Thank You To The Blackford Family!

well, i tried to be smart and look up thank you in japanese but i guess my computer and my ability to work it has its limitations when face with two types of scripts so this is what i got: ありがとう. Anyway, i just wanted to let the family know how much we appreciated their hospitality. this picture was taken in the japanese restaurant we went to on our last night...the food was excellent and i was introduced to wasabi octopus. not being a huge wasabi fan ( i find it often too fierce and mustardy for my palate) i didn't order it myself and chowed down on dumplings of some kind, followed by enough sashimi to scare me, while Caitlin gorged herself on soy beans then tempura squid. however, james, egged on by phil ordered the wasabi octopus and i tried it. wow! yup it had that mustard wasabi taste but it was balanced out by a delicious creaminess. next time i'm there, the octopus is mine. Phil and James then engaged in some sort of male bonding involving snorting wasabi or such like. anyway in the pic, starting from the back on the left, going clockwise, you can see Yuki, me, Caitlin, James, Lynne, Gregg and Phil. i very much enjoyed Yuki's company, and i was privileged to look through her art work and even think about the possibility of one day going to an exhibition with her or to the opera. Gregg made me think of an archetypal english man and when i think about him now, i can only imagine him speaking in an english accent as he took considerable time to show us around and entertain us. And then there was the sideshow that was brother and sister Phil and Lynne. All i'm saying is that Lynne came over as the well adjusted, normal one...Phil, you know what i'm saying!

and included for Corina is a pic of their back yard with Caitlin trying to sidle up to one of the wild cockatoos that flit frequently through. not included is a picture of the possum that Basil the cat killed! all in all,we loved our weekend in Sydney and were made to feel very much home! we hope to return the favour somehow and look forward to see them all again, esp now Lynne has shaved her head and is gigging as the asian sinead o'connor.

The Hall of Show Bags (aka the royal easter show)

now that's more like it! the day dawned hot and sunny for our trip to the Royal Easter Show at Homebush and off we set, having only had the Maclean Show as comparison....well, it was a bit like going to glastonbury but with less mud, more sun, fewer dogs on strings, more concrete. i'll admit it, it was only like glasto in that it was big with lots of stuff going on.

when we got there of course we separated into two groups, those dictated to by the needs of a 4yr old (i.e. me and james) and those child free and hence able to please themselves (i.e lynne and phil). I'm not sure what they saw (but i think it involved cows and wood chopping) but i know we saw a lot of miming by some probably very overheated actors in giant dora and fifi costumes. In between the bursts of incredulous excitement and dancing we of course tried to calm Caitlin down by taking her around the fairground and putting her on as many rides as we could cram in. And of course there was the pandemonium of the petting zoo just to ensure that she maintained her zen like calm.









we managed to squeeze in some stuff for us like a pretty thrilling avant garde acrobat troupe who were just back from Edinburgh (or on their way? can't remember), saw a man fishing standing on a big tank, and i got to enjoy another one of those ferris wheel type rides which scare me rigid but i'm determined not lose face in front of my daughter! through the miracle of the modern day technology called texting (and you all know how much i hate that) we were able to rendez vous periodically with lynne and phil, and lynne's very hungover boyfriend, dave. i think the blur of noise and colour that was caitlin was a warning beacon by and large. Or maybe that was just dave's hangover. Just to finish off the hugely relaxing (ha ha ha) and massively enjoyable day (and i DO mean that) we decided to go to what we thought was the jokily named 'Showbag Hall'. Now for those of you not in the know, a 'showbag' is a bag you can buy at the shows, obviously, and it's usually filled with cheapo toys and sweeties. it's often themed around tv shows, films etc. In our previous exposure to showbags, we had bought them from a caravan parked at Maclean Showground in a very Mitchell And Webb dodgily surreal moment. so little prepared us for the gargantuan effort that was THE SHOWBAG HALL (of dreams? build it and they will come...in their thousands). Imagine the SECC full of stands hawking every type of merchanised gift packs you can imagine, it was dizzying for us, let alone what it did for Caitlin's blood pressure. the flow of the crowd swirled us past a myriad of consumer options and eventually we hung on grimly to one island and gave caitlin a choice...she picked...the fairy one. out of all the tat she got, only the backpack and the purple face mask are still completely intact. overwhelmed by the mass of people we swam for the open sea and got out of there. we eventually managed to get back to the homeward bound train station, where we were joined by a fairy on the platform. she stayed awhile with us...but she didn't want to confuse anyone on the train into thinking there was a fairy on the train so Caitlin was returned to us, happily spoilt and glowing with her day of fun. Needless to say, phil fell asleep on the ride home and james and i took it in shifts to look after the little band of weary travellers. What a day.

Bright Lights, Big City, takeways, civilised opening hours, people, cars...yes it's Sydney

Are bank holidays the same everywhere in the world?

Phil had very kindly invited us to Sydney to stay with his parents over the Easter Long Weekend, so of course we jumped at the chance to leave our rural idyll and immerse ourselves in urban decay for a while. He drew up an itinerary for us which i faithfully reproduce here:

Philby’s Tours Down Under

“She’ll be right, mate…”

Itinerary: J McInnes, L Grant and C McInnes

Date	Time	Destination/Accommodation Details
Thursday, 20th March 2008	18:00	Check-in at Casa del Philby, Grafton’s finest ½ star hotel. Location: ?? Kent St Grafton, Ph: 664????? Inclusions: bugger all…
Friday, 21st March 2008	8:00	Depart Casa del Philby for Coffs Harbour Airport, enjoy the thrill of travelling along one of Australia’s most dangerous roads. Sit back and relax in the sheer absent luxury of Philby’s Universal Coachlines and Livestock Transport Co.
	10:05	Flight to Sydney, on Plummett Airways, Flight #1. Enjoy the pure nostalgia of flying to Sydney on an original 1908 Wright Flyer. Arr Sydney 11:30am (there’s always a first time) Note: Passengers are required to assist with engine starting procedures.
	12:30	Check-in at Blackford (formerly Bates) Motel Location: ?? Valley View Cres Epping. Ph: ???? Inclusions: More than at Casa del Philby…
	14:00ish	Trip to Chatswood to view Asian supermarkets, Rugby paraphernalia shop, and a shopping centre which is everything that Grafton Shopping World isn’t.
	19:00ish	Dinner, venue TBA (Probably at Blackford Motel)
Saturday, 22nd March 2008	6:30	Wake-up call, courtesy of Caitlin.
	7:57	Train to Meadowbank station, arr 8:07, 10 minute walk to ferry wharf.
	8:40	Ferry to Circular Quay. Arr 9:20.
	9:20 onwards	Explore Sydney-town, the Rocks, ferry to Manly, the Manly Aquarium, options include Darling Harbour, Chinatown
	19:00ish	Dinner @ Blackford Motel
Sunday 23rd March 2008	Morning	Sydney Royal Agricultural Show. Trains leave Epping at 30 minute intervals on weekends, Change trains at Strathfield and then alight at Sydney Olympic Park. Too Easy…
	19:00ish	Dinner. Venue: Sushiya, Chatswood
Monday 24th March 2008	Morning	TBA – more shops??
	13:30	Check-out Blackford Motel
	15:35	Flight to Coffs Harbour, Aeroflot Flight # ЯЙФБ. (1 night stop-over in Vladivostok, Siberia) Arr Coffs Harbour 16:40.

So we landed safely in Sydney despite our travel agent's best attempts...and we were met not just by Phil's dad, Gregg, but also by the universal welcoming grey skies of the Bank Holiday Weekend. In much the same fashion as i had carelessly thrown aside all woollens and warm clothing on leaving British shores, i had also abandoned any waterproofs, safe in my delusion that it neither gets cold nor rains in Oz. Despite having been rained on for a fair part of 2007 - 2008, i was resolutely clinging to this misguided notion so had not brought anything remotely useful with me. Luckily, Yuki (phil's Mum) and Lynne (phil's sister) were able to dig up a rain coat for me, notwithstanding the basic difference in body types between me (er, robust Scot) and them (slender Japanese)

So off we went into the thrall of the big city, with me repeating to myself the sage words of billy connolly, 'there is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothes' (only a scot could think that up). Our ferry station name amused us,as did the morningside of ashby. maybe i'll grow out of this, maybe i won't.

We reached Circular Quay and had the obvious tourist moment and uttered the same obvious words as every tourist has since it was built: 'crikey it's smaller than you think, eh?'. We then wandered around the Rocks and were reminded how hick we had become. I mean, god, who expects your shop assistants to be informative, helpful and friendly? where are you from, anyway? Maclean? where? Managed despite some determination on the seller's part to be as disinterested and dismissive as possible, to buy some purple fairy wall stickers for Caitlin. i remember when all her toys were going to be wooden and non gender specific...christ this world beats you down....cheap plastic? more please. but still struggling to maintain some integrity in the theme of her toys....anyway, we had a good explore and it was nice to see some builings than were older than a week or two ago. it was at moments like that when you finally experience some sense of dislocation, when you suddenly become aware of a disjuncture between our new world and our old one. anyway...we headed back to the ferries for a bumpy ride to Manly...any member of the grant family will understand the whitening of my knuckles during that trip!

The weather started to perk up (honest) once we landed safe at Manly. in this pic you can see our travelling compadres plonk in the centre -phil, gregg and lynne. all gamely showing us around AND dealing with the non stop chat machine otherwise known as a wildly over excited Caitlin .
We wandered down to beach and Caitlin built the obligatory castle before we repaired to the pub for lunch.




we then headed to the Manly Aquarium where we got these pics...i apologise for the lack of pics at this point, james had the camera and that's never a recipe for a gallery of pics from which to choose.

after this we headed back into town, lynne and gregg peeled off to head home and we headed into the CBD and had a peek amongst the fantastically expensive shops in the lovely Queen Victoria Building of course, by this point we are smelly as we have been on the go since 8am and have done a lot of walking...so i was bit scared of the super chic shop assistants so we just pressed our grubby noses against the windows and felt mildly superior. We finally hopped on a train home, worn out and city sated. Yuki and Gregg welcomed us back into their house for dinner where we supped aussie wine and japanese whisky and watched james' erstwhile boss morph into a brother in front of our eyes, teasing his little sis relentlessly before exhaustion hit. You see, he made the same mistake as Charlie...he tried to listen to Caitlin all the time....


here endeth the first day (thank god).

Easter Bunnies

well, here i am again trying to get up to date with myself. i tell you, i am far too busy to blog, let alone go back to work!

Lucky old Charlie got to be here when Easter was upon us so was treated to the slightly surreal experience of the easter bonnet parade. it was put on by the local primary school, and all the local pre-schools were invited to come along. all the kids sported home made hats and were to be judged and awarded prizes.
Jacob came as the easter bunny's carrot and caitlin wore a hat she had decorated in the style of...well, anyone's guess really.

Josie was there and fully took part as a little pink bunny, despite being neither at pre-school or primary school. she also took advantage of the sweets being handed out to the pre-schoolers to console them after seeing kids winning prizes. for some of them the dawning realisation that hey weren't all getting a prize was almost too much...as for josie, you gotta admire her initiative!

caitlin as usual, got into the swing of things as you can see, just being there was almost enough excitement for her. but the sweets helped.