Busy day today. Lawn mowing guys arrived at 7am and are just about finished. Real estate agent showing house to a prospective buyer at 9am. Guests for lunch at 12pm. NYE celebrations tonight.

Thanks to the incompetent moron who took the better part of 25mins to completely fvck up our drinks, this is the sh1thouse view we are left with to watch MEET THE FOCKERS. So much for getting here early for a good seat. This better be a funny movie - I need a laugh. Talk about being in a filthy mood.

I am so pissed off right now. The stupid mole you can see here completely screwed up my movie-going experience tonight. This is at GREATER UNION CAMPBELLTOWN.

It began with waiting in a queue that seemed to be going nowhere. Observing the girl serving, it was easy to see why. Instead of batching "like tasks" eg getting both of someone's orders for popcorn at the same time, she would read each item off the register screen - fetch it - return - repeat. The couple in front of me had three kids, which equated to five drinks, two popcorns, two icecreams, one bag of snakes and one bag of chips. 12mins later, she had finished serving them and I approached the counter.

"Yes?" was her surly, pathetic 'greeting'.

"Hi! One medium Diet Coke and one large frozen coke, please," I requested in my cheeriest tone - a half-hearted attempt to surpress my disappointment thus far.

She then proceed to pick up a cloth and start mopping the corner of the counter (2 feet from where I was) where some drink had spilled. For three whole minutes she slowly wiped the counter while I waited for my two drinks. After five minutes, I had one medium Diet Coke and a large frozen Coke cup. "You have to fill that yourself over there ".

"Sure. No problem", and I handed over the cash. As I was paying my $8.50 for the two drinks (RORT!), I asked where the straws were. "At the end!" was her terse reply. "I'm sorry, at the end of what?" "END OF THE BENCH!" she snapped. My blood started to boil.

Our plans to split up (one get tix and one gets drinks) and rejoin in the queue failed dismally. Linda, who held the tickets, jumped out of the queue - which had since filed into the cinema - and came looking for me.

I went to where the Frozen Coke machine was and flicked the lever. Frothy water sprayed everywhere and I observed that the overflow tray had been routed to a cleaning bucket via a makeshift hose arrangement. I tried the raspberry slushie instead - same result. Back to see Little Miss Helpful.

I waited (for a solid 5mins) for her to finish with the couple she was serving before I slid in from the side and requested her attention. "Excuse me, but I think there's a problem with your Frozen Coke machine".

Her response almost floored me, "Yes, it has been broken all afternoon!". I was too flabbergasted to speak. I wanted to scream, "SO WHY THE HELL DID YOU PROCEED WITH A SALE FOR A FROZEN COKE IF YOU KNEW IT WAS BROKEN?!"

Instead, I calmly asked for a cup of Coke instead. I handed over my sticky, partially-raspberry-filled cup so she could deal with it. Oh - and did she deal with it! She tipped the raspberry remnants into the drink machine slops tray, filled it with Coke and handed it back. No new cup. No apology. No eye contact.

Again, I was too shocked to explod. Too angry to complaint in a rational manner. And now, too late to get a decent seat in the theatre.

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POSTSCRIPT 7 JANUARY 2005 Greater Union is now going to FORCE its patrons to endure this sort of service if they want something to eat/drink on their premises. Check out the news article here.

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POSTSCRIPT 9 JANUARY 2005 In a forum that I read, someone wrote ...Cheap cinema's: you get what you pay for..., to which I replied

And what's that exactly?

Your satisfaction with paying over-inflated prices for the shit dished up by Greater Union is proof positive of the old adage, "there's one born every minute".

Hotdogs and Pepsi Max. Champion food for a lazy bugger like me.

(Must have accidentally set the phone camera to 160x120 mode). And this, folks, is the finished product. Time to sit down for some coffee and a bowl of yoghurt'n'strawberries. Not sure what I'm doing today, but keep your eyes on the phlog and you'll find out about the same time I do ;-)

Making a *real* cup of coffee at home in the morning is one of the things I love about being on holidays (aka "vacation" for you Yanks ;-). This morning I'm making cappucinos with the "African Sanctus" blend of beans, from Australian coffee blender, Jasper Coffee (http://www.jaspercoffee.com).

This bag of beans was a gift from Jessica and Luke. Opening the bag reveals a medium-dark roasted beans and the aroma is sweet, full and woody. Probably not the best cappucino blend (better suited to a short or long black), but it will do the trick for today.

Our poor old espresso machine is on its last legs, so I will have to be very patient as it builds up pressure!

Tonight we're sitting in front of the TV with one of my Christmas DVDs (Harvie Krumpet), a bowl of fresh strawberries, and some of Linda's mum's homemade lemon sorbet. I feel so content right now... but my thoughts are very much with the poor tsunami victims.

Lunch with our friends Jane and John who are up from Melbourne. Stopped off at THE BITE in Parramatta for a catch-up.

Linda takes command of the open road. Not out to set any new land speed records today - lots of police on the F3 freeway and double licence demerit points in force until 3 January 2005. Will set cruise control at 120km/h and take it very easy.

Geena's strapped in. All of our bags and presents are packed. Just have to say goodbye to the folks and we're back on the road. It's been an excellent break away, but we're still looking forward to getting home. Linda will be doing the driving as I'm coming down with the flu and have a bad headache and sore eyes. Bugger.