The Longest Post In the World

Sorry I haven't been posting lately. It's been ages, hasn't it?

SORRY!!!

Alright so, when was the last time we talked? Thursday? No, Tuesday. What happened Wednesday???

Ah, yes.

Alright, Wednesday I woke up and ate breakfast, and then Jono and I decided to go for a bike ride at the Olympic Park. It was spectacular. There were swimming pools and arenas and biking mounds and EXXXXTREME little bike trails with pavement and little dotted lines and maps and fountains and everything. I saw an ibis!! I took pictures of lots of things and we rode up a huge hill by riding around and around and around on it in circles forever. From there you could look across the entire area and see all the tiny people walking around. There were lots of construction cranes.

Lately Sydney has been involved in a crazy obsession with ripping down nice little buildings and putting up apartments. The Wards have divulged opinions on this "disgraceful" practice many times, and I completely agree. The government in Australia is rather slow on many matters of tree hugging and historic aesthetic value.

Did you know it's illegal to cut down a tree in your yard in Australia? And you have to get special permission from the council to do anything to your property. And if you pick a leaf off a gum tree in the bush you can be fined or even jailed. They're super protective of their trees and bushes and stuff.

I saw a plant that used to be called a Black Baby but now they just call them Grass Trees because apparently it's racist to call them that. Who knew.

Anyways, back to the bike ride. After the large hill we rode over to a big iron walkway that goes in a circle around the old brickmaking pit. It's now inhabited by golden frog things that apparently enjoy everything humans do besides reading and band-aids.

We finished up our ride after about 2.5 hours, and I went back and had a 40 minute run. Then I showered. And what a good shower it was. I was so clean my ears squeaked!!

After my shower we loaded into the Touareg and went to...(DUNDUNDUN) the Hornsby Gang Show. It was outrageously average. The only good part was this little girl who sang the lonely goatherd song and this one (surprisingly) funny rugby parody. The rest was...dismal. The singers were off. The dancing was okay. I started laughing at this one part that wasn't funny because they were doing a modern dance piece and it was choreographed with the song Hide and Seek by Imogen Heap. The reason it was funny was because HB always did their modern dance pieces to an Imogen Heap song. I don't know. You probably don't think it's funny. Never mind.

Anyways, I got to eat an ANACONDA at halftime...er...interlude...uhm...intermission...whatever...and I also got to try these lovely things called Maltesers. It was grrrrreat.

We went home and I think I just watched TV and the Tour de France and went to sleep.

THURSDAY!

The next morning I had asked Jono to wake me up at 8:00 so that I could shower in time to be picked up by Jono's dad's parents. We were having a fun outy day. Unfortunately, my brain alarm roused me at 8:26, just in time for me to race into the shower, yell at Jono, put clothes on, and jump out the door with toast in my hand.

Jono's grandparents took us to the Sydney Art Museum, where I looked at lots of pictures and sculptures and abstract artsy fartsy things that didn't make ANY sense WHATSOEVER. I also found an awesome asian statue in the very pretty asian wing and took a picture with it. You should check it out on my facebook. Danny will know which one I'm talking about. I think.

Anyways, after the art museum we ate in the cafeteria. I got a salmon tart (baby quiche) with fresh little fun greens salad. When I was out looking at tall buildings with his grandma, his grandpa went and bought me a gingerbread man! It was so cute and nice. I kept the little red ribbon that tied the bag.

After a nice lunch, Jono and I went to the Royal Botanical Garden, located on the King's Domain next to the harbour. We spent most of our time in the Succulent Garden. Pictures are on Facebook. The plants were very succulent. I got prickled by a scratchy plant and it was itchy for a while and kind of painful and then Jono was like "Hey, look, it's poisonous" and pointed at a sign and I freaked out for about ten minutes. But then I realized that the sign just meant you shouldn't eat it. Yay. I didn't die.

As we were going through the garden Jono got a call from his grandmother, who was waiting on Wharf 6 for us. We took a Captain Cook Cruise!! It was awesome. The wind was blowing salty sea spray all over the place and my hair was going crazy and I was wearing my still-bloody Anthropologie dress so a few times I think the entire boat got to see my Hello Kitty Christmas panties. After the first couple incidents I tied my sweatshirt around my legs, though, haha. We got lots of really good pictures of the harbour and the expensive (multimillion dollar) homes on the shore. We saw the hall where the ballroom scene in Australia was filmed (you KNOW which scene I'm talking about, mommy...you know, the one with "the look").

We got back to the shore and walked around to the Town Hall and the ye olde Customs Hall and the Sydney Mint, and the Hospital. We had coffee and bikkies at a cute little coffee place by the Nightingale building by the Hospital (named after old Flo). After coffee we walked back to the car and they drove us home.

On the way home Jono informed me that we would be going to Max Brenner's, a chocolate place about ten minutes from his house, for dinner. When we got back to his house, his mom informed him that their old old friends were coming over, with their kids Hamish and Harriet, for dinner. Jono and I stayed for half of that dinner and caught up with them. Hamish was really nice and embarrassed because it had been crazy hair day at school and his hair was in tiny little stick-outy braids and he was leaving a GREAT first impression on me, haha. I got a bad vibe from Harriet, but she acted nice and Jono said she was nice so I trusted on it. We left the house at about 8:00 and sat down at Max Brenner's at 8:15. On the way in through the door I saw two huge vats of chocolate...just sitting there, stirring, whirring, bubbling, and oozing chocolatey smell. It was at this moment that I knew that I would one day LIVE IN THE ATTIC OF THAT PLACE. This chocolate cafe was amazing. I ordered a little pot of chocolate and a cookie and a chocolate cookie shake and ate all of it and got outrageously obese but it was GREAT.

After Max Brenner's, Jono and all of his friends and I went to Wooley to buy a cheesecake and a pack of picnic spoons. We went back to Jono's house and ate cheesecake, talked, listened to somewhat unappetizing music, and...straightened Jono's hair!!! Woo!! It was so funny. He didn't actually look that bad with straight hair.

Everyone left and Jono and I watched the Tour de France, and then I decided it was time to go to bed.

FRIDAY!!!!

I woke up nice and late. Late late late. It was about 11:30. I ate 2 slices of toast for breakfast. Since it was so late, I decided to go running while waiting for Jono to wake up. I ran a bit over 7 miles, (a little under 60 minutes), then came inside and showered.

Then.

We went to see.

HARRY POTTER 6!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It was so good. I almost cried at this one part that I can't talk about cause Stephanie hasn't seen it yet but it wasn't when Dumbledore died, that's a hint. It was so good.

AND I DON'T CARE THAT DADDY SAID IT WAS BAD.

IT WAS GOOD.

VERY GOOD.

...There was a whole lot of Tom Felton.

After the movie we came home. Jono left for the Hornsby Gang Show. LAME. We went out for dinner. We ventured out to this great sushi place. I had lots and lots of raw fish and rice and avocado. And I had a little wasabi and I didn't die!!!!! It was great. After dinner we went to Woollworth's and bought some random stuff, and then we went back home and made sticky date pudding! It was delicious. We watched Master Chef and ate seconds on sticky date pudding, and then Jono came home and we watched music videos and the Tour de France. I finished the second half of Hannibal, which was REALLY REALLY GOOD. I would like to watch The Silence of the Lambs when I get home. But the movie of Hannibal doesn't follow the storyline at all, which is a really big shame because I'd love to see it with the guy that plays Hannibal, but I won't be watching it in any case.

So yeah, went to bed. Late, again. I might get a good night's sleep tonight, though.

SATURDAY!!! TODAY!!! FINALLY CAUGHT UP!!!

Woke up at 9:00 and showered, then left to go to Jono's aunt and uncle's house for cousin Lucy's 3rd birthday. Her party was so sweet, and she got her first bike and rode it for the first time. It was so CUUUUTE!!! We had some really good cake and champagne and they gave me a huge hunk of cake to take home (although I'll probably just eat it later).

After the party we went to the Sydney Fish Market, which was AWESOME cause it was full of dead things and asian people. We bought prawns and pacific and sydney rock oysters and blue swimmer crabs and pink ling fish. We also got to poke octopuses and mud crabs. Don't worry, I washed my hands. There was one squid that EXPLODED black ink all over everything. I loooove the fish market. We also took a drive around the south shore to look at all the pretty homes. Some of them have the coolest wrought iron; it looks like lace cause it's so ornate. It was all really nice. We just came home and we're eating the seafood right now. Jono will be back in a few hours and we'll probably watch more of the alps stages in the Tour de France, but I'm going to try to go to bed early tonight to get lots of sleep. We're getting up early to go to The Rocks (the main historic district of Sydney). We're going to the market there and doing maybe a pub crawl but probably not because I have to get on a plane on Monday.

MONDAY??!?!!? MONDAY!!!! AHHH SO SOON!!

It really will be good to hear American accents again. I said "I reckon" completely instinctively today. So scary.

Miss you guys.

Sorry about not writing in a while.

Love,

Janet