Banana cake

with fudge frosting.

Found this recipe on Betty Crocker.

I won't say that this is a screw-up, because in the end the cake was still edible. Though no one at home really finished it since it was sweet. Usually they finish up the savoury stuff.

I baked this cake for my Dad's birthday (which was mid last month).

Haha sorry for the almost-a-month late update. Whatever.

And you all don't laugh at me lo. Hahaha. I doubt this is as entertaining as the blueberry muffins one though.

So I sifted my flour,


added the baking soda,


cinnamon,


and salt in a bowl,


and a lot of sugar into a large mixing bowl. I used brown sugar instead...healthier. Supposedly.


DIY-ed some buttermilk,



took the bananas out to mash.


I mashed the not-so-ripe =( bananas coarsely, hoping that there'd be some texture in the cake.


Flashed out my new springform pan.


Actually I didn't really need a springform for this, because it's just a normal cake. Not like it's a cheesecake or anything like that. But I invested in it because I thought, probably next time I'll make some cheesecake. Probably. Next time. Don't know when.

Add softened butter to the dry mixture.


See the impression of my thumb on the butter? I hope that's soft enough =S


Whizz.



Then the eggs.


Vanilla.


Then whizzed some more.


Add the dry ingredients and buttermilk alternately. Dry mix - buttermilk - whizz - dry mix - buttermilk - whizz....till everything is used up.



Until you get a nice looking batter.


In goes the bananas.


Stir.







I thought looking at the cake rise above the pan is a good sign.


Maybe it isn't. It could be the cake pan being too big or small, or whatever reason there is, that caused the cake to rise then fall again =( And on top of that, there's a canyon right in the middle of the cake. I named that the Grand Banana Cakeyon.

HELLO!

HELLO!

HELLO!

HELLO!

Hello!

Hello!

Hello!

This is how it looks like out of the springform.


It's waaaayyyy uglier than the kind you buy at the neighbourhood bakeries.

Anyway, I bought some walnuts. And toasted them in the toaster.


Chop chop.


And this is what you get.


Time for the disgustingly sweet chocolate fudge.

I don't know why I'm making this cake.

I don't like chocolate.

But I just wanted to try and ignored all possible consequences. =P

Sugar and unsweetened cocoa and milk.


Oh boy that was a huge amount of sugar. I swear I didn't add as much as the recipe asked me to.



Stir stir stir.


Butter and honey.


Stir stir stir,

this is the consistency you get.


(my this is super unhealthy. No wonder I put on weight. I should just quit baking altogether, my figure is getting from bad to worse.)

Spread the fudge around the cake.

Sprinkle/drizzle/POUR the walnuts over.

Add some decorations.

Cake. Birthday cake.


Clap hands, sing song.

Blow wind blow.


See the walnuts all over the place in that general direction? This is wind dispersal.

Maybe my dad could have been a tuba player when he was younger, he's just keeping it from me.

One thing I learnt from this is that, it's not exactly a good thing to serve up freshly-baked cakes. Beware of what might happen.



As you can see from the photo above, the coarse banana bits fell to the bottom of the cake. Apparently the batter wasn't thick enough to hold it there. I don't think the cake is soft. Nor fluffy. =(

I want cake.


AHHHHHH~!


I'm back.


I want cake.


Best served cold.

Just like my jokes.

Not again.

I admit that I'm really disappointed, really really disappointed, but it's no one's fault, and I'm sure the kids did their best.

No I think there's something that I can find fault with.

It must be the uniform. eriko reminded me.

Time to change it to the bright yellow + brown ensemble.

I am superstitious.

Bo tio.

AGAIN.

-_-

I was just so close =(

In the end PW was giving away FOURRRRRRRRRRRRRRR (say this with the 'GRRRR' sound) KitchenAids.

And I got none of them!

These two folks were the closest to me.


I'm like #18170. Sooooooo close, so farrrrrrrrr, we aaarrrrrrrrreeeee.

The Jason guy who won one of the mixers, do go to his blog. He paints beautiful stuff! And he's just 29. So this guy can paint, he can cook (I assume he's getting the mixer for himself). If only I'm half as capable.

By the way if you guys are wondering how PW picked the winners for her giveaway contests, she goes to random.org. So she'll just pick the number of integers she wants, and find the winners.

When will it be my turn =(

Please let me win.

I took part in this contest at the Pioneer Woman. To win KitchenAid standup mixers. PW is giving away three of them.

I was supposed to say what I wish I could cook or bake.

And I said Asian food. Which is true. I can't really cook Asian stuff. Okay, maybe I didn't try. But I will!

After which I thought about it for a while and..realised that bread should be the answer. I've never baked the perfect bread.

=(

But still. Please let me win! They cost more than SGD1000 here, and just about USD300 there. Plus shipping..I think it'll be cheaper.

Hope that I'll win! =P I want a sunshine yellow one. (well I wanted red, but everyone seems to have the red one, I thought the yellow one would be cute)

(not that I'll win anyway, there are nearly 20,000 people who took part in the contest!)

Till the princess is annoyed!!

I've been blowing my nose a lot today. Not a lot, but more than usual. Aughhhhhh I hate being sick.

Anyway, here's a video to share. Hilarious yet amazing. Hahaha.



Remember to turn the captions on. The arrow up icon on the bottom right corner.

Awesome. Haha.

But bear he mind he didn't sing that, an a Capella band called Moosebutter did. The guy in the video lip synced, but I think it was well done enough!

It would be a lie to say that I'm not affected. I am. I am worried.

It's just that there is an increasing number of stuff that I have to fret, and I'm very tired from all the worrying.

Where am I supposed to stand?

I'm feeling sick. =\



Edit: I hate school. ='(

Bo tio. =(

No more extra funds for my grad trip. =(

Oh come on.

I read this in the Ask Aunty (Agony) section of the latest Reader's Digest issue.

Dear Aunty,

You've probably heard of Stephanie Meyer's best-selling novel Twilight, which has now been adapted into a movie. I'm completely obsessed with the character Edward Cullen. Usually when I have a crush on a guy, I get over it in a couple of days. But I am totally into this character and it's driving me crazy and he doesn't even exist! I'm starting to wish all guys were like him (except for the vampire bit). I know I won't find anyone like him. I know this is wrong but I'm completely distracted. I can't concentrate on anything. What do I do?

Bewitched




I say go become Bella.

And that was it.

Blurred =(

So, I had my last band practice and last concert as a student.

It crept up to me before I realised it and ran away before I could do anything.

And I think it was the most stressful. I don't know why, everything felt so much more exposed. =S *shrugs*

At least it went quite okay =D

Oh I think I know why. Because there used to be many people in my section. Now it's down to four. And I had to work much harder. Though things were much tidier and it was easier to settle our issues. Most of the time there were only three of us to start with. =\ I'm not complaining.

Honestly, somehow I don't feel good about this concert. I don't know, I think it's me. The thought of it being my last as an undergrad is creepy. The end is coming soon!

I actually miss the good friends I used to have in the band, but they all left for some reason, or it's just that we didn't keep in much contact and aren't as close anymore. I'm old already, time to move on. *smiles and flashes my teeth, 梁婆婆style*

My days in NUSWS started really well and I was happy and in the company of many friends and enjoyed what I was doing. At the end I was still enjoying my tuba and music but something is still lacking...and I miss it.

However, still, thanks to the many many people who made everything possible =)

♥

And we found some familiar faces, tuba players who played with us.


The actual and only complete section photo which obviously didn't turn out well =(


This photo was taken before the first half.

The new wardrobe.

This is like, two to three months late. I'm extremely in blog-debt.

In mid-January this year my dad finally relented to my endless complains about the ugly wardrobe(s) of mine and brought me to the furniture store.

The wardrobes that were in my room were passed down from my sister and brother. Meaning, in the twenty years of my life,

OKAY, twenty ONE,

I've never had a wardrobe to call my own.

And yeay, we bought one! For nearly $900. Thanks so much mum and dad, I'm sorry I'm such an expensive daughter.

These are the old cupboards. Other than clothes, they stored my notes and linen and bags and other miscellaneous stuff.


And then.........it got removed! HAHA. Hurrah!!! Finally, the eyesore is gone!


And I mopped the floor.........anyway, it was quite disgusting. You see, my brother used to rear hamsters and sometimes they escape. So I saw something like a bed of newspaper strips that one of the hamsters made when it was hiding under my cupboard. That must have been many years back.

I suggest you people move your wardrobes here and there once in a while because you'll never know what lies in there.

This is why it's a good idea to have a walk-in wardrobe.


So one fine day the wardrobe came.


The guys have to move the parts over a longer distance to the lift lobby because of....


There was some repainting works going on.


I want to tell you guys about the new colours of my block. But I think I'll not. The ugly colours might just taint the beauty of my blog and you guys don't wanna read anymore.

So this is it!


Simple and pretty and elegant right. It looks a little too sleek for my room. But who cares.

This is the candy-like moth balls that my mum told me to put in the cupboard. And a few weeks later she said that my cupboard smelled too strongly of the moth balls as compared to my brother, who put charcoal and everything was dry and clean.

Tsk. She asked me to put the balls in one lo.


So I had to repack my stuff from the old cupboards into the new one. And along the way I found many treasures.

The bag that I ran away from home with, when I was little.


Stuff belonging to my uniformed school days.

PAP kindergarten name tag

I didn't use 'Erina' till around Primary 3. I suspect that they want me to identify with my Chinese name first.

Here's my Primary School name tag, along with the Young Scientist badges - astronomer and ornithologist - and this I Am Responsible badge. HAHA. Seriously. I don't know why I did ornithology, I don't like birds and I don't remember liking them.


Our name tags were in our house colours. I was from Green House a.k.a. Integrity House so my name tag was green.

I don't know where's my prefect tie. It was maroon with thin white diagonal stripes.

Here's stuff from my then ECA. Hey, we called it ECA in those days okay.

And they spelled my name as Lin Wan Ching Erina. Instead of Lim. Sometimes if they don't get your name right for once, they won't get it right ever. So I was officially Erina Lin for about three years.

Yucks. That sounds yucky. Haha.


I really can't remember what was done to earn those badges. If you're gonna ask, no, I didn't learn cycling to earn the My Journey badge.

On a sidenote, the Girls' Bridgade in my Primary School got shut. No more 29th COY in Yumin.

And then it was secondary school.


Apparently things were less badgy. The name tags were coloured by the batch I think. I really can't remember. I know I had a yellow name tag somewhere..but I lost it.







Oh here's a bonus for your eyes.

Here's me in kindergarten.


I really don't know why in the world they put us behind a red background, when parts of our gown are red! So it was like, parts of me were fused into the background. Like I don't have shoulders for nuts. At a corner of the trencher cap (is that what you call that?) was a red bunch of string. I don't know the term for that. But apparently you can't see it. Thanks to the red background which backfired.

Here's a closer look at cute mini me.


SO FAT.

I had a double chin. I hope I don't have them now.

Hey...was I...fair(er)?

And I love the spunky hairstyle.

Yea right.


Someone please tell me since when I was Lin Wanqin. That's not even my Chinese name in hanyu pinyin. Seriously.


That's my class photo. I can only remember two names because they were in my primary school and secondary school. And my teacher whose name is Mdm. Aishah.

I think.

Damn it.

The invite to Tony Blair's lecture on Thursday was sent out this afternoon at 4 p.m. plus and by the time I went to sign up just a while ago, registration was closed.

Darn.

InTempo 2009

(See, I almost forgot about advertising again.)

NUS Wind Symphony
presents

InTempo 2009

Conducted by Music Director A/P Ho Hwee Long

21 March 2009, Saturday
1930hrs
University Cultural Centre Hall, NUS
$12 Free Seating

COME!!! Here's the programme to attract you.

Chorale and Shaker Dance - John P. Zdechilik
Puszta - Jan Van der Roost
Hymn to the Infinite Sky - Satoshi Yagisawa
Vesuvius - Frank Ticheli

-Intermission-

Amazonia - Jan Van der Roost
Pinocchio - Alex Poelman
Fantasy Variations - James Barnes
Light Cavalry Overture - Franz von Suppé

I'm telling you, Fantasy Variations is very nice.

For tickets, contact ME.

I had a bad day today.

I don't really have the time to blog about it now, so KIV.

Or I might just feel better and not want to blog about it at all.

Okay. So here I go.

Early in the morning I woke up later than I had to. And then I bummed around my bed for a while, and of course I was late for school. I hate being late. But that's what always happen to me, especially to wake up early for the 8 a.m. class. This is me:

Hatred for lateness is much lesser than the love for bed.

A lecturer returned us a midterm paper and I found out I scored really terribly incorrigibly lousily. The result is too disgusting to announce online, my blog might even get reported for obscene content.

After that lecture and a lunch, I headed to Holland V with twiggy - before this semester I hardly ever went to Holland V, it just never was a place that I'd choose to go, but this is beside the point - to get some baking equipment I thought I'd need to make these lovelies for Saturday. However I couldn't find anything suitable. Along the way I gave up that thought.

I just shouldn't make those at all. Even though they are cute and lovely and pretty and sweet and cuddly and delicious though I've never tasted any nor made any. I still want to make them, but I guess I won't have the chance to until past this Saturday.

Then I came home and thought about it. I need not use those equipment actually, I could just mould it by hand! Just that it'd be really time consuming. And I don't have the time. And energy. But I've been to art classes, I can work with clay. Of course this implies I can work with dough! I'm not gonna feed you people clay and put stones in your kidneys! (I was about to say something really politically biased. Thank goodness I didn't, it'd be me against a billion people.) I'm sorry you all won't get any cute little cupcake pops/bites. I really am. I'll post photos here okay, take it as I gave you all already. If I ever make them.

Oh well, this week is very very very packed so I decided to just forget about cupcakes and think of something else. Like roses?

Nah, I'll think harder.

And after that it was band and I played as usual. Mistakes here and there, and after that a fellow member told me off for something that I really don't know how to solve. The best part is, I am not the only one responsible for whatever s/he's happy with. And of the handful of people s/he has to approach me. Instead of coming up with a nice idea or solution to it, s/he had to ask me to decide on the problem. Then how? What am I supposed to do? The entire band is involved! Do I look like I could help or something?

On top of that, you have to tell me about it twice. Once is really enough.

Well maybe I looked like I could help, because I have a nice and approachable and friendly persona everyone comes to me for everything.

Please come to me for only the good things. Please. I am too weary to think about the bad things.

Just kidding. You can come to me for bad things. But not this week. I promise I'll listen if you're listenable.

Oh by the way. To you who told the protagonist about this post, thank you very much. You can now try to find out who the above-mentioned person is and tell s/he if you really have a lot of time on your hand.

Hmmm.

Why not, instead of doing that, you go to CFA at 1030hrs on Saturday morning and help move the tubas? Since apparently you have a lot of time and energy. If you're already supposed to be there, start moving. Then if you want I can tell you about who s/he is.

I'm really thankful for RC, if not for him I guess I'd be weeping all the way from Kent Ridge to Tampines. Alone. But with RC, it was just Kent Ridge to Clementi. Thank you so much!!! Hearts! He probably offsetted all the bad things that happened to me. Heh. *shy*.

HAHA.

Do you want to come for my concert?

Come come come, you'll definitely treat yourself to a good show!!

COME!!

Come laaaaa.

COME!!!!!!!

It's on 21 March, this Saturday at UCC. 7.30 p.m.

Come laaaaa.

You can see the beautiful repertoire that has been prepared for you (our audience).

Oh you want to come already?? GREAT!! Quick quick! Come buy from me!!

Yeay, thank you very much!!

Huh you're not coming? Oh man....it's okay it's okay. Really okay. Just that I might have to absorb the rest of the tickets myself =( And I'm very poor already.

And I feel pressured 'cos I don't have much time to finish selling all the tickets. And they have to add on another two. D=

If you know anyone in my band who needs extra tickets, please let me know!!

Sigh. I'm very depressed by the many 'Oh I have something on that day, I'm sorry..' SMSes I've received today.

Some just don't reply at all.

It's my last concert and I've never been so desperate to sell my tickets. I wonder what happened to me.

Okuribito

Ohhh, the movie's really nice. Watched in on Friday with RC and boy I wondered how many times I cried.

It was a really touching movie depicting a story of a cellist who lost his job and went back to his hometown. He then got a new job which he couldn't accept at first, but after that, not only him, but even the audience will learn how to appreciate such jobs.

And the job is to be an encoffineer. Which means, to prepare a corpse and put it into a coffin. By preparation, meaning, there is a ritual to be performed and part of it is to beautify the dead to look as good as they were when they were alive.

Every body had their own stories, and they really wrenched my heart.

Really, you guys should watch it! And prepare some Kleenex, you'll definitely need it.

Sneak peek

To me, this is far more interesting than a movie sneak peek.

To you, this is far less interesting than a movie sneak peek.

Just gonna say, I'll be coming up with an erinaescapestoTAIWAN2009 blog soon.

Just telling you. But I'm busy with everything these days, from school work to school work to school work to RC to band to friends to Taiwan-related stuff.

So probably I'll start after a few weeks to come.

Anyway.

Just gonna say, again, that we booked tickets a few mins ago to The Answer Is... Stefanie Sun's World Tour 2009 this year. In Taipei.

Hurrah!

I'm not exactly a fan, but the thought of going to Taiwan to catch a concert, priceless. The ticket is about SGD 200 each, by the way. Big money, big money. But I guess now I have to save up. I really have to. So please donate your lunch to me if you don't feel like eating yours okay.

I'm already regretting not going to Hollywood Bowl for any kind of performance last year. I'm so not gonna give up on this.

I told you already, to me, this is far more interesting than a movie sneak peek.

I think I'm nice enough.

I know my reason would be pretty corny. But at least it is valid. I insist it is.

I don't like the look on your face when I said I will leave practice earlier to go home. And sleep. Because of the 8 a.m. test I have on Friday.

I know you have a test too.

But that's not the point.

Usually when I reach home after practice, it'll be somewhat past midnight, and I bathe and come online and do some work (if I have the energy), talk to RC on the phone for a while, and then I sleep. That'll be around 1 a.m. plus to 2. My mane wouldn't have dried yet, but I get very sleep.

And then wake up at 5 plus. To get ready for my 8 a.m. class at the western side of the island. This is like, maximum four hours of sleep. Which isn't unusual in university.

Then stand for around 20 minutes on the bus, 40-45 minutes on the train, and another 15 minutes max, on 95.

Though I usually make it to class a few minutes late, I end up dozing off.

So I think I really need some sleep. Things wouldn't be that hard if I live in hall/residence you know, which I'm not.

I'm not trying to complain. I'm trying to make you understand. You didn't get angry with me, but I just wanna say this.

And if I'm not nice enough, I wouldn't have turned up for practice at all and run home at 2 p.m.

Maybe 3.

Look who's stupid.

I feel particular irked by how narrow-minded someone can be. Quoting from Jingyi, this is a person of high IQ but low EQ.

Damn low EQ.

Read this article.

This is a good topic to write for GP. I could've typed out an essay here, but too bad I don't have two hours to spare.

You're the stupid one!

I'M ALIVE!!

Thanks to Bro's magic fingers~!!!

I couldn't log into my account for the entire night since IE gave me problems. Wrote a message to Bro, he SMSed me for the password this morning, and voila, I can use it as per normal already!!!

=D

To think that I wasted so much time last night whining and crying to RC because I was worried about the photos and important documents in the laptop. And I was darn suay because I was hugging the Buddha's leg, was rushing my assignment ma. And of all times to crash.

Anyway.

Hurray to Bro!

*expletive*

My laptop crashed.

Thanks to IE.

Bloody hell.

お幸せに。

珍贵，又富有诚意的一句话。

曾经的好朋友。

谢谢你。