6 years

This past weekend marked 6 years since Phil and I arrived in Oz for our gig. And it has been an adventure for sure.

We made some good friends.

Bought, and sold, a house.

Got to know two different neighbourhoods in Brisbane quite well and became acquainted with a few others. 

Visited North Qld, Byron Bay (several times), Sydney, Melbourne (both multiple times), Adelaide, Hobart, and surrounding areas of each.

For my part, I finished a PhD and a few quilts, taught some fabulous future midwives, and helped a few young new Australians learn English.

Phil created and led an innovation lab at the university, with much success and some frustration, and was sought out as a consultant or speaker at universities and schools, and even the Federal government.

Now as we anticipate leaving in just a few weeks, here is what I'll miss:

Friends.

TimTams. Yes, you can order them on Amazon, but they are super expensive, so no.

Living on the river in West End with the view that I never tire of, and where I can walk to everything. 

The CityCat ferries, most civilised transportation ever.

The weather, especially spring and fall.

The jacarandas in bloom in October.

Being 2 hours from Melbourne.

Really excellent wine, even though I can't drink very much of it at a time.

Prices that include tax and service charge.

Uncertainty is life

Where has the time gone? As of January, we've been in the Treehouse for 4 years, and as of last month, in Oz for 4 1/2. That means that our first 5 years in Oz are rapidly coming to a close. And let me tell you there's nothing like the impending end of an employment contract to get you thinking about, well, pretty much everything.

Now that I'm no longer a student, I have the opportunity to look for a job. But where should I look? In pursuit of a return to the US, Phil's job hunting back there, but nothing has come up on that front yet. UQ would like him to stay, and that's looking likely at least for another year. So then, look here. But what if a US job comes through for Phil? So then, wait.

Further in pursuit of a return to the US, we've put the Treehouse on the market. Now, the Treehouse isn't your ordinary house. It will not appeal to the average person. You need to be a bit adventurous to live here, and not mind spiders or geckos. You need to appreciate the quirks and not mind the upkeep too much. Knowing this, we decided to sell up as soon as we can, after which we'll either move our stuff and ourselves back to the US, or move to a more modestly-sized rental in Brisbane for however much longer we're here. After a month on the market and 4 open houses, accompanied first by online and now by print advertising ($$$$!), we've had exactly 0 serious interest. At least we can say that we correctly anticipated a tough sell. 3 more open houses and we go to auction on the 25th of May, and see what happens.

But even this is fraught. What if a buyer wants to close quickly? What will we do with all our stuff, which now fills 11 rooms and the storage space under the house, and only some of which we need to have to hand? Rent storage (an action I vowed never to take)? Engage a mover now for storage until we actually do leave? Clearly triaging of possessions will be required and these will include some that were not mine originally and that I didn't want to bring here in the first place. Fireworks will ensue, I have no doubt.

So supposing we stay: what sort of job should I look for? I haven't practiced midwifery in nearly 5 years but I have no immediate prospects for practice here. No one's hiring except one midwifery education program; they want a full-time person, and I don't want to work full-time. I just helped my physio PhD advisor write a grant that includes a 0.8 FTE research assistant position, and I might be a candidate for that position, IF she gets the grant and IF it's funded. Did I get a PhD to be a research assistant? 

Here are my big worries: What if 6 months go by and the house hasn't sold? What if Phil finds a job in the US and the house hasn't sold? What if we can't sell it for enough to at least get our down payment back after we pay off the mortgage and the real estate agent's fee and still have enough left to fund the move back?

And, not so big but a factor nonetheless: we could be leaving before I've had a chance to see Perth, and Darwin, and Singapore, and Thailand and NZ, and some of those islands in the S. Pacific. It's a long and expensive way to come on a holiday from the US. If that weren't the case, we would have had more visitors here at the Treehouse. So, as much as I want to go back and be Marmee, I also want to stay and see more of this part of the world while it's a shorter and cheaper trip to do so.

So, there it all is, but I have to stop thinking about it before my head explodes. Channeling Scarlett O'Hara - I'll think about it tomorrow.

Animals you might see at (or near) our house

This post is for Amity (happy birthday, little Groundhog!) and Zara! Here are some of the animals you may see while you're visiting Oz.

1. Geckos

Geckos are small, very fast, and a bit shy, so you usually only see them very briefly. They are helpful because they eat spiders and mosquitoes. They look like this:

They make a sort of chirping sound which can be pretty loud when you think about how small they are. It sounds like this:

2. Gecko poo

Where there are geckos, there is gecko poo. It's hard to tell from the photo, but a poo is very small, about the size of a grain of long-grain rice. It almost always has a little white dot at one end, which is the gecko's pee. This is what it looks like:

3. Cockroaches

I know this may sound rather unpleasant, but better to be forewarned. The sort of climate we have here is very welcoming for all kinds of creatures, not all of which are ideal neighbours, and cockroaches are in that category. Usually if you see one in the house, it will be dead and look like this:

But sometimes they are alive and look like this:

I haven't seen any lately so I hope they've moved on.

4. Tiny little black ants

They're so small I couldn't even find any photos of them. They aren't much bigger than this apostrophe: '  They tickle a bit when they crawl on you but don't hurt you. Best to leave ants alone though, because there are other kinds that aren't so nice and it can be hard to tell which ones you're looking at.

5. Spiders

Spiders have 8 legs and come in all sizes. They trap flies and mosquitoes in their webs so we usually leave them alone and they leave us alone. I see lots of daddy longlegs around, and  you've probably seen them too, because they're very common just about everywhere:

I sometimes see a spider sort of like this one, in a big web, and leave it alone to let it do its spidery work:

6. Water dragons

These guys are relatives of the geckos, but they're bigger, though also very shy. We sometimes have one visiting the pool.

7. Birds

Lately I mostly hear crows squawking around here. They're big and black:

We also see a lot of magpies around:

But sometimes one of our trees gets a visit from a kookaburra or two. They are native to Australia and have a very distinctive call:

And there are always the brush turkeys - they walk all through the neighbourhood:

8. Possums

Possums come out at night - they're nocturnal - and they sometimes have fights on our rooftop with a lot of hissing. They can be bold, but if you pretend you're going to chase them they run away.

I hope you liked this little introduction to our local animals.

Bump 2.0 - Menopause Edition, or how to procrastinate and still feel you accomplished something

After the afternoon deluge, the clouds lifted a bit, the weather radar had no bad news, and it was still light enough out to go for a run. Or, to be more accurate, a trot. The big questions of the day to be answered were:

1) Can I still run there you go again, damn it, trot! 3 miles without stopping?
2) Do the mosquitoes of SE Qld prefer to bite skin that is sweaty or just moist from humidity?
3) Will the addition of kinesophobia and passive coping variables improve the R^2 ("R-squared") of my linear regression model?

I know, I know. This post is supposed to be about Bump 2.0. I'll leave off digressing and get on with it.

As with labor and birth and parenthood, so menopause. You can read all the books, spend hours at websites, talk to your friends, and go to classes all you want, but nothing can really prepare you for what happens to your body after menopause.

Here is one of the things that happens. One day you look down, and where what you thought was your more or less flat belly used to be, there is now a Bump. Bump 2.0, and not the pregnancy one - that's Bump 1.0. Contract your abs, and the Bump moves with them, but it is still there. Your weight has not changed, but it's apparent that the distribution of said weight, somehow, has.

Since we know there is no such thing as "spot" weight reduction, logic dictates that the only way to deal with Bump 2.0 is a program of "overall" weight reduction. Now for you young women, I'm sorry to say there's more bad news. In addition to bringing you Bump 2.0, menopause plays another cruel trick: your metabolism slows to slightly above Sloth level, and - here's the best part - with no corresponding reduction in appetite! As you might imagine, this makes overall weight reduction a mirage of a goal: you can see it in the distance, but you never actually get there.

Being an HRT* refusenik, I am unable to tell you whether the appearance of Bump 2.0 would have been delayed or prevented had I chosen to maintain my youthful hormone levels through chemistry. If anyone has any pertinent evidence, I'd be interested in knowing about it, although not interested enough to give up refusenik status.

It occurs to me that Bump 2.0 - Menopause Edition would be a good title for a zine or a blog. I'm happy to lend it to anyone who wants to start such a publication, as long as I'm properly credited, of course.

And now the answers to today's big questions:

1) YES!!!! Slow, but I can still do it. The hardest bit, besides all of it, is when I'm downwind of the poo bins.
2) Didn't get any bites in either direction, so research continues.
3) Still to be determined when procrastination time is over.

*hormone replacement therapy, which in the 90s was a really really good thing, and now we know better.

Big weekend in Brissie

Yes, this weekend was the opening of the Brisbane Festival, which as near as I understand it is 4-ish weeks of music, dance, theatre etc. at various venues around the city. Since the 1st of the month we've had the Brisbane Writers' Festival going on, and today Paulie, Stephen, Phil & I went to hear Susan Maushart speak, which was my goal. She's a columnist in the Weekend Australian magazine and one of the only reasons I spend money on the paper (owned as it is by News Limited, i.e. Rupert Murdoch). (The other reason is Phillip Adams.) Imagine my sort-of surprise when she started speaking and I heard the pear-shaped tones of Long Island emanating from her mouth! I always had it in the back of my mind that she didn't write like an Australian, and it turns out that's because she's not an Australian! In person she is just as smart and funny as in her columns and I came home with two of her books, signed, and her gmail address. Sad for us here, she is leaving Oz in November to move back to the Gisland. Phil & I both talked to her at some length during a lull in the book signing and she appeared to be open to further contact either here or there. She is the sort of person I'd like to have living next door to me.

That was today, but last night was ... Riverfire. The pyrotechnic opening event of the Brisbane Festival and this year supposedly for the VERY LAST time - they said this last year too but turns out they were full of it - we were treated to the famous, or infamous, "dump and burn" courtesy of an aging RAAF F-111 jet. As bad environmentally and financially as it is, I have to say it's extremely cool to watch. Last year I went down to South Bank right next to where the fireworks display originates, but this year we just walked up to the reservoir where we have a great view of the city and watched from there. Not quite the same experience but nowhere near the crowds. The streak of light in the sky is burning fuel from the F-111, but the jet flies (and dumps and burns) all by itself, no simultaneous fireworks; this photo is a bit shopped. The link above has a video clip for a better idea of how it really looks.

The Aussie alphabet: E is for Ekka

It's only the end of May now, but August will be here before we know it. And August is the time for the Ekka. Proper name: Royal Queensland Show. Shortened to Exhibition, which being Australia gets shortened to Ekka. A Queensland tradition since 1876, it's got everything. A midway with carnival rides, livestock judging, performances, food, music, and showbags, collections of (usually) candy and toys offered in themed bags (Batman, Barbie, that sort of thing) for some amount of money. All this goes on for nine days in August; this year's dates are 5-14. And the Wednesday of Ekka week is a public holiday, the last official one before Christmas, so everyone can go! They put special trains on that go to the showgrounds where the station is only operational for these 9 days a year.

This photo, no doubt taken from the ferris wheel, is from Ekka 2009.

Trent & Judy visit the Treehouse

We went on Show Day (a public holiday in Brisbane, 12 Aug) to the Ekka, a huge fair with rides, games, food, animals, and a lot of people. A few days later Trent walked with us to the summit of Mt Coot-tha, while Judy stayed back and nursed her sore feet.

Colours

I wish I had a photo of dusk this evening. I went up to the reservoir to run (did about 5K at my usual snail's pace) and rewarded myself with a breather at the viewing platform before walking back down to the Treehouse. The sky was simply amazing with colours in layers. The bottom layer was a band of robin's egg blue; just above that a deep lavender, that gradually faded to a light pink in a sort of ombre stripe arrangement. The natural beauty of this place can't be overstated. Phil and I spent the long weekend just past at a little resort north of here called Agnes Water. Pretty off the beaten path. We chose to drive and see some countryside; long drive but rewarding. I lost count of the number of times one of us said "it's pretty here, isn't it?" Reminds us both of parts of California, if a bit greener overall.

I don't know if I'll really live here for the rest of my life, but if I don't, it will surely be hard to leave.

Poinsettias on the hoof

On the vine? the branch? stalking the wild poinsettia? So, it's June and it's winter here, or so said the news reader on the radio Monday, even though some people might say it's not winter until 21 June. Anyway here are the quintessential winter flowers, blooming away in someone's front garden a few streets over from the Treehouse.

My city view

This is a shot of the city from just up the hill from our house, taken while out walking. At the end of the walk it was dusk and the view is even cooler at dusk but I'm not equipped for low light photography. Maybe with Phil's big-ass camera I can get a dusk shot.

the Blue Room Cinebar

Let's see: how to optimize the movie-going experience? Build small theatres with really cushy seats and small tables between each pair of seats. Give moviegoers assigned seats. Offer them coffee, a full bar, and snacks or light meals, and serve these items at the seats during the film. That, friends, is the Blue Room Cinebar's claim to well-deserved fame.

Who says there's no fall in Queensland?

Here are 2 photos proving that we DO have seasons here. It's just that fall means the temp goes down to the upper 50s/low 60s at night but during the day it's in the 70s and sunny.

Goat at the Royal

So how often do you walk outside a major tertiary health care facility in a major city and find a collection of farm animals in pens on the lawn? There were a cow, a pig, 2 goats, a few sheep, some chickens, geese and a pair of alpacas. This guy had just happily eaten my apple core.

Moon over campus

Taken on a Friday dusk stroll around the UQ campus.

walk to Mt Coot-tha

Friday was a beautiful, sunny, and not humid day. I decide to take a walk up to the top of Mt Coot-tha. There's a trailhead just up the road from our house. (Emphasis on UP.) So off I go at about a quarter to noon. By this time it's quite warm, even without the humidity. It's not too taxing a walk over the first half or so of the 1450 metres. I start to wish I was more of a morning person, because then I could get up early and do this walk before breakfast and, more importantly, before it gets hot. No problem! I could do this! Then I notice the trail starts to incline more severely upwards. Still no problem; have a hiking pole with me. Slog along, but now it gets even steeper...
Some considerate person has arranged the trail so that about every 10-15 metres, it flattens out a bit, so I stop, catch my breath, look back at what I've just climbed, and look ahead to --- oh geez, how the hell am I going to get up this next bit?? Climb, stop, breathe, look around, repeat.
On I climb, ever so slowly. All thoughts of daily morning ascents are now entirely gone from my head. I start to hear children's voices. This is good because it means I'm nearly at the top. I stop one last time to see where I've been and realize that NO WAY am I going to hike back down this hill, by myself, with these knees. After a brief stop at the summit to document my climb (see photo of sign with hiking pole leaning against it) and admire the view, it's the long way home for me: down the access road, past the botanic gardens, over the new pedestrian bridge, and along the bike path until I have to leave it and take surface streets. A short hike ends as a 2 1/2 hour trek, and I decide I can blow off an afternoon run around the reservoir.

My favorite restaurant

Back in November I posted a photo of me with my peeps having lunch out at the Hundred Acre Bar. It is (so far) my favorite expensive restaurant in Brisbane. It's located on a public golf course in St. Lucia, about 2 miles from our house and a mile or so from campus. The menu is creative, focuses on seasonal foods, the wine list is broad and mostly reasonable, and the surroundings couldn't be better. And except for around the holiday season, you hardly ever need to book ahead.

Classic Queenslander

This photo shows a typical, nicely preserved house built in the style known as Queenslander. Qlder houses tend to share certain characteristics: generally they are built up off the ground (to catch cooling breezes and make it harder for critters to enter); they have verandahs on 3 sides; when restored they often have multi-colored paint jobs to highlight quaint architectural detail, like the swinging doors at the top of the steps on this one.

A sunny Saturday afternoon in the fall

In many respects, just like in the USA. Boys are playing sports. In this case, cricket (top photo) and rugby.

I'm back; late summer flora

Wow, I see it's been over 2 months since my last post. What's my excuse? Well, I was traveling in the US for 3 weeks back in Jan/Feb. Then we spent a week in NZ ("En Zed", that is) so that we could get our permanent residency visas granted -- don't ask -- En Zed was lovely and I'm eager to go back.

As soon as that was done, school started for me, both as teacher and student, so I've been busy.

My other excuse is Facebook -- I've been spending my online energy there instead of here.

But here's a photo of a cool bush I saw the other day: it has both flowers and berries at the same time. The flowers are purple and the berries are yellow, a really nice color combination with the green leaves. No idea what it's called, of course.

Now that the semester is under way, and I'm a little calmer, I'll pay more attention. I promise.

House! really! this is it!!

Sadly, house #1 fell through when the building inspector found more problems that we wanted to have to fix. So back to the open house circuit we went. Back to, as it turns out, one of the houses we looked at early in the game. Phil loved it right away; I had to warm up to it. It's more house than we need, certainly; but it is spectacular and unique. This is the deck where we will be spending most of our waking at-home hours. That is, if the mortgage company decides to lend us the money to buy it! If all goes well, we should be moving in mid-January.