A Social Network for Coffee Drinkers
Hey, this is Wellington, the town that’s run on coffee and is generally savvy enough to be online and connected.
We probably need this (Coffeenatic) like an extra hole in the head … but then again that’ll just make getting the coffee in quicker!
(thank you Web Worker Daily for noticing this for us all)
Sleb Sighting – Jason Gunn
Seen at Capital on the Quay (probably coming from the Novatel) at around 11.15am, heading out onto Lambton Quay on a break before heading out to Avalon Studios to film tonight’s dance-off.
Woohoo!
It’s Wine Time
I know we talked about this last year, when we made fun of John McGrath (you know, just for a change) but I feel the need to remind y’all that the Wairarapa Wine Harvest Festival is coming up again.
And now I can say for certain that it really is the most kickass day ever. Just $25 gets your ticket into the shindig, and you can get a shuttle from the train for $15. Taste wines from all kinds of boutique winemakers around the Wairarapa, many of whom don’t have a cellar door. Laugh as the man from Maebus describes his favourite Pinot Noir as tasting “like angels fornicating in your mouth” – and try and get in his good books in case he really is in with Google. Watch my parents try and win half a case of wine with their awesome dancing skills again. But one suggestion: don’t try and walk on rolling barrels. You will just fall off, hit your head and cry.
Late-night shenanigans are back on the menu!
There was a while in 2005 when you knew that on Friday and Saturday nights you could go to Indigo, and they’d be open, and there’d be Nixx-Til-Sixx spinning everything from Bloc Party to Motley Crue and you could drink until 6am. And then that stopped and it sucked. Fast foward to now though, and in 2008, Indigo is now San Francisco Bathhouse, and Nixx-Til-Sixx has been replaced by the fabulous DJ Doofus, but the same thing is happening.
All night long, baby. Just like Lionel promised. 1 a.m til 6 a.m. All weekend. Every weekend. Cheap beverages. Rotating djs. Open when others bars close. Hosted by djdooofus and the nice staff at San Fran. It’s a celebration, bitches!
Welcome to your new favourite place to go when everything else has already shut. We’ll see you there.
Cinephilia: Opening This Week
After the excitement of the pre-Oscar rush it’s another quiet week at the cinema. Opening all over town (that’s Readings, Empire, Penthouse, Regent-on-Manners and Lighthouse Petone) is the historical drama The Other Boleyn Girl featuring the dream team of Natalie Portman and Scarlett Johansson along with Eric Bana as ‘Enery the Eighth.
Even more historical (at least in terms of distance if not accuracy) is 10,000 B.C. which stars our own Cliff Curtis as a character called Tic’Tic (I kid you not). Directed by Independence Day‘s Roland Emmerich, 10,000 B.C. was partially filmed in New Zealand last year and tells the story of a young mammoth hunter’s desperate efforts to save his tribe. There’s no sign of Raquel Welch but Camilla Belle (When a Stranger Calls) comes off the bench to play eye-candy: Readings and Regent-on-Manners.
If neither of these take your fancy, there are sneak previews again this weekend of the Simon Pegg rom-com Run Fatboy Run (directed by his good mate David Schwimmer). You’ll find that at Readings, Empire, Regent-on-Manners and Penthouse today, Saturday and Sunday only.
All three of these titles will be reviewed at Funerals & Snakes next Wednesday (and in the Capital Times on the same day). Meanwhile, tickets have gone on sale for the 2008 World Cinema Showcase which is an absolute doozy this year – a worthy competitor to the main Festival. And the Film Society got under way on Monday which must mean that Summer is nearly over.
Rustic Mexican
Well we rushed down to the new venue for Viva Mexico this evening and thoroughly enjoyed that they’d almost completely run out of stock!
Luckily they agreed to sell us what they still had… which was some pretty good enchiladas.
Hutty goodtimes
The Hutt is a seething mass of culture (as if you didn’t know), and at the moment there is a particularly splendid outdoor exhibition of sculpture, Shape Shifter. The art works are for sale, and we at the Wellingtonista Towers feel a few would look just the thing in the foyer. The exhibition is at the Civic Gardens, next to the Horticultural Hall and opposite the Dowse.
Why not make a real trip of it, and come out on Saturday for the Petone Fiesta. This street carnival features a vibrant and eclectic mix of music, food, theatre, arts and crafts. A certain shop may even be open especially late for the fun , and a certain shopkeeper may be guzzling grog to make the fun funner, but that is another story…
Petone Fiesta, Jackson St, 6pm-10pm 8th March.
Shape Shifter, Civic Gardens, 22 February – 16 March.
Yes, you can has synth!
The L.E.Ds are playing Mighty Mighty on Friday night, and you should go along. But make sure not to party too hard and render yourself incapable of attending the official Newtownista flatwarming the next day…
3 things Miramar needs
- Mesh network
- The cinema open
- Statues of Pillars of Argonath either side of ‘the cutting’
A city littered with poetry
Now, everybody has seen the poetry which seems to appear just about everywhere down near the lagoon and around Te Papa, right?
This one took me by surprise though.
It’s Fiona Kidman, and is in such a comparatively out-of-the-way place I literally stumbled across it.
The full text of the poem is here.
But can you guess where the picture was taken?