I cannot believe how much my little man knows and understands despite being unable to talk. I tell him to do something and he does it. I told him to press the blue button on a talky book and he did... without me pointing! I ask him to pack up his blocks every night and it's like watching a seven year old. He goes through every stage of not wanting to do it, from '...I'm still playing with them' to 'There. I've done one now can I go?' It's a mother's struggle to get him to do it but it's worth it if it teaches him to be tidier than I am. Sometimes I'm reading the riot act and he does something so cute i have to laugh. Like when he looked up at me, big eyes, tiny little mouth surrounded by chubby cheeks saying nya nya nya nya! He comes when I call him, he knows to give me a cuddle and a pat on the back when I'm crying and he asks me to read him his favorite books by sitting on the couch with one and patting the cushion, motioning me to sit beside him. He's a few months off two and amazing me every day with everything he does. I plain and simple love him.

I am now the proud owner of a seven month old baby and he sure is growing up quickly! He sits, has two teeth and is close to crawling! So thats the news on him out of the way.

My 21st birthday is this tuesday and I'm really excited! Mum's coming with me to my young mum's group which will be doing bellydancing for a couple of hours. That group is fantasiv! we've been to the aquarium, scienceworks, Werribee Zoo, Ballarat Wildlife Park, Mueseum... they really look after us! Unfortunatly our Maternal and Child Health nurse who would bend over backwards to help us and the group facilitator have just moved on in new directions so new people must run it. I'll really miss them but that's going off topic... birthday... Uncle dave's visiting!!!!! gotta go now... bye

I'm half way through this camp experience and it's starting to get easier. Well, not easier, but I think I'm getting better at handling it all. I've had a girl tell me I was the best counselor and another made me totally flip out at her and she wouldn't listen to me or be civil with me ever since. I'm back in Bos'n for this session and I've got 12 little girls to watch out for. They are so loud and a couple of them are real trouble makers but I'm at the barn so much that I don't have to do the majority of the work with them. Barn work is very routine now. Four lesson a day, if I'm teaching theory it's all the same stuff repeated. I don't mind it though, I'm comfortable working in the environment. One of my colleagues who's a position above me has been a real pain in the butt but I'm learning to ignore and accept that she's just projecting her issues onto me! I sorta almost feel like a real grown up...
Days off are the best! I live for them. I get one night at the beginning of each session, either mon tue or wed, to go out and eat real food, then friday night to saturday dinner mid session and on change over weekends I get Friday night to Sunday morning. Two more two weeks sessions to get through, as well as the last week of this one and I'm done! The time does go quickly. It's good. I went to Kmart today and bought heaps of food to tie me over when camp food is unbearable. (The eggs they had a camp breakfast the other day were all identical, stemed when they were supposed to look like fried and the yokes were pale and all shaped the same. That is scary!) What I bought though, is not much healthier, that's for sure. I've found salt and vinegar pringles!!! They make me happy. I still miss treats from home. There was a Corvette and classic car and hot rod sho on at Kmart too, which I saw the beginning of which was so cool!!!
I'm running out of time on this library computer but I'll finish up by wishing my dear little bro a happy birthday!!!! I'm gonna send him a pressie... but it will probably cost me a mint in postage. I don't care though, he's worth it!

Wow. America is so different! The roads are opposite, the things are larger and even the plumbing works differently! I've been certified as a level one riding instructor and we have I think one more week of general counsellor training before the children arrive and we take full responsibility for them. We had to spent the last week in pokey cabins, surrounded by mud and 10 minutes walk from the toilets, showers and dining room. It's been such a strain. The barns are 15 minutes walk from main camp and we have to walk up and down hills to get there at least 6 times a day. That would all be ok, but the food is shockingly awful. Breakfast rarely includes just plain toast. It's always 'souless eggs' that taste foul, pancakes or unbearably sugary cereals. The Rasin bran is frosted. I can't really eat it. When we did finally get a serve of toast, it tasted wrong. The bread is sugary!!!!! The butter 'taste' spread is made with sweet cream so I don't touch that either. In my diary, most of the things i write about are how bad the food is. I know I'm complaining a lot, but it's a major culture shock to someone who likes a reasonably healthy diet. Don't start me on lunch or dinner. Try cheese pizza, hotdogs or soggy chicken each day. I don't really know how i will survive here. I've been trying to find things that remind me of home. They have no salt and vinegar Pringles so I got plain. I found Cadburys Caramello choccy but it's made by Hershys so I believe it's sweeter.
We stayed at Brandy's house last night, for our night off. She's a local girl who's working with us in the barn this summer. Her place is huge. She has a pool and hot tub. We visited her aunt, two houses down and her place was bigger again! She had a mini home theatre which could have been a cinema screen and sound system easily. She also had a real Dolly Parton pin ball machine, a real slot machine that you put coins in to line up the pictures and a juke box. Not to mention her massive TV upstairs, the drum kit and the Rock Band PS2 game we had a go at. This place is amazing.
The camp I'm at is YMCA Camp Letts. It's pretty, situated on a couple of rivers where they flow into Chesapeake Bay. The camp is on a penninsula surrounded by waterfront and tall leafy green trees. In fact it's in the same forest where Blair Witch Project was filmed, 2 miles away. It's normally very hot and humid and destined to be worse than we've so far experienced. Which is bad. However, the last couple of days we've had buckets of rain. It's not the most comfortable arrangement but I'll survive.
It's my day off and we took a cab to the Annapolis Westfield Mall. It shits all over every shopping centre I've ever seen. So far, exploring a tiny part of it, I've found two shops dedicated only to Cap hats. One was called 'Lids'. I'm using the free internet in the Mac shop. You just pick a laptop on display and do whatever you want for as long as you want! Another way to get out of camp is to go with a bunch of camp staff who are going to Kmart. It is huge as well. It has a large range of fireworks out the front which I know my brother would want me to bring home (if only I could get them through customs.) I heard that out the back they sell guns. Why don't our little Kmarts sell them??? I'm still confused on tipping and taxes. Food advertised on menu boards is always more expensive when you come to pay for it.
I am a little scared of travelling after camp. We hear all these terrible stories of people getting into trouble and places you mustn't go to alone. I hope I can find some people to hang with, but I'm thinking I'll have to cut the travel dates shorter. It's just too daunting. And I'm so homesick!!
I've seen deer, eagles, turkey vultures, snakes, a dead opossum, squirrels, heard raccoons, seen weird bugs and got a tick. They freak me out so bad. The thought of getting one in my hair!! UGGH! I pulled it out of my leg when I found it but you can get a disease from a certain type and you never know when you get them. There are deadly spiders too. We share our cabins with all manner of bugs. Rats too if you leave food around. Sound like the best place to be now doesnt it! Well at least I can say I'm gathering some amazing experiences and stories to share. I can't work out why people love returning for 6 years running, but I guess you can't find anything like this anywhere else. The camp songs are annoying and people are too happy. Brandy reckons they drug the water.
This summer, Australian Winter, I'm riding horses along beautiful trails, swimming in the pool, playing with a bunch of kids and eating s'mores by the camp fire. I guess I'm lucky.
I miss home. You should all be very grateful to have your comfortable homes, lifestyles and proper food. Think of me.

I'm off to Tasmania on Wednesday with Brad. We're celebrating Christmas and New Years on our own. No family(s) just us in a beach front house with only basic cooking facilities and no shops open. Then we're galavanting all over the place staying in everything from studio rental homes to tree top cabins. Should be great! I hope.
I'm also thinking of applying for Camp America now. It would be so cool if I didn't have to worry about leaving Brad for three months. He misses me WAAAy too much. Plus I'll miss him.

Never offer to do a job you've only tried in small doses. We've put down the floors in Marlene's house and now there are a few hundred thousand nails to punch into the wood. I've punched a couple of nails before. But that many... well, I did a few, bashed my hands a few times, slipped off the nail a few too many times, gave up. Tried again. Got a row in a doorway done. Gave up again, tried again, gave up, looked at the whole job, went to sleep by the fire.
The nails must wait for someone more qualified (or stupid).

We all know my dad is a bit ...well... mad, but he came in, eating a piece of rasin bread, and he told me "If we ever had food shortages you wouldn't buy ordinary bread, you'd stock up on rasin bread because it doesn't go off". He informed me that the piece he was eating was six weeks old and had been sitting with mouldy bread. He thinks it's the grapes in it. Couldn't possibly be the preservatives!

I can't remember any of my favorite line dances!!! :'( This is truly devastating. I love bootscooting so much but because of my stupid knees, I've been unable to pursue it and it's gone. I love dancing. When I move to the music I like it feels so right. So my knees can go jump. I'm gonna go find dance sheets and re-learn!
Also, I have decided I like singing to Madonna - 'Beautiful Stranger' when I play it on the mandolin. It's the only song I've synchronised the playing to singing. I think the most beautiful mandolin song I want to perfect is Lee Kernaghan - 'Sing You Back Home'. Music is hard when you are making it yourself!

Phantom of the Opera: Bluegrass style!!!! Listen! http://www.ragtimewest.com/21.mp3
I think the instrument is a nickleodeon which is very cool. I saw one today. It was like a pianola on speed (To quote it's owner) The have a self playing keyboard, self playing organ, self playing drums, cymbals and the one that plays this track even has a self playing banjo!!!! The are SSSSOOOOOO super cool!


Chillout was this weekend. I went to the youth dance party and met really cool people from the local gay/les youth groups. I took Uncle Richard and Mum to the carnival and we had a swell time. He got Emily his dog a cute rainbow neckerchief and entered her in the dog show as 'most like owner'. He danced around funny and they gave him second place! Dog food prize. I line danced with Mum and saw many familiar faces. Good event.

Stacey and I went to the zoo a couple of days ago which was also fun. Finished the day by seeing 'Into the Wild' at Castlemaine Theatre Royal.

"Euro-English"



I think this a good Idea ....it will get us away from Spanish,and press 1.



The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will be the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other possibility.


As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5- year phase-in plan that would become known as "Euro-English".


In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of "k". This should klear up konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.


In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible.


Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling.


Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent "e" in the languag is disgrasful and it should go away.


By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v".


During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensi bl riten styl.


Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.


Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas.