I test-drove a car this morning, liked it, haggled a great price with the dealer (a price I honestly couldn’t quite believe they were offering, in fact), shook hands on it, and started talking to their financing department.

Then the sales manager comes over and says he’s made a mistake. He claims he miscalculated their best price, and he mistakenly told me a number that was $3000 too low. They’d be losing two grand on it at that price, he says. The apologising and backpedalling begins.

That’s the price we shook on, I say.

He can’t do it, he says.

It feels like an intentional bait-and-switch to me. I’m not that desperate for a car, so I firmly say no and walk out. Maybe they’ll sell it for that price, maybe they won’t. But I’m not going to be tricked or shamed into such a large purchase.

No wonder car salesmen have such a bad reputation.

This week has mostly been about work: focusing on it, doing it, learning the ropes at a new place.

It’s also been about dealing with heat during a commute. There’s such a massive difference in temperature where I work (several km inland) from where I live (by the ocean). Like, more than 10 degrees Celsius difference. It was 39.5C at noon outside my workplace today. It’s still 32C there at 9:30pm. It’s warm here in Neutral Bay, but nothing like that hot.

I’m moving closer to buying a car, though. Look for blog news about that on the weekend. Hopefully.

We’ve had some good eating and drinking experiences in the last two weeks.

Last week I had a work lunch that took place at Bel Mondo, a top-notch – with respect to food, service and view – mod Oz restaurant in The Rocks. I met the missus after this for a drink at Rockpool Bar; it’s just won TimeOut’s award for best bar in Sydney, and while it is impressive it’s a bit too fancy-shmancy for me to want to stay for more than a drink or two. Leaving here we went to Dolcetta, a tiny Potts Point Italian spot we’d enjoyed on our trip earlier in the year, and found it even tastier this time.

Friday was my workplace’s Christmas lunch (I know, I’ve only been there two weeks). We held it at The Meat & Wine Company in Darling Harbour. It was my first time in this chain. It’s a bit busy, but this location is certainly pretty cool. And the set menu included a 500g wagyū rump steak which was both delicious, fairly tender, and immense.

A couple of weeks ago we invited our neighbours around to meet us and have some drinks. One of the couples, RA, invited us out last night to a local Neutral Bay spot, Firefly. It’s also been given a nod in TimeOut’s bar guide for being the only decent cocktail bar in Neutral Bay. I had their version of the Trader Vic’s Mai Tai and found it very slurpable. We ordered more than we needed, but all the food was pretty good. The zucchini fries were tops.

Whilst running this morning I heard a squawking bird. Nothing unusual in Australia, for sure, but this bird was really making some noise.

I stopped and looked up. There, balanced on a telephone wire, was an Australian Magpie. Again, nothing unusual: these are all over the country, including the city, and they’re always squawking about something.

Australian Magpie. Click to enlarge. Photo from Lip Kee via Creative Commons license

This one, though, was trying to chase off the large bird sitting on another wire nearby. At first I couldn’t tell what sort of bird it was at all. Then my Oz filters kicked in and I realised it was a Frogmouth: a Tawny Frogmouth, I think, and probably a young one by the size and tuftiness of its feathers.

Tawny Frogmouth. Click to enlarge. Photo from Arthur Chapman via Creative Commons license

I thought they were actually owls; they’re not, though they look similar and are related. One of their distinguishing features – as you can tell from their name – are their very large mouths. And this one was using his to ward off the bothersome magpie. Once in a while the latter bird would make a little flap towards the former, and the frogmouth would snap its beak with an impressively loud clack.

That magpie soon flapped away, though another came to take its place on a nearby wire and continue the harassment of the frogmouth. The night bird seemed capable of keeping them at bay, though. I watched this squawk-and-feint for a while, and then ran on.

It feels really interesting – good interesting – to come across brand new animals all the time here. I feel like a kid again, learning all about nature.

Hidden Networks is this year’s program from By George!

The By George! temporary public art program brings together the City of Sydney’s commitment to nurturing creativity in Sydney and to providing programs to enliven the City’s laneways and forgotten spaces.

In 2007 the Art & About program included Live Lanes, a series of installations, performances and events in a number of [Central Business District] CBD laneways.

In 2008 the City invited local artist-run organisations to develop concepts for temporary installations which were launched during Art & About. The By George! 2008 projects animated the laneways with thought-provoking and engaging installations.

In 2009, the City is working with curator and urban designer Dr Steffen Lehmann to develop the next stage of this exciting program.

One of the works in this year’s program was Seven Metre Bar, which I’ve now been to a few times. But I’ve also seen PS: Potential Spaces, have been through The Meeting Place a few times, and have walked beneath the endangered birdsounds of Forgotten Songs. I think it’s very cool to turn down an alley for a shortcut and stumble across something that makes you stop and think.

Forgotten Songs. Photo from Halans via Creative Commons license

Work work work work, work work work.

It’s really not that surprising, given that I’ve just started. However, I still have the chance to meet the missus in the city after work and go for dinner, which is a good thing.

The Opera Bar is a very cool spot location-wise to start a Friday night. It is pretty pricey and extremely busy, but those things are to be expected. The big downside: all the people that have been drinking there all afternoon. There was a massive vomit episode right beside our table at 7:30pm. And I don’t think I’ve ever seen so much broken glass in the space of 2 hours.

I had a cool time at The Basement seeing an Eric Clapton cover band, though.

Yesterday was chilled out. Putting some things in the post, buying some groceries. I also took a bunch of photos of our place, our neighbourhood, the ferry ride to Circular Quay, and a walk around the nearby Cremorne Nature Reserve: I’ll be posting some of those later today.

Earlier this week we decided to say hello to the tenants in the other five units of our building, so I slipped a note under each door inviting them to our place for some drinks and nibbles. I’ve since been told that was the sort of unsolicited friendliness that most Sydneysiders wouldn’t demonstrate.

Never mind, four of them did come over. We had quite a laugh sitting in our back yard. We got to know each other a little bit, knocked back a few bottles of wine, had some snacks, and heard a bit about the neighbourhood and building from those who’ve been here longer than us. People seemed to have fun getting to know each other, including those who’d only previously said hi as they passed in the stairwell. I hope we hang out with some of them again.

I’m really pleased with how the first three days of my job are going. There’s some stuff I’m very comfortable with, some stuff that is new but do-able, and some stuff that will be really challenging. I reckon that’s the way a new job should be, yeh?

Today I start work at a new company for the first time since January 1998. In this age of high job mobility that’s pretty exciting.