Be Kind, Rewind and Stuff

Once again, sorry for the tardiness of this post. Yesterday I was shockingly tired from badminton and today has been pretty busy. Had a bunch of stuff to sort out at work, and had a meeting with a mortgage guy right after work. The short story is that we CAN get a mortgage for the range of house prices we’re after (in fact we could get a loan for nearly DOUBLE what we want!) and its more a matter of how much we can afford to pay each week/month than how much can we get a loan for. The options open to us are both vast and complicated, but the guy did show us a scenario in which it could be possible for us to repay our mortgage in 10 years! Shocking, but all his sums seemed right - will have to give it some serious thought.

 

Secondly, we went to our local cinema which is the George theatre on Fitzroy St. Its a nice litle 3 screen cinema with a bar, hot drinks and cakes, so will soon become our cinema of choice I reckon. No annoying kids, lots of beer and cuppa’s! We decided to go see Be Kind, Rewind starring Jack Black, Mos Def and Danny Glover. Its basically a film about 2 guys who accidentally erase all the videos in their store and remake them all themselves. Now, Im not generally a fan of Jack Black, but he’s not too overbearing in this perfectly amusing, popcorn movie. Its not going to reinvent the wheel, or cause a big stir, but its good at what it does, with the Ghosbusters remake being my favourite (especially the whole “how do we shoot it at night” scene!). Gets a bit cheesy at the end, but like I said, it does what it says on the tin admirably. If you want to see a light hearted, charming, throwaway comedy, you could do worse than see this film. 7/10.

 

Not much else gone on. Not got to play Xbox for a couple of days due to tiredness and lack of time, but should hopefully sort that out tomorrow. Really getting back into it in a big way now, after a short hiatus playing solely on Wii, thanks in no small part to Burnout and Battlefield Bad Company. Ive even gone as far into planning ot get back into COD 4 online, once the BF:BC beta ends in a few weeks. Ah, on second thoughts, that will only be a couple of days before GTA 4, and I can see that eating up a lot of my time, so maybe I’ll give COD another go this week.

 

Plans for the rest of the week….nowt for tomorow (except aforementioned gaming), Thursday we’ll be off out for Birthday food, and Friday we’re having a a few drinks with the guy who’s training me at work then off to a gig (CSS at the Prince Bandroom). For once a busy week, full of excitement, thrills and beer! And me being a year older :o(

The Transvestite & Sheep Post……

OK, a proper post today, so lets start with yesterday. Driving was uneventful at best. Slow speed manouvres are still a bit of a pin, but other than that everything is going swimmingly . Got 4 weeks to my test so not really that long considering Im only having 1 lesson a week. After driving, we went to see Priscilla, which if Im perfectly honest, I wasnt really looking forward to. I thought the film was a 7/10, I dont like theatre, and I like musicals even less, but a promise is a promise so I had to go. However, I soon changed my tune when it started. It was a good laugh, faithful to the movie, had great sets and outfits, the musical numbers were (mostly) out straight out of the film so were at least memorable and the performances were great. I dont think even the most cold hearted people could have failed to love it - was thoroughly enjoyable! Thinking about going to see Spamalot now, but I think my brief venture into theatrical hijinks will end there.

Today, has been a pretty routine day. Up early for work, had another enjoyable day ACTUALLY getting stuff done and completing jobs that I started. So unlike all of my previous experiences in engineering. 

Oh, I promised a review of Black Sheep too, so here it goes. Its fairly good. Next….! The whole film has a similar feel to Peter Jacksons early films in the sense that its humourous, gory and preposterous…so all good then! My only criticism is that it bogs down in a few places, whereas Jacksons films were relentless non stop affairs. Saying that though, if youre a fan of B-movie schlock horror its worth watching. Id give it a 6.5 out of 10.  

 

Beccas gone to Knit Club tonight so got the place all to myself. So far Ive done crazy things like….eat food! Watch Primeval! Do the washing up! And shortly……..I will be……..having a shave……..and….a…..shower!!!! oooooooooooooooooo! In other news, have you heard australian magpies - theyre great - nowt like UK magpies - have a listen.  And you can check it out anywhere if you dont believe me - Becca thought I was mad when I told her I heard that noise come from a  magpie!

  

And finally…..thanks to the B3ta newsletter for this awesome find. A great website dedicated to Camp Records, purveyor of groovy 60’s gay pop records! My favourites include “Mixed Nuts” (check out the lyrics), “Im so wet”, “Leather Jacket Lovers” and “Florence of Arabia”. However for sheer jaw dropping excellence, feast your ears on “Homer, the happy little homo”. I kid you not! Quite a catchy tune too!

Parasol Star (sorry - another obscure game reference)

Well, its been a tiring but fantastic day. Started off going over to the St Kilda farmers market which was full of tasty looking fresh produce, but we stupidly shopped the other day so have no room for any of it. Doh - better planning needed next time. However we picked up some fresh samphire, and are gonna cook it for tea afterwards with some barrimundi fillets - yum! 

Oh well, on to the good stuff. Caught a tram into Melbourne, which was lovely and cool, and extremely welcome as its been roasting today. First port of call was Flinders St to see if we could see anything of them filming “The Pacific”, and it turned out we could see quite a bit. The street was dressed with old wartime posters and banners, with lots of period cars and vehicles about. No actors on the set at that stage so took a few snaps (all of which are on Facebook or my webspace) and then did a bit of shopping. Becca picked herself up a parasol to keep her cool (also in the photos) and we went to see if we could find a bar we’d read about in guide books, called “The Rooftop Bar”. Found the building and made our way up to the 6th floor (the clues in the bars name!) and found it to be a great little place. All open air, 6 stories up, with grass on the floor (fake but looked and felt great) and sat ourselves down on old UK style wooden deck chairs. Ordered a blood orange juice for Becca and got myself a pint of Erdinger in a great looking glass. Then sat down, caught some rays, put on plenty of free suntan lotion from the bar and just appreciated the atmos, the weather, and the beer - awesome! After beer and sun, we did a bit more shopping, then walked on down to the film set again to see if anything had changed, and it had. They’d got some old period trams in, more dressing of the station itself, and the actors were on set being filmed. All very exciting, but nowt I can do will explain just how excited I was at the time. Kid in a toyshop!

Got back to St Kilda and found that all the festivities for next weeks St Kilda festival had already started, albeit on a small scale. A few hippyish stalls around Luna Park, some theatrical performance going on and a falconry thing, which was great. The size of this eagles claws were huge - a good 2 inches long. He was bloody huge too - would have those noisy cockatoos from breakfast. Also looking forward to this - a big open air cinema, near the gym on the seafront. Im particularly looking forward to seeing Jaws, outside, on the beach! Proper scary! 

Not quite sure of our plans for tomorrow yet. We want to go back into town to go to the market (if its on), go to a few more beer gardens/rooftop bars and generally lap up my last day of proper freedom! Going to have to investigate how to get into town to as there is  Gay Pride march going down Fitzroy St, closing off all the tram routes from St Kilda beach.  Anyway, Im off now to watch Mythbusters and have a beer. Gotta rest up for more booze and sun tomorrow! Ciao for now!

Watch Monkey Dust Now!

I dunno if anybody has heard of it (or maybe you have and I had my head in a paper bag for years), but ABC in Australia, have just started showing episodes of it here. Monkey Dust is an animated comedy show, that can be quite subversive, and focuses on the darker sides of British culture. Its fupping great though! It was superb, sitting here in St Kilda, thousands of miles away from the Black Country, watching this on TV (NSFW, contains “language” and is very funny!)

 

 

I hope you like it. It kind of reminds me of an animated version of Viz. It has reoccurring characters (with Omar, Shafiq and Abdul being my favourites, along with Roy of the Roasters) and well worth a look. If it aint on TV, Im sure you know about Bit Torrent….

 So today was pretty busy. Started off with a driving lesson, which went well, again. More highway driving, low speed manouvres and general practice. What is good is that theres no such test as reversing around a corner. The instructor thought I was a mental for suggesting such a thing “Why would anyone reverse around a corner, its dangerous”?! I cant argue with that, only breathe a sigh of relief that its not tested. I was rubbish at it back when I had lessons in the UK.

After driving we caught the bus over to Chadstone, with the hope of buying all our gym equipment and trainers. Cutting a long story short, I came away with only 1 top, as it was litterally the only sports item in my size in any of the sales. Everything else was top dollar, including all the trainers. I dont know what we are going to do. There doesnt appear to be anywhere that sells cheapy trainers, I cant wait until we recieve all our belongings in a few months time and Im not buying trainers online as I want to try them on beforehand. Will have to see if there are any out of town sports centres, if not top dollar it (begrudgingly) is. However, I did manage to get some cheap sale Diesel trainers for everyday wear. Nice and lightweight, which is exactly what I was after. All the trainers I have with me here now are fine, and look great with jeans, but they look like boats on the end of my legs when I have shorts on. So these Diesel ones are perfect.  $220 reduced to $140 - bargain.

Another highlight of today was watching 2 guys in a lolly/rock shop make a bunch of special order “wedding” rock. You can order yours and someone else’s name in rock for special occasions! How great is that! I found it fascinating watching them mix, cut and roll it, and the consistency of “rock” when its being made is amazing - its like a huge viscous glassy blob - has to be seen to be believed. This had the knock on effect of making Becca buy a bag of rock and me buying a massive 1KG bag of offcuts from when they make it.  Yum yum. 

Whilst being at Chadstone, I decided to go and see Aliens vs Predator 2, as it was on its last day at the cinema. And….its….exactly the same as the last film really, adding only a small amount to the Aliens/Predator lore. Im sure to the impartial, its a terrible, predictable monster movie but seeing as its me, and I tend to love most things Aliens or Predator, its an OK film. Nothing really spectacular, no great acting performances (REALLY!?!?), special effects are run of the mill and nothing really to recommend about it. And for once, why cant the Aliens attack in the sunlight. Honestley, watching one black monster fight another black monster…..at night….in the rain is nigh on impossible, more-so with the camera cutting to different angles every 2 seconds.  I also found it shocking that its only a 15 certificate here. I mean, you get to see skinned people, Aliens bursting out of children and arms falling off due to acid exposure. How is this possible?!? However, if you like Aliens or Predator, Id say go see it, if not Id give it a wide berth. If youre a fan of the previous movies, Id give it a 7, if not, Id give it a 4. 

Phew - I didnt think this would be such a big update as it doesnt “feel” like we’ve done much today, so sorry if Ive wasted too much of your day.  So in summary…..watch Monkey Dust, eat rock and look at how its made, watch/avoid AvP 2 and er……take care of yourselves…..and each other!

The St Kilda Roads Just Got More Dangerous….!

Thats right - Ive booked a double driving lesson for tomorrow morning! Think its about time I got myself behind the wheel, especially if Im going to be working lates, as the public transport kinda drops off as the day wears on. Im pretty excited, and a little scared - scared mainly of trams, but I guess its just a mater of confidence. Sounds like a good guy whos doing the teaching. I just hope he’s patient too!

Right - job news. Firstly, I havent officially got the job yet, or so Im told. Still in its candidacy phase so they cant really say if Ive definitely got it until all the other applicants have been informed too. Reading between the lines, though, with Boeing and the agency, its a dead cert - provided Im not a fat heffer! I have to have a pre-job medical for Boeing tomorrow, and the fact that Im having it is indicative of whether theyre serious about offering it to me. Fill out a questionnaire, water sample, lung capacity etc…. should be no problem. Then if thats ok, because of the closeness of everything, I will be starting Monday week. There is no way they can do a medical, get the results and send letters out to all the applicants in 1 day, and the agency recommended that the start date be put back a week so as not to rush any of the successful applicants. Fair enough I suppose. 

 Just got back from seeing Cloverfield today, and I must say Im a little disappointed. I wont post any spoilers so its safe to read on if youre going to see it. It does do a good job of teasing you with whats going on, and whats attacking the city. Only showing little glimpses of the “thing” until you see what it really is later on in the film. Reading that back, it sounds far more exciting than it is so dont blame me if it leaves you a bit cold. Both Becca and I couldnt care less about any of the main characters so its kind of irrelevant when they start dropping like flies. Maybe its just the sci-fi nerd in me that just wanted to see more of the “thing” stomping around, and less american half-wits being all heroic. Its also pretty short at only 1 hour 40, including ads and trailers, but I guess if it were any longer it would feel drawn out. It also has a pretty abrupt ending (which isnt really a shock considering the entire premise of the film) but it does leave you wanting a bit more. Even if its just a bit of text on the screen. However, nowt. Not even after the credits.  As a run of the mill film, its pretty good. Interesting way (if sometimes a little stomach churning with its manic camera movements) of taking on the traditional “monster flick” and it does succeed in some areas. However, it doesnt live up to the hype, and I dont think it ever could. I was hoping to come out and say it easily beat I Am Legend (the last film I saw) but I dont think it came close. 7/10

Nothing much else to report. Oh, we popped up to the gym/health spa on the sea front to see its facilities, as we’ll probably join once a wage is coming in. Its fantastic! A sea water pool, hydrotherapy pool, steam rooms and the gym itself is great. All the exercise bikes and treadmills have TV’s on the console in front of them, its all really clean, and has tons of specialist classes on. Head and shoulders above anything LA Fitness offered.  That was about it really. Driving and medical tomorrow and not much else. Wish me luck!

New Job = New Treat

OK - right off the bat - no job news today. Sent off emails and contact numbers yesterday to get references done, and not heard a jot today. I’ll be sure to email them tomorrow to send me written confirmation of the job offer. 

Now, onto the juicy stuff (well…for me anyway). Soon, the laptop you see on the left will be in my possession. Announced today, its called the Macbook Air (crumby name I know) and its stupidly thin, half the weight of my existing Macbook and has all manner of bells and whistles that I wont bore you with, but if youre interested, you can read about it here. Storage size is a bit of an issue but Apple are releasing a wireless hard drive around the same time, so all the macs in our place can speak to it and share files.  Been playing with another new toy today, one which we bought yesterday but reasons I wont bore you with, didnt work until this morning. A little stick that I plug into the usb port on the mac mini, an ariel into the other end, and you have yourself your own video recorder! Has a Sky style TV guide and its just as easy to record programs. Really am quite impressed. You can even stream existing recorded programs over wifi to your ipod touch! Its tech nirvana! 

Didnt do much today. Stayed in and messed with said TV thing for the mac and read as much info as I can about the Apple press briefing last night. Popped out of the house late on to go to the Suzuki Night Market, which turned out to be shockingly busy. The food parts were crazy with folks but the rest of it was a bit airy-fairy and hippyish so left early for food elsewhere. Walked past a ton of Japanese restaurants, Sake bars and Ramen houses, but wanted something spicy so went to a place that specialises in laksa’s (indonesian spicy seafood soup with noodles). Changed my mind at the last minute and ordered a curry, and god damn if it wasnt the hottest curry Ive ever had. It just made me cough and made my nose/eyes water. Shocking. Was in need of cooling down so popped over the road and found a lovely little rooftop bar. The whole place was done up like an English garden sort of thing. White wrought iron style chairs, pergolas, parasols, trellis’s - it was amazing! In keeping with the look of the place, we both shared a pitcher of Pimms! Table service for drinks (and I had a tasty cupcake). They also handed out blankets for anyone out on the roof terrace who was a bit cold (its was a frighteningly chilly 22 degrees today! Brrrrrr!). A real gem of a place that I dont think youre average joe would know about. 

Not sure of any plans for tomorrow. Id like to go see Cloverfield at the cinema but that isnt going to take all day. Oh well, we’ll just play it by ear. Have fun……

Funniest Ice-Cream Ever!

Awesome, eh? Cant wait to have a Gaytime? “Hey mate, fancy a Gaytime?”. The possibilities are endless! Whats even better than that is the follow-up line underneath the main logo (dont squint and try to read it now!) - so good, it deserves another photo, that I’ll put at the end of the post - something to look forward to!

Anyway, its been a busy couple of days. Went into Melbourne yesterday to have a mooch about. Didnt buy much as the money we have in our oz bank account is a bit tight, and while we have plenty of cash in our UK accounts to transfer, the exchange rate is utter crap at the moment, so gonna hold off. I digress. We went in search of bargains, but neither of us bought anything in the sales. Got a couple of nice cups from the posh tea place, had some very tasty and super cheap sushi, and looked around plenty of shops.  We also popped into the big pub next to the train station for some refreshment. While in there, we noticed the bartender was something of a beer expert (and looking on the website its apparently so) and asked for a  few samples. Being a new found convert to wheat beers, I asked for some recommendations, and god damn they were good. Their own brew (found nowhere else) was really nice, but my pick of the bunch was a tipple called “Beez Neez” which has a lovely honey taste. Got me a 6 pack from the offy as soon as we got back, and their chilling in the fridge as we speak. Cant wait to crack on open later! Also hired out 28 Weeks Later from the DVD store, and I thought it was ok. Not great by any means, and nowhere near as good as 28 Weeks Later, or I Am Legend. Special effects were ropey at best and the story was predictable. Having troublesome kids as the main plot device is never a good idea. It just gets annoying and you just wish they would get eaten or something. 

On the health front I feel a ton better. Dont know which tablets are doing the trick, but Im carrying on with all of them. I dont want to feel like crap this time tomorrow. Speaking of which, Im getting nervous about already. I just hope I dont panic and give stupid answers to their questions. Regardless anyway, life here is good - I really do LOVE this place. I mean, I look forward to getting the paper so I can have a stroll about. Could you ever have imagined me saying that about Kings Heath?  The weather is a positively cool 23 degrees today, but ramping up again to 37 by the end of the week. Its strange, having coped with 42, and 38 degrees the day after, it actually DOES feel cold today. Mad, after living in the UK for so long. Its also strange to go into Melbourne and compared to Birmingham, or Wolverhampton the amount of people about is miniscule. Its nice walking around the shops, and never feels crowded, or claustrophobic. Like I say, I love it here!

So on to tomorrow. Expecting the telephone engineers around between 8am and 10am, so SHOULD have internet access soon, but Im not holding my breath. Either way, I’ll be sure to make a post, either from my house or from the net cafe about how the interview went. If they want people to start next week, I would expect them to inform any of the interviewees fairly quickly if they have been successful or not. So I may know either way in 24 hours. Exciting, but at the same time scary! 

Anyhow, youve read enough waffle and droning to get to the crowning glory of ice-cream namery, so here it is. Behold and enjoy…..

 

Friends, Jobs, Rubbish Banks & Kettles!

Its been a long time since my last post and a lots happened. Firstly, we had a great weekend with friends. Had a nice meal in, on thursday night (tasty croutons laura!) and a great curry on friday night. Hired out Sunshine from Blockbuster on saturday (very good film - recommended) and stayed around another friends for “super-sunday” and caught both of the big footy matches. Had a really good time just being around our friends again, chatting and catching up. Its certainly one thing we REALLY miss about being in Australia. Have such a great bunch of friends over here and it will be hard to leave them behind. Again!

Whilst spending time over our mates, we sat and lost our selves in the mind sapping gaze of QVC, the shopping channel. Shockingly, we saw something apparently great on there, called the Tefal Quick Cup. Basically, its a hot water boiler crossed with a kettle. You fill the back resevoir thingy with water, then whenever you want hot water, you press the button, and an element in the neck, heats the water there (as you can see from the diagram above!) and then and into your cup. I mean, for me, its completely revolutionary. No more waiting for kettles to boil. No more hanging around while it bubbles away. If you want a cuppa, its as quick as getting water from the tap. Well…….that was the plan! After finding it £15 cheaper than anywhere else at Argos, we bought one. And, it kinda doesnt work. It DOES boil water on demand. It DOES fill your cup up to a level of your setting. It DOES actually boil the water and not just leave it tepid, as some reviews have suggested. However it also DOES splatter boiling water in a 15cm radius all around the cup too. Not the most clean OR safe thing ever! Tried cleaning the nozzle, changing the filter, leaving it to cool down. Nope! So took it back to Argos today and got a replacement which while better than the 1st one, STILL splatters boiling water everywhere. So….the dream is over! Back to Argos for a refund and wait for Tefal Quick Cup 2.0!  The dreary monotony of conventional water heating awaits….

Job news is that interviews HAVE started back up again for the Boeing position. The agency guy is still hopeful that I will have a good chance of getting one of the jobs on offer on my return, and Boeing are willing to wait for me to get back for an interview. So weve spent a few stressful hours today trying to get a flight back home for a reasonable price. And failed. the resonable price that is - we did get a flight but at a ridiculously extortionate price. Managed to get one from Birmingham, with Emiriates again, on Sunday the 6th of Janurary. Pained me to give them my card details, but if it means I have a shot at this job, I suppose theres nothing I can do. Just a hard pill to swallow.

Went to see the doc a few days ago and he told me my blood test results are fine. Cholesterol, blood pressure, blood fats and sugars etc…. are all well within limits.  However, my family history for heart trouble is terrible so Im trying to see if he will refer me to a specialist. Thanks to a friend (cheers Mark!) a cardiologist is ready to go, but the GP is whinging on about having everyones medical records involved. Knowing how fast these people work, I dont hold out much hope of this happening until well into 2008, which is too late for me. Oh well, I sent the GP an email yesterday pleading for him to send the referral letter ASAP, but Ive had no reply yet. Nevermind, if I cant get it done here, I can always get it done in Melbourne. At a price though :o(

Im sure Ive probably forgotten a ton of other stuff thats gone on, but my mind is drawing a blank at the moment. If I think of anything exciting, I’ll be sure to post it.  Oh - I managed to pick up an awesome buy at HMV - 3 Ray Harryhausen, Sinbad films on DVD for £9! Superb - it isnt Christmas without a Harryhausen movie or 2!

And another thing I forgot. Barclays bank  - avoid. Ive recently had a terrible experience in the Wolverhampton Centre branch. Cutting a long story short, it took 45 minutes, £20 and much frustration just to give Becca some of MY money from MY account that Ive had for nearly 20 years. Who would have known that its common for Barclays to require you to queue in the Foreign Exchange area to transfer money from one UK account to another UK account!?! Backwards Bank more like! Bank transfer cost £20, but a bankers draft costs £10. Want one of those instead? “Sorry, you’ll have to see one of our personal bankers for that”! Of which there is only 1 present. And they already have 3 people in a queue waiting for them. Also, for whatever reason, they also decided that multiple passwords werent safe enough for their online banking service. No sirree! Now, theyve sent me out a stupid farty little calculator thing that I have to put my card in the top and it gives me a password. WHAT!?!? Is this the 1940’s? Is this the new Enigma Machine? Is this what 50 odd years of passowords/code making has come too. Pathetic little calculator bollocky things?!? Grow up! Barclays can stick it up their backwards arses - the accounts are closing. Get your money from some other sap so you can make more Enigma calculators.  They’ll be sending all my statements out by pigeons at this rate. 

See how the idiots in this country make me cross again! Grrrrrrrrrr!  

A Damn Fine Day?…YES!

I decided to get up early this morning to watch some REAL football, as the Liverpool/Besiktas game was on SBS. And its shaping up to be a damn fine match. At the time of typing, its half time and the ‘pool at 2-0 up. Just found out the Rangers/Barclona match is on tomorrow at the same time - excellent! That was a cracking match 2 weeks ago. 

Despite the fact that its only 7.30am here, its beaming sunshine outside, and I can hear the parrots chirping away. Compared to the red nosed, ice cold scousers in the crowd Im feeling pretty warm right now! Forecast of “sunny and 23 degree’s” just been on the box.  Woo hooooo!!!!

On top of this already good news, Guitar Hero 3 and Call of Duty 4 out today. I’ll be popping out right after this match to pick them up, seeing as Crook probably wont surface for another couple of hours at least.  Might get me some more bagels and another tasty ice cream on the way home. 

Watched The Host last night and was impressed. Very different to conventional, well, Western monster movies. No build up to when the beast makes its first appearance. Its eating folks within the first 10 minutes. But that doesnt really do it justice. Its not really the story of “monster appears - plan to kill the monster - kill it”, its more the (albeit same) story seen from through the eyes of ordinairy people. I dont want to give too much away but it really is a good film. Not cheesy (apart from a tiny bit at the end) and the monster design is fantastic. If you like sci-fi, or horror, or even a good action movie Id recommend it. Really good movie - Id give it an 8/10.

Another piece of good news is that because its the 7th of the 11th Month, 7-Eleven is having a “Happy 7-Eleven “Day. Go into any 7-Eleven and wish the person behind the counter a happy 7-Eleven day and you get a free Slurpee! This day just keeps on getting better! And YES - I am easily pleased! 

Remember, Remember the 5th of November.

Except we didnt!!! It was only an email from my parents that reminded me it was yesterday! I havent heard one firework over here, so I guess its not a big thing over here. Suits me  - back in the UK I remember fireworks going off a month before and 2 weeks after 05/11. Plus its all kind of lost in the Spring Racing Festival gubbins here. Very busy today here - the queues for betting shops were out the doors and down the street! I dont particularly like horse racing but Id rather that be in the news than cricket or aussie rules. Nevermind, the Melbourne Cup should be over as Im typing this so I suppose its time for the papers and TV to get excited over the next big sporting event. I didnt really take in how VERY important sport is to everyone here. Makes sense I suppose with the weather being so nice. No fat kids stuck at home watching TV. And Macdonalds is seen pretty much as a joke here too. Starbucks isnt popular, either.  Anyway, I digress!

Been a really nice day here today. About 22 and sunny. Despite SOME others who shall remain nameless who havent even bothered getting dressed, I DID venture out the house today. Went and sorted out membership to a local video rental place. No membership card, you just tell them your phone number and give them a password - is a good idea. I always used to keep forgetting my Blockbuster card in Brum. Got me a tasty ice cream (peanuts and chocolate) and had a walk up the beach. Bit of a difference from last November 6th!  Rented “The Host” which isnt particularly new, but Ive heard good things about it. 

 Not sure what we are doing tomorrow. For sure one part of it will be going to JB Hifi to get games. Only just found out that Guitar Hero 3 is online enabled, so if anyone plans to get it, let me know and I’ll let you kick my arse online!

Also, as Im a nerd, Im going to pop along to this show in Melbourne in a couple of weeks.  Probably be crawling with kids, but if I dont go, I’ll never know. Should be exciting anyway - the first time Ive been to any kind of gaming expo, which is odd considering Ive been into games now for about 20 years or so! Mock me at your desire, I dont care!

Oh, and house news. Email from my parents stated that now our dumb arse solicitor failed to get council confirmation of some environmental letter! The completion date was meant to be this Friday, but I cant see that now. Why is it Solicitors, as a profession seem to be the most mistake prone group of people ever. Has anyone actually had a totally seamless experience when dealing with one of these reprobates? Useless! 

As for the exciting news I promised yesterday…er……as youve read, I dont have any of my own so I typed in “Exciting News” into Google and it threw up a web page, of which one of the stories was about how rural Chinese folk have been eating Dinosaur bones, boiling them to make soup and making them into paste to put on wounds as they believe the “Ancient Sky Dragon” bones have healing properties! So there you go…. EXCITING NEWS!  

The Bourne Ultitmatum

Caught the Bourne Ultimatum last night at a preview screening. If youre a fan of the first 2 films, you wont be disappointed. Id go as far to say that even if youve never seen the first 2 films, watch them and then go to see it. You’d still probably enjoy it if your hadnt seen the previous 2, but it makes more sense if you have. Its also got probably the most viscous and visceral fight scene Ive ever scene - it just looks mean! I’m going to try to remain in this rather upbeat mood, but I really cant see it lasting seeing as I have (potentially) 2 house viewings today. I’d put money on at least one of these sorry fuckers not turning up.