Day 4- 25 December 2011
Once again it’s a multi-parent Christmas Day for me. We started the day with breakfast at Dad and Stepmum’s place then jumped in the car and made for Wangaratta where a very much needed fuel stop gave us enough to continue the trip to Edi where we spent the afternoon with Mum, her partner and his extended family drinking, talking, eating and playing backyard cricket. Gifts were exchanged at both houses and I wound up with quite a good haul including Skyrim which will probably consume more parts of me than I’d like to admit when we return from holidays.

Day 5- 26 December 2011
Departed Albury and made for the mountains. The route we took led us past the Hume Dam and over Bell Bridge at Bethanga. The original plan was to stop by Thredbo and ride the chairlift, however when we arrived and had just opened the car door this massive thunderclap rang through the air. Despite some pretty big pouts we decided that rainy, foggy conditions on the chairlift would not be fun and decided to try again tomorrow. Stayed at the Lake Jindabyne Hotel who once again delivered on being a great value spot with spectacular lake views from every room and tasty food in the bistro. I stayed at the same motel when I stayed in Jindabyne a few years ago after a thoroughly enjoyable day driving through the Snowy Mountains.

Day 6- 27 December 2011
The day was bright, clear and sunny… perfect for a chairlift ride and hike. We headed back to Thredbo where we collected our lift passes and headed up the mountain. At the top, all plans to not hike were discarded as we set off along the wonderful raised mesh walkway to Mount Kosciuszko. Made it almost 3km before heading back and having morning tea at Eagles Nest which is 1937m about sea level with some pretty amazing views. Afterward we drove to Canberra and finished off the day sharing a few pints with Mick who was down from Sydney.

Day 7- 28 December 2011
Up bright and early to meet Madeline for breakfast. The original location was closed so we wound up at Gus’ which is something of a Canberra love/hate location. Following a very filling breakfast we headed off to the Australian War Memorial and once again I was highly mistaken about the size of this place. Found some of Adrian’s relatives on the roll of honour and looked through all the exhibitions. Could easily have spent far longer than we did here. For lunch I couldn’t resist a visit to Koko Black while in town, and I didn’t think Adrian would have any objection After lunch we headed to Parliament House and had a look around, just quietly I think I like Old Parliament House better. Dinner was some pretty damn tasty Malasian at Rasa Sayang with Lana, Dermott and T.

That concludes week 1, I know we’re almost into week 3 of the actual trip. Aiming to get round-ups of week 2 posted before we get back, probably sometime in the next couple of days.. depending on what else is going on. You know what it’s like, this being on holidays business.

For all the photos from the trip have a look at the Ali’s Family Magical Mystery Tour set on Flickr.

In late 2009 I visited Albury to see family for Christmas and noted a few things that differed quite a lot between catching a flight between large state capitals and catching a flight to a regional town. Having caught many flights of both types I wanted to share some of the people watching observations from this particular trip.

• As people sat down they’d say hello to the person sitting next to them, most were strangers.
• I joined in on an exchange taking place behind me where one middle-aged lady had a seat next to a young, attractive, man. Her friend commented that she must have been a good person this year to get assigned such good company. I wished them both a Merry Christmas and noticed that the guy looked somewhat amused about the exchange between the ladies.
• An unaccompanied minor was bought to the back of the plane to be seated. A kindly older lady passenger spoke with her for a while before take-off. The steward didn’t interfere with the conversation.
• Stewards explained matter-of-factly why we’d be a little slower getting off the ground than usual. Being on the first flight of the day meant that additional checks once we hit the start of the runway were needed.
• The woman sitting next to me in the exit row noticed an empty window seat on the other side of the aisle and asked the steward if she could take it. He permitted the change. After the passenger counts were done I said to her that she should go nab her window seat now; just before she got up and moved she said it wasn’t due to the company on this side.
• After the meals were served I started up my phone and began watching some TED talks with headphones in. This was fairly introverted behaviour compared to many other passengers who were conversing with each other. Across the aisle the lady who’d moved seats had turned around to join the young guy and older lady who were in deep discussion. Around the cabin people quietly spoke to each other or read newspapers. Nobody appeared to get irritable about finding themselves in a conversation they’d rather avoid.
• The meal I received consisted of dried apricots, juice, a scone and coffee. Not a bad breakfast compared to the meal Qantas called lunch; consisting of a savoury danish and a warm softdrink.

The company I flew with has fast become one of my favourites for regional travel and I can honestly say I’ve never had a bad experience when flying Rex.

Just south of Trundle is another town called Bogan Gate. Australian readers may be amused by a town named after a somewhat derogatory named social class. To my great surprise and delight Mum told me there was actually a gate which the town was named after. She elaborated that it was in the middle of a field nowhere significant. None the less I insisted that I had to get a photo on the Bogan Gate else nobody would believe it. So here it is:

Saturday evening, we’d had dinner at 6pm and by 7.15p I was yawning and musing about going to bed. Feeling very isolated I had to repeatedly tell myself that checking my phone was a pointless endeavour and to stop thinking about what conversations may be happening on Twitter, Plurk, IRC and IM. It was odd once everybody had gone to bed and I was sitting up alone at 10pm drinking tea and reading a book I’d been meaning to start for a number of weeks.

It’s very dark and quiet out there. A stark contrast to the ‘not quite night’ darkness and noise that is part of living in Newtown. The air is cold outside but the house was centrally heated, so despite bemused friends commenting about how I’d freeze on my trip west, it wasn’t the case at all.

On a Sunday daytrip I did have signal for a couple of hours and checked my email, Twitter replies and managed to catch up with a few people who were around at the time. It amazed me quite a bit how much I depend on the feeling of connectedness with people who are located both locally and all over the world. I don’t need to be talking to these people all the time, but I do feel most at ease knowing that I can. Instead I found other ways of passing the time, listening to my Mum talk to her Mum about the people who grew up and currently reside around the area. It seems that people out here are getting married and having children but doing little else. Perhaps its the rural setting, with little else to do. But it isn’t a technological black hole. The exchange in Trundle ADSL2 capable, people out there probably have a better internet connection than I do. There is no reason why somebody out there couldn’t be as active online as anybody in a capital city.

Admittedly there isn’t the same opportunity to network face to face but that shouldn’t stop you. My friend Fiona is based in Cairns and is a very active member of a number of online communities. She’s travelled to cities and met with several other people. While I’ve never actually met Fi face to face, we regularly communicate through social networks, have text conversations, call each other on mobile or Skype and send each other sms’. In other words, we’re not different to any other people who are friends and living 1600km apart.

I’ve taken some photos around Trundle, I think fondly of this place after spending a great deal of my childhood visiting here. There are a couple of heritage listed locations and Trundle also boasts the widest street in the west. The reason its so wide is that ‘back in the old days’ there needed to be sufficient room to turn the bullock-drawn wool wagons. It’s a saying here that you can tell the difference between locals and visitors by who walks and who drives from one side of the street to the other. You can see some of the larger photos from around here on my Flickr account starting from here.

Here we go!

1. I love to write and sometimes feel I can express myself better in writing. I’m a verbose writer, this isn’t going to be a short read.
2. I’ve never liked beer and only this year have started to develop a tolerance/taste for wine. Despite all claims to the contrary, you can do a uni degree without becoming a beer drinker. My preferred alcoholic drinks are spirits and liqueurs.
3. I’m quite competitive. It’s usually all in the spirit of healthy competition, not necessarily a bad thing if used carefully. My old Personal Trainer was particularly gifted at using this compulsion of mine to progressively improve my performance against my past achievements.
4. If you’re making coffee I’ll have a skim milk latte with no sugar. I haven’t had instant coffee since the late 1990′s and will opt for tea or nothing before instant. Having said that, I love tea and the T2 Monk Pear blend is my current favourite.
5. I am most motivated and inspired when surrounded by people that I believe are smarter than I am.
6. I like my natural lip colour and rarely wear lipstick. This is also because I like to wear colourful eye makeup while still keeping my overall look fairly neutral.
7. I enjoy my own company as much as that of others. If I’ve had an overly social week I crave some time in solitude. I am happiest when I can strike a balance between time alone and time spent around others.
8. I’m a Virgo who was born on the cusp of Leo. Belief in astrology or not, it does sum up my personality. Easy-going, perfectionist and friendly most of the time but get me fired up about something and you’ll certainly hear about it.
9. I love to drive. This inspired my love of taking road trips both by myself and with excellent company. Living close to the CBD of Sydney has meant I drive little and I get cravings to jump in my car and take off somewhere. I usually indulge these cravings when I have days off and a yearning to go and explore somewhere.
10. I will do almost anything for my friends, I’ve been known to put their wants and needs before my own. Fortunately, I also have friends that do the same for me.
11. During my honours year I had purple hair for a couple of months. It was great fun and my students loved it. I’ve had many hair colours over the years and am most happy with the way it is currently.
12. Ever since I was in high school a great majority of my friends, particularly my ‘inner circle’, have been guys. It’s only been in the last few years that I’ve developed close friendships with a few women; usually they have guys as their ‘inner circle’ too. It’s been a learning curve but having chick best friends is just as good as having guy best friends.
13. Puzzles, games and challenges are a fun past-time for me, not a painful thing to be suffered through. Cryptic crosswords are much more fun than regular crosswords for me.
14. I am incredibly self-conscious about dancing. This is the result of being told some years ago that I have no rhythm by a highly trusted person. I can’t seem to get past this most of the time unless there are a lot of my friends dancing also.
15. My natural personality is bubbly, happy and open; I also talk a lot. I withdraw from people and situations when I’m feeling down in order to not inflict my stormy moods on others.
16. I’m a huge romantic and love to hear stories about how people get together and the sweet things they do for each other. A grand romantic gesture is a sure way to get my attention.
17. I feel compelled to hug people a lot. Most of my friends are ‘hug types’ which is probably a good thing since it’s my most common way to greet and say goodbye to friends.
18. I have an affinity for the numbers 5, 8 and any number under 100 that is a multiple of 8.
19. I have a particular dislike for the word ‘blog’, something just doesn’t quite sit right with me about it.
20. To me, my parents divorce when I was quite young was a good thing. Not only did I get to travel more (my Mum, siblings and I moved to Mackay while Dad stayed in Albury) but I was given the opportunity to get to know my parents better as individuals while as a teenager and adult. I respect them greatly for not staying in the marriage purely ‘for the sake of the children’. It was never about getting twice as much stuff come Christmas or birthdays. On a related note, I consider my Mum to be one of my best friends and have always had an open and trusting relationship with her. It is rare that more than a few days go by between us speaking and she’s on my Facebook friends list too.
21. Over the years I’ve made friends with so many amazing people that it’s impossible to keep in regular touch with them all. This makes me feel sad because they all rock and I hope they all know that their friendship still means the world to me.
22. I prefer the cooler autumn/winter/early spring months over the warmer months.
23. I define my personal style as sitting in between classic and funky. Often my outfits will incorporate elements of both.
24. I lost a good many hours sleep worrying about whether my decision to move to Sydney would be the biggest mistake of my life. It wasn’t!
25. I’m a good cook and love cooking but my current kitchen is not conducive to lavish cooking. My signature dessert is lemon cheesecake.
26. My computers, car and significant gadgets have names.
27. Give me chocolate that’s at least 70% cocoa, though if the need is great enough milk chocolate will suffice.
28. I get the giggles often at the most inappropriate times over the strangest of things. Something may be hilarious to me but not always to those around me.
29. I write with my left hand, mouse with my right and can play pool and tennis with either though I tend to favour my right. I’ve always loved how I can multi-task between a writing pad and computer using both hands simultaneously.
30. Rick-Rolls have always been funny and I don’t foresee that they will ever not be funny.
31. I don’t feel overly comfortable wearing dresses; if you see me in one, you know it’s a big deal. This is predominantly a result of it being very difficult to find a well cut dress for my rather abnormal proportions.
32. I’m a terrible liar and find it so much easier to be truthful. Liars get found out in the end anyway and by then it’s always worse than if you’d been upfront to start with.
33. I have a strong moral compass which means there is very very little that I regret. I also believe that even bad situations can be positive if you gain some sort of insight from them.
34. I’m on friendly or neutral terms with majority of my former partners.
35. I really, really hate having my feet touched.
36. I don’t get star-struck around celebrities or well-known personalities. I’ve been asked a couple of times to be a special guest PA at conventions. Once you get past the fact that they’re very recognisable due to their occupation, the celebrities I’ve spent time around are pretty regular people.
37. I wear contact lenses and have never worn glasses. This is due to the difference in strength between my eyes. I’m loathe to get glasses as I hate the idea of having a border to my field of vision. I can wear lenses more places than glasses and they have inbuilt UV protection. I’m yet to be convinced to switch to glasses no matter how cute girls wearing glasses apparently are.
38. I’ve never flown anywhere for leisure with somebody who wasn’t in my family. I have flown with others for business but would love to go overseas somewhere with 1 or more friends.
39. I’ve been involved in Book Crossing for a few years now. Over that time I’ve spent hours sifting through and buying books I’ve found in Life Line book fairs. Unfortunately I haven’t had the time to read and release even half of them yet.
40. As I find out about sites I anticipate I’ll use, I register accounts for them to ensure that my nick (Alegrya) isn’t taken by somebody else.
41. I’ve never had nor, plan to ever create a MySpace account.
42. My great passion, professionally and personally, is to have everybody love technology as much as I do. I see so many ways that it can make life easier and more fun and want everybody to get in on it. My dream job will indulge this passion.
43. I dislike it when people constantly agree with me. I’m not always right and there is nothing wrong with some healthy debate between friends and colleagues.
44. I use Ubuntu on my laptop, it shipped with Windows but the install was never activated. As soon as my battery had charged I installed Ubuntu. The intention was to learn Linux and avoid gaming distractions while writing my thesis. It worked a charm, I now use my laptop as my primary personal computer and still enjoy learning about Linux.
45. I’m an open source software and creative commons advocate. There’s so much great open source software and freeware out there, why aren’t more people using it?
46. Sony Ericsson mobile phones own a special piece of my soul. After having Nokias for years I was impressed by the sleekness and usability of SE. I’m onto my third SE and hope they release something like the N95 in the next year or so.
47. I’ve never owned anything branded Apple. The Mac OS confuses me greatly.
48. My personality type is ENTJ or ESTJ depending on the site administering the test. I always get one of those two types, most commonly I’m an ENTJ.
49. I pay careful attention to my spelling and grammar even if the medium is very casual. Careless spelling and bad grammar are the first things I’ll pick up on when reading something.
50. If I haven’t heard from somebody in a while I’m quite likely to call, email or IM them out of the blue to say hi and see how they’re going.
51. I am a total and utter geek and not ashamed of it.
52. I haven’t had a chance to play computer games since leaving Brisbane and I really miss playing Guild Wars.
53. I have a pretty dry sense of humour and people don’t always get my wry wit or obscure references.
54. I’ve never seen a James Bond movie.
55. Honours was the best year of my time spent at university, followed closely by 3rd year. The opportunities extended to me and things I was involved in made all the stress and work totally worth it.
56. No job I’ve had so far has been as personally rewarding as university tutoring was. There’s nothing quite like the look of delight that crosses a troubled students face in the moment that all the content ‘clicks’ for them. Knowing that it happened as a result of your patience, energy and creativity is pretty awesome.
57. I’ve been an insomniac on and off since 2001 as a result of being stalked. It thankfully wasn’t for an extended time and hasn’t happened again since. The insomnia still comes and goes depending largely on my stress levels.
58. I don’t watch television, but do watch some television shows.
59. My current house doesn’t have a television in the living room and I really like that when my housemates and friends hang out here, we have conversations and engage each other instead of staring blankly at a screen.
60. Sydney is the 4th city I’ve lived in that I can recall. I was born in Melbourne but my parents moved to Albury approximately a month later. I lived in Albury for 12years, Mackay then Brisbane for 7 years each and now I’m in Sydney.
61. I hated Sydney for years and years and my mind was only changed after spending some time here over a couple of weekends in 2007. The idea to move here was planted by an old friend after I told them about how I was getting a bit tired of Brisbane.
62. In early 2007, after Honours and the end of my nearly 4-year relationship I resolved to spend more time and energy taking care of myself. I got into gym and discovered that I loved running. Dropping 3 dress sizes in a year was pretty great too. I’ve been frustrated since moving to Sydney because I haven’t had the chance to go to the gym and get my fitness levels back up to what they were in September. My current fitness goal is still to be able to run 2km in 12mins. I used to be able to easily do 2km in 15mins.
63. I drove my current car out of the showroom when I was 17. I decided that I wanted a new car to take with me to Brisbane and after working out the numbers I bought one. The only thing that wasn’t in my name at that time was the bank loan as I wasn’t yet 18. From May until August of 2000 I had two cars. My old Mitsubishi Colt sedan (it was a beast of a car) and my new Hyundai Excel hatchback.
64. I love Dendy films, the more obscure the better.
65. I listen to most types of music, I especially enjoy the many flavours of electronica, house, drum’n'bass, jazz and most of the things played on JJJ.
66. My favourite colours, in no particular order are: purple, blue, silver and red. I don’t have just one all-time favourite colour.
67. I have a head for trivia and can remember some things in scary amounts of detail for a long time.
68. I dream in colour and have been known to remember up to 5-8 dreams and how they all interlinked to each other. I used to write my dreams down but found that it could take up to an hour to get it all down.
69. I hate running late or being held up waiting for others who are running late to leave for something. If it’s really important I’m usually 5-20mins early. I am sometimes late because I hate leaving people behind even more than being late. Internal conflict anybody!
70. I always carry at least one book with me. Be it an actual book in my bag, an e-book on my phone or audiobook on phone/iriver.
71. I have an inherent dislike for clothes shopping and will put it off for as long as I possibly can. I do have days when I’ll enjoy going shopping with friends but mostly I tend to avoid it.
72. My eyes are my most complimented feature, followed by my smile.
73. I always have trouble recalling the correct spelling of ‘definitely’ and will sometimes avoid using it in text conversation because it’s quicker for me to come up with an alternative word and use that.
74. I knit. My grandmother taught me how to knit when I was a child and a friend re-taught me the basics a couple of years ago. I’ve done some pretty funky projects and use it to relieve stress and occupy my hands while I’m watching television shows or movies at home. I’ve found it’s just one of those things that instantly ‘makes sense’ to engineers/IT folk. After all, it is only a series of binary operations.
75. For years I’ve wanted to go up in a hot air balloon. I haven’t done it yet but I think it would be great and have plans to do it in the next few years.
76. I’ve never been overseas except to visit a friend in New Zealand. I’m very jealous of all my friends who frequently visit Asia and Europe for work and/or pleasure.
77. Sometimes I wear headphones with no music playing when walking in the street just so the street sellers won’t stop me to try and sell me something.
78. I collect movie scores. They’re the best ambient music ever.
79. I have penfriends because I love to get letters and packages that don’t have letterheads. It’s also fun putting together packages that I know they will adore.
80. Some people who know me pretty well have never met me face to face but I still consider them to be good friends. Technology is great like that!
81. I spend way too much time in front of computers.
82. If given the choice I’d rather talk with people in small groups of 2-3 than in large parties. Parties are still great fun, but you can’t really talk with people.
83. I love a good house party and don’t often enjoy going out to clubs. If the group is good then I’d be more than happy to hit a cocktail bar or pub for some drinks and a game of pool.
84. The sorting hat would totally put me in Ravenclaw.
85. I own more bags than pairs of shoes. True story! I really should stop accumulating bags….and own more than 7 pairs of shoes. I suspect I’m letting down the females of the world by owning less pairs of shoes than some men I know. I also don’t own a pair of thongs.
86. I can spend hours playing simple java/flash games on the net that are stupidly addictive and utterly pointless but ever so much fun.
87. I really can’t stand it when people say ‘like’ an unnecessary number times when they’re talking. Like, you know, like totally hate it like. To amuse myself I count how many times they say it.
88. I enjoy doing housework. It may seem strange but I find it meditative, especially if I’m listening to some good music at the time. I’m also quite house proud and like common areas to be clean and tidy within reason and time available for housework.
89. For a very long time I hated having my picture taken. I still don’t especially like it, but I no longer actively run or try to hide from cameras when they’re pointed my way. I just never thought I looked good in pictures. Still don’t but I’m accepting of the fact that not everybody thinks as I do on this matter.
90. I think British comedy is much funnier than American comedy.
91. I love things that smell great. A US-based friend got me addicted to the Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab perfumed oils. I must have more, they’re beautiful.
92. It frustrates me when I see friends going through difficulties and I know that there is nothing or little I can do to help.
93. I have great difficulty asking for help from those around me. The more I need it, the harder it is for me to seek it. One day I will realise that it’s ok to get help from those around me and that I’m not expected to be super-human.
94. It is rare that I sleep well the night before I fly anywhere. It’s a mix of excitement about the upcoming trip and a tinge of nerves.
95. When I was much younger my siblings and appeared in a brochure for a Mackay resort as the children of a family supposedly holidaying there. To my knowledge they’re still using those pictures. We thought it was pretty funny that our fake ‘Mum and Dad’ were actually brother and sister.
96. Hacking code and learning programming languages comprehensively has never come easily for me. I can’t explain why it always seemed so difficult when it was easy for my peers. I suspect it’s a mental block I’ve placed there mixed with the fact that I’d rather be writing the documentation that accompanies the code.
97. While putting together my personal website I’ve been surprised at how easily HTML, CSS and some PHP have come back to me after studying them at uni all those years ago. I enjoy this kind of development because I can see what I’ve created/broken almost straightaway and can change what needs to be changed straight away. Development environments are also much easier to put together.
98. There is much more I’m happy with about my life currently than I am unhappy with. To me the things I’m unhappy with are merely an opportunity for self-improvement and growth.
99. I plan someday have my own consulting company. I’ve been told a few times recently that I should start one but I know I need to learn more about the business environment first.
100. I like the occasional chick flick. They’re a guilty pleasure of mine. Between all the deep, thought provoking movies that I also love; sometimes I’m just in the mood for something I can sit and enjoy and not think too much about.

So there you have it. Enjoy. Be inspired to compile your own lists. It’s a pretty interesting to form a snapshot of yourself. I found it a bit tricky at times but I think there’s at least one thing in there that everybody didn’t already know

The rules:
1- Each player starts with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
2 – People who are tagged need to write a post on their own blog (about their eight things) and post these rules.
3 – At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names.
4 – Don’t forget to leave them a comment telling them they’re tagged, and to read your blog.

8 Random Things:

1. I enjoy problem solving, puzzles and challenges. I adore cryptic crosswords and sudoku in particular.
2. My personality type is ESTJ which kind of explains a lot, but not everything.
3. I was once proposed to.
4. If given the choice between dark, milk or white, I’ll take dark chocolate every time.
5. Tutoring is the most self-fulfilling job I’ve ever done and would do it again in a heartbeat.
6. I made a resolution a couple of years ago to fly somewhere at least once every 12 months for as long as I can. So far so good.
7. I’m something of a clutz and tend to drop things or trip often.
8. I often knit while watching episodes or movies at home to occupy my hands. Not only is it the ultimate in stress reliever but I find it difficult to just sit and watch something, especially if I’m alone.

I’m tagging:
~ Lauren Watson
~ Monnie
~ Fiona Henderson
~ Michael Specht
~ Della Misner
~ Donna Brown
~ Tony Buttafuoco
~ Lauren Hewitt