Moved ~!

Most of my activity can now be found on my craftblog:

http://craftydragons.wordpress.com/

hope to see you there!

 

A godo winter warner – cottage/shepherd’s pie

Ok, there’s not a lot I can cook to any reasonable level, but one of the things I can do is a good cottage/shepherd’s pie. After a week of my shitty attempts at stir-frys and stuff at uni, it always puts a smile on my face when i return to ths traditional wintery food
So it may nto be overly exciting, but here we go:

–You need…–
(cooking for 1)

*a small oven-proof dish
*a pan & a wok/frying pan
*spoons to stir etc
*a potatoe masher

*a couple of decent sized potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
*some minced meat – beef for a ‘cottage’ pie and lamb/mutton for a ‘shepherd’ pie
*random veg – Onions and carrots do the trick.
*Some gravy (I used ‘bisto’ instant gravy)
*Some ‘Henderson’s Relish’ or the equivalent ~ Henderson’s relish is a special sauce in Yorkshire, and is only made in the city where I live. It’s gorgeous for anything Sunday-dinner related (like this). It’s a little spicy. The equivalent coud be worchester sauce or Lea & perrins sauce.
*grated cheese for topping

–Method–

*pre-heat your oven to 200 degrees
*make sure your veg is chopped up and ready
*Put your mince in your wok/frying pan without any oil on a high heat on your cooker’s hob. Get a spatuala and keep the mince moving all the time until it’s completely brown. You’ll notice that the juices will come out of the mince about halfway throughthis process and will act like oil would.
–> add a genrous your Henderson’t relish/other sauce throughout
*Once your mince is brown shove your vegetables in and carry on cooking for a couple more minutes.
*during this process (or after you’ve taken the mince off the heat) boil up some water and make some instant gravy up. Pour enough gravy on your mince to have a little pool at the bottom, but not completely coveirng the mince.
*switch to a low heat (eg if you had it at 6, now put it at 1) and let the mince veg&gravy mix simmer for 20 mins. stir occasionally.
–> add a helping more Henderson’t relish/other sauce

*Peel and chop up your potatoes and put in enough water that they are just covered. Put on a high-to-mid heat with the saucepan lid on. If they bubble over just lift the suacepan lid. cook until they’re soft-but-firm and you can put a fork through them easily. Once this is done, drain the water off them and mash.
*when it’s time to take your mice of the heat, you’ll notice that some of the gravy’s evaporated a bit. Pour the whole mix into the bottom of your heatproof dish. If you like, re-heat up your gravy a bit and add some more, but beware. too much gravy will result in it dribbling over the top of your dish while cooking.
*Layer your mashed potatoes on top and pack it down a bit. add a little drizzle of gravy over the potatoes to encourage them to brown, add a bit more Henderson’t relish/other sauce and grate some cheese over top.
*put it in the middle of a 200 degree oven for 20 minutes.

–serve–
you can eat it straght out of the pot (and me, being addicted to Henderson’s Relish, often keep adding more as i eat lol). Excellent with Yorkshire Puddings or a crust of white or brown bread and some extra gravy
it should come out piping hot, so it’s sure to keep you toasty in the winter ^_~

 

Knitting Meme

What can I say? I was tagged by teh spiffy Rougeknits blog :p

1. Do you knit continental or English?
English, I’ve tried continental and I’m going to give it a few more goes, sicne apprently it’s faster. Also my left hand tends to cramp up when I knit English style, so hopefully the continettal one won’t do that. *le shrug*

2. How long ago did you learn to knit?
My nanan and my mum taught me uber basic stuff. Only garter stitch swatches and everthing i knitted ended up triangular because of all the dropped stitches -lol
I got back into it when my Nanan died. She used to be great at knitting and always knitted us sweaters and stuff when we were small. It’s really sad. I think I got into it to remember her in a way – as usual it’s always too late. I wish she was here to teach me and share and stuff.
Still, there you go – that’s life. (or death, rather).
So i learnt this year.

3. First FO?
That for finished object? some shapeless fingerless gloves.

4. Favorite yarn?
anything cheap. But I love teh feel of cotton :3 And I like thick two-toned warm colours.

5. Favorite pattern?
I’m not good enough for a lot of patterns. My favourites are things with images on it. I liek working form teh graph-paper style patterns. But my ultimate fave is feater & fan. once you remember teh sequence it’s relaxinga nd quite pretty.

6. Favorite pattern source?
The Anticraft

7. Favorite needles?
I like bigger needles. 5 or 6mm I’d say at the moment.

8. Nicest thing you’ve ever knit?
My “Toxic Dragon” feather n’ fan scarf

9. Most hated project?
I both love and hate this alien-toy project I’m making form scratch. It’s hard when it gets into snags, and while I think it’s cute, i feel it’ll be too shitty for other people-haha

10. Who are you going to pass this on to?
THE WORLD!
*buwahaha*

 

MANGA: Vagabond

 

[b]Vagabond[/b]

Rating: 6.5/10 (so far)
Genre: manga ~ Samurai / outlaw / Feudal Japan
Running Time: Many volumes of manga -haha
Find it at: Onemanga.com
Rating: adult (large violence and sexual innuendo/content)

I got recommended this as part the Deviantart ‘Samurai Dueller’s league’ i’m in, in order to get a real feel for samurai, swordfights and style etc, and I think that this manga is one that should be viewed in that context. As an art lesson, and indeed a stylistic history lesson, it is excellent. The drawings are very well done in the realistic anime style, and while it had grown to irritate me the habit the artist has of drawing their characters with their eyes wide open and staring at many intervals (and the translator’s unfortunate habit of making the characters say ‘urrrrr’ every 2 seconds), it is certainly an example for us all to try and follow. The whole thing has a very realistic feel to it, and the manga carries along at a normal pace if life, and its characters are down to earth in that their concerns are certainly earthy.
So, as a piece of art, it is very well done and well worth a look. Each panel is done with utmost care. However, as an entraining manga, it falls a little short. It’s probably just my taste, but for one I find the protagonist (and indeed the minor characters) generally dislikeable, the action often melodramatic and the story too slow and a little disjointed at times.
(Furthermore if Ouso doesn’t stop screeching and wailing soon I may explode-haha)
In short (since this review itself is pretty short) – please please check it out to enjoy the art, but for me it only warrents a rating of six and a half out of ten.

 

ANIME: Paprika

[Paprika dvd cover]

Paprika

Rating: 9/10
Genre: Anime: surreal/fantasy/sci-fi(ish)
Running Time: 1 hour, 27 minutes
Find it at: HMV, Amazon etc
Rating: 15 for ‘mild sexualised violence’ – of which there wasn’t much and it was certainly mild.

Paprika is a film that I’ve been wantingt o watch for a while now. Yesterday me and my sister went perusing around our local shopping centre (it was a Saturday, which fo course means chaos). The summer sales were on, which made thinsg worse, but the DVD sales were great. So, we picked up the DVD for a measly £6 (huzzah!) and, with our otehr prizes in tow (Bufy the vamp slayer boxsets only £15 each!, Blues Brothers at £2! Sweeny Todd!) we headed home to watch it.
And it didn’t disappoint.
For me, Anime is a strange creature in many respects. Being created (to my knowledge) by the people who brought you ‘spirited away’, and supported by great reviews in ‘Neo Magazine’, I had great hopes for Paprika, but with anime films – frankly- one can never really be sure if they’ll understand the damn thing, much less enjoy it. But I feel that comes form a Western point of view, I’m still – in many ways- under the subconscious assumption that a cartoon film will be all action and almost childish entertainment, So, when greeted by a film like Ghost in The Shell, beautifully animated but more puzzling than the Matrix, one floats a little between enjoyment and puzzlement. Anime films (I’ve seen so far) are slow and intelligent. There is none of this Western rush – it’s almost artsy. Now, when it comes to ‘Spirited Away’ and ‘Vampire Hunter D:Bloodlust’ this slowness and care exemplifies the emotion, and weaves a brilliant story. In a film where one struggles a little to see the point, it translates as dull and a little vexing. But, regardless of type, Anime films certainly big it up on the creativity and imagination and, coupled with beautiful animation, it makes them pretty special.
Paprika is a film that has imagination (and, thankfully, entertainment) in bunches.
Now that’s not to say that it’s not an intelligent film. It certainly is intelligent, but because it is set in a dreamscape, where reality and dreams merge and converge, you seem to be able to follow the flow of the film without the lack of answers (at first) irritating you. This flow is a great wave of colour and serial charm. Of childish enjoyment and sinister nightmare. The characters are all brilliantly drawn and you empathize with them all, and the character of Paprika – the imaginary heroine that inhabits the dreams – is brilliant. She’s bubbly, brave, sweet, kind and headstrong when she wants to be; giving a tongue lashing to those who deserve it, and moving through the crazy dream land with such fluid enjoyment and belonging that you as an audience seem to be able to relax into the world in ease. She’s your guide.
Frankly, there’s a lot of other reviews on Paprika that give a better summary of the plot than I can,. As well as a description of the dream world that supports the film. In short: there has been an invention that allows a trained professional to view and manipulate their patient’s dreams in order to psychoanalyse them. However when these little devices are stolen all hell breaks loose, and t begins increasingly difficult to discern where the dreams end and reality begins.
Bold, bright, colourful and very entertaining, I’d definitely recommend it. I really enjoyed it on many levels, and I’m sure you will too. ^_~

 

Art Binge, Exams and the Upcoming Summer Holidays :D

I don’t know whether its the exam- revision driving me stir crazy, or just a little burst of creativity, but recently I’ve been staying up til 3 am drawing-haha
Wel ok, it’s only been a couple of nights, but nowadays time is all skrewed up from the revision-cabin-fever and it feels darn good :3
Ahh… one week and I break up for a big uni-student-slacker-length summer holiday! Two exams to do first though. merf.

Anywhoo- to the art-i-thingies!
[and yes, I know I still haven't finsihed colouring that Vegeta fanart, it is still on my mind nd it WILL get done!]

So i’m currently working on two drawinsg at the mo.

1) I invented a new race for an rp guild I’m starting on Gaiaonline.com called the ‘Moonmaw’ and I needed to do a picture of them for reference. I also made up a Moonmaw characetr called Felix i just HAD to draw. So a little peruse of my 100 challenge, and I came across the phrase ‘all that I have’ – which just seemed ot fit felix’s characetr perfectly. I had an image of him doing a kick ass fighting move (the guy has issues, the Moonmaw are a slave race created by a magical experiment gone wrong). A long time trawling the devart serach for stock photos and I came across a great jump-kick pose.
I drew him out (he looks just as I imagined him too! :3) and today I drew the guy he was kicking, so it didn’t look like he was just kicking teh air. It make sit look WAY better…I never used to do that sort of stuff, as stupid as it sounds. The pose was AWKWARD but worth it. I’m loving it. I did it on watercolour paper so that I could colour it. (no doubt that the Vegeta piccy will get done too while I colour this one-haha)

2) A Nude of Adam. I’ve been wanting to do a nude of my angelic Adam and Eve, (not that I’ve done nudes before, nore actually seen much of the male anatomy-haha) but I coduln’t find a right picture. I found some great stock for reference ( a beautiful male artistic nude – the lighting is gorgeous), but what started out as Adam + Eve ended up as just…Adam -haha.
Still, I vowed to do nudes of both of them, and I definately wnat to do Eve, so she’ll probably be afterwards. I’m hoping to finish the Adam pic this week (i’m thinking of inking him and then pencil shading him). Because I’m going home next week, and no-one wants to be shading/inking a dick when your parents are orbiting -haha XD

So there you go – new submissions soon! ^_~

i shoudl ahe a sketchdump soon too actually. i’ve been doodling Craban and Gabriel.

1. Introduction /DONE
| 2. Love | 3. Light | 4. Dark
5. Seeking Solace | 6. Break Away | 7. Heaven | 8. Innocence
9. Drive | 10. Breathe Again | 11. Memory | 12. Insanity
13. Misfortune | 14. Smile | 15. Silence | 16. Questioning
17. Blood | 18. Rainbow | 19. Gray | 20. Fortitude
21. Vacation | 22. Mother Nature | 23. Cat | 24. No Time
25. Trouble Lurking | 26. Tears | 27. Foreign | 28. Sorrow
29. Happiness | 30. Under the Rain | 31. Flowers | 32. Night
33. Expectations | 34. Stars | 35. Hold My Hand | 36. Precious Treasure
37. Eyes | 38. Abandoned | 39. Dreams | 40. Rated
41. Teamwork | 42. Standing Still | 43. Dying | 44. Two Roads
45. Illusion | 46. Family | 47. Creation | 48. Childhood
49. Stripes | 50. Breaking the Rules | 51. Sport | 52. Deep in Thought
53. Keeping a Secret | 54. Tower | 55. Waiting | 56. Danger Ahead
57. Sacrifice | 58. Kick in the Head | 59. No Way Out | 60. Rejection
61. Fairy Tale | 62. Magic | 63. Do Not Disturb | 64. Multitasking
65. Horror | 66. Traps | 67. Playing the Melody | 68. Hero
69. Annoyance | 70. 67% | 71. Obsession | 72. Mischief Managed
73. I Can’t | 74. Are You Challenging Me? | 75. Mirror | 76. Broken Pieces
77. Test | 78. Drink | 79. Starvation | 80. Words
81. Pen and Paper | 82. Can You Hear Me? | 83. Heal | 84. Out Cold
85. Spiral | 86. Seeing Red | 87. Food | 88. Pain
89. Through the Fire | 90. Triangle | 91. Drowning | 92. All That I Have
93. Give Up | 94. Last Hope | 95. Advertisement | 96. In the Storm
97. Safety First | 98. Puzzle | 99. Solitude | 100. Relaxation

DONE:

1- introduction – Foetus Pic
IN PROGRESS:
92 – all that I have (Felix action)
5 – seeking solace (Adam nude)

 

BodyWorld Exhibitions

 

It’s late at night, as ever. I keep on telling myself that I’m going to go to bed earlier, but it never happens. Maybe I’m a night owl in disguise…maybe I’m just a girl who can’t pull herself away from the internet-haha

My eyeballs hurting tells me to go to bed. Not a good sign.

-ahem-

Aaanyway. In one of my random google browses I came across the body art exhibition form the german guy with the hat. You know- who cuts up cadavers, plasticises them and then plays with them like they’re action men?

Creepy? yes.  This woman’s face says it all:

http://www.dappercadaver.com/blog/wp-images/Body%20Worlds/body%20worlds%2016.jpg

Now to me that cautious expression says ‘holy hell….but..ooooh! Coolio.’

And that’s the general approach I feel towards the exhibition.

Cool?..yes. very.

I actually watched a programme he had where he was dissecting one of these treated cadavers and explaining different parts of the anatomy. It was pretty good- very interesting. They seemed ot have an apaprently normal British guy in a lab coat to try and offset the crazy German guy in a hat – or at least that’s what they were covertly doing. Certainly when he started feeding a brain into a bacon slicer he was rocking to many tunes of crazy.

But a good crazy. I’ve always wondered what i would have done if I’d gone down the biology route- I wasn’t too bad at science and it certainly interests me. I though the programme really unique and educational.

[plus they had a big naked shaved blonde guy in it called Dennis. *gigglesnort* -ahem-]

 

 

Anyway, with the art itself, you’re always in two minds as to its purpose.  Whether to be ‘offended’ or not. I mean, I personally am not – i think if people want to do that with their bodies than fair enough. It certainly provides a great opportunity for us s viewers. He places them in everyday positions like skateboarding etc etc – which gives you a  real hand s on glance at anatomy.

I mean, heck, I’m morbidly fascinated with them. Just look at my version of the Grim Reaper – Adam. Half the time he’s got his flesh all ripped away zombie-style to show off his ribcage. Ther’e something about satisfying and interesting in taking your standard anime bishie and tearing chunks out fo him to show off what’s underneath.

Hmn.0o

‘fair enough’ methinks. ‘thsi is all pretty cool’.

But then it creeps me out when he starts doing stuff liek this:

http://www.ldonovan.com/images/Misc_Pix/BodyWorlds2_Camel.jpg

Yep folks that’s a three headed camel.

 

http://www.iancavalier.com/spiralnotepad/images/2007/bodyworlds3-618.jpg

 

I like bodies and stuff just fine until you start skrewing with them – it gets creepy then-haha

 

But still, it’s darn cool and fascinating. I mean, with modern art nowadays you have to shift through all the crap to get to something half decent or original. And this is certainly original and a good modern art example.

But no matter how much you try to not jump to conclusions. The german guy still looks a little bit crazy-haha

 

Now for some google- tastic piccys XD

 

http://dangerousintersection.org/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/body_worlds_03.jpg

Dude, don’t put your face so close… X.x and is the little dangly penis necessary? Really? haha

 

http://z.about.com/d/philadelphia/1/0/7/D/1/body_worlds_02.jpg

Now this is pretty darned cool. It’d be brilliant as an art reference too

 

http://english.people.com.cn/200504/28/images/0428_A65.jpg

Tee hee – the hat’s hilarious. It’s like an extreme flasher…

 

http://www3.pictures.gi.zimbio.com/Controversial+Body+Worlds+Exhibition+Opens+QyqRpVMJwm5l.jpg

 

Oh well, at least he’s cheerful….

 

 

The TRAX – awesome band find :D

Ok I’ll admit it. I’m a cliche. I’m one of those annoying teenagers that sucks up Asian culture like it’s candy. I like manga. I practice Buddhism. I find many Asian guys hot.

Shut up.

 :p

Anyways, on that track, I was wandering around on my Gaia guild and one of the members introduced me to this awesome band: the TRAX.

They’re like a South Korean version of Linkin Park. Awesome. I love it. As ever I have the Rammstien problem – not understanding what they sing, but heck, that’s what internet lyric translations are for! Lol.

*is listening to them now* haha they so blatantly are inspired from linkin park they just blatantly use bits of their music every now and again-haha.

The riffs are awesome.

Here’s are a few videos I’ve found on youtube, plus a site where you can download a few tracks ;3

http://kparadox.tripod.com/

As you can see form the video – they’re also quite dishy. Esp Rose *snort*

-ahem-

*wristslap*

 

 

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Dragon Gems – new blog for fashion posts

I thought that i should get properly organised. For all my fashion posts you can now go to my other blog…

http://dragongems.wordpress.com/

 

Fashion: Threadless T-shirts

I was browsing the wonderful Rare Bird finds blog, when I came across one of their reccomendations – the T-shirt online shop Threadless.com.
They ahev some excellent – funny, often beautiful, kooky designs on their T-shirts to suit all tastes. I thought that I’d share some of my favourites with you as I was browseing – definately worth checking out!

Here are some of my faves:

[I rellay wnat this one: heck, i want 'em all XD]