Captains Log: Star Date 22.03.05 Well! This is a nice surprise for me to have the time to add this postie, as I have an unexpected day off work today! Yes I have a job! But we will get to that later. Firstly let me tell you about the stuff I have been up to since I last posted! O.k, so the Sunday before Paddys day was a really hot sunny day, myself, Lee and Esther decided to go and chill in Hyde Park for a bit, as did thousands of other people, all there for the Paddys Day celebrations! It was a really fun day, absolutley scorching hot! We bought a Guiness (just to help celebrate Paddys!) which was overpriced, so we decided to be proper tramps and get a bottle of voddy and sprite from the bottle shop and drink like a bunch of 14yr olds in the park!!! It was fun : ) We got talking to some brothers from Ireland, all at least 60yrs old! They were funny! So we basically drank alcomofrol and chilled out looking around stalls that sold tayto's and lots of green things! Treated myself to an icecream, which, when I sat down on the grass to eat it, found a new friend by the name of Michael, a really comical little boy (must of been about 18 months old) who decided to help himself to it!! : ) Was funny, he kept us amused for an hour or so, he was like a duracel bunny, didnt stop moving the whole time! There was a U2 tribute band on in the late afternoon, they were pretty good, and after they had finished the crowd dispersed and we wandered home... We lined up a job at the Easter Show, which is at the Olympic Stadium, 2 weeks work as a ride attendant! Its actually a kiddies game, so not technically a ride, but whatever! The show began on the 18th March, so we had a few days to lounge around before we started. Of course, we wanted to go and chill out on Bondi and do nothing for these few days, only the weather put a stop to that!! You will all be pleased to hear that the weather got rather cloudy and dull, and windy, so a day spent walking around Bondi rather than chilling on the beach was had...and the others...I cant really remember, so cant of been anything too exciting!! Thursday 17.03.05. Paddys Day, and the day before we were to start work at a very loud fairground...what did we do? Of course we went out all day and got ratted! It was a really funny day, we met lots of randoms and had some funny convo's, some locals, some travellers... I randomly bumped into Stephen, John. C, Frank and Ghandi in one of the pubs. I wasn't even that surprised, we are from inbread Luton after all!? We somehow ended up in the Ship Inn (Jen-thought of you!) over by the Harbour Bridge...Didnt see 'cordooourrrrrouy' lady in there, but may well have missed her, it was busy in there! : ) I headed home pretty sloshed and went to bed hoping that this wouldn't result in a hangover in the morning!! : / So. Friday 18.03.05. The Job: We arrived at 9.00am as requested by Averil (the boss) all a little quiet, pale faced and thirsty!! : ) It wasn't too bad though, I have been a lot more hungover in my time and manned my way through! Nothing a can of coke couldn't cure! The job is basically very easy, but its really really long hours and involves standing up for all of these hours and talking to people all day which has resulted in incredibly sore legs and I think I'm starting to lose my voice. (No sarky thoughts here from anyone thank you!) The first night we got an early night (finished at 9.30pm) and treated ourselves to go and see the show that was on at the stadium, it was really cool, there was horse riding, show riders, and holden utes (7.2 litre engines) 4 of them doing jumps and driving in formation and zig zagging in and out of eachother and there were motor bikes doing jumps, which were very impressive. Handstands off the bikes while they were flying through the air! It was a really good show, we stood for the Ozzie national anthem, sung live, which was followed immediatly by a Kylie song, which made me smile! : ) Its like she is part of the official National Anthem!! The show was finished off by lots of fireworks, it was a really nice evening. Had I of remembered my camera I would be able to share some of this with you in picture form, unfortunatley, my brain was not in full working order when I had set off in the morning so the camera was forgotten! Sorry folks! I will try and get to another show before the 2 weeks is up and see if I can get any piccies... The Easter Show is absolutely massive. People save up all year to go to it aparently. Its the biggest fair in Australia, and there are loads of other parts to it other than the fair. Stalls, food places, agricultural shows...There are dog, cat guinnea pig shows! Which are all a bit bizzare in my opinion! I went in to see the cats (mew mew) at the judging show and walked around with a herd of other people staring at cats sitting in little cages, staring right back at us. There were some cool looking ones, with leopard spots etc, but I couldn't help but feel sorry for them, as they have probably never even been outside! This past week the weather has been unpredictable, to say the least! One day its scorching hot and the next its quite cold... yesterday, we were threatened with 90km strong winds and the people in charge of the fairs in Oz came round making sure we were all tied down properly in case of the strong winds coming and blowing the stalls down! The winds didnt reach too strong while we were there, but the heavens opened and it just didnt stop. We could of been at home! It was really miserable yesterday, no one was really around, or should I say, no one in their right mind was around, so it was dead! It rained and rained and rained and rained a bit more for good measure! My feet were soaked and I was thankful to get let off at 7.30 and go home and get dry and warm!! Its really cool seeing the fair from the other side! We are working for a family run business, so proper carnie folk! : ) They are actually really nice (so far!!) and I spend most of my time like a 2 year old, asking constant questions about how everything works and who is who! Its all very interesting and there is a lot of 'office politics' that goes on, or should I say 'fair politics'! Working on a kiddies game has also showed me how many over bearing parents there are!! Geeesh! Its so funny, the kids get to pick a prize ("every player wins a prize every time", arent we good!!!!!) and the amount of times the parents practically force their kids to "get a slinky!" when the kid wants a car or just not a slinky, its really bad! Anyway! The show runs for 14 days and we were (as of this morning) going to be doing 14 days solid, but we got a phonecall this morning to say not to bother coming in, as its STILL raining!! Which is nice to have a day off, it would of been Day 6 today so almost half way through! I think what has happened is that throughout all the summer months Australia stored up its rain, in order to rain really heavily for a week while I have to be outside! Its all a consiparacy!!? So 8 more days to go, then its PAY DAY! Whoop! Looking forward to that : ) Keep a look out for some pics of the fair ground that I will add asap. Going to do something inside today! Over and out! xxx