Spring (III)

It's nearly the weekend and it seems a bit too late for me to write about what we got up to last weekend but work is dull and you don't want to hear about that so I thought I may as well. Besides, it was a great weekend. The weathermen were right with their forecast and we enjoyed a taste of what’s to come. We hit the thirty mark and then some. I spent most of my time in the ocean (the wound has healed) or on the beach.















I surfed for the first time in Australia without a wetsuit but I need to get a rashie at some point. The wax and the chest wig don’t get on too well.

H and I hooked up with some Manly chums on Saturday arvo and we ended up playing lawn bowls. Yes, that’s lawn bowls, someing neither of us have ever done before. My Nan would be so proud. It’s all the rage over here. It was a friend of a friends birthday bash and it was a really good laugh. It was a "Rock 'n' Bowl" club ("The Best Fun You Can Have On Two Feet!" apparently) so there was a bar which formed part of the attraction in the first place. A lot of the people playing were Scottish and it comes as no great surprise that a Pommy team beat them in the final – a team which H and I were in! They weren't very happy at all.

Here's some of our Manly chums. From left to right, Damian, Katie, Amanda and Claire (who lives in Neutral Bay).















Tony Alcock.















Erm, Ms Alcock?















The Birthday Boy.....




















I ended up in Kirribilli after the bowling, in a new chums flat nine doors down from John Howards. I’d gone round there to watch Liverpool play Spurs and Chelsea play Fulham on FOX Sports. It was the first live Premiership football I’d seen this season. Kirribillit sits on the northern side of the harbour, directly opposite the Opera House and next to the Bridge, hence the reason the PM chose to live there instead on Canberra (and who could blame him!).

This is the view from my mates flat. Not a bad spot for New Years Eve!





























Sunday was a scorcher although a little overcast. We hooked up with Damian and Claire and a few others and headed to Collins beach before heading off Damian and Katies’s for a BBQ. Their flat overlooks Little Manly Beach.















So it was another cracking weekend and having spent pretty much most of the time by the beach it felt a little strange going home via Manly wharf, sunkissed and sandy, and having to think about work on a Monday morning. It feels like we are on holiday, even though we have to go to work, and it's wierd to think that this is actually our new lives. And this weekend is a Bank Holiday weekend. We're going to see Hard-Fi tomorrow night and on Sunday we are off to the Parklife festival. It should be a good'un.