The weekend after arriving home from Tasmania was expected to be a fairly routine event for Leeanna and I. Most weekends consist of the both of us working on Friday, and then me working like a chump on Saturday and Sunday. Things took a considerable change when on our way to Krispy Kreme on Saturday morning for some low fat snacks; we looked up and saw that the sky was blacker than Chris Rock’s ass. Within minutes of arriving at the donut shop, the winds started whistling and hail the size of ping pong balls started dropping out of the sky. The storm quickly escalated, and soon the winds were whipping around everything (chairs, signs, pieces of buildings) and between the crazy hail and the now torrential rain, I felt like I might very well be living through “Dante’s Peak 2”. Leeanna and I remained trapped in Krispy Kreme for a couple of hours, but finally ventured out even though it was still raining, as I had to go to work. We returned to our apartment building to find that the entire first floor was flooded up to our knees and it literally looked like there were miniature lakes on the streets surrounding our building. There was debris everywhere in the streets and it was truly the craziest storm I had ever seen. Naturally, the elevator in our building was out of service due to the flooding, which is brutal for us as we live on the 15th floor aka the top floor. That night on the way to work, I saw some of the extensive damage first-hand. The train station had parts of its roof cave-in; all trains and trams had ceased service in the greater Melbourne area; the football stadium around the corner from my work had a couple of massive holes in the roof, where the ceiling had just come crashing through; hundreds of buildings had flood issues; and to top it all off, there were hundreds of traffic accidents and tons of people in the E.R. who had been injured by the hail. In the aftermath, many media outlets said it was the most intense flash flood/storm in decades in Melbourne. In related news, it took our dick-head building managers six days to get our elevator fixed, which when you live thirty flights of stairs up, equals six days of feeling like you would rather be bunking up with Rupert from “Survivor”.
Outside of the flood a couple weeks back, nothing too crazy has been happening. Last week, we decided to take a day trip out to the suburb of Williamstown, which is a nice little sea-side village. Unfortunately, within five minutes of arriving a seagull took a huge dump on Leeanna’s face and shirt. I was laughing hysterically, while as you can imagine the girlfriend was quite pissed off. The best part of the whole ordeal was the fact that she didn’t realize at first that in addition to being crapped on, on her shirt, she also had a nice white streak down her face! Classic! Aside from that, the day was pretty uneventful. We also hit up Chapel Street for the first time. It’s basically just another famous shopping street in Melbourne (there’s no shortage of them), although the only shopping I managed to do was for a pitcher of beer.
On the sporting front, football (Aussie Rules) season has just started here, which is far and away the biggest sport in Melbourne. It might not quite fill the gap of the NFL and NHL, but it sure beats rugby and cricket. On a personal sporting note, I have not been able to better my personal best bowling score of 170. My goal before I leave Australia at the end of the year is to be able to bowl a 200 game. This is definitely why I came to the other side of the world; to perfect my ten-pin game. Sadly, on the poker front things have continued much the same way they have for the past couple of years for me. I did not play online for a couple of months, primarily because I never had the internet in my apartment (been using internet cafes and Wi-Fi spots). Well that all changed a couple of weeks ago and was promptly followed by a small deposit. I quickly lost the money and immediately thereafter blocked all of my accounts, thereby not allowing me to deposit anymore money online while I’m in Australia. Also, after not gambling at all for the last couple of months, I decided that I needed a Crown Casino fix (yes, like a drug addict) and recently played three tournaments ranging in cost from $50 to $125. I did not make cash in any of them, although I do own the distinction of playing well (something I don’t do too often anymore) and being rewarded by having the card gods fuck-me-up-the-ass (pardon my French!). Needless to say, I will probably play a few more tournaments before I leave Melbourne, but after that I hope I don’t see a casino for quite some time.
In unrelated news, earlier this week it was my birthday, and like most holidays I will admit it just is not the same without your family. It’s also not the same when you have to work all afternoon and night, but that’s neither here nor there. Leeanna ended up buying me tickets to see Dave Hughes (one of my favourite Australian comedians) next month, which should be an enjoyable affair. We also had cake in the apartment, but for the first time in a long time, I did not kill off a large quantity of brain cells on my day of birth. I would also like to thank my parents and grandma for their birthday cash donation, which I have assured them I will be using for day trip next week and not spending on online pornography subscriptions.
Yesterday, in our never-ending quest to get out of our shit-box apartment, we bought tickets ($50 each) for the first of four days of the Australian Formula One Grand Prix. Because it was only the Thursday (four-day event), we only got to see practice runs and qualifying rounds for a variety of different types of motor cars and racing series. Near the end of the day, they did do one cool demonstration where they had an F1 car against a V8 Supercar (think Australia’s version of NASCAR) and a traditional street car racing around the track. It was amazing to see how fast the F1 car is compared to these cars and how loud they are! In fact, as I write this from my apartment, I can hear the cars zooming around Albert Park and I live a few kilometers away. It would have been nice to go on the Sunday for the big race, but I need to work and tickets are atrociously priced (cheapest grandstand ticket is $300 if I’m not mistaken). All in all it was a fun day, although I did get ridiculously burnt on my kneecaps and forehead. How my kneecaps got burnt over other more prominent areas I shall never know, especially since I spent more time eating and drinking in the shade then I did in my grandstand seat!
And lastly, just a couple of random things…
Work is going fine. I continue to hump my serving job, although it has gotten a bit better the last couple of weeks as I have been able to get a few more hours due to the departure of the head waitress and assistant manager, who are currently creating babies somewhere in Thailand as we speak, and shall continue to do so for the next couple of months. Leeanna continues to work part-time at the dental office, although she has been told that she should be getting full-time for the month of April when one of the other girls will be gone on her vacation. If all goes according to plan, this will be quite financially rewarding for the girlfriend and make her the chief breadwinner of the house, err shoebox.
A couple of weeks ago, I was walking down one the busier streets in Melbourne when I was mildly assaulted by an Aboriginal youth. I was just minding my business, listening to my iPod, when these two teenagers who were clearly cracked out came up to me and got in my face. One then decided to give me a good shoulder-check/shove which I just ignored and kept on my way. He kept trying to provoke me. He was lucky I’m a pussy/pacifist, because a lot of people would have turned around and kicked the shit out of him! At least now, I can say I’ve had some true contact with “real/Aboriginal” Australians.
And then there was McDonald’s, or Macca’s as 99.9% of the population calls it here. While Leeanna and I were out grabbing a late night snack last weekend, there was an incident where the very slutty woman behind us in line had her panties fall out of her purse. She didn’t notice at first, but the guy behind her in the line sure did and proceeded to announce it quite loudly. The woman in the short mini-skirt proceeded to pick up her panties and put them back in her purse, because let’s be real no one wears underwear anymore. I mean how else are you gonna have sex on the dance floor and allow classy gentlemen easy access to your vajayjay in the fine establishments of Melbourne? And, yes I just used one of Oprah’s words to describe a vagina. My downfall from teenage rapper to middle-age white man is complete.
Anyways, stay classy and hope everyone has a terrific Easter weekend. Oh, and to all my man friends on my hockey team….GO BOOZEHOUNDS!!! (Pretty sure most of you are illiterate and can’t read this anyways!)
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