Bruny Island Cheese

What can I say? It's Bruny Island Cheese.

(Photos courtesy of Suds)

Nick and Suds' little import scheme worked. The cheese arrived safely. And it was good! I really don't need to tell you that do I? Just go back and have a look at that last picture. Yes, the one wrapped in prosciutto went in the oven. Yes, it was melty and amazing.

It was a feast for the nine of us. I felt like I was eating pieces of Tasmania. And sitting enjoying that great spread with wonderful friends was like being in Tasmania. Thank God for all the wonderful ways he provides for us!

Go on, check it out again - one last look:

Uighur burgers and Captain George

Yesterday Ben, Bernie, Des and I snuck away from college at lunchtime to check out the burgers at 'Equal But Different Uighur'. Bron, Dan and I had been there a month or two ago and we'd seen the burgers on the menu and I'd been wanting to go back ever since. We did and it was great. No mince patties there, just chunks of lamb marinated in cumin, chilli and other happy things. They were delicious.

On the way back our bus driver was 'Captain George' as he informed us. He also told the whole bus that he we were his people and that he would take good care of us. Over the trip he talked to us about the weather, Victoria Park and advice about uni. His english wasn't the greatest and that added to the fun. We arrived back at college 10 minutes late for the class after lunch but it was well worth it. Next time I'll take a camera.

Fw: Is your skills about to expired?

Ah, no thanks. I don't think a university degree from someone with grammar like that is going to help me!

So even the spammers seem to know that I'm looking for jobs! Basically I want to do the things that I'm currently doing - office/admin/co-ordination/support/customer service etc - in an industry that I enjoy. So I'm looking for entry level and admin jobs at creative agencies and design studios. Yes, thank God for Sydney, you can actually be that specific up here!

So far I've had a couple of interviews at a very cool digital agency. They seemed to like me and said that they would check my references and then come back with an offer. So I emailed my referee's details through on Monday. I didn't hear anything back so I waited... and waited. Then I got worried that maybe they didn't get the email. So I emailed again this morning and it turns out I was right! Oh dear! Anyway so I hope that one works out.

If that one doesn't work out there is another slim chance where I initially didn't get an interview, but someone has pulled out so they will be considering my application. That's a studio that does point of sale graphics for large film studios. It's a better role - more to do with co-ordinating workflow (traffic) but it's still entry level which is good.

So anyway, I finish up here on Monday. I really hope I get an answer on one of those jobs soon!

Sweet Belem! Ferris B---man's Day Off

What an awesome day! I had a surprise day off (in exchange for working an extra half day on Monday) and Nick decided to wag. We'd been meaning to go on an excursion to Petersham for ages. Petersham is Sydney's "little Portugal". And apparently it's the place to go for Portugese Chicken. Also, as we found out - Portugese tarts. Mmm.
It's only 5 minutes on the train for Newtown. I can't believe we hadn't done this before now!

So with not very much idea of where to go we set off from the station to find the main street and the Portugese Chicken shop. They said that we would know which one it was when we found it.

And they were right! There were people lined up out the front. It looks really small, but once you're inside it is a huge, cavernous, bustling hub of charcoal chickenery. There's quite a big take away section in front and out the back there's a big restaurant. It was packed with people - on a weekday lunchtime - and there wasn't even room for a table for two. Feeling very much in the way and not knowing what to do we sat down at one of the take away tables and they put down menus and napkins. We had come with money for take away, not restaurant prices so we got up and went back to the take away line up. Embarrassing - yes. Awesome cultural experience? Absolutely!

Here's what we got:

Nick had the "Hot Lover" with special Portugese Chilli Ham as well as spicy chicken. It looks like normal take away but you've gotta believe me, it was so tasty! How do Macca's, KFC etc ever survive in this city? Honestly, Starbucks is closing in Melbourne, how can they compete!

I'm sorry we didn't get a picture of the next bit, because as far as I'm concerned it was the best bit! On the way back to the station we stopped in at Sweet Belem - a patisserie/cafe which does stunningly beautiful and delicious cakes. We tried their Portugese Tart (It's like a marriage between creme caramel and baklavah). It was sweet eggy custard in slightly syrupy, seriously crunchy flaky filo with nutmeg on top. Their almond/hazelnut version was good too. I don't normally steal pictures, but in the name of review I hope they won't mind. Check it out:

(From a review on the website of Belaroma - the coffee company that they use)

Better than a Sickie!

An unexpected mid-week day off - for both of us!

Vampire Weekend on the stereo, crepes about to happen in the kitchen, Tea in bed for Nick and sunshine on the window. This is going to be a lovely day :)

Ok this one sentence thing is getting old! (But I think it helped)

Here's what's been going on outside our front door:



In case you forgot, this is what it used to look like:



So it's a bit of an improvement! I've been gardening quite a bit lately. I've got a little plot in the community garden just near our place and my seedlings are doing well. And also, this may sound quite mad... but I've got a bit of a special project on the way too. Kind of an art installation/garden. Our block of flats is large, ugly and orange. And it sits on a flat, ugly concrete slab surrounded by a low orange brick wall. I've wanted to do something to brighten it up for a while now. I'll just say that it involves sunflowers. More on that when I've got pictures.

I'm thinking about running

Are you supposed to exercise in the morning before you've had breakfast or after?

I'm just a bit slow

I spent hours and hours reading and thinking about how to approach and structure my essay and then more hours actually writing it. Then a few days after it's handed in I have one of those moments where I realised exactly how I should have structured and written my essay. It would have been perfect, it would have strengthened a couple of the weaknesses in the essay I actually handed in. It's pretty obvious too. But as long as it passes I'll be happy enough.

Also, but entirely unrelatedly, why isn't Dan mentioned in the list of tribes in Revelation 7?

I'm trialling a task management program called OmniFocus. I'm liking it so far, it's the only thing stopping me from falling into a heap at the moment. I guess I'd better buy it before the trial runs out and my life disintergrates.

This photo is on my desktop at the moment. It distracts me roughly every 10 minutes.

The job interview went well

While we eat honey macadamia caramel ice cream and enjoy a nice weekend, I'm looking forward to a second interview on Monday with the same graphics studio.

Great Place - Great Opportunity

Tomorrow I have a job interview for an office/admin junior at a very cool graphic design studio.

I think I've been profiled

I've been tested for traces of explosives 3 times out of the last 4/5 times I've flown. Maybe I just look suspicious.

If Bron wasn't in Sydney I wouldn't be leaving Hobart

Greetings from Mt Wellington

Nick called this morning to tell me he was standing on the top of the Mountain, with snow all around!

[edit: here's the picture he just sent me]

Nick's been away in tassie for a few days, attending a family funeral, so although I'm sad for the family and sad to have him gone, I'm also making the most of being a temporary bachelorette - take away, tv and house cleaning!

Newtown

Pictures don't count.

Short and Sweet

I've lost my blogging mojo. Or should that be blojo? Who knows! Whatever you call it, it's gone. And how do you get creativity back? Limits work for me. So here's the idea: one sentence. Yeah, I know - that'll be really hard for me!

Fiona's got a blog which is all about sentences, but I don't think she always sticks to one. And there are websites devoted to keeping your email to two, three, four and five sentences. A great idea I reckon. Well, I've blown more than five already so lets stop here. Next time you hear from me it'll be short and sweet!

Dinner

Herman Melville on Original Sin

I can't actually think about anything at the moment except original sin and Hebrew and since I can't type Hebrew characters on blogger it's going to have to be original sin.

That Calvinistic sense of Innate Depravity and Original Sin, from whose visitations, in some shape or another, no deeply thinking mind is always and wholly free. For, in certain moods, no man can weigh this world, without throwing in something, somehow like Original Sin, to strike the uneven balance.

Winging its way to us, August 21st

Name	Style	Milk	Size
C2	Hard-Cooked Curd	Cow	350g
The Pressings	Semi Hard	Cow	250g
Otto	Fresh Cheese	Cow	2
Saint	White Mould	Cow	250g
Fig, Fennel and Walnut Log	Cheese accompaniment		100g

Not a day goes by

It always surprises me when people back home ask us if we'll be coming back to Tassie. Perhaps it shows that we've been pretty slack at keeping in touch. Perhaps it just understandable with us being away for so long. Either way, I wish I could give them a glimpse into our thoughts. Because - and I talked to Nick about this recently - not a single day goes by when we don't think about Tassie.

Repentance

We're in the middle of the Annual Moore College Lectures at the moment. Mike Ovey is speaking on repentance, mainly based on Luke and Acts. The questions he introduced the series with were 'Is repentance part of the evangelistic message?' and 'Is repentance part of the post-conversion Christian life?' The first two lectures were trawling through Luke and Acts, the third, my favourite so far, was on idolatry as the thing we fundamentally need to repent of with an exploration of what that looks like in an atheistic/agnostic society. I'm looking forward to the last two lectures this week.

His paths drop fatness

I'm just attending my 'evening lectures', Spurgeon's Lectures to My Students, and I came accross this advice for maintaining variety in the content of sermons:

No two texts are exactly similar; something in the connection or drift of the passage gives to each apparently identical text a shade of difference. Keep to the Spirit's track and you will never repeat yourself or be short of matter: his paths drop fatness.

That's so pants!

Some b*****d stole Nick's good pair of jeans off the line. Just as his other jeans are literally days away from unwearable falling apart. Such a pain! It's ok, because we can afford to buy more and we're going to have to go clothes shopping anyway... but still - grrr!

Hope it wasn't this guy:

Waking up

Ok. I'm back. I haven't posted for a while partly because I haven't been on the internets heaps lately and partly because the weekend away was so good that the idea of writing a post trying to communicate all the goodness was a bit depressing. So I've reduced it to one sentence and decided to move on with the blog. 'I feel like I've woken up'.

We're into week 3 of term 3. Term 3 is the term of death and the pressure is on. I'm supposed to be writing my doctrine essay this week but it hasn't happened yet and at this point it doesn't feel like it ever will.