1. I had a bit of a shit day at work yesterday. An example: the harddrive on my computer died. Although our IS team is brilliant, I still lost half-an-hour of productive time that I really needed.

2. So I came home and had two large glasses of rum and coke, which didn't get me drunk (or even tipsy) but did relax me enough to enjoy the fic I was reading.

3. Then this morning I got up, read fic for a while, went back to bed, got up, read more fic, and then eventually got dressed just in time for waffles wot nishtalitha made.

4. I've spent the afternoon reading fic and have just now vacuumed.

5. Now I'm drinking wine—this is a lead-in to the copious amounts of tequila I plan to drink tonight. I think after this weekend my next chance to get really drunk is Christmas. And that might not be socially appropriate, IDK.

6. Have a song: Angel of the Morning by the Pretenders. \o/

7. I'm still really fucking tired.

1. At dinner tonight, we had a long conversation about fandom, specificly Star Trek, in which nishtalitha and I talked about who had the most ridiculous Mary-Sue (me, by a wide margin) and tamarillow refused to divulge the details of hers; we argued the merits of Kirk/McCoy v Kirk/Spock (Kirk comes out the winner in that one. COMES. HA.); and we all acknowleged that there may be a great deal of fantastic fic about the construction of New Vulcan but it probably all exists in the gen part of fandom, which we're all terminally unaware of.

2. See above.

3. Ugh, I want a nap.

4. No, seriously, Kirk/McCoy. Reboot fic. I think the thing that makes me like them as a pairing is the same thing that made me like Harry/Ron far more than I liked Harry/Draco, even though (a) there is a lot more Harry/Draco in the world and (b) I consequently read more of it: namely, that the canon shows them as people who have a strong basis for a relationship. Reboot Kirk/Spock... kind of doesn't do it for me. IDEK. Not that it's stopping me or anything.

4A. Just, like, conceptually. Conceptually, there is a bar, and I can't quite find it convincing.

4B. Whereas Kirk and McCoy are all about banter and drunken shenanigans. I understand that a lot more than I understand a public choking.

5. Borders has just sent me a 25% off EVERYTHING coupon. They've just got in a lot of Eloisa James. I might well be convinced.

6. Also, just generally in fiction I like banter and comedy and people liking being in each other's presence.

6A. I'm a really lazy person; I hardly ever make an effort to be friends with people, and consequently am friends with people who, like, 95% of the time are not an effort to be around and hopefully I am the same.

6B. I don't get why you'd bother to spend months pushing through emotional barriers and brush-offs and whatever the fuck when you could just as easily spend the time with someone who's all "Saturday. My place. Bring bourbon. I'll bring the lube."

6BA. Especially when you're supposedly a giant spaceslut.

6C. But, yes, liking each other is a lot more important for me—to be able to see that on the page—than, like, a ~mystical soulbond of OTP~ (and I'm not specifically talking about Star Trek here; it applies to A LOT of the stuff I read).

6D. God, Mary Balogh. So, right, she has this one novel about a prostitute and the minor-nobility John-who-loves-her, and whenever they have sex the girl has to lie completely still coz that's the only way he can get his rocks off (not that he's fantasising her being dead or anything (I think) but just because he doesn't like pushy women) and then they end up getting married... for convenience... or some shit, I don't really remember. I mean, she's an ex-prostitute and now his mistress and I cannot conceive of a single situation with the possible exception of syphilis and an heir you really hate where that would be remotely convenient in Regency England, but. But.

6E. Basically, people should like each other! Especially if they're committed to a long-term relationship!

7. My posts are way more ordered when I number them. Funny that.

In the grand tradition of weekends, I have spent a lot of the last two days alternately eating, preparing to eat, or thinking about what sort of things I might want to eat. It's been awesome.

Background: both my flatmates and I are quite foodie. Not, like, SUPER FOODIE where any of us refuse to eat anything but the duck breast that has been prepared in accordance with the Seven Dances of the Monks (although, god, some of the liqueurs I have bought and consumed have in fact been produced by the holy), but reasonably foodie. In this vein, our kitchen is a treasure trove of random herbs and spices, tins of things that looked interesting, and a whole bunch of stuff that is really freaking tasty if you spend a while preparing it, but is bloody useless if you have a random urge for, like, microwaved beef.*

Last fortnight when we went grocery shopping, we spent an absolutely epic amount. Seriously. It was staggering. I'm not putting the figure here, because I'm kind of ashamed. As a result of this, and because we're coming up to the next shopping expedition in 3 days, we had a whole bunch of stuff that needed using, like a bag of mushrooms and a lot of eggs.

And it's the weekend.

And Wellington decided it was time to charm us all by pulling out of nowhere a lot of sunshine and other seasonally-unexpected things.

And so.

So yesterday nishatalitha made scrambled eggs and toast, and I fried mushrooms and bacon and we had lunch in the sunshine and drank apple juice and it was like a whole plateful of awesome! And then I cleaned my room and nishatalitha and I cleaned the really disgusting bottom rim of the big aluminium windows in the living room. Also I played computer games.

Then the three of us went out and met up with callie, factioncat, and mermaid to have dinner at a Thai place on Cuba Mall (best chicken onna stick in Wellington. Seriously. Seriously. And their roti was damned good too. Would eat again) and see Half Blood Prince. Which. Was a movie. Yes. After that we had planned to go to the Flying Burrito Bros. for frozen margaritas, but it was too busy and then all the liquor stores were closed, oh noes, so we went to Espressoholic and I had hot chocolate (passable) and then we wandered in the direction of the railway station and discovered that every single bar at that end of town was closed. It was only about midnight. This was sad in the face. So sad, in fact, that when I got home I felt moved to drink some random bubbly I found on our liquor shelf. tamarillow told me at some point to go to bed and sleep away my misery. IDK.

Today! Today tamarillow and I made corn fritters and kumara chips and fried mushrooms for lunch and we ate in the sunshine again and now I want a nap. I think nishatalitha is making lamb casserole for dinner. I think I'm going to make chocolate self-saucing pudding as well, because that is a breakfast food of glory as well as a lovely wintery dessert.

* Sometimes I have random urges for microwaved beef. It's a thing.

Saturday! I—

1. wandered back and forth between bed and my computer for all the hours between 9am and 2pm
   
2. then I showered. It was a bit cold but the pressure was awesome
   
3. after that, I ate leftover fish lasagne for lunch
   
4. me and C made a terrific stew out of gravy beef, potato, carrot, kumara, onion, garlic, coriander seeds, worcestershire sauce, black pepper, marjoram, thyme, and steinlager
   
5. no seriously, terrific
   
6. we ate it with bread. It was choice
   
7. I read a lot of fic
   
8. I also played 2 games of Civ IV
   
9. we folded washing while watching music videos on C4
   
10. I uploaded a bunch of stuff, which took ages (but I really like babbling about music, so)
    
11. I changed my sheets, yay
    
12. tobias turned up for headscritching, cuddles, and food several times

Now, like, I think I'm going to go to bed.

Poll #1410275 so totally awesome!
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 7

Complete this sentence: "XXX is awesome___________"

I finished LRW Opinion #3 tonight! It's not due until noon on Friday. THIS IS WHAT SUCCESS FEELS LIKE.

Things—

• I planted vegetables (okay, so it was only 2 tiny silverbeet plants) and flowers yesterday :D
  
• this involved pulling out the dead/dying/gone to seed summer veges in our vege garden
  
• hilariously, our italian parsley has gone completely WILD
  
• this is hilarious because we've been planning to make pesto for aaaaages and haven't
  
• maybe tamarillow and I should do that tomorrow night or something
  
• this evening I plan to make meringues using leftover egg whites
  
• I haven't made meringues in years and years. They are really yummy though.
  
• I think I might dye them green for shits and giggles. Or pink.
  
• probably pink.
  
• I plan to settle in the living room this evening and read my Opinion 3 case. Maybe while watching C4, if it's playing actual music and not shitty reality TV.
  
• I bought this lamp today. It was on massive sale, but I caught a taxi home and then tried to assemble it and it was missing a part. So tamarillow and I caught a taxi back to the shop and then home again with a replacement, and that extra round trip kind of entirely negated the discount. >:|
  
• it does make our dining room much, much brighter though.
  
• I think this means the only householdy shit we semi-need now are dining room chairs, a dryer vent, and curtain rails for the spare room so that people can actually sleep in there.
  
• it is so weird that we have a spare room with a spare bed in it!

You know, my homework for the weekend was supposed to be:
- prepare and do citation test for LRW
- read the first 6 chapters of Strong by Monday
- reread Dobson and the following case
- prepare draft opinion for LRW

My revised plan of study is now:
- finish reading case for draft opinion for LRW tomorrow
- panic

I can probably manage to reread Dobson and the following case for Torts at work in the morning; I can fudge reading the first 6 chapters of Strong for my Torts tute (and, honest, I've read the first third of the 100+ pages—or something close to it); I can also prepare the citation test thing tomorrow afternoon (or call it my lunchbreak) and have until Friday to do it anyway. But the draft opinion? I don't even understand the fucking case I'm meant to be basing it off.

The weekend, however, has been jolly fantastic: I spent most of yesterday in the kitchen making vegan chocolate cake (turned out like crap) and cupcakes (brilliant) and peanut butter/chocolate things (same) for our flatwarming (relaxed and upbeat). Today deepbluemermaid hung out with us and we chatted and watched stuff on nishatalitha's computer and after she left we three watched Top Gear and ate leftovers for dinner.

I want a nap. Just, ugh, I have to finish reading my case first (about 4 pages) and I should probably have a go with the Illegal Contracts Act as well (though that's quite short too).

I totally don't mean to brag or anything (actually I totally mean to brag) but last night tamarillow and I made the best lemon tart in the entire world ever ever ever—recipe from Stephanie's Cook's Companion, which I would totally be going to get and copy right this instant if only the delicious lemony custardy pastryish food of the fucking gods had not stolen my ability to move.

Last night it was still warm and melty; it spent the day in the fridge and so now is cool and tart and. Just. Desserts for the win!

Also my iTunes kind of refused to play any of the songs I've bought off the iTunes store last night, but I emailed the helpdesk, got an actually helpful response, and have fixed the problem by following the steps they gave me. And none of my playlists disappeared! WIN!

I am insanely curious about such things, so behind the cut is a poll about people's homes! Yay!

( To the poll. )

So if you happen to want to describe other things about your house (like, say you have horrible orange spores on your walls and you know not where they come from, or there's a particularly nice view from your kitchen) I am all ears!

Things I am grooving on in this house are:
- my second-hand floral curtains which cost $5, fit the window perfectly, and keep out way more light than the old ones did
- the kitchen is WAY more awesome than old!flat
- there's about twice as much living space as well
- we have a room just to store random crap in
- there's a lot of pohutukawas around the place and they're in bloom at the moment
- our new vege garden hasn't died
- WE HAVE A DISHWASHER
- we have a top-loading washing machine
- we have a box fire
- the bookcases don't make the place feel at all crowded
- the living room, dining room, and bathroom all have wooden floors (the house I spent the most time growing up in, in Hamilton, had wooden floors and I've missed them ever since)
- there's not someone else's kitchen directly below my head

It's still not quite home, but we only moved 6 weeks ago so there is yet time.

Today tamarillow, her mother, her brother, and I made a garden - or at least made a good start on a garden. Her brother dug out the area we selected down to slightly more than a shovel blade-length and then the rest of us sorted through the massive mound of earth, got out most of the really big rocks, and then stuck the dirt back in the hole. Then tamarillow and I put in the brick outline and called it a night. Her brother started at about 2; the rest of us got going around 5; and tamarillow and I knocked off at around 9.30. Then I finished hanging the new curtains I picked up at Trash Palace in Porirua for $5 - they're just for the smaller of my two windows, a floral print (rose and green on cream), and I'll get some sort of stripe for the big window at some point. And we took the rubbish and recycling down to the road. And then I had a shower.

Now I am all blaaaaaaah and kind of hungry but not really. I might eat, if I can be bothered making myself cinnamon toast, or else I'll just go flop in bed and read a bad romance novel and listen to Whitney Houston until I can't focus on page or lyrics anymore.

We have high-speed internet again - at least, nishatalitha and I do. tamarillow's computer did a massive brainfart when we tried to install the wireless network card. I can't get wireless to work on my computer so still have a very long cable running down the hallway, but nishatalitha is all modern and cordless now. It's very exciting.

GOD. I have missed home!broadband SO VERY MUCH. SO MUCH. I can load more than 1 tab at a time! I can use youtube! I can download music! (Although, I have to be careful about that as our former broadband was unlimited and our cable is 10GB/month with pretty hefty extra bandwidth charges).

Anyway. WOOHOO.

Tentative date for a flatwarming is Waitangi weekend, probably the Saturday night.

Have a song: Israelite by the Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra, which I am really enjoying at the moment - jessikast's mum had a CD in her car and this prompted me to buy their 2 EPs. This song makes me want to sing along to it - although I can't hold a tune at all, so I don't.

( the lj post i couldn't make for 5 fucking days )

Telecom has finally come to the party with... dialup. Yes, dialup. 30 days of free dialup, while we wait for our broadband to be reconnected. If our broadband is not connected in that time, we will get another 30 days of free dialup.

You can only open, like, 2 tabs at once. It kind of sucks. Pants.

But darthsappho brought round her old dialup modem so we do have internet! WHOO!

last post from this house have idk a couple of hours work before i can go to bed and we have to be up by six so we can do last-minute shit and take the cats to the new house and then i'll come back and sit with tamarillow on the back lawn and hug and cry as the three strong men carry our acres of crap down the hill.

we got like half the kitchen - more than half, most of it - done today, as in to the new house and unpacked and it kind of looks like something that will be my home soon. but not yet. and the curtains are hung. and nishatalitha vacuumed the house. and there's linen for the first night, so actually all we absolutely HAVE to do with the piles of shit tomorrow is put some things in the bathroom and set up the beds and make them. it would be good, naturally, to get a bit more done - it'd be nice, in fact, to have most of the work done before we all go away for christmas, so we don't come back to a pile of boxes. but.

our new landlord had a chat to our old ones and has heard good things about us and has expressed the desire - semi-jokingly - that we find the move so traumatising that we don't do it again for years and years. i'm already traumatised and it ain't half over. at least on friday i can go get pissed at the work christmas shindig and then go grocery shopping. whee!

So we're maybe moving in like 2 1/2 weeks. :((((( I mean, much nicer house (assuming we get it blah blah), we've been vaguely flathunting for like a year so this is not exactly a shocker, it's roomy and on the same bus route and has a hundred lovely features and larger bedrooms and a box room and a den and heaps of space for bookcases and and and. But.

Like, I think the latest we could possibly move is the weekend before the last week of work for the year, which is like the 14th of December or some shit and HOLY SHIT that's damned close and like it's come up so fast and we haven't even GOTTEN FUCKING MOVING QUOTES omg. At least this is not like the last time I moved where I was seriously terrified for like a month that I'd end up living out of my fridge on a streetcorner in Northland. And we're pretty sorted financially and. And. But.

I have been productive today! We all went to Harvey Normans and I bought a stereo - this one, to be exact - and nishatalitha bought a DVD player since mine appears to be fucked. tamarillow could not find a new breadmaker she likes, though: there is clearly internet searching to be done.

Then nishatalitha and I came home and set up our shiny new playthings, and then sort of. Decided it was a good idea to sort through the morass of cords and old electronics behind the tv and throw out the clearly non-functional bits; and do dishes; and she dusted while I cleaned and tidied my bedroom. Most of the laundry for the entire household is done already; I've eaten lunch and vacuumed; I think the bathroom has been cleaned; and in about 20 minutes we're heading off to Karori to look at a flat.

It's really nice to have a stereo again. It's not a brilliant stereo but it's a significant improvement over my computer speakers - and even at a 1/4 of output it's loud enough to be heard in the kitchen, which is what I was really after. Cooking with headphones on: not smart.

Today I bought awesome greenish-grey elfin ankle boots with a bow and a collar and a zip down the side - awesome because of their innate qualities, but also awesome because I got them on sale for $35, down from $180. WHEE.

I do not know what I want to eat for dinner. WOE.

I have been semi-productive today, although I did spend most of the afternoon gaming and forgot to eat (tamarillow came and visited and I stole part of her lunch; later in the day, she came and visited and I stole half of her nectarine). But we did dishes! And made meatloaf! And I did some laundry! I have to remake my bed before I can sleep, though, which is one of the reasons I am not in my bed reading a Real Novel, even though my right index finger totally hurts from all that gaming.

On the other hand, I have a lot of hot lesbian Sims who like to make out with one another. It all balances out in the end. Also the weather has been fantastic: sunny while I was lying in bed this morning, and raining the rest of the day, so I had an excuse not to go outside. WIN!

No reply from Hell as yet, the bastards. Addled continues to be annoying and keeps telling me that my shoes look comfortable (well, yes, I guess they do). I spent most of the weekend playing Sims 2. Doing two papers at uni is kicking my ass and omg if I keep going with it I've got another 6 years or so of this shit to look forward to. It's cold so I'm going to bed. Blah.

—which is to say, I have spent my entire weekend wearing either my nightie or my trackpants and a hoodie, and at some times—mainly late morning—all of these things.

I have not left my house. I don't think I've even gone outside. It has been brilliant. Also I have done laundry and made fudge (which I then ate) and chocolate cake (which is in the oven RIGHT NOW, in preparation for me having tasty things to take for lunch tomorrow). And I played computer games, and I read romance novels and fanfiction, and I crocheted a little and watched NCIS and talked to my flatmates, and I slept.

Sleeping is perhaps the best thing about weekends, or at least letting myself sleep in until I naturally wake up and then getting up and bumming round on the internet and then going back to bed with my iPod is perhaps the best thing about weekends.

Have a song: Oh Happy Day by the Edwin Hawkins Singers.

Tonight for dinner tamarillow and I made fish curry with egg noodles and kumara chips (baked with lemon juice and salt) and even though the combination is bizarre the dinner was good. I had planned to make eccles cakes (or, at least, my family version of them) for dessert but dinner was unexpectedly complicated to make and filling, so I was glad that I hadn't.

And then like an hour ago I was peckish and whining to tamarillow about how my life was very hard because our house has a distinct lack of good snack foods - I had all my dried apple for lunch today, o tragedy - and she said "You know you're going to be awake in an hour! Why don't you make PASTRIES YAY!" So I did. They are in the oven right now.

This is what I made:

Eccles cakes, as based on the recipe my dad taught me
(this makes 2)

Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius (350F)

1 sheet puff pastry, defrosted, and cut diagonally. I always leave the pastry on the backing sheet to do this.

On each triangle of pastry, put in a lump in the middle:
a small handful of sultanas
a very small handful of dried apricots, diced
about 1 heaped teaspoon of brown sugar, flaked across the fruit
about 1 teaspoon of ground almonds
about 1/4 teaspoon of ground cinnamon

Fold the pastry triangle up into an envelope and squish all the corners together well (or fold them back over the top, whatever).

Put the two cakes into a pie dish or other oven-safe dish. Make three or four slices through the top layers of pastry into the fruit. Brush the tops of the cakes with beaten egg and sprinkle with some white sugar.

Bake for 35 minutes or until golden brown. Eat while hot!