E6000 Glue

I'm sure a lot of jewellery-making enthuasiasts out there would have come across the E6000 glue before. But how many of you have actually read the warnings at the back of the product before using it?

I ordered this glue about 2 weeks ago from a website called artbeads.com for my jewellery-making purposes. I needed a good jewellery glue, this one seemed to be in popular use, and the reviews generally highly recommended it. This is the product description the website provided:

Material: Adhesive
Place of Origin: USA

Overall Rating

4.8

11of12(92%)customers would recommend this product to a friend.

Read all reviews

Write a review

E6000 Glue 3.7 Fluid Ounces

E-6000 is a unique adhesive formulated to meet high-performance industrial requirements. It adheres to more surfaces than virtually any other adhesive. E-6000 has exceptional adhesion to wood, metal, glass, fiberglass, ceramics, masonry and concrete. Not for use on Styrofoam. It also adheres strongly to leather, rubber, vinyl and many plastics. Because it is abrasion-resistant E-6000 may be used on high-wear surfaces. E-6000 maintains its flexible bond in cold temperatures and may be used to bond items subject to vibration. The clear E-6000 is not formulated for exposure to sunlight. For these applications, paint over E-6000 after it has cured.

Sounds good, right? I thought so, too. So I went ahead and paid US$5.50 for a tube of it plus about US$17 shipping to get it (along with some other little tidbits) shipped from the US to Australia. Two weeks later, yesterday, I received my parcel. This is what I saw upon reading the back of the tube:

"CAUTION: Contains perchloroethane. Intentional misuse by deliberately concentrating and inhaling the contents may be harmful. WARNING: This product contains a chemical known in the state of California to cause cancer. Harmful if inhaled or swallowed. May cause dizziness, headaches or nausea. Can cause skin and eye irritation. Exposure may cause damage to the kidneys or liver. Cancer agent based on experimental data...."




I was quite gobsmacked when I read this, as none of these warnings were disclosed in the product description on the website. I am very surprised and shocked that it's not compulsory for retailers to disclose these sorts of health hazards to customers (at least it's my guess that it's not compulsory, or else the warnings would have been there). Heck, I'm surprised they're even ALLOWED to commercially sell products containing carcinogenic compounds in the first place to the public. Now, before you jump all over me and tell me paint strippers, industrial solvents, and some dry cleaning agents may contain a similar ingredient that carry the same potential health risks, I just want to point out that people who use those products use self-protective, safety equipment, as is probably required by their OH&S work procedures, and they were probably at least told about the potential hazards. They will probably also be covered by workers compensation and insurance if anything adverse should happen to them - not that either would be any good to the person if cancer was the end result. Here's a link to the product safety data for E6000 that someone posted on an online forum (she was actually referring to it to point out the relatively low health risks of the glue, but I don't think it supports her case): http://www.tapplastics.com/uploads/pdf/MSDS%20E-6000.pdf 


Some people may argue that "most products that exist can cause cancer; we can't avoid everything", which is true, but I think deliberately exposing yourself to this sort of risk after being made aware of them is plain stupidity, especially if there are non-hazardous alternatives out there. I think what people should be asking themselves is not "What are the chances that I'll get cancer if I use this, if I am being extremely careful?" but "Would I die if I don't use this?". If the answer is no, then I think it's high time to move on. Cancer is not a common affliction for no reason.

Being one who prefers to stay on the safe side, and not wanting to risk problems to myself, to others in my household, or to my potential customers,  I am going to do the smart thing and chuck the glue out. Actually, if you read the safety data sheet, to dispose of it properly, you actually have to get it incinerated.. So I will probably have to take it to a pharmacy so that they can get that sorted out. Don't want carcinogenic waste in our garbage depot causing mutant/endangered species, do we now?

Catching up on blog content!

I realise I have a bad habit of starting blog posts about certain knitting projects and not following up on them. One such project is the Great Gatsby Dress by Mari Lynn Patrick, which I have been going on about for quite a few posts. I have, in fact, finished it - in December last year, according to my barely-more-updated Ravelry account. Here are some pictures of the finished product:

Front (left) and Back (right) of dress

These images are of the dress prior to blocking the neck edge. The picot edging here has a tendency to curl outwards!

...same with the back

Wet blocking the neck edge

A much better behaved edging!

At the annual Jane Austen Festival in Canberra, on the 14th April, 2012. 

I wore it for the first time ever to the Jane Austen Festival, back in April. It was quite cold there, so a knit dress was perfect - providing you had a coat handy! The pianist, who played live music for us to practice traditional old English dances to, noticed it straight away when she saw it, gave her compliments, and asked if I had made it myself. Ah, my very first knitted dress! Of course I was proud of it.

As you can see from the above photo though, due to the weight of the yarn - Rowan RYC Silk Wool DK (50% wool, 50% silk) - the dress tended to drag downwards as I wore it. Yanking a dress up is never a good look; I wore a tank top underneath so that the dress could sag however which way it wanted. It doesn't look very flattering when it is not sitting right, but what can you do. Still, I love the dress to bits regardless, and the thick knitted fabric feels nice and smooth against the skin. Would I knit it again? Yes! But it will take a bit of fidgeting around with knitting maths if I wanted to try knitting it in a different, lighter yarn, and I'm not extremely good with that. Being knitted flat, it's also a bit annoying to have to sew up the side seams of the dress at the end, but I think the seams are probably necessary to give it more structure. My guess is that it will give in to gravity a lot more easily if it was knit in the round.

The Jane Austen Ball itself was very fun, as was eating my way through Canberra. I have to remind myself to post my pictures and restaurant reviews here!

Meanwhile, I think I should invest in a yarn winder...

My current ball-winding apparatus 

This is the yarn I'm using to knit the Knot-sleeve blouse by Olga Buraya-Kefelian - Blue Sky Alpaca Royal in Seaglass

Regarding the Yuja-cha, I did end up meeting up with my Korean friend to get some tips on how to choose the best bottled yu-ja to make the tea. I share her tips with you here:

According to her mum, one should choose yuja-cha that:

• has a yuja content of > 30%;
• has a sugar content of < 15 g per kg
• is made in Korea (I guess to ensure quality? I'm not sure. But I suppose since it's a traditional Korean tea, best to just stick with produce from that country)
• has a bit of honey - not essential, but is better for you, since you'll probably be using it for colds 

30% Yuja/7% Korean Pear

I went to a few Korean grocers with her in the city, but we couldn't find one that seemed to match her criteria perfectly; most seemed to be saturated with sugar. I did end up buying other bits and pieces, while picking her brain about other Korean foods :) I found, at a later date, a bottled preserved Pear and Yuja blend at one of the Korean grocers I some times visit to stock up on (a lot of) snacks and ice-cream mochi balls, which they call..something else. The lady at the counter, maybe in her 50s, had not tried it before, so it's obviously not in popular use, but she said that pear is good for the skin. I called my friend to get her opinion, and she said that she also had not tried that combination, but that it sounds like it would taste quite nice. I bought it, and this is what the tea looks like once brewed:

You do have to use a strainer, unless you don't mind drinking bits of lemon rind

You can have yuja-cha cold or hot. I like it ice cold, but a lot of Koreans like it hot, which is probably the traditional way of having it. The yuja and pear combo is ok, but I prefer the plain yuja one I had at the restaurant. It does put into perspective, though, how much of a overhead they charge on this drink at restaurants. I think the bottle I bought must have been about AU$12 or so? You only need about 1 tsp per cup (or was it 1tbsp? I forget. Just add according to taste.), so you're going to get a lot of uses out of a single bottle. 

I think I've covered most of the things I've been meaning to. Oh, and here's a picture of my teacup and saucer (with spoon!) ring by Jessica T that I got from We Live Like This. I wore it to high tea just the other week, and thought it nicely matched the setting. Come on, you know you'd take this photo too ;)

All about the night that was..

As promised, here is a picture of the outfit I wore to the charity ball on Saturday night:

Dress: Holly Dress (Review); Shoes: Halt, patent black (Wittner); Bag: Tuxedo clutch, patent black (Mimco);
Earrings: Bird branch (emoceans)

I know it's not really 'black tie', but the sateen-ish finish of the fabric makes it dressy enough (says my Review stylist) and I knew I was going to buy this dress anyway, so why not hit two birds with one stone, right? I am going through a (rather long) polka-dot phase at the moment, so this dress adds nicely to my collection of spotty skirts!

The theme:


As mentioned in my last post, the theme this year was African culture. I was surprised with the amount of effort that was put into this event; it seemed much grander than the annual ball held by a different hospital, which I also attend. I must have missed quite a bit of entertainment during the pre-event drinks, because I arrived late, but when I walked into the venue, there were big black cat like things slinking around on the carpet.. On tentatively closing in on the distance between us, I realised they were people dressed up as cougars, or whatever you call those big black felines. I didn't get to take a photo with them, but apparently they were stalking people and freaking them out a bit, haha. During the night, there were also some people dressed as hunters, roaming around the ballroom. There were really big solid fake African animals scattered outside and inside the ballroom, which was a nice touch, and they made the event seem all the more authentic by having actual African 'guards', dressed in traditional wear, at the doors. That was very unexpected. I wonder if they're all sponsored/volunteered too? Surely the hospital wouldn't use money to employ that many people just for entertainment purposes?

The whole plaza ballroom was transformed to match the theme, with lots of greenery, banners of animals, bright colourful lights, a red carpet leading down to the dance floor at the very end of the room, and African-inspired table decor.

The ballroom

Plastic rhinos!

Twin candles on the turntables with bold leopard prints

Mercedes-Benz was obviously one of the sponsors of the event

Some of the silent auction items

The entertainment:


There were performances by African choirs and drummers, a fire performance, 'The Accidents' (nopes, I don't know who they are either; I think they're just event singers), raffles, a live auction...

The African choir

Fire performances by the Phoenix Fire Tribe

The dance floor and 'The Accidents'

The food:

The food was definitely the highlight of the night for me. It was my first time trying African cuisine and I didn't know what to expect.

The entrees were all cold, no thanks to the fact that they were all already on the table on arrival. I'm not sure if it's because the food was supposed to be served cold, or if they just had a case of bad food-serving management. Nonetheless, my entree was quite pleasant-tasting.

I tried all the dishes on offer in the table buffet for mains, and was quite pleasantly surprised by the strong flavours, similar to what we find in Middle-Eastern food. Someone who works with me, who is of African background, mentioned to me before, in our talk about African food, that a lot of cooking techniques used by other cultural cuisines, such as the Portugese chicken-cooking method (like what we get at Nandos, I suppose), are borrowed from Africa. Perhaps this explains the similarities in flavours? My favourite dish was the beef stew, because I adored the heady aromas of the strong spices used. My friend, on the other hand, didn't eat a great deal of what was on her plate, because she apparently had a dislike for such strong flavours. I liked the meat dishes better than the vegetarian ones, just because I found them a bit on the dry side; although, the ball of mashed swede was quite palatable. Interestingly, swedes are not an African vegetable, but originates from Sweden (hence it's name, I suppose?) and is quite popular in colder European countries, according to Google.

My tofu dessert was quite an interesting taste experience. I was a bit scared to try it, even though I've had tofu in both savoury and sweet dishes before (in Chinese desserts). It turned out to be a fantastic little dessert that I savoured to the last spoonful. Okay, so maybe I get a little over-excited when I taste new food, but just trust me that it doesn't taste as horrible as it sounds. As you can see in the pictures below, it's a parfait-like dessert comprised of alternating layers of tofu, caramelised crushed peanuts, and a chocolate mousse/chocolate fudge sauce (can't really tell if it's mousse or just the chocolate sauce plus tofu taste), with a base of biscuit crumbs. The tofu didn't really have a taste and I don't think they actually sweetened it; not like it was necessary anyway. It acts as a nice little buffer to balance the sweetness of the other elements in the dish. My only complaint would be that perhaps they should have used actual bits of cookies at the bottom as opposed to a loose, fine powdery crumb, which has the risk of being aspirated, and made me cough a bit. My friend had the pudding, which she found was overly sweet.

Entree: Chermoula Spiced Fish with melegueta pepper, okra, capsicum and West African dressing (Ghana)

Entree: (alternate drop) Ethiopian Berber Beef Fillet with raisins, saffron and tomato salad with papaya dressing (Ethiopia)

Mains: Table buffet consisting of Beninese Beef Stew (a beef curry with African spices (Benin)), Ashanti Chicken (fillets of chicken with sweet potatoes (West Africa)), Dahomey Fish Stew (fried fish with palm oil, tomatoes and chillies (West Africa)), Ghana Jolly Rice (Basmati rice with onions (Ghana)), Akkra Funfun (vegetarian dish of boiled white beans, inions and pepper (Nigeria)), Fufu (mashed swede (Central Africa))

Dessert: Tofu Peanut Butter Mousse (South Africa)

Dessert: (alternate drop) Malva Pudding (a sweet pudding with apricot jam (South Africa))

Tea served with chocolates

The event left me with an appreciation of African cuisine and has encouraged me to be more open-minded about trying out different foods, even if they may not be visually appealing. I believe that food, especially good food, can break down all sorts of language and cultural barriers and tie people together.  It is also a good medium through which to start learning about a culture. Don't you agree that sometimes food speaks better than words do?

Then there is, of course, the whole purpose of the event - to fundraise for important equipment and medical research at the hospital, which has the largest neonatal intensive care unit and cancer care service in the state. I'm not sure if I heard right, but I think they announced that about half a million was raised from the event, which is quite a remarkable effort. Of course we know that there will never be 'enough' funds for ongoing medical research and public hospital support, so here's to more fun and food-filled charity events in the future! I hope that this post has encouraged you, too, to consider attending one of these good-cause events organised by your local hospital foundation :)

Winter blues

I can't believe it is the weekend, the day of the hospital charity gala ball, and I'm stuck at home sick, in my pyjamas. I've been keeping well this past year, health-wise, but staying up late on cold winter nights always manages to throw me into the arms of illness. Working in a health care setting certainly doesn't help either. I've decided to skip French class today and give up Sunday-rate work tomorrow, as I'm sure the people around me would not appreciate me sharing my germs. I'm still deciding whether or not to go to high tea with my sister tomorrow for the same reason. I have been hoping that my cold will not progress to the stage where my throat hurts to swallow and my nose blocks out my sense of smell and taste, at least until after the ball - African-themed this year, with African food, entertainment and music - and high tea, which is at a popular hightea parlour, highly rated on Urban Spoon.

Attending regular charity events is a great way of supporting our local hospitals, as the funds go towards raising money for medical equipment and important research. The gathering of people from the community in support for these worthy causes also contributes to social solidarity, which I believe is very important to keep human progress up with technology. A lot of people complain about not having the time and the money to go, but no matter how busy you are, you've still got to allocate time to eat, right? As for the ticket price, well, if it was cheap, wouldn't it defeat the purpose of the event, which is to fundraise (and I'd like to point out that one is not obliged to participate in the silent and live auctions - I certainly don't have that kind of money)? Having said that, I accept and totally understand that people may prefer to do charity work in a non-monetary way; something I also do, in the form of charity knitting. It also never ceases to amaze me when people say things like, "Well, what's in it for me?" or "Only if you can promise I'll meet a good-looking doctor there"; perfect examples of exactly WHY we, as a developed country, still have the need to work towards social solidarity. I fail to understand why people are willing to spend thousands of dollars on designer wear and the latest and greatest electronic gizmos (regardless of financial state), but are full of hesitation and resistance when it comes to spending only a small fraction of their dispensable income on the very occasional, selfless cause. If you need another reason to go, well, it's good for your karma and it's a great excuse to dress up and catch up with (charitable) friends as well (sadly, I usually just go with one friend who fits that description), so it's a win-win situation that I recommend to everyone who is working and not knee-deep in financial debt. End of serious rant. (sorry, being sick makes me a bit grouchy)

This particular charity gala is based around different cultures every year, with last year's celebrating British culture. I was worried that we have to dress to the theme, because I've no idea about African fashion, but I was prepared to go all out in bright colourful scarves if need be. Thankfully I called up to check the dress code - it's black tie. Now I'm not exactly the type to buy long formal dresses for a single event, that I am unlikely to have many future wears out of, so for the past black tie charity balls I've been to, I've worn cocktail length dresses. This time was going to be no exception.

My favourite fashion labels are Review and Alannah Hill - both Australian labels, with most of the Review pieces being made in Australia also. Being Australian labels aside (being Australian, I am a proud supporter of Australian brands and products), the reason I love these brands is because their styles, mish-mashed together, very much reflects my own sense of dress; that is, vintage style adapted to modern fabrics, colours and cuts; very feminine and unique. Think frills and knee-length full skirts, floral pencil skirts and bows. I want everything in the store for most collections; too bad price point doesn't allow for that! So naturally when it came to buying a dress for the charity ball, I knew exactly where to go. With the help of the lovely sales assistants at Review - always friendly, honest and helpful - I picked out the Holly dress, which is a limited edition design, available only at 4 stores in the state, a black polka dot overall pattern on bronze sateen, in the classic Review shape of fitted waist with full skirt (a very '50s Audrey Hepburn-esque style). It comes with a thin black belt, but I will wear a satin bow belt to dress it up a bit, and wear a satiny elbow-length cropped black jacket over the dress, which was also picked out at Review to match the dress. I bought 9cm patent leather black pumps from Wittner (another Aussie brand) to wear with it, in my a favourite style (has a 2cm platform at the front, so you can gain the extra height without an uncomfortable, unnatural arch in the foot (compared to other 9cm heels)). To accessorise, I will be wearing a pretty headband from AH, and gorgeous but simple handmade earrings that I bought from We Live Like This (a lovely little shop that sells products made by local designers). Photos to come!

As the dress can be dressed up or down, I can see myself wearing it to other informal events, such as afternoon teas and dinners, as well as to weddings. Meanwhile, you can check out the current pretty Review collection at www.review-australia.com. Try not to drool all over your keyboard ;) Enjoy!

Let's talk about Lomography

With technology ever advancing, man has progressed from using typewriters to electronic tablets, gas burners to induction cooktops, fossil fuels to solar/wind/nuclear power, all in the space of just several decades. In fact, in recent times, the acceleration of technological developments and the increased average living standards in developed countries, coupled with the younger generations strapped with more dispensable cash, paved the way for larger consumer markets, which meant that some things that used to only be available to the professionals are readily available to anyone who can afford them. One professional tool that is no longer only possessed by those who use it to earn a livelihood is the SLR camera. The general public, with a bit of practice, can now take photographs with blurred backgrounds, special effects, and sharp detail. Furthermore, they can use Photoshop software, which can be easily downloaded online or purchased, to touch up pictures, all of which is enough to give professionally trained photographers a run for their money.

Then there is a sub-culture out there that likes to challenge modernity and trends; revive things once long lost in the past; rename them; and ironically create another trend through this process. Lomography is one of them.

Lomography can be described as artistic experimental photography, using low-tech and/or high-tech analogue cameras. Plastic toy cameras from many years ago, such as the Diana and Holga, have been brought back into the market scene, as their basic image capture without light adjustment and focus produces an image with unpredictable effects, such as 'dream-like' blurring, which, while were considered to constitute inferior photo quality in the past, are now considered to be artistic.

Some of the toy camera models have been revamped to allow enthusiasts to have more control over the image they want to produce, with optional accessories available (usually sold separately) such as flash, fish eye lens, and colour filters. Although photographic film has become progressively less readily available since the digital revolution, it is still the main recording medium used in lomography. In fact, the film component can become an artistic tool in itself, being produced by lomo brands in different colours options and varying degrees of colour saturation, which are designed to create colour contrasts and influence the sharpness and brightness of the images.

Like all hobbies that have experienced a resurgence in popularity though, such as card-making, knitting, and jewellery making, this revived hobby does not come at a cheap price. Despite toy cameras originally being intended to be inexpensive novelty items, the ones that are produced now, which target professional and amateur photographers, have massive overheads. The basic Diana model, for example, was available to retailers at a wholesale price of 50 cents US per unit, back in the 1960s, according to Wiki; the price for this camera with its low-quality plastic lens, today, costs over US$50 (US$53.60 on lomography.com, as at 14/1/12). Costs for the camera, accessories, and film aside, an ongoing expense would be that to get the photos professionally developed; that is, if you can even find a place that offers this service. Nowadays, few photo counters do this on site, so it takes at least a week to obtain your photos. Of course, for the impatient few who can afford it, there are home photo developing kits available online for purchase.

Being an avid photographer myself - though only in the love-taking-photo-at-every-opportunity sense, and generally of food (the true love of my life, as you know :P) - the idea of lomography wrapped me in its spell and had me longing to try it out. So naturally, when I saw a Japanese toy camera on sale at Kinokuniya (a massive bookshop in the city - think Borders, but with a larger variety of stationery and odd things (like the toy camera I found) and books/magazines from Japan and some other Asian countries) on one of my Melbourne trips last year, I had to buy it. It's the 'special limited edition' Vanilla Biscuit Camera, which comes with the Love Toy Camera Vol 2 bookazine by e-mook (filled with presumably photo-taking tips, a lot of which I can't really understand with my mediocre Japanese language skills):

Vanilla Biscuit Camera

As you can see from the picture above, the toy camera is simple and pretty small and light, fitting into the palm of my hand (and my hand is quite small, I'm told). It has a key ring attachment, so you could even use it as a bag charm and even smuggle it into camera-free venues (not that I'm advocating for that sort of conduct *cough cough*)! The neat thing about this little guy is that although it is a toy camera, it is fully digitalised; that is, it is a W58.7 x H41.7 x D15mm toy digital camera. The limited memory capacity only allows it to take up to 25 pictures on the highest quality setting (you could get more pictures if you select the poorer specs option - but I wouldn't push it), but there are some of the functions you'd expect on normal digital cameras: a self-take mode; continuous picture taking mode (up to 3 shots); you can select landscape or macro mode (though I have yet to try it out); you can cancel all taken images or delete the last image; and, get this, it can also record videos! No, really. Only for like 17 seconds and without sound, but, hey, it's a toy camera, what more would you expect from it? Another cool feature is that it can be attached via the included usb cable to double as a webcam. Not bad, huh?

This Biscuit Camera runs on a single AAA battery, and, because it has no removable/replaceable memory card, you have to be vigilant about transferring the photos to your computer (via usb cable, through the file transfer program you have to install with the included CD-ROM (Windows-compatible only, I believe)) or the pictures will be lost as soon as the battery runs out - which is very fast. I've only used my camera to take some snaps several times, and I've pretty much used up a pack of batteries already. Here are some of the photos I've taken with this cute little gadget:

High Tea at Palazzo Versace (Gold Coast)', New Years Day 2012 - Silver teaware

Orchids

Surfers Paradise Beach - Foot prints in the sand

Landscape + people

Timezone, Surfers Paradise - DDR - active movement

Food - Day time, indoors, direct natural light exposure (next to window)

Food - Night time, indoors, enclosed space with indirect medium intensity artificial light

For a tiny plastic thing that's intended as a toy camera (though obviously marketed towards lomography fans, as the magazine suggests), I'm actually quite impressed with the picture quality. From the pictures above, it's plain to see that it performs better in bright backgrounds, obviously due to the absence of an integrated flash. The lack of sharp focus and light filtering functions produces an aged photograph look, which is quite interesting.

What I don't like about it is that, due to the fact that the lens does not communicate with the viewfinder, what you see through the latter is not necessarily what is snapped. That is, if you centre an object in the viewfinder, it will probably end up being off-centre (like the orchid picture above). The size of the object that is taken in by the lens is also unpredictable, so I guess it is advisable to take photos from a far enough distance, so that the object lies in its completeness in the middle-ish of the view finder.

Overall, I think that it's a useful little tool for taking random pictures that have a unique, rustic look. I really like it, and am still intrigued by how a little hollow plastic casing can support so many functions! Although, I find it puzzling - quite paradoxical - that manufacturers should want to incorporate unrefined, basic photo-taking function with modern digital technology. The tiny memory space and high battery drainage means that it's obviously not something you'd want to take with you to an event where you want to simply point-and-shoot and have clear pictures that capture a lot of detail. But that's not the purpose of lomo cameras anyway, is it?

My sister went ahead and bought the chocolate version of my camera at a similar price from a different place, and it looks absolutely delicious, moulded into the shape of a block of chocolate! She hasn't been using it though, because she has a Mac. I can't wait to get my hands on some other lomo cameras - there's so many out there with different functions and special effect-creating accessories! Perhaps I'll have to wait until I have the disposable income to support this expensive hobby though...

February update.

Ok, so it's been ages since my last post, but so much has happened in the last few weeks, so I a) didn't get a chance to blog, and b) wasn't in the mood for it anyway.

I'm sure no one is interested in my sorrows, so, in a nutshell, my cute pomeranian - our littleist family member - got run over by my sister, and after a week and a half of hospitalisation and false hopes, we had to let him go. I think I finally know what it feels like to be heartbroken. I realised during the hour we were making that critical decision in the hospital that the vet was largely responsible for little Teddy's fate, because, after asking the vet about anticoagulants to dissolve his leg clot, she seemed to hesitate, then told us afterwards that they couldn't have given him anticoagulants during the week he was under hospital care, due to his extensive bruising. And there we have it. The evidence of negligence. Such utter nonsense. Even humans get enoxaparin/heparin injections every day while being immobile in hospital, to address the increased clot risk; why would it be any different for animals? It is because he had extensive bruising that it's even more necessary to keep an eye out for clots. But what's the use of pointing the finger now; Teddy won't come back. I just want him to rest peacefully now.

The crematorium is delivering his ashes back to us on Friday, so he'll finally be returning home again. I need to do more research about the most appropriate flowers to plant over his resting place in our yard - I want those that are pretty - those that Teddy would like to play amongst - and those that will flower in all seasons and are easy to maintain. Preferably they will be of a shallow root variety so that the roots don't grow downwards too far and strangle Teddy in his wooden memorial box.

I have 4 days to think about it, and, as I will probably be the principal person executing the burial (rest of family are rather more detached), I will need to really think fast. Atleast Friday will be the last day of my 30 straight day work block, so I will have some more time for gardening.

On a brighter note, I have pulled myself together now, and will be able to blog about my other loves soon - knitting and cooking!

Diary of a Wimpy Kid

So I did end up going to a Korean grocer today, and did see 2 different brands of yuja preserve; but, since my Korean is limited to just being able to read Korean characters, without actually understanding 99% of it, I didn't understand the description and the differences between the two. As such, I decided to leave it for the time being. (Seriously, from watching Korean dramas and listening to Korean music, I've only really learned the words for 'hello', 'goodbye', 'I love you', 'bad man', andddd a sound which means the 'sh-' word. All of which probably won't get me too far if I was lost in Korea.) A Korean friend of mine has volunteered to go with me to some Korean supermarkets when we meet up for lunch next week, so that's the yuja choice problem solved.

I've kept a diary since I was in primary school, and I used to write in it religiously up until I started uni. Diary entries decreased in frequency, and ceased almost altogether a few years ago, when what I saw as my living nightmare started. I was physically unable to keep it up, and then when I was well enough to, I had too many emotions and thoughts going through me, and.. I guess it's just hard to try to recap on all the events that have passed in a reasonable length of time, without sacrificing depth. Since the point of keeping a diary is to record everything as you remember it at a certain point in time, I didn't see the point in doing it anymore, if I wasn't going to be able to do that.

Now where was I going with this? Ah, yes; some where along the lines, I started to read the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books, by Jeff Kinney. I know, I know, it's a kids' book, but I still find it amusing, and the silly cartoons and childish humour manages to make me laugh. They really are enjoyable reads, when I have nothing else better to do. As an indication of my fan level, I have all the books in the series, both the 'Do-it-yourself' books, the first 2 movies on dvd, and my sister bought me the 'Movie diary' for Christmas. Ok, so maybe I should have kept that to myself, but don't judge me until you've read the books for yourself. Maybe you will enjoy them as much as I do.

Anyway. Despite stopping diary writing for quite some time, during the 'off-time', I still have been buying notebooks that I think would make a suitable diary. My most recent purchase was from Kinokuniya in Sydney:

The front cover caught my eye, and flicking through the book made me laugh out loud.

Every 2 pages, there is a quote designed to inspire your entry/complaint for the day. To top it off, you also get to rate your day at the end of it. Quite the selling point, I must say. Tell me this isn't the coolest diary you've ever seen.

The Diary of a Wimpy kid has inspired me to start writing again, as has this awesome new diary. Writing is a good creative, as well as emotional, outlet, and I encourage everyone to try this, if you aren't diary-writing already.