Anzac Day

Yesterday, was Anzac Day. It is a combination of Veterans Day and Fourth of July. If you've seen Gallipolli with Mel Gibson...that's what it's about. In WWI, the Australian and NewZealand Army Corp was sent to take the beach in Gallipoli - now Turkey. It was a very bloody and protracted battle that ended in defeat for the Anzac Troops. They say that this event forged a national identity for Australia as a nation, as opposed to just being part of Great Britain. During a service at our local memorial, there was a lot said about the values that this day still inspires: pride in being an Australian, courage in the face of impossible odds, the importance of "mateship". It was a very moving ceremony.

Bird watching: this week the update is on birds...We went on a picnic at New Farm Park in Brisbane over the weekend. It is the site where the convicts grew produce in the old days. Today it is a lovely riverside park with some spectacular fig trees. Some crows started getting riled up and chasing something around - it turned out to be a wedgetail eagle. The eagle got itself stuck in the tree. After a while of hanging upside down, it fell out of the tree and almost landed on my head. Of course, I was running away - so luckily it just hit our cooler. Someone in the party had the presence of mind to wrap it up in a picnic blanket and call the rescue people. The happy news is that the rescue people did arrive and will take care of it and re-release the bird when it can fly again. The rescue people couldn't believe it was a wedgetail as they don't usually come into the city.

Other bird sighting: Tim took Elliott and me off the Mt. Coutha for a little bike riding "in the bush." It was a hideous event....just a little further, around this corner, etc. Elliott had realized what we went down we'd have to come back up, but I thought surely there would be some loop and we would arrive back home without having to go up hill. Anyway, after a little cursing and a lot of pushing, we were almost home when we saw a beautiful rainbow lorikeet in a tree. It made the whole ride worth the trip.

Lastly, news on the house front. Window guy came today and put big red pieces of tape on every window that needs fixing. Those match my yellow post it notes to mark the ripped screens. It's very colorul now, if not fully functional. The owners come tomorrow to have a look around. Tim will luckily be home to handle that. We hope the owners are able to shed some light on the section of fence that went missing sometime between 10 pm and 6 am one night. Is it the builder? Is he going to fix it? Is he mad and going to keep it? Did a kid take it? We have no idea. We have been swimming in the pool now. The pump is broken so we aren't too sure just how clean the pool is...but what the heck. It has cooled off to 24 degrees, so we want to get as much use out of it as we can before "winter" sets in.

And that's how you eat sand....April 19, 2006

We spent Easter weekend at Tangalooma - it is a large sand island off the coast of Brisbane. The island started out as a little bit of lava and grew into an island from all the sand that blew off the coast of the mainland. We needed a bit of a break, but as Tim's been on the road so much, we wanted someplace pretty close. The island is only about an hour ferry ride away.

There is not too much on the island. It is 98% National Park. The other 2% is the Tangalooma Wild Dolphin Resort. If I am very advanced, I may be able to post a link. (hmm...guess I'm not quite that advanced...) It was either stay at the resort or camp in the wilds with the mosquitos and the brown snakes - not much choice. As a guest of the resort, you can feed wild dolphin. Dolphins started to come to the docks to eat the leftover bait the fishermen would throw out at the end of the day. The dolphins really are wild, so there are a million rules to follow. No touching, no petting, no sunscreen wearing. The dolphins are fed only 10% of their food needs, so they still retain all their hunting/fishing instincts. It was pretty cool to see them so up close - I have to admit I really wanted to pet one! We also saw the dolphins swimming around where we snorkeled. They have sunk about half a dozen ships to create a small craft docking area off the coast of the island. There were very cool fish to see and some interesting coral. (The Bahamas are still pretty hard to beat...but it was very cool!)

Our other exciting excursion was to go sand toboganing in the Great Sandy Desert. Australia hasn't caught on the to American way about health and safety...basically, you sled down the giant sand dune head first on a bitty piece of plywood. I had to do it just to prove I wasn't a total chicken. As I launched myself off down the mountain, Elliott heard the guide say "And that's how you eat sand!" I found twice down was plenty; Tim and Elliott made it 7 times.

Other news: we have stopped paying rent on our house in the hopes that they will actually finish off what needs doing. We'll see. The builder showed up to cart away his tools after I threatened to throw them out in the street. Needless to say, he didn't actually finish any of the work he said he'd do before he left. We did have the electrician in and he changed the light fixture - sorry to all those that voted to keep the cherubs. And just FYI, everyone who voted wanted us to keep the hideous thing.

Critter update: only new item in the house was a little gecko. Very cute and not too scary, but pretty hard to catch. Elliott wanted to keep it in his room. I've heard that at first you think one is cute, but soon it turns into a whole community of geckos and they are pretty noisy.

Not much else to post. Really enjoyed the weekend away. Now we are back to the reality of work, school and land lord issues!

Tim puts the hammer down - April 09, 2006

Tim came home after almost two weeks in Melbourne to find the house and garden in the same state he left it. No, not just because I was on line gaming...it was the workmen...I swear. The pool and wall are still a mess and most of the jobs inside still need doing. Tim called the real estate agent and said "Fix it all by Easter or we're moving out!" It's not like him to be so stressed, but enough is enough I guess. I don't think he means it really, but he won't buy any more funiture just in case we really do move.

For all the complaints about customer service in the UK, it's not much different here. The main difference is people in Australia are nice to you while they are not doing what you want. Everyone seems very friendly and helpful and asks you how your day is going. After a lovely conversation, you go away and a while later you realize you still didn't get what you wanted. Another thing I've noticed about Australian men (and this may be a wild generalization) is that they love to talk to one another. They don't particularly want to chat with me, but with each other, they never seem to shut up. Just shooting the breeze. It does seem very matey and bloke-ish. This may be Queensland more than Australia, but it still seems pretty sexist. Tim having a tantrum has stirred the pot much more than I ever could.

Lucky for us, IKEA is not only on the way to the beach, but also close by a state park called Daisy Hill. We stopped by IKEA to pick up the rest of our desk and went and saw some Aussie critters in their natural habitat. Saw a koala in the tree and lots of wallabies hanging around trying to mooch some food from a family picnic. There were some very huge spider webs (mayby 3m. across) with golden orb spiders (non-venomous) and some Kokoburas. I'll try and spare you more wallabie pictures, but it was very cool to see them in their natural habitat and not in a zoo. We took some photos of the spiders, but I'll have to look again and see if it'll show up. We need to go back and go on a proper hike there - it was really lovely.

Easter is coming up and we are going away for the weekend. Hope to have more interesting nature tales to post next week.

Life's a Beach -April 3, 2006

Made it to the beach this weekend for a round of body boarding. The beach had some damage from the recent cyclone, but was in pretty good shape. We went to Main Beach which is about an hour drive from our house. Main Beach is the northernmost beach on the Gold Coast, just above Surfer's Paradise. The waves looked deceptively small...we all got knocked about a bit. Tim's board was actually bent in half, but looks to have survived!

Luckily, IKEA is on the way to the Gold Coast. We had to buy a two person desk for Elliott and me. We were fortunate the desk fit in the space at home because it doesn't seem to be the size we thought it would be according to the catalogue. And we have to go back for one part they didn't have in stock. Is it just us...or has IKEA really gotten bad at quality control and customer service? Just as well it's in a good location.

Posted is the picture I should have put on last week. Went back to Lone Pine Sanctuary - this picture is of a wallabie, not a kangaroo. So cute!