Salt and corrosion

Things I saw today:
1. Two men wheeling rubbish bin-sized cans of Monster Energy (drink) along the breakwater.
2. A recipe for Chocolate Sauerkraut Surprise Cake. Is it really a surprise if it's in the name of the cake?

A story:
When I was a little daisy, just a bud as t'were, I went to one-room primary school. Every morning, Sister Adalbert would make us take our shoes off, tie rags on our feet over our socks, and put some music on so we could dance the floor clean. This was the idea of a young and funky student teacher, who called it a disco. A disco! How sophisticated we were in our little country town. Only I doubt that any actual 1980s disco DJs put the needle of the sort of records Sister Adalbert played: the collected polkas of Jimmy Shand and his Band, football club theme songs... and the song I am about to embed below,

F-list, I have been looking for this for years. Prolonged exposure to this song is the reason I refer to my hometown as the City by the Sea (that, and the fact I suspect it might be hard for people to pronounce). And googling for it on a whim today turned up trumps. So I'm embedding it here for my own amusement, but please feel free to tie rags to your feet and dance the dust off your floor too.

I read the supermarket's free magazine yesterday. It had a page of Easter treats. Easter treats, right? Easter. Treats. Keep those two concepts in mind.

One of the alleged Easter treats was ( not an Easter treat AT ALL )

This morning I opened my curtains and blinked, puzzled, at the world. Something was different. What was it? Something was hanging over the verandah roof. A blanket? Who would throw a blanket over my verandah roof? And then my brain finally registered what it was looking at: a sheet of tin off the roof. Part of the roof was hanging over the verandah and flapping about like a sheet on a washing line. So yes, it's been windy today. The Bureau of Meteorology was not kidding when it said to prepare for a storm surge.

Weekly knitting update: None. We had an unexpected late return of summery, non-knitting weather this week. Until today, obv.

I forgot to say that I went to the launch of the local theatre's 2017 subscriber season last week. I had tickets to the 2016 launch this time last year, but I forgot to go. I really wasn't in a good way this time last year, was I? Anyway, I remembered to go this year, and I got a free glass of orange juice. So that was worth leaving the house.

When I was little, my mother used to make chocolate spiders out of Chang's Original Fried Noodles for Christmas nibbles. I haven't seen Chang's Original Fried Noodles for years, but they always seem to me to be festive because of that. My mother went to visit a friend a couple of weeks ago, and came back with the recipe for the salad they ate at lunch. It involved Chang's Original Fried Noodles. She made this salad the next day. She loves this salad. I don't like this salad, because I find the dressing too sweet. But I am outvoted on the matter. She took this salad to her sewing day, and her other friends liked it so much they're all making it. And I went to the supermarket this morning and right next to the deli counter is a three-tier basket of Chang's Original Fried Noodles, so I am guessing that everyone in the City by the Sea has gone mad for Chang's Original Fried Noodles. They're all the rage.

Speaking of rage, I always thought it would be terrible to live near one of those neighbours that go overboard on Christmas lights. No sleep for all of December while the light show goes on. And then I saw these and... they have SOUND. What fresh hell is this? I've been reading Christmas-themed murder mysteries this month, and I think I've come up with a good motive.

I hate myself for clicking on click bait. I am impervious to What the Cast of [Insert Show] Looks Like Now Will Amaze You, but I saw one today promising to tell me The Unconventional Appliance Housewives Love. Ooh! What could it be? ( Click here to replicate my experience of disappointment )

Tuesday's random reviews:

10:25 – Buying fresh fish – ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
( And other thrill-a-minute activities )

Tomorrow, though. Tomorrow I have actual plans, so that should throw up something more interesting.

We're supposed to be able to see an aurora tonight. Fingers crossed.

My first day of freedom. I started by cleaning out my handbag. I hate having things loose in my bag, and the last little while I haven't had time to tidy it. I mean, I have had time. I've had the same amount of time as always, when I clean out the bag daily. I just haven't been in the right frame of mind. But now I am. So that's my new project: a good clean out. Today, the bag. Tomorrow, the computer desk. One thing each day.

I have been buying packets of stuff called Power Mix to eat at work. That sounds like a dodgy steroid, but it's just trail mix. Fruit and nuts and choc bits in a single serve packet, just the ticket for an afternoon snack. I had my last packet the other day and read the ingredients and realised I have most of those things in my pantry. So I bought the rest this morning and threw a cup of each of them in a bowl: almonds, macadamias, pistachios, pepitas, sunflower seeds, dried cranberries, raisins and choc bits. One serve turns out to be quarter of a cup. So there, I've got afternoon snacks sorted out for the next year or so.

This afternoon, ( I went to a funeral )

Sunday's knitting photo: ( Still working my way through the plain rows to get to the yoke )

I am not watching every episode of Masterchef Australia this year, but every episode I have watched has involved someone making miso caramel. At least two people have mentioned it tonight. It is obviously this year's dish à la mode.

I heard sirens the other evening, sounding like they were down by the river. That's never good. The morning revealed the delightful truth, that a gentleman, possibly (in fact, very probably) under the influence of alcohol and/or drugs, had stolen a car from somewhere and driven it to the City by the Sea. With the City by the Sea's finest hot on his tail, he drove to the river mouth. You can't drive any further than the river mouth, obviously, so he was cornered. No, he wasn't! He stole a boat.

I say "he stole a boat" and what do you imagine? Perhaps this bold gentleman is in a little motor boat? Is it a yacht? Perhaps that local chap who built a galleon in his garden had moored in the river? No. He stole a rowing boat. He rowed to freedom!

No, he didn't. He rowed to the middle of the river and – and here we quote the local paper – "taunted the police".

I mean, they arrested him in the end, but thank you, good sir, for being entertaining beforehand.)

(One of the contestants on Masterchef has by-passed miso caramel. She's making beetroot caramel. No, thanks, I'll pass.)

Knit Every Day in May is drawing to a close. The cardigan isn't. ( Progress this week )

(One of the judges on Masterchef has just said that if he had the ingredients in today's mystery box, he would make sweet corn custard and miso caramel. Are they... Is that... I thought sweet corn custard was a sauce. Like, for meat. Could you serve a bowl of it with caramel? Well, I suppose you *could*, but would you?)

The free magazine from the supermarket has a special supplement this month: product placement recipes with an Easter theme, including Chocolate tarts with MaltEaster Bunnies. Or Crucified Rabbit Pie, if you prefer:



I don't think I'll be making them (but you can, if you like). At least they'd be edible, unlike some of these.

Coming out of the supermarket, I noticed that someone had dropped a tiny gingerbread man on the pedestrian crossing. Oh, it was traumatic. I think because it had little icing eyes. I had to hurry past before I saw it get crushed.

I've just seen an advertisement for a florist offering "on-demand flower delivery". As opposed to all those other florists who deliver bouquets randomly without waiting for an order.

Last year my mother's best friend and her two daughters were visiting the City by the Sea and they went to high tea at one of our fancier tea rooms. They asked my mother and me if we wanted to go, but my mother couldn't/wouldn't leave John for that long. She said I should go by myself, but I didn't. I felt a bit weird about going out and having fun while she was stuck at home so I said I'd stay with John so she could go, but she didn't want to do that either. I think we were having a martyr competition. Anyway, neither of us went, and I regretted that. I regretted it straight away, but even more so once I met them for lunch another day and they showed me photos of it. Éclairs in the shape of swans! One of the daughters is an aficionado of high teas and she compared it favourably (regarding presentation, taste and cost) to high tea at the famously fancy Windsor in Melbourne. So I was kicking myself.

My mother's friend rang a couple of weeks ago and said they were coming back for their annual visit in March and were doing high tea again and did we want to come this time? So we're going. This is what we're going to have (éclair swan not pictured, sadly - I hope that doesn't mean they don't do them any more).

( How is my finger? )

The fashion spread in today's newspaper supplement was for men's fashion, and featured not one but TWO blazer-and-formal-shorts combinations. That's following the one they suggested a month or so back. No. It's still not happening, Sunday supplement.

Back in spring I planted some seeds in my seedling tray. All sorts of things. Most sprouted, except the eggplants. Only one sad little eggplant seedling popped up. So I tended it and nurtured it and soon it was big enough to be planted out into the garden, where it grew. And grew and grew and grew. It's big. So big. I mean, you could climb this eggplant and find a giant at the top, that's how big it is. It's the biggest eggplant plant I've ever seen.

Today I was looking at it and noticed that it had buds and... they didn't look like eggplants. If anything, they looked a lot like the plants that had been in the next row of the seedling tray. That's right. My eggplant is a sunflower.

My computer's auto-correct has lately taken to auto-correcting my email address from alician to Galician (in fact, I let it do the work just then) when I have to fill in a form. It's very hard to fix, because I will reject the change, so it suggests it again, and I reject it, and then it will change it anyway, just to spite me. Which is irritating.

I have been put in charge of making the non-pudding Christmas dessert this year. Most years I make pavlova, but I thought this year I might do something different. Since outsourcing my Kris Kringle decision worked so well, let's try that again. The two options are:

1. Pistachio and Turkish delight ice cream pudding



2. Brown sugar pavlova with strawberries (or whatever other fruit looked nice) and cream



They're both health foods, obviously.

[Poll #2031285]

Perhaps in 2016 I could make all my major life decisions this way. Then I could write one of those "I did X for a year and this is what I learnt" books about it.

I thought on Sunday I should try to post every day this week to get myself back in the habit. That hasn't happened. Twice in a week, though. That's an improvement. Let's see if I can do a summary of what I would have been talking about.

Work is, let's say, interesting now. We won't know the results of the tender for next year until September, so work goes on as normal. We also have to prepare for the new company just in case it does happen. This week, I have been doing my current job and also starting to do the job I may have next year. Also this week, the employment lawyers released their redundancy advice, which was fun. No, it wasn't. But that's an entry for another day.

I am playing phone tag with my hairdresser at the moment. I go to this hairdresser because her salon is a two-minute walk from my house. Also because she is nice, but mostly because she is nearby. Unfortunately, she is sick of being a hairdresser and is studying nursing. She will eventually close her salon, but in the meantime she is keeping it open at odd hours in between nursing placements, which makes it hard to get appointments. Hard to catch her to make an appointment in the first place, and then hard to get in. Last time I made an appointment, I had to wait three weeks. This time, I am starting now, hoping for an appointment in August. I suppose I could just find a different hairdresser, but, oh, that's going to be such a hassle. I'll have to psyche myself up for that. I miss Mischief, my last long-term hairdresser (he moved to Melbourne). For the first time I understood those stories about movie stars flying their favourite hairdresser on location. He was that good.

My mother has been feeling sorry for the birds in her garden now that it's winter. She's always put out bread or seeds or whatever for them, but this year she has been experimenting with making seed balls. 'I think I've cracked it,' she told me the other day, and gave me one of the balls for my garden. She has indeed cracked it. I think she's made bird crack. I've never seen so many sparrows and honey eaters trying to land on one branch. So much angry twittering and flapping and hopping up and down. If you want to try it yourself, the recipe is to melt together a couple of tablespoons of dripping and honey/golden syrup, then stir in enough bird seed to make a solid block; put in paper cups with a wick of kitchen string; set in the fridge.

I recently bought a new box of Glad Wrap (plastic wrap/cling film). There's no cutting strip on it, or so I thought. How can a person be expected to use plastic wrap with no toothed strip to cut it? Only when I was complaining about this to my mother, she looked at it and determined that there was a cutting strip; it was now in the lid so you have to rip upwards, rather than downwards. She was right, of course (and irritatingly). But it's so hard to do! And it turns out that I am not the only one with problems: Glad has had to revert to their original packaging after a consumer revolt. So that's good. Only that article is from January, so obviously they haven't rushed to change the box.

I am going to have a jacket potato for my dinner, and, excitingly, it's a black potato. Well, purple. A Purple Bliss. I imagine it's going to taste just like a regular potato, but I'm not sure how I'm going to feel about seeing black potato flesh.

Tomorrow I am going to the Melbourne Craft Fair, which is being held in the same venue as the Labor Party's national conference. That will be an interesting crowd mix in the foyer.