Trapeze at Twilight Flyers

Andrew and I went to the flying trapeze rig that's temporarily set up in Scarborough as part of the Summerset Arts Festival.

Trapeze is awesome! I'd done it twice before (this was my third time) and it was Andrew's second time. It turns out that this rig is the exact same one that we'd been on before, even though we were convinced that this one looked smaller. Must have been the sunset playing tricks on us.

After our first knee hang, the lovely instructors from Twilight Flyers gave Andrew and I another trick each to work on. Mine was a split hang:


Andrew's was called hocks off:


I grabbed some information about their cleverly named "frequent flyers" classes, but I'm not sure yet I can make all 6 sessions before the rig packs up in March. It's quite expensive ($275 for 6 sessions), but I'd really love to do it again. I think the location at Scarborough was inspired; the sunset and the beach are great backdrops for swinging on a trapeze!

Triple J Hottest 100 of 2014

My votes:

• Grimes - Go (my #1) - #171
• Alt-J - Every Other Freckle - #14
• FKA twigs - Two Weeks - #45
• Future Islands - Seasons - #23
• Glass Animals - Gooey - #12
• Willow Beats - Merewif - #137
• Milky Chance - Stolen Dance - #4
• TV On The Radio - Happy Idiot - #49
• Chet Faker - 1998 - #8

Would have loved to fit in:

• Royksopp & Robyn - Do It Again - #73
• Royksopp - Monument - #59
• Calvin Harris (ft. HAIM) - Pray To God - #103
• Ball Park Music - Everything Is Shit Except My Friendship With You - #58

This year all my votes were completely song based and not loyal to my favourite bands. I actually only found out that Polica, M83, Bon Iver, (and Aphex Twin! but meh) released singles this year by scrolling through the artists on the Hottest 100 website.

I was sure that Pharrell - Happy was going to win, but it's not in the list! It wasn't in last year's list either, so I'm not sure what's going on with that. I think that Future Islands will get pretty high, but no clear pick for #1.

Edit: #1 was Chet Faker - Talk is Cheap, I think that's a good #1!
Edit: Triple J released the hottest 200, I'm glad Grimes got in there!

Jess and Tammy's Doubles - Propane Nightmares (practice)

Christmas Baking

Christmas Tree Cupcakes

I picked the yellow stars out of a pack of yellow star sprinkles, and used some sugar pearls for decoration. Green buttercream icing piped on with a star nozzle. 

Rudolph Cupcakes

The nose is a Jaffa, eyes are mini m&ms, and antlers are Curly Wurly chocolate bars cut lengthways. 

Holly Cupcakes

The leaves are green musk sticks cut on an angle. The big holly berries are Jaffas, and the small ones are mini m&ms.

Holly Marshmallows

Pascall marshmallows with the top dipped in chocolate, decorated with Jaffas and green musk stick cross sections.

Christmas Biscotti

Cranberries and pistachios make this look Christmassy.

Christmas Rocky Road

Starburst Red Berries, pistachios, and blanched almonds make this look Christmassy.

Coconut Ice

Pretty much just icing sugar and condensed milk.

Cocopop Crackles

With coconut snow.

Hedgehog Slice

Andrew's mum's delicious recipe. 

Peanut Butter Cups

Arnotts butternut snap cookies heated, shaped into a cup using a ladle and shallow cupcake trays, filled with peanut butter, and with chocolate melted on top.

Immersive Technologies Pre-Start Inspection

Pre-Start inspection is a tool developed by the Visual Database department at the company I work for, Immersive Technologies. I scored the supporting actor role in the promo video alongside Raj:



I think Raj and I did pretty good, but I won't quit my day/night jobs just yet!

2014 Fremantle BeerFest

Yesterday was the 2014 BeerFest in Fremantle where a huge gathering of WA's brewers brought their best beers and ciders. As always, the setup at the Esplanade was awesome with music, food and master classes to make it worth staying the whole day in the hot sun. Thank god I have the day off today! 

We had bought tickets through Scoupon a while back, and we'll definitely have to remember that for next year. I think Scoupon had the tickets for $5 cheaper, but the real win was that you could skip the massive ticket buying line and go straight to the ticket checking line. 

The festival was quite busy (especially for a Sunday) but not so busy that you had to wait in line for a long time. People were getting drinks then sitting down at the tables and watching the bands which we thought were all really cool, especially in comparison to the music at the Beaufort St Festival which was mostly god awful dance pop with the bass turned up so high that I kept thinking my phone was ringing the whole night. 

We sent straight to Little Creatures to check if they had their Saison, but they didn't so we went back to the start and had our first drink at Eagle Bay, yum! We also had a beer at Cheeky Monkey and a cider at Blackwood Valley, and after scoping out the rest of the festival we stopped at Feral for a tasting paddle. 

I had:

• Fanta Pants (Imperial Red Ale, 7.6%)
• Karma Chameleon (Imperial Black IPA, 10%), best beer of the day
• Karma Citra (Black IPA, 6.6%)

Andrew had:

• Kelis (Saison, 6.5%)
• Razorback (Barley Wine, 10%)
• Hopfen Fahrt (IPA, 6.4%), this one wasn't on the list but was at the taps

We had our first two while watching the band and saved our last glass for the beer masterclass. I saved the Karma Chameleon because that was one I definitely didn't want to rush!

The beer tasting masterclass was with Matt from Bob's Bar. He talked a little bit about types of beer, types of tastes and faults in beer, and about how to start getting into beer tasting. I found the bit about faults really interesting, especially that certain tastes are supposed to be in certain types of beers, but if they're in others they're considered a fault. My palette is definitely not refined enough yet! We also got to smell some hop flowers (which were very pretty and smelt exactly like beer), and crunch on some malt (which was really delicious, but didn't taste like beer). 

We finished off with a Saison cocktail from Cocktail Gastronomy and a beer from Mash Brewery (the Copy Cat IPA). The cocktail was nice, sweet, but we couldn't taste the beer in it. The meringue thing on top was really yum. 

 

We also couldn't resist and got some waffle fries. I don't know why this isn't a thing that is everywhere, they were amazing!

Any trip to Fremantle isn't complete without dinner at Maya. After drinking and not eating much all day we left all the plates squeaky clean.

I love festivals at Fremantle! I think they've really worked out how to make it an awesome day. We went to the Beaufort St Festival the day before and it was quite hard not to keep making comparisons. We had fun at the BSF too, but they didn't get the setup, facilities, and content as right as the Fremantle festivals do. They had different constraints, and they did well trying to keep the masses moving in the direction traffic would, but all in all it was meh in comparison.

Having said that, we will definitely being going to both again next year. Perth is so cool!

Perth Royal Show 2014

I love the Royal Show! I think I started talking about it at the start of August, and it was everything I every dreamed it would be.

I donned my traditional colourful eyes and nails, and this year topped it off with some bunny stockings and an umbrella skirt. Give me a break, it's my one chance a year to do this shit ok?







This year we got to the show just after 1pm and stayed until after the fireworks. I think this was perfect timing, I'll have to remember it for next year. You want to get there early enough to make sure you see all the things you want to see, but not too early so that you get exhausted and can't make it to the fireworks.

Highlights

#1 The Zimboys

These guys were our favourite act of the whole show! I saw them a few years back and they were even better this year. They're a group of 3 guys who do tumbling, balancing, and general acrobatic tricks and stunts including back flips while jumping rope, doubles and triples diving through hoops, handstand balancing on chairs, love it! I clapped so hard the whole time.



The whole act is really cute and involves them getting fake angry at each other, which usually results in them fake pushing each other over, and fake kicking each other in the nuts a lot.

#2 Trippy Fireworks with Prism Glasses

I could never watch fireworks without these glasses again. Watching fireworks with these glasses will blow your mind. Andrew, Krystal, Sean, the VDB guys and I lost our shit. We were sitting there screaming and laughing and rocking our heads around like bobble heads (to get rotation on the prisms) and I'm pretty sure everyone thought we were on drugs. But we weren't, and this is better. Get some!

#3 Sideshow Alley

This year we went on the Python Loop, the Bumper Cars, and XXXL. The Python Loop is consistently fun as always, and definitely worth the $10 (all 40 seconds of it, that's only 25c a second!).



I had to be convinced into going on the bumper cars (I had a bad go kart experience that I now associate with all non-car cars) but it was so much fun I will definitely do it again.



XXXL was surprising! I had written it off as a gentle ride, which it was for the first half, but then it ramped up and showed some impressive pull.



It's a bit hard not to be a ride snob after Port Aventura, but it's nice to get swept up in Sideshow Alley anyway.

#4 Loot

Even though you can get this stuff elsewhere, the Royal Show is the one time we treat ourselves to Morish Nuts, Karutz sausages, and this year some Tiger Snake Whiskey (which earned us free tasting at the Albany Distillery stall, yay!). 

#5 Everything Else

Bunnies (children just don't appreciate the bunnies like I do):


Diving pigs (since 1993!):


Little pigs (poor mum):


Fancy pigeons (AND utility):


Pigeons who look like clickers (I don't want to see a bloater pigeon):


Balls-on-their-face pigeons (my favourite pigeon, here's the yearly video):


Dalmatians (Andrew's favourites):


Sheep dogs (who were being handled by Louis CK's look alike):


Multi-Dimensional Universes (flower smell is a dimension HAHAHA):


Why would anyone miss all this?!

P.S. Here's links to some of the other Perth Royal Shows:

• 2013
• 2012
• 2011
• 2010
• 2008

Homemade Raw Chocolate

I recently got this recipe from a friend at work (thanks Tracy) and it's actually amazing. I don't really like chocolate (except for Ferrero Rocher and Tim Tams), but this is something else, something much better!

Ingredients

• 100gm Cacao Butter
• 4 tablespoons Cacao Powder
• 100m Agave
• 2 teaspoons Lucuma Powder

All of these ingredients are available from a health food shop. Cacao butter smells like dark chocolate and looks like white soap. The cacao powder is similar to just regular Nestle, and I couldn't tell the difference but the packet convinced me it was better (probably substitutable). Agave is similar to honey, but from a cactus instead of bees - in fact, the first time I made this I used honey instead, but the honey didn't dissolve properly so left a sticky layer at the bottom of the chocolate which… was DELICIOUS, but not easy to store. I'd never heard of Lucuma before but it's apparently Peru's version of vanilla, it doesn't smell like much though!

Method

1. Chop up the Cacao Butter into small shavings.

2. Melt the Cacao Butter in a bain-marie, stirring continuously. Don't let the butter get too hot - it should stay at room temperature. When completely melted, remove the container from the bain-marie.

3. Add the Agave Syrup and stir until dissolved

4. Add the Lucuma Powder and stir until dissolved

5. Add the Cacao Powder and stir until dissolved

6. Return the bowl to the bain-marie and stir the mixture to thin it out

7. Pour into a a plastic container (Note: in the picture below I'd made a double batch, so use a smaller container for a single batch)

8. [Optional] Sprinkle some crushed nuts or coconut into the mixture. The nuts will sink down so it's OK to add them at this point. I added a row of chopped blanched almonds and a row of chopped pistachios. I'm sure any other nuts or fruits would be just as nice!

9. Put the mixture in the fridge and let set for at least 2h

10. Remove and chop, then store in the fridge. The chocolate can be quite crumbly, but save the crumbly bits to sprinkle over ice cream :)

Oh Hai Mark! And Ice Skating in the City

Oh Hai Mark!
Last week Greg Sestero (Mark) from The Room came to Perth to promote his new book, The Disaster Artist, at Luna Leederville.



The first part of the session was a behind the scenes documentary about the making of The Room with interviews from a lot of the cast. It was really interesting seeing the actors describe their shock and confusion about the whole process, and it made me understand the movie a lot whole lot more (zero is a percent!). It seemed like the actors were constantly trying to find out what their character's motivation was, but the most they got from Tommy was to "just go with it" or "that's the twist!". The best example was Claudette's character (Lisa's mum) who couldn't figure out how to deliver the line, "I got the results of the test back, I definitely have breast cancer." There was also some priceless footage of Tommy Wiseau reciting Shakespeare for jeans commercial, what the hell is his accent anyway?



Mark then did a reading from his book as well as a reading with members of the audience from the original script of The Room, which was actually much more insane than the movie. One scene that was way more weird is at the end of the movie (spoiler alert!) where Johnny is crying and rubbing Lisa's dress all over himself; the script describes that he was meant to have his pants off and actually has sex with her clothes. What the actual fuck does this guy think people do in real life! Don't leave your clothes at his house.

It was a really good event, this is the movie that just keeps on giving! Mark is a really cool guy, I think he's definitely figured out how to make the best of a bewildering situation. I can't wait to read his book.

Ice Skating in the City
Yesterday we went ice skating outdoors in Northbridge! So much fun, and very trippy skating while the sun is out and shining.



You'd think it was impossible to keep ice frozen outdoors in the middle of a Perth winter... and you'd mostly be right. The ice skating rink had a decent layer of water on top of the ice which in a way made it more fun - you really had an incentive not to fall over! I felt sorry for all the kids falling down and getting up with drenched bottoms, but they didn't seem to care one bit and got straight back up onto their penguins!

We got there a bit early while the session before ours was still running to scope it out and also get a drink at The Lodge. We noticed that there was a lot of water, especially towards the center of the rink, but people were still managing to skate pretty decently. We thought that when the session ended the staff might squeegee the ice down to get rid of some of the water, but instead their solution was to slide a big Christmas tree in the center of the ice to conceal the big pool of water, very resourceful!





We got our skates on and joined the crowd of kids on the ice for a gentle skate. Despite the surface of the ice and the crowd it was heaps of fun. We managed to get in some fast skating and test out the ice properly at the end when the crowds died down.





Definitely a do again. I think that the rink they had set up at Fremantle a couple of years back was better (bigger and more frozen), but the location of the Perth rink was really cool. Dim sim in the morning, ice skating and a drink at the Mechanics Institute in the afternoon makes for an awesome Perth winter Sunday.

Quick Recipe for a Sushi Costume

My mum and I made this costume for a Japanese themed party we went to. When I say my mum and I, I mean my mum mostly did it and I helped hold the scissors.

Ingredients:

• Salmon: Section of orange felt material
• Rice: White electrical tape
• Rice: White dress (or top and pants)
• Rice: White stockings
• Nori: Green (or black) belt (or scarf)
• Wasabi: A green streamer roll

Method:

• Fold the orange material up into a rectangle that fits comfortably on your back. I originally intended to use an orange pillow but found it was too big and heavy to wear
• Use the white electrical tape to draw V shapes to represent the fat in the salmon. We cut the tape in half lengthways because it was quite thick to start with
• Before you wrap yourself up with the scarf, slip a lacky band through the scarf that can be used to attach the green streamer
• Get a partner to sushi roll you!