So it’s one year not-out for me here in Australia.
See you can tell by my perfect use of that cricketing term that after a year here I am now a bonafide Aussie.
But an announcement…
I’m coming home.
After much soul-searching me and Rach think now is the right time to go back to the UK for a one-month holiday to attend two family weddings.
I’ve also decided now was the right time to do a misleading clickbaity headline for this post.
So we’ll be back in the UK for the whole calendar month of July. Literally from the 1st to the 31st which is pleasingly very tidy.
So if you know me - put in your TimTam orders now and text me for a pint. I’ll be London-based for most of the month. Specifically pub-based. Also I won’t have the internet on my phone. So it’s gonna be like the noughties.
Meanwhile here in Australia - plenty has happened in the time since I last posted.
I have passed my driving test. I am now cruising the streets of Coorparoo in a 1999 Honda Civic. It is Bluetooth enabled! (I have to take my Bluetooth speaker in the car because the radio doesn’t work).
The rain has stopped. It’s been pretty relentless for most of the first year due to a weather phenomenon called La Niña.
I actually found it really annoying as not only was the weather terrible, but meteorologists were just getting away with explaining it away with some spanish words leaving us all non the wiser. Also it's really annoying to find that n with the little squiggle on top.
But now that’s over Queensland can recover from the floods properly and move onto the next inevitable weather emergency.
I’ve also been enjoying my first State of Origin series. For those who aren’t aware, each year Queensland Maroons take on New South Wales Blues in three games of Rugby League.
The rivalry is pretty intense. Before Game 1, I was talking to my very calm and kind neighbour Vercelli (is it weird I went to check some of his post to check the spelling of his name for this blog?).
I was discussing the game with him and he told me it was the only time he told me was super competitive and patriotic about being a Queenslander.
He then told me that we need to crush the New South Wales cockroaches as he started stamping on the floor.
Now this took me back quite a bit. My previously very calm and polite neighbour had started using the same hate speech that previously saw Katie Hopkins fired from the Daily Mail.
So I went back to the safe confines of my home before Vercelli remembered I was a foreigner and told me to get back on the first boat home, and I told Rach about our little exchange.
Rach laughed and then explained to me how the NSW Blues’ nickname is actually the cockroaches and that it was all part of the rivalry.
So my neighbour retains his status as calm and polite man who lives in the flat below us.
Other news of note… and sorry I realise this is a long post. But not as long as Dominic Cummings’ blog posts and I believe we are the last two people in the world still blogging, so I’m still the number one blog for brevity.
A Labor government have been voted into federal government, despite the catastrophic spelling error in their party’s name.
So they have a new Prime Minister here - Anthony Albanese, who doesn’t escape the Aussie convention of being nicknamed, so he’s known as Albo.
He beat Scott Morrison (aka ScoMo) from the Liberal Party. That’s was tories are called here - this country really is bad at naming their political parties. Still though better than 'the cockroaches'.
So it very much means that Australia went Albo over Arse.
My parents visited. We took them to all the famous Queensland sites such as The Gabba (they must’ve been very excited to walk past outside it) and the Versace hotel where all the Im A Celeb contestants stay. Easy to please now they’ve turned 60. Their favourite thing of the whole holiday was when we dropped them at Westfield to kill some time on their last day.
They enjoyed their time immensely and spent most of it telling me and Rach how much they regretted having my brothers as it meant they couldn’t move out here. (Looking forward to this bit kicking off in the Family WhatsApp later).
One thing I was worried about when moving to Brisbane was that the city may not be as happening as London as I’m used to - especially with gigs.
Well I was proved wrong last Friday when attending two gigs in one night. We’ve had Jim Jefferies tickets since the pandemic but could only get into the late show starting at 10.30pm. I struggle to stay up past that time due to waking at 2.30am for work so we decided to do something earlier in the evening to keep myself occupied and awake. So we went to see The Wombats before Jim Jefferies.
Last night we went to see the new Elvis film in a posh cinema where they bring you lots of food and beer and the seats recline - so I can heartily recommend the first half of the new Elvis film.
A common theme in the film is about the talent that is Elvis ignoring his direction from his manager and producer and doing really succesful. That type of narrative very annoying for a radio producer who has to work with 'talent'.
Other news is that the project I hinted at in the last blog post will be dropping this Wednesday.
A Radio 4/BBC Sounds podcast called Welcome to The Neighbourhood.
The trail has been released, the first episode is out this Wednesday. You can subscribe to the channel now.
I’ve produced a lot of podcasts in my time, and in the past few years I’ve been lucky enough to be hired on already successful shows such as You’re Dead To Me.
But this is different for me - it’s a concept that I conceived and has been commissioned by the BBC which is a good milestone for me.
It’s all about a passion of mine and many - laughing at the mad shit you read on the local Facebook community group.
Jayde Adams is the host and smashing it. She brings it all to life so perfectly and we’ve got just some of the best guests coming on this series.
So please listen, rate, review - share like it crazy. That’s how these things get recommissioned!
But anyway I ought to pack…
