This is IT-ALY!

So, we decided to go out for lunch yesterday. To a new restaurant that's opened on Antigua Street at the top of Leith Walk.
This place has a long, long history of failed enterprises. Many different types of restaurant have come and gone, most of them only managing six months or so of actual trading. The thing is, it's directly across the road from a whole slew of well-established eateries - off the top of my head, I can list three or four Italian places, a fish place, a Thai place, and a Nepalese place (which, incidentally, does a great lunch deal, and was one of the places we took everyone to when they came to visit).

We go past this corner on the bus every morning, and it's been being done up for months. I took against it at first, because they had a sign in the window proclaiming "This is IT-ALY! Taste of Italy coming soon!"
Fairly innocuous, you might think, but that meant that every morning, as I arrived at work, I was humming Danni Minogue's 1993 pop hit "This Is It". And that's a horrible thing to do to someone, especially at that time in the morning.
But then we walked past it on the way to the cinema a couple of weeks ago, and had a glance at the menu. Which looked good, and very reasonably priced.

So we went there. And boy, I hope they make a success of this place!
I had spaghetti fagolini e pesto - potatoes and green beans sauteed with basil pesto (and spaghetti, obviously). It was fantastic. The slight sweetness of the potatoes mingled with the slight saltiness of the pesto. The spaghetti was just al dente. The pesto was oily, as pesto should be, but not overwhelmingly so. Nom nom nom. That's a recipe I'm going to have to recreate at home.

Matt had the quatro formaggi pizza. But this one, oh, it was so much better than the standard four cheese option. Along with mozzarella, gorgonzola, and emmental, it included goat's cheese. It was possibly the most delicious pizza I've ever tasted. (Yes, we shared our lunches.) I thoughtfully said at one point "Y'know, I think I would give up my hypothetical firstborn for this."

It most certainly isn't a place for people on a diet, and I was somewhat thrown by the fact that they charged £2 for a can - let me repeat that, a can - of lemonade, but it was awesome nonetheless.

Style Guru.

I have been wondering recently about style. Style as a concept in and of itself, rather than as fashion, or as a way of fitting in.
Friday, it having been dress down day at work, I wore the outfit below. It's not that dissimilar to my usual outfits, except that I wore my much-beloved hat, and also I wore a t-shirt/dress with skellingtons on.
Oh, and I had to crop the picture, because I got Matt to take this in the evening, I'd taken off my shoes, and I thought that my mismatched socks (one bright pink with owls on, the other stripy red and black with a skull on) didn't quite suit the outfit as my big buckly New Rock boots did.

I got a lot of comments. Some were in the "Why are you wearing a hat?" or "You're a freak." sort of arena, but mostly they were "Your hat is great!" or "Love the look!" or "You have such a sense of style!"

Now, I don't think I do have a sense of style. I suspect that would involve thinking more about what I wear, and perhaps deliberately wearing items that 'go together'. All I do is wear what I like. And judging by the reactions I garner, what I like is somewhat unusual. *shrugs*

Today's outfit (please excuse the squinting - it was taken shortly after I got out of bed, plus I had no glasses on):

Those are my new and adored purple leopard-print tights.

Anyway, what's your opinion of style? Is it inextricably linked to fashion, either popular or not? Is it a reflection of personality? Or is it just a matter of wearing what you love?

Funny how things linger.

I wrote this song (which also has a melody) back when I was about 14. For some reason, it still hangs around me, especially when I'm depressed. It's not well-written, but it lingers.
*shrugs*

Father, mother,
Sister, brother,
Why do you try to possess me?
Father, mother,
Friend or lover,
I am not who you think me to be.
I am not me.

Do you see the girl behind the mask?
The tears run down her face.
The wall is round her.
No-one has found her.
The mask is back in place.
I am not me.

Father, mother,
Sister, brother,
Why do you try to possess me?
Father, mother,
Friend or lover,
I am not who you think me to be.
I am not me.

The smooth facade
To hide her heart
Has been in place for years.
She don't seem real.
A smile of steel.
Ice eyes to freeze her tears.
I am not me.

And that's all I have this week.

Movie Night! Huzzah!

We were tidying up beforehand, and Matt chucked Raoul (named after the big gay Supernatural dragon from TWOP) on to the sofa in order to put the throw back on to Jabba (our horrible big, pink, flabby looking armchair). I came back into the sitting room, and called out "Matt? Why is Raoul licking the jackalope?"

We had a lot of films to choose from. I got everyone to winnow down the choices.
It came down to Zombie Strippers, Frogs, Crazy As Hell, and The Mangler. We ended up getting Zeph to choose (with no little aiming from his mother), so we watched Frogs and Zombie Strippers.

But Colin was very tired. And I had a box of hair accessories.

Bill's very punk. *does satan hand gesture*

Sammy and Rowenna and Davron... (Shawna, please note that your and Heather's gifts live on top of the sofa!)

This one's not a great picture of anyone, but it shows a bit of the decor, I guess... That's my science shelf. It's got all of my fossils and rocks and things on it. And my bottle of Loch Ness water.


I have no idea what Matt was describing to Ewan. But it was apparently funny.



Ach, it was a good night. Although I heated up the sausage rolls, but forgot to put them out. So we now have a whole 14-inch pizza to get through, a whole garlic flatbread to get through, and 18 sausage rolls! I knew I'd gone overboard on the food!