The Network Ten TV show Totally Wild came down to Tasmania a while ago to film a story about the Tasmanian Devil facial tumour disease. They dedicated most of the show to the Devils plight, but one section is of special interest to us because Mel's daughter Tamsyn appears in one shot and there are a few other mates of ours in there as well. This part of the story was filmed at St Aloysius Primary School and features Nature Nic. I don't think I'm meant to post this on YouTube, however I reckon anything that might raise public awareness of this evil disease has to be a good thing. If you think that your school might like to hold a black and white day to raise money to support the research then click through to Nature Nic's website or go to the Tasmanian Government's Tassie Devil site.

I haven't provided any updates on my tennis progress because I haven't been doing very well. I start off OK and usually win my doubles games, but my serve has been terrible and by the time I've played my two doubles games I'm stuffed and that's when I have to front up for my singles game. Most of my opponents are heaps younger than me so they usually run me into the ground.

This week I won both doubles matches and I was hitting some really good serves. I only made two double faults all night and I was getting a fair bit of power into some of them as well. I wasn't meant to be playing at all but I was asked if I could fill in for someone who couldn't make it. The guy I had to play in the singles had thrashed me 6 games to 1 last time we played, but I have improved a bit and was determined to do well.

I started well and was up 3 games to 1 when he snapped. He became really angry and started yelling and belting the ball into the fence and stuff. It really was a bit scary. On top of that he changed and started to dispute line calls. I fired down my best serve ever. It was just inside the centre line of the service box, but he insisted that it was out.

He started to serve to me before I was ready. On one occasion he smashed the ball past me straight into the fence and then whilst I had my back to him to get rid of the ball he served again and claimed the point. I refused to accept that and made him serve again, but by now I was becoming a bit pissed off myself. He also started to tap serves over the net. That's probably in the rules, but it's not sportsmanlike to smash a serve and then tap one over the next time.

It all culminated when on match point he served from the wrong side. I batted the ball into the net and told him he served from the wrong side, but he claimed the game. He said that he should have served from that side because he must have mucked up with an earlier ball. I was furious. I decided then and there that I was going to give up tennis altogether, but that would have been silly as everyone else there is really helpfull and friendly. It was just sad to loose what had been a good and close game like that. I wonder if he was happy with himself when he got home and had a chance to think about it?

Sue Napier wanted to know where the lockers were. Apparently there aren't any, the students will have their own bins in their pods. Sounds funky, but it's just the new Kingston High School. It doesn't matter that there aren't any lockers because the grade sevens have them now but most don't use them. What does Sue Napier have to do with it? I was sworn in at Parliament House yesterday to give evidence in support of our new school to the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Public Works.

I say Parliament House because that's where I entered (yes the machine beeped again because of the steel toes in my shoes), but typical of the rabbit warren that it is we actually ended up in 10 Murray Street I think. I was shown to a seat at a massive table with three big microphones hanging from the roof so that the Hansard girl could hear everything we said. I had to swear (strange term) to tell the truth, the whole truth etc etc and then the politicians were wheeled in. Whilst they were sitting down a camera crew came in with a huge TV camera and plonked it down opposite me. This worried me a little bit, but when he then put a microphone directly in front of me but didn't give anyone else one I really started to panic. No one told me I would be on the telly! I looked over at Helen (our Principle) and noticed that she seemed just as nervous as me so that made me feel a lot better.

The committee comprised Sue Napier (shadow Minister for Education and other stuff), Brenton Best (Deputy Speaker of the House of Assembly and other stuff) and Greg Hall (Independent Member of the Legislative Council). The Deputy Secretary for Corporate Services at the Department of Education, Greg Glass started off by speaking to the huge submission document that they had put together, then the Principal Architect from Hassell gave a presentation on the design before the committee started to ask questions. Strangely this was where the TV guys left, I assume they must have had something more interesting to film, at least that meant I wouldn't be on the telly because I hadn't even spoken at that point.

They moved onto Graham Bury (the Mayor) and asked more questions. Their questions were really good ones actually. They did a great job of representing the voting public as most of them had already been asked by parents at one meeting or another. They wanted to know about upkeep costs with the wooden exterior, extra costs associated with the green roofs (as in grass), using recycled water in the toilets, the students having access to information from the heating and cooling systems and of course, lockers amongst many other things. I had been told I wouldn't need to prepare a presentation so I didn't, however I did have something planned in my head just in case. As it turned out I wasn't asked one single question, so I had to jump in on other peoples questions to make sure that I still had a say. We were all then dismissed from the table back to the public chairs and then private submissions were taken.

First was Councilor David Grace. David is always outspoken so I was looking forward to hearing what he had to say. He had a few issues, well actually he had a lot of issues (Hansard will do a much better job than me of recording them so I won't try to do that here) and he made sure that he put them all before the committee. Then another lady (Julie Taylor) spoke, but she had a really soft voice and I couldn't hear a lot of it. She said she wasn't representing the Kingston Bypass Access Group (I think that is their name), but then went on to represent them so I'm not sure if I heard that bit correctly or not. I think her concern was related to traffic flows when the new school opens and she wanted to ensure that the new Kingston bypass was built before the school opened. Traffic and student/pedestrian safety was the biggest concern that the parent/guardian group had as well, so I could understand her concerns. We have been told by the experts that traffic impact at school times should be negligible and the council have shown us their plans to realign the road (Kingston View Drive) outside the new school and the existing sports centre, as well as plans to build a new car park and bus turning area so we have had our concerns satisfied for now.

 That was it. I walked back into town with the Mayor and chatted about stuff and it was weird to see the way people would recognise him and point and stuff. I see the same thing happening when a very pretty lady walks down the street, guys heads turn all over the place (I don't do that of course!) and I wondered if they (the pretty ladies and the Mayor) notice it as much as I did.

 The next day heaps of people got in touch to tell me that I was on the ABC news. Apparently they used some footage they took of me and our Principal just sitting there listening intently. If I can find a copy of the news story I'll post it here and if you didn't see the link above you can click here to view the Hansard version of events. If you want to see a copy of the consultants brief, project brochure,  media releases etc then click here, although the information there is a bit old now.

It's about time I did another share update. Not only has it been a couple of months since my last update, but it's also been exactly twelve months since I started this caper. This is a key date for me because I decided to give myself one full year before deciding if share trading was for me. It is! This whole share thing has gone better than I could have ever imagined. I'm certainly not rich (yet) as I didn't invest that much money in the first place (I'm not telling you how much, that's none of your business!), however I have seen a very nice profit over the year. If I had left the money in the bank I would have made around 7% interest for the year. By putting that money into the stock market I have made 39% (and that's after all costs, but before tax). What makes me even more happy is that at the same time the Australian stock market (all ordinaries) has gone backwards to the tune of 9%. I should have lost money, but instead I've turned in a huge profit and I'm perfectly placed to extend that when the market as a whole starts to recover. Am I happy ...... you bet!