Most mornings since my return from overseas Cheri and I have been taking the dogs for early morning walks. Pippy has grown into a crazy skinny mutt, she leaps around like a right nutter. During the day I am working at various website projects for some exceptionally patient clients. I am generally trying to get to grips with Drupal, CSS, HTML, SQL and PHP. On their own these technologies are all fairly straight forward but mixing them up and making them work in the myriad environments they are designed for, is a challenge.

A morning swim down at Boambee is the best start to a day of hard coding...

Took a break off work today to go and try to catch a photo of Ev down the beach.  He was far too slippery in the surf and I just got a few distant blurry shots as he scooted away from me on his shortboard. I did get a bunch of other shots of some of the other guys down there though....

Even one of the old fella :p , Adam... he looked a bit like a monkey in the pic though.

If any of you guys recognise yourselves feel free to use the pics...

Feels as if I never left. Today was Jimmy Friday. Cheri and I got up early and walked Pippy. Scampy our old dog is a bit poorly so she stayed home.

Later I took the boys down to Mylestrom where we had a great day. We paddled the kayak, swam and leapt off 40 foot sand dunes. Then we sailed the boat around like reprobate pirates. Best of all I had five bucks for us to buy some chips and lollies. It was great. Here are some snaps I took...

Brian Hopwood Mac-Homes.

Emrys and I have just returned from a lovely arvo spent snorkeling in the rock-pools on the south headland. I took my camera and went a bit snap happy. I am really happy with some of the pictures I took, check out the sea anemone ...

A rainy Sunday today. Dot, Cheri and I went for a circuit round Sawtell this morning and got utterly drenched. After staggering round the headland in horizontal rain and wading through the high-tide we made it to Split Cafe. They fed us delicious cakes, hot chocolate and coffee.

After that we spent the day hiding indoors. I worked on a clients website for much of the afternoon whilst Cheri and Dot chatted in the kitchen. All very traditional.

The friendly Orara Diggers that are George Bizlek and son, Chris, came by played mudpits for a day. We dumped a few truckloads of roadbase and gravel on the resulting pits and muddy expanses. It's an ugly mess at the moment, but we have a plan....

The inaugural 2010 UNO International tournament (round 1) went off with barely a hitch.

The only hitch was that my boss, Mick, caught us on camera in flagranté with UNO cards in hand. Gel looks very stylish in his pajamas though doesn't he?

The legendary current world champion, Geldof, representing the Canadians played with winning aplomb.
The English team was represented by the traitorous dog, Ruben, who failed to grasp the simple rules of this great game.
The Australians represented by Cameron and Matthew desperately struggled to defend the title in a well coordinated double bluff combined with the little known 'Ginganmannay maneuver'. They where however defeated ultimately by the foreign devils random luck.

At least that could have been the way it happened. All the beer and conversation made me forget the actual game.

Here I am sitting down for Dinner. Gel has cooked a great pumpkin soup, Em is trying to inveigle us into playing "Dangerous Boys". I'm rudely uploading photos....

Some pics of Em, Jimmy, a crab, Nicole, Emma and me at Macauleys from Monday. Some more of Gel, Jay and The Bike. Oh and a classic shot of Ev laying in the sun with teabags on his eyes... !? It's a tough life for some hey?

And here they are.

Well after a patch of lifeless cold dull weather the sun came out and shone for the Chilli Festival. It was awfully decent of it. Cheri, Em and I took the bicycles down to the village and weaved around amongst the truly insane traffic. Maybe next year we should try to organise some kind of public transport to encourage people to leave their cars at home.