rounded up

The hype surrounding the Melbourne Cup, aka "the race that stops the nation" has never really made that much sense to me. While I like watching horses race (there's something powerful about it), I'm not really that invested in the gambling/drinking/dressing up side of things. Which is odd, considering that I love getting dressed up, very rarely say no to champagne and should probably take any chance I can to double my finances. Also, I don't really like the concept of racing. It doesn't have a point. I feel it would be more interesting if contestants (runners, cyclists, horses etc) had to run away from something. Like a dragon.

Mostly its the orange fake tans, the dresses that make you look like you're a bursting sausage, the bogan boys and the vomiting (It is possible to have a drink or two and not get trashfaced) which makes the Races just seem particularly trashy to me, for reasons that make me sound like a prudish old fuddy-duddy. Which I'm not, am I?


This year, I decided to inject a little bit of class to the whole affair. With cupcakes.

I baked 24 "Almost Coconut Cupcakes" from The Whisk Kid's recipe. I am never ever using any other cupcake recipe except this. The coconut milk gives the cupcakes a softness that lasts for days, as well as a lovely summery taste.


When the cupcakes were out of the oven, and I had dislodged Lottie from my lap (more on that later) I set about icing each cupcake according to the jersey that each jockey would be wearing in the race - there were supposed to be 24 horses racing, but Changing of the Guard was (somewhat controversially) scratched, leaving me with 23 cupcakes to make.


Of course, the cupcake that I was least happy with turned out to be the horse that won the cup. It's name was Shocking (it's the orange/black and red one), and later that night, Libby would eat it with aplomb. The other horse that was difficult was Daffodil, whose jersey had a horse on it. That's the white cupcake with six green smarties on it. I find it hard not to use smarties in all my food decorating.


Libby, Emma and Lizz came over for pink sparkling wine, nachos and cupcakes. Very stylish. It was forty degrees Celsius, which is ridiculous, so Libby got in the pool, and took poor Lottie with her. Lottie will do anything for treats, and demonstrated that she may turn into a water dog.

Mostly though, Lottie is very good at three things: Eating, Bouncing and Sleeping. The eating isn't really a problem (although she ate a cupcake wrapper and spewed it up) but the Bouncing is truly terrifying. She's about 6 kgs at the moment, and just over a foot long (not counting tail), but when she bounces towards you, its hard to know whether you're going to be licked or nipped or both. The Bouncing lasts for about half an hour, then is followed by a long nap, which lead several members of my family and friends to comment that Lottie and I have similar sleeping skills - we can nap anywhere, anytime.

For proof:

Lottie, napping in her bed, which she is now sort of too big for!

Lottie and I, napping on the kitchen floor at 6am. Excuse my ludicrous pjs and hair. I have gotten a haircut recently, and no longer look like a gothic haystack.

Lottie, napping next to my leg. The flash woke her up for all of 30seconds.

Lottie, napping on my mother's lap and doing her best kangaroo impression.

Lottie, napping on my legs. After she slid off my lap, she stayed like this for half an hour.

Lottie, napping on mum's lap, distrupting year 10 marking. She likes to have her head higher than her body when she naps.
I think its because it makes her snore.

Lottie, napping on mum's lap, side view. See how much bigger she is???

In other news, it turns out that Editors have contributed the song "No Sound But The Wind" to the New Moon (sequel to twilight) Soundtrack. I generally support soundtracks, but this just makes me cranky. It looks like its going to be worse than the last movie. But the main thing upsetting me is that Tom Smith wrote this song after reading The Road by Cormac McCarthy, not some wretched vampire story. Pah. I thought Death Cab for Cutie were bad enough, turns out The Killers are involved too. See ?? Is it just me, or does this reek of something rotten?