Makeover time!

It's funny how sometimes the laziest weekend can fuel a lot of creativity (and we were trying to avoid going outside, where it keeps getting colder). Our faithful blog readers may notice a few changes on Big "?"s- enjoy and tell us what you think!

Here's what's new:
- Our banner: Adrian got inspired to recreate us in cartoon form! Too bad we aren't this cute in real life.
- Slideshow: We just realized we could feature a few of our most recent photos in a slideshow on our blog. Fun fun! But don't forget to keep on visiting our Flickr site for the whole collection.
- This week we love...: We keep coming across really fun websites that we want to share, so we'll try to update this section as often as we can. Let us know if there's one you want to share, too.

Plus, we've got a few more exciting things to come in the near future. Thanks for reading and commenting! xoxo, d&a "?"

Meet Pax

He's very cute, furry, and purry, and he's the newest and most entertaining addition to our house. Pax the kitten arrived two weeks ago and was nameless for quite a few days, going by everything from "cat" to "little boy" to "kitty" to "Vladimir Putin" (Adrian's choice) until he finally received a real name.

Our roommates adopted him from Lort Smith Animal Hospital, a huge place which is even the setting for local reality TV show "Animal Emergency". Pax is about four months old and was a real squirrelly one to begin with, first getting his paw stuck in one of the holes in his cardboard box before we could even take him home (the nurses had to open the box and rescue him). We were a little worried about what kind of terror this little kitty was going to be...

But Pax has been all cute, charming our visitors and most of all, charming us. For a kitten he can be pretty lazy at times, but he's always a good sport and will always go for a playwhen someone gets out the pingpong ball. In fact, if there was a cat volleyball league, Pax would be their star player, as he is quite good at lobbing and spiking the ball across the kitchen, and he always lands it in the goal (under the fridge, or in Adrian's shoe).

Pax also works very hard on de-carpeting the stairs and is determined to chew all the way through an electrical cord one day. He likes to give high-fives (with claws!) and can be a little squeaky. We've found he can also be a bit of a perv, stealing pairs of girlie underwear from the clothes drying rack. We've been trying to get him to write a guest blog for us, but he unfortunately has a very short attention span. At least he's a fierce fly-hunter and he has also rescued us from a kitchen spider... so he is pulling his weight around here! And we haven't seen a mouse since he's moved in.

We sometimes wonder if Pax were to meet a cat from another country, would they would speak the same language? We've been listening for an Aussie accent, but we haven't heard any "G'Day's" or "Bloody Oath's" yet. Someone surely must have done a scientific study on this! Ah, never mind. Time to get him ready for a first appearance on Stuff On My Cat... now, if only he'd sleep a little more soundly.

Costumes, crepes, and kitty fun...

It's been a busy few weeks but plenty of good times to write home about. Adrian's been Mr. Corporate lately ("Buy, buy, buy! Sell, sell, sell!" he likes to say)-- well, maybe he doesn't work on the stock exchange but he sure loves dressing the part. You've gotta have a little fun at work! Adrian has been working downtown in an office tower of one of Australia's major banks (ANZ) for almost 3 weeks now, and has gleefully discovered a games floor in his building. So every Friday he and his co-workers sit in those video-game cars and race each other. Word is there's a beer cart that comes around the office on Fridays as well- now that's the life!

As for me (Dayle), I've been blissfully unemployed since last Monday, enjoying another wave of sunny, 25-degree autumn days. This week's been a little colder, so I'm not spending as much time doing crayon drawings under the old trees in beautiful Carlton Gardens (the nearby park where we sometimes chase possums at at night). It's been really nice to enjoy some "me" time, exploring the nearby neighbourhoods and shops, and running all of those little errands that have been neglected for months (and fixing tattered clothing and shoes!). The work will come soon enough-- but it's just nice to relax a bit for now. It's a "working HOLIDAY visa", as we say here, not a "working slavery visa"!

But actually, I'm not totally unemployed. On Saturday afternoons I get paid to play dress-up at this wonderful, humongous costume hire (that's Aussie for rental!) shop called Costume Factory. I applied for the job way back in January but only recently did they decide they still needed another staff member for busy Saturday afternoons. It pays great and the staff are all quirky arts students, painters, writers, and theatre enthusiasts, and we basically just help people piece together costumes for the unbelievable amount of costume parties that happen in Melbourne. (For a country that doesn't do much for Halloween, I have been shocked). My first day consisted of fixing up wigs and dressing mannequins as tacky tourists, gladiators, cowboys, and even a 'gay sailor' (that's a sailor suit with sequins!). And ever since I've dressed people up as flappers, Prince, Tina Turner, Alpen yodeler and even an Indian chief and Pocahontas. It's been a real exercise in creativity because a lot of customers walk in without any costume ideas, and it's also easy to get lost in the huge shop/showroom. But it's a nice place to spend a weekend afternoon and I do wish we were staying long enough to see what Halloween brings. And apparently the company's been around for ages, evolving over the years since the Gold Rush days! For that reason we have an amazing amount of gorgeous medieval wear, etc., which we rent to a lot of theatre productions too.

In other news, our roommates got a kitten last week! Pax is rambunctious and lively, and he's completely adorable (but more about him later!). He's also a great entertainer of houseguests--we've just finished a multi-day goodbye party for our French friends Stephane and Jenny, who came to stay with us after working in Tasmania. There was lots of wine-drinking, reminiscing, and a final crepe feast... and we definitely caught (me more than Adrian I think) a bit of the travel bug as we chatted about their plans to travel Southeast Asia. Our friend Bianca's also off to New Zealand now and we're possibly the only people left in Oz from our original Echuca crew. We can only wonder on which continent we'll all meet again... we'll miss you guys! xoxo, D.

Getting sporty in Melbourne

Since we couldn't be around for yet another Jays home opener, we decided to get sporty, Australia-style over the weekend. We'd previously caught bits on TV of the strange spectacle that is the Australian Football League (AFL), and since Melbourne is true heart of the league, we figured it was about time to check out a live game. And people are REALLY into it here...

Basically, this version of football (or "footy") involves two teams of 18 guys each wearing tank tops and short-shorts, running around a gigantic circular field and kicking a ball through the goalposts (not to mention beating each other up along the way). The season runs from late March to early September, and it's by far the most popular and well-attended sport in the country. The league began as a solely-Victoria league, which is why many of the 16 teams are Melbourne suburbs-- only recently did the other state capitals get their own teams in the league. Naturally, we have to cheer for Carlton, not only because we live here, but because they're pretty much the worst team in the league (yay underdogs!). So we got on our Carlton Blues scarves and watched as our guys nearly beat the Essendon Bombers... but then lost.

The game itself is surprisingly not at all boring and pretty easy to follow, unlike American football. Aussies often ridicule American-style football because of the players' padded suits-- "That's not real football, mate!"-- which we can now understand, since these guys play just as, if not rougher, in outfits fit for the beach. Luckily, it's not too hard to understand: there are four fast-paced 30-minute quarters and a few strange rules about how to pass the ball. Our favourite scenario is when one player has the ball, and everything's on pause as he readies himself to boot it, while members of the other team stand a certain distance away and do jumping jacks in his line of sight (presumably as a distraction). Quite funny to watch from the nosebleeds!

At the end of the game, the winning team's "song" comes onto the staticky loudspeakers, and the fans sing along. In our case, we got to hear Essendon's song, which was very 1940s/WWII/creepy. Perhaps time for an update? The best part is how much people get into the game. We sat behind two moms and their teenage daughters-- one mom had a hand-knitted Carlton-colours scarf on-- and they were screaming louder than the jock types sitting on either side of us. From what we've heard, the rivalries run deep, and the queues to score a seasons' ticket or a member's seat will commit you for decades- word is locals sign up their kids at birth! Seeing as many of the teams have been around since the 1800's (Carlton's club dates back to 1864), there's a bit of that old-school Yankees/Red Sox legacy flavour, where fans wear their scarves proudly and take every win and loss very seriously. [You can read a little of the history here!]

Although attendance was more than 64,000, there were still many blocks of seats empty in the MCG on that chilly autumn evening (isn't SkyDome around 50,000 at full capacity?). The Melbourne Cricket Ground (or the "Mc G", as we call it, waiting to stand corrected) is an enormous open-air stadium, and shares with the retractable-roof Telstra Dome for all of our local games. It was definitely a good time to be part of a cheering, excited mass; almost-- but not quite-- a substitute for baseball!

Illegal alien.... no more!

I (Dayle) was just greeted with such fantastic news that I had to share- the Australian government has just approved my second visa! So I'm no longer an illegal alien anymore, on an endless "bridging visa." It's good to know that my 3 months (oh sorry, 88 days!) of slaving away at fruit picking and tomato sorting, my $400 or so for the application and the medical checkup (you know, to see if I am bringing a deadly disease into the country a year after I already would have infected people from Victoria to Queensland and back), and my unpaid hours of boredom sitting in the Health Services waiting rooms have paid off! The gracious Aussie government has kindly assured me (for only $223!) that my eyes are just as bad as they always were, I'm still the same height and weight I've been for ages, and also had me go for two pee-in-a-cup tests (ew) AND a chest xray. Hey, at least I got an afternoon off work. Hallelujah, the doctor must have checked off "Normal", instead of "Abnormal", in the question about the patient's intelligence on Form 26A! I've got myself another year in the country- maybe I'll go pick some pears to celebrate.... uhhh, or maybe not. Adrian's another story though-- maybe they've figured out he really is an alien. Fingers crossed he gets his visa soon...

In other news, we had a happy Easter (hope all of you did too!) eating chocolate eggs on the beach, and camping out along the Great Ocean Road again. We watched a 360-degree lightning show at Johanna Beach (where we'd camped about a month ago and fell in love with the spot) and soaked our hiking boots on a beach hike alongside what we're pretty sure were at least 15-foot waves. Crazy! It was a gorgeous scorcher of a weekend, though now it's been pouring really cold rain for days in the city.

We also watched some of the Rip Curl Pro Surfing Competition at Bells Beach, where the surfing girls got a little festive and tossed a big chocolate egg around while surfing some waves. And we've learned that eating hot cross buns is the major Aussie/Kiwi Easter tradition this time of year (think Easter, the cross, etc)-- and it's really the only time of year you can get them here. Crazy!

And then there was my own Easter treat- quitting my overworking, underappreciated office job. I even copied my resignation letter straight off the web to hand in. Liberation! And Adrian's got an exciting gig in a CBD bank tower, to start next week. So as he's going all corporate, I'm on my countdown to the 4th of April, my last day. I've got a few plans up my sleeve but will reveal more as the time comes. For now, I'm almost on vacation--Yippee!
(Oh yeah, and we're buying ourselves a "Take Me To Your Dealer" poster to celebrate!)

The 1st Rule of MLB is -- You Don't Talk About MLB!

I was on my way to a snazzy office building in the CBD (central business district), to drop off some paper work to my 'handler'. Nothing big, just business forms and such, the usual paperwork anyone goes through when signing up with a temp agency. Like most days in downtown Melbourne, it gets hot and bright, so naturally I have my water and my Jays Cap on, pushing through the crowded streets.
In heat this bad no one smiles, it's all looks that cows make when they're cooped up in a pen. Blank stares, slow blinking, anything to save energy really.
You relish the time you have to stop at the intersection while the lights are changing, take a swig of warmer-than-pee water that was ice cold when you left the house. It's in these weird moments time crawls by, giving you what seems like eons to glance around and realize that you're the only one glancing around, studying all those jack-arsed faces - looking forward, slack mouths, blinking slowly, and trying to save energy.

On my return glance across the street is where I saw him, staring right into my eyes. It's the intrusive stare, the kind you first look away from but peek back to see if they've caught you. Yup, you're caught, next it's confusion; "Why me? Is he staring at me?! Maybe he's looking at someone behind me!".
The last thing you want is to be stopped by some crazy in the street that pulls you aside to preach about Mother Mia the Moon Goddess - especially in this heat. So you stare ahead like the others, focus on the walk light. But he's there, staring. Determined to make eye contact again, you can see him just out of the corner of your eye, staring you down like a mean old bull.

It's just before the light changes that I get the guts to look him in the eye with all the machismo I can muster.
Finally I clue into what's going on. Melbourne city dwellers hate wearing baseball caps. With all the heat baking my brain I wonder how I could've missed it. Looking over all those blank faces you'll never see one baseball cap - let alone an MLB cap.
The sea of colliding people stream toward each other from opposite sides of the street, bringing with it the staring dude-- wearing an Oakland A's cap, the green one with a bright yellow 'A'. A giant smile cuts across his face, mine too, our unspoken 'secret handshake'. Before the two sides meld, we both exchange a quick nod, then we're lost in a fury of people pushing, crossing, you have to keep up or be lost in the mess. On the other side safe, I look back briefly - nothing.
And for the 6 blocks I can't stop smiling.

Hangin' at the Grand Prix

Melbourne Grand Prix
Originally uploaded by bigquestionmarks.

Last weekend we both worked at the Melbourne Formula1 Grand Prix- both for the cash as well as well as for the experience. At $99 a ticket, there wasn't much chance we'd be going as fans, anyway!

For two kids who aren't much into cars, it was actually still really cool. Adrian was the guardian of the corporate box for CAT, where he schmoozed and hobnobbed and ate lots of free food, and watched bits of the race where he could. Dayle was placed right on the Grandstand, checking tickets (and busting people who tried to sneak through), and getting to run to the track once in a while to watch. She was ecstatic to find she was right between the start and finish lines!

The weekend was hella hot- we're told quite unusual for March in Melbourne- Friday and Sunday were the worst, wearing thick uniform shirts (to quote Adrian: "I now know what it must feel like to wear a burqa") and sweating like crazy in the 40-degree heat. At least it was sunny! We saw many a drunk sunburned Aussie hiding in the little scattered patches of shade. Dayle actually had a zombie scare (and had begun comtemplating climbing the grandstand frame) when a dude in an orange t-shirt did a loping zigzag shuffle, hands out front, right towards her gate, and then promptly tripped on the first step and fell on his face. She realized then with relief he wasn't a brain-thirsty zombie, he just had a few too many VB's. Phew!

The crowd was really all for Ferrari- maybe it's all about the name?- and there were fans in red everywhere (or perhaps because Kimi Raikkonen won the race here last year). Lots of people wore flags as capes (quite the Aussie sporting tradition it seems) and there were even a few gladiators (check out our pics on Flickr). The band Kiss was closing the weekend, so on Sunday there were also many weird-looking people in black and silver, limping around the grounds of Albert Park in their moonboots.

But the coolest part was the noise- even while wearing earplugs there was something exciting about the vrooming engines on these machines. If you had to take a earplug out, even for a few seconds, the Formula Ones would rattle the teeth. Insane! We were told by some fans that the cars go 300 km/h or so... just unbelievable! (Especially since we have a van which barely does 100 km/h!). We also watched the V8 cars racing, an Aussie tradition of Ford vs. Holden (the big car manufacturer over here, which we heard is going to make a go for it in North America). There were also some miniature-- but super-fast-- races by the "Aussie Racing Cars", that were so tiny the driver's head was seen where the back seat would be, in these little rounded cars. Cute! (No pictures of those but they're probably online somewhere) Then it was the usual fighter-jet shows and people drinking lots of beer that seems to come with such events... that about sums it up.

Word on the street is that the Melbourne Grand Prix continues to lose tons of money and might not be here past 2010 (it came here from Adelaide just a little over a decade ago). Kind of sad, since there's a cool track for it around a lake and people get pretty excited about it. We didn't even realize there's a Grand Prix in Montreal, but when we're back we definitely want to go! Sure, it's terrible for the environment, the blue clouds of exhaust, but there's something so cool about these terrible beasts vrooming around a track with fire coming out the sides. There were even these handheld TVs you could rent for the weekend (called Kangaroo TV I think) which looked like PS3's but fed you live camera footage of each racing team, in the pits and in the cars, aerial views on the track and so on. You could eavesdrop on whoever you want and actually follow what's on when it's too fast to keep up. Pretty cool!

Now we're working on recovering our hearing and are heading out for some camping along the Great Ocean Road. There's a big surfing competition on at Bells Beach, so we plan to hit that, just chill out a bit and eat chocolate eggs on the beach. Happy Easter everyone and thanks for reading! Hope you all have a wonderful weekend! xoxox, D&A "?"

Salty Tales from a Pirate Techno Party

First and Foremost -- Sorry for not updating last week, yes we're still alive, BARELY!

It was a long week of cold, rainy days that reminded us that the image Australians like to uphold about their country can be quite the "furphy"- that's Aussie for a tall tale. Like most travelers arriving to the promised land of sunny beaches, surfing, and scorching desert wasteland, we didn't think to pack a few warm sweaters... let alone a pair of slippers. But even the locals were saying it's usually a lot warmer in February in Melbourne (though we don't believe much of what they say anymore). Cold or not, when we received a last-minute invitation to board a pirate-themed birthday party/booze cruise on a boat, we couldn't turn down an opportunity for silly summer Saturday night fun such as this...

After a quick trip to The Reject Shop (the aptly-named dollar store downtown), we were outfitted with classy eye patch/sword/hook get-ups. We raced down to the port, where our pirate boat was scheduled to take off at 6:30pm on Saturday evening. Unfortunately, the sad news came that we weren't partying aboard a proper pirate schooner, it was just your typical harbour-cruising boat. And our group was surprisingly difficult to find- you figure, "ah, just look for a crowd dressed as pirates". OH NO... in Melbourne, pirate-chic has seen a rapid rise in popularity, and everyone around us was dressed like a pirate in one way or another (damn you, puffy shirt!).

Eventually we did find our party, and it was a pretty cool thing that people (in a country which doesn't 'do' Halloween) were keen on dressing up for a theme party. After managing to avoid the $10 cover charge to hop on, we were ushered up the plank for some swashbuckling fun- or so we thought. We were still tied to the dock when the sun set- around 8:00- and when we finally did set off, it was too cold to enjoy the sights outside. Like good pirates, the passengers set to work keeping warm with a steady flow of overpriced bourbon and Coke. (Rum what??) There were plenty of good photo moments, a fake-moustache fashion show courtesy of a fellow pirate who had brought a collection along (Adrian makes a fabulous Freddie Mercury, while Dayle was a not-so-convincing Colonel Sanders) and heaps more "ARRRRRRRR's", and then some squirrelly guy wearing a very un-pirate-like flowered muu-muu (and claiming to be the DJ) decided to flood the boat with the brain-numbing techno music they seem to love here. And that was about the time when we and our Irish friends Claire and Aidan realized our doom.

Watching the lights on the city skyscrapers go by, so near yet so far away, it dawned on us that the idea of hopping on board a pirate party had been so exciting it hadn't even occurred to us that it could possibly suck-- and we'd have no way of escaping. As our boat circled the industrial boatyards with their parked cars sitting with trunks open by the water (get on your cement shoes!), the techno got louder and louder. All we could do was yell across our table to each other and count down the minutes until midnight, when our boat was due to land. We can only imagine how much fun it must have been in the real pirate days, to be trapped on a boat on the high seas, full of unwashed scalawags and scurvy. You know, back before Johnny Depp and Keira Knightley made it cool.

Hopefully our moustaches took the party up 2 notches.

Good Riddance (not really the Time of Our Life)

Call us nomads, if you will, but... WE'RE MOVING! (Yes, again.)

As you've probably already gathered, we've been itching to get out of our apartment. One day last week, we stopped by the noticeboard on our local bookshop to check out apartment ads, jotted down a few, and liked one of the ads enough to send the tenants a text (that's how ya do it in Australia- no worries!). A day or two later, we went to check the place out and it was AMAZING. As Adrian says, "There's moving up, and then there's a rocketship to the moon." Apparently the moon was within reach after all--just a few streets away from us, actually--and now we're moving into a spacious two-storey, carpeted house with a patio, two living rooms, a big kitchen, nice new furniture, a legitimate parking spot and more windows than we could ask for! Not to mention the girls living there right now are very cool-- two New Zealanders who loved having the house to themselves but are now trying to save up for a trip to Europe. There's just us and one other girl moving in (a far cry from 13 people, like our current place). It's a bit pricier, and it doesn't have internet (we'll still try to blog as much as we can!) but it's worlds better, and the peace of mind it will bring is worth every penny.

We started what we've thought was the big packing job today (Saturday) since we move Sunday morning, but we're now done way ahead of schedule, realizing we've gotten this whole pack-and-leave thing down to a fine art. So for our last 15 hours on Powell Lane, we'll just download everything imaginable, and write a short memoir of our time here. Please share with us in remembering...

Goodbye, brick wall in our room! We really will miss you for your artsy charm, despite the many times we've bashed our elbows on you when turning over in our sleep. Goodbye, free unlimited internet! You will be missed terribly. Goodbye, cute stray cats who live around our house... maybe we'll come back for a visit. Mrrow!

And good riddance to you, roommate who is still pissing on the bathroom floor! Good riddance to everyone who helps the flies breed faster by never bothering to take out the trash. Good riddance to the "visiting" mom-from-China who leaves our front door wide open at all hours of the day. Good riddance to the alcoholic Tasmanian who gets stupidly drunk and takes his car out for a spin late at night (and won't listen to reason about this dumbassery). Good riddance to an apartment where no one cares enough to keep it tidy, where there is no lounge to relax in, where there is a severe shortage of windows, where a parking lot serves as our 'backyard patio' (see photo above entitled: "Adrian Soaks Up Some Rays in the Garden"). And good riddance to a landlord who manipulates his tenants at any occasion, even proposing a bribe to get his handyman tenant to stay (ie. Adrian drops the bomb- we're leaving. Ernie: "Wait. Who's not happy? Is it you? I'll bet it's Dayle. Take her out for dinner... on my tab!" Adrian: "Uhhhhhh...I don't think you get it. We're leaving.")

OK, our place on Powell Lane wasn't the worst place in the world (a few of our flatmates were actually pretty awesome), but it sure took us back to our student housing days. It was an urgency to get out of the hostel, and the location which sold us, anyway. And our standards for a home have drastically lowered over the past year since living in a hostel, a tent, a van, a caravan, and a really rustic cottage. But we're ready to get comfy for the autumn and winter which are quickly approaching!

Check out our world on a Google map here!

And send us mail (pretty please) here:

139 Canning Street
Carlton, VIC 3053
Australia

... or just come visit us already-- Melbourne rocks! xoxoxo, The Big "?"

What is that menacing-looking blue thing over there???

Last weekend we decided to get a bit brave and took our first train to a far-off suburb of Melbourne. Actually, the heat was driving us crazy in our apartment (it was around 34 degrees) and we knew St Kilda Beach, which is more central to downtown, would be crammed with people... and plus, that oily film on the water's surface isn't very appealing to swim in.

We heard Brighton Beach had charm, and was decorated with a row of colourful beach huts. Sounded perfect! We felt a lot like tourists again, timidly crossing the gates at Flinders Street Station (the big, grandiose mustard-yellow train station at the south end of the CBD)... but once we made it on board, we couldn't help but think how impressive the transit is here. One ticket gets you on the tram (like a Toronto streetcar, but way more frequent and on time), the bus, and the trains (which serve the outer and faraway suburbs). Single tickets ($3.50) get you 2 hours of riding around, or if you validate it after 6pm, you can use it until 3am the next morning. Since it was Sunday, we decided to try a "Sunday Saver" card, which got us all-day access to transit for the day for $5.20. We've heard it's one of the best-kept secrets in Melbourne- not anymore!


It was definitely weird to think about it being mid-February and we were sweltering on a beach, drinking wine and snacking on fancy cheese and crackers (and snapping photos), while everyone at home was getting buried in snow. Here in end-of-summertime Melbourne, the Speedos were out in full-force, and so were the jellyfish. Dayle had gone in for a dip-- still trying to overcome her fear of sharks-- when, looking around the crystal-clear water surrounding her, she noticed one, then two, then three blue wiggly blobs. EEK! She ran out of the water as fast as she could, and there wasn't a chance Adrian would go in after that either. (We were told later by local friends that "Oh, those blue ones won't do much to you" but WHATEVER!) We don't know how people handle the heat here when there's all these monsters lurking in the water. We were telling some Aussies about the Great Lakes and a swim in Lake Huron is sounding more and more appealing all the time.