Merry Christmas!!

It's been a good Christmas day, I must admit.

It's about 10pm and this is what I've done today. Opened presents with my cousin (okay - technically he's my first cousin once removed, or my second cousin, but I can never remember, so I just call him my cousin) and his family, which includes 2 kids, aged 9 and 6. It's been a while since I opened presents with little ones (well, little ones that knew what presents were!). They are so fun to watch!

After a great feast, we all went our separate ways and slept for about 2 hours. When I woke up my cousin's family had gone back to their hotel (I'm staying with my great aunt and uncle in Toowoomba, which is in Southeast Queensland, about 2.5 hours from Brisbane). I went for a run, then helped my aunt (again, it's just easier to say aunt) do some gardening - move a large pile of dirt via a wheelbarrow to the garden bed. My aunt and uncle have 4 goats and a really cool cat - I'll put pictures up later. Their house has great gardens all around it and large hilly paddocks for the goats. After my run my cousin's family came back and we had prawns (an Aussie Christmas tradition I'm wholeheartedly behind, now that i know how to correctly get at the good stuff!) and more food. Then we all read for a while till it was time to say goodnight.

All in all a good day. My heart is with all those I'm not with today/tonight, especially those in my family that are also farflung around this globe of ours.

Much love everyone.

Relay triathlon

This past weekend I did a corporate tri with 2 training mates, Chad and Cam. We were the Salty Mixed Nuts. HeHe.

I did the cycle leg and took us from 88th place overall to 31st place overall. Not too shabby! Of course, that's not all because I kicked ass, but sort of. Ha. It was a 15K ride, I did it in just over 30 minutes. I totally hit the wall at the start of the 2nd lap, I hadn't eaten in about 2 hours. I'd had brekky (!) but that had been at 7 and the race was at 9. Lesson learned!!

This is me getting my bike out at the start of my leg:



This weekend the Bilbys are assisting at the Canberra Half Ironman - we're running one of the aid stations. Should be fun to see everyone going crazy! My swim coach is competing - pretty cool!!

The blues are here again..............

Last night I realized why Christmas is supposed to happen in the winter, rather than the summer. Summer is enough of an event on its own - you don't need holidays to get you through the summer - you're too busy doing all sorts of other stuff - camping, BBQs, just being outside. However, in the wintertime - you NEED a holiday like Christmas (and Thanksgiving) to get you through. Food does wonders for the soul when it's cold and wintry. Not so much when it's sunny for 12 hours a day and the days are jam-packed.

And that's one of the main reasons I could never live permanently down here.

I've been missing Atlanta this week, and my family. I've started sending Christmas presents and maybe all the wrapping and packaging is making me a bit blue?

If you are around loved ones, give them an extra hug for me, since I can't do it myself.