Pawgust 2018

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This August, Mayo (also known as “dog” on Twitter), Richard (also known as “partner”) and I are taking part in PAWGUST 2018 on behalf of Guide Dogs Australia. During the month of August, we will be walking at least 30 minutes a day for 30 days (that’s roughly 2km every day) to raise vital funds for Guide Dogs and support their puppies currently in training.

Oh. Yeah. This blog hasn’t been updated in forever. There was never mentioning of our buying a house, getting engaged, adopting a dog, growing older but not growing up and so on, huh. Well, there you go. We bought a house in Sydney and went into 30 years of debt, got engaged and are set to marry at the end of the year, and adopted my now-8-years-old, made-to-order, dream female Siberian Husky from the shelter.

Pawgust Selfie

Pawgust Selfie: Mayo really isn’t a fan of the camera

So anyway, this August, my dream dog best puppo ever Mayo and I will be walking 30 minutes a day for 30 days. Pawgust made a whole deal about it being in winter and dogs getting extra walk and all that, but truthfully, both my winter dog and I prefer the cooler season, and she on average already gets 45 minutes a brisk walk a day (two walks on Saturdays). The only effort I’m making is posting adorable-if-I-do-say-so-myself pup pics and asking for donations.

I imagine the donation page will go down some time after the event, so this is the blog post for archive of said adorable pup pics.

But there’s still time to support us! To do so, please visit our Pawgust page and follow the steps! You can remain anonymous and any donation above $2 is tax deductible. Even a few dollars help!

Fruit Platter on Qantas Flight QF563

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The fruit platter wasn’t available on my Sunday afternoon Sydney-to-Brisbane flight QF536 (flying for work, too, so that’s depressing), but for dinner on the Sydney-to-Brisbane QF563 flight back Monday night it was! The 1.5-hour flight was delayed.

QF563 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter

QF563 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter

The fruit platter had: 1 strawberry, half a kiwi, 4 slices orange, 4 slices pink grapefruit (a first in fruit platter for me!), 2 halves passionfruit and a banana. And of course soy milk. No apple this time, though.

Flight Meal (Sushi!) on Qantas Flight QF26

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It was a late overnight flight and the second leg of our journey home from a wonderful but exhausting ski trip at the Sahoro Ski Resort (that’s a lot of context in one sentence), and I’d already brushed my teeth and totally determined to just sleep when we got on our flight. The QF26 Tokyo-to-Sydney flight turned out to be super empty.

This empty:

QF26 Qantas international flight: very empty cabin!

QF26 Qantas international flight: very empty cabin!

We didn’t embark early; the plane took off like that!

We were told we could make use of any space and sleep horizontally if we wanted despite in economy class. We were also handed this flight menu:

QF26 Qantas international flight menu

QF26 Qantas international flight menu

Oh sushi… It’s pretty late and I’d already brushed my teeth. Do I or do I not? Yes. Yes I shall!

QF26 Qantas international flight: Sushi!

QF26 Qantas international flight: Sushi!

And that was the right decision! The meal came with a great fresh sushi selection and a panna cotta for dessert. My only complaint is instead of the traditional raw salmon nigiri, they used smoked salmon; and that’s hardly a complaint.

Next morning, I informed Richard, who decided to skip dinner and went straight to sleep, of the awesome sushi I had and showed him the photo. He regretted it.

Breakfast time!

QF26 Qantas international flight breakfast: Cheese bacon egg wrap

QF26 Qantas international flight breakfast: Cheese bacon egg wrap

The wrap wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, but when I asked for a banana, the flight attendant gave me 2! Win! This has literally been the best flight in economy class. (I’m pretty easy to win over with food.)

There was a slight delay because a woman died at the terminal just before our flight, so after a long while, they decided to drop us off at the freight terminal instead. Minor inconvenience.

QF26 Qantas dropoff at freight terminal

QF26 Qantas dropoff at freight terminal

Was getting a sushi meal worth it on a Qantas flight? YES!

Pre-Ordered Meal (Seafood!) on Qantas Flight QF25

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In unprecedented vickie.life history, for the first time ever, Vickie did NOT order the fruit platter special meal on a Qantas flight! How was that possible? Well, I took the bait and ordered the non-online-exclusive salmon option on Q-Eat (get it? Bait? Fish? No?) for our QF25 Sydney to Tokyo international flight.

Q-Eat said: Salmon fillet with sesame soy sauce, green beans and rice: Salmon fillet gently cooked, dressed with a flavoursome Asian inspired sauce and served on a bed of fragrant rice with green beans.

QF25 Qantas flight Q-Eat selections

QF25 Qantas flight Q-Eat selections

On the flight, it was… a very disappointment meal. The salmon was overcooked.

QF25 Qantas flight dinner: salmon fillet

QF25 Qantas flight dinner: salmon fillet

I should have known and had some of that pumpkin on pumpkin action instead.

Richard pre-ordered the online-exclusive Barramundi with lemon dill sauce and roasted winter vegetables. It’s much better than the salmon.

QF25 Qantas flight Q-Eat Barramundi (online exclusive)

QF25 Qantas flight Q-Eat Barramundi (online exclusive)

Breakfast was Spinach and feta toastie, plus a Greek yoghurt with apple cinnamon granola.

QF25 Qantas flight breakfast: Spinach and feta toastie

QF25 Qantas flight breakfast: Spinach and feta toastie

The flight menu:

QF25 Qantas flight menu

QF25 Qantas flight menu

Fruit Platter on Qantas Flight QF466 (and QF411)

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Evening flight from Melbourne back to Sydney, QF466, after a whole day of inter-state work. The flight was later than I’d hoped– Deja vu…

QF466 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter

QF466 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter

The fruit platter looks familiar. Deja vu…

But we got a Lindt Lindor chocolate ball this time. I wasn’t given a chance to reject it, so here’s a pic.

QF466 Qantas domestic flight Lindt Lindor chocolate ball

QF466 Qantas domestic flight Lindt Lindor chocolate ball

In the morning, I’d also taken the flight QF411 from Sydney to Melbourne, and also ordered the fruit platter. I’d neglected to take a picture of the content because I didn’t eat it straight away, but I’m 90% sure it’s the standard apple, banana and soy milk. Anyway, here’s the box…

QF411 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter box

QF411 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter box

Yep. It’s a box.

Fruit Platter and Flight Meal on Qantas Flight QF128

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Qantas 747-400 QF128, Hong Kong to Sydney international flight.

I ordered the fruit platter, as usual.

QF128 Qantas fruit platter dinner

QF128 Qantas fruit platter dinner

There’s a big tray of fruits for dinner and a small tray of fruits for dessert; I suppose I did order a fruit meal. But! Can I point out the small REAL MILK sitting in the tray? REAL MILK! NOT SOY MILK!

For breakfast, there’s another fruit platter (one tray). This time it came with a sugary yoghurt, more REAL MILK, and a punctured orange juice that leaked everywhere and made everything sticky.

QF128 Qantas fruit platter breakfast

QF128 Qantas fruit platter breakfast

Not a super fun experience when I barely slept in the shorter 8-hour flight.

I didn’t keep notes so I have no idea what Richard ordered. Funny how little you can tell what’s in a flight meal from the photo, huh.

QF128 Qantas standard dinner

QF128 Qantas standard dinner

Breakfast looked pretty good.

QF128 Qantas standard breakfast

QF128 Qantas standard breakfast

A muesli bar before we got off the flight.

QF128 Qantas Carman's muesli bar

QF128 Qantas Carman’s muesli bar

Q-Eat Order, Fruit Platter and Flight Meals on QF117

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Qantas has a new Q-Eat programme available for pre-selection for international flights departing from Australia. I wasn’t quite curious enough, but Richard took up the online exclusive offer when I pointed out to him that there’s duck! On a flight! Economy class! This was available on our 9-ish-hour QF117 international flight from Sydney to Hong Kong.

Lunch order: Duck a l’Orange brussel sprouts and creamy mash potatoes (online exclusive) – “Classic French dish in which duck breast is roasted and served with orange sauce, consisting of herbs, vegetables, orange zest and juice. The duck is then accompanied with brussel sprouts and creamy mash potatoes.”

That description. So fancy.

QF117 Qantas Q-Eat online pre-selections

QF117 Qantas Q-Eat online pre-selections

It arrived like this:

QF117 Qantas Q-Eat: Duck option

QF117 Qantas Q-Eat: Duck option

So it sounded a little fancier than it looked…

QF117 Qantas garlic bread

QF117 Qantas garlic bread

QF117 Qantas Rhubarb and apple trifle

QF117 Qantas Rhubarb and apple trifle

Over here, I stuck to my very safe, reliable and/or boring fruit platter. (Mostly boring.)

QF117 Qantas special meal Fruit Platter

QF117 Qantas special meal Fruit Platter

“Later in the flight” snack for all: Weis ice cream bar (as usual).

QF117 Qantas snack Weis ice cream bar

QF117 Qantas snack Weis ice cream bar

“Prior to arrival” meal is a Beef, spinach and cheese gozleme.

QF117 Qantas flight dinner: Beef, spinach and cheese gozleme

QF117 Qantas flight dinner: Beef, spinach and cheese gozleme

QF117 Qantas flight dinner: Beef, spinach and cheese gozleme

QF117 Qantas flight dinner: Beef, spinach and cheese gozleme

The flight menu:

QF117 Qantas flight menu

QF117 Qantas flight menu

Fruit Platter on Qantas Flight QF466

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Evening flight from Melbourne back to Sydney, QF466, after a whole day of inter-state work. The flight was later than I’d hoped and it was pretty empty at the back of the plane.

QF466 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter

QF466 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter

Not the freshest fruit platter I’ve had. I was also pretty exhausted at that point, having been up since 04:30 on the day.

QF466 Qantas domestic flight dark chocolate

QF466 Qantas domestic flight dark chocolate

Not even the 70% dark mint chocolate could keep me up.

Fruit Platter on Qantas Flight QF407

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Sydney to Melbourne short domestic flight QF407; a full flight filled with business people, including yours truly. Special meal fruit platter was still available for order.

QF407 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter

QF407 Qantas domestic flight fruit platter

Breakfast: a predictable small apple, banana and soy milk.

I still don’t entirely know why they think people who choose to eat fruits would want soy or to avoid dairy. But there you go.