Last week my house sitter told me that our garden is looking lovely and that made me so happy! Obviously I think so but it is nice to hear from others that it is noticed. If only I could blink like Samantha from Bewitched and have all of our planned changes done at once.
Instead we are slowly changing and improving things each month. This month I ordered new curtains for my lounge and dining room. Lush, linen-look, sand coloured ones which I have had my eye on for a while, just waiting patiently for a sale and when I saw they were 20% off I nabbed them! The previous owners left homemade, thin, plain cream ones which we have used now for 12 years, it is time for an improvement as they are getting a bit threadbare. I am replacing the rods too so I am now looking for the best price in a plain black metal set. Then that is one more improvement ticked off of our list.
Today Norm has 3 men here working on the improvements to the back garden and I am loving our new patio at the front, it has completely changed the look of the garden and our useable area.
Norm has just moved my planters back underneath the front windows and it looks lovely.
Now we just need furniture. I am considering a bit more of a modern take on the old fashioned metal sets, like Grandma’s wrought iron but a more modern pattern and fresh colour. This sand colour or copper are my top choices so far.
We need something heavy because of the high winds in Cape Town. The material means it will not deteriorate in our strong sun like wood would.
I’ve carried on with my change in the way I am eating and I realise that it is now my way of life, not a ‘diet’. I seem to have found my natural rhythm. The one thing I am struggling with is hair loss. I had the same issue when I did low carb before so obviously my hair loves it some sugar. A hairdresser I know recommended collagen supplements and directed me to the Sally-Ann Creed site. I ordered ‘Beauty Bullets‘ which is supposed to help with hair loss but when they arrived I see that you have to take 7 capsules a day! WTF Sally? I also ordered some collagen ‘creamer’, the dose of which is one tablespoon in your morning coffee and should be much easier to stick to.
Do not delude yourself that this tastes remotely like cream. I have added cream to my coffee too and we will see how it goes. Currently I lose a ‘brush full’ a week. By that I mean I remove a whole fist full of hair each week when I clean my brush.
I am trying to cook healthy when I can. I tend to overcook meat as I have a fear of food poisoning. I love dried out chicken but apparently no one else does! So this week I pretending I was a millennial and I googled ‘how long to cook a chicken breast‘ on the stove. Apparently it is 7 minutes each side, add butter for the last 7 and do not move your breasts around in the pan (stop it now!). So I did all of that, except I did not read all the way through the recipe and it said to use vegetable oil and not olive oil as vegetable-based oils have higher smoke points than olive oil. I had already coated the breasts in olive oil when I spotted that bit of info so I coated them in olive oil but fried them in vegetable and it worked out just fine.
They were juicy and full of flavour.
While I was reading that recipe, a video for another recipe popped up. It contained many of the things I already had in my fridge, so I marked it for the following night. I decided to follow the general flow of info in the recipe but adapt to the ingredients I had. I used a cast iron pan and fried my chopped bacon, removed the bacon from the pan and then fried a whole chopped onion in the bacon grease. While that was cooking I quartered my large brussel sprouts and parboiled in very little water til softened then I chucked them in with the onions. I had 2 chicken breasts left from the following night so I chopped those up and threw them into coat in the bacon grease too. In a little bowl I mixed a container of cream, and a tablespoon or normal mustard with grated pecorino cheese. I then threw it into a roasting pan and coated it all with the mix, added more grated cheese on top and baked. OMG this was sooooo tasty!! It had loads of flavour and was just divine.
I had some of the pecorino cheese left and some cauliflower in the fridge so that was a bit of a no brainer. Last night I baked pork chops, air fried some sweet potato cubes and made a cauliflower cheese bake.
Regular readers know about my drag queen obsession and this week I watched an iconic classic gay cult film called ‘But I’m a Cheerleader‘, a 1999 satirical gem. I heard an older gay man going through a list of required viewing to gain your Gay Card to a young, newly ‘realised’ gay man and this film was on the list and I had never even heard of it. It stars a baby-sized, Bambi-eyed Natasha Lyonne as a young girl who is sent to a gay conversion camp which uses a five-step program to convert its campers to heterosexuality and coax the gay out of her.
If you are wondering about that mental link from my drag obsession to this film, it also stars RuPaul Charles (back when he needed a surname), and Melanie Lynskey who you will recognise from many shows, but what I loved her in was Two and a Half Men where she played Rose, Charlie’s psychotic neighbour. It also stars Clea DuVall who has acted brilliantly in many things and has a chameleon face that can enable her to become anyone she wants. The always beautiful but never attractive to me Eddie Cibrian plays the hot young son of the founder. Maybe that is why he had to prove his manhood by shagging so many women?? Michelle Williams plays a minor role. Everyone is such a baby!
Hopefully I get credit on some sorta card since I do not have my own Gay Card?
My new Spotify discovery this week is Danielle Juhre and I really love her husky, silky voice. First I give you a Mahogany Home Edition of ‘Burning’, the song that got my attention as I often listen to several of the Mahogany playlists.
She sounds like she spent most of her life shooting whisky and languidly smoking Gauloises. It’s fabulous.
The other track is ‘You and I’. Equally lovely.
I hope you enjoy her sound as much as I do and if you watch ‘But I’m A Cheerleader’ let me know your opinion.
Tomorrow is my darling husband’s birthday. I wanted to have people around for drinks but he was not keen so we are just going to lunch with Wes and Caitlin at Foxcroft. Foxcroft is owned by the same group that owns La Petite Colombe where we were last weekend. The food is usually delicious and it will be nice to see the kids. I will tell you all about it next week of course!
Until next time, stay safe. Kisses from the Kitten xoxoxoxoxoxox
Kitten in the City 