A couple of shots grabbed opportunistically when Gill's MTB date didn't show at Smithfield:

Our backyard bamboo tree...

 

I made a few long planned changes to www.dreapadoir.com today, which involved rearranging and renaming the galleries, and deleting some images which I felt were a bit sub-standard. I hope the quality is a bit more even now, but obviously, this is subjective (some may feel it is now evenly bad!). I have added a "new work" section, entitled "nua" which as yet has no content. This will be the repository for stuff which may or may not make it to permanent galleries in time. Feel free to comment if you think images make the grade, or are just awful!

In a bout of subclinical homesickness, I have given the galleries Irish monikers, which I hope does not throw the non-Irish among my readers TOO much!  Now, Dad, feel free to correct any of my translations - just email me and let me know if I went wrong!

Nipped out at dusk tonight to use my new Manfrotto tripod and Canon 50mm 1.8 prime lens. Barely survived the mossies, but got one or two shots I was reasonably happy with. Click on it to see larger image:

Just put a few newish pics in an album to the right - Couple of moody Cormac beach shots, a landscape, a snap of the little fella snoozing on Gillo's back, and some butterfly closeups.

Hi to the Prats-Romo girls! Hopefully one day, we will share a drink again! Thank you for your lovely comments - nice to know someone bothers to look at the blog! I trust you are both well - and stop apologising for your English. It will ALWAYS be better than my Catalan!

Cormac and Gill, and a butterfly:

Thank you to everyone who sent birthday wishes by text, email, MSN and Facebook. I will try and getting around to getting in touch with y'all soon. Nice to be remembered!

  'Tis a wild world up here in FNQ...these signs are everywhere near estuarine waters (click on pic to see full size):



and wandering through jungles, you gotta watch out for things like this 10 inch leg span Golden Orb Spider (The big momma spider's abdomen is almost the size of my palm...if you look close, you might see lots of little male spiders on the web. These are the size of normal house spiders, and will get eaten when they successfully mate!):

And eating - here he is polishing off a bit of marinaded Greek lamb from the barbie!

Suspected pig flu has turned out to be a common-or-garden variety. Or...it could be Ross River virus, or any other of the weird and wondrous one can contract up here in FNQ. oink Oink OINK!???

In response to a direct request from Jordina, here are a couple of shots of Cormac up in the Tablelands behind Cairns, enjoying his new home and trying to eat my camera!

So - first full day in Cairns - it is Cormac's six month "birthday" and it is amazing watching him develop day by day! He sits up, he started solids properly today, and he has learned to drink from a cup! I went in to my new workplace to meet some people and do some admin. It seems a friendly department, and the medicine will be interesting, both medically and culturally/socially. Eimear - lots of ID stuff! Congrats on getting your job, BTW!