Monday

It seems to be the month for medical procedures - or testing at least. After S's latest forays into the medical zone over the last couple of weeks, it was my turn today - but for a different body part. It is amazing how you can fool yourself that you're not concerned about having tests done, until you are actually having the tests done and they come at you with a needle which would not be out of place for injecting a horse, or perhaps an elephant. But it's all good as none of the catastrophic things they mentioned "might" happen in the pre-procedure briefing actually came to pass. It's probably a good thing they don't give you that particular piece of paper to bring home and, luckily, if others are anything like me, we quickly forget the possibility of a punctured lung (seriously - I told you the needle was "huge") or ... and see, how good is that, I've forgotten the other things already.

Who knew that so few places are open for breakfast in the Southport precinct before 7am. Even Ferry Road Markets are closed then, which is a shame since they do a decent coffee. But, if they had been opened, I wouldn't have made it to Daniel Stuart's - and they do a great coffee and the atmosphere, and food, is fantastic.

On my journeys - I drove around for a while looking for a breakfast venue and trying to replicate the car's "stuttering" - I saw a baobab tree and told myself to remember it so I could quiz S and M on where there is one (or an Australian version of one if it isn't actually the African version).

The roadworks in and around Southport for the coming of the light rail are still in full swing and I was very lucky to have cars to follow through the chicanes that are now the road.

It's still fairly hot here which may be why the car actually did repeat its "stutter" this morning and I was able to document it for discussion with the mechanic this afternoon. He thinks he knows what the problem is and on the basis of that I will now give the Volvo mechanic that S recommended a call and see if he can be any more "definite" about the problem and suggest if it is a "known" issue. I'll also ask him about the timing belt and whether it does need to be replaced at 100,000km on Volvos as I've heard. Ah Lars ...