Happy New Year, Mates!!!

Welcome to the year 2009!!! I have been enjoying a nice, long visit to the USA and took a break from blogging. Now, it is back to living in the Land Down Under. Sydney is experiencing a heat wave. Last night, at 9:00 PM it was a balmy 30-degrees celcius (86-degrees Fahrenheit). Everyone expects the heat to break next Tuesday. Let's hope so, we only have air-conditioning on one floor. Many of our neighbors aren't that lucky.

I approach this New Year with a new and positive attitude. BigDogDaddy's industry has taken a huge hit in the USA, so we are all grateful for the work here in Sydney. I also am comfortable driving on the left-side of the road (at least as comfortable as I will ever be.) I am also grateful for all the times I have been utterly and totally lost in Sydney...now I have a good feel for how the city is set up. It will also be great to begin the school year properly (it begins January 28th). So, it is onward and upward down under!!!

This New Year, we are also finding ourselves embracing the Oz lifestyle. Our main wardrobe this week has been swimmies, boardies and thongs along with our sunnies shading our eyes. We are also slip, slap and slopping. (see earlier blog entry for vocablulary definitions) We also have all windows open hoping to catch a breeze and not a bird. Next Monday, we will be one of the many enjoying the ferry races, big ships regatta and fireworks of Australia Day. The harbor will be teeming with fun activities. One difficult tradition to embrace is vegemite. Aussies love it! In the supermarket there are tubes of it, jars of it and blister packs w/crackers. They eat it on toast, biscuits(crackers) and Domino's pizza sells "Vegemite cheesy bread". I must say, we have all given it a go. It is vile stuff to the American palate. It isn't just nose scrunching bad, it is "wipe-your-tongue-off-with-your-napkin" bad. It is a brewer's yeast extract blended with celery, onion and salt. It is basically boiled-down, sticky, black beer. Since we have yet to "acquire" the taste, our complete transformation into Aussie-Americans will be slower than usual. If you want to try it yourself...have some napkins handy.

So, as all of my loved ones and friends in America enjoy the lastest installation of the Ice Age, we wish you a very warm Happy 2009!


Things I like this week:
1. The cool, new Qantas A-380. It is a double-decker, luxurious way to cross the Pacific Ocean. Former Australian prime minister John Howard was on our flight (first-class, of course).

2. Summer Aussie fruit. Kiwi's, cherries, mangoes, berries...yum!

3. School uniforms. Each child got a new pair of black, hard-soled school shoes....done with back to school shopping!!!

4. Vince Flynn's new book Extreme Measures.

Things I don't like this week:
1. Heat and humidity.

2. Traffic around our area...lots of beaches=lots and lots of cars. Many of them with boats, kayaks, surfboards, longboards attached.

3. Parking...it goes hand-in-hand with traffic. Everyone is trying to beat the heat.