Getting warmer...

Today it was only about -15 and -25 after wind chill. You could feel the difference too. Last night I froze my butt off taking photos at Canada Olympic Park. Didn't even really get a lot of photos taken. It was a nice field trip overall. Manny (my mum's friend's cousin) took me around to the COP and the center (whose name escapes me at this present moment) where people trained for the Winter Olympics. Saw a friendly ice hockey game and some speed skaters training. Love the speed skating. I wanna try it out despite the risk of injury. We also had some Wendy's for dinner. I had the triple burger. It was heart attackingly awesome.

I didn't really get much sleep last night. I attribute it to some minor jet lag and some major snoring in the room. Regardless, I was awake with more than enough time to spare to make my banking appointment. I opened up the bank account without much dramas, and had a bit of a stroll around the block in the nice and warm weather. It was still fairly cold though, so I didn't stay out for too long. I couldn't find any bookstores that stocked Scott Pilgrim, so that was a bit of a bummer. Hopefully I'll get off my lazy ass and check out the comic book store tomorrow when it's even warmer. I think it's meant to be around -4.

Anyway, tonight was fairly eventless. Aggie (my mum's friend) picked me up from the hostel at around 7:45 and we went shopping. I got some food supplies for Panorama and some Reese's. Gotta love peanut butter with chocolate. It confuddles me how Australia gastronomists have not made this simple yet extraordinary correlation between peanut butter, chocolate, and awesome. Anyway, this is the one sweet I love to get anytime I'm in North America, with the possible exception of Mr. Goodbar, but I haven't been able to find that here yet.

When I got back to the hostel, I had a beer with a couple of the guys in my dorm room. Cool Canadian guys here for work. It seems that Calgary has massive demand for jobs and yet an incredible shortage on accommodation. As a result, you see lots of Canadians around in the hostel, and you see a lot of homeless people on the street. Apparently around half the homeless people in Calgary have jobs. Very strange. The guys also tell me of this bar downtown where draft beer is 25c. We're gonna hit it tomorrow night. I'll be drunk before I spend a dollar!

Snowboards and souvlaki

Today, as the previous post touches upon, was rather cold. As a result, I stayed in for most of the day. I did, however, get some money changed, and also do a bit of shopping when I met up with my mum's friend who had access to a car (very useful for this weather). I found the boot I wanted but I didn't buy it straight away because it was at RRP (and quite an expensive RRP at that). The board was another matter. I found a fairly good one at around my size for around CAD 200 after tax, so I decided that was too good to pass up.

Afterwards, we decided to find somewhere to eat. We settled on Opa!, a Greek fast food joint whereupon I discovered quite possibly the best lamb souvlaki ever. It was so good I had to have another. Now my breath stinks like onion. I want more.

The wind chill factor

It's now -25 degrees, but feels like -39 due to the crazy wind chill. I kid you not.

Calgary

I'm sitting here at Honolulu airport, waiting for my flight to board after a brief stopover in Hawaii, a bit annoyed at myself that I didn't bring more things to keep me entertained on the flight. Most of it was spent listening to music and podcasts.

Some random cliff notes on the trip so far...

• Air Canada: Small plane, good leg room, poor entertainment options, standard food.
• Molson Canadian Premium Lager: For a premium brew, it lacks taste, but not too bad overall.
• Scott Pilgrim: Rating: Awesome. You should all get it, lest ye die horrible deaths. I must get more volumes.
• Transiting through the USA: Annoying but painless. The hassle kind of makes me want to avoid going through this way to another country again.
• Unsecured wireless networks in Honolulu airport: None that you don't have to pay for. Lame.

(about half a day and lots of stress later)

Delay-o-rama

Ok, so things didn't quite go to schedule today. It all started when the flight from Sydney left about half an hour later than it was scheduled to. This meant that it arrived somewhat late in Honolulu. The Honolulu flight would have left in time, were it not for two of the passengers being held up at US immigration. So anyway, the flight left late and thus arrived late in Vancouver. This was made worse by the fact that Vancouver was hit with a snowstorm the day before, so it took about 10 minutes to taxi to the terminal.

At this point, I was completely stressing out because I needed to get my working holiday visa from immigration then transfer my bags over to the domestic carousel. I then had to run all the way to the domestic terminal, where it seemed many people were late for their flights. Flights ended up being delayed anyway, due to the snow cover on the tarmac. Our flight was held up about an hour and 45 minutes while runway was being cleared. Understandably, some people on the flight were annoyed that weren't going to be able to make it to wherever by whenever.

So anyway, we finally arrived in Calgary, and it was -20 degrees Celsius. And that's the high for the day. But more on that later, because the delays don't end there. It took a long while to get the baggage from our flight into the carousel in Calgary Airport. They kept changing the carrousel number in which it was supposedly coming out of. With that all done, and me all drained, it was time to make my way to the hostel. Thankfully the airport shuttle people were helpful with my airport transfer to the HI Calgary, where I'll be staying for the next 5 days. But guess what? The shuttle... delayed!

The cold open

I eventually got to the warmth of the hostel, where I promptly embraced the glow of the information superhighway. I then had to get food. In the negative 20s. It was a horrible walk, consisting of two false starts when I got lost and didn't have money, respectively, and finally reaching the only open restaurant in many many blocks - the world-renowned golden arches. The receptionist at the hostel gave me a 2-for-1 Big Mac voucher, so I used that.

It was about as terrible as it is anywhere else in the world, but I forced myself to ignore this fact as I was both incredibly hungry and quite poor, Canadian dollar-wise. I didn't exchange any American dollars at the airport because they were exchanging for 1.05 Canadian dollars for every American, plus a $3 processing fee, where it should be getting at least 1.10. Anyway, the airport didn't have them, and Sunday seemed to be very dead, business-wise, so I was stuck with my CAD 9.36, of which 1 I gave to the nice shuttle bus driver as a tip (as I gotta start getting used to tipping when required).

On the way back from McDonald's, I discovered the wonders of free public transport. I didn't feel like walking the long walk home in the cold snow (which, by the way, hurt my face) so I took the free tram that ran on the avenue that my hostel was situated. It didn't stop right in front but it's still pretty damn useful nonetheless. I have a feeling I'll be using it whenever I decide to step outside into the ridiculous cold snap (which apparently stops on Thursday, where it's back to a warm -2). The way things are going, I'll probably try to stay inside except for when I eat, get money exchanged, or buy snowboard-related goods.

Anyway, that was a pretty long post and it's been a pretty long day. I sneaked in about an hour or two of sleep during the past 24+ hours, so I'll go and quietly retire into my top bunk hostel bed to prepare myself for another day of adventures.

Next year

I'm scared as hell. Not a lot of people seem to consider that. When I tell people that I'm going overseas for a year and going (mostly) by myself, they usually reply by saying that I must be brave to do that. That's not really the case. Only a few people realize that not only am I excited about going, but I'm also pretty damn nervous. This is the longest time I'll be away from home, and the first time that I'll be traveling alone outside of the country, so it's only natural that I'm at least a little scared. Don't get me wrong though, I'm very much looking forward to the challenge and the experience.

Anyway, I think I shall designate this as the first official post of the Canadian edition of this blog. I know I'm not in Canada yet, but this is my last post before I leave for my great adventure, and I'm not 100% sure that I'll get to be on the net any time soon. The hostel I'm staying at is meant to have free Wi-Fi, but you never really know. I leave tomorrow (Sunday) morning and arrive in Canada about 2 hours later... if you ignore time zone difference. The travel time actually adds up to about 20 hours, so I hope I get some sleep on the flight, or at least get to watch some movies. I had a look at the list of movies showing this month, and it's not looking too great. I've either seen them, or they're not very good, or both.

This entire week has been pretty intense. It kicked off last Saturday when I had a going away party at Steve and James' place. It also happened to be Nick N's birthday party. A good time was had by all. The people at pub trivia saw me off on the Tuesday. We didn't win, but it was as fun as always. Thursday was probably the biggest night. I had a farewell dinner with about 13 other people at the Belgian Beer Cafe. Great food and drink. I ended up rather hung over yesterday morning.

Throughout all of this, I've been scrambling around, trying to get my computer files in order, and also double-, triple-, and quadruple-checking things that I need to bring to Canada. I'm actually writing this as I take a break from the crazy last-minute thing that inevitably happens before a big trip. I just know I'll still be at it tomorrow as I watch Australia beat up on England some more on the cricket. This final day shall be interesting indeed.

New layout

I decided to change the layout of the blog. This is mainly due to the fact that I was feeling creative at the time. Due to my rusty web design skills, I didn't try to make it too complicated. Basically, I just switched templates and messed around with the header. You may notice that it already says "Canadian edition". The reason for this is that I am too lazy to come up with 2 new header images, so I decided to just upload the Canadian one in advance. If you think it looks like a load of crap, let me know.

Adrian's thought of the day, vol. 2

Why do people use the term 'meteoric rise'? Meteors fall. Do these people come from some bizarro planet where the laws of physics do not apply, and meteors do in fact rise? Perhaps the term would apply to a rise so abysmal that only a falling object can be used to describe it.

Think about it.

Play that funky music

Last week, I took a little trip to the north-western suburbs of Sydney to record a few vocals for Morgan's band, River of Bass. If you have never heard of them (which is more than likely), they're an electronica duo, and they do really good stuff. Anyway, it was a pretty cool day. It was the first time I had ever recorded stuff with proper equipment, and it gave me a lot of insight on how songs (especially electronica songs with vocals) are constructed. The album that I did vocals for, called Accidents Mistakes Happenstance Fate is coming along really well. I'm very much looking forward to the final product.

Last night, I went to see Pearl Jam. It was an incredible night. They played lots of their old stuff, with the majority of the songs they played coming from their first three albums (Ten, Vs., and Vitalogy). They didn't even play any songs from No Code or Riot Act, and only a single song from Binaural, which is my favourite album, so that was kind of a shame. That didn't take away from the quality of the show though. They started off with Release, which got everybody immediately pumped up. They didn't relent, as they followed that up with Rearviewmirror. Overall, the gig was all about the old school, and I suspect that tonight's show might be more skewed towards their later songs.

Apparently Pearl Jam weren't entertaining enough though, as a few of the people sitting next to me decided to leave at the first encore break. It was their loss, as they missed an amazing sequence of songs that lead to the end of the show, including Black, a perennial fan favourite. The boys eventually finished off with a Neil Young song, Keep on Rockin' in the Free World. It was a fittingly rocking ending to a very rocking show.

Sadly enough, I'm not going to tonight's show, or their third and final Sydney show in a week and a half, as I am saving up money for my trip. Last night was probably my last concert of the year, though I'm hoping to catch some bands over in the USA and Canada, especially those that never tour here.

The final countdown

*cue Europe song of the same title*

Right now it's about 31 days, 8 hours, and 30 minutes away until I leave for Canada. I've even got a Yahoo! Widget telling me how many days, hours, minutes, and seconds I have left until I go on my merry way. If you rewind half a year, I don't think I was even seriously considering this, and now I'm barely over a month away from setting off on a year-long adventure.

Now that I've left work, I have a feeling time's just going to fly past in this next month and before I know it I'll be on that plane, enjoying the free beer and watching movies in 4:3. Leaving work felt good. It feels good to know that I have some time to relax for once, to know that, as much as I loved the people I worked with, I don't have to go back to working there. My last day was pretty interesting - they put me in a department where I hadn't worked before. This effectively meant that on my last day, it felt like my first day. But that's all done and dusted now, and it's time for some celebrations.

However, I couldn't really celebrate my resignation in typical Adrian fashion (that is, by having a few cold ones) because I'm currently on antibiotics that, from what I've been told and have researched on the internet, react quite badly with alcohol. This is a direct result of the fact that my dental health regime sucked during high school and university, and now I'm paying for it with bad gums. So, the dentist (who had quite an attractive assistant, but I digress) prescribed me some antibiotics to reduce the inflammation of my gums. They've worked pretty well so far, but I think all those years have really screwed the gums up and it's going to take some time to 'fix'.

Anyway, the celebrations will probably commence in about three weeks with a couple of events - a farewell party with my friends from Wollongong, and a farewell dinner with my friends from Sydney. The latter is taking place mainly for the fact that the venue - the Belgian Beer Cafe - has some incredible beer.

Also ahead in about three weeks is my final night of trivia at the local pub. That trivia night might also be the next time I'll actually have a chance to go, since my team is going to be AWOL for the next few weeks. One of them had a heart attack, and I sincerely hope he gets better. Another has a few busy Tuesdays coming up. Couple that with the fact that it's Melbourne Cup Day in two Tuesdays (which is, incidentally, when I'll be in Sydney seeing Pearl Jam anyway) and it's looking like I have just one trivia night left. I'm going to miss it. It's a lot of fun with some nice locals.

Exits and endings

Today marked a milestone in my life. It is the first time that I handed in a resignation letter (FYI, I finish in two weeks). Not to say that I have been fired from my previous positions... it's just that this job is the first in which my contract was not for a limited period. Perhaps coincidentally, I also found out that about a week ago, a former co-worker of mine, who had been ill for quite some time, had passed away. It was pretty sad to hear that, especially since, judging from the times we talked, she was not a bad person. That's life I guess. Though I did not know her too well, tonight I shall have a drink in her honour.

Obligatory filler post

I've noted more than a few times that I haven't made a single entry for a couple of weeks. Thus, I shall ramble on for the next paragraph or two about semi-exciting developments.

It's been an interesting week, actually. I was feeling a bit down on Tuesday for reasons unknown, and then was up again as my 4-day weekend started after work on Wednesday. I made my way to Sydney on Thursday for Morgan's birthday dinner and drinks at the Belgian Beer Cafe, shortly followed by more drinks at nearby Jackson's. It was (relatively) a pretty quiet night for me, as I was going to be backing up on Friday for another full day, where I would meet up with Matt for some time geeking out at the comic store, then meet up with Dave and Josh to head over to the Swans game (Swans won, hooray for Sydney).

Somewhere in all that mess, I also managed to finally get my hands on The Illogical Consequence by Planet Funk, which is probably the most expensive album I have ever bought, on account of it being insanely and unreasonably lacking in availability (you have to import from Italy!). I also got an email from Amazon UK that my copy of I Choose Noise by Hybrid had shipped after experiencing a delay. I've heard the album and I can't wait to have the actual CD, although it's a bit annoying that I had pre-ordered it from the UK in an attempt to get it as early as possible, and I got a pretty lengthy delay anyway.

Hot day today. Gonna head over to the beach.

Time perception

Funny things happen to your brain when you're not in your right mind. For example, in a drunken attempt to figure out what that phone call was all about the other night, I decided to make a few calls. I ended up talking to another stranger for what seemed like a few minutes. However, when I looked at my call history, it was actually only about a minute. The same thing happened when I got that first mystery call while I was half asleep.

Right now I'm a bit under the weather, both figuratively and literally. My head is still recovering from last night, and the rain outside doesn't seem to want to go away. If I didn't have to work in less than half an hour I think I would just stay in bed all day.

Late night phone calls

What is it that makes people talk to complete (non-telemarketer) strangers over the phone?

It was about 1 o'clock this morning, and I was fast asleep. All of a sudden, the sound of my phone ringing (or rather, the phone vibrating on the desk) wakes me up, as it so often does. I answer the phone, still half-asleep, and find that it's a girl I don't know on the other side. I try to tell them, as best as I can in my current state, that they must have dialled a wrong number on whoever's phone it was that they were dialling from. I mentioned where I work and then they mentioned a couple of workmates' names, and what I thought about them. It was probably nothing, but my paranoid self tells me that I was being 'scouted', in a manner of speaking. Either that or the late night hotlines are getting really desperate.

It was a very unexpected and unusual phone call.

Bloody Sunday

I'm not quite sure what came over me yesterday. I had intended to, you know, do stuff seeing as I had the entire day off. I was planning to at least go shopping for some new shoes and watch some DVDs. As the day progressed it became clear that going to the beach would be a very good idea due to the unusually warm weather for early spring. Alas, what occurred was a gross misjudgement of the conditions - I slept for a good part of the day's daylight hours. What's more is that this meant I couldn't find any sleep at night, meaning I got about 2 hours sleep before my opening shift this morning.

Bloody Sunday.

Foos. Acoustic. Money.

I was excited to find out that the Foo Fighters were doing 2 acoustic gigs at the Sydney Opera House in about a month's time. Tickets go on sale mid-week, and I started to write a message trying to organise people to go. Unfortunately, it was then that I read that the tickets would cost around $150 each. Seeing as I spent about a total of $380 on Friday, I think I'll have to skip this one, as tempting as it sounds. The rock concert they did last year was cheaper, and that's the one I'd rather see.

Oh right, there's an upside

Amidst all the hooplah that I had to go through today, there was a good point that should be noted. I went over to IEP to sort out some final details of my trip. While the major things such as visas, flights, and employment had been sorted out, I still had the business of some added extras. Firstly, and probably most importantly, I booked some accommodation through IEP to last me until my bus to Panorama. Secondly, I upgraded to a "Fully Loaded" membership, which means IEP's Canadian partner SWAP would help me out with whatever the hell the reason is that I am there in Canada at the time (or so I hope). Lastly, I also ordered a Lonely Planet guide that IEP were offering at a discount price. I decided to go with the USA and Canada on a Shoestring guide, as Alison (from IEP) had suggested that they tend to be good for people on a budget, as I assume I would be.

It's a bit weird to have almost everything organised about 3 months in advance. In fact, all I really need now is a better backpack and a new pair of shoes. Alison noted that I'm very organised. I'm really not. Not usually anyway. It's just that when it comes to travel, I turn into this machine that just needs everything sorted out. 3 months in advance... yep, I should be a travel agent.

When it all falls apart

Ok, so I know I was being very optimistic in yesterday's post. I was planning a grand day of adventures. I had forgotten that I should always expect the worst. I guess it all started this morning when I was being lazy and left home later than planned. As a result, I had to run the final leg of the trip to the train station so I could get there with time to spare.

The second thing to 'go wrong' was the US visa interview. The actual interview was fine. It was a short sub-5-minute chat about why I was applying for the visa. The wait, however, was incredibly long. I should have learned from the visa application process that it wasn't going to be as quick as I had hoped. Nevertheless, I got out after enduring almost two hours sitting quietly in a room full of similarly bored people.

To top it all off, the whole Belgian Beer Cafe meet up I had planned fell to pieces. Matt decided not to come because it was too far away from his work, Jenny had a massive hangover from last night, and Jim seems to have dropped off the face of the earth. I sat there waiting for Josh for about 40 minutes, having a couple of drinks. I eventually left the place at around 2:30 and headed off to buy some CDs and DVDs and go home.

The twist in the tale is that Josh was actually on his way to the Belgian Beer Cafe as I was leaving. My battery had died so I couldn't tell if he was coming or not. When I got home and charged my phone I got a message from him saying he was on his way. Damn technology.

Who would have ever thought spring onions could sting so much?

I figured that chopping spring onions would hurt less than chopping regular onions since they're smaller. How wrong I was. Anyway, it was all part of my pasta sauce experiment, part 2. Today I decided I'd try to get a Venetian style sauce going. I used spring onions instead of regular onions because I like them better, skipped the garlic (added a bit of garlic salt instead), and added parsley and vinegar to the mix. I also added a few more tomatoes. It was totally improvised once it had started cooking. At one point I thought I had added too much vinegar. To my surprise, it tasted quite good. I can't believe it didn't turn out terrible. This makes it two in a row now, which is starting to scare me. However, I'm glad that I finally discovered how to finely chop onions.

Tomorrow, I head off to Sydney to do various stuff. First and foremost is my interview with the US consulate for my B1/B2 visa. I hope it doesn't take too long and goes smoothly. I can't really see why it wouldn't. The rest of the day shall be spent buying CDs and DVDs and whatnot. Hopefully I don't splurge too much. I plan to purchase some of the classics like Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd and Quadrophenia by The Who. I'll also have a slight intermezzo at the Belgian Beer Cafe during lunchtime, provided I can get some other people to join me. It's looking like the day will end with an early Father's Day dinner.

Adrian's cooking... success?!?!

Ok, so it's not a secret that I'm more than capable of cooking simple meals with relative ease. However, I've never actually made my own pasta sauce from scratch... until now. What is scary is that this was my first try. Does this mark the end of Adrian's cooking disasters?

Argh, headache!

What was meant to be a relatively light night of farewell drinks for Cynthia at one of Wollongong's watering holes turned out to be a binge of beer, Jagermeister, and vodka. I am only now recovering from the gigantic hangover/headache that I woke up with in the morning. It was a good night though, had a nice chat to some various people, conversations in which I became less and less talkative as my drunkenness progressed. It just occurred to me that I didn't even buy Cynthia a farewell drink. That's the third person heading over to Europe in the span of about a month. It seems I'm the only person going overseas who is going anywhere but.

In between seeing friends off to foreign countries, I've been fervently reading comic books. The most notable (since my last post about comics) have been Daredevil and The Ultimates. Daredevil for its great consistency in writing (I still can't believe they actually jailed Matt Murdock) and art (Alex Maleev is awesome), and The Ultimates for the great modernisation of The Avengers, and the fact that the storylines are worthy of a big-budget action movie. It's a shame they take so long to release issues. The final issue for Ultimates 2 is still about a month away.