Hooray, I finally figured out what was wrong with the blog template uploading, so now I have my old 3 column one back which, unless you have a widescreen 17" monitor like I have, probably looks quite crap, which probably means you should start thinking about upgrading from that 15" CRT monitor ha ha. I'm not sure if I have pointed this out yet but Miss R is a vegetarian. She has been one for 8 years or so now. She still eats eggs and dairy, so she is far from a strict vegan, with the exception of not wearing leather. Anyway, prior to Miss R my diet would consist primarily of a pot full of Chicken Tikka Masala that I would cook up on Monday night and would see me through to Friday. Easy, and fricken cheap. However, obviously this has been modified a little and my vegetarian dish repetoire has expanded greatly. It's no big deal, but from my experience vegetarian dishes take three times as long to cook as simply frying a steak and chucking some vegies on the side. So now I find myself familiar with lentil and chickpea soaking, non rennet cheeses and gelatine free ice creams. Not that i mind terribly much. Miss R insists that i eat meat when i want it. Which brings me onto a group of people I like to call the neo-hippies. I call them neo-hippies as they are a group of people evolved from the original hippy. Most of the time they're female, they're vegetarians, they study arts, ride shitty bikes and wear big blue crocheted beanies to hide the hair they haven't cut, or washed, in 5 years, and can somehow afford rents in the inner city suburbs. All together they're harmless, but they are starting to shit me somewhat in the fact that they ride their shitty bikes at 2kph and block up the bike lanes. I'm not a bike nazi, not like some Lance Armstrong wannabees, but come on, put a bit of effort into those pedals girls, honestly.

Is there something more???

Despite my relative apathy that I convey towards organised religion, I should point out that that does not mean that I am not spiritual. I don't need some fuddy duddy reading from some book that was written when humankind was still struggling with settled farming practices to tell me how to live my life. The world has moved on sorry to say. In light of this I should point out that I am a trained tarot reader. In fact I've been reading cards for a good 15 years now I guess. However, something I thought about today is that I haven't done a reading for, well, I don't remember when. Maybe it is something that I have grown out of, maybe I just don't feel like I need to know what is going on around me or what the future has in store because I pretty happy in the here and now. But it really was amazing how the cards revealed things, something that simple 'chance' couldn't account for. By that I mean doing the same readings for a friend for instance with the same cards popping up over and over again. Yes, I am sure there are skeptics out there, big deal.

Of dogs and sunshine.

Greyhounds aren't supposed to be terribly violent dogs, especially to humans. And Merlin, bless him, is the dopiest lounge lizard on earth. However, an insight into his racing past became apparent last week when he became absolutely fixated on a Jack Russell/Corgi cross. I should mention that this dog is small and is suffering a major case of small man syndrome. His owners who are clearly not brain surgeons, let him out to roam to his hearts content in the park. NO problem except that he wants to fight every male dog including, and not limited to Bull Mastifs, American Staffies and Rhodesian Ridgebacks, all of whom cower at the site of this little shit of a dog. This obviously encourages a very bad vibe in the off leash park and many owners are now reluctant to bring their dogs because of this little abomination. So, with that in mind, Merlin is a greyhound. Bred to chase down anything small and fluffy that moves quickly. And you can see him watching small maltese terriers running or cats or whatever catches his eye. So last week Cleo was off leash and Merlin was on leash (as he has to be) and Cleo was tormenting this little turd of a dog because she is so much faster. Cleo ran past Merlin with turd in pursuit at which point Merlin lunged forward, grabbed this dog by the neck and literally threw him into the fence. I won't lie, I had a little sense of satisfaction that this little turd was put back in his place, but thank goodness I had a hold of Merlin as that dog would've been torn to sheds. Suffice to say that when the turd now sees Merlin he legs it home. Good. For the past three weeks my body clock has been pretty much gone onto daylight savings mode. I suspect it was the fact that I was waking up at 0530 with sunlight streaming in the bedroom window and getting sleepy at around 2130 at night. And the thing is, when I say awake, I really mean AWAKE. It is frustrating as I have found that I am the kind of person whose brain starts ticking over at a million miles an hour in antipation of the day ahead. As a result I am physically incapable of sleeping in. Meanwhile, Miss R is quite happy and capable of sleeping well into double digit territory. So now, finally, the rest of Melbourne is in time with me and I'm not tired, not at all. In the past, losing an hour would put my entire body clock out of whack and it took a good 3 weeks to get it back in check. But not this year. Is it a sign of aging? Am I going to end up as a pensioner whose bedtime is after the evening news and wakes up in time to watch dodgy telemarketing?? Quite possibly. Anyway, all this daylight at the end of the day means I can walk the dogs in the light without either of them freaking out over a fire hydrant they think is a pit bull terrier staring them down in fading light.

What the hell is going on with blogger? I'm pretty much over waiting for them to fix my problems uploading a template. I could do it like a couple weeks ago, so what has changed? I had a great 3 column set up that filled the whole screen, but right now I'm stuck with this generic crappy one. Yesterday my sister turned 30 years of age. Problem is she is in the UK, as she has been for the last 8 years or so. Sometimes I really wish she was over here as I get really jealous of the fact that Miss R gets to see her sister all of the time. Which is fine, but if my illustrious sister was living in Melbourne again, that would be really really nice.

Well, since my experience last week on my old clunker bike, I had to resort to driving to and from work, which wasn't so bad as I was working at a site pretty close to home anyway. I should mention that the old clunker was performing quite admirably until about 1km from home when the back tyre blew. I mean, the tyres are likely to be somewhere in the vicinity of 10 years old now, so it was only a matter of time I guess. So I semi-rode home on a flat tyre, which was not pleasant and made worse by the head wind from hell. So, on the weekend I bit the bullet and ventured out to some bicycle shops and see about purchasing a new set of wheels. I really needed to get this bike on Interest free, or else it was likely that Miss R and I wouldn't be able to eat for the rest of the month. I went to one bike shop that was so busy, that I wandered around, looking like a customer in need of some help for a good 15 minutes. No sales assistants came to assist me and to be honest, their range was pretty shit. So I left. I then ventured out to a BICYCLE SUPERSTORE and lets be frank here, it was fricken immense. I found a couple of bikes that I liked, but alas, they couldn't do interest free payment plans, only Lay-by and to honest, I needed the bike there and then. Anyway, next day, I dragged Miss R to another well known medium sized bike shop. They had a range of good quality bikes at quite good (actually, pretty awesome) prices. I settled on what is now known as a flat-bar road bike. Basically it's like a road bike, but with straight handlebars like a Mountain Bike. I was impressed by the carbon fibre forks and seat post, the insanely large crank gearing and the overall look of the thing. Miss R convinced me to get it cash there and then and not to worry about interest free payment plans and shit. Suffice to say, Miss R and I will be resorting to 2-minute noodles this month. MMmm, yum. Anyway, I rode it to work for the first time this morning and it is amazing what a difference a good bike makes. I mean, the mountain bike I had been using was a pretty bloody good bike, but this thing simply flies. In other news, summer is on the way and it got to like 34 degrees or something like that yesterday. I'm not a big fan of summer at all. It gets far too hot to sleep or do much else. I'm looking at getting air con installed in the bedroom. We have it downstairs in the lounge, but that's no good for when it comes time to go to bed. I think I only got 2 hours sleep last night, the rest was just a sweat fest.

Bicycles

It just so happens that the bike I have been using for the past 6 months to travel to and from work I had loaned off a very good friend. He needed it back so I took it back to him of course. Suffice to say that I had to then resurrect my old clunker for the ride into work today. Holy shit man, it really is amazing what a difference a bike makes. My legs were HURTING within 10 minutes from leaving home and then the seat post decided to collapse on me, so in the end I just thought screw it, I'm driving. I don't know what would have been worse in the end. Like I have mentioned countless times, driving to work, and home again, is the absolute bain of my life. It's funny actually, in the city there is the brand new BHP-Billiton office complex. Right next door is the QV apartment complex which also contains a gym and a Safeway supermarket. Imagine if you lived at QV and worked at BHP? Quite honestly you would never leave your little area. All your needs are met right there and you wouldn't waste 2 hours a day stuck in fricken traffic. On the downside, you wouldn't have a backyard. Bummer.

Sorry folks....

I'm having some issues with my blog template so I have had to resort to using a generic blogger template until I can get this sorted. Last night, being Saturday night, I ventured to the other side of the city with Miss R and her sister Miss J to see a movie (it was Death at a Funeral actually, okay for a bit of a laugh). It's amazing how one feels out of place when taken out of their element. The south side of Melbourne is quite different to the north I have to say. Down south it's all designer jeans and white trainers, whereas up north here it's more tea cosy beanies and vegetarians. I have to say too, much less grief. Walked past a guy who had had his nose broken in a fight. Honestly, some guys need to grow up. I took the dogs to a local deserted velodrome to let them both off the leash. It was great to a point. Good old Merlin got to stretch his legs probably for the first time since his last race in February, and boy did he. Cleo ran off and Merlin took chase but couldn't exactly keep his footing over rough ground, but he did get that familiar greyhound gait happening some a good sprint. The only down side was that Cleo decided to be petulant and not let me put her collar on. Suffice to say, she went to the vet the next day and got de-sexed. Well, actually, we had had her booked in for 2 weeks.

Wouldn't you know it, school holidays have finished and with it has come a vast increase in the volume of traffic on the roads during rush hour. I say this because I had to drive to work today as I had to use my car for a job. I categorically hate driving to work, and back home again. However, all this would be solved if bloody Vic Roads managed to synchronise their traffic light sequencing. Take for example St George's Road. It's a duel carriageway road with a tramline running up the middle of it. Quite a major road I'm sure you would agree. However, there are countless intersections along this way and every time one traffic light goes green the next one goes red. And this repeats itself along most of its length. Why can't some genius at Vic Roads sequence the lights so when one goes green, the next light goes green a minute or so AFTER the light before? How hard can it be?? Honestly, there's no good reason for it. And to make matters worse, the roads that cross over are piddly little neighborhood roads and ALL of St George's Road has to come for a stop for one piss ant car. Just stupid.

Greyhounds are pretty fricken large.

well, we've got another dog. Yes, it's a greyhound. Can I just say that when you see these dogs racing on TV, they look like ordinary sized dogs. However, nothing can prepare you for the sheer size of these dogs when you see one up close. Our boy, Merlin, stand 75cm at the shoulders and is 110cm long without the tail. He's huge, no two ways about it. Poor thing has been in the adoption kennels since March and to be honest, isn't in that great a condition. However, he is very very affectionate and is terribly loyal already. He quite happily follows me or Miss R around the house with little Cleo trying to lick his face the whole time. They are both black and look like twins, except he's like twice the size. His racing career was far from stellar; 32 race starts for 2 wins. I even read that the poor thing had a massive collision at a race meet in Tasmania. Yes, he really got around attending race meets in Victoria, Tassie and NSW. He's just a big friendly giant really. I can't wait until we're confident in letting him off the leash with little Cleo. She seriously wants to play with him ALL the time and it will be good once they can have a good run together. Poor Cleo goes in to be de-sexed on Friday. I hope she'll be okay.

Melbourne my town....

I have been wondering lately about what makes this city of Melbourne so bloody great. For those of you who haven't been here, it's a pretty generic city as far as cities go. There is a CBD with tall buildings and out from it spread the inevitable suburbs. Office workers populate the CBD during the week of course. Suits and ties, especially around Collins St where the stockbrokers all are and around William St where all the lawyers are. The inner suburbs are a mix of old industrial areas, new apartment complexes and old Victorian era cottages. Very tre chic I suppose. The western suburbs still comprise of warehouses and factories. Real estate is terribly undervalued here, especially considering you are only 5km from the city. The south and eastern suburbs are, and always have been, quite exclusive...with the exception of Richmond, which in my opinion is a claustrophobic hell hole where you can never find a car park and traffic barely moves. My personal favourite is, and always will be, the north. It's a little scungey, but it has character. We don't have half as many traffic problems as other areas of the city. It's flat which makes bike riding easy and you get value for money as far as housing goes. I love Melbourne's culture and the ease to get around. I love Melbourne's people; so diverse and carefree. I love Melbourne's food and coffee. All sorts of things.

If you're really that sick...GO HOME!

Do you have someone at your work who is constantly sick? Does this same person continue to come in to work and spread their germs around? Furthermore, does this same person go to painstaking lengths to quietly let everyone know how sick they are, and what a champion they are for turning up to work? Yes, I have mentioned this before, but quite honestly, even when I was a teacher, I was never as constantly sick as this person is. When you're sick, you're sick. Deal with it. Go to the chemist and buy whatever drugs you need to help alleviate the symptoms, and just go home. Don't spread your festy germs to everyone else. I have learned that a day off is worth it, because quite honesly, if you push yourself, you'll just have to end up taking 3 days off instead, and that doesn't benefit anyone does it. Miss R has taken this advice today. She's at home crook as a dog...with the dog. Speaking of the dog, OMG she is the smelliest bloody thing. It seems that when she is out in the park, every other dog within 5km wants to come and lick her face. Which is fine, except that she ends up looking like a porn star after a hard day at the office and smells like dog slobber. Oh lovely. Couple this with the fact that we haven't washed her in 3 weeks and you get a fair idea of what she must be smelling like. MMmmm, nice.