What I do all day

I thought it might be nice to show off my desk at work - it's my NEW desk, not the older one (which was kind of in a hallway). The new one is a proper programmers desk, with all the special equipment I need.

Two screens - check. Yes, it's set up so you can drag windows from one to another.

Photo of the kids - check.

Little wooden toy made by Catriona - check.

Lego army men - check.

Pen and paper - check. I'm so retro, I actually write manual notes sometimes.

Coffee cup - check.

Tea cup - check. They may not have made it into the photo, but hey, I was there to Do Stuff, not to take photos.

Please note that the screen displays have been slightly (and badly) altered to protect my company's intellectual property.

Look what we saw!

Jeff and I rode to work today (this time, instead of 26km, it was 45km! Or maybe that $3 bike computer was not such a good deal...).

Wonderful distraction on the bike path though. There were hot air balloons, including one that looked like it was going to land on us! Here's Jeff ducking.

Planty's latest trick

That's a bit of ripeness, isn't it? Oh boy! These two have been picked, and are ready to be a tasty bruschetta on about Friday night. Yum!

Cards for the Birthday Boys

It seems that everyone here has decided that they DO like getting a nice card on their birthday. Just as well I like to make them, hey?

So when the boys' birthday rolled around last week, I had to make them interesting. My first thought was, of course, an alien abduction scene, featuring cows. I wondered if I had a cow punch (I know Carl have one in their range, but did I ever buy it? I don't think so). A little more thought and I had it - of course!

The cows are really modified dinosaurs, from this punch. I punched them out of white card, and touched them up with black pen. En masse, they look bovine enough. Loving the bright coloured vellum as an abduction ray.




So, with one boy take care of, there was just one to go. Thomas has been mad about tortoises lately (he's that kind of kid - he came home one day and announced "Have you seen my blind tortoise? I need his tail feathers". And we don't know where that little poem came from). So he got a tortoise scene. Also featuring modified dinosaurs. 'Cos that's why I bought that dino punch, obviously, to serve as cows and tortoises.

Cool Op Shop Finds

Last weekend I took off on my NEW BIKE (yes, I have a bike, it's lovely, thanks), and had a ride around the neighbourhood. I managed to stop, at around morning tea time, at a small shopping center. Had a coffee, supported the little cafe, and also visited the op shops. There are two in this block.

Here's the haul, and very interesting, eclectic haul it is.

First there's a book (had to have something to read with my coffee). There's something very recursive about buying a book about looking in junk shops from a junk shop. The book dates from the early 1960s, and is actually a great read. The author recommends buying up bedroom crockery (washstands and basins) now (i.e. then) because modern plumbing in making them redundant and people are just throwing them away. But soon they'll be valuable. And what do you know, he was right!


Next we have a handful of dice - a coupla d6s, a d10 and a d12. Yea baby. If you played games that required n-sided dice, you'd be pleased. I'll just toss them into the bulk dice storage.







Then there's this bowl made by Crown Lynn in New Zealand. They make my favourite tea cups, and this is such an interesting design. What to do with it? I don't know. Photograph it, I suppose.










Last of all we have this odd item. It's made of dark coloured glass. Most strange. I've already used it! I took it to stamp club and showed Cathy. So that counts as 50c well spent. We thought it might be a test piece made by someone who was learning to slump glass. Well of course!

My babies off to High School

This morning I dropped the boys off at their first day of high school. Here they are - don't they look so grown up?










Oh, wait a minute, that ain't right. That was the first day of prep! HERE'S the high school shot.