Singapore

November 11, 2010

We flew to Singapore to visit an old friend of Bill's, someone he's known since kindergarten but lost contact with years ago.  I went to a winery to get a really nice bottle of wine, put it in one of those really pretty wine bags, and without thinking Bill put it in his carry-on.  We then had our "What was I thinking?" moment when security pulled it out and said, basically, "Uh, this is over 3 ounces, what were you thinking?" She advised we could either dump it in the bin (no!) or see if customs would allow us to go back through and then ask the airline if they could find our luggage and put it inside (not very likely.)  But since we had plenty of time, Bill talked his way back through customs (they had to stamp his passport as having come back into the country, then leaving again, just a few minutes later when he came back through.)  At that point they recognized him as the idiot with the wine and waved and welcomed him back.

When he got to the baggage check, several people took on the challenge to figure out what to do with the really nice bottle of wine, and they took Bill's sweatshirt and wrapped it around the bottle, then finished it off with lots of bubble wrap and a cool little handle to carry it with.  They called it a "poor man's stripey bag" and sent it off down the conveyor belt - and it actually survived the trip unbroken - amazing.  Most hard luggage doesn't fare so well.  

Melbourne Cup

November 2, 2010

Today was Melbourne Cup, the biggest horse racing event in Australia.  It's actually a public holiday in Melbourne, and it's a big celebration even all the way over here in Perth.  Our AWC reserved several tables at one of the nicest hotels downtown, and the afternoon included lunch, a fashion show, auction, dancing etc.  Tradition says that everyone must wear a hat, and most of them were really goofy with feathers and things sticking out all over like multiple antennas.  And the best part is I actually picked the winning horse, out of a field of 24.  Seemed simple enough with a name like Americain or something similar that sounded like American - I assumed most women in the club would have picked it for the name, but only one other lady did.  Just wish I had bet a lot more than I did.

Return to postings

Well today is February 10, 2011, and it has been over 4 months since I last blogged, guess I have some catching up to do.  We got our first Mac computer and I have still not taken a class, which I desperately need, but have not had time to do.  Since I've had difficulty making anything on this machine work, I figured the blog would be the same, so I've put off trying it.  But in fact now that I'm back on it seems to be no different than the pc.  Oh well, so much for using the new computer as an excuse.  I will try to backtrack and cover as much as I can remember from the last 4 months, which may not be much.

October 1, 2010

Kanyana hosted a quiz night as a fundraiser, and Bill and I joined several other volunteers from my shift to answer trivia type questions on a variety of topics.   Our table came in 3rd out of about 20 and Bill won a door prize which turned out to be pretty useless since it was for $100 of pool chemicals or supplies.  Good on ya Bill!