An Afternoon of Circus

Today we were treated to the fabulous Cirque Éloize at the Lyric Theatre in QPAC. It was so pretty! Really simple design in terms of lights and set. It had all my favourite elements (well used gauze and things to fly people) and then it rained on stage. Being aware of the logistical nightmare that it is to make rain happen on stage I loved every minute of it anyway. I believe it's playing in Melbourne or may have already played. If it's headed down there though I recommend seeing it even if it is playing at the Palms at Crown because it was a fantastic performance. I'm still a little lost for words. Pretty. Very pretty. Also a spunky guy with a French-Canadian accent. He was cute before the accent... it was a bonus :)

Moving onto another one of my favourite things, boots. I did a quick "boot count" after Naomi's post and realised that the number of boots I own is perhaps a little excessive.

Boot List
- steel caps (necessary for work... even if I'm in an office)
- black knee highs from a few years ago (an old favourite despite the unpleasant circumstances around getting them altered. Sadly the leather's dying and the zip is making a break from the leather so it may be retirement time soon)
- black three quarter boots with a buckle (time to let these ones go... as they're falling apart...
- black three quarter boots with no buckle (I retired those to the skip yesterday as they had a 3 inch hole in them. I'm sensing a trend... stupid Kmart/Target kids boots)
- hiking boots (haven't worn them since 2001 but I've moved them from house to house... might go hiking some time soon...)
- new black three quarter boots (currently wearing them now and they rock)
- new black knee highs (replacement for the other dying pair, Gene's going to escort me to the cobblers to get it altered to protect me from potential nasty men)

Something tells me I might have a bit of a thing about boots... Don't even start me on a coat count... (don't start Gene either, I'll get in trouble)

On a different note, Nick's joining us in sunny Brisbane tomorrow! We're very excited and are making preparations for the trip next week already. It'll be great to see another familiar face. I guess that's the thing about festivals, they're like a family thing for us... a tech family so it's always good to see each other.

Fully licensed. Will bring own boots

Today I am a fully licensed driver. According to Gene this makes me designated driver forever as I tend to have one drink and call it quits for a night which is fair enough.

In celebration of this, and the three inch hole in my right boot, in fine female form, I went shoe shopping today.

I love the Myer sales up here.

Gene is an amazingly helpful person at shoe shopping. He just looks at a shoe and can tell if it's my size... I need a reference shoe before I can tell if it's small enough. Sad but true. Anyhow within two minutes of entering Myer he had found two pairs of knee-high boots in my size. One of them was $70 and cowboy style and the other was $60 and Sarah style. It's soooo pretty! I went to the cashier and found that it was only $40 and on the way picked up a sensible heel (flat) pair of three quarter high boots for, wait for it, $15!. It's been a bit of a shoe hunting day. Like Gene says, I go through shoe hunting phases and hence all my shoes die at the same time. Armed with boots for all occassions, the "Sarah" boots have a heel on them for days when I'm feeling particularly short, and also a cute pair of strappy black heels for the more formal short days, I am ready to tackle any shoe wearing occassion. Well, as long as it involves black shoes!

Miscellaneous Blah

Well, the MySpace website is down so there is every possibility that this post won't get mirrored.

(insert long pause as Sarah gets distracted by another un-named blog)

Just discovered this fabulous site which I think all my wonderful procrastination loving friends could benefit from. dearinter.net - consensus life coaching. Check it out. It seems pretty new but I'm fairly sure it'll take off rapidly.

I'm currently less stressed about work as I've turned down two jobs in the last few days. It's nice to know that people remember I'm Melbourne-based. It's just unfortunate that I'm confusing them by being in Brisbane.

Last night we had an early night and decided to do a load of washing. I also decided it was a good time to watch The Talented Mr Ripley. I quite enjoyed the film. I just wasn't expecting it to be anywhere nearspan> as long.

Today I commented on Nick's blog with the quote Life is no fun when you're hunted by the things you feel from the Finn brothers' song I hope I never (which I also thought was called something else). Anyhow, I love that line. It's a definite favourite. In fact I love that song. It's just that I thought the line was Life is no fun when you're haunted by the things you feel. Which I much prefer... I guess I don't feel so much hunted by feelings. More haunted. I find they're less aggresive. My feelings just pop up when I least expect them to, out of nowhere. (I was going to elaborate on my thoughts but I the surrounding music of Beyonce is not conducive to my musings).

Life's tough isn't it?

Brisbane Update

The season has changed and the festival's going well. Yesterday was aptly proclaimed Horror Day and it was possibly the busiest we've had all festival. The morning was spent trying to flatten the rather horribly rolled tarquet in the sun and lay the stuff so we could rehearse. We fell a bit behind but we may not have been at 100% as most of the crew had been out drinking with the crazy Alaskans for their final night drinks the day before.

After a bit of lunch we were much better and we battled our way through three plots, three dress/tech rehearsals and opened the first show 20 minutes after the last tech run. I've called my first show in four years which was kind of exciting. I was calling the show blind because I hadn't seen it before and there were cues written on pages 4-8 but not on the first three or the last ten. It went well though and there were no obvious mistakes. All shows went smoothly and were not in one way disturbed by the brawl outside the pub next door or the rooftop running backpack person who the police were trying to catch.

Today was a much easier start at 13:00. We were woken this morning at 9:17 by a phone call from one of my shows but that was rapidly sorted out. We were then treated to a televised church sermon which thoroughly confused me as I've been having trouble working out what day it is. A Saturday sermon apparently.

Tomorrow we're going to visit Timea and her folks in Fern Gully (if there are not environmentally friendly forest folk I'm not going to be impressed). Then it's more shows and then three bump outs.

We're excited to find that Nick's coming up to Brisbane to visit us next week and have been speaking to our accommodation to work out beds so all's going well.

Work is rolling in all at the same time - as it does - which is a weight of my shoulders as I've been going through my usual nearly-the-end-of-my-current-gig stress.

There's a couple of hours left before we have to go back to work for our next shift so we're going to play some network games to pass some time. Geeky yay!

Strike!

The new lodgings are still proving to be quite comfortable and I'm still revelling in the wonderfully hot showers. The only downside to our room was "Chainsaw Man" next door. You see our room, while being a private room, is joined to the next room by a locked wooden door. Appearances are deceiving as the door looks quite heavy but transfers sound quite well. We were awakened in the early hours of the morning by chainsaw-esque snoring from the room next to us. After a brief discussion of how unhealthy it is to snore quite that badly we managed to fall back asleep. I found myself unable to sleep because I was making sure that he kept taking fresh breaths of air between snores. This continued for the next couple of nights until yesterday when he finally moved to another room across the hall where we can't hear him. Yay!

Our trip to the Gold Coast was suitably touristy. Gene holds the QLD Putt Putt/Mini Golf title. I need to work on my geometry before I can truly improve at putt putt golf. It took us less than an hour to arrive in the Gold Coast and next to no time to travel down to Mermaid Beach. We checked out the beach which was much less pebbly than I'd been lead to understand. I should have taken some pictures but I was too busy lazing with Gene in the warm weather. Okay it wasn't that warm and the ocean breeze got a bit cool in the evening but it was still blue skies and sunshine for all.

I took us ten pin bowling to pass some time before dinner and it was a rather exciting day for me because I scored my first strike! Let me put this in context for you. I'd bowled about three times before that day and I pretty much spent 75% of those games bowling gutter balls. On Monday I not only managed to only gutter ball 4-5 times but I scored a couple of spares and then the miracle strike. Suitably I squealed like a girl and gave Gene a huge hug for giving me handy hints on bowling.

An hour of wacky arcade games later and we ate dinner at Billy Baxters the all you can eat ribs that Gene had was the way to go. I had an Aussie Breakfast (yes I know it's the wrong meal) which was a little lacking. I just couldn't resist the sound of steak with eggs and chips!

We made it home and watched the Dr Who Christmas special. I lamented Christopher Ecclestone's leaving the show but look forward to the new series anyhow.

I had a job interview yesterday which I'm pretty happy with. Last Friday was a bit annoying as I missed out on a job interview due to a lack of communication. I'm going to meet my interviewers when I get back to Melbourne which should be great. It's exciting to have job prospects!

The first season of shows in Fringe finishes tonight and we'll be sad to see our Alaskan cast go because they were great fun and possibly the biggest show we'll get in the Fringe section. Tonight we've got four shows to bump out and tomorrow morning we bump in the next three.

It's been really interesting seeing the difference in audiences up here in Brisbane. Henry V hasn't been doing as well as they hoped but I'm fairly sure it would have gone down a treat in Melbourne. We were talking to the designer yesterday and he mentioned that around Feb/March the company read the complete works of Shakespeare 24/7 for a week. People can phone in to read parts if they're interested and they've had people do that from different states in the US as well as calling from the UK. It sounded awesome! I think they do a webcast of it so I'm definitely planning to look into it later.

Time's ticking and I really should get going to work. I can't believe we've only been up here for a week and a half. It seems longer!

New Lodgings

We finally realised that Somewhere to Stay was not quite the cheapest place around and while pay day is Thursday we decided to tighten our belts a bit and try and save some cash - hopefully resulting in an even better 5.5 days holiday at the end of our trip. So I spent much of yesterday calling various hostels and inns and getting quotes.

Did anyone else not know that the Bledisloe Cup was being played in Briz Vegas last night? Anyhow, it turned out that last night was a bit night for Brisbane with two football matches, the opening night of A Dolls House and the inaugural Brisbane Festival Fringe Theatre so cheap decent accommodation is like hens teeth.

Today we finally decided on a $120 per week fully self-contained apartment. You may have noted the use of past tense there. We checked out of our lodgings, taxied to the apartments to be greeted by no one. We even wandered around the building. We tried to call the managers but they were't answering. In their defence they were sounding pretty crook. Anyhow we ended up chatting with one of the people staying there who we knew from the hostel we'd just checked out of (they were in the check out queue before us). She said that if we couldn't get hold of them we should probably move on because they just checked in and chose between the two available rooms. The room they picked was apparently in poor condition and they were in the process of scrubbing it down. They waited 1 hour for someone to let them in and if they were us they'd just slip away. We decided that having spent 30 minutes looking for someone to let us in that this might be the right idea.

In true movie style when we were standing on the kurb it started to drizzle. There had been sunshine just moments earlier! We hailed a taxi and headed on to the next place Valley Verandas where we're staying now. It's such a cozy little place! It's costing us $100 less per week than the previous place and although it's a share bathroom the bathroom's quite lovely. The shower door is broken so it floods a little in there but the wonderful gloriously hot showers make up for it. We've got a double room with a private balcony overlooking their outdoor garden area. There's a great and clean wardrobe, TV and (Gene's pretty excited about this) a DVD player. We finally got to watch the end of the Dr Who episode where Rose goes back to 1987 to meet her Dad.

We're now on the other side of Brisbane to where we were previously, North instead of South. Much closer to China town - we ate lunch there. China town also seems to be the adult shop district which was a little odd. The random shops seem to fit in there though and there's City Safe surveillance cameras about. It seems that there may be a few more up hills on the ride home but no quite as severe as the one leading up to Somewhere to Stay.

Tomorrow we're going to head down to the Gold Coast, Mermaid Beach to be specific. Hopefully the weather will be on our side!

Day 6 - Brisbane Festival Opening Night

It's actually a little cool in Brisbane today, a first for our trip. Apparently it's going to rain this weekend so I guess our good weather spell is over for now. Still, according to the weather report it's going to be 21 degrees today. Today is the opening night of the Brisbane Festival (yay for Spiegeltent!) and the Fringe section is opening tomorrow night. Today will be a day of rehearsals - plenty more rehearsals than shows get in Melbourne, or at least it feels that way - and then it's off to Spiegel to join the Opening Night Party.

We've discovered that we're the eldest of the Fringe crew so that's always a little odd. I'm never among the eldest in social or work settings! Tuesday was "crew bonding night" as I mentioned before. Last night we had a bonding session in the bar with some of the Alaskan crew. They were marvelling at the sun going down last night as they're in the middle of their Summer where the sun dips slightly but doesn't actually go down. It sounds awesome! I want to go and check out their 3 months of 24 hour night. I love night time.

While I'm on the topic of drinking two things I have to mention...
1. I'm very excited that the bar downstairs sells their rather palatable happy hour wine at $3 while their beer costs $4.50. More often than not I end up with the more expensive option because I don't like the cheaper beers that end up on happy hour menus.
2. Hazzar for the Spiegeltent's beer being supplied by the Belgian Beer Cafe. The beer should be good.

We've been dining on sandwiches lately in an attempt to save money but I decided it was time for a treat last night so we went to good ol' Sizzler. We ate all that we could, Gene moreso, and I was most happy with my cheese toast. Damn I love that toast. I should make it at home. Anyhow, it was great to eat until we were totally stuffed, even if that hurt a little. Pay day isn't till next Thursday so we're footing close to two weeks of costs before we get paid. It's a little painful to have to pre-pay everything but we're doing okay! Don't have the time to spend money anyhow, too many rehearsals to be had.

It looks like we don't have many full days off during the festival. In fact we have two (so not every Monday off it seems). We have this Monday off (which is unfortunate given our saving plans) and the Monday before our contract finishes (which is weird because we finish up on the Tuesday). I'm still thinking of getting a car and heading down to one of the putt putt places. Maybe a rainforest. It's hard to pick. Depends on the weather I guess!

Well I've got to head off to a tech rehearsal and make sure Gene's up before I head off - lucky bastard gets doesn't need to be in until 17:00.

Happy Bastille Day to all and we'll have a drink for you at the Spiegeltent tonight! (A lot of drinks but we'll spread them out perhaps...)

Day 3 - First Day of Work

First day of work today and it was pretty cruisy. We decorated the foyer of the Metro Arts Building which was good fun. We'll finish that off tomorrow after the cafe closes so that we don't annoy their customers too much. Wow does the food at Verve (the aforementioned cafe) smell good! The scent of bacon and eggs in the morning when you've missed breakfast and have already started work is just too cruel.

A bit of unloading gear and a whole lot of spray painting today and that's essentially it! Tomorrow is going to be a semi-paperwork day for me with some schedule stuff but I love that so I'm looking forward to it.

We had drinks at the Verve this afternoon/evening and the happy hour specials were lovely. The beer was Peroni which I have been assured is quite drinkable and I had the house white which was more than palatable - although I may have just been thirsty as Gene wasn't a big fan of it.

Spiegel is on its way - it's half up in King Georges Square so I'm quietly looking forward to many a night there. There's an archway that we don't quite remember but hey, it has been awhile since we've been there.

Last night we ate at a Vietnamese restaurant, the name of which escapes me, and the food was great. It's about a 10-15 minute walk from our place and kind to the budget. We had dinner with Gene's family from Brisbane which was great. It's nice to see some familiar faces.

I was originally planning to post some pictures but I seem to be having technical difficulties with the SD card drive on this computer. Having found the network cables though I'll just bring my laptop in one day instead and that will make life much easier.

Still enjoying Brisbane and I can't see that changing anytime soon. It was yet another warm day today that even the locals were in t-shirts so I felt a bit better about the whole t-shirt thing. There are some Alaskans here for the festival and they're also a little confused by the appearance of scarves and furry coats in this weather.

Wish I could send a little sunshine back home. Miss you all!

UDO - Unexpected Day Off

It's my second day in Brisbane. Today I find myself armed with a two bananas and a plethora of tech gear with nothing more to do than explore the Brisbane. There was a small but important typo in my contract which means that I'm not insured for work until tomorrow so I got the day off after our safety & fire induction. I'm kinda wishing I'd brought the spare camera battery now. In fact I may yet ride back to the hostel to drop off my shifter, tape measure, leatherman (plus attachments), and mini-gerber (solstice). So perhaps I'll get the new battery.

Brisbane seems to be a wonderful sleepy kind of city. Admittedly this is largely based on our day out yesterday, which I am aware was a Sunday, but even this morning riding into the CBD for work during peak hour wasn't anywhere near as crazy as the Melbourne peak hour traffic. It's a great city to ride in and I'm glad Gene insisted on bringing the bikes. There seem to be bike lanes on most of the city roads and they're all fairly consistant in width. It's not a particularly generous width but it's enough to ride your bike in without being wide enough for cars to pretend they're bicycles.

Our hostel room is pretty good. It's got everything we need including a fridge and ensuite. We fell asleep to the dulcet tones of the didgeridoo and clapping sticks on our first night while last night there were just people talking and drinking. They seem like a great crowd.

I'm going slightly nuts over the number of times I've been asked in the last two days if I've seen a koala before but I guess that comes with the Asian appearance and the tourist maps of the city that mark us as being from out of town.

Yesterday we decided to take a ride into town so we could work out how to get to work at the Metro Arts building. Turned out to be an easy 15 minute ride with only one hill of note. We then enjoyed a huge lunch at the Pig 'n' Whistle in what I think is the Queen Street Mall before heading towards the famous South Bank. We detoured through St Georges Square in the hopes of seeing Spiegeltent being assembled but it would appear that it hasn't arrived yet and we're just a little too keen.

We visited the famous South Bank in the mid afternoon where we were greeted by a corvette meeting. Plenty of shiny cars that didn't really grab our attention. We briefly toyed with the idea of paddling in the wading pool. By wading pool I mean the 1m deep pool. Gene commented that it would be fine, we'd only be in waist deep until I pointed out to him that I'm only 1.5m tall and would be in far deeper than my waist. It wasn't quite warm enough anyway.

While we're on the topic of temperature... the weather here is gorgeous! Particularly after the bleary Melbourne weather we left. I guess that's another thing that's marking us as tourists. We're in t-shirts and shorts while the locals are in coats and scarves. Anyhow, we're making the most of the 23 degree days and soaking up as much sunshine as we can get. It's also soothing for the soul to not be in total darkness until 17:30.

Being the tech-geeks that we are, we were almost immediately distracted by the Suncorp Metway Super Screen at South Bank. A great outdoor venue with a good looking (and tidy) rig. I took photos. The rig was on chain motors for easy of rigging access. We were most impressed. The speakers weren't on chain motors though so less easy to move, but probably don't need to be moved much anyhow. We also discovered that the screen could swivel but I think I've been geeky enough for now. They were playing Mythbusteres if anyone cares.

After our brief moment of geekiness we discovered the art & craft market there where I bought a Snuggle Pillow because I miss my nice dense head-moulding pillow at home and this works in a similar manner for less cost. Mum if you're reading this, it's filled with tiny polystyrene balls, kind of like bean bag balls but the size of your glass bead from teddy bear making days. Easy to clean and easy to travel so I'm happy. I slept much better last night with it than I did the night before. Gene watched a couple of buskers but had heard most of the jokes before so we headed back to the markets. Not before I managed to find a couple of brochures on Putt Putt golf though! We're going to get a car and check out some places when we have some free time. The courses up here look like lots of fun and car hire's not so bad.

Supermarket shopping was nothing to write home about but I was very excited to find bananas for a whole three dollars cheaper per kilo at the fruit shop. No savings at Coles, I think they standardise the prices there.

Last night was a quiet night consisting of roast chicken for dinner, Dr Who (thanks Nic) and plenty of sleep. Tonight we're catching up with Gene's Auntie Vicki for dinner in the West End. Tee hee, I'm still amused that I'm staying in the West End. Always wanted to go to the West End but was thinking more England way than QLD. One step at a time though!

Wish you could all share the lovely weather with us!

Heading North

There's an hour left before we head to the airport to ensure that our bikes can join our trip to Brisbane. We're finally all packed, rooms tidied, dogs stressed at our leaving, it seems that we're ready to go!

It still hasn't really hit me that I'm going for my first work-related travel trip. I'm pretty excited still. Actually had trouble sleeping last night! I've got my maps of Brisbane CBD and South Brisbane as well as directions from our hostel to the Metro Arts Centre. I'm pretty happy that we only seem to be 2.88km from where we're working so it's not a huge hike to get there.

Currently waiting for the rest of the Herman's Hermits songs to download in iTunes. Mrs Brown's daughter is lovely indeed. There has to be much tacky music for a month long trip. Them's the rules!

There's an internet cafe set up at our hostel so the internet access should be pretty good. I'm still telling myself that I'll go swimming everyday in the pool there. If it's not heated I may yet revise that plan.

It's looking like we'll have a quite a few days free in QLD at the end of our trip so we're thinking of heading further up north if we have the funds and travelling back to Brissie for the return flight. Still remains to see how much time we have though. It's likely to be a spur of the moment decision from the two of us... a bit like the inn stays in Nikko & Narita but less Japanese.

Well, it's idiot check time now that my cheesy old songs have been added to my iTunes library. So I'll catch you all from Brisbane!

As a final side note, I can't believe we won't get to see Naomi when we get home! We'll miss you Naomi!

Glow-In-The-Dark Mini Golf - Bad

So we probably should have realised that glow-in-the-dark mini golf was going to be a bit lacking... Call us optimistic!

Wednesday night saw us swing dancing in Glen Waverley. It was funny because we had been talking (and trying to dance our way through) the two moves we knew in tandem Charleston and the class was about tandem Charleston and we worked on those two moves! We also knew the instructor from the Shim Sham workshop we did last year. Now there's a fun dance! Originated from tap dancing I believe, the Shim Sham is a bit of a swing/tap line dance that breaks into a mad frenzy of partner-finding for the last third of the song. Fun for all involved! Anyhow, when we get back from Bris Vegas we're planning to go back to swing dancing and pick up our level 2 classes again to try and master the Lindy Hop. I think I'm going to give leading a shot at our next class too... although I definitely need to keep up the work on following.

Anyhoo, we decided to give glow-in-the-dark mini golf a shot after a bland dinner as a relaxing end to the night. Gene won by one shot so he's one up on the Melbourne Mini-Golf competition between the two of us. It was all in all a bit horrible though. The girl at the counter was, unsurprisingly, not thrilled to be there. When we tried to query the opening hours (the website said from 18:00-22:00 while the sign at the place said 10:00-22:00) she got all condescending and chose to express her displeasure by pointing out the first "tee" three times to us... It was also incredibly hard to see in their (so you couldn't actually see the holes sometimes. It should have been fun but they managed to make it rather lacking. Moral of the story? No glow-in-the-dark mini golf, got it? Okay, as long as that's clear...

Yesterday was a quiet day where we started to try and get ourselves ready for Monday's 09:00 start at Brisbane Festival. So the alarm went off at 08:38 (I like setting it for non-half-hour increments) and we got out of bed at 08:58. The first few hours of the day saw me knitting (I'm almost through Dad's scarf) and then we headed into the city to have lunch with Gene's Mum. We stopped off to buy me a new Palm (PDA) case and it's sooooo pretty! Surprise surprise, it's black! Aluminum with a belt clip. I was mainly after something black with belt clip so it works out well. Only thing I don't like is that there a widget that sticks out when you take it off the belt clip so it doesn't sit flat on a table unless you unscrew the widget and then it's likely to get lost. Poor design but pretty nonetheless. Gram, Gene's car, had a bit of a hissy fit as we were trying to find a park in town which was a bit of a pain, but she got us there and back so it's all good.

For the evening we went on our date to the Red Salmon in Knox and it was quite lovely. The service was a tad interesting (we asked for a dessert menu and instead of giving us a menu she told us that we had to pay at the counter) but not terrible. Food was okay, not the best in the world but pleasant to eat. After that we played a game of pool and a game of Time Crisis 2 at the cinema before heading over to good ol' Time Zone to pass our last half hour before the movie. We played on our old favourite, the rifle game where you shoot targets to make stuff move, and also tried a dodgy bowling game. A few games later and the half hour was gone so we went to the counter to redeem our e-tickets, apparently you don't get to watch the zillions of tickets print at the game anymore, its' all networked. We returned triumphant with a plastic yo-yo, a tub of putty in a toilet, a black bangle and two of those things that throw a ball in the air when you press the trigger and you have to try and catch it in the basket. All worth the $10 no doubt. Pirates was perfectly indulgent. It was all the cheese and humour that I loved about the first one with some nicely placed references. Same ridiculous and fantastic style and well, Johnny Depp. Mmmmm. I liked it. I liked it lots. It was fun and pretty good for a sequel to a film based on a ride. Yay!

Today is cleaning day. Time to re-box our stuff for the month in Brisbane and pack what we need because we're leaving tomorrow! Last minute purchases required include insect repellant, a bike light and some sunscreen. Tommorrow? Well we'll just have to wait and see.

Glow-In-The-Dark Mini Golf - Bad

So we probably should have realised that glow-in-the-dark mini golf was going to be a bit lacking... Call us optimistic!

Wednesday night saw us swing dancing in Glen Waverley. It was funny because we had been talking (and trying to dance our way through) the two moves we knew in tandem Charleston and the class was about tandem Charleston and we worked on those two moves! We also knew the instructor from the Shim Sham workshop we did last year. Now there's a fun dance! Originated from tap dancing I believe, the Shim Sham is a bit of a swing/tap line dance that breaks into a mad frenzy of partner-finding for the last third of the song. Fun for all involved! Anyhow, when we get back from Bris Vegas we're planning to go back to swing dancing and pick up our level 2 classes again to try and master the Lindy Hop. I think I'm going to give leading a shot at our next class too... although I definitely need to keep up the work on following.

Anyhoo, we decided to give glow-in-the-dark mini golf a shot after a bland dinner as a relaxing end to the night. Gene won by one shot so he's one up on the Melbourne Mini-Golf competition between the two of us. It was all in all a bit horrible though. The girl at the counter was, unsurprisingly, not thrilled to be there. When we tried to query the opening hours (the website said from 18:00-22:00 while the sign at the place said 10:00-22:00) she got all condescending and chose to express her displeasure by pointing out the first "tee" three times to us... It was also incredibly hard to see in their (so you couldn't actually see the holes sometimes. It should have been fun but they managed to make it rather lacking. Moral of the story? No glow-in-the-dark mini golf, got it? Okay, as long as that's clear...

Yesterday was a quiet day where we started to try and get ourselves ready for Monday's 09:00 start at Brisbane Festival. So the alarm went off at 08:38 (I like setting it for non-half-hour increments) and we got out of bed at 08:58. The first few hours of the day saw me knitting (I'm almost through Dad's scarf) and then we headed into the city to have lunch with Gene's Mum. We stopped off to buy me a new Palm (PDA) case and it's sooooo pretty! Surprise surprise, it's black! Aluminum with a belt clip. I was mainly after something black with belt clip so it works out well. Only thing I don't like is that there a widget that sticks out when you take it off the belt clip so it doesn't sit flat on a table unless you unscrew the widget and then it's likely to get lost. Poor design but pretty nonetheless. Gram, Gene's car, had a bit of a hissy fit as we were trying to find a park in town which was a bit of a pain, but she got us there and back so it's all good.

For the evening we went on our date to the Red Salmon in Knox and it was quite lovely. The service was a tad interesting (we asked for a dessert menu and instead of giving us a menu she told us that we had to pay at the counter) but not terrible. Food was okay, not the best in the world but pleasant to eat. After that we played a game of pool and a game of Time Crisis 2 at the cinema before heading over to good ol' Time Zone to pass our last half hour before the movie. We played on our old favourite, the rifle game where you shoot targets to make stuff move, and also tried a dodgy bowling game. A few games later and the half hour was gone so we went to the counter to redeem our e-tickets, apparently you don't get to watch the zillions of tickets print at the game anymore, its' all networked. We returned triumphant with a plastic yo-yo, a tub of putty in a toilet, a black bangle and two of those things that throw a ball in the air when you press the trigger and you have to try and catch it in the basket. All worth the $10 no doubt. Pirates was perfectly indulgent. It was all the cheese and humour that I loved about the first one with some nicely placed references. Same ridiculous and fantastic style and well, Johnny Depp. Mmmmm. I liked it. I liked it lots. It was fun and pretty good for a sequel to a film based on a ride. Yay!

Today is cleaning day. Time to re-box our stuff for the month in Brisbane and pack what we need because we're leaving tomorrow! Last minute purchases required include insect repellant, a bike light and some sunscreen. Tommorrow? Well we'll just have to wait and see.

Swing Fever

There is no known cure for swing fever. It's easily contracted through social outings where swing music is played. Symptoms include going for several swing classes per week as well as practicing in your spare time. You may also find yourself trying to swing dance to non-swing music or just swing dancing to no music. Beware - it can take over your life!

Last night we had a swing fever relapse. One swing dancing class with Naomi & Nick and BAM! We're going again tonight for a class in Glen Waverley. We had a cruisy swing dance this afternoon after lunch to see how many moves we could remember from our last workshop - we only trod on one of the dogs but he did step into us well after we started... I still feel bad about that. After that I proved just how unfit I am with a bike ride around a couple of blocks.

We cycled past my our old house, the place that I'll always picture as home because I lived there for at least 15 years, and found that they'd managed to cut down the big fir tree in the front yard. Must have cost a bit as it was crazily near the power lines. It was weird though, to see the gaping big hole. Aside from that it looks the same.

I can't believe I'm going to Brisbane in three days. I just feel like I should be more packed or something. More than anything I can't believe that not all my friends are going to be in easily visited distance when we get back.

Swing dancing last night was lots of fun and the dinner was pretty damn good too! It was a little sad to say goodbye to Naomi because we'll miss her and not get to farewell her on her trip - unless by sheer luck we meet at the Brisbane airport which isn't such a far fetched idea apparently. It's exciting to know that we're all travelling and exploring the world. It's also kind of scary too because it's all happening so quickly. Or it feels like it is. I feel a little like I'm playing catch-up with life at the moment.

For now though, I'm going to try not to let it get to me. I'm just going to enjoy the swing dancing and take it one day at a time.

Grumpus Returns

Today is a grumpy day because I can't find my black leather belt. I know this is a trivial matter but as someone who has a great deal of trouble finding belts that are both functional and fit, I am grumpy without it. It would seem that I've lost weight so now I actually need a belt to hold my pants up and I've stupidly gone and misplaced it. Grr! I know it's in the house somewhere and I've hunted through all the rooms and all the clothes and it's just not there. It's probably staring me right in the face. Damn you belt!

Belt-blues aside though it's been an okay day today. Gorgeous Winter day in Melbourne spent bike box shopping which also resulted in the purchase of a black shirt that does up with small hooks & eyelets, a black vest with lacing up the back and a cream top to go with it. I tried to hunt for a belt that fit but the smallest I could find was a 32" belt and that's about 6-7 more inches than I need.

It's almost time to start getting ready for swing dancing which will undoubtably cheer me up. After all, it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing!

Sleep Glorious Sleep

I closed my eyes for a moment and the next thing I know it's dark. Guess a few more moments passed during my nap than expected.

Today's been a bit lacking really. Haven't done nearly as much as I should have - stupidly long nap didn't help.

Hazzar for my new license that should be arriving shortly. My vanity is content in the knowledge that I'll have a photo of me when I'm 19 on it for the next ten years. More so because of the not-too-stupid picture than the age thing.

Aside from that we watched Zatoichi and I had a nap. It's been a bit of a movie watching house lately due to the joy that is Foxtel digital. I love the pausing TV function. Very handy for unplanned snack breaks.

I've been rather remiss with regards to our flight to Brisbane. For some reason I was under the impression that Sunday was the 8th July. Silly me! Not particularly stressed though. Just have to get a move on with the bike box finding so that we can take our bikes up to Brisbane for the month.

Tomorrow should be more exciting with swing dancing classes tomorrow night - I piked on classes tonight - and hopefully more time awake during the day.

Who needs sleep cycles anyway?

A Few of My Favourite Things

A good meal shared with friends is possibly my favourite thing in life.

Last night Gene, Nick & I went to Iku-Izakaya for dinner and it was lovely. We had a bit of fun finding a carpark but once we got there it was lovely. Friendly service and great food. We had the Ozeki Set which was rather filling and overall well timed in terms of the courses. After dinner we decided to take a stroll across the fish-shaped bridge (well it looked like a fish from the restaurant) and discovered that it led to the Blowhole Sculpture in the Docklands. After playing on the air-pressure platforms, climbing all over the slide, jumping on the springy foam ground and swinging on the swings we headed back to Nick's for a lovely cup of tea - or beer for the boys.

After that we watched Napoleon Dynamite which was amusing but weird before retiring to bed to read our respective books.

It was a pretty good day all round really. Good food, good company, a movie, some reading, more knitting and a play in the park. What more could a girl want?

Quizzical

This quiz is courtesy of Lisa & Naomi

l a s t

1. Person you saw: Mum & Dad at the same time

2. Talked to on the phone: Nick C

3. Hugged: Gene

4. Text: Claire

5. Messaged over myspace: Not sure, maybe John?

t o d a y

1. wearing:

Old comfy jeans with worn knees (and a hole in them now), olive green long sleeve top with a slight bell from the wrists, one plain silver ring on the left hand, one unity/infinity knot silver ring on the right hand. A Jeans for Genes day ring on each middle finger – just got those today J

2. better than yesterday: because I’m feeling better rested and got to catch up with Nick for the first time in a while over a lovely meal. Also finished a couple of crafty projects so I feel like I’ve achieved more today.

t o m o r r o w
1. Is: a good day to start sorting out my life before I disappear to Brisbane.

2. Got any plans: organise my drivers license renewal, look at accountants, finish off pressies for people who are jetting off in the next month and trying to work how to deliver them…

3. Dislikes about tomorrow: Nothing really! I look forward to it.

f a v o r i t e

1. Number: 21

2. Color: black.

3. Season: Winter

c u r r e n t l y

1. Missing someone: Yes

2. Mood: morose

3. Wanting: inspiration

q u e s t i o n s / a n s w e r s

Q: First thing you did this morning?
A: hugged my boyfriend and finished off some hand warmers for him.

Q: Last thing you ate and drank:
A: Just ate prosciutto wrapped shrimp and grilled chicken wings/drumsticks, still drinking A&W Root beer.

Q: Do you have anything bothering you:
A: Too many things I want to achieve

Q: What's annoying you right now:
A: my grumpiness. I just can’t seem to shake the moodiness.

Q: What's the last movie you saw:
A: Howl’s Moving Castle – I’ve just introduced my Mum to Hayao Miyazaki’s films

Q: Do you believe in long distance relationships:
A: Sure. They’re hard but well worth it for the person you love.

Q: Is there a person who is on your mind right now:
A: yes

Q: Where is the last place you went:
A: Iku-Izakaya – Delicious!

Q: Been cheated on:
A: Define cheated.

Q: Do you look like your mum or dad:
A: Dad

Q: Do you have any siblings:
A: Not unless you count Zeus & Clio

Q: Do you smile often:
A: Sure

Q: Do you think that a person is thinking of you too:
A: Maybe

Q: Choose one to have (love, beauty, creativity):
A: I don’t think you can separate the three.

Q: Do you wish upon stars:
A: Yes.

Q: Are you a friendly person:
A: Most of the time – just not right at this instant

Q: Whose bed did you sleep in last night:
A: The two beds joined in the spare room at my parents, so mine and Gene’s?

Q: What color shirt are you wearing:
A: Olive green

Q: What were you doing at 12 last night:
A: Having a cup of green tea at Nick’s house with Gene & Nick

Q: When is the last time you saw your dad:
A: About fifteen minutes ago. I can hear him talking with Mum & Richard in the kitchen.

Q: Do you have more guy friends or girl friends:
A: More guys. I find them easier to talk to because I grew up with guys.

Q: When was the last time you cried:
A: Night before last because it was grumpy night

Q: Do you get angry easily:
A: Annoyed and irritated yes. Angry Sarah is a rare sight.

Q: What was your last thought before you went to sleep last night:
A: Must stop reading Hanging With the Dream King it will still be there in the morning

Q: What are you about to do:
A: Finish off Nomi’s pressie

Q: What song are you listening to right now:
A: Stuff & Nonsense

Q: Would you rather be single or in a relationship:
A: I’m happy in my relationship

Q: Do you ever check your phone waiting for someone to call:
A: Yes.

Q: Rate life as of right now 1-10:
A: 8