Everything and nothing at all.

You and me in the photobooth, waiting for the flash, close the curtain urgently

I’d totally forgotten about my plight with these shortbread cookies until I was cleaning out the memory card and found photos which my mum took of them. These were the nicest batch, and dare I say, my batch that I’d mixed from scratched and made myself. I know, I know, shortbread is freaking easy to make, but it was more the fact that I actually went to the effort of making them that’s really worth something – I’m really lazy and generally don’t enjoy much baking/cooking, etc…

Anyway, the story behind these Christmas shortbread cookies was that I’d made them to give to friends who I simply couldn’t afford to buy Christmas presents for. The problem was, at some point, mum took over mixing the ingredients, and she’d doubled all the ingredients except the flour! But being the amazing cook she is (and me the shitty one), she didn’t like the idea of me entertaining the idea that perhaps she’d done something wrong in the process, as the mix was just faaar too soft to even cut up! Thus began the tedious task of refrigerating them back and forth until I had finally shaped them all and baked them. It wasn’t until much later that she suddenly had a lightbulb moment and went “OH…” haha.

Those who managed to eat some in the end said they were good anyway; but I felt a little bad that there were many friends I’d failed to deliver to, just because we were never home when I was free or had the shortbread with me!

In other matters, tomorrow I’m driving down with a friend, my sister and her friend to Raglan for a couple of nights. We’ll be camping at the local holiday park, and who knows, I might even brave it out and attempt to surf. Maybe. I’ve always wished I could surf… although unfortunately the weather at the moment isn’t looking too fantastic, I’m just hoping it clears up soon, but it’s a guaranteed good trip in general! In fact, this is shaping up to be an exciting week overall: Tues-Thurs is Raglan, Thursday night I will be photographing the Peaches gig (I’m actually quite gutted that I’m missing out on The Mint Chicks because it’s on the same night), and Friday will entail about 14hours of photographing Auckland’s Big Day Out. Not to mention I can’t get out of shifts at work for both Saturday and Sunday…

To be honest, I just can’t wait to see what whacky shots we come up with on the trip and how good proper stage lighting will make my gig photos; so please, please, please all have your fingers and toes crossed for me that my sore throat gets better ASAP!

Cheap Monday

So our beach day didn’t quite go according to plan when the weather soured with cold windy gusts and rain. So when the weather finally cleared up the other day, Charlotte and I took a quick drive down to a beach that I used to visit a lot as a kid, and spent the afternoon laxing in the sun and chatting. It was just a good day, but we didn’t do anything exciting really, and I only took two pictures (one of which is below). I think the funniest thing that happened on our excursion was when we decided to go to Momo’s (an asian bubble tea place) in our beach gear on our way home – upon entry the waitress gave us the most inquisitive, rude look, as if we weren’t allowed to be in there or something… very strange. The same thing happened when we tried to order and pay our check. A friend of mine said, “well, you know, asians don’t go to the beach!” (but he’s asian, so that’s not really racist… hahaa).

I was surprised to find a wayward branch full of the prettiest, yellowy-pink roses that had swayed out onto the footpath in our front garden when I got home as well. Ah, pleasant surprises.

I’m actually in a bit of a crisis at the moment: our family’s decided that our huge yard (along with 2 side hedges) just costs far too much time/money to maintain – think mowing lawns, weeding, trimming hedges, and the regular garden bag service to take it all away – so we want to sell our house and move into a bigger one with a smaller, more tameable garden. This, and with my quickly-approaching departure date of January 26th as mum’s deadline for me to clear my rubbish out, has led me to pour the entire contents of my desk drawers and shelves out. A lot has already gone into the paper recycling and rubbish, but I honestly cannot move around my room, let alone try and sleep (my bed is worse than when this picture was taken). I even slept on the couch after getting home at 3am from Sumadayze. Anyway, the point of this picture was to show how luxurious my cat is, even in moments of chaos – he’s managed to snuggle up and sleep on two (apparently quite pricey, as I’m pillow-picky and can’t sleep otherwise) pillows! What a cutie.

As if my room wasn’t enough to deal with, I procrastinated in my sleeplessness, and sharpie’d myself a Cheap Monday tee shirt:

I must say, although it’s severe cheating, I was quite happy with how my free-hand skull drawing went. And I’d screwed up one sleeve whilst tearing it, but I’ve split the sleeves on both sides (the idea courtesy of Charlotte) and it’s nice and loose, and rather beachy. Maybe I’ll go and confuse the waitress at Momo’s again with my bikini underneath, tehe.

Hey Stud!

Now, I’ve never been much of a bag person – in fact, anyone that knows me well enough will have been asked “can I put my stuff in your bag?” when out and about with me. Anywhere, anytime, I enjoy my pockets, thus making my leather jacket a staple with any pocket-less dress or garment that I wear. I remember the two summers spent in black skinny jeans and band shirts with the boys, walking to and from the mall everyday, with only my phone, eftpos card and house key stuck to my leg in the sticky sort of sweat that tells you such jeans are a bad idea for summer. Such idiocy has served me well – I’ve never fussed over bag checks at events since I’ve never had one! Until I started carrying cameras around…

Anyway, the point is, I’ve fallen head over heels in love with this Melie Bianco bag, which is saying a lot since I don’t even have a habit of using bags… but with the conversion rate plus shipping fees, it totals to about $145 NZD, which is a huge ask for someone who wouldn’t even have that much in their wallet/card that will be potentially going into this bag, ha. I don’t know if I’ll end up getting it, but the black, the studs – it’s all just so tempting for me. In the meantime, I’ve promised myself to definitely not get it until at least after my trip to Taiwan/Japan, where I will undoubtedly be assaulted by an uncharacteristic lust for hot leather in the form of bags!

So these are infamous shorts that I scored for $20 at Glassons on Boxing Day. The look much better when worn, but I didn’t feel like having my tum, legs and arse in the pictures – most especially since I just became very well acquainted with dinner. I really wished that I had a “before” photo now, just for comparison’s sake; but I wasn’t exactly anticipating on spending that much time personalising them.

They started off a completely hole and tatter-free, with the bottom hem in the typical style of being folded up with the sides sewn up to secure the fold. I hated how that looked because I’d always associated light denim with rips and holes, so I’ve never actually worn them out in their original state! The most difficult part of tearing up the folded bit was first having to use scissors and a seam ripper to get it undone – who knew Glassons was so intent on keeping their shorts intact? It was a bit rough at first, but eventually I got the hang of making the tattered, holey bits without actually putting a proper hole through – slashing the denim in the direction of the white threads worked wonders, and my personal favourite touch is the triangular hole on my right thigh (you can’t really tell in that picture, but the triangle’s more distinct when worn).

Then last night I had a huge spout of sleeplessness, and decided to stud my back bum pocket. The only reason I chose the right was because I’d put a few slashes in the left and didn’t want to ruin it… but discovered today that, apparently I usually instinctively slide my phone into my right bum pocket, oops, pocket no more! I’d have to admit that the studding was probably the cause of most of the sleeplessness past 3am, since I sat in bed doing it, but I hate starting something and not finishing it, so I persisted for much longer, since the studs were so hard to align properly!

Mum walked in this morning and joked that I’d raised the value of my shorts to $80 and I laughed – but she’s right though, I see these things in stores for prices upwards of $100! On one hand, considering the trouble, I can see why people are willing to pay for this to be pre-done, but I had so much fun doing it and thinking these were only $20 that I’m glad I didn’t succumb to being ripped off. Pun unintended. Promise.

2010

The first real concept of “2010” was embedded in my head by a b-side song of the same name by the Mint Chicks on their limited edition white vinyl, which was complimentary with tickets to their farewell tour in 2007. Having just said that, I actually had to ask a friend to confirm which year it was because I simply cannot believe how fast time has flown. Then, I was 16, wishing to be 18, glamorously gig-hopping… and now I am theoretically where I had wanted to be.

I wish I could start this new chapter (and decade, as many like to speak of lately), with exciting, self-assured plans for the year to come, and effectively the future… but in all honesty, I just feel lost as hell. Why? Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean that in a negative, pessimistic kind of way – in fact I’m feeling very ambitious and hopeful for the future – but having just finished 7th form and effectively my last year of pretend-childhood, it seems that all of a sudden I ought to start taking myself and the things I do slightly more seriously. Currently, I am sitting on (almost literally… it’s in an envelope, in a folder under my seat) my acceptance letter the Jazz Performance major from university, and the attached form that I need to send back to formally accept my place; but I don’t know why I haven’t mailed it after an entire month of having received it. On one hand, sure, it was December, I had graduated only the day before the date on the letter; then it was work, Christmas chaos, followed by new years… and I could make excuses and say that I really hadn’t had the time, but really, I just hadn’t wanted to make it seem so realistic yet. Ultimately, when I sign, date, and mail the letter, it will have sealed my 5 years’ of deliberating my fate – I will be rejecting law school for jazz school. I’m excited and over the moon, yet shaking with fear over what that might entail. I’ve had so many lectures from people that “know better”, and I’d said to the last person (a family friend), “look, I’m sorry to be rude, but I haven’t made this decision overnight – I’ve thought and thought about it for five years, and I’ve heard what you’ve just said about a million times and I’ve taken it into consideration. More than taken it into consideration. Trust me. It’s Christmas, please leave it alone”… and needless to say the got the message; last I heard, he’d later said to my mother “well I can’t imagine she’d get as bored as she would in law school, I suppose”. Ha!

In irrelevant matters, I was going to make a post about a pair of $20 light denim shorts that I’d scored on Boxing Day; and ultimately chopped them up and diy’d some distress into it because I thought light denim just shouldn’t look primp and perfect… but I didn’t want to start off 2010 with some story about my afternoon with 2 knives and a piece of cardboard whilst on msn at the same time… so…

Beach tomorrow! It will be good. I will have photos. Aaaaand, watch this space, kids, I’m shooting Big Day Out!

Hello, how are you?

My grandmother flew down from Taiwan a week ago and is spending Christmas with us this year; so in between my erratic Christmas shifts and gigs, my nights have been slotted full of silly banter whilst playing Rummikub. Work has been more stressful as of late, as the mall’s been far busier than usual (and I only get called into work on the hectic days). According to today’s newspaper front page, Christmas sales have been down significantly since last year, but at work it seems to be that most people are resorting to cafes to catch up with people, instead of actually spending money on presents for one another.

I’ve been stuck on the till for somewhere between 15-20 hours in the past 4 days alone, and so many things are really making my nerves tick. You know when you enter a store and the sales assistant greets you and ask, “Hi, how are you?” and if they linger for a response you usually respond with “good thanks” and keep browsing? Or, if they’re awful at their job and completely ingenuine, they’ll simply ask and move on before you respond… that’s all very well because it seems to be the routine for sales people. But what I truly cannot wrap my head around is about the 2/5 customers that approach me at the till and go “Hi how are you I’d like a flat white… etc…” – the painful lack of punctuation reflecting the exact way they speak – not even pausing to make their words a question or proper sentence. WHY do they open their sentences with “how are you” without really even making that a question?! Furthermore, even when you totally disregard the fact that it’s a completely redund
ant thing to say, it also makes me feel like a right prick because I’m the one who is supposed to be asking such things, and I don’t know whether or not I should even acknowledged that they’d said it at all?! On top of this, I think the usual 80% of people who say medium when I ask whether they’d like a small or large coffee (whilst pointing to the small, then large cup), has grown into about 90%. Is it really so hard to figure out that a middle-sized cup will not miraculously appear out of thin air, just because many womens’ conscience (or stupidity) seems much more satisfied when they think that they’re not getting a “large”. I give up, I truly do.

I’ve got so many more pet peeves accumulated from work over the past year, but it’s all been heightened over the last few days. It didn’t help that on Saturday morning I started work at 7am following a very late night out in town watching Yacht, who were supported by a crazy set by The Sneaks, and the alien-headed Kazaam Blam. The mere three-hour nap I took before rolling out of bed to get to work on time was simply not enough to refresh myself from having to get quite pushy and block the view of other people in order to get a decent shot of Yacht; their dance moves and craziness kind od reminded me of Karen O, but definitely nowhere as wild. Overall it was a good show, but it was a shame that my friend and I couldn’t stay until the very end of it, just because we were both sooo exhausted from work and Saturday the following would be much worse and busier.

I’ve picked out some photos from Yacht, click here for the full set:

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