Blue Nile Restaurant

I have had East African food before, in San Francisco and Vancouver, an enjoy its spiciness and the soft spongy bread to mop the juices up. That and the fresh juices they serve.

Blue Nile Restaurant is no different. When eating in, there is only the buffet option but if ordering to go you have your choice of items. I was there for a going away dinner before playing a session of Only War Warhammer 40k RPG.

Everyone there was very happy with the food and we all went back for seconds. Especially the spicy chicken. Yum! I'd go back again.

Bistro 161

I like to eat at Bistro 161 when I am in Duncan. It has great tasting and reasonably priced food in a pleasant setting.

Today I had the Yam soup with crushed ginger and garlic with a sandwich of roasted vegetables, basil pesto and brie cheese on a ciabatta bread. Both were delicious and were what my body was craving.


Edit: Bistro 161 is now closed.

Gaming Crawspace Almost Finished

 I tidied up and cleaned out the crawlspace so it can be used for gaming and terrain building (the messy kind).

 I painted the door a few years back as a surprise for my wife. I still need to finish the elven lettering that says "Speak friend and enter".

 There used to be a desk that wasn't very usable. Now its some more shelving but there is still a little disarray.

 This is the to be sold area. Lots of GW and a few Warmachine models to be sold as well as a lot of book. Me and my wife are voracious readers.

This is the main area. I added in six LED lights for the ceiling. Cabinets for finished models on the left. On the left there is also a cabinet for RPGs and two open shelves for scenery. At the very back is general storage. Obscuring the board games and costumes are lots of various styrofoam and interesting plastic bits for scenery that i will hope to make. On the right are magazines, books and more scenery. In the middle is a four foot by six foot table (grey for city on one side and green for rural on the other. I want to make two four foot by four foot collapsible tables in the next while.

Still a work in progress but a lot of things have been accomplished so far.

Postcard of the Interwebs - 20 August 2013

Swedish Study finds exercise changes DNA: I've always said that regular exercise and moderate food intake can do wonders.

Evil Baby: A very evil looking baby.

Toyota Donates Engineers to Food Bank: Seriously. Toyota donates engineers to increase efficiency in a food bank with fantastic results. Its thinking like this that makes me happy to be a human being.

High Five Cat: Super cool and cute.

Abandoned Walmart is USA's largest library: Very cool concept and implementation.

Birthday Candle Burning in Reverse: Cool!

Vanderbilt University Scientists Treat Anxiety:  They target the same receptors that are affected by marijuana. Seriously.

Storm moving into a City: Nifty.

Painting of a Different Sort - Kitchen

So my staycation has been taken up by cleaning the crawlspace, posting items on usedvictoria, gluing and priming models, and this...painting the kitchen. Above is the finished product.

 This is what we started with. Unlike the upstairs that was painted a dark beige (and several rooms still are) the downstairs is painted in a cacophony of colors. Don't get me wrong they are unique and happy colors but it is getting to be too busy.

 

 Here is the other wall.

 Here is the ceiling painted untinted white. This made a big difference.

 The walls were then painted in the untintinted white to cover the colors.

 

 The finished Kitchen from another angle. When it dried it looked lime green but it is loosing that tint as it dries.

 We used Benjamin Moore's Sundance tint (2022-50).

 Now for my last week I hope to finish in the crawlspace, paint models and watch some foreign sci-fi films I borrowed from the library. In other words...to relax.

Cold Comfort Ice Cream

I have been to the bakery several times before, Lone Tree Bakery, where Cold Comfort Ice Cream calls its home. I had not tried the ice cream yet, just the Chocolate caramel tarts...yum! Today I tried their coconut salted caramel ice cream sandwich. Extremely tasty and not a huge coconut milk flavor but it is subtly in the background. They may seem expensive but with a made local product with ingredients you can understand belong in your body, why get second best. I'd definitely try more ice cream treats from here again.

Fry's Sunday Pizza

A local bakery, Fry's, makes pizza on Sunday's and Sunday's only starting at noon. They have four pizzas to choose from and when the dough runs out, so do the pizzas. This is my second time for their Pizza's and they are very good and remind my wife and I of our pizzas in Italy. We both had the bacon Fungi pizza with local bacon, mushrooms and greens. Basic, fresh ingredients and not an overabundance of them, and great dough...all in a wood fired oven and the Ramones playing overhead. Who could ask for more?

So if you are in Vic West on a Sunday, try Fry's.

The Guild Freehouse Pub

No, this is not based on the web comedy series, about online gaming out of the game. The Guild Freehouse is a restaurant in Victoria and collaboration between the owner of Zambri's and Pig (both excellent places for different reasons). My wife and I ate there on a whim when downtown. Its set up like an English style pub with nicer food. I had the plowman's lunch (always a test for pubs with me) and my wife had the special of the day the lamb burger with mango topping. We both enjoyed our meals but my wife's was really good. She let me taste test it. We would definitely go back again.

Straight Razor Shave - First Time

As I have been on a stay in Victoria vacation, my facial hair has grown in the past week. Not only is it itchy but it has been preventing my wife from comfortably kissing me. I did some research and there are three barbers in Victoria that provide straight razor service: Cliff's in Vic West, Uomo in Fernwood and Victory downtown. I had been going to Cliff's for a few years for haircuts and their price is $27 with taxes. I phoned Uomo and they were $27 for a regular barber to shave you, $29 for the head barber and in the $40's for a double shave (to ensure a close shave). Victory's website had a shave for $35 and $45. I went with Cliff's because it was inexpensive and I try to be loyal to businesses I frequent.

It started with some skin moisturising liquid to open and lubricate the hair and skin, followed by a hot towel on the face. Then foam was applied to the face and in came the straight razor. I have to be honest but I got a little scared. The same kind of scared as with needles. I got over it and Martin proceeded to do an excellent job in removing all the hair from my face. He even did a double shave and the results was the closest shave I have ever had. He also foamed repeatedly as required and put some nice inoffensive smelling aftershave on my face afterwards.

I don't use aftershave myself as I have dark memories of several Christmases getting "Blue Stratos" in my teenage years. See the ad below for what I mean. It smelt absolutely horrible.

Overall the experience was interesting. I would not make it a habit but perhaps if I has a week or two of facial hair I would do it again and have it done at Cliff's.

Postcard of the Interwebs - 07 August 2013

New Antibody offers Cancer Treatment: Stanford scientists discovered that cancer cells give off the CD47 protein that tells other cells not to eat them. By having a modified antibody attack cells exuding this protein the cancer was effective in mice. Clinical trials start in the UK soon.

A lovely Sunset: Just a nice sunset.

Gene Activity Test for prescribing Antibiotics: By testing the response of 18 genes, scientists have been able to determine if the subject is affected by a virus or bacteria. If it is bacteria then antibiotics can be prescribed. The test also would help determine the virus. The difficult step now is to reduce the several day test to a shorter timeframe.

Animal Skull in Heavily Salt Water: A calming gif of waves lapping on the shore as a salt encrusted skull sits there.

HERPES virus blasts into cells: With a pressure eight times more that a car tire, the herpes virus blasts its DNA into healthy cells. This discovery, if found to be universal for viruses to spread, can lead to a way to prevent this activity or even cause the virus to activate prematurely. Hopefully with no result like the head exploding scene from the classic Canadian sci-fi film by David Cronenburg, Scanners.

Snow falling by a Waterfall: A nice gif.

Sleepy puppy and kitten: Awwwww.

Hook and Special Teas

I was downtown and waiting for my wife outside of Special Teas, a supurb tea shop, and was hungry. Next door was a new place that had opened called Hook that I had not tried yet. Inside there was mostly smoked salmon items with various flavors. I tried the smoked salmon sandwich. My wife came in and got a maple salmon chunk. We were both very impressed by the taste and consistency of the fish. We would both get items form here again.

My Staycation Plans

So I am now on vacation for three weeks an a day. This time I am staying in Victoria. A staycation if you will. It is a good time to catch up on projects around the house.  Here is a small list:
-Paint our bathroom and kitchen,
-Organize basement and crawl space by selling/getting rid of unwanted items and making gaming tables,
-Some yard work.

Some fun things to do are:
-Create terrain,
-Bike to Sydney, the Sooke potholes, and ghost town,
-Lounge in a hammock and fall asleep while reading.

I will post about them and models that I will paint too.