State of the Nation, well the State of New South Wales

Who is Barry O'Farrell, I’d never heard of him and I like to keep up-to-date with Federal and State (mostly NSW) politics, yet the question remained, who is Barry O'Farrell, well he is the leader of the NSW opposition party, yes the good ole Liberal Party, and the Deputy Leader is Jillian Skinner, at least I’ve heard of her. And for those who care Andrew Stoner is the leader of the Nationals and the only really known of the three (known to me that is!). So on to the good ole Labor party, yes the ones leading the state of New South Wales led by Dumb and Dumber, oops Morris Iemma & John Watkins. So what is the State of the Nation, oops of New South Wales, many will tell you ‘Screwed’ and numerous other adjectives I’ll not elaborate on. So to sum up the state is getting screwed over by Dumb and Dumber and various others in power, which brings me to Costa, what fun he had with Police, Transport, Infrastructure & Treasurer need I say more. Yet what is the opposition putting up as an alternative government, yes I hear you and yes there is still an opposition party, the coalition of Liberal and Nationals still exist, you’ll find them hibernating under the big blue rock just west of Bourke.

Isabella Starts Preschool – Enter the Moron

Well it’s been a big emotional past week for Isabella, yep she started preschool. She is going half day for now, well a half day is 8.30am to 12:30pm, however she is yet to spend the whole half day, mmmm whole half day, almost an oxymoron. Speaking of morons, since moving to our new apartment we see morons all the time, easy to understand this phenomenon as their church is just up the road. Yes ‘The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints’ I wonder what happened to the Earlier-Day Saints. Yes I’m a heathen (in your eyes), and you know I like to wear white business shirts and black ties when relaxing around the house, can I get the swanky black name badge. Yes, yes I know that’s not very tolerant of me, but really how many times does one have to be harassed during a busy lunch break by a moron dynamic duo out to covert heathens before snapping and pole driving them into the pavement is considered acceptable. My personal record is being stopped (well attempted to be stopped) four times in one week, this was when I had to cut across Hyde Park to get into the CBD. Talk about game (or just plan stupid) but they would just step in front of me as I powered through the park, unfortunately for them one time their timing was off and there was contact, my hundred plus kilograms at full speed versus their roughly eighty kilograms at negligible speed, I twisted a little on impact and they bounced of me and onto the ground for a short rest. About thirty other people raced past while the duo were out of action. Strangely nobody stopped to help; I guess they are like the lepers of our time. Yet again I digress with my unkind thoughts, as Kamahl would say, ‘why are people so unkind’.

Anyhow Isabella’s week has been hard, I think she must be thinking why are people so unkind, why does daddy leave me here then he just disappears. Well I do say bye and tell her I’ll be back (without the Arnold Schwarzenegger's accent) and the water works kick into high gear, by the end of the week she was starting the water works as soon as we entered the property, stopping when distracted by some of her play friends and starting up again when I say bye. She seems to be happy and having fun when I return. The teachers say she has improved quickly from the first day of crying playing with a ball on her own to fully integrating with the other kids and activities. Thankfully she is still happy to see me when I arrive to collect her. Hopefully the water works / screaming drop-off will cease soon, nobody likes to see a grown man sobbing in the corner. Hopefully this upcoming week she’ll stay the whole half day, best we did this past week was 9 to 12 on Friday, Monday on the other hand was 10 to 11:30, so we are getting better! I think the 8:30 starts aren’t likely as that requires me getting out of bed earlier.

Gong Xi Fa Cai - Gong Hei Fat Choy

Here's wishing all those celebrating the Chinese New Year a joyous and prosperous year ahead. Bring on Year of the Rat, Baby! I decided to go with both the Mandarin & Cantonese version as we live in Singapore but have Cantonese speaking friends. So Gong Xi Fa Cai Singapore and Gong Hei Fat Choy Cantonese speaker.

Hello World, We’re Still Alive!

Yes it’s been awhile since our last blog, and we have been very busy and then I became very lazy. We did move a week before Christmas, oh how busy we were. By the way, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, Patriotic Australia Day and Happy Chinese New Year (I had to get in early for at least one). We have finally settled in, well we had settling in before Christmas we just hadn’t finished stacking and packing stuff away, but today we did, the last remaining activity was stacking and ordering the bookcase, let me say woohoo it’s done. We have visitors arriving tonight for a few days so we had motivation to finish.

What else has been happening, oh yes the cricket saga. I don’t care if Harbhajan Singh is guilty or not. But as for the Indian cricket hierarchy’s un-sports-person like behaviour, please take your bat and ball and bugger off on your chartered plane and please don’t forget to stow your dodgy attitude in the overhead locker! Maybe it’s time to start watching golf or maybe even the grass growing over the unused cricket pitch.