Full, filled, fulfilled.

Can't think of a single story, so a paragraph on childhood Christmases past:

I'm born on Christmas Day, so it's always been my birthday. We never had santa in our house, except when we were at my maternal grandparents' house. My father didn't believe in it. We were told, rather solemnly, before we could talk, that Christmas was a celebration of the birthday of Jesus, that dude who died for all our sins so we would go to heaven, and Santa wasn't real. So in my first year of school, I happily passed this information on to my classmates. I think some of them probably cried.

Anyway.

There's never been any tradition: birthday presents first or Christmas presents first, except that we always had to wait until after Christmas mass to open our presents. Thankfully, by the time we were 10, my parents had started taking us to Christmas Eve mass. Woe was the Christmas morning when you had to go to 10am mass at the Cathedral (St Monica's). The bishop said mass at the Cathedral and he talks slow. And I mean slow. He could make a 2 hour service last 4 hours on pauses alone. (He said my confirmation mass, which actually, was mercifully short). The Cathedral though, was more beautiful. There were huge stained glass windows lining all the walls. No air-conditioning though, which in the Tropics, in summer, is a big deal. Still, the ceiling was more interesting. Ply-wood tile things with tiny little holes, which I always wondered about. How did they get there? Why was it made out of that material?

I remember my sixth birthday. I don't remember mass. But I remember the entire family was at our place for Christmas, aunts and uncles and cousins and both sets of grandparents. Anyway. I had just been given a Baby Born doll, my cherished toy doll, which still lives in the cupboard above the stairs in our house today. It was raining, bucketing down, in the way only Cairns rain can, so we had to move the celebrations underneath the house (which was an old Queenslander) and the stairs were wet so we were told to be careful, darting in and out underneath plates of food and people's legs. I had candles in the Christmas cake that I got to blow out. There's a photo of me, doll in hand, blowing out the candles on the cake that had one of those plastic Merry Christmas signs, gold cursive, stuck in fondant icing that I hated. Luckily, I always liked fruit cake. I used to peel off the icing and give it to my sister, who didn't like the cake.

Rest of meme here.

Here's one you still might have time to make!

Cheat's "White Christmas"
Ok, what's the deal with copha? You buy it once a year to make white christmas and then you're stuck with it. There's only so many chocolate crackles one person can make. I prefer this recipe, because it makes something similar to white christmas that tastes better (no nasty glace cherries) - and is more versatile. This is easily vegan-ifiable by using dark chocolate instead of white although then obviously you'll lose the White Christmas effect. (It'll still taste awesome.)

You need:
800g of white chocolate, chopped
2 cups desicated coconut
1 cup shelled pistachios
1 cup craisins (dried cranberries)

Then you:
Melt the chocolate in a bowl over hot water (or in the microwave, be careful of burning it, but seriously, it's not hard to microwave-melt chocolate...). Throw everything in, mix it up, put it in a slice tin then refridgerate for a few hours until set. So easy, no leftover copha, more delicious.

Serving suggestion: serve with a real mint hot chocolate. My favourite way to make them? This stuff melted, then thinned out with warmed milk. Candy cane to stir, optional. (Yes, it is summer here. Yes, hot chocolate is unseasonal for me. Yes, I turn my air-conditioning down cold enough that it's like winter at Christmas, sometimes, just so I can make one of these.)

Rest of meme here.

So this is a few days late: our Internet died. It's working now (obviously).

I find recipes a bit underwhelming usually, since I think they're all the same: I mean, I find myself constantly reading recipes and thinking "oh, that's x without y and adding z". Basically all recipes can be turned into something completely different with a few substitutions. Whatever. Here is one of the most fundamental recipes I have, for a basic, but tasty, risotto. It's pretty easy to change things up, keeping the rice base the same and then adding different vegetables, cheeses or sauces depending on what's available. Really. One for all seasons. The secret is the pan, imo, I use one of these casserole dishes. Use the heaviest based pan you can find, something that will distribute the heat evenly that's non-stick.

Tomato and Pancetta Risotto

1 onion, diced
300g rice
1 litre stock (chicken or vegetable)
100 mL white wine (optional)
400g can of crushed tomatoes
2 good pinches of dried oregano (you can use fresh stuff, probably about half that)
1/2 tsp chilli flakes (this is to taste, but don't add too much: it's a fairly delicate balance of flavours)
150 g pancetta
3 cloves of garlic, crushed (lay the blade of a knife flat across the garlic then press down on the knife blade with the palm of your hand, don't crush it using a garlic press)

Bring the stock to the boil and add the wine. It's important the liquid is actually boiling when you add it to the rice.

While you're waiting, cook the onion in olive oil over medium heat until soft. Turn the heat up, add extra olive oil as required (make sure the bottom of the pan is well coated), then add the rice, stirring until the rice is coated in oil (doesn't have to be a huge amount, but it does stop the rice from burning.) The pan should be very hot. Add a soup-ladle full of boiling stock and stir until absorbed. Then you can dump in the rest of the stock and turn the heat right down (I move it from a gas hot plate to an electric plate at this point) and let the mixture simmer gently for 20 minutes, stirring every 5-10 minutes. (If you can't get the heat down low enough it won't work as well, so keep an eye on it.)

To make the sauce, dice the pancetta and cook in a hot heavy based fry pan. After the pancetta is cooked, add the garlic. Turn the heat down, add the remaining ingredients and allow to simmer gently until the rice is cooked. Stir the tomato sauce through the rice and serve.

As always, this is the sum of its parts. You need good quality pancetta to make it any good. Some of my favourite variations: mushrooms instead of pancetta or as well as pancetta, just cook them in the pan before adding the tomato; just make the rice part then stir through fresh mint and parsley (diced), some fresh spinach, some small chunks of roasted pumpkin, 1/2 cup of shelled pistachios and some good quality persian feta or, instead add crispy prosciutto, blanched then food processed spinach and baby peas, fresh mint and fresh parsley. Stirring 2 tbsp of fresh lemon juice through the rice mixture at the end of cooking and some diced preserved lemon then serving with grilled asparagus or baked salmon works well too.

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Three A's and two C's. So yeah, I'm totally satisfied with that.

Thanks la_petite_singe, trinaweena, greeneyedai, and jakiemc for the Christmas cards. <3

happy birthday, sis.


We're more defined by friendship now, I guess, more than our birth order.

Poignant moments stretched, in the mind, towards eternity.

People, not things.  Memories, not souvenirs. 

This is an Australian chick with an addictive Youtube channel. I find her oddly charismatic?


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Go Fug Yourself. Because you don't need to pass exams or get up from your computer to use the bathroom ever again. This is what I read when I a) see a celeb wearing something hideous and am reminded it exists or b) when I've already real Failblog, TFLN and MLIA and I don't want to do an assignment and I've already played several games of Pacman, Frogger and Bejewelled online.

I actually wanted to share an awesome photoblog website with pages and pages of photo montages I found via someone's Tumblr, but I can't find it now. :(

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Reflection, nostalgia, cycles.

Deep breaths and time.

Since my art would make you cry and is limited to a series of academically minded cartoons I drew in year 12:


Tsuguharu Foujita's Young Girl In The Park.

Rest of meme here.

You power me.

Well, of these there are many.

The first song I ever remember hearing was U2's 'Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For'. I had just finished my first year of school. It was 1995 and I was about to turn six. We were driving to my grandparents house in Mackay and there were endless fields of sugar cane. If you've never driven through it you can't understand sugar cane. From the car window it looks small, but it towers over you in reality. We used to walk through the neighbouring fields when I visited my grandparents. It almost has a sound, as a child, when you watch it with you face pressed up against glass. You can imagine the breeze rustling through it, and the multitude of wildlife it supports (from cane toads to cane beetles, snakes to mice) scurrying about within. And inside the car it's cold, but your hands stay warm if you press them against the window, because outside it's hot, so hot, and the air is wet with humidity. Anyway, that's the first song I distinctly remember hearing: I know there must have been others, that probably wasn't even the first time I heard that song. But I was in the back seat and my sister had fallen asleep, and my father was driving and the tamborines started and I was looking out the front windshield, leaning forward I guess, at the unnatural blueness of the sky and the white clouds and the green sugar cane.

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Always unable to speak when it matters most.

Who didn't cry at this point? I mean, other than robots.

(That was the best quality video I could find! Shock horror.)

Buffy had two significant tearjerker moments for me: the above and the season two finale (poor Buffy, poor Angel). I cried during the credits of The Body, but I couldn't until then, it was so numbing.

Anyway. Audio!

Sacrifice (The Gift) and Close Your Eyes.

Rest of meme here.

Nine prayers with answers.

Promise to think about it.