Bar.

First up, real name. It's Robyn. ta-fucking-daa. I finally let go of the whole 'ooh I'm not gonna reveal my real name on the net and be all mysterious', mainly because I don't want people who I end up meeting in real life calling me by my username (which has happened), and also because I already know pretty much everyone who reads this blog anyway (not that there's a whole lot of you).

So yeah. I'm at George's right now, like I seem to be a lot these days. We went on a bar crawl last night with her and some of her eng friends, namely Ben, Andrew and Brendan who organised it. It was great, I'd never been to any of them before except for Robot. The boys started out at Young and Jacksons. We were meant to meet them there but George's meeting with her thesis supervisor or whatever he is ran quite late so as soon as we met them at Y&J we moved on...to mcdonalds. Well we did need to eat! The cashier at maccas wasn't the sharpest knife in the drawer, but then she was a cashier at maccas.

The first place we went to was the Gin Palace, which was really posh looking, all dark velvet drapes and gilded picture frames. They even framed the airconditioning vent, which I thought was a nice touch. It was very pretty and the waiters had awesome uniforms. I wasn't drinking so I had some fruity kind of mocktail which was nice. Even the ice was special - instead of just being cubes it was flat little rectangles. There were lots of little armchairs around little tables so we had our armchairs at a table with a hole in the wall seat. Apparently the men's loo has an unusual bit of decoration in the form of an upside down urinal at head height.

Next up we went to the Croft Institute, which I've read about before. You have to go through this creepy graffiti filled alleyway in Chinatown to get to it. Soem chinese chef in a white puffy hat waved to us as we walked past. Croft is set up like a sinister looking lab, all tiles and white or off white furniture and walls. It was practically empty so we didn't stick around, only going upstairs to have a look at the bathrooms. They were quite scary. The girls one had a hospital bed in the corner, and looked like a set from a japanese horror film. There was an eye wash basin but we tried it out and nothing happened.

After the creepiness of Croft we went to the Chaise Lounge, which was really nice. It was decorated in the same style as Gin Palace, all dark reds and vintagey looking, but more casual. The front was quite full when we went in and a three-piece jazz band was playing (and they were quite good too) but George went up the back and found a little room with sofas in it so we hung out there for quite a while. It was nice and cosy. We talked about bathrooms a lot and George nearly got herself locked into the ladies.

Our last stop was Robot, which used to be my semi-regular tuesday night hangout (they show anime on Tuesday nights) so it was a nice way to end the evening. Very quiet again, but it was Wednesday night. We even sat in my usual corner. We had to end the night at that because Melbourne's public transport ends at midnight which SUCKS. It was raining for most of our walk through the city but it was quite mild so it wasn't too bad. Then of course you're walking with friends and that which is always enjoyable.

Now I have a confession to make. George and I were so impatient on the train home, we could hardly stand it. The tension was unbearable. We couldn't even wait to get home so we did it in the car. That's right, we cracked open the creamed spinach dip and pita bread in the car on the way home. :D Thank god for 24 hour Coles is all I can say.

So yeah. Great night. I'd love to do it again and see more little bars. Melbourne has a lot of them.

I should also probably write something about easter and the comedy festival, but that's for next time because I'm lazy and this entry is already quite long.

-Robyn