Bushwalk

Quite the loveliest walk.

A story you will never know more about

Have a friend who is, well, can't say much, but found himself in a funny predicament a few days ago.
He sent the following SMS before it hit the fan.
Unfortunately for you all he didn't die

60 Minutes

This weekend make sure you catch 60 Minutes.
See Sean fly into a tree

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UPDATE

Video and story

Sean is safe

I'm sure you'll read about it in the papers.

Briss (Mark II)

Went to my daughters god-father's second son's Briss last night.

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Last time I posted this (for son #1) I was asked to 'please explain????'

to which I replied:

I hate it when I have to ex-plane comedy.
Do you mean the relationship where the god father (i.e. Christian) has a son subjected to a Jewish ritual or do you mean the Briss (sealing of the covenant between god and his adopted people by lopping bits off their genitals at a party) or do you mean the picture which is trying to convey the whole shomozle in ascii art?

I hope that nips any confusion in the bud, so to speek.

Steph

Steph is hanging up her keyboard.
The blogverse will be porer for her leaving but I understand why. She has been struggling with it for a while and has outgrown the girl she was. As much as I like to read about her misadventures and vicariously live the life of a self assured 20 something Sydney girl she doesn't have to pressure herself to post so that I have something to laugh at over coffee.

But what a girl - Carry and the clowns from Sex and the city are a fiction. This girl is the real deal. Smart, sassy and in control of her own destiny. But, I guess because of her outrageous, funny and at time appallingly lewd posts and commentary she reached a dizzying level of internet fame - with all the hatters and hangeroners and chattel that goes with that. The fact that she was writing about her own life and getting so much (de/con-structive) feedback would wear anyone down.

Nothing is forever. Over the years many of my fave bloggers have hung up their keyboards but this is a particularly acute parting for me.

I will miss you.

Good luck in whatever you do in life Steph - I have no doubt that you will wring as much fun and joy from this world as you can and will continue to touch the people around you with your humor.

Bye

Sean is doing somethign really crazey

My crazy mate Sean is pushing the crazy envelope to whole new levels of crazy.

Balloon Flight

One of the cool thing about having friends that do interesting stuff is that sometimes they drag you along for the ride. Last thing last night Sean gave me a ring and said they were a passenger down for the flight scheduled for the next day - did I want to come? Um sure, hold on let me rearrange baby duties for the morning - rang mother in law, pleaded - rang Sean - yep, all sorted. One of the down sides of being a hot air balloon pilot is the 04:30 starts.
05:30 we meet up at Parramatta Park. Sean consulted the met, made some decisions regarding take-off locations and landing locations based on wind speed and direction then we jumped in the minibus with the crew and 16 0r so punters and headed out to the launch location just south west of Penrith.
Every few years I get to fly with Sean at some event or another. Before I got married I regularly tagged along and crewed for him at events in Canowindra or Midura - crazy times.
This flight was more sedate than those in his smaller competition balloon. But lovley none the less. It is an amazing way to experience the world.

Thanks Sean

Now that's Aussie

In celebration of everything Australian, Australia Day long weekend just passed and all - I bring you the Beer Thong - yep, you can knock the top of a coldie with the inbuilt bottle opener.

Complete with an ace beer drinking wench slouching over her Corona.
The only thing more Aussie would be bitch'n about kiwis and throwing a few koalas on the barbie.

I'm sitting here at work in the morning having just sat down ...

I'm sitting here at work in the morning having just sat down and turned my machine on. Looking at nothing in particular I'm blowing across the top of my coffee to cool it.
The machine fires up.

sip

I'm a nerd so it's a linux laptop, ubuntu if you must know, and Iv'e a few Gdesklets bringing my RSS feeds through onto the desktop. The desktop on the machine is a photo I took out the back of Mount Blue Cow.

Up pops Laura's post about her dream.

I laugh so much I snort, blow coffee across the screen and down my shirt.

There is now coffee froth running down the ridge line between Mt Kosciusko and Blue Lake.

Do you ever get the feeling...

that suddenly everyone is having kids?
The weddings are over, now we're catching up with friends for christenings

A self indulgent post

Well, it's been a full on few days. Saturday Alex and I moved about a ton of dirt to rebuild the garden that was destroyed by the plumbing works in our unit complex. Sunday morning I spent doing odd jobs including pulling a substantial number of parts out of the innards of a Scandinavian build washing machine to clean the pump. The instructions were in the same pictograph style as an Ikea brochure, possibly written by Fifteen Bobsworth Longfellow *. Needless to say I swore quite a bit but it eventually Yielded to my threats and I managed to emancipate the loose change that had blocked the pump.
Sunday evening we went to see a movie - Så som i himmelen, about a successful international conductor who suddenly interrupts his career and returns alone to his childhood village in Norrland. I'm a total girl in movies and cried just all the way through. Interestingly it took more money in the cinema I went to see it at than Titanic. Proves that I live amongst a bunch of chardonnay drinking intellectual snobs.
On Monday a colleague and I solved a cracker of an IT problem which directly affected the VC of the uni. I celebrated, even tho' it was a school night by getting plastered with Steve (the visiting physicist) and Row (pregnant uni friend) at the Belgian Beer Cafe. Well she didn't have more than a sip but Steve and I got a little silly. Thanks for your company Steve, It is always good to see you.
Tuesday was testing Mondays work and then in the late afternoon ducking home and bringing Annalise and Adrian into uni for show and tell and then up to the library to show Annalise the Tyrannosaurus bones on display. She said "Daddy, the dinosaur has popped and died and only his bones are left". I guess when you are 2 and a half and a bit a popped balloon is the closest you have to a concept of death.
Today, Wednesday; meetings, meetings, gym, meetings and them off indoor climbing with Sean and Andrew.

Then I think that I am going to have a lie down.

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* Fifteen Bobsworth Longfellow was an Adelaide academic who wrote instructions for kit-set model products, mainly balsa wood aircraft and submarines which ran on baking powder. The manual included here was for the assembling of a twenty-five-foot aircraft carrier marketed by Myer stores between 1954 and 1960.

Take the pieces from the package,
Lay them out as per the graph,
Gathering the bits you'll need,
Removing what your shouldn't have.
With the implement provided
Ease the bearings to the left,
Push the little angled mullion
Up into the socket 'F'.
This will free the moulded bracket
Holding back the nylon strand,
Draw the slippery hoop and coupling
Through the right-hand rubber-band.
Put the topside brown side outside,
Push the inside upside down,
Underneath the left-hand wingnut,
Press the folding backward crown.
Overlapping lifting side-flaps
Lower in to fit the screws,
Pack up tools, retire to distance,
Don protective hat, light fuse.


Apologies to John Clarke

I know a secret

Ner ne ner ne ner ner

Fizzy Cysts and other lancible carbuncles

I have recently learnt that my favourite physicists Dr Steven Boyd is coming home to Australia for a quick visit. You may know him from such papers as "Measurement of neutrino oscillation by the K2K experiment". Now you may think your smart because you can count your change in your head and know if the shopkeeper is ripping you off but no matter how smart you think you are this guy is smarter. For his day job, when not lecturing, Steve is firing beams of particles through mountains in an attempt to determine whether neutrinos oscillate in the same way as antineutrinos which may illuminate one of the most perplexing questions in physics : why is there more matter than antimatter in the universe? He has worked at the University of Washington in Seattle, on the K2K neutrino oscillation experiment in Japan, at the KEK laboratory and with the Super Kamiokande detector (also in Japan) and at Fermilab and is now trying to topple the Standard Model at the University of Warwick.
He also loves a good strong ale and I look forward to chatting with him over one soon.

I managed to visit a buddy

It seems rather hard to get away from the house these days but I did manage to get out and catch up with Rowena - an old uni buddy the other day. Her little man, Ryan, is a few months younger than Annalise. We had a lovley lunch, thanks Ro', even if I didn't bring the promised tea cake. She more than made up for my poor form by treating me to the previous nights leftovers (thanks Pat).

Just one of the mums

I'm just one of the mums.
Be it looking after Adrian at a dress fitting for the bride and bride maids dresses whilst they are trying on each other bras and being measured in their undies, or at the beach/park/house with Alex's friends, or mine, or mothers group that are talking shopping, babies, feeding, or whatever other minutia of being a mum, I seem to have slipped right in. Nobody seems the lease self conscious or perturbed that I'm not quite one of them.

Congratulations are in order

Good work Keiran - your boys can swim your boys can swim!!!

Briss

Went to my daughters god-father's son's Briss last night.

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New Years Tails

Bit late but we've been busy, you know buying new cars and fitting baby seats and stuff.
New years saw several hours of frivolities at the Vella's new house, who welcomed us not just with the house, cold beer, fantastic company and a hot barbie, but with the news that Pen' is up the duff - congratulations team Vella!!
After a few (5) quiet ones the girls were fading so we headed over to another friends house for a quieter ambiance and, curiously, one of the best views in Sydney - looking down the Harbour from the top of Heart Break Hill. The French champas was quite nice too.

Quiet

I just wanted to post another picture of Sean Flying because I think that what he does is awesome.