Perhaps in larger cities, but not here. We do have a Portugese steak house (that is a trip in itself - pricey, but well worth it for a special occassion or 2) that basically does the same thing - except with delicious meat (not for the vegetarians among us). But I will look at finding one (and perhaps one day they will come to our little burg). When eating chinese, green tea (hot) is essential to the gourmand experience!

Doc, what a shame you don't have Yum Cha near you.  It really is a taste sensation.  And you're right; the tea is essential.

An awesome bookstore, a great dinner, a cool movie...and all in the company of someone you love...sounds like an awesome birthday to me.

Thanks heaps Rose.  It was an awesome birthday.  And this weekend we're going to see the new Narnia movie, as Toni is such a fan of the books.  We might even squeeze in another visit to the bookstore as well. 

Books, Chinese and a movie plus a beautiful woman to share it with. Sounds like my kind of day.

Glad your day went so well, mate.

Mmmmm, both Fables and Y: The Last Man are great.

Fables may, in fact, (and this is pretty scary to say) overtake Sandman as my favorite comic of all-time.  We'll have to see how it keeps up, but so far I'm completely up to date with the trade paperbacks, and that series continually surprises me by its absolute AWESOMENESS.  Little Boy Blue is THE MAN.  (You would never think I'd have occasion to say that, but there it is...)

And Y is great, too.  I'm not completely caught up on that one, and I heard that the last paperback is due out this summer.  I'll probably finish it up when I get home from Spain.

And how can you lose with Sin City?  Pretty much some of the most gritty, engaging noir comics ever done.

I'm glad the Hulk was good for you. I've not seen it yet, hopefully this weekend.  I love Norton too, he's always good in his roles.  That was some birthday celebration - Yum Cha...I've never had but sounds yummy!

Chris,

We're going for a repeat performance, of sorts, this weekend.  We're visiting the bookshop again, going to the Biennale Arts Festival and then to see the new Narnia movie.  Toni is so looking forward to this as the Narnia books are among her favourites.

Thanks for the good wishes, mate.  Any progress on those designs?

SanCho,

Fables is absolutely awesome.  We now have 1 to 10 plus a off-shoot volume of stories.  I can hardly wait for the next trade.  I haven't even started looking at the Jack of Fables offshoot either yet.  I'm still not sure who my favourite character is; Snow rocks, Wolf is fantastic, as are Blue and Flycatcher and then there is Beast, Rose Red, King Cole, Beauty etc.  Yep, it is a fantastic series.

I'm currently working my way through volumes 4 to 8 of the Sandman trade series as well (Toni borrowed them from the local library).  Gaiman is so good and an absolute inspiration to me.

As for Y:The Last Man, well so far, I'm blown away.  I've only read, wait, no, I mean devoured the first two trades.  I plan on getting the next couple tomorrow.  I think it would make a bloody excellent television series, don't you?

I am chomping at the bit to see the next Sin City movie too.  The books are amazing.  Frank Miller is a hands down, no arguments genius.

Serenity,

I was going to send you an email to say thank you very much for the lovely birthday card, but if I do it here, then the rest of the community (or at least those who read this) will see how wonderful you are.

I completely agree with you about Ed Norton even if his reputation is as a bit of a prima donna (no pun intended).  And I guarantee you'd love Yum Cha.  Thanks again.

Did you hear that he's writing some new material for the Sin City sequels? There's a brand new story Frank has written about skinny little (well, not so skinny or little anymore) Nancy Callahan that will be in one of the two (yay for back-to-back sequel filming!) films they're making, as well as doing A Dame to Kill For among other stories.

Yeah, I'm pumped.

As far at Y goes, they're working on a movie adaptation right now (it'll only be like the first 14 issues or so), but if it does well, they'd like to take the whole series and turn it into a trilogy. Supposedly they're talking about Shia LeBouf for Yorick. While he's a bit over-exposed these days, he's a damn good actor and I think could do a fine job with the part.

When you're done with Y and you want more Brian K. Vaughn (because he's freakin' brilliant), see if you can find Ex Machina. It's pretty politics-heavy, but it's an amazing book by Vaughn as well. Plus, he did such a damn good job on Faith's story in the Buffy season 8 comics . . . he's pretty much awesome. It'll be interesting to see what he does with himself now that Y is done and Ex Machina will be wrapping up in the next year or two.

And Hellboy II comes out next month.



And it looks AWESOME.

Man, it's a great time to be a comic book fan.

Sancho,

I had heard Frank was writing some new material for the Sin City series.  I am so looking forward to seeing what it is too. 

'Y:The Last Man' is freakin' awesome (to borrow your expression).  I don't think I've laughed out loud as much with any other graphic novel series.  Yorick has some of the best lines.  I don't know that I like Shia LeBouf as Yorick, though.  Still, it is good to hear the movie adaptation is happening.

I got the next two trades of 'Y...' on the weekend.  It is so damn good I have just about devoured both already.  The good thing is the book shop has multiple copies of trades up to volume 10, so I'm not going to have to wait for long before I get the next lot.  They also have heaps of Ex Machina too.  I will definitely have a look at these once I've caught up with 'Y...'. 

I've seen the shorts online for Hellboy II and I agree it looks awesome. 

Indeed it is, mate.  Batman, Hellboy and more Marvel than you can poke a stick at...  Oh, happy days