I think we're starting to come out of Winter as it's been slowly warming up this week, rising to a high of 29 degrees today. At lunchtime I went out and sat in the gardens of a Cathedral across from where I work and basked in the sun. I only lasted for about 20 minutes though. Boy was it hot! The … read more

I got up at 4:30. I had already planned to do this because I wanted to be in Fortitude Valley to watch the Liverpool v AC Milan Champions League Final. Someone had told me on BritishExpats.com that I’d be able to find at 24/7 Sports Bar in Fortitude Valley in Brisbane which would be showing the … read more

We didn’t do much at all on our first day in Oz. I think we were in bed before 9pm that night (even though we did have a bit of a kip as soon as we got there). Jetlag had fully kicked in! read more

We've spent most of today shopping for our new house. We went down to IKEA first thing, arriving for opening time at 9am. The IKEA in Brisbane is the largest in the Southern Hemisphere and is absolutely huge. What's more it was pretty quiet and quite an enjoyable experience, unlike the last time I … read more

Can you believe it. We arranged to see a couple of houses early that day. We loved the second place we saw, put in an immediate application, paid the bond and picked up the keys that afternoon! It's a 3 bedroom house on a gated community in Carina - a really nice part of Brisbane. We've got a garage … read more

I nearly had heart failure watching the penalty shoot-out to see Liverpool reach the Champions League Final. I'm now going to have to find somewhere to watch the match in Brisbane at 05:30 in the morning! I know that theoretically things could still go wrong with the house completion but we took a … read more

I made the mistake of leaving it late to book my hotel for this week, with the result that I have ended up having to take a smoking room. As a non-smoker with a very sensitive nose, this week has not been a pleasant experience to say the least. The room is clean, but there doesn't seem to be any way … read more

I just thought I'd do a bit of research into the job market in Brisbane, and suddenly it's 3 hours later and I'm even more confused than when I started! Everything I'm reading tells me that Sydney, Melbourne, and Canberra are all better for IT Security jobs than Brisbane. That doesn't mean to say … read more

The annual Zombie walk has taken place in Brisbane today. I might join in next year. I won't need any make-up - I always look like that first thing in the morning. I'm not a morning person! read more

Great article comparing the weather between the major cities. Rach is set on that we're moving to Brisbane but I'm still open to the possibility of trying out other areas. I guess I better make my mind up soon, if all goes well we've only got 3 months to go! read more

Here's some video I took of the waves at Mooloolaba beach on the Sunshine Coast in Australia when we went out there to validate our visa over the new year. [youtube [www.youtube.com/watch](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5QQl3CusIA8&w=425&h=350]) Soon this could be a regular weekend activity for us! … read more

It seems funny that it's a year since my last post where I rejoiced the fact that we had finally received our visa, and yet it's only now that we're in a position where we're confident it's actually going to happen. The reason it's been a year is simply because that's how long it has taken us to … read more

I'm now on holiday in Oz - more about this later. This post is just to say that we finally got the Visa!!!!! We checked our e-mail while we was in Singapore and we've got an e-mail to say the visa has been granted. What a relief! After 18 months of hassle we can finally put the house up for sale and … read more