1. Wine & Dine at Alvin’s
So, last Saturday, right after my BodyBalance audition (which I passed/survived, thank you very much, Klevin), I picked Henny up and off we galloped through the rain to Alvin’s condo for a little wine & dine. The rest of the folks (host & hostess Alvin and Ellyne, and their wacky sidekick Nisa) thought it be a nice change to sit down to a home-cooked meal ala posh. All dressed and nowhere to go.

But plenty of nice mash - food galore! Stirfried tofu, mock meat and vegetables in bean sauce; a cream cheese potato salad; omellete ala carbonara; the chef’s own special couscous; a bottle of Chilean Merlot… pikante!

Conversation was wonderfully lurid (to the ladies’ dismay, or perhaps not) and we ended with some nice hot red bean dessert and a Japanese samurai film. Much mention of harakiri, and even better, I got to borrow a DVD of Rashomon from Alvin. Akira Kurosawa is the man.

Henny, Alvin, me, Nisa

Food, glorious food!

Me & Ellyne, listening to Alvin’s hilarious anecdotes

2. My 28th Birthday
O damn. Another bloody year older.

Except this round, it doesn’t seem all that bad. It seems an achievement almost, to have come this far, and have gone through so much and survived. 2007 feels like it’s finally getting started. All is good.

Darling Jess took me out for lunch at Seastar. Lovely Chinese stirfry. We had seafood laksa noodles, black pepper beef, honey chicken, and she got me a slice of cheesecake with one tiny candle. (As it should be; don’t wanna be too accurate and set off the smoke alarms, eh?) Jason joined us, which made for mucho fun times.

Afterwards, I went and paid a month-old parking ticket and got a discount. I believe Jess and I are the only Malaysians who even bother with this; most of our friends have stacks of the stuff crammed away in their glove compartment. Strangely, settling this fine made me happy. Odd, me.

Dinner was at Kim Gary, the HongKong restaurant. This round, it was Nisa, Alvin, Jason and Henny. We had hot-stone unagi and porkchop with onaki mushrooms, kimchi and snow peas, cheese baked rice with fish, a chicken ‘n’ chips platter, and the most sinful French toast on Earth, lathered with peanut butter and melting butter…

We (or rather, the rest of them) proceeded to wreck havoc with the Cantonese dialect of Hongkies and us who live in the Klang Valley. Mangled the shit out of it. I attempted to stab myself with the steak knife at least half a dozen times the night. O but that shit was so funny! Sigh… best birthday I’ve had in recent memory…

Which may not be saying much considering how those brain cells go as I get older…