Shake it like a Poladroid picture

I have become obsessed. Yet again.

This time it is with my new camera. I recently bought a new digital camera after a whole lot of trauma due to credit cards and billing/shipping addresses not matching. One of the many hazards of being a Brit abroad. Anyway, I eventually bought it in an actual shop (*gasp*) this past weekend and have been snapping away left, right, and centre. This, however, is not the obsession.

I recently upgraded to being a Pro on Flickr (sadly this doesn't actually provide you with a great improvement on your photographic skills, just more storage space). On idly flicking around I found Poladroid. It's free software that you use to create Polaroid-like images. It's great, you drag your image onto the icon of the camera, it spits out a photo, then you can shake the picture using your mouse and it slowly develops. Whether or not shaking the image actually succeeds in speeding up development time is unknown, but 1) it's fun, 2) you can sing 'Hey-Ya' loudly whilst doing it and, more importantly, 3) it really annoys Liam!

"Shake it, shake it, shake it, shake it, shake it shake it..."

You can can take samples of the image at any point during the developing, and even add scratches/fingerprints to give aging effects. Anyway, here are my three favourites so far. I've cropped them but you get the idea...

Icy Window:


The rainy view out of our front window:


A random crow:

Cooking in Canada

I am not a bad cook. In fact I'd go so far as to say I'm a pretty good cook. However, for some reason, ever since I got to Canada it all seems to have gone a bit wrong. As I wanted to expand my repertoire I brought a cookery book with me, eager to try some new recipes, and to save money Liam and I have been planning our meals very carefully. What we forgot to take account of was that many of the ingredients just aren't available here, and this has led to some unsatisfying conclusions about both cooking and shopping:


1. You cannot buy Halloumi, but you can get about 25 different types of Feta.

2. Havarti is not an adequate substitute for Halloumi, and will melt and burn all over your pans.

3. Strong cheddar is basically tasteless plastic, unless you pay extortionate sums in a specialist 'shoppe'.

4. Guessing the Fahrenheit/Celsius conversion is not a sensible thing to do, and proper calculations should be done (see nos.4 and 5)

4. Macaroni cheese (or Marconi cheese as we now like to call it) does not like to be cooked for too long in a too cool oven, or it turns into an inedible solid

5. Spanish omelette shouldn't be cooked in a pan that's too hot or it burns very quickly indeed, setting off smoke alarms and annoying the neighbours

6. You can't really buy decent cordial/squash here. Our first buy was "tropical punch" that basically tasted overwhelmingly of almonds, making me constantly suspicious that Liam was attempting to poison me

7. Cider vinegar is not a good substitute for actual alcoholic cider in cooking, and will burn your eyes in the process

8. 'Broiling' is actually grilling, despite what it sounds like, but the 'Broil' setting on our cooker doesn't actually work, rendering this discovery rather pointless


I'm sure I've left some off, and will no doubt return to the theme in a later post. I rather suspect that this won't be the end of my culinary disasters...


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