First Batch

These won't help the diet at all of course but I just had to make them....Basic Ingredients direct marketing worked a treat and I couldn't resist the 2k offer. 

I'll just keep practising until I get them right.  They've sunk a bit so I guess that means I need more yeast.

A big week what with the launch of Grand Purl Baa's book and all.

Here's the window display at Avid Reader last night.

Here's a sunset from my car window the night before when I was doing a pracise run via West End.

I know these aren't fabulous photos - they're taken with my mobile phone....

And this is the pedestrian bridge from the restaurant at GoMA last night...

I think the bridge looks best at night.... it looks like a cat's cradle...it was designed by Michael Rayner.... and is called the Kurilpa Bridge.  Kurilpa is the original name for the West End area and was a neutral meeting place for Aboriginal tribes.  Kurilpa means place of water rats.  We were very well fed water rats last night dining at the GoMA restaurant.  Afterwards we were entertained, nay moved, by the melodious and beautiful voice of Kamahl who sang all sorts of songs from the 70s that I had completely forgotten.  It's hard to say which song I enjoyed the most....he sang All I Have to Offer You (Is Me), Wind Beneath My Wings, The Sounds of Goodbye, The Elephant Song, Ol' Man River, The Way we Were and some more but I can't remember and finished with My Way.  Fabulous stuff.  Thank you Kamahl!!!

Wild Weekend

In my wild youth I had a wild friend.  Her name was Loani.  People stumbled and bumbled around her name like a rock in the shallows.  "Leonie?" they would hopefully mumble.  "Loo-ah-knee?" they would stutter.  "Leilani?" they would squeak....We used to titter about it behind the ABC Shop counter as we relieved Joan for her lunch/potty breaks back in the last century...nay the last millenium....Names are very important things....People get a bit "thing" about their names if you don't get them quite right....I made a point of remembering how to say Loani's name and practised it furiously when I first met her.  If I got it wrong...well, she called me Olix....and that's how she inscribed my very own copy of her latest book last weekend.  "Look !" said Cas..."She must be a bit tired from signing all those books...she's spelt your name Olix rather than Alex...." ...so I told him the story....


And so here we are....so many years later...and as she said to me....in our wild youth...if someone had come and tapped us on the arm down at the RE and said "She'll be famous for her tea cosies one day...." well, we would have howled with laughter.....shrieked like hyenas....we still do come to think of it.....

How many glasses of wine, cups of tea, bowls of lentils, pints of stout have we consumed together dear friend as we shared the stories of our day?  Each tried to outdo the other in embellishing...."Wait til I tell you about the one I had today.....she rings me and she says.....can you tell me what happened in Blake's Seven last night?  I missed it......"    "No, no, no...." she'd shriek "I can do better than that....wait til you hear about this one......she wanted to let me know that she's just past Uranus and on her way to Pluto....and she wants to know what's the weather forecast for Pluto"  We'd get licorice all-sorts in our days at the ABC on the phones.

Well now we are here in the more settled time...we're more matronly...more sober....more domesticated....less licentious....we've got to let the young uns have their time in the limelight....and be a bit respectable...but .....in case anyone cares to know.....or ponders on the stray potty word that escapes our lips or wonders if the wild laughter could possibly have come from our table....well ...they only have to look at the teapot and its fabulous cosy to know......tea hee!

Blossom

I'm having a few issues with blogger editor this morning...I am trying to add audio as well as images which has been an interesting experience...I could spend all day on this computer and I don't want to so....

here is a link to some audio I recorded on my mobile phone this morning...I hope it works....



If you click on the title blossom I think you can hear the birds...

The gum blossom is on a tiny plant by the side of the road and it caught my attention the other night driving home in the dusk so I have "captured" it this morning to share with you....I thought it had lots of chutzpah for such a little plant.

Farewell the Kelvinator

It's the end of an era!  This week the streets have been littered with people's junk.  If you knew us well you'd know we are the kings of junk...our house is full of it.  This week was an ideal opportunity to get rid of it but it's a brave person that comes between Robert and his junk.  It has also been bucketing down this week in Brisbane....and I mean bucketing....all the junk (mattresses, sofas, bookcases, desks) has been absolutely soaked....so it is really junk now....I couldn't bear to put our junk out to get absolutely ruined...and so inevitably (because you never really know when the truck is coming around to get the junk)....b-i-l (aka Brother-In-Law) John rings Robert and asks him to help move a fridge from a rental property out into the neighbouring streets to get rid of it....but Robert can't resist... a fridge eh?  So it comes home to us instead of being put out onto the street.  It seems to work and is sexier looking than our old Kelvinator out in the workshop which keeps the beer cool in Summer....so the beer is transferred into the new old fridge and the old fridge is waddled out into the carport ready to go out onto the footpath for whenever the truck comes.   Of course the truck comes at sparrow's f.... this morning and by the time we rush out the door, it's at the bottom of the street.  Typical!!  I'm in my nightie....barely respectable.  Robert runs down the street to sweet talk the men in flouro shirts.  They promise to come back.  We hear the truck rattling and banging around the streets.  I get a six pack out of the new old fridge to place as an inducement on top of the old fridge.  I have a shower and get dressed.  Perhaps I'd better get in the car and find out where the truck is...but Lo!!  They did come back!!  They were very pleased to see the six-pack.  They put our dear old Kelvinator in the back of their truck and squashed it.  That Kelvinator that served us in many shared houses and rental properties...Carrington Street, Leybourne Street, Equinox Street and probably many before those.  One of the boys tried to take Robbie's "trolley" and chuck that in the back of the truck too....but that was rescued...That trolley is a work of recycled art....bits of this and bits of that....Thanks boys for coming back!!!  One less bit of junk!

 

Finished!

Hooray!  I finished my cardigan.  You can't really tell that one sleeve is longer than the other can you?

Mahatmashirtmabottle

 

Right then - got my hat, got my t-shirt and got the bottle.

A good time was had by all...it didn't rain....well not til afterwards....quite extraordinary walking with 7,000 other women...it's not exactly peaceful but it's inspiring.....

 

These were my travelling companions: Julene, Maegan, Fi and Evie.....

Some of us got to play in the water afterwards at the very beautiful Southbank parklands...
 

And my supporters raised a whopping $745 all up - bless them!!!

Aren't we blessed in Brisvegas?

Great friends, great hospitals, great weather, great parks, great restaurants...I could go on.....but I'll shut up now....do you like my hat????

Tickled Pink

 

I am tickled pink to be crashing through my goals and raising money for such a good cause.  My first goal was $100 - I crashed through that one with the help of dear friends Lynda, Loani, Anonymous and Gabita.  Then I crashed through the $200 barrier with the help of Helen, Judith and Cathy.  Then I crashed through the $300 barrier with the help of Paula, Deb, Charlotte, Sarina, Jan, Bob and Penny.  I've moved from Number 9 in the top ten fundraisers to Number 6.  Never knew I'd inherited such a competitive streak from my dear Gran but I'm all geared up now to crash through the $400 barrier.  The event has raised $19,187 so far with the walk on Sunday....go on - tell everyone you know....we'll be tinkled pink if you do!!!

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