stitched view from my hill

another tough morning

Urban Frog

This guy lives in our front yard.

Though I can't summon the Brain Juice required to come up with a proper post, you will note that the new Canon A610 has been put to very good use; since Smarty Pants Liz explained exactly how I could reduce the file size to something more digestible, Flickr has never looked at me the same way. You can now see a handy animated "badge" in the left margin which shows the latest additions --click either on the square that interests you or on sKimu to get the goods.

Liz, by the way, is by far the most advanced Skype-user: her webcam makes me miss her muchly, but also inspires me to get one for myself. Remember when the idea of videophones used to be crazy crazy sci-fi? And we used to say, "forget it, I wouldn't want to have to change out of my pajamas to make a phone call!" Well, I'd much rather see a pj'ed Liz than no Liz at all!

Budget constraints have kept me using the basic free Flickr account for the moment, so until I can think of a sneakier way to get around it, I'm continuing to lump all of the more interesting Italy photos into one album (called Italia). The tones of the pictures totally help to distinguish between "episodes", so if you want to see all of those from the two-week holiday that Filippo and I spent in Sardinia at the beginning of August, look for turquoise. Ok, because we're all new at this, I'll cut you some slack:

The first week of the holiday was beautiful --bright sun, temperatures in the high 30s, fairly un-busy beaches. The second week was windy, sometimes rainy, and more frantic because it was the beginning of the national holiday period (called ferragosto). As at Easter, we camped near the beach, and wore a star-shaped path from our site to the sea to the ping pong table to the kinda-faraway-beach to the kayak shack. I finally had the perfect chunk of time to dedicate to A Suitable Boy (read it! do it now!), which meant that no studying occurred whatsoever. I'm currently paying for it.

Only a few days after getting back to Bergamo there was a 4-day long weekend, so we visited some cousins in their Mountain Retreat From The Heat, and drove up to Filippo's old house to meet his 8-month-old second-cousin.

Only 6 weeks left until I head up to London for the first round of my MSc exams, so I'm pretty much chained to my desk these days. Duncan John sent me WildBoyz season 2 on DVD, so I sneak it into my laptop when I need a break --and technology-related tinkering is fun as well...but can get dangerous: is it wrong that I'm blogging at 11:54pm on a Saturday night? Don't answer that.

Upside Down Pflaumenkuchen

Upside Down Pflaumenkuchen
The sample above was made with plums from Filippo's mom's tree; we devoured it in a single Study Break.

Original recipe yield: 1 - 9 inch round cake.
Prep Time: 30 Minutes
Cook Time: 40 Minutes
Ready In: 1 Hour 10 Minutes

Ingredients:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup whole-wheat flour
1+1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
scrape or two of real nutmeg (please don't use pre-ground)

3 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup brown sugar

1/3 cup butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1 large egg (extra-large also ok)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup milk
7 black plums, pitted and thinly sliced (you may need more or less than this)

Directions:
1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9 inch cake pan. Combine the flour, baking powder, salt and spices. Set aside.
2) In the prepared pan, combine 3 tablespoons butter and brown sugar. Place pan inside the preheated oven until the butter melts and begins to bubble. Set aside. In a large bowl, cream together the 1/3 cup butter and 1/2 cup white sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg, then stir in the vanilla. Beat in the flour mixture alternately with the milk, mixing just until incorporated.
3) Arrange plums in concentric circles in the prepared pan, overlapping slightly. Pour batter overtop of the fruit, covering fruit completely. Bake in the preheated oven for 30-40 minutes --until lightly brown on top and a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.
4) Allow to cool in the pan for 15 minutes before flipping and serving.