Year end highlights!

Around this time of year, people tend to write their top 10 lists. I won't be doing that because frankly there's too much. Don't you guys think I suffer enough from verbal diarrhoea?! I can't even pick my absolute favourite dessert. So here's just some short commentary on my supposed *Best Of...*. They may not represent the absolute best, just the memorable based on my commonly discussed topics.

Highlight event of the year:
The Great European Adventure 2007. At the end of The Great European Adventure 2004/5, Cousin Linh said to me *You'll be back*, and three years later, so I was! For how wonderful it was, go read the month of September plus these entries. And then of course there was the Ilaya-Kelly wedding and the diet that went along with it. That's one even the lab won't forget too quickly, me cracking it at all an sundry made it a thing to fear. And being voted *best* by my peers. That made me pretty chuffed although I wonder how much of it was from bullying :P

Movie of the Year:
You know what? I just think it may be Enchanted! Being Asian, I usually don't pay to see movies twice (if at all) but I was convinced to pay to see two movies twice. The first movie was Transformers which I saw at a normal cinema and then followed it up by seeing it in all its IMAX glory. However, despite seeing Enchanted on Boxing Day...I must confess I saw it again last night. Rare is the movie that makes me want to see it twice in the space of two days! The Simpsons was definitely the most anticipated (and I don't care what other people say, I sure enjoyed it!) while HP5 was definitely the most disappointing.

Book of the Year:
Usually when people give me a book voucher as a present, I spend it right away. Not this year. Harry Potter 7 INSPIRED me to wait two months for a book! And then I stayed up until 3am to finish reading it so I could tell Pooey. And then I got many more months entertainment torturing her about what transpired in the story. Hehehehe.

Sport of the Year:
Pilates has made that line down the centre of my gut from wishful thinking to reality (on skinny days), but the sport that defined the year is Brazilian Jujutsu. Yes-siree. That's another thing the lab won't forget for a while. But I've decided to give it up now that the year is over - the injuries were just too much to bear :( So next year's sports are a toss between rock-climbing and kendo!

I can't decide who is the year's best eye candy. It's just too difficult! So instead I'm just going to list them:

Henry Cavill
(oh, Edward...)

Milo Ventimiglia
(thankfully the emo hair is gone)


Pasha Kovalev
(you have to watch the video, the girl being shown was his dance partner of the week, Sara von Guillen)
Monica Bellucci
(still the woman who could turn me)

Jensen Ackles
(Grand Empress, I disagree, Dean over Sam ANY DAY)

McDreamy & McSteamy
(doctors do not really look like this)

And of course, my lovely husband Marat Safin.
(Arrives in Melb on New Years Day!!!)

This will be my last entry for the year because tomorrow I will be setting up NYE Cocktail Party at the Windsor. I hope y'all have a wonderful blow-out NYE party and don't go home with too many strangers. *cough*

Movie review - Enchanted

*sigh* *sigh* *sigh* *sigh* Omg, Cutest. Movie. Ever. And possibly the best Disney (non-Pixar) movie for like...that last 10 years. Enchanted. Go see it.

Giselle (Amy Adams) is a heroine from a Disney-esque cartoon world: she lives in a treehouse in a forest and her friends are talking animals. One day she falls into the lap of Prince Edward (James Marsden) while he's troll hunting and they decide to get married - hey, both of them have been searching for their True Love! His step-mother, Queen Nerissa (Susan Sarandon) is not quite so keen to lose her grip on power and to stop the wedding from going ahead, she sends Giselle to 'the place where happily ever after doesn't exist'...modern day NYC where she meets divorced divorce lawyer Robert Philip (Patrick Dempsey) and his daughter Morgan. And the story writes itself!

Regular readers of this blog will know that I love a movie that doesn't take itself too seriously. All throughout the movie, Enchanted references classics of Disney past either through plot elements, costuming and character design, or flat out frame for frame recreations. Enchanted pretty much mocks the entire genre of fairytale romances as exemplified by Disney classics...bursting into song, animal friends, ridiculous dresses etc etc...but does it with such good-humoured glee, it never mocks in a nasty way.

For all the mockery, Enchanted is also homage. If you don't believe me on how good this movie is, watch this youtube clip.

It may pose as a cynical bitch but it's sooooooooooo not! It's a romantic dream! This movie is so good, it totally sucked in the entire audience in the cinema when we were watching it. There was loud laughing, people shouting out *KISS HIM/HER!!!*, cheers, applause, EVERYTHING!

A good deal of this is of course due to the performances. Amy Adams is fantastic! She is all wide-eyed innocence and utterly believable in her bewilderment and joy. Her Giselle is totally straight - you never get the feeling that she's an object of ridicule even when she's doing crazy fairytale things in the real world. In contrast is James Marsden's Edward who is ridiculous prince who can't see past his own fabulousness. And Patrick Dempsey...up to now I've always been a McSteamy girl (curse those charming bastards!) but I think McDreamy might have the edge now!

I love this movie. I walked out sighing happily waiting for my own Prince Charming/McDreamy.
9/10
(Photos from rottentomatoes.com)

Stonegrilling with Peishapan and crew

Peishapan had a fly-in, fly-out visit and to celebrate her short return + Xmas, we went to that oh-so traditional restaurant, Ishiya Stonegrill! For those who don't know Stonegrill, basically you get a chunk of raw meat (of your choice) and a volcanic rock set at 400 degrees celsius and you fry the meat to your liking.

Yes, you go there for the food - you sure as hell don't go there for the service. The waitresses were so pushy - they tried to take away my drink when it was clearly not finished! And when Kahuna asked for still water, they gave him acqua de panna ($5). But when we really needed them for things like, oh, placing our orders....they were so slow! And then they got the entire thing mixed up! So many times did they come to our table to request again and again who had ordered what. Tsk.

But back onto the good stuff - the food!

Mmmmmm, meeeat.

The sauces to go with our meeeeeat.

Digging into my meeeeeeat.

For people who have been there before, e.g. me, Kahuna, we know the drill - you get your food, you quickly cut bite sized pieces, sear it quickly and then into your mouth before moving onto the next piece. Don't waste your time talking or else that steak will quickly become well done and bouncy - as proven to us by Peisha's brother.

But meat is not the only thing on the menu that's highly enjoyable!

Maybo savours the aroma of her udon and unagi and shares the news.

So yes, thanks to Peishapan for organising such a fun meal and hope you had a good flight back!

Xmas wrap up

Xmas this year was at Black Rock and apart from the usual pigging out there was....

Lazing around after eating too much food and playing Nintendo DS.

Pass the Parcel. Spuey didn't know how to play it much to the horror of our various aunts. They claimed we had a deprived childhood. I prefer to think of it as not wasting money on such trifles.

Pulling bon-bons.

Card-sharping.

And there are no photos but we took the kiddies down to the beach for some romping around on the playground. Yes, despite being the ripe old age of six and twenty, I still flying-fox, swing, and climb like a child a fraction of my age.

Happy Hols y'all

It has just occurred to me that I will not be able to blog (much) these holidays because Drs Ilaya-Kelly and Kelly don't have high speed internet at their place which I am house-sitting, and anyway, I'm supposed to be churning out the exps during the break.

But I'll have many more updates soon!

Not much to report here

Just like last year, the arrival of Christmas has made me realise that I have done little work last year, and what I did, I did incorrectly. So just like last year I'm doing experiments again!

Which means I haven't been doing much that can be reported here except work.

Yeah, life sucks.

All Class

I remember when Britney Spears got into a really slutty phase some time about three years ago. Around the same time, a picture of her little sister Jamie-Lynn was printed in the newspaper, I think she was about 12 at the time. A friend noted how cute in a little girl way Jamie-Lynn was and I think I said something like "Wait for the change".

Well the change has come: Jamie-Lynn has announced her pregnancy at the ripe age of 16.

All I can really say is at least she was smart enough not to make any virginity/marriage vows in public.

Driving peeves

I really hate it when people drive in the far left lane of the freeway. That is bloody dangerous considering that you know people are going to be merging in.

I didn't have an accident or anything but I've seen a few near misses in the last few days.

Long-lost Monkey rears it's head

Depending on who you are, I am considered quite the princess. People have asked me to go camping with them, just to see me wrinkle up my face!

Camping?! EUW!!!

But every now and then I like to throw a spanner into the works by doing something completely beyond the pale like brazilian jujutsu or being ultra-violent. Today I went rock climbing and a non-insignificant number of people were amazed that I was going to do it although that changed a bit when I revealed it was indoors and not out in the wild. But I was quite the little climbing monkey as a child and since the new centre on Swanston opened up, I've been keen to try it out!

Things got off to a shaky start when my nose started bleeding in the middle of explaining how to put your harness on, but it stopped and Mondz indicated that she was too hungover to climb and offered to be my belayer - things changed. Despite conflicting information about how to do it and little twiggy arms, I turned out to be quite the natural! Even though managed to climb six walls in two hours and in particular, put one guy to shame when I managed to climb a wall quite quickly whereas he only got half way up! I even managed to complete a climb graded 12 but unfortunately when I needed to re-climb a 10 in order to get a pic to prove that I made it to the top, halfway up my slippery fingers made me unsure where my grip was supposed to go :(

Now all I have to do is work on my flexibility and general strength and I may get better and hopefully I will be able to work my way up to 20+!!

Oh What?!?!

Apparently Robert Pattinson (a.k.a Cedric Diggory from HP4) has been cast as Edward Cullen in the Twighlight movie. Now, he looked okay I guess in HP4 if you like pantomime make up, but Henry Cavill has been Edward in my head for so long....*sigh*. He better put up one helluva performance. Especially when I compare their photos like this:

Henry vs Robert

Yep. I know who I'd choose.

Today I superglued my fingers together

That's all I needed to say.

Noooooooooooooooooooooo

What's set off my latest round of hysterics? Well I was going through my formal dresses wondering what I should wear for the xmas party when I came across my qipao/cheongsam and wondered if I could fit into it anymore. Not that I ever really fit into it once I started doing gym and my gluteus suddenly maximised and cantilevered away from the rest of me. I recall being absolutely devastated when I sat down and the silk split at the side seam *sob sob*.

I thought I'd give it a go since people are telling me I appear to have slimmed down. BUT IT STILL DOESN'T FIT!!! Or rather, it no longer fits around my bust. So now I have something to aim for - dropping a size to fit back into my qipao! But not the way I did it last time.

Something's wrong with this picture....

It's a Saturday night and since I'm planning to defrost and plate some cells tomorrow (among other things), I eschewed invitations out to calm myself with vodka, pate and Rossini. And then I got a phone call from Auntie Sunshine asking for my parents....who are out carousing.

Huh.

I am her mother

I have a fair deal of amusement with Amelia. I'll stick her photos on my msn and sometimes people will ask me who she is. Whenever I feel like screwing with a few minds, I like to tell them she's my daughter - hey, I'm the right age for it! And to make it even more convincing, I tell them she's the reason why it took me so long to finish my undergraduate degrees! Eventually I do tell the truth only to get people to say they reckon she'd look like how my own daughter may appear.

Well the happy folk at myheritage.com have set up a look-alike-meter to see how much kids resemble their parents. And I could be her mother!

(I'm aware I'm definitely NOT her father)

and it appears that I look equally like Ma & Pa


I also did Spuey

Much to my surprise, he looks like Pa?!

Anyway, I think Pooey and Circle will enjoy trying this out :P

Missy!

QQ and I had a pleasant walk down to the Rod Laver to see Missy Higgins play. While it didn't have all the bells and whistles of JT, Gwen, U2 etc, the simplicity was part of the appeal.

For you see, while you may go see a great Madonna show, half of the time her songs sound completely different as it's sung in a completely different key to compensate for all the jumping around she does to entertain you. Missy didn't do that. She just sat behind her piano or strummed the guitar and improvised here and there so it didn't sound like a carbon copy but it was recognisable! I didn't sit there and go *what?! That sounds nothing like the song I know!*

Another pleasant thing was how much of a sense of humour she had about herself. At one point a girl yelled out *Missy! I'm pregnant with your baby!* to which she yelled back *I thought we used protection!*

Now the bad...there was this gross old man sitting near us who just kept saying really yucky innuendo-ey stuff. And he had a bad smell. Yuk. Also, it was pretty cold in there. It wasn't really the kind of environment that made people turn the place into a sweat pit.

Anyway, it was good. Here's here non-encore song, Steer

Book review - My Sister's Keeper

How do you define a *good book*? Is it one that moves you? Something you would read over and over again? One that addresses hard hitting topics? Maybe a good narrator? Character growth? Plausibility? I can easily see why My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult became the uber-blockbuster it is...but there's something about it that holds me back.

Short synopsis, Anna Fitzgerald was conceived so her cord blood could be used to try and cure her sister Kate of an aggressive form of leukaemia. When it didn't work, she became blood and then bone marrow donor. After many years of aggressive therapy and brushes with death, Kate is diagnosed with renal failure her parents want her to donate a kidney but Anna instead sues her parents for medical emancipation.

In the words of the judge ruling the case, the book is about the sanctity of life versus the quality of life. The book raises some pretty good issues - what would you do in order to save a life? Would you do it even if it impinged on the livelihood of someone else? Can a decision made in love be bad thing? Is a life lived in pain better than not living? The weakness of this is that while it gets you thinking, the book does not answer any of these things. In fact, the whole issue is solved by deus ex machina that while closing everything cleanly and uncontroversially, it made me feel a little manipulated.

The manipulation works though. The book is written in first person monologue and I will admit to bawling a bit at various points due to the characters' conflicts. However, there are seven different narrators but they pretty much all sound the same, just separated by font. Everyone is incredibly eloquent. Not that that's a bad thing, but when the people range from 12yo girl, 17yo boy, various adults and everyone is essentially the same, they just blend into each other. Some of the fonts are nice though. I do like a good font.

Emotionally moved as I may be, my feeling at the end was not to read it again as I would for other wrenching books such as The Summer Garden or L'Assommoir (oh, such suffering there!). Everyone just seems to be reliving their own suffering or feeling other peoples and it's just a maudlin-fest. I mean sure, the last few chapters of L'Assommoir is a maudlin-fest but Zola's message was alcohol and poverty are bad and need to be fixed! Because of the deus ex machina, the only real message is medical ethics is difficult.

While my review seems overwhelmingly negative, I would recommend it to others. I did manage to finish the book in two days despite many others I could have picked up. And I certainly don't believe it belongs in the 'burn pile' with The DaVinci Code, any Jackie Collins, or The Devil Wears Prada.

Hagrid Lives!

Never my favourite character in the Harry Potter Universe, I actively and vocally wish that Hagrid be killed off. Well imagine my surprise when I saw him at my local coffee spot!!!

Back from the Far Edge of the World (Canberra)

No, I'm not dead (yet)! I've been in Canberra for a conference. I have learned a few things from it.

1. Canberra reminds me of a little town. In fact, it reminds me of the LaTrobe uni campus.
2. I no longer have the patience to sit through lecture blocks where I don't understand the content or don't care for the topic. But then, did I ever? Isn't that why I didn't do commerce?
3. By mildly insulting professors, you can garner offers for lab visits and job placements!
4. You will always judge how good a conference is based on the food they serve you.
5. The Slow Hand is alive and well.
   

Anyway, we were staying in the *king* of hotels in Canberra (ironic tone there). I remember I mentioned to Kahuna that I'd be staying there and he gave me a strange look and then he started laughing. The rest of the lab (barring the head honcho) had arrived and checked in before me, but I'd been told that the actual room we'd be staying in wasn't ready when they arrived blah blah blah. Remembering Pooey's blogs on hotel/motels around the country (each link for a diff entry!), I fully intended to give the place the benefit of the doubt and started by ignoring the 80s style decor of the lobby area. But when I got to the room, I was much unimpressed.

Here are some pics I took:

The counterpane on this bed was stained. Not my bed.

The handle on the door leading to the minibar was broken off. And despite the combined efforts of four university degrees, we weren't able to get it open.

I don't know why that metal thing was attached to the bathroom bench. Unless it used to hold something. But if you're going to remove the functional bit, why not remove it all?

However that's not the really annoying thing! When I first walked in, the room smelled of bad disinfectant, the kind they use in public toilets. I opened up the windows before the others arrived back but the smell hadn't dissipated! It was confirmed to me!

But that's still not the most annoying thing! The most annoying thing was that it took us 30 minutes to walk to the conference centre. And it RAINED every day too. And it was far enough that even the most sporty, the most enthusiastic person in our group (i.e. not me) complained that it was far!!!