Global Financial Crisis......sucker punches me.

So on Thursday this week I was made "Redundant" from where I work. Hooray. I'm actually happy about it. I no longer have to do my "job" that I had there which is fine with me. I also managed to stay employed in the one place for 2 years which is now my personal best. The problem with being single, no kids and no mortgage is that it's very easy to discard you when companies need to save a few dollars. I think all I have to say about the matter is that I can't really believe that my skill set couldn't be put to use ANYWHERE else in the company and that the only course of action was to get rid of me entirely. Great work upper management. I'll wait the few weeks until one of my friends there tells me the *real* reason.

As always when you leave somewhere you've worked for a long time you inevitably miss the people you became friends with the most. This is the case here too. I'll miss everyone that I got to know really well over the past 2 years. I will not however miss my job. I think I can safely now say that I have never disliked a job as much as I disliked what i've been "forced" to do in order to stay employed these past 18 months. I had no interest in what I was doing for a long time and especially when any input I gave on my project or work was dissmissed anyway.

So, now I have a 2 month break from working life planned and then i'm moving back to ADELAIDE!! I'm so happy about this and while it is throwing myself to the mercy of the universe some what, I've done it before and come up trumps. I'm the eternal optimist after all.

The most important thing in life for me is to be happy and I am simply not here in Melbourne. So much of my life and the future that I want revolves around Adelaide and it continually seems ludicrous to not be there. So now i have the opportunity to go back and i'm grabbing it with both hands.

So for the next 2 months it's all about enjoying myself and hang the consequences.

The inaugural "Nina Is Sick...but still able to bark out orders!" bike ride 2009.

So this morning I get up and sit at my PC to check the events of the day. When BAM. Not 2 seconds after opening facebook my friend Nina is talking with me on FB chat. She wanted to know exactly WHY I wasn't out riding my bike?

I told her I had just got up and was probably going to go later in the day, after chores and grocery shopping. She was having none of that. Apparently she is bed ridden this weekend with "Swine Flu" or some other even more deadly influenza that is doing the rounds at work (oh..we work together...did I mention that?). Anyway, as I am from South Australia and therefor possess a super-immune system, I rarely even get affected by (or notice) the trivial viruses that Melbourne encounters and which consistently lay the locals out for days. I was instructed that since Nina had been unable to go out on saturday night that she therefor had a "Energy Surplus". I would have to go out and ride the "excess" energy she had not used dancing the night away in order to stop the world exploding or dividing by zero ....or something....I wasn't quite sure why....

But...as if you ever need an excuse to ride a bike, I fortuitously also had some new biking duds which I had to try out too. I needed some "longies" (full length Lycra pants) for riding my bike in winter because it's SO FREAKISHLY COLD IN MELBOURNE. I bought some online during the week and got them yesterday.

So here we go stats for the Inaugural "Nina Is Sick...but still able to bark out orders!" bike ride 2009.

I decided to take my Scotty bike today and "Go Left" when greeted with the first major directional decision which headed up towards the Dandenong hills east of Melbourne. The plan was to beat my time and distance from the last time I went along this trail (on the Stumpy).

The weapon.

As you can see, pretty impressive biking when I reached the halfway, turn around point I had done a respectable 13.44Km with an average speed of 22.1Km/h.

I decided to stop here...

... as any further was heading into mountainous terrain and I had a bike with no shockers. That and my butt already hurt ;)

The new pants were fantastic too. It was only about 12ºC but not windy and not looking like it was going to rain but they kept my legs really warm. These Jaggad Longies are meant for riding in cold weather and have some "special stuff" inside them to act like a wet-suit and keep your legs awesomely warm. They work. 2 thumbs up. Here's a pic (right click --> save as, if you must ladies.....I know I look HOT in these duds. You're only human after all).

Phwoaaaar. Cyclist legs are so raunchy!!

So, after this I hopped back on my Scott weapon and headed back towards home. I was hoping to at least match the time I did getting to the half way point because the majority of the out-bound direction was slightly uphill. Going back was going to allow me to get some ridiculous speeds up on the bike. This was of course assuming there was not an abundence of Sunday walkers, other riders, dogs, cats, monkeys etc blocking the path at regular intervals.

I managed to get some rather impressive 40+km/h speeds up at certain places but these were cruelly "averaged" down by the inevitable appearance of all the stuff I assumed wouldn't hamper me above in the previous paragraph. Assuming is always dangerous....ask anyone...they'll confirm.

So here's the final stats:

As you can see. Stamina and consistency are my trademarks :)

The total ride distance of 26.9 Km (let's just call it 27!) with an average speed again of 22.3 Km/h and a total riding time of 1h:12m:11secs.

Not bad :)

Oh, have I mentioned previously how much this Scott bike ROCKS!!!

As a special treat for the ladies, here's another leg shot. Mmmmmm calf muscles ....

Hope I helped Nina and you feel better soon .

deforestation and stuff...

My life is so exciting. Really...in Melbourne it's all the go, there is always an abundance of stuff to see or do. That is why today I am going to show you how I mowed my lawn.

So I haven't mowed my lawn since...I don't even know. It has got to be 4 or 5 months easily. I am actually praising it calling it "lawn" because it's really only about 10% grass. The rest is weeds. BIG WEEDS. I thought the whole thing may die over summer due to the water restrictions and hot weather but sadly it didn't...and now in winter it is rivaling the amazon for lush vegetation.

How ridiculous is that?? Once again I had to remove the wild animals from my lawn before attempting to mow it.

After the animals have been shooo'd away.


dwarfed by the forest. The trusty mower.

So the actual "mowing" took about 5 mins. Since it was weeds it just got destroyed by the spinning mower blades of death. A quick follow up wih the whipper snipper and it looks almost like ..... well ....almost like someone gives 2/5ths of a crap about how it looks.

mmmm freshly shaven...um...lawn.

woot.

The best part (??) about this is seeing how many "Mower Ripple Effect" points you can get. The "RME" as it will now be known is how many people within earshot of your place ALSO mow their lawns AFTER you start your mower. You know how it happens....some poor guy manages to convince his wife/partner/boyfriend that he can't possibly mow the lawn today because the weather is so shitty. Wife/partner/Boyfriend lets it slide because it IS a fairly shitty day. Then they both hear it....SOMEONE IS MOWING THEIR LAWN!!! This causes everyone within range who had put off mowing to actually HAVE to then mow their lawns also because they are getting the evil eye from their respective others.
Today I scored 3 points. Woot!!

...and the world was poorer for it.

8 years ago today the world lost a great man, a wonderful father and a guiding light.

I still find it hard to believe that it's been that long since my Dad died. They say that only the good die young and that's what happened in this case. Taken from us far too soon so that he never got to see his children fully mature or get married or meet his fabulous grand kids. While he experienced so much with us while we had him here with us he misses out on some of the best stuff. I still think about him every day and even after 8 years still miss him just as much.

R.I.P Dad.

Best Weekend Ever.

I know I say that a lot....but it really was possibly the best one yet.

To begin with it was 4 days long. Secondly I spent all 4 days in Radelaide and thirdly it incorporated the wedding of 2 of my best friends. Throw in some Rachel, some 5 Star hotel, pancakes, waffles, and crazy dancing and you see what I mean.

The wedding was pretty good as far as weddings go. I was actually Ben's "Best Man" which was quite the honor :) It was my first ever gig as a best man and while some of the "Pre Wedding" task I had to do were a tad difficult to accomplish from Melbourne I think I did a pretty good job and in the end the wedding was better for it ;)

The ceremony was on the Saturday and the weather held off just long enough for the 3pm service to enjoy some glorious sun. The bride and groom both appeared at the church on time and that's always a good start.

The highlight of course was the wedding reception and this was held at Ayres House in the city. The atmosphere there really was one of celebration. The food was excellent also with a choice of 2 dishes for both entrée and main course. Between us, Rachel and I got to taste the whole menu and every meal was very tasty.

I gave my "Best Man" speech after dinner and it went over very well. A lot of laughs were had during the speech and I lost count of how many people came up to me afterwards to say that they thought my speech was brilliant. I don't know...in written form it was 7 pages long and when I got up to actually give it I got horribly lost in the events chain and missed some stuff out or read it out of order. No one seemed to care though :)

After dinner the "socialising" started along with the drinking. I had booked a hotel in the city to stay the night in so Rachel and I took full advantage of the wine, beer, champagne on offer. Consequently we both had a great time I reckon. Thanks must be given to the perenial "party catalyst" Ben Lewis who manages to just take every event he's at and turn it up to 11. He's just so much fun and I think his antics help everyone around him relax and enjoy themselves too. It really was nice to see Rachel being "Rachel" and just having fun and not worrying about anythng like she usually has to. She was an active participant in all the "Crazy Dancing" that took place (as was I...I even did the "Time Warp" and knew the words??!!??!!!) and seeing her having such a blast made me more inclined to do the same. Though special mention must go to Ben Lewis again for inventing the dance move of the century...THE PASSION GRAB!!

Awesomest.Move.Ever

After the reception wound down we went for a quick visit to the Botanic Pub and got in one (or was it two) last drinks before fatigue was setting in (it was 1 am by this point). So Rachel and I headed off to the Rendezvous Allegra Hotel which was a 5 star place in the heart of Adelaide's CBD. I must say..for the price it was very luxurious. When we arrived we were greeted by the malfunctioning lift from hell (I'm sure the thing just didn't like us!) it just would not allow us to go to our floor. You had to stick in your electronic key then press your floor number. We did this several hundred times..for me it wouldn't even leave the lobby and for Rachel it would leave the lobby but only take us to the Penthouse floor and then wouldn't open the door once there??? When we went and told the concierge (<-- I spelt that right FIRST TIME!!! woo woo) he was obviously beginning to think we were incompetent fools as it was the 3rd time we'd been back with electro-key trouble. We got in the "other" lift and the key worked 1st time...BAH!

Once we got to the room it was quite late and while I started taking off the suit I had been wearing all day (no easy feat as it was drenched in sweat from all the dancing) Rachel decided to get in a pre-sleep sleep :) she laid fully clothed on the HUGE bed (Do beds come in a size bigger than "king"?) and nodded off almost instantly. I went and had a shower and when I came back she was already asleep. Poor dear :)

The morning was SURREAL. I woke at about 7am and in my semi-awake state noticed that Rachel wasn't in the bed...I thought nothing of it and went back to sleep. Upon re-waking at 8:30am I noticed that she STILL wasn't in the bed? I woke with a start and cautiously looked around the still darkish room. I checked the bathroom "area" (as it was almost as big as the rest of the suite) ..nope not there either. Then I noticed her bag was gone (it was a medium carry bag type thing) ... ??I went back over to the bed and saw that her clothes were still on the floor next to the bed ?? I honestly thought she'd been abducted in the night and sold in to white slavery!!! A bit concerned, I rang her mobile hoping to GOD that it didn't ring inside the room itself... it didn't. I was greeted by a cheerful "Good Morning :)" and informed that she couldn't sleep at about 6am so she got up and went for a walk around the city for a few hours........ I relaxed, but man was I thinking the worst for a while there :)

We then thought we'd have some Yum Cha for breakfast....but contrary to both our memories of Gouger St. We couldn't find a Yum Cha restaurant that was open. (This was met with howls of laughter back here in Melbourne when I told this to my work mates....the widely held belief here is that "Adelaide is closed on Sunday"). We there for had to settle for Pancakes :) Win. Win. We then went back to Gawler and embarked on the second once in a lifetime event (after the wedding) for the weekend. The formatting and re-installation of Rachel's computer. HOORAY! There were some slight technical hiccups but in the end we got everything working (with a bit of help from the ever dependable Raff). The speed increase was astounding but her computer is getting on in the years, so much so that some (yes, PLURAL) of her children are younger than it. Biggest disappointment (for certain children at least) is that the PC is so old that the new "Sims 3" game actually won't work and gives the error "Upgrade your PC!!" ... hehehe.

Finished off the weekend with an out-dinner of Indian :) and then on Monday morning went and saw where Sofie (Rachel's youngest) goes to kindy now. I helped her make a wig out of wool and cardboard. She let me try it on and it was good to have long flowing curly hair again after 20 years :P. Had a fantastic time once again in Radelaide.

In other Melbourne based news, yesterday the builders FINALLY came to fix the mould damage in my house. Not bad. Quite speedy service seeing it only happened in AUGUST 2008!!!!^ They didn't even finish after 5 hours either :/ and have to come back next week. Also, after 10 years..the Basketball team I play in here finally got NEW uniforms. I'll put a pic up later as they are totally swish and awesome looking. If our amazing skills on the court don't blind the other teams our funky, dripping with court cred new threads certainly will.

Old New

Still waiting to hear from SA Water too. Surgery also pending :)