One big city, one little lamb

Some more about our Brisbane trip....

After visiting my syndicators (and yes, they have real offices, and staff, and they plied us with Chocolate Mousse Cake!) we drove down to look for Enderley Avenue, where my hubby's Nanna used to live. When she was living at Surfers Paradise, there were no high-rise buildings, no apartment blocks, no casinos... just little comfortable beach houses, a few schools, and the local shops. Hubby spent a few months living at Nanna's, 2 blocks from the beach, when he was very little (late 1960s). We knew the house wouldn't be there any more - and it wasn't!



These were some stunning flowers growing at our host's home - don't know the name, but they were worth capturing for all eternity (well, this Blog, at least!).



On Saturday we went to Rydges South Bank for one night - 9th floor no less (the night view is from our balcony), and walked to GoMA (Gallery of Modern Art) which has recently opened (it's next to the State Library). The building was wonderful, but the collection was patchy... some really brilliant work, and some very 'You've got to be joking' art. I was thrilled to see this work by Rosalie Gascoigne - an artist my parents knew well when they (and she) were younger, and who I've met. She has been an inspirational person in my life, as well as a brilliant artist!



We had a wonderful dinner at The Point restaurant. I had king prawns and scallops with a delicious sauce, a rocket, apple, walnut and bleu cheese salad, and a banana and mango tarte Tatin with rum and raisin ice cream. Delish!! We were seated upstairs, and the red glass panels, candles, warm summer night, and lovely company of my dear hubby made for a wonderful night :)




The experience was only marred by one older bastard man who was sitting near us with his wife. The place was very busy, and there was a moderate wait for our meal - but that was fine, no-one was in a rush, the waitress was attentive and lovely... but it wasn't good enough for this guy, who was clearly more important than anyone else, ever. He complained loudly that he'd been waiting for 45 minutes, and it just wasn't good enough, and so on - carrying on until he got something for free, basically, and proving that he was 'the boss', I suppose. The manager had to come up to see him, and she gave them a free bottle of wine, I think. He slipped up when she appeared - she was a woman in her early 30s. He said "I'm waiting for the manager to come up to see me," thinking she was 'just a waitress' - she very smoothly said "I'm the manager, Sir." Beautiful.

Anyway, enough about some stupid man. The evening was delightful.

And here is your obligatory Lulu photo - I discovered that she'd got out on to the balcony the next morning (I still don't know how she opened the rather heavy glass door - perhaps she bribed someone?), and caught her looking down into the street and clearly plotting something. She hadn't been allowed to come out with us for the past few days, and I think she was about to take her revenge....