Last Friday Chris & I went to Marzi’s dinner at Moskitto (or however it’s spelt) in Clifton Hill. It was a fair trek, but I was dropping Chris home afterwards anyway, and I’d originally said yes to Marzi’s invite on the basis of two things: a) that I’d never been to Moskitto’s, despite going past it many times and thinking it looked pretty good, and b) I like Marzi and this is the first thing she’s organised that I’ve been invited to, so I thought it important to start a good trend. As it was I didn’t regret it – it was a very nice evening all round.
We started off from nana & pop’s, having spent the day cleaning out the garage as I’ve already noted. I realised that morning when re-reading Marzi’s original message that it was actually her birthday dinner, not just some random get-together, so I started thinking about presents. I didn’t have to go far, though, as something soon jumped out at me – a tall blue glass jar, with a long neck and a matching stopper. It was quite thick glass, with large bumps all around it providing an interesting – if very 60’s – look and feel. It was kind of a silly thing, but I immediately thought when I found it “hey, a bong!”, quite sarcastically, but then it kind of appealed on several levels – for one, it did look like some bizarro 60’s survivor, it had a certain appeal as a silly jar thing, and it was actually a fairly hefty thing which, with a bit of imagination, might actually look half alright in someone’s house.
Originally it was filled with bath salts, I’m told. It’s apparently made in Italy, although the large mould lines didn’t convey a particularly high quality sentiment. Nonetheless, I thought it was just the right balance of almost interesting and comical for a novelty birthday present. I then got thinking that, just in case it seemed crappy or that I was mocking, I should fill it with something of reliable value. Booze was of course an obvious choice, being a generic container type object, but then I couldn’t really remember what Marzi drank, if anything at all. I knew she quite liked some of the cake’s at Mambos in Frankston, but I can’t really squeeze them into it (well, I could, but getting them out would be troublesome). In the end, in the absence of any real idea of what Marzi would like, I settled on what I would like – M&Ms! :D
We first went to Chris’ place to drop off his stuff and my laptop – I don’t leave my laptop unattended or in my car – and then headed over to the restaurant. I had thought it was a club, actually, slash cafe – when going past on the tram late at night it always seemed busy, lit up in blue light and whatnot. As it turns out there is a bar and a music lounge, in addition to the restaurant part, but it was quite different inside than what I’d expected.
Anyway, we actually arrived right on time, but we first needed to find a supermarket for the M&Ms. There didn’t appear to be one in Clifton Hill, and the nearest thing I could find in the Melways was way back up High Street in Northcote. So, we went there. We picked up the M&Ms from Kmart, which took much longer than it should have due to the stupid antics of the people ahead of us in line – I wasn’t paying attention, but Chris’ account of the situation was that some family wanted to buy three teddy-bears, but wanted two paid for on one card and the third on another, or somesuch. Whatever the scenario was, it took a while to resolve. In the end we got back to the restaurant some 30 minutes later, with Marzi’s present now two-thirds full with 1 kg of M&Ms. :D
While I was getting my stuff ready and out of the car, Chris was holding the jar and swinging it about a bit. I told him not to do that, that it was glass and fragile, but he kept on anyway. Sure enough, only ten seconds later I look up and find he’s managed to smash the stopper. Great. That went in the bin. Luckily the jar itself was okay, but it didn’t look nearly as cool without the stopper. :/
Anyway, we went on in, and I was surprised actually at how many people were there – most of the Ben group had come up for it, which surprised me immensely as they usually won’t leave Frankston, at least not for something like this. I guess they know Marzi better than I assumed.
There were also a lot of friends of Marzi’s that I hadn’t ever met before. I only met one properly – as in spoke to – which was Lauren. I also remember Vanessa, although I didn’t speak with her directly. There were many others, including one guy with an LED belt buckle that displayed scrolling messages; the one it was displaying that night was “I can explain…”. Curious. :)
I think Marzi liked her present, although I didn’t want to make a big deal of it and scuttled away quickly after giving it to her. Many others helped themselves to it’s sugary contents during the night, so I think overall at least it was a hit. :)
The restaurant itself was surprisingly good – the prices were about what’d you expect for a reasonably polished restaurant, but the corresponding food was well above par. It reminded me a little of Mambos when it came to dessert – giant super rich chocolate mud cake. :D
After dinner itself – and the restaurant closed – we migrated over to the lounges, and sat there for a while. But, I figured I’d drive back to dad’s that night, so – given I was going via Chris’ place – I excused us relatively early (just before midnight) and left. I got back to dad’s by about 1:30 or so, I think – pretty good, really.
So that was that. I really should have gone to Moskitto while I was living in Preston, all of about 5km away, if that. Ah well. I’d be happy to go back there again, although hopefully next time it’s a little more active – while it’s always been really busy when I’ve gone past it, the night we were there it was surprisingly quiet. There were other people eating, and the tables outside were pretty much all full, but inside – especially in the bar – it was pretty dead. Still good, since I don’t need a crowd to have fun, but it doesn’t hurt. :)
It was quite funny actually, the incident(s) between one of the waitresses and the aforementioned belt-buckle guy (I believe it’s Matt or Mark; we’ll call him Mr. M). The waitress in question was quite attractive, and had been really nice to me at least. I got the feeling she was just like that though, not that it was anything special between us. Anyway, I was contemplating having a chat to her, but while I was idly musing on that Mr. M beat me to it. He was off talking to her while she cleaned up some other tables, and they both seemed to be getting on really well. Not long later, I noted that he was writing his phone number down on a piece of paper. I also noted, however, at some point in the proceedings, that she suddenly had a very obvious cross on a necklace, hanging out above her shirt. I’ve noticed that being used as a sign to say “back off” before; pulling the cross necklace out from under the clothes. Then Mr. M was seen hunting around, seemingly waiting for a chance to talk to the waitress, while she had her bag with her and was obviously about to leave. Then she did, out the back entrance, so Mr. M never got the chance to do whatever it was he was trying to do – I’m not sure if he’d given her his phone number at that point or not… I didn’t notice as such, but Chris thinks he did, which may explain the sudden turn of behaviour of the waitress.
Anyway, Mr. M was not amused in the end, but I thought it was hilarious. Much entertainment for everyone else. :D
But hey, if we go back there again I hope she’s there, so at the very least I can ask her what happened with that fancy belt-buckle guy, if she remembers him. :)
