Another fantastic year with plenty of great joyous occasions and memories but sadly it has also been tinged with some sad moments too.
The following lists the important events close to our hearts for 2007:-
The year started off on a very sad note with our friend Cath Marlow passing away. I still don’t know how to talk about how sad this made us feel but we were devastated to lose such a lovely, beautiful, giving friend. We’ll always remember you mate!
Love life:-
- I made it through a full year of marriage. Who would have thought Michelle could put up with me that long?
- Alex and Deborah – got engaged and are planning to marry in Costa Rica next April. I worked with my ginger friend at the Bank of New York.
- Chris and Sarah – got married in October. Chris and I worked together a few years back when I first landed in the country.
- Matt and Carrie – our Saffa friends got engaged and we’re heading to their wedding in March 08.
- Jen and Tony – another uni gang member is engaged.
- Deni and Kurt – Michelle’s old workmate and flatmate found true love and got engaged too.
- Hayley and Damian – my sister announced that her and Jet’s daddy are getting married next year.
Destinations:-
- Started the year off with a weekend trip to Portugal stopping in at Lisbon and Sintra.
- Made our way to Seville and Barcelona in Spain with out mates G&K and J&K.
- We moved up the coast from Barcelona into Andorra for a skiing holiday and were joined by Matt and Pat, Brad & Jacks, Robyn & Sean.
- The sad passing away of my grandmother while in Spain saw us taking a trip back to Australia to spend time with family and friends.
- Thinking we’d never get an oppotunity like we had living in the UK, it was off to visit the expensive but most beautiful country of Iceland.
- Next stop was a brief stopover in NY city for a few days before making our way down to the Yucatan Penisular in Mexico with none other than G&K. Check out our video here.
- After a few weeks of actually working, we decided it was time for couple of weekend breaks. The first was to the Isle of Wight with Jamian and the second was to Bournemouth.
- In August, my mumma came to visit and we headed off to Prague and then to Paris.
- A definite destinations must for both M and I has been the Amalfi Coast and Cinque Terre in Italy. We spent 8 days travelling the coastlines of Italy and thought it was just wonderful.
- Sometimes it’s easy to overlook the beauty of your own backyard but spending a quiet weekend with Gerrod and Kristy in the New Forest countryside of England in November was wonderful. Old country town English life is refreshingly different to the big city.
- We were back at work for 4 weeks before jetting off to the African continent for a 4 day long weekend to Marrakech in Morocco.
- We saved the best for last and we’re now in France for a week in a gorgeous chalet to celebrate a winter xmas in the snow with our mates, Louisa and Steve and Gerrod and Kristy and Kirsty.
How we earnt money:-
- I completed a second 6 month contract with the Bank of NY before changing contracts to work with a consultancy working on rewriting the tesco.com grocery shopping web site. This ended up not being what I wanted out of a project so moved on to work for a media agency 90 seconds walk from my front door. Sweet!
- Michelle changed jobs too and started working as a Marketing Planning Manager for the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.
Where we lived:-
- For the first time in the UK we managed to not move. We’re loving our 1 bedroom flat in Chiswick and love being close to great friends. Gerrod and Kristy joining us in the UK and in Chiswick was another of the year’s highlights.
Visitors:-
- Xmas with Leisa – My sister is the greatest, it was awesome to spend xmas with family.
- My parents-in-law, not content with visiting us already a couple of years back, decided that they missed me too much and had to see me again.
- My mumma came to visit us in August and we did some travel over to Prague and Paris.
- And right now we’re lucky enough to have 2nd time visitors Lou and Steve spending xmas and new years with us.
New babies:-
- Ella – Ang and Rick’s second gorgeous daughter was born in April making Jenna the happiest sister in the world.
- Ol mate Fuller and Tone had their first child – Leah – a beautiful Norwegian princess.
- Lewis – Sylvia and Anthony’s first child born in April.
- Savannah – Geraldine and Ben’s second child also born in April.
- Joshua – Anthony and Leanne’s second child.
Musicals/Concerts/Entertainment:-
- If it wasn’t for my sister I would have got through this year without seeing a single musical – and that would have been heaven. Unfortunately we saw Chicago.
- The Spice Girls brought down the house with their awesome concert at the O2 Arena.
- Powderfinger – these guys can do no wrong.
- Crowded House – a wonderful experience at the Royal Albert Hall.
Miscellaneous:-
- We bought a house.
- I lost a pair of sunglasses, two ipods and washed a 3rd ipod. Thank god Apple released the new ipod touch for me to purchase and lose next year.
- We made the tough decision to leave London and we’ll be back in Brisbane in April 2008.
And what do we want most for 2008? For our good friend Matt to have a speedy recovery from his bone marrow transplant and be back on top, traveling the world again.
My apologies if I’ve left off an important event, occasion, or story. It’s just a genuine mistake and not a deliberate snub.
Happy 2008 everyone!
Canon SD850 – Once again, I managed to lose a digital camera. This time it was left on a bus on the way to a picnic. Being the 5th or 6th digital camera I have owned I’m getting sick of having to research and purchase them. I just took Gerrod’s word that this was a good one. So far, so good. Works a treat and lives up to Canon’s reputation for great image quality and production values.
Macbook Pro – The 3rd Mac for the Priebe family saw us selling off our first child as he no could fullfill the same need in our lives now that smaller, stronger and better mac children were available. A fine addition to the family, this machine just kicks ass. As a sidenote, it’s had a few growing pains this year aided by the fact that I’m a clutz and have spilt wine and beer directly over the keyboard. Apple support has been fantastic, fixing it all under warranty.
Apple TV – With a birthday approaching and Michelle not knowing what to get me, I suggested I continue my Apple fanboy obsession and that she purchase me an 
Playstation Portable (PSP) – I loved my Xbox 360 like a 3rd child but like a 3rd child he got less attention than my other children (the macbooks). I thought since I commute an awful lot why not sell this inferior child off and buy myself a pet to keep me occupied on the tubes/trains and planes. The PSP gets a whole lot more attention than the xbox and sparked off an obsession of lunch time competitions with my mate 
iPod Touch Ok, so I managed to 
Sony MDR NC60 Finishing off this years gadget list is these great pair of over-the-ear noise cancelling headphones from Sony. You can’t get by with the standard ipod earphones in London as the traffic and underground noise over powers the music and video. And I can’t handle in-ear NC headphones as the vacuum they cause in my ear causes me headaches. Enter these babies. Extremely comfortable, awesome asthetics and top notch sound quality. You can’t get better for the price. 
While the finger and the house are 
Powderfinger played a stellar concert with every song going off. It was one of my most favourite concerts ever.