Results matching “Weekend”

Snow, take two!

It wasn't on the plan to go skiing two weekends in a row - but the trip a week ago had actually been planned for a week prior.  And this one was pre-paid, so I couldn't get out of it.  Which considering how sick I was on Friday was not such a good thing.  So I went along, thinking I'd have to take it easy as I doubted I'd be able to breathe.

Got up at the same time, had a bit of breakfast, and Steve gave me a lift to the bus stop.  Coach was a little delayed, and got progressively more delayed as we waited for people.  We got to Bullock's Flat just before nine o'clock, however we arrived just after all the other coaches.  So it was absolute chaos in the rental shop.  They rushed us through getting boots, then we stood for forty minutes queuing for skis.  It was an absolute nightmare, I'll definitely not be doing that again.  I'll do what I've done previously - drive myself, have brekky in Cooma, hire gear in Cooma or Jindabyne and rock up all casual like for an early Ski Tube.  

So managed to get on the 10am Ski Tube and went straight up to Blue Cow where I went and got breakfast.  I figured if I had breakfast at 10:30am I wouldn't need to stop for lunch.  (Steve caught the 9:20 Ski Tube)

Ski Tube
Ski Tube

Had a couple of runs on Pleasant Valley by myself, then down Roller Coaster and up the Ridge Quad, where I met up with Steve and Al.  Did a couple of runs each on Side Saddle and Zali's.  Then they went off to get some lunch, and I went back to Pleasant Valley to get my confidence back (which I lost a bit on those scary blue runs ;) ).

Pleasant Valley lift
Pleasant Valley
Top of Pleasant Valley
Top of Pleasant Valley

Met up with Steve and Al again and we did Pleasant Valley and Roller Coaster and Side Saddle and I think Zali's again.  Then we did Excelerator (!)  Managed to do well enough until right near the bottom where I stacked it in front of the lift queues - doh!!  That was my fourth and final stack of the day, so didn't do too badly.

Al and Steve on Summit Quad
Al and Steve
Blue Cow
Blue Cow
Steve at the top of Excelerator
Steve

So then meandered our way back through Blue Cow, Pleasant Valley, Copperhead Road, up the Pretty Valley lift and back down to Front Valley.  By this time it was nearly 4pm and they wanted us on the 4:12 Ski Tube back down, so I called it a day.  

Front Valley
Front Valley
So the day actually was pretty good after a grumpy start.  I got boots that were the same make as last week, and in fact a size smaller (25.5 instead of 26.5) and yet these ones weren't as uncomfortable as the ones last week which really hurt my legs where they squeezed tight around my lower legs.  Didn't spend as long on the snow, but then didn't get as exhausted either.  The conditions were a lot better, although that meant the snow wasn't as good - getting slushy in places and icy in others.  This and last weekend were the first times I'd ever been to the snow on a weekend - I've always only gone midweek before.  But the queue lengths weren't really any worse.  The Ridge Quad late morning had a ten minute wait, but everything else was quite quick.

Coach ride back was pretty uneventful, and even managed to doze a little - after my coughing fit.  For some reason I didn't cough too much during the day, and didn't feel short of breath either - go figure!  It did catch up with me somewhat yesterday day though.  Starting to feel better now finally.

Fondue for two..

To all those people who keep not coming over, this is what you've been missing out on ;)

Fondue for two
Fondue for two
On account of having been stood up two weekends in a row, we decided we'd do our own fondue anyway.  It was fricken awesome! ;)  Altho I did mean we ate over half a block of chocolate each .. oops!! ;)

Here endeth the weekend

Had a fairly quiet morning.  Got quite a lot of rss feed items read.  Was under five hundred unread tonight, which is quite an achievement!

After lunch went over to Pauline's so Stu could fix up their new net connection.  While I helped do a jigsaw :)

Scott and Kerry and Jake came over for dinner and Wii.  Did lots of roast veggies, and my potato bake was almost entirely gobbled up .. so much for leftovers ;)

Could use three day weekends more often...

Rebecca, Charlie and Inner Space

I finished reading Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier last week.  I actually had to read this book in high school in about year 10.  It was probably one of the better books we read in high school, and I quite enjoyed reading it a second time.  Although to be honest I have no idea why she fell in love with him.  Maxim is distant and aloof at the beginning of the book - someone you might possibly have a crush on but not someone you could actually easily love.  Meh.  I probably threw out all my notes on the book from high school before I moved to Canberra, so can't look at what sort of work we had to do on it.  Oh well.

Finished Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl last week.  And then saw the second half of the movie again after having read the second half of the book.  So that was pretty cool.  

Finished reading Inner Space by Nathan Elliot today.  I really loved the movie, seeing it when it first came out at the movies.  In fact when I saw the movie I had absolutely no idea what it was about, just that it was by Steven Spielberg so was likely to be good.  So I picked up the book at a book fair last year.  The book is actually pretty boring.  Well not boring in terms of story line - but that's all it is - just a narration of the movie.  It doesn't add anything to it, and apart from a few very tiny differences, is identical to the movie. Identical is fine, but a little character development to add some interest wouldn't have gone astray.  This is basically just a kids book.  

Three books finished in a week.. scary..!

Oh, just remembered I read Fantastic Mr Fox by Roald Dahl at the weekend too (yes, reading through the box set I got a while back, in chronological order :) )

Lamb

Since I got most of what I wanted to do this weekend done yesterday, today I was free to do whatever I pleased.  Of course that really just meant I could sort out my hard drives :/  

Late this arvo we took some of the remaining beer out to Yass, and Annie did a yummy slow cooked lamb.  And then we watched Master Chef where the main ingredient was lamb! Woot! :)

Ate and drank far too much this weekend .. oops...

Shop at home

On the weekend we thought we'd give Coles shop at home a go.

We weren't really sure what we were doing, so just thought we'd stock up on some of our staples and non-perishable stuff.

Good points:
  • can shop at own pace, from home, no crowds, online - the way we like to deal with people (or not ;) )
  • pricing shows price per unit on different products, and you can sort by that too.  This is actually really cool and saves having to calculate it in the shop
Bad points:
  • you can't read product labels.  All you get is a picture.  So you can't see the ingredients, which means we have to stick with what we know
  • too many plastic bags! (ten for this shop - cause can't use green bags obviously)  Far too many bags than we'd ever get through. 
  • fresh stuff came cold but don't know how much I'd trust things like ice cream
  • we still need to do fruit and veg shopping every week (but can go to the markets for that)
  • can't just browse and see what's available easily
So we may do it from time to time, but we'll need to build up a repertoire of "safe" food, and better plan the shops so don't forget things and have to go to the supermarket anyway!

Weekends go by too fast...

And here ends another weekend :/

Our cherry tree that last weekend was mostly all yellow leaves, had lost just about all its leaves by this weekend..

Naked cherry tree

Still lots of colour on some of the other trees

Autumn glory

This afternoon we went to the Belco markets for our fruit and veg, and a hot chocolate. 

Belco markets

Belco markets

Belco markets

Belco markets

There was a nice doggie there
Belco markets

I had to perform surgery on my toaster oven today.  The rivet holding the door on a spring snapped off, so had to pull the thing apart and reattach the door to the spring.  Hopefully this mechanism won't jam as much as the rivet used to.

Broken rivet

Tonight Stu cooked some brussel sprouts with a hazelnut in burnt butter sauce.  Was surprisingly delicious.  But after watching Master Chef we were still hungry, so I fried some portabella mushrooms in butter - yummm :)

Weekends definitely go by too fast.. *sigh*

Weekend away

Had rather a late start on Saturday.  We headed out around 12pm to do our shopping, but of course being Anzac Day, shops weren't open til 1pm.. not even Coles (which I thought might have opened round 12).  So had to waste a bit of time before doing our shopping.  Stocked up on supplies, came home, got ready, and eventually headed out the door round 3:50pm. 

Had a nice easy drive down to the coast, arriving just after 6pm.  Whereupon it was decided it was beer o'clock.  We cooked a store-bought quiche for dinner (I mustn't have been with real men ;) ).  Eventually got in the spa and stayed there for the next five or so hours.  Ooops.  :)  DC mostly kept up with me drinking-wise.  Not quite, but I was still impressed :)

Quiche (3.6 servings per package??? who divides quiches up like that??)

Bottlecaps Mine, DC's and Stu's efforts (one Quadruppel beer is the same alcohol content as two heinekens)

Sunday was a bit of a sleepin (as you do).  Spent a good chunk of the day doing a jigsaw of Neil's.  And later played some Super Mario Galaxy.  It was ok, but was really only one player so not as much fun (oh, played a bit of Lego Star Wars too, but really don't *get* it). 

Malua Bay

Dinner was a lamb roast with lots of veggies, and our wedding cake for dessert.  And a Mount Majura Pinot Gris, which was very fruity.  Watched Mythbusters and Iron Chef and Rockwiz and then fell asleep when Dave put on Keating the Musical.  So abanoned that and got in the spa.  Where we turned off the lights and sat and just watched all the stars.  Was extraordinarily pretty.  Stu and Dave saw the same shooting star, but I missed out :(  Was determined to stay there til I saw one, but in the end Dave wanted Ben to get some sleep, so I got booted :)

Today we played some Mario Kart, went for a walk then cleaned up, and left for home.  Dumped our stuff then headed straight back out again, this time to Ding's for a very civilised dinner.  He'd been cooking up a storm all afternoon - he did a pretty amazing paella with mussells and calamari and prawns and crab and chicken and saffron.  Jo also did a highly nomorific salad.  Definitely ate far too much :)  And had some Mount Majura Pinot Noir.  And then there was dessert.  !!  Definitely need to have more dinner parties.  Need to get a dining table...

Anyways.  So that was the weekend.  Think I need a weekend to recover from my weekend...

Snippets

  • work was very unsettling this week
  • had to go in to rebuild a server last night.. was very sleepie, but at least the overtime money will be good
  • on call again.  One week in three is too often IMHO
  • watched STIV: The Voyage Home tonight.  One of my favourite Star Trek movies.  It was more similar to the book than the other movies had been, but there was still more detail about some things in the book
  • house is a mess, hope to clean it up somewhat this weekend
  • cooked a yummy pasta dinner tonight with these scrummy portabella mushrooms
  • we need a real server that we can attach the skype phone to and have decent storage
  • Stu needs new batteries for his UPS