disjoining in the middle of the night..

I woke up last night in pain - I couldn't move my arm and the elbow area was tender.. I thought it might be just because of my pump class. But no, I woke up again after what seems like 10 minutes and it was so painful like someone has twisted it, I tried moving my other arm and my legs and everything was fine.

I woke up this morning to observe what's happened and there is this HUGE MASSIVE JOINT sticking out next to my elbow. Obviously I've done some aerobics in my sleep and have disjointed something rather. I'm in pain. I can't even put my bra on because I can't bend up arm or even touch my shoulder. I can't even move my spoon to my mouth to eat my lunch!! SO MUCH PAIN.

And I am making dinner for family and boyfriend tonight. AH.

Toast..

When an all day breakfast cafe is down the street from your house sometimes it's not far enough for it to feel as though you are "going out somewhere to have brunch" so I've been putting it off, until the day of On the Bright Side festival, where I figured the best meal is pretty much a brunch (seeing as I woke up at 10:30 and the festival started at 12-ish which meant that we should be there by 2-ish).

So I had a slice of leftover quiche before S arrived and we made our way to Toast (which by the way used to be this little crappy cafe - thank GOD that is gone considering how bad the food/cake/coffee was and now something better is there at a prime location).

The thing I love about Toast is the cute little white wooden garden chairs outside, with white umbrellas, blue and white tables all overlooking the lovely Claisebrook Cove (and there were vintage 1960s red vinyl chairs inside) and the cute little coloured plastic cups and vintage/old glass bottles (which probably was something else before it was cleaned and reused). It was all very school-like.

S Lemon Iced Tea

Cappuccino - weren't enough coffee in it - it was almost watery..

Caramelised Banana Crepes - which was delicious, sweet, buttery and 

the crepes were the right thickness

My healthy option - low GI (which kept me going for the whole entire festival and some more!!)

bircher muesli, traditional swiss style, oats soaked in dairy,
served with rhubarb and raspberry compote, toasted almonds

It was fantastic - it wasn't soggy and tasteless (or some museli ones are like vomit like!) But this was perfect  mix of sour sweet and the almonds just gave it that crunch!

Oh and Toast does take away too! Which was exactly what I did today for my late lunch.

 Corn fritters with avocado, poached eggs and hollandaise sauce

- The Avocado weren't ripe enough and the hollandaise sauce was sour, not enough of the buttery-ness.. I won't be getting the hollandaise anything at the place..

Overall Toast wasn't too bad, it's quirky, quaint and very much like the artsy cafes that seems to be popping up all over Perth at the moment. If it's busy I wouldn't recommend you sitting inside - in fact why sit inside (unless if it's raining), after all the views are excellent outside and it's a lot more roomy.

I think I'll be back and next time I'll try one of the usual suspects - bacon, eggs, mushrooms and toast. 

My Fair Lady

I spent yesterday afternoon enjoying My Fair Lady - one of film's greats.

I forgot how classic, catchy and funny the music in the movie is. I also realised how so much of it is re-used and alluded to in so many cartoons, movies and books in our time.

And as always, Audrey Hepburn is stunning and such a fantastic actress.

By favourite scene however is the monochromatic Ascot Opening Race scene

and now I'm really eager to go to Melbourne for the Melbourne Cup.I've even come up with what I'm wearing - I'm wearing my lace short dress with exposed zipper at the back - it's flattering and elegant. Now all I need is the big hat.

Riley's Wood Fired Cafe

I wanted to go to a casual eatery, a local cafe with good pizza, steak, fish and chips, pasta at affordable prices. I also had to find something south of the river, which for me is a HUGE challenge considering the fact that I'm not very familiar with anything south of the river. With a little help of google I found Riley's Woodfired Cafe. It serves salad, steak, fish and chips, pasta and most of course wood fired pizzas.

Riley's Woodfired Cafe is a little local cafe situated in Brentwood/Mt. Pleasant area, pretty much in the middle of the suburb. It's brightly lit, white walls and seatings with a few book shelfs and an open kitchen where you can see the wood fired oven. I was suprised by how busy and packed the little cafe/restaurant was. We waited at the back bench before a seat was available.

What really surprised me was that there was only one waitress and one other person at the till. For a place that was packed they really do need a system of service, whether it's by those beeping things, or employing more waitresses/waiters.

The food? The pizza was beautiful and big enough to share between two. However, bf didn't want to, he wanted fish and chips (although he ended up eating the pizza too).

Agnello - lamb, baby spinach, red onion, roasted capsicum and tzatziki sauce (the sauce was sooooooo good!)

bf's Fish and Chips

I love the fact that this place was brightly lit, the food was filling and cheap, the pizza was yummo, and it wasn't just some dodegy looking dirty local cafe. To top it off, there were also a few other couples in the place, as well as a family, for something tucked away in the suburbs it wasn't too bad.

Green Tea Cupcakes..

Firstly you are going to say... "hmmm.." except for all you green tea lovers..

But let me tell you that it's delicious when it is fresh out of the oven and is nice and warm and moist and it's healthy-ish. It also gave me an excuse to use the match powder that I bought from Tokyo and Kyoto.

I modified the receipe I got from mashi so the receipe..

90g butter at room temp
75g sugar
2 eggs
125g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
50g ground almonds
50ml milk
2 tsp matcha powder

Firstly I ran out of baking powder, so I opted to use self-raising flour (i'm not sure how much I used because i went with according to the mixture's texture as I was folding the flour).

I didn't have grounded almonds so I used fresh almonds and grounded them up in the motar - because I was a little lazy to ground it finely, the end result was the cupcake had a little bit of of an almond crunch.

So firstly, you..

Preheat oven to 180'C.

Beat the butter and sugar in a bowl until creamy. Add the eggs and continue to beat. Gradually add the flour and baking powder (in my case I added the self-raising flour), then the almonds.

Heat the milk in a saucepan, remove from the stove and add the matcha tea powder. Leave to soak for 3 minutes, then beat it all to remove any remaining clots. Add the matcha milk to the dough and incorporate well (do not over mix or your cupcake will be tough)

Matcha green tea powder

 

Distribute the mix between a 12 muffin tray, bake for 20 minutes.

You can use as much matcha tea powder or as little as you want - it really depends on how "green tea" you want the cupcakes to taste. The sugar is the same, my matcha is not as sweet, so I added a little bit more sugar to my cupcakes.

Happy baking!

A little bit of leather haven...

Last week I got myself a stitch detail leather biker jacket, it's warm, it's gives a little bit of oomph to all my outfits, and to top it off, it didn't cost an arm and a leg. It was affordable REAL leather.

It's from Just Jeans - it's $199 but I got it for $149. It's not lamb leather but it still feels nice and you can smell the leather smell - which I love. There are other styles and colours as well. There was one with a hoodie - it's actually very casual and relaxed look and I quite like it, although the whole idea of a leather jacket hoodie is baffling. But when you put it on it's rather nice.

I now have a white and a black leather jacket and I really feel like investing in more by grabbing that hoodie leather one... but maybe later.

Being Cultured - Patricia Piccinini's Relativity

M, H and I had a very thought-provoking, eye-opening arty cultural experience today at the Art Gallery of Western Australia.

We spent lunch time gossiping at David Jones food hall (which by the way has some very yummy sushi!) before heading to the Art Gallery to see Patricia Piccinini's Relativity.

You are first confronted with a huge spider web looking thing where a child peeps out from within the web and huge blobs hang underneath. Upon further examination (where you walk up the stairs) you see that the web holds slug looking things inside the web and the child seems to be playing in it. The whole web is made from human hair. It's really quite cool (except for the slugs - they just look ewww... and the faces looks like a dugong.. and as H put it.. "ooo and you can see their butthole..").

The next thing you come across were two children playing video games (I thought they were real kids, especially when two little boys were next to it and taking.. I thought they were all real and the actual real boys were looking at the game boy too..) it turned out the two children playing the video game wasn't real at all - in fact upon closer inspection the children are prematurely aged - the wrinkles around their eyes were amazingly detailed.

There are also all sorts of interesting creatures and the whole exhibition is so detailed, and little short videos to accompany it all.

The exhibition is on until 22nd of August at the Art Gallery. It's worth seeing. OH did I mention that it's free - if you enjoy it just donate a few coins.

The Art Gallery is also has the Body exhibition on as well. Body will focus on corporeality in many guises, from the seemingly simple representation of the human form, from ceremonial markings on the human body to works by contemporary artists that are determined by the physical body of the artist or seek to include the body of the viewer within their realm.

An Education is perfectly fine.

I finally got a chance to see An Education. It's one of those films with witty dialogue, interesting characters, dreamy scenaries, and a plot line about coming of age, learning about life and that only you know what's good for you. I'm sure wikipedia would reveal all for those interesting in what the movie is about..

The one thing I love most about the whole movie, it isn't so much the fact that the plot line is great (which it isn't really), it's more the costumes (and the dialogue - I've always like movies with intersting, witty, thought-provoking dialogue).

The lovely Carey Mulligan (who is absolutely sweet, cute and adorable), who plays the protangonist, Jenny in the movie, dawns such lovely fabulous 60s flocks. The perfectly coiffed up-dos, the glamourous make-up and fancy jewellery and all those simple yet figure-pleasing dresses, (that doesn't need boobs or bums to be showing! - in other words - class).

It makes me even more determined to get rid of all the jeans (except perhaps my Levis and my Calvin Kleins) in my wardrobe.

Go and watch it if you haven't yet. Even if it is just for the costumes and Carey Mulligan.

The Mighty Quinn

I have to say that I've never eaten dinner at a tavern before, not in Perth's suburbs anyway. So when I was asked to go to the Mighty Quinn for dinner, I was more than happy to experience and explore a different dining venue.

The Mighty Quinn is located in Tuart Hill/Yokine suburb, and is one of those typical taverns/pubs - restaurant at the front, sports bar with huge tv screens at the back. I felt like I've stepped into a rodeo though, because the whole place was very much like the pubs you would see in a Clint Eastwood Western movie. Wooden chairs, tables and cuffed parquetry floor, extraordinarily long bar and stage in the middle.

The stage in the middle of the main dining area, resulted in the band playing very loudly (and it really doesn't help that the wooden floors and the layout of the place causes the walls to vibrate and echo). We were fortunate enough, however, to be away from the main dining area and was placed in a corner of another room (which allowed us to talk, otherwise we would have been screaming at each other, even though we were only 30cm away).

The food? it was very satisfying, hearty and value for money. The taste? it's not something that would make your tastebud swoon, after all it's not fine dining, but it has its charm and wasn't too bad at all. I can tell you that I wasn't hungry until late the next day.

Chicken wrapped in filo pastry with prawns and greens

 

Porterhouse steak with mushroom sauce, mash potatoes and side of salad

- there was two rather generous portions of steak, I found the mushroom sauce to be a little salty though

 

The ambience? I rather liked the chilled-out, relaxed, casual feel of the place and I would go back purely for that.

Overall, a pleasant experience and definately not as borgan as I imagined.

my health run week 2

So last week was a really bad/poor week.

I had parties to attend which meant over-consumption of alcohol and naughty foods like cakes, lollies, party pies and what nots..

I did manage to do one running session - but that's about it - the whole week was spent running around attending events and what nots.

I went on the scale today and I lost 1kg in two weeks - I'm going to put that down to cutting my portions down.

In terms of eating breakfast - sort of worked - but not really.

This week (week 3) hasn't been too good either - I managed to avoid cakes and alcohol and ate more fruits and vegetables - but I ruined it by having oily chinese tonight. To make matters worse I'm going to be having San Churros tomorrow night.

But I will be going for a run tomorrow and hopefully squeeze in Zumba before I have to go to San Churros.

Thursday night is my yoga night.

Maybe this bad week can be saved if I exercise at least 3 times.

Asian poses...

One of the lessons learnt (and learnt well) by an asian girl at a very young age is the art of posing and looking "oh-so-cute"! After all, why just smile and look cute, when you can strike a pose and look even cuter!!

In fact there is a site dedicated to documenting the quirky poses and asians do and how to do it.

This fun, random post is inspired by this site and allows me to see how well my new-ish compact camera does in cam-whoring situations, especially without a flash. Please don't take it seriously, I'm completely doing it for fun and plus it really is fun to just pull these looks especially in your silly photos you would take with your friends - after all, why just stick to sticking your tongue out? (plus, it's never attractive).

The "thoughtful"/"confused" pose

Place a finger on the corner of your mouth... open your eyes wide.. can choose to semi-pout or can always shrug your shoulders too..  

The CLAW

  

What's more fierce and cute than this pose?? - The claw! It involves using one or two hands with palms facing outward and fingers bent in a shape of the claw... you can choose to do a fierce face cute open mouth growl face along with it too!

Adjusting Glasses aka Sexy Librarian Look

 

This is so self-explanatory.

Self-Punch Look

Clench your fist and bring it to cheek.  Use hurt expressions on your face to give it more effect.

The GUN/shhhhhh LOOK

I've opted to pose a "be quiet" look/blowing the smoke off the gun I've shot. You can show whose boss by pointing the "gun-shaped" hand towards the camera.

The tears look 
 

Put on a sad/sulk/pouty face and place a curled finger near your eye and hey presto you are done.

The PLEADING/DAYDREAM LOOK

Place one or two hands clenched under your chin with palms facing upwards. For pleading look - add puppy doggie eyes.

A WAVE/HEY POSE

This pose involves extending all fingers like a wave and placing it near your cheeks. 

THE CLASSIC "V"/"PEACE"
 

Very self-explanatory.

So there you go, next time someone points a camera at you, you have some poses to strike and perfect.

HAH. GOD i haven't cam-whored like that in years. It was fun!

Mamma Mia

As part of a very busy social week - Thursday night consisted of us (Mish, Mish's friend Tara and Me) braving the howling winds, the pouring rain and thunder to watch Mamma Mia - the boardway version at Burswood Theatre (which has been playing from June 5th until August 1st).

It was fantastic, it was more humourous than the movie, the cast can actually sing (unlike Pierce Brosnan - who played Sam) and the set and the costume (during the show) was simple, laidback and really was very like idyllic Greek island.

What I loved most about it all, apart from having all the great ABBA hits (and tapping my feet along to it), was the end, when they sang some of the hit songs in outrageous bright sequenced lycra tights and was all very ABBA-like.

 
To top it off, almost the whole entire audience got to their feet and danced and sang along to the songs. That is why I love going to theatre, each play is always so different. I've seen Chicago and Phantom of the Opera, but this is probably the first time I've seen audiences jump up and dance and sing. But then again, it is ABBA. ABBA makes us do crazy things.