All About Work

It was the Sunday before Christmas and all through the house,
everyone was excited -- even the mouse.

Well we don't actually have mice, but if we did, I'm sure they would have been excited too.

We were busy working away, packing boxes etc, when Scott's mobile gave a jaunty little ring. He answered most politely as he didn't recognise the number, and was pleasantly surprised to find a gentleman on the line ringing to talk to him about a job in Nanango.

It all started a couple of weeks ago when Scott made use of the wonderful tool that is the internet to find some businesses in Nanango & Kingaroy where he might like to work when we move up there. Being the wonderfully pro-active man that he is, Scott then proceeded to write to these ten or so businesses, telling them how wonderful he is and pleading for them to take pity on us and employ him.

Two weeks later, or there abouts, and he gets the all important phone call that we were waiting for.

It seems the local hardware store in Nanango will be needing to replace a member of staff in early February, and Scott's letter landed in the owner's lap right before he made moves to advertise the position. After being suitably impressed by Scott's charm over the phone, it was arranged that we would head up to Nanango on the Friday after Christmas for Scott to have an interview.

So, after a two hour car trip, a short trip through town and a half hour interview, Scott walked out with a job. He starts on the 4th February and we are very excited. The furtherest he has ever gone for a job interview, but well worth it I'm sure.

To start with it will be about 25-30 hours per week, paid on a casual rate. This suits us as Scott rarely has time off sick. It's about 1.5km from the house and we will save money on petrol as Scott plans on riding his pushbike to work.

So, Yay for us!! No endless weeks of eating baked beans and noodles because neither of us have jobs.

Christmas is upon us but, for me anyway, it doesn't feel like Christmas. I think that may be because we are moving in less than a month-- that seems a lot more exciting and important than anything else at the moment. We've started packing a bit of stuff-- the plan is for my parents to bring the trailer with them when they come down on Monday and they can take a load back to their place to keep until the move. We have boxes piled just about everywhere at the moment, though most of them are still empty, unfortunately.

I have sent away a few letters asking about employment, but it was just to general people we found on the internet, not someone who had actually advertised a job, so we shall see how we go. Kel was talking to someone who used to work in childcare out at Kingaroy and the woman said Kel could probably walk into a directing job out there and name her price. I reckon that mens I can stay at home and look after the baby and cook and clen and stuff while Kel goes and ears the money. I've yet to talk her into it.

Speaking of babies, there was another scan last week (no pictures-- they are actually less exciting than last time) and an appointment with the doctor today. Apparently everything is still going as it should be. Heart beat is strong and all that kind of stuff. Kel has been able to feel movement -- just slight flutterings for the most part-- for a couple of weeks but I was able to feel something for the first time the other day. Now that was exciting hough it wasn't mush more than a second of pressure against my hand.

I am now off work until Jan 2. Kel has to work a couple of days in the middle there, unfortunately. But I suppose I will be at home packing and something. Oh well.

I also finished my novel the other day. It is now out being read by people in Vision while I go back and change the previous novel, which now has the title of Songs of Other Worlds. Or Singing Other Worlds. Or... something like that anyway.

Thank you. And good night.

Scott

General Rubbish

It's hard to believe that Kel and I have been married for only 3 months. It feels like it's been six months since we got back from Europe. And I don't mean that in a bad way-- just that it all seems so long ago. It's also hard to believe that in less than two months we will be moving to Nanango. I even brought some boxes home from work the other day for when we start packing.

And... And... in about 5 and a half months we will be parents. Everything has been going all right on that front, except Kel's blood pressure is a bit low apparently and, as a consequence, if she stands up for too long she feels a bit faint. We don't intend to find out the gender of the baby but we do have some names chosen. If it's a boy it will be Riley Caden Marlie Robinson. And a girl-- Bella Shyanne Lily Robinson. Of course, they could change another 10 times before May.


Kel's work recently went through accreditation. They haven't officially gotten the results yet but apparently they can't fail.

My novel is going well. I'm hoping to have it finished by Christmas.

Other than that...

Scott

Doctors

Kel went to have some medical checks done yesterday. You remember she was feeling sick when we were in London? Well, it turns out she has a parasite. We now have pictures and everything. She is due to go into hospital on May 7 next year to get it removed...

Yes, in case you haven' already worked it out, she's pregnant. Yay.

Apparently she was pregnant at the wedding. And during the week before the wedding. During that time she had an aromatherapy massage, ate things she shouldn't have, drank alcohol and did a dozen other things she shouldn't have. It was all planned, just not really expected at that time because of all the stress from the wedding. (Though Scott wants to know what is so stressful about marrying him?)

No ill effects from all that though. Apparently everything is fine as far as the experts can tell.

What else has been happening since we came back from Europe?

Scott is playing cricket and not doing particularly well. He is also writing and that is going quite a bit better.

Kel is still waiting for the accreditation people to visit her work. Plus she is growing a baby.

Wedding Flashback

We promised we'd go back to the wedding, so here it is... Cue harp music

Unfortunately it rained for most of the week leading up to the big day so, on Thursday night, we decided to move it into the reception hall. Not idea, but better than being wet. (And we did managed to get a refund on the park, so it wasn't all bad.)

Scott stayed at Kelly's parent's place the night before then spent the next morning running around like an idiot getting things organised while Kelly was pampered and what not.

She arrived only a few minutes late and entered the hall, looking absolutely amazing, to the sounds of Bernard Fanning's 'Watch Over Me'.

The ceremony was great. The celebrant put in a lot of effort and it showed. It was very warm and personal. The only hitch was a microphone that didn't want to stay where it was supposed to. Sharon(not mother-in-law-Sharon, friend-Sharon) did a great poem reading and nobody really stuffed up their lines.

After that it was off for the photos. We took some around the hall then headed off to Cleveland Point, where the ceremony was supposed to be held, for some more. Unfortunately we were a little bit pushed for time, but we still got some great shots. (see for yourself).

We headed back for the reception, which involved musical tables and spit roast. The spit roast was great and everyone seemed to enjoy the changing seating arrangement between courses as well. It gave them the opportunity (ie, forced them) to talk to people they probably would have ignored for the whole evening if left to their own devices.

We didn't do all the formal stuff in the usual way, spacing it out between the courses and and mixing up the order a bit. The main reason for the latter is that we'd secretly been taking dance lessons for about six months
and were a little bit nervous about the whole thing. We wanted to get it out of the way fairly early in the night.

To tell the truth, we were terrible compared to our last few practices, but that was still about a hundred times better than anyone actually expected so it seemed to go down well.


We chatted and danced and did the speeches. Scott's was very amusing (even if he does say so himself) and Best-Man- Josh's was very restrained. Scott got of more lightly than kelly did when Chief_Bridesmaid-Sylvia did her speech.

We left reasonably early-- 10pm or something like that and went off to... Don't you worry about that.

While we were enjoying ourselves, our guests stayed behind to clean and tidy the hall. They did a wonderful job, apparently, because we got our entire bond back. So we would like to thank them all very much for that.

And that's all I have to say about that.

Pictures

I know we did a post a couple of hours ago, but I just wanted to upload some random pictures from the trip. Because I can. Check out the pics added to previous posts as well.

Home Again

Scott was most disappointed. There were dozens of B & B's in Edinburgh and we just happened to pick the one that wasn't run by a Scot. (Okay, there may have been more than one not run by a Scot, but they aren't relevant to our story.)

So, our B & B wasn't great. It was run by an Indian family, if you sat facing forward on the toilet, your knees hit the wall, and breakfast was... interesting. (If you don't see any jam or butter on the table, don't ask for any because you'll end up with more than you will eat in a year.) But it was reasonably cheap. And reasonably close to the city.

We walked along the Royal mile, from the palace where the Queen stays while in Scotland up to Edinburgh Castle. We saw two guys do a talk on the history of the castle and weaponry and what-not. They were very good. So was the castle in general. Unfortunately, we left one camera back at our room and forgot to charge the battery on the other so we didn't get a whole heap of pictures there, but it was very interesting. We also visited an art gallery, browsed through dozens of tourist shops, had lunch in a pub. We had intended to get across to Glasgow but time was running out for us.


After two nights in Scotland we headed to the lakes District in north west England. It is a place famous for Beatrix Potter and... lakes. It was one of my favorite spots. We searched for a while to find a B & B with a vacancy and eventually found a nice place run by a British guy in really bad bike shorts, then spent the afternoon wandering around the town and writing post cards. Dinner, served by a guy from Canberra, was in another pub.

From there, it was on to Henly-on-Thames. We had intended to stay in Oxford, but it was a Saturday night and apparently, in England, everyone stays in B & B's. So we decided to drive on a bit further to see what we could find. And we drove a bit further. And a bit further. We drove until the next place on the map was London. So we turned around and drove the other way. Eventually we found a twin room at a far. The bathroom was small, the beds (both of them) were soft, the cows were smelly. And we had to lug all our crap up stairs so we could repack the bags in preparation for the London Tube the next day. Henly was a nice little town. Very picturesque-- but then so are most towns in England. We found a internet cafe and organised some accommodation in London via "Lastminute.com" (or a similar site). It looked like a nice place. Close to the Tube, lots of facilities, relatively cheap. Good choice, right...

And so to London. Sort of. If you want to stay in London, I suggest you don't stay in Epping. Technically, it isn't actually in London at all, but we didn't find out that until we hopped on the tube and... an hour past the center of the city, after passing through several small towns and extensive farmland, arrive in Epping, in the heart of... Essex. From there we had a 25 min walk (dragging suitcases). It was not so great-- not the way we wanted to finish our trip, but anyway.

Over the next two days we saw Buckingham Palace, the pub where Kelly lived, Covent Garden, Tower Bridge, Big Ben, Westminster Cathedral (we didn't go in there, they wanted 15 pounds-- God must be hard up these days) and we read for a while in Hyde Park.

We probably would have seen more, but Kelly wasn't feeling too well and the commute was killing us.

And then we came home. Customs stole the replica antique pistol we bought in Italy. We will be able to get it back but there's paperwork and stuff. And they cleaned Kelly's shoes because we stayed in the farm with the cows (and the foot and mouth disease thing). Channel seven was there filming Border Security but they ignored us (even though we had firearms and swiss army knives).

The trip was great, but we were ready to come home by the end. We were pretty much flat out the whole time. So that's all from us. There will be a flash back to the wedding coming soon (we will have pics on thursday. yay) You may also want to go back and see pics that had been inserted into previous blog entries.

Thank you.

UK Highlights

We finally found an internet cafe in the UK!! Yay for us.

We got into London on Sunday afternoon and after jumping through hoops to pick up the car we headed for Stratford Upon Avon, home of Shakespeare. Halfway there we had an initiation into English traffic congestion and were literally at a standstill on the motorway for about an hour. An accident up ahead stopped traffic in both directions, brought air ambulances and generally caused mayhem for all.

We eventually arrived in Stratford and found a B&B that would accept two slightly dodgy looking Australian travellers. Stratford itself was quite beautiful as we discovered when we took a short stroll into the centre of town for dinner. Of course, our first meal in the UK was in a pub. The pub was great, the food was great and dessert -- even greater.

We spent the next morning exploring everything Shakespeare. This included visiting the house where he was born, Anne Hathaway's cottage (pictured) and the dwellings of various other family members. (As it turned out, the house where his granddaughter's husband's brother's best friend -- or whoever it was -- lived, was very interesting. In all fairness, the tickets enabled you entry into all of them so we figured we may as well.)

After lunch it was off to Nottingham and Robin Hood country. After driving for hours, we reached Nottingham (and I have to say we were both a little disappointed). We then spent a ridiculous amount of time trying to find the castle by following the insanely inadequate British road signs (is now the time to go on a tangent about the abismal state of the British road signs in general?). Eventually we found it, parked illegally (didn't realize until after -- it's OK we escaped a visit from the parking inspector) and paid to go through the castle gates. That's when we discovered that the castle hasn't existed since the English civil war. Fabulous. Needless to say we didn't stay long.

We then hit the road again in search of a B&B in one of the smaller surrounding towns so we would be closer to Sherwood Forrest which we were exploring the following day. And we drove and we searched and we drove and we searched and we drove and we searched. Not only could we not find a B&B, there seemed to be no evidence of this famed forrest -- no signs, no men in green tights, no arrows whistling through the air. Nothing. We were beginning to dispair. Eventually we found one of the only B&Bs in Mansfield (a not very attractive industrial town). It wasn't the best appointed B&B but it was cheap and the old couple who ran it were very helpful and gave us directions to the forrest the next morning.

And so it was that Tuesday morning found us following a mud-map to Sherwood Forrest. Once there we followed a short circuit trail to the Major Oak. The tree is fenced off and many of the branches are now supported by posts and cables, but it was still very impressive. Scott was most excited to see his first squirrel on this little jaunt into the wilds of England.

Next stop, York. And after looking everywhere, we came to the conclusion that the Grand Old Duke had misplaced his 10 000 men somewhere else. Easy enough to do I'd imagine.

York was very nice. The accomodation was the best so far, and the most expensive. We went for a nice walk along the river, climbed the many stairs that led to Clifford's tower -- that once formed part of York Castle -- and explored the quaint streets in the centre of town.

Today, we finally made it to Edinburgh. We took the scenic coast road, passing through the town where Heartbeat (c'mon, you know, that tradgic English cop-soap show. Been around for years) was filmed. Very exciting. From there we drove through the Yorkshire moors which were beautiful. Miles and miles of rolling hills covered in heather and bracken (which Kelly was very excited to see. It was like all those Enid Blyton stories had come to life). Next stop en route to Edinburgh was the small coastal town of Whitby. We ended up stopping for lunch just outside of town because it was so packed with tourists that it was impossible to find a car park anywhere. The traffic was hideous and on the whole, we were glad to leave Whitby behind. After more scenic dirving, this time through the Northumberland moors, we eventually made it to the Scottish border, and then to Edinburgh.

Paris, Finally

It was a lovely autumn day, a trifle cooler than we were used to of late, but refreshing none the less. The birds were singing, the lake was sparkling and the buildings were all very quaint. Who would have thought that disaster was just around the corner?

But wait, I get ahead of myself.

It all started on our last day in Rome...

It was a stinking hot autumn day. The birds were mangy pidgeons, the river was putrid and the buildings were all in ruins.

We finished all our sightseeing by 2pm and that left us with nothing to do and nowhere to do it for 6 hours until our train left. We loitered around the hotel (which we had already checked out of) for as long as we could and took as long as possible to eat dinner at a pizzeria.

Finally, we boarded the overnight train (only moderately uncomfortable) and headed for Switzerland. From there we were going to Paris on another overnight train.

But wait, I get ahead of myself.

Back to the birds, the lake and the quaint buildings.

We arrived in Zurich at about 8:30am. It was very relaxing after Rome. Cars drove sedately. On the road. Pedestrians walked sedately. On the footpath. And when they met at pedestrian crossings, cars actually stopped. Amazing! We took lots of photos.

We snagged a map from the tourist office and set off on a self guided walking tour of the city. After Rome it was all very beautiful. There were lots of old buildings (most of them still standing), clock towers, bridges, spires-- and all very green. Amazing! We took lots of photos.

Yes, there were clock towers.

Yes, there were spires.

Yes, there were pocket knives.

But...

Where were all the touristy shops?

In the end we did find some with a limited range and high prices.

As our day in Zurich drew to a close we were relaxing by the river and the world came tumbling down! Okay, perhaps a slight exaggeration. But it was bad.

There we were, casually perusing our rail route to Paris when we noticed that Stuttgardt (where we were schedualed to change trains) was quite some distance inside the German border.
Gasp!

Normally, this wouldn't be a problem-- we don't have anything against Germany, as such-- but when your increasingly incompetent travel agent doesn't include Germany on your Eurail Pass... then it's a problem.

Two hours, two helpful Swiss rail officials and one (competent) travel agent later and we were heading back to Italy!

Apparently we had several options.

1. Go direct to Paris, arriving at 10pm and sharing a park bench with a homeless guy.

2. Take overnight trains through France, switching several times and waiting up to 5 hours for connecting services.

or

3. Back track to Milan, wait 30 mins and switch to an overnight train direct to Paris.

Not surprisingly, we took option 3 and found ourselves in a sleeper cabin (extremely uncomfortable) with 1 female English backpacker and 2 men of dubious nationality, moral standards and personal hygine. Their snoring combined almost harmoniously with the sound of the train hurtling through the French countryside.

And so it was that we arrived, finally, in Paris.

We ascended the Eiffel Tower. We...

But wait, I get ahead of myself...

After walking for an hour to our hotel (one of us complaining the whole way) we checked our bags into the luggage room and headed for Notre Dame. We both agreed that it was much better than St Peter's but were incredibly disappointed by the distinct lack of hunchbacks.

We browsed the 42 touristy shops outside (note to the authorities in Zurich) and bought an embarrassing amount of cheesy, overpriced souviniors.

Back at the hotel we were in bed by 7pm. (No, we were sleeping-- we were very tired.)

Day 2 saw us taking in the Lourve. There were many paintings and statues. (The French government seems to have bought all the best Roman ones.) And, come on, the Mona Lisa is just a painting. After that we strolled along the Champs Elysees and had a hot chocolate near the Arc de Triomphe.

Day 3. We lined up to get tickets for the Eiffel Tower. And lined up to get to the elevator.

Day 4. We got to the second floor...

No, actually we did get all the way to the top after queuing for the second elevator as well. Then we queued to get to the rail to have a look. Then we queued to get back to the second floor and to get back to the ground. It was worse than the colesseum. The view from the top was pretty good though.

We wrote some postcards at the bottom, ate crepes and made our way back along the river to the train station.

Then, to England.

But wait, I get ahead of myself.

We don't leave for England until tomorrow morning. So, if you made it all the way through this post come back and find out about the UK.

PS, please excuse any spelling mistakes in this post-- somebody went and rearranged all the letters on this keyboard. Some strange Frenchman, I bet.

Ciao Roma!

Yesterday was great. Possibly the best day so far.

We decided to get out of Rome and headed for the town of Orvieto, about an hour north of the city. It's one of those postcard places clinging to the top of a really steep hill and hanging over the cliffs on the edge.

We took a trolley car thing up to the top and emerged pretty much between a palace and the remains of a castle. From there we walked along the cobbled main street where cars had to almost turn aside if someone was coming the other way. Houses and shops opened right onto the street so pedestrians had to watch out as well. There are 3 or 4 churches, including an ornate (gothic?) cathedral.

We spent most of the time just walking. We could have taken a photo on every street and, at first, I think we did. There were little courtyards, shuttered windows and window boxes. There were narrow winding streets with bridges of the top. And the views out over the modern towns below and the Italian countryside...

Eventually we browsed through some of the touristy shops and looked in some of the churches. The best of the latter was a small one that had avoided the ostentation of the stripped, frescoed, carved cathedral and went for a clean, simple, white look.

There were some catacombs that might have been interesting but we didn't bother in the end. There were also some museums with more pots and coins and whatever but we've seen enough of them in Rome.

We bought some souvenirs, we took a thousand photos and enjoyed the peace and calm (even with a ton of tourists) of the amazing town.

Today is our last day in Rome. We've seen the Fountain De Trevi and the Spanish Steps (from the bottom this time), plus the Piazza Novona and the Pantheon. Lots of walking again, but good none-the-less. Now we just have to waste anohter 5 hours until our train leaves. And it's off to Switzerland...

Italian Highlights

Our rest day over, yesterday saw us heading off early to the Vatican and St. Peter's.

Despite arriving nearly an hour before it opened, we were dismayed to be sent to join a queue that stretched down the road for a few hundred metres. Or so we thought. When we reached the corner we realized that the queue was actually much longer than that, stretching on past the next corner as well. So we just joined the queue at the first corner. Terrible I know.

Once the gates opened it didn't take all that long to get in and then we were able to take our time making our way through the Vatican Museum to the Sistine Chapel. It was all very wonderous. There was room after room after hallway after room filled with ornatly painted ceilings and walls which, all together, made up the apartments that the Popes used to live in.

After this we made our way round to St Peter's Basilica where we joined another queue to get inside. This one moved slower and had us standing in the full sun, fortunately it wasn't as long as the queue to get into the Vatican. But damn it was hot!

Once inside the Cathedral, I have to say, we were a little disappointed. Neither of us having been in there before (Kel didn't actually go inside last time she was here), perhaps our expectations were too high? You couldn't fault the workmanship, everything was very well executed. It's just that there was so MUCH. The walls, ceilings, floors etc seemed cluttered with decoration and art work. We definately prefered our little find closer to the hotel (mentioned previously).

Next we headed down the road to St. Angelo's Castle. This is the castle where Hadrian's ahses were origionally kept. Apart from having lots of stairs, and a big spiral ramp, the castle had rooms full of tapestries and painted frescoes on the ceilings and walls, and of course the battlements with cannons, which any self respecting castle should have.

And now we're back up to date.

The Sights

Yesterday we went to the Colusseum, you may have heard of it. A lot of other tourists seem to have. We lined up for hours and... Actually, it wasn't that long. There seemed to be a squillion people there, but we probably only lined up for 10 or 15 minutes. It just seemed like a lot longer at the time.

And it's big. And old. Standing in a building that is about 2000 years old is pretty amazing. We took heaps of photos, we hid from the rain, we took some more photos. We took some photos for other people and they took some photos of (for) us.

After that we went to Palatine Hill. It's right next to the Colusseum - a whole mess of ruins covering a few acres. There's churches that are nearly complete. There are columns standing on their own in the middle of some rubble. There's a really cool multi level pool thing incorporated into buildings built into the side of the hill. There was a woman walking around in high heel shoes-- which is exactly the kind of foot wear I prefer while exploring ruins.

After lunch we bought some souvenirs (sp?) and made our way down to the river. We saw the Ponte Fabricio, oldest bridge still standing in Rome which lead across to Isola Tiberina. And just down stream we saw the remains of the first bridge built in the city. From there it was back to the hotel on the Metro and an afternoon nap. We needed it, after all the walking today and all the walking from the day before.

We started Wednesday at the National Museum. The first funery (sp?) stone and urn were pretty cool. As was the first pot and headless and/or armless statue. The 100th of each was starting to wear a bit thin, by the 1000th...

Next was to a huge park-- via various statues and fountains-- that contained various museums and villas. We saw the zoo and the dome of St Peter's Basilica from a lookout called the Pinico. We made our way back via the Spanish Stairs. (We didn't know what they were at the time so we didn't go down them.)

Our final stop was justa couple of hundred metres from the hotel. There's a bit of an unimpressive (by Roman standards) stone wall that doesn't really appear to be attached to anything much at all. There's a sign on it saying 'Basilica St Marina (and some foreign stuff)'.

But then you step through the door...

The whole place is cross shaped, probably about a hundred metres along the longest arm. The domed, painted, ceiling would be at least 30 metres high. It was cool and quiet and almost (well, not really) made you believe in God. Not sure what St Peter's will be like after that.

We will find out tomorrow.

Today, though, is a rest day with some reading and sketching (I'm terrible) and maybe a bit of a walk to something close this afternoon.

So, we are off to rest...

Ciao

O.K. We know we've been a bit slack of late and there's lots of gaps to be filled in. (Like a little thing called a wedding.) We have, however, made the executive decision to leave the filling of said gaps until we get back from our honeymoon.

Scene Break

WEDNESDAY 29TH AUGUST 2007,
ROME, ITALY

We finally made it to Rome and the hotel at 4.30 pm (Rome time - 12.30 am Australian time) on Tuesday 28th Aug. This meant that from the time the plane left Brisbane at 8pm on the 27/8 to the time we reached the hotel we had been travelling for 28 & 1/2 hrs. (Insert exhaustion here.)

The hotel is only a couple of minutes walk from the train station. We were slightly worried as we walked down the street the hotel is on. It looks a bit grungy (but is actually quite normal for Rome). The hotel is very nice though. The room is small but the furniture is quite good quality and the amenities are well appointed.

Despite being completely shattered we didn't go straight to sleep. We unpacked so we don't have to live out of a suitcase for this first week. Scott also experimented with local TV and we were slightly horrified when the first show that came on was a dubbed episode of McLeod's Daughter's.

In attempt to re-establish that Italian feeling so cruelly crushed by a terrible Aussie TV show we then went to find a pizzaria for dinner. There are about 15 of them within two minutes walk but in the end we settled on a little place called Dominoes. Just kidding.

Actually, we don't know what it was called but it was very Italian and the pizza was fabulous. Kelly was in heaven with pizza topped only in sauce and three kinds of capsicum. Scott's tomato and herb pizza was also great, although a little firey.

On the way back to the hotel we stopped at a little Aldi type supermarket to get some supplies in case jetlag visited us with an attack of the munchies in the middle of the night.

Now, earlier at the hotel we had examined the minibar price list and decided that we could afford to splurge 1 Euro on a bottle of water (approx. $1.70 Aust didn't seem too bad). You can imagine our surprise when we saw bottled water selling at the supermarket for 16 Euro cents each. We bought six.

Back at the hotel we finally gave into our exhaustion and fell asleep at about 8pm. (we had made a point of trying to operate according to Rome time since boarding the plane in Brisbane in an attempt to limit the effects of jetlag. It seems to have worked as we slept through to 6am and feel pretty good.)

That about brings us up to date. Stay tuned and we'll try to keep you posted.

Ciao

Rest of the Weekend, Finally, And More

So, where were we?

On Saturday Kel had the first of her Hens' gatherings. It was a lingerie party. We want you all to stop worrying-- she did buy some appropriate attire for the honeymoon. (Scott hopes she did anyway.)

Scott and his father were obviously kicked out of the house for the duration and went and saw a movie. A suitably manly movie-- Transformers. Well, okay, suitable if you were growing up in the eighties and like cheesy action movies.

After that there was a BBQ.

Two weekends ago...

That was the Mediaeval Festival up near Caboolture. We spent several hours wandering around looking at, but not buying, swords, armour, jewelry and various handcrafts. We watched some half naked, oiled-up men wrestling for a while. And some other men hit each other with swords. We watched gypsies and middle eastern dancers. (Women this time.) The food was pretty good and reasonably cheap. We also saw Lee, Kelly's brother, who was an official photographer at the event. And before we went home, we went and saw the stained glass collection in the Abbey Church

Then last weekend (I wish people would update their blog more regularly) Kel's parents came over for lunch and to work out a bit of an itinerary for the wedding day. After many hours and surprisingly little fisticuffs we came up with a plan of sorts that has already changed slightly.

Which brings us to this week...

Firstly, we own a house. As of 3pm on Thursday, we own a house in Nanango. Woo hoo. Now we owe... lots. D'oh. Everything went through. We have tenants for six months. And we can't wait to move up there ourselves after that.

But there is a wedding to get thorough first. Yesterday, Kel took (Junior Bridesmaid) Sheridan for her first dress fitting. Apparently that went great. Kel loves the dress (Sheridan's opinion doesn't really matter at this stage-- though she did like it too, which is nice). Then she went to see the woman about the flowers. There have been some last minute (okay, last month) changes to the bouquet configurations but on the whole they are looking fabulous.

And finally, half an hour ago, we got back from the latest, and final, hair trial. The kinks have been sorted out and Kelly is very happy with the changes.

We have also worked out the seating plan for the reception. Almost. There will be a few surprises there, but we want to keep that a secret until the night. Let's just say it will keep everyone on their toes. Don't you love surprises?

That wraps it up for this episode. We will try to be less tardy with our posting in the future.

Weekend Updates

The weekend was crazy-busy for us. It was all systems go from Friday night, with Scott's parents heading down to come and look at the hall with us. Scott went to the hall straight from work, while Kelly met both sets of parents at the flat and they all made their way to the hall together.

Once at the hall, we started by setting up a couple of tables in the general way we wanted them. Just to get an idea. This didn't work so well for Kelly, who insisted on setting up all of them. Just to be sure. It turns out that this wasn't such a bad idea as we had to try three layouts before we agreed on the final one. But rest assured, it's all under control now. No, really.

After this, talk turned to decorations and the setting up of cake tables and other such issues. All in all, we identified exactly how unorganised we are. Excellent.

Hunger pangs eventually got us moving again and we headed out to the Point to get fish and chips to eat under the lighthouse. This was almost a disaster. There was no light anywhere near the lighthouse (or any tables for that matter) and it was rather cold, not to mention the wind. We ended up eating in the car, and as we didn't all fit in one car, this left conversation a little difficult. But the fish and chips were great.

At this point we're going to leave you in suspense (oh, how will you sleep?), wondering what happened during the rest of the weekend. Which is code for: "We're tired and can't be bothered writing anymore tonight".

Wedding Stuff

Where to start? Our lives are just a hive of activity at the moment. Well, not really, but it makes us feel important to say so.

Okay, Number One:

Kel's wedding shoes have been bought. She was out with Syl on Saturday and saw a shoe sale. Low and behold, there they were. The perfect pair of shoes - the last ones left in that style, and even more amazing, they were the right size! AND, they were marked down to $15. Bargain.

Number Two:

We have written our vows. I know that you're all dying for a preview so here are a few short excerpts... "in you and" "you all I" "you and to". Not necessarily in that order you understand, we don't want to give away to much. But now we've piqued your interest, right?

And we emailed them to the celebrant and she said "They're wonderful".

Number Three:

We're going for another look at the hall this Friday night. Not the ideal time for us to do it, but it is the only time that we can get into it in the near future, so it will have to do. Parents (from both sides) will also be joining us for the expedition, measuring tapes in hand (Hey, Mum and Dad, can you bring that big blue measuring tape that's on the reel? You know, the big rolly-up one? Thanks, Kel).

This will be followed by a tour of the ceremony site - by torchlight, very romantic - and fish and chips at the lighthouse. Mmm, fish and chips.

Number Four:

Deborah got a job!! Yay for Deborah. If only she had the internet, she could read this.

Number Five:

It has been decided (credit for the idea goes to Scott's parents) that on the day after the wedding we will be meeting in a park for a BBQ. All wedding attendees welcome, BYO everything. Not sure of further details at this stage, but it will probably be late morning/lunchtime. Stay tuned for updates.

Number Six:

Deborah got a job!! Yay for Deborah. Still no internet though.

And that's all for now.

Postcards from Europe

Well, we're not actually there yet. We feel much closer though after paying out another small fortune last night. How come these things never end up costing what you were initially quoted?

We now have all our flight times (and yes, out travel agent has finally got it right and omitted the overnight stops in Dubai that we never actually asked for), our Eurail passes booked, our Eurostar tickets booked and our hire car for the UK is on standby. We are ready to go...we just have to wait another 2 months before we can go. That's a little disappointing.

The wait could be just as well though as we don't actually know where we are stopping in Switzerland on the way to Paris yet. Current possibilities are Bern, Geneva, Zürich or Lausanne. The one website we looked at showed better pictures of Bern than the others, so we are leaning that way at the moment. It also seems to be one of the 2 most direct routes from Rome to Paris.

O.K. Time to re-focus. Before our European escapades we've got a wedding to get through.

Tomorrow sees Kelly and Sylvia heading off to the party supply shop looking for balloons, tablecloths, car ribbon and various other items that we probably don't really need.

We also need to head out to the hall again soon for another look around. This will involve Mothers, DJ (possibly), decorators and measuring tapes. All of which will play a vital role in making the wedding the high class event that everyone is expecting.

Sylvia and Deborah have finished their evil scheming and finalised the details for Kel's hen's party. Much is still a mystery, we have heard rumors of Sizzler's and a massage a couple of days before the wedding though. Sure hope that doesn't end in disappointment.

Extensions - The Final Chapter

Yay for us!! (Insert manic, crazy happy dance here)

They have agreed to a adjustment in the purchase price for the house. The adjustment is to the tune of $2500 on the condition that we address the repairs ourselves. Of course, we would have preferred them to keep the money and fix it themselves, so we don't have to do the work, but we're not going to argue the point. At this stage we don't think we'll have to fix it up before we move out there, fingers crossed this doesn't change.

So now the contract has officially gone unconditional, there's no backing out now! On the 19th of July we will be the proud owners of a 4 bedroom house in Nanango. Wahoo! Now we get to pay it off for the next 30 years. D'oh!

In other news...

Kel had her hair and make-up trial on Sunday. The make-up was fabulous! The hair style will probably need some tweaking. This was a very long and involved process, so hopefully it won't be necessary for too much tweaking. Plenty of time yet though.

Kel is in possession of most of her wedding jewelry now. Sharon has done a beautiful job. (A thousand thank-yous Sharon.) We can't wait to see the rest.

Scott has also spoken to Josh (Best [this is definitely questionable] Man). Laser Skirmish (or possibly real skirmish if it's far enough ahead of the wedding) is on the cards for his Buck's adventure. Kel's Dad will probably be going so she doesn't have to worry too much about strippers, padlocks, train trips or similar shenanigans. This is very important because Josh isn't at all what you'd call an "Upstanding Citizen". :P

Kel's Hen's Party is also in the pipeline. Deborah and Sylvia have complete control over this (as long as they stick to some very strict guidelines) and Kel doesn't actually know what's happening. She's only slightly concerned. Reassuringly, Josh has nothing to do with this side of things.

Extensions - Chapter 2

The drama peaked (we're not talking Himalayas here, more like Mt Cootha) at 4.30 this afternoon. Kelly received a call from the solicitors to say that the vendors wouldn't be able to be contacted further about the deck negotiations until tonight, so a response would not be forthcoming until tomorrow morning. Not a problem in itself, except that our solicitors are based on the Sunshine Coast and they have a public holiday tomorrow. (Who has two public holidays in one week?!? - Not including Christmas of course.)

So, here's the dilemma we were faced with: We could apply for another extension until Monday, based on the current negotiations as well as the finance, or we could apply for the extension, only based on the current negotiations (confirming that finance had been approved). This could result in one of two responses from the vendor:

1. The vendor agrees to the extension and we have until 5pm Monday to sort out the issue with the deck. OR
   
2. The vendors get stroppy and terminate the contract because we haven't confirmed the finance.

"Why don't you just confirm the finance?" we hear you ask.

"Because then the bastards have us over a barrel," you hear us reply. "If they know we have the finance then we lose all our negotiating power and they tell us to stick it up our jumper."

So, we told them we'd take our chances and apply for an extension without confirming the finance.

At 4.59 this afternoon our solicitors informed us that the vendors had agreed to the extension (phew) and we now have until 5pm Monday to finish negotiating over the deck. So we live to fight another day. Hopefully all this extra stress hasn't been in vain and the negotiations go at least somewhat in our favour.

What on Earth possessed us to but a house 10 weeks before we get married?

Extensions

Yay for us. Well, sort of. We have managed to get an extension on the negotiation period for the house so we can try to get some money out of the owners for the deck. I don't like our chances, but it is worth a try. Their solicitors don't seem to be very keen to do anything much at all. And I don't suppose they need to. If the owners don't want to do anything for us, they don't have to.

On the positive side, finance has been approved. Woo hoo, lot's of debt.

Here are some more photos... (of the house, not of us owing money)

Kelly is going to have a test run with her hair for the wedding on Sunday. Scott's friend Sharon has been a Godsend. The hairdresser is her friend and will do makeup as well, all for a reasonable price. She is making the jewelery for Kelly and the bridesmaids. And her mother, who is a dress maker mother, will be making the junior bridesmaid's dress. If only she knew someone who drove a shiny silver car, preferably a PT Cruiser.

One hiccup with the junior bridesmaid's dress is the fact that we only have half the required material. Surely she only needs half a dress? Does anyone have two metres of crimson/fuscia chiffon?

So, that's all for now.

Feel free to comment so we know you care... :)

Cathy obviously does. Hi Cathy. Hopefully it's warmer in Canada than it is here at the moment. Doesn't feel like that would be very hard.

House Update

The contract for the house in Nanango goes unconditional on Tuesday. In a final hour plot twist, we have discovered that the deck roof is not council approved. (Gasp of horror from the audience.) To add to the drama, the roof doesn't comply with council standards and the vendors are overseas and possibly unreachable. (Oh, the suspense!) Frantic phone calls are being made at this very minute (or would be if it wasn't the weekend, and a long weekend at that) as our solicitor attempts to obtain an extension to enable us to negotiate this matter.

There will be verbal jousting, there will be money exchanging hands (hopefully in our favour), there will be tears spilt and alcohol consumed.

Stay tuned for more updates...

Greetings Earthlings (and Family)

Not very good at starting things off...

(5mins later)

Ah...

O.K. This is the blog of Scott and Kelly, created so we can keep far flung family and friends up to date with current (mostly not very exciting) happenings in our life.

Some of the soon to be current happenings include:

• Our Wedding
• Our Honeymoon (censored content only)
• Our move to Nanango (Bush Country)

Previously on The Robinsons:

Last weekend saw us jet-setting off to Melbourne for Tonya's (Scott's cousin) wedding. Tonya and Nick exchanged vows in a traditional Greek ceremony (minus plate smashing, much to Scott's extreme disappointment) then partied until the wee hours. It was good to catch up with lots of family (in Kel's case, to meet them), many of whom haven't been seen for years (by anyone! Amazing. They just appeared). Looking forward to seeing them all again in August.

The rest of the weekend was spent catching up with Kelly's relatives who are unable to join us for our wedding in August. Connie and Charlie played tour guides for us on Sunday, taking us up to the Dandenongs. Incredibly beautiful and incredibly cold. Not to worry, they warmed us up with fish and chips and borrowed coats.

We had an early start on Monday, heading off to visit Kelly's grandmother. For medical reasons she is unable to travel to Queensland, so this was her first opportunity to meet her future grandson-in-law. Uncle Al also joined our morning of chat, tea and photo-gazing.


After saying goodbye, we headed off to Kelly's hometown for a quick look around. The house Sharon and Marty had built was still the same (although much smaller) but the town had taken off.



We also had to take off, so we headed to the airport and back to Queensland.