As is often the case when I head out for a night of drinking and music, I like to get a feed in first. On this night I was dining alone, so I chose my favourite cuisine, Thai! I headed to Inthanon Thai in High Street Northcote, and found myself to be the only person in the entire restaurant! The service was obviously very fast, and the food was tasty, exactly what I needed!

As I headed out I only had a very short walk down the hill to get to Westgarth, the Merri Creek Tavern was my destination. But along the way I had to stop and take in this amazing view of Melbourne.

A couple of shops before the Merri Creek Tavern I came across a sight that made me stop in my tracks. For those of you local to the area you’d be well aware of it, but I had never seen it before, nor had I ever seen anything quite like it! Things Second Hand is the name of the store, and what caught my eye initially was the sheer volume of “things” inside. A more cluttered shop I had never seen in my life. As I stood there and took it all in, I noticed an older lady sitting on a chair at the front door. The lights were on inside, but the way she was seated (not to mention all the ‘things”) made it impossible to enter, and she was giving off a vibe that indicated she wasn’t interested in anyone entering in any case.

Anyway, into the venue I headed. The Merri Creek Tavern is made up of two distinct areas, a traditional bar at the front, and a smaller music venue room at the back.

For some very strange reason I didn’t do any video recordings of Winternationale on this occasion, instead I just got these two random images. I blame the booze. Or maybe the old lady from Things Second Hand put a curse on me? I dunno. Anyway, you’ll need to take my word for it, they were great, as always.

My friends Mark and Emily showed up to watch as well, and they were suitably impressed, which pleased me no end.

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