Twenty minutes ago, I thought I detected a rather unpleasant burning smell.
It took a few seconds of bemused deliberation until the colloquial penny dropped...and I bolted downstairs to find out exactly what happens when you leave a pot of homebrand pasta boiling for forty-five minutes in a small pot.
The answer = half a centimetre of charcoal.
So I'm timing myself as I write this post, because it's already 1 a.m and that pasta was actually meant to be for my lunch tomorrow- well, today I suppose- so it's going to be an even later night than per usual, and now I can't make fun of my Dad's Great Pudding Explosion so much anymore.
Cooking FAIL.
I partially blame my sister. She initiated a spontaneous game of charades at midnight and so whilst I was earnestly pretending to be a house, then pretending to be an arsonist burning down the house (it was 'song names') my own flame-related disaster was merrily boiling away downstairs.
Irony FOR THE WIN.
And this is why being a crazy cat lady will be so much easier when I'm older. All you need to do is get a spoon and scoop out some jellied fish into a bowl (or one large feeding platter for my one hundred and twenty-six feline friends) and that's it. No preparation required.
Although knowing me, I'll probably end up snapping the pull ring off or something and then the cats will all turn on me and it'll be me fighting against a swarm of 126 cats and I'll run out screaming into the street clutching a can of Snappy Tom with cats clinging to my cardigan as I scream incoherently with several sets of claws in my face.
*coughs*
Righto, down to check on Pasta V2.0...
Monday, September 7, 2009
Friday, August 7, 2009
Don't Phunk With My Heart
Yesterday I went to see my GP over a few minor concerns with what Captain Jack Sparrow would fondly refer to as his "thump thump."
My thump-thump has been...well, thumping rather erratically recently so I figured it was better to veer on the side of caution and see a doctor. However, I couldn't help but feel like a bit of hypochondriac when I was sitting in the office trying to explain exactly what was freaking me out.
In layman's terms, I believe I garbled out, "It sometimes it goes thump...thump...thump...paaaause...gurgle.....thump thump...."
And all credit to my doctor, I think he managed to decipher this (including my lame tapping demonstration on his desk). He said it could be a combination of factors, including lack of sleep, caffeine, stress, thyroid problems, or heart defects (tick tick tick for the first three) and then followed it up with the cheerful question, "Has anyone in your family ever dropped dead for no apparent reason?"
To which I said that there was no history of Long QT or anything like that, which made him ask me if I'd been Googling. To this, I indignantly replied that no, I was not one of those people who print out a whole list of their symptoms off Ask Jeeves and take them into their doctor....but I sort of left off the fact that I learnt about Long QT Syndrome from a storyline on Neighbours.
Anyway, he then ordered a blood test and an electrocardiogram (ECG) and I toddled off next door to get all the Pathology stuff done.
And then as I was sitting there holding my waiting line number, I realised that this was my first ever blood test.
Eep.
I'm not good with blood. I don't dissolve into hysterics, I don't scream, and I don't faint, but I dislike needles immensely. I can normally sit there quite calmly but there is generally a lot of panicking beforehand. Fortunately, I only had seven minutes of panicking before the nurse was passing me vials.
Vials.
Vials in which to hold my blood.
Oh, God.
See, there's just something about the thought of blood being drawn from my body which makes me very very uneasy. When the nurse actually stuck the needle into my skin I was fine, but then I heard this gurgling as my blood was being drawn up the syringe and all I could think of was AAARRRRGGH! AAARGGGGGH! AAARGGGGGHH! AARGGGGH! AAARGGGGGH! AARRGGGGH!!!!!
I tried to toughen myself up my doing Work Experience seven years ago at a veterinary clinic. And I found out that I'm okay with operations, and blood, and seeing a dog's innards on the operating table, and having the vet chat happily about his new Lord of the Rings DVD with collectible Gollum figure while his scalpel was poking at an infected doggy spleen in front of him...but when it comes to things like papercuts or needles on humans it's something different altogether.
What I did do was concentrate very very hard on the radio that was playing some kind of obnoxious ad for Harvey Norman. So I sat there and focussed on the fact that Harvey Norman were having some kind of sale, and this sale was offering 24 months interest-free....that's right, 24 months interest-free and that this had nothing to do with the gurgling...OMG PLEASE STOP THE GURGLING...of my blood being drawn up into a needle.
It was over quicker than I expected, so then I had to lie down while the nurse ran SANDPAPER over my skin and stuck electrodes to it. Then she began clipping leads to all these electrodes, so I felt like one big human component switch as she plugged me into the ECG machine thingy.
So now I'm waiting on the test results. On the upside, my doctor didn't tell me to lay off caffeine or anything like that, which was quite a relief, so I had two very large cups of coffee in the afternoon. The nurse sternly told me that I wasn't allowed to lift anything heavy with my left arm for the rest of the day (where the blood had been drawn) and as I rose to shove my tote bag over my left shoulder she squawked at me "I hope you're not going to put that on that arm! Put it on the other one!"
This made things quite irritating when I had to go to work in the afternoon...I ended up dragging out a 700VA uninterruptible power supply out using only my right arm, and that was all kinds of not-fun. And because I am physically uncoordinated and have issues wearing things over my right arm, I accidentally smashed into the toy keyboard stand at work on my way out and knocked the entire thing over with my handbag.
Obviously I'm not an ambi-wearer.
But since I have no restrictions on my caffeine intake as yet, I'm going to go and have a nice afternoon coffee :)
Mmmm. Coffee. How I thump thump thee.
My thump-thump has been...well, thumping rather erratically recently so I figured it was better to veer on the side of caution and see a doctor. However, I couldn't help but feel like a bit of hypochondriac when I was sitting in the office trying to explain exactly what was freaking me out.
In layman's terms, I believe I garbled out, "It sometimes it goes thump...thump...thump...paaaause...gurgle.....thump thump...."
And all credit to my doctor, I think he managed to decipher this (including my lame tapping demonstration on his desk). He said it could be a combination of factors, including lack of sleep, caffeine, stress, thyroid problems, or heart defects (tick tick tick for the first three) and then followed it up with the cheerful question, "Has anyone in your family ever dropped dead for no apparent reason?"
To which I said that there was no history of Long QT or anything like that, which made him ask me if I'd been Googling. To this, I indignantly replied that no, I was not one of those people who print out a whole list of their symptoms off Ask Jeeves and take them into their doctor....but I sort of left off the fact that I learnt about Long QT Syndrome from a storyline on Neighbours.
Anyway, he then ordered a blood test and an electrocardiogram (ECG) and I toddled off next door to get all the Pathology stuff done.
And then as I was sitting there holding my waiting line number, I realised that this was my first ever blood test.
Eep.
I'm not good with blood. I don't dissolve into hysterics, I don't scream, and I don't faint, but I dislike needles immensely. I can normally sit there quite calmly but there is generally a lot of panicking beforehand. Fortunately, I only had seven minutes of panicking before the nurse was passing me vials.
Vials.
Vials in which to hold my blood.
Oh, God.
See, there's just something about the thought of blood being drawn from my body which makes me very very uneasy. When the nurse actually stuck the needle into my skin I was fine, but then I heard this gurgling as my blood was being drawn up the syringe and all I could think of was AAARRRRGGH! AAARGGGGGH! AAARGGGGGHH! AARGGGGH! AAARGGGGGH! AARRGGGGH!!!!!
I tried to toughen myself up my doing Work Experience seven years ago at a veterinary clinic. And I found out that I'm okay with operations, and blood, and seeing a dog's innards on the operating table, and having the vet chat happily about his new Lord of the Rings DVD with collectible Gollum figure while his scalpel was poking at an infected doggy spleen in front of him...but when it comes to things like papercuts or needles on humans it's something different altogether.
What I did do was concentrate very very hard on the radio that was playing some kind of obnoxious ad for Harvey Norman. So I sat there and focussed on the fact that Harvey Norman were having some kind of sale, and this sale was offering 24 months interest-free....that's right, 24 months interest-free and that this had nothing to do with the gurgling...OMG PLEASE STOP THE GURGLING...of my blood being drawn up into a needle.
It was over quicker than I expected, so then I had to lie down while the nurse ran SANDPAPER over my skin and stuck electrodes to it. Then she began clipping leads to all these electrodes, so I felt like one big human component switch as she plugged me into the ECG machine thingy.
So now I'm waiting on the test results. On the upside, my doctor didn't tell me to lay off caffeine or anything like that, which was quite a relief, so I had two very large cups of coffee in the afternoon. The nurse sternly told me that I wasn't allowed to lift anything heavy with my left arm for the rest of the day (where the blood had been drawn) and as I rose to shove my tote bag over my left shoulder she squawked at me "I hope you're not going to put that on that arm! Put it on the other one!"
This made things quite irritating when I had to go to work in the afternoon...I ended up dragging out a 700VA uninterruptible power supply out using only my right arm, and that was all kinds of not-fun. And because I am physically uncoordinated and have issues wearing things over my right arm, I accidentally smashed into the toy keyboard stand at work on my way out and knocked the entire thing over with my handbag.
Obviously I'm not an ambi-wearer.
But since I have no restrictions on my caffeine intake as yet, I'm going to go and have a nice afternoon coffee :)
Mmmm. Coffee. How I thump thump thee.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Why I Should Be Cast as Kitana...(are you listening, McG?)
I pulled my pyjama top over my face earlier this evening- I don't know why, I just felt like annoying my sister while she was using the bathroom mirror, and pretending to be a masked bandit in bright pink Chupa Chup PJs and waving my hands in the air behind her head just seemed the best way to go about it- when I realised something.
I could totally be Kitana if they ever made another horrible Mortal Kombat movie.
(Kitana always wears a mask that hides everything but her eyes. Thus, it hit me like a lightning bolt when I was mucking around in the mirror.)
I have given this considered, educated thought (mostly because the alternative to this train of thought was going back to a large pile of legislation and national employment standards) and have come up with the following reasons why I could totally be cast as Kitana:
1) I'm Asian. She's Asian. In fact, Kristin Kreuk got cast as Chun-Li for Street Fighter and she's only half-Asian. Therefore, am TWICE AS QUALIFIED as Kristin Kreuk for this role. (Am still irritated at Kristin Kreuk and the fact that she got to star as the love interest of Tom Welling AND Jensen Ackles in Smallville. That's just plain greedy.)
2. Drop-dead gorgeousness is not a deciding factor. She wears a mask over most of her face.
3. Even acting is not an issue. Of course, I do have the unrivalled experience of having a minor speaking part in my Year Six school play, but at any rate, Kitana's voice comes out muffled in MK v DC...quite possibly due to having an entire scrap of blue fabric plastered to her jaw. So I could botch my lines and no one would notice!
4. I really like the colour blue. It's meant to be.
5. KISS OF DEATH! KISS OF DEATH!
And as you can see, my study for the next exam is not going so well....:P
I could totally be Kitana if they ever made another horrible Mortal Kombat movie.
(Kitana always wears a mask that hides everything but her eyes. Thus, it hit me like a lightning bolt when I was mucking around in the mirror.)
I have given this considered, educated thought (mostly because the alternative to this train of thought was going back to a large pile of legislation and national employment standards) and have come up with the following reasons why I could totally be cast as Kitana:
1) I'm Asian. She's Asian. In fact, Kristin Kreuk got cast as Chun-Li for Street Fighter and she's only half-Asian. Therefore, am TWICE AS QUALIFIED as Kristin Kreuk for this role. (Am still irritated at Kristin Kreuk and the fact that she got to star as the love interest of Tom Welling AND Jensen Ackles in Smallville. That's just plain greedy.)
2. Drop-dead gorgeousness is not a deciding factor. She wears a mask over most of her face.
3. Even acting is not an issue. Of course, I do have the unrivalled experience of having a minor speaking part in my Year Six school play, but at any rate, Kitana's voice comes out muffled in MK v DC...quite possibly due to having an entire scrap of blue fabric plastered to her jaw. So I could botch my lines and no one would notice!
4. I really like the colour blue. It's meant to be.
5. KISS OF DEATH! KISS OF DEATH!
And as you can see, my study for the next exam is not going so well....:P
Thursday, June 18, 2009
It's What I Go To Work For
GFC.
It always takes me a little mental minute to process acronyms. Whenever someone mentions the GFC my brain kicks into overdrive. Does it stand for Games For Consoles? Gluten Free Cooking? Grease Fried Chips?
Alas, the rather prosaic answer is the Global Financial Crisis. Nothing quite so fun as the other food-related alternatives my mind tossed up.
Anyway, the 'GFC' has meant that consumer spending has dropped, which means that retail stores are laying off staff, cutting hours and slashing wage budgets. Which means that when I walked into work today for my first shift in two weeks, I was apologetically informed that I wouldn't get another shift until the 10th of July. And this shift would be a grand total of three hours. Huzzah.
However, given the lack of consumer enthusiasm, it meant that my Thursday night shift was very very quiet. This was basically my night:
(M is my Manager, AM the Assistant Manager, 3IC the third-in-charge).
5:45 p.m- Arrive early for shift. AM has downloaded two episodes of Season Four of Supernatural on his iPhone for my viewing pleasure, so I stand in the backroom annoying M, making little squeaky noises when the little Jensen Ackles on screen lifts up his shirt. I get an inordinate amount of pleasure turning the iPhone upside-down so the image rotates too. Why doesn't everything come with built-in accelerators?!
5:55 p.m- M and AM start humming. They enjoy stringing my name along to the Spiderman theme, probably because my full name has three syllables and the tune is as catchy as anything.
6:00 p.m- Shift starts. 3IC is having a teary argument because apparently the Area Manager noticed her very frayed pants hems and told M that 3IC must buy new ones. M informs 3IC that if she doesn't get new pants and comply with uniform standards he can send her home for her next shift. 3IC threatens to call the Union, because obviously the Union does not have better things to do with its time than look at people's trousers.
6:25 p.m- M gives 3IC way too much leeway. I make a mental note that tears will get you out of anything. M and 3IC leave.
6:45 p.m- Colleague is stuck with an Asian woman and her two kids trying to haggle down the price of some kind of robot kit with Bluetooth capabilities. In three years, I have never seen a customer successfully put that thing together. The control box always karks it or something.
7:00 p.m- Am stuck with someone looking for Components. Crap it.
7:05 p.m- Have located a crystal earpiece, but am now combing the Components area for bloody ferrite rods.
7:10 p.m- I emerge triumpantly from the midst of fuses and resistors with three ferrite rods, only to be told that they're not suitable because they lack coils. Why do ferrite rods have coils?! It's a rod! It's ferrite! Why add coils to it's rodly goodness? AARGH.
7:15 p.m- Am now stuck looking in the diodes section for some kind of obscure diode. I hate diodes.
7:18 p.m- Asian woman still haggling.
7:20 p.m- Find a dude roaming the tools section looking for an AV switch. Dump him in front of the right section while discreetly checking him out. Final verdict: nah.
7:25 p.m- Asian woman still haggling.
7:30 p.m- Another customer wants to know if he can ask a tricky question. I say sure- he's holding a SCART-3RGB adaptor, it's not like there's anything else he needs to know about. Except:
"Is it bi-directional?"
EH?!
7:32 p.m- Apparently bi-directional is just a fancy name for input/output. Point-of-Sale database, how I love thee.
7:45 p.m- Boss brings me giant coffee, latte with two sugars. Wish my favourite barista was working so we could bitch about the trials of law school during the coffee-making process. Ooh, it's a large coffee. Daphne the Caffeine Squirrel ain't gettin' any sleep tonight.
7:50 p.m- AM hooks up his iPhone to a 22" Samsung in the back room and Jensen's glorious visage fills the screen. Were my life a Stephenie Meyer novel, I would be gasping at his smouldering dark eyes and chiselled chest, thinking how sweet and intoxicating his breath would be and bemoaning my own feeble insignificance next to his heartbreaking beauty.
AM tells me to stop drooling.
7:53 p.m- Jensen is sharpening a knife. How manly he looks in his singlet and his gun arsenal.
7:54 p.m- AM asks me if I can blow up some more balloons for the sale display.
7:56 p.m- Have filled the last two minutes with blow-related jokes.
7:59 p.m- I attempt to earnestly give a brief etymology lesson to AM by arguing that the word 'erect' cannot be used in relation to a balloon, as 'erect' implies something being built from foundations or rising up, and really, the word 'inflate' is more appropriate. What can't you do with a B.A in English?
8:00 p.m- AM decides to test out iPhone and component cable on a larger LCD screen. Am impressed that such a compressed file can be shown in clear 576p. Have reevaluated my scorn of the iPhone, but I still wouldn't get one.
8:30 p.m- Remember that my coffee is still sitting out the back. Coffee is duly sculled, luke-warm and all, but still coffee.
8:45 p.m- Almost home time!
9:00 p.m- End of shift.
And they pay me $21/hr for this* :D
*Well, in the good old days when I had weekly shifts
It always takes me a little mental minute to process acronyms. Whenever someone mentions the GFC my brain kicks into overdrive. Does it stand for Games For Consoles? Gluten Free Cooking? Grease Fried Chips?
Alas, the rather prosaic answer is the Global Financial Crisis. Nothing quite so fun as the other food-related alternatives my mind tossed up.
Anyway, the 'GFC' has meant that consumer spending has dropped, which means that retail stores are laying off staff, cutting hours and slashing wage budgets. Which means that when I walked into work today for my first shift in two weeks, I was apologetically informed that I wouldn't get another shift until the 10th of July. And this shift would be a grand total of three hours. Huzzah.
However, given the lack of consumer enthusiasm, it meant that my Thursday night shift was very very quiet. This was basically my night:
(M is my Manager, AM the Assistant Manager, 3IC the third-in-charge).
5:45 p.m- Arrive early for shift. AM has downloaded two episodes of Season Four of Supernatural on his iPhone for my viewing pleasure, so I stand in the backroom annoying M, making little squeaky noises when the little Jensen Ackles on screen lifts up his shirt. I get an inordinate amount of pleasure turning the iPhone upside-down so the image rotates too. Why doesn't everything come with built-in accelerators?!
5:55 p.m- M and AM start humming. They enjoy stringing my name along to the Spiderman theme, probably because my full name has three syllables and the tune is as catchy as anything.
6:00 p.m- Shift starts. 3IC is having a teary argument because apparently the Area Manager noticed her very frayed pants hems and told M that 3IC must buy new ones. M informs 3IC that if she doesn't get new pants and comply with uniform standards he can send her home for her next shift. 3IC threatens to call the Union, because obviously the Union does not have better things to do with its time than look at people's trousers.
6:25 p.m- M gives 3IC way too much leeway. I make a mental note that tears will get you out of anything. M and 3IC leave.
6:45 p.m- Colleague is stuck with an Asian woman and her two kids trying to haggle down the price of some kind of robot kit with Bluetooth capabilities. In three years, I have never seen a customer successfully put that thing together. The control box always karks it or something.
7:00 p.m- Am stuck with someone looking for Components. Crap it.
7:05 p.m- Have located a crystal earpiece, but am now combing the Components area for bloody ferrite rods.
7:10 p.m- I emerge triumpantly from the midst of fuses and resistors with three ferrite rods, only to be told that they're not suitable because they lack coils. Why do ferrite rods have coils?! It's a rod! It's ferrite! Why add coils to it's rodly goodness? AARGH.
7:15 p.m- Am now stuck looking in the diodes section for some kind of obscure diode. I hate diodes.
7:18 p.m- Asian woman still haggling.
7:20 p.m- Find a dude roaming the tools section looking for an AV switch. Dump him in front of the right section while discreetly checking him out. Final verdict: nah.
7:25 p.m- Asian woman still haggling.
7:30 p.m- Another customer wants to know if he can ask a tricky question. I say sure- he's holding a SCART-3RGB adaptor, it's not like there's anything else he needs to know about. Except:
"Is it bi-directional?"
EH?!
7:32 p.m- Apparently bi-directional is just a fancy name for input/output. Point-of-Sale database, how I love thee.
7:45 p.m- Boss brings me giant coffee, latte with two sugars. Wish my favourite barista was working so we could bitch about the trials of law school during the coffee-making process. Ooh, it's a large coffee. Daphne the Caffeine Squirrel ain't gettin' any sleep tonight.
7:50 p.m- AM hooks up his iPhone to a 22" Samsung in the back room and Jensen's glorious visage fills the screen. Were my life a Stephenie Meyer novel, I would be gasping at his smouldering dark eyes and chiselled chest, thinking how sweet and intoxicating his breath would be and bemoaning my own feeble insignificance next to his heartbreaking beauty.
AM tells me to stop drooling.
7:53 p.m- Jensen is sharpening a knife. How manly he looks in his singlet and his gun arsenal.
7:54 p.m- AM asks me if I can blow up some more balloons for the sale display.
7:56 p.m- Have filled the last two minutes with blow-related jokes.
7:59 p.m- I attempt to earnestly give a brief etymology lesson to AM by arguing that the word 'erect' cannot be used in relation to a balloon, as 'erect' implies something being built from foundations or rising up, and really, the word 'inflate' is more appropriate. What can't you do with a B.A in English?
8:00 p.m- AM decides to test out iPhone and component cable on a larger LCD screen. Am impressed that such a compressed file can be shown in clear 576p. Have reevaluated my scorn of the iPhone, but I still wouldn't get one.
8:30 p.m- Remember that my coffee is still sitting out the back. Coffee is duly sculled, luke-warm and all, but still coffee.
8:45 p.m- Almost home time!
9:00 p.m- End of shift.
And they pay me $21/hr for this* :D
*Well, in the good old days when I had weekly shifts
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Attention Span FAIL...
My attention span has actually decreased from when I was a kid.
I used to be able to sit through long, painful school assemblies. Chapel, every week (although I once copped detention for sliding with my friends on the pews.) Speech Nights. Double periods, sometimes triple- of the same class. Hours of let's-go-through-every-line-of-Romeo-and-Juliet in English. Yet now, I am unable to sustain my concentration for more than 20 minutes at a time.
And just to prove a point, I am writing this in the middle of my Equity lecture.
It's only one and a half hours and I am so painfully bored that I have actually exhausted the distractions of all other websites, including Facebook.
Currently, the lecturer is talking about 'equitable monetary remedies' and I am blogging about not paying attention.
Sigh.
I used to be able to sit through long, painful school assemblies. Chapel, every week (although I once copped detention for sliding with my friends on the pews.) Speech Nights. Double periods, sometimes triple- of the same class. Hours of let's-go-through-every-line-of-Romeo-and-Juliet in English. Yet now, I am unable to sustain my concentration for more than 20 minutes at a time.
And just to prove a point, I am writing this in the middle of my Equity lecture.
It's only one and a half hours and I am so painfully bored that I have actually exhausted the distractions of all other websites, including Facebook.
Currently, the lecturer is talking about 'equitable monetary remedies' and I am blogging about not paying attention.
Sigh.
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