XXXX Antiques

This morning during breakfast I received a phone call from a lady in Castlemaine named Sheila Landers. She and her husband Peter run XXXX Antiques and are looking for somebody to help get their merchandise up onto the web and up for sale on Ebay. After having a chat with her and visiting their website, I agreed to go to Castlemaine on Wednesday and have a chat with them. This could be interesting, I feel.

A surprise phone call

This morning I got a surprise phone call early in the morning. It was from BEST Employment who informed me that an IT position had come up in Castlemaine and was I interested? I said that I was and came in and gave them an updated version of my resume. They then sent the request on to Castlemaine. It will be very interesting to see what comes of it.

The set top box saga - part 1

After paying my bills, I went to Dick Smith Electronics in the market place to purchase a digital set top box so that I could receive Digital TV. I chose a Sanyo model for two reasons. Firstly it had a 12 months warranty and the store salesman assured me it was good quality. It cost $109.00, so it was a fairly expensive model. I took it home but after connecting it, i could not get it to work properly. The front LED display simply would not come on. I rang the Help line and they said the box must be faulty so I took it back to Dick Smith who gave me a replacement one. I took it home but have not yet installed it. I will do that tomorrow evening.

A day in Melbourne

Today, being Wednesday was a free day for me as usual. But I did not feel like hanging around Bendigo as usual, so I took an early morning trip to Melbourne. I had not had a shopping day there for more than 3 years so it was good to get down there again. I visited a lot of shops but did not buy very much. I was back in Bendigo by 5.00 pm.

At the moment there are terrible floods in Queensland. I rang my mother in Brisbane who assured me that she is OK. I am glad to hear it. It is still raining here at the moment. I hope we get some summer at some stage.

Back from Sydney

Today I flew back from Sydney. The aircraft was delayed slightly due to lightning at Sydney airport. The flight down was very bumpy. I caught the bus back from the airport and was back in Bendigo by 8:00 pm. It is good to be back.

Xmas holidays 2010 - 2011

I haven't updated this blog for a while as I hae been on holidays. To recap:

Thursday 23/12/2010 - flew to Sydney with Qantas. My brother Bill met me at the Airport in a Ford Fairlane Ghia. It took a while to get my bags out as there was a problem with the Carousel. Bill told me that he has left Australia Post and now drives a limo for a living.

Friday 24/12/2010 - I went to Sydney via the ferry which I picked up on Neutral Bay wharf. It was a quick and nice trip to the city. I spent a number of hours shopping even though I felt a bit crook for a while after eating breakfast at McDonalds at Circular Quay. I had a massage at Paddy's Market.

Saturday 25/12/2010 - Christmas day. We meet the family at Cronulla beach. We had lunch at a park, which was really nice. We went to the park because Georgia was on duty with the Wanda beach surf life saving club. After lunch, we went back to the Sargeant's house where we gave out the presents. I managed to drop 3 bottles of wine and break them! That was no great drama because they had plenty of bottles of wine handy. Overall, xmas was a fun day generally.

Sunday 26/12/2010 - Boxing day. As usual, this was a quite day. A day for relaxing after xmas.
I watched the start of the Boxing day test (which was a disaster for Australia). I also watched the
start of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race. Later, for something to do, I walked into Sydney via the harbour bridge. At first I felt disoriented as I did not realise how high up I was. I walked to the Rocks and around Circular Quay. I then walked back to Neutral Bay along the Harbour bridge. In the evening, Mum came to stay.

Monday 27/12/2010 - The Canberra Gates family came to visit us. Chris Gates came over as well. We all took a drive to Freshwater beach. I had never been there before. It looked like a good beach. Unfortunately, the day was cold and wet. They invited me to come down to Canberra with them and mum for a few days, which I accepted. We drove down in the evening. Lillian's two older boys are away, so I stayed in one of their rooms.

Tuesday 28/12/2010 - We did not do much at all today. We just watched TV and movies mostly. I tool Charlie for a walk in the afternoon. His parents did not want him to walk alone in the bush. He is a lot of fun.

Wednesday 29/12/2010 - Today John, Mum, myself and the kids went to the war memorial. I have been there before but this time they have added some exciting new interactive displays. The best one was a film recreation of a WW1 dogfight that was a really cool Hollywood style production. Really good, I thought.

Thursday 30/12/2010 - John, myself and Charlie went and saw two museums. First we went to the National Film and Sound Archive which has recording of all of Australia's movies. I saw parts of the original Ned Kelly film plus pieces of many older films and music clips. There was also a collection of films about Australian inventions. We then went to the National Museum. This had lots of human and natural artifacts but the best exhibit was one that dealt with Captain Cook's original voyage to Australia in 1770. You could see original letters from that time. The handwriting was remarkably good.

Friday 31/12/2010 - Mum and I flew back to Sydney aboard a Qantas Dash 8. The flight took about half an hour. John and Lillian and family went down to the South Coast for a few days. Bill had a party at his place for New Years Eve. The party was not much but we had a great view of the fireworks. They were great. Mum, Frances and I stayed with Bill overnight.

1/1/2010 - New Years day. I did not do much. Just relaxed and went for a walk around the city foreshore. I saw Kirribilly house, Admiralty House and Luna park. It was a hot day but a good walk.

2/1/2010 - I walked into the city and got myself a back massage. Bill and I went to the Mosman pub in the evening for a meal.

Last working day for the year

Today we finished up for the year at BUCO. It was nice to be finished up. We resume on the 4th of January 2011. It was a very busy day as a lot of people turned up looking for help.

In the evening the Shiraz group met at the La Piazza restaurant for an end of year dinner. Only seven were there including a chap from Fiji and a friend of Rod Geri. It was a fun night as usual.