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Published: September 3rd 2006
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Grenwich Mean Time
0 degrees longitude Greetings one and all, hope you have all been well.
Things here have been rather slow. We have however done a number of day trips, which haven't been that riveting, but have been educational.
First trip was to Greenwich (pronounced Gren-itch) which is a quiet little town, kind of reminds me of Notting Hill with its terraced housing, zero setback and beautiful bay windows. It is on the opposite side of the Thames River to where we are located, and took about 20 minutes to walk to. It is known as the site of the, now disused, Millennium Dome and also Cutty Sark Maritime Ship. But most notably Greenwich is where the prime meredian of the world is located and where the term Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) is derived. Melbourne happens to be GMT +10:00 (but changes with day light savings). The meridian line is an imaginary line (an imaginary line running from the North Pole to the South Pole) runs through the Royal Observatory telescope, marks 0° longitude and is the point from which all other lines of longitude are measured. We also visited the (so called) famous Goddards Pie Shop in Greenwich. The pies were good, but
GMT
They will milk it for all its worth not all what they were hyped up to be. Greenwich also has markets and some dodgy looking bloke was trying to sell me a pair of the latest Nikes for £30, which were no doubt off the back of a truck, but i will probably go back in a few weeks and see if he is still there.
I've had a bit of a mixed bag lately with health, got really crook the week before last with a bad fever and the flu. After freezing my tits off all day at work on the Monday (even with a heater facing directly on me), I left an hour or so early and went home. I felt really lightheaded so i just had a bit of a kip before the others came home. By this stage i was no longer cold, quite the opposite really. I was heating up, then as we were eating dinner i just collapsed and my head landed within inches of my bowl of soup. Baz was apparently slapping me in the face for about 15 seconds before i came to... I couldn't even get an appointment to see a doctor. They all kept telling me that if it was an emergency then go to the hospital... Stuff that! I just took the next day off and rested. Their health system is an absolute joke! You have to be registered with a practice before they can see you. And to get an appointment to register, let alone to see a doctor, takes up to two weeks.
I had arranged to visit my family in the lovely town of Burton on the weekend, which is about 20 minutes north of Birmingham. Prior to departure, I managed to join in on the St. Patty's Day celebration as I had a little time to kill before I left the station. So I headed on down to the local and had a few pints of Guinness. They had a promotion going and to receive your 2006 Guinness Party hat, you had to purchase 4 pints but i could only manage three in the very short time i was there. Some Irish bloke, who I was really struggling to comprehend what he was saying, was kind enough to give me a coupon. The two hats he had in his possession might explain his mumbled speech.
Burton-Upon-Trent is quite a picturesque area in the West Midlands and, luckily for me, also happens to be the brewing capital of Britain. I managed to sample a few of the local breweries' Ales (Marstons) which, despite their much darker and cloudy appearance, warm temperature and the fact they were pumped out of a barrel, i found quite to my liking.
For the sports fans, Burton Albion, commonly known as the 'Brewers', are the conference team who held Man United to a draw in the FA Cup in January this year before losing 5-0 in the replay. We took a tour around Burton and other parts of the West Midlands to see some of the sights including the Bass Museum (now know as the Coors Brewery), Pirelli Stadium and Tutbury Castle. This castle is where Mary Queen of Scots was imprisoned for a period of time. The most interesting fact about the castle however is the fact that ghosts are said to roam the grounds, including that of Queen Mary herself. Anyway, enough of the educational stuff...
On Saturday night my two nephews (17 and 18) took me out on a bit of a bender. We went to a club called Barracuda, which was far from the classiest place i have set foot in and would rank up there with the likes of the Storm, or the Nu Hotel in Dandenong... but nonetheless a good time was had by all. I was teaching them the art of downing tequila shots and they showed me what an aftershock was... We stumbled back home at around 3:30am. My other little nephew (a fanatical Newcastle supporter) who is only 8, likes to come in and wake me up at the crack of dawn, so this left me with about 3 hours sleep and a nasty hangover. I reluctantly agreed to get up and went downstairs to watch TV with him. I just tuned into the Cricket, while he kicked the soccer ball at me and repeatedly drummed into my head every statistic there is to know about the Newcastle Football team and how good Alan Shearer is. They were scheduled to play later that day and as fate would have it they lost...
Last week I applied for a part time job at Lords Cricket Ground. The position was for a Ground Steward, or in layman's terms, someone for drunken patrons to hurl abuse at. It is for the Test matches, One-day games and some County games. As i was planning on going to see some of these matches anyway, which would have cost me around 80 quid a day, what better way to do it than to get paid to be there? This could be my dream job. The interview went really well. His first question to me was 'besides English and Australian, do you speak any other languages?' I just laughed and said 'Nah mate in a somewhat 'Chambo manner'... He seemed to be buying the Aussie accent and was loving it. They sent me a letter later that week requesting i attend a training course so I'm really looking forward to working at the Home of Cricket.
I finally got my credit card approved the other week and didn't waste any time racking up the credit. My first purchase was a laptop, which i am really pleased about. Not having ready access to a computer (no, the work one doesn't count as it was build prior to the first world war) is really hard over here and it makes me wonder how we ever got by without them.
Baz's parents arrive next week so it will be great to see some familiar faces, and i'm looking forward to his mum's cooking. Mick and Kel also arrive on the same day so sleeping arrangements could be a bit cramped.
At the moment it is Monday afternoon and i have absolutely no motivation what so ever. There is a strike at work tomorrow. I'm not sure what it is all about, but i do know that it is of no use to us 'contractors' as we don't get paid to participate 😞
Any way it has been a while between drinks but there really is not a lot going on here at the moment. Its back to reality... well, at least for a short while.
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