Salad days

Mark went off doing camper van things by himself today because I had got domestic things that needed my urgent attention.

Mostly these were preparations for the long weekend of taxis, making things for picnics and making sure everybody had got clean clothes, but also I had got to write a letter to Oliver.

Because of being so busy with the camper van I just haven’t got round to writing to him for days and days, and last night was tormented by awful guilty nightmares in which I knew that somewhere he was terribly sad, but somehow I just couldn’t find him anywhere.

It was horrible. I had the  dreadful dream and was woken up by images of his poor unhappy little face, then went back to sleep and dreamed it all over again.

I don’t really think that he is sad, because he is playing in the cricket team and representing his House at shooting this week, so I am quite sure he will be as happy as I recall my chickens were when they discovered next door’s bird table, especially if he is allowed to do extra shooting practice which is his favourite thing.

Also when I looked at the school website I discovered several pictures of him sliding down the school water slide with a crowd of other yelling boys who were being squirted with a hose pipe by a grinning teacher. They have been having barbecues and ice lollies and playing cricket and so I suppose he is as happy as can be expected under the circumstances.

Anyway I wrote him a long letter, and whilst I was at it I filled in some forms my accountant has been going on about for ages and posted those off, and felt virtuous, so after that I did some shopping ready to prepare salads for the weekend picnics.

Number Two Daughter came home whilst I was in the middle of it and offered to help. This was handy, because she did some of the washing up before getting bored and suddenly remembering other things that she needed to do rather importantly, so I was on my own again.

It didn’t matter anyway because she was not impressed with my new Healthy Living Salads For Summer regime.

I had got the end of a cooked chicken which I fried up with some garlic, and then added peanuts and bacon, which in case you didn’t know is an absolutely perfect basis for a salad, especially with a sprinkling of brown sugar and a lot of home made mayonnaise. Then I fried bread in garlic and lemon butter to make croutons to add to that  salad, and fried prawns and cashew nuts and sweet corn in sesame oil to put in another.

You can put green stuff in this lot when it has cooled down if you like, so I chucked some celery in with the prawns and some spinach in with the bacon, and we have got ace salads for our Summer Healthy Living plan.

Number Two Daughter was fairly critical of these, and said that she was actually trying to become healthier and so would prefer to make her own salad if that was all right with me.

She thought that she wouldn’t want any of the fruit salad either. I melted chocolate in a bowl and then added whipped cream and yoghurt and honey and cream cheese and some cubes of raspberry jelly diluted in a tiny bit of water. I whipped it all together and poured it over the top of a couple of chopped strawberries and some sliced banana and then put it all in the fridge to set. Since Mark was out I could lick the bowl myself and I can tell you that it is absolutely gorgeous.

So we have got a weekend of salads and fruit up ahead, which is good, sometimes when you have got a taxi it is not easy to eat healthily.

The last of our new plates arrived for the camper today, I bought them on eBay and they are very pretty. It was a good job I was home because  whilst we were out yesterday the postman had a parcel to deliver which he just chucked through the bedroom window. I was very pleased with this because of not having to trail out to the post office to collect it later, but all the same it was a good job that it was not the china plates.

The picture shows how splendidly the camper van is coming along. It is beautifully patched with a new door.

I am sure it will be ready in time for the school holidays. There are still nearly four weeks to go.