Diet

All’s well that smells well

January 3, 2014 by Blog Editor

It’s time to wrap up my 2012 Perfume Project! Technically the end of 2012 would have been the timely time to do it, but let’s crack on anyway!

After sniffing 52 perfumes over 52 weeks, the winner was the first one I tried, Chanel’s Coco. Deemed “earthy, dramatic and foxy” when first scooshed in January 2012, it’s remained earthy, dramatic and foxy every time I’ve retested. I haven’t got round to forking out for a bottle yet, but it’s nice to know there’s the potential to smell that way. In my own mind, at least!
The runner up was the orange blossomy goodness of Elie Saab, followed by Vanilla Freesia & Lychee by Korres. The latter was a gift from The Mothership and is a nice everyday fragrance which makes one smell like an exotic, summery, fancy cake. In a good way!
The worst: Rive Gauche by YSL. I love the packaging – it looks like a canister in which an evil madman would store a lethal gas that would DESTROY THE WORLD if broken open – but I agree with Gareth’s verdict that I reeked, “like an old piano teacher from the 1970s”
It’s so easy to be seduced by packaging. Would the Project outcomes be different had it been all Blind Sniffings? I love Coco’s classy glass; would I be half as enamoured if it looked more like a bottle of Irn Bru? I was also gutted that I didn’t like any of Tom Ford’s perfumes no matter how hard I sniffed… the packaging is so swanky! And even if I had liked Marc Jacob’s Daisy, I probably would never buy it as the dorky bottle reminds of an Avon kids’ fragrance I got for Christmas in the 80s.
The best part of the Project was testing the wee samples donated by Debra. Many were tiny, plain vials attached to a handwritten label, so I had to use my nose and not be led astray by fancy packaging. Debra, if you’re out there, thanks again! I passed them on to a good friend doing her own Perfume Project. I hope they will keep jetting around the country ’til they’re all snuffed out.
My favourite of Debra’s collection was En Passant by Frederic Malle Editions de Parfums. My notes were, “Vanillaish? Aquatic. Warm. Not old lady.” The professional reviews I read afterwards used words like stems, leaves, linen, cucumber. Are these things really subjective or is my nose making shit up?
All in all, it was a great project and I missed having a pointless yet absorbing project (with accompanying spreadsheet) this past year. Where to for 2014? 52 malt whiskys in 52 weeks? When in Rome, and all that? Hmm… back to the drawing board.

Back to the bar

December 22, 2013 by Blog Editor

Moving from Fife to the Highlands has been like moving from Oz to Scotland, in miniature. My brain wandered down the same path as ten years ago:

First stage – running around like a mad chook securing employment, with a cloud of self-doubt lurking overhead. You suck! You have nae skills! Get set to live in a cardboard box, CHUMP!

Second stage – frazzled by all that putting-oneself-out-there, giving in to urge to hide from the world in my tracky dacks and eat chocolate.

Luckily I recognised the pattern in early November and deployed the same solution as I did in 2003: lift heavy objects!

I was digging the river walks, but my exercise was missing the RARRRRR Factor. Walking generates feelings of zen and goodwill, but I wanted to generate some badassery!

Initially I thought I’d join a gym, having sold off my dumbbell collection due to lack of space at Chez Nessie. But then I randomly found a personal trainer who was not only very affordable but a big fan of ladies lifting heavy weights. And she’d linked to a Stumptuous article on her Facebook page, the very website that got me hooked on weights way back in 2001. She had to be a good egg!

And she is. I’ve had weekly sessions since the start of November and I feel bloody awesome! She has proper weighty weights with the chunky bar and big plates; it’s all very She-Ra. And there’s boxing gloves and pads too, so we can extract the very last of my energy with a final flurry of punches.

I don’t know why I didn’t think of this earlier! I get to do the kinds of exercise I love most, but customised to my dilapidated knee situation. It took a bit of budget shuffling (I became obsessed with budgeting this year. Anyone else? Is that too dull of a thing to write about!?) but it was so worth making a priority.

The heavier the weights get, the lighter I feel. I’m daydreaming of doing a pull-up someday. And that optimism is spilling over to other areas of life. I didn’t notice how ordinary I’d been feeling ’til I started feeling good. POW!

(I realise this is a random rubbishy kind of post but I just want to get back on the writing wagon!)

Loose ends:

After four months inside, Mother-In-Law Mary left hospital at the end of October to continue her recovery at home. She is an absolute champ!
The Bed Bits never surfaced. Methinks I chucked them away in my downsizing frenzy. But I called the manufacturer and they’re are sending us a “Replenish Kit” with all the bits. The fact that it has a name shows I’m not the only dickhead who has done this!

Dispatches from Chez Nessie

October 27, 2013 by Blog Editor

I’ve been in Inverness for four weeks now, but I found good cake on the first day!

#priorities

I’ve been going for morning walks along the river. In the mornings there are blokes fly fishing, standing in the middle of the river in waders. I never see them catch anything; I think they just like standing there. I also like watching dogs who’ve been let off their leads. They zoom straight to the steep banks, and when I look across from the opposite side it’s a series of zig-zagging hound shapes, snuffling up and down the slopes.
Most of all I dig the spectacular trees that flank the river. They’re all yellow and autumnal, and sparkly with fairy lights at night.

Nighttime trees

Do you ever wonder why humans find water so soothing? All crabbitness dissolves as soon as I get to the river. Why don’t I feel the same way about a tarmaced carpark or a brick wall? I guess water has been around for a long time and our brains evolved to find it pleasant. Maybe in a million years our tastes will expand and we’ll be fighting to buy houses with exclusive waste-dump or maximum security prison views.
Chez Nessie has an abnormally small kitchen/living room. The movers actually laughed when they brought the couch in. “Where should we put this? Oh how about RIGHT DOWN HERE, coz there’s naewhere else!”. You can sit on the couch and just about reach out with your leg to switch the light on with your foot on the opposite wall. I dig that kind of energy saving.
You’d think with the kitchen being right there next to the couch we’d stop arguing over who carries the plates to the sink after dinner or whose turn it is to make the tea. NO and NO.
For almost ten years of togetherness, Gareth worked from home while I trudged off to work in the real world. Now revenge is finally mine! He starts brewing at 6AM most days, so while he stumbles around in the dark it’s my turn to open one eye and mumble faux-innocently, “Oh… is it getting-up time?” then pull the duvet over my head.

Morning walk

Good bits of working from home: pajamas and radio. Bad bits: too many cups of tea. Rubbish office banter. About 45 steps per day on my Fitbit if I forget to move!
Any other remote workers out there feel the need to overcompensate for their lack of bodily office presence? I am doing my work twice as fast and responding to emails like a demon. Whereas back in Dunfermline I would have spun around on my chair for awhile or revived the Isn’t It Funny How You Get Hungry Five Minutes After Eating An Apple conversation or made a round of tea before opening the inbox.

Fife is like a box of chocolates

September 29, 2013 by Blog Editor

Dunfermline Abbey

Tomorrow arvo I’ll train it up to Inverness to finally join Gareth, so I’m feeling temporarily nostalgic about 8.5 years of Dunfermline and Kingdom of Fife life. And not just for the proximity to Edinburgh! I will miss…

The Fife accent
I’m sure there are sub-Fife accents (so pendants, hold your fire), but in general there’s a porridge-thick accent that took me years to comprehend. You hear a lot of “ken?” or “eh” at the end of sentences and may be greeted with “Arright pal?” in the way Aussies do with “G’day mate”. Somewhere along the line I swapped “no worries” for “nae bother pal” and I sound bloody ridiculous.

Carnegie statue

The Glen
Ol’ Andrew Carnegie didn’t forget his home town when he went to America to make his millions – he left the Dunny with Pittencrieff Park, better known as The Glen. It’s where I did my 5K training, had our Scottish wedding and got blinded by the pale bare torsos of local lads whenever the sun came out. Gareth took me there on our first date and after we did a lap he said of his town, “Well… that’s about it!”.

Peacock doon the Glen

Springtime in the park

Groovy places galore
You cannae beat Dunfermline Abbey. St Andrews. Falkland Palace. Culross. The fishing villages along the East Neuk (and the fish and chips). And the jewel in the crown, THE SECRET BUNKER!

Deep doon the bunker

Cultural happenings

The woods
I will miss pottering around the woods near our village. Why didn’t I go up there more often? It’s quiet and dark with bouncy pine needles on the ground, and every time I went for a walk I’d say “I need to come back with a picnic or do some writing or just have a snooze” but I never did, dagnabbit.

Bluebells in spring, too

The beautiful Forth Rail Bridge
THE GREATEST OF ALL BRIDGES.

Forth Rail Bridge

Not to mention wonderful pals, discovering kickboxing (let’s not mention destroying my knee), the giant chip-guzzling seagulls, and the most incredible yoga class.

Now bring on the North!

Might come in handy one day

September 21, 2013 by Blog Editor

Some called me lazy back in January, when I shoved the Christmas tree into a garbage bag and tossed into the loft with the decorations still on it, but now it’s packed up and ready to move! FORWARD PLANNING.

Hmm… looking a bit wonky up top

This tasty feeling of turning my life upside down reminds me of leaving Oz in 2003. I love a good life reboot. Back then it was distilling a Canberra apartment into a suitcase; this time it’s a family-size house and garage down to a two-bedroom flat (demand outweighs supply up there, they say). Gareth is mourning the garage brewery, but I’m pumped for smaller digs and pared-down possessions. The more stuff that walks out the door, the more space and lightness I feel in my brain. It’s a calm and quiet process this time though; not a gleeful running-away-from-something feeling.
Unlike a decade ago, I’m not scared of the unknown. I’m not worrying if this is the right or wrong move. It’s just a move. I’m not one to wang on about “The Universe” or fate or destiny… I reckon life is a mish-mosh of a) conscious decisions and b) completely random shit. So I will let things unfold, try to be open and choose whatever path feels best at the time. Something will happen up there, and whatever that is, even if it sucks I’ll get through it eventually.
I’ve been Gumtree-ing like a mofo. Gumtree is the dogs’ knob. I put a random item up there, and on average within half a day someone’s picked it up. Example: our gigantic, ancient television is too big for the flat. It was a cast-off from friends who’d originally got it free from a pub. Now it gets a fourth life with a stranger from Glenrothes. In your face, fancy flat-screen tellies!

Will miss this sunset view

Tip: Think carefully before shacking up with someone with hobbies that require lots of objects. Beware of home brewers, multi-instrumentalists and cyclists. Especially all three rolled into one person. And those who keep random planks of wood because they Might Come In Handy Some Day. I love you Gareth, but every time I open a cupboard I want to run away and be one of those minimalists. I’d travel the world with nowt but three pairs of undies, a Moleskine notebook and insufferable smugness. I’d stop typing vowels too, jst t cnsrv spc.
Most of my stuff is paper – souvenirs, notebooks, letters and Very Important newspaper cuttings. I nearly turfed it all into storage but decided to spend a few days sorting it properly. I pared four mega boxes into one shoe box of special stuff. I took my pal Sara‘s advice that if you don’t have room for something, take a photo then ditch it! Everything not photographed or boxed up now lives on in the brain-shed (or the heart one).

Travel agent note from 2003… this made the cut

So we’re getting there. I can say without an ounce of self-deprecation I look and feel like crap! The past three months have been a bit intense. I’m not whinging – how could I with all Mary is going through (she’s making great progress, by the way!) – but my brain is overwhelmed mush. It’s taken me a week to bring you this gibberish! I want to fast forward to trotting along the River Ness and getting back into my routines. So excited for that.
I went into the loft last night to get more boxes. It’s so quiet and peaceful up there. I could hear the wind and the farmer ploughing the field nearby. I wished I’d appreciated the loft more this past four years. More than just a cardboard graveyard, turns out it’s a great place for nap!

Will move for beer

September 5, 2013 by Blog Editor

There is a large built-in cupboard in our bedroom, of which the real estate agent said at the time of purchase, “That could make a nice ensuite one day.”

EXCELLENT, I thought. Though in reality you might squeeze in a loo and a small sink if you were lucky. The micro-ensuite budget never seemed to eventuate, but I enjoyed the possibility of an upstairs loo, every time I trudged downstairs at 2am, cursing that 10pm cuppa.

But then Gareth discovered brewing.

It started innocently, with a basic beginners kit during the 2010 World Cup. After a few of those he moved on to the brew-in-a-bag method.

Then he took over the garage and built an elaborate brewery with catering-size tea urns, a big Esky/cooler box and a shitload of pipes for all-grain brewing.

Then he turned an old bar fridge into a temperature-controlled conditioning thing, then another old bar fridge into a beer dispenser complete with taps on the front for that at-home pub experience.

He started entering competitions and the freezer was full of hops and the fridge was full of yeast experiments and the bookshelves were stuffed with brewing bibles. The micro-ensuite had become a cellar and 90% of our conversations went like this:

“Taste this beer.”

“I told you a million times, I don’t like beer!”

“You have to like beer, I have 40 bottles of it in the cupboard.”

“I’m sorry!”

“Well can you at least smell it. Do you get blackcurrant?” (or coffee or citrus or some random aroma)

“I get… BEER!”

“You are a shite assistant brewer!”

“Dude… have you ever wondered if this moving slightly beyond a hobby?”

This is not a giant beer! Just a screwy camera angle.

Then came many long months of pondering, calculating, soul-search and research. Finally last September he went back to university to start a Masters in Brewing & Distilling. A year on, he’s finished the course, wound up his engineering life and has just this week started his first job at a real live brewery!

It’s not in Gareth’s nature to jump up and down and allow himself a moment to actually celebrate doing something cool, so I will do it here on his behalf, darnit. I’m so freaking happy that he made this happen. It’s scary and new and crazy but it feels so right.

He really loves this brewing malarkey. The blend of geekery, creativity and graft suits him so well. He can’t stop talking about it and I have no idea what he’s on about but I love how his face lights up. I feel a wee bit teary just typing this.

Best of all, he now gets to wear a hoodie to work. “I’ve finally fulfilled my ultimate career ambition!” he declared.

So, I’d mentioned moving the other day and this is the long winded explanation of why! The brewery is near Inverness and I am on-the-verge-of-spewnami excited for a Highland adventure. I’ll be heading up at the end of the month, just as soon as I clear out the bloody cellar.

Diet

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