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I never ever, ever though that I would be saying this, but - I am so fed up of rocks! I know, 'shock horror'! This week, Nar and I have teamed up to try and tackle the problem of the retaining walls at the front of the house. They were in dire need of replacing, and instead of spending the $25,000 it would have cost to have them replaced professionally we decided we would do it ourselves. Nar works harder than any man alive so we thought it would be a breeze.Last weekend we hired a massive machine for a day to drill holes down into the ground at certain locations to put the upright posts into. Nar and Graham drilled the holes whilst I stuck my head into them (not at the same time) and pulled out all the loose soil. The problem arose when we started digging the holes that needed to be 1.2m deep and only managed to drill down 30cm at best because rock got in the way, and lots of it.No matter how hard we tried, the drill would not break up the rock and we had to resort to manual methods. I have now been resorting to manual methods for the past week, getting a little deeper through the mass of rock each day. By the end I will have muscles the size of melons! The matter was made slightly worse when I stuck my head down one of the holes to find a half decomposed chicken than Uncle had buried a few weeks back - lovely! Nar and I are getting on like a house on fire though, his English is improving and we have a good laugh.
Last week, Adelaide was home to the 'Feast' festival, and whilst here I decided to take advantage of the opportunity to go and see a couple of the theatre performances. I cannot remember the last time I laughed so much; the best of the two I went to see was outrageously titled "Jane Austen's Guide to Pornography" and was absolutely brilliant, it had the whole audience in fits of laughter! Seeing the city at night was also an experience, bright lights and masses of people dining out in the city's numerous restaurants and bistros. The air is so warm even at midnight, not like Aberystwyth where you're bordering on perishing in midsummer! That's the other thing; officially, summer in Australia didn't begin until yesterday! The temperatures here have been often bordering on 40C and it was still spring! Mid January should be interesting!
So far I have been visited by 5 koalas in the back garden (it may be the same koala on 5 separate occasions, but still as impressive) and they are by no means as sedate as one would assume. Uncle and Aunty were woken on Wednesday night by a sound resembling something in-between a child screaming and a goose being savaged by a fox. They quickly got up and checked on the girls, they were fine, before rushing outside to see what was making the ruckus. Then out form the bushes emerged a very macho koala and an exhausted female. It didn't take long to put two and two together and work out what they had been up to, but the question arises as to how any koala could ever enjoy the procedure when it produced noises like the ones that were heard?! We seemed to have encountered the full reproductive cycle this week, when over lunch today the girls spotted another koala in the tree, but this time accompanied by a baby on its back. I have never seen such an adorable sight. The baby was tiny, no bigger than the mother's head and looked just like a teddy bear. It clung on to the mothers back as she climbed up and down the branches. When the juicy leaves were found, the baby ventured off on its own.There was a frightening moment when the baby reached out and lost balance and was hanging on by its front paws with its back legs swinging below. We all rushed underneath in case it fell. He/she was fine and the mother didn't seem the slightest bit bothered at what it was up to. It was an incredible sight, unbelievable!
We have been doing a little more partying and entertaining in the last couple of weeks. The girls had some of their school friends over for a swim and a barbie and then last weekend we went down to 'Uncle John's'( a friend of the family's) for an election party. I must admit that it was a new one for me, hosting a party for the election, but they were happening all over the country. The election just seemed like a big excuse to party! Most of the people that were there were not Aussie citizens so were there for the food and the booze - namely me, because I must admit, the election held no interest for me and I was rather bemused as to all the fuss - certainly doesn't happen quite like this back home! The party was good and the people were lovely. It was held at Kangabbie farm (John's home); a freshwater lobster farm in the middle of the most beautiful countryside. After the election was over, and a new Prime minister was elected - a Kevin Rudd none the less, we all went outside and huddled around a campfire (properly secured of course, to avoid any bushfires) and toasted marshmallows and lit some sparklers - quite surreal in a way. We then camped in what could only be considered a palace amongst the tent world - a 9 berth!
Yesterday was amazing! A few weeks ago Uncle received an letter from the Mini Garage in Adelaide inviting him and a partner for a 'Night with the Stars'. The event was a drive through the Adelaide hills (along some very windy road - great for Mini driving) in a convoy of what turned out to be over 30 Minis, before going to a 'drive in' movie theatre to watch two films. The catch was that we had to dress up as stars (famous people) and if we wanted to we could dress the car up too. After much deliberation we decided to dress as Starsky and Hutch. All we needed was a roll of masking tape, an afro wigg and a pair of aviators. As our Mini was already red, all we needed was the masking tape to make the famous white stripe down the side. The afro wigg was then cut to size (during which a chunk of Megan's hair was accidentally chopped off) and the aviators just added the finishing touch. Uncle Graham in a wig was hilarious - worth every penny. What's more is that our fancy dress costumes won the 'Most Creative Stars' award and we won a 5 in 1 Mini blanket worth a lot more than the $21 we spent to produce the costumes! We weren't sure if we would have won if it were not for Uncle's afterthought to pin a few curls of the afro wig to his shirt as chest hair - it caused a fair few laughs. The drive itself was amazing, the valley up to Mt lofty was beautiful and we really got to test the mini round some serious bends. Mini certainly managed to make a BIG PR stunt when we ended up driving through Rundell St (one of the bigest and busiest dining and entertainment streets in Adelaide) at peak dining time! A convoy of dressed up Minis must have been rather an impressive sight! However, the films were awful (might have something to do with the fact that Ben Stiller was acting in one and 'The Rock' in the other), otherwise the night was perfect. The experience of going to a 'drive in' movie was enough to make up for it (though I didn't expect my first to be with my Uncle, o well).
I still have the rest of the Christmas shopping to be getting on with (which involves endless running around the city) so TTFN.
Kathryn xXx
P.s. Sorry this is so late, I wrote it ages ago but never got round to posting it!
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