Ki, where is your imagination? I saute or grill shrimp in massive amounts of garlic all the time. I also often just cook up a pound of shrimp in Old Bay, make my own cocktail sauce and snack on them. The only reason these big, bad boys are "special" is that they were almost the same price I usually pay for "large?" shrimp. I eat a lot of shrimp. Although I normally loath fried fish, I have a really good recipe for beer batter fried shrimp if anyone is interested. I only make it maybe once a year, but it's super yummy. Some where around here, I have a really good recipe for stuffed shrimp. I should try to find it. Did I say I eat a lot of shrimp? I've also been getting large lobster tails for $4 each, every couple of weeks, at the grocery store this summer. Been eating a lot of them too. Lobsters go really well with asparagus. (Kevin, drooling is unbecoming:) Okay, back to the quiche, I think I'll try that. Freezing small amounts is a great idea. However, although I can cook, I don't bake and don't own muffin pans. I don't even own a cookie sheet. Can I buy little pie crusts or something, maybe tart shells, or would they be too sweet? I have phyllo dough, is there some way I can use that? That's a good idea Kevin, about pre- sauteing mushrooms and freezing them but I eat mushrooms the way most people eat chips. I even put them in scrambled eggs. If they go bad, it's because they got "lost" in the back of the fridge. Yum, Vietnamese spring rolls. What is that sauce they give you with everything in Vietnamese restaurants? Now that would be super yummy too. It's the consistency of broth and maybe the color of beef broth. Does anyone know what I'm talking about? I don't think the dip included with Mark's link is the same sauce I'm thinking of. I think the sauce I'm thinking of has fish stock as a base, maybe. Mimi, Arthur can't say anything about buying food in "pounds". They sell everything by the kilo over there (2.2 pounds). The heads of lettuce in the grocery stores there were the size of basket balls. The fish market I would go to didn't sell prawns in small, smaller, tiny, super tiny, and too damn small to clean. They just sold the big, bad, super jumbo sized prawns. Okay, they still had their heads, and that may have skewed my perception of their size. Nah, I didn't eat the heads. Okay, tonight for dinner, I sauteed green onions, garlic, mushrooms, scallops and crab meat. Then I made a Marsala sauce and at the last minute added some fresh spinach leaves and gorgonzola. I served this over wild rice (pasta wasn't doin' it for me tonight, oddly) and had asparagus too. It was pretty yummy but needs some work. This weekend, I'll try the recipes you have suggested when I have more time.

From my brief visit, Sydney reminded me of Boston or Philly (not quite NYC). Lots of financial institutions (and a Krispy Kreme!). Being from a big city, I liked it a lot. Lots to do, restaurants, clubs, beaches, hiking, biking. I didn't get to see much of Melbourne city proper, but the city was also on the large side, lots of activity. The "suburbs" were really nice. My friends live in one about a 40 minute train ride from Melbourne, overlooking a bay and near a beach. The wineries in Victoria are plentiful, and I liked the chocolatier and the Red Hill Cheese Shop (cafe and shop). Lots of nice sightseeing, especially if they like hiking and biking (EVERYONE was on a bike, it seems, riding past my friends' house). What my friends aren't so use to are the expense and not having the local big grocery store 1 mile away (they have some small shops within walking distance, but no bodegas on the corner). The people were really nice. We couldn't find horseradish for cocktail sauce (their version of "cocktail sauce" has mayonnaise). But you can find all kinds of coffee! Prawns on the barbie... ;-))

DH is definitely a keeper, we do spoil each other. I can highly recommend Ubud, out of the townsite it's very peaceful and the villa is soooooooooo hard to take :-) there are more staff than us! The Balinese people are so gracious and friendly and welcoming, nothing is too much trouble. I got a cool idea for French toast here- they make it with two pieces of bread with jam or marmalade in between, then dipped and fried. Very yummy! Thanks for the sweet thoughts, Lyra and Cathy, between the two of you you're right! :-)

my point about Barbies is this: Even though *I* never bought her another Barbie after the end of her 4th year, and even though I tried to gently discourage other people from doing so, she now, at age 10, has more than 25 Barbies, and 8 Kens. Where did they come from? Other people. You can TELL people not to get her any more, but they still will. By telling people not to, you will only "keep it down to a dull roar." You will not be ABLE to prevent any more from coming in. Someone will either ignore your request, forget it, never hear it, or override it bcs the present is just TOO perfect. So you won't be depriving her for life of new Barbies. You *will* be slowing the tide. Bcs, you see, she's just starting. Barbies today are differnent than when I was a kid (OK, I'm 44, so that was a LONG time ago). When I was a kid, Barbies were expensive. Kids who had 4 were RICH! I thought I was really being indulged when I was given a Skipper. Now, Barbies are $5 to $7. Some are more, but a lot are not. They're an easy gift to buy for b-day parties, etc. And maybe you live w/ a bunch of Grinches, but you don't sound like the sort of person who does--you sound generous and indulgent, and I bet you learned that from the folks around you. That means, all the folks around you are gonna buy indulgent presents for your kid. And a $7 Barbie, or $14 packs of clothes, or $29 cars, are gonna be in your future at every gift-giving occasion. And, the MOMENT aunts, uncles, friends of all ages, etc., realize that she likes Barbies, they are gonna go overboard, right along with YOU. And she's only THREE. Leave some room for "future expansion," and try to establish "controlled growth," is what I'm saying. Then, when he best friend at age 4 insists on getting her a Sleeping Beauty Barbie, bcs she KNOWS (rightly) that your DD will love it, or your future DS wants to get her a Barbie car (bcs he loves cars, and she loves Barbies, he argues--how can you fight that?) you can welcome it enthusiastically into your daughter's room, and not cringe at the idea of trying to shoe-horn it in among all the OTHER stuff that didn't come w/ such love behind it. Drop me a line when she's 10, and tell me whether I was right.