Officially back to week 1! A full year of blogging, once a week (usually a week or two too late). We made it. Feels pretty good. My last few days of the year went pretty swell, as did the first few of the new one. No crazy parties or celebrations but a lot of good food and drink and time with my family. Pretty nice.
I also texted a bunch of friends, was really good to check in with everyone. Do miss my grandma. Love my cats. Things are going well.
Half in the old year, half in the new.
We spent a lot of last week and Monday and Tuesday cleaning the house up. My mum's a total clean freak so I put in more elbow grease than usual to make sure everything was sparkling clean. We also did some last minute shopping, mostly food. I got a really hefty beef cut for our roast. It's pretty pricey which annoys me because I liked it a lot but can't have it all the time...
Cats I saw on the way to the supermarket.
At last it was New Year's eve on Wednesday. My sister and mum got back from Bordeaux about 11AM, they were really hungry so I made them some fried beef and chicken from the leftover meats I had. I made quite a meal for New Year's... here's a Finny recommended New Year's menu:
1. Cranberry mocktail
Take a glass cup fill 1/4 of it with orange juice, 1/4 with cranberry juice, and 1/2 with ginger beer or ginger ale. I used Canada Dry and it was really good. Add a sprig of rosemary and an orange. If you're real fancy put some cranberries on it too. Sadly I didn't have any. This drink was so good. Recommend to everyone!
2. Beef roast and gravy
Get a nice chunky lean beef and smother it in garlic, rosemary, thyme, some peppers, butter, salt. Mine came with a fat chunk wrapped around the beef which gave it some great juice. I also made a beef stock the night before: just boil beef with bone, carrots, greens, onion, and any veg you have for a few hours. The gravy I made with the stock, some flour, vinegar, and butter on a low fire.
3. Creamy parmesan potatoes and mushrooms
Boil some small potatoes a little. Then roast them with mushrooms, garlic, rosemary, thyme. Whatever you want! Then make a sauce of cream, chicken/beef stock, some more garlic, and parmesan. Add potatoes and mushrooms to creamy sauce.
4. Sort-of chocolate trifle with raspberries
I baked a very basic brownie earlier. I overcooked it, better if you keep it soft and gooey. I made a chocolate mousse that actually turned out like a mousse which surprised me. For the mouse, even if you don't have something to whip the cream with: separate yolk from egg whites. Melt chocolate over very low heat and mix with yolk and sugar, super low heat though so you don't make an omelette. If you're seeing clumps it's time to turn the heat off. Beat the cream as much as you can and slowly mix with choc-yolk mixture. Cool it in the fridge, it should give it a mousse texture. I chopped all the brownie up and placed some at the bottom of my glass cups. I put mousse over the brownie, then some whipped cream, a little chocolate shavings and the raspberries. It was tasty as hell.
Closer to the night, everyone just hung out. My mum and sister were really tired from nearly two days of traveling though. My mum took a nap and my sister fell asleep after forcing us to watch the new FNAF movie even though she herself could barely stay awake. We woke her up a bunch of times but she was mad about being woken up and would fall asleep again. Then when we woke her up a half hour before midnight she was mad we woke her up so late. Ah, teenagers...
We drank what was left of the ginger ale instead of champagne even though I did buy a prosecco which I had a really hard time picking on the account of I know nothing about wines and champagnes. I may pick an okay beer or cider but wines mean nothing to me. Midnight came and we opened our gifts, I made a post on finnymemo about all the gifts I got this year so head over there if you're curious.
On the first day of the year we relaxed all the way. We watched some movies set during the New Year as is tradition. Ate leftovers and had some hot chocolates with whipped cream. I love those a lot.
Me with the choc.
Friday was pretty uneventful, most government organizations were still closed so I was still awaiting news from my France Travail counselor. However, I guess the post was working because I got my most awaited gift, my music player! It's the Snowsky Echo Mini and its the dream. If you're looking for a real old school feel but still a lot of memory (plus SD card access, duh) and an okay price, this is definitely it. Doesn't hurt that they also come in such cute colours (I chose the pink one).
Even cat loves it.
So beautiful...
On Saturday our boiler/heater was truly dying. Our family friend Andrey came over and managed to fix it up but there seems to be some part that is in need of replacement. Also, my mum's other friend stayed over because her car broke down so we had a mini-sleepover in a way.
On Sunday I was bored and realized that I had my Steam Replay to look at and that Letterboxd also has some kind of year-in-review feature even though I'm not a paid user. Er, sorry but you'll never see me pay for that kind of stuff... It was pretty funny to browse though.
I write small reviews on my media logs so 0 here.
Josh Hartnett 4ever <3
I actually didn't like Companion much...
Pre-Halloween watches.
Friday? Interesting.
So embarrassing... both sucked, but I knew that.
I'm okay with this.
What the fuck is a nanogenre?!
My Steam Replay is only for the PC games I played cuz I did play a lot on the 360 and DS this year which was not included here obviously. Also some games I've played before but not on Steam so they are marked as first time playing but they ain't.
Too much time spent on DBD.
Kind of like last year.
I'm guessing 2026 is gonna have TF2 at the top too.
Played a lot with my friend Tom.
Very fun but I didn't finish it yet.
Played with my brother and sister.
Killed my brother a lot in this one.
Not bad, not bad...
And then the week was over! Time doesn't stop for any of us, sometimes I wish it would a little. We already had horrible news and it's barely the second week of January. I guess I'm gonna work out what I can for myself and try to see what can be done for others. Every small thing counts now, I guess. If there's one thing I'm leaving solidly behind in 2025 is corporate-owned social media, I've finally cemented my position against it and I won't be back. It's shit for everyone. Even stuff like activism, I mean staying informed about social issues via social media, had some effect there before, now it feels like everything is drowned out by convenient lies and slop. Good riddance.
Goodbye 2025!
This Week I'm Excited For...
We're gonna play Left 4 Dead/Left 4 Dead 2 again but this time with my friend Tom who's never played it before. I'm not sure why I'm this excited for this but I am!
Song Of The Week...
Since I got my music player I've been listening to my curated playlists from 2000s and 90s faves, each playlist is like 10GB+ so not all songs fit on my current SD. I found myself listening to Polar Bear Club's Convinced I'm Wrong a lot. It really got stuck in my head this week.
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