Parties and Motorways

Well we’re into the home stretch now… Last week of the year which means a mixture of flat chat work to get things done and socialising.  Today is a classic case, meetings in the morning to try to get certain things finalised before the break and then a lunch that will mean not coming back to the office until late in the day.  On top of this, my boss’ boss has invited a number of people in the company and their spouses to his house for Xmas Drinks.  That’s nice because it means Niki gets to come in herself and have a bit of a Xmas do.  This time of year is always hard with so many functions on that you tend to be more away from home than any other time of the year – so its pretty generous of the Big Boss to have so many staff and partners over.

So today will be a tough day – lunch at Aqua at Milsons Point and then drinks at Mosman… lah dee dah!!

Also, changing tact, a big thumbs up from me for the new M7.  I drove into work yesterday and I left the city via the Eastern Distributor (which heads South??) and around the airport to the M5 through to the M7 which goes north before hitting the M4 at Walgrove Road.  I left the office carpark a bit before 6:30 and got home a bit after 7:30.  70 mins home in peak hour is amazing.  Normally it would be 90mins easy and that’s a good run.  The traffic was a bit stop start in the M5 tunnel, but pretty much flowed between 80-100km/h along the M5 and I sat on 120km/h on the M7.

Perhaps it was light traffic due to this time of year, but I didn’t stop at a set of lights between William Street in the city and the Glenbrook Bowling Club!  The downside of it though is that the tolls would be close to $7 one way - $3.30 for the M5 and whatever the M7 would charge… which I think is also around $3.50.

 

Hey! Here's an idea...

To cure the troubles at Cronulla, why don’t we segregate people based on their religion and activity and keep everyone separated.  We can keep all the Muslims at one end of the beach and all the Anglo-Saxon locals at the other end.  The Muslims can employ their own people to patrol their section of the beach, whilst the Life Savers can patrol the “Aussie” end.

Believe it or not, this is actually an idea that was flagged at a meeting hosted by Liberal MP Bruce Baird… Hey Bruce, its called “segregation” and South Africa were isolated from the rest of the world for it for about 20 years.

Isn’t it amazing that the Liberals are actually putting these ideas into the mix… and are then reported in our national news paper…

Tick another one in the “Liberals are Xenophobic Racists” column.

Kids Photography

Kate & Brooke took the digital camera unsupervised for 20mins tonight and took about 30 photos on their own... Most were pictures of our hanging Xmas Cards (like 20 of them!!) but these are the best of the rest.

Interesting when you know that the photographer is 6yrs old with a 4yr old accomplice...

Maybe I should get them to do more and call the results "art"?? 

Xmas Comes A Week Early

Due to my mum & dad flying to the Gold Coast for Xmas this year, we decided to get together a week early for the rest of the family to celebrate.



Seemed odd having a Christmas lunch with all the trimmings but it was good to see my Uncle Scott, my Pop and my cousin Hayley and her boyfriend Ray. My family has never been one to get together enmasse regularly but we seem to pick up with the same bad jokes and laughs which is good.



There was way too much food, a lot of beer and wine was drunk, presents were handed out and the kids got excited and after everyone had left bar Mum & Dad; Dad and I fell asleep in front of the cricket... pretty much a traditional Aussie Xmas!



I have also opened up the Xmas Ham early and it now sits in the fridge in the wet tea towel / pillow case and I have now commenced my annual pilgrimige (sp?) to eat the whole ham. Ham sandwiches, ham on toast, ham on its own... mmmmm!

Cricket Reaches Xmas Break

The first of the seasons one day games and the last before Xmas Break was played on Saturday, with us running a pretty 2nd against current back markers Parramatta Leagues. We had a close game against these guys in Round 1 of the season and this time the game was again very close, but this time we were on the wrong side of the lady luck.



End result was a 11 run loss that went right down to the last few overs. We had bowled out Parramatta for 165 in their 40th (of 42) overs and we were pretty ordinary in the field in the first session with Parramatta 5/104 after only the first 21 overs. Pete Nahlous though bowled 8 overs in the second half of the innings and finished with 3/28 off 8. Excellent for a leg spinner in the back end of a low grade cricket match...



Chasing, yours truly and Wayne Agius got off to a flying start of 0/32 off only 4 overs with both of us not interested in singles. But I was out for 12 (3 boundaries) in the 5th over and then we lost another 4 wickets before we had reached 50 odd. Horrendous collapse.



Then Noyz and Pete combined again and got the side down to a managable 40 to win in the final 10 overs before Noyz knicked one to the keeper. Joe Puglisi came in and scratched a half dozen whilst supporting Pete before he went and Terry Hoban at #10 was bowled with 14 runs from 18 balls required.



Enoch Harris at #11 had to block out the 6th ball of the 40th over to allow Pete to retain the strike and instead went for glory which turned to a miss hit drive to mid-off and we were all out 11 short of the total.



The game though was played in good spirits and even though Parramatta are running last they have lost a number of close ones and are apparently the defending premiers in this grade!



Cricket takes a hiatus until January 7...

The Golden Era of Civil Libertarianism.

Can someone tell me why do the police require special legislation to enforce the law and prevent mob violence?  Since when do they require the government to step in and extend the boundaries of what they can and cant do?

I always thought that should the situation present itself, the police could do anything they wanted to ensure that offenders were caught and arrested.  If you’re drink driving, they’ll pull you over.  If you’re throwing punches in a pub, you’ll get thrown into a paddy wagon.  If you’re part of an angry mob, you’ll cop the batons and mounted police.  If you pull out a gun, you’ll get shot.

So what is it that they are now asking for??

Seems as though everyone is worried about the treatment of the “criminals” and not too much worried about putting a stop to anti-social behaviour.

And I blame Civil Libertarians!

Its Civil Libertarians that cause things like this to happen!

I have never been so proud!!

I know I havent posted in a few of days, but it has been so busy! Last night was Kate & Brookes dance concert and I have never been so proud. Both of the girls took trophies home for "Most Promising" in their respective age groups. But what went on behind the scenes at the concert made it all the so much more special. Little Brooke woke up at 3am yesterday morning throwing up followed by "the trots". Niki then started throwing up as I was getting ready for work and therefore I decided to stay and help out.

Niki then took Kate down at midday (still sick) and I hung about with Brooke before taking her down in the late afternoon for her rehearsal. Niki's mum & I kept the girls occupied whilst Niki did hair, make up etc between throwing up every once and a while.

But it was all worth it in the end, and I can't believe the girls both got trophies. We had prepped them to not get one, but they did very very well.

On the downside, I now have the same bug and am writing this from home... but I gotta now........