Do you like dressing up crazy and having your photo taken, while drinking delicious punch and contributing to an art project? Then Maz Leyden at the Cross Street Studios totally has your number this Saturday, April 25:

Bring  fancy dress, silly props, contribution for punch & a sense of humour. There’s more information here.

Looking for something to do on Friday night?

Building on a series of summer shows, new Auckland band Rata & Sons is playing the Kings Arms on Friday 27 March with guest drummer Paul Roper (Mint Chicks) and country pyschadelic rockers Royal Falcon.

Rata & Sons describe themselves as “where Oasis and The Jam meet Cheap Trick and the Kings of Leon”, while Royal Falcon have “expansive lead guitar and dark narratives to create something pretty intense” so it sounds like a pretty interesting gig to check out.

Reluctant blogger Auckland Cheap Eats Review loves authentic Asian food,  but luckily for us, hates paying much cash for it. Here’s his MO.  If you go and say nice things about them on his site, he may even write us some more. Go on.

Why do I have this stupid compulsion to come up with ridiculous puns for the titles of these posts?  Why?  As Mr Fawlty’s medical guests once said “there’s enough material there for an entire conference”.  I’m sure that would apply to most people, but it probably applies a little bit more to some than others.  Anyway I blame my mother.  Primarily ‘cos she’s dead and can’t answer back and also ‘cos she smoked and drank heavily during pregnancy.  Eek, a mouse.

So, stupid title or not, you simply can’t hide from this delightful offering any longer.  I refer to, of course, Hainanese Chicken Rice (HCR).  Now don’t let me down; I’m picking that the majority of my learned readers will already have been introduced to this wonder of the Orient.  If you haven’t you should be slapped until you take the plunge - chickenallergy sufferers obviously exempted, but you’ll need to show your badge.

Full review after the jump…

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A sevens-induced munter infestation hit Wellington over Waitangi weekend according to digerati reports:

Downtown, trying to avoid munters. Just overheard: he’s wasted as, bro - @hadyngreen

Trying to figure out a place I can flee to today to avoid the munt - @robyngallagher

will have to brave the railway station soon. Psyching myself up for Olympic-class munter-dodging - @badtom

There was even a diagram to try and make sense of it all. Here’s a re-enactment:

Don’t let This Kind Of Thing happen in Auckland, team. We’ve already sold Hamilton the dummy on the V8s, the leaden-footed Rugby World Cup preparations could yet bear fruit and, godwilling, we won’t have to worry about that pesky America’s cup for while, either. If YOU see any money spinning events featuring crowds of people with pockets stuffed with disposable income having a good time approaching Auckland, let us or your local city council fuss budget know *immediately*.

Great weather for yachts.  For those of us too proletarian to own one, the next best thing was sitting on North Head and watching the big boys - in this case, BMW Oracle (US, skippered by Russell Coutts, a kiwi) vs Alinghi (Switzerland, current holder of the America’s Cup, skippered by Brad Butterworth, another kiwi). There was a pretty lengthy period of waiting for the wind to stump up (they won’t sail under 12 knots or over 16, according to the tanned expert carrying his water bottle & deck chair up the hill - which leaves a pretty exclusive window of racing weather), and the wee boat with the marker buoy seemed to move up and down the harbour a hell of a lot in that time, but given we had books and fizzy drinks, and had already had a quick dip at Narrow Neck, the wait was perfectly comfortable, and worth it in the long run. (more…)