Making the best of a bad situation

As my Dad would say, "I've caught the dreaded lurgy". I'm not sure where it came from, but Sunday night I had a sore throat, by lunchtime yesterday it had progressed to a sore throat and a runny nose. Over night it didn't get any better, so this morning I was feeling pretty sick and decided to stay home. I slowly got better during the day but felt exhausted by around 4pm so had a lie down and a nap. 
As I still hadn't organised anything to do with getting solar panels I took the opportunity of being home to do a little research and called up three local companies. I have started the process of getting quotes with all of them so over the next week or so I should have all the information I need to be able to book one of them in.
One of the companies advised that even though the roof doesn't face the ideal direction it may be worthwhile putting the panels on flat with the roof instead of using stands as I could actually fit more panels which may give me a greater result. The reason why I'd fit more panels lying down rather than putting them on stands is because the panels themselves would cast shadows if they were on stands and limit the total usable space.
One of the companies is coming to do a full site inspections, another is getting me to send them some photos so they can prepare a quote and the third I'm actually going in to see them as it will probably be easier than getting them to come and see me as their office is pretty close to work. All of them sounded pretty disinterested when they answer the phone but they quickly perked up pretty quickly when they realised that I was genuinely interested and they could actually get a sale out of me if they were any good.
Fingers crossed that at least one of these companies actually delivers on their quote and doesn't end up stuffing us around.

Bomber
If only I was an electrician and a plumber, then I could do everything.

Maybe I missed my calling.

 I took the photo of the fountain the other day when I was out for a walk after work. It is probably 5 minutes walk from homw and in the middle of the large park area that they call Googong Common. There are footpaths all around the Common which are great for walking and riding bikes. This is where I usually go for a walk. The proximity of the Common is the reason why I was happy to get a house with a small yard.

On Sunday I did all the paver edging in the backyard in preparation for planting the hedge. The photo is kind of deceiving as I took it in panorama mode. I was standing in the middle of a right angle corner so the slight curve in the middle of the photo is actually a full quarter circle. As I was doing the paving I really quite enjoyed myself and wondered if maybe I'd missed my calling, maybe I should have been a gardener. I don't what it would be like in the middle of Summer or Winter but the weather is perfect for spending time in the garden at the moment. 
Now that the edging is done we'll start to organise the plants for the hedge. I'm now thinking that maybe a hedge made from magnolias could be good. It's hard to know and I think I'll take the above photo to the nursery and try and get some advice on what should grow well along each fence. The one in shade is where we want the privacy and in the quarter circle we'll plant a tree. The edge in the sun may have some citrus plants or something else, we don't need any privacy over that fence so just want to make it look a bit more interesting than just a fence.

Bomber
If I lost my job or won lotto, I may just become a gardener.

Weighing In

After a slow start to the week I came home relatively strong and am happy that I met my step target. I didn't quite make my calories burnt target. Unfortunately I'm obviously drinking too much beer and not watching what I'm eating. I was hoping that with the effort I was putting in for the steps that I could eat what I like, ah well, I should have known better. I'm a little disappointed that I put on weight but I shouldn't have slacked off on Sunday and Monday. I obviously sail pretty close to the wind in terms of how much I actually need to do to lose weight and how much I am currently doing. I'm wondering that now I'm fairly consistently meeting the 70K step target for the week if I should increase it to make sure that I'm hitting the 4.6K average daily calorie burn. The graph is clearly showing that when I put the effort in to go further, the weight starts coming off. If I slack off, the weight starts coming back on. It's good to get confirmation and be able to track it week to week but now I really want to make sure that I'm losing weight more than ever.
I think that moving house kick started my body back into getting moving as ever since then I've had a little more energy each day. Even doing the work in the backyard has been a little easier on my body than I thought it would be, I haven't been too stiff and sore after a big day working in the yard. I've also been able to work longer and harder before needing a break and also recovering faster if I take a short break for some water or lunch.
My diet is still pretty bad and I'm drinking a few more beers than I should but as long as I'm losing weight and feeling a healthier I'm not going to beat myself up over it. When the physical labour of doing the backyard is over, I'll need to be careful that I don't slack off too much and that I also don't drink as much beer as I have been. 

Weight: 110kg
Steps for the week: 76,053
Average daily calorie burn: 4,362

Bomber
Is 80,000 steps a week going too far?

Here comes the cold.

I've created a new label for blogs, I've been struggling to come up with topics to write about and I think the last couple of posts haven't really been about anything, they've just kind of been me rambling on about whatever pops into my head. So tonight I've created the ramblings label. When I use this label, it will be because the post is a bit of a bitsa, a little bit of this and little bit of that.
The Canberra tradition is that you don't turn the heater on until ANZAC day. Getting up early for the dawn service is the excuse for turning it up and then it can stay on until sometime in early Spring. The last few years we've never made it to ANZAC day as it has been really quite cold, but maybe just the old house was colder than it should have been.
Last night is the first night that we actually needed to turn the heater on, I think we may have on it a couple of times before but that was mainly because of the timers that I set up shortly after we moved in. I tried to set things up the same as they were in the old house and I think it just goes to show that newer houses that are built and insulated properly, don't need as much heating or cooling. The heater was turning on at 3pm to heat the house before my wife and kids got home for the day but we've been turning off the heater when we got home as it was too warm in the house.

The new heater also has an economy setting where it changes the temperature setting back to a certain temperature after a period of time. This means that no matter what my wife sets the temperature to, after one hour it will revert to the setting that I have put in the economy menu. As the house is so well insulated and the heater recirculates the air in the house, this should mean that once the desired temperature has been reached, the heater will shut off and just the fan will recirculate the hot air until it gets cold enough that my wife gets up and changes the temperature on the controller again or the economy temperature is reached.
There is a similar setting for when the aircon is running in Summer and it will be interesting to see if the house stays cold or if the westerly facing rooms really do heat the house up a lot. If I can finally pull my finger out and arrange for the solar panels to be installed, I can set the aircon to run for an hour or two each day before everyone gets home to really try and drive the temperature down whilst the sun is shining on the solar panels. I guess I may be able to heat the house during the day in winter when we have a nice clear day and the panels are making decent power. That is a nice thing about the Canberra winter, once the fog clears, it's usually clear and sunny even if it is freezing cold.

Bomber
I'm a rambling man

I'm a Landscaper :)

Yesterday I removed all the grass so we could have some garden beds to plant the hedge in. It was hard work, but it actually took a little less time than I thought it would. As I was removing the grass, my wife got on the old facebook and put a post up saying that we were getting rid of some old grass in case someone wanted to come and get it for their yard. I don't think I would have bothered getting someone else's old grass to patch up my yard but we had two people come and get some yesterday and they both said that they would try and come back and get some more today, we told them to help themselves and there is nearly nothing left this evening.
I'll take some photos on Saturday so I can show you how much I've done. I'm pretty happy with the design, it should work pretty well. Yesterday morning I planned it out with some brickies string and a can of spray paint. As the day progressed we changed our mind on one part which ended up saving me a little work but as all the grass came out you could see the plan coming together and it looks good.
I'm catching my targets this week even with a slow start to the week. It is looking like that I'll get them and if I don't, at least I know that I put in a big effort in the yard and hopefully burned some fat even if the targets weren't met. I'm hoping to lose at least another kg this week from all the work put in yesterday and what I plan to put in on Saturday.
All the pavers and cement were delivered today so when I came home from work I had to move it all into the backyard and then I had the mulch for the front yard to move onto the front garden beds. The front yard is looking really good now, we just need to choose the tree for the front and plant it. There should be some pavers left over so I can do a mow strip around the tree.
Hopefully by Sunday afternoon everything will be done so I can spend Monday looking into solar panels and organising some people to come and give quotes. 
Speaking of green power, one of the people who came to collect some of the grass had a PHEV vehicle, I think it was a Mitsubishi Outlander. PHEV is a Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle, so at home they plug the car into a power outlet to charge the batteries, this gives them about 50km of electric power in full electric mode, which would be great for around town day to day. The petrol motor will run too if needed and I'm not sure if it charges the battery whilst driving or assists the battery, but they said that they can get to and from Sydney for less than $50 which is pretty good. That would be seven to eight hours of driving on a highway and roughly 600km. Our car would probably cost somewhere close to $120 for the same trip. They didn't have solar power at home which would have further reduced to the cost of running the vehicle. Something to aim for I guess.

Bomber 
I would love an electric motorcycle for commuting.

Lest We Forget

My Grandparents, circa 1940

I never really asked my Grandfather much about the war. He told me a couple of stories so I know he was based in Egypt for some of WWII and was a doctor in the RAAF. A few years ago my father gave me my grandfathers medals and a certificate from when he signed up with the RAAF.
From what I can gather, when war broke out, my grandfather, a young doctor who was recently married and had a pregnant wife, decided to sign up to the RAAF as a doctor. I'm not sure if my grandmother was consulted in the decision at all but it was quite a big decision either way. My Grandfather was posted to Egypt to help out in what I'm guessing was a hospital located at an airbase. I'm not sure if it was a proper brick and mortar hospital or a tent or something in between. 
The story that I remember the most and has stuck with me is a relatively short one but I always remember it on ANZAC day.
"When things were quiet at the hospital, I was often allowed to go with some friends of mine on bombing runs. One day I asked my superior officer if I could go for a bombing run with my friends and he refused as it was too busy in the hospital and they couldn't spare me. My friends never came back that day." And that was all he really said to me before we went on doing other things around his house. I'm not sure if it was the same day as he told me that story or another day, but I remember asking him why he didn't march in the ANZAC Day parades each year. He told me that he didn't want to march as he was only a doctor and didn't see any of the fighting, or words to that effect.
I imagine being a doctor at an airbase, whilst he didn't see any of the fighting, he would have seen plenty of the physical and psychological damage done to those who had. Although he never took the life of a soldier, I'm sure he comforted those who he couldn't save in the last moments of their lives and saved countless other lives that would possibly have been lost if not for his care. I hope that my children never have to know the pain and hardship that my grandfather went through with the war and the depression that followed.
I'm going to get my grandfathers medals and certificate framed and put them up in the house somewhere. I want to display them and for my children to understand what they represent.

Bomber
Lest we forget.

Time to try another trade.

We never ended up hearing back from the landscapers. I know I was threatening that I was going to do the backyard myself but last night I worked out some measurements and some quantities so I could give it a go. 
Today my wife ordered all the bits a pieces that I'll need to hopefully get it done. I figured that I'd need 140 pavers for the mow strip around the garden beds and about 12 bags of premix sand and cement to bed the pavers in. I'm also getting some mulch for the front garden beds. This is just to tidy them up as the mulch is pretty sparse in the front bed and I want to make sure I give the hedge I planted the best chance as surviving and thriving.
Delivery of all the landscaping supplies has been organised for Friday so I'll have Saturday morning before lunch with Dad and then Saturday afternoon as the kids swimming lessons are still on holidays. I should have all day Sunday and as Monday is a pupil free day at my kids school I've taken it off work to be at home.
Tomorrow is a public holiday for ANZAC day so I hope to make a start preparing the garden beds and laying out a design with the garden hose so my wife and I can both finalise the design. Once we've come up with something I'll mark it out with paint and get to work ripping up the lawn that we'll be replacing with garden beds.
I'm expecting it to be very hard work and to take a little longer than I am hoping for. Basically I have three and a half days to go from blank canvas to garden beds ready for planting.
Laying the irrigation for the garden beds will be easy as I'm just going to buy some dripper hose and run it around the bed before we mulch it. Doing the sprinklers for the lawn will not be as easy but I may be able to put them in when I do the garden beds or at the very least, run some tubing under the pavers in preparation.

Bomber
I could be a little sore come Tuesday

Making the most of it

As Sunday was a cruisy day and I had my fit bit on charge for half the day, my targets are going to be a little harder to reach this week. I'm not making any excuses, I'm just going to have to work a little harder to get them. As it was Easter Monday yesterday I didn't really want to have another day just sitting around at home playing games with my son so we headed out in the morning to get some more things from the hardware store. This time it was some magnetic door stops to prevent the front door from blowing shut as well as the lounge room door that can blow shut sometimes too. We've ordered a security screen for the front door as we like the breeze to blow through the house and at the old house we'd quite often lock the front screen door but leave the wooden front door open when we left the house to just get some nice fresh air through the place. At the hardware store we also purchased some new numbers for our letterbox as the ones that were on it were just some cheap and nasty stick on numbers, we've now got nice stainless steel numbers that look pretty good.
Whilst wandering around the hardware store I noticed that they sold the same type of towel rails that we currently have. For some reason there isn't one for a hand towel in our ensuite. The bath/shower towels we use are quite large so there isn't room on the rail for a hand towel too. Since I'd need to mount the hand towel rail next to the existing towel rail and it is on tile, I purchased a tile bit for the drill and then spent the next hour trying not to crack the tile as I drilled into it. Thankfully I didn't crack the tile, but I think I ruined the drill bit or something as even after an hour, I still hadn't finished drilling the three holes needed to mount the rail. From what I've googled, I think I went too fast and damaged the bit and made it blunt. Apparently you need to go slowly. Anyway, on my home from work one day this week I'll grab another tile bit for the drill and try again. I'm thinking that I might grab two bits just to be on the safe side.
By the time I'd finished all the bits and pieces and given up on finishing the towel rail, it was pouring rain outside. It was probably the biggest downpour I've seen in a long time, it really pounded down for five to ten minutes. For the rest of the day it continued to rain on and off lightly so I didn't manage to get out for a walk.

Bomber
I've got to make about 10,000 extra steps over 4 days to hit my targets for the week.

She's Back.

Yesterday was a very cruisy day at home. I did leave the house to go and drop off some of the return and earn recycling but otherwise I stayed at home. The return and earn recycling has an app so you can see if the collection machines have room or not and when you use the app it generates a barcode that you can scan so the money you earn from returning gets credited straight to your PayPal account., that's pretty cool and I got $3 back. Not sure if it was worth the fuel, but I took my daughter with me so it's probably a good lesson to be teaching more than anything else. The tub wasn't very full so next time I'll wait until there is a bit more. I also gave the car a wash whilst we were out but it I didn't do as good a job as I would have liked, I obviously didn't rub hard enough as there is still some dirty marks on the car.
I noticed that the bike had dropped another little bit of oil so I checked out where it was leaking from and I still can't figure it out. It looks like it is dripping from a bolt that holds the side case on, I think it is call the magneto case, but it may be coming from the inspection point just below the bolt. It may be getting blown as I ride from the inspection point up to the groove where the bolt is and then pooling and running down. What I've done is order a new o ring for the inspection fitting, it was only $4 including postage, so it's not a big deal if that's not the problem.
I've bought the oil and the new oil filter so when the o ring arrives I'll give the bike a really good clean up and change the o ring when I change the oil. If it continues to leak then I think I need to get a new gasket for the magneto case and change that. That will unfortunately mean another oil change, but I won't have to change the filter as it would still be pretty new. I didn't want to change the gasket at the same time as the o ring as it's not a simple job and I'd prefer to leave the engine case alone if I can.

Bomber
I like being able to work on my bike.

Weighing In

Happy Easter!
We don't really celebrate Easter in the Christian sense in our house, there's no going to church or anything like that, but the Easter Bunny visits. If your not into Easter, then that's ok too. Things in Australia are getting a little crazy where we are now pampering to all the different religions and not calling things by their religious names, it is not Christmas holidays, it's summer holidays. It's not Christmas time, it's the Festive Season. Easter Eggs are no longer even called Easter Eggs, they just call them chocolate eggs. We are a Christian nation, why do we need to apologise or change our way. Australians overseas will still have BBQs on Australia Day, but we won't expect whichever country we're in to make it a public holiday for us. We don't demand that other countries change their laws because we don't like them or they don't align with our own laws or beliefs. We respect the other country and it's traditions, we may not participate in them but we won't cry foul if our children are in their schools and get taught things differently, we put them in that school, they weren't forced to go there and we weren't forced to live in their country. Anyway that's enough ranting, we've got it pretty good in Australia, it just gets my goat up when people want to try and take advantage of our generosity.
Apart from all the chocolate I'm going to eat over the next little while, I'm happy with the way things are going. I haven't been as busy this week at work in terms of being able to get out from my desk, but I've been busy all the same and managed to get out for a walk at least three times after work. I think I may have missed Monday's walk and I'm not sure why, Of course Friday was a public holiday and Saturday the kids came back from the coast and we had my Wife's family checking out the new digs and my sister-in-law stayed for dinner.


Weight: 109kg
Steps for the week: 83,188
Average daily calorie burn: 4,519

Bomber
I'll throw a shrimp on the BBQ for anyone who wants to live in Australia and respect our way of life. I'll even throw a falafel on the BBQ if they want.

Green Thumbing It

Today I got up and decided that I was going to plant the front hedge, so that's what I did. Our favourite nursery was open but although they had some photinia, they were quite small and didn't look all that healthy. My wife wants a Japanese Maple for outside the bedroom window and we didn't see any nice ones of them either. We ended up going to a nursery on the other side of Canberra, we hadn't been there before so weren't sure what we were in for. It was by far the best nursery we've ever seen, we now have a new favourite. The prices are a little more but the quality is just fantastic. The photinia looked ok, they were a little bigger but twice the price, but the viburnum were the same price as the photinia, a little bigger again and looked fantastic. Needless to say I spent the afternoon planting a new viburnum hedge out the front. 
They also had some amazing large trees, including Japanese Maples, which were too large to fit in the car. We think what we'll do is prepare the back yard as much as we can and then order everything to be delivered from the nursery as this place also delivers. Since we'll be getting everything delivered we'll probably go for a couple of quite large trees to make a real impact straight away and to also screen the new house over the back fence straight away, or at least as much as we can as quick as we can.
I want to put in some sprinklers and drippers too but I can do them at a later date. I need to find the right fittings for the recycled water tap so I can set all the irrigation up from that. They use different fittings for some reason, I'm guessing so people don't get confused and try to use the bright purple tap for drinking water. The annoying thing is that it is hard to find the right fittings. I may end up just putting on standard hose fittings, the sprinklers are going to be hooked up all the time so it's not like there will be a hose for anyone to accidentally drink from or something like that.

Bomber
Sorry landscapers, you snooze, you lose.

We are not alone.

On Wednesday night we finally saw our neighbours. We're not quite sure what they were up to but from the looks of it they were blessing their house or something like that by drawing patterns near the front door with salt. I've tried searching up some of the symbols that they've drawn and I can't find them online. It was late and it was dark so we didn't go out to meet them but it was interesting to see all the symbols in the morning.
On Thursday afternoon when I headed off for a walk, someone was in their garage and I introduced myself. The person was just a friend of the owners but seemed nice enough. He was of most likely Indian background so I'm guessing that symbols may be Hindu or Buddhist in nature, who knows they could even be Magick or something else somewhat obscure.
It doesn't bother me either way, it's just nice to finally know that we have some neighbours and that they don't ride loud pipe Harley's or something like that which could really change the feel of the place.
No doubt we'll meet them soon enough so I'm not going to go rushing around to introduce myself, there will be plenty of time for introductions later.
I still haven't organised any solar power quotes, I really need to get onto that as I do want to get solar power installed sooner rather than later. I just need to make the time to call a few places to arrange for them to come out and give a quote. Hopefully they won't be a slow as everyone else has been. We still haven't got a quote off the gasfitter who lives two doors up the street. He was going to install a BBQ outlet for me but I haven't seen him since he came around to look at the job. The landscapers haven't sent through their quote either. I just wonder about these businesses sometimes, maybe they don't want the job, maybe we give off a "difficult customer" vibe or smell or something, it's just odd, maybe they just need to write a list?

Bomber
I shower everyday, I swear.

It's a mystery

It turns out that my local auto shop should sell the filter and the oil that I need to change the oil on the bike. I cleaned everything up and ran the bike for a while last night but nothing showed up. I then rode to and from work and even went out for a quick ride at lunch, there's still no sign of the oil leak. I'm not sure where it's coming from as there are no signs of it yet.
Over the weekend I'll give the bike a really good clean and try and see if I can get a better idea of what's going on. At least with it being a slow or occasional leak I can afford to wait a little and then order exactly the right part or parts to fix it. On Saturday the kids are coming home from the coast but I should be able to run out in the morning to get what I need to service and clean the bike up properly.
During the week we had a landscaper come past so they could quote on getting the backyard done. We haven't heard from them yet but hopefully we'll get something soon as we'd really like to get started. I'm wondering if we may just go out and get the stuff for the front yard ourselves over the weekend as it seems a shame to waste such a good opportunity. Next week is pretty good too because ANZAC Day falls on the Thursday so with Easter Monday it makes it a three day week and most people won't be at work so it should be fairly cruisy.
Now that the shed is done, I'm thinking that I may start doing the backyard myself and just organise for the dirt and plants to be delivered. I was happy to get someone else in to do it when I was busy but now it seems like I'll have some time on the weekends so I should do it myself. It will be a pretty big job and no doubt take a lot longer than I'm thinking but it's got to be cheaper than paying for someone else to do it for us. Maybe I'll let the landscaper decide for me, if we get a quote and it's not too outlandish then I'll let them do it. If they don't send a quote or, it seems far too expensive then I'll do it myself. The cooler weather is nice for working in the yard and it's been pretty dry. How hard can it really be? Getting rid of the dirt and grass will be the hardest part, unless the ground is really hard under the grass so digging the holes could be tougher than I think....

Bomber
There's a tool for the electric drill that digs holes right?

She's Sprung a Leak

I hopped on the motorcycle this morning and noticed a couple of drops of oil under it. Last time I changed the oil (over 12 months ago) I noticed a little dribble coming from somewhere and wiped it up and never saw it again. Several months ago I noticed some had some oil smeared over the engine case but it looked more like I'd ridden through something and it had been flicked up onto the engine. I'm not sure where it's come from as it's all over the engine case, but I'm pretty sure it's coming from my bike.
I do all of my own maintenance on the bike and with an extra

Probably should have kept a closer eye on it.

long weekend coming up it is probably worthwhile spending some time going over the bike and making sure that it's all ok.
I'll need to order everything locally if there is any chance of getting it in time, that will probably cost a little more but in the long run it's better to have a working, issue free bike then to try and save a couple of dollars by delaying the work.
I'm hoping that it is just perished rubber o-ring or something that should be easy enough to replace.
I've given her a quick clean up and ran her for a few minutes in the garage to get the oil temp and pressure up so maybe there will be a sign of something in the morning so I can ring around during lunch and find out who's got the parts I need in stock. I really should be taking better care of it considering that it is my main transport and if something were to happen to it due to my neglect then that would just be super annoying.

Bomber
House moved, shed built, what else was I doing with four days off?

So... Did I Instagram?

On Sunday morning, my wife dropped the kids off with their Nanny and Poppy and I decided that I would head out for a ride on the motorbike. I put the Insta360 One on charge and set the bike up with a couple of different camera mounts. I decided where I was going to go and then went out the garage to check the tyre pressures on the bike. After checking the tyres and putting in some extra air I realised that I'd left the Insta360 One inside on charge. It was at this time that I realised that although I had the bike keys with me, I didn't have any house keys with me and all the doors were locked. My wife wasn't due home for about another hour and a half and I didn't really want to sit in the garage waiting for her to come home. I really wanted to use the 360° camera but decided that I should just head out and go for a ride all the same. I wanted to finish the garden shed in the afternoon and the only reason I wasn't doing that in the morning was that I needed the car and my wife was using it.
I headed out to a place called London Bridge Arch which isn't really that far from home but it's somewhere that I'd never been.

On my way to London Bridge Arch

Surrounding Country Side

London Bridge Arch

I ended up posting the photos above and a couple more on Instagram as the one post. I'll probably head back out this way again when I can actually take the 360° camera as there is plenty of nice spots. You can't ride the motorbike right down to it, but there are lots of walking trails in the area which look like they could be fun to explore.
I came home a bit of a longer way and just as I turned onto our street so did my wife, so I didn't have to hang around waiting for her which was nice.

Bomber
There are now house keys on the same keyring as the bike key.

More Space

I mentioned last week that I was in the process of building a garden shed for the backyard. Well yesterday I finished it off and started moving things into it, freeing up some room in the garage.
Sunday before last I put the steel flooring frame together. I didn't think that it would take as long as it did to put together but I was pretty happy with how it turned out. I started putting the wall panels together and managed to get one done on Sunday but then during the week I continued to make a panel each night after work.
On Wednesday night I put together one of the doors and there were that many screws that needed to be put in that on Thursday I went out and got myself an impact driver as the little electric screwdriver I have wasn't up to the task. Thursday after work I put together the other door and that meant everything was ready to go. All the parts came in quite a small box and I was surprised by how easy it all went together.
On Saturday morning my wife and kids all helped me put the four walls up and put the gable support beam. I then went through and put all the roof panels on with some help from my wife. We had to stop just before lunch as my Dad was coming over to see the new house and I was cooking a leg of lamb on the Weber. After Dad left we took the kids to swimming and dropped some recycling off at the depot and even returned the bottle and cans that had a 10c deposit, we ended up donating the money which was just under $5.

On Sunday afternoon I went to the hardware store and got some plywood for the shed floor and managed to put it all in. I then started moving some stuff in before it started getting too dark.
All up I'm pretty happy with the result. I'll probably need to put some shelves up and some hooks to hang some things from but other than that it's perfect.



Bomber
Every man needs a shed.

Weighing In

I'm happy with the effort I put in this week. Even though I've hit my targets for the week, I didn't actually head out for a walk after work even once, I've just been trying to make sure I keep busy at work and when I came home from work I was working in the backyard putting the shed bits together so that on Saturday morning my wife and I raised the shed with some help from the kids. I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out. It will certainly make a big difference to the garage being able to store everything that I don't need to put my hands on regularly out of site and neat and tidy. Also being able to put my garden tools and ladders in out of the weather instead of under the eaves along the side of the house is nice.
Next week I should be able to get out walking after work again which will be good. I'm going to keep on trying to get around 10K steps in at work, so the walk after work will be bonus and should help me smash my targets and keep the calorie burn high. The graph is really starting to show that when the calorie burn is high, the weight comes down. I may have to increase my step target to something that will ensure a 4,600 calorie burn, I don't want to tire myself out though so I'll have to be careful.
When I stepped on the scales this morning, it came up saying 108kg, I didn't imagine that to be right so I tried again and got 109kg so that's what I've gone with. 

Weight: 109kg
Steps for the week: 77,665
Average daily calorie burn: 4,829

Bomber
Heck yeah.

3D Cameras

There has been a little bit of advancement in 3D Cameras for personal use. Quite a few have hit the market already and they look pretty cool. The downside is that you have to wear a headset to enjoy the videos, otherwise they just look like a standard video. Until they can make the 3D images work better with things like holograms or snazzy phones I don't think that I'll invest in that technology. What some of the 3D camera allow you to do as well is shoot 360° footage so, I guess it's good for the 360° community as there will be more people making content.
I've started to see more and more people using 360° cameras in their YouTube videos but most are just using the camera to capture all the angles and then processing the footage into a standard video. It make it look like there was someone behind the camera and following the person as they moved past but in fact it is all done in post production.
The image quality of a lot of the newer 360° cameras is a lot better than the Insta360 One that I have, but I'm not going to be rushing out to get a new camera when I've barely used the one I've got as it is. 
Hopefully I can get out for an hour or two tomorrow and finally take some photos for Instagram, because I haven't managed to do that yet and I really want to see what happens when I start uploading photos. My Instagram account is still attracting followers and I'm at something like 55 followers at the moment. If I start to upload regularly it will be interesting to see if the rate that I attract followers increases or stays about the same.

Bomber
time to get snapping

A number of connected items or names written or printed consecutively

Fride-day Pie Day at Bateman's Bay last August

list
/lɪst/
noun
noun: list; plural noun: lists
1. a number of connected items or names written or printed consecutively, typically one below the other.

• I don't like Friday, List Day as a title or even a thing.
• Friday, Pie Day works and we do go for a walk to the local bakery on Friday's for lunch.
• Friday, Ride Day or even Fride-day works and whenever I can, I knock off early on a Friday and take the long way home.
• Fride-Day Pie Day is the best, but unfortunately I can't make that happen as often as I'd like. I managed to do it back in August last year and before that it was the last day before Christmas and a few riders from work all headed out to a country bakery, I'm not even sure it was a Friday!
• I'll still write lists, but maybe not every Friday. 
• List doesn't even rhyme with anything interesting. 
• Even the synonyms for list don't sound nice or really reflect what I thought I was trying to do

Bomber
I don't why I'm so against Friday List Day, but I am.

Cleaning out the inbox.

For some reason I started going back through some old emails last night. I read a number of emails from my previous job and it really made me realise how much I didn't enjoy the last job I had. It started out ok, but in the end I just had to get out. I also looked at my old payslips that had been emailed to me, man I was getting ripped off, I'm now earning twice what I was then. Sure inflation will be some of the reason but my salary has been about the same for the last three or four years so moving jobs really was a good decision. I haven't really kept in contact with anyone from any of my previous jobs, not in close contact anyway, there are a couple that I'm friends with on Facebook but we don't really ever catch up.
After looking at the old work emails I deleted them, it's not like I needed them anymore and I really don't need to think about that old job anymore. I then moved on to some of the other old emails I had saved. Most of them were just junk and I'm not sure why I was keeping them, at work I keep everything and store PST files for each year, I often refer back to emails from several years ago to get information that I may have forgotten or to double check on something. I don't know why I had an eBay folder or why I was keeping old eBay communication from 5 years ago in there.
Finally I moved onto my favourite folder, this folder I don't think I'll ever delete. This folder contains all the emails that my Mum sent me regarding her website. My mother was an artist and ages ago I designed her a website and then I maintained it for her. Every month or so she would email me an update for the website. Usually info about an upcoming exhibition or a workshop that she was going to be running, sometimes a bit of news for the news page on the site.
The website is no longer up, I kept it going for around 12 months after my Mum passed away but I didn't see the point in keeping it up any longer, it didn't really serve any purpose. I keep the emails as they are just how they were when I received them, I guess that's the beauty of electronic documents, they don't take up much room and they look the same as they did the day they were created. I'm sure the day will come when they can no longer be opened as the software will be obsolete or the computer will die and I won't have backed things up properly. For now, I'm glad that I have them.

Bomber
I miss my Mum.

Putting in the effort

Monday wasn't the best day exercise wise as I got stuck at my desk nearly all day. Seeing how last week I missed my goals again I've put in a bit of extra effort the last couple of days to make sure that I get over 10K steps each do to try and catch up and make good on my goals. I'm not going to put up with not achieving my exercise goals from now on, there is no excuse for it and if you go back through all my posts where I've said that I've beaten my goals, I've said how good it felt and how healthy I was feeling. Today was like that too, I made sure I was moving lots and actually got lots done at work. I came home from work and put together one of the door panels for the shed and was feeling good about myself.
I've also started making sure that I'm going to bed on time and getting up a little bit earlier so I can get to work a little earlier. The earlier I start the earlier I can finish and with the afternoons getting shorter and shorter I want to have as much daylight as possible remaining when I get home so I can finish the shed and once that's done so I can go out for walks before dinner. As the weather cools down even more, it won't be very nice heading out after the sun goes down.
I want to lose weight, that was the main goal of exercising more, I need to make more of an effort to eat healthier at lunch and not drink as much beer during the week. It's not like I'm drinking lots, one or two every night and I don't need it. I'm just doing it more because it is a habit and it's there. I need to start drinking more water again too as for some reason I've stopped drinking it again. Perhaps that's why I'm drinking beer after work, maybe I'm thirsty.
If I can get the exercise under control again and continue to lose weight, I'll have no excuses for not planning more time for the Motocamp360 business. I still want to give that a proper go and give it a chance of earning me a little extra income.

Bomber
Why does it seem easy sometimes and hard other times, when nothing has really changed?

Staying Put

I found out today that they are going to be looking to promote some of the people at work and my supervisor suggested that I should apply for one of the promotions. I've been working at a higher level for several years now and not being officially recognised for it. It would be nice to get the promotion as that will open up more opportunities for me in the future as well as give me a greater earning potential.
Earning more could mean that I can afford to purchase additional leave or even take some of my leave at half pay. That way I can spend more time at home with the kids during school holidays and also allow my wife to work longer hours, if she wants to. If this all comes through then it will probably lock me in for a further two to three years in the same team doing the same sort of work.
One of the downsides of the promotion may be that it results in longer hours for me, that's not for certain and there will be peaks and troughs but I would be expected to suck some of it up and not be able to claim as much overtime.
I used to work in a retail store where I was on a fixed salary as an assistant store manager. I didn't get any paid overtime and I was expected to work at least one weekend each month. The salary wasn't even that great and I wasn't getting any personal bonuses, the whole store got an annual bonus if we exceeded our targets for the year, that also meant that you had to stay there until the end of the year and have been there for the whole year to get the whole bonus. If you started during the year you only got part of the bonus and if you left before the end of the year you weren't entitled to any bonus at all. The store manager was on a similar deal but he got bonuses if the store did well so it was kind of in his interest to put in extra hours to earn the annual bonus as they could be pretty good as they were based on a percentage of the amount you exceeded your targets by.

Bomber
Moving up the corporate chain (hopefully).

Around the Yard

I came home from work and built another wall for the shed, one wall to go and then the roof. I should have it ready to assemble by Saturday morning. That means on Sunday I should be able to head out to the hardware store and get the flooring for it and hopefully clean out the garage.
Saturday lunch Dad is coming over to see the new house instead of us going to him. He's had a quick look around the area when we put an offer in but hasn't been in the house itself or seen the backyard. I'm planning on firing the Weber up for lunch on Saturday and doing some roast beef in it.
We've decided to try and get some quotes for some landscaping as we really want the backyard hedge established ASAP and we're just finding that we're a little short of time. The house diagonally over the back fence is going up and they've gone for a two storey shipping container home. I'm sure it will look nice when it's complete, but right now it looks hideous. They've blocked out most of our view of the mountains which is a shame, but they would have got planning approval before we purchased so we didn't get a chance to have a say in it. There is a window that has been cut in one of the containers and it will look into our yard, that and the fact that looking at the back of someone else's house isn't the most exciting view, is why we want the hedge started ASAP because it will probably take two to three years to block out the house.
If I can afford it, I'll probably get them to install a watering system in the yard and possibly do the front yard too. The front yard should be pretty easy but since they'll be here anyway, I may as well make the most of them.
My wife is also organising a gas fitter to do the BBQ connection as I haven't got around to it myself yet and I still need to organise the solar panels. I have a feeling that we'll be feeling a little broke by the time we're done but at least then all the big stuff will be out of the way.

Bomber
Coming to the realisation of just how much there still is to do.

Weighing In

The number of times I've forgotten to weigh myself on weigh in day is starting to astound me. I ended up weighing myself this afternoon after I finished up with trying to build the shed (more on that later).
With daylight savings ending I was up at 6:30am today, I made breakfast for my kids one of which was already up when I got up and the other wasn't far behind me. I started by unpacking the floor kit and discovered that I needed to buy some tin snips so I could cut some of the parts into separate pieces as they were still joined together. I ran up the road to the hardware store and bought some snips, I took a look at the drivers that they had but they were too expensive. I really want to get one of the Makita ones as I've used them before and they are great.
Putting the floor kit took a lot longer than I expected. I finished with the floor around 2pm and then decided to make a start on the shed itself. By 4pm I had made the front and rear walls of the shed and decided that it was time to pack up and have a beer or two. This is when I realised that I hadn't weighed myself so before cracking a cold one, I jumped on the scales, I was wearing my shorts, t-shirt and socks and being later in the day probably means that my weight was more than it would have been if I'd weighed myself first thing this morning.

Weight:110kg
Steps for the week: 62,626
Average daily calorie burn: 4,246

I noticed that I put the wrong figures in for last week, I must have copied them and pasted them without updating, the graph was right just not the written totals. This week I was spending a lot more time at my desk so I need to make an effort to get moving more during the day. It's not a bad week I guess, but I didn't hit my targets and that's not good enough.

Bomber
I got 10K steps today so the week is starting off right.

End of Daylight Savings

Tonight the clocks go back one hour. That's the end of daylight savings. It will be a shame to see the sun set so early but the mornings have been really dark recently so it will be nice to get it back to some sort balance for the colder months. As I used daylight savings as a kind of excuse for not going motocamping, it's a little disappointing that I didn't manage to get out motocamping once in the last six months. Yes lots has happened in the last couple of months but the three or four months prior to that, I really don't have a great excuse. I've at least managed to stay on track or at least get back on track with some of my more minor goals but I need to try harder.
My return and earn recycling effort has worked so far. Ive successfully managed to fill a plastic tub in the garage with cans and bottles that came with a 10c refund if returned. Now I've just got to remember to actually return them. Our normal recycling bin is still being filled up with left over cardboard and paper from moving, that stuff that wasn't of use at least, all the boxes that were reusable were passed on to someone else. I'll probably have to make a special trip to the recycling centre to get rid of what's still lying around.
I need to start focussing on my other goals and making plans to achieve them. Looking at the list of goals there is one in particular that I want to try and achieve within the time frame I set myself and that's to do some adventure motorcycle training. I probably need to start looking at what's currently available or in planning as it's deadline is only six months away.
I'm certainly keeping myself busier over the weekends like I wanted to, but at the moment I am feeling a little time poor to be able to get everything done that I want.
My wife managed to tick some of the tasks off yesterdays list already. The outdoor furniture is clean and she moved some of the pot plants around. I probably need to move a couple of the heavier ones tomorrow but that has taken some of the pressure off me and will give me more time to put the shed together. Tomorrow weather is meant to be pretty nice, not cold, not windy and partly cloudy.

Bomber
It's all good, I don't ask too much of myself.

Is it list day?

I think that Friday may have to be list day in the future, I wasn't too sure on the idea before but I think that it is a good day to plan out in my head what I need to do this weekend, if nothing else. There won't be heaps on today's list but I plan on writing a lengthy list of things to do in the near future.
Most Saturday afternoons are a bit of a write off with lunch at my Dad's and then we now go straight from Dad's to the kids swimming lessons. That means that we're not home until around 4:30pm so it is getting a little late to start on anything, especially now that daylight savings is ending on Sunday morning. This weekend I actually have to work on Saturday so that rules it out completely. Sunday is going to have to be a day of action if I want to achieve anything around the house.
I'd like to put the shed together this Sunday but I know my wife is keen to make the house presentable for visitors so she can start showing off our new place to her friends and family. Like I mentioned on Monday, we've unpacked all the boxes, we still can't find a couple of things but they are most likely hiding somewhere. We've also hung all the pictures and I just have to put up a mirror in the dining room for the wife and then the inside will be finished for now.
We still have all our pot plants on the front porch, they are all just dumped there from the day before moving in. I need to find better homes for most of them and then we need to give the outdoor furniture a good clean so it is ready for entertaining, or at least so it doesn't look unloved if someone comes to visit.
I guess my list for this weekend looks something like:

• hang the mirror
• sort out the pot plants
• clean the outdoor furniture
• start building the shed
• take motorcycle/camping related photos for Instagram

I'm not sure if I'll have time to complete the entire shed as I need to build the floor first so the shed can sit on top. I haven't figured out if I'm going to use ply or slats to complete the floor, it will probably be whatever ends up being cheaper, I may be able to use recycled pallets or something like that. Once the shed is up I can start moving stuff out of the garage and into the shed.

Bomber
I think I like lists a little too much

Getting set up.

My shed arrived late yesterday afternoon, now I know what I'll be doing this weekend. The box it came in is about 2m long but only about 40cm wide and 30cm deep. That means that to make the shed look like the picture each door and the panels either side of the door must be two or three narrow panels screwed together, so eight to twelve panels each side and the roof would be the same. I've purchased a floor for the shed too, that just is the steel frame for the floor, I'll have to go and buy some plywood sheets to put on top of that for the floor. I probably have to buy some more shelving too as if I move the old shed shelves out of the garage I'll need to buy more for the garage. I just need to work out what sort of shelving is best.
Once the shed is sorted I can start looking at setting up the home brew area in the garage. This I'm a little excited about but I do think that the garage is going to be too warm in summer and too cold in winter unless I insulate the garage door. Thankfully there is a pretty easy polystyrene solution for that but I'm not so sure on the price. We've got 20 panels on the door and the standard kit is about $800. That's a lot. I want to look at alternate options that are cheaper, I can't see how one sheet of polystyrene could cost $40 considering it is usually a waste product used for packaging TVs and nearly every other electrical product and is thrown out. A $5 kettle from Kmart would come with $5 worth of packaging if it really costs that much. Yes quality is a consideration but I'm sure that if you buy a garage specific foam panel it will cost more than a generic foam panel.

Bomber
I'd hate to add up the actual cost of moving house.

Instagram

I never managed to get out on the weekend to take some photos for my Instagram account. Hopefully I can find some time this coming Sunday. Because I've chosen to do the whole 360° thing and how I mount the camera to the bike, it is a little more involved than just whipping out my phone and taking a couple of shots, I need to be prepared.
I have some ideas for some shots that could look pretty cool, one of them will probably take a fair bit of effort and a little planning to get right but if it comes out the way I hope it will, it should look awesome. I may be able to plan some other shots using Google Street View, if I come up with an idea, I can quickly check the location and see if it could be worth the effort. It will also help when I think I know where I want to go but I'm not 100% certain of where exactly it is. There is a great location under one of the bridges in Canberra but it's now all marked as no stopping, even though there is masses of space to stop and even an area that is marked out as a parking bay. There are other places that may have changed since I was last there too.
My Instagram account is still attracting followers so it will be interesting to see what happens when I start posting to it on a regular basis. Unfortunately there won't be too many actual motocamping shots, but I have a chance in the next couple of weeks before it gets too cold to head off for an hour or two and try and have a go at taking some photos.

Bomber
I don't want to make any more excuses.

Over before it begun

My wife and I were talking the other day about her work and how it's getting much busier. They are looking to take on an extra person or two and it is sounding like they will probably try and offer my wife a full time position at the end of her current contract. I think that if they offer her full time that she should take it as the last thing she'll want it to turn it down and then find out that they've hired someone else to help out and then they start to cut her hours as they only really need one person to do the work.
My wife taking on more hours is good for her and her career, it may not make that much difference to how much disposable income we actually have as we'd need to put the kids in after-school care each day and that's not cheap. The alternative to after-school care is if I get a car so I can pick them up each day. I'd be able to start work at 7am and finish at 3pm so they'd only have to wait in the playground for 15 to 20 minutes for me to pick them up. That would mean that I'd need to get a car.
Driving a car to work each day would mean that I'd have to pay for parking, it would also use more fuel than the bike and not to mention the registration and insurance costs. It would also mean that the bike would only be used on weekends,.
Riding home from work today I realised that I may have to face the reality of selling the bike. There wouldn't be much point in keeping the bike registered and insured for just a couple of rides a month and one or two motocamping trips a year. I'm going to have to do some figures to find out what costs more, after-school care or running a car and paying for parking. There may be a third option which is the kids catching the bus home each day, I'd still have to start and finish early so I could be home in time to meet the kids once they've walked from the bus stop.
Of course none of this may eventuate so I'm not about to rush off and buy a car and sell the bike but I'd like to be prepared just in case.

Bomber
Don't let it be over before it's begun.

Done!

... and we're done. Yesterday we unpacked the last few boxes and gave them all away to someone else who is moving house. We thought about trying to sell the boxes as we bought them all new, but in the end we decided just to pass them on and ask that they do the same when they are done with them. The old washing machine and some other old bits and pieces went today too which freed up a little bit of space in the garage.
What a crazy time the last few months have been. I think I've already gone through and worked out just how fast things have happened and posted about it at some length, but if we'd stuck with the initial plan of going to auction then we'd still be in the old house right now with a few weeks still to go before settlement. That is only if the house actually sold on auction day. If it didn't sell and we couldn't get the figure that we wanted then who knows, we may not have ended up moving, we most likely wouldn't have ended up in the house we're now in either way as it is unlikely that it would still be on the market.
Hopefully this will be the last time I use the labels, "House Hunting", "Renovations" and "Moving House" in this blog as I never want to move again if I can at all avoid it. I also don't want to ever look at doing an extension to this house. I may end up doing some renovations in the years to come but I imagine that I'll have at least ten years before I need to do anything and possibly twenty years before the kitchen and bathrooms need a facelift.
If some years into the future we win lotto or something like that and choose to move house again, I'm going to pay someone to do everything whilst I go on holidays. I mean just hand over the keys to the new and old house and bugger off for a week. When I get back all our stuff will be set up and working in the new house. That's how much I disliked moving.

Bomber 
My kids will move me into a retirement village when it's time, I'll be cranky and I won't lift a finger.