Oh, down to the river we ride...

Yet another mistake was pointed out to me (thanks Becky!), so now everyone can comment on my posts. I have no idea why it was set so only people with Blogger accounts could respond. Sorry!

Riverfest is going on all week in the city, but having gone both Friday and Saturday, I'd say the only day anything interesting took place was yesterday. Friday, a group of friends and I just wandered around looking for something to do besides shop and eat food. We passed by Hungry Jacks (what they call Burger King here for some reason) several times throughout the day and the same group of bored looking goth kids were always sitting outside. I had to wonder why this was their choice place to mope. Did Robert Smith get onion rings there once? Maybe some day I'll go over and ask them. More aimless walking in search of a Riverfest event, but the only noteworthy thing that happened was passing Hare Krishnas and being given pamphlets by the Socialist Youth Society. Nothing like being told you should consider a new religion and political party by people on the street!

Back at the flat later that night, I stayed up to finally watch a few hours of Rage. Rage is an uninterrupted six hours of music videos shown late at night on weekends. So clearly, this was a bit like heaven to me.

Haha, look at my happy little face! And please ignore my horrible attempt to grey out my flat's disgusting and ugly sofa set. It looks like someone trash picked it from a crack house. Needless to say, I never sit on it. Anyway, I was so excited to watch full videos that have more than just a band playing in a field or a rapper with some booty-shakin' hos (yeah, I'm looking at you, modern MTV and VH1 when you actually take time off from awful reality shows to screen a few videos). The absolute best one of the night was a song that I've heard before, but never seen the video of. It's called 'Letter from God to Man,' by the British rappers Dan le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip. Believe me, it's outstanding and not really as religious the title implies.

I know it's a bit difficult to understand his accent sometimes, so here are the lyrics. Seriously, I was watching this at around 3 am, on the verge of sobbing. Then it changed to The Kooks and my flatmate walked in to get a glass of water and looked at me weird, wondering why I was so misty-eyed over a bunch of rock stars in tight pants flirting with models.

Riverfest Saturday was a bit more impressive because that night was Riverfire and entirely too many people were walking around. So we opted to spend most of the day in the Science Center and Art Museum. They were both pretty neat, though I was creeped out at the sheer amount of taxidermied animals the Science Center had on display. What made it weirder was that every single one had it's cause of death underneath it. I realize that's so nobody thinks they were killed just to be stuffed, but do I really need to know this poor wombat died from impacted bowels? We waited in ridiculously long lines to get dinner, then at 7 a huge fire-spurting plane flew past way too low, scaring the bejeezus out of me and letting everyone know the fireworks were about to begin.

Unfortunately, I did not get to enjoy the display as much as I'd like to because a third of the crowd were taking pictures. Some using their flash. I wanted to scream, "Put your damn cameras down and enjoy the fireworks! Don't you realize your photos are going to suck anyway?" I was so angry that all these people were taking shots that were of the dark sky and one little green spark, then turning to each other and going, "Oooh, that's a good one!" WATCH THE FIREWORKS! Don't take pictures so you can instantly reminisce about that red heart shaped one and miss two minutes of other fireworks in doing so! I mean, I love to take photos and understand that they want to capture their beauty. But take a few really great pictures if you can, then put the camera away. Taking several bad pictures a minute for the entire half-hour fireworks show is just stupid. Since when did photography become about quantity over quality? Grump, grump, grump. Sorry for the rant, it just really annoyed me that I waited all day and people were ruining the show for me.

Today I slept in and am continuing work on a paper for World History, super exciting stuff! Tomorrow is the start of September, maybe I'll be a bit more interesting in the new month. Hope everyone has a good Labor Day! I won't because I don't get the day off. :[

Hot Glam! (I Love You So)

Oh wow, I just realized one of my favourite blogs, Popserious put me on their blogroll! Right at the top too, because it's alphabetical order, but that means I'm above Best Week Ever and Boing Boing! Whoa! Thanks guys, you're awesome! Godspeed You! Black Emperor, Airplane!, !!!, Oh the Places You’ll Go!, and a whole bunch more exclamation points! I'll stop now. I think that last sentence made my spell check have a nervous breakdown.

Also, my Mom pointed out to me that I accidentally had last week's entry as August 13th, when it was really the 20th. So that's fixed now, thanks to the observational powers of Editor Mom. See, all those years of me asking her to proofread my essays payed off.

I make a point of checking a few Philly news sites every day just because I like to keep up on what's going on back home. The last thing I saw on Australian news regarding PA was about the Phoenixville Blob Festival. But it was this piece of (where else but) New Jersey news that made me laugh. Oh you Joize kids and your shenanigans, how I miss you. When I saw that headline, I half expected it to be the group of guys I lived next to last year. They were in the martial arts club and would all stand up then bow at the same time after finishing meals in the dining hall. That was a bit weird, but the Ninjas were nice guys and I never had to worry about my room getting robbed.

Unfortunately my neighbors this year aren't so respectful. Well, just the one. As I said before, all my flatmates are wonderful, but it's the guy who lives below me that's in for a fight. Usually people have to complain because the person above them is blasting music and it's going through the ceiling. I have the reverse problem. To try and handle it politely, I went on the school's chat room because he's constantly on it. I figured it was an easy way to let him know he should turn his music down, but then I didn't think over the fact I was talking to a college chat room full of 18-year-old boys...

Dani: Pace... It’s past midnight. Also, this is like the 10th time today you've played 99 Luft balloons. Could you please turn it down?
Void: stick a luft balloon in his pooper. then inflate it.
Dani: No... I just want him to know his music is way too loud and way too crappy.
Morven: put your vagina on the floor and enjoy it.
Void: pace, can you hear the vagina on your ceiling?
Pace: yeah, its hot. NANANANAAAA 99 LUFTBALLOONSSSSSS
Dani: Listen closer and you'll realize it's my fist.
Pace: hahaha, haha my window aint even open. must be loud.
Dani: Yes, yes it is. That's my point. I have to sleep.
Pace: 99 luftballons cued for 7:40 am
Dani: I'll be up then anyway. HA. And you're just lucky I don't have speakers myself.
Pace: *points speakers upwards*

This went back and forth for a few more minutes, with them getting progressively more lewd and I finally left because got sick of trying to reason with such idiocy. Fortunately, the RA came and made Pace turn off his music shortly after that. They must've heard it themselves because I didn't even call them. But they apparently continued the stupid 'vagina on the floor' thing in the chat long after I left. My one computer savvy flatmate saw that they were being jerks and used a secret trick to kick them off the server for two hours. Thanks man!

EDIT: Pace and my flatmate Gus are good friends that go way back, which means Gus is trusted enough to have a copy of Pace's key. He's also pretty sure of the password to Pace's computer. Did I mention Gus lives right across from me and has to get up really early, so he hates when Pace blasts music too? Next time it happens or Pace is rude to me, Gus and I are going into his room, deleting all the songs he blares repeatedly, and downloading every single Yanni, Goo Goo Dolls, and Jonas Brothers song in their place.

Despite that one annoyance, I had a great weekend. I went to a Glam Rock themed party (I was supposed to be Debbie Harry, but it didn't quite work considering I don't have blond hair or look anything like her) and got to hang out with a fun bunch of punk kids in hilarious outfits. The party was in a cute little rented Russian hall that had pictures of Catherine the Great and Leo Tolstoy. It looked like a babushka's house. Even better, it was directly across the street from the AFL (Australian Football League) stadium. The AFL fans sure were taken aback when they saw a bunch of 20-somethings dressed up as Iggy Pop, Debbie Harry, Marc Bolan, Ziggy Stardust, and Suzi Quatro going into a Russian hall. COMMUNISM! After about two hours of dancing to glam, we decided to just play what we normally listen to, and by the end of the night, we were dancing (in the same way they do in this video) to our favourite Eurovision song:
We then decided to go outside and somehow our conversation turned to jingles from several years ago. Iggy (I don't remember half the real names of these people, mostly because they were introduced to me as their character) was saying he remembered one that had a fat kid saying some phone number over and over. Naturally, we had to call the number to see if the fat kid answered. Apparently that number is now the hotline for a radio station and the operator asked Iggy what he wanted to talk about. "Um, life... Love... How my stupid girlfriend just ran off with the fat kid and took the dog with her. Now I only have the cat, who hates me." Either the story sold them or they were desperate for callers at 1:45 am, because we got put on air. We practically died laughing. Nobody has any idea what station we even called.

SECOND EDIT: At first I didn't put any pictures from the party for some reason, but now I've been told I can't describe a party like that and not provide visuals.

Angie should be a magician's assistant! I love Dennis' expression in the background, haha.

Dancing up a storm, a rather silly looking dance storm. This photo gives you the idea of all the crazy Russian paintings and memorabilia on the walls. That's me on the right in the black tutu and silver top that makes me look like a ballet baked potato. As I looked through pictures I realized that almost every single picture (such as this one) I'm in has me holding a beer. It makes me look like a complete alco, but it's actually the same beer I held all night. Because all they had was beer, which I am not a fan of. Too much carbonation and the taste doesn't appeal to me. So the entire night I took about three sips, yet I kept it with me because I didn't want to be rude. I'm the exact same way with soda. I've probably drank one can of Pepsi in my whole life. I realize that nobody would take offense to me disliking their beloved 'beeah,' but I always worry and over-think things like that.

This guy ('Marc Bolan') stayed in Glam Rock mode all night, he's my hero.

I should really know all their names, I'm terrible... I only know the one to the right who looks more like a member of Panic at the Disco is Rhys, because that's a pretty memorable name. Dude in the middle is so a rockabilly version of David Bowie! I have to laugh how he's posing tough with a clenched fist when he's wearing heavy makeup and the other two are flaunting it for the camera.

That's about it for now, nothing else interesting with me other than I'm a huge nerd and have been watching Mystery Science Theater 3000. Oh wow, the Australian news just said that "Jimmy Page from The Who played at the Olympics closing festival last night." It's called fact checkers, good job.

Mystik Spiral

A few days ago I finished watching all five seasons of Daria (I forgot how oddly parallel that show and its characters are to my own life, perhaps that's why I love it so much) and switched to being an Olympics addict. I never used to watch them much in the past, but it's everywhere over here and I couldn't ignore it if I wanted to. There are giant screens all over campus and the city for people to watch while eating lunch, to take a break from their walk, etc. The ironic thing is I usually don't care at all about sports and sometimes could even go as far as saying I hate them (mostly just because rabid Eagles fans during playoffs are incredibly annoying). Yet the other day I was on the verge of tears when that one weightlifter kept slipping grip and lost his chance. I screamed in anger just as passionately as my flatmates when the Australian boat meant to win the race capsized only a few hundred meters from the finish. Yes, Phelps is amazing and totally deserves his victory, but I actually prefer watching the offbeat competitions and rooting for the countries I probably can't point out on a map.

I haven't just been sitting around watching active people though, I've been doing some sporty whatsits of my own. I went rock climbing last week and not just on an indoor wall like I'm used to, but an actual cliff face. That was a bit terrifying, but it's something I want to try to do every week or two, so hopefully I'll be a pro by the end of the year.

Spent the weekend at Stradbroke Island, aka Straddie, which is gorgeous.

We went surfing, kayaking and sand boarding, all of which were intense fun but completely killed my muscles. Unfortunately I don't have any photos from the first two, and the only one I have of me sand boarding is me with my butt sticking out as I try not to fall over. So I won't be posting that, neither will you see the video of me going down the dune then face planting in the sand. How about pictures of a pretty sailboat and a cute skink on a rock instead?



I was incredibly tempted to put a photo I took of my friend standing on the cliff and write, "Oops, that's a cute skank on a rock, wrong photo..." but I decided against it.

One of my favourite parts of the trip was actually the part a lot of people hated. We were crammed into a seatbelt-less troopie (a type of van) meant for a lot less people to travel in and sped around the island going over logs, rocks, and such off road obstacles while our driver turned up Australian hip-hop to drown out the sound of us being tossed around and freaking out. It's sort of a 'you had to be there moment,' but at one point, the driver pulls down a little DVD screen and this music video starts playing on it:

I was the only one to recognize what it was from the start and thought, "Okay, that's a random choice!" Then other people picked up on it and soon we were all singing "YOUUUUUUUU... YOOOOOU GOT WHAT AHHHH NEEEEEEED!" at the top of our lungs while being thrown around and hitting our heads in the back of this van. It was a bit like that scene in 'Almost Famous' when they all sing along to 'Tiny Dancer,' except a lot less harmonic and with more bruises. It was worth it not only for that experience, but we spotted this little guy chilling out in a tree.

It's not very often you get to see a koala in the wild, our guide was telling us most Australians can't even say they've seen one outside of the zoo. Then he got way too excited about how koalas are constantly high/drunk from all the eucalyptus they eat, which made us a bit uncomfortable considering he was our driver.
Later, as we ate lunch in the park, I spotted a pigeon with a sweet mohawk (I wish I got a better picture of it).

The only bad part of the trip was the ferry because it was the car-loading kind that I associate with doom thanks to 'War of the Worlds' and that episode (the only one I've ever seen and it had to be this one) of 'Greys Anatomy.'

Fortunately we survived both times and managed not to be sucked under by aliens or crash into Seattle. Phew. I know, the chances of both those things occurring are incredibly high in Australia. We should all be grateful I'm alive.

I don't really have much else to say, so I might as well leave you with another purposely awful/hilarious music video by the namesakes of this post title and one of my favourite fictional bands (after Drive Shaft and Wyld Stallions of course), enjoy 'Freaking Friends' by Mystik Spiral:

They're like, "Whehs the caah?" and we're like, "Wihs the cah?"

And then at the end the three of them go stand outside the Australian Embassy and flip it off, haha.
I keep watching 'Flight of the Conchords' with my flatmates, which makes it even better because one gets all mad when they make jokes about Australia (the others don't mind). There's a New Zealander in the dorms on my friend's floor and every time I see him, I say "Brit? Prizint. Jirmain? Prizint. Murray? Prizint. Ivrywin prizint? Litz start this band mitting!" Then he death stares me because I'm sure he gets jokes like that constantly. I think it's cute how New Zealanders pronounce the letter 'e' as 'i,' so I kid in good nature. They make fun of themselves on 'Flight of the Conchords' as well, and some of the jokes are true about both countries. Like when Bret and Jermain are fascinated because basic American TV has more than 4 channels.

Yes, there are really that few stations here. Well, there are technically seven, but two are repeats of other channels, and one is a crappy local channel. Though I shouldn't diss the latter, since that's what I watch most often. I haven't watched much recently because the TV is being hogged by the boys for rugby and AFL matches. The other day I woke up in my beige cinder block room, found a tall skinny guy in his pajamas yelling at a soccer match on TV, and forget what country I was in for a few seconds because I've experienced the same situation in three countries now. Guess I always end up living with tall skinny guys who get very angry at sports, haha (yeah, I'm talkin' 'bout you, Matt).

One of the great things about living with so many people is that someone is always around, and in our case, usually doing something weird. A few days ago, I took a break from watching movies (hey, I don't have any assignments yet) to take a walk and as I leave, my flatmate who works at a donut shop comes in with two dozen chocolate frosted donuts she managed to snag. Actually, they were just normal glazed, but she also had the melting chocolate and truffle shavings to make them fresh. I took a picture of the amazing sight (so much for my walk, eh?) before we demolished them:
As we're eating these, one of the guys says, "Oh, I should probably just have one. I'm a bit full from eating all that cookie dough earlier!" I thought he was joking, but a good ten minutes later, he's gnawing on a half-finished tube of raw chocolate chip cookie dough and reading aloud to us from an article he found online about a creepy British guy who has sex with his cars. Give us a month and this whole flat is going to get diabetes, I swear. Geez, are we a healthy bunch. That Freshman Fifteen I never got may just show up now if we continue like this.

To bring things full circle back to my favourite Kiwis, here's a clip that I have probably watched 30 times and still laugh at all the same parts. Um, just like I do with the actual Lord of the Rings...

Where the hell are you, exactly?

Arg, I've been a bit lazy and not updated recently, sorry everyone. I'd like to say I've been busy out going partying and being cool or something. I've actually spent most my nights sitting around watching TV, dumb movies, or Japanese game show clips from Youtube with my flatmates. That's right, I live with a bunch of fellow nerds. Magic Cards, World of Warcroft, constant quoting of 'The Simpsons,' Dungeons and Dragons, one guy is studying the science of lasers... Yup, full-out geekdom in here, yay! There are currently four guys and three girls (counting me) in our flat, we all get along very well, thank goodness. Well, two of the guys rarely leave their rooms, but they're nice when I do have a four second conversation with them and they don't cause any sort of trouble. One gives me a cheery "Good morning!" every time I see him, even if it's 4 pm.

I suppose I should explain the flat, since a lot of people were confused about where I'm living. First of all, my campus isn't actually IN the city, it's in the middle of a forest a few miles from the city. The other day I was sitting on the balcony eating breakfast and two turkeys ran by gobbling at each other. That was pretty odd. My one flatmate also keeps trying to convince me to be warned of the scourge that is 'drop bears.' Which is just something made up to scare foreigners, kind of like our jackalope or snipe. I told him that and he said, "Snipe? Like... Severus?" Hahaha, yeah, in America, Alan Rickman jumps out and attacks tourists, hahaha. Anyway, there are eight people (though we're currently one person less) in a flat sharing the kitchen, bathroom, and lounge area. We each have our own single room going off a hallway that looks like this:

Yes, a tad dodgy looking (to throw in some local slang), but that's Uni for you. That light is burnt out now though, and for some reason it keeps buzzing randomly in the middle of the night despite the fact it's off. The only way to stop it from doing so and keeping you awake all night is to smack it with a broom. We all take turns doing that so the same person doesn't have to get out of bed constantly, kind of like taking care of a crying baby. Er, you don't hit babies with brooms to shut them up though, hopefully. Also, you can't quite see it, but there's an iron burn on the rug from previous inhabitants. Speaking of the wonderful people who used to live here, we keep finding all this weird stuff they left behind. That closet at the end of the hall had a sewing machine from the 1970s in it, a treasure I've since claimed. We also discovered a broken skateboard (good for moving things) and 'Street Fighter II: The Board Game,' which we have yet to play, but I'm super excited to because it looks hella awesome.

I finally went into the actual city (not just the huge weird mall and sprawling Asian markets nearby campus) on Monday for my first day of classes. Half my classes are there, the other half are here at my home campus, which is nice because I get to spend my time in both environments. The city campus has all the artsy types and home campus has all the nerdy types, so either place I'm set to make friends. Granted, there are the "WOOO! I LIKE KEGSTANDS AND METALLICA!" type at both, but those are easy to avoid for the most part. My class was annoyingly short since it's the first week, so I decided to wander around a bit.

This interesting looking path was right outside my lecture building, so of course I followed it. The sculptural enclosure/ plant tamer thing changes gradually as you walk along, I kept staring up at it and almost running into people. Another mistake I keep making is walking on the wrong side of the street. Just like they have opposite car lanes here, Australians walk on the other side, and American me goes along the incorrect way out of habit. I've caught on to looking a different direction when crossing the street, but I always forget to walk to the left. To the left... Everythang you own in a box to the left... Sorry, had to.

Soon alongside the path, there was a cute little stream with a heap of palm trees and other exotic plantlife. And look, a duck! An animal I've seen before in the wild! Believe it or not, this is the first wild animal I've seen in Australia that we have in America too. Not THIS exact duck, I mean the species. They don't even have squirrels or pigeons here! However, I did spot a seagull later on, and of course I yelled "MINE! MINE! MINE!" :]

Continuing on, the creek turned into a little lagoon for kids. Sand, rocks, things to play on in the water... It looked like it belonged in a Disney World resort. "Well that's weird!" I thought, "All this in the middle of the city? But the lagoon was nothing compared to...





The full out man-made beach right next to the lagoon! And I thought Central Park had weird stuff in it! Why they need this in Australia where they can drive half an hour to a real beach is beyond me. Please note the ibis wading in the water there. Somehow, this sacred Egyptian bird made its way over to Australia and they're EVERYWHERE. I saw about five eating Cheetos out of the trash and I thought, "Shouldn't you be mummified? Piss off!" The funny thing is that for a public fake beach in a major city, this was surprisingly clean. If Philly built one, there would be crack vials, needles, and dead bodies in it a week after opening.




The beach with the river and city skyline in the background. I said Chicago before, but this picture makes it look like the start of 'CSI: Miami,' so I may have to change my comparison. Later I saw a guy trying to make a video of himself doing ninja jumps off a nearby flight of stairs with this view in the background. I ruined one of his takes by making a weird face as I went past.


That's all the pictures I took, because after this the walk goes by entirely too many outdoor restaurants and nothing else. Um, what else is new with me, hmmm... I keep having people think I'm Canadian, even other Canadians who should know the difference. Also, the other day I told someone I was from Pennsylvania and they said, "Ooh, what's a Wawa?" I got all excited that they knew that and went on a rant about how amazing Wawas are. Apparently the person only knew that because of the Bloodhound Gang song 'Pennsylvania,' which has a line that goes, "Do you even know what a Wawa is?" At least that's what they got out of that song, because the rest of the lyrics aren't entirely flattering. Damn you, Bloodhound Gang, for being one of the things Australians associate me with. That goes for you too, Bam Margera, cream cheese, and Kobe Bryant! There are hundreds of better things to come from Philadelphia!

I'll leave you with this hilarious video of the latest craze sweeping Oz:

Road to Australia

I'm watching the Bob Hope and Bing Crosby 'Road to...' series of movies on TV. I know, you're probably thinking "How can Danielle sit and watch old movies when she's in Australia?!" Or maybe you're just thinking about something funny the cat did the other day. But for those of you that ARE thinking the former, at least now that I put the question in your mind, I assure you I'm not a complete lard. One, these movies are clever, hilarious classics and two, it's almost 6 pm here and apparently on the weekends, nobody but me emerges from their rooms until much later.

I'm also a tad bit mopey because I realized back home it's Philly/NJ Warped Tour day. I can't believe it was two whole years ago that I last went. Things have changed so much since then, with both the bands I saw that day and myself. That was my first brush with being a writer/photographer and though my article and pictures never got used in the end, I gained so much from it. I know this blog is supposed to be about my time in Australia, but I would like to finally let some of my pictures from Warped '06 be seen. I feel bad just having them stay in my computer, like I'm hoarding them or something.


I still can't believe I've had the honour of being within feet of JOAN FREAKING JETT. She sounded as awesome in 2006 as she did in 1983 and the woman is 30 years my senior but still looks better in a bikini than I do.



I saw about 20 bands and took over 500 pictures that day, but way too big a number of those photos were of the boys in The Academy Is... Especially Tom Conrad, their former guitarist who's now in Empires and works as a photographer himself. I won't lie, I was a bit of a TAI fangirl, and I still listen to them occasionally. However, I prefer Empires now, they're a lot more mature in music and lyrics, plus their fanbase isn't mostly 13-year-olds.


Okay, so this photo is posed, I still love it though. I unfortunately missed The Sound's set, but Felix and Maja were just standing around their merch tent later that day and I talked to them for a bit. Mostly about the 'Snakes on a Plane theme' video, haha.


Geoff Rickly (lead singer of Thursday) is impossible to get a picture of, so I was proud I actually managed a few. Though, for every successful photo, I had about ten of him blurry or flashing his armpits, haha. Apparently, the next tour stop after this one, he was swinging the mic and it smashed his face. He continued singing despite a bloody nose, that's how hardcore he is.


I remember showing my Mom all my pictures and her saying something along the lines of, "Wow, lots of shirtless punk guys. I can see why you had such a good time." And Tom Gabel from Against Me! is definitely one of the reasons I'm fondly reminiscing my time at Warped. *sigh* Those were the days...

The Voyage

The other morning I woke up to the creepy laughter of this little guy, the kookaburra. I think that's what it is, at least. Then this morning I was awoken to the wild call of the Australian neighbour loudly singing along to ABBA.

I finally managed to take pictures of the comic/drawings of my trip(s) to get all the way to this impossible to reach continent. Yes, I had to take pictures of it because I don't have a scanner. Unfortunately, Paint has disappeared mysteriously on my computer and I'm hopeless at using Photoshop for anything other than brightening colours, so each panel is separate. Which I personally find super annoying and apologize for, though it does have the advantage of letting me comment individually on certain things. Oh, and keep in mind I drew these while incredibly tired, so they're pretty awful, haha. They got posted weird too, so click on them to see the full image larger.


Though it was the shortest amount of time I had to wait the entire trip, I didn't really enjoy being surrounded by dance team pre-teens hyped up on coffee their scary looking mothers gave them. Especially at 5 am. I don't need continuous conversation provided by frigging Sparkle Motion that early, okay?


I have the impressive power to fall asleep despite being barraged with loud noises, which is ironic, because I can't deal with them when I'm awake. Yeah, I'm talking about you, rap-blasting, bass-thumping people who live above me.


My drawing does no justice at all to the wonder of Alex Greenwald. Even when he's all tired from flying, he looked adorable. Sorry, I just revert back to a 14-year-old every time I think about meeting him. I mean, how often do you meet someone who's in one of your favourite bands AND one of your favourite movies from when you were a teen? (The drawing of me in the second panel looks like a trannie... Dammit.)


Someday I'll meet one of my favourite musicians and not say or do something completely stupid. This is about the eighth or ninth time I've failed at the previous statement, so I'm guessing my time should come soon.


I was also a bit pissed off still that I never got my picture with Alex Greenwald. Because I'm an idiot and left the terminal to get my luggage, thinking I could go back to the waiting area again. Which they stopped letting you do six years ago. Not a particularly bright moment on my part. Plus, LA smells gross and I had to walk a mile to get from Terminal 1 to Terminal 7. DID NOT WANT.


I was so exhausted and miserable when I drew this on the plane. I slept through the actual movies they showed and when I woke up it was six hours of 'Hannah Montana.' Needless to say, I was not going to watch that and therefore had nothing to keep my mind off of being sad. Choosing to travel alone was probably a poor choice, looking back on it.


I couldn't find a coloured pencil to make him purple, so use your imagination. No, I do not have a picture of this guy (sorry Nana), and yes, I did take one of the drinks. I damn well deserved it.


I love how these drawings get progressively crappier as I go along. This is the end though, I landed okay and went into Brisbane to get a hostel room for the night. I was with a girl from Taiwan, a Swedish girl, and a Swiss girl. We didn't understand each other a lot, but we got along well. Ha, at one point the Swiss girl says to me that there was a contest going on in the hostel pub that night that she was all excited about. I had seen a sign for Quizzo and asked her if that was it (after trying to explain what it was). "Nooo, somezing else. I don't know the word..." she said. Then blasting over the loud speaker, "IT'S LADIES NIGHT! YOU FINE FEMALES JUDGE THE MEN'S STRIP CONTEST, WITH A PRIZE OF AN $80 BAR TAB TO THE HUNKY WINNER!" The Taiwanese girl's face was of utter shock, the Swiss and Swedish girl were all smiles, and I was falling over laughing. I declined their offer to go and slept for a good 10 hours. Jet-lag is the strangest/worst feeling, especially with such an extreme time difference.

Not too much has happened in the week since arriving, other than me taking obscene amounts of cute animal photos at the Irwin Zoo. I literally have 30 pictures of just koala butts and another 15 of one koala looking like a little grumpy old man while he eats. :/