Wednesday, June 28, 2017

Delicious Banana Bread

This is something that I make using the hand written recipe my sister wrote out years ago and I do not know the original source for it (she may even have made it up), but it is so yummy I have to share this.

Ingredients:
8oz Self Raising Flour
Pinch of Salt
2oz Margarine
1 Egg
2oz Sugar (Caster/Superfine)
Grated Rind of 1 Lemon (Although I use a squirt of bottled lemon or lime juice as a substitute. The kind you keep in a very small bottle in the fridge)
3 Mashed Bananas (In order to use up the very ripe bananas in our house I often make this with 4)
Milk (if needed)

Method:
1) Sieve flour and salt together.
2) Rub in margarine.
3) Add egg, sugar, lemon rind (or lime/lemon juice if using my substitute) and banana.
4) Mix thoroughly.
5) If necessary add milk to give soft consistency. (Although I find when using lemon/lime juice, the milk is not necessary).
6) Place mixture in a greased and floured loaf tin and bake in 180 C (Gas 4) oven for 45 minutes.
7) Leave in tin for 5 minutes after removing from oven when it's cooked.
8) Turn out and cool on a wire tray/cooling rack.

It's that easy and so delicious. If you have any questions about this please leave me a comment and I will get back to you. Enjoy :)

Tuesday, June 27, 2017

I'm dreaming of fire, flying and ..... witches?

My dreams are so vivid at the moment. I have to tell you about the last two I had.

Night before last I dreamed about a fire. I was inside somewhere (but am not sure what the building was) The inside was all black and there was a small fire in a box shelf at about head height. I am 5'4 for reference. I attempted to throw some gel liquid on it to put the fire out but most of it ended up falling on the dog that was at my feet. I then became fixated on cleaning the dog's head, since some of it was close to it's eyes.

I think I left after that, but it's a bit fuzzy, the memory of between that and the next bit.

I was outside. There were scores of firefighters just sitting on the ground resting. I stepped through them as I went because they were in my way, so to speak.

The setting by the way was close to water. We were on the edge of some vast expanse of water, but I cannot specify if it was the ocean or a lake or what. I think the initial fire location was in a wooden hut on a wooden jetty though.

Next I was at 'home' in my bed (dream home and bed not my real life ones). It was night time and I was woken by people shouting outside in the hallway. "Get out! Get out!" I was in some kind of communal residential building. I went and opened my door to look out into the hallway (where the main stairs were). But there was nobody shouting, only a handful of people sat on the floor chilling.

I then realised that is what they must have experienced. (I am not sure which 'they' I was referring to here) After that I felt an immense amount of guilt. Since that initial small fire that I had failed to extinguish had gone on to rage out of control. I blamed myself for the deaths that occurred and all the destruction. I was near tears.

The dream ended with me writing a post on Reddit titled : Am I responsible? (Or something similar) and detailed the whole thing.

Obviously something that comes to mind is Grenfell tower. I am sure experts could tell me in detail the meaning of all that. Lol. What I dreamt about I mean. To be honest I dream about firefighters rather a lot. I am often a part of the crew. Not sure why. If that's what I am supposed to be doing I don't think there is much chance of that. I am not fit enough certainly, to be a firefighter.

Then last night my dream was a wild adventure, with the viewpoint changing constantly. I don't think I can even retell it with the sequence in which the dreams happened. I am not even sure of the time period.

Okay so I was a young woman (in a long plain dress, I can't pin down the fabric but it was handmade, possibly woollen, pre mass clothing retail era) I was poor and was taken in by someone. She had taken in other people too and lived in a large house in the countryside (not rich manor house large) She wasn't really well off but had land and plenty of 'family' (other people that lived there). Together they all did what needed to be done day to day. The main hub was the kitchen. In exchange for being taken in I simply had to pitch in. I was however forbidden from associating with a young man that I grew to like.

One of the other women who was taken in at that time later fell pregnant. I think the man responsible went away or had to go away for a while. I am not sure where or why though. She was waiting longingly for him to return.

I think I was a man and I was in that house but the three women in charge did not want me there. Both me and them (or at least one of them) was able to levitate and this was completely normal at the time I dreamt it. They tried to chase me out. I levitated and flew up to the second floor (ground was floor one) via a window. One of them flew up a spiral staircase that was at the opposite end of the house to said window. I then raced along the upper corridor before any of them could reach me and went out the window at the far end of corridor (on the right hand side of the house from the first window if that makes sense). I then broke the window just above me on the third floor so they'd think I went in there and then flew to the roof and sat up there very quietly.

It took a little time but they found me in the end. The woman came and towered above the rooftop, looming over me, still flying. I could only see the one. Then I was a woman. I went to the opposite end of the roof to where she was hovering and laid in a rectangular hollow. A man came (or the man from before) came and laid over the woman, protecting her from the wrath of that other woman. Then I don't know what happened or how that ended. That scene finished there.

There was a small group of people (at least two) same time period as before. In fact I think this is all same period around the same house. The people were running and hiding, possibly escaping from the house but I can't be sure. Beyond the house garden lawn there is vegetables growing and a shed/warehouse type building with stacks of crates of veg around the front of it (and the front is facing away to the left of the house as you look at the shed/warehouse) There are small and large trees bordering the divide between the lawn and the vegetables. The people hide from view of the house as much as they can until they reach the outbuilding.

There was a small plane here. I was not aware enough in the dream of it to be able to specify what type or even if it had an engine and propellers. All I know is it had wings, a cockpit and a stick with which to control the pitch. Someone else was going to fly. We got in and took off but the pilot pulled back too far and ended up elevating vertically. I shouted not to do that as it would stall but it was too late. The plane crashed, but no harm was done. Next attempt I was in control but had no shoes on. Somebody gave me some boots to wear that were a bit too big. We were in such a hurry I was multi tasking. I was shoving the boots on my feet at the same time as I was taking off. It was as if the plane was drunk though. I had one hand on the controls and one hand one a boot. So the plane lurched to the left and I was unable to gain much altitude. I skimmed over the fields, aiming to dodge between two particular trees when I reached a treeline between fields. The thing was the wind kept blowing me further along the tree line. For some reason I was fixated on this one gap but struggled to reach it. I could have gone through the trees at any point, without the wind buffeting me into one, but I didn't.

Later on, still flying and still trying to hide, but with a little more altitude this time, I dodged behind a long hillside. I am not sure what I was trying to hide from but I think they saw me. There was a row of these hillsides (or maybe they were mountains, I am not sure) and I was dodging behind the cover of one, then zipping around another and another.

There was a man and a woman. They were pretending to be lovers for some reason and went to get a ride. I am not sure what kind of transport this was, but you paid the person a fare and rode in a wooden box. There were other people in the box, sat on the floor. I don't think there were windows but there were probably wheels. The woman tried to leave with all the man's money but was prevented. In the end only the woman took the ride and the man kept all of his money apart from the fare for the woman. He went back to his little plane (the same one from before) and spotted a man walking away. The man carried a bag over his shoulder. The bag was large, square and white, with a red stripe pained across the front from one top corner to the opposite bottom corner. The bag also had a long thick strap. This colour scheme was the mark of a man who had just left jail and was rehabilitated. This was the second time I had seen one of these men in my dream but I don't recall the circumstances of the first one.

The man with the plane was thinking, after what happened with the woman, that this was the last time he would try to help anybody. But upon seeing the bag man he would have felt bad if he didn't give him a ride somewhere. He thought I'll be right back to help you and climbed in his plane.

That's the end. I woke up after that.
I have a dream diary that I sometimes note down my dreams in but these are way too detailed for me to be able to write in the small space I have there. I hope anybody that reads this finds it interesting and maybe inspiring even. I could probably craft a story or two from these. If you feel like you could please feel free. If you do create a story based on either of my dreams to share online all I ask is that you credit me and/or link back to here. I think that is probably unlikely, the amount of people that see my blog, but I feel I have to say that just on the off chance.
Sweet dreams x