June 2006

It's actually been a quiet month this month. Well, socially that is. Most of the month was dedicated to ripping out bathrooms and painting walls in preparation for Jimi's 30th Birthday Party next month.

Greig continued to obliterate the bathroom so that the tiler could come in and start rebuilding it for us. Unfortunately, the tiler had a different idea and we haven't been able to get him in to start rebuilding. By the end of the month we still had a room with a rough concrete floor and no actual bath facilities. This is made even more annoying by the fact that Greig will be away for the first two weeks of next month, so the work ain't gonna happen then either.

Greig attacks the kitchen with a grinder.

My big renovation task was to finally paint the outside walls of the "West Wing". We needed to get them painted before we built the stairs that will allow us access to the loft area. Once again we got Badger, our trusty handy-man, in to build our stepped masterpiece. At least he's more reliable than the tiler.

We also managed to finally finish the benches in the kitchen. This little task has only taken us about a year to complete, but now that it's done, things are looking a whole lot better.

Michael Watson has just turned 40. To celebrate, he invited a group of friends to a nice little party in a café where we were all plied with bubbly. Luckily, Greig and I didn't drive in so we were able to let the wine flow freely. Perhaps a little too freely. It was a fun night though, with lots of old faces and a few new ones as well.

The only other outing we had was a trip to the ABC TV Studios to sit in on the taping of the "Chaser's War on Everything". TV audience tickets are always a great cheap night out. Unless of course it's for "Family Feud" or something lame-arse like that.

Towards the end of the month, Greig jumped on a plane and headed over to the UK. Michael and Will are "getting hitched" and Greig is to be there as a sort of best man for Michael. Unfortunately, I couldn't go with him because of Jimi's 30th birthday extravaganza to be held in the beginning of July. We'd promised Jimi when we first bought the shed that we'd hold his 30th there. Once again, we had to "divide and conquer" so that Greig and I could cover both events.

In some ways I was glad not to go - I'm not sure if I'm ready to sit on a plane for twenty hours each way. But then again, it was an opportunity to visit the UK again and to go to my first Gay Civil Partnership ceremony. (It's not a marriage. We would never "demean" the institution of marriage by suggesting that two gay men could love each other as much as a man and a woman. What a silly suggestion that would be.)

But anyway, Greig flew to London and then jumped on a Train to Paris for a few days with Daniel, an English boy that he'd met in Sydney last October. Apparently, despite living only a few hours away, Daniel had never been to Paris. Then again, I've never been to Uluru.

I took a day off work at the end of the month to start preparing the shed for Jimi's party. All the crap from the past months of renovation needed to be cleaned up, things generally re-arranged and piles of stuff moved out of the way or moved up to the loft.

I now officially hate the new stairs.