[Disclaimer: I realise such entry is laughable at most, given the content is not the confessions of a scorned soul or a broody poet. These days it is a better pursuit for me to find some peace in trivial, happy and optimistic things rather than to contemplate on philosophy. On another note, where does one position the disclaimers?]
The (one and only) joy of being a recent unemployed graduate is the ample time in which to do 'stuff', learn new 'stuff' and think of every possible way to pass the time other than wallowing in self-failure and grief. Years back, free time would be spent on aG, which these days is not the option. It usually takes around 30 minutes (only) to read through every single new posts from the time I last logged on .. which I, like a loser, do. Reading posts about Musicians and their turmoil, Football fans and their utterly idiotic (to me) loyalty, Brazilian waxing, the odd 'shuta-krimi' and not to mention the rights of every minority on this planet.
So I turn to Foodie Blogs. I'm almost tempted to put up a wiki-link on the definition, but I think I'll refrain. I perhaps jumped in the wagon very late, because .. well blogs are just not cool any more, is it? (To my defence, I did join Twitter a few days ago and yet to fully milk all its worth) .. I'll post some of my favourite Foodies at the end of this post. Foodies are generally evil because I find myself constantly thinking about food like a boy who just hit puberty and all their thoughts revolve around sex. I also find myself looking at Food-Photography for hours and hours and take great pleasure in it (I believe the term is coined Food-Porn). I have started watching Hell's Kitchen every Tuesday night religiously (shameful?). Last of all, I find that my own home-food no longer satisfies my palate. Hence one day, I woke up and thought to myself, to hell with the world, I'm going to learn to cook! Currently, the way our household works is that some days, I'll bring home a bunch of ingredients NOT suitable for the curry but the likes of Italian or the odd Moroccan. It really helps when I also have a dietician (because I have been found to be officially under-weight with high cholesterol!) so as to justify (without telling the over-sensitive mother that I can't stand the home-food) the need for me to cook separately some days. Two incredibly negative things have resulted in this new way of life - increased food wastage (because I still can't get the hang and feel of what's under-cooked, cooked and over-cooked among many other reasons) and I find that the mother's kitchen itself is incredibly insufficient for my needs (we only have two knives and no knife sharpener or a casserole dish or a proper baking dish .. the list is pretty long and it would cost me an arm and leg to actually update the amount of utensils .. so for now, I compromise and compromise heavily).
My partner in crime in no other than the sibling who, surprisingly is more competent in the kitchen. So she usually judges when 'stuff' is cooked. I usually chop 'stuff' and read the instruction out aloud .. which no way is the ideal situation, if I were to actually learn the culinary art. I've attempted to cook pasta for yonks (sp?) and only managed two occasions where it was perfect (i.e. to my liking). The lamb cutlets I make, however, are almost there in terms of .. you know ..
So I lack the basics.
However, with all the time in the world at my disposal, I did browse through the library and found the perfect book! I was flipping through it today .. and yes .. it is the perfect book for beginners! That made me happy and these days I'm hardly ever happy. It's called 'The First-Time Cook' by Sophie Grigson and .. well .. maybe I will review it one day. (Speaking of which, I'm yet to review two of Murakami books and that is depressing). It tells me how to chop 'stuff', cook 'stuff', shop for 'stuff', store 'stuff' and what 'stuff' to have in a kitchen (the fact that you need at least four knives minimum and they must not be cheap).
Something else I use is the Video-Jug web-site and I love it. I learned to 'Roast the Perfect Potatoes' !
On a side note: This the way to 'Hide an Unwanted Erection' for anyone who it might apply to. You can also learn how to 'French Kiss', 'Undo your partner's Bra with one hand' and my personal favourite 'How to make your breasts look bigger'.
I'll end this long and boring entry with the link to one of my favourite Foodie-Blog.
All I need now is a motto to cook by.
Monday, June 01, 2009
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Veronika Decides to Die
I must confess - I tend to like pretty much anything from trashy Mills&Boon to pretentious Salman Rushdie/Dostoevsky. Anything at all, as long as it leaves me feeling it was worth the read or if it touches a special chord somewhere within (mostly the heart, but I suppose the nether-regions for selected Mills&Boons). The point I'm trying to make is .. an author need not put a great deal of effort for me to like their books.
Enter Paulo Coelho. I absolutely hate this guy. Late last year, I had the privilege of reading 'Veronika Decides to Die' courtesy of a friend who loves him and sent me this book via air-mail (all the way from NZ) and I hated it. How this guy is a millionaire (or is Coelho a billionaire? The Internet is capped, so I'm not able to check on Google either) is beyond my comprehension. No, I take it back .. I think I know exactly why this guy is a freaking billionaire. Here starteth my review (of the book).
A Brief Synopsis:
Young girl who has everything going well for her decides to end her life but finds herself stranded in a mental hospital (or something like that) alive and kicking. Girl is told she has five days (more or less) until her heart stops beating. Girl realises value of life (and wants to live with a renewed energy) and the readers realise it was all a lie - the girl was used as an experiment whereupon she was lied to and told she only had a few days to live, so that when that anticipated death does not occur her life force will be renewed and she will continue to live her life believing it was a miracle gifted by god and it was her destiny to .. live (with another fellow depressed Prince living in the asylum .. in front of whom she masturbates thrice climaxing all three times).
[I think I would watch the movie (yes! they are making a movie out of this book starring Sarah Michelle Geller) just for the masturbating scene .. should it be allowed on screen].
What I found this book to be is nothing but a preachy-know-it-all-snobbery of a novel where the author spends all his time preaching (worse than your average organised religion folks) and preaching and preaching - how life should be, why it should be so. I might as well have picked up the Quran and read that instead. Coelho is simply more of a Pope than an author. The book felt like a pretentious crap that shoved its 'life ideal and philosophies' down my throat until I choked and spat out in disgust.
I don't pretend to understand life's blacks and whites or even the greys and neither should a literary work. I've grown accustomed to the simple fact that books are there to enlighten you and make you think .. it is not a self help guide where all the answers are churned out. So when an author comes in to establish that he knows it all, that he is the Messiah who has all the answers is nothing but an insult to .. well I don't know exactly what .. but I was furious.
Of course I understand why Coelho is popular. People are brainless morons or one in the making. The laziness takes hold and fuck all that spending time thinking about a book .. let's all read crap that already provides easy philosophies and easy answers to life .. Oh Coelho, you are the greatest, please do all the thinking for me and write more of those crap you call literary works and in turn, I shall contribute just a little bit more to your Billions.
Enter Paulo Coelho. I absolutely hate this guy. Late last year, I had the privilege of reading 'Veronika Decides to Die' courtesy of a friend who loves him and sent me this book via air-mail (all the way from NZ) and I hated it. How this guy is a millionaire (or is Coelho a billionaire? The Internet is capped, so I'm not able to check on Google either) is beyond my comprehension. No, I take it back .. I think I know exactly why this guy is a freaking billionaire. Here starteth my review (of the book).
A Brief Synopsis:
Young girl who has everything going well for her decides to end her life but finds herself stranded in a mental hospital (or something like that) alive and kicking. Girl is told she has five days (more or less) until her heart stops beating. Girl realises value of life (and wants to live with a renewed energy) and the readers realise it was all a lie - the girl was used as an experiment whereupon she was lied to and told she only had a few days to live, so that when that anticipated death does not occur her life force will be renewed and she will continue to live her life believing it was a miracle gifted by god and it was her destiny to .. live (with another fellow depressed Prince living in the asylum .. in front of whom she masturbates thrice climaxing all three times).
[I think I would watch the movie (yes! they are making a movie out of this book starring Sarah Michelle Geller) just for the masturbating scene .. should it be allowed on screen].
What I found this book to be is nothing but a preachy-know-it-all-snobbery of a novel where the author spends all his time preaching (worse than your average organised religion folks) and preaching and preaching - how life should be, why it should be so. I might as well have picked up the Quran and read that instead. Coelho is simply more of a Pope than an author. The book felt like a pretentious crap that shoved its 'life ideal and philosophies' down my throat until I choked and spat out in disgust.
I don't pretend to understand life's blacks and whites or even the greys and neither should a literary work. I've grown accustomed to the simple fact that books are there to enlighten you and make you think .. it is not a self help guide where all the answers are churned out. So when an author comes in to establish that he knows it all, that he is the Messiah who has all the answers is nothing but an insult to .. well I don't know exactly what .. but I was furious.
Of course I understand why Coelho is popular. People are brainless morons or one in the making. The laziness takes hold and fuck all that spending time thinking about a book .. let's all read crap that already provides easy philosophies and easy answers to life .. Oh Coelho, you are the greatest, please do all the thinking for me and write more of those crap you call literary works and in turn, I shall contribute just a little bit more to your Billions.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
The Graduate Part I
Merry Christmas .. Happy New Year .. Happy Valentines Day .. Happy St. Patrick's Day .. and every happy-fucking-holidays I have missed.
On the eve of handing in my very last Undergraduate report, I am incredibly distressed. Four years of doing absolutely nothing has done wonders for the prospect of future employment. I am hormonal, pubertal and mono-pausal all at the same time browsing through five different job-alerts everyday (approximately 150 job listings a day) and finding abso-fucking-outely nothing. The vast amount of disappointment is of course accompanied by non-functional advise from various people in my life and they just do not know when to shut the hell up. Let us not forget Facebook, who keeps alerting me when my cousin's brother's father's niece has landed that marvellous dream job at the age of eighteen or the many photographic (approximately hundreds, but who keeps a count) evidence of new-entrant office parties and various keg-meets after-work. The realisation that you're degree sucks is not a happy thought and it sucks even more when the mother exclaims, 'I give you permission to start yet another undergraduate degree ' like I really fucking give a shit about what you permit and do not permit your fully-grown-should-be-having-kids-if-living-in-ancient-times-daughter to do. Let us not forget the stories of how your father and mother also had a rough and slow career start, only to move onto comments on how you are just not fast enough to land one yourself.
Is it then a wonder why all I want to do is run the fuck away to Zimbabwe and start my own personal civil war in the heart of Africa? (Actually, I don't know where the heart of Africa is .. surely it's Zimbabwe?)
I am a graduate afterall.
On the eve of handing in my very last Undergraduate report, I am incredibly distressed. Four years of doing absolutely nothing has done wonders for the prospect of future employment. I am hormonal, pubertal and mono-pausal all at the same time browsing through five different job-alerts everyday (approximately 150 job listings a day) and finding abso-fucking-outely nothing. The vast amount of disappointment is of course accompanied by non-functional advise from various people in my life and they just do not know when to shut the hell up. Let us not forget Facebook, who keeps alerting me when my cousin's brother's father's niece has landed that marvellous dream job at the age of eighteen or the many photographic (approximately hundreds, but who keeps a count) evidence of new-entrant office parties and various keg-meets after-work. The realisation that you're degree sucks is not a happy thought and it sucks even more when the mother exclaims, 'I give you permission to start yet another undergraduate degree ' like I really fucking give a shit about what you permit and do not permit your fully-grown-should-be-having-kids-if-living-in-ancient-times-daughter to do. Let us not forget the stories of how your father and mother also had a rough and slow career start, only to move onto comments on how you are just not fast enough to land one yourself.
Is it then a wonder why all I want to do is run the fuck away to Zimbabwe and start my own personal civil war in the heart of Africa? (Actually, I don't know where the heart of Africa is .. surely it's Zimbabwe?)
I am a graduate afterall.
Thursday, October 09, 2008
Dance, Dance, Dance
I'm not entirely sure why I'm so so so in love with Murakami. He is not the greatest writer this era has to offer. I've read (just about) enough literature to know that. Murakami doesn't really use hard vocabulary (that I gather from the translations, as I cannot read his works in original Japanese) or even intricate sentence structure. In fact, everything about his books (the ones I've read) are .. just imperfect. Phillip once told me that the more you read his things, the more they would bleed into each other, ie. you'll find yourself reading similar things.
Despite all that, I'm enjoying my Murakami phase every little bit.
The latest book I finished (which took me an awful lot of time) was Dance Dance Dance. Unfortunately, I didn't know there was a prequel to this piece (which after I found out, I bought .. just today in fact. The Murakami books are JUST perfect. The way they look - the cover, the illustration, the back sleeve, the fonts, the way Haruki Murakami is written ..), so .. it's like .. I know how it ends for the un-named narrator without knowing his roots.
It seems stupid to talk about Dance Dance Dance a second time since I'd already talked about it in another blog. But baby, I'm in the mood for writing.
Majority of the reading had been spent on buses to and from work and uni. Also, the Botanical Gardens along with a few Kent-Blues. No, I don't really smoke .. it was just one of those things. Start of Spring, sun-baking in a park with gorgeous views, Murakami and cigarettes. One day, I would like to get an apartment right in front of the bridge, the opera house and the botanical gardens - spend quiet times with a book and a glass of red wine. (Mmm .. I seem to really love red wine too .. a new acquired thing .. must have been that cheese and wine night thing at Sydney Uni. As I say, all I dream of is a soul mate and red wine). I fall in love with Sydney everytime I venture out to Circular Quay.
The Review:
It didn't occur to me for a long time that the narrator's name was never revealed. So, I'm guessing that I was really really sucked into the book. Which is odd because I don't ever recall reading a huge chunk in one sitting. I took my time with it .. like how you would with wine (maybe that's why I can't do straight shots .. so much of life still unlived and I'm turning twenty-two next week .. it's depressing). The plot wasn't exactly this intricate maze of ... maze .. but the unravelling .. was just so incredibly sexy (which is true for most of his novels in-my-humble-opinion). I remember reading Kafka on the Shore and thinking how much it reminded me of the whole Moroccan slow cooking thing .. well .. not the best analogy .. but one of my greatest love happens to be couscous and Moroccan food (and Moroccan tea and their traditional tea-cups .. speaking of tea, I must blog about T-2 one day).
I'm doubtful whether the book had a happy ending. Though it's implied that he .. unknots his life and gets back into the wheel of life, somehow I didn't buy it. Or I didn't want to believe it. Dance Dance Dance was definitely not as .. trippy as Kafka. I always wonder about the grubby pubs in Japan, whether they really play La Boheme and Bach like Murakami always implies. (Which is why I'll be heading to Japan end of next year, given a few financial kinks and life-difficulties somehow work out). Behind all the pretentious references to things I consider cool .. there is never any deep philosophical pretention that I find absolutely unbearable .. adding to the list of things I love about Murakami's books.
.. I've just realised how incredibly attractive Robert Downey Jr is.
.. And I end here.
Despite all that, I'm enjoying my Murakami phase every little bit.
The latest book I finished (which took me an awful lot of time) was Dance Dance Dance. Unfortunately, I didn't know there was a prequel to this piece (which after I found out, I bought .. just today in fact. The Murakami books are JUST perfect. The way they look - the cover, the illustration, the back sleeve, the fonts, the way Haruki Murakami is written ..), so .. it's like .. I know how it ends for the un-named narrator without knowing his roots.
It seems stupid to talk about Dance Dance Dance a second time since I'd already talked about it in another blog. But baby, I'm in the mood for writing.
Majority of the reading had been spent on buses to and from work and uni. Also, the Botanical Gardens along with a few Kent-Blues. No, I don't really smoke .. it was just one of those things. Start of Spring, sun-baking in a park with gorgeous views, Murakami and cigarettes. One day, I would like to get an apartment right in front of the bridge, the opera house and the botanical gardens - spend quiet times with a book and a glass of red wine. (Mmm .. I seem to really love red wine too .. a new acquired thing .. must have been that cheese and wine night thing at Sydney Uni. As I say, all I dream of is a soul mate and red wine). I fall in love with Sydney everytime I venture out to Circular Quay.
The Review:
It didn't occur to me for a long time that the narrator's name was never revealed. So, I'm guessing that I was really really sucked into the book. Which is odd because I don't ever recall reading a huge chunk in one sitting. I took my time with it .. like how you would with wine (maybe that's why I can't do straight shots .. so much of life still unlived and I'm turning twenty-two next week .. it's depressing). The plot wasn't exactly this intricate maze of ... maze .. but the unravelling .. was just so incredibly sexy (which is true for most of his novels in-my-humble-opinion). I remember reading Kafka on the Shore and thinking how much it reminded me of the whole Moroccan slow cooking thing .. well .. not the best analogy .. but one of my greatest love happens to be couscous and Moroccan food (and Moroccan tea and their traditional tea-cups .. speaking of tea, I must blog about T-2 one day).
I'm doubtful whether the book had a happy ending. Though it's implied that he .. unknots his life and gets back into the wheel of life, somehow I didn't buy it. Or I didn't want to believe it. Dance Dance Dance was definitely not as .. trippy as Kafka. I always wonder about the grubby pubs in Japan, whether they really play La Boheme and Bach like Murakami always implies. (Which is why I'll be heading to Japan end of next year, given a few financial kinks and life-difficulties somehow work out). Behind all the pretentious references to things I consider cool .. there is never any deep philosophical pretention that I find absolutely unbearable .. adding to the list of things I love about Murakami's books.
.. I've just realised how incredibly attractive Robert Downey Jr is.
.. And I end here.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
dot-dot-dot
I'm depressed.
The problem is I can't tell anyone why I'm depressed and as simple as the reason might be, it's a little bit more complicated than just the lack of sunlight.
Alone once again. Where the hell are all my friends? Could I even tell them though.
The problem is I can't tell anyone why I'm depressed and as simple as the reason might be, it's a little bit more complicated than just the lack of sunlight.
Alone once again. Where the hell are all my friends? Could I even tell them though.
Monday, June 23, 2008
Sunday, April 06, 2008
Silly Things, Shallow Things, Unimportant Things and Facebook
Today is one of those restless days. Oestrogen level is up causing a hormonal imbalance and I'm depressed about my future home. Or the lack of it. It's not that I'm particularly 'domesticated' person- the last thing I would be sad about is not ever having a place I can decorate in my way, but here it is. It's all in my evolutionary make-up unfortunately, being a female (and such a wonderful one too!) and all. I'm feeling the need for my own nest and the sort of future domestic path I've chosen doesn't allow me to acquire a 'humble abode' of my own (I do however, get a room .. which I have the fortune of sharing with someone else .. a bit like the days I used to share a room with my sibling).
Women are stupid. Their genetic make-up is near bull-shit and evolution fucked us over! I've known some (myself included) to hit a special hormone at some random time and wanting to experience mother-hood right there and then, dreaming up the unborn babies features and etc. God knows, it's the same with having a house some day in the suburbs with a huge front garden with blooming bed of roses and what have you (.. I believe that is the American Dream). Sometimes I wish I didn't have to move in with my future in-laws - not because I'm a bitch and never get along with people in general, but because it'll never be mine. I can't change the stupid curtains or the sofa without considering other people's feelings. I can't invite and entertain people the way I might want without considering whether other people will be offended. The only place on Earth where there is no question of compromise is the very place I shall never have. Then again, I've had plenty of practice living with my own folks .. even then when I was free to choose my stupid curtain I never did. What the fuck? When I dream an alternate life like one of those Sex-in-the-City ladies (thanks to my vivid imagination, I live in a fucking dream-world of alternate realities which I play with when I'm bored/depressed/all the time) I still can't imagine a 'home'-home. I imagine a mattress and a bath tub (not in the same room)!
About a year and a bit ago, when my friend was preparing for her domestic life (in-laws still but an out house thing in the backyard) I remember her picking out furnitures - bed, sofa and .. other things. She was quite stressed because she couldn't decide between the black leather or the chocolate leather. When my other friend finally moved with her family to a bigger place (which she paid half for it .. something that's an astronomical achievement for someone her age) she too spent countless weekends with her better half and mother shopping for the bed, the stupid sofa, the stupid lamp, the stupid side table .. the stupid everything. Now, I see my own parents do the same with our lounge room- re-doing the furnitures to match the stupid TV. The conclusion is, I have never wanted a stupid life where I spend even a moment's thought about personifying a stupid room let alone a stupid house. I've played with stupid cooking sets but I've never played with Baribie dolls and stupid doll houses. The only time I've thought about all that 'make your house a home' bullshit was when I was considering a career path in Interior Decorating because I would/could choose/manipulate other people's choice and of course the money (.. then again which career path haven't I considered under the stars with the exception of prostitution because I don't have an amazing body or could handle a lot of men/women sexually).
Then why does my hormones betray me now? I feel like a low-lifer with a common 'girly' dream.
I also hate Facebook because this seems to be the only way I know what my uncle has been up to with his life lately. We live just 5 minutes away, yet our relationship is no more. This is worse than being cheated on by a significant other (which he/she is bound to do anyway).
Just so very restless.
Women are stupid. Their genetic make-up is near bull-shit and evolution fucked us over! I've known some (myself included) to hit a special hormone at some random time and wanting to experience mother-hood right there and then, dreaming up the unborn babies features and etc. God knows, it's the same with having a house some day in the suburbs with a huge front garden with blooming bed of roses and what have you (.. I believe that is the American Dream). Sometimes I wish I didn't have to move in with my future in-laws - not because I'm a bitch and never get along with people in general, but because it'll never be mine. I can't change the stupid curtains or the sofa without considering other people's feelings. I can't invite and entertain people the way I might want without considering whether other people will be offended. The only place on Earth where there is no question of compromise is the very place I shall never have. Then again, I've had plenty of practice living with my own folks .. even then when I was free to choose my stupid curtain I never did. What the fuck? When I dream an alternate life like one of those Sex-in-the-City ladies (thanks to my vivid imagination, I live in a fucking dream-world of alternate realities which I play with when I'm bored/depressed/all the time) I still can't imagine a 'home'-home. I imagine a mattress and a bath tub (not in the same room)!
About a year and a bit ago, when my friend was preparing for her domestic life (in-laws still but an out house thing in the backyard) I remember her picking out furnitures - bed, sofa and .. other things. She was quite stressed because she couldn't decide between the black leather or the chocolate leather. When my other friend finally moved with her family to a bigger place (which she paid half for it .. something that's an astronomical achievement for someone her age) she too spent countless weekends with her better half and mother shopping for the bed, the stupid sofa, the stupid lamp, the stupid side table .. the stupid everything. Now, I see my own parents do the same with our lounge room- re-doing the furnitures to match the stupid TV. The conclusion is, I have never wanted a stupid life where I spend even a moment's thought about personifying a stupid room let alone a stupid house. I've played with stupid cooking sets but I've never played with Baribie dolls and stupid doll houses. The only time I've thought about all that 'make your house a home' bullshit was when I was considering a career path in Interior Decorating because I would/could choose/manipulate other people's choice and of course the money (.. then again which career path haven't I considered under the stars with the exception of prostitution because I don't have an amazing body or could handle a lot of men/women sexually).
Then why does my hormones betray me now? I feel like a low-lifer with a common 'girly' dream.
I also hate Facebook because this seems to be the only way I know what my uncle has been up to with his life lately. We live just 5 minutes away, yet our relationship is no more. This is worse than being cheated on by a significant other (which he/she is bound to do anyway).
Just so very restless.
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