Red Lantern in Surry Hills
For our anniversary dinner last night, the Snook and I finally got to try out Red Lantern in Surry Hills. I’ve been wanting to go there ever since they were featured on Heat in the Kitchen on SBS a few years back. They do authentic Vietnamese cuisine, and I was in the mood for some seafood. (For those that don’t know, I was a confirmed pescaphobe for most of my life. I *never* ate any seafood at all – not even fish fingers – until I moved to Australia. Suffice it to say, I’ve gotten over myself.) The service was great, friendly and attentive from the start. I was a little disappointed that we couldn’t get the tasting menu – it’s only available for parties of 4 – but our waiter was able to recommend his favorites from the normal menu. We started out with the Goi Cuon (traditional rice paper rolls). They were very good, with lots of mint and large prawns peeking out. There was a spicy peanut-based dipping sauce too. (Truth be told, I think I prefer the Lime & Garlic from Chop Chop, but this was still very nice.) We also went for one of the entree specials: grilled scampi (i.e. langoustine). I’d really only ever seen these on Iron Chef before. ZOMG, SO GOOD. Sweet, creamy meat – not fishy in the slightest – with luscious butter and black pepper and coriander on top. Between the two of us, we were scraping the shell clean in our desperation to savor all of it. For the main, we had the house speciality Cha Chien Don, whole fried snapper with fish sauce, lime, and ginger. It was BEAUTIFUL. The meat came off in juicy hunks, and I even found myself scrabbling after the crispy skin. (Me. The pickiest child in the world eating FISH SKIN. My mother’s head will be spinning, I tell you.) We were too full for dessert, so I finished the night with a Vietnamese liqueur coffee that was so strong it’d curl your hair. So in summary, I had three courses with seafood and I loved all of them. That’s pretty much the highest recommendation I can give right there. (Also, langoustine might be the new truffle. I MUST HAVE MORE.)

For the Snook: Ozzy Osbourne’s World of Warcraft commercial.

The first Twilight reviews are starting to trickle in…

Edited to add: Snookums just pointed me to this list of six excuses grownups can use for going to see Twilight this weekend. I think Jenny‘s definitely going for #6. Me, I don’t really have any big desire to see it. Robert Pattinson doesn’t really do it for me. If anything, I’m only curious as to how it translated from the book… which was trash. Swoony, over-the-top, ridiculous teenage trash.

Four years ago today two silly kids went to Vegas, met Elvis, and got married in a Little White Wedding Chapel.

And I’d do it all over again.

Gmail themes
I logged into Gmail this morning and noticed that things looked different. Then a message popped up telling me to check out the new Themes tab. Holy crap! That’s awesome! I’m rockin’ the Desk theme right now. It appears that some of them actually change throughout the day to reflect the weather in your location. Sooooo cool! (Note: It appears they’re rolling this out slowly. Snookums doesn’t have it on his account yet, nor does anybody else in my office.)

Edited to add: The Gmail blog has more info and pictures of the themes.

Five Quick Physics Lessons for Obama. On hand, neat! I didn’t know that nuclear bombs were so hard to make, nor that the problem of storing nuclear waste had been effectively solved. On the other hand, some of these are pretty depressing. No hydrogen cars? No more manned space travel? Inevitable global warming? Crap.

“The New Coop de Ville: The craze for urban poultry farming.” When I went to pick up our veggie box last week, I asked Michael (of Sustainable House fame) whether he kept chickens. He did! He showed me them clucking away in the narrow strip of space alongside the house. He was actually chucking veggie scraps to them straight out the kitchen window! I confessed that I had long been fascinated by Rentachook, which is where he gets his from. Snookums and his mother have tried many times to talk me out of this wild idea. I know that they’re tiny dinosaurs and that I’m afraid to touch them. I know that they pretty stupid as far as pets go. I know that they’ll poop all over and dig up the garden. I can’t help it – I still think it’s such a cool idea!

I bought two adorable new sundresses on Sunday afternoon. Therefore it’s been raining ever since.

Peanut Butter Buckeye Bars. *droooool*