Paying off the house

Today we sent off the check for paying off the house. Now we'll see how long it all takes to wander through the system.

Kaye spent the morning taking the meat off a shoulder of lamb that we bought on sale shortly after we arrived. When it was about done, she thought that it's a silly savings not to buy the meat already boned and chunked. About two-thirds of the chunks went into a lamb vindaloo; the rest will appear on the menu later in the week. Tomorrow the bones and bits will get simmered up into a broth for some kind of soup (lamb-barley?). The vindaloo simmered on the fuel heater all afternoon and was quite yummy. Ed thought that it was especially good since we'd taken the meat from the bones ourselves. Kaye thinks the heater added a je-ne-sais-quoi, and that Ed should take up butchering as his next profession.

Very unexpectedly, Lydia liked the vindaloo. She ordinarily won't touch anything that's been near garlic (6 cloves) or that has spices in it (vindaloo, by definition). She ate the first offering of a tiny bit of meat and sauce, then prettily begged her way into several more servings. Who can tell?

It's turned pretty cold again, but there's no wind so the house is not unreasonably cold. There was a bit of fine granular snow in the air this morning, but nothing much came of it.

The birds have finally discovered the feeder and empty it in about a day. We wonder if we're now seeing tits, chaffinches, and greenfinches that have migrated down from Amstelveen and recognize their old feeder.