Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Happy Halloween!

I was determined not to miss out on yet another holiday (having missed Easter, Canada Day, and Thanksgiving), so I went shopping for some Halloween decorations. I checked all the obvious stores, Big W (basically Walmart), Target and a few of the less obvious stores, only to find....nothing. Not a single thing. No decorations, costumes, not even a regular pumpkin. I have never seen a pumpkin like we're used to in Canada. They do sell small greenish orange ones for cooking (because canned pumpkin doesn't exist here either!), but that's all I've ever seen. So, what does a girl do when all hopes of Halloween traditions seem to be out the window? Bake, of course! I decided to bring a little bit of Halloween to Brisbane. Although, I do think some people celebrate, as Steve heard on the radio this morning that Halloween is getting more popular each year. But, by the looks of what I saw...well, didn't see... in the shops, they have a long way to go! Anyway, I made and decorated 5 dozen cupcakes for Steve's work and my work. It was fun and satisfied my "must do something relating to a holiday" urge. The sugar I consumed while decorating all those cupcakes definitely satisfied any craving for Halloween candies or lollies, as they call them here. They're supposed to be eyeballs. Jesse really liked them and patiently sat with me the whole time I baked and decorated them. I think he missed being dressed up this year...I KNOW Steve did! ;) Happy Halloween to everyone back home! Hope you have an extra spooky one!

Sunday, October 28, 2007

Bull Ray

*****Warning: This post is not suitable for those family members who suffer from any form of anxiety. Warning...do not read on if you already lose sleep worrying about me!!*****
Today, I finally got to finish my dive course. We had a VERY early start. We had to be at the dive shop by 6 a.m. So, although sleepy, I was eager to get in the water and get my PADI certificate. I ended up being with a new dive instructor because the group was so big, we had to separate into 2 groups and take 2 boats out to Cook Island, where we were diving. Tanya, my instructor for today, was actually from Newfoundland. Anyway, there was really not too much to see, the visability wasn't the best and the sea creatures seemed to be in hiding. Well hidden actually...which brings me to me story...
One of the skill requirements that we had to do in order to pass the course was "hovering", which means that we had to be able to sit crossed-legged in the water, without moving. Basically it shows that you are capable of neutral bouyancy (you aren't floating and you aren't sinking). When my turn came, Tanya tried to find an area on the bottom of the ocean, where we could work on the task. I began concentrating on not letting too much air into my BCD (bouyancy control device...the thing that you wear that fills with air), and crossed my legs. As I was trying to find a neutral place, I began sinking to the bottom. Just as I was about to add some more air to my BCD, Tanya grabbed me by the arm and pulled me towards her and motioned to me to swim. So, I did. No big deal. I continued with my dive, wondering why we didn't finish the skill. Once we come to the surface, everyone said, "Cari! Did you see that RAY?!" I reply, "What ray?".
Turns out there was a bull ray directly under me while I was doing my hover. He was hidden in the sand, until I almost stepped on him, at which point, he raised his tail at me. Tanya said that she has never seen a ray so big. She said it was about the size of a kitchen table and that it's spikes were about a foot long. It also had a very thick tail. Tanya said when she saw the spikes, she was like, and I quote..."Holy Shit!" and that's when she grabbed me and pulled me away. The diving assistant said she literally gasped when she saw that it was directly under me and not so happy to have me directly above it. I took this from an article I found on the internet...
"Stingrays are considered by most experts to be docile creatures, only attacking in self-defense. Most stingray-related injuries to humans occur to the ankles and lower legs, when someone accidentally steps on a ray buried in the sand and the frightened fish flips up its dangerous tail."
Tanya said that the bull rays rule the ocean, as far as rays go. I didn't even get to see the thing, which totally sucks, but I have learned that on any future dives, I will stay well off the bottom! I really believe that everything happens to teach us something we need to know...guess that was what I learned today! If only I had actually seen the ray, it might have made this story even more exciting to tell! I think it is actually a cooler story for the people who watched it raise it's tail to tell, but Tanya said and again, I quote, "This is the kind of thing you write home about!". So that's just what I did.
The above pic is of a bull ray, taken from the internet.

Saturday, October 27, 2007

MS 10km Walk

Friday evening, 4 Pandamites (Pandamites are Pandemic Employees) embarked on an epic adventure. One that took courage, skill and immense bravery. Lead by our fearless leader, Mr Jeff Goslan, we en-barked on a journey that none will soon forget. Two things drove us....raising money for MS and the BBQ at the end of the walk....
Jeff's older brother is in the later stages of MS and Jeff wanted to raise some money and awareness for the cause. So Myself, Trish, Morgan and Jeff did the Brisbane MS Walk that was held Thursday evening. The 10km walk went all along the Brisbane river, up and over the Story Bridge and through a couple parks. We raised (I say we, but mostly Jeff) almost $900 dollars from donations given to us by co workers...
Here's a few pics of the evening...



See the bare feet, that's Morgan....he did the 10km walk in bare feet....crazy aussies
Trish waving the Pandemic colors...
Jeff, Morgan and Trish....
Moi (that's "me" in French)
We got these glow in the dark bracelets...
It's a flower solar panel....I love this, I can't wait to own a house someday so I can run the whole thing from wind and sun....
What MS walk wouldn't be comlete without some Storm Troopers...
Going over Story Bridge
A guided tour that goes up to the top of Story Bridge...hoping to do that soon..
Brisbane City from the Bridge.
Steve

Thursday, October 25, 2007

Still house hunting...

We looked at this place yesterday...http://www.realestate.com.au/cgi-bin/rsearch?a=o&id=402958600&f=0&p=10&t=ren&ty=&fmt=&header=&c=75409532&s=qld&snf=rbs&tm=1193263160 We really liked. So did the other 10 people that looked at it, so I'm not getting my hopes up. It's huge! It's a 3 level townhouse and would be absolutely perfect for company, as there are 3 bathrooms and lots of room! Hint...hint! It's not far from where we live now and the street it's on is a quiet little one way street. They consider pets on application. I've been told that townhouses are much warmer than old Queenslanders in the winter, which would be very nice! The real estate agent said that we'd know if we have it in 24 to 48 hours, so by the end of the week for sure. I'd love to be moved into a new place before Christmas! Speaking of homes, we've been having a lot of open houses for the house we're in now, since it's gone up for sale. There was one on Saturday, there's one today and one this Saturday. What a pain in the butt! We have to leave the house clean all the time, as the open houses kind of pop up on us and poor Jesse gets locked up whenever we have one. It wouldn't be so bad, except that they are always at the worst times...right in the middle of the day on a Saturday, or right when you're getting home from work during the week. Hopefully it sells fast and we don't have weeks of open houses!

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Back to my roots...

...no more blond Cari. I'm actually pretty happy with it and it only cost $12! Much better than the quotes I was given for $90! I think I have become obsessed with getting deals since I moved here!

Tuesday, October 23, 2007

Long weekend

We had a really good weekend. Steve and I both took Friday off and enjoyed every minute of having a long weekend. We didn't do anything too crazy (which made it even nicer!). We spent Friday shopping for new clothes for Steve. He was in desperate need of some clothes that fit! He got some snazzy new duds and he wears them well, I must say!;)
On Saturday, Steve went to the driving range with Jeff and Vic and I got my hair cut. The chick who cut it is traveling through Australia and is originally from Ireland. She was interesting to talk to. I would really like to travel to Ireland someday. She did a really good job of my cut too! I also got Steve to dye my hair tonight. Although I like the blond highlights, they are just too much upkeep and money! So, I went el-cheapo and opted for a home color kit. It turned out okay. I'll post a pic later.
Saturday night, we went out for dinner and then drinks with friends.
Then on Sunday, we went to Redcliff beach with Rej and Clo. Steve and I had never been to that part of Redcliff...we had a great time chillin' and chattin' on the beach. Rej and Clo picked us up, which was a nice treat, since we usually have to rent a car to go anywhere. Thanks guys!
It was a little tough going back to work after a long, relaxing weekend, but the week seems to be going by fast. I'm finishing my diving course this weekend, which I'm looking forward to.
Check out a few of the pics from the weekend...

The beach was a landing zone for skydivers, so we got to see them coming in. It brought back memories!

Rej and Clo and Clo and me...

The guys and me (obviously).


A few photos that were taken at the bar (Hotel Bravo). For some reason, bars are called hotels here. It's strange.


The girl in the picture with me is Robyn. She went to McKenzie College with Steve. She lives here in Brisbane now. That's Vic and Robyn in the other shot.

Happy vs. Angry.
I have a few more things to post about, but I'm too sleepy. Tomorrow. Another day, another post...



Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Spring has sprung...

Our friend, Brianna captured some of the more beautiful moments of spring in Brisbane. Check out her lovely pictures at http://brie-report.blogspot.com/. She always takes the nicest pics!

The cost of homes in Brisbane

This is why, even if we wanted to, we could never buy a house in Brisbane...this is the house that we are currently renting...selling for $625 000...http://www.realestate.com.au/cgi-bin/rsearch?a=o&id=104367820&f=0&p=10&t=res&ty=&fmt=&header=&c=98468420&s=qld&snf=rbs&tm=1192610159

Monday, October 15, 2007

Warning...a bummer post in progress...

Okay, so this post is a bit of a bummer post. For starters, after spending 2 weekends waking up early (both Saturday and Sunday) and going to my scuba diving course, I am sad to report that I still haven't finished it! Why, you may ask? Well, yesterday we drove the hour and a half to catch our boat, waited for our boat for over an hour, got all our dive gear prepared and on the boat, started out to the island where we were scheduled to do our 3rd and 4th open water dives, only to have to turn around and return to the jetty. The swells were huge and not safe to go out in. Apparently, a boat had already flipped and the conditions were only getting worse. It's only the 3rd time in 15 years that the Skipper couldn't take divers out. The ocean really is amazing. It was a sunny, hot day, yet still the sea was hazardous. Anyway, no diving meant not being able to complete the course. We have to reschedule, hopefully within the next 4 weeks. I was disapointed. It'll be nice to have the course behind me, so Steve and I can just get diving for fun. Steve finished his refresher course on Saturday, with flying colors (of course!), so he's quite eager to get in the water. We were thinking about doing our first dive at Byron Bay, where we snorkled awhile back. This has made me reconsider the idea...http://www.thedaily.com.au/news/2007/oct/15/shark-attack-victim-tells-ordeal/... Apparently, it's the season for great white sharks.

In other bummer news...
Steve's company has been bought by the one gaming company that he has never wanted to work for. He was pretty unhappy about it but has decided to just go with the flow and enjoy things while he can. If things change for the worst over the next couple of years, then we just move on. No point in worrying too much about it now. Hopefully, not much will change, but EA is definitely not known to be a great company to work for. Here's the official scoop...http://investor.ea.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=88189&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=1061844&highlight=

And, finally, to try to leave this post on a positive note...
We had Rej and Clo over for dinner on Wednesday night. Rej works with Steve and Clo is his partner. They're Canadian and just moved here not that long ago. They are originally from Quebec and Rej actually has family in Yarmouth, N.S. Small world, eh? We move all the way to Brisbane to hang out with people from home! It's true what they say...when you move away, you really do cling to those from your home country! Anyway, they're a cool couple. It was fun to hang out with them! This is the lovely orchid that Clo brought us...
Hopefully, I'll have some more cheerful news to chat about next post!

Thursday, October 11, 2007

Bon Voyage Sonya!








My boss, Sonya is moving to Seattle next week and today is her last day at work. We're having a little surprise going away party for her. I was in charge of bringing the cupcakes. The challenge was that they had to be gluten, dairy and egg free, so everyone could eat them. They turned out quite tasty! I made both chocolate and vanilla and even found a great icing recipe, which I'm sure to be using a lot in future treats! Hopefully everyone enjoys them!

Sunday, October 07, 2007

Happy Turkey Day!



Happy Thanksgiving Canada! Sure am missing the turkey dinner this year, so eat a little extra for me! Since, I can still give thanks, even if I can't enjoy Thanksgiving meal...I am thankful for all our experiences here in Australia and all the opportunities coming here has given us. I just asked Steve what he was thankful for and he answered..."My beautiful wife." Hmmm...I'm thinking that was either a safe answer or a kiss up answer...what do you think? ;)

Scuba Cari...

I have officially made it through the first weekend of my scuba diving course. It was a very tiring weekend. Yesterday we went from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., with only a half hour break and today from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. with only a half hour break. Phew. Can you say exhausting? Having said that, it went quite well. It was theory work, which was done in the classroom and then lots of pool work. All the basic skills and then some. There were definitely a few frustrated moments of, "I can't do it", mostly for me when it came to taking my mask off completely, while still breathing underwater through the regulator, then replacing and clearing the mask. I also took a few tries to get a couple other skills, but in the end I accomplished everything, including the 200 metre swim and 10 minutes of treading water. I think working out with Steve has paid off, because I wasn't even that out of breath! I'm still a little nervous about next weekend, because we have to do eveything that we did in the pool, in the ocean. No shooting to the surface if you get freaked out! But for now, I'll be proud of what I accomplished today, go enjoy the Thai dinner that Steve is making (can I just say that diving all day works up a serious appetite!) and try to give my poor over-worked lungs a break. I sure hope I sleep well tonight! I think it'll be an early one...

Thursday, October 04, 2007

Perspective

Interesting fact.

Too loose one pound of fat off your tubby ass, you need to burn about 3500 calories. I’ve lost 30 pounds of tubby ass fat…..that’s 105,000 calories…

Steve (mmm cookies) Dickinson

Thanksgiving??

Can I just say that I TOTALLY forgot that Thanksgiving was coming! I was listening to C100 on internet radio last night and was shocked when they said about Thanksgiving weekend! I'm telling you, the opposite seasons have really made holidays and birthdays confusing. You really don't realize how much you mark these events with seasons and temperatures until it's all changed and backwards! We missed celebrating Canada Day, because we remembered too late, Thanksgiving weekend, I'll be doing my dive course, so no turkey for us. Man, Christmas is going to be so strange! We'll be decorating our tree in 35 degree weather! Oh and speaking of trees...I saw artificial Christmas trees for sale the other day! At least we'll be able to get a real fake tree!

Magpie Monsters!




Okay, so you may recall me mentioning that a bird hit me in the head, while I was walking through the park about 3 weeks ago. It was a bird like in the picture shown above. It's called a magpie and apparently, they can be very aggressive during nesting time. Since that dumb bird flew into me unexpectantly, my neck and headaches have been REALLY bad. So bad that I had to go see an osteopath yesterday, in hopes of getting whatever is wrong fixed. I was telling her about how my headaches have been so much worse since the bird incident and she was telling me that the magpies in her neighborhood are so aggressive that people have to walk with umbrellas, even on beautiful sunny days, to avoid being swooped at. Melinda (my osteopath) was saying that even to go to the end of her driveway to get her mail, she has to have her umbrella or they'll swoop at her like 6 times! On top of this, apparently they swoop at people on bikes the most. She says that her "flatmate" has stopped biking because the swooping was too bad, and the other day when she was biking, they kept slamming into her helmet. I googled "magpies" to find these pictures and the one with the chick on the bike was titled..."Australian magpie swooping at a cyclist." I'm going to start carrying an umbrella, especially after spending $75 yesterday to have my neck fixed! According to Melinda, it'll be another month or so before these birds chill out and stop swooping. It's interesting to me, that of all the creatures in Australia, the birds seem to be what scare me the most! Who'd a thought??

Monday, October 01, 2007

30, that damn number is in my life again....

This morning, before I got dressed for the day, I waddled onto the scales to check my weekly weight. and low and behold I was at 194 pounds..... What does this mean you ask...Well it means that I have officially lost 30 pounds...8 months ago that scale would have read 224 pounds, today it reads 194. The goal is to lose 44 pounds, so I only have 14 more pounds to go. I'm losing the weight at a healthy pace, about .5 to 1 pound a week, I have found since Cari and I have started to work out together in the morning I starting to lose the weight a little faster. If you want to know how much 30 pounds is, next time you see one of those big water cooler jugs , (the 15 litre ones) pick it up, that’s about what I've lost so far.

By the way, if your wondering why my toes look so pretty its because Cari gave me a pedicure Sunday night.....I must say, all those lotions and creams get me excited....The bottoms of my feet are baby smooth and no longer look like a deep fried sock. The fact that she can even stomach going near my feet proves that she’s in it for the long haul....Thanks Babe!

Steve (baby smooth) Dickinson

My newest obsession...

This is what I've started eating as a yummy treat or even as just a little something different at brekky. It's just basically fruit cut up in a bowl (whatever you like or have to use up in your fridge), then you sprinkle it with cinnamon, a little wheat free granola and lastly, you drizzle it with chilled coconut cream (you put the can of coconut cream directly in the fridge, then whip it in a bowl before putting it over your fruit). This is sooooo yummy and good for you. According to my nutritionist, coconut cream is a good fat, in moderation. Give it a try...it's a nice sweet, yet healthy snack! And, dairy and wheat free, of course! I love it!