Cavalock and The Post Post Boxing Day Post

Oh gawd, so many amazing Japanese high-balls. Spotted this shelf of pretty cool Japanese booze at our local Don Don Donki. They got an impressive range of Japanese groceries that ought to give Isetan and Meidi-Ya a decent run for their money.

Who knew? If someone had told me at the beginning of the year, I would be totally into these two activities, I would have said they were crazy. Never in a gazillion years did I expect to look forward to heading to the gym and painting miniature figures.

The last time I spent this much time working out was almost 20 years ago. Heh, I'm no stranger to a good workout but I'm ain't as young as back then so nowadays there are some mornings when I'm left a wee bit nauseous after training. It's not the cheapest gym in town and I got a trainer too but it's part of the motivation I guess cos since I'm already paying that much moolah, I'll definitely make it a point to work my ass off.

Plus I get a kick outta giving all the strangers in the gym comic book nicknames. Easy to give names to the ang mos like the Kingpin and Batroc. Hah!

I have written bout my recent foray into Games Workshop's Age of Sigmar miniatures game a few months ago. I had no idea painting those little guys could be so therapeutic and serene. I have painting soooo much I have been neglecting my writing. Yah, my painting skills still suck but I'm enjoying it and that's what it's all about. As long as you are doing the things you enjoy, that's important.

Cavalock and The Instant Noodle Perplexity

The Baker-at-Home called ahead to make dinner reservations at Oversea Restaurant, an old school Cantonese joint that's just a short stroll from our hotel. So they used to have an outlet in Singapore years ago but had to close that. Their specialty char siu was excellent and it's easy to understand you gotta call ahead just to reserve this dish. And yah, this was the dinner we had after our joint food coma earlier in the day.

Here's something interesting we spotted at the food court in Kuala Lumpur. Unlike our local yong tau fu stalls where we get to decide on the kinda noodles or rice to have, well, apparently in KL there is a whole selection of different instant noodles to choose from. Pretty weird huh?

What I did not expect to do in KL? Buy painting supplies from Art Friend. Was definitely not planning that but we happened to see they had a store at the mall and whoa! things are cheaper here. And I also grabbed a novel from KLCC Kinokuniya, not cos it was cheaper there but becos I have never seen the book sold here. I could be wrong but I believe the book is out-of-print. It's an old horror anthology. Few folks understand the joy of finding an out-of-print book in a bookstore.

Cavalock and The Food Coma Trepidation

So we got a wee bit greedy on our first morning in Kuala Lumpur and went on an early breakfast eating spree. We hit the popular kopi tiam at the junction along Jalan Barat and ordered ... and ordered ... and ordered.

We had us some pork porridge, pork noodles and char kway teow, and I washed it all down with a sweeter than sweet tall glass of 3 layer tea. The food was all good although the porridge and wanton noodles were way tastier than pork noodles. But the above pork blood sausage from the pork noodles was my breakfast champ. I don't think I can find anything similar at hawker stalls in Singapore. Well, about three hours after that meal, the Baker-at-Home and I were unceremoniously struck by a case of severe food coma. It was not a pleasant feeling. It slowly crept up as I suddenly found that I could not move my limbs another inch and all we could do was look for a place to rest our bodies ... at the mall. Really. All that carbo overload and sugar overdose were like a lethal double KO blow for us.

Lesson learnt. I think since we started changing our diets and working out. We can't do them big carbo breakfasts no more. :P

Oh yah, if you are at the Jalan Barat kopi tiam, don't forget to try them little custard tarts, damn, they are good and insanely cheap.

Cavalock and The Rainbow Tim Sum Bemusement

Back to Jalan Alor and it's still every bit as bustling as the last time I was there several years ago. Couple things we noticed that seemed new to me. First up, you'll noticed a lot of Burmese migrant workers manning the stalls, kinda like how we got the China workforce here I guess. Other thing worth mentioning is the below rainbow tim sum trend that I'm seeing for the first time. More than a few stalls selling them although I didn't try any. Methinks a wee bit gimmicky perhaps? It was the first time at Jalan Alor for the Baker-at-Home and we both kinda agreed that as attractive as the food is, we could give the street a pass if we visit the city again. Not a repeat-visit for us as we would much rather explore the area for other venues.

Cavalock and The After Dinner Drinks Aspiration

Who knew this would happen to us? Never saw this coming but we became the kinda holiday couple who hangs out at bars after dinner. Hah! I think it's maybe a sign of old age or something, it definitely wasn't because we were bored. Perhaps it's an evolution of one's travel habits from squirrelling back cheap supermarket food to the hotel to dining at fancy restaurants to appreciating after dinner drinks at watering holes in exotic lands.

Well, that's what we did every night in Kuala Lumpur last week, at The Tokyo Restaurant's bar at KL's Isetan The Japan Store to be exact. We read about their famous cheesecake and knew we just had to have it for our dessert that night. It certainly deserved every praise. Extremely light and luxuriously delicious, making it very tempting for us to order a second slice.

Why the need to rush back to our room when we could be resting on bar stools and taking it easy in a foreign city? During the day, we walked to their Kinokuniya book store at KLCC and damn! that has got to be the biggest Kinokuniya I have ever been to, even larger than the ones I visited in Japan. Huge bookstore means lotsa books! Spent almost 2 hours there and noticed some nuggets in their fiction selection that were sorely missing at our local stores.

Cavalock and The Overseas Supermarket Inspection

I guess you could say it was the vacation over a decade in the making. The Baker-at-Home and I finally made our way to Kuala Lumpur for our long deserved vacation. One of those so near yet so far holiday destinations if you know what I mean. Needless to say, we stuffed ourselves silly on some glorious street food and almost slipped into a lethal food coma mere hours later. More on that in a later post.

We did what we always do whenever we are in another country, we visit their supermarkets! And we were pleasantly surprised to find some pretty cool items on sale. Check this out, Haggis and other porky canned food in the non-Halal section! The last time I had Haggis was back in Edinburgh in 2009. Anyway I sure don't remember any of our supermarkets having such a well-stocked porky aisle before. Who knew? I definitely wasn't expecting this in a country like Malaysia.

I suppose no spermarket or grocery store here is complete without some Kopi Luwak or Tongkat Ali item. Heh, and no, I didn't buy any.

Back in 2014, when me and the guys were in KL for our Magic: The Gathering/Makan road trip, this was how this block of abandoned building along Bukit Bintang looked like. Three years later, it's still exactly the same. For some strange reason, I just seemed drawn to it. ;)

Cavalock and The Total Catch Up Post

This last couple weeks is all about catching up as I finally got to watch my very first (and second) IMAX movie! Yah, I know I'm probably the last person on this damn planet to step into an IMAX theatre but there you go. Enjoyed the experience immensely and am glad that the first two IMAX movies I watched were both Marvel and DC comic book movies. Fingers crossed, Last Jedi will be next on the list.

Speaking of being-late-for-the-party, the Baker at Home and I also finally made our way to Gorgon Ramsey's Bread Street Kitchen restaurant at MBS for dinner. As expected the fish and chips came up tops and maybe next time we'll go for the English breakfast.

And for ze coup de maitre, just last week we became an official Netflix household! Done with Stranger Things 2 (I have that copy of D&D Monster Manual on my shelf right now!) and now on a binge watching streak with Brooklyn Nine-Nine (middle of season 2 as I'm typing this!). One serious question, does anyone know if the shows we get here are censored by the authorities? I know the ones on cable are heavily sniped so I'm wondering if the ones on Netflix are too.

* Gorgons are real!

Cavalock and The Creepy Santa Encounter

This is something I have yet to see in my neighbourhood FairPrice supermarket. My go-to favourite on any Korean BBQ menu, Ox Tougue! Well, I seriously hope that's a typo for 'tongue' on the packaging and not a part of an ox that I have never heard of. May be a wee bit pricy for some folks but it's so good! Grills in seconds and always so tender. Friends with indoor or outdoor grills should really get these from Meidi-Ya supermarket.

Something else I just noticed is our local Starbucks selling little tubs of puddings. Saw them while in Japan but this is the first time I'm seeing them here. Maybe it's a seasonal thing or they have been around for ages and I have only just noticed them since I hardly venture into Starbucks anymore. They got chocolate and milk flavours. The milk pudding is pretty good. Although for over S$3, I kinda wish it came in a bigger tub.

And with Christmas round the corner, it's time for a creepy Christmas pix! Yup, that's me with Creepy Santa.

Cavalock and The Rubber Stamp Seizure

So much food to consume before those expiry dates hit us! We have been pigging out on the Japanese snacks and fresh food that the Baker-at-Home brought back from her Japan vacation earlier this month. Breakfast is two slices of bread with some amazing Japanese apple butter jam while afternoon tea at home is either a cheesy snack from Pablo or one of the other numerous biscuits or tarts.

Also glad that she and her friends managed to enjoy a unagi lunch at a Michelin Star restaurant. Yup, the ever popular Unagi Hirokawa in Osaka is still blessed with the same looooong queue as when we were there last year. Think they queued for an hour and a half but it was definitely worth it for them.

Since early this year, I have been collecting stamps. No, not the postage kind that millennials today have no idea what I'm talking about, but the fancy rubber ones with ink pads. The Japanese stamps have always been my favourite and lately this one I picked from Tokyu Hands in Tokyo earlier this year has been pretty active in my journals.

Cavalock and The Lost Week of Miniature Gaming

Nope, I wasn't back in Japan again but the Baker-At-Home was in Osaka and Kyoto with her friends last week. Her third Japan vacation this year but hey, who's counting? She had the luxury of savouring this season's Haagen-Dazs flavours. Clockwise, that's Annou Imo (sweet potato), Sweet Strawberry, Salty Butter Biscuit and Hojicha Latte. Gotta remember to ask which was her favourite.

So the plan for my home alone week was to ... err, never mind ... it doesn't really matter what the original plan was, I ended up mostly tidying up the tiny apartment and playing more a couple games of miniature wargaming.

Played the new Games Workshop game Shadesphire, Age of Sigmar Skirmish and then an epic 2-hour plus Age of Sigmar pitched battle. I believe that's the most miniature wargaming I have ever played in a week. Certainly a joy to finally field my freshly painted figures and seeing them marching across the table. I still have so many more miniatures to paint. Unfortunately all this painting has taken me away from my writing and ... well, them words ain't gonna write themselves.

Heh, that little voice in my head whenever I look at my ever growing collection of games, books, Lego, books, miniatures and books.