Dashers, Part Two

On Mayday, we had the second part of our Balderdash gathering at my house.  This time, Amanda and Ben were able to make it as well.  I have no idea how we're going to carry it off, but the plan is, perhaps, to go round to everybody's house until we've come full circle.  

When I told my parents I was having friends over, I thought it was going to be a low key, chilled out affair.  What I hadn't anticipated was that because my mother had plans to hold a gathering of her own friends that Saturday, she decided that this was going to be the most dramatic full dress rehearsal ever.

Suddenly, there was Noritake china flying out of drawers (we are never allowed to use the Noritake) and she came home toting a wooden block and proclaiming that she was going to make a cheeseboard because Edie had had one.  She even put out both red and white wine glasses out and started decanting things left, right and centre.  After the initial shock, I got into it although I drew the line at decorating with buckets of fresh flowers.

Regardless, it was a blast.

Retno made her special chicken shami kebabs and other Pakistani dishes.  My mom made a thai green curry and we picked a couple of tze char dishes up from the coffeeshop down the road.  The food we eat at home is usually a deeply odd amalgam of East and West at the same table - curries and stir-fries or spicy dishes with clear Chinese soups.  It has driven me nuts since I was a child, but no one seemed to mind.

Here is the famous cheeseboard with Shirin's hand over it:

And here it is without.

It's dead easy to make one of these and if your friends like cheese, it will be a huge hit.  Just get a big wooden chopping board from any fancy grocery store and arrange blocks of cheese, random crackers and some fig pate on it.  I got the fig pate at my local Fairprice Finest, in the gourmet cheese section, and Arnott's does a really good selection of Cheeseboard Crackers.  Because the figs are sweet, I like the cheeses to be slightly more salty or piquant.  For this board, we went with an aged cheddar and a slightly creamier jalapeno.

And of course, we settled down to play.  Many amazeballs options, but I think the star of the show this time round was Edie's definition of the word Twaddel (actually a unit of measurement) which read "The vibration made by a bat flying into a church bell".  I laughed until I literally cried.

(I think it is clear from these pictures who enjoys being in front of the camera.  AhemAsia'sNextTopModelAhem.)

We finished off with a beautiful, light strawberry shortcake from Rive Gauche, courtesy of the runway queen (I will be sitting on the couch at work and she will bound up and say, "Come on!  Let's catwalk!" and then we stand up and strut round the room pretending to be in a Prada show, a Victoria's Secret show, and a Betsy Johnson show respectively till someone comes in through the main door, stares at us agape and we collapse onto the couch again, as if it was just her imagination.).

The only person who wasn't there was Crystal, but I don't suppose she missed much.  While we were debating the various possibilities of chiroptera clanging about in belfries, she was touring South America in style.  She took many beautiful pictures, and brought me a new best friend.  Look!

His name is Number One Llama, because, well, he is.

Rainy Friday morning

Monthly moments

I was so excited about testing my prime that I totally forgot about this photo dump that I created for the end of April.  At any rate, better late than um... even later!

The desert roses growing in our backyard.

Amanda and I queued at Laduree.  Almost everything was delicious except for the pistachio, which was too sweet.

Homemade tomato soup from a recipe that my father found online.  Delicious with fresh basil, croutons and crusty foccacia. 

Cute mason jar-like glasses in the kopitiam down the road.

 

People often tell Shirin and me that we look like twins.  Edie caught us in this completely candid pose that made even my mother do a double take.  (I'm the one on the right... or am I?)

More dogs in the office!  This is Shay, and she belongs to Sson.  I have a massive thing for dachsunds - they're so dopey!  She barked at many people but she got to like me quite quickly.  I have magic hands; animals just flop over.

Bunting stickers that I found in the found in the Wei Ting stationery shop in my building.  Adorable and hardy enough for scrapbooking.  They went straight into my journal!

(And yes, that's silly Ah Kit.)

Test drive: Canon EF 35mm lens

I'm not equipped to do pro-style reviews (there are plenty of those available online) so I'll just give my layman version of how it works for me and how I liked it. 

When I bought my 35mm f/2 lens, I knew that it was special.  The 50mm changed my life and a prime lens with greater range but just as much light sounded like it was going to be perfect.  The man in the shop put it on my camera and said, "Why not start using it right away?  You're going to love it."

And I do.  

I took it out for brunch with some friends the other day and have been using it as my standard day-to-day lens since.  

First, the things I'm not so fond of.  This complaint is a wee one, but it's heavier than the 50mm because it's made of metal.  It also doesn't stop all the way up to f/1.8 but in most cases, that's just me being nitpicky.

The zipping sound of the autofocus is rather startling though.  Someone online compared it to the drone of a wasp and I'm inclined to agree.  I still jump when the lens hunts and consequently, some of my photos are a little blurry.  The lens is clearest on centre focus and even though it's a wide-angled prime, it's still not the best idea to focus and recompose.  

Again though, those are niggling details.  There is so much to love.

I took it for brunch at a place called Kith in Park Mall.  Not the best service, but the food was pretty good.

We decided what to eat as we lined up.  The lens is pretty clear and suits my purposes wonderfully.

I had the big breakfast right at the top, but Winnie's prawn pasta was too pretty to pass up a picture of.  The really impressive dish though, were the tomatoes.  I'll eat tomatoes in sauces and purees and sundried but I am repulsed by anything that is even a hair shy of fully cooked.  People have been offering me cherry tomatoes over the years, trying to convince me that they're sweet ("Like grapes!").  Um.  No.

These grilled beasts however.  Oh my.  They were soft and hot and pulpy in precisely the right way and drizzled liberally with herbs and sea salt.  I actually ordered an extra helping on the side and I never do that. 

While the depth of field is really pleasing on close up shots, here is where the 35mm really shines.  Look at how many people you can pack in!  The first shot was taken from just across the table and the second one was from about two metres away.  At this distance, the 50 1.8 would just cough and give up and it was a massive struggle to try to get a full-length picture of anyone.

I'm so pleased with this range - that's what makes it such a neat little everyday lens. 

Of course, nothing is as much fun as instant pictures!  I was really excited by Winnie's Instax camera - it is so exciting and convenient to be able to print shots right away!

I took pictures of this neat little Vespa on the way to pole that day.  Again, I didn't have to stand too far away.

And finally, here are some pictures where I pushed the lens almost to its limit.

 
Amanda is forcing me to write a post about these rice balls, so I thought I would incorporate them here because damned if I'm going to do an entire post about rice.

These riceballs come from a shop in Novena Square 2 called QQ.  Nina first introduced me to them and I fell in love with them.  You go in, choose a healthy glutinous rice and they wrap it around any five meat or vegetable fillings that you choose.  If you're in a rush or don't want to think too hard, they're tasty, pretty nutritious and are a really good meal in an instant.

I made the mistake of introducing them to Amanda some time ago and since then, she's developed a love-hate relationship with them.  She can't decide if she keeps going back because she's impressed by the gimmick and because I make them look so tempting or because she genuinely likes them.

So, each time she suggests going to QQ, I cringe because I know she will squeal once we get into the shop, dither for five minutes at the back of the queue about whether she really wants one, browbeat the man into giving her six or seven shreds of ingredients instead of five, then hold the finished product up to her face, enjoying its warmth while contemplating whether she actually enjoys eating it.

So, Amanda, for what it's worth, YOU DO.  Now stop making me engage in hour long discussions about the merits of QQ each week!

At any rate, they're good for testing equipment.  Hah.

This is the lens at f/2.8 which is the highest I would push it if I wanted a sharp image.  The colour and light are great and look at that delicious depth-of-field.  I tried the same picture on f/2 and it was a little softer.  The DOF though was noticeably shallow, so it's not great if you want a lot of detail.  Still.  Amazing lens, no?

(That's Amanda's riceball from yesterday - purple rice mixed with red rice.)

And here, again on f/2.8 is mine.  You have to be very careful at close range with what you want to stay sharp.  But hey, that's par for the course with any other close range prime.

My fillings of choice in mixed grains - corn, carrots, seaweed, a very crunchy burdock and spicy chicken floss.  Amanda never fails to let me know that she takes issue with my combo. 

I don't care.  It was delicious.  And on the whole, when I think about my awesome little snub-nosed ranger, I am well pleased.

Gratitude list

1)  Starbucks earrings from Shirin

I'm not even going to go into how tough it was for these earrings to get to my house (owing to a snafu in which I may or may not have misquoted my address the first time) but when they finally did get here, I loved them, right down to the little green straws!  Who knew people even made these? 

They are such a sweet, thoughful present from Shirin and they fit my personality to a T.  I'm very embarrassed now to say that the first day I wore them, one earring fell off.  I don't even know how I managed that and I was furious at myself, but I'm determined to replace it so that I will have a complete set again.  I'm so sorry, Shirin, but thank you, they are awesome.

Etsy, here I come!

2)  A cute drawing from a student

Thank you Nic!  (And Eli!)

3)   Washi tape

The day that Amanda and I hit Kinokuniya, she introduced me to washi tape.  If you aren't already on Pinterest, Washi tape is the new in thing among bloggers and scrapbookers of all creeds.  It's essentially masking tape with beautiful prints on it and apart from being used to hold things together, it works really well as decoration.

I bought some patterned blue tape strips and one roll of gaily striped tape and I've been using them in notebooks and to liven up my journal.  I hate to admit it, but I love washi!  You can write or draw on it like you can normal masking tape and because it's a little translucent, you can even paste it over artwork.  As you can see, I like using it in my journal (the paper is not patchy, I just wanted to blur the showthrough).

Unfortunately, this means I've become one of those annoying fartsy hipsters who can't leave a page without smacking some tape and drawing bunting on it.

Oh well.  At least it's pleasing to the eye!  And if you're looking for a quick, easy way to make things look cooler with minimal artistic talent, well...

(Washi tape and stickers from Art Friend and NBC, both in Ngee Ann City.)