big william's world

Have a few more!

Denver botanical gardens

Morocco is canceled at least it is for us. Bit of a relief actually with all this snow and airport delays. All this from my phone.

OK so it took me all day and I still don't know if we are going to Morocco or not but I can send text and pics from my phone. Am I a smart ass or what?

More fires!

More Snow

Still shovelling and struggling!
I can publish pics and text from my phone but not to the existing blog.
Of course, as usual, my question is NEVER an faq!

Denver and boulder are under 2 or 3 feet of snow and our trip looks like it won't even start
I am trying to set up mobile blogging from my phone but if we are't going anywhere I don't need it in any hurry.
I have been shovelling snow all day and this is how I get warmed up.
bigwilliamsmobile.blogspot.com is the address of the mobile but I can't get it to post to this blog.
Merry Christmas

No picture because we ate it but it had Ricotta cheese (bought in error) fresh strawberries and a ton of dark brown sugar.
The cheese was slathered on and around the fruit mixed with a few basil leaves and covered in sugar.
Served on one of my standard thin-crispy crusts.
Very good.


















Meanwhile I went to look at the ski area - which is a half hour drive from home.
It did not look too scary but I wish I had someone to hold my hand if I go for lessons there!
It's called Eldora. If you are interested look at the website. Probably tame by little William's standards but at least it has plenty of snow and it looks plenty challenging enough for an old codger like me!
Sunny today here but big snow tomorrow apparently. Morocco will be warmer on Friday but not warm enough!

We decided to open all these wonderful gifts we had received while we have time at home before a week of work and packing and planning and travel.
I immediately loved Tim's picture at the back of the picture next to the round pot.







And this is what we found inside.
It feels so good to be loved from far away! and I got a REAL oil painting from Tim! no need to tell you which one that is.
Thank you so much guys for your generosity we were both delighted with everything.
loved the espresso cups and the lego corkscrew and all the cards and M loved the purple scarf.

I promise that you will love it. It is a William original
Ingredients:
285 ml milk
115 g plain flour (all purpose in the US)
6 pieces of streaky bacon - as fatty as possible
3 eggs
salt
pepper
sprigs of rosemary

Preheat the oven as hot as it can get for 20 minutes
mix the eggs, flour and milk into a batter. Easy if you have an electric whisk but if mixing by hand start with a thick dough of the flour and milk and gradually add the rest of the milk then the eggs (otherwise you will get lumps!)
place the bacon on the bottom of a shallow roasting tin and place it in the hot oven, turning and shaking it a bit until it is crispy.
While the pan is very (and contains all the bacon fat) hot throw in the rosemary and pour in the batter.
Put back in the oven - the hotter the better and cook until risen and brown - 10 -20 minutes.
Don't open the door till it has risen and browned.
serve it with anything you like or just on its own
A wonderful fat-free healthy meal.
Let me know how you get on!

The last word (and photos) about the damned fireguard. It just looked so good with a roaring crackling fire in it. I was also pleased that, contrary to little-william's predictions it did not melt!
What you can't see is the Dies Irea from Verdi's Requiem which was playing loudly as I took the pictures. I have discovered that you can borrow CD's for free from Boulder Library and our music server can hold 800 and display cover notes etc. on the tv screen while you listen to them. The recording has Pavaroti and Joan Sutherland among others.

I accidentally opened the gorgeous colored bag from W and MK in Denmark. It was made in San Francisco and shipped direct to me but it is their custom design. With all the colors they know I love and some they love too.
The camera I bought myself - following the usual rule of half the size, half the price and twice the pixels of the last camera I bought.
I like it because you just slide the front door down and the lens does not need to pop out.
More snow is coming for the weekend but we only have to survive in this tundra until Friday when we are off to Cassablanca.
Thanks for the present W and K I love it! Give J a big kiss too.
Can Ben hypnotize T? that could be useful but I doubt B or anyone else could do it.

If you click on the map it gets bigger!

I can hear the complaints that you can't read the map but it's purpose was to show you how many lakes there are round here - no wonder the crocodiles like it.

Unfortunately we missed the launch because we were driving back from dinner and weren't even sure we would have seen it anyway. So we didn't particularly hurry and then we got lost so the decision was made.

That's about it. I just did my 30 lengths of the massive, warm pool.

Home to the mountains for a brief cool-off tomorrow night.

Well nobody handed any in so I guess I will have to tell you the story.
The ducks live in a "palace" near the tennis courts on the "recreation level" of the hotel but spend every day from 11am to 5pm in the lobby fountain.
They come down to the lobby in the elevator and march to the fountain on the red carpet, which is laid daily for them) (or is it layed?) up the steps and plop plop plop they go (in more ways than one! or three!)
A fanfare is played and the event always draws a crowd.
In the evening the ritual is reversed and they go to bed in the Duck Palace.
Hoping again for a Shuttle launch tonight!

Only 30 lengths of this baby to the mile.
The water is very warm but the wind was quite cold this morning.
We hoped to see the shuttle launch last night - Cape Kennedy is only 55 miles from here - and see this

See how good I am at postioning the pictures these days?

fingers are crossed for a possible launch tomorrow night.

As I said there is not much here unless you like Disneyland, Epcot, Universal Studios, Sea World, Shopping, British People (mostly fat cockneys and brummies).

The hotel is excellent though and your homework for tonight is to find out what you can about th "Peabody Ducks"

Boulder Weather for the next five days
3° C -12° C
33° F 20° F 1° C -7° C
53° F 19° F 12° C -7° C
52° F 18° F 11° C -8° C
48° F 19° F 9° C -7° C

But I am off to Orlando: Where its:
70° F 43° F 21° C 6° C
57° F 39° F 14° C 4° C
67° F 50° F 19° C 10° C
71° F 54° F 22° C 12° C
75° F 58° F 24° C 14° C
I will blog if I can! the shopping is good there though - after this cowboy State.

this is what the Pearl Street Mall looks like now - I prefer tulips and sunshine!
OK so fireguards are boring - I knew that! (interesting that the blogger spellchecker does not know "fireguard" and suggests I use the word "beaurocrat" - a well known synonym.
No stupid questions but you missed the clever choice of hinges which allow the thing to recess into the opening and the fact that it stays in the up/open position, apparently without support.
I think/hope W is wrong about the temperature effect.
I was hoping for more from our C Eng reader.
Log fires are nowhere near as hot as English coal fires which is why the fireplaces here are so big.
On side the mountain called flagstaff, above the house, there is Christmas star made from electric lights. From Four miles away it looks like a perfect five-point star on top of one of the tall buildings. As you get closer to it the shape is less star like and from our house it just looks like a lot of lights in a line.
I drove up there to look at it last night but forgot to take a camera so words and pictures and chrismas cards from Google will have to suffice. We live just below the star.
It seems something has been up there since 1948 and it also doubles as an Easter Cross. Over the years it has been vandalized by painting the bulbs red - which, at the time, was seen as a communist threat. The shape was modified to a peace sign by protestors against the Vietnam war.
On the ground the dimensions are 150 feet (50 meters) in left to right but, obviously more from top to bottom to compensate for the slope.

For those of you who thought this was over-complicating a simple problem remember that this fireplace opening is four feet wide! no room to put the thing if you pick it up and move it to make the fire up.
Prizes will be awarded for the most intelligent and the least intelligent questions arising from this design.
The frame is extruded aluminum (aluminium for the UK) a U section with the steel screen sandwiched between flat aluminum bar held into the U section with machine screws.
The handle is made from an aluminum bar and serves as a retainer when the "door" is up.
The worst part of the job? laying on my back for an hour with my head in the fireplace drilling and tapping the steel angle iron above the opening. I broke several drills and several taps.
By the way how do you like my conversion of the wood-store to take the hi-fi stuff and the TV above?
OK guys let me have it!

Went to a concert of their's on Friday night. They used to be, acapela, slim, cute, young, world-class exponents of early music.
They are still sim and sing very well but more folksy, bluegrassy stuff.
No longer acapela they had a brilliant manodolin/fiddle player with them called Daryl Anger (who stole the show) and a good guitarist Scott Nygard (reminded me of Kongens Nytorv! in Copenhagen)
A man from Hull just collected the damaged furniture, from the move, to repair it. He has been married to TWO american women so there are some people more stupid than me! (JUST KIDDING M!)
Temps have been about minus 10 all weekend but will be around plus 10 today so the foot of remaining snow should melt.
Going to Orlando later this week which promises warm weather and a lot of English people. Not much else except good shopping.