Connected At Last

At last the broadband connection here at home appears to be working. It is a much quicker connection than the dial up connection I had! I find I can download 100mb in about 30 minutes! It makes surfing the internet a pleasure.

We had visitors today and became fairly involved so I did not get a chance to contact Netspace and confirm what the problem had been. I guess it was the phone line between the exchange and the ISP.

It was great to catch up with Rod and Maree Bramich today. Rod was the School Council President for much of the time I was at Langwarrin Primary School. Trish and I took their son as a member of an exchange program to New Delhi. They now live at Wodonga but had joined a good friend for a week's break who now lives at Noosa. It was a great day with them but their time with us was too short. Lunch on the deck of the King's Beach Tavern was very pleasant.

Today's weather was certainly a lot brighter than yesterday when Trish and I were caught in a local shower while on our bike ride. We sheltered under a tree waiting for the rain to pass. After about 10 minutes we decided to head back home despite the rain. About 500 metres up the road everything was as dry as a bone and the sun was out. There was a beautiful rainbow too!

I sent out emails today with our 'new' email address. I may have missed a few people in the rush to get things out. If you are one of those, use the email link on the right to contact us and I will send you the new address!

What The rain Can Do!

I took this photo today as we headed off on our ride. You can see the line of rubbish along the side of this waterway. That shows how high the water level was during our recent heavy rain. Even our home has a steepish drive as do all homes in our street. I have been told this is to ensure that the homes stay dry during heavy rain as the road acts as a drain.

Most of the Sunshine Coast is reclaimed swamp so there needs to be many built in features to ensure houses remain dry during up to cyclones. We have lots of lakes and canals here, all good indicators of how the land used to be before development.

The waterway above is currently being realigned as house sites are being constructed and bridges etc built. Perhaps this made this water level worse than it could have been normally when all construction is finished.

If you have clicked on the photo above you will see Trish disappearing into the distance on her bike. To the left of the photo is where the next stage of the estate is going to be built and the this picture shows some of that preparation.

Russell and Irene are happily setup for a week in their caravan 15ks south of Emerald with a lakeside view. They think their next stops may be northwards to Charters Towers and then onto Townsville. They expect to be home to Drouin by the beginning of July. Russell is finding lots of Vietnam Vets 'on the road' and always has someone to have a chat to. There 'next door neighbours' at Lake Maraboon are originally from Warragul!

I have reset the "Visitors" count on the right of this page. The supplier of that little tool have changed some of their setup instructions so it had to be reset.

It had 603 visitors when I reset it. A good one third of those are probably me as I revisit the page after a post to fix up some spelling or formatting problems!

Broadband Still Not Connected

Despite communication from Netspace telling me my broadband connection is 'live' and connected, I am still unable to connect to the service. The last time I spoke with them they were re investigating the connection from their end. Everything seems to be working with correct codes and setup completed but it won't connect. Currently I am using their 'free' dial-up service.

The problem I had with eBay has been solved. However I now have an extra bike computer which I got at a very cheap price. The cordless mouse arrived today and it is very impressive. The base acts as the receiver for the wireless signal as well as a recharger for the mouse battery. It is very light to use and has programmable buttons.

Our caravanning friends from Drouin in Victoria expect to arrive at Lake Maraboon about 15ks south of Emerald in inland Queensland this afternoon. Our experience of the same spot was it was extremely busy when we were there and everyone was very close together. They catch a small crayfish there called Redclaw. When the Redclaw season is on the caravan park gets very crowded. I hear the season is well underway right now!

We have had almost 90 mls of rain the last few days. The pool is well and truly full of water and the garden is flourishing. We are only about 10 mls below the monthly rainfall average for May which is 171 mls for Caloundra. Days are low to mid 20's with mid mid teens overnight.

Local Overnight Showers.

Last night at about 7:30 pm we had a short sharp shower of rain lasting about 20 minutes. A quick check of the rain gauge showed we had received about 13 mls. During the night there was a long storm with thunder and lightning (so I am told by Trish as I slept through it all)!

This morning there was a total of 60 mls of rain in the gauge. Rain in this part of the world can be very localized. On the internet this morning I saw Maroochydore Airport (about 25 k's north of us) had recorded 13 mls of overnight rain while Brisbane had a mere 4 mls. I had spread some garden fertilizer around yesterday morning so it has been soaked in beautifully by the heavy rain.

Despite awaking to a bright sunny morning there was loose water lying everywhere so our daily bike ride went 'on hold'. Water was trickling across pathways or lying in pools making the spray from our tyres very uncomfortable.

More showers are predicted for the next few days. We have now had 135 mls of rain for May when the average is about 170 mls. Days remain quite sunny with today expected to get to about 24 degrees.

Saturday News Update

Our friends Russell and Irene are currently about 500k's north of us near Yeppoon which is on the coast about 40k's from Rockhampton. With about 1 month before they are due back at Drouin in Victoria, Russell was saying they are thinking about heading inland and visiting Emerald, Barcaldine and then heading south to Cunnamulla and eventually back to Victoria. However the beauty of caravanning is you can go when ever you want to where ever you want. They are very conscious of the need for them to be back home late June. It hangs like a sword
across their necks.

The migration from my dial-up internet to broadband is almost complete. The telephone line has been enabled to receive ADSL but it still requires the ISP (Internet Service Provider) to connect its service to my phone line. This is expected to happen on Monday. As I only put my order in for the new service on Wednesday, I am pleased this has happened so quickly. My provider will be Netspace. I have already switched to their free dial-up service (which is an element of their Broadband packages). This will be great for when we are 'down south' if I am to retain my internet access from the laptop.

The home wireless network is fully operational.

Once it is confirmed and I have my broadband connection fully operational I will email people my new preferred email address. I am currently uploading my Treasures of Vietnam and China web page to the Netscape server and will adjust the links on the Blog Page when completed.

It is a nice sunny day with temps in the mid 20's. Overnight was about 16 degrees or so. We are hopeful of some showers tomorrow.

Caloundra's New Supermarket

On our ride this morning I took this photo of the new building site for the new Woolworths or Safeway supermarket being built in Caloundra. Its position should add greatly to the traffic congestion around the town. It will be great to see a little competition for Coles which has been here for some time. Also good to see the Woolworths Petrol station open up close by.

This is a collage I played around with, grouping many of the photos taken of the grandchildren on Trish's recent trip to Melbourne. And we are to get a new grandchild not too far away - late June! Click on the photo for a larger view!

This morning's ride was begun in a very crisp temperature, it was down to 11.7, easily our coldest morning for the year. There was very little breeze so these photos taken this morning show The Pumicestone Passage at its best. The passage separates the mainland from Bribie Island. Again click on the photos for a larger view.

This is another photo of the Pumicestone Passage looking south towards Brisbane and taken this morning.






I got my router/modem back today with the comment there was nothing wrong with it. I was able to set up the security without any problems. I wonder why it now does that so easily when it wouldn't do before hand? I have contacted Netspace to have broadband connected to the home phone line.

Changes To Our Telstra/Bigpond

We have a had a great telephone and Internet deal with Telstra/Bigpond for a couple of years now. It gave us incredibly cheap internet access (even though it was dial-up) and a great deal on phone calls especially on calls interstate.

We discovered today that Telstra was no longer giving the cheap Internet/Telephone package and our phone and internet costs had gone up.

Therefore we will be changing our Internet Service Provider in the next few weeks or so and our major email address at Bigpond will be changing too. At this stage it seems I will be swapping to Netspace as our ISP.

When these changes occur I will email everyone and advise them of the new major email address.

If you find emails you send to to our Bigpond address are being returned, you can always use the link on this blog page about half way down the page on the right hand side. However this should not happen for a couple of weeks.

I have to move the Treasures of Vietnam and China web page too in due course.

A Day At The Races

Trish has been keen to do something in the "Volunteer" area as a way to meet people and get involved with the local community.

She rang one of the local organisations and was told about an 'Expo' at the local race course for yesterday. We were sent a couple of free passes to get into the expo to have a look around. As it turned out the Volunteer Organisation was sponsoring the day's horse races and the 'Expo' was an extra event for the day.

Neither of us is really interested in horse racing but we had a great time. We only stayed for about 2 hours and watched 3 races. It is not expensive to get in and there are heaps of tables and chairs freely available to use. Other groups had brought there own platters of nibblies or cold meats and salads. There were a couple of bars and other eateries around. The weather was about 24 degrees so it was a glorious day to be at the races. Click on each of the photos for a larger view.

We enjoyed walking around and checking out the place and finding out what happens. As well as TAB facilities there were several bookmakers as well. I am sure these photos will show you how pleasant the day was.

As we had driven there it was wise of us to head home early. The several 'schooners' I had enjoyed were very 'moreish' and Trish enjoyed her wine and later a Bundaberg rum! The sight of a jockey with the surname Thomas was too much of coincidence so I just had to have a bet. It ran third so I got all my money back (and a little bit extra)!


The 'Expo' provided some information but it was not exactly what we were after. Trish has a few ideas and I am thinking of attending the local "Computer Club" and see what happens there!

We have several heavy showers moving through today. The sky is very dark and we must be getting close to 10mls of rain giving the garden a good water. It looks like Brisbane has missed out on any rain again.

A Glorious Saturday On The Sunshine Coast

We awoke to what was forecast to be a rainy morning but discovered clear blue skies and and a temperature which was on the way up. By 10 am it was 27 degrees poolside.

Caravanning friends Russell and Irene have discovered Woodgate, a small coastal town between Bundaberg and Hervey Bay. It is a pretty spot with a great beach (but no surf), a great caravan park, a hotel and a Lawn Bowls Club. They have booked in there for a week. They have to be back in Melbourne by the end of June.

Yesterday we drove into Brisbane's northern suburbs to check out Chermside Shopping Centre. It is one of Brisbane's biggest centres. A new Dan Murphy store had opened there (a large liquor retailer) and we stocked up on wine. I also saw the guy who had sold me the faulty modem/router and he said that what had happened to me had also happened to others.

I gave the pool a vacuum this morning and noticed a couple of marks which resisted vacuuming and good scrub with a brush to remove them. The only other way to get rid of them is to use some 'wet n' dry' sandpaper and sand the offending marks off and you have to use your foot to do the sand papering!

Today's weather was beautiful but the pool is still a cool 20 degrees! However following the 11k bike ride I ventured in with the 'wet n dry' and removed the marks.

No my foot is not that long, the water plays tricks and my foot looks longer than it actually is in this photo.

I had my first problem with purchasing on eBay yesterday. I was sent the wrong thing! They sent me a bike computer (I have already bought two of these from the same seller and I paid $18 each for them) and I was meant to get a cordless mouse for the laptop computer.

I emailed the seller telling him of their error and he suggested the easiest way to solve the problem was for me to purchase the bike computer. He said they usually sell for $30 and he would sell it to me at $15. I emailed him back telling him that I had already bought two of them from him at $18 each late in 2006. I told him I thought $10 was a fair price and I await his email reply.

A Timely Update!

It has been a few days since I have done anything to my blog page. Our caravanning friends from Drouin have moved on and are currently in Childers, the scene of a horrific fire at a backpacker's hostel a few years ago. They are using it as a 'centre' to explore Hervey Bay and other nearby spots. Russ informs me his digital set top box is providing them with an excellent TV picture! They seem to think their next spot to stop may be around Yepoon, a popular spot with caravanners on the coast about 40 k's from Rockhampton.

About 3 months ago I began to subscribe to a monthly computer magazine. It is full of interesting news and is accompanied by a DVD disk full of software. The software is usually free programs or what they call "Trials". Trials are usually active for 30 or 60 days before they no longer operate unless you buy them.

However with some of the internet sites I like to visit I often come across these trial programs and a way to convert them from "Trial" to fully operational full working programs.

One such program off the magazine DVD is a program which is part of the Office 2007 Suite called "Expression Web". The trial program is due to run for 60 days but following a quick "SOS" request to one of 'my' sites I received a message containing the code to 'unlock' the Trial to a fully working version. Expression Web (valued at over $300) is used for creating and modifying Web Pages. It is the follow on program for Microsoft's Frontpage 2003.

So the last few days have seen me slaving over the computer updating the web site of our trip to Vietnam and China last year. A link is on the right hand side of this blog page. I have been able to put much larger pictures on the web site and you can see them all much more clearly now. Have a visit and tell me what you think.

http://users.bigpond.com/thomfam1/

This photo shows the computer screen as I uploaded the reworked web page to the Bigpond server on the internet. The pane on the right of the computer screen is my computer while the pane on the left shows my web space at Bigpond. You may need to click on the photo for a larger view to see this more clearly.

It is a bit frustrating at times and requires a fair bit of trial and error. I began to do the page with "Dreamweaver", then modified it a bit with "Frontpage" and I have now reworked it with "Expression Web" So some of the things Dreamweaver does is not fully compatible with how Frontpage or Expression Web like to work.

I am due to get my replacement Router/Modem I had to return to DLink in the day or so and we can get out home network fully operational again.

I expect to move to Broadband late in July after we return from Melbourne.

Last night I had my first try at a "Black Ale" I had recently brewed and found it very pleasant to the palate!

A Great Night Out

Friends Russell and Irene from Drouin in Victoria are still in the local caravan park with their new caravan on their first real 'trip'.

A couple of days ago Russell bought himself a Navman GPS system for the car. This is going to be a great addition and add to his travelling comfort. It is difficult enough when you are in a strange city or town and don't really know your way around. It is a lot more difficult when you are towing a 20' caravan.

The Navman will mean from now on Russell will just have to enter the name of the caravan park (or any address in Australia) he wants to get to and then hit 'enter'. The Navman provides voice directions to ensure he gets to the exact place he wants to, thus removing much of the stress and pressure of looking at maps and guessing which road he should take.

Russell also bought a Digital TV Set Top Box. We got it up and running on Friday and the quality of the TV picture is now sensational and it is so easy to tune. Each time you get into a new town to stay, you have to retune your TV. Now all he has to do is hit Autotune and available stations are added to the TV.

Last night we had a combined Mother's Day and Wedding Anniversary celebration all together at The Spirit of Tibet Restaurant in Mooloolaba. This photo shows us at the restaurant.


It is a great spot. The food is just sensational with plenty of exquisite flavour, variety and a tremendous side serve of special chilli sauce. It made for a great evening. We had plenty to eat and couple of bottles of great red wine.

The owner of the restaurant (seen here) gets in with the customers and ensures everyone has a great time.

Even though it is now a cooler time of year and well outside regular vacation times, the restaurant was full of happy customers. We always have a booking nowadays when we want to go to The Spirit Of Tibet.


The night concluded with a walk along the shop fronts and then back along the pathway overlooking the sensational Mooloolaba beach.

Thanks to Keith

We have had over an inch of rain (27mls) overnight. It is the best fall we have had for almost 3 months. The garden and lawns are getting a great watering!

We continue to do lots of things with Russell and Irene who are caravanning here in Caloundra. Time means they will be on their way further north on Tuesday.


I received the following joke from Keith today! I enjoyed it very much.

Two 90 year old men, Mike and Joe, have been friends all of their lives. When it's clear that Joe is dying, Mike visits him every day. One day Mike says, "Joe, we both loved football all our lives, and we played Sunday football together for so many years. Please do me one favour, when you get to Heaven, somehow you must let me know if there's football there." Joe looks up at Mike from his death bed," Mike, you've been my best friend for many years. If it's at all possible, I'll do this favour for you."

Shortly after that, Joe passes on.

At midnight a couple of nights later, Mike is awakened from a sound sleep by a blinding flash of white light and a voice calling out to him, "Mike-Mike." "Who is it?” asks Mike sitting up suddenly. "Who is it?"

"Mike-it's me, Joe." "You're not Joe. Joe just died."

"I'm telling you, it's me, Joe," insists the voice." "Joe! Where are you?"

"In heaven", replies Joe. "I have some really good news and a little bad news."

"Tell me the good news first," says Mike.

"The good news," Joe says," is that there's football in heaven. Better yet, all of our old friends who died before us are here, too. Better than that, we’re all young again.

Better still, it's always spring time and it never rains or snows. And best of all, we can play football all we want, and we never get tired."

"That's fantastic," says Mike. "It's beyond my wildest dreams! So what's the bad news?

"I've just seen the team sheet and you're playing Tuesday."

Growing Season

About a month ago I had a photo on the blog page of a new shoot just starting to grow on one of the pot plants around the pool. Well it has received a little feed and it has been watered pretty regularly. The photo to the left is the photo from back then! You may need to click on it for a better view. The new growth was quite small at that stage and you may not even spot the new bud!.


The photo below was taken a couple of days ago. It has really grown in the last month!! And what was a just a bud back then is now a 8 cm new shoot. Again, click on the photo for a larger view.


Friends from Drouin in Victoria (Irene and Russell Dawson) have arrived here with their caravan. They are happily set up a local caravan park beside the beach. Trish arrived back from Melbourne yesterday (with a camera full of grandchildren snaps and movie files) and it wasn't long till we were all enjoying each other's company and a few drinks. After a meal at the local Thai Restaurant it was to the RSL we headed and enjoyed a guy who did lots of Roy Orbison songs. He was quite good actually. We all enjoyed ourselves very much.

Russ and Irene expect to be here for at least a week.

I have altered the blog page setup to now only show the latest three entries. It seemed to take ages to load when I had the Blogger settings to show 5 posts as the blog page was opened!

And it seems my new router modem has a fault and needs to be returned to the manufacturer for warranty reasons. It would not save some of the settings which would ensure the wireless signals were secure and would not be received by people outside the network.

At Last A Few Showers Of Rain

Just as we are about to leave the wettest time of the year in this part of the world we have had a few showers of rain today. A total of 9mls fell this morning, the most rain we have had for over 6 weeks. There was no need to water the 'pots' today, the first time for quite a while.

It doesn't look too much like the 'Sunshine Coast' does it! Click on the photo for a larger view.

Our elderly next door neighbour passed away at the end of January. She would have been so proud today to learn her grandson Aaron Jeffery won a Logie last night as the "Most Popular Actor" for his role in McLeod's Daughters.

I managed to work out the "Shared Printer" issue on my Wireless Network. I still await a reply to my email to DLink Support on fixing the Network Security issue.

Caravanning Friends From Victoria

I am pleased to tell you my networking problems have been solved. I can now swap files between the two computers and all seems to be operating reasonably well. A few small hiccups to work out but we will soon see about those. I recently set up a new 'toy' so I could wirelessly send Pay TV signals from the lounge room into the "office" where the new router modem lives. It seems the signal channel was the same as that trying to use the Wireless Network. I swapped the channel on the AV sender and now all things seem to be working OK. I still have to work out how to share the printer and to get the security enforced on the network.

We have known Irene and Russell from our Hampton Park days for years. They have recently joined the caravanning fraternity and are having a 2 month trip to check out the caravanning lifestyle. Cooler wet weather down south saw them arrive here in Queensland a few days ago earlier than expected. Irene's sister now lives in Brisbane so they are enjoying the sights of Brisbane for the last few days. I drove down to catch up with Russell recently while Irene was investigating some of the shops around the city.

2000k's in less than a week towing the van to get here now sees them enjoying a much slower lifestyle. They expect to move on to Caloundra early next week. The weather here has been unseasonably warm and dry with temps in the high 20's all week.

Trish is enjoying her "Nanna" in Melbourne and is due to fly home on Wednesday.

We have both got cheap flights down to Melbourne via the internet which will allow me to get to some of the AFL finals. They work out to be under $60 one way for one person. It is always cheaper to fly mid week when there seem to be more specials available.

I Hope The Bad language Hasn't Upset You!

It has been a day or two since I got onto my Blog Page.

I have decided to move from my internet dial-up to DSL Broadband. To do this I need a modem and with a laptop about the house too I should link it to the internet as well via a home network. So I was looking for a router/modem with wireless capabilities. We make calls to family in Melbourne so the idea of Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone calls is attractive too. An untimed call to Melbourne 24/7 for 10 cents is good to me.

I found the router modem I needed and I had to buy a wireless card for the laptop.

Trying to get it all setup (remembering I won't have the broadband connected till after we return from Melbourne at the end of July) has had the inappropriate language flowing up here on the Sunshine Coast.

The router modem has a red light flashing all the time (probably because it can't find Broadband) and the laptop has minimal contact via wireless with the router.

This photo shows the laptop trying to open the configuration page from the router. It just can't quite get it all just yet. The wireless connection speed is so slow!

But we will get there!

Latest News For Where We Live

Things are really moving here where we live. The developer continues to churn out blocks of land and these seem to sell very quickly. Most new blocks now have sold or Under Contract signs on them, many seem to be being bought by builders for later resale. Some of the bigger companies buy four blocks and then build on those simultaneously.

While blocks are being prepared, new areas of the estate are being cleared and ready for further development. Here the land is being cleared and levelled ready for new blocks of land.


This unit complex has just been completed too. It has both single and double storey units for sale. The original developer went broke and the development has been bought and completed by a new developer. The tower in this photo overlooks the pool one way and provides a great view of the Glasshouse Mountains looking the other way. The double storey units sell for high $300,000.

And at long last the new road at the back of our court has been opened. No fanfare or special occasion, just removed the barricades and the traffic started to use it. This will now provide an easier less complicated access to our place. The map for download on the right has been updated.

This photo shows what has been done at the end of our court. We now have direct footpath access to the new road with this gateway now available for use.


Friends Russell and Irene have headed away from Drouin in Victoria on Saturday on their latest trip in their new caravan. Yesterday when we spoke with them they were in Moree in northern NSW. Rainy weather has seen them continuing to drive north so they are a little bit further on than they had expected. They are due to catch up with friends south of Brisbane on Friday but are a little further along than first anticipated.