Each of these cats has 3 names.

Box: Fish, and plankton, and sea greens, and protein from the sea!

Dave: Wouldn't it be great if he had a little drawer in the front that dispensed fish and chips?

Em: One gun would shoot lasers, and the other would dispense tartar sauce?

Dave: And sometimes he'd accidentally shoot from the wrong gun?

Em: But then he'd just want to shoot from that gun first, anyway. "First I will season you. Then, I will kill you!"

Me: He'd be the perfect bond villain that way!

Dave: Fish, plankton,

Em: And protein, Mr. Bond!

accurate product descriptions

They are made with powdered milk product.
They are in biscuit form.
They taste like sand.

New Adventures in Tea Obsessions

This is Chapter 2 regarding my interest Gong Fu Cha. That's right. I got a tea making set. And by me, I mean somebody else whose kitchen items I have weekly access to.

This is Yun Nan Ming Zhu Pu Erh. (third tea down on the link) It was dried in the moonlight, and its flavour gets better with age. This one can age for 10-20 years.

The same bowl with a lid for straining. This was a cheap mildly chipped set. This strainer is Ching Dynasty.

Using the grill as a water catching table is a stroke of genius, no?
Well, I was impressed.

Click the 'tea' tag to see the previous post and learn how to make tea. Keep in mind that the guy in the video is CRAZY.
And that listening to Chinese folk music is one of the steps.

Marlon Brando

sleeps on his head, clutching his tail.

He's fat, too.

lessons in music theory

I found an amazing site today with full scores of Chinese music. I'm a hack when it comes to playing Chinese music, and the only way I have to play in an ensemble is to play with other people who don't know what they're doing. That's why I'm really excited about this site; it gives me the opportunity to rewrite the scores and share them with people who don't actually play Chinese instruments, and wouldn't otherwise be able to play the music. Plus it gives me real music to practice on my gu zheng, instead of all these Christmas carols my teacher keeps giving me.

That's right. I can play Silent Night on the zheng.


So, here's how it works. This is the score I read from. It reads just like regular music: left to right, top to bottom. The 0's at the beginning mean that I don't have to play. Up at the top, it tells me that it's in 2/4 time and G=1. If G=1, then A=2, B=3, C=4 and so on. It's a musical code!

Of course, I always read D=1, because that's the key my instrument is tuned to, and I refuse to attempt playing in a different key until I'm a better player.

When the numbers have dots underneath them, you play the note an octave lower. When there is a dot on top, you play the note an octave higher. If there are two dots, you play two octaves higher, etc.

Just like eighth notes in Western music have flags that attach them to eachother, the numbers that are only an eighth note long have a line underneath them. If there are two lines, then they are sixteenth notes. If there is a dot beside it, then it's a dotted note.

The rest of it is pretty standard. (The er hu part even has 'arco' and 'pizz' written in.) Once you start playing it, it's a breeze to read. However, now that I've come this far, the prospect of trying to learn this on zheng hurts my head.

I'm going to re-write the parts for plucked instruments as guitar and banjo tab. It's going to rock.

I'm not obsessed. It just happened.

Yes, I've been watching Sailor Moon. Yes, I find it mesmerizing. Yes, if I found a Sailor Moon sweatshirt in the men's section at Value Village, I would probably have to buy it regardless of whether it fit me or not. Which is what I might have done about a month ago.


But I'll have you know that I would have bought it at ANY point in my life, not just now that I've downloaded the later seasons and started watching them in Japanese. Which is much better than English, by the way. The English version is unbearable.

Anyway, I'm not crazy enough to wear the sweatshirt as pictured above. Furthermore, the inside felt like plastic against my skin, so at the very least it would have to be lined. See that blue sweatshirt I was wearing? That's where I'd get the lining from. It was perfect.

For the arms, I used a pair of HIDEOUS sweat pants. I was not going to take pictures of them. They had a zipper at the crotch. Sweatpants. With a zipper.

I got the mini Sailor Moon logo from the arms of the sweatshirt.


I got the hood and the edging from the blue sweatshirt, and I used some spare felt to make the arms of the lining, as I'd run out of fabric.
After sewing it all together, I realized that the front pieces weren't as long as the back, and that the edging wasn't going to be able to lengthen it enough. Also, these pockets were way too high. I sewed the whole thing together, picked it apart, and sewed it again. This meant 2 extra days spent fixing mistakes, and that there were crazy patchwork seams everywhere.


The lining was so easy. I remembered, once I had sewed everything to the zipper, to flip the entire thing inside out and sew along the neckline, so that there are no visible seams on this sucker. It's the most beautiful inside I've done, even though it ended up being patchy, too. I did cheat on the sleeves. But you can't tell, can you?

hott. Plus, it's the fuzziest, coziest, warmest sweatshirt ever.

Em says I look like the eighties. But it's all good. As long as I don't wear them with my running shoes.

Sailor Moon Sweatshirt = $10
blue sweatshirt, red sweatpants, notions = $10

My next sweatshirt is going to be made from two Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles t-shirts. I have a colourful picture for the back, and a small white outline and logo for the front. I'll just have to buy an ooze-green sweatshirt for the sleeves and hood. whee!

more records

These came in a box from the university. Mostly 78's. Some 45's

Rosemary Clooney. Sweet.

Most of the titles are bizarre.

There was one record by a ukulele playing comedienne. I'm going to record it once I find it again.

My mum has a different edition of this album on 10" 33!

Some good covers, too. Look! Liberace's first ever album! That's got to be worth a MINT. ha ha ha. ha.

But seriously, Nat King Cole? That's pretty sweet.