Almost a white Christmas

Well, not for us ... but just a couple kilometers away by the crow's path, it hailed decent sized chunks! 

Anyways, I had told myself that I would write a bunch of stuff over the past couple weeks, but I, once again, have failed to do so.

Instead, I'm here to condense a couple things into one post.  As I'm sometimes overly long-winded when concise would've been much better, perhaps this is a good thing.

First: Snowball.  Ruthie and I are doing much better since the whole ordeal.  Still not awesome, as it isn't really a fun thing to have in your memory.  We continuously have our windows open, and every now and then I hear a noise that is very similar to the sound I hear when he fell out of the window and my heart skips a beat.  But other than that, we contributed to Snowball's emergency bills in hopes that would help some, and then relied on the kind words of friends, family, and even a random coworker to whom I'd only spoken two words to previously to get us through it mentally.  Aside from the empty feeling the apartment had after he was gone [amazing how quickly you can get used to having a fuzzball running around], the worst part was that it just kinda felt like child services had swept in and taken our kid from us.  Needless to say, we are not on good terms with the rescue.  For what it's worth, from stalking the rescue's facebook page, Snowball has recovered from surgery [at a bill of $4900], and is recovering at the home of one of the owners.  The poor guy has a long road of recovery in front of him, though.

Second: Motorcycle.  When Ruthie first called VicRoads, the local department of motor vehicles, she talked to a really nice guy and we had a great first impression.  We got the idea that maybe Australian bureaucracy wasn't nearly as bad as ours.  Turns out we were wrong.  Ruthie has now talked to at least four different people, and has received a different story every time.  We've gone from one end of the spectrum where we would only have to pay a nominal fee for an unregistered vehicle permit to the other end where we have to treat our vehicle as a permanent import, getting it officially registered.  So a week ago, we made an appointment with a local mechanic who does inspections.  He turned a blind ear to the pipes being too loud [thank goodness!] and only cited me for the bald back tire.  So now that I have my official Road Worthy Certificate, I can go through whatever hoop is next.  From what the mechanic was saying, I will have to take my motorcycle to VicRoads so they can physically see the VIN and engine serial [seriously, engine serial!?].  Ruthie was trying to get it so that we would have the motorcycle for this week between Christmas and NY, but there were too many hoops to clear before every thing shut down for the holiday.

Third: Vacation.  Speaking of everything shutting down for the holiday, I currently am off of work.  I left the afternoon of the 23rd and won't be going back until the 4th.  Courtesy of the Australian government, the entire facility is shut down, so I cannot actually do work if I wanted.  Fine by me.  Ruthie looked into getting us to travel some where, but since the entire country is off, prices are 500% higher and she looked too late so everything was booked.  Instead, we've just been lazy bums around the apartment for the past couple days.

Fourth: Christmas.  Christmas itself was super low key.  We got up Christmas morning and skyped to my parents' house where our families had gathered for dinner.  So with the luxury of technology, Ruthie at least go to see and say hi to her mom and brother and eventually-to-be sister-in-law.  While it poured rain outside, we stayed in, watched Scrooged, Christmas Story, and a couple episodes of Firefly.  Ruthie also decorated the flat a bit with the wreath and ornaments she brought from home.  She also managed to get us a tree.  But that's an interesting story.  First it's not like our Christmas trees back home.  That's fine, and we were totally expecting that.  What we weren't expecting was for the stump to be so incredibly soft that it wouldn't stand up in our base.  First we thought it was because the very bottom of the stump was crooked.  So we hacked and trimmed off the bottom.  And then we did it again.  So our tree turned out kinda small.  And then our tree fell over again.  So now it's decorated, with lights, and is propped up by the walls in the corner of the apartment.  It is truly, in Ruthie's words, a "Dr. Seuss reject".  But I still think it's kinda cute.

-EP

Rough day

So last night was not a very good night for us.  Ruthie and I were watching TV, relaxing, when I heard a noise behind me.  To our horror, Snowball had been sitting up in one of our windows and had fallen out down to the tile patio four stories below.  We quickly rushed down, and fortunately the apartment owner was there.  She let us in, and Ruthie got Snowball contained in a box and wrapped in towels while I scrambled back and forth between apartments and the garage to get everything we needed for a trip to the emergency vet.  The initial prognosis was that his back hook joints [first joint up from the paws on the rear legs, like our ankles] were dislocated or worse, and that there might be some internal damage.  He also spit his lip [but didn't break his jaw, which apparently is common with falls], and broke a front toe / tore his nail pretty deep.  But the latter were minor compared to his hooks and what might be inside.  The poor guy was so good at the vet, for as much pain and panic as he must've been in - he really hates new places.

Ruthie, of course, was, and is, devastated.  She blames herself something fierce.  The short of it is that she feels like she might as well have tossed him out the window.  Even though we both convinced ourselves that leaving the windows open was okay, and allowing him to be out on the balconies was safe.  I even managed to look down to the patio below just the day before, saw the awning the owner had stretched out and thought, Well at least if he falls, he'll land on that.  We're both pretty shaken up by it, but Ruthie's been taking it really hard.

I took today off, so that I could stay with her and try and help in any way I could.  Ruthie emailed her mom and Shane earlier this morning, and they both have since called her to try and console her.  I think that's helped some.

In the mean time, we've got an update from the vet through the shelter owners.  Apparently both hook joints are broken and he will need pins/screws as well as an external brace, therapy, and regular care through rehab.  Fortunately nothing internal is damaged.  Like I said, we learned of this through the ladies at the shelter.  As a bit of background, this isn't a big shelter - it's just three women who have gotten together to save as many cats as they can help.  I spoke with one lady last night when it all happened [Ruthie was in no condition to form complete sentences on the phone].  But today, another woman has been communicating with Ruthie.  My gut tells me that there might be some personality conflicts involved with the decisions regarding Snowball.  Ruthie and I tend to agree that it might have been worth putting Snowball down.  Even though the vet / surgeon gave a promising story, is it really going to be easy on Snowball to make a recovery with both back legs broken like that?  The one with whom I spoke last night seemed fairly pragmatic, so it makes me wonder that if I/we had continued to deal with her something different might have happened.  Instead a different lady stepped in today.  So the decision was made to proceed with surgery on Snowball and provide him with the rehab he needs.  The lady from the shelter looked to us, and out of guilt I think, Ruthie said she would take him post-op.  However, immediately after the conversation, she began to second guess herself, and I called back.  I tried to have a reasonable conversation with the woman about caring for Snowball and that we might not be able to do it, but she cut me off claiming she was late for something with work.  Since then the Facebook page has been updated to detail Snowball's situation and there's a line in there about needing to find a place for Snowball during rehab and after.  So I'm guessing they've cut us out.  Which is fine, but I'm simultaneously irritated and apologetic that things have gone down the way they did.  So we'll see what transpires over the next several hours to see if anything comes back from the shelter at us.  Last night we paid for half of the ER bill - $300, as it only seemed right.  If they throw it in our faces, I'll be really pissed - but I honestly don't think that will happen.

Poor Snowball.  The little guy has been just having a terrible month.  His former human loved him so much and she was so devastated to give him up, but Snowball seemed to be scared of the guy she lived with and/or the other cat.  Snowball developed a UTI, and then was forced to move.  He came here with all the new smells and people, and didn't come out from under the bed for two days.  In the week and a half he was here, he'd actually made significant progress, and was actually starting to cuddle with us.  He even let me hold him a couple times for a few minutes.  And now this.  Man, it's just so frustratingly upsetting.

-EP

PS - Ruthie pointed out to me that if anyone who reads this feels sorry for us / Snowball, you could donate to the shelter on our behalf with a statement like "Erin Maloney is not usually an animal killer."  Well, on further investigation, there's no actual way for direct donations - just an account set up for Snowball's care.  Contact one of us if you pity the guy [or us] enough to send money.

PPS - Here's is the FB link to the shelter - there's a post about him an entry or two down.  http://www.facebook.com/melbourneanimalrescue?sk=wall

On two wheels

Once again, since this blog has “bike” in the title of it, it’s time for me to wax non-poetically about transportation and how many wheels I use.

Most days, I use two.  Two wheels and no motor.  I’ve been riding my bicycle to/from work just about every day.  Which means that if we don’t go anywhere on the weekend [which I think has only happened twice since we’ve been here], I can go weeks without driving a car.  And it’s actually been kinda nice. 

Now, I’m not a fast rider by any means.  They tried to poke fun at me for my coworker passing me on the way in to work one morning, and I just openly admitted that I’m not a speedy rider.  For example, one of the super-fit riders said it would probably take him 7 minutes to get from work to our apartment.  It takes me about 17 [more often 20, as I’m not usually in a rush]. 

And while that’s been great and all, I’ve been itching to ride my other two-wheeled vehicle – the one with the loud, rumbly motor in it.  Unfortunately, we’ve hit yet a third speed bump in that road, and my poor machine continues to collect dust in the parking garage.  The mirrors finally arrived early last week.  I took the day off work on my birthday and put them on, refilled the oil, and got a bit of fuel.  Battery wasn’t strong enough to crank all the petrol through the bone-dry system, so it had to go on the charger.  But I haven’t gotten any further than that because meanwhile, Ruthie’s been back and forth to VicRoads [their motor vehicle department] on my behalf, only to find that instead of an easy bit of paperwork and a couple hundred dollars for a permit, now I may not be able to ride the motorcycle at all.  It has something to do with how the motorcycle was brought into the country and us lacking a carnet de passage.  It’s all a mess, really, and I’ve send messages to the people who might be able to help – but I’ve gotten no where fast.  This, aside from frustrating, is fine because VicRoads said their policy department was going to have to make a judgement on if we’d have to pay some sort of tax on the motorcycle and they would get back to us by letter in two to three weeks. 

Poor motorcycle.  Just sitting there, looking pretty – all dressed up [in dust] and no where to go.

UPDATE: 

I actually wrote this on the 25^th – the day after I penned the previous entry.  [I just totally failed to update the blog with this.  Whoops.]  In the mean time, we’ve received the letter from VicRoads stating that I’m allowed to apply for the permit, but no instructions or anything beyond that.  Ruthie’s made an appointment with them, so maybe she’ll make some progress the next time she goes in there.  Fingers crossed.

-EP

Time keeps on slipping, slipping

Right, so in my typical blogging fashion, I have fallen quite behind in updating TFAAB.  So, where do I start?

First, I’m at work, taking a break from crunching data [well, writing this at work, as I can't actually access Blogger here].  Work has been going pretty okay.  I like my coworkers enough to be social with them outside of work even.  On 11/11, I went on my first official pub crawl [organised through work], and even drug Ruthie along.  I killed two “first” birds with one stone and had our first attempt at the tram system that night, too.  Our journey worked out pretty good, with only one minor hiccup.  At our transition point, we got on the second tram in the wrong direction.  It’s my fault, as I was accustomed to DC’s system where the end point is what’s visible on the train, thus indicating which train to get on without solely relying on the direction in which it is pointing.  But a stop later, and we got re-situated.  Anyways, this was supposed to be a paragraph about work.  Whoops.  I kinda sorta made a big boo boo at work yesterday [although if you look at it in the right light, it’s a fault to be shared by two other people], and the good news is that they didn’t fire me. 

While I write this, Ruthie is texting me, telling me that her sewing class went well today and that she’s got a message to call the foster kitty place, so we might have a fuzzball soon.  Personally, I’m a bit mixed on the idea of having a kitty at our apartment, but Ruthie’s desperate for one.  So we’ll see what happens after she talks to them.

Well, back home it’s Thanksgiving.  However, as that’s not really an Australian holiday, I’m working.  The lucky bastards at the consulate get both Australian and US holidays, so they’re off.  This is important because it means the mail office is closed today and tomorrow.  And that is important because I’m desperate to get my copy of Halo Anniversary.  It was released/shipped on the 15^th, and it hasn’t arrived yet.  I was hoping it would be here by yesterday, but I guess now I’ll have to wait until next Monday at the earliest.

Speaking of mail, my parents sent a care package full of yummy treats the other week.  It was a combined anniversary and birthday package.  Although, now that I think more about the contents of said package, it really might have been only yummy to Ruthie and me: Oreos, Fudge Rounds, Marshmallows, and canned tuna [specifically white albacore in water].  The copious amounts of fudge rounds have been great, except I think they have been the source for our [or at least my] particularly rancid farts the past week or so.  Not that I’m going to stop eating them. 

Anyways, Thanksgiving.  Since there’s no official celebration here, and turkeys are like $60 a breast [not really, but damned expensive], Ruthie and I are going to go out for Chinese food Christmas-Story-style.  Also, I think we’ve met a few Americans through derby that want to get together for some kind of Thanksgiving style dinner – but really it’s all because one lady bought canned pumpkin for pumpkin pie. 

Mmmm …. pumpkin pie ……

Road trip to Sydney - day six (return day two)

Route: Goulburn to Melbourne by the Hume Highway
Distance: 740 km (460 mi)

Both yesterday and today, I was quite disheartened to pass the occasional sign that said Tourist Route N [where N is some number between 1 and 12 - although I’ve not seen routes 1 or 2 or 10, but I can only expect they exist as I’ve seen all other numbers up to 12].  But, as the priority was to get home, I have resigned to attempt to drive them another day.

So today was the big push to get home.  Google estimated the drive to take about 8 hours.  I made it in about 7.  Fortunately there was very little traffic, and I was in the driving zone, so we made good time.  And I didn’t even speed by that much.  I would say I averaged about +8km, and the speed limit was mostly 110. 

As an aside, perhaps it is because of the car being so small and all, or perhaps it is due the psychological aspect of being raised in mph where 3 digits was really fast, but every time I approach 100 kph, I have a hard time going much faster.  Folks, 100kph is only 60mph.  That’s like a turtle’s pace for back home.  But here, most people abide by the speed limit pretty well, and 100 or 110 is pretty common for the upper limit.  And personally, after I get to about 120, I don’t like to go much faster …

Anyways, Goulburn was a surprisingly large town [population ~24,000], but it had a much smaller-town feel.  And it worked.  By the time Ruthie and I got up slightly after the sun, and went for a walk down ¾ of the main business strip, the town was bustlin’.  During our walk, we found a rather large secondhand shop, where this old Italian lady talked Ruthie’s ear off - but not for naught, as we learned of a fantastic place to grab breakfast.  [She also judged us for staying at the Astor - the pub - motel last night, but whatever.]

Goulburn also featured a humongous two- or three-story sheep.  It was a merino wool store and museum.  We parked behind the balls and took pictures under it’s quadruple chin.  Good times.

We left the sunshine behind us, which is kind of bittersweet.  Sure, we were starting to bake pretty good a couple hours into our trip [I even managed to sunburn the top of my right knee from the sun beating in through the slightly rolled down window], so when we drove into the cloud cover, it cooled things down a bit.  But now that we’re back and it’s rainy, it’s bittersweet to miss the hot sunshine. 

So, yeah, we’ve made it back home safe.  Our apartment was still standing - no outlets that were left on went crazy.  I didn’t pull an Edward Norton in Fight Club and detonate my own apartment via my alter ego while gone.  And we even were productive upon arrival: unpacked everything, sorted clothing, and Ruthie started laundry.

Tomorrow’s agenda: nothing.  Ahh, that’s great to hear.

-EP

Road trip to Sydney - day five (return day one)

Route: Sydney to Goulburn by way of the Hume Highway
Distance: 195 km (121 mi)

This morning started off in the luxury that my middle-class Marriott budget can afford.  We wallowed a bit in our beds after the sun woke us with its bright rays reaching the 20th floor early in the morning.  Then a quick trip to the gym, and an awesome buffet, and we were out to start our day. 

Except that our day really had only one thing planned: a harbour cruise that started at 2.30p.  And it was only 12.  So Ruthie and I killed some time by walking a few blocks down the street to check out this “motorcycle superstore” we’d seen from the top of the hop-on bus yesterday.  I tried on some jackets and a bunch of helmets, while Ruthie drooled over riding boots and bought some new gloves.  I also picked up the oil and coolant necessary to get my motorbike running again once we get home.

After an easy trip on the free tourist bus down to the Circle Quay [pronounced “key”], we found our correct pier and started the wait for our boat. 

Sure we saw the Opera House and the Coat Hanger [as they call their famous bridge] the first time we were in town, but it was kinda cool just to sit in between them for a while and relax.  Then, of course, once the boat arrived, and we perched ourselves up top, we were treated to some killer views of both landmarks.  We were also shown roughly where Mr. Crowe resides, where Ms. Kidman used to live with Tom Cruise, and quite a few other luxury properties.  Of course, not to be outdone by the eight-figure properties were the stupid expensive yachts parked in all the various piers around the harbour. 

Upon concluding our wonderful afternoon on the water, we hightailed it back to our car to rush out into Sydney traffic.  Much like any other over populated city, we crawled along, going about 20km in an hour, as we started to feel our stomachs grumble again.

What turned into a random exit from the main road in order to fill up the gas tank ended up with an even more random trip to a Chinese place that had quite excellent food - and it didn’t even break the bank.  Seriously, dinner was half the price of breakfast.

Today also marked the first time in this trip that we’ve actually done any driving at night.  We have decided that we are tired of spending money and are ready to head home, so we’re making the straight shot via the inland route, Hume Highway, to Melbourne.  Our goal was to reach Goulburn tonight, so that we had a mere 8 hours [longest actual driving stretch of the trip] ahead of us tomorrow. 

Mission accomplished, and I even managed to talk Ruthie and Lorraine into ignoring their “sense of adventure“ and staying at someplace that wasn‘t called the Cockroach Motorlodge.  Okay, maybe “cockroach“ wasn‘t in its name, but the way I looked at it, it might as well have been.  Yet, at this point, I can still hear the music from the bar downstairs slightly through the window - so not perfect by any means.

So one more day, and then home, sweet, Melbourne.  Although, now we have a new thing to worry about when we get there: the fuel gauge is acting quite bizarre.  The random pull off to a petrol station was prompted by the fact that the trip odometer was only at 85km and yet the fuel meter was sitting at E.  As we pulled into the station, the needle dropped past E and then moved up to about a quarter tank.  Something’s fishy …

-EP

Road trip to Sydney - day four

Route: Wollongong to Sydney by way of the Grand Pacific Drive
Distance: 95 km (59 mi)

Following up on the bizarre mood last night, we almost didn’t make it into Sydney.  I was torn: while I felt like the closer we got to Sydney, the further I wanted to be from a big city, I had a hard time letting go of how anti-climactic it would be to drive all this way and not actually come into Sydney.  So after we waffled a bit, Ruthie finally made the judgement call to come on into the city.  After having failed to get on the internet from the hotel in Wollongong, we eventually stopped at a Macca’s for a bite and some free wi-fi, where we booked a room at the other Marriott in Sydney [at the time, I’d forgotten there were two], and started planning our time in the city.

We actually left Wollongong at a decent hour - a much earlier start than the previous day.  Which enabled us to meander just a bit as we finished our drive along the Grand Pacific Drive [we stopped for a bit at the Sky Bridge], and get into the city with plenty of time to do something this afternoon.

We got into our hotel, got settled, and booked a hop-on-hop-off tour bus trip, where we only hopped on and hopped off once - at the hotel - and set ourselves up for a harbour cruise tomorrow afternoon.

The bus tour was pretty good.  We sat in the upper seats, had a good audio tour, saw some sights, sat in traffic, and killed the afternoon pretty well.

Then we decided we’d go to dinner.  And what better place to go, than to Outback Steakhouse.  Turns out, despite my original impression that all the ones in Australia were only located in Sydney, it was actually a bit of a drive out to one of the suburbs to get to it.  Of course, the drive was made worse by the traffic and the fact that I made one wrong turn, and it took 25 minutes to correct because of said traffic.  But eventually we got there, and we stuffed ourselves like the Americans that we are. 

First, with the exception of a few of the sides [beetroot, for example], and the units [250g instead of 9oz], the menu was just about the same.  And it was  the first restaurant at which we’ve had American style service, where the hostess greeted us, seated us, and the waiter was there within minutes.  I would have to say that the food wasn’t nearly the same as the Outback back home.  I had the special, and it while it was tasty, it just wasn’t quite as flavourful.  Ruthie had her filet, and had the same comment.  Plus, they don’t have A1 or any steak sauce, so Ruthie was missing out on that.  The mashed potatoes were still damned good though.  And t he bread was just as tasty.  Unfortunately, they don’t let you pick two sides, and you have to pick soup or salad as one of your sides, so we all got a little salad.  I totally agree with Ruthie: I think I missed ranch dressing.  No dessert - we were way too full.

Back at the hotel, I made full use of the internet, stalked some people on FB, sent an email or two, and looked up Kindle Support, and phoned in the issue.  Ruthie will have a new Kindle in a couple weeks, and then all will be right in her world again.  They covered the replacement entirely, so all we have to do is get Ruthie a new skin to replace the one she’ll lose when we send the broken Kindle back.

As I wrap this up, I will close by saying, I’m glad Ruthie pulled the trigger and we got here.  Sure, it’s the most expensive part of our trip, but we expected that, and sure it’s a bit chaotic dealing with a foreign city, but it’s been fun.  Plus, the view from our 20th floor room is pretty good [not as awesome as the view from our first night here where we looked over the Opera House, but still good].

-EP