still with the blue skies

that was the first thing i noticed. the second as i was pulling my over-weight case (will i never learn?) to the hire car, was how darn hot i was. dressing for a melbourne early morning is not the same as dressing for perth mid-morning. the car doubled as my wardrobe, very versatile. :) the third thing of notice which i could hardly believe, there were still flies about. what?? almost winter and flies?

but oh, what a beautiful morning (to use a lyric from oklahoma). driving into the city along the great eastern highway, i stop for a brownes ice coffee chill, mmm... then stop at the south perth foreshore to text a few people and take some "welcome back to perth" photos.



up to west perth to meet gail and marija for lunch. forgot to drag my camera out with them... damn! but they will be captured before long. nice lunch, fabulous chat and the three of us trying to dodge the moving sunshine. hard life i know. marija went back to work before long, gail and i succumbed to the temptations of a nice piece of park and more gossip. ahh....

i managed a quick swing through kings park for these pics before heading back to the airport to pick up julie and vince...woooohoooo!!!



a drive-by pick-up at the airport (who really pays for parking these days?) YEHAW!! haven't seen julie and vince since their wedding in tahoe september 2007. beautiful and funny people those two. and of course the first thing we did together was a drive-through red rooster visit. ha!! yes, come to australia, eat fast food. :) then over to the house of griffin where melis was im/patiently waiting to drag us off to the subi oval for football. i know, i know... me and football. i think mike has the photographic evidence, by this stage i decided i didn't want to commit myself digitally being blurry eyed and a little wiped out.

anyway, a taxi over to jb o'reilly's to catch up with al (looking less and less the wee brown man i must say), markus, ang and mike. overloaded with familiar faces and voices and hugs. yah to hugs and excitement. and yes, i seemed to be in an irish sports bar, which is a little alarming so i downed a red bull to keep up the pace. onto the game between fremantle and hawthorn. dad would have been happy with the result, dockers fans not so much.



i piked after the game and went to catch a train from leederville into the city. the others caught a cab back to ang and markus' to play on. it was interesting catching public transport in perth, they had been working on the line before i had left so the station was all brand spanking when i alighted from the train. a bit bamboozled to where i would actually exit on the surface though, it ended up being murray street mall. and it was really sad. small, dirty and empty of people except for a few drunk derros. the city centre really isn't a nice place to be after dark it seems. sad really. so much potential. taxied back to griffin and bed... sweet sweet dreams.