Gruen WA

Just watching The Gruen Transfer and I found The Pitch tonight very topical. Essentially, they are trying to sell the concept of WA becoming a separate country. Our premier is seemingly getting more and more irritated by his federal counterparts wanting our GST money and our minerals.

Two pitches were made.
Firstly to build a Cashed Up Bogan Proof fence across the WA border to keep all of the CUBs out of the rest of the country.
Secondly the secession of WA would mean that the Australian Football League could become the World Football League as more than one country would be playing it.

I did find the pitches highly amusing. I found both concepts relevant as I work in the Cashed Up Bogan industry and C is such a huge fan of AFL.

Check out the pitches and you can vote for your favourite.

In rocks we trust!!

HINT: Cashed up bogans can afford to fly in aeroplanes, especially with all of the frequent flyers points they have accrued from their fly in fly out lifestyle. Aeroplanes can fly over Cashed Up Bogan Proof fences.

Sunday afternoon snack

A cinnamon scroll and a cup of tea to end my weekend. Perfect!

Saturday Night Melbourne

I love visiting Melbourne. The river, the life, and the lights! The trams and the wires.

Getting around on my treadly

I found this article by the ABC very topical, at least for me. I do try to reduce the use of my car where I can, for short trips. If I have the time I walk to the shops to by groceries on a Saturday. Using my bicycle would increase my hunting range however I am reluctant to do so more for security reasons.

I am happy to ride my bike to work as I have a secure area in which to lock my bike, a locker for my gear and more importantly shower facilities! I take lights etc off it just in case, and lock the bike up. My helmet I store in my locker.

I am less comfortable with the thought of riding my bike to the shops, when I am short of time and walking will take too long. There are a few places to chain your bikes but they are quite exposed with pedestrians walking past frequently.

I also thought about riding to my physio appointments. The practice is close to home but in an awkward spot from a public transport point of view. The only place there to tie up my bike would be to the parking signs, and I do not think it would be too difficult to lift a bike up and over the sign if you had the inclination.

So... I think that they do not just have to look at improving paths for cyclist, but also more amenities for chaining your bike up for security purposes, and not just in the City of Perth but surrounding councils too. Oh, and they definitely need to educate Perth drivers!

Winthrop Hall

The University of Western Australia has some lovely buildings. Most recognisable is Winthrop Hall, the venue for the Perth Upmarket today. Wouldn't you know it, I took photos of the insides and the back and the Reflection Pond but not the front, iconic view!

As a student, the only time we ever used Winthrop Hall (and the Undercroft) was at exam time! I passed all of my exams so the memories are not too bad. I can recall however sliding off one of the marbled steps onto my backside after an exam that was preceded by an all night study cram session. Ahh, those were the days!





PS UWA also has some unlovely buildings, including the Engineering building that I always thought looked like a giant block of toilets. Who said engineers were soulless?

Winter dessert

A warm dessert with ice cream is a fantastic way to end a meal in winter.

Last night and tonight I made Apple & Cranberry Crumble to ward away the winter chills.

Frustration

I have been frustrated lately in my efforts to get race ready (!) for the City to Surf. I must have twisted something during the first run that I did, as I was unable to walk without pain for four days.

Three physio appointments, an x-ray, some new shoes and two weeks of rest and I tried to run again. The result - more pain and a visit to the podiatrist. She has done something to my orthotics and fingers crossed I will be able to gradually get back to pounding the pavement.

On the other hand I can still exercise and I have no excuses now for not riding my bike to work!!

It feels like things are starting to move!

C and I had a session with an interior designer last week to select colours for our new house.

I anticipated the session to be quite stressful, but we made decisions reasonably quickly (just over two hours). Our colour palate is fairly neutral and I get the impression that we are not straying too far from standard with our choices.

To make it easier on ourselves we are using the same colours throughout! The same benchtops will be in our kitchen and bathrooms, with the same cupboard doors. We only have one paint colour for our walls to make it easier.

Hopefully it will not be too bland. We should be able to jazz everything up with bright accessories, and the wall will be our blank canvas.

We asked for samples of our choices, we have a few and Tenielle from INDESIGN has promised to send out the paint colours and others when she has them. The photo shows the floor tile we have picked with cupboards, kitchen benchtop and laundry benchtop colours (clockwise from top). Tenielle and Mel went through paint colours and benchtops and the internal scheme before meeting us at Original Ceramics to pick tiles. Thankfully they did not have too large a range or we could have been there for ages!

We are building a house, plans are into the council and it finally feels like we are getting somewhere!

Mission accomplished!

Last weekend we went over to Melbourne to watch the Fremantle Dockers beat Carlton at Etihad stadium. It was a bit nerve wracking in the final quarter as the Dockers let their lead dwindle. Thankfully they held on and it made the trip seem so much sweeter!

Until I met C, I had only watched one AFL game live. I have managed two so far this year and my weekends consist of an AFL TV diet when he is home. (When he is not home I get blissful silence from the TV.)

I like sport. I just prefer to participate, or watch someone I know!

What was sad was the number of Carlton fans who left before the game was over. The same happened at the Western Derby when the Eagles fans left in droves. It showed a lack of respect for their team.

A superhero!

This young superhero was spotted on Saturday on Smith Street, Fitzroy. Great to see that superheroes obey traffic signals!

Hearts

My sister and I braved the crowds at a Bridal Expo this morning. We enjoyed the sample from The Sassy Cookie so much that we bought a bag of their heart shaped cookies for our afternoon tea.

We went back to E's apartment to put up our feet, wade through the rain forest of information that we had picked up and to enjoy our sweets.

The pastel cookies complemented E's pink heart cup nicely! A lovely and simple treat.

Girls Night In - Party Passions

Last night I was privileged to attend a Party Passions cooking class, organised by the Cancer Council. I did not realise how privileged until we were there and Erica from the Cancer Council explained. Last year the Girls Night In campaign in WA raised $275 000 and the girls that were at the class were responsible for 10% of that figure! I was amazed and very humbled. I knew how much my event had made and it all pointed to some of the ladies there raising significant amounts. We learned that one lady had raised over $5000 and there were two ladies next to us who had raised over $9500. Wow.

The class itself was called Party Passions and was run by Nico Moretti of Cooking Passions Cooking School. More about the class here. The food was all canape style and he gave us tips on how and what we could prepare in advance.

It was definitely a good night, very relaxed and it was great to meet some inspiring ladies! Thank you to the Cancer Council for the opportunity.

Thank you also to my wonderful friends who indulge me every year and attend my Girls Night In afternoon tea, and donate so generously!

Using the right language

Last weekend C and I dropped into a local dive shop to get his tank filled. Next door to the dive shop was a large oriental grocery store, that seemed quite popular. I noticed that the parking signs in front of the dive shop were in English as well as Chinese characters to ensure that visitors to the grocery store could not feign ignorance of English as an excuse for taking over all of the parking!

A girl can never have too many purses or girlfriends!

I am lucky to have many wonderful, intelligent and funny women in my life. As for purses... what girl does not have one or two or more stashed in a large tub?

First image here, credit for second image unknown.

I have found a few websites with the image of the young girls, but noone credits it or claims it as their own. If anyone knows the true source please let me know!

Motivation to run

I started my training for the City to Surf today. I have been exercising, I just have not run for any sustained length of time since February.

Today I ran the circuit that I was running during the summer. I managed it in 32 minutes. That is three and a half minutes faster than my previous best time! I am not as unfit as I thought I was...

Hopefully I can manage to keep up the motivation in the leadup to the race. Winter has to hit at some point. It has been lovely and mild here in Perth, with daytime temperatures in the low 20s.

Image here

Tourist information - Perth

For those of you who are not familiar with Perth - and also those who are - I love the spin this video gives to our city.

I have to report that, unfortunately, our "revolving prison" has been dismantled. I am not entirely sure what they did with all of the "prisoners" but there you have it!

Oh, and the public transport being "on the hour, every hour" is sadly true for non peak times from many suburbs. One of the reasons why I moved to live within 6km of the city!

The video is by the same duo who created "Hello, It's Freo". I posted about this previously as inspiration for my bridesmaids.

It is a truth universally acknowledged...

My love affair with the works of Jane Austen began in year 11 at high school. Pride and Prejudice was one of the texts in English Literature and I had soon borrowed her other five novels from the library to read.

I am still unsure as to my favourite story. I waver between P&P, Persuasion and Emma.

Last year I took the plunge and bought the Jane Austen box set of DVDs. This year I started to add to my collection of novels - until now I have only owned my copy of P&P from high school!

I woke up this morning with a desire to watch P&P again. It is such an entertaining adaptation of the novel and Colin Firth is of course a fantastic Mr Darcy. I also love Julia Sawalha's silly and flighty Lydia. What larks!

Morning tea

I love my little Zero Japan teapot! It is perfect for three cups of tea and just right for me when I am having morning or afternoon tea. I still have not added to my teaset, too many other pretty things to admire!

There was some Multigrain Fruit Bread from the New Norcia Bakery in my freezer and I thought it would be a perfect snack on this overcast Saturday morning.

Exercise in the City

J and I went for our Wednesday Walk again this week, that makes it two in a row! We headed to the river this time and J was intrigued by the exercise equipment available for us to play with.

We might have to try and incorporate the use into our walks. It would change it up a bit and stop us from getting bored.

The view is pretty awesome though for getting sweaty. I love running around the river. I cannot imagine an exercise location much better than this!

PS I forgot to add that J turned up in shorts and tshirt and walking shoes this time!!

I think I might be crazy!

I just signed up for the City to Surf for the 12km run. I have never run that far before! The most that I have managed is 10km when I was training for my Laos trip and that was all flat.

I had to predict my time and I ticked the "70 minutes or longer" box. I cannot imagine doing it any quicker.

My work offers a 10 week training session every Tuesday. It will bring my exercising up to four times a week - playing hockey + training, personal training and the running session. I will try and bulk it out with riding to work and motivate myself to either do a long ride or run every Sunday.

I have been putting off buying new shorts for exercising in as well as new running shoes, but I think they will be on my list of things to buy in the next month or two. I am arranging for shower access at work and have myself a locker so I have no excuses now for not riding to work.

Oh well, I need something to strive for. In 2007 I rode 420km in six days in one of the hilliest countries in Asia, in 2008 and 2009 I did the BRW corporate triathlon (400m swim, 10km ride, 4km run) so this is the challenge for 2010!

Image of random corporate team here