The State of Australian Beer

What a small, twisted world. I was reading about some Aussie breweries, and learned the "Big Two" here are Fosters and a Japanese-controlled company called Lion Nathan, which I'd never heard of. (Kirin Holdings owns LN.) LN owns: Tooheys, Hahn, James Squire, Boag's, etc. They also own several Australian and NZ wineries, and one in the USA: Argyle Winery in dear ole Dundee, Oregon. Wacky.

Also, Little Creatures, which I thought was independent, is actually owned by Little World Beverages, which is about 40% owned by...Lion Nathan. (Although, Little World director Howard Cearns characterizes Little Word as "fiercely independent," saying Lion Nathan's stake is a "passive investment.")

Finally, last month SABMiller put in a $10 billion takeover bid for Fosters. Apparently some of the smaller Aussie brewers want it to go through, because if it did, they would be some of the last Aussie-owned breweries left. The Australian reports, "A successful foreign purchase of Foster's would leave South Australia's family-owned Coopers -- with just 3.6 per cent of the domestic beer market -- as Australia's leading brewer."

Sources:
http://www.perthnow.com.au/business/wa-company-news/boutique-brewers-raise-glass-to-takeover-talk/story-e6frg2s3-1226080417937
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/bn-fosters-bid-from-sabmiller-leaves-bitter-taste/story-e6frg8zx-1226079564027
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_World_Beverages
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_Nathan

Welcome to the Family

We do not have the best record with houseplants. However, we have decided to keep trying! We recently added another plant to the family: Agnes the aglaonema.

She joins Chuck the gollum jade, and Otto the umbrella plant. Wish us luck!

Photos from Whale Watching Trip

The weekend before last we went on a 3-hour whale watching trip with our friends Alison and Jon. We had great weather, and did glimpse some humpback whales! 

Matthew, Jon and Alison - setting out.

Humpback whale!

Whale tail.

Spout.

Panorama of sailboats in front of the Opera House and Harbour Bridge.

Here's the link to the rest of my photos from the day.

Photos from our April Bridge Climb

Back in April, our friends Janine and Deanna were here visiting, and we all did the Harbour Bridge Climb together. We had a great time! Luckily the weather was beautiful that day. We had to wear silly jumpsuits, and were clipped on via safety belts the entire time, so it wasn't scary. 

Well, I finally scanned the photos, so here they are, quite belated.

Silly group photo.

 Janine, Deanna, Amanda and Matthew.

 Amanda and Matthew underneath "Blinky Bill," the red aviation safety light in the middle of the bridge. Traffic was going by way down below that catwalk. Yes, that is wind in my puffy suit. ;)

Thanks again to Deanna and Janine for joining us on this fun adventure.

Jury Duty

Image: Library of Congress

I just received some forwarded mail from Oregon, which included a Summons for Jury Service that was for last month. Ooops! I just tried to complete the online E-Juror form, but it was not set up to be able to enter a foreign address. Hmmm, we'll see if they come after me!

Travel Books List

Hey peeps! (I like to pretend there are heaps of you out there reading this.) You like travel, and you like reading, right?

Budget Travel Magazine recently ran an article titled "25 Greatest Travel Books of All Time," which seemed worth a peruse, but the original article was divided up over six pages, and there was lots of clicking and a dumb pop-up. So annoying! My favourite thing on the New York Times and the New Yorker's websites is the "Single Page" option, which means you do NOT have to clicky clicky so much to read the whole article.

Sooo, I copied and pasted BT's whole article into a Google Doc and formatted it all pretty. And, since I went to all that trouble, I thought I'd share it with you, dear readers. Now, there better be some good books on this darn list...

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vQi91qvTvej80m49Zhae4Ut0rBrdXW2IMpTF0Fy2QZ0/edit?hl=en_US