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exumenius

170 Blog Entries
2 Trips
477 Photos

Trips:

Down Under trip Preparation
Kiwis and Kangaroos

Shorthand link:

http://blogabond.com/exumenius




In Search of Reedy Creek Ranch - Night 4

Taroom, Australia

Our team leader John arrived around 7 o’clock this morning to begin packing up the troupee(basically a modified Jeep with seating for eight in the rear) and the trailer for our long haul to Expedition National Park. Involved with myself in this week long adventure were Daniel, Jana, Aaron, Mandy,Glen, our leader John and an illegal sidekick Brian. Glen turned out to be a local guy whose conservation studies mandated 80 hours of volunteer work. Twenty something, with a Mohawk and army fatigue pants, Glen cast himself as a bit of a harrowing character at first glance, however, after meeting him, his smile gave away his true nature; that of a quiet, hard-working fellow. Team Leader John, was an ex-oil geologist turned outdoorsman, who could have been old man Jackl’s twin, in both looks and demeanor. Brian, our stowaway, on the other hand, was quite the opposite, a Jeckl to John’s Hyde. Numerous tattoos, including BEER – one letter on each of the four fingers of his left hand – and a few scars spoke of a misspent youth that carried over a bit too far into adulthood. He was rather small and gaunt, about 5’5”, 150 pounds soaking wet, and had a manner of speech and movement incredibly similar to John Diemel. After hearing the first dozen stories out of his mouth, I decided that was exactly what he was: an Australian version of my hometown neighbor, Mr. Diemel. Oh yeah, the reason I say Brian was an illegal sidekick is that though he is a usual team leader about six months ago he was weed-eating when he took off his glasses to wipe some sweat and the end of the weed-eater hit the ground and kick a piece of metal directly into his eye. It went through the front and lodged itself in the retina. Four surgeries later, he is still wearing a patch, is on limited duty and isn’t supposed to be working, but boredom has got the best of him so he decided to ride along for free.


The Troupee in Taroom
Introductions and packing finished, we hid the road for what was to be an estimated six hour drive. The first hour and half was spent climbing the range up to the city of Toowoomba. On our climb up the steep grade we passed an old, bright pink car carrying two young girls struggling up the hill. Glancing over we spotted a large plastic dildo glued to the dashboard. The girls looked up, smiled and waved. We nearly drove in the ditch from laughter. Home of Queenstown University (or something like that), Toowoomba is a nice little college town perched on the edge of a plateau. We stopped for a quick stretch. The seats in the back of the troupee will numb even the fattest of asses in the first thirty minutes. After Toowoomba, the terrain levels out quickly. This is cattle country. Were we not driving on the left side of the road, one could fall asleep, awake and think you were smack dab in the center of Nebraska. A small town dots the map every 50 to 70 miles, all of them identical to the one before it. Around noon, we pulled off in the town of Chinchilla for lunch and our first taste of the coming annoyance known as harvest flies. A notch smaller than the common American housefly, what they lack in size they more than make up for in tenacity. A strange casual observation: each of these small farm towns has a skate park, and not one of them was in use.

At Miles, we turned north towards Taroom. The table-flat farmland began to give way to rolling hills, some pasture, most in their native scrub grass and savanna-like foliage. A few kilometers past Taroom we hung a left onto Robinson Creek Road, a red dirt road. This would be the last time we would see pavement (or bitumen as the Aussies call it) for days. For about a 100 KMs we bounced along in the back of the troupee dodging potholes, branches and the occasional kangaroo or wallaby. We came upon a fork in the road, and as Yogi Berra suggested, we took it. Actually, we hung a left, following (rather errantly as we would soon discover) the sign pointing toward Expedition National Park. Fifty kilometers later the end of the road appeared, with the Starkvite Campground to the right. Not where we were scheduled to say. Upon thieving a map from the campground, it was discovered that the directions we had been given were wrong and we had taken a left when we should have went


Reedy Creek Ranch
right. A bout two hours, three more turnarounds, one blue refrigerator and one bleached out road sign later, we arrived at the Reedy Creek Ranch, our intended destination. The trip took nine hours, eight of them on the road...much too long in the back of the troupee. As it was already dusk, John cooked a quick meal of jammers and mashies (hot dogs and mashed potatoes). The place is off the grid and the generator goes off at nine, so we unpacked our sleeping bags and headed to sleep on the veranda. Due to the Adrian’s (the owner) pervish tendencies the girls were allowed to sleep inside, us men were stuck under the stars.

What I Learned Today: Those of us who live in cities are missing out on one of the world’s great wonders: the night sky. Here at Reedy Creek Ranch, miles from any light pollution, the full breadth of the stars are on display. Though it is not the northern sky that I am so familiar with, its magnificence is not in the least bit diminished. I fear that there are many among us who have never truly seen the night sky in all its splendor, and what a shame that is.


permalink written by  exumenius on October 14, 2007 from Taroom, Australia
from the travel blog: Kiwis and Kangaroos
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Prepping for Our First Adventure - Night 3

Brisbane, Australia

Still not quite on Aussie time, as I awoke with sun at 5:30 am. No sense wasting a beautiful morning lying in bed and listening to the trains roll by the Albion Station, so I got up and went for a walk. I headed east and found the little shopping center technically called Woolowin. It has a grocery store, a Bi-Lo (whatever the hell that is), a Blockbuster, numerous real estate offices, but most importantly, a St. Vincent de Paul’s. I’ll be headed there later today to buy some work shirts and large sun hat, plus whatever cheap garb I can get my hands on.

Later on, my trip to St. Vinnie’s was a total bust. Some very nice $6 dress shirts were plentiful. There were also four racks of women’s belts, a whole bin of cassette tapes for $1, and special section of stuffed animals, but anything remotely resembling a men’s work quality shirt was nowhere to be found. I returned to the house empty handed. After lunch, Peter and I jumped the train to downtown to try to find some free internet at one of the libraries and for me to finish my shopping. (Note: The ticket men at the Albion station could be the most unhappy people on the planet, I guess calling out “The Shorncliffe Line will be arriving on Platform 4 in three minutes” all day can really take its toll.)


Brisbane from the Pedestrian Bridge
The city library on the north bank, though a beautiful building, was useless to a tourist. One needed a library card to do anything, including going to the bathroom. Across the river the State Library proved quite a bit more fruitful. The information center on the first floor was packed with people on laptops and others waiting in the queues for a free 20 minute online session on the provided desktop computers. While the wireless was free, it was terribly slow, and though I was able to answer some email and post a blog entry, I could not upload photos nor view any such content. What should have taken me 30 minutes, took 3 hours. I need to find a better place to get a free connection, or just break down and pay for it somewhere.

We then headed to Target in the Queen’s Street Mall underground. Within 2 minutes of being in the store I had lost Peter, not an easy thing to do considering the tall, skinny Korean was wearing a black and white Where’s Waldo-ish hat. After a few laps I gave up on him, figuring he had either went his own way or been decapitated by the samurai clad man who was hanging out in Housewares section. Either way, I could have been no further help, so I carried on with my afternoon. I felt a bit bad, because his English is marginal and he got lost yesterday and had to take a cab home, but I got over it. I eventually found some suitable work shirts at the Big W on sale for $10. A pretty good deal considering, my little tube of Carmex cost me $4.75. My advice to anyone coming to Australia: stock up on cosmetics, they are double or triple the price over here.

Returned home to do some reading and took a nap. In the evening we had a large communal spaghetti dinner. Afterwards everyone took their turn emptying their camera memory cards onto my computer. We are going to get some DVDs this week so I can burn everyone a disk at the end of the volunteer session. Most people, like myself, are staying over here for at least a few months, some more, and photos seem to accumulate pretty quickly in a beautiful place like this. Turns out my laptop will be a savior to more people than just myself.

What I Learned Today: Spending a day with someone whose English isn’t the greatest teaches you to clean up your vernacular slang and poor enunciation habits. I don’t know how many times with Peter I had to rephrase something because I was speaking in Midwest slang or uttering nonsense out of the corner of my mouth. Also, it is really funny listening to him pronounce his Ls as Rs. New Zealand becomes New Zearand, library is ribrary, etc. If you think the girl from Lost in Translation was exaggerating, she wasn’t.

PS: Speaking of language issues, yesterday Matt, the funny guy from Wales, was telling a story about him and his brother’s trip around New South Wales and Victoria in a camper van, when he managed to use the words Wanker, Tosser, and Bloody Fucking Bollocks all in the same sentence. Classic fucking British (or Welsh, rather).


permalink written by  exumenius on October 13, 2007 from Brisbane, Australia
from the travel blog: Kiwis and Kangaroos
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Meeting the Team - Night 2

Brisbane, Australia


I awoke early today, as usual, and spent

Brisbane Skyline
the first few hours of the morning using what I would later learn to have been some of my last free wireless internet access for some time. Checked out of the Brisbane City Backpackers around 9 am and headed east over the William Jolly Bridge to the South Bank, and eventually on to the Conservation Volunteers’ Home Office. We were to arrive at 11am, I showed up at 9:30 and they weren’t quite ready for me, so I dropped my pack and took a wander through the

Mangrove Swamp
South Bank Parklands, a verdant, beach-ish park along the south bank of the Brisbane River. I came upon a pedestrian bridge over the river to the City Botanical Gardens on the north bank near downtown. A beautiful city park, no doubt. By far the most interesting part was the elevated boardwalk through a partially-submerged mangrove forest.

Made my way back to the office by 10:45 to find two of my fellow volunteers had already arrived; Mandy, a mid to late 30s, British woman from a little town near Manchester. I came to find out that she sold all of her belongings in April and has been traveling the world volunteering ever since. The other prompt team member Peter (Hu Wuan), a mathematics student from South Korea. Minutes later, our fourth and final member of our group, Daniel, a mid-20s fellow also from England, arrived. We were painfully subjected to the obligatory safety video and orientation session and then broke for lunch to get to know each other a little bit. My first actual meal in Australia was a delicious salmon/chickpea sandwich with cream cheese. At first, $10 AUS might seem a bit pricey for a sandwich, but once you figure that tax is already included and tips are not expected, it seems fairly reasonable…now if only the dollar weren’t so weak – the Europeans definitely have an advantage over here. We returned and were whisked away to the volunteer house, our place of lodging while we weren’t out in the field. FYI: The first time you ride in a right side driver’s car, especially in the front seat, is a bit of a scare.


The Volunteer House
Our digs are located in Albion, a northern suburb, about 5 train stops from downtown. The place is an old Queenstown house (which meant nothing to me until I saw it) consisting of an amalgamation of rooms and covered porches that appear to have been added in the most haphazard of manners over the past 100 years. The 12 foot ceilings, decorative woodworking, and maze-like floor plan do offer a certain bit of charm, however. It lacks air-conditioning and insulation of any kind, so the days are hot and the nights cool as wind seems to blow straight through the place. The house consists of two women’s rooms, two men’s rooms, a caretaker’s room, kitchen, two baths, a laundry, and various lounges and dens. The back yard has a small courtyard. I am rooming with Daniel and Peter this week, though as volunteers come and go we’ve been warned that room assignments are likely to change.

Around 3pm the other crew of volunteers returned from their weekly assignment in Noosa. In this group were Matt, a 31-year old from Wales, Aaron a 19-year old student from New Hampshire, Jana (pronounced Yana), a cute little, 20-year old from Berlin, Germany, Anna a youngster from Tasmania, and Lena, a mid-40s women from somewhere, though judging by her misappropriation of pronouns and poor verb conjugation, somewhere English is not the primary language. Apparently a few more souls will be filtering in over the weekend.

Our volunteer program is set up so that we spend the weekends here in Brisbane and each Monday, or sometimes Sunday, we are put into groups and taken to our place of work. We stay at the volunteer work site until Friday afternoons and then return to Brisbane for the weekend. The best part is that we can leave things at the house during the week, so we do not need to haul all of our possessions out into the wild. While at the house, they provide all the food, all we have to do is cook it and clean up after ourselves. We’ve received our first assignment already; this Sunday, Daniel, Aaron, Jana, Mandy and Glen(?) and I leave at 8 am on Sunday morning for a 6 hour drive to Expedition National Park on the other side of the mountains in what is considered the Queensland outback. We’ll be camping out in the wild until Friday morning, so for anyone reading this, you’ll likely not get another update from me until next Friday at the earliest.

After some time chatting with the new volunteers, or volleys as we are known, Matt, Aaron, Jana, and I took off for Cambridge Street to do a bit of shopping and grab a pint or two. Cambridge Street is a bit of a poor man’s Queen’s Street Pedestrian Mall. The shops are dirty and cheaper, the pubs more abundant and every block a few peep shows tuck themselves into small nooks and upstairs spaces. My kinda place. After the young kids grabbed some smokes, we settled on The Elephant and Wheelbarrow, advertised as a traditional English Pub. Having never been into a traditional English Pub, who was I to argue with this proclamation? Had two pints of Toohey’s, which tasted a bit like Leinenkugel’s Original.

On the return trip I had my first run in with the Aussie law. Earlier I had errantly purchased an off-peak train ticket, which means it was not good from 3pm to 7pm. We boarded the train back to the house at 6:58 and wouldn’t you know it, immediately two transit officers stepped on board to check our tickets. When he saw mine and said “This is an off-peak ticket”, I responded in my best confused tourist, American accent “you mean it isn’t 7pm?”. He looked at his watch and said, “you are two minutes early, don’t worry about and don’t do it again.” I am such a badass.

What I Learned Today: The first five minutes you meet someone tells you all you ever need to know about them...well almost everything, usually. Six hours in and I appear to be spot on with everyone. Makes me wonder what they all think about me. The interesting part about this volunteering arrangement is that each Friday people come and go, so I’ll get to try out this little psycho/socio-logical experiment every week.


permalink written by  exumenius on October 12, 2007 from Brisbane, Australia
from the travel blog: Kiwis and Kangaroos
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Touchdown in Australia - Night 1

Brisbane, Australia

I landed in Brisbane around 11:30 local time,

My First Glimpse of Australia
and was free from the rigors of customs by noon. Stepping outside was similar to stepping into a sauna. It felt like New Orleans in March, minus the pervasive smell of stale urine and sour milk. A man on the train told me that they’ve been getting some torrential rains the last few weeks, which has led to the uncustomarily high level of humidity. I hope he’s right. The Brisbane City Backpacker’s Hostel was about a ¼ mile walk from the train station. Half way there I was soaked.

Brisbane from the Air
The evaporative cooling powers of sweat are greatly minimized when the relative humidity hits 90%. It is sort of like trying to fit a third corn-fed Minnesota girl into the back of a Volkswagen; there just isn’t any more room for her (or the water) to go.

Checked into my room to find the two inhabitants already there were busy speaking German. I waited for a while, to make sure they weren’t talking about how they hate dirty Americans, and then calmly asked them in German where the shower was. Looks of pleasant surprise fell over their faces, especially when they learned that I was from the US. I think they were amazed that anyone from the States knew German. After swapping stories, it turns out one of them was from Poland, the other from Germany. Our final roommate showed, a Czech named Vladimir, who also spoke German. Though in the end, English one out, likely due to mine and Vlad’s poor Deutsch. Everyone went their separate ways, with me heading back to the train station to get an AC adapter. The voltage in Australia is the same; it is just that the top two prongs are turned at 45 degree angles.


Brisbane Square
Upon returning to the hostel, I promptly crashed and slept until 6. Quite a surprise to me, the sun was setting at the 6 o’clock hour as I awoke. I took a walk downtown to find some cheap food. While Brisbane is most certainly a 20th century, automobile-centric city, the traffic is beautifully quiet. In over an hour of walking, I heard one or two horns at the most and not a single siren. I eventually ran into the Queens Street pedestrian mall. Imagine a packed mall, three blocks long, full of bars in the middle and stores on the outside, all exposed to the great outdoors. Needless to say, a great place for a stroll and some people watching. I eventually found a grocery store in the underground level of the mall. Prices were somewhat similar to back home, though it seems meat is bit pricier and the selection of fruit isn’t quite as expansive. I settled on bananas and the old standby, granola bars (or muesli bars as is the nomenclature here down under.)

Returned to the hostel and headed to the lounge


Some Church Downtown
to return some emails and work on the blog. The room was packed with most of the inhabitants were mesmerized by the Simpsons on the TV. The bar downstairs was full, but not overly packed. As much as I desired to find my roommates and have a beer or six, it was already 9pm, I could hardly keep my eyes open, I was over my $50 per diem, and I really needed a good sleep (Monday night was my most recent horizontal sleep.), so I headed to bed around 10pm…there will be plenty of opportunities in the next six months to belly up to a bar, that and I am due at the volunteer office at 10 tomorrow morning. A pretty calm first day, which I needed. The jet lag isn't as bad as flying to Europe, but I still feel a bit off.

What I Learned Today: It is tough to jaywalk in a place where the cars are coming from the wrong direction. I probably crossed 35 crosswalks in my travels today and I still look the wrong way for traffic every time. Thus, in the name of safety, I’ve taken to waiting for the little green man.


permalink written by  exumenius on October 11, 2007 from Brisbane, Australia
from the travel blog: Kiwis and Kangaroos
tagged Brisbane
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The Longest Day (or Three) - Night 0

Suva, Fiji

Technically October 9th began at Justin’s house in Tucson and ended somewhere over the Pacific Ocean, however, for me it stretched all the way to my landing in Fiji early on the morning of October 11th.


The Big Board
First off, a big thanks to Ed for letting me drive his truck down to the airport. The flight to LA from Tucson was rather non-descript, with the mild exception of flying over that accidental oasis, the Salton Sea. After gathering my baggage and bussing it to the Bradley Terminal, I was immediately accosted by a group of Mormon missionaries upon entering the food court. They were quickly shoed away, only to attack a nearby elderly couple. If I had it my way Evangelism would be illegal at the airport.

I lucked out on the flight to Fiji and had an empty seat between me and my rowmate, Rahim. Rahim works as a shelf stocker for Costco in Oakland six months out of the year, the other half he spends back in Fiji. He was a friendly, older man, who turned into a whiny bitch after he didn’t get the special Muslim meal that he ordered. He verbally berated the flight attendant, who had no control over the situation, for about 15 minutes. Finally, one of the flight attendant sacrificed her fish meal just so he would shut up. When his breakfast came with a sausage in it, the same process was repeated.

I slept on and off for about half of the flight.


Landing in Fiji
It was my first time on a double decker 747 and the leg room was plenty adequate. The media options were rather poor, but the service was excellent. We crossed the equator southwest of Hawaii at 2:46 local time (whatever time zone we were in). A few hours later we crossed the International Date Line, and my nearly non-existent Wednesday, October 10th passed into the dark ocean night.

We landed in Nadi, Fiji at 5:10 local time. Stepping out of the plane I was greeted by the rising sun and perfectly still, warm, heavy tropical air. Inside the terminal a band of Fijian men in skirts struck up a tune for us. I lay down on the floor of the airport for a quick nap thus ending one of the longest days of my life.

What I Learned Today: Bula is Fijian for Hello, Danaka for Thank You.


permalink written by  exumenius on October 10, 2007 from Suva, Fiji
from the travel blog: Kiwis and Kangaroos
tagged Fiji
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An End and A Beginning

Los Angeles, United States

Today brings an end to my two week barnstorming tour of all the places I used to live. It was great to see so many old friends again. These reunions made me realized how poor of a job I have done keeping in touch over the years. In this day and age, it is so simple (not to mention free) to send an email just to keep up to date on old friends, yet we all seem so hard pressed to do this elementary task.

I want to take this opportunity to thank all those people who've offered me hospitality over the past two weeks: Jeremy and Chessa, Jesse, Brett and Miranda, Matt and the rest of the Dugout, Joanna and Julie, Rick, Chad and Crissy, Justin, and Ed. This trip wouldn't have been possible without each and every one of you, and for that I am indebted to you all.

Sitting in the Los Angeles Airport it finally hit me that every person I meet for the next six months will be a new friend. Every face I see is a new face, an unknown, but an opportunity. Chances are that some of the people I meet over the next six months will be people who may end up being some of my best friends or maybe my wife (or quite possibly a mortal enemy), but, what if i had planned my vacation a year later, a month, a day; i may have met a completely differenct set of people. How can anyone deny free will in such circumstances? Fate is bullshit. Our experiences are the the simple circumstances of our decisions. Thus is any decision wrong? Or are the consequences of it merely undesirable (at the present time, given our present perspective). I hope this trip can be my chance to open my mind and take each decision and its consequences for what they are, and learn and grow from each of them.

Here's to new friends, new places, new experiences, and, likely, a new me.


permalink written by  exumenius on October 9, 2007 from Los Angeles, United States
from the travel blog: Down Under trip Preparation
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Last Night Stateside - Night 13

Tucson, United States

Columbus Day, a second rate holiday if that.

Tucson Mountain Park
My hosts, however, were required at their day jobs, so I had the pleasure of taking the Volvo for a ride today. After another conference call tying up some loose ends at work, I drove west on Speedway Boulevard up to Gates Pass Recreation Area in Tucson Mountain Park. I hiked a short way up to a small, rock outcropping that likely had a name, though I don't know it, and hung out for a while letting the warm desert wind blow through my hair. From my perch I contemplated the dangerous beauty of this place. Life clings so precariously to the rock and dirt here. The plants and animals use each drop of water as if it were their last, and when given the chance they explode in beautiful colors and odds shapes, vicious bites and sharp points. Tis a small and juvenile mind that finds the desert boring and dull.

Tucson Mountain Park

Tucson Mountain Park

In the afternoon i finished up some final shopping errands. Chad and Crissy returned home and we headed to our old happy hour haunt, Bison Witches, for my last supper, as it were. The waitresses remained as good looking as ever, though the potato bacon soup was a bit more watered down than I remember. Justin met us out and I spent the night as his place near Mountain and Grant.

What I Learned Today: I have some truly amazing, generous friends all across this amazing land.


permalink written by  exumenius on October 8, 2007 from Tucson, United States
from the travel blog: Down Under trip Preparation
tagged Hike and TucsonMountains
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Recovery: Take Two - Night 12

Tucson, United States


The Hotel Congress
Awoke to the sound of train whistles and large trucks removing the fencing and other apparati from last night’s festivities. Our room was at the very end of the hall, at the strange triangle peak of the building, perhaps one of the most character-ful rooms in the place. Though the Congress would not be considered luxury by today’s standards, at one time it was the place to be in Tucson. What it lacks in modern amenities it more than makes up for in quirk and class. It is absolutely great to stay in a hotel that doesn’t have television in the rooms. It forces the guests to leave their rooms and socialize in the downstairs café, lobby, or bar. I think one of the toughest parts about traveling by yourself, especially for work purposes, is the isolation that occurs after the normal working hours. Suburban, Interstat-ish hotels and motels lack true public space and thus each evening is spent mindless watching reruns in the oversized and under-interesting rooms. Not at the Congress. No the Congress is a throwback to the time when traveling was done for the experience and the encounters, not just to say we’ve been somewhere.

We checked out and headed home in order


Raja - The Cat
to get breakfast and nap. For dinner, we stopped by my old favorite Long Wong’s for a mini-bucket of wings. The evening was spent watching CSI – Las Vegas reruns and playing with Raja the cat. Early to bed.

WIL: Sometimes when you fall upon a new idea (or at least an idea new to you) you immediately begin to find manifestations of that idea or thought in everything you see, hear and read and everyone you talk to. It was almost as if it was there all along (it usually is), but you were just too blind to see it. I find this happens most often with ideas or recognitions that challenge, or often change, our most basic ethical and moral principles. It has made me realize that perspective is so very important in our lives, whether it be politically, socially, or spiritually. And since perspective is shaped by our experiences and education, we should strive to enhance these two at all costs.

permalink written by  exumenius on October 7, 2007 from Tucson, United States
from the travel blog: Down Under trip Preparation
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Robyn and Chris's Wedding - Night 11

Tucson, United States

Today was the big day for Chris and Robyn and

My old roommate Chad and I
the reason for my visit to Tucson. Chad was in the wedding party so he had to leave early for pictures, meanwhile Chrissy and I headed to the historic Hotel Congress to check into our hotel for the evening. Tonight was also the Annual Club Crawl, a large festival downtown with bands and beer tents. The very epicenter of the event is Hotel Congress, so we would be right in the middle of the action. But first the wedding.

Since Chris’s family is Catholic, the wedding would take place in a Catholic Church right after the 4 pm mass. By the time the local families filed out and we filed in it was nearly 5:40 by the time the wedding began. A surprisingly large showing considering none of the family, and only a few of the friends actually live in Arizona. Though it was a traditional Catholic wedding, it only took 40 minutes (which was still a bit on the long side in my book.) The priest, whom the Etzkorns flew in from Seattle, was an old, fat man who had enough of a sense of humor to keep us all awake. His homily focused on the three types of love; erotic, friendship, and sacrificial, which I thought was very interesting and somewhat philosophical.

The reception followed at the Tucson Museum of Art,


The Wedding Reception
a sheik and elegant venue. The food was excellent, especially the rubbed shrimp hor’s de ouerves. We ate outside, dancing was limited and booze was free. Music was provided via an Ipod and the Museum was open for cavorting. All things considered, probably the ideal reception, as far as I am concerned.

At around 11 we headed back to the Hotel Congress and the madness that was Club Crawl. Courtesy of our hotel guest status we were able to jump the lines and get in for free. We changed out of our dress clothes and rushed downstairs to the outdoor stage. The remainder of the night was fairly non-descript, just some music, more drinks that I didn’t need and stumbling to bed around 2 am. A long, but enjoyable day.


Jessica, Crissy and I at Club Crawl
What I Learned Today: The Catholic Church explains the existence in the Bible of Song of Songs (that old erotic Egyptian poem) as the book that describes God’s love towards us. Not surprisingly, it is the only book of the Bible that doesn’t once mention God. Why can’t they just admit that they borrowed this text from another religion, like so much else in their holy book. But then again, what fun would the Bible be without a little taste of erotica.

permalink written by  exumenius on October 6, 2007 from Tucson, United States
from the travel blog: Down Under trip Preparation
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Recovery - Night 10

Tucson, United States

We checked out at 9 am and Chad and I took Chris out to the JW Marriot resort at Starr Pass. I had never been to this part of Tucson before, and though it reaked of suburbia, that fact that the resort bordered Tucson Mountain Park made it quite beautiful, and I will admit that the developers did a pretty good job of blending the place into its natural environs.

After arriving home, I had work to do. A half an hour call into the office left me with a busy afternoon, when all I really wanted to do was nap. I finally got my relief at about 3pm, when I finished what was due only an hour later. It seems every Friday I get a call with something due in two hours. I’ll be happy when it is over.


My Temporary Tucson Home

My hosts’ presence was required at the dress rehearsal, so I got to spend some time relaxing, reading, and watching the latest season of Entourage. A so often happens, while I was sitting on the balcony reading, I had what may prove to be a major breakthrough in our (Max and mine) little “appraiser assistant” software development scheme. I really hope the next six months of reading and relaxing will have as many such “ah ha” moments. Called it an early night and was in bed by 10:30 for some much needed sleep.

What I learned Today: It is a good thing I am going overseas and out into the jungle (or the outback) because I am finding that I am just one of those people who cannot seem to let go of work. I used to think people mad for working on vacation, etc, but now I find that I am constantly volunteering to do extra tasks and cannot seem to just let work go. I guess we all need something to keep us busy, however, we should fill this need with things we want to do, not things we are supposed to do. I guess part of me enjoys solving problems and being the man in the know….it is likely an ego thing and I hope I can transform it into a positive attribute in the future.

permalink written by  exumenius on October 5, 2007 from Tucson, United States
from the travel blog: Down Under trip Preparation
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