Taff Down Under 7

Well it had to happen eventually, I got a job.

Bugger.

I've taken on the post of "team leader" working for a project dealing with kids with mental health problems. I know I fit both categories well, and therefore will have no problems working with the client group. It's based at the local community centre, Belconnen. My role is developing the service, and providing one to one, and group work, for kids' aged 5 – 18 years old. I also have to write a report for the education minister, and to make up my hours I've been roped into other projects the centre is running. Notable amongst these is working in a project with adults with learning difficulties, nice; I've not done much of that.

Work that is.

My assignment is called the "Bungee" project, the aim being to give kids the skills and ability to bounce back from mental health related problems.

(Geddit? Bungee / bounce? Please yer fucking selves then! )

So far so good, I've been on a two week induction period, one week down one to go, which mainly consists of sitting around with me thumb up me arse.

The community centre is brilliant.

Cop this:

www.belcomserv.com.au/bcs.html

And this:

www.belcomserv.com.au/everyday.html

And this:

www.belcomserv.com.au/interests.html

Oh, and for you poor buggers working in mental health in Penzance:

www.belcomserv.com.au/mental health.html

And those are things that are just there for me to refer into, put on top of that the extra community resources I have, and then rearrange the following words to make a well known phrase or saying;

"Shit as pig a happy in I as am"

Also, when I asked the psychologist who I'll be working with, what sort of a 1:1 caseload to expect she said, and I quote "Oh, probably at least ten clients, is that too much?"

Heh! Sorted…..

Bloody typical psychologist, our first meeting was to be at 10.30 on the Friday. She arrived at 11.50, having locked her keys in the car,and couldn't get back into her house to ring me, as she'd locked her keys in the car!

Funny thing happened on the way into work the other day. I was walking towards the entrance of the community centre, and walking towards me were a guy and his young son of about 10 yrs old. We were doing that nodding and smiling, looking away, looking at your shoes, looking at your fingernails, embarrassed to have caught your eye, sort of thing at each other that you do when passing strangers in the street. His son had just finished a lolly, and nicely went to put the wrapper in a street bin. Just as he got within dropping distance of the bin…Baaawk!

An Aussie crow exploded from inside the bin. The kid sat down with a thud and looked close to shitting his pants, me and his old man broke the standing vertical leap record for Oz, and then all three of us pissed ourselves laughing.

Aussie crows are big buggers of birds, and their caw is loud and raucous.

 

Oh talking about birds, sat outside the office eating me sarnies the other day, I saw a new parrot, well new to me anyway. Lovely all "golden delicious" green. I asked LeeAnne what it might have been; "a grass parrot" was the reply. Now you know I trust her implicitly, but I still had to look it up on the net, to make sure she wasn't taking the piss. She wasn't

 

They are a bit literal in naming things the Aussies', I mean, when you have a huge barren expanse of land, that kills weary explorers and travelers, and is as dry as my old boots, and covers half the bleeding continent, you could give it a more imaginative name than "The Great Sandy Desert."

We had Bethy's boyfriend Tom around for a sleepover the other night. Took them out ten-pin bowling, got them a stack of sweets and crisps and other unhealthy grub in, rented a stack of videos, and set them up on camp beds in the living room. Nothing untoward happened, Tom got out of there unscathed.

 

The other night we went to a community meeting, to protest about the "Gungahlin driveway extension," a road plan that may have serious concequences for our suburb, and a chance to indulge in some outright Nimbyism.

All the relevant politicos' were there, and to be fair, they put up with a right good harranging. The Aussies are far more polite than us Brits, they don't shout "stick that up your arse you twat," or "fuck you and the horse you rode in on," as we would. In fact the only thing that was shouted, quite often, and by me a lot once I caught on, was "that'd be right!" Which obviously translates as, "you have to be fucking kidding pal!"

 

Oh and while I'm on the subject of Aussie speak, they really do say "G'day!" "No worries!" "She'll be apples!" and all the other things that you have only heard in Crocodile Dundee movies.

And they are incredibly law abiding, speed limits are just that, limits. Not advisory, or minimum, but real limits that people stick to. How strange is that?

Oh and as I'm talking about driving, something really unfunny, I have to resit my driving test.

Not the whole thing, just the therory.

Those of you who have had the pleasure of being in a car with me know what a good driver I am. Never had an accident. Seen loads of them, but never had one meself. And these beaurocratic buggers want me to redo the test. Arse.

Went over to Alberts, LeeAnne's mates, for a night of boys stuff on Tuesday. Had a few beers, only the weak as piss stuff ( Aussie beer! ) as I was driving. The funniest thing about it was going to the local bowls club, that's the old foggies in white, lawn bowls club, to get the grub for the evening as they had a Chinese/Malaysian takeaway in there. You couldn't make it up? Anyway, a fine night of beers, grub and bullshitting was had by all, well at least by me.

This Saturday, we had some of LeeAnne's mates from work and their partners round for grub.

The menu:

Mushroom consome.

Roulade with red pesto, ricotta and pine nuts, served in green pepper sauce.

Cashew and brasil cutlets on a base of parsnip and sweet potato mash, with asparagus and squash.

Lemon delight.

Mars bar flavoured slices with coffee.

Cheese board.

Only one major disaster, not bad for me, but it was a beauty. I decided as the persentation was "nouvelle cuisine," to decorate the cutlets with rocket, and chilli slices. I bought tiny red and yellow chilli's, to decorate them with from the local fruit and vege market. Erring on the side of caution, I tasted the red chillis to see how hot they were. They blew my fucking head off, and I managed to get some on my face, wich resulted in me looking like I'd boiled my head, (not a bad idea, I can hear you say) This was just before the guests were due to arrive. I hastliy washed my face, and made myself look good just in time.

So I only used the yellow chillis as decoration.

They were even hotter and blew everybody else's head off, and I got some on my face again.

Ah well enough of my blather, drop me a line soon eh?