Well, since my last post, it has been almost a week.

What has happened?.....

Well, last Saturday, was Chick Flick night, mark 1.

The boys had a D&D day during the day, and although I was invited, I decided to go to Homebush to do some shooting, but I went over for movies with the girls.

Last week, we watched Love Actually, starring the pile of Brittish film stars, with a really interconnected web of stories that finished.... well. Well, only in the sense that the stories were semi complete, with a tinge of happiness for most of them, but it was also in a sense showing the different degrees of love, and their differences. How love is lost, love is gained, and the value of love, both direct and unrequieted.

So, then we had the week of the archery...
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.

Thursday was a very nice rest day. Then friday.

RAIN!!!!!!
Thursday day and Wednesday had a light sprinking of water. More of a bland drizzle than anything else. But oh my goodness, friday was the pouring tap.

It really pelted down for a brief period of time, but it was like the tap heap had finally been turned on.

We did mini-clout and 18m indoor that day in the wet too, which was lots of fun.

Clout archery is a dying sport, but it's lots of fun. The object is to lob (and I mean serious air time) arrows as close to a marker on the ground as possible, with scoring zones 1m-1.5m radius (we're not completely sure on this one).

Normally, clout is done at 120-150m for recurves and 180-210m for compounders. Our mini-clout that we held was only 90m, but to make it challenging, we only used 20lb bows (which are pretty weak) so that the arrows were coming down at a nice angle. I managed to hit the middle 10 zone target 4 times during the afternoon, which was pretty cool.
We had about 4 seconds of air time for the arrows to get to the target...

The 18m was good too, as I started seriously using my backtension release. I'm still working on my form to use it properly, but it's going well, as I am not as surprised in the shock factor, but it is still hard to set off.
Rebecca, the winner of the Ladies Compound division who received a thumb release aid, tried it out, and I helped her set it up, and taught her how to use it properly. She was doing quite well once she kinda got the hang of it.
And James managed to fire his bow literally out of his hands as he forgot the finger sling that he is now using (after I convinced him to) and the bow jumped out of his hand (as it is supposed to, because the sling catches it). Luckily for him he is a barebow archer and didn't have anything on the outside of his bow to break.

Yesterday, being Saturday, it rained heaps. Which is fantastic. We do need so much more rain.

During the day, didn't really do much, but last night we had Chick Flicks mark 2.

Starting off with a American documentary called Spellbound.

It was about the National Spelling Bee competition that is held annually. There are 249 contestants from across the US from some zoning processes, and over 2 days, 1 person comes away as the winner.

The event has been run since 1925, and the first ever National Spelling Bee winner was still alive (film made in 1999) and was interviewed in the film.

It follows 8 kids through their attempts at the regional spelling competitions to the nationals and how they fare. Further more, it goes into their backgrounds, motivations, their personality and their "technique" of spelling.

My god. There are some serious nutcases about spelling out there. The indian boy.... oh god. Psycho....

And then watching the competition and thinking of how to spell the words that these 8th grader kids had to spell is scarey, as 3/4 of them I probably wouldn't be able to spell, let alone know what they meant. Especially since they have "definition" rounds, where they give you a definition, you have to name the word, then spell it correctly....

It's actually a fairly good doco if you can find it to watch. We borrowed it from a Video Ezy, so perhaps you can get them there.

The second film was Chocolat.

Kirsten and myself hadn't seen it, while the others had, but they didn't mind watching it again, as it was a fairly good flick. Semi warm and fuzzy, with some laughs in it, and touches of sadness, but still a good film indeed.

Based upon the book of the same name, it follows the single mother and her attempts to settle in a small religious town with her radical store of a chocolatery in the old patissarie (spelling?) store.

The movie is slightly different to the book, but it was still pretty good, so if you can, read the book, and then watch the movie. If you do it vice versa, it might confuse you, as there are some characters missing from the book that the movie has.

The third film we watched was Grosse Point Blank.

A classic black comedy about the mid life crisis of a professional hitman.

Not that he's really mid life, as he is only 27 or thereabouts as he returns to his small home town of Grosse Point for his 10 year school reunion.

I'm not going to say much about it, but if you honestly haven't seen it, go and get it!!

It's very funny in lots of ways, and of course it being a black comedy, requires some semi twisted personality humor to appreciate.

I've seen it several times, but I still love it.

And of course it stars John Cusack (spelling?) which is one of the best actors around in my opinion, as he is very versatile in his many movie roles.


Sunday, today.

Rain.
More beautiful glorious rain.
Pity it hasn't been raining harder, but by the afternoon, it kind of stopped.....

Today was the Coffee Fesitval down at the Rocks. But due to the rain, Kirsten and I decided not to go. We went last year, and it was pretty good, as we got some free samples of beans in the mail afterwards from filling out survey cards. =)

But, I bummed at home and we scrounged some cupboards for my dad to modify for the sink setup that we are going to have for the outdoor kitchen under the awning outside my room.

I also scrounged a really nice picture frame. I have no idea what I'm going to do with it yet, but after I clean if off and perhaps repaint it (it's a metallic silver, but I might change it to something else). I can always measure it and get some canvas and do a painting or something like that for a nice present or decoration I think. Otherwise, I can do a quilling piece that Kirsten and I had thought about ages ago.

I love Sydney local council cleanups.... you can literally furnish your house free from the stuff that people chuck out on good months.
Or if you need spare bits to fix other bits. Kirsten's father threw out some bike bits that he didn't need as he has tonnes of the stuff (he's built about 10 bikes from spare parts he has scrounged from council cleanups, so everyone in the family has a bike and spares...) and all of it was gone in under 4 minutes.....

Back at Riverwood, and I'm sure it happens everwhere, there are white vans which have kids hanging out of the doors doing driveby scrounging.... 2nd hand shops and odds-bits and places like St Vincent de Pauls do really well from selling stuff they fix which is picked up from cleanups, as long as the wet weather doesn't damage it too badly.

And, I also finished the computer game Max Payne 2. It was fairly challenging.....

I also borrowed Jenny's Sega DreamCast, and I hope I haven't killed it, as sometimes the machine hangs.... =(
But Soul Calibur is good, and I've learn some moves on Xiang Hua hehehehe, but I dont' think I'll ever play against anyone besides my brother to try them out.
I've also started Skies of Arcadia on Jenny's recommendation, and its kind of very similar to the whole Final Fantasy series in its movement and combat. I'll have to see how it pans out.

I lent Jenny some Anime in return for her lending me the DreamCast, and from her blog, it would seem that she's glued to her computer screen..... =P

And finally, on the job front.

I applied for a job as previously stated I think, Lab Technician at uni for the pathology department.

I got a letter stating the job would be processed in the next month or so, and if I got a phone call, then I would be on the shortlisting for interviews, but if I got a letter then it meant I wasn't a successful applicant.

Well, now it means I'm dreading the mail...... =(

I think that is a suitably long enough post =)