ha noi

So, we're now on Cat Ba Island, relaxing after a busy couple of days.
Here's a quick run down:
Arrived in Hanoi around lunchtime.
Caught a minibus from the airport to the city (only $2 or so).
After being dropped of at the hotel we asked for, decided to say no thanks to the scammer and walked round to the other side of the lake to the actual hotel.
Walked around that evening trying to find the train station to buy tickets for the morning train to Hai Phong. Couldn't find it (apparantly a lot of people have had trouble with the Lonely Planet map of Hanoi), so we went to a restaurant for dinner and asked one of the guys at the hotel to pick up tickets for us instead. I proposed to Debbie at the restaurant, which caught us both by surprise. This photo was taken a minute or so later :)

Getting up at up at 5am the next morning, we found that they hadn't managed to get tickets for the decent seats, so didn't buy them. We thought we'd just go to the station and get normal tickets ourselves. Shame the hotel dude sent us to the wrong station, which we discovered after taking a taxi there, but luckily a guy with a three wheeled motorbike heard us mention Hai Phong in amongst our jibberish and drove like a madman for a couple of km to get us to the right station.

Missed it by that much.

Ok, this place is too hot, need to get a beer. Will finish the story later.

singapore

Man, I forgot how big this place was! They have free foot massage machines, free internet terminals and free wireless!! The humidity is also free, but they can just keep that if they like.

Damn, there was a photo for this, but we wandered out of the wireless coverage area and couldn't be arsed walking back again.

I'm also really in need of a shower so with at least three more hours of flying to do, I'm gonna be nice and ripe by lunchtime.

plane

This is going to be my view for the next 8 hours.

OK, now I'm done.

airport

I have a feeling I'm not going to keep up this rate of posting, but I'll do my best.
Started well: missed our train by about a minute, so had to get a cab. I'm pretty sure the first thing cabbies learn when they get of the plane is that the ONLY way to get anywhere is to take the CityLink. Seriously, if you ask them to take another route they revert to their childhood and forget their grasp of English.

Off to customs now.

Peace out.

off to vietnam

I'm just filling a few minutes before we head off to the airport. I think we've learned all we can (by that I mean Deb has done loads of reading and has told me off for not preparing as much) and it's going to be fantastic!
I'm mainly looking forward to the food... but also the cheap beer.... and I guess the bargain tailor made clothes in Hoi An are pretty inviting... don't forget hanging out in Hanoi's old quarter, eating grilled pork from street vendors... and shooting AK47s in De Nang is going to be neat as well.

Man, that three weeks is going to go by in a heartbeat!

Ok, gotta dash, see you all on the flip side.*


* flip side? What the fuck does that really mean? My life isn't a bloody record, and why would you guys be on the b-side?

national ride to work day

Scored a free breakfast this morning as part of the "National Ride To Work Day". It was good to see so many people riding in to work today, but it also made me wonder where the hell they are every other day of the week!
We usually pass only a handful of cyclists on the way to work in the morning and seeing hundreds more today showed that loads of people are capable of doing it, yet would rather sit on a train or drive to work.

It lead me to assume that most people only rode in today to be part of something instead of trying to stave off an early death due to FATNESS.

Sorry, I'm not a fan of people who do things like catch the lift to avoid a single flight of stairs or fat people who drink 2 litres of diet coke to make them feel better about the choloate they had for breakfast.

Hmm, that didn't end as planned. Here's a picture:

still lovin' it

So, I've had my phone for a few months now and I'm still enjoying it. Having no keys took some getting used to, and it's definitely harder to knock out a text after a couple of beers, but I wrote and sent this on the train after leaving the pub. That has to count for something... Right?

iphone

chasers

This is classic. The chasers boys got through two APEC checkpoints in a fake motorcade then one jumped out as Bin Laden.
Live News.com

a stool for men

square eggs

The photo didn't come out too clear (damn camera phone) but I thought this was funny:

"Unique square design".

laundry day

Haha, this is cool.
We let the washing build up cos it's a hassle to dry towels and sheets without a clothesline. That means that we take a trip to the laundromat now and then which totally beats having towels hanging over every chair, table and cupboard handle in the flat. Also, now that I finally have a new mobile, I can surf the net or update this thing. I guess I could always read a book, but this is a lot more fun :)

It kind of reminds me of MC Hammer's Blog, which he regularly updates from his mobile. The last time I checked in he was using a sidekick, but after queueing up with the rest of plebs, he's now using an iPhone. Good to see he can slum it like everyone else.

mobile test post

Just seeing how this thing works.

transformers

After seeing these, I don't think that anyone can really be happy with the shoes that they're wearing.
(Haha, Megatron is wearing Nikes)

strip generator

Ash posted a comic from this website a few months ago. I kept saying I'd do something once I had something funny to say.
I never got there, so this is my first attempt.

avatar machine

Sick of living life in the first person?

casting a net

For a long time I thought that social networking sites were a laugh, or a passing novelty at best. I mean most Myspace pages look like technicolour vomit, so were usually easy to stay away from.
That changed a little when I rediscovered Facebook. It's really neat being able to easily catch up with people you haven't seen for years, especially with the amount of effort that I've put in recently. I think I've only send half a dozen emails in the last 3 years that have actually left Australia.
Without signing up, I wouldn't know that one mate is moving to Melbourne in a fortnight, another is contemplating a transfer to Melbourne, another is four months pregnant, yet another is making a movie. It really makes the globe shrink when you realise the range of people that are sitting at your fingertips.
Maybe it's the booze (actually, it's most likely the booze) but I haven't felt this nostalgic for ages. I think it's time to break out the old photos, play some Drum and Bass and spark up a fat hooter.
Verdict: sweet

john howard

its been a slow few months

To stop this thing going stale, I thought I'd stick a few updates in here. Now to figure out what's happened since the 11th of April...

Well, mum's birthday was on the 20th, so happy birthday mum!
We got a new TV to replace the old 21" crt. The transformer in it was shot and you had to punch it to stop it from squealing.
Now I can play games on a nice big telly. We've also hooked up Deb's Mac Mini as a wireless media box, so we can stream video and music from computers in the other room (you can see it at the bottom right corner of the tv).

Dad is currently in the Solomons for a stint and last month he was on leave in Brisbane. After spending a few weeks there with mum, he came down and stayed with us for a week. It was really good having him here (and not just because we came home from work every night to a cooked meal). He now knows how to attach pictures to an email, so we should be getting some interesting pics soon.

We also caught up with my cousin Damian who lives in Clayton. We never seem to see each other unless another family member is over, but it's always a laugh.


My mate Travis finished up at work last month, which left a bit of a hole in the place. It was nice working with someone who was on the same wavelength as me. Now I spend a lot of my time explaining myself. So, my sense of humour takes a little getting used to. That's hardly my problem now is it?
We ended up at karaoke, which I really think is the scourge of the pub scene. What ever happened to self respect?


Of course, I say that, but Trav managed to get me up on stage for a rousing rendition of Tenacious D's "Tribute". Thankfully there's no evidence of that, so you'll just have to believe me.


Hmm, what else? Oh yeah, for our awards night at work we were encouraged to submit a team photo. There were prizes and stuff, so we decided we'd go with a superhero theme. I've never been any good at dressing up, so I volunteered to do a bit of Photoshop work instead.
It must have been ok, because we won the first prize of $500.


Looking at it on a different monitor now, there's a lot of stuff that could've been done a lot better, but it was good enough at the time.


So that's it for me. This weekend I'm going to try and send out a few emails to folks that I haven't managed to stay in touch with over the past 3-5 years. It not that I don't care, it's just that I'm exceptionally lazy.

Don't hold your breath though...

red hot

We went and saw the Chili Peppers play at the Sidney Myer Music bowl last night. After hearing today that Anthony Kiedis was feeling crook, it does explain why he didn't look as energetic as usual, but that didn't stop the music from being fantastic. John Frusciante just keeps getting better.

Here's the set-list if anyone's interested:
01. Intro Jam
02. Cant' Stop
03. Dani California
04. Otherside
05. Charlie
06. Fortune Faded
07. 21st Century
08. Throw away your Television
09. Jam
10. She's Only 18
11. John Solo
12. Snow (hey oh)
13. Me and my Friends
14. This Velvet Glove
15. Sunny (flea's little bass song)
16. Don't forget me
17. Warlocks
18. Stadium Arcadium
19. By the Way

Encore:
20. Jam with Flea on trumpet
21. I could have lied
22. Give it Away
23. Final Jam

Also, Chad Smith (the drummer) was due to perform in Federation Square at 6.30 this evening. What I didn't know until they came on stage was that Flea and John were joining him! It was a 30 minute jam session which was bloody brilliant. Especially because we were much closer than the night before.


verdict: friggin sweet