The Proof of the Permanent Residency Visa...

Copy of PB150211
Originally uploaded by LinsB.

... is in the passport!

This picture was taken last Tuesday after my return from Brisbane to collect my boxes and my visa. That's a mini bottle of champagne in the stubby cooler. Actually, Brent gave me that last Christmas and I deliberately put it away to open when my residency was granted. Thanks Brent.

I have now unpacked four of the five boxes and it's amazing how easily everything has been absorbed into the house. The only things sticking out like a sore thumb are my books because I still don't have bookshelves but we're hoping to make some temporary ones this weekend. I was very excited to get the stereo up and running and now just have to get the FM arial sorted out and we'll have radio again. It's lovely to be surrounded by so many familiar things and Jingles is very pleased to be in Australia. He's thinking of becoming a citizen and thinks stubby coolers are an excellent invention.

Australia Through to World Cup!

This one's for the Brits.

I witnessed something quite spectacular last night. Australia beat Uruguay in an unbelievably intense game to make it through to the World Cup. That in itself wasn't spectacular, although it was a great game which went through to extra time and then penalties. I couldn't help but get caught up in the thrill of the moment as I remembered with horror some of the worst moments in English football history when we lost in penalty shoot-outs. My theory that the first team to lose a penalty loses the game proved correct when Australia's giant of a goalie, Mark Schwarzer courageously saved the first Uruguayan penalty. The fact that the Aussie captain Viduka shot his penalty wide (at least I think it was him - I'm still not quite sure who is who in Aussie football) and missed didn't even matter when the Aussie goalie made another good save of Uruguay's fourth attempt. Oh the tension! Now knowing that if Australia scored their next penalty they were through. And they did it.

Yes, it was a good game but what was really spectacular was the response. Honestly! You'd have thought they'd won the World Cup itself. Everyone was so excited. I've never seen such a big fuss. I got quite into it myself, I have to admit. It made me a little homesick to think I'll be missing all the big England games but the atmosphere last night was just amazing. The commentators reminded me a bit of English commentators as they kept going on about 31 years of shame.

It's great to see the Aussies getting so into a real sport for once (usually it's all about picking up squashed balls and running in games I can't quite tell the difference between - expect AFL players wear skimpier clothing) but the country partied on into the night to celebrate their World Cup entry. Personally, I'm just happy to be on the side of the winning team of a penalty shoot-out for once. And it is refreshing to see how happy everyone is - in England we see it as a right to be in the World Cup and the fans seem to do nothing but whinge about the performance of the team and pick up on the mistakes, such as missed penalties. (Incidentally I have so far read no mention of the missed penalty!) Perhaps this is the crucial difference between Australia and England... the arrogance of the Aussies when it comes to sport, and their ungraciousness in defeat (and I'm talking about the media here, not the sportsmen themselves) really bugs me, but at least they focus on the positive and it seems to get them results.

I feel like I have witnessed a great moment in Australian sporting history and I'm looking forward to the excitement of the World Cup next year - although I'm a little nervous that I'm going to be surrounded by so many Aussies backing their own team. It'll be great to be a part of but I do wish I could come home and watch the England games with the usual crowd (you know who you are). Now I just have to get them all calling it by it's proper name instead of the poncey word "soccer" which they insist on using.

Camping on Moreton Island

As always I had an absolutely brilliant weekend on Moreton Island. Moreton is such a beautiful place and there's something about camping, getting away from it all, especially somewhere like Moreton which is pretty rugged and not too developed, that really allows you to chill out and forget about the stresses of every day life.

We left on Thursday afternoon to hop on board the 5pm Resort ferry. I had argued against getting this ferry as the Resort is a good kilometre or two from the campsite which basically meant we had to trudge down the beach with all our stuff. But the lads went ahead and booked it anyway. To be fair to them (because I've given them grief about this for the last week and I'm getting over it now) they had intended on hanging round at the resort to watch Mindi record the dolphin's vocalisations and behaviour during the provision feeding that the resort does at 6.30pm every day. That didn't happen but on disembarking the ferry we were lucky enough to see a mother and calf who had arrived early and who were playing around the jetty. The calf was very excited and was swimming really quickly, flipping his tail up and cruising on his back. It was amazing to get so close and see them so clearly.

The Resort ferry is expensive but quick. The walk down the beach was exhausting (well, actually I was already exhausted as I hadn't slept well the past few nights - must be that Ross River fever. I obviously need to eat more miracle toothpaste) and seemed to take a long time. Guy kept trying to persuade us all to get a room in the resort but thankfully we ignored him. We eventually arrived and set up camp (in the dark). We pooled culinary resources and had a yummy meal of Vegetable Stuff with Salt and Rice. Yum! Mindi and Nobina wandered down from the resort and had a couple of drinks with us. Just after they left, around 10.30pm, it started to rain. Then it began to chuck it down until there was nothing to do but retreat to our tents for shelter. By this time my feet were all sandy and I HATE having sand in my bed so I spent the first 20 minutes with my feet sticking out of the tent until Toby let me wipe them with his towel.

We had a fantastic night's sleep on our inflatable mattress. I could have slept for longer but had to get up to go to the toilet. On my return to our site Toby insisted that he'd found a better camping spot - not surprising given that we'd arrived in the dark - and that we should move. So we picked up the tents (literally - with everything still inside them) and everything else and moved to a spot further up the beach. This camping spot was much better - we had a massive communal area and two separate bedrooms!

Mark headed off to spend the morning on the boat with Mindi and Nobina, observing dolpin behaviour, recording their vocalisations and photographing their dorsal fins for identification. Mark was photographer and Mindi tried to get most of us out on the boat but unfortunately the day I went (Saturday afternoon) the resort was so busy with tourists that they couldn't spare us a driver. Very disappointing, especially as I'd trudged all the way up the beach and then hung around in the heat of the day waiting to find this out when I could have been off snorkelling the wrecks. Oh well!

After Mark left we jumped into the bay to cool off. We didn't quite realise it at the time but we were really lucky to have the area of the bay out the front of our campsite to ourselves. We threw a frisbee around for a bit and then another mother and calf dolphin pair came past. They seemed to check us out for a while and it looked like the baby wanted to hang around and play but Mum was obviously busy and they headed on up the beach. It was amazing to be so close to them.

By this time Guy had recovered from his shock of awaking to find the campsite being removed from around him and he joined us for frisbee. Soon we were joined by another dolphin, a young one who was obviously quite interested in us. He toyed with us for a while, swimming away when we followed him and then coming back when we gave up. Then he started a slow journey up the beach so we grabbed our snorkels and masks and ran after him. We must have swum around with this one dolphin for a good half hour. Mark and Mindi came past on the boat and I think they got some photographs of us though I haven't seen them yet. The boys were faster than me in the water and got close enough to see the dolphin underwater. Each time I caught up the dolphin had swum away. On the way back down the beach the boys walked and I swam. I don't know if it was my indifference or lack of agression but the dolphin seemed to grow more curious when I was in the water alone and it came within a few metres of me. I still couldn't quite see it underwater but it was very special anyway. This was without a doubt the highlight of the trip and a morning I will remember for ever.

The rest of the trip was the usual Moreton stuff only we didn't have cars so there was none of the stress of organising trips to the other side of the island for a surf. We just hung out at the campsite and snorkelled. Jim arrived on Friday morning and Scooby and Denise on Saturday. The snorkelling was fantastic, as always. There is so much to see at Moreton. The sheer numbers of fish never cease to amaze me and I love just settling myself on the surface of the water to be surrounded by butter bream in seconds. I saw moon wrasse, parrot fish, humbug damsels, scores of cute little blue and yellow damsel fish flitting in and out of the coral, flathead, goby, boxfish (or was it a toadfish?), many different butterfly fish and angel fish, pairs of moorish idols, a fish with strange sucker-type things along its caudal peduncle (that's the bit just before the tail but I used its official name because peduncle is such a cool word) which I think may have been a sawtail, lots of very long thin fish hanging about just below the surface which I have been unable to identify but could be a crocodile longtom (or a garfish) and that's all I'm going to tell you about because this list is getting long and boring.


Hanging with the butter bream and humbugs 

By Saturday afternoon the 50-100 metre swim to and from the wrecks was becoming quite perilous as more and more weekenders arrived with their boats and their jetskis, mooring their craft to the wrecks (can't imagine this is a particularly safe thing to do) and generally drifting around all over the place. The beautiful bay we'd played frisbee in the previous day was unrecognisable as it was now full of boats, and our "cricket pitch" between our camp and the water had been taken over by a bunch of 15 year old rugby players full of clever comments such as "alright luv?". No chance of swimming with dolphins now. That evening we went to watch the provision feeding of the dolphins up at the resort. The place was packed and so many tourists queued up to pay to feed the dolphins that I was wondering whether the dolphins would feel bloated and yucky afterwards. I spent some time listening to Mindi's hydrophone but could only hear shrimp snapping their claws as the dolphins had calmed down now that they were being fed. Another dolphin came to check out what was going on but didn't hang around and I heard that one echo-locating which was cool. I have been lucky enough to hear that before. One morning last year Toby and I were doing yoga on the beach when we saw dolphins swim past. We jumped in the water and stuck our heads below the surface where we could hear them clicking and whistling. Very special.

There is so much more I could write, about the boys' night snorkel whilst Denise and I got chatted up by the coach of the 15 year olds' rugby team, getting refused beer service after 6pm in the resort and being treated like the filthy camping scum that we were by the manager, and the wonderful camp meals we had of chicken burritos one night followed by a curry buffet the next. But I will stop there as this post is long enough and has taken me about 5 days to write.

There are lots of pictures of the Moreton weekend on Flickr at:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/79031873@N00/sets/1303386/

I've also added a link to Jim's photos (hope you don't mind, Jim) because he has some great underwater shots (including the one above of me with the butter bream) - I haven't quite sorted out my underwater casing yet.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/55338186@N00/sets/1319109/

Important Announcement: Buckle can stay!

I have finally been granted permanent residency. The very nice gentleman at the Department of Immigration, Multi-cultural and Indigenous Affairs (I still struggle to see the connection between immigrants and indigenous peoples but such is the logic of the Australian government) handled my application with the utmost efficiency and called me today to let me know. What wonderful personalised service, thank you Mr Stephen Maclean.

I can now get a credit card and a new job if I so desire, and I no longer have to work in IT. Oh, the sweet taste of freedom.

So, next Tuesday I am off on a little adventure to the city where I shall be collecting a visa for my passport and 180kg worth of useless yet nostalgic items from the UK that I've decided I just can't live without.

(Don't cry, Bootsie, they can't make me stay if I don't want to!)

TIP: How to put on trousers when your feet are dirty

Have you ever been in a situation where your feet are completely scruffy and you need to put on a pair of trousers but really don't want to get the inside of your trousers dirty because then your legs will get filthy too and if your feet are covered in sand it would also feel quite irritating? For the majority of you I expect the answer is probably no. But for those of you who are crying out "yes! that's me! I have frequently found myself in exactly that situation" then this is the post for you.

The following is a technique which I have developed over my years of camping on sandy beaches because I hate having sand in my trousers as much as I hate having it in my bikini bottoms or my bed. And that's a lot.

The first thing you need to do is from the body of the trousers reach inside and grab the bottom of one trouser leg. Pull it up inside itself until the bottom sticks out of the top (see figure 1). Do not pull it fully inside out.


Figure 1.

Next, place your foot inside the inside-out trouser leg so that it is in fact only touching the outside of the trouser leg (which is of course now inside the trouser!). See figure 2.


Figure 2.

If you're still following me (and it's probably easiest if you try as you read) then the next step is really simple. Pull the trouser leg up (see Figure 3).


Figure 3.

From the bottom of the trouser leg you can now pull down the section which is rolled up inside (Figure 4).


Figure 4.

Et voila! You should now have one sand-free leg fully inside the trousers (Figure 5).


Figure 5.

Repeat with the other leg and you should find yourself wearing a non-sandy (on the inside) pair of trousers (Figure 6).


Figure 6.

This technique also works with cropped trousers and long shorts. It is generally unnecessary with shorter items of clothing (such as short shorts and undies) as the leg hole is wider but feel free to experiment. It is also a useful method to employ when finding oneself in a public swimming pool with a wet floor.

By the way, these pictures were taken on a recent trip to Moreton Island. Check the blog later for more info and a link to photographs of the weekend.

TIP: How to get back to main site after leaving a comment

For those of you who leave comments you might be interested to know that you can get back to the home page of my blog by clicking on the name of the site at the top of the page where it says "Post a comment on: Random Thoughts of a Geordie Down-Under".

The cleverer amongst you have probably already figured this out but it isn't obvious and it's been driving me balmy for the last month. After annoyingly clicking the back button or re-loading the whole site every time I'd viewed a comment for the last few weeks, finally today I thought in exasperation "there must be an easier way. Why isn't there a link?" and I looked very hard and found it.

By the way, does anyone know whether "cleverer" is really a word?

Request for Comments on Site Feed

Could those of you (if any) who read my site in a news reader provide some feedback on the use of the shortened feed, please. Let me know if a full feed would be preferred. I am still undecided personally.

Thanks.

Ross River, Mozzie Bites and a Grand Consignment of Goodies - A General and Rambling Update

I don't have any pearls of wisdom this week (although I might think of a Something of the Month for tomorrow... I'm thinking maybe CDs but there are so many good ones to choose from) so I'll just give you a quick update on the happenings in my life of late. Welcome to the first actual rambling random thoughts post. It's long so I've broken it into manageable chunks.

No visitors for Buckle :-(
Well, no one has excitedly emailed to say that they're coming to visit but it was worth a try. Meanwhile, I'm keeping a close eye on prices of flights with a view to possibly coming home next Christmas. Please note that I said possibly and not definitely and I don't know what the plans are yet but I'm sure many a blog over the next 12 months will discuss various possibilities in detail.

Ross River Virus
I haven't been feeling too well and am a little frustrated that some niggling virus appears to be coming and going for an extended period of time, making me tired, giving me a sore throat and sinusitus - yuk! The doctor said there was no point in giving me a blood test as none of those Yukky Viruses, such as Glandular Fever or Ross River Virus, can actually be cured and you just have to let your body get over it in its own time (great!). A guy at work (Matt) reckons that I've got Ross River Fever and he's had it before so he ought to know. He tested me by seeing how long I could hold a heavy boring IT book above my head. When he muttered "That was as long as I could manage" and I was still triumphantly holding the book aloft (although my arm was aching a bit) I thought "Yippee! I'm cured. Or perhaps never had the disease in the first place" but then Peter came in and said "I had Ross River Fever and didn't even know it!". I did some research and discovered that the symptoms are about as varied in severity as the individuals suffering them so who knows? And given the amount of mosquito bites I get ... (it's a blood borne illness spread by mosquitos the horrible, useless things they are).

Mosquito Bite Experiment Update
Speaking of mosquito bites, some of you may be aware that I suffer incredible allergic reactions at the probiscus of the mosquito and that I get bitten frequently, rose-skinned and fresh-smelling pom that I am. Well, I have another bite and it's horribly itchy but so far has refrained from transforming my foot-shaped foot into a balloon-shaped foot. Recently I have been taking Vitamin B1 (which is supposed to help) plus a multi-vitamin (to enable the body to absorb the B1) so maybe that's it. Or perhaps its the Miracle Aloe-Based Gel I got from Toby's aunt who markets Mannatech products which apparently restore our missing sugars (or something). But I actually suspect it could be the Miracle Toothpaste I purchased from the markets last week which is made in Malaysia from natural ingrediants and cures all manner of known illnesses. I'm thinking of presenting it to the APEC meeting in Brisbane to see if they've considered it as a cure for Bird Flu. And I'm quietly confident that if I eat it, it will cure my Ross River Virus.


A Grand Consignment of Goodies
When I was in the UK a few months back I spent many hours in my parents' loft sorting through the few humble belongings I have, wondering whether there might be one or two items I may wish to bring back to Australia with me, or perhaps enough to ship a box over. Well, much to our surprise Toby and I managed to find 180kg worth of items, mainly books (plus my Jamie Oliver pestle and mortar which probably weighs about 20kg alone but which no kitchen should be without and I just can't wait to start pounding the herbs from our glorious veggie garden) which we thought might be fun to have with us here. They've finally arrived and I am just waiting for them to clear customs. It's very exciting. Now we have to solve the logistical mystery of how to actually get them from Brisbane to the Sunshine Coast as the six boxes they're packed into are too big for our little Subaru. Perhaps Toby's Dad and his trusty Millenium (oops I mean Ford) Falcon and the Shiney Green Trailer can help us out. And then I have to find places to put everything. Ohmigod!

The New Blog on the Block
A while back some colleagues of mine decided it would be a fun ruse if they all resigned and went to work for RMIT in Melbourne, fools that they are. Of course, the pull of the cosmopolitan culture-vulture Melb had more to do with the rather attractive contracting fees they were being offered than the actual cool-dudeness of the city itself and I can tell they're hankering to get back to the Coast to surround themselves with the likes of people like my humble self once more. In fact, they think I'm so cool and they were so impressed with my blog that they've started one of their own. They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery so naturally I'm touched. And it's rather good too. And they've linked to my blog (wow! my first link - I'm going up in the blogging world). And they've crowned me the blog Queen, which may be slightly more than I'm due but I shan't protest. Seriously though, I do miss them and the random conversations we used to have, putting the world to rights and discussing the serious issues (such as whether onions, cheese and sauerkraut are too much topping for a hotdog, and is "zshoozsh" really a word, and if so how is it spelt, and why are government forms so hard to fill in anyway?).

Warning! The next paragraph has a swear-word in it. Please ensure the eyes of any small children or easily-offended adults (particularly parents and grandparents) are averted. Teenagers and lager-louts, please read on.

So if you know them check out their blog at Praj and Brent's Half Arsed Blog (excuse the language. Sadie, please forgive me but I am merely reporting the name of the blog and do not wish to offend anyone, especially someone's parents or defile the innocent eyes of small children) and if you don't know them then why not check out the blog anyway and get to know them. They're good blokes.

Weeds Are Good
I've just remembered that I do have one pearl of wisdom and that is that I have just found out that apparently weeds are good for you! Check out Middle Path. But be warned, the site doesn't work too well in Firefox (won't let you scroll down the page - very annoying) so you might need that View In IE extension Praj mentions in his blog, if you use Firefox that is.

Wrap-up
Well, I think that's about it for now. We're off to Moreton Island this weekend so hopefully I'll have lots of lovely stories of lazing in the sun and snorkelling (have to relax and get rid of this Ross River Virus, you see) and maybe even some pics. Which reminds me, if I can figure out how to do it I'm going to add a photo of Toby's niece on the beach near our house at the weekend.


Zoe on Buddina Beach