我要同米奇老鼠玩！！

近排冇乜心工作，D工悶到抽筋。不但只悶，兩份PROJECT仲俾D客打唑落十八層地獄！！搞到我冇哂MOOD。。。所以呢排成日靜靜雞係網絡搵新工。其實最主要原因係份工錢，我知，我知，錢唔係萬能，但係冇錢就萬萬不能。我依家份工錢，係澳洲來講算係夠食夠用，所以真係好想有份六個數碼既新職。唔怕話俾你聽，上兩個星期鼓起勇氣，係咁派街招問應徵，將份CV係咁SEND哂出去。等左几日，終於有個CALL話有意思要同我CHAT吓。

我都唔知幾開心收到呢個CALL，因為呢份工係我既夢想之一，就係幫迪士尼打工！！！我知，我知，迪士尼冇PIXAR咁好玩，但係迪士尼一樣會令我咁開心。其實呢份係要飛去日本做，日本喎。。。我都未去過。。。都唔知幾想去到流哂口水。。。所以呢份工簡直係一箭相雕！

所以上個星期走左去應徵，一世人最憎就係應徵，吹喇叭，講到我自己有幾好打幾好，只希望討人歡心。不過冇法啦。。鬼叫我穹呀。。。掟硬上啦！！ 呢次應徵淨係第一关！ 如果成功既話，仲有兩关要過，電話應徵，然後仲要飛去日本最後一次應徵。想要高工錢唔係咁易，真係好想要份工，如果得到既話就一天都光哂！！！

Oscar

Probably won't spend whole night watching the Oscars tonight, cuz I already seen the results and is pretty much as I would have predicted. I like Cate Blanchett, so good on her winning best supporting actress. Here's my impersonation of her as Charlotte Gray, "You don't know who I am!! You don't even know my name!!"

Hide and Seek

"I will put lipstick as nail polish and you will pay!!!"

It is good to catch up some sleep this weekend. On Saturday, I slept through till mid afternoon and ended having a headache for sleeping too much. Pete wanted to see Hide and Seek so we ended up in Chatwood for the afternoon session. When we got inside, there were only a few group, suddenly before the movie starts, the whole cinema was filled with screaming teens, just kids everywhere, laughing, chatting, screaming all sorts, thought this gonna be a long afternoon.

Anyway, just from the trailer where Dakota Fanning (A VERY PRECOCIOUS KID!! Everyone knows I have a thing about precocious kids!!) saying "come out come out, whatever you are.." I thought nothing else can be cheesier than that line. The movie is about a father (Robert de Niro) and his daughter Emily, (Dakota Fanning) moved to a country town to start a new life, after his wife suicided in the bath tub. Since the move, Emily started having a good friend called Charlie, who likes to play hide and seek. Charlie wants Emily help to stop his father being happy by having a crush on a local girl (Elizabeth Shue). The question of who is Charlie goes on through the whole movie till the end when all are revealed with a twist.

I was watching the Movie show the other day, David and Margaret both agreed that John Polson, the australia director, do need to choose his story carefully for his film. I thought what a nice way for them to say the film was a disaster. I thought the story has already been done million times. It is a blend of The Shining, The Others and The Sixth Sense, if you know what I mean. The movie itself has a lot of holes unsolved and I felt it doesn't make sense at all. Throughout the whole movie, teen kids screaming at every tension bits, making the whole cinema laughed, surprisingly it was the only time we didn't find annoyed to have kids fooling around in the cinema cuz I could totally sensed the ridiculous plot in the film that makes everyone giggles.


Story :

Popcorn Level :

TOTAL : 4.0/10

Lippy, a little clown.

It's been a while since the tank has a new member. Well I did introduced some algae eating catfish which turned nasty and sucking the fish. They died after I took them out of the tank. Then I introduced 2 gold snails last week which are doing fairly well chewing up the green. Today I went to Manly for breakfast with mates, and stopby at the Aquarium World again. I just couldn't help myself and decided to bring homea new member. Her name is Lippy!! Well, she just a funny little clown fish who likes wearing lipstick. Well not a clown fish really, but Lippy actually is a fantail. I hope she uses Loreal with a better waterproof lipstick on. She looks so cute and silly in the tank cuz her size is much smaller than the others. She keeps chasing after the others to play with her. Funny little bugger. And the tank isn't looking that appealing just with a rock, my Hagalugi mountain and loads of Elodea, so decided to get some hardy, slow growing plant for bit of contrast in the tank as well. I bought this Anubias plant which attached to a piece of driftwood, it is definitely not cheap at $30! But it looks stunning in the tank even though my interior design for the tank is hopeless.

Chicken with a twist... ppsstt...

Yas: "I've discovered a secret recipe to cook chicken."

Me: "Yeah? And that is...?"

Yas: "Someone told me this and I tried it, it tasted so goood....!!!"

Me: "Yeah? And that is...?"

Yas: "Yes, it tasted like like Teriyaki Chicken, and the chicken is so tender!!!"

Me: "Yeah? And that is...?" (impatiently...)

Yas: "Well, have you tried to cook chicken with Coke before?"

Me: "............", "You are fucking kidding right?"

And here goes, the very skeptical of me, I didn't really believe it, and then my colleague showed me his blog of cooking the chicken with coke and it does look soo goood. So last night, went to supermarket bought a bottle of coke and decided to try it myself with some chicken breast. The verdict, it was fucking good!!! The coke caramelised and turned into a thick sweet juice all over the chicken, would never know Coke is that universal. You can drink it, eat it, and even get high to consume with a Panadol.. woo hoo!!

Since there is no real recipe how to cook Chicken Coke, but here's my version.

Get some chicken breasts, slice them to thinner fillet, marinate with some salt, and pepper.



Fry them in a wok or sauce pan. Add some chopped garlic, some small chopped chilli rings and some slice ginger. Fry the the chicken till golden brown.



Here is the big gun, Coca Cola. Yup, you heard me right.



In action, pouring the coke into the chicken till the breasts are covered in coke and let it simmer in medium heat.



After a while, the coke will start to reduce and the syrup will turn sticky and caramelised. Add bit of soy sauce and pepper to taste.



I had them served with some steam vegies and a baked bun roll. You just have to try it to believe it. Yeah, I can't believe is not COKE!

Constantine

"Wooah!!! Brussels Sprouts...nasty!!"

I quite like the trailer for this movie, Constantine, and decided to spend Friday night in cinema after a long stressed week. I am bit lazy to write the sypnosis but here goes from imdb:


Based on the DC/Vertigo comic book Hellblazer and written by Kevin Brodbin, Mark Bomback and Frank Capello, Constantine tells the story of irreverent supernatural detective John Constantine (Keanu Reeves), who has literally been to hell and back. When Constantine teams up with skeptical policewoman Angela Dodson (Rachel Weisz) to solve the mysterious suicide of her twin sister (also played by Weisz), their investigation takes them through the world of demons and angels that exists just beneath the landscape of contemporary Los Angeles. Caught in a catastrophic series of otherworldy events, the two become inextricably involved and seek to find their own peace at whatever cost.

My thoughts, I really like the movie!!! People been comparing this Messiah-like action hero to his previous role as Neo in The Matrix, but I think they are totally different films and have different elements that I like. The gadgets, the ideas and concepts on how killing demons are fresh and unique. The director, Francis Lawrence, is famous for directing MTV for artists such as Britney Spears, Will Smith and Aerosmith, so the settings and visual effects are one of the highlight. It did keep me entertained for a good 2 hours however the ending was bit dragon with heavy converse between Constantine, Gabrielle and Lucifer. It can get a bit too "religious". Apart from those religious message good versus bad, good wins at the end, is pretty obvious the director really want to let everyone knows that smoking is a bad habit by having the main character as a chain smoker who is going to die with lung cancer and close up of a cigarette box with the smoking can kill message on it when he blew it up with a machine gun. Since is a good message, so I don't really mind it that much.


Story :

Popcorn Level :

TOTAL : 8/10

Ring, Ring

The Siemens in Sweden ran a challenge to design the phone for the future and there are some pretty crazy concepts. And the 1st prize is a classic, just imagine everyone walking on the street with this hand sign next to their ear.... Well it kinda remind me of The Shocker, hand sign which has a totally different meaning.

Gays unwanted in the Village.

Thank god!!! Just received the latest news that the Australia Queer Eye for the Straight Guys has been axed! It only lasted 3 episodes and obviously after mowing the back hair of a jewish man last night can't increase any ratings and there goes the gays. Like Emily Howard will say, "Au voir!"

Read news:
Ten axes Aussie Queer Eye


SYDNEY: Network Ten has axed Aussie Queer Eye for the Straight Guy after only three episodes following the show's inability to attract audiences.


The show, which was heavily promoted in Ten's 2005 programming line up, failed to perform in the ratings, attracting a national audience of 903,254 for the first episode, which was well below the network's expectations. The show's ratings�dropped 20% in the second week to 725,263 with the third episode also attracting similar audience numbers.


The decision to pull the series follows speculation it would be moved from its prime time timeslot of Wednesdays at 7.30pm to Mondays at 9.30pm, which was believed to be a more suitable slot for the show.


Instead it will be replaced by American Idol from next week, with Ten planning to air the three remaining episodes of Queer Eye�as specials, "probably once US Queer Eye returns" said Network Ten spokeswoman Margaret Fearn.

Fearn said the show�s sponsors, Volvo, Hutchison 3 and David Jones had been notified and had not asked for compensation but the network is "making sure that their expectations are met".

"We will keep the advertisers' spots in the 7.30 timeslot or � if they prefer � find another appropriate timeslot," said Fearn.

Fearn said the network had only ever commissioned six episodes and denied reports that Ten had invested significantly in the show "It's a prime time show and no show is cheap but we�re not talking millions".


P/S : Look how beautiful the Virgin Money ad I built sitting in the page! hahahaha...

Lil' Brit relief for a good cause

Like Emily Howard would say, "I am a lady, and I do lady things like stroll in the park, or to the theatre.." and maybe a bit of charity activity.

If you haven't heard of Little Britain, then you probably not a funny person, well at least you think yourself is funny even though no one is agreeing with you. A lot of people missed out the first series of Little Britain on ABC last year as not many people have heard of it, when I started using all characters from LB as my MSN messenger pics, everyone had no idea who they were and asking me why all my MSN Messenger pics look so ugly and funny, but yes that's what this show is all about.

The 2nd series now showing on ABC every Wed 9pm, is even more funnier and crass. I love it!! Do you want bitty?! I couldn't wait any longer and had a peek of the screenshots from all episodes in the series and even trying to track down the 2nd series DVD! And guess what I found!!! There is a new special Little Britain DVD has just released on Valentine's Day and is for the Red Nose Day fundraising charity. This special Little Britain comic relief DVD is gonna be so good, having Daffyd interviewing Sir Elton John, Florence and Emily Howard hanging out with their new lady friend, Robbie Williams.

Wait no longer. Grab yourself a copy now before is all gone as claimed to be the fastest sellers, with over 110,000 copies sold in 4 days!! I had placed my order and can't wait to have it in my hand any minute now!!!

Bellisimo

One of my specialty, well not really but just something I think everyone should know how to cook at least, is the Spaghetti Bolognese. Something simple and easy, cooking time around 20mins, and you can't go wrong with Italian food. I cooked it up last night served with Garlic herbs turkish bread, bellisimo!

Spaghetti Bolognese



3 cloves chopped Garlic, 5 or 6 leaves chopped Basil. Fry them away in hot olived oil hot pan till garlic started to turn golden brown.



Put in the beef mince, toss them away and break up the lumps.



Add some oregano and thymes into the mince and I like it a bit spicy, so I added some chilli flake to give it a kick. There might have some juice from the mince while cooking, so make sure the mince is well cooked till all the juice reduced and dry.



Once the sauce reduced, pour in a big jug of good quality Tomato sauce. Normally I will pour some water into the jug, give it a good stir and get all the sauce out so that way we can prolong the juice reducing period to have a very thick bolognese with tender juice mince. (p/s: excuse me for the greasy stove and tomato sauce splatted everywhere on the tiles.)


To go with the spaghetti, get some Turkish Bread, slice them in half, chopped some garlic and spread all over together with Oreganos and Thymes. Drizzle olive oil on top and put it into a preheated 180C oven, and keep an eye of it. It is ready once the top crust turns brown.



Yuummm... Normally when you cook Spaghetti Bolognese, there's always more bolognese that you can handle for one night, so I suggest you cook more Pasta as well, so you can keep some for tomorrow lunch or dinner.

Awwww.....

Just found this pictures on my harddrive and suddenly all good ole memories came back to me. I think I was only 3 yo on the pic where my mum was holding me trying to take a photo as I was trying to run away. To be honest, I am too young back then to remember the event. But I do remember it was taken outside our first house back then which was a convenient store. The 2nd picture of me graduated at Kindergarten at 6yo. I was the top of the class and the school and received lots of presents at the graduation. I still remember the colorful abacus they gave me, a brigh pink color frame with color balls on each row from 1 to 10 then to 100. I don't see them in the market anymore nowdays, can be a collectable.

Flickr Graph

I've been started using Flickr for sorting out my photos online and it is doing a real good job. Register for an account is free, but limited storage space of 10mb a month. But if you want more features and unlimited upload, then you just have to pay for a small amount to have all the good stuff.

Someone has even created this a little cool 3rd party program, Flickr Graph, that will show who is within your Flickr circle of friends. It is a very nifty little flash plugin I would say.

天理何在?

我想应該係时候轉吓環璟。呢排工作傍忙，收工返屋企都仲要做，簡直係人间地獄！我係呢間某公司都做左兩年幾，越做就越俾人恰！ 工錢有唔係多过人，久年仲要用威脅幟職來加工錢，加都係得雞碎咁多。個個同司仲係嘶扮哂野，擦鞋仔，打得小！！！ 波士去旅行，某同士竟然偷偷日日SMS去泰國同波士報到擦鞋，波士返到來，只買手信俾個擦鞋仔。我唔係貪D泰國CHEAP野，但係擦鞋擦到出哂面簡直係过份。所以我已經決定跳蹧，唔洗在係嘶俾人捉水魚！！

2 new pals in the neighbourhood

Since the sucking catfish died after I took them out of the tank for being naughty sucking the goldfish, the algae started to grow back and my water changing routine start increasing. So I've decided to introduce some new pals to do the job. I went to Mosman to check out this new aquarium that just opened Dave been mentioning about. The shop itself is quite nice, in dim light and fluoresecent light to keep the fish tank, and the fish look so vivid and colorful under dim light in the shop. And I am glad to see the tank are much bigger than the other shop with hundred of fish fighting for space in a small 1ft tank. This shop has lots of freshwater fish and some nice gold fish too with a very reasonable price. I don't mind to pay more as the fish look quite healthy swimming in the big tank. I've decided to grab 2 snails and testing it out whether they will eat the clean up the algae. I am not very fond of snails, the slimey little bugger... looks like an alient out of the Star Wars film. I put them in the tank and they slowly popping out from their shell. They are so weird looking with eyes and tentacles, and their flesh has some fluorescent orange dots all over....very... er... interesting.

Oh, and I bought some Hikari Food
for the goldies as well. So far I've beeen only using cheap brand fish food for them to grow, and now they are about 2 to 3 inches long so I've decided is time for them to develop to their inner beauty. The food I bought is specially for head growth for the Ranchu and Oranda. Can't wait to see the results in 1 month time.

Superheores. Comics. Sci Fi. Aliens. Ghosts.

There are few movies coming soon that I can hardly wait. Here's the must seen movie list:


Sin City
Indie comics adaptation movie, but this one is a keeper! The trailer is attractive enough to deserve a good 10. I love the way how they blend the b/w comic style into a movie with few vivid colors emphasizing each character. Totally dig it! Coming out in March in US, but we probably have to wait for another 6 months or so! Damn! I am so jealous.



Fantastic Four
Ironically, yes another Marvel comics flick, but definitely not against this one, cuz I grew up watching Fantastic 4 cartoon. Invisible girl, the human torch, the thing and Mr Fantastic (sounds like a Shaggy's song but), it just truly nostalgic and thanks for bring it back on screen!! Watch the trailer and have your adrenalin kicking now!!



Corpse Bride
Good ole Tim Burton is bring the puppets back! YAY!!! I haven't seen anyone who doesn't like The nightmare before Christmas by Tim Burton. It's gotta be one of the best dough puppet film ever made! I remember I used to know all the lyrics of the songs from the movie. This time Tim is bring an even darker, haunted puppet story. It will be released during Halloween in US. Here you can get the first taste of the movie.



War of the Worlds
Despite the movie is by Spielberg and Tom Cruise has the main character, I guess it is just one of the epic you must see. I never really have read the story myself, but I did listen to the musical quite a few times. I really like the CD as the electronica genre back in 80s is brilliantly astounding. So far the teaser hasn't showing much, but I am sure it is an exciting big budget film that will blow your brains out!


Kung Fu Hustle
Man.... isn't he funny!? Stephen Chow is one of the funniest man in HK movie industry. This movie released just before Xmas in Hong Kong and China, and I already asked the local shop for DVD. She laughed at me and said "Sorry, we don't sell pirated DVDs". Damn it!! But now I saw alot of ebayers start flogging the DVD on sale now, but they are damn expensive! I've downloaded the whole movie on internet, but the quality damn bad, someone obviously snucked a hidden cam into the cinema and didn't get caught in China. I didn't finish watching it cuz I didn't want to spoil my enjoyment watching, so I might have to lay my hands on one of those DVD on Ebay! Well, if you haven't watch Shaolin Soccer, grab it now, and this Kung Fu Hustle will be your in your favorite movie list!

The Aviator

"I wish I can say 'I'm the King of the world!!!' in this movie..."


I've got a few of those buy one get one free coupons from the Kellogs cereals boxes that expires end of March, so decided to go and see The Aviator. I'm not particularly fond of Leonardo DiCaprio, cuz I think he only have one face on every single movie. Like Pete said, he has a very consistent acting skill, perhaps a bit too consitent?

A biopic depicting the early years of legendary director and aviator Howard Hughes' (Leonardo DiCaprio) career, from the late 1920's to the mid-1940's. The movie started off by how young Howard Hughes transformed a small fortune into a massive one by producing big budget films such as Hell's Angels, using 26 cameras, blown out 4 million dollars, that no one had ever done before. Eventually, his passion on aviaton leading him to become one of the richest man back then, taking over TWA airlines, building the fastest spy plane in the world, the biggest in the world called Hercules. Through his success, Hughes got the privilege to met the hottest Hollywood stars back then like Ava Gardner (Kate Beckingsale) and Katherine Hepburn (Cate Blanchett). Unfortunately, his obsessive compulsive disorder just happens to get in the way and almost losing all his fortune... losing all his fortune... losing all his fortune.... losing all his fortune... losing all his fortune....
I am not very familiar with Martin Scorsese's films, as I haven't seen his last movie The Gangs of New York either. This acting from Beckingsale and Blanchett are marvellous, and Leonardo did have a very "consisten" acting skill. I think is just hard for him to act as a mature successful man cuz he just always looks like 18yo. I think the movie was just okay, nothing really makes me excited about it. The plane crashing scene does somewhat probably the highlight of the movie for me... highlight of the movie for me... highlight of the movie for me... highlight of the movie for... highlight of the movie for me... Not just that, I think the ending was bit of an awkward one, people in the cinema left with a "what the?" in the mind... perhaps that's the way of the future... the way of the future... the way of the future... the way of the future... the way of the future... the way of the future...

Overall, I don't think it deserves to have so many nominations at the Oscars, I enjoyed Finding Neverland more than this movie. My prediction, Leonardo won't win best Actor, Cate won't win either, best picture is a possibility just because is a big budget movie.


Story :

Popcorn Level :

TOTAL : 6.5/10

Fuck Valentine's Day.

Alright, the Valentine's Day is way passed, the whole hype is over, some flowers are feeling old and saggy lying around in the office, smelly rotten. Did you receive any flowers? Chocolate? Candlelight Dinner? Not everyone feels lovey dovey during Valentine's Day does it? Some will show it through artwork, check it out here.

Vinyl Will Kill

I never felt so ripped off in my life. I was asked to get involved in this little project called Vinyl Will Kill, by Jeremyville (I dare to say not the very nice person I have encountered with). It is a book about toy figure art and design, fills with loads of interviews with the designers and shit. As far as I am concerned, I got involved is because the maker himself was lacking of HK and JP designers contacts, so pretty much I was told to incharge of all the interviews I got contacts with, which is around 6 or 7 of them. Now the catch is, they have warned me there is no pay for doing it, but they can give me 10 books for doing the interviews, and maybe some other agreements if I get involved into the Art Direction for the book.

The saga begins, I got all the contacts they want, did all the interviews and shit, since last year, trying to organise and put a date for some discussion for the art direction, but all they told me is delayed, on hold. So I thought yeah, whatever, so long I got 10 books I don't care if I really want to have my feedback in the design. The book was finished end of last year just before Xmas, sold out. Emailed the maker to find out where my book is, he said sold out, have to wait for the 2nd batch. Early this year, still no books, the excuse this time was they were moving office, so is a mess but once finished will have the books send out to me.

Eventually after a few emails to them, with lot more excuses, I dropped an email and asking whether I can just buy a fucking book from them if is soo much trouble to send out a free one. I think they got the idea, and within few days, they've sent the book out, but yes... JUST ONE BOOK! Not 10 books that we have agreed on. This time their excuse is, they have not enough books to givaway, and every contributors to the book only received one, so no exception for me as well, and even told me out of about 40 something interviews, and I only did about 6 or 7, so they called it a book for free "FAIR"! Fair?! Fucking not!! If want to compare in ratio, most of the interviews are done by the maker himself, and other contributors only did one interview each, and I have done about 7, is that not enough effort I have put in to deserve fucking 10 books?! Besides, without the interviews I've done of the Asian region designers, the book will be unexciting and all about American thrash!! I felt so ripped off, I can never believe people will be so low to do such a thing. That's one of the reason why I am so tired of the vinyl figure world out there and decided to close down my Figuro online toy store. I hope people out there read this and realise this whole scam is just another fraud making big bucks out of someone elses talent and credability. Vinyl Will Kill? Pfftt... sure it did kill me big time! I probably sounded so sour with this rant, but fuck yeah! I deserve to be sour over the whole bullshit!

~*&@!#^@!!!~

Spent last whole month doing this project and I was loving it, having great time doing it but suddenly got a word from client they are changing their proposition and now the whole design gone down the drain... !!! @#$^)$%*!@#!!~~ sigh... what can you do? move on... i am sure eventually it will send to good use.

Makeover

As I started using the Flickr to store my photos, so I've decided to give my blog a makeover and get rid of the big chunky photos on top. The CSS stylesheet and template are quite fiddly and took me hours to get them right. But I am pretty happy with the way it looks now, even though there are still more changes to make (those ugly blog banners!)

陳慧琳紙醉金迷演唱會澳洲上演

Hong Kong Pop!! Yay!!! Kelly Chan, one of the pop hit HK singer is coming to Australia for another concert soon. I think is in March. I've seen some reviews and pictures of this concert tour in Hong Kong and looking damn hot!! The concertwill be held at Sydney Entertainment Centre and ticket price starts from $48 up to $128.


Anyone wanna go with me???

Too busy.

I am now behind schedule for my work after the trip. Too busy to update the blog. But I'll try my best the next few days. Promise!! Urggh!!!

South Australia, the Wine Haven.

View my Adelaide trip photos here


Just spent the weekend down south and had a wonderful time. It all started from a mission surprise for Pete between me and Dave. I've booked the tickets long time ago while Virgin Blue having the cheap airfare offers. Pete didn't know a thing till we arrived at the airport and find out we heading to Adelaide for a 3 days trip. We flew out last Friday and just got back last night, a nice short trip just do what we do best, relaxing and wine tasting and all.

Adelaide, the city of churches, which claimed to be a boring little town, but that's a totally bullshit. The city itself is quite happening, nice city, small but neat, what makes this little city a gem from the south is the surrounding vineyards. It's only 50km away, the wine connoisseurs' heaven, Barossa Valley, where most of the good wine come from. Just another hour drive down south, McClaren Vale is another best wine hideouts. We spent 2 days driving around the vineyards, visiting wineries, wine tasting can almost easily become our day jobs. Not that any of us are expert in wine, but we were easily getting the hang of the 3 basic steps, swirl, smell and taste and initially we did have an idea what we like and what we don't.

A few wineries that we visited tickle our fancy, either the wine itself or the service, they do deserve a plug here. So let's do a Sideways. Two Hands at Barossa is an excellent choice, either the service or the wine itself. It is a small boutique winery, served by the winemaker herself whom was really helpful and gave us lots of insights about winemaking. Next one got my thumbs up is Chapel Hill, nice wine, great atmosphere by turning an old Chapel into a wine tasting room. They even have a guesthouse where you can attend the cooking class and special wine only made for the guesthouse guests. Grant Burge's Tawny is the best of the best. It won the Best Tawny of the world, judged in Portugal, the only tawny outside Portugal that won the award since 40 years ago. You can't go wrong if it's claimed to be the best of the world. The other two wineries that we think worth a mention is Turkey Flat and d'Arenberg. Turkey Flat, even though some of their wine are sold out, and we didn't fancy their Sparkling Shiraz, but I did enjoy the wine tasting experience inside an old cottage. d'Arenberg, a well known winemaker does know his wine, it was a crowd when we were there, but Pete did manage to pick up another Tawny. The 12 bottles on wine made the journey home awkwardly interesting by having to carrying them onto plane. I wasn't worry much of the wine, but more of a guy onboard who was suffering Aviophobia (fear of flying). They put him right at the front row next to the exit door, he couldn't sit still, keep rubbing his own legs the whole time, walking the aisle up and down, chewing his Mintos he bought onboard. I was so worried he might panic suddenly and open the exit door and jump out in mid air. Thank god he didn't.

PDD - Helix mobile

Normally I don't just plug any new mobile that release in the market but this one caught my eye. PDD, UK's number one product innovation consultancy, will be displaying the Helix concept phone at the 3GSM World Congress. This mobile definitely not something you see everyday. Not like the Nokia new released, I had a look of the real thing at the shop and the phone looks so plasticky, is like a $2 toy. Design wise, both thumbs up for me, it is a clam-shell mobile with a screen that rotates 180 degree when open to show the large equaliser when using it as a MP3 player. Oh yes, not just MP3, it might have minumum of 20GB storage for songs and photos, and a Whopping of 5.0 megapixel camera built in. I think all the phones nowdays should be as useful as this one. If this prototype really going to be released then I think this will come to my wishlist replacing my iPod and my Hutchison 3 phone and my Pentax 4 digital camera.

Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, Mate!

Like Vicky Pollard will say "Ooohh my god!", the show was horrible! When they revealed that Australia going to do their own version of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, it already sounds like a disaster. In US we got studs, England we got lads, but in Australia we got Yobbos. Getting yobbos on a queer show just ain't gonna work. Imagine Steve Irwin make over? Crikey!!

Last night was the first episode. They said they worry about how people comparing them to the US version, why shouldn't there when the US one is so successful and chic? When Carson tjuzes up, everyone is listening. But the Australian queer team just not up to the scratch, they can't even thrash the straight guy's place in glory like the americans did. Don't even mention the sense of humour, only if there is any. I felt bored and keep flicking through other channels. The show is like Home Improvement but in a somewhat gay way. There are tips and hints everywhere through the whole show and they took it damn serious about the whole "make over" thing rather than having a ball like the Americans did. And seeing the Fat Chef, Ryan Andrijich, trying to tell the straight guy stop eating his Barritos because he is overweight? Calling a spade a spade? pffft... I am sure they all are very talented gay men, I do impressed with the interior design makeover at the end, but then simplicity always work on a TV show by just showing the nicest part of the house. Phew... I did my rant... now queer eye move aside!

On the other hand, the 2nd series of Little Britain is back on ABC last night at 9pm, I was happy and damn I missed that show! I laughed so hard over every single characters they are just so wrong and funny!!! Love it love it love it! Rich, would like A BITTY?

HAPPY CHINESE NEW YEAR

Wishing you everyone out there Horse Arrive Work Done, Step Step High Rise, Year Year Got Fish, One Road Smooth Wind, Heart Think Work Done, and last but not least... Dragon Horse Sperm God!!!

PodBrix

Not a Lego fan myself, used to when I was 8yo, but this one is for Lego and iPod die hard fan. This little lego has nothing to do with you iPod what so ever. It just says it all on the site "PodBrix sells modified minifigs inspired by the popular ad campaign for portable music players. In the future we may branch out to other related minifigs." In another words, "We just like to suck cocks and take credits and make some big bucks out of someone elses original idea and bite me!" Well there you go, limited to 300 pieces but 300 suckers already bought them. All gone.

A story about a cat and an apple

Everyone is trying to real hard to bring the iPod down, and this time is Napster showing their secret weapon. By offering $15 per month and you can download as many Mp3 as you want. However, only if you have to choose from one of the 2 ugly Mp3 Players that comes with the deal. The offer is pretty good, but I think the die hard iPod fans will not even think of an Mp3 player with any other color than white as the new black.

Superbowl Ads Showcase

Some cool ads been showing at the 2005 Super Bowl XXXIX in US. Some are pretty good like FEDEX, GoDaddy.com, CareerBuilder.com and Ameriquest. However they are some pretty crap one like Macdonalds. My favorite probably the Monkey Business ones... working with a bunch of monkeys and no one listen, and one monkey alwasy kissing the monkey boss ass.... so true... so true...

Finding Neverland

Von Trapp family step aside! We are the Davies rocking da house!


I was meant to stay home and work on some freelance work last weekend but instead ended up cooking a feast, watched movie at home and at cinema. I've been a bad bad boy. Oh well, I could say I had a very creative week I guess to make myself feel less guilty.

Finding Neverland, the movie title says it all, is about J.M Barrie, the author of 'Peter Pan', his experiences which lead him to write the children's classic. Well no, we are not talking about Michael Jackson and his Neverland here. This movie is based on true events, but how close the movie follows J.M Barrie's life, no one knows. We are told the story of how J.M Barrie met up with a widowed mother with four children and he was inspired by the whole experience and that's how Peter Pan the story came to life. Soon, the whole town is talking about Barrie and the Davies family, which causes some rough waters in his marriage, and how he likes to spend time with little kids. (Just think of Michael Jackson). Despite the Peter Pan story was inspired by the Davies Family, even Peter Pan the name is borrowed from one of the children's name, but deep down is about how Barrie himself discovered the little boy inside himself once again. The romance between Barrie and Sylvia Davies was clearly portraited between Peter Pan and Wendy in the story.

In the cinema, me and Pete were the only male audience, apart from a little boy who sat in front of us who laughed at the dog mostly. 2 old ladies in front of us were really into the movie, gasped so loud showing disapproval when the grandmother dunked her biscuit into the nice cup of tea in the movie. At the end of movie, sobbing noise surrounded us, tissues were all out everywhere. Some quickly rushed out so no one could see her crying. I did feel bit wet around my eyelashes at the end of the movie, but I am sure it was just the irritation from the dried up contact lenses. Overall, I did enjoy the movie, but wasn't as brilliant as I would have thought. I assume I do have high expectation over the movie if it got nominated for Oscar Best Picture. And Johnny Depp, good performance as usual, again he got nominated for Best Actor, but he never won once! Just give that poor guy an award for heaven sake!

Last but not least, before the movie begins, we all got a treat of the upcoming movie trailer, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Tim Burton. Of course, Johnny Depp as the Willy Wonka. Well, I have to say I am not so sure about Johnny's new look, it's just sooo..... er.... "GAY"? (pic below)


Story :

Popcorn Level :

TOTAL : 7.0/10

OLDBOY

OLDBOY, a ghastly, powerful Korean movie which was released back in 2003, finally I got a chance to watch it last Saturday on DVD that I bought from Ebay. I've never heard of this movie till last year when I saw one of the most shocking scene in the trailer of this movie. I went to local HK DVD shop to look for it but no luck, so decided to get it on Ebay.

By not giving it out too much, the movie is about a guy named Oh Daesu, an average man, loud mouth, who got kidnapped and imprisoned in a hotel room for 15 years. He was drugged, hypnotised and finally released with load of money, a cellphone and branded clothings. As he strives to explain his imprisonment and get his revenge, he soon finds out that not only his kidnapper has still plans for him, but that those plans will serve as the even worse finale to 15 years of imprisonment.

Korean movie tends to use a lot of metaphors for story telling. It always leave you half guessing half puzzle but still, you will feel satisfied with the story and endings. Am I too vague or trying to be wanky? Anyhow, in this movie, there are comedy, romance, and violence, yes LOTS OF THEM! Actually there isn't alot of blood spilling, killing extravaganza like Kill Bill, but is the violent act they performing, as you start using your imagination that really makes you squirm. (note: how he holds the hammer backward?) If you are faint-hearted kind, maybe this is not a movie for you. Yesterday I noticed this movie is coming soon to cinema in Australia, go and watch it if you are gutsy enough.


Story :

Popcorn Level :

TOTAL : 9.0/10

雞蛋圓，豬醋酸；新年添財又添孫!!!

As Chinese New Year is on this Wednesday (9th Feb), and since we don't get holiday over here in Australia for this festive season (yeah missing those long holidays in Malaysia, sigh...), and I going away for 3 days trip this coming weekend, so I've decided to celebrate the CNY big feast earlier at my place with friends. The big feast (团圓飯), is a must on the CNY's eve, where family get together, friends get together, colleagues get together to washaway the old year and ready for a whole new year. Since I am overseas all alone on my own, so I've decided to cook up this little something to share it with friends. It's one of my favorite dish, a very authentic Chinese Hokkien dish which my mum used to cook alot. I did cook this dish several times before and I have to say is probably one of my signature dish when I really want to impress people when over for dinner.

This time instead of eating with steamed rice, I've decided to go for the Shanghai style, serve them with steam buns and peking fried dumplings. This dish has no name, well not that I aware of it. Most people, even my mum will just called it "vinegary pork with eggs" (雞蛋豬肉醋）, the taste of this dish is very similar to 東波肉, a well known dish that u can get at 大人餐廳, in Sungei Wang, KL Malasia. Since is CNY season and I am feeling generous, so would like to share this secret recipe to all the food lovers out there and wish you all a Happy and Prosperous New Year. Just like what the Rooster will say this year... "BO~KWOK!!"

Vinegary pork with eggs recipe next page

Get about half kilo of pork fillet, diced it into cubed bite size, chopped 3 cloves of garlic, and slices about 10 leafs of ginger.



Now heat up a pot with oil, toss in the garlic and the ginger and fry for couple minutes, then in goes the pork. Now you might aware the pot is anti-nonstick, so you might have to keep stirring the meat while is cooking inside to prevent from sticking. Don't use a nonstick wok, because we need all the flavour stays in the pot, just like the Fight Club, "Whatever happens in the pot, stays inside the pot!"



Fry the pork till is all cooked outside and still tender inside, then pour water into the pot until double the volume of what is inside and let it stew.



Now time to make some hard boiled eggs. Use another pot, fills with cold water (cuz egg cracks in hot water, trust me), and then put in several eggs. Once the water starts to boil, turn the heat down, and let the eggs cooked itself in low heat.



Now here's the heart and soul of the dish: Sugar, White vinegar (cheaper brand the better cuz is more tangy), Soy Sauce, Chili Flake and the most important part, Star Anise (Illicium verum).


Star Anise (Illicium verum), we called it Eight Horns (八角） in Chinese. It is in a star shaped with 8 cloves. It has a very strong smell and it does release lots of flavour in dish, so you do not need a lot of them for cooking. For this dish, I've only used 3.



Once the eggs are cooked, peel the shell off, and put them inside the pot. Together, you can see I already added the Star Anise, 3 of them, about 3 table spoon of soy sauce, and about half cup of vinegar, and about 10 table spoon of sugar.


Another important ingredient, The Dark Soy Sauce. It is very dark normally you can't see through the bottle, and it should be very thick like honey. It has a kinda sweet salty taste to it.



Just a drizzle of the dark soy sauce, and you can see the instant tranformation, the whole pot will turn into darker gravy color, that's where the meat and the eggs will start sucking the flavour in. And add some Chili flake to spice it up a little bit. Now let it stew for at least 2 hours or more! The longer it stews, the tenderer pork gets. While is stewing, now we can move on to other tasks.



Making own dumplings just too much hassle while you can buy the authentic dumplings from Shanghai. You just need to find a Chinese supermarket and they will have lots of variety to choose from but I prefer to buy the Peking style dumplings, more authentic.


The instructions are on the back of the bag, so you can't go wrong. Look at them... nice golden brown crispy skin.... drool.....



Instead of serving the Vinegar Pork with steamed rice, I have chosen to serve with steamed buns instead. I've chosen the Silver Thread rolls and the Flower Rolls. Pete asked me, "What kinda flower did they use to make the roll?" and I said, "No, is called Flower Rolls because it shaped like a flower"...... or not.



The dish has been stewed at least 2 hours. You can see the meat and egg all dyed in brown color from the dark soy sauce and look sooo juicy. An egg broke apart and the york will melt and add some texture to the gravy.



Here you have it, a decent CNY meal, Vinegar Pork with eggs, served with steam buns, and side dish of Fried Dumplings. P/S: get a nice crunchy lettuce too, wash them, and try to keep the whole leaf intact as much as possible for wrapping the pork later.



Here's how you eat it: 1. Grab a bun, split them in half but still intact, put a leaf of lettuce inside, then top up with the vinegary pork meat. Yuummmm....



Well, I think I had a very happy customer here. Pete says "finger licking good."

Starck naked

This cordless mouse that comes with my Acer PC has been acting up recently. It keeps dropping out and won't receive any signal, even I've just replaced with new batteries. So decided to get a new mouse with 'cord' so I don't have to deal with this 'wireless' problem again. There are so many mouses to choose from nowdays, but have decided to get the new Microsoft mouse designed by Philippe Starck fo $59.95 (not cheap). Well, the design is cool, but the mouse itself really doesn't do much. At first I thought there are 2 extra buttons for 'back' and 'forward' function like other mouse has. But it was just part of the design!!! RIPP OFF!! The blue light kinda cool, and the whole left panel is the left button and same for the right side. So have to hold the mouse very gently cuz is very easily to rest your hand on the right button and opens up the right menu whole time, kinda annoying! It only took few hours, the mouse started to make squeaky noise when I press the left button gently... fucking annoying!! Never ever tempted to buy an useless product just because it looks cool. Lesson learnt.

The little iShuffle entrepreneur on Ebay

It's amazing to see how people will get into so much trouble just to make some quick bucks. This little fellow bought so many iShuffle during the launch at the Macworld in NYC, I wondering how much he gonna sell it on Ebay.

Gene 'R' Kelly Singin' in da Rain... Aight!

 

 

Cool little ad by Volkswagen, Gene Kelly singing in the rain, breaking down da house! Aigghttt!

2005年(雞年)生肖運程-龍: Dragon

今年吉星「紫微、龍德、歲合」入運拱照，又歲逢「六合」，整體的運程不弱，能得到長輩或上司的提攜輔助，令事業步步向前。但要注意今年「天厄、暴敗、歲合」作弄，致某些月份卻阻滯多多。

事業財運︰今年的三粒吉星「紫微、龍德、歲合」都對你的事業甚有幫助，大有機會升職，即使你嘗試新的工作或轉換行業，雖然初時頗辛苦，但最後都能成功。今年的正財運較強，有些收入是朋友介紹而得來的，偏財較弱，不宜投資或賭博。

愛情︰已有伴侶的人士，今年的感情漸轉趨融洽﹔未有對象者，今年遇上合心意的機會頗多，不宜太過揀擇，也不宜太過急進，最好先做朋友慢慢了解清楚，再作定論。

宜配戴屬雞、猴、鼠的飾物。

一切明哲保佑，以和為貴。

Looks like I got a good year this year with more money!!! hehehe Check out your chinese horoscope here. Chinese only sorry.

Wild Wednesday

The mother nature has gone berzerk lately. Australia just had some weird weather changed last Wednesday, Melbourne was flooded, Bass Strait had little cyclone, Snowy Mountain was covered in 15cm of snow in summer, Sydney was a chaos with hails and fallen trees damaging house, and Long Reach has hazardous dust storm. Our weather is totally out of whack! Read more on SMH. And there are some amazing pics there too.

Special Flied Lice

Nice, quick and easy Billy style Flied Lice. When I am too lazy doing groceries shopping and not much food stock left in da house, then flied lice is the easiest way to get by for the night. Something simple yet so tasty, fixed up a meal in 30mins, why not?

Check out step by step Billy Style Special Flied Lice next page.

Ingredients : 2 egg, 5 Shitake Mushrooms, 3 Chinese Sausage, green peas, and mixed vegies, Soy Sauce, Pepper.



Preparation: Chopped half onion, slice the mushroom and sausages into long strips. Beat 2 eggs in a bowl with some soy sauce, water and some pepper.



Heat up the wok with some olive oil, fry the onions until golden brown.



Quickly, put in the chinese sausages, keep tossing them so they don't stick or burnt on one side and not cooked on the other.



Add in the vegies, mushroom and bit of soy sauce to taste.



While the vegie is cooking, put them aside on the wok. then pour a little bit more oil, and pour in the beaten egg mix. Use your spatula keep stirring it until is almost set then quickly cover the vegies on top of the egg and mix them all up again.



Now turn the heat low and pour in the cooked steam rice, best to cook your rice overnight and put it inside the fridge. I did mine there and then, so the steam rice was still bit sticky for flied lice. While the rice in the wok, pour as much soy sauce and make sure most rice are covered in sauce if not it will turn out really blend.



Use your strong arm and toss all the mix vegies and rice together until everything is well mixed and covered in flavour.


Here you have it, Billy Style Special Flied Lice. Normally I like to have it with my Trident Sweet Chilli Sauce.

idog

(Fanning my both hands over my face frantically like accepting the title of Miss Peageant), Oh my god!~ Oh my god!~ I can't believe this!

Just found out through TodayisToday, Sega Toys Japan is going to release a new robot pet name idog, that goes with your ipod!! idog will have all the sensors like an AiBO by Sony, plus more!! Once you hook up your ipod to the idog, it will serenade to the music playing the song through the speaker on its belly, and it will start waving its tail, head and ears synching to the rhythm of the songs!! It will be releasing in Japan on the 2nd of April, they haven't announced the price yet, but I assume gonna be expensive :( Maybe my Japanese friend at work can help me to get one... mmm let me add it to my wishlist... *wink wink*

Australia racing after desperately...

The most talkabout TV drama series which swept most of the Golden Globe awards finally is here in Australia. I was busy working last night and totally forgot it was the premiere of Desperate Housewives. Luckily, channel 7 had a so called "encore" due to popular demand, they rerun the first episode again tonight after the Amazing Race. I have to say the first episide was pretty good. Everything seems to be a blur so far, but I can see where the storyline is heading to. And I can see how it becomes so popular with the suspense at the end of each episode, blending Melrose Place with Agatha Christie murder mystery plot. The whole guessing and suspicious thing really get me going... Normally I don't like to get hook to drama series, cuz once you hooked, alot of time will be wasted in front of TV, but this one is a keeper! I think last one I was hooked on was Six Feet Under, but not till the 3rd or 4th season, when the whole story just gone whacked and totally boring.


Tonight I managed to take some time out and sit back, relax and enjoyed a bit of TV viewing pleasure. As I have a big freelance job coming up, so I am trying to get as much free time out as possible before I hit the bottom with work. Amazing Race is one of my favorite show even though I never managed to finish watching a whole series for the last 5 series! I always forgot and Australia always put this kinda reality shows at weird timeslot just to fill up the TV while no one is watching which is a pisser. Even tonight I accidentally saw it was on while flicking through the channels. Tonight was the first night and first destination was in ICELAND... ICELAND!!! Bjork.... Blue Lagoon.... I WANT TO GO!!!!!! Everytime I think of Iceland, it will remind me of Bjork's "Bachelorette" video clip. The mother nature is soooo bootifooll...

On the other hand, I just don't get why Americans can be so fucking dumb?!?! The petrol lid stated "DIESEL"???? What's wrong with you woman?! The devil hairstyle dude wasn't helping either. And the 2 over confident geeks were just dumb by taking the search for a buoy challenge. And the 2 wrestlers, oh my god... how can someone put up with a bitch like that?! She is one of those who would like to rub the salt into the wound kinda woman, people saying sorry, but she still won't let go and keep rubbing it in.... feel sorry for the partner who is a big giant muscular wrestler, but obviously you can tell he is so nice and gentle to his partner. FUCKING BITCH!

Dusk at Cremorne Point

A picture taken this morning during my morning jog at Cremorne Point. Bootiful.... Click on image to enlarge.