Milkshake...Mistake

My mum ate all the bananas! So I chucked a frozen avocado into the blender along with my yogurt and a bunch of cranberry juice.

Nope.

Not a good idea.

Avocado doesn't go with cranberry. 

Victoria Day!

Hip hip - hooray! Hip hip - hooray! Hip hip - hooray!

I wish I knew the words to "God Save the Queen" so I could have sung it today. But alas, I had to settle for doffing my hat and cheering. In fancy dress. At a heritage village. It was a bit weird, as people took pictures of us (and asked us if we worked there) and that always makes me embarrassed.

It was cool though, cause I'd never been to the place before, even though it's close by and I've often walked around in the area. But I went, and it was awesome, and there were lots of houses and a blacksmith and bowls with potatoes and log cabins and a giant cake with a Union Jack on it and an outhouse and an old radio station and  lots of other stuff too! And I frowned at the only two young people costumed volunteers (they had little grasp of period appropriate costume). However, there was an appearance by Queen Victoria herself, being driven about in 1924 Model-T, so I suppose that opens the door to all sorts of anachronism.

This really has nothing to do with anything, except it's art based on a short film called The Anachronism.  It's pretty cool, we almost went to the opening (they were having the giant squid ship on display!) but the whole shindig was in one of the dodgiest areas of the city, at night. Linked to the Tumblr page, iffen you're interested.

She was escorted by Mounties and a piper and then a brass band! They played ABBA, Elvis, and...Barry Manilow after her speech. And there were Red Hat Ladies and lady Morris dancers! I think when I get old I'm gonna be a Red Hat Lady and drink tea and be a lady-in-waiting to the Queen on Victoria Day. Yep. That sounds about right to me :)

Hat by milliner Sally Faith Steinmann of Maggie Mae Designs.
Linked to her website.

Lots of good times were had, and then we were ready to go! And the bus disappeared, as they so often do around here (as in you're at the stop ten minutes early, and there are already people waiting who have probably been there an additional ten minutes prior, so you know it hasn't already come, and then it just never arrives.) so we had to wait for over half an hour. Without foooooood. Cause by then we were really hungry.

And then we made pasta with pesto and alfredo sauce when we got home and ate the whole thing!

Then watched the last Doctor Who episode! Ooh la la!

Richard E. Grant! And then...John Hurt?! That was weird. Very much so. But a pretty decent episode all in all!

The cake was like this! But waaaaaaaayyy bigger!

So I leave thee with a picture of a cake, and bid thee adieu! 

Halloween Plotting

It's only May, but hey, never too early to start planning for Halloween!

So I've got two front runners this year, one left over from a couple years ago when I was mostly bald (I went with Tintin that time, best costume of my life :) ) and one I thought of the other day.

Alien lady from Mars Attacks!

Pros: 

I can sew, so the dress shouldn't be too hard. 

I already thought of a way to get that hair height. 

Eyeball ring?!

Cons:

That print might be hard to find.

I don't have a bullet bra.

I lost all my makeup.

Spider Jerusalem from Transmetropolitan

Pros:

Black suit, easy!

Funky glasses readily available on Etsy.

I've always wanted to threaten people with a bowel disruptor.

Cons:

I have hair now.

Also, boobs. 

And I'd get a headache from wearing fake glasses.

So many decisions!

Just for funsies, here's a clip of a Halloween Costume Contest I was in last year. (Me and the BF as Liz and Ms. Frizzle from the Magic School Bus are at 36 seconds)

Third Time's a Charm

Guess who I got see in concert? Muahaha! The talented Pokey LaFarge and the South City Three! Well, now there's two more band members (TJ Muller and Chloe Feoranzo, not pictured) so I guess they can't really be the South City Three anymore. 

But I think they need to have some sort of thing acknowledging that it's not all Pokey. As supremely talented as he is, Adam Hoskins' guitar playing makes you feel like you can never lay claim to that instrument again (at least not until you've honed your skills for another 20 years) and Ryan Koenig's showmanship (those weird facial expressions almost rival Pokey's! And I noticed that TJ Muller had taken a few notes...) and harmonica playing are definite highlights. Where would they be without Joey Glynn's bass playing (and then no one in the audience would be able to shout "bass it up!")? And now that they've got cornet and clarinet/saxophone players it's like the perfect finishing touch. (Actually, that would be the worldwide success and oodles of dough that they deserve. But they're definitely on their way to that.)

Yes, Pokey might be the glue that brought them all together, the one with the style and the songs that could easily be mistaken for something written 80 years ago (that means awesome, btw), but those other guys and gal get plenty of respect from me as well.

A bunch of people who saw them at the Folk Fest a couple years back came to their first theatre show and told all their friends. This second time around (technically third) saw a lot of repeat concertgoers and even more of their friends. I know I tell everyone about how amazing this band is, and it seems that most people who see them do the same. We can't help it. It's too good to keep secret. 

Only thing. I gotta get Live in Holland or watch YouTube videos of the band performing cause the albums are nothing compared to the real deal. 

AAANNND THEY MIGHT BE COMING BACK IN OCTOBER! 

Hint hint birthday present!

A Loaf of Chocolate Cake!

I made this cake for my mum. It's super moist and not too sweet, and it's also vegan (with the option of being gluten free if you use rice flour instead of regular). The strange specks are from me not mixing it too thoroughly, but even so it tastes awesome. I had to eat two pieces with my tea this afternoon! It's made in a loaf pan, but I've also made it into cupcakes with good results. Basically, this is my go to chocolate cake recipe that's perfect for everyone!

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/vegan-chocolate-cake/

Latest Acquisition

This is a big book! I never got it from the library for years because I couldn't fit it in my backpack along with all my other books. Bought it at work the other day, so I haven't even got to return it! I hope this isn't the start of an alarming book buying trend...

So far finished the first chapter. Smashing stuff! :D

Gatsby Review - Spoilers and Strong Language Alert!

I suppose I must, but there is no joy in it! The movie, I mean.

Basically, wannabe Moulin Rouge. And not just like a nod to, like wishing to recapture the magic of that awesome movie (my second favourite, after Big Fish). From the opening "curtain" everything goes to poop. The voiceover is awful, Tobey Maguire sounds like an ancient (but he isn't! He's just jaded!) and the frame of him being in a sanatorium is so thin you just want to forget it completely. But you can't because they keep coming back to it for no reason, other than to remind you with painfully contrived typing the story sequences that this isn't Christian writing a story about love. It's Nick Carraway being obsessed with Leonardo DiCaprio and spouting some of the most flat, obvious dialogue that ever rearranged itself from the tomato sauce spilled on the script as Baz Luhrmann and Craig Pearce discussed "ideas" over dinner.

Sure, there are some good points. I saw the opening shot (water! with a green light on the other side!) and said this looks bloody beautiful. It is. But we all knew that already, and that's why I went. Okay, maybe I also had some hopes that it would be good. Let forth the floodgates of my disdain! Disappointed hopes have daubed my barbs with...um....lots of words!

Another good thing was Daisy-coming-to-tea scene. That was just funny. And Leo's suit got all transparent. And then dry right away! Of course, there were a few other super intense = hilarious moments. Mostly Nick creeping Gatsby. He must have very good eyesight to see him through the windows ALL THE TIME.

The ladies all look stunning. I would like to have some of Leo's shirts. THAT CANARY YELLOW CAR! POOP POOP! POOP POOP! (As Mr. Toad would say). I think the only good bit of acting in this whole shebang comes courtesy Amitabh Bachchan (the dude who played Wolfsheim). That tiny scene at the club where Nick gets an eyeful of his human tooth tiepin is just about the only time with genuine mystery or unease. Instead of the usual telling (saying blah blah blah Gatsby is so mysterious and magnetic, etc.) they actually show Wolfsheim's mystery and magnetism. Since he doesn't really say or do anything and we only see him for a few minutes, I'm giving this to the actor's performance rather than the rest of the "creative" team.

But was that worth it to be beat over the head with symbolism the whole time? (The Eyes of TJ Eckleburg, the green light) Nope. Especially if the actual meaning of the symbols is so muddied and overwrought that you forget why the hell they're important (this is if you even remember high school English class. Or if you even care) all you know is they keep popping up over and over and over and over etc.

What else peeved me? Oh yeah, Daisy and Tom and the careless rich and hope and the American Dream. Fuck that. It's not in the movie. Pardon my French. They spend all their time on confetti pool parties and try to explain away the rest through lazy narration. Rather than showing the characters doin' their thang we get told exactly what to think and what to take away from it all.

After the movie my mum asked what we went to see. "Gatsby" sez I. "Oh. Everyone said it sucked." Thus sayeth my 65 year old mother, and apparently everyone she knows. If that somehow makes it more awful... I really don't know. I'm just mad. But I did get some free Cherry Blasters out of it!