Short Sharp Shaga - (should be SAGA, but preferred keep it alliterative)

I'm going to make this one about vehicles today, don't know why, I just am. Any way this is my blog and I can write abut what I want. Answer that and stay fashionable (Obviously Bum Chin I'm excluding you from this one, fashion has always been an option you've chosen to bypass in favour of ..... Actually I'll try and work that one out in my own time than waste your time reading it here).

While I think of what to write, I'll just go to the kitchen for an ice pop.
That was lovely (Mango), right where was I? Oh yes vehicles.

I took my fork lift licence the other month, that was fun, can't wait to start lifting stuff. That wasn't actually that interesting, but like I said, 'My Blog'.


This next tale I'm going to tell actually starts with my dad, whenever he used to build things, they used to stay built, he would make them larger stronger and more indestructible than anything that went before them. Apart from his shed floor of course, but no-one really wants to hear about that now do they?

The reason I told you that, was to tell you this, I built a kennel for my dog, Cookie, he is a cross Labrador and Golden Retriever.
Here he is trying to cover my computer chair in hair, which I might add he seems to accomplish with relative ease.


The problem came when it was time to move houses, From Mundaring to Kalamunda, just in case you weren't paying attention. The reason was that I'd attached his kennel to his pen, so that he could run around in the pen or go into the kennel for shelter. The problem was that it wouldn't fit into the van , so I had to dismantle the pen and carry the kennel on the car, which seems to be of proportions hitherto reserved for my dad's mammoth building projects.

The question you have to ask yourself is "how often would you see a sight like this? (again, click for larger view)
Before anybody quips with a response to the blog, no, it wasn't dog fishing.

The next thing I'm going to mention is a track called the powerlines, it is a famous off-roading track in the Perth hills, it was the original route used to supply power to the saw mills in Sawyers Valley (Not very inventive the Ozzies when it comes to names*)

Any way these powerlines are 30 KM of very rough terrain that is a favourite of ozzies that like to drive the track, really for the sake of driving the track.
This is one particularly hazard part of the track

Here is the boss, trying out her suspension
Me trying out my daredevil driving skills.


For the record, I'm nearly as brave as Michelle.




One final one of my son trying to put the rear axle in orbit.


I was going to post a video to show how hot it was, I had the camera phone, car and egg ready to fry an egg on the bonnet, it worked apart from the fact that I had set the camera phone to picture instead of video. Might try to do that again at a later date.




*In fact a lot of names are either borrowed from English, Scottish or Welsh name places. For example, there is a Midland, High Wycombe, Derby, York, Carlisle, not to mention Perth itself. Those names that aren't borrowed are shamelessly left as they are, from original, aboriginal, such as Coober Pedy, which is a famous town housing one of the world's largest opal mines, the literal translation is "White man in a hole"

Till the next time "G'day Cobber"
(Actually no-one ever says cobber, except in the travel guides)

New blog for 2009

Wow, over a year since my last blog, well I’ve now had 7 people tell me that I should really start blogging again, so thanks for that bum chin, twiggy and both of my parents and several anonymous characters that I can't name for legal reasons. (and of course a lack of knowledge of who the hell they are.) I think it must be one of three reasons for this:

Firstly: my blogs are really awesome and you all can’t wait to get to grips with the next instalment.

Secondly: you all think I have nothing better to do with my time than put pen to paper (or finger to keyboard.) to tell you all of my wondrous travels, and you think I’m just too selfish to keep them all to myself.

Thirdly: you all have nothing better to do because of some unexplained freak of nature say a tornado that has ravaged the country or you got a bit of snow and used it as an excuse not to go to work, stay at home and whinge about having nothing to read so fall back on old faithful.

My obvious choice would be the first option, and who can blame you.

Let’s put this blog into instalments.

1st My job

Well, some of you may know now that I’m not teaching anymore, again you don’t really want to hear the ins and outs of that boring tale, but I’m going to tell you anyway, so if you aren’t interested, then please skip to the next paragraph. For the rest of you, was it really to hard a temptation to resist? Actually, I bet there wasn’t a single person who went straight to the next paragraph; unfortunately I have no way of proving it.

For those of you who didn’t want to read about my teaching, please skip to the next paragraph, I used up the rest of that one talking about you. Right now we’ve got rid of the people who only want to read the juicy stuff, here is what happened: I got offered a full time role teaching apprentice electricians, however the T.A.F.E. could not offer me a visa sponsorship which was what I required to stay in Australia. See, I told you it wasn’t that interesting didn’t I, but thanks for staying with me, it really makes me feel good.

Now, I’m an electrician for a brickworks, and I can hear you asking “so, what does that involve Ian?” Well wonder no more, I will tell you. I’m working in an automated brickworks:

www.australbricks.com.au

All of the processes are automated, and many are computer controlled, however if there is a problem, the computer cannot usually spot the problem until after it has done something it shouldn’t. This is where we come in, plug in the laptop, read the program (Ladder logic, thank you for asking) and work out why it isn’t doing what it should be doing.

2^nd Michelle’s job

Michelle has now got a very prestigious job but I’m not allowed to tell you about it, so I encourage you all to badger her t do her blog, I mean you might call me lazy not doing a blog for so long, but just look at how many she has done, go on, have a look.

3^rd House move

Well, can you guess what this section is about? Actually, you don’t need t guess, because I wouldn’t know if you got it right or wrong and you ……..did you ever get a feeling of deja type? I just got that then. Anyway we moved house from our wonderful home in the hills to a place called Kalamunda, which is aboriginal for home in the hills. They’re different hills, or should I say a different part of the same hills. Yes, I think I should.

The main reason for our move was proximity, we are now closer to things, than we were before, different things of course, but things that we thought we would prefer to be closer to, for example, we are now closer to the city, to a theme park called “Wet and Wild” both of our workplaces, actually all three of our workplaces if you count Ben’s too. Dee has even moved School. Where she is now, they have an outdoor program where they do activities such as snorkelling, mountain biking, kayaking etc, needles to say she loves going to school. Oh and we’ve got a pool. This is the only photo I’m going to give you this time, it is of one of our frequent visitors, they are fabulous beasts called kookaburras.

Although you might want to watch for my next blog, I’m going to try and put a video in there.

Well, that will do for now, but I promise to keep updating the blog more often, but you may have to have them in smaller doses, but at least I will make a promise to save you from the tedium of having nothing to read while it is snowing.