Boring Life Of a Geek
4.4.14-6.4.14
After the Lego movie I went home to get my car and *stuff* then headed out to the club to meet up with the sweetie who went out earlier in the day.
We had the place to ourselves for most of it which was nice. Saturday afternoon I went for a wander around the perimeter.
It rained most of the weekend too, so the planned hazard reduction bonfire never went ahead. I cut and folded and glued little bits of paper.
I left Sunday morning to get a quick visit in to the Airport Open Day.
Had a pretty productive weekend.
(we also had our first fogs of the year this weekend)
Yesterday was breakfast at Edgar's (Pulp Kitchen was too crowded to get a table). I had the eggs bendict which was ok, but the bread was a bit of effort (too tough).
Stu had the rosti stack (which I was looking at too) which was pretty good.
Did some food shopping after that, and then I hacked a bunch of portals while Stu got a hair cut, converting most of Civic for the Enlightened :)
Most of the rest of the weekend was spent clearing out piles and piles of paper. Three in-trays *full* of paper cleared out, filing cabinet drawers tidied, *kilos* of paper thrown into recycling. I even vacuumed the pool and put its cover on, although I didn't get to vacuuming the house.
This was really sad, since just that morning there were 2 Terabyte drives for sale in JB for $99 ... this is like two and a half thousand times the price!
Tonight's dinner was very simple - just a pack of bacon bones, some split peas, an onion and a carrot thrown into a slow cooker with a bit of water, and come back in six hours. And I took Julie Goodwin's suggestion and chucked a handful of frozen peas/corn in right at the end. Super simple and very tasty. The sweetie wanted thirds - must have been good!
14.3.14
Up at stoopid o'clock on the last Friday of the balloons to see the Skywhale in flight and say hi to Neil. Had breakfast before the crowds, although being a Friday morning the crowds (and number of balloons) was a lot smaller than a weekend.
So last weekend (well really the weekend before.. sorry, I've been a slacker) we went down to Bermagui for the weekend. We had a slow start and left Saturday morning and didn't arrive till nearly 4pm.
Cheese!! I wanted to stop here and try cheese .. maybe next time..
A crappy photo of the Wallaga Lake bridge, which was recently used as a film set for Angelina Jolie's upcoming movie "Unbroken". The bridge is meant to be in Japan!
When we arrived at Bellbird Cottage B&B we got out of the car and it was all BELLBIRDS! They were peeping all around the bush and it was a lovely welcome!
The B&B is delightful. They only rent out one (very large) room and it's downstairs and has its own entrance, so it's very private and has a wonderful bush outlook.
I was sitting on the toilet for this photo.. :)
On the first evening they bring down a cheese platter as a welcome, so it was lovely to sit and nibble cheese and look at the bush and listen to the bellbirds.
We chillaxed for a while before heading out. Unfortunately we were a little too late for the seaside fair, so we had a wander around Sculpture on the Edge.
This was probably my favourite - it's made with the tops of milk bottles and old bicycle tyres and has solar powered strings of led lights mingled through. I would love to have seen these at night.
Wandered down to the wharf to find some dinner. The cafe was booked out, so we got some fish and chips from the outside servery.
It was about 7:45 at this point, and there were fireworks scheduled for 8:45. It was threatening to storm on us, so we went and found somewhere that we could park with a view of the fireworks. This is the spot we found.
The fireworks were actually really good for a small country town
Had a pretty good night's sleep.
In the morning they brought down a fabulous breakfast with a yummy variety of food. In fact there was so much food we couldn't finish it all, and I packaged up the leftovers for our lunch!
Then it was off to meet up with some people at the beach. It had been raining in the morning and it did look a little miserable to start with, but the weather cleared into quite a nice day.
Came back to Bellbird Cottage and chillaxed and listened to the birds and sipped some wine. Lovely!
Then we met up with J&H and D at Il Passagio down at the wharf for dinner.
A very nice salt and pepper squid
Polenta chips - crispy and yummy
Quite a nice steak
Good panna cotta
The next morning was another amazing breakfast
Saying goodbye to Bellbird Cottage - we hope to be back one day!
Went via the foreshore to hack some portals
Stopped by some cliffs and took photos of birds
Scratching himself on the wing?
Stopped at the rather green Blue Pool.
And headed home via Cooma.
Stu fell in love with this place overlooking a beautiful valley and across to Brown Mountain.
Fred Piper Memorial Lookout. On a clear day you can see the ocean.
Glider south of Canberra
Hume Solar Farm
And then we were home. A bit tired from what seemed like two days of travelling, but it was lovely weekend nonetheless.
So what else has been happening?
On Tuesday night we went and tried the bar under A. Baker. We had a beer each, which were local beers. As we were sitting there I noticed a Clonkilla wine on the shelves. So I asked the bar tender if all the drinks there were Australian (excepting maybe the spirits of course). But he said that the majority of drinks were in fact Australian - certainly the wines and beers, and where possible from near the Canberra region. Even a lot of the spirts were Australian, although they did have some imports for the Scotches and Tequila. We'll have to go back some time and sample some other stuff.
After a drink we met up with Stu's old friend Katie in Dickson for dinner. We got a selection of bits and pieces that included dumplings and pork buns and peking duck.
Last night we went with Neil to the "Mapping our World" exhibit at the National Library. It was good but a bit too crowded - really hard to get up close to read the info boards. And it probably should have been called "Mapping Australia" because that's what it mostly focussed on. It finished off with a lot of Captain Cook and Matthew Flinders' maps of Australia.
Then we came home and watched The Shipping News.
I had a terrible week for sleeping. Sunday/Monday/Tuesday I simply couldn't get to sleep and was a zombie most of the week. On Wednesday I was desperate and took everything in the house that might help me sleep, including magnesium, a "sleep" vitamin pill, a valdoxan and a shot of scotch. It had the desired effect and I got to sleep very quickly for once. Although I woke up at 5am. Sigh. Thursday night after drinks was also much better, although woke up at 4am with hurty so that ruined that. Last night I finally got a good night's sleep - getting to sleep early and waking up late.
On the weekend I made two lasagnas in two nights.
The first was one I got out of a cookbook I bought recently - a salmon and zucchini lasagna. It turned out quite well, and the sweetie wanted seconds.
The ingredients laid out
And measured out
Assembling - layers of pasta, zucchini, salmon, and a ricotta/green onion/mint/white sauce mix
Cooked!
A rather delicious meal!
On Sunday night I ad-libbed with the other half of the pasta sheets. There was mushroom and lamb mince and bacon and cream in the fridge, so I put it all together.
All the ingredients
So top left is boiling water to cook the pasta sheets in - for about 30 seconds - til they soften and absorb a bit of water. Only do this as you're about to put them into the dish otherwise they'll stick together.
Top right is the "white sauce". Not a true white sauce. I sauteed two large portabella mushrooms (chopped finely) in some butter, then added about 300mL of cream and 300mL of milk with about three teaspoons of corn flour to thicken it. Let that simmer gently for a while. Add some cheese for more thickness.
Bottom left is the meat sauce. 500g packet of lamb mince, browned, then added a tub of tomato paste and some water, and some mixed herbs. Add some cheese for more flavour.
Then layer (top to bottom):
Mozzarella cheese/tasty cheese
Mushroom sauce
Pasta sheets
Cheese
Mushroom sauce
Meat sauce
Bacon
Pasta sheets
Cheese
Mushroom sauce
Meat sauce
Bacon
Pasta sheets
Cream
Bake for about half an hour
Oh my!! This thing was so amazing. But you might have noticed how much cheese I put into it - it was rather dripping in cheese fat. But maybe that's why it was soooo good!! :)
What's been happening.
At work I've been fighting a really weird network problem trying to figure out what the heck is going on and not getting anywhere.
Thursday night I watched Grease on tv. On Friday night we went to the Dumpling Inn for dinner then did our food shopping. Watched Se7en with the sweetie, although I was getting really tired by the end of it and was struggling to stay awake.
Saturday morning we went to Ellacure for breakfast. I had eggs benedict. Sadly the bacon was over cooked (is that even possible??) and the eggs a tad overdone too. Definitely not the best eggs benedict I've ever had. The waitresses were lovely and service was prompt, however the place was packed so it was forty minutes from arriving to getting our food.
Saturday night after dinner I went over to Kit's for drinks as she had a friend over. Stayed up a bit too late.
Today Potty and family came and picked me up and we all went out to the Hall Markets, which I'd never actually been to before.
Other than that, mostly jigsawing. Barely did any housework this weekend, although Stu achieved lots, so at least one of us had a productive weekend heh.
Friday night the little brother came to stay for the night before running a train to Sydney on Saturday. We watched the last episode of Sherlock (and he stayed up and watched All the President's Men).
Saturday morning Potty and the family came by to see all the Lego. I think they were impressed. They stayed for quite a while, so as soon as they left we got ready and headed out to the club. I finally took a few photos of Stonehenge off Macs Reef Road.
At the club we had a bit of a swim then chillaxed for a while before heading up for dinner. C&G did meat pies for Australia Day, and there was even some haggis for Robbie Burns' night.
For dessert we decorated four pavlovas
In the morning I finished dismantling the Lego I'd brought along, and did some work on a jigsaw in the club house before coming home in the afternoon.
A little later we headed out again to Mishi's for a games night (which is really just an excuse to sit around and eat and chat). We did actually play a game - the Logo Game I'd borrowed off DC. It was good, but the game play was a little confusing and we weren't quite sure how far we could go around the table each round. Mishi won that game.
Today was a super quiet day. The little brother came back on his train and dropped in for some lunch and a snooze before he went home (and he fixed the broken fan switch in our bathroom and wired up our aerial system a bit better, but sadly one of the light switches in the caravan is playing up again). I just played with Lego for the afternoon. Tonight we watched The Hunger Games: Catching Fire.
And all too soon the weekend is over..
It's very hot. So hot the fish tanks have been overheating. The lights are off, the lids are off, but the four foot is over 30C in the water - too hot for little fishies! I've been adding ice as fast as I can make it but the weekend could be problematic, since there's no letup for at least two days. Stressed ..
So 2013. Busy year!
We saw in 2013 with a small pool party at our place with Nat and Andrew and also Steve for a while.
We did a bit of travelling this year.
In January we went up the coast to South West Rocks to a school reunion of sorts for Stu and to visit Stu's dad. We drove up and down the coast, swam, visited Trial Bay Gaol, and caught up with Fiona and Margie on the way home.
We only managed to get to the coast once this year, in May. It was somewhat of a disaster with the spa being too cold on Friday night and too hot on Saturday night and a few other things that made it all a bit unpleasant (except for during the day on Saturday which was pretty good). Almost went again later in the year but had to go to Sydney and otherwise we've just been too busy.
We went to Queensland in July for a lovely long weekend to visit Chay and David.
At the end of July we flew up to Sydney for my Dad's 70th and one of my 40th parties (see below).
In October we decided at the last minute to go to Hong Kong for a week at the end of October. It was a great week, even if a little too humid. It's the most spontaneous holiday I've ever taken. I didn't do too much planning for it, because the more I researched, the more things I found of interest to see. So I stopped researching altogether and we took it as it came.
At work I had a mostly good year. I started off the year cleaning and pretty much cleaned all year. I started with the knowledge base articles for our team, then moved onto the log transfer system, then the load balancers. I also rehashed an old domino database for documentation which brought back a lot of memories of my last job. For the rest of the time it mostly felt like I was the "goto" person for any and all problems that came along. We were partly restructured, but the powers that be didn't really have a clear idea of what they wanted, so things didn't change as much as we originally thought they would. I made Stu drag out his tuxedo again for the work ball which was a lot of fun.
Healthwise I felt like I was sick the whole first half of the year - with colds in January, March, April, May and June. So that was pretty horrible. Not flus though, just annoying colds. Got another one the night before we went to Hong Kong too - yay :( But have been ok otherwise.
We had a super busy social year this year. In fact it was so busy that we went from May to September without having a free Saturday night. As a consequence our Buffy and Angel watching was almost non-existent. There were plenty of visits to/from Annie and Potty and the families. Various people came over for dinner and/or swims at the beginning of the year. Nat and Andrew came over a few times, as well as Andrew by himself when Nat was travelling. There were various after works drinks with my colleagues and Stu's and family and friends. Various Singstar/Mario Kart nights were had. Several BBQs at @CLBradley's. Several games nights at Mishi's. Had a video night at our place with work people. We visited people for lunches/dinners such as Matt and Helen, Andrew and Jen, Chris and Geoff, Josh and Ally, Windy and Nanette etc. We saw Daniel and Fi a few times when they came down. Several people came to stay including David and Yvonne, Ken and Jeanine, Fiona a couple of times and Stu's old school friend Tom. I met up with @StuartCRyan a few times in Sydney (we met in real life for the first time at my birthday). I also went to visit David in Junee.
Speaking of birthdays, I turned forty this year. To celebrate I had *three* great parties - one in Sydney, a big one at home the Saturday before my birthday, then a big lunch at work on my birthday followed by a nice dinner and seeing Phantom of the Opera. I was certainly in a different place mentally for my fortieth. During the whole run-up to my thirtieth I was very depressed, and my actual birthday was pretty meh. Such a different story this year though.
In sadder news, my Nana died of old age earlier in the year. And then I found out at the funeral that I have another cousin that I'd never heard about before!
Also in sad news, my father got diagnosed with a brain tumour in March. He had surgery immediately (and they had to cancel a holiday to New Zealand), followed by chemo and radiotherapy. Unfortunately it didn't really help, and he was hospitalised in July because he kept falling over and wasn't able to walk properly. He's been getting progressively worse and has been in a nursing home since September. In August I started going up to Sydney fairly regularly to see Dad and help Mum with the mammoth task of clearing out the garage and workshop. We've mostly been sorting things so far as I don't want to get rid of things until Dad goes. Fortunately I've been able to work out of the Sydney office so not having to take leave at the moment.
We've been enjoying a lot of visits to our little social club. We camped there over the Australia day long weekend, and the new tent survived a storm and massive downpour fairly well. But then a caravan came up for sale, so we bought it! We went to most of the club nights during the year, and plenty of other times as well. It's Stu's little get-away-from-the-world place and he thoroughly enjoys it.
With work people or the sweetie, tried out a few new restaurants. Continued going to Black Pepper for brunches and also Pulp Kitchen a few times. Went to Dumpling Inn a few times and Bella Vista as well. Didn't try too many desserts this year, although did make a Mars Bar slice and a peppermint rocky road, as well as an apple crumble and caramel slice that we tried at the club.
We bought another four baby angels for the angel tank. One died but the other three survived, so now have four angels and about seven danios in that tank. We got a lovely little betta for the macquarium, but he never thrived and died in six weeks. So thinking I'll probably give the macquarium away. The four foot still has a school of duboisis, two multies, a lelupi and a J.transcriptus. There's three multis downstairs, but after breeding once, the single baby I saw disappeared and haven't seen any since. There's still three or four quite old kribs downstairs as well.
Not much Lego action this year. I did get a cute little plane from Fiona, and a small City set from Ric for my birthday. I went with Nat and Andrew to Brick Expo, but was very frustrated with the crowds. I dismantled the Millennium Falcon which had been out for four years! Also over the Christmas break got to sort out and build all of Jake's lego which has been fun.
I did a lot of jigsaws this year. Mostly downstairs until downstairs got too cold. Mostly little ones, but also another section of the huge "Life" puzzle. Gave up on the skies of two jigsaws because their quality was just too poor.
I celebrated my tenth blogiversary this year. To mark the occasion I upgraded to Movable Type 5. But got very frustrated with the fact that I now cannot SSH to my host. Also with Movable Type which is *very* buggy. Next year my domain is up for renewal and I'm thinking about moving my domain to a new host with a new blogging platform. But the whole idea is pretty scary, so we'll see about that...
Shows
Movies
Not many movies this year either...
Books
Other stuff
So that's the end of 2013. New Year's Eve will be spent out at the club with food and booze and friends and fairy lights and fireworks :)