Congratulations Mystie & Samson!

He did kiss the bride

Mystie in all her glory

Sunday 18th Nov., first friend's wedding for me! Mystie and I are colleagues at the ARI and she's been such a good friend since Ive been here. Samson and her are really compatible and are very obviously perfect for each other. Her big day came after only 5 mths of planning (she had to push the wedding up cos she got preganant, double congrats!) and my,my it was a beautiful day indeed. I attended the morning bride pick-up and tea ceremony as well as the luncheon later on.

Some of the Bonies (L-R): Colette, Hong , Janine, myself, me Julie, Mimi & Ben (from Biogerontology)

Table 23 : Addition of Robert at far right. He's the nicest, most patient, baby-faced Polish Ive met.

Great great day, fantastic food..most notably the seared scallops with prosciutto and fried onions. MMMmmmmMMMMM...pls, sir, can I have some more? *blink blink*

News Break: I passed!

Today I passed my first year probation, which is mandatory for all postgrads. I'm pretty sure its hard to fail it, but still glad I passed. *grin*

Celebrated with some retail therapy...nice.

Monopoly madness

The great thing about game night, other than wholesome family fun for generations on end, is that it's always full of laughs no matter how many times you've played it. My current 'in' game is monopoly but not the regular one, modern day monopoly comes in all sorts of themed variations. I'm thinking maybe I should start collecting these sets, and many are limited edition collector's item too! The exciting bit is the incorporation of the new characters into the game, all in line with the theme. How cool is that? You can get all kinds of monopoly , from a range of different producers too. Parker brothers are the original but has now combined with Hasbro. USAopoly provides many US baseball/football/Nascar type versions whilst Milton Bradley has some fun ones like Spongebob. New types may also come with DVD games and credit card function. Don't look confused, you just gotta try it! Some of the ones I have my eBay eyes on:

1. Family Guy monopoly
2. Spongebob Squarepants monopoly (with pewter spongebob characters!)
3. Pwerpuff Girls monopoly
4. Dog Lover's monopoly
5. Monopoly Here & Now with electronic banking
6. Sesame Street monopoly (I want I want I want!!)
7. The Simpsons monopoly


Can't wait to get my hands on my first!

Funkiliy doo-dah names

I've heard that some Asians relish in giving themselves funky "english" names. Among the many Iv'e encountered before are Patience, Rainbow and who can forget Noodle/Dior Cheng E-Kin. silly Hollywood celebs are also joining the stand for weird names like Nicolas Cage's Kal-El (name of Superman's father) and Gwyneth's Apple. The funniest one i've seen was featured today as the boyfriend of Msian actress Lee Sin Je (the gal from The Eye). Ok here it comes....wait for it...wait for it....OXIDE Pang! C'mon the dude probably thinks its major cool and probably rolls off his tongue really nicely. Freedom of choice I guess.

"Hey Oxide, over here!

Life is like Melbourne's weather

Behind every big grey cloud lies the sunshine...eventually.

Today was horrible, woke up late as usual. Gobbled down my cereal with milk and trotted in my 2-inch boots along the 25 min walk to work. Only, it was drizzling. Bottom of my jeans got wet. Laine Not happy.

As soon as I got into work, I had to finish correcting some scripts for my class which was due today. No time to talk to anyone, no time to pop into the lab to say my usual cheery good mornings to everyone. 11.00 am bus passed by....Im still not done...11.30am bus zoomed by...still undone!! Finally finished at 11.40 and had to shove my giant tuna sandwich down my throat to catch the 12pm bus.

Click-clacked to Strathfield station and came upon a forked decision:

Train A: Departs in 10 mins..2 stop away from Redfern
Train B: Departs in 2 mins... 6 stops away from Redfern....My mind was not born for math, what more math in stress and heat and sweat!!

Obviously I chose the train that would take longer to get to Redfern..25 mins!! as compared to the usual 15. Darn it. Already 30 mins late to work. Once at the station, I practically had to half-run-walk another 10 mins to my building. By now, my so-called comfy boots that cushioned my feet around San Fran's all-day shopping extravaganzas were screaming profanities at me. So I burst into my lab, sweating like a birthing pig with 5 mins before 80 anxious kiddos flood in.

So my day hasnt given me a reason to smile today. Until I unexpectedly spoke to an ex-classmate from uni days. He said "We need our dose of laine's laughter today, its been quiet around here".

See I told you so. The sun will come out, tomorrow!

My Non-invitation

James from work recently pointed out that the lanyard Ive been wearing bore the logo of 3 stick people engaged in a threesome. I beg to differ of course, what do you think?

In case you're wondering, its a brand of anaesthetic drug given by my anaesthetist friend Si Panjang. James thinks its my invitation. Since when did it become OK to discuss sexual preferences at work????

Too bad Im really a one man gal.

Oktoberfest! or what's left of it

Although Oktoberfest isn't celebrated in October but late September, that doesnt stop German restaurants here from declaring the entire month in the name of beer. Before coming to Sydney, my only beer crossing was sniping a sip from Dad's Tiger or Carlsberg. Never really had a taste for beer or bier as the Germs call it, but I think the winds have changed. We went out a couple of weekends ago for a beer-guzzling dinner at Lowenbrau (loo-ven-broie) and my my, I must say, beer really does drown the weeks miseries away! We had loads of fun, loads of pork. Now I understand why Dad loves his beer.

I dont appreciate the growing and impending beer belly. Oh NO!!!!

After one too many biers. One crazy Jocie manages a sane pic.