Retro Night

Last night, a bunch of us joined BT for his birthday celebrations at The Clapham Grand. We were all prepared for a Mambo/Retro style of music but for the first 1.5 hours, the music was crap!!! The club itself reminded Lil Miss J of Metro but reminded me of nothing, as I've forgotten what Metro was like.

My definition of good music (read Cheesy hits) finally kicked in at about 12 midnight when some proper 80s music came on. My night was made when Michael Jackson's 'Don't stop til you get enough' and Wham!'s "Wake me up before you go-go' finally played. I could've happily gone home from there.

Kt, BT and I with our shiny disco balls.

The night is incomplete without a girly pic.

We left at about 2am and I was crippled. My shoes hurt so much and I was glad to finally get home. Otherwise, happy birthday BT!

Crab vs. Lobster

After our lobster adventure, Smee had the audacity to circulate my photo to other female members of the Circle. It's a crap photo, my skin looks like shite, my face all puffy from lack of sleep but whatever.

Anyway, J kept referring to Lobbie as Sebastian. Me, being on the same wavelength, totally understood her reference the 'The Little Mermaid'. Last night, on the way to BT's birthday celebrations, Sebastian the Lobster came up into conversation and it went something like this. Also, try to picture all of us on a London double decker red bus on the lower floor, sitting at the backseat.

Kt: Sebastian? He's a crab.

J and I: WHAT?! Nooooooo, he's a lobster!!!! What makes you think he's a crab?

Kt: I wikied it and it says he's a crab.

Me: Whatever. Anyone can write anything on Wikipedia. Look at Sebastian's head, he has a long head! He's a lobster.

J: Yeah, he's a lobster! He looks nothing like a crab!

Kt: Yeah but wikipedia says he's a crab!

J: How did you google it? Why did you google it?

Kt: I just typed 'sebastian, little mermaid, crab' and that's what Wikipedia showed.

J & Me: No way!!! he's a lobster! Look at him!

Mona (pipes up from the seat in front of us after checking the web from his mobile): He's a crab. It says so on wikipedia.

Me: Yeah but anyone can write anything on wikipedia!! Tell me what it says on the Disney site.

(You can see this argument never ending)

J: What!?!? No, he's a lobster!!!

Kt: Have you guys watched The Little Mermaid? I swear they say he's a crab in the movie. It's on the DVD too.

J and Me (indignantly): Nah, no way they say that. Yeah of course we've watched it!

J: Have a look at his head. He has a long head. He looks NOTHING like a crab.

Baoey: (sits in silence and pretends to not know the rest of us)

Parts of the conversation are slightly fabricated, but you get the idea. We must've sounded so silly to the other passengers sitting on the bus. Full grown adults arguing in the back seat about the shellfish status of the Sebastian in The Little Mermaid. We weren't exactly quiet either.

Look at the picture above? Does that not look like one of the lobsters I ate?

Anyway, I can't remember how the conversation changed topic - maybe the bus stopped and we had to get off, but I still was convinced that Sebastian was a lobster.

Today, I had to settle it once and for all. I had to get to the bottom of this Sebastian Lobster/Crab debate. And I concede - HE'S A FRIGGING CRAB!!!

Damn Disney. Can't draw for peanuts! All these years, I believed him to be a lobster. I feel cheated of my late childhood.

Come to think of it, I don't think I have watched The Little Mermaid in it's entirety.

UPDATE: A few days later, I had to ask Mooey about Sebastian - Queen of Stupid Trivia that she is - and she came back with "Lobster". A-ha! Damn Disney.

She was in disbelief, just as I was. As she says, "It was like I believed the sky was green."

Another friend in London

ASu from my college days managed to drop by London on business and we caught up for a quick drink. I haven't seen him since hmmmmm March 2006? All is doing well except for the fact that he dislikes the 2.5 hour daily commute to work and the humidity of Indonesia. London suits him just fine.

Here's me at my disgusting best with ASu. Touristy photo a must.

Lobster Abuse

Smee and I live embarrassingly close to the London wholesale fish market, Billingsgate, where London restaurantuers, fish & chip owners etc go to buy their seafood supplies. Seriously, it is about a 10-15 minute slow walk. Members of the public can also purchase here but be warned as many of the stall owners only sell in bulk. Oh, and also be prepared to get there before 8.30am when it shuts. As typical wholesale markets go, trading begins at the crack of dawn at 5.00am. The market is actually open at about 3-4am, however law forbids any monetary exchange prior to 5am. I have no idea why. Some silly English law I presume.

Smee and I are seafood lovers and have always talked about going to Billingsgate, however we are also very lazy and hadn't made enough effort to get there. It just so happened that we had an adventure on Friday night, whereby we went into Chinatown, and then decided to not stay, came back, went to the local Asda and ate dinner at 1.30am. I had the bright idea of "hey Smee, Billingsgate opens soon, we should just stay up and go there". So we did. Smee played computer games, I caught up on my blogging and then off we went to Billingsgate.

Despite it being 5am, the carpark was already full! We found our way to the door where other patrons were emerging with garbage bags full of seafood goodies.

Nothing beats the Sydney fish markets in terms of service to the general public (errrr non-vampire trading hours? sashimi on demand?) but clearly Billingsgate is servicing the food industry. Yeah it was a wholesale market - boxes and boxes of fish, prawns, shellfish all piled high and priced accordingly. Damn it was cheap!

Anyhow, there were a few traders who do allow the tiny people like myself to buy singularly and by the kilo. Smee and I made our way home with scallops, prawnies (Smee plans to master Har Mee next), pippi meat and of course two beautiful lobsters. We should've bought some fish but decided not to as we had no storage space.

Do keep in mind, by now, it was about 6am. I did want to sleep but hmmm we were a little peckish. Hence the early morning lobster breakfast is born. I made aioli (thank you food processor) while Smee prepared the lobbies for their impending date with destiny.

Smee and I do like to play with our food, and these photos are reminiscent of our Yabby dish

Smee with L1 and then breaking up a battle between L1 and L2.

Me so happy to have new pet, Robbie the Robster. Lobsters fighting it out on the stove.

The Doomsday Pot. Can you see L1 trying to escape?

Clockwise from top left: Smee sending the lobbies on their way to lobster heaven i.e my tummy. Lobbie looking peaceful. Lobbie claw up close. Two lobbies together.

I do have to say, the lobster meat was absolutely fresh and went very well with the aioli. I went to bed at 7.30am and needless to say, didn't get up until 3pm.

UPDATE: I do feel a little bad about eating Robbie the Robster after reading this article in the Metro, however I am in agreement with Trevor Roll's comment.

Blog Death

There was a short craze about 1 - 1.5 years ago which involved nearly everyone in the Circle setting up a blog. Little did they know how much work is actually involved. For slow witted folk like myself, writing an entry can be time consuming as I do not naturally suffer from verbal diarrhoea. (Hai Moo!) That being said, I do enjoy seeing the fruit of my labour, thus I am driven to complete and post blog entries.

But let's not diverge from what I really wanted to say. See all those blog links on the right hand side? Most of them are dead. I really should just clean up that section and discard the abandoned blogs. They are so unloved, unkempt but do deserve a dignified exit. I've taken it upon myself to be the Grim Reaper of Blogs but I'll stick to killing off only Circle member blogs for the time being.

Even though Mooey is not Circle, I will give her a Special Honour. Mooey started her blog in April 2005 and is still going strong - but then again, I did label it "Mally's Rambling Blog".

Let's get down to business:

Mona wins the prize for Poorest Effort. With just FOUR entries, it is more like a school essay rather than a blog. I will give him credit for his 5/10/2006 entry whereby Bao quoted "That's the most I've ever heard Mona speak!" Mona did have another blog but I deleted that link a long time ago.

Born: 05/10/2006

RIP: 07/12/2006

No of posts: 4

J was a bit late getting into gear but nosedived within a two month period.

Born: 24/10/2006

RIP: 11/12/2006

Baoey's blog started because she was inspired by everyone else. Unfortunately posting became less and less frequent due to laziness (by her own admission)

Born: 26/09/2006

RIP: 28/02/2007

Lymbo started her blog as a place to post up pretty things and to document her life in Canberra. Facebook seems to have taken over. The last post was quite depressing. But I do still click on your blog! Just in case you do post something!

Born: 11/10/2006

RIP: 10/07/2007

Lil Miss J and Mr. L technically don't have a blog, just a gallery. They didn't even give it a proper shot.

Born: 03/04/2007

RIP: 12/04/2007

Kt... aaah Kt. My blogging companion for while. Egging each other on to continually post. London has slowed her pace and she no longer feels she has an audience anymore *sniff* What more do you need? I'm your audience!

Born: 08/08/2006

RIP: 14/09/2007

Kahoons. One of the oldest blogs, Kahoons was notorious for long gaps between posts. I'm not sure about the RIP date.

Born: 02/02/2006

RIP: 02/10/2007????

Leesh's blog is far from death. Although the most recent post was at the end of October it doesn't warrant an RIP yet.

Born: 25/09/2006

Now, being the forgiving Grim Reaper that I am and also a believer of Zombies, any of these blogs can be resurrected at will! If not, I will have to lay them to rest for good :(

Happy Birthday Smee

Smee celebrated his birthday quietly with a few work colleagues at drinkies but last night had din dins at Maze. Mmmm mmmm mmmm. We opted for the 'tasting menu' whereby the food was small in portion but big in taste and freshness. It was more or less an a la carte degustation menu and was definitely the best way to sample Gordon Ramsay's delights.

We selected dishes which included tuna carpaccio, foie gras (mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm), the biggest scallops I've ever seen, quail and other fancy schmancy stuff. None of them disappointed. The best bit was that the restaurant itself wasn't overly formal and made for a very relaxing atmosphere. I will return one day!

Smee and I in the bar area.

The next night was Smee's actual birthday and a casual drinks affair it was.

Bao and Kt of course, had to swap jackets and make pretty poses.

Smee and his work posse.

Afterwards, Smee had a hankering for pho, so went back to Cafe East to fulfil his birthday wishes. Happy birthday Smee!