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Congrats to Jackie and Dean who’s first baby is due in November.

That’s all I have to say today :)

They shall grow not old,
As we that are left grow old.
Age shall not weary them,
Nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun,
And in the morning,
We will remember them.

For the record, I was NOT drunk on Wednesday night. I did have a few drinks, but since I remember the evening with perfect clarity and was able to feel my limbs the entire time, I can safely say I was merry at most. I will admit that I acted out of character, but this was no bad thing. “Oooh, do tell HP do tell!” I can hear you say. Don’t get too interested, it’s nothing that would make the news.

Alrighty, that being said here we go with Wednesday night. This was the night of the branch night out for the end of year festive cheer and we all wandered along to Rios in Richmond, a latin american restaurant with floor show. This was cause for concern for everyone but me as the menu is mainly meat. Having been vegetarian for 11 years I can say that there is usually something I can eat, but the others were stressy about it. This annoys me, why should other people worry about my food habits? There was no cause for concern anyway since the salad bar was bursting with brilliant things like fetta and olive salad and cauliflower in a cheesy sauce. Once you’ve loaded up with salad, waiters come around with big skewers of meat and load your plate. Judy found it hysterical that i was sitting on the end of the table and therefore was right in front of the meat the whole time. i found it bothersome that she harped on because I wasn’t fussed about the meat. Alicia was delighted with the whole meat deal :) Our waiter was new, it was his first night apparently (yeah yeah, he’s probably worked there 5 years and just uses that for tips), and he was so sweet and gorgeous.

Anyway, after the food the band plays and the patrons are invited onto the dance floor. Of course, no one wants to be first on the floor so everyone was sat about until the band leader came down off the stage and grabbed Alicia and I by the hands to go dance, so once I was up I was up and I figured “oh hell, why not?”. This was possibly partly due to a couple of cocktails (although as a spirits girl usually I have to say the cocktails weren’t that strong) and partly due to my fabulous dress. Also, suddenly I was tired of sitting around watching other people have a good time, so I stayed and danced which was so freakish it warrented Tracey taking quite a few photos of me (although once I spotted what she was doing I made sure I kept my back to her!). Eventually some of the others joined us, so we did that thing women do and danced in a big circle before Alicia Jackie and I dashed out for a smoke.

The floor show started kind of pathetically, but improved vastly. Very active, huge energy and the women were stunning. It was just three girls and two guys doing some incredibly speedy costume changes. OK, they weren’t doing the changes on stage, there’s sexually charged and there’s too much information… I’d have loved to photograph them (which is why I was sitting where I was, right on the edge of the dance floor) but that’s not allowed, which I cursed ‘coz there were some good photos to be had. At the end of the floor show one of the women came out and dragged a guy out from the audience to dance with her and seriously, since she was wearing a thong and a spangly bra, he looked like he’d died and gone to heaven! Then one of the men dashed out from behind the stage and dragged a women out of the audience to dance with him and - you may have guessed [and this is why everyone keeps telling me I was drunk] - that was me and it was MASSIVE fun! The first couple of seconds I thought “Oh hell, I can’t dance to save my life!” but he was great at leading and pretty soon i didn’t care.

OK, so it seems like a tiny thing, but after all these years of wall flowering on the basis that fat chicks shouldn’t dance, it was brilliant to find that fat chicks can get away with it. :)) Even Judy said she didn’t know I could move, so there’s a compliment indeed.

And no, I wasn’t drunk but it was a great thing to find. Dale, on the off chance you read this, compare it to your tickle fight :)

Today is Melbourne Cup Day in Victoria, a public holiday. lauren found it hard to believe that everything shuts down just for a horse race - except it’s not just a horse race - it’s The Melbourne Cup! Sadly, my pick for the Cup - Holy Orders - wasn’t the winner (but they did get him to run!). Makybe Diva blitzed in the last straight. I don’t care what anyone says, when those horses come round the final turn into the straight it’s an edge of your seat moment.

What a massive line of people! That’s what i thought when Alicia and I wandered out of Borders bookshop (I just realised that’s funny - boarders and Borders. OK, but TSO friends will get it) and back to the cinema showing the Bowie concert thing. I had just spent $90 on CDs - whoo hoo! Couple of Bowie (I know you’re shocked) and a Little Feat double CD. Anyway, we lined up with everyone else and then sat about for an hour waiting for Richard Wilkins to shut the hell up - who picked him? he’s a total king of Prats.

Anyway, the show itself was a blast (although it’s weird watching that in a cinema, you want to clap but wonder what the point is). The new songs sound brilliant and at the end he did Cactus and Hallo Spaceboy among others but those were my faves. The between song chat was fun too and basically I had a huge amount of fun and lots of little weak knee moments because I don’t care what you say Bowie is a very sexy man (and JP, having now seen Bowie’s face 40feet tall I can say - He does so have lips!). GAD is my new hero too.

I can’t even begin to describe how much I loved that. I loved it a lot and have been having smiles all day. Dates for Australia to be announced in November, and I expect to pass out shortly after.

Wow, today did suck indeed. LOL. I was at work super early (especially by my standards) as Dad borrowed my car to get to his work, so he dropped me off and picked me up. Jackie phoned in sick (still feeling the after effects of cheap vodka on Saturday night) and Kirsty was on evening shift (still is, as I write this, poor love) so that left us with four staffers in the morning, two of which vanished into a union meeting leaving me and Di frantic with a massive branch run and a sudden influx of people. Also, no tea break until midday which left us caffine deprived (and me nicotine deprived). We were kinda tense. LOL.
Then my off desk shift turned into an on-desk shift and my other off desk shift was for a class, so I didn’t really get to get away from the public all day which is unfun.
On the up-side though, Diane brought in cake for my birthday. Yay for cake! I’ve just realised I left the card at work. Oh well, it’s not like I’m not going to be there tomorrow.

Apparently after i left kate’s party on Saturday things got utterly interesting as Di and Jackie got utterly pissed. At one point, so I hear tell, Di leaned over the railing around the pool with the idea of spinning around it. Thankfully she fell off it instead and Jackie then fell over trying to assit Di to stand up. It was at this point Di began to dance flat on her back since she wanted to dance but couldn’t get up. It all went on until the wee small hours LOL. I was probably better off here as there’s only so much drunk watching a person can do without wondering at the point of it all.

Caught up with Debs today for lunch at the Silly Yak, Elvira also rocked up which rocked on because I’ve missed her such a lot. This photo is to celebrate the pants of goodness (UK readers, please swap trousers for pants. Erm. You know what I mean). You can’t see the heart on her bum, but trust me, it’s there. I’ve known Debs 20 years now, which amazes me in some ways, but not in others as she’s so fun and also so good to talk to. Elvira is as gorgeous as ever and enjoying her work I think. So it was a nice gossipy catch up which I needed, and a good way to celebrate the birthday.

Went to Kate’s surprise party last night and can honestly say she was not only surprised but utterly stunned. It was a decent night, although I’m dying to know how Alicia got on with the bloke Jude picked out for her (Jude is a serial matchmaker). Dashed out earlyish (10:30) to log on to TSO - does this make me anti-social? Possibly. But the people I knew at the party were the people I work with anyway, so I’ll see them on Monday as it is (and Tuesday, Wednesday…). Ended up not being able to log on to TSO until midnight as it was since Mum is utterly addicted to a game on here (I have no sympathy for people with computer game addictions as I’ve never had one…)

Went over to Balwyn today to see the cars from the Redex Rally 50th Anniversary Re-Run. The car above is not in the rally, I just adore it though. Considering I don’t like to drive and am not interested in cars in general, I really adore that one! It’s a Peugeot 404 and lovely. Manual, though, so I’d have to get someone to drive me about in it. I did mention to Dad that it’s my birthday tomorrow, but somehow don’t think I’m getting this!

And these ones are competing. The one on the left is a 203 panel van and is done up to look like the car that did the filming of the rallies back in the ’50s. The one on the right seems to have come directly from storage in someone’s chook shed. The cars ranged from utterly immaculate (one in particular could have easily passed as brand new) to slightly “Well loved”. The park was packed with people and cars and it was quite a good time with none of the petrol headedness I expected, just Peugeot enthusists drooling over cars :) I’ll tell you this, Peugeot do damn good body design. The cars took off for the trip to Albury at around 10am, so we watched them file out (including one entrant which was a tractor for God’s sake). Apparently they’ve done about 7,000 km so far (the original rally was around 6,500km) and they still have to get to Sydney.

Other than that, haven’t done anything today. Got up too early (or possibly stayed up too late) so have just been flopping about in the couch reading books. Am about to vary this by flopping about on my bed reading books, variety being the spice of life and all that.

Here I am in Sydney. Hello Sydney. Got here on Friday and was whisked away to the Aquarium (well, we wandered down there anyway. There wasn’t much whisking.). Saturday was spent at the Zoo. We took the ferry over which was nice. Sunday was Wonderland where I didn’t go on the demon or the bush beast (Penny lost her hat on the Beast!) but did do the snowy river rush and National Race or whatever it’s called.
Today we are off to Bondi, so of course it’s pissing rain. Tomorrow we get the 6:05am shuttle to the airport. Erg. Once in Queensland we are off to Movie World, where i will NOT be riding the Lethal Weapon rollercoaster. not even for money.