DIFF 2007

It's that time of year again film buffs, check out the programme here.

a change is like a holiday (?)

For the first time in my career I love my job. Something just clicked in me this year, and I really began to get the most from my job. I love the interesting people I work with, I love the kind of work I'm doing, I am looked after financially. So why have I just resigned?

This last week has been a rollercoaster of emotions. Deciding to leave a place that you are so happy with is difficult, but ultimately this is a career move. I need to learn, grow, get out of my comfort zone etc. I still don't know if this is right, but, there is only one way to learn. I am young, and if I can't take risks now, then when can I?

Plus, think of all the shoes I can buy with my new package…

travelstart

Travelstart was started by Stephan Ekbergh in 1999. Although he probably wouldn't like us to say it, Stephan is a bit of a visionary when it comes to travel. In 1995 he created Sweden's first fully-automated, telephone-based travel booking company called Sistaminutenplatser. The system utilised a tone-dialling menu that was unique at the time. It was crazy and complicated, but he didn't stop there!

Well one thing led to another, and after some highs and lows (as invariably happens in the life of an entrepreneur) Stephan eventually launched Travelstart in 1999.

After being wildly successful in Scandinavia, Stephan decided to re-locate to the warmer climes of South Africa. Having settled with his family in beautiful Cape Town, Stephan wanted to bring the Scandinavian travel revolution to South Africa - so here we are! more

Don't be wasting your time with iffy travel agents anymore, this is THE place to book flights online, especially long haul. These peops are cool.

aussie day

By pure coincidence, the first 2 CDs we played in the studio sound system were aussie themed. The first was something new, Xavier Rudd. Kinda like the aussie Jack Johnson. Really cool. Now we are listening to the Priscilla Queen of the Desert soundtrack, some good old skool numbers here.
So we have decided to play nothing but aussie music all day, and surprisingly its a pretty good selection. Think INXS, Kylie Minogue, Nick Cave, Savage Garden, Powderfinger, Crowded House, Men at Work, Ben Lee… And that's just off the top of my head. Not bad for down under.

ROCK 'N ROLLL!

L.A. Cobra are performing a Guns 'n Roses Tribute concert at Burn on friday. See you there…

quote of the day

belated birthday dinner fun

Maria cooked us a most delicious dinner again last night. Special butternut soup to start, then homemade spinach pie, and anchovy pasta for mains. We ended off with a rather messy but completely delish chocolate fountain. Only we can turn an innocent dinner into debauchery!

who wants some of my delicious pie?

africola

I found this bottle of Afri-Cola in Jozi at Big Blue and just loved the bold design. I wasn't quite sure what it was, it looked kinda like a novelty item. Ironically, although it's called 'afri' cola, everything else on the bottle is in german.

So I did some googling and its an actually a kinda posh coke. 'A sweet cola with a clean taste. This beverage is sweetened with real sugar and uses a base of mineral water, which give Afri-Cola a clean, crisp finish. This is a top notch cola.' It also contains 250mg of caffeine! Not recommended for the faint of heart.

I bought it for the cool design, but now I wish I had got a couple extra…

But wait, there's more. A found some REALLY cool TVCs on youtube. Check it out,

07|07|07

There hasn't been much publicity but thanks to Al Gore, the 7th July 2007 is Live Earth day. To raise awareness on global warming etc, they will be having 7 concerts around the globe. All carbon neutral and stuff. The lucky countries are USA, UK, Australia, Japan, China, South Africa and Brazil. So far only the first 3 countries have confirmed their line ups, but there has been huge support for the cause so we can expect some big names.
The jozi concert will be held in the Cradle of Humankind. My plane ticket was bought months ago, all I am waiting for is the tickets to go on sale.
So even if you don't go to the concert, go green. Use energy saver lightbulbs, ride a bicycle, and generally try to be aware of the impact you have on our planet. Cos that would be nice.

life and coffee

The best news I have heard in a long time - vida e caffé is opening a branch on Florida + Innes. I cannot wait… Essenwood Market is gonna have some serious saturday morning competition.
I think I might quit the day job and become a barista.

pics: angeltoes

long weekend - jozi style

I got an invite from my friend in Jozi to come up for a weekend of fun and shopping and etc. Most certainly an offer that I would not refuse.

So here were the highlights of my weekend:

• coffee at vida e caffe. the most perfect foam ever.
• a shopping mission at Sandton City to find the perfect big slouchy bag. we settled on matchy patent snakeskin from Guess. Hot.
• my 5 seconds of broadcast fame. anyone watch go chat on friday?
• margaritas at capitol records in rosebank
• fuel in newtown - cool decor, chocolate martinis, dirty martinis, tree stumps on wheels, noah the tool + die maker (the animals went two by two you know)
• brekkie and handbag spotting at the woolies café at the design quarter. champayne and eggs, yum.
• 44 stanley. cool shops. angel picked up a cool retro flower table for a song.
• green destiny's and temaki at orient Melrose Arch. I NEED to drink more green destiny's!
• the palms in sandton. cool r+b, dancing like crazy, hanging with some of the enger-land rugby players (got some stories to tell there), 'elvis' and his friend 'the rabbi' keeping us entertained with some worrying dance moves, being asked by management to come back next week, angel not questioning my drunken antics…
• hangover brekkie at servicestation. iced cappuccinos are soothing on the kidneys.

Some lowlights:

• having my red delicious stolen out my luggage
• the rugby - nothing more to say here
• the footie - nothing more to say here
• discovering my first grey hair in the bathroom at the palms at 3am
• checking out the pics from the palms the next day. flash photography is not very flattering at all.
• the hangover that took the whole of sunday to unfold
• cats and dogs with farting issues
• getting up at 5am and then missing my flight back on monday morning.

yay | nay

YAY:
Tokyo Sexwale for president
Tanning in winter
Facebook addictions
Performance bonuses

NAY:
Woolies pies are now over R10!
Shabby Shick is still trying to get out of jail free
My puppy chewing up my shoes
Where is Madeleine?

happy birthyday to me!

Saturday was my 27th birthday. Boy, these birthdays creep up on you. I had a good day, and the days leading up to it were great too - got my performance bonus (heck-a-rooney!), bought my leopard print heels, got invited to a free weekend in jozi, have a mystery birthday to collect…
Saturday was a stunning day, so friggin hot. In all my 27 years I have never suntanned on the 12 May, but saturday, shoosh it was bleddie hot.
My plans were to head up to Maritzburg to see Liams band play. I was so keen to do something different, we tend to get into birthday ruts don't we? So Nadja and Porl picked me up (she made me the cutest little sewn flowery cd cover thingy) and we headed off to the midlands mall to meet Torsten & I for a bite to eat. We decided on SPUR for old times sake. I have never eaten so fast in my life! We literally had 15 minutes before the band started so we wolfed down those onions with speed. But there was still time for a quick sparkler/ice cream/clappy song. Then Torsten put us on the road to Johannesburg, so it was a close one, but luckily they didn't start without us. Bianca brought her cute baby/puppy with, so young and already jolling…
It was fab to hear Zephyr play for the first time, and Dan Patlansky was awesome too. Shitballs, that man can play the guitar. Needless to say, I drank far too many Jagerbombs, but luckily I was chaffeured back to my front door. Sunday was a bit rough, and I had some serious nausea issues if I made any sudden movements. Heh.

Purdy handmande felty cd cover + exboyfriend gum (I bet it tastes just RUBBISH ;)

tell us how you REALLY feel

I recently read my first Tom Robbins and in it was an exchange between a Can o' Beans and a Spoon regarding semantics. I have to agree with Can o' Beans, words just don't have the same meanings anymore, which explains why I often I can't find the words to articulate how I feel. Between slang and sarcasm, its a wonder basic communication is possible.
That is why I really enjoy movies set in long-ago-times. A Room with a View, anything Jane Austen, even Rome. They say EXACTLY what they mean, and it doesn't come across as rudeness. No innuendo. No presumptions. No waffling on about nothing. Speech was economical and effective and honest. I love that.

does it contain any NUTS?

My eating habits this year have been all over the place. I keep meaning to get myself organised, but it hasn't really happened. Breakfast is my worst, as I hate cold breakfasts. My ideal brekkie would be miso soup or dhal but lately it seems to be toast. So to solve the bread overkill I got my act together this weekend and made my own muesli. I'm not crazy about the shop bought kind, as they are far too sugary and contain yuckies like coconut and cashews and orange peel.

I got the recipe from my sister, its pretty simple and flexible:

3 cups Rolled Oats (Tiger Oats)
3 cups Porridge Oats (Jungle Oats)
6 cups nuts (your choice)
6 cups seeds (your choice)
180ml oil
200ml honey

Throw it all into a baking tray. Heat up the honey, add the oil and drizzle all over. Bake at 130ºC for about an hour and nicely toasted. You will need to stir it up every ten minutes or so.

I used almonds, hazelnuts, linseeds, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds and sesame seeds. I will add different fruity bits each day for variety.

So this morning I had my fresh crunchy muesli, with plain organic yoghurt and dried cranberries. Good stuff.

I also cooked my world famous most delicious mac and cheese with the works. I usually make my white sauce with soya milk, but I bought the Plain Alprosoy instead of the Unsweetened one. So now my mac and cheese has a strange, sweet, custardy vibe. And I made a HUGE batch. These are the lessons on the road to perfect mac and cheese.

I want Robert Downey Jr

I saw a snippet of this on the weekend and had to go find it on YouTube. Wow. Robert Downey Jr plus Elton John song equals goosebumpy stuff. And it was shot in one take.

Feist

My newest latest discovery is Feist. I heard their song 'My Moon My Man' on the radio yesterday and they are my new favourite thing. Listen out for it on 5fm, reminds me a wee bit of Nouvelle Vague. The singer is a lady from Canada called Leslie Feist. She's been in a few bands, but I think she is doing her own thing at the moment. This is her second album and I am keen to give it a listen - Amazon here we come…

Leah Ann Edwards

Leah Ann Edwards was born on 19 April 2007. Her mom is Lil Debs who lives far away in deepest darkest africa (okay, Tanzania) and stuff.

4th Book Club - Cafe 1999

Oh I love Cafe 1999. I hadn't been there since last year for my birthday when we threw name and got reprimanded. This time I was a lot more behaved. It was a lovely evening, we had a great waiter, the food was tasty and the conversation was interesting. It is so cool how every book club we have had has been so completely different.
I had a delish bowl of the ubiquitious deep fried olives and these phyllo cigars with mozzarella and basil. Damn, their food is good.

Sadly Man Utd got their ass whipped last night, luckily I didn't have to watch, it would have been too stressful…

semi long weekend

So Friday was Freedom Day which meant a lot of lazing around on the couch and some serious catching up of Rome I. That night we headed out to Eighties for a CHEAP jol. On fridays, chicks get in for free and get free drinks (?). I know. Trouble. Do you get a cheaper vodka than Russian Bear? Cos I think that's what they were serving us. Nasty. So we all proceeded to get very drunk very quickly. I don't know exactly when everything went pear shaped but dancing in the 'cage' sounded like a real good idea. But I could tell that these chicks next to me were thinking the same thing, so I shoved past, elbowing them out of the way. One of them must of pushed me back, cos my sister-in-law saw and decided to punch the chick in the boob (she was probably aiming for the face but she is really short). So we went mental in the cage dancing like crazy (my thighs were aching the next day). Then it came time to leave… so G headed off first, whilst I tried to create a diversion with my kickin' dance moves. Didn't work… one of the chicks she shoved earlier stormed over and demanded an apology, G refused and this chick gave her such a shove. She literally flew across the room and hit the wall. Next thing the bouncers are involved and we are all being asked to leave… Talk about throwing name. Won't be going there in while.

looking vaguely presentable

Saturday morning I chilled out, met the guys for brekkie at BBB. Had Eggs Benedict, but wasn't too impressed that the eggs weren't 'hand' poached and it was served on a sesame bun instead of an english muffin.
That night it was pizza and wine at my sister's place. I hired Junebug, which I had heard a lot of good things about. WELL. I don't know what to say, it was not what I had expected at all. It wasn't BAD, just different.

perfect poached eggs - I don't dig it

Sunday night it was back to Joe Cools for more cheapy drinks. This time we kept it kinda tidy. They have actually revamped it pretty good, it doesn't smell like vomit anymore. The vibe and the peops and the music are pretty good too. Though my sister was peed off that they didn't play her favourite song of the moment, Cupids Chokehold.

Monday was back to work, and Tuesday too. We've been busy so they asked us to work the day. Woo Hoo. When is the next long weekend?

p.s. there are more hooligan pics on my flickr for my contacts, don't say I didn't warn you…