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One thing the bounty of the internet gives us is the ability to take a mental break from the drudgery and/or stress of our workday with a brief jaunt into the fantasy land of a flash-based computer game.

Here is my personal top three list:

3. ROBOT UNICORN ATTACK [Adult Swim]

My brother introduced me to this ultimately violent game, where you are a robot unicorn who dashes across a scrolling landscape, facing yawning gaps and metallic stars as fatal obstacles. If you do not jump over the gaps or “dash” through the stars, you will crash in a fiery inferno, decapitating your robot unicorn head. However, as my brother pointed out, you are a robot, and therefore you can and will live again. Or something.

Anyway, what really takes this game over the top is the soundtrack — in this case, inspring pop ballad “Always” by Erasure.

2. YO GABBA GABBA MINI GOLF [YoGabbaGabba.com]

Leave it to the premier hipster kids’ show to make a game appealing to kids and adults alike. Deceptively simple, this game can be played with or without music and is punctuated by exciting animated effects. Fun for kids, challenging enough for grown-ups.

1. SUSHI CAT [Armor Games]

I really think this is the crème de la crème of flash games. It’s my favourite because it’s entirely non-violent — nothing, including dropping from a height and getting squished by moving obstacles, can hurt this cat in its quest for sushi. Plus, it’s a game where you get rewarded for fatness, and that I can always get behind. The first level is dead easy, but some levels are tricky — it can take more than one try to achieve the “Full Belly” required to progress to the next level. You can play this game with or without a nice musical soundtrack; with or without watching the bouncy cat animations between game sections. Warning: playing this game will make you want to eat sushi.

My favourite sushi spot in Osborne Village has changed its name, and while I’m not sure why, I don’t care, because it’s better than ever! Naru (formerly Miyabi) serves up consistently excellent sushi and accompanying Japanese cuisine. The service is fast and friendly and they have an impressive selection of vegetarian options, which I appreciate even though I’m not vegetarian.

Here was my tray; left to right you see a vegetarian caterpillar roll, vegetarian sunomono roll and your classic California roll. Each of these is absolutely delicious, the rice soft and perfectly seasoned, the fillings fresh and tasty (can you tell I like avocado in my sushi?). But of course the finishing touch is the tealight holder fashioned out of a daikon radish — everyone’s tray had this personal and elegant touch.

Here’s Maya’s tray, with a cucumber-votive and a caterpillar roll, shrimp tempura roll, and vegetarian bakudan roll (not sure what the shrimp-covered one in the back is).

This dinner party was to celebrate the temporary return to Winnipeg of my friend Laurie, who is in town for the annual Núna (Now) festival. I also took some fun video which will feature in my May video scrapbook, which is well on its way (See the April version here). I like to upload and start cutting together the footage shortly after I capture it; this is mostly born out of impatience rather than good time-management skills. Once I select the song that will underlie the video collage, it’s easy and irresistable to put the various visual tableaux together. Stay tuned!