12/1/2012 - Sydney, Again.

Before I tell you what I've been doing in Sydney, I'm going to tell you the embarrassing story of how I missed the whole of the party.

On Saturday night, there was  party at the Melbourne house for Ash's 40th, which I'd been helping to set up all day. I wore a dress and looked lovely, if I do say so myself. The party began at around 7pm so by 9pm I was reasonably merry on the mojitos that Simon had been making all night. Let me remind you all that I haven't drank since I was in New Zealand, so these mojitos hit me pretty hard. Around 9.30pm, Jarrah decided it was too noisy and she wanted to read her book and asked if she could use my room, the only room upstairs and the quietest. I agreed, and went up to put a movie on for her and decided to stay with her for 5 minutes to check she was okay. The next thing I knew it was 3am and I was in bed. I missed the whole blooming thing! I of course then couldn't sleep, so I read and then decided to put on a T show at around 5am, when to my surprise Mum was on Skype, so we had a nice chat before I took a sleeping pill and slept until 1pm. Lesson learnt: do not peak early, you'll miss the rest. There is another hilariously embarrassing story coming up but you'll have to wait.

My last day in Melbourne was pretty chilled out. I Skyped with Vicki, hung out with the kids at Gloria Jean's and Stella and Jarrah bought me a present; mini Mars bars, 85 calories each, so I can get rid of my chocolate cravings but not get loads of calories. Eliza drove me to the Bus terminal to get the SkyBus to the airport, but not before we had to explain to Griffin that only I was going on a plane, not him, to which he replied "Don't go without me!" - the sweetie! I had to stand on the SkyBus, but it wasn't so back since I could rest my backpack on one of the shelves and the journey was only twenty minutes.

If I can carry it, I think the guys who work unloading the plane will be fine, no?

I was happy to find at check-in that my backpack only weighed 19.6kgs instead of the 22kgs I was expecting. It's good because I don't plan on sending any more packages home and it means I had space for souvenirs in Bali and Vietnam. After the usual hanging around departures, I boarded the plane expecting it to be packed since I couldn't pick my seat, but the thing was empty. I snapped a picture because I just couldn't believe that my whole row was empty, including across the walkway, and two rows behind me were empty. I would have spread out and had a little sleep if the flight had been longer than an hour. Do cameras count as one of the electrical things that interfere with the plane?

Way too emotional bathroom wall graffiti and a very honest reply. Melbourne Airport.

After getting through baggage claim and picking up my backpack, I made my way down to the subway to get the train to Revesby to meet Lyn, Dan and David. It took about 10-15 minutes all in to get from baggage claim to sitting on the train seats. What I realised when I took my backpack off on the train is that my skirt had got caught in my backpack. For 10-15 minutes, I had been showing off my bum and frilly knickers to much of Sydney Domestic Terminal, and no one had told me. Brilliant. Flying the flag for England there guys. Embarrassing story #2. Lesson learnt: never again will I travel in a skirt. 

Been back in Milperra a couple of days now and it is, as expected, lovely to be back. There was a little gift waiting for me here, a notepad of Australian money. (No no, not real money sillies.) It's awesome, I really like it, especially because of that thing I have about stationary.

I spent most of my first day back reading To Kill a Mockingbird and finishing it in fact, so tomorrow I'll try and remember/find time to write a review and tick it off my TIME list. David's friend Dylan came over, so he was pretty distracted until we all headed out to get some stuff for dinner and hair dye for me, before stopping for a coffee. I was quite pleased to find that if I have my vanilla latte with skinny milk and no sugar, it tastes exactly the same but has half the calories. Today I dyed my hair and we headed out to Parramatta so I could do a little shopping for some things I needed. Some underwear, a bra, some yoga pants, two new books, some shorts and some baggy travelling pants. The last one is to avoid situations like the one above. Had a lovely day just wandering around and looking for bargains really, which I got a few of! Tonight was sushi for dinner, lush and Skyping with home. Yet to catch up with Mum though since I can't seem to get up early enough, boo!

The next books on the TIME list.

Looking absolutely knackered, hair's looking black but it's actually dark red, as always. It'll lighten up in a couple of days, always does in the end.

I think my whole weight loss thing is going pretty well. I mean, technically I've only lost 1lb, but I feel better and I really do think my legs look a little slimmer. I have a plan B though (of course!) that if I haven't shifted it by the time I'm home, I'll join Weightwatchers, seems to work for other people I know! I'm a bit worried about how I'll keep up the exercise in Bali, simply because I'll be in a dorm room and there's no way I'm jumping about like an idiot in front of 6 people. I know I could go running, but I really despise running; it's boring and I have weak knees. On the other hand, I did volunteer myself for the Race for Life 2012 tonight, so maybe some running isn't a bad idea. Plus my hostel has a pool so maybe some lengths? Hopefully I'll keep it up. 

I've done plenty of planning things tonight, like looking up how to get from the Domestic to International Terminal in Brisbane (they're 2kms apart, madness!) to printing out little cheat sheets on currency conversipons for Bali and Vietnam (1000 Indonesian Rupiah  is equal to £0.07, double madness!) to looking at the Ho Chi Minh airport map and finding a meeting place for Dom and I. That one was actually quite simple. Tomorrow it's all about Skyping with Mum, writing/sticking stuff in my travel journal, reviewing To Kill a Mockingbird and possibly getting some Rupiah exchanged and $25USD for the airport tax if we end up straying near a currency exchange, if not there's no rush.