Charlie's Worldlet them eat cake
Posted on June 9, 2010
A little while ago (in a place far far away.. *cue music…* no, wait, thats star wars..) I decided that I wanted to make cakes. Cupcakes to be specific.
I have no idea why, they’re girlie things really, but they’re perfect bit sized pieces of heaven that can be made in about 30 mins and in a myriad (love that word) of different varieties.
So, Monday we made chocolate caramel with almonds and a chocolate butter icing with grated chocolate and almond sprinkles.
They were delish, perfecto and by now, Wednesday, all eaten. They are only teeny.
So, tonight, after lovely home made pizza, and perhaps fuelled by the couple of pints of beer I had consumed, I decided to make more.
All hail pistachio vanilla sponge cupcakes with purple butter icing and pistachio sprinkles.
Oh yeah baby!
so slack!
Posted on June 7, 2010
One post in a week – thats pretty piss poor. Ah well.
So, whats been happening?
My Birthday. Apart from that fact that I was working from 8am till 11pm and couldn’t celebrate at all – I had a wonderful day. Jay bought me a guitar fx thingumy
which means I can sound like Dave Gilmore or Kurt Cobain, even if I can’t actually play like them in any way.
So I’ve been playing loads this week, not something I’ve done much in years – as my fingers will testify to – blister central. Ah well, no pain no gain. Currently learning Another Brick in the Wall and trying to get a good sound for ‘Standing in the Way of Control’ by The Gossip.
Jay also got me a cupcake making kit and book. I love cupcakes and have this idea that I could be the male cupcake king of the internet. or something. Anyway – they look awesome – more on this in the next post 🙂
2. Work. Been very busy. Very very busy.
3. Play. We went out to Serpentine National Park last weekend for a walk (well, as much as Jay’s back can stand) and some photo taking. I’m trying to take a lot more shots with my film cameras so I can justify a future investment in a Hasselblad or Rolliflex. Mostly used the iPhone though, cos its instant gratificaiton!
4. Jay had her operation on her back, which worked well for one day, but since then she’s been worse than ever 😦 Hopefully its just a temporary setback.
Thats kind of it for now, next posts – Trip to Fremantle, cupcakes and gardening
Spelling Friday.
Posted on June 4, 2010
I am fed up with adults who can’t fookin’ spell! People on Facebook are the very worst offenders for this and its starting to really get up my nose.
So, for those of you who are in any doubt as to which words to use when; here’s a little copy and keep for reference
Your = as in it’s something belonging to you (your ball, your house)
You’re = you are (the apostrophe replaces the ‘a’) – you’re going out later?
There = generally a location or referring to a point in time as a statement. I’m going over there, there is a dog over there. There, I said it.
Their = something belonging to a 3rd person or a group of other people – their socks, their ball. Johnny, can you give their ball back
They’re = they are – same as you’re = the apostrophe is a dropped ‘a’ They’re going over there to fetch their ball.
You cannot use any of these words interchangeably.
There ball = means (as a 2 year old might say) = there’s a ball just there.
Your so funny = that something called ‘so funny’ (a racehorse perhaps?) belongs to you.
It’s over their = its over their what? head? like spelling?
Gah! this is stuff you learned in primary school!!
Next lesson – basic punctuation, capitalisation and full stops. When and where to use.
/rant
tragedy
Posted on May 24, 2010
(when the feeling’s gone and you can’t go on, tragedy)
no, nothing like that – this is about fashion tragedy. Self respect tragedy.
I was taking a couple of DVD’s back to Blockbuster on Sunday afternoon (please note the time of the day, it is central to this story) when I was queuing behind a very large lady – nothing exceptional or particularly noteworthy there you might think, but it’s the details that matter.
Lets look at the main points.
1. She was wearing pyjamas
2. Also a fluffy dressing gown with breakfast (or worse) stains
3. And slippers
4. With her hair like she’d stuck her finger in a power socket (I’m not kidding)
5. She had full on facial hair
6. It was 4pm.
7. In a busy video store.
8. She was carrying milk, so she’d obviously been into the supermarket or garage too
So, being the man about time that I am (and a downright sneaky bastard) – I took a pic.
Ok, not a great pic, but I didn’t want to get busted and you get the idea.
When does self respect fall so low that you roll out of bed and just rock on up to the shops without so much as thinking “humm, maybe I should have a shower and run my fingers through my hair and maybe get fucking dressed into some outside clothes”
Tragic.
one rule for one…
Posted on May 19, 2010
You know in real life where if you do something illegal, say, get caught snorting cocaine, or an assault, your life generally goes a bit downhill for a while, and deservedly so. Most employers take a pretty dim view of this kind of thing and would fire you the moment ‘trial’ was mentioned in conversation. Certainly my employment is on condition of a spotless police check.
So how is it that footballers and pop stars get let off with nothing more than a rap on the knuckles, a small ban and then they are back in action again?
I’ve noticed for some time that there is this one rule for one and one for another, especially in football, where players seem to be caught up to no good and routinely get away with it, where as the rest of the population would be left with a criminal record that basically means job options shrink down to ‘do you want fries with that’
These people are hero figures to impressionable kids growing up in the most vulnerable time of their young lives, so I don’t understand how the authorities, particularly in football, give these morons so many chances.
It sends out all the wrong signals – how its okay to break the law, do drugs, get into drunken fights, provided you grovel, apologise, tell everyone how terrible you feel and how you’ve let everyone down.
No, you’re only sorry you got caught. Tiger Woods – are you listening?
My feeling is, these sportsmen should be hung upto dry. They have huge salaries, huge responsibilities, so if they stuff up, they should be out – forever. Just like you or I would be.
But no, one rule for one, as long as you’re a sporting hero, its okay to be bad, you’ll be forgiven and welcomed back with open arms.
Posted on May 18, 2010
Online security and privacy for children is not exactly a new thing. There have been plenty of cases of so called ‘grooming’ by some very nasty people where kids have been lured to their untimely deaths. All parents should know about this kind of thing, as I said, its not new.
Close to home, there have been a couple of murders in Oz where girls have gone off to meet up with one of their Facebook friends only to turn up very dead. One was last year (I think) and there was another this week.
The girl this week was 18 years old.
We were having a chat about this with the girls – being responsible parents, we try to educate them into not giving out their real names on-line, never telling anyone their address or any personal details etc. They have several accounts on various child gaming sites (I’m not saying where, for obvious reasons) where they are under strict instructions only to invite and chat with people they actually know in real life. No virtual friend collecting, no matter how nice they may sound.
Common sense, right?
We found out that several of their friends managed to open their own accounts and have many hundreds of friends, totally unsupervised or where parents know, but just don’t care. Unbelievable.
Worse still, when discussing this latest murder, we find out that several of Jay’s little-un’s nine-year old school friends have Facebook accounts with full support of their parents. Nice – especially as the sign up terms and conditions make it clear you have to be 14.
Compounding this, one of the schoolfriends has over 700 ‘friends’, but ‘its okay, she knows them all’ Apparently her parents were ‘very responsible’ and closed their accounts when the murders happened.
Oh yeah, really responsible. Gate, horse, bolted.
How can a responsible parent allow a child to have their own Facebook account (with all the adult content that’s on there) and then collect 700 ‘friends’??
I’m utterly stunned. Parents should know better
Perhaps we’re too strict and keeping the girls from some valuable social interaction, but given the very real risk, as small as it might well be, I don’t care. They’re not having a Facebook, MySpace, Beebo or any other account until they are old enough under the terms and conditions and also in their maturity to know whats sensible and whats not and to know who they are adding as friends.
And thats a very long way off yet.
I hate colds
Posted on May 17, 2010
I’m sick again – must have picked something up from Sydney or on the plane, who knows.
Its a horrible stinking cold this time, the worst type that gives that tickle and almost sneeze but not quite right behind your eyeball and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it. Helpfully its also giving me a horrible migraine which drugs, sleep, rest, jumping or indeed anything is just useless against. Actually I’m sure that not staring at a small font and blogging is probably more effective than the Neurofen I just guzzled, but I don’t care – I have to do something.
So, colds. Whats the point? Its not as if after 3 days I get better and discover a new superpower I didn’t have before. Its just 3 to 5 miserable snotty days with a sore nose and not being able to breathe. And for what? Nothing. The perpetuation of some miserable sneaky snot living virus that does no good other than to make the host feel crap.
So, I vote for no colds. Its not like the other big diseases, I respect them – catch ebola and its curtains. Bit like the snakes and spiders that live here in Oz – stay away, big time danger. Colds are a bit like being bitten by a midge, annoying and serves no useful purpose other than to annoy.
I shall be miserably making my way through this week with another mountain of work ready to plonk itself on my aching head, suffering from the viral equivalent of a swarm of gnats.
meh!
Sydney part 2
Posted on May 16, 2010
So my trip to Sydney is done and I’m back home in a slightly chilly Perth.
The training course was pretty intense and by the last day my brain was not taking in any more information – was so glad to be heading home.
Interesting things about Sydney.
1. Double decker trains. brilliant idea – fit twice the number of people on the train. Perth, listen up.
2. On the trains, the seat backs could be moved so you can always sit in the direction of travel Another good idea.
3. The coffee was pretty good.
4. The harbour bridge is brown
5. The opera house was a bit smaller than I thought but looked lovely in the sunset
6. Darling harbour is pretty at night, but lacks character
7. You can’t buy a pint – only schooners, which are just over 1/2 a pint. meh!
8. The traffic was terrible
9. The taxi drivers are nuts.
Which leads me on to the ride from the airport to the hotel when I first got there.
The guy was a psycho. I should have realised he accelerated over the speed bumps and practically ran other cars off the road and that was before we left the ramp out of arrivals. He was basically full on the throttle until just before the point of a fatal crash when he hit the brakes as hard as he could. I think he hit the speed limit on the way out of the airport and then back outside the hotel – other than that, warp nine all the way
He drove like a madman, but I suspect, given his nationality (which I won’t mention), this may just be the way he was taught. How we got to the hotel without killing someone or dying in a fireball I will never know – I was so scared my hands were dripping with sweat. Ferrari would be wise to seek him out for next years Grand Prix season.
Anyway – work, beer, food, wine, train, rinse, repeat.
Except for one evening, where I popped out to get a pic of Darling Harbour all lit up.
Darling Harbour
Can’t wait to go back with the missus and a lot more time.
travel
Posted on May 12, 2010
I haven’t had to travel for my current job, which has been a bit of a blessing compared to the previous 12 years where I have travelled often and far and wide.
Business travel is not as glam as it is cracked up to be and often involves just very long and unsociable hours, lost weekends and only seeing the inside of the airport, the hotel and the client or office location.
So it was with trepidation that I was sent to Sydney for a week’s training course – thinking that as per usual it would be another tiring week in a location that could be just about anywhere as far as what I would see goes.
I managed to arrange for an early flight to get out here, which meant I had a few hours of daylight left that I could wander about. I didn’t take my big camera out, just the Trip 35 and my iPhone – I figured that all that real touristy stuff could be done another time and preferably with the missus too.
Anyway, here are some purdy pictures
The Sydney Opera House
Sydney Harbour Bridge
Old warehouses in 'The Rocks' area
Darling Harbour
Sydney CBD
Trip 35
Darling Harbour
Carr park
Charlie's World 