On top of the waves

If I ever say I can do anything, I'm lying. Last night was testimony to this. Me and a few mates got together at Coogee beach to do some fishing, and I ended up catching no fish. Zilch. Nada. Maybe next time. Not all was lost though - it was good hanging with Tony - I don't see him a lot so I was happy to spend some time with him.

I still don't think Alisha likes me. It's 'cause I'm black.

Looking at the sunset, one thought persisted in my mind - "It's so great to be on holidays."

What's at the bottom of the sink?

It's the question on everybody's mind. Well not everybody's - mainly mine. My curiosity was sparked a while ago when I saw my asian friends cleaning the dishes using running tap water instead of filling the sink with dishwashing liquid and hot water. Apparently they are weary of the bacteria living at the bottom of the sink.

So I wanted to get to the bottom of this - is there really bacteria living in our humble sink? I devised a quick experiment to figure this out:

Two different swab samples would be taken from the sink- one first thing in the morning (to see if any bacteria are there under normal conditions) and another after running hot water with dishwashing liquid and emptying the sink. A negative control was done to confirm aseptic technique. These swabs would then be plated on a few different agar plates.

The plates were inoculated and incubated for 24hrs. The results are shown below. Note the order of the agar are: Blood, Choc, MAC and CNA.

Swab 1 - four colonies


Swab 2 - two colonies



The results were interesting. There were four different colonies present on swab 1 - showing that some baddies grow in your sink overnight and will remain there unless the sink is cleaned. Good news though - sample 2 shows that dishwashing liquid and hot water effectively kill a lot of the bacteria present.

So, looking at these results, I'm still going to wash my dishes in the sink.

On a different topic, depending on which days you visited my blog, you probably noticed it changed appearance a few times. I was playing around with a few different designs and have settled for this one - I like it a lot.

Last night was youth and AllStar was a bit low in numbers - the lowest we have had so far. I had this strange experience during the praise - it felt as if we were just putting on a show for the kids, and it reminded me of something that's been on my heart a bit lately - we really need to be seeking God on behalf of these kids - because He is the one who changes lives. He is the one who can make them whole.

Success and Failure

I did it, finally. And I think I passed! It was my first exam this morning.

Before I blog any further, let me introduce you to the newest member of the family, Jethro:

He's a bit of a spunk, isn't he? He is of the HP species. The next sassy individual to make us a trio will be the yet-to-be-named backpack of Crumpler origin:



So now to the failures ... I was procrastinating the other day and wandered over to the site failblog.org to waste some time and I had a wonderful time laughing at failures! One of my favourites:


Ouch.

Sorry Natalie, but your parking was a bit of a failure last Wednesday night:

I walked into Coles this afternoon and saw a sign that grabbed my attention. You see, in retail, it's pretty bad if you advertise a special, but don't have any stock to supply the customer. So to save face and keep the customer happy, the finger is usually pointed at someone else ... but in which direction should they point? Funnily enough, I was talking to Kristy at work on Saturday and we've realised that the universal excuse is a train derailment. Apparently Toyworld currently have no Nintendo Wii's due to a 'train derailment', and Coles seem to be crying 'train derailment' also:

It seems these train derailments happen quite often ... are people injured? Is stock damaged? Why don't we ever see this on the news?

And this got me thinking ... sometimes we use universal excuses in our lives. When there's a discrepancy in our character or actions, we quickly pull-out a universal excuse. We want to cover-up what's really happening. We want to keep people happy. We want to save face.

But God wants us to be real with ourselves and each other. He doesn't want us to hide behind excuses or lies, but He desires us to be honest. And despite what our flesh tells us, people will value and love us for our honesty.

Scooter pie.

'Tis the season to be jolly?

Yes, that time could be nothing less than exam time.

But there's nothing sweeter than studying hard, and then chillaxing with a mate and taking a hike! You'll understand when you see the photos:

We hiked to the top and enjoyed our packed dinner:

• Tuna with crackers
• Celery
• Yogo
• Fruit

How's that for healthy? Cheap too - $7.40 between us both.
Jonny leaves on Sunday and for me it's the most inconvenient time for Jonny to go overseas - I'll be on uni break with plenty of free time and nobody to spend it with! (hint hint people ... I'm available to hang soon). He's gonna have such an awesome time though.

A lot has happened since my last blog. Yes, it was a while ago - my apologies - but I just can't seem to priotise blogging above studying. I'm thinking that's a good thing though! Since then:

• I bought a brand spankin new laptop, named Jethro. He's very attractive.
  

• I created a Skype account, with absolutely no idea how to use Skype. Add me - jason.bevo.

• I have been offered a job at PathWest in Armadale - an exciting opportunity for me!

• The Bible teaches us not to judge, so keep that in mind when I say this - I watched High School Musical 2 and loved it. Bring on HSM3.

To my fellow studyers, all the best in your exams :) Study hard and achieve the marks you deserve. Stick close to God and you'll find the stress will fly right over your head.

Hoola hooping fabulous.