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"What have you eaten" Parallel Chat

The dentist, this afternoon, didn't do any fillings, just took a second impression for a dental plate. Can't say that I quite understand what is going on - in the "old days" a dentist used to take an impression with some gungy stuff, send it away to a dental technician and give you your plate at the next visit. That was the case even quite recently but now it's - 1st impression, 2nd impression, 3rd impression and let you have your plate on the 4th visit. I hope this all means that they will be a better fit. But do they really need all these impressions, or are they just making work (and fees) for themselves? Not that this dentist needs the work - he doesn't have a spare appointment at all and I will just have to wait and hope for cancellations. Not sure what has happened to all the other dentists that used to work there.

Anyway - cup of blackcurrant tea is cooling down and waiting to make me feel a bit less yukky.
 
Just opened a brand new carton of yoghurt (Neil bought it in the Co-op yesterday) and there was something that looked suspiciously like a mouse dropping on the surface! It wasn't particularly big and I don't have much experience of mouse droppings, so it might not have been, but it was something and it shouldn't have been there. So the offensive item has been washed away and the whole 1 kg tub of yoghurt is waiting to go out as well. Goodness knows what else it might be contaminated with. That's the last time I'll buy that make.

I should probably complain, but I've thrown the evidence out, so it's too late. Anyway, I don't want it replaced, just shan't buy that make any more.
 
Just had a phone call from the surgeon at Raigmore. He was meant to have called on Friday, but just called on the offchance to say that the lab at Raigmore couldn't see anything wrong with the lump that was cut out of my breast but (he said) they're not soft tissue specialists and they didn't find anything before so it is being sent to Glasgow to see if they can find anything.

Why they bothered asking the Raigmore path lab to check it if they aren't soft tissue specialists, I don't know. Also, I'm not sure what they specialise in, if it isn't soft tissue. I would have thought that is the most common thing they get to look at.

Ah well ... we'll just have to wait and forget about it meantime.
 
I mentioned in a previous post here, that my GP prescribed me Metronidazole 200mg (Flagyl) tablets to stop the odour from the non healing wound in my lower leg. This was when I mentioned the price of the charcoal based dressings that I was paying $54.00 for a box of 10 dressings.

A bit of trial and error was needed to crush them up, the old two spoon trick was a waste of time, spent to much time looking for tablets that shot out onto the floor, bed, where ever. Picked up a pill crusher from Amazon AU cheap, and that grinds them down fine.

As there were 21 tablets in the box and crushing 1½ up gives me enough powder to sprinkle all over the wound for 7 days treatment. $0.48 per treatment instead of $5.40 for the same time makes a lot of difference in my pocket.

It works very well, and it has helped cleaning the wound out of the fluffy stuff that causes the infection pseudo something or other from taking hold and cuts out the bad odour that comes through the dressing.

I forgot to post this yesterday, I must be getting oltimerz...
 
Where is everybody? Nothing here in 4 days?

I'll make up with a good long post with lots of pictures, as promised in the main thread https://www.diabetes.co.uk/forum/threads/what-have-you-eaten-today.75781/page-2466#post-2499921!

Not much wind on the first day, and mainly from the wrong direction for our goal, a sandbank near the island of Vlieland. Also, the tide was coming in which means we had the currents against us as well.
No way to beat this except by having the motor run along with the sails.
Fine with me, it was a perfect summery day, I'm not complaining about the weather if it's warm enough for a t-shirt in march!

The guests were friendly and willing to help with hoisting sails and coiling lines (after hoisting 5 sails there literally is about a kilometer of lines to be coiled!) so it was a pleasure to work with them.
Nice and easy-going captain as well (I'd never worked with him or on this ship before so no idea what to expect), happy to let me do things my way and trusting I knew what I was doing!



The dogs (my own two and two sleepover dogs I've had for a week) were happy enough with a spot on my vest in the sun, even though they don't particularly like sailing.
Thankfully they were instand friends with the captain's dog too, and there were no issues between his cat and my dogs either!



The traditional beer after the sailing day is done, een 'aanlegbiertje'! The first 'docking beer' of the year, drunk on a sandbank wearing a t-shirt. Doesn't get much better than that!



Our goal for the day was this sandbank. You just sail until you get stuck, some time after high tide, and wait for the water to disappear.
The next high tide was at around 2AM, so at around midnight we briefly started the motor to find deeper water some 200 meters south of our sandbank to spend the night behind our anchor.



Time for walks!
The dogs found it cold and wet and made it clear they wanted to go back on board right after a short run and doing their business.
I agreed, my feet were cold too!

Good thing I brought an extra t-shirt and sweater, I'd forgotten how wet and muddy you are after climbing a ladder 4 times with a wet muddy dog on your shoulder.



We had a beautiful sundown, even when photographed with my phone.





The morning looked magical. Hardly any wind, and in the one direction you couldn't even see where water became air or air became water.
In the other direction we had a clear view of the village of Oost-Vlieland, the only village on the island.







The wind picked up a little when we started sailing, and the same tide that was against us yesterday was now with us.
So we had a perfect sailing day back, no need to use the motor!
 
Lovely photos @Antje77 . Cheered me up at least. Shower helped with this ghastly cold. Just as well as I gave up on trying to get a GP appointment. Hubby and I just looked at each other yesterday when they announced don't go to A&E unless it's life threatening. Seriously, how are we supposed to know if it is life threatening? Hubby, a bit more blunt, just said I guess if you die then it's life threatening. It is getting out of hand.

As you'll see on the other thread, I took eldest grandson into Edinburgh yesterday. I was grateful the multistorey car park was still across the road from the new St James Quarter as it saved parking further away and walking with this cold. I don't normally take the car into town due to lack of parking but the multistorey was fine. He was quite taken with the big Mall and his trip to the Lego store - very chatty with everyone. I'd promised him the trip because he stayed the night at ours during the week without a problem. That was a huge step in getting over this anxiety. It dawned on me though that the trip to Edinburgh was another huge step. If U'd tried to do that a year ago he would have had a meltdown such was his fear of being away from home. It was only when we got back to the car and he said his tummy wasn't sore and he really enjoyed it that I realised. I'd say we're definitely getting there.
 
Tired myself out today, doing very little really. Yesterday afternoon I had said to Neil that I thought I would soon need to buy a new oven because my old one is low down and very difficult for me to get down to clean - actually impossible. He said he could get the oven up onto a workbench so that I could clean it properly. It took quite a while and quite a lot of effort on his part, but he got it up and balanced on a "workmate" but by that time a friend had arrived for a visit, so I couldn't get on with it and he just set to and did it himself. I joined in when my friend had left and even the little bit that I did was exhausting. That old oven will never be like new - too many things spilled and burned onto the bottom, but it is as clean as we could get it between us and is now back into its position. Obviously I am not to be wasting my money on a new oven.

Today I asked Neil to buy some sugar cubes because now Em is making her own cup of tea and manages to get sugar everywhere as she spoons it out of the sugar bowl. This afternoon was especially bad! But Neil thought there would be a packet in the larder and searched the whole shelf where I keep various sugars - no white cubes. However, he did decide that the shelf needed washing as he had found a box of demerara cubes which had begun to turn into liquid and so emptied the shelf. Of course, much of the sugar that was there has been there for more than 2 years - the last time I did any serious baking. And I have to admit that much of it was deteriorating. He kept on popping out of the larder with another offender to see if I wanted to throw it away (obviously his preferred option) and most of it made its way to the bin. Then he decided to turn his attention to some jars of various flours I had there - corn meal (masa), polenta, bamboo, potato, lupin,chestnut and so on. And I had to try to remember why I had wanted them in the first place. They haven't gone out yet but they have been left, very obviously on the table and not returned to the larder. Em's dad arrived to pick her up so left with bags and packets of sugar - demerara, muscovado, added molasses and soft brown. He does much more baking these days than I do - which wouldn't be hard. Also found 3 packets of coconut which were a year out of date - and I thought I had only bought them a few months ago. The larder shelves have some significant gaps on them now.
 
Antje77 said:
And we saw hundreds of real "seadogs" (zeehonden, seals) too, lazing about on the next sand bank!
But my phone camera won't show them properly, too far away.
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I like that word - zeehonden. So close to the English sea-hound. I remember, I was also very taken by the Scandiavian word for vacuum cleaner - stoorsucker (probably the wrong spelling, I only heard it) because it is so close to the scots stour-soocker (sucker of dust), which would not actually have been the name for the tool but, in my opinion, should have been, mostly now called a hoover. I also remember being quite charmed on a visit to Holland by the familiarity of shop names. I'm not a word-smith but I do enjoy seeing these similarities and looking for common origins of words. Both Neil and Alistair have inherited that from me and I inherited it from my mother.

Neil is just wondering what the Dutch word for sea lion is, as opposed to a seal.
 
Annb said:
Neil is just wondering what the Dutch word for sea lion is, as opposed to a seal.
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Hi Neil, pleased to meet you!
It's zeeleeuw, literally sea-lion!
Annb said:
I like that word - zeehonden. So close to the English sea-hound.
Click to expand...
According to Wikipedia a sea-hound is a shark though, not a seal? Is that right?
Of course the seals on the British Isles are way cooler than ours. Ours are just plain old seals, whereas your selkies can occasionally shed their fur to seduce humans, according to the myths!
Annb said:
I was also very taken by the Scandiavian word for vacuum cleaner - stoorsucker (probably the wrong spelling, I only heard it) because it is so close to the scots stour-soocker (sucker of dust)
Click to expand...
Stofzuiger (dust-sucker) in Dutch as well!
Annb said:
I do enjoy seeing these similarities and looking for common origins of words. Both Neil and Alistair have inherited that from me and I inherited it from my mother.
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Same here, and a family thing too!
 
Apparently a seahound is a dogfish (I didn't realise that until now), that is, a kind of shark. Not the Jaws variety but a small one found in European waters. Makes very good eating and is my favourite fish dish. Can't get it here, though.

We see quite a lot of common seals here - they are pretty friendly and often beg for fish from fishing boats in the harbour, or they may get too friendly and try to get into kayaks with their human friends - quite a few of those use Stornoway harbour. DIL received a hefty slap from the tail of a seal when she was kayaking in the harbour - we think it might have wanted to join her, but didn't quite make it. I don't think we get any sea lions here - maybe the water is a bit too cold for them. There are grey seals around here as well, but they are much more shy (or stuck up) and are not seen as often except in their preferred basking places.

I think the common seals are as interested in people as people are in them. On one occasion, walking along the beach near here, we saw one quite a few yards out in the water and watched it as we walked. We realised that it was following us along the beach and when we turned and came back, it turned and followed us back along the beach and did the same when we turned again and walked back along the beach. It tracked us for the whole of our walk. Maybe it was hoping we would have a picnic to share.
 
Annb said:
We see quite a lot of common seals here
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Annb said:
There are grey seals around here as well, but they are much more shy (or stuck up) and are not seen as often except in their preferred basking places.
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Now that's interesting from a language point of view!
Those are the seals we have here as well (an important difference between the two spcies is the grey seal puppies need a lot more time growing on a high sandbank before they're ready to swim).
In Dutch they are called the gewone zeehond and the grijze zeehond, literal translations of their English names!
 
And I never know what I’m going to learn coming on here…making my own yogurt, probiotics, variety in sea lions…always interesting.
 

Do you think there is any connection between grijze and the English grizzled or grizzly, meaning grey and old looking?

Edited to add: Of course, to grizzle is a verb meaning a kind of low, continuous whining or crying - usually a child. Don't quite get the relationship there.
 
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Riva_Roxaban said:
Sea Cows or Dugons in Australia used to be hunted by the indigenous peoples.

They are now protected species.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dugong
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Are Dugongs what used to be thought were mermaids? Not exactly the beautiful fishy female of legend, but perhaps those sailors, at sea for years sometimes, forgot what a woman looked like. I believe that these and Manatees are both called sea cows and were both thought to be mermaids by those poor lonely sailing men...What with mermaids and selkies, the poor old sailors didn't stand a chance.
 
Yes. According to Google French comes into it as well. Grijs in Dutch is the English grey and the French gris.
 
Antje77 said:
Yes. According to Google French comes into it as well. Grijs in Dutch is the English grey and the French gris.
Click to expand...

Must have a conversation with Neil about this. We often come up with words that seem to have origins in both French and germanic or scandinavian languages, so which route they took into English is debatable. Of course, he'll probably come up with something about proto-european languages from further back in time, maybe indo-european even. But that's languages for you. Since the word for grey in latin (which I never learned but which is the basis for French, Spanish and so on) is canus, the origin must be germanic, I should think.
 
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