Yay sun!

The sun is back in Melbourne! It makes life so much more enjoyable. I went out Friday night with Gavin, who I had met in Queenstown, and some of his friends. It was so nice to be out with locals! We had a great Vietnamese meal and hit a few bars in various neighborhoods. Saturday afternoon I had lunch with Greg, a Kiwi, and his Irish wife Tricia who moved to Melbourne a few years ago. I hadn't seen either of them since we finished grad school and it was great to catch up (and see their two little ones!). I spent the morning today at the Queen Victoria market. I splurged on a $9 hat, a $3 pair of sunglasses and an amalgamation of yummy things for my lunch. I'm going to head to the botanical gardens now and have an impromptu picnic of apples, bread, goat's cheese and random Aussie snack foods whose flavor will be a complete surprise to me. Again, the weather makes all these things possible!

For some reason as I was walking down the street today I remembered the pub tour I took in Sydney and I think I forgot to mention it. If you ever get to Sydney, it's well worth it to do The Rocks Pub Tour. You learn all about the Rocks area, the oldest in Sydney, the old pubs and the local beers. It was also memorable for a few funny things that happened along the way. I had signed up via phone and had to pick up my ticket in person. They couldn't find my reservation, but I luckily had my reservation number with me. As it turns out, the reason they couldn't find me in the system is my name was spelled "Fcretmater". When I arrived at the pub tour, our guide had our list of names and immediately asked me how to pronounce my name - I don't have any idea how you would even begin to pronounce that! (It even tops "Fpretmater" that I got once in Chicago. Why do all the letters in our name have to sound like other letters in the alphabet over the phone?) Then two other Americans on the tour were telling us about their experience of asking for a box for their leftovers in a restaurant. Apparently the waitress was very taken aback and took a long time back in the kitchen. They saw her talking to all the other employees, who then took turns laughing and pointing at them. Finally she came back with their leftovers in a Tupperware container. In their words, "I think they just washed out a container someone had brought their lunch in!" Good to know for future reference. So far I've taken a few leftovers home, but usually by secreting them in a napkin in my bag, feeling about 80 years old as I do it. But now I think I'm glad I went to more subtle route.

Tomorrow morning I leave at 6:50am (ARGH!) for a day on the Great Ocean Road. The weather is supposed to be even nicer tomorrow, so I'm really looking forward to that. Hopefully I'll have lots of new pictures to post then! Off to enjoy the sun...