There's no place like home!

This has been such a whirlwind trip and I've disovered the perfect formula for coming down with the flu...

Take 1 cross-hemisphere plane trip on a Saturday that happens twice, with a dash of waiting in the Sydney and Honolulu airports, combined with a subsequet trans-pacific flight that's been delayed 4 hours; Add intense family time with a public social event that results in fireworks; Mix vigorously with emotionally laden catching up with cousins, and friends, making sure that there is at least a minimum of 10 years of stuff, collectively, to catch up on with everyone; Throw in a dash of LA traffic; Knead slowly with a best friend's wedding and all the emotions contained within. Oh yeah, do this in a timeframe of 8 days. And, viola: the flu will cach you as soon as you can blink. It's really an easy recipie. Goes back ages in my family.

My drive back to the Bay Area on Monday from Santa Monica was crazy. I've never had to actually use the rest areas (not rest stops, as Maggie and I found out) on Highway 5. But, they are actually conveniently located every 2 hours, and I used them for a 2 hour nap every 2 hours during my trip home. Yikes.

But now I've been in my bed at home for the last 3 days, being taken care of my my mom and my sister. Really not too shabby a situation. At least I'm not a plane with my ears stuffed up, or at home in Canberra in the middle of the summer with the flu. Mom and I decided it was the flu given my fever, chills, and the increased severity compared to what would be a cold...although I think my fever has broken. Now I'm just sleping it off.

And - since I'm home, I get my mexican sick food - homemade tortilla soup (!!!!) and my favorite burritos from the Taqueria by the high shool. Can't get that in Canberra!

It's good to be home at a time like this.

2 sleeps....

...and one LONG-ASS plane ride and I'll be back in Cali.

I'm now starting to get excited for this trip home - I'm looking forward to seeing my family and am hoping I can see all the friends I want to while I'm there.

I do wish I were going to Atlanta in this trip; I'd desperately love to see all my Atlanta people.

I'm in such a different place than I was at the beginning of the week. This is truly a roller coaster of emotions.



I've done some little things this week that have made me feel more settled... I finally unpacked the last of my stuff from September. I'm getting health insurance today. (I know mom, I should have done that imeediately, but I didn't). I've started to organize what needs to come back to Cali with me, and have realized that I have more gifts for people than I thought, so I don't have to stress about last minute souvenir shopping. Not that I won't be doing that anyway... I have 4 hours at the Sydney airport from the time the bus drops me off to when the plane leaves, and then 6 hours in Honolulu on Saturday morning. I'm hoping my friend Jason, who lives in Honolulu, will be able to go to breakfast with me in Honolulu on Saturday - I can't imagine staying in the airport that whole time! And my flights are on 2 different carriers, so I should be able to leave the airport. I hope.

Tonight I'm going to try dragon boating, with my housemate. I'm looking forward to being on the water in the lake, and she said there are 20 people in each of the 2 boats - so that's a lot of potential new friends!




I got a call last night from a friend of a friend, asking if I could sub onto their social soccer team tonight. I can't because of the dragon boating, and my knee, but I told him to call me for the next season... which he said he would. That would be great too, if I could get that going again. BTW - congrats to the Schmucks, my team in Atlanta, for winning it all this past season. Wish I could have been there... but looks like you guys are doing fine without me. :)

I have now run twice on my knee, and so far, so good (touch wood). I think the combination of riding and SLOWLY starting to run again will be good. I'm running for 20 minutes and then icing right away - and so far my knee doesn't hurt any more after the run than it normally does. It does hurt a bit while I'm running, but not so much that I need to stop. And the rest of the time it feels normal. It's just going to be a while before it's back to 100%. Or even 90%. I'd say it's at 70% right now. But, it is nice to run again - I really do love it and miss it!

Superbowl... Monday?

I took the day off yesterday, to watch the Superbowl. I'm not a huge Colts or Bears fan (but I'm very glad that the Colts won - good for Peyton, good for Dungy, and good that they recovered from a shaky start after Hester's return in the first 10 seconds) - but I decided I wanted to watch the game. It was televised live on Fox Sports and I mistakenly thought that meant I would also get to see the ads... but nope - the only ads I saw were for cricket and rugby. I guess that makes sense, why show US ads to an Aussie audience? However, it does make for a changed experience.

I watched the game at the Eastlake Football Club, which is about 5 minutes from my house. This is a club for 'members only' - I paid $2 to become a member - and they have numerous plasma TVs, a bar, gambling (machines and paper-based, like Lotto I think?) There was one other American couple there, in Canberra for another month finishing up an internship at a local winery. I didn't even get their names, despite having sat next to them and briefly chatting for 5 hours. Whatever.

Last Year:
1. Surrounded by friends
2. Great food - dips, Ash's white chili, bbq chicken, real chips (tortilla) and 7-layer dip
3. Volume!
4. Ads
5. Good conversation in the downtime
6. Winning some money for randomly picking the final digits of the first quarter score (or was it the halftime score? I can't remember).

This year:
1. Sitting in a club with 4 other people. 2 were American, 2 were Aussies, loudly wondering why you'd even watch a game like football. I didn't have enough energy to argue with them.
2. Lame fish and chips for lunch after half-time
3. For some reason the volume seemed really low on the TV we were watching. And there was construction going on, so half the game was drowned out by drilling. Again, I didn't have enough desire to request a volume increase.
4. No ads from home. Just the same ads for rugby and cricket and the same 2 car ads, for the Nissan (pronounced nisen over here) and the Jeep. I did get to see the half-time show, but it was pretty crappy if you ask me. Isn't there usually more than one artist that performs?
5. Okay conversation with the other Americans who were from New Orleans. You'd have thought there'd be more connection there, and I feel like I tried, but they didn't seem interested in anything more than idle game chit-chat.
6. Not winning any money.

I sort of wished I hadn't bothered to watch the game. It was definitely a let-down to see it over here, and I wished I could have found a place to watch it that had a few more people, but again, my desire to stretch out of my narrow comfort zone, which is pretty small right now, is about nil.

Why did I leave everything supportive to come here? Why am I spending hours on end, alone, wondering what to do next?

Sometimes loneliness is oppressive and paralyzing.

I don't know that I'd actually be doing anything differently with my weekends in Atlanta, but at least there, my friends were a short drive away and I knew there were people I could call. Here I feel so isolated.

It's really just tht first step to get out of the house and do something. To leave the cocoon of whatever that's created when you stay at home thinking too much.

I'm going hiking with a new friend this aftenoon. I think I'd rather stay in bed and hide, but I'm going to get out there. As soon as I finish this cry.

At this point I don't want to go to CA, because as soon as I get there I'm going to have to turn around and come back here. Is this home? Is that home? Is Atlanta home? Where the hell am I?

Saturday in Canberra

Today was my first Saturday in Canberra in a while. Since I'd been camping the last 2 weekends, I woke up this monring not really knowing what I was going to do with my day, since I don't have a Saturday routine yet.

I started by talking to some folks on Skype - which I love by the way... it's such an amazing thing to be able to talk to people like they were in the next room. I mean, I know telephones achieve the same thing, but I'm in Australia. In a different hemisphere. And I can talk to the speaker on my computer and hear people as if they were around the corner. I love technology.

After chatting with folks from home I decided that brekky should be the first thing on a Saturday agenda. So I went to idelic, a breakfast palce in Kingston that I love. They have the best poached egg, tomato, avocado, bacon, and bread special. WIth ginger/orange juice, it's perfect. yum.

I decided then to go to the National Gallery of Australia, about a 20 minute walk from my house. They have an Egyptian exhibit visiting from the Louvre and it was pretty cool. As I walked through I read everything with a mind to remember things to tell you, but I can't remember any of them now. So that's too bad for you, isn't it. Luckil, the NGA website has a neat section about this exhibit, so if you are totally interested you can check it out.

http://egyptianantiquities.com.au/Journey/Sections/Intro.cfm



After strolling around the gallery to see what else they have I headed home. And I've been here since then. Reading my book, taking a nap, contemplating grocery shopping (I've decided to do that tomorrow). Oh yeah - I did go for a run this afternoon. YAY! My knee definitely hurt, but I iced it right away and it doesn't feel any worse now than it did before the run. So I may be back in (slow and cautious) business again. It was really great to run again, even if it was a little painful. I definitely miss it.

Doesn't it sound exciting in Canberra? WooHoo.

I'm taking Monday off work so I can watch the Super Bowl. It's being televised live here on FoxSports. I just have to find a place to watch it. Preferably with other Americans so I don't have to explain the game to anyone. And I don't have to defend my desire to watch the game despite not really being a Colts or a Bears fan. Although, I've been told, I'm backing the Colts in this match-up, since the Bears CAN'T be SuperBowl champs.

Nice that I can take the day off work for a football (oops, I mean gridiron) game, huh? Gotta love flex time.

What's in a name?

I'd like to thank my mom and my dad for giving me the name Katie. Well, I guess technically, my name is Kathleen, but I'm glad they chose the nickname Katie. (Can you imagine me as a Kathy?) Having lived as Katie for almost 32 years now (yikes!) I'd have to say that the name suits me to a T, and as far as I can tell, is the best name ever.

Okay - that may be a bit much (and not at all unbiased), but whatever. I like it.

And I like it when people know my name.

There's this coffee place next door to my office, called Mocca. They have really good coffees and really nice sandwiches. I go there at least a couple of times a week. Today when I went over for my skim chai latte fix (I don't mind saying that I'm completely addicted to these) the woman who works there thanked me by name. Usually she asks for a name to call out with the coffee, but this time she remembered me! And this was the first time all week I'd been in!

It may seem small, but it really made my day to be recognized by the coffee girl.

There's also a clothing store over here called Katie's. Even if it wasn't called Katie's, I'd still go because I really like the clothes. It's just a bonus to me that half of my clothing now has a tag that says Katie's in fancy script. It's like when I was a kid and mom would sew name decals into my jackets and hats and sweaters.