Pancake Day!
Feb. 20th, 2007 08:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gothams3rdrobinSo today is Shrove Tuesday - the day when, nowadays, we stuff ourselves silly with pancakes! I love pancakes *drools*
As a kid I absolutely adored Pancake Day. Tea time would go like this; my Mam would make up the pancake batter, then Dad would fry it and I would act as a waitress bringing Mam - and anyone who might be visiting, though we were usually alone - her next batch of pancakes.
Over the last few years, this has deteriorated very unpleasantly and become yet another holiday (of a sort) where Dad sits in his chair pretending to not feel too great, and Mam mutters darkly in the kitchen.
You can imagine my relief that this year was the complete opposite.
Mam and Dad had both actually forgotten it was Shrove Tuesday, so supplies were procurred when we collected Dad from work (it can be handy working at a supermarket, as I know from prior experience). Mam was feeling tired, so we actually cheated this year by buying 'Aunt Bessies' ready-made pancakes from the freezer section. The company makes excellent Yorkshire Puddings, roast potatoes etc., so we had good expectations and thankfully we weren't let down. Even Rowan ate three, which I filled with ice cream, banana slices and chocolate sauce. Only Dad had the traditional filling of dried fruit and sugar (and would have had lemon juice too, but turns out Mam had run out) but since they were already made, it wasn't the same as when the currants are added to the batter prior to cooking.
Me, I was enjoying the chance to have something close to the Banana & Maple Stack, which was a main reason for attending the sci-fi club's pub meetings before Rowan was born. I really need to make pancakes more often myself. And![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
this_shadow, I know you probably won't see this till the weekend, but I am so holding you to the promise of visiting that pancake place Kristian neglected to tell me even existed! Man, I miss the IHOP....
Yesterday we took Rowan out for the day, to keep him entertained while he's off from school. We were originally going to go to the Museum, but turns out it's not open on Mondays! So after a bite to eat at Burger King, we decided to go out into the Bay to Techniquest. For those of you not familiar, this is a permanent hands-on science exhibition, which attempts to teach kids all about physics and technology, amoungst other things. There's a Musiquest exhibit upstairs at the moment, which has a very cool xylophone; you stand within this circle and hit each of the wooden blocks, and the tune you automatically play is the Welsh national anthem! The fact you're enclosed means you hear the tune clearly despite the cacophany around you.
While down there I couldn't resist being a complete Torchwood geek, and I was not disappointed *grins* We saw Torchwood creator Russell T Davies (complete with plum-coloured hair, I swear!) on Queen St, in a bit of a hurry interestingly, and so Tim joked that, since RTD obviously wasn't at home at the moment we should go raid his flat! *giggles* We think that's the location they use for Owen's impressive Bayside flat.
He then showed me where the 'official' entrance for Torchwood - the Tourist Information office - is actually located, and I couldn't resist taking a picture;
It's located down on the very edge of Mermaid Quay, down where the Water Bus docks. *grins* You only have to go up a small flight of stairs to reach all the eating establishments, including a Coffee Mania, Starbucks and Cadwalladers ice cream parlour.*geeks out* You also get a sense for just how damn big the Hub is, 'cause it's a five minute walk from there to the Water Tower.
Speaking of which....
Rowan's standing on - we think - the cloaked flagstone, and if you squint you can make out me and Tim in the Tower's reflection (I am so going to get in trouble for that...*grins evilly*)
Plus, there was a really wierd sight in what used to be a carpark near the Eli Jenkins pub. I had to take a picture just to share it, and if anyone wants to try and write a TW story based on the picture I'd be thrilled!
You can't make them out all that well, but they're these wierd looking plants that remind me of the trees you can get in a Crystal Garden kit. Well wierd, and very sci-fi looking.
Last night was the Sci-fi channel premiere of Heroes, and it's looking very interesting. There was a great deal of WTF going through both episodes, which is something that eventually irritated me too much about Babylon 5 and Lost, but hopefully I can stay the course with this one. Life On Mars is on tonight too!
Tomorrow we're taking Rowan and his best friend Isaac bowling...pray for us? *grins*
As a kid I absolutely adored Pancake Day. Tea time would go like this; my Mam would make up the pancake batter, then Dad would fry it and I would act as a waitress bringing Mam - and anyone who might be visiting, though we were usually alone - her next batch of pancakes.
Over the last few years, this has deteriorated very unpleasantly and become yet another holiday (of a sort) where Dad sits in his chair pretending to not feel too great, and Mam mutters darkly in the kitchen.
You can imagine my relief that this year was the complete opposite.
Mam and Dad had both actually forgotten it was Shrove Tuesday, so supplies were procurred when we collected Dad from work (it can be handy working at a supermarket, as I know from prior experience). Mam was feeling tired, so we actually cheated this year by buying 'Aunt Bessies' ready-made pancakes from the freezer section. The company makes excellent Yorkshire Puddings, roast potatoes etc., so we had good expectations and thankfully we weren't let down. Even Rowan ate three, which I filled with ice cream, banana slices and chocolate sauce. Only Dad had the traditional filling of dried fruit and sugar (and would have had lemon juice too, but turns out Mam had run out) but since they were already made, it wasn't the same as when the currants are added to the batter prior to cooking.
Me, I was enjoying the chance to have something close to the Banana & Maple Stack, which was a main reason for attending the sci-fi club's pub meetings before Rowan was born. I really need to make pancakes more often myself. And
this_shadow, I know you probably won't see this till the weekend, but I am so holding you to the promise of visiting that pancake place Kristian neglected to tell me even existed! Man, I miss the IHOP....Yesterday we took Rowan out for the day, to keep him entertained while he's off from school. We were originally going to go to the Museum, but turns out it's not open on Mondays! So after a bite to eat at Burger King, we decided to go out into the Bay to Techniquest. For those of you not familiar, this is a permanent hands-on science exhibition, which attempts to teach kids all about physics and technology, amoungst other things. There's a Musiquest exhibit upstairs at the moment, which has a very cool xylophone; you stand within this circle and hit each of the wooden blocks, and the tune you automatically play is the Welsh national anthem! The fact you're enclosed means you hear the tune clearly despite the cacophany around you.
While down there I couldn't resist being a complete Torchwood geek, and I was not disappointed *grins* We saw Torchwood creator Russell T Davies (complete with plum-coloured hair, I swear!) on Queen St, in a bit of a hurry interestingly, and so Tim joked that, since RTD obviously wasn't at home at the moment we should go raid his flat! *giggles* We think that's the location they use for Owen's impressive Bayside flat.
He then showed me where the 'official' entrance for Torchwood - the Tourist Information office - is actually located, and I couldn't resist taking a picture;
It's located down on the very edge of Mermaid Quay, down where the Water Bus docks. *grins* You only have to go up a small flight of stairs to reach all the eating establishments, including a Coffee Mania, Starbucks and Cadwalladers ice cream parlour.*geeks out* You also get a sense for just how damn big the Hub is, 'cause it's a five minute walk from there to the Water Tower.
Speaking of which....
Rowan's standing on - we think - the cloaked flagstone, and if you squint you can make out me and Tim in the Tower's reflection (I am so going to get in trouble for that...*grins evilly*)
Plus, there was a really wierd sight in what used to be a carpark near the Eli Jenkins pub. I had to take a picture just to share it, and if anyone wants to try and write a TW story based on the picture I'd be thrilled!
You can't make them out all that well, but they're these wierd looking plants that remind me of the trees you can get in a Crystal Garden kit. Well wierd, and very sci-fi looking.
Last night was the Sci-fi channel premiere of Heroes, and it's looking very interesting. There was a great deal of WTF going through both episodes, which is something that eventually irritated me too much about Babylon 5 and Lost, but hopefully I can stay the course with this one. Life On Mars is on tonight too!
Tomorrow we're taking Rowan and his best friend Isaac bowling...pray for us? *grins*
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Date: 2007-02-20 08:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-02-20 09:04 pm (UTC)*whimpers at not being able to go to the Pancake place today, but it would have been likewise mobbed.*
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Date: 2007-02-21 04:19 am (UTC)We had pancakes on Sunday. Same tradition, different day.