rachel.blog

insignificant ramblings of a 50-something woman

  • Jim Jefferies on gun control

    This is fantastic so I had to share it. Jim Jefferies is an Australian stand-up comedian and this is a very funny performance about gun control. It’s definitely worth watching 🙂

  • All or nothing?

    Some people have expressed concern to me that I’m punishing my kids by banning sweets. But the thing is, when I say I’m banning something, it does not mean I’ve literally banned something. I never take anything to extremes. I’m flexible with practically everything I do in my life. So what does banning sweets mean?…

  • A day in the life of a Happiness Engineer

    What does a Happiness Engineer do all day? I started my day today at 6:30am because I’m a morning person and I’m still a bit jet-lagged. Sometimes I start at 6am, sometimes at 7am. The choice is mine. I began by catching up on emails and replying to WordPress.com users via email. Then I started live…

  • Footdee, Aberdeen

    We went out for a long walk this afternoon to an old fishing village at the very tip of the east end of Aberdeen harbour. It’s called Footdee, or “Fittie”, as the locals call it. Aberdeen harbour has been hijacked by the oil industry and none of it is walkable to the public (not that…

  • Duthie Park, Aberdeen

    We’re in Aberdeen and still all a bit tired and jet-lagged but glad to have all the hard stuff over and done with. We ventured out for a walk in Duthie Park yesterday and it was wonderful. They have an enormous winter garden as well as some brilliant playgrounds. Can you judge a city by…

  • Nappy days

    When our babies were in nappies (nappies = diapers) we used cloth nappies. I rarely bought disposables: they’re way too expensive and not very biodegradable so we invested in some good-quality washable nappies instead. I have a tendency to get obsessed with things and I got very obsessed with cloth nappies. I look back on this now and…

  • Vegan blueberry & cashew cheesecake (gluten-free too)

    Since we’re about to leave New Zealand, I thought I should spend all my fly buys points. So I bought a cookbook I’ve been wanting for some time: The Revive Café Cookbook. It’s written by the owner/founder of the Revive Cafés in central Auckland. The book has exceeded all my expectations. It’s wonderful. I thought I’d share this recipe…

  • Creepers against climate change

    I’m feeling a bit disheartened. There were not very many people at the Auckland climate march. Maybe a few hundred? I feel a bit disappointed about this. Don’t people care? It feels a bit like that right now. Perhaps I’m just down because it’s the end of a week with lots of disappointing news. The people…

  • Congratulations to John Key

    New Zealand’s centre-right National party won by a landslide last night granting a third term to John Key. This is apparently an unprecedented result because often support starts to wane for a leader by the third term but he has more support now than in the previous election. I did not vote for him. I…

  • What’s a country?

    We’re planning to attend the people’s climate march in Auckland tomorrow despite having lots of other things to do like an open home to prepare for. I told the kids about it this afternoon and Daniel’s response was: “How long will it take? Will I still get some Minecraft mods tomorrow?” 🙂 The recent Scottish referendum…

  • An apology and Scottish independence

    I retweeted a tweet earlier that I thought was funny but was criticised for tweeting foul language. I actually regret retweeting that tweet now (and have removed it from my feed), not so much because of the language – I do have a bit of a foul mouth – but because I can see that some might find…

  • People’s Climate March

    Originally posted on …and Then There's Physics: I thought I’d temporarily hijack AndThen’s blog to write a quick guest post about the upcoming people’s climate march. There are going to be a series of climate marches around the world on the 21st of September which is this Sunday. Every significant social movement in history has…

  • Panic mode

    It’s time to panic and freak out. Less than two weeks to go before we leave for Scotland. Our house will be auctioned next week. We haven’t started any packing and I’ve only just listed our car on TradeMe today. How does TradeMe know more about our car than I do? Admittedly I know very…

  • Saggy bits

    I got this card for my birthday: It’s funny! But would it be just as funny if it was the other way around? Say it was a woman whose shadow had two huge boobs and the guy’s saying “If only”. Would that be funny? I don’t think I’d find it funny but perhaps that’s because I…

  • My birthday, computer science, clouds, pauses, and helmets

    I’m 39 tomorrow, boo hoo. Only one more year and I’m 40. That’s scary. Apparently a new computer science curriculum has been launched in English schools as a replacement for the old ICT course. I think this is wonderful. Teaching children how to create software is far more useful than simply teaching them how to use it;…

  • The 10 album challenge

    Inspired by Denise’s post over at Listen Watch Read Share, I thought I’d try to compile my own list of top ten albums. It’s not such an easy task because music preferences change over time, so I’ve tried to select music that I’ve loved for years and that I never tire of. This is certainly…

  • Easy vegan blueberry ice-cream

    Since I’ve banned sweets from our house, we have been missing something yummy for dessert. I thought I’d try making a healthy ice-cream to compensate. Credit to my mother-in-law for the idea to use bananas in this recipe. They give it the creamy texture you would normally get by using dairy products but without having…

  • Oops, I did it again

    Sorry, indeed. For the second time I have published a test post to my real blog. This time I received some comments on it! Thank you 🙂 WordPress.com has a new editor and one of the features of this editor is that you can write up your posts from one central link and then choose which blog you…

  • Larnach Castle, Dunedin

    We couldn’t leave Dunedin before making a trip to Larnach Castle. It’s touted as the only castle in New Zealand but whether it really is a castle is probably debatable. It was built by a merchant baron and politician, William Larnach, in 1871. It’s on a prominent spot and has battlements and turrets but lots of…

  • St Clair, Dunedin

    Another wonderful day in Dunedin. We return to Auckland tomorrow and I feel sad about that. This evening we went out for dinner in St Clair, a very lovely beach suburb. We went to The Spirit House, a superb Thai-Vietnamese-Korean restaurant overlooking the sea. The food was delicious, the views wonderful, and the service I…