freyakitten

Irritating.

I'm checking flights for the next dance comp I'm thinking of going to for which I have not yet booked - a comp in July, in Canberra - and the flights available which are the most convenient times... are Tiger.

Leaving Adelaide on the Friday, I can catch a direct flight with Qantas at 6:40am, or a direct flight with Virgin at 6:20pm (which arrives after the Friday night activities have started) or I can take the 1:35pm Tiger flight (and get dropped off at the airport with free wireless internet at 11:30am).

Leaving Canberra on the Sunday, I can catch a direct flight with Qantas at 5:55pm, or a direct flight with Virgin at 4:30pm, or a direct flight with Tiger at 7:40pm - which even with the extra time needed to check in for Tiger flights still means that I'd only need to arrive at the airport at a later hour.

This is leaving aside the fact that the return airfare with Tiger ($58+$68=$126) is cheaper than either of those one way flights with Qantas ($147 each way), and approximately equal to the Canberra -> Adelaide flight with Virgin ($129; Adelaide -> Canberra journey with Virgin is $109)

All prices quoted do not include booking fees, credit card fees, nor checked luggage. All Qantas non-direct flights are more expensive. There are some Virgin non-direct flights which are less expensive, but they're at completely inappropriate times.

And they were tasty. Very very tasty.

The recipe took me half an hour to prepare, plus cooking time, doing it all by hand with no beaters or stand mixers or other implements of Doom. I got it from a link to a post on Desert Candy.

I chose not to ice the cupcakes, as that would be too much like hard work. And the original recipe says it makes 24, but I made double that. And I've changed the terminology to Australian where appropriate.

Earl Grey Cupcakes (makes ~48)

1 cup (1/2 lb or 200-250g) unsalted butter, at room temperature - I used Nuttelex, a lactose free spread. It's what we have in the fridge.
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
3 cups self-raising flour
1 cup milk (I used lactose free)
2 tablespoons Earl Grey tea or the contents of 2 Earl Grey teabags

* Preheat the oven to 180C, fill enough cupcake pans (my 'cupcake pans' are small muffin tins, and I have four six-muffin tins - the original recipe appears to think that 'cupcake pans' come in 12-muffin tins only) with patty pans or grease well.
* In a bowl (or with a stand mixer), beat the butter until creamy (using Nuttelex, I can omit this step).
* Add the sugar and cream the butter with the sugar until it is light and fluffy.
* Add the eggs one at a time, beating each egg very well so that it is thoroughly combined before adding the next egg.
* Beat in half of the flour along with the tea.
* Then add the milk and the remaining flour, stirring until just combined.
* Fill the patty pans 2/3 full.
* Bake 20-25 minutes, rotating the pans halfway through to ensure even baking.

Next time I'm trying this with honey instead of sugar.

Wanted: one interpreter. Must be fluent in Freyakinese.

It's that Gifty meme. Mostly copy/pasted from jeneration :D

The first 7 people to respond will get something created by me. That is: MADE. Handcrafted. Stuck together. Conceived. Etecetera.

This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

- I make no guarantees that you will like what I create, but I will do my best.
- What I create will be just for you.
- It'll be done this year (2009).
- What you will get will depend on where you are (there are things that can't be posted internationally) and how I am feeling. My talents, abilities, and general motivatableness tends to run in the direction of handsewn things, embroidered things, baked goods, or preserved foods.
- If there's something you know I do well, you can even request something - but I don't guarantee to fulfil the request.
- You have to be willing to send me your address so that I can get it (whatever it is) to you :P

The catch is that you should post this in YOUR journal. There is no obligation to repond to me, but you do need to make the offer to others. It's like pass-the-parcel - or paying it forward! :-)

GO!

Hee! In the free wireless room of the State Library, and it seems that something like a third of the laptops here are Eees.

Bastard apparently vaguely mentioned to his mother that he was looking at getting a dishwasher. Apparently his mother suggested that we redesign the entire kitchen while we're at it, and pulled out several proposed plans. We're nowhere near wanting as much done to the place as she ever suggests (it's so far from cost-effective if we should choose to sell our house that it's not funny), but some rethinking of the base cupboards is in order, unless we want to put the dishwasher in the laundry and buy a new washing machine (a side-loader) to go on top (not enough space otherwise). Bastard had had some thoughts.

Bastard then left me alone with the design software while he went to training.

The design I made in fifteen minutes of thinking and figuring out how to make stuff appear (I spent the most time fiddling with drawer inserts, trying to delete them after I'd seen what they actually looked like) is the best one so far. It has the second-best choice of corner cupboards (which also happen to be more expensive than the first choice) but it has a better use of space and simpler plumbing choices.

The design software we're using is the IKEA one, it's good as a place to start, but there is no way we're going with the options available therein. For one thing, in order to get benches that are as high as we have now (which are the perfect ergonomic height for me, and tolerable for Bastard), we have to have 21cm worth of wasted space underneath, where the cupboards' legs are for the tallest available cupboards. That's another drawer's worth!

Bastard is now fiddling with options some more.

Had annual blood testing happen on Friday. Friday the 7th of November being the only day in October when Bastard could give me a lift AND I didn't have dancing or something else on that night which would make taking of blood, with associated needles (and mild phobia thereof), owies (pinprick HA! Sting a little BOLLOCKS!), and adrenaline reactions to the whole shebang a Bad Idea. I have a decided preference for getting a lift home in that state, and dancing when there is a significantly larger-than-usual chance that I may wibble out is very very bad.

I have a bruise a touch over 4cm long and 1cm wide on that arm. It started as a lump a couple of centimetres away from the hole, which swelled over 12 hours or so, then spread out to the long, flat, painful bruise it is now. The phlebotomist used a vein I don't normally get poked in, which was good, as there aren't any pinhole scars there, and it was slightly less painful than usual, but it still burned the whole time.

Results should be back soon.

Dancingman has put up photos of Dancemania. This includes me and taliesins_muse in our formal finery and me and Baby Giant partway through the performance. Would you believe Baby Giant is three quarters my age? Also note that the couple dancing on the left side of the photo are in the same pose, but the gentleman is bracing the lady's arm away from his body, where mine is dead straight but barely reaches the far side of Baby Giant's torso.

I will add that the photos from Dancemania are the only pics of me wearing gold, ever. It only suits me when my hair is red, not when my hair is it's natural vague mouse.