It has almost been two weeks since we moved into our rented house in Canberra. Megan and I have been both sick since then The dogs are not allowed in the house so they have to brave the Canberra cold in the shed Took the day of yesterday and made a few phone calls to change our address and also applied for naked ADSL2 from iinet. No TV and no internet and feels like there is not much to do at home.

Tonight, Megan and I are going to my companies staff dinner! Looking forward to the free three course meal and drinks! Wish we where both not sick.

I went to the Autumn Balloon Spectacular this morning. I did not want to miss the start when the balloons are inflated so I went early, but when I reached at 6AM, there where only few security guards getting ready for the day. Found the best free park though! Had a big breakfast and weighted for the balloons to arrive. One by one four wheel drives pulled up with balloons on the trailer. They use a hot air fan to inflate it first and then turn the flame on. The flame is bloody loud when it is on!

I went to The Canberra Photographic Society meeting tonight. It was very interesting, a lot of nice, like minded people but a lot more talented. It was the the competition night for members. Members could print picture they have taken and display them on an open and/or themed category. Some of the pictures where really too good to be taken by ameture photographers. There was judge invited to judge the photos and we all sat and listened to his comments.

Two of the guys I spoke to: Dave and Richard have Flickr sites. I told them I had one too but after getting back home and looking at their pics on Flickr, I am a bit embarrassed about the quality of my pictures

Anyway the purpose of me going there was to ask members there which would be the best place to click pictures of the 2008 National Autumn Balloon Spectular.

Before and during Earth Hour pictures of Canberra city does not look like it changed at all, except the parliament house has the lights turned off!
There where around 150-200 people gathered at Mt Ainslie to look down ANZAC Parade and Capital Hill to see the city with lights turned off. I with everyone else
was pretty disappointed that the city did not look any different Most business except restaurants may be had to have their lights on and the street lights where
obviously left on. We had the lights turned of at my brothers place.

Talking to my sister in law about Earth Hour and she mentioned how, Earth Hour is not a new concept in India. In India it is forced Earth Hour, sometimes with
notice but mostly without for couple of hours.
Could we do the same in Australia. Have a forced hour of black out every week during scheduled times? we could surely get used to it. I certainly did get used to
it when I was India!

Got my new pc today but it was not what was ordered and looks like it will not be replaced too Got introduced to a lot of staff yesterday and today and don’t remember any names except one person who is working on SharePoint. My boss is spend half the day trying to figure out how to get our work space clutter free. Workmates seem good, four guys and one girl (Vietnamese). One of the guys prides himself as a geek, looking forward to meeting him.

My boss was sending me links to houses he thinks I should have a look at to buy. All around 450k to 500K I will need to spend a lot of time this weekend looking at open houses.

Missing Megan, Henry and Lama. Hope they join me soon!

Drove to Canberra this afternoon to start work tomorrow. I’ve never seen th freeway as busy as today. All the stops on the freeway where so crowded that I did not feel like stopping anywhere. I stopped for lunch and had to join a long queue

Anyway, I am in Canberra, in the shed at my brothers place. He is not home and not picking up his mobile Lucky I have my eeepc, I can at least browse the net!

Starting work tomorrow! Hope it is a nice place to work for and hope the team I work with are nice people.

For tonight, I hope my brother is back home because all my work clothes are in his house.

After being jobless for a couple of weeks, I finally accepted an offer in Canberra. Megan has been away all along my job hunt and it has been quite boring without her around. She is coming back tomorrow night! We will have to soon start planning on moving to Canberra. Hopefully Megan finds a job there easily. Last time, she got an iPod shuffle from a recruiter but returned it because she declined the offer. It’ll be nice if she gets an iPhone this time!

My new job is going to be as an Analyst Programmer working on some GIS system! It will be good to gain experience in something I have not worked with before. They also use SharePoint for their intranet! so I will still get to work on SharePoint!

Time to look for new soccer club in Canberra. Wonder what the standard of the game is in Canberra.

Hope the move to Canberra goes smooth.

Off to pick up Megan from Melbourne tomorrow. She bought me an Asus eepc!!!!