Sea Monkeys and Cemeteries

So on Saturay I was casually strolling through the toy department of Big W (as you do) when I thought to myself "Man I wish I had sea monkeys, they were the coolest," and then I turned into the last aisle and what did I see? Sea fucking monkeys.

And the best bit was, unlike 4 years ago when I last considered buying sea monkeys, $20 seemed a bit extravagant for brine shrimp in a plastic tank. But back then, I was earning $100 a week, putting half of it straight into savings and somehow making a measly $50 stretch to buy lunch every day at school and alcohol on the weekend. now, the $17.94 Big W charges for the "starter pack" is just a drop in the ocean of things that make me spend money.

I hatched them on Sunday. So far they're little more than little specks floating around in their tank. Tomorrow I can start feeding them and then they'll start getting bigger. Sea Monkeys are a special hybrid brine shrimp which have been bred to grow larger and live longer than natural brine shrimp. With proper care, they can live up to two years and grow up to 3/4".

For anyone who's lived a deprived life and never had Sea Monkeys, you pour a small sachet of crystallised eggs into the tank. When the eggs hit the water, the protective casing dissolves and the eggs can then hatch. After 5 days, you being feeding the Sea Monkeys, every second day.

They're pretty damn amazing.

Yesterday I went on a photography/thrifting excursion to Newtown with my friend B. I got the train, which is something I don't do very often because, well there's no point walking 20 minutes to my nearest station when I can just get a bus from outside my house. That and there's a Vinnies on the way to West Ryde station and I ALWAYS end up in there. Yesterday was no exception. Hadn't even gotten to Newtown and I'd already made two purchases: a strange multi-coloured belt thing (that I doubt I'll ever actually wear but for $1 who cares, right?) and the cutest velvet envelope clutch patterned with gold bows.

It's something that I would probably think is hideous if I saw it in a regular store but in Vinnies it just looked so adorable. And it was $5 so I wasn't exactly making a huge dent in my wallet. Oddly enough when I got to Newtown I didn't find anything worth buying at their Vinnies. I find different areas have vastly different prices. If I saw this same bag at Newtown Vinnies, it would probably have set me back $15. That said suburbs like Rozelle, Newtown and Paddington that charge higher prices normally have better stock. It's pretty hard to find something decent at my local thrift stores but it's worth it because they're always such a bargain.

We started off the day with sushi train and the place was pretty incredible. they actually had beef sushi which is something I've never seen on a train. I felt overwhelmed being at an unfamiliar train so I ate a lot slower than I normally do and between us we only spent $23. Considering me and J normally spend somewhere between $38 and $43, and last time actually managed to spend $64, I was impressed by how well I controlled myself. They even have sachets of mayonnaise! Mayonnaise and sushi are such an odd combination but it really is a match made in heaven. Whoever thought of that is a genius.

After our lunch and our disappointing Vinnies visit we sought refuge from the icy conditions in Max Brenner. I got one of their $6 Italian thick hot chocolates, which I found out are made with vanilla cream as opposed to milk. They're amazing though. It's like drinking melted chocolate and you feel like puking half way through but it's so worth it on a cold windy day.

After a few wrong turns, we made our way to Newtown Cemetery. It's really ridiculously old. I didn't see a single stone that wasn't from the 1800s. It's nice to spend some time in an Australian cemetery after all the ones I visited in Europe. Instead of marble there was sandstone, because that's basically what Sydney is built on. Sadly, because of that, some of the pieces had lost a lot of detail.

My favourite type of headstone is the kind that lists the cause of death. Call it morbid but there's not much interesting about "here lies the mortal body of blah, wife of blah who worked in blah industry, died blah, age blah". Seriously. How much cooler is "Here lies this guy, drowned in Sydney harbour on this day, aged dramatically young." Much more interesting.

-m xx