When the Cheshire emerges...

What an amazing culinary invention. No doubt one of the biggest things I associate with childhood and my maternal grandmother to this day. However, within the family there was also the time when my aunty cooked 1200. That was fun to hear about...

The last couple of trips home have been monumental in relation to kourambiethes fixes. I think I got them on my trip home in September, as I had my car and the large container would've lasted. But then there was (definitely) Christmas time...

On deciding to only take a carry-on bag (no point in spending extra when it's not necessary), I visit yiayia and she gives me a large container once again. I'm laughing saying I can't take it all, and she's telling me to take it on the plane with my handbag. I really couldn't not take any, so with mum later I compromised. I had to.

I fit about 12 into a small round container. And I relished those to the very end.

***

The trip home two weeks ago rolls around. I fly in, go with mum to visit yiayia straight from the airport. She warns me that yiayia was a bit cut about the compromise we would have to make once again.

"Dodika (12)? What do you mean, how am I meant to make just 12?" she had said to mum (or words to that effect).

We get there. The round container emerges, packed to the brim - with 12 of them. Mum said yiayia packed them in as tight as she could. Yiayia hands them to me shaking her head slightly. A perplexed disappointment hung in the air.


I'm just about to finish the last of them. At least next time will be when mum comes up to visit - with a suitcase. I'm expecting big things.

***
Your joy is divine and so is your suffering. There's so much to be learned from both.

This is NOT a trick of the light. From the knee upwards: chocolate, strawberry, vanilla.

What does one do with a TRIPLE TAN?!

***
As long as you stay where you are and tell yourself you have to do it because you've always done it, the only payoff you get is to defend your misery.

I did a story on Dubbo's new nightclub ahead of its opening two weeks ago, and finally got there last week when Australian hip hop group Justice Crew were in town.

Had a great time - they weren't on for long but it was a bit of fun and they were entertaining. The DJ afterwards was also pretty good, a diverse mix of rnb and dance - he even got The Prodigy in there so I was pretty happy with that. The club is pretty spacious and even has a quirky snack van in the smoking area. And it was busy too, which was good to see.

A slight #firstworldproblem with the night though was to do with the crowd on the dancefloor. It looked like a lot of these people had never been to either a club or a gig, let along a gig in a club. There were drinks going everywhere and moshing in a space that only had maybe up to two hundred people. Ridiculous. And really, this was for Justice Crew.

Courtesy Amaroo Hotel (I think)

Worst thing about this was that even the outer parts of the dancefloor were horribly wet and slippery. The glassies weren't cleaning it (if HQ can manage, they could here) and in heels I felt like I was extremely close to a stack that would've left me unconscious...

CASE STUDY: I watched a guy who was having fun and a bit of a crazy drunk dance, right? OK, that's fine. He had a whole cup of beer in one hand... then half a cup... then about a quarter of a cup... he looks at it, gestures to say, "Hey, where'd my beer go?", and then next I look and the cup's gone. He may have taken one sip.

I hate to say this, but I'll put it out there as I see it. It felt like it was a case of country people not knowing how to club. Guess it's just the different crowd... but control your drinks people, it's not that hard! It's not like you don't get drunk people sloshing drinks anywhere else, because you do, but this was pretty excessive for a smaller crowd.

For all of that, it won't deter me from going again should I get the chance. Just hope that it won't be as intense. I want to be able to wear high shoes!

***
A non-doer is very often a critic - that is, someone who sits back watching doers, and then waxes philosophically about how the doers are doing. It's easy to be a critic, but being a doer requires effort, risk and change.

Well by trying this out I was definitely a doer...