Chocolate Ginger

Plain chocolate. Ginger, crystalised (tasty) or stem (heaven).

Wonderful. Addictive. Ahhhhh….

CRYSTALISED GINGER

Costiness: £2.47 for 250g from A Quarter Of

STEM GINGER

Costiness: £3.10 for 250g or £29.99 for the whole 3kg jar from Sweet Greetings

The Batchel

Despite the name (relating to the handle on top), I do love this bag in yellow. I have a bit of a thing for yellow at the moment. Lemon, mustard, sunshine, yolk…

Leather bags with a long cross-body strap and sturdy rucksacks are all I generally use, apart from special occasions. This would be great for OU tutorials and carting around books and papers, and I do like a larger bag from time to time. I also love the 13″ satchel in both this colour and purple for a day to day handbag.

Costiness: £93 from The Cambridge Satchel Company

Barry White – Love’s Theme

Live in Mexico…

Don’t Date…Epilate

This is the new Braun gadget, the Silk-épil 7 Dual Epilator. Seems they’ve teamed up with Gillette Venus for something a bit different from the painful epilators of yore. I’d like to try one, anyway, as I’m not one for waxing and shaving gets a bit dull. Don’t speak to me of depilatory creams, I can smell them soon as think of them. Grim. Anyway, that’s my Valentine’s tip.

Carmen

So, my first full proper opera in the flesh, thanks to Opera North and The Culture Vulture running a bloggers’ night for Carmen at The Grand in Leeds.

I still don’t know why the first part was set in a picnic area in front of an empty lock-up, why the translation was so dry that it made me laugh inappropriately in parts or what the woman in the swimming costume was meant to be, despite a couple of people trying to explain these to me. But never mind.

I knew I liked the music from Carmen, but lots of it was cut, including one of my favourites – the smugglers’ quintet – and the conducting was rather flat, so I got nothing from the orchestra when normally live music moves the air to the point where it moves me at least a little, even when it’s not my cup of tea. Buckets of dialogue went out of the window too, so I struggled to know what was happening at points, and faced with an American setting that made little sense, so many unsympathetic characters and a Jose who was kitted out as Ranger Smith, I found my mind wandering rather more than it might. I understand that the cuts (at least 45 minutes, I think) put the opera into a more accessible format of three 40 minute sections, with intervals, but since so many people did not come back after the second interval (mostly the regular audience, not the bloggers on the whole), it obviously failed to keep the crowd satisfied.

The adult nature of the production, so hyped before the performance, seems to come from the tits and arses (which brought more laughs than racing pulses) rather than any threat of real sex and violence. Opera North have now apparently given the show a 12 certificate. Most kids have probably seen worse on the internet, and even if they live sheltered lives, on X Factor. OK, maybe not nips.

Still, on to the positives. I thought Escamillo and Zuniga were played brilliantly, I liked some of what was hinted at behind the hard-to-like character of Carmen, and some of the lighting work was excellent, especially in the final section. Would I go to the opera again? I’d give it another go, but probably not Carmen again and I’d probably try a more traditional production.

Rastamouse

CRUCIAL, people, CRUCIAL. Give it up for the Easy Crew, wicked. iPlayer, back to back and ting.

Collar Spot Dress

Spring is coming, and I kinda want to feel fabulous and like I’m in Grease. Take me to a diner…

I love this in “Nude Spot”. It’s got a bit of stretch, it’ll go a long way.

Costiness: £40 from ASOS

Costume Drama

I have no desire whatsoever to see The King’s Speech. I’ve had my own speech impediment, ta, and I don’t need to see it tastefully re-enacted by posh people with no plot. Bread and circuses.

I’d rather watch this: