We've also...

...been going to Perth a lot.
I took this pic of a bloke in a cowboy hat while my husband nipped into the Kojonup bakery to buy some lunch.
What follows is the sort of photo you can take out of the car window when your husband's driving at 110kmh, eating a pie and steering with his knees.

In case you're wondering, it's of canola fields.

Sale of the Century

Well, not quite but a Booktopia book sale is always good and the one they've got on at the moment (their end of financial year sale) is a ripper.
You'll have to wade through 41 pages to check out all the specials but it's worth it if you want to get your hands on things like Peter Robinson's Inspector Banks novels for around $5.
There's all sorts up for grabs but I know from past experience that you have to be quick - they sell out fairly quickly.
Postage is $6.50 for up to 100 books, their service is great and the books are usually delivered within a week (they're based in Sydney).
And I know I sound like a walking advert so I should probably point out that I have no connection with Booktopia other than being a customer.
We're a family of mega readers - we have books coming out of our earholes - and I've been meaning to blog about good internet bookshops for ages.
A really fabulous one is Book Depository, which is based in the UK and not only has a list and prices that rival Amazon but also has free delivery worldwide.
Again, the books are usually on your doorstep within a week and the service is excellent.
You can get bucketloads of hardback titles at Book Depository for about half the price you pay in Australia (it will vary according to the exchange rate) and you don't have to worry about the weight because the postage is free.
I managed to get Rick Stein's Mediterranean Escapes for about $30; it was selling for more than $60 in bookshops here (they have a massive range of cookbooks as well as house and garden, craft, photography, art - you name it).
There are links to both websites just to the right of this post (under Places I Like To Visit).
If you're a booklover, believe me, you'll be like a pig in the proverbial.

Poxy lady? Let's hope not.

Spotted in a supermarket carpark last week, one of those Wicked rental camper vans with the following slogan painted on the back: "If God were a woman would sperm taste like chocolate?"
As an atheist, this is a hard one to answer but I'd like to think that if there was a God and she was female, she'd have the imagination to go seasonal.
Beer and seafood in summer, roast chook in winter, chocolate on birthdays (and let's not forget special catering for those who have allergies, gluten intolerances etc).
Unfortunately, all of that wouldn't fit on the back of a van so I can see why whoever wrote it just went with chocolate.
But while we're on the subject of spotted, it's one of the reasons I haven't been around lately.
Son, who lives on his own, came down with chicken pox, big time, as in really ill.
He's now better and my husband and I are waiting to see if the pox will be passed on to us.
We both think we had it when we were kids but my husband can't check because he's an only child and both his parents are dead.
My mum says she doesn't remember me having it but then my mum's reached an age where one in 10 conversations start like this:
Mum: "I read that book you were telling me about, what was it called, you know, the one that was made into a film with...what's his name?...I saw him on TV last week with that woman who was married to Xavier Cugat...Ron! What was the name of Xavier Cugat's third wife?...it's on the tip of my tongue..."
Suffice to say, every time we itch, we panic.
And in case you're wondering, Xavier Cugat's third wife was Abbe Lane.

Get thee to a kitchen...

...and make yourself some Anzac biscuits. The home-made versions of these biccies are so far ahead of shop-bought it's not funny and they're ridiculously easy to make.
Mine are courtesy of a Bill Granger recipe but there are heaps of recipes on the internet (or ask your Nana, she'll probably know one off by heart).
Whatever you do, don't call them cookies, or a digger might (quite rightly, if you ask me) come over to your house and wash your mouth out with soap.
Eat your Anzac biscuits in front of the Collingwood/Essendon game tomorrow.
This is something I look forward to every year, not because I like either team (they're Carlton's sworn enemies) but because there's a really good chance half a dozen of them will beat the crap out of each other, be hauled before the tribunal and be out for several games.
But that's just me.
Whatever you do tomorrow, have a good one.

Channeling Elvis 2

I decided to forgo the french toast cut into bunny rabbit shapes and do this magnificent creation for Easter instead.
Granted, it looked better in the magazine, but even then they had to use blurry soft-focus photography to get away from that "I lost control of my bowels while skiing" look.
It's called Choc Coconut Ice Cream Cake and I got the recipe from a New Idea mag, as in I was allowed to rip the recipe out of the magazine when I was at the hairdresser last week (thank you, Shelley).
This cake is a mixture of vanilla ice cream, crushed Choc Ripple biscuits, toasted coconut, mini marshmallows, strawberry-flavoured dessert topping, Ice Magic and M&Ms Speckled Eggs.
So delicious. So Elvis.

Channeling Elvis

The photos probably speak for themselves but then I thought, what the hell, here's your chance to explain your kitsch food fetish once and for all.
My husband's always put it down to an early adulthood of too much Cinzano and lemonade (yes, in the same glass). But seeing as I haven't touched Cinzano since I drank a whole bottle at a hockey cabaret in Manjimup in 1974, I think it's more deep-seated than that.
I think some people are born with a kitsch gene and even if they struggle against it for years and years, they one day end up making, say, a dozen Rudolph cupcakes.
For some reason this kitsch food fetish only surfaces on holiday-type occasions. As in, Christmas or Easter looms and I get really excited and go into a frenzy of searching through recipes for something suitably naff.
The Rudolph cupcakes are a bastard to make because you have to pipe 24 melted-chocolate antlers on to baking paper. Which means you (as in, I) pipe 37 crap antlers before you get the hang of it, then you have to go out and buy more chocolate and melt it down and pipe 24 more.
The melted chocolate goes everywhere. I found some in my belly button and also behind my ears. I didn't tell my family this, of course, and they quite happily ate the lot.

The snowman cupcakes were less successful, mainly because I couldn't be bothered making the cupcakes. By this time it was 10pm on Christmas Eve, I was full of Yellow Glen and my family made an executive decision involving vanilla ice cream and Ice Magic.
Even so, I managed to breathe new life into a Martha Stewart concept: two marshmallows and a fruit-jube hat threaded on a toothpick, with coloured sprinkle thingies for eyes and nose.
Result: Chucky Snowman. Not my finest moment.

This echidna pav was made for Australia Day. I was toying with the idea of Kylie Minogue but realised she was probably a pav too far.
Dead easy to make: bake your meringue in a pointy oval shape, cover with whipped cream, add dried cranberries for eyes and after-dinner mint sticks for spines.
Serve on a turkey platter (echidna platters being hard to come by).
Now it's nearly Easter and I'm on the hunt again. Nigella Lawson has a recipe for rabbit curry called Hot Cross Bunny, which appeals on many levels.
But if you have any other suggestions, I'd love to hear them.