very random blog on a rainy Sunday afternoon

hi everyone. As many of you know, Andy is not a vegetable lover. He's not even a vegetable liker. He is barely a vegetable eater, although I do have to give him credit for his recent efforts, which have seen him eating green beans, zucchini, and snow peas on a fairly regular basis when I make them to accompany our dinners. So imagine our intense laughter and pleasure in watching the following last night:



In other youtube video news, we joked that we hope our reunion with Buddy sometime next summer will go something like the reunion in this video:

A very Happy 5th Birthday to Buddy this Tuesday! Zach & Spike, thanks for taking such great care of him for us!

ok, that's it for the youtube links for today I promise. So, things here are good. Andy is out kayaking a portion of the Yarra River this afternoon with a group from Monash Uni. I'm lounging around the apartment taking it easy, reading Carter Beats The Devil, and writing this random blog entry. I bought a bottle of orange juice the other day, and when I looked at the Use By date, it was Aug. 14, which made me smile, as that is the date we fly from Melbourne to Portland.
Last weekend we enjoyed a mini-getaway to Mornington Peninsula, also known locally as Melbourne's Playground. We had a rental car for the weekend, so Friday night found us at our local Safeway, massively loading up on groceries. Who knew that a Safeway could be so quiet on a Friday night? :) Saturday we took in some sights along the drive, enjoyed some wine tasting and pizza at one of the wineries, and soaked ourselves at the hot springs. Sunday we again saw some sights and did a beach & bush horseback ride.

We've been chatting about how equally amazing & weird it seems that we've been here for almost a year already. We're even thinking it might be kinda weird in some ways to be back in the US after being gone for a significant amount of time. I think it will be interesting to see how it feels, see what we notice while we're back, etc. We've been keeping up with the presidential election 'stuff,' mostly via the local World News and Jon Stewart's The Daily Show online. We've also been keeping up with the US economic woes (and just slightly joking about whether or not we're likely to find jobs when we return next summer). We'll be filing our Aussie taxes here soon, and our US taxes next month while we're in Portland. Bring on the big returns!

Speaking of US taxes, our Yankee 4th of July Party went off pretty well. One guest even arrived wearing red, white, & blue and bearing Yankee-rific party favors of Coca-Cola, microwave popcorn, and Oreos! I caught Andy sneaking 2 hot dogs in 1 hot dog bun for himself, pictured above.

Hope all is well for everyone. Keep on enjoying summertime - we're looking forward to getting in on some of that next month!

Cheers!

Love, Christy

2 Very Cool Events Today

2 very cool events happened to me today:

1 - Andy and I received a surprise package in the mail from Marnie, which held 2 new Portland Underdog t-shirts for us, and a peacock bookmark for me. For those of you wondering, "What the heck is Portland Underdog?" - it is our Portland-based bowling team league. What an awesome surprise! Thanks, Marnie!!

2 - While I was at work at the shop, I ended up chatting with a gentleman whose son I went to elementary school with in Sioux City, Iowa! I overheard him talking on his mobile about how he had just gotten off a flight from the midwest of the US, so while I was ringing up his purchases I asked where in the midwest he had been. His first response was, "Oh, you wouldn't know it. A state called Iowa." And I replied, "I'm from Iowa. I'm from Sioux City." To which he totally started freaking out and said, "That's where I was! My son lives there." And then he introduced himself, and his last name was Galinsky (not the sort of last name easily forgotten). To which I said, "You don't happen to know someone named Chris Galinsky do you?" Now he totally freaked out and said, "That's my son!" And I told him I knew Chris from elementary school so long ago. Anyway, it went on from there, but what a random event, huh?

Hope you are all well -

Love, Christy

Nielsen, O'Connell's, Crocs, Buddy, oh my!

Happy July from Australia! I can't believe it is July - it doesn't feel like July for us. Maybe the Yankee 4th of July BBQ Party that we're hosting this Friday night at our place will help. We've encouraged our guests to bring their most creative 'Yankee-rific' food item, so we'll see what we end up with! We're supplying the hot dogs, potato salad, and apple pie.

Before I get started on a bunch of other topics I must "Hooray!" my Uncle Denny & Aunt Linda, for they are on their way to Australia this September! They've got a whirlwind of a trip planned, with visits to Sydney, Cairns, Ayers Rock, & Melbourne, all in 3 weeks time. We are thrilled to have more family coming to visit us and this country.

Well, we successfully visited & returned from official Australian "Croc Country" on our journey to see our good old friend Jason Nielsen and to meet his girlfriend Leslie. What a fantastic feeling to get off the plane in Cairns and receive a huge hug from such an old friend (and a huge hug from a new friend I might add as well) over here in this part of the world. Our week couldn't have been more perfect - we had warm, mostly sunny weather, we stayed at a crazy Jungle Village on our 4WD journey from Cairns to Cooktown, and we stayed at the resort where Jason & Leslie are chefs the rest of the week (at awesome friend prices I must add - $50/night rather than the non-friend price of $180/night - sweet). We ate a ton of great food (most of it prepared especially for us by our personal chef friends :), enjoyed a lot of good drinks & laughs, saw our first crocodiles in the wild, went on an Aboriginal rock art tour, soaked up some sunshine, and enjoyed late afternoon naps nearly every day.
Aside from visiting Jason, seeing crocodiles in the wild was definitely the highlight of the trip - I think it made all 4 of us feel like little kids again, sitting in the boat just staring at these impressive & intimidating creatures, passing the binoculars around and whispering phrases such as, "Wow!" and "Oh my gosh!" and "My mom would not approve of this." The largest croc we saw was about 12 feet long, we think. Thanks to Jason & Leslie for being such fantastic travel guides, travel partners, and hosts throughout our visit!

With that trip now in the past, we are really on countdown for our upcoming trip to the US next month -- that's right, it's next month!!! I've received a few requests for flight details for our arrival in Portland, so here they are: we arrive on Alaska Airlines flight #2586 on Thursday, Aug. 14th at 12:45pm.

In general life news, things are going very well. I'm working FT this and next week at the shop, as one of the owners is on holiday. I love working down there. I subbed at a special needs school for 1 day 2 weeks ago, which was interesting and went really well. Andy and I attended a rather bizarre social gathering sponsored by the teaching agency I work with the Friday before we went on vacation - nothing like getting a bunch of substitute teachers together to liven up an indoor lawn bowling arena. You may think I'm joking here, but trust me, I am not. By the end of the evening, Jag shots were being poured all around, of which I must admit... I had 2! Eeewww! I can't even recall the last time I did a straight shot of liquor. And I was one of the well behaved ones! Thankfully I didn't feel too horrible the next day, and our friends Marloes and Annelieke came over and we feasted on pancakes for hours.
It is mostly cool and kinda gray in Melbourne so far this winter - some rain, but nothing like Portland's locked-in grayness for days on end. There's usually some sunshine every day.
Enjoy the pictures - oh, and there's some awesome ones of Buddy at the end that we just got from Zach - if you have ever seen Buddy, you will be shocked!

Wishing everyone a safe and fireworks-filled 4th of July!

Cheers from the land down under-

Love, Christy
xoxoxoxo