last days of summer

on the verge of art

i thought i'd share with you one of our fantastic verge finds. This time around we decided to focus on things that we actually need rather than more furniture that we don't have any room for. Sooo, we got our hands on some plant pots and hanging baskets for the garden.... and this lil' beauty....

How cool is that! Why anybody would throw out such a beaut is beyond me but their loss is most definitely our gain! I love the fact that one of them is wearing a red jacket.

things i learnt yesterday

1. brian mcfadden and delta goodrem have split up! Maybe it had something to do with his latest song which rather unpleasantly talks about how he likes it when his girlfriend's drunk and he gets to take her home so he can 'do some damage'. yeugh, who uses such words? 'do some damage'? Like really? And did nobody listen to this record first and think, hmmm, not sure that's quite the tone we want to be conveying. Anyways, he is now donating all proceeds from the single (which probably won't be that much) to a rape support charity.
2. I can't make gravy. Is gravy that difficult to make? Well, i'm struggling. This is the second time i've attempted it and the second time it's not gone quite right. And the second time i've cried over gravy. I think i need to back away from the homemade gravy route and make friends with bisto.
3. Following on from the point above, i'm not cut out to be a housewife. I'm clearly underqualified (sssh, don't tell R, i might get the sack). Our house currently looks like we both work full time and don't prioritise housework.
4. Schindler's list is a looooonnnnng movie. I haven't seen it and i'm not sure i'm going to. (it was on tv the other day so i recorded it). Actually, geez, it's not like i haven't got the time... I WILL watch it (gimme a week and i'll report back).
5. I'm on my third Kazuo Ishiguro book in as many weeks. I read 'When we were Orphans' first and couldn't put it down. My friend then lent me 'Never let me go' (the one that's been made into a movie with the lovely Carey Mulligan and Keira Poutley) and now i'm on 'The Unconsoled'. It's v confusing (and big) and i'm not sure i can persevere. It's due back at the library today so i need to make a decision... renew and finish... or return and give up.

Autumn!

I'm so excited that Autumn is here. It's still warm (hot) here and i do hope it stays that way for my friend, elinor who arrives in 2 weeks! (Eek! I'm so excited about her forthcoming visit) but, it's so nice that summer is on it's way out (sorry UK peeps, i know you've probably only had about a total of 11 hours of sun (our daily average) in the last 3 months). It was a pretty brutal summer, heat wise, especially for a newbie like me. Perth had a record 57 days of more than 32 degrees and it hasn't rained since 1 february (0.4 mm. does that even count?)... Anyways, more importantly, i'm bored of wearing flip flops and shorts and vests every day. I wanna wear clothes! I'm yearning for coloured tights, jumpers (yesss, i'm so excited about getting to wear a jumper), jeans (i tried to put on my skinny jeans the other day and had to peel them off straight away, they were so uncomfortable), oooh, my pink gloves! AND i got my mitts on a copy of UK Grazia the other day (Thanks Tam) and now I really want a cape and some ski pants. (And as i re-read that sentence, i do appreciate that wanting a cape and ski pants makes me sound like i'm about to adopt a super-hero fashion sense).

Cake!

Lime yoghurt cake with rosewater and pistachios. It's a Rachel Allen recipe but I was a bit disappointed. The cake turned out well but i wasn't convinced by the flavour. As you can see from the photo, it was quite sticky. The rosewater and lime syrup is poured over the cake and soaks into the sponge.

I even threw the last slice out because it'd been hanging around for that long it'd gone a little bit dry... Now throwing cake away is not something we usually do, especially with a cake/biscuit/pastry/chocolate/i'll take anything sweet fiend in the house (that's not me by the way) so i think that's a sure sign that i won't be making this cake again.

No, not sharks, dolphins!

On Sunday R and I set off for a cycle ride to Fremantle. Our route took us south of the river and along the cycle path that runs all the way along the Swan river into Fremantle. I had an awesome day. It was so lovely being out on Sunday morning in a new area, (I've never cycled this route before), seeing the families picnicking on the riverbanks, people kayaking and fishing. And the dolphins! We saw dolphins. I saw a dolphin on the Swan river once before when we were out on the boat but that was more of a glimpse. This time we stopped and watched the dolphins swimming and playing about in the water. I did have a little moment of realising how bloody lucky i am to be living in such an amazing place.

The photo above is a pelican on a lamp post. Unfortunately the pelican rather stubbornly wouldn't turn around so i couldn't get a good angle on his beak!

In Freo we stopped to watch local band, San Cisco, play at a mental health awareness day (where we also got free water and fruit. We love a freebie! The bananas were V popular and we didn't manage to get our hands on one of those. For those outside of australia, bananas are currently about $11 a kilo. That's about £7!) Triple J (australian radio station) have been playing San Cisco's record these last couple of weeks so it seemed like a good opportunity to catch the band live before they potentially get big and popular. They've got a good sound to them... a bit Vampire Weekend-ish.

We were going to jump on the train home but i suggested we cycle along the coastal path to cottesloe, which we did, and we stopped for fish and chips on the grass in the shade of the pine trees. R had a little snooze and then we jumped back on the bikes and decided we might as well cycle all the way home. (We worked out it was probably about 55 kms in total)

We stopped in our local, the Paddo, for a well deserved pint, (a midi for me) and bumped into a couple of friends, so 1 drink turned into 2. We then went home watched the last of the Twilight movies (god, can she get any more drippy? I'm interested to see what she's like in the Runaways movie, which we've going to watch on dvd this weekend) and ate cheese and crackers. An absolutely perfect day!