Category: Diary

Finally they decided.

Introducing my latest nephew, Xavier Dale Janke.

a quickr pickr post

Apologies for the burst of Cliff Richard there.

Last night I was a bachelor once again. Rae, Stink and Bertie Boy had headed up to Shepp to meet the new arrival but as I am still at work it fell upon my shoulders to stay home and feed the cats.

So, a night of ‘freedom’. No family, just me. What to do? The world was my oyster for one night only.

Yeah, right.

I grabbed takeaway from The Noodlebox, called Rae twice and SMSd her twice more, watched the 1st downloaded episode of Life On Mars and then lay on the couch missing the kids and watching television before heading off to bed at 10.00pm. What an excitement machine I am.

I just read that Vancouver had 23 consecutive days of rain, and they were eyeing off their record of 28 consecutive days.

Reminded me of the rainy few weeks I spent there in 1999.

3:15pm, Vancouver, November 25th, 1999. I remember I had just picked up my ticket to a much warmer San Francisco from a Flight Centre across the road.

Here he is; the boy, who at this time, has no name. Our new nephew and cousin to Phee and Bert (amongst others).

Photo courtesy of Rae

Helen and Dale, you’ve done a great job. Can’t wait to meet him.

Today should be a great day. My ‘little’ sister is scheduled to have her second child. After a rough time first go round she’s booked in for a caesarean. Rae and the kids have headed up for the day to meet the new arival and to try and keep my mum under control, she does love her grandchildren that woman.

Good luck Helly and Dale, I can’t wait to meet my new neice or nephew.

UPDATE

It’s a boy! 10:20am. No name or other details yet.

Went shopping this morning for my wedding outfit. All went surprisingly well and I think I’ve got a cool looking combination for the day, even if my Mastercard has a decided dent in it. This getting married thing, even when done on the cheap, is an expensive business.

Nearly everything is in place now with only a couple of meetings to go.

The Celebrant meeting will go something like this –

“What’s the absolute minimum we have to say? Good, that’s it then.” so hopefully that won’t take too long.

The venue conversation will go something like this –

“You say you can make it look nice? Good. See you on the day.”

And once that’s taken care of we’re pretty much done.

Ah, that’s more like it. Channel 7 has the footy back. No more Eddie (who is probably still waiting for that famous last Broady punch to land) on Friday nights.

The planets have realigned, all is well with the world.

When I was growing up my ultimate dream (one of many) was to have a television in my room. All the groovy kids on the television shows had one and, well, it just seemed so damn cool. I did end up buying myself a telly for my room a few years ago, watched it twice and never turned it on again. So much for dreams.

This afternoon Phee had one of her dreams come true. A couple of months ago I told her if she saved enough money I would give her the last ten dollars and she could get a DVD player for her room. Rules are she has to ask for a DVD and there’s no television watching. She saved the money (eventually, that girl likes to spend) so today we picked up a player and set it up. I honestly don’t think I’ve seen her smile that much. To make things even better we said she could watch one movie straight away. She thought she was in heaven as she watched The Aristocats on her DVD and my old telly.

Thinking about how happy this has made her maybe I should revisit my dream but instead of a 12″ TEAC, maybe a 105cm Sony plasma. There you go, I’m feeling better already.

I finished a book, I actually finished a book! My bedside table is stacked high with partially completed tomes; I’m always picking up something new to start and if I don’t stop this habit soon I’ll be able to open my own partially read (one-and-half hand?) book store.

The book, a great Christmas present from Rae, was a history of The West Gate Bridge, written in 1978 just after it opened. A fascinating story of this incredible and tragic project, one I am indebted to everyday I drive to work. It got me wondering when the tolls were lifted – they were supposed to last for 40 years before the bridge was returned to the State, debt free. I knew the tolls had been lifted much earlier than this, but had no idea when so I turned to Google.

And Google let me down. I couldn’t find the answer, or a clue, anywhere. Eventually I resorted to Yahoo – and there was the answer, four entries down. The tolls were lifted after 6 years, making the year 1984 (you can see the toll signs at the Melbourne Museum in their fantastic Melbourne – Stories From A City exhibition).

My faith in Google is now shaken, if they can’t tell me this maybe they’re holding out on me on other things. What’s the world coming to when you can’t trust Google? Maybe the answer lies in one of those many unfished books.

I’ve decided I’d make an okay caveman.

New Years eve we decided to have takeaway, it was hot, we were tired and, well, it was New Years Eve. I hopped in the car and headed to KFC. After a ten minute wait (thankfully, air conditioned) I made it to the head of the queue and placed my order. “Sure, that will be a 10-12 minute wait on chicken” the chirpy (oh, did I just type that) teenager said. I looked at the number of people waiting, could see the line up of drive through customers and knew that actually meant 20-30 minutes so I jumped in the car, drove one freeway exit and tried another KFC. After 10 minutes waiting in the sauna like conditions of this one I got to the front of the queue again. This teen wasn’t so chirpy when she told me it would a 10-12 minute wait on chicken. What the hell does KFC stand for? ‘Kan’t Find Chook?’. I gave up, headed home and we had leftovers with salad.

Strike against me on the ‘hunter/gatherer’ section.

This morning we had cold showers. We thought it must have been because Rae had turned down the heat on our hot water system until I tried again in the afternoon and cold had turned to ice. Rae, the handy woman, ventured out but with no luck. As she walked back in to call the agent’s emergency plumber hotline (I wonder if his phone is painted red?) I twiddled a nob, pressed a button and turned a dial. Whoosh. I didn’t blow myself up and, from behind the safety of the replaced door, I could see the pilot light had been relit. Now two hours later we have hot water again.

That’s one for me in the ‘power of fire in my fingertips’ section.

So, if I was a caveman with my cave family, we may have starved but at least we would have been warm.