Back by popular demand...

I've bowed to public opinion and decided to continue to finger update. Here you can see that the lower half of the nail has totally come away now, and the black scab continues to advance. I suspect that it'll all be over by Christmas and we'll be living under the glorious new regime of healed fingernail.

In all seriousness, it's little things like this that remind me how amazing the human body is. The ability to replace wounded and broken parts out of nothing? It's almost as if there were some amazing kind of mind behind it all...


Also back by popular demand - Eddie! This photo was taken by one of our freelance journalists (me) about a week ago. I have no way of knowing if this is the original Eddie or a scaly imposter. There's no real way of knowing at this stage. Or at any stage to be honest. I mean, how do you tell lizards apart anyway?


This weekend will be Cornerstone's thirtieth muster. The muster is an annual gathering for the current Cornerstone students and staff to mark the end of the year and commission people for future events. Because Cornerstone is thirty years old this year it's going to be a massive event with ex-students and ex-staff invited too. It's predicted that there will be around five or six hundred people present, which is only a fraction of the total number of people who have been linked with Cornerstone over the years. It should be good.


I'm writing this on Tuesday 27th November, which is Calvin's fifth birthday. He's been very excited by events. Plenty of presents and a nice birthday party, and Ruth worked her usual birthday cake magic. He did cry when he didn't win musical statues though. I think that when it's your birthday and you're the centre of attention you probably expect only good things to happen. He was fine by the end of the party, of course, but it's always a traumatic thing for a parent to be at a birthday party and your child is the only one crying. Especially if it's his party. Double especially if he's crying because he isn't winning every game that you play. I blame the parents.

Next time I'll write I'll be able to tell you how the muster went. Have a good week.

In Memory of Alf Stewart (Who's not actually dead)

This is a photo of a Galah, the fabled 'flaming' bird that has nestled itself into our subconscious thanks to Alf Stewart's (of Home and Away) legendary catchphrase. I was unable to take a photo of a 'hoon' but if you look on YouTube you'll find a few. NSW has just introduced legislation which means that dangerous drivers can have their car confiscated, crushed and a video of this event put up on YouTube. That's the kind of proactive policing I'd like to see more of in the UK.

Back to the bird. It was in our garden and showing a marked reluctance to leave, even when a two-legged beast flashed a camera at it. We think it may have fallen out of a nest, or have injured itself. It couldn't fly very well. Don't ask me where it is now. I don't know.

We've finally had some news about our plans for next year. We'll be in Dubbo for at least half the year (but maybe longer) and then heading off to a first-year centre. We originally thought that we'd be at Swan Hill in Victoria, but it's been suggested that we'd head of to Canowindra, which is still in NSW and a couple of hours nearer to Sydney. We're open to things changing in the next six months or so anyway, and this would depend on sorting out course and visa requirements.

We're hoping to have a few visitors next year - both sets of parents, other assorted family and friends. If any of you are looking for an excuse to come out to Oz and see what all this sunshine is about then here we are!

Yep, we're getting closer to Summer here. It's still Spring, but it's lovely weather. We've been taking advantage of the swimming pool here.

I suppose it's time to tell you about Foodbank. Foodbank is a charity set up to support other charities. Foodback collect donations of food and other goods from supermarkets and sell them on at a super-cheap rate (sometimes they give them for free) to charitable organisations like Cornerstone. Admittedly some of the goods are past their sell-by-date (hence how they end up at Foodbank) but a lot of them aren't. We've managed to get our hands on all kinds of things at great prices, such as essential items like cans of Coke and boxes and boxes of Kinder chocolate for a few pounds. It's great for people like us who have no money! Viva la Foodbank.

Finger Update

This is just a quick update to make sure that all you know that I haven't forgotten you. I'm beginning to think that more frequent small updates might be better than infrequent big updates, so this is a kind of experiment in that direction.

The big news today? I wouldn't call myself a 'traditionalist' as such but they've started putting Splashe cola in plastic bottles instead of glass and it just doesn't feel right.


Well, I know you've all been waiting for the update on my finger so here it is. As you can see from the photo the black scab has moved up my finger, probably signalling its future decay. On the plus side you'll be able to see that the bottom of the nail has come away and revealed underneath brand new shiny fingernail, so I'm hoping that this kind of overlap will occur for the whole nail meaning that I am never without nail protection. Isn't the human body amazing. STAY TUNED FOR THE LATEST UP-TO-DATE COVERAGE.


Calvin had his first day at 'big' school today. In Australia you can decide whether to send your child in the January when they are five or six, so they stay at home longer here than in the UK. Calvin's been ready for a while - he was dressed in 'uniform', hat and shoes by 6:30am. He'll be going for one morning a week for the next month as part of his induction into the school. Here he is in his uniform. He was very excited. The day went very well indeed.

I'll let you all know how my finger is getting on shortly.