I thought I'd better pop by and say a quick "hello" just in case anyone actually reads this blog and is wondering where I have got to and what I have been up to.
Well, not that much really.
But I'll give it a go anyway otherwise this would end up being a really short and boring post. (Some of you might say "better than a long and boring post, Buckle" but I shall pretend I didn't hear you).
Toby's friend from university, Scott and his wife, Lucie have been staying with us for the last three weeks whilst they set about moving to the Sunshine Coast. Yes, that's right! Finally, someone has taken notice of our ravings about how wonderful life is here and have made the move to join us. Like me, Scott and Lucie (hereinafter collectively referred to as The Bradleys because that's much quicker to type) came straight from six or so years in London. Scott probably had a better idea of what to expect having already lived in Cairns and Brisbane and possibly other places around Queensland, but Lucie, being Czech, has only really experienced Europe and, like me when I first arrived, is experiencing certain cultural differences. Particularly, she discovered early on (as did I) that mayonnaise is not actually mayonnaise here but is in fact salad cream masquerading as the more superior, creamy, delicate on the tongue mayo that we become used to in Europe. If you want real mayo make sure you go for S&W. So far it is the only thing I have tasted here that remotely resembles mayonnaise.
The Bradleys actually move out of our place today so it'll be strange to get home to an empty house. It's okay though as they're only going around the corner so no doubt we'll see them again tomorrow. It'll be just like on Neighbours. Which is actually quite a scary thought.
A few weeks ago (Jan 25th) we had Australia Day which is where you don't have to go to work so long as you spend the day being Australian. Obviously this consisted of going to the beach for a body surf, listening to the Triple J Hottest 100 on the radio, having friends around for a BBQ, eating too much meat and drinking lots of beer.
Since then Toby's office at Noosa have released the new strategic plan for the shire, the culmination of years of hard work and lots of playing with maps by Toby. We had a little celebration for that and in the same weekend friends of our's, Adam and Bec, had an engagement party (congratulations) and invited us all around to celebrate in the beautiful, large, airy and spacious, gorgeously decorated, (room for expansion) house (with double garage, lawn and huge wooden deck!) they have just finished building. (Not jealous. No really, I'm not.)
I've been keeping up with my windsurfing and have discovered the joys of southerlies in Pumicestone Passage. Rather than bore the non-sailors amongst you with descriptions of my attempts to tack and talk of the maximum wind speed I have managed not to fall off the board in, I thought I'd just show you a photograph of the passage. But I couldn't really find a nice one, so instead I have uploaded a picture I took last year of a view of the Glasshouse Mountains from Happy Valley in Caloundra. See the water? Well, see the next stretch of water beyond that and beyond the sand bank with trees on it (which is actually the tip of Bribie Island)? Yeh, well that's Pumicestone Passage (and if you can actually see it you have the best eye sight in the world). Sorry, it was the best I can do but I think you'll all agree it's a jolly nice picture anyway. To see a bigger version click on the link and go to Flickr.
My shoulder is playing up again. Toby and I have discovered a thing called Trigger Points, thanks to advice and a good book recommendation from my friend and massage therapist, Nirvana. (Such a suitable name for a massage therapist, don't you think?) Toby has now purchased a theracane. It's a weird looking contraption, the general idea being that you use it to apply pressure to trigger points. Trigger points are small knots of muscle, "exquisitely painful"(??) on application of pressure, which refer pain to other parts of the body. I haven't quite got the hang of the theracane yet but Toby is having hours of fun and can be found theracaning various points in his back and neck most evenings. I think he might be addicted to it. Personally, my back and shoulder muscles are so bloody tight it's like one huge trigger point. No chance of finding a small grain-of-rice-sized knot in amongst that mess, I can tell you.
No, I prefer to pay Nirvana to do it. Much more relaxing. Last night she performed "cupping" on me. It sounds rude but really it isn't, although the resulting effect is somewhat like vacuum cleaner shaped lovebites all over one's back. And when I say vacuum cleaner shaped, I mean imagine the perfectly rounded shape of the sucking end, not the shape of the actual vacuum cleaner. Check out this link for a bizarre pictorial example of cupping in action. It certainly wasn't an unpleasant experience and despite standing in the cool air (all oiled up and feeling cold) for 45 minutes afterwards, waiting for a bus that never turned up and tensing my newly manipulated muscles every time the wind blew, I do feel remarkably better and more energised today than I have all week.
Meanwhile, I'm trying to revive my 'puter so I can do all my blogging from home and perhaps even provide you with some other treats, such as edited movies. Wow! Won't that be fun? Unfortunately that's a little way off as there is a fair amount of work to do to sort out the study and determine the most economical way to get 'putered up.
Anyway that's the latest, although not necessarily the greatest, from me. Apologies if this is a bit dull. I can attribute this to lack of sleep caused by horrible aching sensation in the shoulder. Am just about to fall asleep at my desk now. Bye zzzzzzzzzzz.....
The Possibility of Slowing Down
1 week ago
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