Thanksgiving dinner :)

2 weeks and 1 day later, I finally got to have Thanksgiving dinner. Due to a bunch of craziness this was the earliest we were able to do it. Luckily I had several friends who were very eager to experience an authentic American Thanksgiving meal thanks to TV and movies. We definitely had more than enough food and it was all super super yummy :) I had some help from Sharyn in cooking the food. Ovens here are generally pretty small and you aren't able to fit anything more than a small to medium size turkey (maybe 8lbs max) in one.

The main spread :)

From L to R: Mashed potatoes, the carved turkey (Sharyn made both of these and did an amazing job cooking her first turkey!), green bean casserole (made by me!), and cornbread (thanks Jiffy). There was also gravy that either hadn't made it on the table yet or it might just be out of view.

The dessert spread :)

I made all the dessert and what's a Thanksgiving dinner without pumpkin pie. My Aussie friends thought pumpkin pie was a requirement for all Thanksgiving dinners, but I can definitely remember a few that didn't include pumpkin pie... Pumpkin pie here is a bit of a novelty, Aussies generally think of pumpkin as a side veggie (so if you got a meat and 3 veggies, one of them might be roasted pumpkin) and not as something that goes into a dessert. These pies were made with real pumpkin (you can't find it canned here). The crust is a frozen crust I found in the store (not quite ambitious enough to make my own crust just yet) and it's more of a shortbread crust, rather than a flaky pastry crust. The recipe I had made 3 pies, 1 went to church on Sunday. It was quite yummy :) I also made banana pudding as I had a request for it. :)

Holidays!!!!

I go home in 9 days!! Due to time travel, Dec 18 will be the longest day of my life. My Dec 18th will start on Dec 18th @ 12am in Australia (yeah I know duh), but it will only be Dec 17 @ 8am in Alabama (my final destination). When I finally get to Alabama it will probably be around 9pm on Dec 18. So my Dec 18 will be ~40hrs... I think... or maybe this isn't how it actually works, but I think I would rather think this way seeing how I lose a day coming to Australia.

Also in the holiday fashion, because I missed Thanksgiving due to my conference in Perth, I will be celebrating it a little bit late. So tomorrow night, we are having a Thanksgiving meal! Complete with turkey and gravy, mashed potatoes, green bean casserole, cornbread, pumpkin pie, and banana pudding. The turkey might actually be pre-roasted since I'm having difficulty finding anything else at the store (and 2 weeks ago I would of had a difficult time just finding a turkey). This will also be my first attempt at a green bean casserole and pumpkin pie, so hopefully it will go well. The pumpkin pie is also from fresh pumpkin as you can't get canned pumpkin here. Luckily I still have fixings for cornbread and banana pudding left from when my parents came and brought me food. :)

Finally because listening to Christmas carols all the time at home isn't quite enough, I watched "A Christmas Story" last night to help get into the Christmas spirit :)

Conferenceing!!

A couple weeks ago I had the opportunity to go to a conference. This conference happened to be THE conference for people in my field to go to and it also happened to be in Perth. (For those of you that are geographically challenged in Australia, Perth is on the west coast toward the south.) Just getting to this conference was a challenge in itself. I found out about it at the end of Oct, about a month before it was suppose to happen. Immediately after finding out I mentioned it to my boss and he said it should be fine but needed to check with the higher ups. Then he was out of the office for a couple weeks and when I finally managed to catch up with him I found out I needed to fill out this form and send it to Person A. So I did this and by this point it's a little more than a week before I would need to leave for the conference... I didn't hear anything and by the end of week I was getting a bit anxious. After several phone calls and emails on Fri and Mon, I finally got approval at 5pm on Mon to go to this conference at the end of that week. On Tues I booked plane tickets to leave on Wed and a place to stay. Cutting it just a bit close... They really should work on the policy and procedures to get approval to go to a conference.

I had almost 2 days in Perth to wander around and explore. It was a lot of fun and a very pretty city, but rather hot. I would have liked a bit more time there though and especially to have someone to hang out with.

The conference itself was really good. I went there only knowing 2 people and even them I had only met once. There were about 50 people total there and only a couple of those were women and I wouldn't be surprised if I was the youngest there (the average age was probably about 55). I made a lot of contacts though and learned a lot! The tiny conference was a very difference experience to the massive conferences I had been to before. The biggest difference was that all my food was included!! Breakfast, morning and afternoon tea, lunch and dinner. All very very yummy :) I can't wait for the conference next year!! It's going to be near Adelaide.

Let them eat cake!

We threw a surprise birthday party this weekend and I said I would make the cake for it. Feeling particularly inspired by the slight obsession with Madagascar 2 multiple people have here, I decided I would do a fancy cake! Luckily a friend had a book of cake designs for kids parties that I could look through for further inspiration. Originally the cake was going to be a penguin cake, but due to lack of being able to easily find black food coloring and lack of a large enough pan to do it properly I decided to do a lion instead. Much simpler since all I needed were my round cake pans :)

After Alvina convinced me that making the cake part of the cake a red velvet cake might be a slightly bad idea, I managed to find a yellow cake recipe that looked like it would suit for my purposes. It almost did until I only had about half the required amount of sugar, so I used some brown sugar as well and added a bit of extra vanilla (well actually I kinda doubled the amount of vanilla called for).

Yay!!! My 2 layers!!

The next big task was definitely the frosting. It would have been much simpler to buy a couple tubs of frosting and color appropriately, but said tubs run about $4.50 (these are the Betty Crocker ones that are about $1 at home). I'll make my own frosting thank you very much!! So first stop was some yellow frosting to cover the whole thing.

I think this only looks slightly disturbing :P

So frosted up the whole thing and then made up a few different shades of brown by adding cocoa powder to the rest of the yellow (I meant to take a pic here but forgot). Using a piping bag and tips borrowed from the same friend I got the cake book from, I piped on the lions mane.

It's starting to look like a lion!! :)

Next challenge was to decorate his face appropriately. I had picked up some black writing icing (also way overpriced but I didn't want to try to make this) so I used that for the mouth, left over brown frosting for the nose, and marshmallow fluff and chocolate chips for the eyes.

So so so cute!!!!!!!!!

I had a lot of fun and everyone really liked it :) I think I might have to do more decorating of cakes in the future :)

gotta love shopping!

So I'm not quite sure who came up with the idea for the Aussie shopping center but I'm pretty sure they were almost a genius. I would say shopping centers (or centres) here are completely unlike anything I've ever seen in the states. They are very similar to the typical American mall in the sense that they are enclosed and have the normal range of shops that typical American malls have (electronics, book stores, jewelry, hair, food court) but there are a few differences. Most of the ones I've seen have at least some undercover parking, either in the form of parking garages or sailshades (which are essentially giant canvas tarps). Anchor stores tend to be places like Kmart, Target, Big W (the Aussie Walmart), and grocery stores. (The mall in Ithaca was kinda similar since it had non-typical dept stores for anchor stores but not quite the same.) There also tend to be more anchor stores than what you would find at a mall of similar size in the states. This is great because it is one-stop shopping but you have options on where you buy things! At the shopping center near where I live there is a Kmart, Target, and 2 grocery stores. The entrances to the grocery stores are about 50 steps from each other. If one doesn't have what you're looking for try the other or you know something you want is on sale that week but everything else is cheaper at the other store not a problem. You don't have to worry about wasting gas driving around to get the best deals. Another difference is more of the shopping centers tend to be multiple levels and have inclined moving sidewalks to get from level to level instead of escalators. You can take your buggy on these and magnets keep it from sliding all around. The buggies are also different, instead of having 2 rotating wheels and 2 fixed wheels, all 4 wheels rotate!! That can make them a bit difficult to control sometimes :P Other differences mostly revolve around the prices of things :P

you're it!!!

So Alvina tagged me on this whole 8 questions thing and to make her happy I figured I'd do it :P besides it is kinda interesting :)

1) If you could spend 6 weeks learning about something (basketweaving, audio mixing, the guitar, cooking, photography, chemistry, painting, etc.), what would it be and why?
oooh definitely pastry and chocolate making!! it'd be awesome to learn that type of thing from a professional. and so much yummyness :) painting would actually be a close tie for second... though i'm not sure i'd like to learn about it as much as just spend time doing it... maybe i could do each for 3 weeks! :)
2) What would you order for your last meal on earth?
jim bobs chicken fingers, bbq ribs, mashed potatoes, banana pudding and brownies :)
3) If you are handed two plane tickets and 7 nights hotel, where would you go and who would you take?
i thought the where would be easy cuz my first thought was the big island of hawaii so i could see lava. but been there done that so if i can go anywhere maybe i should go somewhere else... so i think that somewhere else would be... at the moment i think costa rica... there's a volcano there too!! though who am i kidding i really want to go back to see the lava in hawaii :) the who will depend on when i get these plane tickets :P
4) Name 5 things on your bucket list.
1. skydiving
2. visit every continent
3. spend several weeks traveling across europe
4. hike the entire appalachian trail (or a similar long backpacking trip)
5. own an island

5) What are the last things you do before you fall asleep?
brush teeth, say a prayer and read a bit til i feel like i can sleep :)

6) What are your favorite pizza toppings?
cheese!! sausage and pepperoni if i'm going for classic pizza toppings, chicken and pesto if i want to spice things up a bit

7) What's your cell phone wall paper?
somerset dam with all the gates open releasing water!

8) What are 3 things you always take with you out the door everyday (minus the keys)?
cellphone, wallet, and a purse to put it all in

Since I don't really having many blogging friends (and probably even fewer friends that actually read this), everyone who reads this is tagged :P and you can either leave your answers to my questions in the comments or post on your blog and leave me a link! The questions I have for you are as follows:

1. What are 5 things (food or something else) you would have shipped to you if you were living in an area that you couldn't find those things in the store?
2. Assuming it was possible to live on a different planet, which planet would you choose to live on and why?
3. What record would you try to set to get into the Guinness Book of World records? Why?
4. If you could only have one kind of birthday cake for the rest of your life what would it be?
5. 90F weather or 40F weather?
6. What was your favorite grade in school and why?
7. How many email addresses have you had (past and present)?
8. What are 3 spices/herbs/seasonings you couldn't live without?

rice krispy treats!

So marshmallows you find in the grocery store here are different. They come in small bags, look kinda crusty, feel less fluffy, and are pink and white! Supposedly the different colors taste the same but I'm skeptical... (quick side note: I saw the word skeptical in the paper today and it was spelled "sceptical", that was weird...) Well, I had read on a forum that you could find American marshmallows in Target (yes, we have Target here but it's a little different from Target in the states). So I decided I need to make a special trip to Target to find these American marshmallows because I had a craving for rice krispy treats :) (ok, maybe it wasn't really that special of a trip... I just went on my way home from work :P) and I found them!! There was much rejoicing :P
I made rice krispy treats tonight and they are yummy :)

money money money!

One of the big things that's different here is money and the way most people pay for things. In the states, I rarely carried cash, maybe $20 if I knew I was going to need it. If I needed to buy something I would just use my credit/debit card. I can probably count on one hand the number of times I've actually had a US$50 bill in my possession and I've only seen a US$100 bill a few times as well.

The biggest initial challenge was figuring out the different bills and coins. All the bills are different colors and sizes here! The smallest bill is a AU$5. There are $2 and $1 gold coins and then the silver coins are .50, .20, .10, and .05. Australia doesn't have a penny and everything is rounded to the nearest .05. (I really like that system and I think the US should do the same.) I see $50 bills all the time here, I even saw a $100 at the street party. Whenever I get money from the ATM, if it is at least $50, I get at least one $50 bill. I find I carry cash much more often here (and a lot more of it) because there are lots of places that don't accept credit/debit cards (mostly food places in the shopping centers). For the first month or so I was here I paid in cash for pretty much everything under ~$50. I don't use cash quite as often now but still much more often than at home... Perhaps it's better for my budget this way :P

it's been almost 3 months!

Since I moved here... not since I last wrote something :P

I feel like I've settled in fairly well, though it still feels like I'm on holiday sometime. Certain things still shock me... like the cost of eating out! Occasionally there will be a culture difference these days that will catch me off-guard but most of the time it's random phrases that come out of people's mouths.

A lot has happened in the last few weeks... at the end of July the church I'm going to here had a street party! About 9000-10000 ppl showed up and there was lots of food, fun, monster trucks and fireworks. A long day but a good day. :)

Work is going well... I'm slowly getting around to seeing all the seismic sites we own right now. Still trying to figure out exactly what I'm doing though... However, we did have a few earthquakes over the past couple weeks!! One was about a M3!! Of course I had no clue what to do with all that information but it was still exciting! We have also finally gotten things going for a proper workstation and internal network set up. Hopefully by Christmas things will be completely set up.

In other news, my parents will be here in just over 3 weeks!!!! yippeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!

starting to feel settled in

Yay, so I've finally gotten all my furniture!! (That happened this past Saturday) It was all flat-packed so I've been spending a lot of time putting it all together and I've done it all by myself except for the bed (I had some help with that). It definitely makes you feel a little more proud of your furniture when you put it together yourself. :P Having furniture in my place definitely makes it feel a little more like a home. I also took a trip to IKEA to get all the odds and ends you need for an apt/house. It ended up being a fairly pricey outing but I got most all the little things I needed and a few that I didn't need. :P Now I just need to get a washing machine, tv, and some more decorations.

I'm still working on getting settled at work. They have finally completed part of the transition, but there are still several other things to do. And it seems no one is still really sure exactly what I'm suppose to be doing everyday. As it is, I have maybe 5-10 hrs of things to do right now a week but this does leave me time to go out and see more of the different things that the company does.

Earlier this week, I had visitors from my church in Ithaca. One of the girls had come over to study art in Sydney and her mom came for a visit. They both came up to the Brisbane area and we went up to the Sunshine Coast. It was wonderful seeing people from "home" and from the states in general. I've not met any other Americans since I've been here. We had a wonderful time together and having a couple visitors made it seem just that much more like I'm getting settled in here.

ps. I apologize for any lack of regular posting. I've been pretty busy getting settled.

A place to call home!

Yay!!! So I found a place to live. It's fairly close to work, church, and friends I've made from church. It's also close to a park, shopping center, and train station to get to the city. It's a 2 bedroom townhouse and just the right size for me. The complex it is in is gated and very quiet. I ended up with a 7 month lease since a 6 month least would put me at Christmas. At that point I'll make a decision about staying there or moving else where or what.

Since it wasn't furnished, I've been spending a lot of time looking for deals of furniture/appliances. I just bought a fridge today, thanks for a tip from a lady at church! It's new to me and in good shape and was much much cheaper than buying it brand new. I found a package furniture deal for a really really good price that will pretty much furnish the whole place (except for a tv and furniture for the spare bedroom). After I get all that taken care of I'll worry about buying a washing machine (there is no room for a dryer, so all the laundry gets hung up outside).

A guy at church said something to me this morning that is so true. He and his family are Australian but have lived overseas and he said that it's great being a Christian if you move overseas because all you have to do is find a good church and then it's like having an instant family. I have definitely found this to be the case. I've very much enjoyed the church that I've been going to here. I wouldn't say it's home yet, but it's a lot closer to being home than the other churches I visited.

WARNING: rant ahead...

I spent the better part of the day Saturday looking at apts/townhouses. The whole process of finding a place to live here makes me want to kick and scream and yell and throw punches like a little kid having a temper tantrum. :P

So first off all the prices are quoted weekly, but you pay (at least for all the places I looked at) every fortnight (every 2 weeks). To actually find places you end up being pretty much reliant on the internet to discover what's available... no calling up a real-estate agent and getting them to do the job for you (ok that's similar to the US). Then you have to make a million phone calls to actually see all the places you want to see (cuz there are a million different real-estate agents and one can't show you the place that a different guy has listed). Then go look everywhere and hope you find a place you like. So all this isn't really what bothers me though... it's what happens after you find a place you like.

First you have to put in an application. They want all the usual stuff (id, personal info) and then pay slips, bank and credit card statements, 2 business references, 2 personal references, and current and previous addresses and occupations. You also have to have 100 identification points, I think I might have 60... but really how the heck am I suppose to have 100 points when I just moved here. I've never been given a rent receipt, I have no clue what a tenancy history ledger is, I don't have any bills in this country currently, and I don't own a vehicle.

So I did find a place I would like to live... but I haven't gotten past the application yet. There were things it asked for that I didn't know the answer to so I'll be asking about those at work. Hopefully it all works out!!

Rant over... I guess it wasn't really too much of a rant :P

the weekend!

Friday before leaving work, I was given a car! with a gps to help me find my way! Yay!!

Sat. I started looking for a possible permanent place to live but between not knowing where I was going and driving on the wrong side of the road it got to be very stressful so I decided to go have a little fun. I had been told about Mt. Coot-tha, which was a lookout over all of Brisbane, so I went up in that direction. It was quite pretty up there, although pretty crowded since it's a big tourist area. After taking a few pics and eating some lunch, I went driving around and found a spot to do a little hiking around. The I stumbled across the botanical gardens, which were super pretty!! You could easily spend a couple weeks there.

Sunday, I was planning on going to one church in the morning and a different one in the evening. Unfortunately, I had difficulty finding the church in the morning... and finally found it by a very indirect route, but since it was a small church and at that point it was almost 30 min after the service had started I decided that I'd just go to their evening service instead. So I spent the afternoon hanging out and went to a local park with sorta a mini zoo with a bunch of native Australia animals. That evening I went back to the church. It was a super small crowd (maybe 20 ppl), but ppl were friendly. Once I get a better idea of where I'm actually going to be living I'll be able to better decide on a permanent church too.

After church, I was invited to dinner and the young adults bible study on Monday and so I went. Dinner was amazing, especially since I have only been eating sandwiches and pastries pretty much since I got here. Bible study was good too, though a little different than what I'm used to. It is good to know that the sunday school answer to any question no matter what country you're in is always Jesus :).

i made it!!

I made it!!

So I guess this is the morning of my 3rd day in Australia. I’ll count the first day at the day I got here since my flight landed at 6am. The flight went well… there weren’t many good movies, but thanks to a couple Benadryl I slept at least half the flight so it didn’t matter.

The first day was pretty uneventful. I was picked up at the airport and taken to a motel, where I’ll be staying for a few days while I find a place to live permanent. Luckily the motel is a couple blocks from a large shopping center so I walked down there to get some food and wander a bit. Otherwise I just chilled and watched tv and went to sleep at 6pm when I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore….

Day 2 I was up at 4am… way too early… and made even earlier when the wireless internet apparently gets turned off at night…. I was picked up at 9am to be taken to the office to meet people and be shown around. I then went to Wivenhoe dam, where the control center for the seismic network is currently (it’s in the process of being moved to where my office will be) to be shown around there and meet more people. It was really pretty out by the dam and I got to see wild kangaroos!!!! Unfortunately they hopped away before I could get a good picture, but I was told that kangaroos are everywhere so I should have plenty of opportunities to get a pic. Everyone I met was super friendly so that’s good. After all this I was taken to a grocery store so I would be able to eat in my hotel room. Yay for food! And I found kinder bueno for an even bigger yay!!! I managed to stay up til 9pm.

Day 3 up at 4am again… ugh… I’m supposed to be picked up at 8am today, I’m not really sure what all will be going on today though… I do know that Fridays are social lunch days at the office so someone makes lunch for everyone and everyone hangs out.

Although my body is still completely screwed up to the time differences, I don’t mind the doing stuff cuz it’s better than sitting in the motel room watching tv. I did find a pretty good tv station from the limited number at the motel. It’s a very random selection of old and new American shows… everything from NCIS and Law & Order to Get Smart and Bewitched.

On my way, but stopping in SF first

This was also written from the LA airport waiting on my flight.

After a 2+ hour delay at DFW, I finally made it to SF. Originally the plan was to hang out with Tim and Alvina for a bit right after I got to town, but due to my delay I wasn’t sure if that was going to happen. But it all worked out! After having pho for dinner, Steve and I met up for dessert with T&A and A’s cousin to have these gianormous crepes that were super yummy. Then we played games at Alvina’s house.

The next day after having bfast at google (I got connections), I made my way to the city and wandered around, eventually finding my way to the Golden Gate Bridge. Since I had been to SF several times before I had done a lot of the touristy stuff but going on the GG was one of the few things that I hadn’t done yet. It was the perfect day for it, very clear and sunny. I walked about a 1/3 of the way across and then turned back cuz I had started to get hungry and I wasn’t sure how long it would take to get back to the train station to get back to my place of sleeping.

Saturday, I got to go to the Big Basin Redwood State Park for some hiking and to see redwoods!! Yay for big, old trees! Steve, Neela and I went to a Japanese restaurant for dinner that night. Yay for sushi!! Neela and I ate 5 rolls between the 2 of us. You should be impressed :P

Sunday was the wedding!! It was absolutely beautiful and I had a great time.

Today, I hung out with Neela and her family and then headed to the airport a few hours ago to catch a flight to LAX and then on to Brisbane.

getting ready to go

This was written mostly from the airport waiting to board my flight to Brisbane, but I didn’t have internet then so it took awhile before it got uploaded to online.

These last few weeks in the states have been pretty hectic. I was sent by my new job up to Ithaca to retrieve a couple things. When I found out that I was going to be going, it made me super happy :D. It was great to see everyone up there again and hang out. I was lucky enough to be there for my birthday. The night before we went to Doug’s Fish Fry (I may have gained a reputation for liking fried food while I was there :P) and night of we played BANG! Neela and I were a team the last game we played and we won as the renegade!!

After leaving Ithaca, I drove up to Ottawa to meet the people we’re getting our seismic instruments from and get a little training. On the way up, I took a little detour to meet up with Jen for some rock climbing!! We had a blast!! Then it was onward to Canada. The folks up there were really nice and super helpful. I learned a lot about the instruments and the software we’ll be using. After 2 ½ days, they decided there wasn’t much more that they could teach me right then so I got a car and was left to explore Ottawa and the surrounding area on my own. I spent a day visiting a couple of the museums and the rest of downtown Ottawa and I also went to a safari-like park. The rest of my time was pretty much spent hiking in mosquito-infested forests.

After getting back to Auburn, I only had 4 days before I left to go to SF for Tim and Alvina’s wedding and right after that I was heading to Australia. That time was spent packing, hanging out with friends and family, and eating Jim Bobs (along with other food I thought would be difficult to find in Australia).

it's may already?!?!

Yes, I'm aware it's been May for awhile, but it actually sank in last night. Arrangements for me going up north for work related stuff has finally gotten mostly worked out and I'll be gone 1 1/2 weeks then and a plane ticket to Australia via SF has been booked. Counting today I only have 9, maybe 10, more days left at home... eeek!!! I should get packing now!!

special delivery from australia

I got a package in the mail today from Australia! Well actually it came yesterday but since we weren't at home when it came, USPS left a note saying I had to come get it at the post office. When I went yesterday to retrieve it, the postlady still hadn't gotten back in from her route so I had to wait til this morning to get it. So I had been promised a "care package" from the boss over there that would give me more info about the project, the area, and cost of living. That's pretty much what I got. It cost $50AUD to send express mail and was in an envelope that required it to weigh less than 1kg (2.2 lbs). That's just a little pricey!!

I got a few maps, detailed and not so detailed. The more detailed ones had places of interest located, such as my office, shopping areas, and important places related to the job. There was also a tourist (road) map of the state of Queensland. I knew the area was big... but it didn't really sink in until I saw the paper map! There was also info about Brisbane and living there and some touristy info.

There was a grocery store sale flyer so I could get an idea of food costs. Several things seem about the same price and some are more expensive.

Info about the project was included, along with a station map and list. There was also an eq epicenter location map, which was really cool. Actually there wasn't really that much info about the project, just a lot of station lists (apparently there are several different kinds of stations).

sometimes fortune cookies are right!

So we've (my parents and myself) have been eating a lot of chinese here recently of the takeout variety. They like it and it's cheap and I don't want to fend for myself so I go along with it. (not that I really mind :P) Well you of course get a fortune cookie with every meal. So this has meant a lot of fortune cookies for me recently! As y'all know most of the "fortunes" in fortune cookies these days don't seem to be really fortunes, just some random saying that may or may not make any sense. Well of the last few fortunes I've gotten a couple seem to be actual fortunes and what's even cooler is they are actually kind of relevant! :P So here goes... (though I must admit that one of them is actually kind of random)

1. "You look pretty." That's seriously all it said. It's like the fortune cookie that builds up your self-esteem.
2. "A new relationship is about to blossom. You will be blessed." hmmm...
3. "The time is right to make new friends." I've actually gotten this one twice! It really must be true :P

It's kind of unfortunate that they don't have learn chinese on the back of them. And another side note, the fortune slips make wonderful bookmarks for my small bible.

life getting ready to leave

So really there's not too much new going on, although I feel like there ought to be. I'm lucky since they're taking care of plane tickets and the visa process, so that leaves me with more free time. :)

Things that have happened in the last couple weeks:
1. The visa process was started!! An immigration lawyer was hired to help with this process and I've sent them all my paperwork. Hopefully I will have my visa soon.

2. Plans are being worked on for my trip to Ithaca and then onto Canada for instrument training. (Though if I had things my way plane tickets would have been bought already, hotel room reserved, and I'd get more time in Ithaca but since I'm not paying for anything I can't complain too much especially since it looks like I'll be in Ithaca on my birthday!)

3. Plans are being worked on for the move over there via SF for a wedding. It wouldn't surprise me at this point if I end up in SF a day earlier than I would have if I were making my own travel arrangements.

4. I went on a grand tour of the southeast to see just a few of the awesome people that I know! I started in GA, then onto TN, and finally SC (I also drove through NC, but didn't stop). I did the whole trip in a week and had a wonderful time! (but was glad to be home and not driving long distances for awhile)

5. Baking/making sweets... most recently fudge, but I want to make nutella ice cream sandwiches before I leave and another cheesecake or 2.

On a side note... There have been a few people that I thought knew that I was moving and it turns out that they didn't know... and these are people that I see and interact with often!! whoops!!! It is interesting to see those reactions though :P

what to take when you're moving to the other side of the world...

Here's what I'm planning on taking with me as of right now. Some of this will probably change depending on how much actual costs are to ship things. There are the usual things that you would take with you no matter where you move. Then there are some slightly more unusual things that are going with me because they are either impossible to find in Australia or very expensive! Other things will probably be added as I get closer to leaving and continue learning about things that are available.

1. Clothes and shoes - mostly things for spring, summer, fall weather as winter weather can be warmer than summer weather in NY. I'll stock up on a couple pairs of extra jeans and make sure I have all the shoes I could need as both are $$$ over there.
2. Toiletries - including extras of anything that I couldn't live without. This also includes makeup even though I rarely wear it cuz that's $$$ over there too.
3. Sheets, blankets, towels - things that will make it feel a little more like home.
4. My silicon pans - I like to bake :P
5. Semi-sweet chocolate chips (and maybe some other flavors) - see above. Generally all that is available is milk, dark and white chocolate chips.
6. Laptop and accessories - for skype!
7. Very clean camping gear - customs doesn't like foreign dirt and I like to camp :P
8. Climbing gear - I like climbing too :) and there's lots of rock
9. Camera
10. Dvds
11. Dominion and maybe other games - maybe I'm a little nerdy :P
12. Reese's pb cups - not available
13. OTC drugs - some things not available, others just very $$$

That's about all I can think of for now... as I said though earlier, I'm sure more will probably get added. :P

what will I be doing anyhow??

The title for my new job is the state seismologist. But what exactly does this mean? A seismologist at an oil company, USGS, and university can do very different things. So here are a few of what my main responsibilities are going to be (along with translations in the () for some of y'all).

1. Management and Operation of the Earthquake Monitoring Network - 65 stations (all the stations are connect to a network so I can see if they're working on a computer screen, I'm suppose to make sure they're working.)
2. Undertake routine seismic data analyses (figure out what all the squiggles mean when there is an earthquake and for some past earthquakes)
3. Maintain Earthquake Data Base on a monthly basis (catalog/list of earthquakes and basic info about them needs to be updated)
4. Assist in field operations (field work!!! not all those stations have been installed yet)
5. Assist in extended analyses of all seismic data relevant to earthquake hazard assessment (what's the chance of an earthquake happening in X years)

There was a whole long list of stuff in more detail than this but these are going to be my main tasks.

So what should I talk about next??

blog title!

I just wanna say thanks to Alvina for the awesome blog title!! She gets a cookie! (well actually a bunch of cookies =P)

Here's the story...

So I promised y'all the story of how I ended up with this job...

When I started grad school, I had it in my mind that I was going to get my PhD. However, I decided after being there awhile that the whole PhD thing maybe wasn't quite for me or at least not at that point and last winter I switched to getting a masters. About a month after making this decision, a professor in my dept came up to me and said he wanted to talk with me. All I could think was that I was in trouble =P. So we went to his office and he started telling me about this job that a guy he taught in grad school a long time ago was trying to find somebody for. It was a position as a seismologist, installing and managing a new seismic network for a couple years and the job was in Australia. The guy specifically wanted someone from my school and someone with a masters degree. It pretty much sounded like my dream job and I was the only one that really fit what he was looking for so we started talking. At that point I was suppose to be done by May and August at the latest and the people in Australia thought they would be ready for me to start mid to late summer. Then they started having some funding problems so it became sometime in the fall. I didn't get done by August and my timeline for being done was pushed back to Dec. and Australia was going to be ready for me in Jan. Well neither of those things happened. So I finally finished at the beginning of March and a week later I get a phone call from the guy in Australia saying that I should have an offer letter within a week. Two weeks later I get an email with the offer letter attached! and in just over two months I'll be moving out there.

It's been totally amazing just how faithful God has been through this whole process. So many times I thought I would never finish or they would be ready for me before I was ready to go and then say that since I wasn't ready they would find someone else. But I did finish and they finally are ready for me and now it is time for a new adventure!

G'day mate!

Well it's finally official!!! I have a job as a seismologist in Australia! :D I should be moving there the beginning of June.

I figured I'd start this blog for a couple reasons:
1. Cuz someone (Alvina) said I should.
2. Cuz it's a good way to keep all y'all informed about what's going on and keep in touch with all y'all.

Sometime soon I'll post the whole story of how I ended up with a job in Australia and a little bit about what I'll be doing while I'm there.

God has been so faithful throughout this process! and I can't wait to see what He has in store for me. :)