Perth by Yellow Car Sunday Round-up

The AE86, aka Toyota Sprinter, aka Toyota Trueno is a two-door hatchback imported into Australia for just a few years from 1983. The appeal of it lies in it being a small light car with rear wheel drive. If you've ever had to resort to doing donuts in reverse, (hello Holden Camira) you can appreciate the advantage. This has made it a supa- dorifuto car of culty choice. The engine is a DOHC four cylinder Toyota engine which has seen faithful duty in Corollas but now with the added charms of an after-market turbo. Small mammal sized exhaust is not mandatory but is recommended. It is fun because the tyres go sqolk! the turbo goes fwoooooooooshcha and away we go.



Crafty's fellow Chris asked me to come along on an AE86 cruise somewhere and I said yes for reasons stated above. First though wasmorning tea at theirs and the small matter of my first book singing for Digital Dish. Buy one and I will personally come to your house dressed like obi-wan-kenobi and sign your book. Two and I will maintain a distance of no less than 50m from you and your property. Crafty has flash new deco digs and a fountain and while having toasted ham and cheese sandwiches, tea, and brownies, I committed to building a deck at our place.



The idea of a cruise, is you meet up at a pre-designated spot and the get given a route to drive to with designated stops at shopping centre car park for modification related banter. A dozen or so AE86s showed up. It's very easy to engage people in conversation when they have a topic at hand they'll happily talk about in great detail. I always find enthusiasm interesting and much better than the usual circling around general topics for a common interest. East took us to the hills and from the hills along Mundaring Weir Road through the state forrests.



Stop in another car park and then decide to leave the pack and go back for a beer at the century or so old Mundaring Weir Pub. The places heaves on a Sunday and time is needed to wait for food and the sad circular journey of the sheep on a spit had yet to reach the end of its journey. It was a beer and a packet of chips and out of there, getting a jar of home made pickled onions on the way out.



Guilford burger place (Alfred's?) hadn't opened yet which triggered not only hunger but my ususal funk on Perth's general lack of non-shite burger places. Over the Swan River and decided to give Bassendean a try on an off-chance there was something and there was - Pierre's Kitchen. The pic doesn't show the rest of the shop which resembles a lunch bar but the place is the golden standard on restaurant finds - kinda slummy, cheap, and delicious. I had the buckwheat crepe with prosciutto and mushrooms for $8 and thought it was tops. And then the day was over and Chris dropped me home from where Toni and I met up with Rob and Manas for a bite to eat and a beer at Little Creatures . Manas then put us out of our misery [in joke] with her easy/very tasty home-made orange cake with marmalade sauce which we had with a Lamont's cleanskin.



[coda] umm we should get out more, learn new things, and recognise that you don't have to spend big bucks to have a good time.