I'll begin this blog by explaining the title; The bucket list I wrote about in my previous blog has many influences, one of which is a book written by a man named Ian Usher. After his wife divorced him, he sold his life on ebay. Car, House, Job and Friends. With the money he set out to achieve his life goals and ambitions, writing a bucket list of 100 items to complete in 100 weeks. This is where I saw 'Have a workplace romance', I put it on there, not as a goal I would deliberately set out to achieve, but something which I hope would happen at some point. And it did...

09/10/12

The rest of yesterday was similar to last week's evening in Port Douglas with Lloren, but a lot more casual and I guess because of that, it was more fun. We grabbed a pizza, ate it on the marina with some beers and chatted til the sun went down. The sunset this week was awesome though too. As we have each week, we got ice cream, got the bus back and chilled out. Today we had a lie in, went up for lunch, came back to mine and had beans on toast. It was then onto the beach for a swim, a few beers and more relaxing. After dinner, because Lloren is leaving next week, she wanted a picture on the rocks by the beach, naked. Naturally, I offered to take said picture and believe it or not, it looks unbelievably classy. Silhouette style with beautiful sunset colours in the background, I'm pretty pleased with myself. Now, as she's watching s***-factor, I'm writing this up before we put on Hot Fuzz. Also found out Max is coming up tomorrow and starting work on Thursday!

10/10/12

Max arrived! The feeling of awe at the beauty and sheer amazement at the room was relived as I showed him around. The fact that I have someone I know here until I leave is a relief. Everyone leaves in the next 30days, sure they might replace some of them, but there's always that risk that those replacements are going to keep themselves to themselves, or are in couples. Let's face it, besides Lloren, I only see the others at work or dinner times. Oh, and the occasional staff party, but it's become apparent that they're quite rare. So when she goes next week, I'd be quite lost I guess.

11/10/12

Work was casual last night, not a lot going on, but when I was dropping some guests off, Luke and Charlotte were walking up the hill towards Max's pad to invite him down to the staff house for some beer and fire. So, 20minutes later, I gave Lloren a lift there and after work I headed down for a cheeky bev or two. Walking back was awesome though, took a few slow shutter pictures and generally had fun. This morning, I decided to get up when Lloren went to work and go straight to the beach, I'm pretty fed up of wasting my mornings sleeping, but I'll find out how I really feel later. Don't get me wrong, I did sleep on the beach, but it's a lot better than just staying in bed. Think I had about 2 more hours before waking up properly and going for a dip in the ocean.

And not a single tip that day was given. Ah well, my whisky bottle is empty, I'm 4 beers lighter and it's good having Max next door. Drinks with the guys, or guy as the case may be, is good to have. Also, my chest is slightly sunburnt from lying in the shade. How does that even happen?!

12/10/12

11:30am; phonecall. Starting at 12 for an 11hour shift. I am shattered, maybe having Max next door isn't the best idea. He's moving today anyway, so it's not always gunna be like this.

13/10/12

When I finished work last night, it was straight to Lloren's. As she leaving in less than a week, any time we can spend together we are. It just sucks that our working hours conflict so much. It was about 12am by the time we decided to go for a walk on the beach. Tried taking pictures, but it was too cloudy for the stars and the glow of Cairns was too feint to look good. So we chilled out on a coconut tree for a bit and headed back. This morning I realised that when I sleep in until 11am or later, it's with good reason. I'm not wasting my morning, I'm catching up on needed sleep. So when Lloren went to work, I abandoned my thought to go to the beach and slept until now, 11:15.

14/10/12

Last night reminded me how horrible it is to drink too much coffee. It was dead quiet, so we had 2 coffee breaks. But this is in contrast to what I'm expecting today. Another group; 'Lend lease' who come every few months, arrive in force. Last night after work was nice, the kind of night where you lie there chatting and don't notice how late it's getting.

15/10/12

Sleep to Bus in 0.25hours. But knowing I don't have work is good. Lloren probably isn't finishing work until a bit later this aft, so instead of going into Port Douglas tonight, we're going to spend out time on the beach after work. This is why I'm going in now. I need some booze for tomorrow and some food for the week to keep me going. My appetite has gotten pretty big over the last week; yesterday, as well as the staff lunch (which was god awful) I had 2 rounds of beans on toast and 2 portions of dinner which was chicken wrapped in bacon, mash and spinach. After skyping with the rents last night with the rare perfect connection, I was getting ready to sleep in the bed I made two nights ago, only to find out that the space sky dive was going to be on! I arrived at Lloren's at 1:15am and creeped her the f*** out by walking into her room. Turns out the sky dive wasn't on until 5am or something ridiculous, but we saw the take off and set an alarm (which we obviously slept through). So as I'm approaching Port Douglas, I've decided my first stop is Java Blue for one of their Affogatos to wake me up a bit!

16/10/12

Lloren's leaving do tonight isn't at the staff house, but instead at one of housekeeper's houses, about 5 minute walk from the front gate. As I don't finish work until 11pm, I have to walk there by myself, in the pitch black. I'm going to get lost and eaten by a Kangaroo or something. That's a point; I better put my beer in the fridge! Starting work in 30minutes and a headache coming on, I've heard good news; not many check ins.

18/10/12

Yep, 2 days without blogging... What has happened? Not a lot, which is probably why I haven't blogged. Well, the party didn't go on for a number of reasons, so the plan to let off some steam was aborted, but walking home to find Lloren in my room was a welcome image when finishing work. Just back from lunch, me and Max thought about our leaving plans. We'll be leaving here on the 7th December, and en-route to Sydney on the 10th. A few plans made, but I'll be leaving what we do until the time.

19/10/12

Lloren left today, she's been a huge part of my life here at Thala and I'll miss her, I guess I'll have a lot more time to fill now. It's certainly the end of the blog with the title the way it is, but we are meeting up in Sydney. After her trip around the Red Centre, I'm sure there will be plenty to catch up on. I can't however, say the same about my remaining 7 weeks here at Thala, it will probably be the same old, same old...