Do you ever wonder what you will post on - I do. I thought, what have I done this weekend - not much...

But then I began to think, what we did do. Still recovering from broken ribs two weeks ago, Sue and I are also keeping each other awake with constant coughing from our chest colds (not real good with the ribs, I can tell you!)

I must be on the mend though because I've again continued on the house makeover for the pending sale within the next 2 years. We had the family areas repainted by so-called professionals and were NOT overly impressed by their "Professionalism". We decided that that front of the house will be a family effort by ourselves. OK, I know we are doing this to sell but there's that pride thing. This is the house we've lived and loved in with our two boys for the last 30 odd years.

Way back, maybe 10 years ago we decided to paint the inside with heritage colors of the 20's.
It was nice at the time with all that kitchy frieze under the picture rail but things have changed, so the revamp is to suit a new market. 

Mind you, I could leave it with that distressed look!

Out came the sander and I started the preparation of the hallway, and next weekend, we'll start the first coat of paint. You may well ask why I do this myself? It saves $4000!

It looks a bit blotchy at the moment but next weekend might see the first lot of undercoat.

One of the things that disappointed me with the professionals was the lack of presentation.
I think its a matter in personal pride you take in what you do.

The other thing I did this weekend was to almost complete the research and 1st chapter draft on my book "Six Day Bike Racing in Australia". I have this Face book page called "The Cycling Scrapbook" based on another blog I do and currently it has 3800 members who are potentially my research team. I didn't start the page for this reason but it just happened that way - serendipity!!

Australia had their first Six Day bike racing events in the 1880s as did England, the US and Europe. Our first event was in Melbourne 1881. I am researching these events via the Internet with the digitized newspapers of the era - how convenient is this?

Early six day bike races were held over 12 hours a day over those six days.

Those early days went hand in hand with Cycling exhibitions of trick riding , and endurance events.

These are the bikes that our first six day riders travelled close to 1000 miles over that period of six days. 

So I guess that next weekend there will be more of the same - more research, writing, painting, that is unless we go away for the weekend, in which case, we'll blog on it.

Have a good week.