Melbourne 16/12/07 -

Hello... thought I would do a little update during my break at work and since Paul told me Toadie was in Hull (gutted!)... I thought I'd best let you all know that I've now seen THE Dr Carl Kennedy... what a ledge!!!

On christmas eve me and Mel decided to have a few drinks at home and then head out to St Kilda as we needed to buy our Espy tickets for new year. They're having loads of bands there (it's a bit like a massive adelphi in Hull... except without the smell of sewage!) and our Irish mate Elaine and her crew are going so we needed to make sure we got tickets in time. Anywho, the Espy was dead (although the bouncers were feeling super chatty and festive) so we decided to try the Elephant and Wheelbarrow down the road as we'd heard it was a 'proper pub' not a namby pamby bar. The place is seperated off into different rooms so we went to check them all out only to be told that behind one door there was a neighbours night going on... it happens every monday and we did know about it but had completely forgotten!!! After we'd got ourselves a drink we overheard an announcement that Carl Kennedy's band "Waiting Room" were about to play and I was gutted that I was about to miss it... but the star of a doorman let us in on the sly and then later on the doors opened up anyway. The band were great and Carl is an absolute legend... what a guy!!! Me and Mel were like kids singing along to all the covers he did and we made friends with a bunch of irish guys in the crowd too... what a night!!! Can't wait to get the pics up for you all to see... so will try and get that sorted soon.... ooh... and Mel pashed one of the irish fella's... she'll kill me for writing that... and even more when I tell you she forgot to ask his name... what a hussy, hehe!!!

Both of our housemates were away for christmas... Tanya was in Tassie with her bloke Brett and his family and Mark went back to see his parents in Adelaide, so me and Mel had the place to ourselves. But to make sure that we all got to celebrate together (and eat as much as possible) we had an "O'Grady Christmas" (we live down O'Grady St) the thursday before christmas. It was loads of fun and we didn't even need to cook as Tanya had taken care of everything... excellent!!! Really great food... the best dessert... and lovely company.

We had a christmas day BBQ invite from Elaine, but decided that we would give the whole cooking thing a go and make our own... which actually turned out rather well even if I do say so myself... we even had christmas crackers and everything!!! Had a few drinks in the morning so after our feast we napped (rock and roll!) then just ate more and chilled out in the evening. Our schedule was pretty much drink, eat, sleep, eat, drink, sleep!

On boxing day we went to see P.S. I Love You at the cinema (using the cinema passes Mark got us for christmas... cheers Mark!), which all you ladies back home should go see... it's a super weepy chick flick!!! The cinema is in the Crown complex which is a big casino / shopping centre / cinema / food court / nightclub / music venue... so we finally got to check all that out and even caught the 4 o-clock christmas spectacular show... which wasn't really that spectacular... although it probably is aimed at 5 year olds!!! We also saw a massive gingerbread village that some local uni had made... mmmm gingerbread!!!

Not really too much to report other than that. I have now changed jobs and work for AGL, which is a gas and electricity company (yes npower people... I know I am a geek!). It wasn't actually through choice... just where UCMS moved us... but as I had previous experience I dont have to go on the phones and got my very own role doing batching and quality checks etc... beats getting shouted at by grumpy customers!!!!

Haven't had chance to check out the temperature back home for a while, but it is currently el-scorchio here, around 33 degrees today and forecast 36-38 for the weekend and around 42 for new years eve... eek, lets hope I don't melt! Well that's all for now... going out in St Kilda again tonight with Elaine, etc so hopefully it'll be a gudun.

Hope you all had a great christmas and HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone!!!

x x x