Garibaldi v. Fruit Shortcake aka What Diet?

In which I pretend to be getting my recommended fruit servings for the day...

and continue to review British/Irish products...

I found Garibaldi biscuits in Myers of Keswick, but the Fruit Shortcake was in a nearby Astoria Key Food.  Score one point for Fruit Shortcake!

Still, Garibaldi is less crumby.  One for Garibaldi!

Hold up.  I hate competitions.  It's bad enough I've been choosing favorite books of the month; why should I subject my biscuits to such scrutiny?

Anyway, it's not really a matter of comparison.  Some items are better on a given day, depending on mood or craving.  These two types of biscuits are similar enough: they've both both curranty middles that are slightly sticky but not really messy.  The main difference is the Fruit Shortcake seems little more buttery in taste and Garibaldi is more oatey and crispy.  The Garibaldi gets nicknames like 'squashed fly biscuits', obviously because of its look, so if you're squeamish about that sort of thing, I'd go for the Fruit Shortcake instead.  But Garibaldi has an excellent dunkability, particularly in tea.  Not everyone goes in for dunking, I know.  I get grossed out when bits of biscuit break off and make a soggy mess at the bottom of a mug - blorging just thinking about it - but I love the dunked taste once in a while.  So, architecturally I know which to choose when I'm hankerin' for a dunkin'.

Either one will only be good if you like raisins.  If you don't I'd go with Jammie Dodgers.

An Update is in Order...

So it's been a month since my last post, and in the past year or so my posts have been erratic. I thought I'd explain why, and maybe do a brief rundown of what I've been up to.

Don't worry, it won't get too personal!!!

In fact, the biggest problem has been technical.  I had a poor excuse for a laptop - actually it was a netbook - which became a test of patience to work with.  It was so slow!  At first I thought I just had a bad Internet connection at home, then I thought I needed to clean up my computer, but any steps I took in these directions did little or nothing to improve the speed.  It was just a bad computer to work with, plain and simple.  There were few alternatives, though.  My tablet, and my phone, are not ideal for writing more than a paragraph.  So I kept the posting to a minimum, or when I knew I could do little things around the house while pictures were loading.  Finally, the netbook got to a point where it took twenty minutes simply to open a document, and I knew it was beyond time for a replacement.  Having taken care of that, I hope to make a better showing from now on.

Then there's the organizational bit.  When I first started this blog - waaaaay back in 2005 - it was more of a mixed bag.  Then a few years ago I thought I'd narrow it down, mainly to a tea blog.  I started to compartmentalize, started other blogs, relegated certain things to other social media, and so on.  This was, and is, fine up to a point.  But then I started to over-think, I think.  When I wanted to write about something, I'd stress over whether it was appropriate to put it here, especially if it had nothing to do with tea.  Then I thought, well, when I have tea with friends do I spend the entire hour or so talking about tea?  Of course not!  So why can't Taking Tea With Catherine be about other things, once in a while?  After all, there's nobody paying me to write Only About Tea.  So maybe I'll lighten up a little.

Speaking of money - ugh - when you're paid to write, you tend to have deadlines.  Well, I don't have that problem, do I?  Consequently, sometimes I need to push myself.  I write for pleasure, and even if I did get paid, I hope I'd enjoy doing so, but as I'm my own boss on this site it's easy to procrastinate.  I have drafts that go back months, and someday I'll get to all of them.  (hopefully before they're completely out of date!)

So there's my reasons and excuses.  Now, the brief update.

There's not much happening worth remarking on.  I've been on Staycation this week, and had a scare when an upstairs apartment had a fire.  Thankfully my place wasn't damaged, but I feel for the neighbors, and it made the threat of fire real to me.  I still have the two cats, though Moofer is sick with kidney disease and I have to give him subcutaneous fluids on a daily basis.  That's a needle in his skin, by the way.  At first, he didn't seem to notice the needle, only the inconvenience of me holding him down for a few minutes.  Now he seems to feel it, so it's more of a struggle, but it's worth it if it keeps him alive and relatively healthy.  I don't have any travel plans, as I'm broke between a root canal, Moofer bills and the laptop.  Though I get the travel bug from time to time, I remind myself that some people never get to go away, and this is only a temporary setback.  Plus, and for me this is a big plus, I always have my books to take me away!

Now I'll leave you with some shots of the adventures of Moofer, Zenobia and the Bookshelves:

/Can I join you?

No. Go Away.

Who asked you?