Music Assembly

Here are a few photos from this mornings junior school concert. These guys are 7 years old and have been playing the violin/cello for about 8 months. This was their second concert this year (the big one) they played 5 pieces and had a great time

Here are some of the cello's working hard finding F#

TV dinner with the Fin-man

We popped around to see Fin the other day, he was pretty tired after a days toiling in the garden, her he is having some steak.

Hotshot Moth Swat!

Right. It happend like this. We were all eating dinner, having a few drinks, it was warm so I opened the back door and a MONSTER of a moth flew in. We did all the tricks, turning on and off lights to draw him to the back door, waving towels in his general direction, trying to catch it in our hands etc. (as the girls did not want it harmed) After about 10 mins of ineffectual lepidoptery, i decided to go get my fly gun. walked out to the bar, had a sip of my stout, walked back into the kitchen, bear in mind the lights were still off, and all in the space of a nanosecond saw him flying towards me and shot him mid-air right between the eyes. He was mildly stunned so Liam put him back outside. I stood motionless with the 'did anybody else see THAT?!?!?!?' look on my face, Liam came back in, gave me a high 5 then we went back and had desert.

Corcaigh Abu!!!

Another addition to the republics presence here in Western Australia

Roger that...

Finn has a new puppy, called Wilco. He hasnt been able to do much as he is still a pup and is awaiting a series of injections and inoculations but we did get to meet him last week during one of Finns violin lessons.


We had great fun playing in the tall grass.

More from the garden

Now that the weather has sorted itself out and we are back in summer mode again, we are starting to look after the garden a bit more. Here is one of the passionfruit vines after growing all the way from the gazeebo to the house.

Here is the lemon tree (remember the small one from 2 years ago) Well despite our relentless neglect, it has survived another year and is finally sprouting fruit.

Here is the lime tree, hard to see the fruit here as it is the exact same colour as the leaves

Heres one.

Thirst quencher

Nothing quite quenches a thirst like a beer with a twist of lime from your own lime tree! Yes, the tree is fruiting, its still small but there are about 8 limes on it now and a whole load more jsut starting to grow.

Thirsty stuff

The thermometer cleared 100 degrees on saturday morning in the bar. Heat like that needs a good quenching.

Orchestra buddies

Mom and I joined a local orchestra last thursday, we sightread through a few pieces for a concert in about 3 weeks time. Mom says she remembered where all the notes were on her violin, but not which order they come in......

Even better than the real thing...

Remember that post a few months back about the new pegs? Well, with much to-ing and fro-ing with the supplier to get a size that fit my viola I finally got them installed. They look just like the real thing...


But work waaaaaayyyy better. They glide, no more sticking pegs, no more difficult tuning AND no more finetuners, which made a huge difference in the sound of my instrument. I highly recommend them. The ozzie supplier is here and the homepage of the maker is here

The "no finetuners, pseudo-baroque", look

MORE gardeners for the strand

Pet and George got their thumbs green the other day and cleared a whole bunch of weeds out of the west wing. This adds them to the long and illustrious list of gardeners we have had this year, Margaret, Hugh, Feargal, John Hearne, Liam, Noreen, Mick and Ann to name a few. Thanks very much guys, the usual fee is in the post.....

Micks World

Mick is all settled down now on this side of the world, Ireland being 13000kms away on the top left of the map, and he even has a bunch of ozzie keys now, house, car, work etc. Well done Mick

Some really good monthy python classics

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buqtdpuZxvk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3KBuQHHKx0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p62uutgNN4c

more currency shenanigans

The red (wine) baron.....

On one of the tours I found this plane made out of wine barrels

wine tour

Check out all these barrels

This is the mothership! This is where all the wines ferment

Here is Penny and Jane, enjoying the early morning tour

And here are all the bottles ready for shipping