30 January 2009

10 Random Thoughts

1. I feel pressured to make this interesting.

2. It has been damn hot here! Summer starts here on December 1. I am not sure why. And it has been a cold summer, all the way through mid-January. Now, we're in a heat wave. In Farenheit, it was 111 degrees yesterday, 109 degrees today and 104 tomorrow. Luckily it will go down to 82 degrees on Sunday. Yay!

3. Steve and I went camping this weekend for the long weekend - off Monday for Australia Day (did anyone receive a card?).

3.a. We slept in the middle of nowhere. Again! I have to give myself credit on this, I mean, what a good wife, right? Steve picked a site that was good for families and groups. But by families they meant a husband and wife and by groups they meant no more than two people. It was just literally in the middle of nowhere, with noone but us. 11km from the main road. As we arrived, I was thinking, 'How am I supposed to run that entire way in case of emergencies? What if someone chases me down that long road, I'm never going to make it.' Luckily, it was a peaceful evening with no scary people.

3.b. We also hiked 22km through mountains on this trip. My longest trip ever! The next closest I've hiked is maybe 7km.

4. My mom is coming to visit! In May! It's going to be very fun. I cannot believe she is going to do this, I'm so proud of her.

5. I've finally 'finished' a big project I've been working on at work. I worked for four months on creating a new website for work (I didn't personally create it as I'm not a web designer), but it was my baby, my project; it was four months of blood, sweat, tears and fears of getting fired. It's now ready to view! Take a look: http://www.ascet.edu.au/.

6. It really is a small world. I keep in touch with a girl from high school who is best friends with my oldest friend from home. This girl and I keep in touch through Facebook - what a phenomenon - and it turns out that her new mother-in-law moved an hour plane ride from Melbourne, weird, right?

7. Bindi Irwin is very popular here. My brother Brian is quite fond of her as well.

8. We went to a Neil Young concert last night. When Steve asked me to go three or four months ago, I jumped at it. I was very excited! How fun would it be? In the past couple of weeks, as we were listening to Steve's iPod, a song came on and I shouted, "I can't wait to see Neil in concert, it will be such a good show." Steve looked at me funny and said, "This is Neil Diamond on the iPod, we're going to see Neil Young." What? No Sweet Caroline? Who is Neil Young? It was good (so hot out), but very relaxed and chill. And he closed with a Beatles cover which was cool.

9. I am trying to think of another random thought.

10. Oh, here's one. Steve and I did not buy matching outfits contrary to popular belief. The pictures you saw in the Australia Day cards are a requirement for anyone doing the Sydney Harbour Bridge climb. We do not buy outfits to match.

Love and miss you all tons!
~Kate (and Steve)

29 January 2009

Christmas Break - Informational Blog

Over the Christmas holiday, my work closed for two weeks. How nice is that? Seriously! Two weeks off. A lot of companies do this in Australia. I feel that they're very good at making a work-life balance here in Australia. Steve took a few extra days from work to travel with me - nice, right?

Anyway, we decided to jam-pack our two weeks with things to do. We spent the first weekend in Queenscliff, a beach town about 2 hours from Melbourne CBD. It was beautiful. We stayed with about 15 other couples and 16 children. It was very chaotic. The house we stayed at was big enough for all of us staying there and about about 10 more families. It was an old nursing home. It was kind of creep actually, there were even name tags on the doors of the people that used to live there. I, of course, picked a room without a name on it as I thought this room might be less likely to have a ghost in it. It was a great weekend, relaxed, fun, drinks, games and sun. This is when I learned the hard way that the Australian sun does not love my skin. Or rather, it does:) On Saturday, my legs got so burnt that my ankles swelled into cankles and I couldn't even walk. And great, we're supposed to fly out to Tasmania on Sunday. Don't flights make some people swell? Why yes, they do. And I am one of those lucky people.

Poor Steve, we weren't able to hike the way he liked to because I was a cripple. I needed to keep my legs elevated as much as possible and that was really hard while we were camping outsite of Hobart, Tasmania. Hiking consisted of a drive up a mountain and me staying in the car while Steve would pull over, get out, walk a few feet into the forest and return.

The campground we stayed at was so amazing though. You should have seen these animals! They were everywhere, it was literally like a zoo. Or better yet, it was like Toy Story or A Night at the Museum where everything during the day looks normal but at nighttime the place turns into a zoo and everything comes alive. There were animals EVERYWHERE! Pademelons (in the wallaby family, pictured) - Steve actually saw two trying to start a family, bandicoots (who look like hopping mice), ring-tailed possums (pictured), superb wrens, Tasmanian native-hen (which look like miniature emus), Steve saw two platapuses. It was really cool to be out in nature this way, and they weren't too afraid of us, pretty used to people since they live on a campground.



We flew home on Christmas Eve and finished wrapping presents so Santa/Father Christmas could visit. Christmas was really nice; Jill came over and we went to lunch/dinner at friends' houses. Then we flew out to Sydney on Boxing Day (the day after Christmas) for a friend's wedding and New Years.



Sydney was great! The last time we were there was in winter, when it rained and someone lost our camera. But it was much nicer this time. We went to Bondi Beach, it was packed, see picture above. It's pronounced bon-die. Do not try to pronounce it as bon-dee as Australians will have no idea what you're talking about. You would think they could piece it together, bon-dee beach, but no, no clue. Anyway, Bondi Beach is where they film the Australian TV series Bondi Rescue. Just your typical real-life Baywatch with no David Hasselhoff. This is also the second time that I was reminded that the Australian sun does not like me. And I reapplied!!!!! I have since gotten a sun hat, which I still have yet to use.

We climbed the Sydney Harbour Bridge (below) which was really cool. It is a very safety-conscious tourist attraction. They require you wear no jewelery or watches, cannot take cameras, they provide hats and hankerchiefs which must be clipped onto the harness you're wearing and they even do a breathalizer on everyone! It was a beautiful view of Sydney from that height, and I got to see where Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban have a house. Love it!

The two day wedding was amazing. There were two choreographed dances that put our wedding dance to shame, though, that's not incredibly hard to do. It looked like straight out of High School Musical. Seriously. The brides' girlfriends were doing an Indian dance performance for the entire room when all of a sudden the bride got on the dance floor and danced with them. Then out of the back, three male guests jumped in and danced while the groom watched with the rest of the crowd. Not long after that the groom jumped in too! It's like the 80's movies where you wonder, 'How does everyone know the same exact dance?' It was beautiful though.

New Years Eve was fun in Sydney. Luckily we found an amazing place to see the fireworks off of the Sydney Harbour bridge. We didn't realize what we would be in for when we started looking for a place to see the midnight fireworks at 3pm that day. We got on line and were in the group of the last 25 people to get into this gated-off area. While we were on line, I noticed a sign that said no ATM and Cash Only! Ahhhh!!!!!! Did we have cash? We had less than $100 and we were there from 3pm until midnight! We had to be very careful about what we ate as we needed to make sure we had enough money for booze:)

We wrapped up our two week holiday on 2nd January and headed back to Melbourne. Back to the grind.

And so, we started planning all of our upcoming trips, camping in January, getaway to the wine region in February, camping/beach in March, Ayers Rock in April, Sydney in May with my mom, Gold Coast in June...but these are all weekend trips. Hopefully I'll have some fun things to write about.

See you soon!
~Kate (and Steve)

06 January 2009

Meredith

Good Evening People!

This blog will be about the Meredit Music Festival. Held every year in December from a Friday until Sunday. I wanted to leave work early but did not want to tell my boss why. Apparently this event gets dubbed as a 'hippie' event and I heard my boss makes fun of those who attend, so I just kept that to myself. Maybe you will be able to sense sarcasm in this blog.
This picture shows the absolute chaos that happened over the weekend.

I was slightly nervous that I would be bored going to a music festival all weekend, this was my first. I mean, what could we possibly do all weekend? The obvious, listen to music, yes. But what if I didn't like the music? What if I wanted to sleep and the music was too loud? What if I wanted to take a real shower? What if we didn't meet up with the other people we knew going as the ten thousand people there might be hard to find them? What if, what if, what if everything??? I've only become a 'camper' in the last five years, was I really ready to embark on a full weekend of music and camping?

I committed. Along with Steve and Annie, we drove the few hours to Meredith on Friday afternoon and then sat in a bit of traffic waiting for all cars to get checked (no glass bottles were allowed, but any other form of container in which to put alcohol could be taken in).

The forecast was not looking good. I think it drizzled a bit on our carride, maybe even rained a bit. But this did little to prepare me for what was to come. Two nights of camping, three days and nights of music and this year, especially for us, 48 hours of sideways rain, cold wind and mud. It was a thrill. I cannot even begin to describe the actuality of this weather-but I will try.


Out of pure luck, we were in the farthest possible section for camping. Tents were crammed in next to one another, like sardines. And couches! Everywhere! Couches at campsites and even more down at the stage. There were so many. I wondered if people literally took the couches right out of their living rooms or if they found a couch on the side of the street and grabbed it on the way. After this weekend, none of these couches would be able to return to their original homes.

People were walking in the dirt road (which was a no-no on the list of rules), people were partying, people were listening to music, people were waiting on line for the port-o-johns. There were just massive amounts of people, everywhere. As we drove to a land far, far away, we pulled up next to another group of friends by pure coincidence. Steve picked out a site for our tent wanting to set up before the downpour started. Annie set her massive tent up next to us.

We then began a difficult walk down a very, very long road to get to the music, the Supernatural Amphitheater. Maybe not so difficult for the drunk people there who didn't care, or Steve who has experience walking in any condition, or Annie who had gum boots (of which I had gum boot-envy all weekend), but it was tremendously hard for me. I am pretty sure I was moving at the pace of a slug and missed about four sets of bands performing. It was just mud, pure mud. It must have rained pretty good before we got there. But it was just slippery. I just had this huge vision of me walking too fast and slipping and being covered in mud. No way was I going to go all weekend without a shower and mud covered.

Off to bed early. As we slept, the wind swept through like a tornado. And all night. I almost thought one of the drunk neighbors was pushing our tent in just to annoy us. Poor Annie had this giant tent that broke. It caved in on her! While she was sleeping. The wind was so intense and insane! Annie's tent day 1:

That was Friday night. I thought that was bad. Had I known what would happen on Saturday, I probably would have been kissing that muddy ground thanking the skies above for providing such a beautiful evening for us.

This day was just absolutely ridiculous. We finally got our acts together and put on our ten layers of clothing-oh, I forgot this very important point!

Steve must have learnt this in boy scouts. As it was completely muddy and wet on Friday night, I had on a pair of synthetic socks which allowed for them to get wet, but to keep me warm still. They were unbearable to get off at bedtime, so wet and muddy.

When I had to get dressed on Saturday, Steve wasn't sure if the other socks I brought were synthetic so he suggested I put on the damp, muddy socks from the night before. Oh it was so disgusting. I almost got sick when I was entering my right foot into this dreadful, unwarm dirty sock. But Steve insisted that they would keep me warm. Then, I had to put on the cold, muddy shoes I was wearing the night before. Another joyous moment at Meredith. I was so annoyed that Steve didn't know if my other socks were synthetic, it would have been so nice to wear a fresh, new, clean pair of socks. Ugh! What the heck do boyscouts know anyway? It wasn't until I actually got out of the tent that I realized my feet were warm. They were! He was right! Boyscouts know everything! And while I tried really hard not to think of how filthy my feet were, at least they were warm in this freezing cold weather.

And so, in the dirty, warm socks, we went to the top of the hill where we could slightly see the bands on stage. It was a giant tent, two actually, that tons of people were under to be sheltered from the sideways rain. Massive amounts of rain fell from the sky. And because the tents we were under only had ceilings and no side walls, we might have well just been outside with the rain. The wind was blowing the rain sideways into the tent and making us wet. It was hard to get into the music with this but I did hear a few bands that I liked. Wish that the weather wasn't so bad so we could have been out more. Mostly I was just standing there, face down, with a hat on and a raincoat (thank goodness Annie's dad insisted she bring an extra set of rain pants and raincoat!) snug around my face, I wondered how long I would have to sit there.


We walked around some more. Up and down the hill, the food and bathrooms were down the hill. The 'path' up and down the hill was really just a hill filled with mud. I know this entire area is a farm, but don't they have any grass on this farm? I swear it must only be dirt for miles when there are no people or rain. It was so thick, seriously! I just had to put my foot in it, it just sank right down, like quicksand. You could almost hear the oozing of mud into my shoe if it weren't for the rain. And when the heck was this rain going to stop anyway??!?!?! I think there was clearly enough mud to last us a decade! I almost thought girls were going to break out into full-on wrestling.

The mud near our campsite was so bad that they brought in quads and a tractor to pull the cars out of the mud who got stuck. By the time we got back to our site that night, half the people were gone because the weather was so ridiculous. I was proud that I was still there, although, that's probably only because I wasn't driving.

Another early night for us, about midnight. Steve said this is the most sleep he's gotten at any music festival in his life. Annie's tent officially became our storage area for our esky and chairs as it clearly could not be a safe place for one to sleep, some of the poles even snapped in half - just from the wind! It was now a storage area because Annie had to put the seats down in the back of her car and sleep there! What a trooper and a true Meredith fan (8 years of attendance!).

Sunday we awoke to no rain! Was this really possible? Maybe we were all having the same exact dream. But no, this was real life and there was no rain! We could actually get to the stage and stay dry, and the mud was about 98% muddy still, but that 2% difference made it feel like dry ground.

We watched a few bands, one of which we felt was a cult as the lead singer was male and sang songs that sounded like Simon and Garfunkle and all the other band members (all 12 of them) were women, ranging in age from 13-25ish. Seriously. Okay, there was one other creepy guy in the band, but totally a cult, right?

And better than that, Steve was offered a porn DVD by some random guy. Steve said no and another guy near the porn DVD guy said, 'Don't worry, he's not in it.' I guess he was thinking that Steve would be interested if the guy offering the DVD wasn't in it. Still not interested. And so random!

Later down at the stage, we ran into the porn guy. He was wearing what can only be described as a 10-year-old girl's winter coat circa 1986 (bright blue with pink and purple flowers on it). And that's it! Nothing else. Seriously. I know this because he flashed us a few times. And this was earlier than 11am. He must have been pretty cold.

I sound so bitter, huh? I still had a great time and I would probably do it again next year. It can only go up from here, right? Just jinxed it! I had a really good time and left on a really good note-no rain! We were able to enjoy some of the music and got a ton of sleep! It was a good experience and I'm happy we went.