(*) Grab one last packet

It's still busy in town this morning, even a week after Xmas - it was chaOTIC then! I tried to stay clear, but failed miserably... I forgot one of the boys little prezzies at the last minute! The big major prezzies I had for months already! Gagh! My brother and his wonderful wife paid me an excellent visit on Xmas Eve - we went out to a beaut Bakery Coffee Shop for lunch, sitting in the shade on an old wooden verandah. Lovely. Always good to hang out with them... my brother and I are so comfortable with each other now we can prattle on for hours non-stop without getting bored! heh heh They showed me piccies of their new place up in Cairns, Far North Queensland (he's moving up himself this week, just to get things ready). The place looks awesome! I saw a version of it when they were 'house shopping' back in May when we went up for 10 days, but I think this one is even better! Wow, a brand NEW house! Sen-sation-al! Three blocks from the beach and all... what a tough life! Plus he landed a job straight off no problems at all (the joys of nursing). Good luck to 'em tho. I *am* really happy for them tho, even tho I'ma gona miss them like crazy.

Today I paid mah rent, some money for the boys' holiday away with their Nan (yay!), picked up a new name sticker for mah new boat, "Wyreema II" (and not "Gherkin" as Geoff suggested! rofl), and finally got those old beach trolley dolly-trailer tyres replaces (pic 'em up tomorrow, hopefully...). Even fishie got some new food... I mix his feed around now and again to give him a change etc. he eats anything I give him... thankfully the change in diet doesn't seem to faze him at all. He wasn't too fussed with his new sea shells in the bottom of his tank that I got him for Xmas either - ungrateful git! rofl. I also managed to find some spare fuses for mah cat too... naturally, they weren't the *regular* ones, so I had to hunt around just a little bit... managed to grab one last packet left in one place! D'oh! I blew my indicator lights fuse towing the boat on the way to sailing last Saturday... thankfully that's all it was. But one side-affect is that, because I replaced one fuse with another etc, I somehow managed to disconnect the CD player/radio. Now it won't play without putting in the right security code... the problem being that I *have* put in the right security code, but it still refuses to co-perate with me! Norty thing. Not a biggie tho... it's not as tho I wont survive a few days until I get someone to figure out how to get thru the code of mah CD-player at the car retailer! heh heh.

Hosting the Sailing Club's webpage has been lots of fun. Lately we've received some old photos from people who used to sail there back in the 1980's and 1990's. That's really great how a simple thing like a website can keep like-minded people together like this. Yay! There's even a hilarious 'alternative' photo someone took when one of our loyal members, Timothy Hone, was receiving a Maritime Medal (for his contribution to sailing, especially with the disabled) a few days before Xmas... gotta love the internet! I'll post them later this evening, when I finish fiddling and adding them to the webpage etc.

And yeah, now I've got a different type of boat, I've gotta figure out how to sail it properly! I managed to pick up a brand new book on sailing that class of boat (a 'Laser') for just cost price down in Melbourne, and lately I've been cramming as much as I can into my brain, trying to remember some tips and hints on sailing it more efficiently. I've just gotta get out there and practise practise practise! Too bad there's not enough water at Carcoar to do that at the moment... bugger! :( Ya, I can read and read, but it's not until I actually start *doing* it all out on the water that it's gonna make any difference, in reality. Like I said yesterday (?), sure, it's still 'sailing', but it's like the difference between a car with manual and automatic transmission... same result, just different ways to achieve that. Anyways.... I'm really looking forward to it. There's a whole weekend regatta in 2 weeks' time nearby, so I'll sail my butt off then, and come home in an exhausted heap, I'm sure of it!

Mah flowers are growing again, like wonderfully! Isn't it amazing what a few drops of water every day can do, hmmmm...? rofl

Glad the weather's been good for 13-yo JD working out in the cauliflower paddocks over the last 2 weeks... well, he's seemed to have missed the major rainstorms of the last few days anyways. Now, if only it would keep raining... gotta break this drought and fill the dams up again... for the sailors... oh, and for the farmers and stock, of course [cough cough] lol.

And, oh yeah... there *ARE* new photos on the way... just gotta get around to editing and uploading 'em...