A Saturday night gathering

(Not to be confused with a hootenanny or a shindig)

We were at the apartment of one of Terz's photography mentors last night, and I've never been in a place that so closely mirrored the design style of my parents' home --- which is to say, heavily into art and antiques, yet totally chapalang (everything/anything; a mix of all kinds of things) and mismatched. A Philippe Starck armchair ("very stylish, but not very comfortable") cozied up with rosewood furniture. Glam rock gold cushions prettied up both the black leather sink-in couch and a hard wooden bench. A scowling stone tiger guarded the clear glass doors to the balcony, to prevent an unwary guest from walking into the glass (apparently, it happens). Amazingly, coasters were not required for the living room table and our glasses could be placed willy-nilly. Even I nag my friends to use coasters on our living room table and the cheap Ikea table in the game room.

Over pizza later:

B: Which pizza is vegetarian?
The Host: That one. You're vegetarian?
B: I'm a seafood vegetarian.
The Host: Why?
B: I don't remember.
The Host: !!
L: Does this mean you only eat seaweed?

For dessert, what better complements the taste of Pizza Hut than oranges, mangoes and Royce chocolates? (Don't answer that.) The thing about Royce chocolates, though, is that while they're very tasty, you can't really eat more than three or four pieces in one sitting before feeling jelat (an overkill of tasty goodness --- akin to the feeling you have after consuming an entire Sticky Chewy Chocolate sundae at Swensen's).

The good thing about our social life nowadays is how little exposure to the TV we have. At last night's gathering, everyone was so excited to be raiding the mentor's photography book collection that there were actual prolonged stretches of silence. The only ambient sound: the susurrus of pages being delicately flipped over to reveal the next visual gem. Other nights, we're mostly out in places that either don't have TVs or, in the case of neighbourhood coffeeshops, have them tuned to the banalities of Channel 8, which we in turn automatically tune out anyway.

As it is, I didn't even know there was a big security conference going on last night until we saw the flashing lights and police blocks outside the Shangri-La, and one of our party pointed out that the policemen had anti-bioterrorism kits hanging off their utility belts, the kind only the army used to have. How times have changed.