Visitors are coming

I'll be entertaining some visitors in November... My Aunt & Uncle are arriving on November 10 and my Mom and Frank land on the 16th. It will be great to see some familiar faces after last being on North American soil in June. The 3 months I've been over here have blown by... for obvious reasons...

For the week that the fam overlaps here in Oz we've rented a unit on beach in Coolum which is about an hour north of Brizzie where we'll be relaxing in the sun, golfing, bush whacking, touring, and whatever else we can get into. If any Australians (or others) know of some "must see" sights on the Sunshine Coast please leave a comment so that I show the fam a good time while they're here.

On another note, it looks like my first real vacation / home leave won't be until the Christmas break. If money, time, and logistics weren't an issue this is what I'd do: fly to Vietnam to visit a friend who is moving there in November to work for 2 years, trek around Nam and maybe the surrounding area for a week or so, then fly home for Christmas, then fly to Hawaii to spend some time with the Jackson's (I wonder if they remember inviting me, haha), then back to Briz for work sometime in January... Not sure how I'd fit this all in, so we'll have to see what happens. Time will tell..

I talked to Frumby on the phone this morning too... he's tossing around the idea of coming in December to visit, and possible tag along to SE Asia as well. If anyone else wants to come along we should start thinking about it too... Given the state of the project I'm not sure if I'll be back here in 2007 or not. Hope so, but it's out of my hands.

Anyways, this weekend I'm laying relatively low in order to let my foot heal. I injured it on a "surf-ski" sort of like this one last weekend. So I have to keep it out of the water which means no surfing or waterslides, 2 things that I had on my list of "to-do's" this weekend. Oh well...

Instead I'll be taking in the AFL Grand Final between the Sydney Swans and the West Coast Eagles, and on Sunday the NRL finals in which the Brisbane Broncos will kick ass.

Keep on keepin' on.

I could live in E-Bay

Well, I still don't have my laptop back. It has cost me $600AUD for a new motherboard, which is on backorder and I won't be getting it back for another 3-4 weeks. So here's a quick update from work (after hours of course!).

It's been a couple of weeks... what have I been up to? September 2nd was "Riverfire". Basically it's a 30 minute long fireworks display on the Brisbane river in the CBD. They launch fireworks from the Story Bridge and about 8 seperate barges on the river, coupled with 2 passes from a pair of F-111 fighter planes. I spent it at a friends place who lives 19 floors up right on the river, so the fireworks exploding right in our faces.

The following weekend I went to Sydney to see Ben Folds play with the Sydney Orchestra at the Sydney Operahouse (yes, the big white shell looking thing you see when you think of Sydney). Could I say Sydney any more in once sentence? Sydney. The show was one of the best I've seen. The seats were perfect, with a great view of his hands while he played piano.

While in Sydney I stayed in E-bay (Elizabeth Bay) in a flat that overlooked the opera house, bridge, and the city. The only crap part was the weather, which is rainy pretty much the whole time. But it made good weather for shopping on Oxford street, tapas with friends, cocktails at Jimmy Licks, wine on Victoria street, ferry ride to Manly beach, and sushi in the Cross (King's Cross). Overall another notable weekend. I hope to get back to Sydney to see some more of the city soon.

This weekend I've lined up another surf lesson to hone my skills, golfing at the Brisbane Golf Club, tennis, bbq, and my ice-hockey final. I might have time for laundry Sunday night, but I doubt it.

Go Flames.