Collins Square

So I went to look for the little Christmas Market, which I found in Collins Square, not far from my place.

I knew Collins Square was there, but I hadn't ever been in. I assumed, correctly, that it was office blocks for important and serious businesses. It is very big and has multiple towers

I knew there was a Woolworths Metro attached to it. I have seen it multiple times. Strangely, it is closed at weekends. I do not know of any other supermarkets which are closed at weekends. Even tiny grocery stores are open.

I did not know anything else about Collins Square

Today I went in. The Christmas market was a reasonably typical craft market, though a high end craft market. I did not find it especially interesting.

What was interesting was the totally unexpected (to me, anyway), quite large food hall that is in there, including a wine bar and food stalls from all sorts of ethnicities.

It was amazing. And busy. (And closed at weekends!)

I must go and try some more of the offerings. So many tempting cuisines to try.

I had a karaage sando from Nosh and an iced chocolate 
from one of the coffee stalls

Fun Things to Do

Things continue active in the Harbour Flat.

Lindsey's son, daughter in law and granddaughters have been in Melbourne this week, so we had an impromptu meal on Monday night at a pub in Collingwood. Advantage:  that I could take the train and the venue was only a short walk from the station. Disadvantage: I didn't especially like the venue. It was dark and noisy and my chips were overcooked. The fish was nice, but overcooked chips are a big flaw in my world. And it wasn't only my chips which were overcooked; other people mentioned it too. It was good to catch up with people and I had a good evening, but I wouldn't choose to go back to that particular pub. There are lots of others to try.

I spent quite some time on Tuesday walking round and round and round the Coles supermarket in Spencer Street looking for a pre-cooked turkey crown which I could have sworn I had bought in the Coles in Sebastopol last year. Not only could I not find it, I couldn't find any turkey which wasn't flavoured, adulterated or marinated. I couldn't find much turkey at all, though there was a positive Kosciuszko of varieties of ham. I picked up most of the rest of my shopping list and then on an impulse I hopped on a tram and went round to the Woolworths in The District. Where I found the pre-cooked turkey crown I had been looking for. Obviously I hadn't bought last years in the Coles in Sebastopol!

I think I got almost all of my target of 30 minutes of walking a day during my futile hunt in Coles.

Down in The District. Freyja had alerted me to the presence of the big, cuddly, pink bear so I went to look for it. There are other big things as well.

This is, apparently, a lolly tree

I was at work yesterday. Lindsey had bought some more Australian Bush decals for a wall leading to the treatment room. She had earlier got some gum trees and bush animals but there was still quite a lot of space to fill. So Lindsey, Nurse Pri and I filled it

And then, when I got home, there was an exciting birthday box waiting for me:

filled with yummy things:

and fun things:

Thank you to Tabitha, Austin and Freyja.

Although - one of the items may have been stolen

He colour matches very well 😂

I don't have any actual plans for today but there is a rumour that there is a little Christmas Market today in Collins Street. I might wander up in a bit and have a look.

Birthday Week

It's been quite a fun week.

I met Lindsey at Papa Gino's in Lygon Street for lunch on Thursday, largely because I was hankering after a Lygon Street pizza. And it was very nice indeed. Then Lindsey went to Ballarat and I went pottering around in the city centre.

Lady Gaga was in town on Friday and Saturday. I was surprised that there were so many people on my tram when I came home on Friday evening. Usually most people get off at the station. I was wondering why so many stayed on the tram - until they all got off at the stadium stop, when I remembered that Lady Gaga was throwing a party. I hear very little from the stadium, although I do sometimes hear people partying on the waterfront. I went down to Level 1 (road level) and level 4 (concourse level) to see how much I could hear from there and I could hear quite clearly from the concourse. People facing that way were sitting on their balconies, glasses and food to hand. 

Saturday was the work Christmas party, very conveniently held at The Harbour Kitchen, a mere 200m from my place. The weather wasn't all that it could have been but the venue was perfect. It's a glass house by the side of the harbour with a lovely view of the water. The space was more than enough for our party. The food was really nice and very plentiful and there was good choice of drinks included in our package. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.

Sunday was my actual birthday. I had arranged to meet Lindsey and Wendy at the Convention Centre to go to the Good Food and Wine Christmas Market.  How to get there? I checked with the online maps to see which trams I needed to catch. It was going to take more time than I expected to go by tram. Then Google said: you could walk it in 12 minutes. It's only 1km away.

Really?  12 minutes? Surely longer than that? But it was a lovely morning. The sun was shining. It appeared to have stopped raining for the time being. I was in no hurry. So off I went. And it is a lovely walk. I went down along Docklands Park, across the Jim Stynes Bridge, along a riverside walk and then over the Seafarers Bridge to the Polly Woodside. I knew that all these things existed. I had no idea they were so close to my place or so close to each other. I didn't know about the cafes and children's park along the riverside walk. And I got to the convention centre in the 12 minutes that Google had said I would, therefore much earlier than I needed to be. I sat in the sunshine by the Polly Woodside while I waited for the others.

Hot air balloons from my bedroom window
first thing Sunday morning

Seafarers Bridge up ahead

Polly Woodside

We enjoyed the Christmas market although, as is usually the case, there were many more alcohol stalls than food stalls. These things really should be called Good Wine and Food fairs! I had pre-ordered a piece of pork belly which I needed to find. Then I went for a wander around the food stalls and bought shortbread, flavoured butters, gingerbread, oils and vinegars, other festive treats. We had arranged to meet at the Christmas tree at the entrance at 12 but by 11:45 it was getting a bit crowded for me. Plus I had seen everything I wanted to see. So I wandered out back to the Polly Woodside, where Lindsey and Wendy met me.

We came back to my place to offload the shopping and then ambled up to The Quarterhouse where we were meeting Freyja and Simon for my Birthday Sunday Lunch

Freyja and Simon's gnocchi and pizza:

Lindsey and I had the Sunday Roast:

This is a plate for ONE person and there were
green beans, peas and carrots hidden under the meat
and Yorkshire pudding.

Lindsey took a Leftovers Box home with her!

We didn't get a photo of Wendy's chicken Caesar salad. But we did get a photo of Wendy!

The Three Sisters

It was a good day. Beautiful weather. Great company. Excellent food. Fun Christmas market. The heritage ships were in the harbour during the afternoon. Two new bridges for my "collection". An excellent start to my 8th decade.

Partying

Jim's daughter Jeanette and her husband Matt were in town last week. Matt was here for work reasons. Jeanette had come along Just Because. They were staying in a hotel by the Flagstaff Gardens, not far from my place.

I met her after lunch on Friday and we wandered up to the Carlton Gardens and through to the museum. A nice cup of tea and a potter around the ground floor and then we wandered back to my place for a bit of a sit down, before heading to Moon Dog Doglands for dinner.

Moon Dog Doglands' main space is only available for private functions or when there are events at the stadium. The Jungle Room is available at other times but I had completely failed to take into account that it was a Friday night and that the Work Christmas Party Season is now underway. Fortunately we managed to snag a table for two and equally fortunately the limited menu that was available to walk-ins had vegetarian/vegan options available for Jeanette.

At some point, earlier this year, Freyja pointed out that upon reaching both our 2025 birthdays we would jointly have attained the Grand Old Age of 110 years old. We should have a party to celebrate.

So we did.

We hired one of the meeting/event rooms at the Queen Victoria Women's Centre, where Freyja works. We invited friends and relations. We organised catering through the Asylum Centre Resource Centre.  I organised cakes through Smith and Deli in Collingwood. Lindsey went and collected them. She and I visited Dan Murphy and the supermarkets. I bought Flowers. Visitors came, including Jeanette and Matt who had reorganised their weekend so they could stay in Melbourne for the party.

The food was lovely. We had ordered the ASRC canapés from lots of different countries' cuisines so there was food from Palestine, Syria, Kenya, Eritrea, Afghanistan amongst other places. Lindsey brought party pies and pastries. I brought sushi. We had lots of alcoholic, non-alcoholic and soft drinks, plus tea and coffee.

It was a lovely afternoon.

It was unfortunate that we had chosen the Saturday of the Black Friday weekend, but that is not an event that interests either Freyja or me so it hadn't crossed our minds. It didn't really matter, except that Chris, who had come from Macedon by car, ran up against lots of traffic, pedestrians and delivery drivers behaving wildly. And the trams were very busy. It was also unfortunate that it rained on and off during the day, so we couldn't use the top floor room that we had intended to use, with the wrap around balcony. We moved down one level and used the larger meeting room instead.  But apart from that, everything seemed to go well.

Freyja, Simon and me, on the top level after everyone else had gone home:

There will be more partying next weekend. Saturday will see the RMG Christmas party and Sunday is my actual birthday.

🚋🚊🚉🚅🚎🚂🚃🚄🚇🚆🚂🚃🚉🚈🚋

Public Transport is free across Victoria at weekends, starting yesterday when the new metro tunnel opened, until the end of January. Lots and lots of people, including Freyja and Simon, took the opportunity to go and admire the new stations. Lots of other people took advantage of the free trams, trains and buses to go out and about. I took the train to Alphington to go to the Sunday market but I do that on many Sundays - public transport is free at weekends in Melbourne anyway, for people with a senior's Myki card. The trains were busier than they usually are on Sunday mornings. I met Freyja and Simon at the market, before they went off on their Metro Tunnel adventure. I now have lots of delicious late spring / early summer vegetables ready for the week ahead.

Today is the first day of Official Summer in my part of the world. It is, of course, cold, wet and very windy

Tram Challenge (and half of the 96 route)

There are seven tram routes which terminate around where I live. Two down by the library on Collins Street, three at The District and two at the La Trobe Street intersection. I vaguely wondered where they went to at the other end. One I know, because it's the route that takes me to work; I get off close to the end of the route. Others I travel along bits of from time to time.

There are 25 tram routes in Melbourne. I decided that it might be fun to travel each of them, to check out the routes and to explore bits of Melbourne that I am not familiar with.

So one day, after work, I took the 86 to the end of the route, out by Bundoora RMIT, then rode it back to The District. Route 86 collected. I went to visit my podiatrist in North Fitzroy, then took the tram to the end of that route and then came back to the library. Route 11 collected.

I was telling Freyja and Simon that I had been surprised how much further the route 11 tram went beyond North Fitzroy, and by how leafy West Preston is. They said that when they travel the train lines they try to find out things about that line that they didn't know or which were of interest (such as how leafy West Preston is). A colleague at work asked me about the shops at the end of route 11. I hadn't noticed. I had just turned around and come back.

I obviously need to be more mindful about this challenge. No point doing it just for the sake of it. I decided that I would take photos of the end points of the tram lines and actually take the time to look around. 

Yesterday Lindsey and I took the 96 to St Kilda and had lunch in Acland Street. We caught it from Batman Park, which I wasn't aware of and which is rather cute. I must go down and have a proper look at it. There's a helipad and it's by the Yarra River

It's not the terminus - it's about half way along the route. That's ok. I'll do the other half another day. It's not feasible to do all 25 routes end to end in one go and this is supposed to be primarily a fun activity and not an endurance test.

Anyway. We went out to Acland Street, which is the terminus of the 96. It's a very long time since I have been to St Kilda and even longer since I've been to Acland Street. There are lots of cake shops (it used to be famous for its cake shops), there's a branch of Readings (book shop), lots of cafes and restaurants and plenty of shops. It's also by the bay.

We had lunch in the Abbey Road cafe, had a wander around and came home on the #16 tram

Sunday Brunch

Julia, Travis, Young Henry, Baby Theo, Freyja and Simon came for brunch on Sunday morning.

Everyone gathered at 10:30 at my place.

10:30 is breakfast for many people on a Sunday morning.

What to serve????

Potato gems. Breakfast sausages.  Chicken tenders. Avocado and asparagus. Corn chips and salsa. Summer fruit platter. Toasted ciabatta. Non-alcoholic mimosas (I called them bucks fizz - I think they're effectively the same thing).

It was quite a lot more relaxed, for me, than a full three course Sunday lunch, mainly because I didn't do any real cooking.  All I had to do was grill potato gems,  sausages and chicken tenders in the air fryer, simmer the asparagus, prep the fruit and make toast.  We did manage to burn the last round of toast which set off the smoke detector. Fortunately no smoke got out into the corridor and we all managed to turn the alarm off without incident.

It was a lovely thing, Sunday brunch. Good company. Happy chatter. Mostly finger food. Then everyone went away to do afternoon things.

I went over to the District on Saturday afternoon to get the non-alcoholic prosecco for Sunday. There's a flower stall outside Dan Murphy's which had bunches of sunflowers available. I like sunflowers a lot and always think of Stella when I see them. They were her favourite summer flowers. So I bought a bunch for her. They are making my living room very summery

Brandy has discovered that the new, low shelving in the sunset strip offers an excellent view of the happenings on Harbour Esplanade

The verdant green of early summer along the harbour promenade:

Brandy and Whiskey have settled well into the apartment. We've been here three months now and they seem to have adapted to life as Flat Cats. My concern has been that they don't get the amount of exercise that they got in Mount Helen, either in my place or Lindsey's. (I, conversely, am getting lots more!) Whiskey is chunking on the weight. So I bought them a cat treadmill

Whiskey is treating it with exactly the same suspicion, derision and contempt that I would treat a treadmill, should anyone ever buy me one 😂  Brandy is largely ignoring it. I have it locked at the moment so it won't rotate. The guidance is to entice them onto it with cat treats - but they won't eat cat treats. I might try little bowls of grated cheese or even milk. If I can encourage them to view it as stable and safe - then I will unlock it 😈

Christmas has arrived at Victoria Point:

Thursday

I had arranged to meet Lindsey at 12:00 on Thursday. I jokingly suggested that we should meet "Under the Clocks". I knew she would know what I meant. I think every Melburnian knows what that means. But Flinders Street Station is a bit out of the way for both of us, so we arranged to meet on the steps of the State Library instead.

It was raining when I got there, and I was a bit early, so I retreated into Melbourne Central and had a little potter around while I was waiting

We took the tram out to Carlton and had lunch in Lygon Street. I haven't been to Lygon Street for ages, which is a bit odd because I like Lygon Street and it is not at all difficult to get there from my place.  Then back into town for a wander around Melbourne Central and The Emporium. And back to my place for a cup of tea.

🎄🎄 🎄 🎄 🎄 🎄

I am beginning to think that some sort of festival is approaching. I am not sure quite what gives me this impression:

Guarding the Bourke Street Mall

In the Spencer Street Food Hall

Guarding the Library at the Dock

At the sunset lookout on Harbour Esplanade

Also at the sunset lookout.
It looks like a purple Dalek from my
lounge room window!

The Myer Christmas windows are made of Lego this year and are very cute:

The Christmas Eve Myer Music Bowl
carols by candlelight the left
The Boxing Day test at the MCG on the right

This cat was in all the windows

This is not all of the windows. If you can get to Melbourne at a quiet time, they are worth a look

I bought a second shelf unit to put on the one I bought for the TV. The TV is a bit too low for my comfort but the second unit made it too high. It was almost as tall as the bookcase it replaced. So the TV is raised up on towers of books until I can get a shelf at an appropriate height, or have the TV fixed to the wall. I didn't want to waste the new shelf unit though, so on Thursday evening I put it into what I now call the Sunset Strip, for want of a better name

And while I was doing that, The Enterprize (sic) came into view for a brief visit

Thursday was quite a busy day in the end.

This was my early morning view on Friday, as I was getting ready for work:

Happy to report that the Marina Towers
were not on fire!