Wildilocks Can Has Journal?

So Xmas has come and gone. Call me Grinchy, but really, Xmas is Really Not Very Good and we need some better options. For example, I really didn’t want to travel back to WA for 4 days for Xmas, but Jeremy’s parents insisted, even though we’d spent a whole lot of quality time with them this year, and my family really isn’t hugely fun on Xmas and I’ve missed many an Xmas in the last 20 years.

Anyone got any ideas? I tend to do Oxfam unwrapped but if I’m seeing the rellies I still am guilted into buying Stuff that is Probably Not Wanted, and get given Stuff that I Probably Don’t Need.

Augh

So who else has a kitty who likes to hide under the doona??? *diesfromthecuteness*

Also, Michael Pollan has written another food treatise. If you haven’t read any of his writings yet, I highly recommend this one, well… along with all the others It gets a little preachy, but if you don’t already know this stuff, you should.h

The Food Issue - Farmer in Chief

I has a new blender! Lookie:

[clicken to embiggen]

If you look carefully, you’ll notice there is no cord. That’s not because it’s not visible: it’s because there isn’t one! This is a Vortex Hand-Crank blender, which requires no electrickery to function. I’d really like a pedal-powered blender, but they’re not so easy to buy off-the-shelf. I was slightly concerned it may be a bit of a toy blender, but when it arrived, I was pleasantly impressed with its sturdiness. I’ve read that the one weak point is the clamp where it is attached to your bench, and am hoping they’ve improved the material of that since the reviews I read, but even so, I’m impressed with the heft and feel of indestructibleness. It’s also made of shiny and stainless steel.

So, I took it for a test drive earlier. I don’t have any prep pics, but this is the result:

Nom! I was impressed at how well it blended, and how fast, definitely comparable to an electric blender. It apparently crushes ice fine too, though I haven’t tested that yet. It’s pretty noisy [Jeremy was wailing "doooooom!"] but then so are most electric blenders, and The Aerie is pretty small so everything sounds loud.

I got the blender from here but they were a bit slow to ship, even with the requested Courier delivery, so if I were buying again I’d probably try elsewhere.

Anyone have any good smoothie recipes to share? I am a big mango smoothie fan so those will be on the menu soon, though I think I will continue to enjoy my standard breakfast of fruit salad for the time being - I likes me fruit salad. Found a reasonably good site full of smoothie recipes here: http://www.flowercarole.com/ [bit too full of advertising though].

Actually, that makes me wonder something - has anyone else noticed top Google results increasingly including a lot of sites listed which have Google Adwords? Is it possible/likely/a conspiracy that Google has an algorithm in there which is ranking sites with Adwords higher than sites without o_O? Cos when I tried Yahoo to compare, I got very different results - and no Adwords sites….

I also recently bought me a new secondhand IBM X40 laptop, which is from the secondhand laptop shop down on the corner of Elizabeth and Lonsdale. $400 for something that actually works better than my stupid Acer whose power cord is now dying and I really don’t want to keep plonking down $150 a pop to fix every 6 months, thankyewverymuch, is smaller and lighter and has a 3 hour battery. It just doesn’t have a touchpad, which is a bit of a step backwards, but I’m coping with the buttony thing fairly well and can get a mouse if I really want. *edit* oh lookie, I found this. I hope it works well!

Found this via Treehugger last night, and thought it was of sufficient import to tell you all about. You see, this is one of those little tiny things that always HUGELY bugged me when I’d find toilet paper rolls on backwards, to the point where I’d often change it around, if possible. But I’d never known that my gut annoyance was something anyone else would have cared about - I thought I was just a little *cough* anal about it.

Turns out though - putting the TP on “under-hung” instead of “over-hung” is bad for the environment, mmmkay? The article is funny and has a whole host of amusing diagrams to boot. Vis another:

there’s more as well as descriptions of how to tear your toilet paper one-handed. Hehe.

I wish I was in Wellington right now, it sounds awesome….

If not a one of you has any pics of snow posted tomorrow, I’ll be a saaaaad panda.

We went a visiting to CERES today! It was the first outing for my eZee Torq having only just got heem back yesterday, and even with the long hiatus, battery charged fine and I didn’t even come close to running out, even going back via Merri creek and stopping in at FOE on the way home.

At Ceres, had a bit of a look around the bike shed area, then we went and had a lovely lunch - there wasn’t a huge rmenu but the salad and the gluten free orange & poppy seed cake + bush chai were all great. My salad looking delicious:

But looked a little alarmed by his muffin:

Well it’s been a fun and sociable weekend though not for great long periods of time, with and ’s bday drinks at Polly we only managed to catch 1/2 hour of *shakes tiny fist* however the music at Blitz was great and got his dance on for about a solid hour and a half.

is also over from Perth til Tuesday and as I’ve just got my working electric bike back [after about 6 months of asking for it...!] I have proposed a cycling, eating & exploring Adventure for tomorrow!

This Adventure is to somewhere I’ve wanted to visit for some time, CERES - The Centre for Education and Research in Environmental Strategies - http://www.ceres.org.au - up in East Brunswick, where there is much organic food goodness and it’s only 8 or so km from the Melbourne CBD. As has brought a nice folder bike with him, and has already ridden to places as far away as Coburg, I felt this would be a nice outing.

I am proposing we should leave the CBD around 11.30amish, give or take a bit, allowing us to reach CERES hopefully around 12 - 12.30, barring any hold-ups. We plan to have luncheon at the Ceres Cafe [>pdf of menu] which looks scrummy, and I’d also like to visit the Nursery and at least one of the farm areas. Unfortunately the Bikeshed is only open on Fridays and Saturdays. There seems to be a variety of things to check out that are open 7 days, so I’m sure we won’t be bored!

As far as route goes, I propose going up via Nicholson St, and returning via the Merri Creek trail. If anyone wants to join us cycling up, please let me know asap, as that may make our lunch time a little later start if we’re socialising more along the way or changing our route. Otherwise you can get a tram easily and Ceres has how-to-get-there information here, and here is the Google map.

If you can read this, you’re invited to join us! So please do if you’re free and would like to catch up for a yummy organic lunch.

Hmmm, New Zealand looks to be having upcoming power problems if there’s not tons of rain in the next few weeks. Am hoping it doesn’t get scary drought like in Oz. *does a raindance* And unfortunately, we don’t have time to wait for the Singularity to fix everything.

Very happy with all the lovely replies to the photo and model call posts. ’s mum sent me a plush llama today, it is made of adorable and win. Must post photos.

So much to do! Time is in fast-forward or something, it’s almost the middle of the year. I am loving being in Melbourne, am feeling wonderfully healthy even though I haven’t lost quite as much weight as I’d hoped by now, even with WiiFit which I bought the day I got back from NZ. It’s a lot of fun by the way, I especially like the boxing, it reminds me of when I used to go to the gym and do Body Combat.

Did anyone see this when they were kids? I don’t know if it was likely to have got to Australia or not, it does look like i could have been a Sesame Street cartoon, but I don’t remember it…

I do however, remember these, and if you’re from Perth and close to my age, you’ll get a kick out of them:

Well it was a fun Saturday night, food was okay at Deville’s but not supramazing, Sin was fun, and Sat morning we had a photoshoot at the shop with which I got pictures back from the same night …. so now I has a bunch of peekatures for shop promo to play with for new business cards, flyers and web stuff, I’ll post my two faves of me below, but there are maaaany more of everyone else!

This is my last week for this trip! I’ve enjoyed being back, been great to catch up with people, especially great to spend so much time with and , but believe it or not, I’m actually missing Melbourne. I’m especially missing The Aerie, and I can’t wait to be back into my weekly organic food box security, as I’ve not been eating so well over here, and been a bit poorly on a few days. I’ve had a hard time keeping up with email and work due to internet being all over the place and being so busy each day at work!

Anyone in Perth who has not yet caught up who would like to, time is now running out!

I fly out to NZ Friday night, and I am looking forward very much to catching up with all Wellingtonites, especially as is having a partay while I’m over, whee! Anyone who isn’t able to make it on Sat night please let me know if you’d like to catch up and we’ll make a time & place, I don’t have much scheduled [and I'm waitlisted for tattoo, so that might not happen either, not the easiest thing to do to book a tattoo from another country :P]

I have electric bike back from this week too, looking forward to being on two wheels, it’s been an age since I rode as I haven’t needed or been able to in Melbourne, so much has changed in 9 months, and I am doing a big circuit today out to Bassendean, the city, then on the way back to my mums check out the new organic store on Charles St that I don’t remember being there last time I went down Charles St. Whee!

So, what do you think of the pics?