Recipe for Lovin'

It's been hard not to get caught up in the cooking hysteria that is masterchef, my own dad lost it when he got his own master chef official apron, but rest assured this post will expand your mind beyond the musings of Julie Poh or even Justine (Who I thought should've won, but let's face it in reality shows I always think the hot chick should win....)

People have been cooking by recipe for centuries. I reckon even Cave people when they decided to cook meat once upon a time, wrote down how to do it and passed it to their neighbours over a cold beer.. I feel like it's safe to assume that most people don't want to pass on a bad recipe, so wouldn't the world become a Darwinesque survival of the fittest (tastiest) for recipes? Wouldn't eventually we have only good recipes? Going on my family kitchen this isn't the case we have been through our share of bad recipes. But we throw them out. where are these bad recipes coming from?


As has become standard for my blog, i'll pose that question and then now answer it. I think recipes are a mere player in the grand narrative of global cuisine. Recipes are written but become dated as the narrative progresses. A bad recipe now may only be bad because the narrative has changed and microwaving everything is no longer a fascination or even appropriate. The narrative of food at the moment is Fresh and seasonal is the best, good ingredients result in Good dishes. The head to tail thing is big at the moment too. (yeah I ate cow tongue, and goat meat) There you have it now i'm off to cook some nasi Goreng 2 minute noodles.

Aaron Aaronson

A large part of my working day is spent reading what people's surnames are. Thrilling stuff I know, but it made me think of the lineage of surnames why they were chosen and where they came from.

My name is derived from the occupation a 'clerk' and the 'e' I heard denotes landowner. (Alright!) In my ponderings I wondered whether new surnames are still being invented and if so how?

My Name is from my parents and that's how it works for everyone so wouldn't it be right to assume that all surnames have now been thought of? When they first started using surnames did they just make it up? used something about their personality or occupation?

Taking this line of thought to a hyperbolic conclusion (quite common in my blog posts really...) If there is indeed a finite amount of surnames, wouldn't it lead to a homogenisation of surnames and eventually everyone would have the same one?

Names are changed through marriage and surnames die out, some surnames are more common then others and therefore with a higher number of people more chance of that name surviving. Common surnames will become more common and eventually everyone will have the same one! wouldn't that be rad!

New name!

Turns out i'm moving away from the train moniker, I found it was a little confusing and tryhard especially when the only people who read this are people I know, so why blur it with a nickname. The new name is a clever (clever because I thought of it) pun on the film the sum of us. This movie i've never seen but i'm pretty sure Russel crowe was in it. It was about relatinships between father and sons and voyage of self discovery. I'd love to know if it's any good if anyone's seen it?

While thinking of my new name I googled 'Gus' to see if I could find a pun using my name. I didn't, but I did learn that Gus is Macgyver's first name, and Gus was the original animal playing sports movie. It involved a horse kicking field goals for a gridiron team. DOn't make them like they used to.

The photo above is another Chinga special, from his travels. I feel like they're too good for facebook so i'll post my favourites on here.

Hero's in a half shell

Sydney is a city of festivals. I feel like Sydney has a festival for everything. Tropfest, Field day umm the Sydney Festival and it's great, it's almost at a point where at any time of the year there will be some kind of festival on to keep bored Uni students and cultural sydney siders occupied. After attending the Livid festival of light in the City I couldn't help but feel that the festival facade was a temporary cultural expression that imposes itself intermittantly on Sydney's architectural foundations like the Rocks and Circular Quay and any number of venues across Sydney. This may seem a little negative but I feel like Sydney lack's a cultural soul. Cultural events come by, impose there creative world views then leave Sydney as an empty cultural shell waiting for the next pearl to arrive (nice mixed metaphor gus man)

The good part of it is that Sydney is incredibly dynamic and flexible. The venue which entertained tween's with the wiggles can transform at night to a haven of filthy electro heads. Many of the biggest bars and clubs fail to attract a regular crowd and are forced to rely on promoters and the acts they can book. Tank night club which I feel is a great venue and as Sydney as it gets, relies on club nights like the RnB super club and One love to fill it's floors rather than having a crowd for the venues sake. One love could move and Tank would be empty.

Anyway Here's an awesome song for those that like to kick it oldschool

Run DMC- My Adidas (pilot priest remix)

YO-YO Yayoi Kasuma

It was a thursday or friday and with some recession related free time on my hands I went down to the recession friendly Museum of Contemporary art in Circular quay to check it out and see what I could see. An exhibition showing by artist Yayoi Kasuma or Kusama (No idea who that is, is she famous?) called the Mirrored years was on. I didn't expect much from my maiden visit to the MCA but it turned out to be a quite the thought provoking play date. The exhibition was mainly based on installations as opposed to paintings, which is awesome since the best painting I ever did was mis-interpreted as an umbrella (yeah it was a boat). One of the installations which is pictured (taken from Yayoi's website) actually made me feel an emotion! I know isn't that impressive! The huge room was filled with Inflatable "clouds" that were black rubber boat material blobs with white painted on. The environment was so far removed conventional Museum spaces, and anything I had experienced and it was hard not to be taken away by it all. It showed a tension between the fluffy bubbliness of clouds, and the dark ominous feelings they can bring before a storm an emotion that I experience as I walked through. Pretty rad and arty hey!



It made me think of how aspects of design ellicit an emotional response. No doubt they tell you this in the first lecture of Design 1001, but it parrallels the way which literature is designed to do the same a notion I am familiar with from doing English at Uni.

Apparently my Post's are too long

My Back Hurts! My back Hurts!

So I know it's been a while between drinks here at the Train, and while most would assume that my absence has been due to laziness, it's been more to do with lack of inspiration. I try to avoid complaining about things which has cut back a load of material there's enough complaining on the internet already! I've got a few things I would like to write about coming up so I should be right for a while. I'm thinking of re-branding the train It's a little unecessary to have an "avatar" as they say, chances are you know me anyway!

Here is my friends website of graphic design stuff has a few pics of stuff she's done which is pretty cool. Not cool enough work on this blog's background though....Caroline's web site

I see red I see Red I see Red

It makes sense that business often choose primary colours for logo's and design. By using these colours, the strong meanings of power, passion and strength are transposed from the colour to the brand. I wonder why then if these colours are used so regularly why have they not become overused, cliched and maintained they're stature and meanings? Surely if everything is red red's meaning of passion would be lost?

The meanings of these colours were often derived from the ability of man to procure them. gold as a colour is a rare find in the natural world and as such denotes stature and wealth. Now we can paint anything we want gold for around the same price as any other colour so how has gold maintained this stature?

I guess afte centuries of reinforcement the meanings are consistently reinforced. Gold medals, gold coins but why is the meaning of colours not cyclical like most aspects of design? Why do companies continue to use strong reds and blues even though it seems everyone is using the same reds and blues?

Anyway there's some food for thought. The photo at the top was taken by chris, notice how red is a primary colour and makes the plant's stalks seem to emerge from the water with strength. I wonder if the image would appear the same if the water was red too?