White people withdrawal symptom

It has barely been two weeks since I left Sydney & I have been suffering from white people withdrawal symptom for about a week. It's just weird. I've been too used to being surrounded by white people in everyday situations that constantly being surrounded by Asians (Honkies mostly, but also Filipinos) has been a little unsettling. Going to the more touristy places like 'Moh Loh' Street (摩囉街) helps a bit. Yesterday's trip to Macau helped even more, because even though there were hoards of Chinese-Chinese there from across the river, there were also relatively more white and white-ish people/tourists. I wonder what I'd feel like when I head north to become a 好漢 & visit the Great Wall next week...

Shopping

East Asia is such a shopping haven. With the high exchange rate (approx. A$1 = HK$6, and A$1 = NT$24), everything just seemed so much cheaper. I bought this pair of Converse (on sale) for just HK$159 (you do your own calculation). I can't get anything like this back in Aus for twice as much!?!?!? Almost bought another pair (red tartan) in Taipei for NT$690 (use a calculator you lazy asses!) but they didn't have my size. Fine! Spoiled my plans for having 5 pairs of red shoes. Guess I'd just have to get by with 4 pairs only :P

Things were even cheaper in Taipei. These were of course my half-day shopping in Dan Shui (淡水). The Snoopy board game you can see, for example, was only NT$300, & it's an official merchandise!!! I've bought more (other stuff I mean) since, but simply couldn't be bothered to take more photos. If only I can bring home all my shopping in First or Business Class luggage allowance & still pay only Economy fare......

Macau tomorrow. Well, if no rain.

Still need to do my SmartID.

Three weddings & a funeral

As most of you who have been following my blog would know that I've already attended 2 weddings this yr - once as a groomsman & once just as a normal guest. On top of that, I would also have alerted you to the fact that there is a third wedding coming up (in about 4 weeks' time), which makes it 3 weddings in the 1 year. The 1st 2 were in & around Sydney, & this 3rd is in HK, so, in an effort to try & make myself finish the blooming PhD quickly, I booked my flights early to arrive HK 5 weeks before the wedding just before the prices started to go up. As such, I'm here (HK) already. Alas, writing being writing thy just come & go at will (not my own will) so needless to say I still haven't submitted the darn thing. In fact, I've brought along Ch 1 with me to fix up while here in HK. Anywho, that's beside the point. I arrived late Wednesday night (re: previous blog entry) & by Friday (yesterday) morning the '3 weddings' turned into '3 weddings & a funeral'. My cousins NG's & Clara's grandma was involved in a traffic accident - she was hit by a school bus while crossing a suburban street & was killed instantly. Sad news, sad news. I've met her quite a few times throughout the years, always a kind lady. Shall be sadly missed. Actually, come to think of it, it is getting awfully similar to the plot in 4 Weddings & A Funeral, where there were 3 weddings, then a funeral, & then the botched 'wedding' between Hugh Grant & Andie McDowell. Hmm, who will be the permanently engaged '4th wedding' in this episode?

Hump day

It’s hump day and, no, there’s no hump in any sense. Right now I’m in the departure lounge of the Sydney International Airport waiting for my flight to Honkers. I’m off for 5 weeks to see family, do yet another wedding (that’s #3 for the year. Thankfully no more for a little while :P), and travel through East Asia for a bit. By East Asia of course I mean only Taipei & Beijing. Got the Taipei trip booked, just need to do my China travel document when I arrive & I can go & book my Beijing trip. Back home in time for another blisteringly hot Xmas. Yes, I’m a sucker for torture :P

Now that I think of it, there was a little hump. Flying Virgin Atlantic for the first time & as I found out they’re not very lenient with the luggage situation. Everyone’s allowed 23kg, but because of the weighty souvenirs & gifts that I’m bringing with me (mostly food – 2 x 3kg tubs of premium honey, a dz of Tim Tams (bar original flavour)) I ended up being overweight (well, my check-in). Also, they have a lower carry on allowance (6kg instead of the normal 8kg), so when I got to the counter I was asked to move some of my carry on into my checked in, which pushed it overweight (I was 26.something to begin with. The move pushed it to 28.something) & they charged my $60 for it!! That’s like half of my TRS gone! Even the old trick of 'but I weigh next to nothing' didn't work. Must stock up on duty free on the way back !?!#(!%*

Great, more humping. We were already on the runway when the captain announced that 1 of the wheels' cap was loose & we had to turn back & have it re-fastened. An hour's delay. That's why I only just arrived an hour late. A quick shower, & it's already 4am Sydney time. Some zzz might do me good.

Melbourne Cup 2006

It was that time of the year again & of course everyone has to have a little bet. I was no exception. It is the only time of the year that I actually gamble (well, apart from the occasional lottery tickets, hee hee), but unlike last year there wasn't a hot HOT favourite like Makybe Diva last year. Not really a horse person myself, I obviously had little/no idea on what to bet on this year. For some reason, Pop Rock stood out, & with my usual tactic of 5-&-5 on 2 horses, I need a second horse. Given that I had pretty good luck with the hot favourite last year I went with the favourite (Tawqeet) at the time. Not that I thought that it would win with that shoe problem, but there was still hope of placing, so I went with it. Back to the office, the office sweeps started going. Not wanting to feel left out, I went in on a couple of bucks as well. & which horses did I get? Land 'n Stars &, wait for it, Pop Rock! On the tiny, snowy TV in our conference room, we watched the race as we were still dishing out the snacks. Pop Rock, Tawqeet and Land 'n Stars did not feature anywhere in the front pack. Great, $22 down the drain. But wait, it's coming back, it's coming back, it's catching up... Ah crap, half a nose! Bloody Japanese horse Delta Blue won by half a nose over Pop Rock! Well, at least I won some back from TAB & the office sweeps.


Absolutely exhausted right now. Brutal tennis session last night, playing in light drizzle. The balls were so much heavier & so much harder to move around & slide around. Luckily I had 2 leftover bananas when I got home so the recovery session is going well.

Finalising 1st year marks in 1/2 hour. After that am done with teaching. Oh wait, there's still the marking of the 3rd year online tutorials. Hmm, can't wait to get out of here & do some packing that I said I would do last wkend...

Floored

It's Halloween, the make-believe 'holiday' that celebrates, well, the make-believe. But true to the myth, it has been a rather strange day today. It's phato-essay marking day for this year's 1st year course, and normally these are easy as chips & should be able to chewed thru with no trouble what so ever. it was a 9am start, & because there wasn't really any breakfast at home I got up even earlier so I could stop by Mecca's to pick up a McMuffin & McHash Brown before parking & jumping (literally) onto the express bus. A couple of stops after I got on, this Armani-clad guy (& I don't mean just the suit, it's the whole works, complete with Armani shades & briefcase) got on. By now the bus was already pretty full of ppl express-ing to the city for work, so he had to stand, & he stood not far from where I was sitting (thus I had a good scan of him). As soon as the bus got going again, he pulled out a rosary from his pants pocket & started praying quietly. Because it was peak time trafiic, he had pretty much the whole bus trip (there was an accident on the Gore Hill Freeway so we were delayed even more) which ended up being about an hr & 40 mins long. But I guess stranger things (than praying Armani guys I mean) have happened I suppose.

Then it got worse. The normally easy breezy photo-essay turned out to be a crap bunch this year. The quality of the 1st year essays were simply appaling, with less than a handful (out of 100+ students) really hitting the mark & getting close to 100%. With the bad quality, everyone just slowed right down, feeling horrid for having to read the stupid things & laughing at the outrageousness of what 1st years come up with (my favourite remain the loin-cloth wearing Aboriginals from last year's bunch :D) (for non-Aussies, the funniest part was of course the Austn Aboriginals never wore loin clothes; they went about starkers). It ended up taking the 5 of us 7 hours to go thru the lot, which I'm guessing had a 60% average. Thank God I don't have to do that ever again with me so close to submitting my own piece of sensationalised writing early next year. Oooh, can wait to get that monkey off my back & move right on.

Sydney Food and Wine Fair

When better then lunch time to blog about the Sydney Food and Wine Fair. It was of course Anne's birthday on Friday & I went with her to the Sydney Food & Wine Fair at Hyde Park on Saturday to sample to g-o-o-o-o-o-o-d food from some of the finest restaurants in Sydney. We met at the corner of DJ at 11:30 & waited for her Japanese 'friend of a friend' who was relatively new in town (Kei, see below). We got there early (Fair 12noon - 2pm) so we could have a bit of a walk around & gawk at what we could get before lining up for tickets, but unfortunately 1/2 hr was still not early enough as the line for tickets were already long. As such, we didn't actually get to the ticket booths until probably 20 past, & after more queuing at the stalls finally got to sit down by the fountain for some real food. I took pictures of everything that we had (bar the quail, which I only remembered that I forgot to pic after I have already devoured it) - smoked salmon with truffle aoili, duck sald with pear, mushroom hamburger, fried bananas, chili quail with lemon, & of course a dessert favourite, mango & passionfruit pavlova, all washed down with 2 glasses of champagne. Yes, there were only the three of us, so what better way of walking all that food off afterwards than a stroll around the nearby Royal Botanic Gardens. It was such a nice day as well, warm-ish but not hot, sunny. A great day.

Finally bought my new JVC Everio GZMG37 digital hard disk camcorder. Well, actually bought it a couple of weeks ago. Have already animal-tested it on the dog, & will try it in a real event 1st time this coming sat for Anne's birthday party & to record birthday messages for Nat. More events coming for recording - there is of course the wedding in HK & my related trips, back in time for geog xmas lunch, & NYE!! Alas, the still image function of the JVC is not good, so I shelled out & bought a new Canon PowerShot S70 as well (been meaning to upgrade the digital cam for a couple of years now, finally found a great bargain at Bing Lee - $600 off 'cos it's the 2nd-latest model & last 1 in stock!!). So many things to claim back GST on way out ...

When Harry met Ed

Ok, so that title is a bit misleading. Harry didn't exactley meet me & I didn't exactly meet him either, but hear me out & this is the gist of my story:

Monday morning, good weather, so when better to stroll down the city & pick up more things that I need to take with me to HK on my way to uni. As I was walking past Town Hall there was this strange looking man with what I thought was white stockings underneath his casual shorts. So naturally I had to take another closer look, & that's when I realised the slightly chubby man was in fact Harry Kewell (yes, the soccer player) & those 'white stockings' were in fact 1 of those skintight things that stops u from having DVT. (Yes, he looked chubby for an athlete, but only just. Maybe 2-3 kilos. Probably from lack of exercise/game time) Anywho, as I made my way across Town Hall to go to DJ Harry K was on the mobile from what I can gather asking for directions. He disappeared just after waiting at the lights @ the corner of QVB & Kinokuniya.

Ha, gist my ass!

Busy long weekend

It most certainly was a busy long wkend, with the Drozdzewski-Gastineau-Hills wedding up in Gosford on Saturday. As planned, most of us travelled up the night before. I got roomed with Kath & Omar, with Nicola & Wendy arriving a day later, so we decided to head out (next door) to the RSL & have a bit of a drinky before settling in for the night. The next day was pretty similar, except because the wedding ceremony was not until the afternoon we walked into town & had a late brunch & did some final shopping (cards, etc). Back to the motel just in time to get changed & be ready for the 2:30 taxi. Unfortunately, the AFL Gradn Final was also due to start at 2:30, which meant that I had to miss out on the whole thing. Or so I thought. Our taxi called & said it would be 15 minutes late. Great! I got to watch th 1st bounce, & some more! As some of you might know, it was a close match, except for the 1st quarter where we made WAY too many mistakes & conceded a big lead. We scored the 1st point though, which is what I saw & left the motel room (& TV) with the knowlegde that the Swans were leading. Unfortunately that was the only time we led in the entire match, even though we came SO close to catching up. Final score? A heart-breaking 84-85 :'( The picture says it all.

Anyway, back to the wedding. So as we sat thru the ceremony before waiting for a long time for the taxi to arrive to take us to the reception across the lagoon (we booked the taxi at 5, thinking the ceremony would go long, which it didn't. Plus the taxi arrived late also. So we ended up waiting for almost an hour!) The chilly lagoon-side weather started to kick in, & despite my silk scarf Anne & Nat were freezing in their singlet top/dress. Thus, the huddle (Rachel was warmly snuggled up in her wool pashmina)


Across the lake to the reception at the Boathouse, which has floor-to-ceiling glass windows that looked across the lagoon. We were all already waiting, some drowning our sorrows with champagne & canape ( the Best Man, Al, who is also a huge Swans fan) while others just got merrier & merrier by the glass full or bubbly, the Bridal Party arrived at the reception by boat (how classy!). The reception was a lot of fun, with traditional Polish, well, traditions like the salt & bread thing (forgotten what exactly it is, but I'm guessing it went along the lines of not being hungry & full of flavour), funny speeches, & good food. As the happy couple finally ran off in their hired limo at 1/4 past 11, the rest started scurrying off as well. We headed back to the motel, and after a bit of drama & comotion (Rae lost the keys to her rental car) we were finally off to the after party at North Avoca 2am. All being geographers we naturally got lost on our way there. A simple 20-minute drive turned into 45 minutes. As such, we didn't end up staying for long. Without getting lost this time, still didn't get back to the motel until 4am! The failed promise of a good, warm bonfire on the beach, plus lack of sleep, plus wedding alcohol consumption mode meant that I've been carrying a cough & sneeze with me ever since getting back to Sydney around lunch time Sunday. Only 5 more wks before I hurry off OS, do a bit of trip-ing in East Asia, before getting to yet another wedding (yes, wedding #3). In the meantime, have settled back into writing mode & seems to be on track to finish re-writing the current chapter by self-imposed deadline of mid-Oct. Terrif! Only 4 more chapters to go, plus splitting the lit review into 2.

(1) (2) (3) (4)

My 12 days of work is finally over!! Apart from not having any handouts for the 1st yr class on Tuesday, N6 being a nuisance when I covered for Dan-ski's 2nd yr class on Wednesday, & being slapped a deadline on Friday for the Blacktown project, things have been pretty uneventful. What's more, it's mid-session break next wk! No class! Alas, I registered myself for the 'submitting your thesis' seminar on Tuesday, so still needs to head in. And it looks like Kev's transnationalism project has hit another rock & require some SPSS assistance. He actually asked my already while on the 1st yr field trip last sunday, but I was so dense I could barely process what he was trying to get out of the database I ended up being not much help at all. Looks like one of the RAs is coming in to meet with him on Tuesday so I might be called up again to do SPSS. At least that'll bring in some more dough as I've just been slapped with a $1400 tax-owing payment. As far as I'm concerned I'm still low income, but not according to effing ATO! So now I have to pay MORE tax. How wrong is that!?!

On a brighter note, finished the long 12 days with a Swans match last night. No, we didn't end up going because for some reason there wasn't a purchase option on the Ticketek website for the Swans match. Never went around to an actual Ticketek office either, so, no tickets. We just watched at the Fung's after dinner. Well, the 1st half anyway. We came home for the 2nd half. Yay, another Grand Final berth! Alas, will be stuck mid-way thru the ceremony of the Dan-Will wedding. Maybe I can sneak in a quarter or so while the girls go back to the hotel to change clothes/dresses before the reception? Also Auntie Francis' birthday yesterday, so cake was on offer. Hmm, rich chocolate mousse cake...

Missed the swordtail birthing again this time. Maybe I should just wait until I get a proper digital video camera to do the birth-filming instead of just using the low-res video function on the Canon...

You know you in fact look old when

1. salespeople of computer-based tutoring software in shopping centres stop you & ask, "do you have any children in school" when you thought all along that you yourself barely look like you're out of school
2. you're disgruntled about most things (or does that mean you're a US postal worker?)
3. your optometrist prescribes you progressive lenses (luckily that's my boss, not me :D)
4. 
   

Working marathon

It's Day 2 of my marathon working stint. Here's how it goes:

It's 1st yr field trip wkend and because there are only 4 tutors this yr instead of last yr's 5 ot 6, all have to be on hand for both days of the day-long field trip. Normally I don't mind the 1st yr field trip at all as it's pretty easy to do & it's also kinda fun, but having to come all the way to uni by 8:30 in the morning for BOTH Saturday and Sunday, now that's a downer. At least traffic at that time of the day wouldn't be heavy at all so that's a bit of a relief I guess. Also, no AFL finals to watch this wkend as the Swans won a thriller against West Coast last Sat nite & we move straight to next wkend's prelim. Am contemplating going to Telstra again for the match. Will have to see if others are willing.

On top of the 1st yr field trip this coming wkend, I'm also starting the 3rd yr tutorials tomorrow (wednesday). Big Kev finally decided that he doesn't want to do them himself so I am left with the 4-hr wkly tuts. Luckily most of them are only online discussions so I don't have to come in for them except for the intro workshop tomorrow. With that slated into my usual sleep-in Wednesdays, that will string my working marathon to 12 days straight, starting yestreday with tutorial briefings, followed by the 4 hrs of tut today, & tomorrow, 2 days at WESTIR (thurs & fri), 2 days of field trip (whole wkend), back again for field trip debrief & workshop briefing monday, 4 hrs of workshop on tues, 4 hrs online tut next Wednesday, before finishing off with 2 more days at WESTIR at the end of next wk. And I only have to be re-writing chapters on top of this schedule!! In anycase, at least I'd have $$ coming in to recoup the mass spendings that I've been having. Queen & ABBA back catalogue, approximately $500; 3 x Freddie Mercury biographies, another $100; return tickets to HK, $1,000; flight-hotel package to Taipei, approimately $500. Am also looking at options of travelling to Shanghai, & maybe even throwing Beijing in. And don't forget the up-coming Wedding #2 in a little over a fortnight's time. Still have yet to go look at the registry after a whole month of sitting on the invitation.

On a sad note, 1 of my swordtail died last nite. I thought it was preggers as it looked big, so I moved it (along with another 1 which IS definitely preggers) into the birthing enclosure. But a closer look late last nite saw that it (navy blue) was actually bloated. A quick reference to my fishy guide revealed that it had some sort of quick-setting bacteria with no cure. Scales were dropping off, & by this morning it was dead. Unfortunately the navy blues had never really breed successfully so I'm only left with the male & a rather pale, bronzy looking 1.5" long fry from its previous birthing. At least the reds are still shitting them out like there's no tomorrow. No blue replacement
is planned as the TV-quarium is really running out of room to hold everyone in. Be on the look out though as I'd be doing late nitely patrols to try & capture the red birthing on video this time.

Happy 60th Mr Mercury!

Busy rant

Why is life so busy these days? I've hardly had time for a breather this past wk or so. Here's how I unfolded:

1. Teaching. It was "western suburbs" week for the 1st yr tut so naturally there were plenty of lively & interesting discussion. But unfortunately Senile Kev also designated Tuesday as marking day for Essay 1 so the lot of us cramped into that tiny room on Level 5 for the whole day (8:30 start, so naturally I arrived at 9:30), stepping out whenever we needed to go do something else. I had 4 hrs of tut straight 11 thru 3 (as per every Tuesday) so I escaped that boredom for a little bit. Unfortunately the marking still wasn't done by the time my tuts were over & I got stuck for nearly 2 more hours finishing up them up with Karin while the rest went on their tuts & putting marks up on WebCT. 1st yr essays are such a dredge. More marking this wk - workshop reports. Great, tiny maps without colour. & I only have 30+ to mark x_x

2. Council. Headlining project for Blacktown Council yet again (why do I always get stuck with headlining even though I'm only there 2 days a wk?) & while we continue to struggle with the problem of not receiving any health data for the compilation of report on community health (how ironic is that!), Gaynor (Council planner) needed some prelim results to showcase the new style report to a meeting group. I thought I was in the clear after giving her the tables & graphs to an entire chapter the Thursday before, but in clearly Council fashion she did not reply to that email until Monday. She decided that she needed to change her mind & instead of showcasing one chapter she needed 1 indicator from each of the 10 chapters instead. As a result I went into work a day earlier than usual (thus skipping my Wednesday morning recovery session, which completely threw me off myrack for the rest of the wk) as she needed the stuff by Thursday. Spent Friday morning lulling around at home & at plant nurseries to try & regain momentum but failed with doing much mroe writing. Lucky I decided to skip the laser war game that night otherwise my Saturday writing session woudl've been wrecked as well.

3. Queen. Was orignally on a high earlier in the wk when I completed my Queen back catalogue buying spree. Well, also complete. I ordered A Night At The Opera from DirtCheap but it turned out to be a Chinese import (knew about the import part, but not the Chinese part. I wouldn't have actually minded except it has Chinese characters written all over it, making it looking nothing like an original/remastered copy. Very legal, just not very original looking). Have yet to open it, & am not planning to. Will sell on eBay instead & buy the 30th anniversary edition CD/DVD combo. Am still waiting for the Freddie Mercury Tribute concert DVD anyway. With those 2, the whole back catalogue would've cost me $350+!! Curbing spending my ass!

4. ABBA. Yes, am really curbing spending. Except I've also decided to buy the ABBA back catalogue. Luckily unlike Queen (22 albums, including Greatest Hits I, II & III) ABBA only had 8 albums & ABBA Gold (which I've had for yrs) & the Definitive Album (which I also have). Am not bothering with other ABBA after-the-fact compilations like Classic ABBA or whatever they are called. Am really stopping my back catalogue buying sprees after this. Really.

5. Peter Freestone. My "Freddie Mercury book by Peter Freestone finally arrived at uni bookshop so very happily paid for it with my bday voucher. Got change in yet another vouhcer (cos it was 30c over the minimum cash refund -_-). Am waiting for the Mercury & Me & Definitive Freddie Mercury bios to arrive from UK Amazon. Will take wks I'm told. More $$ spent on Mr Mercury there... Am really curbing spending.

6. Swans won by 92 on Saturday. Dejavu as we head west against to plat West Coast for the 1st qualifying final. Given what happened last yr, I wouldn't mind losing this 1 as long as we win the flag again. Oh heck, we'll win the flag even if we beat West Coast this coming Sat night. Great, finals fever just when I really need to put my head down so I can pick up my writing rate. Now where is my Swans wristband?

7. Croc Hunter Steve Irwin got killed by a stingray today. Good conservationist. His antics though, as I've always 'criticised' where a bit out there. Sure that did bring some humility and, umm, 'fun' to the whole greeny/nerdy conservationism front, am still wondering how Americans can take us Aussies seriously if the only regular Aussie they see if the croc-hugging Irwin. it'd be cool if his last word was 'Crikey' as he got stung by the stingray though.

Weekend

Another wkend has come & almost gone. Below are the gist of this wkend's update:

1. Freddie Mercury. Saw that a Freddie Mercury doco was on friday night but we were watching something else at the time, so could only look up the repeat on Foxtel. Great, 8:30. Still needed to get up early even on wkends! Good doco though. (Am going thru a Freddie Phase. Put the Queen Wembley concert on during my Wednesday morning recovery session & am now totally obsessed)
2. D's Cellar Tea. After wk's of preparation, the big day was yesterday. It was a sunny warm day & everything went without much hitch. It was held at the Gastineau-Hills' in St Ives, a beautiful garden. Some of the Poles were a bit crazy though
3. Lord of the Rings trilogy. Well, ok, so I didn't really complete the trilogy in 1 go like I have wanted for a long time, but I didn't get to watch the 1st 2 back-to-back. Home from Cellar Tea around 6-ish, & my brother was halfway thru LOTR 1, which, after a brief shower, I came downstairs & joined him for the rest of the show. After a brief session break to cook dinner, I immediately put LOTR 2 on in hope to finish the trilogy. Alas, by the time that was done it was 10, & I was rather buggered from the day. Have to leave it for another time. Probably something I should do AFTER I've finished the damn PhD! Guilted myself into reading an article & typing up some notes for the rest of the night.
4. Sunday mid-morning sleep-in. Have been suffering from a mild case of sleep deprivation all wk (averaging 6 hrs a night) I finally had a 10-hr sleep session, i.e., didn't get up until after 11 this morning. After a bit of breakfast & TV, I decided that I needed some physical/gardening thearpy. Luckily I have a couple of guava out on the front patio that I raised from seeds some time ago in need of the bigger pots that I also bought some time ago, so I ended up spending a couple of hours on them, plus underplanting with thyme & sage, repotting the tarragon that used to accompany the thyme, & repotted the hydrangea that looked like it could use a new home. Finally managed to have some lunch at 3.

Still half a Sunday left. See what I can conjure up for the rest of the wkend.

**************************************************************************************************************************************

Damn, sat & finished the trilogy instead of writing my chapter!?!?!

BTW, birthday shout-out to Raelene up in Newcastle

Birthing - didn't even go to lamaze

Finally put my head together & did some writing last night. Late last night though, but it's better than nothing. When I finally had enough, I went back downstairs to clean out my glass before heading to bed. Felt nosy so I turned on the aquarium light & low & behold the pregnant red swordtail that I had separated from the rest of the school into a 'birthing suite' was right in the middle of a birthing session! Seeing that swordtails are livebearers they obviously give birth to fully-grown fries (not the Macca's kind). As I'd never seen that despite the many birthing sessions that they had had this past yr, I proceeded to invade its/her privacy & stayed & watched for a fair few minutes. Every now & then it squirts out a newborn, which was still coated in its egg sac. After a few more seconds, it breaks out of its own egg sac & started swimming freely. A pretty good end to the day, even though technically it was the start of today (12:30-ish)

O' possum where art thou?

Barking dog. Quick shufflings in the ceiling. Empty mouse traps. Yep, sounds like the possums have moved into the ceiling of our rumpus yet again. I have a pretty gd feeling of where the main 'entrance' is. Just need to remember to look up possum man & be prepared to part with a couple of hundreds to evict the annoying critters. Yes, annoying. They look cute & all but when you're trying to watch TV & they keep doing quick-steps right over your head, the cuteness can just wear off like that.

Back to uni tomorrow & hopefully that'll be a big enough kick in the you know where for me to start seriously (re)writing again. Have only managed to to 1 3-paragraph section this wk plus the intro & conclusion. Spent the rest of the time TV-ing & playing Bombic. At least I've now finished all 26 levels of Bombic & promptly removed it from my laptop to avoid any further temptation. Unfortunately am also feeling very bored as a result.

Created specialist www's for my dog a couple of wks ago. Here are the www's: (1) (2)

The 5th season

Winter is barely half gone & the calendar is already turning into another season. The 5th season, in fact - social season! After the busy social schedule of April to early May, back-to-back-to-back social gatherings are, well, back on! Tuesday was the start of a string of gatherings. Sean boy is our Oxford practical exchange & he is scheduled to be here for about 6 wks doing research on Lebanese-Australians so naturally getting stuck with our Big Kev was the perfect setting for his work. He has actually been here for 3 wks already & I have been helping him out with mapping & CDATA (as usual, I've been left with the tag of the designated mapping guru. I'd much prefer 'desecrated' at this stage :P) Anyhow, one of us got wind that he 'fancied a drink or two' (& that's a direct quote. Who speaks like that down here, & in that accent?) so we decided to go up to the Royal & have a few drinks after a long day of tuts (I had 4 hrs straight from 11 till 3!!) and/or interviewing (the Sean boy actually got stood up for his interview. Again, something completely unheard of to me, & obviously had not happened to me, yet). That was the plan anyway. As we all made our own ways up to the Royal, we ended up spending the first 1/2 hr or so watching the boy chatting up a German girl who is also on practical exchange (worse still, both without drinks in their hands!) while coughing down car fumes as we sat outside next to a bus route. We did, however, manage to get Ian to dish out some dirt on a lecturer & a former secretary. Bussed & trained my way straight to Pennent Hills afterwards for the tennis. Good to have exercise to work off the alcohol instead of hair of the dog, but luckily it was stay-at-home Wenesday so it didn't really make a big difference if I did pick hair of the dog.

Yay, got my inivtation to the Drozdzewski-Gastineau-Hills (no, not a 3-way. Just a Pol marrying a hyphen) wedding today, which can only mean that the Cellar Tea that I helped organised is not far away! Finally picked up the wine list & went & bought my 1 bottle (& saved 1 for my own personal use :P) during lunch time. But before that, there's the amalgamated Rae's surprise b'day party & Anne's short farewell on Monday. Crap, that means I have to go shooping again for ingredients! Fine, I needed to head out on Saturday anyway for other crap.

Big Kev on jury duty this wk so the meeting on aims & objectives was rescheduled to next wk. That can only mean 1 thing - I'm left high & dry & 'aim'less (ha, aimless!). Seriously, am slowly (VERY slowly) re-writing Ch 6. I just wish I can get thru this level of the stupid Bomber man so I can concentrate on writing work again!?!?!

Ooh, pills!

Who gives a rat's arse?

No one apparently, as far as my health is concerned from what I can gather. It's now day 3 into my little experiment and so far no comment still. What is the 'little' experiment? Hmm, let's call it Operation Cry Wolf, 'cos I am crying wolf to some extent. Here's the rationale for my wolf crying:

I am once again helping out with another wedding & this time am only doing a pre-wedding party. Always one to speak my mind (ha, NOT!) I obviously advertised such as appointment on my Messenger msg thingy, which for about a wk, read "Working on wedding stuff". No sooner than I put that msg up & my contacts started coming online, everyone has been msging asking me when the big day is. Not entirely disgruntled, I thought I these ppl actually did care about me in general or just my 'getting married', thus the little experiment. After a couple of wks with the msg reading "no, I'm not getting married so STOP asking" I recently changed it to "OMG, I'm dying" with a little crying face at the end. It's been on for 3 days now and so far not 1 single msg asking about my 'dying'. 1 can only speculate that weddings draw more attention than deaths. Contemplating switching msg again to see what 'crowds' other topics draw.

Birthday, actually

The day has finally arrived and yesteryday was once again my birthday. As usual, I tried to keep it as low-key as possible but alas it didn't go according to plan. For no reason at all, Peter (my boss) looked up the staff files on Monday and to his surprise, after working with me for over 4 years, that yesterday (Tuesday) was in fact my birthday! So, when I turned up at my normal time (8:30) the trusty Barb was already at her desk clicking away. She said happy birthday and that caught me off-guard. That's when the Peter-looked-up-staff-files story got spilt. Ah well, secret's out. And guess what? After all that, still no cake!?! Cheap bastards!

Afternoon meeting went long but productive. Finally culled down the Blacktown indicators & now can bum around & wait for Area Health Service to give us stuff that we asked for. Also starting tutoring again next wk. Originally Kev said he won't be needing help in the 3rd yr course anymore so he gave me an extra session of 1st yr, but then later on (after I've accepted the extra 1st yrs) he changed his mind & said he needed help after all. Now I'm stuck with four hours straight of 1st yr workshop/tut classes on Tuesdays and the 5 wks of online 3rd yr tuts. At least they're only online tuts & I don't actually have to be there.

Today is Wednesday & is my usual stay-at-home day. I usually spend the first few hours of my waking moments recovering from tennis the night before & today was no exception. Watched a little bit of TV & played some video games before sitting down for Project Runway 2 while having lunch. After that I baked the 4th batch of doggy biscuits (parsley & tarragon) because we've run out of the previous batches (see May/June 2006). I thought about changing the shape of these biscuits away from my usual balling technique & decided on sticks instead. Unfortunately they all turned out looking like turds. With the freckles of shredded herbs poking through they give these turds a green tint. No sugar like usual so no intention of taste-testing said 'turds'.


p.s. a birthday shout-out to Baboon. maybe I'll see you in HK in Nov/Dec