Heading Home Later Today

Our last full day in Melbourne was spent enjoying some sunshine and tidying things up. After a quiet morning on the 'net' and sorting out photos etc the deck was a great place to chat and keep an eye on Charli. Since walking a few days ago there is so much for her to discover, even in her own backyard!

In the afternoon we cashed in vouchers received for Christmas and were able to change a polo top which was not the best size. All went well. The vouchers went on DVD's.

We returned to the house where DVD burners were put to work!

Later that evening we enjoyed spending our last meal with our two girls and friends from Drouin. It was their choice and we finished back at Springvale at a Vietnamese restaurant. The Salted Pepper Squid was enjoyed by everyone, even Charli!

We fly out of Tullamarine this afternoon and get back to the Sunshine Coast about 5 pm tonight.

A Couple Of Nights With Kim

We spent a couple of nights with youngest daughter Kim who lives in St Kilda. Kim remains footloose and fancy free and us oldies enjoyed the chance to catch up with her, spend some quality time together and check out St Kilda.

She lives right in the middle of all the action.

From her unit to Acland St is seen at the foot of the street in this photograph. This means absolutely no need to drive!


Acland St is a hive of activity, eateries of all types and styles and plenty of outdoor seating. Every second shop seemed to be a restaurant of one type or another. First night we had Malaysian, second night we gave Indian a try. Plenty of BYO (Bring Your Own alcohol) and a great time was had by all. It was pretty hectic though and plenty to eat and drink.

I managed to get to the third day of the Australia England Test at the MCG. This is the view I had from the grandstand. I will tell you lots more about the new MCG stand in future blog editions.

Tonight we are having our last night in Melbourne with family members and friends from our Hampton Park days. We fly out Sunday mid afternoon and arrive back at Maroochydore just after 5 pm. The internet tells me after some recent rain, temperatures on the Sunshine Coast remain coolish with no max temps of 30 or more recorded for December.

Almost A White Christmas

Melbourne weather has meant top temps continue in the mid to high teens. A bit cool for us I am afraid. Some areas which had been hit by bushfires a day or so ago were now covered in a light covering of snow!

Christmas Day is always a big day and has become quite different to what we used to do many years ago.

Charli spent her first real Christmas looking google eyed at all her presents. Who says kids are spoiled nowadays?

Late morning we drove to our daughter's place in St Kilda (Kim) where we were joined by Chris and family for a Christmas lunch and more presents for all the kids (and oldies too). Prawns, hams, oysters and drinks. A great day was had by all. Emily really enjoyed her presents as you can see!





Chris borrowed a screw driver and spent some of the afternoon assembling presents to be enjoyed by all. This gift was quite a hit.




Later in the afternoon it was back to Kate's to prepare for Arj's side of the family with a family gathering at Kate's. Again more drinks, prezzies and some sensational Sri Lankan curries.

We all got to bed a little bit too late.


Boxing day saw us head down to Drouin and after a quick visit to Russell's to see the new caravan and have a cuppa we continued on to friends from our Hampton Park days. Too much to eat and drink again but that is Christmas. Great to catch up with friends.

Today is a quiet day as Trish and I move to stay with Kim for a couple of nights. Hopefully I will have recovered enough to get to the 4th Test at the MCG tomorrow.

My Favorite Melbourne Eating Spot

Two days ago we awoke to the evaporative cooling running to keep the house cool. This morning we awake to the ducted heating running.

Such is Melbourne! 19 degrees today and a miserable 16 tomorrow, Christmas Day!

Last night four of us (Trish, Kate Charli and myself) decided very late in the day to head to my favorite eating spot when in Melbourne. It is Malaysia Garden Restaurant just near the railway crossing at Clayton railway station. We have been eating there for almost 25 years. The two kids who played around the tables 25 years ago (the owner's two kids) now serve us at the table!

It is great Malaysian food and pretty reasonable in cost. I have given up counting the number of people (friends and staff) we have introduced to the "MG"!

We have now introduced Charli to the MG and she is pretty keen on the Beef Rendang! As you can see, Charli is loves on her rice and curry!

Merry Christmas to everyone and a Happy and Safe New Year!

Another Yarn From "Keith" - Gay Dancer Dad

BILLY'S GAY DANCER DAD

Billy was at school this morning and the teacher asked all the children what their fathers did for a living. All the typical answers came out, fireman, policeman, salesman, chippy, captain of industry etc, but Billy was being uncharacteristically quiet and so the teacher asked him about his father.

"My father is an exotic dancer in a gay club and takes off all his clothes in front of other men. Sometimes if the offer is really good, he'll go out with a man, rent a cheap hotel room and let them sleep with him."

The teacher quickly set the other children some work and took little Billy aside to ask him if that was really true.

“No,” said Billy, “He plays cricket for England but I was just to embarrassed to say.”

Changes In The Weather

We are still 'down south' in Melbourne spending Christmas with family and where possible catching up. Trish has just about finished Christmas Shopping with Kate. Yesterday was humid and in low 30's. A change with some rain came through last night (Melbourne can sure do with the rain!) and today the temp will get to about 21. Christmas Day is now expected to be wet and 16! I did the right thing in getting a jacket to wear!

The week is expected to see temps lingering in the very low 20's. The cricket at the MCG (4th Test Australia Vs England) may have some brief interruptions from rain.

Last night we caught up with 'the group'. When we lived here this group had a regular outing every 6 weeks or so and we always got together at Christmas time. It was good to catch up and share tales.

The ladies each prepared a 'course' and what a sumptuous meal it was. Gifts were exchanged and we all had a great night. The sound of rain beating on the rooftop helped the evening go off very well indeed.

Kate and Arj are expecting another addition to their family in June 2007. Charli is becoming more mobile, she can walk from one room to another and is extremely pleased with herself!

How To Show A File Extension.

On Sunday I posted a section about Downloading Files from the Internet and the extension.nfo. An extension is the bit which goes at the end of a file name, eg word.doc The extension .doc tells the computer it is a file which is opened by Microsoft Word. In the file word.exe the .exe means it is an executable file, ie when you open it it does something, in this case it opens up Microsoft Word. Picture files can have all sorts of extensions but the main file extension for a picture is .jpeg

In that post I said to open the .nfo file using Wordpad. I am not sure what computer program .nfo is meant to be opened with, but we can tell the computer whenever it sees a .nfo file we want it to be opened with Wordpad.

Many of you may not be able to "see" the extension in the file name eg .nfo, as XP doesn't show it automatically. It is an XP feature which must turned "on".

To do this go into the Control Panel Start > Control Panel.

Double Click on "Folder Options" and click on the tab "View".

Turn off the tick beside "Hide extensions for known file types"

On my computer I also have a dot next to "Show hidden files and folders" and I have removed the tick from beside "Hide protected operating files (Recommended)". However if you have a few people who use your computer you might want to leave this last option ticked.

When you close the View tab, make sure you have clicked "Apply" first.

Now you should be able to see the extension in the name of a file.

Melbourne For Christmas

We left the Sunshine Coast on Tuesday at about midday and flew to Melbourne. Despite being a two and a half hour flight we arrived at Tullamarine Airport at Melbourne close to 3:30 pm (courtesy of Daylight Saving).


From the airport it was only a 5 minute drive to the home of Chris ("The Lad") and Wendy along with their two children Andrew and Emily. Kate with Charli had driven to the airport to collect us and we took the opportunity to pop in for a visit and dinner. I don't know who slept better afterwards, the grandkids or the grandparents!



We arose Wednesday to a smoky Melbourne. Fierce bushfires to the city's east saw smoke being blown in over the city by the prevailing wind. This wind is expected to change direction on Thursday leaving the city smoke free but enjoying strong northerly winds and a temperature in the mid 30's.

Downloading Files From The Internet

Recently I was asked by a friend for a good web site from which to get programs for a particular kind of computer program. This person was interested in programs you could use with an Ipod.

Several of the links where you could get these programs are listed on the right under "Les' Links".

In part, my answer to them follows:

These are my preferred sites to from where you can download files:

1/ Appznet http://www.appznet.info/best/index.php

You have to subscribe to this with a User name and working email address. I suggest a hotmail address is best. Appznet has just restarted on a new site so all previous software downloads from there are gone. You should carefully read all instructions on how to download, passwords you may need, and how to post etc.

You then to scroll down to the "Download" section about half way down the page. Then either into AIO (All In Ones - a collection of programs for a special purpose), Software (where most programs are), Freeware for free stuff available to anyone from all over the internet or Game for heaps of games to download.

Down further is "Our Release" a section of programs cracked by "Team Res". You need the password to 'unpack' these files once downloaded. You MUST read Our Release -Please Read Before Downloading to get the password.

Appznet has a 'request' area where you can get cracks for programs.


2/ Softex Meganet http://softex.meganet.lt/news.php

You don't have to be a 'member' to download stuff from this site. You will find a doubling up of available downloads with downloads from Appznet in many cases.

3/ 9Down Download: http://www.9down.com/ Again, you don't have to be a member to get the free stuff.

4/ Warez Download http://www.warez-dl.com/index.php You need to 'subscribe to this one too with an email address. Again read the instructions for new posters and downloaders on how to download files.

I have found all sites to be 'safe' as far as their downloads are concerned up to this stage. But I suggest you are very careful!

You can even get copies of Windows Vista and the new Office suite of programs from some of these sites. Some would be huge downloads so you would need broadband to get access to them.

In each of these sites you could use the "Search" facility to track down what you want.

After downloading a file you first must read the .nfo file which explains how to install the program then use the crack to unlock it and get the full working version. Right click on the .nfo file you have downloaded and unpacked and use "Open With" and select Notepad ( a program which is on every Windows computer).

Drop me an email if you need any more help.

Have fun!

Saturday Late Rain Eventuates

There were overcast skies all day yesterday, and at about 5 pm the thunder started to roll in. Severe storms hit parts of the Queensland South East with Cooroy (about 60 ks north of us) getting a belting with several houses losing their roofs.

We just got lots of thunder and some steady rain for much of the night. Click on the photo for a larger and more detailed view.

This morning there was 24 mls in the rain gauge to go with the 6 mls we received overnight Saturday.

In Caloundra we get about 1600 mls of rainfall p.a. So far this year we have had 1275 which is about 90% of the annual average.

The pool is now fully topped up (I hadn't quite filled it right up earlier).

Yesterday I bought a new and heavier base for the umbrella. The previous base weighed in at about 15+ kgs but the new one is 20+ kgs and covers a wider area thus creating a more stable anchor for the umbrella. The base costs about as much as the umbrella! Still I think it is money well spent when you remember the hassle I had getting a small repair done to the pool. This cost is further exaggerated by the cost of water to refill the pool as well as the cost of replacement pool chemicals.

Saturday Update

The pool is now fully operational with all chemicals replaced and perfect for swimming. It was 26 in the pool when I had a swim after our 10 k bike ride this morning. However before the bike ride I found this little visitor resting on the pool thermometre. The 2 iron golf swing sent him to where all cane toads should go!

6 ml of steady rain overnight certainly made things a lot greener.

Steamy and overcast today, almost 28 degrees and the possibility of a storm on the Sunshine Coast overnight.

Lots of cricket on TV at the moment. Here we get NZ vs Sri Lanka on Pay TV from 7:30 am, Then I can cross to Australia Vs England just after midday and from 7 pm we can watch South Africa Vs India live again on Pay TV.!

Pool Fixed

Wednesday's repair did not go entirely without a hitch. While sanding the repair back Dayle saw that there wasn't quite enough fill in one small area. Therefore he had to mix more fill, patch the repair again and then wait again for it to harden before sanding it back.

However it looks pretty good now!

The hose went back in again about 4 pm yesterday afternoon to refill the pool! The timer went off last night at midnight and it took another two hours this morning to fill.

Then the pool needed two bags of salt to get the levels right again. I found the pool turned a little green from 50 kgs of salt being added. Later today I will turn the chlorinator back on and hopefully first thing Friday the pool will be crystal clear and ready again for action!

I have removed "New Site" from the Blog title.

Pool Repair At Last

After a 12 k ride then a quick spray of the front lawn for lawn grub I got down to bottling a brew. Then at about 10 am Dayle from Leisure Pools arrived to repair the chip.

First job was to pump the water from the pool down to where the chip was. It was a little sad to see about 10,000 litres going down the drain when so many areas of Australia need rain very badly.


It took about 45 minutes to pump the water out and get the chip above water so it could be filled.

Dayle mixed a concoction which was then worked right into the chip to make sure it was fully filled in. Then he left for about three hours to allow the filling to dry and set.

Later this afternoon he will return and sand the filling till it is smooth with the rest of the pool and then it will be polished.
Then the garden hose will go into the pool to top it up again. A couple of bags of salt will go in too and I will need to run the filter for some of the night to ensure the salt dissolves properly. Tomorrow it will be a 'water check' at the Pool Shop and any outstanding chemical requirements will be added to the pool.

Busy Tuesday

At last we have a beautiful day here on the Sunshine Coast. It is easily the warmest day we have had since the day we had an extra 6 people here as well as Kate and Charli two weeks ago. It is high 20's outside, little wind to speak of, and what wind there is is from the north east, our warm wind area.

This morning we had a full ride, over 12 k's and little wind to ride against.

Today is $1 DVD borrowing day locally so the dining room table is fully utilized! Blank DVD's, 5 movies and rewrite disks to put the movies onto. This is when the external DVD drive I got off eBay comes in very handy! I can connect it to the laptop, put the original DVD into the laptop and copy via the external drive. This leaves the big computer free for me to do the Blog page etc.

I also got Neil Young's "Heart of Gold" DVD with a DTS soundtrack. I will do a copy of this DVD for Bazz at Drouin and drop it off for him on Boxing Day when we go down there for the annual BBQ! It is a double DVD pack with a few 'extras' on Disk 2.

I have been able to tie the pool repair guy down to a day and time! Things are now due to happen tomorrow at about 10 am. (Weather permitting of course!)

Two Weeks To Go!

Incredible, Christmas Day is a mere two weeks away. Once again it has crept up on us.

Blustery winds have dropped to being 'breezy'. We got our first bike ride in today that we had for about 4 or 5 days. Still hard work up hills into the brisk South Easter.

Whilst in Melbourne recently Trish took these photos of the grand children. Here is Chris and Wendy's two children Andrew and Emily. The photo was taken at Kate's home at Charli's first birthday. Emily has commandeered Charli's new 'bike' here.






In this photo Kate and Arj's Charli has managed to get the 'bike' back again just long enough to have the photo taken. Her legs aren't quite long enough just yet to use it properly so it was good that Emily was able to give it a good test drive!

We fly down to Melbourne with Jetstar on Tuesday Dec 19th getting to Tullamarine mid afternoon. We fly back here on New Year's Eve arriving at Maroochydore about 5 pm with Virgin.

Cooler and Windy on the Sunshine Coast

The weather here is mid 20's and with a blustery wind from the South East right off the ocean.

This wind goes on to become the blustery northerly hitting Victoria at the moment causing huge problems with the bushfires there.

I contacted my sister yesterday. They live at Omeo in Victoria's 'high country' and where the fires currently are. Fortunately for them this time they are not in any immediate danger. This should become clearer by mid next week.

By the way, the link to Appznet (under Les' Links on the right) is once more working.

Cleaning bottles ready to bottle another two brews sometimes this week took up time yesterday. This will keep 'supplies' up well into January and February 2007!

Australia Zoo

Australia Zoo is the best value outing for families here on the Sunshine Coast. It is about $40 per adult entry but for that you get a pretty good day's entertainment. Trish and friend Dawn went there yesterday using a couple of freebie tickets and they enjoyed themselves. Dawn hadn't been there before but Trish had. Here you see Dawn 'meeting' a lizard. Zoo staff constantly patrol the grounds with live animals giving opportunities for anyone to get up close and personal with these creatures.

Needless to say there are still extensive reminders of Steve Irwin everywhere you look with cutouts and huge photos everywhere. Many of the 'tributes' left by fans following Steve's death are still on show there.

There are all sorts of animals there with a big focus on crocodiles. This is an alligator, not a friendly sort of chap is he?







This elephant is patiently awaiting the next person to feed it. Food is handed to prospective feeders and the elephant waits patiently. The Irwins are big fans of elephants and now tigers.

There are shows or demonstrations going on across the zoo but the main show area is the Crocoseum. Little kids can also feed and pat small farm animals in a special enclosure.


The 'Crocoseum' is a large open air area where visitors can sit and watch 'shows' where animals are put on display.



Needless to say the crocodiles play a huge part in these shows.



Other animals on display in the Crocoseum include snakes (mainly pythons) and beautiful birds of sensational colors. There is no cost to attend these shows as it is all included in your admission price.

On The Improve

I am pleased to report that both Trish and I are on the improve. We are both feeling much better. I am again enjoying a cool brew or two at the end of a thirsty day!

Here is another photo taken while bike riding recently.

The pool is due to be repaired 'today' as the pool installers are meant to be doing a pool elsewhere on our estate. However with a good 10 mls of rain overnight my guess is they have been held up from beginning the new job until Monday.

Both Trish and I are sorry to hear that Newcastle friend Michael Collogan (we met them when caravaning at Mudgee several years ago) has lost his mother after a lengthy illness.

Trish and friend Dawn have free tickets to Australia Zoo and have gone there today.

There seems to be heaps of cricket on Pay TV at the moment (NZ Vs Sri Lanka, South Africa Vs India and W.I. vs Pakistan) and this keeps me very occupied. On top of that we are enjoying repeats of The Vicar of Dibley, Little Britain and Absolutely Fabulous on Pay TV as well.

Trish now has a bike odometer as well. It arrived today and I have fitted it for her. It is all a bit of fun!

The weather here continues mild with max temps about 26 and overnight about 19. We have had some rain recently with a good fall last night. The pool gets a regular workout from me, especially after mowing lawns or doing other chores around the house.

It is amazing how many times when surfing on the internet that you are asked to enter your email address especially when "Signing Up" for something. I have 4 email addresses I can use. My 'official' address via Bigpond, another address with Yahoo, and a Hotmail address. Today I found another good setup with a site called "Inbox" at http://www.inbox.com These free accounts are always handy to have and if they become clogged with spam, just delete them and sign up for a new account!

Wog Hangs On

Trish is slowly recovering from the 'wog' and is at least out of bed for longer periods nowadays. I am about 95% and now wanting to do things around the house. I haven't had a 'brew' for 6 days and still don't feel today will be the day.

Weather remains a little cooler and windy.

I managed to jump on the bike for the first time for a while and clock up a few more kilometres. Rode past "Duck Swamp" (I think that is its local name, pretty spot) and then on to the Caloundra racecourse. About 40 mins and almost 12 k's.

Despite being cooler this morning I still had a quick swim after I got home to freshen up after the ride. I had to clean up some ash from recent fires which has been blown or carried in by the rain from the pool this morning.

I tend to wear the bike riding gear into the pool. It freshens it up a bit ready for the next day's ride!

We got 20 mls of rain the other day but 20 k up the coast at Maroochydore they got 68mls. Shows the local nature of the rainfall in this part of the world. Only to get to 26 or so today.

Chooka is catching fish in Westernport he tells me!

We fly to Melbourne two weeks from today and return home on New Year's Eve.

Tummy Bugs

Both Trish and I have been hit with a nasty tummy bug. My episode began early Thursday and I was ill for several days. Yesterday (Sunday) was the first day I began to feel reasonably OK. I lost about 5 kgs. Then Sunday evening Trish begins to feel nauseous and is quite ill for several hours. Today she is in bed reading with a "I have been hit by a truck!" feeling.

I lived on "Imodium" for two or three days while Trish says the first thing she lost was the anti-nausea tablet she took. It is saving us money though in alcohol and food!

First decent rain for about 3 weeks with 20 mls overnight. Today's max is a cloudy 25 and very mild for this time of year.

The Appznet download site is offline again at the moment. Hopefully it will be back again soon!

I got the joke below from 'Keith'. It tickled my sense of humour.

Enjoy!

A man and his wife are awakened, at 3 o'clock in the morning by a loud pounding on the door. The man gets up and goes to the door where a drunken stranger, standing in the pouring rain, is asking for a push.
"Not a chance," says the husband, "it is 3 o'clock in the morning!"
He slams the door and returns to bed.
"Who was that?" asked his wife.
"Just some drunk guy asking for a push," he answers.
"Did you help him?" she asks.
"No, I did not, it is 3 o'clock in the morning and it is pouring out there!"
"Well, you have a short memory," says his wife. "Can't you remember, about three months ago when we broke down, and those two guys helped us? I think you should help him, and you should be ashamed of yourself!"
The man does as he is told, gets dressed, and goes out into the pounding rain.
He calls out into the dark, "Hello, are you still there?"
"Yes" comes back the answer.
"Do you still need a push?", calls out the husband.
"Yes, please!" comes the reply from the dark.
"Where are you?" asks the husband.
"Over here on the swing!", replies the drunk.

A Cold Change

Dark clouds came in on Wednesday evening signalling a decent drop of rain and some relief from the hot weather was on the way.

There was little if any rain but a cold change there certainly was. Maroochydore recorded a record low max temp for November of 21 degrees. Overnight the wind had blown a gale. The reason the sky was so dark was it contained dust from inland as well as smoke from the fires in NSW. We only got 2 mls of rain out of it too.

Yours truly was struck down by a nasty tummy wog. I had 10 hours sleep on Thursday night and though much better today I still am not game enough to have anything to eat. Kate said I probably got some 'bad beer'.

Kate and Charli flew back to Melbourne today. It was great having them here.