It's finally Christmas Eve, and I've just spent all morning making mango cheesecakes for dessert tonight... We're just waiting on everyone to arrive for lunch - should be a good day. Hot though, Elders Weather have the current temp at 34.2*C, with 47% humidity - meaning it actually feels like 37.8*C. Better than last year's 48*C!!!

I'll update tonight and let you know how the day panned out - with photos aswell :)

Only 4 more sleeps until Christmas!!!

Only 6 sleeps until Christmas...

Actually, we have our big family Christmas 'do' on Christmas Eve - not sure why, that's just always the way it's been, and the way people seem to want to do it, so who's to argue. It's a pretty impressive night usually, complete with a visit from Santa, and the whole hot Christmas dinner thing (hot ham, turkey, chicken, and roast vegies - went down a treat last year when it was 48*C!!! No matter what anyone says, Nana won't budge down from that tradition...). I don't envy poor ol' Santa... Can you imagine dressing up in a red woollen jumper, trousers, boots, beard and hat in that weather? And that's just the beginning - then you need to run for your life from a pack of wild bush kids who are determined to talk to Santa, and relieve him of his load (not to mention those older ones, who just wanna see 'what's underneath the suit???'

Well, it's finally rained!!! In fact it's still raining now, but more of a light drizzle. The storm made a grand entrance at about 4.30am, with thunder and lightning and the works... At 9am we'd already had an inch, which will be really good for the paddocks, and will also cool everything down a bit.

My new fave song is Evermore's 'Light Surrounding You'. They played it live on Sunrise on Friday morning, when Grant was leaving the show - I nearly cried when they were showing the flashbacks - hahaha Christine, I had the sense to be late for work so I could see it! Nah, but it was so sad, and I wish I could see it again, but I think the video streaming would be a bit much for my poor old dial up connection (@ 24kbps!). Anyway, yeah the song's cool, and I've already downloaded it onto my iPod. My other fave at the moment is a golden oldie - 'Don't Look Back in Anger' by Oasis.

IT RAINED!!!

Ok, so it wasn't exactly pissing down, but for a brief moment there this afternoon, it actually rained. It rained enough that you could hear it on the roof, and there was a dude standing out in the middle of the road outside work, with no shirt on, just standing in the rain. Pity he wasn't hot (and believe me, I checked, but no cigar).

And then Christine had to go and spoil it all by saying it wouldn't last. And true to her word, it stopped as quickly as it started. not fair not fair not fair...

Ah well, hopefully there's plenty more where that came from over the next few months...

Absolutely nothing happening here in the Swamp today, so here's a meme to pass the time...

Last Road Trip - Broome to Halls Creek (why? I wonder that myself...) about 900km with my mum and younger bro
Last Bad Advice - Better to be a plucked chicken than a f***ed duck.
Last Movie I Saw in a Cinema - Borat. I so want to go and see that again.
Last TV Show Watched - That 70s Show
Last TV Show I Enjoyed Watching - That 70s Show
Last Book I Tried to Read - mmm... does cosmo count? If not, then probably some book that my mum thought I should read. I think I got about 2 pages into it. Reading's not really my thing, unless it has to do with Guides, M*A*S*H, or music.
Last Thing I Left Home Without - my shoes this morning on the way to work. Also my wallet on Monday morning...
Last Take Out Meal - Chicken Treat last night. Too buggered to cook, and maccas was shut early for their work xmas party do. Slackers.
Last Celebration - last Saturday night at the roadhouse - dad put money up at the bar for everyone to get drinks, and had a pretty good night.
Last Item Loaned Out and Haven’t Gotten Back - oh god, that could be anything!
Last New Word of a Foreign Language Learned - ummm... none that i can think of... touche?
Last T-Shirt Acquired - it's been ages since i went clothes shopping... ok, I think it was a black capped sleeve t-shirt, with a printed white pattern down the side.
Last Package Received - membership application forms from Guide House. And before that was my singstar bundle I bought off of ebay.
Last Web Site Visited - http://www.guideswa.org.au/member
Last Injury - ummm... I scratched up the back of my hand the other week, and it went down to the meat, as my brother so delicately described it. Other than that, nothing for a while.
Last Run In with the Law - not going to jury duty back in September - they hit me with a $300 fine, which I appealed against, and had it withdrawn.
Last Place I’d Want to Live - Fitzroy Crossing or Halls Creek. It's a toss-up between the two.
Last Physical Fight - so long ago that i don't remember. I'm sure I have had one though.
Last Magazine Read - Cosmo
Last Thing I Broke - umm... I got a flat tyre the other day after work, does that count as broken?
Last Thing I Fixed - dunno, probably someone's phone at work
Last Thing That Made Me Laugh - Loz putting a gay pride sign on Chris' back numberplate at work, and Chris not noticing it until the next morning. Also, Ross and his coconut. That's always amusing...
Last Thought - only 12 more days until Christmas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I always knew that real estate in Broome was way over-inflated, but until I started looking for somewhere to rent on my own, I didn't realise just how expensive this little exercise would be...

For instance: to rent a 2 bdrm / 1bthrm unit in Cable Beach (the suburb, not necessarily close to the actual beach), I am looking at $290/wk. That's unfurnished aswell. It's certainly not a welcoming market to young locals.

This is a photo I took last Thursday of the jetty beach - taken with my new digital camera... I think it's pretty damned good. Although it does look better when it's a decent size...

Only 17 more days until Christmas - that's 3.4 days of shopping per person on my list of peoples to buy presents for. Not including the pets. If I include them, it would only be 1.7 days per person/animal. But 3.4 days sounds better, so that's what I'll run with.

Did you know that giraffes have no vocal cords? I read that on the bottom of the lid on my apple and blackcurrant juice yesterday. Come to think of it, I haven't heard of what noise a giraffe is supposed to make, or whether it makes one at all... You'd think that it would have some sort of grunt or something - hmmmmmmmmm...

Bought Matt's christmas present today, and Mum's last week... That just leaves:
Dad
Nana
Lisa
Merrion
Smells
and the animals: Puss, Grumbles, Geena, Kelly and Gerry.

My little Corolla had it's 10,000km service this morning - just under 6 months after buying it. I now understand what parent's go through when their kids grow up - my baby's not a baby anymore *proud sniffle*...

Congratulations Blogger! The first electronic thing in my house to recognise Daylight Savings on it's own!!!

Daylight Savings started this morning in Western Australia for the first time in god knows how many years. I've been sitting here this morning, wondering how many of my electronic devices will automatically update the time, as they are supposedly meant to. So far it's a dismal showing with a score of 0. The laptop (connected to the net), mobile phone and satellite tv are all still showing 7.44am, whereas I think they're meant to show 8.44am. But then again, I still get confused as to whether we're meant to turn the clock forwards or backwards!!!

Not that anyone actually wanted Daylight Savings, save for a few cocky politicians in Perth, who decided that they didn't really give a rats as to what anyone else wanted, they'd just push it through state parliament regardless. I don't know if they remembered the 3 (yes, 3) referendums over the last few years which have all shown that the WA public don't want daylight savings... So now we have a 3 year trial.