Luminous Night at UWA

Port Beach

Peta's Easel Party

Long time family friend and artist Peta bought 10 easels on sale when an art supplies shop was closing down. Sounds like she was winning at life, but when it took over an hour to put together just one easel, Peta didn't feel like she was winning anymore. Thus she decided to bring in her friends as reinforcements. Together we put together the remaining 9 easels in just over an hour. We celebrated afterwards with dinner at Alchemy, the Middle Eastern inspired restaurant located in front of the artists studios. Work is made so much more enjoyable when it is done together with friends!!

Historic Tour of Fremantle with the Mayor

A couple of weeks ago I went on a tour of Fremantle organised by CUSP- the Curtin University Sustainability Policy Institute. Our tour guides were Brad Pettitt and Peter Newman. Brad is a super friendly man, has a Phd in sustainability and is the mayor of Fremantle. Peter is Professor of Sustainability at Curtin University and has been involved in developing train lines in Perth, with the aim to reduce societies dependence on cars. They are both so SO SO knowledgeable! I was mega impressed! What I loved about Brad is that he spoke in really matter of fact manner. He didn't preach about how amazing his council is or about how shit councils have been in the past. He acknowledged that Fremantle needs a lot of work, and was willing to listen to anybody who opened their mouth. Peter knows a great deal about Fremantle's interaction with the local Indigenous people, and was able to point out many silly things White people have done.

A few things I learnt on the tour-

• Most of the heritage buildings along High St were built in the 1890s around the time of the Gold Rush in Western Australia
• Western Australia's oldest public building is in Fremantle: The Round House, built in 1931 as a gaol for Indigenous people who were then taken to Rottnest Island
• In the 1970s there was a plan to widen High St into a four lane highway and extend Roe Highway such that it would run through where Henry Street now is. That would have been horrible!!
• The building which Dome now sits in was Fremantle's first library
• The site where Metropolis Fremantle now sits was an Opera house. Think that Fremantle had an opera house!

Andy & Ameila

Amelia, Jenna and I recently went to see the "Picasso to Warhol" exhibition at the Art Gallery of Western Australia. Picasso is my home boy, Warhol is a cool cat. Then we ate orange almond cake with double cream and chocolate banana caramel cheese cake at King Street Café. It was a perfect Sunday afternoon. 

hello spring

hello freesias. hello organisation, concentration, and non-procrastination. hello strawberry banana smoothies, blueberry bagels, asparagus, and sugar snap peas. hello early morning swims and evening walks. hello to listening, learning, laughing and living. hello spending time with special people. let’s do this.

How to Cook Artichokes aka "oh shit Dillashaw Leslie backburner what another cheque-books like"

This week I had a prodigious conversation about the lack of artichokes eaten by Australians. They are so simple to cook and delicious and their purpley green leaves are beautiful and they are a vegetable. 

So everybody. LETS GET ON IT.
If you don't already know, here is how to cook and eat an artichoke.

1. Buy some globe artichokes. Preferably on a Sunday while meandering around a farmers market drinking a soy chai and wearing bright yellow sunflower pants.
2. Take them home
3. Cut off top 2-3cm
4. Take off any small leaves at the bottom of the stem
5. Cut off stem leaving about 4 cm
6. Rinse under cold water
7. Put in a steamer basket with half a lemon and some garlic cloves
8. Steam for 20-40 minutes, or until the outer leaves are tender and easily come off (depends on size)
9. Eating time... peel off leaves, 
10. Dip fleshy end in a good (homemade?) mayonnaise 
11. Grip non-fleashy end.
12. Place in mouth.
13. Pull through teeth to unfasten the soft yummy artichoke flesh
14. Discard remaining petal in the compost
15. Smile

"Oh shit Dillashaw Leslie backburner what another cheque-books like" refers to the time I tried to get my laptop to type out a sentence about artichokes which I dictated to it. Clearing not a winning program.