It's so good to see the back of the inaugural K sports weekend. The preparation for it has consumed my like for the best part of the last 4 months and at last it's over. We had footy, softabll and games for the kids going over the weekend. Not even the death of a 22 yr old man from here put a stop to it, the show must go on was the general consensus. Amidst it all, there have been sorry ceremonies, wailing and a bit of a payback for the families of those who survived the rollover about 100km's East of here. It was a bit of a mad scramble at 5am on Sunday morning to get the pallet and a half of oranges out of the morgue in time for the new arrival. It was the only storage space availale.....At least the morgue smells nice now (or it did on Sunday). W didn't win either grandfinal but we did come runners up in both the softball and the football, each team taking home $500 each and $1000 each for the winning teams. There were discos and concerts until 2 in the morning and actually it was quite fun.

I was driving 2 men through town to someones house to pick up band equipment. As we soared down the dirt road at about 40km's an hour, they started shouting "bumpy bumpy bumpy". The volume of their shouts got louder and faster as we approached an invisible speed bump on the road which we hit it at 40km's an hour. No shit our heads hit the roof and the troopie creaked to a stop. They sat there in stunned silence as I said, " sorry, I thought you were commenting on the condition of the road". They laughed. I should add that the speed bumps out here aren't any ordinary speed bumps, they are more like equalateral triangles with a nice point at the top. They haven't been in the car with me since.

Mum and dad were here a couple of weeks ago. Dad bought his bulldogs scarf despite my protestations that he'd look like a fool wearing it in a place where the floor tiles are brown and gold for the Hawthorn footy club. Anyway, dad bought it anyway and one of the kids Janice took a liking to the colours and asked if she could have it. The week went by and we went to Alice then Uluru. I took a week off work to go with them. It was a great week and tough to come back after that, but come back I did with dads bulldogs scarf in tow. Dad asked me to give it to Janice. I tried to tell dad that Janice didn't really care about his beloved scarf and that he would be better to hold onto it, but NO! I had to bring it back and give it to her, so bring it back I did. Shortly after the friday night disco when I was dropping Janice at home, I brought out the scarf and said "John asked me to give this to you". She looked at the scarf, then she looked at me and said " Can I swap it for a ball". HAHAHA it was so funny, I just about wet my pants with laughter afterwards and delighted in telling dad I couldn't even give it away!! I still get such a lick out of that....

After mum and dad left to return to Melbourne, I drove 260km's north of alice to go to an sports weekend in another community. I stayed for the weekend, our football and softball teams were there. The footy team left the day before I did with 2 kungkas (girls) in tow.Actually I left with 4, then we got about 10 minutes out of town a dn 2 of them decided they wanted to stay for the football grandfinal, so I turned around and took them back. I had been given directions to go the back way to Papunya, so we set off from Yuendemu at 9am along the Nyirripi Road and turned left 40km's along as I had been told. It was a dirt track really but we continued along (the girls were asleep), I lost a mirror and half an antenna to some trees along the way, but I was happily driving along until 140km's and an hour and a half's driving out of Yuendemu - imagine my chagrin when we hit a dead end. So I turned the troopie around and back to Yuendemu we went, along the Tanami Hwy. We eventually left Yuendemu for the thrid time that day, at midday. A further 100km's along we got a flat tyre. An essential part of the jack was missing so we had to sit by the road and wait. Thankfully it wasn't for too long as 3 police cars pulled up returning to Alice from the sports weekend. They changed the trye for us and away we went. It was later revealed that the 40km turnoff should have been 25km's - It had been forgotten that the pervayer of that information had been driving around Yuendemu for 15km's befpore he gave me the directions. oh handy! Thanks for that. We got back eventually, and since I have been reminded about 'getting lost' quite consistently by the locals who find it absolutely hilarious!! Need less to say it wasn't a local who gave me the directions. You can't rely on anyone out here I tell ya......

Anyway, See you in a few days. I've chucked it in for now. Need arest and a beer. Al

Ok I'm still here. I keep waking up and finding myself in the same concrete, dirt filled room. I don't know what's going on. I can't quite settle into permancy here, yet nor can I bring myself to leave. I'm so confused.....Buggered if I know how I'm still here. I think it was a mistake telling the CEO that I'd stay until they found a replacement. No ones coming, EVER.

Since I 'resigned' I have grown to love the kids, some more than others it must be said. The little mongrels throwing rocks at the green shed get less of it than others. They have so much potential and the longer I'm here the more empathy I have for them and the fact that they will never know what it's like to have choices. The choices I had when I was a kid. Is it to be netball,basketball or softball? Guitar or piano? The Jungle Book soundtrack or The Nolan Sisters.....The choices I took for granted.