A week in the life

In which Fiona has a week off work.

Monday - stuffed around and did nothing.

Tuesday - looked after youngest nephews (the 3 yr old is teaching me spanish)

Wednesday - Melb. International Food & Wine Festival revisited. This time lunch at Bottega with CF & PJ. I had the parsley, chive & green olive risotto followed by the tiramisu. As with last week the venue was superb, the food delicioso, the company great.

After lunch, and on a whim as I was walking past Her Maj., I decided to grab one of the $50 Billy Elliot tickets. The lead was Josh Denyer - I hadn't seen him perform before - so it seemed opportune. So I spent a lovely afternoon at the theatre (missing the earthquake cos it hit during the loud, tap dancing finale of the show).

Thursday - Up early for day trip to Canberra. Arrived in Canberra at 8.30 and headed for the gallery to see the Degas exhibition. Long queues to get in, but we were at the front...

The exhibition was great although I would have liked to have seen more of Degas' dance works displayed. I did ponder twittering from the exhibition but couldn't be bothered.

After Degas it was off to the new Portrait Gallery for morning tea and a leisurely look around.

A wander round (new) Parliament House was followed by lunch in the cafe (with a superb view thru to the War Memorial) and then it was back to lake side and a visit to the National Library (via the national archives). Afternoon tea and wireless internet @ NLA thena stroll around the lake and eventually over to city centre for more wandering (civic library) and tea before back to airport for flight home.

Our flight home was at 8pm so at 7.20 ish we wandered up to the departure gate thinking we'd get a coffee there - ONLY they don't serve hot beverages after 7pm! (we could have bought alcohol but hot chocolate was a no-no). Couldn't buy anything after 7.30 and our flight was late.

But still it was a great, if tiring day, and I see that Tiger have cheap airfares again...

Friday (today) - relaxing, maybe some housework, more relaxing, perhaps some shopping

All is right in my world.

A day in the life

So I worked the long weekend (well the saturday/sunday part of it) and spent the holiday monday (a) recovering from it and (b) taking my littlest nephews to the beach.

Tuesday was devoted to housework(yes really) and spending way too much time on the 'puter.

Today was play day. Started day with darcy & brekky @ crown (won $200 - yay) then it was off to meet a couple of friends (and former colleagues) for lunch at Punch Lane.

As part of the Melbourne International Food & Wine Festival a number of restaurants are offering 'express lunches' - 2 courses, a glass of wine, tea/coffee for $35.

Punch Lane's express menu consisted of two starters, two mains & two desserts - strangely enough our table skipped the starters and went for the mains/dessert combo.

I had the chicken confit (extremely delish) and the chocolate mousse with brandy soaked plums (could've done without the plums but hey!)

The roasted ocean trout was also highly recommended by our table as was the torta something- or-other for dessert.

The service was excellent - friendly & attentive without being intrusive.

Punch lane is in Little Bourke Street - pretty much halfway between two of my main city haunts - The Princess & Her Majesty's theatres.

Looks like Spag Tree may lose our pre- theatre custom...

After lunch I wandered round town - bought some un-needed but gorgeous paper clips @ Kikki K, some books at Dymocks, and some 2ndhand books @ Kill City.

Also played with some 'smart' phones (I'm about ready for a new phone y'see).

Tomorrow it's back to work - have a booktalk to prepare for and lots of other stuff to do before I go on hols next week.

Busy, busy, busy