Musical Interlude: Satan & St. Paul

Satan & St. Paul by John Fullbright...heard this on Jules Holland a couple of weeks ago and couldn't not for the life of me keep his name in my head long enough to find him on youtube!

I seem to be in a bluesy Johnny Cash kind of mood today musically.
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Listening: Satan & St. Paul - John Fullbright

Musical Interlude: Roll Me Up & Smoke Me When I Die

On Andrew Marr this morning...



...he 20 years old, from Shropshire, and has this amazing voice. Blues Boy Dan Owen, who, I would never have heard of given that I rarely watch Andrew Marr on a Sunday morning, lucky I changed channels when I did. (Also, dad saw it and sent me a link).

This is an album I will be look forward to hearing this year and thus is being added to my (thus far) very small list of 2013.

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Listening: Roll Me Up and Smoke Me When I Die - Blues Boy Dan Owen

Musical Interlude: Overgrown

James Blake [overgrown] from nabil elderkin on Vimeo.

Another on my 'obsessively playing' playlist, but it was probably a given seeing Mr. Blake's new album was released on Monday and I'm still obsessively playing the last one and EP. I'm still to listen to the new album fully, but I just think that this (his first single from the second album) looks and sounds gorgeous.

I'm so happy that this initial offering's good, I love his music.
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Watching: Community: Series 2, Episode 13 - Celebrity Pharmagology

Musical Interlude: Laura

Bat For Lashes - Laura from thatgo on Vimeo.

Currently on my 'obsessively playing' play list...
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Watching: Community: Series 2, Episode 10 - Mixology Certification

Polish Problem...

You know how a couple of posts ago, I mentioned that I had a bit of a nail varnish problem? Yeah, this is only about half of it. Apparently my way of distracting myself on my really depressed days is by buying nail varnish. And given many of the places I've been buying them from currently have three for two offers, it's way too easy. Now, I'm not buying expensive brands, there are a couple in there which were a little pricier and a few that should have been but I got at the factory shop across the road from work for a fraction of the price (seriously I bought an Essie polish in there for £3 which should have been upwards of £8/9) but the fact that most of this hall has been bought since just before Christmas is bad! 

There are worst things I could be consoling myself with, and I do love nail varnish, but well, the fact is that my nails are so weak at the moment that they're peeling and breaking like mad. A couple of weeks ago they were almost back to a good length and looking nice, and then the peeling began again and now I'm back at the quick and have torn my thumb nail so close that it's really sore.

So basically, to make myself feel better I'm buying something which I can't use and therefore just taunts me. I may as well be buying clothes which don't fit or shoes I can't walk in.

*sigh*

If I was willing to have my photo taken I should have started a make up blog, seeing I can't seem to stop buying the stuff! For example I would definitely recommend to you Maybelline's Color Show Nail Varnish, as it's really highly pigmented, dried quickly and they're releasing some brilliant colours. I would recommend Barry M on colour selection, but tell you they're incredibly thin and the ones I own either need 4 coats or you need a similarly coloured base, so it's not the polish to use if you need to be quick. I'd also point out that Rimmel's nail varnish is great, but their 60 second formula dries slower than any other and can be on the thick side, however they also have double width brushes, which make them really easy to apply. And I'd mention that Barbara Daly polish is one of my favourites as it's cheap, has good coverage, dries quickly and is formaldehyde free! Which for a drug store nail polish is I think verging on the holy grail.

I'd also reveal one of my favourite polishes in by Nails Inc and while I've bought/been bought some, most of mine have been bought by buying three or four issues of magazines giving them away...oh don't look at me that way, they're £11 a pop and the magazine is £3 at most! Thus for 4 it costs me just over the cost of 1 polish! That's a win to me!

I told you I had a problem...

{Update: I bought three more this morning and, had there been any colours I hadn't snaffled already, I was going to buy another three when I had to nip back to the shops this afternoon. It's been a bad few days. So why not drown myself in formaldehyde and other horrific chemicals.}

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Listening: Angel - The XX

Recipe: Fat Wee Rascals

When I was a kid, my mum and dad would take my sisters and I on holiday to various places around the UK, but York was one of our favourites and if we were lucky, we'd go to Bettys for our tea. Now, I know you're probably thinking that York's not very exotic, but we always had fun and Bettys Tea Room is legendary. It's wonderfully old fashioned, with servers in traditional black and weight uniforms, a pianist playing throughout your meal and it's beautifully art deco interior was endlessly fascinating to me when I was a kid. It's been a long time since I was down there, but periodically, as a treat. we'll buy my dad their equally legendary Fat Rascals and have them posted up to us to store in the freezer.

Fat Rascals are somewhere between a fruit scone and a rock cake in my opinion. They're dense and full of dried fruit and peel, with a lovely crunchy crust, but the iconic part is their crooked almond grin and glacé cherry eyes. Needless to say, Bettys is very secretive about their recipe (and rightly so) but I scoured the net for a few homages to them and came up with a couple to play with as my dad love them and their crooked little faces, so I wanted to make him some for Easter.

Here is the recipe I used (I doubled it)  which was created by Tom of Gastrolad:

Fat Rascals

(Makes four big buns or six small buns)

225g Self Raising Flour

1 tsp Baking Powder

110g Butter

60g Caster Sugar

1 tsp mixed spice

200g mixed dried fruit and peel

1 egg

A splash of milk (plus more to glaze)

To decorate:

Demerara Sugar

8 Whole blanched almonds

4 glacé cherries, haved

1. Preheat the other to 180C.
2. Start off by rubbing the butter into the flour and baking powder until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.
3. Mix in the sugar, allspice and dried fruit.
4. Make a well in the middle of the dry mix and break the egg into it, also adding that splash of milk. Now start to mix the ingredients and they will start to come together into a fairly stiff dough. If needs be, you can add more milk, but don't make it too wet.
5. Divide the dough into four (or six), and shape each piece into a hemisphere, i.e. flat bottom, with a rounded top.
6. Placed each on on a greased baking sheet, sprinkle with demerara sugar and decorate with three almonds and two cherry halves.
7. Brush them with a touch of milk and place in an oven pre-heated to 180C and cook for 25-30 mins.
8. They're ready when you insert a skewer or knife into the middle and it comes out clean.
9. 
   

The fat rascal demands to be eaten warm, with plenty of butter, so ideally tuck in straight away. However, you can keep them for a couple of days and re-heat in the oven.

 (Note: the original recipe had allspice instead of mixed spice but my sister thought the former seemed wrong and the mixed spice smelt/tasted right when they came out the oven, also I brushed them with milk before putting on the sugar and decorations, because otherwise you'd just brush it all off again!)

So here they are! I made seven fat wee rascals - it should have been eight but I managed to incorporate the eighth into the others, I think once they had their grins they had a taste for rascal dough - and they're almost there. I should have used unsalted butter and they're a bit too crumbly so probably need more liquid but they tasted right bar that! Not bad for a first attempt and they made my dad happy, which as he's had a bug this week is nice.

Also, Happy Zombie Jesus Day! A.k.a. Happy Easter, though it will probably be known as the former from now on in our household, especially as I have spent my evening watching the Zombie dramas and films that the BBC (In The Flesh) and Channel 4 (28 Weeks Later) have provided for us on this Easter Sunday. I love this choice in programming completely and utterly!

I will also retrospectively thank them for the wonderful Zombie/Alien films we had on for Christmas and  Valentines Day. Can we have Zombies for my birthday and all major holidays this year too please?

Link | Bettys of York
Link | Gastrolad
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Watching: 28 Weeks Later

Dulux Colour of the Year: Indigo Night

Please forgive the two sets of blue suede shoes, I could resist and I'm ashamed to say that I bumped a set of royal blue Converse Ox Lite's for them. I'll go and hang my head in that corner over there...


1) Benefit BAD gal Mascara in Blue - I went through a year or two were I wore nothing but blue mascara, is it sad that I'm enjoying its catwalk return? | Link
2) Karen Millen Dress with Floral Embroidery from ASOS - a little old fashioned, but I'm completely in love! | Link
83) Barry M Dazzle Dust in DD98 Petrol Black - my favourite eyeshadow! It's the one I wear if I'm dressing up and want to look fancy or make my eyes look über green. It's a perfect mix of dark blue black base and peacock/purple sheen...it's just beautiful! | Link
4) Tennyson (Blue Tortoiseshell Glasses) by Paul Smith | Link
5) Scalloped Front Tab Across Body Bag in blue from ASOS - *quietly places in shopping basket*| Link
6) Christian Louboutin Rolando in Navy | Link
7) Blue Stamp Cufflinks by Clare Hillerby - when I started jewellery at uni, she was (and still is) a complete idol. I fell in love with her jewellery because it's subtle and elegant and beautiful...she has her own style, which is something I still haven't found | Link | Clare Hillerby
8) Original 1227 Table Light by Anglepoise | Link
9) Blue Pocket Postal Notebook by Moleskin | Link
10) Blue Adjustable Flower Earrings by Gulnur Ozdaglar - these are made of recycled plastic. Her jewellery is spectacular | Link | Gulnur Ozdaglar
11) Anthropologie Spot of Tea Mug | Link
12) Suede Wood Platforms in Navy from Kling | Link
13) Gosh Limited Edition Nail Varnish in Tilted Blue - I almost bought this last week, I'm avoiding wearing nail varnish while buying tonnes of it! My depression buying has always been makeup based and right now that obsessive purchasing is of nail varnish. | Link


So there are thirteen lovely lovely Indigo Night inspired bits and bobs. I want them all!

Enjoy!

Link | Dulux Colour of the Year
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Listening: Hey Little Bruiser - Ed Harcourt

Musical Interlude: Small Hands

Keaton Henson - Small Hands from Keaton Henson on Vimeo.

Beautiful and heartbreaking.

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Listening: Small Hands- Keaton Henson

Monday Moodboard: Dulux Colour of the Year

1. Tut-topshop by Eleonore Bridge (via Design Crush Blog)

2. Silver Studded Blue Butterfly by Unknown (via Pinterest)

3. Through My Window by no-soap-was-harmed (via Pinterest)

4. Blueberry Pancakes by Chang Pick Yin (via A Blog With A View)

5. Still Life by Anna Williams Photography (via Pinterest)

Much like Pantone, Dulux creates a colour of the year for the paint range, this year it's Indigo Night, a blue which looks like the dusty matt skin of a blueberry or the colour of a good bruise...I don't know if that make the colour sound appealing or not, but it's the colours it brings to mind.

It's not quite the jewel tone that Pantone's Emerald eludes too, but it's a rich, dark and comforting colour, which could very easily translate into home furnishing and clothes. A colour which could be a bit scary in my little room, especially after I switched from dark magenta too a pale buttery yellow, but in the right space would be really imposing. That said I keep seeing people pinning a picture of a small black bathroom and it looks incredibly luxurious with the white roll top bath and thick herringbone flooring. I'd happily cocoon myself for a couple of hours reading in a bathroom like that.

Anyway as with the Pantone Moodboard, the colour doesn't match precisely but there's a definite tone...a bit of a Bowie tone me things...

"Blue blue electric blue, is the colour of my room, where I will live...blue..."
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Listening: Sound & Vision - David Bowie

Pantone Colour of the Year: Emerald

So for the Monday Moodboard last week - which returned after a long absence -  not only do you get some lovely shade related photos but this week you get thirteen emerald(ish) coloured treats for 2013's colour.

Again, I don't think Pantone could have picked a nicer colour and everything on this, I genuinely like and would like in my life...at least the few I could afford.

1) Ciate Creme Nail Polish in Ditch The Heels | Link
2) Faceted Wooden Earrings in Turquoise by Anthe-Stolz from DaWanda | Link
3) Andy Spectacles from Selima Optique | Link
4) Zoya Nail Polish in Ivanka | Link
5) Gosh Velvet Touch Eyeliner in Woody Green - this is one of my favourite eyeliners, they're really soft and easy to apply, they're also packed with pigment and last ages! Only downside is they slide a bit, so use a primer! | Image | Link
6) Emerald Christian Louboutin Pumps via Pinterest | Link
7) Vintage Clock London Emerald Green via Design Atelier Article (Etsy) | Link
8) Moleskin Notebook in Oxide Green - Pantone do do a specifically Emerald notepad, but I'm sorry, a moleskin just can't be beat! | Link
9) Alexander McQueen Flower Lace Strapless in Green (Emerald) via Lyst | Link
10) Green Polka Dot Scarf from Wanelo | Link
11) Barry M Dazzle Dust in 73 Emerald - this was the first eyeshadow I bought when I left school and broke away from my 'safe Emily' makeup. The blue mascara years may have been a mistake but the pink hair never will be. Barry M Dazzle Dusts have been a staple of my makeup bag since then, they're very highly pigmented and worth the money...unless they explode in your bag and go over your brand new bright yellow sneakers! Grrr... | Image | Link
12) Jasper Conran  for Wedgwood Chinoiserie Green Teacup from John Lewis | Image | Link
13) Vintage Emerald Earrings (14kt Yellow Gold and White Gold) from Cynthia Findlay Antiques | Image | Link


I could so easily go full out green from that list and I just hope that the fashion world picks up on Pantone's prediction, as Emerald really is a beautiful jewel tone and I'm bored of muted colours and neons. Plus I'd really quite like a pair of crystal green glasses. My glasses at the moment are crystal grey and the pair I'm looking at at work are crystal purple. I always seem to be drawn to the crystal frames (i.e. translucent plastic) and I have no idea why!

Anyway, hope you enjoy the list and I will type up my window posts now that my latest window is in and I've taken some photos. For now, on my day off, I have some work work to do and a cardigan to search for because I don't know where you are, but it's cold, windy and trying to snow here at the moment. So a nice day all round.

Link | Pantone Colour of the Year
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Watching: Seeking a Friend for the End of the World