| S | M | T | W | T | F | S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | |
| 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 |
| 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 |
| 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 |
| 28 | 29 | 30 |
How exactly are you supposed to dress for temperatures ranging from 5 to 28 Celsius?? Seriously ... I need to know! I imagine layers are the key, but still, it's not an easy task. Yet this is something I'm being faced with all this week.
I started my third prac on Tuesday (with Monday being a public holiday ... more on that in a moment), and I'm doing this one at a little school in Ipswich. This involves travelling west about an hour and a quarter each day, ending up a fair way inland ... with slightly wider temperature ranges than are usual here by the coast.
This morning, I believe it got down to around 5 degrees. We had a late start today, and I didn't get to school until around 8am ... but even then, it was COLD. I wore a skirt in anticipation of forecast highs, and at around 8am, I nearly froze! It was soooo uncomfortably cold. I really needed long pants and closed in shoes.
But then, by lunch time it had warmed up and apparently reached 28! That's not just warm, that's approaching uncomfortable up here with the added humidity. At least I was dressed suitably for the heat - the teacher I was with was in tights and a long sleeved top.
Such crazy weather to try to dress for! I just can't work out how best to approach it. Why can't Mother Nature just pick a season and stick with it?? My wardrobe would really appreciate the simplicity.
Meanwhile, Monday's public holiday. It was Labour Day in Queensland. Same holiday every year. Not a "real" public holiday ... one of those convenient ones usually only recognised by banks, schools, government departments and offices. A fabulous excuse to go shopping or catch up on any number of tasks.
Not this year though! Suddenly, someone, somewhere, decided that it's a fabulous year to stop opening on Labour Day. And suddenly, with no warning or announcements, everything remained closed. Not even the supermarkets were open! How ridiculous is that!?
It's not like it's a serious public holiday. There's no religion attached to the holiday, no national celebrations or time for remembering past heroes. It's just an excuse for a day off, like the Queen's Birthday holiday or the Ekka holiday. For those in relevant industries, it's a great opportunity for making a bit more money thanks to penalty rates. For the rest of us, it's a long weekend.
Except for this year, when we received no notice that nothing would be open!!! I drove around in circles trying to find somewhere to buy a notebook ... and ended up at the local IGA with the entire population of my local area. Insanity!!
In more convenient news ... tomorrow is a public holiday in Ipswich! So I can at least have my convenient catch up holiday tomorrow, with everything near home being open as usual. Got to love that!
A month or so ago I got a new car. A gorgeous little purplish-blue Honda Jazz which I love to bits and have had a fabulous time driving around (for over 2000km already!). Of course, there are many differences between it and the Peugeot 206 I used to drive. The Honda Jazz is brand new, and an auto (I've always driven manual until now) ... so most of these differences are positive, and certainly make up for anything I'm missing out on.
There are little things that I miss though. Like the way the headlights on my Peugeot would turn on automatically when it was dark. Or the way the windscreen wipers were automatic (although this often frightened the living daylights out of me when I wasn't expecting it!). And the electronic alert that would tell me how many kilometres I could drive before running out of fuel. Such useful features! I was perhaps a little spoilt I think.
Coming into summer, the thing I'm missing most at the moment though ... the temperature reading! The little display in the centre consol that told me what the temperature was outside. Not an entirely uncommon feature in cars these days, but the Jazz doesn't have it. I don't really have a thermometer anywhere else, so now I have no idea what the temperature is at any given time.
The one exception to this is that they've just installed a new electronic sign outside the carpark at uni, so as I arrive at and leave work I can check the current temperature. It doesn't tell me what it reached in the middle of the day, but it's enough to tell me I'm relieved to be working in air-conditioning! This morning as I arrived just before 9am it was already 32C!! We're in for a long hot summer I think! I'm certainly starting to question my own sanity in booking a holiday to Darwin in mid-January.
So as it turns out, football can be fun even in the rain! Tonight the Qld Roar played Central Coast ... and it rained basically the entire game. Convincingly at times, less so at others. Enough that we spent the entire game sitting under plastic ponchos though!
I pulled out my Shakespeare poncho ... the one I got at the Globe in London when we went to see Romeo and Juliet and stood in the rain for the entire play. Such a cute poncho ... clear, but covered in red letters quoting Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor ...
"Let the sky rain potatoes, let it thunder to the tune of greensleeves, hail kissing comforts, and snow eringoes; let there come a temptest of provocation, I will shelter me here."
The game was actually pretty good ... although the result was rather less than desirable. The visitors are going home with yet another win ... their third for the season, and they're still the only team in the A-League to win a game this season. It perhaps wouldn't be quite so frustrating if it weren't for the fact that we were by far the stronger side tonight.
Oh well, we played well, and it was a fun night despite the rain and unfavourable score line. I think we earned our place as true fans tonight too ... we were among a mere 8,815 people at the game (in a stadium that holds 55,000). Shame, but not surprising really. Brisbane isn't used to rain! We hide indoors whenever it threatens.
Is anyone else finding facebook is somewhat taking over any desire to blog? It's bizarre! I seem to be spending far too much time on there. Instead of reading blogs, or summing up random events, or destressing by posting on here, I jump on facebook and randomly respond to or write wall posts and other such things. Which is fine, and social, and great fun ... but it's infinitely more temporary, or "of the moment". I feel like I'm losing the record I usually have of my life. I like being able to look back over what I've been doing in past years. I don't really want to lose that! So new resolution - I need to start posting more often.
To begin with, I need to post about my day on Moreton Island yesterday. In the rain! It was soooooo wet! In fact, I should probably start this with a weather update. The weather in south-east Queensland has been so insane! A week ago a group of Guides from the UK (including Annette from Sweden who I lived with at Pax) arrived in Brisbane for a weeks stay in "the sunshine state". Needless to say, the long awaited rain also arrived on Sunday. It hasn't rained in months ... not properly at least. We're in drought, and have been for a record length of time. So the rain was rather welcome, by all but the travellers of course.
Anyway, a week later and it's STILL raining! Not so much today, but we haven't had this much rain in years. It's been raining so much, that now we're dealing with flash flooding! Not so much here in Brisbane, but it's pretty severe just north on the Sunshine Coast (near where Annette and the UK Guides were staying until they flew to Tassie today). There are reports of up to 700mm of rain in places inside 24 hour periods! It's massive! So, so, so wet! The Noosa river rose about a metre overnight a couple of days ago. Crazy!
Needless to say, SES has been keeping busy. I haven't been called up yet, but there were eight people from my local group up on the Sunshine Coast last night helping out, and a few more went up today I believe. Loads of sandbags to fill, and residents to help out of flooded houses and so forth. There are plenty of flood boats out in action, and loads of roads cut off by water complicating the situation. People are stranded, and some fools are trying to drive and getting stuck. Sounds crazy!
Anyway, despite all this insane weather, we (Annette, the UK Guides and I) went to Tangalooma yesterday! We were meant to be going on a whale watching cruise, but it was cancelled. They said dolphin feeding would still be happening though, plus in the morning on the news they were saying the rain should be clearing around lunch time.
So, we went! We took the 10am ferry across to the island. Good trip over ... a little bumpy, but not bad. It was showering lightly this morning, but not too much. It almost looked like it was going to clear up too!
However, it didn't! It kept raining. Got heavier at times. Stopped raining once ... but started again shortly after. Basically, the entire day was wet! So we were on this gorgeous, sandy island at this lovely resort ... and we could hardly leave the cafe area. It was too wet! We had a fabulous day, but I wish the travellers could have all seen it the
way it would usually be ... gorgeous sand, blue skies, lots of sunshine, heaps of fun! Rather than the grey skies and insane wet!
Oh well, no point complaining about it now. We had a blast all the same. We went quad biking for a while ... which was loads of fun! We all had our own bike and followed the guide around on the beach for a bit then up the hill to a specially designed track and through a heap of puddles and stuff along the way. I'd never been on a quad bike before, but it was great. Super easy, and hilariously entertaining.
We kept running into each other ... or rather, I could find my break easily enough, but the girl behind me (and the one behind her) less so, and they kept running into me from behind and pushing me forward into the person in front ... rather funny! One girl had trouble steering at one point and nearly rode into the sea! Then at another point one girl got bogged, and in the process of trying to get out her wheels threw sand all over the girl behind her. All so funny!
The others were all super prepared mind you ... being English, they're obviously used to the rain. ;) They all had wet weather gear - jackets and waterproof pants too. I had one of my hooded jackets from London, so my top half was fine, but I was in jeans with nothing else to protect my legs. And it rained the entire time we were out on the quad bikes! Serious rain too ... getting in my face as we were riding and everything. By the time we got back to the resort my jeans were absolutely sopping. I felt slightly better to discover that many of the English girls' wet weather pants hadn't worked ... so they were all wet too. ;)
At the very end of the day was the highlight - we got to feed the dolphins. Of course, this meant getting very wet again! We were all under the impression that we'd get wet up to about thigh level. We just had to wade in, hold a fish under the water, and the dolphins come in and take the fish out of your hand. Simple. Our legs would get wet, and our arm to our elbow, but otherwise we thought we'd keep relatively dry. Big mistake!!
It was still raining when we fed the dolphins! Perhaps not particularly heavily, but it was still wet! And the water was really choppy ... lots of waves and so forth. So when standing on the beach waiting to go out and have our turn, we noticed that we'd be getting wet a little higher than expected - more like up to our waist. I was still in regular clothes on top! I'd only prepared my lower half for wading, thinking that was all that would get wet. But we walked in as far as our waist, so in no time my tshirt was wet. Then a big wave came ... and we hardly had time to turn around before the wave crashed into us and I was drenched head to foot! Even my hair was drenched! Oops!
It was still fun though! We fed the dolphins, and it was the most incredible experience! We weren't allowed to pat them, but they came right up to us to take the fish. I fed one called Echo ... and he was beautiful! A regular ... he's about 15 years old, and has been feeding at Tangalooma for over ten years. The water was really murky because it was so choppy, but he rubbed against my hand a bit as he took the fish, so I could feel him there. So beautiful! They came up out of the water a bit as they were coming in and out too, so we could see them a bit then at least. I'd love to do it again one day when the water is clearer ... usually you can see them in the water too apparently. And one day ... I'd love to swim with them! Such gorgeous creatures!
Anyway, after that, we raced back in and changed/dried off as best we could (difficult, considering most of my clothes were now sopping wet!), and headed to the boat. The trip back on the ferry (a 20m catamaran) was pretty rough! Apparently they nearly postponed it on account of the weather - still being rather windy and rainy of course. I have never in my life been seasick, and I've been out on rough seas before. I love the water ... I feel so at home out there. But I can't in all honesty claim I didn't notice the rough seas this time.
We were being thrown about all over the place, and it was dark, and we couldn't see a thing out the windows. Plus we were watching tv, which I don't think helped. We were all mucking around chatting and having a great time ... laughing continuously and the UK girls were squealing every time we bumped (which was rather often, at least at first). It certainly wasn't terrible ... one of the staff was handing out sick bags at the start, and insisted it would be bad and we may well need one, but none of us did. I have to confess I was a little queasy though. Not horribly so, but it was a bizarre feeling!
I guess we were lucky to get home ... they did cancel some trips earlier in the week, and watching the news when I got back last night regarding the weather and flooding on the sunshine coast, it's not surprising the seas were as choppy as they were. Oh well, it was still a great trip back! And far more interesting than it would have been if the seas were flat! And in spite of my surprise in the morning that the trip was going ahead at all, the day turned out to be a rather enjoyable one. Far more so than staying home and studying! ;)
I can't believe how cold it's been in Brisbane! It's so un-Brisbane-like. It's never cold here ... not really. It gets windy at times, sometimes you need to pull out a jacket of some description ... but I've never felt any real need to complain about the cold before. But it's been dropping below zero. Seriously ... it's cold!
I feel like I'm dressing for London again. Literally ... I'm pulling out clothes that I haven't worn since London. Quite nice actually ... I much prefer London clothes than semi-warm Brisbane clothes. It's such a bizarre feeling though. At least it's still sunny I guess ... the sky's still lovely and blue. Even if it is deceptively cold.
Meanwhile, I got an email from Caroline - my boss in London. Little Sean who I used to look after - now 5 years old - is getting into cricket in rather a big way by the sounds of it. So cute! And in Caroline's words ... "He supports England, Ireland (yes they do have a cricket team made up of Australians) and Australia (I think you must have indoctrinated him in his early years)." Tehe! I'm so impressed. ;)
Must run ... coffee plans. This week has been one big social event. I've eaten out more often that at home I think! Such fun.
We were on tsunami alert this morning! How random is that!? I completely missed it until after the event too ... I missed Sunrise this morning, so didn't catch any news. I didn't find out until my mum got back from the bank this morning, and informed me the bank wasn't open ... the NAB stayed closed for half the morning on account of the alert. The whole east coast of Australia was apparently on alert, following the earthquake near the Solomon Islands.
Such a random alert ... I don't remember ever being on tsunami alert before. I'm more than familiar with severe storm warnings, or cyclone alert, or heavy winds, or hail ... but tsunami alert - that's a new one for me. Even more bizarre as we've just been doing training at SES on Working in an Emergency Operations Centre - and our hypothetical event that we're using as a training exercise is a tsunami hitting our local area. Freakish!
Meanwhile, I spent the weekend at Relay for Life ... and came home completely wrecked. Staying up the entire night was not a good plan. I potentially slept a little along the way ... but considering I spent the night sitting in a camp chair, continually waking up to check what was going on around me, it wasn't exactly good sleep. I came home yesterday with a headache and a wee bit of sunburn, and proceeded to sleep all afternoon. Then most of today. I skipped uni today ... which hardly ever happens, so clearly I needed it.
I also made the decision sometime during the night to take leave from my Ranger Guide unit. Various complications have been making it far more difficult and far less enjoyable than it should be. Plus it has been taking up far too much time, so my uni work has suffered horribly. I was going to resign completely, but the Leaders up the line have convinced me to take a few months off while they try to sort out the dramas ... then I can reassess my decision. It's nice they suggested the leave option - they've made me feel a little more valued than I had been.
So Relay was my last event with the older girls for a while. Sad, but it had to happen ... so also a relief. And despite the stress involved on my part, the event was at least a good one to finish with! The girls all seemed to enjoy themselves, and it was great to have some along from other districts. Fabulous cause too ... we haven't finished collecting all the money yet, but we've well exceeded the required $1000/team in fundraising. All up for the event they've raised around $80,000 so far, so we expect they'll surpass the $100,000 mark by the time all monies are deposited ... rather exciting!
Guides is hardly going to disappear from my schedule either. I'm already helping out with Brownies again, and loving it. I'd forgotten how much I enjoy working with the younger girls! I've also put my hand up to help out with the Gumnuts - the little ones ... 5 and 6 year olds - hopefully we'll have a new unit starting in a month or two. Less responsibility in both places though ... just helping out, not organising. Other Leaders will look after the responsibility side of it. :)
Feeling good! Priorities are back where they should be ... on uni. Guides is back to being fun again, minus the stress and frustration. And I have new music to listen to ... always a good thing! Where would we be without music? Loving Corinne Bailey Rae currently. And I have tickets to Eskimo Joe, which arrived today with news that Little Birdy are support ... love it!