Wow, I have totally spaced on something cool and big. My 6 year anniversary with Josh!

We celebrated this about, oh... 2 months ago! Not writing about this is grounds alone for Josh to give me the flick. Well I'll make up for it now!

So I arranged accommodation at "The Blackman" hotel - one of the Art Series Group. They are very VERY cool! Don't get me wrong, the property was very lovely, but next time I think I'd try 'The Olsen' - it has a pool and is closer to more restaurants etc. My friend tried to warn me, but I wouldn't listen! So here is our balcony Suite for 2 nights:

So on our first night, Josh arrived super late so we got some room service dinner and lounged around in our big fluffy robes drinking red wine. I may or may not have spilled a few drops on my robe :S Of course I did... c'mon. Food is an all over experience!!


The next day in the city, we took the opportunity to do some shopping and lunch. Seeing as we both have champagne taste on a beer pay check, we went to the "Clear It" outlet on Brunswick Street Fitzroy to get some Jack London (for him) and Dangerfield (for me) items. The place was so intense. Because there weren't really any mirrors, we used my camera to model the things we liked. Here is Josh modelling but pretending to look casual. He is going to kill me for putting these up :D

Lovely <3 And here is me...

I don't know why it is so blurry. Either Josh doesn't know how to use a camera or he felt super self conscious in the girls section taking pics of his little lady so lifted it for a split second to take the picture before quickly lowering it.

Anyway he bought a few jackets and i bought... nothing! Unreal!! So we worked up an appetite and went a few doors up to the Little Creatures Dining Hall. It was awesome! You could leave your ID and borrow a board game. Naturally because Josh is obsessed with 'Words with friends' on iPhone... we got scrabble. We played at our own pace while eating, sampling the fine tap beers, and also while Josh juggled a few more scrabble games on his phone.

My yummy lunch! Beef and kipfler potato salad, with a poached egg. YUM! 

Josh got a club sandwich on a chopping board :)

That night we mustered up the appetite and energy to go out for dinner to "The Kitchen Cat" (used to be Jamie Oliver's Fifteen) which is run by Tobie Puttock - who was working hard in the kitchen :) It is a really nice basement layout and has such delicious food, but I thought it was a little pricey - particularly the alcohol. There was a great selection but we just couldn't manage it :( frown frown. I had the best EFFING dessert there - a beautiful plump grilled peach with vanilla marscapone. DROOL!! Check out their site - you will be convinced to try it.


For the rest of our time we lounged around on the most comfortable bed I have ever slept on in my life. I pulled the sheets up to see what it was...

I'm now looking out for ex-art series hotel mattresses. Providing they don't come with ghosts and STI's :) ahhaha...

Celeb Crush: Rory Culkin

Is it just me... or is there something about Rory Culkin?

I saw Scream 4 a few weeks ago and developed a bit of a crush on the character Charlie, played by Rory Culkin. I know what it is too, the hair. The long hair, the nerdy vibe, and the sexual inexperience- despite his chiselled face and attractive features. I love that shit. I wanted to show Charlie how it's done. A few people have told me I could be a good teacher, so I am going to imagine this is what they had in mind when they said that. Teaching skinny shy boys how to party (strictly in my imagination of course).

This all makes me recall the days when Josh and I were courting. Ahhh, those were the days indeed! There was me; the born and bred tom-boy trying to correct myself slowly by quitting skating, wearing more pearls and trying to learn how to rock a short hairdo without being mistaken (again) for a lesbian. And there was Josh- the skinny, shy, slightly nerdy guy with a chiselled jaw, Iron Maiden T-shirt, unrealised attractive features and hair longer than mine. A match made in heaven- well, at least that's what Wes Craven seemed to think when casting Charlie and Kirby!

Anyway, those were fun times. We would be walking down the street and someone would say "Excuse me, Miss?" and I'd turn around to respond, but they would be looking at Josh. Hmm... that was meant to be a joke but I have a feeling it could have actually happened.

This has always been a thing with me. You see, when I was a kid I went to Catholic Primary School, and in grade 3 we had to make First Holy Confession. I didn't have anything to confess so I made up a lie (as you do in confession...) that I had sinned by fighting with my brothers. The priest couldn't see me, and asked how many brothers I had. I told him two. He resonded "Wow, THREE boys? Your mum must have her hands full!" and my tiny but apparently gruff voice responded ".....I'm a girl...." to which he apologised. One other time I was getting my hair dyed and my housemate said I looked like my dad when I don't wear make-up. Oh god. It seems I've had to try extra hard to be noticed as a girl in this life. Perhaps that's why I overcompensate by wear pencil skirts and bust-enhancing tops? Who knows...

Anyway, I can be a little rough and Josh can be a little soft but we work pretty nicely together. For example, tonight I will be going to his place to drink beers and watch a doco about Grizzly bears (which I am promised has some gruesome fight and kill scenes) but maybe tomorrow we will be drinking tea together and i will be asking him which colour shoe looks best with my new skirt and knowing that I will get the correct answer.

I don't know what this has to do with Rory Culkin anymore, but I think the lesson is clear: I can't stick to a topic, but the result is still pretty entertaining. And Rory Culkin is awesome and why are there so many Culkins?

lovely love

Ladies and gents, that envelope contains the first love letter I ever wrote to my Josh- back on February 14th (that's right) 2005. wow :) I think I explained this before - how we weren't quite dating and he didn't know my feelings were reciprocal until I gave him this letter. It was one of my most anxious moments sitting beside him as he read through it.

Now, as you know, I am quite a creative person and always have to be doing something. Before the blog (and you) got all my creative attention... there was Josh. I suppose you could say he was my muse. I wrote stories, comics, poems, letters, drawings and little love notes by the bucket-load. Actually, more like... by the BOX load- as he stored them in some gift boxes and shoe boxes. I realised not long ago that he didn't seem to have those sacred documents anymore. He explained they were still in the wardrobe of his old bedroom at his Mum's house. You could imagine my shock. I had to retrieve them before they became house-hold reading material. I had this horrible mental image of his mum and sister perusing the collection over breakfast going "Ooh, here's a good one!". I didn't want them to know exactly which parts of Josh I liked best, expressed via the art of poetry. I didn't REALLY write a penis poem or anything like that, but there are some fairly incriminating documents. Here are some pics of the more creative and less sickening displays of my affection..


 I made this booklet for Josh when he got Chicken Pox in 2005. We had only been dating for a few months and I wasn't allowed to visit him as his house was a disease-ridden quarantine zone. I'm pretty sure his brother and sister both had the pox too. Josh was 18 at this point so it hit him pretty hard. He was zonked out on Phenergan for about 2 weeks and I didn't hear from him. Of course I was freaked out and thought he was dying. Always melodramatic. When I got finally in touch with him he could remember reading the messages but then fell asleep for 3 days or something and forgot about them. What a relief. My boyfriend was now a junkie :) Here's a picture i stuck in there of us 'just as friends' at a dress up party in early 2005.

I love his embarrassed smile- it slowly rises from one corner like a fish-hook pulling at his lip :) I used to call it "The Hook" naturally. Below is a pirate book I made for some anniversary. Maybe like 74th day anniversary or something ridiculous like that.

When Josh tried to grow his first full beard I noticed the red hairs in it that I'd never noticed before- so came the name "Captain Red Beard". OMG check this out...

That's me nearly 6 years ago in full Pirate garb :) Anyway part of the reason I went through all the letters and drawings was because our 6 year anniversary is coming up this month and I was feeling nostalgic. As you can imagine, we toned down the amount of letters and gifts to one another and now do Birthdays, Yearly Anniversaries and Christmas only. It was getting insanely time consuming and it almost became this intense game of One-Upmanship that saw us colouring in pictures at 3am by lamp-light. I remember one Birthday Josh made me close my eyes while he put the finishing touches on a card he was making me. DRAW FOR ME JOSH, DRAWWWWW *whip-crack*

It is nice to look back on all that stuff, and it's also interesting to read what I had to say back then. I feel like I have been through a lot in the last 6 years have been doing lots of soul searching lately as I feel like I have changed beyond belief. Reading the letters, it is just clear to me now that I am still the same Jade... I just have a more busy and complicated life so I kinda live for myself and don't make a million presents all the time. I get too caught up in the trivial dramas of day-to-day life and forget birthdays until a week prior - not enough time to make comics. I would like to do more nice things for others this year - hopefully i can share this with y'all :)

soup, plastic bag asphyxiation, and head shaving

Well, last night turned out to be quite the interesting night indeed! Firstly I made my first home-cooked meal in over a week and was so proud of myself. I fell off the horse hard-core after moving house and i went out, or got take away, or just ate poorly for most of last week. It was soooo good.... but so bad. and i cannot exactly afford that champagne lifestyle right now. i'm on the tap-beer lifestyle until i get myself sorted out! Anyway I made delicious pumpkin soup from one of my Jamie Oliver books, and served it up in my beautiful soup tureen which my friend Sarah bought me! I had to show her how lovely it looks on the table!! LOOK SARAH LOOK!

I'm not super sure what it was that made Josh go crazy... it could have been the amazing soup, or the funny episode of big bang theory on TV, or just something in the air... but he snuck up on me and put a plastic bag over my head. many times. here is one of us together!

Aw how sweet- couple photo! Yeah, and then Josh went more crazy.

And then he decided he wanted me to shave his head like we had spoken about. While Hayden started cleaning out his clippers I went looking for an image of Tim McIlrath from Rise Against with his partially shaved head to show Josh. I found the Rise Against DVD (Generation Lost) and remembered it featured in one of the video clips. Here is what i was envisioning (fantasizing) for Josh:

Oh Tim... how amazing you are...mmm. anyway Josh seemed excited by this hairdo, perhaps bordering on sexually aroused even. When we found out that the clippers didn't work we were disheartened for quite some time. I think we even watched a movie (Land of the Lost - super funny), and I cut my hair for something to do. Then Josh remembered that K-mart is now a 24-hour store so we headed over there at about 10.30pm for some new clippers. Once back at home, the hair clipping was imminent and it called for a "before shot".

hehe. Anyway we were remarking that all of the celeb crushes i've got have some patricular feature strikingly similar to josh. For example, tim mcilrath has that whole browny red hair thing and red beard goin on. When i started dating josh he had longish ringlets much like tim did at the time :O all josh needs is one brown contact and the deal is done! Josh feels flattered that i'm only interested in guys who look similar to him haha.

OK, Josh wouldn't hold still for long and I didn't get the *best* shots of the new 'do - also due to the crap flurescent light in the bathroom. Here is one of him dusting the hair off with his shirt...

and le finished product:

I think it looks super cool! And the best thing is, when he gets sick of that hairdo he can do the other side too and have a mohawk, and then he can shave his whole head too if he wants! Multi-do. Oh yeah anyone else see the resemblance to the post apocalyptic cillian below?

Good thing Cillian is also on my list ;)

a weekend of love

Hola everyone! Happy Monday! Happy Valentines Day for yesterday if you are into it. If you aren't, then.... happy Sunday i guess. WELL. WELL WELL WEELLLLL!!! I had a loverly weekend I must say! As I mentioned I had my friend's wedding to attend on Saturday, and oh. my. god. it was amazing. The story is this: Ryan and Sarah started dating in year 12 (2004) at the school Josh went to. They have been together ever since. Last year Ryan signed up for the Army and had to go away for a few months for basic training and they stayed strong through that. Then he got posted to Darwin which is bloody ages away, and still they managed. Then one day out of the blue he popped the question right before he had to go back up to Darwin from his visit. So lovely! Here are a few nice snaps of the day, and of the bride looking stunning:

These ones are a bit blury but I like them because Josh is stalking Sarah in the background, getting closer...

closer.....

He got there in the end! he he Josh. Oh yes, below Sarah got a pic with all the boys but Simon was standing somehow with BOTH feet on her veil!! What an ordeal that was haha

Oh and the cake! It is a very true representation of the bridal party. Not sure that Pooley (Ryan) has a camo Jeep though...

I thought this below pic was funny. Caught at just the right moment of a weird facial expression.

It was such a beautiful day! One of the real tear-jerkers was when the celebrant read out secret letters they had written to each other. Pooley's letter to Sarah was astoundingly romantic, it got the tears welling up in my eyes, that's for sure! They are the first people in our age bracket to get hitched, I wonder who will be next...? Well i'm pretty sure it won't be me, but I have my suspicions about others!

~

Oh yes, and after that wonderfully romantic day, the following day was V-day. Or Valentines day if you will. Josh and I don't get too into it, it's a bit commercial. We have shared 6 Valentines Days together each one a little different from the last.

~

I remember the first one so clearly! Josh and I were not dating yet but we were hanging out heaps and I knew he liked me. And I liked him. BUT we were both painfully shy and hesitant. So he invited me over to his house to hang out on Valentines Day. Of course I knew it was the day of love but he, on the other hand, did not. I thought he must have planned something, so in the days leading up to it I bought him a present (a CD) and wrote him this really long letter thanking him for various things that we had done together and things he had shown me. I know that sounds seedy but it was 100% innocent i swear. Anyway yes the letter was along the lines of "thank you for going op-shopping with me, thank you for showing me the Tropicana juice bar on Elizabeth Street, thank you for always looking out for me..." etc etc for pages and pages. I think he still has it, i would be interested to read it again :D Anyway I rocked up to his place to hang out and gave him this present and letter and he was so embarrassed to not have anything for me. He liked the letter and said it was the nicest thing anyone had ever said about him. He actually looked like he was going to cry. And I have only seen him cry once in the 5 or so years that i have known him. He isn't really a crier. I do enough crying for the both of us seriously.

Wow, i did not intend that walk down memory lane. But I like it. Remembering the early days... I'm totally going to do something special for him soon. Just don't know what yet... I can't discuss it here as he reads my blog :D aw Josh you were so cute and innocent back then! *memories*

~

Anyway, other valentines days usually entailed a daytime celebration. One year - possibly our "first" valentines day we wanted to go and have a picnic at the Botanic Gardens but it was over 40 degrees and neither of us had a licence so we had a backyard picnic instead. The other years were in a similar low-key fashion, until one year we decided to have a proper Valentines Day complete with romantic dinner in Williamstown. It was the worst date we have ever been on. Josh booked this Greek restaurant but we could only get a 9pm sitting. Then they took forever to give us menus, take our order, replenish our wine, and it took over an hour for our entrees to come out and there was a hair on one of them. We had just about run out of things to talk about, and we were just so hungry and annoyed. Then they informed us that they had run out of what we ordered for our main, and asked if we wanted something else. We said no and left. But then we got Hungry Jacks drive-thru on the way home and had a picnic on my bed :) Best ending to the shittest night. After that we aren't really into V-day too much haha.

~

But this year our local Indian Restaurant waiter informed us of a Valentines Party they were having. It involved a banquet and some Bollywood Dancing! Josh and my interest was piqued indeed! So we signed up! Soon Maki and his girlfriend Mel heard about our plans and were interested as they aren't a huge V-day couple either. Then another couple we know joined us, and then Hayden too! It was awesome! We got some bubbly and the banquet was massive! It was: papadums and raita, lentil soup, potato and pea cakes, prawns in spinach curry paste, a selection of naan breads, spiced rice, a chicken curry, a lamb curry, a vegie curry, a whole tandoori grilled fish, and for dessert pistachio ice cream! I didn't really take any pics of the food as i was way too busy scoffing my faché, but i took some silly pics of us playing games with our fingers...

Here is Hayden doing the "blood" sign...

We all did it. Mel took the other pics. And here is Josh doing my most hated trick. He bends his thumb back over his hand and chases me around trying to stroke my face!!!!! AAAHHHHH

After we finished dinner we were the only people left and the staff cranked up the Bollywood tunes and showed us how to dance!

The owners kids were there and they are amazing dancers! Well the girl was - the little boy was just kind of jumping around but he was so effing adorable. It was heaps of fun, and I don't think they wanted us to leave! They kept going over to the laptop and changing tracks! The girl knew all the words and all the moves. Then the chefs came out and they were awesome dancers!

The two on the left are the owners, and those are their kids. The two at the back in the middle are married and they are the waiters. The guy in the turban was a fucking ace and he is a chef, and i think the lady on the right was a kitchen hand. Could be wrong, this is 100% assumption. Anyway turban guy knew all the moves and had a cool beard!

Well, that is the end of my weekend story. Oh actually, i will tell you something funny! Josh and I both talk in our sleep and say creepy things sometimes. On Saturday night i was fast asleep when Josh yanked one of the pillows out from under my head and laid it down between us - he yanked like 3 times until he got it out. My head fell to the other thin pillow underneath and i was like "Josh! Josh!? What did you do that for?.... Josh....??" and he turned over to me and went "*sigh* you said you didn't want 2 ice-cream sticks." and i said "what are you talking about...? These are pillows, not ice-cream sticks!" to which he replied "Well, you SAID you only wanted one ice-cream stick so I was just trying to help!" and with that he went back to sleep. I asked him in the morning if he remembered but he didn't. Haha.

Ok well i am thinking about making dinner for the housemates tonight, I havent cooked for everyone in ages, I dont know whats going on, we have all been all over the place! Maybe a mushroom risotto...? mmmmmm

one weekend in january

Hi everyone! Well even though it is Tuesday, I would still like to share with you some of the things i got up to this weekend.

Friday night i went to a local night spot called POW! with some friends. I am not drinking booze at the moment, possibly until Jan 30th at which time i have a Hens Night, so i was on the cola and raspberry train. I dont usually drink soft drink so i was feeling pretty drunk and hypo as a result! It was a really fun night doing some people watching, and it was nice to be able to leave when i was ready and drive myself home to bed. Note to self: sobriety is your friend.


The next morning i had a massive sugar hangover from the soft drinks which was really bizarre, haven't felt that kind of low since i was a little tacker. I got up at around 7.45am and went to the local gym. I must point out that I am not a member, but my friend works there and i possibly snuck in for a few hours for free :) This could become a regular thing maybe, we'll see. I am undergoing an unofficial change of life right now. I am going from NO excercise to SOME excercise. This is huge, people. I am trying not to alter my diet too much at this point. We eat vego dinners everynight and i usually take leftovers for lunch. I feel that i eat quite healthy and have a pretty good vitamin intake, but i have a desk job so i am not what you might call 'fit', and i reeeeeeally don't want to end up with Kankles or one of those huuuuge office chair bums!!!! EEEEP!


Anyway after i recovered from the gym and cleaned the house a bit, and had a nap, i went to my friend's house for a vego mexican dinner party!!! It was amazing! We played Flash UNO which is an intense electronic version of UNO, and you have a time limit to make your move otherwise you have to pick up more cards haha, so many lols to be had. also we played a few games of jenga. Tensions were running very high by the end of the night hehe...

mexican is def not the cleanest meal hey? Oh the photo below is our "freestyle Jenga" game where we messed it up at the start to see how long it could hold on with a crazy structure. It lasted surprisingly for a while!

Sunday morning I woke up at around 11am and felt like a cup of tea from my sushi cup.... you know - the one that i accidentally smashed :( The next best thing was to use Josh's face cup that we got from Tokyo. I'm not sure what it is meant to be, but I have a feeling that MAYBE it is Japanese politicians of some sort. They have funny faces, but it is not as awesome as my sushi cup. Josh would, of course, beg to differ.

My perfect sunday morning easy breakfast outside:

Mmmmm, grilled cheese and tomato on toast. My ultimate comfort breakfast. Ah yes, My table... my "Fuck" table. I'm pretty sure i have explained it before but my mum found this cool old blue table somewhere and said i could have it for when i moved out. I was trying to sand it back and i don't know... maybe going for the shabby chic look. I was getting quite exasperated by the lack of progress i was making so i sanded a rude word into the top and walked away from it for good. So now that i want to use it as my dining table in my new house I have to fix that up he he :)

Oh yeah, then Sunday afternoon we were to play some mini-golf. I put on the whole summery get-up - as it IS technically summer. I thought better of it and changed into warmer clothes after looking at the grey sky. Here are my sexy golf legs...

Oh yeah i have to share with you an amazing tip!! I recently changed all my bed linen to white. white white white! and no matter how messed up the bed is, it still looks nice and clean and inviting and magazine worthy. try it! anyway i am getting off track! So we drove all the way to Ballarat to sample their GOLDRUSH mini-golf course. It probably took us just under 1 hour. Considering we have a mini-golf course in our suburb.... i'd say it is worth calling it a JOURNEY.

The thing about Ballarat is that it is fucking cold. I don't know why. But those of us in jumpers were pleasantly chuffed at our wardrobe selction. Even though i had on long socks, jeans, and a jumper.... i was still fucking cold. The light rain didnt help either. I felt sorry for Stevens who was wearing summer clothes. Easy mistake to make though as... it is summer.

There were so many little kids running around the course, or wandering off causing the parents to have mini freak-outs. Some of them walked on our green casually, others covered the hole with an object thinking it would be funny. wtf. I don't know how many times i heard one of the crew mumble "wheres the supervision...". Plus there was this boy around 8yrs old who had the worlds most annoying voice ahhaa....man we are an angry bunch.

This wall was a small wind-break for Stevens, and i guess Boucher thought he would give a little warm cuddle to heat things up.

"Ballarat: Where Summer Comes to life"... hmmm yeah. I think the grey sky says it all.

Haha all the guys wanted photos in the Mad Dog frame, they were trying to do the best face...

Hahaa, this is Josh not looking his best... haha fuuuck.

Boucher being all 'squinty'

That one was actually Maki hitting his head - perfect timing.

hahaha i think Stevens won

Well that's that people. Hope you enjoyed my weekend vicariously through my blog. Tonight i have to do a clean out of the 2 spare bedrooms for the arrival of my new housemates. It will be a cleansing feeling i'm sure :) kind of like a colonic but without all the poop.