Dinner- Asian

Sashimi (salmon and tuna), pickled ginger and wasabi-- a lovely start to a great dining experience.

Throw in some good (foodie) company-- and you have the makings of a great evening!

That was how it started.

Warmed up quickly with a glass of the house red.

Followed it up with a couple of plates of sauteed "field" mushrooms (wood-ear and shiitake rock!), golden fried prawns rolled in sesame seeds with garlic sauce, roti telur (this was the only part that I deemed miss-able) and a sizzling barbecue of pork ribs! Delicious. Followed by two rounds of fortune cookies.

When skating on thin ice, your safety is in your speed. (Er... OK?!)
Be satisfied with what you already own. (Hmmmmmmmmmmmpfh!)

OR (depending on whose fortune you pick!)

Your sweetheart may be too beautiful for words but not for arguments.
your smile makes everyone realise that the world is a lovely beautiful place.

And topped off with coconut rolls with honey butter sauce. Yummmmmmmmmmmmm!!!

5 X 2

I watched this surreal french film by Francois Ozon. (Ironically) it left me gasping for breath.

(What is it about French movies and full frontals?!)

Valeria Bruni Tadeschi and Stephane Freiss set the mood as a middle aged couple very civilly parting ways-- signing the divorce papers after agreeing on the terms read out by a stodgy lawyer.

The (as yet) unvoiced bitterness and the anger forms a silent undercurrent.

The film moves chronologically backwards from this point to capture for us four other instances which are the "big moments" in this couple's life.

We see a patient Gilles as he handles their child and we see another darker side of him in a dinner converastion with his gay brother and his lover. Marion glitters through this scene as she entertains them after a long hard day at work.

We move backward through the agony of Marion alone in a traumatic childbirth, silently chastising the unrelenting Gilles as he passes zombie-like through the motions of a regular day.

We see Gilles and Marion united in holy matrimony as they mouth the (we already knowthis to be untrue) words-- until death do us part.

We see Gilles distracted by Marion's appearance as he cavorts on a beach with his girl friend.

The film forces us to consider these moments in reverse chronology and makes us wonder if things could have been different.

The pace remains slow and ponderous. The nudity seems excessive. All in all, it leaves one wondering why this story needed to be told this way. However, it also leaves us feeling like we have been throught the bitter parting of ways ourselves. And it feels like a series of snapshots in an everyday life...

In vino veritas

Succesion... and bequests

Life looks a little different if you are the next in line... or so I think...

C'est la vie... quest que vous faite!?

I am sitting at home wondering about one of my favorutes... who is in love with somebody I like... Easy to say it is being handled. But with a couple I know being in discussions for decades now, it has a new meaning. Shoud we decide on immediacy?

I don't know how to answer this!!!

Wodelouse rocks!!!

On a relatively blue morning, when waking up and taking on the day seem a drag the one thing I can depend on to pick me up is a Wodehouse.

Transported as I am immediately to a world of eccentric "peers of the realm" who look like "dying ducks" and are bullied mercilessly by observant nieces hiding in the shrubbery playing not so mute witnesses to the indiscretions of older relatives; or larger than life sisters with commendable memories and "bellowing voices" who bully these same older relatives into doing their bidding, the cares of the day peel off and I find myself smiling again and ready to take on whatever the day has in store.

Bring it on!!!