Right, so, last night (Saturday) Laz organised a group of people to go to dinner at Dracula’s, a themed restaurant somewhere on or near Swanston Street. I think. Anyway, it was a little pricey ($68 each), but then again, I’ve had more expensive meals that had no entertainment whatsoever (and weren’t as good)… plus, I’m not really crying poor at the moment, so I figure I can indulge a little. :D
Although, on a subnote, I did realise that I don’t have any more money this year than I did any of the previous ones, going back to the start of uni even. I just have fewer money suckers… girlfriends are expensive, I’ve realised. Of course, there’s the car, which is inevitably going to be the biggest money sink of all… but it at least has a straightforward function, and despite it’s occasional breakdown, is far less moody.
Okay, okay, I’m being antagonistic… :) I’ll be good, promise. :D
So yeah, Dracula’s… I rode down to Laz’s (news on the bike coming tomorrow… er, today… d’oh), and from there departed towards the city and our night’s entertainment. I’ve never been to a themed restaurant… at least, nothing nearly as extensive as Dracula’s. It’s a pretty impressive setup – the props are both extensive and pretty well done, all round. The little haunted house ride into the restaurant is a little corny… but unbeknown to me, part of it was filmed, which provided immense amusement during interval.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. We had quite good seats – first centre row on the upper level. That gave us a good view of the stage, while still keeping us up in the posh section, not down in the moshpit with all the Cranbournites. ;)
The style of humour was quite antagonistic, not too apologetic, and generally actually funny… the show was a mix of live musical performances, story telling and stand up comedy. The music was pretty darn good… a good mix of classic rock and modern pop. The show even ended with an Australian rock tribute, which was pretty cool. There was also an extended performance of Black Betty with puppets, which was both well played and well animated – alongside the humorous antics of one of the band members and a groupie… did I mention the show was for mature audiences only? :)
And I didn’t see Laura there anywhere. Muahahaha. … I’ll be good. :D
There’s wasn’t all that much vampirism in the show, all things considered… the style was more just generic gothic… some references to vampires and undead in general, but mostly just music and making fun of Tasmania, New Zealand and Seattle – the latter the direct fault of Michelle, Laz’s friend from Seattle, whom attracted several mentions in the show.
One of the funnier parts was a skit with a 70’s style male porn star, who looked like a young Merv Hughes crossed rather unfortunately with all too little leopard-skin material… quite funny, that part. I won’t retell specifics, for the sake of the younger members of the audience, suffice to say they were a good laugh and occasionally tasteful. :D
I should say that the audience demographic was fairly wide… there were a couple of primary school kids, out with their parents, and a few tables over a senior couple out with a few of their friends (for an anniversary or birthday, from memory). There was quite a host of birthdays – at least a dozen – with ages from 18 to forty-something. Some even had cakes, which were paraded most teasingly on stage… we should have faked someone’s birthday. :)
Dessert was really nice… little chocolate coffins filled with cream. Very nice. The food was very good, throughout, although a little sparing… I was just as hungry by the end of the night as the start, even given I thieved Angela’s entree as well. And ate most of our table’s breadsticks. Only a couple of dozen, no big deal. :D
There was one poor girl from Tasmania… probably not the only one in the audience, but the only one dumb enough to admit it when the audience was asked. She coped a whole lot of jokes throughout the night, which were all quite nice, and very funny. She was good about it to – she was laughing harder than anyone else. The ideal audience member – from an embarrassing place and full of self-depreciating humour. :)
‘course, I’ll just reiterate here how much I loved Hobart. A beautiful city. But it’d be tough moving there… it’s hard enough being the new family in town anyway, let alone when you’re only the second. ;)
Hehehe… sorry, I’m not good at being good. ;)
So, yeah, I’d certainly recommend Dracula’s. I probably wouldn’t have brought primary school kids, but I’m sure a few months of therapy’ll fix them right up. ;)
It was also cool that many of the waiters and waitresses definitely got into the theme. In fact, many of the cast members were actually working the floor at various points, and seemed happy enough about it! They were very good performers, so with my cynicism I presumed they’d be rather full of themselves… but some of them, seemingly not. That’s good. :)
There was one sour point, which was one of the waitresses getting cranky with our row and that behind us, claiming we’d bandited off with a pair of their groovy salt and pepper shaker skulls… I’m pretty sure no one did; I think they’d mistaken how many they’d put out to start with. It wasn’t that they thought someone had thieved them – I could imagine many people being tempted to take them as souvenirs, although I certainly didn’t and I’m pretty certain none of our group did… it was just the confrontational disposition of the waitress. Rather than playing it coy and mentioning that they were missing, as would be the normal procedure, she immediately launched into an angry tirade against the whole lot of us, barking that we’d have to all pay for them if they weren’t found. It was quite irritating… I ignored her, but I think it got under the skin of quite a few people. Definitely at odds with the rest of the experience there. Our drinks waiter in particular was good – funny, helpful and pleasant. Ah well. I know second hand how downing waitering can be, let alone when you’ve got to pull a big performance with it as well, so I guess it’s fair to assume she was just having a particularly bad night.
And second hand is way worse than first hand in this case – obviously I’ve never done any hospitality work – because second hand is where your girlfriend gets home after work and inadvertently takes it out on you, whereas first hand you merely take some crap from some mouldy customer, and then get to bitch about them for the rest of the night with everyone else.
So I guess it’s obvious I’ve been thinking about Sarah a bit lately. I’m not entirely sure why… my feelings on that front are changing subtly, I think… I’d write about it I guess, but I don’t know where to start. We’ll see how that goes.
Grrr… sorry, I’ve fallen off my ADD medication, it seems…. must need more M&M’s. :D
Mmm…. I’ve been craving M&M’s tonight… but I was lazy as it was and had fish & chips for dinner… M&M’s to add fat to that cholesterol would just be too much, even for me. :)
‘course, the ultimate “diet”, so says Cherie (Sket’s sister), is smoking. Ah, yes, let’s get slim & healthy by inhaling four thousand poisonous compounds. *English chorus* Brilliant!
Anyway… nearly 1am, so, bed time for me. In summary, Dracula’s good, fat bad, Wade cheeky. All indicators normal. :)
