Anthony Malloy

It’s been a great week, Rae has been home on annual leave and it’s been fantastic to spend so much time with her and the kids. It’s going to be a rude shock when she returns to 9-5 next week, not sure who will cope the least, me or the kids.

Yesterday in particular was everything a holiday day should be.

I took the day off work and we made the most of it. In the morning we went for breakfast at our old haunt, The Famous Blue Raincoat. They say you can never go back but that just ain’t true when it comes to breakfast at The Coat. Just as good as ever. The plan was then go and buy four plants from Bunnings, Dale had suggested lilly pillies, but at $45 a pop we re-evaluated. We trundled on down to the Newport Lakes Native Nursery to see what we could see. And we saw a lot. For the price of one lilly pilly we left with enough tubes to start our entire front yard and best of all, being natives suited to the area, we just have to plant them and forget about them. I would take a photo to show you but we woke this morning to find our front yard covered in polystyrene balls. Strange things happen in the burbs.

In the afternoon Rae decided on a much needed nap so I took off. After a couple of chores I headed to Yarraville for a good browse through The Sun Bookshop. I eventually picked up one of the new $9.95 Popular Penguins, John Wyndham’s The Chrysalids. We were supposed to read this book in Year 10, or maybe it was 11 (Miss Marita, can you remember?). I have no idea why but I never finished the book back then so I figure I should make Mr Kemp happy and get around to it now. Thankfully the bug-person cover of my memory has been replaced by the cool original Penguin style. I wandered around to Try This, ordered a coffee and had a read in the front window.

And how do you finish a perfect day? Have the lovely (and currently internet-less) Ren over for a roast dinner, red wine and a movie. After some to-ing and fro-ing we ended up watching Sweeny Todd, which was fantastic. I also have some great news for anyone else sitting on a 1992 Brown Brothers King Valley Cab Sav, it has matured very very well.

You can’t top that sort of day easily so now it’s catch up with work for me and catch up with housework for Rae. All good things must come to an end, but every time I look at that garden in years to come I’ll remember yesterday.

Excuse me while i change things around a bit here. The old theme was getting a bit tired so I’ve switched to a new one. I’ve also added a ‘Now Reading’ list to the side and just for Daniel I’ve put the comment link at the bottom of the post.

You can’t deny you’re a geek family when you can offer a visitor their choice of a linux, mac or Windows (7 or Vista) laptop when they need to get on the net.

Ever since we moved in the front yard has been a pile of rubble, pretty much untouched since the builders moved on and and concrete drive was finished. We’ve wanted to make it presentable from day one but anybody who has had any work done knows just how horribly expensive landscaping can be, especially when you’ve just paid for a house.

Thankfully we have Dale, my sister’s hubby. Dale works for a landscaper and has both a great eye for garden design and boundless energy. The whole Janke clan came down this weekend and Dale set to work. The results below show what can be achieved in two days with energy, enthusiasm, a credit card and a Dingo.

Before

After

(Bigger photos on Flickr)

The grey bit in the middle is sandy loam and before long it will be lovely green grass. We have yet to put to any plants in (giving the credit card a breather) and you’ll notice the ‘bonus’ rock feature to the left– two massive boulders that couldn’t be moved, even by the guy with a bob cat who was working across the road. We’ll post some more pictures once it greens up and we clean up the dirt.

Thanks Dale (and Rob who pitched in to help). You’ve done an amazing job and now I won’t have to apologise for the mess whenever anyone visits. It finally feels like we have a proper home.

How do they pick ’em so well? On a day I have loads to get done the young ones decided to revert to six month olds overnight. I don’t think Rae or I got more than half an hours sleep at a stretch and now I’m walking around in a fog that no number of latte’s can lift. Of course they’re all narky and grumpy too because they didn’t sleep which just makes the day oh so more pleasent.

I think they’re all going for an early nap today and if I can clear some of the mountain of what I need to get done I may join them in the land of nod.

We build a new house, he has his own room, there a big comfy chairs or a floppy bean bag, but where was Bert happiest this morning?

Crammed in to a nappy box.

Two yeas ago these two beautiful children arrived. I can’t believe it’s been two years, it just seems like yesterday that I got the tap on the shoulder at 5:50am that things were on the way. Now they are fully fledged people. Loud, confident, talkative, outgoing Kennedy and our shy, considerate thinker Henry.

Happy birthday kids, you’ve made all of us happier than you could ever imagine.

 

 

I was just wondering who you voted for.

I know that when talking to my friends the other day about what was our ‘most loved toy event’, as you do, that Big W’s sale came a distant third behind ‘what the &#&# are you talking about Tony?’ and ‘huh?’. I even did a Google search to see who came second but sadly couldn’t find a list.

I wonder which marketing person got a huge raise for coming up with that phrase.

When you hear an odd stat  while listening to the footy (“That’s Richmond’s tenth time they have scored three goals in a quarter when kicking toward the city end playing an away team from Western Australia when Richo wasn’t in the team.”) do you too try and construct the SQL statement they must have used to get it? Or is that just me?

I did note that in two games played today the winner failed to double their opponents score by one point. Hmmm SELECT winner FROM game WHERE…

Now that’s the way a weekend should be.

Friday was Rae’s RDO for the month so it was bonus long weekend, but it really started on Thursday night when Zita sat for us so we could head off to The Sun for a movie. For the first time ever we had a movie theater to ourselves. We could ask each other outloud “what did they just say”, rustle our lollies as loud as we want and laugh as madly as we wanted. Can thoroughly recommend ‘My Year Without Sex’, especially if you are, or are married to, a Bulldogs supporter.

Friday, a bit of a shop, Zita came over for dinner and some work while the women in the house watched a chick flick on the telly. Oh, and there was a bit cleaning up going on ’cause on Saturday Veronica, Steve, Jonathon and the beautiful new Hannah came to visit. Here’s a hint – when you have people over for coffee, make sure you actually have milk in the fridge so you can make coffee for them. Somehow we managed to scrape together enough for a couple of coffees each and the mini scones with jam and cream disappeared pretty quickly, much to Phee’s chagrin as she was eyeing off the entire plate.

That afternoon was spent sitting in the big comfy chair reading a book I bought at the Sun Bookstore when we went to the movies, keeping an eye on the footy on the telly and luxuriating in the quiet of babies sleeping. The night was spent watching the remastered Scarface with Rae and polishing off a bottle of bubbly and some beers.

Today was Sunday morning market shopping, end of tax year new laptop shopping, display home viewing, general lazing around the house and roast chicken eating. It’s been a wonderful relaxing weekend, such a shame it has to finish. Now it’s Masterchef, a warm cup of milk and an early night because when a weekend has been this good you just know that the weekend ahead must have something nasty in store.