What we’re watching Smallville - Season 9
Heroes - Season 4
Sesame Street
Play School
The Wiggles
Movie reviews On a scale of 5 stars
Avatar 3D *****
Excellent!
Planet 51 ***1/2
Good fun
G-Force ***1/2
Silly, but good
2012 **1/2
Great effects, bad dialog
Harry Potter Half Blood Prince ***
Is this getting stale?
Bolt ****
Really liked this one.
Star Trek *****
Fantastic reboot for the original Star Trek. Casting was superb. Some great lines too, like:
"The ex-wife got the whole planet in the divorce. All she left me was my bones." - Dr. Leonard "Bones" McCoy
Good reads The Lost Symbol - Dan Brown
Smart and riveting, like his last three novels.
Otherland - Tad Williams
4 books, nearly 4 thousand pages. Excellent sci fi series.
Enders Game - Orson Scott Card
3 books and they weren't enough. If you like sci fi, read this if you haven't already. Not sure how I ever missed this one. Excellent!
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Last weekend, I organized a trip for us, and Teresa and I took Friday off from work and headed off with Heather for three days of adventure. My mom had flown back to the US the day before, though not without a bit of adventure of her own thrown in there, as well. We had a nice visit with my mom, though, after hosting her for three months, we were looking forward to a weekend away with just the three of us.
Friday morning we got up super early to catch a 7 AM train from Central station in Sydney. We nearly missed it, too, as the cab we had called to take us to the train couldn’t find us, and drove off with us seeing him drive around looking for us and waving our arms and yelling for him to stop. Getting another cab, with a child seat, out to us proved to be futile. We wound up hopping on a bus that slowly made it’s way to the nearest train station. When we got there, we were able to get a taxi from the queue, after the first two in line feigned to suddenly have a booking and speed off when seeing we had a little one with us. Grrrr…. So the third taxi in the queue gave us a nice speedy lift to Central station and we made it onto the train without very much time to spare. For getting us there quickly and being generally very nice, the cabbie got a pretty decent tip.
The train was taking us out to Dubbo. Dubbo is a small city/very big town out west a ways, in New South Wales. It’s not quite to the outback, though, maybe half way there from the coast. It’s a five and a quarter hour car ride, or a six and a half hour train ride. In the car, we’d have to stop every hour or two for a potty break for Heather, between that and food stops, I reckon it would take us about eight hours to drive that far. That is if Heather didn’t have a melt down, being strapped into her car seat for so long. So I figured six and a half in the first class car of the express train was a good deal. All in all, I’d say it was a good call, too.
We all enjoyed the train. We had two set of seats facing each other with a removable table in between us. The train was pretty new and very comfortable, though the air conditioning made it slightly arctic in our car. There was an attached dining car that served hot food, and afternoon tea, complete with scones with jam and cream (strawberry jelly and whipped cream). Yum!
In Dubbo we rented a car, as we were staying about 10 Kilometers outside of town in a little bed and breakfast farm stay sort of thing. On the farm, there were chickens, ducks, a horse, two ponies, a goat and a bunch of sheep and lots of beautiful wild parrots and a small group of wild kangaroos, plus a very friendly cat named Stuart. The proprietors were actually away for the weekend, and got their daughter to stop by and do the breakfast thing and show us the animals. In that way the farm stay experience suffered a bit, but we still enjoyed it.
The weather was a bit off. It rained a bit during the train ride, though not too much. It cleared up nicely on Friday night, giving us a stunning view of the stars. Saturday the weather threatened rain most of the day, keeping the heat down and only sprinkled briefly, but on Sunday we had a lot of rain.
Heather got to sleep in a ‘big girls bed’, instead of her cot (crib). She loved the farm place, but either the bed or the surroundings in the cottage freaked her out when she woke during the night. Luckily we were all in one room, so comfort was nearby.
On the farm, Heather got to collect eggs from the chickens, even from one we had to shoo off of her eggs. The eggs weren’t warm, so she wasn’t actually incubating them, just sitting on a pile of six. She also got to feed the sheep and lambs, the goat and the ponies and a horse.
Dubbo Zoo – Taronga Western Plains Zoo
more to come soon…
 The amazing two headed giraffe 
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Wow, what a weekend we had. Nice and sunny, and hot all weekend.
Friday night – A night on the town, courtesy of Teresa who got us tickets to the ‘Legends of Motown’ concert. It was a great show and a very fun evening. Kasia and Gram-ma Joyce teamed up for babysitting duties, taking Heather to the North Sydney noodle markets.
Saturday morning – Balmoral beach. This time we went to the opposite end of the beach, where there’s a semi circular rock wall set in about 4 feet of water. It creates a very calm area for little ones to play in the water. For the first time, I took Heather in some waves and she had a blast. With Heather in my arms,we jumped up for some of the waves and for a few carefully chosen ones (the Big ones!!) Heather did bodysurfing for the first time, with a bit of help from Daddy. I’d support her under her chest with one hand and she’d kick as the wave approached. The waves were a few feet high, definitely enough for her to feel the wave push her in the water.
Saturday afternoon – After leaving it abandoned down by the water near our old place, we finally picked up our canoe. It only took a few hours for me to make room for it in the garage. :\
Saturday night – Kasia came over for dinner and I gave her a lesson on how to blog. I made a blog for her and Felipe, who’s been in Brasil for the past week. Their blog is also on my site and I hope to see more content there soon! kasia and felipe’s blog 
Sunday morning – Bondi Beach. At Bondi, Heather and I did wave jumping and body surfing again, with Heather laughing throughout, even with an occasional bit of saltwater in her mouth. The waves were a bit bigger at Bondi, but Heather still had a blast in the surf. She wasn’t the only one. My mom and I walked up the beach to the place where, last year, we added some of my dad’s ashes to a sandcastle at the waters edge. We sat together on the sand there for a while. It was a nice moment for us to share.
After Bondi, we headed back to North Sydney for Yum Cha. Heather and I gorged ourselves on sesame prawn rolls, while we all shared sweet and sour pork, black pepper beef and of course, mango pancakes.
Sunday night, we headed into Chinatown to catch the Lunar New Year Twilight Parade. More to come soon…
Gōng xǐ fā cái means, ‘Congratulations and Prosperity’ in Mandarin Chinese, and is a common greeting amongst Chinese speaking people at the time of Chinese, or Lunar, New Year. Chinese New Year is celebrated on the new moon, in the first month of the lunar calendar.
February 14, 2010 – February 02, 2011 is the year of the Tiger.
To celebrate the year of the Tiger, we headed over to Sydney’s Chinatown to see the festivities. Mainly, we were in search of the Lion dancers. Traditionally, the lion dance is done by martial arts shools and it goes from shop to shop, receiving an offering of some greens, containing a “red packet” with money in it, attached above the entrance to the shop. The lion takes the greens into it’s mouth, then spits out the greens, keeping the red packet. In return, the lion bestows a blessing for prosperity. The lion consists of two people inside a costume with a large colorful lion head. The dancers are accompanied by a drummer and people playing cymbals and sometimes firecrackers. The loud noise is meant to drive away evil spirits.
It’s a lot of fun to watch and Heather was especially into it. As we wandered around Chinatown we managed to see quite a few lion dances being perfomed, including one complete with a cool acrobatic demonstration. Heather wore her Choengsam, a traditional Chinese dress, so she was looking very much a part of the celebration. She kept saying she wanted to touch the lion, but whenever we got close, she had a change of heart.
 Gōng Xǐ Fā Cái
Heather loves music, and she loves to sing. We find it a treat to hear her songs, so it’s good all around.
One of Heathers favorite songs is ‘Do-Re-Mi’, from ‘The Sound of Music’. You know the song, ‘Do, a dear, a female dear, Re, a drop of golden sun…, etc’. Teresa started singing it to Heather at bedtime, and Heather quickly learned all the words and sounds adorable when she sings it. Occasionally, Heather will sing a song she’s learned at daycare and we don’t quite understand all the words in it, so we try to figure it out, usually with many repeated verses and some guesses on our part.
Sometime last week we were all riding in the car and Heather started singing a song we’d not heard before. Not all the words were clear, but we got the jist of it. It went like this:
Heather: ” Slipp’ry fish, slipp’ry fish, swimming in the waahtah,
slipp’ry fish, slipp’ry fish,
Gullup, gullup.
Oh No!
eaten by, a tuna fish, tuna fish, swimming in the waahta,
a tuna fish, tuna fish,
Gullup, gullup.
Oh no! eaten by a great white shahk, a great white shahk, swimming in the waahtah,
great white shahk, a great white shahk, Oh no!
Eaten by a morris whayle a morris whayle, ?????? in the waahtah.
Teresa, Gram-ma Joyce and I all applauded our little virtuoso on the lovely song and tried to work out what the morris whale was. I didn’t have my iPhone with me, so we looked up the song lyrics when we got home. It turned out that “gullup, gullup” was “gulp, gulp” and the “morris whayle, something in the waahtah” was “enormous whale”, spouting in the water.
I shot this video last night, I think you’ll enjoy it
One of the most entertaining and beloved children’s musical acts of the past 15 years or so is a band from Australia called ‘The Wiggles’. They are very popular worldwide and are especially so here in their native country. There are four of them, Anthony, Jeff, Murray and Sam, respectively the blue, purple, red and yellow wiggle. Sam is actually a replacement for Greg, the original yellow wiggle who got a rare disease and can no longer perform.
A lot of people miss Greg, as he was the lead singer and wrote a lot of their songs. I prefer the new yellow wiggle, Sam, but it’s probably because the first wiggles DVD that I saw, had Sam as the yellow wiggle. I liken it to which James Bond you saw first/prefer. For me it was Sean Connery, though I do really like the new bond, Daniel Craig. Roger Moore, though entertaining was just never James Bond to me, he’ll always be Simon Templar, The Saint. Since I’m sliding into major story line tailspin here with my stream of consciousness babble, I have to say, I really enjoyed Val Kilmer as Simon Templar in ‘The Saint’ movie that came out a number years ago.
Anyway, this is about the Wiggles, isn’t it… or is it?
Heather is in daycare, five days a week, as Teresa and I both work full time. It’s a lovely, modern daycare facility with a young, caring and attentive staff. Heather has a great time there, but sometimes in the morning, she doesn’t want me to leave. You see, I do the drop off duties every day and Teresa does the pickup in the evening. Since I start work at 10 AM, I can spend 30 to 45 minutes there each morning. Usually we start this time with the second half of Heather’s breakfast, generally, yogurt and a cup of water. After the food, we do some art, play with the other children or read some books.
Some mornings, when I leave, Heather is okay with it and goes off to play with her classmates, or her carers. Other mornings, she clings on and doesn’t want me to leave. Often one of the carers can coax her from me with offers of doing something fun, play doh, art, reading a favorite story, etc. Sometimes they can’t and I have to pry Heather off of me and hand her over, crying, after giving her a kiss and saying ‘Bye Bye’, Daddy has to go to work now.” It’s gut wrenching, even though I know, like many other children in daycare, that the crying doesn’t last long and soon she’s having a great time again.
About a month ago, I started singing a Wiggles song with Heather at daycare. A crowd of other children soon gathered around. Now, most days I perform 3 or 4 Wiggles songs, with a group of delighted kids flocking around me. I do this just before I have to go and what I’ve found, is that when I do this, the goodbyes with Heather are very easy. No clinging, no crying, just blissfully easy. I tell all the kids that I have time for one more song, ask them what they want to hear and choose the one that Heather wants, usually “Here comes the bear”.
One of the Wiggles, Jeff, is always falling asleep and has to be awakened by the crowd, at the urging of the Wiggles. I did that once and now the kids do it all the time, at least 3 or 4 times during each song. They have taken to bringing over throw pillows for the songs and lying down on them, making sure I know they are all asleep. Then I get to say, “Oh no, everyone. Look, Heather, Harry, Gemma, Luke, Georgia, etc… have fallen asleep again. On the count of three, let’s help them out by calling out, “Wake up everybody!”. When we do that, the children jump up, shrieking with delight and we carry on with the songs, until they fall asleep again and it starts all over.
When I finish my last song, I wave and say goodbye to all the children, by name, some of them say “Bye Paul”, then I lean down and give Heather a kiss and I’m off, leaving Heather and a bunch of happy children to carry on with their day.
So, here’s a picture of the Fifth Wiggle, with the rest of the group. : )
This weekend we had torrential rains, nearly the entire weekend. One break in the rain brought some fine feathered friends to our terrace, a dozen sulfur crested cockatoos.
Have a look! : )
PS: I’m not being paranoid about getting my toes bitten. Just before this video was taken, one of them had been biting my toes. Not hard mind you, but enough to be a concern. These are wild birds, after all. Oh yeah, and their claws are very sharp, too.
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