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Published: January 12th 2012
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Well hello there, do come inside. Why don't you take a seat? That's right, put your feet up, I'll grab you a cuppa and we can begin...
December saw some bizarre weather changes here in Melbourne, from being around the 35 mark when I took a stroll in the Botannical Gardens (yes, a stroll, not a walk; it's too hot at times to move fast), to hail on Christmas Day which in some parts of Melbourne resulted in flooding and damage to pretty much everything, due to lemon size hail. I kid you not. I have seen the damage to some cars and loads have been written off due to the dents covering all the panels. Crazy times.
Tucker came for the weekend just before Christmas and we went out to wish my housemate, Susha, and her boyfriend, Shane, well on their trip to South America. They have gone for around three months and I am very jealous indeed! We went to St Kilda and spent the night listening to a chap called Peter Coombe on stage with his band. He was around in this generations youth and sang songs back then which they all remember now, including one
about wearing a newspaper hat, which some people did. Strange but amusing. Tucker also left his job the following week in Sydney so returned the weekend before Christmas for a celebration and we ventured out to another suburb with Mindy for a few drinks. The highlight of the night though was food afterwards...
We spied a Chinese style restaurant across the road and ventured across to it, our bellies leading the way. Sitting down, we selected a few dishes to quell the rumbling complaints of said bellies, and waited with impatience while the chef whipped up the goodness that would satisfy our hunger. Mindy had suggested we order buns which we did, and man alive they were awesome! A bun, for the uninitiated, is about the size of a large orange. It is a sort of doughy outside, without being sticky, filled in this instance with finely chopped pork and some sort of bbq'ish sauce. Open it up, get some soy sauce action going, and boom, happy belly, happy face, happy fullness and much sitting round saying 'Oh, yes!' ensues. Sweet.
Christmas eve saw a couple of drinks with my friend Connie, then Christmas morning we sat around
our tree and opened our presents to each other. Amongst my wonderful gifts was a pink plastic mac in case of rain, a book voucher (which I used to buy the complete short stories of H G Wells - cha-ching!), a stir fry recipe book (in my house I am the stir fry king), and a survival guide for bald men in the modern world. All were warmly received. Tucker and I had a traditional lunch of Asian soup with noodles, before sitting in Federation Square enjoying a couple of drinks and watching the thunder and lightning come down. It was warm enough to sit outside under cover which was good, and made people spotting in the rain more enjoyable 😊 On returning to the house we decided the only thing to do was to dance in the rain on the balcony. In our pants. The pictures are not suitable for a public website.
For New Year, we headed an hour or so down the coast to Geelong and spent the evening with some people that Tux had met in a bar close to the waterfront. The beer did flow but it was a very relaxed night and we
watched two sets of fireworks and listened to a band and managed not to fall off our stools. The weather had improved vastly since Christmas and was nice and hot, and the day after we relaxed by walking along the beach and sitting in the shade of a tree for a few hours. That night we met the gang again and had dinner at the restaurant at the end of the universe. Well, at the end of the pier anyways.
Unfortunately I had to work between Christmas and New Year and things are very busy, but on the plus side I got a promotion before Christmas which looks pretty cool on my CV. This weekend I am off to Sydney to see friends Saturday then meet the work people Sunday, as we have two days of meetings to start the year off on Monday and Tuesday. I also have received my care package from mum with a range of Christmas presents that were all very lovely 😊 And I must mention a thanks for my other presents from my family :D
Other news I have to share which some of you will know about, is that Melbourne has
a new Pom resident - Tux has come to live here! After leaving his hell like work in Sydney he was able to get a job here around New Year and has been making a mess of our lounge floor with all his transported stuff in the last week or so! But it will be good to have him around the area too, and many people say that Melbourne is better than Sydney anyway, at least in terms of places to go out, bands to see, and general friendliness. Andy and Clair Jackson are also on their honeymoon in Australia at the moment, travelling up the east coast in their beast of a campervan, and should arrive in Melbourne in February to see their old chum Nick. Super!
Take care all,
x
P.S. An extra congratulations to Russ and Jo who got engaged recently!
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