This whole "getting older" thing isn't all it's cracked up to be

To be honest, highschool sucks. And I'm beginning to doubt it will get better in the next two years. Sure, the youngins get out of my way now (thanks to my white shirt, so we can tell the difference between the youngins and the geezers), that's a perk. But we also get heaps for homework and block. Block? What is this? Just make it harder for everyone why don't you? Yes, good idea. They're not angsty enough, those teenagers, we need to raise the anxiety in here. How about we stress them out with tests that we tell them are important, but don't mean anything and smash them all into one week. Nice one, jerks.

And then! They give us laptops, connected to the school internet, during class, monitoring programs that we have to sign into. Distract us more. Teach use skills in paying attention and not spending math reading fanfiction. That's not the most idiotic thing I've ever heard, at all.

I'm really pissed at school at the moment, if you didn't notice. Frikking people and everything! Pisses me off so hard.

Comfort foods and fairy bread

I'm not sure if I've talked about comfort foods before...Well, here are my favourite comfort foods and recipes

Number 1 comfort food tie:
Macaroni and cheese cooked by my grandma and chicken casserole cooked by me.

Recipe for chicken cassarole (I'm sure you all know how to make Mac and Cheese)
Cream
A striped bbq chicken, no skin
French onion soup powder

Preheat your oven to 200 degrees celsius
Put all the chicken bits in a large pot (that has a lid).
Make the french onion soup.
Pour the french onion soup over the chicken (about 1 and a quarter or so mugs)
Pour about 120ml over the chicken, this depends on how much sauce you like. It's really not all that important.
Stir the chicken around a bit.
Cover the pot.
Put pot in oven for 20mins (the time also doesn't really matter).
Done. Deliciousness is ready!

Numero dois:
Crown mints and Glucogel jelly beans.
My grandma also gave me these (still does) and they comfort me immensely

さんばん(I'm just going to keep going with Japanese as I don't know how to say "number" in any other languages. Ps. さんばん(sanban) means number 3):
Tinned chicken soup, of course.

よんばん (4):
Corn relish dip with chicken crimpy shapes.
I'm pretty sure all of these things I'm putting down have something to do with my grandma, although I got the chicken casserole recipe from my neighbour...

ごばん (5):
"Cakes" as my grandma calls them when they're really cupcakes. I don't know the recipe for these. It's a heavily guarded secret.

ろくばん (6):
Chocolate chip cookies.
These have no relation to my grandma, I just love them. And I'm too lazy to make my own so no recipe for that one.

ななばん (7):
Pikelets. I also don't know the recipe for this one. I made them with my grandma when I was a youngin', but back then I wasn't the master of remembering that I am now.

はちばん (8):
Jaffles. I'm pretty sure that's not what they're called anywhere else other than my home, but they're toasted sandwiches with tinned spaghetti in them. Do people eat them anywhere else? They should, they're awesome.

きゅばん (9):
Fairy Bread. Now this one is pure Australia. I know this because we recently got two new students at my school, one from Wales, one from Scottland, and they had no idea what they were and were disgusted by the thought of them. Obviously they had never had the amazing Australian delicacy that is Fairy Bread (Its deserves capital letters so I give it capital letters).
So we made them some.
They hated it.
Haliegh - Wales. Said she felt like she was going to through up. What. A. Disgrace.
Steph - Scottland. Said it tasted like butter. Shameful.
WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?!

Hello people not from Australia reading my blog that have no idea what Fairy Bread is. Here is your explanation.
Fairy Bread is a slice of bread with margarine and hundreds and thousands sprinkled on it. It is often served at children's parties and is overall loved by all Australians. Anyone who doesn't like Fairy Bread is not Australian and we don't want your prejudice here.

I may have a slightly biased view on this topic...shut up.

I have been eating Fairy Bread since I was a youngin' and I'm sure that is the reason why I am the person I am today. Without Fairy Bread I don't know where I'd be.

じゅばん (10):
I think that's enough ranting about Fairy Bread. For now.
Next on the list would be Cadbury Cream Eggs. Best. Shit. Ever.
Little side note to any celiac readers I may have. You can most likely eat cream eggs if you're okay with "trace amounts" of wheat. The inside egg bits has been processed so much that it has no gluten left in it.

And that's it, though I'm sure I'll think of a million more right after I post this.

Arh! I will destroy you!

I don't care about the irony of posting this right after posting about how to stop being pissy. I'm pissy at a thing, not a person, I'm close to being positive that I can't hurt my phone's feelings.

It won't freaking show up on iTunes or iPhoto. Making it nearly completely useless. And I don't know what to do. And I just did all the stuff below because I was mad at a person and now it seems ridiculous to try them all again to stop being mad at my phone. I'm pretty sure this is different, what with my phone being an object, not a person, and I feel like I have a right to be mad. Apple has been pissing me off lately.

- Just realised I was doing number three on my list - kinda, I don't think my phone will mind if he reads it, he's pretty cool like that.


So anyway, about Apple pissing me off. It's not so much the actual Apple company because I love those guys, it's more that PC people have AAAAALLLL these products, programs, developers, etc. and we Apple users have things made by Apple, things made by Belkin or Griffin, and a few other things made by independent companies. If iTunes screws up, we're like fish being taken out of water (we being the less tech savvy people, techie people can fix it themselves, the bastards), flopping around not knowing what to do, slowly dying. - "slowly dying" metaphor is Apple users succumbing to the pit of despair that follows after something doesn't work. We have to email Apple and talk to people like "Alfredo" that aren't all that helpful, but they try, or wait until it fixes itself. That's something good about Apple (don't get me started on how great Apple is), things fix themselves. I spent two weeks emailing Alfredo and after we had both given up on getting my vampire shows to freakin' work, they just started working again. That's kinda good, right?

ahhh. I feel better now.

Stop being mad before you do something stupid

I'm a bit mad at someone at the moment and this is how I stopped being so overreacty last night.

In no particular order other than how I remember them:
- Call/talk to someone and bitch about whatever you're mad at for a bit.
- Ask above person if you're being unreasonable.
- Write down why you're mad at this person/situation or what happened around you being mad.
- If you've hand written it, throw it away - seriously, do this or else you'll do something you will regret...
- If you've typed it, delete the document. You want no record of this being written.
- Listen to some heavy metal and rock out really hardcore.
- If the above makes you angrier, listen to some music you really like or know the words to and rock out to that
- If writing about what happened didn't leave you as not angry as you were wanting, write a numbered list of reasons why you're pissed about everything - as in, everything in your whole life. Then write a list of numbered reasons why your life is great. You have to get more good things than bad things. - this will make you realise that you're being ridiculous for being mad when all this other shit is good and also make you realise how good you've got it.
- Have a shower/bath and do all the deep conditioning hair, exfoliating, shaving, face mask stuff. - that one's more aimed at the gals...
- Go for a run or swim or whatever kind of somewhat intense exercise you like to do and push yourself.
- Go to sleep. Either have a nap if you're blessed with that skill (I am incapable of taking naps) or if it's night, go to bed early.
- If all else fails, go out and buy yourself something pretty.

I hope you guys found this interesting/useful. See yas laters.

How do you have so much energy? It's just not natural.

I wish I could run like a primary schooler, not so much the flailing arms, more so the insane amounts of energy. Have you seen these kids? They reach speeds I couldn't even dream of. They make me feel like a sweaty old person.

It reminds me of my youngster days. Running everywhere just after discovering that running is freaking awesome. Not even worrying about running into anything because my cat-like reflexes will stop me and even if I do, I'm a youngin', it doesn't even matter. Those were the golden days, you guys, they were also horrible though....I also remember eating small amounts of sugar and rolling around on the floor, then crashing hours later. Not being able to do things. Back then getting a job was like the coolest thing ever and I was planning on getting one as soon as possible.

And now...I'll a get a job...sometime.

Good for every meal

What did I have for breakfast? Mac and cheese.

What did I have for lunch? More mac and cheese

I love you

Why would you say 10-12 if it's going to be 20?!

Cookie instructions, aye? They piss me off.

I'm being a lovely daughter at the moment and baking gluten free peanut butter cookies for my Mother. On the recipe it's all "cook for 10-12 minutes until golden brown." So I'm like, yep, that seems pretty legit. In they go, 180 degrees celsius, timer set for 10 mins. Everything's hunky dory.

Come back when the timer goes off. What? They're still pale doughy colour? How could this be?

Then I proceed to put the timer on for 2 minutes like 5 times until they're slightly more golden. I'm not sure if they'll be good or not...hopefully good. If not, I'll just try again!

UPDATE: Cookies are done. They taste awesome. My mother is pleased.

The App Store is the best invention ever

I'm talking the one for Apps on my Mac, not the itunes one...they're probably called something different. Oh well!

Whenever I go on the App Store I'm like, "Gah, this stuff is expensive" And then I realise that it means I never have to leave my house ever again. I have very little need for disks anymore. I don't have to go out and buy whatever program/game, I can find either the same thing or something similar on the App Store. I just bought Braid and I'm excited. My first App Store purchase.

The only thing is that real money and computer money seem really different. I would (grudgingly) pay $99 for a good drawing program at JBHi-Fi or something, but on the App Store that seems like a huge amount of money for an App...even though it's actually a drawing program. I think Apple has made the mistake of accustoming me to free cute little games on my iPad, and now it seems ridiculous to pay more for something that - seems to me, but I know it isn't - is just a bigger version of that.

BRAID! How adorable is it?

I'm so sick, I'm hanging around in a Snuggy

Eating left over fried rice, feeling sorry for myself. This is the life.
I am comfortably warm, though.

Progression from first day to third week - Japanese

First day - I should study Japanese more. So I will!

Second week - I should really get on that studying Japanese thing.

Third week - Nope. Give up.

Present date - listening to my Pimsleur* in my sleep has now replaced must study Japanese. It's totally good enough.

*Pimsleur are these sweet guys (don't know what gender) that make language tapes (not really tapes) for people to learn different languages from. Generally people are awake listening to them as you're supposed to reply to the questions, but it totally kinda works if you're asleep. At least it kinda somewhat does for me. Good enough!

Ahhhh! Why are you doing this to me?

Sinus infections suck.

So...are you guys going out, or what?

Nope, not about me, sadly. Still eternally single over here.

Two of my friends have started going out and I, of course, was the last to realize, mainly because I don't notice those sorts of things. (What sort? I hear you say, I don't know.) And it's a little strange because they were like best buds and whenever anyone would ask if they were going out they would be very adamant that they're not, and now they are. Strange.

So, I'm not really sure where I'm going with this...I guess I just wanted to write, so I am...

Well, I bought new watercolours! That's mildly exciting. They're all pretty. Link to various things I've painted with my new watercolours here

That's all (more than) I had to say...so I guess I'll just go.

Green Tea Castella

So I've made a fool out of myself once again. I thought I had brought some green tea back from Japan to Australia as my mother and I love green tea. This is not the case. Turns out I brought back a green tea cake. A freaking cake, you guys.

Mum and I opened up the packaging (it looked like green tea packaging) and there was this green sponge-like thing in it. So, thinking it was tea, we assumed it was one of those tea blocks or something and picked off a bit and put it in hot water. It got all weird and wouldn't dissolve so I looked at the packaging, it said Green Tea Castella. I say "What's green tea castella?" Mum googles it. Castella is a sponge cake. No Japanese green tea for us.

The end.

Art makes me happy

I feel like I should be blogging, so that's what I'm doing.


In Art class we're doing observational drawings of trees in the wetlands off our school. It's making me very happy. I sit on my own on a bench near my tree and I just draw it and the surrounding area for the whole class. It's very relaxing, even if it is 32 degrees celsius and like 80% humidity. It is ridiculously hot here, you guys. I'm dying.

Back to art. Tip for overly stressed people, find a tree with not so many leaves and draw it, leaves frustrate me. Even if you're bad at drawing, as my art teacher says "Tell the left side of your brain to shut up." i.e. Draw on the right side of your brain, this can be achieved by:

-Not talking, this brings you back to the left side
-Notice the shape of the tree, not what it should look like, draw what you see, not what should be there
-Give yourself a lot of time to draw it
-No distractions

Tips for general drawing and also things I like to do whilst drawing:
-Use one colour of pencil and use tone to make your work more three dimensional
-Add shadows to make it more three dimensional
-Draw things late at night or when you're tired - I find that's when I'm my most creative. I'm writing this blog post right before I plan on going to bed!
-If you decide to use colours, use crazy bright ones and make all the trees purple. I like purple.
-Draw all the textures you can see
-Nice water colours make me extremely happy

**DRAW A ROBOT**
Automatic way to relieve stress. Or possibly increase it when you realise that the legs are very hard to draw 3D and that the neck has to go after you're drawn the head and body.

Robots are my comfort draw.

I’ll draw a robot and post in sometime soon-ish.