My Blue Heaven

Found some Venice photos

So I was digging around trying to organise all my various photos and videos from the past year – I’m generating quite a large collection and there are so many photos I haven’t touched or shared with anyone or even looked at from past holidays. Like my big week-long drive around Italy in September last year, or my Florence trip from January, or even my visit back to Sydney last March (thats a year ago!!) There are literally thousands of photos that myself and Kwai have taken that are untouched. Small wonder I’ve been putting off attempting to go through, sort and pick out the good ones and photoshop them to decent size. Ack.

Well the other night I decided to make attempt at a small chunk of photos (about 500 or so) taken in just Venice during our 7 day drive around Italy last September. Hopefully I’ll get around to doing the rest eventually. But for now, here are a couple of good ones I picked out. 🙂

(And yes I know I still have yet to finish my Italy series of travel vlogs. Three vids in and we hadn’t even reached Venice!)

Happy 2007

Wow. Can’t believe it’s 2007 already. How time flies.

Normally I try to write some sort of profound new years blog entry, but I seem to be lacking inspiration this year. Oh well. You can watch my NYE vlog instead. 🙂

Btw, I don’t expect to travel to ALL those locations I listed this year.. they were merely a list of possible destinations that I am interested in seeing. My resolutions are more like.. medium term goals over this year. Just some things I want to achieve this year, things that are important to me, to help keep me focused and disciplined when I get lazy/distracted/tired. (And the list isn’t all-inclusive.) And yes the editing is a bit choppy… Kwai did alot of it and we were in a hurry coz it was NYE and we needed to get out to watch the fireworks.

Myself and Kwai went to see the fireworks on NYE here in London, over the Thames. It was pretty cool, for London. Nothing compared to Sydney of course, but a good show nonetheless. And the atmosphere was pretty cool… for once people in London seemed warm and friendly and actually spoke to each other (or maybe it was just the alcohol).. but there was definitely a celebratory festive air on the banks of the Thames that night. Then we went home.. and it only took about an hour and half.. (which was quite good for NYE).. and stayed up till 5:30am celebrating the new year with our friends from around the world on stickam (ok it wasn’t as sad as it sounds.. it was fun) and watched the live video of Times Square celebrations in New York.

Coming up soon is our trip to Florence, Italy. We’re gonna spend 5 days in Florence for my birthday in mid jan. Can’t wait! It’ll be nice to just soak in the beauty, the art and the food of Florence over a relaxing 5 days.. no rushing from one city to another this time. 🙂

Fotos

Some photos I took in December from my work. Pretty views of english countryside at dusk, during those few days we had such bad fog in London that they cancelled heaps of flights.

Can’t think of a clever title

So I’m STILL sick and still trying to recover. I marvel at just how much snot my nose can produce. I mean.. is there an endless supply or what? Hehe sorry if thats too much info. 😛

Anyway I have some good news, but I won’t go into that just yet. All will be revealed by the end of next week. If you’re that curious then feel free to email me, but really, its not a big deal – just a little something I’m fairly happy about. 🙂

Still haven’t had a chance to trawl through the pics from Italy. But I found some miscellaneous pics taken around London over the past month or so. Enjoy.

So summer has drawn to a close here in London. And with the onset of autumn begins a “new year” in many areas. For one, bible study group will be starting up again in 2 weeks time. I’m quite looking forward to hanging out with our “rebel” group regularly again. Our group is actually moving away from St Helens – we’re joining the church plant at Clerkenwell. So looks like I’ll be going to a new church soon. I’ve already volunteered my piano playing skills for the service. So yay.. I’m gonna be able to play piano again soon.. after so long without. :))) Nicely coinciding with this is the start of the courses at Goldsmiths University of London – the PACE (Professional and Community Education) program, which is much like the Sydney Conservatorium of Music access program. I’m gonna audition for the Modern Jazz Workshop. *crosses fingers* Hopefully my skills are enough for the course and I haven’t forgotten absolutely everything I learnt at the Con. It’ll be good to just get playing again. Even if I don’t have a piano at home… some playing is at least better than none. And perhaps I can practice on the church piano…

Current listening :: “Pose” – Justin Timberlake

Days gone by

Found some old photos from Frankfurt taken last year. *sigh* Makes me miss Frankfurt and the continental life. Anyway, these photos were all taken by Kwai with his digital SLR.. thats why they’re so nice. 🙂

Only thing I can claim is the new functionality I’ve implemented on this weblog. Notice anything new? (Hint: click on the photo thumbnails). Yep I implemented a rather fancy web 2.0 lightbox script which uses the prototype javascript library. (Ok, so I didn’t program this script, but it’s still cool – I’m trying to learn how it works.. hopefully I’ll be able to program some fancy js and even ajax soon using this cool, albeit slightly bloated, prototype js library). I’m also in the process of cleaning up this old web site of mine, in an effort to try bring my code up to scratch, make it “W3C standards” compliant and use it as more of a learning playground… perhaps even making a portfolio worthy of being added to my CV.

Anyways, enjoy the pics. Mouseover the right or left of the photo to navigate through the pics. Full gallery here. 🙂

Anyway, we have a long weekend this weekend! Woohoo!! Plans include Kwai’s birthday bash on Sat (he turned the big two five on Wed), lots of rest and relaxation, church, and the Notting Hill Carnival. 😀

Dizzy

Had the day off sick on Monday. I woke up in the morning after a pretty restful weekend (only went out on saturday to watch 2 movies – Cars and Miami Vice) and a decent nights sleep. But then I sat up in bed, and I just suddenly felt dizzy, room spinning, vertigo sorta dizzy. Had to lie back down again. I tried getting up and having a shower, thinking I’d feel better afterwards, but I still felt dizzy. When I walked, I had this definite lean to the right.. kept walking into the wall! :/ Going to work was looking unlikely, so I booked an appointment to see the doctor. Turns out she reckons I have some sort of inner ear virus. I can’t remember the name.. either Labyrinthitis or Vestibular Neuronitis? Anyway, she said it was a virus and so no meds would help. She just prescribed some Procholorperazine to help with the dizzyness and nausea, if I needed it.

So I’m back at work today, was feeling ok this morning, but I’m starting to feel slightly dizzy again. I do wonder why this occurs. I’ve had it on occasion over the last 3 – 5 years I think. Whenever I get very tired to the point of exhaustion, I’ll get this onset of vertigo.. though I’ve never thrown up from it. I wonder what the cause really is. The doctors diagnosis seemed a bit.. not very well researched. She only took my blood pressure and asked a few questions. No other tests or much interest in background history etc. Anyways. I guess thats what you get with the NHS – a free health system giving quantity over quality. England’s healthcare kinda sucks.

Snip snip

In other news, got myself a £10 hair cut (trim is probably more accurate) on the weekend! Cheap cheap! It was at the Rush hair academy, where they train junior or even senior hair stylists, and they need models to practice on. Rush is now what Toni & Guy was a few years ago. Anyway, the hair cut was free, and the £10 was just for the blowdry. Bargain! And an awesome blowdry she did – she wanted to show off the soft layers so she gave my hair a bit more volume and movement with piecey, flicky ends. I loved it so much I did a mini photo shoot when I got home, with kwai’s SLR. Hehe. Check it.

Heheh. I hardly ever get a blowdry these days coz it’s too expensive. In fact its been 5 months since my last hair cut! I know, there’s hardly any difference – I only trimmed my fringe a bit and maybe an inch or two off the dry ends. I’m trying to grow the layers out a bit coz they were cut too short last time.

And finally.. here are some pics of me and kwai’s cooking endeavours recently. Been really getting into cooking at my place coz am trying to save money blah blah. Anyway, I reckon it’s fun to cook, and the food is usually nicer, not to mention half the price. 🙂

Current listening :: “First Love” – Utada Hikaru

Photos @ Maze

The Review

I liked the menu (modern french with an asian influence). Between the two of us, we shared 10 dishes, and 3 desserts. Plus 2 cocktails (I had a strawberry caipirinha and Kwai had a peach and passionfruit cocktail), finally finishing with coffee and complimentary petits fours. The menu was really cool – it was kinda like a-la-carte tapas, where you pick from lots of different small dishes – allowing you to sample lots of things at a fairly low cost. A foodies heaven! They also had the chefs selection 7 course menu, with the best signature dishes (from the aforementioned tapas style menu) that work the best together. We ended up choosing the chefs menu, plus 5 more dishes and 1 more dessert. 🙂 I was absolutely and utterly stuffed by the end… had a major food coma, not helped by the cocktail at the beginning! The price was also really quite good value – which is suprising for a top restaurant owned by a famous celebrity chef. A chefs tasting menu would normally be about twice what we paid. I guess its only been open for a year, so prices might rise later. Not that it mattered this time, as work is paying for the bill. (I’m finally cashing in my reward from that Hoover project a month or so back).

Anyway, we really enjoyed the 3 odd hours spent there. I’d probably rate it as the best dining experience I’ve had in London so far. It was great that the restaurant and staff weren’t stuffy or snobby at all, unlike so many fine dining places. The decor was very modern (perhaps a little cramped, but hey its London), and the atmosphere quite trendy and lively. The service was excellent – the staff were discreet (ie not in your face all the time), polite, friendly and very attentive to details (eg when one of us went to the toilet, a waiter would almost immediately come over, pick up the napkin, shake it out and fold it neatly on the chair for the customers return!!). Oh and it was a NO SMOKING restaurant too! Yay!!!! When a customer at the table next to us started to light up a cigarette, a waiter very smoothly and politely informed him it was a no-smoking restaurant and took the offending cigarette away.. as I sat there silently cheering!! 😛 We felt quite comfortable there, more so than other restaurants where the atmosphere feels a bit stiff. And getting to visit the kitchen and meet the chef topped off an already wonderful evening. 🙂

Current listening :: “Bubble toes” – Jack Johnson

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Miscellaney

Current listening :: “Mofongo” – Yellowjackets