10 things I love about you

Today is the HAG's and my third anniversary and I, being the cheapskate that I am, thought that as a gift I would dedicate a blog post to him...

1. You're not like the typical guy who when asked to do something, does the bare minimum and waits for the next person who notices to deal with it. When you take rubbish out of the bin, you clean the bin. Before you fill the fridge with groceries, you wipe away any crap on the shelves.
2. You are really cute with babies. Although you make it seem like I'm the one who's good with kids, you are far more patient and caring when they're upset.
3. You give me the most amazing presents - TomTom, camera, iPod Touch, laptop, holiday to Vegas...
4. When we go out for dinner, you will read the menu and tell me which dish you think I'll probably order. And since you know me so well, you're usually right!
5. You're not a jealous boyfriend so I can tell you all sorts of stuff without having to worry about you freaking out, like which friend of yours I find very hot and how I flirted with so-and-so at work.
6. You don't expect dinner to magically appear before you. When I'm cooking, you always ask if there's anything you can help with. And you always volunteer to do the dishes.
7. You are the most amazing kisser ever.
8. You are quite bashful so you're probably blushing at Number 7.
9. You read my Glamour magazines and discuss articles with me. Such a girl.
10. When you're watching something boyish on TV (yes, I know I'm contradicting Number 9) and I'm just sitting next to you reading a magazine or faffing around on the laptop, you will stroke my arm or do circles on my hand with your finger or whatever, just so that I know you're not ignoring me.

Happy anniversary! I'm still as smitten as I was on Day 1 :)

Eba misses you

Last weekend was the last time I went to Reading to see the HAG.

Although I'm absolutely ecstatic about him coming up here to live, it does mean that I will no longer be regularly going to Reading and that makes me sad because I won't get to see my other boyfriend very often...

Some of you may remember him as Pickle from a blog post a while ago.

I was looking at photos of him from when he was only a few weeks old and I just can't believe that he's almost 3 now.

September 2007

Look at the size of him then! Now he's almost as big as me! Ok, maybe not quite but he probably will be the next time I see him... sniff...

April 2008

He is the most adorable child I've ever met. He's just so affectionate - he puts his arms around me and squeezes tightly and he does cute little Eskimo kisses...

April 2008

When I pout, he says, "Awww, Eba sad..." and gives me a big kiss on the lips. Yes, he calls me "Eba" and I think it's the cutest thing. To him, the HAG and I are one person called "EbaMike".

June 2008

Once I phoned the HAG when he was at Pickle's house (well, his parents' house... he's a bit young to own property...) and the HAG put Pickle on the phone. I asked him if he missed me and he said with great enthusiasm, "Of course!" Just too sweet.

January 2009

When I visit, usually within about 15 minutes of being at their house, Pickle will take my hand, say, "Come on, Eba", and lead me upstairs to his bedroom to play. We joke that he's learning early how to take girls up to his room...

September 2009

I'm going to really miss him. The HAG and I will still go down to Reading to visit every so often but I'm worried Pickle will forget his Auntie Eba and think of her as a stranger when he sees me... :(

Life, love and poop

The HAG couldn't believe that I mentioned pooping in my last post so I said to him that my next post would be all about pooping. He probably thought I was kidding and even suggested the title of this post. So here goes...

We used to call pooping "thinking". So whenever one of us needed to go, we'd say that we were going to go do some "thinking". Afterwards, one might ask the other, "Did you have some good "thoughts"?" Now, we just call it pooping.

The HAG and I are very comfortable with each other. I recall that from the very beginning, we left the bathroom door open whenever we showered or peed. And after a short while, we were comfortable with being in the bathroom together. We do, however, always shut the door when we poop. Some things just don't need to be seen, heard or smelled. The romance doesn't need to be killed completely...

Countdown - 3 weeks

Three weeks until the HAG moves in.

While he is busy down there trying to pack up his whole life into lots of big boxes, I am up here trying make room for all his crap... er... stuff.

My flat (soon to be "our flat"!) has two bedrooms and the spare bedroom will have to have the double bed and other items of furniture moved out so that it can be turned into the HAG's office. I think "office" is just an excuse for a boy's room filled with drums, loud speakers, pictures of naked women, mini-fridge of beer... OK, maybe only the first two are true (yes, we're going to be really popular with the neighbours...) but who knows if the other two will appear when I'm not looking...

The master bedroom has a built-in double wardrobe which at the moment is jam-packed with my clothes (but I never have anything to wear, of course). I have to clear out half of the space for the HAG's clothes! Why??? He only has one pair of jeans and a T-shirt! He could just wear those on him the entire time - why would he need wardrobe space??? (I'm sure you can't tell that I'm in a bit of an exaggerating mood...) Thank goodness the spare bedroom has two built-in double wardrobes so I will just have to move the stuff I don't wear very often into those. Why would the smaller bedroom have more wardrobes? Design FAIL.

Right now, I don't really use the bathroom very often as I have an ensuite. The main bathroom is for guests (and pooping when the HAG is up... you didn't need to know that...) and for when I feel like a relaxing bubble bath. The ensuite is full of bottles and jars and tubs of cleansers, face cream, eye cream, face masks, blah blah (hey, don't judge. I don't look young for my age without a bit of help)... they might have to migrate to the main bathroom when the HAG moves in... either that or I get rid of all those lotions and potions and start looking ugly. Then the HAG will probably dump me. Hmm... tricky...

Living with a boy

So the HAG and I have been together for almost 3 years now and as you probably know, it's been a long-distance relationship since the very beginning. I'm actually rather impressed that despite the need to travel 400 miles to see each other every fortnight, we have managed to stay together all this time!

But in a month's time, we will no longer have to do that because... the HAG is moving up to Glasgow and we will be living together!

I've had some interesting reactions when breaking this news to people:

"OMG, aren't you nervous?"

"Gosh, what do your parents think about that?"

"I'm so jealous! I wish I could get a guy to commit to me like that!"

"Seeing each other every single day? What if you start hating each other?"

Well, to be honest, I am a little nervous. Not about living with the HAG as such, because I'm quite confident that we'll get on very well. The thing about long-distance is that although I don't get to see the HAG frequently, when I do see him, we'd spend between 3 to 14 days together so to an extent, I know what living with him is like. I'm pretty sure I won't want to kill him when we move in together. Unless he eats all the food. Then he would deserve to be killed.

What I'm a bit nervous about is the change.

I'm used to living on my own and not having to answer to anyone. I can do whatever and meet whoever I like after work. I'm sure I won't need permission from the HAG to meet my friends but I will still need to let him know in case he thinks I'm dead.

I'm quite a messy person. I have clothes strewn on the bedroom floor. Bills scattered in the hallway. Old newspapers and magazines on the coffee table. My toiletries are everywhere. My shower is laden with numerous bottles, full and empty. I will need to be more organised when the HAG moves in. (I really hope that the HAG is fully aware of all this already and isn't now put off living with me having read this.)

And the parents? I don't really get the concern that people have about them having a problem with me living with the HAG. Do other people out there have really uncool parents? Come on, we are in our twenties after all... I don't even get ID'd anymore when I buy alcohol at the supermarket (That means I look at least 25 and I hate that). Mr Dad and Mrs Mum are totally happy about it, giving suggestions about how to move all his things up here and stuff.

As for the commitment factor, well, I mean we have been together for ages now so it's about time! (Hope I don't sound too desperate there... ahem...) But I am very glad that the HAG has made the decision to move up here so that I don't have to move down. It's a really big step and it means a lot to me for him to do that.

Thank you :)

Comeback

The last time I blogged was just over 5 months ago.

In the year of 2009, I blogged 6 posts.

In the month of June 2006 alone I blogged 15 posts. Sometimes more than once a day.

Ok, enough statistics. What has happened? I used to love blogging. Whenever anything happened, my little brain would be thinking about how to write about it in an entertaining and witty way (some may disagree but it's my blog and if I say I'm entertaining and witty, then I am. End of).

So really, why the drastic decline in the number of posts? Have I lost my ability to convey thoughts into words? Do I not have anything worthwhile in my life to write about? Am I just too lazy? The last one is undeniably true but I genuinely believe that I was born that way so it's not something I can change.

Sometimes, I do think to myself, "Ooh, that would make an interesting blog post... but I didn't blog about that other thing last week that was pretty cool, so why blog about this one?" I become trapped in a vicious circle, where the longer I don't blog about anything, the more I think that my next post needs to be awesome.

And here you have it, my huge, long-awaited comeback post about... nothing really remotely awesome. Actually, "nothing really" might be a more fitting description... but hey, I am out of the vicious circle and plan to continue blogging about nothing really.

A little bit more food...

Seafood

Ah, seafood... yet another love of my life. Yes, I may be small but I just have so much love to give. The HAG once asked me if there is any food in the world that I don't actually like. I had to think quite hard about this. In fact, I'm still thinking so I'll get back to you.

I don't really cook much seafood myself but luckily for me, my parents cook quite a lot of it at home and whenever we go out for dinner, usually 75% of the dishes we order will feature some form of seafood. I do love some western ways of preparing seafood (especially when there's cream involved...) but Chinese-style is the way to go - salt and pepper soft-shelled crab, lobster with ginger and spring onion, scallops with vermicelli and garlic and black bean sauce... mmm...

Unfortunately I don't have any photos of the yummy Chinese goodies mentioned above - I don't tend to take photos when I eat out at Chinese restaurants... not sure why really... probably because the urge to dig in as soon as the waiter puts the plate on the table distracts me... so I'm afraid you'll just have to look at the photos of the few seafood dishes that I've made myself.

So unoriginal but sometimes it's just what I need - breaded fish, chunky chips, peas and the most attractive splodge of tomato ketchup.

Salmon marinaded in coriander pesto then pan-fried, with colcannon (mashed potatoes and cabbage) and designer salad leaves.

Pan-fried scallops in garlic and chilli oil, roast potatoes and salad with honey mustard dressing.

Salmon marinaded with tikka masala paste then pan fried, on top of cucumber raita and naan bread (shop bought - I am yet to try making my own naan bread).

More food...

Pizza

I love pizza. It involves two of my mostest favourist things in the world: carbs and cheese. Seriously, what more can you ask for?

One day, I was craving for some amazing, crusty pizza with gooey cheese but at the same time, I was also feeling in a healthy(ish) mood. The latter rarely happens, I assure you. So what I did was buy some garlic pizza bread, and loaded it with buffalo mozzarella, cherry tomatoes, spring onion and basil. I ate it with a little dish of balsamic vinegar on the side... oooh, it was heavenly...



So that was the more goddess-like version of pizza. But as I said, I don't often feel the need to be healthy so... here's the other extreme... pizza crunchie (deep fried pizza in batter) with chips...




With my flat being so central and surrounded by restaurants and takeaways, I'm rather proud of myself for managing to fight the temptation most evenings but of course, I do slip sometimes (prime example above)...

Japanese

Another love of my life: sushi. I make rather decent sushi (Mrs Mum says so and she is a very fussy woman) and with most things, it's cheaper to make yourself than to eat out. However, after a day of work, the last thing I really want to do is to go buy fresh ingredients (can't really get away with buying fish days in advance of eating when you're going to be putting it into your mouth raw), chop and slice it all up, cook and season rice then wait for it to cool, then actually finally assembling it all together. And why should I need to do all that when there'a Japanese restaurant 2 minutes away from my flat? Even with my measly trainee solicitor salary, I can afford to indulge every so often...

14-piece sushi combination: salmon, mackeral, tuna and king prawn nigiri; California maki (crastick, cucumber, mayonnaise and fish roe); and cucumber, carrot, radish and sesame seeds maki

Bento with Japanese rice; miso soup; king prawn and vegetable tempura; salmon, mackerel and tuna nigiri; California maki; and teriyaki chicken.

I will be moving soon (more about that later) and I don't believe there's a Japanese place near my new flat... very devastating... excuse me while I go comfort myself with some cake...

I'm back!

It has been over 5 months since my last blog post. Once I stopped blogging for about a month or so, I just felt that it was too hard to keep up. But I am planning to make an effort with this again, starting with a little post about food...

Since I live on my own, I often have to cook for one. While I lived at home with my family, I would love cooking for just myself when all the others had gone out (and if there wasn't that opportunity, I would sometimes sneak into the kitchen at 2am to make myself a second dinner...). There's less chopping to do, I don't have to think about what other people like or don't like, I can experiment without worrying too much about how the result would taste, there's no time spent on serving the meal on several plates for different people so I can eat the food while it's still steaming hot... I thought it was great.

But of course, when you have to do something on a regular basis, the novelty kinda wears off... just like it would if I received presents every day... (no, actually, I take that back... just in case someone who is planning to shower me with gifts reads this... it could happen...)

What do you cook for one person? Quantity-wise, I'm not going to bother making a big roast dinner. I may be a pie but unfortunately there are limits to how much I can stuff into this teeny body. Effort-wise, is there much point in slaving away for an hour or two just to create a masterpiece for myself? I like to be impressed but I prefer it to be someone else doing the impressing, thank you very much.

Anyway, I thought that I would over, the next few weeks/months, post some pictures of meals that this "single female lawyer" (as my brother likes to call me) eats on her own...


Pasta, pasta and more pasta...

Rigatoni with basil, mushroom and sundried tomatoes in a creamy, garlicky sauce.



Linguini carbonara with pancetta and spinach

Spaghetti bolegnese (my version which I insist is awesome)

Square-spaghetti (which apparently clings onto more sauce) with king prawns and sundried tomatoes in a sauce made from cream, egg, parmesan and lemon zest/juice, all topped with coriander and parmesan

You can see from the photos that none of the dishes have much sauce. I hate pasta that's drowning in sauce... and don't get me started on pasta that is overcooked... ugh...

Am I too cute?

I had my review at work today. It went pretty well, and I was only one mark away from the top mark but there was one tiny criticism (and it wasn't even related to my work performance): "Try not to let people think of you as a little girl."

Apparently I'm too warm, friendly and cuddly. All very well if you're a primary school teacher, nanny or hot-water bottle; not so good when you're a corporate lawyer.

Although it was only a comment at the very end of the meeting and my mentor didn't even write it down on my review form (he was merely telling me as a friend), it gave me something to think about. I mean, I often joke that I'm too cute to be a lawyer but is that really what other people think too? Do I need to be a brutal bitch to succeed and have people take me seriously and respect me?

I'm not too concerned about what he said. I do understand where he's coming from and that the corporate world is very macho and cut-throat, but I don't really intend to do corporate work when I qualify. I just moved to the Private Client department and even before I started, I guessed that this was going to be my favourite department, and now that I've worked there for a week, I'm 99% certain that this is what I want to do when I grow up. And I don't think that being too nice in this area of work will do me any harm because the clients involved are REAL PEOPLE rather than MONSTERS... ahem, I mean, (heartless) businessmen. And no I'm not being sexist; I never met a single female client in the six months I was in Corporate. I went to 3 meetings this week and two were with women and one was with a couple.

I will take on board what my mentor said but at the end of the day, I am who I am... a small, cute Chinese girl who always has a smile on her face... is that really so bad?

Warning: This is mushy and will either make you sick or very jealous

Just some of the reasons why you're the best boyfriend any girl could wish for*...

• You will sit on your own for 45 minutes at a buffet restaurant, without any food in front of you (or the ability to go get food because I've left my handbag and shopping bags at the table for you to look after) while I queue for Alaskan king crab legs (which you won't even benefit from since you don't like seafood) and when I finally get back to the table, you don't utter a single word of complaint.

• When the alarm on my phone goes off at 7am (because I've stupidly forgotten to turn off the recurrent alarm even though I've taken the day off work) in the living room, you will get out of bed and look all over the living room for my phone to turn off the alarm instead of kicking me out of bed and getting me to do it myself because I am sound asleep and you don't have the heart to wake me up.

• When I'm having (yet another) one of my irrational moments and I'm down (probably because there's a speck of dust on my fingernail or something equally significant), you do not show an ounce of annoyance or frustration, but instead you use that lovely, soothing voice to comfort me and somehow manage to make everything OK again.
  
  

*Other girls better not wish for you though because then I'd have to kill them and I don't really like blood...

Our friend, Mr Taxi Driver

I take taxis quite regularly. Sometimes I'll take one back to my parents' house at the weekend if I can't be bothered taking the bus despite the fact that it's £20 for the taxi and just over £2 for the bus. And sometimes if I'm feeling really lazy, I'll take a taxi back to my flat from the train station after work even though it's only a 15-minute walk... But my usual taxi journeys involve going to and from Glasgow Airport.

Now I don't mind when taxi drivers don't utter a single word to me during the entire journey. It's not their job - all they need to do is take me to my destination in one piece. And not take me to a secluded alleyway to rape me.

But when I do get a friendly taxi driver, I'm quite happy to chat with them. And when you ask them to take you to the airport, that's usually a good conversation-starter.

So a good few months ago, I got talking to a driver who was taking me to the airport. He asked me where I was travelling to and I told him I was going to visit my boyfriend. He was pretty interested in this long-distance relationship and started asking me questions about how we met, how often we got to see each other, etc.

A few weeks after that, I called for a taxi to pick me up from the airport (I'm stingy and don't like to be ripped off by the white taxis at the airport. Yeah, I won't pay the additional £5 yet I'm perfectly willing to pay the extra £18 to take a taxi instead of a bus... makes complete sense in my head). When the taxi arrived and I jumped in, the first thing the driver said to me was, "Hey, are you just back from visiting your boyfriend?" I thought this was pretty funny, but then again I'm really easily amused so of course I would.

Therefore, I was even more amused when the HAG phoned me from the airport earlier to tell me that when he got into the taxi tonight from the entrance of my flat, the driver asked him, "Hey, are you the boyfriend of the Chinese girl?"

Heeheehee...