The phone rang and woke me again today. “Were you asleep?”, my mate asked me probably already knowing the answer by the way I’d ignored the home phone, but had responded sleepily to the mobile when it rang. It was about lunchtime, I guess, and he had some pretty amazing news he wanted to share right away. Since then, I’ve been a little sleepy on and off throughout the day. Slowly but surely my body is returning to normal.

I called briefly in to work today. Ostensibly it was to pick up my card-reader so I could transfer some more photographs across. Actually, I just felt like catching up with the gang to see how they all were. “You’ve lost weight and you’ve got a tan” was the universal consensus, which made me feel great. A colleague and friend who has been overseas is also back and we made plans to catch up in the next week. Also, one of the blokes at work is playing his first live gig in quite a few years, so I’ll probably go along to that tomorrow night. And then on Friday there’s a farewell drinks for someone. It’s kinda cool being able to socialise with everyone, which is great, without actually having to go into work.

As it happened, there was a delegation of European broadcasters visiting including a Swedish woman. “Why are you wearing that shirt?”, she asked at first, totally confused about why I was wearing my “Sverige” t-shirt. I explained that I’d been there and had a wonderful time, and had enjoyed the summer, and wished her the same for her time in Sydney.

Tonight I caught up with the guys at the pub, which was great fun. Again, everyone commented on how much weight I’d lost, which was a nice boost to the ego. Clearly I must have been really fat and unhealthy looking before I left.