'Now, if you're ready, Oysters dear, we can begin to feed.'

I just made the BEST dinner - thai yellow coconut curry with prawn, red pepper* and pak choi. I love asian greens, I always like to eat them whilst Mark is away as he doesn't like them so much. I like the bitterness and the crunch. I guess I've always liked things like that, cabbage, sprouts etc. Green leafy things as part of a hot meal.

I really don't have that much to report. Stress continues to plague me in various guises - all UK-move-related. But I am calmer today due to a possible step forward on the temporary accommodation front and after a long discussion with one of my staff (Rosie) about Port Stephens and all the things we can do when we go up there in November with Mark's parents. I am planning a lot of swimming, walking, relaxing, whale and dolphin watching, fish eating, and horse riding. Spring break!!!

Since Mark went away I've not been really doing that much, which I'm hoping to change this weekend with at least one proper day out. Last Saturday I got the train to Redfern then walked into Glebe and met Dean at about 10.30am, we visited La Banette, the bakery/patisserie and bought many pastry and cakey and bread based items. La Banette is great - can't believe I've not been before. They do this mini brioche thing stuffed with nutella, omg so nice!!!
We got the bus back to Newtown and dropped the food at Dean's before heading round to Shenkin to drink coffee and milkshakes and eat hommous and falafel and greek salad. Mmmm Shenkin falafel is amazing, and their hommous is pretty much the best ever. Possibly even better than the chile dip from Sultan's Table. We sat for a long long time then went back to Dean's to while away another couple of hours playing with the dogs. Then I walked back down the road to mine and watched the last of my DVDs before I had to take them back to the video shop, the last one being Notting Hill, which was enjoyable enough but Love Actually is SO much better. Then I walked up to the video shop to put my DVDs in the returns chute.

Sunday I woke up feeling a little ill. Lay around feeling sorry for myself for a while but then had a shower and caught the train to Circular Quay for a walk and to take some more photos. Then bought some AMAZING CHEESE from David Jones on the way home. Like mega creamy brie with a blue vein. Oh and also 6 oysters to try to make myself feel healthy. Oh oysters. How I love thee.

'O Oysters,' said the Carpenter,
'You've had a pleasant run!
Shall we be trotting home again?'
But answer came there none --
And this was scarcely odd, because
They'd eaten every one.



*Yes, pepper. I may have slipped comfortably into 'eggplant' for aubergine, come around to 'chips' for crisps, and eventually even forced myself to adopt 'lollies' for sweets, I cannot and will not ever bring myself to call a pepper a 'capsicum'.

Shuffling around

This evening Mark and I are getting packed up as we leave the Glebe house tomorrow for another temporary home. At least we will soon have a more permanent home! As I mentioned a couple of posts back, we had our application accepted on the house in Meadowbank and put down a deposit on it last Saturday! Until we can move in on September 3rd, we will be in the Medina Executive Apartments. It looks pretty nice and is being paid for by Macquarie University out of Mark's relocation allowance. The downside is that it's in North Ryde (near Macquarie University), a dull suburban sprawl connected to the city only via a 40 minute bus ride. But, there are gym, sauna and swimming pool facilities, so hopefully I will be too busy getting wet to notice the surroundings too much.

Today Mark took the morning off work and we strolled around Glebe and Newtown, until it was time for a seminar he wanted to attend at the University of Sydney. We also had another poke around in Gould's Book Arcade on King Street, the most brilliant warehouse piled full of second hand books, where I acquired Nylon magazine and Nabokov's The Real Life of Sebastian Knight. That makes the second Nabokov novel I have bought in a week (the first being The Defence, found for $3 on a stall at Glebe Market) - the lesser known ones that I found hard to get hold of in the UK just keep appearing!

Here's a few pictures from around Glebe/Newtown:


View of the Central Business District.




On King Street, Newtown.


Mark in a cafe reading Nylon.

Glebe house

I realised I never posted a picture of where we are staying at the moment! Here is the house, in Glebe, just off Glebe Point Road. It is a shared house, we have our own room but are sharing kitchen, dining room, garden, and 3 bathrooms with the others. There are a few interesting people here - Singaporeans, Canadians, other Britishers.... The Singaporeans make amazing homemade tea which they let me try. Lovely!



So we have been here just over three weeks now. We leave next Thursday (31st July).

Rain booo.

Feeling a bit ill today, got a cold coming I think. The weather is awful at the moment which doesn't help; it has poured with rain pretty much solidly since yesterday evening. This means I am stuck inside the house, as neither of the three pairs of shoes (well...two pairs of actual shoes and one pair of flip flops) I brought with me in my suitcase are very rain-appropriate. I wore my canvas shoes to just walk a hundred meters down to the Fair Trade Café on Glebe Point Road last night and they almost died, so I am having to give them a day off today.

I also need more clothes! I am so fed up of the same hoodie-jeans-jacket everyday. I think American Apparel is due to open their Sydney store soon though, possibly even today, so I need to get down there and pick up a new hoodie, especially since the $$$ price works out slightly cheaper than the £££ price.



I may end up with this one in brown. I kind of favour the hoodie dress that they do (they same thing just longer like a dress), but it doesn't come in brown and I am kind of attracted to this brown. Ho hum we'll see.



I like this cardigan as well, it's a unisex one but looks a good fit, and I'm always borrowing Mark's cardigans because I like how they fit so it would be good to get my own and I'm sure he would appreciate it!

Mark just skyped me with some good news!!! We got our application accepted on the house in Meadowbank!!! I'm so excited! It is still a month until we can move in, but it's so good to know there is some stability coming. We move out of this house in Glebe next Thursday, and Macquarie University (Mark's work) are hopefully sorting us out something for the intervening weeks.

In other news, I forgot to write that I passed my Graduate Diploma in Law, and not only passed but got a Commendation, hurrah! So there are two things to celebrate right now. Although they will possibly be celebrated by hiding in bed from the weather...

Thai thai thai weekend.

This evening we had a lovely meal at Thai-riffic on King Street in Newtown, with the University of Sydney people. It was pretty good - Mark and I shared a Pad Thai as we were warned the meals were huge, and the warnings were right! It was delicious though - a much nicer Pad Thai than what I am used to, and they put the peanut at the side of the plate which I like. I am not very fond of the peanut part of Pad Thai so it was good to get the option of whether to add it to the dish or not.

On Saturday we had a lovely day at Glebe Market, followed by rosehip tea at Badde Manors on Glebe Point Road. On Sunday we had a really good red curry at the Fair Trade Café just a few doors down from Badde Manors. I like that café, it has a very relaxed bohemian feel.

Apologies for the lack of interesting photos here and at Flickr recently. I will get back on track soon I promise!