OK, I was sucked in. In the city today, we finally tried the iced coffees at a place that has a sign saying
Best in town
I’d seen the sign there on several occasions, and today we caved.
We shouldn’t have.
It was definitely not the best iced coffee in town, and I left the café feeling rather ripped off. Although I was more annoyed that their stupid sign worked and they got my money.
On the way to work a couple of days ago, I saw an ad at a bus stop for Lemon Mint Tic Tacs. I thought they sounded interesting, and wanted to give them a try. I was happy to discover that the shop near my work had them.
The verdict? They started off well, with a nice lemony flavour. But at the very end, you know - when you chew the last little bit because it’s too small to suck - it tasted like the smell of Toilet Duck. So I won’t be getting them again. I wanted to like them but oh well. I’ll just have to stick to orange.
Let’s see, what’s been happening… I’ve moved offices, but I can’t remember whether I did that since I last posted or if it was before then. I think it was after. So I’ve slowly become used to the new building, and not being able to see M during the day. It’s a bit weird really - it’s as if we’re a “normal” couple working separate jobs! But we go to and from work together so there’s still that companionship.
I’ve started my final year of tafe. There’s also an interpreters’ course being held this year but that would add an extra two nights of study, plus a lot of out-of-class work, to the two nights I’m already doing, and I didn’t want that. I may do the course if they offer it later on, and I’m accepted, but I couldn’t take studying 4 weeknights out of 5. I don’t need the stress!
Finally, there’s a rather good chance that we’ll be going to the UK in November. There’s a conference on in London and, similar to the one M went to in New York last year, this will be partially paid for by work. So we’re working out where else we want to go. We’ll only be gone for two weeks, same as last time, so we’ll probably go to Wales and Scotland after being in London for a while. We haven’t worked out exactly where we’re going or how long we’re staying in each place, but it’s so nice to have something to look forward to. This time we’re both going to go business class - his ticket will be paid for by work, and we’re going to use frequent flyer points for mine.
The only hassle was actually finding flights that offered business class seats for award points. The direct flights were all taken, but I managed to find two separate flights going through Tokyo. The flights through Tokyo are 12 hours apart, so, knowing absolutely nothing about the city, I don’t know whether that’s enough time to go into the city and have a bit of a look around. We thought that maybe we could spend a night there and then go to London the next day, but that may not work out with points. But it’s so much fun planning holidays! Well, until you realise that all the hotels you want are booked and you’re stuck with whatever you can get.
I’m ready to burst. We went out for dinner tonight for the Festival of Food, which is where you pay $20 each for a 4-course meal. It was quite nice, although my steak was definitely not the medium I’d requested, but more like well-done. Still, yummy and now I’m ready for a nap.
*****
In the last couple of months I have developed an obsession with Boston Legal. I left work early today because I read on the BL site that I visit that there was going to be a live webcast of “An Evening with Boston Legal” which was held in Los Angeles. It was due to start at 3pm my time, so I left work at around 2:00 to ensure I had plenty of time to get home and ready.
It was quite good - it was just a panel of the cast members as well as the show’s writers and directors, moderated by Camryn Manheim who asked the panel various questions. It only went for an hour, but I think it was worth leaving work for. And hey, it’s Friday, so given the option of staying at work or going home… well, it wasn’t a difficult decision.
I found out a couple of weeks ago that James Spader is going to be on The View on November 21, which is when I’ll be in NYC. I went to the website to see about getting tickets but it said they’d already given all of them out for the next whatever months, so I’m going to try to get standby tickets. M is already aware of this and has been informed that he can do his own thing if he doesn’t want to come 
I would ordinarily have no interest whatsoever in going to see The View - way too much oestrogen for me - but I’m sure I could manage it if I actually got tickets to this one.
*****
Another year of tafe is nearly over. At the bridging course last night there was a guest speaker, who came to talk about the interpreting course being held next year. If you pass all the prerequisites of the course, you are awarded NAATI accreditation as a para-professional interpreter, which means you can get work as an interpreter (NAATI is the National Accreditation Authority for Translators and Interpreters and accreditation from them is essential if you want to be an interpreter in any language in Australia). She succeeded in completely scaring the crap out of me and virtually everyone in the class, so I don’t think I’ll do it. I still have one more year of my current Auslan certificate, which is 2 nights a week, and the interpreting course is another 7 hours on top of that. So if I did both, I’d be studying a total of 13 hours over 4 nights a week, and I don’t think I’d be able to cope with that in addition to working full-time.
And, unlike the tafe course I’m doing at the moment which is has virtually no work outside class hours, the interpreting course does have quite a lot of extra work involved, and as much as I don’t want to fall behind my other classmates who would be doing the course, I think it would be too much for me.
I felt a bit depressed, realising that I wouldn’t be able to do it, but I guess when it really comes down to it, I’m not studying Auslan with the goal of becoming an interpreter - it was just to learn a new language and hopefully become good enough to be able to communicate most things I wanted to communicate. Of course, fluency would be fantastic, and it’s something I would love to have, but I have a job already and it’s not as though I’m trying to start a career. There’s no rush for me to do every course available to me just because it is being offered.
But the main reason I won’t be doing it is that I don’t think I’m good enough. The guest speaker said that it’s not a language acquisition course, and you’re expected to be fluent or near-fluent in both languages when you start, which I’m definitely not - it’s why I’m learning the language after all! I don’t really have any confidence in my abilities, and I think that taking the year to finish off my certificate and hopefully gain some more confidence will be good, as well as the much lighter workload. And if the course is offered again (apparently they haven’t had an Auslan component in the course for 5 years because they didn’t have the numbers), I might do it then.
As I mentioned last week, it was our wedding anniversary last Wednesday, and on Saturday we went out for dinner to a very nice restaurant. Neither of us had tried it before, and we were both curious because something so expensive must be good, right?
We arrived and were seated at our table, which unfortunately wasn’t next to the window. Even so, we had a lovely view of the lights on the Adelaide plains (although we are a bit desensitised to it because we have a similar view from our house). A waitress came over and asked if we’d like some water, to which we said yes. She then asked if we wanted sparkling or still. Errrmm, I guessed that it wouldn’t have been appropriate for me to say ‘tap’, so I just went with still.
Nothing on the entrée menu really grabbed us, so we decided to have a main and dessert. I got a tenderloin, and M had venison. We also got 2 serves of vegetables and some mashed potato. When everything arrived, I thought I should have had an entree because my piece of meat was so tiny, but fortunately there was plenty of mashed potato, without which I’m sure I would still have been hungry afterwards. The main course was really good, but I wouldn’t say it’s any better than at our usual favourite restaurant.
For dessert, I decided to have the Magill Estate Chocolate Truffle Box. I was hesitant to order it because I’m tending to steer away from really chocolatey desserts these days, but there wasn’t really anything else that took my fancy. When it arrived, it consisted of a box with 9 truffles in it. I thought there might have been a variety of truffles, but they were all the same. The first one was divine - so rich and smooth, a lovely hazelnut praline. After the 7th one, though, I was glad to see the end (I gave M two of them). I’d actually been contemplating putting the box in my bag and having them later, but thought that might not be very good form, plus it would have been pretty obvious when the waitress came to take the plate and the box wasn’t on it any more.
We had a nice port with dessert, and coffee afterwards. There was a selection of petits fours with coffee, and thank God none of them were chocolate. So, all in all dinner was very nice. I don’t know whether we’d go back, only because it wasn’t really worth the price, although the food was excellent. I think we’ll just stick to Lenzerheide from now on.
The carpet is done! The carpet guy showed up when he was meant to this time, so it all went according to plan. I haven’t seen it in person yet because I was working late when it was being done, but M took a few photos. I’m looking forward to going down there so I can oooh and ahhh in the room. Now we just have to find someone who wants to rent the house.
First, another reminder of the original room:
And now the completed room!
Yay that the room is finally done. There are a couple more things that need to be done around the house but it’s pretty much ready now. M saw one of the neighbours recently, who told him that the ginger cat was there before our previous tenants moved in, so it seems that he wasn’t abandoned by them after all. I guess that’s a good thing as it means that he can obviously look after himself, but I still feel bad that it seems he doesn’t have anywhere to go. Unless it’s all a big trick and he’s been playing us… cunning little bastard.
We left work early yesterday because we were dropping M’s nephew off to pick up a new car he bought, and I thought I’d leave as well since I’d worked late 3 nights that week and just felt like leaving early. We stopped off at the shops to ‘buy some milk’ and ended up spending $170. One of the things we got was a packet mix for some Crunchie cupcakes (in case you don’t know, a Crunchie is a Cadbury chocolate bar - chocolate covered honeycomb). M went out to a renunion dinner last night, and while he was gone I thought I’d make the cupcakes. They’re honeycomb-flavoured cakes with chocolate icing and choc-covered honeycomb pieces on top. I thought they turned out ok, but they weren’t brilliant. Although, they were good enough that they’re all gone now (there were 12! But in our defence, they were quite small…).
Since they were made from a packet, I thought it would be nice to find a recipe that I could make from scratch since I had some patty pans left over and we wouldn’t want them to go to waste. So I looked for some on allrecipes.com and found a whole lot of yummy-sounding recipes that I’d like to try. The only problem is that I’m not a good cook so I’m not very optimistic about them working out.
Today we had an inspection at M’s house. We’ve been having trouble with these tenants for a while, with them not paying their rent, and M had sent them an eviction notice, giving them 7 days to pay what was owing. They paid, but recently stopped paying again, so M sent another notice. They had said before that they were planning on moving out in a few months, and M wanted to arrange an inspection. The agent that found the tenants for us called them but didn’t hear anything, and we got a call from her the other day, saying that she’d talked to the tenants who said that they’d moved out over a week ago. They figured they didn’t have to give any notice (which isn’t true, and was clearly written in their lease that they did), and since they weren’t living there any more, that they didn’t have to pay rent either.
They asked the agent when they were going to get their bond back, and when she said that they had to be up to date in their rent for that to happen, got really angry and said that they were going to talk to their lawyers. Whatever.
So an inspection was arranged for today. They didn’t turn up, so we started the inspection without them. While they didn’t exactly trash the place, it was left in a pretty poor state. The kitchen was disgustingly filthy, the main bedroom had goodness knows what all over the walls and there was furniture, rubbish and various damage. Needless to say, they won’t be seeing any of their bond. I took plenty of photos just in case they try to dispute it but I can’t imagine how they think they would have any chance if they did.
Tomorrow M and I are taking the day off to go there and clean it up, and get the locks changed. The agent said that there is someone who is interested in it for a 3-month lease while she’s waiting for settlement on a house she bought, so hopefully we’ll be able to clean it up enough that she’ll want to move in. It would be good to find someone so soon, and not lose too much rent.
On the way home we stopped off at the hardware store and bought what we needed to repair the damage they did as well as clean everything. Before these tenants moved in, I spent 4 hours cleaning the kitchen, and I have a feeling it will be a similar amount of time tomorrow. But we bought one of those cleaning glove things, so we’ll see if they actually work.
*****
On a yummy note, some of the best pancakes I’ve ever had was when we went to Galway last year, and M found this Irish recipe, and made some tonight. They were fantastic!
Pancake Recipe
Ingredients
125g / 4oz Odlums Cream Plain Flour
Pinch of Salt
1 Egg
300ml / 1/2 pint Milk
Oil for frying
Method
1. Sieve flour and salt into a bowl.
2. Make a well in the centre of the flour, break in the egg and add about a third of the milk. Beat well, gradually pouring in the rest of the milk and drawing in the flour to make a smooth batter.
3. Pour batter into a jug and allow to stand for about 30 minutes.
4. Brush a pancake pan or frying pan with oil. When the pan is hot, give the batter a stir before pouring a thin layer onto the pan.
5. Fry until golden brown. Turn and fry the other side until brown also.
6. Stack pancakes on a large plate, as they are cooked.
I just ate a huge cookie and now I feel sick…
I turned 25 about 10 days ago and I’m finding it difficult to write that on things that ask for my age…it looks weird and I’m also not liking the fact that I’m now in the 25-34 age bracket…..I know it’s not a huge deal but I just feel that I’m not quite where I was hoping to be by the time I reached this age….the best remedy for this, I’ve discovered, is to spend a Friday evening with similarly age friends (and older) carving pumpkins and having a slumber party! Who says it’s only for kids!
So last week this is exactly what I did. It was the most fun I’ve had sober in awhile, not counting the recent haunted house and corn maze adventure which was complete hilarity.
Carving pumkins is hard work…we were at it for hours, amidst the usual banter, and here is my final product
I accidently cut off the cat’s (on the far left) other leg and tail…..details details…
In other news a co-worker of mine seems to find it necessary to come into my office and show me the hole in his jeans which just so happens to be right on his ass…..
I am so FULL. M and I went out to dinner with some friends tonight, to the Red Ochre in the city. It’s a great restaurant, made better by the fact that we had a Festival of Food brochure. So that meant that we got a 3-course meal for $27.50 each. Excluding, of course, the bottle of wine we got and the side dish of mushrooms. But it still worked out a lot cheaper with the brochure, so it was good. But we didn’t get any bread! So we’re tight-arses using a brochure to get a meal, but surely we’re not so repugnant that we’re not worthy of bread? Having said that, though, I was completely stuffed at the end and was ready to fall asleep on the table.
True to my recent (lack of) alcoholic form, I was feeling quite tipsy after one glass of wine. I don’t know what has happened to me over the last 5-10 years or so, but any tolerance I developed for alchohol during my somewhat restrained university years, has completely vanished. I think I’m turning into a fogey, because I’m not really that interested in drinking any more; I like a glass of wine with dinner, but I don’t like being drunk. Someone get me some knitting needles and a rocking chair. Not that knitting makes you a fogey. Oh whatever, you know what I’m getting at.
I’ve been told by a couple of people (literally) that they’ve been having trouble commenting here. Now, with the small number of comments I get, I appreciate every one of them, so today I found a new way of fighting automated comments. So now you don’t have to enter a code any more, but you will need javascript enabled for the comment to post. Other than that, it should work *fingers and toes crossed* The extent of my testing so far has been to write ‘test’ in the box and click Go, and it has posted successfully, but if it doesn’t work for you, please send me an email and let me know. But I hope it does because if it doesn’t then I don’t know what to do. I’m sorry, I’ve tried to fix it! I’m trying to make you happy! We’ll see whether it does block unwanted comments - hopefully it will. If not, then I guess I’ll have to go back to the other way, or find a different one again.
Our house has a spiral staircase up to the second floor. It looks like a rather flimsy structure, and over the past few weeks I’d been wondering if the whole thing would come crashing down if I were to fall down the stairs. Last night I discovered that the staircase is actually a lot more robust than it looks. It does, however, cause rather painful injuries to one’s rear end and shin.
My mum and uncle came around this afternoon, as my uncle hadn’t seen my house, and he wanted to come before he moved back overseas. I wanted to make something to have for afternoon tea, and decided on some Honey and Apricot Tea Cakes, the recipe for which I found on the side of a cereal box. They looked really nice, and thought I’d give them a try.
I entered into the cooking process with some trepidation, as I have the ability to muck up even the most simple of recipes (and had done so the night before - very disheartening), but I thought that if they didn’t work, I had other stuff to put out, so I may as well give it a try. Fortunately, they actually worked, and they tasted good! So much so that I’d even be willing to make them again.
Cooking is so much easier now that we have a dishwasher - all the dishes get chucked in, I wipe down the bench and voila! The kitchen is all clean again.
Like a lot of workplaces, mine has a ‘junk food’ area where you can buy cheap chocolates, chips and drinks, and after lunch today I was having a look through the chocolate box to see if there was anything worth getting. Since I’ve been trying to lose weight in the last 6 months, and just generally improve my diet, I usually (but not always) try to get chocolate bars now with relatively low fat content (I use this term very loosely when talking about chocolate).
So I was picking up various chocolates and looking at the nutritional information on the packet. Most of them were around 15 or 16 grams per serve, saying that there was one serve in the packet (as you would expect). Then I picked up an Aero and had a look. In the fat per serve column, it had only 2 grams, but when I looked for how many serves per packet there claimed to be, it said 7! SEVEN serves in one packet? An Aero only weighs around 50 g, and they think we’re going to break it up into 7 individual serves? Not bloody likely!
How stupid do the chocolate companies think we are? Claiming to have 7 serves in a chocolate bar is stupid enough, but then to think that we’ll look at the fat content, see 2g and think we’re eating low-fat chocolate? If they’re going to do that, they may as well break it up into 28 serves and say that there’s only 0.5g of fat per serve! Duh.
