Washing a house, Winter Fair

Saturday morning I dealt with the tail end of this stage of the Mysterious Chunky Family thing, which involved me dressing the living areas and washing down the walls inside a house, and Shannon and my brother Tom washing down the walls on the outside of the same house and giving the gutters a scrub, becoming completely saturated in the process.

Grumpiness reigned, and there was much snappishness amongst the three of us. I've reached saturation for this project, spending all weekend slaving over the house as well as all week working, and I'm pretty sure that this is the same for the Boys too. This Saturday I was determined that I would only do a what was on my list of "Last minute sprucing" things. However, I kept finding more work for myself, culminating in the final and depressing decision that in order to sell the house I needed to paint all the walls and tear out the existing bathroom. Disheartening much?

At 2pm we went home so that we could spruce ourselves before meeting up with some of Shannon's friends who were coming out to Petone from town for the Petone Winter Carnival and to watch a rugby test.

The carnival was everything you've ever dreamed of in a suburban beach-front winter carnival i.e. hot chips and a giant fairground ride, and people setting fire to wooden sculptures on the beach half an hour after the scheduled burn-time (we suspected not enough firefighter supervision - or matches). It was, indeed "A wee bit shit". But in an awesomely, comforting, know-what-to-expect kind of way.

 

365DOP: Chicken Breasts with Lentils and Mashed Potatoes

Cross-posted from 365 Days of Peta.

This Insatiable dish is basically what it says on the packet, but with all the French-ified accoutrements that we've learnt to love from our Peta. As I'm writing this up, I'm looking over the recipe again and realise that the recipe also owes a lot to fusion cuisine, the dark time to which I've referred earlier. However, this is defo on the lighter end - essentially it is a French-style dish with a couple of Asian herbs thrown in for good measure.

How is it done?

The chicken: bresticles marinated in lots of Dijon mustard, lots of white wine, cumin and Vietnamese mint (in my case: regular mint because of the enormous mint tree at the back of the flat). Peta recommends at least two hours.

The marinade is reduced to make a sauce and the chicken is cooked in a fry pan, just a few minutes on each side. I seem to recall reading that, in terms of food poisoning, using the chicken marinade as a sauce is a terrible idea, so I was a bit hesitant to do this (as  in, didn't want to give my family salmonella).

Suffice to say, my trust in Peta was well rewarded. Not only did we all escape with our bottoms unscathed, but also OMG THE MOST DELICIOUS SAUCE EVER. The sauce was the highlight of the whole thing, as was agreed by Dad and Tom.

The lentils are cooked in a stock similar to the Smoked Fish and Puy Lentils dish that I made earlier: however, you can see that Peta has chilled out a bit with the ingredients, because the stock for these lentils is Kaffir lime leaves and spices (as oppose to umpteen vegetables that are later given the biff). I love lentils so hard, and I love that there are so many recipes of Peta's where she makes ample use of lentils.

Peta also notes that the French eat a lot of grains and pulses, and that Puy lentils are the créme de la créme. Shannon would agree.

In a fit of enthusiasm I also decided that there was nothing to be done but to follow Peta's mashed potato recipe. This is very different to how I would make mashed potatoes. Essentially, it's backwards - the potato is mashed and beaten into a pan of warm milk and olive oil.  This makes a fairly liquid mashed potatoes which I wasn't that impressed by, although my lack of a ricer or a mouli meant that it was a bit more lumpy than was ideal.

Conclusion:

I made this for my menfolk, and both Dad and Tom commented on how delicious it was - they don't usually gush but they definitely made a point of commenting on how good it was. I ate spoonfuls of the sauce while I was cooking and keep thinking about making it again. Maybe this weekend?

A++ for this one Peta!

(No pass mark for my food photography though. Does not do it justice.)

Arohanui on Thursday when I'm loving on stuff

(L-R) Claire Scully via Supersonic Electronic; via Audrey Hepburn Complex; Judith Braun via Supersonic Electronic; Maedchen in Uniform via All Things Amazing.

sing up some of my enormous stash of yarn. I think it's almost more exciting crafting out of the resources I have than going out and buying new yarn for each project. There is an element of challenge to finding the perfect project for all this yarn I have. In some cases the challenge is mostly in matching the yarns to make something multicoloured and non-hideous. At the moment I'm making a patchwork scarf for S (more about this tomorrow) and it's pretty much the perfect project for clearing a space in my stash drawers.

♥ Having my little brother Tom around for dinner. I feel as though I haven't seen him forever, and also I'm looking forward to pillaging his hard drive for episodes of Time Team that I haven't seen yet.

♥ Also in the family vein: hooray for a new baby cousin! 

♥ Rediscovering the Joy of Blogging. I've been having the most enormous blog cravings - to write enormous posts and to start new projects and to investigate everything I have tagged for blogging in my reader. Hence, the beautiful Drop Capital which comes via Jessica Hische. I'm intending to start taking some better photographs of my projects too - I've read an awesome article about photographing your Stuff on Craft.com recently, and it made me so excited. More photographs for the blog!

♥ Having heaps of food stashed away at work. Yesterday I nominated a "spend nothing" day and succeeded - I drank coffee and tea in the office and nibbled on the supplies I have in my desk. Toasted sandwiches were my special lunchtime friends. The initial plan in having all this food at work was to save some money but given that I do most of my food shopping for the office at expensive delicious Moore Wilsons I don't know how much this is working - though it is exciting having such a variety of food to hoe down on without having to venture into the freezing outside.

♥ Feeling in control of my spending. For the first time in an incredibly long time I feel as though I am in control of money, or at the very least, I know where it is all going. Dude it's totes empowering, and when I'm drooling over something I have no need for, the adrenaline rush that I get from keeping on top of things neutralises the Want also.

♥ Drooling over travel. I'm definitely feeling the itch and the debt repayments and savings I'm managing to do while living well makes me realise that travel IS a possibility. The next issue then is: WHERE TO GO? So many possibilities! So much excitement!

A Big Easter Weekend of Pottering Around - Easter Saturday

I just had a look at the list I published on Thursday, and I just have to say: OH MY GOD I SUCK SO MUCH. At sticking to weekend lists. Is this why I so rarely get things done? Ugh. I disgust myself. This is the list, with the relevant bits highlighted.

• I'm going to ride my bicycle down to and along the water front, I shall listen to Edith Piaf while riding in the sun and waving to the happy people.
• Then I shall have a coffee
• Then I shall go to the library and get out the entire BBC series of Pride and Prejudice. Hah! Any other suggestions for ridiculous girly long weekend watching?
• Then I shall come home and bake some chocolate cup cakes. And ice them with lavender coloured icing. I think that rose flavouring would be good too.
• And then I shall knit something ridiculous and watch episodes of Pride and Prejudice until my eyes pop out of my head.
• Dinner would be good too. I should make something elaborate. Some kind of roast perchance?

So, I'm looking at the list, and the first item is a big fat Fail; I definitely achieved the second (easy) so *one* achieve; didn't get to the library so no Pride and Prejudice *sad face*; I'm finishing making the cup cakes now and did most of them yesterday, a hesitant achieve; I made a ridiculous hat for myself that I finished at mum's this morning - achieve; and Tom is cooking dinner, so final item is achieve - because you can't fail when somebody else is cooking dinner for you and especially not if it's Tom's Lamb Curry.

Not that bad then! In fact, four achieves to two fails. OH MY GOD I SUCK SO MUCH; Oh My God I RULE So Much! Hah!

ALSO I completed a task from yesterday (food shopping) and went for a two hour skate with my derby girls at Upper Hutt Skating rink. Yay yay yay. Awesomeness. And I was taught new things to do and I terrorised small children and skated fast and made revolting sweat patches on my jeans.

I give myself a Four Out of Six Isn't Bad, and also a Tomorrow is Another Day. Where I shall finish my laundry before training at 3pm, in addition to that other stuff I wrote.

Arohanui

Things I love, for the first time in ages, and in an effort to neutralise some of my angst of the last week.

• Riding my velocipede along the waterfront at a leisurely pace on a sunny day. I like watching the people strolling, everyone seems to be in a good mood. I also like pulling up to a park bench on Oriental Parade and reading in the sun while listening to the sea. Yay!
• Baking cupcakes. I love the anticipation, the smell, and the fact I get to ice them afterwards, with ridiculous pastel coloured butter icing from a piping bag.
• New flatmate anticipation - don't get me wrong, there are many things *wrong* with the process of finding a new flatmate, but it is exciting to get to meet some new people and to think what they could potentially bring to your life as well.
• Living with my brother Tom. He's so quiet, keeps to himself so much, but he has an absolute heart of gold. He's taken to checking that I'll be home for dinner, and he makes good burritos.

• Being excited about Richter City Roller Derby's inaugural bout "The Grudgemaker". I am going to be MCing and I bought a suspender, fishnet stockings and false eyelashes the other day, to go with my new peacock blue and emerald green brocade 60s mini dress. I am going to have SO MUCH FUN. I've never worn false eyelashes. If you're in Wellington, you should totally come BTW.
• Having a great Shannon around.

 

(the photo is by the Polaroid Kidd, who seems to have taken his site down *sad face*)

Not my story

Earlier today Tom (presently on overnight shifts) was woken by a strange scratching sound from the kitchen. He wandered from his room next door to find that we'd partially caught a mouse: the trap had caught on its tail, and it was dragging the lump of plastic around behind it. When Tom came into the room the mouse tried to escape into a hole in a cupboard but the trap prevented its escape; it was too big to fit in the mouse-sized gap and wedged itself firmly on the wrong side of the hole, ultimately preventing the mouse from avoiding Tom's rodent-wrath.

Tom then gave the mouse to the neighbours cat, Elvira. This cat has recently lost quite a lot of weight and has become more enthusiastic about killing small animals. Clearly Tom supports Elvira's development programme.

I heard this story and it seemed quite slapstick (especially the bit about the mouse being prevented from escaping by the trap on its tail). Now that I've written it out I'm realising that the slapstick patina  belies the fact that it's quite cruel tragedy when perceived from the mouse-perspective. However it does mean that we're winning for once: Us: 2, Mice Invaders: 0

Arohanui: bite-sized lumps ♥

• Epic cooking adventures with my brother
• Re-discovering fruit flavoured lipgloss
• Star wipes
• Deeply meaningless vintage television - interviews from 1973 that glorify some  celebrity that neither I nor Google have ever heard of
• Text marathons with Bex about dating conundrums
• Falling asleep on the train
• Having a bottle of wine in the house
• Discovering Ngaio Marsh - like Agatha Christie but with misplaced patriotic pride. Booyakasha
• Writing Booyakasha
• Meanderingly long biographies about disgustingly rich people (e.g. Mitford Sisters, Jerome Sisters, Peggy Guggenheim et al). I especially like it when the time frames/family trees overlap
• Choosing to follow both Stephen Fry and Britney Spears on Twitter in the same 12 hours
• Having two pairs of very clean bearings for my skates
• Brie on freshly cooked asparagus for lunch
• Asparagus season
• ANTICIPATION: Kylie in December, Scots Liz in New Zealand!, running away with the Boy over Christmas.

Hm, title sounds a little like munching on offal.

Crumpet Toast and other cautionary tales

My Fabulous Public, you may have noticed my severe lack of motivation on the blogging front over the last week or so. I've been exhausted in the evenings from working full days (and full on days at that - learning makes me very tired). In addition, I have been fed at Austin Terrace the last few nights which has meant that I have been far far away from my computer. But here I am! At home... I'm making a mysterious brown rice/vegetable/lamb stock concoction that is baking as I write, listening to Pulp, and drinking a beer stolen from my brother. Mmm, stolen beer tastes so sweet. (I was intending to buy my own beer, but realised at the supermarket checkout that I had left my wallet at work. I was annoyed by this. Then I went to the bus stop, waited for ever, only for the bus driver to keep his doors resolutely closed while I waited in the increasing cold. Which made me more annoyed and increased my already dire craving for beer.)

I bought Crumpet Toast the other day, in a moment of supermarket bizarre product splurge.Supposedly, it's a cross between crumpets and toast, more square and perfectly sliced so that it fits into the toaster more neatly. It's more like toast than crumpet, which is a little disappointing, but I can tell you that it makes a mighty fine toasted cheese sandwich. I strongly recommend buttering the outside of the bread before toasting is commenced for extra extra dairy deliciousness. (Butter is so good, and margarine such a travesty). Question: Would I buy crumpet toast again? I must confess I am a purist when it comes to crumpets, and that crumpet toast did not fulfil all my crumpety ideals. No more crumpet toast for me.

I decided to make a very short photo essay about my daily trip to work; I have to wade through deepest darkest Hutt Valley to get to work and the suburbs are mind blowingly suburban, but also strangely soothing for a suburban girl such as myself. There is a bland beauty to the neighbourhood; the commitment to having perfect lawns, exotic flowers and trees and plants, and to having these plants so severely placed in the perfect lawn. Bizarrely,the suburb sits right below a barren hill range - the hillside is broken only by gorse, bracken and a poorly placed wreckers yard which looms large on the skyline. This totally bleak vista makes me feel like I'm visiting the end of the known world. I can't imagine what it must be like to live there.

What I did during The Six Week Convalescence

I write this with great excitement, as I am FINALLY sans-cast, not quite limber, yet strangely nostalgic (already! what a freak) for The Time I Was A Cripple.
So. Let us now take a look back at the last six weeks... and the Varied and Amazing Things I Have Done between waiting for my bones to knit, climbing up the walls and slipping over on the wet mossy concrete on the walkways and stairways of various houses. Mmm, huzzah!

• I made manymany tiny origami stars. They are pretty and pointless and you can find out how to make them here. Oh, and I used this paper for a different lot of them. Pretty pretty pretty.

• Knitting! Squares for the giant and never-ending patchwork blanket in the lounge...

• ... similarly I swathed myself in pink wool...
  
• ... and I made slippers for Shannon on my new fab thing, the Knitting Loom, which I then decorated with red and green pompoms, and gosh golly darn, didn't they look silly. Yes, they did.
  
• I have read manymany books. Mmmm, books. Here are some of them, looking pretty in a pretty pile.

• I listened to manymany Agatha Christie radio plays. I love Poirot and his use of "the Leetle Grey Cells" and I believe that, as a society, what we really need are more pantomime French accents on public broadcasting. Huzzah! 

• Keeping with the multimedia theme is the obsession that I developed with watching entire series of shows in one sitting. I've watched the first series of the Mighty Boosh, learnt parts of all three series of the League of Gentlemen off by heart, obsessed relentlessly about the 2008 series of Time Team (I am so in love with Phil Harding/Wurzel Gummidge) and felt harrowed by the entire series of Band of Brothers, leant to me by the fabulous Nat. 

• I undertook a little editing for Ange, who in turn whisked my dirty washing away and returned it clean and dry, and with my underwear impeccably folded. There is nothing like clean, dry, folded washing when you've obsessed over a growing pile of dirty laundry for a fortnight. I love her.

Mostly however, I lay in bed and demanded tea and coffee from Beatrice and Callum when staying at Shannon's flat, from Bella and Tom since I've been home and from Shannon everywhere I went. And these lovely people (amongst others too numerous too mention) totally humoured me, and checked that I hadn't fallen over whenever I made lots of noise. Lovely lovely people came to my house up fifty-million steps to visit and ended up waiting on me. I have been driven around by manymany lovelies to save me from encroaching and barely resisted insanity. My parents visited me everyday in hospital despite how much of a mission it was to get there, and made me feel I could call on them whenever I needed. I'm so lucky to be surrounded by so many amazing people. I'm so sure that I haven't mentioned all of the incredibly thoughtful things that people have done for me, from lending me magazines and DVDs to plying me with lollies and chocolate to vacuuming my lounge, but rest assured NOTHING is taken for granted.

Arohanui darlings! *mwah*

If you're super keen you can follow my Convalescence Adventures here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here - the famous Caper Caper.

Mysterious Night to Myself

6.47pm     Mysteriously... I have a night to myself.

Honestly... not so mysterious. I piked BIG time and in multiple ways too dull to detail.

My pikeage was not only condoned but wholeheartedly enforced by the Boy.

So I'm at home. I'm going to have an early night, and be a little crafty, and watch BBC Medieval season DVDs and read my new biography of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. So, essentially, undertake some serious history geeking or craftiness (different geeky).

I made Bex a CD. I may embark on creating a matching Muxtape.

I need food.

7.32pm     Muxtape and Mince on Toast for dinner... not just any toast but hot buttery Pandoro five grain sourdough, deliciously seedy. And the mince made with Tom's fair hands last night, bless him... chili con carne a la a Boy Flatting.

8.08pm    Somebody has eaten all my chocolate. In a desperate attempt to ingest something sweet I drink a glass of Tom's coke and a glass of Bella's Ginger Wine.

This does not satisfy any cravings at all.

I need LOLLIES, CHOCOLATE CAKE, &c.

What I Have Eaten - the week in review

This week I have been away in Kaikohe - eating not very exciting food mostly. For dinner I went to Kerikeri... there is a rather decent restaurant there called Cilantro where I spent an awful lot of money, and ate affogato after affogato. Mmm, affogato with amaretto rocks my tiny world.

I've thus cooked the last two nights - Family Dinner for Dad and two youngest brothers last night and Flat Dinner for Boy and Bella and Brother this evening. Tonight I made Toad in the Hole, a la Delia Smith's online recipe, thus indulging both my love of retro food AND my love of sausages and gravy... I grew up with Delia looming large in my culinary life... clutching an egg on the cover of the massive cookery class book of my mother. I always found the perfection of her hair to be simultaneously unnerving and strangely compelling. It made me trust her, I feel. Also, I quite like caressing eggs.

The gravy was very good. Never underestimate the power of mustard powder and Worcestershire sauce. Delia encourages us as such. I will never again dismiss her worldly wisdom.

In which Sarah discusses the series of uncanny events that characterised the weekend just past

Saturday night: I ran into three or four people I hadn't seen in a very long time (very sweet Mariko and a drunken chat with Rita ex-honours), and was cornered by somebody I'd never met and probably shouldn't have! Yes! Shannon's ex-girlfriend came over to introduce herself and clear the air, because "she wasn't sure what I thought of her you know and she'd seen me around and stuff and she just thought she'd say hi because..." (insert drunken rant here...) I was, of course, paralysed by politeness, and after what felt like an interminably long time was forced to put an end to the conversation by saying how nice it was to meet her and I hope that she had a good evening, before pronouncedly turning my back to her and starting a conversation with Bex who was watching Al's band and standing next to me. Bizarre and awkward situation to say the least. Uncannily, I saw Colin the next day and he reported a similar situation with his boyfriend's ex (ie unsolicited and drunken communication) although his story involved more hollow and violent threats on the part of the ex. So, I'd like to state for the record, that I will not be stalking Andy's new girlfriend when she arrives in NZ and I will not corner her drunkenly anywhere and will not say or do anything to her that could be misconstrued as creepy or stalkerish. She is of no interest to me. Despite her fascinating love of puppies.

Sunday afternoon involved a huge premenstrual/over tired meltdown, walking the streets of Newtown during the fair with tears streaming down my face under my sunglasses because I was Lost! and Alone! and it was like Ruth laughed at me on the phone, and although I know it was just general Derby AGM hysteria, in my premenstrual overtired anxiety spiral paranoid overwrought state it was just enough to send me into torrents of tears which then, of course, become about EVERYTHING ELSE wrong in my life... Josh rang later to tell me he'd left the key on the dining table and was going to Dad's house and when he asked me how my day was I don't think he was listening when I told him that it was fucking dreadful... thus didn't make any comment. He was here when I got home though, so I could bawl my eyes out to him when he gave me a hug. Nice brother.

Tom's face has gone all weird from some kind of temporary palsy that has paralysed him on one side. When I first saw him I thought he'd had a stroke, which was a bit spooky. Also, his scooter was stolen this weekend. Scooter Stealer, a Pox on you and your family for seven generations! Meanwhile Tom looks a lot like Quasimodo but refuses point blank to let me refer to him as such. SO not fair.

In which Sarah takes the day off work because she can

And because she has lots of annoying grown up errand type things to do. At the moment I'm waiting at home to sign a contract for the washing machine hireage. *Yawns*. I need to read some trust documents. I'm seeing a lawyer around lunch time, so sign aforementioned trust documents.

I can't get over how much like the weekend it feels. Yesterday was amazing awesome - breakfast and coffee in bed; sitting in the sun talking shit, listening to music and drinking endless pots of coffee with Henry and Mark and Callum and Isabelle and Julia and Bella; walking home in the sunshine; having Tom and Mum and Luke over for tea; dinner with Dad and Tom; a bottle of wine with Shannon... and everyone in fabulous good moods, and I feel like stretching my hands up to the sky and sighing filled with Vitamin D and deliciously satisfied.

Today I might bake a cake.

Free from the Dull Ones

The anxiety has subsided - I think it was when I rearranged the lounge, neatly placing my teacups on the window sill, that the magic happened. I am sitting in an empty bedroom and am deliciously full of the favourite food of the home-alone single Sarah, the toasted sandwich. (Should I be saying - the home-alone, poverty-stricken single Sarah). Just missioned over with Callum to my little brother's house; another borrowing of his turntables for a party tomorrow night - big night Tuesday before Waitangi Wednesday.

But the best bit is that there is no annoying people watching shitty tv in the lounge and guffawing periodically at some "witticism" or other. Is this a good time to reflect on the fact that flatting with randoms nearly always leads to a deep seated dislike of someone you are inherently incompatible with? Or maybe it's just the act of living with people in general. I did look for my own place at one point, but it's SO expensive, and one bedroom flats can be so nasty. And bedsits - I remember when Andy and I lived in a bedsit. There wasn't a great deal of room for two adults. Even if one of them was relatively small (even then I had far too much furniture).

So, anyway, I think I might go to bed now. Or at least, to bedroom, as the room itself is a fucking pigsty and I desperately need to move the piles of dirty clothes off the floor.

ALSO: Checking my stats before, I have almost had 5000 visitors (not 5000 hits - defo have more than that). When I have had 5000 visitors  I think that I will have a Blog Party. It's going to be amazing - and virtual.

Christmas Slideshow... For some reason I only took shitty photos, but Go Figure

I am wearing my sunglasses indoors

Not because it is particularly bright inside (although there is a little sun) but because this morning my regular glasses fell apart in my hands and I'm waiting for the Araldite to set on them. This is the second time I've ended up in this kind of situation - the first time my glasses snapped in half over the bridge though, and they were completely useless. I'm quite proud of my handiness though with the glue... fixed some earrings and a brooch too while I had it mixed. Today I have POTTERED. Delightfully so... can't remember the last time I had a pottering sort of a day. I've wandered up and down Cuba St a couple of times and had a couple of coffees at Midnight. I've read a little, written a little, done a little research on my Future. Getting hungry for lunch. Bex is coming over soon. Yesterday Mum gave me a set of towels and a set of champagne bowls. Michelle gave me a huge bottle of gin and thirty frozen croissants. Tom gave me his old stereo thing. It has a tape player so I can listen to all of my old mix tapes. Cool.