Sydney venue sorted! And what? You want a tractor for Utopia block?

In five minutes, it will be 11pm. So it is at 5 to 11 that I email Nolasco, our village elder in Tanzania, to tell him that no, we won't be able to barter a tractor (Massey Fuguson 275 or Ford 4000 as the request goes) for the Utopia Block land, but we will settle on that figure of 9-million Tanzanian shillings. That's about $8600AUD. For 2.3 luscious acres. Primo. So primo in fact, that for once this week, I'm going to sleep really very well tonight! I'm very, very excited. Total break through. The level of my excitement is not coming across because I'm too sleepy to put a sentence together.

I do just want to say though, that today has been a ground-breaking day. We also had our ideal Sydney venue - our number one choice - The Argyle at The Rocks donate their venue, their staff and their beer for the evening of Wed 28 June, our upcoming fundraiser. Such generosity and support is pretty much unheard of reckons Janine Moodley, our Corporate Sponsor Liaison, and she'd know - she does this stuff all the time. So totally cheering about that.

Also cheering because I've got a fabulous team of gals who have become SKOC (Sydney Kujenga Organising Committee). We meet Monday nights and get stuff for this fundraiser sorted. The event is going to absolutely rock and I'm absolutely convinced we'll make ... EVEN MORE ... than the $100K I'm aiming to raise. Imagine the bliss of travelling to Tz, knowing that we had 75% or so of the funds raised. Then it would just be up to people power (youse!) to raise a bit more while we're over there to get us over the line for the last of the building. Takes the pressure of the remaining FWS girls a bit...and gives Daz and I plenty of scope to worry about THE BUILDING process, as opposed to THE FUNDING process.

In fact, I'm so attached to this concept that I told Daz we need to go into the $30million PowerBall this weekend. I never go in lotto, but this weekend, you watch me. Here's what the winning me would do: offer Shona, Anne, Kelsey, Daz and Corky a job with FWS. I'd probably also offer Ben, Kelsey's lovely IT boy, our webmaster a job too. Why hesitate in asking him? Well, the thing is: would he take it? I dont know. I think not. He has a great job at Lonely Planet and he's studying to be a pilot, so maybe he thinks we are getting in the way with all our pesky little website demands. Stuff him, I'd ask him. If he says no, he'll be the one crying when he sees how flash our new website is and he wants to be married to it.

Then we'd have a meeting about what other staff we might employ. It's a funny thing though - you'd still want lots of volunteers because volunteering is fun. You'd just want key staff that would help you get g-g-going, dammit. So we'd have to chat thru who those key players might be. Sir Bob Geldoff. Angelina Jolie. Toni Collette. Andrew Denton. Sir Bono. Deepak Chopra. Quite a chat, that one.

And then I'd invest the rest into stuff that earnt money for FWS and fuelled it forever and ever. One of those investments would be that magazine I keep talking about starting - mosaic. One day, one day (May 15, 2008 is the day truth be told).

Darren said I should give some winnings to my family. He's right. How much do you want Flabby Gut? La La? Mumpie? Gwenda-and-Pup Show? Winks? Pigsy? Watch them all come out of the woodwork now.

The Kesho kids will be lucky to get a look in at this rate!

Goodnight Rebecka. Okay, I'm going, I'm going!