'CROCS' - NOT the ideal footwear for operating in!

I spent my usual day in 'theatre' yesterday and had an oportunity to try out my new little camera - it's a 'Fujifilm - Finepix' which was cheap but has an underwater housing I can use when snorkelling.

Anyway! - a friend of mine who is a surgeon took it upon himself to try out those clog style shoes called 'Crocs'.

Comfortable, plastic, and with ventilation holes!
Could it be that the holes which let evil vapours out might also let evil fluids in?
Here's the result. If I were Janet I wouldn't wash these socks I'd chuck them.

The 5th Horseman

A cartoon from today's 'Australian' newspaper.

Lukla plane crash.

Cousin Phil & myself standing at the tail of the plane about to carry us to Lukla on our way to Everest basecamp, 27th October 2004.

It was Yeti Airlines 9N-AFE, the same plane that crashed a couple of days ago.

6th October. George's 17th Birthday

George is 17!
It's also (very scarily) 37 years to the day since I started Med. School in London.

Apocalypse Maleny- Friday's Helicopter action over my backyard

Ooops! ALMOST LOST THE HOUSE!

Friday afternoon. Early finish and we were having a coffee when our Maleny neighbour, Jane, phoned to say that there was a fire threatening the homes at Bald Knob.
I left at 3.30 and got up there in an hour and a half - traffic!
Helicopters everywhere, a dozen or so fire-trucks.
Thick smoke blotting out the sun.
The firemen did a great job and got control of it before it became dark.




It was like a scene from 'Apocalypse Now'
I stayed up there last night to let the house 'air' and get rid of the smoke smell.
I think we may be culling some of the old shrubs & trees near the house.

NEW TOY! - Good old Apple

Suddenly realised that my desktop iMac was 3 years old! No wonder I thought it was slow.
So I got myself one of these little beauties;

It's got a 24" screen.
It runs at a blistering 3.06 Gigaherz.
It has not one, but 2 processsors.
Best of all, it has a 1 Terabyte hard-drive.
I didn't even know what a terabyte was until recently.
I was so taken with terabytes that I got a 1 Terabyte external drive as well to do the automatic backups.
Naturally the kids were keen on this aquisition as they got the 'old' one.

FIRST REAL HAIRCUT IN ALMOST 5 YEARS!

Regan, a friend of Paula's who is a hairdresser, just happened to be over when I had a spare hour.
Result? No more ponytail!
I miss the 'swish' as I move already.

Sat. 13th Sept. - Another broken bone.

Jake this time.

Playing basketball for Brisbane Grammar, collided with some heavyweight and had his left clavicle broken.

Annual General Meeting - in the Rainforest!

The Wesley Anaesthetic group has an AGM. This year we decamped to O'Reilly's Rainforest Guesthouse for 2 days of chatting, voting, hug-fest.

Paula & I went up Friday night so we could get in a walk on Saturday morning - 17 km!

It took us 5 hours as the trail was awash in mud.

Came across this 'Lamington Spiny Crayfish' on the trail.

We walked past 20 or so waterfalls.

In the evening there were about 40 of us for drinks & dinner
Next morning view of Mt. Lindsay (on the left) and Mt. Barney (on right).

I'm now on Facebook.

(Click the title above)

It lets me keep up with what my kids are up to - and their friends - and their friends' friends.
Talk about six degrees of separation.

BRISBANE 'RIVERFIRE'

Paula & I to a charity dinner at Restaurant II in the city. It's always held on the night of the Riverfire Festival - enormous fireworks along the river and off the tops of buildings.


Highlight is a flypast by one of the aging fleet of F-111 fighters.
It's just like being in Baghdad!


One of the guests at the dinner was Brenton Rickard. He swam at the Beijing Olympics and won a Silver Medal in the 200 m. Breaststroke. Here he is being stalked by Paula.


Of course we had the obligatory 1.00 am. wait for a taxi.

I PICKED UP A WOG AND I'M CROOK!

When I first arrived in Australia a patient said that to me and I had no idea what he was on about.
Roughly translated it's "I seem to have acquired a bug or infection and I'm rather unwell".

Anyway, Paula gave me her cough.

So I have, and I am!

Birthday Pig!

The birthday was back in May, but Paula has been waiting to spring this on me.
An 'OMERSA' leather pig footstool
I have liked these little beauties ever since my old friend Tom Bell bought his brother one for his 21st roughly 39 years ago.
Now I have one of my own to admire.

Olympics - a great cartoon

Big Brother Google watching me - even in Australia!

Speaking of privacy issues, Google has just released a thing in Australia called 'Street View'.
Apparently on it's first day a couple of bad guys and a cheating wife were 'discovered'.
I thought I'd better see what I was up to and sure enough - here I am at the Maleny house busy 'whipper-snipping' my fence-line.

Google Street View of Me

Madeleine coming home after gap 6 months.

We had a great time with Madeleine in the UK, since when she has done her 'Contiki' 5 week bus tour of Europe.
However, she has had enough of the UK and is missing her family & friends here in Brisbane.
She arrives back in Australia tomorrow evening.

I must say that, after my first trip back to the UK in 5 years, I think it has changed and is not as welcoming and friendly as one might expect.

My own family & friends are great and live in nice places. However, London is now a threatening 'Big Brother' kind of place with it's CCTV everywhere and apparently number-plate and face recognition software. It's not the place I remember from my 12 years there as a student and junior doctor.
I think it will be a long time before I spend any time in London again. But - the Lake District and Northumberland still beckon.

Saturday. Brisbane Grammar sportsground.

George scored a brilliant goal in his soccer match.
As we were leaving I spotted this sign;

Wed. 11th June. 17th & last Day UK.

Dropped Madeleine off in Hampshire. She was about to go off on the Contiki drinking tour of Europe for 5 weeks!

Flight left late in the evening for Bangkok where, INCREDIBLY, we bumped into Mick & Sue's daughter, Sally.


We lost a day, so it was Friday 13th before we flew over Sydney and got this view;

Tue. 10th June. 16th Day UK.

To Bladon churchyard and the grave of Winston Churchill.

On to a tour of Blenheim Palace, followed by lunch at Woodstock.


A couple of summer evening's beers at 'The Rose Revived' and 'The Maybush' on the upper reaches of the Thames.

Mon. 9th June. 15th Day UK.

Alistair did the godfatherly thing and fixed Madeleine's broken orthodontic wire.

We then had a spot of lunch in Betty's before leaving Harrogate for the 4 hour drive to Ducklington, near Oxford, to stay with the Coles.

A warm welcome from Rachel before Cole slipped into his comfortable socks & sandals and joined us for dinner.
Myself, Paula, Victoria, Rachel & David.

Sun. 8th June. 14th Day UK.

A walk in the Yorkshire Dales with Al & Clare. We walked from Hebden to Grassington. Pub lunch then back to Hebden along the river.



BBQ in the evening.