Shoe blow out

 Since getting a bad blister on my heel, I have been wearing my leather thongs to walk in.

I have had these thongs for a few years, very comfy with quite a thick sole and leather straps.

One felt a bit uneven and thinking that I had tried on something, I turned them up. Whoops, no, bits had come off them, the left one was worse than the right but the right one had a hole in the upper.

Time for new shoes. Two shoe stores had nothing that I liked, I don't like rubber thongs so went to the internet.

I wanted something with a decent sole that I could slip on and off.

Only took a week to arrive, comfy, thick sole, leather. Walking this morning and almost got a blister on the top of my foot, need to wear them in a bit more before doing long walks.

I made ice cream!

 My favourite chef Jamie has a new/newish series called Cooking for Less and he had ice cream as one of the dishes that he made. He called it No churnable ice cream.

Very very basic. It's 600gms of double cream, I used thicken cream, beat it until it increases in size then add a tin of sweetened condensed milk, keep beating until it's completely mixed in, add some smashed up chocolate. Mine had been in the fridge and didnt smash up well.

Freezer for a few hours and there it is. Jamie used paper that he wets and places in tins to stop it sticking he also suggested putting it in the fridge for an hour or so before serving. That's in England in the dead of winter. Hasn't been an issue here although can't scoop but it cuts into slices well. 

I bought some cherries for Christmas and I took about half and boiled them with some water and a spoon of sugar. Took the stones and any stems out and it makes a yummy sauce to pour over home made ice cream.

Christmas parkrun

 First time that it has been held at our local parkrun. The director was worried that very few people would turn up. No need to be concerned as there were more there than on the usual Saturday. Average is around 90 depending on time of year, temperatures and what else is happening in the runners agenda. One hundred and eight runners/walkers crossed the line this morning. Several in Christmassy atire.

Warren couldn't run so he volunteered to hand out the time tokens, he took Esme with him, our visiting dog. Lucy and I walked 4kms.

She was waiting on Warren coming across the line.

Christmas

 We did Christmas early this year, like we do most years.

Dinner was at our daughter's with each member of the family making or preparing a dish. 

We took a pavlova for dessert, picked up from the The Cheesecake Shop.

Warren decided to dress up for Christmas.

Flowering trees

 October has the beautiful purple flowering Jaranda trees which last all month.

Then December has the red, I don't know what they are called but equally beautiful, I should know their name as we have one but I don't.

 This one always seems to be the first or at least one of the first in the area. It is opposite our local shops. It always have a great display.

This is ours. The lawn was mowed a couple of days ago and now the lawn underneath is a carpet of red from the flower petals falling to the ground.

Walking

 My monthly results from the running/walking app. 

Not that clear to read but the 30 is the number of days I walked last month, taking 23 hours to walk 103 KMs with an elevation of 727 metres.

This afternoon, I achieved my revised goal of 1350kms for the year. Last year, I did just over 1100 starting on 8 Jan so my first goal was 1200, then it moved to 1300 and then 1350.

A screen shot of my phone, this week so far 24kms with a day to go, 57kms for the month, total for the year is 1351kms and I am due to finish walking around Australia on 7 Dec 2033. Only about 12000kms to go, not much when you say it quickly.

High tea

 My weekly coffee group ramped it up a bit this morning and we went south for high tea. 

Very different to "take own coffee and chair's to the local park.

Each month we have been putting in $10 each and putting an entry into lotto, we have had several small wins.

High tea cost us $49 each but our winnings throughout the year paid for it. Yep, I realise that $10 a month is $120 for the year so more than covers the cost but hey, it felt like a bonus.

The table was set very nicely with lattice plates, cups and saucers, everything matched and had pink roses on them, very feminine. Choice of teas or coffees, served orange juice when we arrived.

This three tiered plate was just for me. Savouries at the bottom, second tier was a sweet scone and a savoury one with butter, jam and cream, then sweets on the upper tier. We all took home a doggy bag.

Funny but we all wore dresses today,very rare indeed.

The 1% club.

 A TV Program that we are enjoying. 

A hundred people are asked the same question, they have 30 seconds to answer. If they are correct, they go on to the next harder question. Each person has 1000 dollars, if they go out ie get it wrong their $1000 goes into the prize pool. 

Supposedly another 100 people have been asked the question and graded so first question is the 90% question. Last night 11 people went out of the first.

This was it.

How meny wirds are korect in theis sentense? Answer of course is 3, how, are and is.

It is a mixture of puzzles, logic and common sense but some are about out there.

We didn't get very far last night, bombed out on a picture puzzle.

It was a moose, a mouse, a sheep and a deer.

Which one was the odd one out.

I came up with three solutions.

1 deer as it only had four letters, the others had five.

2 mouse as the others had horns

3 sheep as it had wool, the others had fur.

Nope, answer was mouse because the plural changed to mice and the others didn't change.

Anyway, two people were left at the end to try for 100,000, the woman took the option of walking away with 10,000. The guy got it right.

Question was January=717, March =5315 June=4624 what does August equal? Answer 6848.

Letters in the month, then number of month then multiply. We were at a loss.

Makes one think.