42 - re-read harry potter series

i emerge from my potter-cocoon and return to my muggle world after a rollercoaster seven weeks swinging between  tears of triumph and tears of heart-wrenching desperation. too emotionally involved? bah!

it was even better than i remembered, so much vivid detail, so many twists and such an epic spectrum of feeling. i'm not sure i'd encourage a 12-year-old to read the later books... i could barely handle it myself haha. i found it was  interesting how the series is really quite moralising in a way (good vs evil, courage and nobility of spirit, value of love and friendship, destructive potential of wealth and power etc) but it acknowledged a lot of complexities of human nature so it felt real, and inspirational. i suddenly have the urge to write a high school essay on the issues explored in the series :P but don't worry, i won't.

anyway, 5 out of 5 stars, for sure. 

17 - dine at vue de monde

for my friend's birthday, we splashed out in the extreme through a gourmand degustation dinner at vue de monde. the flavours were amazingly striking and often subtle at the same time, presentation was artistic (sometimes playful, eg in an ashtray in a cigar box, sometimes abstract in a kandinsky kind of way). it was amazing, but to be honest, the most memorable aspect was probably the deeelicious french butter they served with their cute little warm bread rolls. echiré i will heart you forever, unless you over-present yourself in my life and i end up hating you for giving me obesity and atherosclerosis. moderation is the key; too much of a good thing; treat 'em mean, keep 'em keen... etc. sorry about the tangent, i've been hearing these pearls of wisdom a lot recently :P oh the other highlight was the goodies bag they handed the girls at the end of the night - deeelicious brioche, eggs and tea - so we could continue the experience the next day. that we did :) went shopping in canterbury for more french butter.

the pic of of the smoked trout - flavours were so intense, the foam was really really smokey. and foamy, i guess... :/

05 - go to nyc

whoo! was in nyc for five nights 18-23 Dec 2009, and it was waay not long enough. must go again. siiigh why didn't i choose an internationally transferrable career?

10 - watch an aus open tennis match

i should have clarified that i meant to watch it at the showgrounds, as opposed to on TV which i have done for many years already. so this year, we got ground passes to watch the women's finals but it was a rather lack-lustre match and henin wasn't winning so i turned my attention to gossipping with friends and trying to figure out the waiting period protocol of making/replying to phone calls etc.

not sure if this is counted as a cop-out crossing out... if i'm around melbourne next jan i think i'll invest in some proper seats.

37 - read 20 new books (5/20)

"alice in wonderland" - lewis carroll. ***1/2

ok so i knew it was going to be nonsensical but i kind of expected to extract something a bit deeper from it... some bits made sense from a social commentary point of view, but other bits were very puzzling, which i guess they were supposed to be, which i guess was the point of that letter in the courtroom chapter. i liked the puns and the mock turtle. though i don't get why in the illustration he had hoofs...

i enjoyed the ride and didn't really mind feeling like a fool at the end of it. will be watching the tim burton 'sequel', despite not winning that trip to the london premiere.

37 - read 20 new books (4/20)

"oliver twist" - charles dickens **

i totally loved great expectations so i figured i would love long drawn out dickensian tales of destruction and redemption in general, but i just really didn't connect with this oliver fellow. it was soooo sentimental, oliver was so good to the core but just extremely unlucky and lucky and unlucky and lucky in turn... i mean, good social commentary blah blah blah, but overall it felt really simple and not that interesting. i really struggled to get through it. i felt so tempted to just watch the movie and be done with it, but then i would feel like a cheat, not much better than the heartless scoundrels in the bleak novel.

i'm glad i read it, but it was literally a marathon effort - you don't enjoy it, but you're proud you finished alive.

38 - read 10 christian books (1/10)

"mere christianity" - c. s. lewis ***
i like the way he writes - you really do hear the voice of a gentle old englishman carefully explaining how he came to believe in god and jesus despite being an atheist most his life. it's full of analogies and imagery to explain the concepts, and it's interesting to pick up on post-war sentiments and kind of gauge the mood of a population through that (the book was initially a radio series). there's a lot of theorising and it doesn't categorically prove anything, but he does present a gently persuasive argument that does explain (in my view, which is christian and i guess thus concordant with his views) the state that the world is in. i know i've used 'gentle' twice but i did find that to be a striking feature of the book :P

not life-changing, but then it did take me many months to read because i was getting distracted by stuff. so perhaps i was being unfair to it.

37 - read 20 new books (3/20)

"perfect grammar" - penguin guide to english grammar & punctuation ***
a friend gave me this little pocket edition a few weeks ago because she knew how much i loved correct (and correcting) grammar and punctuation. it was a good overview of the basic parts of speech, sentence structure and common errors (that that iiiii made any of them heh heh) although because it was such a concise book there weren't enough examples of the more complex aspects of grammar to help you understand. my head hurt - i hadn't thought of phrases as nouns or verbs as adjectives before... a good refresher in many ways but i doubt i would be changing my speech as a result.

74 - lose 5 kg

whoohoo! most prompt post ever, just weighed myself and i'm chalking it up as mission accomplished. yes i know there's immense irony in that statement now, and dehydration is probably significantly contributing to getting me over the line, but i'm crossing this off my list!

my secret? eating in smaller portions and exercise, sustained by stress and a good dose of heartache.

76 - wake up at 7am for a week

another boring post... oh well. this would have been around the second or third week of jan, there was a bit of turmoil going on so i wasn't sleeping properly and kept getting up really early. it even got me going to the gym before work :O !!!! craaazy.