Phone Conversation

Bec: "Hello"
Stuart: "Hello, how are you?"
...3 minute conversation ensues about computer frustration I'm having...
Stuart: "Can I ask you a question?"
Bec: "ok"
Stuart: "If someone needed stitches, where would they go?"
Bec: "What have you done?"
Stuart: "What makes you think it was me?"
Bec: "Is there anyone else with you?"
Stuart: "There are some fish..."

Apparently, the handle of the kitchen scissors broke while Stu was trying to cut some plastic and he ended up cutting his finger instead. All is well, he didn't need stitches but the finger is still bandaged...

Jono's 21st

At Sapore in Leichhardt, lots of people, nice food. More photos here

Another Week, Another Explosion

This time at Broadway Shopping Centre - photo from SHM

In other news, I went to my first lecture at SMBC today. I'm doing one subject of the Graduate Diploma in Divinity (I'm still trying to work out if I'll be divine when I'm finished - only 7 subjects to go).

I was in class when the explosion happened and got a bit distracted when my phone kept vibrating in my pocket with calls and messages from people who wanted to make sure I was ok.

More photos of Nandos

See more photos on Jodi's blog

Never a dull moment on Mountain St

This what I saw as I arrived at work this morning (photo from SMH), the pink building on the right is where my (Barneys) office is!

There was apparently an explosion last night, which has made a big mess and sucked 2 of the windows out of our office. A lot of glass from Nandos (where the explosion happened) has been thrown across the road with such forced it's knocked down the fence around the old fire guttered Barneys building. It hasn't even been 2 years since our fire...

I'm not sure whether it's significant but this morning I was wondering if I should have chips with my Nando's chicken pita meal at dinner tonight or be more healthy and have salad... I guess I don't have to answer that question anymore...

Routine and Me

The older I get, the more and more I realise I am ruled by routines, not just ruled in a being controlled sense but ruled in a "I think routines are awesome and hate not having them" kind of way...

Which makes me wonder why I enjoy student work so much when every 3 or 4 months I need to create and get used to a whole new routine!

At the moment I'm enjoying waking up around 7, having breakfast while reading my "60 days of Prayer for Purpose", praying, heading to the gym and getting to work at around 10am. (Except for Tuesdays when I go to kickboxing class at lunch so skip the gym in the morning.) I know that at the end of February Uni will start and my routine will be turned upside down and I will need to start again. The other thing I know is I don't need to stress about it now - but I am *sigh*.

It's exciting though :-) uni starting back, new small groups and first years to meet, ETC and I have enrolled in a subject at SMBC so I'm looking forward to my first experience of Bible college.

Back to Work

Today was my first day back at work after 3 weeks of holidays and I actually enjoyed it! To tell you the truth I was even looking forward to it, last week I kept thinking about all the things I needed to do, plans I wanted to make for this year, people I needed to call . I had to stop myself from working in the holidays! It's amazing what a few weeks rest will do, at the end of last year I was so over working, I seemed to be tired and grumpy all the time and had almost convinced myself I was a bad staffworker and should maybe do something else.

The sermon last night was on rest, Malcolm spoke about how Christians need to take time out and have good rest and to trust Jesus to look after all the things that keep us busy or worried - it's so true! You can listen to it here (when it's been downloaded in a few days).

I did have a bit of a late start to my working day though, my plan was to be at the gym by 830 and at work by 10 (gotta love flexible working hours). However, it took such a long time for me to pack my bag this morning - it hadn't been packed for a whole 3 weeks, I left late and was halfway to the bus stop when I realised I'd left behind a rather important item of clothing (the hazards of showering and dressing at the gym) and my water bottle. I came home again and ended up arriving at the gym just after 9. I got to work at about 10.30 and spent most of the day cleaning the "Credo Corner" and rearranging the cupboard. I still haven't finished but hopefully will be done by the end of tomorrow.

What's been happening?

It seems like lots as happened since my last post... Things like:

Despinidic Family Christmas





Mum, Aunty Lyn & my sister Liz in my backyard on 15th December.









Holiday in North Haven


Stu and I outside of Burst *003 our home for a week.











Followed by Christmas and a week spent at Stu's mum's in Matraville.

Since then I have vacuumed, worked out how to sync outlook with google calendar, made 10 rather large turkey pasties, eaten a lot of ham, done way too much shopping and playing on the internet...

But that's what holidays are for!

I've also started reading a devotional book called 60 days of Praying for Purpose for Women (sounds corny I know) but it's helping me think about my relationship with God and how I "do" life which is something I always struggle with when I'm doing my personal bible reading so am looking forward to the next 58 days...

Happy Birthday Stuart

Today Stu turns 36! We've had a nice relaxing day at home catching up after spending a week and a half apart while I was on NTE.

I baked a carrot cake - we haven't tasted it yet but it looks awesome, I hope it tastes as good as it looks.

Back in the Real World

I'm finally back in the real world, after a week and a half of AFES NTE (ie. Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students, National Training Event) and related conferences. As always NTE was a great time of learning about God and really really tiring! I was blessed with a great mission team though (above) who put in a lot of hard work - and it showed! Another great blessing was my billet family Colyn and her daughter Jo, they helped to feel relaxed in their house and treat it as my own, which is what I needed after a week in student accomodation in Canberra.

UTS had the fun (and immense!) job of ushering 1100 people into their seats on NTE, here we all are in our yellow ushers shirts receiving instructions from our ushering guru, Jodi.

But they're so cute!

In the last week or so we've noticed a bird's nest on the window sill of the window next to my desk in the office. Unfortunately the birds that built the nest are Indian Mynah birds, aka "the flying rat". Indian Mynah's are a common pest in Australia and often kill native Australian birds, see this transcript of a report by the 730 report for more info.

We did think about destroying the eggs (Stuart suggested boiling them and putting them back in the nest - very mean!) but there's something about being able to watch the progress of new life being formed...

Yesterday 2 of the eggs hatched!
It's hard to tell but there are 2 little birds there... They can barely hold up their heads and are really, really cute! Again, we had the conversation about killing them but now it's even harder to contemplate!

What would you do?

I like Chocolate

Another SMH article about chocolate

I Like Georgette Heyer

Especially on days like today when I am sick in bed, just found this you tube clip of Stephen Fry talking about his love of Georgette Heyer



Her son died last week, I met him in 2002 when I went to England on a Georgette Heyer fan club tour - we had a posthumous 100th Birthday party for her and he was there. His obituary is here.

Stereotypes

Generally, I think of stereotypes as being bad, often just an inaccurate way of putting some one or ones into a box. However, there are times when it's very easy to see why stereotypes exist.

For example, when the members of my extended "Greek" family get together, it can sometimes feels as though I've been transported onto the set of "My Big Fat Greek Wedding".

Last night, I went with my sister to one of her Nutrimetics spa's, it was on at 9pm at a place and with people she didn't know and so I was her moral support. We arrived at a massive house (that looked more like an apartment block), complete with fountain and a security doorbell at the front gate.

And then we embarked on the most stereotypical adventure of my life! The room was full of middle-aged Indian ladies talking about their daughters, husbands and food. It was like a scene from a Gurinda Chadha movie!

Belinda was a bit overwhelmed and I guess it wasn't the best Nutrimetics spa she'd ever done - but it was fun to watch. It made me think about why stereotypes exist and realise that they aren't always a bad thing. I guess it's when we refuse to see the individual and his/her own personality because we're to busy putting them into our own little stereotypical box that stereotypes become less than helpful.

Mmmm Chocolate

The more I discover about bacteria and other micro-organisms the more I am amazed at how something so small can have so much power over the human body! They can even make you want to eat chocolate! Read this article from SMH.

More Mongolian People

Greg gave me some of the photos he took in Mongolia, they are so much nicer than mine. Sigh.

This is Tseegi & Muggi, two of the girls in my class. They were also the best English speakers and would often help us by translating for the rest of the class.

Tseegi's sister is one of the doctors in Ulziit, both of her parents are teachers. She wasn't to be a teacher when she grows up.

They also taught me to "coo" when the horses approach the finish line at the Naadam races.

I'm on track again :-)

Thanks to an anonymous comment I discovered that Google analytics wasn't working on my blog because the tracking script was missing. I think that probably happened when I changed my template a month or so ago. So it seems that you were all still visiting my page I just didn't know it!

I have added the script again and it should all work now - prepare to be tracked!

Must do work...

Have you ever had those mornings when you spend an hour at your computer but aren't really sure what you were doing?

I know I should do work, and I know I have work to do, I guess I should just do it...

In other news, I have managed to stay on top of my exercise regime - I even exercised 5 times last week without going to the gym!

I have had 2 days of extreme socialness, Trivia and the biggest schnitzels you've ever seen at The White Cockatoo in Petersham on Tuesday night with Bible Study; Yum Cha yesterday with Credo SaNers and last night I went to a Nutrimetics training evening with my sister! (No I'm not becoming a nutrimetics salesperson, I just went because she said it would be fun and I got free stuff).

The nutrimetics thing was surprisingly fun, I guess that's what happens when you put 30 women in a room and give them beauty products to play with.

So now, back to work - or maybe I should find a pretty picture to put with this post... This is the younger generation of my family from Left to right, Liz, Chloe with mum Belinda, Stuart, Jono & his fiance Katie :-)

Where have all the people gone?

According to google analytics no one has visited my page at all in September :-( There is probably a direct link between that and how often I have updated it I suppose...

I'm very tempted to blame facebook for taking up all my web time but perhaps I have just been slack... Or caught up with things outside of cyberspace. I will try to post more from now on - I promise :-)

It's all part of the job...

Need I say more?