sw’as

Greetings everyone! Happy holidays to all my teacher friends (remember I’m not one of you anymore, so you’d better enjoy.) How are the rest of you? I know the weather has been quite mild, except for Toowoomba of course.

We have obviously had some excitement in our lives this past week, although it’s certainly resulted in a desperate bout of homesickness. It seems everyone but us has met my lovely new nephew Charlie. Simon and I were absolutely thrilled with his arrival. After seemingly taking so long to get around to being born, he was suddenly in a tremendous hurry. I received a quick call and a text at work, and then a couple of hours later, he was born! I don’t know how long skype will sustain us (Charlie bawled on first sight of me – brilliant), but we are certainly grateful for it and all the photos we have received so far. I’m afraid to say Haddons and Dowricks, but I think Charlie detoured us and looks like every member of Tony’s family that I know. And he is gorgeous and healthy and has made his mum and dad so happy and proud.

Nothing compares with that, but there have been some other highlights during the last fortnight that will make for lovely memories for us both. Our good friend Miriam celebrated her 29^th birthday with dinner and then a trip to an 80s roller disco. As I watched hundreds of fluoro-clad Londoners glide/shuffle past, I was reminded of Toowoomba Skatehaven Saturday session (2pm til 4pm – no pass outs.) Remember the Skittles and the giant pythons? The speed skate? The outfits in Battersea were just as outrageous, but admittedly there were a few differences. The $30 cover charge would be one. The surlies on the door who confiscated packets of chewing gum (“you’ll throw it on the floor and people will hurt themselves.” No I won’t.) and bottles of water (no reason.) Guns and knives fine, but absolutely no hubba bubba.

On Saturday we went to our long awaited performance of King Lear at the Globe. I had never seen my favourite Shakespeare play performed and was so excited to see how it could be done. Our seats were excellent. There are 700 seats for groundlings at only five quid, but the idea of standing for three hours didn’t appeal. We had front row balcony seats in the middle gallery with a perfect view of the stage. The performance was hilarious in parts, incredibly bloody in others and just so moving. I pretty much cried the whole final scene. Loved it.

On the Sunday we finally made a trip to the Victoria and Albert museum. The exhibition I went to see was disappointing and we got through that in about twenty minutes. But the rest of the museum is exquisite. I loved the historical fashion, the jewellery room and the cast court, where there are enormous, yet intricate, replicas of famous columns and buildings from all over the world. As usual Simon was mesmerised with the sculpture section and plans on creating a bronze statue in the future. How long would that take? Five, six days?

A few weeks ago, my friend Bec and I decided that a surprise was in order for our husbands. There is a famous cabaret club in Chancery Lane called the Volupte Lounge. The boys were told to don suits, Bec and I glammed it up a little and we tottered down a dark alley (it wasn’t really that dark.) The boys were suitably surprised and very impressed with their introduction to a burlesque house. It was such a fun night; we drank classic cocktails painstakingly made by the bartender, were shown to our seats by a Russian with feathers in her hair and enjoyed a delicious three course meal. There was also singing, dancing and lots of sequinned flesh. All brilliant and in such good fun.

If you’ve considered queuing in the sun for four hours, but didn’t know how it would turn out, you could ask us. Wimbledon makes crazies out of a lot of people and we are delighted to be part of that group. We dragged ourselves out of bed to meet Bec and Aaron on Saturday morning and began lining up at 8am. It was actually quite fun; it’s on a big oval, with people playing games and picnicking. A couple of people I know, Jason and Sarah M, camped the night before and were 135 and 700 in the queue respectively. Stewards come round to give you a queue card with a number (we were 6677 and 6678) and if you’re not there to get a queue card, no one can get it for you and you’re on your own (I seem to remember this creating a problem for aunty Pat and uncle Ken.) Painfully the ticket booths didn’t even look at our queue cards; they just took our general ground fee of twenty quid and we were in!

These tickets gave us access to either standing or unreserved seating at courts two to nineteen. It’s a beautiful venue, so green and bright and I’d seen it so many times it felt familiar. We parked ourselves on Henman Hill with Pimms and strawberries and cream (simply too complicated to make at home) and enjoyed the sweltering heat and the big screen. The atmosphere is relaxed and fun, with drunken Scotsmen in eighties wigs providing entertainment in the form of huge Mexican waves. In the afternoon, for charity, people from centre court and court one can hand in their tickets to be re-sold. We were very fortunate to pick up two great seats on court one and saw James Murray (Andy’s brother) play men’s doubles and Molik versus Stubbs in mixed doubles. A strange thing (bit too quaint for my liking) about Wimbledon is that the male players are referred to by their first and last names only, but all women players are referred to as Miss this and Miss that. Overall, Wimbledon was one of the best days of the year and worth every second of the four hour queue.

Cannot wait to see the Elverys in only eleven days now! We’ll meet them and Hannah in Norway on the 11th. Best wishes to you all. Hope you’re all well. Stay in touch!

Laura and Simon.

Which means I totally forgot to wish two important people a happy birthday!

Happy Birthday Aidan and Happy Birthday Nathan!

Here is a picture I took in celebration:

Since I’m talking about birthdays I might as well do a wrap up of my birthday. The actual day was a pretty low key affair (I went to work) but I did play soccer (always a highlight) and I had the Easter long weekend to look forward to. We absolutely killed the opposition at soccer. Coming of the previous week where we knocked off the two top teams^[1]in mens we had another mens double header (back to back) as well as a mixed game. We are now well clear of the top of the table in mens.

Laura and Jiselle took it upon themselves to organise me a birthday party at the very last minute and got the grand total of six people there (including themselves) after buying food for 20. The six also included my Mum. I think they had hoped for a bit better turnout, but thanks anyway for trying, girls.

On Saturday evening my immediate family climbed the Story Bridge as part of my birthday present, which was pretty damn cool.

Sunday and Monday saw various activities mostly involving the computer from what I recall.

1. That is, aside from ourselves obviously. [↩]

Today my Dad turns 50. It’s not easy to express what a dad means to a person and this is most certainly the case with my Dad and me^[1].

I’ll start by saying we go back a long way, nearly 23 years, so it’s fair to say I know a lot about him and can probably make a fairly accurate assessment of his character. But let’s face it, he knows much more about me than I know about him, so I’ve still got to be careful what I say.

I have an overwhelming amount of love and respect for my Dad, but, as regrettably is often the norm, I don’t say it nearly often enough^[2]. From the moment I was born I have found it fun to be alive, this, along with all my other key personality traits (not to mention my dashing good looks) can all be directly linked to the wonderful parentage and parenting Dad provided.

As I have grown older I’ve come to appreciate more and more the level of care that was taken in my upbringing. The love and care Dad has provided me with over the years is hinted at in the photo below^[3].

So thank you for everything, Dad. If I pull off fatherhood nearly as well as you have, I’ll be exceedingly happy.

Many times throughout my childhood, I seem to remember Dad’s birthday being forgotten^[4], apparently because it is so close to the Christmas/New Year excitement. Well, that certainly hasn’t happened this year, and there is a big bash scheduled to be held this weekend. People are coming from far and wide for what is hoped to be one of the best Sunday afternoons on record. There will be plenty of fun and food, some wonderful music, a pool for the summer heat, friends and family galore, and most importantly, a jumping castle.

As part of the party, Laura and I have been asked to run a trivia quiz on the 50 years of Dad’s life. In that spirit^[5] here are a few events and people that share an anniversary with Dad’s birthday:

• 1956 - Elvis Presley records “Heartbreak Hotel”
• 1969 - Marilyn Manson, American singer is born
• 1984 - Greg Chappell scores 182* in his last Test innings
• 1976 - Cambodia is renamed “Democratic Kampuchea”
• 1975 - 14 die when British freighter “Lake Illawarra” rams pylon bridge between Derwent
• 1896 - An Austrian newspaper reports that Wilhelm Roentgen discovered a type of radiation later known as X-rays.

Happy Birthday Dad!

1. Before I go further, it’s important to note that Mum is just as important, respected and loved as Dad. Most, if not all, of the nice things I say here apply directly to her as well. [↩]
2. Or at all, recently. Sorry about that, Dad - maybe that should be my new year’s resolution. [↩]
3. Does anyone else think it’s a little weird how he has hardly aged in 22 years? [↩]
4. Sorry about that too. [↩]
5. And to reward people for reading this site, these facts may or may not come up in the actual quiz. [↩]

This weekend actually felt long, which is good because it was supposed to be and they have a habit of feeling short if they’re supposed to be long.

I have achieved a good amount of uni work this weekend and our project is coming along - sort of. I promise I’ll post a link here when we have something worth looking at.

You may have noticed an abundance of happy birthday posts on here of late, and I have one more for you. It was Tarlee’s birthday TODAY. We went up to Toowoomba to celebrate the three of us (Aidan, Tarlee, and Me) turning 22! Yay!

It was a fantastic evening of fun and laughter, nicely lubricated by some lovely wine. We got Chinese take away and sat around chatting for hours. Some time late in the night (I’m pleased to say I have no idea what the actual time was) we decided a misadventure was in order. In the process of trying to convince Brad to join us on the misadventure I slapped him hard (sorry Brad!) on the arse with a hose. I wouldn’t recommend doing such a painful thing to such a large man - lucky he’s my friend.

The night didn’t get much more rowdy from there - we went on a slight misadventure but Laura turned back early because she was sick and most of it consisted of sitting on a vacant block and looking at the view. I did however climb some scaffolding to check out a new house being built and took a fantastically cheesy photo (may need enlargement and reading of statue text for full appreciation of cheesiness).

I also took some photos which I think are pretty cool (here and here).