London frost

The first London frost of the year. It's exciting to finally wake up to a truly cold morning. It'll be sad if our winters grow milder as the years progress - although I think the effects of climate change will eventually see us descend into a new ice age. (Glaciers gradually melt, adding fresh water to the salty sea water, affecting the North Atlantic Drift, therefore lowering the temperature of the nice winds that keep our country so unusually warm for its position.)

What would be worse, no winter or a world that resembles Narnia under the reign of the Ice Queen? One would mean our veg plots would go crazy, and the other would be incredibly pretty... hmmm

Mousebeard

I thought I'd write an update about my book, The Mousehunter... which was once called Mousebeard. (I use Mousebeard in the title to this post as I want to try and reclaim the term in Google search! I came up with it first, I swear!) It's not out for another year yet, but there's always stuff going on.

I've been hard at work on the illustrations, and also typing away at the sequel on my weekly days off. It's a strange feeling embarking on the second story. It feels very much like I'm writing my first book again, albeit with a lot more experience and a much greater understanding of the characters. They speak more fluently, and act as I want them too now. The ideas for this one are also well over a year old in the planning, so they're much less 'jumping out of nowhere and hitting the page' than they were in the first one.

I'm really enjoying working out the plot in detail, and adding twists and character growth and the like. It's peculiarly a bit like gardening and running a veg plot, in that you plant things, wait a while for the elements to kill them or let them grow, and then in a few months see what you have. Everything changes, lots of things die, and things that you thought would do badly often become the most successful parts of the whole process.

A green birthday

Instead of calling this blog 'Anything but Sprouts', I should probably have called it 'Mainly Courgettes'. Yesterday was my birthday, you see, and there among the presents was this wonderfully unusual book called 'What will i do with all those courgettes?'. It's a very good question - and name for a book – I hear you all saying. Maybe I could use them to make a picture? or even write an autobiography? Or simply just use one of the 150 recipes to make something to eat...

As you can see, there was actually a green theme to many of the presents I received. Ok, so it wasn't all gardening 'green', but when it's a book about the Muppets, who gives a Rowlf?

New links

As I sit and listen to our resident drilling woodpecker I've started the overhaul of the links and the site, and it's taking a while. If I paid any attention to my web and blog guru girlfriend, I'd have blogrolls, RSS feeds, and all sorts of whizzy technical stuff, but as much as I'd like to do all that, I don't have the know-how or time just yet. It's nice to be blogging again though.

Ethical Awards

As you've probably spotted, I haven't quite got to grips with Blogger's confusing picture upload and publishing settings, what with my pics and layout being skew-whiffy. I apologise, and I promise to sort it out...

But aside from that, me being a hardened Guardian reader and a militant Ecover user, I noticed this and thought it worthy of a mention.

The whole ethical living thing is something close to my heart, and I imagine there's quite a few folk out there who think the same. Anyway, everyone can vote for it, so maybe give it a go.

Shroom watch 1

As I mentioned before, I received a GYO Mushroom kit for Christmas, and here it is. It looks like something out of the sixties, and clearly the makers have decided that design isn't a necessary concern for people who are likely to grow mushrooms. Who am I to criticise though? If they taste mushroomy, then that's all that matters. Oh, and that's not my local Satyr pictured with them, it's the back half of Milo the cat, who has to be a part of everything.

If anyone fancies growing some fancy mushrooms, then i found there's loads of different sorts you can buy here. Clearly, my bog standard mushrooms have some way to go before hitting the heights of those on that site, but if they grow I'll be happy.

More snow!

Snow in Crystal Palace!

So there I was, lying in bed with a cat prodding my face, when I realised there was something different about today. It had snowed! I asked for winter, and someone very kindly obliged!

Thanks for all your lovely comments! I've been slightly nervous about the whole 'leaving work' thing, but that's only because the idea of being in charge of myself is slightly daunting. What will I do with my evenings? Probably work still... Ahh the work ethic is strong in this one!

I've resigned

Well, as the winds rattle through London, sweeping the streets clean of people, I've taken it upon myself to resign from my day job. Possibly the greatest threat to the success of my veg plot has been removed. No longer will I battle away on Saturdays trying to write, when, as of the end of March I'll be able to write all week long. Which means, come those April Saturdays, I'll be able to dig all day.

Maybe between now and then we'll get some winter to break down my soil for me?

Return of the Sprout

So 2007 is alive and well. I'm fed up with it already, but that's what the first few weeks of the new year are about aren't they – wishing you were somewhere else. (Although, our Wii did arrive yesterday, and I'm loving Baseball even though I have no idea what the rules are. They make about as much sense as wilfully buying sprouts.)

However, as for the Anything but Sprouts plot out back, there's big news in the shape of new bird seed in the feeders. The Greenfinches have returned, and have finally stopped hurling abuse at me from the comfort of their tree. I've apologised for it not being purely sunflower seeds, but I can only do what I can.

I'm going to be starting a new regular post on here relating to the growth of mushrooms. (Who could ask for a better christmas present than a grow-your-own mushroom box?) So in the next week or so, I'm going to have Shroom Watch up and running. I'll keep you posted. I'm sure the photos will be captivating and groundbreaking in equal measure, so keep your eyes peeled!!

This is the start of the return of Anything But Sprouts. It's back, in just the same way as the sprouts you ate on Christmas day returned as a whiffy fart. Although hopefully it won't be quite as whiffy...