you prob'ly think this song is about you
Feb. 11th, 2024 10:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pensnestI was recently reminded of a meme (the kind of meme that preceded photos with captions, ie a list of questions) I filled in about household stuff. Rereading it reminded me how American some of the questions seemed, so I thought I would have a go at creating a more British version.
I managed the perfect number of questions - 42 - but if you care to complete this meme, how about adding a question of your own to the end, so that your readers can do an enhanced version.
01 White bread, brown bread, wholemeal bread, granary bread, or something else?
Dark rye sourdough bread from Aldi. Or occasionally some kind of wholemeal with seeds option, particularly if sandwiches are needed.
02 How long have you had your kettle?
Since FIL died, I suppose, since it was his. So nearly three years. But we don't use it except for hot water bottles, as we have a boiling tap.
03 How many teapots do you own?
Erm. Four 'everyday' teapots, although two are very large—one actually calls itself An Enormous Teapot—and do not come out very often. A pretty one to match the good china, and another that goes with the Chinese dinner service, but is very small. I've never used it. So, six. Plus the two Chinese ones that have been repurposed as plant pots.
04 Do you own a device for making coffee?
There is a coffee percolator, and a French press, but they don't see much daylight.
05 Do you have fresh mushrooms in your fridge?
Yes, of course!
06 How many tins of tomatoes are there in your kitchen stores?
Two.
07 Do you have a box of wine in your home?
Yes.
08 What kind(s) of mustard do you have?
Spotty mustard and Dijon mustard in the fridge, plus a little tin of Colman's Mustard (powder) in the spice drawer.
09 Name the One True Jam.
Raspberry, of course. Preferably home made.
10 What flavour(s) of squash or cordial (or other soft drinks) do you have in the house?
Lime squash, orange squash, Ribena (blackcurrant), and currently also Elderflower and Rose Cordial.
11 Do you have fizzy drinks in the house, and are they in cans or bottles?
There are Coke cans, various, left over from Camp. My son, an occasional visitor, is the only person who drinks the stuff.
12 Eggs: scrambled, fried, poached or boiled? Or something else?
All of the above, but not very often. Last time we had eggs it was boiled, for tea.
13 Is your hob gas or electric?
Electric, induction flavour. Gloriously easy to clean.
14 Are there dirty plates, cutlery etc in your kitchen sink?
No, for my Beast is an efficient and splendid Beast.
15 Fairy, Finish or supermarket's own?
Aldi's dishwasher tablets are recommended by Which? so we use those.
16 Is there anything mouldy in your fridge?
I don't think so?
17 Which supermarket(s) do you shop at?
Aldi as much as possible, then Sainsburys for the things Aldi does not stock. Tesco very occasionally (when we need GF bread) and Lidl even more seldom.
18 Do you buy food from not-supermarkets?
Meat comes from Archers, the excellent butcher which gets its supplies from East Anglian free range farms. Plus barn chickens.
19 How old is your home?
About 105.
20 What would you change about your living room, if you could?
I'd love to figure out a better way to fit the television in so that the furniture could stay in a sociable configuration, but for most of the time, having a twin sofa facing the TV is what works.
21 What colour is your sofa?
One is cherry red, one is brown leather.
22 Do you own a pouffe?
I do! It was FIL's, and he used it as a footrest, as is proper, but I have it stashed under my craft table in case I want my feet off the floor. The cat has been known to use it as a couch.
23 Do you organise your wardrobe, and if so, how?
My T-shirts are graduated by colour. I'm so proud.
24 Do you own any nifty devices for efficient storage, and if so, are they indeed efficient? Well, I got some drawer dividers recently for my socks. The sock drawer looks good, for the moment.
25 If you have a loft, is it fully insulated?
Yes.
26 Curtains or blinds?
Curtains, everywhere except the smallest bedroom and the guest ensuite.
27 How often do you vacuum?
Hardly ever. Because Beast does it. \o/
28 Do you have a welcome mat at the front door?
Well, right at the moment we don't actually have a front door... we used to have two mats at the front door, though I don't know if either of them actually said Welcome on it.
29 What is the oldest object you own?
I... possibly my fountain pen, which was my mother's, and may have been hers when she was actually at school. Otherwise perhaps the chest of drawers which belonged to my grandma, because I think they were of the utility type which were popular just after (or during?) WW2.
30 Do you own any Art, or just pictures?
I have three pictures by Kerry Darlington (one is an augmented print). There are two pictures I found in an art shop that was closing down, both abstracts in shades of brown and not surprisingly quite nondescript. Plus my mother's portrait of her art teacher (in charcoal) and her Gorgon's Head embroidered in gold thread over velvet. I don't suppose anyone would pay much for it, but to me it is certainly Art.
31 Do you have a home office?
I have a craft room, and Beast has an office.
32 Do you have any fannish objects on display in your home?
My boys! Five Nsync dolls, and a crocheted llama which is not, strictly speaking, merchandise, but popslashers will understand.
33 How many books do you own (an approximation will do)?
64 Billy bookcase shelves, plus about 5-6 feet of cookery/craft books. Not counting Beast's stashes, which are piled here and there about the place.
34 How many radiators are there in your home?
Oh dear. Twenty, I think. We don't have that many rooms, but when you have a ground source heat pump they give you extra radiators.
35 What kind of temperature do you like to keep your home at?
17.5 - 18 C
36 Do you have any functional fireplaces in your home?
Well, the one in the kitchen has a function as shelving for cookery books. The previous fireplaces have been removed.
37 How many (living) plants are there inside your home?
About two dozen. Will be more when I get round to planting the vegetable seeds.
38 Do you garden?
Yes, rather haphazardly.
39 If you have a garage, can you fit your vehicle(s) into it?
Oh dear me, yes. It is enormous!
40 Do you have a charging point for an electric vehicle?
Yes
41 Have you ever gone to an amateur theatre show?
Yes, and performed in many.
42 Have you ever been to watch a football match?
Nope. And Carrow Road is just a short walk away.
I managed the perfect number of questions - 42 - but if you care to complete this meme, how about adding a question of your own to the end, so that your readers can do an enhanced version.
01 White bread, brown bread, wholemeal bread, granary bread, or something else?
Dark rye sourdough bread from Aldi. Or occasionally some kind of wholemeal with seeds option, particularly if sandwiches are needed.
02 How long have you had your kettle?
Since FIL died, I suppose, since it was his. So nearly three years. But we don't use it except for hot water bottles, as we have a boiling tap.
03 How many teapots do you own?
Erm. Four 'everyday' teapots, although two are very large—one actually calls itself An Enormous Teapot—and do not come out very often. A pretty one to match the good china, and another that goes with the Chinese dinner service, but is very small. I've never used it. So, six. Plus the two Chinese ones that have been repurposed as plant pots.
04 Do you own a device for making coffee?
There is a coffee percolator, and a French press, but they don't see much daylight.
05 Do you have fresh mushrooms in your fridge?
Yes, of course!
06 How many tins of tomatoes are there in your kitchen stores?
Two.
07 Do you have a box of wine in your home?
Yes.
08 What kind(s) of mustard do you have?
Spotty mustard and Dijon mustard in the fridge, plus a little tin of Colman's Mustard (powder) in the spice drawer.
09 Name the One True Jam.
Raspberry, of course. Preferably home made.
10 What flavour(s) of squash or cordial (or other soft drinks) do you have in the house?
Lime squash, orange squash, Ribena (blackcurrant), and currently also Elderflower and Rose Cordial.
11 Do you have fizzy drinks in the house, and are they in cans or bottles?
There are Coke cans, various, left over from Camp. My son, an occasional visitor, is the only person who drinks the stuff.
12 Eggs: scrambled, fried, poached or boiled? Or something else?
All of the above, but not very often. Last time we had eggs it was boiled, for tea.
13 Is your hob gas or electric?
Electric, induction flavour. Gloriously easy to clean.
14 Are there dirty plates, cutlery etc in your kitchen sink?
No, for my Beast is an efficient and splendid Beast.
15 Fairy, Finish or supermarket's own?
Aldi's dishwasher tablets are recommended by Which? so we use those.
16 Is there anything mouldy in your fridge?
I don't think so?
17 Which supermarket(s) do you shop at?
Aldi as much as possible, then Sainsburys for the things Aldi does not stock. Tesco very occasionally (when we need GF bread) and Lidl even more seldom.
18 Do you buy food from not-supermarkets?
Meat comes from Archers, the excellent butcher which gets its supplies from East Anglian free range farms. Plus barn chickens.
19 How old is your home?
About 105.
20 What would you change about your living room, if you could?
I'd love to figure out a better way to fit the television in so that the furniture could stay in a sociable configuration, but for most of the time, having a twin sofa facing the TV is what works.
21 What colour is your sofa?
One is cherry red, one is brown leather.
22 Do you own a pouffe?
I do! It was FIL's, and he used it as a footrest, as is proper, but I have it stashed under my craft table in case I want my feet off the floor. The cat has been known to use it as a couch.
23 Do you organise your wardrobe, and if so, how?
My T-shirts are graduated by colour. I'm so proud.
24 Do you own any nifty devices for efficient storage, and if so, are they indeed efficient? Well, I got some drawer dividers recently for my socks. The sock drawer looks good, for the moment.
25 If you have a loft, is it fully insulated?
Yes.
26 Curtains or blinds?
Curtains, everywhere except the smallest bedroom and the guest ensuite.
27 How often do you vacuum?
Hardly ever. Because Beast does it. \o/
28 Do you have a welcome mat at the front door?
Well, right at the moment we don't actually have a front door... we used to have two mats at the front door, though I don't know if either of them actually said Welcome on it.
29 What is the oldest object you own?
I... possibly my fountain pen, which was my mother's, and may have been hers when she was actually at school. Otherwise perhaps the chest of drawers which belonged to my grandma, because I think they were of the utility type which were popular just after (or during?) WW2.
30 Do you own any Art, or just pictures?
I have three pictures by Kerry Darlington (one is an augmented print). There are two pictures I found in an art shop that was closing down, both abstracts in shades of brown and not surprisingly quite nondescript. Plus my mother's portrait of her art teacher (in charcoal) and her Gorgon's Head embroidered in gold thread over velvet. I don't suppose anyone would pay much for it, but to me it is certainly Art.
31 Do you have a home office?
I have a craft room, and Beast has an office.
32 Do you have any fannish objects on display in your home?
My boys! Five Nsync dolls, and a crocheted llama which is not, strictly speaking, merchandise, but popslashers will understand.
33 How many books do you own (an approximation will do)?
64 Billy bookcase shelves, plus about 5-6 feet of cookery/craft books. Not counting Beast's stashes, which are piled here and there about the place.
34 How many radiators are there in your home?
Oh dear. Twenty, I think. We don't have that many rooms, but when you have a ground source heat pump they give you extra radiators.
35 What kind of temperature do you like to keep your home at?
17.5 - 18 C
36 Do you have any functional fireplaces in your home?
Well, the one in the kitchen has a function as shelving for cookery books. The previous fireplaces have been removed.
37 How many (living) plants are there inside your home?
About two dozen. Will be more when I get round to planting the vegetable seeds.
38 Do you garden?
Yes, rather haphazardly.
39 If you have a garage, can you fit your vehicle(s) into it?
Oh dear me, yes. It is enormous!
40 Do you have a charging point for an electric vehicle?
Yes
41 Have you ever gone to an amateur theatre show?
Yes, and performed in many.
42 Have you ever been to watch a football match?
Nope. And Carrow Road is just a short walk away.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-12 04:55 am (UTC)Very British flavored indeed.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-13 03:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-12 08:40 am (UTC)Love your llama nod :D
no subject
Date: 2024-02-13 03:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-13 02:54 pm (UTC)You must have the only garage in the WORLD that is big enough for an actual car to go into - they're building new houses up next to our Aldi and you'd be hard pressed to get even the tiniest of cars in their garages, what's the POINT?!?!?
no subject
Date: 2024-02-13 03:22 pm (UTC)Our garage—detached—is enormous. It was designed when FIL lived with us: he had decided he wished to purchase a truck so that he could go to garden centres and buy stuff without having to pay a delivery charge—it was rather along the same lines as buying a boat so he could catch free fish and the capacity was done with this truck in mind. There is now a work bench (every last inch covered in FIL's tools), loads of room for our not insubstantial car, and plenty of room to accommodate BIL's car when he visits. As it happens, FIL never bought that truck. My Beast pointed out to him that the road tax on the vehicle he had in mind was £1,500 a year. He ended up with a small electric Mercedes, road tax £0, and quite a lot of discounts. When he sold it, it had approx 200 miles on the clock.
Modern car-free garages would not be quite so tiresome if the clusters these new houses were built into had any space around them for parking. My daughter's house has a garage that is now, I think, a gym, and they have two cars, so parking as a visitor is bloody awkward. I think every house in the neighbourhood is in the same state, and the road is only 1.5 cars wide. Ack.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-14 04:42 pm (UTC)What is granary bread?
I knew there was something I'd notice in your home that wasn't what I expected - no fireplaces! Whenever I watch Escape to the Country with my mum we always remark on how incredibly important fireplaces seem to be in the UK. But you have none. Is it by choice or just happenstance?
What's the difference between a charging point for an electric vehicle and an ordinary outlet? Is there a difference?
no subject
Date: 2024-02-14 05:42 pm (UTC)Charging points for electric cars are mounted on the wall outside the house, and have an end that fits into the socket in the car. (they may be higher power than a normal lectic point, but I'm too bleary to check - flu...)
no subject
Date: 2024-02-14 06:45 pm (UTC)I think the charging point is 30amps.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-15 10:01 am (UTC)Your sitting room must have been frozen!
no subject
Date: 2024-02-15 10:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-16 09:48 am (UTC)(I've a friend with a conservatory and it bleeds heat from the lounge in winter. May be better in summer, or may just fry them...)
no subject
Date: 2024-02-16 10:20 am (UTC)We have a 'garden room' now, with windows on three sides, but it has a proper roof and proper walls below the windows. Much more satisfactory, and it makes a beautiful dining room.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-17 11:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-14 06:43 pm (UTC)We did have a lot of fireplaces, but most of them were not very attractive, and took up a lot of space. The one in the sitting room was hideous, and the bedroom 3/study ones were just so big. So we had them removed. The little one remaining in bedroom 2 is moderately decorative but blocked up, and we have felt no need to unblock it and fill the hole with dried flowers, or whatever one does. But I like the one in the kitchen, which was obviously the original important fireplace in the house, so it has been repurposed.
People on Escape to the Country always want 'character', which translates as 'old stuff', so fireplaces are Very Important for that.
Our charging point (which is in the garage) is I think 30amp, rather than the regular 13amp for household sockets. We had to have a 100amp supply for the house in order to have the charging point. And it has a permanent hose—hose doesn't seem like the right word, in the circumstances—with a particular socket on the end. I'll show you when you visit.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-14 07:41 pm (UTC)The one in your kitchen is delightful but the rest don't sound like they were worth keeping. That's so true about the people on that program!
I see! My mum has an electric moped and that's just plugged into an ordinary outlet but I guess it doesn't require a lot of power compared to a car.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-15 10:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-15 10:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-14 05:39 pm (UTC)Chunky marmalade from Seville oranges is the only true way.
My wardrobe keeps all the morris/sword dance kit together!
no subject
Date: 2024-02-14 06:46 pm (UTC)My wardrobe keeps all the morris/sword dance kit together! What a magnificently British sentence!
no subject
Date: 2024-02-15 10:06 am (UTC)Silver shred is a watered down, pale imitation, totally devoid of any flavour....
Alas, I fear you will never see the light or taste the true delight of Oxford marmalade.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-17 02:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-17 04:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-17 02:33 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2024-02-17 03:02 pm (UTC)