Salt and corrosion

I caught the credits of some TV show last night, and the makeup artist was called Wizzy Molineaux. Imagine how awesome life would be if you were called that.

When my colleagues and I came second in that trivia quiz last month, our prize pack included a voucher for drinks at the same bar, so obviously we had to go back to the quiz this month to use it. A different team this time, minus Angela and her research assistant (whose idea it was) as they are travelling. In their place: New Lady, Dr A and our trainee receptionist. We won, of course. Angela's husband texted her to say she'll struggle to get back on the team next month, since we improved our place without her. I think he's a man who likes to live dangerously.

What else? I bought some new socks last week. Living on the edge. I just wanted a dark pair of socks, but when I got them home I found I had purchased a pair of all day socks (as opposed to ones you only wear for an hour, obviously). What makes them all day socks, apparently, is that they don't have elastic round the cuffs. I thought they might fall down, but they don't, and they're very comfortable. So that's good.

I'm not a fan of sports in general, or bowling in particular, but I very much enjoyed this story.

A few months ago, it was decreed that my workplace needs to review the shared network folders and create a systematic file-naming system. I was on leave when this was decided, but one of my colleagues volunteered me for the working group. Guess which one! 'I thought it sounded like something you'd enjoy,' she told me. (She was wrong.) Anyway, we have created new primary network folders, and have just finished debating the secondary folders to go in them, and now we have to come up with an official file-naming policy. Thrilling times.

I spent this afternoon reading documents about best-practice file-naming. The first one I read was insistent that underscores should be used to make file names easier to read. The second one was equally insistent that underscores should never be used. The first one said that file names should contain all pertinent information. The second one said that they should be as short as possible. The first one said abbreviations should be used wherever practical. The second one... I think you get the picture. This is going to be fun.

The local theatre sent me its annual program last week, so I could book four or more productions in advance. Despite the program listing shows all through the year, the four I want are in a six week block from July to September. So that's my winter entertainment sorted out. I am going to see something called I Heart Bunnings (Bunnings being a hardware chain). I am so highbrow.

Today I bought a new frying pan. It was an action-packed day.

Here, have a random word:

8. Ripple

This week I asked the random word generator for a verb and it gave me 'to ripple'. That, as I'm sure we all know, means to form or display little undulations or waves on a surface, or to cause such undulations to be formed. That derives from the Middle English 'rippelen', meaning to crease or wrinkle. Also, as I'm sure we all didn't know (I certainly didn't), it means to remove seeds from flax with a comb-like instrument (in other words, a comb). This comes from the Middle English 'ripelen', meaning to remove seeds. Aren't these random words educational?

There is a biscuit in Australia (and possibly elsewhere in the world?) called a Chocolate Ripple. Made by Arnott's, it is an honest, old-fashioned biscuit; a good dunking biscuit and a mildly flavourful treat, chocolate in the sense that it has cocoa powder in it, without going so fancy as a chocolate coating. Its great claim to fame is that it is the basis for the Chocolate Ripple cake, which involves a lot of Chocolate Ripple biscuits held together with whipped cream. Grate a Peppermint Crisp over it, and you have the very hautest of haute cuisine. I haven't seen one of them for years. Looking at the Arnott's site just now, they also have a recipe for a vanilla slice made with Sao biscuits, which would prime my tastebuds for disappointment. (A question for Australian readers: is the Sao the most boring biscuit ever devised? I think it might be.)

But this is about ripples, not biscuits. Ripple is also a charity/search engine thing, so if you google using Google, so you must ripple using Ripple.

Next week: Bopping

Today I have been reading the credit card use policies of charitable organisations. Oh yes, I know how to live. What was particularly striking was the Cancer Institute's policy, which said approval for an employee credit card had to come from the Chief Operating Officer, or in the COO's absence, the Chief Cancer Officer. The Chief Cancer Officer! Imagine having that on your business card.

Also, I have ordered my 2012 wall calendar. I get one of these every year. I say one, but it comes with a mini version too, which is handy. I put the little one up at work and the large one is at home. It's what I stick my fruit stickers on. So there you go. My exciting life.

As you see, I've got nothing. No news. It's a quiet week. I was quite excited to find a recipe for homemade nutella. Three guesses what I'll be doing this weekend.

I bought a new lunch box this weekend. I know, my exciting life. I really liked my old lunch box because it came with its own fork tucked into the lid, but, alas, it was warped from being microwaved on a regular basis and the lid no longer fits, even though it claimed it was microwave safe. Well, I suppose it was microwave safe. Just not microwave sturdy. My new box also claims to be microwave safe and it's made from a different sort of plastic, so we'll see how that goes. Anyway, the new box is a Nude Food Mover. It's made of clear plastic, you see, so you can see your unwrapped food in the box, nude, which makes it sound slightly pervy. Also, they have these little characters to illustrate their brochure, which are an orange and a pear with pixellated parts. I'm not sure I want to eat either of them, particularly the orange's false eyelashes.

( Racy! )

The texts to the editor in the local paper have found something new to complain about. Well, one person has. She says that there are too many musicals on concurrently and it's unfair that she can't get to see them all. I don't normally like it when people are dismissive of first world problems, because worry is worry no matter what, but 'too many musicals, not enough time' is the very definition of a first world problem, surely.

As part of our merger process (which is still fun!, by the way, only slightly less so than it was), we have changed our financial reporting year from Australia's financial year, which runs from July to June, to the calendar year. This means that January, not July, will be the busiest month of the year for me. I'm not sure I'm entirely pleased with that, because every other business will be on holiday in January, so it will be a pain to get documents that I might need. On the other hand, it means for the first time in my working life I will be able to take leave in July. Fancy that! I'm going to take a week off, just for the novelty value.

'How many times,' asked a polo supplement in today's paper, 'have you stood on the side line of a polo match and never actually seen a hint of polo because you were too busy enjoying yourself with your mates?' I can tell you: so many times. No, wait, not at all, because I've never stood on the side line of a polo match at all. I suspect this supplement wasn't really aimed at me.

Today I accompanied my mother to look at garden furniture. All go, then. A man whose name tag said Steve served us. He had a such a lovely, chocolately voice, rich and deep and smooth. He was wasted selling garden furniture, I tell you. When we got back in the car, my mother said, 'Did he sound familiar to you?', and, yes, he did. We eventually worked out that he was the artist formerly known as the Voice of the Morning on the local radio station back when it had local content. I suppose he lost his job when the station was taken over by a statewide network with most of the programs syndicated from Melbourne. Oh, fame, you fleeting mistress.

I saw the end of the Nigella episode on before the news the other night. She was making something with golden syrup in it, but, she said, don't worry if you don't have golden syrup in the house. 'Just use dark golden syrup instead.' Thanks for that, Nigella, you've been a huge help.

I don't remember what she was making, but I was inspired by seeing the golden syrup to make Mary Woolley Pudding for dinner with my mother and her partner. 'We're having Mary Woolley Pudding,' I said, and my mother said, 'First catch your Mary Woolley,' as she always does because that joke never gets old. Mary Woolley Pudding is a simple steamed pudding flavoured with golden syrup. It's called Mary Woolley Pudding after one of my grandmother's old friends who gave her the recipe. My grandmother was scrupulous about recording who gave her recipes. Her old exercise book is filled with recipes for things like Betty's Biscuits. I don't know why she chose to title this one Mary Woolley Pudding, no possessive, but she did and so that's what we call it. It is a good pudding.

Mary Woolley's family also thought it was a good pudding. So much that they ate it for breakfast and thought this completely normal, and one of the Woolley children caused Mary no end of embarrassment after perusing the breakfast menu of a posh Melbourne hotel in the 1960s and bellowing to his mother on the other side of the room, 'Mum! They don't have pudding!' Shocked society matrons had fan themselves in horror.

'But we,' said my mother, concluding her tale, 'were never allowed to eat it for breakfast.' Not that she's bitter about that.

This week I have been busy preparing for an audit. Audit number two of four for the year, because of our merger. Necessary as per constitutional and contractual obligations, but I am a bit over them. Although I am enormously pleased when I print off a report for, say, tax withheld from wages, and it adds up to exactly what it says it should on the balance sheet. It is the most satisfying feeling in the world.*

Tonight is the last night of my ( Photoshop course )

Finally, the teacher said that she was talking to the professional photographer who teaches the How To Use Your SLR Camera course and he showed her some amazing things in Photoshop. Like, he opens a nice photo and makes some adjustments and it becomes an even nicer photo! Which is what I wanted to learn, basically. So, um, two stars out of five for this course.



* That may be an exaggeration.
** Except for one of my mother's friends, who tried to delete a Word document but somehow deleted Word itself instead. She was beyond help, although I did reinstall Word for her and make her promise to only delete things from My Documents.