HFDU - 14th Edition

Originally sent: March 11, 2004

G'day everyone! Well, I suppose it's about that time again. It seems like forever since my last email, but it's only been a month and a bit. I've managed to keep myself quite busy down here, enjoying the nice summer weather and taking advantage of all of the Aussie holidays.

The most recent holiday was Labour Day, which meant that we got a long weekend. So, I went with three Irish women (and boy are they feisty!) down the coast a couple of hours to Sorrento (was there at Christmas), Portsea, and Queenscliff. All quaint little seaside communities that have lots to offer. I stayed in a youth hostel for the first time in my life and actually thought it was a good experience. I don't think that I have slept on the top of a bunk in many, many years, but it was cheap and we enjoyed ourselves, even on the night when a hen's night and buck's night (bachelorette and bachelor party) were staying at the same hostel . That made for an eventful evening, or rather, morning!

The girls and I just hung out on the beach, read books, waded in the bay, went for hikes along the water, shopped a little, and just relaxed. It was exactly what I needed after a busy week at work! And Pajy performed like a champ, blessing us with the sun when the sunroof was open and keeping us dry when it was raining. This was also the weekend of the Australian Grand Prix, so needless to say, there were a lot of people around. If you haven't noticed by now, Melbourne is the sport capital of Australia -- 10 of the 16 footy teams are based here, Australian Open, Australian Grand Prix, Spring Racing Carnival, and the Commonwealth Games are coming in a couple of years. We went to lunch on Friday and clear across town you could here the Grand Prix cars doing practice runs on the track! It was very cool!

I also had to go up to Sydney for 3 days for work, so me and the girl that went up with me stayed over the Friday night and had a great weekend in Sydney. It really is a beautiful city, and a must see if you come all the way down to Australia! It's much more like America, whereas Melbourne is more like Europe. But both cities are great and offer different atmospheres. Speaking of America, a couple that I worked with just transferred to another Big 4 Accounting Firm in San Francisco in February. For some reason I get proud and excited when others go to America. Another guy was sent to Chicago for 3 months for training for his new job and he was so excited to get to the States. It really is a neat experience for the Aussies to travel to the States as they typically would travel around Europe first.

Work has been going well. I've been pretty busy with a deadline that is coming up, but managing to get everything done and still enjoy my weekends. I have been walking to my client at least 2-3 times per week to get in some exercise. It's about 4 kilometers away and takes me about 35 minutes. Most of the walk is along the river so I really don't mind all that much, and my new mobile phone has a radio so the walk goes by very quickly when I'm listening to that! The weather has been pretty good lately but we did have a couple of days of 100+ heat, and when most apartments have no air conditioning, you just hope that they only come a day at a time so that the bricks don't heat up! It's pretty miserable at times, but at least it's not humid. One day it was so hot that I just hopped in Pajy and drove around with the air conditioning on for an hour or so to cool down! I can't say that I have ever had to do that before, but I was thankful that I had the option.

The Yarra Valley wine region just had its annual Grape Grazing Festival. I went up on a bus with about 20 other people (co-workers and friends) for the day and we toured 3 different wineries. You hire buses because with all of the wine tasting, your blood alcohol content goes past .05 pretty quickly and the government is very strict over here about drunk driving. Anyway, you buy a day pass and get a wine glass that you carry around with you everywhere. The atmosphere is so casual and very festive, and everyone seems to end up at one particular winery that ends up being more like a concert than a day at a winery. Only on this day, do you see some of the strangest people drinking wine -- people who you never would imagine drinking wine! The bottles are pretty cheap though and they just keep them coming so everyone definitely enjoys themselves. I will definitely be attending next year as well :-)

Our softball season is officially over. We made it to the Grand Final for Wednesday night, but played horribly and ended up losing pretty badly. That was only the second game that we lost during the whole season, and we had beat that team just 2 weeks before. Regardless, we had so much fun during the season and I'm so glad that I got the opportunity to play. Most of us are going to start playing Wednesday night trivia at a nearby pub so that we can keep the spirit of our team up! Our end of season bash is coming up in a couple of weeks, so I guarantee that I'll have some good stories to tell after that night is over! Speaking of bashes, my birthday was a few weeks ago, on one of the 100+ days, and I had a nice night out with the girls going to dinner and to a bar afterwards. It was good to catch up with them, and a fun night, despite the fact that B and I were spending our first Valentine's Day together, apart. He was so sweet though, and sent me a nice box of goodies for my birthday/V-Day, and my parents and best friend "AP" were very, very thoughtful and sent me flowers at work, so that made it a little easier to get by being away from everyone that I love :-)

It took me about 8 months, but I finally woke up one morning and decided that I was a bit homesick! I just want to pick up people from home and bring them over here! Although I have met some great friends over here, they've known me for a few months, whereas my friends from home have known me for many, many years, and my family has known me forever! But, that will hopefully be cured by my family's visit in June and my planned visit home sometime later this year. I definitely have food cravings too, like Tex-Mex and cheap margaritas, ribs from Houston's, Chick-Fil-A (strange, I know!) and my dad's famous Mason burgers. I think I'll gain about 10 pounds when I ever do get home as I'll be eating all the time! And it's weird to think that the city of Houston just keeps on going day after day, and it will have changed so much by the time I come back for a visit. It'll be good to get back home. B says the same thing -- but he's FINALLY back in 36 days! Can you believe it? It's really gone by quickly but I miss him so much and just want him home. He's exploring around Europe at the moment and last I heard he was in Munich, headed of for the Austrian Alps and Italy next. Must be a tough life :-)

A few things that still make me smile:
- Sausage and mashed potatoes are affectionately known as "bangers and mash".
- I still feel like I do a bit of a sidewalk dance with people when facing them head on walking on the street. There seems to be no general consensus as to which side you go to, so everyone just "dances" until you make your way past one another.
- I'm no longer the new kid in the group as the entire class of new grads just started. I'm just an old secondee now!
- The Aussies still like to argue with me on how to pronounce things saying they are closer to the "Queen's English". I simply state that Americans have no desire to speak like the Queen, that we are happy to speak American :-)
- Some people think that Texas is next to Canada, and that the United States is part of Central America. I gave several of them a geography lesson!

Well, that's about it for this Edition. Next time up you'll be hearing about our Group Retreat, Easter, and B's return :-) Until then, best wishes to everyone and please, please, please keep in touch. You should know by now that I love to hear from everyone and it always makes me smile in the morning to get an email from home!