[Sarvi]

Yum, the double brie sounds great. Yes, here we call them bars or squares. But slice sounds more dainty 🙂

[Sarvi]

Oh, great! I look forward to seeing them.

[Sarvi]

Ah yes, the ‘slice’ phenomenon, I read about it on a food blog. I like the idea of “bringing a plate” — sounds so convivial.

[Sarvi]

I’m super excited about both of them. Must start cracking my back stash quickly!

[Sarvi]

It’s a rare treat, but if I could, I’d be buried in a casket of the stuff. The smell of it is like catnip for me.

When you say crisps/chips — you mean a thin, crunchy, deep fried potato snack? Or a thicker finger-shaped pieced that’s crispy outside, tender inside?

[Sarvi]

While we’re still circling the topic of local differences, I was wondering, in my greedy way, about what kinds of snacks folks like to eat. The other night I noticed I had some wine that was ready to go, so I put out some nibbles to go with it. Salty olives, truffle cheese, crisp flatbreads with seeds and herbs, a bowl of spicy pecans. I didn’t actually want any dinner after that.

What are some favorite local goodies [besides your local -mite 🙂 ]?

[Sarvi]

I have wondered that too. I think it’s a bit of an illusion — somebody is always popping up with a fresh new project, so it gives the impression that nobody ever does anything but sew, when in fact it’s the output of a large group, not just a single individual. I try to remind myself that if I really wanted more sewing time, I could have it, but I’d have to give up working on the house renovations, photography, editing, reading, maintaining correspondence, baking …

I get the same feeling from a friend of mine who is a terrific reader. I hate being behind her! She’s read and seen everything, and her photography has gone ahead by leaps and bounds. Where does she find the time? But she doesn’t sew, or bake, or make films — she doesn’t have a kid and college is long behind her. So long as we’re each happy with our choices it all works out in the end.

Sorry, I should save the long-winded ramble for the News thread. In sewing news, I’ve finished the first draft of my tweed outfit, and know what I want to change for the second draft, but first I need to finish up a 2+2 outfit. It’s a stash bush, my first time making the pattern, so I’m really looking forward to finishing it.

I have a LTTS messenger bag cut out, but have now decided I don’t like the lining fabric I cut, so I have to find a new main that will work with the lining, and vice versa.

[Sarvi]

That sounds fantastic, meleliza. Agreed, it looks like a great stashbuster.

[Sarvi]

As a non pink-lover, I am lucky that mine is not every girl, and loves blue best. I loved red myself, as a kid. My green-loving sister became a pink-loving adult, so who knows what strange twists fate may hold.

Ladybug buttons would popular here, though, I imagine.

[Sarvi]

I confess I can’t resist doing that to my Oxonian friends (mocking the accent), though I wouldn’t think of doing it to my Liverpudlian electrician. RP just begs for it. I throw in some hoary Wodehouse-derived slang for good measure.

[Sarvi]

I think juliamom also did this?

[Sarvi]

Durian is a spiny-skinned large fruit with a sweet, custardy flesh and a potent love it or hate it scent. My FIL gave us some as a gift, frozen and hand carried from Singapore. I pity the people on the plane. The stuff was not only frozen and wrapped in many layers of plastic, we put it in a cooler, in the trunk, and we were on the highway doing 70mph. Think about that — that’s a 70mph wind pushing the the smell away from me — and I still had to ask him to pull the car over so I could get out and walk away until the smell went out of my nostrils. I think he knew I was a keeper when I tried some anyway, because you know, what if it was AMBROSIA? Yeah, it wasn’t ambrosia. *shudder*

[Sarvi]

I imagine that anything to which one is not accustomed can seem terrifying (or alluring, for that matter). My grandmother (Iranian) would happily eat tongue and calf’s brains, but shuddered at most Chinese cuisine. I’ll eat snake and ostrich but not snails, frogs, or rabbits. My husband’s Singaporean, the only thing he won’t eat is … celery. Because it tastes weird, he says? But he’ll dig right in to durian. I would swim in a vat of any of the -mites, or possibly even actual mites, before I would get near durian.

Oh and the peppermint oil isn’t scary at all, it’s actually just that — oil of peppermint. What you use to make peppermint candies. Certainly less scary (to me!) than poison. Alas, whatever sealant was used for our cork floors didn’t like such a big pool of it. The paint and the wood floors didn’t mind it a bit.

[Sarvi]

Crikey! We use peppermint oil on our thresholds and it has worked well so far, but try it in an inconspicuous spot first … It bubbled up some of the varnish near the kitchen when the bottle tipped. Not sure how it will react with the cord. Maybe stick to using a spray bottle for steam instead of filling the iron?

[Sarvi]

*Ants*? Is that an autocorrect error? If it’s really ants, and you don’t harbor a deep love for insects — I’d say just turning the iron on would drive them out pretty quickly.