Tour Guide

The end of another exhausting week where I've either been acting as taxi and tour guide or chief cook and bottom-wiper at home; one of those weeks where you're so tired your eyes don't stop stinging.

On Wednesday we took a bus down into the city where we met Kath and Annette for breakfast at Circular Quay. And after that we sort of hit all of the Australiana shops because Kath wanted some aboriginal art and Annette wanted a didgeridoo, so by half three I'd seen more novelty kangaroo scrotum wallets than you could shake a stick at.

Which was nice.

And then we did afternoon tea in the Queen Victoria Building, though it got the thumbs down from Annette when she said it reminded her of the faux-plasterwork in the Trafford Centre (I think she might be missing the point because the QVB is the real thing and the Trafford Centre is a 1990's monstrosity).

On Thursday (yesterday) the heavens opened so that even the radio DJs were calling it "a shocker". It looked like a very bad winter's day in Manchester so I collected them from their hotel (where they were huddled in the doorway wearing stylish ponchos) and we had breakfast at bill's in Surry Hills; the Surry Hills branch of his restaurant being even more cramped than the one in Darlinghurst, though the food was marginally better and the sight of Annette fulfilling her foodie's ambition of stuffing her face with one of his signature dishes sort of made up for the appalling conditions outside.

The dish in question was the ricotta hotcakes with banana and honeycomb butter. By ten o'clock she was all hotcaked out.

In the afternoon we went shopping at Bondi Junction, having realised there's really very little to do in Sydney in weather like that. Then it cleared up a bit so we drove the clifftop walk from Coogee up to Bondi, where we tucked into fresh fillets of shark before heading up to South Head, where we stood at Gap Bluff taking in the entrance to Port Jackson. And then, of course, it was booze o'clock, so we sat in the sun at Watson's Bay admiring the yachts bobbing on the harbour.

Today I was exhausted, though it was really good to have been tour guide yesterday and made me realise how well I've come to know the history and geography of the city; probably better than some Sydneysiders you might meet (particularly on the history).

Today it was back to the potty training, which means coaxing Ella not to poo in her knickers in the corner of her bedroom. No luck so far; every new day brings fresh challenges.