Alanz Eyes

An update!

Oh wait, that’s not completely different…. Oh well, you’ll just have to accept it anyway. It’s taken me this long to recover from our holiday, so I hope you can forgive me for not writing. I haven’t really been ‘recovering’ as such, I just haven’t felt like writing anything, but that changes today.

The holiday was great.

The actual reality of the holiday didn’t change much from what I expected, and since I’ve already detailed those expectations, I’ll just summarise a few things I didn’t detail.

My family xmas went better than I expected it would, with no arguing or bickering. It was as if everyone knew the enormity of it all, with the whole family gathered together for the first time in 16 years, and everyone wanted to remember it well. It was great having Deidre as part of it, as part of the family.

Mom surprised us all (except my dad, of course) with a gift of $500 each, which was tightly rolled up and placed within the bon-bons. When we pulled them to break them open with a loud crack, out fell a small gift wrapped up in a paper xmas hat. Just what we were expecting. However, what we weren’t expecting was that the small gifts were a rolled up wad of ten $50 notes.

It was very well done, and I credit my mom for going to the effort of making them look just like bon-bons bought in a shop. My first thought was that they were monopoly money, but when I unrolled the wad, they certainly seemed real. My second thought was that some strange person in the bon-bon factory was overcome with generosity, and I was the fortunate recipient. But then while Deidre was holding one of the $50 notes up against the light to see if it was real, I noticed that both my younger brothers had the same thing, while Deidre had a small bottle of perfume, and dad just had the paper xmas hat. That’s when I realised what mum had done.

So that was a xmas to remember. On my part, I gave her a small album of photos of her budgie which she’d accidentally stepped on (read the 3rd paragraph here). She’s still a blubbering mess about it, but that’s her choice.

Port Augusta was significant for me, but in a way that was completely different to how I expected. After being there for a day, I realised I didn’t need to be there!

It had changed too much for it to have any meaning for me. What it used to be, is no more. What was important to me exists only in my mind now, in my memories, and that’s where they will remain.

I was saddened by one of the changes. Aboriginal drunkenness had apparently resulted in widespread vandalism across the city, especially the public schools. My old high school entry points were blocked by tall, barred fences, preventing access.

My high school years were extremely significant for me, and while I got a few photos through the bars, it was not enough. The areas I wanted to take photos of were unavailable to me. Since the high school was supposed to be a major point for me, I was sorely disappointed by how the changes had impacted upon my ability to ’stroll down memory lane’. There were gates on that lane which I couldn’t get through.

While I was in Port Augusta, I didn’t see a single person that I might have known. In fact, for the entire first day I was there, I saw only 5 white people, and 3 of them were counter chicks at the supermarket we visited near our motel. Two others were customers. Every other soul we saw in the streets and on the beaches were Aboriginals.

I’d heard that ‘the Aboriginals had taken over the town’, but I didn’t believe it was true. Amazing.

We went west and north, into ‘outback South Australia’ and the Flinders Ranges. This is the real outback, where the sand is red, and the conditions are close to being desert-like. Very hot (43 degrees Celsius at the time we were there, or 109 degrees Fahrenheit), very dry, and absolutely no animal life to be seen. It was far too arid for anything more than snakes or lizards.

We visited some old ruins of a community that once tried to exist there in the 1800’s. They failed. A lot of people died. All that remains are ruins.

I’m glad I got a lot of photos, and I’ll be posting sideshows of them soon. If you’re a friend of mine on Facebook, you’ll have already had the opportunity to see them. My Facebook friends will always get to see them before I post them to this blog.

Returning to Canberra was a welcome end to the travelling, but it wasn’t an end to the ‘holiday’. Our friends from NZ, Garry and Monique had joined us from Adelaide, travelling with us to Pt Augusta and back to Canberra. We arrived safely back in Canberra on the 30th, and they were with us until the 3rd, so we had a good time showing them around the place. I think they enjoyed it, which was good.

New Year’s Eve was a great time.

We had a bunch of friends who joined us for the celebration, and while some stayed and went early, we were happy that they came at all. The rest that stayed for the whole night helped us have a fantastic time. It was one of the best new year’s eve celebrations of my entire life.

I drank a lot. I hadn’t done that since the same night in 1999, when I was celebrating Millennium Eve.

It was an honour for me that the friends who joined us chose to be with us on such a night, to celebrate with us. Out of all the parties and friends they could have joined, they chose to be with us, and I’m grateful to have such friends.

After Garry and Monique left on the 3rd, things have been returning to a semblance of routine. Deidre has been working, and I’ve been looking for work. It’s a little slow right now, being the holiday period, but I’m hoping to find a new contract soon.

I feel that 2008 is going to be like 2007 – full of exciting new changes that will propel us forward.

There’s a lot we want to do, and it’s going to be interesting to see which of our plans reach fruition this year.

Some of the things I want to do this year could be considered as ‘new year’s resolutions’, and include:

• lose 10 kg and get fitter
• take up pistol shooting
• join a car club with my XR6 Turbo and go on country cruises with others
• invest in at least one property
• sell a number of ebooks

None of these are particularly difficult, I feel. One of the best ways to achieve resolutions is to make sure they’re what you actually want to do, rather than what you think is best but don’t want to do. If you don’t want to do it, you won’t. I want to do all of the above.

Facebook Friends

I also want to finish off 2008 with at least 200 Facebook friends, just for the fun of it. So if you’d like to add me as a friend, please do so (and please send me a message to let me know why you’re adding me!), and you’ll not only be helping me achieve a goal, but helping yourself stay up to date with my blog posts, and get to see my photo albums before they’re posted to the blog. I’m sure it’s something you can’t wait to do!

Have a great 2008, and I hope you achieve your own goals and find more happiness than what you currently have. Cheers!

If there’s one thing that’s constant in my life, it’s change. I can always rely on everything to change, regardless of how much I want to settle down, or how much I think things have settled down. Change will always remind me that I can’t rely on anything to stay the same.

My contract finishes this week, and after 5 weeks of looking for another contract to move on to, I haven’t found anything. This has been a little disconcerting, as I had hoped to find another contract to either start with immediately, or at least in the new year. I haven’t found either.

I know that Christmas time is not a good time to look for work, and I’m glad that we’ve been preparing enough to accommodate a greatly decreased income for a period of time. I’ve worked out that I’ll be fine until the end of January, when the funds will start being drained, so I’ve still got a decent period of time.

Most people look forward to their holidays as a time of relaxation and rest. I think that’ll be the same for me, but I’m not entirely convinced. For me, relaxation and rest occurs when I’m doing my own thing, by myself, without anyone else bothering me. So let’s look at this holiday period for me….

On the 24th we’ll be getting up around 5am and driving from 6am through to about 4pm, to Berri in Sth Australia. After freshening up in our hotel room, we’ll have dinner with my parents and my brothers before collapsing into bed asleep. The next morning it’ll be Christmas Day.

We’re having breakfast at the hotel, and then joining my family for Christmas Brunch (for those who don’t know what that is, it’s a mix of Breakfast and Lunch – Brunch). This will start at around 10:30am, and will involve feasting and frivolity until about 2pm, when we’ll set off for Adelaide, arriving there about 5pm.

We’ll arrive just in time for Christmas Dinner with Deidre’s dad and his partner Janet. After more feasting and frivolity and drinking copious amounts of beer, we’ll collapse into bed asleep.

I think the next day will be the only period of rest and relaxation I’ll have for some time. It’ll be Dec 26, Boxing Day, and Deidre wants to go to the beach. It’ll give me time to chill out and relax.

On Dec 27, we’re going to the airport in the morning to pick up our friends Garry and Monique, who are flying in from New Zealand. They’re joining us as we drive north 3-4 hours to Port Augusta, where I grew up between 1978 and 1985. We should be there by mid afternoon. After doing a quick site seeing trip around the place, we’ll find our hotel, have dinner and collapse into bed asleep.

Dec 28 will involve going north for half an hour through the Flinders Ranges to Quorn, a small town of about 100 people or so, and where I lived for a year in 1977. Being only a tiny town, and half an hour away, we should be back in Pt Augusta soon after lunch, allowing us to do more site-seeing of the place.

My mate Dan, who I grew up with in Pt Augusta, will unfortunately not be able to come with me, so I’ll be taking hundreds of photos to share with him later.

My time in Pt Augusta is going to be quite emotional. I lived there when I was aged 11 through to 18, and they were some of my most formative years. The wild, emotional times of adolescence, and the music that went with it. The experiences I shared with Dan, and the experiences I keep for myself.

Revisiting it after 22 years is going to be a bit of an emotional rollercoaster ride for me.

On the 29th we’ll be driving 4-5 hours east to Berri, where we’ll stay overnight and have dinner with my parents, before continuing on back to Berri on the 30th Dec. We’ll try to leave Berri as early as we can, allowing us to arrive back in Canberra before dinner, after which we’ll collapse into bed asleep.

The 31st Dec – New Years Eve – will involve some site seeing for Garry and Monique as we take them around some of the best parts of Canberra, but we’ll have to be home before 4pm, as that’s when we’ve invited everyone we know to join us and celebrate the end of 2007, and the beginning of 2008.

We’re having an open party, where people can come and go as they please, bring food and drink if they want to, and stay as long as they want. At the very minimum, there’ll be Garry and Monique there with us, and if anyone else wants to pop in and join us at any point, that’d be great. I’ll have the BBQ going, and the food cooking, and the drinks fizzing….

And then after midnight some time, I’ll be collapsing into bed asleep.

Garry and Monique will be with us unil 3rd January 2008, so there’ll be more site-seeing as we show them the joys of Canberra. There’ll also be some relaxing along the way, as Garry and I shared a favourite pastime – sitting in Starbucks and talking about roleplaying games or Star Trek.

It’ll be good to revisit that with him after so long.

But then they’ll leave on the 3rd, flying on to Perth, and then on to asia where they’ll walk around for a few months before continuing on to Europe, where they plan on settling down. I really don’t know when I’ll see them again, or even if I’ll see them again, and the thought of that makes me sad.

With change comes sadness, as the old makes way for the new, ultimately bringing yet more excitement and happiness.

Deidre’s returning to work on the 3rd January, and so the 4th, being a Friday, will be the only day that I’ll have to myself for two weeks. I think I might enjoy that day!

Then there’s the weekend, and I hope that I’ll be starting a new job on the 7th.

I went for an interview yesterday with a recruitment agency for a Sharepoint Consultant role, and it went really well, very positive. As a result, I’ve got a second interview on Friday with the actual client. I’m hoping that will go really well too, and that I’ll start the new role on the 7th January. Wish me luck!

So that’s my life right now, and over the next 2-3 weeks. It’s going to be an exciting time! This is a heads up of what’s coming, and there’ll be more updates as they occur.