i might consider doing these things, but then again, perhaps i won't: 2010

That time again (hmmmm, de ja vu all over again?) where I list those things I might like to vaguely consider doing, but then again, no pressure if I do not, in 2010.

• 2010 will be the big year of hard core savererering. No more puzzling at what happened to the YTD earned when we look at our pay slips - because it will mostly all be going into the bank.
  
• Compleat Don's sweater before the end of January. Keep up with the knitting (loving it - thanks again for the push, my beloved Harriet). Aim toward a garment a month (fortunately, hats can be considered garments).
  
• Accept that I am not going to learn Italian any time soon, but that I will definitely return to Roma in the not to distant future (despite not chucking any euro-cents in the Trevi Fountain)
  
• Keep on silkscreening and learn the photo-emulsion method
  
• Make that quilt I've been planning (and have had the fabric for) for the past 7 years
  
• Sew at least one article of clothing - preferably that skirt
  
• Extend adjectival vocab (yes, I know) carried forward - for the last several years
  
• Get the hell out of Marie Celeste at a reasonable time each day
  
• Stop swearing. I know, y'all have fallen down at that one. I do think it unbecoming of a woman of my advanced age.
  
• Keep up the most exellent work at the gym
  
• Continue with my reading project - so far has been a hoot! After the Live & Let Die memoir, I love Roger Moore even more (ha!) than I would have thought possible. And cannot quite believe I've not read Ngaio Marsh for a whole year, but is true - my goodness that year did go fast </old lady>.
  
• A Big Project - details of which will be revealed at a later time.
  
  

On reflection a lot of these seem to involve the feminine arts, I admit that I do have a bit of a yearning to embrace my crafty roots (or embrace my old ladyness).

the one that went

That time of the year again (cue: I cannot believe it went so quickly and the usual things one says at this time) where we see how I progressed with those things that I might have considered doing in 2009, but which were not resolutions in any way, shape or form:

• I will not spend a whole year reading (and re-reading) Ngaio Marsh novels to the exclusion of all else ACHIEVED
  
• Continue our experiments in cooking (this has really been working quite well) carried forward ACHIEVED
  
• Continue the efforts to save lots o' cash (has also been working quite well, except for that minor art-buying hiccough - and the new small art-buying hiccough which is about to occur next week) Well, we have some savings, but in general: FAIL
  
• Keep up the gym thing (min 3 days a week) carried forward ACHIEVED
  
• Leave the office at least once per day (even if only for 5 minutes) and take a mental health day every once in a while. I have taken Dishy Boss's excellent lead and blocked out my calendar every day for lunch, because I work with the sort of morons who book meetings during lunchtime. Considering that I went batshitcrazy during the year & had to see a therapist: FAIL
  
• Go on some sort of honeymoon! (or at least a faux wedding night) I guess we could consider or Melbourne visit as qualifying: ACHIEVED
  
• Have more adventures, of all sorts. carried forward
  
• Do not spend every evening zonked out in front of the computer and not engaging with what I am mindlessly scrolling/clicking through Oh dear - FAIL
  
• Use Gertrude the macbook for more than browsing (ie refamiliarise myself with the mac os)
  
• Blog moar carried forward Well, a bit. I still loathe the MacOS with the power of 1K firey suns: ACHIEVED
  
• Use "splendid" and "neat" a whole lot more in conversation (and maybe even "smashing" or "keen"). "Cool" and "awesome" becoming somewhat tired, I think. carried forward Why do I always forget this one? FAIL
  
• Consolidate and organise the now even more enormous itunes libraries carried forward And then the backup music drive died, so am glad I didn't waste that effort ... but, FAIL
  
• Do not promise to send emails within a certain time frame because I invariably will not do so (particular apologies to Harriet and my Lesbian Lover) Sorry guys, FAIL
  
• Italian lessons FAIL
  
• Throw out every horrible piece of white or beige granny underwear that I own. This follows on from "and she just wore these horrible bras all the time..." (scroll down), despite buying a whole lot of new stuff, I keep reverting to the ghastly - I figure if they aren't there, I won't be able to wear them.ACHIEVED - multiple times. Note to self: stop buying granny undies
  

All in all, not too bad really. And not too bad of a year, except for the crazy bit - which in hindsight was for the best, am in a much better place as a consequence. Thanks universe!

Next up: the 2010 list.

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practical / impractical

Impulse buy from the B&P¹


Water flask.

I adore it because it fits in my pocket and doesn't take up too much room in my bag. Also, from a distance, it may have people thinking I'm swilling vodka or gin at 9am.

Don't adore it because it really isn't quite enough water for anything but a very quick journey.


¹Our closest convenience store, so named for the bongs and porn which were once plentiful behind the counter when I first moved here - now, sadly, a generic convenience chainand the bongs and porn are long gone, but the name remains.

more stuff in my letterbox

I swear this is the most enthusiastic home delivery menu I have ever seen.



From Lat-Dior in Newtown. The various dishes contained within have the following descriptions: Very succulent! Very Nice! Tangy! Delicious! Healthy and Energizing! Different! Very Aromatic! Very tasty! Quite cooling! Quite green in appearance! Lovely!

It! has! the! effect! of! making! me! speak! in! exclamation! marks! though!

I think my favourite dish description is: 13. Sossou Gorgiguan: Very Tasty! Has to be tested to be believed. (Originally from Senegal, the work [sic] "Gorgiguan" means literally "homosexual" in Wollof). Fresh and boneless tuna, steamed with some mild African spices, like netetou and tamarind.

Gay tuna? Awesome!


We're totally going after Mom leaves (because everything on there does sound kinda fabulous) - will report back.



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apart from some new oven gloves

Wandered out today and used our Xmas dosh (thanks to Mom and my Aunt) and acquired the final weapon in our kitchen arsenal:


30cm (7.6 litre) cast iron flame-proof casserole.

We'd planned to go with a different brand, but when we saw the kitchenaid ones were 50% off (!) and had much more practical design features (such as handles one can actually grab), we were sold!

Of course, then we arrived home, looked on teh internets and saw that the same casserole which cost $489.95 here, retails for US$150 in the US. Truly, it is not only books where we antipodeans are completely screwed over.

But we are pleased with it nonetheless - roll on winter and comfort food!

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shiny, shiny, bad times behind me

Stuck on tight with sticky tape.



Seen on the way to the Salt Mines.

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quest

Since May, I've been searching each grocery store I encounter and finally, success!



Delightful!


Naturally, I bought all the boxes on the shelf (of course this means that I will now see them everywhere).

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a slightly delayed post: 14

To celebrate Bessie's 14th birthday, we gathered as many candles as we could muster (43) and planted them in our favourite chocolate cake (was planning to link, but recipe appears to have been removed from the taste.com.au site - luckily we have a printed version!!).



She'll still always be our baby.


As our next crafting activity, we're planning on fashioning one giant perpetual birthday candle from all the remnants.

Note to self: source wick.

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babies

My parenting philosophy has always been: do the opposite to my parents.

Thus, leave teenagers the hell alone.





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die luft der freiheit weht

We really needed Phil to make a set...



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inheritance

For Christmas dinner, we got out the good china and the good silverware. That is a sentence I really never thought I'd write, for if you'd told me I'd have "good china" or "good silver", I'd have laughed merrily - that sort of thing just isn't my style.

But thanks to Mom, it is now my style. And very pretty it is too. Makes one feel rather grown up.

Enjoy our Christmas snaps feat. the good china and silverware (monogrammed, no less).











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christmas crafting

Given that gifts have been disseminated, I can now share the fruits of my crafting - admittedly much less crafting than I would like, I'm really keen to go back to the days when I made almost all of my gifts - perhaps next year...

First, Mom's scarf!



I was well pleased with how this turned out. Mom absolutely loved it and really adored the colour (lesson learned: any colour that Joan likes, Mom will like - something about Taureans). I used the isobel pattern here with a couple of extra repeats (and no fringe, obv). Would highly recommend - very easy to follow and memorise, blocking was a bit of a pain though - first thing I'd blocked that did not involve a plate). I'd like to particularly thank Jessica Fletcher for her most excellent company during the making of this gift.

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Joan tends to receive the majority of the family in-joke gifts. Her card this year will only be understandable to the most hardcore Seinfeld fan:

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Next: Joan's shirt (another complicated family in-joke):



From roughly the first day they met, Joan has been fairly relentless in teasing Don about his "fancy university" (which, of course, makes Don don [ha!] his "fancy university" apparel at strategic moments). When Phil and Smilla were visiting, we learned Phil had all manner of "Stanford Dad" paraphenalia which we found both hilarious and somewhat odd. So, in the absence of an appropriate shirt being available for purchase - I created one. Yay for silkscreening! Again, I'm way chuffed with the result, but after all that work with the scalpel, I really am motivated to get into photo emulsion.

I plan to obtain a photo of Don and Joan in their respective Stanford shirts when Joan awakens from her Christmas nap.

Next post: the inheritance.
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reliance

Is terrible when twitter is dead and one cannot write pithy comments on the way home from boozy Xmas lunch 3 - especially when one is without headphones.

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wood (or a $200 DJs voucher)

Today saw 5 years at Marie Celeste (formerly Land of Freaks, Acronyms and Meetings).

The humanity!

Back in the day, I was sure I'd last less than three months.

5 days in.

To celebrate, I got to pretend I was DishyBoss in a senior management meeting.

The admin chicky is going places.


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passing on the m4d sk1llz

Recently I've dragged out the supplies which have been packed away for about 10 years and have been teaching Bessie to silk-screen.

Our first project was a single colour print of her current fave band (Joan is horrified because she would never have been permitted to listen to such dreadful mainstream stuff) on a couple of Don's old white tee-shirts and a pillowcase.



Last weekend we dragged out the supplies again for a her Design & Tech work - a shirt to match the argyle print pyjama shorts she is making for textiles.









We've been very much of the stencil method because it is cheap, doesn't require a terrible lot of materials and is comparatively simple, but I'm super-eager to give photo-emulsion a bash and am toying with the idea of a silk-screen short course next year.

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stuff in my letterbox (2)

Just ... what?


A quite small (7cm x 5.2 cm) flyer (can you call it a flyer if it is so tiny?) found amongst the mail today.

The origin is unclear, well apart from the obvious right-wing batshit-craziness, but that right-wing batshit-craziness could take either Labor, Liberal or Independent form.


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