Catching up!

Hey everyone! It's been a busy and chilly couple of months in Melbourne (yup, we're still here!) and we thought, geez, it's about time to update the blog. Sorry for being such blog-slackers... here's the wrap-up on what's been happening (more details to come):

The Big Move: Back in May our nutty Kiwi housemates told us they wanted to break their lease (it was too expensive somehow suddenly) and move out of the house on Canning Street sometime in July (it was something new every week with those guys!). We were sick of freezing in an increasingly-crowded house anyway-- the one chick's freeloading 18-year-old brother and his friend had moved over "temporarily" from New Zealand and had already overtaken the 1st floor of the house for six weeks, and we were getting sick of eating our meals in our bedroom-- so we started a quick n' dirty apartment hunt. Over two weeks we saw some flashy, grungy, huge and tiny living spaces, until we came upon The One. Just like we met Daisy, we knew we were meant to be, we knew we had to have the fabulous one-bedroom apartment on the banks of the Yarra River. The current tenant, an interior designer, had been assigned to work on a fancy Shanghai hotel but didn't want to give up her gorgeous gem of a place from June to December. She'd met a couple other potential subletters before us and so naturally we were ecstatic when she let us know she wanted us to have the flat! And after so much hellish share housing, hostels, camping and rustic cabins on cow paddocks, needless to say we've been thoroughly enjoying the bliss of having our very own space-- kitchen, balcony, gas heater, views of the city and more :)
Happy birthday to Adrian: Last week Mr Rogers got a little older. And though he continues to creep toward the big 3-0 (a wee bit faster than Dayle, I must add!), the part-ay spirit has not left him, and so we celebrated the big event last Saturday night with many beverages and three hours of karaoke in our own room at FM Karaoke on Bourke Street (in the CBD). It took a little bit for voices to get warmed up but soon enough the initial shyness was lost and everyone was enjoying a good selection of karaoke favourites like Queen and Aerosmith set to excellent and very dramatic Asian love-story videos. The staff at FM were fantastic and put up with our jolly group of songbirds (thanks to everyone who was brave enough to get onstage!). When everyone was hoarse we dashed down a few alleys and made it to the Croft Institute just in time* (* Note: Despite protests, Melbourne has just begun a citywide "lockout" policy where you can't enter a bar after 2am, no matter how late it stays open... something to do with curbing streets violence or something...) for some more hours of dancing. Fun times for all! Adrian also joined the trendy Melburnian crowd and got himself a real authentic Crumpler bag, straight from the Crumpler HQ in Collingwood. He hasn't stopped grinning since.

We'll have more updates soon... complete with the grand photo-tour of our awesome apartment, our thoughts on Australian television (something we haven't seen in ages before moving in to our new place!), and updates on our future adventures as they materialize. Now it's time to get back to watching one of many generic cop dramas which occupy weeknight TV... :)