En route

Currently on the M25 on my way to Heathrow Airport. So excited, I feel quite sick. When I messaged Cowboy to let him know I was on my way, his reply was:

"It's about damned time."

I know, Cowboy.... 

England is rather grey this morning at 7.47am, and the sooner I'm above the clouds, the better.

Let's just hope he doesn't notice where I accidentally had the wrong setting on my trimmer and shaved a patch out of my bikini line...

Pre-Visit Psychosis (PVP)

Just a few short days now stand between me and Cowboy. I've entered the phase which I like to call "the pre-visit psychosis" which means I can't remember anything, I do a great deal of faffing about, and I generally cease to function well.

I spent yesterday in the kitchen, using up all of my vegetables in soup. One of my creations was the fabulous Beetroot Haters' Soup which smelled and tasted quite divine. If I hadn't been suffering from pre-visit psychosis (PVP) I'd have taken a picture or two.

Today I need to finish a project that I started a few weeks ago, which seemed like such a good idea at the time.



Cowboy and I will have been together for a whole year when I go out there on Monday, which certainly defies my expectations. To mark our anniversary, I'm putting together a scrapbook of pictures from my trip when we met, and what we've been up to over the year. This is partly for my benefit too, as I don't want to forget how we came to be together when it's such a ridiculous story.

I have a few pages left to do, but with PVP they've become quite difficult. I only have a couple of days left to fill the remaining space in the book. It's been a lovely experience to sit and take time to look back at my photos, think back to our earliest conversations and interactions, and remember all over again why I fell so hard for him.

We had a curious coincidence of thoughts last night. I dreamt that he had turned up in England and surprised me. When I told him about it this morning, he paused and then said "That's weird. I actually thought a little while ago about what it would be like if I just showed up in England and surprised you. I imagined doing it."

More likely, we've both got seeing each other on the brain and it's inevitable that we think the same things at around the same time.

I'm pretty excited. One of the strangest things I'm excited about is seeing Cowboy's dog, Blue Dog.



I'm firmly a cat person. Or I used to be firmly a cat person. These days I'm not so sure. I made friends with a stranger's pitbull on the tube the other day, and played with my brother's dog while nobody was looking last weekend. I have an overwhelming urge to shove my face in Blue Dog's stinky, grubby fur and give him a big hug. He hasn't had a bath in goodness only knows how long. I can only blame the PVP. No rational person would want to go within three feet of him.

Apart from how he is blindly adoring and obedient (mostly), and just loves attention. He gets a whole double page spread in the scrapbook.

Fixing dried out Mac Fluidline

Thank goodness for the internet.


The other day, I went to apply my favourite eyeliner (Mac Fluidline), which I had foolishly left with the lid off in the hot weather.


It looked very sad indeed. Dry, cracked clean down the middle, and there was no way I was ever going to coax any of that black goodness to come out of the pot and on to my brush, let alone stick on my eyelids.

I became cross with myself for being careless and foolish. I did not want to throw away something perfectly usable, if only I could fix it. Then I became determined not to be defeated by a pot of make up, and began to hit up Google for some solutions to my problem.

When I found one, I was so bemused at how it could work, I put off trying it out until the next morning. It involved eye drops, which intrigued me.

I had some cheap and cheerful eye drops in a drawer, from when I used to commute to work on the underground and my eyes would get very sore and scratchy. I had First World Problems.



I squeezed three drops into the dried up pot, and admittedly, I was a little disappointed that it didn't magically fix itself immediately. The drops sort of rolled around in the crack, and nothing seemed any different. I grabbed a kirby grip (that's a bobby pin to you guys over in the USA - hi!), and started to scrape the eyeliner off the sides of the pot and stir it around with the eyedrops.

At about this point, I thought I had lost my mind and should just throw it all away.



"Never, never, never give up!" Winston Churchill boomed in my head. Besides, I've got an unpleasant tendency to give up something that I am not immediately good at, and that's not a good way to approach life when you're 27 years old and need to get good at something.

So I forged ahead. Once I'd mixed everything together well and smoothed out the paste (and flicked some all over my white desk, hands, fingers, clothes etc), I took a cotton wool bud and started to restore some order to the little pot of horrors.

It took some patience, but it eventually looked like this:



I had to clean up the rim of the pot, and then clean everything around the pot with some make up remover, but I was pretty pleased with it. The gel itself was now the perfect consistency to apply to my eyelids, and gives a good clean, bold line.

I am now obsessive about replacing the lid on the pot, even though I'm armed with this fix now.

Thank you, internet. Specifically, thank you to this page for the original advice that I found.

Edited 12/03/2014: Since I posted this originally, I've had to undertake this whole process twice, as the pot keeps drying out. I'm not that good at the whole lid-replacing thing. I also actually prefer the eyeliner with a softer consistency, and would suggest using four eye drops and making the paste a little thinner. This might prolong the time that it's usable before it needs fixing again.

A small thought about long distance relationships

 A casual 5,500 miles separate me and Cowboy for the majority of the time. Another part of the deal is the 8 hour time difference, which means that when I wake up, he is just going to bed. I am lucky that it is only 8 hours, and I do get to speak to him for the last part of my day, and sometimes first thing in the morning if he stays up late.

Getting to see each other is expensive, both in terms of high flight costs and in terms of the time needed to get across the planet and back.

It's really not the best idea either of us ever had (but he started it, so I like to blame him).

For a little while, I joined a very popular forum for people in long distance relationships, and for a while I thought I'd found a good place to hang out. Then I grew tired of the threads detailing how somebody hadn't replied to a message, or somebody hadn't wanted to sleep with Skype running, or how somebody had said something like "We need to talk" and the forum was supposed to suggest what it was about.

I realised I didn't identify with any of these people. Sure, they were in long distance relationships, just like me, but I came to the conclusion one day that, actually, I was secure enough about my relationship not to need to wise counsel of complete strangers. I didn't panic (any longer) when I didn't get an immediate reply to my message. I would put my phone down and go and get on with something else. I didn't get jealous of his friends who are girls. I didn't feel the need to share my relationship with these people.

Cowboy and I take it one day at a time. We say good morning, we say good night, every day without fail - unless we have no signal, no battery, or one of us is drunk. We don't get angry with each other for having a life outside of Skype and What'sApp. I encourage him to go out and socialise and flirt, because I know he enjoys it and I also know that he would never go beyond flirtation and a dance. We trust each other completely. We talk openly and frankly about marriage and kids, so we both know where this is going. We also avoid games at all costs.

There's no time for sulking or manipulating, and where would it get us anyway? When he does or says something I don't like, or that upsets me, I tell him as simply and honestly as I can, as soon as I can. He usually then tells me simply and honestly that he's sorry, and also that I am overreacting. He rides out my moods with patience, unphased, and doesn't hold it against me. Maybe that's from his work with horses...

We true to keep the bigger picture clear. When times are tough and I'm lonely and sad, and I miss him so much I could chew through a pillow, he reminds me that "one day we'll be together all the time, and then you'll get sick of me."

He is probably right, but distance seems to have taught us a great deal of tolerance. Those little things, the missed messages or the plans that don't include waiting by the phone or the computer, don't matter. The geographical space between us isn't enough, we give each other space away from communicating. And we work hard at keeping drama out of it. I choose not to mind about his grubby fingernails or his (obscenely) smelly feet, because on balance he's a pretty good catch. I like to think we'll keep these things going when we finally live together.

I don't think our relationship is special or different because we're long distance. Maybe that's why I didn't last on the specialist forum. 

A Japanese proverb (which I found on Pinterest) says: Who travels for love finds a thousand miles not longer than one. If you find the miles long, maybe it's just not quite what you should be chasing after...

Passing the time

Sixteen days until I fly off to see Cowboy, which means sixteen days of finding ways to pass many hours without losing my mind.

Today, I watched five episodes of The West Wing back to back. That was a good start.

I've also peeled eight pears and three apples, cored and diced them, and I'm currently stewing them with some cinnamon, sugar, sultanas and the juice of a small orange. Look at the golden, bubbly goodness... Mmmm...



Meanwhile, over in Washington (State), Cowboy is spending his days building fence. I don't know the technical details about fence building - no doubt I will very soon learn - but as I understand it, it involves a lot of posts...



It's back-breaking work, so I think he is most excited about getting a massage when I get out there. I don't really blame him.

I'm going to go spend my afternoon rearranging my possessions and pretending to be productive.

Tomatoes

I get an organic, mixed fruit and veg box delivered every fortnight. I occasionally feel guilty about this, as it seems decadent and foolish when there is a big Sainsbury's around the corner packed with bargain food in plastic bags. But when I shop there I feel guilty about the obscene amounts of plastic packaging.

I use two companies (Abel & Cole, and Riverford), and like to pick and choose the better box depending on what they're offering each week. This week, because of the ridiculous English heatwave (not ridiculous), I ordered an extra salad box from Riverford to keep me going through the warm weather, when hot food is offensive.

What they sent me included this scrumptious box of tomatoes.



My natural reaction was to immediately shove my nose in the box and get a good long sniff. I adore the smell of tomatoes, especially when they're still on the vine like these bad boys. Reminds me of my Grandpa's greenhouse.

Then I set to work making a simple, but glorious, lunch. It's a kind of fake bruschetta. Bruschetta alla Bee? Something like that.

Here's how it happened:

1) Grab two slices of thick sliced multigrain bread from the freezer

2) Throw large chunk of butter into a frying pan over low/medium heat.

3) Fry bread on both sides, adding more butter if needed, until golden, sizzling and smelling like heaven. Ensure butter has soaked into entire bread surface. Set aside to cool slightly.

4) Dice tomatoes into reasonably large chunks. Put in a bowl.

5) Season to taste with salt, freshly ground black pepper, and a glug of balsamic vinegar.

6) Add a good handful of torn basil - mine was frozen in olive oil in, which meant I snapped off a bit and let the oil melt into the tomatoes. If you have fresh basil, all the better, just add a glug of olive oil to the tomatoes along with the seasoning.

7) Pour juicy, crisp, fragrant tomatoes and the juice all over bread.



I then ate this a little too quickly, because it was so very, very good. You could add a little garlic if you wanted. I sometimes cheat and spread garlic and herb Boursin on the bread for a cheesy, garlicky, wonderful addition. But often I find the simple tomato, basil, butter combo is just right as it is.

This meal takes about ten minutes to throw together, and is also a really good way to use up bread that has gone a little stale, because the butter makes everything soft and wonderful.

Enjoy!

Royal Baby! (and bees)

So, yesterday afternoon, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge (aka Kate and Wills) welcomed their first-born into the world - a strapping boy by all accounts. All very exciting, and prompted my house mates to bake Royal Baby Cupcakes, complete with luminous blue icing, as a celebratory gesture. That's about as politically involved as I like to get these days.

Today I rescued three bees from the kitchen, which is quite a victory as far as I'm concerned. If a bee gets trapped in my kitchen (and they fly in through the door all the time in this hot weather), I feel personally responsible for the decline of bees the moment I find the sad, coiled little carcass in the corner. A dead bee is one of the saddest things.

On a more positive note! The bees in the garden are loving the lavender bush which is starting to flower.


It's very pleasing to step outside and hear these industrious little creatures working hard in the sunshine, bickering with each other over the best flower. One day I aim to have bees of my own.

This little lady was very territorial about her little patch.


I'm still nursing my torn plantar fascia, which does appear to be improving, so hopefully cowboy boots will be an option by the time I get out to Washington.

Cowboy was distinctly unimpressed with my bee-keeping ambitions... I'll show him.