Thought I'd give everyone a few months to start saving up ;o) 

We had a great, walk with Julie, Dillon and Chris up at Cathedral Rock near Ebor. Below is a shot from the top of Cathedral Rock I've uploaded some dodgy photos of rocks and plants and the odd one of Evan, Dillon, Julie or Chris. Chris seems like a lovely bloke, he identified a native pepper plant and gave me a leaf to taste, which I passed on to Evan. After a bit of wheezing and carrying on Ev decided it was not so much a food plant, as a potential 'practical joke' plant.

 UPDATE: I've made a new album of the walk here .

Jay's old mate Pete has been staying for the past week. Pete and Jay have drunk and eaten their way through every pub,rsl and restaurant in Sawtell. Pete made himself wildly popular with the boys when he gave Emmy a Captn Jack Sparrow outfit, and Evan another penknife (with torch and compass!!).

Here is a shot of Pete getting thanked by Emmy, with a vicous stab through the heart:

Pete's now on the train home, and I just got back from taking the boys to the Movies.

Tomorrow Ev and I are off for a walk with our mate Julie....

Here is a youtube vid of Emmy blowing out his 5 candles. Ok I know it is bit late...

When I was in Bris a while back I was lucky enough to make it to the Asia Pacific Triennial at the new Qld Gallery of Modern Art. Saw some amazing porcelain busts, here is one of them:

I just wish I could remember the artists' name....
Here is the back view:

Click for a big pop-up, not sure how well that works in Internet Explorer, but I can't be stuffed fixing it up. You should be using something..., anything else anyhow.

Little Eve : touches her toes.

Thanks for the photo Ma!!

Got back from the Brisbane Home-Ed Conference yesterday, a lo-ong road trip, poor Eleanor still has more to go. Cheri is all inspired and happy after having met up with lots of old friends and heard lots of great speakers like the fantastic Alan Thomas and John Taylor Gatto. It was really great to see Darshan and Katrina although I would have like to have had more time (if only to crawl around with little Ollie), I was minding Emrys which involved lots of wondering off. Darshan was an excellent Snape at our Harry Potter Halloween Party back in 2002 and Katrina made a fabulously crazy Trelawney, the divination teacher.

Meanwhile, I was gadding about town with the boys. We stayed in Lota with Jasons' family, Brian and Dallas. It was great to catch up with; Rachel and family, Terry, Gail, Lila (of Curly Days fame!! The last page of EC mag), Andrew, Buddy, Gala, Zefir, Belinda (Green Mango Theatre) and Odile amongst others - although there are too many people and there is never enough time - we should all just live in a big village... Why don't you all move to Sawtell .

Just returned from a camping trip to Minnie Waters with Julie and Dylan. The kids and I were dead impressed when a bunch of Emus invaded the campsite. We did not manage to ride any of them, nor even find a giant egg to fry for brekky.

Sorry didn't get round to dubbing it.....

Steve Bell has written a great article over at the Guardian about how he got inspiration for his fantastic Tony Blair cartoons . As Steve points out, now that Tony has resigned he needs to decide, "who he should get to do his portrait bust for the members' lobby in the House of Commons". I for one think we should all write and suggest Steve Bell . In fact, come to think of it, why is there not some kind of parrallel to the members lobby where all the great cartoonists of the day could exhibit their portaits of the fearless leaders.

Lets see, Tony is sorted, Thatcher and Major could both have a few Steve Bell's but I reckon Gerald Scarfe and Ralph Steadman would definitely be high on my list of appointed artists. I remember Ralph did a great portrait of Maggie T as a loo.