Wedding Dress

Imp and I then headed to the Wedding Dress exhibition at the Museum. I turned the corner and gasped first when I saw this corset - Imp followed suit a second later. I can only comfort myself by thinking that women then were a lot smaller. Also, they had to have had broken ribs from those corsets!

Ukranian Gold

Imp kindly went with me to the Gold Rush : Treasures of the Ukraine exhibit even though she had already been. It was pretty interesting, though as Imp said, a lot of stuff showed huge Greek influence. We also saw some wonderful Singapore souveniors at the Museum Shop - except they're not making them yet. They also have no idea when they'll be ready or how much they cost, and you need to 'request' them'.

Service - good and bad

It was J's overdue birthday lunch, what with everyone's schedule not making an earlier dinner appointment possible. She suggested that we try Dempsey Brasserie and it was a huge disappointment. In J's words, the service was bad and the food mediocre.

First of all, I had to help myself to menus. Considering this is Singapore, and I usually like to order before the decade is out, this is not so uncommon. However, when Simian and I tried to order and it seemed that two of the ten dishes on the menu were out, it did not bode well. It turned out they ran out of Spinach. We ordered and then waited.... and waited. J asked where our food was and a frazzled waitress told us that it was because they were very busy. We were told that the food would be another 15 minutes. It came out sooner than that, but it seemed that the fact that they were very busy and somehow hadn't gotten around to cooking our meal was suspect because (1) we ordered a Cheese plate (2) and eggs and (3) D's eggs were cold!!

When it came time to get the bill, they charged J for a side order that never came. Then we waited again for them to finally come back with the corrected bill. By this time, everyone was thoroughly fed up.

Simian and I went to the Factory afterwards because I had to have the gula melaka waffle. They ran out of gula melaka ice cream but they substituted it with another flavour. It was still good. M you would have liked it - there was toasted coconut on top. We got our orders made first because apparently we're 'regulars' (we've gone all of four times). They were understaffed - the owner told us some of her wait staff didn't turn up AND the place was packed. Still, they managed to actually give better service. 

Burek and Skateboarding

Simian and I had lunch with A, and his girlfriend yesterday. A is a friend of one of our ex-neighbours and has been in Singapore for almost a year and a half. He took us to eat burek and partake of the big beer list at Next Door Cafe.  It turns out the cafe is the meeting place for East Europeans in Singapore. The beer list was extensive but also pretty expensive. We went with them to check out the wakeboarding competition at East Coast for a short while and Simian got to try out the Flexdex there.

We came home and I made a birthday cake for my brother-in-law and bake some cookies. We met my in-laws today for lunch at Cafe Iguana.

Day out with Imp

Imp and PlanetofSound came by. PlanetofSound was just dropping Imp off - but they ended up playing with our cheap skateboard :) We've agreed to head down to the Long board shop together soon.

Imp and I went to the Sun Yat Sen Villa (free this month for Singaporeans) to see the special artifacts that were on display - there really wasn't all that much new, so we had a wander and then went off.

Then we went to the Factory. I blame Imp. I was happy with our waffle and ice cream - and then she ordered fries! I have no control when faced with fries and hence stuffed my face.

Stuff

Things I did in the last few days in the US - held to Nosh with M to meet a friend's friend for coffee, then back to Maryland to clean the house (of course!) and then sit around and watch my birds. Suntaneye and her husby heard this catbird when they came to pick me up to take me to the train station.

I came back to a bunch of flowers from E - very sweet of a 2 year old to steal her Mom's credit card :) I also made biscotti over the weekend - M got some fantastic biscotti from Trader Joe's and I needed more so I made some.

Simian and I also made it to the Longboard shop that D told us about and we managed to get helmets. All the other safety equipment was out however so we need to go get more. In the meantime, I managed to scrape my knee again.

Simian and I saw this van on the way back, and it made me crack up and take a quick photo.

Dinner with Suntaneye

Back to Maryland late last night - E woke up this moring and according to M, she said "Aunty D is SO gone".

I met Suntaneye and her husby for dinner at Tahina's and then we went to the new yogurt place in the same complex, USpoon. I was so excited and took so many photos Suntaneye and her husby said I was an embarassment :) An Asian guy walked out, did a double take and said that we were the first Asians he had seen in five miles. Predicatably he had just moved here from California :)) I came home and there was a deer on the lawn. Deer are pretty dumb - but there's still something magical about seeing them standing in your headlights.

Bennett Place

M drove us to the Bennett Place - site of the largest troop surrender of the Civil War. Little of the original farmhouse survives, except for the chimney, but it was a fascinating look into one of the most important sites of the Civil War. I was very glad to have had the opportunity to go.

We headed to Whole Foods afterwards and then to the apartment for dinner.

Mama Dip's

We went to Mama Dip's for lunch and had some home style Southern cooking. My lunch was a mix of sides and the chocolate Pecan pie was fantastic. Prices were a little steeper than I expected for a place that was supposed to be a family style restaurant though - yesterday's 'fancier lunch actually cost less.

Watts Grocery

M, WW, E and I went to Watts Grocery this afternoon for lunch. It serves all local grown and sourced food and it was good. I just found my new favourite food - Pickle Sandwich. Apparently it is a Eastern North Carolina speciality and it is absolutely awesome. We also had hush puppies and M had a chicken confit and WW had a steak sandwich. There was a blackberry-blueberry cobbler for dessert. It wasn't a cobbler in a traditional sense - more like a jam with ice cream on top. It was still great!

Day out in Durham and Chapel Hill

M, WW, E and I had lunch at Foster's today, a crowded little restaurant cum deli. The food was good and the desserts were really good. There was also a lovely fig tree in the backyard and all the birds were flocking to it.

In the afternoon, M and I went to a Farmer's Market in Chapel Hill and then to Southern Seasons, which has a huge selection of stuff imported from all over.

I just saw this great article on 5 Guys - I fully agree that they are awesome :)

Also, an obligatory YAY for Michael Phelps becoming the most decorated Olympian of all time :)