The end of a fun-filled day

I forgot to take my camera with me today so the only photo I have to record the fun is this one, taken on Brighton Beach. We walked there after having dinner with the Fredericksons at a wonderful Thai restaurant on Church Street. I do love the ability to just walk everywhere. I really need to take some pictures of the little village we live in.
First thing we did today was tour the Parliament building. There was an election here last weekend and the Liberal party is taking over the state government. The Labour Party had been in control for about the past 11 years. In Australia, "liberals" means Republicans. Here it is mandatory to vote or you face a fine. Our tour guide was quite a character. There's a 5 year project going on right now to replace all the sandstone on the building and when I asked him how many years this new sandstone would last (the first batch lasted 150 years) he said "You're brave to assume we'll be around that many years from now. The scientists are saying it's not just global warming happening but also solar system warming". Then he went on for a bit about that. Pretty funny guy. The carpeting in the building is either red with oak leaf and acorns or green with the same pattern. Didn't know that when royalty visits they have to stay on the red carpet. If they do move to the other area, a red carpet is rolled out for them. Last time Queen Elizabeth was here to open Parliament was in 1952. She's been back 17 or 18 times since then but not on an official "opening day". The new Parliament has their official opening while we're here, Dec. 21. Maybe I'll pop down.
After this, I went to the ACMI and saw the temporary exhibit, "Dreams Come True: The Art of Disney's Classic Fairy Tales". It was fabulous, though I don't think Joe would have enjoyed it as much as I did. Made me want to have a Disney movie marathon and see some of the classic animated movies again.