The week that was (in images + a video)
The new Ipad Pro with M2 chip
I had my doubts. There’s already something wrong with the new iPhone 14’s camera system and its video format is confusing and tedious to work with.
But I’ve been wanting to upgrade from my (old) five year old 10.5 inch iPad Pro for so long, that it was a foregone conclusion; I was going to buy one no matter what though I was trying not to grimace at the thought of two very expensive lemons.
When I finally got it and set it up, I just had one regret; I wish I stuck with my original choice of an all-white combo- a silver variant and a white Magic keyboard. I had been dissuaded by Sam telling me horror stories of his work colleagues toting less than pristine all-white iPad combos. Apparently, stains are difficult to remove.
I sort of teach tech for work and deal with user experience issues, but I’m never one to be super conscientious about reading and following instructions to the letter. I just let intuition do its job - yup, just zoom, swipe, tap - and if it works, then the device or website works. Maybe the new iPadOS 16 is amazing, who knows. That, or the fact that I never did anything much really with my old 10.5 iPad Pro. But you have to consider that five years in tech time is literally a lifetime; a lot can change and I’m glad that I sort of waited. I’m not sure if it’s the right analogy, but I think that updating your devices is similar to managing your Kiwisaver. Best practice is to stick with a specific fund instead of shifting it to a more conservative or safer one when you’re hit by losses due to the ever fluctuating markets; by doing so, you’re simply cementing your losses.
While we get the advantage of leaks, it’s never really certain what you’ll get. But after waiting for five years before I upgraded, I got a way better and bigger screen (from LCD to mini LED), a faster chip, and an operating system that almost replicates the work-flow you have on your laptop. The leap in capability is just phenomenal. if you have last year’s model, you’re not gaining anything dramatically new and spending another NZ$2,299 for a chip change is a waste of money- unless of course, you have money to burn.
Bag of bones
When we visited the Pokeno Butcher shop last weekend, I got a pair of split beef marrow bones for $13. At the Asian shop the other day, I picked up a $5 pack of beef bones- so it’s literally a meal from bones.
Other ingredients
Diced garlic and ginger
spring onion for garnish
flavour packet of sinigang and pinapaitan
cabbage and spinach
Method
Saute the garlic and ginger in a pan and put into slow-cooker. Sear the beef bones on the pan where you just browned the garlic and ginger. Slow-cook for about 6 hours. When done, separate from the bones and set-aside. Add two cups of water to the slow-cooker broth, season with the sinigang and pinapaitan to desired flavour (I prefer it to be sharply acidic and bitter), add the beef chunks and let simmer for 30 minutes. Steam the cabbage and spinach separately. Season bone marrow with pepper and garlic salt and grill on high for 15 to minutes. Assemble as below. Garnish with spring onions and garlic chips.
Love/Hate
HATE
Gaurav Sharma, a quack, hack, and a major TWAT
The US Federal Reserve and the fucking, goddamned American dollar
Having to wait years for the next seasons of streaming shows
People who are easily brain-washed
Costco New Zealand; waste of money
LOVE
Taylor Swift’s new album (finally, bitch GROWS UP).
My new Apple devices :-)
Conceding that spending so much money at Christmas is, well, a waste of money
American Costco (if you want garish consumerism, then do it right. Do it the American way).
Climate change; WE’RE ALL GOING DOWN, no one is exempt
Fantasy
Playing James Bond- apparently, in spite of my youthful looks, I’m too old to be in the role. Fact: Daniel Craig was 35 when he did his 1st Bond film.
That in one magical moment, I can draw a perfect, amazing drawing on one of my numerous sketch-books lying about the house.
That in one magical moment, I can finish writing a perfect, amazing short-story on one of my numerous digital devices lying about the house.
Baking the perfect macarons in under an hour using just a hand-held electric mixer.
Getting the perfect body within 30 days by doing exercises 3x a week.
Growing the most luscious, luxurious mustache.
Getting super youthful skin by applying not two, not three, not four, but six products every night.
Getting the cat to love me for what I am.
Looking exactly in real life, like your digital photos.
Trump and Putin dying painful, lonely deaths and Duterte ending up in jail.
All the brazen thieves in Auckland getting the electric-chair
Saturday (in images)
What happened in the world today? DON’T CARE- to each his own.I have chores to do and things to learn.
The 'fuck you' list (because why not?)
Ron DeSantis and to every Florida lawmaker who opposed climate law changes; you deserve what nature gave you.
To the common cold ( as it turns out, it’s not Covid but is worse than Covid).
Herschel Walker
Luxury labels raising their prices
Password security
Everything I ate last week
‘Eating well’ can be dangerous. I blame the dip in my immune system to the food I ate in the last week.
Sunday (in photos)
Tested negative for Covid and feeling slightly better so went out to spread my germs at the mall!
Black duvet, natural sunlight, a good camera and Lightroom
When we were kids, my sisters and I thought of having a photoshoot. We got blankets, an instamatic camera and a black satin dress. My sisters put on make-up borrowed from my mothers and posed like their lives depended on it. When the film roll was developed- yep, someone saw those photos- everything was washed out, over and under-exposed and the make-up was patchy. I can’t remember whether we found it hilarious or horrific.
Fast-forward to 2022 and we did the same thing for Toni’s graduation. We got an $18 black studio sheet on Trade Me that turned out to be too sheer, so we put a black duvet sheet behind it. We used natural sunlight, used a consistent focal length of 60mm on the Nikon Z 6ii and edited the RAW files on Adobe Lightroom.
Good photography is a talent I know, but to charge $$$$$ for it is criminal.
Auckland local elections 2022
Ahhh politics…I’ve been unable to tweet lately because I could no longer access the original email address that I used to set up my current account, and I think it’s a blessing in disguise. The kind of energy I expend and the mindset that I’m in when I do my mostly political tweeting is CRAZY.
Maybe it’s divine intervention; God is probably telling me that if I wanted to actually help people, mouthing off and insulting governments and businesses is not the way to do it. It’s satisfying, and they fucking deserve it, but won’t really change anything.
So would voting help? I have my doubts (Hello Philippines) but as long as the flame of democracy burns, let’s make our voice heard! There should still be places in this world, where the majority ends up picking the right people (like New Zealand I hope).
For Mayor:
Still a toss-up between Wayne Brown & Efeso Collins
What I agree with Wayne Brown: public transport shouldn’t be free, but should be faster (and more frequent).
Con: possible personal conflicts of interests because he’s a businessman
What I agree with Efeso Collins: advocacy for Auckland’s disadvantaged.
Con: opposition to same-sex marriage in the past, which shows a tone of conservatism that may be bordering on the intolerant.
The Crazies
John Alcock; red flags for someone advocating Personal Responsibility & Personal Freedom.
Tricia Cheel; anti-vaxxer, pseudo-scientist
Ted Johnson; anti-vaxxer
Michael Morris; should hook-up with Tricia Cheek over some Kombucha and vegan skewers
DUH
Craig Lord: social services ARE NECESSITIES
Lisa Lewis: you mean ‘skeletons’ in your closet
Phil O’Connor: anything else aside from abortion?
Ryan Earl Pausina: speed bumps are for safety
The questions list
what are you really, really good at that?
Is this what you’re supposed to do?
do you really, really need to have it?
Are you prepared to get it?
Do you have what it takes to get it?
Will doing it prove once and for all, that it’s what you’re meant to do?
If not, what then?
The 'ugh' list
Lip readers
‘Righteous’ people calling out Lea Michele
The far-right
Real-estate people on TikTok
‘Experts’ on TikTok
Under-seasoned food (like this breakfast platter I had recently at Bird on a Wire)
Any kind of vegetable that is 2x its normal price
Fast-fashion
Summer fashion (you don’t need it- what you need is a perfect body)
House of the Dragon (boring, boring, boring)
Eat like a king
After returning from Ashburton, I had a week-long craving for Filipino food even if I had my fill of it.
After unpacking bottles of bagoong na alamang and packets of instant Papaitan mix (bought in a Filipino store in Ashburton), I set about buying pork belly, and beef offal like tripe and stomach. I also bought a packet of a dozen Vigan-style longganisa made by a local producer- Nanay Nelly- in Auckland
I made something of a cross between binagoongang baboy and pakbet (minus most of the usual vegetables save for an aubergine that cost $6). In lieu of atchara, I had kimchi.
For a week I ate like a king who ruled his kingdom with absolute power; no one dared to point out the obvious.
Ryan 30S Pro Max
In the Apple TV + science-fiction series Foundation, genetic clones reign as emperors of a 12,000-year-old galactic empire. Every memory, every gesture, and every feeling is meticulously passed onto the next clone to ensure a seamless, seemingly eternal continuity.
It’s sort of the same thing with your phone now- the exact same data and even how you have your apps arranged, can be copied onto a new phone.
Just imagine if we can clone ourselves- pick an age where you think you’re at your prime- and after 5 or so years, you move all of you into a fresh, new body.
What's your fantasy?
In the Christopher Nolan film, Inception, there is a scene where Cobb (played by Leo Di Caprio) and his group tour a secret basement filled with sleeping men hooked to IVs and dreaming the equivalent of 40 hours a day.
‘The dream has become their reality’, the watcher says.
A scene from the movie Inception
When I was growing up, reading books had the same effect on me; I’d be in bed reading away for hours or days on end.
I would remember the books I read, but not the time I read them. There is a Christmas that I don’t remember to this day, but I vividly remember the book I read- The Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy.
I was made to expect that when I finally ‘socialised’, or ‘got some friends’ or left the one-person island that my mother said I spent so much time in, things would be different. But alas, it wasn’t!
The world was boring! The people in it were as dull as the oatmeal I forced myself to eat every morning years later, in the (vain) hope it would lower my cholesterol levels. Or- it could all be just me. So to this day, I would dive right back to books when I needed a different and better reality.
I have a soft spot for fantasy; if genres were drugs, I would pick it not for the high but for its hallucinatory effect, and the longer the better.
The Chronicles of Narnia were the 1st fantasy books I read when I was in the 6th grade. It was so real to me, I kept inspecting closets for that secret door to another world.
In high school, I plowed through War & Peace and Anna Karenina- hardly fantasies, but to a 14-year old, 19th century Russia seemed exactly that- and I don’t think I finished either. In college- which really didn't get exciting until my last year- I passed the tedium of days reading through Tolkien (LOTR & The Hobbit ). Then it was the Dark Tower series by Stephen King, but I only got as far as the third book. Tried to start Malazan Book of the Fallen by Steven Erikson with Gardens of the Moon, but couldn't finish it for some reason. I would have gone on and finished the entire Dragonriders of Pern series by Anne McCaffrey, but in the era before Kindle, it was hard to find books and they were also expensive- I only finished the 1st four books.
And it also happens that there are some books that are better off seen on screen. I read Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, but opted to watch the rest of the series on the big screen.
Lately, I discovered Raymund Feist’s Riftwar Trilogy which I finished while I was in Ashburton to visit Doyet and the family. It felt like being at home again in Pangasinan, comfortable with no care in the world; you read, slept and ate with the food magically appearing on the table.
Feist’s world-building of magicians, lords, dragons and sorcerers is familiar, but it’s the conviction in the writing that creates the illusion of being firmly in that reality. A thousand pages fly past like a fast-moving photo carousel and it no longer feels like reading, but living.
I finished the trilogy just as I was heading back to Auckland so I didn’t feel the full weight of that emptiness that almost feels like grief, as if you had just lost someone, when you finish a book that you’ve inhabited so completely.
You just sigh and face this reality with some reluctance.
It wasn't that hard was it?
I’m not kidding, but several YouTube tutorials and a few dozen test shots later, I can actually shoot manual now. I’ve been shooting photos for so long that it was a matter of finally looking where I had refused to look.
And suddenly, there were all there, and there were only three things: aperture, shutter-speed and ISO.
I’m not saying I’m going to win the next Nikon or Canon Photo competition (I wouldn’t even bother to join), but I feel less of a fake when someone praises my photos. I feel less guilty for spending thousands of dollars on all the gear.
Confessions and declarations
Confession: Did you know that I don’t know how to shoot manual??
Declaration: Will learn how, for real
I traded in the Nikon Z 6 to the Z 6 ii which has useful upgraded features for video
Weekend reading
bake, bake, bake
It’s slightly stressful doing heaps of little things and I had a couple of pastry sheets left over so… the thing with pastry sheets is that you don’t get to use all of them and you chuck the rest into the freezer with the intention of using them, but you never ever do.
So I used up all of them and made more palmiers; this time I made savoury ones stuffed with grated cheddar cheese and sprinkled liberally with paprika. And because they tend to be a bit bland, immediately after bringing them out of the oven, they were doused with a generous sprinkling of chicken salt.
But this is the thing with savoury palmiers; if you don’t brown them, the pale pastry takes in some moisture the next day (even if stored in a container) and would taste like pastry that had been sitting on a table for a day. So lower the temperature when you bake them so the cheese doesn’t burn and allowing the pastry to brown.
I also made chocolate palmiers by mixing cocoa powder and brown sugar- not so successful as the sugar burned too quickly.
And with the one pastry sheet I had left, I made three bacon and egg pies in a muffin tray. Cut to fill the cups and into that goes an egg and as many small strips of (rendered) bacon as you can fill it. Cover with a pastry piece, make vents through it and bake in the oven for like 15 to 20. And don’t forget the egg-wash!
