I'm free, to do what I want, any old time....

Ah, the Soup Dragons...wonderful.

Anyway, as I'm sure most of you have heard by now, I'm leaving Citi after 7 years - has the feeling of a sinking ship at the moment, so I guess that makes me a rat?

I can't say I'm too unhappy about the situation, in fact it feels like a massive weight is lifted, but a lot of decisions lay ahead. Traveling & studying are the two things I'm looking forward to most, so we'll see how things go.

Best contact is through this blog or my personal email address: leesmales@mac.com

All the best....

Wet & Not So Wonderful....

What a very strange weekend.... Started out with a few 'quiet drinks' on Friday evening - dodging the seemingly ever present torrential downpour I headed across the road to the salubrious pub that is the Coronation to meet Lucy & some colleagues. A Coopers Pale or four later we were headed to the even greater destination that is the Hellenic Club of Sydney..... sadly (or is that gladly?) I have never been there before & it is little wonder that it does not top the list of the most glamorous bars in town. The games room (4 sad looking pokies), the pool room (a battered old table), the TV room (like something from Bullseye - the era when 'with teletext' meant it was state of the art), the lounge (3 chairs covered in cigarette burns) & the bar (a table with some very dodgy brands of spirits) were in actual fact all the same, smoke-filled, room! If it hadn't been so funny I would have cried.... the boys I was with didn't seem to mind when some very 'healthy looking' girls walked in.... not sure how their evening ended, but I'm still uncertain why we were even in the place! After a few drinks in there, skilfully avoiding Lucy's attempts to get me to drink dodgy tequila we headed to meet some of Lucy's colleagues in the Star Bar.... yet another glamorous destination - what on earth were we doing?!? Now, this was a place that I'd deliberately avoided on several occasions, and this time I got to see why. Seedy does not do this place justice..... Another couple of drinks in there, and that was enough....into the torrent of rain we headed (had to be seen to be believed) looking for a taxi home.

Unfortunately, the evening took a turn for the worse (no I didn't vomit...and neither did Lucy.... no number 1s or 2s involved either) for when we got home we found that the leaky door in our bedroom had not been fixed as the landlord had promised, and was in fact allowing buckets of water into the bedroom.....ruining the carpet once more & in fact finding it's way through two floors and dripping from a light fitting onto our favourite (& new) armchair. Very annoying.... got a little of our own back by phoning the landlord at 2am & getting him to come out to solve the problem... not sure he was overly happy. On Saturday, the landlord 'fixed' the problem & promised that no rain was forecast and so we headed out to do a bit of shopping - ready for our trip back to the UK. Guess what happened? Well, there was a bit of rain.... in fact more than a bit...Manly corso was practically flooded, all of the lights in the shops went out (I wonder how many people walked out with non-empty pockets - like Christmas for a Scouser) and the waves (which had been missing for a few weeks) were back with a vengeance (the surfers are probably the only people enjoying the weather!).

In fact, the weather has been terrible for the last 3-4 days (only just turning for the better today) - reminiscent of so many UK bank holidays (it's the Queens Birthday holiday here). At Newcastle, the wind has washed played a part in beaching a 40,000 tonne coal ship! The Hunter Valley (which we visited last weekend) has seen flash floods & 6,000 people evacuated from the town of Maitland - one family died when a section of the motorway disappeared. It's just incredible - and I never thought I'd say it, but I'm looking forward to leaving Sydney for the UK on vacation in order to get some decent weather!! I can't believe that there is a drought in this country - there has been a LOT more rain than one would see in London - and yet the reservoirs have still been VERY low (not sure what the situation is after the weekend). The excuse given is that 'the rain is falling in the wrong area'....well why the hell don't they build another reservoir? Whoever decided to put the reservoirs where they are now was either amazingly stupid, or a kiwi trying to get one back at the Aussies for all those sheep jokes.

On Sunday we headed to the Hordern Pavilion for the 'We Love Sounds' Dance Festival... fortunately, the rain held off on the evening and we had a pretty good time. Several different zones of music, some good djs, plenty of bars & an excellent sound-system in the Pavilion itself... Unfortunately, a fire alarm & poor planning led to a somewhat scary crush attempting to get into the Royal Hall of Industries (RHI).... felt sorry for the security guard who had to cope with it.... and the RHI also suffered from an amazing lack of toilets (the two cubicles seemed to be taken up for long periods of time by people with colds, or maybe it was something else that was making them sniff up a lot). Enjoyed the Infadels (live group), DJ Shadow was interesting (probably would have been better at the end of the evening, maybe crashed out in a chill out room of sorts) although the hip-hop fella who came on stage with him was a waste of space - a bit like Robbie Williams getting his mate Wilkes on stage - James Zabiela probably the best of the bunch, but they were in a venue that was much too big, with an inferior sound system & I personally was already ready to go home after the DJ Shadow set. Looking forward to the Dance Village at Glastonbury.....

Also, Lucy & I were interested to check out a bit of the youth culture here...very strange it is too. Seems that the dress sense falls into one of two camps - dress like you're going to the gym (actually like you're going to the gym in the 1980's and sport leg warmers & McEnroe style headbands) or dress in shorts / tight trousers and no shirt (one particular bloke had the words 'BadBoy' in bold on the back of his shorts....I bet he is) - whatever happened to jeans, trainers & a t-shirt? Also felt that I was at least 10 years older than anyone else there (I'm only 29!)....in fact 10 years ago is probably when I last saw glow sticks in a club in the UK - yet they are incredibly popular here....often find myself thinking that Sydney is about 10 years behind the times!

Couple of final things..... Redbull is evil (had awful stomach cramps after drinking three cans of it on Sunday - admittedly mixed with vodka, but that's not the point) & the whale migration season is currently up & running! Amazing that such fantastic wildlife passes hundreds of metres from my apartment! Unfortunately, looks like we're going to miss the opportunity to go whale-watching as the migration may well have finished by the time we get back from vacation.

Two more days & then home.....

Counting Down The Days...

Well it's almost time for us to head back to the UK on vacation... It's fair to say that I can't wait to see family, old friends & Spot! The lure of Glastonbury is also there, but most of all I'm just looking forward to getting away from the grind of work for a couple of weeks. We fly out on Thursday, and the plan is to have dinner in London on the Friday night before heading home for a while - back to London Thursday 28th June.

In the meantime, we've got a few activities to keep us both occupied. Friday night it's Lucy's leaving drinks (her temping contract at HSBC finishes) and I'm going along with a few of my friends. Saturday is going to be a day of preparation, last minute shopping and who knows what else.... On Sunday we're going to the Hordern Pavilion for a dance event called 'We Love Sounds' - a whole day of Dj sets & live music, including James Zabiela, Tiefschwarz & Grandmaster Flash. Monday is a bank holiday - ironically Australia & New Zealand have holidays to mark the Queen's birthday, but on different days! Don't think we even have such a holiday in the UK? Thinking of public holidays, I noticed the other day that some politicians are thinking of having a day to celebrate Britain - if it's anything like Australia Day it will be awesome.

Tuesday it's back to work & then Wednesday night I'm looking forward to the 2nd game in the State of Origin series....should be excellent & a perfect send-off for my vacation. For some reason Lucy is insisting that I pack early in the week.... guess she doesn't trust me to arrive back from the Origin game in a sensible state!

Most interesting story of week.....2nd most popular boy's name in the UK? Have a guess. It's not Ben, David, Simon or even Lee....it's Muhammed! Definitely a sign of times changing.

Member's Dinner at Terroir - Top food, great wine & lovely company

In March, having been very impressed by the quality of the wine, I became a member of the Hungerford Hill Winery in the Hunter Valley, and on Saturday we headed to Pokolbin for the annual member’s dinner.
We arrived around 6.30pm, to be greeted by a couple of glasses of sparkling & were introduced to a whole bunch of people, all of whom were very friendly.

Sitting down for dinner around 7pm, the head chef – Darren Ho – went through the extensive degustation menu & after the 1st course, the chief wine-maker took us through each of the wines we would be drinking – all very informative. Just looking at the menu now is mouth-watering enough – sea scallops stuffed with water chestnuts, bbq duck with sweet pickled lemons on basmati rice & choy sum, wagyu beef cheek slow braised on witlof & paris mash potatoes – but I can promise you it was delicious! A successful mix of Australian cuisine with the chef’s Asian heritage. The wine was also superb – and plentiful – as was the accompanying music (a couple of staff members were roped in). However, most of all, we enjoyed the company of the people at the table (think we’re going to be ‘dog-sitting’ in Newcastle at some point soon!) & an older couple we met – Ray & Rhonda – who were extremely friendly & have invited us up to the North Coast to stay (which we intend to do soon). A really pleasant way to spend an evening – made all the better by the craic we had with our taxi-driver, Bruce, on the way to our accommodation.

We stayed at the Elfin Hill Motel – a result of it being the only place to allow one-night stays on a weekend – but we were not disappointed with the choice. The rooms were modern inside (even if the cold water tap fell off!) but with a ‘log-cabin’ look from the outside. A hearty breakfast, served by the very amenable host, and we were off on our travels again – picking up the ‘chilli schnapps’ & ‘Drayton’s Port’ recommended by Bruce the night before! We just couldn’t resist going into the ‘smelly cheese shop’ (does exactly what it says on the tin) before heading back home to recover from the hangover!

Most amusing part of the day – I’m not sure Lucy will thank me for mentioning this – was when we got back home. Lucy was feeling a little the worse for wear by this stage (worked out we’d had at least 14 glasses of wine the night before) and couldn’t figure out how to open the door of the car – “Pull The Handle” was my advice. I was laughing to myself for quite some time after….

We’ve definitely been eating a lot of rich food of late – and that coupled with a bit of eating at work whilst bored / depressed means that unfortunately any weight loss I had when I arrived here has been reversed. A bit of a quiet week & a step up in the exercise routine is definitely warranted…. Although looking at our plans for the trip home it might have to wait until July!!!!

One final point I just had to mention was the Australian love for amusing dog breed names (we've spotted this before but ran into a new one on Sunday). Labradoodle (Labrador crossed with poodle) seems to be quite popular, as does Jack Russell mixed with Fox Terrier (not sure what that's called...maybe Jack Fox?) but the new one this weekend was the Spoodle (Spaniel crossed with a poodle!).

A great pub & some bagpipes in Berry, then a tent at Depot Beach

Last weekend (25-27 May), we decided to get out of Sydney for a little while & head down the south-coast of NSW. On Friday evening, we ended up in the lovely little town of Berry. We’d been through a couple of times before on our way south and had resolved to check out the shiny hob-caps adorning the local pub! So, just over two hours after leaving work on the Friday evening, we had checked into the Berry Boutique Motel (friendly people but the place nothing to write home about) and were having the first of several beers in the Great Southern Hotel. What a superb bar…a bit down-trodden but some real characters in there, and a roaring fire in the corner (much needed on the chilly evenings we are experiencing). The décor was a cross between 70’s novelty (pool ball lampshades, pyshedlic coloured benches), biker chic (there was a large motorbike & leathers in the corner) & Australian themed junk….. superb! Felt a little bit like an Australian ‘Cheers’ bar…only the post-man was replaced by someone sat at the corner of the bar in his ‘rail-man’ uniform. Around 11pm we realized that we hadn’t had anything to eat & so went in search of some food…. The only thing that was open was a ‘donut van’…. Bit random but we had to make do & had a couple of deep-fried donuts – not something I will be in a rush to do again.

Saturday we had breakfast & the people at the hotel informed us that their was a Celtic Festival on in town, so of course we decided to check it out. It seems that both Australia & New Zealand are places which are extremely proud of their Celtic (Scottish in particular) routes…..and they certainly take up any opportunity to have a parade! We spent a couple of hours watching the various events (lots of bagpipes), walking around the stalls (bought some excellent home-made chilli & coriander jam), admiring the cairn terriers (a lot friendlier than Buster – Lucy’s parents dog) & eating haggis. Highlight of the morning was the strong-man competition, notably the event which involved the contestants picking up stones (ranging from 100kg – 165kg) and placing them on top of large barrels….only one managed to lift the heaviest weight.

After picking up some supplies (cheeses, pate, bread, etc) at the excellent Berry Emporium Food Co – lots of top food to choose from, and very friendly & efficient service – we continued on with our journey. We eventually got to Depot Beach (after getting lost at Pretty Beach) at 4.30pm…..leaving just enough time to get the tent up, get ourselves organized & stroll to the beach before dusk. Had a tremendous evening, listening to music, eating great food, drinking some quality wine & port (brought from home) & talking late into the evening. At one point a possum almost joined us (Lucy was delighted) & it seemed as though one of the many kangaroos was about to join in with our conversation when it coughed (Lucy thought it was me clearing my throat!). Whilst I wouldn’t want to do it every night, the camping was actually a nice idea and I slept like a baby. We awoke in time to see the dawn – the fantastic colours rising over the ocean – and marveled at how nice it was to have the wildlife around us.

We packed up, headed to Bateman’s Bay for breakfast – very annoying woman on the next table – and then back to Pebbly Beach for a walk, game of boules & a doze in the sun. On the way home, we stopped off at Sussex Inlet to catch up with friend’s of Lucy’s family - had a nice chat, went over stories of bush-fires of years gone by. And then headed to Kiama for fish & chips - the flathead is really much tastier than the cod at home!