I feel like this quite often, actually. 

mrstsk:

It’s raining here in Osaka and I’m feeling British (in the pleasantly dreamy, filtered and archetypal way you can only feel when you’re far away from actually-existing Britain), so I’m listening to this song, which for some reason I didn’t feel right about including on the Thunderclown album a year ago. In retrospect I rather like it. Toodle pip!

(via teenagestrangler)

Suddenly I’m sporting some long hair.

Reading: less news, more books

academyfightblog:

fuckyeahbandboyswithkoalas:

Axl Rose - Guns N Roses

hey look it’s Axl Rose with a rabid koala

the rabid koala is going to main Axl Rose

(via stickypaste)

The Brian Jonestown Massacre, “Cabin Fever”

I should probably get out a bit more.  Not that I don’t get out, exactly—but working from home and not having a car causes me to feel a bit more isolated than I did previously back in the states.  

Before I moved, I was looking forward to a small period of holing up in a far away winter.  Now that time is over. 

It’s been a while, but I’m back with another beer review—my first from Melbourne.  I’ll write more about beer in Melbourne on a subsequent entry. 

Holgate Temptress Chocolate Stout.

After drinking many a mediocre pale ale through this dreary Melbourne winter, I was pining for something dark, smoky, and warming to drink.  The local Bottle-O doesn’t stock much beyond Cooper’s Stout and Abbotsford Invalid Stout, which are fine beers—but I was in the mood for something nuanced and complex.  

Behold, Temptress by Holgate.  Like most Australian breweries, Holgate is an enigma to me, but they seem highly regarded.  The packaging has a vaguely Frank Kozik design to it, like you might see on a Melvins LP or Amp-Rep flyer.

Poured straight down the glass the minimal carbonation is obvious.  At its most agitated it raises a tiny cloudy head that dissipates immediately, with a faint smooth cocoa scent rising.  

Mouthfeel is pleasantly viscous—taste is a little thin and acidic, but has an excellent lingering chocolate finish.  The flavor becomes more intense when it warms up a bit.  

Overall, a fairly enjoyable beer.

teenagestrangler:

Silver Apples, “Walkin’”

The soundtrack to my sunset walk around suburban mosques, cemeteries, and lovely tropical gardens.  In Preston every third house is an ugly 1960s brick abomination, but there some mysterious little cottages and bungalows surrounded by thick palm trees, cherry blossoms, and hedges.  

Australia has butter beans, kidney beans (heaps of kidney beans), lentils, borlotti beans, and chickpeas—but the black bean is hard to track down.  In fact, finding black beans in a can is practically impossible, though I’ve heard that Spanish groceries sometimes carry them.  

Luckily our neighborhood middle eastern grocery Hassoun’s carries dried black beans—so last night I ended the black bean drought by cooking up a big pot.  I used Mark Bittman’s quick soak method and cooked them during the course of the day, which is a considerable perk of working at home.  After work K & I went to Bunning’s (and torturously brought home a massive plank on the bus for K’s couch project) and then started making what ended up being the finest tacos to grace these shores in quite a while.  

To make the tacos, we got some Lebanese-made corn torillas at Hassoun’s ($3.50 for 6, which would be ridiculous back in the states where you can get 30 for $1.99), added some brown rice, the beans, salsa from Woolies (I intend to start making my own, but we were short on time), cheddar, sour cream, guacamole (hey, Australian avocado are widely used and quite good), rocket (or arugula, if that is your preferred nomenclature), and cilantro (ne Coriander).  They were amazing.  

When food is this easy to make, I have difficulties understanding how you can charge $20 in a restaurant for this stuff down here.  Before we moved and I didn’t know if I was going to be able to keep my job I told Kirsten my dream of starting a burrito/taco cart.  I could charge $15 for 3 tacos and still be considerably cheaper than the competition.  

Next stop: Southern cooking (collards, corn bread, grits, biscuits, mac and cheese, etc.  

now playing: “Shadows of War” by German Oak (obscure war-obsessed kraut rock from 1960s West Germany)

“…the unwarped primal world glided to and fro before his passive eyes; and the miser-merman, Wisdom, revealed his hoarded heaps; and among the joyous, heartless, ever-juvenile eternities, Pip saw the multitudinous, God-omnipresent, coral insects, that out of the firmament of waters heaved the collosal orbs. He saw God’s foot upon the treadle of the loom, and spoke it…”