I sit in Alice Springs doing absolutely nothing, with all the Things I Need To Do go round and round in my head and are no closer at all to being done.  As I am away from Brisbane until Monday, my hands are tied.  Tuesday, I am on reserve, Wednesday is a day off, and Thursday I fly to Kenya.  I feel like there is no Time Left, and it irks me to be simply sitting here with nothing to do until my flight in another two hours (having already sat here for almost two hours).

The hardest thing is to do nothing.

Mind you, the last few days have been full of Everything, and there has been hardly a moment to breathe!  My new climbing shoes arrived on Thursday so we got up at 0250 on Friday morning before work, to climb Beerwah for sunrise.

Sunrise, with my new red shoes on the right

The shoes were incredible!  Even grippier than my guide tennies, and that’s saying a lot.  (D’s guide tennies on the left).

Moving on, swiftly, flying a 717 isn’t half as much fun as flying in the Tiger Moth, or the SNJ, or even trolling around for a jolly in the Cessna 172RG.

In formation with a Chipmunk 

The second Tiger formatting behind us

Both Tigers back on the ground

It was decidedly interesting landing into Alice Speings today, however.  At forty degrees with the associated thermals and turbulence, it was quite a roller coaster on approach.  A clue that it was bad was the tower controller advising us of a dust devil on a half mile final.  Thankfully, the aeroplane didn’t generate any wind shear warnings and we continued the gusty approach to land.  And after, I felt quite breathless.  Always a fun workout!

Once we get going, it is off to Darwin for the night.  I have taken a photo of the weather plan for the day

Surrounded by two cyclones, with an apparent volcano off Brisbane (there is no volcano, that volcano is in PNG so I don’t know how it made it to Brisbane!!!)

It will therefore be quite “interesting” flying into Darwin tonight and Cairns tomorrow! 

Oops

This morning, I got up at 0430 to go climbing with Tash.  It was another very early start due to my reserve starting at 0800, and after the inevitable coffee, I opened the garage door to reverse out my car ready for Tash’s arrival.

Then, I received a text saying she would be ten minutes late, so I went back into the house, leaving the garage door open.  Ten minutes later, I finished loading the car, hit the door switch to open the garage door, jumped into the car, and started reversing.

Except, apparently when you hit open twice, the garage door actually closes.

And my car always beeps frantically when I reverse in the garage due to C’s shelves being so close at the back.  

And when I suddenly realised, and the beeping went BEEEEEEP, and my slightly befuddled morning brain coordinated with my foot to hit the brakes, it was too late.

My poor house.  Or rather, my poor garage door (bent and bruised) and my poor car (scratched).

When I called D in a tizzy, and he came immediately over, he said he expected it to be FAR worse than it was - although I did explain I wasn’t moving very fast at the time!

The outside

The inside, with D trying to unbend it

Working hard some four hours later

He did a pretty awesome job.  Although the garage door will never be the same again, it is almost completely functional now.  That big steel T bar is the final hurdle as he wasn’t able to fully bend it back, so he has now gone in search of a new one - which apparently we are getting for free!  

I was going to go with him, but H wants me to go view a house with him, so when I get back from that, the garage should close again!  Luckily C is also home and can babysit the wide open door in the meantime...

Oh yes and I still went climbing, as D persuaded me I should

Most of the way up Tibro 

Anyway.  Today has been quite interesting so far...  let’s see how it ends up!

I haven’t mentioned on my blog yet, but C is moving out tomorrow, so that has been quite a shock and is the end of an era.  Shock is probably the wrong word as he has wanted his own house for two years, and has been actively looking for six months - but when he announced his moving, it was still unexpected!  

Tonight, we are having our Very Last Cheese Night As A Family Plus D (hehe) so that will be nice, at least!

Today, I was supposed to go to Caboolture Aerodrome and help do ground runs on a Mustang, and then we were supposed to put the engine back together on the Chipmunk.  I was very excited about this, but unfortunately being on reserve, I got called in and now I am going to Melbourne instead.  I have to say I am more than a little disappointed, which isn’t really fair as it is technically a work day.

I have also decided to start making the pork ramen I have planned for the last couple of months.  I bought the pork bones before Christmas and froze them, in preparation for having time to do it: and with three days off after today, it seems a good time to start the 36hour broth.

I just got off a 3 day trip last night, culminating in a very busy afternoon with widespread storms in the Sydney Canberra area which kept us very busy.  Here is a photo of our weather radar followed by a screenshot of the BOM radar!

We found a nice clear path through

This one was taken on the ground after the previous flight in which I took the photo 

Flying alongside said storms to try to find a gap

An anvil with some nice mammatus cloud beneath 

After today, I have three days off, and the plan was to go climbing first thing tomorrow, but after two long hikes up Mt Ainslie in Canberra (9.5k each) my shoulders and neck are feeling quite tight and sore so I must see how the day progresses before committing!

Other than that, the plans for these days off are a bit different: I have a guy coming on Monday morning to measure up my walk in robe for shelves and drawers etc (or Dad, you could come and do this for me), then I am babysitting Asher (3) and Rory (1) for the rest of the day.  Tuesday, I have my car service, so I’m not sure when I will be able to fit any climbs in!

Anyway, I am going to have breakfast now!