It’s been the second day in a row of staying in with a book and pottering kind of weather in Perth and I’ve made good use of it.
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I’ve just finished
‘Confessions of a QANTAS Flight Attendant’by Owen Beddall and thoroughly enjoyed it for what it was. Beddall dishes the dirt on the famous and not so famous people he’s looked after over his prolific career with what was once Australia’s premier carrier but is now facing challenges in the shape of rebranding and cost cutting as it seeks to stay competitive in a market where consumer expectations are high and the demand for value for money even higher.
From the point of view of a gay man in one of the world’s few ‘gay friendly’ industries, Beddall weaves tales of the passengers he encountered with observations of the cities he’s lived and worked in with the added dimension of being the go between for his heterosexual colleagues and their romantic escapades both at work and at play.
It’s not all saucy details and scandal, unfortunately. Beddall’s career with QANTAS suffered several set backs in the form of work related medical conditions which ultimately saw him become a costly inconvenience to the airline he worked for with pride. It was also interesting to read about the internal changes of the airline as it restructured and what it meant to employees.
With it’s Australian point of reference, ‘ Confessions of a QANTAS Flight Attendant’ is an easy and entertaining read that’s perfect for a winter’s day on the sofa or even on the plane.
I’ve been having amazing luck with the cosmetic sample sachets I find attached to the pages of The Australian Women’s Weekly. This was how I discovered L’Oreal’s Revitalift Magic Blur a few months back.
This month, I found Garnier’s equivalent, Perfect Blur (RRP $16.95 but currently on sale at Chemist Warehouse for $14.39). I was pleasantly surprised at just how much I did like it. It’s more fluid than L ‘Oreal’s but seems to give a more matte finish on my skin and wears well under makeup. It dries really quickly and lasts through a busy day as well as through a run in the sun. I’m going to be making the switch, I think, when I get through my current tube of Magic Blur.
It wouldn’t be a trip home to mum and dad’s without mum and I exchanging small but essential gifts. Mum gave me a Uniqlo T shirt (the black one’s mine, the purple is mum’s but I don’t think you can get it online in Australia anymore). She’s a huge fan of Heattech herself and swears by her white scoop neck long sleeve T-shirt during winter. My sister in law is Japanese and I think a massive Uniqlo shopping haul in Tokyo will be in our collective futures.
And I gave her something Japanese in return in the shape of some stainless steel kitchenware from Daiso. An obsession with stainless steel kitchenware is practically genetic if you’re Malaysian or Singaporean Chinese. Practically genetic.
Rainy days in also mean comfort baking and I made this Banana Bread Supreme from Best Recipes yesterday. It makes a very moist loaf that is best kept in the fridge. It’s practically fat free because it doesn’t contain butter or oil which means it’s perfectly justified to slather on some butter on your slice for morning tea. I made double the recipe stated on the website to fit my large loaf tin. The golden syrup / sugar combination was just right. I used brown sugar for the batter as this is all I had. I didn’t have cinnamon sugar so topped my loaf with raw sugar instead. I used wholemeal SR flour.
The bread tastes even better when kept in the fridge overnight. It even got a cheeky grin from Toddler SSG this morning. He’s still on a strict baked goods for breakfast diet which he supplements with a squeezy pack yoghurt. It has to be a squeezy pack of yoghurt, mind you, and not a punnet or bowl. The first half is to be fed to him and then he’s to be given the remainder to squeeze direct from the pack into his mouth. Don’t question the process and turn a blind eye.
