Move over, A380!

By | | Australia, events, Interesting! (Well, for me)
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Yes, it’s true… the A380 is no longer my favourite plane to fly in.  That honour now lies with the Nanchang CJ6A.

Back in December(whilst i was in Melbourne), I celebrated my 37th Birthday – and we kinda decided to make it a special one… So Jen treated me to something a little bit special – a flight in a fighter plane.

Gift Certificate

There’s a group called Fighter Combat International that operates from Jandakot airport south of Perth (just off the Kwinana Freeway)

Just off the Kwinana Freeway

They have a fleet of Chinese Nanchang fighters – prop driven planes that are used to train fighter pilots. We arrived at the hangar and signed in. Predictably, I was bouncing off the walls like a 6 year old amped out of my tits on tartrazine and sugar, the night before christmas.

First, I had to get changed into my flight suit:

Very Fetching.

Quite cool actually – that’s an XL, and it was pretty darn big on me. With the getting suitably dressed out of the way, it was time to sign my life away:

What could possibly go wrong?

We had a safety briefing, most of which I missed on account of turning to the other guy flying today (who seemed rather neutral about the whole thing I have to say), going ‘This is SOOO cool’, and so on. There was a description of what we would do, and what not to do (touch any of the controls, projectile vomit, draw willies in the guest book. I may have made the last one up.).

The guys then gave us a couple of minutes to calm down before walking out to the plane… which was soooo Top Gun:

Ian gets into the Nanchang.

Once settled in, Chooky (yes, the guy’s callsign is ‘chicken’) showed me how to use the straps and intercom, how to slide the canopy back and so on. he also pointed out the various dual controls that I had not to touch, and strapped on the camera (there’s a DVD of me screaming like a girl still to come). That all seemed to go well:

Getting Strapped in

once suitably immobilised, we trundled off down the runway, and took off in formation. You have no idea how cool this feels – almost as cool as it looks, I guess. What then followed is just an insane blur of adrenaline. I’ll try to put some structure to it rather than rambling, but I’m not promising anything.

We performed a set of formations around each other – flying in a close echelon formation. The planes are unbelievably close together – in formation, only a couple of metres apart:

Flying Formation over Safety Bay

After we had flown formations around each other, the two planes broke off into seperate chunks of airspace and went aerobatic. My pilot asked how adventurous I was – ‘pretty adventurous’ was my answer, so he threw a sharp turn with 2G, then 3G, then 3.5G… like the best damn rollercoaster you have ever been on, but it just kept getting better.

I was making ‘wooo haaaaah’ noises, so he kept going, pulling an amazing turn on the wing (I need to look up what that move was… basically, you fly ‘up’ a ramp, turn sharply on your wing (look right, and you are looking straight down)and slide back down the ramp..

again, I was making good noises, so he did a more extreme one – the barrel roll,where you go fully inverted, and pull about 4G as you pull out… insane.

A couple of full loops (up and over), then the most insane so far – a stall turn. You build up some speed, then go fully vertical until the engine approaches stall – at which point, you kick the tail and dive straight toward the ground (or in my case, the ocean).. it’s eerily quiet, as you are essentially motionless at the top, and the G forces you pull at the bottom… wow.

here’s a youtube video of what a stall turn looks like (this is a remote control plane):

The final ‘stunt’ was a half reverse cuban 8. it’s an odd enough name that it stuck – so I found another video from the same guy:

I had my camera in my pocket, and tried to capture one of the more gentle movements (I couldn’t actually lift my arms off of my legs at anything more than about 2.5G!!):

The view from up there was incredible – here’s looking back towards Perth (the skyscrapers are in the centre of the picture):

perth

So after all the aerobatics, that was it, right? not on your life…

What comes next is probably the most insane experience I have ever had in my life.

The two planes got into radio contact again, lined up and pushed at each other at max speed ( a closing speed of about 680 kph). as soon as they passed each other, they turned 90 degrees, and instantly started dogfighting. One of the pilots is an RAAF instructor, the other is an aerobatic pilot who has competed in the Red Bull aerobatics tournament… and they dogfight, desperately banking, turning, climbing, diving trying to get into a guns position on the other guy.

My pilot (the RAAF guy) got the drop on the other pilot twice, each time, they broke off and started again.. until the other passenger called ‘knock it off’, and they broke off… he was getting sick, and wanted to level out.. so my pilot asked if I wanted to head for the reef, or do some more aerobatics… well, what do YOU think I did? 😀

once my stomach was well and truly spun around, We dropped to the hard deck for the flight (500 feet) and raced each other along a reef, looping and banking over the islands… then came back around to the airport and landed (again in formation).

At the end… I handed my sickbag in, untouched. 

sickbag

Can’t say the same for the other guy though…

A new low… weight that is!

By | | Australia, Diet and Weight Loss, Food
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The diet/exercise regime is doing very well – I clocked my lowest weight today since about ’97. I have got back down to 102.8Kg.

basically, this means that since landing in australia, I have shed 10lbs.

Notice that, as a child of the United Kingdom’s screwed up attitude to metrication, I swap between lbs and ounces, stones and kilograms without being able to work fluently or comfortably in either. I judge weights of people in stones and pounds, small (useful) stuff in grams and kilograms, but have a complete inability to switch between them (without asking google).

I have been forcing myself to work in metric only – why should I be disadvantaged because of backwards idiots who still cling to ‘imperial’ measurements? – but find it awkward.

Anyways, whether you call it 102.8Kg or 16 stone 3, it’s a darn sight less than I used to weigh (at my peak, I was 124 kg, 19 stone 7). I’m basically about 40lb down from there.

Jen is doing even better – she has lost sixty pounds as of today..

Part of this is eating better, and part is exercising more – today, a lot more:

Life begins at Forty…

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Forty degrees, that is.

It’s been hot the last few days – and the aussies have been doing the whole ‘hot enough for ya?’ thing. I guess we are supposed to be dripping with sweat and miserable, not basking in the sun like lizards.

ah well.

You want to know how hot 40 is? it’s this hot:

forty

The main thing is to enjoy the heat, but also to cool off when it starts to get a bit sticky.. so, time to get the pool cleaned. nothing like a bit of manual labour to get you cooled down.

Well, it is when you clean the pool the way I do:

Kayak, Kayak, Kayak… :D

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Well, we now own our first boat.

Our Kayaks

Okay, ‘boat’ is a little grandiose for a a sit on top kayak, but they are ours. We got a couple of kayaks from Anaconda, the outdoor shop, strapped them to the top of the ute and hauled them back to the pool..

Cue an afternoon of splashing around in the pool, falling off the Kayak (a lot) and climbing back on again (badly), with much water up the nose, spluttering and general making up of new swear words…

but it’s all fun 🙂

I’ll admit that this is mostly a reason for a gratuitous beach shot, but basically, the answer to ‘why did you bother getting kayaks’ is prety much answered by this:

(one of) the beach(es) at yanchep

Our new best friend.

By | | Australia, Interesting! (Well, for me)
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Sorry guys, you have all been usurped.

This is our new best friend. The best friend of the sunburnt muppet is PAXYL!

Our new best friend

Our new best friend

It soothes, with its coolingness, and heals with its antiseptic, but most importantly it contains lignocaine. A sunburn treatment that contains anesthetic. Its relief in a small bottle. We are now covered top to toe in this stuff, it only takes a minute to dry in, then less than 5 minutes later the worst of the pain is gone, and its effective for 2 hours.

I love it.

The Stupid – it Burnses us!!

By | | Australia, grrrr
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It’s been a great day.

We set out to weed the garden, clean up the pool and put down the first dose of ‘death in a can’ to deal with the roaches and spiders. y’know, for those people that don’t like the things, that might be coming to visit us soon… 😉

well, we got finished faster than we expected – so what else could we do?

ian asleep

yep, one of the hazards of joondalup is the roving papparazzi, who will catch you unawares and post you on the interwebs..

After a strenuous (ahem) morning, we grabbed some lunch and headed off to the skip in our ute – the recycling here puts anything in the UK to shame.

Here’ s a novel idea – rather than throwing stuff in the skip, they look at it and decide if someone else could use it… so if you want plant pots, or old wooden chairs, or any other sort of tat, you can go along to the municipal tip and help yourself – it goes to landfill eventually if nobody wants it.. cool huh?

Anyway, we then headed to IKEA for some boxes and odds and ends, and settled down to another strenuous afternoon in the pool. This time it actually was strenuous, due to my swimming practice.

subbie

Meet ‘Subbie’. He’s a sub bug, and we have two of them – a blue and a purple. Basically, you pop a battery in them, and they have a little prop on the back – they go like stink, and are pretty erratic.

Subbie here is helping me to learn to swim – basically I drop them in the water, then chase them. simple, but very effective – today I was diving to the bottom and clearing out my snorkel like a pro.

Dinner was steak from the Barbie, and a nice ice cold drink.

That’s where things went horribly, horribly wrong.

We forgot one little thing, you see.

Sunscreen.

Half a tub of nivea after sun later, and it still hurts like being dragged along behind a truck, across some salty gravel. probably.

Jen’s in a worse state than me – I guess the only consolation here is that it’s the first serious sunburn incident since we got here.

pack a hat, folks!!

New theme for the blog, and a new car!

By | | Australia, Interesting! (Well, for me)
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Well, actually, you can’t get much further from a new car!!

Our 'Ute' 

Nissan Navara Utility 'Ute' Truck

This has enough space to carry stuff when we move house, and means that we can actually go somewhere with folks when they are over without having to either take the train, or squeeze into the unfeasibly small back seat of the 207cc.

Cars don’t really die in Australia, at least not from old age the way they do in the UK. No salt on the roads, less moisture and no nasty cold starts mean that trucks like this one (1989) just keep running and running.

Ours has done over 290000 km and all still works (even the air con works).

plenty of space in the back too:

The Back of the Ute.

Spot the pole for holding up the rear hatch!!

Driving

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Aussie drivers are mental.

Well, I will change that statement.

Perth drivers are mental.

The East Coast is apparently not that great, but people who have driven in the East and West say that Perth is the worst.

The rules of the road here include :

  • Tailgating is compulsary
  • Staying in one lane is a bad idea
  • Swerving about whatever lane you are in at the moment is beneficial
  • If someone indicates that they are changing into your lane, you MUST accelerate to prevent them from doing so
  • As a follow on from above : if you want to change lane, do it as fast as possible into as small a gap as possible, without ever indicating (if you indicate, they will block you)
  • If your exit is coming up, move into the “slow” lane and accelerate as fast as you can, so you are doing a really high speed as you reach the end of the exit slipway
  • You should drive the largest car you can afford, the wider the better
  • 50% of the cars on the road should display a sticker on the back saying either “F$@k off, we’re full” or “If you dont love it, LEAVE”
  • A UTE is the prefered method of transit
  • If you have a UTE, you need to get a dog so it can sit in the back of the UTE
  • When parking, the best places are not tarmac, they are on grass.
  • When parking in a car park, ignore the many empty spaces and instead park at the sides, on grass if possible, to reduce the number of steps to whereever you are going (This will be demonstrated at a later date with pictures)
  • When lanes merge – try your damnest to edge in front of the other car in the other lane. Even if you could have slotted in easily behind them, you MUST get in front. He will be trying to get in front of you too – your manhood depends on you getting in front.
  • Aim for bikes – motor, or pedal
  • Speeding is evil. Do not speed. Ever.
  • Drink driving is not a problem. If you can get the key into the lock, you are fit to drive. Hurrah for remote locking.
  • Driving while as high as a kite is also fine. The same rules apply as drink driving.

    • There are some differences in the driving here …
    Traffic lights take forever! The majority of traffic lights are large affairs, and have filter lanes. The people turning right get to go, then the people going straight on, then the other set of people turning right, then the other people going straight on. You can wait on your green light for an age. And it is a green light. No amber. No prepping to get ready to go on green. Its red, red, red, red, red, GREEN GO! GO! GO! Then you get amber to warn you that you are going to have to stop soon. Then finally red. And you have to wait forever to go again. The amber light seems to last longer. When we get back, we will skip a few red lights as we are used to the amber being on so long 🙂

    The Aussie slip roads onto freeways work slightly differently from UK sliproads onto motorways. They basically add another lane, then remove it. Leaving the two lanes to merge into one. Like that bit on the way back from Edinburgh on the M8 at Livingston. The person who is ahead has right of way. So, there is a lot of acceleration to be the one ahead. So, there is a lot of emergency braking. So, there is a lot of bumps, and the freeway grinds to a halt early in the morning. They are very fond of this manner of traffic management. You will frequently be going along a two lane road in the burbs and if you dont spot the “Form One Lane” sign, it can come as a fright when a giant 4×4 tries to side swipe you.

    We thought there were a lot of rude people on the roads when we first arrived. Not sure my opinion has changed, but at least we have a reason for it now! The freeway has an upper limit of 100kph (60mph) but it also has a lower limit of 80kph (50mph). They rarely speed, so you try and overtake someone when your restricted to 10mph of each other. It leads to two cars side by side, one edging ahead slightly over a long time. Its like being stuck behind two trucks on the M8. The other thing that makes it all seem rather rude, is that while you are encouraged to move to the left and keep the slow lane left and the fast lane right …. undertaking is perfectly legal. So, if someone is doing 80kph, they are perfectly entitled to sit in the “fast” lane. We had repeatedly been stuck behind someone doing just that, getting frustrated that they wouldnt pull over. Getting annoyed at the idiots undertaking us. Except thats all fine and legal. There is a lot of weaving from lane to lane to get where you are going a few seconds faster.

    There is more to come here, but I figure thats enough for now, keep watching for Driving (Part 2) in the future!

    One Down, One to Go …

    By | | General Mumblings
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    We had two loans left over from “the lost years”. They both have defaults on them, and they have refused to remove them, so we refused to pay any more than a pittance towards them.

    One is due to clear from my credit record in June next year, one Jan 2012. The 2012 one was for a relatively small amount, so after much discussion we finally decided to pay it off. And I just did.

    We are hoping that after a few months they remove the default, if they don’t we start the campaign of harassment – REMOVE THE DEFAULT, HAVE YOU REMOVED THAT DEFAULT YET, IS THAT DEFAULT GONE NOW?

    If that doesn’t work, we have a new tactic open to us once the account is closed where we harass Experian to remove it as its old information.

    Neither of these tactics may work, but its worth a shot. The worst that happens is in June 2010 I am left with one default that was settled 18 months before. Hopefully its better than still having a default.

    Besides, between not paying them their cash, and the bank of england repeatedly dropping the interest on our mortgage rate, we might keep some cash in our UK account 😉

    New Year in Perth.

    By | | Australia, events
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    The whole festive season was a bit strange, christmas just didnt feel like christmas with it being warm and the sun staying up till 8:30ish. We kept spotting trees and christmas decorations and doing a double take. the Aussies dont seem to do christmas cards much either – all the cards we got were from home – and thats not just coz we dont know that many people 😉 Nobody in our workplaces had any, and they arent in windows, or the houses we were in. They are in the shops, so there must be a trade for them (maybe for brits), but the Aussies dont really seem to do it the same way the UK does.

    We finally settled on adopting it as an Australian Summer Festival. It was less weird 😉

    Christmas itself was good fun, we did a lot of cool stuff that we have pretty much covered (though we will probably put up more pictures of Penguin Island). But we havent covered New Year in much depth.

    You know how when a band is asked to comment on a Scottish crowd they always say “man, Scotland is the best, they are just wild, we love playing gigs in Scotland” and you think, “thanks for saying that, but we know you say it everywhere you go”. Well, I had the same kinda thinking about Scots and New Year. Yeah, yeah, the Scots make New Year a big thing, but its just not a big deal everywhere else. You see the fireworks in Sydney and Times Square and all round the world and you know everywhere likes New Year.

    It appears WA doesnt get the point of New Year. The plan was the day trip to Penguin Island, then you know, probably bed, coz its always tiring being out on the boats. WHAT! says us, BUT ITS HOGMANAY! We have to stay up for the bells! “Hogmanay” and “The Bells” being two scottish concepts, it took two goes to explain we wanted to stay up to celebrate the new year arriving. It didnt take any persuation at all, just a suggestion and another paella and champers and all sorts was planned in moments.

    There were 6 of us (plus the kids, who went to bed – I remember being put to bed, and then getting up again for the bells and steak pie as a kid) and the paella was fab, and there was wine and beer and sangria and whiskys. Another couple of people dropped by briefly wondering “whats all the fuss about New Year, I mean, its dull and boring, its no different from any of the other 364 days …” So we let them know they were doing it wrong!

    The Aussies were enjoying the night, if not the whisky, but didnt seem that interested in the bells themselves. So, I ducked inside, and with 10 minutes to go, got the telly on. Mostly it was just old movies that was showing, but one channel had a New Year countdown on. Sydney is 2 hours ahead of Perth. I had expected to see Perths New Year countdown, but what we got instead was Sydneys, repeated two hours later. I have to say I think this is a little bizzare, rather than show your own fireworks at the time, repeat someone elses two hours later. But hey, Sydney does it very well. Apparently it wasnt just a repeat though, Sydneys fireworks had already been shown in Perth live as it happened in Sydney. So, it wasnt just a repeat, it was a repeat of something that had only been shown 2 hours previously! Weird!

    Calling the UK was a bit of a no-go – the international phone lines were filled pretty quick, however, thanks to the wonders of skype and skype out – we could call across the internet and get out onto the UK phone network no bother (what with it being 3pm in the UK)

    So, in summary, it was good, but a little weird. Next year, we are hoping to make it to Sydney for New Year, we have seen it many times on the tv over the years, and have always said it would be cool to do. This year will hopefully be the year to do it!

    And then, the piper must be paid.

    By | | Diet and Weight Loss
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    Back to work, and that means back to the weight loss and diet. Time to survey the damage from all that beer, the monster paella servings and various cakes and biscuits.

    ouch.

    My weight is back up to 106.1Kg – nearly 6lbs heavier than before christmas. I’m hoping to be able to go up to Exmouth at Easter and be able to enjoy the beach without well meaning folks trying to roll me back in the sea..

    so, I did the only thing i could – I Wiiiiiiiiiiii’ed 🙂

    Twenty Minutes. Oh yeah. 

    I raised the Wii fit balance board up on a couple of phone books (about 12cm off the ground) and did twenty minutes of free step with the pace set to max. This will do the trick!!

    I’m gonna need a bigger boat…

    By | | Australia, events, General Mumblings
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    Mel and Rudy were great hosts over chrimble and new year, but serously, these guys are crazy. It must be something about the heat, or the water, or goodness knows what… but yikes.

    let me explain.

    After the shark attack in Port Kennedy, they were non plussed, and to be honest, I can see the point – back home if you heard about a climber falling to their doom in the grampians, you would just shrug your shoulders and accept that this is what happens sometimes. I guess the aussies view being eaten by a large carniverous fish in the same light.

    So, yesterday, we spent an incredible day at Penguin Island. Sounds nice and safe, penguin island… complete with fluffy penguins. At the end of the day, and after much cajoling/emcouragement, Jen and I kayaked back across from the island to the mainland.

    major achievement – as most of you will remember, I can barely swim. heck before I came out here, I couldn’t swim at all. but hey, there’s us –

    basking in the glory having kayaked across. (for what it’s worth, we beat the ferry 😀 ).

    As it is, we did much better than the poor asian girl who tried to *walk* across the sandbar – and swallowed a stack of sea water when it got rough. The ambulance was just arriving for them at the jetty when we landed in the kayaks.

    So today, when Jen spots the story we have a read, and flick through the comments, to find the guy who says ‘what, no comment about this being just round the corner from the shark attacks?’

    one quick visit to Google maps, and it all becomes clear – these Aussies are downright certifiable. not only do they choose to go boating a couple of days after a shark attack, they go to to the same damn bay.

    So, once more, a Happy 2009. I’m kinda glad to be in one piece to say it!!!

    Whats Black and Blue and Red all over

    By | | Australia, events, General Mumblings, grrrr
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    My legs!

    I am going around like an eighty year old woman at the moment.

    We were taken 4×4 off roading, which was fun and enjoyable, we went along the beach at Preston Beach, and then around a reservoir further inland. Up rocky roads that the 207 would get swallowed up in. We also rescued another 4×4 that was up to its wheel arches in mud, it was surprisingly easy to do.

    See that white 4×4 in the picture (if you click on the picture it will show you it bigger), thats not us, but thats what we were doing.

    It is fun, but its damn difficult on the spine. My back is killing me now!

    We also did some kayaking on the reservoir.

    The kayaks are pretty stable in the water, and it was also fun. Me and my clumsiness however meant that when I was trying to get out, I fell over, skinning my knees on the gravelly ground, and bruising my leg on the edge of the kayak.

    The reservoir was also pretty bad with flies

    This is apparently “no flies”. There are “no flies” this year. Given that we spent the entire time doing the aussie wave to keep the flies out of our faces I have to say I am mighty glad there are “no flies” this year. I did get mozzie bites on the leg that wasn’t kayaked. This time though, they are looking worse than before, with the red itchy bit spreading and being damn itchy. The flies seemed to like it too. Blearg.

    There were also (I think) march flies. When mosquitoes bite, you don’t feel it till usually the next day, certainly it takes a while to appear. A march fly bite you feel. It hurts. And I got a march fly bite on the back of the bruised leg. It stung like buggery. It took a few hours to surface and now half of the back of my right calf is red and sore to the touch.

    On the same leg, one of the dogs, Minnie (who looks very like Misty), launched herself at me to try and bite one of the march flies, leaving me with another bruise!

    So, in the space of two hours, I ended up with a sore back, mozzie bites, a march fly bite, two separate lots of bruises and a skint knee.

    *sigh*

    This was a couple of days ago now, so I am starting to heal. In time for the new year 🙂

    Booze, glorious booze …

    By | | Australia, Food
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    With New Year on its way, and visitors starting to arrive in less than six weeks, we reckoned it was time to stock up.

    The national pasttime here in Oz is drinking. Its taken so seriously that when other shops are forced by legislation to close (usually) at 5pm, and corner shops at 8pm, the offies are allowed to open anything up till 9pm, and given that they open at 8:30am, thats some going. I nipped out at 8:30ish yesterday morning to get some croissants for breakfast from the local bakery and the Bottle-O bottle shop thats beside it was hoaching. At 8:30 in the morning.

    Most of the shops sell chilled crates of beer or pre-mixed drinks like breezers, some have large walk-in fridges for this.

    They have drive in bottle shops as well. We had heard about this before we came over, but couldnt quite get our heads round this idea. They are popular. I will get a piccie and put it up here so you can see.

    Anyway, we wanted to stock up our booze. So, we went to one of the many giant liquor shops (They often have great names like Thirsty Camel or, my favourite, Liquor Barons), these places are huge warehouses filled to bursting with beer, wine and spirits.

    booze

    booze

    Heh. We still had whisky, port, wine, beer, cider and peach schnapps in the house, this is just the new stuff.

    But, thanks to Dan Murphys, we now have more 😀

    Any requests from our visitors as to what they fancy while they are here?

    I should point out that the WKD is already gone. It didnt last through dinner….

    less than three feet of water…

    By | | Australia, General Mumblings
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    See that picture I posted yesterday, of me standing in less than three feet of water, about 5-6 metres from the shore? That’s quite a thing for me, being a bit of a woos when it comes to sharks – that’s the second time in Australia that I have actually set foot in the ocean.

    This fear of nature is something that causes great hilarity for the aussies – and I have taken an almighty ribbing about it. I purposely don’t say that I have a phobia about sharks (that’s selacophobia, btw) because, as far as I am concerned, there’s nothing irrational in the slightest about having a fear of what is essentially a self propelled mouth filled with razor sharp teeth. I think that’s a quite healthy fear to have actually.

    on this morning’s news, this took on a more serious note, when some poor bugger was ‘taken’ by what is believed to be a 4 metre long pointer shark off the beach at port kennedy. that’s here:


    View Larger Map

    We were staying down at Preston Beach, 40km down the coast (and will be again for hogmanay), Perth is about 80km to the north. The beach is closed, and they are out hunting for his body.

    The guy was snorkelling for crabs with his 24 year old son when there was a ‘violent disturbance in the water’ and lots of blood.

    I think that, on the whole, I am going to maintain my healthy fear of the coastline, and not adopt the more relaxed attitude that the aussies have. Statistically, you may well be more likely to be hit by lightning than eaten by a shark, but I’m not about to start playing golf in thunderstorms either…

    Merry Australian Summer Festival!

    By | | Australia, events, Food
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    Coz it can’t be christmas, can it?

    For days now, we have been doing double takes when driving past houses – christmas trees look sooooo weird in the middle of summer!!

    My boss Rudy and his wife very kindly invited us down to their beach house in Preston Beach (we have been down a few times) and we have had a relaxed fun couple of days so far. It’s been pretty awesome.

    First night down, we had a giant tapas style feast – we brought a frittata, some devilled sausage and some patatas bravas – but the star of the show was Mel’s paella. To say this was a big paella pan was a bit of an understatement…

    After spending christmas morning at the beach house with Rudy’s parents, we headed off to Mel’s folks – an absolutley gorgeous place by the murray river (well, ‘a’ murray river, rather than ‘the’ murray river – that’s over east where they are having the big drought). incredible. They have their own jetty and a couple of boats.

    Mel’s folks (also called Ian and Jenny!!) made us very welcome for dinner, and Ian took us all upstream on the river

    The guys had upgraded their net connection to make sure we had the bandwidth to do skype video, so we spoke to Jens family (asides from Robert who refused to get out of bed). Diana did a nice little rendition of We Wish You a Merry Christmas on the xylophone, and Adam ran around like a maddy.

    We have recorded a wee christmas video message, but youtube is being a bit odd, so it may be a day or so before that appears.

    Today, we went down to the beach, where the aussies insisted that it was too windy (!) seriously, the best beach we have seen outside of the carribean, and it’s too cold… check this out:

    happy birthday to me… :D

    By | | events
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    My Birthday was nearly two weeks ago, so I didn’t really expect to be finding anything in the post waiting for me.. but tonight, there was a fairly bulky parcel in the postbox.

    I expected it to be for the landlord (he gets a lot of mail, which stacks up until we get bored and drop it off at the letting agent’s office), but no, it was addressed to me (and I have to admit to being a little excited)

    Rush into the house like a kid, and attack the package with scissors to find out it’s a parcel in birthday wrapping paper – all the way from Falkirk 😀

    Alan and Penny, you guys rock – thanks for the card, and also for the T-shirt:

    For anyone who hasn’t come across the atheist bus campaign, it’s a humorous antidote to those tedious alpha and ‘real meaning of christmas’ adverts that pop up all over the place at this time of the year – and an indication of just how many people really would just rather get on with their lives in peace, thanks all the same!!

    I think in all honesty, that I won’t be wearing this one at the office, but I will be wearing it at the next Perth Atheist/Humanist meetup – I’m sure it will go down a storm!!

    Its such a perfect day … I’m glad I spent it with you..

    By | | Australia, Food, Interesting! (Well, for me)
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    We had a FANTASTIC day on Saturday.

    Absolutely brilliant.

    I woke up and went through to our gym (OK, the extra bedroom we dont know what to do with, so we put the exercise bike in it and got a weights bench, so its now a gym 🙂 ). Did a good upper body workout – I am increasing my bench press again to a far less embarrassing weight 🙂 – and then 20 minute interval training on the exercise bike. ROAR!

    After a nice long shower, we decided to go into Perth to get some breakfast. I fancied taking Ian to Pranz – a cafe in west perth just up the road from my work. They do amazing paninis. I have only had the veggie ones, because they are fab, but the rest also look good. Cept west perth appears to be shut at the weekend. So, we took a drive to east perth to see what it had to offer. And apparently, east perth has only marginally more than west perth at the weekend! Ah well, we skipped breakfast and went straight for lunch. So, we went for sushi! There are two great sushi bars with conveyor belts here, and from a conveyor belt is the very best way to eat sushi.

    Once sushi-sated, we took a wander along Hay St and stopped off for ice-cream. Yay! It was oh so very tasty. Hay St was full of people, vibrant, sunny, shops were open, buskers were performing. Goths were gathering on steps in front of buildings. It was all good.

    The sky was beautiful and clear, it was around 30C. And I got the aforementioned sunburn. We had the roof down on the car, it was just great.

    Later on that night, after dinner, we went back out for a run in the car – we are considering East Perth to stay in once the lease is up on this place and wanted to see it at night. So, once again through East Perth, it was so warm we put the roof down again 🙂 Happy to report that East Perth is quiet at night, while being in walking distance of a couple of pubs and restaurants.

    Why things feel a bit weird

    By | | Australia, General Mumblings
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    We have come to an understanding as to why things feel a bit weird here.

    Basically, we arrived in Autumn, the leaves were falling from the trees, well, from the trees that lose their leaves in the Autumn. We mentioned way back, a lot of the trees here dont lose their leaves, they lose their bark.

    During winter, there continued to be a steady stream of trees losing their leaves.

    And through spring. When the trees that had held on to their leaves grew new ones and ditched the old ones.

    And now its summer, there are still leaves on the ground.

    I took these pictures this morning.

    You can see the green all around in the background of the second, but the leaves are on the ground.

    Add to this that the latest the sun goes down is 8:30. Tonight sundown was 8:17pm, and it gets dark pretty fast – no hour long twilights here. (and thats only this year, they are most likely to refuse Daylight Savings in a referendum next year and wont change the clocks, so it will be dark at 7:30pm at the height of summer)

    So….. it gets dark fairly early, and there are leaves on the ground.

    It feels like the longest autumn EVER! It feels like a seven month autumn with some really cold and wet days and some really dry and warm days.

    Its all a bit strange!