Sherry woke up around 6.35 or so. It was starting to get light. Sherry then wanted to put the coffee on but realised we were way down on milk. So I said i'd go for a walk and get some. There's a deli on the corner of bath and whatever else, but its only 2 blocks away. I got there but the place was not open yet. It said 7 on the window and it was 7. A really well tanned guy shouted me a free paper. He said 'Morning' and he sounded Indian. 'You want one white feet?'
It was a pretty muggy morning. Nicde ot be out and walking with most of the town still in sleep mode. Pity the store owner was too so I waited until 10 past and then walked off towards State St just hopingthere would be another shop on the way., There was one - but their fridge had no milk, so on I pressed to State Street and Cantwell's Market. Success! But geez a bit of a hike. Got back around 7.30 and Sherry had the Californian equivalnt of Sunrise on.
The top stories of the day
- Serena Williams losing a match because she threatened to ram a ball down a linesperson's throat - costing her 2 points and the match
- Kanya West interrupting the acceptance speech of a girl and saying 'Beyonce's video was the best' Beyonce then allowed the winner of that award to come up when Beyonce won another award to give here a cahnce to give an acceptance speech.
Also sussed out the local college football, ice hockey and baswketball. Movies too, and monday night football at The Sandbar looks good. But i got tired of sitting around home quickly. Luckily I stumbled onto a podcast which was a self guided tour of downtown Santa Barbara. I left home around 11.30 - ran into Janet so said high and also met the lady from Alabama.
Unfortunately the head phones were not working so to listen to the podcast or music in between i would have to play it through the external speaker. So i played a few tunes before i got to the second stop on the tour. The first stop was the Courthouse which Sherry and I did last time. So first stop was the Public Library. Once there i fired up the podcast and low and behold the voice over was J. Peterman from Seinfeld! At least he made sense on this podcast.
The gallery off to the side was pretty cool. Some interesting artwork. There was a fair bit of artwork with numbers next to them. it turns out a jury of critics was baout to judge which paintings shoudl be admitted to the collection. I got kicked out for this.
I then walked into the main public library and it was quite impressive, Massive windows, a couple of murals and lots of people. It was opened to the public in 1917. Fun Fact 5
There are a lot of fountains in Santa Barbara.
I can only guess that they wanted to get some sun on the their shells.
That guy is Benjamin Franklin. Doh!
Next stop on the tour was the El Paseo. Its a photographer's dream. I did my best. It's claimed to be the first Shopping arcade and was opened in 1927. If anyone knows of any rooms for rent - either for commercial or personal use let me know please. 
Right near this equisite paseo is the Casa de la Guerra, This was originally the home of Commander Jose de la Guerra and was completed in 1827. Just to the right of this photo below is like an outside courtyard and this was a popular gathering palce in the 1920's. really cool architecture. In fact - all of Santa barbara is just an amazing place - even the ones that arent mentioned on the tour. Every building has some Spanish Influence.
There's a plarque in between those green bushes and just here the first ever Santa barbara council meeting was held in 1850. This area here is known as the 'Plaza de la Guerra'. I expereienced a council meeting of different sorts just off to the right of here as some middle aged - fairly well dressed man tried to sell me drugs. He even showed some medicinal marijuana certificate. He first came up and said 'have you seen Mike anywhere?'
I don't think this place was part of the tour but just looked cool. Had the standard fountain in the middle and was U-shaped - a theme that im beginning to understand is not just an annomily around here.
This fountain is located just off the oldest street in Santa Barbara called 'Presidio Avenue'. A guard's house was built here in 1840 to keep the Americans at bay. 6 years later the Mexicans were overrun. This fountain area was designed in the 1920's to 'help you take a load off'
Across the street from Presidio Avenue is the Lugo Adobe. As J. Peterman says 'it's like being inside a painting'. It was built by an early descendant of Luis Lugo, an enlisted soldier of the Presidio compound across the road.
The musuem just next to this was closed. So both the musuem and gallery are closed on Monday's. Ah well - I took this as a sign that i should call it stumps for the day. It would be a bit of a walk back and I wanted to make sure I was home in time for Monday night football.
I stopped in at Radioshack on the way back. Found some headphones for 10 bucks. At first i tried to have a look at them but couldnt get them off the rack. After buying them i pulled them out of their packet, whacked them on and bopped all the way home with 'Check My Brain, some Prodigy, Doors, and The Game.
I made it back by about 3.10pm so had plenty of time. I then stared uploading all these photos and then snacked on pistachios, jerky and grain chips in preparation for the football.
Once that was done the hard work was finished. The bags had been taken off the carousel and the girl and i were both allowed to pas through baggage clearance without getting them searched,. And then i saw Sherry!
Great to see her. Sherry couldnt find the parking ticket initially, but soon we wer off in another bloody cream PT Cruiser. haha. We stopped off at Denny's on hte way home. I had a choc shake and god they taste even better than i remember. I also had a Philly Melt with prime rib meet. 
Came home and i was pretty stuffed. Sherry unpacked nearly everything for me while I had a shower and watched NFL. Saw a bit of the Cleveland v Minnesota game. Then Sherry woke me up around 5.30 for the Packers Bears game. The first play I ever saw green Bay involved in saw them give up a safety. hahah Thats got to mean something. The next play they fumbled the ball over for nearly what would have been a touchback but was isntead rukllked out of bounds,. The ruling was evfen challenged by Chicago. The half time score was 10-2 apparantly that score has only happened 3 times in the history of the NFL.
Oh yeah - Bob Costas. You are a retard. You interview one of TV's biggest personaliteis and you have completely stuff up the interview by having no understanding of laughing at the guests jokes, or allowing for satellite time delay. I was embarassed to watch it. i can only imagine how Jay Leno feels.
I wish I could have stayed awake but I was just so tired. I owe Sherry an apology when she wakes up. I wasn't too complementary of her spag bol. I think I was trying to pick a fight - or more makea point about the way people complement the chef on their cooking. I didnt wake up until midnight.
Woah! Its getting light outside - Its 6.17 AM Monday morning here. Ive been up since 1 am plugging in my laptop and blogging about my trip so far. i might also try and finish off last tr\ip as well. I couldnt finish it due to the internet crashing for the last 3 days i was home.
The airport is dead early in the morning. I'm sitting here at Gat 5 of the international terminal at Tullamarine Aiport at 4.20 am and their is absolutely no one here. Arriving at the airport you would be forgiven if you drove up turned around and driven home because the place looks closed. Mum got the Plum carpark right near the level one elevator, and that never happens. In fact - the only time we saw people was at the check in counter where there were around 20 people in the line. No other check-in counters were open. I was randomly chosen for an explosives search/ Well not random - I was the only person around.
Mum asked a hundred questions at the check in counter - I'd rather her stress than me i guess, but it was all in control. She did really well actually. The high point of the morning was at home when at 2.30 am just as I was zipping up the case we found a lock on it, which was locked, preventing me from putting my own lock on, to lock the bag. Everything had gone relatively well up until then - I had even allowed enought time for some breakfast before I left, Mum's good with the bacon - but uses too much oil in general. And then the lock happens. Anyway - Mum pulled out the mass saw and staretd going at it. But she then found a small pari of bolt cutters and it was off in a jiffy.
This put us 5-10 minutes behind schedule, but Mum had a great run in along the Prnces Highyway. In fact, all up i reckon it only took an hour 5 minutes to get to the airport from home. Nearly as good as the complete run in on the Monash. Those roadworks better be finished by the time i get back or there will be hell to pay.
I did not sleep a wink last night, and conisdering i was coming off a big day with the McPhee's wedding, I thought I was guaranteed to sleep a fair chunk out of the plane trip. I had to be up by 2 AM at the latest which let's be honest, is usually the time i like to go to bed. But honestly i was pretty anxious the whole night, nervous in fact. At first i wanted to make sure i had all the right Apps downloaded for the Iphone, and then it was a race against time to get the thing charged. So I went to bed with about 4 hours or so to spare before I had to get up. I tried to get some sleep but instead watched Sopranos and periodically checked to see if the phone was charging up. Well it turns out i didnt even plug the thing in correctly on the charger so i only had arounds 20% battery the whole flight. I remember looking at it and thinking - is that even charging? it still looks low.' Well yeah it's not plugged in fool.
We went to Woolies, Shelley went to the supermarket while Erin and I went to Dan's. Wasn't plannning on much but ended up buying a bottle of Contraeu, red bulls (it's an incredible energy drink) and beers. Oh yeah and ice. So there was a bit to carry back to the car.
So it was the four of us for a while, and then everyone seemed to arrive in a convoy. I think first was Renton and Tracey, then Felicity and Trent, Rodders, Jeremy, Amy and Caz, then i think it wa Sharee adn then much later on Doug popped in to say hi. This wa at about 10.30pm when we were all pretty sore and sorry. (10.30 haha. we did start early though)
It's become a bit of tradtion at mine to do shots. This time we had 5 punters in the line-up (me included) to do Skittle Bombs. I had my first one of these a little bit under a week ago at Doug's Bucks Night. So yeah we smashed those - Renton, Shelley, Erin, Sherry and myself. Doug if only you'd been there a bit earlier we would have had 3 out of the 4 there. 
The bottle was finished by about 7 or 8 i reckon. I think i had about 5 skittle bombs and then scotch with red bull. (no idea what thats called - possibly alcahol abuse?). But yeah we had plenty of good American food. The only thing that i think we could have done with more of was rolls for the mini hotdogs. But the ribs. Haw Haw. Missaspeaka! Those ribs were off the hook. Plenty for everyone - really juicy and soft. We also ordered a couple of pizza's later on which went down really well.
Rimmer did real well out of it as well - getting to lick one of the U.S.A plates clean and a fair bit of cheese in a can. Probably not the best thing for dogs. 
The Renster and I had the Arnold thing going most of the day. Bit of 'It's a Trap!' with Rodders. But yeah - I cant remember much else that was said. All I know is that I had a blast.
But yeah it was reallygood to see everyone. Thanks to Fliss and Rachel for the prezzies too.
.jpg)
We played poker and I absolutely tore the best man a new one. He shouldnt have played his pocket 9's after solid re-raising by me on 2 bets. i had pocket Jacks and they held up. I then won the next hand on Ace high, so I was a massive chip lead. unfortunately i think that win set a precedent for the rest of the game as people were winning on rubbish. I layed down twice and the one decent hand i did push with i copped a bad beat on the river. But thats Poker as they say in the classics. .jpg)
Doug of all people won! I mean. This was a good start for the young man and that only served to make the rest of the nights shannigans all the more painful for him. We told him then and there that he would suffer. We were all pretty jolly by this stage. Marty ushered us outside for a some group photo shots. he had a bit of Austin Powers about him - not in vocular delivery but more just in photographic execution.
Anyway, marty the ranga took the photo. Back row - Jimmy, Chris, Clint, Andrew, Matt, Murray, Doug, Andrew, Carlos, Jarryd, Trent, and I cant remember the name of the guy from Doug's work.
But yeah we then went for a walk down the street, cans in hand. Low and behold - on Jackson's road a Party Bus had pulled up. Awesome! Seats all along the sides. We got onto the freeway with good olds blokey party songs. Walk this way, thunderstruck etc. hahah The boys even played a bit of hard core corners in the back seat. We made a few pitstops along the way before hitting the RACV xclub. First the bus pulled up alongside the Yarra for a a pitstop and then we went to the Victoria market to sample some fine cheeses. I especially enjoyed the Bree. I didn't know Doug was a cheese man but he sure took a liking to it. .jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
We then went to the RACV club and shot some pool. We had to be let in in dribs and drabs. I was in the last group of 5 to be let in and I reckon that was about 30 minutes after the firsr group went in. Doesnt matter as I had a good chat with Carlos. .jpg)
Was good to see Carlos. I'd forgotten all about him. J-rock too. Good times with that old gang. They all lok well. But yeah, the RACV club had massive tables, mahogony and red royal carpet. All that was missing was a cigar or a pipe to complete the experience. I think I downed a Bloody Mary just to add to the alacholic differntation that i would put my body through for the 15 hour drinking session. Beers, Kilkenny, Beam's, scotch and dry's, Bloody Mary's, Skittle Bombs. Crazy. I felt seedy until Monday. .jpg)
Cant really remmeber what happened next but yeah we then hit some clubs and bars. Unfortunately the groups got split up which was a bit of a downer. We headed to some really shit palce off little bourke street. paid 10 bucks entrgy and stayed for 2 minutes. Clint and Marty both missed out on the Elephant Wheelbarrow but yeah - we had to set up shot somewhere. Too much barvado and stuffing around going on. And not the good stuffing around. .jpg)
.jpg)
More shots, beers, chatting and we got a bit of a dance happening too. that was good fun. hahah - teh mosh circle for Bullet with Butterfly Wings. my god! how old are we?? .jpg)
We then went back to the hotel and relaxed for a while. Sherry, teh absolute bestest girkfriendist in the worldest picked both Dough and I up and we went to Maccas. I would have loved to have tried the Angus burger but it was brekky time so had to settle with the McMuffin meal action. That orange juice did not go down well. .jpg)
Hit the pillow at about 6am and was amazed that I actually got to sleep...or passed out.
Congratulations Doug. I'm pretty positive you had a good time and all teh beswt for a long and happy future with Stella..jpg)
Posts
