Suuny Days And Warming Up

It continues to be coolish with a strong southerly still blowing. This tends to make bike riding a little unpleasant. We are into September which is the beginning of the magpie swooping season. We have been quite lucky here with few swooping problems however one magpie found me out today and had a bit of a go at me. As you can see from the photo further 'precautions' have been put into place.

Temperatures should be above the mid 20's later this week.

The fallout from the recent approval of the large estate to be built next to Bellvista continues. I had a call from another local paper yesterday for a comment. Feelings on it all are quite high as there may well be a negative outcome for the nearby airport. Letters to the newspaper have been quite willing. However I was a little upset when one Bellvista resident (and a resident member of the Bellvista Community Association) signed a particularly nasty letter with his name and followed it with BeCA! We moved into damage control quickly with disclaimers to the newspaper and people who were singled out for attack in the article.

Trish had some sewing ladies around Monday morning and I bottled my 'brew'.

I was disappointed that another brew I was beginning to drink isn't too good either. That is two brews in a row now that have been a bit ordinary. Previously I have probably had no more than three crook brews in 6 years, now suddenly I have two in a row!

I continue to enjoy playing with the new phone. I installed Skype onto it recently and I am using a totally different Skype account for it. If you want to be added as a contact do a search for the Skype name 'thomfam90'.

On TV Again

The weather turned wet yesterday with strong winds. I had an email to give a Channel Ten News Reporter a call over the approval for the new development. The weather today is sunny and clear with a maximum in the high teens and a very strong southerly wind is blowing.

At least I managed a couple of sentences this time, but it is amazing how little of what you say gets to air with these things. The piece was shown on the Queensland Channel 10 evening news so I received a bit of a welcome at Computer Club this morning!

The word is getting out that the helicopters are the major concern of residents here. Not the best photo this one but overall it could have been worse!

There was always going to be a loser when Trish and my teams met in the first of the finals last night. My team Geelong won fairly comfortably in what was atrocious conditions. Our cold weather today is the northern tip of the inclement weather sweeping across Victoria right now.

Busy, Busy, Busy.

After some delightful weather (mid 20's), today is still not cold but some rain has blown in from the west. It is probably the northern tip of what is currently sweeping through the southern states.

I have bought the phone referred to in the post below. The phone (a Galaxy S) is sensational and does heaps of things. However it is with the Optus network, the lesser network we have here and the signal I get at home is nowhere near as good as that provided by Telstra. I can still use it inside the house but for lengthy calls I need to move to the front bedroom for a totally clear call.

The new plan costs me $9 more per month than the old plan. With that I get around 7 hours of included calls at any time and to any Australian phone. This almost negates the 'just so' coverage we get at home. Also any unused call time at the end of a month is carried over into the next.

I can connect the new phone to my in home wi fi network and access all the internet stuff the phone provides. Probably the best thing is its ability play internet radio. As long as I am within home wi fi range, I can listen to any radio station anywhere. I like to tune in to the radio when I go to bed or first wake in the morning.

The new phone has been a huge learning curve for me. I have even created an email account just to use with this phone as it receives and sends emails as well.

The government has just OK'd the new housing development here. It is a little controversial as the developer got so hung up with the local Council that they bypassed it and went straight to the government for a decision! Eventually the new development will be home for over 50,000 people when fully completed. This is just the first 'stage' of the development and it is referred to as Bellvista II. We have been promised that both Telstra and Optus will extend their mobile phone networks to accommodate Bellvista II!

The local press is having a party over it and with me as the President of the Community Association I have been in the thick of it all. I did a radio interview with the local ABC yesterday afternoon, a quick bit on the local Channel 9 news last night and later today I am doing something for the Channel 10 News.

Much of the controversy is caused by the new development's close proximity to the Caloundra Airport. I am guessing this is what will be the focus of things this afternoon when Channel 10 want to talk to me.

We have issues with helicopter training flights which occur directly above the estate. It is the repetitive circuits where they practise take offs and landings which are the problem. When this is happening it can go on for several hours. It can make sitting outside a bit of a pain to have the noise there going on and on.

I bottle washed today which was a brave thing to do considering the weather has turned wet! By the way, I took the photo with the camera on the new phone!

It is a big weekend for sport on TV. My team plays Trish's team in the first match of the AFL finals tonight. There are then three more finals footy matches over the weekend and all live on TV. There is coverage of the second cricket Test from Sri Lanka on TV as well.

Should be a good weekend.

Wet Mornings, Sunny Afternoons!

It has been a couple of days now since I added a post so I had better update things.

Again sport on TV took up much of the time over the weekend. My team played in a Friday night blockbuster against the top side and had a resounding win. It was a surprising and unexpected result for both sides. Trish's team also had a win.

On top of both our footy sides winning, Australia won the cricket as well.

The last two days have seen a heap of overnight rain, a wet morning followed by a lovely sunny afternoon. The rain has amounted to almost 2 whole inches.

I am considering a new mobile phone. However as we don't spend much on a mobile phone service, I am looking for the best deal I can get. Unfortunately the best deals are available from providers using the Optus service. The service strength here is best described as OK. I even bought a $5 Sim Card to see how it worked. It received and made calls OK but the signal strength was way down. But it worked.

Today I had a guy from the computer club around, he has a new Optus phone so we did another test. It worked OK.

The deal is a brand new smart phone (Galaxy S) with around 7 hours of talk time included! This is for $29 per month which is a bit more than I am currently spending. I currently get an hour free each day. This is always during a pre-determined hour. This service will allow me to call outside the prescribed hour.

You can check the deal HERE.

I had my first BeCA Committee meeting as President last night. It seemed to go OK.

A Good Deal

Our delightful weather has continued the last three days.  Hardly a cloud in the sky and around the low to mid 20's most days.  Even the pool is a little above 21 degrees right now.

Wednesday was especially busy for me as President of the local Community Association.  Firstly there was a photo session for the local paper.  The new Bellvista II development is about to be fully approved and work will begin.  Then it was time to catch up with local MP to discuss what is being done with the main road into our area.  The new development means the road needs some upgrading and as a result some residents will need to backtrack down the main road, make a u-turn then back up again to get on the main road into Caloundra or to Brisbane.

Trish has Stitchers followed by Mahjong yesterday so she was out all day.

Today Thursday saw me on the bike for a shorter ride than normal as I had a Computer Club member popping around for some help.  She put Bellvista into her GPS (we are really Caloundra West) and discovered Bella Vista is 700k's away! She possibly shouldn't be allowed near a computer either.  But I think she appreciated the help.  We managed to get the printer to work, she had been plugging the USB lead into the ethernet connection on her laptop!

I have been keeping my eye out for a good deal on an internet radio.  That is a radio which can go 'online' to my wireless network and play online radio stations.  There are in excess of 1500 stations out there which this gadget can access.  The better model available via Kogan seen in the picture here, is usually $189 + $19 delivery.  I visited a website called "Spreets" today and bought a voucher for $99 which allows me to buy stuff from Kogan to the value of $200.  So my $210 delivered internet radio will cost me less than $120. It is also a DAB digital radio, an FM radio and an iPod Dock. I have to pay any delivery charges.

I am please with my deal!

I haven't ventured far from the TV whenever possible, I have been watching the Test Cricket live from Sri Lanka.  I have sport all night on TV tonight while Trish has her Trivia night.