Real cool and not too costly (AM)

It's been so hot for so long. I keep looking at the weather forecast hoping to see cooler weather ahead but it never comes. It just never comes.

Of course it will one day, and I know when that day comes, I will regret the warm days I've wished away.

What I won't regret are all the Frosty Fruits I've eaten this season, each more delicious than the last.  Nor will I regret the google search that led me to discover the Frosty Fruits ad that ran during our childhood. I'd forgotten all about it of course but at the first sign of that dancing fruit it came flooding back. Super catchy and super creepy, it's got it all, just like the delicious ice treat it's selling.

Please watch it all the way to the end.

Adidas, I just can't quit you (PM)

J is going to blow a gasket when she sees this picture I found off Stefan Edberg these days...

Warm, dry and still committed to Adidas. Pretty much her favourite things. I guess she really knows how to pick them.

Adidas, I just can't quit you (AM)

In late 2011 I saw some Adidas running gear in the window of Rebel Sport and I wanted it. It was some kind of whack, fluoro pink, eighties-inspired running shorts and singlet, but at the time I wasn't really running much or doing much proper exercise so I didn't buy them. Thought about them a lot though. So, naturally late last year when I was doing some running and needed some shorts, I decided I'd see if those delightful pink whack attacks were still around. They weren't and I just ended up buying a pair of navy and green Adidas running shorts that I liked well enough.

End of story.

I thought. But then, in January when I decided that I was really going to start running regularly and setting goals and shit like that, I decided that I may need some more running stuff. Like a singlet or two. Maybe another pair of shorts. You see, if you can remember back to when I got my compression tights in 2011, I like to have real exercise clothes to exercise in. It makes me feel more likely to succeed and generally better at stuff and also like people won't judge me 'cause I look serious about my sport. I realise this is pretty weak-minded but whatever works, right? Plus, you can only run so much. Well I can anyway, and running was all I could think about, so if I could channel some of that running obsession into clothes it seemed somehow productive. Or something.

When I thought of buying running clothes, all I wanted was Adidas. Oh sure, I looked at Nike, checked out what Puma had to offer but none of it appealed to me. I thought about it. A lot. Did that pink running ensemble really hook me so hard? I mean, guys, I bought a singlet with a giant Adidas logo on it! And a garish running jacket (which I effing love and which I have run in once and can't wait for the cooler months so I can wear it more!!)

 
And then it came to me. I suddenly knew why I wanted only Adidas.

Stefan Edberg, who has been off the tennis circuit for almost 20 years, was sponsored by Adidas. And I loved Stefan Edberg. I loved him. And even though I don't ever think about him  And even though I very rarely think about him, I am pretty sure that all those years of loving and following and thinking and watching him has ingrained Adidas as my preferred sportswear label.

Well played Adidas. Well played.

Not that I'm bitter about it. If it weren't for a childhood crush on Stefan Edberg and subsequent life-long brand allegiance to Adidas I never would have discovered these bad boys on the Internet. And soon they will be mine.

GOLD! When it comes to running clothes, the stupider the better, I always say.

So, well played Adidas for also making stuff I want.

A year of the new guy (PM)

Happy birthday Little Nut!

Gee, they grow up so fast! Just jokes! But not really. I mean, first they pop out and they are just this tiny little thing that sleeps a lot and somehow you love them more than anything or anyone before even though you barely know them and they barely exist. And only one year later they are a full little dude that maybe walks and maybe kinda talks. Crazy. I mean what else happens like that in a year. Nothing! Except I guess you could maybe meet a person, not know them and a year later be totally in love with them. Or someone could die and you could go from being completely unable to imagine a time that is without the pain to being in a place where the pain is dulled, less constant. You could lose 20 kilos or gain 20 kilos. A person could go from completely non-existent, COMPLETELY, to 3 months old within a year. Shit. I guess a lot is possible in a year. No wonder kids go from tiny little sleeping bundles to a toddler in that time.

A year of the new guy (AM)

Children. Some people believe they are our future. I'm an agnostic myself, but if there's one thing I can say for sure, it's that there are a LOT of them around these days. So that indicates to me that the future is probably full of them too. And that's OK by me. Have you seen how cute some of them are? Off the charts. 

 

A year ago yesterday I wrote this, because my nephew was born. Little Nut. The son of my Midbro. The brother of my Niecey. Yesterday was his birthday and to celebrate, we had a picnic on the sidelines of Midbro's Minkey football game. 

If I was a different kind of person, I might say something like "I can't believe it's been a year since Little Nut was born" or "They grow up so fast" or "Time goes by so quickly....if you don't stop to look around once in a while, you might miss it."

But readers, I'm not and I won't. Because the thing I can't believe is not they grow up so fast, but that this person for whom I feel so much love has only 365 days under his tiny tiny belt. I mean, I love him a LOT, and it feels like I've been cultivating that love for longer than a year. 

HB Little Nut. 

Yum things! (PM)

Is that the same jar of coconut and chocolate spread I gave you for christmas? Because if it is, you have marvellous restraint. That stuff lasts days at my house. Mere days.

But this is a yum thing that lasted a little longer.

OK, big rolls of meat may not appeal to everyone, but if you dig on meat, stay with me.  This is a beef brisket that I brined for two weeks in order to turn in to hot salt beef, the cousin of corned beef. It seems brisket is the kind of cut that contains a lot of connective tissue, which needs a little coaxing to break down and taste delicious. Brining helps with that. So in it went in to a brine bath that sat in my fridge for two weeks. Every day I turned the brisket over, to make sure it was even. The brine needed to get even with the brisket and I let it.

After the brining,  it looked like this:

Eww. It did not look pretty. But it was ready to cook.

I simmered it for four hours, again this is to make sure that the final result is nice and tender.  They say two hours is enough, but the longer the tenderer. So as you can imagine, after four hours it was so tender it would fall apart at a whisper.

In the great tradition of hot salt beef (there is one, apparently), I turned it in to a sandwich with lettuce, caramelised onion and hot english mustard. Delicious.  This photo does it no justice.

Then I turned it in to a second sandwich with all those things plus cheese and pickles. 

Deliciouser!

Yum things! (AM)

You know, K and I love to cook. To try new things, make classics - we love it all. And we are pretty good at it. Why shouldn't you guys benefit from that? But it has been really hot lately. And I was on holidays. I have made about three real dinners in the last 2 weeks.

Dinners I have eaten in the last week include:

Pizza
A salad sandwich
Indian takeaway
The tiniest amount of left over Indian takeaway to which I added a boiled egg



It's getting pretty desperate. But the lunches are worse. Some days I just eat a carrot. But yesterday I did something special. Really special. The hippy version of peanut butter and Nutella, nut spread and coconut chocolate butter. But far from being some pale imitation, the spread equivalent of carob to chocolate, this was the richest, creamiest deliciousest way to spread things on a bread.

Now I keep thinking about other things I could spread this combo on. Pancakes! Banana bread! Probably putting both these things on anything but the plainest old bread is unneccesary, but I like to think of the possibilities. Probably making salted caramel brownies is unnessary too but check out these bad boys. I can not wait to make the hell out of them. Gonna eat 'em too!

These are the insights I have when I'm running (PM)

This is the view from my run this morning. My longest run yet!

It's true, the Misses Soft Crab are running our little hearts out (not literally I hope). Running our little butts off (a little bit literally would be fine).  And sometimes I have insights too. Mostly, though, I just have some random thoughts.

Insights include things like:

It is easier when I have a better posture!

Cee Lo Green makes great running music!

This New Stretchy Men's Chesty from Bonds that I am wearing is the perfect running top the way it is more sleeveless t-shirt than singlet!*

I don't think I'm going to run all the ks I was hoping to.

Don't think about running.

Running along the Elwood Canal is not like running along an Amsterdam canal. A thing I did one time but like to pretend I did a bunch of times.

Elwood canal. It's ok I guess.

Random thoughts include things like:

When will the...

So hot...

Water...

I love running...

I wonder how much money I have in the bank.

Running is hard!


*I run in this top often. It looks like this.

But I don't look exactly like that in it. Firstly, mine is navy of course, second that guy is way buffer than me, third, that guy is a guy, fourth the sex difference makes the top sit less singlet-like.The women's version is way more singletty and I wouldn't recommend it for running. At least not to K.
 

These are the insights I have when I'm running (AM)

Did you know that the Misses Soft Crab took up running recently? It's true. Actually, it's not entirely true. The J-Crab has been doing it on and off for years. But I have never done it before. So I guess what I mean to say is "Did you know that I took up running recently, but J has been doing it for ages?" The truth can be so boring.  

Anyway, we've both been running lately. 

It's true what they say about running making you feel like a million bucks. Obviously while I'm doing it I want to puke a lot of the time. But afterwards, and not long afterwards, I feel like a million bucks. And the feeling lasts and lasts. 

And sometimes during the run, I have some moments of clarity that lead to super insights. Like these things, which I thought about this morning:

Shoulders are really important for personal temperature regulation!*

To all the groups of friends walking three abreast on the Princes Park running track - don't!^ 

Dogs who let their tongues hang out the sides of their mouths when they are running look so goofy!#

The rest of the time I just want to puke. 

*I roll up the sleeves of my K t-shirt when I'm running. I expose those shoulders of mine like a hipsterish gentleman exposes his ankles. At first I rolled them up because I thought it made me look tough. Then I realised that when the sleeves fall down and that tiny little bit of t-shirt material covers my upper arms, I steam up like the glass on the front of a bain-marie. So now I think I should get a sleeveless k t-shirt. If anyone sees one, please email me. 

^I guess this isn't an insight, it's just something I think. Groups of friends walking abreast on a running track may be having a lovely conversation, but please, consider the runners. Do you know how hard it is to find the energy to speed up to overtake you guys? Its really hard. Please don't make me do it. 

#

Am I right?

It's cool (PM)

I find this picture cooling.

But also, confusing. Apparently one of the bears is a reflection in ice. Really? How does that work?!
I've got no hope of understanding it in this weather.

It's cool (AM)

If you've been here before, I don't have to tell you that we have a pretty tenuous grasp on quality writing, and shit you guys it's been over 30 degrees for days now. That means that: a) my house is really hot; and b) I have not done any productive supermarket shopping because I can't figure out what to eat in this heat. Therefore, a+b=I am so hot and hungry. All I can think of is eating and cooling. In the interest of that, I have this for us all:

Just some shades I created using a really great program called Paint. HAHA. I hate you, Paint, but thanks for allowing me these cooling colours. Don't you think it is a little bit mind-bending how visuals can just change your feeling. Although I wish I'd thought about this yesterday when I went for a run in the stupid heat. I think thinking of things like this may have helped:

Oh yeah.

Don't thank me. Just enjoy it.

An account of my second solo bike ride (PM)

Say, that’s a nice bike.

Although our reader, Miss Dizzy, makes some excellent points about the proud history of drug cheating in cycling and hence the appropriateness of the name Delilah, I have to say that as soon as I saw a picture of your bikey I thought she should be called Maybel. I don’t know why it just happened in my brain like that. According to a random baby names website I just looked at the name Maybel means lovable. !!!.

How good is a morning bike ride. I love the way riding a bike is fast and wheel-based but you are outside, like walking. It makes me miss the days when a home conveniently located to everything meant I rode everywhere. I should start riding to work. But I really need a new bike. But I am broke. But, hey, let’s not bring this day down. I'm gonna go eat a sandwich and forget about my troubles. WOOT!

An account of my second solo bike ride (AM)

I got a bike for my birthday. 

This is what it looked like in the darkness yesterday morning, when I got up early to take it for what was only my second ever solo bike ride. 

Hard to see, sure. But the main thing you need to take from this photo is that it is very beautiful. 

By way of background, I should probably mention that the fact that this was only my second solo bike ride is not because I insist on riding in a peloton. No. It's that I didn't know how to ride a bike until, well, about two weeks ago. 

But now I have some rudimentary bike riding skills. And my very own bike, a bike so lovely it makes you want to take it out every day of the week and twice on Sundays. So that's why I took her out for my second ever solo bike ride yesterday morning. 

It was a beautiful still morning, and the balloons were up.  

After a shaky start, I found some rhythm and decided I would take her all the way to the park. This meant crossing Glenlyon and Brunswick Roads. I know! I was acting crazy!

But readers, I crossed those roads, I crossed them good.  And as cars and other cyclists overtook me, I felt like they couldn't even tell that I barely have the first clue how to ride a bike. Those suckers were none the wiser! Geez it felt nice. And the feeling of the wind fanning my face and rustling whatever hair was sticking out of my  Melbourne bike share scheme $5 helmet... well. It was enough to make me pull over and take this photo of my bike because I was loving it so much. 

The other reason I stopped was because there was a 'For Lease' sign blocking my way and I really had no idea how to negotiate it. Pick up your 'For Lease' signs, Nelson Alexander! 

I crossed Lygon Street. I peddled down Canning Street.  I rode along the bike path back towards Lygon street and even had to stop at the lights where all the people on bikes have to stop at the lights!

Score!

I eventually returned home and discovered that Moreland's garbologists had been and left the bins strewn along the footpath in that way they like to do it. Lucky for me, because how pretty does my bike look alongside the yellow of their lids? 

I love you new bike. Now if only I knew what to call you.
She has a working title of 'Delilah' because she is from a place called Samson Cycles. But I don't feel good about naming her after a biblical double-crosser.
I like that she is so white. Can we find a name that relates to how beautiful and white she is?
J?
Chickpea?
Anyone else?
Please direct your suggestions to misssoftcrab@gmail.com

I'm not kidding you guys, please help me. 

In praise of holidays (PM)

Yeah, holidays rule.

I think this boat we saw near Hobart on our last holiday said it best.

But home is lovely too.
Sometimes it looks like this:

And that's pretty nice.
And Pickle is on board for a picnic of sorts after work tomorrow night, so that will be nice?