Casino Night, Dog Racing, and Brunch

On Friday night the social committee hosted a Casino Night at the office. It cost $20 and included drinks and food (canapes). It was a blast. The three games were roulette, blackjack, and Texas hold 'em. I mostly played blackjack. Everyone got $1,000 to start the night off with (we played with fake money). The person who had the most chips at the end won a trophy. I racked up about $7,500 at one point but heard someone else had over $10,000. It was getting towards the end of the night, so I started betting bigger, which basically led to me losing all my money. Oh well. The competition for the trophy ended up coming down to two people. They had close to the same amount of money, so instead of counting it, I encouraged them to decided it at the roulette table. The guy bet on black; she bet on red. We all watched the ball go 'round and land on black. Pretty solid way to end a casino night.

Interesting note: blackjack is played a little differently. The dealer deals himself one card face up then deals to all of us (rather than dealing himself one card face up and one card face down). It's basically the same concept, but just a little Aussie twist.

Saturday was a hot day (hit over 80 degrees) so I decided to head over to the Bondi Beach.

It was the first really hot day since the start of winter, but it wasn't that busy at the beach. Maybe crowds were down because it was election day?

Here's a nice cliche photo of me relaxing at the beach. Good to catch some rays.

This belongs on Instagram...

And for those of you who are wondering, yes, apparently topless sunbathing is allowed. There was a little of that. But don't worry, Michelle. It's not really the women you want to see who are sunbathing topless. I mean, not that I want to see it, it just wasn't the hot ones. Er, um, I'm going to go ahead and end this paragraph...

I met up with a buddy from work and we grabbed a burger and a beer. We then headed back to the beach before heading home. Saw this guy. He's getting married and it looks like he's on his bachelor party (or stag party as they call it here. I believe they call it a buck party in the UK. Or maybe that's vice versa).

I'm assuming you can guess the bachelor

He had a sign that said he had to kiss 20 butt cheeks. From what I overhead, he had 6 more to go.

There was also some kite flying society out, and they were hardcore. Check out these cool kites. They were massive.

Overall, it was a great time at the beach. I want to head back next weekend. The area around the beach (Bondi Junction) is cool, too. Cafes, a big shopping center, etc.

After the beach a group of us met up around 7pm to hit up a greyhound track (yep, weekend of gambling).

I've never been to one before and this was actually a lot of fun. Minimum bets were $1, so each race we'd all pick two dogs (to either place or win outright). It was cheap, but still added that little extra incentive to cheer on the dogs. Got really into it. Over ten races, I ended up down $11. Not too bad for spending three hours at the race track.

We used a LivingSocial coupon to get in. Normally it costs $6 to get in, but the coupon was $6 which included entrance, one drink, and a packet (as pictured above). The packet normally costs $4 and has information on all the dogs (the experts' take, latest race results, etc). That made it a lot of fun. Before each race, we'd all pour over the info (not that we had a very good idea on how best to use the information contained in the packet...).

On Sunday morning I woke up and attended mass at the St. Mary's Cathedral. That was nice. I then met up with some co-workers in the suburb called Newtown. We had brunch at Martini Cafe. It was a tasty outing. Newtown was also unique to walk around. It has a lot of cafes and trendy/hipster shops (retro dress stores, antique shops, etc).

That pretty much summarizes my weekend. My Huskers won convincingly today, a nice change from last week. Hope we can pull off the W against UCLA next weekend. Now I have to make sure my fantasy football lineups are set. By the time I wake up, most games will already be over.