Things You Gotta Do For Your Sisters

As I've mentioned time and time again, the Hii girls are easily distracted by bright and shiny things and develop obsessions very very easily. Mel and Monica have a thing for Sid Dicken tiles and it's a giant pain in my backside as it usually means I have to lug the damn things across the ditch for Monica. Anyhoo, a little birdie at Smith & Caughey told Mel that there's going to be 50% off everything in the furniture department today. Mel and I went to scope the place out last week and earmarked every tile worth purchasing as she would be in Malaysia by then. Monica being Monica, told me to buy her anything and everything. Umm no, VETO!

So bright and early today, me and Viv rocked up to S&C, armed with colour photocopies of each tile the 2 sisters are interested in. There were maybe 40 other people waiting for the doors to open too. The minute the doors open, Viv and I legged it up three flights of stairs and made a beeline for the tiles. We were like mad women grabbing tiles off the wall and taking turns guarding them while the other go off to forage some more. As it turned out, no one else cared about these tiles as 99% of the tiles we wanted were still there. I culled the list down as Monica's tastes during sale times are pretty dubious. There was a long line of people behind us and I imagined my back being the target of many death stares while the tiles were boxed up. Sorry, people. You gotta do what you gotta do. THEN we lugged the stuff back to our car. And all this before 10.30 am. Wohoo not bad for an hour's work.

Lin, there was only one cookbook holder left and it was the pewter one. If you don't want it, I'll take it. Otherwise, I got it for you. The crazy 1000000000 threadcount sheets aren't on sale. I thought they were and pulled everything out excitedly. But turned out it was something else that had 25% off.

Tiles lined up dominos-style.

Nine tiles in total - 2 for Mel (the King was cracked so no go), 2 for Viv the sheep and 5 for Monica the loser.

Viv's first foray into Sid Dicken tiles.

Mel only wanted 3 and I got her 2 as one of the ones on her list had a crack. All sounds very self-controlled and sensible until you hear the true story behind it all. When we went to check the tiles out, she saw one she really wanted. Being kia-su, she raced off and bought that one full-priced in case she missed out. Tsk tsk tsk.

Monica's medieval tiles, floral tiles and Ha tile. Ummm what's with the Ha!

I have 11 tiles to lug over to Melbourne at some stage. Can. Not. Wait.

Ho ho ho...............

All my beloveds (well apart from one but she's in la la land) have or are going back home for the holidays so I'm feeling a tad melancholic. Oh alright, more like bitter and twisted that I don't get to go home for a holiday but instead, have to toil for my sins in boring o Kiwiland. But that's ok because we are all going to be together for the next Christmas. Only 365 days to go... ho ho ho. Hope Santa has been kind to you all this year and that you left out some nice snacks for the poor overworked fat bastard.

This is how I feel 24/7 at the moment..

Don't ask.

Merry Christmas, you filthy animal.... and a Happy New Year.

Guess where that quote is from?
Hint: My favourite Christmas movie.

I Heart You, Mammoth Supply Co.

There's a new food company here in NZ and their gimmick is that their products are man-sized. So their yoghurt are filled with seeds, grains and fruit. So basically, it's for people who aren't counting calories, aka men. Some feminists are getting their knickers in a twist about it though.. bla bla bla sexist, bla bla bla stereotypical. Ah shuddup you silly old birds.

They just brought out their ice cream range and I'm in lurve. I bought the peanut butter ice cream because Viv has a real weakness for peanut butter and I enjoy tormenting her. I tried some and I kid you not, even my toes curled with pleasure. So so so so G.O.O.D!!! I want to take a bath in the stuff. Run to your supermarket and get one NOW.

I will have to try the cookie dough obviously. It's worth getting fat over. Yes, you heard me right.

Aotearoha Comedy Carnival

Anyone who knows me well knows that I'm a comedy show freak. I lurve lurve lurrrrve them. Anyway one of my favourite comedian duos at the moment is Sammy J and Randy the puppet and they were performing at the show so I bough tickets ages ago and forced Vivien to go with me.

Sammy J and Randy were great but they performed stuff I've already seen before so meh. Here's a old clip of Sammy singing his Backward song.


But the real winner of the night was Sam Wills, aka the Boy with Tape on His Face. He just got back from sell out tours in the UK apparently and he was really good. The vibe was a lot more electric if you watch it live but this will give you an idea of his gig:

Taste of Auckland 2010

Taste of Auckland was on last month and I got Mel to go with me. We went to the 5 pm session on Friday and the weather was pretty yuck. Luckily it wasn't so bad that it got in the way of us stuffing our faces. Phew! It was on the rugby fields opposite Victoria Park so I had to sink my heels into the grounds as we navigated around all the stalls. The things I do for food.

Our tickets came with $30 crowns each. You use them to pay for food at the stalls. Basically, Taste of Auckland is a food festival where you can buy products from various stalls - usually products you find in specialty foodstores and you can also buy dishes from the top Auckland restaurants that took part. The restaurants that took opart were Bracu, Clooney, dine by Peter Gordon, Euro, The Grove, Harbourside, Monsoon Poon, Mudbrick, Prego, Soto and Toto.

Poor chef grilling chicken after chicken for the hungry mob.

How awesome does this coil of sausage look? Imagine re-enacting that scene from Lady and The Tramp with it? Hohoho I volunteer myself.

Kohu Road stall.. me favourite ice cream brand. They do sorbets now too.

The Malaysian stall that had the cheek to charge an entry fee (comes with some food but still!). Winner of Australian Masterchef, Adam, was in there cooking but since we were too cheapskate to pay and go in, I took a photo of Mel instead.

Mel looking all excited, trying to decide what to spend our precious $60 crowns on.

After circling all the stalls, we finally decided on the offerings from The Grove. Not because we thought it was the best restaurant in Auckland, but because the dishes looked to be the biggest out of all the other restaurants. Haha.

Mel queueing up to order.

Entree : Yellowfin Tuna Salad with Avocado, Corriander and Chilli; 12 Crowns. The tuna was fresh and succulent but it didn't rock my world. It was nice but nothing groundbreaking. Maybe because I'm not a fan of corriander.

Main: Crispy Wild Boar with Heirloom Beets, Apple and Hazelnuts; 12 Crowns. The crumbled snow-like looking topping was the apple. This dish was soooooooo good. The boar was so juicy and tender. Yum yum yum yum yum.

Dessert: Valrhona Chocolate Pave, Cookie Crumbs and Strawberry Cream; 8 crowns. This was crazy rich. The chocolate was headache-inducingly rich. Luckily the strawberry cream and strawberries balanced the richness out. *smack lips*

We then took a break from all the eating and watched Matt Moran do his thang at cooking arena. He was very smooth in his delivery - able to cook while telling the audience anecdotes about his career. This was glaringly obvious when the dude after him ummmed and aahhhed throughout his opening speech.

The MC was one of the contestants from NZ Masterchef. Kelly or something.

We still had $30 crowns left so we got the teriyaki chicken from Soto for 8 crowns. Again, our choice was dictated by how big the portion was. Mel then spent the rest on some cheese from Kapiti Cheese.

My stash : A free teatowel and some nougat.

Closeup of the nougat : They had raspberry liquorice inside!!! Yum.

I think I prefer Taste of Auckland to the Food Show even though it had less free samples. Less free samples = less cheapskate crazy crowds. I will be going again next year!

A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words

Wellington Traffic Cam taken around 4 pm, Thursday Arvo at the Terrace (CBDish)...

Auckland Traffic Cam taken around the same time at Greenlane, about 15 minutes from CBD.

How is Wellington a happening town again?????????? And yes, I'm bored.