Hobbes

Midsummer 2009 photos

2009-12-21T02:44:46Z

http://www.flickr.com/photos/29033702@N03/sets/72157622915792341/

All these photos are taken by tomble who is an awesome photographer, if anyone would like one of them taken down, please ask.

Baby Snake

2009-12-20T23:53:51Z

http://www.flickr.com/photos/29033702@N03/sets/72157622914932833/

Stuff left behind at Midsummer

2009-12-20T23:10:13Z

- Seamus's purse (collected)
- Althea's sunglasses
- Sarah's sunglasses (okay technically they were left last night when they came to pick up the purse :)
- Penny's (I think) green jacket
- A black stone bracelet (I think it is Evie's, based on photographic evidence)
- A whole bunch of kitchen stuff, punch bowls, plates, salad bowls. Please put your hand up if these belong to you.
- Several people's dignity :)

kitling @ 2009-12-20T14:20:00

2009-12-20T03:20:57Z

New hobby - dressing girls up to match vodka bottles :)

One has to wonder what special edition Absolut I can dress people up in next time.

Welcome to Absolut Disco!

Happy Midsummer everyone!

kitling @ 2009-12-18T14:21:00

2009-12-18T03:21:10Z

Calling the State Library - I was second in queue when i called. Its 25minutes later - and I'm next in queue....

At 35minutes I gave up - it would be quicker to go in person.

Work drinkies time.

kitling @ 2009-12-17T19:13:00

2009-12-17T08:13:32Z

i lost my purse

bugger

this is going to make the next little bit annoying. i need to replace all my cards

kitling @ 2009-12-15T09:02:00

2009-12-14T22:02:14Z

Drains are well blocked.

Impatiently waiting for real estate agent to answer phones as this is beyond our repair abilities and we need a plumber.

In better news - me and Megan built an Absolut Disco in our backyard :)

kitling @ 2009-12-14T15:51:00

2009-12-14T04:51:16Z

Also wanted for Midsummer

- A good non alcoholic punch recipe - preferably without pineapple juice as a main ingredient and also tastes good when vodka is added later :)

- A loan of a punch bowl.

- The loan of a fairly stable outdoor table, needs to be stable enough to support dj decks and the amp, we have a car and can pick up and return.

- A bag of 100 tealight candles from Ikea *flutters eyelashes at Del*.

- Better food colouring - okay not really, but me and Megan just made a choc ripple cake (for practice) and used green food colouring!

- Also if anyone wants to bring music on an external usb hard drive we can plug them in.

- Which means we also need a USB hub thingy - cos the macbook only has 2 usb ports.

Midsummer 2009

2009-12-14T03:12:50Z

Midsummer is the longest day of the year, and what better way to observe the passing of the year than with friends and family.

We'd like you to join us to celebrate Midsummer. There will be food, there will be music, there will be candles, and most importantly, there will be friends and family.

As actual midsummer falls on a Tuesday this year, we have selected the nearest Saturday :)

When: 19th December, 2009, from 5pm.
Where: Nigel & Renee's house*.
BYO: drinks, food to share, candles, fire wood, wishes and dreams
We will provide music, BBQ, ice, tea lights and salad.
Please RSVP
*if you don't know our address, please email or phone 0411740668.
---

Gosh the year has gone by fast, midsummer is this Saturday!

Few changes to the usual midsummer format this year. Firstly, to stop the candle ceremony going for hours, we will have a smaller table set up - wishes for absent friends, extra wishes etc can be done at that table, rather than as part of the ceremony, I don't want to stop people making wishes, but I think a limit of one wish per person during the actual ceremony is fair and should help keep time down.

For those that want to make, or avoid the ceremony - we will start it at at dusk.

Can I please get some willing wenches/volunteers to help with setting up for the party, food prep and decorations, I actually want to make some effort at decorating the backyard this year, not sure it will work, but it is worth a try?

Also - I'm looking forward to seeing everyone :)

kitling @ 2009-12-11T16:49:00

2009-12-11T05:49:09Z

I visited the zoo this afternoon. They have a new area to house the seals that is very awesome. They have seals, penguins, eels, sharks, manta rays, fish and pelicans!

Then I went to the giftshop to complete my errands. The staff all have cute red t-shirts with little elephants on them eagerly awaiting the birth of the baby elephant, which is due any day now.

The pregnant elephant is being very closely monitored and a caravan has been set up near the trail of the elephants which is housing the keepers who are on 24 hour watch.

The staff I talked to are all very excited, its the first baby elephant to be born at the zoo.

http://www.zoo.org.au/Melbourne/Dokkoon/Keeper_Blog

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/melbourne-zoo-staff-nervously-await-the-birth-of-baby-elephant-to-dokkoon/story-e6frf7kx-1225809225381

kitling @ 2009-12-11T11:25:00

2009-12-11T00:25:16Z

Do any of my friends know anything about Victoria Geology. More precisely, if I find a flaked core on land adjacent the Koo Wee Rup Swamp and its sitting 60cm down right on the clay layer, how can I tell how old it is using associative dating. We haven't found any hearth features or reliable charcoal samples - so carbon dating is out.

My boss is all excited and thinks we are looking at a possibly Pleistocene site. The oldest artifacts previously recorded in the area at no older than 20,000yo. I really have no idea, and am frantically trying to learn geology.

kitling @ 2009-12-08T16:06:00

2009-12-08T05:06:47Z

Who borrowed my West Wing Season 1???

kitling @ 2009-12-04T12:12:00

2009-12-04T01:12:53Z

Before I bin them. I don't suppose anyone has any use for an old thick pin nokia car charger.

We have two. I'm keeping the thin pin one.

Circus!

2009-12-03T05:54:09Z

So quite a few of us appear to be going to the NICA show on the 12th December.

I'm not exactly sure who, as Travis kindly booked tickets.

Anyway - would people be interested in meeting up before the show for dinner?

Either on Victoria St, or somewhere closer to the NICA venue. Not knowing that side of town, recommendations on where to eat on Chapel St/High St would be appreciated :)

EDIT: Borscht, Vodka & Tears is in the vicinity and is a place I've wanted to go for a long time and never managed it. That said, it isn't very cheap - so cheaper food suggestions are welcome.

http://www.borschvodkaandtears.com/

kitling @ 2009-11-29T15:10:00

2009-11-29T04:10:26Z

Our festy circus freaks are back in town!!!

I dressed Emily last year to match the red sequined vodka...hmmm... :)

Things wot should be included in an archaeology degree.

2009-11-27T05:44:00Z

Everything we covered, plus stone tools should be a mandatory subject, so should managing archaeology which is supposed to teach you about the legislation but really didn't touch on the details.
- AAV site cards
- soil science
- geology
- local geology
- surveying
- mathmatics

So if I have 28 artefacts, 22 are quartzite and 6 are crystal quartz, what percentage are quartzite?

And what is the formula for working that out, because I need to know what percentage are flakes, cores etc. I haz excel and a calculator, I just don't know the formula and I'm wondering if its gin time yet?

Interesting factiod of the day. If your car is registered and it is written off, VicRoads pay back a percentage of your registration for the portion of the year you no longer need your car registered. That is nice I think.

kitling @ 2009-11-27T09:07:00

2009-11-26T22:07:55Z

Happy Tanksgiving!

Does this mean I get a tank? :)

kitling @ 2009-11-19T17:58:00

2009-11-19T06:58:08Z

Shakespeare in the Gardens, Midsummer Nights Dream

I got busy and haven't got around to this, but I have to do it before the $25 ticket offer expires.

Which means I plan to do it tomorrow evening and I will then post bank details for people to pay me back ASAP.

Shakespeare in the Gardens - 9th January 2010

List of names - please confirm you want a ticket and can pay me back asap.
Fi
Adam
Halo
Maia
Me
Nigel
Travis
Emily
Lirion
Arienmir
Megan
Jai

That is 12 people - which is the limit I can book for.
If you don't confirm that the date works for you I won't book for you.

As people keep asking.

2009-11-18T06:27:28Z

Photo of car accident posted to Nigel's lj

When I say I got rear-ended, it is not what people normally assume by that. I was traveling at approx 50kms per hour down Hoddle St, something must have happened to the driver behind me as he accelerated into me at speed. I don't know why, he got carted away very quickly in an ambulance.

See the greyish coloured car behind mine in the photo, that is the car that hit me, he then ricocheted off me to that point. I was about a car length behind the taxi and as you can see from the photo, I did a lot of damage to it. 5 cars all up were involved.

I am very badly bruised, I have a spectacular set of bruising on my legs. I feel like I did about 300 sit ups without the benefit of exercise. The drivers seat in our car broke, so I sub-consciously braced my body to stay upright, hence why everything is sore. I've damaged my right wrist (scraped the skin off it on the steering wheel) and hurt my shoulder, back and neck. Big thanks go to the lovely Emily who came over to help me and Nigel cook a big dinner on Saturday for guests when I couldn't use my left arm. My osteopath was rather impressed with what has happened to my back.

Luckily - the TAC pays for the ambulance, hospital and subsequent osteo visits - I suspect there will be quite a few.

I seem to be going up and down. I was very bad Saturday (thanks Emily for helping). Sunday was a lovely day where we went up the Mornington peninsula and soaked in the hot springs, thanks to Adam for driving and Fi and Nicki for carrying my bags. I managed to walk around the city doing site surveys on Monday which was good, but then I spent today and yesterday in the state library studying and am all stiff and sore. Moving around seems to hurt less than sitting or lying down. Its a shame I have lots of research and report writing to do. I can't even play warcraft for more than about 30minutes without pain.

Thursday and Friday I have to be in Healesville for an excavation from 8am. Sensible people would call in sick at this point, but if I don't work, I don't get paid and they are relying on me to be on-site and this is a time critical project. That said, they have said they will give me the easy jobs, I need to be doing the recording, section drawings, photography, auto levels etc. I need to write up the report for this site, so that will be an exciting challenge. I won't be lifting buckets of dirt, but I will probably take a turn troweling if for no other reason than moving seems to be helping more than simply sitting down, writing and recording.

The other news is the celica is totalled, if that wasn't obvious from the pictures. That said the insurance company in a surprising gesture is actually going to give us more money than we expected.

So we get to go car shopping this weekend.

kitling @ 2009-11-18T12:16:00

2009-11-18T01:16:30Z

Batman died of syphilis in 1839!

The history of Melbourne is full of cool factiods!

Car accident

2009-11-12T04:56:34Z

So I was pootling down Hoddle St at about 9.30 this morning, having dropped Nigel in the city and heading out to Healsville when someone smashed, rear-ended my car.

If you look at Nigel's lj - you can see our car no longer has a rear end.

http://nigelw.livejournal.com/34493.html

The police, ambulance, vic roads incident truck and firemen showed up.

The driver of the car who's fault it was got carted away in an ambulance so I haven't got his details, but the police and ambo says they did.

I then hit the taxi in front who hit the mazda in front who hit a fifth car.

I then managed to exchange numbers with the other drivers. But basically I sat on the edge of the road while nice person who worked in an office near the accident got me a chair, a cup of tea and used my camera to take photos.

They got a second ambulance for me because I'd hurt my neck, leg and arm.

My car and the one that hit me got towed, I don't know if the taxi did.

I got taken to St Vinnies, and was xrayed - luckily nothing is broken, but I'm pretty bruised and sore and the doctor said to take it easy for the next couple of days.

Once they let me out of the hospital, we went down to were the car got towed to get our stuff out of Nigel's car. Basically the car is totalled and I'm very lucky to have walked away from that accident.

It's a good thing to have comprehensive car insurance.

kitling @ 2009-11-12T11:49:00

2009-11-12T00:49:29Z

dear lj

I was in a car accident. 5 car pile up on hoddle st, some one rear ended me i hit the car in front and it domino'd. Currently in hospital awaiting xrays. Think i am ok tho.

angelique (celica) appears to have been totalled. Glad i was in a car with crumple zone.

Poater from phone.

A Midsummer Night's Dream

2009-11-11T00:38:07Z

So this year's Shakespeare in the gardens is A Midsummer Night's Dream.

http://www.australianshakespearecompany.com.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=99&Itemid=90

I've been sent a thingy which allows me to book cheap tickets $25.
So I think I'm going to book some in the next week.

Is anyone particularly interested in joining us?

I should mention that I can only book up to 12 tickets at the cheap price and that Jess gets first dibs :)

I'm just going to pick a random weekend in January unless anyone has a preference for dates.

kitling @ 2009-11-09T18:13:00

2009-11-09T07:13:53Z

If you don't like the heat, or even if you do, I have some advice for you

Vodka slushies make everything better!

kitling @ 2009-11-09T15:44:00

2009-11-09T04:47:04Z

I can haz redundancy please!

woohoo!

I was thinking about wishes for midsummer, and well, this year has turned out pretty well all things considered :)

Todo list for next year
- Finally make a serious commitment to Nigel and the bank and buy a house*
- Buy a 4WDrive
- Be an awesome archaeologist.

Now, back to that report writing for UCA.

*Alternative plan involves doing a runner to Mexico with Megan:)