Discussion Thread 🦜 Wednesday 21 May 2025

Eyyyy happy anniversary to me and his lordship. 14 years of marriage, a lot more in general, we're gonna pork it up at big pig and then watch a shitload of malcolm in the middle on a heated blanket with fat purring cats.

ours was the other week. Due to a bad back I struggled to chase the kid around the playground so Mrs B did that which left me sitting in the restaurant watching the hockey.
Happy anniversary!! What an excellent way to celebrate, enjoy!
Sounds delightful. Conga rats!

I’ve just experienced a real security lockdown at work today during finishing time.

All is ok and everyone was locked on site until the situation was cleared.

I really hope we don’t have to go through this more in the future.

Just got home after leaving work at 5pm. Given that I live in the inner north ... The tram I was in was t-boned by a car on St Georges Road just shy of my stop. Stuck there for quite a while. Everyone is OK tg. Just some very spectacular scars on the tram's paintwork and the car's front end is pretty much cactus. I would like to know how someone could not notice a tram directly in front of them with all it's lights on and pinging its bell etc.

Glad you’re ok!

It’s cold as balls this morning - for the 3rd day in a row! 🥶🎾

Where is the global warming that this climate change promised us? I was expecting Mai tais..

Frdge effect. All the heat has been taken from us to fry the other side of the planet.

Blergh long day.

Gibson needs food. Strays need food.

Simon eventually gets food lol

Edit: whole gang was waiting and they bolted to the food spot as soon as they saw me lol

🐈🐈‍⬛💖

Finally Simon can eat something lol

I'm gonna have to suck it up I think, and just get another call centre job - that way I can pay for driving lessons, rent and bills without being fucked in the arse, and then I can apply for industry jobs when I have my Ps.

I can lie through my teeth and nab another cc job; "I'm totally gonna be here long term", "yes I believe in the vision of your business" - then I can bail when I have the rest of my eggs lined up.

I can do it. Deep breaths.

You can do it.
Yes. I'll be hard, specially after your last experience. But there is an end date. Get a cheap calendar and mark off the days. Even just a few weeks of salary will build up an emergency fund and give you some (financial) peace of mind. Something else that might be useful in your situation - short term/casual cleaning contracts. My sister did this for a bit to cover a financial gap. Basically picking up rubbish after events. She got lucky and got a contract to do Flemington after race days. Good money for very flexible work. And the head contractor provides all safety equipment etc. Given that you're close to public transport and venues this might be worth looking into.
How long do you have left of your course?
You've got this!
- Not long, a month or two I think :)
You can do it put your back into it

Yeah he's done for the day.

Still hopeless at the dog park. Zero recall ability. Today just wandered off when I was chuckin' the ball, found someone else with a ball and decided that was a better ball so followed the lady with the 'better' ball (who wasn't even throwing it) around for 10 mins. I thought alright maybe he'll come back.. nope. Had to go get him (again).

Caution: Perth day 1 photo dump
::: spoiler spoiler

:::

Ugh the blue skies and the unbeatable Swan River, wish I was on holiday there rn. Keep the pics coming
Lovely pics! Keep them coming!

That was a really, really good massage - holy shit do my shoulders need a lot of work. Went fuck it and booked another short head/neck/shoulders massage for next week so they can work on it a bit more. I'm so glad I went for this, my body is a lot happier having been attended to and the masseuse was really lovely too so it felt just like a Good Thing in general.

Got blood test out of the way after that (also a really lovely gentleman) and then treated myself to a banh mi - must be my lucky day because I got six free baguette rolls as a bonus!! Breakfast sorted for the next few days 😋

Now I'm just enjoying a bit of Sun and naycha while it's still warm enough... Then time for psych stuff. Then I might grab some yoghurt on the way back because my gut is definitely a bit out of whack atm. It's a good day where I am being fantastic to myself. Yes.

yay, you are worth it 😘

I wasn't in the right lane to take a turn I needed, so ended up driving through the CBD. In peak hour. I managed not to run over any pedestrians, scooter riders or delivery bikes. I also survived a hook turn.

I don’t often drive in the city, but when I do I’m always shocked by the number of food delivery scooters and bikes. Why get delivery when all you need to do is go down the lift and walk a block or 2? Would be a good reason to stretch your legs. I live in the burbs so walkable city convenience seems pretty fancy to me.
I did my first hook turn last year!

I have reached an agreement where instead of taking lunch I can leave an hour early.

This is great.

Cool.
The good old take lunch at the end of the day but leave an hour earlier to do it.

I fed Ted downstairs in another room with the door closed. Bill is meowing pathetically that he can't steal Ted's food now.

Poor boys… perhaps a steamed vegie snack might fill their hollow bellies. (Melbcat eats pumpkin and broccoli)
- they are both so fat they are on a diet

Broccoli is the messiest vegetable to chop. The little bits of the florets that shed off go everywhere and smear if you apply the wrong pressure at cleanup.

Agreed! I am almost tempted to microwave the bunch whole - like it was a cauliflower. And put a nice cheesy sauce on it.
Speaking of nice sauces, for dins tonight I did the water 'fried' chicken wings things again. Oh wow! Oh wow! This is definitely going on high rotation. Used 500g of wings, barely covered with water. Put a couple of generous teaspoons of crushed ginger/garlic paste in the water to start with. When half the water had evaporated put in a slug of soy sauce, some crushed chilli (from a jar) with some dijon mustard and some worcestershire sauce and a tablespoon of honey. When the rest of the water had evaporated put in the juice of half a lemon and turned it all out on a platter. Yummmmmmmm. Ate half the wings over rice but I reckon crusty bread would work too. The other half of the wings is for tomorrow reheated. The sauce was magically good. Worked out as richly flavoured, a bit sweet, a bit hot, a bit tangy and deliciously sticky. Finger licking obligatory. Took about an hour all up but def worth it. I wonder if adding tomato sauce would be interesting .... next time.
- These sound amazing, I’m gonna try it!
Cut off a floret, turn it upside down, crosshatch the stem. It now pulls apart with no mess.

I rugged up. Long sleeve t, fisherman's rib jumper, slicker, knitted hat, warm socks and boots.

there is an inversion layer over the bay and all the ships looked like they were floating in air

I found a cowrie shell and a piece of coral

a willy wag tail was hanging about the sea wall and breakwater

Surgical pre-admission question: Do you live at home?
Facetious reply: Where you live is called your home.

Hot Dog night 🌭

Yum.
it's guacomole night here
it's fresh food made with guacs, tomato, spring onion, coriander and a little chili sauce. eat with a few chips

Memory moment from tv: the foldy back page of MAD magazine

Goodnight all :)

Miss Meow has nearly as much furniture as I do! I plan to also put a kitchen trolley I have into the corner to act as a dog safe feeding platform.

I'm off to the shops to man handle all the meat like the senior citz do. Hopefully I can get lamb shanks. I have plans for them.

I'll be dusting off the slow cooker any time now and lamb shanks will first up for a winter warmer!
- So good to hear from you!
  It's happening tomorrow. Possibly curried lamb shanks.

Almost every weekday morning from 7am some fucker's dog several blocks away starts barking non stop for a solid hour. I'm so incredibly fed up with it but I'm surprised none of this guy's immediate neighbours haven't found a spare tranquilizer dart to send a message yet. I'm so very over living here, can't wait to move somewhere quieter...

I lived right next to one, literally behind the fence that barks for a few hours in the middle of the night. After a while I get used to it.

The birds are not chirping this morning. Might be too dark still.

Trying to get work done but it seems like Office 365 is tweaking right now

This company uses Google spaces. I'm so fucking grateful I was given a 365 license.
- They can both be arse in their own ways but I think I'd prefer Google overall

0.1c And it definitely feels that way.

Time for a snack.

Woke up with both ears fully blocked, so toddling off for a cleaning this morning. Hoping the fact I haven't used drops doesn't mean it's too blocked.

Taking it as an opportunity to wfh though.

Melbcat is curled up with me enjoying the electric blanket. Toasty baby

Not feeling great today at all. Headache and light sensitivity that comes and goes (all this screen time and coffee definitely not helping), starting to feel nauseous, really ragged and tired. Brain distorting random memories about thesis into nightmare situations. Taking it as an overwhelming sign to take a break...

Luckily I snapped out of being bed-locked and booked myself in for a full one hour massage this arvo at a place round the corner, ahead of psych session later. It's an ongoing thing to actually choose things that legitimately feel good instead of constantly hunting down digital dopamine.

My anxiety and catastrophising always spikes before I get sick. But thesis writing will do it too. Wise choice of massage before your psych appointment. Take care
- Definitely felt like I was heading in the direction of falling sick but sort of self-generated as opposed to catching a bug. I'm not entirely surprised tbh, this whole thing has brought up a lot of old memories and ingrained bad habits etc. I can't wait to be free of this burden and move on with life 🙂

I’ve bought some more Concrobium… it’s pricey but I’m trying to deal with the spread of mould -_-

Everything was fine until the unfixable roof leak appeared and now any patch of moisture or damp is fair game.

I envy my dog for braving the cold weather.

I made cheese sauce earlier this week so the boys could have steamy nachos like in the Steamy Nachos song (Jerry was a racecar driver by Primus).

It turned out quite well, and it's easy to make. Essentially a roux with a bunch of grated cheese mixed in. Here's the recipe

We use cheese sauce to cover veggies!
- I was thinking this with the sauce itself, once recipe called for putting a bunch of vegetables in the sauce. Or I could make the vegan version I found which seems to be slow cooked vegetables mashed up. Maybe I can treat it like the savoury version of a smoothie for them.
Have a look at queso recipes if you want inspo to tweak it a bit.
- I'll check them out, anything to mix things up and keep food interesting.
Nice. What brand of chips do you use?
- I use the fancy Mission chips. They're thicker and can take things like dip better

Lovely sunny day here. Want beach but I'm still recovering from a cold.

hate that i'm taking extra care now when i get sick, 😔😠, i can't deny i'm getting older

The fresh air will do you good. Also ozone etc. Bundle up warm and do beach I reckon.
- Really? It's low tide. 🙂

Beep Beep 🚚
🍏🍎🍐🍊🍋🍈🫐🍓🍇🍉🍌🍒🍑🥭🍍🥥🥦🥑🫛🍆🍅🥝🥬🥒🌽🥕🥐🍠🫚🥔🧅🥯🍞🥖🥨🧀🧇🥞🧈🍳🥚🥓🥩🍗🍖🫓🍕🍟🍔🌭🥙🧆🌮🌯🥗🍲🍜🍝🥘🍛🍣🍱🥟🦪🍥🍘🍚🍙🐠🍤🪼🦀🐙 🍗🥮🍢🍡🍧🍰🧁🥧🍦🍨🎂🍮🍭🍬🍫🥜🌰🍪🍿🍯🥛☕️🍵🍺🍶🥤🧋🧃🥂🍷🥃🍸🍹🧉🔋

Soup please chef. And some freshly baked crusty rolls.
- 🔥🍲🔥🍞
Ham and cheese toastie, on thick white bread, pleeeeease.
- 🍞
  🧀
  🍖
  🍞
Some famous Perth fish please
- 🤩🐟

My ongoing quest to create an edible/satisfying gluten (oat) free porridge continues. The current mix uses polenta+chia for the stickiness, rice flakes+millet for texture and coconut+ground up almond for yums. It's ok but the millet takes way too much soaking and cooking to get soft. I might try to source some aramath instead.

I found a pretty good store bought one but it's not cheap so I'm using their ingredients as a starting point for my experiments. The polenta was a good addition.

Is rice based ‘porridge’ a go? It’s not really the same but cheap
Edit: Sorry saw someone already suggested that
I grow amaranth in the garden. Pretty stuff, and it grows really easily.
- Amaranth seeds might be harder to harvest in quantity from home growing compared to leaves though. (I friggin love amaranth leaves)
Have you tried buckwheat porridge? It’s commonly eaten in eastern European countries, where it’s called Kasha. Buckwheat is not related to wheat, it’s gluten free.
- Yeah I like buckwheat porridge. Just wanted to branch out a bit this winter
Is porridge meant to be sticky?
I make a smooth porridge with quick oats and water. Quick oats are precooked. Then I might add some sultanas, chopped banana, brown sugar, butter, milk
- Er, quick oats are not pre-cooked. They are rolled thinner and ground up smaller so they cook very quickly. That is all. Unless the packet says of course.
- Sticky is probably not the right word, I find non oat porridges all a bit grainy in texture unless I do a quick blitz with the stick blender. Unfortunately oats are not for me anymore
Are you soaking it overnight, maybe even 24hrs?