Answer to Week 5 of Where Art Thou is the No. 5 Cafe located along Centre Way! As promised, the special cafe muffin deal ($4 small coffee + muffin) is free for Edouard, who guessed it right first before 11.59pm! Just let me know when you want it Edouard!

The score currently looks like this. Looks like we have finally established our first leader! With the correct guess of a difficult picture, Edouard has scored 2 points. He leapfrogs above everyone else and streaks ahead. Well done again Edouard!

Edouard - 3 points
Neil - 1 point
Bjorn - 1 point
Neomien - 1 point

What with the majority of us writers being students, and with exams around the corner, i’ve been slow to update the Where Art Thou series. But never fear! After a 2 week hiatus, Where Art Thou is back, with 2 pictures to guess! Which means more chances to score!
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Its Halloween today. An import from overseas, what do we do during Halloween since it is gaining more popularity, especially among the younger generations?

Around my place, the kids dress up and door knock for candies and chocolates. These days, there is usually an adult who accompanies the kids, just in case, they get into any trouble. What about your suburb?

Or how about a visit to the Haunted Bookshop and experience one of their Haunted Melbourne Ghost Tour?

[I better start posting entries again before Sean kicks me off the author list!]

I know day-light saving change has already kicked in for 5 days, it is repeating every year and neominen has already talked about it.

But the truth is, I still cannot get use to it - it’s 7:20pm right now and there is nothing outside looks like 7:20pm. (well, maybe except the fact that all shops are closed…) Also, it seems like time is running much faster than it should be, I slept at 4 something this morning, and it did not feel like 4 in the morning at all.

So, how long does it usually take you to get over the “time difference”?

This past Sunday was open day at the Royal Exhibition Building over in Carlton. Brian, of the Fitzroy blog, Fitzroyalty, took some nice pictures of the building. It seems like the Exhibition Building is barely being used. Most big exhibitions (Sexpo, Car Show, Factory Seconds) seem to go to the Melbourne Exhibition Centre in Southbank. The two times I have been there (Beerfest, cheap bedding sale), the shows were barely using half of the space in the building.

The IMAX Cinema seems even worse. I love IMAX but the theatre is huge and it never fills up. IMAX Melbourne never gets any of the good IMAX films such as The Matrix. In fact, they are still playing the same movie I saw 4 years ago. How do IMAX and the Exhibition Building not bleed out money?

hey guys. we had some good story suggestions so far.

if there’s anything you’d like to add to the melbourne metroblog or something you’d like to let us know about, please feel free to suggest a story! i can’t promise we’ll post it, but if its relevant we’d certainly love to write about it.

I have written before how World Cup soccer frustrates the hell out of me. I love when countries compete in any competition but soccer at the end of the day always lets me down. Just like a battered wife, I will continue to come back and watch this sport.

In an interview aired yesterday, World Cup soccer boss Sepp Blatter made an apology to Australian fans and went as far as saying Australia should have gone through to the World Cup finals instead of Italy. He also admitted that players are cheating more and the referee’s were obviously watching a different game.

Its good to see that FIFA has finally acknowledged the utter bullshit of what was perhaps the most controversial call in Australian sport. Was Blatter’s comments a save face to not discourage Australian’s interest in the world game or does FIFA truly believe the game needs an overhaul? Only time will tell…

Blatter sorry for penalty (The Age)

Bonus: The Zidane headbutt parodies still make me laugh. Check them out here.

21 octogenarian American tourists arrived for dinner last night while i was working the dinner shift in the hotel. The tables have already been set and the 2-course dinner meant that the main course was served alternatedly. So Joe Blogg will get veal and lemon tarts while his missus gets the lamb and chocolate cake.
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Suburb View

Mark says:

When I realised that looking for my first home what a time consuming process it involved, I thought there had to be a better way.

With the introduction of Google Earth, looking at houses with a birds eye view, there was no current way of finding what houses were for sale, and more importantly how much they cost.

The site was launched in early August and I believe this was the first Australian site using Google Earth to display Property Listings. It slowly morphed to use Google Maps where the visual look and feel of results is the same on the Google Map vs viewing in Google Earth.

its a useful website. it would be cooler if when you click on the available places the pop-up includes a picture of the interior or outside of the unit (i could’ve sworn i’ve seen that done somewhere on a real estate website before). but at least it points you to the appropriate pages on domain.com.au or realestate.com.au etc. all in all a good implementation of google maps + australian real estate websites.

to use, just click on the “view on map: Rent” or “sale” on the right of the map. it’ll show the available units. i suggest using a “hybrid” street-satellite view for maximum benefit.

this will definately come in handy when i find a new place to stay at the end of the year.

The State Election is truly heating up now that we’ve less than a month before that fateful day - November 25…….

I can’t wait for the ground breaking policies and programs that are to be released in the coming weeks.

The war chest has been dragged out of the basement of Treasury and the goodies are to be handed out left, right and centre….and the Opposition? Well, they have their hypothetical war chest…..

Colin has made a few comments about the Fare fights, which is quite topical for our readers and authors alike.

One of my favourite things about elections are the sound bites - keep an ear out for some good ones!

But before we start on a few weeks of commentary, I thought I might remind you that you have until the 7th of November to enrol…..are you enrolled?

If your over 18yrs, an Australian Citizen and have a Victorian address you’re eligible to vote.

It’s compulsory to enrol if you’ve lived at your address for more than a month - WHAT?!?! I hear our US friends exclaim…..yup, it’s compulsory here downunder!

You do actually get fined if you ARE enrolled and you don’t vote……um, so if I don’t enrol and I don’t vote I’m okay yeah?

Well, elections and voting are somewhat fundamental to democracy……in a few countries people fight and die for the privilege to get to the voting booths.

And whoever happens to win on the 25th will be the ones that shape your immediate world and have the freedom to play with your tax dollars for the next few years.

Your call.

Enrol to vote

if you need some fresh air and a nice open area to spend some time you can try the lygon street park. its officiall called Argyle Square, but its right in the middle of lygon street where pelham street meets lygon. so i call it the lygon street park.

its not as big as Carlton Gardens, or even Lincoln Square. but if you’re enjoying some ice cream on lygon street, why not stop by the nearby mini park and take a break in the cool shade of the trees.

there’s also a cool human sun dial in the concrete clearing which i can’t figure out how to use. so if anyone actually uses it to get the right time, please tell me how you did it.