I packed up once again this morning, stashed my stuff at the hostel and set out to walk around the northern part of Melbourne. First I went to the Melbourne Gaol, a group of black stone buildings built in the 1840’s, where they are presently showing an exhibition on Ned Kelly, who is sort of an Australian folk hero. Some people speculate that Ned Kelly’s iron mask and armour were the inspiration for the character of Boba Fett in Star Wars, and I have to say I agree: The resemblance is uncanny. From what I could glean from the unorganized displays, Kelly did indeed commit quite a few crimes, from stealing horses to murder, but the state of Australia’s justice system at the time was present as a real tragedy of errors, and no doubt the sensabilities of the times were vastly different from those of today. The gaol itself was rather daunting, and I was glad to leave its dark stone interior. It was designed to depress, of course, and it definitely looked up to the task.

I then walked up Elizabeth to Melbourne University, which has some really nice old buildings, and then over towards Royal Park, but on the way in a heavy rain began to fall, so I decided to abandon my original plan of strolling over the hills and dales of the park, instead electing to walk around the lovely neighborhood of Parkville, which is full of beautiful old houses that seeming all have names, even the little, run-down ones. Very British, that. All of the houses have porches and gardens, and some are covered with ivy. The glass in the windows is often blurry because it is so very old. Almost no one was about. I had expected something more lively, considering the fact that a major university was located right near by. At least someplace I could eat, since I hadn’t eaten at all this morning.

I passed a bunch of ashes, broken glass and bits of what looked like bone on the sidewalk, looking for all the world as if someone had recently spontaneously combusted there. As I was pondering what caused people to spontaneously combust, speculating that various roaming cells of certain gases were to blame and thinking that perhaps there might even be one nearby, waiting for me to walk into it -BUZZ! It was just my cell phone, but it startled me nontheless. Shauna was calling, wondering what I’d like to do tomorrow when I am in Canberra. We chatted a bit, a few people beginning to appear on the street. She told me her cell phone number and I had to squat down on the street to write it down, just as one of the area’s denizens walked by, no doubt wondering what my particular brand of mental illness was.

After I hung up, the rain began in earnest, causing the street grates to overflow as leaves blocked them up. I passed a voting place, my hunger growing, but I had already walked back downtown before I found anything open. I think a front must have passed through, because along with the heavy rain, it’s gotten a lot colder as well. Still, even in this weather Melbourne seems a pleasant place, with it’s preserved buildings, lit up at night, public restrooms and baths from the 1800’s still in use, its trams rumbling up and down the streets, occasionally emitting blue sparks.

In order to avoid another lack of living arrangements when I arrive in Canberra at 4am tomorrow morning, I reserved a room at Canberra Central Apartments. Shauna said that she would get in touch as soon as she was finished sabotaging the elections. I’m not looking forward to an 8-hour bus trip, but at least I get to sample this particular mode of transportation in Australia while I’m here. Perhaps something interesting will happen.

Wow, now I’m Number 9 on the World’s Best 100 Real People Websites. The poison must be working. The only reason I can’t continue to advance in such a fashion is that Number 7 and Number 3 are actual friends of mine who could potentially pick me out of a lineup as they’ve both met me in person. I suppose I could settle for Number 3 if I absolutely had to.

After a day of walking around Melbourne, this city has won me over, despite my original pissy mood. It’s a laid-back place that doesn’t take itself nearly as seriously as Sydney does. Less of a reputation to prove, perhaps. There are lots of motorcycles here as well, for Australia, that is. The street I’m living on, Elizabeth Street, has tons of shops selling new and used bikes. Even the 150cc NSR, which is available in Taiwan, is for sale here. Not sure who would want one, except maybe a small beginner. It’s a two-stroke, however, like mine, and is roughly as powerful as a 300cc 4-stroke bike. I was surprised Australian emissions standards allow 2-stroke bikes.

Today I walked over to Chinatown, which suffered from an apparent power outage as I was eating lunch. All of the sudden the music stopped and the lights went out, and a small sparrow jumped up on my table, looking like an escapee from a Disney animated feature. I went outside to find everyone milling around, wondering what was going on. Even the traffic lights were out, and crossing roads immediately became much more similar to the situation in Taiwan, where people just sort of take their chances no matter the color of the light. A table full of people sat inside a Teppanyaki place staring at the powerless table/grill while the cook, burn scars covering his arms, smoked a cigarette outside. A blind woman was asking what was going on, why there were so many people suddenly out on the street, and someone immediately went over to her to explain. I doubt that would happen in Taipei. A couple of firetrucks screamed by, dodging the trams. I had seen signs calling for a school walkout at 1:30 this afternoon to protest “the racist war” scrawled on some walls. Perhaps that had something to do with it.

The Fitzroy Gardens, my next destination, are beautiful and very well-kempt. Immaculate green lawns, fresh air full of birdsong and little lakes and streams…people here really know how to make a park. I walked around the well-to-do neighborhoods to the east of the gardens and admired the Victorian architecture. I really like Victorian style, mostly because it’s so unnecessary. It’s almost pure excess. It’s great.

Then I walked over to Federation Square, which is listed as “Under Construction” in my 2000-edition Lonely Planet guide. It was supposed to be finished quite some time ago, but it’s far from complete. Doesn’t look as if anyone’s doing much to it either. I dodged traffic on Flinders Street due to the lack of a sidewalk on the south side and crossed the Yarra River to King’s Domain. The Yarra doesn’t look clean, but it apparently is, as there was no odor and people were learning how to row boats up and down it, spurred on by coaches on bicycles riding along the banks and shouting through megaphones. The water itself is a muddy brown, though.

King’s Domain park was another exquisite park, huge and empty, with more clipped, green lawns. A guy carrying a leaf blower wandered around with nothing to do. Some wildlife photographers foraged in the bushes for pictures of some bird. Unfortunately, this kind of beauty is hard to photograph. It’s more of an atmosphere thing, and the beauty is just being there. I could have taken a lot of pictures, some of which perhaps worthy of a calendar or something, but not the kind of stuff I’m really interested in, so I decided to save my memory for more appropriate subject matter.

It got quite cold as the sun approached the horizon, and I went back to the riverbank running along the south part of the city. High-end restaurants line the riverbank, as well as an interesting ‘jumping water’ fountain and large black obelisks with water running down them, from which huge balls of fire periodically explode. I welcomed the blast of heat from the fireballs, even though it didn’t last. I walked over to where there was an old ship in drydock and took pictures of the masts and the river at sunset. As I walked along the wooden docks, a couple dressed for some elegant occasion strode past me. Then another, and another. I looked ahead to where someone was holding a party of their houseboat, and decided to head back towards the city.

I was surprised that things were still open and people were still on the street as late as 9 or 10 at night. This seems like a much more comfortable arrangement than I’ve found in other cities in Australia. This phenomenon, as well as the general cheerfulness, could be attributable to the festive Melbource Cup holiday, but somehow I don’t think so. I think this city must be like this most of the time. It seems to be fairly open and friendly for its size, almost like a small town, which to be honest most Australian cities remind me of. Granted, this one has more silly hats, but that is just one more point in its favour.

Tomorrow I plan to cover the northern part of the city and more of downtown before I get on the bus at 8pm. I’m thinking that a true motorcycle tour of Australia will have to wait until my next trip, and will no doubt require a great deal of planning. I still want to do it, though. I can’t imagine a better country for that sort of thing.

Ed mentioned some very valid points in his criticism of this site. The reason everything is so large is that I designed for a higher resolution that 800×600, and I also work on a 19″ monitor. I know not everyone has a monitor that large, but it just didn’t occur to me when I was designing this thing. The large icons are part of that, of course, but the reason I used “mystery meat” icons was that a good portion of my readers don’t speak English and just want to look for photos, so I thought I would go for an icon-based menu rather than a text-based one.

Also, I kind of like my crazy, jumbled up design. It’s not unlike my life, in that it’s a work in progress.

The dump I’m staying in, the Elizabeth Hostel, isn’t so bad I guess. At least I got a room to myself, no matter that all the furniture has stickers on it reading “Property of the Meteorology Department”, which doesn’t fit the decor of the room at all. The whole thing is run by Chinese people, and there’s a Shaolin Kung-fu (Wing-chun style) school on the 1st floor, so at least that is familiar. It’ll do, and I really don’t feel like wasting time trying to find another place to stay for one night. At least I have hot water, if not a towel or soap.

This morning I walked all over trying to find a place where I could rent a motorcycle. When I finally found what seems to be the only motorcycle rental store in Australia on Queensberry and Peel, I found (1) that I can indeed hire a good-sized motorcycle and ride it to Canberra and (2) that doing this would cost up to A$800. In other words, it is prohibitively expensive to do that, so I decided to just buy a $48 bus ticket instead. It leaves tomorrow night at 8:00 and arrives in Canberra at 3:50 the next morning. I will try to find a hostel at that time in the morning, but I don’t have high hopes after my experience here in Melbourne last night.

So anyway, now that those matters are resolved and I have found an Internet cafe with FTP and Javascript functions, Melbourne seems like a much nicer place. I still need to walk around some more to get a better feel for it, but at least there aren’t any flies. Yet. I imagine that they’re on their way now that they know I’m here.

I am in Melbourne. This is most definitely not a happy thing. I shall explain momentarily. First things first.

After I finished the last entry and logged off at the Internet cafe in Sydney, I walked past a man in a bright blue suit urinating on the street. He wasn’t even trying to be subtle about it. I suppose subtlety is too much to ask of someone who actually bought and wore a bright blue suit for a night on the town. Although bright yellow might have been a better choice, considering his aim.

Yesterday I went to the Australian Museum and looked at the interesting Aborigine exhibit, which was quite educational. One thing I don’t understand is why so many people equate Australian Aborigines with American Blacks. I would think comparing them to Native Americans would be more appropriate? Perhaps people just can’t get past the issue of skin color. They have roughly the same skin color, so they must be the same! Some progress.

As I was at the museum Jeb called and we arranged to meet outside the hostel at 3pm. For once I was on time, and Jeb was already there, looking taller than I had imagined him. He was in a good mood, probably because he had just gotten back from Melbourne. We walked to the tower in the middle of downtown Sydney and eventually found the Disney-esque queue leading to the smallish elevators up to the top. In the elevators were TV screens showing the interior of another elevator, presumably on top of us. The Elevator Lady said that the TV screens were for “communication”. I wonder how they do that. Sign language? Funny faces? I’ll bet that’s not why they’re there at all. I bet it’s just so they can watch people who don’t think they are being watched, and tape them doing silly things like scratching or picking their noses so that they can produce an award-winning TV show called “Australia’s Funniest Elevator Antics”.

The view at the top wasn’t bad, and I made Jeb turn green by casually mentioning that there wasn’t any actual building underneath us, just the one rather skinny elevator shaft. “But there is something underneath us,” he said brightly. “The restaurant.”

“Yeah, but what’s underneath that?” I replied, which made him go green again.

After we entertained the elevator passengers on the way back down with stories about giant bungees and the need to exit quickly before the elevator snapped back up again, we found that our tickets entitled us to a vitual tour of Australia. This was extremely cheesy. We sat in a dark room listening to an audio tape, then in a revolving room watching miniature figures make bad jokes about the rainforest and Australian TV, and then we were taken to one of those motion-chair machines and shown a poor-quality video which had nothing to do with the motion of our chairs. Well, once when an on-screen horse snorted we supposedly were sprayed with virtual horse snot, but other that it didn’t really connect. It just shook us around a lot. I reckon they make a fortune on gather loose change alone.

Alas, Jeb had to go meet someone, so he had to go, but not before he persuaded me that coming to Melbourne would be a really good idea. So I bought a train ticket for the next morning at 7:43. A 12-hour ride. I could watch the scenery, I thought. It’ll be fun. I didn’t feel like going back to the hostel just yet, so I walked around a bit, and was mistaken for a homeless person by a van full of charity workers. “No, thanks,” I said to their offer of food. “I’m stuffed, really.”

Eventually I ended up at the bar I went to before on Oxford Street, called Midnight Shift. I sat around awhile watching a stout Papua New Ginean dancing around half-naked, and then I struck up a conversation with an Australian of Thai descent. I’ll call him K, and he turned out to be quite nice. I found that he works helping out elderly people and also works to better public workers’ working environments. He offered to take me for a ride around the city, and throwing caution to the winds, I said ok.

It turns out that K drives a small convertible MX-5, and we drove around Sydney with the top down and the heat turned up. I gazed up at the lit buildings sweeping by overhead. It was amazing, magical really. I hadn’t been for a ride in a convertible since I was a kid and my dad restored an old Corvair Monza convertible, which was later stolen and trashed. We drove out to Watson’s Bay and sat for a while and talked, and then we drove around a bit more, eventually ending up at my hostel.

So I was in a good mood as I got onto the train to Melbourne. I had a window seat, I was listening to my MP3’s, the weather was clearing. The scenery was beautiful all the way down, although the train food wasn’t anything to write about, so I won’t. At one point a drunken family boarded. They all reeked of alcohol, and the son sat next to me. Junior apparently recognized everyone in the train, including me. “Don’t I know you? I know you, right?” He then wanted to trade hats and then drink more alcohol. “Dad, let me have some more of that stuff,” he said to the father, who was sitting behind us.

“Nah, wait until we get moving,” the father replied.

“Aw, come on? Mum? Give me one more shot?” Apparently Mum was an easier sell. They rode for one stop and then got off at Wagga Wagga. Their stench didn’t leave for another couple of stops, however.

We got to Melbourne at around 7pm. I had planned to get a room at a backpacker’s, have some food, walk around, etc. The only problem is that there was not a single room available. I walked clear around the city, to nearly every hostel and hotel in the downtown area, but noone had anything. In the end I found a horrible little room at a horrible dump on Elizabeth Street for $40 a night. Ook. I guess it will do for one night, but I am going to try to rent a motorcycle tomorrow and head for Canberra as soon as I possibly can. Now is just not a good time to be in Melbourne. The hostels are full, the Internet Cafes don’t have working Internet (“Can this Internet cafe do FTP?” I ask, and just get a blank stare or “What’s FTP?” in response), and everyone here is entirely too happy about the situation, especially considering the fact that I’m pissed off with the entire city at the moment. Why did I come here?

In other news, this site was raked over the coals by the guys at Blog You! Blog You! Blog You! And when those guys rake something over the coals, you can rest assured that they will do it with real panache. Go have a look. I’m going to go find a clown to hit.

My comments are back, for some reason. Oh, well. They come and go as they please. If they get into trouble, guess who’ll come crawling back on their knees, begging for forgiveness? Yep.

I walked down to Darling Harbour today and toured the aquarium there. It was full of schoolkids being shepherded around by older women who (I hope) were seriously misprounouncing the kids’ names. “Come on, Jihad,” I heard one of the women call. “Keep up with the group, and remember to hold hands.” I managed to stay out of the children’s way for the most part, and I even saw a couple of fish during my time there. The tank full of jellyfish were the most interesting. The seafood restaurant right at the aquarium’s exit was the most disturbing part, however. It really makes one wonder just what they do with fish that get sick and die there.

Afterwards I walked around a bit, and as I did I accidently knocked over a stand to which was linked one of those divider ropes. In an almost domino-like fashion, the whole thing came crashing down while I dove to stop the reaction before my mistake became visible from space. Then I got pissed off at the whole affair and started another chain reaction on purpose. Nearby one of the professionals on his lunch break (you know the kind, the grey suit, blue tie, sunglasses, a look I like to call “Subtle Pimp”) snickered and sneered. That’s right, I thought, go ahead and laugh it up, you pompous ass. At least my city, while despicable in many ways, doesn’t have swarms of flies tormenting its residents. Actually I doubt flies could survive in such large numbers in Taipei.

Later on I took in a couple of 3D IMAX shows. The theatre claims to have the largest IMAX screen in the world, but it looked pretty much the same size as all of the other IMAX screens I’ve ever seen. The first feature wasn’t bad, but the second, which concerned a haunted house, was really good. Not good plotwise. Plotwise it sucked, but the 3D effect was quite nice, in a trying-to-grab-the-floating-thing-in-front-of-you sort of way.

Later on I called up Grant who, horror of horrors, actually had work to do today, so we arranged to meet at 6pm. I think he has been working on the Matrix sequels too long, because when arranged to meet, he said “Get on bus 372, and then call me. Come alone. No police.” We went out to his place in Randwick and had dinner at a new Greek restaurant there. The food wasn’t bad, and I had Lemon and Lime with Bitters for the first time. It was excellent. Plan on seeing this drink featured prominently in the journal in the future. Afterwards we retired to Grant’s humble abode where he drew a picture for me and then taught me how to say “Canberra” without sounding like a total fool. In the meantime, it started to storm outside, the first rain I’ve seen in Australia, I think, although it might have been raining the night I arrived in Perth. As I got on the bus back to George St., I was welcomed by the sound of drunken singing: As I was going home one night, as drunk as drunk can be… A bloke named Merve had apparently been deserted by his mates, and he was trying to get to New Town. Apparently he felt that singing would help in some fashion.

I’m hopefully going to meet Jeb tomorrow after he gets off work. I’m also thinking of trying to get to Melbourne again, now that the Cup is over and done with. It would mean a 12-hour bus trip, but it might not be so bad. We’ll see. And I could stop by in Canberra on the way back to Sydney to see Shauna as well, which would break the trip up nicely. What would be best would be if I could rent a motorcycle in Melbourne and ride to Canberra, and then take a train or bus back to Sydney. I have no idea if that’s possible, though. If it is raining tomorrow I don’t know what I’ll do. Probably go to a museum or something.

For some strange reason, my comments aren’t showing up now. This could be a problem with the browser on the computer at the Internet cafe I’m at right now…I hope so, anyway. I also refreshed my archives so that they all appear to be there. I don’t know why they disappear from time to time, but they do. Probably out carrousing or something. Someday I’ll wake up and see “Poagao’s Comments Arrested after Police Chase. Archives Called in for Questioning. Report at eleven” on TV.

I’m just downstairs from the hostel I’m staying at on George St. in Sydney’s Chinatown. The weather’s getting a bit hot, and nobody seems to have air conditioning. My tiny triangular room certainly doesn’t. I hope it doesn’t get too much hotter, at least not at nights when I’m in my room. On the other hand, hot weather means beaches and swimming, which would be cool. I’ve already got a bit of colour after getting out of the office, so that I don’t appear so white, although I’ve been a good deal darker, still, at least I don’t look like The Undead Office Monkey anymore.

Speaking of monkeys, I went by ferry to the zoo at Taronga today. It was most entertaining, mostly because I hung around the gorillas most of the day, taking pictures of the frolicking primates. There’s a beautiful view of downtown Sydney across the harbour as well, and I bought a postcard of the largest gorilla, a huge gorgeous silverback.

After watching the people at the zoo and comparing them with the animals, I’m left in doubt as to who really belongs in captivity. Most of the babies and many of the adults were louder and more obnoxious than any animal there, and none of the animals smelled quite as bad as many of the humans. Even as I type a woman next to me is constantly rearranging the chairs so that she gets the most comfortable one. She has tried every single chair in the cafe, and I’m expecting her to demand mine soon. I suppose our general cruelty and pettiness has allowed us to succeed so violently.

After the zoo I walked through some of the parks back to Hyde Park, where I narrowly fended off some more of the ever-present Mormons before nearly falling asleep on one of the wide greens there. At about 6:30pm I went in search of Quizmo’s, a sub shop that beats the pants off of Subway since the former actually toasts the sandwich, but it seems that even in Sydney things close ridiculously early. Nothing at all was open, so I settled for KFC for dinner and returned to the hostel to do my laundry, which resulted in marginally cleaner, though strangely spotted clothes. I was thinking of going out again tonight, but I doubt anything will be open.

Dean wants to interview me and Steve about our books for the government magazine he works for. It sounds cool, although we’re both travelling at the moment. The woman next to me is typing rather furiously. I wonder what it is that demands so much speed and comfort? Blogging, most likely.

As always, no idea what’ll happen tomorrow. I may walk around Chinatown and Darling Harbour, or call some people up and bug them. What I really want to do, now that I’ve seen a bit of the countryside from the rental car, is travel to someplace fairly remote and reasonably scenic, rent a motorcycle and just ride around for a day or two. I’m planning to travel to Canberra to see Shauna on Sunday as well. Although she denies anything of interest in that fair city, I’m sure we’ll find something worthy of our attention. I think that Jeb might be back in town after his trip to Melbourne (lucky bastich), so maybe we’ll get in touch.

Melbourne didn’t work out. I had forgotten about the Melbourne Cup, which is taking place at the beginning of this week. I could go later, I suppose, but really there should be enough stuff around Sydney to do this week. I considered going to Brisbane, but from what I hear it is just like Florida, where I spent a fair bit of my childhood, i.e. endless hotels on endless beaches.

Thus was Saturday wasted on such frivolous plans. I’m at an Internet cafe off of Oxford Street in Sydney at the moment. I’m staying at the George Street Hotel in Chinatown, since it’s the cheapest I could find and it’s clean and conveniently located. Last night after I got settled in to my triangular room which includes exactly one bed, one table and a fan for cooling, I went out walking around, eventually making my way to Hyde Park, which was practically deserted. I wondered whether I would be accosted, and sure enough I was: by Mormons. “So where are you from?” the mormon in question asked.

“Taiwan,” I answered warily, wondering whether this would somehow lead to the damnation of my soul.

“That’s great! You don’t look Malaysian though,” the mormon answered. I let the mistake pass as I didn’t want to encourage any further discussion. Most people end up with Thailand, but this guy exhibited spectacular cluelessness to somehow get to Malaysia in the space of just one sentence. He gave me a pamphlet, claiming it would chance my life. I opened it up, read the words “Only the union between a man and a woman is considered holy in God’s….” before stuffing it in a rubbish bin. So much for changing my life. I knew damnation would figure in there somewhere.

I walked in my sinful fashion over to Oxford Street, where I found a bar Rick had told me about earlier, the Satin something or another. It was, as he had said, segregated into sections. Bears at the front, Asians in the gaming room, and others in the back, although I didn’t see the Aborigine section near the pool tables. Damn.

I lingered for a while, and eventually spotted a really nice-looking guy. He looked like a scruffier, younger version of Tiger Woods, and I found him quite attractive. He appeared to be with someone, but I tried to approach him anyway. He avoided my gaze, however, and ignored me. Dejected, I walked back to the hostel and took a shower in the shared bathroom, and then went to bed in a most unsatisfied mood.

Today was much better. Jono is in town, of course, and he, Rick, Jimmy and I drove a rented car to the Blue Mountains this morning. The smell of the new Mitsu reminded me of driver’s ed in high school, where we had brand new 1985 Chevrolets to learn on. Rick made fun of the low height of the Blue Mountains as we approached, but the surrounding countryside was beautiful, full of rolling hills and little farms. We drove up to a promontory and gazed out over the valley to some massive waterfalls spilling over a cliff on the other side. The tiny figures of people walking around the falls made Rick dizzy, so we drove into the tiny town of Katoomba for lunch at an old restaurant where the Waitress of The Month wears a little crown thingy on her head (either that or the other waitresses use it to haze the newest girl). Jono and I shared a delicious meat pie and I had a Cream Soda Spider, aka ice cream float. All of the cream soda in Australia is red, for some strange reason. They don’t know anything about the gold kind.

After lunch we drove a couple of hours to some caves, where we signed up for a 1.5-hour tour inside a network of caves called The Orient. It was magnificent stuff, draperies of rock, stalagtites, stalagmites, all of those wonderful formations. I had never been in such caves before. The only caves I’ve been in before were the newly-laid sewer systems my friend Chris Davis and I explored when we were kids. These were natural, though, and I felt like I was in a combination of Disneyworld and a cathedral. No idea why they called it The Orient, though. The Cave Lady wasn’t too clear about that, either. Jimmy kept seeing food in various formations, which is quite typical for Jimmy. “That one looks like bacon!” he would exclaim excitedly, and then “Hey, that one looks like spicy hotpot! Ooh, that makes me hungry!”

At one point the Cave Lady pointed to a shape and said it was called Nefretiti’s Couch, because it looked like the figure of a sleeping woman. The obvious bulge looked like a breast, so I was surprised when she said “…and you can see the head there.”

“Are you sure that’s a head?” I wondered aloud, gaining a withering look from the cave lady.

“Let’s try and have fun, shall we?” she replied. The time went by all too quickly, though, and soon we were out in the sunshine again. The daylight was fading as we drove down the mountain. Rick was almost falling asleep at the wheel by that point, so we stopped at a hotel compound called the “Hydro-magestic”. It was like walking into 1936. The architecture, the decor, the atmosphere…even the music was appropriate. We ordered tea and sat out on the veranda watching the sun set over the rolling hills. It was positively sublime, I tell you. I felt like we should all slip into period costume and when we were done reading in our newspapers about the depression and the threat of Nazism, we would get in our Deusenberg and head out for a night on the town. Getting into the Mitsubishi and turning on modern music was a bit of a jolt, even though I tried to remind myself that Mitsubishi built Japanese Zeroes.

I have no idea what’s on for tomorrow. I should pay for a couple of more nights at the hostel, though. Looks like I’ll be there for a while.

I’m thinking of spending next week someplace other than Sydney. Perhaps Melbourne, which I hear is nice. Depends on what kind of deal I can get on flights, I guess. Everything is up in the air these days. The Taliban has included Australia in its Jihad. Crazy. It’s like looking at the Taliban spokesman and thinking he’s cute, and then realizing what he stands for. It’s like hearing about things like B-52s and Anthrax in the news, and the first thing that springs to mind is rock bands, followed quickly by the horrible realization of what they really mean.

Sydney is home to quite a number of really nice motorcycles. The weather is perfect for motorcycling, although riders are called “Temporary Australians” here. The weather is a bit hazy today, most likely due to nearby bush fires. I might try to visit Taronga or the beach today. Jonathan is due tomorrow, and we are planning to visit the Blue Mountains on Sunday. So I’ll have to crash at a backpackers for at least a couple of days starting tomorrow.

This looks quite promising (thanks to Shawn for the link). Hopefully we’ll see it utilized soon both off and online. The biggest benefit should be with online uses, like MMORPGs and 3D homepages. There’s been a serious dearth of good first-person shooters lately. Actually, I think I prefer “first-person explorers” more, but it’s a fine line between the two. Ideally both elements should be present. I’m going to get Red Faction, but where are Unreal 2, Jedi Knight 2, the next Duke Nuke’m, Return to Castle Wolfenstein, Quake 4, Doom 3, the next Half-life installment…? Maybe they’re all waiting for this technology. I hope so. That would be a reasonable excuse in my mind. It wouldn’t make me content, per se, but it would forestall my rather unorthadox tactics of constantly badgering innocent salesmen by shaking promo boxes in their faces and repeating “Is it out yet? Huh? How about now? Is it out yet? Huh?” until they have to fend me off with one of the cheaper, more expendable keyboards.

I’ve found out the hard way that the temperatures in Sydney vary quite widely from morning to midday to night. It’s rather warm, almost hot these days at noon, but quite cool in the evenings. This means one should bring all of one’s clothes with one all day long or else risk either freezing for half the day or sweating for other half.

I met up with Simon’s friend Grant today, and we walked through a seemingly unending series of parks and photographed such interesting things as a half-eaten fruit bat lying on the grass. The crows whose meals we interrupted in order to capture that particular image sat suprisingly patiently in a nearby tree while we shot away. Later on Grant took me round his place of business, Fox Studios, where they’re currently busy on the second and third Matrix movies. One would expect a great deal of activity at such a place, but there was hardly anyone about. On the way in the guard wanted to know my name, and he of course also wanted to know what TC stands for. I said “It’s technical,” and he let us through. We passed a couple of open doors and saw some figures dressed in black lying on tables, but I suspect they were either tired staff or props.

I have learned some rather distressing news on this particular subject: Tank is apparently not in the sequels. Now, I don’t know what they were thinking, but why did they bother keeping him alive if not to put him in the sequels? All I can say is that they are going to have to come up with a hell of a replacement to top Tank. Tank is cool. Tank is sexy. Tank is hole-free.

We took a bus down to Darling Harbour, which is kind of touristy but fun and full of interesting things like concave fountains you can walk down into, a monorail, a submarine and a floating lighthouse shaped like a big tamale. We then went to Chinatown and browsed through an old comic store and were accosted by the owner, who apparently mistook the sentence “Do you take credit cards?” to be some sort of secret code. “The vole cries at midnight,” he replied. There wasn’t much else to do at that point but make a hasty exit, and we walked up to an enormous old market which apparently had something to do with Queen Victoria, as she was sitting on the top floor, enclosed in glass and spinning so she could wave at everyone. There were also shops.

At one of the shops outside the giant old market, a sign was posted advertising Zhenzhu Naicha, or Pearl Milk Tea, which is just tea full of little gelatinous balls one either chews on thoughtfully between gulps or cause one to wonder what the hell is in their tea, depending on whether one expects the little balls to be there or not. I was curious at this Taiwanese staple appearing in downtown Sydney, so I asked the owner, a large middle-aged man with a mustache, what it was all about.

“Oh, yeah, we’re about to launch the Pearl Tea. We hope to hook Australians on the whole concept of things to chew while you drink your tea,” he boomed. “And you know what? We’re going to sell it together with meat pies. You see, we’re also hoping to hook Asians on meat pies. That way, everyone wins.” He seemed very confident that he wouldn’t have to deal with most of his Australian customers exclaiming “Hang on! There’s something decidedly dodgy about this tea!”, while most of his Asian customers are complaining about the curious texture and flavor of the fruit in their pies.

We planned to meet up with Ryan, a self-described “half-pilot” who is another friend of Simon’s, so we took another bus out to Grant’s house, which is located in Randwick, a suburb of Sydney. By now it seems to me that Sydney is composed of a bunch of small beach towns all strung together. After we arrived and met up with Ryan, we walked down to the beach to look for a restaurant. We went into a swanky joint on the beach to look at the prices, and apparently you can cook your own steak there for just A$15. We decided it might be better to go to a hole-in-the-wall place with some ridiculous name I can’t remember right now. Funky Coogee or something like that. We got kebabs and took them out to the beach to enjoy before catching buses back to our respective abodes.

So I am back at Rick’s and Jimmy’s flat back in Bondi Junction. Neither of them are home yet, although Jimmy might be asleep in his room as he’s been feeling a bit under the weather lately. I suppose I’ll spend my evening much like most people in Sydney: watching TV and going to bed. That is, unless Jonathan, who is from New Zealand, who worked on the play with us a couple of months back and who might be in Sydney, comes to live here. In that case, I’ll be looking for another place to stay. So I’d better take my shower now, just in case.

On this auspicious date many (not too many, lest we offend) years ago, Shauna was born! Happy Birthday, you angry redhead! She’s rather busy at the moment, but I look forward to meeting her in person after she’s done sabotaging election websites. Ooh, er.