Christmas Presents

Before we can have our Christmas dinner, we need to clear the dining room table. So this year, rather than jars of pickled chillis, we have a different extra Christmas present for all the relatives. Bags of dried chillis...

I think they look rather festive, and quite smart in those cellophane bags with Tassel Pickle labels. Those are Tokyo Hot and Fiesta chillis.

Meanwhile, the Missus is creating a new sort of Christmas decoration from the dried Guajillos.

It's nearly as big as Little Miss! Only 9 more trayloads to go. Anyone need any dried chillis?

No Going Back

Having thought long and hard about it, we're not all going to Australia in the New Year - I turned down the job offer on Friday. It was a tough decision, as it was quite a good offer, but in the end we decided a new life in Oz was not for us.

Instead, it looks like ECEA Consulting is getting its first contract. But it's not quite finalised yet, so I wont tempt fate by announcing what it is. More news in the New Year!

Update: I can now reveal I have a contract with Capgemini working for HM Revenue and Customs on the Aspire contract, in Telford 4 days a week.

Ickworth Winter Walk

A favourite, indeed (as you will see), a must-do walk around this time of year is in the grounds of Ickworth House. Keeping the main attraction to the end of the walk, we set off down the hill past the vineyard and across to the other side of The Canal. Here is the view looking back across at the summerhouse with the church and rotunda behind the vineyard.

The water was pouring merrily over the weir beneath this bridge. Ooh look. Big Miss has been growing while I was away - she's nearly as tall the Missus now.

We continued along the western bank of the River Linnet.

As the woods close in from each side of the river, you get to a point we call Echo Valley. It works best on a calm quiet day like yesterday. Little W had great fun shouting at the trees and hearing them echo back.

As the valley got to its narrowest, we crossed the river and went up alongside an ancient hedgerow towards the wood. Here there is a spooky tunnel that gets you through to the Albana Walk.

But what we were really there for, and the reason why Little Miss had to carry a bag of carrots all the way, was to feed the 'Reindeer'.

Yes. Well, actually they are Fallow Deer, not Reindeer, but we pretend otherwise.

At first they weren't interested. But after Little W and Big Miss had thrown their carrots over the fence, one of them came up to take a carrot from Little Miss.

Yeah. Job done for this Christmas Eve!

Not in Melbourne

The cricket isn't going too well, is it?

You and your colleague Anna are depressed? Boo hoo, at least you're surrounded by ENGLISH people in ENGLAND. I am a lone English girl in an office of 16 AUSSIES in Melbourne, AUSTRALIA. Will somebody reading this please help me and write me a sick note so that I don't have to go to work on Monday?
Liz, via TMS inbox

Liz, via TMS inbox on BBC Test Match Special website.

I know how she feels. It was bad enough after the first day of the first Test Match of the series when I was the lone English man in the office in Melbourne. But I'm safe at home in Bury St Edmunds now, thank goodness!

Lilypond

I mentioned back in June that one of my "Enterprising Ideas" was to do music publishing. Well, I got my first commission this week! Not that it pays anything, but I've been asked to set a piece of handwritten manuscript for next week's Abbot Consort concert.

I used Lilypond, a free music-engraving package. Rather unusually for these days of WYSIWYG editors for everything, it actally runs as a batch process on a text file. The input looks quite arcane, but is simpler than it looks. Here is a sample of my file...

...which gives a result that looks like this...

It's a pretty impressive tool, I think.

Hmm. Wait a minute. Maybe I shouldn't post this yet. It's meant to be a surprise for a member of the audience!

Update 19-Dec: Safe to post now. He did get a surprise!

Aladdin

A highlight of the run up to Christmas for us is the Bury St Edmunds Theatre Royal Christmas Pantomime. This year it is Aladdin, and it is every bit as good as previous years.

As the theatre is still in the process of being restored, this year's, like last year's is being held in a Big Top in Nowton Park. We went to the first Sunday matinee performance and it was pretty much a full house. There is a walkway from the car park to the Big Top.

It makes an atmospheric venue, with the audience surrounding 3/4 of the stage. Circus is combined with traditional pantomime as the terrific Incandescence Circus Theatre Company add stilt-walking, fire and acrobatics to the story.

No James Nickerson as pantomime dame this year, but Gregory Ashton is a lively Welsh Widow Twanky with an impressive range of costumes.

There are some great set piece songs and dances and some colorful minor parts. Keiron Crook is cool as Djinn, the Genie of the Lamp and Lung the dragon adds chinese character and an excuse for the traditional everyone-join-in song "Lung the magic dragon, lived in a lamp...."

Fabulous entertainment. It continues until 7th January.

Christmas is Coming

Somehow, even though the Christmas decorations looked the part, it didn't feel very Christmassy in Melbourne. Hearing brass bands playing Christmas carols in summer sunshine, just sounded incongruous. And, of course, it was still bright and sunny at six o'clock.

Even when it eventually got dark, it felt too warm to be christmassy. Here is Bourke Street.

But now I am home in Bury St Edmunds and we have put up the decorations in the house, it is quite cold and it gets dark early.

And the Abbot Consort are into rehearsals for their annual carol concert (7:30 pm on Tues 19th December at St Mary's, Ipswich - on the corner of Stoke Street and Belstead Road). Yes, now it feels like Christmas is coming.

Lost Delivery Office

While I was out the postman came. There was something for the Missus that had to be signed for, so I was left a card.

I went into town to go to the delivery office to collect it. But when I got there I found this...

Aargh! The delivery office has moved. But where to? Skyliner Way? Never heard of it. I headed for the main Post Office to ask them. But then I spotted this Information Point on Cornhill.

I'd noticed it before but never tried it out. Here was my chance. You just point your finger at the screen and off you go. I entered the post code from the card - IP32 7YY.

Hang on a minute. That can't be right, it's showing a spot just round the corner from the old delivery office, where the Bury Free Press offices are.

I tried again entering the street name. No luck here either...

I walked round the corner and spotted a postman emptying the post box. "Where's the delivery office moved to?", I asked. "Ah. It's moved to Moreton Hall now". And now I remembered seeing the AA sign coming up the hill past Sainsbury's and Matalan - 3rd exit at the roundabout. An easy walk from home. If I'd known.

So the delivery office has moved, but they appear to have kept the post code. And so much for the Information Point - it just goes to show, there's no substitute for talking to those who know!

Chilli Harvest

While I was away I missed the harvest from the Chilli Farm (aka the back garden and greenhouse). Luckily the missus took some pictures with here phone.

Here's what the dining room table looked like once the majority had been collected. In fact having filled the bottom drawer of the freezer, filled a handful of pickle jars and making several jars of chilli sauce, the dining room table is still covered in chillis, now drying nicely. The smell is fantastic.

These are the Fiesta chillis.

They are a lovely mix of colours and are quite hot.

This is a small selection of the pile of Guajillo chillis.

These are mostly being dried. They are very mild in flavour, and have all turned red while drying. Great for adding colour.

Here are some little birds-eye type chillis that came from some of the Caribbean mix plants.

Very potent. To show the scale, one of the Tokyo Hot chillis is laid on top. These are medium hot, quite sweet and fruity.

And here are my favourites, the Habanero Orange chillis.

Absolute dynamite, but beautifully fruity.

Now, how are we going to eat them all? I think I'll make some chilli con carne this weekend, for a start.

What next, then?

So now I am home, it's decision time again. Do I take the rather generous offer of a permanent job in Australia, starting in February? Or do I take one of the other options available - yes a have a couple of interviews lined up. It's difficult. Meanwhile, despite the scepticism of my Aussie friends, I'm quite enjoying the December weather - I'd almost forgotten what rain is like, and the low sunshine is quite cheering. "We're enjoying temperatures in the 30s", says Martin in Perth. Me too, but Fahrenheit rather than Centigrade.

Home

So it was goodbye Australia.

Well, OK, I cheated. That sunset was over the Indian Ocean when I had my meal overlooking Cottesloe Beach on my Perth trip.

My plane was 2 1/4 hours late leaving Melbourne (at 2:10 am), but apart from that, the journey was fine. And I had a window seat which, on the second leg from Hong Kong gave me some spectacular views of Central Asia. We went up the Eastern end and then around the North of the Himalayas.

This Gobi desert landscape looked desolate.

In fact, we travelled across thousands of miles of frozen and apparently empty land before we got to Europe, which was mostly covered in a sea of cloud.

Our our first sight of England was much warmer, though. That's the river Medway there.

But the best sight of all, after a long wait for my bags (they had a shortage of baggage handlers at Heathrow), was this...


It's good to be home!