Viva Forever

I’m not much of a celebrator of Christmas but hey, it’s nice to spread some positive cheer around. My Christmas (as in, about 1am today) started off pretty crap, as the lack of confirmation email in my inbox meant I more or less didn’t get an interview for the clerkship position at the courts. Sigh, oh well, gotta keep looking.

Anyway, otherwise Christmas morning was Christmassy with my extended family visiting. My family got presents from me, and I got $100 as presents (yay for cash gifts :D) which would definitely pad out my bank account (currently sitting at $9). I spent a few hours cooking pudding bread as a present to Tim’s family. The bread was made from this recipe (although mine is vanilla flavoured as I couldn’t find any butterscotch ones). I made one a few days ago for my family to road test the recipe; I was a little iffy about making “vegan foods” as anything vegan strongly brings to mind the image of eating cardboard. But it was a success, absolutely delicious and I highly recommend it to anyone (it’s not difficult to make either). I forget to get pictures of the final product but here it is while still baking in the oven:

I also tried to make these cookies as well, but they turned out horribly crumbly, dry and flavourless. I think it might be that I didn’t put enough margarine; I had balked at the idea of putting in 1 1/2 cups of that stuff. Oh well, I settled for some almost-insta triple choc cookie mix instead. Deeeelicious.

I’m not big on cooking, but it’s an awesome feel to know you’ve successfully CREATED FOOD to nourish people with! But anyway, I hope the lot of you had a good Christmas too. :3

Horrific Article of the Week: Training Your Girlfriend

The gist of the article is that this incredibly bitter “Relationship Correspondent” took it upon himself to advise his readers about what to do about girlfriends that act like a “bitch”. Which is to treat them exactly as if they’re dogs until they learn to be “obedient”. The whole thing is so demeaning, I can’t even pick out particular choice quotes. The justification seems to be that women do this to men anyway, hence men should do it to women first.

Isn’t the better solution be that NO ONE does this to ANYONE? As someone pointed out in the comments of the article, the irony is that the “perfect” outcome would be a girlfriend who is dependent on the boyfriend, even though that’s the type of thing that the writer complains of when women do it to men. Isn’t it then obvious that, generally speaking, NO ONE wants to be on anyone’s “leash” in a relationship?

I cringe inside when I hear of people boasting that they have their significant other “whipped” (though the double standard seems to be that it’s okay that the boyfriend is whipped yet it’s more unacceptable when the girlfriend is instead). To me, since I don’t like the idea of being controlled, then I’m going to assume that other people don’t either, unless they tell me otherwise. Of course, if one party expressly tells you that they’re okay with you handling most decision making processes etc, then that’s a different matter because they chose this course of action rather than being manipulated into it. However, I find it troubling how some people are so preoccupied about who’s “wearing the pants in the relationship” when the answer could well be “both people”.

But yeah. WTF is with that article?

So! Today (technically yesterday since it’s 3:23am), Xuan, Tracey and I met up with Amanda on her last day visiting Sydney. Xuan has already written out a nicely detailed recount of what happened (with pictures!) so there’s no need for me to repeat what he’s already said. Here’s a couple more of my own tidbits:

• I felt absolutely horrible for being 40 minutes late to get to the meeting place; a delayed bus meant missing out on trains I needed to catch to get there on time. Grr. But at least the guys were really nice about having to wait for me to show up!
• I remember remarking during lunch, “hrm if only we brought cameras” only for the three of them to immediately reach into their bags to take out their respective cameras. Damn me for not being more prepared!
• it is amazing how Amanda can just walking from one shop to the next in a seemingly untiring way. Towards the end of the day, Xuan, Tracey and I were shuffling after Amanda and clamouring for seats to sit on where we can as she shopped. I know other people who can do that too, it’s mind-boggling how much stamina they have for shopping so extensively.
• Speaking of shopping, while I had previously concluded that I’d never find anything that fits me and is within budget, I was happily proven wrong today. I bought a lovely suit jacket from Events that was on sale that happens to fit me very snuggly (but just a tiny bit tight around the waist). I’ll let the receipt do the talking (red bits added by me):
  

All in all, it was an excellent but exhausting meeting! :D

In other news, the other day I got to participate in my first game of Dungeons and Dragons! I played as a level 3 bard as there was already an existing group of players with fighters, sorcerer, cleric etc… just not a bard. It was lots of fun, with me entering the story at a point where it just begun to get kinda epic. I didn’t get to actually say or do very much, which I didn’t mind as it allowed me to see how the others roleplayed.

I’ve been somewhat productive!

My mother wanted me to make something for my aunt for her birthday. Oh a whim I bought the pattern for this lil’ girl in a ladybird costume. I named her Emily because she looks like one, maybe because she has green hair. She stands at the mighty height of 11cm (4.3 inches) measured from her feet to the top of her antennae.

I’m quite happy with how she turned out (I love that little shell on her back, you can see it in the second picture) but I’m iffy about her face… next time I might try to find tiny buttons rather than beads for her eyes, currently they’re too googly for my tastes. Also next time, I’ll be sewing the face features on BEFORE finishing everything.

Also, I fail at photography. Everything always comes out blurry and weird. It’s one thing that I never seem to have gotten the hang of, and I seethe in quiet envy at the likes of Omi and Hannah who takes such awesome photos.

Oh and also, I’m nearly finished with Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix! It’s getting pretty gripping towards the end!