Forty years ago today Mum took these photos (on Dad's camera) of my budgie Bluey on Dad's face one Sunday morning.

Backdating.  Cause I'm a slacker.  Nothing to see here, move along.

Monday.  Slept ok.  Ok day I guess.  Went to have some of the snow peas that I bought probably only two weeks ago and they were *covered* in slime.  So fricken unusual because normally they last weeks and weeks in the fridge.  Pissed as.  Then David came home and spent all afternoon swearing at the fish tank lights.  But he got them working in the end.  Bestest brother ever.  (not sure if I ever mentioned the story - a few weeks back the transformer for Stu's stoopidly expensive LED fish tank lights went POP and that was the end of that.  It was a completely non standard transformer, there was no doco anywhere online for the lights, and they were strangely wired.  David decided to get resistors and rewire the thing so it'd work with a standard transformer, and also be less likely to blow out the lights.  Just waiting for the other transformer to go next so he'll have to do it all over again.. hrmmm....).  Had sausages and salad/veggies for dinner.  Then got more grunty that Stu's sauerkraut had gone off.  And some ham we bought ages ago is also looking very strange.  I *hate* wasting food and we've wasted so much this week >:(  Feeling like I should ban perishable food that I won't eat (like ham and sauerkraut) and veggies that only I like (like snow peas).  Don't get me started on trying to find veggies that everyone likes and doesn't cause health issues in people.  Took til 8pm to get UK photo labelling done.  811 left.  And blogging.  An hour and a half later.  hrmmm.

But look!  Poppy in the staircase!

Tuesday.  Ok sleep mostly.  Finished scanning Dad's WA slides.  Was good to see his photos, after only having seen Mum's very red-shifted prints for so many years.  I think I'll need to scan her negatives of those holiday trips - hopefully they fared better than the prints!  Worked from home so just watched some silly horse race on tv in the background.  David made home in time for the race but steadfastly ignored it ;)  Later in the afternoon had no tickets and not much else happening so flexed off for an hour or so and got some UK photo labelling done.  Only 581 photos left!  Leftovers from the club halloween night for dinner.  Hacked some periwinkle.  Watched random stuff on the internet in the evening.

Wednesday.  Okish sleep.  Up to 5000 of Dad's slides scanned.  I'm into Central Australia now.  I remember Mum saying a while back that Dad had issues with his camera on the WA trip, and there was a $25 camera fixing bill listed in the holiday expenses, but all the photos from that trip looked fine.  The Central Australia trip on the other hand was a disaster.  So many of the photos are over exposed, and there's *heaps* missing - obviously too bad to even keep.  I'm thinking *this* was the trip he had camera issues with.  Must have been absolutely heartbreaking for him.  I'll have to get Mum's negatives of this trip too.  Pity you can't climb Ayers Rock aka Uluru anymore.  I'm calling it though - I reckon within twenty years the local Aboriginal people will start doing guided tours to the top.  Charged of course.  I don't know how true it is, but David and Yvonne went some years ago and got the impression that the Aboriginal people didn't really care too much that people would want to climb to the top - they were much more worried about the sacred sites around the base of the rock.  I'm having to be the Naughty Email Intervention Layer (aka NEIL) at work, probably for another few weeks at least.  Which is a bit of a poo.  Cause he doesn't document anything!  Actually *going* to work sux epically - takes so much extra time out of my day.  Had leftovers for dinner.  Then it's back to "work" - finishing scanning the morning's photos (because there's not enough time in the mornings on "work" days), backing up hard drive, labelling photos etc.  Only 475 to go!!!

I don't have any notes for Thursday.  There was work drinks.  And I went with David to the mall to do some shopping.  Saw this very pretty car in the car park.

Friday.  I swear Dad must have had sex on the brain.  Following his Coitus Tower slides from the USA, this was the label for a thorny devil in Central Australia.

The evening was packing for our long weekend away...

Twenty years ago today I headed down to Melbourne with Luc and Cynthia.  I've hardly got any photos, so therefore I have hardly any memories.  It's hardly worth putting into the Australian Holidays blog, as we didn't really do anything touristy.

I'm pretty sure we went down so that Luc and Cynthia could buy an apartment off the plan. 

I imagine we went down on the Friday, as there's a photo taken at Ettamogah Pub in the afternoon. 

I'm pretty sure this was in Crown Towers, taken on the Saturday.

Then we must have gone to see the developers.  I remember taking the photos there.  I think maybe this was going to be the location of the new building and this was the view?

Pretty sure we had dinner in Southbank that night.  I remember having some very nice wine and Luc (my other friend Luc) told me I should have taken note for future reference).

Then I imagine we came back on the Sunday.

I had a few more photos in this folder I was going to post, but since David did the jigsaws not me (other than a bit of help here and there) I probably shouldn't.

Which makes for a pretty lean post for this quarter.  I've just been so fricken busy.  Who says the pandemic lockdown gives people more time?!?  Not me!!

I think this was an opshop find of David's.  Moraine Lake in Canada (been there!)  I did it, then pulled it apart and let David do it.  Someone had spilt something on some of the pieces which was a bit sad.  Pretty easy jigsaw to do because a lot of piece variety and easy to tell orientation.

Another opshop find of David's I think.  This was of Milan Cathedral rooftop, which I would have been to this year if it weren't for Covid :(  While secondhand, it had actually never been opened so we were the first to do it.  David started it first but hated it because the piece quality was abysmal - when you placed a piece, several other pieces would come adrift.  I called it a 5000 piece jigsaw, becuase you had to redo all the pieces like five times each.  He didn't quite rage quit, but he didn't bother to do the sky.  I pulled it apart but kept the sky separate - little point resorting it all.

This one belongs to Duncan at work.  It was also brand new when I did it.  Actually I started it wayyyy back before the pandemic lock down.  It was nearly finished when I left it, and I only pulled it out again a few weeks back and finished it off.

Backdating, cause I'm a slacker! ;)

Monday.  Slept well.  Ok day at work, although I felt like I was waiting for everyone for stuff, and I was just in limbo.  Leftover brisket and salad for dinner.  Got kitchen cleaned and UK photos done by 19:30 so got stuck into blogging.  An hour and a half later and still not caught up.

Tuesdsay.  Went to the chemist at lunch.  But the markets are closed Monday/Tuesday which made for an eerie place to go.  But they did have Floriade there too!

Wednesday.  Woke up at 4:30 and never got back to sleep.  Another day of stoopid meetings.  Was going to wait for the sweetie, but I'd had enough by 4pm and went to meet the sweetie for a drink, followed by dinner at Happys.

Thursday.  More expensive drinks at Pot Belly.

Friday.  Woke up at 3:30, think I only got about fifteen minutes more sleep just before 6am.  Hurrah.  Lunch with Tony/Jess/Keira at Herbert's, but I'll stick that in another post.  In the evening headed into Belco for C's birthday pot luck barbeque.  A whole crowd of "neurodiverse" people, such as are her friends :)  A very pleasant evening by the lake, and we were among the last to leave, and still managed an early night :)

Saturday.  Logged into work to try and finish off some work I didn't have time for on Friday (too much stoopid) but Notes had crashed, so it was a sign to just shut it all down.  Then we headed out to the club.  Stu read a book outside while I did another coat of primer on the main benchtops, and started some more of the cabinetry as well.

The boys had stained the dick as well

Happy hour started super early (like 15:30!) and Rob and Lyn brought *heaps* of food, which ended up being our dinner.  We avoided the various parties around the place and had a nice quiet evening by the fire (not that we needed the fire - the day had been super hot!).

Sunday.  Woke up at ~1am and didn't get back to sleep for like four hours, and then only had a little more.  Heard people going home from parties at 3am new time (2am old time).  Headed home in the morning (we could have stayed another night but Stu thought we should go home). 

Found out all that yellow stuff around Canberra is Cape Weed, an invasive species from South Africa.

I was so tired it was a bit of a nothing day.  All I managed to achieve was towel washing and jigsaw.  Had roast pork for dinner and watched Ponyo.

Monday.  Woke up at 5am (new time, so really 4am old time).  But!  All the things!!  Had a really productive day.  Started watching Against the Wind (more on that in another post).  Did some blogging catchup, although no UK photo labelling.

Backdating to the night I took these.

I don't think there even was a Nightfest this year.  But if you're in Civic and night and there's flowers and pretty lights, you take photos right? :)

The other events in the Olympics we won ballot tickets for was synchronised swimming and synchronised diving.

I took along our work Sony Mavica because it did short videos, but I spent entirely too much time changing "film" (floppy disks) to really enjoy the synchronised swimming.

My photos of the synchronised diving were pretty crap, but apparently we won medals!  - Rebecca Gilmore and Loudy Tourky winning bronze

and Robert Newbery and Dean Pullar also winning bronze

Most of my footage of the synchronised swimming was videos on the Mavica, but Mum got a few photos and I got a couple of photos as well on the Mavica.

Obligatory Olympic Park photos

Afterwards I met up with Daniel and he took my camera and took a whole stack of photos of the athletics in the afternoon.  He also got this pretty cool photo of Sydney Olympic Park at night.

I see this tiny little patch of Floriade on my walks.  There's a sign which casts a shadow over it most of the time, but I've still gotten lots of pretty photos.  These are photos from the past couple of weeks.

Not as many photos this time, promise ;)  Also backdated to the day I took them.

A week later and more of the tulips are out.

On the middle Saturday night of the Olympics, twenty years ago tonight, there was a free concert in The Domain.  For some reason I ended up going with Neety, the brother type person's girlfriend at the time.  I was a little too terrified as a youngster to take my *super expensive* digital camera with me, so the only photos from the night were Neety's.  

The concert was pretty cool.  There were a bunch of acts that I'd either never heard of or didn't know any of their work, then Paul Kelly and Neil Finn (Crowded House).

Aside from creepy guy rubbing his genitals into us in the mosh pit, but after I GLARED at him he went to find some other people to harrass.

This was Leonardo's Bride

and Mark Seymoure

Paul Kelly was a surprise.  The only thing I knew by him was Dumb Things from the Young Einstein soundtrack, but even though I didn't know his work I really enjoyed him live. 

And Neil Finn did a whole bunch of Crowded House songs, which was super awesome, even though he stopped singing I Fall at Your Feet just in time for everyone to sing "who knows where that might lead" and barely anyone sang it (I did!!!).  

Neety wanted to hang around after to see if she could wangle a meeting with Neil Finn, or even get a copy of the playlist, and span some yarn about coming all the way from the Blue Mountains or some such silliness, but didn't get anything.  

There is a photo she took of Neil Finn rehearsing earlier in the day though.