Welcome wagon

I love my new flat. Really, I do. I've been almost 2 months now, and it feels like home. I've got things how I like them, my stuff is everywhere, and I love having my own retreat from the world. Not least of its plus-sides is that it is 6 minutes from work.

And for the most part, I like my new neighbours. The senior citizens downstairs are friendly, the women in the next block always smile and say hello, the gardener is hot - as he should be - and very friendly. But the guys who share a landing with me have a little bit to learn about how to not piss off your neighbours. So I thought I'd compile a list of tips, all the things I'm too chicken to say to the white shoe wearers.

1. Never, ever play your music so loud that it rattles the plates in your neighbour's dish drainer. If they can hear the words - assuming, of course, that there are words - it's too loud. If they can feel the bass as they sit on the couch, it's too loud. If they have their own music on but can still hear your combination of turkish pop, rock, and south american pipe music, it's too loud. Same goes with your television, the football, in fact any kind of noise.

2. Don't fill your neighbour's bin the day after they have been emptied. How do I know it was you? Well let;s see...you has a party in the stair well till all hours, the bottles in my recycle bin are a lovely combination of girly sweet drinks and turkish liquer, and there's a collection of chip packets, pizza boxes, and styrofoam takeaway containers; I'm guessing it isn't any of the pensioners.

3. When you drive past my window, I should not be able to hear your radio.

4. When your friends arrive, there is no need for them to cluster on the stairs and have conversations that would seem loud if they were in my living room. Get them inside, shut the door, and shut them up. And they shouldn't have to knock on your door. Be an adult and get a door bell.

5. Smiling and waving in a Joey-from-Friends "How-you-doing" way is not neighbourly. Especially when I've seen your girlfriend.

SO there you have it. My tips for the cavemen next door. Now all I've got to do is get the ones on the other side of the fence to change the program on their swimming pool filter to not start at 9am on weekends, and it will be the perfect flat.

We've gotta stop meeting like this...

So I'm back in a settled existence, working, seeing friends, blogging, and it only seems fair that it was time one of my other stable occupations kicked in: I'm back on internet dating sites.

Yes, sad but true. And right now, I'm wrestling with levels of frustration that I should be familiar with, but somehow always strike me as something out of the blue when they come.

First there was the guy who messages regularly, seems interested enough, but never quite gets to the next level. He seems happy enough with just chatting via the keyboard, which I can see will get old fast. I've dropped all sorts of subtle hints, from the usual what's going on this weekend, to asking questions about cooking, where he goes, what he gets up to. Nothing shakes him loose. But without fail, every time I log on, he's there with a hello, however much he makes me work for anything more than that.

Then there is the guy who seems to have dropped me since I wouldn't add him as a Facebook friend. We've chatted a couple of times, and he seems nice enough, but I don't want to friend him, and have to explain to Dad, my aunt, my sister-in-law, my cousins, and various others, who it is that I've just added. It gets awkward. And that's without considering howmuch of my life he would have had access to. But he hasn't messaged me since I told him I hardly use Facebook. A little lie, but nothing too serious. His loss.

But I've saved the best for last, because he's such a cliche. The guy who opens with the line "I think you're hot" and doesn't appreciate it when the "compliment" is brushed aside with a flip comment. Apparently, I'm supposed to reply "Thanks, I think you are too". Catch is, I don't think he's hot. He might be interesting, he might be intelligent, but usually, guys like this, they aren't hot. If they were, I doubt they'd be scouring the internet looking for a girlfriend. Luckily, I have a handy blocking button I can push, and he has now been consigned to the interweb dating scrapheap.

Men. Honestly. Even through a keyboard, they still seem to have no clues. Of course, I'm so much better, given that I'm sitting on the other end of the keyboard, just waiting for a message. Because a girl can't be forward, she can't initiate anything. Lord, the hypocrisy.

The curse of suburbia

I live in the burbs, always have and probably always will, truth to tell. For the most part, it's not as bad a place to live as the intelligentsia would have us believe, provided it's approached with right attitude and a good set of neighbours. Growing up, I was pretty lucky. We only ever had one bad lot, the ones who would call the police to get our games of street cricket moved on, the ones we used to collect dog poo to leave on their doorstep, that sort of relationship. My new flat, well, things are a little different.

For the more part, I put up with my noisy immediate neighbour. I don't think he has any idea of just how loud he is, to be honest, and the elderly downstairs neighbours are probably too deaf to notice. As long as he keeps to a dull roar, I can usually deal with him. And his music. And his excessively loud-talking friends. And his stomping up and down the stairs at all hours. It's fine. You get that when you live in flats. I don't like it, but I deal with it. The problem neighbour here, I've never actually seen them; they're not an immediate neighbour, there's a house between them and me. But oh my god have I heard them.

They have a dog. I think it must be a puppy. Again, never seen, only heard. Because they don't tell it to shut up when it sets up with continuous barking at night. All night. It sets off all the yappy neighbourhood dogs. I'm guessing that they're telling it to shut up and let them get some sleep. I know one day I will be out on my balcony telling it that, if this keeps up. That was last night. Today, worse, if anything. It seems that the return of good weather has brought out the lawn mowers. Fair enough, I have no objection to mowing the lawn. It has to be done, and I'd rather they did that and kept the seeds under control so they don't make me sneeze. They did it this morning. Then, based on the sound of things, they did it again this afternoon. Then they had some sort of motorised thing going that I can only assume was doing the edges. Except they must have really sucked at using it, because they did it again. And then again. And once more. Then just once more, because they'd obviously missed a bit. In all, I think they fired it up about 6 times. And each time they did, I couldn't hear anything that I had going on in my flat. No music, no TV, no thinking. And I need to think. Because I'm still writing a thesis here.

In fact, they're out there again. I think they must have moved to the front of their house, because it's a bit fainter. It's not drowning out the sound of trams or traffic, birds, my stereo, my brain. It's just sounding a little like a dentist's drill now.

They clearly don't realise the risk they're taking. I've been studying for days straight, only moving away from the laptop to get on the wii fit and work out some of the kinks - I swear, if it wasn't for all the crap I eat while studying, I'd be fit as by the time this is done. But crap I am eating, drinking, inhaling. It's so bad, I actually craved vegetables last night. I'm hopped up on a combination of sugar and caffeine that I'm sure could trigger a heart attack in a lesser mortal. And now there's people messing with me. I'm hoping that either I get the thesis finished (pfft, like that's going to happen this side of 3am) or they turn off the bloody whipper snipper. Otherwise, I've got a fairly good idea that a local medical team will be performing a gardening tool extraction procedure later today, and it won't be from me. It's taken all my self-restraint not to litter this post with swear words. Don't think I've got enough left to deal with much more.

The Whooshing of a Deadline

Douglas Adams once said that he loved deadlines. More specifically, he loved the "whooshing" sound they made as they flew by. I'm getting a closer acquaintance with the whoosh today. My thesis draft is due on Monday, yet here I am, writing another blog entry. Interesting fact; the number of blog entries I make correlates pretty closely with the number of things on my to-do list. There's an inverse relationship between blogging and the number of days left on a deadline, as well. But somehow, on a glorious sunny spring day in Melbourne, it seems especially harsh that I have to be cooped up inside and writing about Marxism. I know, it's self inflicted. I'm not asking for sympathy. I have a feeling I wouldn't get much anyway. I'm just having a moan. Anything to keep me from examining the question of women as consumers/consumables. Yes, sounds entertaining, doesn't it.

It never ceases to amaze me just how many ways there are to procrastinate, if you really put your mind to it. I read somewhere that many perfectionists procrastinated, because they were afraid that nothing they could do would be up to standards, so it's better not to try. I must be the ultimate perfectionist, because I'm notorious for putting things off to the last second. At least this time I won't have someone nearby telling me I look dead when I surface after a weekend of no sleep. L is still safely in London, and nobody else here would tell me so bluntly except my Nana. Sorry Nana, no visits until my sleep pattern returns to normal.

All of which adds up to the fact that I should be doing something else. Anything to do with my thesis, actually, as long as it has a direct relationship. So what am I doing instead? Blogging. Playing online solitaire. Wandering through dating websites. Hell, I'm even considering housework right now, so desperate am I to avoid putting pen to paper - or hands to keyboard, at least. Maybe make a cake. Pathetic, isn't it. Meanwhile, the whoosh is getting louder...

Clarity

Thinking about it, I need to add a little clarity to the miserable post I've just put up. I know it was miserable. I'm kind of wallowing in it for the night. What can I say? Sometimes you just need to curl up on the couch with a vat of chocolate ice cream (or in this case a jar of Nutella). I think a few explanations are also in order.

First up, I am not moving back to the UK. I am not thinking of moving back to the UK. Not in any serious fashion at any rate. I'm back here in Australia, and I'm generally happy enough being here. There are many advantages to it.

So now that's out of the way, I should probably explain a few things. There may be someone reading this who has read my blog for a while, so they will remember that I had what I can only call a dark period for a while there. The bit where a friend who reads this observed that I sounded like I wanted to slit my wrists. Another friend became very concerned for me and attempted a kind of intervention. I'm not in that place. A large part of my completely wet blanket mood comes from two things; I haven't been getting much sleep lately, for one reason or another (mostly stress related, actually; did I mention that thesis deadline in the last paragraph or so?) and on top of that, I've started cutting back on my sugar and caffeine intake, attempting to get it to ordinary levels, which was one of the contributing factors last time I slid into the blackest of black holes. It's Spring, too, which in Melbourne means pollen clogging the nose, and, in my particular case, the type of headaches that can make you forget to breath, let alone to anything else. Add to that an epic collection of stupid people to deal with at work today (clue: if I'm asking you if you've sent me the latest version of the drawings, because I can't see the difference between this lot and the last lot, you're not getting your plans approved. Just a hint), and you have a vat of misery sitting waiting for me. And there was no Hellcats on TV tonight to jolly me out of it (Pretty cast? Check. Cheerleaders doing the physically impossible? Check. Implausible story lines? Check. poorly acted vehicle for a "triple threat" a la Lindsey Lohan/ Olsen twins movies? Check. God I love that show). And I'm having both a fat day and, given the sudden warmer weather and my need to have actual work clothes, wardrobe shortage issues. I'm not without reasons for being down in the dumps. I've decided to retreat into gloom and doom for the night. I live along, I have that choice and nobody is here to complain if I decide to listen to the Waifs sing about being in London Still on repeat. Or if I chose to blog about it. So sue me, because that's the only way anybody outside this room is going to have any impact on this mood, and by then I'll have moved on.

Oh good. Looks like I've made the transition into nasty piece of work. Tomorrow I shallbe all smiles, even if they're sarcastic, with service returned to normal. No need to confiscate pointy things just yet.

Irony has a name

This week has been a teensy bit surreal. Not sure where it came from, why it came, or how, but I wish it would go away. Because out of the blue, for no real reason, I'm suddenly missing London.

Yep, that's right. The weather in Melbourne turns nice, I get myself set up in a great flat, I pick up my new car tomorrow and I'm in a job that I actually quite like, with the prospect of some financial security looming, and suddenly I'm missing the grey, grim life that I led for the past 2 years. Go figure.

I first noticed it last Friday, after a night out with work people. Maybe it was because it was the first night out with them that I'd had, a night where nobody I knew was driving, where I stumbled home in the wee sma's, not having to sneak around fearful of waking anyone, or hoping that there was nobody deciding that I'd slept enough. Maybe it's down to the looming thesis deadline that's evoking memories of late nights in London, or perhaps it was the arrival of some London-related mail. I know I triggered it properly by downloading the latest episodes of Spooks, and reminiscing about all the times that I've run through the Bakerloo platforms at Charing Cross Station, just like Lucas et al were doing in the most recent, trying to pick where they were filming, and getting excited when I recognised it, just like I used to do with Australian films when homesickness started to bite back in London.

Or perhaps it's really all down to L's announcement that she is definitely coming back to Melbourne at the end of this year. It's truly the end of an era once she gets back. Sure, I've still got friends there, there are still people who I would visit if I was to go back. But she is the only one that I knew over there that I also knew here before I left. And when she comes back, it is almost certain to mean that I am here for good as well. And much as I'm loving being back in Melbourne - and don't get me wrong, I love this city like no other - I'm missing some of the freedom of being over there.

Over there I didn't get nightly phone calls from my mother. I didn't feel sit around doing nothing, because it's next to impossible to pin anyone down without booking them months in advance. I was out and about, doing things on whims without having to justify it to anybody. There is a freedom to living on the other side of the world to what you consider your real life, and I miss that. I miss the adventure of wandering a city that is older than my country, older than I can contemplate, where you turn the corner and suddenly you're looking at something that pre-dates not only your own country, but the one you're standing in as well. The twists and turns, the people.

I never thought I would come back here and wax lyrical about London. Maybe it's the realisation that I really can't move back there that has set me off. I don't think I would move back. But I would pick up huge chunks of it and move them here if I could. I think I understand what it was that made the colonialists attempt to reconstruct England in Australia, at least to a certain extent. I'm glad they did.

Actually, I think I know what has set me off. It's the realisation that both of my brothers are deserting the family Christmas, leaving me defenceless on Annual Family Fight Day. I can see their point; it's the first time I've been home for the festive season since 2008, so it's about time I shouldered some of the burden. It feels strange and slightly wrong to be once again contemplating a hot Christmas, let alone one at home but without half my family around.

It's frustrating to think of just how homesick I was before I made the decision to move back here, only to find that I'm missing London now. I had thought I was settled, but it seems I've been kidding myself, at least a little. I'm not really. It's nice to have a home, it's nice to be home, but damn I love to travel. Guess I'll just have to get down to planning another little adventure...

There's the rub

Today felt like summer. It probably helped that daylight saving kicked off overnight, meaning that even though it's almost 8 it's still a little light outside. It took me a while to work that out this morning. I have a phone and laptop that are programmed to set their own time, but my watch and all my other clocks hadn't changed. I actually had to get online to double check the time (thanks very much timeanddate.com, by the way. Lifesaver)

But that's all beside the point. I spent today with the windows of the flat open, basking in the glorious sunshine as I moved around, puttering (i.e. procrastinating) in my linen shirt and cut off jeans. For someone who feels that she has gone without a summer since early 2006, it was like a slice of heaven. Or it was, until a mosquito found its way into the flat. See, only two of my windows have insect screens. And, as fate would have it, they aren't the windows that stay open without props. So I take my chances, or I have until today. I shut the windows a little before sundown - prime mozzie time, in my experience - but it was too late.

And now, I have a problem. Two, actually, one on my wrist, one on my elbow. Which leads me to the question, how the hell did I not notice that there was a bloodsucker taking a nip of me on my right wrist while I was cooking dinner? It's not like my hand was still for long, either. Now I've got to keep reminding myself not to scratch, so it doesn't get infected. Because I'm allergic to mosquitoes. Of course I am. Sometimes, I'm even allergic to oxygen. Why would I not be allergic to mozzies? Bloody bugs.

And speaking of bugs, it turns out that my nearest neighbour here is a Collingwood supporter. He was home with a friend yesterday to watch the Grand Final replay. Personally, I wish that they could have just kept on repeating the draw until everybody gave up and moved onto next season. I wasn't actually watching the game. I didn't have to. I could hear the cheers from next door. One or other of them footy fans was outside smoking at regular intervals, polluting the air with smoke as well as sound. Turns out, mosquitoes aren't the only kind of bugs around here. Bloody Collingwood supporters.

So now I'm left with a dilemma. I know where the Collingwood supporter is, but there is nothing I can do about it. Whereas I can't find the mozzie, no matter how I search. A brief glimpse here, a flitting shadow there. But make no mistake. Once I find the little bugger, it won't be taking any more of my hemoglobin, that's for sure. If only I could do the same to the Collingwood supporter.

Meanwhile back at the ranch...

So, it's been a while since I blogged. Many months, in fact. Long enough for me to have re-established myself in Melbourne and thrown myself back into working, studying, and all from the comfort of my own couch. Long enough for me to realise just how unhealthy study can be.

It's all very well when you're young and have an active metabolism to live the student lifestyle. But I'm not sure whether it's down to juggling full-time work and full-time thesis writing, but something is missing this semester. I think it's called a waistline. Sitting around while I research and write several thousand words*, mainlining coke straight from the bottle to keep my energy levels up, with a jar of Nutella and a spoon beside me for "solid fuel" breaks, I have come to realise that my study habits will kill me if I keep it up. I'm back to being sleep deprived and somewhat grumpy. I have 2 days worth of dishes piled up on the kitchen bench - I have no flatmates here to pester me into cleaning them, which is good and bad; I also have another 4 days worth in the cupboard to use before I am forced to do something about it, so I think it's mostly bad, from that front.

And what do I have to show for it? A deeper understanding of the relationship between chick lit and what went before it? Perhaps. The realisation that feminism can go round and round in circles without achieving anything other than an increasingly dense collection of theory that has little or no application in a real world still riddled with inequality? Of course. A caffeine/sugar habit and will see me getting withdrawal once again when I cut back to a regular person's intake? Undoubtedly. A new high score in Spider Solitaire. A steadily increasing BMI and a lowered ability to actually move my arse off the couch. A sudden inclination to blog once again. Beyond that, I'm not sure. Then again, I'm staring down the barrel of missing a deadline, so I'm bound to have some second thoughts about the whole process, given that I can see a month ahead with little or no sleep. Seems I have taken something away from this process. My poor time management in London was not down to the number of invitations to do interesting things. It was actually because I suck at organisation. Huh. Who woulda thunk it?

*Researching and writing of thesis may not have actually been taking place during the time spent on couch. Or, in fact, at all in any time over the past 2 weeks, with the exception of last night.

On the dock of the bay

I like San Francisco. There are no two ways about it. The only thing I can come up with that is wrong with the city - it's insanely steep hills - are also something that adds to its character, meaning that the 'fault' is pretty much nullified. In a lot of ways, it reminds me of Melbourne. There are the street cars - including an old Melbourne W-class, still in its green and yellow livery from the days of the Met - the enormous expanse of water that fails to yield a single city surf beach, the local love of good food and music, the central shopping strip that is strangely reminiscent of Bourke St, and the glitzy neighbouring city that overshadows it all.

But there is one thing San Francisco has that Melbourne can't even pretend to lay claim to: The Bush Man. Although the name suggests there is only one, apparently, there are a few of them scattered around the city. Some, I've been told, even work in concert. The deal is this: take one homeless man, seated on the ground holding a branch that passes for a bush in front of his face. Place him near an object of street furniture, whether it be a bin, a seat, a light, anything will do as long as it's enough to register the object. To those looking directly at him, he will be obvious and will probably seem a little bit nuts. To those like L, who are absorbed in looking everywhere else, however, he will be invisible, just like all the other homeless beggars on the street who are ignored every day as a matter of survival for many city dwellers. He takes advantage of this invisibility to scare the living crap out of the unsuspecting. He suddenly thrusts aside his "bush" and yells, or simply thrusts the branch into the path of the passersby, having picked his mark carefully as someone who has not seen him, for maximum effect.

The result is hilarious for those who have noticed him (often by being given a fright themselves). It's like a hidden camera exercise. Only the tin beside him, for those who appreciated his efforts to amuse them to give him a little something back, gives away the fact that he is a genuine vagrant, not some actor with make up giving him the bad dentistry and worn out wardrobe of someone living rough. His wide grin suggests that he enjoys his job a lot.

The Bush Man has become a bit of a local celebrity. Tourists can even buy t-shirts that proclaim "I had the $^%£ scared out of me by the Bush Man". But it masks what is a large and growing problem, as far as I can see. Yes, he is doing something to support himself. It's a simple enough ruse that gives enjoyment - and fright - to many. But I have seen as many, if not more, beggars on the streets of American cities than I have seen anywhere else. In one of the world's richest nations, there are many who go without.

That this man is able to hide in plain sight suggests something about the collective consciousness of society when it comes to the down and outs around us. It is too easy to pretend that they are not there. The gratefulness of some beggars when you simply acknowledge their existence by shaking your head when they ask for money can be heartbreaking. I can't - and won't - give money to people begging on the street, if only for the security reasons I had drilled into me when I was younger (never reveal where you keep your cash, how much of it you have, or make it more accessible for someone who may or may not be able to overpower you), but I always feel terrible for walking by people who are obviously in distress. Yet the vast majority of people don't even notice that they're there. So well done to the Bush Man for taking the initiative and calling some attention to himself, if nothing else.

The Man from Independence

There was movement at the restaurant,
For the word had spread around,
That girls from overseas were in town.

The restaurant was in a town called Independence, a slice of southern California quirkiness offering a haven on the west side of Death Valley. That the restaurant was called Hooligans was just a bargain. But whatever the reason, L and I were clearly the biggest show in town, not withstanding the local "talent" occupying the stage with his synthesizer, a laptop, and a microphone. He was interested enough in us to ask from stage for details about us, where we were heading, where we had been. The waitresses came to visit us at regular intervals, even the owner/chef came out, missing front teeth and all, to see how we were going.

It's a strange feeling to find yourself a novelty piece. It was kind of flattering when we were walking from our motel to the restaurant/bar, to have guys literally hanging out of car windows checking us out (that doesn't happen too often these days. In fact, it never happened that often, even back in the day). But by the time the waitress had asked us for the fifteenth time if we were OK, it was getting a little old. Because this isn't a town without the occasional visitor. There's about 3 hotels, enough to accommodate the entire town, I think. There are hiking trails, fishing and hunting all nearby. It's between several major tourist attractions. I can't see any reason for there not being visitors to what seems quite a pretty town, if slightly quirky. My only guess is that we're 2 "girls" travelling alone, and that we're foreign. Either way, as interesting and flattering as it was to have so much attention, I think I'll be looking forward to getting back to being one of the tourist masses tomorrow in Yosemite. I'll just have to keep an eye out for Sam is all.

Troubled times

Approaching the half way point of the epic road trip, there are several problems that have reared their ugly heads. If I'm honest, I should have foreseen at least 2 of them. The rest? Well, nobody has perfect foresight, but hindsight is 20-20. Hopefully, I'll be able to avoid making the same mistakes again in the future. And some of the problems are beyond my control, so I just have to resign myself to dealing with them and moving on.

See, there are few things worse on a road trip - or any long trip, for that matter - than being sick. And so far on this one, I've had a cold that turned me into a travelling snot block between Boston, Philadelphia and Washington. And then, as we pulled into Chicago - snot free at last - I realised that I'd done something to my back. Something that made walking extremely painful. Potentially, something caused by driving through the storm from hell the night before - that's what I'm blaming. It's mostly eased up now, after experiencing Chicago largely by bus rather than the usual method of transport for L and I in cities - foot. But now, every time I have a long drive, every time the bed isn't just perfect, it twinges. I have to be extremely careful carrying my enormous pack, and I hate not being able to just throw it around. But physical impairment pales in comparison to some of the other problems.

Because whilst driving through some of the flattest, dullest scenery that America has to off in its northern states - thanks Iowa and Nebraska - L has become sulky. She's bored. And this has uncovered a fundamental difference in our travelling philosophies that was masked while we were jetting around Europe. She's all about the destination. And I mean ALL. The journey itself? Well to her, that's just the prelude where you plan what you're going to do when you get there, so anything that takes longer than reading the Lonely Planet is just wasted. Whereas I - the instigator of the road trip - am quite well able to cope with long stretches where there is very little to see. I'm not sure if it was my early training, taking long car journeys up through Australia's eastern seaboard, or if I'm just taking the Baroque view of things, where the journey is almost more important than the destination, but either way, I cope better. And by the end of a long day, where I have done the bulk of the planning and almost all of the navigation, since L struggles with map reading on the go, we're both niggly. And things get said. Like the bit where, after the longest day on the road that we will have, we were pulling into a budget hotel in Sioux City.

It was getting dark quickly, we'd missed a couple of turns and had to back track. All day I had been asked questions that I didn't know that answers to, that I couldn't know the answers to, never having been to any of the places before. And when she cruised into the car park - or what we thought was the car park - and asked what I thought was an idiotic question before accelerating so I couldn't see where to navigate her (because I have to tell her where to go, she not being used to or comfortable in unfamiliar places), I snapped. I told her to slow down, to stop asking me things I couldn't know, to take a look for herself. And we barely talked for the rest of the night. We unpacked the car in complete silence, she threw her stuff onto the bed (always the best bed...I don't know how she does it), and we went to dinner without her doing more than nodding. Last night was hardly better when I informed her that spending an hour at Mt Rushmore (which I knew would turn into 2 hours if I agreed to 1 - I know her photographic habits too well to rely on estimates of time to see places), at the expense of a couple of places further down that I really wanted to see, on a day when we will be spending around 8 hours in a car, that just so happens to be my 30th birthday, is not something I'm prepared to do. Sure, we'll be stopping there. We will see it. But she knew going in that this wasn't going to be an easy trip. And I think she underestimated just how much road time we'd be logging, and just how unprepared for long boring stretches she would be.

But not all of the problems relate to her (although her tendency to open the curtains before we're fully dressed, regardless of the outlook - or in-look - has caused me some anxious moments, as has her drifting and abrupt driving style). Perhaps the biggest problem is that I am fast running out of money. Boston and Washington DC sucked up too much of my cash and I'm now in the unenviable position of looking like I'm barely going to make it into the 3rd week of the trip before it's all gone. And when it's gone, there is no more. I have no resources to tap into. So how I'm going to pay my share of the car extras is beyond me. Although part of that is also caused by L and her insistence that she be put on as an extra driver, even though she refuses to drive in any of the cities and only does a few hours in the morning when we're in the country, or the evening when we've left a city that morning. Bam, there goes $145 of my carefully planned budget.

That's not to say that I'm not enjoying the trip, though. As I type this, I'm sitting in Custer, with a view of the Black Hills on the other side of town. Today sees us heading through the Wild West, towards Cody, and then Yellowstone. I'm loving what I've seen so far. I just wish there weren't niggles and worries to get in the way. And I've resolved never to do a road trip with L ever again.

Dazed and confused

I'm currently propped up in bed in a Chicago hotel room. I'm trying very hard to move nothing other than my finger right now, because I've done something to my back. I'm not certain when, or how, but I know that it wasn't there yesterday morning when we left the middle-of-nowhere place we were forced to stop in thanks to a combination of traffic jams and horrendous weather (think three hour lines of cars to get across the Canada-US border, followed by a storm with rain so heavy that I was driving at 20 miles an hour down a freeway, still barely able to see, and not even being overtaken). But it was there when the time came to lift my bags out of the car.

But either way, sitting here gives me a good view of the morning show that L puts on. If I didn't know better, I'd think it was just to provoke me. But I know better. I know that the fact we are in a first floor hotel room, with the windows open, curtains wide apart and cars and buildings all around us with prime views into our room is not enough to stop L from emerging from the bathroom wrapped only in a towel, shower cap still on her head, for some unfathomable reason. It's not enough to keep her from stepping out of the shower without a top on and standing in front of the window as she looks for something. Because it didn't stop her from stripping down to her flesh coloured singlet top before she went in, it never stopped her from essentially flashing the people up top on London buses from the windows of our old flat, and no doubt it won't keep her from putting on a show any time there is a window - because she likes natural light. And right now, there's plenty of that streaming through the windows. Luckily, it's Sunday morning. There aren't that many people out and about. Well, not compared to last night, at any rate. So I had better get on with getting myself organised for our day out and about in Chicago. But one thing's for certain: as I do that, I'm getting dressed in the bathroom.

Hilton: The 4 star screw up

One of the things we were really looking forward to on this trip was reaching Niagara Falls. Not only were we going to be seeing one of the natural beauties of the world, we had also decided to splurge and stay in the Hilton. It was going to be great; our room was high enough and cost enough that we were going to be having in-room views of both the Canadian and the American falls. We could hear the roar as thousands of litres of water rushed over the edge, we could almost feel the spray. We would be staying in luxury that would put our other accommodations (admittedly, chosen as much for their cheapness as any other criteria) so far into the shade that we would probably be griping about their crapness for the next 4 weeks. Or so we thought.

Because almost from the moment we arrived, I've been questionning whether it was worth all the extra cash. Sure, the views are great. But what do views matter when there is a litany of disaster strewn across the interior?

It started when we first arrived at the door to our room, fully laden with our bags because we were trying to avoid the insane tipping system that sees anybody getting cash out of you, however crap their service. But we couldn't get into the room, because neither of our electronic key cards worked. A trek down to the lobby later, and we could get in. And yes, the view is great, if you discount the enormous Fallsview Casino that splits the two falls, and the car park that partially blocks the view of the Canadian falls. Or the crane that is out to the side, by the corner window, with it's cabin just a floor below ours. It is awe inspiring, and we were suitably gobsmacked. Had that been the only problem, we would have considered our stay enjoyable, in spite of the need to divide the Crabtree and Evelyn toiletries between us, as they hadn't given enough for 2 people to use. But it didn't stop there.

After a trip to the Falls, and many photographs for L, we came back to the room, planning to treat ourselves to room service. This is, after all, an early birthday treat for me, and the only thing that would have completed it more than lazing about in luxury having room service (i.e., having minions wait on my every command) would have been a massage. But getting back into the room once again proved problematic. Because my key still didn't work. Luckily, L's did, and we were in, on the bed, and ordering from the children's menu in no time. When the food arrived, it looked great. L's lasagna was a gooey concoction of cheese, tomato and pasta, just as all good lasagna should be. Mine was a couple of chicken drumsticks with vegetables. The veg was delicious, cooked well and not dripping in oil, unlike many other meals we'd sampled to date. I bit into the chicken, crispy coating flying off the drumstick (I'd thrown caution - and etiquette - to the winds and was eating with my hands by this stage). But something wasn't quite right here. It was too hard to get through the bite. A look at the drumstick revealed why. There was blood oozing along the bone. I've never actually seem chicken that has been cooked do this before. It was stomach churningly vile.

So of course, I called up and got them to bring me a replacement meal. It took a while, as well. Someone came to take the plate away, first, clearly not believing me without seeing for themselves. By the time the new meal came, it was on towards ten o'clock. If I hadn't been starting to feel queasy from the rare chicken, I would have been ravenous, gnawing my own arm. As it was, I was a little wary of the replacement meal and immediately cut into the drumstick, not wanting a repeat. And it was almost as bad, the meat a horrible dark colour that suggested that it hadn't been properly prepared before cooking. So I called them up again to complain. "So you want it well done then?" asked the person on the other end of the phone. Now, as far as I am aware, you don't ever ask how you want your chicken cooked. There is no medium rare for chicken. There is only cooked, or uncooked. And this was clearly the latter. So I just got my money back, a strange hybrid of US and Canadian money that came with an apology and a promise to "tell the cooks". Because clearly, they hadn't been informed that they sent up a chicken that had only just left the coop the last time. By this stage, I was considering myself lucky to not be camped out by the toilet bowl, because I was feeling decidedly unwell.

So I did what seemed reasonable for someone feeling a bit sick. I went to bed and slept the sleep of the exhausted. After all, I had spent the day before reminding L that when she's driving, it's a good idea not to wander across the road, not to steer where you turn your head, and that the Americans drive on what is quite clearly the wrong side of the road. I had also been trying to answer questions that there was no way I could have known the answer to: how does the US/Canada border crossing work? where do I pay the toll? And, as you might expect, I was in a beautiful queen size bed, the perfect amount of support, the perfect pillow configuration. Sleep-wise, it was great. It was only when I woke up again and stepped into the shower that the next screw up hit me.

The shower should have been awesome. It should have made up for any number of pathetic showers along the way. It should have delivered on the border guard's assertion that only the best things are to be found in Canada. But it didn't. Because the thermostatic mixer thing was loose. Because gravity pushing things down. Because the hot setting was at the top of the dial. Because I didn't like being scalded whilst in the shower. Funny, that last one. I have a strange dislike for the sense that my skin is about to leave my body. Probably a similar feeling to what the chicken had as I bit into it's leg. But either way, I've come out of the bathroom and to my computer, still with something of a stomach ache, all steamed up because there's no exhaust in the bathroom either, to sit on my ratty desk chair (like something that the Thistle hotels I was working on in the UK would have discarded long ago as being too worn out, given that you can actually see the padding on the seat), with the TV providing a fuzzy picture reminiscent of the reception you get with the old bunny-ears style aerials, and turned to my blog to work up the kind of righteous indignation I can never manage in person. Because although I plan to go downstairs and complain, and demand to know what they're going to do with me, I'm certain that I will be ineffectual. And that's not right. Because this is supposed to be a treat, staying here. It's supposed to be a bit special. And so far, it's been special for all the wrong reasons.

Washington Burning

I've been in the US for almost a week now, and I've never seen such extremes. The rich and poor are pretty sharply divided here, and it's not by geography. If nothing else, it's the levels of bitterness that seem to mark them out. And as a white woman travelling here, I seem to come in for my share of the bitterness. Because the poor are predominantly black or Latino. In the course of three days in Washington, I have been abused because I didn't respond to being called "white girl" by someone in a wheel chair who, I realised a few seconds too late, was asking me to open the door. I might have felt a whole lot worse about that had I not been laden with around 30kg of bags at the time, and barely able to walk myself. The other time was when L and I were walking through the apparently safe, upper class streets of Foggy Bottom, where we were yelled at across the street by a down and out drunk, who screamed that we were "white hos".

It's not restricted to race, or even locals though. Wandering the paths of Arlington Cemetery, a beautiful peaceful place the sheer scale of which is overwhelming, we came across a group of French teenagers on a school trip. I thought it was a strange place to take a school group, but as a way of getting across the nature of America's militarism, and the respect in which they hold the armed forces here, I guess there are few better places to go than a monument to the fallen that not only overlooks the national capital (not to mention the Capitol), but is within the grounds of a vanquished foe of the Union from the civil war. some of the French boys had outpaced their teachers and, when they didn't get a response to their question (in French) asking if we understood them, proceeded to follow us along the path with the continuous stream of filthy gutter slang that would have had their mothers washing their mouths out with soap, if not cuffing them across the back of the head. Because we do understand French, we just didn't realise they were talking to us when they asked.

But there you have Washington in summary; beautiful monuments and stunning settings, with the constant background hum that something isn't quite as full of pomp and circumstance as the politicians and public servants would like to believe. I guess it's like Canberra, but on a grander scale. And so are the social problems. Because everything in America is bigger than it is anywhere else, it stands to reason that the social and racial divides should be no different.

Of course

It had to happen, really. And the timing is probably better than it ought to have been. The inevitable on-the-road cold has struck, laying me low at a point when I'm not doing the driving, thankfully, but annoyingly, right when I have to lug my ridiculously heavy bags to and from buses, since getting around on the cheap has its cost in physical pain.

But either way, I'm on the road, and have loved my road trip to date. Boston was gorgeous, even with the unseasonably cold weather of the second day, when we were in coats, scarves, and longing for hats. Just to contrast, today's arrival in Philadelphia was warm and temporarily sunny. We got to the hostel just in time to avoid a spectacular thunder storm, though, and too late to get into any of the sights. So we snuck around outside, checking out the Liberty Bell (I'm still tempted to call it the Taco Bell), and a few buildings. Now I'm staving off the cold with whatever drugs I had to hand - nothing terribly efficient, it has to be said - and sharing the love with the other people in what has to be the biggest hostel dorm in history - 28 beds, thankfully only half of them occupied. I can see I'm going to be popular here in a few days...

The Final Word

It's a grey Sunday in London, so it seems appropriate to get back onto my blog for one last time before moving on to greener pastures - well, lighter, brighter, warmer, with any luck. Because d-day - departure day, that is - looms large on the horizon, moving ever closer, and suddenly, I find that I only have a couple of days left as a Londoner. And it's a very strange feeling, let me tell you. I am currently homeless, unemployed, and whittling my possessions down to the smallest number I can bear. Somehow, I think I wouldn't survive as one of those people who are perpetually on the road, but by the standards of a pack rat like myself, the last three and a half years has been condensed to a scarily small pile of possessions.

The goodbyes have all been said, and I'm beginning to realise just how much I'm going to miss certain people when I'm no longer in the same country, continent, hemisphere. Because as much as I might bemoan the lack of possessions at the moment, the things that I'm also whittling down, like friends, acquaintances and flatmates, are the things that have meant the most.

I know. I don't normally go in for the touchy feely stuff. In fact, I normally run from it at a speed that people who have seen me exercise are astonished by. My hockey career could have been very different had I been able to put on such a turn of speed on the pitch (and if I had skills, but hey, that doesn't make such a nice image, does it...). But here I am, feeling the urge to get all gushy. Make the most of it, these moments don't come around too often, and I still can't manage to do it with any degree of sincerity and without resorting to cliches.

There are people I won't miss. The friend of a friend who came around this afternoon to buy my sewing machine, and spewed phoney declarations of a friendship we never had for the entire time she was here. The person who I saw for what we both knew would be the last time a couple of weeks back, who promptly went home after that night's drinks and unfriended me on Facebook. I also won't be missing London's air quality, the pavement pizzas to be found after pretty much every Saturday night, the men who turn all of the city into their own personal lavatory. I won't be coming back any time soon because of the lure of those things.

But there are people that I am going to miss, because they bring their own unique quality to a friendship. Jones, with her ability to bring bowel movements into pretty much any conversation. Chris, and her involved love life, the twists and turns of which are better than any novel yet published. L, the most motherly flatmate imaginable, with her tendency to voice every thought that enters her head, even if it's just a commentary on what she's doing at the time. C, sweet, giggly, and hilarious when tipsy. The core group of those who were out with me until 2am this morning, the chief causes of my husky voice when I eventually surfaced from a deep sleep today. They are the ones who have made living here, away from old friends and family, not only bearable, but enormously fun. And I will miss them. Drunken promises of catching up in Sydney for New Years Eve had better be followed through on...but just in case, I plan to annoy people on email until they come visit me, just to keep me quiet.

But that's the thing with leaving somewhere. My intentions are good, and so are those of the people staying behind. But the bittersweet truth is that, over time, there will undoubtedly be drifting apart. The number of people who keep in touch with will shrink. I think I know who will fall by the wayside, and who will last. But from here on in, the things that have come so easily while in London will require work. And I'm not known for my work ethic. So if you're one of the people I'm talking to, and you don't hear from me for a while, rest assured that I'm not ignoring you. I'm just distracted. I will get back to you at some point...just bear with me, that's all.

Meanwhile, off to America for me...Five weeks of Thelma and Louise style antics with L. Although hopefully without the murder or the messy ending. But I wouldn't mind if we ran into a Brad Pitt along the way...

A lot to answer for

I got very excited in New York over Christmas. There were many reasons for the excitement, but the one that made me stop in my tracks and walk a few steps back to check out a poster on a billboard was the discovery that the writers of The Nanny Diaries have finally gotten around to producing a sequel. This may be news to some - those in the UK, certainly, where it's not destined to land on shelves for another month or so - but to quite a few, it will be no shock. It was out in New York, it was out in Australia, and it made the journey back from Melbourne safely stowed in L's luggage until it was pounced on by me and read in a flash.

It's taken me a little while to digest what I read there. The book was lacking several things, not least of which was the fantastic alliteration of the Harvard Hottie - now he has a name, somewhat disappointingly, and is extremely absent for a large chunk of the book. The years have rolled by faster in Nanny's New York than in the real world, though, and suddenly Nanny is jaded, nostalgic and approaching an early mid-life crisis.

Gone also is the biting but disturbing critique of the wealthy society families. It's not nearly as surprising now to discover the truth behind something Cherry told Ponyboy in The Outsiders a few decades ago: It's rough all over. We've been presented with the dilemma of the rich child who has everything they want except the love and attention of their parents often enough to have become desensitised to it. And if we wanted to know what happens when the children grow up and reach high school, well, we've had Gossip Girl to instruct us on the difficulties of their lives. The parties, the clothes, the dash to spend cash - it's all too familiar.

The difference is that Kraus and Mclaughlin set their novel just as it was all revealed as a sham. They hint at the outcome before the story even begins, with a quote about Bernie Madoff's relationship with his sons. The makings of something a little more serious than the usual chick lit romp are already in place - even if they just re-use the framework from The Nanny Diaries. But somehow, it all falls flat.

Maybe it was me. I've read a whole lot more books with pink covers featuring cartoons of impossibly thin but beautifully dressed girls. I've seen Gossip Girl, and the episodes focusing on what happens when one of the rich bastards gets caught out. But whatever it is, somehow, Nanny just comes across as a little spineless and whiny as she hangs out with her former school mates, swans around town getting paid and enormous amount of cash to do very little, it seems, and fails to stand up for those who deserve it. Nanny, the great defender of the unloved, the champion of the children, has gotten all growed up and lost something in her years living abroad with her world-saving husband.

Still, for any who haven't read it yet, don't take my word for it. Read the follow up to the book that is credited with lifting the lid on Upper East Side Manhattan. Take a peek into the sort of lifestyle we can only dream about. Then follow it up with lashings of Gossip Girl; because really, who doesn't wish that they at least had the option to reject that lifestyle?

Beware Pagans...

At last there is light. So much so that I’m tempted to put my sunglasses on when I’m at my desk for certain times of day. I’m at risk of being blinded. It has to be a health and safety issue. But I don’t really mind. Because, as long as I don’t venture outside, I can bask in the sun, stretching out my feet like a cat, and pretend that it’s almost summer, and I’m almost warm.

It looks like I’m not the only one with this kind of thinking. I’ve seen a few people tricked into wearing shorts, flippy skirts, bare legs and sandals. There’s a more sensible man leaning against a wall outside. It’s the end wall of a terrace, and he stand beneath a wall-mounted street light, head raised to the sun and looking like he’s about to indulge in a pagan ritual. He’s smart enough to do it whilst wearing a sheepskin jacket with a heavy beard to keep his face warm. Although now I think about it, judging by the amount of laundry he’s just picked up from the laundromat in his supermarket trolley, I’m wondering if that’s as much because he didn’t have enough clean clothes as anything else.

I do feel that I should brave the cold and offer him a warning though. The last man I saw leaning against that wall was facing the other way and searching for relief from things other than the cold. If the trickle he left running from the wall to the gutter was anything to go by, he wasn’t worshipping the sun. South London: workplace, temple and toilet, all rolled into one handy location. How convenient.

Waxing lyrical

It's enough to make a girl get homesick. Reading the Melbourne newspapers online, I stumbled across an ode to Melbourne's arcades and laneways. Sure, it's advertising. It's selling a product that is, in turn, selling the bars and shops that haunt the back alleys of the city - the hidden gems that make Melbourne a place that takes some knowing. But reading through the list and seeing so many old haunts and places that I always meant to get to but never have, as well as a few I'm not as familiar with, well, it made the yearnings to be back in the Garden State that little bit stronger.

You can read it for yourself. See if you find yourself drifting towards the allure of Koko Black (incidentally, for any non-Melburnians who stumble across this, you don't just go there to buy truffles and the like; the hot chocolates are also just as good...and in the Block Arcade there's a fantastic chocolate shop as well. Or there used to be. Please god let it still be there). They may have missed out other gems, some whose names I can't even remember (the bar on the old town square? Anyone? I know it's something-Below and was designed by Six Degrees...that it's a great place to grab a drink on a sunny day, propped up on a bar stool outside in the sun). There are places outside of the city grid just as well worth mentioning that are missed. The Belgian Beer Cafe Bluestone - whoever thought of putting a pub in the grounds of the Institute for the Blind? It's genius.

But there you have it. Homesickness in a very concise dosage. All the things that Melbourne has that aren't weather dependent, that make it one of my favourite cities, a place that you have to spend time in, to get to know, like the quirks of an old friend. I've got less than one hundred days left living in London now. In around 150, I will be back in my home town, pounding the pavements, wandering the streets, searching for a job. And I might just stop off in Degraves St on my way out of Flinders St Station.

With a note from my Mum

I've been guilty of a little blogging absenteeism lately, so I've indulged in a little hypochondria to try and explain away what basically amounts to a combination of laziness and a disturbing lack of things to say. Think of it as the kind of note you always wished your Mum would write that could act as a get out of school free card - better than the Monopoly version, that's for sure.

So that headache that's been lurking around for a month or two? Nothing to do with allergies or a failure to drink enough water. It's a brain tumour. An aneurysm. A stroke. The stomach ache you got from eating too much stuff that was bad for you? A sure sign of a stomach ulcer (actually, given my current coke intake, that one might be true). The pulled muscle in your side? Appendicitis. So, here's the note...

Dear Reader(s),

Please excuse Killi's prolonged absence from her blog, as she has been recovering from a no doubt fatal illness that can only be diagnosed by putting her symptoms into Google. The most likely diagnosis to date appears to be chronic repetitive stupidity.

Yours sincerely,

Killi's Mum (Lulu)

There you have it. Yet another example of why I should not be allowed near a computer when I am both tired and tending towards a migraine. Who says paracetamol/ibuprofen are safe drugs? I promise not to medicate and blog in the future. I also promise not to let it go so long that nobody knows about the bizarre running woman the other day...but I have to hold something back for tomorrow now, don't I?