stay tuned!

Some things I have been up to lately:

• teaching
• getting stuff for the house
• surfing
• Great Ocean Road Trip (great before-and-after for Wheel of Fortune)
• surfing
• taking trips to Bunnings (the Home Depot of Australia, it's so good)
• living without: central heating, a clothes dryer (hang clothes outside), a rice cooker, a closet, clean underwear (just kidding)
• eating Australian bacon
• cooking on a gas stove
• driving ma new whip (pictures to come)
• drinking Australian beer
• mowing the lawn with a whipper-snipper (aka weed whacker)
• watching Point Break to learn Keanu's and Swayze's moves

That's about it for now.  I'll definitely elaborate on these things as I get some time.  Peace out.

bummer heights high

I just heard on the radio that HBO has taken on and is broadcasting an Aussie comedy called "Summer Heights High." If you ask any Aussie what that is, they can tell you and probably recite the whole series. It is a mocumentry of a public school in Australia with the main characters all played by one actor (Chris Lilley). This series is hilarious!!! I did get worried watching it though, because I thought maybe all schools in Australia were like this. If you can get your hands on this, definitely watch it.


On another note, we have moved lots of stuff into our new house and it is wonderful! Next up on the to-buy list is a BBQ.

school...again

This past Friday, I worked my first day of teaching ever. I signed up with this teaching agency that sets up schools with teachers and I was placed in a secondary school for a day of PE.

In the morning, I drove by the school and parked on a little side street beside it. I walked in past some crazy decorations and students all dressed up in costumes. I thought it was Halloween (a week early) and I picked a great day to start! I asked some students where the office was and they pointed me in the right direction. I walk closer and realize that I'm a the wrong school, I walked up to an all girls private school. I just walked back out and walked to the next school which was my correct school.

I met the school organiser and he gave me my schedule and I met some of the other teachers. It was really good that there was another phys. ed. teacher there and he helped me out in terms of where to go and where the equipment was. The kids are pretty much the same as Canadian kids. Some were a little rowdier though, probably because I was a substitute. It was a pretty good day. Next week I'll be working at another secondary school for four days. We'll see how that goes.

In other news, I got up on my first waves yesterday! I can't wait to go surfing again, woo hoo!!

shoes

One of the funny things about Australia is that people wear there shoes inside their house! Just walk in without taking your shoes off. I'm used to taking off my shoes and even movers in Edmonton would put on little booties before stepping inside your house. The other thing is that I have seen many people walking on the street without shoes on! It's almost the opposite here. Strange, but true.

PI!!!! (Phillip Island)

The weekend of October 3-5 was MotoGP Phillip Island. To those who aren't into the motorbike racing, Phillip Island is probably best known for the Penguin Parade. Every night, the penguins come in from the ocean and go to sleep in their little burrows. We saw the penguins and they were so funny walking up the beach to get home. There were heaps of Asian tourists there! I didn't take pictures of the penguins though because the lights scare them (nobody could take pictures). I have them in my memory though! We saw one poop and one run and fall into a hole. It was great.

We stayed at an awesome farm/house that was one of Cyn's family friends. It was an awesome property with a close by beach! I took my first dip in the ocean there and it was cooooooolllld! We saw some beached jellyfish too.

Now for what we've all been waiting for, the bikes! We went on all three days. Friday was their first practice day and there were about 24 000 people there. Pretty busy, but not too bad at all. If you don't know, there are three classes that race during a MotoGP weekend. The 125cc 2-strokes, 250cc 2-strokes, and 800cc 4-strokes. The MotoGP guys were going 330 km/h on the straight while the 125s were getting up to 245 km/h (not slow at all!). the first thing you'll notice is the sounds of the bikes! I took videos, so I won't describe them, but you feel the noise. I was overloaded with everything to see! I took 300 pictures over weekend!!!! Seeing these guys fly around the track made me want to ride so much! A track day might be in order here. Phillip Island is the fastest track on the MotoGP calendar!

During the race, we were sitting by turn 7 and 8 right by the fence. The bikes were so close and we heard every ear splitting decibal the bikes put out! I have to say that of all the GP bikes, I like the sound of the Honda thee most. The Ducati was very recognizable, as was the Kawasaki, but the Honda just sounded so mean!

I've been a Rossi fan from when I first started watching and I still am, but I found a new hero in Nicky Hayden! He is just so friendly to the crowd and so good to watch. Pulling wheelies for the crowd during the cool down lap, how can you not like him!!!!!! He had a fantastic race too, except for near the end where you can tell his tires were wearing while Rossi chased him down and passed him on the last lap. Rossi finished 2nd from a 12th starting position. How good is that!?!?

This was a fantastic weekend that I'll remember for a long time. I have pictures to put up as well (I'll put an update once I get it).

What's next!?

FYI

Did you know that drink cans here are 375mL? They are slightly taller.

Indi! (the farm, not Harrison Ford)

Hello everybody, I have found it hard to get internet access for my computer, so the pictures that I have taken are not uploaded yet. When I finally find a place to hook up, I'll upload and explode your senses with the awesomeness that is Australia.

After the short exploration of Geelong, I was off to Cynthia's parent's farm. It's about a 3 hour drive from Geelong and we made it quick. Being a city boy, I didn't know exactly what to expect, but I knew there was lots of land, animals, and a scooter to ride around on!

During the trip to the farm, I also had my first chance to do some driving. It takes some time getting used to driving on the opposite side of the road! Cyn's car is also a manual and I don't get to practice that much on one of those. After driving on the wrong side of the road for a bit, I got the hang of it and driving was good. I also turned on the windshield wipers instead of the turn signals more than once. Cyn took over again once we got really rural. One other thing is that I noticed is that there are way more hills on than in Edmonton. When you add in hills to single lane roads for both directions of traffic, it gets freaky!

During the drive, there were fields and fields just like the prairies, but add in the hills and also huge trees in the middle of crop fields. It was cool to see! Lots of sheep too.

When we got to the farm, it was getting a little dark, but we rolled into the drive and saw her parents. Then we took a quick spin on the Honda C90 before dinner! At dinner, Cyn's dad showed me to a variet of Aussie beers. I tried lots of types over that weekend! Let's see, I've had Victoria Bitter (VB) and Pure Blonde before, then I tried: Coopers, Melbourne Bitter, Blue Tongue, Beez Neez, and probably some other ones I haven't remembered!Anyways, lots of beer, good times. On the farm, we also saw lots of kangaroos hanging out. It was super fun. We were on the back of the ute and Cyn's dad was driving super fast through the trees to chase the 'roos! Lots of pictures, but once again they aren't uploaded yet. It was just amazing seeing these huge gum trees and all the land. The farm was absolutely fantastic! I could spend more time there for sure.

The way back was a little hair raising again because it was during the night. As of now, I have driving in Geelong and am getting used to the different traffic behaviours! Next up, Phillip Island!

Australia!!!!!

Hellooooooo, everybody! This is the revival of my blog and let's start with the first post of me in Australia!

A little background is that this is the first time I've lived away from home for an extended period of time. Very exciting stuff and it's a fairly big move!

Of course, all adventures start at the airport. I went to check in and then lined up to get my luggage taken care of. I finally realized that nobody was even working at the check-in desk!!! We thought Air Canada had folded!! But no, they figured it out and I think they got a couple people to check everybody in. Then we had to go through security and my flight was leaving in 40 minutes, I think. As I finally got past security, they were already boarding!!! I made it on and it was all good. Phew, close one!

Then in Vancouver, I sat in the terminal before my 15 hour flight. I must give a shout out to the free WiFi provided at the Vancouver airport!

On the plane, I had a window seat and a nice lady from Sydney had the aisle seat. Nobody was sitting in between us, yessssss. That was great. I got on to eventually watch five movies (What Happens in Vegas, Indiana Jones, Kung Fu Panda, Speed Racer, and The Happening) and even have a nice nap in there! I had my Shure SCL2 earphones and they were absolutely awesome. They blocked out a lot of the plane noise so that I could listen to the movies at the lowest volume setting (so I didn't kill my ears). I definitely recommend these to anyone who has to do some flying. As I got closer to Sydney, I started feeling a little nervous because it was getting real! I landed and missed my flight to Melbourne, so I got on a later one.

In Melbourne, I finally met up with Cyn and we headed into the city! The driving is craaaaazy!! First of all, I'm still getting used to cars driving on the left. I don't know where to look yet, so it's all a little crazy! Lots of jaywalking and lots of traffic. The Aussie accent is sometimes a little quick and it takes me a little bit to process it. I have to point out that the toilets have a cool feature as well. They have a full flush or a half flush, so you can save water if you are just flushing for a pee! That is good water saving that every toilet in the world should have. We were around Lygon Street, which has lots of restaurants and the first thing we did was get a kebab. They're pretty much what we call donairs in Canada. We had some chicken ones and it was supreme goodness! Drunk food at it's best! Then we walked around a little at night and called it a day. The next day we had some brekky and drove to Geelong. The bacon over here is pretty sweet. It's almost more like ham (I'll take some pictures next time). And also, the toast doesn't come on a separate plate or with jam. It's meant to be eaten with the eggs and bacon!

The drive from Melbourne to Geelong was also pretty interesting. People actually drive under the limit because their photo enforcement is hardcore and it gives demerits.

In Geelong, I have gone to the city for the day and walked around a bit. I can see the ocean!!!! It's actually pretty amazing. Next up will be visiting some beaches. More updates to come!

wisdom extraction

Wisdom teeth, that is. I haven't blogged in a long time and I thought it'd be a good time to get back on the blog train.

This morning I had my 2 lower wisdom teeth extracted. Prior to this, I have never been sedated, had an IV, or basically gone through surgery. I've never even had a Tylenol 3 until now (which I know now is codeine, a controlled substance). Basically, I am quite innocent in the world of surgery and post-op recovery.

I did my fair share of research through Wikipedia (awesome) just because I research stuff when I'm interested and also because I didn't know if I wanted them taken out. The dentist said they were straight and there was room, but the teeth have not moved much over a year. The teeth were peeking out a little, but not fully exposed like a regular tooth. I now realize that my situation could have fallen under the second most common category of impaction, which is vertical impaction (38%). This is where the wisdom tooth is straight, but the tooth does not fully erupt past the gum line. If I left it, then there would be a flap of gum where food and bacteria can get trapped. The flap is called the operculum. I didn't like this flap hanging around anymore, so the teeth came out. (And also because I'm still under my dad's health insurance!)

All I remember of the day was going to the surgery place and filling in an info sheet. Then going into the room, which was quite small compared to a regular dentist room. I looked around and there were some gas lines, and some dental equipment with some burly metal handles. Like screwdrivers but the tool was right on the end of the handle, and the handle was metal. After that, the doctor explained about the nerves, and how it is rare that it gets damaged, which would result in having a numb lip and tongue forever (eeks!). He even asked me if I wanted to be sedated. This caught me off guard, so I asked him what people usually do even thought I knew what most people chose. He called in the anesthesiologist and jokingly told him that I didn't want the drugs. So I played along and said, "yup, just gotta man up." I think it is a good thing to have some humour before something serious like a surgery. It just loosens up the tension a bit and maybe the doctor will take more care if he is working on a funny guy! The doctor was a cool guy though, he did come in saying, "what's up man?"

So he put in a little IV needle in my hand, which hurt less than a blood test needle. That IV was what I expected to be the most painful, but no problems! It wasn't attached to anything, the anesthesiologist just put in 3 needles or something and that was it. They also put this nose snorkel thing that was giving me some oxygen. It was kind of space aged, like I was in Star Wars or something. After that, I felt a little tingle go up my arm and probably within three minutes, I was out.

The next thing you know, I'm waking up on a sweet leather recliner and my mom is there! I was all tripped out and had to walk to get my shoes (it's like a house, you wouldn't wear you muddy shoes in the house would you?). I didn't know how I got from the office to the passenger seat of the van, but it happened. And I was still very sleepy, but my mom said she had to go get some drugs and asked if I wanted anything. I said I wanted a Booster Juice and she asked me what flavour. She gave me a pen and a receipt to write it on, but the pen wasn't working and I don't know if my mom would remember "Mango Hurricane," so I just said Original. My mom got it and I held it between my legs and fell asleep. I walked from the van to my house, put the Booster Juice in the fridge, and went to sleep.

When I woke up, I had some sick gauze in my mouth that I took out. Pretty bloody, but not bad. I read the post-op stuff and took a T3. Then I opened up the Booster Juice and started chugging. It was damn good and I was slobbering everywhere. I even have some red spots on my pants that can prove it! Whatever, the slobbering was worth the drink. Then I just put in some new gauze and watched a movie.

I'm not to swollen right now, and I hope it doesn't get worse. Maybe I'm like Wolverine with super quick healing powers. I hope so! Then maybe I can get my skeleton laced with Adamantium. Hmmmm, yes, that'd be sweet.