My motorbike made noise so I worked very hard, saved lots of money, and put it in to get fixed. That was before the Wharf Dispute.
I haven't had the motorbike since Easter, and not because it isn't fixed, but because a gasket I need has been sitting on the docks all that time! Even after the strike.
During the meanwhilst, Kristie and I have replaced the vacuum cleaner, bought a new futon couch (our house can now sleep around 10 guests), and beefed up the computer.
Still no motorbike.

We zapped over for a visit at the start of May, bringing Bernice with us and dropping her off to spend the weekend with Rachel in Castlemaine.
Family visits to the Paulls, Smiths and Folletts, though we found ourselves short of time as always. More dutiful than social.
Our main reason was to attend Kathryn's 30th birthday party at Axedale and to see her new baby. Kathryn's an amazingly level-headed mother, and an attentive friend.
Kristie and I convinced two women at the party that we'd walked all the way from Adelaide in 10 days. Conversations with strangers can be a lot of fun. (I think they forgave us).
It was startling to feel a Victorian chill in the night, and to see the stars so much clearer. The Southern Cross is at least 10 further south viewed from Adelaide.
We didn't go puma hunting as we'd hoped, but using the night-scope for stargazing was wild.

Way back in January, I had a birthday as I do at that time every year. I wanted to go to the Emu Farm at Murray Bridge for a corroboree and Native Aussie style feast. It was brilliant. Emus are truly amazing things. They have a gill, like fish and other stuff too, but you have to go to the Emu Farm to find out.
For starters we had cheese and emu kabana, pickled onions and gherkins with Champagne punch, which I couldn't drink. I had taxi duty that night.
A tour of the farm and on to dinner: kangaroo, chicken, mullet & emu normally cooked in a pit oven but due to fire restrictions the BBQ was used.

A choice of salads, quandong and muntries and native currants. The damper was delicious - like corn bread. For dessert we had steamed quandong pudding with wattle seed sauce, yummy. The after dinner entertainment was some traditional dancing and digerido playing. Jase was really good at the didge. Riff & Joe chickened out.
Recently Dad & Margaret had a Japanese girl staying with them, we decided to meet in Bordertown one weekend. I hate Bordertown. They have a fauna park, which you can drive around but can't enter, that has the largest population of albino kangaroos ever. The pub we ate at on Saturday night was great.
I really enjoyed meeting Sayuri and I think see enjoyed meeting us too. She was amazed to see the stars at night - she had never seen them before because of the bright lights of Japan. That really blew me away. You only realise how great things like that are when someone else tells you they've never experienced it.
Work at Telstra pays well and that's the only reason I still do it. School is great too.
Why hasn't anyone sent us the crossword back? It wasn't hard - most of the answers were in past editions of the Gekko.
Anyway, here's the solution.