Back to Blogging

Well, it's back to blogging, I thought I'd be most of the way to the UK by now but unfortunately not...

Tonight I went to a function with Dad. It was at Parliament and was in celebration of the public holiday on Monday which is Labour Day. I shook hands with a few politicians and ate some little bits 'n pieces. We met a very nice coulple, Walter and Eva and they will probably join up to the German club (Walter is German, Eva is Polish) and it was nice to chat to them.

The photo below is the balcony at Parliament House which is really nice.


The next photo is from Nightcliff Beach. These pics were taken on Mum's new phone.

I actually have a splitting headache so just a short one tonight...

Back Where It All Began

I had a very short stay in Port Hedland but it was nice to go back and have a look around. So much has changed (and a lot is still the same!). A nice trip down memory lane. I really enjoyed wondering along the beach though. I would like to live one day by the beach (and have someone to walk it with coz walking the beach solo is no fun - like when I lived in Tannum Sands - but at least this time I had some company).



I also found some interesting things on the beach ;-)

Whilst at the airport I bumped into someone familiar...


And someone else couldn't help but having a look around...


I feel like I still have so much to do. Jasmyn, Amanda and Cain came around earlier and it was lovely to have them here. My brother rang also so it was nice chatting to him. I will go off and make some more curtains...

All Things Houses

Today dad and I went and looked at a new retirement village that has opened. They have two and three bedroom houses / duplex units for "sale" but within a retirement villiage setting and there is a community centre with nurses, physio etc. For a retirement village the houses were quite nice and the standard of finish was nice but I thought they didn't seem very "retirement" friendly considering they would be for older people - the door frames and vanities / cupboards weren't wheelchair friendly and given that at older age some time may be spent in a wheelchair and the house would be less friendly. Anyway, I love going through houses and picking them to bits with my dad.

He next showed me a new development suburb near the hospital, Lyons. I noticed a two storey home was open for display so wanted to go have a look. It was by a builder I hadn't heard of before, Killarney. As soon as you walked in the front door you nearly went head first into a set of stairs. The layout was ok but there was too much wasted space due to the positioning of the front door / staircase, and the finishing didn't seem to be top quality (the laminate on the timber flooring was already peeling. But I liked the master bedroom ensuite, room for two (the next Killarney house had a nicer version of this shower / basin set up but I didn't snap a pic of that, and sorry, still have cupboards underneath the basin):


The next Killarney house was much nicer and better finished off. The master room was huge and I was quite impressed. It was actually a really large house and I'm still quite taken with it. It's called the Cavan 5 and has the master bedroom, three proper bedrooms and then the "study" which you could use as another bedroom (it's quite roomy) and it actually has a bathroom attached like an ensuite. There's another room the plan calls the "store" which you could use as the study (this backs onto the other side of the second ensuite). So really, it's like 5 bedrooms plus a study.

The other one I really liked was the Piper 4. It's 4 bedroom but from the plan (which was a little fuzzy, it looks like there is a games room, family room and a living room). The ensuite was cool, not only was there double basins and a separate toilet that can be accessed from the ensuite or the hallway, there appears to be a spa ;-). The main bedroom has both a bathtub and a shower. The layout looks to separate the rooms more into traditional "rooms" rather than the open planned spaces that most of the houses have. It's nice.

What I liked about the Killarney homes over the PTM Homes that we looked at next were the double basins in the ensuites and double showers ;-)

I was initially doubting the quality of Killarney given the first house we saw (the double decker) but the sales guy reckons that it wasn't their home, it belonged to another builder who was unable to sell it successfully so they were taking it over, or some excuse like that.

There were some PTM Homes open for display also. They had such cool and funky (almost spacey!) interiors and one of the homes I really liked the layout of. The second home I totally didn't like the layout of, although the bedrooms were a good size.

The one below (The Saij 1) had such a funky kitchen and sooo many cupboards. We couldn't find a space for the fridge, till I looked in one of the "cupboards" and it was one of those integrated fridge thingies (I think it's a new concept here).

The Saij however was the one I didn't like the layout of - although I did like the main bathroom and the ensuite and it had a rather cool "theatre" room and study (I guess you could make the study a fourth bedroom) but the study and the theatre room are away from the bedrooms which would be good for sound purposes if you're playing a movie or games really loud.

The other PTM house was The Prairie and I really liked this one. The kitched was very funky with a light blue theme and I just LOVED the 3x3 cupboard thingy you can see on the left side of this pic. You pushed on each door to open it and each square is a little cupboard. I guess I just love the splash of different but similar colours.

This house was really nice because it had two different areas - one section of the house was like the kids section which had three bedrooms (or two and a study) laundry, main bathroom and a family room. This section was entered into by a door off the side of the kitchen, so it was distinctly separate. The kitchen area was an open space with a dining and another living/family area. Off the end of this came the master bedroom which was very funky (although not as large as the master in one of the Killarney homes). Although more user friendly, the internal living space was nearly 40 square metres smaller than the other PTM house.

There was a turtle in the park next door which was really cool!

After all that excitement I crashed when I got back home, and it was a struggle to get back up again. I have started puttying the sliding door frame and am about to venture outside to start the actual sliding door. Not too difficult this putty job, bit fiddly though and I'll have to sand and give it a second coat I think also. I have also inherited yet another curtain! I'm actually a bit tired...

PS. For more information, check out:

http://www.ptmhomes.com.au
http://www.killarneyhomes.com.au/

Hot, Wet and Purple

Before I began the undercoat the day before yesterday, I had to move the bookshelf about a meter to the right. Easy enough task, take everything out, move bookshelf, put everything back where it was... but I had to wait for Her Royal Highness to move first...


So today, I have finished the first coat! I'm not sure if it's my imagination or the fact that I know some areas are lighter than others (it's a first coat, it's ok to be like that right?) but I'm convinced I can see the outline of where the window was. It's even worse looking at the real wall instead of just this picture. I used masking tape on the ceiling and skirting board and they seemed to work ok, didn't peel any existing paint or any of the new paint. I also put masking tape on the air con and little security sensor thingy although I would have disturbed the wet paint if I were to take them off, so they're still on (I hope it doesn't peel the paint off when I eventually do take them off).

As some people know, if something takes an hour to do, I will normally get it done in 3 hours. Painting is no exception. I am horrendously slow. But I am proud of the outcome :-) My first wall! The area on top of the air con was the hardest, as was the area around the sensor.

As I had finished and was washing up the brushes and pads, mum went to have a look. I heard a small scream of delight so I think she's happy with it :-) which is good because she was saying yesterday that she thought the colour was too dark and wanted to change it but I'm sure the paint is non-refundable! And to be fair, if you compare the photo below to the one done with the sample paint, the sample paint does look a little darker (at least it did on my phone when I was comparing them - but you'd probably need to have them side by side).

Dad also liked it and now everytime I go and have a look it makes me smile, I love that colour! Really need to change the curtain box now though! (hmmm, next project: curtain box or putty the sliding door... guess it should be putty the sliding door, then while that's drying I can do the curtain box... then the other curtains... or maybe my "to do" list is just too long but I want to do it allllll!).

Anyway, second coat tomorrow...

In other news, I took a short video of the drip coming from the air con unit - this shows how humid it gets here and how hard the air con has to work to get rid of all the water!

I'm so looking forward to going on holiday soon, so soon, so very soon, yay!!! Meanwhile, it's good to see that someone is chillaxing
;-)

It's Time

There comes a point in every woman's life (or there should, I've decided) and my time is now. I am ready. To paint. There is something a bit nerve wracking about opening a can of paint (even a very small one) and facing a wall which is about to undergo a tranformation. It would be less daunting just putting the undercoat on, but I was testing the colour, straight onto the existing paint and new plaster (a colour not too dissimilar to this text!).

Was it Blackberry Sorbet? No. A last minute change to Angel Heart. If you're gonna go for it, you might as well jump into the deep end (and this from my mum!). So the slightly darker Angel Heart it was. The original intent was to get a sample pot of both colours and test them, but at $7.50 I decided to be stingy and just get the darker one. So... what thoughts have the audience??

Of course I'm getting deeper and deeper into it and the "to do" list is suffering. The black and white (or more appropriately: aged white = yellow) curtain box won't do and needs to be replaced. I'm thinking this can be done with a strip of appropriate fabric and a staple gun (which apparently you can hire from Bunnings). My biggest enemy seems to be time. I had also planned to finish puttying the sliding door... luckily I've finished the curtains, although if I don't keep my big mouth shut I will end up getting another two curtains on the "to do" list also.

I feel the need to watch "Bridge to Terrabithia". It's not such a random comment if you've seen the film (and you will!) - I'm refering to, of course, the scene where they paint the room (der!). Love that movie.

On other things... I felt rather strange at Coles today when I bought some bread and floss and after going through the checkout felt empty handed because, here you don't have to pack your own bags. Sweet.

Also, I had a chance to catch up with my favourite dish, honey chicken (brownish lump of meat to the right):

I caught up with some CSI the other night with my mum.

I also swung past the local Day Spa and picked up a brochure. The lady told me that the Hot Rock treatment is good for knots in the back even if you think that you need strong hands to get rid of the knot she said the heat from the rocks works wonders. They have a special going, $45 for half an hour of hot rocks (usually $60). So I might go for that. I've also just noted that they do waxing. I can choose from bikini, g-string, mohawk or brazilian. I'm assuming that Brazilian is the same where ever you go (unless of course you're in New Jersey where it's outlawed!) so I'll just go for that. At $50 it's slightly more than the one in Amazingstoke (depending on the exchange rate) but I wouldn't have thought that there would be such a high demand here for it. Well, I could be wrong. I'm curious as to what a mohawk is though!

Holiday?

Well, I'm not sure about Mr Tickle, but I seem to have done more work recently then I did at work! (shhh, don't tell my boss).

Today and yesterday have seen me add removalist, seamstress, cross-stitcher, chef and IT help desk to my list of achievements, along with spending time with my niece, delivering paper work to my sister-in-law-to-be and visiting display homes! Man am I buggered!

The sorting out of boxes is going well. I must have thrown out 50% of what I came across. Mum said that I should just throw some things away and not let her know what they were (because then she would want to keep them), but there were a few things that I had to ask if she really wanted them thrown out and of course she didn't! These included baby clothes, dolls clothes, my Barbie Ferrari and all the lego etc. It was kinda cool going down memory lane but I'm glad that lots got thrown out too.

The coolest find was definately my recorder... the search continues for my music book. Technology certainly moves on and there were plenty of examples of antiques among this group, including:

The display homes I visited were very nice, very funky and modern. I'm not sure I would actually buy any of them, but one definately had appeal as I thought it was quite large with good sized bedrooms.

Mr Tickle has some random photos he wants uploaded...

sign at Coles ;-)

chicken sausages, dinner from the other night

I'm so pooped, might go watch Pirates of the Carribean with mum or just vege out and do n.o.t.h.i.n.g!

Oh yeah, the password reset thing worked a treat! Was a bit freaky - all that white text on black background, but I just followed the instructions and seemed to press all the right things as the password is gone and dad can now use the laptop (thank you Peter!!!!). I know the next thing will be that he'll want access to the wireless internet... but that is a job for another day!

PS. As you know, Mr Tickle needs to stay well hydrated in these hot conditions. For "sensational taste" Mr Tickle recommends...

Troubled Tickle

Mr Tickle has had a rough couple of days, I think the heat is getting to him! I've had a lot of headaches as well.

Today I went shopping with mum for nappies... learnt a few things about nappies too! Anyway, bumped into Mr Haberdashery at the eatery so we all had lunch together, which was nice.

Yesterday Mr Tickle bumped into a few familiar faces also:


This afternoon we all went to have a look at a duplex unit (aka semi-detached house) which has just been finished. It's by a builder who mum and dad know quite well, Shane. The unit was very nice, very high quality finishings. He used a really nice tile scheme in the kitchen and bathrooms - it's a large, almost copper colour tile and just looks stunning, a little bit shimmery. We drove around the relatively new suburbs and looked at some houses. I like some of the two storey houses (we do have them here). They look quite funky and I'd love to get a look inside one of them!

Swung past Spotlight this afternoon on the way home and picked up the rods for the curtains, so I can properly start them tomorrow. I'd better get over this headache quickly as there still seems so much on my to-do list.

Ooooooh, chicken sausages for dinner tonight!!! These are spinach and pine nut chicken sausages too! Yummy yummy.

Tomorrow mum and I are going to PM's house (with the nappies!) so I'll get to see little Jasmyn again.

Success

Last night it was dinner at Sunset, the all-you-can eat buffet restaurant at the casino. It was quite nice. The food wasn't exactly gormet but there was such a variety that even if you just have a little bit of this and a little bit of that you end up with a piled plate! And if you're into seafood, then it's the place to be.

As the name suggests, the view is also quite wonderful. Just up the beach is Mindl beach where they have the sunset markets and the sun sets over the water and is breathtakingly beautiful. There is something very calming about being in the warmth, next to the beach and watching the sunset.

We were later treated to a lightening show and a bit of a storm. It was a lovely night out and quite reasonably priced too.

Today, Mr Tickle contemplated the Doppelganger theory when he encountered my new puff... I have discovered the puff to be a wonderful thing, makes everything so foamy! and uses less shower gel!


Mr Tickle got up to something today... but he's not saying what... stay tuned to find out.

I on the other hand have been very busy. After a sluggish morning (just couldn't seem to wake up) I went for a drive with dad who was meeting a guy out bush about the house he is building. The guy is qualified as a tradesman (carpenter I think) but lost half his right arm during a work accident but is now building his own home. The home is quite nice, it's out on a 2 acre block in Humpty Doo. Very quiet out there. I was startled by the two dogs which pounced on us, but they were very friendly. I also spotted an outside dunny and giggled. I guess coz he's building the house from scratch it was required (but yes, we do have inside loos also).

Continuing the self imposed ban on cross stitching (which was taking over my life) I have also finished off the cork hats... the reveiling of which will take place later. I also had an afternoon stroll up top to the post office as I had to return a letter which was put in the wrong PO box - the line at the delivery centre was about 15 deep! It was a good stroll, and didn't take as long as I thought it would to get up top. It was very hot but I wanted to get a little teeny tiny bit of sun.

When I got home I contemplated the cross stitch but then remembered that I wanted to vacuum out dad's car and put the nice floor mats we bought the other day, in them. I'm not sure... but I think I might have busted the vacuum cleaner... it was making this weird squeaking noise just as I was doing the last footwell and then it cut out. I tried turning off the power and turning it back on again but nothing happened. I was finished anyway :-s it was very hot so maybe I just overheated it. Oops. Serial vacuum cleaner kaputter. Anyway, the new mats look nice ;-)

My brother just rang. He's exhausted and it's only been two days! I think he's having a good time though, enjoying meeting people and from all different back grounds too. Him and Amanda video phone each other all the time so he gets to see Jasmyn every night and she tries to grab the phone. So cute.

I have also finished all the holiday arrangements :-)

Therefore, I might squeeze some cross stitching in tonight. Still on the list include fixing the hem of my grey trousers, fixing my saree top, making curtains, vacuuming the 4WD so I can put the old mats from the Subaru into that, booking mum and dad's holiday to Sale... and anything else that comes up!

Ready... Steady... Tickle!

Mr Tickle has been helping me in the kitchen. When mum goes to work, I'm in charge of dinner (dad always wants to go out for a meal) but I like wreaking havoc on the kitchen instead (and instead of restaurants wreaking havoc with my tummy!).

Balsamic steak stir-fry

The stir-fry was a success and both Mr & Mrs Haberdashery thoroughly enjoyed it. The steak was very yummy and all up it came to a relatively cheap meal for three and I was literally sweating it out in the kitchen.

Mum and I hit the shops again today... the tiler came around and after mum screamed down the phone line to her sister we took off for some retail therapy. I found this awesome shop called Swanky I think or something like that, anyway the clothes were quite good value and I just loved them. Little strappy tank tops and floaty dresses, denim mini skirts with flock detailing. Then I got sulky though because if I bought anything I would never get the chance to wear it in single digit weather. My mum took pity on me and bought a dress for me (~£10) lovely! and made me feel about 12 again.

We walked past a sushi shop and they had this (random) cute little display of furniture... oooooh, I want to make a dolls house, I'll add that to the list of things to do (of which I'm getting nothing done... obsessed by my cross stitch and finishing it).



(The new tiles in the ensuite look great by the way! This led to a few "I told you so's" between mum and dad...)

Mysteriouly a new Medicare card for me turned up which left me with the assumption that they are psychic - I had left my card in the UK and was going to try and find it, but it must have been expired anyway, as I have had a new one delivered to me. Problem solved.

We're going out to dinner tonight at the casino which should be nice. Maybe I can wear my new dress? But it's probably a bit casual. I could wear my grey "trousers" (for the foreigners... pants as they are locally known) but I was going to take the hem up as it's a bit long (and I don't have my tall tall boots) but like I mentioned... too much time spent cross stitching!

xoxo

How much is that doggy in the window?

Warning: Blog contains a disturbing photo. This cruelty must stop, donations requested.

I was out shopping in the city with mum (on a mission to buy two cork hats) and I spotted something familiar in one of the shop windows...

It was sooooo sad, I just wanted to buy all three of them (two of them are only little children!!) and give them to a good home (at least Patches lived on the beach, at the sunset markets surrounded by lovely people)... ooooh actually, it could be the same people at this shop but they just take Patches there every Thursday for the market hoping for a sale...

I think this ended up being the same shop I bought my hat... so I probably didn't help the situation and should have boycotted the shop. I should then have set up a picket line and demanded freedom for all of Patches relatives... maybe tomorrow.

Other than that, Mr Tickle has been lazy and has not been exercising. It has been raining a lot today. I went out with dad and helped him take some garden waste to the tip and we went to the Oriental Emporium for some supplies. Lots of cross stitching was done, I caught up on most of my emails and delved into an area I thought I wouldn't have to for a while: more travel consulting - I am organising my parents trip to Sale for my brother's graduation in July (I thought I'd get in there early and book the accommodation because if the whole class is graduating then there will be a high demand for it and the nice places will go quickly!). The hard part is finding tourist things for them to do, not that there is a lack of things to see and do, but they don't want to hire a car. It's a country town (actually I think it's a city) and most of the things to see would require a car, but I think I can get them to the beach and back and maybe to a neighbouring town, Bairnsdale, but I don't know what there is for them to do there... the search continues.

Also, I just had a brilliant idea for something to do in Melbourne... *muahahaha* (think: evil laugh).

Catch Up

Mr Tickle was a little slack yesterday and didn't blog, bad Mr Tickle. But he's back to form today and it will be a big post.

Yesterday Mr Tickle was left in the dark :-(



I was waiting for my brother to come over to pick me up as we were all going shopping together and whilst sitting at the dining room table, all of a sudden the lights and air con went off... then the fans slowly stopped turning. I wondered if it was just a fuse, but then later saw the neighbour checking his fuse box also, so must have been an outage. Dad theorised that someone hit a power pole and I thought this was a good theory and had a look for the power poles... couldn't find any so I thought they were along the main roads only. I later found out from my brother that Palmerston doesn't have any power poles, all the electricity cables are underground... and how long did I live here??

So the cause still remains a mystery. I don't know if it was related or not, but shortly after the power went out, the fire engines came past and stopped a few houses down the street.

On the way to have dinner with the extended family last night I videoed a monsoon shower:

Dinner was lovely and I thought that what I've mostly been enjoying the last few days was so much contact with family. Having my brother just pop over (umm.. you don't live here!) and just popping over to pick him up on the way to the shops or vice versa. It's just nice. And I really do love my neice, she's gorgeous. Although I'm still a bit nervous around Amanda because she must feel like there are so many strangers in her life at the moment all just wanting to touch and play with Jasmyn (after all, I don't really know her) so sometimes I feel awkward.

Oh, one thing that I haven't missed is being mistaken for my brother's girlfriend all the time... this only happened twice yesterday! At least no one has asked if I'm Jasmyn's mother (although anyone would be proud to be asked that as she's a stunner but it's my brother...ew).

I have also decided never to become a travel consultant. Well, I suppose their systems might be more sophisticated than just using the internet, but seriously, some companies ought to review their websites to make sure they work!!

So today was my brother's enlistment ceremony where he was welcomed into the Air Force as an officer. The ceremony took place at the control tower at the airport. We were all seated downstairs waiting for everyone to turn up. The guy in charge then says we're going upstairs (and I was thinking the first floor or something). But then he says that there is only a mezzanine grated floor up there and is everyone ok with heights. That would be fine (except I was told to dress nicely so of course have high heels on... and am the only one!). It was amusing though because I nearly asked the guy if he had asked my brother if it was ok because I know he's not that good with heights and especially heights with open floors like the mezzanine! But he put on a brave face. I on the other hand got told it would probably be best to carry my shoes till we got 3/4 around the tower to the platform where the ceremony will be so I don't snap the heels of my shoes... have you ever walked on the mezzanine floor barefoot! It feels like your feet are being grated (and not to mention looking like a bum with no shoes on!). At the other end was a concrete platform so I could look normal again. On the way back I just walked on my tippy toes.

The view was excellent from up there! We also got a little tour of the facility. We had a look at the control tower and got to use the binoculars to watch a plane land. We also viewed the radar room where they take over the flight after it has taken off (or before it comes into land) from about 40 miles off and guide it in. The military still use a manual system to keep track of all the planes, in case the power goes out and also it's a portable system for missions etc. Of course they have computers and stuff, but it's a back up thing. Quite cool. (Apparently the civil aviation stuff is all computerised.)


It was all very impressive. Almost makes me want to join aswell! But I'm not sure if you need 20/20 vision for that kind of job... but when I got home, someone else was all ready to enlist aswell.


And I'm not superstitious or anything.. but enlisting on Friday the 13th?? :-p

PS. Used the SD card slot in my computer for the first time, how advanced!

PPS. It's always best to make sure the batteries in your camera are charged before taking it anywhere!!

Off with the fairies...

Mr Tickle spent much of this morning with his head in the clouds. Late night, early morning and too much to think about!


But it appears to be evening again (it comes around quickly!) so not too much sitting around doing nothing went on. Lots of cross stitch got done and I even made a start on the curtains for the two bedrooms (ok, I measured the height and width of the windows, but it's a start).

Went back to the tile shop to buy some tiles for the ensuite. There were some examples of bathroom set ups and I was wondering if the following passes as a suitable basin or if the cupboards are still unacceptable:

Then there was this example (which was actually just a frame on the wall) and it struck me as the kind of designer thing in fancy magazines that no house would actually ever have... but no cupboards...

THEN I saw it... an actual example in the flesh of the concept of no cupboard around the basin (in Australia)... will this suffice? Actually, I think I like the designer one better.


Dinner tonight: chicken stuffed with spinach and pine nuts. I failed on the cheese sauce for the veggies the other night: no flour. I also noted this morning that there is no butter in the house. That's half the ingredients missing. Despite going to the shops this arvo (local lingo!!) to get food (I still love the fact my shopping bags are packed for me), butter still was forgotten so the toasting of pine nuts will have to take place without it, but I have a new non-stick pan to work with so it should be ok.

Didn't get to baby sit this morning, but I have a step-aunt (is that a title?) role of picking up Cain from the library tonight. Now... where is that library...

Problem Solved!

And what a simple solution it turned out to be! Not a glass of swamp juice, not litres and litres of water (although I'm sure that's helping too), but a good old fashioned cup of tea!

Not quite PG Tips...

(actually, it reminded me of the first cup of tea I ever had, at cadet camp, about half my lifetime ago)

Poor Mr Tickle though had to go to the dentist after lunch. She's a very nice dentist though, Sinead, from Ireland I guess. Although, she too was paying me out about my accent, especially when I said the word "London", *sigh* oh well, I'll just have to cop it I guess. I am meeting up with another old friend from high school later today and he's already been teasing me about it!


I was such a good girl and went for a jog this morning and got to glimpse the sunrise. Still not up to half marathon standard (not even up to 10km dressed as an apple standard!) but I'm still blaming the weather.

For dinner tonight: salmon fillets with frozen veggies but just because I feel like cooking (but didn't have anything planned) I am going to make a cheese sauce from scratch like someone wonderful taught me how to do :-)

Crazy Pram Pushers

Today I was out shopping with mum... we had just left a shop and I turned around to walk away and mum grabbed my arm and said "Look out!" and just then I saw a pram nearly running me over! So I looked at who was driving the pram and of course it turned out to be a guy I went to school with Ben, his wife Amey (who I also went to school with) and their little boy Ethan who is a week and a half old. He was trying to run me over to get my attention (Amey hadn't seen me yet!). So it was great to catch up with them. Ben apparently wants more children already (he said he wanted 5!), but Amey said give it another year or so!

Changing subjects... mum gave me a couple of books:

... which I found very amusing and told her of the story of when I was making a banana cake with about 20 ingredients... :-p she looked at me like I was mad (a common occurence).

Tonight we are all going for dinner at PM's house. We also get to baby sit on Wednesday because PM and Amanda are going into the hospital for a scan and will find out if #2 (or should that be #4) is a boy or a girl. At least it will narrow the name choice a little. He was thinking of Jordan for a boy...

Still very hot. I am attempting to become a fish, drinking super human amounts of water but it's still not stopping my headaches. I have also been given the impossible mission of searching for a new mobile phone for my mum: must have a qwerty keyboard, be on the NextG network, pre-paid but not cost a fortune... Ebay might be my only saviour.

I am thinking of introducing the concept of webcams to my brother as he will be moving away from his family for his new job. But I don't think he has a laptop either (then my next exciting thought was that I'll sell him my laptop so I can get a new one which will only weight 500g!). Plotting and scheming all the way. I will go and do some more cross stitch...

PS. 150m of Glad Wrap with "Ezy Cutter Bar" costs $10.91 = £4.95 (lol... I even have a pound sign on my computer, yay!)

Exploring

I went to the shops today with mum and met up with Amanda, PM and baby Jasmyn and I got to push her around the shops - which gave an intersting perspective of "will the pram fit through this gap" and "excuse me sir move out of my way, baby coming thru!" - haha, road rage auntie! My brother had the impossible mission of buying jumpers for when he moves down south, so we got to the shop, found the mens section and then thought - are they even going to be selling any jumpers here, it's 34degC outside! So they left to go to another shopping centre and mum and I went grocery shopping. I couldn't find any brands I liked or even recognised anymore (other than Treseme!!). But I have bought a lovely nutty cereal and a box of sultanas, so that should ease my daily Jordan's Raisin & Almond craving (can I just import??).

I did spot something at the shops that I had to share:


Meanwhile, Mr Tickle went exploring...

The front of the house.

Throw another Mr Tickle on the barbie, love!

Not all those he encountered were friendly...

The locals.

The queen of the house.

But he finally found a friendly giant...

Dino.

I watched Madagascar 2 with my brother et al. Got my hair and necklace pulled by my little neice who seems to have a fascination with electrical cables. Despite drinking lots of water (I would consider it lots...) I have a headache. No running tonight. I will attempt some sit ups etc after dinner.

Meeting the Family

It's good to be back home. Mr Tickle got to meet some old family members...

And I got to meet the newest family member...

She is tooooo cute!

Now that I'm settled (well, didn't sleep that great last night either, but only got to Darwin at 1am) I will get back into my jogging. I will head off in about half an hour and see how I go with the heat.

:-)

At the airport again...

… heading home! My feet are killing me from the amount of walking I did today and yesterday (probably more due to the sandals I’m wearing!). It’s very warm and thankfully there is a cool breeze every now and then. My visa should be in Canberra by now (but I haven’t been on the internet yet to check). Positive thinking :-)

A lot has changed in Brisbane. Things under construction have been finished and more things are being built. I enjoyed walking through places that I used to visit in a previous life! Now, we even have our own Brisbane Eye!


Mr Tickle will get to meet the family soon :-)

Brisbane

I’m on the train heading to Dakabin to catch up with Lacey. I thought I would do this in the morning as my new appointment is in the arvo and I won’t have time after that. I kept waking up every couple of hours last night, convinced it was 8am (when I’d set my alarm). I eventually woke up at 6am to bright sunshine (still thought it was 8am) so decided to get up anyway and search for food. I was wandering around the mall by 8am and found that the passport photo place was open and even more impressively, the post office was open (although I didn’t know the weight of my application so didn’t buy anything yet). So with everything done by 8:15am I checked out of the hotel and jumped on the train.

Lucky

We landed in Singapore about an hour late, which means the pilot ended up making up 40 minutes somewhere along the way. I had it better than some others because the gate for my flight to Brisbane was opening about 15 minutes after we landed (it took about this amount of time to get off the plane!) and I still had an hour before it closed. There were staff waiting for the more urgent connecting flights which I think they were holding. They seemed nice and helpful. So after a very long walk to the departure gate I still had time to spare. The flight to Brisbane ended up being delayed by just over half an hour, they were probably getting the luggage from my first flight. Again though, the pilot said he would try and make up some time so that when we landed in Brisbane we would only be about 10 minutes late. Nothing to stress about!

Again I was sitting at the back, next to a woman who was actually sitting in my seat so I took the one next to her. It was quite apparent though that the flight was pretty empty so I jumped into the middle section and got three seats to myself again! I had a brief thought about trying to see if there were any business class seats available but thought that three to myself was good enough. I just went to sleep anyway. I haven’t watched a movie this entire trip! Well, I’ve had a splitting headache for most of it so have wanted to rest my eyes. Only an hour and a half till Brissy!! I’ll go wake Mr Tickle…

PS. Only plastic knives on this flight, and I was so hungry at “breakfast” time that I even at the baked beans (and liked them!).

The Plane

With time to kill before taking off, I had a wander around the plane. I am sitting in the back row and was very pleased to find that the two seats next to me are empty!


I don’t have a window to look out of though, but behind me is an exit door so I can stand and stretch and look out that window if I want to. I also found out that there are economy seats on the upper deck, so keep that in mind in future if you’re going on the A-380 but I don’t remember seeing them when I was choosing my seat online. There are stairs going up to the upper deck directly behind the left hand side last row (I’m on the right hand side).


I ventured up and ended up in the galley (the hostesses probably thought I was strange, but a lot of people were going up so I wasn’t the only one I don’t think). Beyond the stairs is the upper deck economy section and beyond that, probably the millon dollar suites / first class / business class passengers.

Mealtime came around and I got served first! The meal looked awesome and no, that’s not trick photography, that really is full metal cutlery!

Despite being very yummy, I think it didn’t agree 100% with my tummy (not too bad though – and I’m thinking it was probably the ice cream dessert that did it).

Anyway, I was strangely impressed with the loo… There’s a little drawer with twin razor blades (which have business class written on them but hey, they’re down here with the plebs and on later visits, their number are decreasing), female sanitary pads and combs. Also, there is cologne, aftershave and body lotion in stylish Singapore Airline bottles, a bottle of mouthwash although you have to dilute it but you are advised not to drink the water from the tap… and several wrapped up toothbrushes with a tiny tube of toothpaste (although we also got given a flight pack with groovy pale yellow socks – which I’m wearing – and a toothbrush and toothpaste). I thought the high tech part was the tap, a mixer tap, with a cool electric mixing feature that you press the left or right buttons to make the water warmer or cooler. Also to open the rubbish bin you stand on a little pedal so you don’t have to touch the lid of the bin… ew… I am a little strange…

I am also plugged in. My laptop is running off the in-seat power socket that everyone has (that took me a very long time to find – probably because I was looking on my right arm rest and it’s at the end of the left arm rest). I was a bit hesitant at first because it said 110 volts and I didn’t know if this would be ok for my lap top but I figured that’s what the rectangular thing on the cord is for so just plugged it in and no sparks so far. So technical.

Still don’t know what’s happening when I get to Singapore in terms of my connecting flight but it will all be ok as I now have more time till my biometrics appointment (thank-you Peter!) and still need to get the passport style photo!.

Oh, don’t let me forget the entertainment system… which I actually haven’t used yet as I was busy reading the Daily Mail, then I got a massive headache – take off was really bumpy, I might even have to change my pants – bit of a nervous traveller that I am, I was gripping my seat belt (which seems to become too loose too quickly) so the bumps and reading the newspaper probably didn’t go hand in hand. Anyway, I’ve been sleeping, which, considering it was probably only about 2 or 3pm in the afternoon (UK time) is a bit decadent. And now I’m writing this blog but I will explore the system more in a moment. I have found out though, that there are many cool things on it. For example, you can learn a new language (Spanish anyone??). There is also a “PC” feature where you can plug in your usb stick and use their programs which can look at photos, or use Microsoft type applications. I’m sure it would all be a little fiddly using the little keyboard control thingy but I was keen to test it out… which is when I discovered that I have forgotten my usb stick – either that or it’s in my stowed luggage but I don’t think it is :-(. Nevermind, I believe my application is 100% ok and so I don’t need to print anything else off (positive thinking!!). I did also have a minor panic about that because having forgotten the pic I needed to check that there wasn’t anything else I forgotten, but it doesn’t look like it so far. You can also plug your ipod in if that’s what you’re into, but I’m not. I’m off for more exploring…