Well hello hello everybody, a very much overdue blog coming up. Apologies for this but as most of you know both Iain and myself started work around three weeks ago and after returning to the world of work after our extended holiday and the happy hour drinks after work, we have been struggling to find the time! Anyway, this will probably be a fairly long update to compensate, so grab yourself a cup of tea and I hope that you're sitting comfortably!

The weekend before we started work, we headed to the World Volleyball championships which was actually held in Glenelg (you see it pulls in all the major sporting events:) Iain actually booked the tickets, he tells me it was because he thinks it's good to watch and the players are very talented, nothing to do with tall blonde rapunzel looking women in bikinis! It was actually quite good, but the weather was a little overcast by the second match and we left a little early (we have since seen it a further 3 times as it's been repeated on Eurosport on a daily basis).

On Tuesday 25th March 08, I started work, I had the week before nipped to the so called shops and made a couple of purchases, namely shoes, couple of skirts and couple of tops and come Tuesday morning, I'm dressed in my new summery skirt and top and open toe wedges (as our stuff was still floating over the water somewhere) and you can imagine my shock horror when I open the blinds to find not only is it raining but it's blowing a gale. I had time to grap my one and only jacket (denim jacket) and umberella (bought from our time in brisbane) and head out to the tram. I was severely underdressed, as our fellow Australians had scarves and winter coats, but got to work on time and had a really good first day. I've been there three weeks now and it seems a realy good company to work for, similar role to what I was doing at home but as it's a smaller company you get more involved in everything. I was amazed to find on my induction plan a 'drinks' meeting scheduled in for my first Friday at4pm. It turns out every Friday there is a 'beer o' clock' that everybody in the company goes to alcoholic beverges and snacks are provided! I've been catching the tram to and from work, it took me a couple of days to get the hang of it and since then it's been relatively problem free! The initial challenge was getting on a tram from the city back to Glenelg after work. The trams are busy to say the least, in fact it was only when 2 trams pulled up opened their doors and one person clambered on doors shut and tram left (with the remaining 150 prospective passengers still stood there) that I realised how busy. I now walk back a couple of stops to make sure I get on, not that far as tram stops are like tube stops in London. At the end of the first week at work, we had been invited to the Young Achievers Awards sponsored by Channel 9 (tv) on the Saturday night, now I could say that this was due to my impressive performance due to my first week at work however I think it had more to do with the fact that they wanted representatives under the age of 30! - Iain obviously just about scrapes through under this:) It was a black dress for girls kind of do and shirt and tie for boys, so Iain and I visited the shopping centre (and believe me White Rose is amazing in comparison) to find him some trousers and a shirt. We succeeded and that night we headed off to the Hilton for the ceremony. It was a very nice do with drinks and a three course meal provided. The company that I work for was sponsoring hence why we had a table and the young achievers were all very inspirational, the local MP's were also present and one of them was brought over to our picture for a table, my boss advised him we were from England and he stuck up a conversation as he had family back in England. The exact place I have forgotten for now but it was where that now famous canoeist (the one in Panama) comes from which is what Iain proceeded to tell him as I sat there with my mouth open, I wasn't sure this was the kind of small talk we should be making with the local MPs but he took it in good jest:) We've also been making sure we go for a short run (aka crawl) along the beach where we finish work a couple of nights not so much to get fit more to work off the drink and food we have been consuming! I have taken up power yoga, which I do in town after work on a Tuesday, it's very good although it's very different from back home. They are a lot more into the spiritual side of it and when in the first class we started with a chant and a lot of ohms, I did begin to question my sanity and whether I was in some cult meeting! Iain started work on the Friday of the same week as me and it seems to be going well. He had got a works van and phone and the guy he's working for seems lovely and early finishes (although they do start very early) seem to be par for the course. We have now finally managed to set up the internet and Foxtel, let's just say service with these sort of providers is comparable to one of the mobile phone companies back home. A couple of weeks ago, Danny and Gaz came to visit, Danny was just here for the weekend and Gaz was here for a couple of weeks. The first weekened they arrived consisted of a couple of beach days and nights out where we discovered from an Australian friend that Danny had a striking resemblance to the Australian Idol winner Dean Geyer:) and the last couple of weeks have been really good and managed to fit quite a bit in. Last week we ventured back to the races and on sunday we did a day trip to the Barossa Valley region which was good and because it was a coach trip meant that we could all partake in the tasting. We also stopped off at the Whispering Wall which was good to see and learnt a few more words and sayings from the Tweed dictionary, 'you're all talk and no mouth' is a now infamous example of tweedly faux paux. It's now the weekend again and our Gaz left on Thursday, so Iain and I are going to have a steady chilled out weekend on the beach as we feel shattered. Anyway it's been a good couple of weeks and I'm definitely going to make sure that I update this sooner rather than later as becuase so much time has passed I can't remember it all, I can't remember what I've already written about it and my creative juices have stopped flowing as I try and remember!

Hope you're all well.

Sara and Iain

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