A Cold, Sunny Wednesday with a Wave

Finally, a post with a photo. But don't let this nice looking wave fool you, South Narrabeen was closing out, rendering it practically unsurfable. So after scouring the Northern Beaches of Sydney, Andy and I decided to paddle out at Dee Why. It didn't look that great because a lot of water was moving around, but we refused to give up without getting our hair wet.

The paddle out was vicious. It took me about 25 to 30 minutes to make it out the back. Quite frustrating, especially as I had almost made it to safety, only to get nailed on the head by a four wave set, pushing me back almost to the beach. But I persevered, and made it to the lineup, huffing and puffing. The waves were actually good, had a few fun ones, got axed on the head by a few, but it felt great to be in the water.

Tomorrow we are driving up to Byron Bay for the Splendour in the Grass festival. We had been planning on sleeping in the car since every flea bag motel and hotel for miles had been booked solid for the past 3 months. But today, Jamie decides to call up a place, and by some miracle they just received a cancellation. So instead of being filthy people who sleep in their car, we are now staying at a campground with cabins. Stoked!

Winter

I didn't feel like writing anything on here last week. Veronica was gone the entire week up in Dubbo, and frankly I was pretty depressed about it. Didn't help that I was eating leftovers all week. No joke, I ate the same reheated meal 7 times in one week. My mood was pretty dark, Dark Knight style. Speaking of which, we saw it the previous weekend, pretty stellar popcorn movie.

Having my wife back home made me feel like a new man. The sun came out, we enjoyed having a flat white from Barefoot, surfed both days, Veronica went for runs, and we relaxed. Saturday night we went to dinner with Gavin and Martina at The Oaks to watch the rugby. The Wallabies (AUS) played the All Blacks (NZ). The game was well played, but let me tell you, my steak at The Oaks was a disappointment. Big time. Not only was it way more expensive than other pub steaks, but at this place you cook your own. I could almost enjoy the novelty of going to a restaurant to cook my own food, except these morons didn't even give you a steak sauce like every other stinking pub does. Yeah, if it sounds like I am bitter about this meal, it's cause I am. Oh well, it wouldn't be Australia if we didn't pay a fair bit of money for a crap meal.

I finished reading "The Time Traveler's Wife" by Audrey Niffenegger this weekend. Extremely impressive book. I actually cried. Don't tell anyone. If you haven't read it, Veronica and I would highly recommend it.

Not much else to report. I've been enjoying Beck's 'Vampire Voltage', a b-side to one of his single's. You can get a free download at stereogum.com. We are headed to Byron Bay this weekend for a huge concert festival, Splendour in the Grass. Pretty excited about it, as well as the 10 hour roadtrip. Can't wait to get out of Sydney for a little break.

Blah

I blame the monotony of day to day life for the extended absence of updates to this blog. Sometimes I am inclined to think, does anyone want to hear about where we ate a meal, and with who? Frankly, I am bored by that. I have visions of family and friends yawning while reading the blog, and I am saddened at the thought. But enough of my silly insecurities, here is the lowdown for the past week and half.

Veronica continues her training for the City to Surf. Her devotion to training is inspiring, although I can’t claim that she has me out running, I have been shamed into making every effort to surf even on small days. Speaking of the surf, it has been just that, small. Ridiculously small. The conditions would be epic, if you were midget. But the days have been gorgeous; sunny, brisk, hardly a cloud in the sky. This Tuesday while surfing in Manly with Jay and Andy a pod of dolphins cruised by. I don’t care who you are or how jaded your heart is, when you see dolphins your spirits are instantly brightened. As if to illustrate the yin and the yang of Sydney, I was harassed by an old, senile man while parking the car afterwards. To make a long story short, this cantankerous old man informed that I should back the White Chariot up so that 4 cars could fit on the stretch of road. Harmless, except for the fact there was plenty of room for 4 cars. I would love to tell you all that I handled his rantings gracefully, but after the 4th minute when he told he was going to call the cops I told him to go ahead, and in the process to get a hobby. Old balls kept on, and that’s I when I uttered, ‘Why don’t you cork it you pathetic bread thief descendant.’ I know, it’s pretty terrible, and it’s something that I have felt bad about for the past 3 days. This isn’t even the first time I’ve had a run in with a retired person either. Perhaps my 3rd or 4th month here in Sydney I had a 60 year old man want to fight me in Glebe for walking on the wrong side of the sidewalk! Geez, no wonder Sydneysiders are gigantic a**holes, they learned their crappy behavior from their elders.

This past weekend we had a free dinner at the Bavarian Bier Café. Oh yeah, that is one of the perks of having a foreign license, and your boss having a lead foot. I will say no more for fear of incriminating myself to the authorities. J We continue to watch ‘Flight of the Conchords’, a stellar show with some delightfully goofy humor. Sunday night we went and saw ‘Mongol’, part one of a three part epic about Ghengis Khan. Pretty good film, perhaps a little high -handed with Ghengis’s being such a noble man, but that’s entertainment for you.

Veronica has been in Dubbo for a job most of the week. I’ve stayed out of trouble, diverting myself by playing ping-pong over at Andy’s Wednesday night. Last night Jamie and I went and had $10 steaks at the Ivanhoe. They lost our order, which ended up being awesome since they refunded our money and we enjoyed delicious free steaks. If there is anything that warms my chintzy heart it is a free meal. Veronica gets back today, STOKED, and we plan on seeing ‘The Dark Knight’ this weekend. Doubly stoked. Only other news is that the great one, Kelly Slater won J-Bay yesterday in South Africa. For non-surfers, Slater is the Michael Jordan of surfing. He has won 4 out of 5 contests this year, and he is on pace to win his 9th World Title. Amazing stuff.

Weekends are way too short

Is it just V and I, or do weekends most seem way too short? It’s already Monday morning, and since we were not fortunate enough to have July 4th off, this past weekend seems like a hazy dream. Which is a real bummer.

Besides the brevity of the weekend, good times were had. Friday night we went and had pizza at La Casa, then rented a movie. ‘This is England’ was pretty dark, but a sweet movie about skinheads in 1983 England. Great soundtrack and a good film, but quite dark. Go figure, a skinhead movie that is dark.

Had a nice sleep in on Saturday, and ambled to Barefoot a little before noon. With our caffeine fix satiated, Veronica went for a run and I went for a surf out at Curl Curl. Some decent wind affected waves, but I had one of those sessions where you never miss a wave and are always in the right spot. These sessions don’t happen often, so you have to appreciate it when you get it, even if the waves are by no means epic. Late afternoon we headed over to Andy’s flat for a house warming party to watch ruby. The party ended up being fun, maybe a little too much fun as I awoke Sunday feeling quite average.

Sunday morning we caught the ferry with Martina and Gavin and headed to The Rocks for the Aroma Festival. The chocolate and coffee festival had a huge turn out due to the gorgeous day. I am sure the cheap-ish coffee and chocolate had something to do with it as well, and it was a fun time. However, I absolutely HATE big events because people inevitably cut in line. Not only do they cut in line, but for some inexplicable reason, they get right in front of me. So I asked this middle aged hag with terrible sunglasses how she could have ended up in front of me, when I got behind the lady in front of her. She starts muttering about she has been running back and forth getting prices, and this is her place in line. Of course I was blown away by her articulate defense of cutting in line, so I just muttered under my breath how pathetic she was. I now realize I should not have wasted my time by muttering underneath my breath, but sometimes I honestly forgot how worthless the majority of Sydneysiders truly are. These pompous paraquats will never be labeled as considerate human beings. Sorry for the tirade, but I am genuinely in awe. Sydney is such a cool place to live, but the people who grew up here suck. Sydney = Suck People. How else do you explain that out of all of our friends, we only have one friend who actually grew up here in Sydney? However, I don’t want you to think I let a minor incident tarnish a very enjoyable weekend. It’s just been a while since I’ve gone off on a tangent and I needed to vent about this latest douche bag encounter. Forgive me for this guilty pleasure.

Before I end this thing, please check out this great blog, Stereogum, http://stereogum.com/ These nice people actually offer free MP3’s. Brilliant stuff I tell you. Page 5 of the downloads has Bon Iver’s song ‘Skinny Love’. It is the money, trust me on this. Also on there is The Black Keys covering a Captain Beefheart song. Very nice.

Wallabies

I don’t know why the postings have become so infrequent. While work has been busy, it hasn’t been so consuming where our blog should have suffered so badly.

So, last weekend was pretty cruisy. Friday night we saw Zohan, and while it is no Billy Madison, it was still pretty funny. Saturday, after our morning ritual of Barefoot, we met up with Jay, Ria, Jamie and Morgan and strolled around Manly. At noon I went for a surf with Mike, and then that night we headed to Olympic Park to the see the Wallabies (national Australian rugby team) play against France. The game was a blowout, but it was good times nonetheless. Unlike a football game, the rugby was over quite quickly in only 2 hours. Took a photo of the empty looking Olympic Stadium. Only 48,000 showed up to the game, and the stadium can hold almost 80,000.

The weather has been beautiful for the past 10 days. Out surfing on Friday I saw a penguin as well as a pod of dolphins. Cool stuff. Sunday Veronica went for a run, I went for a surf, and that night we went and had dinner at Martina and Gavin’s house. The weekend was over way too quick.

Went for another surf on Monday morning with Andy out at Curl Curl. While we were checking the surf we were treated to a show of four whales breaching and cruising around about 200 meters from the beach. Very cool.