Sunday

Who lines up for two hours for Cinnabon??

While I must admit that we purposely went to Westfield Newmarket to see if we could score a box (amongst other chores), we certainly didn’t want to waste two hours, or even an hour, lining up for pastry. Sorry, but it’s just stupid.

I think David Jones is underrated. Some good- pricey but quality- stuff there like George Jensen homeware, Yves Delorme towels (on sale too), and Aquazzura Casa serving-ware. But we were looking for patent-leather shoes for Emma and Ben’s wedding, and we did find ones that were just under $200 (you wear them only once or twice anyway).

Christmas decorations were also on sale and we got a new wreath to replace the one we’ve been using for years (setting up the tree next weekend).

The shirt I was looking for at I Love Ugly no longer had my size, so time to rethink (again) about what to wear for the coming month’s various social engagements (there’s just two anyway lol).

Still mulling over Christmas presents as well (saw a cute holster type thingy for a 40 oz Stanley cup), but the crowd was starting to grow so after lunch at Selera (noodles and Hainan chicken), we called it a day.

The work weekend

WHY ARE IPHONE PHOTOS SO SHIT??????

The long weekend

Le week-end de la Fête du Travail a été une période de détente et de repos bien méritée. Le dimanche, nous n'avons rien fait de particulier - le linge n'a pas été lavé, la vaisselle s'est accumulée dans l'évier, les vêtements traînaient partout.

Je me suis levé tard, vers 10 heures, car c'était l'occasion de prendre un peu de temps pour moi. Après tout, vous travaillez tellement qu'il est difficile de vous convaincre que de temps en temps, il est tout à fait normal de ne rien faire.

Passer du temps sans rien faire peut sembler presque coupable, mais c'est en fait essentiel pour se ressourcer et se détendre, afin de revenir au travail avec une énergie renouvelée (AI wrote this).

Start of the week

The mornings are still cold. I’ve been wanting to get back to yoga, but trudging up the stairs for decaf at 5:30 am, I feel like I’m 65, my knees stiff, my hips locked.

In spring, the sunshine is at an almost level slant through the sliding deck doors. We’ve stripped off the worn UV plastic panels off them and within 5 minutes, you can feel the warmth seeping into your body. This is Lily’s favourite spot- she’s already soaking up the sunlight and for once, she’s silent. I join her, sitting at the edge of the wooden bench. One by one, I strip off my clothes- half the sliding door is covered by a thermal curtain so the neighbours don’t see anything.

I used to hate the sun, avoided it like a true Asian person (I draw the line though at using an umbrella as a shield). But now, I’ve mentally left the dark and over-cast universe that I’ve inhabited for the better part of my adult life.

And now I’m out in the light, in the sunshine.

My alarm goes off- 10 min to 8am; time to get to work.

Friday at the Auckland Night Markets

We’ve been going to the markets for years and we’ve seen how it’s become a barometer of changing tastes and food trends. New Zealand is a bit behind I must admit, but who cares? I’ve calmed down now and realised that food is just food.

We’ve seen the current It food come and go. When it came out, there were always queues for churros and now, we look with sympathy at the Indian dude stuck with a franchise with practically no buyers (I looked furtively and his deep-fryers hadn’t even been used and it was already 7pm). From a business perspective, this kind of customer desertion can be brutal.

Asians on the other hand have always been more adept at pivoting to another product. We remember the dumpling wave (wasn’t really obsessed with it) when every other stand was hawking them at ridiculously cheap prices. And now, there was only one or two selling them. On their commercial gill plates, there were various meats for the now-popular food combos that promised more food for your buck.

Islander food- pork roasted on a spit, hefty cubes of taro, rice sticky with coconut cream - has also seen a resurgence for the heartier eater.

The same thing for desserts- the still trendy Korean waffles with sweet bean paste, American-styled cheesecakes, pecan tarts, baked Alaska and cookies as big as your face featuring the now ubiquitous Biscoff biscuit.

A couple of years ago, I would spend $40 which seemed a lot (I liked variety). Now, you’ll easily go past that if you weren’t careful now that most of the vendors have EFTPOS machines.

Tested and Approved:
Trendy Tanghulu; various fruits encased in sugar similar to candy-apples. Surprisingly refreshing with just enough sugar to complement the fruit’s sour notes. Careful in eating them though- the sugar crystals can be sharp enough to nick the inside of your mouth.

Korean puff pastries; the woman selling them filled the pastries with cream and torched the sugared top ala Creme Brulee.

Still a NO
Filipino food includes the usual suspects like dinuguan, pork laing, adobo, etc. The problem is that I can cook these better in my own house. The only thing I like is pork barbecue, and no one else does it better than Pinoys. The trick? You need to put some fat in your BBQ.

The Viral Dubai chocolate; they were selling portions of it and even if I’ve never really been a chocolate fan, I just needed to taste what the fuss was all about. And this is what it’s like- imagine eating a ton of pistachios and barfing it out, before using it as a chocolate filling. Gross.

Today

  1. Fine. Hold onto kindness as strongly as you can because sometimes (grudgingly), it’s the right thing to do.

  2. What does blue cheese smell like? I said, like an unwashed, uncircumcised penis which my friends took offense to, because 1) they’re not cut and 2) I didn’t know shit because I was.

  3. I said to someone today; work is actually easy. Life outside of work is harder.

  4. Have yet to do something creative on my desk space. Sigh.

  5. This is why I hate balconies, cliffs, and even small decks.

  6. I was asked, if I had the chance to live in real life, any three recent shows, what would they be? I replied: be the conflicted daddy in Euphoria; an aristocratic, Eton-educated, psychopath banker in Industry and a butler in Downton Abbey.

  7. Word of the week: CHOICES

  8. I fucking actually hate E.

Sunday aspirationals

So we had a sudden craving for chilli con carne for Sunday dinner and Farro Foods had a pre-made one that we had tried before and it was really good. So off we went to the branch in Mt. Wellington with the awful parking to pick one up and a couple of small things.

Entering the store triggered in me that irrationally exhilarating feeling I had when I had my first credit card with a limit in the mid-five digits- I just wanted to buy everything in sight that caught my fancy.

It’s the supermarket of my dreams; heirloom tomatoes that looked like they were made by a 3D printer gone haywire, new season asparagus as thick as sausages, niche vegetables like celeriac and witloof, at least seven kinds of micro-greens, store-made focaccia bigger than dinner plates, specialist cheeses, inidividual organic acai and fruit breakfast bowls and seasoning and oils from Europe and South America.

It was everything I didn’t really need but wanted to get.

We got the chilli and some good nacho chips to go with it, but when our basket started to fill up with, ‘oh look at this small treat’ stuff like pickle dip, bags of broccolini, Israeli couscous, and Appleby’s Strawberry and Cream ice-cream, we had to forcibly march ourselves to the check-out counter.

Someday…

Change it up

I figured that in life, there’s a lot we can’t obviously change - our DNA, height, penis size etc- but the things we can do change, actually far outnumber the things we can’t.

So change it up!

There’s something satisfying about having the means and the willpower to effect changes no matter how small or shallow. Some didn’t work (doing a uniform for work in a bid to put a cap on expensive clothes-buying); some are a work in progress (cleaning the kitchen every night before going to bed); and some have been a spectacular success (reminding myself that at the end of the day, only my own choices and actions impact me directly- something that is happening a thousand miles away does not).

I’ve been working from home for years before the pandemic happened and was something I negotiated for at work. But I only set up an actual work space upstairs in our house when the lockdowns happened and while I love it, I always felt that the trestle table was too small. And the surface was black- I would see dust on it every day which annoyed me no end.

The universe was probably reading my mind because one day while going through our cat’s social-media feeds, I got thrown a random post from a local Ikea reseller and the desk was nearly perfect. I would have wished it to be a tad longer on both ends, but after two weeks of using it, the length was just right. It also came with drawers to organise an ever-growing collection of electronics.

A long ass week

Soldier on

The other week, I was acting like a crazy person and complaining about ‘chaos’, ‘entropy’ and ‘flux’. But it wasn’t anything intellectual.

I was simply tired of the fact that I was doing chores constantly; that there was no end to it; that no matter how organised you are or that you’re a couple of steps ahead, things always catch up with you and you’re buried again in disorder. And you’re tired, you’d rather do something else instead. Can you ignore it for a while? How long though? Is this even a good approach?

But within 48 hours, I was over it. Life moved on whether you liked it or not.

I got a good night’s sleep, cleared my head, bought new outfits for a work-related show and put on a niacinamide face mask (my complexion was starting to look muddy).

I had work to do, bills to pay, belly fats to battle, house renovations to complete.

I can’t afford to not be my best.