Second Night Out

The last time Josh and I had a baby-less night out was when we went to see Harry Potter, less than a month after we had Wolfgang. He's 5 months and a week now, so it's been ages. Sometimes I think I might be more attached to Wolf than he is to me. It's all about the milk for him really. Tomorrow is my 24th birthday and Sunday was our 5 year anniversary, so last night we had dinner at The Station Hotel and then went to see New Moon. Don't don't don't yell at me. I'm a total nerd-burger and I read all the books a couple of years ago so I had to see it! God it was angsty though. I should get a major gripe out of the way before I get into the good bits of the night: Hoyts Cinemas, why the hell would you put half an hour of advertisements before the film? By the time it actually got round to the start of the movie, most people didn't even realise they were so exhausted by the endless terrible ads so people kept having to tell each other to shut up. Half an hour of ads. If you'd shown just a few trailers and a few local ads then we all would have been home to our children (though judging by the look of the rest of the audience, I'm fairly certain Josh and I were the only parents there) at least 20 minutes earlier! You bastards! Be a little bit choosy about who you sell your ad-space to why don't you? Argh. Apart from that, New Moon was worth viewing just to see their fantastic and justified use of Thom Yorke's 'Hearing Damage'. Why are young girls so in love with Robert Pattinson? He's odd looking. And quite deranged. I don't know about all these horrible new interviews in bloody Girlfriend magazine and all that, but he's supposed to be a recluse who eats endless microwave meals and obsessively reads everything written about him on the internet, including creepy fanfiction. He should go back to the UK maybe. Oh I'll shut up about it.

Dinner. Guess what Josh ordered for entree? 'Fromage de tete' otherwise known as 'head cheese' or jellied brawn. Don't know what it is? Chopped up pigs head in pork stock jelly. Mmm. Maybe.

Now I know the chef would have been all like 'Oh this is so cool, so retro. We need to re-visit the classics. I can make the people love this again' at the same time as thinking 'I hope they like it. I hope it sells. I really want people to get into this. My heart is on my sleeve.' So it's absolutely no criticism to the chef at all. I'm just not that mad about offal. I'm certain that when I'm in my fourties I will probably enjoy it. I fully believe in naturally acquiring tastes for things over time. I didn't like oysters when I was younger and now I do. I don't know how it happened but it did. Anyway I had a bite, and it tasted fine, not terribly flavoursome really. It's more the different textures of the various bits of meat. Jelly like here, stringy there and spongy every now and again. I made Josh finish it. The waiter looked very relieved.

For mains, Josh had the 400g Black Angus New York strip steak with hand cut chips and bernaise. I had the prosciutto wrapped pork fillet with black pudding, caramelised peaches and sauteed kipfler potatoes. Both amazing. The Station Hotel always do their steaks perfectly to your requests, and their chips are just beautiful. I was very impressed with the pork dish; salty and rich meat and black pudding contrasting with the sweet peaches. It seems like more of a winter menu dish (apart from the peaches) and I could have done with a cider on the side to cut through the richness, if only I were allowed alcohol.

No time for dessert so we had boysenberry choc tops at the Cinema. Quite a contrasting night. Admittedly I was thinking about Wolfgang the whole time. I'm going to have to get used to leaving him with my mum or with Josh on his own if I'm going to manage to go back to work. There were actually quite a few babies at the Station Hotel last night. There was one little boy maybe a month older than Wolf at the table next to us. I watched the sleepy boy throw his arms around his mother's neck and bury his face there and I missed my Wolf terribly. It's quite strange; when I'm out without him, it's as though I've been stripped of the maturity he affords me and I feel like a young and stupid girl again. Oh, so Hey Bambini, the Station Hotel would be a good place to review! Babies cried in the dining room and no one batted an eyelid. Also plenty of room for prams, capsules and strollers.