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Two days at home by myself, two days of sheer laziness! A little browsing on the net, a little wandering around Oakleigh and surrounds. A whole lot of nothing very much.

This morning I walked off down the rail line to Huntingdale — a real run-down collection of tiny little shops. Very cheap fruit and vegetables, a couple of dusty travel agents, then lost myself in one of the second-hand goods stores. Floor to ceiling junk, I could barely turn around in the aisles. Old 486 PCs, 45s, 78s, old pianola rolls, floppy disks by the fist full, every kind of storage media you've ever seen, all covered in dust and all slung in a box or on a shelf.

Back to Oakleigh for lunch, bruschetta and beer and the same crowd of old Greek men smoking and young Greek lads hanging about. Neither lot ever seems to buy anything, they just sit and talk. Old men talking quietly and earnestly, young men talking loudly and assertively. Somewhere around them three or four other customers arrive, drink, eat, pay and leave!

New Years' Eve. The end of a good year. Last bike ride of the year. A seven a.m. start from somewhere in Fairfield, six of us headed out on a two hour ride out around Heidelburg, Doreen, various hilly parts to the north east of the city, then back again. The last few months have seen me only riding to and from work, laziness, house-moving, holidays, it all hit hard as I could barely keep up and had to be almost carried back the last stretch to Mill Park! The coffee at Tom's house aftewards was a life-saver.

Off to the Rosstown this evening for the New Years' gig. Dave Graney & the Lurid Yellow Mist — a fantastic band name, but a fairly dull and lacklustre show. I'm not sure who the intended audience was, maybe we were too young, it just didn't quite seem to gell with the crowd, the band, the brightly lit room and the music. Trains there and back were packed, nearly requiring a shoe-horn to get on at Oakleigh, I feel sorry for anyone trying to head for the city and get on at Caulfield or further in! Back out it was slightly better, we could stand without being stood on, and its only a couple of stops from Carnegie to Oakleigh and home.