Good Morning!

It's 6:30 in the morning and I've just spent the past hour working on an essay due tomorrow. Eeek! I'm not usually one to put things off till the last minute, but I had grand plans to work on it while I was in Canada for the past two weeks (just got back yesterday morning). But instead of working on my essay, I spent my time in Canada doing the following:

1) Visiting family and friends in no less than three Ontario cities + Montreal
2) Driving to all those cities (which actually wasn't so bad, and based on that experience, I'm considering an alternate career as a truckie, should this whole PhD thing turn out to be a bust)
3) Attending a public health conference in Toronto
4) Attending a wedding (Congrats Neil!!!)
5) Eating lots and lots of foods and drinks not available in Sydney (the list includes: Timbits, Tim Hortons' iced coffees, poutine, mmmmm poutine!!!)
6) (When not being looked after by generous family members) entertaining Gus with trips to a water park, arcade, the local pool, and a six flags in Montreal.

I had a great visit to Canada, but it was a whirlwind tour, the planning of which was akin to the National/Provincial/Territorial meetings I used to plan when I was a public servant. And despite good intentions, I missed seeing some friends and family members that I really wanted to see again.

Anywhoo, here I am, back in Sydney, suffering from another bout of crazy jetlag, but extremely happy to be home and see Vic again (who stayed in Sydney while we were in Canada eating timbits and poutine).

Off I go for a run (my cure for jetlag is sunlight and exercise), followed by more essay writing. I'm trying to get it all in early, since if yesterday is any indication, I'll likely be falling asleep tonight at around 6:30pm.

Getting ready to climb back down

About a week and a half ago, I handed in a couple of papers to my thesis advisors to review. And while I was waiting for their feedback, there were about a million things I could have done (reading, start writing an essay due in June, drafting up chapters for my thesis...). Instead, I procrastinated, procrastinated and then procrastinated some more.... In my defense, I think I was a little burnt out from all the work I put into those two papers. In the week in a half since I handed in those papers, I did a minimum of thesis work and way too much friday-night-lights-watching and playing in general. Just yesterday, Gus had a sleepover at a friend's and Vic and I enjoyed dinner and a movie (complete with a choc top), and this morning - out for bacon and egg rolls and flat whites at a coffee shop down the street. mnum, mnum. But, it's all coming to an end. I got their feedback on Friday and I need to hunker down and finish up these papers (one is due on May 31st). So, scuse me, while I climb back down into the hole that is my phd. I'll be back soon.

p.s. - went to see Girl with the Dragon Tattoo last night and it was a ripper! (as they say). Lisbeth was fantastic and the winter scenes reminded me of why I shouldn't complain that it's only going up to 18C tomorrow. If you haven't yet, do go see it.

Go for a run with...

Michelle!

I'm soooo jealous of all the flatness in those pictures.

Laying down the gauntlet

Running in Sydney involves hill training, whether you're interested in hill training or not, every single time (unlike Ottawa where we had to actively go looking for hills in order to get some hill training in). It's a killer. And it's probably why I only run on Saturdays and Sundays and why it usually takes me a really long time to 'prepare' for my runs. Preparing involves making sure I have the perfect music mix and my shoes are tied just so (sadly this can take a couple of tries to get it just right). But when I do finally make it out, I'm rewarded every time with some spectacular views.

Living by the beach in Sydney means living by the coastal walkway and what could be better than a run along the ocean. Here's my route, starting at our local beach:



a little off-trail running, Sydney-style:

Up one of many sets of stairs:

..and back on the walkway:





Made it to the next beach over and to my turnaround point:

Then turn around and head back to our beach. I'm not sure if you can spot them, but there were a ton of surfers in the water today - look for the little black flecks in the water.


And the music for my run today was indeed perfect. I used this playlist from Runner's World, prefaced by a couple of warm-up songs (Living Proof|Cat Power and On the Borderline|Sally Seltmann). The Runner's World mix has a great selection of fast-paced 90s grunge. If Prodigy yelling in your ears to "EXHALE" doesn't move those legs, I'm not sure what will.

OK - so here's a challenge for Michelle and anyone else out there who walks, runs or cycles. Take your camera with you next time you head out on your favourite route, take some pics of the highlights and then post them along with your fave music mix on your blog or on flickr or wherever and let me know about it in the comments or via e-mail and I'll post the link. It'll be fun and inspiring. Do it!

p.s.: the 'Tahs won on Friday night so they're moving on to the semi-finals!!!! GO THE 'TAHS!

GO THE 'TAHS!!!

We're a little sad that we can't be in Canada right now during the playoffs, cheering on the Habs. So, instead, we're heading out to catch some footy (in this case, Rugby Union) tonight to cheer on the 'Tahs (Warratahs), hopefully to the semi-finals.

I know NOTHING about Rugby, and in fact my knowledge of anything remotely footy-related is limited to what I've seen on Friday Night Lights. But, Vic loves rugby, in fact I think it's one of the reasons he was interested in coming to Australia. And his excitement is contageous, so we're all counting down till tonight's game.

For Marcle

I never did manage to find the usb cord for my camera, so I ended up ordering one from Hong Kong through ebay. It cost me 6 bucks, including shipping and it arrived within a week of ordering, so I was pleased as punch with my purchase.

Armed with my new usb cord, I downloaded more than a month's worth of pics onto my laptop the other day and found this picture that we snapped when we were in Melbourne for a weekend while my parents were visiting. C'mon, people, how cool is this? A country where laneways are named after acca dacca, the coolest band on earth!

Picture in your mind...

That's what you'll have to do this week, because I've misplaced the USB cord for my camera. And such a shame because I've got a ton of great pics from our Easter weekend away in Bateman's Bay (about 5 hours south down the coast), all trapped away in my camera. We fished, we bush-walked and swam; we tested out the 4WD on the truck (hadn't intended to, but it was all fine in the end); and we saw wild kangaroos, wallabies and parrots. Bateman's Bay is right next to the Murramarang National Park, which is positively, draw-droppingly, beautiful. It's just as well that I can't show you the pictures, because they likely wouldn't do it justice.

To top it off, the Monday we came back from Bateman's Bay, we went out to see the Avett Brothers, who are one of our all-time favourite bands. They're from North Carolina and are currently touring oz. They were amazing, the kind of band who is even better live than recorded. They sang lots of my favourites, and their rendition of Paranoia in B Flat Major was most phenomenol.

Today I'm at home with Gus. He's on the 2nd week of his two week school break. We're enjoying a nice, lazy day in, so I decided to take the opportunity to whip up a batch of Bircher Muesli. I don't remember seeing this in Canada, but it's a big thing here. Basically, you mix up a 500g box of muesli (I'm fond of Carman's) with a 1kg tub of yoghurt, a grated apple, maybe some honey if you've got a sweet tooth and let it sit in your fridge. It gets better with time, and lasts for as long as the yoghurt lasts. It makes for a quick, healthy brekkie. yummmm.