This Blog Should be Called: "I need a holiday to write a blog

So I've been away for awhile... well, not away (like on holiday), just home... and busy of course! Why is that being home is soooo busy? So I planned to write something to update you when I did go away again (just for a few days), but even then I didn't find time! What have I been so busy with?

On my last mainland trip, my computer got slightly hacked. Yep, they took a few hundred from my credit card and tried hitting my facebook and PayPal accounts. It seems they didn't get into those. So I had to do the paperwork to get my money back (no, of course I did not book a ticket on Arab Airways, but if I had, I think I would have had exciting things to do!).

And my little laptop was rather old, and slow (it was second hand when Rob gave it to me five years ago, and needed to be plugged into a power point to work), and I just started mistrusting it. I've heard that people who have had their houses broken into sometimes feel that their very person has been breached in some way, and therefore feel unsafe in their house. I became that way with my computer, and used it less and less, and when I did use it, I really didn't like to be. So eventually I forked out and updated everything. Now I've got new programs (you know everything has changed since 2000 - which is the vintage of all my other programs?) and I am having to learn it all again! And transferring all my documents over, and re-organising them etc. Always quite a task.

What else has there been? Well, there's been curtains. That has been a saga, which still is not complete. I might fill you in on that one later. Why a curtain saga? Well, first, we had completed building one room, and moved our bedroom in there just before leaving for the mainland. This room has four windows. I had decided to use the three curtains that were in the old bedroom, and had to cut and sew them to the size of the three main windows in the new room. There's still a fourth window to go!

New room!

Also, not long after our return, I got news that I would soon be sharing my 'craft house', and not just to the mice and critters. Nope, this sharing is with a much larger critter; man-sized in fact. Rob's son wanted to move in, and you know you can't say no to children. So a massive amount of energy went into compacting my activities, furniture and supplies into two rooms, instead of the whole house (I'm sure an ironing board in the kitchen and fabric all over the dining table would have been inconvenient for both of us!). Then I started on the curtains there. Downstairs (the windows that had curtains) needed hems taking up so they didn't drag on the floor. Two more windows still needed curtains (now done). And the colours they were just made me feel hepatic, so dyeing was undertaken. Then there's upstairs. The saga continues at this point.

Curtains needed attention, particularly the colour!

Then I made the mistake of actually looking at the 'bathroom' area (this is outside the main house, but still under the one roof, if that makes sense). I usually just walk past it, ignoring it all. I go back 'home' even to visit the bathroom, due to the toilet there leaking (supposedly Mike has fixed this now, using a mechanic's product).

Mould, mould, mould. I knew the doors were acquiring the shadows of blooms (well, that area is rather exposed to the moist air, given it is only three-quarters built). But I opened the bathroom door knowing I'd have to clean the bugs out of the bath and shower, and well, it was all spreading. Then inside the bathroom cabinet was black. Gross! Rob said I didn't have to do all this work; that his son could do it. I opened that cabinet and showed him. He walked away not saying anything. I took that as agreement. Oh, and miserably, I was working with cold water on cold days. The hot water system there was not completely hooked up yet (it's a woodfire job when the water is connected). I could have boiled the jug, but I was just going through too much water, it was black every five minutes. Looking closer again, the tin on the outside of the bathroom (but inside the bathroom area) did not just have a thin layer of dirt and dust...it was mould latching on too. More cleaning!

Then the floor was an issue. It's just concrete. But it was not a successful lay, and continually dusts up. If you sweep it, you have to keep on sweeping, because more concrete dust comes loose, and you start digging a hole. So the owner had scabbed up old bits of carpet and lino, and put it down over most of the concrete. But it is rather hard to sweep carpet. And always way too filthy to vacuum. Plus, concrete dust is great at blocking up the vacuum cleaner. And then finally, between the overlapped layers of lino, there was mould. I dragged it all out. Scabbed up Rob's remaining BondCrete and gave a section a go-over (not nearly enough to do it all). Then I bought another tub, and gave the main section a go-over, this time at a 50:50 ratio BondCrete : Water. That did it. Problem solved...until I paint the area. There's still more BondCreting to do, but in less used areas (and I guess more successful areas on concrete!).

I painted the laundry wall with some of our leftover paint (not all walls in this area have 'walls'). Two of the three doors, there's still another coat to go, but since they took a week to dry, I'm waiting until finer weather). And finally, I gave the tin a go. It had concrete splatters up one side (first photo), so I had to use a textured paint. We had some brown suede left over, but not enough (and I wouldn't want the whole wall brown - yuk!), so I came up with a stripe design, and painted away. Gosh, talk about wrong time of year! A day later it was wetter than when I first applied it! Two weeks later I was still waiting for it to completely dry! It has now, finally, but I'm definitely not doing the middle section or second coat for a couple of more months, I can see how painting can be a real disaster!

Concrete splatters

Craft house bathroom wall

Then there's been recipe testing. I've now tested fifty-six and a half recipes, out of a possible eighty-three. I'm only obligated to test twenty-five. But I wanted to test as many as possible. I'm just like that! So I've felt like my life is cooking, eating, cleaning, cooking, eating, cleaning, cooking, cleaning, eating, cleaning, cleaning, cooking, cleaning, eating, cleaning. Yep, a bit crazy. Rob can't wait until I stop and just clean! The oven desperately needs it, the bottom shelf copped a falling (and then exploding) container of cornflour (still not entirely cleaned up - that stuff spreads!). And the fridge? I went to do that months ago...and then got distracted. It will come...after recipe testing, okay?

Pina Colada Cupcakes: vegan AND gluten free!

We've also had a touch of book binding, but thankfully that is not my responsibility, I just 'help out' to reduce stress levels for Rob. And I'm nursing an itchy leech bite. This is the first leech that has ever successfully got his/her full suck from me. I was walking by the local wholefoods shop, when next thing I noticed I was kicking a large black slug. Gross, again. Which means there's been gardening: the rhubarb patch has had its first bit of care and attention since it was planted (before my time here), and I'm half-way through what the raspberries need.

One of Rob's sayings is: "I'm too busy to have a job". The scary thing is, the more he says this, the more it comes true. And I've not seen any work done on our house since we moved into the 'room'. It's been engines and biodiesel, and airplanes, and printing, and garden, and parents (they take up a lot of time, but another lot you can't say 'no' to, they won't be here much longer, and are having a real hard time currently). The same goes for me, as you can see from the above. But guess what? Yes, some of my time has been put into job applications. Selectively. But a bit of community involvement, intellectual stimulation, and pocket money would do me good. Thus far I've had two rejections from the ABS (they didn't even want me to collect census forms!), rejected for an apprenticeship in a museum, and the big Roy Morgan research firm doesn't want me trudging under bridges to interview homeless people. Hmmmm... if only they knew how suited I am for all of these positions hey?

Friends & Food

So after that long walk, it was on to the real part of the holiday for me – time to wake up!

A couple of my friends live in Queensland, and so the Tassie boys took me for a drive through the big smoke, where roads cost money to drive on, and engineers are busy building ramps, overpasses and a mazes of new roads to charge us for. Definitely a shock to the system. But good ol’ Homer on the GPS got us there after hours of driving.

First stop was Mary’s (of Beetle Creative). Mary did live in Tasmania, but is busy creating her own little beetles and decided she needed Mother Beetle’s support…which meant moving back to Brisbane. Well, what a time for me to turn up!!! She’s only six weeks away from hatching bub number two, and it was her wedding anniversary – good timing Kat! But she didn’t mind – what a great friend!

Mary even went out of her way to ensure she had a vegan meal ready to cook on the first night – Nachos from the Turn Over a New Leaf Cookbook. Yum! The second night she was at a bit of a loss though, with having to feed a picky three year old and an even pickier man. I was so happy that I had planned ahead so I could take that bit of stress away from her, and whipped out a packet of Asam Fish which I could cook to go alongside her steamed veggies. She even tried a bit (I do keep claiming it’s the BEST camping food ever), to which I think she agreed!

This started the week long of midnight or later nights, full of chatting about art, craft, food, children, friends, markets and men, all of which continued from Mary’s and on to Michelle’s. Hard work when my bed time is usually something more in line with the setting sun!

Miss Three must have worked off a lot of sweat at her swimming lessons, as after that all she could think of was cake.

Swimming lessons

So we invented an excuse to cook cake: the cat! Tabby, who adopted the family 10 years ago, had never celebrated a birthday. So we decided it must be tabby’s birthday. I let my memory guide me in buying what ingredients were necessary for vegan cupcakes, then when back ‘home’, headed to the PPK for guidance. Thankfully there was a chocolate cake recipe basically the same as the Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World cupcakes I usually cook. Saved! The girls went crazy decorating with all the birthday candles they could find, including Dora.

Tabby’s birthday celebrations

Girls and candles

The cupcakes - cookies and cream!

For dinner, I decided that since I had most of the ingredients with me, I’d cook the delicious Cold Sesame Noodles again, and get the opinions of this family to give back to Allyson for her upcoming book. It turned out that only Michelle and myself liked it. Miss Six said it tasted like ‘poo’ (yeah right! I think you just like that word!) and Miss Three was enticed with tomato sauce for a little while. On the other hand, the girls liked the Syndian pumpkin balls on their plates, whereas Michelle and I thought they were too dry and tasteless. The Mister in the house didn’t touch any of the strange apparitions on his plate. I understand kids not liking things that are ‘different’ but feel sad when the men won’t even give things a go. Oh well, he really missed out. And the Noodles is a main course for four people, so I lived off it for the next few days! That made things easy, but meant I didn’t get to test any more recipes, as I had been hoping to do.

On the last night, we decided to take the challenge of eating out. I really wanted to take the whole family to Loving Hut. I’ve heard great things about them, including that they’re child friendly. But since I was outside my own territory, and could not guarantee there would be anything any of her people would eat, I let Michelle pick the place, as long as they had a chance of catering for me. She ditched the family and decided on Mexican, since she never gets to eat it as the rest of her family just doesn't like it.

We drove to Pickled Cactus, got green lights all the way there, and then a carpark right in front of the restaurant, despite it being a busy night. Good signs! Michelle started to get cold feet about them being vegan-friendly. I assured her Mexican can do vegan (and crossed my fingers!). We got our table, the last in the place and studied the menu. Then when the waitress came along, Michelle did my bidding for me: “My friend is a vegan – do you know what that is?”, “Can you do anything for her?”.

“Yes, I was vegan for 17 years!”. Score! Our fantastic vegetarian waitress assured me they understood what a vegan was, that if I asked for no cheese and sour cream I would geta vegan meal, and then went on to make her recommendations. We took her up on them:

Pickled Cactus meals (mine closest - yes - that huge thing!)

Michelle was over the moon, and it was really nice and relaxing after that. And I somehow managed to eat everything in that Supreme. Michelle took a doggy-bag home. “You could have it as lunch tomorrow” she had insisted when I said I was full half-way through, “No I can’t – I’m flying!”. So I made the most of it!

But I have to say, as great as it was, Pickled Cactus was nothing when compared to a true vegan restaurant. While at Yo’s, we went into Lismore for 20 000 Cows. An unusual name, with an awesome reputation. I finally got to tick this one off my list! And I can’t wait to go back...and that is not because the neighbour’s cat decided to join us at the Ashram (though it did make me feel very at home!).

Cat on my lap at Cows

We ordered a feast, and got a feast. It came out in many courses, with many plates to sample and share. Every single dish was delicious, well presented, and there was much excitement with every bite. And we thought we were done (this is three men and myself). We were satisfied, contemplating whether or not we should order dessert. And then the finale came out – we didn’t even know there was still more! Well, that struck the dessert off the list...no it didn’t actually, I couldn’t handle that, so I asked for the cheesecake as a takeaway. They were happy to do this, but it became obvious that they don’t usually do this – they gave it to me on one of their plates with alfoil over the top. I had tears in my eyes over how sweet it was for them to be so generous and trusting! And I gave Yo firm orders to return it at his earliest convenience.

20 000 Cows Middle Eastern Course

I had many things on my to do list while on the mainland, mostly to do with experiencing vegan food. I wanted to go to Loving Hut. I wanted to go to a Mrs Flannery's Health Food Shop to try Tofutti Cuties. I wanted to find and buy sorghum flour. I didn’t get to tick these off my list this time. But, my handy ‘just add water’ wipes certainly got to show themselves as handy – adding water to wipe my hands clean after patting the cat at 20 000 cows, wiping perfume off Miss Three’s face, along with many other scenarios.

Can’t wait until next time!

Vegan in a non-vegan world: A Review of The Pier (Port Macquarie)

The Pier is a modern pizza and tapas joint. Being a ‘Soul Session’ Thursday night, it had a better atmosphere than anywhere I’ve been since I lived in Sydney.

Rob settled in for a half litre of German beer, the waiter took his order, and then scampered off without even giving me a look. It was all downhill from there.

We ordered up big time, excited that there were potential options on the menu. After I chased the waiter down again, clarified that I was a vegan, and asked if the dishes I was ordering were suitable, I was told a ‘yes, definitely’. Cool! Except the chargrilled veggies had been removed from the menu due to lack of popularity. I upgraded to my back-up option of Hindu pizza, minus the two cheeses (obviously), and minus the onion (time to give my poor bod a break from the substance it doesn’t like).

Our ‘Bites’ were probably the best dishes of the evening. I had the simple tomato, basil and olive oil, the man ordered something with cheese. They came out on the same serving slab, but there was no contamination.

The marinated olives were quite nice. This was a dish Rob ordered, so I never asked about whether the bread was vegan, since he’s not.

Then my ‘Taste’ was a real disappointment. It came out with a white coloured sauce beside it. This is the dish I was told ‘yes, definitely’ to my question of being suitable for a vegan. Rob tasted it for me and clarified that it was actually a cheese sauce. I gave a corn and capsicum fitter a bite, declared it egg, and put it back down again. I won’t go into Rob’s disappointment at me refusing ‘good’ food. But then he tried a bite too, and even though he loves egg, he said these were not very good. He did eat two out of the four though. When the waiter reappeared, I asked him if they had egg in them, just to confirm my suspicions. He went away and confirmed that there was egg ‘just to combine the ingredients’. HELLO! NOT VEGAN! I just nodded my head but said no more; my consideration for the dining experience of my companion. I’d already over-stepped his preferred line by even questioning what was in my food.

And the pizza? Well, I generally find veganised pizzas quite nice. But with this gourmet variety, I found it only just doable. And given that they had no idea what vegan is, I actually have no idea whether it really was, as ‘milk solids’ can be hidden in both the base and the sauce. The flavours were okay, but overall it was quite dry, especially the mushrooms which were a dried variety to begin with.

I ate it. I needed to be fed, it was in front of me, we would be paying for it, and it really did save ruining the night by creating a scene and then tramping all over town to repeat the experience. But I know most other vegans would have demanded their money back. I wouldn’t be going back there, unless it was just to drink. Then I’d have to do a LOT of research to know what it was I was drinking! Bon Apetit hey?

Activities...

So what do you do when you’re on holiday? At the start of this blog, I said that what I like about holidays is the simplification of life – you can only do what you can carry and/or what is available in your location.

I didn’t come to Port to do any ‘activities’ as offered by the location though. Rob is at the airport, stuffed in a classroom, doing work. My being here is incidental to that, and I’m ‘on call’ to pick him up whenever his day there ends (always afternoon, but a bit random). Plus, I’ve been here before and done the ‘activities’:

Riding camels on Lighthouse beach with Michelle…

…and the fun and games at Fantasy Glades (now closed I believe).

Back to the present: the first day we were here we went for a long walk, from Shelly beach (well from our apartment actually) almost to the lighthouse, and back again. This is an amazing part of the coast, where the ‘rainforest’ (I do believe it’s regrowth) actually meets the beaches.

Lush and green, with interesting textures and shapes:

Despite how the much Bitou Bush has taken over:

Forest behind the coast is how it should be. I had never really thought about it until I was flying over Port, but our practice of building right on coastal locations, though convenient to our desires, does seem a bit wrong. Seeing all the swamp land behind the sand dunes, it seems to me that the swamp is there for a purpose. And from the air Port looks like it has been built on a swamp – all around the town that’s all there is! I had been told this before (I actually lived here once upon a time), but never really believed it. Nor did I go exploring.

I think this photo shows the water reservoir for Port, but all around it looks like swamp, like everywhere else that isn’t built up in this region. Even the airport was swampy in the grass areas! And it does seem that Port is suffering beach erosion, just like Old Bar. Here’s Town Beach, which looked smaller than I remembered it:

So, other than walking and beach viewing, what the hell am I doing with myself?

Well, I decided to tackle the cooking in a better way than ‘heat in pouch’ meals. Which meant shopping for resources, which took time, of course! A really cool blue scanpan knife from House. Cutting board and containers to contain leftovers for Rob’s lunch from Go-Lo. A large $2 bowl, salt, pepper and cumin from the Reject Shop (and yep, they had reject service to go with their reputation). Crap products, but the best option when you need cheap. We will actually have to leave the bowl and containers behind…

I also found a pair of thongs for myself:

Killed a bit of time reading on the beach:

Yep, there were showers out at sea on this day:

And showers on the land yesterday, so I finally got the washing done (took a good two hours!). There was a fantastic tiny secondhand bookshop combined with coffee shop nearby, which was a much more pleasant environment than the laundry, so I had a cup of green tea, and although I didn’t need a book to carry around, I picked one up anyway:

And food is an activity too, isn’t it?

Dinner at Sara’s Kitchen.

Tofu sushi for lunch, with a ginseng drink.

Yummo treats:

And tested out some recipes:

Cold Sesame Noodles

(served with Asian bean and kumera bites – remind me not to have these again, though I do know their veggie bites are yum).

Quinoa tebbouleh (with falafels purchased from Coles)

And cleaning up the mess of course. Here’s a photo of my work area:

(view from the toilet)

And cups of tea in between of course:

And until today, not much computer time:

Because of the dismal lighting, I’ve not been sewing or reading at night. We’ve actually been watching TV, exactly what this room was set up for:

(yup - that's the bench that is *meant* to be the kitchenette - microwave behind TV, bar fridge beside microwave. No more powerpoints available for the kettle or toaster)

To the extent that we even watched the footy last night (we NEVER watch foot ball!). I fell asleep when it was 10:0 in favour of the Maroons. Then Rob woke me when it was 12:10. And although there was a chance there for a moment, the Blues just couldn’t do it. I missed all the action hey?

When food shopping is an adventure…

So on Saturday night, when options were open, we opted to buy groceries and cook our own dinner. This resulted in Asam Fish (pre-purchased from the Cruelty Free Shop for this trip) with a side of mashed potatoes and asparagus. Oreos were dessert.

We also bought some fancy supermarket bread and vegemite to do us for breakfast the next day, and of course FRUIT! Despite my cravings for pizza for lunch (pizza shops were the main option in Merimbula, and again here!), Rob was busy talking to other pilots over on the airstrip (an activity he tells me he doesn’t like to do, but here he voluntarily sought it out – was he bored, or does he secretly like it?). So vegemite on toast doubled as lunch too. His craving emerged as pizza for dinner, and he was certain he’d get it.

We wondered down to the shops, and all that was open was the Take Away and a Gelato Bar. The few ‘gourmet’ shops were closed, especially the one where we thought we’d get a nice, customised pizza. We back tracked to the Take Away, Rob having seen some mention of pizza on a sign there. We dubiously looked through the window to the menu. Yes, Pizza was available Thursday to Saturday. There was the menu on the main board with all the other burgers and fried goods. But it was a Take Away! Rob suggested they must be pre-packaged pizzas which would rule this little vegan out on the cheese front. Then the quality would be questionable for him.

So we opted for Bi-Lo again – straight to the freezer section. I knew I was defeated on the pizza front, so Rob studied the packets before him while I hunted around for any surprising new foods. Nope, Herbert Adams pasties have milk solids in them. Hmmm… spring rolls… but with what? And $5 for six? And then I remembered the main ingredient on pre-prepared pizzas is mushrooms (Rob hates mushrooms!), so I told him the bad news. “You can make your own though – buy a base…”. The costing was looking like coming closer to the $15 from the Take Away shop.

Yup, a pre-prepared, generic brand base with cheese was $8 for one (or $10 for three). It looked like Rob was trying out the Take Away, so I hunted for something for myself. Armed with a ‘boil in pouch’ Indian lentil dish, and a few green beans, Rob approached me with a package of herb breads “these don’t have butter!”. I verified this claim by reading the ingredient list (whoohooo – they used olive oil!). We made a selection of marinated antipasto goodies from the deli, Rob added a few other embellishments, and finally, we were done.

So an hour after we had set off, we had what we needed to cook dinner. The bill? $20 a head (this did include fortune cookies for dessert and another loaf of bread).

I pan fried the potatoes left over from the previous night, with a bit of chilli powder. We couldn’t get the grill working, so cooked our pizzettes in the oven. And they were yum!

We leave Old Bar tomorrow, so I’ll show you a little bit of it:

I guess there’s a festival here at some point in the year. Summer perhaps?

The beach has been subject to some serious erosion, and trees are falling from previously safe higher ground, down onto the beach:

Of course a group of locals is concerned about this, and there are signs in town calling for Council action to build a breakwall or something, along with the tally of donations to the cause so far.

The surf is good though, even on not so good days:

And at the Bar end of the beach, the erosion is less, but perfectly formed into beautiful miniature cliffs:

They also have a fenced off an area to be a sanctuary for nesting Turns too.

Yes, I’m ‘different’…

…and at no time is this more obvious than at breakfast time. It is rare that I find anything satisfactory. I’m learning to adjust and give up, finally! When we were in Thailand, all I wanted for breakfast was a banana. Well the bananas over there are actually plantains, a starchy banana that gets the barbeque treatment. But they don’t bring their barbeques out until the afternoon, because the Thais consider plantains to be an afternoon snack. So at first I took the man on wild banana chases…until it was finally afternoon and I could have my banana for breakfast! Poor man…

Today in Merimbula, I knew my choices were limited. I’ve already decided not to do a hotel breakfast again unless I’m desperate, or in a very high class establishment. Today I wasn’t and we weren’t. But there was a servo next door, so I held my breath that there might be a piece of fruit there for me. We went in…and walked back out pretty quickly. We decided not to bother walking into town, and therefore the man took to the hotel breakfast. I gave him the message to bring back a piece of fruit with him if there was any. When he came back, he carried nothing. By this time I was getting hungry, which also means I was at risk of getting grumpy too, so I purposely tempered my mood. It did take effort. The plane would have something for me… I just had to hold out until we got there.

“There was fruit…”

My brow furrowed.

“…but it was plastic.”

Life in rural Australia hey? Food must be animal, packaged, or plastic.

So we packed up, walked back to the plane (close to two kilometres), and FINALLY I could ease my growing hunger!

I had some of the awesome, home-made ‘tear and share’ basil and olive bread left over from yesterday’s lunch too:

All this while the man used the airport internet facilities:

Small airports seem to attract a lot of birds, which is quite enjoyable to hang out in:

We traveled up the coast. Wollongong was the first bit of major population on our trip, complete with heavy industry:

And the obligatory freight ships on the horizon:

On my to do list is to travel along the coastal road between Wollongong and Sydney, because this has to be so cool to travel over:

Flying along the cliffs, over the ocean is really cool though. It is actually the law that you have to fly over water, and reasonably low (depending on the restrictions on the day and at the time) along this section of coast! Closer inland is a restricted military zone. Not all pilots are happy to travel low, yet alone over water for any period of time. I guess they have to pass over on the other side of the military zone. But that would mean missing out on the most spectacular of scenery!

The pollution of Sydney makes it rather unappealing to visit though:

One sight that is pretty amazing from the plane is the ship wreck just north of Newcastle:

This beach is super long, and super wide. And there’s people living there! A bit like a mini Sahara desert!

Mid-afternoon we arrived at our destination: Old Bar. The man picked it for a few reasons: it is a very old airstrip, heritage listed even, because the local council wanted to close it, and the locals did the work to ensure it was kept. It’s also right by a surfing beach, and within very close reach of town (most airports in Australia require a taxi ride). So we’re staying at Lani’s on the Beach, which has the best location of accommodation in town – they’re right on the beach; no one else is! And if you really wanted, you can arrange to have the two gates opened between park and ’port, and park your plane next to your rented cabin! But we didn’t bother. Scout is over there waiting for another avian friend to join him.

We walked down the beach, which turns out to be quite pebbled:

Then we went into town, which didn’t have much. We contemplated eating out, but it looked pretty dismal, unless we wanted pizza, and so we opted for some groceries from Bi-Lo. I’m off to cook now.

Did I mention that I LOVE rocks?

~Katara Jade

Old Bar, 21/05/2011