Okay, so the year is already one fortnight on (which means it is almost 4% over already!), but the past month has been quite busy, and this is really the first chance I’ve had to get back on Horus Kol and post for a while.

Christmas was great – although I ended up working all the way up to Christmas Eve (and then ended up back a week earlier than I should have been) thanks to one of those projects.

I spent most of my time over at my parents, even the week I was working, and in between all of that I had my Nan and cousin visiting and staying up at there, too. Also, we moved Samantha, Dan and Alyssa to a new home in the south of the city (on New Year’s Eve), and then there was Lachie and Megan’s wedding (which was great, and good to see them married, too).

Amongst all this, I have probably shot about 400 pictures on the Sony, which will take me some time to process, filter, and then post on the website. Thank goodness for digital, at any event, so I don’t have to develop all of them before I decide what’s good and what’s not.

So, I’ll be getting more photos up on the site soon enough – along with a bunch more posts and things about life and stuff. I’m planning on getting out and using my camera as many weekends as possible this year – including some travelling out of Adelaide, and even inter-state (I’m also planning to get a car sometime) – so Horus Kol ought to be a busy site, if I can ever find time to post.

Again, Happy New Year! to all – and I hope that when you get to 2010, you can look back on 2009 as another great year.

I-Nex on the Temptation

It’s the last week before Christmas, and Mark (my boss) very kindly setup a trip for the company and friends out on the Temptation. This catamaran sails out of Glenelg, and runs up the coast and back for a distance offering chances to see dolphins and other sealife that you might not normally see from being on the beach.

As it was – we saw only the one dolphin as it was feeding at the harbour-mouth, but it was nice to be out of the office and with friends on a calm and sunny day.

Of course, the camera went with me, and you can see the pictures here.

Well, it was probably one of the most dullest ways to spend a week off work, but it was nice and (mostly) relaxing. I didn’t exactly get all I had set out to do either, but hey, it was supposed to be time off.

What I did manage was get out on my bike a couple of times – Ride #1 and Ride #2. I also managed to spend a whole afternoon just chatting with me sister as we wandered up and down the Marion shopping centre, and of course I got to spend time with my niece.

I also started sorting through the collection of data CDs I have stacked on a shelf in my study – most of which is defunct data (like old backups of this site from 5 years ago), or duplicates (like my photo albums, which I’m sorting through and going to place onto a single DVD – oh and post up the choice pictures onto here).

And then there was the reading, and the sorting of the myriad bookmarks, so I have been able to organise a lot of things that I want to write here and on Religious Funny.

Finally, I spent most of the weekend at my parents – helping my Dad with digging up half the garden in order for him to put decking where there was once lawn. Needless to say, I hurt a little now from the hard graft, but I’m surprised that I don’t feel as bad as I thought I would.

So, yeah, back to work today – and it was actually a pretty non-hectic day. Obviously, there was the marathon reading of email, but after that I got back into the swing again today.

Another thing I started doing in the last week was a timeplan in my head – when I’m going to be writing for Horus Kol, Religious Funny and Random Tweak – when I’m going to working on my new Python/Django projects – and when I’m going to doing other things like more drawing, reading, and general relaxing. It goes a bit further than that – I’m starting to think about what I want to be doing in 2010 and beyond already (and we haven’t even got into the last month of 2008 yet). Needless to say, this involves things like buying a home, and travelling more frequently and over more distance again, and getting into shape.

There’s nothing like a week off for getting your head together.

I’ve already had a few questions from friends who are probably more than a little surprised at my current Facebook status…
To try and stem the flood from everyone else, here’s what has brought this about:

Most of you know that I tried to start some teaching courses in January, and that there were problems with getting the two different centres I would have had to attend to get their act together. This meant that I was given a deferment for a year at Reading, and a chance to reapply at St Martin’s in Lancaster.

Following this, I decided to take a little time out – my last real holiday was two years previously.

I also started trying to find work – either something that I would be able to do in the year I had found myself stuck with, or something that I would like enough to think about doing for longer and turn down my course at Reading. This has proven to be quite difficult.

Anyway – my sister is getting married in Australia in a couple of weeks, and I had already intended to spend some time there so that I could be at the wedding and see my family.
I also had one outstanding job application.
I also had reached the absolute limit of my ability to stay financially solvent.

I’d made a deal with my parents so that they would help me out a little while the job application would be pending… and that I would get a holiday work permit so that I could live with them if I was unsuccessful… this would allow me to return to the UK for the teaching courses next January – and also save me a fair bit of money on living in the interim.

The only real problem was that, with the prospective interview dates, I wouldn’t know about the job until I was already in Oz.

Its now come to a crunch time – I’ve not heard anymore about the job interview, and my flight is booked for Sunday. I most likely won’t be back for a couple of years.

I kept all of this quiet up to now, except from a small number of people – I didn’t want to repeat what happened in January where I was going, and then wasn’t…

I apologise to those people who feel like I should have told them sooner – but I also hope you understand my motivations for keeping quiet.

I will be missing a lot of people over here – but this is just one of those things that I have to do. I’ve been thinking about when would be the right time to rejoin my family, and while the actual timing of it all is a bit sudden, I have to say that this is that time.

Well – you’re all invited to crash at mine (when I get a place) and to have barbies and beers in the South Australian sun whenever you feel like a break from the UK.