I've always had a connection to Mexico. When I was still in primary school I won second prize ($10) in a fancy dress contest at the St Carthage's Christmas Carnival dressed as a Mexican. I had a sombrero, a poncho made from a sheet, a stripy towel draped over my shoulder, fake mustache and fake five o'clock shadow (mum's mascara I actually didn't have facial stubble in primary school!). $10 was a big deal at that stage of my life so I think think this gave me ...

American Epilogue I'm writing this on a plane somewhere over the Gulf of Mexico, I should have been writing it yesterday at Duck but I was obsessed with leveling with Jamie in the scrabble challenge that had run over from Saturday. Scrabble is how we passed the time away while watching Hurricane Hanna go by. It amazing how hard it is to play scrabble with another person with the same spelling ability as me - using only two and three letter words make it hard...

Yesterday Jamie and I travelled to Duck on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. We're staying at a beach house (mansion actually) that belongs to a friend of the Fumo family. Originally we were planning to stay here until early Monday morning, when she was going to drop me off at Nolfork airport to go to Mexico but with potential hurricane Hanna heading up the coast toward North Carolina we are playing it by ear. While we are waiting for Hanna we are making the mo...

One of Jamie's big surprises last week was that there is 'gang' activity at her new school and even in her class. She was a class on corporations and business and used an abbreviation on the board for Burger King (we still don't understand its significance) and this sparked a few gang involved students to start 'dissin' each other which apparently lead to a fight at lunch time. She was understandably taken back by having sparked friction between the school yard ...

I've been in "historic" Edenton for almost a week now and the place is not that bad. Other than some old buildings I'm not sure why it is so historical - its a quaint little town with a number of old houses and buildings and ex-civil war canons. My travel agent in Oz tells me that Google says that Edenton is the pretties town in the south. This might be a stretch but it is rustic and located on the landward side of Albermoral Sound which...