Casa de Amor

Resurrecting the Dead???

2007-06-17T16:58:00.000+10:00

So, if I'm contemplating blogging on this blog am I contemplating too much? Would I be better off starting afresh on a new blog and letting this one RIP? Not sure but I'll keep thinking about it. Will be back to let you know what I decide... :)

ETA: Okay I'm back. It didn't really take long to realise that it's better to let sleeping dogs lie so I've started a rough draft blog with no fancy template just an ugly green blogger format but it's started and we can evolve from there. If you care to take a gander the link is: http://rachelscommentsonlife.blogspot.com/

Photos! (About time I hear you say . . . )

2006-07-11T20:56:00.000+10:00

This is Shelby in the early days when she was still grumpy at us all for dragging her out of her 24/7 sauna.

She's since forgiven us for this, on the condition that we provide her with food and accommodation free of charge.

We've also taken her out to social outings with us, which I think is rather generous.

However, all that said, I do think it was this maroon nappy that won Queensland the State of Origin (Shelby was wearing it during the Decider), so we're pretty happy about that.

Nocturnal Stupidity

2006-07-05T15:04:00.000+10:00

You'll find that if you have a newborn baby, you'll spend the first few weeks predominantly involved in the following activity: trying to work out why your baby is crying.

Babies cry for a number of reasons.

The usual reason is hunger: they're letting you know that their stomach (that starts out the size of a marble and increases slowly over the next few weeks) is empty.

The next most usual reason is wind: this usually comes straight after a feed and requires a bit of back-slapping and other weird gymnastics to get them to burp.

The next most usual reason is their nappy: they don't usually enjoy having a soggy nappy on.
After that, the reasons get many and varied, and can be things like: they're in pain, they're tired and cranky, they're uncomfortable, they're too hot, etc.

Anyway, generally, if they're crying, if you go through the following three step process - 1) Feed 2) Burp 3) Change - you will be able to stop most babies crying.

You'd think three steps would be fairly straightforward.

Not at 2.00 in the morning when you're tired.

During 45 minutes of constant grizzling from Shelby, we alternated between feeding (by Rach) and burping (by both of us), until we suddenly thought of changing Shelby's nappy. Lo and behold, it was very soggy. we changed the nappy . . . and all of a sudden, we changed the baby.

Well, for the next three hours anyway.

I'd like to think we learned from this little lesson, but we probably didn't.

Two Weeks Later

2006-06-30T10:01:00.000+10:00

G'day all. It's now two weeks since Shelby entered the world, and life is still chaotic . . . If I was to describe life with a newborn, I would say that it is a rather dreamlike state. The past - that rather tame life of 'just us" before she was born seems a long time ago and kind of distant. The future - that time (hopefully) when she'll be walking, talking, becoming a teenager, possibly getting married - seems incredibly distant. So you're just left with the present. Which consists of minimal (and interrupted) sleep, changing nappies, and a vague sensation that the house looks like a mess.

There's emotions, frustration, tears - but for an hour or two every day, Shelby opens her eyes, and you see those very small but very dark blue eyes looking at you. And, oddly enough, when that happens, it all seems worth it.

But as Rach and I both agreed, it's actually rather lucky that babies are difficult to look after when they're little, otherwise, you'd never want them to grow up at all.

On a more objective note, Shelby is doing quite well and healthy. Not that that matters, because I'd look after her even if she was sick. But it's nicer that she's healthy.

The name Shelby . . . despite its origins in a Christian romance novel (which I only discovered after Shelby was born) . . . has turned out to be a bit of a winner and nobody has given us strange looks when we introduce her to people.

The Waiting is Over

2006-06-13T13:27:00.000+10:00

And, ladies and gentlemen, it is a girl.

Shelby Alyse Hodge

Weight: 7 lbs 8 oz

Born: 3.02 a.m., Tuesday 13th June

Need I say more?

Children

2006-06-11T14:48:00.000+10:00

I am currently reading For the Children's Sake by Susan Schaeffer Macaulay. It is such a fascinating and thought-provoking book on how educating a child looks and should be. I really encourage anyone who has influence over a child at any stage to read it. It truly makes you rethink the way we view children.

I just have to share this beautiful quote I found this afternoon.

***

"The Christian view of the child does not allow him to be conditioned as a dog may be conditioned to repond to a bell. We must have due respect for the sacredness of his separate personality. Therefore, we treat him with dignity, allowing for his weakness and need of support at any given stage."

***

And one more quote:

***

"We, each one, whatever our age, intelligence, or sex, have the responsibility of acting within the definite framework given in God's Word. Since Jesus Christ's early work, nobody is to act as a priest for anybody. And the Holy Spirit is the One who works deeply into our personal lives. We must never presume to usurp His work. It is dangerous to think that we are entitled to do so because we are parents, family, teachers, church workers, or adults. "

***

All too often we hear of child training methods that are touted as Christian which are based on "behaviouristic" methods and involve setting up a child to fail and then punishing them for failing. Too too sad. Children are mini-people that have less life experience than we as adults and should be treated with respect and love.

***

P.S. Tomorrow is D-day but I truly doubt Baby H will be making his/her debut appearance so don't hold your breath and DON'T say anything smart like, "You still here?" "How are you GOING?" "What? No baby yet?" or the ever clever and all knowing, "It'll be late." My hormones might get the better of me and I might say something snarky like, "Yes, don't you like having me here?" or "I'm actually in pain and think I'm about to deliver could you be midwife?" or "No we're waiting on the birth of a hamster didn't you know that?" "Late? Oh no does that mean it'll miss all it's birthday parties? Oh dear how terrible!"

Thoughts on Becoming a Father

2006-06-09T21:22:00.000+10:00

I just realised that in the midst of all these blood tests and big questions, I hadn't really written about what my thoughts were about becoming a father.

It's strange . . . before Rach was pregnant, I was rather petrified by the whole idea.

Where's the money going to come from?

Will I make a good father?

Do we need to move out of the unit and into a house?

Where's the money going to come from?

Is Rach going to turn into a round balloon that wears sack dresses all day and never wears makeup?

Is she going to become so focused on the baby that I'll be just the guy who pays the bills and empties the recycling?

Where's the money going to come from?

Will I ever be able to go out somewhere ever again?

Will "spare time" be a ludicrous concept?

Because I like having "spare time" (e.g. watching a DVD every now and again, reading a chapter of a book, listening to some music, going for walks), does this mean that I'm way too selfish and I'm in for the shock of a lifetime?

Where's the money going to come from?

Anyway, oddly enough, once I laid eyes on the famous double stripes, none of that seemed to bother me any more. I thought it might hit me later on and it was delayed shock, but I've only got a few days to go and I'm not worried yet.

The reason? I can only put it down to the fact that God has never failed to look after me. Sure, I've had disappointments, and life hasn't always gone the way I wanted. And I'm sure Rachel would say the same thing. But, the important things we need in this world - clothing, housing, food, friends - have never been lacking. So, on those grounds, and also the promises that God makes to look after His children, it's been enough for me.

I'll worry another day, maybe. But not today.

Three days to go . . .

Three Years, Too Many Pancakes

2006-06-07T21:48:00.000+10:00

Yes, today, narrowly missing 06/06/06, is 07/06/06, which happens to be the date of our third wedding anniversary.

We celebrated in somewhat limited style (we didn't really want to go away anywhere with a baby around the corner) by eating too many pancakes at Pancakes on the Rocks. But they were GOOD pancakes.

The secret to surviving three years of marriage?

From Rachel: "Remember that it takes two to tango. Be honest. Talk about everything: the good, the bad and the ugly."

From me: Be ruthless.

And on that note, this is a good time to remind our readers . . . that we have FIVE sleeps to go.

Before we have to start counting in negative sleeps, that is.

Big Question of the Year

2006-06-06T17:24:00.001+10:00

I'm usually pondering over something at most times of the day, and there have been many different and varied things to ponder in this most life-changing of years.

One of the questions that has kept me occupied for the last year or so has been this one:

How do you serve God by being a property statistician?

It's not necessarily the easiest question to find answers on.

If you're a minister or a missionary, then it's fairly easy to know how you serve God. If you're a secretary to a minister, it's also easy to answer the question.

Being a Christian doctor seems to be an acceptable option.

But a Christian property statistician?

How does one do that?

I have heard that I can meet non-Christian people and tell them about Jesus. Which is certainly a worthwhile thing and would definitely serve God.

However, what about the other 99% of the time, when I'm doing property statistics? Is my problem that I should be making it less 99% statistics, 1% Jesus conversations and perhaps a bit more 80% stats, 20% Jesus convos?

How low can this ratio go before I get the sack?

In other news . . . six days to go.

Blood Test 2006: Four Vials and a Getaway Driver

2006-06-05T14:03:00.000+10:00

Things turn full circle.

Had my annual blood test yesterday - which some of you may remember from last year as being one of my least fun experiences of 2005. While still not my favourite thing to do on a Saturday morning, I've got to hand it to the nurse on duty at Beverly Hills Pathology: it was the best blood test I've ever had.

I wasn't looking forward to this one. This is a 12-hour starvation test and last year, after surviving the test, I briskly walked two blocks to get the homeward-bound bus, arrived at the bus stop, and promptly felt woozy. (I think I used up all my blood sugar on the trip home.)

However, this time I suitably calmed myself down and made sure Rach came along as my getaway driver. . . . and brought something to eat afterwards.

My secret to getting through the test this time . . . .

Inane conversation.

As she's sticking the needle in: "What's your name? I'm Matthew." [It didn't occur to me as I said this, that she'd just seen my name on the actual pathology request from the doctor, my Medicare card, and asked me how to spell it on the FOUR vials that she pulled out in front of me before I lay down.]

However, she was very nice and played along. "I'm Susan."

"Oh, do you normally work here? I don't think I've seen you on duty before."

"No, I'm normally at St. George Hospital."

"Public?"

"Yes."

"That's where my wife is having her baby! It's due in a few days time . . ."

Etc. Etc. You can laugh, but it worked. Afterwards, I managed to get to hold my vials while I checked that she'd spelled my name correctly and my date of birth. I'm not sure why, but I actually found it rather satisfying looking at vials of my own blood.

In other news . . . This time next week is the due date (June 12th).

Stay tuned.

Children Learn What They Live

2006-05-10T15:09:00.000+10:00

Well, we are into count down mode over here! Only 4.5 weeks until our little one's estimated due date so we could be holding a baby in our arms anytime in the next 2-7 weeks!!! Looking forward to it with great anticipation!

Just surfing the web lately and found this lovely poem that I want to save for future reference. Maybe even one day I'll find a nice print copy of it to hang in our home or something.

Children Learn What They Live

If a child lives with criticism,

he learns to condemn.

If a child lives with hostility,

he learns to fight.

If a child lives with ridicule,

he learns to be shy.

If a child lives with shame,

he learns to feel guilty.

If a child lives with tolerance,

he learns to be patient.

If a child lives with encouragement,

he learns confidence.

If a child lives with praise,

he learns to appreciate.

If a child lives with fairness,

he learns justice.

If a child lives with security,

he learns to have faith.

If a child lives with approval,

he learns to like himself.

If a child lives with acceptance, and friendship,

He learns to find love in the world.

(sourced from: http://jennifersdreams.com/inspirations/children.html)

Heartbeats

2005-12-21T00:13:00.000+11:00

Heartbeats are the proof that someone is alive...right?

Well, Matthew & I heard the heartbeat of a little someone tonight and it was the coolest sound ever! :)

For those of you who hadn't already heard Baby H is estimated to arrive sometime around the 12th of June, 2006 and we are all very excited!

84 Charing Cross Rd & The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street

2005-10-15T15:33:00.000+10:00

As someone who reviewed this book on Amazon.com said "I really can't say why I really enjoyed this book but I did."

The basic gist of the story is that this female author in New York called Helene Hanff writes to a rare and secondhand book shop in London to order some books. Over time she corresponds with this man Frank and for about 20 years they write back and forwards sharing more than just books. It's not a romance because Frank is a married man and Helene gets to know his wife as well but it's a special story as they form a strong friendship and so forth. Helene really wants to visit London but her plans don't seem to come together and then 20 years after the letter writing friendship started the London Bookshop's secretary writes to tell Helene that Frank has died suddenly. And that's where 84 Charing Cross Rd pretty much ends.

The Duchess of Bloomsbury St (which in my borrowed version of 84 Charing Cross Road is in the same volume as they're both very short) is the sequel and is Helene's journal/diary of her eventual trip to London and her thoughts and experiences whilst there.
It's just one of those fun stories. Perhaps it's because Matt & I became such good friends via letter writing that I enjoyed it so much or is it that romantic notion that we can be close friends with people we've never met? Anyway, I recommend this book. It will take very little time to read as it's so short. Let me know if you do read it and what you think of it! :) (Oh and I have ordered the DVD of 84 Charing Cross Road which Anthony Hopkins plays in and apparently it makes the book even better....I shall let you know if that's so when it arrives. :))

Gottschalk

2005-10-14T17:23:00.000+10:00

This probably belongs on the Arts page, but what the heck. I was in the library last week and decided to get out a CD by Louis Moreau Gottschalk. The last time I'd heard Gottschalk was probably 10 years ago, when I heard some of his music on the radio. I remembered it being kind of catchy, but I'd never got around to chasing him up since then.

Anyway, for those of you who don't know (and most people don't . . .) Gottschalk was an America pianist back in the 1800s. He was quite a virtuoso apparently, but what made him really stand out was that he drew on a lot of his background in Louisiana and created music with Cuban/French Louisiana influences, with lots of syncopated rhythms, a good 50 years before jazz or ragtime was around.

It's amazingly catchy stuff and I've been wandering around all week listening to it. The main difficulty is trying to stop myself bouncing when I'm walking and listening to it, because that's a bit embarrassing in public.

Sleeping Outdoors

2005-10-10T17:11:00.000+10:00

I'm a great fan of afternoon naps (short ones, mind you). I'm also one of those people who are game enough to go for lunchtime naps.

However, I found out that springtime is well and truly here because I had a sleep outside in a park in North Sydney, and my face is now kind of sunburned . . .

Note to self: In shade, or put on sunscreen . . .

Some dumb tourists....

2005-10-08T16:41:00.000+10:00

Matt's Dad sent us these today. Found them rather amusing. Hope they tickle your funny bone too. :)

The questions below about Australia are from potential visitors.

They were posted on an Australian Tourism Website and the answers (some times brilliant) are the actual responses by the website officials, who obviously have a sense of humour.

Q: Does it ever get windy in Australia? I have never seen it rain on TV, how do the plants grow? (UK).
A: We import all plants fully grown and then just sit around watching them die.

Q: Will I be able to see kangaroos in the street? (USA)
A: Depends how much you've been drinking.

Q: I want to walk from Perth to Sydney - can I follow the railroad tracks? (Sweden)
A: Sure, it's only three thousand miles, take lots of water.

Q: Is it safe to run around in the bushes in Australia? (Sweden)
A: So it's true what they say about Swedes.

Q: Are there any ATMs (cash machines) in Australia? Can you send me a listof them in Brisbane, Cairns, Townsville and Hervey Bay? (UK)
A: What did your last slave die of?

Q: Can you give me some information about hippo racing in Australia? (USA)
A: A-fri-ca is the big triangle shaped continent south of Europe. Aus-tra-lia is that big island in the middle of the Pacific which doesnot... oh forget it. Sure, the hippo racing is every Tuesday night in Kings Cross. Come naked.

Q: Which direction is North in Australia? (USA)
A: Face south and then turn 180 degrees. Contact us when you get here and we'll send the rest of the directions.

Q: Can I bring cutlery into Australia? (UK)
A: Why? Just use your fingers like we do.

Q: Can you send me the Vienna Boys' Choir schedule? (USA)
A: Aus-tri-a is that quaint little country bordering Ger-man-y, which is...oh forget it. Sure, the Vienna Boys Choir plays every Tuesday nightin Kings Cross, straight after the hippo races. Come naked.

Q: Can I wear high heels in Australia? ( UK)
A: You are a British politician, right?

Q: Are there supermarkets in Sydney and is milk available all year round? (Germany)
A: No, we are a peaceful civilization of vegan hunter/gatherers. Milk is illegal.

Q: Please send a list of all doctors in Australia who can dispense rattlesnake serum. (USA)
A: Rattlesnakes live in A-meri-ca which is where YOU come from. All Australian snakes are perfectly harmless, can be safely handled and makegood pets.

Q: I have a question about a famous animal in Australia, but I forget its name. It's a kind of bear and lives in trees. (USA)
A: It's called a Drop Bear. They are so called because they drop out of Gum trees and eat the brains of anyone walking underneath them.You can scare them off by spraying yourself with human urine before you go out walking.

Q: Do you have perfume in Australia? (France)
A: No, WE don't stink.

Q: I have developed a new product that is the fountain of youth. Can you tell me where I can sell it in Australia? (USA)
A: Anywhere significant numbers of Americans gather.

Q: Can you tell me the regions in Tasmania where the female population is smaller than the male population? (Italy)
A: Yes, gay nightclubs.

Q: Do you celebrate Christmas in Australia? (France)
A: Only at Christmas.

Q: I was in Australia in 1969 on R+R, and I want to contact the girl I dated while I was staying in Kings Cross. Can you help? (USA)
A: Yes, and you will still have to pay her by the hour.

Q: Will I be able to speak English most places I go? (USA)
A: Yes, but you'll have to learn it first.

Fundraising

2005-10-07T17:06:00.000+10:00

I can't remember if I told anyone this, but Rach and I are hoping to go to Vanuatu at the end of the year. The reason is that the Talua Ministry Centre (a Bible college over there) is building a library, and we're going over to help put it together.

So at the moment we're raising money to go over (that's a bit of a shameless plug, isn't it?).

Anyway, this was not meant to be an ad just so much as letting you know what travels are coming up in the future . . .

It should be very exciting, and we'll keep you posted closer to the date on what's going on. If you want to know more about it, we'll be happy to tell you about it . . .

The Creepy Stairs

2005-09-28T16:06:00.000+10:00

Saw a creepy, creepy ritual today.

Every morning when I go to work I catch the train to Town Hall.

I then walk up a flight of stairs to the platform above me where I catch the train from Town Hall to North Sydney.

As I walked up, there was a man and two women standing halfway up the flight of stairs. They weren't standing in front of me, just on the side of the stairs, facing the other side of the stairs. But I was thinking to myself, "Why are they standing there?"

After all, there are no trains that leave from halfway up the flight of stairs. If they want to catch a train downstairs, they could go downstairs. If they wanted to catch a train upstairs, they could go upstairs. None of these people looked particularly unfit, as if they would have trouble climbing the stairs in one go.

Anyway, I walked past them, looked back down, and by this time I saw a fourth woman walk up the stairs, stop, turn sideways and stand with her back again the rail like the others. So now there are four of these people standing halfway up the stairs, one on each step.

I'm thinking to myself, "What on earth is going on here?"

The North Sydney train drew up a couple of minutes later, and then all four of them, one at a time, made their way up the stairs and onto the train.

There was no sign at all that they knew one another or that they were imitating each other.
But I have NO idea why they did it.

Am I thick? Could somebody please fill me in on stair etiquette at Town Hall in case I'm missing something?

Because let me tell you . . . THOSE GUYS FREAKED ME OUT!

(Perhaps I've been watching too much Twin Peaks.)

I Did It My Way

2005-09-27T12:35:00.000+10:00

Those of you who know me well probably know that I'm a bit of a time management junkie. I'm always attracted to systems that can get me more organised, show me how to do more in less time, etc. etc.

However, I have now devised my own. It's specifically designed to organise my life and no one else's. It contains all the important things I should be doing (or am trying to do), my priorities for work, and outside life. And most importantly, it all fits on one A4 sheet of paper.

It mainly consists of checklists, 'cause I've always liked checking things off. I have, as yet, been unable to stick to it perfectly, but it does give some structure to the week. The problem is, as I look at it, is that I need to give some things up. I'm not sure I have the energy to do everything that is on my list.

But isn't this always the question - you're on the treadmill, you've run till it's going flat out, and you can't just jump off. (You'll hurt yourself.) You've got to keep running till it slows down, and then maybe you can get off. If you're lucky, you'll have time to think before jumping on it again.

I'm still trying to perfect the art of hitting the slow point, and then saying NO to jumping back on.

Old Dinosaur

2005-09-26T14:44:00.000+10:00

Well, I think I can finally wear my own old dinosaur badge. I have hit the age of 27, and something tells me that I should probably start acting like an adult.

Like all the time.

Maybe. We'll see how it goes.

Sorry about not blogging for ages, I've just been busy, and this blog is one of the hardest things to work up motivation for.

Not that things are any less busy at the moment, because the boss is away from work for five weeks and asked me to look after a few urgent things for him while he was away, which is making life busy.

But I'm over the flu, and things will hopefully be sensible in October.

Hope everyone else is keeping well also.

A Most Enjoyable Week

2005-08-23T21:17:00.000+10:00

Hi everyone,

Well, after a long absence, I'm happy to come back and say that I've had a really enjoyable last week. For three main reasons:

Reason 1. Sunday before last, I held a classical music appreciation afternoon at my house. A few people from church came over and we listened to Enescu's Romanian Rhapsody No. 1, Mozart's Violin Concerto No. 3 and Beethoven's Symphony No. 1.

I was testing a theory that I'd long held that if people actually understood the structure of classical pieces, and had some sort of outline to guide them through a piece, they'd be able to cope with a long piece of music, and actually enjoy it.

So, I write up special program notes that broke the pieces up into parts. So, for instance, if a movement is in sonata form, you have an introduction, first theme, second theme, repeat of first theme, repeat of second theme, development, recapitulation, and coda. I broke the music up into those segments, and marked them down with time notations corresponding with the time on the CD. So the audience, at any time, could check where they were up to on the piece of music.

Well, either they were all being polite, or it worked really well. Most people (a few of them self-confess musical Philistines) actually sat through a whole overture, concerto and symphony without falling asleep. I'm definitely going to try it again.

Reason 2. John Ottman, one of my favourite film score composers (he did The Usual Suspects and Apt Pupil, two of my favourite film scores) came to town for a Q & A. He was a real trooper and went for three hours, with just a 15 minute break and then stayed around to sign my CDs afterwards. A great guy, and I can only hope one day that they give him a different style of movie from the usual superhero and horror films that he gets at the moment. He's a really nice guy, too.

Reason 3. Last, but certainly not least, I caught up with my three groomsmen at the annual Briz Crowd AGM. This was held in Mooball, picked because of it's totally corny name. We probably could have stayed there for a week, but we would have run out of money.

Big Fridge, Warm Feet and Skating to Beethoven

2005-07-30T07:41:00.000+10:00

Hi all!

In this weeks' news . . .

Well, since last time I posted, I preached a sermon on 3 John at church last Sunday. I'm sure it could have been tweaked endlessly, but I was pretty happy with it. I think because the passage actually spoke to me. I think it would be a lot trickier to preach on something that I was a bit ho-hum about.

Also, in the news . . . God provided an awesome new fridge. It's 520 litres (which is just ridiculously massive), and it fits absolutely everything we could want in there. So that's great. And it makes Rachel really smily as well . . .

And to keep the smile there, she bought herself a pair of ugg boots this week on line because her old pair were a) falling apart and b) cheap imitations. So she's been quite happy with her new ones.

Finally, last night the youth group activity was ice skating. Never having been ice skating before, I was not looking forward to this.

And, sure enough, I spent the entire night clinging to the wall, falling over, twisting my ankle, wobbling and every other variation of crap skating that new skaters come up with.

I didn't get very far last night, but damn, I'm keen to try again. I've realised that a new life-long amibition of mine is probably going to be to ice skate to a Beethoven symphony. I don't care if I don't do anything fancy, but just to glide along listening to Beethoven would be awesome . . .

The Case of the Vanishing Keys

2005-07-20T21:59:00.000+10:00

Well, well, well....

I just made it home and we have proceeded to turn the house upside down only to realise that Matt's set of keys are NOT here!!!! So, we must presume that unless they have found a new "key hideout" they must've slipped out of his pocket whilst on the train to/from work yesterday! Interesting!

On the state of the house I am pleasently surprised. Apart from a load of washing, some dirty dishes the house is looking pretty good. The dead fridge is smelling particularly rotten but we hope to move it to a new home on the balcony tomrrow where it shall reside until the next council cleanup. RIP (or not!)

Report Re: State of the house

2005-07-19T20:01:00.000+10:00

Is to come shortly after I arrive home....Matt has locked himself out of the house and won't be able to get back in until I make it home tomorrow night with the keys (unless he stays around until the real-estate agent opens at 9am which he might if the place is looking terrible but I'm not sure!) Lol...wonder where he'll sleep tonight?

Injections, the Rise and Fall of the South, and a Death in the Family

2005-07-19T13:59:00.000+10:00

Hi there! The run-down on bacheloring so far:

Friday

Went to work. I remember that. Friday night was a bit of a blur, but that might have been the onset of starvation.

Saturday

Went to the doctor's to get an injection. Learned a new fact: apparently, the pain levels of the injection are dependent on whether they warm up the stuff they've injected into you. considering the doctor had just fetched this stuff straight out of a fridge, I'm not sure that I wanted to know that.

Got home in time for the South to rise and fall again in the lounge room. (Reviews soon to appear on the Arts page.)

Sunday

Death in the family.

Our fridge not only stopped keeping things cool, it started warming things up. Everything in the fridge section was warmer than the surrounding kitchen, and the freezer was rapidly defrosting.
With some careful juggling between the little downstairs fridge and a freezer that friends own a couple of blocks away, I managed to salvage some stuff.

I also went out and bought the new fridge that we'd been planning to buy. We didn't quite have enough money for it, but we were actually going to go out and see if we could haggle it down to the price we wanted next Saturday. I was forced into it a bit earlier than that.

However, I haggled and got it for the price I wanted. (Phew. Thank you, God!)

Anyway, in the process of cleaning out the old fridge, I discovered that Rachel is a Freezer Hoarder. Anything half eaten, no matter how small, was stored in the freezer. The problem was that it was FORGOTTEN in the freezer . . . who laments the four sticks of celery stored in a lunchbox all those many months ago? (Actually, who laments me - who copped flack from Rach for losing said lunchbox many months ago?) Who weeps for the small bag of grapes stored last spring?

Certainly not me. I chucked 'em in the bin. Ditto for said bits of green sludge in plastic bags. I don't know what it was in a previous life, but now it's just sludge.

That being done, I went back to work on the sermon, and managed to get to church on Sunday evening. I'm preaching on 3 John next week, and other people have been preaching on 1 and 2 John for the last two months. The funny thing about John is that every sermon sounds like it's on the same topic. Mine will be on the same kind of topic as well, but I think every sermon brings a slightly different viewpoint on the subject.

We'll see how it goes.

Monday

Back at work again. Day was fine, but uneventful. (Apart from lunch with Dave, which is always enjoyable.) Monday night, finished off the sermon.

Well, first draft anyway. I'll have a run-through with Kevin tonight (Tuesday).

And that's where I'm up to. Anything else exciting going on in anyone else's life?

Where Have I Been?

2005-07-14T23:03:00.000+10:00

A few people have asked me why I haven't been blogging. (Well, obviously, I've been blogging film reviews on the other page, but I haven't been blogging personal stuff on here.)

That's a fairly good question. I think it's because I tend to like to do things for effect. So I like to do something exciting, and then say, "Yes, well, I just did that." And blog about it. Like making my own news, really.

However, all of that is a bit fake. Because the last two months have really been spent finishing off (actually, I'm still working on some) jobs that I volunteered to do for other people. The things that are really important to me are kind of sitting in the background somewhere.

This is not making much sense, is it? To start where I left off last:

In case you hadn't heard, I am interested in working (in some capacity or other) in the classical music world. Anyone who's visited my Arts page or ever tried to pick a CD at our place would know that this is something that's really important to me.

At first, I was hoping that God would somehow miraculously open a door and that I'd find a full-time job in that industry that would still allow me to live on my current lifestyle and perhaps even pay more in the future.

God had a slightly different idea.

So I kind of stopped blogging around the same time. Perhaps I was hoping to jump on here and say, "Hey, you'll never guess what I'm doing now!"

But I'm not. In fact, the message from God seems to be that I'm to put my head down at my current work and do a good job for them. I haven't given up on the classical world, but I might have to do volunteer work for an orchestra or something like that.

However, I haven't really had time to think about that because what with leading on Winter Camp a while ago, working on the copywriting course my father gave me, writing the sermon that's due in just over a week at church, trying to put together a budget for the next six months, going away to visit friends in Kiama, an engagement party in Orange, my brother's 21st party in Brisbane (go Pete!), and, an event of my own making, eight hours of the Civil War in my lounge room on Saturday.

So, I've been feeling a bit like I've been treading water for the last couple of months. But perhaps that is the point of a blog, to jump on and tell you what I'm really thinking, not just the "edited for attempted humour" version.

So I'll see if I can work on it.

And, yes, the rumours are true . . . I'm bacheloring again. Rachel, faced with the prospect of eight hours of the Civil War in her lounge room, wisely decided that it was time to visit her parents in the outback, whom she hasn't seen for eight months. So she headed off today.
For the record, my meal tonight was pretty good. I had an apple and a couple of bananas for dinner. I know, it sounds a bit light on, but Cade and Lisa had chocolate biscuits at Bible study tonight, so that made up the other half of the nutritional spectrum.

I might be in a bind tomorrow when the apples run out, but I think there's still ice cream in the fridge. I'll see if I can get people to bring corn chips on the weekend as well. That'll provide a bit of vegetables. (Corn, you see.)

Meat . . . do I need meat? Hey, vegans live without it.

Who likes vegans, though?

I might buy some fish fingers. They're close enough to meat, I think. Or some meat pies. They're definitely meat. Talk to you later. Sermon beckons.

Matt HELP!

2005-07-13T10:00:00.000+10:00

I'm dying over here on me own....post something! :)

Oh and for everyone else I'm heading outback for 7 days tomorrow!!! YIPPEEEE!!!! Waaaay too long since October last year.

So, yes, wonder if Matt-the-bachelor can survive okay this time?? What's the votes? YES/NO

All comments will be noted and we shall compare notes on Matt's survival when I return. OK?

Good. Glad to have that sorted.

P.S. Matt shall not beg for food from others as he has plenty here to last him! ;)

I proved it....

2005-06-29T14:09:00.000+10:00

Woolworths beats Franklins in price....most of the time!

Follow the link to my LJ post about it:

http://www.livejournal.com/users/astrldec/30434.html

Just to Say Hi!

2005-06-18T10:30:00.000+10:00

I've just finished being a little nerdy and have added a few photos from the past year of marriage. Mostly photos we took while away on trips. Incase you wanna look the link is in our Photo Album!

Nothing much is new. I'm still inhaling books more than I'm inhaling websites. Books I currently have on the go are:

Created to be His Helpmeet by Debi Pearl
Christian Parenting & Childcare by Dr William & Dr Martha Sears
More with Less by Longacre

I hope to start Redeeming the Routines by Robert Banks & The Healer by Dee Henderson shortly.

Anyone read or heard of these books? What's your opinion and/or thoughts on them. I love to hear others opinions on books. Oh and if you run across any reviews on any of the books please post a link here. :) Thanks!

Well I'll be off to enjoy the rest of my Saturday!

The Big TWO

2005-06-07T14:44:00.000+10:00

Well, well, well, it's two years since a beautiful, sunny Saturday in Brisbane when a (slightly larger) Matt Hodge waited nervously up the end of a long aisle for a beautiful girl in white who pretty much floated down the aisle with a big grin on her face.

That's a long sentence, but, hey, it's a big memory.

I'm normally a gibberer when I get going, but I don't like to rave on about marriage too much because the longer I'm married, the more I realise that it is a game that takes a long while to get good at, and that you'll never perfect.

So, on this, our second anniversary, I have three thoughts:

1) Rachel, I love you very, very much, and you're still the perfect wife for me.

2) To those of you who are thinking about getting married, if you're not prepared to play ruthlessly, don't play.

3) To those of you I know who have been married many years, thank you. I'm watching you closely and I appreciate having role models such as yourselves.

Three Things

2005-05-24T07:05:00.000+10:00

Hi everyone,

After a long absence (so what's new on this page?), I've been thinking about three things lately. (Well, more than three, actually. I think three thoughts per fortnight is perhaps a little on the low side, at least for humans. But three thoughts that I'm going to blog about.)

1) You can't always tell what God is up to. This can be quite comforting before anything happens, because it's nice to know that whatever happens in life, it's God's plan. This can also be very cool after something happens, because you can say, "Whoa! Look at what God just did! That's awesome!" However, when you're in the middle of a transition (and who finds change enjoyable? I don't), it can sometimes be a real test of patience wondering how things are going to turn out.

But this I do know: God is good. He will do what He wills, and it will be good. If we follow Him, the rest of the details will fall into place. More on this later.

2) Much less seriously, I have issues with the Fair Trade Coffee poster. It says, "Is Your Coffee Dumping on Someone Else?" And then it goes on to have a spiel about how bad low-wage coffee is and what it's doing to poor farmers in Africa. Now, this is fine. But . . . the poster shows Colin Firth having coffee poured all over him.

Now what the heck does Colin Firth have to do with free-trade coffee? If you buy slave-labour coffee, you're dumping over some poor coffee farmer in a third world country, not Colin Firth. He's not going to be disadvantaged at all if you buy sweatshop coffee. If he's upset about the issue, why couldn't they just take a photo of him drinking coffee from a fair-trade coffee plantation (He could be the next Kamahl!) . . . I'm not sure I get contemporary advertising.

3) I've got issues with hairdressers who guilt-trip you. When I go for a haircut, I pay my money like everybody else. I should be able to get my hair cut in peace without feeling bad.

However, the first question I get is, "How long since your last hair cut?"

What kind of question is this? Does it matter? Figuring that she was trying to say in an under-handed way that my hair was too long, I mumbled something about, "Oh, I've been too busy to remember to get a hair cut."

"Too busy to remember a hair cut?" she said with a sceptical look.

I just kind of shrugged and said nothing. But it was too late. The damage had been done and it was another miserable hair cut.

Why oh why can't we get Bogart's Hairdressers down in Sydney? Maybe I should ring them up and ask them to move a chain down here.

The Newness Block Draws to a Close . . . and Thoughts on "Shiny Things"

2005-05-13T15:36:00.000+10:00

I know, I know . . . I haven't posted (or replied to emails for that matter), but I was still on my newness block. And I'll be finishing it on on Saturday.

However, I notice that if you combine Rachel's post below with Cafedave's post on his website, the topic of the day is Christians and possessions.

Which actually has a lot more to do with a Newness Block than you would think.
I'll start with the possessions first.

My relationship with stuff has always been rather strong. I like stuff. Maybe not the same stuff as other people. I was more of a music and movies man than a car and clothes guy, but we all feel the call of different things.

But my spending has kind of gone through stages. It started in the uni days when I had a casual income, and no money. I spent most paycheques down to the ground, and, sadly, didn't give much money to the Lord, which I think was rather misplaced priorities.

I moved to Sydney, started having to pay board, and figured I should settle down a bit. But I still had more money than ever before, and still managed to do a good job of amassing stuff (However, I was putting aside money for things like engagement rings, honeymoons and Ring Cycles, so I started saving properly for the first time in my life.) All of a sudden, the concept that I couldn't have it all started to dawn on me . . .

Then I got married. For the first time, I wasn't paying off my credit card properly, and I had less money left over to splurge on stuff. But Rachel and I still lived quite comfortably and enjoyed ourselves.

And then after a year of marriage, we said, "What on earth is going on with our credit cards??", sat down and did a budget.

Now, we spend even less, and buy movies and music a lot less often. It may be possible that in the future, God will put us in a position where we have to give up even more, but I'm not sure yet.

But, having tried the range of positions from relative affluence (I'm not sure what it's relative too, though) to . . . well, still pretty good compared with a third world country, but perhaps not completely up with the Joneses, I have these observations to make about shiny things (or "stuff", as I call it).

1) I believe that you should be giving regularly to those ministries and places that don't earn their own income. Missionaries, ministers, charities, the poor, etc. need our generosity. I feel hypocritical saying this, because for many years I completely ignored this and spent mostly on myself. But I believe firmly now, that if you've got money to spend on stuff for yourself, you can buy a bit less stuff now and give some money away.

2) Stuff can really be a blessing from God. If you've ever seen that gigantic tower of a CD cabinet we have at our place . . . I like each and every one of those CDs, and I've never regretted buying them. The beauty of music (and other arts over the years) has given me much pleasure, as I think the arts (in its best state) is meant to do. I don't think God's ideal world is a purely functional world where we all wear a sack and don't enjoy life.

3) That said, the focus of having stuff to enjoy (which I lose really easily, and which the world has completely lost in our modern age) is that by enjoying our stuff, we can give thanks to the God who gave it to us. Let's face it, no matter what we think about our working abilities, you get your paycheque every week because God provides for you that way. If he wants to take that away from you (either by losing your job, getting sick, etc.), it could be gone tomorrow.

4) So, recognising that the God who gives us stuff can also take it away, we should enjoy what we have WHILE we have it, because tomorrow you might have less. This is the opposite of the world, by the way. The world's view is that they don't enjoy what they've got now, and tomorrow they want more. But I say, tomorrow you might have less.

5) Following on from that, if God has placed something out of your reach at the moment, then be patient with what you have. Because you might never get it. I'm not saying, don't want anything more. It's great to be able to save up for that special stereo, that TV, that car. But you might never get it. And if you're not prepared for that, and happy where you already are, I can tell you now, even when you get that new thing, it won't be good enough. You'll still want more.

6) Don't be envious. If other people have been blessed with a nice car, and you don't have the money for one, be content that you've got a car. If other people have better (or more fashionable) clothes than you, then stop looking at their clothes. The Bible says it's wrong anyway, but I reckon half our problem arises when we think we'd be happier if only we had the same stuff that somebody else had. I'm not saying this is easy to do, but it's something we HAVE to do.

7) If you try to be content with what you have at any time, then you'll find that what you DO have is amazing and marvellous. For instance, just one example: I used to buy all my music previously. I didn't have much time for listening to the radio, so I'd just buy CDs of whatever I heard at concerts or movie soundtracks, etc. Once we started budgeting, however, CD purchases couldn't be as frequent. So, for the first time, I started seriously contemplating the North Sydney library. Now, amazingly for me, this library has the biggest classical and soundtrack collection of any library I have ever seen. And you can take out six CDs at any one time!! So this year, I have listened to more new music than ever before, for no cost at all.

And my opera CDs and musical CDs, have become like special events to me. Being able to sit down at night time, and listen to singing or orchestral music - stuff that would be fairly expensive otherwise - is really great!

And this is where the newness block comes into it, because if you want to be content with what you've got, you can't keep wanting new stuff. It's the exact opposite of new stuff. So by cutting down a little bit on trying to get new stuff and enjoy what I had, I feel like I was in a little bit preparing for a time when perhaps I'll have even less than I have now.

There's heaps more I could go on about, but, after all that rant, what am I trying to say?

Be content.

Don't be envious.

You could well end up having less tomorrow.

You can't take it with you.

Be content.

Musings...

2005-05-09T09:02:00.000+10:00

Life is a journey.

We all get to certain destinations at different times. And sometimes God doesn't mean for us to go to a destination that He takes someone else on.

As I've mentioned to a few people, lately, my time online has been limited, especially personal blogging, mainly, because I've been spending a lot of time reading and rediscovering my love of books and the written word.

This morning I started reading a book I won off E-bay. Living More With Less by Doris Longacre. Just reading through the foreward and small quotes written after it has really made me think about the ways I presume my standard of living is a good way to live and my money is best spent on getting the BEST of things rather than being content with food and clothing as the Bible says should be our "expected" standard of living. I guess this is one destination I'll have to spend time rethinking and evalutaing the throw-awayness of my life-style and think through the ways I can use less processed resources and enjoy life in a different way to what I expect is "the best" way.

Anyway, I shan't ramble on anymore but I will write here the qoute that challenged me the most:

When someone steals a man's clothes we call him a thief.
Should we not give the same name to one who could clothe the naked and does not?
The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry man;
the coat hanging unused in your closet belongs to the man who needs it;
the shoes rotting in your closet belong to the man who has no shoes;
the money which you hoard up belongs to the poor.

--Basil the Great Bishop of Caesarea, c. 365

Week 2, Day 4 of the Big Newness Block

2005-04-27T14:44:00.000+10:00

Hi everyone!

In case you haven't heard yet, I've been on a six-day surprise holiday with Rach. Well, it was no surprise for me, because I organised it, but it was a surprise for Rachel, who didn't see it coming at all. It was quite a lot of fun. We went out west and visited our friends Liz in Orange, Fish in Dubbo and Bec and James in Bathurst.

Congrats go to Liz, who managed to get engaged the day after we left . . .

Exciting stuff, eh?

Also to Fish, who managed to snag himself a girlfriend by following the old Roy Orbison Principle: "I drove all night . . ."

The interesting thing about the holiday was watching myself whenever I went near shops. (In regards to the whole newness thing.) I could feel my excitement levels growing when I walked near a bookshop or a music/DVD store. I didn't even have to see a particular book or movie I was interested in. I just wanted to get in there and look for new ones.

Does anyone else get like this? You just want to get something new, even though you have no particular idea what new thing you'd like to get?

Anyway, my newness tip for today will cause some pain:

EMAIL NEWSLETTERS

When it comes to newness, email newsletters are the killer. With many of them now coming weekly or even daily, it is quite possible for you to never be on top of your email inbox.

So, my suggestion for today:

Unsubscribe yourself from every newsletter that won't a) lose you your job if you don't read it or b) seriously (and I do mean seriously) impact the major relationships in your life.

When the four weeks is up, we can have a think about subscribing back up to them, but for now, cancel the lot of them.

Now, you probably won't want to do this because you enjoy getting all these new newsletters.

That's fine. I enjoy getting them too.

But, the reason we're getting rid of all this new stuff is because we need some breathing room to deal with old stuff.

If you've got unanswered emails sitting in your inbox, or it's been a long time since you emailed that old friend of yours, then take it from me: a month of unsubscription will be good for you.

Heck, if you want, you can even start to read some of those urgent or half-finished books or those half-watched DVDs in the time this will now free up.

Enjoy...

Week 1, Day 4 of the Big Newness Block

2005-04-20T10:59:00.000+10:00

BOOKS

For those of you non-readers, you can switch off now. This one especially applies to me, but there may be others among you like me.

You have lots of books sitting around the place, many of which you haven't read.

You have a few that you've borrowed from other people and either a) haven't read or b) haven't returned.

But, despite all this, you love reading book catalogues, getting new books from the library, borrowing more books and buying more books from bookstores, and convention and camp bookstalls (always a killer on the Christian bookworm's wallet).

Now, the interesting fact of life is:

You can only read one book at a time.

There may be a brief exception for those who can read a different book with each of their two eyes, but for most of us, you can only read one book at a time.

So it makes sense that perhaps we should focus on one book a time?

So here's the plan of action:

Pull out all books which belong to someone else.

Ask yourself, Am I really going to read this?

If you're not, give it back to the person and say, "I'm sorry, I ran out of time to read it."

If you are, drop everything else you're reading and read those books now, one at a time.

Don't pick up any other books in the meantime until you've finished off the one you're reading.

When you've finished those, then we can move on to the ones that you've half read. But that's for another post.

Have fun!

Week 1, Day 2 of the Big Newness Block.

2005-04-18T16:08:00.000+10:00

In my last post, I was talking about how a lot of the stress that we feel is this constant feeling that we need "new" things. So we find ourselves in a position where we're constantly being bombarded by new things.

However, I think the point in all of this is that a lot of these relentess new things we let into our lives. Nobody tells us we have to read heaps of email newsletters, have to keep up with lots of things that are going on, etc. After all, there's plenty of people out there who don't keep up with as many new things as we do, and they're not any the worse off for it.

So, here's an interesting experiment . . . why don't we try shutting off the flow of the new, just for four weeks? I'm going to try (starting yesterday). It's called my Big Newsness Block. I don't know if I'll get onto this blog every day, but I'm going to suggest something whenever I can that YOU can do to stop new stuff coming into your life (just for four weeks), so that you can breathe a bit and then work out what to do.

I don't have a tip for yesterday (I'll let you do what you like on Sundays). But here's my tip for today.

NEW DVDS/VIDEOS

If you're like me, you have a collection of videos and DVDs. However, you might also have a stack of borrowed DVDs and videos. Someone may have pushed a movie into your hands and said, "Here, you should watch this." You may have eyed it off at a friend's place and asked to borrow it. And now it's sitting there on top of the DVD cabinet. You started out by thinking, "I'll watch it sometime soon." But you can't seem to find the time.

Now, this is a fib, actually, because when Star Wars III comes out, you know you'll drop everything to watch it. Or if a movie comes on television that you really want to watch, you'll find time to watch it. Or your favourite movie comes out on DVD. Or you see an episode of a television show on DVD, and it hooks you into watching all the episodes in one hit.

So let's not kid ourselves that you haven't got time to watch it. Basically, what happened is that you let that stray DVD into your house when you were in one of those moods for something "new" but it has got buried in an even stronger flow of more "new" stuff.

So, here's what we're going to do. Before we watch any more DVDs from the video store, or borrow any more from anyone else, we're going to watch the borrowed ones and then return them. If it turns out that you're really not interested in watching it after all, give it back to the person and apologise profusely and say, "I'm sorry. I just didn't get a chance to watch it." If you really can't find time to watch it this month, give it back to the owner and say you'll borrow it when you really can watch it (ie within two days of borrowing it).

Now, when you've sorted that out, look for DVDs that you have bought, but you haven't watched all of them. What about that second disc of extras on a movie you've got. Have you watched them all? I bet you haven't. So, this month, instead of getting out new movies or borrowing new ones, if you sit down in front of the DVD player, why not relax and enjoy catching up on the unwatched parts of the old movies you already own?

Starting today.

The Flow of the New

2005-04-12T14:57:00.000+10:00

I was recently reading a post by the one and only cafedave talking about information overload. This has actually prompted me to do some thinking. And I'd like to share that thinking with you and offer a bit of a challenge. For starters, go to this link and read Dave's comments plus the post that he's linking to. I'll wait till you get back.

All right. Back with me? Now, most of you (especially those of us online) will probably agree that information (all of it good and interesting) just keeps coming at us. I have a theory, though, that wasn't mentioned in the article, but I feel it coming through.

My theory is that all of us who are feeling busy and flat out are feeling "The Flow of the New". What do I mean by that?

By The Flow of the New, I mean that loud voice in our heads, that nagging feeling in our bodies that says for our lives to be fulfilling, we need to be doing something NEW and DIFFERENT.

For instance, why is it that we'll go out wandering around bookstores, looking for some new book to catch our eye, when at home we have piles of books that we've never finished or, worse yet, never read? Because we want something NEW.

Why is it, when we have a large collection of movies, that we'll want to go out and hire a stack of new ones? Because we want something NEW.

Why is it, when we have hundreds of CDs, do we feel the constant urge to buy new ones? Because we want something NEW.

Why, when we have a wardrobe full of clothes, do we still want to wander the shops looking for more? Because we want something NEW.

Why do we always want a bigger stereo, a bigger TV, a bigger car, a bigger house? Because we want something NEW.

Why is news called "news"? Precisely because that's what it is . . . a bunch of "new" facts that you haven't heard before. It's some "new" information about the world to add to your collection.
Why do we turn on the TV to see what's on? We want something NEW to stimulate us. The stuff we've already got lying around the house just won't do. We need that rush of the NEW.

Why, when we hear about a new movie coming out that we want to see, do we keep reading up about other movies and find out that there's four that we want to see, and then beat ourselves up if we only see two of them? Because of that relentless drive of the NEW.

Why do we check our email a billion times each day when we have 100 emails sitting there waiting for a reply? Because we want something NEW.

Now, the crazy thing about all of this is that a lot of our deepest satisfaction in life actually comes from enjoying old things. For example:

Our Christian faith. The interesting thing about the Christian faith is that it's nothing new. God handed down his word to us, completed about 2,000 years ago, and it hasn't really changed much in that time. If you're hoping to get an email tomorrow of a new bit of the Bible, it's not going to get there. Our satisfaction in God's Word comes from meditating and looking more deeply at things that we already have been given, not looking for more and more information to load on top of it.

Friends. Seriously, when it comes to making friends with people, what kind of sad world would it be if we only talked to new people we'd never met? How would we ever make deep and meaningful relationships if we didn't spend time developing our friendships with people we already know?

Long-term projects. Some things in life take a lot of time. They require us to keep coming back to the same thing over and over again. (Whether it be building a house, making a quilt, reading a long book, etc.) If we constantly drop these things in favour of new things, where would our life be?

Don't get me wrong. I'm not suggesting that all new thing are bad. Progress is great, and newness, freshness and variety are all good. But we need time to enjoy what we already have. Back in the old days, people would have called it "contentment". If we don't feel complete until we get that new thing, well, then, when will we ever be complete? We won't. It's all an illusion.
Anyway, the real question is: having recognised an issue, what can we do about it? I'll be back shortly with a radical new idea that has come to me . . . in the meantime, what do people think? Am I on track? Way off beam?

Thank you, Dave, anyway, for a stimulating idea . . .

Easter Break, Bec's Wedding and My Wife's Nose

2005-03-30T14:15:00.000+10:00

Hi everyone,

This Easter we caught the train up to Brisbane for the wedding of Rachel's old schoolfriend and bridesmaid, Rebecca Cunningham.

Let me say, right from the start, that I'm actually a fan of long-distance train trips. For 12 hours, I can read and not feel guilty. I love reading, but apart from the train trip to and from work (which is about half an hour each way), I usually don't read much because I keep thinking of stuff I should be doing around the house.

But on a train . . . what else can you do? Rach and I both finished about two books each on the trip up and down.

Brisbane was a very relaxing time hanging around Calvin and Skye's place (my best man and his wife). Exciting news there was that Skye is now pregnant, and demonstrated the point by looking under the weather most of the weekend and eating a lot of oranges. (A crucial sign of pregnancy if ever there was one.)

The wedding itself was a low-key but very nice affair, with Miss Rebecca Cunningham becoming Mrs Owen Klun. Rach got to catch up with some old school friends of hers, which was kind of interesting . . .

Caught up with a few movies and stuff on the weekend, which will be reviewed when time permits on Matt's Arts.

On the train back, Rach's nose kicked into overdrive. I'm not sure if anyone else knows this, but Rachel has a super-sensitive nose. So what might be a slight odour to you or me (in some cases, barely detectable) is an almighty stench to her.

In this particular case, it was the smell coming from the train engine. We were in the carriage just behind the train and Rach didn't enjoy it much . . . Within half an hour, she was breathing through a handkerchief. (Every now and again she would swap the handkerchief and hold Bromley over her nose.)

However, eventually, it all settled down and the rest of the train trip was conducted fairly uneventfully. By the time we got back to Sydney, we were pretty knackered, though. But we're slowly coming back to normal . . .

How was everyone else's Easter?

Lack of Blogging

2005-03-21T09:51:00.000+11:00

Hi everyone,

Some of you may have been wondering at the lack of blogging on the website over the last couple of weeks. I haven't really blogged since going to Katoomba Mens' Convention with the guys from Hurstville Presbyterian two weeks ago.

The chief reason for that is that I was rather convicted by the convention (which was all about work). I realised that the way I approached work wasn't really bringing glory to God.

So I put my head down, and I've tried to do a more God-honour job at work. One of the consequences of that was that a I haven't been blogging as much (which I tended to do as a form of procrastination). Anyway, I'll try to get better at writing here regularly on my own time, but I'm still trying to work everything out. So apologies also to those expecting emails or anything like that.

In my life, anyway, at the moment, things are a little bit low-key. (Not boring, just low-key.) I feel as if God is doing something in me at the moment, but quite what it is or where it is heading, I'm not sure. But I'll let you know shortly.

Hope you are all going well out there anyway. If I don't hear from you sooner, enjoy your Easter!

Rubato and Railings

2005-03-04T11:20:00.000+11:00

Went to a 4 1/2 hour Beethoven concert last night. I'll post the full review on my arts page shortly, but there's a couple of issues I got thinking about last night.

First one. Rubato. Now, this really only applies to those pianists among us, but if you've done a bit with the piano, you may have come across this word. It's Italian for stealing or robbing (at least, that's what my dad told me) and when you're talking about piano playing, it refers to kind of playing fast and loose with the rhythm.

Imagine you were playing a piece on the piano and you played it at regular time, like a clock or a metronome. That would be playing without rubato.

Now, if you were playing with rubato, you might cut a beat short here, or stretch a beat out there. You play around with the rhythm, stretching or compressing it, as needs be, to add a spontaneous effect. It's especially noticeable in Viennese waltzes and Chopin piano music.

The reason I mention it is that I noticed the 73-year-old pianist last night seemed to be doing a fair bit of that. Either that, or he was having trouble keeping up with the orchestra.

Which gave rise to an interesting question . . . having done a bit of rubato in my time, I've got to confess that I've occasionally used it because it gives me that extra bit of time to get my fingers in that awkward position that I couldn't manage if I had to play the piece at speed. The trick was always to make it sound like you meant to slow down there rather than have it sound like you were pausing to get your fingers in the right spot.

So was that guy playing with the time last night to add interesting spice to the Beethoven? ('Cause I had never heard these pieces played with the rhythm that he used.) Or was he struggling to keep up? I'll never know . . . We pianists are a devious lot with all kinds of cheaters' tricks up our sleeves.

The other issue that struck me last night was railings. If you've ever been to an orchestra concert, you'll know that the conductor has a little platform on the stage with a music stand. But behind him, between his back and the audience, is a railing that comes out of the little platform.
Watching Gianluigi Gelmetti last night, there were numerous times when he stepped backwards and was stopped by the railing. Now what I want to know is, was the railing invented because somewhere, sometime, some conductor, in the frenzy of conducting something crazy (like Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, for instance) stepped backwards from the platform and went crash off the stage.

I wouldn't like to fall off the Opera House concert hall stage. 'Cause you wouldn't just fall off the little platform. You'd fall off the stage (a fall of about a metre and a half). The concert hall is built for such an occasion, because I was in the front row, and there was a clear space of a few feet in front of my feet in case anyone toppled from the stage. But I'd love to know . . . who was the guy who first fell from the stage? I bet you there's somebody in the history books somewhere who did it . . .

Maybe that's why they don't allow you to take video cameras into the concert hall. They don't want any conductor falls ending up on Funniest Home Videos.

Ohio, Armpit Hair, and a Chat with Mr King

2005-02-22T14:36:00.000+11:00

Some of you may have been wondering where I disappeared to on the blog world . . .

Actually, I didn't disappear that far, there just wasn't that much to tell.

However, now, I can tell you that my mum and my other two brothers, Peter and Joel, are now safely in Ashland, Ohio. I rang up Mum this morning and she sounds a lot more relaxed than I've heard her in the last few months, let me tell you . . .

For the last couple of months, she was madly trying to pack up everything, sell things from the house, shut down a music school, etc. etc. You get the idea.

Not sure how Pete and Joel are going, both leaving behind girlfriends . . . (I only found out that Joel's "special friend", Vanessa, was official the night before he left.)

It came about because I was telling him about Matt Davis and his $40 girlfriend. Joel was saying, "What? 40 bucks? Man, I just had a quick word to Ness's Dad and that was it."

My mind then flashed back to January 2nd. Rachel and I, rather than sit in traffic for an hour and a half on the drive back from Brisbane, called in at the King's place in Nabiac where Joel was visiting. Now, all of a sudden, the behaviour of the family made sense . . .

Joel strutting around in a singlet top, armpit hair clearly visible . . .

Vanessa, smiling shyly . . .

Little brother teasing the daylights out of Joel and thinking the whole thing was slightly embarrassing and slightly funny.

Older sister wondering how her younger sister had pulled it off.

After I'd hung up from Joel, further questions haunted me: the chief one being: Surely, he hadn't worn that singlet top when he asked the old man for permission?

I just had visions of the conversation:

JOEL: Hey, Mr King. You know, me and Ness?

MR KING: Oh, yes. So you and her are a bit . . .

JOEL: Yeah.

MR KING: Well, I suppose it's okay, if . . . umm . . . I mean, you know about . . . well, there are a couple of things that . . .

JOEL: Yeah, it'll be cool. No hanging around her room, that sort of stuff.

MR KING: Yeah, yeah, that sort of thing. Your parents would have . . . umm . . . probably taught you . . .

JOEL: Yeah, it's cool. I'll treat her right.

MR KING: That's good. That's good. Well, I guess . . . umm . . . well, I guess you can . . . . yes, I think it'll be good. God bless you, son.

JOEL: Cool.

(Yells to Ness, eavesdropping in next room.)

Hey babe, we're on!

Actually, I must give apologies to both Joel and Mr King for that one, but I can't help wondering . . .

Oh yeah, and Joel, if you're reading this . . . happy 18th, little brother!

For All You Wannabe Romantics . . .

2005-02-16T16:58:00.000+11:00

Okay, guys, this one's for you. Imagine you're young and single, you go off to a Christian camp or something like that. (That's usually where these things happen...) And there you see a girl . . . she kind of catches your eye.

You get to know her a bit better and you're thinking to yourself. Hmm...I might ask her out.
Let's pause for a moment. Let's say that you have to pay money for the privilege of taking her out.

Yes, that's right. Money.

Now go back to this girl . . . is she worth forking out the money for?

I think this is a very good question, and one that was prompted in my mind when I found out today that my brother-in-law Matt, who was over in Zambia for the last year, has decided to court a young lady the traditional Zambian way. (She is Zambian herself.) He has paid her father about $40 Australian for the privilege of getting to know the girl better. (I don't have her name yet at the moment.)

Now tell me . . . how amazingly cool is that???

Rach, if we have daughters, can I put a price tag on them if guys want to go out with them??
It gets better. Apparently, if after a while he decides he would like to marry this girl, he has to hand over four cows. So, how much would you pay for the girl of your dreams?

Makes You Healthy . . . Not Sure Yet About the Other Two

2005-02-11T10:46:00.000+11:00

This week I decided to be a little bit more disciplined with myself, because I noticed that life was kind of falling apart around my ears.

So I've started getting in bed at 10.30 on the dot and waking myself up at 5.45 a.m. I've managed to get out for a walk most mornings at about six in the morning. It's starting to get dark in the mornings as well, which is pretty cool.

Already, I can notice that the enthusiastic morning walkers of summer have disappeared . . . This is the way I like it. Empty streets, not too many people. Not many cars. It's the best time just to listen to music and think.

I've only been doing it for four days, but already, this early to bed, early to rise thing is starting to make me feel more energetic at work . . . I wonder if I can keep it up.

Also, on other fronts, I've learned a fair bit about sermon writing this week. Most specifically, it's that elusive 20-minute mark . . . trying to say what you're trying to say, but also not killing your audience with a talk that goes on forever . . . well, we'll soon see how it all works, won't we?

At the risk of everyone thinking we're complete idiots...

2005-02-05T22:58:00.000+11:00

I post for your reference a recipe for a Fire-Brigade visit to YOUR HOUSE!

Ingredients:
Two raw eggs
One saucepan
Water
Stove top
Hotplate ON (High)
A phone call from DH to come pick him up from the train station
Getting side-tracked and doing a few jobs on the way home from the station...

Method?

Place eggs in saucepan, cover with cold water, place on stove-top and turn hotplate onto high.

Chop up all other vegetables needed for chicken caesar salad.

DH phones to say he needs to get picked up.

You walk out the door without turning off the stove.

Leave the front door unlocked but closed.

Run errands that take 30 minutes to complete

Come home (remembering 5 minutes before you get home that you still have eggs boiling on the stove!)

Find fellow tenants from the unit block outdoors scanning the road nervously.

Hear sirens in the distance

Have said tenants ask you if you live in Number 5 and then proceed to tell you after you nod that your house has a LOT of smoke in it...

The TWO firetrucks pull up and the men charge inside. Inspect the damage which is minimal as only the pot, eggs and plastic container beside the stove have suffered any long term damage.

They give you a bit of a talking to about leaving the stove on when out, leaving cookbooks on top of hotplates and help you put on a fan to blow the smoke out of the unit.
**********

There you go. The perfect 'recipe' to get 6 hunky men in uniform to visit your home. :)

The Wiggles, The Bus Stop and the Mexican Restaurant (plus BLOOD)

2005-02-05T10:05:00.000+11:00

All right, let's be honest . . . who out there likes having blood tests? Well, okay, probably nobody thinks it's a fun thing to do.

But which of you out there are the happy-go-lucky, sit down in the chair, talk about nothing while they're sticking the syringe in and taking blood and then waltz straight out the door again type? Oh, it's you? That's you? You don't mind it?

RIGHT . . . WELL, YOU CAN GET OFF MY BLOG RIGHT NOW!!!!! YOU MISERABLE FREAKS!!

For the rest of you . . .

Went to have a blood test this morning. It was one of those tests where you've got to fast for 12 hours beforehand. That may have had something to do with it. Anyway, trotted down to the big medical centre at Kogarah. It was about three blocks from the train station, and Rach had the car, so I took public transport. It was a bus, because the trains weren't walking.

Anyway, got there okay, feeling fine. But secretly inside, I knew the fear would lurk back up again. I just do no like blood tests. Maybe it was because of the first one I ever had, where I curiously watched the whole thing before going woozy. Maybe it was the time in Brisbane when I was sitting in the chair (not watching this time) with the needle in my arm, saw black spots, and then woke up a few seconds later, drenched with sweat, and being told by the nurse that I'd passed out and they were moving me to a bed.

From then on, I've always asked to lie down.

Anyway, horror of horrors, the girl led me into this tiny little room that had no bed and a big high stool. I mean, my feet couldn't touch the ground on this chair. I asked if I could lie down.

She said, that's okay, and took me down to another room with pictures of Harry Potter, Teletubbies and The Wiggles on the wall. After booting out a pregnant woman who was loitering aimlessly in the room, she made me lie down . . . and it all began.

I just looked at the wall. I was actually okay, until I started to hear that clicking sound where they start to take multiple syringes worth of blood. (I reckon they did about four.)

By the time she'd finished less than a minute later, I just had that nauseous, woozy feeling. Anyway, she was very nice, got me a drink of water, etc. Apparently, she always has to lie down as well, even though she can quite happily do the vampire thing with no worries at all. Strange, isn't it?

Anyway, I felt better after a couple of minutes, so I headed back to the train station. Maybe that was my mistake.

I trotted the three blocks back to the station with no worries, but I had to cross a couple of roads to get to the bus stop. I started to feel the woozy feeling again, but the light went green and I wanted to make the bus. Got to the bus stop (missed the bus anyway), and I was feeling decidedly bleugh . . . So I sat down and tried to take deep breaths. I contemplated lying down, but my bus arrived. Fighting off all woozy feelings, I jumped on the bus and sat down.

The trip from Kogarah to Carlton, while one of the shortest I've ever had, was one of the worst. I just felt myself getting that nauseous, clammy, sweaty feeling . . . it wasn't good. I leaned forward and hung on to the seat, because I felt like I was on the way out.

Then the bus stopped at Carlton. I somehow managed to stagger off the bus outside the Mexican Restaurant at Carlton. I sat down in a doorway for a bit before another wave of wooziness hit met and I decided to lie down. Now, lying down in front of the Mexican restaurant in Carlton, is nobody's idea of fun. First of all, half the smokers of Carlton use this as their butt dumping ground (You should all quit, you know . . .). Second of all, it's a main road and heaps of people are driving past.

Anyway, a bum lying on the streets is nothing unusual in Carlton, so nobody said anything. After a couple of minutes, I managed to get up, walk over the railway bridge to home and ate a HUGE breakfast, I can tell you.

I'm feeling better now, but I hope they don't send me back for rerun. And they're going to send me a bill for this thing! They should pay ME for this kind of stuff!

All right. Enough rant. I'll get back to the sermon.

Talking in My Sleep and Poirot Novels

2005-02-03T10:18:00.000+11:00

Apparently, I talk in my sleep. I never used to. Or if I did, I never knew about it. But my wife informs me that, not only do I talk in my sleep, I'm bossy in my sleep. A couple of nights ago (when it was kind windy and rainy), apparently, she came to bed, I sat up and said, "Shut the big grandpa window! I'm going to drown!" And then threw the sheets over my head.

I can neither confirm nor deny this particular story, but it creeps me out a bit . . .

Now, onto the subject of Poirot. I've been collecting a series of Agatha Christie novels via mail order for the past two years. They were supposed to be only 45 of them, but they've just kept going, so I think they're going to do her entire series.

Anyway, I've now read over 50 of them. And it just hit me this morning that I've got an issue with Poirot novels. If you've never read one, at the end of every novel of his, he always has a party or gathering of some sort where he sits everyone down and proceeds to recap the case.

This will go on for several pages, and will involve Poirot implying that at least one person is guilty (who he will then prove to be innocent on the next page), and then, finally, right in the last few paragraphs of the chapter, he will suddenly announce out the blue that someone in the room (usually the person you least expect) is the murderer.

Said murderer will then jump up, say something racist about foreigners, and be led away by the police. (And remember, when these novels were written, murderers would be hanged.)

Now, while I'm willing to concede that this technique might have caught out the first few murderers who came his way, surely, after a while, you've got to wise up to this? I mean, you're a murdered, you've bumped off about three people by the end of the book, the police don't suspect you at all . . . in fact, nobody suspects you (you bumped off all the people who did) and then Poirot says, "Hey, would you like to come around for coffee?"

I mean, for crying out loud! You'd usually have a good 24-48 hours to skip town, get a new identity and hit the French Riviera. Sure, people would realise that you'd done it, but at least you wouldn't have to get hanged for it . . .

I know, I know . . . it's fiction. But still . . .

Country Wildlife, Scary Ned, and How to Tail Jews in an Unobtrusive Manner

2005-01-31T10:04:00.000+11:00

As you may or may not have been aware, Rach and I went to Victoria for five days. We were going to see our old friend, Elissa Shelling, get married to one Mr Andrew Dowling. (Who we hadn't met, but to all accounts is a great bloke.) Here's the rough diary sketch. (I'm sure you can leave a comment and complain if you didn't think there was enough detail.)

Tuesday, Jan 25

Stayed at work till 6.30. Came home, Rach picked me up from the station. We ran some errands, and Rachel suddenly remembered that she'd left eggs boiling on the stove.

Too late. Six nervous Asian neighbours and two firetrucks later, our house was still smelling like smoke. (No flames, however, so you can relax.)

We packed for the trip.

Wednesday, Jan 26

Drove from Sydney to Victoria. It's quite amusing the things country towns will do to get people to stop and have a look. They all have some novelty they try to push on you.

Goulburn - Giant Sheep

Holbrook - Giant Submarine

Gundagai - Dog on Tuckerbox

Place that starts with a "T" - claims to be the halfway point along the Hume Highway (contents: one service station and some crappy looking buildings)

After passing through Albury/Wodonga (which at least has people living there, and thus doesn't need to have a giant novelty item), we drove another half an hour to Yackandandah. Novelty - the movie Strange Bedfellows with Paul Hogan and Michael Caton was filmed here. Haven't seen SB, so can't say whether this was good for tourism or not.

I met Granny Mac, an elderly lady that Rach used to know from Bourke. She was very glad to see us and showed us all round her garden. (She's a mad keen gardener.) I'd heard on the radio playing in the local bakery that there was going to be a flag-lowering ceremony for Australia Day, so we trotted up to the local park and joined in the fun. Had a barbecue from the local Lions Club, listened to some speeches from politicians we didn't know, and Granny caught up with a 97-year-old man who'd come back for a visit and actually remembered half the people she remembered from when she used to live at Yack in her younger days.

Stayed the night at Granny's place. Suddenly realised why I'm too cowardly to live in the country: the wildlife. The toilet was haunted by both a frog and a big spider and the bathroom was home to a wasp.

Thursday, Jan 27

Hung around Granny's place and did next to nothing. At night, watched her video of Oliver Twist (review will be posted soon on Matt's Arts page)

Friday, Jan 28

Left Yack, and stopped at Beechworth - Novelty: yummy bakery. (Actually, it is a yummy bakery. They could start up a chain of them, and I wouldn't complain.)

Stopped at Glenrowan. Novelty - Ned Kelly's last stand took place here. Now, there's not too much to see of the pub where the stand took place, because the Victorian Police, true to form, burned the place to the ground after they captured Ned. Where the pub once stood, there's now only an empty corner block of land with a pony grazing on it.

There's actually not much else there at Glenrowan, so one guy has tried to cash in on that by creating an "Animated Theatre". This consists of several rooms and locations where you have computer-controlled animatronic robots, enacting out various scenes from Ned's last stand. Only catch with this (apart from the $18 price tag) is that the guy has a puerile sense of humour. He's into grossing people out, scaring people, and toilet humour.

So not only do you get to see Ned hang, in the pub where the siege was taking place, there were no less than two urinating robots (one of them a man, and the other a dog) and a vomiting robot, which squired water (meant to be vomit) out of his mouth all over the table where he was sitting. However, I will reiterate, this is the LEAST tacky of Glenrowan's exhibits.

Hit the road and arrived an hour later in Mansfield. No real novelty in Mansfield, so we just had a swim in the motel pool, went to a Swiss-Italian restaurant for dinner (do you like getting your fish served head and eyeballs intact? Rachel objected to my trout's eyeballs.) Watched True Lies on tele that night. This is a first for me, because I've never seen TL before (review coming soon on Matt's Arts) and it's been a long time since I've watched a movie on television with commercials. It's not winning me over.

Saturday, Jan 29

We quickly figured out that everybody else staying in this motel (the cheapest in town) were Elissa's Jewish relatives. We suspected they were on the Friday. When they came out Saturday morning wearing ties and jackets, we knew they were. We started to follow them up the road to the Shelling farm, which is just outside of town. Rach said, "Try to look unobtrusive." For some reason, my internal dictionary failed me, and I told her that I didn't believe there was such a word as "unobtrusive" and that, frankly, it had come from her internal dictionary which has produced such gems as "stickynose". She stuck to her guns, however.

Wedding took place outside in the Shelling's newly made "bush chapel" (which looked surprisingly like a carport and was conveniently located outside their house). To the sound of The Man From Snowy River theme, Andrew and groomsmen arrived on a tractor.
To the sound of Clancy's Theme, also from TMFSR, Elissa and bridesmaids arrived from the back porch of the house. (This just reminds me . . . Mansfield does have a novelty, and that is that TMFSR was shot near hear and had its premiere in the town cinema. So, while I would normally consider this music a bit on the cliched side to have for a wedding, I couldn't think of a better choice for a Mansfield wedding.)

Service was very nice, and it refrained from raining during the service. As soon as it was over, however, it bucketed down, thus ruining all chances of photographs out in the paddock.

Reception was held at a reception place in town. Very nice, with a lot of Jewish dancing thrown in. The one where they pick the bride and groom up on chairs and carry them around is very nice, but I'm guessing the reception management were getting nervous wondering who pays insurance if either the bride of the groom (especially the groom, because Andrew was fairly tall) clock their head on the roof.

We then headed back to Yack to spend another night with Granny Mac. (Yes, it does rhyme.) At Granny Mac's, Rach pointed out to me in dictionary the word "unobtrusive".

Sunday, Jan 30

Drove home, both feeling tired and blah about getting back to Sydney. We're back here now and still feeling tired and blah. So that's why I'm writing this up. Now I'm going to go get some sleep.

Granny Mac, thanks for putting us up. It was great.

Andrew and Elissa, God bless.

Rachel, I'm sorry. There is such a word as "unobtrusive". You were right and I was . . . wrong.

Everyone else, look after yourselves and I'll talk to you soon, I'm sure.

From Bromley (& Quark)

2005-01-20T20:26:00.000+11:00

BROMLEY: 'Allo, 'allo, 'allo . . . Just thought I'd get on 'ere and have a little talk about what's been goin' on in the Hodge household the last week . . .

Frankly, it's been a bit on the borin' side . . . Rachel's been watching "SeaChange" . . . a show with NO BEARS!! . . . I mean, for crying out loud, when are they going to break out the GOOD shows?? Whatever 'appened to "Grizzly Adams", eh? eh?? (I'd do a rendition of "Take Me 'Ome", but I might murder it . . .)

Or Ben the Bear? Yeah . . . that takes me back . . .

Anyway . . . in other news . . . Quark has decided that he is the Phantom of the Opera . . .

QUARK: yeah im the fantom cos i can wear my eer on my face lik a mask. and i can sing songs like nitetime hi tens shar pens each train station. well i think its like that. i dont know what hi tens are . . . is it like hi 5?? i like hi 5 but matt and rach dont watch tv so i never get to . . .

BROMLEY: Yeah, you get the level of culture around 'ere, eh? eh? To top it off, Matt's pulled out his record player and started assaulting our ears with the complete works of Mr Franz Liszt (otherwise known as Mr Wooly Warts) and the complete works of Brahms (otherwise known as Smoking Santa). Growl if you hate pianos!!! GROWL!! GROWL!! GROWL!!!

QUARK: i like peeanos if i get to play stuf on them but i dont because i cant reech the keys...

BROMLEY: It gets worse . . . Matt and Rach have been . . . SOPPY THIS WEEK!!!

QUARK: Yeah!! reely reely soppy!!!

BROMLEY: They've been talking . . . cuddling . . .

QUARK: gross!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

BROMLEY: Worst of all . . . Matt's been watching "SeaChange" too!!

QUARK: yeah cos thats gro . . . i lik divr dan tho. he makes me laf

BROMLEY: What?? David "Stubbly As a Bear's Bum" Wenham?? He's a joke, mate!!!

QUARK: yeah but it makes me laf . . .

BROMLEY: Shh . . . Matt and Rach are home . . . we've got to go hide . . . I'll just hit Post . . .

QUARK: byebyebye hehehehehe

Romance is not Dead!

2005-01-17T16:52:00.000+11:00

Hi, all!

My wonderful, darling, lovely sister spent last night making up several new pages for our website. Some are still "under construction" but some are "open to the public". The first link is to the left of this post and is labelled How We Met. Check it out! You'll then have the option of reading The Proposal and viewing a few wedding photos (which are coming).

So, take a look and post a comment...or two! :)

Clearer Head

2005-01-14T17:25:00.000+11:00

Knocked over the PYC stuff last night and I've got more of a grasp on 2 Peter, so I'm starting to relax a little.

Also, I went for a walk this morning, so my IGM feels pretty good.

Actually, the weekend might not be so bad.

We'll see how it goes. At this stage, I'm planning to see "Phantom of the Opera" again on the weekend. And thus ends a fairly boring blog entry . . .

Internal Guilt Mechanism

2005-01-13T13:00:00.000+11:00

After just over a year of going for walks in the mornings, I came to the conclusion this morning that I have developed an Internal Guild Mechanism (or IGM). It's like a little voice that waits till I wake up in the morning and then says, "You need to go for a walk."

I can say things like, "But I slept in. I'm tired."

But the voice will just respond with things like, "You'll get fat. You skipped a walk three days ago as well. You'll die from lack of exercise."

On top of that, the voice was also reminding me of all the things I'm doing at the moment:

1) Getting ready for youth group to start up again.

2) Preparing stuff for Presbyterian Youth Committee (PYC)

3) Preparing a sermon for February

4) Thinking about how to get down to Victoria at the end of the month for a wedding.

5) Writing an advertising letter as part of the copywriting course

6) Working through what I want to do with myself this year

7) And, somewhere in there is going to work

On the whole, I didn't really feel like getting out of bed this morning.

But, going on the assumption that you can only do one thing at a time, I picked option 7, and tonight I'll be working on option 2.

But I'm getting tired writing about it, so I think I'll leave it there . . .

How about the rest of you? Are you still in holiday mode or did January try to mug you as well?

Rachel's thoughts on King Kong, Wholemeal Spaghetti and Hammocks!

2005-01-07T20:42:00.000+11:00

King Kong

Matt & I watched this last night. I know it's listed in the Top 100 but why?? It is not a bad way to spend an hour and 40 minutes but it isn't my ideal way to spend that time. The story line is a little bit tacky and all those monsters and dinosaurs consuming people. FUN! :-S Anyway, all in all I'm feeling more "cultured" for having seen it considering it IS on the Top 100 and I have a LONG way to go to saying I have seen them all but I'm not that sold. And also, it weirded me out watching people who I know can't possibly be alive so in otherwords are d-e-a-d! Lol....yes I'm morbid but it is what was running through my head while we watched it.

Wholemeal Spaghetti

Different. We had it tonight with our Chicken Cacciatore and I didn't notice a big difference in flavour. It was slightly more chewy than white spag so I think I could've boiled it a bit longer but it wasn't bad. Al dente really. Worth a look if you like spaghetti bolonaise and need to up your fiber intake. Just remember to boil the living daylights out of it!!! :)

and now the hammock!

Gowings (a male, outdoor, adventure supply store) is on the list of stores that participates in the Super Voucher that Matt gave me for my B'day. So, I have about $50 to spend. I was throwing around the idea of getting the complete Anne of Green Gables set but wasn't sold on that idea. Then I thought of getting some Little Women books but nah that's not that exciting. What's something that I wouldn't normally think of getting but is something I would LOVE?! A HAMMOCK! This is something I've wanted for AGES but haven't gotten coz a) we can't drill holes in walls and don't have the space to hang it on our balcony and b) see reason a. Anyway, I thought I'd check them out. Gowings online doesn't sell free-standing ones so I thought I'd just double check their 3-4 story store in the city and see if they did stock them in store...and they did!! They cost $130 but I worked it out and I can save 3/4 of my "mad" money over the next 2 months and have enough to buy it! I haven't found out delivery charges yet so am trying to do that but I'm pretty sold on this idea so hopefully by the beginning of March I will be the proud owner of a free standing hammock!!!! Good-bye old crummy couch that's sitting on our balcony rotting and HELLO! comfy hammock! :-D Can ya tell I'm a little excited by this idea??

Well, am going to be off. I have a book to read. (The Guardian by Dee Henderson)

Rock Climbing

2004-12-30T13:34:00.000+11:00

I can now add to my list of cultural pursuits that of rock climbing. Well, depends, is it really rock climbing if you don't climb anywhere?

My good friend, Dave, invited me along to go rock climbing at Kangaroo Point in Brisbane. The idea is that by sticking fingers and toes on small ledges (approximately 2 millimetres at their widest point) you can haul yourself up a cliff face.

I never got off the ground. However, I think I can see the attraction, and I'm keen to try indoor climbing or something with bigger ledges (perhaps 4 millimetre ones!) and see what happens.

If nothing else, it would give me awesome grip . . .

Merry Christmas!

2004-12-28T10:29:00.000+11:00

G'day everyone,

I'm writing this from sunny (and stinking hot) Brisbane. I'm up visiting my mum for one last time before she and my brothers head off to America. (My Dad and my youngest brother, Daniel, headed over in November.)

I hope you all had a good Christmas. We drove up from Sydney to Brisbane on Christmas Eve (had a very good run, apart from a detour through Newcastle which added 45 minutes and a marital fight on to the trip).

Christmas presents . . . my wife gave me movie tickets (because I haven't got out to the movies so much nowadays) and a copy of JFK on DVD. My family gave me a Borders gift voucher. And my in-laws followed up the Confederate Flag they gave me for my birthday by giving me a pocket watch with a picture of Stonewall Jackson and Robert E Lee on the inside. So, all in all, quite a good birthday.

Now, I never quite finished off the Adelaide story, did I? It's kind of stale news now, so the bullet points are:

- The Cricket. This was my first live game of cricket, watched in 35 degree heat, sitting on the grass in the sun. It was day 3 of a test match between Australia and New Zealand. Live cricket is an interesting experience. Thousands of people all talking, laughing, eating food, hitting each other with clapsticks and somewhere in the distance, a bunch of guys will be playing cricket.

Siegfried - The third Ring Opera is the one that is the killer to sit through, because it's long, has a lot of tenor and has the most draggy moments. But by this time, the Adelaide Symphony Orchestra was getting into it, so they were really starting to churn away. The original guy who was going to sing Siegfried had done some damage to his vocal chords so he was replaced by a stand-in guy. He drank from a bottle of water every 20 minutes (though he was pretty good at making it part of his act) and managed to pull off a halfway decent job.

Barossa Valley - This was a total tourist trap designed to make us spend our money. Which we did.

National Treasure - see Matts Arts page.

Gotterdammerung - The final Ring opera is probably the best of the lot, especially the last half hour. Everybody just floated out of the theatre. Awesome, awesome stuff.

And that was Adelaide. Talk to you soon!

Emergency 000

2004-12-17T11:09:00.000+11:00

My brother Josh (14) had a motorbike accident last night. His motorbike was going about 70Km per hour when he ran into a pet sheep on the way home. (the sheep is fine) but my brother came out looking rather beaten up. They were concerned about neck/spinal injuries and he needed to be seen to by a doctor so the Royal Flying Doctor Service came out and flew him and my mother to Adelaide (that's where Matt & I went for our holiday) It is a LONG way from where they live but it's where they RFDS flies patients. The doctors and nurses worked on him until 2:30am last night, xraying him, bandaging him up etc etc. He is resting in Hospital now and I hope Mum can find a place to rest. She has no bed etc obviously so has been up all night. At this stage they're positive there is not major damage to his spine/head but they're waiting for a 2nd opinion on x-rays because they found a lump of some sort on his neck and aren't sure what that's from. So, as I know more I'll let you'll know but if you could pray and think of him and my mum and also my family as they're all at home still (it is a 2 day drive from my family's farm to Adelaide and about that from my place to Adelaide if I was to visit (although I could fly there but that's not necessary at this stage). So, it's a waiting game.

Adelaide - Part 2

2004-12-08T15:08:00.000+11:00

Probably should have mentioned five members of the Adelaide Police Band came out five minutes before we went in for Das Rheingold and played a short 2-minute piece that had all the best bits of the Ring (or at least the best brass bits) in one short piece. I thought they were going to do it at every opera as an alternative to the dinging bell that goes off five minutes before you have to run for your seat, but, no, apparently, they were just here for the first opera.

Okay, so we finished up Das Rheingold, and then we went off to have dinner at the Evans' place. We've forgotten whether it was Rachel's dad who was best man at Mr Evans' wedding or vice versa, but there's a connection there somewhere. So we caught up with Mr and Mrs Evans, and their two daughters Sarah and Melissa . . . was it Melissa? I'm going to get in trouble here, I can see . . . Or was it Melinda? I'm sure it started with an M. I'm sure my wife will read this and correct me.

Saturday was spent running around town. I think we got up late, and finally made our way into town to buy stuff we needed for the cricket the next day, like hats, Australian flags, Australian t-shirts, sunscreen, water spray bottles, etc. We also went to Haigh's chocolate factory, which is the equivalent of Darrell Lea down there. Expensive chocolate, though. That didn't stop us buying quite a lot of their chocolate.

And then it was back home, getting all dressed up again (which was quite nasty in the 35 degree heat) and heading back into town for the first of the long ones - Die Walkure. (Supposed to be a couple of dots above the u, but you know what I mean. In English, it's The Valkyrie.)

It was in this one, that Rach and I both started to realise how much Wagner could drag when he gets around to it. However, that said, they pulled this one off fairly well. The production was very clever, because the sets were fairly simple, but not necessarily minimalist. Uncluttered and clean is probably the best way to describe it.

We also got to see Lisa Gasteen as Brunnhilde, and she certainly stole the show. She can just sing and sing and sing at full volume without any trouble at all. Unfortunately, our Wotan couldn't, so he was having a bit of trouble by the end of the night, but he's got a good presence. (He kind of played Wotan like an old bikie.)

Highlight of the night would have to have been the beginning of Act III, which was the Ride of the Valkyries. Traditionally, this is meant to be sung by women riding on flying horses, who ride around and pick up dead warriors off the battle field to take them back to Valhalla. It's getting the flying horses that is the issue. So, instead, they set this scene in a big nightclub called "Wunder Bar" (a play on the German word for "wonderful"). The audience loved it, and were cheering and laughing (most un-Wagnerian things to do).

Of course, things started to get a bit draggy after all the Valkyries disappeared and it was just Brunnhilde getting in trouble from Wotan. (It does go on for 40 minutes, after all.) However, you can't beat that great ending where Wotan leaves his daughter on top of a rock surrounded by fire, especially in this case, because a bit of the floor rose up and real flames shot out of the floor which made it quite spectacular to watch. I'm not sure why, but real flames are really hypnotising on the eyes . . . combine that with the awesome Magic Fire Music at the end of the opera and we all kind of floated out of the theatre . . .

The Adelaide Leg - Part 1

2004-12-04T11:33:00.000+11:00

G'day all,

Well, I'm back now, and I'm not going to blog it all in one hit, but after we got back from KI . . .

actually, one bit of KI trivia I forgot to share was the KI wave. This was totally awesome, and I learned it from Rachel's aunt Louise. When two KI locals pass each other when they're driving, they will give each other this little wave by lifting the index finger of their right hand as they go past. (You can do this with the left hand, but it's not as cultured.)

Anyway, when I got a chance to drive, I got totally into it. It was great. Did you know, that if you give the KI wave to a local walking down the street, they'll give it back? It's great! Problem with all the KI driving was that now that I'm back in Sydney, I keep wanting to wave to other cars, but you can't. I'm also struggling to drive fast as well. (It was pretty laid back on KI.)

Ah well . . . we got to Adelaide in our little 3-start apartment 3.5 kms out of town. (However, this wasn't too bad, because there was a bus stop right outside and every bus that stopped there would stop in front of the Festival Centre where we were going.)

The first Friday morning there, we didn't have time for much else other than doing some shopping for groceries and getting dressed for the first opera . . .

which brings us to . . .

Das Rheingold

I'm not sure what it is about going to the opera in the afternoon as opposed to the evening, but it's not at all the same experience. (Couple that with the fact that it was 35 degrees all that day, and that could be part of it.) Felt really hot and awkward on the way up there.

Worse yet, when we got the Festival Centre (which really doesn't have too much breathing room in its foyer area, unlike the Sydney Opera House) it was packed to the gills with old people. And I mean old. Rachel would easily have been the youngest person there. There were probably about five people under the age of 30. There were possibly 20 people in between 30 and 60. The rest would have been over the age of 60. I'm not sure whether it's Wagner, the cost of tickets or what . . . but it was old . . .

Surprisingly enough, though, the production of the opera felt quite young, with a few snazzy contemporary touches. At the beginning, they blacked out the entire theatre. I thought when they said blackout, they were going to just turn out all the lights. But, no, they even turned out the EXIT lights . . . even the orchestra had to play in the dark.

But gradually, as the overture started to roll (and you've really got to hear this overture . . . it's just arepeggios in D major that start getting faster and faster and faster like water for four minutes), a see-through plastic curtain dropped down and water started to trickle through it. This was the famous water curtain that drops all the water in from the roof and then starts hauling it back up to the top again. It kept going for 20 minutes, which was pretty impressive.

Through the curtain, you could just make out a kind of cube, lit up with lights, with a figure sitting on it. (I now know that it was Erda, the earth goddess.) Then out popped the three Rhinemaidens (wearing wetsuits, believe it or not) and we were off.

The singing was a bit of a mixed bag, especially when you're like me and have been spoilt by CDs. The most surprising thing of all, was that usually you cast your best singer as Wotan, the chief god. He's the main character in the first three operas, so you want him to sound big and majestic.

I don't know how it happened, but the best singer by a country mile was John Wegner, who sang Alberich, the bad dwarf (dressed all in black leather), who steals the gold from the Rhinemaidens at the beginning of the opera. Try as he might, the guy singing Wotan just couldn't compete.

And it wasn't just Wegner's voice. He had greasy shoulder-length black hair, and no matter what they got him to do on stage, he would just powerfully belt out his lines. Absolutely amazing.

There were a lot of other quirky touches (such as the giants being dressed like construction workers, with their own little motorised buggy and their welder's helmets), but on the whole, the production worked really well. The two and a half hours was over before you knew it.

All I can say is, it's a real pity that they're not making a DVD of this . . . ah well . . . maybe some overseas opera company will hire the production and we'll get a DVD that way . . . as long as they have John Wegner as Alberich, I'll be happy . . .

The Longer Version by Matt

2004-11-25T10:54:00.000+11:00

G'day folks . . .

Well, after a massive cleaning-up operation in the house, vacuuming, cleaning bathrooms, etc., we boarded a plane for Adelaide on Monday afternoon . . .

We had an hour to kill at Adelaide airport before we got the plane to Kangaroo Island, so we went and had a look at the only thing to amuse a visitor at the airport, a memorial to two Australians who were the first to fly from England to Australia. (They landed in Darwin, actually, so why the memorial is in SA is beyond me . . .)

Anyway, their memorial was the actual plane that they flew in, which was a rickety-looking old thing . . . we don't realise how far we've come, really.

Flew in a small plane to Kangaroo Island, which is really, really an amazing place. After looking around it for a couple of days, I said to Rach, "You know, God is a far better composer than Wagner." That about sums up KI for me.

After meeting Rachel's grandma, her uncle Peter and her hyper-energetic aunt Louise, we went back to get an early night at Grandma's place.

Tuesday morning, we were given the tour around Kingscote, which is the biggest town here. (I'm writing this on the free internet computer, courtesy of Kingscote library.) Getting a tour around would be okay, but with Rachel's grandma to accompany us, it was much, much better. She's lived here so long, she's practically a part of the history. We had a look around Kingscote museum and there's a painting by Joy Davis on one wall, a box she's donated in another room, etc. It's amazing.

Wednesday, was even better . . . Aunt Louise took Rachel and I on a tour, as well as Annette and Claudia, two German girls out here on a bit of a holiday, and we did a lightning tour around the island. Having Germans with us has made it an interesting holiday. It's like the whole fortnight is a big German/Australian holiday.

First off, Seal Bay, which, as Rachel said, is where you pay money to sit on the beach and look at seals. Seals are amazing creatures. The males just eat, mate and sleep. The females do all that, plus stay pregnant for 18 months. That's it. Most of them get eaten by sharks.

Then Bales Bay, which is a quiet, empty beach with no one around . .. . but it looks beautiful. Then Little Sahara, which is a bunch of gigantic sand dunes in the middle of the island. I could hear the Lawrence of Arabia theme music in my head, but sadly no Anthony Quinn around . . .

Then round to Louise's daughter Rebecca's place. Now, it was a little house to start with, but Rebecca's boyfriend Dean extended it out and put a porch on it. This is the most amazing porch I've ever seen and really has to be seen in photos, but the idea is it beats quite a few outback bars . . . Dean himself is a bit of a Bob Marley fan, I take it, because he's got the dreadlocks and colourful shirt down pat. However, apparently, he is a cleaner in town, so that's what he spends most of his time doing.

Anyway, in wandered his neighbour from up the road, who also has an amazing house. Then Rebecca's grandfather (Louise's dad) showed up, with his neighbour. Then Louise's son Ben and his partner Sarah. Then there's me, Rach, and the two German girls. And we're all sitting around this porch eating lunch. I was thinking to myself, How do all of these people get the time off to come out here to this place at lunchtime and drink beer? I say this place should be put on the tour . . .

And, speaking of tours, we were off again . . . down to the Remarkable Rocks (which really are remarkable . . . if not amazing, stupendous and staggering), the Admiral's Arch (which is also amazing). Also in there, we managed to catch up with Louise's remaining children . . . and take a photo of a koala on the way home!! Does this island have it all, or what??

And today is a quiet last day, as we get ready to fly back to Adelaide tonight. The Ring starts tomorrow. I've tried to avoid all press on the Ring, but when we were having dinner on Tuesday night at Louise's place, she was telling me that apparently there's some old guy who's come to Adelaide for his 70th Ring Cycle. (He just tours around the world going to Rings.) I'd read about him before I came down here, but apparently he's quoted as saying that he did not have a favourite Ring Cycle until Adelaide . . . I'm starting to get excited now. But still, this guy might be a bit of a raving Wagnerian.

So I'll reserve my judgement until a later time . . .

And I'll get off this computer. See you all soon!

Hello from the Kangaroo Island! (by Rachel)

2004-11-25T10:41:00.000+11:00

Okay...

We arrived on Kangaroo Island Monday evening and spent a lovely night with Grandma and settled in. The great thing is that G'ma goes to bed really early so we haven't been at all sleep deprived while here!

Tuesday we went touring around Kingscote which is the main "town" on the island (not very big). This is apparently where the first free settlers (ie NO convicts) settled a convict-free settlement. And it is also the first place settled in South Australia! So a lot of history.

Wednesday (y'day) we had a whirlwind tour of the island with my aunt and 2 German girls who were visiting here. It was awesome! We sat on the beach surrounded by Australian Sea-Lions and watched the little butter-ball baby sea-lions swim, chase seagulls and generally have a lot of fun. Then we went to this gorgeous beach, (too cold to swim though!), we climbed sand dunes in the "little sahara" then we visited my cousin Rebecca and her house (gotta see this place to believe it...I took some photos so will share when we get home), had lunch there, checked out the most beauitful beach (officially) in Australia which was 2 min drive from her place, checked out my other cousins new house, caught up with him for a little while, then visited Remarkalbe Rocks and Admirals Arch (natural rock formations on the coast....amazing!), then we came back to Kingscote via Parndana and checked out the log cabin my grandfather built way back when that my other cousin is living in with his girlfriend. AND...on the road back to Kingscote we passed TWO Koalas in trees! I've never seen two koalas so close to the road or so CLOSE! :) It was so much fun.

Today (Thurs) we're just hanging around Kingscote, buying souveniers, spending time with Grandma and picking up some KI honey from my uncle's farm. Then later tonight we fly to Adelaide where we'll be for 8 nights. If any of you ever want a holiday and live here GO TO KANGAROO ISLAND! Don't do a day-tour from Adelaide but come and actually stay. It is an amazing place!!!

In All Seriousness . . .

2004-11-22T11:48:00.000+11:00

Hi everyone,

I can't really argue with B & Q too much regarding the plot of the ring, but they perhaps didn't mention too much about the music . . .

I tried to give Rach a touch of the Ring by playing her the "Siegfried Idyll", which was a piece of orchestral music based on the end of Siegfried. It was first played by a small chamber orchestra on Christmas Day in 1870 as a surprise present for Wagner's wife, Cosima.

Rach didn't see the Christmas cheer in this. "Did she have a chair?"

"Pardon?"

"You mean, it's Christmas morning and she has to stand up for this whole thing? My legs would have been killing me!"

"She probably had a chair."

"Yeah, but I'm thinking . . . she gets up, hoping to get a Christmas present . . . instead, comes out, and there's all these strange men with instruments standing on her staircase! I mean, was she even dressed properly??"

"I don't know . . . they don't exactly . . ."

"Yeah, I'm sure she liked it!"

So much for romance and Wagner . . . lol . . . anyway, if I can get to an internet cafe, I shall try to keep a holiday diary. Otherwise, I'm sure you'll hear about it when I get back.

Have fun . . . ('cause we will be . . .)

RiCy IV - Gotterdammerung

2004-11-22T11:34:00.000+11:00

Bromley: And 'ere we are, back for the last installment of the Ring.

The fourth one's called Gotterdammerung (though with a few of those useless dots over the letters) which is Kraut for "Twilight of the Gods". Which is one of the most stupid titles I've ever heard . . . I mean, why spoil the ending in the title? Nobody would have gone to see "Return of the Jedi" if it was called "Luke's Father Darth", would they?? That's right!

Anyway, enough of that . . . it starts with three old bags playing with a piece of string. They kind of just tell us what happened in the rest of the opera and then their string breaks. . . . I'm not kidding. Read a synopsis of this opera . . . and to think that people pay money for this thing . . .

After the old bags, out pops Siegfried and Brunnhilde. For no unexplained reason, she sends him off to be a hero, etc. etc.

Well, about 10 minutes later, he bumps into a bunch of shifty sorts, drinks a love potion, decides to marry some other chick and then says that he'll go fetch Brunnhilde for the new chick's brother to marry! (Opera, mate . . . and Krauts love it . . .)

So Siegfried goes back to the mountain, disguises himself as someone else, tries to sing lower to fool Brunnhilde and drags her back to marry this new bloke.

Anyway, the reason for all this is that apparently Alberich (shifty fellow from the first opera who stole the gold in the first place) had a son (don't ask how he got him considering he renounced love, etc. etc.) named Hagen and it's Hagen who is organising all this shifty stuff to get the ring.

To cut a really, really, really long story short (it's about 6 and a half hours, I think), Siegfried gets stabbed in the back by Hagen, Brunnhilde shows back up, lights up Siegfried's funeral bonfire (I don't remember them checking with Siegfried to see whether he wanted burial or cremation, though.) And then, she starts singing . . . this is it, ladies and gents . . . this is the fat lady singing. And to finish off . . . how's this for a clever plot twist, eh? . . . she rides her horse into the bonfire. That's right. She sings, and just when we're all sick to death of her, she roasts herself alive. I betcha you wish that could happen to the singers at the end of a few other operas, eh?

Anyway, she roasts herself and that seems a good enough excuse for Wotan and the rest of the gods to do the same thing. They get Loge, the fire god, to set fire to Valhalla and the whole lot burns down! If you're lucky, the theatre catches fire as well, but I don't think OH&S allows that anymore.

And that's it . . . that's what all the fuss is about . . .

Q: yeah dusnt it sound stupid?

B: But at least there's a bear in Siegfried. It's like the best 10 minutes in the whole opera.

Q: are there any doggies?

Q: Nah, mate . . . They just don't have the same stage presence . . .

RiCy III - Siegfried

2004-11-21T11:48:00.000+11:00

Bromley: 'Ello, 'ello, 'ello . . . we're back for round 3 . . . Siegfried. Pronouned zeegfreed if you're not a Kraut.

Quark: then why do they spel it siegfried?

Bromley: I'm not going to answer that one . . . Now I got me little furry ears burned last time because I forgot to mention the Ride of the Valkyries. Basically, somewhere in that opera, after the sword fight and before Wotan does his nana at Brunnhilde, she goes to hang out with her sisters, the Valkyries and they all sing the Ride of the Valkyries. (This is without helicopters, for those of you Apocalypse Now fans - didn't ya love that bit where Robert Duvall tells the bloke to go have a surf? No? Maybe it was just me . . . ) Anyway, I didn't bother talking about that bit, because it had nothing to do with the story, so who cares, apart from people with too much time and money on their hands . . . aka everybody who's going to Adelaide.

Anyway, opera 3 starts with . . . oh, yeah, do you remember that chick Sieglinde from the last one, who was going to have babies with her brother, etc?

Q: yeah it made me sik

B: Yeah, well, she had the baby, little mate. Called him Siegfried. Then she carked it.

Q: is that all that peeple do in this show?

B: Mate, that's all people do in opera! So, Siegfried gets picked up by a nasy little dwarf person called Mime, pronouned "Meemuh", in case you were thinking of those scary blighters what pretend to be stuck behind a glass wall. (I'd like to see what happens if you really did stick 'em in a glass box. I reckon they'd make noise then!) Anyway . . . off topic again.

Mime is the brother of Alberich, who was nasty blighter who made the sword in the first place.

Anyway, to cut a long story short ('cause I'm sick of it, Mime wants Siegfried to kill the dragon from the first opera and get the ring for him). But he can't make a sword to do it. He wants to use the broken bits of the sword that Siegfried's old man used when he was killed in battle, but apparently, you can't be a scaredy-cat and remake the sword.

Q: i woodnt be abel to make it then

B: That's right. But Siegfried isn't scared of anything because he's a mindless German nut who drags wild bears around. So he shows up, gets a bit narky with old Mime, and remakes the sword.

In the second act, Mime drags him off into the forest to kill the dragon, which he does. Then he kills Mime (but this is apparently a good thing because Mime was going to kill him)

Q: he killed the dragon! was there lots of blud?

B: Even better . . . he licks the blood!

Q: yuk!!!

B: And then guess what happens . . . only in opera . . . once he's taste the blood, he can talk to animals! (Wagner ripped that bit off "Doctor Doolittle".)

Q: thats wierd

B: So a little bird comes along and tells him to climb a mountain and rescue Brunnhilde who's still asleep up there. So in Act 3, he climbs the mountain, bumps into Wotan halfway up. Instead of telling him, "Hey, buddy, I'm your grandpa," which is what any respectable grandparent would do, he dresses up as a bum and says, "Get outta here, ya little punk." (Or words to that effect.)

So he belts Wotan's spear with his sword and breaks it and then trots on past up the mountain. Anyway, comes up there, finds Brunnhilde, realises that she's a chick, not a bloke and . . . gets scared for the first time!!

Q: like matts scared of rachel?

B: Yeah, mate. Being scared of women is probably not a bad move. Anyway, he wakes her up, Snow White style, and then they start singing for ages.

Q: what do they sing about?

B: It's something like: "Oh, no, I'm mortal now," says Brunnhilde. "I'm going to die an old woman." And then they talk more gibberish about how everything's going to come to an end, and they end up singing something like. "Hey, we're going to die. Let's laugh about it. Ha ha ha ha ha ha! Ho ho ho ho ho ho ho! Hey, let's call it laughing death!!! Ha ha ha ha!!! He he he he he!! Ho ho ho ho ho!" And that's the end.

Q: laffing deth? thats a silly ending

B: It is indeed, mate . . . and to think, people pay money for it . . .

Ahem....interuptting RiCy transmission to laugh at Australians

2004-11-19T23:59:00.000+11:00

You Know You're From Australia When...

Your next door neighbours can be from Tunisia, Israel, Indonesia, Japan, Zimbabwe, Iraq, Brazil, Spain, Malaysia...

The community is so concerned over the fact that muslim women can't use public swimming pools because there are men present that they have female-only periods.

The Greeks and Mexicans next door ask you over to have a barbeque.

You don't actually use the words 'sheila' or 'shrimp'.

You sleep with Aeroguard on.

You're wearing a cap emblazoned with 'Get A Dog Up Ya.'

You feel obliged to spread salty black stuff that looks like congealed motor oil on bread and actually grow to like it.

You actively dislike Americans, but watch their TV, eat their food and worship their idols.

You think Tall Poppy Syndrome is a national condition.

Democracy means the freedom to draw caricatures of John Howard.

Your idea of a lethal weapon is a slug gun.

The closest you ever got to going overseas was your packet of 5 Days In Rio grundies.

A posh meal = an all-you-can-eat buffet.

The term "musical instrument" also extends to wobbly bits of ply-wood, hand saws, gum leafs and combs.

Your most offensive curse also doubles as an exclamation of awe or amazement, like, "fark orf!"

All of your internationally famous people don't live here.

You think footballers dressing up in drag on TV is funny (but your son being gay isn't).

You relish test cricket - the longest, slowest game in sport (and that's not even counting the replays). After all, what else gives you an excuse to sit on your arse for five days, watch TV and sink piss with your mates?

You don't drink Fosters, but you let the world think you do.

The only thing better than beating the Pohms at ANY sport is giving them shit for it.

You love, adore and admire a particular team/sportstar/actor on a winning streak - until they lose. Then they're just crap and 'past it.'

You can compress several words into one - ie 'g'day', 'd'reckn?' This allows for more space for profanities.

You favour either Holden or Ford - or a souped-up WRX with new kit and a bootful of subwoofer.

Driving down the main street/beach road playing bad techno is your idea of a perfect Saturday night / Sunday arvo.

You make kooky films, sometimes about wayward road trips (across the outback preferably). Quite a few are crap.

You know all the words to Khe Sahn but not the national anthem.

Your nickname ends in 'a' or 'o'.

You have a customised stubby holder.

Your soap stars become pop singers and move to the UK.

You've ever used the words - grouse, tops, ripper, choice, sick, rad, exo, ace, wicked, ballistic - to mean good. And then you place 'bloody' in front of it when you really mean it.

Your cooking apron has plastic breasts on it.

The "Aussie Aussie Aussie! Oi oi oi!" chant has been a religious experience in the past.

The blokes at the local gym think your weight training is an opportunity to ask you out on a date.

The big national sporting events are men-only.

Your politicians believe than sticking the prefix 'un' in front of your nationality is an effective way of making you sit down and shut up.

Our mantras are 'fair go for all', 'mateship' and 'little Aussie battler' - but we still publicly condemn those with different viewpoints to us.

The barbeque is a male-dominated arena. And the women do the salads.

'Fair go for all' excludes indigenous people.

An eight-hour trip to go camping for the weekend isn't out of the question or excessive.

You take pride in living in a tolerant multicultural society but firmly believe that all Poms and Kiwis are fair game.

You insist on asking every celebrity who steps of an aircraft what they think of Australia. If the response is not overwhelmingly positive, they should be subjected to immediate public ridicule.

The private lives of footy and cricket players become more important than local and national news stories.

Slick pick-up lines like 'Wanna shag?' and 'Carn, show us yer tits' can constitute male-to-female conversation.

You say 'no worries' quite often, whether you realise it or not.

You realise you have no Bill of Rights.

The first thing guaranteed to get eaten at parties is fairy bread.

So that's the special ingredients that make up an Aussie - whatever your taste.

You actually get these jokes and pass them on to other friends from Austrailia.

Get Your Own "You Know You're From" Meme Here

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And to hilight the ones I totally relate to:

Your next door neighbours can be from Tunisia, Israel, Indonesia, Japan, Zimbabwe, Iraq, Brazil, Spain, Malaysia...

You don't actually use the words 'sheila' or 'shrimp'.

You feel obliged to spread salty black stuff that looks like congealed motor oil on bread and actually grow to like it. (love the stuff!)

All of your internationally famous people don't live here.

The "Aussie Aussie Aussie! Oi oi oi!" chant has been a religious experience in the past.

The barbeque is a male-dominated arena. And the women do the salads.

An eight-hour trip to go camping for the weekend isn't out of the question or excessive.

You say 'no worries' quite often, whether you realise it or not. (I didn't realise this until I read this line and then remembered saying it at least once or twice today at work.....go figure. )

RiCy - Part II

2004-11-19T09:09:00.000+11:00

Bromley: 'Ello again . . . All right, so now we get on the flamin' HUGE operas. The other three.

Quark: YEAH THEY MAKE U SLEEPY AND IM WRITING IN CAPITALS SO THAT PEOPLE DONT PICK ON ME COS OF THE WAY I RITE

B: Crazy, crazy boy . . . Anyway, at the end of the last opera, Wotan was in a bit of trouble because he'd lost the ring.

Q: YEAH THAT WAS FUNNY

B: So while everybody else was recovering from the last opera, Wotan has a plan to get rid of the ring. He goes and has kids. To about three different women. All up, I think he had over 10.

Q: WHAT A NORTY MAN!!!!

B: Yeah, well, it gets worse, little buddy. The second opera is called "Die Walkure" or "The Valkyrie") which is Kraut for "Fat Woman With Viking Horns". It starts with one of Wotan's kids (who doesn't know Wotan is his dad . . . he thought his dad was some old git called "Wolf" who dumped him in the forest when he was a kid). This bloke's name is Siegmund. He breaks into a house which is built around a tree. (I think the guy who built it was a bit of a greenie.)
Anyway, he meet the greenie bloke's wife. Her name's Sieglinde. Anyway, her old man comes home (turns out he's not a greenie - he's a bloke called Hunding - and considering that Hund is Kraut for "dog", what does that tell you?)

Q: HES REELY KOOL?

B: No, mate, it means he's the flippin' bad guy . . . Crikey, we can't do anything with you? Hunding's the bad guy. Siegmund says, "I'm hiding here 'cos some blokes want to bump me off because I killed some of their friends." Hunding says, "Yeah, mate, I'm one of them." Anyway, in true Kraut fashion, they agree not to do anything till the next morning.

In the meantime, Sieglinde knocks her husband out with some sort of sleeping pills and comes out to talk to Siegmund. Siegmund keeps on gibbering about how his Dad (Mr Wolf - not the guy from Pulp Fiction) was going to leave him a sword somewhere. Anybody in the audience thinks Siegmund's a total drip because we spotted a whopping big sword stuck in the tree in the middle of the room in the first five minutes . . . but, hey, this is opera, isn't it?

Anyway, Sieglinde tells Siegmund that this old guy came along and stuck a sword in the tree.
So, what does Siegmund do? Well, you'd think he'd pull the sword out . . . he does, but he says heaps of other things first (just to kill another 20 minutes). Something like: "A) Hey, look, if I open the door, it's spring time outside. Ain't that cool?" B) Hey, Sieglinde, you're my sister. C) Let's get married. D) Let's have babies."

Q: YUCK!! THATS YUCK!!!

B: Mate, what can I say? . . . And people pay money to see this! So, needless to say, Siegmund nicks the sword and the two of them run off into the wood.

Q: THATS PRETTY NORTY.

B: So, then after everyone's had themselves a few drinks in the intermission to recover from all of this, the second act starts up with old Wotan the Pirate, talking to one of his kids, Brunnhilde . . . that's the chick with the Viking horns.

Q: IS SHE FAT??

B: Mostly. So he tells her that Hunding and Siegmund are going to have a big fight and he wants her to rescue Siegmund. Then his wife comes along and rips into him for saving gross people like that. So he tells Brunnhilde that he's changed his mind and that she should save Hunding instead.

Q: SO WHAT DOES SHE DO?

B: Saves Siegmund. Or tries to. (That's 'cause Hunding's the bad guy, remember?) But Wotan comes along, lets Siegmund get it in the gut and die.

Q: ohhh

B: Then he kills Hunding anyway.

Q: THATS WIERD

B: Then he chases down Brunnhilde (we're into the Third Act now), tells her that because she disobeyed him, he's going to turn her into an ordinary woman and leave her sleeping on top of the rock for someone to wake up and take home for a wife. (Wagner ripped that bit off Snow White.) She complains and says, "Oh, but come on, Dad, you really wanted old Siegmund to win anyway, didn't ya?" So he says, "Yes, you're right. So just for that, I'll still turn you into an ordinary woman, but I'll surround the rock by fire so only a really brave bloke can rescue you."
So that's what he does . . . and Wotan wins the Father of the Year Award. And Brunnhilde goes to sleep. Until the next opera . . .

Bromley and Quark's Guide to The Ring Cycle

2004-11-17T16:46:00.000+11:00

Bromley: Righto, ladies and gents. We're 'ere to explain to you what the big Ring Cycle thingy is that Matt's so keen on and Rach is pretending to be interested in. Well, look, have you ever heard that old sayin', "It ain't over till the fat doggy sings?"

Quark: thats mean! im not a fat doggy and you made it up its fat lady!

B: Just joking there, little buddy . . . Thass right . . . It ain't over till the fat LADY sings. Have you never wondered to yourself, "What fat lady? Why is she singing?" You might even have wondered, "Why is she fat?"

Well, we don't know why she's fat, but she's singin' because somebody has paid her a fair bit of money to appear in Wagner's Ring Cycle. In Kraut, it's called "Der Ring Des Nibelungen". You can see why they started calling it the Ring Cycle after that, can't ya?

Anyway, a Ring Cycle (which we'll call a RiCy for short - pronounced "Ricky" as in Ricky "My Trousers Are Stuck To My Body" Martin) consists of four operas all telling the same story. It's a bit like Lord of the Rings but with no short heroes. In fact, anybody short in the RiCy is usually a bit of a shifty character and shouldn't be trusted.

Q: does that mean were shifty cause we re reely short too?

B: Well, I've always had me doubts about you, Quarky old boy . . .

Anyway, the first RiCy night is the short one. Well, short by . . . well, actually, no it's flippin' long by anyone's standards except Matt's and Wagner', but since when were they the experts on anything? The first RiCy opera is called "Das Rheingold", which means "Bit of Gold That Some Idiot Left On The Bottom of the Rhine River Guarded by Chicks Rather Than In A Bank Guarded By Big Beefy Blokes With Guns".

The curtain opens and there's three ditzy women swimmin' around. Out pops this little dwarfy bloke . . . shifty little critter . . . like Quark here . . .

Q: hey!

B: He tries chattin' them up . . . but not having the old Bromley talent, fails miserably in his efforts to pick up. So instead he steals the big nugget that they're guarding. Having taken half an hour to explain the bleeding obvious, the second scene starts.

We meet the gods up in the sky. We meet Wotan, the chief god, who only has one eye, for some reason that's vaguely explained in the fourth opera (where he doesn't even make an appearance . . . so why bother?). The better theory suggests that he only has one eye because he always wanted to be a pirate and pirates are cool.

Anyway, Wotan has just bought himself a castle by trading off his sister-in-law. Apparently, he didn't consult his wife on this one, because she starts off the scene by having a domestic with him.

Q: what a naughty man wotan is

B: Mate, just you get married, and then we'll talk about trading off sister-in-laws. I can understand where the old devil was comin' from . . .

So, along come the giants who are contracted to build his castle and Wotan decides to hold out on the sister-in-law. What does he offer to pay them for instead? Well, he offers to pay them a whole lot of gold which he has to steal first . . .

Q: its just like a histe movie

B: Nice spelling of "hiest", there, mate

Q: leave me alone your mean bromley

B: Anyway, so Wotan and his lawyer mate the fire god, Loge, head off down to nick the gold. This takes 'em about half an hour and they end up ripping off Puss in Boots to do it. (If you don't believe me, read a synopsis of the story somewhere). They nick the gold and the dwarf. Oh yeah, and part of the treasure is this ring which gives you a lot of power as long as you don't want chicks. And the dwarf puts a curse on it.

So Wotan ends up giving all of this treasure to the giants, except for the ring which he wants to keep for himself. But this earth goddess pops out of the ground and tells him to throw it away or they'll all end up dead. So he does. (And it turns out that they all ended up dead anyway, so this chick was just being a bit of a spoil-sport really.)

The two giants have a bashing contest, where one clubs the other to death, and then the one that's left turns himself into a dragon and heads off into a cave with his treasure. (Sounds a bit like the Hobbit, doesn't it? Tolkien was a bit of an unimaginative git . . . )

The gods then say, "Oh well" and head into their castle. And, oddly enough, some people think this is worth money to see on stage.

I'll be back with RiCy Part 2: The Valkyrie tomorrow . . .

Bike-Riding Expeditions, Word Counts and Major Changes In Life

2004-11-16T14:40:00.000+11:00

There are a few things going on at the moment in life.

For starters, my Dad and my little brother, Daniel, boarded a plane today for America. Well, actually, it was bound for New Zealand, but after a night in NZ, they will head for America. Dad's got a new job with a group called Business Reform (http://www.businessreform.com), so he's moving to Ashland, Ohio for that.

Mum and some of my other brothers will then move over in January sometime. It's all a rather big change, really. I'm still not sure exactly what I think of it. But, hey, it's an excuse to visit America, so that's got to be one good thing, surely?

Anyway, word counts . . . after trying to write 4,000 words in one night the other day, I realised that I was probably a bit optimistic about getting this novel written . . .

But, it's been a good month . . . because I've got a feel for what's involved . . . and next year . . . well, next year, I think I'll give it a damn good try and see if I can drag even more people along with me than I have this time around.

And I'm still going to keep writing up until holiday time because something is definitely better than nothing.

Speaking of holidays . . . we have this big calendar at work where you write down when you're going away on holidays.

I marked off the two weeks form 22nd November onwards and labelled it "Matt's Ring Cycle Expedition". I didn't realise that I'd caused such confusion.

Several people have asked me if I'm going away for a bicycle tour.

I think I've finally laid that rumour to rest, but it took a while.

Anyway, I shall blog more of Rings and things on the Art's page . . . (Not today, though . . .)

Crazy, Crazy Goals

2004-11-10T11:52:00.000+11:00

Goal-setting . . . I sat down and wrote out exactly what I've got to do to get from where I am now on the novel to 50,000 words before I go away on holiday.

I'm on 10,000 words at the moment (well, just short of it, but something like that) and to get to 50,000:

Wednesday, 10 Nov: 4,000 words
Thursday, 11 Nov: 1,000 words (because of Bible study, not much time)
Friday, 12 Nov: 1,000 words (because of Youth Group, not much time)
Saturday, 13 Nov: 8,000 words
Sunday, 14 Nov: 4,000 words
Monday, 15 Nov: 4,000 words
Tuesday, 16 Nov: 4,000 words
Wednesday, 17 Nov: 1,000 words (because I've got Interweave on that night)
Thursday, 18 Nov: 1,000 words (Bible study again)
Friday, 19 Nov: 1,000 words (PY again)
Saturday, 20 Nov: 8,000 words
Sunday, 21 Nov: 3,000 words

Honestly . . . can this be done?? If I get 1,000 words written in a night, it's a good night.

Can this really be done?

And so the great mad spiral begins . . .

How are we all doing out there anyway?

Novels, Tiredness, Guidance and Ya Pears

2004-11-05T16:08:00.000+11:00

Writing novels makes you tired. I'm only up to 3,000 words (This writing on weeknights is a bit of a killer.) And each morning it's getting harder and harder to get out of bed.

But it's fun, isn't it??

Now . . . guidance . . . we started an interesting Bible study last night. We're looking at "Where To, Lord?", the first Matthias Media Bible Study to have a DVD come with it. (Featuring, Tony "Watch-Me-Swivel-In-My-Chair-As-I-Read-The-Autocue" Payne and possibly the world's most boring bass tune.) Anyway, all that aside, it really has got me thinking.

The study is kind of challenging me to think in terms of making all my decisions in line with the purpose God has created me for. That might not make decision-making any easier, but do you have any idea how many decisions I make without even thinking about God?? Like, I've just automatically divided stuff up into "Big Things That I Should Ask God About" and "Little Things That I'll Do By Myself". However, that little things category takes up the majority of my time.

So I'm having a bit of a re-think.

Interrupting my re-thinking this morning, was a Ya Pear. Have you ever tried these? Rach and I bought some in Woolworths Rockdale the other day to be different. Now, you would think that a pear is a pear. Well, no. They only vaguely look like pears (they're all white/cream on the outside), and they taste . . . well, they taste pretty blah, to tell you the truth.

Have I just got a bad one, or are Ya Pears really just some weird genetic mutation designed to take anything fun out of pairs?

Anyway, back to work . . . I'm trying to stay alert enough to make it through PY tonight.

Cheap Therapy and Cure-all for Writer's Block

2004-11-05T09:21:00.000+11:00

For those of you who suffer from writer's block take a break and pop some bubble-wrap.

And for those of you who need therapy but can't afford it pop bubble-wrap...it's much more cost effective! ;)

Where Did I Pull 2000 Words From?

2004-11-03T15:45:00.000+11:00

I surprised myself . . . I wrote 2000 words in two days! (Not at all fast enough to win NaNoWriMo, but hey, look, it was a surprise for me.) I haven't written like this since I was 15 . . . different story altogether, though.

I haven't posted my novel up anywhere yet because there's not really enough of it to make a coherent story. Yet. (I'm kind of writing it out of order as well, just to keep the writing going . . . I'll try to put some up soon.)

However, do any of the budding novel-writers from St Giles (you know who you are . . .) want to get together to share author-read drafts on the weekend? No criticsm or feedback (unless asked for), no pressure. Just the fun of having an audience. (If this gets a completely resounding "no", I'll drop the idea . . . but, hey, it would be something different.)

The basic gist of what I'm writing about, anyway, is something to do with Wagner. (See Matt's Arts page, where I'll talk a little about Wagner.) I think I wanted to throw time travel and Chinese martial arts in there, but I'm not sure quite how to do it. We'll see how it goes.

Anyway, keep it up, everyone!

NaNoWriMo, books, driving and a SIL with the same name...

2004-11-03T09:58:00.000+11:00

Well, Matt is roaring along with his novel. According to him he is now over the 2,000 word mark...or 4% along the way. Quite impressive start...However, he says he's only just starting which makes sense considering he's going for 50K! Anyway, I'm sure he'll talk about this enough as it is.

On the driving front we are going to have to live with each other. Matt does have an uncanny knack for not giving his passengers the feeling of security that yellow light means he'll stop and so you brace yourself for the feeling of no stomach as he speeds up and goes through or the feeling of getting your stomach back as he's hit the accelerator to start going through only to decide 2 metres before the while line that no he'd better stop and so you get whiplash.... ;) Just teasing. It is such a blessing having a car to drive around in. I'm becoming quite spoiled....and like to avoid public transport!

Lol...

Book recommendation: You all have to go check out a Bill Bryson book from the library and have a read. However, if you don't have a sarcastic sense of humour don't bother you possibly won't like it. Bill Bryson writes travel books in which he basically spends the time bagging out the country/language he's writing about. So, far I've enjoyed Notes from a Big Country, Notes from a Small Island and am not far off starting Down Under So that's America, UK and Australia. He's a well travelled fellow. And he keeps you in stitches in the most inappropriate places....so DON'T take one of his books to a funeral....totally inappropriate place to be stifling giggles.

Now, to finish up this post I would like to inform the viewers of this blog and commenters that should they encounter a certain lady called "Rachel Hodge" posting in the comment areas of this blog it is NOT me....it is my Sister-In-Law who was born in the same year as me but is actually 9 months older than me, is studying law at university, is un-married (thus the name mix-up) and will post crazy things at the drop of a hat.

IN FACT the only time you know it's me in the comment section is if I've posted as "Rach" or as I will do from now on as "Rach Hodge II" which is the original Rachel Hodge's nickname given to me since June 7th 2003. So, I apologize most profusely to any and all people's confused by this name-muddle but it was rather amusing....

Novelists and My Driving

2004-11-01T14:56:00.000+11:00

Well, well, well, 15 comments on one post? That's my best effort yet . . .

For those who wanted to know, I DID sign up to NaNoWriMo . . . I think it's the fact that when you tell someone else to sign up, it issues a challenge to you. If the email arrived and said, "Invitation" to write a novel, you'd say, "Nuh! Too busy." But because it's a CHALLENGE . . . that's a different kettle of fish.

It's the equivalent of having someone send you an email that say, "Hey, you loser!! You can't write a novel! You can't do it, because you're a wuss and you've got no ideas! You're too scared to start because you're S-T-U-P-I-D."

So what do you do? You click the button, join up and start writing . . .

Well, I will start writing as soon as I get home from work . . . Rachel, be warned . . .

I also had fun challenging other people to write a novel. So we have Mr Lucas Gillman signed up as well. This could make for a fun month . . .

Now, as for driving . . . let's be honest now . . . who runs into things when you drive? My wife and I . . . actually, hold on a minute . . . Dave Phillips, if you're reading this, this is the bit where you shut down this window, go get yourself a coffee and come back in a month when this post has disappeared . . .

Are you gone yet?

Good.

Yeah, my wife and I keep running into things. And getting into fights over it.

we'll be going round a sharp corner and BUMP . . . Rachel will be banging the kerb on the way round. I'll say something like, "Hey, watch out for the corner. We've got to look after the car." Which doesn't get the best response from Rach, but hey, she's scraping the car, you know what I mean?

This was all well and good for the last couple of months, because she was the one bumping into things, and I was scot-free on that particular column of the checklist. Orange lights and deciding whether or not to brake was a different kettle of fish, but hey, nobody told me in driving school that I had to announce to all passengers in the car whether I was going to stop or keep driving when I saw an orange light. A bit of variety makes life more interesting, I say. I mean, one day, my car might be hijacked by some dude with a gun and I can slam on the brakes suddenly and send him through the front windscreen because of all the practice I've had . . .

But I'm getting off topic.

Anyway, yesterday, I managed to run our car up against this little brick garden thing we've got next to the driveway. Rach just gave me The Look and we've pretty much agreed that we'll live with each other's imperfections when it comes to driving . . .

And we'll both try to watch out for corners . . .

Briz Crowd AGM and NaNoWriMo (or InNoWriMo, if I have my way)

2004-10-26T17:17:00.000+10:00

Okay, I think I have now not blogged for long enough, that I can be let back onto the world . . .

Latest news . . . we had an AGM of the Briz Crowd this weekend. I'm not sure if Briz Crowd is still the appropriate name for it, but that's what it was. AGM sounds pretty good.

The Briz crowd are myself and three friends I met during the high school homeschooling days . . . they were all groomsmen at my wedding (and I've groomsed and MCed for two of theirs . . . we're still waiting for Josh to buy the ring).

Needless to say, it was an awesome weekend, with a lot of flack given to my driving skills . . . the old, "Who's put on the most weight?" question and a swapping of time-tested marriage tricks and tips. (e.g. "Mate, every time I take out the garbage, I just win brownie points plus." "Really? I'll have to try that one.")

All very exciting . . . Also . . .

My sister has challenged me to sing up for NaNoWriMo.

What? You haven't heard of NaNoWriMo?

National Novel Writing Month? Actually, it should be called InNoWriMo, because it's pretty international now . . .

The idea is simple . . . You sign up and between 1 November and 30 November, you write yourself a 50,000 word novel.

It's not that difficult, is it? You'll get a certificate of achievement if you actually pull it off, plus you'll be able to talk to lots of different people at the same time.

I'm debating . . . if I said yes, it'd be one of the all-time craziest things I've ever done.

If I said no . . . it'll be an ordinary old month . . . well, except for the Wagner, of course. (More about that coming soon on the Arts page . . .)

I wonder if I can combine the two?? What do you think? Should I do it?

For more info, go to ??.

Better yet, anybody want to take the plunge with me? What about you, Mr Dave E

Flaming Crepes

2004-10-10T14:59:00.000+10:00

It all started one fine Sunday afternoon...

What is IT you say? Well, IT is the incident of the "Flaming Crepes".

Matthew R Hodge was being a wonderful, loving husband by offering to make us lunch. When he asked me what I wanted I said, "Ham & Cheese Crepes". And even though this gourmet sounding food (which I make relatively regularly) was daunting to him he said, "OK!"

I let him off the gourmet hook and told him there was a Greens Packet of pancake mix in the pantry and he went to turning the packet into crepes! (Well, done sweetheart!)

Anyway, this crepe mixture was sticking, scorching and being genrally cantakerous so the first crepe ended up being discared as a small heap of crepe fragments. Trying to get this lovely crepe out of the pan and onto the plate took some maneurving and one piece fell down into the stove tray.

Okay that's fine...happens all the time around here.

That is until Matt asks me to help so I'm standing there trying to get this crepe to cooperate when we smell this nasty burning smell. I lift up the fry-pan and what do I see but a small flame shooting up from the stove tray! That piece of crepe is burning!! We both watch it for a few seconds thinking it will burn out but NO the flame only grows larger and more insistent that it would like to burn down our kitchen....OH NO YOU DON'T YOU LITTLE FLAMING CREPE!!

I quickly grab a glass from the sink, fill it up with water and wildly throw the water onto the flame...with a sizzle the flaming crepe stops flaming and becomes the water-logged, blackened coal it should be. The water boils up rather quickly in such a heated environment and we can get back to the task of making lunch...

What a lovely lunch! :) Lol...it did taste nice although from now on we stick with our home-made crepe batter and leave the Greens Pancake Mix to grow mold in the pantry.

THE END

P.S. To those of you who like cooking I've recently posted a recipe for apple pie that doesn't use apples....check it out it does actually work!!

Public Speaking No 2

2004-10-09T22:00:00.000+10:00

Well . . .

I spent most of Friday preparing my slides for the talk.

Got nervous on the way out there.

I had a set of the slides I'd printed out for myself, and I wrote down a whole stack of notes next to each slide to help myself while I talked through it.

Anyway, got out to this place at the Epping Club.

As soon as I walked in, I thought to myself, "Oh man, they're not going to want to pay us."

There was hardly anyone there!

Seating for 500 and they only had about 100 people there!!

John did predict this happening, but still. I felt a bit sorry for them.

Still, this is why we charge $2,000, so we don't go all the way out to these little things and find there's only a handful of people.

I had to wait till some woman from "The Garden Clinic" finished talking about gardens. Which is where we talk about clothing.

Now, I figured that a $2,000 an hour statistician would wear something along the lines of a suit. So I wore jacket, tie, trousers; I had a shave; Rachel helped me colour-coordinate everything (Thanks, baby!). I even risked the mortal embarrassment of travelling by train from Carlton to Epping wearing this outfit, even though on a Saturday afternoon, nobody is wearing anything at all like that.

This woman from "The Garden Clinic" is wearing a tight skirt, singlet top and thongs. Maybe it's the "I've been out in the garden all morning look." Anyway, I caught the tail end of that and learned a bit about water crystals. Half a teaspoon in the plant. Put too many and when it rains heavily, you have little volcanos all over your garden.

Oh, yeah, don't put tap water or ex-laundry water on plants or vegetables. It's bad. Really bad.

Speaking of bad, after a brief intermission where they showed some houses for sale (this was a real estate agency do after all), a bald guy came up and demonstrated yoga. While he was taking his shoes off, he told us all how yoga was a beautiful thing and how it made you feel really good.

He then proceeded to do some of the nastiest acrobatics I've seen in a long while. The splits was looking relatively mild compared to this guy's contortions. Bending in half, wrapping your legs behind your head, you name it, he did it. . . .

After that, there was a few more houses, and then yours truly.

I was nervous for about a minute into it. After that, it was really easy. And it was so dimly lit in there, I couldn't see my handwritten notes. So I just glanced at my overheads from time to time and made it all up. Turns out, I pretty much had memorised what I was going to say anyway.

Unfortunately, I was a bit late due to Weed Thong and Bendy Man going overtime (and then I took longer than expected, but hey, for $2,000, you want to do these things properly, right?), so at about 5.30, the lady from the real estate agency was getting kind of keen for me to wrap it up because at 5.30, they had to be out of the ballroom so The Greens could come in and celebrate another election loss.

I hung around, answered a few questions, and was out of there by 6.30.

I think I could do this again.

Thank you, God. (Thank you all those praying.)

Public Speaking

2004-10-08T13:49:00.000+10:00

Have you ever thought you should get better at public speaking?

Does the thought absolutely freak you out?

You might not want to read any further.

There was this real estate agent mob up at Epping that have been ringing us for the last two weeks because they wanted John (the boss, celebrity real estate guru, etc. etc.) to speak at some do they're having at the ballroom of the Epping Club. I haven't been to the EC myself, but it does sound rather like a posh establishment.

Anyway, we couldn't give them a straight answer because Mr Edwards (John's last name) was away in WA and didn't get back until Wednesday. Wednesday, he said he'd do it for $2,000. (He can't be bothered preparing speeches for less than that nowadays.)

Then the next day he actually asked when the date was. I said this Saturday. (The 9th.)

He said, "This Saturday?? I'm down in Melbourne for a seminar. You know . . ." [giving me a look] " . . . you could do it."

Now, what do you do if you're standing in front of the scary ride at the theme park? Do you wander back and forth all day working up the courage to do it? Or do you say, "Damn it . . . let's get it over and done with."

Yeah, yeah. I'm the latter. So I said, "All right."

So yours truly is now the $2,000 guest speaker at this function. Seating for 500, they said. Plus standing room, they said.

And they were narky about paying for $2,000 as well. "What am I getting for my $2,000?"

"Well," I'm explaining . . . "You're getting a professional property statistician from a respected property statistics company coming to talk to your crowd."

Ladies and gentlemen, if you can spare a prayer for Matthew Hodge, Mr $2,000-An-Hour Professional Property Statistician, that would be most appreciated.

Incidentally, there's $500 bucks in it for me, so I'm not just doing it for the fame.

Or the infamy.

Wonder if I'll pass out??

On a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being talking to myself and 10 being asking Rachel's Dad for permission to go out with her, this is about a 9.5.

Let's do it.

Cleaning up the House Before the Wife Gets Home

2004-10-07T15:02:00.000+10:00

I was up late last night cleaning up the house before Rach gets home.

Have you ever noticed, though, the crazy things you do when you're by yourself, though?

For no particular reason, I decided to tackle the special features on my Wizard of Oz DVD. Now, I don't know whose idea it was over at Warner Bros, but they got together about six hours of audio material of all the different takes they did of the songs for Wizard of Oz. So I left that on as background music.

"Number 2,021, take 8"

JUDY GARLAND: "Somewhere over the rain . . . " [cough, cough, cough]

"Number 2,021, take 9"

[Start again]

You get the idea. If you ever wondered what the Munchkins sounded like at normal speed, I can claim to have heard it. Better to have left them speeded up, I think.

I also decided to go through some of my old correspondence and throw old letters and Christmas cards out. However, some of them I couldn't bear to part with.

For instance, there' s a card given to me on my 21st that cheers when you open it. Even after all these years . . . I had to keep it.

Anyway, the house is cleaner, we're now hooked up to Optus ADSL (no more disconnections and slow internet to drive Rachel up the wall).

I'm seeing winged monkeys in my sleep, but that's not such an issue . . .

You Vould Like to Yodel, Ja?

2004-10-06T09:20:00.000+10:00

For those of you wondered where I was, I was in Melbourne. Rach's grandma turned 70, and so I went down to Melbourne for the weekend to join in the celebrations. Those celebrations consisted of a dinner up at the Cuckoo Restaurant in the Dandenongs.

So we all enjoyed a wild night of eating food (lots and lots of food), celebrating and being entertained by a bunch of guys putting on German accents and yodelling . . . and woodchopping . . . and doing that weird slapping dance that Bavarians do . . .

The rest of the time was spent lounging around the grandparents luxurious Rosebud house . . . with about a dozen other people as added background noise. It was very nice.

And now I'm back in Sydney, at work again . . .

A Thought

2004-09-17T17:02:00.000+10:00

I had a thought just occurred to me just now and I thought it worthy of blogging.

Do you remember when you were young, naive and somewhat crazy and you had dreams? Perhaps you wanted to be a fireman.

Perhaps you wanted to be in the movies.

Maybe you thought of being a writer or a poet.

Or maybe it was nothing that spectacular, but it was a cool idea you had.

You thought you'd read all of "War and Peace".

You thought you'd watch every film with John Cleese in it.

You thought you'd do a five-day bushwalk.

You thought you'd make a movie.

And then . . . somewhere along the line . . . you found yourself either:

a) Doing what you were good at (which is completely different from doing what you like)

or

b) Doing whatever paid the bills.

I'm not suggesting unresponsibility or not doing our work, by any stretch of the imagination. But why did we lose that twinkle in our eye?

There are plenty of other people out there who follow their dreams and get exactly what they want out of life? What made them different from us?

I wonder what God thinks of all this. Did he give us all our desires and interests so we could then suppress them all and do what brings in the money?

Is there a line between following our dreams and living a selfish life?

What do you think?

Lack of Blogging

2004-09-13T13:27:00.000+10:00

Many of you may be wondering why I haven't blogged for a while. I do apologise. Partly it was a lack of time.

Partly it was because I was wrestling with a problem.

Procrastination.

Not procrastination on blogging, mind you. Procrastination on my work.

I don't know about you, but I believe God calls us to work hard at what we do. Now, that doesn't necessarily mean that we have to burn the midnight oil, work at least an hour overtime every day and kill ourselves in the process of doing the job.

But I do think it means better than doing the bare minimum that is expected of you, and filling up the rest of the time with surfing the net, answering emails, talking to people . . . and writing blogs. Now, I'm not against taking a breather or having some down time, but when these things push work to the sides and are used as an excuse not to work, I think there's something wrong.

This is what I think.

When it comes down to what I do, it's a different matter. I do all those things. With a vengeance. I have mastered the art of doing what is expected of me, and only what is expected of me. Mind you, I'm not getting in any trouble at work. I'm keeping people happy. But I know that I should be able to work better. And I believe God expects it of me.

So why don't I just work harder?

Good question. I want to. I don't want to be slack. So why don't I just get on and do things?

The answer came to me in the middle of a church prayer meeting the other night. We were being encouraged to pray privately and confess our sins. So I had to confess to God that I really wasn't working very hard at my work. I was being dishonest with my time.

And, amazingly, right at that moment, the answer to "why?" entered my head.

If I work hard, I'll find myself with time to think and plan for the future. And that's a complete unknown to me. I may need to find a new job. I may have to do something different. Or, and this is the one that I'm really scared of, I may end up just doing the same thing as I do now forever. Well, not forever, but for a long period of time with no end in sight.

So rather than think about any of that stuff, I'm procrastinating and leaving things to the last minute, so I will always be busy with the stuff I'm doing now. If I do have spare time, I waste it with meaningless trifles rather than thinking about the future.

But God has told me something new. I haven't actually heard his voice say this, mind you, but it's what I feel he wants me to do. He wants me to work hard. In fact, he wants me to excel at my job. I don't know what he wants me to do in the future. I have no clue. I have to leave that up to Him.

But right here, right now, where I am, I have to honour God in the way I work. So I went back to work the next day and I'm looking at my work in a different way.

So how can you help?

1) If what I'm talking about makes any sense at all and you understand where I'm coming from, I'd be interested to hear your comments (and hopefully encouragement).

2) If you're a praying person, and you read this, could you pray for me that I will obey God in the way I work?

That'd be excellent . . .

Anyway, I'm off for now. Will post more on the Arts page soon because I have seen a lot of Australian films over the last month that I haven't finished posting about. Talk to you all soon.

Random thoughts

2004-09-12T14:39:00.000+10:00

Did you know that some people are afraid of marshmallows??

It's true!

They have even given it a label....Althaiophobia

Weird huh?? Yeah I thought so too.

Also, answer this easy question...

What is Rachel's favourite movie??

...

...

...

...

...

Love's Brother

Matt & I went to see this movie y'day and I fell in love with it. It is a very sweet story set in Australia during the 1950s. It has a messy love quartet and Adam Garcia the handsome hunk from Coyote Ugly. Worth a watch if you like soppy, romantic films that make you sigh with happiness! I hope it wins the AFI award for Best Film of the Year.

Anyway, enough random thoughts. Hope you had a great weekend!

Embarrassment

2004-09-03T13:50:00.000+10:00

I've learned recently two new facts. Well, actually, I've known them for a while, but they've been cemented in slightly more.

a) I can embarrass Rachel in public quite easily.

b) I enjoy doing so, because she always smiles more beautifully when she's embarrassed than any other time.

The odd thing is, though, I don't often set out to embarrass her. Usually, I'll just be in a group setting and I'll think of something that seems somewhat amusing to me. (Well, enough to make me want to test it out loud . . .)

I'll look around and the notch the comment down from its original level of "Something You'd Only Say In Front of Blokes That You'll Never See Again" down to slightly above "Amusing Anecdotes You Tell In Nursing Homes". Then I'll chuck it out there.

Then . . . WHAM! . . . I feel an elbow in my ribs, hear the sound of "Matthew!" and Rachel's going red . . .

Now, this should possibly be my cue to actually take it down to the "Anecdotes in Nursing Homes" level and leave it there. (If not just shut up completely.)

But something inside me says, "Make the next one a 'Cheeky Comment You Say To Get a Reaction Out Of Your Parents'". This then turns into a chain reaction, with comments escalating up to dangerous new levels.

If I really want to up the stakes, I break out Bromley and Quark, but that's a different story . . .

From Quark

2004-09-03T13:48:00.000+10:00

rachel i think your butiful and nice and your my favrit person in the hol world and i reely like your hugs and stuff and can i come tonight because il get sad at home and bromleys being mean and saying i just want to say this so i can come but im not im saying it because i like you and your my favrit!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The View From the Escalator

2004-09-01T15:17:00.000+10:00

I was handing out leaflets for Wednesday lunch-time Bible talks in North Sydney this morning and the strangest thing happened.

Well, not really strange, because it happens a bit in North Sydney.

It started with a sound of tambourines and bongo drums and then up the street came a bunch of Hare Krishnas. They then proceeded to stand behind me at the escalators while I was handing out these leaflets.

They left after two minutes, but during those two minutes I was putting myself in the shoes of the people coming up the escalator.

They're thinking that they're stuck between a guy wearing a suit (well, almost . . . I gave the flick to the tie) handing out leaflets for Bible talks saying, "What gives life meaning?" and a bunch of guys wearing orange robes and bashing tambourines.

They're thinking that religious people are weird . . .

What I found interesting, though, is the thought that everyone is religious. If we think that this world is it, that we're here to work, get a house and travel the world in retirement, that's religion. If we think that God doesn't exist and man is king, that's a religion.

The question really is, Does one religion contain the truth?

And also: If there is only one true religion, what are the consequences of ignoring that truth?

Bachelor Diary - Day 9

2004-08-27T17:03:00.000+10:00

I scored big time today. Absolute big time.

Here's my recipe for success.

Step 1. Get up at 5.30 a.m.

Step 2. Wear a purple t-shirt, grandpa cardigan and beanie saying "Australia's Wonderland".

Step 3. Head to your nearest Baker's Delight.

Step 4. Get this . . . they give out day-old bread to homeless people!!!

It was awesome. I've been eating bread ALL DAY!!

I picked a brown paper bag off the ground, toasted some of it up in the work toaster and offered it to Dave saying I'd bought it at a coffee shop down the road. ("What, there's no Vegemite? Oh, look, I can go get it fixed up . . ." "No, no. It's okay. It's probably better for me this way.")

Awesome.

Lunch consisted of about six pieces of bread with butter nicked from the work fridge.

I mean, who needs to ever go grocery shopping with a system like this??

I don't have to worry too much about dinner because it'll be another nutritious night out at PY, complete with all manner of nutritious junk food. So that should be good.

Debating what to do on the weekend. The bears told me today that I should tidy up the house for Rachel to come home instead of sticking all loose items in the cupboard. I told them that until they grow the appropriate skeletal framework necessary for pushing a vacuum cleaner, they could shut up.

Or, alternatively, I would clean the house and I could use them to clean the toilet with.

Bromley relented, muttering under his breath.

Quark said that Bromley looked like he had been used to clean toilet because he was brown. He then laughed too hard and fell off the top of the piano where they've been living for the last two days. I'm not sure where that boy gets his sense of humour from.

Splinters, Canoes and Red dust!

2004-08-26T18:33:00.000+10:00

Bump. Bump. Ker-Thump...that is the sound of ME driving along a rather rough track down to this gorgeous water hole/dam on the 190,000 acre property my parents live on. It's gorgeous and so quiet and peaceful....getting there isn't!

Lol...

I haven't driven along that track since I took Matt down there for a breakfast picnice a fwe years back. Once we got there I took off my sneakers, rolled up my pants and went for a canoe around the dam. It was pretty muddy and the canoe slipped out as I was getting in so I grab the sides of the boat and get a whopper of a splinter in my hand...a bit is still in there and it's hurting so I'll have to attack it with the splinter remover later but I'm being a bit of a woose and avoiding it at the moment! :)

Oh and did I mention that the dirt had loads of prickles out there? Sore feet too! Lol...I'm a sook huh? Well, anyway, the FUN part was getting the dirty tennis ball and rubbing it in Lydia's hair...

Now for the red dirt part...here's a visual.

That isn't our place but that's the kind of colour the dirt is around here...so now imagine that in runny mud...all over my feet and legs...and I haven't yet washed so I'm feeling pretty grubby! :) It was a fun adventure!

And now my culinary skills are being called on to cook spaghetti bolonaise!

Bachelor Diary - Day 8

2004-08-26T16:03:00.000+10:00

Well, it finally happened . . . I ran out of muesli today. And I blew most remaining food money on pizzas last night. (I was too tired to cook.)

So I had three big glasses of Milo for breakfast, washed down with the remaining four muesli bars in the box. (So I kind of had muesli.) Was feeling a bit sick by this stage, but at least wasn't feeling hungry . . .

until about 10.30 this morning. Dave went to get his morning cup of coffee of toast and I offered to come along and catch up on how life was going, etc. etc. At the coffee shop, he said the magic words, "Can I get you anything?" So I scored a couple of pieces of toast and vegemite out of that one. (Apparently the big breakfast was stretching the friendship.)

Lunchtime was a bit trickier. I wandered around Greenwood Plaza, hoping there'd be some sort of free food that they'd be giving away. I scabbed a bit from a deli by doing the old, "Can I have a try of that before I buy it? . . . This is rubbish! I'm not buying that!" routine.

Topped it up with raiding the biscuit barrell at the office . . .

Still not sure what to do about food at home tonight, because we're out of leftovers. Hoping somebody brings a packet of biscuits (hopefully two) to Bible study tonight.

By the way, if you want to donate anything, that'd be great. As long as it's in some sort of microwaveable tupperware container that'll be great. And self contained. (I really don't want to bother with any of that, "just put it in the oven for 15 minutes, then sprinkle cheese on it and boil yourself some vegies to go with it" type stuff, so don't worry if that's the best you can offer.)

Bachelor Diary - Day 6

2004-08-24T16:47:00.000+10:00

I was on the way home last night and I was still thinking about the KFC issue. Then, I'm afraid to say, I got hit with a case of pride. "I know how this works," I thought to myself. "I get KFC, blog about it the next day, and everyone will just say, 'Oh, Matt is so hopeless at looking after himself . . .'"

So I decided, "Screw that!" (I probably shouldn't have said it out loud because the guy next to me who was trying his hardest to read a copy of The Purpose-Filled Life while pretending not to read it gave me a bit of a dirty look. I tilted my head to look at his book cover, and he went red and looked away . . .)

Sorry, digression.

I decided to go home and cook. It's not that hard.

So I went for the recipes Rachel had left for me. One I found was for skillet pork chops.

I was okay as far as browning the pork chops went. But then came the moment when I had to mix up a mixture of chicken broth, lemon juice, flour, garlic and onions. I chucked it all in the frypan and then turned to read the next bit of the recipe book.

It told me to cook the mixture up until it was boiling, chuck the browned pork back in (sorry, I forgot to tell you that I'd taken the pork out) and then cook it "but make sure that the broth mixture doesn't evaporate when you're cooking the pork".

Determined to be careful, I turned back to the frypan, only to discover that the mixture had all evaporated anyway (except for garlic and onions, which just don't die). This was an unexpected development . . .

So I chucked some water in just to watch something boil. When I saw some bubbles, I threw the pork in. It still evaporated anyway.

I cooked up some vegetables to have with my pork (which tasted, by the way, like pork with onions and garlic). I'm wondering if KFC would have been better.

Next morning, I decided to take the entire container of muesli to work instead of just a little one with some muesli. (Dave had been giving me flack for "carrying enough Tupperware to put a Sylvania Waters housewife to shame" so I decided to take the whole thing.)

So I took the whole thing in but it only had enough muesli for one bowl. So now I'm going to have to bring a whole bag of muesli in tomorrow. If we've got one in the pantry at home.

Lunch consisted of more garlic and onion pork. Got a longing for Oporto, but I'm out of loose coins. Got hungry about mid-afternoon, so I decided to curb my hunger by hitting into Dave's 4 litres of milk.

Verdict: 1/2 a litre of milk does a better job of simulating morning sickness than filling afternoon hunger cravings.

Bachelor Diary - Day 5

2004-08-23T16:52:00.000+10:00

I wasn't on the internet on the weekend, so we're at Day 5 already.

The weekend wasn't too bad.

Friday night was youth group, so I skipped dinner and just ate supper there. It was a healthy nourishing meal consisting of corn chips, potato crisps and a lot of Mint Patties (nature's greatest chocolate).

Saturday morning, there was still some muesli in the house, so that was okay. Had friends over to watch nine hours of film (see Arts page). We cleaned out remaining bread rolls in the house for lunch.

For dinner, bought pizzas. Probably should be a bit careful with my food money.

Sunday was good too. Still had breakfast, but finished off the milk. I should buy some more.

Lunch was "Guess Who's Coming to Lunch", so I got a good feed at the Wilsons' house. Skipped dinner again but had supper at Ben and Jackie's which consisted of nourishing mini-meat pies, crackers and dip and ice cream. All in all, I'm being looked after fairly well.

Monday morning was a bit rougher. I found the milk from last week in the fridge at work was off, so I had to throw it out.

Hit Dave for some money for milk. He bought me 4 litres worth . . . hmm . . .

My pay cheque clears tomorrow. It's not like I'm that broke.

Lunch came around and I had chili again. (I brought the bowl this time ... I'm getting the hang of this stuff.)

Hmm . . . what should I do for dinner, though? I'm feeling too tired to cook.

Hmm . . . I wonder if perhaps cut the corners on filling up the car with petrol this week, I can afford to go to KFC tonight? It sounds like a plan.

Except that I need petrol to get to KFC. A bit of a chicken and egg problem this one.

Quote of the Day

2004-08-22T00:46:00.000+10:00

"But it might go out of fashion and by then we won't be wearing anything!" --Hannah Davis

(My sister refering to the fact that the jumper I'm about to take off Lydia's hands is one she LOVES and couldn't wear for a couple of years anyway.)

I love my sisters!

I'm Worried!

2004-08-20T19:30:00.000+10:00

I don't know about the rest of you but Matt seriously needs some cooking lessons...and how to look after leftovers. :-S

I am enjoying my time outback. It's quiet! No traffic, smog, trains or anything like that! It's great! :) And I have a pile of frozen meals to cook up for the kids and I hope I have better luck than Mr. Matt! Lol....

Well, just wanted to check up on Quark & Bromley. How are they doing Matt?

Bachelor Diary - Day 2

2004-08-20T15:01:00.000+10:00

Dinner last night consisted of some vegetable chili out of the freezer. There was a lot of it, because Rach has dreams of being a camp cook one day.

Anyway, chucked it in the microwave for 10 minutes or so. There was still a big frozen ball in the middle, but I didn't want that much of it anyway, so I just drained out the warm edge bits.

I had it with (light!) sour cream, which was cool, except for the pale yellow shade it's turned. Not sure what's going on there.

Made it through Bible study, anyway, without heaving too much, so it can't have been that bad for me.

This morning (Friday), it was really cold. Which was good, because it means I could just wrap the ball of frozen chili in GladWrap and take it to work that way . . .

Well, that was the plan. It was a packed train on the way in and there was a bit of a hole in the bottom of the bag. It took me about five minutes to explain to the woman next to me that, no, I was not bleeding and then after I'd convinced her of that, five minutes of very fast talking to convince her I wasn't relieving myself in the train.

Sydney-siders . . .

Anyway, at work now. Further problem with taking ball of chilli to work. What do I microwave it in for lunch? There's no bowl big enough and I don't want to scrape it up off the sides of the microwave.

Ended up throwing it out and buying Oporto instead. I hadn't really budgeted for it, but this is kind of an emergency.

Feel sleepy and bloated now . . .

I'll blog more when I feel more awake.

Bachelor Diary - Day 1

2004-08-19T12:49:00.000+10:00

G'day folks,

The wife has left me (only temporarily, for those of you gasping in shock).

Rach's Mum and Dad are going on a holiday to celebrate their 25th wedding anniversary, and Rach is going on a holiday to babysit her remaining 5 siblings at that grand old outback homestead "Rockwell".

So I'm left to fend for myself. Bachelor style.

Now, the problem with this whole bachelor thing is I've never actually done it before. The closest I came was when I stayed at Andrew and Fiona's place for two weeks before I got married.

And I only cooked for myself on about two occasions.

So this is going to be interesting.

Anyway, I saw Rach off at the train station this morning. This reminded me of all the times I used to put her on a train going back home to the outback back in the old going out days. However, she never got serenaded by a stuffed bear and a stuffed dog the night before on any of those occasions. But that's off topic . . .

Food eaten so far:
- 1 decaf latte courtesy of the Voodoo Coffe Lounge in North Sydney (bought with left-over train money . . . )
-1 small bowl of muesli brought from home and consumed at desk
-2 squares of Cadbury Chocolate Mousse chocolate.

Still feeling reasonably fit and healthy.

Niggling Bachelor Worry for the Day: What am I going to have for dinner? I know I've got leftovers in the freezer, but I also have a Bible study at my house tonight. They'll arrive at 7.30. I'll get home from work at 6.40.

In just 50 minutes, I've somehow got to fit in 1) Defrosting Dinner, 2) Eating Dinner and 3) Doing Lots of Other Things to Procrastinate on 1) and 2). It's the third one I'm worried about. Am I going to have enough time for it?

Bear Centre??

2004-08-17T13:37:00.000+10:00

This is Bromley!!

I just 'eard that there was a Bear Centre at Coogee!! Can I go??

Are there any grizzly bears there? Let me 'at em!!

Growl! Growl!

Brom

Nice try...

2004-08-16T22:13:00.000+10:00

at convincing me that riding the trains is a wonderful way to go...but nada...it ain't working...

We bought a car...for ME!

The Queen of this castle...to only be delayed by my lack of brain power at working out how to get around traffic jams! Muahahahaha!

You my darling husband can enjoy the psyche power of working out when that train will arrive but I shall enjoy the power that comes from getting stuck on the wrong road heading to the city and having to take a detour via the airport! And then...having the joyful experience of discovering the new Krispy Kreme Drive-Thru at the airport!! These doghnuts are really wanting us to buy them and get fat aren't they? How's that for an 8 hour shift at Coogee Bear Daycare center working with the 3 yr olds in the Polar Bear room? (and yes I didn't make up those names!)

By the way, Bromley and Quark should be happy because we pulled out the TV and watched some Olympics tonight. Way to go us Aussies with 5 gold medals already!

Copywriting

2004-08-13T12:38:00.000+10:00

My Dad sent me a course on copywriting last week . . .

I don't know how familiar you are with it, but direct response marketing is big in the United States. The idea is to write a letter that is so powerfully convincing that by the time you hit the end of the letter, you want to buy what they're selling. Cheaper webpages can do it as well, because sometimes a few well-placed words can be more effective than heaps of bells and whistles . . .

For an example, the following link is for "The Budget Kit", which is probably the best budgeting tool I've ever seen:

http://www.moneytracker.com/about-the-budget-kit.htm

It's quite a long page, but it sets out to suck you in to buying the product.

Anyway, I'm going to learn to write that kind of stuff! I'll keep you posted from time to time on what I'm learning . . . . and I promise not to advertise too heavily on this page.

But, I'm thinking that maybe CityRail could do with a bit of publicity:

WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU HAD TIME TO MINGLE AND RELAX AT A TRAIN STATION?

In most busy cities of the world, commuters are in a rush. They're trying to sqeeze on to crowded trains, trying to get where they're going as fast as possible.

What happened to the good old days, when people used to slow down, smell the roses?

At CityRail, we take a different approach. We want you, the consumer, to enjoy the experience of travelling. We want you to have time to admire our beautiful platforms, watch our awesome StreetVision TVs and just generally relax and think about life.

So our policy is not to run trains through as fast as possible. We space them out a bit. Some people say that we're not keeping with the timetables.

But where's the fun in that? If you get hung up on a timetable, you're going to be a boring person. Where's the spontanaiety? Where's the sense of excitement that comes from looking at the board and wondering if that train (scheduled to arrive in 8 minutes), is going to arrive in 2 minutes or 22 minutes?

Some people say that we make them late for things. But, honestly, is it really that important? Why not take some time out, buy a snack from the vending machine? Try to read that book you never have time for?

Think how much happier your partner will be to see you when you arrive a bit later . . . absence makes the heart, etc.

So next time you're standing on one of our beautiful platforms, playing the Random Train game, take a look around you. See those other people standing around as well? They're real people. They've got anxieties and problems, just like you. Feel the love . . .

An Apology

2004-08-12T17:35:00.000+10:00

Hi everyone,

I feel an apology is in order. According to my wife, it's getting too freaky the way all the stuffed animals in our house are talking. They've been talking to visitors, too . . .

While this goes down well with some people, others don't quite know what to make of it.

So if you were freaked out, I apologise.

Rachel's getting used to them, but she wants to know, "Where do their voices come from???"

I'm not actually sure. I just talk to them and they answer.

The Joy of Gloves & The Madness of Cables

2004-08-03T15:36:00.000+10:00

Coming from the Land of the One-Week Winter where I used to live, Sydney winters were something of an ordeal for me when I moved down here. I know I grew up here as a kid, but for some reason, I don't remember it being this cold. Maybe I was doing a lot more running around.

Anyway, just went outside this lunchtime to sit on a park bench and read a book and it was COLD . . . so I pulled out of my big jacket pocket my gloves and enjoyed the wonderful sensation of circulation running through my fingers . . . It was awesome.

Except when it came to turning pages on the book. So I took them off again. I was now happy as far as book-reading went, but I wasn't happy as far as circulation in fingers went . . . am I trying to ask for too much here?

Enough of that . . . cables!! Cables are interesting little things. Our internet and email went down at work today and our sadly underpaid Office Nerd being off for the day, I had to try to work out how the thing worked . . .

It turned out - after many phone calls to our Internet People, a choice exchange of dialogue between My Boss and the Internet People where he informed them that he preferred the Other Internet People, and even a phone call to the off-work Office Nerd - that the problem was a cord in the back of the Internet People's Modem should have been plugged into the hole next to it.

This is why I got my degree, of course . . . If your computer ever shuts down, and you want someone to experiment with randomly plugging a cord in a different hole, give me a call . . .

New Blog!!

2004-08-02T16:17:00.000+10:00

G'day everyone!

This is Matt . . . and I've decided to blog about something. It's a bit arty, but if you're interested, I'm talking about "The Relentless Pursuit" on the Matts Arts page . . .

http://mattsarts.blogspot.com

Plus, I'll try to have a few more film reviews up there soon.

'Oo's Embarrassed??

2004-07-20T13:09:00.001+10:00

'Ello, 'Ello, Ello!!

This is Bromley the Bear signing on . . . I thought I'd come up 'ere and have a bit of a look at this bloggy thing. You two ain't writing much, are ya?? I've seen postcards with more on 'em than this site.

Anyway, I'm just doing me own blog because nobody wants to set up www.unsuitablebear.blogspot.com. When they do, I'll blog there.

Seeing as Matt 'asn't written his tuppence worth on "Shrek 2", I'm going over there to write something about it . . .

Growl! Growl! Brom!

P.S. If there's any cute single female bears out there that are wantin' to drop me an email, you can do it at growlgrowl@studbear.cave.forest. I like growling, watching "The Edge" and "Legends of the Fall" (both have awesome bear-mauling scenes) and getting Matt in trouble with Rachel . . .

P.P.S. Some people say I have cute button eyes that make you swoon. Growl!!