Cruising for consistency

Just to keep the world updated, Jeff and I are doing really well.
My job at the fruit market is pretty good. I make around 12/hr (which is low for Sydney) but, it's all cash in hand which means that I can work without hour restrictions. Since I worked as a cashier at a fruit market in Ottawa I'm doing quite well here. Their computer system is all touch screen so really all I needed to know was the names of all of the veggies and fruit. Perfect. No codes or anything. One of the especially nice things is that we sell a lot of flowers. So all day long I smell mangos, roses and the bakery next door. It's really very nice. One of the odd things that I do is shuck peas and make bows. There's two new weird things to add to my resume.
Also, Jeff got the job at the telemarketing place. He makes like $17 an hour but has to wear business attire. I think he looks pretty good in a tie.
So far I think it's going ok. He's worried about meeting his sales quotas but yesterday he had two sales so it seems possible, although not enjoyable. We just keep thinking about the things we'd like to do and it makes being at work not so bad.
Jeff bought Magnum P.I. season 2 this week so that's pretty much all we've been watching. If anyone wants to know what to get Jeff for his birthday this June, it'd be Magnum P.I. season 3 on DVD. (EDITED to include season 4 and 2 (our season 2 is region 4 coding and won't work in North America))

We both have this Saturday off, so Hopefully we'll get some surfboard shopping done.

Jobs, Spiders, Anticipation

We apologise that we haven't been writing in our blog as often as we'd like to, but we probably won’t be getting internet at our apartment. Most likely posts will be made from UTS (Tia's school) which she is only at 2 days a week. In any case, we'll try to be more on the ball.

The last week and a half have been pretty good. The weather is still fantastic and we have developed an increasing level of comfort in our apartment and in Manly more generally. Last weekend we spent a lot of time lounging around, but we did manage to write a lot of post cards.

Tia got a casual job at a local fruit market. She has training this coming Friday and we assume that she'll be doing cashier work. Hopefully we'll get a discount on avocados.

Jeff has two interviews today near Darling Harbour: one for a telemarketing place which sounds pretty good and another for a street marketing position. In either case we will soon have a little more disposable income which means SURFBOARDS! (finally).

We have a bunch of new pictures however you'll have to make do with the following


Here's a picture of those awful jellyfish that Jeff keeps getting stung by. The last time his wrist got quite swollen. We're thinking that he's mildly allergic to them.


This is an orb spider. They're pretty big compared to the usual spiders we have in Canada. We're told that they aren’t poisonous, but they're pretty intimidating and you see them all over the place. There's a bunch in the bushes across from our apartment.

No crocodiles or terrible lizards sighted yet.

Hopefully we haven't been missing too much in Canada. We could both go for some Harvey's veggie burgers and a romp with Ohia, but other than that we're holding out well. With the new jobs our blog will hopefully gain some more interesting material including :
new surfboards/surfing pictures,
Taronga Zoo,
Ocean World/water-slides,
New Zealand,
and other great adventures.

We hope that you are all doing wonderfully. Things are going quite well for us. Thank you for all of your e-mails and well wishes.
Take it easy,
-Tia and Jeff

Nothing much but hello.

Nothing extra special to report, Jeff is working at the warehouse again and has another job interview in Manly. I have yet to receive my working visa acceptance, which is frustrating, but hopefully it will come soon.

Last weekend we went surfing in Bondi again and Jeff got stung on his foot by a bluebottle.
Apparently when you get stung on the foot it goes straight up to your glands. He said that it felt like he had been kicked in the nuts very hard. Poor kid.

Tuesday we spend lounging at the beach enjoying the warm ocean.
Maybe once we're both working we'll pick up some cheap bodyboards as well.

We have some new pictures, of spiders and things, which we'll post soon.
When I set up our hydro and things this week, the women on the phone was an Australian who married a Canadian and was moving to Ottawa. We talked for over 30 minutes about Canada, Ottawa, Quebec and weather. It was strange, but a nice example of how nice most Australians are.

boysen berry soy icecream is awesome.

Pictures of Manly and our place.

So, here are some pictures of our new apartment. All of the furnishings came with it, excepting some minor things, so don't bother commenting on our horrible taste. The pictures were taken in the evening so it looks a bit dark, but during the day it's really quite sunny. We're on the ground floor across the street from a bit of bush and the harbor. We're really missing our music (some how neither of us remembered to bring anything, actually Jeff had two Velvet Underground c.d.'s [thankfully] but I have been craving The Blow and Xiu Xiu) In any case, Canadian postcards and MP3 cd's can be sent to the following address:

Tia and Jeff
4/5 Commonwealth Pde.
Manly, NSW, Australia
2095

If you'd like an Aussie postcard just comment with your snail mail address and we'll pick a special one out for you.

Here is our bed and our beautiful picture of Paris (which I'm sorry, is flashed out). It's too hot right now to sleep with anything besides sheets. The mattress is actually quite new (thankfully) and pretty good to sleep on.

Here's a quick shot of the bathroom. We don't have a tub but thankfully the shower is really nice (good pressure and spray). We actually have a nice new bath rug now, and this picture doesn't show our unclosable window (It's made of 2 sheets of glass that overlap, one above the other, only there's like 2 inches between them which leaves an unclosable gap between our bathroom and outdoors) weird.

Here is our dining area and kitchen. I personally like the little archway and the recessed windows which act as great bookshelves.


This is our living room. It's kind of circular, and really bright during the day. Our windows look out onto trees and glimpses of the harbor, however if we're just stalking around we keep the blinds closed because we're on the ground floor and there are people walking by often enough.



Here is our dressing burrow and our back door which, when open, lets in a great breeze.


Here is a picture we took from the wharf. It's the little beach that is like 20 steps outside our door. Our apartment is just across the street from the back of Ocean World. We usually walk along the beach shown here to get to the Corso and the larger ocean beach.


This is the Corso in downtown Manly. There are a lot of cafes and shops that sell swimsuits. On the weekends there are little markets that sell homemade stuff and touristy stuff. The beach is right at the end of the street there.


This is me and some local flora. We were just walking home from signing our lease! It was sticky out, and I guess that's one of the reasons that my pants look like they're falling down.


Here's a picture of Jeff pretending to be an Asian tourist on this sidewalk that has a little detour over a bushy hill.

These are some crazy flowers that just grow on one stock. There's no bush or plant really. I know they look fake, but they're just weird and pretty.




These are "Mashies" from KFC. They are balls of mashed potatoes covered in the 11 secret spices. Jeff loves them especially, but I think they're pretty great also. Funny thing, tomato sauce (ketchup) costs extra here, and your much more likely to find sweet chilly sauce instead.

Bugs, waterslides, cockatoos and good weather.

Interesting things have been happening over the past couple of days. Some of which are good, and others which would be better classified as 'not so good'.

We're really happy to be in our new apartment, however we have been faced with a challenge most Canadians are not accustom to. Australia has cockroatches.
They are big and gross and disgusting. We're invested in a serious stock pile of bug repellent and traps and have been reading up on how to live with these creepy things. Mostly this involves keeping the place very clean. We can't leave dishes in the sink and crumbs have to be cleaned off the counter. We're bought cocking to re-trim the countertops and fill any holes in between tiles. A few days ago we did a pretty serious clean and extermination and we haven't seen anymore bugs inside since. We fully expect that there will be more (Apartments/buildings are not well sealed here) but, we are resolving to do the best we can to keep clean and try to keep our cools. We've talked to locals who say that they're just unavoidable. They're even in the more posh buildings.

Another not so good thing is that all of the temps at Jeff's work got let go, so we are currently jobless. However there are lots of part-time gigs in Manly. We'll take what we can get. I'm actually allowed to apply for my working visa now, so hopefully we'll have some luck soon.

The last not so good thing is that I (tia) got bit by a cockatoo at the Royal Botanical Gardens yesterday. We were taking pictures of them on our arms (Jeff went first and he was fine) but my cockatoo thought that my pinky finger looked delicious or something and proceeded to try to open me up like a nut. Jeff took some pictures which you can all see once we're home. Why is it that I'm the only one having issues with the native wildlife?

Some good things are:
-We saw some GIANT bats at the gardens. They were awesome. We also saw a lot of neat parrots and birds and plants that we don't have in Canada.
-Tomorrow, we're going surfing at Bondi again.
-We went bodyboarding and had a riot.
-We went to the Manly art gallery.
-We discovered that there are waterslides right across the road from us.
-We tried vegemite. It's good and salty. I think it'd be nice with avocado.
-Amazing race starts tonight and we actually get that station. (Australian TV is hilarious. We're sure that most locals probably think it's lame, but to us, it's great.
"I love the short tail shrew. It's got short hair and a short tail. Awwwwsome"
Maybe it's just the accent.