perfection.

How can you not love Altona?!

Memories...

...of almost SIX months ago! Time is flyyyyying!

Gia!

This is Daniel Giansiracusa... and he's the nice boy that we got to meet after the Bulldogs defeated the West Coast Eagles 134-74. Ok... so it was mostly little kids getting his autograph... but I think our American accent makes it pretty clear we have no idea what we're doing!

Priscilla

What an entertaining way to spend a Friday evening!!!

Happy ANZAC Day!

Grid system

Every time I drive around North Melbourne I long for Chicago's grid system.

Crystal clear

I love that this labelled photo is being used to explain an "umpiring error" that occurred in the final minutes of the Bulldogs game. Here you'll see some guys jumping, some guys not wanting to get in the mix, and some stats in bubbles above their heads. What you don't see is a Bulldog then falling from an injury (legit? fake? who knows) and a guy who's no where in this picture being awarded the free kick. Clear? Crystal. Who says footy is confusing!

Carrie is coming!

Our first visitor... we're SO excited! Carrie will be here in TWO WEEKS!

What IS footy?

A lot of friends from home have asked us what IS footy? Here's a few factoids about Aussie Rules Football for you:

-It's kind of like American football, but without the pads and helmets. And, the players play offense AND defense.

-It's kind of like rugby, but no one tapes their ears down.

-It's kind of like soccer, but you can also use your hands.

-It's kind of like cricket. Not really, but the field is round like in cricket.

-It's kind of like baseball, but one player's head is the ball and one player's elbow is the bat.

-It's kind of like running the 100 meters... if you were going to run it for 100 minutes instead of 10 seconds.

Still undefeated!

The Western Bulldogs are still unbeaten after 5 games... this is the first time they've started off like this since 1940-something! Ok, ok, so technically yesterday was a draw, but there's still no tick mark in the "loss" column for our boys. I think there's no shame in our player pretending he was hurt in the final seconds so that a better player could line up for the game winning goal! Haha! I heart footy.

Aussie Tucker

Here's a list of a few things we will NOT be having today:

-deep dish Chicago-style pizza from Giordano's
-apple turnovers from Ideal Pastry
-hot chips and guacamole from Uncle Julio's
-potstickers from Hong Huan
-apple fritters from Old Fashioned Doughnuts
-"The Big Night Out" from The Melting Pot
-BLT flatbread from Charlie's
-medium coffee, extra cream, extra sugar from Dunkin Donuts

How do they do that!!!

How on earth is this possible? Watching this in real time was crazy because the Essendon player flattened our Bulldog but nailing the back of his head with his knee. It just raises the question... how the hell do they jump that high?!!!

Throw out everything I said about how we were going to watch the game from home. It turns out the game airs on a 3 or 4 hour delay. We just couldn't possibly wait that long, so we showed up at the stadium and hoped there were still tickets. Standing room only? Sure... why not?!

Footy

We are doing our part to help the Western Bulldogs hit their target of 32,000 season ticket holders. We consider it part of our duty as temporary Australian residents. We have been to 3 games so far, but tonight is an "away" game (even though it's being played in Melbourne) so we'll have to watch it from home. Our footy gear arrived today. Now we can sport our membership cards on a fancy lanyard and rock up to the stadium like the true lost-in-another-country Yankees that we are!

Dunkin

It's so unfair that the ad at the top of my Hotmail account is almost always for Dunkin Donuts. It taunts me. It tortures me. It makes me run to the cupboard and pull out what is left of the Dunkin Donuts coffee beans that Jason and Mairead sent. Thank you guys... you're lifesavers.

Hmmm...

Hmmm...

...What do I do with this?!

The affected area

Each of the little digital pushpins here represents a house that needed a Red Cross visit. No problem! :)

Where's Jen?

I apologize that our blog has been neglected lately... but this picture will show you where I've been. We were activated for 6 days as a result of the wild and crazy windstorm that tore apart Melbourne and it's eastern suburbs last week. Since then I have been in the EOC (Emergency Operations Centre) at the Red Cross as the State Controller. It was an incredible learning experience... that's for sure! I love the Red Cross!

Comments

Unfortunately there are people in the world that think that "heywalsh" is a great place to post their spam. As a result I have changed the settings so that no one can leave comments anymore. This makes us very sad, but virus-free. If you have a comment, we'd LOVE to hear it... so feel free to email it to us. You know our addresses...

Good Tip

How many Americans got run over before these helpful hints started appearing on the road?

yikes.

www.theage.com.au

Melbourne Weather

Wednesday: Gusty northerly wind shifting squally west to southwesterly during this evening. Areas of raised dust. A brief shower tending to rain periods later. Possible hail and thunder later tonight.

Thursday: Showers and fresh to strong west to southwesterly winds, easing later. Possible early hail and thunder in the eastern suburbs.

Friday: Clearing shower or two.

Saturday: Fine.

Sunday: Fine.