stephen-turner.net

As the day draws to a close, it’s always nice to reflect on Christmas for the year. Been a crazy busy time this year, largely the reason I haven’t posted much here for a while. (Though I will do my classic cheat and run with a little back-fill posting to fill in some gaps).

We moved out of our Sydney house a week ago, as we were forced to do by landlord eviction, and have put all our possessions in storage. Spent the last week at Sallie’s parents’, on the family farm near Coonabarabran. Nearly finalised a new place to live there (at least for everyone else — what I do is going to be more complicated).

So we enjoyed Christmas Day out here today with close family, including  many small children now. Will, Alex and Lachlan had excellent days in their own ways, with the usual ups and downs. It’s been an odd time for them, so they’re really craving security and familiarity.

Anyway, lots of nice food, lots of nice presents (my highlight was Wii Cricket, though there’s more coming for me ) and a good day with good weather. Will is obsessed with his new Pixar Encyclopedia, Alex loves his cars and trucks, and Lachie is just taking everything in.

Hopefully we’re heading to Nelson Bay on Sunday — I say hopefully because there’s a lot of ominous flood warnings coming around. It’s hard to no how accurate they will be but it seems fairly certain. We shall wait and see.

Merry Christmas to all! Will be having a picture post fest to end out the year!

Turns out we didn’t actually get out of Sydney until 3pm! A ute to return in the morning, the hotel to pack up and two cars to pack, then a visit to the hospital, just to see/farewell/wish a merry Christmas to many of our long term family doctors, though we’re seeing a lot of them in the future regularly enough anyway (every few months most likely). We ended up with two amazingly well stocked Christmas hampers: lots of food, biscuits, cake, Christmasy stuff, as welll as some toys, and little gifts like a drink cooler and a mini book light (something I’ve always liked the idea of owning!)

We stuffed all that in the car (barely!) and headed out, but not before a brief lunch at the old Wentworthville Woolworths shops — like a greatest hits tour of places we used to live. Three moves in three years is just too much, especially with only one of them being voluntary.

It’s a longish drive, but seems easy to handle now. Stopped briefly at Lithgow for a coffee, then at Mudgee for dinner at Maccas. The last part of the trip was in the dark, but it’s so quiet by then that we barely see any traffic.

Got to Coona, then the farm, at 11pm, just enough to unpack a little and then sleep.

Two different dinners today, with the work Christmas lunch at Aqua at Milsons Point, with crazy perfect views of the Harbour Bridge. Very, very good food, where I get to indulge my fish love (without my fish allergic wife), and have prime Barramundi as the main course, along with a vege entree and an amazing chocolate cake as the desert.

So good, some phonecam snapping was in order:

The view from my seat

The desert… where presentation is nearly everything!

The afternoon was a nice work gathering, as nice as any work gathering can be, with an amusing Kris Kringle swapping of parents (someone gave me a cut Spiderman dinner set that went straight to Will when I got home), and I gave a colleague something similar for their young child. Drinks, conversation that was rarely work related, and a great location and atmosphere.

In the hot conditions, when we were done with that I jumped the right train to get back to Blacktown and pick up the kids, then headed to our hotel room. Got the glorious news that Sallie had spent the day finishing the packing and cleaning with Rachel, and later with Salllie’s parents down from Coona to help us out, so my ordeal would nearly be over. Then, I took the boys over to Blacktown Westpoint where we had dinner at the Hogsbreath Cafe with Sallie’s parents, grandparent and Uncle Wayne and his wife Roisie, and they young daughter Joselyn. Big family gathering, fun evening, nice food even though I didn’t eat heaps since I was full from lunch!

I had some more work to finish, back at the old house after dinner, finishing it all off and taking one last load to the storage (where we picked up a second smaller space!) Finishing and finally closing off the old house at 11pm felt early compared to yesterday, and I enjoyed an hour at the hotel before sleep.

Tomorrow, we hit the road!

Starting today we’re moving out… out of our Blacktown house, and hopefully out of Sydney all together. It’s all a little weird, with too many unrelated things all hitting us at once, and we just had to make a decision.

For now though, all our stuff goes into storage, and we head up to Coonabarabran on Friday. The moving is a two day process, with two nights at a local hotel to keep us together.

We stay at Coona for a week, at Sallie’s parents’ farm, which had of course been the Christmas plan for months anyway… we just didn’t know it would be this all-encompassing. Christmas there, then a week at Nelsosn Bay, then back to Coona for a few days.

Then I go back to Sydney and back to work, staying with parents or brother, whille the family stays in Coona and secures somewhere new to live. Then all our stuff gets moved up there. Simple, hopefully.

Yes, I will be back in Sydney and back in my regular job from early January. For the moment at least. There are plans underway that will hopefully change or minimise that of course… they have to really. It’s only a matter of time though.

• Liza Dawson Associates
  Definitely another agent to note, dealing with YA as well as sci-fi and other areas. Look at new agents especially.
  (tags: writing agent)

• OnDemandBooks – Home
  Something new that I haven't seen before — instore book on demand publishing, using some kind of new system/machine. Could be a big thing.
  (tags: education google future business writing)
• New Zealand Model Sets The Record Straight | Australian Penthouse
  Rachel Whitwell interview from Australian Penthouse — see Rachel in the January 2010 issue…
  (tags: video news women images penthouse)

• SPECIMEN Custom Guitars and Tube Amplifiers / Guitar and Amp Repairs / The Chicago School of Guitar Making
  Notable Chicago based custom instrument and amp maker — interesting to note for ideas on design and business. Some nice work, very sculpture like.
  (tags: guitar music woodworking design ideas maker)
• X-Company
  Australian company (that mostly works remotely) doing all kinds of 37signal-ish things in the web biz, using XHTML, Wordpress and other tools. Big talk, curious to see action… and their jobs page
  (tags: entrepreneurship business programming web ideas australia)

We haven’t had an official Santa shot for several years now, so with Lachlan’s first Christmas, it seemed like the right time:

Will is overdoing the effort, Alex is cute but was completely unwilling to take his hand out of his mouth, and Lachlan was the best behaved at all. Works for us

• CWA Debut Dagger Award: 2010 Competition
  UK crime fiction comp I should know about.
  (tags: writing)
• RipDigital CD to MP3 Conversion Service. Burn CDs to MP3, AAC, Windows Media (WMA), FLAC and lossless
  Curious about this company — seems "easy"ish business, also seems replicable locally, wonder if anyone else does it here?
  (tags: business entrepreneurship ideas tool media music)
• Orana Arts
  List for training and writer related stuff that's done out west, including Coona. Keep WritersLink group noted.
  (tags: writing business news)
• Flux – Submission Guidelines
  A small US publisher that specialises in YA works. They appear legit but check to be sure. Getting in with a small but real publisher is a good way to go.
  (tags: writing agent)
• The Bent Agency
  Another good agency to query, in the US again. Good on YA stuff especially.
  (tags: writing agent)
• TADNSW Home Page
  Group that deals with technology issues and support for the disabled in NSW. Might be interesting for help for Will, or to help and volunteer with them and donate computer gear.
  (tags: william family computer charity)

While I can’t claim anything other than a general influence for this, it was still such a good thing to see…

Over the weekend, when Will and Alex both get up a lot earlier than us, they clearly wanted some breakfast and drinks themselves. Good thing they didn’t get the cereal out, but on two occassions Will did get the milk out himself, and pour a drink for himself. That’s great to see — the initiative and self-help skills there are such a great thing.

But then what I saw later in the day that was just wonderful… when Will got himself a drink of milk, he got another cup, gave it to his little brother, then poured Alex a drink as well (then closed the milk and put it back in the fridge!)

A little thing really, but it was such a good thing. Not only helping himself with a drink, but then stopping and getting his younger brother a drink as well. Made us all feel good