jayneandmarty.com

Thought I’d share how I attempt to keep all our appointments, contacts, to-do list, data and so on in order.

1. Neither of us have jobs where we need to have our work contacts, emails, to-dos, appointments etc with us on a device when we’re moving around during the day, so we can let our desktop Outlooks handle all that. If there’s something that either of us need to work on at home, we email ourselves at home. So, work items are separate from home items.That makes things heaps easier.
2. The MacBook is the master.
3. Friends and family information. All this is stored in Address Book, including phone numbers, addresses, emails and birthdays. The birthdays stored in Address Book automatically show in our calendar (iCal) and the email addresses automatically show in Mail. You can’t add a reminder alarm to the birthdays so I’ve set a recurring alarm for each Sunday to check iCal for upcoming birthdays.
4. Appointments. We put these into iCal. We set reminder alarms for some but not all.
5. Syncing. Each week I use iSync to transfer data from the MacBook to our phones. This means that our contacts and appointments are identical across all three devices, including reminder alarms. If there’s a new contact in my phone iSync imports it to Address Book.
6. At some point to-dos. I use Microsoft Entourage to manage these as it lets me set up projects and add tasks to them. For example, I have a project called Muchacha and a list of 18 things that I’ll get around to doing one day, including “replace fuel hose and fit fuel/water separator”, “install bilge pump” and “paint name on side”. None of the items have a due date so I use Entourage’s categories to tag them as “Now”, “Soon”, or “Later”. This really helps me to declutter my brain and prevents procrastination. No longer do I gaze out of the window thinking about how good it would be to install a depth gauge on the boat - I’ve previously thought about that and tagged it as “Soon”, behind 8 items marked as “Now”. If I think of something new, I add it to the list and tag it. When we complete something I delete it. The system’s working so far. There’s no need for reminders or phone syncing as there are no due dates.
7. Immediate to-dos. On Fridays and weekends we make lists on a notepad for what we plan to complete today, e.g. “Food shopping, buy fuel hose, conveyancing email, wash car, pick up dry cleaning, dig holes for patio”. Sounds a bit obsessive I suppose but I can tell you there’s nothing like seeing everything crossed off the list at 6pm. Jayne thought I was a loony at first but she’s seen the light now.
8. Everything gets backed up each fortnight.

So. There you go. MacBook, 2 x phones, notepad. Done.

ANZAC day and Australia Day are my two favourite holidays of the year. I love this country and thoroughly enjoy anything to do with “being an Aussie” - Jayne and I deliberately try to be as Oz as possible on these two days. On Australia Day this year we drank stubbies out of the esky, ate pies, had BBQs, wore thongs, went wakeboarding, camped, abused noisy campsite neighbours, cheered at a bloke who was holding an Aussie flag whilst waterskiing, wore boardies, didn’t shave (well, I didn’t anyway), swatted flies and mozzies, spent time with family, got woken up at 5am by screeching cockatoos and got sunburnt. Not bad.

This year’s ANZAC day was a little quieter than that but we still had a great day. I woke early and drove the short trip to Torquay for the dawn service at Point Danger. I overslept, actually. I would never have made it in the military. I’ve never been to an ANZAC day service before, let alone a dawn service, but I knew that I’d be moved even if it was simple. Jayne said the reason she didn’t go is because she knew she’d cry. (I say that’s the best reason to go. She’s promised to come with me next year.)

Anyway, the hairs on the back of my neck were up as soon as I approached the Point. It was cold, windy and dark but all I could see were hundreds and hundreds of heads silhouetted against the ocean. It was clear that there were thousands of people there. The service was already under way when I arrived, but I found myself a spot where I could see the ocean, the Aussie flags and the speaker and just tried to take it all in. The Last Post got me going, the national anthem brought a lump to my throat, and watching the diggers march past finished me off. I don’t really know why. It’s not as if I’ve been directly affected by war. I guess I’m just proud to be Australian, and when you’re standing side-by-side with other proud Australians honouring what the Aussie servicemen and women have done for this country it’s hard to keep emotion out of it. Maybe it was the bagpipes. Bagpipes have a strange effect upon me. If you ever want to distract me, hire a bagpipe band.

By the way, what is with the people who bag our national anthem? I think it’s fantastic. Like all good national anthems it can be inspiring when sung by a child, can create anticipation and suspense when sung by a crowd and is reassuring and happy whoever sings it. It’s about us and our country, not our meaningless queen (to single out one particular anthem from a different country). I like it.

But back to today. To be honest the rest of the day seems a bit insignificant. We had a big breakfast, worked on the boat and in the garden, walked at the beach with Maxy and watched some of the footy. We weren’t as Oz as we were on Australia Day but perhaps that’s the difference between the two days. Both celebrate Australia and its people but while Aus Day is loud, parochial and hot, ANZAC day is more refined and calm.

We’ve just finished watching the final moments of the eBay auction for Muchacha’s old boat trailer. On Friday night I set up the auction and put a starting price of $150 on it. We thought the trailer was probably worth a bit more but that’s what we’d have been happy with.

By Sunday night it was at $250 after six bids with around 20 watching it. Fantastic.

Then this morning it was up to $300 with more than 40 watchers and at 12pm it was at $400. Double fantastic.

By 2.30 there were 17 bids, eight different bidders and it had jumped to $535.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

$535!

Supply and demand, I guess.

P.S. Jayne “watched” the last 14 minutes of auction by hitting refresh every 20 seconds. Then she had to have a cup of tea and a lie down to recover from the stress of waiting for new bids and seeing none.

Rob beat me to it, but I’ll add a couple of our photos anyway.

Sim had his rally drive experience today. Family and friends had tipped in a bunch of cash as a 21st present for him. Rallydrive is located near Rockbank in Melbourne’s west and lets members of the public ride in a rally car at speed with a pro driver and also drive it as fast as you like for as many laps as you can afford.

With light rain falling to help bed the dirt track down a bit Sim certainly went for it on the course. No spins but a fair bit of sideways action and plenty of snarly engine revving. His car was a tiptronic Magna AWD, and before you say “Magna??????” here’s what the Rallydrive web site has to say:

These cars were driven by Ross Dunkerton and team mate Bill Hayes and secured 1st and 2nd place in the Australian Cup.

The Rally Drive cars have not been altered or de-tuned in any way and produce over 280hp. The cars are full FIA spec which means you could race these cars in any rally anywhere in the world.

When he’d had his 10 laps or so he was taken around for another 4 laps by one of the drivers at top speed (the last pic). It’s fair to say that there was triple the sideways action and quadruple the snarly engine revving.

Looked like great fun.

I have to say, though, that it would be hard for anyone to not look back on it and wish they’d gone even harder. Still, I suppose that’s what keeps you coming back for another go (and another $500) …..!

Through the chicane:

Too fast for me in this pic:

Trying to catch the slowpoke in the Suby (he did):

Sliding around on one of the hot laps:

We’re battling the lurgy here in Geelong. I’m still suffering from something I picked up just before Easter (I think I caught it from Georgia and Lindsay), and while Jayne was OK for a week or so she finally succumbed and had to take this Wednesday and Thursday off work.

To make things worse, Max developed a hotspot on his tail on Monday. Hotspots sound a bit gameshow but actually they’re moist eczema and not that great. They usually develop when skin is broken or not dried properly, then the dog licks the spot which causes the moisture to remain, and subsequently bacteria spreads and the lesion gets worse.

Anyway, they’re fairly easy to treat so on Thursday he went to the vet - he had a cortizone injection and we have some cream to smear on the spot. Also he had to have some of his hair shaved off so now he has a bald spot and looks like a mangy flea-bitten mongrel. It’ll grow back at some point (hopefully).

Seawater is good for it so I took him to the beach early this morning. These pictures show that it hasn’t affected his energy levels. He sure loves that frisbee.