Yep. I do. I bought it at That Dapper Market. I think it’s rather spiffy.

Oh – and see that freckle on my ring finger there? That’s my favourite freckle. I’m not quite sure why it is, but it is.

Yep.

My introduction to jazz music came initially from a beau who played beautiful albums whilst he romanced me with home cooked meals, decadent wines, and late night cheese platters in his low-lit lounge room. It’s easy to see how a girl picks up a liking for such things in such situations. Fortunately for me, my love affair with jazz music has far outlived my love affair with my Hubble.

My latest adventure with Jazz was over the Adelaide Fringe Festival when I went to see The Jazz Hop Experiment - a local band who take non-jazz songs and turn them into jazz songs. Ah. May. Zing. Seriously cannot wait to see them again in June at the Hoot Adelaide Hills Jazz Festival!

So… There’s been a bit of a lull in posting lately. I’m sure you haven’t noticed… But in case you have, here are a list of reasons why I haven’t been on the Fizz of late:

1. I started my Bachelor of Arts (Internet Communications) five weeks ago. I know, I know – somewhat ironic that I start studying internet communications and then stop communicating via the internet. That aside, it’s my first attempt at a tertiary level course in many, many years, and I have to cram to get ahead because I’m having two weeks off in about three week’s time, when my fourth assessment is due in. Suffice to say, every moment outside of work that isn’t taken up with the below items, is taken up with study.
2. I’m training for a half marathon.
3. I’ve started taking burlesque classes, one night a week. I’ve only been to one so far, but it was SO much fun!
4. I’ve taken on a second job, one night a week.
5. I’ve been baking cupcakes for a friend’s house warming.
6. I’ve attended my friend’s house warming slash surprise engagement announcement!
7. I’ve taken my youngest nephew for his first ever driving lesson.
8. I’ve been unpacking boxes and trying to find homes for the surprisingly, jaw-droppingly, large amount of stuff that I have.
9. I’ve been falling in love with my new housemate who made me an amazing dinner the other week complete with candles and wine.
10. The Adelaide Fringe Festival. Say no more.

Quite seriously, I don’t know how I’m still standing upright. I am crazy busy personified right now and I haven’t even started indoor rock climbing yet! Suffice to say, the Fizz will not be updated regularly for a wee while to come so please feel free to cheat on me with other blogs. I promise, I won’t hold it against you… Much…

Number 21 on my list of Things I Will Do - make a giant cupcake - check!

On Saturday I pulled some of my cupcake recipes from my days as a cupcake empress and jigged and combined them to create a GIANT cupcake recipe which, after a few minor oven temperature adjustments, seemed to work out just fine. Tonight, I decorated the little darling in time for its big debut tomorrow as a birthday cake for one of my most favourite work ladies.

The cake itself is vanilla and lemon (yet to be taste tested), with the frosting being a delicious meringue flavour (successfully taste tested by Yak, House Husband, AND moi!) coloured orange and pale yellow for the base, and grassy green for the top. The little fondant flowers I did nay make myself, but thought they were just the sweetest way to finish the whole thing off so couldn’t resist adding them to the mix.

A few days ago Lady Smaggle wrote an excellent post about curly hair vs straight hair with respect to the possibility that having straight hair results in being taken more seriously than if you have curls – you can read her post here. I instantly delved into my photo archives to find the above two photos – the first being me with relatively straight, long hair – the longest, in fact, that I have ever had in my life; the second being me with what is now my most favourite hair style I have ever had! My little crop of curls.

I have always been a little envious of curls. There was a girl a grade below me  at school who had the most amazing tiny ringlets, and I always loved the old Hollywood starlets in their photos with their beautiful pin curls. I too, loved to watch Baby’s hair blowing in the breeze, but it wasn’t until I stumbled upon Carly and her amazing, energetic hair, that I realised what true curl-love is. My fate was finally sealed when, in London in 2010, I saw a lady swing dancing with a gorgeous mop of messy curls. That was the final straw. I was going to bite the bullet and get a perm.

In the latter half of last year I did exactly that (you can read about it here - it was on my 32 new things list), and I am so in love with the results I don’t know if I will ever go straight again. I feel like I have found a hair style that is me. It fits me perfectly. It’s fun, it’s bubbly, it’s a little different, it’s energetic, it’s messy but all the more amazing for it, it looks high maintenance, but it’s really not. I love it! I love that doing my hair involves flipping my head upside down and tussling it. I love that the more uncontrollable it is, the better it looks. I love my curls!

I don’t know if I get taken any less seriously now than I used to, or if I’m thought to be less professional looking, but the thing is, I don’t really care. I ain’t bothered. If you miss the power punch of me because you’re too concerned that my curls make me look a little flibberty-gibberty then totes soz to you. But, to be honest, I’m not so sure that happens. Quite possibly it does in the oh so serious world of law or the upper echelons of the British banking arena for example, but in my world (which is currently in finance, by the way), where people see the passionate person under the curls, they can see that my curls are an extension of my personality, and those curls are freakin’ awesome!

I have a real thing for socks that tell you which one is for your left foot and which one is for your right.

I remember when I was a kid, asking my Mum how you could tell which was your left sock and which was your right. I mean, you have left shoes and right shoes, so you must have left socks and right socks, right? Despite Mum’s best efforts, I could not get my head around the fact that socks were all made equal and were quite interchangeable. It just didn’t make sense!

So, just imagine my pure, unadulterated, and child-like delight when sports companies started bringing out ‘technical’ socks that were labelled with little L’s and R’s!! It’s what I’d always wanted! Socks! Designed for left feet and right feet individually! Not generic foot tubes that jumped onto whichever foot happened to be handy at the time! Huzzah!

1. Between impromptu trips to Perth, starting a new job, house sitting in a suburb that I’m convinced is closer to the WA border than it is to the Adelaide CBD, house hunting, and falling madly in love with a kaftan, I’ve been, and continue to be, a busy little fizz!
2. Despite the reason I was there, I really did have a lovely time in Perth and managed to catch up with 84.6% of the people I wanted to. People are very important folks. Be sure to catch up with them regularly, whether that be in person, via email, phone, or carrier pigeon.
3. I have a job! It’s with a company that I used to work for before I left Adelaide many moons ago, and it feels great to be back in my old digs. Sometimes I get the warm fuzzies just sitting at my desk.
4. I have been introduced to a man who could possibly be one of the loveliest men in all of Adelaide, AND he’s going to be my housemate! We met for the first time today, and will be hitting the rental market hard over the coming weeks to find ourselves something fabulous.
5. I wish I had kissed a Timelord. Do you know any?

It’s always darkest before the dawn
- Shake it Out, Florence and the Machine

There was once an amazing man whom many of my friends (myself included) called Paulie Pants. He could dance like Fred Astaire, had a smile that warmed a room and which nearly never left his face, eyebrows that sat like mini-pyramids above his sparkling eyes, and a heart bigger than Phar Lap’s that was made of a gold more pure and more beautiful than could possibly be found on this earth.

Through all of the years I knew him, he had a wonderful knack of bringing people together and of making them feel wanted, loved, special, and cherished; this was exactly how everyone who knew him felt about him. Every Friday without fail he would update his Facebook status with “Aloha Friday!” to welcome the coming of the weekend, which for Paulie Pants and anyone lucky enough around him, always brought barrels of laughs and oceans of fun as he crammed everything he possibly could into his life. No excuses were needed for parties, they just happened because there was no reason why they shouldn’t. If there was even the slightest suggestion of dressing up for something, he was there (early!) with a Sherlock Holmes cape or a Hawaiian shirt on, a deck of magic cards in his pocket ready to entertain us with his latest trick. Paulie Pants was a self confessed sufferer of FOMS – a fear of missing out on something – and I think it’s fairly safe to say that in an amazing 32 years of life, he never did.

On Wednesday we had to say goodbye to our beautiful friend Paul, and it was the hardest thing most of us have ever had to do. There is no comprehending why a sun that shined so brightly should be taken from our sky before it even reaches midday, or how it could ever be right for there to be so much less magic in our world, but we can be thankful for having had the absolute joy, the pure pleasure, and the unbelievable luck of having known such an amazing man.

RIP Paulie Pants. We are all better for having known you. x

Photo 1: Pre-meeting long black with a dash of hot milk. It’s just how I roll.
Photo 2:  Barry, the Fringe Factory Flamingo.
Photo 3:  My London bus coin purse – given to me by a friend years ago and loved just as much now as it was then. Really, every girl should have a sequined London bus coin purse.
Photo 4:  A fabulous collection of old luggage at the Fringe Factory. I. Want. Them.
Photo 5:  Beetles with trees growing out of them next to deck-chairs under umbrellas near Rundle Mall in Adelaide. Love.

I love a well named business. Especially if that business is a bar or restaurant at which I can drink or eat and instantly feel just that little bit cooler simply by being there and bathing in the glow of it’s ingenious name.

I had a girl-date at one such bar just the other day when my dear Yak suggested we meet for a wee tipple at a pub called Benjamin.

Now, what’s so dang ingenious about calling a pub “Benjamin”, I hear you ask ponderously? Well, nothing on it’s own really… Until, that is, that you find out that the Benjamin is on Franklin Street! Benjamin on Franklin! Gah! The subtlety and then blatant obviousness of it just had me gagging to walk through the door and swill swanky, presidential drinks like Cognac and Champagne. I love it!

And, after setting you up with high expectations with its ingenious name, the pub itself does not disappoint. It fully delivers on it’s promise of a character and atmosphere that dwells somewhere between Alice in Wonderland, your Grandma’s living room, and Thomas Edison’s library. Seriously, I could move into this pub, I love it that much.

(Unfortunately, my photographic skills weren’t loving it so much… you’ll get a much better idea of how awesome this place is (especially with respect to the above amazing crystal installation) if you pop on over to their web site)