Day 24: Not even the birds wanted my cookies

Between You, Me and the Lamp Post

Day 24: Not even the birds wanted my cookies

Someone asked me today if one of my hobbies was cooking and baking. Euh well, I cook dinner every night, but I would hardly call it a hobby. 

Am I a good cook? Well, you would have to ask my son that. I haven’t poisoned him yet, so that’s a good sign. By no stretch of the imagination am I competition for Julia Child though, so let’s just say that I’m an average cook.

As for baking … no, where it comes to baking I have two left hands. Let me tell you a story, two stories actually. Long-time readers might be familiar with the stories as they’ve been published before, but since I have quite a few new subscribers to my blog I’ll tell the stories again.

I remember the day like it was

yesterday. My son, Dieter, had his 6^th birthday coming up and I was going to make cupcakes for his party. I got all the ingredients together, mixed the dough, scooped bits of it into the paper cups and placed the lot in the oven.

“Keep an eye on them will you, Dieter,” I said. “I’m quickly gonna go and make the beds.”

It didn’t take long before he called “Ma! The cupcakes are foaming.”

I stuck my head out of one of the bedrooms. “You mean they are rising? They’re supposed to do that.”

A short while later Dieter called again. “Ma, those cupcakes are rising really high.”

“How high?” I called back.

“I don’t know,” he said, appearing in the bedroom doorway. “The oven looks like a washing machine. All foamy.”

Foamy? That didn’t sound good.

When I went to take a look, I saw right away that something had gone horribly wrong. The whole oven was full of foaming dough and it was forcing its way out through the cracks. To cut a long story short, instead of normal flour I had used self-rising flour with a good dose of yeast. It took me ages to clean the oven and Dieter got a store-bought coke for his birthday.

Not one to give up easily, I decided to try my hand at cookies. Maybe that would work better than cupcakes. I followed the instructions of the cookbook and paid attention to use the correct flour this time.

When the time came to eat the cookies Dieter took a bite and pulled a face.

“What?” I asked him.

“They’re kinda hard,” he said.

I tried one too and OMG this wasn’t a cookie, this was a stone and so were the others.

Instead of throwing them in the bin, I decided to feed them to the birds. Imagine my surprise when a couple of pigeons showed up, briefly pecked at the cookies and took off again. Not even the birds wanted my cookies!

Oh well, I could always feed them to the ducks.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” my ex said. “The ducks might sink.”

The years passed and I met someone who gave me the recipe for focaccia bread. I tried it and it came out beautiful. I tried another kind of bread and while the result was not exactly perfect, it was edible.

Something I make really well though if I say so myself, is ‘Aalsterse vlaaien’. It’s not bread and it’s not a cake, it’s a type of flan, but solid. 

Just about every woman in Aalst, Belgium, knows how to make it and being from Aalst, I too pride myself that I can make it too.

A side order of pigeon?

I’m doing cat aerobics this morning. Have you ever tried cat aerobics, it’s quite demanding. Let me explain.

Yesterday afternoon a pigeon landed on our balcony. This might not seem like a momentous occasion to you, but have a look at the picture above … do you see that? The entire balcony is enclosed with mesh. First a fine nylon mesh, and for extra strength a thick green plastic mesh.

So how did a pigeon manage to penetrate this fortress of security … it sat on top of the nylon mesh, near the Christmas lights, and as the mesh sagged under its weight, it discovered a way to slip in.

Fortunately for the bird, the cats were not on the balcony at the time. Just imagine what would have happened if they were! They would have chased it, it would have panicked, and ultimately it might have been killed.

As it was, the bird flew to the top of the canopy of the swing and sat there for a while, then fancied a walk on the floor, followed by an inspection of the windows and various places of the mesh. He was clearly looking for a way out.

Just when I thought I would have to go outside and give the bird directions, it flew to the top of the mesh, and used the opening created under its weight to escape.

I heaved a sigh relief.

This morning though the bird was back, and this is where the cat aerobics came in. This time Holly and Mickey were outside, so every time the bird landed on the mesh, I had to get up to shoo the pigeon away.

As the bird kept coming back and back, I had to get up and down, and up and down, and up and down. It was exhausting.

How could this bird, who was smart enough to find a way in and out of a mesh enclosed balcony be stupid enough to keep coming back to a place where two cats were just waiting to catch and kill it?

It had seen the cats, I know that because I saw the bird looking down and cocking its head from left to right as if wondering what those big hairy things were. Had it never seen a cat before? Was it not familiar with the fact that cats chase and eat birds?

Was it hoping that the cats had been fed and wouldn’t be hungry enough for a side order of pigeon? In that case, I had news for the bird … they had been fed, but after the main course comes dessert.

If the bird though Holly and Mickey wouldn’t be fast enough to catch it, I had news for Mr. or Ms. pigeon. Just the other day I saw Holly in action after she had spotted a fly on the balcony.

She chased it from one end to the other, keeping her eye firmly on the insect. And then suddenly, out of nowhere, she whacked the fly with her paw and the fly flew no more.

I have no doubt that she would have pursued the pigeon just as diligently and in that case it would have been bye bye birdie.

As it is, the pigeon finally got the message and flew away. Holly and Mickey witnessed his departure with obvious disappointment and me, I could finally stay seated and have a little peace and quiet.