What does October mean to you?
While our northern hemisphere friends are finding the days are shorter and the leaves are falling, here is Brisbane we are in the middle of spring. To me, October means the beautiful flowering jacaranda trees, which means that exam time is looming for students (been a few years since we’ve had to worry about that!) – and the early days of the month are part of the spring school holidays (again, not something we tend to remember these days!).
The shops of course are full of Halloween merchandise, it’s a holiday we seem to have adopted from our American friends as it wasn’t really a “thing” when I was growing up.
Meanwhile – here’s what happened in our household in October 2023!
1 October – We were on Coochiemudlo Island for the long weekend, went for a beach walk at low tide and spotted movement in the water – behold, the husbear caught a little wobbegong (type of shark) with his (almost) bare hands! As luck would have it he’d brought gloves.
2 October – Finished my latest puzzle with some assistance from Miss 26.
3 October – I like having our daughter back home – today she bought us an ice cream treat!
4 October – I’ve been trying to schedule the majority of my meetings for a Wednesday, and today it was back-to-back meetings. In the evening I had cuddles with Seth.
5 October – I’m knee deep in monthly reporting for my clients. Was meant to have another meeting but it was postponed, kinda glad, feeling a bit “meeting’d” out after yesterday!
6 October – Spent some time hanging with Miss 26 and her kitties Maisy and Egg in their “suite”.
7 October – Weekend at Coochie with some friends, as night set in we relaxed around a brazier / campfire.
8 October – BBQ breakfast is served!
9 October – Back to the real world of work today seeing as it is Monday after all!
10 October – Fleur gave her daddy lots of cuddles while we were relaxing on the couch watching some TV.
11 October – My computer spat the dummy and refused to work! Fortunately I store everything on the Cloud these days, but my laptop isn’t really set up for full time work and I’d lost all my bookmarks on Google Chrome. What a stressful day 🙁 … At least we’d put the slow cooker on so dinner was taken care of: silverside and veges with cheese sauce, so yummy!
12 October – Presented a workshop for a business group this morning and invited my team member Shaheeda to join us – and took her out for lunch afterwards. When you find a great team member, it’s important to look after them!
13 October – Friday night Netflix, we watched a lovely movie called “Happiness for Beginners”.
14 October – We voted in the referendum, then visited my Dad who is in respite care for a couple of weeks while our stepmum is in Melbourne visiting family.
15 October – I’ve been putting it off for months but finally got stuck into it – cleaning out my wardrobe that is! Definitely worth the effort though.
16 October – The husbear made a yummy stew for dinner – this pic of Seth shows how I feel after a good meal …
17 October – Yay! The husbear was able to fix my computer, glad I don’t need a new one. We’re still not sure what was wrong with it, he took it apart and cleaned everything (inside was coated in dust) and it came good. So long as it works!
18 October – Wednesday is meetings day, starting with BNI in the morning. I then had a coffee with a friend who specialises in Facebook marketing, haven’t seen her in ages but we occasionally refer clients back and forth, good to catch up on the goss. So it was kind of a work meeting, kind of a catch up 😉 .
19 October – I attended the local Key Business Network breakfast, as a substitute for my business coach who is away on holidays. Lovely friendly group and some good connections made.
20 October – After admiring the shoes that one of the other women wore yesterday, and asking her about them – I ordered a pair online! I prefer heels with a strap, otherwise they tend to slide off when I walk (especially if I’m wearing pantihose); they can be very hard to find but these were Diana Ferrari Super Soft, a brand I know and love so that’s why I didn’t waste a minute! Plus the price had been reduced!
21 October – An early start to catch our 9.05am flight for our holiday in Darwin. However when we arrived at the hotel, they said our booking had been cancelled – WTF?! Turns out I’d booked in July using a bank card that expired in August, which shouldn’t have been a problem because we weren’t charged until we arrived. But because of the expired card, they cancelled our booking. Apparently they’d tried to ring twice but I’d never gotten back to them. Not impressed – I get so many spam calls that these days I tend not to respond unless it’s somebody I know OR they leave a message. We were a bit flabbergasted – they clearly hadn’t tried too hard, I mean what about email or text or leaving a message?! In the end we managed to re-book there and then but certainly not a great start to our holiday!
22 October – Gosh, there’s so much I want to share about our adventures in Darwin. But seeing as this is meant to be a “Sentence A Day” I might leave the details for a separate post about and I’ll keep it short and sweet here: today’s adventure included a tour of the old WWII tunnels and a visit to the Mindil Beach Sunset Markets.
23 October – Lunch at Stokes Hill Wharf; Royal Flying Doctor Service museum, and the Bombing of Darwin WWII experience.
24 October – NT Parliament House and library/museum, Waterfront Precinct, sunset at Cullen Bay.
25 October – Fannie Bay Gaol, Darwin Military Museum and other WWII relics; then fish feeding at high tide at Aquascene.
26 October – Jumping Crocs boat tour on the Adelaide River; lunch at Humpty Doo Hotel; swim at Berry Springs; and another visit to the Mindil Markets (last one for the year, they’re not held during the Wet Season).
27 October – All good things must come to an end, we flew back to Brisbane and arrived home around 7.30pm, where two kitty cats were VERY happy to see us. Miss 26 had thoughtfully provided a couple of treat sachets so we could spoil them when we returned!
28 October – Lots of unpacking and washing! Our lovely daughter made lasagne for dinner.
29 October – To defeat those Sunday and end of holiday blues, we decided to play tourist in our own city. We took the River Cat to South Bank, had lunch, and wandered around the markets. I got a cool pair of handmade earrings, love to support local business!
30 October – Miss 26 is at it again! Tonight she made us a wonderful dinner of pork spare ribs.
31 October – Trick or treat or nah?! Once again we were all set for Halloween … and once again we didn’t get any visitors. Wonder how long it will take us to get through this stash?!
All in all, October was a pretty good month – and our holiday to Darwin was an absolute stand out, can’t wait to spill the beans in another blog post!
What did you love most about this month’s Sentence A Day post?!
