Peter on TV

Card Smart AGM 2010 in Launceston

Our company Annual General Meeting this year was held at the Country Club Launceston in Tasmania. It was wonderful catching up with everyone, with their families.

Peter and I explored the city centre and Cataract Gorge (see pic above), watched 'Avatar in 3D' to escape the heat, and dined at the fine dining restaurant 'Stillwater'.

We, who work for Card Smart, are blessed to have such generous directors as Paul Lemaire and Matt Holani. We do this annually at the company's expense. We are very grateful for their generosity.

Peter on the Trapeze

The Card Smart challenge this year at our AGM was trapeze lessons. I was chicken to do it, but luckily, Peter was willing to. Here he is. Listen carefully to the commands from the instructor and Peter's grunts. Watch and be impressed like I was.

New Year's Eve 2010 at Sensation in Melbourne

Wasn't that amazing? That was the Sensation 'Oceans of White' party held on New Year's Eve in Melbourne. It is a white party, so everyone is required to wear white.

Sensation paid for Peter and I to be there to dress the VIP hostesses. After we finished, Peter and I joined the party. We were able to get passes to the deluxe rooms, where we met a lot of fun people. The girls love the gay boys, so we spent a lot of time drinking and dancing with them.

Sensation 'Oceans of White' VIP Hostesses

Peter was commissioned once again by Sensation to design and produce the outfits for the VIP hostesses for their New Year's Eve dance party in Melbourne. The theme was 'Oceans of White'. Peter designed a dress inspired by 1940's swim suits.

For the accessories, we purchased rubber sea creatures from the Fish Market, which we spent Christmas and Boxing Day gluing and glittering. The octopus, lobsters and crabs made perfect headdresses.

We also bought styrofoam balls, which we painted, glittered, skewered and made into 'pearl' sashes. Peter completed the outfits with handmade star fishes.

Christmas 2009 in Ulladulla

Peter has moved to Ulladulla, which is 3 hours south of Sydney. His former boss opened the new Institute of Design Ulladulla, and recruited Peter to head the fashion design course. After much discussion, Peter and I both agreed that it was a great opportunity for him. This just means that we will both be doing a lot of travelling to see each other, since I will remain in Sydney. Luckily, I am able to work remotely as long as I have internet access. I have told my boss, and he has agreed to let me work from Ulladulla periodically. I should be able to work there for an entire week every few weeks, for example.

Peter rented this charming beach shack, which is only 5 minutes walk to Racecourse Beach.

We spent Christmas and Boxing Day in Ulladulla. It was wet and windy on both days, so we spent the time indoors painting and glittering the accessories for Peter's NYE commission. We found one day though to have dinner on the veranda. That is Benita, on the foreground, the sexy gnome I got for Kris Kringle.

Card Smart Xmas Party 2009

The Card Smart Christmas Party was held on Dec. 17 at the Bayswater Brasserie.

Like past years, we played Kris Kringle to amuse ourselves. The twist this year is that one can 'steal' or opt to grab a gift that was already opened, rather than picking an unopened gift from the pile. Obviously, good gifts got stolen a lot. Luckily, I ended up with the sexy gnome Benita. I stole her, then she got stolen from me, but at the end, she was mine. I thought she would look perfect in the front veranda of Peter's beach shack.

Institute of Design. Ulladulla

Peter has joined the Institute of Design Ulladulla as Head of Fashion. The brand new school had its open day on Nov. 21, when local government officials, school heads and teachers, potential students and local residents had their first look at the new school.

3rd Year Anniversary

Peter and I celebrated our third year anniversary on Oct. 1. It sometimes felt as if we were not going to make it, but we are both very happy we did. We celebrated it by attending the annual Sleaze Ball, the party where we met at. We had a great time and the music was fantastic. Of course, that was not enough. The following evening, we had to go to Extra Dirty. That was also great. The men were ultra hot and we did not stop dancing.

Happy Anniversary my dear Peter.

Flashback to 3 years ago. This was the what I wrote then about meeting Peter then. He is "M".

God, I do not remember the last time I went on a date. It has been that long. So, it came as quite a big surprise to be asked recently.

I met this guy at the most romantic of places, a gay dance party. Let us call him M. We had a fun time dancing and flirting on the dance floor. I told him I was single, and he revealed that he was in a relationship. No problem there, as I was not after anything. It became weird later, because we met his partner outside the dance venue. He was actually very nice. They even offered me a ride home. I gave M a sweet peck outside my apartment and sent them both home.

M texted me that day, and a week after asking to meet up. My first instinct was to decline, because I did not want the complication. But he wrote me such sweet text messages that I could not refuse. We met at a cocktail bar at 7:30 pm on Wednesday in October, and did not leave till past midnight. It was the best first date I have ever had. He was handsome, sweet, funny, interesting, and we had loads of alcohol. He told me that he and his boyfriend were in the process of breaking up. I did not really pry because I did not know what I wanted to come out of this. We have seen each other several times since. He is wonderful.

Winter in the Park

I bought another painting. I know. I think I have an addiction. I have certainly exhausted whatever art budget allocation I have for the year. However, I just could not resist.

Peter and I have admired Alexander McKenzie’s landscape paintings, since we first saw them in an exhibition last year. He paints beautiful, moody, dream-like landscapes with great skill. However, his paintings are usually large in scale with matching large price tags. I was therefore surprised, when I saw a couple of new paintings by him that are only 15x19 cm in size. They were obviously more affordable. It was hard to choose, but I settled for this one as Peter also loved it.

Repack

Peter and I recently visited the Art Gallery of NSW to view the Archibald Prize for portraiture exhibition. Running at the same time were the Wynne Prize and Sulman Prize exhibitions. We both admired a finalist for the Wynne Prize called “Recycle”. The entry was a simple picture of a pile of carton boxes against the blue horizon, with a workman on his phone in the background. What stood out was the photograph-like quality of the work, plus the beauty in such an ordinary scene. It reminded us of the works of the famous Australian painter, Jeffrey Smart. Looking around further, we realized that the same painter was a finalist for the Sulman Prize. This time his entry was called “Teamwork”, which depicted 3 cherry pickers converging on an electrical pole with 3 guys watching from the ground. Once again, it was beautiful.

The name of the painter is Peter Smets. I found out that he was associated with the Schubert Contemporary Gallery in the Gold Coast. I checked out their website, and found other works by him from his most recent exhibition called “Men at Work” still available for sale. I decided to purchase a smaller work called “Repack”, which had similarities to his Wynne Prize entry. Here is a picture of it.

I never thought I would buy an artwork without physically seeing it, but I had no choice in this case. The painting has arrived, and I absolutely love it. I think Peter Smets may be big one day.

Bathroom Reno

After 14 years in my flat, I decided to renovate my bathroom. There was nothing major wrong with my old bathroom. I just never used the bath, the shower was small, and the floor tiles were hard to clean.


I decided to go with the trend, and go for a contemporary look. There were a few dramas with the builder, but I am happy with the final result.


I love my new bathroom. I love the gray colour, the big showerhead, the glass shower screen, the soft close toilet seat, the mirrored shaving cabinet, and the sexy basin and pedestal.

Sydney Mardi Gras 2009

We were looking forward to the Mardi Gras party this year and it did not disappoint. Somehow, all the factors that made a great party gelled. The midnight show featuring my fave anthem of all time, “I Just Wanna Dance”, was fantastic. Alison Jiear sung it live complete with dancers. It was awesome and reminded me of the traditional Mardi Gras shows of years ago. Here is a video of the actual show.

We bumped into so many friends on the dance floor. No complaints this year on the music. Peter and I were on our dancing feet from 10:30 pm till the party finished at 8 am. A fitting ending was finally getting off our feet and lying on the grass outside Fox studios.

For recovery, Peter and I went to Frisky at the Metro. The amazing Jojo played the entire 8 hour set, and I did not want to leave the dance floor for a second. The place was not full, which prevented the party from really taking off. However, we still enjoyed ourselves.

New Year's Eve 2009 at the Sensation White Party

Peter and I celebrated new year's eve at the Sensation Party at the Telstra Dome in Melbourne. Peter designed and produced the outfits that the VIP hostesses wore on the night. We were there to dress the girls, and party afterwards.
It was my first straight dance party. It was a strange feeling. Peter described it as being the only gays in the village. I wore white shorts, and an old white harness with wings, a remnant of past Mardi Gras. Whereas the costume would have gone unnoticed in a gay party, I was most conspicuous on the night. It was flattering to have people want to take pictures with me. We got drunk on champagne, and had great fun with the girls.

Christmas 2008

Like last year, Peter and I flew to the Gold Coast to celebrate Christmas with his family and friends. First was a nice lunch at a restaurant with his brothers John and Francis, and his sisters Anne and Denise, plus their families.

His sister Denise was nice enough to loan us a car to drive the 5 hours to Bundaberg to visit his parents. They were unable to make the reunion due to his father's poor health. Peter and I had great fun swimming in the beautiful waters of Elliot Heads.

Along the way to Bundaberg, we stopped to visit Peter's friend, Elizabeth. She and her mother prepared a beautiful lunch for us.

We also visited Peter, Maxine and their children, Buddy and Dusty, in their new home. We stayed one night there, and was totally charmed by beautiful Dusty. Here is a picture with her playing with Peter's hair.

We spent Christmas eve in Maleny with Annie and her children, Scarlett, Flynn and Will.

Pirate Christmas party

The Card Smart Christmas Party this year was held on a boat that cruised around the harbour. The theme for our Kris Kringle was pirates, so we carried that theme all throughout the party. We had barbeque and salads with lots of wine and beer. The boat also featured laser pigeorn shooting. It felt really fake trying to shoot these "pigeons" with a laser beam.

City 2 Surf

City to Surf is an annual fun run held in Sydney. It is a 14 km walk/run from the centre of the city to Bondi Beach. It is for both serious runners and strollers. I organized a group from work to do it this year, since our workplace has initiated a fitness program. It was great fun, but very tiring at the same time. The winning time for the event was 41.12 minutes. Jeanette from work finished the course in 77 minutes, which was excellent. I walked together with Peter, Wendy, Doreen and Kenny. Our time? 162.58 minutes. We placed 53,296, out of approximately 58,000 participants.

Abu Dhabi Nights

Peter was commissioned to create outfits for Liz and Roderick, who were having a farewell party before they move to Abu Dhabi. It was going to be a grand affair, so Peter wanted to create something special. I assisted him by accompanying him to Cabramatta to pick out cloth materials and stitching beads onto the belt of the Liz's dress.

They were kind enough to invite us to the party at the Museum of Contemporary Arts. It was a theme party, so Peter and I wore these harem pants that he made originally for Mardi Gras. He wrapped this silver material around our heads as turbans. I thought we looked like Norma Desmond from "Sunset Boulevard". The party was indeed grand with the museum decked out like a harem, complete with camels and belly dancers. French champagne was flowing all night. What a fun and decadent night.

Wet in Seaworld

The Card Smart AGM for 2008 was held in Sea World on the Gold Coast. Highlights were a gala dinner with sea lions as guests, a private dolphin show just for Card Smart, and a soccer challenge in the rain. Sadly, the weather was not good as you can see from the pictures. Inspite it being cold and wet, we persisted with enjoying the various rides in the theme park.

Handog Nang Pilipino Sa Mundo

Twenty-two years ago, I was working as a computer programmer at the National Computer Center in the Philippines. Our center was given the important task of tabulating the results of the 1986 Marcos-Aquino presidential elections. On February 6, 1986, a couple of days into the tabulation, 30 of us walked out of the PICC building in protest of the fraud that was going on.

Our small act of defiance is now recognized as one of a series of events that led to the EDSA revolution and the people power that eventually overthrew President Marcos.

Here is a video of that historic time. The title of this post and the title of the song in the video means "The Filipinos' Gift to the World". 3 minutes 12 seconds into the video, you will find the clip of our group walking out of the tabulation center. Do not blink as you may miss it.