Saorrento

Although there is still a tonne of paper work ahead, I have to say something! Almost three months ago now, my girlfriend and I started toying with the idea of entering into the property game. We figured, why not? we’re both financially viable, it will be a great investment and perhaps a stepping stone to larger future investments and most importantly saves us pissing money up against the wall renting, or aka paying someone elses mortgage.

Since that time Michelle’s parents have been generous enough to allow me stay with them playing happy families, rather than renting whilst saving (or repaying debt) in preparation of taking out a mortgage - this has been a huge relief and I’ll forever be grateful.

So with the financing plan in play, we ventured out into the property market to get a general idea of what to expect. Sadly we very quickly realized that our expectations of the market were those of yester-year.. or more like yester-century. Prior to now, my experience in the property market came from the experiences gathered through Mum and Dad, mostly through the eyes of a teenager.. so they were already a bit skewed. From those days, I recall things going at a much more peaceful pace, first we go looking at blocks - all the blocks were well prepared and ready, we’d spend hours standing on the blocks from various perspectives seeing how a house could potentially sit. If you liked the block, you would go in and buy it. Fast forward to today, the biggest shock to both Michelle and I were that in most cases we were looking at blocks off the estate-plan, for in reality, the land had not even been cleared yet, let alone streets and fence lines been established.

There were a few estates which we fancied, but that was mainly going on the name of the estate alone and the geographic location. Bonus points were awarded to the estates that contained park land and more importantly lots large enough to fit out house. Oh, I hadn’t mentioned that had I, yes, mistake number 1, not only had we been through a few dozen or so display homes looking at houses but we had also settled for a builder and had designed the perfect house.. now all we needed was the perfect block!

The only problem with this approach, hence why it is marked as a ‘mistake’, is that we became severely limited on block type before we had even started looking, nay before we even knew what was available in the market! Instantly we were looking for land around 500 square meters in size, with 17 meters frontage. If we had wanted to build out in the country that would not of been a problem, but searching for land that size within the Perth city metro area was almost impossible, with blocks commonly coming in at 350 square meters with sometimes as little as 10 meters of frontage. With one decision we had just excluded 85% of the land currently available.

Determined that we were, we accepted the loss and pioneered forwards finally discovering three estates around the Canning Vale area that took our interest. So there we were, finance on the standby, ready to jump in… alas, there was no land for sale. Despite the estates boasting lots that were perfect for us, they were not at release stage yet, and it wasn’t til two months on, that the opportunity presented itself to buy within New Haven.

At the late hour of a Saturday afternoon, the very Saturday the photo above was taken, we met with the land owners and signed up a contract agreeing to purchase the property; we had finally begun our long road of paper-trails to build our own house!

Since that date we have progressed further still, having signed an agreement to arrange pre-start for the house design by our chosen builder we moved onto finance, and took the initial step to arrange to take out a mortgage on the lot of land.

WOOT!

The swift stroke of the second hand past midnight on the 31st of December will bring to close the first decade of the new millennium. Looking back on this decade one could easily sum it up by ‘we survived’. The millennium bug, the latest of doomsday scenarios in the late 90’s didn’t turn out a single light bulb. Satan didn’t waltz through the streets of New York City Gabriel Byrne’s style (as portrayed in End of Days) in search of a bride, nor was time itself sucked through the heart of the TARDIS by the Master’s great design (the Doctor Who Movie), no, the sands of time simply slipped through the beginning of an even larger hourglass and a new millennia began.

December 31, 1999. 11.50PM:
Having just completed watching Final Destination and End of Days, my sister, along with our lifelong friends Clinton and Adrian began the countdown into the new millennium. Clinton and Adrian lived with their parents in Canning Vale; my Mum, Dad and sister made the trip up to Perth from Bunbury for the New Year celebration. We had a lot to celebrate, not only didn’t we all catch up nearly enough, perhaps once a year if we were lucky, Clinton had just completed his first year of upper-school (year 10), and I had successfully completed year 11, my first year at a new school, having moved from Esperance at the beginning of the year. My first year at Australind Senior High was a good one, I made many friends, some of which I recall meeting on the very first day have turned into some of the closest friends today. Well, by some I mean really mean one, but I do keep tabs on a few others every now and then.

As I reached toward the VCR to push in another cassette (the movie things we used before DVDs) my eye caught the LED time display, it was 11.55pm. Quickly we scurried around making sure our cups were full and the party poppers evenly distributed between the four of us. From 60 we started counting down, the momentum and excitement building up as we left the 50’s for the 40’s and then the 30’s. we counted down till about 25 where we were then flooded with ‘Happy New Year’ cheering and celebrations by our parents in the lounge down stairs – with that, we did a quick 10, 9 , 8, 7 , 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and joined in the celebration, toasting each other and popping our poppers; the big 2000 was upon us.

Since then nine New Year celebrations have gone by; none are remembered more clearly than the night of 1999 – just four mates celebrating together, no wild parties, girls or alcohol that I can recall. In fact perhaps it is because all the other new years’s since have involved copious amounts of alcohol that I simply cannot remember them? I can only recall a few; one camping at a Dam outside of Mandurah on the scarp – at midnight from our altitude we could clearly see the fireworks from Bunbury, Mandurah and Perth. Another on a farm, one at my rental in Eaton (which got quite messy) and a few more in Perth at various mate’s houses.

So at a glance, life after that night went a little like this; graduating class of 2000 from Australind SHS and enrolling into a four year Software Engineering course at Edith Cowan University in 2001. Entered a local website design competition, the result of which lead to more work and therefore the catalyist for launching my own business ‘Equinox Website and Graphic Design’ whilst still studying. By the end of 2002 I made purchase of my first NEW car, a metallic blue 2002 Kia Rio. In the years that followed the business grew and an appropriate renaming took place and the more generic titled ‘Equinox Studios’ was born in 2003 servicing not just websites, but other aspects of business, including IT support, stationary ie Letter heads, logos, business cards, magnets etc. In 2004 Equinox Studios came runner up in the Telstra small business awards. At around that same time I employed my then girlfriend of 2 years into the business to further expand the company into the Education department and development of a sports management system for sporting facilties to use to draw up fixtures for various sporting events. We took the prototype as far as Queensland. Later in 2005 we broadened our horizons with a trip to Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Not too long after this, my grandfather had to give up his car, a 1989 Mitsubishi Magna Elite. Being one of my all time dream cars, I bought it off him, selling my Kia Rio. Dispite the 13 year age downgrade, the Magna had more electrical features than the Rio ever did, not to mention a bigger engine and cruise control.

April 2006 saw me relocate to Perth, to begin work for a R&D software development firm having graduated with a degree in Software Engineering the year before. Months into the relocation my 4 year relationship came to an end, not able to withstand the long distance, and with it the future of Equinox Studios slowly but surely faded away. I closed down the company in 2007.

I stayed single for almost the better side of a year, avoiding women, instead getting my social life back on track that had been suffering, along with having plenty of time to spare to take up any projects I saw fit. Around this time I decided a few changes were in order, so getting my priorities right, I got a new car, then a new girl. My second new car ever; fourth overall; a 2007 red Mitsubishi Lancer Limited Edition sedan. Breaking up due to different life interests (ultimately we had nothing substantial in common, not even a TV show) I once again found myself single in early-mid 2008, but in a far happier state than I was in the prior breakup. For one, I didn’t avoid women and quite happily enjoyed the fruits of a single man’s lifestyle.

But life wasn’t all fun and flirtish, drifting between girls and cars; 2007 brought forth its fair share of shattering wake-up calls. On the sunny Saturday, the 27th day of January at 2pm, my Nanna passed away. She was the last of my grandparents, outliving them for a few years. I was very proud/honored to be able to be there in her final moments and the days leading up to it. When she breathed her last sigh her nursing home room suddenly fell very still, impervious to the 12 or so people, sons and daughters, grandchildren and cousins that surrounded her as she left this mortal realm for the next. She, like all my other grandparents will be missed.

A few months on my mum phoned me one evening, crying over the phone as she told me she had been diagnosed with breast cancer, my life at that moment stopped. For that whole evening, silence filled my surroundings, blurring everything out other than the uneven rhythm of my beating heart. I remember vividly talking a shower, and scrubbing myself down as someone with OCD would, never feeling clean. I wasn’t anywhere ready to go on with life without my mother. That year had to be the hardest I had ever lived through, though what I was feeling would of been nothing compared to what Mum was having to endure, throughout the treatment. I only wish that I spent more time at her side, to comfort her. I thank God every day for her making it through such a terrible year, and for her ever improving health.

Time, being the healer of all things, I eventually found myself at the end of 2008 on a paintball skirmish field, arranged through Renee, the high school friend I stayed in touch with and her co-worker friend. On the 30th of December that co-worker friend and I met up at the Broken Hill pub and shared quite a few drinks getting to know each other. Flirting wildly across the table; discussing exotic travel ideas of the likes of Russia. The evening ended by what I could only describe as fireworks – the most passionate and wild goodnight kiss in the car park. That was my new year’s kiss, for the very next day she set off on a week’s vacation to Singapore.

2009 brought on even more travel, with three overseas trips carried out; 9 weeks of annual leave. The first of which being a couple of weeks in Vietnam, the next a few days in Singapore followed by a mammoth 6 week trip around the world, including Russia.

So from starting out as something of an entrepreneur, to owing a handful of cars, skiing in Melbourne, various relationship pitfalls, supporting my mother through her cancer treatment, to traveling around the world, being at my grandparents sides, watching as they all moved onto the next realm, a lot has happened, a lot of life experiences some good, others horrible, all of which shaping me into who I am today..

I started this decade with three grandparents, no debt, not much travel experience, having owned one car and lived in zero houses by myself, no business experience nor that of love and ended with no grandparents, a bit too much debt that i am currently rectifying, having owned 4 cars, lived in 5 houses outside of home, a fair amount of travel and business experience not to mention the affairs of the heart.

Just what will this next decade bring?

The epic tale of this journey started just over seven months ago, and like all good tales involves a girl. During an initial meeting [December 30th at the Broken Hill Pub] (some might call it a first date) after all the small talk and flirting banter had subsided hypothetical plans for a trip to Russia were being sketched.

Russia was an adventure both of us had wanted to do for quite some time, although given the political nature of the country it wasn’t exactly a destination either of us felt comfortable doing alone. So year after year, trip after trip, Russia was left undiscovered, until that very night. That night I had found a traveling buddy, and although I didn’t realize it at the time, I had also found love.

Over the coming months the Russian adventure was shaped and molded; like a kid playing with play doh unsure of what to make… we knew we wanted Russia in the trip, but we didn’t know where to start or what the journey would involve. The adventure transformed from a Trans Siberian journey across Russia, mainly due to financial constraint, to just visiting St Petersburg and Moscow, to including Las Vegas, New York and London. A round the world fare was then determined.

It was at this point in time that we were getting serious with our travel plans; the next obvious step was to establish dates and look into flight availability. The trip in its entirety was about six weeks long, it then occurred to us that that’s a long time to be traveling with someone you have never traveled with before. Not wanting to compromise our Russian experience with the wrong companion we decided upon doing a smaller scale trip to ‘test the waters on first’ before committing ourselves to Russia later in the year. So in the month of May we tested out those waters in Vietnam.

In many ways Vietnam was a mutual grounds for both of us, namely because it was a place neither of us had been to, whilst offering a nice balance of relaxing atmosphere and exciting things to see and do. We both took particular interest in the Vietnam War, which lead us to a number of war related museums and tours including the Chu Chi Tunnels network that ultimately lead to the demoralization of the US forces invading at the time.

Our two week tour of Vietnam was a conglomeration of one fantastic experience after the other; having stayed at Ho Chi Minh city and then traveling up to the Old Quarter of Hanoi, visiting the various museums of war and history, getting into the thick hustle and bustle of street activity through to enjoying a relaxing cruise on a junket in Ho Long Bay. There was no question upon our return from Vietnam, it was time to get serious about Russia.

It was around this time that we both approached our employment for time off. I was a bit skeptical at this point as to how easy it would be for me to get time off, given that I was requesting six weeks and that it would mean I wouldn’t be available to go to Sydney for the annual Visual Impact Image Expo that the company participates in every year. To my complete surprise, my boss asked if I would mind calling in to visit our main distributors in Phoenix Arizona; Golden Colorado and Antwerp in Belgium. My leave was green-lit and with three new exciting destinations added to our list.

Three months later, with little more than 42 days to go, the adventure ahead is becoming seemingly more real. All flight and accommodation reservations have been booked and paid for.

This is actually my third international trip for the year; the first of these being Vietnam in May, the second, just around the corner being Singapore for 4 days in August to celebrate my girlfriends birthday, and the last of these being the epic round the world adventure setting off 11 of September for six weeks.

I really don’t quite know how I have managed to pull it all together; to save the money required whilst doing one trip after the other, with no prior savings, in the middle of a recession no less! I am consciously aware that I am living life very tightly financially to make these three trips work out, and truth be told it has become far too tight for comfort, but it will be all worth it. (special thanks to Mum and Dad advancing me some travel money for the trip) In a way this trip is rather symbolic; my last harrah before knuckling down, repaying debt and saving for the future; for future adventures and investments alike.

2009 is definitely the year of travel for me.

I am hoping that this upcoming round-the-world experience provides the much needed inspiration that I am desperately in search for. I want 2010 to be a new chapter in my life, a new beginning. Up to this point I have been living a life of dreams and recklessness, and although it has served me well and I have numerous stories to my name, I feel I have somewhat out grown that spir-of-the-moment lifestyle. I am now in search of something more definitive, complying to a plan… I am ready to start growing up and begin shaping my future.

To the dreams that I haven’t yet made happen, watch out – you’re next!

I am beginning to realise now just how easily influenced i am by my TV idols. One the one hand you have my latest reality show fav ‘Master Chef’ which is running for its first season in Australia, presenting me with such delightful culinary combination’s that are tempting to try out at home. On the other hand are the boys from the BBC fanging about on race tracks and burning fuel, and more specifically Jeremy Clarkson’s witty retort ‘Well how hard can it be?’ brainwashing me every episode.

It was during a visit to a local cake shop, sourcing out ideas for my girlfriends birthday that the culinary fan-boy in me collided with high-octane-wittiness when we were quoted $80 for a slab of cake with a ‘Garfield’ maybe iced on top.

$80? for a cake?? No way should any cake, aside from perhaps a wedding cake cost that much?? Anyone can make a cake… How hard can it be?

So my lovely girlfriend wanted a Garfield cake.. well, okay, that’s definitely doable.. I’ve drawn Garfield a few times in the past, so i am no stranger to shaping him… but if this does turn out, if I can pull this off, then lets save Garfield for another day, and choose a different test subject for today.. How about the lovable pooch Odie

Approximately 7 hours worth of effort went into this; my first DIY cake

Step 1: Find a drawing of your subject you want to model, and print it out 1:1

Step 2: Bake the cakes, ensuring that the cake surface area meets the size requirement for the cutout you made.

Step 3: Divide the cake into quadrants for easy handling, and line them up to suit your cutout.

Step 4: Using a knife, cut out around your cutout into the cake to make the required shapes.

Step 5: Prepare a board for the cake to sit on. Note: Depending on the size of your cake this could be the final resting spot of your cake, so choose a board that wont be missed in a hurry. (or disguise the board so your housemates don’t know what you used

Step 6: Place all the pieces of the cake on the board to suit your cutout.

Step 7: Remove cutout, and make some thick white icing, mixing just icing sugar and water… this is for the undercoat.

Step 8: Cover your cake from head to toe with this ‘undercoat’.. it will make decorative icing easier to perform, and also seal your cake retaining the moisture. Place cake in fridge to assist setting of icing. The icing must be completely set before resuming.

Step 9: Now prepare your coloured icing. Doing one colour at a time. In this case we need a pale yellow.. Mixing icing sugar and margarine together will provide thus colour. (the texture of margarine and icing sugar makes it easy to apply onto the cake too).

Step 10: Using the same Icing method (Icing Sugar + Margarine) add some red food colouring and apply to the tongue.

Step 11: For the ears I mixed in a little Milo… then using a sifter I sprinkled some additional Milo over the top.

Step 12: For the black icing, i resorted to plain old ‘Water + Icing Sugar + Coloring’ to give it a shine. The difference with using water over margarine is that the icing sugar is runny. to ensure that you ice only in the area that you intend to, outline the area using an icing pen first. Thus creating a perimeter for the black icing to stay within. Then put it into the fridge to speed up the setting process.

Step 13: Afterward, using the icing pen to further define your cake design.

And there you have it.. one Odie cake
My first cake for 2009 and my first ‘decorative cake’ EVER.

My obsession with travel began back in 1997 where a family holiday took me for the first time out of Australia and to the likes of Singapore, England and United States. Since that time I have made a small smattering of trips of my own; revisiting Singapore a number of times and returning to LA/Hollywood and visiting Las Vegas. On the domestic scale I am no stranger to the wide open roads, having driven numerous times to Denmark and Esperance essentially covering the south west region of Western Australia. I have also had the fortune of my work taking me to places such as Newman, deep in the Pilbara of Western Australia and across to Sydney on the east coast.

There are many aspects of travel I enjoy, the first of which and probably still the most significant of these is through my hobby of photography; in my opinion nothing makes for better photography than foreign landscapes and cultures. By foreign, I am referring to anything other than local to the viewer. However in recent times I have discovered how much I enjoy the challenge of learning languages. In anticipation of doing a Russian Trans-Siberian tour in late 2009 I began to learn to speak Russian. To this date I have only a few short phrases to show for my efforts, such as ordering beverages and saying please and thank you – but that is simply because I haven’t really been putting a great deal of time into it. So imagine how good I will be when I do actually start studying it. However my Russian has been put on hold for now in light of a new challenge – learning basic Vietnamese all thanks to my girlfriend / partner in crime who bought me an audio disc and book.

New Years 2007/2008 I made a resolution; to go abroad at least once a year. This year I plan to do a double-whammy (to make up for past years if nothing else) starting with a tour of Vietnam in May.
I am very much looking forward to this trip; lately I have begun to feel somewhat overwhelmed by western culture, though this can possibly be attributed to my recent increase in watching TV - being swamped by western-dramas. I close my eyes and picture the solitude of the Vietnamese country side; through all the hustle and bustle of an over populated country with swarms of mopeds and bikes coming from all directions lays a simpler lifestyle; dramatically different from the lifestyle that I have become accustomed to over the past 25 years. I really am looking forward to experiencing and embracing the change that the Vietnamese culture has to offer.

Later in the year, around late September to mid October dream of a Trans Siberian adventure is starting to form. The month long journey through Siberia will most likely begin in the Far East province Vladivostok and journey on through to Moscow and St Petersburg, making stops at local villages on route.

For as long as I can remember I have always wanted to visit Russia. My fixation with history, particularly World War II has undoubtedly played a strong part in this, as from very early on I became enthralled by the battle of Stalingrad the pivotal turning point in Soviet history and their stand against Nazi Germany.

So much adventure planned for 2009.. Recession be damned!

Well here we are, what initially was to take only a day or two to transfer has ended up taking nearly a month and the job isn’t over yet; only about one quarter of entries have been transferred over thusfar.

So what have I been up to? Well, planning a trip to Russia for one, then greater Europe, resigning from my job, then not resigning, followed by putting off Europe for another year until the world economy sorts itself out. January has been a thrill of a ride to say the least, full of dreams of travel and adventure.

February so far has proven to be a far more mature month, with travel plans starting to take shape in the form of two international trips for 2009. September/October are still slated for the grand Russian adventure which came about through a girl I met a month or so earlier who also expressed interest in touring Russia, who coincidentally now is my gorgeous girlfriend.

Thinking back to that initial night I remember exactly what it was that first drew me to her; it was two things in fact, one being her incredible spirit of adventure, I found her passion for travel extremely alluring, the second was her gorgeous smile… I will never forget that night… anyway, I digress…

The second of the international trips planned is in fact slated first of the two. As of a week ago Michelle proposed a week and a half trip to Vietnam. Although only a week in its infancy the trip to ‘Nam’ is becoming seemingly realistic for May. Not only is Vietnam yet another amazing country that neither of us have yet had the pleasure of visiting but it will also prove to be rather insightful as to how well we travel together, a handy thing to know before investing a month into Russia later the same year. Though, through simple observation alone based on our desire to travel and explore I believe we will be great.

Of course all this travel needs to be financed, and although I have been purchasing a number of lotto tickets per week, currently I am still financing my life the old fashion way by pushing paper about, well, of the virtual kind at least. Work is going very well, and although working on a project for three and a bit years can be somewhat nerve wrecking at times, we are so close to the finish line it isn’t funny. Since the Visual Impact Image Expo in Sydney last year I have been busily fine tuning the software, creating printed media, cd covers and labels, help files and filming/editing videos for promotional DVDs. Currently half a dozen advanced beta’s (Preview Editions) of the program are in the field, the feedback has all been rather positive.

Just for a refreshing change I was approached by the Sales department of our parent company today to help with their new promotion for a product called Rowmark. Now I may only be a humble Software Engineer on paper, but I have made a point to lend my expertise in many other areas of the two companies I am associated with, including; project management roles, onsite customer service (not limited to software) and of course designing promotional media for our Sales department. So when Tom approached me today to share his ideas for the new campaign I was only all too thrilled to be a part of it. The theme for this year’s Romark launch: TopGear (yes, I am referring to the BBC Series TopGear). From what was loosely discussed the motto would go something along the lines of want top gear for your signage applications, look no further than Rowmark… or something along those lines, anyway, it’s a play-on-words thing using ‘Topgear’ as a keyword the design is to reference indirectly the infamous BBC series. I look forward to getting those creative juices going again; it can make the perfect break from mind numbing computer code.

Tonight was the first time I watched a complete episode of NCIS (well, I watched most of it), I really enjoyed what I saw of it. I am not completely sure just how much of the DNA research conducted in the episode was fictional; regardless though I found it quite fascinating that so much can be learnt from an individual based on a hair sample. By the end of it, the scientist was deducing the diet and what type of water the subject was drinking - most impressive stuff.

Anyway, I am going to cut my rambling here. Usually my posts are more subjective and particular than this but I have been meaning to make this ‘first’ entry for a while now, and well, 1.18am seemed like a great time to do just that.