Sunday, July 29, 2007
And soooooooooooooooooooo forgetful!
Today when Stu and I were having our traditional weekend morning coffees down by the river, we saw Gwen Stefani, Gavin Rossdale and little Kingston having a wee stroll out by the river. No paparazzi or bodyguards in sight. How lovely that someone so famous can stroll round our little city and not get hassled. I love Brisbane!
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Sooooooooooooooooo behind on blogging!
Hello hello
I am rubbish at blogging at the minute - I am terribly sorry. I hope someone other than my mum (hello mum!) is listening.
Lots to catch up on from the last couple of weekends, as they have been very uncharacteristically busy. I have barely had any time for sitting around in my pyjamas - I am sure you can imagine how traumatic a time it has been.
I have now officially commenced my stint as an RSPCA volunteer. I work in the wildlife ward, in the Fairfield Shelter in Brisbane, which is the state HQ. It is huuuuuuuuuge and has a big farmyard section, all the usual dogs, cats etc and my little section which is for wildlife. Last weekend I had my orientation where they showed us a video that made everyone cry, then a tour of the shelter and bit of animal behaviour and training training. On Saturday I started properly. Mostly scrubbing poo and cutting up fruit and whatnot, but it's very interesting and rewarding. There are a lot of birds in at the minute - a couple of Rosellas, a Lorikeet, 2 Kookaburras, a couple of cockatiels, a plover, and a couple of Galahs. Just as I was leaving they were bringing in a Tawny Frogmouth, which is pretty exciting! There's also a blue tongued skink with a missing foot, a brush tailed possum and a couple of ringtail possums, and some mice. There are also 150 Peachfaces whose owner is in prison, so we get the unenviable task of looking after them for the minute. Being lovebirds they are getting pretty busy with the lovin, and there's shortly going to be a bit of a population explosion which everyone's pretty worried about.
We are responsible for cleaning out cages (which is pretty grim in the case of the possums) and getting them all fed, and that's what I'll be doing with my Saturday mornings from now on! I am very excited, if a little intimidated at the prospect of having to handle these animals as some of them are a little fierce, and obviously they're all wild and not too keen on being held. On Saturday me and the other girl who just started managed to release 4 birds by accident, which was a bit traumatic. Obviously on the way out I find it a little hard to walk past the cat section without pausing for a while... I have fallen quite badly in love with one chap in particular and I have the distinct feeling that if he's still around once we have moved out to a house he might be coming home with me one day.... (hope Stu isn't reading this)
Last Sunday we had a bit of an exciting adventure... One of Stu's ex colleagues has a boat, and offered to take all the poms out to South Stradbroke Island for the day. It was fab - South Straddie is lovely, and we had a great boozy afternoon on the boat and the Island and whatnot.
So what else has been happening in the world of Robinson.....
Oh yes, we have decided upon the suburb we want to move to - Paddington. I have long coveted it, and this weekend took Stu up for a look round, and he also fell in love. It is lovely - really nice houses and cafes and little boutiquey shops, and stuff and things shops and whatnot. I heart it. It is really seriously hilly though, which is a bit of a drawback, but does mean that the views are fabulous. We love it so much, and are so sick of here that we are considering breaking our lease so we can move soon. There are some great places for rent at the moment (and obviously we need somewhere suitable for cats) and we are very excited! In other grown up decision news, we have decided that we are going to apply for Permanent Residency. Being here on the visa type that we are frankly sucks arse as we get absolutely no benefits at all, and are fleeced left and right by the taxman. It's going to take a while to save up the cash to apply, but I'll keep you posted. Apparently it should be pretty easy because we are already here and working and whatnot.
Next week I'll be going to the gold coast for 4 days, for my company conference. I am really very unexcited about it - 18 hour days and lots of schmoozing, room sharing and all that bollocks. In fact I tried to get out of it - there are concerns about cost because of the number of staff going, so I volunteered to take one for the team and stay back. That backfired slightly - not only am I going, I am going for the full 4 days, I am hosting a table at the conference dinner, and manning a stand to talk about the analytics team. I have been working there for 10 minutes, and am somewhat surprised and feeling distinctly intimidated by the whole thing as I don't really know anything and have no idea how to schmooze HR big cheeses. I'm also pretty concerned that someone will notice that I have no real HR or analytic background, and my appointment as an analytic consultant is a bit of a fraud. Ah well - just gonna have to hope all the delegates just get pissed and don't care.
Well, I hope that you are still awake after reading that essay. I'll try and be a bit less rubbish in future. Wish me luck for the stupid conference!
I am rubbish at blogging at the minute - I am terribly sorry. I hope someone other than my mum (hello mum!) is listening.
Lots to catch up on from the last couple of weekends, as they have been very uncharacteristically busy. I have barely had any time for sitting around in my pyjamas - I am sure you can imagine how traumatic a time it has been.
I have now officially commenced my stint as an RSPCA volunteer. I work in the wildlife ward, in the Fairfield Shelter in Brisbane, which is the state HQ. It is huuuuuuuuuge and has a big farmyard section, all the usual dogs, cats etc and my little section which is for wildlife. Last weekend I had my orientation where they showed us a video that made everyone cry, then a tour of the shelter and bit of animal behaviour and training training. On Saturday I started properly. Mostly scrubbing poo and cutting up fruit and whatnot, but it's very interesting and rewarding. There are a lot of birds in at the minute - a couple of Rosellas, a Lorikeet, 2 Kookaburras, a couple of cockatiels, a plover, and a couple of Galahs. Just as I was leaving they were bringing in a Tawny Frogmouth, which is pretty exciting! There's also a blue tongued skink with a missing foot, a brush tailed possum and a couple of ringtail possums, and some mice. There are also 150 Peachfaces whose owner is in prison, so we get the unenviable task of looking after them for the minute. Being lovebirds they are getting pretty busy with the lovin, and there's shortly going to be a bit of a population explosion which everyone's pretty worried about.
We are responsible for cleaning out cages (which is pretty grim in the case of the possums) and getting them all fed, and that's what I'll be doing with my Saturday mornings from now on! I am very excited, if a little intimidated at the prospect of having to handle these animals as some of them are a little fierce, and obviously they're all wild and not too keen on being held. On Saturday me and the other girl who just started managed to release 4 birds by accident, which was a bit traumatic. Obviously on the way out I find it a little hard to walk past the cat section without pausing for a while... I have fallen quite badly in love with one chap in particular and I have the distinct feeling that if he's still around once we have moved out to a house he might be coming home with me one day.... (hope Stu isn't reading this)
Last Sunday we had a bit of an exciting adventure... One of Stu's ex colleagues has a boat, and offered to take all the poms out to South Stradbroke Island for the day. It was fab - South Straddie is lovely, and we had a great boozy afternoon on the boat and the Island and whatnot.
 |
| Trip out to South Stradbroke Island |
So what else has been happening in the world of Robinson.....
Oh yes, we have decided upon the suburb we want to move to - Paddington. I have long coveted it, and this weekend took Stu up for a look round, and he also fell in love. It is lovely - really nice houses and cafes and little boutiquey shops, and stuff and things shops and whatnot. I heart it. It is really seriously hilly though, which is a bit of a drawback, but does mean that the views are fabulous. We love it so much, and are so sick of here that we are considering breaking our lease so we can move soon. There are some great places for rent at the moment (and obviously we need somewhere suitable for cats) and we are very excited! In other grown up decision news, we have decided that we are going to apply for Permanent Residency. Being here on the visa type that we are frankly sucks arse as we get absolutely no benefits at all, and are fleeced left and right by the taxman. It's going to take a while to save up the cash to apply, but I'll keep you posted. Apparently it should be pretty easy because we are already here and working and whatnot.
Next week I'll be going to the gold coast for 4 days, for my company conference. I am really very unexcited about it - 18 hour days and lots of schmoozing, room sharing and all that bollocks. In fact I tried to get out of it - there are concerns about cost because of the number of staff going, so I volunteered to take one for the team and stay back. That backfired slightly - not only am I going, I am going for the full 4 days, I am hosting a table at the conference dinner, and manning a stand to talk about the analytics team. I have been working there for 10 minutes, and am somewhat surprised and feeling distinctly intimidated by the whole thing as I don't really know anything and have no idea how to schmooze HR big cheeses. I'm also pretty concerned that someone will notice that I have no real HR or analytic background, and my appointment as an analytic consultant is a bit of a fraud. Ah well - just gonna have to hope all the delegates just get pissed and don't care.
Well, I hope that you are still awake after reading that essay. I'll try and be a bit less rubbish in future. Wish me luck for the stupid conference!
Friday, July 13, 2007
My spying widget...
Reveals to me that I have had another visitor to the blog from the google search "husband wears thongs". I'm wondering whether I should actually set up a support group.
More worryingly, someone found me by googling "Hate Buddhists". I sincerely hope that they did not misunderstand this post as meaning that I do. I would like to make it abundantly clear that I thought the actions of the christians picketing the event were disgusting, and I told them so.
More worryingly, someone found me by googling "Hate Buddhists". I sincerely hope that they did not misunderstand this post as meaning that I do. I would like to make it abundantly clear that I thought the actions of the christians picketing the event were disgusting, and I told them so.
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Like a Moff to a flame
This weekend we went for our very first escape from the city mini break, to the 'Garden City' Toowoomba. It was bloody lovely.
I had first seen Toowoomba on some local travel programme which is on on Saturday afternoons over here, and it looked like a really nice town, full of Antiquey shops and great big old queenslanders, parks and cafes and whatnot. There was a lovely B&B recommended, so I took the decision that this would be our destination for our first get away. However despite the fact that I was all very excited about it, whenever I mentioned it to a local they got a look of total horror on their face and I began to worry that I had made a horrendous error of judgement.
As we pulled in on the Greyhound bus I was a bit worried that I had indeed got it all terribly terribly wrong. There was no evidence of antiques, or cafes, or queenslanders, or gardens, or anything really. All we could see were large 60s style concrete buildings, and big car lots.
However as we walked up to our B&B we obviously wandered into the bit that the programme had been based on. We walked through a beautiful park, up a really wide and leafy street with lovely looking cafes on. The B&B was just GORGEOUS. The people who ran it had lived all over the world and it was full of lovely little artefacts and knick knacks and you could spend your whole stay getting the story of them. They were absolutely lovely people - and to add cream to the cake they had a KITTY!
He is a Russian Blue/Maine Coon cross called Moff and I love him.
The first afternoon we were there we never even managed to leave the B&B to explore - just sat by the roaring log fire for a bit reading books, then had some afternoon tea in the garden, read some books with the cat and just enjoyed being out of the city and somewhere with a bit of peace and quiet.
We went out for a few scoops (alright, quite a few scoops) and a nice dinner, then sat in the guest lounge and ate chocs and played chess next to the fire. It was just heavenly and we were so super relaxed.
Basically it was just lovely - really relaxing and it kind of helped to drive home the fact that we would very much like to stop living over the road from a nightclub and have a bit of space. It was so nice to be somewhere with more than 2 rooms, a garden and STUFF in it.
Speaking of stuff, our stuff allegedly lands in Brisbane on 19th July. Which is excellent progress! We'll just have to wait and see how long Customs want to hang onto it for...
In other very exciting news, as of 21st July I will be doing this on a weekly basis. I am quite pant wettingly excited about it, but haven't had my orientation yet so can't fill you in on the details for a bit. Will do though. I think Stu is a little worried that I am going to try and smuggle all the cats home though.
I had first seen Toowoomba on some local travel programme which is on on Saturday afternoons over here, and it looked like a really nice town, full of Antiquey shops and great big old queenslanders, parks and cafes and whatnot. There was a lovely B&B recommended, so I took the decision that this would be our destination for our first get away. However despite the fact that I was all very excited about it, whenever I mentioned it to a local they got a look of total horror on their face and I began to worry that I had made a horrendous error of judgement.
As we pulled in on the Greyhound bus I was a bit worried that I had indeed got it all terribly terribly wrong. There was no evidence of antiques, or cafes, or queenslanders, or gardens, or anything really. All we could see were large 60s style concrete buildings, and big car lots.
However as we walked up to our B&B we obviously wandered into the bit that the programme had been based on. We walked through a beautiful park, up a really wide and leafy street with lovely looking cafes on. The B&B was just GORGEOUS. The people who ran it had lived all over the world and it was full of lovely little artefacts and knick knacks and you could spend your whole stay getting the story of them. They were absolutely lovely people - and to add cream to the cake they had a KITTY!
He is a Russian Blue/Maine Coon cross called Moff and I love him.
The first afternoon we were there we never even managed to leave the B&B to explore - just sat by the roaring log fire for a bit reading books, then had some afternoon tea in the garden, read some books with the cat and just enjoyed being out of the city and somewhere with a bit of peace and quiet.
We went out for a few scoops (alright, quite a few scoops) and a nice dinner, then sat in the guest lounge and ate chocs and played chess next to the fire. It was just heavenly and we were so super relaxed.
Basically it was just lovely - really relaxing and it kind of helped to drive home the fact that we would very much like to stop living over the road from a nightclub and have a bit of space. It was so nice to be somewhere with more than 2 rooms, a garden and STUFF in it.
Speaking of stuff, our stuff allegedly lands in Brisbane on 19th July. Which is excellent progress! We'll just have to wait and see how long Customs want to hang onto it for...
In other very exciting news, as of 21st July I will be doing this on a weekly basis. I am quite pant wettingly excited about it, but haven't had my orientation yet so can't fill you in on the details for a bit. Will do though. I think Stu is a little worried that I am going to try and smuggle all the cats home though.
 |
| Toowoomba |
Thursday, July 05, 2007
I've broken my arse
On Friday last week we had some work drinks here to celebrate the departure of one of the Aussies who is going to our Washington office to work for a bit. So I partook of a glass of wine or two, and then on my way home Stu called to say that he was having work drinks and there was a card behind the bar, and that I should join them.
I woke up on Saturday with somewhat hazy memories and a very sore behind. Neither Stu or I could think of anything to explain sore behind, so put I put it down to experience and proceeded to be verrrrrrrrry careful getting in and out of chairs for the rest of the week.
Yesterday, Stu had a work meeting, and one of his colleagues enquired as to the state of my bottom. He was naturally a bit surprised, and somewhat curious, and asked for the reason behind the question.
Turns out that as I was walking away from the bar, I skidded in a wet patch, and landed tailbone first on the little foot railing thing that some bars have. I am quite pleased I cannot remember this event, as my arse is still so sore now that it must have REALLY hurt at the time.
So I'm adding a bruised coccyx to my collection of random drinking injuries collected over the years, including but not limited to bruises, fractured nose, a black eye and concussion.
We're off to be tourists this weekend, going for a night's break in a chintzy B&B in a wee town with lots of vowels (Toowoomba) which is about 130k west of Brisbane. I am very excited, and will update you next week!
Until then, me and my broken arse wish you well.
I woke up on Saturday with somewhat hazy memories and a very sore behind. Neither Stu or I could think of anything to explain sore behind, so put I put it down to experience and proceeded to be verrrrrrrrry careful getting in and out of chairs for the rest of the week.
Yesterday, Stu had a work meeting, and one of his colleagues enquired as to the state of my bottom. He was naturally a bit surprised, and somewhat curious, and asked for the reason behind the question.
Turns out that as I was walking away from the bar, I skidded in a wet patch, and landed tailbone first on the little foot railing thing that some bars have. I am quite pleased I cannot remember this event, as my arse is still so sore now that it must have REALLY hurt at the time.
So I'm adding a bruised coccyx to my collection of random drinking injuries collected over the years, including but not limited to bruises, fractured nose, a black eye and concussion.
We're off to be tourists this weekend, going for a night's break in a chintzy B&B in a wee town with lots of vowels (Toowoomba) which is about 130k west of Brisbane. I am very excited, and will update you next week!
Until then, me and my broken arse wish you well.
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