Gone on a Lucky Country

Aria Restaurant Sydney - 24 hours and counting.....

2011-11-10T14:59:00.001+11:00

There is this great couple that recently moved to Sydney from Atlanta. Their names are Mollie and Dan and their blog is here. The reason why I bring them up is due to the fact that we have a date with them tomorrow night - a date I have been looking forward to for a month - A date to eat incredible food...

The idea hatched itself over some glasses of wine (could it have happened in any other setting?) - basically, the four of us love to eat really incredible meals in top restaurants and we are blessed enough in our lives to have the means by which to pay for these meals. So, we decided to make a list of the top restaurants in Sydney (after all, we are in a foodie's paradise - why not take advantage of it?) and then eat at one every month. Obviously there are going to be some hiccups in the plan as we will be in New Zealand for a good chunk of December and will need to skip that month; but the four of us are also pretty easy going so no rigid schedule is being adhered to.

This month, November, is our first month in action on this plan. We chose the restaurant Aria (when I say we, I mean Mollie and myself - the poor guys are just arm candy for this project!) which is located just before the forecourt of the Opera House and has a lovely view of both the Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

I think any food tastes better when consumed looking at a view like this

The restaurant is owned and run by celebrity chef Matt Moran who is most recently famous for guest-judging on the third season of Masterchef Australia. Side note, if you don't download and watch this show, you should.... I think it's better than the American version and that's really saying something...

As you might have guessed by now, I'm more than a little excited about our dinner there tomorrow night. I think we've all agreed to go with the tasting menu (always my favourite way to eat since you get to try lots of things) and with good reason. Check this baby out:

SEASONAL TASTING MENU

TUNA
sashimi and tartare of yellow fin tuna with yabbie tails, cucumber ,honeydew melon and wasabi

PARFAIT
chicken and foie gras parfait with a salad of smoked duck, rhubarb and black pepper
SALMON
roasted fillet of King salmon with fennel, orange and watercress

PEKING DUCK CONSOMME
with dumplings, shaved abalone and mushrooms

PORK BELLY
Kurobuta pork belly with pork croquette and caramelised apple
LAMB
roasted fillet with ricotta gnocchi, pumpkin and mustard fruit purée and a sage and balsamic sauce
STRAWBERRIES AND CREAM
panna cotta with pistachios, balsamic strawberries and strawberry sorbet

COFFEE AND PETITS FOURS

Suffice to say, my mouth is already watering!

It's Spring!! I'm Cheerful!!

2011-11-09T12:00:00.000+11:00

One of the best things about living in Sydney is the glorious weather. I know... that sounds dramatic - but I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio. A place where it was not uncommon to have snow 6 months out of the year. A place where summer only lasted a few weeks each year. Ok, maybe I'm exaggerating a little bit; but as someone who is always cold, moving here was like a lifetime dream fulfilled! No Snow! Ever! At worst it gets down in the 40's during winter! Heaven...

Granted, now that I've been here for 2 winters, I'm starting to feel like 40 degrees is actually really really really cold! Oh acclimatisation, you are a cruel trickster!

Anyway, I can't decide if it's all the excellent sleep I've been getting or the fact that Spring is truly here that is making me in such a stinking good mood - but, who cares? Life is awesome!

I do think that the warmer weather has a lot to do with my happiness though - Spring in Sydney is scattered with these really lovely signs of growth. I know I have posted about the Jacaranda Trees in the past and I know I have posted pictures of them; but I just can't convey how gorgeous it is to look out of our windows and see dots of brilliant purple all over the cityscape.

This is not my picture - I found it on-line and stole it...

The sky is crazy blue every day - a blue that you will. not. believe. until you actually come here and see it for yourself. It's warm enough to sit outside on the ferry in the mornings on the way to work. The past few mornings it's actually been a bit too hot to sit in the sun on the ferry and we have had to seek seats with some shade (well, Joe thinks it's too hot - I think it's glorious!).

It's still light out now when we leave for work. The windows are open in our bedroom now and so we are being woken up by water, sail boat and bird noise. Not a bad alarm clock if you ask me! Basically, everything is sunny, warm and beautiful! (see what all this extra sleep does to me? I am so annoyingly cheerful!)

Summer in Sydney is festival time. Every week there are new tents, signs, and exhibits being set up in Hyde Park. We just finished up with the Crave Food Festival and it's attendant Night Noodle Markets. Joe and I went last year; but had to give it a miss this year as it was taking place right during the week of surgery stuff (see previous post). The events for the Annual Sydney Festival have just been announced and already my calendar for January and February is chockers with events.

Heaps of flowers have been set-up in the forecourt of St Mary's Cathedral as they are every spring and summer.

There is just something so awesome about looking forward and realising that from the beginning of November to about May it is just going to be lovely outside. Realising that you have a full six months in which to spend your weekends on beaches or sprawled out on blankets some where watching an outdoor cinema or listening to a free concert.

Jealous yet? Want to visit yet? Seriously, Tourism Australia should hire me to market to cold mid-westerners!

Basically this taunting is fully intended for my family.... Come visit! Soon!

Good Excuses for the Win!!

2011-11-08T15:28:00.000+11:00

I know I haven't been here in forever and usually I don't have a very good excuse for my prolonged absences; but this time I have a few decent excuses. Our life has been busy busy over the last couple of months... We took a beautiful holiday to Fremantle and the Margaret River region. We drank (and bought) lots of gorgeous wine while we we there and returned in just enough time for a busy week of catch-up before Joe went in for surgery. Ha ha!! See? I do have good reasons? I win....

Gorgeous Picture of Watershed Winery in Margaret River - stay tuned for more posts on this later

My poor husband had been having horrible problems with breathing that were growing steadily worse over the last six months. Sleep was eluding him (and by proxy, me) and slowly, breathing during the day also became a real hardship. He started up with a horrible hacking cough, his asthma returned and every cold virus and allergy irritation seemed to be attracted to him. It all happened so gradually over a period of months that neither of us really saw the true impact that it was having on us. We were both exhausted, we were getting sick constantly and poor Joe could hardly breathe! He finally got a referral to see an ENT specialist who took one look and told him that he need surgery and soon...

Basically, everything in Joe's breathing area (Please don't be intimidated by my fancy medical terms - I'm really just like you) was swelling up and slowly cutting off his airway. Nice right? Additionally, he has some genetic malfunction where his esophagus is weak and will continue to swell and get irritated if not taken care of... The long and short of all this gross medical talk is that Joe had to have surgery. In this surgery, he had his adenoids and tonsils removed - he also had part of his soft palate shaved back and he had his entire esophagus cauterised, widened and scored with little cuts to ensure a strong esophagus for life.

It was a rough procedure and there was a whole lot of pain involved. A whole lot. Joe could tell you a lot more about the specifics of the pain; but let me tell you, it was hard just to watch him go through it. It was made much worse by the fact that the dose of pain meds that they gave him wasn't even half strength. He wasn't eating or drinking and I started getting concerned. Thank goodness for my lovely sister Julie who is a nurse. She gave me all the proper info on what safe dosages were, I called Joe's Dr., he agreed and we went forward with better pain management. That's when things started turning around and the healing process began. Yesterday was just 3 weeks out from the surgery and Joe is feeling like a whole new person. He still gets a bit tired and sore when he talks too much and he still has to concentrate a little bit when he's drinking so as not to allow the liquids to come out his nose!!

The best part of this whole procedure has been the sleep. Oh! The Sleep!! Neither of us realised (again, as it al happened so gradually) how little sleep we were actually getting through the night. It has been absolute heaven to go to bed every night and wake up feeling truly rested. As the sleep has improved, everything has improved. We are in good moods all the time, we want to go out and do things, we are happy and life is beautiful. I know that anyone reading this who is a parent will understand what I am talking about when I say that 6 solid months of interrupted and crappy sleep can make life seem like a very dark place.

Anyway, if you add together the general misery leading up to the surgery, the surgery, the recovery and some other largely life-changing decisions that have gone on in the last week and a half (and no, I'm not preggers) than I would say that I have some darn good excuses for neglecting you for the last month or so.

I promise I'll be better from here on out - and really, with this much sleep in my life, I am feeling like there is not much that I can't do right now.

More news to follow in the coming weeks - we are welcoming summer, our first overseas visitors and some big changes here so there should be plenty of writing material!

It's Fridayyyyy... Fridayyyy....

2011-09-30T11:32:00.000+10:00

Well, Joe and I leave for Perth tonight and I can't wait. I've been really struggling with anxiety this week - not sleeping well and generally feeling quite on-edge.... Luckily, I had plans to meet up with Cristin for a Mani/Pedi last night so that helped to get me in a holiday mood. I also made the executive decision that I needed a massage so after my nails, I ran next door and got a 90 minute Thai massage. So worth it (even though I'm a bit sore today) and exactly what I needed to finally let go of all my stress and tension and mentally prepare for our holiday.

Of course, because I spent hours after work getting pampered, I didn't get home till late. That meant that we ate dinner late, I finished the laundry very late, started packing extremely late and went to bed ridiculously late. So, I'm pretty tired today; but still feeling really mellow - maybe I'll try to sleep on the plane...

Pierogi Party - Part 2 - Everything Else

2011-09-27T14:25:00.000+10:00

After the filling is chilled, it's time to make the dough and assemble the pierogis. I strongly advise recruiting as many people as possible to help with the process.... turn it into a family tradition, invite people over and call it a party.... whatever you decide to go with, just know that this is not a one person job.

I would like to thank the 9 other people who tramped over to my house to offer support (the men) and help me (the women)!! It was a day long process with pauses for a pizza lunch and a reward dinner of kielbasa and pierogis. Much beer and wine was consumed of course as you can't have a party in Australia without that! We all walked away from the day richer by several dozen pierogis each, deeper friendships with each other and lurking hangovers...

I'd also like to thank Cristin for coming over and being my own personal photog for the day so that you could all see the step by step process. Didn't she do a lovely job? Also thanks to Ellen for a picture of hers that I used and to Jon for a few photos of his that I used here as well - one of which perfectly captures the joy you should have while making these little beauties... Enjoy!

Mimi's Pierogi Dough

-Adapted from pretty much every pasta dough recipe out there

1 cup flour

1 egg

1 T canola oil

1 T cold water

Pinch salt

Combine all ingredients in a bowl until a flaky ball of dough forms - I use my hands because ~~I'm not fancy~~ it's easier to help the ingredients come together. It doesn't matter if the dough seems quite messy and uncombined. It will come together while it is resting. If the dough is very very dry and you cannot get all the little floury bits to come together than you can add a 2nd tablespoon of cold water.

Cover the dough and let it rest for at least a half hour so the gluten can relax. Cut the dough ball into 4 pieces.

Roll out each piece by pushing it through a pasta machine on the highest (thickest) setting. Fold it in half and run through the machine again several times, folding each time. This is called "laminating" the dough. As you proceed though this process you will notice the dough goes from feeling sticky to feeling very smooth and glossy. Once the dough has become smooth and glossy and you have it in a nice square shape than you can begin running it through progressively smaller settings on your pasta machine. Do not fold the dough once you start this process. I use an Atlas pata maker, I laminate on setting 1 and then run the dough through to setting 5.

Cut circles out of the dough. Now, you can do this with whatever utensil you would like; but here is my 2 cents. I have made hundreds and hundreds of pierogis throughout my life and I can't recommend this little silver tool that you see in the above photo highly enough... it's by Pampered Chef and it's called a Cut-N-Seal. If you follow this link than you will see that it's under $10.00 - totally worth it! If you don't have one than you can use a circular cookie cutter or something else like it.

Place a small spoonful of filling in the middle of each dough circle.

Hopefully, look this happy and excited about doing all this work cause you know it will be worth it at the end of the day!

Fold the dough over the filling while pressing the edges lightly together. Place flat on cutting surface, ensure all air bubbles are pushed out and then press down in the centre of your Cut-N-Seal to trim the excess dough from the edges and achieve a uniformed seal. If you don't have this beautiful tool than you can seal your pierogis with a swipe of water, edge of a fork, and quite a bit of pressure. Again, I can't recommend this tool from Pampered Chef enough. In this batch of about 15 dozen, there were only about 3 pierogis that opened up while boiling - with more traditional methods of sealing, your rate of pierogi death will be significantly higher. Plus they just won't look as pretty!

Once the pierogis are sealed and ready to go, drop them in salted, lightly boiling water for about 3 minutes per batch. You don't want to crowd them in the pot so only do about 6-8 at once. Drain and cool the pierogis on a cooling rack placed over something to catch excess water. Be prepared to change your water at least once and possibly twice when you are doing a large amount. Once the water starts looking thick and cloudy it's time to start a clean pot to boil. After the pierogis have cooled, I pack them in Ziplock Quart Freezer bags by the half dozen. They freeze quite nicely and will keep for up to 3 months.

Pierogis are best served fried up in a pan with butter and onions; but the above method is nice with kielbasa and good for a crowd. Throw a bunch of the pierogis and kielbasa in a baking dish, top with melted butter and carmelised onions and then into a 350 degree oven until everything looks all toasty and delicious. When using fresh (uncooked) kielbasa (as in the bottom photo) just cut into one of the pieces so you can make sure not to serve your guests undercooked pork.

So, that's basically it. Lots of hard work; but, I promise, worth it in the end....

Pierogi Party Part1 - The Filling

2011-09-27T13:17:00.000+10:00

Welcome to my step by step primer on making the most delicious pierogis that you have ever tasted!

One of the places that pierogi's can go wrong is in the filling. The number one rule is that the filling has to made in advance and left to chill in the fridge at least over night... I procrastinated horribly and didn't start my filling until 10pm on the night before the pierogi party... Why? I don't even remember...

Anyway, here is the "ish" recipe for the pierogi filling. I say "ish" because you may decide to add more or less of something - you will need to taste as you go and adjust accordingly. I've never actually written my recipe down so this time when I made the filling I wrote down the amounts as I went. I started with 2 cups of onions, made it all the way to the end and realised it was not enough... I had to fry off 2 more cups to make the filling taste right... So, go with your gut here (literally and figuratively) - you are looking for really thick, salty, cheesy oniony mashed potatoes....

Mimi's Pierogi Filling

- Adapted from my mother's recipe who adapted it from my Grandmother's recipe

5 lbs potatoes

4 cups diced onion

150 grams butter

2 T salt

(I use flaked sea salt-use less if you are using table salt)

325 gram sharp cheddar cheese cubed

(preferably white)

Peel, dice and boil the potatoes as though you are making mashed potatoes.

Saute the butter and onions over medium high heat until carmelised and almost burnt. Add 1 teaspoon of the sea salt as you are cooking down the onions.

When potatoes are soft, drain the water off of them and put them in your mixer bowl. Use the wisk attachment so that the potatoes get to mashed consistency. Add the cooked onion (making sure you scrape all of the butter and browned bits out of the pan) and add the cheese several cubes at a time, followed by the salt.

Mix until the consistency is smooth and the cheese is melted. The mixture should be fairly thick and glossy from the cheese. Taste at this point and add more salt, onions or cheese as needed until the mixture is very flavourful.

Chill filling for at least 4 hours – preferably overnight…

The consistency should be quite similar to cookie dough.

Revisiting my List

2011-08-31T14:37:00.000+10:00

I was checking out some new blog followers when I came across someone who wants to move to Australia. She posted a list on her blog of things that she wanted to do once she got here and she stated that she got the idea from another blogger (and kept some of the original items). As I read my way down the list, I realised that the list came from me! It was only my fourth entry in this blog and it has been so long since I wrote it that I had almost forgotten about it. I went back and read through it and I thought it might be fun to re-visit it now that we have been living here for a year. Anyway, thanks Jay Jay (hope you are reading this) for reminding me about this and I hope your immigration process goes smoothly! You will love it here!

Here is the original list:

Visit Fiji at least once

Take a vacation to Thailand/Singapore/Malaysia/Philippines

~~Visit Melbourne~~ - This was a fun trip; but I didn't really connect to Melbourne as a city. It just made me miss Sydney.

~~Drive the Great Ocean Road~~ - This was incredible! I fully plan on going back again soon and doing this again. I saw more beautiful things on a weekend during this trip than I have ever seen in my life.

Snorkel at the Great Barrier Reef

Visit Tasmania

Visit both New Zealand Islands - Not done yet; but we are going for 2 weeks with Joe's parents right before Christmas

Take a tour through wine country - Not sure why I was so vague with this one when I wrote it? Which region? I didn't know there were so many! Anyway, we are going to the Margaret River Valley in a few weeks and I can cross this one off!

Go to Japan

Stay at one really upscale resort in one of the places listed above

~~Go to the Taronga Zoo~~ - This was really cool - I went with a friend who got me on her family pass. I can't get over how expensive the entry fee is; but it would be worth it at least once just to see it - it's a great zoo.

~~Walk through the Botanical Gardens~~ - Happy to report that I've done this a fair number of times! So many times, in fact, that I can't even tally them all up...

Go to a show at the Sydney Opera House at least once - Still haven't done this! What is wrong with me? I see that Opera House EVERY DAY and I still have not been inside... I am asking Joe for tickets to something for my birthday and we are getting this done.

Visit every famous Sydney Beach - Again, I'm not even sure what I was thinking when I wrote this... I'm not even sure if I know what all the famous beaches are in Sydney. I've been to Manly, Balmoral, Bondi. Coogee, Tamarama, Clovelley and Bronte. What am I missing? Maybe Curl Curl and Dee Why?

Take a vacation to Hawaii

Have a picnic in all of the famous Sydney Parks - Again... What parks are the famous ones? Well, I eat my lunch in Cook and Phillip park all the time; but that isn't really famous. Obviously, we have supped in many of the aspects of the Botanical Gardens. Surprisingly enough, we have never had a picnic in Hyde Park. I walk through it every day to and from work; but I've never eaten there. Oh Wait! I take it back! We went to the Night Noodle Markets there, sat on some newspapers, ate pork buns and split a bottle of wine. Sounds like a picnic to me! Am I missing some famous parks?

Take a cruise through Sydney Harbour - Does taking the ferry back and forth every day count? I think we will do one of those touristy sight-seeing cruises when Joe's parents come at Christmas

~~See Mrs. Macquaries Chair~~ - Indeed, and have the pictures to prove it! Not sure why I thought this was that important? It was cool and all; but I'm not sure it belongs on a list with a trip to Fiji.... Just sayin...

~~Attend the open-air cinema~~ - I'm crossing this one off even though we never got to go to the St. George cinema in the Botanical Gardens (which is the specific one that I was writing about). We did purchase season tickets for the Starlight cinemas at the North Sydney Oval and spent many an evening under the stars watching movies...

Hold a koala - Now that I've seen koalas in the wild on our Great Ocean Road trip, I have less desire to hold one. Seeing one seemed to fill whatever koala shaped hole was in my life at the time I wrote this..

See a kangaroo - I'm not going to cross this off since I've only seen one in the zoo - I don't think it counts till you see one in the wild...

I think I've done pretty good so far with crossing things off this list - next year is definitely the year for Fiji! Now that we've been here for a while, I think I need to sit down and draw up a new list. Perhaps this time I'll keep it out in the open instead of burying it in a blog post and not looking at it for a year!

Spring equals Fall?

2011-08-26T14:57:00.000+10:00

Today is Daffodil Day here in Australia. This is a huge fundraiser by the Cancer Council (much like the American Cancer Society for those back home) that is held every year to raise funds for research etc… The event, in a nutshell, is people all over the city selling merchandise to raise the funds. Most of the volunteers are school children in their uniforms and they are quite adorable and earnest about selling as much as they can. I always buy from the boys that stand on Wharf 4 of Circular Quay as I am getting off the ferry. My reasoning is simple: people will approach you over and over during your morning commute asking you to support the Cancer Council; but if they can see that you have already bought something than they leave you alone. So, I try to buy something the instant I step into the city. In hindsight, I wish I had waited and bought from the two 10 year old boys at the exit of the St. James Station. They were having a very serious discussion with each other about where exactly to stand to maximise their sales thereby raising more money. What cuties! This year I bought a sunny little bunch of actual Daffodils. It’s a very small bunch for $5.00; but for such a good cause that I would have paid double that. They are quite fragrant and, as I sit here at my desk, basking in Spring flowers and dreaming about the 67 degree day outside the windows right now, it’s hard to reconcile that it’s actually almost September. Anywho – here are some facts about Daffodil Day:

This year Daffodil Day celebrates its 25^th anniversary in Australia
The largest national fundraising event of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere, Daffodil Day raises essential finds for cancer research, prevention and support services.
The daffodil is the international symbol of hope for all touched by cancer
This year Daffodil Day aims to raise over $9.5 million to fund the cancer control initiatives, patient support and research services of Cancer Council's eight state and territory member organisations
More than 10,000 volunteers are expected to staff over 1,200 Daffodil Day sites across Australia

Last night a friend with a car was nice enough to drive me out to a little Polish deli in Roseville. As you know (if you read my last post), I am having a pierogi party tomorrow and I was hoping to get some authentic and delicious kielbasa to cook up with the pierogis when we are done working for a much deserved reward dinner. Well! It was incredible! If you live in Sydney you should go there and buy as much deliciousness as you can carry home. I cannot recommend it highly enough! This place is called European Taste Smallgoods and Delicatessen – they don’t have a website; but if you Google them you will find lots of articles about them. They are at 19 Hill St. in Roseville…. It’s a very tiny place – just enough space for a couple of deli cases and some dry goods on the other side. Pretty much everything was in Polish which made me feel proud and sad and sorry all at once. Proud of being Polish, sad for Dad being gone and sorry that we never learned Polish growing up. I checked out the deli cases while the customer before me was being helped and found what I was looking for!!

The woman behind the counter (who I also think was one half of the couple that own it) made me think of Grandma Ziebro – in those pictures before her hair went all grey. Anyway, she helped me find the kielbasa I wanted – there was only smoked in the case so I asked her for fresh. She gave me a suspicious look and said “Only in freezer, only in package of six – you still want?” Indeed I did. She handed it to me a little reluctantly and I asked her if it was the same flavor as the smoked garlic one I was getting. She said no. I asked what the difference was and she said “This one raw – you must cook!” Poor woman, I kept trying to tell her that I knew that it was raw meat and that I needed to cook it ; but I think she was nervous to sell it to me cause she thought I would take it home, eat it raw and get sick. She packaged them up though and as she was ringing them up she asked me why I was buying so much. I told her about the party and that I was teaching people how to make pierogis. She immediately paused and took the handle of the shopping bag and pulled it to her side of the counter. I was still waiting for the total when this conversation happened:

Her – “You are going to teach people how to make pierogis?”

Me – “Yes….”

Her – “How do you know how to make them?”

Me – “My Dad was Polish and I had a big family and we used to make them all the time. I decided one year that I wanted to really perfect the family recipe so I worked on it for a long time and now I have a really great recipe and an easy way of making them”

Her – “What kind you make?”

Me – “Mushroom and sauerkraut and potato.”

Her (nodding) – “Ok…. What do you put in your dough?”

Me – “Flour, eggs, water, oil and salt”

Her – “Yes, many people do not put the oil”

Me – “Oh, you definitely need the oil or the dough is not good”

Her – “Ok! Very Good!”

Then she got all smiley, gave me the total and wished me well for the party. Whew! I was quite nervous that I was going to fail the test and not be allowed to buy my kielbasa. She was so cute that I want to take her back in some of my pierogis when they are done, ask her to adopt me as her granddaughter and teach me Polish. They are right by a train station so I see many trips for kielbasa in my future. I am just sorry for the people who will be riding that train home with me, smelling that garlicky goodness and not getting to have any. I hadn’t gotten to taste any of the stuff I bought so it was with great trepidation (who am I kidding – I ripped that package open and cut a piece off before I even said hello to my husband) that I tried a piece when I got home. It is some of the best kielbasa I have ever tasted. Like Easter Kielbasa on delicious steroids. Amazing…

This morning as I was leaving for work, I quickly reached in the fridge to grab an orange and a yogurt to throw in my bag for breakfast. I shut the fridge door and a split second later that garlic and spice smell reached out and slapped me across the face a couple of times. In that instant I was a little girl – at the top of the basement stairs – back when there was orange striped carpet (I think?) – smelling that same smell sneaking its way out of that old green fridge with the silver handle that was in the basement – Easter was just a few days away – Mom was making poppy seed roll just up those 3 stairs in the kitchen – I was getting called to knead some Babka – Daffodils were blooming in the woods and Lily’s of the Valley were sending their scent in through the open kitchen window. I wanted to live in that memory for the rest of my life and, when I blinked and it faded, I just wanted to sit on the kitchen floor and weep for every Easter that I will ever have in my life that isn’t like that one.

This is yet another thing that confuses my seasons/holidays. Daffodils, kielbasa smells and slowly warming weather spells Easter to me…. Instead, I should start thinking about our Labour Day trip, whether or not we will have a Halloween party and how big of a turkey I will need for Thanksgiving this year.

Quite strange…

Bad Mood Day

2011-08-24T09:59:00.000+10:00

I had to get up an hour earlier than usual this morning and it really threw me off - I kept asking Joe on the commute in to the city why he was so cranky. Suddenly I realised that I was the cranky one... Oops...

I've been trying to take lots of deep breaths this morning - I had a coffee etc... Just trying to tame this wave of irritation that keeps spiking up. Well, it's not really working so well.

Any tips? I could really use them right now....

This was all I could come up with...

2011-08-12T14:23:00.000+10:00

This is about my eighteenth attempt at writing a blog post in so many days. One of the posts during last week’s spate of beautiful weather in the 70’s was titled “Spring has Sprung!” I deleted that one because really, how many times can you write “It’s so warm!! I love sunshine!” before you realise it’s a crap post? (It’s about 6 times by the way – at least that’s how many I wrote before I deleted the entry).

Anyway, I stole an idea from another blogger for this entry and it’s so easy that I know I will actually write it. Basically, I am just going to list some non-sequiturs from my recent life in bullet points below and then you will all be filled in on how exciting my life is. No really…

Ok, here goes:

In Australia, you are supposed to drive (AND WALK) on the left. This bullet point is for the crazy woman in Cook and Phillips park this morning who walked straight towards us on the right (direction not degree of correctness) of the side walk and then made us stop completely and shuffle around so that she wouldn't have to walk on the correct side of the side walk. I hope that you are reading this!

I had cinnamon toast for brekkie this morning and it was magical. Not cinnamon bread that was toasted - oh no! This was white bread toasted with cinnamon sugar on top. Joe was sick this week and one night for dinner he made himself cinnamon toast - I wasn't even paying attention till he sat down with it and the smell hit me. It was one of those visceral scents that transport you to a time in your childhood. I think the last time I had cinnamon toast like that was when I was living at home and my Mom made it for me. I can't believe I forgot about it - it's so comforting and delicious especially with a hot cup of tea.

Joe and I are going on a date night tonight - we have both been sick with horrible flu/cold/coughs and since we are now all recovered we will be celebrating with dinner and a movie in the city.

It really irritates me when I get a work email that someone has signed only with their initial. I know they don't mean anything by it; but to me it says, "I'm so busy and important that I can't be stuffed to write my full name for you..."

I am hosting a pierogi party at our place sometime in the next month where lots of people will come over, I will teach them how to make yummy pierogis, we will make them all day and then we will all have dozens to keep in the freezer like little bags of gold! This party necessitated me buying a pasta maker and I treated myself to a gorgeous black Atlas beauty.

Best for Last.... My husband has the greatest sense of humour... We have a slow leak in the S pipe under our sink. I have a little bowl under it catching the drips; but it seems to be getting worse. I asked Joe to email our real estate agent about it and, let me tell you, if I had wrote the email it would have been matter of fact, boring and no frills. This is the email that Joe sent:

"Hi __________,

I'm sad to report that the recent spat of cold weather has given our kitchen sink S-pipe a bit of the sniffles. It has a pretty persistent drip that no amount of tissues and love seems to cure. It's making a bit of a mess of the cupboard under the sink. Would you mind sending the plumbing doctor over for a house call?"

Isn't he just the cutest?

Bacon Bacon Bacon!!!

2011-07-26T17:32:00.000+10:00

This is a tale of our epic weekend…. Brought to you on a Tuesday; but who’s counting? That's a joke - I know who's counting...

It all started with this incredible recipe I found for chicken enchiladas…. I decided that I was going to make them. The recipe calls for a can of green chiles which I just so happen to have in my pantry (thanks to my fabulous M-I-L). I decided that I should always have green chiles in the pantry for a “just in case” scenario and so I began a hunt to find some more. This is like hunting for a needle in a haystack here in Sydney…. I heard tell of a couple of places in Newtown that might have them so I laid plans for an excursion for Saturday.

If you don’t live here, than you might not realise that it’s been raining incessantly for the last 3 weeks. Not just drizzle; but full-on downpours for days on end. Our ferry stairs were turned into a beautiful waterfall that quickly turned ugly as soon as you tried to climb it. Everything has just been cold, wet and grey. So… I checked the forecast for the shopping trip and was pleased to see that we were supposed to have relatively clear skies. It was raining a bit on Saturday morning; but it cleared up by about 11 so off we went. Our first stop was Fiji Market in Newtown. There was a small Mexican selection here (smaller than in the photos if you follow the link); but better than anywhere else I have seen so I’m not complaining. I got a bag of Masa, canned jalepenos, tomatillo salsa, canned black beans and canned adobo chiles. I wished they had green chiles; but they didn’t. They also didn’t have corn husks for making tamales with; but I figure I can do those myself this summer during fresh corn season. I pretty much danced out of that store on a complete high.

We were walking up King street (popping in and out of all the cool little “junktique” stores that are there) when I saw a restaurant called “New in Town” which is cute since it’s in Newtown (Please follow this link and look at the pictures of the food!!). It’s a Polish restaurant and I was so excited to read their menu! We ended up having lunch there because we were hungry ~~because I wanted to and gave Joe puppy dog eyes~~. We got the potato pierogis and the grilled Polish sausage and then split each entree so that we could each taste both. The sausage was great – nothing like our Easter kielbasa from “Little Warsaw” in Cleveland – but perfectly respectable with dollops of mustard and horseradish (which was incredible and could be eaten by the spoonful) on the side. The pierogis were honestly pretty disappointing… I can’t say for certain; but it seemed that the filling was encased in wonton skins? Those work in a pinch for raviolis; but the effect when used for pierogis was very very odd. The filling was quite bland and a little mealy. Not horrible; but certainly not pillows of deliciousness like my own. I’d love to go back and try some of the items listed on their dinner menu and see what they were like - if you followed the link and saw the pictures I'm sure you would agree. I’m also kicking myself for not asking them where I could get kielbasa in Sydney – I’ll try to remember the next time we go there. Finding this restaurant was another little kick in the pants for me to buy a pasta maker and make some pierogis of my own. I swear I am buying one today and then it’s going to be pierogi party time at my place!

On to the Newtown Foodworks still in search of green chiles… In fact, they did not have them (or if they did, I couldn’t find them). I did, however, find some mustard that I had been looking for and I found some Jone’s Root Beer!! I got two bottles (which didn’t last long) and, in hindsight, I should have gotten several more…. Oh well, yet another reason to spend weekends wandering up and down King St.

Sunday we went into town (aka Military Rd) to pick up a prescription and have dinner. We had time to kill so we wandered over to our little discount store to pick up some odds and ends – yaknow… superglue, bobby pins and striped socks (don’t judge my shopping list!) We wandered by Neutral Bay Fresh which is a lovely little produce shop and I decided to pick up some fruit and veg for the week while we were there. I’ve never actually walked carefully through that little shop – every time I have ever gone in it has been a rush job for something in particular. Well, this time I was in no rush and I gave my full attention to the whole place. Not only did I find some incredible raviolis (roasted lamb, mushroom and rosemary), I also found Hellmanns Mayonaise and I found (excuse me while I scream a little) AMERICAN BACON!!!! Real, honest to goodness bacon! Joe and I quickly scrapped our dinner plans and rushed home to make BLT’s for dinner. I cannot even tell you how darn good that bacon smelled while I was cooking it – and that BLT was just about the best thing I had tasted in a long time. I am not ashamed to tell you that I saved every bit of bacon grease that was in that pan. It’s sitting pretty in a tiny container in my fridge waiting to be used in my risotto tonight and some scrambled eggs this weekend!

Granted, none of these incredible finds were cheap – the bacon alone was $12.00 for eight slices! The mayo was $7.00 for a very very small jar. But, for something that is as much of a treat as these little touches of America are, I would gladly pay double those prices. It’s nice to know that I can get these things every once in a while – knowing that I have access to them is sometimes just as good as actually having them.

I have to say, drinking my root beer while I cooked that bacon was almost a religious moment for me…

Excuse Me?

2011-07-15T15:04:00.000+10:00

This lovely gem was taken directly from "Publication 54" - Otherwise known as Tax Guide for U. S. Citizens and Resident Aliens Abroad.

"If you work one year, but are not paid for that work until the next year, the amount you can exclude in the year you are paid is the amount you could have excluded in the year you did the work if you had been paid in that year."

I welcome your comments on this insanity.... Seriously...

Would Anyone Else Like Some Money From Me? Anyone?

2011-07-06T11:15:00.000+10:00

I got a lovely letter from the IRS last night - Happy Fourth of July to Me!!

Just Kidding! The letter says that we owe them $2,300.00 from our 2009 return that was done incorrectly. In a way, I had been expecting the letter; but I hadn't been expecting it quite so soon and I certainly wasn't expecting it to be so much. Last year when I filed our taxes, I wasn't thinking about the liquidation of my parent's assets after my Mom died... So, when I got some additional tax forms about a month after I filed, I realised that they were really supposed to be included in the original filing. We were deep in the middle of our move to Australia though so I was distracted enough to just throw them in a folder and deal with it later.

At Christmas, I was talking to friends about it and I started getting really freaked out that I was going to get in huge trouble if I didn't fix it right then and there. So, I slowly started the process of getting the right year of Turbo Tax re-installed on my computer, finding my original tax return and going through the amendment process. When I got to the end of the amendment, It said that we owed a thousand dollars. I was so mad that I had to pay a penalty for having dead parents that I actually declared our charitable donations for the year. I've never declared them in the past because it feels slightly wrong getting a tax break for doing what you should be doing in the first place. I know, that's stupid and idealistic. Anywho, entering all that stuff brought our total owed down to $675.00. That was a number that I could live with and I had a brilliant idea: I would save the amended return, file my 2010 taxes and then use part of my 2010 return to pay what I owed in 2009. Personally, I thought that was bloody brilliant.

I still haven't filed my 2010 taxes though because I was waiting for the Aussie tax year to end (June 30th) so I could file them together. Don't worry, I filed the extension paperwork for the IRS so I don't think I will get in trouble there. I was going to start the US taxes last week and when I went though all my paperwork, I realised that we had never gotten Joe's W-2 from his employer in the States. We've requested a re-print; but we still haven't gotten it.

But - back to the outrageous amount that the IRS feels they deserve from me - beyond the thousand dollars that I already knew about, they are also saying that I claimed excess SS tax or some such rubbish... I did the taxes through Turbo Tax and I even had H&R Block check them when I was done so how could that have happened? Who knows...

Anyway, I got all ready to call them last night - I ate ~~some~~ a lot of chocolate, I had ~~some~~ a lot of Jack Daniels, waited till after 9pm (7am in the States) and logged on to Skype. I was ready - well, maybe not ready, but at least resigned. The line rang and rang and then told me they were closed! What? I double checked the times and the time zones only to realise that it was the Fourth of July.

So, I have to call tonight and figure this all out....

Going "Home"?

2011-06-27T14:53:00.000+10:00

Now that we've been back in Sydney for a couple of weeks, it almost feels like our holiday to the States never even happened. The build-up to the trip was intense - creating packing lists, buying souvenirs and generally worrying too much about what it would be like being back. I've heard a lot of ex-pats talk about their first trip back and there seems to be an almost unanimous agreement that it is a very big deal. There are a lot of emotional issues inside of that first visit - do you still fit in, are you homesick for your original home, are you homesick for your ex-pat home etc....

I can't lie - I was so nervous... I was excited to see my family again; but I was mostly afraid of going back, realising that I missed it too much and then coming back to Australia completely miserable and homesick. I have been lucky up to this point on the homesickness front - not that it hasn't happened; but that it seems to happen infrequently and be very low-grade when it does.

Anyway, the visit was great... There was lots that felt weird and lots that we seemed to just fall right back in to. Being back in the States did make me realise how much I had been missing; but hadn't admitted to myself. I really miss driving... I love that we use public transport here; but I miss the ease of getting places easily, quickly and on my own timetable. I also miss the ease of driving - I've driven here; but it has not been a fun experience... Being on the wrong side of the car throws off what little spatial understanding I have and both of my driving experiences here have left me shaken and teary as I narrowly avoid being side swiped the whole time. So, while we were back on our holiday, I was finding any excuse possible to drive - it just was so effortless and enjoyable.

I also missed the prices and the ease of shopping - it's easier to drive to stores, they are bigger, it's cheaper and the customer service is unparalleled. So yeah, I miss those things a lot...

I was really looking forward to eating certain types of food that I missed and that part was very disappointing to me. Nothing tasted quite like I remembered and nothing tasted as good as the food here in Sydney. Except burgers.... They were amazing and promptly reminded me why I don't order burgers here in Australia - they just can't quite seem to get them right.

Anyway, the last two nights before we left to come back to Australia, I got really really homesick. Crying myself to sleep homesick - which is exactly what happened to me when we originally moved here. It passed, and by the time we left for the airport on our last day, I was only looking forward to coming back here to Sydney. Isn't that interesting? Crying for one home and yet looking forward to returning to your other home...

I guess if I learned anything from this trip, it's that you can have two homes and you can love them both so much that you can miss each one when you are gone from it. I learned that Sydney has become my home over this past year and that, regardless of my "ishews", I don't want to leave it.

Coming out of customs and into the Sydney airport proper are these banners. One says, "Welcome to Sydney" and that's the one I was excited to see when we moved here. Look more closely though, and you will see that they next one says "Gday, Welcome Home". That's the one that I was most excited to see on this trip because I felt like it had finally come true for me.

If you look more closely, you will see a Christmas tree as well, which is a dead give-away to the fact that this is actually not my picture. I stole it from the interwebs because I never have enough hands free to actually snap a picture at any time during a trip - let along a 26 hour, 4 layover trip.

The upshot of all this is: I love my family, I love the US and I miss all of them all the time. I also love Sydney, I love my husband and I love our life here - so parting from one to go back to the other isn't as hard as I thought it would be.

Great Ocean Road - or - Warning! Longest Post Ever!

2011-06-24T11:09:00.000+10:00

Now that I’ve spouted off about nothing much of value over the last couple of posts, I suppose I should treat you all with some beautiful pictures from the Great Ocean Road to thank you for your patience!

We left Melbourne in the afternoon and I had hoped to arrive at our lodging in Apollo Bay before nightfall; but, considering the amount of times I had Joe pull over so I could take pictures of the incredible coastline stretching away into the distance, I am shocked that we got there before midnight. I am always so nervous about booking accommodations here in Australia – there doesn’t seem to be the same “truth in advertising” as there is in the States. Also, instead of chain hotel/motels where you can expect a predictable experience, mostly you find independently run places where you’re not quite sure what to expect.

Our accommodations in Apollo Bay were really quite beautiful and I recommend them without any reservation – we stayed at “Captains at the Bay” and our room had, not only a lovely dual-headed shower, but a gigantic soaking tub (and let me tell you, there was nothing better than a glass of wine and a good book while soaking in said tub). After we got settled, we headed down to the main drag in town for some dinner – very expensive food (a la most tourist traps) and not very good quality; but we were tired and hungry and thankful for what we got.

The next day we continued on the drive with the intent of doing some sightseeing and getting more fabulous pictures. One of my goals was to visit the Otway light station as I had seen some beautiful pictures of it online when I was researching our trip and I was not about to miss any of the sights on this drive… It was slow going again, as I had Joe pulling off every few turn-offs for incredible photo opportunities. We turned down the long long drive that led to the light station and started noticing cars that had been hastily pulled over on the side of the narrow road with their occupants standing by them pointing cameras up into the trees. It was looking like something very interesting was going on...

This time it was Joe who wanted to stop as he wisely said “there is obviously something cool going on and I would like to see it”. I couldn't argue with that point so over we pulled and were treated to trees full of koalas. I've seen them at Taronga Zoo; but that was nothing compared to seeing them in the wild - just hanging out in the trees. Before we left for the trip, I got a recommendation from a co-worker about a place on the GOR where you could go to see koalas. We had bypassed it the night before on our drive in as it was getting late; and so I had intentions of stopping to see them on our way back to Melbourne on Tuesday - it was really cool that we no longer needed to cause we were getting our own little koala experience right here without an extra trip for it! Most of them, predictably, were sleeping so they just looked like large bumps on the branches. There was one very active one that was eating (see above) and I attempted to take a video of it with my camera. I was holding the camera over my head though so it came out shaky and not very good quality... Oh well. They were completely adorable and it was hard to rip ourselves away. I could have spent the whole afternoon just sitting on the car and watching them.

The light station was also worth it – it was so beautiful that it almost hurt. Up against that crazy deep blue sky, the white of the lighthouse was blinding; but still set off by the red railing at the top. I could have sat and taken pictures of it all day. There was a little snack hut attached to a visitor's centre; and, outside of it, shielded from the wind by a lean-to made of tarps and sticks, was a grizzled old man singing old sea shanties. Yep. As if the experience was not cool enough by itself, the soundtrack of sea songs being sung in the background took this to a whole new level. Joe and I walked down to the lighthouse itself and climbed up to the top. I don’t feel like I can even describe the experience well enough to do it justice. The view was crazy – water forever, cliffs below and waves smashing into foam far far below us. The wind was so strong that it felt like you actually needed to hold on the railing for fear of being blown away. We stayed up there far longer than was prudent and came down chilled and hungry. Luckily, the car had been parked in the sun so we settled into the warmth with a snack and away we went again….

We knew that we wanted to see the 12 Apostles and considering that we were about half-way there, we decided to press on and see them that same day (Really, in this sentence, the 4 times I say "we" - I mean "I").

We had gone to the store before embarking on our journey that morning and had gotten the provisions for a picnic lunch so we had supplies to last us through the rest of the afternoon. We drove and drove, again through a landscape that was incredible in its beauty and reached the vicinity of the 12 Apostles hungry and worried about the increasing lateness of the hour. We couldn’t find a place with picnic tables etc… for us to have our late lunch so we pressed on – finally stopping at a look-out for something called The Gorge… We walked out to it, hoping to find picnic tables; but instead found some beautiful angry ocean, rain and a squall blowing in. We ran back to the car, popped open the food and had an excellent picnic dinner in the car while the storm passed quickly overhead.

After that we drove around a bit, trying in vain to see the 12 Apostles – little did I know that we needed to go to the visitor centre, park and then take a stroll out to the lookout point. We finally figured it out after much turning around and frustration – mostly on the part of Joe who was the poor driver for the entire trip. We got there, got settled, got some coffees and started down the path to the lookout. We purposefully tried not to look at the rock formations till we got to the very end of the lookout point and then turned around together to take them in. I can’t decide which was better – seeing them for myself or watching Joe see them. I had been talking about them for days and he really didn't understand what the draw was. When I started researching the trip, I saw picture after picture of them and so knew what we were in for. He hadn't actually seen them yet even in picture form so getting to see his face while he took in the view was pretty amazing.

While we were on the furthest lookout point, I happened to glance down and see that there was an echidna right on the other side of the fence from me. Of course at the time, I thought it was a porcupine or hedgehog – I had to Google it later that night to find out what I had actually taken a picture of! We slowly moved along the paths leading from lookout area to lookout area, taking pictures of these rock beauties from every angle imaginable. We realised as we neared the end of the viewing area that if we waited for 15 minutes or so we would get to see the sun set on them. There wasn’t even a decision to be made – we found a good viewing spot and settled in with about a thousand other people.

Not to drag this otherwise upbeat post down - But I have to say, holidays are hard for me… They became really difficult after my dad died, got even harder after my mom died and, now that we are on the other side of the world from our families, they start to feel like looming black clouds when they begin approaching. I especially struggle with holidays that my parents really loved – Easter, Memorial Day and Christmas. I was struggling a little on this trip because I was missing Easter back in the States - it's such a huge holiday in my family that it is hard to even explain without doing it an injustice. So here we were - we happened to be standing on the edge of this huge country, in another hemisphere, all by ourselves watching the sun set on the most beautiful thing I had ever seen – On Easter Sunday…. It was perfect, it was sad, it was inspiring and incredible. I only wish that I were able to share these experiences with my Mom and Dad. My Dad especially would have loved that sight... I know it was beautiful enough to make me cry and I think it would have done the same for him.

We shook off the deep emotion that that sunset had laid on us (much as recounting the story has laid some deep emotion on this post) and headed back to the car.

I was nervous about the long drive back to Apollo Bay in the dark; but Joe handled the night driving with ease. There were hardly any other cars on the road so the journey was quick and painless. Back to our room to change and then out again for dinner. Again, lots of money for so-so food; but who the heck cares when you spent your day looking at the things we saw. We went back to our room for coffee, tea, Jack Daniels and some cookies to round out the day on an upswing. Joe turned on the TV and we stumbled across a program on ANZAC Day. It was sad and sobering so it maybe wasn't the best end for an emotional day; but it was incredible interesting and I'm glad we saw it.

ANZAC day was the next day and we decided to spend the whole of it in Apollo Bay. We read, sat on the beach for hours, ate fish and chips, napped and generally had the first “non-running around day” of the whole vacation. It was perfect and I’m glad we decided to rest up a bit. Tuesday morning it was up and out the door so that we could get back to Melbourne in time to return the car and head to the airport for our flight home.

It was a great holiday and my feeling is that, if you are living in Australia, you should go do this drive. Absolutely.

What Not to Blog....

2011-06-23T12:39:00.001+10:00

I was going to start this post out with a comment about “Unbloggable Ishews”; but then I realised that none of you would have any idea what I meant. The reason for that is that you probably don’t read this incredible blog (unless you are my sister Julie who recommended it to me) by Suse over at “Pea Soup”. You should read her – she’s funny and inspiring and reading her posts is a highlight to my blogroll. Anyway, she occasionally will mention “unbloggable ishews” in reference to problems that cannot be aired like the usual post content.

I feel that way a lot – it’s rewarding having readers; but I wonder sometimes how much nicer it would be to have a “diary” instead of a “blog”. Not only do I have lots of these ishews… I have them across different facets of my life. Sometimes when Joe and I fight (which to be fair, is very infrequent and usually small) I am so tempted to log on here and pour my heart out with my indignity and righteousness…. (yikes! That would be a miserable entry, no?) In those moments, I am reminded of the movie “Julie and Julia” where Julie and her husband get into a fight, he storms off and leaves her with a yelled “And don’t blog about this fight!”. Too true, too true….

Another huge “ishew” that I had never even considered when I started this blog was not really being able to talk about the differences between countries and the hardships of settling into a new culture. Don’t get me wrong, no one minds a cutesy little post where I compare the currency of both countries or posts about the different types of food here etc…. But those entries that I write about the negative aspects of being in this country (or moving to a new country in general) seem to spark an insane negative knee-jerk reaction from Australian natives and ex-pats alike. In a way, this could be a positive I suppose. No one wants to read a complaining rant about Australian customer service (or lack thereof) or a teary entry about how homesickness can hit you in the gut sometimes so hard that you are left bent double and gasping – trying to regain your equilibrium. I’m sad for them though – those entries that will never see the light of day on this blog – the really honest (and maybe slightly scary) ones.

I have to consider my audience so carefully. I don’t know if anyone at work reads my blog; but I’m sure some do - so I can never post about my “ishews” at work. Really, when you pare down my list of things that are unacceptable subject topics there doesn’t seem to be a whole lot left to air my voice on. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I have started posting so little? Well, along with the fact that my life is super boring!

Enough introspection! Onwards and Upwards as they say....

Our First Visitors!!

2011-06-22T09:59:00.001+10:00

Sunday was Father’s Day in America but not in Australia – a fact that I had forgotten until I went to the newsagent to buy a card for my Father in Law and realised that they didn’t have any…. Oops! Needless to say, I felt a bit stupid considering we had just returned home from the States where I easily could have purchased a card and even left it at my in-laws house to be opened on the appropriate day. Obviously, I spent far too much time in the States shopping and not enough time strategising for Father’s Day. Sunday was a quiet day for us since we had just had a group of people over the night before and stayed up really late. It’s full on winter here now so we snuggled up on the couch and watched some movies. I’m working on a counted cross stitch and I’ve just realised that I’m actually getting very close to being finished with it… Sunday I took the opportunity to knock a huge bit of it out. I’m hoping to finish it in the next couple of months and so have it ready to give to my Mother in Law for Christmas. Then it is on to the next project! I used to know how to knit and crochet quite well so I am thinking about starting that back up? Or perhaps I will finish the other unfinished cross stitch projects I have on the go at the moment…

Speaking of Christmas and my in-laws – I just booked plan tickets for Joe’s parents to com visit us for 5 weeks over Christmas!!! I am so excited!! They will be our first visitors here and we have decided to do a New Zealand cruise with them while they are here. I found a great deal on a 12 day cruise that departs from Aukland and gets us back into Sydney on Christmas Eve. There are so many things that I want to show them – the NYE fireworks from our windows, picnics on the reserve, the Botanical gardens etc…. December should be a very full month! In early January they are going to go up to the Great Barrier Reef for a few days and then they will be headed back for the States on the 11^th. Have I mentioned that I can’t wait??

Melbourne Trip

2011-05-17T09:42:00.000+10:00

I had heard a lot about Melbourne before we went for our visit - in retrospect, I probably heard too much because my expectations were sky-high. I was impressed driving in from the airport on Thursday night - the streets were wide (if you live in Sydney you will get why that is a big deal) and the city looked large and very planned. We finally arrived and checked in to The Rialto around 10pm - I knew it was going to be a good stay when they took our bags from us and took them up to the room while we were getting checked in. The room was sumptuous - not huge; but well appointed.

Every single detail was perfect and the shower alone was worth the price tag. Joe immediately collapsed into the luxurious bed; but, me being me, I needed to take a couple of hours to wind down. I decided to unpack and settle the room - and check out the mini-bar. Then I decided that I wanted a bourbon and ginger; but there was no little ice/freezer compartment in the fridge. I pressed the "instant service" button on the phone, asked for ice and was promised that it would be delivered promptly. It was... in a silver bucket big enough to bathe a baby in, on an additional silver platter, with a doily. I could have made hundreds of drinks with all that ice! Anyway, drink in hand, I finished unpacking and then decided to give the shower an inaugural run still with drink in hand. It was perfect.... enough said....

We ventured out the following day for a self-guided walking tour of the city... It was very quiet since it was Good Friday and not much was open; but we still had a great little wander. There was a lot that I liked about Melbourne; but there was a lot that I didn't. The little lane ways were gorgeous.... This one in particular, full of ~~graffiti~~ art was one of my favourites. We walked around the CBD, went to Southbank, walked around Federation Square and rounded out the day with dinner in Fitzroy. Back to the hotel for a nightcap and called it a day.

Saturday the city was much more vibrant - everything was open and there were tourists everywhere! We had to pick up our rental car around 3 so we had an early breakfast at the hotel and headed out again. We went to the Observation deck at the top of the Eureka tower. It was cool seeing the city laid out like that and I got to see where the Australian Open is held (fairly easy to spot due to the massive quantity of blue courts). It made me realise that we still have not been to the top of the tower in Sydney - We will have to rectify that this Spring (Fall if you are reading this in America) when Joe's parents come to visit. We wandered some more and ended up at a Yum Cha restaurant looking out over the river for lunch and then went to pick up our rental car.

Side note - I was nervous using Europcar as I had never used them and they seemed very "Budget-esque"; but they were the only ones with cars left when I was planning the trip so I had no choice. I have to say though, very very good service - nicer even than Hertz!

Anyway, that was the end of the Melbourne portion of our trip - here are some more photos for your viewing pleasure.....

This guy was crazy-talented!

I've just realised that I now have a picture of Australia's highest restaurant and now Australia's highest postbox - apparently, instead of getting into the giant things that are so prevalent here, I am now into the highest things!

This picture is for Matt

A lead up to the Melbourne Trip...

2011-05-16T10:51:00.000+10:00

As some of you ~~may be marking off the days on a special calendar and trembling in anticipation~~ may know, Joe and I are leaving on Sunday the 22nd for an almost 3 week holiday in the States. Excitement abounds and I am even more busy than usual - what with the packing and preparing...

You would think that being busy would be bad for blog writing; but, in this case, it is forced me to get some stuff done. I've been wanting to blog about our Easter holiday; but the photos have been sitting - leering at me from my sadly neglected pictures folder. How do you choose 4 or 5 good photos of the 12 Apostles when you have about 40 photos of them in different shades of sunset? See... you understand now...

Well, Joe's mom (i.e. the greatest MIL ever) has planned an open house for us during our visit so that we can see the whole family without having to cram a bunch of individual visits into our time there. We decided to put together a folder of pictures so that people could see where we have been and how beautiful this country is... Well, actually, I was just going to throw everything into a folder and let it play at random; but Joe has been nice enough to put together something with some heft and depth. The photos will actually be in order and there will be some labels and explanations as needed. That will save us from standing next to the tv all day saying - "Yes, this was our trip to Thredbo" - "Oh, that's an Echidna".

Anyway, this whole process necessitated an afternoon on the couch with Joe going through my pictures folder. I have come to realise that I am not nearly as organised as I like to think I am... The pinnacle of embarrassment came when I had to show him a folder entitled "Random Australia" in which I had pitched an alarming number of completely random photos. Add to that the existence of additional random folders in my on-line Picasa account that I had uploaded from my phone; and I am truly feeling sorry for him. We had many conversations like this one yesterday:

"Oh honey, I don't really like that photo - you should really put up the one of the Botanical Garden"

"Where are those ones?"

"Oh, they are in the folder called Nature - Sydney - Garden"

"That one is empty"

"Oh..... Did you try Random Australia?"

"Yeah"

"Oh.... Here, let me have the mouse"

click.... click.... click... click...

"Here they are! On-line in my Uploaded Blog Pictures folder"

"Thanks (almost invisible eyeroll)"

Anyway, the upshot of all of this is that we went through all the photos from our Easter holiday and they are now sorted and done. I was going to have this blog post actually be about Melbourne with some pictures; but now it's sort of long and I don't want to blow everything at once!

Tomorrow my pretties - tomorrow....

But here's an arty picture of the Opera House to tide you over (I know that it doesn't have anything to do with our trip to Melbourne; but I'm feeling guilty for not having any other photos in this post!)

Wherever a man turns he can find someone who needs him

2011-05-14T16:36:00.000+10:00

Hey All,

I know this is supposed to be a post about our trip to Melbourne and our drive on the GOR; but that will have to wait.

There is a blog that I have been following for a while - My best friend Meaghan introduced me to it and I was hooked from the first entry I read.

http://www.jennepper.com/ - Please make your way over and check it out. It's a very funny account of infertility... until she has a baby - then it becomes a very funny account of pregnancy and motherhood in general. The story turns sad though and Jen and her family need help - here is a link to her friend Andrea's blog with all the donation links and information - http://dixonsmakeitwork.blogspot.com/p/just-relax.html - Please go there and donate... And if you are living in Cleveland, please consider attending the fundraiser.

I would try to write my own synopsis of the sad story here; but I would do a horrible job. So, I am going to unabashedly copy straight from her friend Andrea's blog:

I am lucky enough to have known Jen (you might know her as Jennepper!) for a few years and to be able to call her an "in real life" friend. Gianna even considers Oliva one of her BFF's

Jen is amazing. As is her husband Mark. And their girls.

It took 3 years for Jen & Mark to successfully conceive Olivia. Miss O was born on valentine’s day 2009 and has been adorable, dramatic and awesome ever since.

Last summer, Jen & Mark decided to add to their family and after a successful FET they found out they would be having identical twins. Unfortunately, her pregnancy wasn’t all roses & sunshine – there were lots of concerns and doctors and drama. In the end, Jen ended up in the hospital around 32 weeks with hopes of seeing her girls very soon. A c-section was scheduled and the wait began.
Things went wrong. Very wrong. The girls were born via emergency C-section on December 29, 2010. Itty Bitty Baby, Ainsley, was small but mighty and taken straight to the NICU. Hog Baby, Evelyn, was just as beautiful but born perfectly still.
Ainsley is a fighter. A beautiful little girl who is surrounded by so much love, hope and prayers. She has been through a lot in her short little life – including spine surgery, G-tube surgery and most recently a tracheotomy.

The road ahead is long and her family has been adjusting to their “new normal” that includes 2 full time working parents, spending time with Olivia and spending whatever time they can with Ainsley along with countless hours in the car coming to and from all of these places.

Who knows what the future holds, all we can do is focus on the now.

When someone is hurting, or in need, as friends we want to do SOMETHING. If we could take away their pain and their hurt we would, but since we can't we typically try to fill their bellies and put a smile on their face in any way possible.

A group of friends, and mom’s, have come together to do just that – support, fill bellies and make smiles. At first our small group of amazing women were able to provide them, amongst other things, a basket full of goodies including gas cards, parking passes, groceries and dinners.
With the long road ahead for the Knepper's, we want to do something more and we want to reach out to all of YOU – all of the wonderful people who follow Jen’s blog, know her in real life and just want to extend their prayers/thoughts/hope into action.

Please share this page, Jen’s story, and ALL of this information in whatever way you can.

Blog about it and link back here. Share the button we have created on your blog. Tweet it. Facebook it. Email it. Donate. Pray. Love. Hope.

We are accepting donations, of all shapes and sizes – there is no such thing as an amount too small.

There is also an event.

Myself along with several other "in real life" friends have put together a fundraiser dinner & Reverse Raffle where 100% of the profit will benefit the Knepper family.
There will be food, booze, reverse raffles, live entertainment, lots of goodies to be raffled off with a side of relaxation.

The event is planned for Saturday July 23rd in Northeast Ohio.

If you are interested in attending the event or if you would like to donate an item to be given away (we’ll take whatever you want to give us!) please contact us for further information.

If you have any questions at all – email us.
We can’t wait to hear from you!

No family should have to go through something like this. No baby should be in the hospital for this long instead of at home. No parent should have to experience loss and joy on the same day, and no one should have to travel this long road without support. As a mother, I can't imagine her loss. As a friend, I can't imagine her strength.

Please share this page, Jen’s story, and ALL of this information in whatever way you can.

Blog about it and link back here. Share the button we have created on your blog. Tweet it. Facebook it. Email it. Donate. Pray. Love. Hope.

Home Again Home Again

2011-04-27T10:37:00.000+10:00

Well, we arrived back to Sydney last night to find rain and a 25 minute wait in the taxi queue. It didn't do much for my feelings of homecoming; but walking into our apartment did. I forgot all about our view - about the water and the lights from the city. I had to run around to all the windows exclaiming over every familiar sailboat.

The cleaners had been during our absence so the place was clean and looked so darn welcoming. Sleeping in our bad last night was a perfect end to the long holiday weekend.

I have oodles of pictures and much to tell you about; but I also have 2 suitcases of dirty laundry to deal with. So, give me a few days to get myself in order and then this weekend I will go post-crazy with our gorgeous photos.

Hope you all had a wonderful Easter!

I’ve been putting off this entry for months…. I’m sure you’ve noticed

2011-04-18T14:31:00.000+10:00

It’s a bit embarrassing how long I’ve gone without updating this space and it reminds me of my own frustrations when I was reading Aussie ex-pat blogs before I moved here. The blogs would be full of information, pictures, details… They were engaging and I was completely hooked on them. They would start off strong and then, as people got jobs and settled into normal routines, the updates would either come less frequently or stop altogether. Even when the updates would continue, the tone would change in a huge way – it would go from Adventure! Excitement! Discovery! to Boring! Tired! Routine!

That’s about how I’m feeling right now… Joe and I are both working full time so there is no time for me to go on little day trip adventures or to go explore a new market on a Tuesday morning… Weekends seem sacred now – A time for us to recover from the week and to do things that are enjoyable to us (mostly that involves sleeping in and having quiet dinners with friends). The idea of going on some huge trek across the city via public transport on a Sunday, quite frankly, makes me want to crawl back under the covers and sleep for the rest of the day. I also don’t have the free time to spend an afternoon writing three or four blog posts complete with pictures. Any of you readers who works all day and then comes home to make dinner and do laundry knows exactly what I mean. The “me” time is the first to go away.

Not that I’m complaining – not by a long shot…. Joe loves his job. I love my job. We are perfectly happy with our weekends of indulged laziness. I guess this is just my explanation (or my half-hearted apology of sorts) to you for not having more of an exciting life to post about.

I’m not making any promises to be better about posting; but I do have some exciting things planned in the next few months that might make posting more of a joy. Joe and I are going on holiday to Melbourne over the Easter break. It’s only five days and we have a lot that we want to see and do; but I think it will be incredible. We are spending the first two days in Melbourne proper and then spending three days at a B & B on the Great Ocean Road where we will get to relax and look at beautiful scenery. I’m sure I will have pages and pages of photos to post after we get back. There is also a tentative weekend trip to the Hunter Valley planned for early May with our two favourite couples.

The most exciting travel coming up is a 16 day trip back to the States! We are going back in late May (Yay! We will be there for Memorial Day) and returning home in early June. I’ve know for a while that this trip was in the works; but we hadn’t finalised anything until last week. Now that we have our leave scheduled at work and our plane tickets bought, I am getting practically dizzy with excitement! I am starting to form mental shopping lists of all of the things I want to stock up on while we are there. It’s a bit mad to me to think that we have been gone for almost a year. We landed in Sydney on the 23^rd of June. We’ll be landing in LA on the 22^nd of May – 11 months already gone on this adventure and it seems like it’s just been about half of that.

The Lady Meets the Queen

2011-02-24T19:00:00.000+11:00

Two mornings ago there was quite an event in the harbour. It was billed as "The Lady Meets the Queen". Basically, there were going to be two cruise ships passing each other in the harbour - the Queen Mary 2 and the Queen Elizabeth. I heard some folks talking about it and I also saw some signs up on the ferry wharves advertising it. Quite frankly, I was pretty underwhelmed... There are always cruise ships coming in and out of the harbour - after a while you just stop noticing them.... I wasn't about to take time out of my snoozing time to go look at some boats for goodness sake!

Well, Tuesday morning the alarm went off at 6:30 (ugh!) and Joe went to take the first shower (I have arranged it this way so I can loll around in bed for a few more minutes and make myself tea without feeling too guilty). Suddenly there was noise assaulting the peaceful morning - helicopters mostly; and two of the loudest ships horns (whistles? Do ships have horns?) I have ever heard. Joe and I both went out to the office to check it out; and I have to say I'm glad I got to witness it. I learned later that the Queen Mary 2 is the third largest cruise ship in the world and the Queen Elizabeth isn't much smaller so it was pretty breathtaking to see these floating cities pass each other in such a narrow part of the harbour.

Luckily my camera was nearby so I have some shots to share with you; but really, they are pretty crap - you can blame it on me still being half asleep and not wanting to open the window and let the cold wind in! Also because I had not had my tea yet.

Oh, and did I mention the choppers? There were eight of them circling the ships as they moved like snails through the water. I'm guessing security was pretty tight on this - they didn't even have eight choppers for Oprah...

The next day when I got home, I checked the mail and got a nasty surprise - No, not the usual spiders and webs that are pretty much always in there. It was a letter from the US District Court - Eastern Division of Kentucky! I had one of those moments where your heart stops for a minute or so and then starts flinging itself against your ribcage. Horrible scenarios started running through my mind - I was being summoned, subpoenaed, sued or something else equally as awful. I ripped the letter open only to find a jury summons - Ha! What a trick! Needless to say, I do not qualify for jury duty in my present situation, i.e... living outside of Boone County for more that six months out of the last year and also living out of the actual United Sates.

Back to the pictures of the cruise ships - I wanted to share them right away so I plugged in my camera that same morning and was completely embarrassed to see photos downloading from as far back as Australia Day (for those of you who don't know, that was on January 26th.... Oops). So, it seems as though I need to do some serious photo editing and then start sharing them. Maybe I'll work on that tonight? Then again.... maybe not!

Helloooooo Manchester!! And...some pictures of Thredbo!

2011-02-07T11:11:00.000+11:00

Hello all you eager blog readers!

First off, I want to congratulate the little town of Manchester, NY for bravely stepping into the breech left by the absence of South Korea - You are the number five city that visits my blog! Hurray for you!

Secondly, I want to talk about the last leg of our Christmas trip. Thredbo was gorgeous - the mountains were stunning of course; but what really made the stay there so great was the level of relaxation that we were all able to reach by the end of our stay.

There was plenty of hiking of course (like when Joe started at the bottom and climbed to the top on the most difficult track); but mostly I remember the spa treatments, the monopoly games, the yummy dinners and the evenings spent (in one room or the other) drinking wine and talking. We decided to extend our stay there by an extra day and it was the best decision that we made the entire trip. We stayed at The Denman which was staffed by a team of the most friendly and wonderful people I had encountered on the trip. (So nice, in fact, that they did not charge us for a bottle of wine from the mini-bar that we accidentally broke.)

Joe and I went on a ski-lift for the first time. I expected him to be a nervous wreck since he has a fear of heights; but he ended up being fairly calm. The ride up was easy-peasy for me; but I surprised the both of us by being more scared on the ride back down than he was! I think I need to visit Cedar Point the next time I am in the States so I can ride some coasters and get back my usual ambivalence to high, dangerous places!

Anyway, here's some photos... They don't even begin to do any justice to these incredibly beautiful mountains; but at least they can give you an idea of what it looked like!

The View from our Room

At the top of the ski-lift (arrow is pointing to our room)

Views from the top of ski lift and beginning of hike

A list of the available hikes

We did the sissy walk!

Views from the Hike - Notice the snow!!

Reaching the Lookout

The View from the Lookout

Us at the Lookout

Me in my Chrissy Hat and Scarf

This bird was only about a foot away from me and HUGE!

Back at the restaurant for some beer and burgers!

On out way out of Thredbo National Park - I was obsessed with getting pictures of these signs! Joe was nice enough to pull over so I could run around on the road and take these...

A Perfect Day

2011-01-29T22:42:00.000+11:00

Back when I was younger, I dated this guy.... He used to play me this song in a misguided attempt at romance...

To be honest, I always found it a bit creepy; but I understood the sentiment. I was in my mid-twenties when I was first introduced to Patty Griffin (Thanks to my sisters!) and this song...

I love this song - love it, love it, love it. Even if I am not having a "heavenly" day, just listening to it can lift me about halfway...

Today was a perfect day, a heavenly day... We had plans to go to a rodeo with our fabulous American friends; but, as Joe was still recovering from Wednesday's sunburn we decided to bow out and spend the day inside. What made it so perfect? If I described to you all of the little things that we did today, the yummy dinner, the movie we watched and the tiny meaningful moments that made up the day, it would only lessen the experience.

For now, I just want to snuggle into bed knowing that I have another entire day tomorrow to try to repeat today....

Sunday Blog

2011-01-23T23:45:00.000+11:00

Well, as you may be gathering, this will not be a post about Thredbo or even an installment 4 to our Christmas holidays. This is just a quick little note to let you know that all is well!

I promise a Thredbo blog is soon in the coming - just as soon as I get the photos sorted.

Joe and I have been busy... Busy with work and busy with the general day to day things.

But, it's very very late - and I still have to do an on-line grocery shop - and my feet hurt.... So, I am going to say goodnight and leave you with the promise of more exciting entries to come this week...

Christmas Vacation - Installment 3

2011-01-10T01:32:00.001+11:00

** Just a quick FYI for those interested - I wrote this entry 2 days ago; but I didn't have the photos organised for it and plus, it's the weekend, and I was busy relaxing! - sorry it's so late in coming! **

After our late night of wild and crazy domino playing - we opted for the later breakfast time the next morning. There were more choices on the menu that day, including some delicious little potato cakes and a few more egg options. I have to say, both mornings, the breakfasts were very good - nothing super fancy; but really tasty and nicely presented - Barry cooked the breakfast and Rod served the table. I got fried eggs the second morning and they were some of the best eggs I've had in a while... not sure how he cooked them l but they were crispy on the bottom and soft on top! Plus there was freshly brewed coffee - flat whites, cappuccinos etc... After breakfast we packed up and got everything ready to go - we still had about 20 minutes till check-out. P.I.C was enjoying the paper in the conservatory and I was jotting down some thoughts on my laptop in the dining room when Barry and Rod descended again. They basically asked us to get our stuff out of the rooms so they could go in and make them up for the next guests - I get it, they have every right to expect us to leave before the final check out time; but in this case we had a bit of time where we were just collecting ourselves for the next leg of the trip. We felt rushed out and we ended up pulling out of the parking lot still about 10 minutes prior to check-out. It left a bit of a bad taste in our mouths about the stay.

All in all, Barnsley House was a beautiful beautiful place to stay. The gardens were overwhelming inviting (see pictures above) - the whole place had this pervasive air of restfulness about it. I thought that the rates were a good value as well - prices were comparable to some of the nicer B&B's we've stayed at in the States. I do feel like Rod and Barry's attitudes effected our stay a bit; but, I do feel that if we had stayed at any other time than Christmas (and more than one day), than our experience would have been much more positive. Also, the fact that it was rainy on Christmas and we couldn't enjoy the outdoor areas was really unfortunate.

We drove back up into town to find it absolutely bustling with activity. We headed to the visitor information center so P.I.C could ask about the best way to get to Thredbo. Beechworth is famous in it's own right for being the town where Ned Kelly was jailed and stood trial. If you have a couple minutes, you should click on the link and read about him. It's a very interesting story and still very important in Australian culture today.

On our way over the the courthouse, we stopped inside an old telegraph office. The office is still functional and for a very small fee you could send a telegraph message to anywhere in the world! Joe promptly wrote one out to his Dad back in Kentucky. We are still waiting for the call to tell us that he received it - We are figuring that it is probably going to take sometime for it to actually get there as it will need to be mailed once it gets to the States. The guy working the telegraph was an absolute wealth of knowledge and was able to tell us some of the history behind the telegraph in Australia.

Our next stop was the courthouse - we paid our admission fee and as we prepared to head inside, P.I.C happened to make some remark to the man behind the desk about his major (and I do mean major - P.I.C is obsessed) interest in Ned Kelly. The man quickly engaged in conversation and we ended up getting a bonus lesson in how the class systems were set up back in Ned Kelly's day. It was interesting to hear from a local about it and also someone who was so obviously well-versed in the history. It really added an additional layer to our experience as we went through the courthouse. One of my favourite parts was that they had recorded "readings" of certain trials playing in the main room. The result of that was that, if no one else was in the room, you could sit and imagine what it must of been like actually hearing these trials go on.

It was an interesting visit; but the day was hot and we were very tired so when P.I.C suggested going to another museum, we all deserted him. Joe and I opted for a carriage ride (made even more awesome by the fact that the carriage owner had his two dogs - one adult and one a tiny puppy (but both the most well-behaved doggies ever) tethered to a post by the street where we were able to pet them to our hearts content)) and then the three of us retired to the pub for a cold beer while P.I.C geeked it out in the other museum.

We met back up at one and headed out towards Thredbo. We briefly discussed having lunch in Beechworth; but we were all still full from breakfast so we decided that we would just find a cafe or winery on the way and stop there. I have no idea of the route that we took or the route that we were supposed to take - we were listening to podcasts and enjoying the scenery in the backseat while Cristin and P.I.C were in charge of maps and other such navigational tools. The woman in the visitor's center gave us directions to some scenic highway that was so new that it was not yet on the printed maps or on any GPS systems. I don't exactly know if we ever found that highway; but we did find some pretty great scenery - this is the sort of view that makes you stop, sit by the side of the road and wonder at how anything can be this beautiful.

Even though the road was beautiful, it was in the middle of nowhere with no lunch prospects. We finally passed a little pub around 4 - the kitchen was closed so no luck there; but I was getting sick from being so hungry so I made myself a quick half sandwich while we were stopped in the parking lot. I ate way too fast and I made the sandwich with hot (really really hot) salami by accident so, by the time we came across a proper town, I was feeling pretty vomitous... Everyone else was really hungry though so we stopped for a look. I had noticed a "Man From Snowy River" Museum on our way into town; but it was boarded up and in disrepair so I didn't want to go back and get a picture of it. Luckily this arcade was right in front of where we parked so I was able to get some sort of picture to show my sisters.

While everyone else walked up and down main street looking for food, I sat on a bench, felt sick to my stomach and generally had a couple of miserable minutes where I wished for all, each and any of my sisters to be sharing in this Snowy Mountain experience with me. We met back up at the car in a matter of minute - everyone felt the food choices to be dodgy so we decided to just press forward towards Thredbo and figure out food when arrived. I discovered that having the window down made my tummy issues disappear, the air started getting much much colder as we climbed and the view started looking quite mountainous! It was exciting to feel the altitude and temperature change so quickly as we continued.

........... Ok, Thredbo update tomorrow...........

Christmas Vacation - Installment 2

2011-01-08T01:30:00.001+11:00

After the movie we decided to drive around the town to see what there was to see - short answer, nothing. It was a ghost town... I would not have been surprised to see tumbleweeds blowing down the six streets that comprised the downtown area. Rod had told us that we should go to "The Gorge" to see the waterfall or to go out to "The Lake". It wasn't a very nice day - gray, rainy and a bit depressing. I think we were all feeling just slightly dampened at the idea of not being with our families on Christmas; but we were determined to make the best of it. We drove up to the access road that leads to "The Gorge" only to find that it was washed out from all the rain and flooding. We Cristin and P.I.C briefly considered hiking the 4km into the woods to see the waterfall until I declared that an 8km hike was not my idea of a good Christmas... We decided then to find "The Lake" - we did find it eventually; but it was mostly full of family groups celebrating the holiday by having a BBQ and swimming around in the dirty water. Again, we felt quite out of place driving slowly by on the crunchy loud gravel road as every head swiveled to see who we were. We left the lake without even getting out of the car. In the end we drove down to the other end of the gorge which was right outside of the town. The sky was getting more and more gray; but conditions ended up being perfect for those really dark black and white photos.

We were getting very hungry so we drove back into town. I asked if we could stop at this beautiful little stone church with an open door - it was dark inside and smelled like incense. There was a creche and an advent candle wreath. It was just what I needed to see to remind me of what the day was really about. Right as we were about to leave the church, the rain started - huge angry drops that wouldn't let up. We were trapped in the door way for about ten minutes until it was safe to make a run for the car.

Back to the B&B for lunch we went... Cristin and I were able to whip up quite a feast of turkey sandwiches, tuna sandwiches, olive and feta salad, chips, biscuits and lots of wine. It wasn't the fanciest Christmas lunch around; but my tuna sandwich was so yummy! We ate, sitting around the coffee table (since we weren't allowed in the dining room) and watched some tv - I remember "Just Shoot Me" being on; but it was mostly just background noise. We all agreed after the feast that it was bath/relaxing/nap-time.

After all the relaxing time (which mostly ended up meaning napping time) we reconvened for a late night game of dominoes. This coffee table gathering was celebrated with salami, cheese, fruit, champagne and Hershey's Kisses fresh from a care package from the States (thanks Annmarie!)

Rod and Barry got back around 10:30 - Barry (he was the super uptight one) came to ostensibly "check on us" which we understood was really him checking on his beautiful lounge for damages. We had to force him to take out dirty dishes and trash. We were not given clean dishes, or new trash bags - also, our beds were not made up for the night.

We finished the game late - after midnight for sure; and, just so I can go on record saying this, I totally won....

............................Installment 3 - coming soon!.....................

Christmas Vacation - Installment 1

2011-01-06T00:38:00.000+11:00

Per the usual, I've returned from somewhere with far too many photos and probably not enough witty prose to go along with them. I'm just going to write the whole story, plug the photos in and keep my fingers crossed.

After my homesickness leading up to Thanksgiving (I know, I know, you have no idea what I am talking about since I never did end up writing a post about Thanksgiving) I was looking for a way to mitigate any sort of celebration or expectation of celebration for the Christmas holiday. Much like my old industry in the States, the entire country of Australia seems to shut down from Christmas to New Years ((and in some cases two weeks into January) They call it the "Silly Season")) so we were going to end up with about a week and a half's worth of vacation in a city that had virtually ground to a halt. I didn't need all that down time to get me thinking so we decided to take a vacation. I started looking a while back for some little shack or cottage on a beach somewhere where we could have a nice week away. I soon discovered that it is nearly impossible to book ANYTHING near a beach for the Christmas holidays - ah yes, and also they seem to charge double over the holidays.

Luckily, our intrepid friends Cristin and her Partner in Crime were also looking to get out of Sydney over the holidays so we decided to holiday together. We settled on a trip length of 4 days - 2 days in a little historic town called Beechworth and the remainder of the time in a ski town at the top of the Snowy Mountains called Thredbo.

Joe and I both took the day off work on Christmas Eve - P.I.C (Partner in Crime mentioned above) had to work till noonish so that gave me the morning to pack and get the apartment settled. P.I.C and Cristin picked us up around 2 and we started the drive south. The drive was pretty unremarkable at the beginning - of course there was much talking and laughter - also some podcast listening and snacking. I first realised that we were not only going south; but also, back in time, when we stopped for petrol the first time and I saw the pumps were circa 1970. We stopped for dinner and shopping in Gundagai. It was a cute little town with an IGA (which was our main reason for stopping there).

After we stocked up on lots of wine and food for Christmas day, we wandered down the main street to "the local" hotel which was surprisingly crowded for a Christmas Eve evening. We ordered our fish and chips (and, of course, I'm the one with the Corona) and then found a table outside in the courtyard. As we sat there, we began to notice that people were walking to the hotel from all over the town - it was almost as though the entire town was coming together to celebrate Christmas Eve at the pub. Also, it should be noted that these folk were showing up in what was obviously their Christmas finery. We ended up eating rather quickly and then moving on as we felt further and further out of place the longer we sat there. It was extremely obvious that we were "not from around these parts"and it felt a bit like showing up at a huge party and being the only people that weren't invited.

In Beechworth, we had booked ourselves into a lovely Bed & Breakfast called Barnsley House. Cristin and I were seduced by the pictures of the rooms on the website - claw foot tubs, private patios, afternoon tea and a bright sunny conservatory just perfect for reading. After I booked the room, I got a very nice e-mail from "Rod & Barry" informing me that they would be gone on Christmas Day visiting family and that our food was pretty much up to us. They would make us breakfast of course; but it would be early. No problem we thought - there are little fridges in the room so we would just buy some groceries and have some snacky sort of meals.

When we went into the IGA to stock up we were slightly horrified to realise that there were only 3 types of meat in the deli case - the whole store was really operating under the umbrella of "slim-pickins". We called Rod & Barry to check if there was a BBQ we could use - there was not. We asked if we would be able to access some plates - we would not. It was around this time that they started referring to Christmas being a "limited service" day. This did not bode well.....

We checked in very late much to the disapproval of Rod and Barry (both wearing shorts and house slippers - very strange). We were reminded several times about the early breakfast and told that they needed to leave for their families house by 9:30am sharp!

Admittedly, the house was completely gorgeous - everything was done up perfectly down to the last detail. It was in a bit of a dodgy neighborhood; but since it was enclosed in a high dense hedge it wasn't really noticeable after you pulled in.

The next morning it was up early for breakfast - there was one other couple staying at the B&B. They were from Melbourne and were there for Christmas with his family as he had grown up in Beechworth. They were easy and fun to talk to. We must have been lingering a bit too long over our coffees; because Rod came over to the table to tell us that we needed to finish up and vacate the dining room so they could lock-up and leave. It was right around that moment when I realised that they were locking the door that led to the back of the house (which included the kitchen, the dining room and that gorgeous conservatory). We were then left with just our rooms and a small "Guest Lounge" to our disposal. We settled in to the lounge to watch a movie - there was nice selection of DVDs that were for guest use; but we opened them only to find that all of the disks had been removed and replaced with small stickers that read "Ask Rod or Barry for assistance". They really were living up to that stereotype of fussy gay couples. Thankfully I had downloaded some movies onto my laptop so we were able to watch "Love Actually" (albeit on a very small screen).

.......More to Come....

You Found Me How?

2011-01-03T11:48:00.000+11:00

Not sure if you remember (just pretend here that you could never forget); but awhile back I wrote this post about Google Analytics and what drove people to my site... I have to admit, when I first started blogging, I was a wee bit obsessed with how many people visited per day, where they were coming from and how they found me.

Well, I've gotten busy - the side effect to that is that I care much much less. I haven't been on my analytics page in months! So, I popped on yesterday just to see how things were going. Sadly South Korea has been ousted from the number 5 slot in the country rankings; but mostly everything has stayed the same.

I was quite please to see that I had acquired many new and strange Google searches that I can't wait to share with you. I was trying to list these in my order of favourite; but it has proven far too hard to choose - Please buckle up and enjoy.

"feel his stubble" - I typed this one into Google to see where I was in the search results.... Yikes, it brings up some questionable search returns!

"bogans in maroubra" - I'm sorry, I'm laughing too hard to even comment on this one!

"British expat club Kirribilli" - I think each of these words were used in separate posts... I must have been hundreds of pages through the search results!

"Bronte fine wine old bottles" - No clue on this one...

"i just can't get over being homesick, Australia is too modern for me" - This one is a bit sad; but I can't help wondering where this person came from who is thinking that Australia is too modern? I am constantly amazed at how many things here are stuck in the 80s, 70s, 60s and sometimes even 50s...

"left and right lucky every night" - Bwah ha ha ha ha ha! That is all......

"it been raining for the whole day and been sleeping since morning, got to take a bath now" - I'm not making this up - There's no way I could make this stuff up!

"Moved into Victorian house fruit flies coming out of sash windows?" - I know I've written about our sash windows.... but fruit flies too?

"should i go for a walk at one in the morning" - Again... no words for this...

Well, this concludes my little foray into analytics for this quarter - hopefully, with more and more entries the search results will get more and more crazy! Do you think that's possible?

What To Do This Summer?

2011-01-02T13:13:00.000+11:00

Ok, I'm getting a bit nervous seeing as our six month anniversary of living in Sydney has come and gone without us having much to show for it. We've done precious little in this great city and I plan to rectify that. Of course, being here in the winter to start with doesn't lend itself to a whole lot of activities; but this summer is chock a block with fantastic stuff to do.

I've cobbled together this list and I'm looking for some input - anyone want to do these things with us? Anyone been to these in the past with reviews of whats worth it and whats not? Lots of them are happening in the next few weeks so I need to make a schedule, book tickets and make some plans!

I've underlined my favourites - and am now realising that that was most of them..... Guess I have some hard choices to make...

The Rocks Markets By Moonlight

Chinese New Year Events:

Dragon Boat Races - Saturday 12, Feb and Sunday 13, Feb - Darling Harbour

Twilight Parade - Sunday 6, Feb - Town Hall to Chinatown

Chinese New Year Markets - Friday 28, Jan to Sunday 30, Jan - Belmore Park

Cinema Alley - Friday 11, Feb - Haymarket - Must book seats

China Heart - Sunday 30, Jan to Sunday 13, Jan - Powerhouse Museum

Australia Day - Wednesday 26, Jan
Ferrython - 11am
Parade on the Water - 1pm
Live Music in the Rocks - from 11am
Darling Harbour - from Noon
Short Films
Concerts
Fireworks

Mike Birbiglia - 13 to 16, Jan - Everest Theatre by Central Station

The Giacomo Variations - 19-22, Jan - Opera House

Symphony in the Domain: Midsummer Shakespeare - 22, Jan - The Domain

La Boheme - July to October - Opera House

Sting: Symphonicity Tour - 31, Jan to 3, Feb - Opera Forecourt!

Mahler's Sixth Symphony - 3 to 5, March - Opera House

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN
MISSA SOLEMNIS OP. 123, D MAJOR
SYDNEY PHILHARMONIA CHOIRS - Sunday 12, June - Opera House

Macbeth - 10, Sept to 8, Oct - Opera House

Sydney Shakespeare Festival - February Weekends - Glebe Harbour Foreshore

International Short Film Festival - Week of 7-16, Jan - Bondi Pavilion - Sunday 9, Jan - Best of Poland Films

Picton Rodeo - 8th of January - Picton

Opera in the Domain - 29th of Jan - The Domain

Annie Leibovitz - to the 27th of March - Museum of Contemporary Art

A New Year

2011-01-02T00:36:00.000+11:00

I went through a period in my life where I was big on New Years resolutions - I'm over that phase and instead of making a horrifying list with things on it like "Drink 3 litres of water everyday" or "Spend less money" I now just try to take a couple of days early on in the year for some reflection. Firstly, I make a list of things, people, experiences etc... that I am thankful for (yes, I know that's what Thanksgiving is for) and, where I can, I try to thank them or pay something back or forward if I can. Secondly, I try to be really honest with myself about the things that I really failed at throughout the year; but conversely, I recognise the places where I excelled - where I improved and then I try to build on them for the next year.

Honestly, I haven't really sat down to have "the big think" for this year yet; but some initial findings have become crystal clear. Moving to this great country has had it's ups and downs. More ups than down (Although, I confess I still struggle with the Anti-Americanism that I find so often); and so so so much learned from this whole experience. My marriage is starting this New Year with a depth of love and shared experience that is overwhelming.

I've made friends here - incredible, generous, funny, wonderful people that enrich my life on a regular basis. Friends that I can even see every day for a whole week and not get sick of!

Seriously though, this year is going to require an especially long "think". If I find anything interesting I'll let you know.

I've posted below a video that I took of the New Years Fireworks - It's quite long and you can hear my uncontrollable giggling and laughing (a side effect of champagne and excitement). It's also shaky and very "homemade" - so, I recommend forwarding to the last couple minutes to catch the grand finale. Or, if you have no interest in hearing my super-annoying voice, you can watch the one below this one that was professionally taped! If you have the time, I would watch both - if you are short on time I would definitely watch the professional one!

Just a quick note about the fireworks - They have a very good show at nine for the kids and then the regular ones at midnight (I think this is brilliant). Also, they shoot them off from many different locations in the Harbour so that, depending on where you are, you can see the same thing as everyone else (I think this is brilliant as well). So, the ones to the left in my video were being shot off from Ft. Dennison; but there were more to the left of that and them three other places on the right of the bridge. It was nice cause there was a view from all the windows in the apartment! They also shoot fireworks off the tops of the skyscrapers in the CBD - this city is crazy about it's fireworks!

Anyway, enjoy! I hope you had a wonderful New Years celebration - I'll see you again soon!

My amateur video:

The video that's really good!

New Years Eve

2010-12-31T20:31:00.002+11:00

Just a quick little note - it's almost nine and dinner and firwworks are around the corner! I'll be taping it and posting it if it turns out ok...

Ill post tomorrow about resolutions and all that stuff - Have a great New Year!

Motivation

2010-12-30T23:46:00.000+11:00

I’ve had this crazy deadline for myself lately – that before I wrote about anything else; and before Christmas happened… I would write a blog post about Thanksgiving that was just as large, delicious and fun as the actual day was. I started the entry – actually, I started it many many times. My latest go at it is saved in my draft folder. It’s rather disjointed as I have been adding a paragraph here and there over the last few days. On Christmas Eve I was running around the house, trying to pack and shut down the house and I kept stopping to write a few more sentences here and there. Trust me when I tell you that that is no way to write a blog post and absolutely no way to pack for a trip. Here I am on vacation with a stack of sweaters, a stack of tank tops and not much in between. Same with the blog post, I keep trying to conjure up for my readers how it feels to be so far away from your family on an emotional holiday; and the surprise you feel when the holiday goes so well that you file it in your top 10 of all times. It’s a hard emotional state to convey through writing and there is only so much you can write about a golden brown and delicious turkey. So, I am going to table that Thanksgiving post. I am going to set it aside and maybe write about it at some point in the future.

I know I haven’t been good about blogging lately; but I’ve had a lot of time to think about my motivations (and de-motivations in this case) and here’s what I’ve come up with. My blog is essentially a travelogue of our time here in Australia – except, we aren’t here on vacation… this is real life happening the way that real life happens. So, sometimes there just isn’t anything fun, exciting or touristy to write about – and that is just going to have to be ok with me; and be ok with those of you who faithfully check this space every day. Also, I need to get myself out of this strange idea that every event must be written about in order. I think I would write more often if I didn’t feel like it was a chore – rather something to be enjoyed… almost something completely selfish.

Just a Quick Recap

2010-12-30T12:24:00.001+11:00

Well, I haven't posted in a while...

Here's what's been going on...

Thanksgiving happened, I started working full-time, We did lots of fun stuff with our friends, We went on vacation, Christmas happened, Joe climbed a mountain, We came home, New Years is about to happen.

So, we just got home last night - I actually wrote quite a bit on vacation so I am going to take today to upload and sort photos and then homefully start posting some entries...

Stay Tuned!

I Was Going to Blog Tonight but...

2010-12-05T22:10:00.000+11:00

I guess I am still technically blogging by writing this; but I was planning on a much longer entry than this will end up being. Friday was our company Christmas Party and I decided to spend the bulk of my evening beginning the processing of the 165 photos that I took to commemorate the event. Hey, part of my job is publicity remember?

Since I was doing the downloading and sorting photos thing tonight, it made me think of all the photos that were living in limbo on my phone. I've decided to download all of them, sort them and then possibly post some here tonight.

First Up - The Jacaranda Tree.. These purple/blue flowering trees are apparently a harbinger of Spring here. They are also incredibly beautiful, fragrant and difficult not to take a million pictures of.

The end of our street (or beginning ish)

Also on our street

I think this one was in Mosman

Close-up on our street

I was going to do a second topic - like hibiscus or something; but I think that will need to wait for another night - some fireworks just started going off over Fort Denison so I am going to go watch them and then head to bed.

Night all!

p.s. - Hey Megs, Thanks for the awesome Thanksgiving card! Made me laugh out loud!

Thanksgiving!! Oh wait....nevermind..... Something Else!!

2010-12-02T23:32:00.001+11:00

Well, this is my third or fourth attempt at blogging in so many days.... I have a sea of abandoned drafts that I have left in my wake - badly written and very very plodding. I'm hoping this entry won't end up in the graveyard with them tonight... I'm trying to tip the odds in my favour by writing this at our brand new dining room table instead of half-slumped over in bed. Hopefully the austerity of wooden furniture will keep me focused better than a pillow-top mattress can!

But, back to the table.... Most of you will know that we have been slowly buying furniture for our apartment (and for those of you who didn't... welcome! we are slowly buying furniture for our apartment) and; up to this point, we had been using a patio table as our eating space.

** Crap, I'm already so distracted... I was trying to download photos that weren't there and then I had to spend 15 minutes stalking a big black beetle around the apartment with bug spray until I finally cornered it.

Ok, so my whole story about the table was going to be a lead up to a nice little tale about our fabulous ex-pat Thanksgiving; but now it appears that my photos grew legs and wandered away. I can't bear to write about the golden and delicious turkey without some sort of visual aid to help me along, so that part of the entry will have to wait for another time.

But, luckily for me, since I have been so completely negligent about blogging lately, I have a whole slew of other topics that I can cover. Well, maybe not a whole slew; but at least one or two little things....

I mentioned several posts ago about a fun weekend excursion we had had. My excuse for not blogging about it directly after it happened was the fact that I took no photos of it; and was dependant on others photographic generosity. Well, I have to admit, I'm feeling a bit guilty... I whinged and whinged until I got the photos I needed; and then proceeded to put it off til now (and, to be perfectly honest, if I had my Thanksgiving pictures at hand, I would be putting it off further still!)

The event we attended was the Red Bull Flugtag that was held in the Botanical Gardens overlooking the Opera House and the Sydney Harbour Bridge. For those of you who have no clue what I am talking about, let me explain:

Red Bull sponsors a competition in which people build contraptions, machines, etc... that they hope will fly when they run them off a giant ramp over the water. To give you an indication of the types of things we were seeing, the teams and their aircraft (and I use this term lightly) are judged in the following three categories:

1. The distance of "flight"

2. The design of the "aircraft"

3. The costumes and the dancing.....

I'm sure you can see where this is going - not much flying per-se; but plenty of entertainment! The week preceeding this event had been plagued by a constant rain so we didn't have our hopes up for too nice of a day. We headed out early with a picnic lunch and a ~~tarp to hide under our blanket~~ blanket to sit on. I tried to be "prepared" and so went wearing a tank top, a mid-length sleeve shirt and a light sweatshirt. Joe and I both wore jeans as it was very cold in the morning when we were getting ready to go. We hadn't even gotten halfway to the event before we all started peeling off layers! It was hot - really hot. Poor Joe had only worn long sleeves so he had to go buy a $20.00 Red Bull Flugtag T-shirt from one of the vendors. Of course, not one of us had thought to bring any hats or sunscreen. We realised it was a seriously rookie mistake as we looked around at all the Aussies with their sun protection. Well, that's actually only a half-truth... At first we (or at least me) thought the sun was great - it was warm and cozy and it was drying the ground. We (again, really only me) basked in the sun, working on our (my) first tan of the season. In all fairness, I am coming out of two winters in a row and I don't deal well with being denied sun exposure as frequently as possible.

Well, I'm sure you are seeing where this is going... We all got burnt. Badly. Technically, there were varying degrees of badness... Fellow Blogger Val got burnt the worst - really, one of the worst sunburns I have ever seen! Joe came in second with a burn that was just about the worst I had ever seen on him. I came in third with what I would consider a medium burn for me. Not too bad; but gone in a couple days. Fellow bloggers husband (incidentally the person kind enough to have taken all these photos and to let me use them in this entry) didn't actually burn at all and was the luckiest of us all.

We had some other issues with horribly rude people standing in front of us and obscuring our view of the first few crafts; but after Joe found us a new place to sit, we were able to enjoy the view un-impeded. After a couple hours in that spot, we had to move under the shade of a tree - at that point though, the damage had been done!

When Joe and I got home, we threw open all the windows and took off as many clothes as possible (I know, I know... move along) as the burn really started to set in. I think we were a bit sun-addled - Joe decided to take a nap in the spare room (why there? I have no clue?) and I figured I would lay next to him and read. Well, we both ended up ~~passing out from sun exposure~~ falling asleep and woke up after dark with a freezing cold wind coming in all the open windows - if you have ever been burned you know that horrible feeling where you are really cold; but the burned parts of your body are on fire and having the both of them at once give you constant chills? Oh yeah.... I had that for the rest of the evening.

But, I would have done it again in a heartbeat - the experience was incredible! I'm going to leave you with a little video that I am ~~stealing~~ borrowing from You Tube so that you can all see how we spent the afternoon!

(and yes, that aircraft is a cupcake and yes they are wearing giant chef's toques!)

Thanksgiving Approacheth!

2010-11-24T22:39:00.000+11:00

I wish I could use that as an excuse for my non-existence in this space lately; but I can't. Honestly, the only thing keeping me from long, insightful, photo-filled blog posting is plain old tiredness.

I am exhausted and I can't quite figure out why.... Those that know me well can vouch for the fact that I can stay up until all hours of the night writing or just generally mucking about on my laptop. This week has been quite the exception. I have gone straight to bed every night for the past week with hardy a glance spared for my cold and lonely laptop. Don't tell too many people (cause I don't want to diminish my street cred); but I have been asleep before 11 almost every night for the past 10 or so. I think my husband thinks that aliens have taken his real wife and replaced her with a very very tired pod person...

I don't even have a whole lot that I can blame the tiredness on either. I am busy, to be fair; but I used to work 40+ hours a week, take care of the house etc... in my old life while staying up till one in the morning most nights without breaking a sweat.

Maybe it's the clean Sydney air? Maybe it's the lapping of the water outside my window at night? Maybe it's the glass of wine with dinner? Maybe I'm just anemic?

At any rate, it's 20 till eleven and I'm about to turn into a pumpkin......

It's a dangerous season out there for pumpkins so I think I had better go to bed!

Hello There

2010-11-11T23:27:00.000+11:00

Not much going on here, and I have not one single picture to post. In keeping with my blog post from a couple of days ago I am trying to pry myself out of the bad habit of only posting when I have a ton to talk about and a ton of pictures to post.

We have a new person starting at work on Monday - he is from Washington D.C.so Joe and I have been trying to help him out with the whole "being American and settling in Sydney" process. Poor guy - we had him over for dinner tonight and I think I talked his ear off. I need to tone down my mothering instincts in a serious way!

We went out on a fun excursion last weekend that I will blog about as soon as I have the photos ready (I was lazy and didn't take any so I am totally using someone elses) and this weekend we have almost nothing planned. If the weather holds than we might go lay on the reserve for a while; but, if we do, Joe will have to take a bath in sunscreen first. Anyone else interested? (in the reserve part - not the bath part...)

I almost forgot!!! On Tuesday we had fly screens installed in the majority of the apartment! I cannot tell you how exciting it is to be able to leave the windows open all night, to hear the water and the sailboats, without having giant mosquitoes and moths coming in to stalk us. We only had screens installed into the sash (typical open up and down) windows; but our next goal is to have screens put in the office. Of course, those ones will need to be hinged so they will be a bit more complicated; but I think it will be worth it in the end.

Anyway, that's all I have going on tonight - I just wanted to pop in before the craziness of the weekend sucked me in and spat me out on Monday with no blog posts to show for it...

Bad Habit

2010-11-10T10:14:00.000+11:00

I wanted to blog a couple of days ago about something and I didn't... I didn't because I told myself that I didn't have enough news or photos for a "real" blog post. I have gotten myself into the mindset that a blog entry has to be very very long with at least 4 bajillion (yes, it's a real word - look it up) photos to match.

So, I need to get myself out of this habit. I will begin by now posting the post that I wanted to post the other day- Ha!

So, Monday morning I had an absolutely incredible dream about my Dad. I have dreams about my parents all the time; but, in those dreams, they are more like ideas or shadows. Hard to grab on to and even harder to hold on to long enough to try to see their faces in the dreams. Not this one.... I dreamed we were having some sort of family reunion. My Uncle Ray was there rocking a fantastic pin striped suit. My Dad showed up and the two of them started talking about clothes (in the dream, my Dad was claiming to have lost weight and wanted to buy new clothes - even though he looked the same to me) and where to buy them - especially the suit which my Dad was quite impressed with. I remember being conscious enough to realise that I could see Dad's face and that it really felt like he was there. At this point, I didn't feel like a player in the dream; but I was more than content to sit and watch - this was the most I had seen of my Dad's face in a dream for years!

Then my Dad saw me. His face lit up like someone turned a spotlight on behind it. He rushed over to me and started talking a mile a minute. At one point he grabbed my hands and held them. I just remember everything slowing down - I couldn't even pay attention to what he was saying because I couldn't stop looking at his face. He was laughing and making all those little facial expressions that you are afraid you will forget as time slips by. I remember reaching up and putting my hand on his face - I could smell his shaving soap and feel his stubble. I was, in that moment, a little kid again; but somehow not.

And then I woke up - just like that....

It was weird - I woke up and Joe had already left for work. He never leaves without waking me up to say goodbye and kiss me. I called him to make sure everything was ok and he told me that he hadn't woke me because I seemed to be having such a good sleep. I'm so glad he decided to let me sleep that morning...

If my Dad were alive, it would be his 77th birthday tomorrow. I would probably be buying him a nice pair of courderouy pants. Except, I think what he really would have wanted was a pin striped suit...

Write Tonight?

2010-11-06T12:13:00.001+11:00

I am in the midst of dealing with our first ever "shaped" internet usage! "Shaped" is a nice Aussie term for "you have used to much internets and now you must be punished!" So, we have a plan for 100MB a month (yes, I know this is an extreme amount; but we download a lot so don't judge) and it is at lightning fast (I'm not being sarcastic - it really is crazy fast) broad band speed. Once we go over our 100MB we get throttled back to a "slightly faster then dial-up" speed.

What that means.... Well, for one thing, it means that I downloaded too many movies the other day. Also, this means that there will be no video-Skyping tomorrow for our Skype date with Joe's parents. That is a bummer. The only positive here is that our usage resets in about 24 hours - so, we only have to live with a pre-historic internet connection for another day.

Jennifer - I am dying to watch your You-Tube videos... I can get to "this is the part of the classroom" and then it stops loading and I have to give up. I swear I will watch them Sunday night.

Anyway... last Sunday (well, really two Sundays ago) - the day after the crazy rain, was a momentous day because it was my grandfather's 91st birthday. Well, technically, his birthday was Saturday in the States; but I got to call him on Sunday morning our time and talk to him after his birthday dinner. I've blogged about him before in this post about his time in Perth/Freemantle so you can go there and read up on the back story if you would like. I feel so connected to him here in Australia and I think about him all the time. It's incredible to me that I lived my whole life up to this point thinking that no one in my family had ever been to Australia. Now knowing that he was here before me gives me this feeling of calm - like he checked it out for me to make sure it was ok for me to come. I was so lucky to get married in Florida on the beach two years ago and I was even more lucky to have him there to walk me down the aisle. This is my favourite picture of us from the wedding - I think I look a little like my mom in it which makes it perfect.

So, I just want to say - Happy Birthday Coach! I'm so glad I got to share in your day a little even though I am so far away. Also, thanks for sharing in this wonderful adventure we are having - I promise, I'll make it to Freemantle while we are here and take lots of pictures for you!

Sunday was also the wedding day of fellow blogger C. where she married her Partner-in-Crime in a lovely ceremony overlooking the harbour. It was an unfortunately rainy morning; but they made the best of it and managed to make the whole umbrella thing work. Also, I've seen the "sneak peak" photos and I can say that wedding pictures involving umbrellas are super-dreamy. I can't wait to see the rest when they are done because I think that they are going to be gorgeous. There was a nice BBQ after at the local sailing club - it was very intimate, the food was great and there was plenty of wine. It was a wonderful morning and it was an absolute privilege to have been invited and to have gotten to share in such a great occasion.

The week that followed was uneventful. I literally can't remember a single thing that went on during the week. I'm sure I did a ton of laundry - I made some yummy dinners - I walked to the shops a few times. Actually, scratch all that - I just opened my batch of photos from that week and I beginning to remember more as I look through them. Ha, who needs a photographic memory when you can just take pictures of everything you do and store them on your computer? I'm kidding - well, sort-of...

I have several pictures of beautiful Aussie scenery - the clouds, the flowers etc. I still just can't get over how amazingly beautiful everything is here. I really had to rely on the scenery and the beauty here this past week as I really struggled to be a "stranger in a strange land". People here really seem to speak their mind about America - they do it a lot and mostly they do it in "joke" form. They joke about the tired old stereotypes that they get from the American tv and movies that are consumed en masse here. Usually the joking doesn't bother me very much; but there just seemed to be a lot this particular week. The worst part about it is that you can't respond to the joking without looking like a spoil sport with no sense of humor.

So, on the days when I was so mad that I just wanted to fly back to the States to be around Americans that aren't egotistical crazies who eat at McDonald's every night (let me just interject that I am not saying Aussies are this way - I am just saying that this seems to be how many of them perceive Americans) , I had to use the scenery to pull myself out of it. Also, a couple glasses of wine in the evenings are never remiss when you are in a bad mood!

*editing to add that at midnight the internet completely died and so here I am the next morning, praising Blogger's auto save function (ha, that's totally going to get Googled) because without it, this might be a very different (and much more angry) post.

A good deal of the week was spent trying to get ready for Halloween - We decided to have a Halloween carnival at work complete with Bobbing for Apples and also Donut on a String (which I shamelessly stole from Arvin's Halloween festivities last year). Much fun was had by all; but it was a lot of wok and a lot of stress. By Friday afternoon when I was setting everything up, I was pretty much ready to be done with everything. With Halloween, with the people, with being new and not knowing what to do/where to go/where to buy things etc... After the carnival, Joe was nice enough to take me out to a nice dinner and then, after we had had sometime to decompress, we met up with the work colleagues at a hotel (which is a bar) and continued the night.

Saturday was a very very quiet day - Joe and I weren't feeling too well after being out too late the night before. We mostly just putzed around the house, watched a movie or two and vegged.

Sunday was a Halloween party that we were invited to by a coworker. It was "fancy dress", which mean costumes here; but not everyone ended up dressing up. I am slightly amazed to say that I dressed up as Bride of Frankenstein, complete with fright wig, fake eyelashes, white skin, stitches on the face and the whole bit and I have not one single picture of this to show you. Not a single picture....

I also have to add here that it has been raining constantly (ok, that may be a slight exaggeration); but it has been reminding me of winter here more than spring. I am really ready for some blindingly hot sunshine. I think that may help improve everything around here.

And that is all....

Playing Catch Up

2010-10-31T23:40:00.002+11:00

Just a warning - this will most likely be incredibly long, boring and rambling as I am determined to catch up and write about the last week and half all in one post... Strap in, this may get bumpy....

In my last post, I left off with my adventures to Chinatown on the Tuesday before last. I went off to work the next afternoon and when I was passing through Hyde Park, I realised that the Night Noodle Markets which are part of the Sydney International Food Festival were due to end in a few days. I had been looking forward to this event ever since I saw the first tents being erected in Hyde Park so I made a date with Joe to have dinner there that night. It's actually a bit strange as he was working from home that day and I was working in the office - it's usually the other way around! We aren't really the "festival going" type of couple; but this really wasn't too bad. We didn't get there until a bit after 6 when I thought it was quite busy - silly me, by 8 it was a complete and total madhouse!

We started off by buying a bottle of wine... as we were standing in line, the real estate agent that showed us our unit saw us and came over with some friends of hers to say hello and ask how we were settling in. It was nice of her to come over to talk to us and it made me like her a bit better. As you may remember from this post, she was a bit witchy when I tried to see the apartment for the first time so I am now revising my opinion of her! Anyway, we got some pork and duck buns and then started looking for a decent patch of ground on which to sit (I think you would have to get there around 3 to actually get a table)... We found a perfect place and as soon as we sat down, a family sat down about 4 inches away from us complete with a screaming toddler in a pram that got parked facing us. Yeah, we totally moved! I'm glad we did though because; as we were settling our stuff around us in our new spot the woman next to us said something to us and I realised she was American. So, of course, me being the shy thing that I am (ha ha ha) struck up a conversation with her. I've exchanged some emails with her and I'm hoping to meet up for a coffee soon. Call it what you will... fate, kismet, providence etc... but I believe that we ended up on that little patch of grass for a reason. The American woman, her British husband and adorable baby left soon after we sat down. Joe and I stayed in the park to finish our wine and watch dusk and twilight come down on the market.

I know you married folks will understand when I say that sometimes couples don't have much to say to each other over a quick weeknight meal. Especially when you work in the same place and spend as much together as we do! This was not one of those nights... We couldn't stop talking - couldn't stop holding hands - couldn't stop smiling at each other.... You know what I mean! We sat with our wine in the grass and really talked... about the big (and mostly fantastically wonderful) things in our lives right now. When we finished the wine, we really wanted to eat a yummy desert to round out the night; but there wasn't anything at the Noodle Markets that looked good to us. We walked down to Circular Quay and had some delicious coffee and some tirimisu at Rossini at the Quay. I think we missed about 2 ferries while we were sitting there holding hands - we just didn't want to leave and spoil the great conversation that we were having. It's moments like those when I realise just a fraction of how lucky we are as a couple. How lucky we are that we found each other in the middle of our crazy lives, and how glad I am that we both stuck it out through much of the crap that we had to deal with early on in our relationship. Our marriage is worth every bit of stress that we ever had to face.

I can't ever have imagined moving halfway around the world - that just wasn't in my wheelhouse... I'm a homebody, I don't like change and I don't like my routine to be altered. It still seems pretty crazy that we are here and that I'm actually happy with my new and different life here. The only thing that I can figure is that being with Joe is like being home to me - as long as I have my hand in his than I can go anywhere without fear or worry. I know this might sound a bit schmaltzy (ok, probably more than a bit); but big life events can either strengthen a relationship or they can reveal all the tiny cracks that will eventually lead to a full break. Moving in general can be very stressful - let alone moving to a new country. I was always worried in the back of my mind that our move might shake our marriage up and cause some fights etc...

In the end though, I was completely unprepared for the effect that this move had on our relationship. I didn't think that this big stressful move could make us fall even more in love. I didn't think it could strengthen our already rock solid foundation. I guess that putting yourselves in a position where your spouse is the only one you can lean on for a while can deepen your patience and trust in each other in a way not many things can.

Anyway, I digress ((I mean, that was a seriously long, vomit-inducing digression) I hope you are still reading; but, if not, I would totally understand). We hopped on the next ferry, still holding hands and then it was homeward bound.

I've been trying to discipline myself into taking pictures of anything and everything that I like or find beautiful - even if it makes me feel silly or even if the picture turns out looking like crap. I was lying bed that night reading a book and Joe was sleeping - I glanced over and realized that my husband's back, as he sleeps in bed next to me, is one of the most beautiful things that I have ever seen. So I snapped a picture.

Thursday was a free day for me; and I can't remember anything remarkable about it. There was probably some laundry involved - Ah yes, I believe I finished the last season of The Tudors... yikes, they were really into the torturing and beheading there at the end.

Friday was work and then out for a few drinks with coworkers. Joe got dinner at the pub; but I didn't eat. So, when we all left the pub, Joe and I went around the corner to a little Italian place where I got a salad and a bowl full of mussels. Oh, and I had the best cappuchino of my life... Really, like the total best. Also, I think there was a redback spider in the toilets....

Saturday morning (or maybe it was Thursday? At this point I'm not completely sure of the days) we were quite shocked to hear the buzzer. It was the postman! OMG! The postman actually rang our buzzer and then actually brought a package up to us instead of just leaving a card in the mailbox! I guess my complaining finally paid off. The package was a from my fabulous and wonderful sister Julie and it was full of incredible goodies. Peanut butter M&Ms, Reese's Pieces, Bath and Body Works Lotions, Magic Erasers and some Skyline Chili seasoning packs. Oh the rapture! The lotion has to be my favourite item - she sent me one of their new line (I think - I am so out of the loop on all things involving American shopping) called Dark Kiss. I'm just letting all of you know, up front and right now, that I would consider doing pretty much anything to get my hands (ha ha - literally... wow, that was a bad pun) on more of that specific scent. I might even consider smuggling a koala out of the country for someone if they offered me enough of this lotion - just saying....

In the afternoon, we headed up to Pymble for a housewarming party for a coworker. Their new apartment is huge and completely gorgeous! The company was wonderful, the food was truly beautiful (especially the whole broiled fish with ginger) and we had a wonderful time. About halfway through the party, the sky opened up and it rained absolute buckets... in the back of my mind I pictured all the open windows in our apartment and had a mini heart attack but what could we do? It cleared up by the time we left which was good as we had to walk back to the train station to head home. Well, you can probably see where this story is going... we got home to complete destruction and devastation (ok, I'm exaggerating a little but it was pretty bad). Lamps were blown over, there were puddles on the side tables and the couches were completely soaked. Joe's computer equipment was ominously wet; but all survived save his keyboard. Our bed was so wet from the rain blowing in that we actually had to sleep in the spare room that night. We closed our bedroom door and turned the heater on in there full tilt to try to speed out the drying process. Really though, we were very lucky that both Joe's desktop and my laptop which were both left right in front of open windows made it through unscathed. Needless to say, we have been pretty militant about closing the windows every time we leave the apartment now - Lesson learned.

Ok, I am now admitting defeat. I still have a weeks work of blogging to go and this post is so long that I doubt most of your will have even made it to the end without falling asleep.

Next up, a wedding, a week of being irritated and a Halloween Party. I'll try not to wait another week again so that I can keep these entries a bit shorter.

(Also, can I just say that I am having such a love affair with parenthesis in this post)

(Yeesh!)

Insomnia - Or - Why I am Writing at One in the Morning...

2010-10-25T01:33:00.001+11:00

I suppose I should be grateful for my insomnia tonight - it certainly lends itself to blogging far better than sleeping an a warm comfy bed would...

As I mentioned in my last post, this past weekend was very productive with the both of us getting a bunch of stuff done around the house. We made a trip to Ikea for more furniture on Friday night and then spent the weekend getting it all set-up. I also finally finished re-painting the armoire I had been working on for a seeming eternity...

It's pretty incredible having an actual living room full of furniture - we spent so long with nothing that I had almost forgotten what it was like to invite people over without asking them to bring their own chairs with them! I was really in a rush to get all of this set-up this past weekend because Monday night I was hosting my ex-pat book club at my place. I knew it would push me to get more done than I would have otherwise... Quite honestly, if I hadn't been hosting the book club, I think the armoire would still be unpainted...

Monday morning I had plans to go see "Eat, Pray, Love" with my friend Kim. I hadn't seen her in a few weeks and I was missing her like crazy... She had just gotten back from a holiday in Western Australia so we had much to catch up on at our lunch after the movie. I really wanted to sit around and talk to her all afternoon; but she had to pick her son up from school and I had a ton more to get done before book club. It was a resounding success, although I hadn't read the book and those that had read it didn't really like it.

(I have to pause here to add that I had ordered the book weeks before but it hadn't arrived yet. Also, I have to add that I got it several days after the book club meeting, started reading it yesterday, finished it today and I thought it was one of the worst books I have ever spent painful painful hours trying to slog through).

But, I digress... Tuesday was a scheduled "day of adventure" with a fellow blogger. We talked about doing some walking tours etc; but the day was rainy and overcast so we decided to head down to Chinatown and Paddy's Markets for some Yum Cha (Dim Sum) and some serious shopping. We met around lunchtime so we decided to start with the food and then go from there. Yum Cha was delish and wonderful - fellow blogger had never experienced it before so it was neat to get to explain how it all works. We had a bit of a translation issue at one point and so ended up with a lovely dish of beef tripe (you do know that tripe is stomach lining right?) on our table. As with most odd things that you can order in a Chinese restaurant, the flavour was great; but the texture was quite um... textured.

I was quite impressed with the both of us though - we both tried it and we both actually ate more than one piece each. Actually, when I wiki'ed tripe to make sure I talked about it correctly, I found out that most commercial breakfast sausage in the States uses pork and beef tripe as filler. I guess I can't honestly say that this was my first experience with it! The rest of the food was stellar, and so, buoyed up by a pot of Chinese tea, we headed out into the drizzle in search of bargains. Paddy's Markets were closed much to our intense disappointment; but the upstairs shops were open so we headed up to see what they had on offer. We were figuring that they would be regular places; but they seemed to all be stores that were geared for lower budgets which suited us just fine! I was able to pick up 4 pairs of shoes for only $70 and it felt like I was back in America with such bargains. We had just completed a circuit of all the shops when we noticed one off in the corner called Typo. Fellow blogger and I were helpless - like moths to a flame we went in slack jawed and drooling. I would try to explain the coolness of this place; but I know I would fall very very short so I am just going to encourage you to follow the link and look at the catalogue. While in the shop I fell in love with a rather large black canvas with Australian city names listed on it in an arty sort of way.

I texted Joe some pictures, he liked it, it was a good price so I bought it. Then I realized that I had to carry it home. Yikes... I hadn't really thought that one through. Luckily it was longer than it was wide so I was able to sort of tuck it under my arm and grab the bottom of it with my hard. I got lots of stares on the way home... We didn't end up wandering too much through the actual streets of Chinatown as I now had an enormous canvas tucked under one arm; but I am hoping that our next outing can be truly exploratory in that sense... We did see a bit before we went into the markets and also on our way back to Central Station to catch our respective buses and trains which is when I snapped these couple of pictures. I'd like to give it a go on a sunny day; with my actual camera and not just a cell phone.

I am going to give sleep another chance; but I will write again in the morning - I still have to talk about Night Noodle Markets, meeting more ex-pats, being in love with my husband and our busy social weekend.

Obsessions, Eggplant and Voting

2010-10-20T00:13:00.000+11:00

What a title right? I mean, how could you not read this?

Obsessions:

I can't stop taking pictures! I downloaded some photo apps for my phone and now I am snapping pictures of random park benches, wharfies or anything else that is in front of me... I even did a self portrait of myself tonight. How Aussie am I with my messy "couldn't care less" hair? I even had random unnecessary bobby pins stuck in it just to mess it up extra!

Really though, in all seriousness, I didn't prep for this shot - I just took it in five seconds as a lark; but it somehow managed to capture a lot more than just what my face looks like. It's a bit hard to describe; but I know the ones of you readers that know me the best and longest will know exactly what I am talking about.

Anyway, this is really a microcosm of what I am really talking about.... Obsessions... Well, not really; but the things that you are semi good at and have always wanted to learn/improve/take classes on etc... Being here in my specific situation is giving me some opportunities that I never would have imagined. Opportunities in the shape of seemingly endless free time, a new country/city/culture to explore and most importantly, a new perspective on who I can be, who I want to be and what my life could be like.

I've always loved photography; but I've always written myself off about it - "I have a crap camera", "I don't know anything about photography" etc... I've had some lucky moments and gotten some good shots. I took a bunch of pictures on one of our vacations to Hocking Hills and they turned out so well that Joe and I had the whole series framed to hang in the house. So many people commented on them - Honestly, it was always nice to correct them when they assumed that Joe (the artistic one of the two of us) took them. I started to think that maybe I really could take good photos if I tried hard enough etc...

A couple weeks ago Joe and I did some of the Eastern Coastal walk and I was so blown away by the intense beauty of what was around me that I resolved then and there to start taking pictures of everything and anything that caught my eye or looked beautiful to me. I bought photo editing software. I started paying just a bit more attention to what I was photographing. I would say it's going well so far. Maybe some die-hard photographers will disagree with me and tell me that it takes more than a mobile phone and a vignette to make a good picture. Maybe they will tell me it takes a $3000 dollar Nikon, many classes and years of experience to produce a good picture. I say beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

What I'm coming to realise is that it doesn't have to be about "trying hard" or having a top of the line camera... It is about seeing beauty in simple things, in shadows - about seeing a picture in your head and then capturing it with whatever you have available to you. Thankfully, I have a wealth of material. The train stations here are much like the train stations everywhere - nothing special; but coming from a life without trains, I notice them now. I ride them, I wait for them and I love their yellow doors.

I am writing and writing about this and I still don't feel as though I've really made my point... I suppose if I had to sum it up - I would be saying this:

I have given myself permission to take photos of everything and anything I find beautiful or interesting. I have stopped mentally telling myself that I don't know enough to take good pictures. I am resolved to take advantage of the newness with which I see my surroundings and try to document that.

Eggplant:

I do my grocery shopping on-line here and have it delivered. It's much easier than dragging it home two miles from the store - even with my ~~shame on wheels~~ granny cart. I mostly get all of my staples and heavy stuff (((mineral water, milk, canned goods, beer, wine) and yes, beer and wine are staples) don't judge) delivered and then do my meat and produce shopping throughout the week. This past weekend, I was getting ready to host a book club, I had a full weekend planned and then rest of my week was already booked out.... I decided to order some produce on-line to get me though to when I could make it up to the shops. Among other things, Eggplants were on special and I sprung for two of them.

I was kind of expecting those skinny Asian eggplants when the groceries were delivered; but instead I got these impossibly fat, glossy specimens of what eggplants should always look like.

Maybe it's just me, maybe it's that I hadn't made anything Italian-ish in a while; but the first thing I thought of was Eggplant Parmesan. I had also ordered a big hunk of mozzarella so I was set... it was more a matter of timing than anything. The weekend was out, Monday was the book club with nibbles for dinner; but tonight - Tuesday was the perfect time. It was gloriously gray today - drizzly this morning; but clearing quickly into a blustery, too shy for Spring day. It was Eggplant Parmesan weather!

I decided to forgo the salting and pressing that my mom always did with her eggplant - I never found it very helpful and I am of the opinion that, if an eggplant is full of bad bitter seeds, no amount of salt and squishing with a full gallon of milk ( my siblings should hopefully get this reference) will make it any more palatable. All the produce I have gotten here has been completely beautiful so I forged ahead with the egging, breadcrumbing and frying. I did the usual layering with sauce, eggplant pieces and mozzarella cheese. I don't have a recipe; but I can tell you that the process of preparing this dish is best enhanced with a nice glass of champagne, the sound of your husband playing music in the office and four new pairs of shoes waiting to be introduced into your closet. After I finished our dish, I had leftovers of everything - not enough for a whole other 8x10 casserole; but enough for a smaller cute, "one meal for two people with no leftovers" size casserole. I figured I could freeze the smaller one and then inspiration struck! Our neighbors across the hall are expecting a baby any day so I packaged it up and took it over for them to freeze and have after the baby comes. After I got back from delivering it I had a moment of panic.... What if the eggplant was full of horrible bitter seeds? What if it was inedible? What had I delivered to them?

Sheesh - I really need to start trusting myself! I took ours out of the oven when it was golden and bubbly on top. I broke open a cleanskin bottle of Semillion Chardonnay and served it all up. I am happy to say that there was not a single bitter seed to be found... I am actually going to just be honest and say that it was by far the best Eggplant Parmesan I have ever had - better than Mom's and better than anything I have ever had in any restaurant...

It was so good that I actually had this crazy moment after a couple of bites where I blurted out to Joe, "Why don't I do this for a living?" I've spent the evening thinking about that - about being good at something, about enjoying something, about the difference between a hobby, a passion, an obsession or just work.

Does working at something dull your passion? Do you need to take classes to be good at something? It's a lot to think about; but it's really good stuff to be thinking about right now.... Joe made it a point to show me a cooking school around the corner from work last week and I have been thinking about it ever since. Why shouldn't I do what I love?

This is just one of the many many reasons I am glad we moved here. I am working so few hours that I finally have time to take classes if I want. Plus, moving has gotten us out of our rut - it was a good rut; and I would have been happy in it for the rest of my life; but since I am out of it, I might as well look around and see if there isn't a rut that looks a bit better!

Oh Yes!

Voting:

Go here and vote for me - even though they have my blog listed as Gone "to" a Lucky Country instead of "on"... Sort-of ruins the whole meaning; but oh well, it would still be cool to win. I'm only up against 9 other blogs so I think I actually have a decent shot...

I'm Back!

2010-10-13T09:48:00.000+11:00

Where did I go? Well, nowhere really - I was here the whole time... I just wasn't in the mood to write anything.

So, I'll give you the highlights since I've been on hiatus....

We had a long weekend and our first Aussie holiday (it was their labour day) - we had friends over for a dinner/game night that Sunday as it was too rainy for a picnic. Also, we had Australian Daylight Savings Time go into effect. So, we used to be 14 hours ahead of the States and now we are only 13? I think? These uneven numbers are really screwing with my head.

Also, we went to Ikea and now we are the proud owners of, not one; but two couches!! It is extremely exciting to sit in something that is not a bed or a bench from a patio set. We have big plans for this coming Friday evening to go out to Ikea again and buy ourselves two armchairs and a bookcase! Who Hoo!!

This past weekend sucked a bit - our downstairs neighbors smoke and mostly we can't smell it; but Friday night it was really bad and it had Joe and I up all night with allergies etc.... (I do recognize the irony of an ex-smoker complaining about smoke) so Saturday was mostly a bust and rainy to boot. I think there were like 3 naps that day? Sunday was better though with blue skies and sunshine. We decided to walk all the way around Neutral Bay - We made it to the High Street Ferry Wharf and then caught the ferry to Kirribilli. Then we walked into Kirribilii proper for some brunch.

*Side note - Have I told you about the Orange Juice here? I didn't think so..... They don't serve you orange juice from cartons or concentrate here. They go juice oranges into a glass for you. Yeah.... The first time I ordered it I thought the place we were eating was extra snooty or something; but no - pretty much wherever you order juice, it will be freshly made. Yum...

Anyway, after brunch (I swear every time I say brunch I think of "How I Met Your Mother") we walked across the Harbour Bridge into the Rocks/Circular Key. We had just missed our ferry so we had about an hour to kill. We got sorbet and sat in the sunshine to people watch - honestly, it was so much fun I didn't even want to go home.

Monday (2 days ago) was our second wedding anniversary. We both worked (me only half a day though) so it wasn't any huge celebration. I did make a nice dinner though - pork roast, apple/potato pancakes and green beans. We got each other cards and little gifts - usually, I am the winner in this department. I always write long sappy messages in my cards and pick out the perfect presents. Yea, Joe totally beat me this year - his card (and what he wrote inside of it) was so perfect that I cried and he got me Ugg slippers. I have needed new slippers for months and I just keep forgetting to buy myself some. So, he beat me to it and got me like the most incredibly comfortable footwear ever. I know it's bogan to wear them outside so I won't; but I will be wearing them at every second while I am in my home!

Last night Joe worked late - really really late.... I stayed home all day because I was waiting for the Post to deliver something (which they never did - don't get me started on how annoyed I am with these people) so it was a long hard lonely-ish day. I did have three Skype dates that morning (thanks Ladies!) so it helped break up the day a bit.

Also - just a quick thanks to Jen for the Birthday care package... Everything made it through quarantine. I literally walked out of the post office, found the nearest bench, ripped the package open and started laughing. I LOVE MY HALLOWEEN COSTUME!!!!!! Thanks also for the great card, candy, stickers, chili powder etc.... You will be happy to know that the M&Ms did not taste like chili powder!

Ok, I am off to get ready for work

Eastern Coastal Walk - Part 2

2010-10-04T12:48:00.000+11:00

After we finished our al fresco lunch looking out at Bronte beach we climbed up and around the next curve in the cliff. I was excited for this next part of the walk as I heard a great deal about it; and also glimpsed it from rather far away when we first started the walk. I'm referring, of course, to Waverly Cemetery.

Waverly cemetery was started in 1877 - amazingly enough, it is still operational today - and sits on the top of the cliff looking out over the Tasman Sea. Apparently, the cemetery started off on a relatively small plot of land; but over the years has grown to over 140 acres of plots and monuments. I know that some people don't really enjoy being around or in cemeteries; but not me...

I know this will sound a bit macabre or even slightly fanciful; but I don't care. I just feel very peaceful by graves. I also feel quite hushed and reverent thinking about all the lives that used to belong to all the remains - all the memories and experiences sort-of massing together into this huge cloud of slowly forgotten humanity that hangs over the dead.

Wow, that sounded even worse than I thought it would.

Ok - to explain - when I was little I was completely freaked by cemeteries, wakes, coffins, dead people etc... The fear part of it faded as I got older; but the rest of it was still pretty firmly entrenched. After my Dad died, I realised that dead people aren't gross or scary or anything like that - they are all someones dad, mom, brother, sister, husband, wife etc... I also came to realise that cemeteries weren't spooky at all - they were places where family members could come to feel close to those that they lost. Plus, some years earlier, my bestest friend Meaghan took me to a cool old cemetery in her neighborhood in New York which sort-of started me down the road of viewing cemeteries as history. Well, back to my original subject matter... there is plenty of history here at Waverly Cemetery...

There are lots of famous Australians who are interred here... I didn't recognise the names so I doubt any of you would either. One super interesting tidbit that I read was that there are at least eleven Civil War veterans buried there. Also, in true Aussie form, there are memorials sprinkled all over the cemetery - to WWI veterans, to WWII veterans, to the soldiers of NSW, to those that were killed in a sea mine explosion, to the Irish Martyrs etc...

I was reading an old (ok, not really old - just outdated) account of the cemetery from the late nineties that was discussing the general disrepair of the place and the inefficacy of having a path for walkers doing to Eastern Coastal Walk leading right through the cemetery. Apparently, there was some vandalism from the local youths and so-on. There was a discussion of having a new and modern boardwalk put up along the cliff; but outside the fence of the cemetery. I am pleased to report that the board walk was indeed erected and looks very nice and not garish. Joe and I (well, mostly me) decided to use the old path so we could ~~take a gazillion pictures of~~ walk through the cemetery and be reflective. We did rejoin the new and level boardwalk at the main gates and I must report, I think it was the most pleasant walking experiences of the whole trek. In this case, I think modernization of the walking path was a resounding success.

Some final shots:

The rest of the walk went downhill from there (no, not literally) with the entrance to Clovelly beach which was mostly all paved, filled with children and looked and smelled rather oily.

There were a couple more fetching little coves - one with fishing boats and dogs and sunbathers on the rocks. Then, back up to the next cliff on which was perched a forlorn looking park on one side and apartment buildings on the other. The walk weaved into some residential areas, taking us away from the sea view and I was not impressed. Luckily, down the next hill was Coogee beach, the end of our trek and some delicious iced coffees as reward. The bus ride back was, thankfully, much less crowded and I used the time to doze on Joe's shoulder. We were both pleasantly wearied and decided on an evening in with tv and an early bed.

My final verdict on the walk is this:

I would do it every weekend if I could - it is absolutely not to be missed! I can't wait to do the beginning and final leg of it... Plans are in the making!

Eastern Coastal Walk - Part 1

2010-09-30T01:20:00.001+10:00

It was a beautiful day last Sunday and I had been bugging Joe for a while to do the "Bondi to Coogee" walk. This particular trek is one part of a beautiful walk along the beaches and cliffs that stretch from the mouth of the Sydney Harbour down to a beach called Maroubra. The walk in it's entirety is called the Eastern Coastal Walk so I suppose the title of this post is slightly wrong - however, I do hope to complete the entire walk eventually and so have parts 2 and 3.

The portion of the walk that we did was 6 kilometers long (just shy of 4 miles) - it didn't seem all that long; but there was a lot of stairs and climbing involved so it did take us a couple of hours to complete. In this first picture you can see the approximate route that we took. It's not a great indicator of scale, so, in this second photo, I backed the map out so you can get a better idea of the length of the walk.

It was an absolutely perfect day with bright blue skies - I took about 70 pictures in total and then whittled that number down to 30 once I got home and started editing. Just a warning: I'm not sure how I am going to pick only a few photos to add to this entry. There may be multiple entries with lots of photos on each one so be prepared!

We started by taking a bus to Bondi - I have to admit - not a great way to spend a morning. It was crowded on the bus (the Bondi buses are always crowded); however, we were lucky to have boarded the bus at the first stop so we did have seats for the entire trip. The last time we took a bus to Bondi it only took about a half hour. There was so crazy traffic on Sunday though, so we were in route to Bondi for almost an hour. Once we got there we sunscreened up and we were off. The beach was already starting to be really crowded (even though it's just early Spring here) and we weren't in the mood for crowds after our bus ride.

It was very crowded to begin with - there seemed to be a lot of people just strolling up the first hill to get a better view of Bondi beach in it's entirety or maybe going up to the famous Bondi Icebergs Club (so named because their members swim year-round... yes, even during the dead winter) to see the salt water swimming pool. Either way, Joe and I were ready to take off at a good pace so that we could get away from the worst of the crowds (again, we were pretty sick of people at this point). Well, to be completely truthful, Joe was ready and I kept lingering behind to take pictures. I couldn't help it really! I have been stricken with shutter-bug-itis!

The surf was crashing up over the corner of the Icebergs swimming pool and everywhere I looked there was blue water, blue sky, white rock and green foliage. It was very very hard not to take many more than 70 photos. Heck, I would even venture to say that only taking 70 photos showed great restraint on my part!

Once we rounded the first cliff thingy ( I don't know what to call them - maybe a curve? Yea, that sounds good). So, once we rounded the first curve in the cliff walk we could see down the coastline for miles.

It was incredible to see people on the cliffs so far away looking for all the world like tiny ants and to think that we would be standing there too in about an hour.

The beginning of the walk by Bondi was very challenging. There were dirt paths and lots of precarious steps that had been hewn in the rock. Sometimes the steps were more like divots so it would be tough keeping your balance. There was also a great disparity in the size of the steps - there would be a couple that were about 6 inches, than one that was 10 then two that were 3 then.... well, you get the idea. Murder on the calves I tell you.

The rocks along the walk were particularly beautiful - they had that distinctive "erosion" look to them... that softness of line that can only come from years and years of the harsh elements facing the Tasman Sea. Some of the rocks were a golden colour that was really beautiful up against the blue sky; but my favourite were the white and grey rocks. They were just so stark and dramatic against all that blue. It made the coastline pop out at you. This one was an accidental dead end that we got to - I think it was meant to be a lookout of some sort... or maybe just a resting place. We only had to retrace our steps for about 10 meters to get back to the main path.

I'm certainly glad for the wrong turn though as this was one of my favourite photos that I took the whole day.

Well, the next beach on the walk was called Tamarama Beach. I had a little information card talking about the walk and it proclaimed this tiny little beach to be where "all the most buff, tan bodies" were in Sydney. Yikes! Once we got down there though, we realized that it wasn't anything special... I think once you start actively advertising a specific beach as a place where all the hot people go to get half naked, than all of the not-hot people start showing up to gawk. Once that happens than it is just a regular beach.... After the walk, when I was doing some ~~googling~~ research on it, I read that Tamarama was actually considered to be a gay beach. I have to admit, it just looked like a regular beach to me...

After Tamarama, we walked on to Bronte Beach which was about the half way point in our stretch of the walk. I liked Bronte the best - it seemed very family friendly without being overrun by unruly children. Plus the sand looked completely gorgeous. I made a mental note to keep it on our list of beaches to frequent this summer.

I did read later that it can have some pretty dangerous undertows/rip tides etc... so maybe it will be a beach where we lay on the sand and wade in the water - not a "swimming" beach. Not that either of us are major swimmers but.... I digress..

We stopped at a little picnic shelter in the park overlooking Bronte to eat our packed lunch of sandwiches. We had bought them at a stand in Circular Quay earlier that morning so my hopes were not high. Rightly so, they were just ok; but we were pretty hungry by that point so we really didn't care.

I am going to go ahead and cut this walk into two posts. It's already one in the morning here and I have to work in the morning. I love you all; but not that much. I will add the rest of my photos down below; but you will have to make up your own stories to go with them!

Good and Bad

2010-09-27T14:41:00.000+10:00

So, Ive had this post rolling around inside my head ever since we got our stuff (man, that makes it sound like there is a whole lot of empty hollowness in my noggin). I've been wanting to write about my Mom and Dad - not just about them; but about a few of the things of theirs that I was lucky enough to inherit... Some possessions that mean so much to me that they are almost a tangible thread that I could follow back to my Mom and Dad if I tried hard enough. Ok, I know that sounds fanciful. I'm hoping to explain it here though so maybe by the end you won't think I'm so crazy.

So, like I said, I've been thinking about this post; but I wasn't really in a huge hurry to write it. Friday evening at work someone gave a talk about eating organic (explanation, if you want to give a short talk about something than you can while everyone is drinking - I know right?) and it seemed to push a lot of buttons in the office.... including my own. It wasn't the subject matter that bothered me - I think that if you can afford to eat organic than you should. It was more of the way the subject was presented - lots of blanket statements and not a whole lot of objectivity. Anyway, you know me with the big mouth - first I chimed in to give some examples of how crazy expensive organic food is here. Then, as the talk devolved into a discussion, I was trying to get across the point that eating organic won't save your life just as not eating healthy your whole life will necessarily condemn you to cancer. So, I used my parents as an example - one who ate very healthy and died of cancer. One who ate badly and died of cancer.

Ugh! What was I thinking? Now I am the girl with the dead parents. I try really hard to just not ever mention that my parents have died - so hard in fact that, when I was leaving my old job to move to Australia, several people asked me how my parents felt about it. See? I am usually very very careful. So, we went out to the bars on Friday night after all that and I ended up having a couple drinks too many - which means that I spent Saturday morning lying in bed thinking. Oh no - thinking...

Usually when I think about my parents (which is all the time), I think of happy things - I try very very hard to not think about the sickness part of their lives. So, when I was a little hungover, missing them and had the morning to lay in bed with my fuzzy head and think, I thought about all of the horrible things about the actual sickness and dying part of the time I had with them. It didn't make for a good morning; but it did make me realize that I needed to shake all of those feeling off and write a wonderful celebratory post about my parents and the things they left for me. I am going to rise above and make this happy!

First up - the spice rack... This hung in our dining room/kitchen for as long as I can remember. It was full of Spice Island Spices (the nice expensive ones) so it didn't get used very often. Mostly, it was a place to stash bills and paperwork. When we sorted through all of the stuff in my parents house before it was sold, I was lucky enough to get the spice rack. I immediately hung it on my kitchen wall, full of the same dusty old Spice Island spices that were too old to use. It was a bit like a shrine really - I didn't use it at all. When we decided to move to Australia, I had to really think about what to do with it - Leave it in the States in storage? Bring it with? Buy new spices and send them over?

The main problem was the old jars of spices - you can bring spices into Australia; but they have to be new and unopened. I wondered if I should save all of the old bottles and try to clean them out; but the assortment wasn't very good. In the end, I decided that if Mom were here she would want me to use it - not just look at it on the wall like a painting. So, I threw away the old bottles of spices, I bought new bottles and labels and I brought all of it to Australia with me. I've been slowly building up my collection... each time I go to the grocery store I buy a bottle or two of spices and herbs and then I repackage it when I get home. I'm so glad I made the decisions I did - I use it almost every day and it reminds me of Mom's cooking. it's like having her in my kitchen with me every time I make a meal.

So, the next bit of this story is somewhat of a confession. I didn't come by this next piece of property through any sort of division of property - I took it. Granted, I was about 16 or 17 at the time and my parents were still alive so it wasn't like I knew it would be worth something more to me one day. It was just an old book that was down in the basement and I wanted to have it; because I thought that reading Shakespeare would make me seem really cool. In reality, none of my friends ever really cared; but I had this book and also a collected works of Edger Allen Poe so in my mind I thought I was a young literary genius. I've carted this book around with me for the last 10 years - it went through my house fire with me and it moved a bazillion times with me. I'm honestly quite shocked that it's made it this far. I decided to bring it to Australia with me because it is one of my oldest possessions (and I use the term possessions loosely) and I've just always had it with me. I had never looked inside of it before we got here. I'm not sure what made me open it up when I was unpacking our stuff; but seeing that the book was one of my Dad's college textbooks was like a little gift from him - A little message saying "I'm here with you".

I started turning some pages and I found his notes. His writing - such a wonderfully familiar sight - scribbled in the margins of the plays he studied in college. He was exactly the same age in 1960 that I am now. I made a mental note of the notes in the book and decided to blog about it. So, this past Saturday, after I spent the morning in dark thoughts, Joe and I went down to the reserve to read. I brought this book and my camera to take pictures of it for this entry. I had such fun reading the little notes and reading the passages that my Dad underlined when he was 27. I was careful not to look at every page - these sorts of discoveries are best when you can dole them out to your self in small increments over time.

If I were to leaf through every page and read every notation - it would be too much. I would feel cheated that there was nothing left to discover. It was obvious that they hadn't covered every play in the book; and it's not like the pages were littered with notes. They were few and far between - always judicious - so that makes them all the more precious. I figure that I will know the next time I need to get a message from this book. This particular Saturday, I needed a really big message.

I was really low, really missing them - feeling sorry for myself... sick of hearing people say "but you are so young!" when they find out that my parents are gone.

I was sitting on the blanket next to Joe, taking my artsy pictures for this blog entry when I ran across not just a message; but a gift.

An absolutely amazing gift.

So, now I am restored - back to thinking my happy thoughts!

Chicken Pot Pie

2010-09-26T00:38:00.002+10:00

I was just downloading my newest batch of photos from my camera when I ran across a bunch from a dinner I made earlier this week. It was pretty epic so I thought I would share. I was wanting some warm comfort food, I had some puff pastry sheets and chicken breasts..... Of course, Chicken Pot Pie was the first thing that popped into my head! Really, when a dinner begins with onion, celery and carrot it's really hard to go wrong.

I didn't have a recipe (per the usual); but I think I ended up with a fairly traditional rendition of the dish... I tossed some raw potato in and I also mashed up a couple cooked potatoes that I had with some milk and used that to make the delicious creamy sauce. I decided to put my own spin on it in the spice department; but throwing in a lot of tarragon. Maybe even a bit too much... It ended up working though - what I thought was a bit overpowering in my saucepan somehow calmed down and meshed with the other flavours as it bubbled away in the oven for an hour or so.

I had some leftover puff pastry so I decided to use that as my crust. In hindsight, I think I would have cooked it separately and then floated it on top. Maybe not... I do know now that rolling puff pastry into little balls to make a pretty edge means that they do not cook all the way. I will not be trying that trick again!

I think my oven heats a bit unevenly as one side of the pie ended up being more puffed and brown than the other - no worries, it was still pretty and it all eats the same. I was quite happy with my decorative tree cut out of the pastry. I'm glad I followed through on that particular whim.

I was quite pleased when Joe had a second helping - that always means that I made something really really yummy in his mind. I almost didn't notice how much he was enjoying it - I was too busy photographing my serving and sipping on my delicious wine from the Coonawarra Valley (gift from the neighbors for feeding their cats).

I also made a green salad - I didn't want our whole meal to be so heavy. Although, why I feel the need to justify myself is beyond me. Well, actually it isn't; but that is another post.....

Taronga Zoo

2010-09-22T23:48:00.000+10:00

I'm not going to lie - I'm exhausted!

I don't have much in me for this post; but it has been hanging over my head for some time, I'm overdue for a blog entry and it's 11:30 at night.....

Work is great - I just forgot how much harder it is to make free time for blogging when you don't get home from work till late and then still have to make dinner etc...

Anyway - I digress...

I've been putting off this zoo entry because I couldn't think of anything really to say about it. A zoo is a zoo is a zoo is a zoo... Admittedly, Taronga is one of the cleanest zoos I have ever had the pleasure of seeing and they do have many cool Aussie animals that I have only ever read about. Still though, it's hard to imagine how to fill up a great big blog entry saying things like "and then we saw the wallabies - after that we walked over to the chimps" and so on.

So, I'm just going to give you the highlights:

Kim was a doll for taking me and letting me use her guest pass (did you know that admission is $45.00?)
We only saw half the zoo in the time that we had
The Koalas were super cute - especially the mom and baby.
Chimp faces fascinate me
I got to feed and pet a wallaby
Emus are quite scary when they are a foot away from you and staring you down with beady red eyes
I saw the biggest gorilla ever!

Now you get to see the pictures - Enjoy!

Another Year Gone

2010-09-20T01:10:00.000+10:00

I am feeling only slightly guilty for not blogging all weekend - It was my birthday weekend and one of the presents I gave to myself was the permission to slack off on blogging, taking photos and everything related. I hope you all will pardon the absence.

I've been saving up some fun news for a few weeks and since it is finally official I can spill it...

I got a job!! Whoo-Hoo!! I am actually going to working at Joe's company. It is very very part-time - only a day and half a week to start; but then going up to two and a half days in November. I'll be handling culture and publicity exclusively till November when I will pick up the extra day doing some work around the accounts receivable/invoicing process. It's nothing super-glamorous; but it is fun, interesting, engaging and will get me out of the house a bit more. Don't expect to hear much about the job though as a lot of my new co-workers read this blog! Anything I post here would be the same as talking about it in the office.

So, I had made plans earlier in the week with two other couples to have a picnic on Saturday - I honestly didn't realize until it was pointed out to me that it was actually my birthday that day. I really hadn't planned on really celebrating it because I was too worried that it would make me homesick. Since I got a birthday package from Joe's Mom and Dad that had some Montgomery Inn BBQ Sauce in it, I decided to have a Southern themed picnic. I made devilled eggs, sweet tea, pulled pork sandwiches, coleslaw and potato salad. One of the girls brought apple turnovers (so so so so so yummy) and the other brought Bloody Marys (so so so so so yummy). Really, it was a perfect day. Perfect.... seriously. I can't think of anything that would have made it better!

I got flowers from one of the couples - so thoughtful! They also took some pictures throughout the afternoon and you can view them on their blog here. Joe's boots even made it into the photo collage!! It was a truly wonderful afternoon spent lounging on the blanket, drinking, talking and laughing. Did I mention laughing? We had so much fun, in fact, that we already have the next picnic planned for two weekends from now. I can hardly wait.

All of my worries about being homesick were completely unfounded - it was a great day.

Sunday (today, I guess - but since it's after midnight - not really. I digress!) was a busy day. It started slow with me sleeping in far too late... We had discussed doing the Bondi to Coogee walk; but it was overcast and a little chilly so we decided to postpone that till a nicer day. We decided instead to catch a bus for Manly beach with a little picnic dinner and some books. We walked by the exhibition grounds on our way from the bus to the beach and got to see/hear a Scottish Pipe Band competition... Awesome!

It wasn't the sunniest, warmest day; but it was so nice to lay on a blanket, smell the ocean and hear the waves for an afternoon.

There is something that is just so wonderfully calming about the ocean...

Then there is the sand.... It gets on the blanket and it gets in the food. You find it in your house months after your excursion - and, even though you are wearing jeans and a long sleeve shirt, it somehow ends up in your underwear.

The views from the blanket were awesome - just imagine how much greater it would be on a sunny day.

And yes, I need a pedicure... and I have a blue ladybug on my toe...

When we got back into our neighborhood we had the choice of waiting a half hour for the bus or just walking home - wisely, we decided to walk... and since I had my camera, you will now be subjected to two artsy pictures that I took on our way home.

The End!

Fun With Google

2010-09-16T16:05:00.000+10:00

If any of you have ever had your own blog or website, you quickly learn about things called analytics. This is a bunch of HTML code that you embed within your site that tracks how many people view your site, where they are coming from, what types of operating systems they are using etc... It won't tell me exactly who you are (cause I know you are totally nervous right now reading this); but sometimes I can make some educated guesses... When I see a big old blip on my map coming from Charlotte, North Carolina - I know who that is; and when I see a blip in West Babylon, New York - I know who that is too!

So here are some stats:

I've been writing this blog since May 5th of this year and I have posted 85 times since then. It's been a little over four months at this point and I have had over six thousand hits on this blog! People from 40 countries have been here to read my posts. The top five countries that send the most traffic to my site are:

1.) Australia

2.) USA - come on folks... you should be in the number one spot!

3.) United Kingdom

4.) Canada

5.) South Korea - really? number 5 in the whole world?

One of my favourite parts of analytics is my ability to see what people were doing Google searches for before they stumbled across my blog. Of course there are the usual "goneonaluckycountry", "move to a lucky country" etc... but occasionally, there are some other random searches:

North Shore Sydney
Lucky Country Red Wine
Bundaberg Ginger Beer
The City in the Morning
And The Only Thing That
Mimi Food Blog Sydney
Australian Ketchup at T J Maxx

So yeah, some of those actually make sense; but "the only thing that"?? Really? The weirdest part about these searches is that people actually clicked through to my blog while looking for these things... I tried doing my own search for "The city in the Morning" and for "And the only thing that" and I made it about 10 pages through the search before I gave up - I'm not sure how far you have to drill down to actually find me.

My favorite search term of all of these was obviously "Australia Ketchup at T J Maxx" - I wondered how many pages of search returns I would have to wade through to find my blog. Apparently - not many.....

Picnic On The Reserve

2010-09-15T10:30:00.000+10:00

Saturday we had friends over for a picnic ~~in our front yard~~ at Kurraba Point Reserve and it was lovely. Joe and I took a little picnic dinner down there weeks before; but it was chilly, it was late, there was a mob of crazy teenagers and we sat on a rock. So... this time - sitting in the sunshine on a blanket with lovely friends, beautiful food and delicious wine was one of the nicest Saturdays we have had since we got here. I think I am going to make this a weekly tradition - in fact, there is another one planned for this coming Saturday. We are having over 2 fellow blogger/ex-pat couples that we have met and liked immensely. The theme of the picnic is "Southern Style Food" complete with sweet tea, pulled pork sandwiches and coleslaw...... Yum!

Guess we'll be enjoying this view again in a few days...