Merry Christmas from The Land of Oz!

Ho, ho, ho! Hee, hee, hee! Yep, it's that time of the year! The holiday feast is upon us. This means that starting in 2 days from now I'll be chained to the table post in the kitchen to prepare boatloads of goodies for all... Although "they" don't know that I know where the spare key is hidden so when "they" leave the house I can then go jump in the pool.

'Course, I'll bet some cranky bloke way up north will tattle on me...

Before I get to the Christmas Greetings part of this post, I thought I'd tell you that on the latest bushwalk we saw 7 koalas, 2 emus, 3 yellow-tailed black cockatoos, a pair of kookaburras, 2 bilbys, numerous galahs, magpies, rosella parrots, and we heard around a dozen Bunyips (horrid creature, look it up!).

Here's proof:

I also have a tomato update for y'all. So far we've harvested 153 ripe, juicy, sun-hot, fresh-off-the-vine tomatoes. There's 232 still on the plants (and they keep producing more and MORE and MORE) so we figure we'll get around six to seven hundred tomatoes by the time the season is over. Not too bad for AUD$35 (USD$23).

It's finally getting warm and it might actually stay there for a while --FINALLY!!! It's 86 F in the shade, 118 F in the sun, but the pool is still a freezing cold 76 F. However, the pool should be in the high 80's this arvo. And that's a good thing cus I've got to scrub the pool walls later today. If that water was any colder I'd need a drysuit, or at least a 5 mm wetsuit! Sigh...

Went for a walk on the beach the other day. Yup, took lot's of pictures too. But I won't put any of those up since I don't want to antagonize anyone going through winter right now. And I especially won't put any pics of when I saw a group of 20-something year-old girls playing beach cricket. They had string bikinis on. I was going to take a picture but since WP had threatened to separate various body parts from my main body part if I did... Well, you get the idea.

To make it up to you blokes in the frozen north, I thought I'd show you some vids of how Aussies celebrate Christmas.















And here's a lesson in 'stralian:







And here's just a couple of commercials for two of my pals up north, Ish and KC:

Astoundingly Amazing Antipodean Arachnid

But before we get to our wonderful pictures of cute, fuzzy critters from down under, how about a parrot picture or two?

Cus after all, that's the reason I have visitors... it's sure not for my wit and charm...

First, I thought I put up a pic of a pair of vicious, ferocious, seed-flesh eating, mean, nasty critters!



Yeah, I'd hate to be that sunflower seed...

Moving on...

I thought I'd put up a picture that really illustrates the difference between a male and female galah. You can easily see the difference in the eye colouring in this shot:


Plus the fact that the female is yelling and screaming and waving her arms about while the bloke says, "Yes, Dear."


One last thing before I get to the cool critter captures, there was a

Conversation with Wifey-Poo

the other day.

As always, YT is yours truly (that's still me) and WP is Wifey-Poo (the most wonderful, caring, understandable, patient woman in the entire world).

YT: I've got the last of the broccoli steaming for dinner.

WP: Are you sure that'll be enough for all of us?

YT: Oh sure, I'll run it through the food processor and then add it to the creamy chicken soup. I'll add more milk and seasonings, bake a fresh cobb for dunkers, no worries.

WP: Mmmmmm, sounds good!

YT: Well, yeah. After all, it is the soup the BOSS likes.

WP: ...HUH? *Oh crap what's he going on about now*

YT: Oh you know. The British Overseas Secret Service. After all, Mr. Broccoli did direct all those wonderful documentaries about the double-oh agents.

WP: That's bad... very very bad...


And now


the reason


you've read


this far!


Here's a tiny thumbnail of a cute, little furry critter:









Go ahead and click on the thumbnail, no worries. It won't bite!

I dare ya to click it.

I double dare ya!

Triple dare ya!

And for those of you who wussed out and didn't expand the cute, furry critter pic up to over 1400 by 900, here's a slightly smaller version:


Then the helicopter circled overhead and got this shot:



If you are wondering how I found this lil' wee beasty, then you may recall that I clean the pool in the mornings before having a swim... Here's what was in the reservior above the filter basket:


Yup, same critter. Dead and floating upside down.

See? Y'all up north have cute, fuzzy, grizzly bears roaming around mauling folks, and down here we have cute, fuzzy, spiders roaming around in our swimming pools.

Sarah Palin Hot Tree Sex!

*Since the football game ran late, we join the following show in progress*

...The intrepid papparazzi photographer from Chatanika slowly creeps through the outhouse graveyard in search of the extremely elusive Sarah Palin.

His search is rewarded as he spots Sarah (SP) and Tawd (TP) in a tree!



SP: Taaawwwwwd! Git over here an' give mama sum luvin'!

TP: Ahhh, yore Tawdy's gunna git lucky!




*smack, slurp, drool*





TP: YEE-HA! Yore Tawd's gittin' ready!





TP: Yore Tawd's gunna ride you like muh Ski-Doo!





SP: Doncha know I'm ALWAYS on TOP!





SP: Hey! That wuz quicker'n last time!

TP: I gots a race to git to!

SP: Alright dear, you go win sum more gold for mama!

TP: Yee-ha!

SP: While yore out racin', Ah'm headin' on down to the carwash. Gotta go look me up some, uhhhh, figures with Brad.



And on a totally unrelated note, the morning gang of cockies sure do enjoy their sunrises:

The railing on the upper deck seems custom designed for these buggers.


There are six cockatoos in that pic. Can you find them all?

BTW, for those of you knot from the interior, just google "chatanika" and "outhouse". Good times up there!

Sarah Palin Naked In Action With Bodyguards

I awoke to the sound of a huge commotion happening outside! I grabbed the camera, then I remembered my robe (brrrrr, cold this morning), and I stealthily sneaked outside to get some illicit pictures of the ruckus...

sneak...

sneak...

sneak...

OW! stubbed me toe

sneak...


What did I see? I had stumbled into a SECRET MEETING with A NAKED SARAH PALIN SHOWING HER PINK BREASTS, HER NAKED HUSBAND, a whole buncha SECRET SERVICE BODYGUARDS, and a GODLESS COMMIE RUSSIAN SPY who was trying vainly to fit in!

WOW!!!! I've just got to get shots of this! Heck, The National Enquirer would pay biiiig money for these!

I slowly crept around the trees and bushes while keeping myself hidden. The wall of ferns growing between me and the secret meeting table made great camouflage...

First I got a shot of them all descending down to the TOP SECRET MEETING, the SECRET SERVICE AGENT was patrolling the perimeter, while a NAKED SARAH PALIN and her husband came (snicker) swooping in. I thought for sure they'd notice the GODLESS COMMIE RUSSIAN SPY SHE LIVES RIGHT NEXT DOOR TO, but they didn't:


As the meeting progressed, I got many candid shots, but then the SECRET SERVICE AGENT noticed me! He's the one on the upper right of the pic


Before I could be apprehended, the GODLESS COMMIE RUSSIAN SPY burst into the meeting! He cowered the NAKED HUSBAND OF SARAH PALIN, and then A NAKED SARAH PALIN herself swooped down to do battle!

Help me Sarah, save me with your sexiness!

With everyone frightened and run away, the NAKED SARAH PALIN then decided to have her way with the GODLESS COMMIE RUSSIAN SPY! Naturally, after she found out that the GODLESS COMMIE RUSSIANS have waaaay more oil that the US, she bowed down before the the BIG OIL KING!



Hmmmm, anyone know the email for The National Enquirer?

Just a WEE bit sexist...

Alright, I'm "ok" with the coverage on SBS going to another sport while the road race plods along 80 k's of flat, polluted, industrial crappy, eight lane freeways. Yep, no worries. But did they have to go to beach volleyball? Now, I have no problem with the sport of volleyball, nor even the beach variety. What I don't like is that the "uniform" for the women's beach volleyball is two very small pieces of spandex (don't mind that, though) while the "uniform" for the men's beach volleyball is baggy t-shirts and baggy shorts.

Is this FAIR??!!!?!?!!

If the babes have to strut out there in nothing but basically a g-string, then the blokes should have to ALSO!

Gack...

back to the dishes...

and then cleaning the pool...