Blogwonky

Being a long-time astronomy geek, I decided it was time to take the short lunchtime walk from my place of work to Sydney Observatory…

Other than a dude at the reception desk, the place was deserted. I looked through the exhibits.

The Transit Instrument

29cm Refractor in the South Dome

When I had finished looking around inside, I noticed it was a few minutes before 1pm. I was therefore able to observe the dropping of the Time Ball (below). I made a video of this exciting event which may become a future episode of Noswonky’s Most Exciting Moments.

The Time Ball

As I strolled to the Quay this morning, I glanced over at the Opera House and noticed that the steps had turned ‘flesh’ colour.

I zoomed in and witnessed 5000 people performing a massive lewd act on the steps of the iconic structure. It was for artistic purposes…

See also: SMH Article

While splitting up the bill at Epitome, I managed to scam Yuko by passing off a 50 Euro cent coin as $1.

Later, we went to Chatswood and Yuko bought some meat at a Korean butcher shop. As we walked away, one of the staff came running after us saying ‘what’s this?’ Yuko had used the coin to pay for the meat and the Koreans were not falling for it. Yuko had to take it back and replace it with legal Australian currency.

But in the evening, at the Red Chopstick, she was able to dispose of the pesky coin by using it as part of the tip…

Today I had a lunchtime meeting with ‘Carlos’ (not his real name), who has been an occasional commenter on this blog. He brought some of his colleagues with him and we drank beer and ate burgers next to that big round building with the non-round name. I have know Carlos (not his real name) for a frighteningly long time. When I mentioned the year we met, some of the others at the table claimed not to have been born then!

Carlos is, unfortunately, a banker. At least he works for a bank, which I believe is sufficient to label him a banker. I was a banker once too, working at the same bank as Carlos for a while, but I got out (or was ousted) well before the GFC struck.  Carlos got ousted when the GFC struck, but has now joined another bank.

Carlos - Banker

I told Carlos that I had resigned from my job to become a hobo. He was shocked, but he wished me well in my hobotic future.

Later that afternoon, my resignation became public knowledge at work. It had been under wraps for more than a week pending negotiations with management regarding the timing of my transition to hobo-hood.

It was time for another team lunch! This time we went here.

When our food arrive, we looked at it in amazement…

I ate a very nice piece of trout…

While I ate, a crazy dude tried to stare me down, but I ignored him…

Yuko came to the city to meet me after work t the Quay Bar. I got there first and started drinking beer and skyping…

When Yuko arrived we had some nice food and Yuko tried to photograph seagulls.

As we returned to my car, we took a close look at the Arcadia, which was in port.

We talked about the possibility of going on a cruise. Yuko became very excited about this.

I went walking an witnessed the devastation from the recent storms. I was confronted by a particularly shocking scene at the Bridge of Death, where the raging river had left a stack of logs piled up against the deadly structure…

I continued my walk, and on a leafy street, I encountered a man in yellow carrying a woosy shoulder bag. I walked right past him, but then he called out my name. I stopped and realised that I knew him. In fact I recently gave him a huge amount of money, and he was still smiling…

Yuko also found a dead spider on the sofa. I denied responsibility in the death of this arachnid.

The new underground parking area at Lane Cove has an electronic system to identify the number of available spaces. The picture below shows the indication for the ‘disabled’ area. A quick visual inspection of the area showed that there were actually only two spaces available.

The indicator at the entrance shows the numbers for each level. The figure for level 3 also appeared to be wildly optimistic, as when I drove around I could only see perhaps half a dozen free spaces.

In the afternoon we went to a house auction in Pengilly Street. It was a one level house on a large block - the same size as Mother’s land. The price guide had been ‘over $2.2M’, but it actually sold for $2.49M. A very good result indeed.

At Pengilly Street Auction

At this time of year there is a different ship in port almost every day. Today, it was the Queen Victoria. This is probably the biggest ship which can fit at the terminal…

After work I met Yuko at Firefly. There was a display of Japanese Taiko drumming in the plaza, although the performers were not Japanese. They demonstrated a high level of skill as a large crowd gathered to watch.

Meanwhile, we decided to try Firefly’s pizza. It comes in a rectangular shape.

We also drank beer. It was very nice indeed.