Kangaroos, Koalas, and Q-flies, oh my!

Blue Mountains Excursion

2011-06-27T23:28:00.000-07:00

After a few somewhat routine days in the office, it was time for some more adventure. Bright and early Saturday morning we headed up to the Blue Mountains to do some camping and find some mammals. No weekend-sleeping-in when there’s exploring to do! And beautiful weather, too!

In Katoomba, we had a bit of a stroll around town – mostly just long enough to find food. There’s a great bakery that’s really hard to resist, with things like roasted pear and almond cream turnovers. We also found this amazing tea shop, and although Ingrid was tempted by the Chinese Gunpowder tea, she decided upon Summer Pudding tea. Fully replenished, we headed to Echo Point and hiked down to the Three Sisters.

After that we drove up to Jenolan Caves on a mission to find a platypus. Ben and I were aware of the caves but had never been there – turns out it’s a really cool place! (…and this time of year I mean that both literally and figuratively.) You drive down into this pretty steep valley on a narrow winding road, then you actually drive through a cave

and pop out on the other side in front of this big lodge, and it really feels like you were suddenly beamed into the Swiss alps or something.

We went on one of the cave tours to check out the underground scenery. I think we were a bit hungry because all of the formations looked like food to us - bacon, cottage cheese fountains, etc. And Ingrid figured out what she wants to be when she grows up. She's going to be an electrician so she can climb the really tall ladders that disappear into nowhere and change light bulbs. Dave and Karen - aren't you glad she came to Oz to figure out her future?!?

Then we got stuck into our platypus hunt. We still hadn’t had any luck by 4:30 when the sun started going down (and it was really cold), so we decided to skip camping and stay at the Caves House to maximize our platypus opportunities. We ended the day without a platypus, but we did manage to find swamp wallabies!

Caves House has lots of accommodation options, and we decided to go for the cheapest “hostel-style” option. It was a pretty bare room with 1 set of bunks and 1 double bed. And it wasn’t exactly the warmest room I’ve ever stayed in (although through a twist of events we ended up with our own column heater in the room, so that helped).
(Stretching contest in the room)

But they only have one dining option, which is the award-winning Chisolm’s Restaurant. So instead of eating canned soup cooked on a camp stove as we had planned, we found ourselves eating fresh Australian damper with eucalyptus butter, egg ozen linguini with truffle oil, roasted lamb with balsamic caviar and ratatouille, and crispy pork belly. Gotta go with the flow, right? Just to add to the atmosphere, an opera singer started performing at the end of our meal. And they had lap blankets to help keep us nice and toasty during dinner (…because in Oz, even fancy places are built like crap and are hard to heat).

After dinner we waddled back to our room for a game of cards. Turns out none of us are exactly card sharks, and we had a really hard time coming up with games that could be played with 3 people. We had fun trying to make up rules to games we half remembered and ended the night with a hilarious round of BS. We learned that Ben sucks at lying (although that doesn’t deter him), and Ingrid can be pretty sneaky (but buckles under pressure).

The next morning before dawn, we rolled out of bed and straight into every layer of clothing that we had to resume the platypus hunt. We got to the lake at the crack of dawn, and sure enough! - there was not one, but TWO platypuses!! Gratifying reward for getting out of bed really early on a really cold morning. They are still the funkiest animal ever.

So our morning was a success, even though it was freezing. The low was -3!! (Yes, that’s Celsius, but it’s still cold!) There was a pretty thick layer of frost on everything… thick enough that you could make snowballs and ice skate down the street. I know that’s exactly what Ingrid came to Oz for.

With our platypus mission accomplished and our winterland fun finished, we headed off to our next destination – the glow-worm tunnel.

It’s an old train tunnel that is U-shaped, and it’s so dark at the bend that glow worms can thrive. It’s a bit remote and only accessible by dirt roads, so it’s a hot spot for 4-wheel driving. But our little Mitsubishi Mirage (“Mitty”) held his own! It was a beautiful day for a hike, and it’s a pretty cool hike – glow-worms, tree ferns, cliffs, great views – good times!

And on our way back out of the forest, we spotted some Eastern grey kangaroos – third mammal of the trip! We stopped by the zig-zag railway in honour of Grandma Connie / Nani, and then puttered our tired selves home. And thus ended our 36-hour whirlwind tour of the Blue Mountains.

Visitor!!!

2011-06-21T18:42:00.000-07:00

Woohoo!!! Ingrid’s in Australia!!!

So flights from California land in Sydney at ~6am, and the theory is that the best way to get over jet-lag is to stay awake and active all day. So we made sure Ingrid stayed active all day. Really active.

The first stop was Bondi beach. Sydney had come through with some beautiful weather for her arrival (which was fortunately just before the airport was shut down due to the Chilean volcano ash). And there’s supposed to be a really good whale migration this year, so we were hoping to see some whales. Sure enough – we had barely stepped out of the car before we saw several whales swimming along – probably humpbacks.
Somewhere in the background are whales

We did the cliff walk between Tamarama and Bondi beaches, watching whales and some intrepid surfers. We stopped by a beach-side café to get some tea and coffee (to warm us up) and decided since we were there we should get some fig toast and corn fritters with bacon, poached eggs and lime yogurt. And of course, we enjoyed the sunshine.

Next stop was home, to show Ingrid where she’d be hanging out for the next month (and so she could shower! :)

And then we were off again. We took the ferry down the Parramatta River to Circular Quay (which is pronounced “key,” as Ingrid now knows quite well after an extensive conversation among some tourists in front of us). We got some gelato and walked around the Opera House. Then we headed into the Botanic Gardens on a mission to have Ingrid mobbed by birds.

She seemed to be OK with it. We also found mammal #1 – flying fox (the largest bats in the world).

We grabbed a fast bite and then went to hear Jane Goodall speak about her life as a biologist – could you ask for a better start to a biology internship? And Ingrid even managed to stay awake through the whole talk – take that jet lag! We didn’t have a book, so Ingrid got a t-shirt autographed by Jane.

I think we finally got Ingrid to bed at ~11:30pm. So 20+ hrs of travel followed by a full-on 17 hr day – welcome to Australia, Ingrid!!

Lingo Lessons: EOFYS

2011-06-12T18:43:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure whether it's officially in the dictionary, but this is an actual word here. It's pronounced pretty much like it looks. It stands for End Of Financial Year Sale, so it's all over the place (usually in the context of an annoying jingle) during June. If you want a taste of what you're missing out on, you can see a video here.

So happy EOFYS everyone!

Winter

2011-05-28T22:00:00.000-07:00

Winter is here again. It's that time of year when everyone from North America laughs at us when we whinge about how cold it is. But once again, I remind you that houses here are built like crap. Insulation, doors and windows that seal properly, vents in the walls that close -- all completely foreign concepts. That's fine for spring and fall, but it turns out Sydney has 4 seasons. We have recorded indoor temperatures below freezing and above 100F during our time here in Oz. A lot of houses (like our first house) don't even come with any heating/cooling options. And central heating??? - forget it, unless you're insanely wealthy. Lots of layers and blankets - that's how most people make it through winter. One friend makes her kids put on their down coats if they get cold (yes, they got down coats just to wear around the house).

When we moved to Dubbo, we were excited because the house had a fireplace... which we were forbidden from using. :( But this house has a great wood stove that we're allowed to use, and has become my new best friend!!

Bring it on, winter!!!

[PS - It was just announced that this was the coldest May in 41 years! Makes me love our wood stove even more!]

Another Visitor!!

2011-05-13T17:03:00.000-07:00

Yay – someone else is coming to visit!! That will bring us up to 4 visitors in 3 years! (Unfortunately that includes Stan the Man – a paper doll.)

My cousin Ingrid is coming over in June for 4 weeks, and we’re really looking forward to it. Theoretically she’s coming over to get some science experience, and Ben and I have outlined a project for her to work on… but my mind keeps turning to all the fun things we could do with her, instead!

Our families have had some great adventures together – a long-standing Thanksgiving tradition, summers in grandma & grandpa’s pool, family reunions in Hawaii, lots of hikes. When Jen and I were in high school, we visited them in North Carolina over spring break and took a road trip out to Cape Hatteras.

My most vivid memory from that trip was on the drive home – Ingrid’s stomach was having a rough time, and after the second or third time that we stopped, her loving brother Carl said “Why don’t we just hang her out the window – then she can ralph all she wants.” Don’t worry, Ingrid, I promise we won’t hang you out any windows.

And when Ben and I were working in Alaska, they came up to visit us in Kantishna. And even though they were attacked by giant mosquitoes while trying to make a cast of a bear print, they still seemed to have a good time.

So we’re looking forward to more good times with Ingrid, and excited about showing-off Oz to another visitor!

My Birthday

2011-05-10T21:47:00.000-07:00

Another year done-and-dusted!!

It was a low-key celebration this year, but we had a surprise delivery from "Mum" (whoever that is) and Dad :)

Lingo-Lessons: Pear-shaped

2011-05-05T17:15:00.000-07:00

I’m learning that many of our “Aussie lingo-lessons” are actually “Brit lingo-lessons”. But we’re learning them here, so I’ll continue to attribute them to Oz.

So for me, “pear-shaped” means that something is shaped like a pear.

Here, it is used when things have gone wrong, or not quite the way you planned. As in “The date was going really well, but then his ex-girlfriend showed up and things went a bit pear-shaped.” Or “The Tigers just keep narrowly loosing – this season has just gone all pear-shaped for them.”

I forget which natural disaster it was recently – the floods, the earthquakes, the cyclones, the bush fires – but for one of them, I heard a news reporter state “Things have gone all pear-shaped in (wherever), with the body count continuing to rise.” I’m obviously not that comfortable with Aus-speak, yet, because that totally didn’t work for me - it just seemed to trivialize the whole disaster.

Flat Stanley

2011-04-30T18:06:00.000-07:00

Another visitor!!! Yes, he may just be a paper doll, but we'll take anyone we can get!

Flat Stanley is a children's book about a boy who was accidentally squashed as flat as a piece of paper. The advantage of being flat was that he could put himself in an envelope and mail himself anywhere in the world. This has led to the rise of a popular school project, where kids mail their Flat Stanley out to learn more about different places in the world.

So my wonderful cousin (second cousin? cousin-once-removed?) Molly

decided to send her Flat Stanley to us!

And Stan the Man arrived just before we left on holiday to Tasmania, so we had a great time travelling around with him! He was good about keeping a journal to tell Molly about all the things he learned. And we did our best to take lots of pics to share with Molly.

Apparently Stan the Man traveled further than any other Flat Stanley in the class. The downside is that he was the last one to get home. But the upside is that it further boosted Molly's popularity - which was already sky-high, but a little more coolness never hurt, right?

Movin' right along... again

2011-02-13T13:25:00.000-08:00

Surprise surprise – we’ve moved again. We are self-professed geographic sluts. We have once again erased all trace of ourselves from one house and started "scent-marking" another house - replacing the remnants of someone else's dirt with our own.

On the road again

Kerry's contract at the zoo ended and Ben needed to run some more experiments for his PhD. So we’re back in Sydney, now. Ryde, to be specific. And with Sydney just announced as the most expensive real estate in the world, couldn’t be a better time to move back! Yay!

So you should help us take advantage of all this money we’re spending on rent and come visit us. :) We have 3 bedrooms, so there’s plenty of extra space. And we have a great back porch, with a view of the city (and any fireworks that might be going on in the greater Sydney area). And we’re within walking distance to some great restaurants and nice parks. And shopping, if that’s your thing. So let us know when you're on your way!

Ani overseeing the unpacking process

Ummm… Anyone have an ark we can borrow?

2010-12-05T17:20:00.001-08:00

When we moved to Dubbo, we were looking forward to dry weather, big blue skies, water restrictions, none of the chronic mould problems we had in Sydney. And that wasn’t just being naïve – that was based on my experience in Dubbo over the last 1.5 yrs. We were NOT expecting one of the wettest years in history. But that’s what we got.

Burrendong dam has gone from 8% full to 130% full over the last 6 months. Farmers have gone from one of the best harvests due to the rain to one of the worst harvests due to the rain – even small farms have lost $80,000 in the blink of an eye. The river has been higher than I have ever seen it, and the rain keeps interfering with my bike commute to work – a problem I never had before.

And then last week, the clouds took it to a whole new level. On Wednesday, the bike path bridge went under. On Thursday, the Serisier/“little” bridge went under, meaning there was only 1 way to get from one side of Dubbo to the other. Traffic chaos ensued – there were back-ups that would put Chicago or Sydney rush hour to shame. The highways in almost every direction from Dubbo are closed. A few remain open, but are covered with water. And I don’t mean there’s a bit of water on the road. We had a friend coming home from the coast who said the water was almost over the hood of her Forester and she couldn’t tell where the road came out on the other side. Several towns around central-west NSW are being evacuated or have already been cut off completely.

And there’s another major storm heading our way this week.

And the locusts are starting to move in. Guess the “worst locust outbreak in years” doesn’t pose much of a threat to the farmers anymore.

River lookout when Mom and Dad were here.

River lookout on Thursday.

Now it's all underwater - I can't even get in to take a similar pic.

For more pics you can check out this website

Our new baby!

2010-09-08T05:13:00.000-07:00

Didn't know we were expecting, did you?!? Neither did we!
But we are now the proud parents of a baby sugar glider - a little boy, 37 grams.

How cute is he!?!
He was found in a tree that had been cut down. His mom and siblings probably moved on after the tree was cut down, and he was left behind. He will be released eventually, so our job now is to get him to that stage. He's on 5 feeds a day: 6am, 10am, 2pm, 6pm, and 10pm. Other than that, he pretty much hangs out in his pouch.
And he still needs a name, so suggestions are welcome!

Ani's Birthday

2010-09-03T03:45:00.000-07:00

Happy 7th birthday to Ani!!

Being the loving parents that we are, it took us about 3 months before we got around to celebrating it. And we still made her do the humiliating birthday photo with a tempting treat sitting right under her nose. But she didn't seem to mind when she got a whole meat pie - this year's "human treat" birthday present. Notice those flashy new bowls that she got for her birthday, too! (The dog she stayed with when we went to the States ate her old recycled tupperware bowls.)

Her technique was pretty amusing - she took off the top and ate it, first, then licked out all the filling, then ate the bottom crust.

She seemed pretty satisfied with her birthday present.

Spring!!!

2010-09-02T05:44:00.000-07:00

Today, spring sprung! :) Sunny, amazing blue skies, and 27 degrees (that's 81 in US-speak)!! It was so sudden and so perfect. I love warm weather. Some people blame their moods on hormones - for me, it's all about the weather (which still probably gets back to the hormones, but that's OK). I didn't have to wear gloves or a hat on my bike ride to work (and could have gone without a fleece), I almost put on a dress to walk Ani this evening (but then got lazy), I didn't have to turn on the heat at all. And it was capped off with an incredible sunset that just kept going and going. I'm sitting outside at 10pm, completely comfortable. Happy girl.

Dear Mr. Magpie

2010-09-01T05:18:00.000-07:00

Dear Mr. Magpie,

Despite what you might think, the more you dive bomb my head, the more I want to hurt you. You are not doing yourself any favours by snapping your beak as loud as you can in my ear, striking my helmet with your big ol' beak, or thumping your chest against the back of my head. I call myself an ecologist, and I understand your motivations, but I promise I don't want your chicks. And why don't you attack the walkers right next to me? What did bikers ever do to you? I appreciate a good obstacle course, but this is getting to be a little much.

So in the interest of yourself and your loved ones, BACK OFF!!!

Sincerely,
An intrepid bike rider

PS - If less that 9% of you are vicious attackers, why are there THREE of you along my 15 minute commute??

PPS - Why did you have to teach your bad habits to the wood duck along the bike path, too?? Seriously, what duck charges a bike??

Election Time

2010-08-01T04:32:00.000-07:00

It’s election time down under.

“Wait,” you say – “didn’t you just get a new prime minister?”
Why yes – yes we did. Now it’s time for another one.

In order to understand the last regime change, it is critical to understand that in Australia, the person who is the head of the majority party is the prime minister.

So when the party leaders freak out because poll numbers slip a little bit and decide to oust the current Head of the party and put a new person in place, there’s nothing stopping them. And that’s exactly what the Australian Labor Party did. Almost overnight, they executed their ‘bloodless coup,’ as the papers called it. When Australia woke up on 24 June, rather than talking about Australia’s win over Serbia in the World Cup, everyone was saying “What the hell?!?” K-Rudd got the boot, and Julia Gillard became our new leader. First female prime minister.

And that was all done in preparation for the next regime change – the federal elections.

Elections have to be held every 3 years, but the prime minister can decide to hold them earlier. So shortly after Gillard took office, she announced that elections would be held 21 Aug – a mere matter of weeks away. So Australia has been a flurry of election activity. Everyone is whinging about the never-ending campaining. Seriously?? 5 weeks?? That’s NOTHIN’!!

But here’s what cracks me up. Watching the campaign ads, you’d think it was all about which prime minister – a lot like presidential campaigning in the US. But Aussies don’t vote for the prime minister. They don’t even vote for the party they want for prime minister. There is nothing on the ballot related to the prime minister. In fact, there is nothing about the prime minister even written into the constitution. You just vote for Senate and House representatives. The prime minister comes from the party that wins the majority of the seats in the House (turns out the Senate doesn’t really matter). And yet there are lots of furious people saying "I didn't vote for Gillard, I voted for Rudd!!" Well, no, you didn't.

Vegetarian

2010-07-06T05:30:00.000-07:00

Yup - that's melon rind.

Mmm - meat!

2010-07-05T05:00:00.000-07:00

Aussies love a good slab of meat. And if you can gamble on it, that's even better. Which has led to the creation of meat raffles.

Meat raffles are a standard fixture of any good pub in Australia. They're a weekly event, so you show up, buy your raffle tickets, and drink some beer while you're waiting for the numbers to be drawn. And if you're a lucky winner, you get to go pick out your tray of meat. The owners of the pub have to buy all the meat, and they generally don't make much off the raffles. It's just another way to draw customers in.

So the South Dubbo Tavern has one of the best meat raffles - mostly because they have the best tray-to-customer ratio I know of. Every week they raffle off 42 meat trays, and on an average night, I'd say there's around 100 people there. Ben and I bought $10-worth of tickets and won 2 trays - $50-worth of meat!! Mmmmm.

Movin' right along

2010-06-20T05:17:00.000-07:00

Yep - it's that time again. Time to update your address book. Two years in one place was starting to push our limit - our feet were getting pretty itchy. So we up 'n moved.

Now we're happy Dubb-ites, or whatever you want to call people living in Dubbo. I got a 7 month contract at the zoo, and Ben is at the "writing stage," so he can do that anywhere. Although everyone looks at you a little funny when you say you like it (as if it's not physically possible to find Dubbo pleasant), we're really enjoying the rural NSW life.

A bit of research into moving vans revealed that it was out of the question to rent the van in Sydney and return it in Dubbo. For the few companies that did allow it, they charged a ~$5,000 one-way fee. (Yes, that's the correct amount of zeros.) Although we always love a good opportunity to throw away some money on fees, we decided to opt out of this one (just for you, Mike). Since I was already living in Dubbo, I rented a truck there, drove it ~7 hours to Sydney, we loaded up all our stuff (in the dark), slept in an empty house, and then drove back to Dubbo (me in the truck, Ben and Ani in the car).

Not only was the truck big (and Australian highways small), but it was manual AND the position of the gears was different (i.e., reverse was top left). But after ~14 hours and 1000 kms together, I got a bit attached to our little truck (or at least my ass did). I spent the whole drive singing "The Lady was a Truckie" by iconic Aussie country singer Slim Dusty, and "Bumpin' up and down in my little red wagon" (the truck had good shocks).

The side-note to all this is that when I left Dubbo with the moving truck, we didn't actually know where we were moving to. But that's another story, and we did know by the time we got back to Dubbo with our van-load of stuff.

So this is our new home: 10 Lovett Ave., Dubbo

We're paying $100 less per week for about 3 times more space. Hard to complain about that. So if anyone wants to come visit, we have lots of extra space now! It even has a little cubby house out back for Ani.

Skink in the tub

2010-05-30T04:57:00.000-07:00

We have a skink who has moved into our tub. It just crawled up through the drain (which is open to the outside). I think it might be escaping the cold weather, although it probably doesn't hurt that we bring home some of Ben's flies to feed it. It mostly just likes to curl up in the drain.

A day in the life: Fly Boy

2010-05-09T23:24:00.000-07:00

Things are going well with Ben’s research. The big huge experiment that we started in December is almost finished. There were 2 flies that outlived all the rest and acquired names: Ponce and Methuselah. My parents regularly inquire about them, right after asking about Ani. But now we're just down to 1: Ponce (who, by the way, is female).

Having proven that we can survive an experiment that size, he and his honours student (Sarsha) decided it would be a good idea to run an experiment 4 times bigger. They just finished setting that up. So all is well in Fly-land, but very busy. That's a lot of mouths to feed.

Pumpkin

2010-05-08T23:01:00.000-07:00

Fall is here and it’s pumpkin season. FYI – squashes are called pumpkins, here (e.g., butternut pumpkin, kent pumpkin, grey pumpkin). And we don’t have the orange variety that you typically think of. But they’re still tasty – especially in fall.

So I got inspired, despite the lack of spare time on my hands. I found a recipe for stuffed pumpkin gnocchi, and figured while I was at it, I should make pumpkin scones, too. And somehow, I decided that I needed 2 whole pumpkins to get 500 g of pumpkin. With all the leftovers, it looks like now we’ll be making pumpkin soup, too. But everything turned out pretty well!

And not only did this culinary adventure produce some tasty food - it also provided Ben with some valuable insights about my kitchen skills: 1) I'm no good at estimating quantities, 2) the time estimates that they provide on recipes are a gross underestimate for me, and 3) apparently I cuss a lot when I cook (probably due to our extreme lack of counter-space).

When ya gotta go

2010-05-05T14:46:00.000-07:00

Ben stumbled across this webpage the other day (he was doing race searching, if that explains anything) - the site just cracks me up:
The Australian National Public Toilet Map

You can browse them or search for a specific one. There's even a trip planner function - I guess for short you could call it the TP function! (hahaha...) The header reveals that it's a project of the National Continence Management Strategy - who knew such a thing existed! Mom and Dad - maybe you want to offer your modelling services over here. (I don't remember what your life-size poster/advert was for, but I remember jokes about incontinence...)

Anyway, for those of you contemplating a trip over here, don't forget about this incredibly valuable resource!! :)

New Zealand

2010-05-04T01:23:00.000-07:00

It's a year late, but better late than never, right? Last February, we went on a whirl-wind road trip around New Zealand with my parents. The 4 of us have been reminiscing over the past few weeks: "Remember what we were doing a year ago today?" It's hard to capture the trip in words (and I'd never get anything posted if I attempted that), but here are some of our memories captured in pictures.

And our hearts go out to the people of Christchurch. We have such happy memories of strolling through the city on a gorgeous day - it's hard to image the destruction and hardship they're enduring now.

View New Zealand in a larger map

Baby Update

2010-05-03T23:42:00.000-07:00

It’s been a busy few months in the zoo nurseries here in Oz, so it’s high time for an update. These aren’t all the zoo babies that have been born in the last few months – just the pregnancies that I’ve had a hand in monitoring.

Cheetah Cubs – 3 Oct 2009, 2 boys & 2 girls

After months of trying, one of our young cheetahs got pregnant just as I was leaving the zoo last July. She had 4 adorable cubs the week before I went back to Dubbo in October, and the big excitement was that 2 of them were king cheetahs. King cheetahs have a striped coat instead of a spotted coat, and while it’s a natural thing, it’s very rare. So all the cheetah keepers are busting their buttons! They’re all healthy, and growing fast.
king (sister) and regular (brother) coat patterns side-by-side

Mali (Asian elephant) – 16 Jan 2010, girl

If you remember the “elephant doula” story when I was working closely with Melbourne Zoo to monitor an elephant pregnancy – this is the outcome! An adorable (and very hairy!) little girl. She took her sweet time making her grand entrance. Everyone involved – whether they were monitoring her behaviour, or her hormones, or using ultrasound – expected her to give birth weeks before she did (which isn’t that long when you have a 2-year pregnancy). Anyway, when she finally did come out, it went very smoothly. And the vets at Melbourne Zoo (who are some of the best people) just sent me an adorable picture thanking me for my help. Yes – it’s proudly hanging on our wall. You can see more cute pics here.

Kufara (black rhino) – 17 Feb 2010, girl

When I started working at the zoo last year, Bakhita’s pregnancy was the first one that I diagnosed, so I have a special attachment to her. She just recently gave birth to the cutest little girl, and is being a very good mum. I was able to get a few glimpses of her when I was out in Dubbo recently. I’ve been told before that rhino babies are the cutest of all babies, and I kinda thought “whatever – most babies are cute.” But they really are SO adorable!!! And I’m not a big mushy cute-baby person.

Pathi Harn (Asian elephant) – 10 Mar 2010, boy

In contrast to Mali, who waited until the very end of the “parturition window,” Pathi Harn initiated his grand entrance to the world fairly early and caught everyone a little off guard. And then he decided to put everything on hold. PornTip (the mum) looked like her water broke, she was showing birthing behaviour, the German guy who travels the world assisting with elephant births had made it into town… and then everything stopped. They couldn’t detect fetal movement, and after the water breaks, the fetus can only survive a couple of days. So they decided it had died, and announced that to the media. And then FIVE days later, a zoo gardener was making his early morning rounds, and spied a small grey blob in the elephant enclosure. PornTip had a very short labour and gave birth at 3am to a little boy, who was weak, but alive. So now the zoo had to go back to the media and explain that by “dead,” they actually meant “alive” – you know, one of those common misunderstandings. So he was our “Miracle Baby,” also known as Mr. Shuffles. And despite a close call with the pool a few days later, he is doing just fine.

Pathi Harn with his cousin Luk Chai and rest of fam

When it rains it pours…

2010-04-21T00:57:00.000-07:00

… but not in a bad way. Just a crazy way.
From December through February, I was mostly unemployed. And frankly, I wasn’t particularly assertive about changing that. I’m happy being a couch potato! When we got back from New Zealand, I one tentative job in the pipeline. But within a week of coming home, I somehow managed to acquire a total of 4 jobs. I could have had five, but I decided I needed to draw the line somewhere. Don’t ask me how – it just happened. And don’t ask how the logistics of that work out – I’m still not sure. Anyway, here’s the run-down:
Job #1) Research assistant working with Gouldian finches – I’m looking at sperm in egg yolk membranes to look at pair-compatibility.
Job #2) Lab coordinator organizing and managing the lab sections for an introductory biology course.
Job #3) Lab instructor – teaching 4 of those lab classes mentioned above.
Job #4) Reproductive biologist – doing the same thing I’ve been doing out in Dubbo.
Yes, Dubbo is still 5 hours away from Sydney. Yes, the first 3 jobs are at Macquarie Uni, which is in Sydney. At least it’s keeping me out of trouble!
But it's also keeping me from blogging, so I apologize for that. I think I'm getting everything under control, so I'll try to be better.

Easter Holiday

2010-04-13T20:16:00.000-07:00

Generally, when planning trips, we try to avoid the “peak” times as much as possible. That’s the benefit of being semi-employed and in grad school – our schedule has a lot of flexibility. However, when we decided to buy tickets to the Blues and Roots Festival in Byron Bay, we neglected to notice that 1) it was during the Easter long weekend, 2) Byron Bay is one of the busiest places in Australia during Easter, and 3) our driving route would take us along one of the main holiday arteries at peak time. But despite the crowded campgrounds and traffic jams in the middle of nowhere, we had a fantastic getaway.

Hanging out in traffic in the middle of nowhere, with guys honking to draw attention to their mates peeing on the side of the road because there was absolutely nowhere to go.

It's hard to get a sense of how crazy it was, but this is our crowded campground at the festival. We're waaaaaay at the back

The Blues and Roots Festival was good fun. They had some great artists, and it's just fun to listen to live music.

And the gumboot fashion was just astonishing! Here's just 1 example:

Other highlights of the trip included the Macadamia Castle,

a dip in the orange-coloured Lake Ainsworth,

and several Big things, because all good road trips in Oz MUST include some big things. We saw the Big Banana, the Big Prawn, and a big oyster (but I don’t think it was officially “the” big oyster).

We explored several small towns and their quaint personality. We had Devonshire tea in the beer garden at the post office/cafe/general store in Wollomombi. There were flowers and sculptures on one side of the garden, and shark jaws and beer signs on the other. We missed the goanna pulling championships in Wolli, but we had some great fish 'n' chips. And we drove down Waterfall Way, each enjoying the waterfalls in our own way.

We also spent a lot of time on the beach, 'cause you just gotta.

View Easter 2010 in a larger map

Good times

2010-04-10T23:14:00.000-07:00

Australia likes Easter. A lot. The local papers are filled with announcements about Easter parades, Easter bonnet workshops (seriously - I think it's a national requirement that all children must make at least 1 Easter bonnet and then be paraded around, generally to their great embarrassment), Easter chocolate raffles (which replace the more typical meat tray raffles), Easter brunches, etc. So I'm scanning through all these wonderful Easter activities, and stumble across this:

A week later, it was followed by this:

It was part of a celebration for the bicentennial anniversary of Governor Macquarie. No place like a cemetery to celebrate an anniversary! Along with crematorium tours and hearse-rides, the open day also featured a colonial costume parade. Oh yeah, and a stations of the cross service. You know – all those normal anniversary celebration activities. Unfortunately, Ben and I were unable to make it.

Food

2010-03-11T14:16:00.000-08:00

I come from a family that loves food. We like trying new food, we reminisce about food, we remember important events by what we ate. So although food has not featured much in the previous blog entries about Mom and Dad’s visit, it did play a very important role. In fact, Mom kept an entire food journal, and we have photos of almost every meal. While I won’t bore you with a complete recap of everything, here are some of the things you can look forward to trying when you come visit us. We of course had to introduce them to several classic Aussie foods:
Vegemite
Meat pies
Sausage rolls
Chico rolls
Aussie burgers (I wish I had a picture of Mom eating one of the best Aussie burgers we’ve ever had… cute little mom sitting there with a burger that was about the size of her head and beet juice and tomato sauce all over her face)
Kangaroo
Barramundi
Lamingtons
Anzac biscuits
Pavlova
Lemon Lime and Bitters
Ginger beer

They also got to try several fun fruits, which aren’t necessarily unique to Australia, but were new for Mom and Dad:
Quandongs
Rambutan
Longan
Lychee
Dragonfruit
Fresh passionfruit
Durian
Green ecology limitless magnificence (I think that counts as a fruit)

So if you don’t know what any of those things are and are eager to find out, go get your plane ticket! And Mom and Dad - if there's anything I missed, let me know.

Australia Day

2010-03-10T14:06:00.000-08:00

Yes – the holiday that marks the end of the summer holidays and celebrates all things Aussie… like barbeques and beer and fireworks. And we were right in the middle of all the Sydney shenanigans. We decorated ourselves with Aussie flag tattoos,

ate kangaroo (also known as Skippy steak for those of you who may be familiar with Aussie TV in the 1960s)

and joined a million other people gathered in Darling Harbour to watch the boat and firework show.

When you're 5ft tall on a bridge with thousands of other people, and you didn't arrive the day before to claim a front row seat, this is how you still catch all the action.

And I think Mom and Dad practically have Australian residency after the gusto with which they celebrated Australia Day.

M&D out of Sydney

2010-03-09T02:07:00.000-08:00

Mom and Dad enjoyed their first 2 days in the small, obscure Aussie town of Sydney, but they really wanted to see one of the more famous cities that Australia is known for. So we headed to Dubbo – that wonderful, iconic, tourist capital of Australia. I know – it hardly needs an introduction since everyone has already heard about it. We also visited a few lesser-known attractions outside Sydney: the Hunter Valley and the Blue Mountains. And while both those places offer scenic views and good food, neither of them have what Dubbo has to offer.

We started our day with a relaxing walk along the Macquarie River, listening to the melodious sound of the cockatoos.

We then headed to the zoo to see where I hung out most of last year. The temperature was only supposed to reach ~104 F, so to avoid the risk of hypothermia, I thought it would be a good idea to stay as active as possible. So we got geared-up with some classic, old-school bikes – the ones that have no gears and you pedal backwards to brake.

And then we set off to get slobbered on by rhinos

elephants

and cheetahs.

Eventually we abandoned the bikes to go in search of roos. We found some wild ones,

and we also saw my old roo-mates: Emmett, Parker, and Xander (...and Kristie).

Having finally had our fill of animal slobber, we decided to check out some of Dubbo's other wildlife. So we headed to the cozy South Dubbo Tavern for Monday Night Trivia. Our team didn't win, but we did make lots of friends thanks to the amazing assortment of peanut butter candy (something notably absent from Aussie lollie shelves) that Mom and Dad had brought from home. So friendly people, friendly animals, beautiful sky, lots of sunshine - what more could you ask for!?

M&D in Sydney

2010-03-01T14:09:00.001-08:00

As Mom and Dad flew over Sydney, the clouds parted and a ray of sun lit up the opera house.

They were ushered through immigration and customs with smiles, and were greeted on the other side by 2 wonderful people. (…OK, that might be pushing it, but at least they were greeted by the people they came to see.) Outside, the sky was blue and the temperature was perfect as we drove to Bondi, one of Sydney’s iconic beaches. As we were heading down the hill to the scenic cliff walk, we spotted dolphins jumping just off-shore.

Seriously?!? Ben and I have never seen dolphins along the coast. And it wasn’t just a few random jumps - they kept jumping and playing long enough that we could run back to the car to get the binoculars, and we got some great views.

And thus begins my parents visit to this corner of the world. Not that they didn’t have a few drops of rain, but overall the weather and animals cooperated as if they’d been part of a magical Disney experience.

They had about 3 days in Sydney – plus a few extra hours here and there. So along with beautiful beaches and dolphins, my parents’ itinerary also included exploring Sydney's diverse neighbourhoods, eating fresh seafood at the Sydney Fish Markets

going under and over the Harbour Bridge

meandering around the opera house and the botanical gardens

listening to the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under the stars

visiting the Taronga Zoo and saying hi to my baby, Luk-Chai

and getting to know the local wildlife.

We also had a Christmas party. Mom and Dad provided the presents; we provided the mini-Christmas tree and the Christmas crackers.

Maybe it was a raw deal for Mom and Dad, but they didn’t seem to mind. Ani, on the other hand, was not thrilled with our decision to put all the party hats that came out of the Christmas crackers on her.

Visitors

2010-02-27T16:17:00.000-08:00

No - we haven't fallen off the earth. Yes - this blog is still active. Yes - I've received the reprimands from several of you about the lack of posts, particularly during such an eventful month. I blame it on my parents, always causing trouble...

So my parents arrived the morning of Jan 22 to finally come check out this awesome place that we're living. And it was so much fun to have them relaxing in our house,

checking out the places we work,

and spending time with their granddogter.

The general itinerary for their trip was as follows:
Week 1: hang out with us and get a glimpse of our lives
Week 2: get away from us crazy kids and spend some time exploring Oz on their own (mostly Kangaroo Island and the Great Ocean Road areas)
Week 3: the 4 of us head to New Zealand to explore the South Island
Week 4: we wrap up our time on the South Island and see a bit of the North Island
Then we had 1 last day in Oz together before they flew home... to a big snow storm.

And although that sounds like a relatively benign schedule, in reality it was anything but relaxed. It's been an action-packed month, and we returned to fairly crazy schedules, too, so more details & pics will follow.

Lingo Lessons: drop the "r"

2010-01-11T14:43:00.000-08:00

So to talk like an Aussie, the two biggest things are 1) shorten all your words and add "-ie" (as mentioned before), and 2) don't pronounce the letter "r", especially at the end of words, but sometimes at the beginning, too. So keep that in mind for the following conversation:

"Your dog is really cute - what's her name?"
"Ani"
"Oh, as in Arnold Schwarzenegger?"

What?!?

But following Rule #1, Arnold becomes Arnie, and following Rule #2 it becomes Anie. I'm still not sure why they thought we'd switch to an Aussie accent just to pronounce our dog's name and then resume our Yank accent for the entire rest of the conversation (which was a few hours), but that's OK.

So in case you were wondering, our dog is not named after Arnold Schwarzenegger. She's named after a bird called the Ani (either the smooth-billed or the groove-billed - you can choose).

New Year’s Eve

2010-01-04T16:15:00.000-08:00

Sydney has some of the world’s best NYE festivities, and this year we decided we wanted to be part of them. Downtown gets absolutely packed (like 1.2 million people); some people even camped out the night before to claim the best spots. We didn’t have the time to be able to do that, so we decided we’d do even better – and be on a boat! So we made a last-minute decision to book a NYE harbour cruise, and managed to get upgraded to a nicer cruise than we planned on, essentially getting ~25% discount. Talk about happy new year!

So we boarded our boat and were greeted with cocktails and appetizers (both included in the price).

Ben and I were starving and decided we should get our money’s worth, so we kinda stalked a few of the people walking around with the food trays. Yes, we’re classy. So we ate our shrimp and drank our wine as we cruised under the harbour bridge, past the opera house, right by the crowded masses of people on shore, alongside all these extravagant sailboats, enjoying the last bit of sunshine (which graciously made an appearance late in the day).

And then the light show began. The family fireworks were at 9, and then the blockbuster fireworks were at midnight. And the thing about Sydney’s NYE fireworks is that they’re EVERYWHERE. There are 5 places along the harbour shooting off synchronized fireworks, then there’s a whole different set of fireworks on the bridge, and then there’s more being shot off the sky-scrapers in the CBD, so they’re in front and behind and to the side. And in case that wasn’t enough to look at, all the boats also have lights on them, so there are all these great floating light displays around you in the water. Definitely a night to remember!

We were using our cheap back-up camera, thanks to the demise of our blue camera, so our pics aren't the best but I've posted a few of them anyway. To get a sense of what it’s like to be in the middle of all this pyro-technics-mania, you should check out this video (click here).
Boats, skyline, opera house, and the bridge.

The shark boat :)

Fireworks from on bridge, fireworks in the sky, and boats in the water

Passing under the harbour bridge at the end of the night.

Happy New Year!!!

Christmas

2009-12-25T16:14:00.000-08:00

Oh – it was Christmas?!? So this year was our non-Christmas. There was no family, no Christmas decorations in our house, no presents, no Christmas music, no snow (although the weather did get cool and drizzly on Christmas day in an attempt to make it feel more like a northern hemisphere Christmas). But our Christmas present to ourselves was finishing with the flies a bit early! So we went home and ate our fancy dinner of bangers-‘n-mac (Kraft macaroni and cheese and sausages – but they were nice lamb and rosemary sausages!) and lounged around on the couch watching bad Christmas specials on TV and enjoyed relaxing together.

Ani did get 1 present – we threw some wrapping on a bag of kangaroo jerky that we had gotten for her a while ago. Then we gave it to her to let her unwrap it, and promptly zoned out again. So she was through the paper, into the bag, and finished with 3/4 of the jerky before we remembered her (what good parents…). So that was her extra special present.

Merry Christmas!! Hope you were able to spend it with someone you love, even if it wasn’t as exciting as our Christmas. :)

A day in the life: Fly boy (and girl)

2009-12-23T16:09:00.000-08:00

So if you’ve ever lain awake at night wondering how the food you eat might affect how soon you die, then Ben is your man. Well, if you’re a fly. He’s in the middle of a big experiment right now with hundreds of flies that each get one of 18 different diets (high protein, high sugar, high calorie, low calorie, etc.).

And since I am currently unemployed and un-thesis-ed, he’s recruited me to be his assistant. So the two of us have spent the majority of the last several weeks together in a small, hot, humid room feeding flies and counting eggs. And we still like each other!!

AND, enough of the flies have died that Ben said I might get a day off soon! So I blame the lack of blogging lately on my slave master. And the unfortunate fact that our camera met an untimely end, so I can’t employ my normal blog approach of throwing up a few pictures and then adding a few lines of text.

‘Tis the season

2009-12-14T14:27:00.000-08:00

Christmas is really in the air! Christmas music playing in the mall, Christmas parties filling up the calendar, long sunny days, ice cream, picnics, lots of fruit coming into season – you know, all the classic indicators of Christmas.

Truth is, we really can’t get used to this whole tropical Christmas thing. We’ve been to 3 Christmas parties (one with barbeque and slip-n-slide), attended Carols in the Park (accompanied by ice cream and fireworks), reaped our treasures from Christmas crackers, but it just doesn’t feel like Christmas – especially with family far away. And we’ve discovered that most Aussies don’t know ‘Grandma got run over by a reindeer,’ so we’ve enlightened them (… and shocked them with our morbid sense of humor – although they really can’t talk).

Our friend Maria (originally from Peru) recently said something about how it feels like Christmas. I guess it all depends on what you grow up with, because for us, Christmas is snow and fireplaces and family crowded in a warm kitchen and Christmas lights lighting up the dark evenings.

A day in the life: Elephant doula

2009-12-13T14:26:00.000-08:00

OK, not quite, but I’ve gotten 4 calls this weekend in regards to monitoring an elephant pregnancy (related to the trip I made to Melbourne Zoo a few weeks ago). There was a bit of a false alarm this weekend and their head vet is away, so essentially I got this call saying “What do you think – is she starting to go?!?” We checked over the hormone assay results and ran a few more tests, and it turns out she’s not going, yet. My guess right now is that she’ll give birth on New Year’s Day. We’ll see!

Mud Run

2009-12-05T19:04:00.000-08:00

Time for another fun race! Last year we had our mountainous, unexpectedly snowy, windy eco-challenge down in ACT. This year we decided to go for a mud run just north of Sydney.
We kept our tradition of not sleeping before races. Last year it was due to being cold and the wind blowing our tent in and Ben's race starting insanely early. This year it was because Kerry's last day in Dubbo and the vet-block Christmas party were the day before. There was a 6hr drive between the Christmas party (which we stayed at until 8pm) and the race (which started at 9:30am), so the thing that was sacrificed was sleep.
But the race was awesome - Ben did the 12K race and Kerry did the 6K race. All of the obstacles involved making your way through mud (some of it rather stinky) and water (which was fairly brackish).

And in between obstacles, it was a pretty nice run through a forested valley. Ben said he saw someone worried about stepping in a little cow dung along the trail (before the first obstacle) and he thought "If you're worried about that, just wait!" And as you cross the finish line, you're greeted with a cold beer! So excellent race and a really fun way to get a little exercise - nothin' like getting dirty to make you smile!

Before:

After:

Zoo Grooves

2009-11-29T18:41:00.000-08:00

Basically, this is a day to hang out at the zoo and listen to music – not a bad event! And the day was perfect. Little warm at first, but then a nice breeze picked up and temps dropped and families scattered themselves across the lawn and kids ran around with their ice cream and flashy new face-paint and some people danced and lots of people laughed – just a good happy day.

Most of the bands were local, and often included people associated with the zoo. So here's the line-up:

Mumble Pants – which is comprised of our head vet and his wife, one of our keepers, one keeper’s ex-husband, and another guy, who undoubtedly has a connection to the zoo. This year they all dressed up as athletes, so we have (L -> R): a race-car driver, a tennis player (ex-husband – can’t blame her if he wears shorts like that!), a golfer (Jodie, the vet’s wife), a lawn bowler (Benn, the vet), and a roller-skater (Addie, a keeper).

At the Bar – which featured our accountant’s husband as the drummer

Maggie someone – this 13 year-old girl who (in my old fogie opinion) was dressed way too old for her age, but had quite a set of lungs on her.

The Nevilles – a cover band from Sydney

Fruit of the Day: Strawberries

2009-11-26T18:01:00.000-08:00

Bet you’re glad you have this blog to introduce you to this crazy exotic fruit! OK, so this isn’t a crazy new fruit that we’ve discovered, but Kristie has planted strawberries in her backyard, and they’re just amazing! They’ve been going for months and months, now, and the strawberries are an impressive size. And the flavour is great. So every morning I head outside, say good morning to the joeys, and then grab a couple of strawberries to take for morning tea. Nothin' like fresh fruit! I blame Mom and my first birthday cake for getting me hooked on berries at an early age.

Our Anniversary :)

2009-11-24T16:27:00.000-08:00

We’re EIGHT years old!!! Which means we’ve known each other for about 13 years. Man – we must be old! And we’ve loved every minute of it. Well, maybe not the minutes apart from each other.

So to celebrate this year, we decided to see a performance in one of the main Opera House theatres. We’ve seen three performances in the Opera House, but so far, they’ve all been in the small side theatres. So we got tickets to Concord – a performance by the Sydney Ballet Company – up in the Opera Theatre. And since we only spent ~$50 on the tickets (for both of us) we figured that meant we had extra money to spend on dinner! So we went to Aria – a restaurant that is right on the harbour, with a nice view of the Harbour Bridge and the Opera House, and which has been made famous by the chef’s guest appearances on Masterchef Australia.

First they brought out a complimentary amuse-bouche of tomato bisque with olive foam on top - it was just amazing! Didn't think to take a pic until after we had mostly finished, but nice backdrop, huh?

For our entrees (aka appetizers) we ordered:
SCALLOPS - roasted spiced scallops with prawn crisps, shaved fennel and a tamarind and date dressing

RABBIT - ballotine of rabbit, foie gras and capocollo with ginger bread, pumpkin and a pomegranite dressing

For our mains, we ordered:
LAMB - roasted lamb fillet with red capsicum, baby artichokes and a green olive and lavender sauce

SNAPPER - steamed pink snapper fillet, beetroot puree, kohlrabi, green apple with crème fraîche

We didn't have time for dessert, but after we paid the check, they brought out a plate of complimentary little dessert things, for which I'm sure there is a fancy name, but I can't think of it right now. There was raspberry jelly, chocolate coconut truffle, and cinnamon cake.

Dinner was a fun extravagance, and the ballet was very impressive. It consisted of three parts, each by a different choreographer - one from Russia, one from Spain, and one from England. I think Ben said it best when he said that you kind of forget that gravity still applies to them, until every now and then you hear a foot hit the floor a little hard. And then I had to leave Ben the next day :( … but only for 10 more days.

New Neighbours

2009-11-23T13:26:00.000-08:00

Sad news – our neighbours are gone. No more giggling kids on the trampoline, no more evening chats over the fence, no more bi-polar Joe (the youngest kid, who could instantly switch from the most contagious laugh to the worst screams), no more spontaneous dinners together, no more kids running over to get toys that got lobbed over the fence into our yard, no more playing mediator as Rob and Ann sort out issues through water fights, no more jokes where Rob asks if we think we’ll be able to make it home OK after a few glasses of wine. It’s been depressingly quiet.

Our new neighbors just moved in – a couple that’s probably about our age. We don’t know what they do; we just know they can afford a three-quarter million dollar house and nice cars. We’re sure they won’t replace the Harveys, but we’ll see how they are.

Happy birthday to Ben!!

2009-11-20T13:15:00.000-08:00

Another year older, but at least we were able to celebrate together! The three of us headed to the beach. The weather’s been pretty hot lately, so the water felt great… at least to 2 of us. While Ben and I were body surfing and playing in the waves, Ani headed back to our pile of stuff and played life-guard.

We just can’t convince her that water is fun, and all of our attempts just seem to make her like it less.
For lunch, we headed over to the shops (bare-foot, in true Aussie style) and got a great meal of oysters, prawns and calamari.

Of course, this had to be chased down with some ice cream, which we got for ~1/2 price thanks to the blackout that hit town just before lunch. Nothing like a good discount to make your birthday happy! And then a storm rolled in just as we got back to our stuff, so we watched the beach clear out and the awesome lightning come in before we skedaddled.
We decided to keep the seafood theme going for dinner, and tried our hand at making our own sushi.

In various combinations, these were the ingredients we used: salmon, prawns, avocado, asparagus, red bell pepper, snow peas, cucumber, cream cheese, and spicy mayo. And I must admit, we were rather impressed with ourselves!

So we ended the day with some nice white wine, homemade sushi, and Harry Potter: Order of the Phoenix.

And Ben opened all his cards during the commercials, so in some very abstract way, our family even got to be part of the celebration. (The skype calls the next day were a better way to connect with family.)

Business trip

2009-11-19T13:05:00.000-08:00

Woohoo – an expenses-paid trip to Melbourne! Two years ago, Australia imported 8 Asian elephants for breeding. Half went to Taronga Zoo, which had their first elephant birth in July, and the other half went to Melbourne Zoo, which is expecting their first elephant birth in December. Parturition can occur any time during a 2-3 month window, and because things can go wrong when you’re delivering a baby that big, it’s helpful to know exactly when the baby is going to come so you can have your whole team ready. There is a change in hormone expression that indicates the delivery will happen in the next few days, so Melbourne Zoo is trying to set up a system for monitoring hormones in order to catch that change. Unfortunately, it’s not going so smoothly, which is where I come in.  I went down to Melbourne Zoo for 2 days to help them figure out why their assay wasn’t working and offer some other tips. I’ll never get over some of the perks of working at a zoo. This trip’s highlights: I got to watch them draw blood from an elephant,

and was able to help groom a snow leopard while they were doing an exam. There was SOOO much hair that came off that cat!

Fruit of the day: Loquat

2009-11-17T00:19:00.000-08:00

Since Kristie hasn't been in her house a full year, yet, she didn't realize that she has a loquat tree in her backyard. And in spring, it goes crazy producing fruit. It's originally from China, and I guess I'd say the fruit tastes like a cross between pears and apricots. It's great - after a hot bike ride home from work, I walk over and eat a few loquats right off the tree. As a fruit-picking addict, it's the highlight of my day!

Roo-mates

2009-11-15T12:44:00.000-08:00

While in Dubbo, I’m living with Kristie again. You may recall that the last time I was there, she was hand-raising a little Eastern grey kangaroo named Emmett. Well, Emmett has gotten much bigger, and he now has 2 “brothers”: Parker (another Eastern grey),

and Xander (a swamp wallaby)

– both of whom were rescued from pouches after their mother was hit by a car. Em & Parker are fairly independent – they have their own bedroom, they spend a fair amount of time outside,
joey daycare at the zoo

and they are close to being weaned off the milk formula (much to their dismay – Em is particularly addicted to it!).

They are pretty good buddies, too.

Em is much more interested in people than Parker is, and will even share his secrets with you.

Xander is teeny, and still lives in his little box. But the other day he ventured out of his pouch, and although he looked like Bambi at the beginning, he was getting the hang of it by the end.
bambi-legs

dinner time

Visitors!!

2009-11-11T23:06:00.000-08:00

It's official - we're going to have visitors!!! My parents have bought their tickets and are headed to our corner of the world for a month. It'll be great to see them, but we're also REALLY looking forward to showing them a bit of our world and sharing some Aussie experiences with someone from home. Ever since we've moved here, we keep saying "So-and-so would love that restaurant/bird/neighbourhood/etc." Now we actually get share some of that stuff!

And I stole something from a fellow-expat's blog because I thought she captured the excitement of having visitors from "home" really well:

"My World
So it’s officially one month until my parents come!!!

It will be nice to have someone from home come here to see the life Andrew and I have set up for ourselves. None of my family or friends have ever seen the apartment I’ve lived in for over a year. People can’t see the street I live on (well, I guess they can on google these days). They haven’t eaten the food I’ve cooked in my kitchen, they haven’t sat on my couch to watch some TV.

Think about all your friends and all your family that you are closest to. You’ve been to their homes… you can walk into their places and notice if a picture or plant has been moved. You ask “did you get a new couch?” Or maybe you notice that they have put some new paint up on the walls. Now imagine setting up your own life, getting your first place, decorating, living your life… and never having those closest to you even see that life after almost a year and a half. It’s pretty sad, but that’s the reality you face when you move across the world I guess. So not only am I excited to see my parents again, I’m also excited to just have them be a part of MY world. It will be nice."

I heart Dubbo

2009-11-08T16:51:00.001-08:00

Dubbo cracks me up. In some regards, I have never seen a town with more town pride. The "I heart Dubbo" t-shirts for sale in the visitors centre are not really for visitors - they're for all the residents, who then wear these shirts anytime they go somewhere exciting and take pictures to have printed in the Dubbo Photo News. Dubbo hearts often pop up in all these random places. And I came back to Dubbo just at the end of the week-long "I love Dubbo" Festival. I'm not really sure how they stretched it into a week-long celebration, but all the businesses still have their "We love Dubbo" signs up.

But on the other hand, anytime I tell someone I like Dubbo, they kind of look at me funny and say "Really?!?" Yes, really.

Back in Dubbo

2009-10-23T04:29:00.000-07:00

I'm back out in Dubbo for 7 weeks. Same thing as last time - filling in for the reproductive biologist at Western Plains Zoo. Gotta love being back in a small town full of friendly people. Seems like everywhere I go, people are like "Hey Kerry, good to see you again!" At the gym, my instructor made a public announcement at the end of class - maybe a little more than I would have liked, but nice to feel welcomed back. And I'm lovin' the bike ride by the kangaroos, again. I'm not happy about being away from Ben and Ani again, but at least it's a lot shorter than last time.

Getting to know you

2009-10-22T03:11:00.000-07:00

I've decided that personal maps should be a standard part of introductions.
"Hi, what's your name?
What do you do for a living?
Can I see your map?"

Could this idea be related to my obsession with maps and travel? Possibly. But I do think it makes practical sense. It replaces the "Where are you from" question, which is becoming more complicated as people become more mobile. To simplify this question, people either pick one place ("I'm originally from Colorado") or give a very general answer ("I'm from the US"). Consequently, you can miss some great parts of that person's geographic history. Having a map allows you to identify points of common ground (literally) in one glance.

And then you could have a recent version that you can show to people you haven't seen in a bit - get an instant overview of trips that people have taken since the last time you saw them.

So here's our map. It's only for places that we've both lived - it does not include vacations we've taken. The "B&K holiday map" is a whole other project.

View Our Map in a larger map

Korean Festival

2009-10-15T04:27:00.000-07:00

This weekend we decided to venture down to the Korean Festival – kind of an obscure little festival by Sydney standards – and it was a great decision. The decision to ride our bikes was less stellar, given the hilly-ness of the ride and our post-long-run fatigue, but that’s OK.

So we came up to the park where the festival was, and I seriously asked Ben “Wait, what country are we in?” All the people were Korean; the majority of the signs were in Korean; there was Korean music playing; the master-of-ceremonies was speaking Korean (with occasional bits and pieces translated to English by a younger Korean). We had biked 2 miles and suddenly we were in a different country. I kind of felt like we had crashed a large Korean wedding.

And we stuck out like sore thumbs. Not only were we some of the very few white people, but Ben was also one of the tallest people. Within 10 minutes of arriving, we were interviewed by a film crew about what we thought of the festival. Later, someone pin-pointed Ben in the audience and dragged him up on stage to leg-wrestle their Korean leg-wrestling champ, who succeeded in flipping everyone who came up on stage, but I still say Ben put up the best fight.

And he got a prize for loosing

– turned out to be a case of this great orange drink. Didn’t enjoy the extra weight on the bike ride home, but we’ve been enjoying drinking it!

We had some great food, too: spicy chicken with funky noodle-things, dumplings, kimchi (of course), some novel berry drink, and these “pancakes” that are filled with brown sugar – very addicting.

And we accidentally bought a whole bottle of rice wine. You may wonder how we pulled that off, but I will remind you that in regards to communication, we may as well have been in Korea.

So all-in-all, it was a great afternoon!

Spring-time

2009-10-10T00:03:00.000-07:00

It's weird - now that we've been here over a year, we can start to recognize some of the signs of changing seasons. And spring is definitely on its way in:
- baby birds are everywhere
- plants are covered in flowers

- baby skinks are scootin' around
- gum trees are getting ready to shed their bark

- the first St. Andrew's cross spiders are starting to spin their zig-zags

- the common koel has started its mournful mating call outside our window
- we even had a thunderstorm the other day

And since I mentioned the baby birds, I'll give you an update:
Molly Magpie has lost one of her kids, but the other two made it through the brutal winds of the dust storm and are as sassy as ever. Really - magpie kids are obnoxious. I thought they were going to fledge a week ago, but they're still hanging out in the nest - almost as big as the parents - making mom and dad bring food to them. Even after they fledge, the go around harassing adults for food. (Hmmm - maybe they're not the only species with obnoxious kids?)
both kids

Lily Lapwing lost two of her kids, but the other two are still doing fine (we'll pretend Pokey is one of the ones who made it). Both parents are extra protective, and they've moved away from the office window so I can't get good pics anymore. But they're getting quite big.

Wilma Wood-duck has 15 kids!! So I was walking by the campus lake the other day and saw a pair of wood ducks with 15 ducklings! But I think they're cheating - I think they just rounded up everyone else's kids.

I got charged by the one with its head up just after taking this pic!

My life would be better if I had that house... or would it?

2009-10-08T23:29:00.000-07:00

So the other day we woke up early and headed to Manly Beach for a nice morning walk. Manly Beach is probably the second-most famous beach in Sydney (the first being Bondi). There's a beautiful long beach with two craggy/cliffy/great-splash-producing outcroppings on either side. So as Ben and Ani and I are wandering among beautiful new houses with ocean-view balconies,

and watching the morning sun dancing on the water, and checking out a few ambitious surfers and this awesome elderly (70ish) lady walking back from her morning swim, and being envious of the people who have a walk on the beach as their morning commute

- we start thinking "this is the life!" And if we both got "normal" jobs, we too could wake up with a nice run on the beach and then enjoy a cup of coffee together on our balcony watching the waves.

And it's a happy thought. And it reminded me of this book title that I heard the other day but now I can't find it anywhere so I'm not sure I got it right: "My Life Would Be Better If I Just Had That House." But the problem is that it's just not us. We're too trendy for Manly. (Or maybe it's the other way around - I can never keep it straight.) Manly is pretty much DINK-ville, and by no stretch of the imagination do we classify as yuppies or DINKs (double income, no kids). Plus, Ani wouldn't be allowed to run on the beach with us - I guess with riches comes species-ism. So for now we'll keep our life in our house, but sometimes it's just fun to imagine.

Vegemite

2009-10-06T23:26:00.000-07:00

Ah, Vegemite – the food icon of Australia. I don’t know if any other country has the equivalent: one single brand of food that is such a colossal part of the cultural identity. And when you try to mess with such an icon, it doesn’t always go smoothly – a lesson Kraft is slowly learning.

So Vegemite, for those of you who don’t know, is this substance that kinda looks like hot fudge or Nutella, but tastes like a cross between salt, brewer’s malt, and salt (really, it’s so salty you probably get a week’s allowance in 1 teaspoon). The key to Vegemite is to use it sparingly, but it is still an acquired taste. And I’m determined to acquire it! I don’t know – maybe it will give me a cool accent? Maybe it will turn me into a sun-bleached surfer-babe? Maybe it’s just my effort to embrace local culture?

Anyway, Vegemite was invented in 1922, and has been doing just fine. But Kraft decided they needed to mix things up a bit, and thus begins the endless Vegemite media saga. Here’s a recap:
- In June, Kraft releases a new product that is basically Vegemite mixed with cream cheese
- They decide to open up a 3-month national contest to name this new product, and they receive 40,000 entries
- Kraft chooses the name “iSnack 2.0” (in an effort to make Vegemite cool to younger people. Yeah.)
- The Aussie public rebel – seriously, if they weren’t so laid-back, there might have been street-riots – and this fury is broadcast from every possible media outlet
- Kraft revokes the name and opens up a national vote to chose between Cheesybite, Creamymate, Smooth, Snackmate, Vegemate and Vegemild
- After nearly 5 months of seemingly endless Vegemite media coverage, they have chosen the name “Cheesybite.” So far, there’s been no public outcry at that name

So I can’t even begin to sum up all the criticism the name received, but one of my favourite critiques was “Do you really want to use the #2 to describe a thick brown substance?” Which also leads to my favourite name suggestion: iSh*te. (Yes, I may be a doctor, now, but I still appreciate a good poo joke.)

AU vs. US (the environment series): Green bags

2009-09-30T19:44:00.000-07:00

Australia seems to have a bit of a split personality in regards to the environment. With some things they are pretty progressive, while with others they are a bit behind the times. And sometimes they are WAY behind the times, but we’ll save that for another day.

So “Eco-friendly AU” has made it a mission to eliminate plastic shopping bags. Instead there are reusable cloth “green bags” (which are sometimes green, but can also be red or blue or pink…). They even have insulated green bags to keep things cool. Everyone has them, and most people are pretty good about using them. Grocery stores almost expect you to have green bags (instead of in the US where you feel like a nuisance if you bring your own bags). Target Australia has even joined the cause, and is no longer providing free plastic check-out bags. If you want a bag you need to buy a compostable bag or a reusable cloth bag. South Australia has outlawed free plastic shopping bags altogether.

Although this idea is certainly around in the US, Australia seems to have actually acted on it a lot more. So, in the effort to reduce the emissions and harmful waste associated with plastic bags, AU wins.

Bangarra Dance Co

2009-09-23T19:44:00.000-07:00

Last night we went down to the Opera House to see "Fire: a retrospective" performed by the Bangarra Dance Co - an indigenous Australian dance group.

The performance was great. I won't say too much about it because I don't do that "theatre critic" thing very well. But I'll say this: they kicked ass with props! They had one dance where they did all this crazy stuff with blankets, another with sticks, a car, and one number with a slip and slide. Yes, you read that correctly, and it was just as awesome as you might imagine. Who needs Ice-capades when you have a slip and slide!

On a separate note, it was a very wet, stormy night - would never have guessed that a crazy dust storm was on its way in.

Under a blood red sky

2009-09-23T06:02:00.000-07:00

We woke up this morning to an eerie orange glow in the bedroom. Looked out the window, and this crazy orange haze was everywhere. My first reaction was "So this is what you get when you mix sunrise, wind, and fire." (They've been doing some preventative burning in the nearby NP, which has made things fairly hazy at times.) But the thing was, the air smelled like dirt, not smoke. Turned out - it was dirt. The largest dust storm Sydney has ever seen, to be specific.

The orange glow kept getting more intense and surreal as the sun got higher in the sky, and coupled with the intense gusts of wind, the morning had a very creepy feel. Well, "creepy" is how I'd describe it, but some other people prefer "apocolyptic" - literally. Whatever you like - I'm stickin' with "creepy" until proven otherwise. When the sun was able to peek through a bit, things had a bit of a metallic glow to to them - especially car windows. Very funky.

The best color was fairly early, and I was too lazy to get dressed and go outside to take good pics. I blame it on lingering jet-lag and the fact that we were out late last night. So excuse the window screen in all the pics, but you can see some really good pics here.

PS - now we have orange boogers.

Fruit of the day: Feijoa

2009-09-22T18:53:00.000-07:00

These are great little fruits, and I swear they taste like SweetTarts. The consistency is a bit like a pear (a little gritty), but they are really sweet and have a nice little zing to them. They're originally from South America, but has apparently gotten big in New Zealand and Australia.

Beach-time!

2009-09-20T21:41:00.000-07:00

We were supposed to do this on our first day back, but the weather didn’t cooperate. So today, we finally headed to the beach. It was the perfect temperature, beautiful blue sky, great waves, got a fabulous cup of coffee and blueberry muffin – we were a happy little family enjoying the day together. Some guy walked by us on the beach and said “Doesn’t get much better than this!” Yup.

Ani – perhaps due to a bit of separation anxiety, or perhaps because she didn’t get out much over the last 3 weeks – was a bit funny. She didn’t seem to be as exploratory as usual, and she also seemed to need a refresher on how to interact with other dogs. It was like she was testing out every possible social reaction with the dogs we encountered: bark at, chase, stalk, ignore, fight, play, lie down and let all the dogs come to her. Not sure what she figured out - she ended up just sitting by us. She also got to chase seagulls, which made her happy.

And a random note: Julie, a fellow grad student and Ani’s housemate while we were in the States, didn’t dip her toes in the ocean until 1 day before she moved back to the US! Ben and I couldn’t believe it! Sydney is ON the coast – it took us less than a week after arriving before we got to the beach. Oh well – to each their own.

And on a reflective note: today was also the Sydney marathon. A year ago, Ben was supposed to be running the marathon on an equally gorgeous day, but managed to contract a respiratory infection the week before, so we went hiking in Ku-ring-gai NP, instead.

Molly Magpie

2009-09-19T22:48:00.000-07:00

Before we went to the US, there was a magpie that started stealing clumps of Ani hair from the backyard (glad someone likes the fact that she sheds so much!).

Now, there’s a nice nest above our backyard and, as best as we can tell, three hungry mouths occupying it. That’s about all we can see from our vantage point. Both parents seem to be taking very good care of them.

And there are more baby birds by Ben’s office – a little family of masked lapwings. Mom and dad and the 4 little ones spend their day running around the little grassy area outside Ben’s window, so they’re great entertainment (unfortunately, not the best for productivity).
All 4 little ones are in this pic, and that's B's window in the background.

Plover babies are just so cute. There’s one I’ve named the pokey little puppy. Ben said maybe we should call it Kerry, instead. Not amused. (Oh wait, is that the sound of Robin’s laughter?)

Home again, Home again

2009-09-16T22:45:00.000-07:00

Can’t believe our whirl-wind visit through the midwest is over - one successful defence, one successful wedding, LOTS of fun visits with great people, plenty of laughs, too much good food… and now we’re back in Oz. And we were welcomed home with a very enthusiastic Ani-greeting! And spring – Australia definitely shifted seasons while we were gone.

But it was a little weird coming back, and I think it was weird because it was so easy. Last year, after all the planning and a journey half-way around the world, we arrived to a whole new world and people met us at the airport and showed us around, and everything was novel and special. This time, after our demi-global voyage, we slipped right back in to life-as-usual. We got off the plane and caught our usual train with all the morning commuters (and were able to answer questions of confused travellers), we stopped at our neighbourhood ATM that we always stop at, we came home to our house and our dog, we drove on the left-side of the road without thinking about it (OK, maybe there was a little bit of thinking), we got groceries at “our” Coles. It’s weird to travel that far and have everything be so familiar – pick right up with your normal routine. At one point when we were walking out of the train-station with the schoolies and business people and we all looked like we were going about our day-to-day routine, I kinda wanted to stop and say “Hey – this isn’t our normal routine. We just got back from a big trip. Shouldn’t someone be saying ‘welcome back, mate!’ ?”

I guess I’ve gotten a similar feeling after returning from a long camping-trip or study abroad – after a big experience like that, you feel like something should have changed, but it hasn’t. It’s a little disconcerting that everything is the same and it’s so easy to fit back in. Re-entry to the US has happened enough that I guess we’re a bit jaded, so it wasn’t weird going back to the US, but it was weird coming “home” to Australia.

Random thoughts from the US

2009-09-10T18:32:00.000-07:00

Things in the US are big. Houses, highways, refrigerators, washing machines, cars, restaurant meals, fountain sodas, grocery stores (and the aisles and the containers) – on average, most things are bigger in the US. I didn’t notice the smallness of Australia so much when we moved there, but it really struck me on this trip back to the US. Unfortunately, that also includes us. I think we both put on about 5 kilos during the 3 weeks we were there!

We need to work on our Aussie accents. Everyone was disappointed by our lack of accents – even our own parents, whom we’ve spoken with on a semi-weekly basis the whole time we’ve been in Australia. We’ve picked up some of the vocab, so now we need to focus on the accent. Next time, we’ll sound like fair-dinkum Aussies.

After Sydney, the US feels like one big bargain store. Things are generally cheaper in the US, even though OZ is closer to China – I think we’re getting ripped off. So we bought new running shoes, a computer, some clothes, toiletries (including real deodorant), and I’m sure some other stuff.

It’s very weird to jump between different parts of your life, especially when they’re a recent part of your life so it’s easy and comfortable to slip back in. Seeing grade-school friends, college friends, grad school friends, “real world” friends; popping from one family to the other; driving our old Honda (thanks Amanda!) down familiar streets, walking the halls of Purdue, hanging out in the Brookfield Zoo endo office. It felt kind of like someone had stuck our lives in a blender. Made a nice smoothie, but still messes with your mind a little.

Internet access in the US is such a nice thing.

T minus 2!

2009-08-20T17:27:00.000-07:00

We have 2 days until we leave for the States!!! Are we prepared? I have no idea. For a while my answer was that emotionally, we were totally ready - can't wait to see everyone!! But then this morning Ani saw a golden retriever on our walk and she got all excited. I said "I know - it looks like your cousins (or whatever they are), doesn't it? We'll see your cousins in a few days! ... but you won't..." :( But Ani will be in good hands.

Anyway, we're trying to keep our schedule updated (see the side of the blog - you should be able to click on it to view it). If you're going to be close to one of our stops (Chicago, Lafayette IN, St. Louis, Milwaukee) let us know - we'd love to connect with as many friends/family as possible. And if you have any requests from Australia, let us know - we have 2 days left to shop!

This means war

2009-08-18T16:18:00.000-07:00

We have 2 wars going on at home right now. They’ve turned into hard core, knock-down, drag-out battles – there’s no mercy. We’re lookin’ a little beat-up, but I think there’s an end in sight.

One war is against mould; the other is against this vine. They both do their sneaky little dispersal, spreading everywhere relatively unnoticed. And then one day there’s mold on the ceiling and on those leather shoes you haven’t worn in a while and on the far side of the couch and all over that straw hat. Then you go outside and realize that cool tree in front has turned into a carpet of vines, and the backyard bushes look like a massive tangle of string.

So we’ve been tackling the vines for a few days, now, and the battle culminated with a massive attack on all fronts today. The good news is that the vine (at least the visible portions) is pretty much gone. The bad news is that in our vicious attack, we had some civilian casualties: the bushes. It kinda looked like an elephant had come through and munched our backyard – there were frayed, broken branches everywhere. So because it looked horrible and some of the bushes needed thinning anyway, we took some clippers to it. And now it looks like a black rhino came and munched everything, instead. I think we have about the most pathetic looking backyard. I know we’re related to some really good green-thumbs, but we apparently didn’t get that gene.

I can’t tell where we stand with the mould battle – some days I think we’re winning, and then I discover that the box of dog biscuits has turned into a box of blue fuzzy stuff. Seems like most Sydney-siders are in the midst of this battle now – wet cool winter weather with no A/C or central heating to dry things out. Makes me miss Dubbo! But now that I’m working at home, I can race out and stick things in the sun when it decides to show up. And we’ve gone through a lot of bleach and mould remover in the last few weeks. So hopefully we can return to a peaceful home, soon.

AU vs. US (the environment series): Insulation

2009-08-17T18:46:00.000-07:00

So builders in Australia apparently don’t believe in insulation. Even after a year, I have not gotten over this fact. I’ll admit that New South Wales is pretty nice in the spring and fall, but in winter it can get down to freezing and in summer it can get up to 100F. To me, it seems like buffering your house from these extremes would be a good idea.

And some Aussies are even catching on – out in Dubbo it seemed like everyone I talked to was insulating their house. Why now and not 50 years ago when the house was built?? I don’t know. It’s kinda like insulation is this great new thing that just came to Dubbo. Maybe it will make it to Sydney, next (you know, Dubbo is so cutting edge compared to Sydney). Even in Ben’s department’s fancy new building, the contractors refused to install insulation – even in humidity and temperature sensitive rooms.

But here’s the thing I don’t understand. The inside temp is always within a few degrees of the outside temp, but the humidity level inside can be twice as high as the humidity outside. I spilled some instant coffee on the counter (perfectly dry), and when we came back a few hours later it had turned to little dots of brown liquid. How the hell did they construct their houses?!?

They say Australia is ~10 years behind the rest of the world. With regards to insulation, it’s a lot more than that! So the US wins this round by a long shot.

Movin’ on up Update

2009-08-15T16:21:00.000-07:00

Someone wanted our pans.

You may remember our "Movin' on up" posting. Well, we recently had "council clean-up" - this is where you can put anything you want out on the curb and the council will take it away, but it's customary for people to cruise the streets and go "shopping" before the council comes. So I put our old pots out there, and they were gone within a few hours. I feel sorry for whoever thought that was a good find!

Happy Aus-iversary to us!

2009-08-11T15:55:00.000-07:00

11 Aug 09 - our 1-year anniversary in Australia!

*Not to scale.

I really can't believe it's already been a year. We haven't explored Oz nearly as much as we had hoped to, and there are still times I have to think twice about which side of the road I'm supposed to turn onto. I haven't started saying "Ta" (thank you), but I have gotten comfortable with the "-ie" ending to absolutely everything (sunnies, brekky, mozzie, etc.). I still get excited about all the cockies (cockatoos) and kookaburras and other fun birds. Crumpets are a regular part of breakfast, and we always have some tasty cheese in the house, but we haven't quite gotten on the Vegemite train, yet. We'll see what another year brings! (...hopefully more visitors!)

Bye to Dubbo

2009-08-08T21:38:00.000-07:00

What I’ll miss about Dubbo:
- the people
- the sun
- living with a kangaroo
- being able to bike everywhere
- the sky, the river, and the red dirt
- listening to all the Aussie slang
- the fact that when I missed a couple days at the gym, people would ask where I’ve been, and they sent me a birthday card
- morning tea with the vets
- trivia night at the South Dubbo Tavern
- the Dubbo Photo News
- running in to people I know when I’m out and about
- biking past kangaroos on my morning commute
- the laid-back-ness
- being able to stop at the Indian restaurant on my way home when I didn’t feel like cooking
- maybe I’ll even miss the Mystery Sound

I know it’s only been 6 months, but there’s a part of me that’s fallen in love with Dubbo – especially the people. The carpenter (i.e., “the grandpa of the zoo”) would give me a little honk when he drove past me on my way to work. One of the ladies from the gym was like a mom and would always ask when I was going to see Ben next. Ben said Abbott was the same – he got really attached to the people and it was really hard to say goodbye (yup – that’s you Katie and Annie!!). I’ve decided that the social dynamic in grad school (maybe all of academia) is just different that the social dynamic in other work environments. I don’t know whether to blame it on the stress or the fact that it’s a temporary-thing. Anyway, I’m definitely going to miss Dubbo – but I’m going home with an “I heart Dubbo” shirt!

Lingo Lessons: Root

2009-08-07T21:37:00.000-07:00

So, “root” has a much different meaning here. Let’s just say that if someone caught you “rooting around,” they wouldn’t think you were just looking for something. They’d be more likely to call you a slut. And, since my job title is Reproductive Biologist, I have now been dubbed the Rootin’ Specialist of the zoo. So when you come to Oz, be careful who you root for.

Life with Emmet

2009-08-06T21:27:00.000-07:00

*FLASHBACK TO DUBBO*

Emmett is still cute as ever. He has made the transition from being bottle-fed to lapping, and it’s gone fairly smoothly. (Sorry he looks a little possessed in the photo, but it's a pretty good milk-mustache, don't you think?)

And he keeps getting more exploratory. Kristie moved him to a play-pen-thing when he started getting out of his box, but now he has figured out how to leap out of the play pen. He almost landed on Kristie’s head one night when he did this amazing leap out of the play-pen and ended up landing on the couch!

He likes to suck on his pillowcase like it's a dummy (aka pacifier). Or your sweater, if that happens to be more convenient.

And Ben FINALLY got to meet Emmett, so he's happy.

Update: Just after I left, Emmett got a sister, so now Kristie has 2 joeys! Kristie said she didn’t want me to leave because she wasn’t looking forward to being a single mum, and now she has twice the work-load! Good thing they’re so cute.

Grad School Kerry

2009-08-05T21:25:00.000-07:00

No – we haven’t fallen off the bottom of the earth. Yes – we’re doing fine. The blogging absence is related to the fact that I’m defending my PhD thesis in a few weeks (aagghhh!) and there’s a lot of writing to get done. This means that Grad School Kerry is back, and I’ve decided that I don’t really like Grad School Kerry. Zoo Kerry is fine, Field Biologist Kerry is pretty good, Hiking Guide Kerry I like quite a bit. But Grad School Kerry is dirty and doesn’t exercise as much and has bad sleeping habits and starts making velociraptor and guinea pig noises. And Ben is keeping me in quarantine in the house so I don’t get sick and jeopardize my defense, so since I don’t go out, I wear the same clothes over and over. My only consolation is that there’s an end in sight.

And I’m taking a break today to post a bunch of old entries that I never got around to posting, so the blog should be a little more active for a bit.

Back together again!!!

2009-07-09T14:56:00.000-07:00

6 more hours until we're all done with this stupid long-distance thing! Just thought you'd like to know.

Perks of the job

2009-07-06T01:50:00.000-07:00

The two African elephants at Western Plains Zoo are in training, which is a lot of fun for all the employees. They're being trained to go on walks, but to fully appreciate this, you have to picture the scene: we are out in rural Oz, and the zoo has a ton of property - several acres of which aren't even used for anything. So the elephants go for a short walk through the zoo

and then get to roam around this huge expanse of grassland. They aren't on leads or anything - just under voice control of the keepers.

For now, only employees are allowed to tag along, so the other morning I went on an ele walk. I can't even explain how cool it is - you're hanging out within touching distance of these 2 elephants that are, for all practical purposes, free.

The 4 ele keepers and I spent about an hour letting Cuddles and YumYum do their ele thing - which mostly involved eating.

Two of the keepers have this push-up contest going, so that morning they decided to take it to a whole new level. Literally. One of them got Cuddles to boost him up with her trunk, and he did push-ups on her back. It's such a surreal thing to be watching these huge elephants peacefully grazing in the distance one second, and then be hoisting a full-grown man around the next.

No matter where you fall on the debate of whether wild animals or captive animals are better off, I think these 2 elephants are the luckiest in the world.

It's a boy!!!

2009-07-04T01:32:00.000-07:00

...and I totally called it! I got the gender and the delivery time right! Yup - Australia is celebrating its first Asian elephant birth. Our lab is monitoring all 5 Asian elephant pregnancies in AU ...well now just 4. (So yes, you could say I cheated a bit, but does that really matter?) So a little boy was born at Taronga Zoo (the sister zoo to the one I work at) at 3:08am on July 4th. You can see more pics here - it's really cute.

(one year)

2009-07-01T01:28:00.000-07:00

Ben has now been in Australia for a whole year, and Ani will reach her 1 year mark in 2 days. However, I have made the executive decision that we will celebrate our 1-year Aussie Anniversary together, so it will be the day that the 3 of us were reunited (i.e., when I arrived in Oz). I figure that's fair since Ani spent most of that time in quarantine and Ben didn't do too much exploring before I got here. So you can save your happy anniversary cards for a little longer.

Life with Emmet

2009-06-21T19:40:00.000-07:00

Emmet is getting bigger and more alert and is spending more time out of his pouch, which is fun. He generally gets a bit of an exercise during his pouch changes. Sometimes he's really into it, sometimes he just wants to get back in his pouch. He's getting better at this whole hopping thing - he'll do laps around his mum (Kristie). But sometimes he'll shake his head and throw himself off balance and start doing this out-of-control zig-zag jump. And sometimes when he's making a tight turn around Kristie, he'll end up running into her, instead. But he's getting better and better at it!

AND, I got to do my first feed this week (quickly followed by my first and second solo-feeds)! It's a lot like feeding a baby - you mix up a special formula, put it in a bottle, warm it up, and feed him. And every time you feed him, you also have to toilet him, which involves getting a wad of tissue down there and "tickling" him until he takes care of business. The poor roo moms have to do this orally. :b I have decided, as much as I like the idea of giving birth to something that's the size of a peanut, I'm glad I'm not a kangaroo.

Happy Winter Solstice!!

2009-06-20T18:39:00.000-07:00

Woohoo!!! Longer days from here on out!! This is a very comforting thought for me as I bike around town in the dark. I have good lights on my bike (as long as I replace the batteries), but it's still just nicer to have daylight.

Penny for your thoughts

2009-06-18T14:43:00.000-07:00

So I’ve realized that there are two topics of conversation that Ben and I repeatedly revisit when we have time to just chat – while we’re walking Ani or driving long distances or taking train rides. Neither of them actually move us towards any particular outcome or resolution – they’re just things to talk about.

So the first is about our future and what we’re doing with our lives. And not really in a practical way (e.g., should I take this job or not), but in more of a whimsical way (e.g., maybe we could get jobs running a biological field station on a remote island; maybe we could learn Spanish and go live in Spain; maybe we could both get jobs with a pharmaceutical company and see what it’s like to get a real paycheck; if we have kids we should have a toffee-making weekend every fall; wonder if we’ll ever own a house). They pretty much cover any possible direction our lives could go, and are entirely shaped by something we’ve seen/heard/felt recently and not so much shaped by reality. But it’s fun to imagine.

The second topic of conversation is guessing who will actually come visit us while we’re in Australia. We generally agree about most people, so making bets isn’t that interesting, but there are a few people we debate about. So will you prove us right or wrong??? [Reminder, plane tickets are still really cheap right now… :)]

Vivid Sydney

2009-06-17T00:22:00.000-07:00

As “the largest light and music festival in the Southern hemisphere,” you can be sure this was on our list of things to do while I was in Sydney!! So my last night at home, we finally got down to check it out. Although there are a lot of different facets to this festival, one of the main things was “Smart Light Sydney”. Basically, artists set up their “light art” installations along the harbour. They range from a light in a tree shining down on to a bench:
Ben as art

to projecting images onto the Opera House:

It really reminded us of going to see a festival of lights display at Christmas-time in the US – lots of families and couples coming to check out the lights, all rugged-up since it was a cool night. There were street vendors out along the route, one person doing a unicycle act, others playing music/singing. Just a good happy feeling.
And since we were down there and this was partly a festival of music, we decided we should see a show at the Opera House, so we finally made it inside!

Impressive, isn’t it?!?! OK, so this isn’t the main big concert hall – this was a little playhouse in one of the side-wings. I don’t even know how many theatres they have, but there are several. So we saw Reggie Watts, and he is absolutely incredible. He has a 10-octave voice range, can flip-flop between musical genres like it’s nothing, can create amazing songs on the spot with his loop machine, and he inserts this hilarious social commentary throughout the show to top it all off. It was a great evening, topped off with a delicious sticky toffee pudding (you knew I had to get food in there somewhere).

Lingo Lessons: Crook

2009-06-15T00:21:00.000-07:00

Leave it to a country founded by convicts to use the word “crook” to describe a very non-criminal part of life: being sick/ill/unwell. It’s used as an adjective – for example:
“Why weren’t you at work last week?”
“Oh, I was really crook. Couldn’t even get out of bed.”

And Ben and I have both been a bit crook lately, so it seemed an appropriate time to share this lingo lesson. I guess it is that time of year. Luckily, we both evaded the dreaded swine flu… for now.

Don’t play with your food

2009-06-14T00:16:00.000-07:00

MasterChef Australia has possibly become Ben’s favourite TV show lately. He’s not quite to the point of actually taking notes, yet, but he might be soon. Between this show and our new pots and pans, he’s becoming quite inspired in the kitchen! If only grad school didn’t get in the way, I’m sure I could be married to an excellent chef.

One of the things he learned recently was how to clean and prepare a whole squid. So while I was home, we visited the seafood shop and got ourselves 2 whole squids and a blue crab. We sautéed/boiled/fried to our hearts content and then made a delicious garlic butter sauce. All I can say is “Watch out MasterChef!!”

Yes, that's the same crab. Cool colour change, huh!?!

Ani's birthday

2009-06-02T00:14:00.000-07:00

Happy 6th birthday to Ani! Yep – our little girl is turning into an old lady. And every year (as long as we remember) she gets a special treat that’s all hers and she doesn’t even have to work for it (much). Some of her previous birthday treats include an Arby’s roast beef sandwich, a vanilla ice cream cone, and a lollypop. This year we wanted to go with a classic Aussie treat, so we were debating between a meat pie and a sausage roll. The sausage roll was cheaper, so guess what we got! Oh, poor little dog with cheapskate parents. AND we made her wait with it right under her nose so I could take a few humiliating photos. I think she still enjoyed her birthday, though.

Bongo

2009-05-31T03:31:00.000-07:00

Before you continue reading, I need to warn you that this posting has a TMI (too much information) and PG-13 advisory – just a consequence of being biologists. In the interest of good taste, I won’t share too many details, and I will let you make your own jokes.

My boss (Bec) asked if I could come down to Taronga Zoo for a repro procedure on a bongo because it would a good training experience for me. Since Ben has never seen the zoo or met Bec, I asked if there was a chance he could come along. I hadn’t really thought through the implications of this request, but essentially what I did was invite Ben to come watch his beloved wife help electro-ejaculate a bongo (yes, that is pretty much what it sounds like). Talk about an awkward situation for a husband!

So the stimulant didn’t do a very good job of getting the target organ going, but it did get the bongo’s legs going at one point. Unfortunately, I was the person manning “his station,” which meant I was right in there between his front and back legs – not a good place to be when they start swingin’. I managed to do this roll between his 2 back legs (don’t ask for details – it all happened too fast – I remember I ducked my head under his top thigh and rolled out). Not sure what hit what, but my only injuries were a bruised, swollen knee and a bruise on my thigh. Could lead to some interesting answers when people ask what happened to my knee!

And I think that’s enough said about that.

Movin’ on up

2009-05-30T03:26:00.000-07:00

When we first moved to Oz, we felt a bit of a financial pinch. Well – maybe it felt more like a grab, but either way, it drove us to start our new life here for as cheap as possible. For some things, that was fine, but we quickly realized that for pots and cutlery, that just doesn’t work. The pots we picked out looked fine enough at the beginning, but the fact that they came from a discount store and the whole box weighed about as much as a pillow should have been a sign. After 10 months of use, our pots and “aluminum-ware” might be about the worst I’ve seen, which might not mean much for some people, but for 2 people who have spent a lot of time living in Forest Service bunk-houses and field stations and other under-funded communal-living situations – that’s saying a LOT.

So now that the costs of moving are fading into the distance and Kerry has been gainfully employed for 5 months (and the fact that Target just had a huge 50% off sale), we decided it was time to upgrade. We are now the proud owners of real pots and pans (that actually feel heavy when you lift them and that don’t start loosing their non-stick coating the first time you use them),

and real cutlery (which isn’t quite silver, but is better than aluminum and much less bend-able).

So watch out all you fancy-pant billionaires – the Fansons are moving up in the world!!

The Exchange

2009-05-29T03:21:00.000-07:00

So Tamara recently invited me to a dinner & theatre event, and keen for an outing, I said sure. Let me just say this – dinner theatre is quite different in Ballimore, NSW than it is in, say, Chicago. So there were 5 of us who went, and we drove along for about 30min until we rocked up at this little pub, in the middle of nowhere. But there was a big sign out front saying “The Exchange – funniest play to come to the Outback.” So we sidled up to the bar to get some beer or wine (some of the girls were disappointed that they had run out of vodka, but where did they think they were – a pub??) and then were ushered to the back room, which was kind of a big covered porch with 5 plastic tables and some folding chairs, for dinner. Tiny little outback pub – probably serving traditional meat and potatoes, right?? No – try spring rolls, fried rice, butter chicken, and curry. And then 1 dish of beef stroganoff, which was more like a few pieces of beef in a big tub of gravy made from a powder mix.

The play, quite appropriately, took place in a small outback pub. It was a 3-man production – there was the bar-tender and then 2 older blokes who spent their days hanging out at the pub. It was quite amusing, and I’m getting to know the lingo and the sense of humour well enough that I could get most of the jokes (my own personal accomplishment of the evening). But I’d say about 50% of the dialog was the 2 older guys arguing about “Whose shout is it?” (i.e. who is buying this round). And then periodically, amid the jokes and the drinking, they would lapse into these philosophical conversations involving a dialog between the 2 older guys and a simultaneous monolog from the bar-tender, and wax on about the meaning of life or Aboriginals or relationships. All-in-all, quite an entertaining evening, and a good taste of rural Australia.

New Flatmate

2009-05-28T03:16:00.000-07:00

I have a new flatmate. I may have lost Underwear Boy as a source of entertainment, but now I have Joey. Whoops – make that joey. And actually, his name is Emmitt. Yes – I am now living with an eastern grey kangaroo joey!!

So some fools were out shooting kangaroos, and managed to shoot a female who had a joey in her pouch. So they decided to try to raise the joey, but when it was clear he wasn’t doing too well, they dropped it off at the zoo (the vets also function as a wildlife rehab centre). So now Kristie (who I rent a room from) is hand-rearing the joey, which thereby makes him my new housemate! Right now, he’s about the size of a cantelope (or rock melon, as they’re called here) when he’s all curled up. He’s about ½ hindlegs and ½ everything else. He lives in a box of blankets, as he’d still be spending most of his time in his mum’s pouch at this stage.

But in the last couple days, he’s started sticking his head up more and looking around – very cute. And when Kristie transfers him to a clean pouch, if she doesn’t have the next pouch ready fast enough then little Emmitt will try to flip himself into her sweater (they kind of do this somersault into mom’s pouch).

Ben is insanely jealous, but at least he should still feel loved, because I’m choosing him and Ani over a joey and a nice heater (at least for the next 2 weeks).

We have tickets!

2009-05-19T20:29:00.000-07:00

It's official - we're headed across the pond to come harass y'all!! So I've created a calendar, which might help with keeping our schedule straight. You can find it on the right-hand side (below our contact info) or you can click here. I think you can also add things to our calendar, so if you know of events while we're in the US (or if you're planning a trip over here!!), go ahead and stick things on there.

Basic itinerary is that we arrive at O'hare 23 Aug, spend a few days in Lafayette for Kerry to wrap up her thesis, spend a while in St. Louis, then spend a while in Chicago/Milwaukee. We fly out 14 Sept.

If anyone's interested, it cost US$934/person to get us back and forth across the pond. In other words, ticket prices are low right now, and it's a great time to plan a trip to come visit us!!

Happy Feet

2009-05-17T21:13:00.000-07:00

With winter approaching, we decided to get us some uggs!!

So here's a bit of historical trivia for you, which I found interesting. For ages, the terms Ugg/Ug/Ugh/Uggies have been used as general terms to refer to warm, cozy sheepskin footwear. However, a few years ago the American Deckers Outdoor Corporation trademarked the name "Ugg" (and all derivatives thereof) and started mass producing "UGG Australia" brand boots, which are made in China. The company started going after the numerous small businesses in Australia that made uggs and threatening them with fines and lawsuits. This is a little like someone trademarking the word "chopsticks" and then suing anyone in the world that tries to sell a product called "chopsticks". So the little Aussie manufacturers banded together and fought back, and are now allowed to sell "uggs" again.

These are actually Ben's uggs

So Ben and I bought our uggs (since we can call them that) from a place in Dubbo that makes all their products on-site with all-Aussie sheepskins. There are doors from the shop to the factory, so you can look through and see people working - it seems like a very happy atmosphere. They also employ a number of people with intellectual disabilities, which is great. And they're just so friendly and willing to make whatever you want - I think this was probably one of the happiest shopping experiences I've had! And we're not shoppers, at all.

Tamara also gave me some great socks from Tassie, so my feet are extra happy!!! (...although 2 pairs of wool socks plus uggs was just for the photo - I'm not that pathetic.)

Underwear boy

2009-05-15T20:08:00.000-07:00

Well - it's the end of an era. Peter (aka Underwear Boy, due to his chronic, unabashed lack of clothing other than boxers... and sometimes just briefs) is moving. For those of you who haven't heard about U-Boy, he's renting a room from Tamara, and therefore my housemate when I house-sit for Tamara. He's a criminal lawyer, and his company had relocated him to Dubbo to get more familiar with aboriginal crime. Now they're sending him to Walgett, which is kind of in the middle of nowhere, and if you say the name with the right drawl, I think it captures the essence of the place. From the sounds of it, Dubbo was just breaking him in - Walgett is where he'll get into serious stuff.

But anyway, he's known about this move for ~2 months. This morning, he slept in until 11, got up and made a huge breakfast, chatted on the phone, had a few cigarettes. Then apparently while he was in the shower, he had an epiphany that he's moving in 2 days, because he suddenly runs out of the bathroom, towel around his waist, leaving wet footprints all over, picking up clothes with one hand and moving dishes around with the other - and starts freaking out about all the stuff he needs to get done. Which led to the following conversation:

Peter: This sucks – why does this stuff always happen to me?
Kerry: Other people move, too.
Peter: I’m like a victim.
Kerry: Of what? Having a job?
Peter: Yeah. Why can’t I just be on an island somewhere, drinking and smoking, with lots of pretty girls that don’t want to marry me.

Yup - that's Peter.

Lazy river, lazy day

2009-05-12T05:22:00.000-07:00

Ben and I spent the rest of the weekend takin' it easy. We headed out to "Butlers Falls" just south of Dubbo, but we failed to spot anything that remotely resembled a waterfall. In fact, it was so still that it was perfect for skipping stones. The name must refer to something else.

Ani enjoyed soaking up the sun and playing in the water and pouncing on things in the grass (luckily not snakes). And Ben and I proved to be entertainment for some of the local kids. A few young boys walked by us, and we could hear them debating our accents for quite a while.

On the way home, we decided to stop by one of the local wineries. However, being the end of the day on Sunday, they didn't have much open for tasting. We tried two reds, but since it was such a warm day, we were really in the mood for a white. Unfortunately, they only had 1 bottle of anything white, and it had been opened to pour one glass of wine - the managers had left for the weekend with they keys to the wine shed. So they offered us a taste, and then I (in my oh-so-classy-wine-snob way) asked if we could buy the rest of the bottle at a discounted price. Ben insists she hesitated, but I swear she was more like "whatever - it's the end of the weekend, nobody else will be drinking it." And it's Dubbo - anything goes.

So we took our mostly full bottle of wine and walked through the vineyards and down to the river (again) and soaked up a bit more of the beautiful day.

My birthday

2009-05-11T05:26:00.000-07:00

Leaves changing colours, temps getting colder, shorter days... must be my birthday! As I mentioned on Ben's birthday, the flip-flopped birthday eco-cues are one of the weirdest things about living in the other hemisphere. I had grown quite accustomed to lilacs, lilies-of-the-valley, and bleeding hearts around my birthday. Even more than cold Christmases or autumnal Halloweens, I miss my spring-ish birthday. (...but yes, we are still wearing shorts.)

But despite my lack of spring flowers, I had a wonderful birthday weekend, primarily because Ben was here, but also because it really felt birthday-ish. The vets had a cake for me on Friday, Tamara gave me wonderful socks from Tasmania, Maria sent a bottle of wine up with Ben, Kristie sent me a text message, I had a pile of cards from home, Ben decorated my room with balloons and crepe paper and had a confetti gun and everything - y'all are great!!!

On Saturday, we went to see Spamalot, which was a lot of fun, and it was the New South Wales premier, no less. We actually saw Spamalot in Chicago for my birthday a few years ago. Between professional Chicago theater company or local Dubbo theatre group, you might think Chicago would win hands-down, but we both kind of liked Dubbo better! First of all, you're just much more up-close and personal, but also, the whole idea of Spamalot is that it's a spoof on people who took themselves too seriously, but in Chicago, they took themselves too seriously. Dubbo still had amazing costumes and scenes, but without so much attitude. But we came away from both performances with aching cheeks from laughing so hard, which is always a good way to spend your birthday.

Happy Mother's Day!!

2009-05-10T06:00:00.000-07:00

Unlike Father's Day, Mother's Day is actually the same in Australia as it is in the US. So to the two best mothers in the world, we hope you have a double-whammy of a super Mother's Day!! We miss and love you both lots!

Underwear Boy and narcissism

2009-05-05T18:35:00.000-07:00

One last ode to Underwear Boy.

As Australia is mourning the loss of the classic Aussie bloke (seriously – there’s a competition to find/celebrate those rugged outback men), Underwear Boy is doing all he can to contribute to the rise of the metrosexuals. I realize that I am not the most appearance-oriented person, but I am continually amazed at UB’s vanity. He spends more time in the bathroom in one day than I do in an entire week, and has twice the number of “beauty” products as Tamara and me combined. I honestly don’t think that is much of an exaggeration. He has multiple different hair gels, hairsprays, shampoos, and a hair straightener for his 1-inch hair! One day I counted 11 bottles of hair regrowth formula in the bathroom, which is kind of ironic since he once told Tamara “My goal is to become a fat, bald lawyer. All the best lawyers are fat and bald. But not until I’m 30.”

The blue circles are UB's, the red circles are Tamara's, and the green circle is mine.

He has 2 pictures up in his room – one of him and his fiancé, and one of him and his “stunning” chest. Interestingly, his investment in his appearance seems to stop at anything that would involve too much effort (i.e. exercise). He has a few dumbbells in his room, but I’ve only seen them used as a doorstop. And apparently, eating an insane amount of grease every day is also part of his health regimen. He has gotten visibly fatter in the 3 months I’ve known him – an observation facilitated by his chronic lack of clothing.

Once again, we shake our head and say “Oh Peter.” This entry is not meant to offend anyone who identifies with UB – just to share my enlightening experience of living with a metrosexual.

Fruit of the Day: Dragonfruit

2009-05-02T05:46:00.000-07:00

This fruit comes from a cactus, and it looks just great, doesn't it!?!? But for as vibrant as the color is, the taste is actually quite subtle. It's mildly sweet, but there's no distinguishable flavour to it. But it's quite refreshing, and apparently low in calories!

Boxing Kangaroos

2009-04-27T04:56:00.000-07:00

They don't wear gloves, but kangaroos really do box. It's a male thing (... oh those boys), and it's purpose is essentially to figure out who gets all the girls (...like most male things).

So this has been one of the things on my "To see" list, and thought I might need to track a mob of kangaroos during breeding season, or something. But no - the other day I was biking home from work and saw a group of roos near the bike path... and then I realized that 2 of them were BOXING!! I stopped and watched until it got too dark (which unfortunately is way too early, now), and I realized there were actually a few different groups of boxers. I think in this case it was a bunch of young blokes warming up their muscles for spring - the fights didn't look as lethal as the real ones sound. So there are a few great things about roo boxing:
1) The Lazy-boy maneuver: while boxing, the roos will actually sit back on their tail - yes, put their full body weight on their tail - so they can kick their opponent with both legs. OK, it's not quite the same as kicking back in a lazy-boy, but I love this move!
2) The Simpson Strangle-hold: I actually don't think they're strangling each other, but when they go at each other, they throw back their heads (which look really small) and their heads roll around a bit, and it looks a lot like when Homer strangles Bart.

While I would love to take credit for this photo, it's not mine (I didn't have my camera) - I stole it off Flickr from a person with the username "aaardvaark." If you click on the title of this entry, it should take you to his Flickr page, where he has some more great boxing-roo photos. Thank you Mr. A!

AU vs. US: Stupid show tricks

2009-04-24T05:49:00.000-07:00

OK - this is not really a competition, but there are a lot of differences between the US and Australia, so this segment is dedicated to highlighting those differences.

So this week - stupid show tricks. In the US, you have David Letterman, who likes to drop things off the top of buildings: a 300lb safe, 5000 tennis balls, large pumpkins, old cans of paint. He ropes off a city block in NY and then gets one of his staffers to push things off the roof.

In Australia, you have Hamish and Andy, who decided to drop a car. From a plane. At 14,000 feet. Better yet, this is a REAL person's only mode of transportation (other than her bike). There was a contest for Aussies to enter their car in this once-in-a-cartime experience, and some poor student won. AND, there was a separate contest to select someone to push the car out of the plane, and the person who won was actually a double-amputee who didn't know what he was entering. If the car hit a 1km target from a moving plane at 14,000 feet (supposedly ~30% chance of happening under perfect conditions), then the girl won a new car and the guy won $100,000. So Hamish and Andy set out to select some massive expanse of deserted land where nothing would be hurt if the car missed it's target. Luckily this is not very hard to do in Australia. Then they loaded the car into a plane that was only slightly bigger than the car - a plane which had been dubbed the fridge with wings - and shoved the car out, and it HIT THE TARGET!! (Sorry - maybe I should have given a spoiler alert.)

AU wins this round hands down, and we STRONGLY recommend you check out the Hamish and Andy podcast for Friday 17 April - it's hilarious! You can also check out their website by clicking the title of this blog entry.

NOTE: You are welcome to inform us of any US show tricks that we may have missed, but no matter what you say, AU still wins. How can you top that!?!

Back together again :-)

2009-04-21T04:35:00.000-07:00

Guess what - I spent almost a WEEK living at home! With my husband! And my dog!

We spent most of the time playing dueling computers (i.e., working... but doesn't it look like we could have been playing battleship??). Ani was even roped into helping - she helped proof-read drafts of papers for both of us (despite her argument that it was more important for her to try to hold down the bed.)

But even working is more fun when you're together. And then there's all the basic 'living-together' things that you get to do together: long evening walks with the dog, going to the gym... and then having pec wars, cuddling on the couch and watching tv, laughing, cooking (in our own kitchen, where I don't have to worry about sharing the space with house-mates or making a mess or taking up too much room in the fridge).

And we had an eating adventure - we went to a Hot Pot restaurant with Maria. So for those of you who don't know, there's a big pot on a burner in the middle of the table. It's divided in half, with a mild broth on one side and a spicy broth on the other. Then there's this huge buffet of uncooked meats and fish and veggies and noodles and sauces, and you cook everything and mix it all together and pretend to be creative and have a lot of fun. It's kind of like a cross between Mongolian Barbeque and fondue. And it's a bad idea for anyone who's particularly possessive/picky about their food, because everything gets mixed together in the pot. Now we've developed a plan of attack for next time - so come on over and we'll take you there!!

But now I'm back in Dubbo. :-(
[Although on the bright side, the weather in Sydney was getting cold and rainy and winter-y, and for right now the weather in Dubbo is still pretty nice.]

Easter

2009-04-13T16:48:00.000-07:00

Easter is a big holiday here. And Australia is not a very religious country, so it seems to be more about chocolate eggs & hot cross buns than Jesus. Everything chocolate must be in the shape of an egg – and they can get quite gigantic and expensive. Easter things start appearing in the shops right after Christmas. Craving a chocolate egg the size of a small child for New Years?? Just can’t wait ‘til Easter?? No worries! The whole week before Easter, the vets and I played Easter bunny. Every morning, there was a new batch of chocolate eggs hidden all over. And while there aren’t quite as many hot cross buns as there are chocolate eggs, you can get those just about everywhere you look, too. And I must admit, freshly baked hot cross buns from the bakery down the street are quite nice.

The other thing about Easter is that it’s a 4-day weekend, here: Good Friday and Easter Monday are official holidays. And I swear more stores are closed on Good Friday than on Christmas Day. After a bit of searching, Ben and I finally managed to find 1 grocery store in Dubbo that was open – which was a very good thing, since we had 5 hungry mouths to feed and not much in the way of food. And on Saturday, we had a great pre-Easter dinner... of Indian food. Can't have Easter without camel races or Indian food!

HAPPY EASTER, EVERYONE - We miss you all lots!!

A Day at the Zoo

2009-04-12T16:32:00.000-07:00

Slobber, snot, and showers… oh my! So Saturday we headed out to the zoo. I’m finally getting to know some people and what animals they work with, so I was able to arrange some behind-the-scenes stuff – which was probably just as exciting for me as it was for the kids, since I hardly get out of the lab! We fed the African elephants, the giraffes, the black rhinos, and the maned wolves. And in case he wasn’t exposed to enough non-human body fluids, one of the giraffes also sneezed on Danny – yay!

In between animal feedings, we biked around the zoo. Unfortunately, Mr.Golden Sun did not want to come out and play, so our bike-ride was a little wet. And poor Danny, who didn’t really know how to ride a bike, got a crash-course in bike riding. In the rain. Through an obstacle course of cars, pedestrians, and other bikers. He did great, though, and both kids had a great attitude about the rain – despite the fact that we looked a little like drowned rats by the time we got to feeding the maned wolves.

Then, to add to our adventures, we also managed to get locked out of the car (which meant no access to 2 of our raincoats and all of our food). Now this is not to say that we didn’t have the keys – we did. But this is a quirky car, and the keys don’t work to unlock the doors, so you can never lock all of the doors. Unfortunately, we did. So in addition to meeting several animals at the zoo, we also got to meet the NRMA man (which would be similar to the AAA man).

And I swear, despite the way this picture looks, the kids said they had a really great time! They were particularly fascinated with the fact we got into the zoo for free.