That Little Bit Extra

Part II : the incident involving the TV aerial

Since the last instalment quite a lot has happened. We have arrived in Hobart for a start.
Anyway, without further ado:

The Villa:

Wow! Just a quick run down of the villa really, as I really don’t want to have to boast about it too much. Currently it is just Lexi and I living here, which means we have a 6 person dining table and a sofa each to watch our TV and DVD from (The DVD is especially useful as we have a total of 0 (Zero) DVDs).
Last but, and I don’t think that this has ever been used in a more appropriate way, by no means least, The View. We look down from our living room over the city of Hobart, out onto the river Derwent, and across to the eastern shore of the city. I can’t put in to words just how nice The View is, so suffice to say its sock blowing offly amazing (I still have trouble reading that and I know what it says, so look over it a couple of times and give it a chance), EVERY time you walk past the window (Yep, especially at night!).

Hills:

Or put another way The Hill:
Living at the top of a hill and having a sock blowing offly (is it getting any easier to read? I thought I would throw it in again, maybe start a trend and get it added to the dictionary) amazing view does have its downfalls. Well… one downfall. This has now become apparent. It is The Hill that is pretty much the only way for us to get to anything, anything at all. The first time we walked up it was not very nice, but we naively thought that it would get better as we got used to it. It has now become apparent that this is not going to happen. It’s hard really to explain to a predominantly flat country the meaning of the word hill here. I mean, Hobart is built on a hill. Everywhere is uphill, if you’re going down then it’s a safe bet you are going the wrong way. None of these hills however compare at all to the mountain on which we live. The best example I can think of to describe this would be for you to walk up a motorway embankment (not on the steps of course) about ten times in a row… maybe more. We are currently trying to stay healthy by walking up and down it at least a few times a weak… I will let you know how long this resolves lasts.

Spiders:

Yes well, apparently they come bigger here. The worst part, is not knowing if any spiders we find will can actually kill us, neither of us being particularly proficient at spider recognition (something that now comes highly recommended). We lasted approximately 12 hours before we found First Spider (who from now on will be used to determine just how panic inducing a spider should be – anything you find at home probably wont even have long enough legs to cover his body and I’m doubtful whether any of them will actually attack the TV aerial you are trying to poke them with). The battle (which I assume is now going to be an on going thing) lasted about an hour and as I write this I am hoping that the bits of screwed up paper have kept First Spider in the closet behind the TV. I think for safety reasons this cupboard will now remain closed and plugged till the spider has suffocated. By the size of it I reckon that this will be about 10 minutes, but 3 months is a safe bet. On the plus side we now how have no means to iron or Hoover anything in the villa.

: 09 May 2005 07:00 |  Tags: Tasmania |  Comments (2) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

Not really very far on from The Start

Part I : the incident involving the 12 hour Saturday

(Please note that nothing in the way of chemistry will actually be covered to aid accessibility)
So, here we go:

Melbourne:

So, then we flew on to Melbourne. It has trams that run throughout the city, but, contrary to popular belief, they are not free and it is illegal to just get on and off them (popular belief being just what we reckoned actually, but popular none the less). They are, however, free if you can avoid being caught on the tram without a ticket. This is not a risk that I would advocate running but hey, if we can manage if without even realising it can’t be that hard.
It is relatively easy to find your way around, (If, however, you do find yourself lost, it’s a good idea to recall the sites that you saw on your earlier route. Whether it be some Jurassic Park extras (apparently they are called cockatoos) sitting, or rather hunching awkwardly on the second oldest rollercoaster in the world (I don’t really know how this is supposed to make you want to ride on it) or a big red building (“There’s that big red building, where you said, ‘look at that big red building’…” – Jetlag really does make you think slower apparently)) and we can highly recommend a place just out of the city called St Kilda Beach, very bohemian! Yes, I read that in a guide, and no I don’t have any idea what it means… something to do with cafes being in the road apparently. And it is very nice for a couple of nights.
There seems to be plenty of opportunity to meet the cast of neighbours here, although I have not had the chance to be ‘treated’ to this yet.

Jetlag:

Yes it really does happen, even when you go this way round the world, and yes it’s not all that nice. You know that when you start to read peoples t-shirts as Humpty was a Pus Hed (I don’t actually know what this is but it sounds quite good) when really Humpty was just Pushed, that your suffering. An afternoon siesta does not work and means that your evening goes to pot and you wake up in the small hours of the morning wondering why exactly it is dark and you are still wearing clothes.

Housing:

Australian rules on house building seem to be almost non-existent. Everyone just seems to build what they want where they want it. This leads to every street having a thrown together look that makes every journey that little bit more exciting (I wanted to put in ‘an eclectic mix’ but really I’m not sure how to use it in a sentence with anything other than ‘the roads are…’, which to be honest is a bit of a useless sentence, especially if, like me, you’re not completely sure of the exact meaning of the word eclectic).

: 12 Apr 2005 02:49 |  Tags: Tasmania |  Comments (1) |  Close comments |  Report a problem

The Start

Writing about web page http://www.utas.edu.au

Hello!
If you are reading this then you have been directed here, by some misinformation, a random search, or a 'friend', to read all about… well… me. Or rather me and my friend Lexi (Lexi and I for those of you not doing a science) and our University exchange to Tasmania.
Well, I will try to make this interesting (where possible, or infact where I can be bothered) so that it is accessible to all who may stumble across this place (this means that I wont always be talking about chemistry things – thankfully).
On that note i will stop rambling and, hopefully with in the next couple of weeks, put on the first update.
Now, if you are bothered about such things or you like what i write, then you will be interested to know that this is only a condensed version of the newsletter (for want of a better word) that i sporadically send to people unfortunate enough to have spoken their email address in my company. If you, for some reason, would like to put off doing a bit of work every now and then, or you just like the thrill of actually getting some mail that doesn't try to make you buy something to do with sex, then send me an email and i might even add you to the orginal newsletter. You could even try posting a message here, but there is no guarantee that either will actually work.
Email me at My_Tasmanian_Account(put at symbol)hotmail.co.uk.

: 04 Apr 2005 05:28 |  Tags: Tasmania |  Comments (6) |  Close comments |  Report a problem