Sunday, December 30, 2007

Just a quick one to wish everyone a happy new year before it all goes a bit mad here tomorrow. I've been lucky enough to be invited to the VIP viewing area for the fireworks at Dawes Point tomorrow which should be very cool - I've never actually been down to the harbour for the NYE fireworks so if I'm going to do it I might as well do it in style!

Otherwise still very quiet. Hanging out; walking; Wiiing; reading... I'm probably the most relaxed I've been in ages! Mind you, so is my waistline so I really must get exercising - however it's really hot at the moment so hard to motivate oneself for running again. I will though. Maybe next year :o)

Here's to a great 2008 for everyone - I'll be back with a review of 2007 very soon!!

Monday, December 17, 2007

Not much to report at this point. School's out until 29 Jan 2008 though, so I'm pretty happy about that!

Still not back at the gym, but the Christmas shopping is pretty much sorted and most of my life admin is under control. Been having a laid back time of things lately. Highlights last weekend were playing with Muz's new Wii. If you haven't, do so immediately. If you have, you'll know what I mean! I'm still aching from the boxing, tennis and bowling at the weekend - I didn't think I'd even work up a real sweat whilst playing a video game.

So what's in store until Christmas? Relaxing mostly. Trying to do the running and gym thing. Trying to eat healthily - not the easiest time of the year to try and do that though!

It's all good right now... ;o)

Friday, December 07, 2007


It's Christmas-time. There's no need to be afraid.

Here are two images - I think it's going to be a close call as to which of these will be more associated with Christmas this year.

"The Holly and the iPod" anyone?

Thursday, December 06, 2007

Tuesday, December 04, 2007

As you can see from the post below, I'm loving the fact I can take pics with my phone and bluetooth them straight to the MacBook for inclusion on Minkered... Too easy.

Huzzah!
So, only three weeks til Christmas, suddenly.

Still working at the gym and running stuff, but I did buy some pretty running shoes - they're lime green and everything! And I bought two pairs, so I can run long into 2008...

Hmm. I had a quiet week last week and the weekend was great and also quiet. Caught up with Muz, read a bit, played with the new MacBook. Ah yes, my new baby arrived so that was fun. And this morning the Remix JamPack has arrived so hopefully I'll soon be making sweet music. Well, music at any rate.

I'm also trying to renovate a couple of chairs I liberated from the pavement recently. I'll post a picture of them as they stand right now and then I can post again when they're finished and hopefully looking snazzy. (As you can see, they're going to require a bit of time and effort!)

That's it for the moment - I'll let you know what else comes up this week. Will Dave finally get back to the gym?

Monday, November 26, 2007

And lo and behold it was suddenly another two weeks since I last blogged and I again wonder who's stealing all the time I once had.

Since the last post things have been a little calmer I suppose. The five week block of teaching did indeed finish, and then last week I was in Thu/Fri for a couple of days. We had had a teacher night out in Newtown on the previous Friday night and that was fun.

Two weekends ago I managed to catch up with Adrian, Bobby and Gary & Peter which was great. Last weekend was a whole new show though Jerry. Muz and I entered the Sydney Urban Max race and have a really good time. It's a bit like the Amazing Race, with over 350 teams running around Sydney (or using public transport only) solving clues and undertaking challenges. Muz wrote more about it here, so go have a read and see the map of where we went. The highlights for me were two - one, stripping down to our undies in the pouring rain and diving into a swimming pool to find a rubber duck with the number 72 on it; and two, coming 7th overall and 3rd in our category. Way to go us! We also realised today that we did one extra checkpoint so could have actually come in second! Doh. We were really chuffed though, and good to know me and Muz can race well together should other challenges come up.

Yesterday was Gary's birthday do in Tamarama and it was good to spend a bit of time there and have a few beers with the sun setting over the sea. Today was a bit confusing as I thought I wasn't working unless called in. They didn't call so I didn't go, but apparently I was meant to be there! Oops. Better luck next time. If there's not much work this week then I'll finish the Christmas stuff and get back running and to the gym.

No, really. :o)

Saturday, November 10, 2007

Another week goes by, and in fact we're now only scarily some 6 or so weeks until Christmas! Yikes...

As below. Teaching still as described, though only one more confirmed week and then back to casual until the end of term. We did have the first of the 2008 Kindergarten orientations this week, which seemed to go well. If the kids are all as well behaved as the ones I had it'll be fine! There are two more Thursday mornings of that to come, then one hell of a lot of planning and research for me over the long end of year break.

Sculpture by the Sea was good last week, though it didn't seem quite as busy as last year in terms of pieces on show. Was good to go with Muz though, and then spend some time with Gary and Peter and a few others for a leisurely lunch in Tamarama.

Dad seems to be continuing his improvement, and I'll find out a bit more later when I call to say hello.

In other news, all good. Hoping to spend a bit more time on this in the coming few weeks when I'm not so flat out with work. Let's see!

Friday, November 02, 2007

So, it's November and week 3 of the term is already past. So, what's been happening? Not that much to be honest.

Teaching remains the same - hard to plan, changing most days, not quite sure what's coming next. I see it as good experience for my future work. All good.

Dad went home from the hospital and seems good. A relief for us all.

Last weekend remained pretty quiet. Ended up spending most of the time doing life admin; playing playstation; watching trashy movies and reading. All good. Still very happy with my lot right now.

This weekend - who knows? So far plan is to visit Sculptures by the Sea on Sunday, but otherwise the world is my lobster.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Two posts on the same day? Monsieur, with these Rochers you're really spoiling us!

Whatever.

1½ weeks into the casual teaching which has been interesting. It's hard not really knowing what to expect on a daily basis - it makes planning really hard, and sometimes I feel I'm not really giving it my best as a consequence. I know things will be different when I have my own class, but for the moment I just have to go in and do my best.

On that note, the school has verbally offered me a year's contract for 2008, teaching kindergarten. It's great news - I had made it known that I'd quite like to work with the younger children - though I was thinking more Yrs 1 or 2 than kindy. However it'll be great experience and it's great that I don't really have to think too much about work for next year. It also means I can spend the Christmas holidays planning and programming ready to give it my best shot. I'll tell you more once it's all official like.

Otherwise, things are ticking along nicely thanks. I enjoyed my two weeks off and really did very little, but decided that was long overdue as I haven't had any long period of time off for over three years. Yay.

I've been worried about my Dad, who's had an operation to unblock one the carotid arteries in his neck - the good news is that he's on the mend, though he's still in hospital for the moment.

Love life is great. Thanks for asking.

Have a pretty free weekend this weekend coming. Now just working out what to fill it with...
The devil will find work for Idol hands to do...

Watching Australian Idol this serious has been car crash television - I personally don't think the singers are that great, but something keeps me watching. I have been fascinated with how much to me Matt Corby looks like a young Jane Fonda, but couldn't really find any pictures to prove my point. Fortunately my mate Muz did me this favour and found these two 'separated at birth' pictures:




I can't wait for Matt's workout DVD. And also given what he was wearing in the last couple of shows, I don't think it'll be too long before we see him wearing something like this:












I think I might have to be washing my hair that evening.

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

iTunes meme: (Thanks to Muz)

Sort by song title:
First: The A Team - TV theme
Last: 80s medley - Stars on 45 (I would like to say I did used to share this computer with a flatmate...)

Sort by time:
Shortest: "Not Happy Jan!" - TV ad soundbite
Longest: Hedgehog 1:15:46 - this is one of my own mixes

Sort by artist:
First: Take on me by A-ha
Last: D.E.V.I.L. BY 666

Sort by album:
First: Album: Absolute Dance Move Your Body! Song: Conquering America by Bodies Without Organs
Last: Album: 70s Preservation Society Song: Disco Inferno by The Trammps

Top 5 most played songs: These are all from the same album - Trip The Light Fantastic by Sophie Ellis-Bextor. There is a good reason why this album has been played so much...
1. Me and My Imagination
2. If I Can't Dance
3. New York City Lights
4. Only One
5. If You Go

First song that plays on shuffle:
Aerodynamic by Daft Punk

Type the following into the search and how many titles come back?
Sex: 19
Love: 263
Death: 3
Fart: 0
Tardis: 1 (No farts, but I do have a "tardis"!)

Thursday, October 11, 2007

Ohmigod, ohmigod, ohmigod!

Yesterday afternoon I went to the local shopping centre to have a mooch around. Having a peek at a cheap DVD stall lead me to almost gasp in disbelief. The previous night I'd been at Muz's, and we'd spent a bit of time sharing weird memories by searching for stuff on YouTube. One of my searches was for the clip from The Fast Show which parodies The Singing Ringing Tree, one of my strongest childhood TV memories. Last time I searched for the clip it wasn't there; this time it was. Muz wasn't familiar with the original show, so I spent some time trying to explain it to him to put the clip from The Fast Show in perspective. I remember it as an eastern european production of a fairy tale that ended up being quite scary.



Last time I tried to buy the original Singing Ringing Tree it was hard to find, and weirdly only available from Amazon in Germany in order to get the version with the BBC voiceover. Hence my almost gasp. There nestled amongst the $5 DVDs was a locally produced version of The Singing Ringing Tree - the cover design drew me in. So I paid my money and came away happy. I'm saving it to play when Muz is next here, so I have someone to bore to death with my memories. I particularly remember the spinning dwarf; the musical bridge; the giant fish encased in ice and the glorious 'technicolor' it was filmed in, which only added to the spookiness.


Wikipedia has this to say about The Singing Ringing Tree:

"Imagine a fairy tale conceived by Wagner and directed by Fritz Lang, with nods in the direction of The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari and German expressionism, and you'd be close."


See all the screen shots and read the full story of The Singing Ringing Tree here.

See the Fast Show parody here. You need to watch past the fake introduction!

Monday, October 08, 2007

Well as promised, here it is... my 666th post. So, is it the number of the beast?

According to http://www.666man.net, this is what we should know about this number...

"The number 666 comes directly from the worship practices of the city of Babylon about the time of the Bible prophet Daniel. The people of Babylon worshipped gods that were associated with the sun, moon, visible planets of our solar system, and certain of the stars involved with the practice of astrology. The Babylonians were the principal developers of astrology, as we know it today. In their worship system, they had 37 supreme gods, and one of these, the god associated with the sun, was supreme over all the other gods. These people believed that numbers in some way had power over the gods they worshipped. However, they had to create numbers that they could assign to the gods so that they could have power over them. To do this, they counted their gods and assigned a count number to each of the 36 lesser supreme gods, and then added up all of these numbers (from one to 36) and assigned the sum to the sun god. The first god they counted got the number one assigned to it, and the second god they counted got the number two assigned to it, and so on up to all 36 lesser supreme gods. Now, if you have not guessed it by now, the sum of the numbers from one to 36 totals 666, which they assigned to the god associated with the sun. They did the calculation like this:

1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + ... + 33 + 34 + 35 + 36 = 666

However, they went further. They feared these gods and worried that one of them might strike them down sometime, so they made amulets with a 6 x 6 matrix of the numbers one through 36 on them. The practice of creating amulets with this arrangement of numbers as part of astrology appears to have continued well past the time of Jesus. Archeologists have found amulets with Latin Inscriptions, so we know that the Romans were indulging in this practice.

Therefore, the 666 number came about because of the pagan worship practices of the Babylonians and their practice of astrology."

The weirdest thing about all of this is that 36 is my lucky number! I never knew of the association until today, and I'd not added the numbers up to 36 together either. Odd.

Friday, October 05, 2007

I'm officially doing bugger all. It's great. Think I might do a bit of life admin and treat myself to a trip to Manly on the ferry! Also Blogger tells me that this is my 665th post. That means I have to think of something suitably evil for the next one!

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

And so it became October, and it's really starting to be warm and sunny. Estival even. In summary, summery. I digress...

I've had a great few days since the last post on here thanks for asking. As mentioned I worked on Thursday and Friday - the first day covering for teachers as they did some planning so I had about an hour with six different classes. Friday I taught the Yr 5's, and then went off to the end of term teacher meal in Leichhardt. Interesting! It all got a bit hen night/18th birthday party for my liking, but it was fun-ish whilst it lasted.

Oh, and the best news of all? School offered my five weeks casual full time work as a roving teacher - basically this means I'll fill in for teachers as and when I'm needed, but it will be fixed term rather than a day-by-day basis. Cool! There should still be casual work for the last five weeks of term too, but this is a great start. Woohoo!

Saturday was a leisurely morning and then spent the evening over with Muz on the north side. Beers and thai food. Yum. Sunday back home and cleaned and tidied the house. Muz came over later, and when we were joined by Tim we hit the Union for food and beers. More beers back here before heading off to Bad Dog. We had a blast! Muz had a couple of shiny silver body suits (don't ask!), and we slipped into them once at the party. Did we steal the show!! That lasted about 3 hours before we donned our 'civvies' and partied till the wee hours.

Yesterday was a slow, lazy, wonderful day. Sleep, trashy movies, KFC, beers... all the things to do when you don't have to do anything! Noice.

I'm now at the start of a couple of weeks holiday as mentioned, but I think today might be another of those lazy days. Don't want to rush into my 'to do' list too quickly!!

Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Lots of posts from me - what's that about?

Today was a bit of a milestone, and an anticlimax all in one - if that's possible. The really good news? I now have my teaching number, which means I can officially teach primary school children in NSW and get paid for it! The eighteen months of study has paid off and now I'm let loose on the real teaching world. I may get a full time job offer for 2008, but it's about a 1:5 chance so I'm not holding my breath. Meantime, there should be plenty of casual work available for Term 4 (starting mid October) so that should keep me out of mischief meantime. However first I intend to have some time off doing nothing but Davie things.

The anticlimactic part? I was offered paid work for tomorrow and Friday, but my teaching number came through too late to accept it. Bugger. Mind you, the school is still keen to have me for next term on a casual basis, and I'm going to their end of term meal/booze up on Friday so it's all good. Today did involve me heading out to Blacktown (about an hour on the train); waiting for 1.5 hours to get served by their customer service rep only to be told I needed another document from Uni; another hour on the train this time to my old work at Qantas where I finally officially resigned (they'd kindly let me have leave without pay to study); to Uni to get said document faxed off; and finally home.

*Stop the press*
My school have just called to offer me the two days paid work - woohoo! I'm really teaching to earn my keep! Yeehah! Wonder which class I'll get tomorrow!

So what do you call it when your anti-climax gets reversed? I'm not sure I should be saying I've just now had a climax...

Monday, September 24, 2007

What a difference a week makes! And what little difference 3 years make! Read on...

I left you a week ago having not really done much stuff this time Monday night. However miracle of miracles I managed to knuckle down and so when a mate came over for dinner Tuesday night I was all but finished my full report. I even amazed myself as that's not even due in until this Friday! From the full report it was relatively straightforward to précis that down to a Powerpoint presentation and so by Wednesday mid-arvo I was done, dusted, finished and able to walk away from the whole thing for the evening. Very cool. Thursday was the post-Internship conference and I presented everything at around noon. Woohoo! Thursday night I printed everything else off and by Friday afternoon I had completely finished my Masters course (assuming the final report makes the grade). Almost unbelievable. The last eighteen months have really flown!

Yesterday was another interesting day, but for completely different reasons. Some of you reading this may remember I got into running when I last moved back to Oz in 2002-2004; completing 2 x 10K runs, 2 x City to Surf 14K runs and 2 x half marathons. I was pretty into it and only stopped when I got shin splints and then when I met Craig and started the uni course the running went by the wayside. Well my mate Muz persuaded me to do the 9K Bridge run and I took it as a way to kick-start my running career again. I had hoped to get in some decent training, but due to teaching, the uni stuff and some badly timed hayfever and/or headcold symptoms it just didn't happen. So my preparation for yesterday's race was a 3K run last Wednesday; a 5K run last Friday and then the actual race! Miraculously I did the whole thing without stopping and thanks to Muz's pace-making we came in at just under 52mins for just under 10K (according to Muz's iPod). I was really amazed how my much body remembered and readjusted as I'm not even sore today at all. Weird. Hats off to Muz too, as it was the furthest he'd ever run and a personal goal for him ticked off. Way to go mate!

Today ended up as a great impromptu day too. Caught up with Bobby and another mate Brett for coffee and ended up at the Coogee Bay Hotel for lunch and beers. Noice. Since then the day's been very chilled and has involved lots of cups of tea and searching the interwebnet for stuff. And here I am. Soon-ish to bed. I'm off this week if my teaching number doesn't get sent to my by the Department of Education. If it does I'm up for some casual work - if not it'll be mid October as it's end of term this week. Fingers crossed, but either way I'm going to make sure I enjoy the first time off I've had in two years ;o)

Monday, September 17, 2007

I sometimes find it amazing how I can find so many useless things to do when I've got some uni work to do. Right now I'm working on my action research project for my Masters. Allegedly. Today I had a leisurely start to the day, stopping for breakfast in the city. I didn't actually put fingers to keyboard until around 11.30am, and was over at the Metro centre having lunch only some two hours later! Bumping into a colleague only wasted a bit more time, and then it's amazing what else you can find on the interwebnet to keep you amused...

I even watched Australian Idol.

And then I came across a blog post from someone that just made me a little pensive. When someone else bares their soul a little it can often trigger stuff for me if pertinent, and this particular post certainly was. I'm not going to say much more than that for now, as my project research is still looking at me somewhat blankly. However let's just say I'm grateful for what I know and what I'm learning... and there's plenty still to come.

With a knowing nod and glass raised to the author... "To adventure and misadventure."

Bring it on.

Thursday, September 13, 2007

September already eh? Haven't really had much time to myself lately, but that's all been in a good way. Finally online at (new) home, which helps.

So, the teaching practicum finishes tomorrow. The last nine weeks have really flown. So now it's head down to write the mini-thesis which I have to present on Thursday/Friday next at our post-intership conference. Then that's it. I'm on the open job market pretty much ready for term 4, which starts mid-October. This means I'll finally get chance to have a real holiday. Sigh. Can't wait.

Settling into the house properly now. Have even been cooking, plus the telly and CD player were returned from being fixed today. Woohoo! House warming and meal invites going out soon...

In other news... ;o) Going to keep that one under my hat. It just seems appropriate for now, but it's all good. Better than good. Almost incredible. Suffices to say I'm happy though... oh yes.

More soon, probably in between cups of tea instead of doing the thesis - I know what I'm like!!!

Tuesday, September 04, 2007

Ah. Well my archives are back which is good. Now I just have to sort out the formatting... :o)

One step at a time!

Monday, August 27, 2007

OK. So the number of posts is still not great. However I do have an excuse in that I currently have no internet access from home as since the move the phone line hasn't been properly sorted.

So, what else has been happening? I've moved house, and am now in lovely Alice Street in Newtown (not really that big a move, but it went very smoothly). Big thanks to Ken and Bobby who helped with the move - particularly to Ken who sold me his white goods at a knock down price. Julia moved in that first Sunday and so far it's been great to share a place.
The teaching is going well and it seems weird that I'm over two-thirds of the way through the internship already. Time is flying.

And about that time stuff. I wonder why else time has been flying so? Well I've been spending some quality time with a lovely bloke and really enjoying it. More of that soon, but suffices to say it's made everything else seem very easy ;o)

OK. In an internet cafe so I'll make this brief until we get online at home and then it's on for one and all. More soon... Oh, and thanks to some of the new people that have posted comments, directed here from other blogs!

Monday, August 06, 2007

Ay Caramba!

I promise I'll try and do this more often. Particularly as I've now realised that there are a few new people looking coz of Facebook (ah the perils of the interwebnetthingy).

So I left you in June. Lovely girl. Since then, in brief:
Spent three weeks in the UK primarily for my Dad's 80th birthday. Have to say it was fantastic. Wasn't sure how Dad's health would be, but he was in fine fettle and seems to have recoverd well from the stroke in February. It was great to spend time with him and he really seemed to enjoy himself. I also managed to reconnect with old mates from London/York and genuinely enjoyed myself even with all the running around up and down the country.
Returned to my DET interview which seemed to go well. Fingers crossed re job offers.
Started a nine week placement at school in Marrickville teaching some gifted and talented 11 year olds. So far, so good. They're a challenge, but it's all good teaching experience.
Am in the process of moving out of the house and renting a place to share with Julia, my niece. Moving in two weeks and I have to say I'm very much ready for it now. Prepare for lots of invitations for food and wine. I'm going to get back to being the entertainer that I always used to be. Woohoo.
Had some fun nights/days here since being back. Thanks to everyone that's helped my prop up bars around Sydney. Thanks to Tim for organising the theatre last Friday - it was lots of fun and good to spend a bit more time with Tim and Chris. Tim - you're now linked! There's a lovely picture of the two of us on Tim's blog from Kooky last when we inadvertently went as twins. Peas in a pod.
Feeling like the move will herald a return to form for this happy camper. Way to go me.
OK. Time to plan tomorrow's spreadsheet lesson. More soon. Really. Though there might be small gaps in transmission as I move house as I'm here and there for a bit and not sure when the internet access will be sorted out.

Thursday, June 07, 2007

Woah! So almost 9 months goes by... and I wonder what the hell's been happening. You probably do too, if you're still reading.

So. What news? Well - since September there's been a lot happening. In summary:

Craig and I split up in March which is sad. However we're still friends and still living together as landlord/lodger (me lodging - Craig bought the house).
Dax our staffy is as beautiful as ever and will be 5 in August.
I have one assignment left before I have completed the Bachelor part of my two year Masters of Primary school teaching. Just waiting to see where I have my 9 week internship starting mid-July.
I hit the UK for three weeks holiday 20June-11July. I'm in London 23-26June and 2-10July. Prepare to catch up for beers and shenanigans.

In fact that will do for the first update in all this time. More soon - but look out people in Blighty... I'm on the way!