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Year View| Summary| Highlights| October 2006 (Month View)

01.10.2006Sunday 1 October – Lion’s Den Pizza

Day
Once again, Bronwen and I were woken when the sun hit us, but after getting to bed at a slightly more humane hour last night, it didn’t seem so bad. We spent another enjoyable day wandering around the festival.
Night
Dad, Mum, Bronwen and I had pizza for dinner at the Lion’s Den Hotel, before heading back to Cooktown.

02.10.2006Monday 2 October – Cairns & Silas

Morning
We had a quiet morning at Mum’s in town.
3:05pm
Mum drove Bronwen and I to the aerodrome, where we caught another eight-seater Cessna Titan 404 to Cairns—a forty-five minute, $220 flight into a headwind. Shan picked us up from the airport in Cairns, and we drove to the mud and mangrove strewn esplanade, giving Bronwen a quick tour of the curvaceous highlights of Cairns.
Night
Silas picked up Bronwen and I, and drove us to an Indian restaurant where we had dinner and a chat, followed by a walk along the esplanade.

03.10.2006Tuesday 3 October – Brisbane & Work

4:30am
I got up, woke Bronwen, called a taxi, and caught it to the airport.
6:10am
Bronwen and I departed Cairns in a Jetstar Airbus A330, arriving in Brisbane two hours later.
8:30am
After picking up my luggage, I caught a train home.
Midday
A quick unpack, shower, and some ice cream, custard and cream later, and I found myself back at work—as tired as I’d been when I last left.
8:30pm
I left work, caught the train home, put some washing on, watered the garden, played around with the binoculars I’d brought back down with me, and listened to some “E Nomine”, which I quite like.

04.10.2006Wednesday 4 October – The Devil Wears Prada

Midday
After a nice sleep-in, I found myself again at work, which is where this sentence trails off…
9:30pm
I walked from work to South Bank, meeting Bronwen there and seeing “The Devil Wears Prada”, which, while entertaining, was ruined by its typically trite “Hollywood” ending.

05.10.2006Thursday 5 October – Work

Six people were made redundant at work today, due to the new integration with Melbourne IT. I also had my first proper unpleasant call—a BigPond customer who did not have an account with us, and had been transferred here by the department I was trying to transfer him back to, and who was not happy at all.
Another day at work, with very little else to report. These midday to eight o’clock shifts aren’t fitting in with my exercise schedule—I’m too lazy to exercise in the morning and I don’t have time when I get home.

06.10.2006Friday 6 October – Working (As Usual)

Morning
I did some work on one of my websites, adding more bikes and fixing up a few things since the site was split into two different brands.
So far, at work today, I’ve come in to find that there were almost no jobs in the job system at all—which is a first (at least since I’ve been here) and that Tony, one of the level 1’s, is leaving. I then got in trouble for promptly providing a customer-facing response in response to a hidden response from level 3, which took them two days to get around to. Apparently, I should have attempted to do more than just tell them what our senior technicians told us.

07.10.2006Saturday 7 October – Surfer’s Paradise & White Chocolate Cheesecake

God looked down from above, and he saw Ned and Bronwen, missing their train. After getting his morning cup of tea, he noticed them transferring to the next Beenleigh train—and he smiled. A short while later, looking up from his paper, he saw Ned and Bronwen getting off their train, and onto a waiting bus. Glancing down, halfway through his cereal, he noticed that Ned and Bronwen had finally made their way to Kingston, and were walking towards Joe’s place.
  Having just cleaned his teeth, God noticed Ned and Bronwen had left Joe’s place—having had a good chat—had caught the train to Nerang, and were waiting in line, wondering if they’d fit on the waiting Gold Coast bus or not. Just then, the phone rang—it was God’s chauffeur, waiting to take him to work. Meanwhile, Ned and Bronwen had managed to get on the bus, and navigate the stop-light-ridden streets to Surfer’s Paradise.
  On his first cigarette break of the day, God noticed Ned and Bronwen had finished their Hungry Jack’s breakfast-lunch, had a pleasant wander along the beach, a nice swim (although the waves were breaking far too soon), finished their afternoon argument, and were waiting for the bus back to the train station. Then his pager went off—again.
Evening
After having a cold shower (our hot water broke, was looked at on Friday, looked at again today, and can’t be replaced until Monday) Bronwen and I took Bronwen’s parents to Freestyle, where I engorged myself with a white-chocolate cheesecake.

08.10.2006Sunday 8 October – Working

Afternoon
I went grocery shopping.
3pm
I went to work, over at East Brisbane.

09.10.2006Monday 9 October – Nail Fungus

Today I received this email: “Hello the-i.org, I’m emailing you today to request a link exchange between our website and yours. I found your website http://www.the-i.org by searching Google for ‘Nail Fungus’”. Nail fungus?
Midnight
I rode home from work, and then onto Clint’s, where I spent a few hours along with Allan. We dropped past McDonald’s at some point—they turn their ice-cream machine off at night. I didn’t get to bed until around four o’clock.

10.10.2006Tuesday 10 October – Rain, Lateness & Madness

Day
Ned ride to work. He work. He ride home. He have to go via Roma Street Parklands, because men in orange refuse roads to him.
3am
I’d ridden through a light misty rain to Clint’s, and we’d gone for a walk around the suburbs, hurrying back to his place as it began to drizzle more seriously. It was here that it happened—I think it was the second mint slice that did it—I switched from “normal” to “I’ve been up all night/my assignment must be nearly due/why is the fan spinning?” It also began to rain. I picked up my bike, rode across the road, and hit the concrete thing on the other side. Having recovered from this unexpected lump in my life’s journey, I rode into a bus-stop-sign. Still alive, I flew towards the bend around Dave’s Ampol (which isn’t an Ampol, for some reason). It was here that reality—and the icy cold rain—struck me, and I realised that missing the bend would result in holes, and it was far better not to have holes. The rest of the ride home was a mixture between a slush-puppy machine and my freezer, and I ended up very cold and very wet. The water flicking off the road up my back was particularly unappreciated.
4:30am
Fighting the router to try to get it to stop freezing up when I pound it with EMule traffic. I’ve turned off application-protocol-sniffing and simplified the QoS rules a little, and disabled a pile of other rarely-used features, and will see how that goes. Now, bed.

11.10.2006Wednesday 11 October – Can’t Remember

I got a bit behind in my journaling, and can’t remember what happened today.

12.10.2006Thursday 12 October – N/A

I neglected to record my exciting activities today.

13.10.2006Friday 13 October – Missing

Once again, I neglected to record the exhilarating and bamboozling things I might have done today.

14.10.2006Saturday 14 October – Sunburnt at Stradbroke

Today I successfully managed to ensure I’d be in pain for the next few days. I got up absurdly early, and drove with Maz and Clint to Cleveland, missing the seven o’clock ferry to Stradbroke by a minute. A pie later, we caught the next ferry, and then a bus, to Point Lookout, walked along Flinders Beach until we found Maz’s parent’s camp, and spent the rest of the day digging a big hole, and rerouting a creek. It was the few hours in the sun digging a dam and canal that got me sunburnt, though it was quite an achievement to have successfully altered the course of a creek.

15.10.2006Sunday 15 October – Multicultural Festival

Attended Brisbane’s Multicultural Festival at the South Bank Parklands with Bronwen, in the boiling hot sun. It was like a small Woodford. I noticed all the SLR cameras people were carrying, and wished I had one myself.

16.10.2006Monday 16 October – Work, Early

Back to seven o’clock starts—oh, the pain.

17.10.2006Tuesday 17 October – The Departed

Morning
I am very, very sleepy. I stayed up far too late last night for a twenty to six start this morning, missed the train, caught a bus to Hungry Jack’s for breakfast, and walked to work from there.
Evening
I had to be at the South Bank cinemas by six o’clock, but as it doesn’t take long by bus, I decided to leave it until the last minute and watch some “Little Britain” episodes with Jalyn. This turned out to be a bad idea, as one of the overpasses on the riverside expressway had annoyingly developed “hairline cracks” (according to local media), although the story I got from a policeman at the scene was a bit different. The resulting rushed walk to South Bank was quite exciting—against the severe backdrop of a steely grey sky— with just a hint of rain—several helicopters were hovering overhead, the Suncorp clock was off, power had failed to park road, police and traffic controllers were everywhere, and there was an ambulance picking up a pregnant woman near the cinemas.
  I managed to make it to the cinemas just on six o’clock, a good while before any of the cars I walked past would have been able to get there, and watched “The Departed” with Bronwen. It was quite a powerful movie, and managed to avoid the stereotypical “everyone lives happily ever after” Hollywood ending.

18.10.2006Wednesday 18 October – Sleepy

Wednesday 18 October – Sleepy

19.10.2006Thursday 19 October – Not Sure

I can’t remember what I did today. Not in the exciting “it’s all black” kind of way, but in the “I wrote this in a few days time and couldn’t remember what I’d done” way.

20.10.2006Friday 20 October – Don

Night
Saw “Don” (a Bollywood action movie) with Bronwen at the Regent—fantastic movie, so much better than almost any Hollywood movie.

21.10.2006Saturday 21 October – Camera Hunting & Children of Men

Maz came over. Caught a bus into the city, went to Sony Central with Bronwen and Maz. Bronwen then left and Maz and I went to a few camera shops, looking at the Sony α100 and the Canon 400D. Unfortunately, no one had the Nikon D80.
Evening
Maz and I went and looked at a few more cameras at Indooroopilly with Kieran, and dropped around to Kieran’s place for a while.
Night
It’s raining. Bronwen and I saw “Children of Men” at South Bank, after a pleasant dinner.

22.10.2006Sunday 22 October – Crank

Afternoon
Walked to Bronwen’s parent’s place, where I abandoned Bronwen, then back to Maz’s place, and on to his aunt’s to pick up a lawnmower, then to a friend’s Mum’s place to have a look at her Nikon D80.
Night
Clint picked Maz and I up, and we saw “Crank” at Indooroopilly. I’m not sure what to say about Crank—they didn’t bother with the plot, because it already had all the ingredients for a fantastic movie.

23.10.2006Monday 23 October – The Light Bulb

Morning
Our particularly bright, and rather expensive, light bulb ceased to light. This caused great consternation, so—risking life and limb—I managed to climb onto a milk crate, wedged on top of two chairs, and remove the light bulb. As it is a rather expensive light bulb, I tried it in a lamp stand, and found that it worked. Being worth more than my life and limbs, I again risked them, to put the light bulb back, now working. So now we know how many of me it takes to change a light bulb.
Midday
Went to town, looked at cameras. Then went to work.

24.10.2006Tuesday 24 October – Working

Working.

25.10.2006Wednesday 25 October – New Camera

Morning
Called in sick at work, and phoned several places to find camera. It is very hard to get. Ended up going to Oxley and getting the black Canon 400D with 17—85mm IS USM lens that I wanted, for $2000 from Harvey Norman, including $59 for three additional years of extended warranty—which is around $500 below their listed price. Had to argue quite a bit to get them to match the price Maz had got from Harvey Norman’s at Indooroopilly. Apparently, he had to argue a lot to get them to match the price we’d be quoted from Rainer’s. And Rainer’s doesn’t have black in stock—and were quite rude when I was looking at cameras.
Afternoon
Having spent hours getting to Oxley and picking up my camera—the train I caught stopped one station short of Oxley, and the connecting bus was going to take so long to arrive that I walked, which turned out to be a very long, hot walk through what appears to be a wasteland, complete with abandoned waterslide. Once home, I charged up my camera battery, bought a 4 GB CF card from Umart, and took a few photos. Maz dropped around later, and we went and took a few photos of nothing in particular.
Night
Had pasta for dinner from Caffe E with Bronwen.

26.10.2006Thursday 26 October – Govinda’s

Afternoon
Had lunch at Govinda’s, and bought a camera bag and wired remote.
Night
Walked home from work taking photos. I’m very impressed with my new camera. Already it’s solved the majority of issues I was having with my old camera—the wide lens is brilliant, and the speed at which I can compose and take photos is fantastic. I’m also able to take photos in the dark without any screens or backlights showing up—which was something that annoyed me with my old camera.
Midnight
I walked home from work along the river through the city taking some photos.

27.10.2006Friday 27 October – More Photography

Midnight
I walked home through the city again, taking some photos. Bronwen was up when I got home, which was nice.

28.10.2006Saturday 28 October – Curry Night

Cam came around. Bronwen went to Simon’s memorial service. We all went to Cam and Tina’s Curry Night later, which was nice, and I had a look at a few lenses that one of the people there had.

29.10.2006Sunday 29 October – Photos & Chez Tessa

Went for a walk around the city with Maz, taking photos, and then up to Kieran’s for a while, and then to Chez Tessa for dinner with Clint and Bronwen, which we ate at Mount Coot-Tha.

30.10.2006Monday 30 October – Working Early

7am
Working early is nasty after a week of late shifts.
Evening
I finally did my tax.

31.10.2006Tuesday 31 October – Working

Morning
Work, as usual.

Year View| Summary| Highlights| October 2006 (Month View)

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