Me Being Observant

Alrighty! I think I'm noticing a wee bit of a trend here... When I post some sort of pointless rambling, or attempt to write something witty, I get pretty much no comments! That's ok, I'm not a writer and I don't play one on tv so I wouldn't expect anyone to think I'm a funny writer.

However, back when I was posting funny stories from my youth where I'd hurt myself, I DID get comments! I get even more comments when I post pictures from Oz ('stralia, mate). I've also noticed that I get more comments from folks up in the cold north when I post summertime pics from Oz. Perhaps it's cus seeing pics from a warm place maybe helps you mentally thaw out in the frozen arctic?

Did I mention in my fizzix labs at UAF my lab partners referred to me as "master of the obvious"? I *think* they were being sarcastic cus the TA just always said "read the f*ck*ng manual, dave!"

But for whatever reason I have surmised y'all like funny stories of me hurting myself, and pics from Oz. Funny stories from my youth are many, the only thing is they take some time to write cus my wreck-o-lection ain't what it used to be.

So today you get some pics instead! But I'll put some funny captions on them for you to make up for the lack of storytime.

Here goes:


"Now remember: we are bound to hit him when he walks under the tree if we all crap at the same time!"



"Harriet, if he's trying to impress me, it's not working."
"Quiet Blanche, it's working for me!"



"I wonder what the view is like from way down there?"



"Why am I always the one on guard duty?"



"... and THEN the penguin says to the bartender, 'but I already HAD the fish and there's STILL no olives!' Ha, Ha!! Get it?"
"I don't get it Larry."
"Shmuck."




"I wonder if this looks as attractive to humans as it does to other cockatoos?"



"Not NOW, honey. That weirdo peeping tom with the camera is watching!"



"... swee-eeet home, Alabama!"


For those of you puzzled over the last caption, I'll tell you in 3 days why the bird was singing that song (at least that what it sounded like to me). In the meantime, how's about y'all try to guess? You've got three days...

Oh yeah: I thought of a LOT of funny ones (especially for #3), so put a caption for a pic number in the comments so everyone (or at least my wonderful visitors) can see how witty you are.

It's a rough life...

I know, now you all are gonna fly down here and beat the tar outta me...

A toofer

Hey, you get two today! I just remembered I'd forgotten to keep you posted about the Grate Tomato(e) Count, my pool temps, and various sundries.

So, we are up to 70 tomatoes off the 3 plants (two flower flushes from each so far), and it looks like we'll get at least one more batch of flowers from each plant. The tomatoes have been getting 
smaller as the drought gets worse, so it's not much use weighing them. But boy are they TASTY!!

I decided not to turn on the solar heater for the pool today, that way it won't get any warmer than the 92 F that it's at. It's going to feel really really really good jumping in that sucker in about an hour to cool off from the heat (105 F in the shade, over 125 F in the direct sun).

Ahhhhhhh....... I really do think of you all up in winter at times like this...

Woke up to something cool two days ago. I was walking around the pool (did I mention we have a pool?) early in the morning when the sun was just rising to see which group of cockatoos and parrots had shown up, and I almost walked into a web.

One of the garden spiders that hangs out under the balcony over the pool hadn't pulled her web in that morning! They usually pull the web in well before the sun is up; maybe she was still digesting? I don't mind the spiders as they take care of a boatload of insects.

I noticed that the sun was rising right behind her and shining through her making her look like she is glowing. I swear this photo is NOT doctored at all:


Hee, hee! Let me find someone to bite and transfer my radioactive spider powers to!

A (w)hole buncha stuff

I'm here! I'm hear! And there might be a few more visitors showing up
here as Ishmael has added me to his links. Does that mean that I'll
be going political? Not a chance! This here blog is a place for folks
to go and forget about their worries --Cheers, anyone?

This is going to be a very rambling, disjointed post; mainly cus that's
how my brain normally works when it does happen to work at all.

Oh, there might be a couple more visitors; family friend who was just
visiting us for two weeks, and The Old Fart (me poppa).

Our friend from Alaska (we'll call her Anna cus that's her name) was
down visiting. She's from Anchortown but has travelled all over AK for
her job.

When she left AK they were in the middle of a bit of a cold snap. Minus
15 F in Los Anchorage, minus 40 in Fairbanks; you get the idea: bloody
well COLD. She brought the cold temps with her!We were having beautiful
summer temps down here (like around 100 F in the shade), and the day she
arrived it dropped down to a right royal cold temp of 75 F in the shade.
Unfortunately, their was no rain with the freezing cold snap. But fear
not for us frost-bitten aussies; that only lasted a week and it's back
up to real summertime temps.

The pool actually had the temerity to cool down to 72 F! How, I ask HOW,
can anyone be expected to swim and frolic in such icy cold waters? It's
back up to 92 F water temp, but I tell ya: it was a rough week!

I had also gotten back on my mountain bike a few weeks before she arrived.
I think last post I alluded to a wee bit of a crash... Cracked rib, bruised
knee, sore shoulder. But really, nothing serious. Just enough to keep my
lazy ass off a bike for a bit. I'll be going out tomorrow morning for a
ride for the first time since; it'll be on the road bike so I'm sure I'll
have some great road rash to tell you about soon.

Got some great bird pics and also some good koala shots to show you, but
that'll have to wait till I get a chance to sort them. In the meantime, how's
about a couple of emu pics? An emu is a large, flightless bird native to
the Antipodes (that's a fancy word for New Holland)!






As you can see, they are rather large.

Oh, I got some more injuries: a jammed wrist and a skinned knee. I was
showing Anna how to bowl and bat in the nets at the local playground. The
game is cricket and it's way too complex to tell you about. She did pretty
good with the bowling, and the batting wasn't too bad either. One time I
decided to really let one rip (which she said she didn't even see as it
zoomed past her ankle and into the stumps). My follow through wasn't quite
as good as Brett Lee's... In fact, it sucked! Hence the jammed wrist and
skinned knee as I went cart-wheeling down the concrete pitch.

Did the above paragraph confuse all you folks up north? Well, it was kinda
the idea :)

I got a new set of chess pieces while she was down here: a set of winged
fairy figurines. Now I have the dragons playing against the fairies! They
are on my own chess table that I made, so I guess I'll have to take pics
of it and write a post about how awesomely handy I am. Although I didn't
use duct tape, it still came out pretty darned good so tune in soon for
handyman's corner.

Let's all give Jill a cheer in her upcoming race: winter mtb through 350
miles of Alaskan wilderness. Jill: I'll think of you every time I jump in
the pool.

Gotta run, naps to take and laps to swim.

Galah and Cockatoo

Yeah, yeah, I know. Y'all up there in that other hemisphere (especially those of you in Alaska) are going to hate me for posting these pics in the middle of your winter.

To that I say: Tough! It's my blog and I can post pics of purdy birdies if I want! Does it make you feel any better if I tell you that I'm very envious of the sled doggie pics from Akbushbaby and of the winter biking pics from Jill?

Remember when I used to write all the humourous stories of my youth? Most of them involved me hurting myself somehow. Well, I've got a great bike wreck story that happened only TWO days ago! Complete with pics! So, like, stay tuned!

Anyways, here's a pic of a Galah hanging out in a gum tree (eucalypt) in the back yard, and then there's a pic of a Cockatoo in the same tree a couple of days before. Enjoy!









Now, if'n y'all will 'scuse me; I've got a pool to jump into before I start making dinner for the clan.

Tour Down Under!!! Wee-Hoo!

Some of you may be surprised to find out that I'm a cyclist and enjoy following the bigtime races. Why would this surprise you? Well, I don't really blog about it much (if at all). Why not? Well, there's plenty of cycling blogs out there and I've always been one for doing my own thing. Speaking of cycling blogs, two of my favs are Fatty and Jill, and they both happen to be nominated for Best Sports Blog this year. So how's about you go check them out and vote for whichever you'd like.

Who am I voting for???? Dunno yet! I got into blogging via Fatty (long story, he doesn't know it though), but Jill does winter cycling in Alaska, like I used to. Hmmmmm, better go flip a coin, eh?

The only thing I'll say today about my cycling is this: After a ride in the morning it sure is nice to come home and jump in your warm pool! Not that I'd ever do anything like that, but I imagine it would be nice and if I did do it then I certainly wouldn't mention it cus it would seem like I was rubbing in the fact that I have a pool and live in a year round summer. Ahem...

Food: shall I just say that I'm back to updating my wee little food blog and you should just go there to see all the new goodies?

Race pics!!!!

These today are from the Tour Down Under Classic in Glenelg from Sunday the 20th. I got a lot of behind the scenes shots and some very good race shots. I was camped at the final corner of the circuit (2 km circuit and 25 laps) at 150 metres from the line. I was also up on a ledge so I had a very good view over the 15 rows of folks crowding the barriers. The blokes would hit the corner at 50-55 kmh and exit around 40-45 kmh. FAST!

Here's a sample:




and here's one from the back of the team presentation area; this is a Caisse rider on his way to the presentations. They have REALLY cool looking bikes this year...





More race pics and behind the scenes coming soon, maybe even to this blog!

Heat Down Unda

I've got loads of great Tour Down Under pics for you. Some great race shots and some excellant behind the scenes shots from Glenelg and from Hahndorf. Also some good overpass pics from the Unley to Victor Harbour stage (it only ran less than a kilometre from the possum lodge).

However....!!!!!  You don't get to see them today. In fact, I was gonna go down and stake a spot out on Old Wilunga Hill (of which I've ridden up many times) to was the pros go up it. I decided not too cus it's rather, ah, warm today. Standing outside at Glenelg for 8 hours on Sunday and then Hahndorf for 4 hours on Wednesday has made me decide that today (now that the weather is warming up) would not be a good day to repeat that.

How warm is it???  Well, my pool water temp is 92 F in the shady, deep end and when I jumped in the water felt chilly. Suffice to say, this ain't a day for blogging nor for standing by the roadside.

If'n y'all want any warm weather sent your way, just lemme know; we've got more than enough to go around!

cheers from Oz,

moi


Oh, almost forgot about the great tomato(e) count:

Total number of tomatoes harvested: 44
Total number on vines: 57
number ripening on vines: 3 (two will be on tonights homemade pizza)


If you are wondering about the slight lull in output; the first 39 were from the first flush of fruit, then there was about 3 weeks when we didn't get any (buy more than 3 plants next year) and actually had to *gasp* BUY tomatoes! But now the second flush is starting to ripen, YIPEE!

Still Here!!!

I'm still here!! No, really... I am!

However, I'm going to keep you all in suspense till I have time to write (and post some AWESOME photos from The Tour Down Under Classic) a detailed (more than you may want to know) explaination (Lame Excuse) for why I haven't posted for a month.

Anyways: I'm here and I did not abandon all my loyal readers! I think I was up to 7 or 8 before the holidays.

more soonly and cheers from Oz!

Holiday Feast, Parrots, Cockatoos, Tomatoes

Hey, how's that for a title? Hmmmmm, should I do them in order? Nah.

Let's start with the tomato(e) count, shall we? There's been a lot of action on the 3 plants, so the numbers will be way different from the last count.

Total number of tomatoes harvested (and eaten): 30
Total weight of tomatoes harvested: 2.72 kilos (6 pounds)
Number of tomatoes currently ripening on vines: 6
Total number of tomatoes on vines: 67

I can tell you from experience, that NOTHING tastes better than a fresh, organic tomato(e) right off the vine that is roastingly hot from the direct sun! The sweetist tomato(e) you'll ever taste!!! I was shocked at the sweetness of them when they are sun hot and right off the vine. Ahhhhhh, bliss.


Next topic:

The annual Holiday Feast down under! I started this tradition 7 years ago when I made various polynesion dishes for the family for christmas. Over the years it has expanded --to say the least.

For the complete list of items this year (and how to get any of my recipes) check out Dingo Dave's Delightfully Daring Delicacies.

Next topic:

You know how there's a thing going around where you take a photo every ten hours and post it? Well, there's no way in heck I could do that! Mainly, I'm rarely awake for that long at a time (I like naps). I'd also forget to do it.

However, I'll post nine great pics I took this morning from the back yard in a 10 minute span!

Heeeeeeere we go:





























Notice the size of the full grown cat in the lower left of this next one, compare him to the big ole cockatoo.

More Weirdness from the Possum house

Let's get right down to it: I have four (4) more weird things about me to post.  So here's one (1) or two (too) (2) more:

Weird thing #4
I used to commute via mountain bike in Fairbanks Alaska. Year round. No car. No bus service. For 12 years. I always told folks I'd rather ride at -35 F on a nice trail than at +35 F in the pouring rain. And I meant it! And I still do. Without a doubt!

Hmmmm, I had a weird thing #5, but I can't seem to remember it right now... so let's just go on with the tomato(e) count, shall we?

Total weight of tomatoes harvested and eaten: 2.105 kilos (4.6407 pounds)
Total number of tomatoes harvested: 22
Total number of tomatoes on vines: 67
Total number of tomatoes ripening on vines: 8

Oh, I posted a foodie post over at my Dingo Dave blog, so go check it out, eh?

Almost forgot, I need to post the holiday feast. This'll be a list of all the cool dishes we'll have during the time when no one works down here in South Oz. That'd be the 21st through till at least the 3rd.