Winter is finally here!

I've not updated for a couple of weeks, mainly because to be honest nothing much has been happening recently. Mostly just work time, home time and weekend time. I guess I'm getting quite settled down in Sydney now. I shouldn't get too used to it, as if I were to settle down here I wouldn't be living where I am now.

This is a picture of the ground floor of my apartment. I've already mentioned that it's a converted church and listed building so they have to keep some original features. God knows how they managed to get away with adding the monstrosity of flats above the church though. The flats don't fit in with the rest of the church at all, but at the same time it does make a unique building and I always like unique.

The church is still functioning as I often see people in the other half of the ground floor of the building attending some service at the church. How very ironic of me of all people to end up living above a church. People who really know me will realise how very religious I am and how much I love religion. I wonder if the church has a crypt and where people were buried below the church. Oh well there's a multi story car park below the building now so they probably sit happily side by side with flash parked cars. Do you remember the film Poltergeist, one of my favourites? :-)

They've recently removed the covers of the lifts and here you can see some of the beautiful original doors that were in the church. The wood finish in the lifts is really fine and always makes me want to touch the walls whenever I'm in the lift on my own.

Jason and John from the UK office recently visited us here for a week of meetings with Sydney Water. We had a really good time going out for some great food and beers. It's not many places where you can go out for Japanese noodles for lunch and then Bavarian beer and food in the evening and all for quite a cheap price too.

I'm sure both of them will go back to Wallingford and report at how tough life is out here and how much hardship we have suffered in putting our lives on hold for a year to come here to work. :-)

Winter has finally arrived in Sydney as it's relatively cold during the day and night here. It almost reaches below 10 degrees C in the morning and ranges up to 18 during the day. Quite cold for Sydneysiders. Some of the locals are wrapped up in gear that I would go snowboarding in, while I just have a shirt and light jacket on.

I was quite chuffed the other day as when I was walking home from work a tourist here asked me for directions to an art gallery. Fortunately I knew where the place was and could give her directions, does this mean I'm a qualified Sydneysider now? I'd like to think so, but probably not as I doubt I'd ever get used to the heat for the rest of the year.

Fu%&wits First should be all sorted now, I've probably said this before though. After speaking to a customer care manager in the Sydney branch they sympathised with my problems and said they would email the Bristol branch to cancel my membership and as a gesture of goodwill they would allow me to have six weeks free membership at the Sydney gym. They recommended that I also send a letter to the Bristol branch to complain, get my money back and cancel my membership too just in case.

I also spoke to someone who was dealing with my case at the Bristol gym and they assured me that my membership had been cancelled there and they have requested a refund for my last month's membership. I'll just have to wait and see if this is true. I doubt I'll be joining them again when I get back to the UK next year. So after only four months I've finally managed to relocate fully to Sydney, I hope it's not as traumatic when going back!