a very merry belly rally

I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to go home for Christmas this year as I had to work until the 24th and be back again after the weekend. At first I was a bit sad, but then my sister decided to come to London! So all was good! And in the end it was even better than I had imagined. Thursday we went out with my new housemates to the Hootananny in Brixton,! :) Friday my sis and me had a nice little dinner, just chilled out and watched “Three wishes for Cinderella” and Saturday we got invited to have lunch and dinner at another big houseshare.  And it was soooo nice and cozy! Totally made up for not going home :) Felt like a real family-dinner!

And the food!! Everybody had contributed something so we had loads! There was a big turkey with all kinds of roasted veggies, potatoes, stuffing, prawn cakes, Yorkshire pudding, herring salad, ham and egg pie… and of course lots of mulled cider! Mmmm lovely! :)

Despite being German my family normally always has raclette or fondue on Christmas, which I like very much. And I don’t know if this was a traditional English meal – but it was delicious! And also whoever said British people don’t know how to cook!? Not been true with any I’ve met so far :)

Anyway what is your family’s traditional Christmas meal?

Food – plain and simple?

How many hobbies do you keep your entire life? And if you do, why is that? My biggest hobby has always been music and films and I was lucky enough to turn it into my job. So my job is my hobby :) then there is photography, where sometimes I can’t stop shooting and other times I leave my camera in the corner for weeks. Cooking on the other hand is something that you have to do every day in one way or another, cause you simply can’t survive without eating. So it combines necessity with pleasure, if you do it well enough (…burned my pancakes this morning haha) A lot of my friends say that it takes way too much time to cook, but I have to say that’s not entirely true, cause once you got down a few basic recipes you can pretty much be done in less than half an hour. And show me the restaurant where you get a freshly cooked meal faster than that, except when you’re the only customer maybe :)

And above all you can have anything you like at any time you want it :) goat cheese with pear and rucola for breakfast? why not? peanut butter with chocolate cream, jam and banana for dinner? hell yeah! you can try any crazy combination you like. I don’t know many people who haven’t fallen in love with cooking once they’ve really tried it. Or at least I definitely have!

Sweet/sour idleness

There is definitely something to not having to get out of bed, I gotta admit that, but when it’s dragging on for days and days it loses its charm pretty soon. I don’t think I’ve ever had a cold for such a long time and I’m really running out of things to keep me entertained. Reading, watching movies, looking for every impossible thing on the internet… though I found some pretty cool stuff like this video here (click title to play):

C’était un rendez-vous

by Claude Lelouch from 1976, which he got arrested for. It shows his ride of a Mercedes-Benz 450SEL 6.9 at high speed through the streets of Paris at 5:30 am. He later dubbed it with the sound of a Ferrari 275GTB, but I much prefer this version with the sound of Snow patrol… sry ;)  Quite a ride, huh?

And what could be better than a plate overflowing with sugary deliciousness to accompany this? So we choose…yup, good ol’ pancakes ….had to squeeze in the food somewhere, didn’t I? ;)

Good morning… run

Okay, so I’m still sick, which is horribly annoying. I’m really not good at lying in bed all day long. And to make things worse I got an inflammation of the middle ear so I can’t really hear anything and therefore not do any work for university. I picked probably like the worst time to get sick, cause it’s the beginning of the new term and everybody’s full of  energy, zest for action and new resolutions. Me, too, I had so many plans on what to do and I can’t follow any of them because I’m too tired all the time. But at least I wanna put down one of my main resolutions here, so I won’t forget it or rather so it’s out there. When I’ve said it, I feel more like I really have to do it then. So here it is:

I’ve been running for quite a while now. Two times a week for an hour, which is pretty good for me personally, BUT: up to now I’ve been kind of an evening runner, which doesn’t really suit my daily schedule. I’ve always liked the idea of running in the morning, but on an empty stomach it’s horrible and I always thought if I ate I would have to wait an hour or more until I’d digested everything. Well, it now happens that I’ve heard of people running immediately after eating and that it’s ok. Though that’s probably not for me, I thought I’d try to have just a little snack before the run, like half a banana or a toast or sth and regular breakfast afterwards. So to phrase my new semester resolution: Go running in the morning. Every second day for half an hour. There it is :) I put it down!

And now to come to more cozy matters: Fall has definitely arrived now and therefore it’s pumpkin time! Started today with some freshly made butternut-squash-soup and will undoubtedly see more of this over the next few weeks.

Common cold

Go hang yourself, you old M.D.!
You shall not sneer at me.
Pick up your hat and stethoscope,
Go wash your mouth with laundry soap;
I contemplate a joy exquisite
I’m not paying you for your visit.
I did not call you to be told
My malady is a common cold…

But it is… plus a nice inflammation of the middle ear which is driving me crazy. Still, I’m already feeling much better today and even more so as I bought a… guess what? …a lens, yes! Ok, I know I’m bad and probably mad but I really really had to get one and even though I almost fainted on the way  :D I don’t regret it in the least, cause simply put: I love it!  The Tamron 17-50mm f/2.8. — Just beautiful!

So when I got back from my little shopping trip I made myself a nice hot corn porridge with half a banana, almonds, rose hip jam and cinnamon.

My new baby

Omg! I just bought a new camera and am sooo excited to have a digital SLR again. It’s a Canon 500D (or a Rebel T1i for you american gals;)

I got the kit with the 18-55mm lens which is !@%$#%@ …*ahem*… not good… but the price difference to the body alone was almost non existent, so I thought ‘why not?’ and will probably sell it on ebay once I get a better lens. I’ve started a little research… I need a wide angle, a macro and to be able to have a really small aperture if I want to. Can I have all of this combined please?? Pleeeeaaase? …*sigh*… Well, it’ll take some time and money until I get the right one I guess ;)

So anyway here is tonight’s picture, which I used my dad’s EF-S 17-85mm 1:4-5.6 IS for btw…

two grain spikes on the field behind my parents’ house… Good night!