but seriously

how good are sleater-kinney.

kwik-e-mart

i was in seattle and next to the space needle they had set up a kwik-e-mart to celebrate the simpsons movie. it ruled, look at the picture of the tubby cop with wiggum...

donut soup

molecular gastronomy is a very intriguing topic for me. mixing up textures and flavours and the food stauts quo; snail icecream, melon spheres etc. i read all i can about the fat duck and el bulli and the crazy shit they get up to. i think it's beyond me, however it's interesting to read from a wtf perspective. however one of my regular food blog reads had a pretty easy one; donut soup . pretty easy, fry up some high quality doughnuts steep them in some milk and water, add some more donuts and then blend the hell out of them (that's the abridged version). so on one of my london work trips i went to krispy kreme (i said high quality) and made it. it's sweet, it's thick, it's donutty and delicious...

seekraal

i was at the fish stand the other day and they had this funny green seaweed/spikey stuff that looked interesting. i bought it as seekraal but found out it was called samphire, sea bean/asparagus and a host of other names. it grows near the sea hence it's salty nature. it's crunchy and great, and i've bought it a couple of times since

turkse pizza

We live near a pretty Turkish street (although there is a horse butchery on the road), and they have a delight called turkse pizza. It is a pizza style base topped with tomatoey paste with a little mince, rolled up with lettuce and chilli and garlic sauce. Pretty great and a steal for eur1.50. I think we may have found the holy grail of turkse pizza, a new shop on our road churns out these beauties which made me change my perspective on the genre; crispy base, tomato & cucumber (a vast improvement on simply lettuce), awesome

backlog

I need a burst of inspiration, had the usual busy summertime time. Lots of visitors, rose and her sister, dietmar and annie, I was in seattle for week (more on that to follow, lots of tattoos and coffee, no heroin and a disappointing lack of grunge). Anyway, here we go kids, this was a burst of fun cooking we had in june, about a week or so, most of them will get their own post so I can look like a prolific blogger.
I made some thai curry paste. It was pretty easy, you can see all the ingredients, just a little tough to chop them all before blending. You need an inordinate amount of chillis too (20 dried and 20 birds eye). I liked it, but it wasn’t all time, even though I did concentrate on making it as legit as possible (except I did blend it as opposed to pestle and mortar, which is supposed to allow more of the oils to be naturally released). Fuck that I say, life’s too short for pestle and mortar. I made some mussels with it tonight, nice but not as fresh tasting as normal mussels

jarvis

My best of 2006 post is way out of date (this is what comes of being a less than prolific blogger). However there was an album that I wanted to shine some light on, because I have continued to listen to, and it may still be my gig of 2007 so far. Jarvis’ album appealed to me for 2 main reasons;
1) it rocked
2) it was so jaundiced

rocking is pretty easy and I can name a lot of bands that do it more than adequately. But having a jaded, modern life is rubbish slant is something special, especially when it is so eloquent. It’s always about the lyrics, but simply the title “from aushwitz to ipswitch” or the video to “don’t waste your time” capture a unique slant on life. “ cunts are still running the world” requires no nuance, it’s telling like he sees it. After these gret tracks I still wasn’t expecting too much from a 40 something brit pop washup in concert. However, he rocked; great between song banter and purple haze??!? as an encore.

So this ties nicely into my eternal quandary, how does one age gracefully (or disgracefully, depending on how you want to go). I was on facebook the other day and I saw all these people that I saw in my early 20’s, and they remain douche bags. Then I would have been lairy and told them they were cunts, I have mellowed somewhat in my old age, however the temptation is very strong let me tell you….

atp vs the fans

hey kids

we were at atp vs the fans on the weekend. it ruled, no camping, hot showers, a fridge and all the mod cons. also great bands and good friends, top!

my highlights; cornelius, the books, yo la tengo, sparklehorse, les savy fav.

great!

madrid

i went to madrid this weekend to see manuel and kay-z. it was great, only a couple of days, i ate my bodyweight in jamon serrano (manuel bought a leg which we ploughed through). we played wii (the first console i have been interested in owning), drank rum?!?, and ate a lot of tapas. very nice...

photos

looking at the hyacinth fields, dim sum, roast dinners and a cat-in-a-box

Vinyl

My new found vinyl craze has gone through an obscene burst. This week I have bought/received; lps;
css, prefuse 73- extinguished outtakes, fugazi-the argument, spiritualized-amazing grace, Jarvis
7/12 inches;
Panda bear- bros, cat power- the greatest, and about 5 others
And I won on ebays;
Pixies, trompe le monde, king tubby-double album, stereolab- , broadcast-work and non-work
Luckily I got a raise, maybe now I need to get a secret credit card that dagmar can’t track…

The lovers gift-sterilisation

That’s what I got mittens for valentine’s day. Some might say it’s cruel, but others (like these guys) advocate it…

two gigs

it's not a post about data (see what i did there, switch & replace)
we went to see two pretty great gigs last week.
on monday we went to see jarvis. i really like the new album, it's got an interesting old man sleaze to it. and the titles are jaundiced enough to be coming from someone half his age; "cunts are still running the world"", "from auschwitz to ipswitch" etc




and then on friday it was lo-fi-fnk, one of the faces of new rave(tm). they were great, pumping beats, nice sportswear, fun!

i've missed you

Had a great christmas. It was cool not to travel for a holiday. I sat on my erse, boozed and slept late (and cooked a very delicious goose for Christmas). Billy ruptured her appendix on Christmas which sucked (how selfish can you get?). it was very sucky, she was in a lot of pain, and missed her slot to go back to oz, but luckily alls well that ends well and she’s sunning her bum over there now
Then benjy and phil came to visit. We repeated the same trick but looked at some windmills and went to Rotterdam (and finally went for a peek in one of the cube houses)
New years was surprisingly good,.a little raving (so to speak) and some good tunes

Last week was spent in morzine in the alps for a little snowboarding. We had lessons every day and I loved it as I thought I might. I could carve and make it down the hill in one piece. We had a hot tub to rest our aching bones and a chef cooking us great meals. Very great.

Mouldy is here this week with Clemence, so it’s all good…

marcus

prince + bratwurst

pics

my blog was getting boring, so i had to upload some pictures from the last month or do, ilja came to visit. jamie lidell played (i don't have any sonic youth pictures, but they rocked)

slack posting

Since I got back to being able to drink again, I have been a shit blog poster. Does that mean that blogging is the drinking of the teatotaller? Or that drinking allows you to spout more crap- I’m not a psychologist, but there’s a good story there.
Christmas is around the corner.. it’s also the time of year for “best of” lists. I’m a sucker for stats and numbers so this is why it appeals to me- it also tells me what I missed out this year and get my downloading ass on asap. (I talk exclusively of music, but there’s many movies and books too), but I will aim to give at least my top 5 of books, movies and albums of this year. I have started running again, it is great, but I have lost all of my condition, and I want to be totally ripped for snowboarding. Bro.
Tonight I am going to watch sonic youth, they are going to rule. Officially. “rather ripped” is far too rock for 40 year olds., it’s interesting to be an older statement of avant rock. I confess that besides dirty I’ve never been a big fan, but murray st and rather ripped have both been great. Kinda mellow and not too difficult to listen to. Anyway, tomorrow night is Jamie lidell and if you don’t have multiply, first kick yourself then go get it.
Only 5 shopping days till Christmas, get moving bitch

vincent gallo loves you (for $50k)

Check it, For just $50k you too can now win a night of unbridled passion with actor/guitar hero/misogynist/tough guy Vincent gallo (cheaper than buying his semen anyway).
Also it applies to anyone ”Heavy set, older, red heads and even black chicks can have me if they can pay the bill”

hype machine

i think this is a great site. If you have heard of a band and want to find out what they sound like, put the name in the search function and kaboom they’ll link you to mp3 blogs that are posting that track. Very useful for checking out what the “kids” are listening to and for finding cool mp3 blogs too. Ps I had blood taken today and barely winced.

opiate of the masses

I am a semi-Luddite at home, we don't get any teevee. There is so much crap on that i dont usually miss it (and my pet bugbear is reality tv and how crap it is)
However, with time on my hands bored in the hospital i got to browse a number of channels and loved two programs; iron chef and project runway.
Iron chef is classic, a reality show with aspiring cooks having to go through immunity rounds and cook wierd challenges (a new tgi fridays meal, ingredients out of a vending machine). A cooking show with a twist (and salman rushdie’s girlfriend presenting it, who is real purty) i hope betty goes next...
Project runway is also on on reality show, this time with fashion designers (one with the most outrageous neck tattoo) most entertaining.
Which leads me to think that dvd series, books and red wine wont get me through the winter, and the idiot box needs to be cranked up tivo-style..