We only get thirty sweet noggy days… Then the government takes it away again.

I’m hoping to get some time to try my hand at making some nog again this year. Past attempts have been less than successful.

Since Justine was at school until around 9:30 last night, she and a bunch of her friends decided to go out and have a few drinks after school. Taking pity on me, she asked if I wanted to come along (probably so she could have more than a few drinks and have me drive her home; yup, that’s it).

I caught up with Justine — and her school chums: Jae, Emily, Fiona, Steph and Elise — in Melbourne Central. I didn’t know but since they’ve renovated, Melbourne Central has a new section called “L3″ (which is, conveniently, on the third level; what a coincidence!) which has bars, restaurants and cinemas. Sort of like Knox’s “Ozone” area, or Chadstone’s similar bit if you’ve been there. We went into the “Melbourne Central Lion Hotel” which I found a tad strange since we were inside a shopping centre but also inside a bar… Lunacy!

We spent around five minutes in the pub… bar… thing before a couple of people decided it was too loud; we retreated back outside to a little restaurant thing called “The Groove Train” and proceeded to have a few more drinks.

Most of the others had to leave by around midnight to catch trains which whisked them off in all directions to various areas of suburbia; Justine and I went downstairs to Chilipadi to have a second crack at the hawker market they have there Thursday through Saturday nights. We both had roti; mine was covered in Rendang curry and Justine’s contained egg, mayonnaise and sweet chili sauce. Both were cheap (five bucks) and delicious.

Slept well enough again. Morning was the sort of weather I expected from Perth, but it didn’t last very long.

The presentation John and I gave went down well — I cracked jokes unintentially — and it seems people were geniunely interested.

I should also thank Diana as she was kind enough to buy me a pair of (lucky) black socks to go with my suit — I forgot to bring some!

Afterwards, we took a tour ferry to Freemantle which is a rather old place. The building are all old (well, depends on which part you visit) and all probably have historical significance.

After a few drinks a few of us went to “Gino’s” (you’d think a place with that name would serve pizza) which didn’t have very good food. Catching up with some others at the Little Creatures brewery we had quite a few drinks (pilsner was OK, pale ale tasted funny — almost lemony) we made our way ‘home’.

Due to the way work’s EBA is structured, the ANZAC long weekend is the last long weekend I’ll have until Christmas. Of course, I’m able to use my leave to take long weekends whenever I desire and I do get extra days at Christmas and Easter to make up for it… though working straight through from the end of April to the end of December is a pretty long haul.

Nevertheless, I spent this weekend how I try to spend most of my weekends, doing as little as possible.

On Friday night, Justine and I saw Sin City, which isn’t due for release here until August (go figure). I haven’t read the comics graphic novels on which the film is very strongly based, though I have flicked through them on occasion. The film basically has three stories which mostly don’t intertwine, though do a little; these stories are told in a rather gruesome, gritty manner — which, to my understanding, emulates the graphic novels quite closely. The majority of the film is in black and white, though some parts of the screen are colour — certain characters (such as ‘Yellow Bastard’, played by Nick Stahl, who was John Connor in Terminator 3 and Ben Hawkins in the fantastic Carnivale [which I haven't yet talked about here]), for instance. Many of the scenes and angles look like they have been ripped straight from the graphic novels, and they appear almost like a living comic to great effect. If you like comic book movies, see it. If you don’t like gore (even though it’s in black and white, and mostly stylised), don’t see it.

On Saturday night, we had planned to go to Sweet Basil restaurant (one of the first restaurants Justine and I went to); they weren’t answering the phone though the message on the phone claimed there were open for lunch and dinner. So, we decided to go to Tokyo Teppanyaki (not to be confused with Ginza Teppanyaki which I’ve talked about before) along with Kat and her new bloke, Warren (who happens to be good friends with the son of Ginza Teppanyaki’s manager, eesh). This place was a bit more expensive than the previous place; the food was probably on par though I particularly enjoyed the prawns. I would love to go back and get the ‘expensive’ banquet, which includes lobster and Patagonian Tooth Fish (as well as tempura ice cream… yum!) in the menu.

Afterwards, we made our way to Bridie O’Reilly’s and hung out in the beer garden for a while, and had a few drinks and more than a few laughs before heading home.

We had plans of some sort on Sunday, but I forget what they were. In the end we just bludged around all day, watching TV and the like. Nice and relaxing. For some reason, all day it felt like Saturday to me. Not sure why, but it felt like I hadn’t had enough time off. If it were a normal weekend it would have seemed far too short.

Luckily, we also had Monday off. I could really get used to three day weekends; hell, I could get used to five day weekends, I’m sure. Since I hadn’t undergone the pain for a while, we decided to go shopping at the DFO mall since it was open and I hadn’t been there since before they’d started the refurbishments (i.e. adding more shops on the outside). We spent a couple of hours there; I purchased a pair of jeans, t-shirt and shirt. Justine purchased a… well, pair of jeans, t-shirt and shirt… strange really. Since shopping tires me out much more than it does Justine, I managed to dictate when we went home.

Not really thrilling, but since I didn’t post all weekend I thought I’d squish it all into one post. I’m quite glad this week is a four-day week too; four days too many but I’ll survive.

At home, we have so much booze, we could probably open a bar for the next few months and make a decent amount of money.

Of course, it would be illegal, but that’s not the point. We do have some really nice stuff though. Actually, I think it might be that I have some really nice stuff. Hopefully though, drinking nicer stuff will stop me from becoming an alcoholic, since I wouldn’t be able to afford to keep drinking at that rate. Either that, or I’d be a drunk and broke very quickly.

At home, we have Jose Cuervo gold tequila (admittedly not the best, but it’s certainly not the crap we used to have), previously mentioned Woodford Reserve, the unfortunately named Mount Gay rum (which is an extremely nice gold rum), Absolut vodka (as well as an almost-empty bottle of Skyy and half-full bottle of Smirnoff), not to mention bottles of Johnny Walker, Jim Beam White, Glayva, Jim Beam White, Black Sambuca, Jim Beam Gold, Sake, and various liquers. There’s a bit more than that but I can’t remember them all.

Maybe I should just drink it all myself?

While at work today, it occurred to me that though I’ve had Egg Nog, I’ve only ever had it from a carton.

Since it’s the Christmas season, I thought I should hunt down a recipe and try making my own.

While doing a little bit of research (still at work, I suppose that makes me a cyberslacker), I read that “Egg Nog” basically translates as “Egg Ale” from ye olde English.

Well, what self-respecting person makes their Egg Nog without booze, I thought to myself? So, I used this recipe. Problem is, it didn’t specify which rum is supposed to be used. Always being frugal, I just used some Bacardi I already have.

What does this have to do with the title of this post, I hear you asking? Well, after a few chugs of my Nog, I began to feel rather jolly. I’d say around 20% of this particular Nog is booze, which is a good percentage. It also explains why Saint Nick is so jolly. Drinking this crap year-round would make anyone jolly!

Anyway, that’s enough from me, I can hear the elves chanting my name — I think the drinking contest is about to start up again! Nog me boys!