Singular Scene

So Singular in Each Particular

Worth it

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I heard a story today that made the learning curve I mentioned yesterday seem totally bearable.

A couple of weeks ago on our site we started streaming a bible study programme that is recorded by a couple of our pastors in our tv studio. Apparently, one of the “stars” was approached by a grateful congregation member who had invited a group of friends to watch it with her. It went down very well with her friends and raised some questions with one in particular which resulted in her chosing to believe in God, which she had never done, in spite of years in church. That’s when the website becomes more than a notice board.

That’s when struggling with CSS and PHP becomes redundant…

Don’t Panic

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I had a couple of weeks there in my new role as IT girl when the gloss had worn of and the clouds had parted displaying for all and sundry just how steep my current learning curve is. Not pretty people… not pretty at all.

Everest has nothing on this…

Actually, I started to get a bit anxious about it…

Which is separate from the anxiety about being away from my dearests at Christmas.
And the anxiety about being more comfortably upholstered than I was before winter.
And the anxiety about my family and their comings and goings and doings that I have issues with.
And the anxiety about the Count (which is much diminished, by the way).

I have been doing my best to squash all those other anxieties and trying to conquer the learning curve by reading really fat technical tomes. You know, the ones which have cds neatly tucked into their covers (to compound the already vast screeds of information therein) in the hope I could fill my brain with all one needs to be an IT girl.

It wasn’t working so I threw my hands up in the air and actually said

“God… this is ridiculous… I can’t do this”

To which he replied (in his most Australian of accents)

“too bloody right luv… what were you thinking?”

Sigh…

So… I asked him about CSS and ASP and PHP and CGI and Perl and C++ and XHTML etc…

and he said

“one thing at a time ok?”

I replied “Ok… about CSS..”

“Chuck out the books and try making some … You’re one of those learn better by doing type chicks…”

So the fires out front are burning the books and cds and I’m tweaking templates and fiddling with code from here to eternity.

And bingo

I finally get it…

I have made inline and external css that works… (most of the time)

So I say “Thanks God… You must be a bit of an IT guru yourself I suppose…”

And he said “yeah, the world wide web is just my footstool …” (Acts 7:49)

“Makes everything else seem a bit smaller really… thanks, God”

“You’re totally welcome… tis the way it should be.”

Christmas Ritual

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I made our family’s favourite Christmas Indulgence last week. A morsel referred to in the Edmonds Cookbook (the Kiwi chicks cooking Bible) as Russian Fudge. I can’t make Chocolate Fudge or Coconut Ice, or much else in the confectionery dept but I make MEAN Russian Fudge…

Here’s how

3 cups sugar
1/2 c milk
125g butter
1/2 c condensed milk
1/8th tsp salt
1tbs golden syrup

Put the sugar and milk in a heavy based saucepan and heat gently until the sugar is melted, stirring continuously. Add the butter, condensed milk, salt and golden syrup Stir it until butter is melted [Edited – oops ]and bring to the boil.

Continue boiling till it reaches soft ball stage, only stirring occasionally to prevent sticking to the pan. Remove from heat, cool for 10 mins and beat until thick. Pour into a greased pan, allow cool slightly then mark into squares. Remove from pan when cold and store in airtight container, not in the fridge.

Then eat it…

Share it…

Make more if it…

Eat that too.