One week and counting.

Tuesday November 17, 2009

BUBBLES! Rice Crispies here are called Rice Bubbles, I meant to type that yesterday but must have blanked it. It just struck me as weird.

My feet hurt. I’m tired.

We walked all over the place today. After breakfast here at the studio, we headed over to the library and signed up for cards. We’re starting to feel like regular members of the community already. The branch library is right next to the train station at Toowong shopping centre. It only took us a few minutes to get our cards and a few minutes more to pick up a couple of DVDs. To this point we’ve been at the mercy of Aussie over the air TV. We haven’t had a TV schedule so it’s been hit or miss.

After the Library we had to make it over to Paddington and the rental office to turn in our inspection report for the unit. We took a train downtown and then walked over to Paddington from there; about twenty minutes hike. Normally that wouldn’t be an issue, but today the temp got up to 37C, about 98.9F. That’s hot anywhere.

After the rental office we walked back downtown and checked out the Queen Street Mall for a while. We found out it’s going to be near impossible to get a contract for a phone without a job. We also looked into getting Leah’s phone unlocked to we could get some pre-paid time, but the unlocking fee is more than it costs to just buy a new phone and go pre-paid. That’s what we’ll have to do I guess.

We grabbed some lunch in one of the many food courts around the mall. We’ve done a lot of food court eating since we’ve been here, but usually there is a nice selection at a reasonable price. I’d say the options are mostly fresher and better than what you would get at a mall food court in the US. Of course there are Maccas (Australian for McDonalds) everywhere and KFC seems quite popular as well. We tend to go for sushi hand rolls or Kebabs. Kebabs are very much like Gyros, only the bread is thinner and you have more choices at to what goes in them. I saw someone get tomato sauce (Australian for ketchup) on one today. I don’t think I’ll be doing that anytime soon. I get Hot chili sauce, the only spicy thing we’ve had here.

---slight interruption---

!!! Paul Hogan sighting!!! As I write this there’s some old Australian comedy show on featuring The Man himself. Man’s a national treasure. And judging by the tightness of his shorts this show must be from the 80’s.

---Resume posting---

We did some more shopping, I got some hair clippers, and a home phone. I haven’t had a land line since I made the cell switch in 2002. You don’t get much choice when you’re trying to buy a phone with a cord these days. $39 for the cheapest cordless they had. They didn’t even have one with a coiled cord anymore. When I asked the clerk about them he looked at me like I had the pox.

We also managed to find a full set of bike maps. When we went to campus last week they gave us a bike map (number 6) It’s the best map of the city I’ve been able to find but it only covers a small area around St. Lucia. (That’s where UQ is) It has the names of every street, all the bike routes, and all the bus routes. I’ve been on a mission to find more since last Thursday. I finally found the city council office and got a full set of ten.

Oh, a few things to mention on the shopping front. We checked out the grocery a little closer and found you can have ranch dressing here, despite what I’d heard rumored on the internet. In fact you can get Newman’s Own.

When we came home we were shagged. It was almost five when we got in and we had been walking around since eight. We met our new neighbors to the south, Melissa and Andrew and chatted with them for a while. They told us that the house we live in now used to be owned by a couple who were in their late nineties and just moved into a retirement home this past June. The new owner divided the house into studios, so that’s why everything is so new.

They were super nice and had some advice for me on where I might look for work. I’m running out of small things to do now and have the whole find a job thing looming big now. My plan is to get up tomorrow and hit the streets a bit. Our phone should be hooked up sometime tomorrow so at least I’ll be somewhat reachable.

About 6:30 clouds rolled in and we got a nice bit of rain. Lots of lightning and thunder made for a great break from the heat. It poured really hard for about an hour. Then cleared up and cooled off. That would be nice every day.

I just looked at the clock and it’s only 9:30. It feels much later, Leah has been asleep for almost an hour already.

A few observations from today:

-Movember is hilarious. There are so many awesome mustacos (Australian for moustache) around town right now.

-Managed to cook dinner without setting off the alarm tonight. Though it was only 280g of shrimp and it took about 40 seconds to cook.

-I haven’t been able to find real Q-Tips anywhere here yet. The only ones they seem to sell are the cheap plastic kind. (Mom, you may need to get a care package ready)

-Nudity isn’t uncommon on regular TV here.

-NFL Football is called “Gridiron”

-I’d kill for a Diet Dr. Pepper

-I’ve been told that food portion sizes are much smaller here. I don’t find that to be true. The only difference I’ve seen is in the drinks. A large Coke at Maccas is the medium back home. Otherwise portions are quite similar.

-I didn’t realize that I’d adopted “a bit” as a turn of phrase. Thanks April for keeping me in line.