Seymour Weekend

Last weekend was simply fabulous. As I mentioned before we all travelled over to Seymour to help the congo there with some of their rural territory. We had a total blast.

We headed off early so that we could meet the group in Seymour at 0900 and after a whole lot of organising, we got on to the territory. The rural territory there was the real mccoy. Not just sheep and cows, but snakes, kangaroos and wallabies. It was a very cool experience indeed. We only got to talk to a few people and they were all nice and kind.

At lunch time we all met up at a local cricket ground and had the hugest feed. Everyone brought enough food to feed an army. The weather was beginning to close in and there was thunderstorms predicted so instead of the planned BBQ in the evening, each of the locals grabbed a mob of Hoppers Crossing-ites and invited them to their house for dinner. The Reynolds, the Knightons and us went to the house of an Aussie brother and his Burmese wife. They were so hospitable. We had Burmese curry, pork steaks, potato salad, prawns chips oh the food! There was so much.

Next day at the meeting there were 50 in attendance. Considering there are 17 people in the congregation, it was a nice boost to the numbers! After the meeting we emptied all of the food from the local McDonalds before heading home. We were absolutley wrecked, but felt the buzz of the brotherhood. Awesome.

We took heaps of pictures there so let me know if you want to have a lookie. They are thinking of making it a regular thing every six months or so, but we will have to wait and see.

Last night was great too. Mrs L is here from NZ for work this week so we met up in the city for dinner. It was so awesome to see her and catch up on all the goss from New Zealand. We wanted to go to Mercadante (where we went a couple of times back in August) but they were closed so we went walkies to find somewhere else. If you know Melbourne, you will have heard of Lygon Street. This is a street that runs for many blocks and is jam packed with restaurants all down both sides. There is food from all over the world. Anything your heart desires. We found a place called Papa Gino's, a nice Italian place. I can't remember what the ladies had, but I had the Calzone - it was so huge that I could not finish it. Yes I know, I am man enough to admit that! The Calzone was stuffed with Parmesan, Mozzarella, Ricotta, egg, bacon and salami. Whoooah!

Anyway, its late and I need my beauty sleep (as if one night would be enough!).

Wassup dudes

Hard to believe it, but another week has gone past. My how time flies when you are having fun!

Work has been good this week, I am doing most of my stuff by myself now and only needing the minimum amount of help from the other guys. It is interesting work that requires extreme attention to detail, but I am loving it. It is nice to have the freedom of being out on the road by myself for most of the day but having the security of an international company behind me. Got to love those regular fortnightly paychecks too. Been a while since we had some of those!

This weekend we are doing something a little special. Tomorrow we are going to a congregation called Seymour who are about 2 hours from here. They have a small congregation there with a huge territory so we are going to help them out. We are leaving about 0700 so that we can meet the FS group at 0900 then we are going to do some rural territory that has not been done for donkeys. In the afternoon there is going to be a massive BBQ for all to attend then on Sunday we will all pile into their KH and boost their numbers for the meeting. Should be a lovely weekend and a great chance to meet some new friends.

Came across this neat picture on icanhascheezburger that I thought you might like...



Bye!

And the sun shone on

Yeehaa, totally love the weather here. Nice and sunny most days. We have only had two lots of rain since we have been here. The first bout went for about 15 minutes before it disappeared and the other was a thunderstorm that lasted all night. The storm was welcomed by all as it takes the pressure off the water restrictions a little. We liked the storm because it provided an awesome show to watch in the sky. You see, where we are is flat. Dead flat. In fact it is so flat that even where we are, 30 minutes from the city, you can see the city clearly off in the distance. This dead flatness creates a beautiful big sky. And when that sky is lit up by forked lighting, it rocks. Very impressive.

Last weekend it was so lovely and pleasant in the afternoon after the meeting that a group of us went for a trip out to a place called Geelong. It is a neat little beach town about thirty minutes to the south from where we are. Half of Australia had the same idea as us because it was packed, but everyone was in a happy cheerful mood. Kicking footballs around, throwing frisbees, walking the dog, eating ice cream and enjoying the warm.

After we had walked along the waterfront, we went into town and found a restaurant called La Porchetta. This is a great little pizza place that is franchised all around Melbourne. You can get a pizza big enough to feed a family for only eleven bucks. Mint. It was so yummy. This will be another stop for anyone who comes to visit us!

Work went well this week. From the Tuesday I managed to do most of the stuff myself without too much direction from my trainer so that was good. By the end of the week I was pretty confident and so am looking forward to the coming week to see how I go. I really enjoy driving around the city meeting with my clients and getting to know the lay of the land.

The Reynolds are away this weekend so Mrs B and I are home alone. We have just had a lazy weekend. In the morning yesterday we had a look at a rental house, but didn't like it so will have to keep looking. Also did some shopping in the afternoon and then watched a DVD in the evening.

Its now almost three in the afternoon and Mrs B and I have decided to go back to Geelong by ourselves and have fish and chips on the beach and watch the sunset.

Be good.

The first week of work

Well I survived my first week of work! My brain was absolutely fried by Friday evening. It was awash with numbers, addresses, barcodes and procedures. A lot to take in but it is all slowly starting to make sense. They are a really great company to work for and they like to look after their staff.

The weather has been just marvellous since we got here. There has only been a slight bit of rain. They do really need rain here at the moment, it is so dry everywhere. Maybe they could borrow some of the rain from New Zealand!

Tuesday was a public holiday (Melbourne Cup Day of course!) so the Reynolds and us decided to head out for a bit of a drive and a look-see around the place. We drove out to Bacchus Marsh and spent the morning strawberry picking which was great fun. Crouching in the blazing sun going "one for me, one for the basket" was neat. They were $9 per kg and the packs we had held 2 kgs. We managed to fill in two packs. We gorged on them for the rest of the day.

When we had finished strawberry picking we then went to Lederderg Gorge and went for a bushwalk. It was very dry and aris, but nice and cool when we went through patches of trees. Eventually we got to our goal of Grahams Dam where there is a swimming hole. The girls all jumped in for a splash around. For a while we had the place to ourselves and it was lovely. The quiet silence of the bush, the warm heat of the sun and coolness of the water was great. It is a great spot and will be on the list of places to take our friends when they come to visit.

Well, thats all for now, must go and finish my cranberry vodka!

It's offiicial: Melbourne ROCKS

This is my first post from the Lucky Country and what can I say? It is great. We are having so much fun here.

The Reynolds have taken us in and are just wonderful. We have met the congregation and they are awesome. We have been to the markets (again) and they rock. We really, really love it here.

Still hunting for a house at the moment. There are a few around, but there is a lot of competition and as such, the agents don't do much work, you have to do it all yourself. We have been scouring the net trying to find places that are in the territory of Hoppers Crossing. We are sure that something will come up soon. All in good time.

Looking forward to starting work on Monday. I already have my car which is great. My Toyota is not ready yet so I am driving a groovy little Citroen Berlingo. Uncle Don would be proud!

Right better go, sleep in tomorrow then the meeting in the afternoon.