The Payoff

The planning is paying off!

I have dates to visit both these places in October and November: a chateau in the north of France, just a little past Paris, and in the South of France, an olive farm (orchard?)

Dates! On sticks, though I want to call them vines. They're kind of like hard, large grapes, or a cross between grapes and large olives. They aren't anything like I expected. I was walking up Fraser Street to Breka to buy croissants, when I glimpsed these for sale at the green grocer next door. Such a pretty colour...

They taste like dates, but less condensed. Crunchy, like Asian Pears. (Didn't we call them 'Apple-Pears' in the 90s?)

With a perfect pit in the centre. These ones aren't fully ripe, so they have that starchy flavour that under-ripe bananas have. A little unpleasant, but not enough to stop me from eating them.

I've been hammering away the last few days, making new earrings. I've also got a few other goodies that I've been piling up. Here's a glimpse.

These are handbound notebooks made of one-side-used paper, mostly collected from work.

The covers are various things, mostly tetra packs I picked up in Europe in 2007, but also an Italian cookie box--that's the two kids from the seventies in yellow and pink.

The pages open out flat. This means that they are easy to write and draw in, but also that the used side of the paper is exposed. There are other ways to bind that would have hidden the used-side of the paper, but I figure the random text can either add something to the book, however they are used, or they provide convenient places to affix things.

And then the hammered things. Bottle cap earrings! My new favourite thing to craft.

Heineken, Gulden Drakk, and Fat Tire...

...Coronas and Dogfish Ale! They're beauties.

So here it is--the blog I've been talking about creating for ever. Now everyone will be able to check here for what I'm up to, rather than receiving rather lengthy emails...

The trip is in the works, kids! I've got my plane ticket purchased, no hostel booked, and farms contacted. In other words, I'm rather disorganised as usual, but such is my Gemini nature. I don't like planning that much, but I do like adventure, and being able to make my way as the moment sees fit.

But--I don't leave until the 13th of September, so I'll be practicing my blogging skills, putting up pictures of my remaining days in Vancouver.