HFDU - Silver Anniversary Edition

Originally sent: September 30, 2005

G'day everyone! My oh my, it has been ages since my last email, and I think about some of the things that I will be including in here, and they seem to have happened so long ago. I have been meaning to send this silver anniversary edition for well over a month now, but the author in me has just not felt up to it lately. So like the procrastinator that I tend to be, I find myself sitting here at 3:30 on a Friday afternoon in my office with a mound of work to do, and I suddenly have the urge to write to all of you. So be it, I must follow the author instincts in me and type on……

Well, as most of you probably know, I am winding down my tenure in Australia. I have just under 5 months to go, and look with great sadness upon my future departure from this land down under. My valiant attempts to cheer myself up about returning to the States have consisted of booking my flights/tours to/through Thailand and Egypt, but these efforts have not been able to overcome the magnetic pull of the southern hemisphere that has kept me here for almost 2 1/2 years now. I still feel such a bond with this place, and feel as if I'm returning home upon the announcement that we have commenced our descent into Melbourne on a flight home from Sydney, or as I drive over the Westgate Bridge and see the sparkling city of Melbourne looming in front of me. At the same time, I feel helpless when I hear about the trials that Hurricane Rita has put everyone in Houston through, and grateful at the same time that it missed a direct hit on my American home. I spoke to my family each morning and evening as new events unfolded, but in between, I was a bit lost and wondering what was going on. In the end though, I hear that my cat behaved well throughout the evacuation and it was another example of why family is so important.

Switching gears a bit, spring officially arrived on September 1st, but I think that someone forgot to tell the weather that. It's a bit confused, but I suppose as long as it doesn't rain on me on my way to work, I can't complain too much. The normal annual company events (of which this has been my 3rd go round) have been in full swing. I've attended my 3rd company Ball, and not unexpectedly, it was an affair to remember. The theme was "Bollywood", and although B & I had a bit of an issue getting to the Ball, once we were there, we felt as if we were at a large family feast. The entire room was very "cozy" and the Bollywood dancers were phenomenal! One of my best friends here, CT, just returned home to Scotland with her husband BT. They were two of my favorite people and it was hard to see them go. We had numerous going away parties from them, from all afternoon affairs with the office, to intimate drinks with our close group of friends at the local pub. I definitely have some great memories of times spent with CT & BT, and at least I have someone to go visit when I make it over to Scotland!

I've recently spent a few weekends away, especially since B's footy season has finished. We took my other Scottish friends, KD & CD to B's holiday house at Lakes Entrance. I hadn't been there since Easter weekend, so I was due for another fishing trip. I caught a nice 50cm tailor and fed the family on Saturday night with it. The boys took advantage of the fact that they didn't have to drive anywhere at night, and consumed a stockpile of beer, while KD and I worked on the wine. We also spent a weekend at Mt Buller, trying to hit the slopes, but it was the end of the season and the snow was crap, not to mention the weather. We left Melbourne about 4am one Saturday morning, drove about 3 hours to the mountain, had a nice breakfast, and then discovered that there was no electricity on the actual mountain itself. This meant that the lifts weren't running, the ski hire place wouldn't hire out anything (in the event that someone wanted to be adventurous), and we were forced to spend the better part of the day at the one pub on the mountain that had a generator. I wouldn't call it B's best 1st skiing/snowboarding experience, but a memorable one at least!

We have become the team everyone loves to hate at our weekly trivia night at the local pub. It's because we're so darn good! Not really, but we did win an unprecedented 3 times in a row (receiving a $50 drinks voucher each time), and the pressure must have gotten to us because we've been 4th the last two weeks in a row. The trivia team is very diverse, including 4 Scots, 3 Americans, 2 English, and poor B, the lone Australian. It does provide us with an edge that most teams don't have. And often when we don't know an answer, we just offer to buy the host a beer. It usually works :-)

B & I have booked a trip to Western Australia during the Christmas Break. We are leaving the day after Christmas and will be gone for 10 days. It's the only state that I have yet to visit in Australia, so I definitely had to get there before I head back to the States. I lured B over there with the promise of a deep sea fishing trip as apparently monster-size fish happily jump on the end of your fishing line! I on the other hand, will drag him along with me to the highly regarded Margaret River winery region and a few areas around Perth. We’ve also recently spent a day on the weekend in Daylesford (the spa country) for our 2 year anniversary. Although we just went up for the day, it was nice to get away and still managed to leave us feeling refreshed and like we'd been away all weekend.

I've definitely been enjoying the perks of being a manager with my company - it seems that there are excuses to have lunch every week, there was a partner/manager dinner for the entire audit division, one for just my group, and numerous "just because" lunches and Friday night drinks sessions. I suppose that these perks are well-deserved after putting in 6 years with my company, and having to put up with the perpetual annoying client while holding their hand during the audit. I don't feel guilty, I just tell everyone that they need to put in the time and they'll be rewarded too. Managerial duties also include interviewing the new "grads" who are coming out of university, which proves to be an ordeal in itself. Sometimes I think that I would never make it past an interview for this place if I had to do it all over again. Lucky I got in early…...

We've recently had a couple of large celebrations - my friend HE's 30th birthday party and the AFL Grand Final party, also hosted by HE and her husband LE. HE & LE are from England, and they are two of the most entertaining people that I have had the pleasure to hang out with. HE is famous for the things that she says after having a few beers, and LE is just pure entertaining. At trivia, I reckon HE knows the answers to more music questions than the number of songs that I have in my entire repertoire. I must have been a musically-retarded child, having never developed the passion for off-the-wall musicians, or many of the mainstream ones for that matter. This has to be due in part to the fact that parents made us listen to the likes of the Statler Brothers in the car on road trips.

Anyway, due to the vast amount of trivia knowledge as alluded to above, we have won various gift packs of liquor from the pub, most recently the Jose Cuervo and Jagermeister gift packs. If anyone needs to borrow a Jose Cuervo beach ball with matching flip-flops, or a pair of Jagermeister ski gloves, just let me know! Needless to say, we have been well-supplied with liquor at our parties, most recently having finished off BOTH bottles at the 2005 Grand Final Party this past Sunday, also hosted by LE & HE. Their apartment has become the favorite for get-togethers as they have a massive balcony for the bbq activities that typically take place. Long afternoon, long night, a drunken run-away, and a trip to the emergency room summarizes that party quite well. I am happy to say that I was perfectly sober through it all, primarily due to the fact that I had the flu, which automatically designated me as the "ambulance driver".

Well, as if this isn't already long enough, I feel obliged to tell you all that Australia does have up-to-date movies and the like, and that I am still a huge advocate for assigned seating at the cinema. I've recently seen Wedding Crashers, Charlie & the Chocolate Factory (not to mention all of the Wonka bars that I've been buying trying to find a golden ticket!), and the Dukes of Hazzard. No Oscar winners, but some amusing scenes if nothing else. I've also spent a night at the theatre with the girls watching the on-stage version of Dirty Dancing, which was actually quite amazing. It's really sad when you can rehearse almost the entire performance from your seat in the audience, and how I sat there and critiqued the actor for not putting the right emphasis on "Nobody puts Baby in the corner".

Okay, enough of my rambling. I hope you are all well and safe from the treacherous Gulf of Mexico. I'm about to venture off to Sydney to work for 4 weeks, but will be on email regularly, so don't let that keep you from sending me a hello. I'll try to get around to updating the photos on the website this weekend, but no promises. I've just recently decided that I really should put together a photo album of my time here in Australia, so I've been sifting through all of my digital photos to select the ones that I actually want to print. What a chore! And I thought that spring cleaning was time consuming.