Birthday boy!
This last weekend we celebrated the big lawyer man's 25th birthday. Now he is officially as old as his grandma girlfriend. What an old man... :) We had a lovely dinner on Friday night with a group of friends at a Spanish tapas restaurant that gave everyone potent garlic breath and great joy with their food. The night continued with drinks at random next-door hotel/pub, then we made our way back to Erko and had strange cocktails...Marcus's first drink was tasted like a fruity toothpaste. He didn't react very well to that. One of our friends had a "Monica Lewinsky" martini, though I'm still not certain how one would devise a cocktail recipe for that particular personality. I think it had a cigar-flavored spirit? Why that would make sense is beyond my range of common sense, but there you have that. Marcus was also bought a cocktail with absinthe. I didn't realize absinthe was legal in this country, though it is Australia, so why wouldn't it be? I mean, Australia's not Canada or the Czech Republic or anything, but as I've said, the country does like its beverage!
We ended the night fairly early (midnight-ish) then went home. Saturday was filled with a faux lease-signing (seriously, bills and anything having to do with bills is ten times more complicated here--don't even get Marcus started on the electricity companies, they are absolutely incorrigible!), brunch with Marcus's mom, such and such, Monica Lewinsky martini-drinking friend's birthday drinks, the Mardi Gras parade (Sydney's version of Gay Pride) and continued birthday drinks. The Mardi Gras parade was pretty awesome, with LOTS of supporters out. The police marched, the fire brigades, the state emergency services, plus your usual band of drag queens, S & M'ers, leather lovers, winged boys, half-naked boys, and happy gay paraders. The streets were so crowded that we had to buy little stools to stand on in order to see the parade! Everybody's favorite parade entrant, though, were the life savers (no, not the candy, the Aussie lifeguards!). They were dancing down the street in their little speedos and swimming caps, making boys and girls alike drool with desire. It was so much fun to watch! I'm hoping next year I can wend my way into some pre-festivity planning.
Sunday was Marcus's birthday (same day as International Women's Day) and we spent a quiet day amongst ourselves. I made him french toast for breakfast, which he had never had before, then we went up to the grocery store to pick up ingredients for home made pizza. I made him sit in the living room and watch sports (such a hardship for him!) while I made a humongous batch of peanut butter-oatmeal-coconut-chocolate chip cookies. They turned out quite well, if I do say so myself. I candled a plateful of cookies and our roommate Bec and I sang the happy birthday song (they're so funny, they say the "hip hip" "hooray!" after singing the song--I'm getting to enjoy the worldly variations of this song!) and he opened up his presents. A movie (Coming to America) and a home-made pizza later and we were pretty much ready for bed. I enjoy a good laid-back day.
In other news, I heard back from my non-prof and actually had a meeting with three of the gals last Friday before Marcus's birthday dinner. All kinds of fundraising brain storming went on, which was great to be a part of, and after meeting for longer than any of us had planned, we agreed that I would first start with one project then we'd move on to the fundraising business. My first project will be to help them create a Style Guide for their publications, which is a natural progression (and an actually fun progression) from what I'm doing here at the Audit Office. All of the letters and guides I edit here are done to a very rigid style guide. I'm thinking that the style guide I help them create will be a bit more general and I'll get to help them brand their organization. It's an exciting opportunity that I'm very much looking forward to, so this is a positive step forward for my volunteering. And just in general, I really need something new and interesting to focus my time on. It feels like my brain is atrophying in this work-world. However, I will be done working at the audit office in less than a month (I can't work any longer than six months with this visa) so I'll be out of this dreadful work and then there will be the obstacle of finding another job. In this economy, I'm a bit frightened, but I'm an intelligent, hard worker and any company would be blessed to have me. This is the attitude I will continue to hold onto while I job search. :)
Maybe I'll take a barista course and finally look for work in a cafe and try to bake my cookies.
We ended the night fairly early (midnight-ish) then went home. Saturday was filled with a faux lease-signing (seriously, bills and anything having to do with bills is ten times more complicated here--don't even get Marcus started on the electricity companies, they are absolutely incorrigible!), brunch with Marcus's mom, such and such, Monica Lewinsky martini-drinking friend's birthday drinks, the Mardi Gras parade (Sydney's version of Gay Pride) and continued birthday drinks. The Mardi Gras parade was pretty awesome, with LOTS of supporters out. The police marched, the fire brigades, the state emergency services, plus your usual band of drag queens, S & M'ers, leather lovers, winged boys, half-naked boys, and happy gay paraders. The streets were so crowded that we had to buy little stools to stand on in order to see the parade! Everybody's favorite parade entrant, though, were the life savers (no, not the candy, the Aussie lifeguards!). They were dancing down the street in their little speedos and swimming caps, making boys and girls alike drool with desire. It was so much fun to watch! I'm hoping next year I can wend my way into some pre-festivity planning.
Sunday was Marcus's birthday (same day as International Women's Day) and we spent a quiet day amongst ourselves. I made him french toast for breakfast, which he had never had before, then we went up to the grocery store to pick up ingredients for home made pizza. I made him sit in the living room and watch sports (such a hardship for him!) while I made a humongous batch of peanut butter-oatmeal-coconut-chocolate chip cookies. They turned out quite well, if I do say so myself. I candled a plateful of cookies and our roommate Bec and I sang the happy birthday song (they're so funny, they say the "hip hip" "hooray!" after singing the song--I'm getting to enjoy the worldly variations of this song!) and he opened up his presents. A movie (Coming to America) and a home-made pizza later and we were pretty much ready for bed. I enjoy a good laid-back day.
In other news, I heard back from my non-prof and actually had a meeting with three of the gals last Friday before Marcus's birthday dinner. All kinds of fundraising brain storming went on, which was great to be a part of, and after meeting for longer than any of us had planned, we agreed that I would first start with one project then we'd move on to the fundraising business. My first project will be to help them create a Style Guide for their publications, which is a natural progression (and an actually fun progression) from what I'm doing here at the Audit Office. All of the letters and guides I edit here are done to a very rigid style guide. I'm thinking that the style guide I help them create will be a bit more general and I'll get to help them brand their organization. It's an exciting opportunity that I'm very much looking forward to, so this is a positive step forward for my volunteering. And just in general, I really need something new and interesting to focus my time on. It feels like my brain is atrophying in this work-world. However, I will be done working at the audit office in less than a month (I can't work any longer than six months with this visa) so I'll be out of this dreadful work and then there will be the obstacle of finding another job. In this economy, I'm a bit frightened, but I'm an intelligent, hard worker and any company would be blessed to have me. This is the attitude I will continue to hold onto while I job search. :)
Maybe I'll take a barista course and finally look for work in a cafe and try to bake my cookies.
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