We are so excited about Obama's victory. I was interviewed by some Australian media sources.
If you want to see a video, go to this link: http://www.abc.net.au/local/videos/2008/11/05/2411264.htm?site=melbourne
I don't know how long it'll be up. I probably should have put on a nicer shirt, in retrospect...
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Monday, October 27, 2008
Around the bay in a day - really! (well, sort of)
I finally did it. I rode around Port Phillip Bay in a day, all 140 sweaty kilometres of it. The actual Around the Bay in a Day ride is 210 kilometres, but we stopped in the northern Geelong suburbs and took the train back to Melbourne. My riding companion and I had been riding for a solid 8 1/2 hours at that point (with an hour's break as we took a ferry) and had had enough.
I had been saying I'd do the ride for a while, then decided it sounded too daunting and stopped talking about it in the hopes that people would forget that I'd made such an outlandish claim. But my friend Greta kept pushing the idea, and when I admitted I'd sort of given up, she declared she would do it with me in order to motivate me to to the ride. She was a great sport, true to her word, and we did the ride on Saturday.
The first 20km or so outside of Melbourne were marked by what seemed like thousands upon thousands of cyclists with fancy racer bikes. The rest of the journey was marked by what seemed like thousands upon thousands of flies. It is difficult to say which was more annoying. On the one hand, the cyclists didn't seem hell-bent upon entering my every exposed orifice (although maybe I just wasn't their type). On the other, I had no real fears that the flies were going to knock me over and trample me to death in a stampede of fluro Lycra. The insects crashed into me, certainly, and although a horsefly to the forehead as you're flying downhill has enough force behind it to raise a welt, it isn't enough to knock you from your perch. The same cannot be said for a middle manager in a Melbourne bank pretending to cycle the Tour de France on a Saturday morning.
What I don't understand about the Lycra Pack, as these riders are known, is why they wear matching outfits covered in advertisements. I know why Lance Armstrong was covered in adverts for the US Postal service, but no one is paying the Lycra Pack to bomb around Melbourne on their $3000 bikes. The most unfortunate sartorial choice I saw was a woman sporting an advertisement for some sort of food. I don't know what the food was, but I can hazard a guess as to its texture: across her tuchus were the words "MOIST AND CHEWY." It was revolting.
Although the day was forecasted to be disgustingly hot, we were lucky in that the first 95km was along the coast, and the morning coolness did not burn off until midday. It was the most beautiful part of the ride, all along the beach and sea cliffs. There were some serious hills, some that seemed like they would never end, but it was (almost) worth it soaring down the other side. We stopped once at the 40km mark to stretch our legs, but for the rest we rode straight through, excepting stops while still in the saddle to take a swig of Gatorade or eat energy-giving snacks like peanut-butter cracker sandwiches. While on the subject of Gatorade, let me tell you, that stuff works. When my legs were feeling the strain and were complaining about the hardships I was subjecting them to, I had a few sips of Gatorade and instantly felt better. The exahaustion and even muscle soreness were gone. I wouldn't have believed it, but a marathoner friend recommended sports drinks in addition to water, as he found it really helped. It does. My whole body ached at times, but after Gatorade and a cracker, I was right to tackle another hill. Gatorade is not a proud sponsor of LesandCassinOz, but if they want to kick in a few bucks for this endorsement, I wouldn't say no. I'm just saying. If you are doing a serious athletic activity (we're talking marathon or multi-hour bike ride, not just a jog to the shops), I recommend it. But stay away from the red one - it tastes like pulverised red sweets of an indeterminate type.
We were feeling pretty proud of ourselves by the time we got to the ferry at the end of the peninsula. We'd gone beyond the Lycra Pack, who for all their customised bike shorts and stupid clip-on shoes didn't venture more than a few suburbs from the city centre. We were chuffed, that is, until we got on the ferry and met a couple in their late 50s who were 8 weeks into a yearlong bike trip around Australia. The woman said she'd only started cycling this year, and they'd decided to rent out their house for a year and see the whole country by bicycle. Greta and I no longer felt like such athletes - now this was a bike trip worth writing home about. I hope that they are keeping a blog so that their friends and families can marvel at their accomplishment.
The second leg of the journey was by far the inferior. For one, we were no longer on the coast, riding instead on a hilly and dusty highway. It was now mid-afternoon, and the sun was merciless. Fortunately Leslie had bought me a gel-filled seat cover and had lent me his iPod to make the journey as comfortable as possible, and I was exceedingly glad of both during this leg of our travels.
When we finally managed to get to Geelong, we went into a shopping centre to freshen up a little. There never were two girls who looked less likely to pop into high-end department store Myer and pick out an outfit and extravagant hat for the Melbourne Cup. I looked slightly more civilised once I'd washed most of the dead flies off my face.
We toddled around in the northern suburbs of Geelong for a while, then caught a train back to Melbourne. And there ended our journey. There had been no trouble with cars the entire trip, until I was across the street from our apartment again about to cross to home. A car full of hooligans (I didn't see them, but they must be hooligans) threw water on me, then took off at top speed, weaving in and out of traffic and driving in the tram tracks to avoid pursuit. I like to think I would have caught them if I weren't the other side of a 140km bike trip.
Anyway, it all ended well. I slept 12 hours that night and felt I'd richly deserved every one.
Some of you are saying, "That's all very well, Cass, but what is Leslie up to? You're ignoring his exploits!" Leslie is up to his eyeballs in his final folio preparation, but it's coming along well. He has very ambitious ideas, but they're coming to fruition admirably. He's doing a Greek mythology theme to some of his shots and a magical creatures theme to some of the rest. He will no doubt post the final images and tell you all what he's been doing.
I had been saying I'd do the ride for a while, then decided it sounded too daunting and stopped talking about it in the hopes that people would forget that I'd made such an outlandish claim. But my friend Greta kept pushing the idea, and when I admitted I'd sort of given up, she declared she would do it with me in order to motivate me to to the ride. She was a great sport, true to her word, and we did the ride on Saturday.
The first 20km or so outside of Melbourne were marked by what seemed like thousands upon thousands of cyclists with fancy racer bikes. The rest of the journey was marked by what seemed like thousands upon thousands of flies. It is difficult to say which was more annoying. On the one hand, the cyclists didn't seem hell-bent upon entering my every exposed orifice (although maybe I just wasn't their type). On the other, I had no real fears that the flies were going to knock me over and trample me to death in a stampede of fluro Lycra. The insects crashed into me, certainly, and although a horsefly to the forehead as you're flying downhill has enough force behind it to raise a welt, it isn't enough to knock you from your perch. The same cannot be said for a middle manager in a Melbourne bank pretending to cycle the Tour de France on a Saturday morning.
What I don't understand about the Lycra Pack, as these riders are known, is why they wear matching outfits covered in advertisements. I know why Lance Armstrong was covered in adverts for the US Postal service, but no one is paying the Lycra Pack to bomb around Melbourne on their $3000 bikes. The most unfortunate sartorial choice I saw was a woman sporting an advertisement for some sort of food. I don't know what the food was, but I can hazard a guess as to its texture: across her tuchus were the words "MOIST AND CHEWY." It was revolting.
Although the day was forecasted to be disgustingly hot, we were lucky in that the first 95km was along the coast, and the morning coolness did not burn off until midday. It was the most beautiful part of the ride, all along the beach and sea cliffs. There were some serious hills, some that seemed like they would never end, but it was (almost) worth it soaring down the other side. We stopped once at the 40km mark to stretch our legs, but for the rest we rode straight through, excepting stops while still in the saddle to take a swig of Gatorade or eat energy-giving snacks like peanut-butter cracker sandwiches. While on the subject of Gatorade, let me tell you, that stuff works. When my legs were feeling the strain and were complaining about the hardships I was subjecting them to, I had a few sips of Gatorade and instantly felt better. The exahaustion and even muscle soreness were gone. I wouldn't have believed it, but a marathoner friend recommended sports drinks in addition to water, as he found it really helped. It does. My whole body ached at times, but after Gatorade and a cracker, I was right to tackle another hill. Gatorade is not a proud sponsor of LesandCassinOz, but if they want to kick in a few bucks for this endorsement, I wouldn't say no. I'm just saying. If you are doing a serious athletic activity (we're talking marathon or multi-hour bike ride, not just a jog to the shops), I recommend it. But stay away from the red one - it tastes like pulverised red sweets of an indeterminate type.
We were feeling pretty proud of ourselves by the time we got to the ferry at the end of the peninsula. We'd gone beyond the Lycra Pack, who for all their customised bike shorts and stupid clip-on shoes didn't venture more than a few suburbs from the city centre. We were chuffed, that is, until we got on the ferry and met a couple in their late 50s who were 8 weeks into a yearlong bike trip around Australia. The woman said she'd only started cycling this year, and they'd decided to rent out their house for a year and see the whole country by bicycle. Greta and I no longer felt like such athletes - now this was a bike trip worth writing home about. I hope that they are keeping a blog so that their friends and families can marvel at their accomplishment.
The second leg of the journey was by far the inferior. For one, we were no longer on the coast, riding instead on a hilly and dusty highway. It was now mid-afternoon, and the sun was merciless. Fortunately Leslie had bought me a gel-filled seat cover and had lent me his iPod to make the journey as comfortable as possible, and I was exceedingly glad of both during this leg of our travels.
When we finally managed to get to Geelong, we went into a shopping centre to freshen up a little. There never were two girls who looked less likely to pop into high-end department store Myer and pick out an outfit and extravagant hat for the Melbourne Cup. I looked slightly more civilised once I'd washed most of the dead flies off my face.
We toddled around in the northern suburbs of Geelong for a while, then caught a train back to Melbourne. And there ended our journey. There had been no trouble with cars the entire trip, until I was across the street from our apartment again about to cross to home. A car full of hooligans (I didn't see them, but they must be hooligans) threw water on me, then took off at top speed, weaving in and out of traffic and driving in the tram tracks to avoid pursuit. I like to think I would have caught them if I weren't the other side of a 140km bike trip.
Anyway, it all ended well. I slept 12 hours that night and felt I'd richly deserved every one.
Some of you are saying, "That's all very well, Cass, but what is Leslie up to? You're ignoring his exploits!" Leslie is up to his eyeballs in his final folio preparation, but it's coming along well. He has very ambitious ideas, but they're coming to fruition admirably. He's doing a Greek mythology theme to some of his shots and a magical creatures theme to some of the rest. He will no doubt post the final images and tell you all what he's been doing.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
We're MIFFed
The Melbourne International Film Festival finished up last week. It's our second film festival. An American friend said it was strange when you come to your second Melbourne something, like your second Melbourne Cup or your second Melbourne Film Festival. This was our second film festival, and it makes me feel more at home here to have the continuity, to compare this year's film festival with last year's.
We each got 10-movie passes for the two weeks, and we had very different opinions on them. Ten movies in two weeks was a lot, but Leslie really likes movies. Strangely, I liked almost everything we saw more than he did. For someone with so many movies, he's very picky. But he says he sees so many in the hopes that he'll come across one that will punch him in the guts. None of these did that, but I found most of them fairly enjoyable. With the very notable exception of an exceedingly violent campy Japanese Western, which I found so vile I had to close my eyes for most of the duration. But overall, the calibre was pretty good.
A few weeks ago we went hiking in the nearby Dandenong Mountains. Although winter is a rainy season in Melbourne, it never gets that cold, and the snakes are not active in winter, so we think it's probably the best time to go hiking. Leslie brought his big camera bag and lugged 15kg of equipment up and down a mountain for three hours, but he didn't feel "inspired" to take any pictures. So this will have to be a text-only blog. Artists, you know.
Over Christmas this year we're tossing around the idea of going to Tasmania (or Tassie, as the Aussies say - there is nothing they won't abbreviate) and hiking and camping for three days. The website about the trek says it can be done in two days, but a lot of it is along the coast, and a lot of people like to take longer to play at the beach. I know I just said that winter was the best time to be in the woods because of the snakes, and that is true. But Tassie has only three common types of poisonous snakes, and only two of them will kill you. This is far better than Victoria, where there are 27 common types of snakes, and 21 of them are "dangerous" or "potentially fatal." Actually, I should clarify. The white-lipped snake is highly venomous, but there has never been a recorded incident of it killing anyone. The other two, well, they have track records. But I still like our odds in Tasmania over those here in Victoria.
This is also our second winter, and it seems like it's going on forever. We haven't been here long enough to know what months bring what season - we're just hoping for winter to end. I remember it being pleasant on my birthday last year - we went canoeing in the park - so I'm hoping that in the next few weeks it warms up.
We each got 10-movie passes for the two weeks, and we had very different opinions on them. Ten movies in two weeks was a lot, but Leslie really likes movies. Strangely, I liked almost everything we saw more than he did. For someone with so many movies, he's very picky. But he says he sees so many in the hopes that he'll come across one that will punch him in the guts. None of these did that, but I found most of them fairly enjoyable. With the very notable exception of an exceedingly violent campy Japanese Western, which I found so vile I had to close my eyes for most of the duration. But overall, the calibre was pretty good.
A few weeks ago we went hiking in the nearby Dandenong Mountains. Although winter is a rainy season in Melbourne, it never gets that cold, and the snakes are not active in winter, so we think it's probably the best time to go hiking. Leslie brought his big camera bag and lugged 15kg of equipment up and down a mountain for three hours, but he didn't feel "inspired" to take any pictures. So this will have to be a text-only blog. Artists, you know.
Over Christmas this year we're tossing around the idea of going to Tasmania (or Tassie, as the Aussies say - there is nothing they won't abbreviate) and hiking and camping for three days. The website about the trek says it can be done in two days, but a lot of it is along the coast, and a lot of people like to take longer to play at the beach. I know I just said that winter was the best time to be in the woods because of the snakes, and that is true. But Tassie has only three common types of poisonous snakes, and only two of them will kill you. This is far better than Victoria, where there are 27 common types of snakes, and 21 of them are "dangerous" or "potentially fatal." Actually, I should clarify. The white-lipped snake is highly venomous, but there has never been a recorded incident of it killing anyone. The other two, well, they have track records. But I still like our odds in Tasmania over those here in Victoria.
This is also our second winter, and it seems like it's going on forever. We haven't been here long enough to know what months bring what season - we're just hoping for winter to end. I remember it being pleasant on my birthday last year - we went canoeing in the park - so I'm hoping that in the next few weeks it warms up.
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Honey, we're home!
We are home from our trip to Ireland (in Leslie's case) and Ireland and New York (in mine). Being back in Ireland was nice for me, although hectic. It was the week of my brother's wedding, and there was lots and lots to do. The wedding was beautiful, everyone seemed happy, and a good time was had by all.After the wedding Les stayed in Ireland, but I took off the next morning for New York. I had been warned that three continents in two weeks was a lot, and it truly was. I was pretty exhausted by the time I got there, but it was wonderful to be home. I didn't do anything really touristy, except walk over the Brooklyn Bridge and back and go to Junior's for cheesecake. If you have never been to Junior's, you don't know what good cheesecake is. I had mine for breakfast. It was fantastic.
Seeing my friends was a wonderful homecoming experience. We're all doing a diverse range of things and have all moved on to new jobs, schools and opportunities, but our friendships have endured. We just hung out in diners as always, except instead of talking about the SATs, we now talk about our apartments and jobs. It's weird to see people you've known for so long but who are now in a new context.
Being back in New York made me somewhat homesick, which is a feeling I have not experienced since I've been in Melbourne. At first the city felt dirty, sometimes disgusting and very difficult to live in and get by in. But after a day, I realised that of course New York is those things, but it's completely worth it all. It's not just the subways, or the sheer size of it, or that I can go to a hole-in-the-wall creperie and have dark
chocolate and raspberry crepes in the Bowery one day and then to a Ukranian diner (but not the really authentic Ukranian diner, that's on the next block) for pierogis on the Lower East Side the next, and it's not just the people and the atmosphere and that there's always something going on somewhere. The city is alive and full of buzz, and it made me yearn to be part of it again. The life in the city is changing, and not always for the better, but it's not dead. Living in New York City isn't like living anywhere else in the world. So maybe we'll get back there someday. I'm not done with New York yet. I'm not ready to have fully moved away.But for now, I do love Melbourne. It's not dirty, disgusting or difficult, and it is a vibrant city unto itself. It ain't New York, but what is?
Getting back to Melbourne proved difficult. My travel difficulties started when I tried to fly from New York back to Ireland. I hadn't written down my flight number, and I couldn't find my flight on any of the screens at Newark airport, in New Jersey, where I was supposed to fly out. I panicked, but fortunately I called a friend and he checked my e-mail for me and confirmed that I was indeed in the right place. I found the correct check-in desk, but my flight was delayed by an hour. I was supposed to connect in Atlanta for a flight to Ireland, and I would have missed my connection. The check-in clerk said there was nothing else going to Ireland that night out of Newark, but he could get me onto a flight out of Kennedy, an airport in Queens about an hour away. He said I'd have to get myself to Kennedy, but it was a direct flight. I said OK, so I had to rush to get the bus to JFK. But the seat Delta gave me on this new flight was in business class, so all was forgiven. I felt like a 16-year-old in a liquor store and that the authorities were going to swoop at any moment, as I clearly did not belong among the suits in business class. The flight attendants were
obsequious, always checking to see if I needed things. The glassware and silverware were real glass and real metal. I ordered steak (you actually order from a menu), and although post-911 regulations mean that airlines can't give business class passengers steak knives, the butter knife they gave me was plenty to cut it, it was so tender.So that turned out to be a change much for the better. The rest of our travel snaggles were not nearly as fortuitous. I arrived in Ireland on Friday morning, and Les and I were due to fly out at 7pm for London, where we were to change to a Qantas flight to Melbourne at 10pm. Dublin Airport was having radar trouble, and flights were running half an hour late. We only had two hours to connect in Heathrow, which is barely enough time, and if we were half an hour late we would miss our Qantas flight. So we decided to buy another earlier flight, a 6pm, figuring it would get us to Heathrow at 7.30 and we would have two and a half hours. We needn't have bothered. The 6pm flight was three hours late, and we didn't arrive in London until 10.30.
After a fruitless trip to the international terminal to try to talk to a Qantas or BA person (the Aer Lingus people had told us to do that in Dublin) and back, we joined a 3-hour queue to talk to Aer Lingus. At 3am we finally got
to to talk to an agent, who said that because my flight was booked as two separate tickets (Dublin-London and London-Melbourne), there was nothing she could do for me. "We said we'd get you to London, and we got you to London." I don't believe that this was true, as Aer Lingus and Qantas are in the same alliance. But she'd had a rough night.Leslie's ticket was booked as a single ticket, so she said she could get him a standby ticket for a noon flight out the next day. She said all flights were coming up as full, and standby was the best she could do. She got us a hotel for a few hours and told us to come back to the airport at 8 and throw ourselves on Qantas' mercy, although they would not have to honour my ticket if they didn't want to.
We slept for three hours and came back to see Qantas, and here our luck changed. We encountered a lovely Qantas agent, who gave me no trouble about having two separate tickets.
He booked us both standby tickets for the noon flight (despite her word, the Aer Lingus woman had not, in fact, booked Leslie a standby ticket at all), although he warned us that it was running three hours delayed and was oversold by 15 people. There was a possibility he could get us as far as Hong Kong, and then we'd be stuck there. He said that we should come back to him when the flight closed at noon and he would do what he could.At noon, he had blessed news. We had flights all the way to Melbourne, in adjacent seats. We checked through our luggage, and he didn't give Leslie any difficulty about his being 8kg overweight other than ribbing him a little about having a heavier suitcase than his girlfriend, when it's usually women who try to carry to much. We got home about a day later than we were supposed to, but we got home.
It's good to be home.
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
It's the eye of the tiger
Keen LesandCassinOz readers will recall that in March we decided to cycle three-quarters of the way around Port Phillip Bay in three days. We based our route off a bike ride called Around the Bay in a Day, which I declared "crazy" people here in Melbourne did once a year. We took it fairly easy, averaging maybe four or five hours a day, and although we were tired, it was nothing too strenuous. Well, we have decided to become crazy people.
Yes, Les and I are going to cycle all the way around Port Phillip Bay, a distance of some 210 km, in a day. Actually, the true Around the Bay in a Day ride is 250 km, but all 2000 places available for the ride are sold out. So we are going on a slightly shorter version, which has a shortcut (unfortunately, the shortcut cuts out easy breezy flat coastal riding and none of the hills). There are three versions of the 210-km ride, and one of
those has already sold out as well. So that is at least 4000 riders in Melbourne who know they have what it takes to tackle this mammoth task, and the ride isn't until October. The ride costs $125 per rider (given to charity), so as soon as we have the money we are going to sign up for one of the 210-km options, provided that thousands more deranged Aussies haven't snapped up all the places by then.This is quite a task, given that while we both cycle every day, neither of us goes very far. We've started going on long rides at weekends, two hours or more, to get used to long distances. Bicycle Victoria, which operates the ride, seems to think it is possible at this stage for people like us to train for this ride. If only we could just
play some inspirational 80s music and do a few seconds of various exercises, and then it would be October and we'd be fit and ready.The other big piece of news in our lives is that we are coming home for a visit. Leslie flies out tonight for Ireland, and I will be joining him on Saturday. He'll stay through July 11th, but I'm leaving on the 6th for New York and will be there for four days. We're very excited to see many of you soon. And I have learnt my lesson and will not wear every piece of clothing I own on the plane. It was not a smart way to fly. This time I will take as little luggage as possible and bring books and magazines on the plane, not more socks and boots. That is, if either of us actually gets to fly, given the current Qantas strikes.
It will be especially good for Leslie to have a vacation, I think. He's been working insanely hard this semester - up late most nights, working all weekend. He's come up with some fantastic photos for his assignments, and I'm going to put some of them up on the blog so you can see
what he's been up to. But it'll be good for him to have a bit of a break - he only has to do three assignments while in Ireland. You all will see him much more than I have in the past few months.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Pop quiz, hot shot
I'm afraid we're not adventuring as much as we used to, so I apologise for the slowdown in blog posts. We haven't forgotten you, it's just that, well, how much do you really want to hear about Guitar Hero? And the new episode of House?
But I have been working on something for the past few weeks. We decided to have a pub quiz for Democrats Abroad Victoria. I was in charge of doing everything - booking the microphone from the pub, writing the questions, buying the prizes. Because I was the one to get the prizes, I got what I thought was most appropriate and best for the situation - $220 worth of American candy. It was awesome. I got Butterfingers, Mike and Ikes, Jolly Ranchers, Now and Laters, taffy, Baby Ruths, 3 Musketeers, Jelly Bellys, the list went on and on. The shop woman looked at me a little strangely as I went to pay for it all. It may not sound like much to you who have access to this stuff all the time, but over here in Oz these things are hard to come by. There's a candy shop in one of the malls in the city that carries it, so I took two of just about everything they had. The first prize was an enormous bag of candy, the second prize was a slightly smaller bag of candy, and the third prize was just a jug of beer.
I spent weeks working on the questions. My picture round was pictures of presidential pets, and teams had to identify which president owned which pet. I had originally cropped the pictures so that just the pet was in them, but Leslie said that was too hard. So I expanded them out again, so in some pictures the president or a member of the president's family was visible in the picture. I think this made it too easy, as many of the teams got all the questions right.
The trivia was due to start at 8pm, and by 7.45 no one was there except me and another committee member. I was really nervous that no one was going to come, and I'd have been so disappointed if no one had because I'd spent so much time (and money) preparing for the night. But it all worked out in the end - we had six teams, about 30 people. Everyone seemed to have a good time, and I think the questions were not too hard nor too easy. We'll probably do another trivia night sometime soon.
It was a relief to have it over with, and a lot of fun on the night. It made me feel a great sense of accomplishment to have seen the entire project through.
In other news, we bought a car. It's a red Mitsubishi Lancer, and it seems fine. We bought it from some friends of ours who bought it 10 years ago, and a mechanic has recently replaced the clutch and declared it to be in perfect working order. Leslie drove it home from our friends' house today, and it seemed to drive fine. I was against having a car, as I fear that it will mean that we won't cycle as much, but it was getting ridiculous to expect Leslie to schlep all his gear on the tram.
He's very busy at the moment with school projects. He has a major fashion shoot assignment due soon, and he's shooting some of the images for that tomorrow. I think he likes the creativity of planning these big photo shoots, but it stresses him to have so much work to do. Still, it's good practice for the big bad world.
We also saw the latest Indiana Jones movie last night. I really liked it, I thought it was a rip-roaring good time. But Leslie said it was a disaster, it shouldn't have been made, it lost the heart of the original three. Take from that what you will.
But I have been working on something for the past few weeks. We decided to have a pub quiz for Democrats Abroad Victoria. I was in charge of doing everything - booking the microphone from the pub, writing the questions, buying the prizes. Because I was the one to get the prizes, I got what I thought was most appropriate and best for the situation - $220 worth of American candy. It was awesome. I got Butterfingers, Mike and Ikes, Jolly Ranchers, Now and Laters, taffy, Baby Ruths, 3 Musketeers, Jelly Bellys, the list went on and on. The shop woman looked at me a little strangely as I went to pay for it all. It may not sound like much to you who have access to this stuff all the time, but over here in Oz these things are hard to come by. There's a candy shop in one of the malls in the city that carries it, so I took two of just about everything they had. The first prize was an enormous bag of candy, the second prize was a slightly smaller bag of candy, and the third prize was just a jug of beer.
I spent weeks working on the questions. My picture round was pictures of presidential pets, and teams had to identify which president owned which pet. I had originally cropped the pictures so that just the pet was in them, but Leslie said that was too hard. So I expanded them out again, so in some pictures the president or a member of the president's family was visible in the picture. I think this made it too easy, as many of the teams got all the questions right.
The trivia was due to start at 8pm, and by 7.45 no one was there except me and another committee member. I was really nervous that no one was going to come, and I'd have been so disappointed if no one had because I'd spent so much time (and money) preparing for the night. But it all worked out in the end - we had six teams, about 30 people. Everyone seemed to have a good time, and I think the questions were not too hard nor too easy. We'll probably do another trivia night sometime soon.
It was a relief to have it over with, and a lot of fun on the night. It made me feel a great sense of accomplishment to have seen the entire project through.
In other news, we bought a car. It's a red Mitsubishi Lancer, and it seems fine. We bought it from some friends of ours who bought it 10 years ago, and a mechanic has recently replaced the clutch and declared it to be in perfect working order. Leslie drove it home from our friends' house today, and it seemed to drive fine. I was against having a car, as I fear that it will mean that we won't cycle as much, but it was getting ridiculous to expect Leslie to schlep all his gear on the tram.
He's very busy at the moment with school projects. He has a major fashion shoot assignment due soon, and he's shooting some of the images for that tomorrow. I think he likes the creativity of planning these big photo shoots, but it stresses him to have so much work to do. Still, it's good practice for the big bad world.
We also saw the latest Indiana Jones movie last night. I really liked it, I thought it was a rip-roaring good time. But Leslie said it was a disaster, it shouldn't have been made, it lost the heart of the original three. Take from that what you will.
Sunday, April 20, 2008
From zero to hero in no time flat
A few weeks ago Les and I met up with some friends and went to an exhibition at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image. It sounds la-dee-dah, spending many hours at a museum, but it wasn't, quite.
The exhibition was called Game On, and it was an exhibition about the history of the video game. The bulk of it was made up of hundreds of playable free video games. The exhibition had everything from Pong and Frogger through Nintendo games like Donkey Kong and Mario World to arcade games like Pacman up to modern online role-playing games and the latest games for the Wii. It was a very crowded exhibition so it was hard to get at a lot of the games, but if you were patient, you could play whatever you wanted. We spent hours playing various arcade and video games. Neither Leslie nor I had TV or video games growing up, so while the exhibition didn't trigger feelings of nostalgia from our youths, it sparked a feeling of "Ha! Now we can play what the cool kids have always been playing!" Video games are still something of a novelty to both of us, so we were thrilled to be let loose in a giant centre filled with all the games we weren't allowed to have as children.
When we got hungry we left and went to a chocolate cafe. It's not a cafe that has prepackaged chocolate - it's a cafe that only serves chocolate. Chocolate bagels, chocolate pizza, chocolate fondue, chocolate cake, chocolate waffles and of course, seven or eight different kids of hot chocolate. Leslie got a bit of chocolate overload, but I was in choco-heaven.
I love being a grown-up. You can play video games and eat chocolate all day and no one can tell you not to.
The next day, inspired by the Game On exhibition, we bought a second-hand Play Station 2 and Guitar Hero. Guitar Hero
is a video game where you play a plastic guitar (with buttons where the frets are and a plastic toggle instead of the soundboard to strum) along with popular rock songs on the screen. Each fret button is a different colour, and you the screen shows you what buttons are coming up.
Winter is coming up, so we figured now was a good time to invest in video games. Leslie brought out his Tomb Raider 1 game from Ireland and beat the game, and I'm having lots of fun rocking out to Guitar Hero. I'm not very good yet and still get booed off the stage sometimes, but it's a lot of fun.
It turns out that if you don't let your kids have TV or video games when they're children, they don't grow up to be adults who don't like TV or video games. We're getting really into both. We're reliving other people's childhoods.
Sorry that this post isn't about leaping off cliffs or going on exotic trips, but life can't be all action. Sometimes you just need to sit on the couch and pretend to play the guitar.
The exhibition was called Game On, and it was an exhibition about the history of the video game. The bulk of it was made up of hundreds of playable free video games. The exhibition had everything from Pong and Frogger through Nintendo games like Donkey Kong and Mario World to arcade games like Pacman up to modern online role-playing games and the latest games for the Wii. It was a very crowded exhibition so it was hard to get at a lot of the games, but if you were patient, you could play whatever you wanted. We spent hours playing various arcade and video games. Neither Leslie nor I had TV or video games growing up, so while the exhibition didn't trigger feelings of nostalgia from our youths, it sparked a feeling of "Ha! Now we can play what the cool kids have always been playing!" Video games are still something of a novelty to both of us, so we were thrilled to be let loose in a giant centre filled with all the games we weren't allowed to have as children.
When we got hungry we left and went to a chocolate cafe. It's not a cafe that has prepackaged chocolate - it's a cafe that only serves chocolate. Chocolate bagels, chocolate pizza, chocolate fondue, chocolate cake, chocolate waffles and of course, seven or eight different kids of hot chocolate. Leslie got a bit of chocolate overload, but I was in choco-heaven.
I love being a grown-up. You can play video games and eat chocolate all day and no one can tell you not to.
The next day, inspired by the Game On exhibition, we bought a second-hand Play Station 2 and Guitar Hero. Guitar Hero
is a video game where you play a plastic guitar (with buttons where the frets are and a plastic toggle instead of the soundboard to strum) along with popular rock songs on the screen. Each fret button is a different colour, and you the screen shows you what buttons are coming up.Winter is coming up, so we figured now was a good time to invest in video games. Leslie brought out his Tomb Raider 1 game from Ireland and beat the game, and I'm having lots of fun rocking out to Guitar Hero. I'm not very good yet and still get booed off the stage sometimes, but it's a lot of fun.
It turns out that if you don't let your kids have TV or video games when they're children, they don't grow up to be adults who don't like TV or video games. We're getting really into both. We're reliving other people's childhoods.
Sorry that this post isn't about leaping off cliffs or going on exotic trips, but life can't be all action. Sometimes you just need to sit on the couch and pretend to play the guitar.
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