Little Nell & Mum Doing Fine

Little Nell & Mum

Congratulations Lesley, Andrew, Isla & Nell we are delighted and excited with the addition to the Williams Family today. This blog is just full of nothing but good news lately! It's very exciting.

Hope you all like the shot of little Nell & her mum! We're looking forward to the real shots coming through.

Speak to you all soon.

Love

Uncle Chalky & Auntie Bek

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

If you'd like to see some real shots of Nell goto Lesley & Andrew's Family Blog:

http://lesleynandrewnisla.blogspot.com/

So, Dinner with the Queen? Or a Dinner fit for a Queen!

I have got a FANTASTIC NEW JOB! We had decided to keep it quiet after all the stress of that other job at Easter, the job was advertised in the paper on a Saturday and I spent a weekend trying to revise my CV taking on board some of what Chalky had learnt at his careers session he had when we first moved to Oz. In the end it just didn't feel right to me and so I adopted some of the lessons from Chalky's session and I phoned the company, sold myself to the manager who was recruiting, got a copy of the Job Description and wrote the most 'in your face' application letter I'd ever done. Applications closed 10th July and I hadn't heard anything so I followed up with another phone call expressing how interested I was in the role and how right I was for the role...

Then on 2/8 I got a phone call - was I available for an interview 8/8/07 at 9am! I've always done well in interviews, especially interviews first thing in the morning. It was a very structured interview - panel of 3 all asking a question in turn. Very competency based and I needed to give examples of how I could demonstrate that I could do the job.

The final question - thrown in for a little fun was "You can invite 3 people over for dinner, alive or dead, who would you invite and why?" Before I could stop my mouth from moving the words 'The Queen' came pouring out...(then my mind registered what I'd just said and I was praying that none one on the panel was a republican!) so I continued saying how much I love the Queen, her discipline and strength of character and her humour and I'd love to meet her, my prospective boss then said "ME TOO!" so I breathed a BIG sigh of relief and thought 'this is in the bag, the job is mine!' In case you're interested I followed up with Jamie Oliver, so he could do the cooking and I'd have more time to chat with Queenie and I respect Jamie as he seems to have a very balanced life, he seems a good dad and husband, has a passion for what he does and also gives back to the community - characteristics that I admire. Finally since I would expect Chalky to also be at our table I chose Sir Steve Redgrave for him as it's one of his biggest regrets that he didn't go in 2000 and see him win Olympic Gold for the 5th (I actually said 4th but it's wrong) time and I know Chalky would love to meet him and be inspired. (Chalk has since told me that he'd be as happy if I invited Cameron Diaz to dinner but hey, it's me sending out the invites...!)

It was supposed to be a one interview session and they were going to make a decision quickly and if successful I should hear within the next few days. Driving to work on Monday I got a phone call on my mobile from a private number - I answered with my heart in my stomach and it was EnergyAustralia they started by saying "thanks for coming in for the interview last week, we were really impressed (at this point I was just waiting for the BUT!) instead came and we'd like to invite you back to meet the senior managers and to just further discuss the team and the role in a little more detail, was I available the next afternoon? OF COURSE!!!!

Going back the next day I knew quite quickly that I was going to be offered the job, I wondered if they could tell exactly how excited I was from the goofy grin I felt was all over my face!

So after a quick chat with the senior boss I learnt that the team is really under performing and that I would have quite a bit of work to do but the only way is up and they were really pleased to have me on board and I would have their full support for the job!

I was planning on just going straight home so I could tell Chalk face to face but I couldn't contain my excitement when I left and I phoned him straight away! I just screamed into the phone. Unknown to me he'd considered following me into the city and was planning on being in a pub near by so that when I phoned him I could just meet him and we'd celebrate straightaway but then he thought that if I didn't find out how would he explain where he was and it would make me feel under more pressure!

So as I walked in our front door I heard the clink of glasses and the pop of a champagne bottle! He'd made reservations at the Summit http://www.summitrestaurant.com.au/ - the revolving restaurant in Australia Square, we were going out to celebrate! After making a few quick calls to share the news with family we headed into the city, stopping off at Zeta Bar http://www.zetabar.com.au/ for a cocktail before walking down to the summit, neither of us could stop smiling and it was a perfect evening. The food was divine and our conversation was so positive and full of energy. Certainly a night I won't forget and so perfect that we celebrated straight away.

The view from the restaurant

I've handed my notice in at Sony and my last day there is Thursday 6th Sept, I've got a week off before starting at my new job on 17/9. My new job is in the city, down near Chinatown, I work a 9 day fortnight and have a team of about 12 to manage! I'm sure that I'll do another post soon to tell you more details.
Zeta bar is also in London next time you're visiting as for the Summit that's a Sydney only experience and certainly worth doing so be sure to add it to your itinerary!

City To Surf - 72 years waiting to race

A special event - the streets were closed and 50,000 people joined dad to celebrate his birthday.

Well we did it! The weather was perfect and Dad was up for the challenge!

After a shaky start last week when I found out my friend hadn’t actually entered us in the race, I sent out feelers to see if anyone could help and on Saturday I got us 2 numbers – so Dad was Spyridouca and I was Deborah– nevermind! We had the numbers and we were in the race.

I baked us some Bill’s Banana Choc Chip bread (which has become the traditional food of walkers over here - we had some on our 22km walk last October when Joan was visiting), we joined the SOUL "back of the pack” crowd for the start and while we were waiting to start we heard that the winner had finished, in around 41 minutes. 2 minutes later we crossed the start and we were off and racing!

1/2 way 7km

We paced at around 12 minute kilometers and even though we had walked heartbreak hill before I think the preceding 5km might have been a little too much of a warm up and dad was starting to feel it in his ankle, we stopped for a breather and then pushed on downhill to Bondi.

The last kilometer is always the hardest and we were both delighted to see the finish line.

We had taken 3 hours and 2 minutes to finish – not a bad effort! (this was our timing on our watches the official time will vary as they give all the Back of the Pack 20 minutes off for their delayed start when in fact it took us 40 minutes to get to the start line!)

The oldest man who was a first time entrant was 87 – so since dad wasn’t registered as having done the race he could still take out the record in years to come!!!

Smiling through the pain! It's over.

Just because Dad likes numbers and co-incidences and we had 3 hours of conversation to cover we realized that in 2000 when I did the race on my birthday I turned 27! In 2007 when Dad did the race on his birthday he turned 72! It was all about the 7’s and 2’s today.

The Rockports performed beautifully and Dad’s delighted with them. I’ve checked in with him tonight, he’s been snoozing since I dropped him home and I’m sure he’ll have a great sleep tonight, I nearly wore him out but as you all know he’s got quite a few more years in him yet.

Clipping from the website: Well done Deborah on completing the 2007 Sun-Herald City2Surf. You were 50729th over the line with a time of 203:08.
Well done Spyridouca on completing the 2007 Sun-Herald City2Surf. You were 50730th over the line with a time of 203:09.

PS - Since the race dad has discovered that the discomfort in his ankle was actually gout, such a shame because otherwise he would have done the walk easy. Anyway it's something that can be managed, it's not caused by alcohol as dad has given up drinking so he's already talking about doing it again next year!!

PPS - I'll update the Queen story over the weekend.

Dinner with the Queen

This is just a teaser but recently I have been talking about having the Queen over for dinner - I'll fill you all in soon! Stay posted.

A bike ride, a new view and a winter swim

Last Sunday 5/8 in the depths of the Sydney winter we braved the elements for a Sunday bike ride along the northern beaches.
We lathered ourselves in sunscreen (as you do in winter!) and headed out with the bikes on the back of the car and found ourselves at Dee Why
While we didn't set off as early as we would have liked we still had a large part of the day ahead of us, usually it's Chalky who's first to call a break and stop for a sandwich but this time it was me, I was finding all the hills along the sea quite treacherous and needed a break, after only 3km!
Refuelled by a ham sandwich and salt & vinegar crisps we headed on toward Manly. We fought the crowds along the beachfront with all the pressure on me as Chalky's oversized handlebars don't take a bell so I've got to do the ringing for both of us - I nearly came off my bike when my handlebar got caught up with someone's shopping bag but I managed to stay upright.
So after Cabbage Tree Bay we climbed up Darley Road (where nearly a year ago we'd seen Nicole Kidman go by on her way to her wedding). Chalky hadn't been to North Head before and was very impressed with the view (who wouldn't be) so this has now been added to Joan's itinerary for her next holiday!
We stopped to eat the rest of our picnic and rest the legs before returning to Dee Why, we were pleasantly tired and while the day was starting to cool off someone decided to cool off by heading in to the see for a dip - mad englishman!

It was lovely to be out on the bikes again and I'm sure you'll have more posts soon with our riding adventures, hope you enjoyed the video - I've just learnt how to do this so I'll try to add a few more in future.

What a view - well worth the ride!