Perth

Wow, what an unoriginal title...sorry.  I got nothing.

Anyway, I thought I'd post before going away from the internet for a week as to make it less daunting on the flip side.  Hooray for internet holiday!  Funny how I am literally the most internet addicted person I know (except for maybe one person) and I am soo happy to not have the ability to log into anything for a whole 5 days.  It is a true addiction I guess.

I've spent three days in Perth and the surrounding area.  Perth is on the southwest coast of Australia.  It is having a population and resources BOOM.  Australia loves its mining.  Perth the city is very very beautiful.  Its small, only 2.4 million people...but its rising quickly.  they have the prettiest park I've ever sat in, Kings Park.  It sits on a hill and looks over the city sky line...so nice. 

I'm not actually staying in Perth,  rather a suburb called Cottesloe.  Its right now the beach, which would be nice except that its winter!  And despite what all you midwesterners say, its freaking cold.  And if you were here you'd be cold too.  I heard that there was frost on the car windows this morning!  But in general Cottesloe is really pretty.  2 things I learned is that the beach is called "Heath Ledger's beach" in the guide book.  I dont know if thats because he used it before he died, or if they're just making a cheap connection.  I know Ledger was from the Perth area, but I dont know if it was Cottesloe.  I kind of hope he wasn't from Cottesloe.  There is so much money here, it would totally change my opinion of him, lol!  The money here makes me sick, but then I realized that it was out of jealousy, cuz if I had the means to own a mansion a block from the beach here, I would snatch that up in a heartbeat.  I kind of reminds me of the money side of Evanston on the Lake.  Combined with the niceness of Beverly Hills, Florida where my grandparents lived.  Take what you would expect a mansion on the lake in Evanston to cost, add a few mil because its Australia and everything is expensive, then add a few more mil cuz its Perth.  Yea...kinda makes you sick.

I'm halfway between Perth and Fremantle (called Freo by the locals).  Fremantle is a destination spot.  Reminded me a lot of the Woodstock Square, but the whole city.  I was going to go to Rottsnest Island (Rotto by the locals) yesterday, but it was raining so I nixed it.  Rotto is a small island named by Dutch explorer because he saw a lot of rats on the island.  The rats are actully quokkas that are only found on the island.  And there's no cars allowed on the island, so everyone rents bikes and tours around, its only like 24km all around.  There are also a lot of shipwrecks in the area because of reefs and rocks.  So its a great place to snorkel...except its cold!  After I nixed Rotto on Wednesday, I decide to tour around Freo only to find out that the museums I wanted to go to were closed.  Ugh.  So I got home super early and read my book for a long while.  Today I went back to try Rotto again, and getting there at 11am, had missed the last ferry.  Grr.  So I went to the museums that were closed yesterday.  I liked Freo better today, even though it did hose me two days in a row. 

Tomorrow I leave at 6am to meet up with my tour in Perth city center.  Woooohoooo!  I was going to include pictures on this long rambly post, but the stupid computer at the hostel is not cooperating.  And its a mac.  Just sayin...

Why no comments

I know you read it!  Yes you!  So tell me so!

Sydney Is: Vivid!

If you've been waiting for pictures than this is for you! This post may be will be heavy on the pictures.  There is a festival going on in Sydney, its been going on for the entire month, making it hard to call it a festival.  But none the less, I present The Vivid Fest:

Sydney Opera House

Sydney from Circular Quay

Not part of the festival, just cool blue lighthouse light-posts that fit the theme :)

I really do live in Oz!  Can you say Emerald City (appropriate that I just finished reading Wicked and the sequel, Son of a Witch)

The coolest looking church I've ever seen...

St. Mary's Cathedral is an impressive cathedral as it is, the lighting makes it unreal.

Had lots of religious undertones.  It is a church after all.

One of my favorites!  Starry night-ish

Designing the Nation.  History of Australia.

Might be hard to tell, but the tan part is a picture of colonial-time-Australia.

Looks like Cinderella's Castle

I love visitors!

It's always nice to meet up with a friend, which is not to be over shadowed by the coming excitement.  Its especially nice when said friends smuggle you goods from home!!  Like care packages from your mom :) 
Warning: This one's for the ladies.  Fellas, you may want to skip ahead to the cool pictures in the next post.

Lachlan came back to Sydney this week.  And as my own personal mailman, brought with him a bag full of things from my mom!  Master packer that my mother is, she managed to send chocolate, peanut butter (yes those things are in Australia, but its not like you can ever have too much), peanut butter cups (cuz while they have both peanut butter and chocolate in Australia, they don't have anything that combines the two, its very sad.)  Over the counter medicine that I'm partial to, new underwear that fit me (may seem silly but I'm not spending $10/pair on non-fancy underwear, and mine are all too big) plastic applicator tampons (they don't exist here and every non-Australian girl complains about this), and a whole buncha makeup that's ridiculously expensive here!!  And she managed it get here in a Time Out Chicago bag, one of my favorite magazines.  

Oh wait, did I forget one?  What's that grey thing everything is sitting on you ask? Well that would be the DADDY DAYCARE ROBE!  That's right, my uniform in Boston.  The ugliest, most comfortable, warmest robe that was given to my brother-in-law when he worked on the Daddy Day Care movie that I confiscated last winter.  It felt really indulgent when I saw it in the bag and realized I didn't need it cuz its not that cold here.  But I'm already wearing it and thankful to have it! I just have to figure out how to get it home...like everything else.

New design!

I'm quite in love with this new design!  I can't take much credit for it....its just a template, but I still love it!   

Survival of the Fittest...

How I'm surviving stu-vac

I thought I might share with whoever actually reads this the type of questions that are leading me to drink alone.  And this way I can say that blogging is not taking away from my studies.  Clever, eh?

An experiment was designed (Science 120, 12th nove 1954) to investigate whether the smoke of  cigarette papers is a carcinogenic agent of lung tumors.  In this experiment 74 mice were used, of which 38 served as experimental and 36 as control animals.  The experimental mice were placed in the experimental cage and the controls in the control cage of the smoking machine.  This machine was set to smoke108 cigarette papers per day, six days per week for one year.  The environment of the control mice was exactly like that of the experimental animals except for the smoke from the cigarette papers.  At the end of the experiment the animals were sacrificed.  There were 13 tumors in the experimental and 11 in the control mice.  

The author states: "There is a very slight preponderance of tumors in the experimental over the control mice which is not significant by statistical analysis...The results of this experiment indicate that cigarette paper has little or no effect on the generation of lung tumors in albino mice."

Perform the appropriate statistical analysis to check the first of these conclusions.  What is your conclusion from the analysis? Do you agree with the second statement in the author's conclusion?

Did anyone make it to the end of the problem?  Yea, its rough.  Try deciphering that for 6 hours a day, over and over.  It drives a person to drink.  Just in case you're curious, which I doubt you are, that answer to that question goes like this:

There is little to no evidence to reject the null hypothesis that there is a difference in tumor rates in albino mice exposed to smoke from cigarette papers and those exposed to smoke from a smoke machine (x2= .11 with 1df; p=.73).  Of the mice exposed to smoke from the cigarette papers 34% developed tumors, while 31% of the mice exposed to smoke from the smoke machine developed tumors.  The difference is only 3% which does not fit in with the calculated 95% confidence interval of 18% to 25%.

Living in the moment

My life at the moment.  

I seem to have acquired a great many things that I have no idea how I'll get home.  

Exhibit A: A FIT BALL.  Are you kidding me!?  Why in the hell would I get a fit ball when I'm living abroad for a year?  Oh cause I decided to join the fancy schmancy training class that requires you to buy not just a fit ball, but also a resistance band and boxing gloves. 

Exhibit B: Scuba fins, and boots, and gloves, and snorkel and mask.  Why did I decide to take up activities that required so much gear?  I did not think this through.

Exhibit C:  I've also at some point decided that I needed 4 new bags, 3 pairs of boots, 2 pairs of flats, 2 pairs of sneakers, and many new clothes.  That may sound like a shopaholic to you, but remember I've been here for 4+ months, only brought flip flops and running shoes with me, and recently lost 40lbs.

Between studying for exams, taking on another workout class, and my busy weekend, my teeny room will remain in this state of disarray for some time to come...

Murphy's Law

Is it Murphy's Law that says that everything that can go wrong will go wrong?  I think it is.  I generally find it bad form and glutton for punishment to call out Murphy's Law.  There is ALWAYS something worse that can go wrong.  But tonight definitely felt like one of those nights.

My plan for the day:  shopping, Uni, dinner with family of family.  Simple.

Shopping was fine.  I got home with enough time to unpack my loot and get ready to head straight back to Uni.  Uni was pretty good.  The cute boy in my class (one of the 5 boys in my program) complimented my brand new boots I had just bought!  But class got out about 5 minutes late, and I had only 15 minutes to get to Sydney Harbor.  Usually I get out of class 15 or 20 minutes early so it should not have been a problem.  Tonight it was a problem.

I tried to call Janet, the woman I was meeting, when I realized I was going to be about 15 minutes late for dinner.  Then I learned that my phone ran out of credit.  And I forgot the voucher at home.  Thankfully I can text when I run out of credit, so I text my roommate and ask her to find the voucher and text me back the number and pin.  Thankfully, she's home and able to help me.  Then I realize that I have nothing to write with...why did I change bags?  So I use my eyeliner to write the pin down.  I top up my credit, phew, I can now use my phone!  Oh, but I forgot the number of the hotel at home.  That's ok, I'll just call information!!  Wait...I'm not in America.  I doubt 411 would work here.  I ask the lady sitting next to me, she didn't really know what I was talking about, eventually we get on the same page.  There IS an information in Sydney.  Its 12455 if you were wondering.  Call information, they connect me to hotel.  Hotel puts me through to Janet's room.  Janet is supposed to be meeting me in the lobby right now, she's of course not in her room.  I leave a message anyway, just in case.  Call information again to be connected to the hotel and try to leave a message with reception.  They are surprisingly unhelpful.  I leave a message, but I'm not sure that the woman wasn't just placating me.

This was all while I thought I was only going to be 15 minutes late. After a bit I realize that the bus isn't really getting far, the entire city is grid-locked.  My own personal hell.  I give up on the bus half way and jump in a cab.  Cab is a bit better but not much.  After 20 minutes in the cab, and $20 worth (the only cash I have on me) I ditch the cab and run the last 6 or so blocks.  I've now made Janet wait 45 minutes for me.  And I can't find her.  I go to reception, they give me the phone to call her room.  She's not there.  I'm sure she's gone to dinner by herself by now.  I wander around for a few minutes aimlessly, contemplating getting a drink at the hotel bar.  Then the valet comes and asks me if I'm Kassi.  Yes!  Yes I am!  I just missed Janet, she's gone up to her room.  Thankfully, she was just going to check for another message from me and came back down a few minutes later. 

What in the world did we do before cell phones?!

Dinner was great, but I meant to bring a few things with me for Janet to deliver back to the states.  And guess what...I forgot.  Do you sense a theme to my day?