Archive for the ‘Miscellaneous’ Category

Dog Lovers

Sunday, January 1st, 2012

Last night we went to Wentworth Park, to watch the puppies run.

DSC05078a

The races started at 6:45 and ran till 10 pm, 10 in total. We had no form or foreknowledge, and picked out dogs mostly randomly. And they ran like their tails were on fire!

DSC05107a

DSC05103a

The dogs are greyhounds and they chase a ‘rabbit’ (the orange thing that runs along the rail in front of them). Here’s a shot of one of the beasts as he was paraded before the race.

DSC05089a

DSC05118a

That’s Bernard placing a bet right there. And here’s the betting results:

RS: Bet $6 total, won $6.45 total (4 wins)
BS: Bet $103 total, won $10+? total (2 wins) {he has one ticket yet to cash}
AW: Bet $100 total, won $61 total (4 wins)
MB: unknown {we think he broke even}

Obviously I was the winner here. I attribute that to my natural affinity with hounds.

DSC05119a

The dogs got faster when the sun went down. I got tired!

DSC05110a

Probably because of my epic walk earlier in the day, when we finally got home I was knackered. I was asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.

New Year’s Day

Saturday, December 31st, 2011

Later this evening we’re off to see doggies trot. I was my usual hyperactive self this morning, and decided to go for a walk. Yesterday I’d done the Randwick ->The City stroll I’d never gotten around to before, so it made sense this New Year’s Day to walk to Bondi Beach.

I decided to go via the two beaches between there and here, namely Bronte and Tamarama. Check them out on a map!

The sky was blue, the sun was out, I was lathered in sunblock and I set out. It took about 40 minutes to get from Randwick to Bronte Beach, which is a lovely and well tended beach in a cove surrounded by expensive tourist homes.

DSC05035a

Bronte was popular with dogs and kids, having both a large field adjacent and an ocean-fed paddling pool. As you can see there were many people out even before 10 am on New Year’s Day. The surf club had a thermometer which said 28 C. I was hot but bursting with energy. My feet hurt but I felt I could walk forever. I think the past three days have gotten me back into form and the limiters have finally been removed.

After a good gander at Bronte I continued along the coast, along the bluff you can see in the above photo, to the tiny and beautiful Tamarama beach nestled between two cliffs:

DSC05046a

DSC05050a

The top photo is taken from the south looking north, and the bottom photo is vice versa. If you can see through time you may be able to see me actually taking the photos in each of them.

There were quite a few model types at Tamarama. Adam says the suburb is nicknamed ‘Glamarama’ due to the richies that live here, but I’m inclined to think it may be due to the high frequency of ‘glamma’ types jogging and dog-walking and working out in and around this pretty little beach.

Next I continued north along the coast, walking high on the cliffs overlooking the ocean. The wind was strong and it was really a wonderful walk (if very hot!). Here’s an example shot of what the scenery looks like:

DSC05051a

Look at the colour of the water! Despite the beach and the perilous appearance of this little bay, there was actually a surfer down there. If you look closely you may be able to see him in the picture.

Continuing up and around the cliffs seen in the distance of the above shot led to the world famous Bondi Beach:

DSC05073a

Having been here a few times I didn’t linger. Besides, I was hot and hungry (it’d been about 2 hours by now). I had originally planned to bus it back to Randwick, but since I’m young and full of vitality I said to myself “What the heck!” and walked.

Coincidentally, the return trip went past Bondi Junction mall, which led inexorably to the food court and this:

DSC05075a

I’m back now, collapsed on the couch waiting to go and see hounds. Adam and B traipsed off to the city in my absence to do some shopping and museuming. I think I’ll take this chance for a little nap…

Friday Night Lights

Friday, December 30th, 2011

DSC04953a DSC04954a

The above were taken at Bondi Junction mall. They are representative of the sort of sights seen in bakery cases everywhere down here.

I had walked to the mall in the AM for a bit of a trot and to have a looksee. Here’s what I found:

DSC04957a

Yes yes, I know – enough with the Oporto already! Point taken ๐Ÿ™‚

In the afternoon we headed to ‘the cricket’, specifically a 20/20 game between the Sydney Thunder and Melbourne Renegades. We got there shortly before the start at 7pm, and the sun was relentlessly shining down onto our seats. It was quite brutal. But our seats were very good with a spectacular view.

DSC04968a

The game was at the ANZ stadium at Olympic park, which is where the athletic events for the Sydney olympics was held.

DSC04969a

I enjoyed a delicious $15 meal of chips, sausage roll and a Lift. I washed it down with this guy, priced at a reasonable $4.60:

DSC04985a

A Magnum. It was delicious. I’ll have to try some other flavours before I leave.

DSC04983a

Eventually the lights went out and we watched Melbourne beat Sydney in a close game that went to the last ball. This was an upset and there was lamentation amongst my fellows. Or not, especially since Bernard had placed a bet on Melbourne winning and won $8.60 ๐Ÿ™‚

DSC04998a

All in all, a fun night!

…oh, and here’s yesterdays TSV on TVSN (this is for KLS to have a laugh!):

DSC04961a

Fishing Season

Thursday, December 29th, 2011

Yesterday morning I woke up with a bit of acid reflux. I figured it was probably the double-fillet Otropo burger and chips I’d had for lunch. Or perhaps the 2.4 L of Lift. Or maybe the half a bag of licorice bullets, or half a pack of cheese and onion chips. Or Chokito bar, 2.5 fish cocktails and 2 potato scallops I’d had for dinner or maybe the 6 small cherry ripe bars. It must have been one of these.

Anyway the basic cure for reflux – exercise – worked well, and after a brief trot around Centennial park I felt much better. On the way I saw this guy:

DSC04925a

Yes yes, I know – always with the spider photos! He’s a classic orb weaver, about 6cm in length from leg tip to tip. He says “Hello!”

Pat arrived late morning, and we set off to the city for a looksee. A couple of items I saw when I looked:

DSC04932a DSC04935a

Christmas Rilakkuma says “Hello!” as well ๐Ÿ™‚

After some trotting around we ended up near the UFO catchers. Pat & Adam settled in at a pub downstairs to watch the cricket while Bernard and I tried our luck. I was not lucky; he was. Here’s some proof:

DSC04937a

Amazingly, this was not his only prize! The other was bigger and greener. I’ll post a shot at some point.

After this I went trotting around again (to look – unsuccessfully – for new and original postcards and to get some cash) while the others watched cricket in the pub. During this trot Bernard’s luck continued as he won $200 on a poker machine!

And then, when the cricket was done, we discovered ‘Fishing Season’.

DSC04945a

As you can see, it’s a tabletop arcade game with multiplay where the players shoot nets at fish to catch them. It’s token based, so you have to buy tokens and feed them in to play with, and as you catch fish the game shoots out tokens as prizes. Since there was no way to redeem the tokens, we just fed them back into the machine to keep playing.

For three hours!

Yes my friends. The four of us, on a $20 investment, sat there and played Fishing Season for three whole hours! How’s that for value for money? At one point we were up to nearly three times our original number of tokens, and I reckon we could have played for much longer had we not, at one point, just started ‘rapid firing’ nets just to burn through our credits.

And then, in the evening, there was four player Magic and K-Pop till midnight ๐Ÿ™‚

Happy Christmas

Sunday, December 25th, 2011

Happy Christmas to all! I received many fabulous gifts, many of which I’ll surely blog about in the new year, but for now I’ll showcase just one:

20111225-144611.jpg

Yes, that’s #58, the rarest of all FF books and the one that now makes my collection complete! Thanks brother ๐Ÿ™‚

Tomorrow I head to Australia for fun times and fine dining. As always, you can follow my exploits on this very blog…