The Final Countdown

The clock is ticking as we are starting to see the beginning of the end of our time here in Australia. It's full on summer here - darn hot during the day with the smell of jasmine in the evening air which is really quite intoxicating. I mention that: a) because it's true, especially when you're eating at a restaurant that is open (we like to refer to it as "dining al fresco") and b) there's a freakin' cold snap going on at home and this is my chance to rub it in a little!

Nancy and I took the City Cat to the South Bank on Saturday and did a bit of exploring again. One interesting feature of this area, which was home to the 1988 World Exposition, is the large man-made beach - which looks pretty cool in the middle of the cityscape. This is actually a chlorinated pool but is designed to look like a real tropical beach. We didn't bring our suits but Nancy is threatening to "head to the beach" frequently while I'm back in North America - probably freezing (I'm going to be back in Orlando for a conference and then on to Montreal (via Boston) - departing this Sunday). There are plenty of great restaurants at South Bank and a fair representation of tourist destinations / traps if you take a quick hop over to the Queen Street area.

It's definitely cruise ship season here. We had the P&O Pacific Princess ship in on Saturday (as normal), then the Star Cruises "Superstar Gemini" on Sunday and then a Japanese ship that came in this morning which is staying until tomorrow evening. Too much traffic! I would think that if someone were looking to buy a "home" and looked at this apartment, they had better love the cruise ships off their balcony or this isn't the place for them! We do have one of the "Queen" ships - the Victoria - headed here the on the 26th of February, which will generate a bunch of people coming to Portside to see it when it docks. It's part of a 106 day trip around the world - yikes!

I'll keep this part short but I have finally reached a long anticipated milestone - my first 1,000 miles since I acquired my Nike+ "gadget" for my iPod Nano. I hit my 1,000th kilometer last year but it took me about 17 months to log the miles (or 1,602 kilometers) - something that is sort of incredible to me. I won't bore you with "it's equivalent to the distance from Muskegon to..." stories but I'm going to see if I can get my next 1,000 in a shorter period of time.


Last, and probably least, I find "The Soup" to be quite a funny show and it keeps me up to date on the strange things that populate U.S. television. Since this post is entitled "The Final Countdown", I thought this YouTube clip was appropriate to end with. Please keep those comments and /or e-mail notes coming - we're not home yet!