g'day! :D,

Well time for a little update I think! I will try and make it shorter than the last one!

I am now working for a company called Lochard on a kind of open ended contract thingy that means that they can keep or ditch me pretty much whenever they want (within reason I think!). They deal in providing information (not sure who to) about the noise around made by specific flights etc. There is quite a lot else that they do, but I am not quite sure at this point exactly what else that is! This is my area anyway, so i am in a team of 4 report writers dealing with reports for all of the major airports around the world including gatwick, heathrow and stanstead!

One of the girls has just gone to London for a couple of weeks to help out BA with some of there reports It would have been nice to have gone...spend 2 weeks back home, then come back out again all expenses paid! Maybe if we do a bad enough job this time they might need people to go back! It is in my contract that I may need to do some international travelling so that would be cool. I could have to go anywhere tho! They have also already mentioned a permanent job saying that "they were very impressed so far with what I had done".. Not bad after less than 2 weeks of work

Anyways, working life is ok, I am getting used to it again really. It gives you some kind of purpose, and a reason to get up which is nice. It is also nice to be earning money again to stock up the account before leaving again in May (ish) time. I have found an amazing café which does a fantastic roast beef stew with lots of veg and rice for $5 or a roast beef and gravy on thick bread for $3.70...which always brightens up my day! : D (called the lady butler in caulfields which is 15 mins tram ride from St Kilda for those of you in the area!)

The next plan of attack is Adelaide, Perth, cairns then down the east coast to Sydney where I fly out of at the moment in July. I think that might get pushed back though as I would only have about a month to do all that after Melbourne. This feels like a long way away though so we will see how it goes. I want enough time to ski in New Zealand. Decisions decisions!

Other than this life is still good. We are now living in Coffee palace in St.kilda which is a lot livelier than the last hostel. There are around 250 people in the hostel, and seems to be fully booked most of the time so there is always people about. This is not necessarily a good thing when you want to have quiet nights because of work (hence the 3+ nights where I have ended up out on the town on like a Tuesday night!)

Last week we attended the obligatory Neighbours tour and night. The tour was ok, but we were ferried around in a brightly decorated neighbours bus that made us all look like right geeks…very embarrassing! They even put on old episodes whilst we were in transit to Erinsborough high and Ramsey Street…great! I have taken lots of pics, but only got to meet the "Q" lister "Darcey Tylor" (as apposed to the other "P" listers) to the girl's disappointment is looking considerably older than you would think. Probably due to all the drugs, sex and alcohol that I am sure the crazy neighbours "stars" are doing! Nevertheless I took lots of pics of all the houses and the sign which came with us in the van! All in all it was a good laugh.

A few days later we attended the evening in a local pub. Toadie, Steph skully and Paul Robinson were there, with Dr Karl and his band playing music later. As cheesy as it sounds we had a really good night. There was a really good atmosphere in the bar, and cheap drink (which is always a good way to get a good atmosphere I guess in a room full of backpackers!)…anyways, we met all the "stars" and took pics. I think toadie was the coolest, with Steph coming in a close second for being fit! We didn't really get much time to speak to them as the bar was absolutely packed! Once they had done the rounds it was time for Karl to come on. Me expecting him to be total cr*p was pleasantly surprised, with the good Dr singing such classics along the lines of oasis, blur and many others (most of which I cant remember..(For explanation refer to the cheap drink section of the email!)

The one disappointment of the evening was that we didn't get to see Harold, who has got to be the only one that I actually wanted to meet! There are a few people coming down soon that we met in Sydney (hey soapey & dan…have you persuaded the two northern spooners to come down yet? Matty, when are you and Sue coming down?) So I may get the opportunity to go again, which I think I will take if big hazza is there!

I think that's about it, apart from the fact that I seem to have misplaced (had thieved) my phone which is quite annoying. I luckily had my oz sim in so I still have my UK one which has all your numbers on it. I will be purchasing a new one on the weekend. I am hoping I will be able to get the same number, but I will let you all know.

The insurance people are going to be busy when I get back with already a lost passport & broken camera on the list I am going for the clean sweep with only my watch and IPOD left out of the valuables bought after the phone joined them! (I am trying not to let it annoy me as there are a few numbers that are potentially lost forever!!)

Not much else planned as far as I know, but these things have a habit of cropping up. Its Paddy's day soon too which will be a busy one as there is lots o Irish around!