Back again! No photos coz I'm using a mac at the moment and the image uploader seems to have issues with Safari, so you'll have to wait until I get access to a PC again. Went to the Museum and Gallery in Hobart which was alright. Lots of stuffed local fauna and too many portraits but good anyway. Then I went gallery hunting and found a really cool one at the bottom end of criterion street called (wait for it) the Criterion Gallery (www.criteriongallery.com.au) which showcases work by contemporary artists from Tasmania, the mainland and New Zealand. On Friday Lisa drove me up to the top of Mt Wellington which was to be honest absolutely FREEZING but I got some good photos from up there so it was worth it from that point of view then in the evening we left the kids with the babysitters and went out for a few drinks in town. Went to the knopwood first which was packed and met up with some friends of John and Lisa's who were down here for a stag do for the weekend. Stopped of at Mykonos for Lamb Souvlakis on the way back (heavy on the chilli sauce!) and crashed fairly shortly after. Saturday began with a trip down to Salamanca market where I got some good christmas presents but started to feel a bit rough after the last night's activities so got a bus back home and crashed in the tent for the afternoon.

In the evening Lisa and I bundled the kids in the car and went round to a friend of their's house for a birthday BBQ. John was already there as he had been trying to fit a new bathroom for Dean (who's birthday it was) unfortunately progress had been slow and tools had been downed by the time we arrived. Food was consumed, Cascade was drunk in quantity (Dean works for the brewery) and John and I finally made it out of there at about half three in the morning. We were offered scooters to ride home on which we were nearly drunk enough to take but at the last minute decided walking was safer. Given the fact that we weaved all over the road as it was this was probably a very wise decision - waking up in a ditch the next morning with a broken leg is not my idea of fun!

Sunday was understandably taken at a fairly leisurely pace, or would have been if a large quantity of logging wasn't going on in the front garden. I excused myself for a while as I didn't really trust myself (or anyone else) with a chainsaw or an axe at the time, but I did manage to summon up the energy to go and help load the logs into the ute. We had planned to go to Richmond after all this wa done but by that time it was getting late so we took a trip down to Kingston Beach and then hit Mykonos again on the way home before chilling in front of Australian Idol, which was won by an irish bloke...