Election Debate

I'm trying so hard to watch this show - but it's difficult to keep paying attention.  Brown's platitudes sound like an old, wheezing machine, Cameron's trying too hard to be a man of the people, and Clegg's coming across as petulant and irritatingly liberal.
I wish the crowd wasn't so restricted - they should definitely have a fiery Jeremy Kyle-style crowd in there. 
And I swear that kid in the skull cap was on the BNP question time? He's all over the schedules!

Love Songs

Sometimes I think I'm too light on people. I see all the music and art and books and happiness that I want to see, and forget that actually there's a grimy side that we all encounter but push under the carpet. I've hit the stage where I'm freewheeling - day to day, I'm fine, but far off plans are distant and a bit scary. 

Love songs frighten me. Life plans terrify me. I see a nice pot plant or drum machine or saucepan and I think 'Oh, that's nice, I'll have that in my flat when I finish my degree' but then I think, will I have a job? disposable income? have to share the flat with another single friend because I still can't keep anyone close? will I still want to change everything around me every few weeks? will I still cook? who will I cook for? will that saucepan sit in a cupboard, or even worse, on the kitchentop, a testiment to my adult disillusionment for all to see? will I write? will I sell out? will I be happy?

I think part of the problem is that I get on well by myself - a little too well. I forget to need anybody else, so everyone else is actually a bit of a nuisance. I let few people in. I think that's why I'm so pissed about this latest - thing. Because I geared myself up to give another person  a chance that, inevitably, they proved they didn't deserve. I worry I've got only so many shots before I lose all my childish wonder and become very bitter and solemn.

I can't wait for what comes next, and I know I'll do it my way, but I hope the things I cant control, like the people I meet, and the twists of fate that define life, are kind to me.

Fudge

Today, my little sister and I made Fudge, inspired by Sophie Dahl's new programme for Bbc 2, The Delicious Miss Dahl. In the great tradition of home-made fudge, it stubbornly refused to set, and is now condemned to the freezer in a variety of suspicious shaped lumps, in the hope that it'll form something halfway solid.

The programme is actually very good - kitch and quirky, with occasional sassy moments (I love when she refers to oysters as an 'invitation to carnal knowledge'). I can see why people are sceptical - sometimes the programme goes out of it's way to be whimsical and nostalgic, and the editing leaves much to be desired, but overall the programme's got a warm heart, and she's a very likeable, eccentric character.
I feel very proud to have met her now-husband (according to wikipedia). Of course, when I say 'met', what I really mean is a friend and I once encountered Jamie Cullum walking down Queen's Gate, and the entire depth of conversation consisted of me saying (loudly) 'It's Jamie Cullum!', to which my friend responded by pushing me into a hedge and hissing 'Shut up!'.

This is Pomegranate Fudge from Not So Humble Pie. Doesn't it look amazing? The recipe looks pretty easy, but it asks for all these american things like a particular US brand of Pomegranate Extract, and Marshmellow Fluff, which I can never find over here. Perhaps a mission for the summer?

Andromeda

Our closest neighbouring Galaxy, Andromeda. It's 1.5 million light years away, but it is visible as a faint smudge on a clear, moonless night. It's beauty is breathtaking but, tinged with sadness, because we all know the only way we'll ever see it like this is through the lens of a camera. Well, in my lifetime at least. There's things out there to be found that I'll never know about! It's hard to put into words the combination of joy and melancholy inspired in me when I look at photos of deep space.

My rainy day philosophy

You know those days when you stay indoors because it's horrible out and you can't be arsed with much?
I hate those days - it makes me so angry at myself for wasting precious time. And, at last, here is a Venn diagram on a back of a postcard that accurately summs up the reasoning behind not spending whole days sitting in my kitchen watching bad tv just because nothing needs doing.

Innit good? Currently listening to Death Cab for Cutie - Summer Skins.. it's making me really, really want to listen to Explosions in the Sky.. but must sleep! I need all the energy I can get in order to adequately fail my mock tomorrow...

Hop Farm Festival

I am very, very excited about this.. it's like the organisers picked me out of a crowd and said 'Yes, her - let's organise her perfect lineup, at a cheap yet well-known festival, only ten minutes away from her house, and then release the tickets when her Dad's in a good mood so he buys six. Oh, and for good measure, let's arrange it for three days before her birthday.'

More cake.

This can't be going anywhere good. Still looking up pictures of cake. 

But pride of place, my favourite cake ever ever, simply because it looks both amazing and delicious in equal measure:

Cheesecake sunday

Today I made cheesecake, and it actually turned out remarkably well, owing principally to the absence of any need to use an oven. This gives me an opportunity to post a gratuitously big picture of a cheesecake! mmmmmm.

I went for the trad. plain one, simply because in adding flavours and fruit, there's far greater room for error. Though I did add dark sugar with molasses instead of the boring normal brown sugar - which turned out suprisingly well! Hurrahhhh

I have a HoA mock exam tomorrow.. I can't decide if I'm worried or overwhelmingly confident, I sort of modulate between the two. I keep trying to use Queen Mary as a mental carrot and Goldsmiths as a mental stick, but let's face it, I'm going to pick cheesecake-making over revision any day. 

I haven't read anything in so long.. I think I'm going to start on Siri Hustvedt's 'The Shaking Woman', as it's a sort of non-fiction feminist autobiography thing. Also, it's got a very nice cover, and considering that I ascribe a great deal of misplaced importance to book covers, that makes it high on my agenda of 'books to read before you see that oxford guy/get called up for university challenge/meet affluent, intellectual but easily impressed strangers with links to the London literary scene/become the Doctor's new assistant'.

A cheesecake I came across and am desperate to emulate:

'Om nom nom nom nom'

I want a Tardis!

Just seen the latest episode of Doctor Who - 'The Beast Below' - and absolutely loved it - even the monster was cute. And as for the Doctor and Amy, they seem to be becoming more and more insane every moment - We're familiar with Amy's obvious batshit-craziness (Dolls of the Doctor? Really? Even I'm not that bad), but the Doctor evened the scores a bit with all the glass-on-floor action and extreme gesticulation*. 

'Gotcha.'

Highlight for me was this super-hug at the end. It just looks like such a brilliant hug, the sort of one that can only be explained in an onomatapeic 'Mmmmmmnnnnnnnnnnnngh'. The eleventh doctor is shaping up to be like a benevolent old professor - reminds me of a mad old Oxbridge don. He's got less of the adolescent rage from the 10th, but still retains the childlike glee and truly fantastic hair of previous doctors.

A friend and I genuinely had a debate earlier about whether the Tennant/Piper combo was more or less 'ridiculously good-looking' (Zoolander style) than Smith/Gillian. She's a diehard Tennant fan, though she begrudgingly admits that this series so far is brilliant. But I have definitely transferred my affections - the new nerdy, awkward Doctor seems much less self-righteous and testosterone-y, which is a huge improvement, irrespective of how he looks. 

Obviously, it goes without saying that they're both very, very attractive people, but it seems a bit trite to compliment them on that, when you add to it that they're both bursting with charisma (and insanity). I really do like this doctor, I hope he sticks with it for a bit.


* I think 'Extreme Gesticulation' sounds like it has the potential to become the most amazing gameshow... it'd be like 'Total Wipeout' crossed with 'University Challenge' crossed with 'Pictionary'.

Soul, glass, concrete and gravel

The Man's Machine - Jamie T & Ben Bones

I get the feeling that Jamie T doesn't really like New Brutalist architecture? Lols..