Friday Favourites - Prince

YAY! Freaky Friday! I mean Friday Favourites! Finally, Friday, you are here and we can think and talk about Prince. Mate, I am so glad you bought Prince up because I really love him so much.

There was a time in my life when I just used to hang out in my room listening to Prince for hours on end and on reflection I wonder why I don't do this more now.

God, to pick a favourite Prince song is like I imagine picking a favourite child might be. There are so many great ones. Raspberry Beret and Purple Rain are two of my favourites, both in life and in karaoke. And let me clarify that when I talk about favourite Prince songs this also means favourite all time songs.

Little Red Corvette is also another personal favourite. This is actually the song that made me really realise how awesome Prince was. I should confess that as a child in the eighties I remember that people would all talk about Prince as a musical genius and I didn't really get it. But as I matured I realised that maybe those musical commentators did know what they were talking about. Also I have to say that contrary to the essence of Friday Favourites I actually think all these songs are also best things.

Anyway, there are so many Prince songs that I love, but I think the one I have to nominate as my Friday Favourite is If I was Your Girlfriend. It has a good beat and you can dance to it. But there is more to it than just that. The song is Prince wondering what life would be like if he was the female best friend of his ex-girlfriend. What a creepy, awesome approach to a break up song! Dude is a genius! Also it is funny. "Can we just go to the movies and cry together?...Baby can I dress you, I mean help you pick out your clothes before we go out?" HAHAHA. Man, I love Prince! And I really love this song.

Friday favourites

Welcome to the first installment of Miss Soft Crab's Friday Favourites!

Friday Favourites is what happens when it's Friday, and we have a favourite thing we would like to share with the crab community.

It is also what happens when something is not necessarily a best thing, it's just a favourite thing. It has a little special place in our hearts, but isn't hands down a best thing. For example, let's say that one of these days I want to do a post about cheese. Cheese is, absolument, a best thing. But maybe instead of posting about cheese in general, I post about babybel. I'm not sure if it could be described as a best thing, but a favourite thing? Sure.
Look, this isn't science everybody. It's just a couple of ladies talking about some things that they really like. So here goes with Friday Favourites!

Readers, my first Friday Favourite is the song Seven by Prince.
As we all know Prince wrote pretty much all the great songs in the eighties and nineties. All of them. If one wishes to choose a favourite Prince song, they have tens to choose from. Maybe even one hundred. There are so many options. But we're not here to talk about options, we are here to talk about favourites and for me, that's Seven from the love symbol album.
I'm not sure I can explain why I love it so much. Maybe its because you don't really hear it as much as some of the others. Maybe it is because the lyrics have this kind of dark biblical thing going on. Like if Prince had written all the hymns we had to sing at catholic school, then this is what we would be singing. That is very appealing to me.
In actual fact, I think that the reason I like Seven so much is because clearly, it is not one of Prince's best songs, and yet it is a shit -hot song that makes me so super happy whenever I hear it.
It came on when I was in a shop recently and though I hadn't heard it in years and years I immediately thought to myself yes. YES! Seven, you are an awesome awesome song and I am choosing you as my first Friday Favourite.
Have a quick listen everybody!

Oh butter.

I'm so glad you brought this up because I have been wanting to talk about butter for ages.
I'm actually surprised that we waited this long to talk about it.

First, bread and butter.
Bread and butter is pretty much the best thing in a world full of best things.
No matter how many delicious things I eat and will continue to eat (insha'allah), I am never ever ever going to get sick of bread and butter. It is straight up delicious. My heart sinks a little whenever I see bread and olive oil on a restaurant table. I eat it, of course, but I don't love it. Actually, sometimes I do, if the oil is particularly nice and I put a little salt on my plate and then dip the bread in the salt after dipping it in the oil. Then I love it. But still, I don't love it as much as bread and butter.

I love how you can put butter in something, and then on something. The other day I made pierogi. I put butter in the dough, butter in the potato and beetroot filling, and then butter and chives on top when I served it up. Somehow, it came out not tasting very buttery, just extremely delicious.

I love how butter is a friend to the sweet dish, and a friend to the savoury dish. You can't say that about many things. Salt, maybe. Rice, I guess. Probably lots of thing. But butter, you do it with such grace.

I could go on and on but I am getting really hungry, and must stop now. But finally, I just want to mention that I think butter and mushrooms also go together beautifully.

Butter: An MSC Tribute

Butter, I love you on all breads. Not with other things. You go to waste on a salad sandwich. But on your own you shine. You are good on white bread and on multigrain. But I love you on rye bread best of all. I think it is the way rye bread is so fragrant and a little bit sweet. It is a beautiful marriage with you, butter. Your salty, creamy deliciousness. In debate about same sex marriage people often say that the definition of marriage is between a man and a woman. But the marriage of flavors of butter and rye bread is as beautiful as any heterosexual marriage goddamn it.

Butter, I love you with corn too. Char grilled, sweet, hot corn. When you and corn get together you turn two nice simple things into a really beautiful thing. Butter, when you get on corn it's like when the dorky girl takes her glasses off in a movie so we can realise how beautiful she is.

You used to be cream, butter. Then they churned you from one beautiful thing into another. How do you do it. Cream! Butter!

Without you, garlic bread is nothing. And where would croissants be!?

Of course I don't eat you all the time butter. But that doesn't mean I don't care about you. I just thought you should know.

MORE WAG

Congratulations Mate and Chops for psychically inducing the birth of Baby Twudd/Jiggley. (Actually I saw Rebecca Twigley on a TV commercial last night and her face was the name Rebecca Judd so I guess it is just Baby Judd born last night. Whatevs.)

So in the interest of being able to relate to your morning post I went and had a look at the Herald Sun website and the pictures of the Twudd wedding and readers 2011 hottest WAG poll. (I can't believe that is thing. ) And I learnt this: the Twudd wedding did not look classy; and WAGs all pretty much look the same. How readers can tell them apart to judge who is hotter completely baffles me.

To be fair to the WAGs though the majority of them were smiling in their pictures with only a few remaining to pose with that stupid open mouth face.

This Hun gallery lead me to another called 'Punching above their weight'. This was basically a bunch of footballers and their girlfriends based on the premise that the WAGs were too hot for the them. But, though there are some pretty unattractive footballers around, it basically just looked like a bunch of regular looking dudes with some plastic ladies. The couple I was most struck by, who actually seem perfectly matched in terms of attractiveness, was Barry Hall and his girlfriend. They are not just similar in terms of attractiveness but also in terms of features. They look alarmingly similar in fact. A total brother/sister couple. Am I right?!

What the WAG?

Yesterday on Chops at Home, Crimpy reviewed the Carlton football club theme song, and I provided special comments. I opined that this song is a total snore fest, which it is.
This is not a controversial opinion, but I like to think that in the same way the flap of a butterfly's wings in the amazon can lead to a tsunami in the pacific (not that I want it to! please stay still little butterflies!), maybe Crimpy's post was the trigger that eventually caused Rebecca Twigley to go in to labour and give birth to the Twigley Judd (Twudd) baby.
The birth of the Twudd baby was certainly the trigger that prompted me to look at pictures of R-Twig and C-Judd's wedding on the HUN online for about 20 minutes, then read an article called Footy's hottest WAGs, then look at a HUN photo gallery of footy's hottest WAGs. I'm not proud of any of this, but it's done now.

All of this activity left me with two overwhelming impressions: if I can just avoid looking at that first photo then I can avoid wasting a shitload of time on Herald Sun galleries, and, WAGs are boring looking and seem to permanently have their mouths open in their WAG photos. Check this out:

This is Jimmy Bartel's girlfriend, Nadia. She came fifth in the Herald Sun's hottest WAGs poll. As you can see, she has her mouth open in this photo. She isn't smiling. She is just looking at the camera with her mouth open. Let me tell you, I could have selected pretty much any photo from the Herald Sun WAG gallery as an example. If the WAGs weren't smiling in their photos, then they were doing some version of this face. I know this is meant to be a kind of sexy face, but to me she just looks like a total idiot. If a normal person was photographed in this pose, people would wonder why she looked so pissed off and perhaps whether she needed to go to the chiropractor because she is standing so awkwardly that she must have back pain.
I'm sure she is a perfectly nice lady. Perhaps all WAGs are. Lauren Phillips certainly seems pleasant. But for pete's sake, close your mouths WAGs, you look like morons!
That's all.

Set it free

I remember you telling me about the porridge party. I tend to recall you mentioning something about a combo that included one or all of rosewater, soymilk and white chocolate. Perhaps that is the missing porridge? I hope my memory is failing me because I'm not sure I would like to eat porridge with those three things in it, it could be a little gross.

Mate, I'm so sorry you have stopped loving your porridge combo. Several times you have looked at me earnestly, and told me that I should have porridge with LSA, soy milk and dried fruit for breakfast at work. You have practically implored me to do this. Now I understand why - because you have stopped loving the shit out of your porridge, and knowing I have a microwave at work, you want me to have what you used to have. It all makes sense now.

I think you should eat eggs for a little while.

In the movie Indecent Proposal, Woody Harrellson says to Demi Moore that if you love something you should set it free. If it comes back to you, it's yours forever. If it doesn't, it was never yours in the first place. It's possible that it was actually Demi who said this to Woody, or that this was not said in the movie Indecent Proposal at all. But none of that matters. What matters is that you fall in love with porridge again. I believe this will happen if you just take a little time out. Go and explore what eggs have to offer. Perhaps revisit toast. Just let porridge be free and I'm sure your love will come back tenfold.

I just don't know what to do with my porridge

When I worked in an office I used to eat a warm muesli that I would make for breakfast. I guess it was really porridge. I would put oats, LSA, roasted almonds and sometimes dried apricots in a bowl with some soy milk and microwave it. It was delicious and sweet and warming. It was a really good porridge. When I tried to replicate it at home it never quite worked. I think maybe the microwave was an important factor.

At home, for the last 18 months or so, I tend to have porridge with stewed apples, cinnamon, vanilla yoghurt and chopped dry roasted almonds. Sometimes I may vary it. No yoghurt. Raspberries or dried apricots cooked in the porridge. There are other things I may do. One time I had it with some left over raspberry coulis. YEAH BOYYYYYYYYYY!



But you can't do that every day. I have porridge and apples, etc. most mornings. At least 4 or 5 days a week. And I love this porridge. I really do. But 6 months ago it was still making my heart sing. Now I just enjoy it a lot. Where has the singing heart gone?

A couple of years ago Chickpea had a porridge party. It was on a Saturday afternoon and I was quite hungover. When I got there I was starving. What I really wanted to eat was hot chips. Of course what I got to eat was porridge. I think she served it four different ways. One of them totally slips my mind, but I remember the others, at least in sentiment if not in every detail.

There was one served in a waffle cone cup with maple syrup and facon; one infused with kaffir lime leaf, maybe served with coconut milk and palm sugar; there was one with dark chocolate and I think raspberries. And maybe the other was a more simple, regular kind of porridge. They were actually all very yummy. Even the American style one, but I don't really think any of them are the porridge to replace my daily porridge. I feel like maybe my porridge needs a change, but I don't know what to do with it. Maybe I should eat eggs for a while instead

A tale of two Mexican dinners Pt. 2

Isn't it funny that K and I found ourselves at two separate Mexican dinners last night?! Mate, yours sound lovely. Piksticks don't work for me. My teeth are too close together (not freakishly so readers, I just can't get anything wider than floss in. I actually get compliments on my teeth so don't start picturing me as some sort of freak. Please).

Anyway, on to the dinner Russeth cooked for the family.

Menu
Let me remind you that this is not a competition, readers. But I do have to tell you what Russeth made.

Tortillas. These were beautiful. The proper corn flour makes them so fragrant and tasty. Apparently the other secret is to wrap them in a tea towel so they steam themselves, becoming all soft and delicious. These would have been the hero of the meal if there weren't so many other damn heroes fighting it out for supremacy.

There was a white fish in bits covered with almond meal, sesame seeds and paprika (THIS, I think, was the ultimate hero warrior), there was a very spicy delicious potato thing, slow cooked pork (cooked for hours in lard so it just falls apart), also Russeth made salsa verde (coriander, tomatillos, a whole lot of fragrant deliciousness), salsa rojas (so much chilli and depth), a delicious guacamole with tomatoes and coriander, red cabbage in lime juice, and some chopped tomatoes.


Shit. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. I think Russeth might have out done himself. (I don't know, he always puts on a pretty fine spread. Was this better than Sexico - his Mexican feast 29th birthday party? It's hard to say. I think maybe it was!)


Of course I made chocolate molten babycakes for desert.


All in all this meal was delicious. DELICIOUS!

Interesting conversation
Now, let me remind you, readers, that this is not a competition. But our conversation was quite high brow and political if you must know.

Of course we talked of of poor Amy Winehouse (RIP Amy Winehouse. Really). We talked of the massacre in Norway.

Later when we talked of Baby's poo, Dad (still eating) pulled a face and observed "Even talking about Rupert Murdoch is better than this." To which Mum replied "That's how we got onto this topic!" Hahaha! (It's true.) Oh, how we laughed.

Then someone (me) mentioned Smurf jiz and the world was right again.

A tale of two mexican dinners

Quite coincidentally, J and I found ourselves at two separate Mexican dinners last night. We thought we would compare them on Miss Soft Crab today, though not in a competitive way. Just because.

Let’s begin with the Mexican dinner AB cooked for Lil, Chambo and I.

Menu

AB served chicken burritos with buttered corn and chunky guacamole.

She also made sangria, but after having a sip of it told us we weren’t allowed to drink it because she feared that the special sangria wine she used to make it had turned. (I had a sip and thought it was fine, but didn’t argue because I didn’t want to look like someone who can’t tell when wine has turned.)

The burritos were delicious. It was the buttered corn and the chunky guacamole that did it. The corn had been char grilled, then the kernels removed and butter stirred through. We spooned it in to our burritos along with all the other delicious things you would expect in a burrito – cheese, sour cream, jalapenos, salsa, lettuce and guacamole. The guacamole had chunks of avocado instead of mushed avocado, tomato, coriander and lots of green chilli and lime juice. It was a real winner.

The first burrito I constructed balanced the different ingredients perfectly. I congratulated myself on every bite.

I guess I got a little cocky, because the second burrito was basically stuffed full of so much stuff that I couldn’t wrap the tortilla all the way around without delicious things oozing out either end. I soldiered on, but didn’t take a photo because it probably looked pretty gross.

Interesting conversation

The topic on everyone’s lips was dentistry. It all began with the discovery of a bunch of what AB called Piksticks in the drawer of her coffee table. These things are like tiny bottle brushes which you shove between your teeth to use instead of dental floss. AB raves about them, and likes to keep them in the drawer of her coffee table so she can maintain dental hygiene while watching television.

She invited us to try them for ourselves, but recommended we select carefully as some of them are definitely used. In the cold light of day this invitation seems so unappealing, but last night it seemed like a good offer and I can cheerfully report that Piksticks really do work.

Sadly, it was too late for Lil who told us that she was in the process of getting a root canal. Readers, getting a root canal is a three stage process that involves removing the nerve, drilling a hole then filling the hole. WTF. Lil has just completed stage 2 – drilling of the hole. Apparently the dentist had to up the size of the drill-bit three times. *Shudder*

AB advised that she too had spent a great deal of time in the dentist’s chair of late, having her canine teeth rebuilt. We all looked at her blankly. “Because of all the grinding” she said. She thought our blank looks were because we didn’t understand why she needed tooth rebuilding, not the fact that you can get your mother flipping teeth rebuilt. Ha!

Turns out AB grinds her teeth in her sleep and had ground her canines down so much they no longer had any pointy bits on them. These days, dentists can replace lost pointy bits. Isn’t that incredible? AB doesn’t think so. Apparently her dentist rebuilt the heck out of her canines, so much so that her chewing motion was impeded. Anyone who knows AB also knows that impeded chewing motion absolutely will not do, so she went back to the dentist and told them to fix it. I understand that tooth filing was involved. *Shudder*

Despite the talk of dentistry, we all had a lovely time. Thanks AB.

FOMOODT

Your week sounds very nice.

Even though you didn't include the chocolate molten babycakes, my heart sinks a little bit at the mere mention of their name because it kills me, it absolutely kills me to miss out on delicious things. Hey, I am going to invent an acronym, for that, leveraging off the established acronym FOMO (fear of missing out)!

FOMOODT - Fear of missing out on delicious things!

Who's with me? Lets all try to make FOMOODT happen by using it in a sentence today!

But back to the babycakes. I am really happy that my chutney club brothers and sisters got to eat them, and I am also really glad that I have the recipe, but mostly I just have the worst case of FOMOODT since I went to Japan as a vegetarian in 2002 and pretty much cried like this every time I walked past a takoyaki vendor on the street. It was the beginning of the end of my vegetarianism.
But on a positive note, let me provide a quick recap of my week's highlights.

• I got a seat on the tram every single morning!



• I ate classy dumplings for dinner last night with Chambo and JZ.



• Neicey turned 1. I made a chocolate ripple cake for her and covered it in smarties (I borrowed this idea from J who made an awesome smartie covered birthday cake for Baby, thanks J). I bought candles that spelt out NEICY and when we all sang to her and she loved the shit out of it! Best thing!

Obviously, I was also there when J dropped me home after our trip to Ikea and I saw the light and I agree - it was a best thing.

And now it's almost the weekend! BEST THING!!

A few highlights of the week

Truth be told anyone who reads this blog knows that the number one highlight of my week was eating the chocolate molten babycakes. So in the interest of keeping things interesting I'm keeping this on a Monday to Friday (morning) schedule.

• Last night I watched the last Graham Norton show of the season. I really love this show. Heaps. Graham Norton is really funny and he manages to make almost all his guests likable (this was even true for Colin Farrell, but not true for Bradley Cooper or Miley Cyrus. Come on though, dude is a talk show host, not a miracle worker). Anyway this show was a best of from the past season and had some of the best things I saw and that I heard this week. So I was going to include links here for you. One thing I was going to include was a thing Bette Midler did and another was a funny the Robert Pattinson made, but you know what? I started looking for these things on youtube and (and found them) but the best thing was just watching Graham Norton clips while doing this research. I had so many laffs that I am doing you a favour by not including links. Go and look for them yourself.

• Well I ain't eaten nothing real special this week. The best thing was definitely baked potato with chilli beans. So hearty and delicious. It really hit the spot, so in a way it was special. I slathered it with this chilli sauce from Oasis Bakery. It is so good. A little sweet, a little vinegary, so spicy. Do yourself a flavour chilli lovers, if you are ever in Melbourne's southeast swing by Oasis for a little lunch and a little grocery shopping. You absolutely will not regret it.

• When I was dropping K off the other day after our trip to Ikea it was getting late, nearly 5 o'clock and it wasn't dark at all. It could have been any time of day. The days are getting longer! NEW BEST THING!

• Hey! It's FRIDAY!
  

Haiku Thursday Pt 2

Thursday
Sometimes you, Thursday,
Mean Szechuan for lunch. These are
The best Thursdays. Yes.

Porridge
I love you always
With apple With cinnamon
Porridge I love you

Blow out
Just five minutes and
My hair looks so much better
Should blow dry always

Chocolate molten babycakes
Babycakes, you changed
everything. I can't stop
thinking about you

It's Haiku Thursday again!

Isolated Showers

Bad enough you're rain.

That you're also all alone

Really breaks my heart.

#96

I've tried 1 and 8

But you. You're a cut above.

Let's stay together!

Chocolate Ripple Cake

Just cream and biccies

You might as well be White Wings

But you call to me

Removalist

"Are you bionic?"

I asked. Seemed likely. You said

"No, I'm a Kiwi."

Of course there is nothing wrong with taking style cues from chocolate!

Hershey bars are really stylish, aren't they?

Handsome. No-nonsense. These are good things to be.

You know, I once saw a documentary about how the Hershey company were responsible for making all the chocolate bars for the American Army during WWII. They had scientists working around the clock to develop a formula that was inexpensive to manufacture but also heat resistant so the chocolate wouldn't melt in the pockets of the American GIs. They also had to wrap it in poisonous gas-proof wrapping. Anyway, the documentary was chocker-block (ha!) with images of handsome American GIs eating Hershey's chocolate. I didn't mind. Now, whenever I see the Hershey bar I picture WWII era American GIs. I don't mind.

But back to chocolate-as-style-inspiration. I say go for it. Make that Ritter Rum Raison happen all over your body!

I'm quite drawn to the style of Easter favourite, the Elegant Rabbit. I like how jaunty s/he is. I like how the Elegant Rabbit isn't elegant at all, and Elegant Rabbit doesn't care! Look at his/her face. Is that the face of a rabbit that gives a hoot what you think?


S/he is just doing whatever s/he wants and s/he is loving it.

I guess it's Elegant Rabbit's attitude I like, rather than style. But I associate the style with the attitude, so now I just like the whole package.

And I want to eat him/her.

Chocolate bar as style inspiration - Is it wrong?

So the other day I was at The Coffee Company buying some coffee. As I was standing at the counter I saw some Ritter Sports. They were in a red packet and I fell in love with that packet. I only really saw the top of it, I don't even know what flavour it was but the thing was that it didn't make me want to eat chocolate it made me want to dress in a way I can only describe as yacht owner chic. This is basically a more mature take on one of the preferred styles of my mid-twenties, nautical.

It's possible that it was marzipan Ritter Sport
But I prefer to think that it was rum and raisin because I just don't think that marzipan could conjure the sort of yearnings in me that this packaging did.


Yacht fashion is a more preppy, rich person's version of nautical and needn't always include strictly nautical themes. It's a little more subtle. It would have lots of blue and white of course, with highlights of red, but would be wider than that, incorporating other colours, mainly pastel and would basically mean I would dress as if I summered on the Mediterranean. Perhaps this is just about wanting to be rich and summering on the Mediterranean?

I mean, for God's sakes. It is the middle of winter. If anything I should be dressing like a Snickers or Mars Bar wrapper. But look at that Mars font. That could never inspire any kind of fashion related feelings in me.

For a minute I thought the colours of Crunchie may be appropriate for winter fashions. But look what these wrappers look like:

DISGUSTING! No wonder I don't buy chocolate bars.

I guess it is hardly surprising that it took a European chocolate to make me think about style. Thank you Germans! Though if I am honest, while Australian chocolate packaging blows and most American chocolate bars are similarly unattractive, the Hershey's chocolate bar has a classic look that could work this winter. Brown knits with white or cream highlights. That could definitely work.

Dish poetry

Mate, this mornings post about dish fairies raised a few questions in my mind.

• Like, why don't people just wash their dishes? How hard is it to wipe a soapy rag over a coffee cup rinse it and turn it upside down? It's not that hard. I mean doing a whole sinkfull is one thing. I put that off all the time. But a lunch plate, a coffee cup? Sheesh, people. Wash a dish.
• WTF is a person doing with a tin of condensed milk at work? Just spooning it into there mouth? Condensed milk is not a lunch. Nor a milk.

I guess that is only two questions. But it also reminded me of something that happened at my old work one time. After getting upset about the state of the kitchen someone (whose job it was to clean the kitchen) wrote a little poem and stuck it up in the kitchen. It did not rhyme and it had no discernible rhythm, but they called it a poem nevertheless. It went something like this (this is not exact, but the poetic feeling and the sentiment is about right):

Kitchette (sic. I may not remember the poem exactly but I remember the spelling mistake) Poem
Push the milo and coffee tins to the back of the bench.
Put your dishes away.
Don't leave out the milk.
If you don't like it you can get a job elsewhere.

Did I mention that this person's job was to tidy up. I'm pretty sure they did not have hiring or firing powers.

Dish faries

Recently, a big brouhaha erupted at my work because the cleanliness standards in the kitchen had really slipped. This happens from time to time. Despite the signs in the kitchen that say "Please clean up after yourselves, dish fairies do not work here!", a few people don't do their dishes, then a few more, then a few more. Before you know it, things are really gross.

Usually someone gets sick of it and does them all, then sends an email to everyone telling us to lift our game.

This time, shit got even more real than usual.

The 2IC of the whole organisation sent us all an email telling us that things were totally out of hand, that kitchen facilities were a privilege, not a right, and if we couldn't clean up after ourselves the kitchens would be locked and we wouldn't be able to use them.

Well this certainly set a cat among the pigeons.

People were outraged. This is outrageous! they cried. They can't take our kitchens away!

they also cried.

After all the outrage, people started to really worry that the management would take our kitchens away.

It turns out that fear of losing the kitchen is a very powerful motivator, because since then, the kitchen has shone like the top of the Chrysler Building. People have really pulled together. And the fridge! The fridge was totally cleaned out. All the old Tupperware in plastic bags that people had left in there for months, the contents of which had liquefied, it's all gone! You can totally see inside. And in case you're thinking sure, it's clean now, but it will fill up with grossness soon enough let me tell you readers, you have nothing to worry about! Someone stuck a bunch of labels and a sharpie on the fridge door so you can write your name on your food, and self nominated fridge police can follow up with you if they feel it has been lurking in the fridge for too long.

Hooray!

Meanwhile, as much as all of this controversy has amused me, the best thing about the kitchen/fridge wars has been the fact that with a clean fridge, now I can see this:

One of my genius colleagues has an open can of condensed milk in the fridge.

See you in Buddha hell

I guess I'm glad that the Chutney Club meeting I mostly missed was pretty much the best one yet. I guess I can overcome my jealousy and feel glad that you guys got to enjoy all those delicious things.

I mean, if watching the Dalai Lama on Masterchef taught me anything, it taught me not to be jealous and to be thankful for the...oh, wait, watching the Dalail Lama on Masterchef taught me NOTHING AT ALL because the Dalai Lama has no place on Masterchef! The Dalai Lama has totally jumped the shark! Honestly Dalai Lama, I just don't know why you would do it!

But seriously. What have I got to be jealous about, really. I mean, things are pretty shit-hot for me at the moment. I managed to take time out from my busy moving and cleaning schedule to drop by the club and exchange jars of the lemon pickle I made for jars of everything everyone else made.
I have a new bedroom that looks like this:


A fridge full of chutney that looks like this:
and I got to spend my first night in my new home watching Harry Potter 5, followed by the Dees beating Port Adelaide, followed by hilarious hunks on Graham Norton.
It's practically l'age d'or pour moi.
And now I am going to post this early, because J and I are going to Ikea to get some things to make our lives, I mean our houses, even better.
Hooray!

The wonders of the world

I feel like this weekend was so rich. The world was opening up like a beautiful flower with so many things we could discuss on Miss Soft Crab.

There was a 60 Minutes interview with Miranda Kerr where she proved just as annoying as I thought she would. When I read in a magazine after she had her baby how she tweeted that it was soooo amaaaaazing that she was nourishing him with only her breast milllkkk I thought she sounded super annoying, and the interview I saw last night really proved that theory right.

There was The Graham Norton Show with Ewan McGreggor and Chris O'Dowd as guests.

HUNKS PLUS HILARITY! Is there anything finer?! (Rhetorical obviously because the answer is no and this is not up for discussion.)

And there was the Dalai Lama on Master Chef. WTF?!?! That guy is such a publicity slut. It was disgusting. (I really hope I don't go to Buddha hell for saying that.)


There was all that. And then there was Chutney Club. Mate, and world, what a shame for all you guys that you could not come to midwinter chutney club because ... yowser! There was some serious shit going down yesterday. And when I say shit, I mean delicious things and when I say down, I mean my throat!

I know we say this every time, but chutney club is just getting better and better.

Reader's, here is a run down on the chutneys exchanged yesterday:


Mandarin and chilli marmalade
Chilli and capsicum jam
Red onion shiraz jam
Kimchi
Lemon pickle
Meyer lemon marmalade

David made the kimchi and to serve it he barbecued prawns over some sort of smokey BBQ pot. That is a pot with something smoking in it. Delicious.

For Biggie Little's chilli jam he made a shooter's sandwich. This is a loaf of bread hollowed out and stuffed with steak. Then weighted down over night. As a vegetarian I did not get to eat this. And I confess I felt sad about it.


Biz made eggplant fritters. And as I said to him, I'll say to y'all, I love it when Biz makes fritters. I love it.

All this was good. Everything was good. Delicious. But all that just fell away when it was time for dessert.

I love that Biggie Little has joined chutney club because dude loves chilli. I love chilli! And dude has made some real special chilli condiments. But you know what else. He brings his lady along and girlfriend knows a sweet treat.



For Christmas chutney club we were treated to a beautiful cherry pie. Tastes so good make a grown man cry. For reals. But yesterday that cherry pie was pushed from my mind by these sweet little bitches.


Chocolate molten baby cakes. So chocolatey. So molten. So fucking good. The sort of rich chocolatey goodness that makes one (me) hysterical (it's actually not hard). They are a Nigella recipe. So do yourself a favour people and give these babies a go.

Belated goodbye, house

I know we have said this already this week, but moving house really is hard to do. Apart from the cleaning and packing and all the boring stuff, there is also the sentimentality.

Last time I moved house properly was about a year ago. Baby was only 2 months old and I was still very much in a post-labour/shit i have a baby now fog. It meant the whole moving experience was both more and less painful than usual. Thanks fog. If I had been a bit more clear headed I am sure I would have felt a lot more sentimental. As it was I just felt foggy.

We lived in that house for about 3 years. And it was a really great house.


It had three big bedrooms, two living spaces, a good back yard. We had many happy years there, many happy times, and some good parties.


It was where Baby first came home to. If I had the presence of mind to get emotional during that move, I sure would have.

Thank god I was in that fog. Oh no. I promised myself I wouldn't cry.

Goodbye house

I'm moving out of my lovely house this weekend. This means that all I am doing with my time is either packing or feeling guilty about not packing. Because I am a sentimental girl, I am also thinking about how much I've liked living in this house. There are so many great things about it, including a very effective heater and an awesome shower. I feel a little sad to be saying goodbye.

Goodbye front bedroom, with the nice morning light and the nice view of the street:
Goodbye garden. Remember when I grew all those tomatoes and eggplants in you? Such a good one. Sorry Doggy buried all those bones in you over the last few days.
Goodbye lovely housemates. You are the best housemates ever. Readers, do yourselves a favour and share a house with Rumpy and Paws at some point in your lives. You'll thank me.

Goodbye Monday curry night. I think I will miss you most of all.
But hello little flat!
You and I are going to have the best time!

Goodbye snow, hello shame

Thanks for sharing your snow learnings, J.

It made me think about what the snow has taught me. I think the main thing I have learnt is that shimmying down the mountain for a few days is fantastic, but then it's really time to go home. I get sick of wearing so many layers, and the fact that all the indoor places smell a little bit like wet dog. So that's what I have learnt from snow.

But I've also learnt something else today.

This morning I accidentally clicked on a link that actually wasn't a link at all, but was a virus. My computer totally lost it. It went black and stopped doing all the things computers do. I called the IT guy and told him what had happened. He told me that black screen is very bad and he would have to rebuild my computer from scratch.

"Please try your hardest to keep everything from the desktop!" I pleaded.

"There is a lot of really important stuff on there that I really need!!".

I was referring to all of the work I had been doing for the last couple of weeks and had saved on the desktop because sometimes, I just don't feel like digging around the network for the right spot to save stuff. Losing all of that work would be terrible! IT guy needed to save it!

He assured me that he would definitely be able to save everything, so I trotted off feeling very relieved.

It was much later that I remembered my desktop also housed a folder containing all of the pictures of Ewan McGregor and Don Draper that I have ever posted on Miss Soft Crab. ALL OF THEM! That amounts to quite a lot of photos of hunks that I am keeping in a folder on my desktop.

Of course, the IT people couldn't retrieve the work I had done without also retrieving the folder with the pictures of the hunks. And by the time I realised, the damage would have been well and truly done. I'm pretty sure they thought it was the pictures of the hunks I was referring to when I said the stuff on my desktop was "really important stuff that I really need!" because there was a lot more smirking than usual when I went to retrieve the computer. Damn those nerds!

Anyway, I have learnt an important lesson about only posting pictures of hunks when I am posting from home. Which is why this post is so late.

Thanks for waiting.
Here is a picture of a new hunk, Michael Fassbender, for everyone to enjoy.
You're welcome!

Ski Trip Pt III - What I learned

I guess that while I was at the snow it's not that I learned things, exactly. More like things I already knew became identified, realised. Much like the theory of the snow plough/pizza slice shape one must make with their skis to stop, which I had long known but never done until last week, I feel like many things made this same transition from theory to reality.

They still listen to Pearl Jam

We had a coffee at the bottom of one of the runs at this 'Bavarian Beer Hall'. It is just a place with that name. It sells beer. It has a confused identity. It has a mountain theme, you can tell by the deer heads and horns on the wall. It sells food, fish and chips, burgers, pizzas.


Yes, they have a traditional Bavarian pizza. And they have red and white check table cloths. Don't they know that means Italian?!


When we were leaving they started playing Pearl Jam. It really made sense to me. Pearl Jam seems the exact music that snow sport enthusiasts listen too. A few days later I heard a cover band playing late '90s Foo Fighters. Of course.

Snow chains are really important

When you see the sign that tells you to put your snow chains on and then you see snow, put your snow chains on. Maybe you will think everything is ok, then hit a slippery spot, then have someone pull the handbrake in panic, then the car could do a 180 turn into, thank god not off the, side of the mountain. Anything could happen without snow chains. Use them.

Learning a new skill is awesome

It's not really that often that I learn a new skill. I wish it happened more because it is awesome. I only skied for two days. Lesson day then one more day. That second day I was by myself. And I forgot my gloves. In the first hour I fell over and my hands were freezing and skiing seemed boring. Then I had a coffee and went back for more. By the end of the day I could manoeuvre around all the people and not fall over and I felt so great. I kept saying to myself, 'This will be my last run,' but then I would have all this fun and I would keep going back for more! It's not like I can ski good or anything, just better than before and it is so exciting. I want more new skills.

Nightmare experiences

It's funny you should be writing about nightmare experiences when I am having one of my own right now!
I am sitting in the back seat coming down the mountain and I have such car sickness! I am trying not to vomit while also trying to distract Baby who I think must also feel spewy judging by his cries.
Must go before I vom all over iPhone.

Reflections on Year 9 ski camp

Year 9 ski camp had a reputation as the most awesome thing that our school did, apart from serve alcohol at the year 12 formal, and not including providing an education for us. All it was was three days skiing at Mount Buller, but for some reason, from more or less the first day of Year 7, everyone looked forward to it and was convinced it was going to rule.

In reality, year 9 ski camp took the social nightmare of being a teenager at an all girls school into a place that is really cold. It was basically cold Mean Girls. But Tina Fey didn't write it and therefore was not funny. AT ALL. I'm sure some people had an awesome time, but this directly related to which tier you belonged to.

At the top of the pile were the girls who went skiing every year with their families. They knew what they were doing. They used words like "pomma" and "black run" and wore ski gear from Surf, Dive 'n' Ski. For these girls, ski camp was the awesome time we all hoped it would be.

In the middle were the girls who didn't know how to ski, but were athletic and competitive and had no fear. They wore practical gear that allowed them to get the job done. They probably had a fairly good time at ski camp too.

At the bottom of the hierarchy were the kids who have never skied, have no athletic ability, fear the cold and either wore gear that was more suitable for temperatures in the mid-teens, or in my case, gear that their mothers borrowed from a friend who has four sons. Four sons! Do I look like your son, Mum? Do I?

Anyway, year 9 ski camp was a total nightmare for those of us in tier 3, a nightmare that began as soon as we arrived.

We were all told to put on our skis and board the chair lift. I had serious reservations about this, what with never having skied before and never having been on a chairlift before. However, the general Mean Girls environment was not, shall we say, a safe place to voice one's reservations. Those of us who had them spent a long chairlift ride quietly reflecting on them. Plus, the teachers insisted we do this and told us it would be fine! They are teachers, they know what they are talking about, right?

I'm sure you can see where this is going.

When the chairlift ride finished, the top tier girls whisked off happily. The rest of us immediately fell over and pretty much formed a pile of human destruction that got bigger and bigger as each chair deposited its load of girls. They basically had to stop the chairlift so they could clear the area, which was easier said than done given that we were all wearing skis, and snow is really slippery. People would get up, then fall over, then get up, then fall over, etc. etc. etc.

Meanwhile, the teachers were literally nowhere to be seen, because people look exactly the same in snow gear. So there we were, lying contorted in the snow, unable to recognise anyone or anything apart from our own dreams which lay shattered around us.

For many of us, the trauma of the chairlift incident basically ruined the whole camp for us. We had ski lessons in the afternoon, but the damage was done. All our energy then went in to convincing teachers that we were sick and couldn't ski the following day. Those of us who were successful sat around in the canteen drinking hot chocolate and looking at the floor. We barely spoke. Turns out that teenage girls with broken spirits are terrible company.

Some girls rallied, and managed to master the snow plough by the third day. Those girls were the tough ones. I just sat in the cafeteria drinking hot chocolate.

It took me years to ski again. And I have never really felt the same about hot chocolate either.

But now I love both! Hooray!

Remember that time I skied a blue run?

Yay!