GMA, Sports,

Poor Matt, he watches Good Morning America regularly. Today the first part was about your current political situation with outtakes from what I assume was a debate last night. The second half was about the Super Bowl in which he has no interest either. Not a good start to his Sunday morning. We once went to a Super Bowl party when we lived in NC. Neither of us know anything about American Football but I kind of understood it when our host kindly tried to explain what was happening. I am not sure Matt even went near "the box" that day. Now English football, or what North Americans refer to as soccer, is a different matter although he doesn't think much of the way the players behave these days. They lay down on the field and die for the tiniest bump. When Matt played soccer they didn't have team replacements. If anyone was injured badly enough they were sent off and the team had to continue short handed. He once tried out for a professional soccer club - in those days they didn't pay players the fortunes they get now - unfortunately he tore the cartilage in his knee. When I first met Matt he still played soccer occasionally for the Borstal (YA) team. He will tell you, at the drop of a hat, how very active he was starting early with gymnastics where he ended up teaching others, he also swam, played water polo, soccer, Badminton, tennis with his ex wife etc. etc. When I first met him he was teaching SCUBA diving for the British Sub Aqua club where I had gone to learn. When we emigrated to Canada he took up golf which he played for many years until those many years caught up with him. Hey, even I played golf for a number of  years. I nearly forgot, he took up cross country skiing too, as did I. That, of course, ended when we went down to NC to live.

Updating our bed bug saga. It doesn't seem to me that the visit of the pest control did very much at

all. I am still getting eaten alive and dreading going to bed at night. Not that, I understand, bedtime is the only time they bite. If they are hungry, they eat. However, as they mostly stay close to beds that is where they get their munchies. I bought myself some Polysporin itch medication because the bites were driving me mad. It works pretty well I must say. I do wish there was something I could spray on myself to discourage them though. The exterminators are coming back on Thursday. Meanwhile I am quite sure that bugs are running from our neighbour into our apartment. We are spraying our door and the hall carpet in order to prevent this. We bought a bug spray from a local store. It's called Blaze Pro and seems to be working pretty well.

A friend of mine, from a cookery group, posted the following recipe the other day. She said everyone asked for the recipe when she made it for dinner guests. I haven't even tried to consider how many calories are in this dessert. I might say, I couldn't cut and paste the copy of the recipe so I patiently typed it all out switching back and forth only to discover, on looking for a picture, that there were a number of versions online. Only one trouble making it on this side of the pond, our cream is not nearly as thick as that of the UK, or as far as I know, Europe in general. It has a much higher fat content. I am not, as so many think, talking about clotted cream, but everyday cream which can be bought in stores or used to be delivered by the milkman - if there is such a thing any more. If one visited the Channel Islands, the cream there was quite yellow it was so thick. I remember visiting an aunt in Jersey and she produced trifle for dessert. I thought "how stingy, she hasn't topped the custard with cream". She had, it was virtually custard colour. Delicious.

Irish Coffee Trifle


Deep layers of bliss.

100 g Sponge Fingers
150 ml Bailey's Irish Cream
150 ml Espresso Coffee
100 g Hazelnuts, skinned
400 ml Double Cream
200 g Marscapone
Vanilla (a splash or a knife point of seeds)
25 g Dark Chocolate

1. Put 100 g sponge fingers into a serving bowl and pour over 150 ml Bailey's and 150 g strong espresso.Leave to soak.

2. Toast 100 g hazelnuts and chop them in half. Whip 200 ml cream to soft folds then fold in 200 g of marscapone and most of the chopped nuts. Spread this mixture over the sponge fingers and refrigerate.

3. Softly whip another 200 ml cream, flavour it with a little vanilla or a knifepoint of vanilla seeds then spread it over the marscapone mixture. Leave covered in the fridge for an hour (20 minutes will do in an emergency).

4. Scatter the remaining nuts over the trifle. Melt 35 g dark chocolate in a bowl set over simmering water then trickle and splash the chocolate over the cream layer. Refrigerate a few minutes, just long enough to let the chocolate go crisp and then bring to the table.

Servings: 6

Have a great day