Just another dent in the damage…

My house is full of vegans – bar Bella, she eats fish with her Amicat – and it means there are a lot of cook books. I make it sound like there are a lot of people in my house but in fact there’s just the two of us and our cat, Bella. And I guess the reason we have so many cook books is due to Max’s obsession with recipe clippings, he has a whole lever arch file full! Being vegan is not difficult, it just means you have to think more about your food, plan your meals, your pack lunches for work and check menus before you agree to a night out. But to make veganism really work for you at home you’ve got to learn some darn cooking skills, make your food exciting and never settle for just a hummus sandwich or a dreadlock burger or that god awful sos mix. Veganism is better than that! But I hate cooking – I hate waiting for things to cook – anything that takes longer than 20 minutes makes my stomach hurt and I end up eating most of it out of the pan before it even hits my plate. Max calls me a picker, I can’t help it! Say you’re cooking with a pepper and you’ve got it nicely chopped up ready, for every piece the pan gets my mouth gets the other. It’s just the way it goes.

Max caught on to my dislike of cooking early on and figured the way to my heart would definitely be through my stomach. It worked. Five years on I eat like royalty… every day. Even if there’s absolutely nothing in he never fails to cook up a feast of feasts. Leave it to me and we’d be eating chilli and wedges every day, not that there is anything wrong with that either though.

So just as I was getting used to letting Max own the kitchen, except on my occasional baking days when I crack out super tasty cookies or cupcakes, in walks Vegan Yum Yum and turns my culinary failings into something more at home on Masterchef. I’ve turned a corner, I get excited about coating my tofu with a corn flour batter, whizzing up a tahini paste for my steamed broccoli and turning tomato ketchup into an incredibly mouth watering sweet and sour sauce. I’ve followed Lauren’s amazing blog for a while and always been insanely jealous of these rather special cupcakes from the Martha Stewart show but I never really thought I (the world’s most reluctant cook) could make any of this incredible food myself. Then I get a copy of the cook book and how wrong I was.

What makes the book so special for me and what makes me rate this more highly than any other book on our shelves are the beautifully shot images of the finished meal. Pictures of the food is something a great deal of our cook books lack and by being so anal about following craft patterns to the T I’m one of these that literally follows every instruction within the recipe and I like my food to look like the picture. Without pictures how can you really make your recipe appealing? Really? I like to decide what I want to eat by seeing how tasty it looks. And there are many many tasty things to choose from in this.

The added bonus of planning my every meal around the Lauren Ulm Bible is being able to take her recipes everywhere I go via my phone! Yes, she has an iPhone app [iTunes link] too that includes many of the recipes from the book and updates as and when she updates the blog. And again, as well as a handy ‘tick’ function to mark off your ingredients, there’s pictures!! Don’t just relay on making your food sound good… make it look good! Have a look at some of these master pieces from my very own kitchen:

Broccoli Almond Sweet and Sour Tofu

Nearly Raw Tahini Noodles

Spicy Tomato and Chickpea Soup (pp. 180) with a pepper, onion and avocado salsa topping

Cinnamon Raisin Swirl Bread (pp. 13)

Creamy Broccoli Dal (pp. 173) with homemade roti

And tonight we ate Hurry Up Alfredo (sorry about the poor image quality on this one):

We added black olives on top for a little extra bite, and it was wicked! This cook book is amazing… seriously. It’s probably the best cook book in the world. When Lauren says ‘decadent (BUT DOABLE) animal-free recipes for entertaining and every day’ she actually means it! They are the most doable recipes I’ve ever read and some of the most yummy food I’ve ever tasted.

I’m not much of a New Year’s Resolution type person but last year I did write a list of 25 things I wanted to do in 2009. I thought it’d be worth going over what I did and didn’t do ready to prepare a new list of 26 things I want to do in 2010. So let’s see:

1) Set up an Etsy store and start selling small crafts: Well, I got the Etsy store bit sorted but getting the stuff to sell has been harder. I thought it’d just be a case of make a load of stuff and get it listed but it turns out a lot of the patterns I’ve been using to make consumables are all copyrighted and you can’t sell the stuff you make using them. Turns out I need to start writing my own patterns if I want to sell anything I make. The only things I really have for sale are my SSCS crochet whales as it’s OK to make money you intend to donate to charity, but a store with only one item to sell would be pretty naff right? I’ll work on this one. Promise.

2) Make more use of sewing machine and create at least one skirt from scratch: Again I kinda half did this. I reorganised my craft room so I can actually get at my machine without having to carry it about everywhere and I sorted out all the stuff I need to get on with making things – I just didn’t get round to making the skirt. But, I did make a lovely cushion (and embroidered it) and ploughed through one of my sewing books so I can learn more about what my machine does. I think this coming year will be my skirt making year so watch this space!

3) Learn to dive: CHECK! I actually did this one. This year I not only got my PADI Open Water but I completed my PADI Advanced Open Water and got qualified in Enriched Air diving. I’ve got about 20 dives logged now and am super excited about getting out and seeing more of the world’s oceans. At Christmas I went to Malaysia and got to play about with my new camera, here’s Nemo:

4) Learn Photoshop basics to improve photographs: So Photoshop is harder than I thought and there is definitely a lot to learn on this… but I’ve made a start. I’ve managed to cut three people out of one image and put them in to another, I’ve rubbed out plastic bottles and lamp-posts and learnt about image size and how to crop (ya’know – the simple stuff). My cutting out skills definitely need working on though. Max also showed me how to open my eyes – i.e. cut out Claire’s open eyes and stick them over my closed eyes!

This is a photo taken of Claire and I with Todd Kowalski from Propagandhi. On the original picture we were outside a pub and my eyes were closed. Here we are in Hawaii with my eyes open (if you look very closely you’ll notice they’re very similar to Claire’s eyes).

5) Take more photos and get uploading to Flickr: My new camera has helped with this one. On my last holiday I took about 1000 photos! Can you ever imagine doing this with an old camera that needed film? Crazy! Anyway I’ve slowly been making more use of Flickr and you can go and see my photos any time – lexrigby’s Photostream.

6) Make Donna a big granny blanket: Yes yes I did this. It got completed on March 18th for her birthday. Here is a picture of me admiring the finished product:

7) Print some Moo cards: Totally failed on this one. I figured I didn’t really need any if I didn’t get the store up and going. They’ll come eventually when I’m all business like.

8) Get funding for the IATUL conference in Belgium: I failed this too but it was kinda out of my hands. I wrote my statement about why I should be awarded the funding but at the last minute one of my bosses decided to write the entire thing himself on my behalf. I don’t blame him for not getting it or anything as I was told the application was exceptional, just not exceptional enough. Life goes on.

9) Design a cross-stitch pattern to raise more funds for the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society: This was another one of those half did/half didn’t ones. Whilst I didn’t get around to design the pattern I longed to do I did get all subversive after buying Subversive Cross Stitch and started writing some cross stitch patterns inspired by Propagandhi lyrics.

10) Organise another SSCS fundraiser: This one is another ’still to do’. I think time ran away with me on this one. Whilst I didn’t organise a fundraiser myself I did volunteer at a number of events this year (including the International Dive Show at the NEC) and completed the first round of volunteer training. I’m now listed as an official volunteer on the Sea Shepherd UK website, so it’s all good in the hood still.

11) Make sushi: No making but plenty of eating. I’m going to get Donna to show me how to do this, she makes amazing sushi!

12) Finish Ursula tattoo: Yep, done and dusted. This is on my back:

13) Start work on Kali tattoo: I didn’t do this but I did get a whale instead, I think Kali needs more thinking about. This one is on my left inner arm – it was pretty swollen so excuse the chubbiness, I think the photo is a bit squished too (I got it off Myspace because I couldn’t be bothered to take a photo):

14) Keep up the weekly postings on my work blog: I did this! Want proof? See Librarians’ Blog for Science and Engineering.

15) Master the art of false lashes (just because there’s got to be at least one vanity thing in here): I did this too but none of my pictures are close enough for you to see them clearly. I’ll work on getting proof of this.

16) Keep up with the personal training sessions: After a year I figured these were just getting far too expensive to continue. I went from about August 2008 to August 2009. I fully intended to restart them but really £120 a month on top of my £42 a month gym membership… really.

17) Tick off the to-do list and write up results: I guess the result of this is this blog post. I did tick items off in my book and did refer back to my list to remind me what I needed to do, I just didn’t do as much as I wanted. I had planned to do a scrap book but I definitely think a blog post is more my thing.

18) Start open uni short course on marine biology: The Open Uni course I wanted to do is a short module called Life in the Oceans: Exploring our Blue Planet. It looks like the greatest short course of all time but a las I’ve not had a spare £150 to do it yet. I will though, studying Richard Attenborough’s Blue Planet sounds like the best thing ever.

19) Prepare for Cilip (this is the professional association of librarians) chartership: I simply changed my mind on this one I’m afraid. I just don’t know if I want to charter just yet. The chartership means doing a lot of work I just don’t want to do at the moment. Career development portfolios and all that malarky… snore.

20) Cook for Max at least once a month: I managed this one I think for a few months. I mainly make him puddings like cookies and cake. This will change this year though as I’ve a new cook book and it’s amazing. I won’t tell you anything else yet as I’m working on a post for this beauty that stands alone.

21) Visit Stef in Canterbury: Sorry Stef, you just come home too much. I’ll visit her this year for sure.

22) Read Moby Dick: I didn’t do this either, but I did read a lot about other whales!

23) Cycle to work at least twice a week in the Summer: This is my main regret I think. I should have done this, but I didn’t. Curse me.

24) Watch a broadway show: For my 25th birthday Sarah got me some gift vouchers for a London show and after loads of faffing about she never got to come with me. Instead, Max and I went to see Wicked… and it was wicked. I’d already read the book (and thought it very strange) so was interested to see how it would translate to stage. I liked it, it worked well and luckily they kept all the sexy scenes out.

25) Finish decorating the kitchen: YES, YES and YES and it’s the greatest kitchen of all time.

I’ve already written this year’s list… I might put it up later but in the meantime, thanks for reading.

Last week saw the return of Sheffield’s FREE vegan food fair. We had a great time making up soups, chillis, curries, pizzas, vol au vonts, dips, cakes, cookies, displaying fresh fruit and serving up jo-public. Although essentially the fair was 100% free, donations were welcomed and ended up covering the entire cost of the venue and extras. What a result! We welcomed the homeless and the Big Issue sellers – sending them on their ways with full tummies and take outs. Take a look at some of these!

Firstly. The Sea Shepherd Conservation Society have done it again – teaming up with Lush to raise funds for the ‘End Canada’s License to Kill‘ campaign. This time get yourselves in store to purchase a First Swim bubble bar or Sea Shepherd Charity Pot to show your support. The commercial hunt brutally claims the lives of over 250,000 seals each Spring, making it the largest mass slaughter of marine animals in the world. And many baby seals are slaughtered so young they haven’t even had a chance to go into the water, hence the name First Swim.

The facts:

• The slaughter of seals is incredibly cruel (a post mortem survey has shown that 42% of these babies are skinned alive);
• It is a threat to the survival of the species;
• It is a threat to the survival of cod;
• It is a slaughter done mainly for unessential, vanity, and luxury items, and therefore, is unnecessary;
• It is unethical to slaughter newborn seal pups (About 95% of the seals to be slaughtered are babies less than four weeks old.

Secondly, if you’re interested in what Captain Paul Watson has to say he’s going to be at the London Dive Show March 28th-29th giving a short seminar from 3:15pm in the North Gallery 16/17. There will also be a Sea Shepherd stand at the event (554) to raise awareness and generate interest. Annoyingly I have a prior arrangement so if anyone does get to go please please please get in touch and let me know how it went.

If you ever needed any more proof that Propagandhi are the best band in the entire world. look no further. March 10th sees the release of their new record Supporting Caste, but if you can’t wait that long (I can’t) you can download two exclusive tracks from their website, providing you donate to one of three organisations:

• Sea Shepherd Conservation Society (an international non-profit, marine wildlife conservation organisation);
• Partners in Health (provides a preferential option for the poor in health care);
• Peta 2 (the youth division of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals).

Needless to say my donation goes to the Sea Shepherds and I think YOURS SHOULD TOO (although all are seriously worth while)! These guys need more money to succeed in shutting down the illegal slaughter of whales. Help them out!

Once again whilst enjoying our Christmas break, eating til we explode (that wasn’t just me was it?), Captain Paul Watson and his Merry Men set sail on this year’s mission to save the whales. Operation Musashi launched and I think it’s about time I gave y’all an update.

Leaving Brisbane, Australia on December 4th (with a brief fuel and oil stop in New South Wales and Tasmania) the crew headed off to the Ross Sea with one sole purpose – to intercept the Japanese whaling fleet. Operation Musashi is in fact Sea Shepherd’s fifth Antarctic Whale Defense Campaign aimed to tackle illegal whaling activities committed under the guise of ‘research’. Following the success of last year’s campaign (Operation Migaloo), which saw the Japanese fleet return home 484 whales ($70 million) short of target, Captain Watson intends to further undermine their profits and expose the true damage of violating the international moratorium on commercial whaling. For Watson, in targeting endangered whales for the sale of its meat this fleet threaten ‘the diversity of life and thus the future of our own kind upon this planet’ and it is up to us as human beings to ‘risk all to protect diversity and the right of other species to live unmolested by the rapacious greed of humankind’.

Fast forward to December 20th 2008 and the crew aboard the Steve Irwin have their first encounter with the Nisshin Maru.

On Saturday morning, we spotted a moving target on the radar. The entire area was shrouded in thick fog and dense ice as we moved towards the ship. It could only be a whaler in this area and we could only assume that they thought we were part of the fleet. They did not alter course nor did they attempt to speed up. – Captain Paul Watson

Then out of the fog, emerging on Steve Irwin’s port side, came the Yusshin Maru No 2 sporting a new device – a large net rigged to draw across the entire side of the vessel on a high wire between the fore and aft mast – to stop the Sea Shepherd crew from boarding. And so the inflatable Delta was launched armed with rotten butter bombs as foul props. But with high winds and a malfunctioning GPS system the Delta was called back and the Irwin moved on to seek protection against the blizzard conditions from a nearby iceberg – where they remained for the next 12 hours before pursuing open water. This time the whalers escaped fleeing eastward, putting 50 miles between themselves and the whale protectors. Being more concerned with running from the Sea Shepherds than killing whales meant that for now the whales were safe.

Unbeknown to the crew they’d only have to wait another nine days until their next encounter. Quartermaster Jeff Hansen ‘noticed something on the radar that warranted first mate Peter Brown’s attention’. With the fog clearing Emily Hunter (daughter of the late Robert Hunter) later confirmed this ’something’ to be the Kaiko Maru, one of the fleet’s spotter vessels. And so the chase continued and the Japanese were unable to continue whaling in Australian waters. However,

‘What is now good news for the whales in Australian waters is now bad news for the whales in the waters south of New Zealand,’ said Captain Watson. ‘They are still targeting endangered and protected whales in the waters of an established international whale sanctuary and thus they are still in violation of international conservation law and acting under the principles of the United Nations World Charter for Nature, we will continue to pursue, harass and intervene against their blatantly illegal lethal assaults on the whales.’ – Sea Shepherd News.

Fast forward again to January 6th 2009 and three whaling vessels (spotter vessel the Kyoshin Maru No. 2 and the two remaining kill ships, the Yushin Maru No 1 and No 3 – No 2 had headed off for mechanical repairs) lay on the horizon engaged in a search for the missing whaler Hajime Shiraskai, thought to have fallen overboard the night before from the Kyoshin Maru No.2.

Out of respect for the lost whaler and his family, we all stood down as an offer of assistance was put forward to the whaling fleet to help in the search. Our Japanese crew member radioed the Japanese fleet with our offer which resulted in almost 15 minutes of silence before we finally got a response. – Crew Blog.

And that response was to inform Paul and his crew that the fleet were not willing to accept any help from ‘Eco-Terrorists’. Yet with Paul being Paul they launched two boat crews and a helicopter to search the area, aiding the search nonetheless. But not for long, the ship is in need of fuel to continue with the Operation’s second leg. After a stop in Hobart they’ll be back in the dangerous waters to continue our battle for the seas. Please support this mission!

I’ve always kinda liked Blink 182 but it was mainly because I thought Travis Barker was hot. The guy is a complete DUDE. He gives kids free drum lessons and everything. So when I heard he’d been in a plane crash I was pretty cut up about it. But then the thing that upsets me more is after being a vegetarian for 25 years (!!!!!!!) hes decided to start eating meat again to ’speed up the recovery process’ saying that he needs more protein than that he gets from his protein supplements. Can you believe this?? I think he suffered a seriously bad bump to the head if he thinks protein is only available to vegetarians in supplement form. I’m one of those ‘extreme’ vegetarians… you know, one of those ‘Vegans’ and I quite happily get more than enough protein from my ’strict’ diet of leafy greens, beans, tofu and those amazing little chunks of TVP (that’s textured vegetable protein). 

I need protein from food rather than just protein supplements. I changed my diet. I would do anything I possibly could if they said like “There’s a possibility you might heal faster if you do eat meat or just change your eating habits” so I did. I don’t regret it at all.

Oh Travis please do some research before you believe everything you’re told.

I have a treat in store for all you Sheffield peeps!! My friend Donna and I are organising a showing of Rob Stewart’s Shark Water (click image for details). It’s going to be a great evening of entertainment. For those coming expect a short talk from Giles Lane (ex-SSCS crew member), vegan fish and chips (electricity permitting) and plenty of cakes, a little craft and lots of fun! All money raised will go directly to the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society to continue in our struggle to protect the seas.

For filmmaker Rob Stewart, exploring sharks began as an underwater adventure. What it turned into was a beautiful and dangerous life journey into the balance of life on earth.

Driven by passion fed from a lifelong fascination with sharks, Stewart debunks historical stereotypes and media depictions of sharks as bloodthirsty, man-eating monsters and reveals the reality of sharks as pillars in the evolution of the seas.

Filmed in visually stunning, high definition video, Sharkwater takes you into the most shark rich waters of the world, exposing the exploitation and corruption surrounding the world’s shark populations in the marine reserves of Cocos Island, Costa Rica and the Galapagos Islands, Ecuador.

The best thing about living in Sheffield is that there’s always cool stuff happening! This past weekend I managed to visit the Hurtful Essences bunch, watch the use of wacky bikes at the eco/mobility fest (a mini festival to encourage people to use bikes/public transport instead of their cars) and pat pigs at the Nether Edge village fair. Brilliant.

The one thing I’m really liking about Uncaged’s latest campaign is how good it all looks. The Hurtful Essences demo on Fargate involved a giant inflatable shampoo bottle and campaigners dressed as rats. The leaflets are a far cry from the usual shocking images animal rights groups use, simply because they’re still in-keeping with the whole orgasmic Herbal Essences advertising. Look a little closer though and you just might see some little lab ratties in those bubbles. I like it because it quite literally exposes all the bad s**t behind the ‘pleasurable’ experience of washing your hair.

Saying yes to Herbal Essences means saying yes to the ugly reality of animal testing.

And quite frankly I think it is time to ’start saying no’. Please visit the website, sign the petitions and learn more about Procter and Gamble. You can also get yourself a nice 10% off at Lush… but make sure you get yourself a Shark Fin Soap while you’re at it.

Iran as a Nation of Nose-jobs is another one of those repetitive cliches that, putting it politely, really gets on my nerves. Since beginning my research into Iranian blogging I have collected a mass of editorials that, like Hitchens, although seemingly attempt to depict ‘Iran’s Other Face‘ or ‘Lift the Veil‘ do little more than mislead its readers into thinking that the only aspirations of young Iranians is western simulation – to listen to western music, to dress in western fashion, to experience western romance (like you find in the movies) or simply to up sticks and seek new opportunities in the west.

Often such editorials only scratch the surface of Iran’s rich cultural heritage, offering us typical accounts of ‘when I told my friends and family I was going to Tehran, they looked at me as if I were taking a short break in Mordor’ and ‘nothing quite prepared me for the dust, noise and being swathed in fabric head to toe’. Don’t get me wrong, when I told my friends and family I was off to Iran for two weeks I, obviously like many others, was confronted with dumb-founded expressions and grew tired of comforting their fears that I might be taken hostage and paraded on Al Jazeera. However I don’t think I was unprepared to be ’swathed in fabric’ – I think that’s just ignorant. I lost count of the number of times I had to explain to people that wearing hejab is the law in Iran and of course I would need to wear hejab to abide by the law. The only way I felt I could describe this to others, with little knowledge about Iran, was by making a poor comparison between state law in the US. For example whilst the legal age of consuming alcohol may be 18 in one state it is quite possible that it may be 21 in another and just because you are old enough to drink in your home state it doesn’t mean you’re old enough to drink it in another state and must therefore stick to soft drinks unless willing to break the law. Tenuous or what!! but you get the point.

I thought that after visiting Iran I might write up my own experiences of life in a ‘closed society’ but to be honest every attempt I made followed a similar route – ‘it’s not what you’d think’, ‘that’s not what it’s like’, ‘it’s so different to how you imagine’. But the final nail in the coffin came as I read Rachel Cooke’s poor ‘Persian Pilgrim’ in the Observer (which I can’t seem to find an online link to). I think just about every third sentence riled me in some way and consequently I came to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter how sincere you try to be in writing about your experience in Iran as a westerner usually you just end up sounding like a complete moron.

I haven’t seen a woman’s forearms, or even a wrist, for so long that my vision has adjusted; it’s like getting used to a black and white television, after colour all over again.

Repeating stereotypical notions of ‘chador-clad Islamists’ or ‘Down with America Friday prayers’ is something I wanted to move away from but in attempting to depict a ‘truer picture of Iran’ these always seem to end up being the starting point of conversation. In attempts to educate people about Iran it seems that we always need to address the media’s misrepresentation of Iranian culture and exaggerated stereotypes, which shape the public image of Iran in people’s mindsets. If I felt like being harsh I’d say that mostly people here are ignorant but that isn’t true. We are just bombarded by terrorist theories and images of brutality to instill fear and subsequently justify supposed preemptive strikes against Iran. In my opinion an attack on Iran is highly unlikely’ it’s just too infeasible. For a start there’s too many paykans in the way, but that’s another story’.

My time in Iran was spent making some wonderful friends, re-acquainting myself with an ex-colleague and inspirational information studies researcher, hunting down traditional Persian cuisine for the less traditional (i.e. veganised chelo kebabs, tadique and khoreshes), frequenting coffee shops, shopping in the bazaars and generally having the time of my life, rather than fantasising about ‘orange blossom and the sound of the muezzin dancing faintly on the breeze’ or ‘camels padding elegantly across sand, crowded but authentic bazaars, and caravanserai with vaulted ceilings and twirling grilles over their windows’. And I certainly didn’t spend as much time as this Cooke woman moaning about my ‘wretched scarf’.