The Atrium

Tucked away in Rochester High St is this little gem: The Atrium.

We entered after we saw a sign advertising a lunch-time special. We got so much more!

The Atrium interior

Our waitress seated and handed us the aforementioned lunch-time special (two courses for £11.95) and informed us that the building was over 200 years old, an oddly timed but useful snippet of information.

Floorboards which are , apparently, made of old wooden ships.

Some minutes later we had decided on our food and what arrived was quite something. I’ll let the pictures do the talking…

Smoked salmon, mackerel, and a poached egg (yes that is a poached egg and not cream cheese!).

Sauteed mushrooms with a spring roll . A strange combination but it works!

Sauteed mushrooms with prawns demi glaze (don’t ask me what demi glaze means).

Scottish salmon fillet with a beetroot, plum and port sauce.

Do yourself a favour and visit this little place if you live in or around Rochester. If you have friends or family in the area, make up a reason to go and see them; go to the Atrium.

Great value for money and , I would imagine, quite a romantic little restaurant if you are there for later than 4pm. I only wish we had had everything on the menu so I could have taken more photos. Otherwise, no complaints !

Have a great week everyone 🙂

 

 

The running diaries: Part Two

Hello everyone,

You probably won’t remember that some time ago, I wrote about how I ran…for 20 minutes a day…for a couple of days. It was all very exciting.

After only a few days I didn’t feel equipped to tell you that running is the best or worst thing in the world, so I’m returning to the subject two months down the line.

I’m still running 2-3 times a week, not as regularly as before but when I do I run for longer periods of time and feel less likely to call 999.

 

 

In no particular order, I have also noticed the following things happening:

– I have not lost weight. I’m not telling you this because I was aiming to lose any. I’m telling you this because if you’re thinking regular 30 minute runs are going to help you shed some kg’s, they won’t. After a steady 30 minute run, I burn off around 200 calories. That is equal to one really good biscuit.

– I don’t have more energy. People have told me they have ”so much more energy” when they exercise regularly. Those people were lieing to me. I have more energy immediately after my runs, yes. But more energy in general? Not happening.

– I’m drinking more water. When I say more, I mean about 1.5-2litres a day. (I previously kept myself functioning on under 500 ml a day. I don’t know how I did it. It was a gift ).

– Experiencing a need for colourful food; Salads, vegetables, fish, and less of a need for dairy, starchy, oily foods. I can smell the oil (a superpower of some sort has developed).

– I run faster and longer with company. I’m certain this has been proven scientifically but I’m too lazy to look it up. Running alone is nothing compared to running with someone you know, trying to show them how well you’re doing while you’re secretly dieing inside.

So yes, it’s going well.

Also here is a food photo and something I like to have after a run, or anytime…or all the time.

Avocado on rye crispbread

What you’ll need:

– x1 (preferably soft) Avocado

– rye crispbread

– x1 lemon

– salt and cayenne pepper to taste

Mash up your avocado, squeeze in the lemon and spread over the crisp bread with a little salt and pepper. I like mine with a little bit of cottage cheese.

Enjoy (the running or the eating) !

Iron Man 3

Yes, it’s good. It’s very good.

Whether  you’re an avid follower of Marvel cinema or just a cinema go-er , this (possibly) final instalment of the Iron Man series is not one to miss. I got the odd sense that a different release date might have been planned originally.. it’s all set around Christmas time. Anyway, that’s my only negative (if that’s even a negative..). Onto the positives:

Robert Downey Jnr is , as always, great. Arrogant, sarcastic, and this time  suffering from regular and severe panic attacks since his stint in the Avengers (apparently flying yourself into outer space, blowing up aliens and falling back down to earth will do that to you ).  A lot of references are made to ‘New York’ and the ‘black hole’, a nice way of joining all of the movies together.

Also, very refreshing to know that our super-hero is not ok. The norm is to have audiences believe that your hero will get through anything and this movie realises that audiences are tired of that;  We want panic attacks. We want emotional and physical breakdown. We want things to go wrong!

And then there’s Ben Kingsley . Terrific casting move. I’ll never forget his role as Cosmo in Sneakers (1992) and I was expecting similar acting here. He has a very quiet way of being a bad guy and , in this role, an unshakeable belief in his message and what he’s trying to do.  There is more to this but I don’t want to spoil it for you.

Shane Black makes an impressive comeback as director. Bit of trivia for you : he was particularly popular in the 80’s and 90’s for being involved in the writing and directing of almost all Lethal Weapon movies, The Last Boy Scout and The Long Kiss Goodnight. After a quiet stint in the 2000s, he’s made his mark again and stuck to making his action sequences funny, witty and highly entertaining.

Go and see this movie!!  9/10 in my books (I feel strange giving it full marks…no-one does that do they?) .

 

 

 

Spring cleaning

Hello friends,

Spring. I can’t tell you how much Londoners needed this. A 5-10C jump in temperature has completely transformed the city.

Spring greens and evidence of said transformation

 

Longer days have also meant that I no longer have to squeeze in running during my lunch hour and spend the rest of the day with a questionable smell about me, which is always nice and a bonus .. for everybody.

I have also had a bit of a spring clean with skincare and have thrown out products which I haven’t used in years. Alarmingly I have also thrown out some products which are not even sold in the shops anymore, a testament to how old they were.

Only two items remain (minus eye cream, make-up and hair serum). The first:

Item number 1. Dior Hydra Life Pro-Youth Silk Creme

Don’t let the name put you off. It’s not a £5 cream I know but I’ve had this for 1 month now and using it twice a day, this is what the inside looks like:

 

Hardly used any.

It will set you back between £28-£38 depending on the size you get and should last you longer than 6 months. That’s on average £6 a month if you’re alarmed by the total price. If it lasts you less , what the hell are you doing!?

The second item:

Purifying Toning lotion

 

The Toner… ahh the toner. Could have done without the toner. Also at £28, this Crystal Iris Extract toner is about as ridiculous as the name. Maybe in 20 years time I will look back and say

Wow. Where would I be without crystal and iris extracts .

Maybe.

Maybe not.

And I have to admit the toner was a guilt-purchase. I cannot describe the look of horror the sales assistant gave me when I said ,’Just the moisturiser’ .

So the toner happened.

Any items you’ve been guilted into buying? Interested to hear from you!

 

A mixed bag.

So yesterday we got the opportunity to see a movie before its’ release date!

I wish I could tell you it was exclusively for us. I wish I could tell you I was asked to review this movie and later post it on my super popular blog.

Not the case.

We won vouchers.

All the same it was a treat watching Olympus Has Fallen, as much as I expected it to be an utter failure of a movie, it was good!

(Minor gripe – Gerard Butler always looks like he’s chewing on something )

It has everything you would expect from an american action movie; bad guys (usually Korean , Russian or Serbian , this time they were Korean), Morgan Freeman, american flags falling in slow motion, and really really bad acting.For all of these reasons, it’s a great movie. Don’t ask why, it just works

In other news, THIS:

 

Some very tasty nachos were had at The Bank on Northcote Road in Clapham. If you’re ever near there, Northcote Road in general has a lot of good places for food and drink and this is no exception. One problem:  a large glass of wine and these nachos cost me £12  … I’m pretty sure that’s not good. If you’re not alarmed by that price, then this place is for you !

All the time in the world at The Bank

And I’ll leave you with that for now 🙂 Enjoy your week!

 

 

 

Oblivion..

Good-day everyone,

The movie world seems to be going through another Tom Cruise phase and the release of Oblivion yesterday was no exception.

We get to see the full range of Toms’ acting abilities as he puts on:

– His ‘action’ face

Exhibit A

 

– His ‘concentrating’ face

Exhibit B

 
and his ‘Don’t worry, I’ve got this, I’m Tom Cruise’ face.

Exhibit C

The movie is set in a very clean and IKEA-esque post-war world, where Jack Harper (Cruise) is partnered with Victoria (Riseborough) to clean up earth before getting the hell outta there to Saturns’ moon (apparently a much better destination). It’s a little bit like Wall-E , minus the wit and intelligence.
Jacks memory has also been erased and replaced with only the knowledge that he needs to finish his cleaning job before heading up to Saturn. His job is made a little harder by ‘scavs’ (scavengers). He also occasionally has flashing images of himself with a girl on top of the Empire State building, repressed memories of some sort which later lead him to discover that he is being lied to by the higher powers (”What?! Really?!”) .

Morgan Freeman makes an appearance but his talents are wasted with lines like ,” They took our best <looks at Tom Cruise> … and cloned him.”

I would have probably given this a 7/10 if Kosinski (director, co-writer) had attempted to throw in some of the humour we see in the Mission Impossible movies but unfortunately that was nowhere to be seen here.
I’ll give credit where it’s due for the scenery and effort put into creating the world surrounding the characters. Kosinski’s work with Tron:Legacy was second to none and it shows here too. Oblivion could possibly be the best looking bad movie I’ve seen this year.

Let me know what you thought of it!

Mama, and other horror stories.

Hello all,

Like many of you (well…maybe not too many), I was quite excited to see Del Toros’ ‘Mama’ and I was not disappointed when I finally got the opportunity this weekend. It goes like this:

Lilly and Victoria ( two little girls aged around 3 and 6 (?) ) are  abandoned in a cabin in the woods by their father.. They are found 5 years later. There is more detail to this obviously but it’s not hugely important. The girls’ uncle is granted custody of the two children and he and his girlfriend Annabelle (Jessica Chastain) are left to care for them.

Damaged kids

What ensues is a ‘who’s who’ of Bowlby’s Attachment Theory , or as I like to call it, ‘What could happen if you leave your kids alone in a cabin for 5 years’ :

Having missed out on the crucial first years of interaction with anything other than each other (and the monster in the cabin) , Lilly and Victoria do what any child would do:

– They walk weird

– They don’t talk much

– They eat moths

and they hate Jessica Chastain.

Jessica’s character tries to ignore all of the above but eventually it becomes apparent that the children have learnt their behaviours from something darker than neglect. I won’t give you too many spoilers here but there are a few scares, many of which you will see coming but still have an impact. Del Toro has redeemed himself in my eyes after The Hobbit.

In other news, I lived my own little horror movie this last week after having a wisdom tooth taken out.

I do believe that Dentists are solid proof our childhood experiences can shape our adult lives, as we saw quite clearly in Mama (except I don’t eat moths before my appointments). I can’t quite pinpoint mine to an exact moment, but I know all moments were horrible. This one was no exception. It took three people to get one tooth out, and I was not one of those three people.

Where you see dentist, I see this:

Sensing my fear, my dentist made sure to send me to a surgery which had a piece of cardboard as a ‘sliding door’, a pharmacy which was closed, and a dental surgeon who kept using the phrase ,’You will feel a slight pressure’ (slight = extreme, pressure = pain ).

Thankfully it’s all over. Until next time .

 

The Liebsters

Hello all,

I’m living in a very exciting time right now. I have been nominated for a Liebster Award by the lovely hannahferrett ! You’re probably all familiar with this extremely important and prestigious award … . But if you’re not , the Liebster is a blogger to blogger award given to ‘new’ blogs,  or those with less than 200 blog followers. This is what I looked like accepting the award:

And here are the RULES of receiving it.

You have to:

Post 11 Random facts about yourself
Answer the 11 questions the person that nominated you asked
Go back to the person that nominated you and let them know you have answered their questions with a link to the answers
Ask 11 questions for the bloggers you are going to nominate
Nominate 11 bloggers with few followers
Go to their blog and mention you have nominated them and provide a link to find the questions you have asked them and to find out more
No tag backs

So here we go:

11 Random facts about yourself

1. I am not a morning person. This is the most important thing you should know about me.

2. I feel extremely awkward around babies and small children.

3. I walk fast.

4. I allegedly spent Grades 1-3 in junior school walking around with a pencil for no reason. This memory is everyone else’s except my own.

5. I find it very difficult to come up with 11 ”random” facts about myself.

6. I have watched Interview with a Vampire over 100 times.

7. I own too many bottles of nail varnish.

8. I hate cooking most of the time.

9. I spent 1 year playing World of Warcraft online and almost failed a course because of it.

10. I get irritated very quickly and very suddenly for no reason at all.

11. I never finish my tea.

Answer the 11 questions the person that nominated you asked

1. Why did you start your blog?

I had a dissertation to write and created the blog during a 15 minute ”break”.

2.  What’s your most regrettable fashion choice?

Getting a boy haircut. It made all fashion look terrible on me.

3. Which two people would you most like to be stuck on a desert island with?

No two people! I can’t even hypothetically imagine having to spend all of my time, all of the time with two people. I need space, even from those I care about.

4. What’s your favourite TV show?

Right now, Breaking Bad.

5. Which celebrity irritates you the most?

All of them to a certain extent. In particular those who are famous for no reason at all.

6.What do you find the hardest about blogging?

Making what I have to say interesting to read for someone else.

7. What camera do you use?

Iphone camera .

8. Which fashion trend should be retired immediately?

Crocs.

9. What’s your weirdest hobby?

I don’t have a weird hobby, unless this is weird?

10. What’s your dream job?

Food critic, travel writer, artist. All in one. 

11. What’s your favourite shop and why?

That’s impossible to answer! I have a different favourite depending on what I need: Urban Outfitters for clothes, Whole Foods for food, Pylones for household items, Oliver Bonas for jewellery, ..I could go on and on.

Nominee Questions! 

1. What inspires you to write?

2. Where in the world are you?

3. Where in the world would you like to be?

4. If you’ve had it, what did you do for your 30th birthday?

5. What is your day job?

6. Do you have any other blogs ?

7. Where is your favourite restaurant ?

8. If you could visit a place 50 times over, where would it be?

9. Do you have a phrase or word you say more often than you should?

10. What do you spend too much money on?

11. Where will you be this weekend?

And last but not least… Here are the Nominees! I’ve nominated you because I read you, find you interesting, and think you are worthy!

1. http://kazvan.wordpress.com – Kazvan
2. http://junikonj.wordpress.com – Junikonj
3. http://norecipejuststory.com – No recipe just story
4. http://restaurantbastards.wordpress.com – restaurantbastards
5. http://mevscake.wordpress.com – Me Vs Cake
6. http://badbooksgoodtimes.com – Bad Books, Good Times
7. http://withthegrains.com – With the Grains
8. http://belocchio.wordpress.com – Bel’ Occhio’s blog
9. http://foodbloggeronadiet.com – Food Blogger on a Diet
10. http://zenscribbles.wordpress.com – Zenscribbles
11. http://writingthegirl.wordpress.com – Writingthegirl

Happy blogging!

For your eyes only.

Bloggers, readers,

It’s hard to believe we are in April. Several reasons:

– It’s still 3C outside.

– It snows occasionally

– It rains more than occasionally.

A combination of the miserable weather and a tooth problem (another blog another time) has meant more time was spent in than out for the last two weeks. As a result I am depleted of almost every haircare and skincare product I own. All except one.

Eye cream. If you’re looking for a good one, Dr Hauschka’s Eye Contour Day Balm is not too bad at all. 

Here are the good bits:

– It will be the only eye cream you need to own for the next 50 years. The consistency is extremely thick  (almost like a paste or wax) and you need to apply a very small amount each morning.

– You can feel the balm all day. The skin of the applied area looks dewy and feels soft from morning till night.

– It keeps the lid and contour areas moisturised. I had a patch of dry skin on one eye-lid for a couple of days and despite moisturising with my other day and night creams, it did not go away. The balm helped.

Here are the bad bits:

– This is more of a personal thing really but I get bored of products easily. Using one eye-cream for the rest of my life will not happen. This balm is long lasting but  it’s almost too long-lasting for my taste.

– Having a thin layer of waxy paste under your eyes feels ‘moisturising’ but it doesn’t do any favours to your make-up (if you wear any). You might get a slight rubbing-off of mascara under your eyes if your eye lashes start to pick up the balm.

– I can’t tell you if it works because I’m not quite sure how I expect it to work. Will I still get wrinkles in 5-10 years time? Yes. Can I slow the process down considerably? Probably not.

Let me know what you think of it if you get it, or if you have it already!