So after a stressful couple of weeks, the body decides that TTotM should start six days early (this is after a few months ago where TTotM started five days early in Egypt and caught me completely by surprise (thank heavens the place I found out was also a servo that had supplies, and there were people with pain killers to tide me over til I got back to the hotel room that night!)... and so I'm like really body, REALLY???  Most people have a twenty-eight day cycle, and you want to make it nineteen days? Yeah thanks.  NOT.

And did I mention the stressful couple of weeks?

So even coming off oncall and four beers did nothing for me, and instead of coming home happy and/or tired, I came home a weepy mess.  Yah, not pretty.

Le sigh.

(you didn't know they still had these in Australia did you?)

Saturday was a very quiet day, didn't leave the house.

Watched Fantasia 2000 after a couple of beers, which brought back so many memories of watching it in Marrickville in 2000-2001 after cointreau and/or vodka and vanilla coke.  Except this time was the first time watching it on Blu-ray, which was just stunning.  Beautiful and clear and none of the pain of VHS!

Sunday was also pretty quiet.  

Went for a walk to the bakery for pies for lunch.

Watched Kundun in the afternoon.  I missed out on seeing this in 1998 at the cinema because friends had gotten special screening tickets, but the only ticket I could get for the night would have been sitting by myself, so didn't end up seeing it.  Vic's comment at the time when I asked him how it was, was "Mao zedung was a f!@#%it".  Stu and I were a little emotional after watching it.

Then we went off to do our food shopping.  5pm on a Sunday you'd think the place would be deserted right?  Well the carpark was certainly more empty than usual, but Coles was *packed* :(  Ended up being quite stressful.

Came home and cooked dinner.  The sweetie must have liked it, he wanted thirds.

So all I've achieved this weekend is a bit of photo sorting and some photo dvd burning.  And lots of Laserwar played.

I was a fan :)

"...ish", their first album was (and still is) one of my favourite albums of all time.  "The Other Side" I got as well but it didn't grab me in the same way.

I had this poster of them up in my room (at least I think I did, I don't have any photographic evidence)

I decorated the whole back of my Year 11/12 school folder with a poster of the band.

I carried a picture of Eric around in my wallet.

I saw them live twice.  The first time was at the NSW Institute of Sport at Homebush, probably in 1990.  We sat on the side and I meticulously wrote down every song they played.  The second time was at the Sutherland Entertainment Centre, aka "The Bop" one Friday night in 1991.  I was quite close to the stage that night but got annoyed at a girl in front who kept bopping sideways, alternately obstructing my view.

Then they disappeared.

The next mention I saw of them was over last new years in Sydney - they were to be the support act for Roxette.  But that was in Sydney and all too hard.

Then a few weeks ago Mix106.3 announced that they were coming to Canberra.  I put out a notice on the blog, but the only two people that showed any initial interest decided they weren't really interested after all.  I didn't really want to go by myself, so it all got too hard.  The sweetie said he'd go with me if I really wanted him to, but I was thinking as of the day of the concert that I probably wouldn't go.

But then late yesterday afternoon I asked Neil if I should ask if there were any tickets left and he said yes.  So I called and they still had tickets left, so I bought two!  At which point Windy came by and said Nanette and her friends were going and he actually might have been interested if he could find babysitting.  So he arranged that - win!

So he picked me up and we went and dropped off the laptop and on call phone to Neil (thanks Neil!!) and off we went.

We arrived a bit after eight and picked up my tickets.  We had 399 and 400.

They'd said on the phone earlier that doors would probably open around 8:15.  Met up with the others and waited.  And waited.  And waited.  In the end they didn't let us upstairs til ~8:50pm :(  But because we were in the foyer right by the stairs, we were among the first to go up!  So of course we took up position right in front of the stage :)

Then we waited some more.

We were even close enough to see the set list for the night..

Which translated is:

Finally, a bit after 9:30, they came out!!

It took me mere seconds to realise I was going to need earplugs.  I could *feel* the music, and the wind from the speakers.  And as soon as the guitars started I knew I was going to get deafened and stressed.  So put in the earplugs and that worked well.

So as it turns out, Eric (now known as Erik) is the only original member of the band left.  Everyone else is new.  When I saw 1927 the first two times, they were actually a little boring - they just all stood there and played their songs.  Erik seems to have relaxed quite a bit these days - he seems more like a muso just enjoying what he does.  There wasn't a whole lot of interaction with the crowd though.  

So I sang along to the songs I knew, and took photos during songs I didn't...

After the show we hung around a bit comparing photos.  I went and bought myself a tshirt and their latest cd.  And the keyboardist (above) came out, so Nanette dragged me over to get an autograph :)  I asked if the rest of the band would be out, and he said probably in around fifteen minutes.  So we hung around.

So worth it!!!

OMG I got to hug Erik!!!!!!

Very squeeeeeee ;)

And I got my cd autographed by the whole band :):):)

So thanks Neil for the kick in the butt to get tickets, and looking after on call for me, it was a totally awesome night :):):):)

Busy day today.  Finished geotagging all 18701 of my holiday photos.  Still have my parents' photos to do.  Rotated theirs today and had a look at them all (first time I'd ever actually seen them).  Also time spent cleaning the house (not that you could tell :/ ) and cooking dinner (a pork belly, following the recent Coles magazine suggestion to cook it skin down for the first 2/3 of the cooking time.  It turned out pretty well).  

Tonight I went to find our spare house keys for Peter, but can't find them anywhere :(:(:(:(

Edit.. just found them ... under piles and piles of crap :/

Oh, and still can't find anyone to go to 1927 with .. seems noone of my demographic in Canberra ..

Yay.

So arrived, and marvelled at the STARS!!  

Then set about turning everything on.  Except I couldn't turn on the gas.  Knob was jammed.  I was already hungry at this point, so was getting stressed and grumpy from low blood sugar level.  Then we heard from Dave - he hadn't even left home yet! (people had bailed at work so he had to fill in for them).  So we abandoned thought of using the spa that night, and went into Bateman's Bay to get some dinner.

We went to "Little Restaurant and Bar".  With a super friendly waitress and chef.  Lovely service.

Stu had a pork croquette dish off the specials board.

And I had lamb cutlets

For dessert Stu had banana and pecan nut pudding

And I had a Lindt Swiss chocolate slice

Accompanied by a nice pear cider.

All super delicious, a great find.

So we get back to the house and Dave had just arrived, to tell me I'd been doing it wrong, turns out there's knobs on each gas cylinder as well.  That I couldn't actually see, from my angle, in the dark.  Yeah so I felt completely useless.  So had a breakdown and went to bed.  As you do.

Saturday was just doing a jigsaw, a walk to the shops, crosswords, and that was about it for the day.

In the evening we cracked open the Heineken keg and ordered pizza (three smalls which got demolished in short order).

Warmed up the spa and enjoyed that for quite a while, getting through almost all of the keg between us.  I was quite impressed with our effort heh.

This morning just more jigsaw, although I didn't finish it - sky is taking far too long.

Then we tidied the house and headed home, stopping at the Scottish Restaurant for lunch.

Did some fish tank stuff when I got home, as well as geotagging holiday photos and house tidying.  So a productive afternoon/evening, but that didn't stop the Sunday night depression :(

So yeah, just more UK photos and Trivia night stuff, but didn't really get to anything else on the todo list :(:(

Eighteen months ago today we went to Sherwood Forest and then to York to see the Minster and the Hogwarts Express!

So we went to Maccas again, and the little brother met us again.

Pink dots are all around Sydney.  Possibly part of Street Works

Had a bit of a wander through Darling Harbour, including climbing a rope pyramid.

Billions of bins

Tumbalong Park

Me up the rope tower

Me up the rope tower

The rope tower

View from the rope tower

For Dave2: the Hard Rock Cafe building

Darling Harbour

Brolgas dancing at Cockle Bay Wharf

Darling Harbour

Then to Wildlife World.  Spent a couple of hours there with Kore squeeing over kangaroos and koalas.

Fluttery

Kore and a flutterby

Koala

Gak gak bird!

Didn't catch the name of this guy

Zebra finch

Cunningham's skinks

Kookaburra

Yellow-footed rock wallaby

Wombat

Bull ant

Cassowary

A tiny dragon (kid's hand next to it)

Central bearded dragon

Ridge-tailed monitor

Kangaroos

Face-plant kanga

Juvenile emu

Emerald dove

A few seconds later - the dove being chased out of the food by an emu!

Stu, Kore and emus

Salt water crocodile

Yvonne could tell me what these finches are...

Nom!

Salt water crocodile

Didn't catch the name of this monitor either

Kore and bat

Kore touching a stick insect

Koala

Fiona the curlew upstages the koala keeper talk

Capture!

Rainbow lorikeet

Frilled-neck lizard

Kore and a kangaroo

Salt water crocodile

Was later leaving there than we hoped and had to meet David and Yvonne at a Korean place.  Our original instructions were "on Pitt St, south of Town Hall near Capitol Square, on the right".  As we were walking I asked what the name of the place was.  NaruOne.  OK, so into Google Maps.  No probs.  Except Google Maps was wrong by a whole block.  Got the address (375 Pitt St, Lower Ground) and then had to go back a block (after Stu led us downstairs under 395 Pitt St).  So anyway.  Fifteen minutes late, hot and stressed.  *sigh*

Had bibambap at Yvonne's recommendation.  

So left there at 2:00 and headed down to the Powerhouse museum for a special exhibition, which might have been awesome, had it not been for stoopid money-hungry corporations.  Made me very upset.

So came back to the hotel and crashed, because frankly both Stu and I were completely done with the afternoon.

Although Kore and I did pop out for takeaway - we got some Turkish because she'd never had pide or dolmatas or falafel before.  

Watched a heartbreaking documentary on the township of Iitate in Japan that was affected by the Fukushima reactor disaster.  

Didn't sleep very well *again* last night :(:(  Blah.

Headed out a bit after nine and met the little brother at the local McCafe.  Had brekky (bacon and egg mcmuffin and a hash brown.. yumm) then wandered through the Devonshire Street tunnel to the station to buy our tickets.  We decided to get a MyMulti (Zone 1).  

Art in the Devonshire Street Tunnel

Headed to Town Hall.  I went down and got myself a ticket to the Art of the Brick show on Friday morning! 

Kore's first ever train!

Deck chairs outside Town Hall



Then we had a wander through the QVB.  Stopped in to look at HobbyCo.  Nearly didn't get Stu and Kore away from the anime section ;)

Old freight trains
Thomas!
Crystal pavilion thing in the QVB

Christmas Tree in the QVB

Left there and went and got our tickets for the Tower/Wildlife World/Aquarium from NRMA (10% discount - same as online).  Then to Sydney Tower!  I didn't worry about panoramas this time since I did that last time.  Just zoomed in on all sorts of things, and did the tour guide thing for Kore.  And far out it was crowded!  Queued to go up, queued to go down.  And then got stuck in the lift.  Well not really, it just didn't start.  Ended up just hitting the door open button to get out.

Sydney Tower from King Street

Sydney Tower under construction

In the "4D" show
Harbour from the tower

Don't know what this kid was looking at..

Kore up the tower

Darling Harbour

Pacific Jewel

Highest post box.  Except you can't actually buy stamps up the tower.  Pointless!

By this time it was lunch time, so we went to the Westfield foodcourt.  I had subway! heh. Poor sweetie.  Sydney is super crazy busy at the moment, and even at 2pm the food court was packed.  Basically the sweetie's idea of hell :( 

Then headed across to Hyde Park to see the Archibald Fountain and St Mary's cathedral (didn't bother going in - since "pics or it didn't happen" would mean it didn't happen heh).

Kore and Stu inspecting the wicker concrete on a building in Market Street

Kore in Hyde Park

Archibald Fountain

St Mary's Cathedral

A bit of a wander down Macquarie Street.

Hyde Park Barracks

Stu picks hogwart's nose

Parliament House

State Library

Ibis

I told Kore they look better in flight

Conservatorium of Music

And down to Circular Quay, to go see the Opera House.

Obligatory Harbour Bridge photo

Kore discovers the Opera House is tiled

And back to Circular Quay and the Manly Ferry!

Circular Quay station with barricades up to stop people watching the fireworks there

Circular Quay

This was Kore's first ever ferry

Manly Wharf

Wandered up The Corso to the beach.  

Smiley face in sweat

Bubbles!

There are several taps along the Corso for filling up water bottles.  Best idea ever!

The Corso

Manly men in Manly

Manly beach

Kore dipped her feet in :)

Then back to the Steyne hotel for a beer.  We originally had a table in the middle, but then noticed a window seat was free, so we all moved over there.  I tell you what, a nice cold beer, seat by the window with a lovely sea breeze and a view of the ocean was AWESOME!!  Really really nice.  Even the sweetie felt better after the stressful morning.  Decided to get "fish and chips" there because that's a traditional beachy thing to do (and Kore had never had it before, in fact she'd never even been to a pub before!).

Then wandered back to the ferry, which we timed nicely for some lovely sunset pictures over the harbour.  

They haven't finished the barricades on this side yet

Kore's second train

And finally back to the hotel.  

Had to point out that the moon is upside down here

Bat!

Took over 1100 photos today .. whoops!!  Not sure how my experiment to deal with photos on a daily basis is going to work!  OK so an hour and a half later and I'm still not finished processing photos, let alone select some to blog, resize, upload and enter them into the blog.  Might work on that tomorrow morning if I get a decent nights' sleep and wake up early enough.