Australia Day 5 - Tonja "Quidley Down Under"

Laundry day. Lara and Donna stayed at Phil and Sharon’s to do laundry, while Phil, Ward, Chipper, Jon, James and me went to the church. Let’s see…who’s missing from the group? Oh yeah…Tonja…or, “Quidley Down Under”, as we call her. (Quidley is her maiden name). She is staying with a family whose daughter is a beautician, so “Princess” went to get her hair colored and cut this morning. We all playfully gave her a hard time. Actually, the daughter is the one who offered.

Chipper and I conducted a training session this morning to teach Sharon Eagling and Pam Wright how to use Easy Worship. They are thrilled to have this program!

After lunch at a local seafood place, Phil and Stan (one of the elders) took us to a music store. Let me digress for a moment. Back at the seafood restaurant, one of the employees told us how much she loved our accents. That’s a first for me. No one has ever told me they liked my accent.

At the music store, we bought some new music stands and a guitar stand for the church. The Thornton church also bought some new drum heads for their kit. The clerk at the music store asked us where we were from. I told him Nashville, TN. He asked, “What’s the name of your group?” I told him we were a Flock of Seagulls tribute band but I don’t think he bought it. Kidding. Actually, we told him we were a worship band here to visit the Thornton Church of Christ for a couple of weeks. He thought that was cool. He was extremely kind to us and he offered to let me play a $6,500 Maton guitar. (Maton’s are incredible guitars – sort of the Taylor’s of Australia – played by one of my favorites, Tommy Emmanuel). Instead, I bought a $10 Maton cup holder. Probably not the kind of commission my sales guy was hoping for.

As we looked around, we found the exact same guitars in the store that we brought with us. We were so glad we bought them at home because the prices here were over double what we paid in Nashville. We paid around $500 for each instrument and the same instruments here were each over $1,000. We went back to the church and Jon changed the drum heads and tuned up the kit. I did some more work on their Easy Worship program. Jon, James, Chipper and Phil had fun playing music. Afterwards, I walked to the Eagling’s home with James and Jon. Along the way, they told me they are feeling back to normal. Jet lag is over for them. Still no change for me. It was sunny for most of the day, but a late afternoon storm came in and cooled everything down by fifteen degrees.

Kathy brought over one of the snakes her husband used to breed. It was a beautiful corn python.


Eddie, an elder here, is one of the sweetest guys you’ll ever meet. He’s near 70 and is an amazing wood worker. He makes all of the drumsticks for the church. He says he can make them cheaper than they can buy them. He’s going to make a set of sticks for Jon out of Tazmanian Oak. We each had dinner with our host families tonight. Lara, Donna and I ate with Phil and Sharon. Sharon made Corned Beef (cooked all day in the crock pot), pumpkin smashed potatoes, steamed veggies and cheese sauce. Everything was terrific! I’m looking forward to a left over Corned Beef sandwich. After dinner, we sat in the Eagling’s living room and talked and laughed for over an hour. Phil Eagling is in a lot of pain tonight. His back is still really bothering him from the accident back in July.