8 down, 4 to go... and random notes

Well I have officially finished 8 out the required 12 classes for my degree! What a relief! I have enjoyed releasing all the pressure off my shoulders (and from my stomach)... and now get to enjoy life for a while as a real housewife.... well, apartment-wife. So far, it has been glorious. Billy has been treated to delicious food, though he ate too much of the very rich chocolate cake and was so sick the next morning that he had to call in sick! DOH! But besides cooking and making my husband ill, I have been catching up on all those tasks that I had been pushing off for so long... We'll see how much I accomplish before Dan arrives a week from Monday!

Oh big news about Dan's trip... we had originally wanted to go dive with the sharks. But, it turns out, that you just go diving in the aquarium (oceanarium they say) and there is actually a wall between you and the sharks. You just get to swim with the fish. Boring. To dive down in a cage (and feed the great whites!) you have to pay mucho $$ and take a ridiculously long journey out into the ocean. That is a no-go. I had enough time on the ocean during our honeymoon, and I don't know if my stomach is strong enough yet to repeat the journey. So diving with sharks is out. BUT.... walking with the TIGERS might be in...

At the Australia Zoo (opened by Steve Irwin), they let you go take a tiger for a morning stroll. Now much cheaper, and only an hour from our hotel, this might be a winner! We have to talk Dan and Debbie into it... but hopefully they'll want to do it.

That's all for now... we're having a party tonight so I must get everything ready! (Billy has of course insisted that we throw this party... on a day that coincides with his sailing race... so he can't help prepare, as usual!) Marjie -- give him grief, please! He won't read this, so I'm in the clear :)

A Day at the Races...

We have now experienced another Aussie tradition... a big horse race, part of the spring carnival. Every woman is decked out in fancy dresses, heals and hats/hair pieces of all sorts, and the men are all in suits and ties... But the classiness went no further than the apparel. It was a messy array of drinking, smoking and gambling! Ick! And we barely saw any horses :( I had watched SeaBiscuit the night before and was very excited about the races, but was a bit disappointed... we went with a big group of friends and we had staked out a nice section of lawn right at the rail, about 400m from the finish line. But this meant we only saw the horses for the 1.1-1.3 seconds they passed! And watching on the screen was disorienting because you had no depth perception and could not tell who was winning. I don't think the views were much better for those in the stadium because it is set so far back from the track... it's very odd. If I go again, I'm not going to go to a big race. There were ~120,000 people there with us, and I prefer a smaller crowd!

In any event, it was a fun day!

See? You can take the girl out of the honky tonk, but you can't take the honky tonk out of the girl... (don't worry, we picked up all our trash!)

It was CROWDED... this was us, trying to leave...

Halloween?

It came and went without a notice this year :( We didn't see a single pumpkin, or any sort of decoration in fact! Oh well, that's what happens when you're on the wrong side of the world... where would we find a pumpkin this time of year?!

You may be worried about what we will do about thanksgiving... this is a concern, but we are planning. Dan is importing several canned items for our feast, and two of our friends are on the hunt for a turkey. It won't be easy, and there will be some sacrifices for taste (aka, canned items appearing in nearly every dish!)... but we will celebrate turkey day!

Billy Goes to the Prom...

Wilson's Promontory, that is... no, he didn't sneak his way into a high school dance :)

Unfortunately Billy has to work for a living, and therefore doesn't have the freedom to fuss around like I do! Therefore, I am only going to post pictures since I don't really know what they did... From what I gather, they had a lovely time hiking, sitting on the beach, and drinking a few beers underneath the stars... (stars... I don't think I've seen them since July!)

Lucky for them, the weather report was off by 20 C... (all the meteorologists should be FIRED!) so rather than being a low of 10, high of 13, as was reported the morning they left, it was 30 degrees! But of course it was cold at night, so they all got sunburned but then bundled up in their huge jackets and hats at night...

Here are some pictures that tell the story better than I can...

Billy at the 'Squeaky Beach'... the sand makes squeaky sounds when you rub your hands and feet in it.

Andrea, Tyler and Elma (and part of Brian!)

I think some ocean spray got on the lens... (doh!)

After the sun set, Billy went off to hunt wombats for dinner.

Fortunately for the wombat, Billy was wearing his sailing jacket which has tons of reflectors all over it. He was easily detected and avoided.

I forget what this is... it's not a wombat... it looks like some sort of cat-rat hybrid?!??!

Below is a video of Billy making the sand squeak... sorry about the bad angle... I can't take credit for that one!