Adventure, baby!

Family

Dinner At Longrain

For Brandon’s last night in Sydney we went to dinner at Longrain in Surry Hills. Longrain don’t take bookings (at least on Saturday nights like when we went), so we had to wait in the bar area for an hour and a half till they had room for us. The bar area was really funky and they served appetisers and amazing cocktails.

Longrain isn’t my fave restaurant – I tend to think it’s popular because it’s trendy, not because it’s amazing. I hate to be negative, but it’s just not the kind of restaurant I like. Firstly, I’m not a fan of the atmosphere – it’s quite loud, so I find it really hard to hear what people are saying. It also take s a long time to get food, so I would recommend eating in advance – we were there at 6, sat down at 7:30 and my food arrived at 8:15. By that stage I was so hungry I had eaten two bowls of plain rice out of desperation.

Longrain is a bit of a “sharing” restaurant, where you order big dishes between several people – except we ordered our own food, which arrived at stages, so some people got food straight away, and others had to wait 30 minutes. Not cool! I also didn’t think the service was great. Very poor in face, compared with other restaurants of similar price. I also thought it was over-priced. Alec ordered snapper – it was $50. For one fish – just the fish, with nothing else. He did say it was amazing fish though 🙂 Last thing I wasn’t impressed with was the lighting – really dark and none of my photos turned out after the sun went down.

On the plus side, we had a really great night. Really great friends and conversation.

Janice and Andy want their beverages. Stat.


Self-portrait.


Seb loves his beer.


More beer!


Janice’s cocktail.


Prawns.


Oysters.


Calman chugs back an oyster.


Dessert tray.


Sheilds UP!

This guy has the best defense systems ever.

I can imagine doing this myself at work – “No, I won’t do it, you can’t make me!”

BBQ At Beverly’s

After driving back from Newcastle Alec and I went over Bev’s for a relaxing BBQ.

Lisa photos … something. 🙂

So attractive.


Chris does a manly dance.

Attack of the killer Beverly.

BBQ-ing is very serious business. That’s Bev’s blue cheese sauce bubbling away in the pan.

Bev presides over her table of food.
Och, that tickles!




Tribute to Hedgies

I love these lil critters. I’m sad we can’t have them in Aus, but it’s probably for the best. They don’t live very long (3 – 6 years I think) and are very sensitive to temperature. Let’s be honest here – I just killed a pine tree. What hope to I have of keeping a wee thing like this alive?

Bebeh hedgies. SO cute.

Ready to roll.

Is that his tail down there?

Can’t Stop The Rain

I think this is the most amazing photo of a frog I’ve ever seen.


I’m amending this post after being asked if I took the photo. I only wish I did. I found it here. Photographer is unknown.

Black Watch and Go Organic

Alec and I saw the National Theatre of Scotland perform Black Watch today as part of the Sydney Festival. The play came with rave reviews, so I went in with high expectations. It was lucky for me that the show really followed through. It was powerful, poignant and creative. I’ve never been touched by a play quite like I was by this one.

Black Watch tells the story of Scotland’s Black Watch Regiment, particularly focusing on their deployment in Iraq. The play reveals the harsh reality of the “war on terror” and the effects it has on soldiers mentally, both on deployment and when they come home and try to fit back into society again. I loved not only the content, but the creative staging. It’s an absolute must see.

After the play, we went to Go Organic on King St, Newtown, for late lunch. I left my camera at home, so these pics are taken with my trusty iPhone.

It was super expensive, but really tasty food. Hopefully the cost is improving me on the inside!

My muesli with yoghurt and berries, and mango yoghurt smoothie.

Alec with his berry yoghurt smoothie.

Taking time out on a Saturday afternoon.