Merry Christmas!!!!

                                                                                                                                              Letter No. 261

Dear all,

OCTOBER was quite a social month. We also went to one of our favourite local restaurants Botellon for dinner for our friends Sue and Carolyn’s birthdays on Friday 22 October. They have their birthdays on the same day. A week later, our friend Libby had her 50^th birthday party. She only lives about five houses down our street, so it was pretty convenient. She did a sit-down dinner for 50 people and a live band. She did all of the organisation by herself which was a big solo effort. It was a nice evening with all the usual fun stuff – dancing, drinking & eating.  

Matthew finally finished his six years at Uni on Thursday 28 October. He completed his double degree and now has a Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Laws from The University of Queensland. He then went up to Noosa for a fun weekend to celebrate with all his mates, and to do the Noosa Triathlon (on Sunday 31 October) for the third time, as part of a relay team. Sadly, he had a rather catastrophic accident during the triathlon bike leg. He hit something, went over the handlebars and absorbed his full body weight with both hands. Without realising how badly he had injured himself, and thinking that he had possibly broken a finger, he still managed to put the bike chain back on, finish the race, see the medic and get the finger strapped, then go for lunch with his mates, have a shower and drive himself home!! None of his friends can drive a manual car so there wasn’t much alternative. As he headed home he started to realise that the problem might be worse than he’d initially thought. He drove straight to our house, by which time both hands, knees and left shoulder were all swollen and bruised, with lots of cuts and scrapes. It was a bit of a shock.

I took him straight to the PA hospital about 7pm, expecting casts on one hand and strapping on the other. The PA was fantastic and he was extensively x-rayed, MRI-d and CAT scanned. He even had his head examined. It seemed that he had been very lucky and had escaped any damage to his head, and only had bruising to his knees and shoulder, which all turned interesting shades of yellow and green afterwards. The outcome for both hands was bad though, with multiple fractures especially his left ring finger, left wrist, right thumb and right hand, which would require bone graft, wires, pins/screws and multiple surgeries to come. A bit more of a shock. At midnight he was admitted, and they told us they would operate on both hands in the morning. However, by midday the next day he was still 10^th in the queue for surgery and they said he wouldn’t get seen that day (there had been some car accidents, so he had been bumped). They then bounced us into the private system, as we have private health insurance, and made an appointment to see a specialist hand surgeon the next morning at the Brisbane Hand & Upper Limb Clinic. Katie brought Matt home, with enormous temporary plaster casts on both hands, and then started the strange new experience of having our grown-up, highly independent 22-year-old living back at home with us for the short-term, unable to do anything whatsoever with his hands – including all the things we take for granted like using a knife, picking up a kettle, tying his shoelaces, driving etc. Interesting times.

NOVEMBER The next day was Melbourne Cup Day. Katie and I had tickets to an event at the Doomben Racecourse in Ascot. The event didn’t start until 11am and Matt’s appointment was at 8am so I took him in and we thought there would be plenty of time. The surgeon said he didn’t want to operate while Matthew still had open wounds on his hands, due to the risk of a bone infection, so it would now be at least two weeks before surgery! We then went into the Rehab Physio place so where his hands were properly cleaned, bandaged and splinted. It took forever! I dropped Matt home, had a quick change and headed off to the races. Katie had already left with a friend and I met them at the racecourse around noon. We had a really nice day, sitting right next to the finish line which was quite exciting, and there was glorious spring sunshine. Somehow Katie managed to back the winner on pretty long odds, and we seemed to pick a winner on most races! It was most unexpected and very lucky, and we came out at least $500 up! I had to have a little nap when we got home, after such a stressful and exciting day.

That weekend, 5-7 November, I went Hiking in Girraween National Park for two days with my friend Derek. We took a day off work on the Friday and drove down. It was a three-hour drive past Stanthorpe. We stopped at a few wineries on the way before getting to the Girraween Environmental Lodge. It was fairly basic and there had been a camping option, but as it was bucketing down rain, we were glad we hadn’t selected that option. After checking in we went to the campground and sympathised with the rest of tour group setting up in the rain, before going to Ballendean Tavern for dinner and a few games of pool.

We then had two days of hiking in the park. The first day was 18km covering Mt Norman (the tallest in the park) and the underground creek. The country is spectacular with massive granite boulders and slabs. There had been a lot of rain in the previous few weeks, so all the creeks were running, and the wildflowers were in bloom. It was a great sight. We were quite knackered by the time we got back. It had been predicted to rain quite a bit during the day, but we only got a few spots in the afternoon. This was lucky as it is almost impossible to walk on the granite slabs if it rains, as they are so slippery. We had a night in at our lodge with a beef ragout and a few red wines and listened to the rain. We were again thankful we had not camped.  The next day it was predicted to thunderstorm by midday, so we started early and did a shorter walk of only 8km to the Junction and the Granite Arch. We had lunch back at the campsite before heading back to Brisbane. It didn’t end up raining during the day anyway!

In the meantime, Katie and Jessie both worked like mad on their final assignments and finished Uni for the year on 8 November. Katie had been slightly derailed by having to complete her last two major assignments in her final week while driving Matt around to additional X-rays and bone density scans but managed it anyway. It was a great relief to all.

Matthew’s surgery was scheduled for Wednesday 10^th and then Friday 12^th November but kept getting pushed back as his skin wounds hadn’t healed enough. It was a bit galling that both times the surgery was postponed so late in the day that he already had his bag packed and was “nil by mouth”.  It finally took place at 7pm on Monday 15^th November at St Andrew’s Hospital and was a 3½ hour surgery in which he had a bone graft, screws and wires. Katie collected him next morning with massive plaster casts again, and he then went straight on to appointments at the Brisbane Private Hospital and then the Physio afterwards, where he was fitted with new splints. We are starting to feel that we are on a mission to survey every hospital and x-ray/physio establishment in Brisbane. Matt has remained incredibly positive throughout the whole process though. He was still smiling and determined to do everything he had planned, including starting his PLT (Professional Legal Training) course the following day, and discovering that you can still type with only five working fingers. His work colleagues at KWM have been fantastically supportive too.

We had Backyard Drinks at my friend Derek’s house on 19^th November. It was a lovely warm evening with a total eclipse of the moon that night. We sat on his front deck and watched the show with a glass or two of red wine. The next day we went to see the latest James Bond movie, “No time to Die”. The ending was a surprise. I won’t spoil it for you but will definitely be going to the next movie to see what happens next! Worth seeing if you haven’t.

On 22^nd November Jessica went to the Liveris Academy Summer Camp on Stradbroke Island for four days. They spent four days doing a role-playing activity, working in four groups and writing business plans for a fictitious struggling start up. They even had actors who the kids had to “fire” in a real-life simulation activity. It was apparently fairly intimidating for 23-year-olds to fire a fairly belligerent 40 year old, even if he was acting. One group was so intimidated that they decided not to fire him, which nearly stuffed up the whole exercise! On Friday night we were invited to the Liveris Academy at the University of Queensland to see the students present on two topics, working in small groups. Five teams presented their strategies for revitalising the economy of Gladstone after a predicted downturn due to the future transition away from coal and gas. Three groups presented ideas to minimise micro plastics in the oceans. There was a winner in each group and we were very pleased that Jessica’s team won the plastics section. There was a drinks function afterwards in the Liveris Academy function space. It was a doubly pleasant evening for me as I had led the structural design team for the Andrew N. Liveris Building at the University and had never seen it fitted out. I had only been to site when it was bare concrete. It is actually a very impressive building, with several structurally difficult bubble pods hanging off the building everywhere. We had cursed the architect when we were designing them, but boy they looked good! You can see more information about the Liveris Academy and a video of the cool building here:  https://liveris-academy.uq.edu.au/

On the Sunday Jessica was in a Cheer Leading Dance Competition. Jess is one of the people called flyers who get thrown up high and caught by the others. Jessie didn’t want us to go and watch, and Katie would have been too nervous to watch anyway. Amazingly Jessie’s team won the competition in their own category and were the overall Grand Champions. She was thrilled. A huge week for her!

DECEMBER On 1^st December the UQ semester results were out. Everyone did very well, with the family GPA of 6.5 (out of 7). Katie was the family top scorer with straight sevens (again). Both Jess and Katie received Dean’s Commendations for Academic Excellence. The next few weekends were big. Katie went to see the Queensland Ballet performing Dracula on Friday night with some girlfriends while I went to works drinks. Saturday was a 60^th birthday party for our friend Jeremy Tod. It was a great party.  They were planning to have cocktails on their tennis court but a massive thunderstorm came through just as the party was starting so they had to quickly relocate undercover. There was a massive lightning strike to a house in the next street about 8pm and everyone screamed – it was quite a shock! Katie lost track of time and made a good effort to beat her record of 13 glasses of champagne (led astray by Liz Redfern many years ago in Hong Kong). She didn’t manage to set a new record, but I had to drag her home at 2:30am which is an extremely late night for us! Sunday was a sloooow day.

On Tuesday 7^th December we had a family dinner at home for Matthew’s 23^rd Birthday which was nice. He spent his actual birthday (the next day) at the Ashes test match between England and Australia. The England team has not covered itself in glory thus far. The following weekend we spent several nights out at various Christmas cocktails and Christmas drinks parties. There were two parties in our street on consecutive evenings hosted by different sets of neighbours, with many of the same guests at both, which we all found very entertaining.

On Monday 13^th December it was Matthew’s Graduation Ceremony. We had a fabulous long lunch at Greca, a Greek restaurant at Howard Smith Wharves, which has a lovely view over the river. Afterwards, we went back to Matt’s place for afternoon tea before going to the university for the ceremony. Matthew’s two housemates were in the same graduation ceremony, so it was quite a household celebration, with all parents in attendance. We drove to Uni, picked up his gown and trencher, and then wandered around the Great Court and the Law Building taking photos before the ceremony. It was about two hours of speeches and presentations, followed by drinks in the Great Court afterwards. Matthew is the proud recipient of a Bachelor of Laws and a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Chinese and International Relations. He starts as a junior solicitor at King Wood Mallesons (KWM) in January. He has been working there for the last three years as a part-time paralegal, so it will be a relatively smooth transition to full time employment.  https://www.kwm.com/au/en/home.html  

The following few days featured more drinks, my birthday and my work Christmas party, for my immediate team of 25, which I was hosting (so I had to stay until the bitter end). I wish all the partying could be spread out over three or four months rather than all being in December! On Sunday 19^th we had an early Family Christmas with my sister and her family and our parents at Lisa’s house. It was a really nice afternoon and good to catch up, as we haven’t seen each other very much this year due to Covid. We are heading to Far North Queensland on Thursday for Christmas at the beach but that will all have to wait until next letter.

Cheers, from Derek, Katie, Matt, Jessie & Molly

25th Wedding Anniversay!

 

 Letter No. 260

Dear all,

JULY  It was Katie’s birthday in July and it was an all-weekend celebration. On Saturday night we went for a dinner with a group of six friends at Stanley’s, the Chinese restaurant at Howard Smith Wharves. It is a great location under the Story Bridge. We had pre-dinner drinks at Felons Brewery and post-dinner cocktails at Fantauzzi. The next day we had a family lunch at Popolo, an Italian restaurant on Southbank. Katie managed to pull in a couple of lunches with girlfriends the following week to stretch the birthday out even further. Matt had given Katie a voucher for High Tea as a mother’s day present earlier in the year. They finally went there on 19 July. It was at a new restaurant called Matriarch in New Farm and was a pretty swish afternoon tea with four cocktails! We had to make our own dinner. 😊

It is our 25^th Wedding Anniversary in October this year. For Katie’s Birthday I gave her a mystery trip away and didn’t tell her where we were going until we got there! She did guess on the way though. We had a mid-week three-day break in Springbrook in the mountains behind the Gold Coast, staying in the same place where I proposed, 25 years ago. I had actually managed to book the same lovely log cabin in the forest at Springbrook Mountain Chalets. I had also tried to book the same restaurant for dinner one night but unfortunately it had closed down. We stopped for an early lunch in a little country café on the way and had a great short hike that afternoon to Purling Brook Falls – only about 4km but with fabulous views of the Gold Coast, mountains and an impressive waterfall. The next day we went to “The Best Lookout of All”, and it was possibly true, with fantastic uninterrupted views over the whole Gold Coast and northern NSW. We also went for another hike on the Twin Falls circuit. Another afternoon reading by the fireplace (Katie is still studying!) and a nice dinner in our log cabin. The next morning we went to the Natural Bridge for a walk and a chance to admire the natural beauty and the glowworm caves. It was a great little minibreak and nice to revisit a place which is quite special to both of us after so many years.

Katie got her first Pfizer vaccine on 27^th July. She had a LOT of difficulty getting an appointment. I had signed up about a week before she did and got both mine relatively easily, while Katie had to wait for at least two months to even get registered. The Queensland online booking system is hopelessly over-complicated and seemingly random, and in the end she gave up and just kept phoning around all the private clinics until she got an appointment.

On Friday 30^th July we hosted the Mortlake Fine Wine Appreciation Club (Morfwac’s), otherwise known as the Winosaurs. It is a group of 15 families who live in our street. We get together every two to three months on a Friday night, taking turn to host. Everyone brings a bottle of fine wine and some nibbles. Some people take it VERY seriously, so you need to pick a nice wine and research it thoroughly and then verbally present some form of wine tasting information. It’s actually a very entertaining evening and not as formal as it sounds. It usually runs from 6pm to 8pm, with a few hangers on until 9:30pm. It was a good evening.

The next day Covid came to Brisbane and we went into a three day lockdown which was extended a few days later to an 8 day lockdown. It was all over the Western suburbs and centred in Indooroopilly, which is very close to us. Quite a few of the university locations were hotspots as well and Katie had been at one of them and had to get tested. Fortunately, the testing system was extremely well organised with testing centres popping up everywhere, and it was quick and her test was negative. It was Week 2 of the University term so everything instantly went online for a couple of weeks.

AUGUST On 2 August Jessica had an Adenoidectomy. She has had constant problems with breathing and a snuffly nose ever since she had Glandular Fever a couple of years ago. She had her tonsils out last year and this year her specialist advised her to have the adenoids removed as well. As we were in lockdown, we were surprised that the surgery was going ahead, but the specialist explained that her nasal passages were so blocked that it wasn’t “elective surgery”, it was actually “essential surgery” as he considered her to be respiratory compromised! This was even more of a surprise as we hadn’t realised her breathing had become so bad. I dropped her in at 6:30am and brought her home at 4:30pm. Jessie was in a little bit of pain afterwards (but not as much as after the tonsillectomy) but could tell by the next day that the surgery had been a success. Hopefully this is the end of our hospital dramas for a while.

The lockdown lasted a whole nine days but was lifted in time for us to go to dinner with some ex-AECOM work colleagues Sigrid and Nathan. We went for Spanish Tapas in Botellon preceded by cocktails at Boucher. Sigrid has just got a new job so we were happy to celebrate with them. Whenever we see Nathan and Sigrid we always have big nights and huge fun! The next day we went to the European Masterpieces exhibition at the Queensland Art Gallery. This is a touring exhibition of art masterpieces from New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, providing a 500-year journey in art from the 1420s and emerging Renaissance, to the height of early twentieth century post-impressionism. It included works by Rembrandt, Rubens, Turner, Degas, Renoir, Cézanne, and Monet, all direct from The Met’s collection which is one of the finest collections of European painting in the world. Most of these works rarely leave permanent display in New York, so it was a unique treat and a spectacular exhibition. We had a quick lunch at the Gallery afterwards before a lazy Sunday afternoon at home.

Saturday 28^th August was a huge day. In the morning a group of eight of us went on the Ride for Suggy -- a 40km memorial bike ride for one of our friends who had committed suicide four years ago and had been a keen cyclist. We had a nice ride and stopped at the Regatta for a beer about two-thirds of the way through. I stopped at home briefly for a shower and then the group reconvened for a late long lunch at Jeremy Tod’s house where he had a great pulled pork slow barbecuing. I had made a chocolate cheesecake as my contribution – I had actually made it myself rather than sub-contracting that job to Katie as I thought it was a boys’ only event. Then all the wives started showing up, so I called Katie to come along as well. Anyway, it was a lovely long afternoon of socialising, eating and drinking and everyone was just settling into the red wine, when we had to leave! We were already committed to a 60^th birthday party that night, starting in the city at 6pm. So we screamed home to change and headed off to the city, where the first part of the party was a private screening of the movie The Fountainhead, starring Gary Cooper and Patricia Neall, and based on Ayn Rand’s novel of the same name. The story focuses on an architect who refuses to comprise his artistic integrity. The party was for our architect friend Derek Trebilcock, and this is apparently his favourite movie. We had drinks and nibbles before the movie and dinner during the movie and then afterwards went back to Derek’s to party on. It had been a long boozy day with a lot of exercise for me so by the time we got back to his home in Graceville I was starting to fade! I had to have a little nap on the front porch while Katie made conversation for both of us and finally woke me up in time to wobble home.

SEPTEMBER For Father’s Day on 5 September the kids came over and we had a roast dinner on Sunday night. Two nights later it was Jessica’s 20^th birthday and we went out for dinner at the Tuk Tuk Thai restaurant in Milton which was very nice.  Jessica also had an evening picnic that Friday with a group of her friends at River Quay on South Bank. She needed someone to assist with bringing picnic blankets, food and drinks so Katie drove them in. I met Katie and we had dinner at a nearby restaurant and went back and picked up the leftovers and gifts while Jess and her friends went on clubbing in the Valley.

Katie has been finding this second semester very intense with more assignments and deadlines than the first one, so we haven’t done as much. However, we did both take a day off on Friday 17 September and drove up to the Carnival of Flowers in Toowoomba for the day. We went to two orchid shows and bought a heap of orchids which are good value at the orchid show. Then we went to the very lovely Boyce Gardens for a wander around. These huge and sprawling gardens with lots of different botanical areas and species were established as private gardens by leading Toowoomba citizens Leslie and Margaret Boyce over almost sixty years, and then given in trust to The University of Queensland, for the enjoyment and education of the people of Australia. It was really lovely. We had a nice lunch and then went on to Queens Park for a wander around the expansive flower displays and a ride on the Ferris wheel.

On 21^st September the Forbes Family officially leaped ahead the rest of Australia and became 100% fully vaccinated. The process has been pretty flawed and we had to be persistent to get our appointments, but it is done now. At least until booster shots are a requirement.

I went for another great hike with my friend Derek on 26^th September. We did it with a group of 10, led by our guide Teresa, and hiked the Toolona Circuit at Lamington National Park. It was an 18km hike over quite rugged terrain and took us 8 hours. One of the tougher hikes we have done. I was quite pleased to see the car at the end.

OCTOBER It was Molly’s 11^th birthday on the 2^nd October. She is still very fit and healthy, and people still think she is a puppy but the grey hairs on her muzzle are starting to give her age away. She is such a joy to have – although slightly too barky sometimes! We took her for a day out to the beach on Sunday 10 October. We usually go to Palm Beach on the Gold Coast but decided to take her up to Currimundi Beach on the Sunshine Coast for a change. There was a nice surf beach, but it was a bit of a walk to the dog beach from the car park. Molly loved splashing and playing in the waves though and we had a nice lunch afterwards.

The next day Katie and I went to see Boy Swallows Universe at QPAC; a stage version of the novel by Brisbane writer Trent Dalton. It is a very funny story of a young boy growing up in Brisbane’s western suburbs in the 1980s and living in a dysfunctional drug dealing family. The 1980s Australian music was great, as was the fantastic story and local Brisbane references.

On 24^th October Katie and I went to the Fox & Hounds pub on Mt Tamborine for lunch. It is quite unique because almost all the internal fittings of the Fox and Hounds came from the Sussex Arms pub in Tunbridge Wells. The entire pub interior was transported out, beams, carpet, decorations and all. The pub was originally built in the 1700s, so the original features of the hotel are older than the first settlers in Australia! The pub is packed with British memorabilia. They do regular monthly events to mark British occasions and this month was a Dr Who exhibit, so we went to look at their full-sized blue Tardis, as well as their English red telephone box like the one I made. I had a specific reason for going in fact, as I have been commissioned by the Spicers Hotel group to construct a Tardis for them and wanted to see how mine compared. Mine is only half constructed but I can see already it will be much better!

This came about through an interesting connection. We were interviewed in July for a Channel 7 news feature about Street Libraries. They had contacted the Street Library Association of Australia for recommendations of good libraries in Brisbane. They did a fairly long news feature, and our library was the most impressive, with Katie and I getting the most airtime. It played on the Sunday evening news and the owners of the Spicers group saw the story and decided they would like a Tardis built, as they already have a genuine red telephone box at one of their hotels. One of their staffers knows Katie and got in contact with us. After lots of planning and agonising over how much to charge them, I started construction in August, using plans from the website that I had used to build the red phone box a few years earlier. It will take up all my Saturdays for about a year! But I love doing carpentry jobs and this time I am getting paid for it – even better!

It was our Silver Wedding Anniversary on 12^th October. We celebrated at Rico’s, a fabulous seafood restaurant in Eagle Street Pier. It has been a privilege to have Katie by my side as my best friend, supporter and confidant for the past 25 years. She must be a saint to put up with me! We followed this up with a family dinner at Kafé Meze on Sunday evening to allow the kids to join in the celebrations. Katie bought me a silver cocktail shaker and I had a special silver present which I didn’t give to her, as an emergency shortage of perfume made that a more critical gift. The silver present will have to wait for Christmas now.

Cheers, from Derek, Katie, Matt, Jessie & Molly

Another letter another two lockdowns!

Letter No. 259

Dear all,

APRIL There are so many long weekends in April that I seemed to be at home more than at work! Brisbane opened up just in time for the Easter weekend, so we had dinner with my sister Lisa and family on Easter Friday, dinner at Sue & Brad’s house on the Saturday, a family lunch at home on Easter Sunday and afternoon drinks at Libby’s house on Monday.

The next day (6th April), I flew up to the Whitsundays – not for a holiday but to visit a site. AECOM is rebuilding the ferry terminal at Shute Harbour which was destroyed by a cyclone in 2017. There is only one sensible flight per day and I had carefully planned my trip so that I could have two hours around the pool in tropical North Queensland. Annoyingly, our stupid plane developed a fault after we had got to the runway so we had to change planes and I was two hours later than expected. All my pool time evaporated! I had a nice evening in Airlie Beach and was on site early the next morning before a 2pm flight back to Brisbane.

Katie is about half-way through her uni semester now. She’s doing three courses: a non-fiction writing course, one on professional practice in the publishing industry, and one on academic research techniques which she’s finding quite challenging. She is really enjoying the steep learning curve, although she does keep telling everyone that she is the oldest new girl in town. She has quite a few assignments to do and a couple of seminar presentations coming up.

We went to Cabarita Beach in Northern New South Wales from 8-11^th April. Katie had booked a beautiful AirBnB. It was a studio apartment just for us, as the kids were too busy to come. In the end Matt did come down for one night and slept on the sofa. We didn’t do too much, went out for some nice dinners, mooched around the markets and went to the beach. A nice mini break. It was Mum’s 80^th birthday in April and we all went for lunch at my sister’s house to celebrate. We had been planning to do something a bit bigger but with all the snap lockdowns, it was just easier to go to Lisa’s.  As usual Lisa and co did a fabulous lunch and it was nice to see everyone.

The following weekend I had a garage sale. It wasn’t too much effort and I made $600 selling mainly junk that we don’t want. I also have been selling quite a bit of stuff on Gumtree and made another $1000 or so. We then spent most of that on an upgrade to Matt’s (now mostly empty) bedroom and study, putting in a new guest bed and study cabinet. Katie bought new bedding and I got a full WFH kit from AECOM, with two large computer screens and a headset, so it all looks great and I can work from home if I need to.

On Friday 30 April, both Jess and Matt went to the UQ Law Ball. It was the first time they were going to the same ball, and they hadn’t planned it. Matt went with a small group of friends and went to a nice pre for a cocktail beforehand at a friend’s house. Meanwhile Jessie hosted a pre at our house with about 20 people which was pretty wild and involved a lot of pre-loading. Amazingly they bumped into each other in the crowd and texted us a nice selfie of the two of them together all dressed up.

MAY Katie, Jessie and I went to see the production of Grease at UQ’s Schonell Theatre on 6^th May. It was a joint school production between Matthew and Jessica’s high schools. It was quite good actually and Katie ran into lots of her ex-colleagues from BBC and caught up on all the gossip, which she really enjoyed. The next week the theatre was closed down due to an apparently unacceptable level of asbestos in the seating coming from the ceiling space. I guess we will find out in about 20 years or so whether that was a problem for us!

The next night we went to our Winosaurs club. A group of people in the street decided to have quarterly wine tasting evenings at rotating houses. We are actually some of the youngest people who go but it is always a nice evening, and some people bring along some pretty special bottles. About 24 people go and we take turns talking about our wines and having a small taste of 12 or so bottles over the course of three hours. It’s actually very informal and a lot of fun. Katie was very restrained as she was volunteering at the Brisbane Writers Festival all weekend and didn’t want a headache!

Matthew and the boys had a house-warming party at their now-finished house on Saturday 8^th May. Naturally we got roped into helping them set up. I had mainly helped him string fairy lights around the garden and set up a fire pit while Katie had helped with styling and candles. We were even invited to the party which was quite surprising. Katie went along after her shift at the Writers Festival and had a few cocktails with Matthew and his friends. I couldn’t go as I was already going to the Rugby at Suncorp Stadium that night. It was a very exciting game with the Reds (Brisbane Broncos) vs the Brumbies in the final. The Reds came from six points behind to win by one point, six minutes after full time. It was Mother’s Day the next day. We had a quick brunch at a café in Toowong, then I dropped Katie back at the Writers Festival and went to help Matt clear up. The mess wasn’t too bad surprisingly. Matt said it was a great party.

Mum and Dad had another Clearing Sale at their farm on 15^th May to get rid of all the stuff they should have got rid of at their previous sale. I went up to help, mainly by looking officious and making sure people took everything that they had bid on so that no junk was left behind. The auctioneer is really very good and there were only a few lots which didn’t sell. I had to rush back home in the afternoon to do a bit of gardening before a dinner in Graceville with friends.

The following weekend Matthew had another party. This was his Annual Eurovision party, which he has done for a few years (except last year of course). All his friends pick a country, bring a food or drink item from their country and dress up – not just in national costume, but in something a bit more creative. Katie and I attempt to dress up as well but we are always amazed at how clever the kids’ outfits are. This year Matt was Ukraine, so he dressed in a white lab coat, gas mask and stencilled a Chernobyl nuclear logo on the back of the lab coat. One of Matt’s friends was the UK, so he came as Dead Prince Philip and brought a Victoria sponge cake. Another was Malta, dressed as a Maltese knight complete with armour, sword and large bucket of Maltesers. We joined them all for drinks and nibbles and Katie awarded the costume prize to the Russian baboushka doll with a series of different sized buckets on her head. We left them all to watch in the studio while we watched upstairs.

On 29 May I went off for a Camping Weekend with a group of five mates. We stayed at a friend Jason’s farm on Boonah on Saturday. We had lunch in the Commercial Hotel in Boonah and then helped him moving electric fences in the afternoon after we had set up our tents. He gave us some motorbikes to ride – I had forgotten how much fun bikes were! It was pretty easy camping as we had a fridge, power, gas BBQ and hot showers. We had a BBQ dinner and ate in Jason’s beautiful dining room in his architecturally designed house. We had drinks around the campfire and spent the night in our tents.

On the Sunday we had to get up at 5am for a big hike. It was still dark and about 5 degrees Celsius and we had breakfast and were on the road about 5:50am. We met our guide Teresa in Boonah and it was another 45 minute drive to the NSW border. We were climbing Mt Superbus which at 1375m is the tallest mountain in Southern Queensland and the second highest in Queensland. When we arrived where we were leaving the cars it was blowing a gale. I had unpacked one of my jackets as it had been warmer in Boonah, and this turned out to be a big mistake. It was just above freezing in the wind and I was very very cold; we all were. It took us two hours to get to the top of the mountain and then finally the wind stopped and it warmed up a little. There were spectacular views from the top but this wasn’t our final destination. We hiked on for another two hours to the wreck of a Lincoln Bomber that crashed in 1955.

The wreck itself was pretty impressive. In the early hours of April 9, 1955 an RAAF Avro Lincoln Bomber had crashed into the side of Mt Superbus. The plane had been en route from Townsville to Brisbane transporting a sick baby when it crashed and exploded. All six people on board were killed. Even 66 years on, the scars of this tragedy are very evident, with wreckage strewn just below the southern summit. The hollow fuselage of the plane dominates the landscape. Twisted metal remains strung in trees and litters the forest floor, becoming one with the mountainside amid moss and fallen leaves. Trees have grown around some of the wreckage, while some sections remain untouched. It was a very sombre sight. If the plane had been just 50m higher it would have cleared the mountain summit.

We had lunch just above the wreck and then had a four-hour hike back to the cars. The whole hike was through thick forest up steep and slippery rocks with no marked trail. We would have never made it without our guide. We made it back to the campsite about 5pm just as the sun was going down. It was bliss to have hot showers after such a hard walk. We had dinner and drinks around the campfire but it was not a really late night as we were all pretty tired. The next morning we had breakfast before packing up and heading back to Brisbane. A great weekend.

Katie had a study weekend while I was away, focusing on her final assignments which were all due the following week. They were all worth about half the assessment credit for her courses. She also had a friend from her course Olivia staying over for the weekend and they had studied together. I didn’t think they would get much done but apparently they did, although they also managed to squeeze in a Pilates class, a movie and a few glasses of wine. Matt and Jessie were also under the pump. Matt’s final thesis was due on the 4^th June and Jessie had assignment deadlines as well.

JUNE On 5th June we went for a fundraising lunch for Outback Futures, a charity which provides mental health and wellbeing services for people living in remote and rural communities in outback Queensland. Katie has been quite involved with fundraising events for Outback Futures over the past few years. This one had been initially planned for 2020 but postponed to this year and Katie is now their Event Consultant. There were 170 people there and about 60 of them were people that Katie had “encouraged” to come along. We had a bus of 60 going from Graceville and we knew most of them, so it was a pretty fun bus trip.

The lunch was at Spicers Hidden Vale, a lovely country hotel about an hour’s drive from Brisbane. There was welcome champagne to start and then four food stations, all with matched wine, followed by a desert station. The food was a fabulous “paddock to plate” experience and the wine was pretty good too. It was a perfect blue sky winter’s day and there was an acoustic guitarist playing, a raffle, a charity auction and a whip cracking station for people to try cracking a whip. I am quite good at whip cracking and when the instructor realised that I was actually better than he was, he let me take over. Novices cracking whips when they have had a lot to drink is quite funny! I had brought a speaker to play music on the bus on the way back and lots of people were dancing in their seats (and a few in the aisle) so it was quite a raucous trip. The event was hugely successful and raised $80,000 for the charity, so Katie was delighted.

Katie finished her first semester of her Masters in Writing, Editing & Publishing (WEP) on 11 June. She and a group of 15 students went out for a celebratory dinner at the Burrow in West End. The average age of her group is around 28 but they have accepted Katie into her group and she has, in her usual fashion, become the social organiser! They went bar hopping through the gin bars in West End afterwards. I was long asleep by the time she got home.

On Friday 18^th June we went to the Regatta for dinner with Katie’s study buddy from her WEP course, Olivia. She is a lovely American 30-year-old stuck in Australia since last year’s lockdown, who decided to make the best of it and study. She and Katie are getting on like a house on fire and meet up before lectures every afternoon to compare notes and review each other’s work. Olivia found herself temporarily homeless for a few days and ended up staying with us. We also ended up with the contents of her house while she found new accommodation. In a sad twist, she then got herself a temporary job in Sydney for three weeks, flew down there and has been stuck there ever since in the Sydney lockdown – double stuck! Not sure if she’ll make it back in time for the start of next semester.

That Sunday we went to a Winter Wine Festival at the West End Hotel. There were over ninety wines on offer to taste and I thought I did quite well getting to 39 of them. Unfortunately, by that time I couldn’t really remember any of them! We all went for pizza in the pub afterwards. Some people kicked on but we had to go home and have a little nap. It was a good afternoon.

I went to Darwin for work from 22-24 June. I nearly went a day later and thank God I didn’t, as there was a Covid Positive passenger on that flight and I would have had to go into self-isolation for two weeks. I had to catch a taxi or a lime scooter everywhere in Darwin because there were no hire cars available. Apparently, the car hire companies in Darwin sold off the majority of their car hire fleet during last year’s lockdown. Also, it is peak season (school holidays) and no one can travel overseas, so Darwin is a hot destination.

Brisbane went into another snap five-day lockdown on 29 June. Now that I finally have a good office set up at home, I worked from home for the whole period. Lockdown finished at 6pm on Saturday night. We had previously planned to go out that night, to Slipstream Brewery with some friends.  We ended up walking in on the dot of 6pm (ignoring the fact we were technically not meant to be out driving before then). We were with the Biddles and Rasmussens. We worked our way through about half of the craft beers and had a nice pub dinner. Not sure how much longer this will continue. There is a major Covid outbreak in Sydney, and there are also lockdowns in parts of NSW, Victoria and South Australia. Queensland has managed to escape major outbreaks so far, but it’s unlikely to last forever.

Cheers, from Derek, Katie, Matt, Jessie & Molly

Ten Years in Australia

Letter No. 258

Dear all,

Our Christmas Drinks party last year was on Sat 21^st December. It was much smaller than usual, just people in the neighbourhood that we had been seeing anyway, as there were still restrictions on the number of people in your home at indoor events. It was good to have the opportunity to raise a glass with close friends after such a difficult year.  Katie went all out with the usual feast of canapes, ham, mince pies, Christmas cake and cheeses.

We had our traditional English family dinner on Christmas Eve with just the four of us. I have finally managed to convince Katie that we don’t need to leave out a glass of port and a carrot for Santa and the reindeers. It was a bit sad for her though! We had Australian Christmas Day with Mum, Dad and Lisa and family at Brookfield which was nice as usual. We didn’t see them enough in 2020!

We had our Christmas holiday at Peregian Beach this year as we were not able to leave Australia and interstate travel is risky now with continual border closures, lockdowns and quarantines. Katie had booked a lovely three-bedroom house a short walk from the beach. The kids came and went intermittently. We had a few beach days and nice dinners in Peregian. On 30^th we went to our friend Kylie’s Peregian beach house for a NYE Eve Party. There were a few of our friends from Graceville there so we had a nice evening, concluding with perhaps one too many drinks for the road. It was quite late and we had a slow day the next day.

We hadn’t booked anything for New Year’s Eve, so we decided to stay at the holiday house. We made a trip to the local Seafood Market to buy a feast of fresh lobster and Moreton Bay bugs, and had it with nice pre-dinner drinks, a bottle of wine and some chocolates from Katie’s brother Chris’s fabulous Betty’s Christmas hamper. Everything was delicious. It was only Katie and I that night as Matt was at a party in the Sunshine Coast hinterland and Jessie had driven home to have a party at our house for 40 of her closest friends. We were a bit concerned about Jessica having a party without us being home, but her friends are mostly quite studious and responsible. She had to call a few times for assistance in how to set up for a party! Our good friends Jeremy and Leona live just around the corner and were on notice to pop round and help if there was any trouble on the evening. Luckily for us (and for Jeremy) she didn’t need help and the party went really well (at least that’s what she told us). She was quite shocked though how much effort was required to clean up the next day! Apparently it took her 8 hours!

JANUARY We went to see the movie “The Dry” on New Year’s Day and then on to the beach at Noosa and to the Sunset Bar for cocktails and bar snacks in the evening. A few more days at the beach and we headed back to Brisbane in 3^rd January. We stopped at Peregian Markets and Caloundra for lunch and a swim on the way home. It was very hot!

Brisbane went into a very sudden “snap” three-day lockdown on 8^th January. Yes – three days – sorry to the rest of the world! We didn’t have any plans so it wasn’t too hard. The worst thing was that the tennis courts were closed. It was my 10-year anniversary at AECOM Brisbane on 10^th January – the celebration lunch was postponed. This year also marks my 25^th year with AECOM in Hong Kong, UK and Australia.

On 16^th January 2021, after 22 years and 37 days, Matthew moved out. He was super excited about the move and we are happy for him but also a little sad as it is quite a milestone. He is sharing a house in Toowong with two of his BBC friends. The house is owned by the mother of one of the boys, so an easy landlord to have. The house has been previously rented and needs a fair bit of work – painting, garden, furniture, air conditioning, wi-fi etc but the boys are calling it a “fixer-upper”. We helped him move his bed in the morning. He didn’t have any other furniture and was living out of a suitcase for a few weeks until he found a chest of drawers and we helped him move that in as well. That evening we went to a tennis party at the Tods but my day was tinged with sadness.

We had an Australia Day BBQ with our friends the Biddles on 23^rd January. John had applied for and got a job in Papua New Guinea. The only problem is that he cannot travel there due to all the Covid restrictions. The next day Katie and I took Molly for a walk up Mt Cootha to look at the view. She wasn’t much interested in the view but did have lots of good smells to sniff.

Katie has been accepted to do a Masters program in Writing Publishing and Editing at the University of Queensland. She is very excited about the new challenge and the possible opportunity to move back into publishing after a gap of quite a few years. The course starts at the end of February and will take her two years to complete. Matthew took her for a full tour of the university campus on 3^rd February. He showed her all the libraries and buildings and places to park and most importantly where to get good coffee! She also has a student card now with her photo and age on it just in case she gets challenged at the bar.

FEBRUARY  We had a nice Thai dinner out with some friends at the local Thai restaurant. It turned out that one of the people we were having dinner with is a good friend of the owner, so our meal ended up being free, which was nice. I felt a bit guilty though because of the rough time the hospitality industry has been having lately. We also had a family game of Putt Putt Golf at Hillstone Golf Club on 7^th February. It was quite fun as usual and we had cocktails and pizza afterwards. Jess once again proved that she should not give up Uni and become a golf pro.

Katie hosted a Cocktail Party at our house on 12^th February for a group of St Aidan’s mums from Jessie’s school year. I was voluntold that I was the barman. Actually, I don’t mind as it is quite fun. It was a Friday night and I took a day off work to help set up. I have so much unused annual leave now that it was nice to have a day off to potter around the house. There were 20 ladies and we offered three cocktails – a Pina Colada, a Strawberry Daiquiri and a Moscow Mule. It was quite a production line making around 30 of each cocktail (some ladies had seconds or even thirds). Every cocktail required a different type of glass, so it all needed a bit of advance planning and preparation. We had gourmet pizzas delivered mid-evening and then they all finished off sitting around the fire as the evening wound down. I stayed until my bar tending was no longer required.

Katie went to a Post Graduate Welcome party on 15^th February and met a few of her fellow students and lecturers.  She says she is the oldest student by a country mile but they all seem very friendly. That Friday I had a Go Karting night with twelve members of my work team. It was an indoor two-level circuit. There were two slots of twenty minutes with a break in between. The whole evening actually took about two hours in all with registration, safety briefing, watching other races etc, etc. The first twenty minutes was a qualifying race and we were ranked in order of who did the fastest lap times. One of the guys in my team is a fairly serious race car driver and of course he came first. I was quite pleased to come fifth in the qualifying race. In the final race, I was even more happy to increase my standing and finish in fourth place. Each lap took 40 to 55 seconds and it was quite intense, and very hot. We were all a lather of sweat by the time we finished. It was a really fun evening.

We decided to take Molly to her favourite dog beach on 21^st February, Palm Beach on the Gold Coast. Molly is our only child now! We had the morning on the beach reading the paper and Molly really enjoyed playing in the surf. There is a lovely café there so we always have a nice lunch and an ice cream.  The next day I went to Darwin. I have three projects there at the moment, so I flew up in the morning, did a flying visit to two sites, had a night out on the town, visited the last site the next morning and flew back that afternoon. It was really great to actually go somewhere again, even it if was a brief work trip. It is so much harder to plan anything these days though, with the different states snapping the borders shut all the time!

There was a Brisbane Boys’ College Old Boys drinks function on 26^th February. I went along with an old school friend, John. There were about 100 old boys there, but only one from our year there, but we had a nice catch up. I had tried to talk Matthew into coming as it was very close to his new house, but he had something else on that night. His house has now been painted and tidied and air-conditioning installed so it is all looking a lot better.

MARCH I went out for a Director’s Dinner on 3^rd March to celebrate my 10 years at AECOM Brisbane and 25 years with AECOM. We had a dinner at a fusion Chinese restaurant, Happy Boy, in Fortitude Valley followed by cocktails at the next door wine bar. It was a very nice evening and good to be appreciated.

Matthew and his flatmates have now decided they want a built-in desk in their house. They talked to the landlord (Fergus’ mother) who agreed to pay for materials if they got someone to build it. Guess who got that job? Actually, I didn’t mind as I like building stuff. It took me three Saturdays to measure and plan, buy materials, prep and construct the desk. It was nearly 4m long with an integrated cable tray and invisible legs supported off the wall. I had built one similar at our home several years ago. It is always good to build something two or three times so you can perfect the technique. The boys were delighted with the result and all three of them set up their computers and chairs with a lovely view over the garden. I finished the project on 6^th March, just in time for Uni lectures to start again. They were so pleased that they presented me with a bottle of gin as a thank you for my efforts.

I went to a few exhibitions in March. Queensland Museum had a special exhibition of aquatic dinosaurs so Jess and I had a “Day at the Museum”. It was pretty cool. I think I am still a child at heart! A few days later Katie and I went to Curiocity, which is a 6.5km art circuit through the City Botanic Gardens, South Bank, CBD and the Cultural Precinct. Along the way there were interactive and digital installations celebrating art, science and technology. Unfortunately, it was a rainy day and we had to keep ducking inside coffee shops to avoid getting wet.

On Sunday 14 March, I went for a guided hike up Mt Knapp with my friend Derek. It was on private property and we had permission from the farmer to hike. It was about 8km but took us 6 hours as it was totally off track with uneven footing, steep cliff sections and sections of head high grass. Walking on the flat in long grass was the hardest, especially when the top of the seed stalks was at head height and kept on poking you in the eye. I had so many seeds in my socks I almost threw them away at the end of the hike. I have since bought gaiters for next time. It was a very rewarding hike with some spectacular views and interesting rock formations.

On the 28th March we went to the Mould Cheese Festival at the RNA Showgrounds with some friends. We had bought tickets for the March 2020 event but it had been delayed by Covid and reinstated a year later. There were about 40 small booths of boutique cheese producers. We had a nice three hours, tasting cheese, buying cheese and sitting at a picnic table eating our purchases with a glass or two of wine. Very pleasant. We got a lift home with the Tod’s daughter and then decided to kick on, so invited them back to our Studio Bar to try our latest favourite cocktail – a Sgroppino with limoncello, lemon sorbet, and prosecco.

The next day I was flew up to Rockhampton for work. My flight left at 6am and I picked up a car from the Rocky office and drove about 1½ hours to get to the site. On the way I heard that Greater Brisbane was going into another snap lockdown from 6pm that night. They knew all about it on the site but didn’t give it much thought. I spent a few hours at the site out of phone contact and headed back about 3pm. As soon as I got back into phone range, I got heaps of missed calls and phone messages from the Rocky office. It appeared that I had to get on a flight back to Brisbane before 6pm, otherwise I would have to do the three-day lockdown in a hotel room in Rockhampton! I had been planning to stay overnight and do another site visit in Gladstone the next day, but instead I hot-footed it back to the airport and got the last seat on the last plane out! I made it home just in time for the three day lock-down. The annoying thing was that I had to go back to Gladstone the next week as soon as everything opened up again to finish the other site job!

Cheers, from Derek, Katie, Matt, Jessie & Molly