Jacaranda

Colin has 3 more exams this week and I'm so excited for them to be over. I'm also excited for December 10th because I will be off work for 1 whole month. I don't know how our bank account will feel about it, but I'm hoping it will be understanding and gracious. heh...

In the last few weeks it's been getting pretty nice outside, we've been hitting the low to mid 20's and it's been super nice. It's been so warm that we've also been experiencing lots of thunder and lightening, including a tremendous lightening storm a week ago that was magnificent to watch. However, Friday, Saturday and Sunday the temperature and humidity SKYROCKETED. The boys attempted to study but were mostly just trying to stay awake. Cooking in the kitchen was painful, but fortunately we really only ate 1 meal a day + lots of snacks. I leave for work at 7am and I actually had the a/c going on my drive this morning. But at about 10am it started raining, and continued to do so for 7 hours. It is now blissfully cool and I can return to my normal routine of eating and sleeping in peace.

This last month has brought out lots of beautiful flowers, and my new favorite Aussie flower is from a tree called "Jacaranda". It's like a purple Australian version of our Cherry blossom tree. They're EVERYWHERE. Except in our yard.

Hope you're all well and enjoying your sweet sweet snow. I can't believe I won't touch any for over another year.

E.

Pickles

Today we received a package brought over by my brother and sister-in-law's friend, Ardelle. She was passing through Sydney on her way to Melbourne, so she "muled" a package from home. Colin went to the airport to meet her. I've been thinking about this package for a long time. Mostly because it contains a lot of sugary items, but also because it was something familiar from home that was thoughtfully picked out by loved ones. All day at work I couldn't wait to come home so I could rip into it and snack!

There was also a flash drive with tv shows and pictures on it! As well as a bag of turkish delights that Colin had already retrieved from the pile of goodies.

What a treat to come home to. Thanks family.

You might remember, dear reader, that we made a formal complaint regarding our previous landlord who neglected to give us our damage deposit back. We received a notice today informing us that both parties neglected to show up to the hearing which took place yesterday at 10:10am. We will have to inform them that we didn't receive notice in the first place, because we would have loved to be there. Fortunately Sachin didn't make an appearance from India. Then we really would have looked foolish.

The boys are in full study mode. I tried to take pictures of them last night but they stopped what they were doing as soon as I brought out the camera. Our living room looks pretty funny at the moment. There are tables set up to roll balls on, towels on coffee tables, tape all over the floor, stuff taped to the walls, laundry clips scattered, and the plinth is set up right in the middle of it all. 3 is a nice number to have for studying. 1 will be the patient, another the practitioner, and a third to critique. I made them a rhubarb-strawberry meringue pie last night because Drew had never tasted rhubarb before. I messed it up so it wasn't a very good first impression. While the pie was baking we got Drew to drink a cup of dill pickle juice for $2. It was super gross. Mike said that Drew wouldn't get the money if he threw up, so he kept it down. His new nickname is Pickles but I'm not sure if it'll stick.

We just booked tickets to go to the great barrier reef in December. I'm pretty excited! We're flying to Cairns, Queensland from Dec 16-21. I couldn't wait to tell everyone at work where we were going and after I did they looked at me like I was crazy. My boss' brother was in the room and he said, "Queensland is more of a winter vacation spot." Oops! So if the crocodiles, jellyfish, and sharks don't get me, then surely the heat will. I'm still looking forward to it but I'll make sure to book a hotel with a pool. Or at least a sprinkler.

We've been getting quite a few moths in our house lately, which explains why most of the used furniture in Sydney smells like moth balls. Yuck. Last night however, the mother of all moths was in our bedroom. I thought it was a giant spider at first. Colin killed it with a broom but was never able to locate the body. Later in the evening I was cleaning up our room, and when I was throwing my damp charcoal colored shirt into the laundry I was suddenly attacked by the angry queen moth. I screamed and ran out of the room. The boys again tried to exterminate it but it took refuge in the light fixture dangling from our 10 foot ceiling. About an hour later I went back into our room and could finally see the moth sitting on the edge of the fixture. It took Colin another 5 minutes of chasing the moth around the room but Colin eventually won. I have never seen an insect fight so hard for it's life, it actually made me feel bad.

Well I've got to go and eat some chocolate.

g'night! (that's the opposite of g'day)

E.

Round 2

Exams! I don’t remember ever being worried about exams two weeks before they begin, I’m not worried this time around either. However, they are two weeks away and I have a heightened sense of their arrival. Today will be productive as soon as I’m kicked off the computer by my lovely wife who undoubtedly will enjoy a TV show or movie, while I stair at a piece of paper. This time around I was lucky enough to not have two exams on one day. Instead I think I have one everyday for two weeks excluding the weekend. Well I’m off to enjoy some reading. I’m pretty sure studying stories are coming your way. Be excited!

C.

Todays reflections

Colin and I went grocery shopping last night. I always finish every shopping trip with a walk down the frozen foods aisle to see if my favorite ice cream is on sale. To my surprise, it WAS last night. I asked Colin which one we should buy: Vanilla, Chocolate, Raspberry white chocolate, Cookie dough, or Macadamia Supreme. We decided to choose macadamia because it sounded really adult. I'm eating it right now and it's very tasty, but in a grown up way.

Every once in a while I notice that packaging here is only in English and I feel like I'm a traitor to my bilingual mother land.

Our microwave has a button that says "microwave" and you have to press that button before any other button to get it to work. You would think that the mere act of pressing any button would be sufficient evidence of my desire to use the appliance, but maybe Australia just doesn't have that kind of technology yet.

I killed an insect at work today. I have no idea what it was, but it looked like a cross between an ant/ear wig/scorpion. While I was exterminating it the smell of chocolate infiltrated my nostrils. I assumed this was the bug's defense mechanism and it was trying to poison me with some weird chocolate gas that came out of it's body. Much like the Octopus. After killing it, I asked my boss what kind of unusual Australian insect farts poison chocolate. He did not know, so instead made fun of me! I also couldn't find it online when I got home, so I can now conclude, without a doubt, that I'm an idiot.

2 hours ago, Colin and I went to back to our local camping store to exchange the grill we bought. They had a fancier one come on sale, so we decided to make an upgrade. (I didn't tell them that we took it on a camping trip, but only as decoration). So we walked into the store holding the grill and a receipt. The girl at the desk said that we had to leave the grill at the counter but I didn't understand why I couldn't hold it. I would never buy a jacket at a store and then leave it at the front counter every time I went back there to shop. That's silly. So I looked at the girl with a confused expression and she said, "You can't walk around the store with merchandise." But this WASN'T merchandise, I OWNED it. I was in an arguing mood but Colin looked at me like I was crazy, so I submitted. Fortunately, when we were exchanging the grills, I managed to unintentionally and briefly make her life difficult because I had bought the first grill on my Canadian mastercard that expired the next day. I think that's probably why I bought it, one last hurrah on the old plastic. She had to call her manager over and he had to explain to her that she didn't actually have to put money back on to the credit card because we were purchasing a more expensive model. SUCKA!

We're thinking of attempting 'Camping- the sequel' this weekend. I couldn't decide if I wanted to write that or not.

Decided!

E.

Thanksgiving

What a day. I’m generally ecstatic about get togethers of any sort, however, thanksgiving is a time where food is showcased and people come together sharing in a warm thankful experience. I don’t know if there’s a word that outdoes ecstatic so I’m going to say I’m ecstatic, ecstatic, about thanksgiving. Just a side note, it was a thanksgiving dinner at Evelyn’s parents place 6 years ago now where are love first started to build (I asked her to be my girlfriend).

In preparation for this event, which was held at our place, Evelyn set the date and invited all the North Americans; though no one from the states came we had a total of 13 Canadians around our two tables. We had to special order a turkey from the third butcher we went to and it took 4 days to come in. I’ve never actually roasted a turkey. To start we don’t have a roasting pan. Luckily Evelyn was given a gift certificate for a couple stores from her boss. We found a beautiful roasting pan that will be used many time in the next year because roasts are fantastic! So is gravy mmmmm. Well to get things started we pre-heated the oven I pulled the skin back from the breast and poured melted butter down the literal chest of the turkey along with some fresh sage and thyme. The turkey was placed in the oven for 20 minutes at a very high temp (450 or 475 F) for 20 minutes supposedly sealing in the succulent juices then the temperature is lowed to 120 C – Sorry, I don’t think properly any more now that I live here. Celsius and Fahrenheit sort of merge and I do things in both. Well after that was all set, ready to cook for a good 3 hours we continued getting ready for the dinner. I started making some stuffing while a friend was also making a butternut soup. The kitchen was fairly busy and definitely tight. Some time later about 30 minutes before people are supposed to arrive Mike looks over at me and says “isn’t that supposed to be flipped up?” He was referring to the ridiculous on switch for our oven. Someone’s body had somehow pushed it down and the turkey thermometer read 60 C when it should have read 87 C. Oops. Thanksgiving dinner’s supposed to be late anyways so people are extra hungry.

ON:

OFF:

It was a potluck and no one disappointed. We had so much rich delicious food our eyes smitten, persuaded our bodies to consume too much. After dinner people tryptophaned out on the couches, helped with the dishes, or tried to walk the dinner off by pacing from room to room=me. It was a success, dessert came out at least an hour later and most people managed to finish off there plate of chocolate cheesecake, fruit salad, and walnut cake with baked pears on top.

It was a day to remember, how blessed we all are. Canadians living in Australia have it good.

Lastly, Evelyn decided to start making the cheesecake late Saturday night because we had gone “camping” Friday and Saturday. So she got it all ready, drove over to Willy and Jenna’s at 12 am to pick up some more cream cheese, put the cake in the oven around 1:30 am set her alarm for 2:30 am to take it out. Went to sleep and woke up at about 6:30 in utter shock realizing she had turned the alarm off while sleeping. The cheesecake may have been a little less moist then it would have been, yet was still wonderful and put people over the top as they enjoyed it.

C.

Camping trip gone wrong

Probably the thing I like most about blogging is that when something weird happens, I just think about how I now have something to share.

Due to a staff member going away this week for holidays, I ended up working a wednesday and getting a Friday off. So Colin and I awoke early Friday morning and went camping up the coast towards Nelson Bay. I thought it was only a two hour trip, but it turned out to be 3. No big deal, it was a beautiful drive.We even passed a sign advertising a shark petting zoo, and we went to check it out but it was $48/person, so we decided to keep traveling.

After checking out 3 campgrounds, we decided upon Fingal Bay and chose the perfect site. After parking, we meticulously weighed the pros and cons as to where we should set up our new tent. When a spot was decided we began unloading all our gear: air mattress, camping chairs, sweet new cheap grill...And in that moment, as Colin and I were looking for the same item that neither could see, I realized that I had packed everything except the tent. With all of our new neighbors watching, we quickly replaced the previously extracted items and jumped in the car, never to return.

Not 5 minutes after purchasing our campsite, I made Colin go back into the office to explain the situation. They didn't say much, just mostly laughed. There were no hard feelings, but we had to wait around for a bit because they were filling our propane tank that we had originally asked them to fill.

Not sure what to do, we walked around the beach taking pictures of dead blue bottle jellyfish (aka Portuguese man of war). It was overcast and depressing. We were both super tired from our early morning so we had a 40 minute nap, then decided to find a cheap place to stay for the night. The first place we walked into was called the Santa Catalina Motel. The old gentleman behind the desk asked us if we were here on holidays and I explained my packing error, so he took pity and gave us an old room for cheapsies. It even had a full kitchen inside so we could pretend we were camping. Things were looking up.

In the middle of dinner a woman started frantically knocking on our door, asking to use our cell phone so she could call the owner. I gave her my phone but she insisted that Colin go with her to call the number on the front door. When he returned he was laughing saying that her tv wasn't working properly, and she was apparently a little nuts. God forbid your television doesn't work while you're on vacation. We finished dinner and Colin proceeded to do his regular hotel routine of playing superman, diving from bed to bed.

The following morning we woke up and made breakfast, then checked out. We drove around a bit before settling on a place for some coffee. Then in an effort to salvage our strange weekend we found a short but beautiful hike. For whatever reason I thought that there would be a bathroom before the start of the hike, but there wasn't, so we had to run down the mountain after climbing it.

It was another overcast day and all I had wanted to do was lay on the beach anyways, so we started driving home. Colin was getting tired so we pulled over at a McDonalds, got a coffee, and I drove the rest of the way. As soon as we drove out of the parking lot, there was a big downhill onto the highway with a cop waiting at the bottom. Since I had been only driving for 45 seconds and it was all downhill, I happened to be going over the limit. I'm fully anticipating my first ever speeding ticket in the mail soon. It was an inconvenient way to end my inconvenient 2nd hand dungaree weekend.

Here's to better luck next time.

E.

p.s- Australian saying of the day: Someone who is nosey would be called a "sticky beak."

Quality Donkey Work

Nothing out of the ordinary has been happening for/to us lately, which is basically the source for any blogging inspiration. It's been raining a lot lately which sucks for doing laundry, but nothing beats the smell of post rain in Australia. It brings me back to February when we first moved here when it rained constantly but was still smokin' humid, and it just reminds me of what an exotic place we're living in. The rain also makes it difficult to play Soccis, which is a combo of tennis, soccer and volleyball. Apparently they play it in the US and we love it here! I'm not great at explaining it but essentially it's juggling the soccer ball within the tennis boundaries, never juggling more than 3 consecutive hits in a row before passing to your partner/hitting it back over the net/letting it bounce once, and not let the ball bounce more than twice while it's on your side of the net, and never two bounces in a row. You can juggle the ball out of bounds but it cannot drop AT ALL while out of bounds. We play it on the tennis court as either singles or doubles but the perimeters are the same regardless. You also have to bounce the ball then kick to the opposite court during serve, you can't drop kick it like a goalie. This has taken some time mastering. The rain prevents us from playing because we aren't allowed to go on the courts within 24 hours of rainfall because the courts are sand/clay.

Last night one of my coworkers had her 40th birthday party with an Alice in Wonderland theme. Colin and I went as the modern Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum from the more recent Johnny Depp Movie.

I'm obviously Tweedle Dee because I don't have my suspenders hiked as high as my counterpart. One lady was dressed as a flamingo, she had the best costume, and I must give her props for keeping the beak on most of the night. That's hardcore.

I'm in the process of planning Thanksgiving dinner for our Canadian friends next weekend. It's difficult finding a turkey outside the month of December so I'm going to have a butcher order me one in. I also have to make pumpkin pie filling since they don't sell it in cans here. I've found a recipe that looks 'easy as pie' so maybe I'll never go back to the old fashioned way of buying it in a can, heh... It's pot luck style, so I'm really looking forward to eating what everyone brings. Until this year I hadn't realized how monumental but overlooked Thanksgiving has been in my life. It's truly the stepchild of holidays. Back in Thanksgiving of '04 I invited a cute classmate to spend the weekend with my family and we've been an item ever since. That was my first time going to the Calgary Zoo in many years, and now it has become a tradition to go to the zoo every thanksgiving weekend we're in Calgary. Now that my brother and sister in law have kids, going to the zoo is 100x more fun seeing the animals through the eyes of a child. The last Thanksgiving we were in Calgary, my nephew, Søren, went dressed as a skunk and got to see his favorite animal, the giraffe, for the first time.

I hope you all have a very happy Thanksgiving. This will be our first turkey cooking experience, so here's hoping that we actually get a turkey in time to cook. Wish me luck!

E.