My Blue Heaven

Merry Christmas!

To my friends and loyal readers. Wishing you all have a very merry christmas and fantastic new year! It’s been a heck of a year for me, lots of exciting and tough times, but here’s hoping things will be on the up for next year as I settle into living London. Will probably post some reflective “year of 2005” musings closer to new years. For now… enjoy this joyous season with your friends and family. And I hope we all don’t forget the real “reason for the season”.

Check out my christmas e-card to you all. Copyright to Kazzart Designs. Made with photoshop cs2. Photo of Big Ben taken by moi. 🙂

New acronym learnt today. TGI Friday. Thank God Its Friday! 😀 Looking forward to my 4 day weekend. Plans include cooking my first christmas lunch – with roast turkey, stuffing, potatos, christmas pudding… the works! 🙂 Might also try visit a 1 or 2 of the outdoor skating rinks in London.

KC Actors Studio

My boyfriend has just set up his own business – an acting school called KC Actors Studio Ltd. Check out the preliminary website and company logo I created in 4 hours.

Any prospective actors in London? Here’s a shameless plug – come do a 10 week course starting beginning Feb 2006. For more info, visit the website. 🙂

Current listening :: “Don’t panic” – Coldplay

Release

Torrential heart
Stone to turn
Empty clouds
Mind unseen
Guilty bright
Lonely sun
Searching night
Abandoned sea
Needing
Release

Current listening :: “Prison Food” – Ben Folds

Moofies

Narnia was out here last Thurs. Watched it on Fri night. T’was pretty good – it followed quite closely to the book (from what I can remember of it). Next up, King Kong is out this thurs. Looks good too.

Ooh and I saw the teaser trailer for XMen 3… looks phwoarsome! May 2006. Can’t wait!!!!

So I made myself some real homemade miso soup last night. It turned out rather well. Quite pleased am I. My dinner consisted of fresh salmon sashimi (from the fish stand at the asian market at Colindale), a big bowl of miso soup, some yakitori stir-fried mixed vegetables and boiled rice. Very yummy and healthy dinner. Mmm.

Current listening :: “Happy is a yuppie word” – Switchfoot

Bonito, miso, udon.. japanese food = yum!

Kwai took me on my first shopping trip to Oriental City in Colindale, London on the weekend. First stop was the asian (oriental for the locals) food court… man I was in food heaven! Every kind of asian food outlet imaginable… chinese, thai, malay, singaporean, japanese, korean, vietnamese. Mmmmmm…. *drools* We decided to tackle the huge array of choice buffet style. Some dim sum from here… some satay sticks from there.. and some roast pork/duck from another. My eyes were definitely bigger than my stomach.. but luckily we didn’t buy everything at once. I was suprised how quickly I got full. Will have to take another trip back to try some of the dumplings and other stuff!

Anyways we next stopped at the asian (oriental for UK’ers) supermarket. Heaven for buying asian groceries. They had sections for different cuisines – again – japnese, korean, chinese, thai etc. We hit the Japanese section first.. and never made it any further. I’ve discovered japanese cooking! And it isn’t as hard as I thought! I’m gonna learn how to make a wicked udon noodle soup, miso soup, teriyaki or yakidori chicken.. even miso yaki beef… or karaage chicken… mmm! I discovered on this very cool weblog a few basics in japanese cooking. Such as the basic jap soup stock consists of two main ingrediants – bonito flakes and kelp. Thats how they make that yummy udon soup.. and miso soup.

So now I have added to my kitchen white miso paste, bonito stock powder (which contains kelp already), some udon noodles, kikkoman slightly-sweet shoyu (soy) sauce, a tube of wasabi, and yakitori sauce. Last night I cooked udon noodle soup and vegetables with a bit of miso paste added to taste. And some yakitori chicken pieces. Mmm.. it was delish! Still need to fine-tune a few things.. but very excited am I at the prospect of learning how to cook all those delicious japanese dishes. Gonna try getting some bulk sashimi too to slice up. Mmmm. Tonight I’m gonna make some real home-made miso soup. With miso paste, bonito stock, wakame seaweed and tofu. Yummy AND really healthy. Only problem is that japanese ingrediants (particularly good quality, non-msg ones) tend to be rather expensive. Esp over here.. being imported so far.

And finally I’ve discovered the nicest japanese green tea ever. Its by the company Ujinotsuyu – who make the really nice genmai cha (green tea with roasted rice). They also do sen cha… and we found this High Grade stuff.. loose tea leaves in a sealed foil bag.. 100g for 10 quid! But its GOOD stuff. Looks like real fresh leaves when you pour water in, not like the usual dried stuff. And it tastes soooo good. Quite different from your typical cheaper stuff. Really soft clear taste.. even the strong dregs aren’t bitter. I think I’m becoming a bit of a green tea connosiour. Hehe. Mmm.

Ooh check out my new Yahoo! avatar. (Thanks Viv for the reminder).

Current listening :: “These are the special times” – Christina Aguilera

Rant alert

Is it just me or are there more uptight, self-righteous, with-a-stick-up their-arse kind of people in the UK than there are in Australia? Yes I’m probably making gross generalisations.. and yes I’m actually referring to particular incidents. I guess I’m just having a bad day.

There are 2 things in particular that have gotten under my skin today – 1) self-righteous nosy neighbours with MAWS (middle aged woman syndrome) and 2) ridiculous company policies (prob maws related too).

Issue 1 is a bit complicated, so I’ll try not to get into it too much now. In short, I recieved a letter from a neighbouring flat informing me that they called in an “Environmental Health Officer” in response to noise from my flat. This apparent call was made (I say apparent, coz it is highly possible that she is bluffing) at 2pm on a Sunday afternoon!!!! And what was I doing at that time? I had some music (Jamiroquai) playing on my stereo/computer and whilst doing my vacuuming. No the music wasn’t very loud at all.. it was a fair volume – being a weekend afternoon – but it wasn’t like “party” loud. The letter states that she has made “repeated requests to you .. to please turn your music down”. Okaay… if banging on someone’s roof constitutes making a “request”, then I suppose she has done so. She goes on ranting about other crap, trying to sound all formal and intimidating. I’ve been told that if she has indeed made a complaint, then I would recieve a letter from the council. Which I haven’t yet. I’ll wait a few days.. and if no letter arrives, I might call her bluff by going up and asking her (politely – which is more than she has done for me) for copies of the documents written by the Health Officer when they visited, and for copies of the “crime reference number” and letter from the police (she states in the letter that a “crime reference number has already been allocated in reference to Flat 3 and the police have sent written permission to call 999 as and when further incidents of harassment occur”). I think I can smell bollocks in the air with this one. What do people (particularly those in the UK or who know about such things) think?

With issue 2, we’ve just been told that we’re “not allowed” to eat lunch at our desks as a new company policy. If its cold food/sandwiches then we can eat at a table set aside for lunch. If its hot food then we’re to be sent off to eat in this tiny storeroom so that the food doesn’t make the office smell of food. I mean that is absolutely ridiculous – telling someone where they can and can’t eat their lunch. I’m certainly not going to sit in isolation in a storeroom to have lunch every day. Almost makes me want to go back into contracting so I don’t have to deal with this office politics & policies crap.

Argh I’m so pissed off at the moment. Why are some people so annoying? Perhaps they feel they have to spread their misery to others. Grrrr. Not Happy Jan.

Current listening :: “Respect” – Aretha Franklin