Thursday Update

The visit to the Pool Shop Tuesday afternoon wasn't too good. It set me back about $35 but I am pleased to say all is now perfect. There was no chlorine in the pool. Over winter I cut the pool filter times back to about 4 hours per day. The pool filter 'creates' the chlorine which keeps the pool free from algae.

The pool also needs 'buffer' which doesn't allow the chlorine to just flash-off with sunshine. The buffer acts as a kind of sunscreen for the chlorine.

I have now reset the filter to 6 hours per day (in peak swimming time it will go to 8 hours per day) and with the buffer I added to the pool, the chlorine level is now perfect. The pool also needed another chemical. On top of that I bought a bag of salt as a backup.

When we lived in Melbourne the pool there used to cost me $35 per month! This one off payment of $35 should do the pool until Christmas at least!

The lawns were mowed yesterday and the place is looking pretty good.

Today we went around to one of Trish's friends from Quilters and I put Publisher 2007 on her computer for her. I think Trish has promised the lady I will volunteer to put their website together for them.

From there we did a quick trip to Spotlight for one of their "specials". I meandered into Trade Secret and grabbed a cotton jacket made by Driza-Bone marked down from a retail price of $180 to $30. I was delighted with my purchase.

As you can see from the photos we have had a shower of rain this afternoon. It was about 23 earlier today with a much cooler south easterly wind kicking in and blowing yesterday's warmer weather away. It was a cooler this morning so I didn't need a swim after my daily 13k bike ride.

All According To Plan

Monday was a busy day! I cleaned the inside of the car so it now looks about as good as the outside. Cleaning inside the car isn't one of my favorite jobs .... but it is done now.

Then yesterday after lunch I washed bottles so all is ready for a bottling in a day or so.

Our spell of warm weather is due to come to a halt soon with storms later today signalling a switch to cooler southerly winds. According to a little thermometre in the backyard, it is about 29 degrees out there and a little sticky. The sky looks a little dark too! The pool was almost 23 degrees this morning after my 13k bike ride.

The external hard disk drive that was causing me problems is winging its way to Singapore right now. I contacted Western Digital support this morning and the recommendation is I send it back to WD and they will send me a replacement. It was taking 3 minutes to copy a file to it today on any of the computers I have here at home. I would have expected that file to transfer in a little more than 30 seconds usually.

Later on today I head to the Pool Shop to have the pre-summer water test and I will need to pick up a spare bag of salt too.

We were back to specialist this morning and she is pleased with the way things are looking for Trish after the excitement of the weekend. Next visit is in three weeks time.

Car Is All Shiny Now.

Trish had a bit of a relapse which required her to head back into Caloundra on Friday afternoon. A bit more laser treatment and it seems we got in early enough and no harm has happened. She went back again Saturday for another checkup and a little more laser and all seems to be OK now.

Saturday was AFL Grand Final day. What a match it was, after 2 hours of hectic Australian rules footy the game was a draw! So back they go next Saturday afternoon and do it all again. Over 100,000 were at the game.

I did a bit of messing around with my movies on Sunday and found it took an inordinately long time to transfer a newly downloaded movie from the main PC to the external Hard drive I use. I have noticed the transfer has been a bit slower than usual lately. So eventually I downloaded everything off the drive, (this took about 4 hours) and then did a quick reformat on it. A quick reformat takes about 20 seconds, at the end it said the disk could not be reformatted! I tried a full reformat and this takes about 2 hours! Again it said the disk could not be reformatted.

This morning I tried a quick reformat on the old XP laptop and it worked OK. I decided to give it a full reformat and two hours later it had finished. After all this it still took about 3 to 4 minutes to copy a movie across a job that usually takes less than a minute. Currently I am having a go at a "Disk Repair" job on it and this is expected to take 8 hours to do.

Our car doesn't get washed too often these days. But as yesterday wasn't too hot I decided it was a good day to wash the car. The guy from over the road popped over for a chat and said he had some whiz bang car polish, did I want to give the car a polish too? Sounded good to me so the car received a polish as well as a wash. Today I decided the outside was clean, I should do the inside as well! The car looks pretty good for something which is getting towards 5 years old! And it looks like it is going to rain tomorrow!

I did about 13k's today on the bike and hit the pool for a quick swim when I got back home. I didn't think 21.7 degrees would feel that cold bit it sure did!

More Cricket

Trish received excellent news from the specialist yesterday. All that is now required is time for things to settle down. Preliminary tests are excellent.

I headed back to the cricket yesterday in overcast conditions to watch more of the Interstate Challenge, this time between NSW and Tasmania.

The conditions were tough for batsmen but Tasmania's captain George Baily made a commanding 71 for his side. They totalled about 218 and were able to dismiss NSW for about 140.

They used the new one day format of 45 overs each with both sides batting for 20 overs one after the other. Later both sides came back to play their final 25 overs. This format seems to keep interest up throughout the match and also that batting conditions are similar for both sides.

Those dark overcast skies as seen in the above photo are back again today but didn't stop me getting a 13k bike ride in this morning. Trish is back to Quilters this morning and is able to drive the car OK.

Today's match is Tasmania Vs a second rate South Australia. I am not bothered about heading back to watch this one.

To The Cricket

Trish is home again and we are off to the specialist this morning.

While I waited for her I popped down to the main Sunshine Coast Cricket ground to have a look at the Interstate Challenge game that was going on. Recent rain had put a dampener on proceedings with a full days play being lost on Monday.

I watched South Australia Vs New South Wales in a reduced 30 over match. Most of the S.A. players were not regular first class cricketers as their senior players are in a CLT20 tournament in South Africa.

However NSW were at near full strength. With Australia about to head overseas Test players weren't present but we did see players of the likes of Clark, (former Australia opening bowler), Phil Jacques (former Australian opener),Warner (Australia T20 opener), Henriques, Casson and Khwaja all who toured with Australian teams. Several of these players are on the brink of Test Cricket selection.

NSW won easily.

Today I am hoping to see a full strength Tasmania against NSW.

46mls In The Rain Gauge

Sunday had been overcast with only the very occasional light shower which was not even enough to register in the rain gauge. But on Monday morning the promised rain eventually arrived. It was pretty steady all day and when I checked the rain gauge this morning (Tuesday) there were 46mls in it (almost 2" Lou Ann). Needless to say I haven't been on my daily bike ride for several mornings now.

This meant most of Monday was spent inside.

Yesterday I received a call from our Councillor asking if I was available to attend an onsite meeting in the local park to discuss the site for a new Toilet Block the Community Association had requested. That filled in some of the dreary afternoon and the rest was spent updating the Community Association website. The photo shows where the new toilet block will go. We will lose a little garden area but this seems to be the best spot, between the pathway and the tennis court.

We needed to consider proximity to services (water, power, sewerage), proximity to areas where the public will be and ensure people could get a clear view of it from the park as well as the street for security reasons. It will go where the garden area is and the back wall will form a tennis hit up wall as the rear wall will take the place of some of the tennis court fence.

Last night we watched the movie "Get Me To The Greek". Trish was bored with it while I managed to struggle through it and did get a laugh or two. I am glad I didn't have to pay money to see it. We also watched "Hachiko, A Dog's Story" with Richard Gere which was a much better movie.

The rain has almost stopped right now but showers are expected to continue throughout the week. It looks a bit gray in this photo!

I have recently 'discovered' internet radio and I have installed a program on my PC called RamaRadio. I enjoy listening to a station called KeepMusicFree 60's from the US. There are heaps of classic hits from the 60's playing almost non stop. I bought this small FM transmitter for $9 from China and it arrived yesterday. I plug the lead into the headphone jack of my PC speakers and then set an FM frequency (106.1). I go into the lounge room and set my Tuner Amplifier to 106.1 and the music playing from the internet radio station is transmitted on 106.1 from my FM Transmitter to my sound system in the lounge room where it can be enjoyed by everyone.

I previously bought an FM Transmitter for about $75 for use in the car about 6 years ago. Now you can get them from China for $9!

I just ordered this gadget for about $11 (delivered) from China. It is another FM Transmitter and MP3 player. It plugs into your car cigarette light for power and has a usb port which will take a flash drive. The MP3 player then plays the music from your flash drive and transmits it on a FM frequency which can be picked up by your car radio. Pretty nifty! Check it out HERE from a website called DealExtreme.

And if it doesn't work, it only cost $11!

Should fill in the long hours when driving from here to Melbourne!

Overcast On Sunday

A bit of the 'same old, same old' the last few days. I ride nearly every morning and do somewhere between 12 and 14k's depending on which route I take. I tend to steer clear of places with very tall trees right now as we are in the magpie nesting season. Magpies can become very territorial during this time of the year and protect their 'space' from any intruders, especially old blokes on bikes! I have been swooped just once so far and it wasn't at all vicious as some of them can be.

Trish now drives to gym, she has a nasty magpie on her usual bike riding route to the gym so she chooses the safer form of travel.

The wind has been stronger and cooler the last few days so I haven't taken the plunge into the pool after a bike ride since earlier in the week. And it looks like my riding will be curtailed with rain forecast for the next few days right up till Wednesday. This is a shame because the three interstate cricket teams are on the "Coast" right now for pre-season matches but it isn't looking good at all on the weather front

I got my bottling done on Friday. Unfortunately my footy team had a bad night out on Friday and have been eliminated from this year's finals.

Computer Club was hectic again but I hope I was able to help people.

I managed to acquire a copy of "Office 2010 Pro" which I have installed and fully activated. Then on Saturday afternoon I went around to Tony's place and sorted out several problems on his laptop. Needless to say things didn't go easily but we got there in the finish. His 'touchpad' driver on his laptop had become corrupted and even a slightest brush would cause his screen to go crazy with letters and figures. We reinstalled the driver and all is well again now. He too has "Office 2010 Pro" on the laptop and we have applied to swap his Voip Phone plan to a more economical one.

Trish and I had lunch at a different bowls club on Thursday. A pleasant enough meal and it was great to get out.

Wet weather is forecast for the next few days so all isn't looking too flash.

Almost Time For A Bottling

We have been enjoying some great weather the last few days with temps getting well in to the mid 20's and higher. However the cool overnight temperatures means that the pool loses any heat it gained the previous day. It is around the 21 degree mark in the pool at the moment.

I managed to fix up that computer on Monday afternoon. It is a 5 yr old machine running XP with less than 500MB RAM. I switched off about 12 startup options that had built up over time and that allowed the PC to start a little more quickly. At its age it is lucky to be running at all.

Tuesday was bottle washing day and later that day I drove to Kawana to collect the Community Association Newsletters which we had printed. I then dropped them off locally so they can be divided up and passed on to the volunteer deliverers. They will probably go out for delivery later this week.

I have been riding most mornings since our return from Melbourne and usually manage to get about 13k's or so. It is magpie swooping season and I had my first attack from one this morning. It wasn't too vicious and hardly caused me any concern. A couple of nearby walkers got a bigger shock than I did!

Trish is at Stitchers this morning. She is the Vice President and is running things today as the President is away. Trish has decided to have her other eye done next week.

The Water Is Cold!

I was pretty busy at the Computer Club on Saturday. Trish worked at the Tourist Information Centre Saturday morning so I had 30 minutes to fill between end of Computer Club and Trish's pick up time. I headed down to the beach. It was a sunny day with temps in the mid 20's. People everywhere and I had problems getting a park. It was delightful.

Started spring tidy up in the afternoon as we are in footy finals and only 2 matches on TV this weekend. Mowed lawns and then did a "Weed N Feed" to get rid of some of the broad leaf stuff which was growing. Lawn is looking good!

I gave the pool a good clean over the weekend too.

Trish and I were invited around to Paul and Linda's Sunday afternoon for drinks and a meal. Linda cooks a great curry and Sunday night was no exception. The home brew, the red wine and a couple of whiskeys went down beautifully. Monday morning wasn't too hot though!

I put in a 13k bike ride but kept a close eye out for swooping magpies. I have been safe so far. Again a lovely day about 25 outside but the pool is still only 21.5 degrees. Despite this I had a quick swim after the bike ride.

I am off around to assist one of the Computer Club members this afternoon.

A Good Laugh

Click on the photo to see a larger view (and be able to read it). Then click on "Back" to return to this page.

At Home Again

Our plane was delayed for about 40 minutes but it made up 20 of those during the flight back home. We grabbed a taxi at the airport and we were back home by just after 2 pm. The night before we dined with our daughter Kim and Chris, Wendy and the grandkids. Chris took us to a large Chinese Restaurant near where he lives. The had a tremendous 'special' with 50% off certain areas of the menu. Needless to say they were the menu areas we concentrated on. We ate heaps and the bill came to a little over $70 for 5 adults and two children.

Our arrival back home saw us very weary. It wasn't long until we were unpacked and things had been tidied up. Outdoor furniture was put into place, some leaves were tidied up and Trish got into some washing.

I spent time on the PC getting things copied back over from the laptop. I made some DVD's for Trish from stuff she had been given and a few TV shows I had gotten for her. Despite being a bit tired Trish headed off to Trivia while I continued to sort stuff out on my PC.

This morning I had a bike ride and did another 13 kilometres. It was windy and warm so another load of washing went on.

I had the Community Association Newsletter to finish and Trish had her Quilters one to do as well.

I got a brew on, vacuumed the pool and did some more fine tuning of the Newsletter before sending it off for printing.

Busy, busy, busy!

Time To Head Off.

It is a sunny but cool Wednesday afternoon. Our bags are packed and we are putting in a 'quiet' day prior to heading over to Chris' place to spend the night so we can be at the airport early to catch our flight home tomorrow morning.

Trish has tidied up around the house, given the floors a quick clean and today has put some washing through.

We have done a little more checking out of places here should we decide to return to Melbourne in the next year or so. Some of the Over 55's places seem to be very expensive for what you get. We have several options available to us so we will just keep an eye on things. It has been a valuable and informative process. Other over 50's spots seem fantastic but then there is limited broadband access. It seems that whatever we do will require some compromise. Building our own 'small' place here would be the most cost effective rather than moving into an Over 55's resort.

I have received a couple of emails while here from people at home seeking advice on their laptops. It seems I will be busy this Saturday at the Computer Club!

I Bought A New TV!

Monday was spent with friend Keith Damon while Trish spent time with Keith's wife June and friend Irene. While the ladies headed to the movies Keith and I headed to a couple of electrical stores to check out a new TV for their home. Keith isn't up with the latest on modern TV's so he asked me to go with him. He is now the owner of a new 46" Samsung Series 6 LCD TV.

This model has an inbuilt "Media Player" so Keith bought a 500GB external Hard Disk Drive which is now full of movies. The TV plays movie files from an external hard disk. They are extremely pleased with their purchase! Trish and I then enjoyed a pleasant evening with them while the movie transference was completed!

Saturday ended up being a very windy and unpleasant day. We spent all afternoon with my brother and his wife at his home in Alphington along with all my family. Geoff enjoyed it very much. I had a few drinks and kept an eye on the footy match on TV, my team plays the winner this Friday night in a do or die game at the MCG. We will be home by then and I see both of the AFL matches for this weekend are live on TV. The kids loved Geoff's Tree House in his backyard.

Sunday was very much a rest and recuperation day. During the afternoon Arj and I watched his team bow out of the AFL finals series when Sydney defeated his Carlton.

This afternoon we will do a little window shopping before collecting Charlie from kindergarten later on.

We fly home on Thursday at 10:45 am so tomorrow afternoon we will head over to Chris and Wendy's for a our final night in Melbourne. Chris will drop us off at Tullamarine Thursday morning for a flight back home.

A Miserable Saturday

The weather forecast is miserable for the rest of today, strong winds and heavy rain are expected. Now this could mean some sunny breaks later or it could mean batten down the hatches! The rain is heading down from the north west and Kate's home is in the lower right hand corner between Cranbourne and Pakenham on this map.

Friday was spent in 'recovery' mode after our heavy week visiting. We visited the close by shopping centre with Kate and the kids. I spent much of the time perusing electrical equipment as I am helping someone with buying a big screen TV on Monday. Chips for lunch was enjoyed by everyone.

Trish and I have been keeping an eye on possible accommodation for us in case we decided to head back to Melbourne to live. (We will be doing this sometime into the future). We have visited half a dozen or so places (Over 50's Independent Living Resorts) and checked them out. The recent world financial turmoil has impacted on us severely so our choices are not as wide as they would have been a few years ago. We checked another place out on Friday afternoon but it isn't what we were looking for.

I went to the footy Friday night to see my side playing in the finals. They were defeated by 4 points when a controversial umpiring decision went against them in the dying minutes of the game. The game finished in appallingly wet conditions. Handling the ball was akin to trying to play a game with a cake of soap! It was a bruising affair. Next week's game is now do or die.

Today the whole family is off to spend an afternoon with my brother Geoff and his wife Jeanette. People are taking a casserole each over for lunch. Later on this afternoon I may or may not go to the other AFL footy match which is on again at the MCG tonight. It all depends on any impending storms.

It would be easier if I didn't go to the footy but instead settled down and watched it on TV.

Survivor

We have just arrived back at Kate's from spending a couple of nights with Eddie and Patsy. I feel like we have been on our own TV episode of "Survivor". But it was all great fun. We are both looking forward to a good night's sleep.

Eddie was once a principal of the school where I taught and we have remained good friends ever since. We told the same old stories we told each other last time, we used exactly the same 'lines' we used when together last time, we drank too much and ate too much just like we did last time as well! But it was all good fun. They were great hosts and entertained us on a wet Wednesday by taking us to the Pig N Whistle hotel down at Arthur's Seat on the Mornington Peninsula. It was a very pretty spot and we spent a very pleasant hour or so there.

I had Shepherd's Pie while everyone else had soup with bread. I also enjoyed a couple of beers but at almost $5 a pot it was a little on the expensive side.

Trish and Patsy get on well together so everything was fine. Patsy wanted a little done on her PC which was a pleasure for me to do and Eddie wanted his own email address setup. Everything was achieved without too much much fuss. Now all Eddie has to do is learn how to turn the computer on!

Trish and I had checked out a couple of spots here as possibilities for us to return to live in Melbourne in a couple of year's time. There was one spot that looked just perfect but I have since discovered I can get 4GB download on Broadband for $50! I currently get 50GB download for $60. 4GB isn't anywhere near enough for me I am afraid.

We have pencilled our name in there for something in a couple of years but the internet setup will need to improve markedly for us to go ahead with it. I need to keep pinching myself and try to understand we are actually in 2010, not 1990!

Kate has spent $2400 having her central heater unit replaced! The repair bill on the other one was heading towards $1000! The main computer board had gone on it. They now have a more modern and more efficient unit installed and fully integrated into their evaporative cooling system too.