Some final thoughts on Australia

These are just random bits that I couldn't really fit in anywhere else, but I still wanted to mention them, and then I'll move on.

-What they call "lemonade" we call "Sprite." If you want a lemonade, you have to order a lemon crush.

-To all the young men of Australia: Pull up your pants. You look like morons. Seriously.

-To all the young women of Australia: If you are dating these morons, you deserve a slap upside the head. Stop perpetuating the moron...ity...ness. Whatever. They look like morons. Stop encourging it. They will never amount to anything because they are going to spend so much time worrying about keeping their pants from falling down they won't be able to give their full attention to anything else, including you.

-Australia has weird crows. They make this bizarre sound, kind of like a baby, a baby that is trying to lure you into the tall grass where you will be set upon by a pack of hyenas. If I can figure out how to get something up on YouTube, I will put up my video of the weird crow call. If I can't, then just use your imaginations.

Yay me!



-There is A LOT of graffiti in Australia, at least in the parts that we visited. I noticed this especially in New Castle and on the train ride between New Castle and Sydney. The graffiti monsters are rampant over there! Catherine, over at She Never Shuts Up, pretty much sums up everything I feel about graffiti, so I'll let you check out her musings on it here.

-In the same post, Catherine also touches on words that are fun to say, which brings me to my next point. Australia has a lot of place names that are just fun to say. Woolloomooloo, Wagga Wagga, Ulladulla, Wombat. Okay, the last one isn't a place name, but it's still fun to say! Also, Wagga Wagga always made me think of Fozzie Bear ("Wokka wokka!") This was not the only Muppets connection that I found in Australia; there was also a store in Sydney that we kept walking past named Wagamama, which I had never heard of, but I thought it was fun to say. (Apparently, I am out of the cool loop. Foxie, over at Dreaming of Ferraris was blogging about her desire to hit up a Wagamama on her next visit to London AT VIRTUALLY THE SAME TIME THAT WE WERE IN SYDNEY. How wierd is that??? Cue Twilight Zone music.) So, everyday, we'd walk past it and after about 1/2 a block my husband would stop, look at me, and patiently wait for me to say, "WAGAMAMA!" and then snicker like Ernie (another Muppet!)for the rest of the block. Once it was out of my system I was fine. Until the next time we walked past. I don't know what the actual pronounciation is supposed to be, but in my head (and whenever I shouted it out on the street) it sounded like the Muppet performance of "Mahna Mahna," the YouTube version of which I cannot embed, so you'll have to go here to check it out. Just remember to replace "Mahna Mahna" with "WAGAMAMA," and you'll have a good idea of what my husband was dealing with on the streets of Sydney.

-There is a general straight-forwardness that I like about the Aussie people that we, in America, are seriously lacking. At the Wildlife World or the Aquarium, I can't remember which, there is a crocodile display. You can go upstairs and look down into the display, and at the top there is a sign that reads, "If the fall doesn't kill you, the crocodile will." That's it. There's no waiver you have to sign saying how you have been fully warned of the dangers of hanging over into the crocodile pit due to the possibility of falling in and the bodily harm that might ensue should you find yourself injured at the bottom of a crocodile pit. You don't have to release the company; their children; their heirs; their successors, assignees, trustees, agents or any other thrid party that might in any way shape or form be affiliated with them ever in case of any injury resulting from said inappropriate placement of one's body in relation to said crocodile whether or not said crocodile, his heirs, replacements or agents was negligent in the method of his attack on your intruding body, which negligence shall be defined as but not limited to any failure to hiss, posture, snap his jaws or in any other way warn of a possible pending attack and shall NOT include the crocodile's bellowing in a manner likely to persuade the invading person that he is indeed an alligator, not a crocodile, thereby confusing said person about what animal will actually be attacking his dumb ass.

Where was I? Oh yeah, Aussie's are a lot more straight forward about stuff. I like that.

-Since we were there in winter, it was pretty chilly outside everywhere we went. There is also a lot of outdoor seating, which, when combined with the chillyness of winter, can make for very uncomfortable dining. The Aussies, however, have embraced the heat lamp. Almost every establishment that we passed that had outdoor seating also had at least one heat lamp throwing off a welcoming warmth to passersby. I don't know why I haven't seen more of this in America. Maybe the places I've always lived have just gotten too cold in the winter to bother. After all, when it's 40 below, a heat lamp on the sidewalk just isn't going to cut it.

-The local news is always worth checking out. While in Newcastle I read about Ely, the koala who had gotten his head stuck in the grille of a speeding car that had mowed him down while traveling at a high speed. Luckily, Ely was not fatally injured and is recovering at the Australia Zoo. Unfortunately, Ely was also diagnosed with chlamydia, which is a real downer, seeing as how it is koala mating season. Ely, you might want to pay a little more attention when you finally get back out there, both on the road and off.