November 2005

25-Nov-2005 - Here comes the rain again

Its friday and I went to my mums place for dinner last night. On the way back I saw around 6-8 late teen guys running down parramatta road jumping up and down completely naked.. hahaha.. was a sight to see!

Its raining today, and tomorrow is meant to be a BBQ at John W's place.. not sure if it will still be on. And the rave i'm going to tomorrow night (hard wars) is an outdoor party. Apparently if it rains there will be some cover - hopefully its enough. Its gonna be fun either way. Lets hope its not too cold!

24-Nov-2005 - Town Hall fire

On the way to work today some kids who were sitting down near Town Hall station told me the station was closed due to a fire. I kept walking and discovered the whole station closed off, so I went up to George st and there were police and fire brigade everywhere.

My only option was to walk to Wynyard to catch the train, so I did. On my way I bumped into Sara. I know her from raves back in the day when I used to go raving with Luke and Nick.

After a bit of a chat I continued to Wynyard. End of story.. hmm.. that story went nowhere really.

I like the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

21-Nov-2005 - Lucky escape

Oh yeah forgot to mention the friday night close call..

I often park my car in a section on my street that is next to a vacant lot. But my car has been vandalised many times in this strip and so after getting my new car I decided I wasnt going to park there on friday night.

And thank god!

Because I walked past there on saturday and I saw 3 cars had their windows smashed. I was telling the concierge and they said that 6 cars windows had been smashed early saturday morning. That could have been me (again!). Lucky escape..

21-Nov-2005 - I'm getting my life back

I have been playing counterstrike way too much lately. The main reason is that I am in a clan which plays on the GameSpace ladder.

But the comp has finally finished, and our team got to about 17th or 18th on the ladder out of 174 ranked teams - not bad! We were up at 11th position, but lost our last two games dropping us a few spots. It was lots of fun and i'll probably play next season with the guys, but I now have my life back and have a couple of months without any gamespace counterstrike wars.

So I will probably restart jogging, cycling and rollerblading a bit more - I havent done hardly anything physical lately! And its daylight savings now so there is plenty of opportunity after work etc..

Havent done a whole lot over the last week. I finally did some grocery shopping after not having a car for a while. And I bought way too much pizza ingredients and have already eaten two full pizzas by myself, and have the ingredients for two more. They must be used up in a couple of days, so looks like pizza for dinner tonight and tomorrow night hehehe. Yum.

Drove out to parramatta yesterday to take my bike in for servicing. I realised I only had a few days left before the 3 months free servicing expires, so I got it in just in time. Was good to have a bit more of a drive of the new car too.. Me, ben and jules have tried to come up with a name for the new car... so far its 'The Machine' but i'm not sure if that names gonna stick. Only time will tell! hmmm.. The Animal?

Looking forward to Hard Wars this weekend. Its gonna be outdoors at a tennis centre. Hopefully it wont rain! Still have to work out what i'm doing for NYE because the Utopia party is in the Entertainment Centre with one room and looks like it will be crap. Jules was suggesting Godspeed in a couple of weeks... might look into it.

15-Nov-2005 - Cars and Rooftops

I finally have another car.

On saturday I went out to around Parramatta and had a look at a number of cars with my mum chauffeuring me around. I like 5 door hatchbacks because I can lift the back and stick my mountain bike in the car. And my old Ford Laser was a reasonable car, so I decided to look for newer model Lasers.

Last week I went and test drove a car near Parramatta. Its price was $4990 and the car was alright. Anyway, the next day I called up the dealer and offered him $4500 for it. He said he couldnt do it.. he couldnt budge on price it was the lowest possible price. Ok then. Whatever. So I offer him $4500 without the 12 month warranty. Again he says cant do it - already discounted and this is the lowest price i'm gonna get etc.. etc.. Ok fool, dont take my offer!

But it was a week later that I realised exactly how much of a fool he was. That same car was now being advertised online for $3980. I guess he couldnt sell it during the week - and he could have had $4500 from me with no warranty! Sucked in to him - thats what you get when you dont budge on price.

But I had seen better offers since in private sales, so this Saturday I went to Carlingford to a guys place and test drove his car. Its a 1994 Laser, air con, pwr steering and 8 months rego. He had it advertised for $3700 - bargain! I figured he wanted $3500 and I thought that was a good price, so I offered him $3300. Funnily enough he did no bargaining back, and accepted the $3300!! Last night I handed the cheque over and now own a car again... hooray! :-)

The new car

In other news.. I went and played badminton with the guys from work on wednesday. I havent played badminton for.. hmm.. 20 years? I sucked, but it was fun anyways.

Went to a rave on Saturday night - Eckythump Summer Session. These parties are known for their cool venues and this time it was on a rooftop tennis court in the middle of an industrial complex. Very unusual venue - there was a fitness centre underneath. It was the Rooftop Tennis Centre, Inshape Fitness, 182 Bourke Rd, Alexandria. The party was ok.. although the music could have been better. Went out Sunday night to usual venue and had a holiday day off work on Monday.

Got another rave in 2 weeks - and still need to work out what the hell i'm doing for NYE. Thats all for now.. bye!

7-Nov-2005 - Carless weekends

Well i've had two weekends without a car now. Poor me.

Last weekend Aaron came to Sydney and we went to Manly via the ferry. I havent been on a ferry in ages, so it was fun :-). When we got there we walked around a bit, then went for a rock climbing adventure and went all around the foreshore to the left of the main Manly beach climbing over the rocks.

We discovered this cool tunnel that had been dug out through the land which was about 10 or 15m long. And of course I had to take a photo ;-). After rock climbing for a bit we came across another beach - I dont think i've ever been to this beach before... somewhere in Sydney I havent been!

After stopping for a much needed drink (and iceblock), we headed back along the rocks to Manly beach again, had some junk food and headed back to Sydney on the ferry. And its fun to sit on the front of a ferry when you are going past the heads on a day when there is a reasonable sea swell. :-)

That night we went to Kate and Marks halloween party. Ben was DJing and Jules was there too.

Didnt do much on the weekend that just passed other than spend nearly all of Saturday looking for a new car (well not NEW, but you know what I mean). I was totally over looking at cars on Sunday so I just spent the day relaxing - and bought my tickets to Eckythump for next weekend. Went clubbing Sunday night and me and Jules watched this guy dancing very umm.. interestingly. Its funny when you mix overconfidence with uncoordination. :-)

3-Nov-2005 - The Beast is dead. Long live The Beast

It is a sad week indeed. My car, known to many as 'The Beast' is dead.

I bought the old Ford Laser '88 Hatchback from my mum a few years ago, but it has finally outlived its lifespan.

I was driving to my mums place along the M4 motorway on Thursday night when I noticed the engine acting strangely. I looked down and saw the engine temperature guage was maxed out. I needed to pull over, but couldnt immediately as I was going through the express toll lane on the freeway. So I drove for a couple of hundred metres through it, then pulled over. Maybe that was a costly mistake, but I didnt really have a choice.

Anyway I opened up the bonnet and discovered the radiator cap missing (and the radiator empty). Since I couldnt drive without a radiator cap, I called the NRMA so they could bring one. In the meantime I tried to restart the car, and it would not start - very bad sign! My mum bought a radiator cap and brought it to me, but it didnt fit - but she also brought a torch and looking through the engine I found the old radiator cap (it was getting dark).

So now I had my radiator cap, plenty of water, but still the car would not start so I didnt have much of a choice but to wait for the NRMA guy to turn up. After waiting for about an hour they call me up and say that they cannot send an NRMA guy onto a freeway because its too dangerous, so they must tow it off the freeway. Alright then - what choice do I have?

A tow truck turns up half an hour later (total time: 1.5 hours). After it pulls up, the driver steps out of the truck. It took him about a minute to get out. Now i'm not kidding or exaggerating but I think this guy was the fattest guy I have ever seen that has been able to walk! He had the biggest gut and I have no idea how he manages to balance while walking. He had a really bad attitude and everything he said was in an "I hate your stinking guts" tone. He had missing front teeth, and you just know this guy has been in many pub fights in his life - with an attitude like that i'm not surprised!

He pulls my car onto his truck and then I get into his truck. It smelt like he hadnt had a shower in a month - the BO in there was absolutely disgusting and I felt sick straight away. There was trash everywhere. He even had a fridge in there to supply him with his required amount of fat and sugar. My day is getting worse and worse.

So after waiting 1.5 hours he drives me about 200m off the freeway and into a service station. He tells me he is going to wait until the NRMA guy turns up, and they will probably say my car is beyond repair and he'll tow me back to the city. But after a few minutes of waiting he zooms off really fast in his truck - not even saying goodbye - in typical bad attitude style.

The Beast (1988 - 2005)

So there I am waiting at this service station. Waiting. Waiting and more waiting. I got hungry and so instead of getting a nice cooked meal from my mums place I got 2 soggy sausage rolls and a coke. Yuck. Finally 3 hours later (!!! total time: 4 hours 30 mins) the NRMA guy finally turns up. It takes him about 1 minute to diagnose the problem - a cracked head. Nothing he can do about it, need to tow it back to the city.

So there I am again, at the service station. Waiting.

This time its another hour for the tow truck guy to arrive (total time: 5 hours 30 mins). The tow truck pulls up, the window winds down, and guess who is grinning at me with half his teeth missing? You guessed it.. the same stinking fat bad-attitude tow truck driver I had before. He knows he was a prick driving off before, but I avoid the topic.

Now I am stuck feeling sick in this BO-filled truck of his. It was the worst truck i've ever been in - i'm sure there were no shock absorbers.. it was like riding a rollercoaster - you could feel every little bump in the road really hard. I had to listen to him crap on about women drivers and his GPS unit for the trip back into the city.

Finally we arrive back in the city and my car is dumped at a garage (total time: 6 hours). Now i'm at chippendale, and the only way to get home is through the dodgy streets of Ultimo at 1am in the morning. Having had the crap beat out of me in these streets before I decided my day was bad enough as it is and waited for a taxi.

About 20 taxis went past that were not picking up passengers, until finally a taxi arrives that I can get into. A few minutes later i'm back at home finally! (total time: 6 hours 30 minutes). I remember Adam from concierge saying "Bad luck comes in threes" (see 10-Oct-2005). Well I guess the lock picking didnt come into the equation.

The mechanic has since told me my car is gonna cost $1250 - $1500 dollars to fix. You can buy another one for $1500 so I thought its time to sell it for scrap. I offered it to the mechanic and he said he'll buy it for $50 (the other alternative was to pay $100+ to tow it away to a wrecking yard and i'd only get $50 out of it in the end anyway). So $50 it was.

The Beast is dead. Long live The Beast.

 

"Long had it held its reign over machine and man. For it I will grieve as there will be no other.."

Ben Taylor, 2005