Author: Joanna

Have a Caeli – that’s Ball to you!

Cyst­ic Fibrosis is a cause close to the hearts of some of the Wel­ling­tonista, so we’re really happy to pro­mote the Winter Caeli (Scot­tish Ball) at the Inter­con­tin­ent­al on August 23.

This fun­drais­ing ball will be an event like noth­ing ever seen before in Wel­ling­ton – find out how things are done the Scot­tish way and help raise money in style

Tick­ets are $90, and for that you get:

• Wel­come bubbles
• Three course meal
• Wine with din­ner
• Live music
• Scot­tish dan­cing
• Fun­drais­ing auc­tion and raffle

For more inform­a­tion or to buy tick­ets, con­tact 0800 651122 or CFwinterball@gmail.com

Afterblaster: Awesomeness in a ring

I’ve said it before and I’ll no doubt say it again, but there are few things as fun as going to the wrest­ling. Just check out the audio of the video below if you don’t believe me.

Yes, that’s the almighty Laz­arus Volt kick­ing the Con­dor’s ass quite soundly, and he’ll be doing the same thing to the crotchety old Brute this Fri­day July 24 at After­blaster and you should be there to see it. Details are on the Kiwi Pro Wrest­ling site, but what you need to know is that doors open at 7.30pm and tick­ets are $15 pre­s­ales, or $20 on the door.

Girls are different from boys – apparently

So tonight was the Sil­ic­on Welly magazine launch party (which we twittered about yes­ter­day), and nat­ur­ally I was there, rep­res­ent­ing for the Wel­ling­tonista. I was inter­ested to see that in this IT net­work­ing occa­sion, the ratio of guys to girls was about 7/2, and in talk­ing to the rare woman there, I found that – like me – the major­ity of them worked in pro­ject man­age­ment, comms or organ­isa­tion. As Wel­ling­ton’s offi­cial Queen of the Geeks Brenda has asked before (sorry, I can­’t find the link, maybe she’ll com­ment with it) – where are all the female pro­gram­mers at? And if you look at the cov­er of this issue of Start-Up, you’ll see that only ONE of the Sil­ic­on Welly honorees is female. What’s going on, people?

I don’t have the answers, so I sup­pose all I can do is pro­mote some gender-sep­ar­ate events. Pretty Pretty Pretty which is the girlie site I run with Well­ling­tonista PAG Amy, is hav­ing a big girlie party to cel­eb­rate our third (month) anniversary, and if you’re a lady, you’re invited. Mean­while, in response, the boys are hold­ing anoth­er Chap’s Night that you might hap­pen to come across. Enjoy!

Cellar-Vate Nga Waka Dinner Menu July 9

We men­tioned it before (and reviewed a pre­vi­ous din­ner), but if you need fur­ther con­vin­cing, here’s the menu for the Cel­lar-Vate Nga Waka din­ner on July 9

Nga Waka Three Paddles Sauvign­on Blanc ‘07
Corn, cap­sic­um and pars­ley risotto with goats cheese

Nga Waka Riesling ‘03
Skin-on Tera­kihi, water­mel­on, red onion and dill salsa

Nga Waka Mar­tin­bor­ough Chardon­nay ‘07
Ginger, soy and chilli chick­en pieces

Nga Waka Home Block Chardon­nay ‘04
Sliced pork ribeye with Dijon, cream and white wine sauce

Nga Waka Pinot Noir ‘06
Rab­bit pie, mash and jus

Nga Waka Late Har­vest Riesling ‘04
Coconut panna cotta

You don’t get huge por­tions of any­thing, but you do get lots of tastebud parties in your mouth, and stim­u­lat­ing con­ver­sa­tion. There are still some tick­ets avail­able for this tast­ing. Book­ings can be made by e‑mailing Rebecca – becs[a]cellar-vate.co.nz. The event costs $40.00 a head and starts at 6pm in the Cab­in­et Room (func­tion suite above the Back­bench­er).

We got a great big convoy, filling up the streets

If you’re plan­ning on driv­ing to work tomor­row, or even if you’re plan­ning on tak­ing pub­lic trans­port, you should read the fol­low­ing press release about the great big moth­er-truck­ing protest that’s planned for tomor­row morn­ing in Wel­ling­ton.

Analyse this!

I’ve been pok­ing around in our site stats which tell us everything about you, from the col­our of your eyes to your home address, and wheth­er any of you are scrawny with big noses, small chins and many issues or not, and I’ve real­ised that the Wel­ling­tonista is fail­ing you in a couple of areas.

1. We haven’t made any pro­clam­a­tions as to which is the best brothel in town, or even done any reviews that we’ve writ­ten about.

2. We haven’t writ­ten any Flight of the Conchords slash fic­tion. Well, out­side of our heads, any­way.

3. We can­’t tell you how much Short­land Street act­ors get paid. I don’t think even the Auck­land­ista could help with that one, although they’d like to.

Per­haps our lovely read­ers could address or answer these issues in the com­ments?

Molesworthy updates

Item! The next Cel­lar-vate din­ner, which we have drooled about before is on July 9, fea­tur­ing Ngawaka wines, and it costs $40. Give the lovely Rebecca a call to reserve your tick­ets.

Item! The super­cute Green Land Cafe under the Min­istry for the Envir­on­ment on Kate Shep­pard Place is run­ning a com­pet­i­tion to win a bottle of the fam­ous olive oil grown on Mt. Vic. Buy a cof­fee, pick an num­ber and go into the draw. Actu­ally, don’t, because it’s a gor­geous green vir­gin, and I wants it. So back off! Also, how lovely are the staff there? They totally buttered my scone for me, if you know what I mean. And of course what I mean is I think it’s part of their waste reduc­tion respons­ib­il­it­ies.

Item! It’s not near Moles­worth Street, but it’s just as bleak – Stan­ley Road on the corner of Vic­tor­ia Street and Wille­ston is run­ning Happy Hour from 4pm-6pm, with all kinds of beers (Corona etc) for just $3.50. It’s not a par­tic­u­larly cosy spot, but hey, giv­en how dry this part of town is, con­sider it a good oas­is to stop at while you cross the desert of Wil­lis Quarter.

Eat Lessbanese

We’ve men­tioned Habebie Res­taur­ant before (well, actu­ally I can­’t find a link, so maybe we did­n’t actu­ally) but we have excit­ing news – it’s BYO now (and may have been for a while now), but more import­antly, from Monday-Thursday, all mains (except sea­food) are $17. And since prices for mains usu­ally go from $22–28, and that includes meze starter plat­ters, we’re telling you to get your asses down there for some awe­some big piles of meat. But take a cardie – it’s not the warmest place ever.

Have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?

As we move through the elec­tion year, we’re going to start get­ting plenty of invites to “Meet the can­did­ates” type events. We wanna know about the nefar­i­ous ins and outs of invit­a­tions you receive. Are they unso­li­cited? Do they provide you with instruc­tions on how to get there using pub­lic trans­port or are they purely for the car-drivers? Are they encour­aging healthy debate or unhealthy drink­ing? Or are they, as one invit­a­tion the fly spot­ted recently, sug­gest­ing that you park in nearby super­mar­ket car­parks, per­haps because they’re work­ing in an unholy alli­ance with a tow­ing com­pany?

Spill your guts. Keep us in the know.

Winter tidbits

1. Plum is now doing 2‑for‑1 for small plates on Tues­days
2. It’s 1994 all over again with the new plaid shirt uni­forms at the South­ern Cross
3. There is a Lone­star open­ing in Petone. Get your big plates of meat in the Hutt without a sur­charge on pub­lic hol­i­days!
4. Mojo Bond St have mulled wine, as does the Green Room.
5. Cafe Itali­ano is offer­ing 2‑for‑1 pas­tas for $15 on Mondays and Tues­days.

That’s all we’ve got for now.