I thought it might be an amusing exercise to do a quick recap of the year. I can’t really draw the re-cap entirely from my blog because I’ve only been properly blogging for the past 6 months, so January to July is a hodge-podge of life-facts. Actually, I tell a lie about the ‘amusing’ part; all of what I do is potchkyism and I can’t even manage a charmingly naive enthusiasm about it–I have instead cultivated a prickly shell of pseudo-intellectualism with a cumbersome vocabulary. This is just pretentious and wearying, I know. Something to fix for 2013, perhaps– become a warmer, less brittle person?
And here I drag on like cow’s spittle. Come after me with your napkins.
JANUARY
I was still on JSA and making several job applications a week to receive money. This is how I felt about my predicament:
When I started the Prince’s Trust ‘Team’ course in the middle of the month, though, things perked up considerably! It was very intense from the first week. (In the second week I abseiled down a viaduct.)
FEBRUARY
As part of my course, I did a work placement with a fairly fancy London law firm as an office dogsbody. Despite the fact that I was and am grateful for the opportunity, it is still an experience I do not wish to repeat. In more enjoyable news Mr Pear and I celebrated our first anniversary together. We went to Bristol and enjoyed the aquarium.
MARCH
I made wedding favour cookies with my best friend and her then-fiance. Taking our cue from these vintage-inspired cookies, we quickly learned how to deal with royal icing and do brush embroidery. I used Nigella Lawson’s cut out cookie recipe and ready-made royal icing (shhhh). When the cookies were all packaged up and laid on the tables, they added a little something to the generally very beautiful wedding, as we hoped.
A few days before the wedding, her fiance said, ‘You’re gonna cry at the wedding, aren’t you, Pear?’ and I replied with a laughing denial. But as soon as I saw the groom sobbing at the sight of the bride walking down the aisle, all radiant in her dress and innate loveliness, I was seized by an indescribable feeling. As he blubbered his way through his vows I was internally shrieking, ‘I am not crying, I am not crying, oh god I AM NOT CRYING, YOU’RE CRYING.’
I also turned 22 and finished ‘Team’.
APRIL
I got a job interview for a library assistant post at London Library. It went terribly. I was obviously very relieved to let my hair down afterwards:
YEEEAAAAHHHH
On the day I got my rejection letter, I went to Middle Temple Library to arrange some volunteering.
MAY
I continued volunteering with Middle Temple Library, started living with Mr Pear, and became a baby-sitter for an awesome and hilarious ten-year old girl. I also started writing for MouthLondon again. The following months were mostly spent trying to adjust to my new routine–I am not very good with change and I grudgingly acknowledge that I function best with structure to my day.
JUNE
One of our summer favourites was cold somen with ginger-spring onion sauce. It’s more like a relish, I suppose. Really fresh and strong.
JULY
Thai fried rice with sweet basil was another favourite. It seemed more economical to cook a surplus of rice in one go, one to be served immediately and the other to be kept in the fridge to make this dish. Because until recently I had an absurdly small wok, I had to make it in 2 batches for us, which allowed me to adjust the heat level accordingly. Mr Pear takes half a chilli with his rice; I like 3 whole ones.
This was also the month I started food blogging again. Hurray!…?
AUGUST
I made a very simple and very good raspberry cake. Just fresh berries baked on top of a yellow sponge, far too easy to cut and eat slice after slice. I think at this point I stopped volunteering at Middle Temple Library because balancing writing and babysitting was surprisingly difficult for me. Still, it was a shame – it was up there with Two Temple Place in terms of interesting and supportive volunteering environments.
SEPTEMBER
The fresh sweetcorn available prompted memories of eating sweetcorn in Thai desserts, and I was very glad to find Leela’s recipe for making my very favourite Thai coconut sticky rice pudding with sweetcorn.
OCTOBER
Out of sheer luck I successfully made mini sangkhaya fak thong using munchkins. They were very cute, if I do say so myself.
NOVEMBER
In terms of cooking, the most glorious November creation was clearly the Double Rainbow Trifle I made with Mary. Behold its pavonine glory and weep:
Making something so beautiful and ridiculous was very therapeutic for both of us. It was the best baking and cooking and assembling I’ve ever had this year. ♥
The rainbow trifle was of course delicious and nothing can ever hold a candle to such a thing. However, it has to be said that the pocky birthday cake created by the talented and capable Genie for my best friend that month was a wonderful creation:
Loy Krathong wasn’t too bad, either!
DECEMBER
A lot of Christmas cooking happened, and with that of course comes Christmas eating, which I did with great enjoyment for the first time this year with just my friend and family. However, the constant stream of Christmas food means that I have very much missed eating Thai food. Yesterday presented the perfect opportunity to eat a good amount of it as the day before that my parents suddenly decided to come round. I made two dishes to eat with white jasmine rice, pork panaeng curry with pea aubergines and chicken with garlic and black pepper. I also baked a dark chocolate cinnamon sour cream cake. Mr Pear sang and played guitar after dinner. An enjoyable way to spend one of the last days of the year.
Today I am going to spend my night with some of the Ferretbrain crew. I am sure it will be marvellous, I have missed them! I’m currently enjoying some chocolate-cinnamon cake with tea before I carry on making some custard creams. I’ve also got to marinade the chicken for our small New Year’s Day meal.
He got me some fairy lights! I’d been wanting them for at least a year.
RESOLUTIONS?
I could make a tired, sarcastic joke about the impossibility of improving upon perfection, but I won’t.
- Improve photography skills. For the past month-and-a-half, I’ve been learning, by trial and error, how to use Mr Pear’s dSLR. I have sort of never really understood people who go to the effort of procuring such heavy, expensive, complicated pieces of equipment and then–in spite or because of these very features–go forth and wield them even more poorly than they would a point and shoot. I am attempting to not be one of these people and furthermore to take photos of food which aren’t terrible. I’m still on training wheels at the moment, shooting on aperture or shutter priority; maybe next year I’ll be on manual. Such lofty standards, I know.
- (What was that about not being ironically brittle again…?)
- Write short stories. Anyone can do this.
- Publish short stories. Don’t laugh. I have Aspirations.
- Start sewing again.
- Really work on needle-felting.
- Improve my Thai. I want to be painlessly reading short stories by the end of 2013.
- Carry on food blogging!
Hope everyone has an absolutely immense new year, and so on, and so forth. :-{D
Hmmmm. An untrustworthy face.
my new year’s resolution is to include more pear in my life!! MORE DOUBLE RAINBOWS
Hope your 2013 is immense as well!
excellent goals. i may have to take a leaf from your book and vow to be able to use manual this year – have had my dslr for 4 years and i still cannot use manual to save my life. by sheer luck the pictures aren’t too revolting, usually….
<3 here's to a pearriffic year <3
April: boo.
I dunno if you’re feeling at that stage, but you might wanna consider combining some of those resolutions? I found making myself write in Gaelic a massive, massive help and it’s improved my reading no end. Using the same alphabet does make it easier, though.
All the best, etc.