Interject

Jan 10

Photography resolutions

It’s January, which means it’s that time of year for resolutions. I’ve made a few of them, including keeping a kind of photo log of my cooking that I’m the most impressed with and blogging about it. But here’s one that I’m even more committed to achieving…

I want to improve my photography, which is more to do with my technical knowledge of the art. With the help of Digital Camera’s December issue in which they made suggestions on types photography to attempt, I’ve expanded on this and made myself a list of stuff to try out with my Nikon this year. Here goes…

  1. Shoot a misty landscape at sunrise 
  2. Shoot a self-portrait
  3. Photograph the moon
  4. Photograph traffic trails
  5. Photograph light-trails
  6. Photograph a city-scape at night
  7. Attempt tilt shift
  8. Shoot wildlife on my new telephoto zoom lens
  9. Photograph trees in the wind
  10. Photograph a seascape
  11. Photograph flowing water using long exposure
  12. Photograph Ozzy in action and stitch together shots in Photoshop
  13. Attempt HDR using Photomatix

I’ll be updating my blog (and Flickr) as I try out each new item in this list, so watch this space!

Jan 08

[video]

Garlic prawnsThe garlic prawns actually called for king prawns, but as I couldn’t find any that were MSC certified I went with the safe option and bought wild caught Atlantic prawns. I can guarantee that they taste excellent with garlic butter. Fry two cloves of garlic with butter, and chop up parsley and a red chilli. Leave the seeds in the chilli if you like it HOT and saucy. I just like it saucy, so I left the seeds out. Poor over the prawns and you have yourself a simple, but ludicrously tasty dish. Serve as a starter or as part of tapas. 

Garlic prawns

The garlic prawns actually called for king prawns, but as I couldn’t find any that were MSC certified I went with the safe option and bought wild caught Atlantic prawns. I can guarantee that they taste excellent with garlic butter.

Fry two cloves of garlic with butter, and chop up parsley and a red chilli. Leave the seeds in the chilli if you like it HOT and saucy. I just like it saucy, so I left the seeds out.

Poor over the prawns and you have yourself a simple, but ludicrously tasty dish. Serve as a starter or as part of tapas. 

Dec 25

[video]

Dec 16

[video]

Dec 05

So you’ve got a puppy. You need to toilet train this puppy, and people might tell you, ‘Use puppy training pads! They are brilliant. Simply put them on the floor and they emit a scent only the dog can smell and encourage them to pee on this. Move the pad closer to the door until you start taking the pad outside, and voila! Your puppy will be house trained.’ Brilliant. And it certainly seemed to work. Unfortunately the pads are white, and now Ozzy associates anything that is white with something that he can pee on. He tried to squat on my Wii Balance Board - I just about managed to stop him on time; he has weed on our futon mattress, our duvet and white duvet cover, our brand new guest duvet and duvet cover, and his brand new bed (which wasn’t white, so I can only assume he was telling us that this is what he thinks of his new bed). And if he gets away with going to the toilet in the house, it seems to give him the idea that it is okay to go in the house again. He begins to squat and wee right in front of me, and when I notice he looks at me as if to say, ‘I just do pee. Okay?’ He can’t understand what the problem is. I am confused as to why he will pee in our bed, yet he wants so badly to sleep there. We let him in one Sunday morning and he happily settled himself down between us under the bed sheets. There he lay, on his back, before shutting his eyes and commencing snoring. That made him realise that our bed is significantly more comfortable than his bed, and is also more comfortable than the sofa. He tries to get into our bedroom at any available opportunity, and if he beats me to it when the door is open he is either so delighted that he will jump all over the room and bounce on the bed looking utterly elated, or he will lie down on the bed and refuse to get up. ‘But is comfy.’ He tells me with his eyes. He refuses to come when called, so I must resort to scooping him up in my arms to which he groans at, remaining as floppy as he can in protest. He is also very fond of the sofa. This is his bed, and he sometimes feels mildly annoyed that we are taking up so much space on it. I admit that I quite like sharing the sofa with him, especially when it is just the two of us. He snuggled up next to me the other day and I spooned him, and I realised that spooning a puppy is a nice thing to do. I nearly fell asleep with him. However, I do want him to realise that although he may join us on the sofa in the evening, his bed is his place and that is where he should go if he wants some peace. This is when the toileting occurred. Clearly he does not share my views on the matter. After washing the cover and the blanket that were also soiled, I went to put the cover back on the cushion/bed. It ripped. I was most definitely annoyed; Ozzy had also peed on our new duvet and sheets that evening as well as his brand new bed, and to top it off it had ripped. I came to work not wanting to speak to anyone. Still, I have persisted. One day I will get Ozzy to realise that his bed is his place, even if I have to lie on it myself to convince him. However I have a feeling that this will work out well for him – there will be more space for him to stretch out on the sofa.

So you’ve got a puppy. You need to toilet train this puppy, and people might tell you, ‘Use puppy training pads! They are brilliant. Simply put them on the floor and they emit a scent only the dog can smell and encourage them to pee on this. Move the pad closer to the door until you start taking the pad outside, and voila! Your puppy will be house trained.’


Brilliant. And it certainly seemed to work. Unfortunately the pads are white, and now Ozzy associates anything that is white with something that he can pee on. He tried to squat on my Wii Balance Board - I just about managed to stop him on time; he has weed on our futon mattress, our duvet and white duvet cover, our brand new guest duvet and duvet cover, and his brand new bed (which wasn’t white, so I can only assume he was telling us that this is what he thinks of his new bed).

And if he gets away with going to the toilet in the house, it seems to give him the idea that it is okay to go in the house again. He begins to squat and wee right in front of me, and when I notice he looks at me as if to say, ‘I just do pee. Okay?’ He can’t understand what the problem is.

I am confused as to why he will pee in our bed, yet he wants so badly to sleep there. We let him in one Sunday morning and he happily settled himself down between us under the bed sheets. There he lay, on his back, before shutting his eyes and commencing snoring. That made him realise that our bed is significantly more comfortable than his bed, and is also more comfortable than the sofa. He tries to get into our bedroom at any available opportunity, and if he beats me to it when the door is open he is either so delighted that he will jump all over the room and bounce on the bed looking utterly elated, or he will lie down on the bed and refuse to get up.

‘But is comfy.’ He tells me with his eyes.

He refuses to come when called, so I must resort to scooping him up in my arms to which he groans at, remaining as floppy as he can in protest.

He is also very fond of the sofa. This is his bed, and he sometimes feels mildly annoyed that we are taking up so much space on it. I admit that I quite like sharing the sofa with him, especially when it is just the two of us. He snuggled up next to me the other day and I spooned him, and I realised that spooning a puppy is a nice thing to do. I nearly fell asleep with him.

However, I do want him to realise that although he may join us on the sofa in the evening, his bed is his place and that is where he should go if he wants some peace.

This is when the toileting occurred. Clearly he does not share my views on the matter.

After washing the cover and the blanket that were also soiled, I went to put the cover back on the cushion/bed. It ripped. I was most definitely annoyed; Ozzy had also peed on our new duvet and sheets that evening as well as his brand new bed, and to top it off it had ripped. I came to work not wanting to speak to anyone.

Still, I have persisted. One day I will get Ozzy to realise that his bed is his place, even if I have to lie on it myself to convince him. However I have a feeling that this will work out well for him – there will be more space for him to stretch out on the sofa.

Dec 01

[video]

Nov 17

Ozzy: The First Two Weeks

Tonight marks the second week of our lives with our new family member, Ozzy the black labrador. 

His mother – a black lab cross – found herself in Bath Cats & Dogs Rescue Home through no fault of her own. It soon turned out that she was in fact pregnant. Ozzy was one of the cheeky fellas who popped out. After receiving a phone call from the rescue home (we were on the puppy waiting list) that some black labrador puppies, 6 weeks old, had just come available, we jumped at the opportunity and went to see them as soon as we could. 

We couldn’t touch the puppies as they hadn’t yet had their vaccinations, but one of the members of staff held all of the still available puppies up for us. We saw three, all very cute, all looking very relaxed and puzzled at the same time. Ozzy was the only one with a white stripe on his chest, and he instantly looked at us in a more curious and inquisitive way than the other puppies had, and was particularly interested in Elliot (I guess it was the facial hair). He reached out for us with his paws, and promised us that if he had the chance, he would without a doubt give us a licking the likes of which could not be rivalled. 

Read More

Oct 06

Best Soundtracks/Scores

Chocolat - Rachel Portman

The Insider - Lisa Gerrard, Peter Bourke, Graeme Revell, and featuring various others

Moon - Clint Mansell

Battlestar Galactica - Bear McCreary

Amelie - Yann Tiersen

The Beach - Various artists

Drive - Cliff Martinez and featuring various others

Lost Boys - Various artists

Lost in Translation - Various artists

The Limits of Control - Boris, The Black Angels, and various others

Donnie Darko - Score by Michael Andrews, soundtrack featuring various artists

Tron Legacy - Daft Punk

Danny The Dog / Unleashed - Massive Attack

Gladiator - Hans Zimmer

Hideous Kinky - Various artists

Sep 18

My first experience of Canada was Chinese

I went to Toronto for a month in 2003. There I got to experience the real Chinese Canadian culture. Staying in Toronto I stayed at the guest house of a Chinese couple from Shanghai, who had been living in Canada for around the past ten years. I lived in a Chinese area where my nearest supermarket was a Chinese store. In fact it was in eastern Canada where I had some of the nicest Chinese food I’ve had anywhere to date - including China! But it was through my pen friend I was lucky enough to meet a number of other great people.

Read More