I blog therefore I am

The blog enjoyed its little break it was just what it needed. I won’t delve into the why / how / what.. the bottom line is.. it’s back on track! Not blogging gave me a bit of extra time to do other things but I must say ... I kinda missed it. So.. what's been happening? A few things ... I :

- read or finished reading these little gems:

- spent an evening at the Opera (C#2's idea - merci friend!) to hear Goran Bregovic and his musicians performed their Tales and songs from Weddings and Funerals. It was a great to finally go inside the Concert Hall but I truly enjoyed the music, it was good to try something different.

- went to the ARIA Awards for the second year in a row (once again C#2's idea) including the red carpet arrivals. Lots of Aussie artists of course (photos of Gabriella Cilmi and The Veronicas) ... and a distinguished guest from the US of A.

- saw Blue King Brown in concert. I wasn't familiar repertoire but was curious to see them and I can safely say I won’t buy their records but I’m still glad that once again I experienced something different.

- added another 2 signed (cricket) books to my collection, one "by" Adam Gilchrist, the former Australian wicket-keeper, who was always a joy to watch and I can’t wait to read all about his brilliant career, the other book is the current Australian captain’s yearly diary, Ricky Ponting that's his name (the guy in the photo - I had to edit the photo, I couldn't possibly let you see on my face what was going through my mind right at this moment, something like "I'm completely star struck but why do I bother getting the picture taken because I'm sure it will be blurred". I love his diairies full of behind the scenes stories and the past 12 months have been particularly tumultuous in the kingdom of cricket.

- worked - at times not fun at all, but I need to earn money legally to pay for all my activities :) It’s been hectic in the past few weeks but things are coming back to normal and I’m struggling less with my not-so-new responsibilities.. when you’re not fully qualified for a job it takes a bit of time to embrace the challenge but I'm getting there.

- gambled a wee bit for the Melbourne Cup a.k.a as the race that stops the nation because it just does that. In Melbourne where the race is held it is a public holiday! In the rest of the country, people do a little bit of work in the morning, then everyone gets together for lunch and patiently waits until 3pm-ish when the race is on. It doesn't matter if punters have won or lost, they keep on drinking and partying. You have to experience it to believe it.

- wandered around the Monet & the Impressionists exhibition at the Art Gallery of NSW, because that’s where we (the company I work for) had our end of the year cocktail party with clients and selected VIPs. This year I didn’t have to worry about the organisation of the event / wait till everyone had arrived to start binging on drinks and canapés and it made it a very pleasant evening! But I didn’t see much of the exhibition itself as I talked to a few of our guests but still enjoyed the evening and was one of the last ones to go!

- was invited to an afternoon tea organised by our travel agent at a posh Sydney hotel .. glass of champagne on arrival, delicious pastries going down nicely with Lady Grey tea … oooh, nice! Our table was facing the Opera House aaaaah ... occasionally I had to turn around and look at models parading in Ralph Lauren / Cartier / Celine / Loewe clothes & accessories. On our way out we were given a bag of goodies: tea and coffee (from the sponsors of the event), chocolates, a food magazine, a sample of moisturising mask and a sample of J’Adore.. how awesome was that???? I felt a tinge of guilt at not passing on the invitation to my colleague who actually takes care of all the travel arrangements, but I thought .. too bad, I’m the one who got the invite!!!

That’s about it... business as usual as you can see :)