In the last post we mentioned on how cheap flights between the US and Australia are.  We just wanted to draw your attention to the reality of the situation.  United has a sale going where you can actually fly round trip to Sydney or Melbourne for US$ 439 from Chicago, or only $299 from San Francisco.  A trip Down Under for less than your 2008 US stimulus check.  Call it Mr. Bush's parting gift.  Here are the details.

You bloggers have been reading about how great Australia is for 2 years now.  If I were not sitting in Sydney posting this message, I would be booking these flights. 

Unfortunate occurences seemed to be conspring against us the last couple weeks, but combined to concoct a delicious little drink of good fortune. 

As most of you know, we are planning a round-the-world route on our way home, returning via a 4 week jaunt in England.  It's going to be fab.  My employer has a policy where they reimburse the lower of direct fare home or the actual flights, but as you may have seen on the news airfares have plummeted, and our quoted direct flight home is less than half of what we were counting on... in fact, round trip flights between the US and Oz are now less than half of what any of our previous guests have ever paid!  In the meantime, we have to ship most of our belongings home--although the idea of schlepping 8 suitcases around England sounds fun--and these shippers didn't get the memo about the flights, so it's bloody expensive.

To the rescue comes Julia's brother, Doug, who through misfortune of his own has become a victim of the US economy and has a couple weeks time on his hands.  So for only a little more than we were going to pay to ship them, he is coming over to spend a week and a half and then take our bags back for us.  And he arrives on Thursday, so he'll be here in time for our going away bash this weekend!  Bonus! 

In other news, packing is hard work, requiring gut-wrenching decisions on what to bring home, what to sell and give away, and what to leave at the curb.  Some purchases that seemed like a great idea 18 months ago now have 18 months of dust (4-in-1 board game, anyone?) and are easy to throw away.  Certain well-worn favourites are harder to decide if they're past their use-by date, and gifts also have an emotional attachment beyond their actual utility.  Julia is a better liar than me and has an easier time telling Auntie Tutti Fruiti that the bowling ball she gave us sadly rolled away when we weren't looking. 

Julia is an absolute legend though, so while I pass my last 2 weeks blogging about her hard work, she is the commander general in the three-fronted battle of packing our things, vacating our apartment, and travelling Britain.  Tally-ho! 

I am a terrible gift-giver. 

This admission will surprise no one.  Before I met Julia, my my gift-giving legacy included a bendy-straw dispenser purchased from a going-out-of-business ice cream shoppe, a girls hair clip discovered in the hallway of Batavia Middle School, and a key chain I stole from my mom's desk. 

Julia is a fantastic gift-giver.  Dating for less than a month in 2001, Christmas came very quickly as the first test of our relationship.  The first gifts were supposed to say, "I am not taking this too fast, but I like where it's headed."  She made me a hemp necklace and found a CD from a band we'd agreed we always liked but had never purchased.  I on the other hand spent the entire weekend shopping only to decide on a drugstore picture frame.  "Pictures of us forthcoming," I said.  Nice.

Julia's gift-giving skills are a huge plus for our relationship.  That I no longer give any gifts to our families is a win-win all the way around, everyone would agree.  But I still have one person on my list: Julia.  And she is missing out. 

A quick recap of the last year in gifts:
Julia's birthday:  Nothing.  Nada.  I think we went to dinner.
Anniversary:  I forgot.  Not kidding, I forgot our 4th wedding anniversary. 
Sweetest day:  Came and went so quickly I hardly noticed.  It's in October, right?
Christmas:  I shopped... a lot.  I really tried, but I had nothing.  She picked out a dress online, and I clicked "buy" and put in my credit card details.  It looked great on her.
Valentine's day:  We went surfing that weekend.  Julia got sick while camping in the rain.  No gifts.
Birthday 2009: She really wants a Kindle and has made it so obvious that now it's been posted on the internet.  Not much effort required here.

Julia is the first to say that she doesn't mind my ineptitude in the gift-giving department.  There are many ways I make it up to her by doing things she hates, she says.  But after the past year in gifts, we can all agree that she deserves a great 5th anniversary present.  This is where the wit and wisdom of the Kookaburra2 readership comes in... What do you think I should do??

General comments can be posted to the comments section, specific ideas should be emailed directly to me.  THANK YOU for your help.  I don't deserve it, but Julia does.  :-)

In a fitting end to the summer holidays, I made my way down to the Sydney Cricket Ground on Sunday for Day 2 of the test match between Australia v South Africa.  Cricket is a peculiar sport.  But until a couple weeks ago I didn't know the first thing about cricket, so let me test my skills and do a brief overview. 

A test match lasts 5 days... that's not a tournament or a series, but one game that lasts 5 days.  Generally play lasts for 6 hours each day, with breaks for "lunch" and "afternoon tea" at 2 hour increments.  Yes, tea.  Runs are scored when the batsman hits the ball and runs from one wicket to the other without getting out.  There are 3 ways to get out: the bowler throws the ball past the batsman and hits the wicket behind him, or the batsman hits the ball and it's caught on the fly, or a fielder throws the ball at the opposite wicket before the batsman can run to it.  There is no obligation for the bowler to hit the wicket, or for the batsman to hit the ball, or even for the batsman to run if he does hit it.  In other words, there are no "balls and strikes" or any limit to how long the game could theoretically go on.  Probably this is why someone set a 5 day limit!

First, one side bats as many runs as they can until there are 10 outs; this is called an "innings."  The other team goes up for an innings, then the first team bats again.  Presumably the first team is now in the lead, since they've been up to bat twice.  Now the other team has to make up the deficit before they get "all out."  If they do they win, if they don't they lose, and if the 5 day time limit runs out, it's a draw.  Bless the Lord, there is no overtime.  (I'm skipping over a many things like 4's, 6's, extras, declarations, and follow-on's, which you could get here.  Suffice it to say that although the game is long, it is not simple.)

Sunday was a beautiful day to see the cricket (the "the" is mandatory).  We actually walked up to the box office and got front row seats!  It became clear soon however that they were available because they were "full sun", ie. in the hot sun all day long.

So let's recap: we've got 5 days to get 40 outs, so a little better than one per hour.  By comparison, baseball gets about 20 outs per hour, and some people consider that a slow game!  The pace of cricket boggles this American's mind, but started to become clear when...
1. One of the South African "outfielders" sauntered over during the game to the fence to sign autographs for kids.  In between pitches!  He kept one eye on the field and walked back on when it looked like the next pitch was about to be thrown.  This continued through most of the morning.
2.  Once Australia was bowling, a nearby raucous fan was screaming at the struggling Aussie bowler, "Patience, mate!"  I was trying to imagine an instance in any other sport where an underachieving athelete gets cries of "patience" from the crowd.
3.  A "maiden" is when the bowler throws six balls in a row without a run being scored because the batsman either doesn't swing or doesn't run.  This is a desirable statistic, something to cheer for.  In other words, when the play has reached its most boring level, the crowd applauds.