Well Christmas was the usual combination of farce and farrago.

Let me start with an apology first; we forgot to get our acts together to send Christmas cards in time this year. By the time we’d realised that we’d missed the “last post” day, it was all too far gone. So we didn’t bother.  That being said, many thanks to all and everyone who did send us a card, we’ll remember you next year. Honest.

Here’s a thought, when will “dead tree” Christmas cards become a thing of the past, and e-cards become the norm do you think? I was all set to blast out everybody an e-card in lieu of a dead tree card, but couldn’t really justify it as they seem just too tacky at the mo.

Bethany was having Christmas with her father this year, as it was his turn. Fortunately for us he wasn’t going back to Tasmania for a holiday as he usually does, and we’d managed to talk them into coming to our place for Christmas dinner, so that wasn’t too bad. We’d decided not to have Christmas decorations as Bethy wouldn't be about, and were doing very well on keeping to this. Until that is Lee-Anne came across an illustration on a website for an “invisible Christmas tree.” “Right, I’m making one of these,“ she declared. Oh bugger, here we go. But to be fair to her, she got all the bits and bobs together, and cracked on. To say it took some patience is the understatement of the year. My only contribution was to dismantle an old fan we had lying about, to use as the hanger. The end result was spectacular; my photo really doesn’t do it justice.

Just before she left for her Dad’s, Bethy showed me a picture of the Christmas present her boyfriend, Brandon, had given her. Apparently it’s called a “Onesie”. I thought it was a  cow onesie, which earned me a good slap. It’s an owl apparently.

Christmas weather lived up to the stormy forecast, which made it rather nice, I got homesick again. Though some folk had it worse than others;

The Emergency Services Agency said it responded to 40 calls for help after the city was lashed with lightning and heavy rain. In the most serious incident, a Florey woman was watching television when a lightning strike hit a gum tree and sent a giant shard of timber crashing through her ceiling, directly above the couch where she was sitting. 

Jane Klose was sitting on this couch watching television when a gum tree was hit by lightning and exploded, sending this shard through her roof above her head. Mrs Klose said the ACT State Emergency Service worked for about 3½ hours to ensure her house was secure and liveable, and the family was able to remain at home for Christmas.

 

I managed to get this snap while driving home from work on Christmas eve, it won many plaudits on the Canberra website.

As ever I had left all my Christmas shopping until the last minute, and it was only on Sunday the 23 rd that I actually got my act together enough to start shopping. Funnily enough this turned out to be a breeze, and I got everything that no one wanted, and the usual smattering of “why the fuck did you buy me that?” presents, easily.  It made a distinct change from my normal way of buying presents; running around the local mall throwing my credit card into shops while screaming “Help me, please help meeeee!”

That night I got home and we started doing our “mise en place” for the Christmas lunch. Yes two days in advance. Nope, I’m not being Welsh about this, we didn’t start boiling the sprouts and carrots two days out, we just started our prep.

On Christmas eve itself  I was working. No punters kicked off, and there were a few spreads laid on at the office. It was a nice relaxed day, which was fortunate, as I knew the evening was going to be frantic.
That night I got home, and THEN the serious cooking started. Me and Lee-Anne  worked from six o’clock in the evening until eleven thirty at night, ensuring all the prep was done. Anything which could be precooked, was cooked, cooled and stored, and  all our recipes were laid out with millitary precision, for best efficiency for the following day. After five and a half hours of cooking, cooking for what turned out to be an exquisite meal, we were knackered. Knackered but surrounded by haute cuisine of the finest kind.

“We haven’t eaten yet,” Lee-Anne said to me, “what do you fancy?” I thought about it. I looked about our kitchen and dining room which were filled with the aroma of good foods, tables burdened by opulent treats, and shrugged; “Buggered if I fancy anything really.”

We ended up eating Dorito sandwiches. Just call me Heston.

The next morning we awoke. But first, let me step back in time a bit here. In the run up to Christmas, Lee-Anne had taken me to one side one day, and whispered to me; “You’ve got a special Christmas present, but you have to open it first thing Christmas morning.”  Of course, this set my mind reeling; “have to open it first thing Christmas morning, why?” Well the obvious thing that occurred to me was that Bethy wouldn’t be at home then, and we’d have the house to ourselves for a few hours or more. This set off a chain of thoughts which culminated in me thinking; “Christ, if she’s got me one of THOSE sorts of presents, I’d best have something similar to give her in return” Which found me one morning presenting my credit card at the “ahem” “XXX Adult Superstore”. Let’s just say I got her something leather and leave it at that shall we?

So as you can imagine something was up before me on Christmas morning. “Shall I get you your special present?" Lee-Anne asked coyly, “Oooh yes please!!!, “ answered my hairy brain, “but you open this first". So I gave her her special secret gift. She seemed very pleased with it, (and it fitted, thank fuck,) but somewhat puzzled. She left the bedroom, and came back with a square box, about six inches to a side, neatly wrapped. As you can imagine, my mind, and other bits, were trying to work out what the hell could be in it! I tore the wrapping off to find…

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 ……. A Heston Blumenthal “Hidden Orange” Christmas pudding.

Errrmmmmmm what? Not what I had been expecting, to say the least. “But why did I have to open this first thing on Xmas morning?” I asked, puzzled. “Well,” Lee-Anne replied brightly, having cottoned onto where my mind/balls had led me,  “mainly because  it takes  three hours to steam.”

Apparently Lee-Anne had been to the local supermarket one day, and had come across a high pile of them, and snapped one up. The next day there wasn’t one in sight!  It was lovely, absolutely stunning, and as good as the one we had tried in Blighty the previous Christmas.

We spent the rest of the morning getting the house together and doing the final touches to the cooking. Mary and her insane mutt turned up, and soon after Bethy and Glenn arrived. Not having seen our amazing Christmas tree they were all very impressed. The meal went down fine, and I didn’t even get pissed before serving it.

The menu;

Mushroom mousse, with pan fried bread and a fennel remoulade'.

Salmon en croute with watercress and rocket dressing.

Ham, roasted in pineapple juice with cloves.

Nut roast  with seasonal veg

"Butterfly" roast chicken with seasonal veg

Heston's "Non Sexual" Christmas Pudding.

Cheese plate.

 

Presents were distributed, and all were pleased. I got a Kindle fire, (which I’ve subsequently “acquired” hundreds of books for,) and lots of other lovely things. Everybody was astounded and impressed and amused by the 50’s replica radio I had found for Lee-Anne. She didn’t model her “early morning” present for them though.  We gave Glenn a really nice book on medieval armour, a subject on which he is an enthusiast. And totally coincidentally, he was given  the same book by Mary. He already had a copy at home in any case.

So that pretty much, after they left, was Christmas for us. We watched TV, I had three days off, Lee-Anne had eleven, and so the Christmas thing was done.

Between Christmas and new Year we had a day of technology hating. First our printer ran out of ink. No worries, we’ll go to the local store and get new cartridges. The problem was our old printer was old enough to have been  made by Caxton, and of the sort which needed lead typeface pieces reinstalling as well as ink. Looking about the store we found the ink section, but no inks for our printer type. I showed the salesman the cartridges; “Ooh, not sure if they make those any more, I can probably order them in, they’re about $30 each”. We needed four of them. I looked about a bit, and whipped out my credit card. Instead of buying four cartridges at a sum total of $120, I bought a brand new scanner/printer/fax etc combo for $78. Bargain.

It was while we were relating this bargain find to Mary that she remembered that we had bought her a hard-drive TV recorder the previous year, and she hadn’t got about to wiring it up to her TV. I volunteered to do so. After half an hour of fiddling with this piece of crap, and getting worse than nowhere, I came up with an ideal solution. I took it into the garden, put it on the floor, then rammed a pitchfork through it; “We’ll buy you a decent one”, I informed Mary. (Though we haven’t actually got around to do that yet.) 

Back at home our new fan was awaiting assembly. I looked at the assembly instructions, they consisted of a tiny, badly drawn, image, and the instructions; “assemble as in diagram, do not force, yellow the original way inds plastic hell, made in China, you’ll regret buying this.”Lee-Anne hid all the garden implements.

Back peddling a bit here. After we had Barney, (for Barney read “poor old Barney” from here in,) put to sleep the fortnight before Christmas, Millie was confused. She’d never been an “only dog”, and before we adopted her she had a “husband” and pups around her. We made a point of making a big fuss of her, and she seemed to be ok. But then between Christmas and New Year we noted something about her. Left to her own devices she would go and sit in front of the open front door, and not move. I pointed this out to Lee-Anne and we kept an eye on her. Every day she would spend any free time just staring out the screen door, watching people passing.

Being a soft old bastard, I cracked first; “Do you think we should get Millie a companion dog babes?” Lee-Anne burst into tears, “Yes, she’s so lonely.”

So we started searching online.

I’d always said, after Barnum went, that I fancied a Jack Russell, as they are a hardy bred, and would be good walking companions for me. So we were looking for something of that ilk. Looking at dog adverts is bloody heartbreaking, I'd have ended up with thirty or more mutts if left to my own devices, so I let Lee-Anne do the work.

One day she e-mailed me this photo from a local website, I took one look, and fell in love.

“Right, we’re having two of those then.”   Lee-Anne was surprised, “two?” My logic was this, if we got one, then, within the next few years, when Millie goes, we’d be back at square one. So getting two would mean they would have companions. I know there’s a massive logic hole in my thinking, but I’m ignoring it.

We emailed our landlord, and told him of our plans. Very kindly Vinod agreed to us having two pups, stating he knew how important our pets were to us. Lovely man.

I rang the girl who had the puppies, and arranged for me and Bethy and Brandon to go have a look at them on my birthday. “Ok, where’s Temora then?” I finally asked. Buggering miles away, frigging three and a half fucking hour’s drive away. I wish I’d seen that first.

(Oh, New Year’s Eve? I worked until 9.00pm, came home, sank a large Scotch, and was in bed by 10.00 pm. Fuck I’m old. Welcome to 2013.)

Lee-Anne gave Bethy instructions; “Don’t let Taff just grab two and run, if you think we’ll be ok with just one tell him that’s all we’re getting.” Now Bethy, despite being the most sensible and honest of kids, is still a seventeen year old girl. So on my birthday, we drove up into NSW, through the blistering heat with the aircon turned up to 11.  Brandon and the GPS navigated for us, as this girl lived not in Temora, which is at the back of beyond itself,  but another sixty kilometres outside of Temora on some redneck country dirt road. We eventually got there, and Megan, the owner took us inside to the puppy pen.

Bethy took one look, and asked me; “Which two are we having then?” We chose the most active looking two. We couldn’t take them straight away as they weren’t fully weaned, so I left  $100 as a deposit, and we fried our way home.

Later that day I got my Birthday presents, and fucking lovely they were too. I got a “No shit Sherlock” T-shirt, a Che Gevara clock,  lots of lovely DVDs, and a bottle of Laphrohaig!  (Amazingly, as of the writing of this, I still have some left. More on this later.) The funny thing is, since having whisky wine gums at The Fat Duck, Lee-Anne is now something of a connesewer of Scotch aromas. Not the taste, just the smell. Oh and the day after my birthday, while at work, one of the girls I work with asked if it was the “Big Four Oh” for me. I could have kissed her, but she’s bigger than me.

We had planned on going out for a meal somewhere nice for my birthday, and maybe taking in “The Hobbit” movie too. But after seven hours driving in the roasting heat, I was completely fuckered. So we ordered in some pizzas, and I drank Laphrohaig. And that was my 54 th. birthday.

We needed to prepare for the pups arrival. We knew they were on “Bonnie” puppy food so we scoured the net for a local supplier. There is only one source in Canberra, on Iron Knob street, (I kid you not.) So armed with my trusty credit card, and in the sound knowledge that I know the local trading estate well, having visited many of its sex shops and other less than salubrious establishments, I set off. I did several orbits of Fishwyck, and found myself none the wiser, and very very pissed off. I was going to call it a day, and head home.  I had 20 litres of best bitter which needed bottling at home, and didn’t want to waste my whole day off. I was passing a garage when I had a brain wave, I could call in there and have a look at a road map! I was doing just that, when I remembered I had a fucking GPS sat in my glove box. I found Iron Knob street easily using that. (But didn’t half feel a tit for forgetting I had it!)

The other problem we had was what do you call these pups? We ran an online competition and asked everyone at work, and ended up with three hundred different names and combination of names. I wanted to call them either Holmes and Watson, or Ted and Ralph. Bethy stated she wanted them to come home before she chose, so she could judge their temperaments, she's too bloody sensible by half. 

So on the appointed day I set off at 6.00 am for another drive to Temora and the back of Bourke. This time one may own, as I wanted to take photos, and for some strange reason no one else seems to enjoy me stopping every 300 yards to get the camera out again. I drove up, the heat was unworldly, in fact the area was experiencing some severe bushfires at this point, but fortunately not when I was passing. It’s an amazing area, Australia’s prime wheat growing area,  so your drive is through endless wheat fields, on long straight roads which stretch to the horizon. I took a zillion images, but, due to it being all endless wheat fields and long straight roads which stretch to the horizon, they were mainly crap.

Got to Megan’s, paid her the other $400, and scooped the pups up. She gave me the vaccination forms, and other bits and bobs and I drove back.

As I was not stopping to take photos on the return trip, it wouldn’t have been be fair on the pups, I put my foot down a bit. A bit too hard in fact, as I got pulled by the plods. I got the usual semi-sarcastic bollocking, but even I had to laugh when I asked the cop where the road speed sign I’d “flown past” was; “It’s back there just behind those trees sir.” I stopped laughing when I saw the size of the fine the bastard gave me.

So now they’re home, and settled in, and they are beautiful.

They spend all their time running about, fighting, chewing our toes, falling asleep, but mostly just shitting everywhere. For a while it looked like their names were going to end up being; "That Little Bastard's Shat on the Carpet Again!" But Bethy decided on the names “Digby and Ginger’, which I can live with, and will be better to shout for them down at the nature reserve. Best of all, Millie, although not enamoured of them, is tolerating them. She’s getting a fair bit of attention off us too, so she doesn’t feel usurped by them.

Here's a nice gif. of a Jack Russell, not one of ours I hasten to add.

We did eventually see the Hobbit, in 3D none the less, it was our wedding anniversary treat to ourselves, we had a great curry afterwards too at our favourite Indian. Lee-Anne introduced me to the delights of the Taj some time back, and as I was introduced to Indian food in the late 70’s in the UK, (thanks Terry and Noreen,) the Taj is a knock out. Without a shadow of doubt, everything about the Taj is a wonderful reminder of that era, the decor, the menu, the food, the ambience. It’s like stepping back in time!

Service is great, the wait is reasonable, the portions good, the choice small but interesting. There is a small but worthy wine menu, Indian beers, a must for me with a curry, are available. The best thing for me though, is as someone who enjoys the hotter end of the curry scale, vindaloo and other hot choices are on the menu. (Unlike some Canberra/Aussie places where you have to request your curry be served “hot”.) We love the Taj, we walked past many other places to be there, we have never been disappointed there.

Funny isn't it though, going back to  talking about the wedding anniversary reminded me, I still find myself, even after living here for over eleven years,  being struck by something, (a parrot, someone's accent, bloody awful TV adverts, an endless vista, a passing truck,) and  saying; "Bloody hell, I'm living in Australia!" It's not supposed to happen to usless fuckwits like me, I'm still a Bryn Road boy at heart.

The Hobbit, hmmmmmm…A good, but not great, movie. The effects were amazing, though unfortunately we were sat too close to the screen to make best use of the 3D effect. It filled the time space well, with no dragging, (I hope they keep that up for the next two episodes.) Thorin Oakenshield was a bit wooden, the rest of the dwarves ok. The music was second rate, they should have got Lisa Gerrard to do it, though that would have meant me buying the soundtrack CD . I'd forgotten how much more of a kids book "The Hobbit" was compared to LOTR. My biggest problem with it was , believe it or not Martin Freeman, do you think he's getting over exposed? It may just be that he’s in a lot of stuff I enjoy. Oh, I love the way they did a "Jaws" with Smaug, where you only caught glimpses of him. Benedict Cummerbatch is going to voice Smaug in later episodes, that could be good.

Lee-Anne writes; I mustard mitt to being mildly offended when I realised that Peter Jackson had made his trolls Australian. I thought it was the old "chup" on the shoulder that Kiwis carry about Aussies. Then I realised who he had based them on and I couldn't stop laughing.

Oh, Bethy’s been accepted for a place at The Australian National University!! She’s got a place to do a double degree in psychology and biology, with the aim of moving on to do research following that.

The University currently has the highest ranking for universities in Australia. It is also one of the highest ranked universities in Asia and the Southern Hemisphere according to several compilations, including the Academic Ranking of World Universities  and the QS World University Rankings (the latter two were amalgamated as the THE-QS World University Rankings until 2010).] In the 2011-12 Times Higher Education World University Rankings the ANU is ranked at 38, behind its rival the University of Melbourne at 37. The QS World University Rankings consistently ranks the Australian National University highly. In 2011 it was ranked first in Australasia and twenty-sixth in the World, one below the University of Tokyo, one above King's College London. It has dropped nine places since the 2009 THE-QS World University Rankings (in 2010 Times Higher Education World University Rankings] and QS World University Rankings parted ways to produce separate rankings) where it came seventeenth globally.

 

Yes, we’re ever so proud! She gained that without her International Baccalautreate being finalised, just on her year 12 score! She’s currently on her gap year and looking for work.

I'm on the wagon again. As I said last time, my cholesterol and liver function tests came back showing; that I was; "basically dead, just hadn't fallen over yet." So I'm on the wagon, only having a shandy on Friday and Saturday nights, big fun. Also, my diet excludes anything which may contain, have come into contact with, or indeed have been produced in the same county as, fat, at all, of any sort. Boy, am I a happy chappy!?!? On the plus side, I've already shed five kilos, on the down side, where the fuck did those five kilos come from?. Going to the gym at 5.30 am, fuelled by lettuce, and without a hangover, is just fucking wrong as far as I can see.

Our peach tree was overladen with fruit this year.

I had plans to make Peach Vodka by the gallon, but woke up one morning to find the flaming local  cockatoo flocks had had the lot of them. What they hadn't eaten they'd thrown on the ground. I should buy a shotgun. We have millions of pears though, so I may try making home-made pear cider.

For a man on the wagon, I'm doing a hell of a lot of brewing. My beer cellar (or the floor of the air cupboard as Lee-Anne calls it,) is heaving!

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So now to the important news;

The ABC has the intriguing news that today has been hotter than any other recorded day in January at 41.6 degrees. The all time record is for a February day at 42.2 in 1968. Another interesting thing about today is the diurnal range. The low this morning was 13.6, and the high was 41.6, for a difference of 28 C.

That should keep my family happy. The bloody weather.