Does the body rule the mind, Or does the mind rule the body? But we cannot cling to the old dreams anymore, For there are brighter sides to life

HAPPY 2011 EVERYONE!!!

I can’t even begin to describe how refreshing it is to feel like I have a really nice and refreshing new start. I’m happily crossing things off to-do lists and today I gave my room a thorough tidy-up, as well as slept in new sheets last night on the first night of 2011. This is going to be a much better year than last. I know every other person is probably saying that, but considering the amount of crap I went through last year, I’m determined and excited for this to be true.

The highlight of my day today was remembering that I had bought a lotto ticket from my friend Sinead at the supermarket yesterday, and deciding to check the numbers online… and it turns out that I had a Division 4 Bonus Ball win, which equals $60 for me! Yusssss. See – looking like a fantastic start to the year already. My sister and I had slightly misread the results online and almost thought I might have won a bit more, but sixty bucks redeemed at Charlotte’s workplace suits me just fine. Isn’t it just handy to have two best friends work at Lotto outlets? I rarely buy lotto tickets and like to save them for special occasions, so I thought, heck, it’s 1.1.11, it can’t hurt!

My quote of the moment: “To live is so startling it leaves little time for anything else.” – Emily Dickinson

Here are some photos from my New Year’s Eve Yard Party – only a handful of them were taken by me, before inebriation, haha. The rest were taken by my sister and apparently my friend Veronique was the one who took gazillions of photos of the red cups and beer pong in progress:

The conception of the brilliant beer pong table came about when I agreed to let Ethan bring his friend Curtis along to my party. I also asked him in the same txt whether he had a long enough table suitable for beer pong or not, and he said he didn’t – but that they would build one! A bit skeptical, I asked how serious they were – to which Ethan replied “His dad’s a builder, he’s an architect [student] and I’m an engineer[ing student], between us, we’ve definitely got it down” – and that they did! Apparently they modeled the colours and “BMS” off “Blue Mountain State”, but it just so happens to also be Liv’s school colours at Pepperdine, haha.

That rude person’s photo-bombing hand is mine, I’m a bit embarrassed to say. And I really don’t look too great a few seconds later in that photo to the right. Also, I believe that magenta sheer blouse which I was wearing is the only pink item of clothing that I own! Bought it on new year’s eve for $20 on sale. It matched my lipstick, you see…

Here are some shots from a bit earlier on… when we looked fresher. The one on the left below is of Cara, Charlotte and Veronique, on my bed.

In the second photo down from this, we are doing tequila shots. I got told that my mum took this photo, but I’m not sure how true this is… I want my hair a bit longer!

The morning after and pancakes my sister made. Unfortunately, I turned it down for bacon and eggs that I whipped up instead.

Also, I’ve got a bunch of directions I’d like to head in, and things I’d like to accomplish this year, but I still think that new year’s resolutions are just not for me. I often read other people’s ones, and it just seems like such an overhead, umbrella sort of thing to do – not to mention the fact that I hate making goals. I know that goal-setting is a healthy thing to do, blah blah (enough teachers and parents have told me that), but I like things to be vague. In a way, because it feels like such a disappointment if I can’t meet them, but also as if I’m setting a limit as to what I’m going to do.

So, no new year’s resolutions for me, just badass, kickass time.

Oh, one last thing – I finally put up photos from the Viper Room last month. Click here and here!

She has black hair and small hands, And I have a red kite; I’ll put you right in it, I’ll show you the sky

Mmm, what better blog post to end the year with than one filled with scrumptious food that makes you go for seconds, thirds, and then confess of the agony of over-indulgence? Although, for some reason I am writing this blog post at 6am (very reflective of how I’ve been living December…) so I’ll just keep this short and sweet.

Last night something came over me and I announced – much to my family’s delight – that I was going to whip up dinner for the evening. I know that sounds like nothing at all, and a lot of families take turns with cooking, but in our household, it’s a big deal when Amanda cooks. Especially voluntarily. I rarely cook, and I avoid the kitchen as much as possible, preferring instead to enjoy the fruits of my mother or sister’s kitchenly labour (yes, I made that word up – I could have said “culinary labour” but I didn’t want to!) because they both cook amazingly. The only times I will usually cook is when I have to, such as when I’m home alone or when my mum is too tired to cook.

Anyway, being the ambitious, thrill-seeking person that I am, I decided to aim high and announced that I was going to cook up a risotto.  Now, everyone knows how much hard work risotto is, but how worthwhile the outcome is, so that’s why I picked it. Also, mum and Liv have been talking about wanting risotto for quite some time, and I thought, hell, this Jamie Oliver recipe book is going to teach me how to cook! In reality though, I didn’t really follow the recipe (I never do), and kind of made stuff up as I went. Apart from staples like steak and lasagne, I’ve never cooked the same thing twice, because I literally throw together what is available at the time, and make up weird combinations of things. Luckily for the family, this time I avoided lemon (which I usually use a lot of) and mint, and threw together something more normal-sounding. I decided to whip up three dishes, as I needed some more kitchen drama to keep me busy whilst stirring risotto; and I was pleasantly surprised and pleased with my miraculous ability to finish cooking them all at the same time:

There was a tray of meatballs with basil, black pepper and parmesan, baked in tomato-y sauce which I didn’t get a decent photo of, but that was dish #1.

Dish #2 was chicken with spinach and capsicum, which I cooked in hot, delicious butter.

And #3, the most important thing being the risotto (spinach and onion). To be honest, about ten minutes into cooking this, I started freaking out that it wasn’t going to work out, and that I would let everyone down. But I’m glad I didn’t! The only let down was that I forgot to put mushrooms in the risotto, but we ate so much of it so fast that we hardly had time to notice.

I think that’s my cooking quota for the next 3-6 months fulfilled, thanks, haha.

I hope everyone has a good and safe New Years and I will see you next year! What are your exciting celebratory plans for New Years Eve?

And a young man’s gonna make mistakes, til he hits the brakes

“By the time a person has achieved years adequate for choosing a direction, the die is cast and the moment has long since passed which determined the future.” – Zelda Fitzgerald

I think it’s safe to say that I certainly do not live my life in a very safe manner. Wait, that sentence just sounded retarded. But it makes perfect literal sense in terms of what I’m saying. It’s true – I take a lot of risks, some calculated, but more often than not, I ignore such “calculations” and stick with what I want to do/think I should do/think I can get away with. The latter which sounds absolutely terrible, although thus far I have turned out quite “alright”. Point is, I wholeheartedly agree with the above quote, and I am living my life and making my “big decisions” as I see fit – not in the most “sensible” and “safe” manner at all. Instead, doing what I think will lead to where I’d like to be. I think that if I can’t dream big and try to fly towards such dreams up in the clouds at age 19, then there will be no more-appropriate time to do so.

I’m beyond grateful and appreciative towards my parents’ encouragement and support of me, even in times when they disagree with my decisions; I know there are many, many parents out there who simply do not provide such freedom and constant support towards their children. I’ve noticed (and mum’s also told me) that people are either in positive awe of how brilliant it is, or in absolute shock and horror towards my parents with regards to the fact that my sister and I pursue such “unconventional” pathways – and all with their full backing and support! Other parents that my family knows have either high-5’d us for sticking to our guns and going for it, or have taken it upon themselves to try and convince me that music is a stupid course of study that will lead to nowhere, and no career. They’d list all the reasons why I should study law or whatever instead (this is back at high school when I hadn’t decided on my university degree yet), and how I should just keep music as a hobby, etc. It’s as if the decision is so fucking obvious that only an outright idiot would choose otherwise. Even though I am always polite and try to deflect and then divert such conversations, it always maddens me, right to the very core. I just want to say who the hell do you think you are?! Don’t treat me like a fucking idiot; you say that as if I hadn’t thought of all of the above already, etc. Anyway, I don’t even know how that train of thought got here, because then I got distracted and have been reading something completely irrelevant for the past half an hour. Point is, I’m glad I still have a lot of things that I look forward to, because of the path I’ve chosen. Rather than having chosen one which I dread to face the end of.

Yesterday, with just a towel-bag of essentials, I set off for a very long drive out to a friend’s family house, south-west of mine. The weather hovered from very cloudy, sunny, and then cloudy, spitting rain, sunny, then back to the clouds and eventually decent rainfall. Photographically equipped with only a Canon point-and-shoot in the back pocket of my denim cut-offs, I didn’t take that many photos. The countryside experience is more about the intertwined smell of freshness, cow dung and grass in the air, the bugs that crawl on you, and the thorns, sand and mud on your feet. All in all it made for an interesting day – most certainly a very adventurous drive as I wasn’t quite sure where I was going to end up – with great company, great conversation, great food and great fun. In other words, a bloody great day:

And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Park that car, drop that phone, sleep on the floor, dream about me

This is the jewellery post that’s been requested a few times… and now you can see why I’ve procrastinated from it.

The days are so happy, the air so warm, my mind is so alive but I keep listening to broken songs. The prose and poetry I keep scribbling in notebooks or drafting but not publishing on my blog are all so full of achiness. Not outright pain, no longer sorrowful, but some sort of deep-reaching ache like that of an old sporting injury that never fully recovered… which you completely forget about until you try to exercise that particular region and suddenly you tense up a little and find no solid strength that you can rely on.

I’m taking a really long drive out to the countryside to a friend’s house tomorrow, so that should inject me with some more positivity and creativity as well as a splash of saltwater and sunshine. Although chances are, knowing myself, I can still derive some other kind of ache to write about late into the night after that, I’m sure.

Anyway, here is the jewellery post that has been requested a few times now. It’s not my entire collection, but its the pieces that are frequently gracing my limbs or are of some kind of special value:

This is the chain that I got for Christmas on which I soldered my charms on today. I had been so careful to not burn my hands a second day in a row, but my sister startled me at one point and I burnt my knee instead. That’s two blistering burns in two days. The really painful background to this bracelet is that earlier this year (I don’t want to go into details again or I might cry), following some unfortunate series of events, I ended up losing my silver charm bracelet which my parents gave me on my tenth birthday. I had been collecting charms on it annually ever since, so I was so shattered when it got lost in rather unexplainable circumstances. Ever since, mum and I have been slowly buying back the same old charms, as well as new ones. I know it’s never going to be the same, but I guess I could think of this as the chain with my adult life on it, rather than childhood. I am the most sentimental person ever, and for better or for worse, I attach a lot of emotions onto possessions, so it seriously felt like I lost my childhood.

It was really hard to photograph all the charms clearly without being really anal about it, so I just couldn’t be bothered and will make a list instead. So far these are the charms I’ve got on the bracelet above, from left to right: Bell – which is a replica of what I got for my 18th birthday, mum’s intentions were that it signified or heralded me into adulthood… Kangaroo bought at the Blue Mountains in Australia; Cable Car I got from San Francisco; State of California (it’s at a funny angle in the picture) from my trip; Mickey Mouse from Disneyland; Spider which was originally from when I was 13; Bear which mum bought me from Yosemite National Park in America; Car for my 17th birthday when I was involved in a car crash and needed a car; Ballerina for my 12th birthday; Quavers and Treble clef originally for my 11th birthday.

I don’t know how I remember all that, but somehow I do – which just truly reflects how attached I was to my bracelet, I guess. It’s like I have to buy all my years back, in the form of a little piece of metal – which I know sounds retarded… but. Every time I think about it – such as now – I seriously feel my eyes well up in a gush of frustration and anger especially at self, with “what if”s and “if I could have changed my actions and reactions” that night. I need to let go.

This picture shows some of my favourite silverware. The write cuff at the back with the turkey stone is actually my mother’s – I just kind of have it on loan from her. She had it custom made for her when she was about my age as she couldn’t find any jewellery that fits her very small wrist. Nowadays, we have yet to find someone other than us two who can comfortably fit it. The turquoise bracelet is a high school graduation gift from mum and the key attached to the side of it is a charm from my sister. It’s not very visible here, but the silver bracelet in the foreground features a heart-shaped clip at the front. I got this for my 19th birthday, and I was supposed to put my aforementioned charms on this one, but I decided not to in the end. The bracelet on top of that is a Pandora bracelet that I got for my 18th birthday. The charms aren’t very clear here, but they are placed in the order which I got them: Rabbit, Mother of Pearl Hearts & Hedgehog from my mum. She was born in the year of the rabbit, and as for the hedgehog, we have an inside joke/nickname between us from when I was younger – she’d tell me I’d be nasty and prickly like a hedgehog whenever I got angry, and so it kinda reads like rabbit loves hedgehog/hedgehog loves rabbit. Just some cute, sweet mother-and-daughter thing I guess, haha.

Next to that I got a Suitcase charm from an old friend, signifying all the places I want to, and will embark on traveling to; the next two are from a handful of friends – a Four-Leafed Clover and a pair of Quavers – all were for my 18th birthday. The last two were from this year – a friendship knot from my friend Cara for my 19th, and a Kangaroo from dad when we went to Australia earlier this year.

The two rings were both self-bought in Taipei earlier this year as well, on separate occasions. The funny thing about this set of jewellery is that I often like to wear these turquoise pieces with my aqua Dr Martens because they’re the same colour!

This is just a bunch of my other bits of silverware. As you can see, I have a preference for silver, and I’m not really into gold. In fact, I don’t think I photographed any gold pieces I have, because I never wear them. The half-heart necklace on the right hand side has my sister’s name, Liv engraved on it, and she has the other half with my name. Mum bought these as Christmas presents for us last year, signifying the two pieces of her heart… Christmas was a bit of an emotional time for us in 2009 because we weren’t sure whether or not my sister would be home for Christmas this year (turns out she is though, but won’t be in 2011). I had worn it every single day since last Christmas, until November… (see below)

The necklace to the left of that was bought at Kinkaku-ji (a.k.a. Temple of the Golden Pavilion) in Kyoto when I went there in February. The huge chunky bracelet in the middle is from a Charlie Brown boutique in Sydney. On the far left is a feather pendant which I wear on a silver chain around my neck. Someone on formspring asked me why I wanted a feather tattoo, which is for the same reason that I have this necklace: the Chinese character for feather is part of my name, and also bares a lot of meanings, symbolism and connotations.

Here are some of the rings that have rotated as favourites of mine for the past few years. The middle one is from Disneyland; the 2nd one from the left is from Japan; 2 to the right of it was bought at the same time as a ring for a very old friend, years and years ago. The ring with the longest history out of this bunch is the band that is 2nd from the right – it dates back to the summer of 2005 when a bunch of mates and I were at the mall, and the boys found it. We all wrangled over it for ages, and took turns keeping it, but somehow I’ve hogged it ever since, haha.

This is by far the prettiest necklace that I own, and its entanglement and stranglehold of my neck was the only reason that I took off my aforementioned half-heart necklace (which my sister wears the other half of) back in November. Liv and I were shopping in Santa Monica and it was love at first sight when I laid eyes on it. Liv was quite taken with it too, but after seeing the little matching heart piece which dangles down the back of my neck when worn, she immediately insisted that it was stunning and that I had to buy it. Ironically she ended up paying for it, and the dress I bought from that store, yay. What I love about it most is how it sparkles in the sunlight… Oh take me back to our afternoon in Santa Monica under the Californian sun…

These are longer necklaces which I like to wear with loose shirts, and a lot of black. The key on the left is the backdoor key to my friend’s old house at which he no longer resides. It hangs off a piece of Kangaroo leather which I bought in Brisbane in 2008. The bullet casing in the middle is indeed a real one, from a friend who does rifle shooting. I’ve often forgotten I was wearing it whilst traveling and worry about it being confiscated at customs. For some reason I always fail metal detectors and even hand metal detectors several times; and my luggage has to get x-rayed over and over, so this doesn’t really help… I made it into a necklace using the chain and ring of an old necklace that had a broken pendant. The hourglass necklace does indeed work, and I bought this at Wasteland on Melrose Ave in LA last month.

The necklace on the left is something that I only ever wear when I’m wearing some nice dress for a fancy ish dinner or something. It looks kinda shit in the photo but based on several compliments about it, I’d have to say it actually looks pretty fancy and expensive in real life. Ironically, I bought it for $5 from Bling when it was shutting down at Botany at the end of 2008, I think. The necklace to the left of it is from the Free People boutique on Cahuenga Blvd, in Hollywood. The left two necklaces were made by me about a week and a half ago, as seen in this post.

Just a bunch of slightly quirky bracelets over the years, the newest addition being the rain and umbrella bracelet at the bottom, which I got for Christmas. See, it is really a widely known fact that I love the rain. The bracelet above that as well as the top two red and blues ones were from Aotea Square market years and years ago, all on separate occasions. The black one is a mass of dagger-like hearts. The fine silver thing above that is actually an anklet, which I don’t wear much because the bells get really loud and I feel as if I sound like a belly dancer when I walk around… The pretty flower bracelet in the middle is a handmade gift from a Japanese friend, from back in 2004, I think.

This is what I wear on my right ear. That’s one earring, looped through the three lobe piercings I have. I didn’t take a picture of the left ear, just in case newly-pierced industrial piercing (which I only got only last month, in Hollywood) was crusty or something… up close is not a good view. I just usually wear plain silver studs on the lobes, and occasionally a single, dangling earring. I’ve actually got quite a collection of quirky earrings, but I hardly ever wear them, so I couldn’t be bothered posting them today.

Wrist candy from this year. I love watches. At one point in time before I cared about comfort whilst bass-playing, I wore three, large-faced watches – each telling the time of a different time zone that was relevant to my family.

So there it is… the heavy metal that adorns me often. I didn’t really want to do this post for ages, because for one, look! It’s turned out fucking huge… since I can’t do something without going into details! and two, it just looks like a narcissistic showy post. But oh whatever, I’d waited until I got a fair few requests for it, so for once I am satisfying someone out there with a blog post haha! As if that’s normal for me.

Oh what are the chances – you think you wont sink, oh what are the chances – I think what you think?

Who would ever notice how much they used their right thumb? I never did – until earlier to night when I gave myself a burn blister from the misuse of a lighter. At the time, I said that the pain it caused me was more than that of when I got my industrial piercing last month (and trust me, that hurt like a bitch); but in hindsight, I think the only reason it felt like it hurt more was the fact that it was such prolonged pain, emitting from such a small area. Why was I playing with a lighter indoors to begin with? Well, I had received a wax seal stamp for Christmas and was just dying to try it out. It might sound like a completely random present to a lot of people, but I actually write a number of handwritten letters and have been wanting one for ages so despite the fact that my sister had rather ruined the surprise for me last week, I was still delighted today.

I had to resort to using a candle to help melt the wax in the end, but I also left a bit of a mess on the envelope from where the candle’s wax wanted to interfere. Here is the final product, sealing a letter to a very good friend who is now living/studying overseas:

For some reason here, you can’t see the line of the flap of the envelope, but I swear this wax seal isn’t just sitting on a blank piece of paper!

Pavlova and strawberries for dessert was scrumptious. I really ought to stop pigging out, but Christmas makes for such an easy excuse.

How bad do I sound, admitting that I am over the moon about how overcast and almost (if not? I don’t remember) rainy the weather was today, on Christmas Day. It just gave me a really guilt-free excuse to snooze on and off all day, lounge around with my favourite people and unfortunately also over-eat. I’m just proud I haven’t been doing any drinking, haha.

I’m not sure why, when nor how the tradition began, but for some reason, at our household we have our “Christmas feast” on Christmas Eve rather than Christmas Day. Whenever friends enquire and comment about the absurdity of it, I just say that it means the kitchen is calmer on Christmas Day and we just spend the day indulging in the plentiful leftovers from the previous night. My mum is an excellent cook and Christmas is no exception. We had turkey that was covered in bacon strips, which came out superbly crispy – my favourite texture for bacon. Being so good at roasting things, mum made sure that the turkey was perfectly well done, but retained all of its juiciness. She even made me take pictures as I was cutting it up for proof of its moisture! The vegetables were roasted along with the turkey, giving everything that delicious taste and smell. I’m not a fan of oysters but I did try one, thinking that perhaps I’d prefer them cooked rather than the raw ones I’ve tried, although it didn’t change my mind about them at all. However, what I did thoroughly enjoy was the melted cheese and sauce that mum had topped it with – there was even some leftover sauce in the pan that I ended up using as a sort of gravy on the turkey.

Snowflake had been well fed with Whiskas tin food, which mum especially picked out a turkey flavoured tin of, so for once he was looking rather dozy and disinterested rather than attempting to hijack our dinner table. There have been a couple of incidents in the past where he has actually caught us off guard, with our backs turned, and stolen meat off the table!

Being such a night owl, a personal downside of mine towards having Christmas during summer time is how late the sun sets – tonight it set well past nine o’clock, and we have to wait until it’s well late to turn the Christmas lights on. I know it’s energy conserving and all, but I just love fairy lights so much that they’re a permanent fixture in my bedroom, even. Maybe I’ll take pictures of this at some point.

Dinner was then followed by a dessert of blueberry cheesecake. My hasty photos don’t really do the cake much justice because I was more preoccupied with the notion of getting to eat it, but Lottie can attest to how amazing it was. I told her today when she had a slice that she never should have turned it down last time, and I don’t think she ever will again!

Anyway, I’m just rambling and rambling about food in an uncohesive manner, I’ll just let your visual imaginations take over and get into bed to do some more reading.

Hope everyone had a lovely and safe Christmas.

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