Shangri-La la la

We booked a buffet dinner at the Shangri-La tonight & each of the 8 of us made separate ways to the city for the feast (it was the buy 4 pay for 3 promotion). Pity the restaurant/cafe was on the 1st floor so we didn't really get a Harbour view (we were on the wrong side of the restaurant & away from the f-t-c windows anyway). At least the seafood got replenished regularly. I had never been so full. In the 2 hours & a bit that we were there, I managed to scoff down 2 halves of the lobster/crayfish, 2 halves of the bugs, 1 1/2 dz of fresh oysters, a handful of prawns, probably 1/2 dz of their guava yogurt drink thingy (yum!), a salad (don't know why I was wasting stomach space with greenery), chesse & crackers, sushi, BBQ octopus, & what looked like 3 million desserts. The others didn't fare too badly either. The quality of the food though was not quite up to scratch so it was only a so so night. At least the oysters & guava yogurt drink thingys were good.

破戒

Some of you might know but I quit tuna about 7 years ago because the harvesting processes are quite harmful to many seabirds, including one of my favourites - the albatross. Anywho, so since quitting seabirds I've only ever eaten tuna when there was absolutely no other choice, i.e., when tuna casserole was the only thing on offer when dinner-ing at a friend's. So far, I’ve managed to be force fed it about 4 times in the last 7 years, & the last time I ate tuna was probably 2 years ago. If you could read the headlines then you probably would've guessed what I did - yes, I ate tuna, not once but twice this week. Here's the story: after my usual UTS class Wednesday morning I head to lunch before going off to do my various things. Because I was heading back to UNSW to pick-up/drop-off a few things I didn't have my laptop with me. Otherwise I'd just eat & then hide in the UTS library for the rest of the afternoon (why the heck am I still not able to connect to the UTS wireless???) Anyways, so I headed up Market City & because it was quite a hot day I needed a cool lunch - sushi. Bought my sushi box & then I found it - a cooked tuna roll hidden in the middle of it all. Too hungry, so I ate it & quickly washed it down with some Powerade. Then yesterday we came back from a big shop at Flemington &, what was for lunch you say? Prawns, rolls, & tuna sashimi. I seriously wasn't going to eat the sashimi so the thoughts just raced thru my mind - it's bad for the birds, but they're not farmed so they're healthier fish than salmon, etc - before deciding to, yes, eat it. They're nothing like I remembered (mind you, I haven't had tuna sashimi for like 9-10 years). Maybe it just wasn't that terrific grade toro that I last had (this 1 was more pink-ish than maroon) so it was relatively tasteless & the flesh was rather, umm, 'coarse'. Nowhere near as soft & oily as salmon. What are the implications for all these then? The last few times that I ate tuna (& veal) I would donate some $$ to WSPA to kinda wash the 'guilt' away so I guess I'll be looking up what one off donation projects they have in the next few days & figure that 1 out.

More on breaking rules. Was at Flemington Markets yesterday & to my surprise I saw a few plants of water hyacinth on sale at the pet stall. I actually looked all over for it when I was setting up the backyard water feature & hunting for plants to populate it. All I managed to find was websites that says water hyacinth are prohibitied from sale in most Australian states despite I found many healthy specimens floating on the water feature outside the McLeish vineyard in the Hunters. Apparently they are considered weeds because they can grow out of control quite easily --> smother our waterways etc. But as my water feature is very self-contained & not lead to any aqua thoroughfare I think it's pretty safe to have them. Their purple flowers are simply amazing. I saw them in bloom outside 中正紀念堂 when I was in Taipei. Let's see how mine will now do.

Meanwhile, Easter Games Nite is tomorrow!! I have my bunny ears ready & all though the idea of games nite is getting a bit tired & old seeing that the 1 with the new game (PS3) may not even show up. What to do, what to do, what to do?

Bargain hunting

Went down to the shops for my habitual Saturday morning 'walk' which consists of a quick stop @ the library, browse thru the shops @ Towers & quickly buy whatever that I absolutely needed to buy. All these usually only take about 2 hours max. Today was of course no exception. Got my books, CDs & DVDs from the library (ooh, this books has a short project on making a hammock seat!) & toured the shops. There were quite a few bargains to be had. There were a few stacks of clothes at Myer that were 75% off the marked (i.e., already reduced) price which meant that I got a white tuxedo shirt & a 100% cotton dress shirt for just $12.50 EACH!! Bargain! Then I moved along to DJ & found even better stuff! OK, so I didn't end up buying this scrumptious Ben Sherman, satin-lined long coat which fitted me perfectly (it was still $250 or something after reduction... sigh...), I did, however, get a new set of wireless keyboard & mouse for just $19.95 (reduced from $149. How ridiculous is that?? It was makred 'XP Entertainment Pack but all I needed to do was download the appropriate exe files from Microsoft for Vista). They're a great replacement for the old wired Dell keyboards & mouse. Am quite determined to rid all traces of that Dell from my life. Now having new keyboards & all, I can drop every old things back to UNSW when I head that way Wednesday. Pity there is no Borders at Towers 'cos otherwise I would've spent that 40% off voucher on more books. Have already scooped a hardcover Tintin & a colour Peanuts comic. Will scoop another hardcover Tintin when I next get near a Borders.

My birthday is in March??

Ms Dufty is now officially a Dr Rae (well, not quite 'officially' as she's yet to do the ceremony but you get the gist) so we headed out for some food & drinks Sat night when she was in town. For a change the group headed west to Parra instead of me going east & we ate chilli crab, Hainan chicken etc at Temasek. Oh, sweet sweet crab... Anyway, it also doubled as a birthday thing for Robbo (who didn't bother to do a birthday thing this yr) as well as for me (yes, my birthday is/was in July, but who's to stop me from celebrating MY birthday any time of the yr I want. In any case, this was a celebration for my LAST birthday so I have another 1 to look forward to in just 4 short months :P). Afterwards we skipped into Roxy. None of us has ever been in & I for a start was kinda surprised by the mish-mash of styles there (the converted old theatre with a new, contemporary looking bar, hip-hip musik pumping with the occasional 80s track...). Another month before the next outing. Oh wait, there's of course the Easter Games Night. Now where the heck are my bunny ears?

It's been 3 months but our broken fence has finally been fixed. So I've spent hours over the wkend & Monday redoing the bits of garden that it trashed & finally it now looks presentable. B is of course now let out of solitary confinement & released back into the bigger enclosure.