What made you smile today?

[Gilly Goodness]

Denied a birthday cake for 5 years. Well back home at last in Biloela, where the community campaigned for 5 years to have them released from detention and brought back home. She got a very big birthday cake.

Happy birthday Tharnicaa! 🎂

Made me smile and tear up.

(In Tamil culture noone touches the cake. You are hand fed by someone else. Photoes are taken. No word of a lie, this can take up to an hour if many relatives come. And you eat the cake before the main meal. Took me years to understand this and then go with the flow.)

[Gilly Goodness]

Is this the first time druids and technology have combined?

So you Poms are spendin' £83 each on the Jublee.
That's a lot of mince pies and ginger ale! 😉


Made me smile.


+ Boris has allowed y'all to not have to ask for a 568 ml of bitter anymore. Result!

[Ash Armstrong]

[Gilly Goodness]

Good to see Ash. Purpose, fresh air, good music and art. Friends. Says it all 🙂

Durin' covid the Australian National Gallery was lucky enough to have a great collection from The Tate come down. Me and Mrs Goodness travelled down and with my sisters saw it. Van Gogh's luminous Sunflowers. Small but very potent. Like Kylie Minogue 😉 (she's a pop star, Ash). Then a Rembrandt self portrait. Amazin'. A few jaw droppin' realistic Dutch still lives. A Cezanne landscape and a still life.So much from other eras. Julie gave us a framed Sunflower's copy on canvas that is above my head as I type. The buzz of the original is incredible. Lots of young folks take selfies with it. We did. Hheeheheee.






Since bein' retired I do miss the social aspect of work. The small talk. The occasional sportin' wager even though I often lost my shirt to a Kiwi.

Spose my bucket list would include seein' The Nightwatch. Stonehenge. Dublin. Eiffel tower.

[Ash Armstrong]

First week on my new job over. It's been good; a bit of a tiredness slump yesterday, and the news about Alan White was no doubt contributory, but all good again today.
My manager let me go at 4.00 this afternoon, as it's my first week back and, as she rightly said, little good work gets done in the last hour on a Friday! Finishing early allowed me to seek out and catch up with a few folk I know there. All good people.
Signed up for University gym access (there are two sports centres with pools, gyms, and stuff, one on campus and one in Oadby Student Village), and I'm going for my first session since October 2019 on Sunday. Gently does it to begin with I think.
Overall, feeling upbeat, optimistic and content with my new circumstances.
I have an annual leave entitlement, as all the university staff do, of 27 days, in addition to the public holidays and university closed days, which takes the total up to, I think, 42 days leave, paid of course, per year. I've booked a day off in July to go to London for my return to the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, to see (again!) Verdi's Otello. First visit since June 2019. I can't wait! I'll also be visiting the Courtauld Gallery at Somerset House on the Strand; it recently reopened after a major refurbishment, having closed in October 2018. They have a superb collection of Impressionist masterpieces, several Van Gogh's and Cezanne's, and lots of Modigliani. Salivating at the thought of standing before them again.
I feel restored and renewed.

[Gilly Goodness]

Family. Goin' home. Because of the people of Biloela. Qld. Thankyou.

https://www.smh.com.au

[Ceasar’s Palace]

You guys make me smile in a Delete kind of way.

[Ash Armstrong]

Are you clasped in the skin of the fish of the plain, as well? 😆

I am. Sorry about the smell...

[Gilly Goodness]

I'm actually an ensign on the Moorglade...

Are you clasped in the skin of the fish of the plain, as well? 😆

[Ash Armstrong]

Are you working in Sunhillow now?

I'm actually an ensign on the Moorglade...

[madbear]

Just come across a student named Olias in my new job! Unbelievable. I'm curious as to whether his parents are Yesfans....?

I know of an academic called Arwen Evenstar, whose parents are obviously Tolkien fans...

Are you working in Sunhillow now?

[Ash Armstrong]

Just come across a student named Olias in my new job! Unbelievable. I'm curious as to whether his parents are Yesfans....?

I know of an academic called Arwen Evenstar, whose parents are obviously Tolkien fans...

[Somis Sound]

Buster's BBQ has re-opened !!!!!!! YESSSSSSS!!!!!!!

[Gilly Goodness]

I was doin' a trivia quiz where the question was "convert 51, 6 and 500 into Roman numerals", Man, I was LIVID!

However I calmed down while attemptin' the next question, "Convert 101, 5 and 49 into Roman numerals", which made me more CIVIL.

😘

[Somis Sound]

Tried a new place and had an incredible fresh healthy Banh Mi sandwich. YUM!!!