I'm Dreaming of a Wet Christmas...

...and we got one!

After weeks of raging bushfires, extreme temperatures and tight water restrictions, we were blessed with a most wonderful Christmas present of heavy, heavy rain. The big downpour started Christmas Eve, continued well through the night (I was still up at 2:30, so can vouch for that), and has been sustained throughout much of this morning. In fact, we have even had several showerings of hail, too, allowing us to experience just a hint of a white Christmas.

I haven't checked, but I imagine that snow might even be falling in parts of the state which were burning only last week. I hope this means that all those wonderful fire-fighters can go home to their families - exhausted but relieved - and relish a well-earned break. My brother-in-law was one of those unsung Fireys, and I haven't thanked him yet: on behalf of Victoria, "Thanks Jamie!" - I know everyone is extremely grateful for people like you, even if they don't get around to saying it (and thanks R, S, E, G & B for parting with him at such a critical time).

Our December has been so hectic - on many fronts simultaneously - that I think Mel & I were in danger of 'missing' the simple joy of Christmas. And by that I don't mean we were rushing around the shops, caught up in the commercialism, but instead we were caught up with work and Family Albums and work and general busy-ness. So it was terrific to get to Church last night for an evening carols service, and immediately start to feel like we hadn't completely missed the spirit of Christmas. The service was terrific - the carols sounded beautiful, it was finally raining heavily outside, the childrens' participation was hilarious and Jeff gave a great message aswell. Connor, Darcy, Sam & Eliza - my nephews and neice - were all involved as everything from wisemen to angels, and made it a very, very memorable experience - I SO wish we had taken the video camera, but will just have to savour it in our diminishing memories instead. We then went back to J & K's to enjoy their company, and watch Carols by Candlelight over a glass of wine. Given the choice between watching Hi-5 and Dannii Minogue performing carols, or watching Connor performing his stand-up routine as a wiseman in the local church's nativity story, the latter wins hands down.

This morning has been a relaxed Christmas morning - the VERY BEST kind - and we have listened to some carols while watching Jessica open the first three Christmas presents of her life. She wasn't overly enthusiastic about the first one, but soon got into it. She was very, very tired though (after a couple of very late nights), so it was probably too much to handle first thing in the morning. It was probably no help that cameras were trained on her for a good portion of that time (although she must know by now that this is to be expected by her doting and well-meaning parents). Mel & I finally committed ourselves to not buying each other a gift or gifts, and for once had the resolve to stick to that plan. We figure there is nothing we need, and little we really, really want, so the money could be much better spent where it'll do some good.

This afternoon it's off to Mel's Dad's for a Christmas dinner, then tomorrow it's a Boxing Day Christmas Dinner at my Mum's. It's the first family Christmas she's been able to host in years (she just moved back from Sydney this year), and is very much looking forward to it. Knowing previous years, no effort or expense will be spared in catering so beautifully to everyone (both with regard to food, and in the broader sense also). Then it's back to work for a couple of days before a three week break in early January. At this stage, I'll be asking Mel not to wake me up until around about the 15th, as we are both well and truly ready for a long rest. The Family Albums are almost all completed: Mel's were finished this morning (they're due to be distributed tonight), and I have one more video to finish before mine can be given out tomorrow. Mel's, especially, looks terrific (a 2 Disc collectors edition), but my family will have to make do with a single disc (albeit one with 19 clips). As always, we've used every possible hour before our deadlines, and have resolved that we'll try to start earlier next year. Since they take about a month to do already, and demands on our time will only increase, we're telling ourselves that we'll actually start in September next year. I guess it's possible, but we'll wait and see. I somehow predict that there will always be some album-related work involved every Christmas Eve.

Well I should get back to it. Jessica's sleeping at the moment (poor girl has been down for 2 hours already), so it's the ideal time to finish video number 19 before it's too late. It's obviously already too late for those in the Northern Territory and Northern Ireland, so I'll post a photo of the disc so that you can pretend you have it in your hands today - the real thing will be posted on Wednesday.

Here's wishing you a terrific Christmas and a safe, fun and fulfilling New Year.

Love,

Matt

(I'm off to put the heater on - it's freeeezing!)

Idle Australian

The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

I know, I know, it's been a long while since I posted anything, and some may have started to equate idleness (of the blog) with laziness (of the blogger). They are two different things, I would argue: Idle being "not working or active; not spent or filled with activity; not in use or operation" as opposed to Lazy: "averse or disinclined to work". While the latter description has been applicable to me on many occasions, it's not the reason I haven't posted anything recently. If anything, it's been the opposite: there's been too much on the go. If I didn't have such a deep respect for the Queen's English, and such an aversion to punny plays-on-words, I might term this lost month "Go-vember". But that would be pretty lame, right?

Jessica is continuing to amaze us with her development: she is just so engaging of everyone around her, so inquisitive, so determined, so independent, so intelligent, so loving, so funny, so precious. (and I think that's what I'd say about her even if I wasn't her Dad!). She goes out of her way to catch people's eye when we are out shopping, and give those people a great big smile, which almost always gets a big smile in return (from people who just moments-ago had their serious shopping faces on). She's been busy with lots of outings recently including two birthday parties in as many days. Yesterday's party was for her cousin Jesse (he turned 1), and today's party was a combined 1st Birthday for all the kids in Mel's mothers group (the kids are all turning 1 over the next month or so aswell). The party today was held at Wilson Botanic Park and I'm embarrassed to say I'd never been there before - and it's in my town! It's a beautiful place for an outdoor party and BBQ, and there's even a lake filled with turtles and ducks (there were 8 turtles swimming around just in front of us). Anyway, this photo was taken yesterday, at Jesse's party, and it features a guest appearance by Jessica's cousin Grace (who intuitively wore a turtle neck yesterday in anticipation that I might mention turtles in tonight's post - how clever!):


Mel is doing very well, too, I think. At least that's what she says when I ask her. She could be lying. She seems quite tired (which is understandable, since she does way more than I do), and I know that she pushes herself to cram heaps of productive things into every available moment of the day (usually at the expense of any down-time). The deck has been scrubbed and restained, the Christmas presents have all been bought and wrapped, the garden has been trimmed and tidied, her work clients have all been micro-managed, and of course Jessica and I have been looked after beautifully (I like to think that I require a little less maintenance than Jessica - certainly less changing - but maybe I'm every bit as dependant). It's certainly time for a holiday somewhere for Mel's benefit especially - I put the form in about 6 weeks ago, but 'they' want to think about it a bit longer before they'll decide if I can have the time off. Approval of my leave - if it comes - will then mean we have to decide on where to go, and we're no good at that having had so little practice! Any ideas?

Work has been busy, with a LOT more travelling this month (and on that note they upgraded my old, second-hand vehicle with a lovely brand-new one...which was nice!). The extra travelling (sometimes 8 hours a day) is certainly made much easier in the new car, which is one of these. As well as much more travelling, there has been a renewed interest in the DVD proposal, which has necessitated a lot of after hours work in putting together costings and production options for senior review. The DVD was presented in part to about 150 of our trading partners to gauge their interest, and they seemed to appreciate the idea. A decision from our C.I.O. can't be far away and, if it was in the affirmative, production would start in mid-January (for approximately 5-6 weeks full time, or 20 weeks part time). I had learned to not think about the proposal any more, since it had been put on the 'back-burner' for so long, but now that there is some real chance of it being taken up I guess I'm getting a little excited about that (quietly, of course!).

As well as work, there's been a bit of activity involved in putting together some quick clips for Children's Celebration (which took place today). Jeff and the team did a great job as usual, but I have to say that his kids (my nephews) stole the show. Connor read perfectly, pausing for effect and adding emphasis on the the right words like someone five times his age. Darcy said a great prayer and only stumbled once (and added an "Aw, shucks", which was a great touch). Then both of them played air guitar up on stage. I say "played air guitar", but that doesn't do it justice: when all the other kids mimed the actions of playing a guitar, C & D started drawing inspiration from some of the best 80's big-hair rockbands, wrestling with their air guitars, dropping to their knees and arching their backs, doing windmills with their strumming hand, and doing it all with a strained face and eyes squeezed closed. I wish so much that I had taken the video camera (or any camera). It was so incredibly funny that I was almost crying. Jamie & Beth & Grace were also able to make it, so it was great to see them briefly too. The Celebration seemed to go really well, and people had a fun time.

Speaking again of Australian Idol, it was the Grand Final tonight. I think more people were interested in that than in the Victorian State Election held 24 hours earlier. As Mel says, if electoral voting wasn't compulsory, there would no doubt be far more votes cast on Australian Idol than at the polling booth. Actually, as I think about it, maybe we could adopt the Australian Idol model for all state and federal elections?: 25000 hopefuls, culled to a Final 12, each having to perform policy announcements in front of a live audience each week. We could SMS their names to keep them in the running, with the PM or Premier emerging at the end of an arduous few months of elimination. On second thoughts, I wonder if anyone would actually spend the money to vote for a politician? Perhaps you'd SMS to vote them off instead? Yeah, I can see the voting-off model working much better. The considerable amount of money earned via the mobile phone charges could then go into public works or tax cuts, so the populace gets the politician that they dislike the least AND the the money goes back into the community - everyone's happy. But I digress...

Yes, it was the final tonight, and we found ourselves watching it with a level of interest that I hadn't expected a few months earlier. We hadn't been followers of the show this year (we watch very little TV anyway, and hadn't had much interest after previous years' AI efforts), but we caught Jessica (not that Jessica - the contestant!) singing "Beautiful" quite late in the series. We also saw a stunning few performances from Damien ("Crying" by Roy Orbison, "Waiting On An Angel" by Ben Harper), and it was pretty clear that there were some terrifically talented people this year (well, at least 2 of them). It was nice to have a final where both finalists really deserved to win - unlike some previous years - and where you were pretty confident that both were destined to have strong success regardless of the night's outcome. We have family in the Northern Territory (Jessica's from Darwin), and family in the U.K. (Damien is from County Kerry), so we didn't even have a parochial favourite. Terrific to see a 30-year-old Irish-born father win, and I'm sure his album will be eagerly anticipated and well worth picking up. I'm also pretty sure that Jessica will be given a contract of her own in the next 24 hours or so, and do equally well. So, Dad, were you flying the Damien flag over there in Downpatrick? (I know he's from the Republic of Ireland, not Northern Ireland, but he does have the right accent!!) Or did you not even know that it was on?

Anyway, I should leave it there for now. I'm not sure if I'll head to bed just yet, or try to do some more on the Family Album (each year, Mel and I put together some clips of old and recent home movies and photoshows, and present those on DVD to our respective families at Christmas - her DVD's being a far superior version to mine). Neither of us have had much time to do a lot towards these as yet, so I can see that the next 4 weeks will be a mad scramble to get the Albums done (it's a very enjoyable scramble though). On second thoughts, since it is 1:27am , I think the scramble can wait another day. Maybe I am lazy after all??

Take care,

Matt

Up at 3am tomorrow, then a 7hr drive, so I'll just post this quickly...

Cape Capers

Firstly, great to see you back online, Bec. Hope you're back to 110% health very soon. Your Sydney Symphony/Rocks market/Italian dinner/Walk through the Botanic Gardens outing sounded very special indeed. I'm glad it wasn't a date, or else Mel might be very jealous ("when was the last time YOU took me to the symphony!").

Today we managed another drive down to Cape Patterson. For the past couple of days, Mel had been threatening to spend Monday working from home, but at about 9:30 morning she gave in and agreed to a trip to the beach with Jessica & Jersey & I instead. We were able to get everything ready and packed in just over an hour (a new record!) and we took off to spend a few hours by the sea. Being a Monday, we pretty much had the beach to ourselves; hard to believe given the lovely day and the stunning scenery. Jessica had a fantastic time: amazing to think it was only her second time at the beach (and the second time this month - how extravagant!). She crawled for miles and would stop every little while to excavate, yell something, then move on again. This time around she wasn't so intent on eating the sand...just throwing handfuls of it into the air with great enthusiasm. She also crawled down to the waterline and enjoyed the tide lapping around her - without any fear whatsoever.

We had the cameras with us - of course - and I'll try to upload a short, unedited clip just to show you Jessica's excavation exploits. I may post another one of Jessica in the water, in the next few days...



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Uleaderboard...

For those of you who have been asking for an update, the results of the Ulead video contest were announced today. In short...no, we didn't win. We did take second place though, so that's something (unless you subscribe to the "first loser" philosophy, in which case it's not). If you're interested in seeing who we lost out to (that should probably be "to whom we lost out"), the winning video is here.

Take care,

Matt

City to Surf

We had a ball yesterday. Monday's my day off, but Mel had to work in the City, so Jessica & I decided to take Mel to work and then hit the town ourselves. After dropping Mel off at 9am for an 8:30 appointment (doh!), J & I parked at the Queen Victoria Gardens and set off to see the sights.

We first walked along the south side of the Yarra, past all the private school boathouses, watching all the school kids set out on their rowing classes. We walked through Southbank, across the walkbridge then down to the Melba Star where we sat and had our milk (OK...that was mainly Jessica). A group of old ladies - who were waiting for the Half-Tix counter to open - couldn't resist coming over and checking out Jessica. They thought she was just adorable, and then kept remarking that it was "just lovely to see the young fathers these days - they're just beautiful", adding (to me) and feigning total indignation, "Do you know that in your parents generation the fathers didn't lift a finger? I keep telling my husband 'you did nothin' - I did everything'. It's true! It's true! He didn't! Lazy so-and-so. I reckon you young dads are just soooo wonderful." Then they tottered off to see a show, giggling away as they went. Funny old ladies - I don't think they'd been drinking, either. Jessica loved the attention (which is obviously SO lacking otherwise!).

We then went along to Birrarung Marr, back up and along Flinders St to Federation Square, then up Swanston Street, across Collins, down Elizabeth (where we bought some rice crackers for Jessica and some Brunch bars for me!), then back along Flinders. Over the bridge to the Arts Centre we charmed an old lady who was busking operatically (again, it was mostly Jessica doing the charming, and I was just there to push m'lady's chariot). Past the Arts Centre and the Gallery, across to the Walker fountain and the Floral Clock, then up to King's Domain for some avocado, pear, cheese and apple (at least that's what Jessica had - it was the remaining Brunch bars for me). Then we walked to the Shrine of Remembrance, where Jessica fell asleep (I'll have a stern word with her about respect!), before we headed into the Botanical Gardens and sat on the lawns by the lake to have a post-sleep snack. A group of Japanese tourists who were passing by were admiring Jessica as she ate, and even asked to have a picture of the two of us (though I suspect they framed me out - unless of course they were doing more whale research). We then went back to the car and headed off to collect Mel.

From there we went down to St Kilda beach, where we walked along the pier, had a coffee and sandwich at the pier cafe, then walked back along the beach to Acland St. Luna Park was closed so we couldn't show that to Jessica, but we did give her a taste of our gelati from 7 Apples. Oddly, she didn't seem to love it (there's plenty of time to acquire that taste, and boundless opportunities to do so!). Headed back to the car and got home at about 7pm I think: a big day out (at least by our standards). Perhaps Bec & Vanessa did rub off on us with their recent visit? In any case, Jessica saw so much colour and movement and it was great fun for all of us, so we'll try to do something similar at least twice a month. I hope we can stick to that plan.

Here are a few snaps from our big day.

Matt

Blogtoberfest

I don't have one specific topic to post about tonight but, as I'm quickly being left behind in the posting stakes by my brother-in-law and my Dad (the latter of whom has only started his blog this week - here), I'll make an effort to update mine. The content is likely to be incoherent and rambling, so it should fit in seamlessly with the preceding posts. Here are some random topics, in no particular order and without a unifying motif of any kind:

We have a Family Christmas party at work (I've never been but I'm told it's great fun for kids - in fact we plan to attend this year) and as part of that, the social club provides a present for each of the children in an employee's family. There's a form to fill out, nominating the name, gender and age of each of your children, to ensure that the right number of gifts are provided, and that they're age and gender-appropriate (are you allowed to say gender-appropriate? Too bad, I already have). Anyway, I'm only explaining this so that the conversations I've overheard in the office this week have some context. In a couple of conversations, I've heard people proudly boast (der, what other type of boasting is there Matthew?) that they lie about their children's ages each year - adding a couple of years to the age of each child because...wait for it...they'll be given a more expensive present. Charming, eh? I've also heard comments from people who have listed imaginary children - in one case three of them - on their form to collect more presents. You'd be surprised - or maybe you wouldn't - by the number of people who openly say they do this every year. But the conversation that really struck me was one I overheard yesterday between two of the ladies in the office - one of whom is the HR Manager. It went something like: Admin Lady: "Are you going to the Christmas party this year?" HR Manager: "Nah, can't be bothered. But I'm sending a girlfriend to pick up my presents for me. You gotta make sure someone gets 'em for ya, or else some charity will get 'em." Ah, priceless. The spirit of Christmas wrapped up in one beautiful sentence: "...or else some charity will get 'em." Yeah, fancy THAT happening? Those pesky poor kids stealing OUR kid's unwanted, unclaimed and unnecessary presents. And at Christmas, too? Oh, the horror.

My sister and her friend Vanessa came down from Sydney last week. It was terrific to see Bec and lovely to meet Vanessa. We had dinner together a couple of times - including Thai! - and they were able to be entertained by Miss J (I'll try to attach a photo here of Bec with Jessica, but my strike rate with posting photos is not high). Bec & Vanessa spent most of the week painting the town red - going on train rides through the hills, touring Yarra Valley wineries, strutting along the St Kilda foreshore (I added the strutting part - it may or may not have occurred), eating Vicar's Follies at Miss Marples in Sassafras (it's a huge sundae, in a cozy tearoom which pays homage to the Agatha Christie character), and many other things that crazy young kids get upto these days. Terrible that out-of-towners can do more in your home state in one week than you've done in several years, but hopefully some of their enthusiasm will have rubbed off on me. I could certainly put away a Vicar's Folly.


We were invited to a dinner at Docklands (a newly developed restaurant/entertainment precinct in Melbourne) for a product launch, and listened to Max Walker delivering sporting anecdotes to the small audience (we were given signed copies of his new book, too). Even Sally the BrandPower lady was there, just smiling and signing photos of herself, while the 3-Minute Angels gave everyone 3-minute shoulder massages as we were served nibbles and drinks by 4 girls dressed as 4 different product variants (of course they were!). So that was a bit surreal, and not at all like our usual Saturday night on the couch. Except for the 4 girls dressed as product variants serving us drinks; that part is exactly like our usual Saturday night.

Did I tell you what I was given as a combined Father's Day & Birthday present? Well, despite assurances that a gift would not be given this year, my girls presented me with... a 60GB iPod Video! It's such a brilliant present, and I have it with me every day. I can now carry aroung hundreds of photos of Jessica & Mel, along with hours and hours of video, and of course weeks and weeks worth of music. But the aspect of this that I wasn't expecting to get so much enjoyment and value from is that of Podcasting. I've known that Podcasting exists, and I know what Podcasts are, but I didn't realise how useful, entertaining, educational and fun they could be. For the uninitiated (there must still be someone who knows less about this than me), Apple (the maker of iPod) provide a free software program called iTunes. In it's simplest role, it lets you manage your music library: you load all of your CD's onto your computer and iTunes takes care of the organisation of your collection by title, artist, genre, playlist etc - also providing the interface for playing these files on your PC or syncing them onto your iPod device (it also does the same for any photos or videos you want to manage or sync). That was a verrry long sentence. In a slightly-more advanced role, iTunes also lets you connect to the online iTunes Store, where you can buy songs or albums or videos or TV shows to put on your iPod (haven't done so yet). Here you can also subscribe to a multitude of audio and video podcasts from thousands of different people or organisations: a podcast is a free program delivered automatically to your PC on a regular (daily/weekly) basis. You find a podcast you're interested in, click on Subscribe, and every time a new update is uploaded by the author, it'll be downloaded to your PC (and by extension, onto your iPod). There's an enormous variety of podcasts available across every possible genre. I'm now subscribed to almost 20 different podcast 'channels': from the very funny (eg the "Ask A Ninja" advice-line, "The Chaser's War On Everything", and "The Ricky Gervais podcast"), through the very practical (eg. "43 Folders" - a personal productivity resource, "This Week In Media" - a discussion of digital creativity and new technology), through a series of short-film 'festivals' (eg. Australian Film Television & Radio School podcast). Most recently I've been receiving some really interesting/challenging lectures on society, philosophy and apologetics by Ravi Zacharias (a speaker who's strongly influenced by C.S. Lewis). I now very often listen to one of Ravi's talks on the way to work, or watch a short film when I'm waiting 15 minutes to pickup our Thai order, and Mel is now well accustomed to (though no less annoyed by) the inane-but-catchy "I am Ninja" jingle that I sing to her throughout the day. iTunes is free, and you don't need an iPod to use it, so if you have a reasonably fast internet connection and you're interested in watching something other than TV, or listening to something other than the radio, you may get a lot out of subsribing to a few of these podcasts. Not all of it's good - in fact some of it's lousy - but you get that with everything I guess (and at least you didn't have to pay anything for it). There, that's my public service announcement for the day.

On a mildly-related note, here's a funny video I came across on YouTube today: as a former Duty Manager myself, married to a George Lucas fan, I really enjoyed the concept. There're 4 episodes I think, but here's #2.

Jessica (I must stress again here that these paragraphs are NOT in order of priority!!) is now a completely competent and confident crawler, and has turned into quite a Jersey-seeking missile. She also loves opening the pantry and clearing out the bottom shelf (just like I remember Susanna doing 16 years ago!), and is also very confidently getting to a standing position and beginning to "cruise" along the furniture. She also has 7 teeth on show, with one more just about to break through. We keep asking ourselves where our little baby went, since we really seem to have ourselves a little girl already. We're even talking about what to do for Jessica's 1st Birthday (it sounds premature, I know, but if the next few months go as quickly as the last 9 did, we'll need all the time we can get!). Mel has posted some more photos of Jessica on her blog, here.

What else is news? I read recently that Mat Kearney will have two of his songs featured on two successive Gray's Anatomy episodes. I don't watch the show (from what I can tell from the occasional ads I see, it seems like a poor-man's Scrubs?) but I recognise that many, many, many people like it - so that's great news for him in terms of broadening his audience. One of the songs they'll be using - "All I Need" - is actually the very same song that I've asked permission to use for a 3 minute clip I'll be making later this year. The record company (Aware) were really, really nice and in addition to letting me use the song, they thanked me for having thought about Mat! Very nice indeed. I've been turned down flat by another record company in the past, so it was a lovely surprise to get such a positive response from Aware. It's a beautiful song, so I guess I'm willing to share it with Gray's Anatomy. Even though they totally stole my idea! (But I guess they're used to stealing great ideas on that show).

Speaking (the astute observer will recognise that I am actually writing) of videos, you may be wondering what happened with that ol' DVD Proposal? Well, the man in charge - the only one who could approve the project - resigned from the company a couple of weeks ago and left the building immediately. Yep, just like that! He had never managed to watch the DVD - despite my gentle prodding - so the proposal is once again in a state of limbo. The two lower-level managers who did see the DVD way back in May (both of whom liked it) have suggested that there's life in the dusty-old, moth-eaten proposal yet, but we'll just have to wait and see. I'm glad I have a day job, and I'm not counting on this project to put food on the table!

Well, I should probably call it a day. For not having had anything to say, I certainly used enough words to say it! I noticed today that the hit counter at the bottom of this page reads "555". Fancy 555 visits to read this long-winded drivel? To be honest, I'm probably responsible for 500 of those visits, but to the remaining group of visitors, thanks for dropping by! I'll even try to make it worth your while next time.

No promises, though.

Take care, (and remember: watch out for those sneaky Salvo's trying to steal your unwanted Christmas presents)

Matt

Maiden's Voyage

We managed to get out to the beach at Cape Patterson for a couple of hours on Sunday afternoon. It was Jessica's first time at the beach and she seemed to really love it. (In fact, we had to try very hard to keep her from shovelling fistfuls of sand into her mouth). It was a bit of a hurried visit - we didn't get there until after 3pm - but we were still able to get a few lovely photos before the sun went down. I've been trying to post 9 of those pictures to celebrate Jessica's 9 month mini-birthday...but it looks like I'm only being allowed to post 5 at a time. Enjoy!

The Adventures of Jessica...

I decided to put an entry together for an online Video Editing competition. The basic premise was that the video had to be original, funny, less than 2 minutes in length, and be made entirely with Ulead VideoStudio. It was fun to put this together - especially the stealing of the keys - and I'm glad I gave it a go. No, I'm not expecting to win any of the 12 prizes on offer, but it was great to have had to come up with something. Hopefully Jessica will like it when she gets to see it (it's 1:00am, and it was only finished a little over an hour ago). Here it is for your "entertainment". Please ignore the clumsiness in parts - I was on a tight deadline! Doesn't J look great though??

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It's my little sister's 29th birthday today: Happy Birthday, Bucket! (aka "Bec" for some strange reason). Hope you like your present (and no, it's neither a C64 nor a colourful wooly jumper - sorry). Here's a happy snap to help celebrate the occasion.

Matt

Celebr8!!!!!!!!

That's a pretty dodgy title, I know, n im sry 4 dgnr8n n2 txt 4m. But rehashing "Jessica's Sweet 1/6th" as "Jessica's Sweet 0.66666666666667th" didn't really work either.

Anyway, today is indeed another special one because...(drumroll please)...Jessica is 8 months old tonight!! She's currently celebrating (celebr-8-ing?) that milestone in a most subdued and solitary manner: she retired to bed about 30 minutes ago. Yes, it's a disappointing social performance on Jessica's part, especially considering her past form as quite the late-night socialite: at 6 months she could stay up partying until at least 11pm; at 4months she was often up until 1 A.M.; and from birth to 2 months she would routinely be up with us until 4 in the morning! A sad deterioration, but I guess that's the trouble with getting older.

At 8 months, Jessica is doing beautifully. She is really vocal now, and will sing/scream/yodel/cluck/giggle away very excitedly for ages. She has a little monkey-piano plaything (one of a growing number) that plays a jamaican-inspired version of 'heads and shoulders, knees and toes" (complete with steel drum) over and over and over. It lets you add extra riffs of guitar by sliding the little guitar lever, or add a jazzy piano if you smash the little piano keys, and Jessica just loooooves bashing away and singing very very loudly over the top of it all:

• Jamaican music centre with possessed circus-monkey perched atop it (did I mention a little monkey spins around and kicks in time with the music?): $26
• Nutritious but high-energy meal of apple, pear & avocado: $1
• Witnessing 8 month old, fructose-fuelled, popstar bashing away at the keys and guitar while screaming a very enthusiastic melody and shrieking at the rude monkey when he turns his back to her for a second: Priceless.

I could go on and on about how much she has changed in the last month or so, but I won't. Suffice to say she is just wonderful, and becoming a little more so each day.

In fact, as it is Fathers Day here tomorrow, Jessica (with some help from Mel I think) painted me a Fathers Day card. It's on our new fridge at the moment (the last fridge became an oven last week after at least 15 years of faithful, rusty service) but I will go and take a snapshot and try to post it (the snapshot - not the fridge) tonight.

Come to think of it, with all my jabbing about how well Jessica is doing generally, I neglected to say that she has actually been terribly sick this week. We all have, actually, but it's been heartbreaking to see Jessica crying and exhausted and unable to breath freely and therefore unable to drink properly and therefore unable to sleep and therefore exhausted and...etcetera. She is definitely getting much better, as am I (I had to have yesterday off work), but Mel has either fought it off well or is yet to get the full brunt of it. Hopefully, and quite probably, it's the former: she's a tough little cookie that wife o'mine! We inherited this bug from a family visit last Saturday, and I apologise profusely to anyone we may have unwittingly given it to this week. If it makes you feel better, you can smack me in the face when you next see me: I think that really does help sometimes.

Well, since we don't have Jessica up with us to have a 2/3 birthday party, and I need to mark the 8 month occasion in some way, heres some useless trivia involving the number 8 (it's only from wikipedia, though, so don't go quoting any of it in a school assignment).

• it's the number of legs on an arachnid
• It's the atomic number of oxygen
• it's the number of teams in the AFL finals series
• it's the most significant ball in snooker
• it's figure represents infinity, when shown horizontally
• it's the number of pawns, per side, in a game of chess
• it is (or at least, was) represented in slang terms as "one fat lady"
• October was originally the eighth month of the Roman calendar
• it represents "T", "U" and "V" on most phone handsets, but "B" and "N" on a BlackBerry handset
• it's the number of notes in an octave, the number of sides in an octagon, the number of faces on an octahedron, the number of days of Hannukah, and the number of children in an octuplet (and the first, recorded octuplets to have survived are apparently the Louis-Chukwu Octuplets, born in 199?....yes...8).
• there are 8 fluid ounces in a cup, 8 pints in a gallon, 8 tablespoons in a gill, 8 bits in a byte, 8 vegetables in V8, 8 apparitions in "Macbeth", 8 pinches in a teaspoon, and 8 furlongs in a mile

Did you remember all that? There will be a test.

it's now getting late, and much like Jessica, I'm becoming a bit of a piker. I'm afraid that'll have to do for tonight, and the posting of Jessica's Father's Day finger painting will have to wait until tomorrow (which is, after all, Father's Day). As much as it's a nice idea, Father's Day seems to me to be the most redundant 'day' of all: an unnecessary garnish atop an already extraordinary feast. Eleven and a half years ago I was given the most wonderful partner in Melissa, and just eight months ago we were heaped with the extraordinary blessing of Jessica. I have the privelege of sharing everyday with these beautiful people, and I know that I am blessed and loved. What need do I have for Father's Day?

Still, as quickly as I've written this, I realise that my situation is probably quite uncommon, and that many Fathers and their Children will have long ago drifted apart. It's pretty selfish of me to dismiss Father's Day so flippantly, just because I happen to have a wonderful family around me every day. I simply can't imagine what it would be like to be cut-off from Jessica or Mel, or God-forbid, both. To the fathers for whom estrangement is a source of anxiety, regret and longing, I pray you'll have a suprisingly wonderful Fathers Day this year.

Goodnight.

Matt

Whine, cooler.

Oh Hi.

I started writing a post last night - primarily about work - but it started getting very negative and gloomy and...well...just plain "whiney". Mel told me to give it a rest and go to bed instead. I did, and looking at what I wrote 24 hours ago, she was right. I'm a little more relaxed about things today, not quite so negative, and the post looks much too serious in the cooler light of day. Here's what I mean (it's the start of what I wrote last night):

I've said before that I have a reasonably good job - especially in comparison to a lot of the difficult jobs that others find themselves in - and generally that is true. But I have to admit I'm more than a little hesitant about heading back in there this week. Last week felt like a very negative, nasty week, and I can't see that changing this week either (unless my boss has taken his pills). It's possible that I'm just overly-sensitive, and blowing it all out of proportion, so I'll rattle off a few of the odd events of last week, and you can be the judge. Am I just overreacting?:

Exhibit A: On Tuesday morning, I was involved in a weekly phone link with my boss and the rest of the team in Sydney. As I'm the only team member working remotely (not from home, but 1000kms away from my boss), there has always been a level of autonomy and trust: I haven't needed to be 'managed', let alone 'micro-managed', and there has never been a question about my capability or commitment to work professionally without 'being watched'. Anyway, as part of the phone hookup, the issue of housekeeping came up, and my boss noted that he had observed some paperwork and empty coffee cups left on the Sydney team's desks overnight. He reminded the team that he wanted papers locked away and cups tossed in the bin before people went home of a night. Simple enough (more than a little "OCD", but simple enough I guess). THEN he said, "Matt, you're not immune from this - how does your desk look?". "Yep, I keep it very clean - pretty much just my phone, laptop and a picture of Jessica." "Well, I'd appreciate it if you would take a digital photo of your desk as it looks at the moment, and email that through to me." Sorry?? I'm almost 32. I've been married for 11 years, I have a daughter, and I've been working since I was 15. I discuss Big People Things with Big People, and most people consider me an adult. So it's somewhat disconcerting to be asked to take a photo of your workspace for a housekeeping inspection. Despite my internal protestations, I did take a photo, and I did send it through, and it did meet the standards. Maybe that's not an unreasonable request - and perhaps I was wrong to feel so slighted by it. I'll move on.

Exhibit B: The very next day, I was emailled a softcopy of the bill for my work mobile. A terse note was attached suggesting that I needed to address the "excessive" and "unreasonable" costs I had been incurring. When I replied that I did not think $17.24 (58 cents per day!) was necessarily excessive in a business environment which requires a great deal of off-site communication, I was publicly (via CC to the rest of the team) chastised for my impertinence. The whole rest of the team were then asked to scrutinise their bill also, and prepare a detailed action plan for cost reductions, as a penalty for my temerity. It seemed quite unusual, but again, maybe my expectations are unrealistic. I'll move on.

Exhibit C: My Sydney counterparts had received a particular training session earlier this year, which myself and one other Melbourne based employee would have benefitted from. My boss asked the trainer to include us when he was next in Melbourne. The trainer responded that he gets to Melbourne infrequently, and would organise a session directly with us when he was next in town. My boss then sent a note last week, asking me if I had received the training yet. I replied that I hadn't, and also CC-ed him on an email to the trainer, asking when he might next be in town. The trainer replied that he had not yet made it to Melbourne, but would still include us in the program. My boss then replied, to me, that it was MY fault that the training had not been conducted, and that 'had you followed this up personally, the failure would not have occurred.". Riiight. At this point, I had to start wondering if I'd done something to upset him: a pattern certainly seemed to be emerging.

There's an Exhibit D, E, F & G aswell, but I won't elaborate (difficult to do so without discussing where I work, which would be indelicate of me). Suffice to say, every day of last week there was another example of pettiness and belittlement. Not sure why it all happened last week, and there is absolutely no avenue for recourse should it continue. So it's dampening my enthusiasm for heading back in there tomorrow!

I probably sound pretty feeble with all of this petty whining (if this is the extent of your problems at work, Matt, try working in a mine, or a casualty ward, or a sweatshop, or as a peacekeeper, or a single-mum, or just about anything else. Yeah Matt, you've got it realllly tough!).

Based on that self-absorbed drivel, I don't think I should write about Work anymore! Unless it's a light-hearted discussion of the similarities between where I work and the BBC series of The Office (a brilliant series, which I have watched from beginning to end probably 10 times, and which should not be confused with the dreary, unfunny, American version which yesterday inexplicably won the Emmy award for best comedy - beating Scrubs and Arrested Development in the process). The extent of my future work comments might just have to be random quotes from David Brent and the rest of the team at Wernham Hogg.

Anyway, moving - swiftly - away from Work and onto nicer topics....What else has been happening? For one thing, some of the family have started up their own blogs in the last couple of weeks - you can follow links to the right of this message. There also seems to have been a lot of birthdays since I last posted (Happy Birthday Cordy, Anthony, Noah, Matty & Rachel - and Happy Birthday in advance Sammy & Eliza). On a related topic, I got onto Google Calendar and have started filling in everyones birthdays and anniversaries, which I'm then able to share online with family & friends if anyone else wants to link in. Pretty groovy idea, and it's great to receive an email notification of upcoming birthdays, and a 4:30am email each day, listing Matt Lowe's itinerary. It's a little bit sad that most of the time it says "You have no events scheduled for today"! Perhaps I need to link in with the Google Calendar of some interesting people, and live vicariously through their itineraries?

Look at that - it's 11:30 and I need to be up early for an appointment, so I'll have to leave it there. Once again, I wrote too much about nothing and ran out of time to write something interesting. I'll try to do better next time.

Good night for now.

Keep those desks clean.

Matt

Incey-dental

One of the people in the above photo now has 6 teeth - guess which one?? (perhaps get a grown-up to help).

If you picked "Jessica", you are correct. It's been a big week for her on the teeth front, with the top row of teeth anxious to join their cousins on the bottom row. You can't tell in this picture, so don't strain to look (it's at least a couple of weeks old anyway). You can look at Mel's teeth if you like - according to this photo she has 15! Lots of crying and restless nights this week - for Jessica especially - but it's amazing to see her developing so quickly. Still not crawling just yet, but she frantically scrambles while perched on her big belly. She can spin herself around very easily, and has the legs and arms all doing what they should be, but just hasn't managed to put all the pieces together quite yet. I think of it as her having the kickstand down on her little motorbike (with her big belly as the kickstand); the back wheel is spinning frantically, and as soon as that wheel makes contact with the ground, she'll be screaming around the house (and probably down the street if we don't catch her in time).

I will post something a little later - I have to go now to make sure my old suit still fits me! I haven't needed to wear a suit to work for a long while (it's not that sort of job, ordinarily), but tomorrow involves a meeting in the City for which I need to look semi-respectable. I think those semi-respectable days are long behind me, though, and I may need to resign myself to updating my wardrobe at Big & Mighty or Solway (trumpetted as "where the big men buy!"). Wish me luck.

Matt

(PS. the photo above may crop up in an unusual place in the very near future - will let you know if it happens as planned).

(PPS. I've added a link to Mat Kearney in the sidepanel: he's a great musician we 'discovered' in the last couple of weeks (think Chris Martin meets Jack Johnson, with a lot of extra stuff - including spoken word - thrown in). If it's your birthday in the next little while, expect to receive a copy of "Nothing Left To Lose" from me. That is, if I know you. If you've stumbled on this blog at random, and I don't know who you are, when your birthday is, or where to post the disc, it's unlikely I'll get around to buying you his album as a present. If you fit this description, you should probably buy it yourself...it's very much worth it).

The Ex-Box

Ah, the Commodore 64. How could a two-tone blue screen and just 64K of RAM have delivered so much fun? I know it's been superseded by the NES, the Super NES, the Sega, the Nintendo 64, the Playstation, the Dreamcast, the GameCube, the Playstation 2, the XBox, the Nintendo DS, the PSP, the Xbox 360 and soon the PS3, but there's something admirable about a computer that runs on 64K of RAM (since a brand new PC these days would have 1GB or 2GB RAM, and therefore up to 32,000 times the RAM of a Commodore 64).

I still remember the Christmas that my Mum bought my younger sister Becky & I a brand new Commodore 64 computer system. It was 1985, and I was 11, and for a family of 6 kids who lived week to week on a very tight income, receiving a present of this magnitude was absolutely astonishing (I hope I was as mindful of that generosity then as I am now in hindsight). Dad, who wasn't living with us at the time, even delivered a 1541 Disc Drive as his Christmas present to us, to complete the package. Not sure what we had done that year, but I'm guessing we must have been extra, extra good.

I distinctly remember playing River Raid and Frogger - the two games that came with the pack - right through Christmas Day, Boxing Day, and the following weeks and months. The C64 quickly became a big part of my life, and right through Grade 6, Year 7, Year 8, and Year 9, I was spending most of my after school time - and much of the weekend - in front of that "Ready" prompt. I played Ace & Ace 2 with my elder brothers, and my now-brother-in-law introduced me to Gunship, which we all played religiously for well over a year. I even managed to do some extra-nerdy things like some programming, and using Geos (think Microsoft Office...without almost everything) to prepare my school projects. Sure, I was a very pale, geeky, shy and overweight young man with very few social skills and even fewer friends, but I could get through almost every level of The Last Ninja AND my homework was neatly printed!

Somewhere in the early stages, I apparently negotiated (perhaps 'swindled' is a more apt description?) to buy out my sister's half of the computer for a multi-coloured woollen jumper that she liked. Now you might suggest that this doesn't sound like a particularly fair trade - and I would definitely struggle to disagree with you on that point. I actually don't remember the trade at all, but I've been 'reminded' of it on several occasions so I'll have to take Mum's word on that and make an unreserved apology to my little sister. Sorry Bec!! You're welcome to play as often as you like, whenever you like, and I won't even push in to have a turn. And yes, we do still have it - and boxes of games and joysticks - in our cupboard. Of course we do!

BUT... the reason for this post is to offer a brilliant substitute: now everyone can have a C64, even those people who were swindled out of their 50% stake by their selfish, mean brother back in the mid 80's... (but maybe that's why you have all the social skills now Bec? - I did you a favour!)

I came across a C64 'emulator' program today, which allows you to play C64 games on your PC. There are hundreds and hundreds of games available for download, and they play on the PC exactly as I remember them on the C64. They are also such tiny files, that it takes a few seconds to download all of your favourite games. Tonight I found heaps of old faves like Boulderdash, Pacman, Ace, Gunship, Pirates, Spy Hunter, Winter Games, Summer Games, The Last Ninja, Pitfall, River Raid etc etc. I realise how tragic this must sound to the uninitiated (eg. those kids who spent the 80's outdoors playing sport or socialising with friends), but it was great fun to be reunited with some blasts from the past. Mel has been gracious enough to humour me as I jive along to the very 80's, very-synthesized MIDI soundtracks (esp. The Last Ninja) - but it's not hard to know what she's realllly thinking.

Anyway, here's a link to the free emulator software, and below that is a link to some of the games. I'll also try to add a few screenshots soon to whet your appetite (or to remind yourself why you never got caught up in the C64 in the first place).

http://www.computerbrains.com/ccs64/
http://www.c64.com/

Matt

June? What June?

OK, let's just skip over the excuses very quickly. I was busy. Things came up. Priorities shifted. Blogging suffered.

I won't elaborate on the reasons for the busy-ness, since it seems to be a universal phenomenon that really needs no further explanation or elaboration. I'd love to meet someone who honestly felt that they had more than enough time in the day to achieve everything that they wanted to achieve, and even had some 'spare' time up their sleeve. I don't know if such a person, or such a situation, exists. Perhaps there's enough hours in the day when you're very young. Or when you're very old. Or when you find yourself serving time in prison. There's probably too many hours in the day then. But for the rest of the time, each day seems to finish 3 or 4 hours too early.

I did read somewhere once (come to think of it, it was actually in a first year Psychology lecture) that in studies where a person is isolated from other stimuli (daylight, clocks, alarms, television etc) their body appears to revert or switch over to a 25 hour internal body clock. If that's true, and our 24 hour "day" is a flawed and arbitrary construct that is perpetually at odds with our biology, then I guess that would go part way to explaining why there's never enough time to achieve everything you set out to achieve. Mind you, I'd be happier if their findings indicated a 27-28 hour default, since that would explain my 4 hour daily deficit. Still, it's a good theory, and I need all the justification I can get.

So what's happened since I last posted all those weeks ago? Well, quite a lot actually.

Jessica keeps getting more beautiful each day, not to mention bigger, brighter, happier, louder and more active. She turned ".5" at the start of this month, and on the same day made a start on her first solids (Rice Cereal). She had been gearing up for solids for a while, often grabbing at our spoons and shoving them in her mouth, and tracking intently as we'd move a forkful of food from our plates to our mouths - desparately wanting to join in. She's now up to 3 meals a day, with Avocado, Apple, Potato and Sweet Potato now added to the menu. Her favourites seem to correspond with the colour and general messy-ness of the options: bland, white Rice Cereal is by far her least favourite, and apple & avocado, with which she can paint her white wondersuit bright green, seem to be the pick of the bunch. Mel has posted some great shots of a messy, green dining experience on her blog, so rather than post those photos here, you can just visit Mel's blog by clicking here. Perhaps her daily avocado and apple facemask is the real secret to Jessica's youthful complexion??

Mel, as her blog will attest, has been very very busy too (probably far busier than me). Her consultancy business is in great demand with several clients, who thinks she's just about the greatest thing going. The standard of her work (and her diligence, skill, integrity, courtesy etc) is pretty legendary in industry circles, so much so that she's had to turn down some lucrative offers for further work. We've joked before that maybe I should leave my job and work for Mel, but every week that idea seems less and less silly. On top of her consulting work, she looks after Jessica bautifully and even manages to get along to Mother's group and as of last week took Jessica to her first swimming 'lesson' (water awareness, I think it's called). Apparently there's a DVD on it's way of Jessica in the pool for the first time: I'm looking forward to seeing it and will try to post some stills here in the coming weeks. Not sure how someone was allowed to film other people's children at a swimming pool in this day and age (I'm sure I wouldn't be allowed), but I'm glad they did in this case.

On my work front, not a lot has changed except that it's more hectic than a few months ago. It's not uncommon to work from home of an evening, or sign in on a weekend to get caught up on some looming deadlines, although I don't for a moment think I've got a rough deal. From what I hear and have seen of the workload of some others, I could almost be considered a part timer by comparison. There's also no update on the DVD proposal, as the General Manager who needs to approve or reject it has yet to find time to watch te presentation (did I mention it's been a busy few months?). I did (only yesterday) submit the User Story that Ulead asked for, and that's likely to be published in the near future on their website. Curiously, in response to my User Story submission, Ulead made a very unexpected request which Mel & I were only too happy to oblige. I won't say any more at this stage - just in case something comes up - but suffice to say it's all a bit surreal (in a very nice way!). Watch this space, I guess.

I haven't gotten to one tenth of the things that I wanted to cover here, but it's 12:30 and it's a 'school' night, so I better get off to bed and leave the rest of the catching up for tomorrow (or the next day, or the next day). I will attempt to post one lovely photo of Mel & Jessica taken last week. Mel hates it - sees too many flaws in herself - but I think it's beautiful. Once I've posted that picture, I'll turn off the VCR an head to bed. The VCR has been on to tape the only two shows that I watch these days (we've turned the TV off again): Scrubs & Arrested Development. It's a bitter-sweet one tonight, as it is the absolute final episode of AD ever to be made and screened. It was one of the most intelligent comedies I've ever seen, but the American audences didn't take to it in sufficient numbers, hence it was cancelled by Fox part-way into the third season. It's a real shame there won't be any more episodes coming, but at the same time it's probably a good thing to 'go out on a high note'. It's sad when shows drag on and on, long after they cease being funny. I guess it's the same for blogs, too, in which case I should probably have stopped writing quite a while ago. It's in that spirit that I'll sign off for tonight right now. Without writing anything else. After this. Well OK...after this, and the "Cheers, Matt" bit.

Cheers,

Matt

60/40

Just a quick post tonight (OK, this morning - it's 2:37am).

Couldn't let Saturday's party go by without a mention. My Dad turned 60 this month, and my brother in law turned 40, so my sister had the idea of having a combined 100 Years Celebration. It was a terrific night, with around 90 guests packing the church hall, enjoying games, wonderful food, some speeches, a few audiovisual clips, and generally having a great time together. I offered to put together a clip for both Dad & Jeff, and was given boxes of old slides from the 60's and 70's to scan and incorporate in a visual history. It was great fun seeing some of these photos for the very first time - much like discovering treasure - so while it took all week to get the slides scanned and the videos made, and while I didn't sleep between Friday morning and Saturday night, it was really enjoyable.

It's unfortunate that half of the family couldn't make it to the party: those of us who could were treated to a really special evening. Thankyou again to everyone who organised the night, and setup tables, and blew up balloons, and cooked wonderful lasagne and apple pies and everything else, and who made name badges, and gave speeches, and invited everyone and who gnerally made it all so great. And again, Happy Birthday Dad, and Happy Birthday Jeff. May there be many more.

Matt

(On an unrelated, the DVD proposal I posted last time has been seen by my Sydney colleagues, my boss and his boss, and the reaction has been really positive so far (one said "blown away" and another said "blew my mind", but they could have just been polite). Our General Manager is yet to see it - he's been too busy to watch it and even asked one of his staff to watch it and give him a precis! (which didn't happen). He's the decision maker, as he's the only one who can authorise spending the money, so the discussion is stalled until he finds time to watch. I'll give him this week before I start trying to progress it any further. Watch this space).

Mum's the word...

Yesterday was Mother's Day - (Happy Mother's Day again Mum) - and it was Mel's very first!

Yes, Jessica and I remembered (don't know why I had to remember - she's not my mother! hee hee), and Jessica sent me out with a small shopping list to thank her Mum for all she does, and all she is. The previous night Jessica was running a temperature, and wouldn't sleep, and would cry and scream intermittently (all related to new teeth we think) so by the time Mother's Day came around, an exhausted Mel finally felt that she had earned the accolade! I think you only officially qualify for Mother's Day if you've nursed a baby through a temperature with a cold wet flannel, so Mel made the grade with only hours to spare. (Only kidding of course - she's been a wonderful Mum since the first day of the pregnancy, and keeps getting better).

Here's a special Mother's Day clip that I had to share: it reminds me SO much of my own family (thanks Deb for the link). Enjoy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhcA4Ry65FU

Matt

Breakthrough Bonanza

Breakthroughs: there's been plenty of 'em lately.

The one on everybody's mind today, of course, is a very literal breakthough: the miraculous rescue of the two miners from a caved-in gold mine in Beaconsfield, Tasmania, after two weeks of drilling and careful-blasting. I can't begin to comprehend what it must have been like for Brant & Todd to have been trapped in a 1 metre cage, 1 kilometre underground, for 14 days. You'd like to think that, faced with a similar predicament, you'd be able to maintain your composure, humour, and strength to even half the degree that those two guys did: but I'm really not too sure about that (I get a leg cramp just sitting and watching the TV in a cold room). Phenomenal courage and composure in a terrifying situation. I sincerely hope they enjoy the bajillions they'll earn for their story in New Idea, and the tele-movies, and the Happy Meal action figures, and the VB ads ("you can get it crouching, you can get it...umm...still crouching"). And I do hope the rescuers are immortalised in Happy Meals too - an outstanding job all 'round.

The next breakthrough is also just as literal, but sadly didn't make the papers (they were a little busy I guess). On the weekend, Jessica got her first two teeth! (I guess we don't need to get her anything for Christmas now). We'd seen them coming up under the surface of the gums for a few days, and she's been dribbling a LOT in recent weeks, so we knew they weren't far away. Sure enough they arrived on Sunday - which according to the books is on the very early side of average - and it's amazing/frightening to see her hurtling toward toddlerhood. She has SO much personality, and is doing so well. Here's a couple of snaps to show off those pearly (but very sharp) whites...



And the third "breakthrough" - not nearly in the category of the other two, but important to me anyway - is that I finally finished the DVD proposal I mentioned in a previous post. I actually posted the 3 discs to my 3 bosses at 8am today. I don't know what I expected to feel (relieved, excited, scared) - but in the end I really didn't feel anything at all about it. It could be that I spent too long on it (about 200 hours) and am well and truly 'over it', or it could be that I'm preparing myself for a potential/probable "no thanks" reaction, or it might just be that I'm too tired to remember what excited me about the idea in the first place. But in any case, I know that I couldn't have done any better, so I'm happy about that. I even took a couple of photos of the finished product, so I guess I must be reasonably happy with it (here's one). I guess we'll soon see what happens, when they all open their packages, pop the discs into the nearest DVD player, and spend the next 19 minutes of their lives trying to follow what on earth I'm yabbering on about. I guess I'll post their reaction in the next few days...fingers crossed.



(Oh and by the way I managed to catch up with the Marketing and Communications Manager from Ulead last week for a bite to eat - Ulead make all of the software that I use for my video editing - and he was really interested to hear about the above project. He actually asked me to write up a bit of a user story for potential inclusion on their website, and was also generous enough to provide their brand new software package in support of my efforts! I was working up to purchasing it as soon as the proposal was completed - part as a reward, part as a more professional platform to use for the 'real' DVD if my bosses agree to it - so I was blown away by his fantastic gift. Thanks again Tobie! So, if Ulead agree to post a user story, I'll of course link to it from here. In the meantime, here's their main site: www.ulead.com

Well, that's enough for me for tonight. I need some sleep, and Mel & Jessica deserve to have their hubby/daddy back. For a while at least. Until they realise that they weren't really missing anything. Or until I get the green light and have to start on that real DVD. Whichever comes first.

Matt

A little Lewis...

And as it's been a while, here's another short passage from Mr Lewis (on the tendency of certain school texts and curricula to dismiss, ridicule and discredit all emotions, feelings, and values):

"The operation of The Green Book and it's kind is to produce what may be called Men without Chests. It is an outrage that they should be commonly spoken of as Intellectuals. This gives them the chance to say that he who attacks them attacks Intelligence. It is not so. They are not distinguished from other men by any unusual skill in finding truth nor any virginal ardour to pursue her. ... It is not excess of thought but defect of fertile and generous emotion that marks them out. Their heads are no bigger than the ordinary: it is the atrophy of the chest beneath that makes them seem so. [Emphasis mine: that's one of my all time favourite phrases, and I'll try to work that into a conversation at work sometime!]

And all the time - such is the tragi-comedy of our situation - we continue to clamour for those very qualities we are rendering impossible. You can hardly open a periodical without coming across the statement that what our civilisation needs is more 'drive;, or dynamism, or self-sacrifice, or 'creativity'. In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function. We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful." (C.S. Lewis, The Abolition Of Man, 1943)

The Feaster Bunny

Well it's been a busy, but lovely, Easter long weekend...and we somehow haven't had to cook a single meal.

It started - as weekends usually do - on Friday, and we were invited out by my Dad to a local restaurant for an impromptu dinner. Got to spend some time with many of my nieces (Susanna, Erin, Grace, Beth & Eliza), my nephews (Connor, Darcy, Samuel & Jesse), two of my sisters (Rachel & Keren), one of my brothers-in-law (Jeff), Dad & Maureen and of course, Mel & Jessica (thanks Dad!).

On Saturday, after work, we went into Donovan's in St Kilda, and had lunch with our 'old' friends from Sydney, Matt & Melissa. Had a great time catching up on their news and introducing Jessica, and it's truly a beautiful place to spend an afternoon. It's pretty pricey, and the portions are quite small (well, by my all-you-can-eat-and-then-some standards), but the food was delicious, the service was excellent and the location and atmosphere were fantastic. It was a freezing day outside, and the restaurant is right on the beach, so were enjoying looking at the choppy waves from the comfort of our warm, luxuriously-rustic surroundings (here's a couple of pics). And to top off a lovely meal we all had Bomb Alaska which - although sans flambe (doh! - I was looking forward to that) - was still great. And as the whole meal was a gift from Matt's former boss, it was doubly delicious! (thanks Matt, and thanks Matt's former boss!)




Then on Sunday, we were treated to an amazing Easter Sunday gathering at Mum's. Having arrived shortly after 1pm, we didn't leave until after 9pm, and food was never far from me for the whole time. I dragged myself away from the table long enough to share an Easter Egg hunt with the kids (I think the record find was 14 - 14 more than I found). We also played some great games including one where two teams are given a word at random, and they have to sing a song containing that word, at which point the other team has to counter with a different song containing that word, countered by the first team, and so on until the timer runs out. Easy with "love", a bit more difficult with "broccoli"! Our team didn't exactly win, but we were almost helped across the line by the extra credit awarded for our team's special dancing (thanks Connor!). Got to catch up with Mum & Becky & Jamie & Rachel & Jeff & Keren & Stephen & Susanna & Erin & Grace & Beth & Connor & Darcy & Samuel & Eliza & Jesse & Tanya & Jasmine, and it was a real treat. AND we were festooned with so many delicious foods (yes, Biscotten Torte was there... but with everything else that was on offer I was only able to manage 4 or 5 servings!). A really great day (thanks Mum and Bec!).


And then Monday morning we headed off to Yum-Cha with our other friends Eddie & Shirley, who were also down from Sydney for the weekend. I think I'd only had Yum-Cha two or three times in my life, so the meal was great fun and very tasty (we went to The Golden Dragon). We were going to be joined by Eddie & Shirley's son, Darren, but he's 16 and apparently deeeeply in love with a Melbourne sweetheart, so the idea of having lunch with us didn't really rate on his list of priorities. It was Eddie & Shirley's first opportunity to meet Jessica too, and they seemed suitably impressed. I'm sure Jessica will really enjoy her time with "Uncle Eddie" & "Aunty Shirley" as she grows up, though she might need to close her ears for some of Uncle Eddie's more colourful anecdotes!

So it was a terrific weekend of food, fun, food, friends, food, family...and food. In my defense I did manage to avoid eating a single Easter egg (no, that's not code for having eaten more than one, either), but that has less to do with self-discipline, and more to do with forgetting to bring home the eggs we were given at Mum's! I don't hold out much hope for the four Cadbury Sitting Rabbits that are currently sheltering in our cupboard, waiting to be taken around to Mel's sister Jenny's house for her kids: if those bunnies are not taken out of the house in the next 24-48 hours, or locked away somewhere, I can't be held responsible for their continued safety...

We apologise for the break in transmission...

Let's see: last post March 17th, this post April 14th. Not my best performance, I'll admit..

If you're thinking that the paucity of my posting is directly related to the TV having been switched on again last month, you'd be wrong (well, you wouldn't be entirely wrong, as it must have played some part, but I'd like to think it's a little more complex than that!). In my defence, it's got a lot to do with the convergence of many worthwhile things competing for my time. It's somewhat ironic that, the more things you have going on in your life, the less time you have to write about those things (though they'd probably make the most interesting posts) while conversely, the less you have going on in your life, the more time you have for posting, but then you're likely to have a less-interesting blog as a result. It's probably true that the most interesting blogs will never be written, as the people living those lives can't make time to sit down and write what they're living. Not sure what that says about me (boring enough to have a blog in the first place, but with enough going on to keep me from updating it very regularly).

One of the things that's been competing for my time is the DVD proposal: it's about 80% complete, and I'm hoping to have it to my bosses within a week. It's a 20 minute video presentation, on DVD, hoping to convince them to let me make a full-scale DVD for them. If the time spent making this initial DVD is anything to go by, it might be a blessing if they say 'no' to the real thing: it's eaten up an awful lot of nights and weekends so far.

Over the last few weeks we also had my Uncle over from London: Uncle Roy is a real character, and it's great to see him when he makes it out here every 12-18 months or so. He was here for 4 weeks, but it felt like only a few days, and we really regret that we didn't get to spend much quality time with him (other than the 20 frustrating hours spent trying to fix/rebuild his laptop). While we weren't able to get the laptop 100% fixed before he had to go back, we were able to introduce him to Jessica for the first time, which I think was more-than-adequate compensation. I'll pop a photo of Uncle Roy, Mel & Jessica here aswell - though he and Mel will no doubt want it taken down immediately. He's not always that shiny red colour, by the way: he and our friend Frank seem to have a tradition now of heading out in a small boat and getting burned to a crisp in the days leading up to Roy's flight back home (I guess if you live in London and work 12 hour days indoors, sunburn is a unique souvenir).

Having seen Uncle Roy off on the 2nd of April, we welcomed my Dad and his wife Maureen from Northern Ireland on the very same day (they must want some sunburn, too). They're spending a couple of weeks in Victoria, then spending 4 weeks driving north through New South Wales and Queensland, through to the top of the Northern Territory. They're visiting with my brother and his family who are stationed in a remote part of Australia, where John is a pilot with Missionary Aviation Fellowship. You can check out what MAF does here. Dad's actually driving a 4WD vehicle up there to hand over to John and the family, as they currently have no transportation (Dad and my other brother, Stephen, purchased that vehicle this week, and from what I saw of it tonight I think the family will be very impressed). The Australian Outback will be a huge change for the two of them, as they're accustomed to life in Downpatrick, N.I., where they operate three 200-year-old stone cottages. If you're ever planning to be in that neck of the woods.... We're hoping to put together a little box of treats for John, Angela, and particularly their 5 great little kids Jordan, Mitchell, Cooper, Emily & Joshua (all of whom we haven't seen for over a year, and won't see for at least another year), before Dad & Maureen leave on their trek on Monday. Here's a snapshot of Dad with Jessica, whom he also hadn't met before this visit...(you can see the family resemblance, despite Jessica having a little more hair)

Tomorrow I have to go into work early, so that I can leave early and get to a late lunch with friends of ours who are down from Sydney. They've invited us to a fancy place on the St Kilda foreshore called Donovan's, and we're very much looking forward to it. Not because of the place itself - we'd be happy catching up with them over a doughnut and a cup of coffee - but just because they're great friends. They're actually a Matt and Mel also! They've already warned us that they're really only here to meet Jessica, so I don't think it'll matter if Mel & I are there or not. Matt & I used to work together in Sydney, and have stayed good friends ever since - I was even a groomsmen at their wedding. He now works as a DVD Account Manager for Fox Studios, which sounds like an exciting & glamourous job at first, but evidently is a hugely stressful and demanding one. And I guess all of the free DVD's (they do Simpsons, Star Wars, Arrested Development) don't mean much if you're never home, or awake, to watch them!

And on Sunday we'll be getting together at my Mum's new place for Easter lunch. It'll be a big congregation of the family - which doesn't happen nearly as often as it should - and my sister Bec will even be down from Sydney. She hasn't met Jessica yet, either, so I can see that we'll walk in the door, hand Jessica over, then have to ask for her back when we go to leave many hours later. It's Mum's first big get-together at the house (that I know of!) since moving back from Sydney, and she's always been a fantastic host. She's even promised to make her much-loved Biscotten Torte for dessert (I'll have to keep that in mind when deciding how many Easter Eggs I'll eat). Really looking forward to Sunday, and will no doubt take hours of video and several hundred photos, to the annoyance of virtually everyone.

Speaking of photos (yes, we were), it's time to add some more photo's of Jessica. I missed posting on her 3 month milestone (April 2nd) so I'll now post 3 recent photos - 1 for each month. These were all taken last Sunday, the 9th, and I really like the way they came out...they almost do her justice!

Well, I'm supposed to be heading off to work in less than 4 hours, so I really should get to bed. Happy Easter!