Breakfast Bungle

After last Sunday's horrendous breakfast bungle in which TJ and I spent an HOUR trying to find somewhere open before nine, forgetting half the places we love and ending up siting outside Filter in Fitzroy doing much griping and groaning, I have decided to list all my favourite breakfast places HERE, in a spot where I can't misplace the piece of paper where I scrawled it all down.

So,

Filter - 285 Brunswick St Fitzroy.
Corn cakes...mmmm. Coffee...double mmmmm.
ICI - 359 Napier St Fitzroy.
Organic kickass coffee and the best brioche french toast in town.
Fandango - 97 Errol St North Melbourne.
To die for coffee (even the skinny), and the poached eggs with beetroot & fetta relish is SUPREME.
Apte - 538 Heidelberg Rd Alphington
Yummy, scrumptious menu. Wish i could go past the banana bread with labna for once in my life.
Kosina -2 Napier St Essendon
Pancakes, thick, luscious, often embedded with blueberries - droolworthy.
Mart130 -107a Canterbury Rd Middle Park - Good all rounder.
Circa the Prince - St Kilda - for the mornings we feel more spiffy and presentable (doesn't happen often).
Fruits of Passion -188 Bellair St Kensington.
Recently revamped in very chic modern country style, meaning for a brief few weeks during the reno, I had to find an alternate coffee dealer. Still some of the best coffee I've ever had. Seriously. Orgasmic. My fav off the menu is the eggs benedict defying its name by being served on a hash brown. The muffins fresh out of the oven and still in the tray rock too.

Trotters - 400 Lygon Street, Carlton- if only for those amazing lemon ricotta muffins. The home made hash browns are pretty special too.

Balzari - 130 Lygon St Carlton. Excellent brekky.
The Boathouse - 7 The Boulevard Moonee Ponds
Absolute riverfront on the Maribyrnong, excellent views, beauuutiful food. Coffee pretty ordinary. But a very chill spot.

See, and I know there are so many more!!

Oh, wait on.

The Commoner 122 Johnston Street, Fitzroy.
What a place. Feels like sitting in someone's kitchen eating while they cook. Love their work (and their coffee, and those wicked good pancakes).

Oh, God, that place near Newmarket Station that is in the old Hygienic Library. Their coffee and breakfast is beyond good. The name will come to me. TJ's not so impressed because it's an egg heavy menu and he does love a good serve of french toast/pancakes.

And GAS in South Melbourne, although I hope they're getting over the middle eastern poached egg thing. If i have to eat another egg with dukkhah sprinkled on top, well, I won't be responsible for my actions. But great coffee.


I'm just going to have to keep on adding to this as I remember places, because this is the EXACT problem I ran into last Sunday.

Much love sent to Jeremy (no, i don't know him, but by God I owe him BIG TIME) of the breakfast blog for continually pointing us in goodly breakfast directions.

Mum - a poltergeist flipped my bike!

I've just spent the last half hour wandering around the house looking for a drink i poured.
I swear there are gremlins in my house. Can't find it anywhere and I'M REALLY THIRSTY AND IT WAS THE LAST drop of that yummy stuff Freya brought over the other day.

And who put the celery in the *pantry* last night, so that when i went to look for it to make my risotto, all hell broke loose.

All of this = me going slowly crazy.
or there are gremlins. One or the other.

I've been doing Dream Incubation (whereby you think on a problem before you go to sleep and your dream self provides the answers). It normally works a treat, and I'm getting more and more into it, so you can imagine my surprise when I asked my dream self 'what is going on with all my clumsiness lately' and the dream answer i get?
Poltergeists.
Wow. Thanks a bunch dream self. Really insightful.

So in the tradition of what I'm now going to call The Elephant Files in honour of that most auspicious time I fell off an elephant in Thailand - we have today's story, which was actually yesterday's story - but my hands hurt so bad that I could barely type after the incident.

Here goes:
The Elephant Files 2

Or

How I flipped off my bike onto my head.

So here was the thought process. "Hmmm, I have a day off work. I need coffee, I have a mountain of drycleaning, and yet I have an ass the size of Tasmania. What should i do? I know! I'll bike ride down to Cosina for my coffee, dropping off my drycleaning on the way."
Tick
Tick
Tick.

So after the usual fifteen minutes of faffing to find my helmet get my gear on, off i went - putting the motherload of drycleaning into my basket on the front.

Okay - you can stop laughing now, yes i really do have a basket. No, it does not have flowers. No, I do not have streamers from my handlebars although yes, if i find some I WILL buy them.

(in an aside, just found my drink. I left it in the laundry) (????)

Now the bike ride was going fairly well. Thighs were working, I actually seemed to have the whole gear change thing going on for once and I was feeling pretty confident. The backroad I was on sloped wonderfully downhill, and I prepared to coast all the way to Buckley Street. Which I'm sure would've worked a treat if it weren't for two things:

1. Speed hump
2. Basket

I hit the speed hump just fine, but the shock combined with the sheer TON of drycleaning was too much for a girly girl basket. It came loose from the top, but still miraculously attached to the bike down at the wheel. So it's creating sparks off the road while I'm screaming something that sounded like 'duck' but was in actuality 'f*ck' in rapid succession.

Finally the bike runs over the metal basket flipping me into the air like a freaking pancake to land firmly on my
a) hands
b) head
c) butt

My drycleaning drags on the ground (which is something I've longed to do to my pin-stripped suit forever). I bounce off the road ending up in a glorious fetal position where I stay like a limp kitten until three, count them, three separate young men pull over saying 'you right, luv?'

Who said chivalry is dead?
That person obviously didn't have a mangled bike basket and cracked helmet to get things moving.

Anyway, long story short, Stefan helped me up, inspected my gravel rash hands, unscrewed the remainder of the basket with a set of keys (!!), put the chain back on and sent me on my shaky way. I called him Macgyver, which he probably didn't realise was the highest compliment I could humanly pay him.

So I sat by the side of the road for twenty minutes wondering if after a bit of an accident, I was the kind of person who would forge on to finish my task (coffee/drycleaning/writing) or would i be the kind of person who ran back to the nest licking her wounds.

Then the little voice inside me, that **might** sometimes sound like Melanie Scott, said 'you have gravel rash, go clean your gravel rash IDIOT'.

insightful soulful moment over.

Worst part? Uphill all the way home with bleeding hands that couldn't grip the handlebars properly.

Poltergeists. Sniff.

Hey Murphy - want your law back??

Today, woke up feeling good, the sad grumpy mood from the night before dissipated UNTIL...

I looked in the mirror and LOW AND BEHOLD there was a GIANT DOUBLE DECKER cold sore under my lip. Double decker meaning THREE cold sores that miraculously hatched and then merged under the cover of night into one mammoth glob that threatens to cover a square inch of very obvious facial property.

Where did it come from? Normally, I might get a cold sore about three weeks after a bad virus. Or if I’ve been super run down and stressed. Not just a little stressed, but super stressed. In fact last time I had one was two years ago after that whole Mum and Dad dying within six weeks of each other schemozzle.

My life at the moment, with the coffee, banana bread and lazy weekends, does not warrant a cold sore.

Press Undo! I want my face back!

Fran here at work suggested a boost of zinc and a healthy slather of zovirax. Done!

Cold sore - STILL THERE.

Of course, it would be the day I have a job interview. How hilarious is that. Only a temp role – but one that should take me through the hard-to-find-work Christmas period – so go me.

Luckily they overlooked my massive face impediment and offered me the role. So it’s bye-bye lovely little lawyers library with funky green lights and HELLO dancing girls at the new workplace.

Dropping off the radar

Hey look! I'm still alive!

But by god, I have been working my ass off (oh, if only that were true and my ass really WERE smaller, but alas, I'll just have to settle with the working thing).
I have, drum roll please, finally trained this little capooty to get up an hour earlier and go sit in a coffee shop and write write write before work.
and eat banana toasted banana bread (see aforementioned ass)
and drink coffee
oh, and can i please have another coffee, because that one seems to have disappeared.
Decaff? no, no thank you. I like the way the second coffee gives me heart palpitations and makes my hands shake.

and then, write at lunchtime, trying to find somewhere suitable that doesn't sting me $5 for a coffee. At the moment the front runners are:
1. Starbucks. This one has the bonus of sometimes running into Freya who writes at lunchtime too. It has the down side of having to have THREE shots of espresso before it starts to taste like real coffee - but hey, there's always the chai for a sugar hit.
2. The basement library in the place I'm working at the mo. Seriously, how cool is it that this place has a library? Okay, it's a legal library and therefore boring as batshit, but nevertheless, there are desks, and cubicles and little green lights that are totally conducive to forgetting to go back to the office when the allotted half hour is over. I love lawyers. They are smart and funny and have libraries in their buildings where alphasmart typing is not frowned upon.
3. The little park with tables and a nice view of the old law courts i found last week. But this one is totally weather dependent. During that evil northerly that blew my skirt up around my ears last Friday (I kid you not, and yes there were witnesses, and yes they were a group of teenage boys playing downball against the building wall and yes I did run), I couldn't even make it there.

and then, write after work on the train on the way home, not giving a TOSS who's reading over my shoulder (because they always do).

and then come home and watch tv all night (ah, remnants of my old life coming to the fore).

And to wit - there's a third of a book done. And let me tell you, i totally earned that third of a book. And the dishes in my sink will attest to the fact I've done ZERO housework since this whole gangbusters effort. Ha! It feels great. I may never do housework again.

Really the whole thing is just a big warm up for Nanowrimo. The aim of the November writing fest is to reach 50,000, but that's not going to do me much good since I'm aiming for 90,000, so I decided to give myself a head start. I think this might preclude me from actually signing up for Nanowrimo? Not sure. Maybe if I still write 50,000 in November?
In any case, no one can stop me buying the t-shirt which actually looks kind of cute this year. And really, it's getting a bit old that I'm still wearing my 2003 nano t.

Seriously girl, cough up some dosh and buy yourself a new one! Stop being a cheapskate.

Well that was a mess. If you're still with me by this last line you must truly be my friend
Either that or you enjoy watching train wrecks.

Stationery Fiend

I've always been a stationery fiend. As a kid, I'd skip the toy department, the barbies and bears (well maybe not the bears), and head straight to the erasers and notebooks.
I fact, late last year I cleaned up my office and put all the empty notebooks on one shelf, and to my not-so surprise, they took up almost half a shelf. I've been on a personal vendetta this year to fill them all up so I can start buying new ones again.

So it shouldn't surprise anyone, and least of all me, when I decided there HAD to be a rubber band that would fit around my manuscripts better than the ugly brown ones I'd been using. I searched high and low people. I went to Kikki K, Officeworks, Penfolds, Borders and finally, successfully, the place I probably should've gone first - SMIGGLE. Mmmmm Smiggle. So many erasers, notebooks, pens, folders in so many colours. And of course, kick ass elastic bands like this one, that fit around my manuscript like a bum in a bucket.

Not sure what it says about me, that finding a frog green elastic band for $1.20 has made my day.

Also making my day and possibly week, is that the lovely vivacious Ziggy is coming for a visit.

This dog is the sweetest thing, although you have to be careful not to open your mouth while you're patting her because odds on you'll get a dog tongue right on in there. And yes, this is the voice of experience over here - I have been french kissed by a dog. Eeeeeeeeeek.

Ziggle is also quite fond of head butting you until you pat her, and less endearingly, launching herself uninvited,onto your solar plexus while you lie on the couch after a big dinner.


It's nice to have a dog in the house again. TJ's been away for a few days and I felt very alone and quiet there for a while.

Birthday Goodness

I think it's probably fair to say that I've been narky lately. Upset, angry, disenchanted and easily ticked off.
Not sure I've ever been this narky. Ever. The other day, the guy sitting across from me on the peak hour train alternatively sucked up snot and kicked my shin. I pushed back gently. I frowned at him, but then he kicked a little too hard and all hell broke loose. I yelled 'Move!' loud enough to get through his iPod and make half the carriage look up from their mobile phones/books/newspapers. He moved.
What I'm not telling you, is that as I yelled 'move', I also kicked him back. Not hard (I'm probably lying here, I had a lot of anger and i think it was pretty hard) but still, I physically assaulted a fellow public transport sufferer.
So not like me.
I am normally the soul of 'excuse me please'. I have manners my mother would be proud of.
Not this week.
I kinda hoped my birthday would yank me out of it, after all, I have an alter ago affectionately known by family and friends as 'the birthday monster'. I love birthdays - everyone coming over, the presents, the cake (perhaps a little too much) singing happy birthday etc etc.
It's not just my birthday, I get almost as excited at other people's. Notice the 'almost'.
So I tried. I really really tried to get into it, even going to the extreme lengths of singing happy birthday to myself along with everyone else.
And having all those people I loved there helped - for a little while.
But much too soon I reverted to cranky, annoyed, crying at the drop of a hat and generally being a pain in the ass. I miss my dog. I'm angry that she's gone and nothing makes it feel better.

I mean you know you're bad news when Zac (see below) comes to visit and spends the entire time watching the wall to escape you.







In good news, even my narky state of mind couldn't detract from the fact that i got some of the cutest presents a girl could wish for. Look at this (thanks Mel, she's beautiful!) :


and this (I haven't taken it off, Freya):




I have the best friends in the world. I hope they forgive me.

So if you see me on the street, seriously, walk the other way. I've got a bee in my bonnet and I'm not adverse to kicking total strangers.

In Dog Heaven

In dog heaven there are wide expanses of green green grass where you can run circles in joyous abandon.
There are trees covered in sniffs to paw over
There are plates of fresh cooked chicken and slices of corned beef from Dad.
There is no vet.
There are pillows to lie on, tissues to chew and patches of sun to sleep the afternoon away in.
In dog heaven, nobody asks you to come or sit or tells you you're a bad dog.
Instead, God is pulls you up onto his lap to give you a scratch behind the ear, or on your belly, or wherever you feel like it most.
There's all kinds of chocolate that's not bad for you.
There are no fleas.
In dog heaven, the roads aren't paved with gold, they're paved with those squeaky toys you love so much, like Henry, and Froggy and Monte.
There are lots of other dogs to play with, and you'll feel like a puppy again.
Sometimes it rains, so you can run through the mud but mostly it's like a fresh spring morning.
You'll love it. And one day when I get up there too, you 'll be wagging to see me and show me around.

There better be all these things and more, Mookie. There better be every little thing your heart desires or ...
or what?
or i think my heart will break.