A funny thing happened to me last week

On a rainy, cold night while I was walking down Glenferrie Road in Hawthorn… I was hit by a car… 

It sounds worse than it was. Luckily I wasn’t seriously hurt but I’m still in a bit of shock over it.

It happened like this - I was crossing a side street when a car turned into it from Glenferrie Road. From the corner of my eye, I could see the car coming towards me. It was a green light for me to cross and I thought the driver would wait until I was finished.

Clearly I was wrong. 

He kept going. His car hit me on my left hip and I hit the ground on the right side of my body. 

It was quite surreal feeling as the car came towards me and I realised that it wasn’t going to stop. I pushed my hand out in front of me as if I had superhuman strength that would stop the car.

When I think back on it, it really does feel like it happened in slow motion. Did my life flash before me? No. My first thought was ‘really? Is this really happening to me right now?’ As I fell to the ground, my second thought was ‘f**k, how hurt am I going to be because of this?’ 

I was lucky that the driver had slowed down because he was turning and didn’t hit me at a high speed (the commercials/CSAs are right people!). I ended up with a graze and bruising on my right knee and internal bruising in my right arm and hip. My left side was fine, I suppose I wasn’t hit hard enough to be hurt one that side as well. 

As you can imagine, I was pretty pissed off that this happened. People around me stopped and helped me up, genuinely concerned if I was alright, which I really appreciated. As the driver got out of his car and came towards me, it was a chaotic scene. Apparently he had just missed hitting another car and other pedestrians, I just happened to be the unlucky one. 

My natural reaction was to rip right into this guy. It started with “what the f**k are you doing? I’m f**king crossing the f**king road”. As I was screaming at him, the man who he just avoided knocking down started to abuse him as well and all the witnesses began yelling that I should report him to the police. 

He only had one response to my ranting - “sorry sorry sorry”. He didn’t speak much English but had a passenger who did and she came out of the car at this point. She was in a state of shock, asking me if I was alright, that it was an accident and the car was broken, pointing at the fact that all the windows were completely fogged up and he couldn’t see where he was going. 

“Why are you driving if you can’t see where you are going? Don’t you know how dangerous that is???” I yelled out in response to that. 

I didn’t end up contacting the police, but I think one of the witnesses called them while I was shouting at him. He gave me his name and number just in case my injuries were worse in the morning. My visit to the doctor the next day confirmed that I was alright, no major injuries. 

After two days of rest, I was back at work. 

Although getting hit by a car kinda sucks, I know how lucky I was to walk away so lightly. I really should go and buy that lotto ticket…

Photography challenge: E is for Energy

A windy day in the Carlton Gardens - Hochgurtel Fountain

Over the last few years, it seems like it is more windy than usual in Melbourne. Is it just me? The wind allowed me to take this beautiful shot of the Hochgurtel Fountain in front of the Exhibition Building in the Carlton Gardens. Apart from that, it is also a great source of renewable energy. 

Victoria is well known for experiencing great wind speeds, especially along the Southern Coast and higher altitude areas. It makes sense that we should take advantage of this natural phenomenon and use it to create renewable energy through wind farms. 

However, when the Victorian Liberal party came into power last year, they changed the law regarding where wind farms could be located. Wind turbines cannot be placed in specified ‘no go areas’ such as the Mornington Peninsula, Yarra Valley, Dandenongs, Bellarine Peninsula and Great Ocean Road, within five kilometres of 21 regional cities or within land two kilometres of a home without written consent from the homeowner. 

The change certainly makes it a lot harder to start a wind farm in Victoria and the limited locations for them means that a lot of potential jobs in the wind turbine industry may not be realised. 

There have also been health concerns raised about living close to wind turbines, including the ‘shadow flicker’ (the shadow casted by the blades) causing seizures and sleep problems as a result of the operational noise. 

I certainly don’t discount the concerns that nearby residents would have to living near a wind turbine. I have visited a wind farm before and the noise didn’t seem too bad, but I don’t live near a wind turbine to really experience the daily impacts. 

But I do think that if we are serious about becoming a more environmentally responsible country (and state), some work needs to be done to improve the laws regarding wind farms in Victoria to allow us to harness wind energy.

Review: Cacao macarons at Puccinos

The next stop on my search for the perfect Salted Caramel macaron was Puccinos on Bourke Street. They sell the full range of Cacao macarons (as well as the yummy cakes from Le Petit Gateau).

Cacao call their version a ‘Salty Caramel’ macaron and it was nice to finally eat one that tasted good.  

Cacao's Salty Caramel macaron

The outer shell of the macaron had a great sheen to it, with a nice crunch and the right amount of chewiness.

When it came to the ganache, there was no mistaking that this is a Salty Caramel macaron. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, I’d rather a strong flavour than none at all. But it does border on being a little bit too much.

Do I crown this the best Salted Caramel macaron in Melbourne? It is pretty good, but the slight flavour imbalance puts the title just out of reach for Cacao.

Address: 188 Bourke Street, Melbourne
Hours: Mon-Sun: 7am - 9pm

Review: Royal Saxon

After spending a few hours on Church Street sitting on couches, measuring dining tables and trying to figure out the best configuration of furniture for a brand new apartment that we have only inspected once, all the pieces we saw were starting to look the same.

We needed to take a break and the Royal Saxon was like a beacon of light to us weary furniture shoppers, offering much needed food and rest.

The place was renovated a few years ago and it looks great - modern and funky. We sat outside in the courtyard area, where there was lots of light and a beautiful fig tree.

We ordered lunch and started with the mozzarella di bufala, new season figs, basil, mint, lemon and olive oil. It was delicious! All the elements on the plate really worked well together. The figs were perfectly sweet and plump and the mozzarella was soooo good, really fresh and creamy.

Mozzarella di bufula, new season figs, basil, mint, lemon and olive oil

For mains, we had the house-made Italian sausage, roasted peppers, oregano and mozzarella pizza, porterhouse steak with roasted pumpkin (one of the specials they were offering) and zucchini fritti as a side dish.

I had the pizza and you could tell the base was homemade and fresh. The house-made Italian sausage was really tasty and my recent cravings for pizza were very much satisfied. 

House-made Italian sausage, roasted peppers, oregano and mozzarella pizza

My boyfriend had the porterhouse and it was cooked perfectly, just melted in your mouth. The roasted pumpkin was really soft and full of flavour. The oil with herbs on the plate also turned out to be a great dipping sauce for the pizza crust! 

Porterhouse steak with roasted pumpkin

The batter on the zucchini fritti was light and crunchy and the zucchini inside was yum. They were hard to stop eating once we started!

Zucchini fritti

The service from staff was great, although we were there for a late lunch so it wasn't busy.

The prices were a little higher than usual for a pub/bar but it was an enjoyable, good quality meal. We will definitely go back if we are in the area again.

Address: 545 Church St, Richmond
Hours: Mon-Thurs: 12pm - 12am
          Sat: 12pm - 1pm
          Sun: 12pm - 11pm