Today I feel old….

Very old.

As my baby girl is starting her first day at school. Prep to be precise, which is the year before Grade 1.

Between the uniform, hat, backpack, socks and sneakers, you can barely see her.

Unbelievable.

I think I am in shock. I need a whiskey or something….

Australia Day.

I’ve never been a big celebrator of Australia Day.

Not because I don’t want to or don’t ‘believe’ it in.

But I celebrate EVERY day as Australia Day.

For instance, on this past Australia Day, I did the following – went to the beach with the family, beers with my mates at the pub, got sunburnt, had a barbie, had a bet on the horses, lost money on the horses, won money on the horses, wore my thongs, boardies and t-shirt from sunup to sundown, watched Australia play sport on TV – and that is what I do EVERY weekend.

I do love Australia. And as someone who has spent nearly 5 years living overseas away from Australia, it makes me appreciate it even more.

Good on ya !

Friday Funny

Wow! 300 Posts and still going….

…. strong-ish… sort of….

Who would have thought – over 10,000 hits and 300 posts of fun, humour, sadness, stupidness and banality.

Thanks to all those who have contributed over the past year and a half.

Thanks also to those who have chatted via email outside of blog world.

I wish I could buy all of you a beer to celebrate!

I’ve be Tagged!

The lovely Miss Natalie has Tagged me – my first one ever (I think…)

The rules: List 7 random facts (your choice) and then tag seven people at the end.

( I won’t be tagging 7 other people because I think everyone has already done this before).

1. When I was 20 and lived in Dallas, Texas, I bought a pot-bellied pig as a pet.

2. The sound polystyrene makes when it is touched, sends me crawling up the wall. Even the sight of it gives me chills.

3. I can’t understand why people hand-wash dishes in the sink, when there is a $1000 dishwasher right next to them.

4. When I was about 6 years old, I was swept off some rocks into the ocean and nearly drowned. I have a fear of surfing near, around or over rocks.

5. By the end of 2008 I will most likely be out of a job. I have to start deciding now what I will be doing from 2009 onwards.

6. I would like to live in a small village in France or Italy for a year or so, and indulge in the culture, wines, food and language.

7. I hate shaving every morning for work. When / if I become my own boss, shaving will be a once per week chore – if that!

I don't normally...

.... but here is a link that everyone should go to.
Takes 30 seconds.

If you want to stop whales being killed for 'research',

then Sign this:
www.whalesrevenge.com is trying to get a million people to sign a petition to stop whaling.

Friday Funny...

[ click on pic above to enlarge ]

First Kiwi-bashing of the year...

A Kiwi walks into his bedroom with a sheep under his arm and says:

"Darling, this is the pig I have sex with when you have a headache."

His girlfriend is lying in bed and replies: "I think you'll find that's a sheep, you idiot."

The man says: "I think you'll find I wasn't talking to you."

It pays to drink

A week ago, it was decided that I need to start two diets – a Food Diet, and an Alcohol Diet – because SurferCam was bulking up… and it wasn’t the off season.

The Food Diet was easy – cut down on fatty foods, cut out snacks, cut down on the quantity of food, and eat more fruit and vegetables.

The Alcohol Diet was not so easy – cut out all alcohol during the week and drink less beer on weekends.

The Alcohol Diet was re-written on Day 2 – cut out all beer during the week. This means Rum, Vodka, Gin and Wine are all ok during the week, and beer was to be consumed on weekends only.

The Alcohol Diet was re-written on Day 5 – the weekend starts on Friday afternoon, thus allowing beer consumption on Fridays.

So, I’ve improved my eating habits out of sight, dramatically cut my alcohol consumption, and what happens???

I get fucking sick!

Woke up Saturday morning with the flu. First one in 6 months.

And I put it all down to the reduction of alcohol consumption.

I think it pays to drink. Cheers!

Not sure if I'm going to hell for this but ....

... the Pope is WRONG!

An article last week on the Sydney Morning Herald’s online site states “The sport of Beckham and Kewell is crucial in teaching honesty, solidarity and fraternity, Pope says.”

Now let’s analyse this :

Honesty – diving, faking injuries, and acting is not being honest. Pretending to be tripped in order to receive a penalty is not teaching honesty. Maradonna’s ‘Hand of God’ was one of the biggest acts of dishonesty ever in sport.

Solidarity – most of the time when one of these prima donnas scores a goal, he usually run away from his team mates and is often seen pushing away his team mates when they get to close. Sorry, no solidarity there.

My Hero

My Hero

… and each day I grow more and more to look like him….

People / Things I am sick and tired of seeing or hearing about :

David Beckham – get over yourself and play a real sport.

Beckham’s wife – ugly and annoying.

Britney Spears – hot but tragic.

Amy Winehouse – go to McDonald’s and have a feed.

Olsen Twins – join Amy at Macca’s.

Nicole Kidman’s pregnancy (already) – she’s pregnant, get over it.

Fergie – your music is crap, bit like your bloated face.

Lindsay Lohan – hot but obviously an idiot.

Indian Cricket Team – you know you are dodgy, conniving lying bastards.

US Election (already) – no one cares Down Under.

Please feel free to add to the list – I am sure there are many MANY more!!!

Brown Undies – Part II

A surfer mate of mine informed me this morning that he could have told me about the shark out there – “it’s a 3 metre long (10 foot) Tiger Shark – and it’s been there for years”

The day it happened, I think I might have been a bit to blasé about the whole incident. But yesterday, and even more so today after my mate told me that information above, I think it was actually a bit more serious than I first thought….

Brown Undies

Yesterday, my girls were in Sydney and so I had the day to myself.

Knowing that the surf was small and murky (from all the rain) here on the Coast, I decided to head down south just to get away and maybe have a surf.

I checked out my favourite spots around Lennox Heads and stopped at Flat Rock. The water everywhere was very brown and murky due to all the massive rain and flooding we've had.
Everyone was surfing the rights on the northern side of Flat Rock, which was big, about 6ft to 8ft faces but not that good. Over to the south side of Flat Rock, out front of the camping grounds, was an awesome left that was big and very clean, but there was not one single person out surfing it. As you know, this is never a good sign if the locals aren't surfing what looks to be a good wave.

A guy came in and I chatted to him and he said it was alright. He then pointed to the south side and said it looks good there. I agreed but asked how come there was no one out there. He didn't know.

Anyway I left and checked out several more spots down to Ballina but ended up back at Flat Rock.
I was checking out the waves and got chatting to a guy about my age and we agreed that the south side looked good but couldn't work out why no one was there. He was from Townsville so none of us had local knowledge.
"I'll go out there if you're keen" I said. Terry agreed and I paddled out and he came out about 5 minutes later.
The paddle was epic and after 20 minutes, and just as I thought I could see our cuzzie bro neighbours in New Zealand, I finally made it out the back. I was a long way off shore and had already drifted about 500m down the beach.
The water was very murky, to the point where I was sitting on my board and I could not see my feet! And for most of the time I laid on my board as I wasn't game to let my feet dangle down in the water. There were logs, whole trees, plants and all sorts floating around.

Once I got my breath back I took off on a really good size wave and paddled back out.
My new best mate Terry caught one too and was inside.
Out of nowhere, about 10 metres in front of me, a black fin popped up and headed straight towards me, dead straight towards me, with bow wake coming off the fin. It wasn't a dolphin and was definitely a shark. With the water so murky I couldn't see how big it was - all I could see was a fin coming towards me and coming fast!
I fucking shit myself, being about 300 metres from shore and having a fucking shark heading straight towards me.
I spun around and paddled my guts out, continually looking back over my shoulder to see where it was. Terry saw the look on my face and didn't need to be told what was happening. He started paddling before I pointed and yelled for him to paddle in.
I paddled like I have never paddled before, to the point where I couldn't feel my arms and my neck hurt from trying to look behind me while paddling flat out. My heart was thumping out of my chest. It was the scariest fucking feeling ever!
I finally got near Terry and he's asking me what kind of shark and how big it was. I couldn't talk as I could barely even breathe from exhaustion. But if I could I would have said "Who fucking cares what type and how big - it's a fucking shark!"
After what seemed like an eternity, I made it close into shore, then realised I was in a gutter and remembered how people have been attacked by sharks in only one metre of water. So I paddled my guts out again.
I finally made it to shore and nearly kissed the sand.
I realised that both Terry and I had only caught one wave each and after such a mission to get out there in the first place I said to him "Sorry to cut your surf short" to which he replied "No worries, I'm glad you saw it and not me"
"Right, I'm going to the pub now to have some beers to calm the fuck down!"

Later Terry got talking to a local up at the car park and told this guy what had happened.
"Oh yeah," said the local, "there's a big tiger shark that hangs around out there."

Where the fuck was he an hour ago!......

I’m Back.

I’m Back. Whether you like it or not.

And I’m also back at work today which I am just thrilled about….

Christmas & New Year recap.

Weather : The weather where I live on the Gold Coast is supposed to be hot days with blue skies and perfect weather in the late 20’s early 30’s (80’s and 90’s for all the Americano’s playing at home).

The plan was to surf as much as possible and make the most of the $5,000 we just spent on fixing our pool.

Unfortunately, for most of my 11 days off, the weather was shit – cloudy, stormy, raining, windy as hell, and sometimes cold. I even had a jumper (sweater) on a couple of times.

Christmas Eve : Should from now on be known as “watch Dad get drunk and try to assemble toys at midnight in the dark.”

Christmas Day : Ate and drank myself stupid.

New Years Eve : Ate and drank myself stupid. Fell asleep at 9pm. Yes, I know how to party….

Apart from spending some really good quality time with the Monkey, my 11 days off was fairly boring and very disappointing. And I think I put on about 10 kilos, mainly due to trying to drink the local brewery dry….