Bacon butties

I must be entering my second childhood, as Shakespeare would have it. For roughly the last 35 years I have been buying multigrain bread (invented long ago by the Germans as Vollkorn bread) with the view that it was an improvement over the white bread of my youth. But lately I have reverted to white bread.

To me white bread seems to go well in making up a bacon butty. I get a couple of slices of short-cut bacom, whizz them in the microwave for about 30 seconds and slap them between a couple of well-buttered slices of white bread. That has been my late supper for a little while now - "late" as in around midnight.

Although eminently satisfactory, that is of course a very simple repast so I call it a "butty", in honour of a famous food item well known North of Watford -- where chip butties seem to be a mainstay. I have never had a chip butty and they seem to be just about unknown in Australia but I think my repast has similar stark simplicity.

The "u" in butty is pronounced as in "bully" -- from "butter" as pronounced in both Northern England and Germany. Germans in fact would call the same thing a "Butterbrot", where "Brot" is bread.

Not all change is for the better

As any old fogey (such as myself) will tell you.

A rather crazy instance of that which has finally intruded into my consciousness is that my modern 3-in-1 printer only takes about a quire of paper at a time.

Whereas in the "good old days" of continuous stationery you would go through about 4 reams before you had to add paper. It's a big difference and the limited feed of my current printer does sometimes catch me out because of that

I guess I have old habits that die hard

(For those who have forgotten their school lessons: 24 sheets = 1 quire; 20 quires = 1 ream)

Poetry night

It has recently become clear to me that Paul is at least as sentimental as I am: He has a real feeling for things of the past. So I thought that he would enjoy it if I introduced him to canonical English poetry -- which, sadly, is almost totally neglected in the schools these days.

So we got together for a curry dinner at my place, with Susan and Anne very kindly going to fetch the curry for us from my usual curry place.

The canon is of course enormous -- probably best defined by Arthur Quiller Couch's 1912 "Oxford book of English verse" -- which OUP have recently brought back into print after futile efforts to revise it -- sadly for the rare book trade.

So what I tried to do was pick out just a few personal favourites: Wordsworth's Daffodils; Donne's Death; Coleridge's Ancient Mariner; Grey's Elegy; Hunt's Abou ben Adhem; Blakes's Tiger etc. -- and of course the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.

It was almost entirely new to Paul and Susan but they both got a heap out of it and I enjoyed reading it to the assembled company. A relevant picture below. Note my Namatjiras in the background!

At my request Susan made us a Spotted Dick for dessert, and produced a gourmet version of it, of course. Last time I heard Paul was on his third helping! Those who know Paul will not be surprised by that.



Videos here

Ode to a tablecloth

This is undoubtedly a bit mad but I thought I should mention the role of my "miracle tablecloth" in our dinners at my place. It is a very fancy white lacy tablecloth made of some synthetic material of Chinese origin. And it is IMPERVIOUS to curry stains -- which can be pretty serious stains. And by the time of my poetry night everybody was quite used to it. So while there were quite a few curry spills onto the tablecloth on the night, nobody paid that any heed. They knew that I just toss the cloth in the washing machine and it comes out as bright as ever. Susan tried to buy one like it but could not so it is a bit of a rarity.

Joe's 24th

Yesterday evening was a celebration of Joe's 24th birthday. He came up from Canberra for the weekend. The dinner was for 7pm but a few of us accumulated at my place beforehand. That gathering was a very typical one for us: With everybody clustered around computers. That was mainly because we wanted to Skype Vonnie into the dinner from New Zealand and we had to set up Skype on a laptop to do it.

It took quite a while but between Paul and Joe we eventually got it done. Paul's Susan also sat down and helped with some aspect of the process at one stage. Anne and I however remained bystanders, even though it was Anne's laptop that we set it up on. Her laptop was the only one with a wireless connection to the net.

There were 15 of us at dinner. I had invited more but some were out of town and some had other commitments. And the person who probably talked most to everybody was Von -- via Skype from New Zealand. She (or the laptop) got passed all around the table. It was a pleasure for both her and us to have her present despite the physical distance between us.

We had the dinner at my local curry house as usual and their food and service was first class as usual. I had my usual Balti lamb and Joe had his usual chicken Korma. We both like to stick to knowns.

Joe said a few words to the gathering, remarking that whenever he was down in Canberra and thinking about his family he always thought of us sitting around a long table in that restaurant.


The birthday boy with his Nanna


Ken and Maureen with grand-daughter


Paul with his gorgeous wife

Praise for the South of the South Island

From Lady Von in deepest New Zealand

It seems the locals are finding us amusing as we are having so much fun in this small quiet country town. I can't even count on my hands how many times I have been asked "Why did you move to Lumsden of all places?" Many of the locals don't realise what they have here because they have been so spoilt with their lifestyle for so long. Here is a list of why Lumsden:

* 4 distinctive seasons including snow to enjoy and look forward to

* No traffic to worry about

* 3 Towns and 1 City only an hours drive away in each direction to go shopping

* Cheap seafood and great tasting food that is cheap

* Many places to go fishing

* Cheap and tasty Beer and even tastier Wine

* Endless activities for the kids to enjoy

* Endless activities for the adults to enjoy, skiing, Bushwalking, Duck shooting (if you are in to that)

* Spectacular views wherever we look

* Friendly strangers who take the time while walking past our house to pick up our wheelie bin that fell over accidently when the bin man came and place it neatly back at the fence.

Usually I don't need to give the locals the full list before I start to see a small smirk appear on their face when they realise I am right.

I don't dislike Brisbane where I grew up, I have fond memories of my childhood with warm summer days spent swimming and the smell of the summer storms, I just don't feel excited by it anymore.

In New Zealand I am like a child discoving life again and all the glorious small little things that the locals take for granted are a great joy to us and we can't help but show our excitement.


Enjoying a snowfall


The fireplace


Dressups with Hannah

Pasta marinara

As she usually does, Jill gave me a Sunday lunch for my birthday, with Anne and Lewis also present. And she served up some excellent pasta marinara followed by pavlova, one of my favourite desserts.

Mainly through sheer determination, Lewis has made a great recovery from his stroke and can now drive again.

It was the first time I had been to Jill's new place at Middle Park since she moved in. She downsized from her Riverhills place but has still got a very gracious home. We had lunch on the patio with lots of greenery around so it was very pleasant.

Lewis's sense of humour was obviously not damaged by his stroke as he gave me a rather remarkable object for a birthday present. So it was a rather light-hearted lunch with the only serious bits being the expected excoriation of Julia Gillard.

Thai food

My birthday celebrations today were a little different. NANNA organized a dinner for me at her local Thai restaurant. And the big crowd at the restaurant told you all you needed to know about the food. My judgment that it was first class was clearly shared by many others. I had pork with garlic and pepper.

And how many men get a dinner given to them by their 87-year old mother in law? I think it shows Nanna's good nature at least. Nanna also gave me a present in the form of a cushion with a wool cover on it that she had crocheted herself. It was in the very attractive soft colours that you only get with wool.

Paul, Susan, Jenny and Anne were also there and Paul in his usual way kept us all on our toes with his thoughts about the world and life in general. He really has an enquiring mind and is always looking for rules and regularities in life that explain why things are as they are.

We also talked a fair bit about politics as we have done ever since the last couple of elections. We were all agreed that Julia Gillard is on the wrong track and speculated about the likelihood of her getting her carbon tax through parliament. I pointed out that is far from a done deal and even speculated that the Greenies might jack up at the last moment -- as they did for Kevvy's ETS. Julia's poll ratings are so low that it seems clear that her party will want to dump her before the next election -- but probably only just before the next election.

After dinner we went back to Jenny's place for tea and coffee and I talked about how kids these days have been robbed of their cultural heritage by today's schools. As Paul is particularly sentimental, that has been a big loss for him so we agreed that he and I would get together more regularly so I could do something to introduce him to the literature -- particularly the great poets -- of the past.

Paul thinks Vonnie is pretty sentimental too so we might skype her in on any such meetings if she wants to be there.

We also talked about religion and how most people do have some religious beliefs -- so people who have been brought up as atheists -- as Paul and the twins were -- have missed out on a significant part of what it means to be human. That is of course an irrecoverable loss but Paul is determined that his kids will have the chance of that experience. He wants to send them along to Sunday school from an early age so they grow up at least knowing what religion is all about.

I suppose it shows how well we all get along as a family that we spent most of the night talking perfectly amicably about the two things you are NOT supposed to talk about: Religion and politics.

HAGGIS!

Thanks to kind friends, my birthday celebrations generally stretch over a week. This year, however, they are all clustered on this weekend.

Tonight it was just Anne and I dining together with Anne having prepared some of my favourite foods.

We had some large South Australian oysters from the shell to start and then we went on to haggis with neeps and tatties, washed down with a bottle of my usual Seaview champagne. As usual, Anne did the neeps to perfection. And for dessert? Rhubarb crumble. Heaven!

As a present, Anne bought me a deafie's phone -- one where you can turn the volume up. It is sure to be useful as my hearing aids are not up to much -- even though I paid $7,000 for them!

I was also pleased to get quite a lot of birthday good wishes via Facebook and email

Hannah's first snow

It's getting cold over there in the shaky Isles but Hannah likes it



After growing up in sub-tropical Brisbane, Paul, Von and Suz have always found snow exciting and Hannah inherits that

In Brisbane at the moment you can walk around in undergarments only in the middle of the day -- and that's midwinter

Gloom

I am normally pretty buoyant in mood and not much bothers me. Anybody reading these memoir notes should detect a fair bit of jocularity at times. But I can be bothered sometimes. And today was one of those times.

I have had an awful lot of surgical procedures to get rid of skin cancers lately and today I had two more bad bits excised. I was not looking forward to it. A lot of excisions don't bother me if they are in places that are not too awkward but both today were awkward so it all felt a bit too much when I woke up this morning.

Fortunately, my appointment was for 10:30am so I didn't have a lot of time to dwell on it before I went in. My mood has gradually improved during the day but both wounds are a bit sore so I am not expecting a very comfortable night tonight.

I have already made a booking for the next lot of surgery in 3 weeks time. Hopefully I might have a bit of a break after that.

During my younger days I did set aside money for a "rainy day" so it helps a lot that I can now afford top flight private medical care. And it is a judgment on the "free" government hospital system that there are private hospitals all over the place in Brisbane. Around 40% of Australians have private health insurance so can afford to use private hospitals. One of the best private hospitals is only ten minutes drive from where I live (the Wesley) and that is where I go.

Afer many years of it, I have become something of a connoisseur of plastic surgery -- an unenviable distinction! And the man I go to is in my judgment the best in town. And others must think so too as his fees are three times higher than the government-approved fees.

Such fees do however have one effect that is very helpful to me. His waiting list is very short. I can get an appointment at very short notice. And that is exactly what you need when you are battling cancer. Some of my skin cancers are fairly aggressive so getting them excised within weeks rather than months of their appearing does potentially mean the difference between life and death. And getting rid of them promptly certainly improves my comfort levels.

So when I arrived at the surgery today I was in a first class environment receiving not only expert treatment but also very polite, cheerful and considerate treatment. After having been there many times before I know the staff there pretty well and felt I was among friends. So that helped my mood considerably.

And not being bound by bureaucratic rules and procedures helped too. I had an appointment for only one excision today but another growth had popped up only days ago and was bothering me so I asked the surgeon to get it out too -- which he promptly did.

The importance of a common culture

This very small note is a reflection on something that happened over an excellent Yugoslav dinner that Anne made me at her place tonight. Not only were the cevapi cooked to perfection but Anne had even managed to get hold of some kaimak, which is VERY hard to find in Brisbane. But cevapi without kaimak are incomplete, of course.

We usually go to Vince's place for breakfast once a week and Vince's offerings are bad news for slimmers. They would tempt anyone off the strait (not straight) and narrow path of dietary virtue.

We were talking about this when Anne remarked that she particularly liked one of Vince's humbler offerings: Savoury mince. And it is certainly true that Vince's chefs do a better savoury mince than your mother ever cooked. Anne watches her weight to some extent however (I watch mine too but do nothing about it. I just watch) so she remarked that Vince's savoury mince is rather a big meal and she hesitates to order it for that reason.

I responded: "You don't have to eat it all, you know". As the one who pays for it I am in a good position to make that comment.

Anne however looked at me in shock. She explained that in her upbringing everybody ate EVERYTHING on their plate. We then both had a laugh about that and remarked how old habits and customs have a lot of influence.

And, as it happens, I well understood the rules under which Anne was operating. When I grew up, "waste not; want not" was the watchword too. Though I was always described by my mother as having "hollow legs" (i.e. a big appetite) so I always ate up everything anyway (except liver).

But the point of this short meditation is that Anne and I have a common culture: Queensland country town under Protestant influence. And that common culture eases our interactions constantly. To use a rather trite modern phrase we really do know where each other "is coming from".

And it's interesting that our backgrounds are not formally identical. Anne's mother was a Salvationist and her father came from a Gospel Hall background. And my background is of course Presbyterian. At the time Anne and I were growing up, however, a general Protestant culture and theology had emerged -- so people switched between churches without much thought for denomination. The Salvation Army, for instance, was very heavily against alcohol and gambling but so were Methodists and Presbyterians.

And Anne was true to her Salvation Army background in that she did for some time in her youth sing on street corners with the Army, in the now far-off days when they still did that. And I of course regard that phase as a mark of great distinction in her life history. I have great admiration for the Sallies. So despite superficial dissimilarities, our core culture is just about identical. So we understand one-another to a far greater degree than we would without that common background, even though neither of us is religious these days.

And culture can trump theology sometimes. These days you will not hear the doctrine of predestination preached from any pulpit that I am aware of. Yet it is a perfectly scriptural doctrine. See Ephesians chapter 1.

But although the doctrine is treated with some embarrassment by the clergy these days, it lives on unabated among the people of the church. I remember both my mother and my aunties saying to me: "It was all planned out before we were born, John".

So when Anne says of something "It was meant to be", what I hear is not any doctrinal statement but rather an assurance that I am among my own people.

A baby shower

Susan is well along in her pregnancy now and all looks to be going well so she and Paul put on a baby shower this afternoon at their Daisy Hill place -- and they did get showered with many things for the baby -- including a toy Dalek which Paul seemed inclined to keep for himself.

Susan is a talented and hard working cook so the spread she put on was legendary. I think I tried most things but my favourite was the Pavlova. Maureen would understand that.

There was a friend of Susan's there who had her little 18 months old boy with her. He and I hit it off very well and his mother looked a bit worried that she might lose him at one stage. He kept coming back for more games and eventually sat on my knee for a fair bit.

The coming back for more reminded me of certain other children who used to come back saying: "Come on John, More John, More"

And, wonder of wonders, I won the door prize. I normally don't win anything. But that might be because I don't go in for much.

Songs of yesteryear

Anne remarked recently that a lot of the songs we enjoy listening to would be unknown to the young people of today and we both thought what a pity that was.

I decided that I could at least introduce Paul and Susan to such songs so that at least they would have some of the pleasure that we oldies find in the songs that we have grown to treasure over the years.

So I arranged one of my "educational" nights again -- this time not devoted to anything serious but simply to playing some old favourite songs which Paul and Susan mostly had not heard.

We started off with a curry dinner on the verandah as usual and then adjourned to my computer for 10 minutes so I could play us two videos: George Formby singing "When I'm cleaning winders" and Joni Mitchell singing "Both sides now". Formby is still a very funny man and Joni's phrasing of her own song makes it a great work of art.

After that we moved to the sitting room for music off CDs. We started off with the incomparable Paul Robeson singing Ol' Man River and went on from there -- not forgetting Peter Dawson's brilliant rendition of The Floral Dance.

Some other songs that we played were Men of Harlech, the Holy City, The Battle Hymn of the Republic and How Great Thou Art. So it got a bit religious but I am a great fan of religious music. The fact that I was once very religious myself no doubt plays some part in that. And as William Booth said: "Why should the Devil have all the good tunes?"

At Anne's request I put on the hilarious "Blue Bird of Happiness". It is actually a quite wise song but lugubriously overstated. I was pleased to see that Susan had a smile on her face for a lot of it. She obviously saw the funny side of it.

Susan also provided an impressive confection for dessert, as she usually does, so that rounded off a very pleasant evening.

A small but congenial gathering

In conjunction with her birthday, Jenny had a few of us over to her place for a dinner on Saturday night. Present were Jenny & Nanna, Paul & Susan and Anne and myself.

The food was good and varied and Paul in his usual outspoken manner livened us all up. He is mightily stirred up about coal seam gas at the moment. He has shares in it but the Greenies are obstructing it. That has certainly pushed his views even further in a Rightward direction.

I put up a couple of quiz questions which some people got right but nobody guessed the pronunciation of Mungindi, an outback Australian town. Nanna even got the pronunciation of Tucson right. It probably shows how many cowboy movies she has seen.

News of Joe was of course sought so we were pleased to hear that Paul had been in touch. Paul thinks the world of Joe. Paul sometimes comes across as a bit abrasive but he has a very good heart. We expect to see Joe back in Brisbane on the weekend after his birthday.

A close encounter with a surgical laser

Owing to my extensive iatrogenic skin cancer, I require the services of the medical profession rather frequently. My GP (JQ) freezes off the more minor bits and my dermatological surgeon (RH) tackles the nastier bits. I have seen both of them such a lot that I am now on quite friendly terms with both.

Usually, whatever needs to be done can be done locally in the doctor's rooms but there are some bad bits that can only be tackled by a surgical laser -- and today was such a day. Accessing the laser is a big deal, however. You have to undergo all the checks, quizzes and tests prescribed by the hospital where it is located.

So I rocked up at N.W. Private hospital on time for admission at 4:30pm and went through their process. And despite the complexity of it all I was not kept waiting for more than minutes at any stage. I passed through the hands of about 6 people before I got to theatre but they had plenty of staff to attend to whatever was required. Brisbane private hospitals are like that: Immaculate and efficient with very attentive patient care. All covered by my private health insurance.

But when I finally got into theatre at about 6:30pm it was still a relief to see the friendly faces of RH and his head nurse. With the roar and clatter of a laser drilling at your face, it is a comfort to be sure that you are in competent hands. It was done under local so we actually chatted a fair bit during the procedure, as usual.

An amusing aspect of the chatter and banter was when it was noticed that I was (coincidentally) wearing maroon undershorts. Maroon is the colour of the Queensland team in the State of Origin football matches and the Queensland team had just won, as they usually do. So I was regarded as a fellow supporter of the team. And, as in most places, football is a big deal and support for the local team makes you a proper person. So I emerged with somewhat undeserved credit. I mentioned however that all four of my grandparents were born in Queensland so I got additional respect for that.

I was home by 7:30 and Anne made us an excellent dinner of lamb cutlets and salad, which we washed down with a bottle of Tyrell's excellent Verdelho, though I had only one glass, in consideration of post-operative requirements.

And despite that rather large bite out of my day, I still put all my blogs up as usual. You can't keep a good blogger down, even if he does have a few raw patches on his face and body. I was however not in pain at any stage so that helped.

An amusing night

I rarely comment on the dinners for two that Anne and I have together but tonight has to be an exception. Anne had an invisible cabbage and burnt the majority of the sausages (though not badly) and I knocked over a glass of wine, breaking it and spilling the contents onto my lap. So a good time was had by all, with lots of laughs!

Lamb cutlets

How many lamb cutlets should one cook up as a meal for two? My answer: 16

I am sure that is far more than is usually contemplated as they are rather dear these days, but I follow my own rules.

I find them delicious but they are individually so small that I have steadily upped the amount that I order. Note that a much esteemed French dish -- rack of lamb -- consists of only FOUR cutlets.

So tonight Anne cooked up 16 cutlets, of which I had just over half. And with a good salad, French dressing on the salad and a bread roll (thickly spread with REAL butter), I actually thought that I ate a dinner tonight that was as good a dinner as anybody else in the world was eating!

You might guess that I like French cutlets! They must of course be cooked medium to medium rare and need plenty of salt on them.

The Royal wedding

At some expense, Anne has bought a thick special issue of a women's magazine entirely devoted to colour pictures and information about the recent wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.

Spending time with an old Monarchist like me clearly has a corrupting influence! I entirely approve, of course. Courtesy of London's Daily Mail, I keep myself well-informed about the Royal family.

Anne liked Camilla's hat. And if you don't know who Camilla is you are just not with it at all, at all.



I myself thought that the best outfit of the occasion was the dress uniform of the Blues and Royals worn by Prince Harry.


(Prince Harry wore the Blues and Royals officer’s uniform in Dismounted Review Order, with a Forage Cap. He also chose not to wear a sword though the uniform did have sword slings)

The dress uniforms of the British military are in general rather splendid -- in keeping with the record of success of British arms.

And the Royal family are a military family so have every right to wear British military uniforms -- which they frequently do on formal occasions.

Mothers' day

Paul and his Susan put on an excellent brunch for Jenny and Nanna at their place and invited me along too.

Susan excelled herself by putting on a breakfast that had it all: bacon, black pudding, scrambed egg, chipolatas, blueberry pancakes and potato cakes. She also had a banana and nut sauce for the pancakes and icecream too. Quite remarkable and inventive. She is quite a cook. And in consideration of Jenny it was all gluten-free too. Neither Nanna nor I would try the black pudding though.

As Nanna will soon turn 87, we discussed a bit what people used to eat in her day and noted how she has arrived at her age in reasonable health despite having a diet for most of her life that would give food freaks the horrors. All meat in those days was fried in dripping (beef fat) so they got a heavy dose of fat practically EVERY DAY! These days only oldies even know what dripping is.

I was also interested to hear that Jenny's father was a successful fisherman during the Depression, so that helped them to survive the hard times fairly well. Fish in those days was mostly cooked in dripping too -- and the custom of covering it with batter made sure you got an extra heavy dose of animal fat! Batter soaks up fat.

We chatted quite a bit about politics -- with Ms Gillard's latest brainwave of sending illegal immigrants to Malaysia evoking many groans.

We asked around for news of Joe and I was able to provide a little. We all respect that this is his time for independence, though. We were all very pleased to note that his "addiction" is not to tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, heroin, cocaine or "speed" but rather to -- wait for it -- Milk! Many parents would envy that!

I drove the Humber out but was by myself as Anne was being entertained by one of her sons.

Hannah is now 5 months old

There's nothing cuter than a baby in a beanie!

Von has fond memories of the time when we all lived at Riverstone Rd. in Gordonvale. I think it shows that even at an early age she had good taste as I myself regard that house as the best I have ever owned.

She made some reference to it in her most recent email. We had a really good crop of lemons on the lemon tree at the time and I thought that maybe we should make lemonade from them. We did and then I had the idea that maybe we should do the American thing and get the girls to sell lemonade by the side of the road. So we set the girls up with a card table and some folding chairs by the side of the road with a sign offering lemonade for a dollar a cup (or was it 50c?)

That was a great hit. People driving past would see these two pretty little girls selling lemonade and would come to a screeching halt to buy some. They had never seen such a thing before so stopped mainly out of curiosity, I imagine. Even the local cop stopped to buy some. Riverstone Rd is the main road into Gordonvale so they had plenty of passing trade.

Everyone was of course very nice to them and they got to keep the money as well! So they had a lot of fun.

And Von remembers that episode with great fondness. One of my eccentric ideas has become a treasured memory for her. She has now planted a lemon tree so her daughter will one day be able to do the same.

UPDATE: Von advises as follows: "The Lemonade was 50c a glass and Susan and I saved the money we earned from the stand to spend at some show if I remember correctly. We used the little vegemite glasses, do you remember them?"

I do indeed remember Vegemite glasses: Once ubiquitous and always absurd. A purely Australian folly, I think. They were a sort of plague that you couldn't avoid.

UPDATE 2: Suzy has emailed me to say that the lemonade stand is one of her fondest memories from childhood too so I am glad that I thought to put the story online. At the time, I thought the idea up as a bit of fun, never dreaming that it would leave such a lasting impression

The Susans and the Simons

Having two Susans and 2 or 3 Simons in the family is a bit of a problem. In both speaking and in writing how do we know which one we are referring to? Context eventually bails us out of course but it would be nice to have more clarity from the beginning.

The Simons are easy: There's Vonnie's Simon, Tracy's Simon and George's Simon (though we haven't seen that Simon for a while).

But the Susans seem to be insoluble. "Paul's Susan" is not too bad but Paul does after all have two Susans: His wife and his sister. But that is not really a problem. When we say "Paul's Susan" everybody understands that the Susan concerned is his wife.

So how to we refer to Paul's sister? We could say "Russell's Susan" but that would not feel right as she was "our" Susan long before she was Russell's. Not that there is any disrespect to Russell in that. His devotion to Suzy is all we could ask. Suzy is precious to all her family so her having a husband who also regards her that way is a great relief. So we could refer to her by her married surname but who uses surnames in referring to family members?

The only other option is referrring to her as "Twinny Susan" and that sounds a bit wet. Definitely an insoluble problem. I think I usually refer to her as "Suzy" but not everyone else does or wishes to.