I've been making moderately good progress on the novel I'm writing, but yesterday I realised I need to completely restructure two chapters, amalgamating different sections of the material with each other. I don't want to lose any of the content but it needs re-ordering, not in big chunks but re-writing to integrate it differently.
I've been reluctant to come to this conclusion because we're talking about 9000 words to be shuffled around, but I've come to the conclusion it has to be done.
That's today's task then.
Aside of that I've been considering growing zucchini. Here in England we normally say 'courgettes', but I've been conditioned in the direction of 'zucchini' by American nutritionists online; I like the word better anyway. If your name was going to be Zucchini or Courgette, which would you choose? Courgette is pretty, but does it carry too heavy overtones of Les Miserables?
And the thing with zucchini is they are low FODmap, low in oxalates, high in L-citrulline, though they are high in salicylates so hmm. But I seen to be able to cope with them and although just meat has all you need I'm going to give them a go. But I'll grow my own because why wouldn't you?
Anyway, zucchini grow fast and vigorously and need good compost. We have plenty of garden space, and grass clippings aplenty in the summer months, but my compost waste is mostly eggshells and teabags; I don't really generate peelings. My husband does, but not much. He eats his food, he doesn't throw it away. And he mostly eats keto things like mushrooms and tomatoes and kale, where you eat all of it, there aren't peelings.
I hate the idea of buying compost in plastic bags, though — I mean, what? We did this in the summer to get our garden going, because when we moved in there were plants in the wrong place and they had to come out of the ground into pots, and we built up one bed that then needed some earth adding in, to plant our heathers. And heathers need ericaceous compost, so we bought several bags of that. Plus, the front of our house just has a brick yard to park the car, so our garden there is all in pots and we bought extra compost for planters.
But it's stupid, isn't it, buying compost? If ever there was an example of modern insanity it has to be that.
So early this morning (there's a lot of thinking time before sunrise in an English winter) I was not only reluctantly facing up to the reality that I need to restructure those two chapters, but equally reluctantly accepting that if I want to add zucchini back into what I eat then it makes sense to grow it and if I'm going to do that I need good compost and the best way to get the best compost is to make your own — bokashi-bran-neutralised dry closeting compost (I mean humanure) combined with grass clippings and weeds. To neutralise the pathogens and exclude rats, if you don't have a proper system in the sense of hardware you need a system in the sense of strategy. It's very easy. You need 2 large airtight buckets, one for collecting current deposits and one for curing already collected deposits. Said deposits (I hope you don't mind reading about this) are a combination of paper plus what naturally exits you plus a handful of bokashi bran (which neutralises pathogens). These are accumulated daily in a tub with an airtight lid until it's full, at which point you close it up and leave it for a fortnight, while you move on to the 2nd bucket for accumulation.
After that you empty the cured bucketful into your regular composter to mix with carbon elements (grass clippings, torn paper, spent compost etc) and leave it to rot down, which it does in short order and gives you the best compost you ever saw.
The only thing is, rats are very partial to humanure; so the composter for the second stage must be rat-proof. And I know we have rats in our compost because I have seen their tunnels. All they're getting is teabags, eggshells and grass clipping (plus a few ends of broccoli stalks and apple cores rejected by my husband) so I doubt they're too enthusiastic at the moment, but I don't want to create a population explosion of rats. At the end of our garden is a deck with a shed on it, and beyond the garden fence is the bank of the stream — so I'll bet you anything you like rats live under that deck.
But, as it happens our Hebe and Alice have two composters I bought when we lived with them, that they no longer need for various reasons. And those composters are the Subpod ones, which are rat-proof. Like this.
I think we might do that.
And now the sun has risen (I think it has, behind all that cloud) and what we laughingly call 'day' at this time of year in England has made its appearance, and it's time to get up for our prayers.
Yesterday morning for breakfast I made myself egg-nog (beaten egg and hot milk, and a splash of vanilla and a teeny bit of manuka honey so it tastes nice, and cream), because I wanted to go to church without setting off abdominal agony by giving my gut anything more challenging than liquid to process. And that was delicious so I think I'll make that for my breakfast again today. It worked well for church, and I was glad I went because they had all my favourite songs in the one meeting. I walked home after to get some exercise, because I knew perfectly well that the chances of my going out for a happy afternoon stroll in the biting cold wind we had yesterday was exactly zero. So I was glad about that too.
I haven't been to church all through Christmas because it gets a bit much for me — I need things to be plain and simple. I went to Russian Orthodox Christmas though, last week, because the priest is kind and a friend and invited me. So I have actually and literally been to church over Christmas, just not much.
It's two minutes to eight and time I got out of bed. Catch you later. But that's what I've been thinking about these last three hours as morning came. Wish me luck with re-structuring those chapters, it's not easy; praying friends, all prayer support in the endeavour gratefully received.
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