Not to sure what country I am in !

Jake and I thought we would venture further a field on Thursday then our normal trip to the park and the pirate ship and walk to Campsie shops which was about 25 minutes away. We set off on this very summery day and after about 5 minutes I realised Jake had thrown his hat off so we had to retrace our steps to find it. When we finally arrived at the shops it was as if we had been transported to an Asian country. There were all sorts of little shops, mainly Korean, and I think we were the only 2 white people with blue eyes. The shops were not very attractive, except for a couple of chemists, and rather smelly. It reminded my of the old markets in Singapore many years ago. There was not a coffee shop in sight. Then I spied down one of the side streets a Big W sign and headed that way. There was a shopping centre with shops I recognised and a food court. So Jake and I shared some chicken nuggets and chips and a drink for lunch. It was good to get in out of the heat.

Campsie in Sydney's south west is a haven for lovers of Korean food. Most of the suburbs Korean restaurants are found along Beamish Street, with the most popular including Se Jong, Asawon and Jan Wong Korean Restaurant, although there is no shortage of choices, most of them casual and family friendly.

Two tasks finished this week.

I finally finished my jigsaw puzzle. I completed the picture some time ago and only had the brown border to finish but this looked rather difficult as it was hard to distinguish between the slight difference in the browns so it ended up under the bed. I received a new jigsaw from David for Mother's Day so I resurrected the old one from under the bed as I had to completed this one before starting on the new one. Well it sat on the table for a couple of weeks and day by day I gradually found one or two pieces. Then magically the pieces started to fall into place and presto here is the finished product.


The other task I completed was the polishing of the 100 or so souvenir spoons. I still have to put them in order in the cabinets but should finish that tomorrow in between going for breakfast with Sokit and Jolanta, the gym and visiting a new baby. Not forgetting euchre in the evening.

I got a mention in the last euchre news letter "Special mention to Cath in achieving a hat-trick of
wins after last week's 'Golden Duck' and she completed the night in equal third place, winning 5 out of the 8 games."

It has been a busy week. I have spent a bit of time over at Kerry's looking after Jake. Kerry had to go to hospital this week for some minor surgery. She had a bit of a reaction to the anaesthetic and had to stay in overnight. She seems to be on the mend now just a bit sore.


















About 25 people from I C Frith and myself gathered at Winston Hills hotel for a surprise dinner for Sokit's 60th on Wednesday. This time inspector gadget did get a surprise.










Melissa also had a birthday this week and she spent it in Greece. Hope it was it was a great week Melissa.




David came over to dinner on Tuesday night and brought Lenny and Bandit. Pinto was happy to see them both and shared his dinner with them. As you can see from the video they all enjoy playing together.

If you want a job done well, don't get O'Reilly

Feeling rather tired tonight so I may not finish this blog until tomorrow. Tony has just gone off to the A league soccer with Craig and Amy. Kerry and the kids have just left and I have finished tidying up so here goes...


Remember O'Reilly in Fawlty Towers, the builder Basil always got because he was "cheap", well I think he just completed our hallway. The tiles are uneven and the grout is coming out. Every time we come in our front door we have to play hopscotch to miss the cracks we have to keep refilling. Then Friday we found that the study door would not close as it kept hitting the tiles so we had to chop some off the bottom of the door. Oh well what do you expect when you pay someone 20c an hour.


We got a new book shelf so I could put all the old photo albums on as they have been tucked up in a chest and were not easily accessible. This means now I have to go through all the old loose photos and either throw them out or put them in the albums. This will be a major job and I don't know whether to start this one first or the other huge job I will have when I clean out the recipe cabinet and sought out all those recipes. I need this cabinet to put all the dishes from the cabinet we lost when we put in the dishwasher. Not forgetting the souvenir spoons I started polishing a month or so again and have not finished yet. Well what's retirement for you may ask.

We got a bargain when we bought the book shelf. We found just what we were looking for but they did not have any that colour in stock and the one on the floor was scratched. The shelf comes in a box and you have to put it together and you know what trouble we had with Jake's bike. So we asked could we have the one on the floor which was already put together. They gave us this one for half price and you can't see the mark anyway as we have put Tony's Gold Paint Tin trophy on top.










Last night we went to see Hale & Pace at Star City. Craig had given Tony tickets for his birthday. I said Craig could go with Tony but unfortunately he had other commitments that night so I went along. What a boring show!!!!! Lots of people were "killing themselves" laughing and Tony & I just looked at each other and said "what's so funny". It was just a lot of smutty innuendos and puns on words over and over again. Now I know why I didn't watch them on tv thirty years ago. Even the supporting act which was an illusionist was pathetic , he just moon walked around the stage like Michael Jackson most of the time and the rest was in the dark and you couldn't see what he was doing anyway. I think he was swallowing razor blades. Tony and I couldn't wait to escape even though we then had to pay a $22 fee for parking in Star City.

How hard is it to put a 3 wheel toddlers bike together?

I would say about an hour's hard work. That's how long it took Tony and I to do it. It looked simple but lining those rods up to get through the holes was not so easy. We managed to put it together to look presentable.

Kerry Ann prepared a lovely afternoon tea for Jake's Birthday and we sought of visited in shifts between 2pm and 5pm as everyone had other commitments on as well. Jake and Felise were very excited and seemed to enjoy themselves. Felise, who looked pretty in her pink jumper and brown skirt, had been ready all day waiting for people to arrive. Jake looked very handsome in is blue vest. Felise helped Jake blow out the candle on his Teddy Bear birthday cake which was made by Kerry. Simone made some yummy slices and we took some of these home on our goodie plate.

Belated Happy Birthday to Jake

Its hard to believe a year has gone by and Jake turned one yesterday. He spent his birthday at Cheeky Monkeys and Kerry Ann had made cup cakes for all the children and the teacher put a candle on top. He is having a Birthday afternoon tea on Saturday and I will then present him with a cardigan which would cost around $500. $40 for the wool and $460 for all the time I put into making it. I just could not get it right and kept pulling it undone. It didn't help that the pattern was hard to follow in places and they had actually left some instructions out. Anyway it is finally finished. I just hope now it fits him.






As you can see it is awhile since I have written in my blog. Part of the reason being that we had used up all our megabytes and to use the Internet was going to cost quite a bit as we didn't get our quota back again until last Saturday. We have now upgraded and hopefully will not run out again. Particularly now that Tony has retired and he spends quite a lot of his time on the Internet.


I had to interrupt my writings just then to watch "The Amazing Race". That is one of the shows I have taken to watching along with " True Beauty" about all these bitchy people who think they are just "it". Normally we play cards on Thursday night and I have to tape them but this week cards has been changed to Friday night as Christa is having a farewell dinner for one of her daughters and family who are going overseas for 4 months. She already has one daughter and family living in Sweden.

Taking about playing cards we are still playing euchre on Monday nights at Northmead and last week the Tigers happened to be playing footy. They were showing the game on the big screens and I found it had to concentrate on cards as it was such an exciting game. Tigers won 19-18 against Manly one of the top teams. Go the Tigers!!!

Our handyman George is in the process of breaking up our front entrance. He is laying new tiles for us. His answer to everything is "no problem". Hopefully there will be no problems and he won't break too many tiles. The old brown ones we had were very dark and ancient so I will be glad to have the new ones.

Last Saturday Adam, the handyman from Tony's old work came with his wife Kerry to fit in our new dishwasher. As usual there was some sort of problem with the pipe connection and it took longer then expected so they stayed for lunch. We never seem to have anything done that is straight forward. There is always some obstacle in the way. The dishwasher is great and I have used it a couple of times.






Tony has started to grow a beard. What are your comments? So far peoples reaction is half and half. I quite like it for a change.