Ten Best Strawberry Daiquiries in Florida ... no sorry, in America ... oops, okay then, in the World.

* It turns out that no matter how much you want one, a strawberry daiquiri is not always an available commodity. The term 'Florida' needed to loosen itself for this list-quest. The term 'daiquiri' followed suit. One barman, when asked about the possibility of such a drink was heard to say: 'Thank God! No!' Like my fashion sense, I believed my daiquiri sense may be just a little ahead of its resurgence. Or, a little behind the times. One or t'other.

1. Margaritaville, Universal City Walk, Orlando, FL. This was the yummiest daiquiri of the whole trip and the return. Divine!
2. Olive Grove Restaurant, Lake Buena Vista, Orlando, FL. Not bad, nice glass. Good food to accompany it—which for the USA is a great compliment.
3. Capris Restaurant, Homestead, (Gateway to the Keys), FL. Mmm. I think they has a 7/11 slurpee machine out the back.
4. A pub. Name forgotten and googling is not helping. Charleston, SC. I was dying for a daiquiri. I ended up with a Fat Yak beer. A Fat Yak beer, under ordinary circumstances, might be a very nice beer. It is no strawberry daiquiri though.
5. Ben Ash Deli, West 55th and 7th, New York, NY. 'I'll see if I can rustle one up for you.' Next day at breakfast I noticed it was on the menu—why would you have to rustle up a menu item?
6. Rosie O'Grady's, 7 th Av, near West 52nd, New York, NY. This is the home to the 'Thank God! No!' barman. Don't you love New York attitude? He did make a fabulous Razzomatini though. 'Just like a strawberry daiquiri,' he quipped. I had two.
7. Then I had a Key Lime Martini. I floated out of Rosie O'Grady's. Our last night of holidays deserved a celebration.
8. Albert Park Hotel, Albert Park, Melbourne. 'By any other name'. I think the humble strawberry is too humble for the cocktail these days. This had addled strawberries, but was accompanied by mint, rose infused vodkas and elderberry. Very exotic. Thanks B—.
9. Rumi, Brunswick, Melbourne. It's getting to the point where any cocktail makes this list. Tonight I managed two delicious serves of Rumi's Vodka Cocktail—vodka, pomegranate juice and lime in a sugar rimmed glass. I cannot believe there was any vodka in there. Very, very nice. Does it not take at least two spirits to make a cocktail though? Isn't this just a high priced mixed drink?
10. Automatic, Southbank, Melbourne. I just had to have one so I could finish this blog. Oh, yeah, like you wouldn't have anyway? Well, if they still had that ice cream one with blackcurrant liqueur, I would have had that instead but unfortunately they don't and so the list goes out with an actual strawberry daiquiri. Lots of strawberry pieces. Nice, but not the best.

Ten Things that Make you Queasy at the Astronaut Hall of Fame and Kennedy Space Centre.

1. Multi Access Trainer. Strapped into a chair on a spinning machine on three axes. You are twisted this way and that for what seemed like eternity. It was a long time to giggle loudly through nervousness and sheer ick-ability.
2. Climbing Wall. Queasiness comes twofold on this apparatus. Firstly, you have to tell them how much you weigh. I felt really ill about that. I still feel ill thinking about it. You are strapped into a harness and counter balanced by your self in weights. When you then climb a frame, you can bounce up and down using your own weight to make you feel a little weightless. The harness digging into my nether regions was enough to make me feel ill. Maybe I got my weight wrong, said too much. That makes me feel netter. It was the worst ride of the day.
3. Mixing chemicals on the mid-deck of the Space Shuttle. The actual chemicals were not nauseating in themselves, but the pressure to stick to the script, say your lines well and complete your tasks was. Mission specialist four and I did execute and achieve our goals though, well before time, and spent the rest of the voyage giggling at everyone else, and so, airsick bags did not need to be deployed.
4. G-Force Spinner. I did feel quite shaky at the end of this one. It was a centrifugal type spinner with added tilting. Inside a small box, (that I was surprised did not smell of vomit), you seem to be at the controls of a jet fighter that gets into trouble mid-air. It’s partly the footage, partly the spinning that results in a queasiness that is greater than the sum of its partlys.
5. The Shuttle Launch Experience. I took valuable and possibly very sensible advise and did not board this ride at Kennedy Space Centre which emulates travelling at twelve and a half thousand miles an hour. We were driving the next day, a long way. On inadequate sleep; the son of someone in a queue somewhere had to take the rest of the year off after riding it. I have regrets.
6. Vanilla Latte from the Orbit Cafe. I don’t learn a lesson with the words ‘vanilla latte’. I always think it sounds so yummy. It never is. It’s the reason I can’t abide the smell of Gloria Jeans. I am not sure what more I can do to convince myself.
7. Losing a camera. This didn’t happen, but sighting it sitting under a bench from across the room is still enough to churn a tummy. Especially when it has my darling Bodhi, so sweet and stroppy, on it. Disaster averted.
8. Dots. In a convex dome. You stand on an unstable platform and stare into this dome and it makes you feel odd. It was there, beyond that I have no idea why you would so please don’t bother asking.
9. Bowel control. All pooh talk is a bit queasifying, but, apparently, NASA monitors astronaut trainees’ bowel movements to ensure their control is such that their breakfasts, lunches, dinners and snacks end up traversing the small window required, in a gravity free environment, for all other astronauts to avoid sharing the moment.
10. Launch Cancellations. At t-minus nine minutes and counting no less. It drops your tum like a lead balloon. It doesn’t help that you then have to wait with bad filter coffee for the exiting masses to leave so you can avoid the disappointing exodus from the centre.

Ten Worst American Coffees and Their Relative Rating.

1.Filter Coffee, Room 1434, Comfort Inn, Lake Buena Vista, Orlando, FL. Tasted like they found their crustiest pipe to conduct the water.
2. Cafe Con Leche, Cuba Coffee stand, Key West, FL.
3. Machine Latte, Dunkin' Donuts stand in a petrol Station, Key Largo, FL.
4. Filter Coffee, on the road, Homestead to Satellite Beach, FL.
5. Vanilla Latte, Orbit Cafe, Kennedy Space Centre, Cape Canaveral, FL.
6. Filter Coffee, Orbit Cafe, Kennedy Space Centre, Cape Canaveral, FL.
7. Starbucks Latte, Cocoa Beach, FL. You expect at least middle-of-the-road from Starbucks, don't you?
8. Filter Coffee with Vanilla Coffe Mate, Truck Stop, road between Charleston and Washington D.C.. No more vanilla anything allowed!
9. Filter Coffee, Irish Channel Restaurant and Bar, Red Roof Inn Downtown, Washington, DC. All the grinds in the bottom of the cup make for a gritty last mouthful.
10. Latte, Healthy Food Cafe, 5th Av, opposite the Museum of Sex, NY. Expectations were super high. This coffee had a lot of work to do, and wasn't up to it.

Relative rating worst to least worst: 1, 2, 4, 8, 9, 3, 5, 7, 6, 10.

Ten Jobs That Seem Like Someone is Just Finding Something for You to Do.

Ten Jobs That Seem Like Someone is Just Finding Something for You to Do.

1. Advert. People in the States are paid to be advertisments. Nothing big-budget. Stand on the corner of a large intersection with a sign that says: 'All-you-can Eat Buffet Breakfast $4.99'; 'Subway—That Way'; 'Disney T-Shirts, Half Price'.
2. Fancy advert. Because there is so much advertising around, creativity is required. This employee has to dress in a cow suit, with half a football as a hat, stand on two poles, in the grass, at the side of a major roadway, to entice us to eat his boss' pizza. Was that in the job description when he applied?
3. Bellboys. Is it the standard of hotel we stayed in, or is the bellboy becoming less of a career option? Some people still prefer to pay someone to carry their bags. These people need my help regarding efficient packing. Read my book—'You Won't Need That'—in stores soon.
4. Cold Bouncers. When it is blizzarding outside, economics suggests turning off the automatic door, and getting one of your employees, sufficiently rugged-up and heater-equipped, to open doors only when absolutely necessary. Like regular bouncers, the nasty ones make you wait in the cold until someone leaves, before allowing you to enter.
5. Hostesses. I have been in the restaurant game. I always thought the hostess had the cushiest job. She sits on a chair, looks pretty (okay, that can take work) and then occassionally shows someone a table—if they're in a restaurant, if they are in the twenty-first century, I think they possibly know what a table is and the function it performs—and gives them a menu. Then, back to the chair. I'll warrant, when it's busy they also have to write things and call out your name. I still maintain they must be someone's niece.
6. Clarifiers. The man I saw in this position waits at the head of the queue of an attraction. When you get to him he clarifies with you what sort of a ticket you are going to purchase. He then directs you to the cash register where someone sells you the ticket. Someone is being fooled if they think this means you spend less time at the register. It just means the lady at the register waits longer between clients.
7. Pedestrian Safety Officers. You are thinking Lollypop Person's, and that they are important employees. These are not Lollypop Person's. They work busy New York intersections and advise you when to cross. Only thing is that the time they tell you to cross usually coincides with the time when the white/green man is displayed. There may be the odd person in the world that does not know that green or white means go and red means stop, but when the red man was displayed, they chatted amongst themselves and paid no heed to those who either didn't know or chose deliberately to go against the man. It's either a silly job, or, they are bad at it.
8. Emergency Callmakers. Shhhh. Don't tell anyone that these people exist. But I am not sure if their job is the ridiculously silly one, or whether that moniker falls to the person for whom they create emergency calls—the calltakers. Their silliness in mutual. Regarding either, I don't understand why. Don't even ask me. I'll just sprout conspiracy theories—but if you need proof, ask me one day about the Holden Merino.
9. The night shift of the guy who sits beside the rail tracks and puts charges on the tracks so that when the train goes past it warns the workers ahead that it is approaching. There are no trains at night. This job would have definite merit in places where there are trains at night—I don't at all question that. The absurdity of this job is location orientated.
10. Retail staff at Anaconda. I am sorry to the few staff members we found who were helpful and in some way acting like people who serve customers, service customers, or, at least, sell stuff. But there were definitely a few who had been given a job just so they could say they had a job, could wear a black and orange t-shirt, and could pay tax, but who in effect performed no single useful function. Not even when you physically gave them your whole wallet in a desperate attempt to be able to walk out of the shop with a purchased item.

* And just when I thought I could never find another job for number ten, i found another number ten, so here is number ten, take two: 10.1 Any government job where you ‘carry on as normal’ while the in-coming government decides on whether your unfunded project will go ahead or be scrapped.

Ten Holiday Related Poor V——'s.

*Warning: There are things in here you may not want to read. That is guaranteed to make you want to read—it's a car accident—but, let me reiterate, and don't say I didn't warn you, there are things in here you may not want to read.

1. Poor V——, I keep falling asleep while he is in the middle of a conversation with me.
2. Poor V——, I dragged him onto four roller coasters, a doomdrop—twice—a soaking wet water ride, and a Dr Suess carousel. I think he would have just preferred to stay on the Carousel of Progress.
3. Poor V——, I have discovered I am a control freak—it's not careful planning, it's calculated command.
4. Poor V——, we came over with sixteen condoms; we are going home with sixteen condoms. And on top of that, poor V——, he also recieved a lecture on adequate foreplay.
5. Poor V——, I am the Sugar Sheriff, I like to lecture: bad combination. And on top of that, poor V——, he is constatly offered some of the double chocolate dipped, sugar coated donut with sweetened cream and sprinkles (example) that I am scoffing. He eats bread and water, I have three of those for breakfast; his reading is eight-point-nine, mine is five-point-five.
6. Poor V——, he doesn't get to spend quality 'boys time' with Wes (see below). For example, when we were in Charleston, Wes went to a strip joint called 'Jugs and Beavers'. V—— didn't go. Just tell me. I didn't realise you wanted to go.

7. Poor V——, everytime he wanted to go to Burger King, I developed an allergy to the smell. I think he really did want to go there—he told me about that.
8. Poor V——, dialogue is literature, and I analyse/overanalyse literature for a not-for-profit living. No sentence, no comment, no throwaway line. is sacred.
9. Poor V——, he has to eat four anchovette sandwiches because he self-depricated. I was supposed to eat four peanut butter sandwiches because I self-depricated, but I was a better Skopa player that day and wiped my debt. Yay!
10. Poor V——, did he really understand what he was getting into when he said yes to this holiday.

Ten Reasons Why Universal (U) is Better than Disney (D), or, Conversely, Why D is Better than U.

1. U has shorter queues.
2. U has better rides, and more of them.
3. D has sillier (read: funnier) shops and merchandise. I can try Mickey hats on until next Tuesday. And those rubber snakes. And what about all those really expensive adaptations of Disney merchandise—Swarovski, Tag Heuer, Alexander McQueen, Tiffanys, Disney for Target. (Some of the above may not be absolutely the truth.)
4. Believe it or not, or, more accurately, they are both atrocious, but, D has better food outlets than U, and more open on the day.
5. U has less faffing to get to, in, and, around.
6. Both U and D had a super-dooper ride closed. It's winter, I know, but boo to D and U for this. The entry price wasn't one ride less. I'm not going to be here again for a while. Oh, have a whine Charlie. Some people never get to go at all. Oh, yeah, okay. Sorry D and U, and all the people who never get to go.
7. U had a better Harry Potter castle being built. D didn't have one at all. U's looked ace!
8. U had alcohol. But given number two, above, that may not necessarily be a great idea.
9. U had lockers at each scary ride. Except Cat in the Hat. Very Sensible.
10. U didn't have regular street blockages due to oversmiling, overdancing parades.

I think we have a clear winner—U! Well done. Nice try D, someone has to come second.

Ten Rides Conquered at Universal Studios, Islands of Adventure.

Facts and figures courtesy of http://www.universalorlando.com/

1. The Incredible Hulk. Zero to forty miles per hour in two seconds followed by a zero-g roll and at least four total inversions. Eek. It makes you just a bit green and just a bit shaky.
2. The Amazing Adventures of Spiderman. A 3-D ride. Incredibly realistic—so much so that I had to close my eyes the first time we plunged four hundred feet towards the sidewalk. The second and third times I left them open. We didn't crash. Spidey saved us.
3. Dr. Doom's Fearfall. Dr Doom is collecting fear to use in combat against the Fantastic Four. He gets it from you by shooting you a hundred and fifty feet into the air, and then plummeting you back towards the ground faster than gravity. A couple more bounces up and down and then he gets your fear and your lunch.
4. Jurassic Park River Adventure. A leisurely ride through friendly, if not cheeky, dinosaurs is disrupted when the boat goes off course into the raptor containment area. Only thing is, the raptors are no longer contained. Just before the T-Rex can eat us all, we are saved (um?) by an eighty-five foot free fall in the dark, culminating in an all-mighty splash and soaking. Lucky it was already raining, otherwise we would have got wet.
5. Popeye and Bluto's Bilge-Rat Barges. What was I saying about being wet. Now we are really wet. Great Fun. Can we do it again. For a small fee, you can dry off in a whole body hand-dryer. Why bother? It's still raining.
6. Duelling Dragons. My all time favourite so far, here. Two Roller Coasters are built side by side—Fire and Ice. Super Speedy—up to fifty-five miles an hour (88kms/hr), and they near miss each other three times. Cooler still is that it is a ride in which you hang down rather than riding on. You have to do this in two's, riding the red and blue each time you ride—just to even yourself out.
7. The Cat in the Hat. It was okay. I didn't panic. I am not sure how many of you know about my Cat in the Hat Comes Back phobia. That book freaks me out. All that pink stuff that won't clean up. But this was the original. Just fishes in toilets and balancing crockery. I was okay. Not too scary.
8. Jurassic Park Discovery Centre. Not so much a ride as a ... well ... a centre. We saw a baby dinosaur hatch, played a trivia game, and combined our DNA with a dinosaur to see what would come out. It was warm and dry for a bit.
9. Caro-Seuss-el. The excitment-o-meter didn't actually get far out of the pink on this one, but the fabulous Seuss characters are a hoot, and seeing your boy on a whacky camel thing is even hootier.
10. Poseidon's Fury. Technically a 'show' not a ride. Lots of water and fire and laser effects. Fun enough, but get me out of here. I have rides to ride again!