Two sisters: Tallulah, not yet 3, and Hannah, just 7 weeks. My best friends kids. Today was hard: I had to say goodbye to these angels who I have gotten to know a little over the past 4 days, and their parents. The trouble with holidays: they always go way too fast.

I'm back in Brisbane after a lovely few days on the Sunshine Coast where I stayed with my old and dear friends Jackie, Adrian and Russell, and did the rounds with my Dad, visiting old family friends and drinking a lot. Also got poked and prodded by pathologists, doctors and dentists and had all sorts of sharp scary metal things stuck into me and am happy to announce that I am 100% fit and well.

Tomorrow, we're off to Port Douglas in Far North Queensland - a sleepy old resort town. My brother lives there - actually, he lives on acreage out in the foothills behind Port Douglas. There is a waterhole just down the road, and plenty of rainforest to gaze out at. You can't actually swim in the ocean there at this time of the year because of the man-o-war jellyfish so having the waterhole is a very cool option.

I am loving being home again for a while. Being away for so long makes coming back a very novel experience. I have been particularly entertained by the Australian Language and accent - on my first night back I had to ask my friends to repeat themselves constantly coz they were all talking too fast for me to hear what they were saying. Weird. Words I had fogotten about include:

"Ta" (thanks)
"Ta-ta" (see ya)
"Hoon" (short for hooligan, late night car drivers)
"Stroppy" (irritable)
and best of all - being called "dear" and "love" by complete strangers

So, dears, from the lovely world of Uncle Tony's broadband cable, ta-ta for now.