I <3 Teapots...and Jono Shaved

So I began the day by being showered by 10:30 so that we could go to lunch at Mr. Ward's parents' house. Mr. Ward's mother is the principle of Ravenswood, the all-girls partner with HB. I also met Jono's cousin, Christopher, who recently joined the Australian navy. (As a side note...he is beautiful.) I may be going on a tour of the base at some point.

We had crepes with dismal maple syrup (Jono was SO right about the quality) and then fresh fruit and very pulpy orange juice (FINALLY a family that drinks pulp - hint hint). I ate my fill of that and then the announcement was made that we had sausage, short cuts of bacon, eggs, tomatoes, and mushrooms as well. We talked for a long while about the usual, and I told them the story of the arm wrestling librarians to emphasize a point about how great America is. It was well accepted around the table, and I obtained many favorable opinions.

After breakfast Jono decided to shave his beart...FINALLY. Buuuut he had to go to his LAME Hornsby Gang Show afterward, and so Mr. and Mrs. Ward, Bec, and I loaded into the car and drove out to....THE BLUE MOUNTAINS!

The blue mountains were awesome. I unfortunately accidentally deleted my first thirty pictures, so I have none of the excellent ones, but the mediocre ones are up on facebook. They were just the touristy google shots, though, so if you just look it up you'll find what I lost. When you first look over the ledge, though, (and I'm not trying to be cliche here) it completely takes your breath away. You get shivers. It's so huge. And blue! I learned that it looks blue because the haze of oil given off by the gum trees. Cool, right? I got to see some real wattle, the national flower of Australia. I took pictures. They were not deleted. We rode on the scenic railway and the cable car, which were both REALLY steep and scary and awesome. We walked around the rainforest for about an hour. They have the coolest plants and vines and gum and turpentine trees. And it's really wet. And actually a little cold.

We exited the cable car into the gift shop, and went over to the snack kiosk to get food for the road trip home. We got Tim Tams, which are and Aussie staple. They were AMAZING. AAAMMMMAAAAZZZZIIIIINNNNNGGGGG!! I also got peach iced tea. It was much more flavorful here than in America. I think that they water it down in America.

On the way back we stopped at the Ugg store. Like...THE original Ugg store. The one that started it all. And then the USA stole it.

We made it back fairly early, and Jono's parents and I watched a little friendly TV programming about eating habits and refacing your house. It was really funny because some of the home makeovers were hideous. Australians have little trouble making their opinions known. I love the insulting. It's so open here. You're never really judged in secret - it's all just out on the table. All the time. As in you walk past strangers on the street a friend will turn to you and say something about a person's weight or their outfit and it's GREAT. I love it. So much judging. And you know it's fair because everyone you walk past is doing it to you, too!!!

I took a nanonap before Jono got back. Brad got here before Jono came home and we watched Harry Potter 2 with Bec. Jono arrived and we rushed to the Gordon train station and hopped on to get to King's Cross - the redlight district!

We first went to Soho, a great club with very expensive drinks. We got bored with that and ran over to World Bar, where we got a teapot and jam doughnuts. Also very expensive. Come to think of it, EVERYTHING is expensive in Australia. Anyways, we finished up there and hailed a taxi home.

We hung around Jono's room when we got home (which was around 3:30 AM). We crashed at about 4:30, after I had eaten all his chocolate and a bag of weird pizza chips with the nondescript name "Shapes."

Sorry I didn't post at my normal time. I was busy partying, obviously. Haha.

Miss you guys. ONE WEEK GONE ALREADY!!!!!!

Don't know what I'm supposed to be doing today. We're watching Spongebob right now. We just finished watching the Simpsons for about an hour. Slow morning. I didn't pay money to do what I could have done back home!!! Haha. Okay. Talk to you all later.

Love,

Janet

P.S. They only have Avatar Book One out in Australia. OH THE HUMANITY!