I have a bike.  I have a home.  I have a job.  I have decided to attempt to regularily ride my bike from my home to my job.  It comes with many adventures.

My job is in Northern Sydney.  Northern Sydney is notoriously hilly.

Going to work it is mostly up hill past the River.  One of the hills I had to get off my bike and walk up, but when I got off my bike, my legs would not work!  They were completely depleted of energy!  I have never not being able to walk before, it was extremely disconcerting.  Then there was the 20 minute recovery at the top of the hill... hopefully with practise both of these things will be reduced!

A friend from work is helping me get between work and the river, which is the complicated, hilly stretch of the journey.  His advice is not always something I'm willing to take.
[top of the super steep hill]
FRIEND: You don't need to brake on this hill till you get to the bottom.  My max speed on this one has been 68km/h!
ELIZABETH: Umm... don't brake?  meep
[on the hill]
ELIZABETH: eek
[at the bottom]
ELIZABETH: That was fun!
FRIEND: I beat you down the hill, you must have been braking.  I told you not to brake!
ELIZABETH: You bet I was braking, it was scary!

I got up to 54.5 km/hour braking on that hill.  My fear of flying off my bike at 55kph prevents me from wanting to go any faster.  Tis very scary going fast on a bike.

Despite scary parts going up and down really really big hills, I really enjoyed the 3 trips I've taken to or from work and would like to keep it up at least twice a week.  The trip home takes an hour, and the trip to work currently takes 90 minutes.  I should be able to cut both of those times down with practise (It's only 15 km).  The train takes 55 minutes and costs $32/week.  Yay, exercise is fun!

My plane is taking off in 4 hours in 22 minutes. 

So... I haven't finished packing, I just found my passports, I think I'm going to switch bags, and I don't have any winter clothes.  It'll all come together at the last minute just like it always does :)  I don't need to leave for the train for another hour, so there's still time!  Really!  There is isn't there?

These are the things I'm really looking forward to not having to deal with in Canada:
Giant cockroaches in the shower
Giant cockroaches in the kitchen
Giant cockroaches on the streets at night
The heat
The lack of air conditioning
The guilt ridden cold showers

4 hours and 14 minutes... meep!

Excitement, excitement, I'm going home to Canada for my birthday!

Yes, I still call it home... my... half home.  It's complicated.

Anyway, flying in February 6th, flying out March 1st. 

Yay!!

The trip back was very very long. I left at 10am Sunday from London Ontario, and arrived in Burwood NSW at 8:15am on Tuesday. That's a mere 36 hours and 15 minutes. The flights were pretty good, but the video on demand wasn't working on my flight to Sydney from San Francesco. Ah well.

When I got to Sydney, the lines for customs and quarantine were huge. I had to declare the chocolate I was bringing back, as well as the tea and my hiking boots. I was worried about the hiking boots because I hadn't had a chance to clean them before I left. They asked to see them, so I had to unpack my bag. They said "ooo, they are dirty!" and then told me to wait while they took them away. At this point I was beginning to worry that I wouldn't see them again. It was all ok, they brought them back a few minutes later in plastic bags all clean (and wet).

Next hurdle was getting back to Burwood. I was approached by a taxi driver who when hearing that I was going to Burwood said:
Taxi driver:I'll take you there for $85.
Me:85 dollars?? Last time it only cost me 40.
Taxi driver:But there's traffic, my price is the best you'll get.
Me:No thanks, I'll try my luck else where.

It ended up costing me $45. In traffic. Take that stupid over priced taxi driver!

Anyway, I spent most of the day with Karen, though went for a nap at 3pm (not a good idea). Jenny and Karen cooked a wonderful meal and desert (they are the greatest) and I headed back to bed at 9pm. Well, that didn't last long; I've been up at 2am. At this point I've decided that I'll just stay awake until tonight.

In my spare time until getting up time, I have joined facebook, uploaded a lot of photos of the wedding on my website and called Mum.

Wow, have I not missed winter! It was 13C in my room when I woke up. I've got the heater on now and it's risen to 19.5C

Yesterday I had a fantastic time with Amanda at Canada's Wonderland. We went on almost all the rollercoasters as well as a ride called nightmares (spins you around super fast) and the sledgehammer (spins you and throws you up then drops you down).

Low points:
Having to spend $17 on sunscreen
The Heat
Sponge Bob Square Pants Action 3D video.
Spending $4 on a pop

High points:
The wooden roller coasters that feel like they are going to fall apart which adds to the thrill
Been terrified at the top of Top Gun.
The ice cream cookie we had for dinner for only $4
The bus trip home for reasons I shall not mention

( In other (wedding) news )

Got a ride to London for a dress fitting today. This is where I'm staying (aside from a trip to Toronto) the rest of this holiday. The dress fits lovely!

My website http://sigma.phispace.net/ has been updated! Not with content (though Canada photos will come soon!) but the front page is prettier.

Wow, I'm leaving Canada in 5 days, so much studying to do.

So, I made it to Canada!

( My Flight )


( Time in London )


( Time in Kingston )

So, that's the update on what I've been doing in Canada!

That's right, 13 hours until I leave. Yes, I've started packing, more importantly, I've charged all those electronic devices that need to be fully charged for the plane. Now I just have to remember to not walk out of the house without my bag/passports/computer.

Australia's funny. They won't let you leave without an Australian passport AND they won't let you back in with a non-Australian passport if you are Australian. It's very important I bring BOTH my passports.

Good point, where is my thumb drive?? Ah, coat pocket.

Tomorrow, I have to buy gluten free cookies for mummy, buy a fridge for Karen and I and not fall over from lack of sleep.

This is all very exciting, I'll be in Detroit :p in... 33 hours, London in 38!!!! Of course, those numbers could be drastically wrong; I lost the ability to add an hour or so ago.

Today is election day for the state of NSW. I'm about to go and vote but I have absolutely NO CLUE who to vote for. They all suck. If I were in Avalon, I'd so vote for the guy I voted for last time, but unfortunately, I'm in Burwood now. Oh woe......

In other news, I bought my plane ticket to Canada (well, Detroit, it was cheaper by $600)!! It shall be super fun visiting for 2 and a half weeks from May 30th until June 17th. Sadly, by the time I get there I will have ABSOLUTELY NO MONEY. Ah well.

Ah, my job. It's a shambles. It's a comedy of misunderstandings and manipulation. My boss, was quite surprised to hear from the Help Desk/Support guys that my last day was March 30th. She thought my contract was until the end of June. I had a meeting with my boss and HR, it was just so... I haven't cried in about a year, but thinking about that meeting makes me teary. I actually cried on the bus to work yesterday (admittedly while talking to Sonya about the meeting). They want to use me for 3 months, then drop me down to one day a week which isn't enough to pay the rent let alone buy food, transport and pay bills. There were three options I thought could happen and this is the worst(the others being IT would keep me on indefinitely or drop me completely now). Ah well, at least I know that there are people here to go to if things get really bad.

And then finally, there is the house situation which is even worse than the job situation but I'm not going to go into that because I really WILL cry. That all being said, I'm still a lot happier now than I was in Canada at the end (except about not seeing all the fantastic people there who I miss so much!).

Time to vote!! Oh but who........

Tafe assessment number 2 had a result of 96%.

I'm back in Australia again, had a fantastic time over Christmas in Canada.

Highlights were:
Watching Bones with Mum.
Christmas day with the Rowes and the Baileys
Playing games on the wii with Nate
Losing spectacularly at Risk to Phi
Losing spectacularly at Star Wars Monopoly to Steve
Playing with new Palm T|x with Dad
Blue Man Group with Amanda, Stephanie and Stephany.

Low points:
Waiting in line for 4+ hours at Ottawa for a passport.
Getting lost driving in Toronto about 60 million times

Now I am quite jetlagged. The clock says it's 1:55am, my mind says it's 9:55am. Humph. Better try to get back to sleep, I go back to work today.

Today I woke to find TWO flight itinerys in my inbox. TWO! One was for my trip to Canada (Yay!!!) and the other was a trip mum had booked to Hobart for the three of us when Mum and Dad come in 2 weeks time! It's quite exciting, niether me nor Mum has gone to Tasmania before :). We shall have 3 full days there.

This morning at work, our Boss came over to the help desk and announced that our Get Active Challenge team (Team Tornado) had better WIN WIN WIN!!! Then she suggested we make a large chart tracking each person's progress to encourage competitiveness.

Day 2 total: 12.5km
Week 1 total (thus far): 25km
Overall total (thus far): 25km

54 days to go!