Funky lines

Traveling travails

A visage for today

Selfies

Who me?
Tanned, burnt and dripping wet the whole time.

Déjà vu and beach hopping

Sunset

Y?

I'd sent a post titled t'day with plenty pictures that never made it to the blog despite resending it twice over.
Ugh..why?

Uhh

But leave it to me to pick out mismatched swimwear.

Also today..right now

Chocolate spray

A kit kat spray can chocolate wafer, what else can one even need?

VU

View from the room.
I know it looks like a poster this gorgeous view..ah the sun, the sand, the birds, the greens and the weather.

Song kill

I woke up with Aerosmith's 'dream on' stuck in my head and I can't seem to shake it off.
I think I'll have to listen to the entire song to stop humming it through the entirety of this trip.

Gimme snore

When sleep is of the essence doesn't matter how or where.

Brrr

I'm leaving you behind horrid weather..for a while if even.

Swing swing

Tonight smells like swollen words on yellow pages cracking like embers atop blue fire lit under a golden tree near a platinum tidal pool sprinkled with stolen heartbeats that I thought were lost, that burgeon out of your cache.

Grim

Who me?
Reading this manga because artwork

Limerick

Finally!
It's done.
I need just five minutes tomorrow and even the black shading but apart from that this is it!
This was a mouthful!

Eat feed

The one thing I look forward to with all my enthusiasm is an afternoon meal which is only about me and mostly about leftovers but as long as they're done up good it doesn't matter.
Stir fried brown rice with leftover stuffings for dumplings and eggs along with a colourful salad to seal the deal.

Now I’ll tell you my darling

Morning that seems like it's been through a blast of tornado to suddenly come to a momentary halt where the time has slowed and there's a moment of repose.
That I whooshed past the few hours this morning in a blur, head to head with the speed of sound in a commotion of activities would only be a minor exaggeration because granted the speed of sound is breathlessly quick but I was almost at par with a breakneck speed of my own sine qua non, what with early morning doggy walks in this winter's chill after which there was a whole list of chores at home followed by feeding the pooches almost after having cleaned the house, prepared lunch amongst other things and now..phew, now I finally sit nursing a glass of turmeric water, contemplating today, hoping to get done with everything that's pending which includes my drawing and packing as well because tomorrow night I leave for warmer climates.
The pooches in the meantime will be taken care of until I come back that is which will only happen next year but talking of now I'm taking a breather.

Say one thing about time say I didn't have any to keep a darling apprised of my life that feels a bit like Pollock painting, bizarrely spotted and hither to tither with no linear short distances.
There's been one thing after another and today I know I'm alone with myself and for that I'm happy.

Strenuous jobs

Homemade dumplings that I made this morning and froze which I now proceed to boil because why not?

#%^**$>>

Dear diary,
Now I shall gripe about everything.
Today has been both a most fruitful as well a fruitless day.
Say it is a bundle of contradictions because I got a lot of work done and a lot of work stayed undone like workout and my pending drawing.
I'll tell you that I've been on my toes before the clock hit six and didn't have a moments rest, in fact I've had so little time that even the dogs haven't been taken out for their evening walk yet and I'm just about to rectify that error but oh it's raining like some god committed blasphemy.
I haven't worked out today and it upsets me not because I missed a day but because I ran out of time to be able to squeeze it in and I hate it when that happens; these unwanted gaps break my flow and it's not just workout, it's my pending art as well that didn't have a moment to get updated because it's only now that I've reached home and ugh, I've to be out again and the reason I'm home is because I got drenched and now I need to change and change my shoes to wellingtons cuz goddamit it's raining and the pooches need a walk.

Catkiss

I'm aware that my house is turning into bit of a zoo but I don't mind.
The more the merrier they say.

Fried rice

Well, no surprises here.
Leftover rice with leftover chopped vegetables that I used to make some dumplings that currently sit in the fridge ready to be boiled and eaten for dinner.
Chow fen for lunch.

Oh come on

Merry Christmas

Christmas carols

The thing about Christmas here in in China is that it's not a holiday, absolutely no religious holidays here and for that I'm glad, however international companies do let their foreign employees take an off and for that I'm not glad because now I'm not alone at home and I've to cook something that's favourable to vogue the parties instead of my usual soups and fried rice fair.
It's only Tuesday after all and because it's X-mad I'm making something celebratory like puri+shahi paneer+gobhi aloo and cake for desert.
Life my darling isn't fair but at least it'll be a full on meal on a weekday.

Zigzag

The shortest distance between point A to point B in a manga is a meandering jigsaw of a labyrinthine maze traveling through prime numbers.

Animated

Nights of Sidonia is so incredibly sci-if that it makes Blade Runner 2049 look like flintstones.

The blur

Should I tell you, yes I'll tell you that I've not had the time even though I was up fairly early, that is to say before the clock struck five and there's been not a moment to myself, squeezing just a couple hours of barely to get on with my drawing and I don't know where the day went..but I do know and that it was spent shuffling between house to house, taking care of mutts and cats, preventing civil wars in the process and tidying up my house every instance I got, while the rest of my daily schedule paved the way.
I think things started going downhill after I changed my locations from workstation to lounge and gave full access of my affection to the dogs who wouldn't have any other way, lighting up seeing my face every two minutes like they've just seen me after forever .
Right then..dinner. Thai curry tonight because I don't think I am favourably inclined to do anything but.

Let them eat cake

My Christmas scented dried fruit and nut cake spiced to the gods and spiked with a wee bit o rum.

Changes

I was near compelled to change my work setup today because the pooches were relentless in their enthusiasm to not let me work while they stayed in the confined space of a study room and so I had to shift my cat there to avoid any discord and move myself out into the lounge.

Is it Monday?

Lunch or more like a miscellaneous platter of varied leftovers.
Eggs, millet salad and a sort of bruschetta to fill up a plate and serve as my post work out meal for the day and now for some coffee

Caked on

Who me?
Getting ready to bake a Christmas cake. This is just the basic fruit and nut mise en place.

New friends

To new friends

The day that went

I am on doggy duty which probably explains why I was suddenly MIA last night but the interesting or rather odd turn of events that led to that sudden situation last night were confusing at most.
I wasn't sure of the exact date when the neighbour would be traveling and a day before she informed me that yesterday would be it and gave me the low down as to how and where things were kept in her house and other mutt related info.
I was half expecting that before leaving I'd get perhaps a prompt, a message, a phone call or at least some semblance of hint that they were leaving and that that the canines were now in my care.
It was while watching a tv series last night when the clock had struck nine that I began to grow concerned since there was not a sound nor a peep to be heard which meant the dogs were alone in the house and that no one had been back.
What does that mean?
That no one had taken the dogs out for an evening walk, nor had they been fed and no one had informed me about it.
Naturally I'd assumed that the neighbours would come back before leaving for the airport, knock on my door, tell me they're about to leave etc etc, but apparently they left with their luggage in the morning and went directly to the airport after work without coming back and doing the needful.
So basically it was guesswork and I was left with the puzzle and finally ten minutes after nine I let myself in the house and the dogs were delighted and half sad to see someone other than their family, but they know me well and took it in their stride and soon after they'd had their evening walk and a meal after which they were cleaned and put to bed.
I found myself getting upset almost fuming about this situation because before entering the house I'd called and messaged numerous times to ascertain whether or not they'd be coming back because it was just so sudden and they near vanished without a trace and left it up to my discretion to do as I please.
I mean a word of knowledge that hey, we're leaving , the dogs have not had their walk or meal etc, would have been helpful but NO!

Anyway the dogs are cleaned, walked and fed and now I teach them a couple new tricks.

But seriously what do you make of this odd behaviour?

Phews!

What am I if not a tired mess right now. This will have to wait another day.

Screen kiss

Who me?
Binge watching nights of sidonia when I should be getting on with work.

Drags

This morning, a particular dull pallor of macabre grey offset by rust browns of the trees slowly crosses the dinghy line separating glum and moody..this morning has firmly established itself in disconsolate camp, somber in its bleakness urging one to similarly begin drooping until their laments are one with today's woes.

Morosening

This morning smells like doldrums set to the tune of disco jive amidst urban jungles of ennui and complacence which isn't all that bad unless you've to take out the trash and hear not a single response to a well meaning good morning thrown at an elderly couple.

See read

Well whaddya know.
I found this Seinan manga and what the heck I can always give it a read, as soon as I finish the current Manga I'm reading which is so very Juicy, in a way that some Josei manga's are called Lady and the butler.
It's funny, cute and romantic in a way that's fun to read. I mean I wouldn't ever read a similar book nor watch a movie of that kind but manga is a different story. It's a quick read and cute and funny and a good in between read when you've had it up till here with everything.

Updight

Over five hours of non stop drawing with only a slight neck ache and severe loss of time.
It was at seven when I realised that dinner isn't done yet and now the cooker slowly builds up pressure to feed some khichri..the lazy woman's easy meal.
Right so drawing.
I was thinking of cracking up the old acrylic but decided to doodle instead because there's no reason except I felt like it.
A sort of a brush up before the leap.

No crick

I am liking this easy easel setup. My neck has never been so thankful

Paper strutting

This is probably my absolute favourite paper to draw with pens on.
It's even better than the Rendr paper which cost almost ten times more than this pack of sheets.
It's strictly pens of course this comic drawing paper and I love the touch, colour and smoothness of these sheets.

Paper stuffings

Rice paper rolls stuffed with all the good things one can want served with a zingy dip.

I mean how can one not fall in love with transparent foods?

Shrug uh

But darling I sleep each night thinking tomorrow to be awful and live through that just as always hoping the very worst day after day and it never gets old nor does it get absolutely horrific.
It passes and so do these nights that promise to end in dreamless tosses.

Warps

Tonight smells like ferric bolts liquified to calcium flakes that melt like snow mid air when you breathe life into them propelling their icicle laughter into wings of pink wreaths saddled atop a prancing rhino in paddy fields.

Feels

As indeed it is

/-)

You know that time
When that noon was night
I thought I sank
but I was flying

Sueet

Who me?
Sucking on a lump of jaggery for dessert because I can.

:;(

Who me?
Waiting for my skin to strip itself from the bones or fly into flakes as I smile.

-/

My mood isn't the best today and yet I can't be mad because my hair is looking glorious.

weepy slate

Life without the comforts of photoshop isn't happening for me. For one it took me almost two hours to edit a set of photographs that could have been done in half the time and second because the outcome is not nearly as crisp as what I'd usually get with photoshop.
I'm still learning and it's taking time.

Another thing I feel upset about is that I haven't been able to click good pictures and I'm lost for a good final photograph which is the finished product with a satisfactory angle.

Sometimes I get lazy and forego the tripod in favour of saving time for the final product which needs to be clicked in at least three different places in varying lights and though the photographs look good in the small camera display, they look absolutely horrendous on the screen where I can see the blurs, bad angles, shakiness and some good pictures get destroyed because they've a slant to it. 

Tripod is necessary!

Tofutuna

I know this looks like what on earth but I'm only trying to recreate a fantastic salad I had at a Japanese restaurant the other day.
It was a tofu and fish salad so sublime that I all but ate the plate it came in.
It was to be expected, since the salad in question was their top delicacy and this in a restaurant the kind that probably used Phoenix eggs and dragons breath in their cooking is saying something.
Sure one has to wait for months to get a reservation and there are only a dozen or so tables to eat at and yes one needs to take off their shoes before entering and pawn ancient fortunes to pay but it was worth it because one bite and I was lost.
Think of it like a labyrinth far too simple and prodigious to be easily understood which was this salad which I've tried to recreate succeeding only mildly because for one it lacks a basic Japanese ingredient called bonito that needs be sprinkled atop to finish it and also the tofu which over in that restaurant was probably made under strict historic guidelines is nothing like the machine pressed ones sold in vegetables markets, but all that aside I'm a bit vague on the dressing they used and so the one I made came close but not nearly enough, though having said that, this salad turned out unexpectedly delicious and one that I plan to tinker and tweak.
This one is a keeper, and so I shall retain it in my repertoire.

Gloss

Tonight smells like eyelashes pouring forth in a tumbler of nightly rites inked in blue dusk hue akin the writings on the wall that crumbled yesterday under the weight of sweet strawberries rendered purple beneath the strain of torn up dreams in a sequence of papier-mâché incenses lit during dawn in an alter that is really a shrine for your smiles.

Some days

I have no two separate creams for my right and left elbow in fact you wouldn't believe sometimes I totally skip my nightly skin care routine only just applying a thin layer of face oil following up with a honey based occlusive and then there are days that I do go for the full routine and they vary everyday, because sometimes I'm exfoliating with acids, other times I'm not, sometimes I applying retinoids, other times I'm not, sometimes I'm sticking a sheet mask, other times I'm not but usually the routine goes something like this.

Full on days
-facial cleansing
-Toner
-essence
-acid
-serum
-retinoids
-facial oil
-moisturiser
-face mask

No fuss no muss days
-facial cleansing
-toner
-serum
-face oil
-moisturiser/face mask

Sheet mask days
-face cleanse
-Toner
-sheet mask
-retinoids
-facial oil
-mask

Zero fuss days
-face cleansing
-face oil
-moisturiser

Random days
-face cleansing
-toner
-sheet mask

Days I don't care
-no steps, just sleep.

Scent need

Have you ever felt an intense need all of a sudden to buy something which is not pens, to be more accurate a random urge to suddenly buy a particular fragrance.
This unannounced desire has suddenly stirred its secret bouquet and now I look for a specific dainty parfum 'Guerlain Mon Guerlain' because I remember taking a whiff of it sometime back, getting blown by the powdery sense of it, the exquisite untold, unreal lavender note of it and yet at that moment told myself that I didn't need any more fragrances, that I've had enough for a lifetime, that there's no need for this unnecessary splurge but now I berate myself for not having done so because I'm hit by the delicious scent all of a sudden in the sunlight of my consciousness and desperately I search for it.
Come to me Guerlain.

-/-

The kind of night that makes me want to throw caution to the wind and eat a whole piece of milk chocolate.

I’ve been given an X-mas card

Typical

That every time I have to step out I make a list of things that can be done/need be done once I'm out.
Killing one bird with two stones so to say and so I carve out a long list of things that need finishing.
It can be anything as mundane as buying a crate of eggs and tofu to something as tedious as getting electrical appliances repaired, and so today I figured I should get done some Christmas shopping seeing how I was going out and making a small stop to a store on the way is no skin off my nose and just like always I made a list of things that had dried fruits and assortments of sugars and what not, ingredients that I'd need for my Christmas cooking etc and just like always after having made an elaborate list of things I forgot it at home, sitting neatly folded on my coffee table like it was destined to.
This is getting to be a habit I think because it's the third time in a row that I've done something similar and yes I know perfectly well that one can make a list on phone and perhaps there would be someone quick to suggest (I'm looking at you) an app that is apt for just the work but I am prehistoric where lists are concerned and this way I remember exactly what I bought when.
All my forgotten lists find themselves getting stuck to my journal and it feels like a scrapbook of items that felt like a necessity way back when and now who knows.

Right, on with the work and then off for some shopping or at least a cup of coffee.
I'm in the mood to leisurely spend a while staring at a cup of espresso.

Straight jacket day

That I'm drinking my lunch says a lot about today which began with a clang of noises in my head, pushing against my skull to erupt out in a wave of throbbing migraine which has since abated courtesy a medicine and now I follow up with a smoothie which I didn't wish to drink cold so I warmed it up and that probably explains my mental fatigue because who in their right mind makes a smoothie and warms it? Well I did and it doesn't taste half bad.
Now all I have to do is go out for the afternoon and get done with some work that awaits me.
It's bright and sunny and therefore I look forward to a lovely jaunt and maybe even a sprightly cup of coffee.
I might just end up spending the day outside today.

Why

Tuesday! Of course.
Why else would I wake up wracked with migraine the size of Saturn?

Mornings

Nightgaff

Nighttime and I think
of this bed in which I could sink
and fall in a cloud
falling to plop in your drink
just as you're about to sip
puckering your bow shaped lip
now wouldn't that be
a hugely delicious trip

Wavead

Tonight smells like bad decisions clamped in a blue plastic clip smelling of sea foam that's been kissed by a just birthed koi bejewelled like the shimmery dolphin skin catching sunlight on a dying dawn of awakening apocalypse roaring with gaslit thunders chiming like the clocks of my soul churning a moment after every eon of seeing your smile.

Dine fine

The thing about going in a slight calorific deficit is that you feel a bit hungry.
Case in point my dinner that I have reduced by about 10% and the little crannies that weren't filled in completely I shellacked them with raw vegetables and now I wonder why do I do this to myself and I've to remind myself that is the plateau I'm trying to overcome.
So breathe and persevere.

—

This evening makes me want to dunk myself in all the comforts known to man.

Pinkle my heart tickle

Strawberry ice cream in motion. The entire ice cream making process is magical and it's something of an alchemy seeing primrose liquid emulsion of cream, sugar and milk turn into this rosy thickness that is soft serve consistency almost.
Now I all I gotta do is freeze it for a couple hours and then scoop scoop.

Tid bits and but if’s

That I've not been able to find a moment to sit in front of the machine is saying something because I always find at least five minutes to wade through my day and stay propped in my study room except today because say one thing about today say I was busy.
Busy with this and that and these and those and now that I'm free somewhat I still have things to do.
I was washed over by the need to be present near my kitchen, delighting in domestic do's because I've been cooking up a whole lot of things today.
It usually happens this time around the year and I don't mind it.
Believe me when I say that currently there's strawberry ice cream that I'm planning to make before dinner and for that I have already taken a stroll through my frozen kitchen garden that is the freezer and brought out a bundle of strawberries I'd huddled and now they sit thawing soon to be churned into pink slush for an ice cream proper.
I know tomorrow I won't be flourishing with glowing hearts which is why best get done with all the things I can do today.
Right, so I'd made a good many bagels out of which I've already given away half and left with a few to sustain the next couple days until I embark on another bread project next week and there's dinner to be done and Monday calls for a proper elaborate meal with all the fixings and it can wait for another hour or so.
Until then I have my cat to cuddle and play with, but first a bit of work that needs me.

Holed in

Who me?
I spent today making bagels.

Oodles

Nothing you haven't seen before, nothing you won't see again..one of my go to Thai rice noodle salads, refreshing and spicy and all too easy to make.

Lights gone

Nighttime and it's Monday again
time to sleep rabid
and wake up sane
the fatigue of this weekend
churned into another week of pain

Blood clots

Talking of movies, I saw a movie today called Apostle and it's a sort of horror thriller movie except I think it's a snuff film because from the steady slow burning pace of the initial half it escalated into a cauldron of blood letting, torturous deaths, gruesome violent scenes and absolutely painfully cathartic mutilating shots.
Wasn't I just complaining about horrible dreams, well, there's something fun for my subconscious to trash.
Bring on the nightmares then.

The new world order pushes

That day has indeed come as I'd foretold when men (biological) but now trans women will be competing in Ms Universe pageants and anybody who says otherwise shall be ground into the ground for thinking of those women (born men) as anything but women.

Now Mr and Ms Universe will soon be men and women will have to accept it because come on they're after all women on the inside. Cells, chromosomes and science be damned because science isn't always right, right? It's the feelings that count.
Ms Spain current is the first ever trans woman crowned in Spain and soon shall be competing for the crown and seeing how it's being held in Bangkok I very much think that she might win (wink)

Militia

Hail hydra

Song zeal

These are small karaoke booth where couples, singles or a group of three friends can come and uh..sing.

Night froth

Th past two night have been wracked with a series of sweat inducing nightmares.
I'd wake up caked in perspiration, hair matted on one side, nightshirt clinging to my bosom because I'd sweated bullets not because it was hot but because I saw something so horrendous that my every pore decided to weep.
Last night's dream was a catastrophe and so vigorously violent was it that my mind faded it but somewhere there was an abattoir run by necromancers where everyone industriously butchered bodies.
There were heads rolling about on nearby tables, gutted stomachs with someone hovering atop, torn off arms lining shelves and a whole room filled with horrors of mutilated corpses.
The efficacious team of men and women slicing about these bodies were relentless in their jobs and I could get a birds eye view as if I were mounted on a drone.

Someone was chasing me and my only route to escape was through a narrow tunnel which was obnoxiously long and wet and I had to crawl through it with enough speed to exit but it was so small I could hardly breathe what with water flowing in my direction and me needing to keep my head above it and keep crawling for god knows how long because I wasn't even sure that it would end.
The discomfort in that airless and oppressive bottleneck situation where I was almost squeezing myself every inch was so unbearable that I woke up to a sweat laden body thrashing about under a blanket.

I slept again and dreamt something as horrible.
Two nights it's been happening and now I feel like my nights were so much better when I dreamt nothing at all.

Green in black

Last night got a bit watery.