Purple Monster

Hotel Pro Forma & The Knife

2010-02-08T19:25:00.012+01:00

Watching Hotel Pro Forma and the Knife's Darwin inspired performance was an intriguing experience. It was my first (and maybe last) electro opera, with a geological and biological touch. A strange, dream like combination woven together with slow, mezmerising movement.

In the beginning, I expected an average modern exprimental theatre piece, that would soon bore me out of my wits. Then, as a red clad lady stepped onto the the front of the stage, singing a legato opera piece about some kind of natural mineral erosion, I changed my mind. And later, when the entire back of the stage moves sideways, and beams of green lazer shot over my head in a sea of smoke and dry ice, it was clear that this performance is in no way old or boring, however there were periods that dragged out to the point that it was mildly sleep inducing.

The audience was comprised of an older, cult crowd, probably Hotel Pre Forma fans, and a younger, hip electro group, The Knife's followers. That is also partly, in my opinion, why the dreamy production was such a hit! Two very accomplished groups working together.

As a whole, it was an interesting and unforgettable experience. A storyline with many layers to be discovered and thought about, with Karin Dreijers remarkable soundtrack and the choppy, experimental choreography, unlike any other dance performance I've ever seen. Topped off with melancholic opera and occasionally a smooth, sweet pop voice, it was truly unique.

The Kooks, My New Found Love In The Music World

2009-08-17T22:57:00.010+02:00

One word, wow! As I sat at home, listening to an old Coldplay album over and over again, I couldn't help but to wonder if there wasn't more good music out there. Don't get me wrong, I do like alot of music apart from Coldplay, but I felt like I was in a rut, always the same bands in my fave playlist on Spotify. And then, in my moment of musical despair, there they were, The Kooks!

Of course they didn't just apear, the shaggy Brighton dudes have been a band since 2000. Lead guitar and vocals, Luke Pritchard, thrills with his amazing accent, dreamy voice and clean guitar riffs.

According to me, as a critic, their best album is Inside In/Inside Out. Some of my favourite songs are Naîve, their biggest hit, Seaside, which gives me shivers from the sheer perfection, and Always Where I Need To Be, with it's brilliant guitar and bass riffs.

I highly recommend them to Arctic Monkeys fans like myself, or anyone who enjoys a good indie band. Five =) =) =) =) =) out of five!

Got milk? NO!

2009-06-16T23:39:00.011+02:00

Lactose intolerant? Even if your not, you have probably heard it before from an aunt or an associate.
"Oh I'm sorry, I'm lactose intolerant, do you have soy milk or something like that instead?" That's what they all say, and you barely ever just happened to have the strange, bean based liquid they crave! For all those whom are lactose or milk protein intolerant, and for the considerate yet confused people who aren't, but want to learn more about us alien people who are, here's a guide to the strange world of intolerance!

To start off, here are some basic facts about lactose or milk protein intolerance.
*To be allergic and intolerant is not the same thing. Allergies are when you react to a food product or another substance with some form of uncomfortable reaction, and intolerance is meerly that your body is lacking the substance we use to digest lactose or milk protein.
*You can be intolerant to lactose, milk protein, or both. In some countries it is very common to be intolerant to one of them, like in Finland, where lactose intolerance is a run-of-the-mill hardship, or in China where milk protein intolerance is often seen.

If you aren't intolerant, you may think cooking or even drinking coffee without dairy would be a big hassle, but hopefully the following paragraphs will prove you wrong!

Purple Monsters's Official Guide to the Perfect Dairy Substitutes
Whether you are intolerant and need a little help with your every day dairy substitutes, or just a slightly confused non-intolerant person who happens to have an intolerant sister or such but feel as though you need a GPS in the soy isle of a super market, i hope you will enjoy the following guide.. =)

Substitute for:

Drinking milk/Cereal milk
I would suggest rice milk with added calcium, because of it's delicate, milk-like flavour and it's nutritional value.

Cooking milk for savoury or unsweetened dishes
Soy or oat milk is best for cooking according to me, they heat up well and dont add sweetness to your dishes. Oat milk is generally more available in northern European countries. For asian stews or other foods, coconut milk is an often used "dairy", both for dairy eaters and intolerant people.

Cream/Butter
I tend to use vegetable oil (such as canola or palm oils) based butter substitutes, they taste good and are better for your cholesteral levels than real butter. For cooking/coffee cream, vegetable oil based cream products work as well, or if you live in northern europe, oat cream works well in savoury dishes as well as coffee. You may also want to try powdered, dairy-free coffee creamers.

Yogurt
From my experiance, soy-based yogurt imitation products ("soy-gurt") taste the best.

Cooking milk for desserts
If you are looking for a flavourless dairy free option, go for rice milk. It won't add an unwanted flavour to your dessert. Other, more flavourful options, are almond milk or coconut milk. Observe that rice milk is a quite sweet product, so you may want to reduce the amount of sugar you add to your dessert.

A Story

2009-06-03T18:31:00.003+02:00

This is a story I've been writing in english class:

England

1808

March 26

Suddenly, I woke up! My three year old brother Morris had crawled up on my tummy and was pounding on my chest with his little fists. On my right Currie started to stir, and Grey who had his arm around me gave out a low, sleepy groan. I got up slowly, lift Morris onto my hip and walked towards the mouth of the cave, bending over so I wouldn’t hit my head on the stalactites. Our cave was a rather small room in a big rock right on the seaside. It had been shaped by the violent waves that must have come in at high tide many years ago. Nowadays we were lucky and had very calm water in the bay that we called our home.

It was a very foggy morning, and I could hardly see anything so I walked in the direction of the sea, and then I saw a tall human silhouette up to his knees in the water.

“Trisso!” I yelled, and the silhouette turned around.

“Book!” You are awake! Look what I caught!” he said and held up a big greenish fish.

“That’s food for all day!” I exclaimed. Morris started to doze in my arms and the three of us headed back to the cave with the fish. At the mouth of the cave grey had started a fire, and trisso hung the fish over it to cook.

Currie, Morris and I are siblings, and Trisso and Grey are brothers. We are all orphaned and we live in a cave on the beach because we fear the cruel life in and if we don't hide, the government men will take us back.

The rest of the day we spent doing our chores, preparing food, sweeping sand out of the cave and collecting oysters between the wet slippery rocks on the west side of the beach. By sunset we were exhausted, so we took a quick evening swim and then we crawled into the corner furthest into the cave and went to sleep.

At first I thought I was dreaming, but as I felt the cold, hard, sandy rock beneath me I realized that the voices I was hearing must be real. I peered out through the mouth of the cave and saw the silhouette of three men in police helmets holding batons! It was then I knew we would have to flee.

“Grey!” Wake up!” I whispered softly.

“Whatizzit?” he answered sleepily.

“The government men are here! We will have to wake everyone and and get out of here fast!!!” I whispered back. We got up and quietly woke everyone. We gathered our few belongings and and one by one crawled out of a small hole in the cave wall, our emergency exit. I was the last one out and as I wiggled my way though I heard one of the men say

“I swear it was here somewere that the lady reported to have seen a group of homless children.”

We tiptoed along the low shrubs in the dunes, until we were out of sight and earshot from the men. The we walked along the beach for what felt like all night. Grey and I took turnes carrying Morris, and Trisso carried Currie. We hadn't seen the men since we left the cave, but we decided that we must find a new place to live were they would never find us. By the time dawn broke, and a small slice of the sun could be seen licking the surface of the sea at the horizon, we were all exhausted and starving. Currie had woken up and was strutting impatiently. Suddenly she exclaimed,

“Look! There's a house!”

And sure enough, far ahead, a rather big red farmhouse could be sighted, and nexto it there was a barn.

“I’m really tired, do you suppose we could sleep in that barn?” Trisso said.

“Maybe.. Lets go see if there is hay or something we could sleep on!” I answered , as we walked in the direction of the barn. The door was open and we stepped in. It was very dark in there, and little sunbeams trickled own from the roof. The whole barn was filled with hay and it smelled strongly. As I lay down in the soft, blond grassy mass and put my head on Grey’s shoulder, I wondered if someone might find us, yet I was so sleepy that I didn't care.

Once again, I woke up suddenly! Someone had opened the barn door and the sunlight blinded me. A rather tall, balding middle aged man was standing in the door opening staring at us!

“Gertrude!” he called out,” Look what I've found!”

A moment later a middle aged woman with a frilly pink apron came rushing into the barn!

“Oh, goodness me! Children!” she exclaimed, surprisingly happily.

Then Trisso decided that it was time to introduce us, so he said

“Goodday Mr. and Mrs, my name is Trisso and theese are my frineds and my brother. We ar sorry to have borrowed your barn for the night but we were terribly tired, you see we have traveled a long way!”

“Why hello dears!” said the woman, “But were on earth are your parents?

“But we don’t have any parents.” I answered quietly. “The reason we had to leave our home and sleep in your lovely barn is that some policemen tried to put us in an aweful orphanage.”

“Oh, that's just dreadful!” said the man, “You must come into our house and have something to eat, you must be famished!”

We woke Morris and Currie, and walked into the big, red farmhouse with the friendly couple. The man who apparently was named Charles, showed us to a cozy table in the kitchen, and Gertrude served us scones, tea, cheese, butter and marmalade. We thanked them graciously and ate until our stomachs wouldn't hold more. Then I stood up, ready to leave, but Gertrude stopped me.

“We were thinking, if you and your friends wanted to, you could stay with us for a few nights until those horrible men stop looking for you.” I gave her a surprised look, and then I looked at Trisso and Grey.

“That sounds like a fine offer." Trisso answered for me.

“Yes, it most certainly does." Grey added.

“Well then it is decided!" Charles exclaimed.

The couple led us up a squeaky flight of stairs, through a hallway, and into the most delightful room I have ever seen outside of a book. It had two beds with lacy, flowered quilts and pillows. A huge window that beamed with sunshine, a cot with a small quilt that would be perfect for Morris, and a vanity with a mirror decorated with lillies of the valley.

”Oh goodness me, this is a beautiful room!” I exclaimed with delight.

“We thought that you and your sister and brother would take this room, and your friends would take the room next door.” Gertrude said, hiding a laugh at my enthusiasm.

We gladly agreed to the sleeping arrangements, and quickly made ourselves at home. I placed my only lipstick on the vanity, one that a noble woman once had given me when I sang at the town square to make money, and Currie curled up on the delicate quilt to see if it was as soft as it looked.

The next morning, after a hearty breakfast, Charles brought us outside to show us the farm. There was a field of corn, a strawberry field, a henhouse, a pasture with cows grazing, and a very fat dog with sad eyes and droopy ears. Charles explained that the dog was so fat because it was going to have puppies. This made Morris very excited, so he started playing with the dog hoping some puppies would suddenly appear.

We ate the sandwiches Gertrude had packed for us, and spent the afternoon helping Charles with the farm chores. Later that evening, after dinner, the couple said they wanted to tell us something. We curiously quieted down.

“We have often wished for children like you, for we don’t have any of our own.We have very much enjoyed to have you here, and before dinner Charles called the town council. He asked if it would be possible to adopt some homeless, orphaned children, and the council said yes! So we were wondering if you would like to stay with us. We would give you food and shelter and you could go to school. We would be like your parents!” Gertrude said looking at us.

I looked at her in shock, then at Grey, last at Trisso. From their eyes, I knew what I should answer.

“Why that is the kindest thing anyone has ever suggested to us! We would love to stay here with you!”Gertrude hugged me, and Charles was tear eyed with joy. And from that day on, we were no longer the homeless children, we were the happy children at Charles’ farm!

Inkheart

2009-06-03T18:04:00.005+02:00

I have recently been reading an amazing book, and I just finnished it today, so i thought I would write a review of it here :)

Inkheart by Cornelia Funke

The book is about Meggie, a 12 year old girl who adores books more than anything. She lives in a farmhouse in the italian countryside with her father, Mortimer. Everything seems just fine until one night, when i stranger arrives at their door. He seems to be an old friend of Mortimer's, but he is carrying some news that will change Meggies life in instantly, and leed to the secret of her mothers mysterious disappearance. In one strange evening, everything will change, and it's all because of Mortimers hidden gift, to read people or items out of a book just by reading it aloud!

I think it is a brilliantly writen book, just as Cornelia's books always are. The plot is amazing, and the descritions of the characters are fantastic. The first few pages are quite slow, but by the end of the second chapter it is impossible to put down! It is the first part of a trilogy, an I am dying to reed the next one. I would definatly suggest this book to anyone who likes magic, or even non-fantasy readers such as my self, who simply enjoy an exiting, well writen book.

I give it 5/5 stars!

Define Random

2009-02-13T20:13:00.009+01:00

The name of my blog has the word random in it, and the other day i was thinking, what exactly does it mean? Well i came up with that in the way that my friends and I use it, it means something that doesn't have anything to do with it's surroundings, for example:

"Hi Tom! How are you?"

"I like cheese!!"

After i figured out what random actually meant, I was thinking that I don't write random things in my blog, so I should definitely write something random now so that my blog content goes with the name! So here it is, the randomest text ever:

There was a boy, his name was Billy. One day he was walking down the street when he met a purple moose.

"Hello Billy!" said the moose.

"Hi moose dude!" said Billy

Then Billy climbed up onto mosse dude's back and they rode happily down the street.

Then, out of nowere, came a green goose. It swooped out of the sky and landed on Billy's head!

"Hello moose dude, hello Billy. I was just thinking, I like Jell-O!!" said the goose.

"What a coincidence! So do we!" said the moose dude and Billy in unison.

And then they all rode off into the sunset at mid-day!

Surya Namaskara

2009-02-03T18:20:00.010+01:00

When you read the title you probably thought that I had gone totally mad! Well I haven't I just enjoy doing yoga! Surya Namaskara is Salute To The Sun/Sun Salutation in English, and is a quite normal combination of 12 different yoga poses. It stengthens the back and is generally very good for the body.

Here are the 12 yoga positions in the order that they are done:

*Prayer Pose

(stand up with your feet together with your hands palm to palm at your chest while exhaling)

*Raised Arm Pose

(lean back gently with your arms in the air while inhaling)

*Standing Forward Bend Pose

(lean forward as far as you can with you legs straight and your hands reaching for the ground while exhaling)

*Equestrian Pose

done while inhaling (see the picture of the woman)

*Four Limbed Staff Pose

(lie down and hold yourself off the ground with your arms and toes, and keep your body straight while exhaling)

*Salute With eight Limbs Pose

(same as the previous but let your chest rest on the ground and lift your rear end while holding your breath)

*Cobra Pose

(my personal favorite!! Lie flat on the ground but lift up you upper body with your arms and look up at the sky while inhaling)

*Like a Mountain

(stand on your hands and feet and lift your rear end towards the sky while exhaling)

*Equestrian Pose

*Standing Forward Bend Pose

*Raised Arms Pose

*Prayer pose

Sound fun? Try it! Strangely you feel very relaxed and happy afterwards =)

Check It Out! It's a Sea Cow!

2009-02-01T21:20:00.013+01:00

I just wanted to write a little about the family of animals called Sirenia, which includes Manatees and Dugongs. Never heard of them? Didn't think you had, so thats why i'm writing about them. You see, they are very endangered! Manatees and Dugongs are herbivorious marine mammals that live in rivers, costal marine waters and swamps ect. Both species are endangered and Dugongs are very near extinction.

At present there are three (or possibly four) kinds of Manatees and one kind of Dugong, but previously there was yet another kind of Manatee, the Steller's sea Cow, which is now extinct because of it being over-hunted by humans. The currently living Species in the Sirenia group are the Amazonian Manatee which lives in the Amazonian Basin, the West Indian Manatee that lives around the Caribbean and is the biggest living species in the Sirenia group, the African Manatee that lives in many differrent rivers and lakes on the continent of Africa, the Dwarf Manatee which is a possible species of Manatees that supposibly lives in a tributary to the Amazon, and the Dugong that lives in the wide spread indo-pacific area but mostly hang out in Austrailia. The Sirenians closest relative is the Elephant.

They feed on different kinds of seagrasses and are the only herbevorious sea mammal. When their molar teeth start to get warn down they loose them and get new ones, and this can happen unlimited times. That was about all I wanted to tell you about theese gental kind creatures, hope you like them! :D

My Movie Review Of "Bombay Dreams"

2009-02-01T20:51:00.004+01:00

I just saw a movie with my friend called "Bombay Dreams", that surprisingly enough is a Swedish production, in Swedish!

It's about a girl called Ebba who lives in Sweden and is adopted from India. Her adoptive mother refuses to take her on a trip back to her birth country, and claims that she knows nothing about her biological mother.

One day Ebba finds a bunch of letters in a cabinet from her biological mother, and decides that she is going to go to India alone to meet her, without telling her adoptive mother..

I really enjoyed the movie, so i'll give it four =) =) =) =) out of five.

ALF

2009-02-01T15:28:00.005+01:00

Have you ever watched the popular 1980's TV show ALF? If you haven't, you are really missing out!!! The show is about a small furry ailien from planet Melmac named ALF (alien life form) that by mistake crash landed his space ship into a totally normal american familys (the Tanners) garage! They take him in and he gets used to the life on earth, and becomes part of their family. In each episode he manages to get into trouble somehow ;)

The Perfect Comfort Food, Which Also Makes You Smart!

2009-01-31T11:15:00.005+01:00

This is a dish with a story. It is required to hear the story before eating the dish, so here it comes: Once upon a time there where three extremely hungry teenage girls overloaded with homework. They looked through the fridge and here is what they found:

1 pack of bacon

1 large carrot

1 large tomato

1/2 dl of heavy cream

4 slices of extra sharp cheese

5 thick slices of smoked ham

3 tbsp of catsup

Delighted that they were finally going to get some food in their hungry adolescent tummies, they put the bacon in a frying pan and fried it until it was crispy, and then they placed it on some paper towels to drain, and poured the excess fat out of the pan. Then they put the ham in the frying pan. While the ham was frying they sliced the carrot and the tomato and then they added them to the ham. When the ham had turned a golden color of brown, they added the bacon, the cream, the cheese and the catsup to the pan, and let the delicious smelling dish simmer. Then they filled three heaping bowls with steaming pasta and ladled the dish over it. The next day all the girls got A's on their tests!

Oops! I think i might have put the recipe into the story!! Oh well, it doesn't matter to much , does it? At least you have heard the story now, and if you ever are overloaded in homework you can enjoy this wonderful dish, just like the girls did! It is guaranteed to give better test results if eaten while studying! :D

A Very Lemony Recipe

2009-01-30T20:26:00.004+01:00

Homemade Lemon Curd

3 dl water

1 dl sugar

4 tbsp cornstarch

5 tbsp lemon juice

3 egg yolks

2 tbsp butter

Mix water, sugar, cornstarch, lemonjuice in a pot. Stir as you bring it to a boil. Remove the pot from the heat. Separate the eggs, carefully stir the yolks into the mixture. Gently heat the mixture while stirring, but do not boil. Blend butter into it. Let the curd cool, and serve with for example sponge cake or pancakes. (or eat it out of the pot with a spoon, yummy! :D)

The Figure Skating Jump Called Flip

2009-01-30T20:10:00.007+01:00

The title probably doesn´t ring a bell in your mind, does it? Well thats why i wanted to write about it! I figure skate 2-4 times a week and have been trying to do this jump for the last month. It is a 360 degree jump that is quite hard to master. It takes practice because you have to cross you legs in the air and still have time to land on one foot. If you think it sound cool, try it next time you are on ice skates! Skate backwards and then jump from your right toe straight up in the air, spin and then land on you left foot. Sound easy? I guarentee you will land on your gluteus maximus, just like I did the first 15000000000 times... Ouch! I can do this jump quite easily now, but as they say, practice makes perfect! :D