kimbofo

Something fruity

After yet another upper respiratory tract infection, I've decided that I need to boost my fruit intake. I eat plenty of vegetables and enjoy at least one glass of juice a day, but I struggle to eat much fresh fruit. Apples and oranges bore me. By contrast, I love bananas but I'm fussy about them, they have to be just right, not too green, not too yellow and so I find it difficult to buy more than two or three at a time because they go "off" before I can eat them.

Today I made myself a delicious fruit salad comprising one firm but just-right banana, some organic strawberries, some pre-cut fresh pineapple (lazy, I know, but worth it to avoid all the hassle of "peeling" a pineapple and chopping up all the meat), a kiwi-fruit and a deliciously sweet passionfruit. The whole mix was absolutely scrummy, and left me feeling very saintly.

That feeling didn't last long though, because later in the afternoon I treated myself to a strawberry tart. So what if the custard-cream filling was highly calorific, the stuff on top counts as part of my fruit intake, right? (I wonder how far I can stretch this theory... )

Bring it on

I seem to be going through a Nick Cave phase right now. Bring It On is an oldie, but a goodie, and probably my favourite Cave song, helped in part by the magnificent vocals of Chris Bailey from The Saints. Not sure about all the girls wiggling their butts in it, but whatever floats your boat, right?

Saturday plans

I have the place to myself as T* has been kidnapped by four Australians in a grafitti-covered van, bound for the MotoGP in France.

Initially, I had planned to go to Oxford Street this morning to sort out two lots of passport photographs -- my Australian passport expires on May 20 and my British one follows suit next month -- but my eyes are still a little bloodshot from the conjunctivitis and I didn't fancy donning my spectacles** for the pictures. So I am at home, tossing up whether to brave my local Homebase to buy some plants for the front door (all current specimens, bar my lavender bush, are dead or close to dying) and collect a tile catalogue (for ensuing bathroom renovation) while I am at it. Or should I just laze around, catch up on some reading and watch my new boxed set of House (series 3)?

Decisions, decisions...

* I have never seen a four-star-and-above hotel man so excited by the prospect of camping in a field. I think it was the excuse to buy gadgets. He certainly amassed an impressive collection of wind-up battery-operated lights. Perhaps he's planning on doing a spot of interrogation while he's over there? (He's gonna kill me for writing this.)

** I wore my specs to work on Tuesday instead of my contact lenses. Most of my colleagues have never seen me wearing glasses before. The responses ranged from "hey, cool specs" to "wow, you look like a sexy office dominatrix with those". I have made a mental note to wear my specs in public more often.

Did anyone notice...

... that I changed the design of this blog again?

Can you tell I get bored very easily, very quickly?

No wonder I have so many job changes on my CV.

The Age of the Understatement

I never thought much of the Arctic Monkeys, but this new "spin-off" duo, known as The Last Shadow Puppets, is impressive, particularly if this single -- The Age of the Understatement -- is anything to go by. I love the retro-Sixties sound and look. And the lyrics are great too. Don't know who penned "She would throw a feather boa in the road..." but it's a wonderful line. Both chaps are just 22... You can find out more via the official website.

Health update

Good news: the upper respiratory tract infection seems to be on the wane.

Bad news: the conjunctivitis in the right eye has now spread to the left eye. Yes, I look like a rabbit with mixamatosis (did I spell that right?).

If I was a horse they would have shot me years ago.
------------------ Sent with Instant Email from T-Mobile

Falling apart

I went to the pharmacy after work tonight and bought the following items - this might give you some idea of my current state of health:

• Ibuprofen - for back pain
• Cough medicine - for chesty cough
• Antibiotic eye drops - for conjunctivitis
• Vitamin C and zinc tablets - for an ever-suffering immune system.

Unfortunately I couldn't find anything to sort the throat infection which now seems to have worked its way into my inner ear, so that I'm now going deaf (as well as blind). 

God knows what I am going to be like when I'm a (really) old woman!

------------------ Sent with Instant Email from T-Mobile

Think I picked the right week to take off

After so much crappy weather these past few weeks, I'm so pleased the sun's decided it might be worth making an appearance this week.

[Post courtesy of my neighbour's unsecure wireless connection -- we are still without internet.]

The Kyoto Garden

Place: Kyoto Garden, Holland Park, London.
Date: May 4, 2008.
Camera: Panasonic DMC-TZ3.

My sister, brother-in-law and three-year-old niece are in town, so I am taking the week off work to spend some time with them and do some sight-seeing.

Yesterday we took a walk to Holland Park, a gorgeous oasis of green, just off Kensington High Street. I have strolled through this park countless times -- indeed when I first landed in London, back in the summer of 1998, I based myself at the Holland Park Youth Hostel for a few weeks while I looked for permanent accommodation. Despite this, I never really knew about the Kyoto Gardens until a few weeks ago when I read about it on someone else's blog! Talk about one of London's best kept secrets.

The Kyoto Garden is a medium-sized pond and waterfall garden which was opened in 1991 to celebrate the Japanese Festival. It's lovely and peaceful, although the signs warning people that it is a "garden for quiet reflection" seems to have been much ignored judging by the amount of people wandering through it willy nilly yesterday afternoon. Still, now I know it's there, I'll make a point of visiting when it's not likely to be particularly busy --  so that'll be 8am one weekday morning, then!

BoJo is the new mayor

I woke up on Saturday morning and didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

Unfortunately my prediction came true: London mayor Ken Livingstone was ousted by Boris Johnson.

Be afraid, be very afraid.

Election day

I've just cast my vote in the London mayoral elections.

If you believe the media hype it's a two-way tussle between current mayor Ken Livingstone and Tory party candidate Boris Johnson.

Apparently the result won't be known until tomorrow, but if bumbling Boris gets in I won't be happy.

PS. I am without a broadband internet connection at home hence the lack of recent posts. This one is being brought to you courtesy of my Blackberry handset.

Hitler gets the wrong motorbike

As someone who very much enjoyed Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman's Long Way Round -- the book and DVD -- this little clip really tickles my fancy!

Whitby

Place: Whitby, on the north-east coast of England.
Date: June 21, 2007.
Camera: Sony Cybershot DSC-W1.

Last summer I was fortunate enough to visit Whitby, on the north-east Yorkshire coast, with my dad, who was visiting from Australia, and his cousin, who lives just up the road, for a quick day trip. I never got around to posting any of my pictures and, to be honest, I'd pretty much forgotten about them until I was reorganising my photographic archive early last week.

Whitby is one of those magical English seaside villages where the houses that line the steep cliffs look like they're about to tumble into the ocean at any moment. Their positions seem so precarious, you wonder how they've survived for so long without falling into the maze of cobblestone alleyways and narrow streets below.

From the top of the East Cliff -- where the parish church of St Mary's stands alongside the ruins of St Hilda's Abbey -- you can see all of Whitby and the River Esk spread before you, a sea of red roofs and grey cobblestones in the foreground, the green of the Yorkshire dales in the background. It's an amazing sight.

This was my second visit to Whitby and it had lost none of its charm from the first time I'd walked its streets and gorged on its delicious fish'n'chips -- possibly the best in the UK, I have to say -- back in 1998. 

Any Australians who read this blog may like to know that Whitby is the very place from where Captain James Cook set sail for Australia. He was also educated in nearby Great Ayton.

But the fishing village also has an important literary heritage, for it was here that Irish writer Bram Stoker began penning his classic horror novel, Dracula, while on holiday in 1890. In fact Whitby features quite heavily in the book, because this is the place where one of the main characters, Lucy, meets Dracula for the first time. Spooky.

You can view more pictures of my visit to Whitby via my Flickr account.

Australian reviewer pans U23D

I wonder if The Age reviewer Jim Schembri realised you were supposed to wear special glasses while watching U23D. Why else would he describe it in a paltry three-paragraph review as a "distinctly underwhelming experience"?

A weekend of wet and occasionally sunny weather

It's been one of those weekends where the weather has conspired to keep us indoors. We've had intermittent thunderstorms, accompanied by very heavy rain and light hail, throughout yesterday and today.

I made it to the supermarket yesterday afternoon for a quick top-up shop without getting too wet, but it wasn't so much the rain I was worried about but the cold. The temperatures have plummeted and I've resorted to sitting on the sofa every evening wrapped up in my fleecy rug. (T thinks it is hilarious -- I've told him it's genetic, as my late maternal grandmother was notorious for sitting in front of the TV, an assorted pile of handknitted/crocheted rugs tucked up under her chin to ward off the chill. I've now named my rug the "Florrie rug" in her honour.)

Today has been similarly cold and wet, but there have been bursts of occasional sunshine too. It was interesting watching the London marathon on my laptop, seeing the runners pound the streets under sunny skies while here, about seven miles west, it was teeming with rain. Some 15 minutes later the rain reached central London and drenched the athletes while outside our window the sun was shining brightly. It was like this all day -- downpours broken by short periods of clear skies -- so goodness knows what the rest of the week will be like.

My sister, who lives in tropical Queensland, arrives from Australia on Friday, so I hope she's packed something warm: she may be in for quite a shock when she gets to Heathrow, and I'm not just talking about the state of the airport!