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The Family Bandwagon

Our family is spread out across the country and across the world, and what better way to keep in touch than a collaborative digital journal?

Wednesday 29 June 2005

Work is boring!

DSCF3615
One day down, one day to go.
Okay, I'm going to edit this post because I wrote it at 4 o'clock yesterday when, I'll be honest, my brain wasn't exactly in top gear. Or even any gear; have you ever had one of those days where it seems like the clock is ticking backwards, and Management have decided that today is the day to get you to work on every boring project that has never been completed, mostly because they are only ever given to people on their second-to-last day? I'm talking about, "documenting the user administration of the Intranet," or "counting how many of the coffee granules are not a uniform shape, then arranging them by order of increasing weight, sub-order size. Then entering that information into a database. In binary. With a magnet on the disk platters."

You get my drift.

Luckily for me, today is the last day, so all that stuff is now picked up by however is next to leave, which based on prior experience and the current state of the business could be the boss, except he will go out the window rather than down the stairs.

I can't wait to be on holidays!!

Sword woes

Hi all,

Cheryl and I are well. Cheryl's work is still loving her, and she's still enjoying it.. although rather than talk about that, I'll just have to invite her to join this so she can post herself. My work has been crazy busy.. so busy, in fact, that we're getting another person on staff. That takes the total from about 4 when I started to around 10.. so it's growing. Hopefully not too fast.

I ordered a sword on Saturday from a martial arts place out in Pooraka. On Sunday I was talking to my sensei (that's plural and singular, incidentally.. there was two of them in this case) and discovered the blade I had ordered for $550 was.. well.. not the highest quality. The wrappings on the tsuka (the blunt end) tend to unwrap or even disintergrate after a small amount of use, and it's $200 to get a sword rewrapped. Also, the tsuka (the guard seperating the blunt end from the sharp end) tends to come loose and rattle. So I rang the place on Monday, and cancelled my order.. lucky, really, because I wouldn't be able to afford a new sword once that one fell apart.

Now I'm going to order one through the dojo, from Seki City in Japan, an area famous for it's blades. So it should be a bit better. For everyone future reference, avoid the Paul Chen manufactured blades!

Anyway, I'd better get back to work. We're redoing the Immigration SA site.. it's a huge job, and right now I have the fun job of dropping in all the content. And I can't even complain about how badly the site is built, because I did that too :)

Tuesday 28 June 2005

Cauliflower soup

*crawls out from under the bandwagon*

i'm SO tired tonight.. this fortnight is very busy at work. We've been running workshops for the Smovers every morning (Voice and stage 9 - 10am, then either Think Tank or Journal Club from 10 till about lunch time).. That kind of "hands on" stuff really eats your day up!

It's kind of funny.. After the long weekend, I was down 4 or 5 hours. Mostly because I didn't drive back until Tuesday - ensuring I missed all of the crazy traffic AND I got to have another evening with Timmy - yay! Now, I'm up about 9 hours - and as much as I keep saying I'm going to leave early (so I can go to the shops.. maybe buy a new bicycle light cos mine has died - they don't like to be dropped), I find myself still in the office at 5pm each night... at least!

The rest of the week is just as busy.. Tomorrow I've got meetings until 4pm, then Thursday and Friday we're going off-site for some team training (*fingers crossed it helps*).. I'll fly to Melbourne friday night, G&D's party on Saturday night, Timmy's birthday on Sunday and I fly back to Canberra on Sunday night. *phew* and it doesn't finish there!

Next week is the Invention Convention (we bring 30 kids to Canberra and teach them all about enterprise and entrepreneurship).. Emma is our IC manager who has it all under control.. but I've got a few jobs during the week, as do the rest of the Smovers. On top of that, I want to see at least a bare-bones-run-through of everyone's shows next week - because I'm having the next week off! Yes, I get to spend a whole week in Melbourne with Timmy!! Yay! We're even going to stay at the Novotel, St Kilda for our anniversary night (because we wanted to do something special). And then the Smovers (most of them) are off on the road on the 17th July. I'll be off to Townsville to visit them in their second week (most probably). So it's busy busy busy for me. *grin* At least I'm liking the job.

The house on the other hand... nah, it's okay.. see my other blog to get an idea about the (little but annoying) frustrations I'm having..

That's enough from me (for now...)

*lays down in the back of the bandwagon and falls asleep.*
*wakes up again because she remembers that she has cauliflower soup to eat*
*eats cauliflower soup*
yummo!

Monday 27 June 2005

not too far behind

* lisa jumps on the family bandwagon*
ok, i'm actually not weeks behind you guys so it seems i managed to catch the bandwagon this time. this is kinda cool, once i work out how to use it...it'll be good to be able to keep up with what's happening.

my update - i have gestational diabetes, which means i'm "high risk" now. nothing to be concerned with as long as my blood glucose tests stay on track - i had to do them 4 times a day, but the dr today said skip the first one, so 3 times a day now. it also means i have to go in for some type of scan twice a week, and i get to have another ultrasound on wednesday! i have so many appointments now! thankfully it's only 6 weeks to go - or less, the dr will review induction around 38-40 weeks.

anyway - the kids've been sick, and it's the start of the holidays, so hopefully all will be well for the next 2 weeks! that's about it...lisa

This is a great idea!

I love it! This is something else I can do instead of work, especially considering that it is my last week (and a short week at that -- I finish on Thursday)! Work is boring at the moment, but perhaps that's because of my attention span, rather than the work itself? I slept in this morning, caught a taxi and still only made it in just before 10 o'clock!

Of course, writing here will mean I'm officially contributing to three separate blogs ... but at least I'm writing! Did I tell everyone (anyone?) that I'm going to try to be a (commercial) writer? I've been checking out the requirements for writing for some online tech magazines, so once I've written a few articles I can send them in and see if I get picked up. If that works, maybe some print magazines, all whilst I write my big novel. I'll keep working as a computer programmer, of course -- I like my tea and crumpets (and a roof, and warmth, and all those other creature comforts that require a regular income). So it's kind of a far-far-far-future thing.

This weekend we packed up some boxes, moved stuff around (where "around" means "Tim's place" -- thanks Timmeh!). Dee's sister Kendall and her clan are coming on Tuesday, which means there will be five people in our little spare room. Again, big thanks to Tim for some mattresses to put on the floor!! This week is going to be exciting, and crowded.

I'll give it a go

Hi all,

Count me in. I'm happy to use this for family communications instead of email, but only if people actually read this. Email is working fine currently, and everyone gets the message then.. so if it turns out that email remains the more suitable option, then we should stick with that.

Can you tell I've been working in technology for a long time.. I'm no longer convinced that "new" automatically means "better" :)

But yeah, I'll give it a go.

*climbs onto the back of the bandwagon*

Blogging for everyone!!


I know I've been kinda slack at writing or phoning everyone.. so I thought maybe we could see if an online writing place would work.

I know Glenn and Damien have blogs.. so maybe we could all just post to this.. and Mum and Dad and Lisa and whoever else wants to see what the family is up to could just log on and take a squizz..

Thoughts?

*shrug* Decided to start it anyway. *grin* We'll see if it lives for more than a couple of weeks.