Sunday saw Michele and I do something a little different for a change. We went for a nice breakfast slash lunch at the Mt Street Cafe. I love a place that has a good all-day breakfast menu. It's one of the few places that I keep on coming back to.

I'd mentioned it to Michele before, but there's an cool worldwide exhibition that recently came to Perth that I want to follow: it's called Space Invaders. The basic gist of it is that they go around and put these tile (or other) mosaics in obscure but public places. Space Invader Spotting is apparently something that's fun to do. I know where two of them are in Perth, but once the weather clears up I want to go out and find the rest. I couldn't pass up the opportunity to show Michele one of them, as it was right near the cafe.

Despite what you might think, there's always cool stuff like that happenning around Perth, you just need to keep an eye out for it. I just wish I was better at finding out about these things...

I haven't been to the markets in years, but lacking any better ideas, Michele and I decided to head for the Subi markets. For probably the first time ever, I actually enjoyed it, even to the point where I was able to cope with the crowds! (I have issues with crowds - or rather the rudeness of people in crowds - that makes me rather jittery). After picking up a few more things I decided that maybe the markets weren't so bad after all.

Sure, this doesn't look like much, but it took us an hour to finish. Actually, Michele couldn't finish hers - she had to call Jono and ask him to finish it. We had that for dessert after a meal I Cooked All By Myself: a beef salad dish. Daniel wanted to catch up for dinner, and lacking any better ideas on where to go and what to have we decided to just cook something at home. It's about the only time I've had to even think about cooking something nice this year - I normally never have the time.

When he came over to finish Michele's Hot Chocolate, Jono brought his PS2 and a copy of Katamari Damacy. I've been hanging out to just see this game for ages, and he brought it over to play. Not only that, he left it here so I could play it some more! He's so generous. I wonder how long I can keep it for. The game itself is as whacked out as it's made out to be. It's surprisingly challenging, but awesomely fun.

I'm gunna play it 'till the controller breaks. Sorry Jono.

Almost a month later and I'm still sick. Turns out I had sinusitis, and it didn't clear up after the first course of antibiotics. So then I got a secondary infection (which was actually quite painful) and am back on antibiotics. Oh well.

Last weekend where gradings for Iaido and Jodo. I'm happy to say I passed both gradings :) I am now 4th Kyu in Iaido, and I double graded to 1st Kyu in Jodo. Go Me!

Things are taking an interesting turn at the Dojo. While Rebecca is leading the Kenbu side of things, I'm left to teach it about half the time as Rebecca and Marcus help out at the Mt Lawley Dojo on Mondays. Sure we've only got one regular student, but it's odd being put in a position where you have to instruct someone, especially since Kenbu is fairly new to me as well. I'm not sure how to go about that, and I'm a little worried that I'm doing it all wrong. We're also helping out at the Curtin Dojo on Saturdays until they can organise something perhaps a little more appropriate (if at all). Again, we're put in a position where we have to instruct, where we're probably not really best equiped to do so.

Through all this I'm wonderring: where are the senior students during all this? Why are we, junior students, doing this? I don't mind though, it's fun and hopefully I'll get something out of it if I don't bollocks things up too much.

Work is actually fun at the moment. Recently I mentioned I went to that Apple training course. While a lot of it was boring basic level stuff, I did manage to pick up a lot of useful information. So I returned from the training course and got stuck into setting up and deploying all the new shiny 20" iMacs for various staff members. From scratch. This included installing, securing, integrating into our network environment, reimaging, licensing, and documentation. I'm quite happy with the work that I've done with it so far. I've got two deployed to staff so far (as test cases), and after a few teething issues it seems that everything is ready for the rest of the staff. The last thing I'working on is a document titled "So, you bought an iMac". It's been a busy two weeks doing all that, but I'd say I've learned and achieved a lot.

So I just completed the MacOS 101 Mac OS X Support Essentials v10.4 training course that I mentioned earlier. It was a three day course covering basic Mac operation and troubleshooting. While a lot of the course was "Duh" material, there was still a lot of useful information in there. I also managed to pick up some hints in other areas, such as deployment, which should help make life easier.

My sister is also buying a 15" Powerbook. I am so very, very jealous. I want one. Of my own (not the crappy old slow one that I get to use at work).