Movember

If you are wondering about the title of the post... it is not a typo. Movember is a charity event that they do here for the month of November to raise money for Prostate Cancer. I don't know why Prostate Cancer needs so much money. Maybe it has gambling debts or other outstanding loans. How it works is that you register yourself with the event and you have to grow a moustache for the full month and get folks to sponsor you. Our studio registered a team. I was hoping to have at least a "Magnum PI" by the end of the month but fearing that I would end up with a "Higgins". I'll let you be the judge.


And what would a new look be without a new car to show it off in. Yes, that is right, we finally got a "new to us" car. It is a 2000 Mazda 121 Metro. We are really excited to have it. After 10 months of pushing a stroller it will be a nice relief to have the luxury of a car. Especially with the summer temperatures and humidity now. You can work up a sweat just by breathing some days. On top of that the feeling of hitting the open road with the wind blowing through my moustache is so liberating. Now that's living!



Until next time .... Cheers!

Tradeshow and Gala

I had my company Tradeshow and Gala on Saturday in Sydney. This is what CWT (my company!) does each year...has a tradeshow and then the big gala. It was quite nice. I've been having issues at work...which most of you reading this probably already know! So, I wasn't too excited about going, but at the same time, I was looking forward to having some fun! :)

The tradeshow is basically airlines, hotel companies and a couple of car rental companies...they sponsor the party and do the tradeshow. It was actually pretty fun. Most of the booths had a cool set up and there were some great prizes...like airline tickets...that I never won! :(

Twister anyone?

Cathay Pacific reps arguing about the Roulette winner....hmmm, wasn't me!

And British Airways with Crown and Anchors...kind of felt like The Price Is Right because they changed it around and you had to land on the $100.00 bill. My group was definitely one of the loudest...we did lots of cheering! Fun!

I didn't get to see much of Sydney but our convention was on Darling Harbour so a very nice view.

Let the party begin!!!
Some of the girls getting ready at our hotel. I almost lost my suitcase. Oh yeah, it got dropped off at the hotel (while we were at the tradeshow) and then some woman took off with it. By luck this all happened after I got back to the hotel and I saw her outside the hotel with MY suitcase. The guy working at the front desk had to go out and get her to come back in. Ohhh, that would of sucked!

The Gala was really, really nice. Much more formal than I thought it would be. I felt like I was at the Oscars....our CEO got up, did a speech, and then started announcing the awards. (2000.00 voucher towards travel per winner...again, not me)

That's our CEO. I was impressed with the decorations.

Me and the other supervisor, Dan. Although he stepped down about a month ago...leaving me on my own! Very funny guy.

Me and the other Stacey. Yeap, there are 2 of us!!

One of the highlights of the night was the band....
not sure how much it cost, but the company got an Australian Idol contestant, Ricki Lee. Apparently it was a pretty big deal.

She sang some good songs so I got in lots of dancing. Very nice.

And then back home on Sunday. Ohhh, I was tired when I got home. But, it was a really good time. I met lots of nice people from other offices across Australia and we all had a great time together.

Back to work on Monday and then Darryl's Christmas party is Saturday!!!

Storm... we don't need no stinkin' storm

Well I must say that this week has been eventful... nature-wise. We have had three storms in the last five days. Quite serious storms as well. Man, can Mother nature kick your ass when she wants to. Reg and Clo's area (the Gap) was one of the worst places hit. Luckily their house is still standing albeit their lot has a lot less shade now though. I will let some pictures do the talking.

STORM # 1 BREWING SOUTH OF THE CITY SUNDAY AFTERNOON

The storm has Brisbane in her crosshairs

Storm 1, so far, was the most destructive. It ravaged the Gap and left thousands with out power for days. If you really want to see how powerfull the first stom was check out the video below:



Make sure you watch the whole thing to get the full effect



STORM # 2 STARTS TO BUILD LATE WEDNESDAY EVENING.

This one didn't have all the power of the first but damn did it bring the rain. 250mm in a couple of hours.

STORM # 3 HIT TONIGHT. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 20.

The kids and I just beat this guy home. Stacey luckily got to commute through it ... Thankfully the buses were still running. This one had some intense lightning and also added to the flooding and destruction.

This last flood pic is right outside Pandemic Studios (my work). Where that lady (on the right) is standing is the start of our parking lot... just about where my parking spot is.

This last pic pretty much sums up the shear size of these storms. I was going to post a video of the lightning but it was taking to long to upload... and I want to go to bed. Maybe I'll add it tomorrow.

ciao!

A typical weekend with the MacPurdys...

A typical weekend in Brisbane is time spent at the beach with the kids. We went to South Bank yesterday and it was probably the best the kids have done in the water since we moved here. They were jumping in the water with no problem at all and "swimming" around for most of the day. This of course means that Darryl and I were also in the water the whole time with them so I have hardly any pictures! But, I'd rather see them have fun in the water then take tons of pics!

We met up with Mireille, Mike, and the boys and then ended the day with ice cream. Perfect for everyone!

Even Baby Maddox was enjoying the water!

Shamus and Jason enjoying the sand.

Today was a relaxing day at home. We took the bikes out for a spin and the kids "worked" on the bikes afterwards.

We got back from biking just on time....it's started to down pour rain and it's still going!! Lots of thunder and lightning. The weather actually hasn't been very nice lately. Plenty of rain...which the Aussies are happy to see...but no fun if you're planning stuff outside.

Next weekend is my Christmas party in Sydney. Hopefully it will be decent. I know some of you are aware of my "office drama" lately (and thanks for the support) but I hope it will all be over this week and I can enjoy the Christmas party. Darryl's party is the following weekend and then Breagha's surgery is the following week. And then we roll into Christmas season!!! I've already been enjoying the prep work..Christmas gifts, Christmas cards, decorations, making plans...it won't feel like Christmas here but I still love getting ready for it!

Family Health!!!

Well, we fiiiiiinally got an answer from our insurance company about covering Breagha's hernia surgery. They will cover it!!! Ah, saves us about $3000.00 so pretty happy about that. It took much longer than they told us it would take but it was a good result!! So, now I have to book the surgery and go from there.

Besides Breagha's surgery, she is doing well. A little girl bit her today at daycare....big time! 5 teeth marks in her arm (fighting over a doll). And she had a divider fall on her foot on Friday...she limped around all weekend. I think it was pretty bruised. And she was bit by another child last week at daycare! So, B has had a rough go. Hopefully that is it!!

Shamus is doing great - no surgeries coming up and doing well at daycare. We really like his teachers and he loves them. So, very happy about that!

Darryl and I are good too. Darryl started swimming last month with Steve and is really getting into it. I started running a couple of months ago and I'm up to about 7-8km. Happy about that. No one has bitten Darryl or I either so we're good there! :)

And that's the family health! We keep pretty busy with the kids but we're enjoying our own time exercising...it's hard to fit it in sometimes but we manage.

And we haven't lost our jobs or quit yet so that's good too!!

There is hope yet ... Hopefully!

Congratulations Barack Obama!

Sunday was a great day

We didn't have any plans for Sunday but it ended up being a great day. We had rented a car on Saturday and went "car hunting" so Sunday was our "relax with the kids" day. We met Felicity and her gang at New Farm Park in the morning. The kids had lots of fun playing together. Then we went to the Powerhouse for lunch and then the kids played some more!!! We brought the water guns with us so very entertaining for Shamus and Tycho.

Afterwards, we went for a walk along the water and Shamus and Darryl tested out the exercise stations along the way. Shamus did quite well!!

Feel the burn Son!!

Just a couple of shots of the beautiful trees in Brisbane. Some of them are huge!!

And I love the flowers that bloom on the trees. Smells very nice too!

Ok, back to exercising!!

Where was Breagha during all this?

Asleep! A busy morning/afternoon so she was pretty pooped!!

And one more shot of another tree...

This tree really is huge. I have no idea how old it is!!

After our walk we headed back home and I started getting ready for my evening out! Felicity invited me to join her and her family on an evening of dancing. It was really great. I had a super time and thanks again for the invite!! We went to a "Cloudland" dance!!
Check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloudland

Cloudland dances began in 1940 and continued until 1982 when the building was demolished. I love music from the 50's, 60's, and 70's so it was a perfect evening to me!! And the band was amazing. Really impressive. I also enjoyed hearing Felicity's parents tell me stories about the dances they were at in the 1960's. They actually met at one of the dances in 1968. Romantic! It was pretty funny because Felicity's Dad said that back then- you would dance with a girl for about 5minutes and that would give you enough time to decide if you liked her or not. If you did, then you would ask her where she lived. And if it wasn't too far then you would offer her a drive home. If she lived too far - you're out of luck because the boys didn't want to drive that far!!! Felicity's Mom said that only the guys had cars so the girls were always hoping that one of them would offer them a ride home.

Any excuse to get dressed up!! My 60's dress fit into the evening well. :)

Great band. The music was all from the 40's to the 70's (mostly the 50's/60's) ... and ended with a Grease and ABBA medley. Verrrrrry nice!

This singer was the hit of the night - Normie Rowe. Apparently he was a huge pop star back in the day. It was pretty funny to watch the older crowd go crazy over him.

Like Felicity's Mom!!
And Felicity and her brother laughing at their parents!

It was a really great night with wonderful music and it was really amazing to watch some of the people dance. Most of the people there used to go to the Cloudland dances in the 50's and 60's so they were incredible to watch. Great swing and jazz dancing!!!

A great experience for me.