Golden Boot!

Well, as posted in my last post, Kate made her debut for her school soccer (or football as they call it here) on the weekend and to my great surprise, Kate's team won the 4 team tournament with 2 wins and a draw, didn't concede a goal and she herself scored 3 out of the 5 goals her team scored and scored the most goals in any of the teams!

We were very surprised but also very happy!

Of course, as a proud dad, I snapped the following pics of her in action:

Warming Up

Throw Ins

Lining up her first goal!

Giving Coach Ben some tips ;-)

Trying to round the Al Raha keeper...

One on One with the Keeper...

Happy with the trophy!

Back in the UAE

Got back from London after a pretty intense but successful business trip... and its one day back in the office and then its the weekend!

A pretty relaxing weekend on offer with the only commitment being Kate's debut for the school football team.  She has apparently got her way into the side as a deft striker, so I will be very keen to see how she goes this weekend.  Apparently its a bit of a round robin tournament running from 8am to midday.

Otherwise, we're free spirits this weekend... not sure what we'll do but we'll make the most of it I hope.  I am thinking beach...

Then we have a short week next week (4 days) and then its off for the Eid break and then the UAE National Day Holiday.  These things run concurrently and I think I have 10 days off!  So we'll try and do some touristy things as well... things like Ski Dubai and another crack at the sand dune 4WDing.

Also, this morning, saw another truck over turned on the highway... was carrying a shipping container, the truck was upright, its rig on the back was on the side and the container was skewed across the sand, dented but unopened.  Glad that didnt happen to our furniture!!

Off to London

In a mere 30mins, I will be whisked away and driven to the airport and am off on a 2 nighter to London.  Etihad airlines really is classy in that its business class travellers get picked up from home and taken to the airport, are then taken by car to their hotel and then back again on the way home.  Its a really great service that I wish Qantas could emulate.

The trip in itself is not terribly exciting... more meetings on the London Array windfarm project.  Its a really exciting project, but this trip in itself is not terribly interesting.

The girls though tonight were very jealous of me going in a plane and even though we're flying to Sydney in 4 weeks, they want to fly to London with me.  Very sweet.

Also, speaking of the girls, Kate & Brooke both made the school girls football (soccer) squad and Kate got picked in the starting XI this weekend in the first game.  So, we're off to see her game representing the mighty Greenfield Community School against some other mob!  Apparently their strip is blue and green vertical stripes... nice!

Weekend!

The weather in Dubai has been improving every week and we're having beautiful weather at the moment.  I went out this morning for a walk before work and the weather was cool without the chill and the early morning sunlight was really nice.  We have massive parkland around our place and I walked along there until I got to the end of my estate and saw for the first time the next stage of the estate development.  Workers were already busy installing palm trees at 6am this morning and its coming along.  The area has really filled up and is very popular.

This weekend is going to be a good one too.  We're off to the mall this evening for a bite to eat and a look around.  Ibn Battutta is our local mall and we'll go for pizza or something... maybe even check out the movies.

Tomorrow, is D&D game day and I will be nerding it up during the day which is always a good bit of fun.  No plans for the evening, but we'll see how it goes.

Saturday will be quiet... I have to go to DEWA (the local water and power company) to sort out some bill issues (I am not getting them) and then we'll relax around the pool.  Have a couple of work colleagues potentially coming over as well (trying to convince them to move to the Green Community) and other than that we're doing nothing but "chillaxing".

So, all is good! 

London Calling... again

Am off to London again next week.  The joint venture project I am involved with over there is getting increasingly busy and it seems to be that I am expected over there every 4 weeks.

But on top of that, we're having the corporate accountants trying to "minimise" costs and I have been asked once again to fly out of Abu Dhabi on the 2am flight, land at 7am London time, work a full day and then come home on the 9pm London flight (1am body clock time) and land at Abu Dhabi at 7am the next day and go straight to the office.  In addition, I live in Dubai and would have to get home from Abu Dhabi and there is no way I want to do that.

I did this once before and I got a cab home at 7am and "worked from home" but was virtually useless the next day and slept for half of it.  There is no way I can be functioning in the office... but that's what is expected... Sit up to 2am for two nights in a row, sleep 4-5 hrs on a plane, manage the time shift, work a full day and come straight to the office from the airport.  All for the sake of saving a hotel cost for 1 night.

I have though managed to argue this and have got my one night, but fly out in the early morning the next day.  Much more manageable and humane.

Crazy Drivers...

Was late home last night once again... my 50min drive turned into 90min as once again, a semi trailer found itself on its side and across the 3 lane road.  This is increasingly being a normal event lately.

It seems to me that the trucks in this country travel incredibly slowly when compared to Sydney as they stick to the slow lane and convoy along at no more than 80km/h and yet they seem to end up on their side more often than not.  Again, a truck turning around a round-a-bout rolled and lost its load last night and I think I have seen approximately 10 vehicles (mostly trucks or vans) on their side since arriving here in February.  I did also see a car on its roof once, but that would have been excessive speed.

I find driving in the UAE a breeze now... people cruise at 140km/h, trucks stay in their slow (right) lanes and everything seems fine, but BANG and suddenly the traffic backs up because something has gone wrong.  I have never seen these incidents live but always seem to end up behind them in the traffic.

I presume that its because trucks are being overloaded, but the one last night was a big truck with a shipping container on its back... really difficult you would think to overload such a defined cargo?

Fan(s)

Wow, surreal experience today...

Went to Festival City today (yet another shopping centre) and whilst we're walking around, this lovely young lady comes up and says "Are you Mr Clayton?".  For a minute, I was thinking "ooh, I dropped my wallet or something" and I said yes.  She then said that she reads my blog all the time and really enjoys it.

I was stunned... and I was really stumped as to what to say to that, and I probably came off a bit rude because I was trying to comprehend how a complete stranger can recognise me in a shopping mall from my blog.

But anyway, we went to lunch and I was still trying to comprehend it all as I was sure the only people who read this are friends and family... but I guess, I must have some regular readers and I am quietly pleased someone recognised me!

So, thanks for the hello Mystery Lady, you made my day.