Okay, so I'm done.

The pattern -- after three fresh starts and too many on-the-fly corrections to count -- is done, and I'm working on a way to internetify it (by which I mean, trying to remember who I know that has a scanner apart from my parents, and my vague ex-flatmate, with whom I'm not on the best of terms).

I also have a knitted up sample, which looks ace, and which -- due to tension problems which, let me be clear, in no way detract from the finished piece -- is currently pinned out flat to my ironing board in the hope that it will remain flat when the pins are removed.

I was all set to take and post a photo, but when I went looking for my camera, I remembered that I lent it to my sister at Easter, and don't have it back yet. And also that, if rumour is to be believed (and it always is), the reason I don't have it back is because she broke it. So the photo has to wait as well.

In the meantime, I'm trying to decide what to do with my -- erm, well. I don't know what it is. I'm trying to decide what it is. It's a blue and white knitted rectangle, 25cm wide by 15cm high, and no uses spring immediately to mind. I thought about backing it with fabric and safetypinning it to my schoolbag (because knitted things are so punk rock), but it's too big to do that successfully, by which I mean without covering up zippers and things. Decisions decisions ...

I'm turning the disastrous one from yesterday into a potholder, so that when my mum comes to visit at the end of next week and gets upset about my charred teatowels, I can point to my potholder as evidence that I'm really trying to be a responsible adult and not set teatowels on fire, and that all the charring currently in evidence is from before her last visit. And hope that she doesn't notice that I have new, charred teatowels since that last visit.

"I am so smart! I am so smart! S-M-R-T! I mean, S-M-A-R-T!"
(three updates at the bottom)

My gran taught me to knit when I was about four, and we spent many, many days knitting away happily in the garden. Not long after we started, I noticed that the things my gran was making were far more interesting than the warped, holey, lopsided scarves I was struggling to make - some of it was as holey as mine, but seemingly deliberately so, and some of it was in multiple colours.

At the time, I was desperate to learn to do this lacework and two-coloured knitting, but as Gra fairly pointed out to me, first I had to learn to do basic knitting properly.

Ten or twelve years later, after producing many, many, many warped, lopsided (generally unfinished) scarves -- I picked up the trick of not dropping stitches relatively quickly, but even tension eluded me for awhile -- I got the hang of basic knitting. Then I figured out ribbing - it's still loose, but it's OK - and shaping, and officially had the skills to be able to make something other than scarves.

I decided that, given my limited attention span, I should make something small, so that I had a chance of finishing it, and that's how I came to make myself a pair of mittens. When I made my second pair, I wanted to work 'L' and 'R' onto the backs of the hands; Gra had made me a pair like that when I was a kid, and while the lesson didn't take, I thought it'd be fun to have them in adult sizes. Apparently, though, on something small like mittens it's easier to embroider the letters on afterwards than to work them into the piece -- this eliminates the floating threads which fingers get caught in so easily. So, I learnt to embroider from my mum, and the lessons on two-coloured knitting were put off again.

Two pairs of mittens, one beanie and a third of a scarf later, my burst of knitting activity wore off again, and I didn't pick up the needles except to give lessons for a good few years. Then my mum shoehorned me into knitting blanket squares for her women's group, who were making blankets to send to a local women's shelter, and that set me off on another burst of knitting.

This time I've been more productive than usual. This is not to say that I've gone back and finished any of the UnFinished Objects floating around in my knitting box, but I have very nearly completed a looooooong scarf -- the first one I've ever got this close to completing.

Alas, disaster struck at the last minute. I was right near the end of my last ball of wool, nearly ready to cast the scarf off and start in on the hated chore of sewing the loose ends in, when I realised that, lost in my knitting, I was late to meet a friend (as an aside, this excuse, when relayed to engineers, will result in far more mockery than refusing to go out because Doctor Who is on). So, I rolled the thing up, set it down by my favourite green chair, and rushed out the door.

A couple days later, I picked it up off the floor, unrolled it and prepared to finish it off -- only to discover that, in its sojourn on the floor, I'd stepped on the project and snapped one of the (plastic) needles into three pieces. This would not have been disastrous, were it not for two things: Firstly, the broken needle was the one the work was on, leaving me with dozens of stitches to pick up; and Secondly, I'd been using stupid fluffy wool, and couldn't see the stitches to pick them up. I did what any girl would do in my situation -- swore copiously, and put the problem aside until my mum comes to visit me next week so she can fix it.

In the meantime, I went back to my other optimistic project -- a jumper with a hot-pink skull knitted into the front. Now, this one has been a real drama. Not only is it the biggest thing I've ever attempted to knit by a long shot, but it's my first attempt at knitting anything more complicated than horizontal stripes in two colours. It's been an experiment and a learning experience; my gran never got the chance to teach me how to do it, and my mum doesn't know how.

Anyhow, the technique has proven to be simultaneously easier and more complicated than I'd expected. I've been twisting the yarns together whenever I change colours, and while it doesn't look pretty on the back (and, from my examination of things other people have knitted for me, doesn't seem to be the accepted technique), it has so far been successful, insomuch as I don't have little holes in the fabric where I've changed colours. But -- and, cliched though it is, there is always a but -- I've found it really tricky to get the tension right when floating the yarn across, with the result that my skeleton is seriously puckered about the lower face. I've gotten better as I've gone along, so he's not quite so misshapen now that I'm working on his eyes, but it looks utterly demented early on.

Last night, in a burst of procrastinatory knitting zeal, I decided to attempt to make my own knitting pattern, so that I could make something utterly unique and wonderful, and also so that I could make something which wasn't puckered and demented like the skeleton is. I'd been browsing the Dresden Dolls site earlier looking for any indication that the rumour I've heard of an Australian tour later this year is true (looks like yes - I found Amanda saying they were planning to come at some point over the summer, and they might be playing the Big Days Out, but if that's the case, I'm hopeful for side shows), and it popped into my head to make a Dresden Dolls knitting chart.

I poked around the website some more, and decided to try the logo with the two D's and the nautical star. This one ...



I pulled the image up on the computer, dug out some graph paper (aha! An advantage to being a failed engineer! Having graph paper easily to hand!) and tried to copy it down. Boy, did that not work.

The next attempt was more successful -- I turned the contrast on the computer wayyyy up, stuck the graph paper to the top of the screen, and traced it off. Then I pulled it down, turned all the curves into square edges, and decided that there were way too many stitches, and that the design would be huge.

The final attempt, working from that traced picture and eliminating all pointless detail, looked more successful. The design is 55 stitches wide, 32 high, which in 8-ply wool and on 4mm needles is probably about the right size to put on the chest of a jumper -- with my tension, about 25cm wide and maybe 15 high?

I'm in the process of knitting it up now, and it looks good so far. If it turns out okay, I'll post the finished dimensions and a tidied up chart (as in, not covered in white-out and properly divided) later. Looking at the experimental piece now, it looks like it'll be the right size and shape to turn into a laptop case, which would be totally rock and roll -- but I'm concerned that, being wool, it might get staticky, and I don't know how good for the laptop static is. Don't computer bits come in anti-static bags? I need a technical adviser on this one ...

UPDATE: To my considerable surprise, the finished dimensions are precisely what I thought they'd be - 25cm wide by 15 high. I'm getting much better at eyeballing measurements like that. The letters and the blocks came out really well; the nautical star, by way of contrast, is completely fuuuuuucked. The shape is just way off. I'm going to have to tweak the pattern a bit (a lot) and try it again.

UPDATE 2: I had a better idea than starting again - I went through and changed the shape of the star by duplicate-stitching over the more demented parts, and it's been pretty successful. I'm going to change the chart to reflect the changes I've made today, and then maybe post it. I'm totally pleased with myself right now - the thing looks tip-top. Now, what to do with it ...

UPDATE 3: I am grateful for engineering friends who don't ask questions when I phone up shortly before midnight to ask if I can please borrow a protractor - not even, 'What, right now?' The new chart is much improved, and I'm going to knit it up tomorrow (or more to the point, later today, it now being twenty to one). And now I am going to go to sleep.

Every so often, I make my sister a mix CD.

I call it the 'Beck Live' mix - it dates back to the days before Ethel had a functional stereo, and the only musical entertainment anyone got when they rode with me was Beck Radio. I took any and all requests, and made an honest attempt at all of them (except the mysteriously frequent, 'Would you please just stop singing?' Have I mentioned that I got kicked out of the school band for being too unmusical to play even a triangle? Because I did.).

Anyhow, my sister hated it more than anyone else, which is really saying something, and so I naturally redoubled my musical efforts every time she got in the car with me. Boy, did she hate it. It was great. I'd sing some Rocky Horror tunes, and she'd ask if I knew anything else, and so I'd throw in some Beatles or Proclaimers or something - before singing my favourite song from The Wizard of Oz, first as Dorothy, then as the Munchkins, then as Glinda. "The wind began to swish, the house, to twitch ..." It was mostly old stuff, because I'm hopeless with lyrics - worse than with triangles, if you can believe that - and I've heard the old stuff long enough to remember it better. It's fun to improvise, but it takes a little too much concentration (when you're as hung up on rhyming as I am) when driving if you only know five words and have to make up the rest.

When my sister got her licence, I made her the first Beck Live CD by way of congratulations, full of my favourite singing songs, and have been repeating the tradition at irregular intervals ever since. I try to put in some stuff she knows, some stuff she should know, and some stuff she's massively unlikely to know. Last time the obscure stuff - at least when you're my sister, who is even less up on her music than I am - was from Nouvelle Vague, some 1930s big band stuff and some B-grade movie theme songs. The aim with these random selections is, although I'll deny it if this ever gets out (she says, publishing it on the internet), to see if I can shock her so much she crashes the car again. Not hard, or anything, I don't want her killed or anything like that. Just enough for dramatic impact.

She's coming to see me in a couple of weeks, and so I'm starting work on another CD for her. I'm sort of trying to make a themed Beck Live album, and my theme is genderfucking. I want to see how long it'll take her to figure it out. The songs can be about genderfucking, or by genderfucking performers, or, as in one example, from a musical about genderfucking but not mention genderfucking at all. Confusion, confusion is the aim here. I've got about forty-five minutes so far, and suggestions are welcome. (I'm thinking Antony and the Johnsons are called for, but I don't have any.)

Of course, should I fail to make up 80 minutes of obscure music with an obscure theme, I'll cobble together another Beck Live mix from the usual dosh that makes up Beck Live mixes, and I'm sure it'll be fine. I've told her that, by way of bribery, I'll copy the Dresden Dolls bootlegs I've just come, very happily, into possession of, and I suspect she'll be too blown away by the French version of Amsterdam - as I was - to care what else I give her. That cover leaves David Bowie's in the dust ... and almost makes me wish I hadn't failed French in year seven.

I left a comment elsewhere the other day, in which I referred to both Catch-22 and The Simpsons, and then said something about not wanting to mix my cultural references.

It occurred to me not long afterwards that being concerned about mixed references when it comes to The Simpsons is one of the most absurd things in the world. The Simpsons is practically defined by its use of mixed cultural references -- it's that whole postmodern schtick, and one of my favourite things about the show. My pop culture literacy is pretty good (although my knowledge of contemporary music isn't great), and so it's pretty rare that The Simpsons will refer to something and I'll miss it. Similarly, my Simpsons literacy is pretty good, and so I'll normally spot a reference to the show at a hundred paces. And, somewhat pathetically, I almost know Catch-22 off by heart.

With all that in mind, I was really concerned by the fact that I was struggling to recall a reference to Catch-22 on The Simpsons. In all fairness, I don't know my Simpsons as well as some people I know, not having the benefit of a full set of DVDs to study from, but I'm confident that if there was a reference in there, I'd have seen it.

So, I racked my brains, and I came up with a single reference: the episode where Sideshow Bob tries to blow up Springfield with an out of date nuke. In that episode, Bob crouches in the garden outside some military hotshot's office listening to him yell, just like when Yossarian crouches outside Major Major's office trying to trap the man.

Okay, that's one. But I can think of four or five references to Frasier, and, while awesome, that show doesn't carry the cultural weight that Catch-22 does. And I don't think it's a case of the book being an easy target, because I can think of eight references to One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, and that's hardly a reference that'll go over anyone's head. I'd expect that, over the course of, what, eleven years of The Simpsons, there'd be at least three or four Catch-22 references.

I dug out a couple of interviews with Matt Groening that I read for uni a couple of years ago. Lo and behold, Groening cites Catch-22 as one of his biggest influences. So where are the references to it?

Next stop is the Simpson-phile's Simpsons-file, where my search for Catch-22 turned up the same interview with Matt Groening I'd read, and two episodes I hadn't thought of.

One is 22 Short Films About Springfield, in which the Catch-22 reference is apparently the number 22 in the title. Uhhh, right.

The second is the one where Sideshow Bob's brother tries to blow up Springfield, and the Catch-22 reference is obscure at best. If I had a copy of the book to hand, I'd check, but I can't place the quote offhand. I'm wondering if it's not actually a quote from the film, which I haven't seen all the way through. I'm given to understand that there's a big difference in dialogue between film and book.

Anyhow, I'm sort of pleased to know I'm not losing my mind, even if I am disappointed to find that there's no bastard child of Matt Groening and Joseph Heller running around out there.

As a vaguely related aside, I sort of want to get a Flying Hellfish tattoo. The episode itself is pretty average - it was just on - but I love the logo.


(These colours are a bit off, but it was the best image I could find in a hurry)

It was one thing when my 7pm Simpsons fix was replaced by Big Brother.

It is quite another that Big Brother has now been superseded by Celebrity Ready Steady Cook.

I can only assume that this is a sign of the coming end of days.

I've just submitted my first piece of work as an Honours student.

It may be summarised as follows:

Dear sociologists everywhere,

I would like to refer you to the interesting, varied, overlapping and quite often wildly contradictory worlds of, just off the top of my head, liberal feminism, radical feminism, materialist feminism, queer feminism, Marxist feminism, psychoanalytic feminism, cultural feminism, post-structural feminism, separatist feminism, postcolonial feminism, sex-positive feminism, ecofeminism, lesbian feminism, men's feminism, socialist feminism, modernist feminism, transfeminism, difference feminism and postfeminism.

In the event that you work up the courage necessary to claim that the problem with feminism is that it focusses on gender, then I may be willing to not dismiss out of hand your suggestion that there is "a" problem with "feminism".

Yours,
Beck

Y'all can google them yourself. If you can't find a feminism that suits you, you haven't looked hard enough.

Dear Christopher Eccleston,

My dear, dear Christopher Eccleston.

You know I love you, right?

I turned down a hot date tonight to stay at home and watch you battle the Daleks. Hot dates don't come my way very often, Chris - you don't mind if I call you Chris, do you, Chris? - so I'm sure you can understand the sacrifice I've made.

We've been together for awhile now. It's been a very pleasant Saturday night ritual, sitting down in my favourite green chair, with a cup of tea, waiting for you with my tongue hanging out of my mouth. I'm sorry it's over. I don't know what I'll do with my Saturday nights now, Chris.

I never thought it would be like this in the beginning - this dizzying whirl of a love affair. I only flicked the tube on that first Saturday night, the second week you graced our screens, because it was that or study. Tough call, Chris, isn't it? It was only meant to be an idle distraction, but the moment you opened your mouth, I was gone. That rapier wit, that thick accent. Do you do it on purpose?

As the weeks went by, it only got worse. There were lines that seemed directed only at me. "Dinner and bondage, Doctor?" Please, Chris, don't do it. She's a Slitheeen - and you already know she's a Slitheen! That's not what you like, Chris, is it? Because I'll go out for dinner and bondage - just ask me. (But maybe we could have dinner first, then bondage? I'm concerned that the ropes might interfere with your ability to eat. And food gets so messy on the sheets.)

I only missed one episode - half of one episode, to be more precise. It was the night Harry Potter came out - you're nodding along with me, Chris, aren't you? I knew you'd understand. It had been killing me all day. What a dilemma. Doctor Who, or The Boy Who Lived? In the end, I watched the first half of what turned out to be a very quiet episode of Doctor Who, and then took Harry Potter to bed. I was sorry the next week, though, when I switched on the tube and saw you scolding those freaky kids. That was hot, Chris, really hot. You could send me to my room if you like, Chris. I've put Harry Potter back on the shelf. I could be a very naughty girl. I could even get a gas mask if that's what you like, Chris. Just let me know.

Our last time together ended on a sour note, and it was my fault. I'm sorry I shook my fist at you when you kissed Rose, and said something derogatory about how the chemistry between you and Captain Jack was far, far more convincing than this vague attempt at straight love with Rose could ever be. What can I say? I love the homoerotic subtext. (The hints of incestuous goings-on were sort of cool, too.) Rose doesn't need a doctor, Chris. I need a Doctor. I'm not kidding about the dinner and bondage, Chris. Really I'm not.

I'm also sorry that I was in two minds about the extermination of the Daleks. Don't get me wrong, it's not that I don't comprehend the threat the Daleks pose to civilisation - but there's something that's just so right about their program of exterrrrrrminating The Weakest Link contestants. They play the game like it's played in my head. And, I'm sure, in yours. You just strike me as that kind of person, Chris.

If it helps, though, your replacement is worse than I could ever have imagined he would be. I suppose the only consolation is that Billie Piper is leaving too, so I'm not going to have to suffer through any more of that "tense" relationship.

Just answer me this, Chris - and I know you've probably got non-disclosure agreements up to your deliciously mobile eyebrows, so I'll settle for whatever vague hint you're able to give me - is there any hope at all for further gay adventuring with Captain Jack? I wish it were with you, Chris, but if I have to take it with your boring replacement, I will.

I'd say that I'll always remember you fondly, Chris, but that would be an outright lie. Instead, I remain,

Yours in desperate lust,
Beck


PS - The fact that the BBC can now afford to employ Matrix-style bullet-time effects? Is a really good example of Why The Second Two Matrix Movies Weren't Much Fun. Just my opinion, of course, but if you know the Wachowski Bros, pass it on: I really, really needed the special effects to distract me from the movie itself. Oh, and also? Can the straight love. I'm begging you.

It turns out that, in order to get the educational discount on this iPod that I may or may not be blowing my tax refund on, I need to purchase it online through the Apple store.

This bugs me.

Leaving aside the fact that I don't have an Amex, Mastercard or Visa, and thus cannot purchase from their online store, I don't think I like the idea of mail order.

Don't get me wrong, I love getting things in the mail, and I check my mail almost compulsively - the only thing that's stopping me from running to check my mail right now is the fact that I'm in the middle of dying my hair, and it's all sticky and fashioned into a mohawk. I'm waiting with great anticipation for a free pen that's meant to be coming from the good people at 3M. It has post-it notes built into it! And if they don't see through my cunning ruse of signing my dad up for one at my address, I should be getting both the pen and highlighter forms of it any day now. I anticipate that these will be wildly useful, as, in my uni work, I use a great many post-it notes and highlight so much that I once used up a highlighter before I lost it - an unheard of occurence for me. (Get your free one here. It might turn up in ten thousand years.)

But there's a difference between getting free and delightful things in the mail, and getting paid-for things in the mail. If I'm going to lay out serious money for something - and most of my tax refund is, in my impoverished, full-time-student world, serious money - I would like to walk into a shop, hand over my cash, and walk out with exactly what I've paid for. It's a quaint olde-worlde sort of a hangup, but I think still related to being a member of what I like to call the ADD Generation - I like instant gratification, or in other words: now now now now NOW!

Anyhow, between these two problems, I'm completley stymied as to what I'm going to do with my tax refund. I can't buy my iPod online because I don't want to wait (and also don't have an acceptable credit card), but I can't buy it in person because I want the educational discount. This is a ridiculous state of affairs.

I would love to love Apple, I really would, but they're not making it easy for me.

I'm slowly getting used to working the Thursday night shift at work.

I used to avoid it wherever possible, since I prefer to work days when I can, but taking that shift was a condition of my part-time contract. It's a short shift - 4.15-9.15 - and tends to be pretty straightforward. The rest of the girls are generally pretty cool and it's not insanely busy the way it is on weekdays at lunchtime.

Downside? Well, it's dark outside, which plays havoc with my sense that I should be at home with a cup of tea, or at least in the library (preferably with a well-concealed cup of tea). I routinely miss the bus home, which I find to be particularly distressing - not because it's at all difficult to take another bus home, just because they've recently changed the timetable so that, instead of missing the bus every day that I work, I now only miss it on Thursdays. It's a bit of an indignity. And of course, in our store, with the doors open to let in the cold wind off the harbour, and with our demented air conditioning, it's bloody freezing by about 7. Keep in mind that we're all being made to wear our summer uniforms ...

It's also kind of a long day, since one of my two classes is at 9am on Thursday mornings. I'm not wild about long days. If I could fruitfully rearrange my sleeping patterns to divide a week into eight 21-hour days, I totally would. Anyone with a proposal for doing this should contact me immediately. I have a regular, if rotating, work schedule now, and minimal time-critical commitments at uni, both of which should make it easier.

Anyhow, the point is, as a general rule the Thursday night shift is tolerable. Right up until you get shifts like last night, which are bad-verging-on-terrible. One of the girls called in sick, so we were short-handed - only three of us in womenswear after seven (we typically have four or five). One of the three people we had is very new - very, very new. And the air-conditioning was, for reasons unknown, spewing out air colder than the wind blowing in off the harbour (bear in mind at this point that it was very cold last night anyhow).

Despite this, we got through the night with no problems. Right up until nine o'clock. We'd switched off the music, ushered out the last customer, locked the doors. We'd tidied the piles and racks and were about to get our bags and go, when the phone rings. I find it all but impossible to ignore a ringing phone (although, given the history of wrong numbers at my house, I'm getting better at it fast) - and besides, at ten past nine, I assumed it'd be the manager phoning down from upstairs to confirm that everything was one and we were ready to leave.

Nup. It was a customer phoning to complain about a suit she'd bought the day before. At ten past nine. I would sincerely like to know what possessed her to phone at ten past nine, when every store in the city closes at nine. Particularly since, by her own admission, she'd phoned at quarter past nine in the morning to complain about the suit - or rather, her apparent allergy to it. She seemed surprised to learn that, twelve hours later, a different shift was working - or not working, more to the point, as by the time I'd worked her around to something resembling a point, it was past quarter past nine, and so past the time to which I normally get paid. (Meanwhile, at this very moment, my bus home is pulling away from the stop on the next block ...). I suspect I would make a good psychoanalyst, as I seem to have a phone manner which encourages people to rave on about the most insane things - although it may just be an aspect of my personal Weirdo Magnet. Eventually she calmed down enough to accept that nobody on this shift knew anything, so I promised her a personal phone call from "our Apparel Manager" first thing the next morning, gave her my name and the manager's name, and hung up with a sigh of relief. Wrote a novel on a long reel of docket paper for the next morning's manager - "Why I Promised You Would Phone This Nutcase Back Before The Store Opens Tomorrow: Please Don't Kill Me" - and sprinted out the door.

I'd missed the bus, of course, and so spent what seemed like an eternity freezing to death on George Street waiting for another bus to come along, in my skirt and bare legs and thongs (yes, stupid choice for a freezing night, but I burnt the tops of my feet when my kettle died and leaked very hot water all over my feet on Thursday morning). It was not the best night ever.

In happier news, though, my tax cheque has cleared, and I've got to figure out what to spend it on. I've wanted a green iPod ever since they first came out (is that five years, now?), and have the cash to get it. It has been suggested to me that, if I'm insistent on getting a green iPod because I'm ridiculously superficial like that, I should at least get the six gig one. Then I started thinking myself - sort of a dangerous thing, because technology sort of confuses me - and it occurred to me that there's not a huge amount of difference in the price between a green 6 gig iPod, and a (boring) white 20 gig iPod (I'm paying educational price, so it's a shade over $400 for the 20gig).

I'd originally been thinking that a black-and-white screen would be better for me, because I thought that a colour screen might have poor contrast and clarity - that's what my brother's colour Game Boy was like, back in the day when that was cutting edge technology. Couldn't see a bloody thing on the colour sceen, and it was much easier to play the black and white one. One of my regular customers came in with her new colour iPod last night, though, and showed me - I was very surprised by how clear it was - and now I don't know what to do.

Damn. All I want to do is blow a fair bit of money on some schmick technological gadget. Why must it be so hard?

One of the very few things I miss about living in college - besides climbing up on the roof and sitting on top of the lift shaft eating pizza - is the Monday night ritual of Tim Tams and Sex and the City.

I kept watching after I moved out, but it just wasn't the same - not least because the content of the show changed markedly in its final seasons. More on that later.

I started watching the show, on and off, in high school, largely as a result of the outraged publicity it received when it first hit the airwaves in Australia (the same kind of outraged publicity that recently ensured the high ratings of Big Brother Uncut), but I'd never seen the really early episodes - the early episodes that have replaced Big Brother Uncut on the tube as of yesterday. (It's worth noting that, while they're playing the series from the beginning, the clips on the ads are from much later episodes, and I wonder why?)

Leaving aside the ever-changing nature of Sarah Jessica Parker's nose, compared to the shows I know best, these early shows have a really different vibe (no pun intended). The setup of the show has changed a lot; where the later shows only have SJP's annoying, faux-intellectual voiceover, the two I saw last night also use a vox pop format, something which I find annoying on the news and, as it turns out, all but unbearable when it comes to entertainment television.

Even worse than the vox pop, though, was the cunning way in which Carrie was able to address the audience directly - and when I say cunning, I mean that in the most unenthused way possible. Every so often - generally at interesting moments - the action will freeze and Carrie will turn around and speak, almost confidentially straight out of the television. Thinking Ferris Bueller? Yup, that's about right. And what was kitschy and fun in Ferris Bueller was tragically overdone in Sex and the City.

They even used - wait for it - split screen technology! Whee!

It's not all negative, though. I got very disillusioned towards the end of Sex and the City, as the show shifted towards more of a relationship focus. Bor-ing. We were all just watching for the sex, weren't we? I mean, it was right there in the title; let's not delude ourselves about it. Who really wants to watch four thirty-something women bitch and moan about how they're thirty-something and desperate and don't want to be slutty anymore (don't get me started on the slutty business) because they'll never land a man? I could listen to that on the bus.

Anyhow, the sex was there in the shows I watched last night, and as soon as they lose the Ferris Bueller moments, I'll be a very happy chicken indeed.

As a vaguely related aside, I am totally adoring the new Carlton Draught ad. As well as the episode of Doctor Who that was on on Saturday night, in which they played The Weakest Link like it's played in my head. Roll on the real-world implementation ...

It's a very sad thing to note that next week marks the end of this season of Doctor Who, and hence the end of my dizzying love affair with Christopher Eccleston. I'm not sure what I'll do for kicks on a Saturday night after this. Maybe sit at home and admire the blue floral cooking pot I found while op-shopping (instead of studying) this afternoon. I don't think anything so mundane as going out and interacting with people will ever live up to the joyous delight and delightful joy that has been the last two months of the good Doctor.

After many days of complaining about having no supervisor, I now have an abundance of supervisors!

By which I mean two.

I have also fixed a technological problem which has been plaguing me for months, by which I mean mildly annoying me for a couple of weeks.

As you were.

I started writing about the schizophrenic breaks my wardrobe has, and it got out of hand. So instead, I'm going to round up a few short and random bits and pieces, and put them up.

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First off, recipes - sweet 'n' easy. These are some of the most straightforward recipes I know, are popular whenever I make them, and I find myself giving out the recipes all the time. They're also both like heart attacks cut into squares, so be warned that I take no responsibility for your cholesterol levels should you make these recipes. I was given the Mars Bar slice recipe by a friend in first year engineering, and the fudge recipe is from a girl I went to high school with.


MARS BAR SLICE
This is one of my favourite things in the world to make, because it's easy, and can't be sabotaged by my wilful and demented oven. Next week, which is when my dad assures me it'll be possible to buy un-poisoned Mars Bars again, I intend to make this.

5 regular sized Mars Bars
1T butter
1C Rice Bubbles
1T honey
1/2 slab cooking chocolate (optional)

Melt Mars Bars over low heat - preferably a double boiler - until soft and easy to stir. Mix in the butter and honey while still hot. Fold in Rice Bubbles - carefully so they aren't crushed. Pour into foil-lined slab tin. Melt cooking chocolate over low heat and pour over top (can be full layer or drizzled, depending on taste). Place in fridge until firm. Cut into squares.

Note: I use very little cooking chocolate on top, and substitute Coco Pops for Rice Bubbles. Up to you.


CHOCOLATE FUDGE
This is even easier to make than Mars Bar slice, and is much admired. Apparently it tastes more complicated than it is, and I give out this recipe all the time.

3C cooking chocolate (dark, milk or white all OK)
1 400g can condensed milk
60g butter, chopped

Melt all ingredients together over low heat - preferably double boiler. Pour into foil-lined slab tin. Place in fridge until firm. Cut into squares.

Note: There are lots of good additions to this. I typically use 1C of unsalted peanuts, but I've also made it with hazelnuts, almonds, glace cherries, M&Ms, and once (unsuccessfully) dark chocolate bits. One bag of Cadbury Choc Melts (the 375g one) is near enough to three cups, and 60g is about a quarter of a normal block of butter.


Both these recipes can be made in the microwave (typically taking about 5 minutes to melt completely). I've made them both in a single saucepan over a low heat, but as with anything dairy-based, it's best to use a double boiler (dairy burns fast, and burnt chocolate is bitter as fuck). My electronics-touch-of-death accounted for my microwave several months ago, but I find it straightforward to improvise a double boiler from a brass fruit bowl (or a cake tin) and an appropriately sized saucepan. The fudge recipe in particular is completely customisable, and it's fun to experiment. Let me know what you find.

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In other news, my best friend from high school is getting married in early January, and she told me the other day that her partner is pushing for a U2 song as their wedding waltz. I assume it's a misnomer; can you waltz to U2? Em's never been a U2 fan, at least not so far as I've known. This is the girl that introduced me to the Js back when we were kids, and helped me write a U2 ripoff song to go along with our ripoff synchronised swimming routine (remember that American exchange student I mentioned? We liked her to start with. Not so much towards the end). I choose to believe that the song they're considering is "Sunday, Bloody Sunday", or something else equally inappropriate, rather than something soppy, but I'm not holding my breath.

Honestly, though, I'm not sure what to hope for. One of my friends says he went to a wedding at which the wedding waltz was "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For". Fucking hilarious, and I'd love to be able to say I went to a wedding at which that song was played. I imagine quite a few people mistake that song for a love song - it sort of sounds like it, after all. It'd be apt (it's a poorly kept secret that I'm not overfond of her partner), and it'd be very, very funny. But then, she is my best friend, and so I'm probably not allowed to hope for public humiliation like that ...

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I got a pleasant surprise in the mail today. I bought a pair of fishnets about a month ago, wore 'em to work, and they split that day. I'd thrown away the receipt and box, but wrote a letter to the manufacturers about it on the off-chance something would come of it. Fishnets tend to be pretty fragile, and I've lost count of the number of pairs I've ruined (although not typically on the first wear). About three weeks later, I finally got a response from the company, basically asking me to send in my tights for quality control analysis, which suggested to me that I wouldn't be getting anything back unless they actually turned out to be faulty. So, I sent them in, expecting very little, and less than a week later, an envelope arrived in my mailbox with not one pair of replacement tights, but two. Thanks, Voodoo.

These guys make hot tights, and most of my tights and stockings come from them, dating way back to my first tights purchase, a pair of bright orange, thick opaques that I've been wearing for about five years, and some black lace ones that I've had nearly as long. More recently I've bought some of their printed ones (leopard print - whee!), and of course the fishnets, in three different colours - as well as coveting a few other things that I can't quite justify to myself (the fishnets were for work - or so I keep telling myself). Anyhow, with customer service like that, I'm absolutely going to keep buying from them.

Do they make stayups? I think hosiery is hot, and while I find stockings more comfortable than tights (plus, there's nothing quite so sexy as stockings and garter belts - think Rocky Horror), it's very hard to find stockings in fun patterns or textures. They tend to be plain black or tan, and the wildest they get is seams up the backs - which is great in its way, think Secretary - but stockings seem to be firmly positioned within the marketplace as either a) for staid, boring old ladies that never adjusted to pantyhose, or b) sexy young things that are only wearing them to indicate their willingness to take them off, a la my Unified Theory of G-strings. Anyhow, it seems that stayups come in more interesting flavours than stockings, and I'm wondering if they're as comfortable as stockings are. I'm planning an experiment at some point, and will keep you updated.

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Uni-wise, I'm still supervisor-less, but am assured that it's in the works. My units of study are sorted out, and I already know which one I like best. And I already have more reading to do than I want to think about - particularly for my Modernism unit, which I'm not feeling any real love for. My sociology tutor seems like she's going to be very cool about letting me customise the unit to my needs, and I'm totally loving the term "This is a special case. This is an Honours student". I feel like a privileged species.