Renovation - day 3 - still not coping.

Today I got home and there was a bath in our kitchen, a toilet in our living room and the door that is supposed to go back on the bathroom is out on the street... progress???  The rubble that was in the bathroom itself yesterday has been cleared out though.

And I'm still not coping.  I'm coping less actually.  Slept terribly and the world is all wrong.  Take this for example - this is our lovely new kitchen.  They know we are still living here and this is where they put the bath (maybe as punishment for me eating grilled cheese sandwiches when they were fasting, and then me asking if their fasting was like Ramadan - turns out no, and it also turns out they were reasonably offended "we are NOT Muslim - the Muslims have killed our people." Sigh, all I wanted to do was eat my grilled cheese sandwich, so I went and hid in my room)

Here we have the cleared out bathroom space - and no, that isn't going to be trendy exposed brick wall.  It is kind of cool though, if you look closely, you can see the many different colours of paint that have been applied over the years people have been inhabiting this little patch of rubble.

And while you wouldn't know it, this is usually our living room, and this is where the couch usually is.  Instead, there is a toilet.  Go figure (more punishment?).

Only one more sleep and then we are off four a four day weekend down the south coast though.  Really can't wait.  Not only because of the renovation, but we've both been belted by work lately, and of course, it's the birthday biathlon (Jamie Saturday, me Sunday).  We are staying in a town called Mollymook, where Rick Stein opened a restaurant late last year.  We are eating in the said restaurant on Friday night, and staying in the adjoining accoms Thursday - Sunday.  Planning on lots of walking, reading, lounging, eating, drinking and sleeping.  A bit of revival I think we've both earned.

During bathroom renovations - feeling unsettled.

We didn't live through our kitchen renovations - just left on a holiday and came back and it was done.  This is entirely different.  After one day, I came home and the bathroom looked like this:

Gasp.  The house is totally a mess - covered in dust, all the things that need to go into the new bathroom are sitting in the living room (ie. a bath. sink, cabinets), there are drop sheets on everything, only the hot water works in the kitchen (go figure), and the only place to sit is our bed (because the spare room is full of furniture, chairs, and more bathroom crap).  I thought I could totally handle this, especially since the toilet is still functional - when I say functional, you need to pour a bucket of water in the top to make it flush (we were planning on using buckets as toilets- so, so gross, I know, so this is a far preferable use for te buckets), but the house being like this is really upsetting me.  Nothing is right and I don't like it.  I just feel like pacing up and down and whimpering about things.  We managed to squeeze two chairs into the last remaining piece of floor space in the living room lat night to watch some TV, but who wants to sit on a hard chair to watch TV and eat laksa?  Not me.  I know I could have bigger problems than the fact I have to live in a house that's being renovated for three days, and the end result is going to be 100 x worth it, but everything just feels all wrong right now and I'm totally unsettled.  I slept terribly because I knew everything wasn't right, and I'm sure tonight will be the same  We've decided to go out and see a movie this evening.  The sooner we get out of here the better... bring on Thursday.

Bathroom before.

The bathroom renovation has begun.  And just because it's really nice to compare, this is what things looked like beforehand.  How someone could willingly have chosen these tiles for a bathroom floors and walls is totally beyond me (and probably what someone else will be saying in 30 years about our taste - "Can you belive it WHITE tiles on the wall and GREY tiles on the floor!!!  WHAT were they thinking?!?).

This is the current laundry, cleaning supply storage area, and overflow moisturiser area.  Handy hubby built the shelves a while ago, but now a proper cupboard for all this stuff is going to be built (with doors for the cleaning supplies).

The basin is going to be bigger, and not a corner one.(p.s. that's my new $18 maxi dress - it's awesome)

The toilet is moving over to the other side of the shower (next to the basin) and the shower is going, and a bath (with a shower in it) is going along the back wall.  Everything is white except the floor tiles (grey) and the side of the bath will be mosaic tiles (grey, blue, pink - but quite muted - not too bright).  It's going to take three weeks - we are going to live in the house for three days while they do it.  I already know I won't cope with just that.  But luckily we are going away for a long weekend this weekend and then moving in with the Wheaters on their first wedding anniversary.  Because that's what everyone wants on an anniversary - friends moving in.

Taste Sydney part II.

Muz and Em after we ate ourselves happy.

Some of the tents of the restaurants set up.  All the chefs did an entree, a main, and a dessert.  Such a good idea, and all the superstar chefs were there in person (cue much whispering and giggling between me and Em).

Lots of people for whom food brings joy. There was a totally chilled out happy vibe and it was a lot of good fun.  We'll definitely go again next year.

Taste Sydney.

Thanks to some press passes, Em and Muz and I went to the Taste Festival in Hyde Park on Saturday.  16 really great Sydney chefs are all there, serving tastes of their signature dishes.  Naturally we were excited... It was a beautiful afternoon and a massive part of the park was taken up with food and wine exhibitors, plus lots of competitions to enter.  Fun! On to the food...

Beef ribs smoked in watermelon with watermelon and avocado salsa from Dank St Depot (I've read about this dish in a cookbook and was dead keen to try it.  It was great):

Mini sandwiches with blue swimmer crab meat and corriander mayonaise from Guillaume at Bennelong:

Yellow curry of Byron Bay Berkshire pork with pickled mustard greens from Longrain (we started hopping into this one before we rememberd to take the pic - we all agreed it was our favourite):

Organic grass fed wagu beef burger from Plan B (we got one of these each - the rest of the food we shared a plate):

Vanilla panna cotta with lavender honey and fresh pomegranate (the top of this wobbled around and was totally hilarious - big points for food with comedy value) from Joah's at Whale Beach:

Sauternes custard with caramel from Marque:

Happy Friday everyone!

Friday evening has to be my favourite time of the week, and it's never better than after a week that has just wiped you out.  Jamie and I usually have a drink at home and then go out for dinner on a Friday - date night, a little ritual we've both come to really look forward to.  However, he's in Perth this week, and didn't answer my call to cheers him, so I'm cheers-ing Friday with my blogettes.
I've got on my Qantas business class PJ pants, poured a big glass of white (and am planning on drinking the rest of the bottle tonight), I am making oven baked fish and chips, and I'm watching 30 Rock (I have three seasons on DVD from my last trip to Jakarta and I'm planning on polishing off a fair hunk of that too).  How totally awesome is that... I hope you all have a great weekend.

Tosca.

I've grown up with my dad cranking out opera at deafening levels, and continually telling me like its the first time every time, that the lead roles in Tosca are the pinacle of what opera singers aim for.  Thanks again to Frank, I'm particularily familiar with Cavaradossi's aria E lucevan le stelle, – “And the stars were shining".  It is a rather famous piece of music, but it moves me every time.  I teared up a bit hearing it last night, it was amazing.
This was the first time I've seen Tosca live and I loved it.  It was a rather controversial rendition of the Puccini classic - it's set in modern(ish) times.  Tosca wears sunglasses on her head and carries around a bottle of water in her handbag - perhaps not quite how it was intended.  Rather contreversially, the director has changed the ending - instead of killing herself at the end, Tosca is shot in the head at point blank range (After killing Scarpia, after he tried to rape her and lock up her lover - it's all a bit B&B isn't it - little wonder I like it).  I probably would have preferred to see a classic version of Tosca before seeing the modern version which the director describes as a "cross between Tarantino and Scorsese," but I still enjoyed it so much, and Jamie said he did too.

Diana Krall!

So, on Saturday night, we made the trip to the Hunter Valley to see a couple of my favourite girls in action in A Day on the Green.  Except we didn't go for the whole day because it was too hard to tear ourselves away from our amazing hotel view (see the next post for more about that).  We saw most of Madeline Peyroux, who is one of my favourites.  As you can tell by her name, she's got a lot of French influence, but she's American.  She does lots of pretty, jazzy, melodic songs and she's on high rotation around here.  I must admit I liked her less after seeing her in person (the Michael Buble syndrome), mainly because she was wearing a PIRATE shirt.  You can't really see it on the screen, but trust me.  It wasn't a good thing.

But enough about her and on to Diana.  If you know me at all, you've probably paid out on me for my fondness for the Canadian jazz sensation that is Diana.  She's awesome.  I have all her CDs, and I think that actually made it hard to go to her concert because I really wanted her to play my favourite songs, not just mostly her new stuff.  I was dying for her to play the cover of Catie and Linds' wedding song "Case of You," which she does the most amazing version of, but sadly, she didn't.  She still was so great though.  She was at the piano the whole time, and had a trio with her, and they all looked like they were having a great time.  I don't think Diana is totally comfortable in the spotlight, and is much happier to blend in with three other people than to be the singing/piano playing centre of attention.  Her voice was totally flawless though - we could have been listening to a CD.

So, my love is not in any way whittled.  I just wish it could have lasted longer.  And that she took (my) requests.  BTW - we weren't as close as these pics might lead you to believe - the pics are of the big screen to the side of the stage.  I'd definitely see her again, and it was a beautiful night to which we could BYO cheese and pate and drink wine.  Nothing wrong here.

Hunter Valley.

Jamie came home and surprised me last week with tickets to a Diana Krall concert in the Hunter Valley - OMG - only my favourite femme artist ever.  I was totally excited, and he also booked this amazing acomodation.  It was really hard to tear ourselves away from this view.  Sitting on the balcony wth a glass of wine was one of those moments you wish you could just freeze in time, and it's almost hard to enjoy because you know it's going to be over and you won't have it any more.  You feel totally relaxed just by breathing.

We styed at the Golden Door Elysia, which I really liked.  It was simple but luxurious, clean, and all about the view.  Normally I think places that are all about a view are overrated (especially when it comes to restaurants), but this was really breath taking.  This was the view looking across the bedroom and into the bathroom - everything was all sliding doors, so you could shut of whatever bit you wanted to.  There was also a big living room with a kitchen behind sliding doors.  We'll definitley go back, and next time stay a couple of days, glued to the balcony.

Home made pasta and duck ragu.

We got a pasta maker as a wedding present - which clearly is a good thing. I've only used it once before andthe result was below average. I don't know what I did wrong, but I didn't do it right. After a bit of inspiration from My Kitchen Rules I decided to make parpadelle with duck ragu for special dinner guests Muz and Em. I had a lieu day on Friday, so had plenty of time (after my massage) to get stuck in with Em.
So... here we go - I read in several places you need 100g of flour per egg - that seemed to work out well. You do not however need 150g of flour per person, as I read somewhere else online. That is FAR too much - excessivley way too much.  But taking care of too much food hasn't ever been a problem in my house...
Em and I had a great time making the pasta and we were a really great team.  We didn't even need to talk about it, we just worked together so well.

We rolled out the pasta and hung it over the back of the chairs to dry for a while...

The duck had been bubbling away all afternoon and smelt SO good. So it was just a matter of shredding it and cooking the pasta. And then there we were - sitting down for our first time with visitors at our new table. Dinner was lovely, but the company was even better. We realised during the week that we hadn't had Muz and Em over properly since they moved here, so it was nice to sit down and catch up - it felt like old times.