Santa comes to town

Last weekend, we were lucky enough to be at the beach when Santa stopped by for a visit. He arrived by surf rescue boat, and was wearing shorts and a short sleeve top, all while my brain was screaming "Fun, but just plain WRONG".





As much as I love the sun and sand of a Southern Hemisphere winter, it does make it difficult to get into the Christmas spirit. We haven't even made an attempt at a tree this year - although Gus did decorate the TV and as a result, we ended up putting the pressies under the television. Oh well, we'll have plenty of snow-filled Christmases to look forward to as we'll be back in Canada next year.

We all start our holidays tomorrow and I can't wait. I'm going to keep plugging away at my thesis during the holidays but I plan to take lots of breaks, which will hopefully involve plenty of Jen's Southern-Hemisphere-themed-but-still-Christmassy cocktails.

Merry Christmas All!

All systems go

We finally got our internet and phone up and running last week. Phew!

In the midst of all the internet drama, I went to Canberra for 3 days for an alcohol and drug conference. It was my first one (bloodborne virus-related conferences being my usual shtick). The conference was held in Canberra and I was hoping to spend some time walking around the city but unfortunately it rained every minute I was there, and I only managed to walk the five minutes it took to get to Koko Black for some amazing chocolates (my own brand of drug/alcohol). It was a different sort of conference than I'm used to, full of sessions alternating between the benefits of moderate consumption and the evils of over consumption. Of course, my favorite sessions were on the benefits of moderate consumption of alcohol, which is something I can really get behind.

Lucky for me, Jen, expert epidemiologist and cocktail mixer, is here for a visit. They arrived late last week and left this morning for a trip to the Great Barrier Reef. We'll be meeting up with them next week to spend Christmas together in a beach house up the coast from us. Can't wait. I'm looking forward to some moderate consumption of cocktails over the holidays!

p.s., Advocate for the use of scientific evidence in drug policy by signing the Vienna Declaration.

Technical Difficulties

On Monday last week, our internet connection was no longer. On Wednesday, after a technician came to 'fix' the problem, our dial tone disappeared.

A week and a half later, and many, many, many hours spent in:

• A gazillion calls to a call centre in Sri Lanka,
• Several conversations with our property manager,
• Several conversations with our building's strata (sorta like a condo board that looks after the building)...

And yet we are still without Internet and phone service. Aaaaaargh! Telecommunications in Australia - not their strong point. And I'll leave it at that.

Hope to be back soon. Stay tuned.