Yeah, yeah, I'm back!

From a window at it's international airport we could see downtown Sydney as a Qantas 747 is moved to a terminal.

This is short for now. We've been back from Australia for almost two weeks now and the jet lag is thankfully over. It took a longer time than usual to get over it...maybe having to deal with cold weather again and not wanting to get out from under the warm blankets early in the morning might have contributed to that. The trip back was actually pretty good, most of the flights were on time, and it was nice to arrive in Shreveport without having to drive back from Alexandria or Longview just so we could have cheaper flights.

Like I said, I'll get into our trip in a later posting. Since we've been back one of the worst things that could happen to the United States happened....the passing of Obamacare, the socialist health reform package that'll put us on the lower level of Euro-style health care that'll increase costs and decrease care as well as limit any innovation of medical procedures and care because there'll be no incentive to do so. Plus a ton of companies will be laying off people they can't afford to keep!

This STORY in the American Spectator is brief but it gives an insider's view of how inept the Administration is when it comes to their understanding of free-market business practices and how they are making things just a tad worse...make that a whole lot worse.

Heading Home

Just a quickie....it's early Wednesday morning in Melbourne. We're up and heading to the airport in about an hour. Wish us a safe journey!!!!

We're in Melbourne!

But, first, some pictures from the west side of Australia:

Perth: On Cottesloe Beach there was a large sculpture exhibition going on which included this piece of art with these sails. It was fun to watch with the breezes going on. Oh, and the temperature this day was 104 degrees!

Perth: Jonnene's sister-in-law, Olga, shows her daughter what she remembers of playing a guitar.

Perth: A week ago we had an outdoor "snags on the barby" meal with Christine and her man, Eddie, along the banks of the Swan River. "Snag" is Aussie slang for sausage...and they were delish!

Yeah, we're here. It's Monday night and we're in our room at the Best Western Atlantis on Spencer Street, right near the stop for the SkyBus so we can get a ride to the airport early on Wednesday morning. We spent last night up in Bendigo at the home of a couple of friends of Jonnene's and caught the train back to Melbourne this afternoon. It was probably the first time I've been on a passenger train since I was a little kid when we would ride between Minden, LA and Hope, AR. It was nice but I spent nearly the whole ride sleeping since we were dealing with a 3-hour time lag since leaving Perth.

Speaking of, we left Perth very early Sunday morning. Jonnene's sister and parents took us to the airport...which, BTW, had been and was being renovated big-time since we had been there in 2008. We figured the weight of our check-in bags just right: the limit we were allowed was 23 kilos (50 pounds) and each of our bags were pegged at 22! That means we had added about 27 pounds to our bags from what they weighed when we left the States. We have added quite a few things that we're bringing back with us including chocolate that Jonnene claims we will make last until June. Hope she's right!

Tuesday, we'll get an early morning run in the Central Business District (CBD) of Melbourne and we'll spend the day just walking around. Probably check out the Victoria Market, the gardens...just enjoy the day. We'll try to find a nice place to eat for our last dinner in Australia and then back to our room to finish repacking our bags.

More Oz Notes

The Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Parade that staged in front of our hotel in Sydney.

Here's the water polo team. Wow.

• Tonight (Wednesday) Jonnene and I are going to a restaurant called "That Little Mexican Place". The only other time we went there was in November of 2006 when it was brand new and we meant to go again when we visited in 2008 but didn't make it. It was a small place with about 7 or 8 tables and the guy who owned it, Gavin Bower, was also the cook. It was interesting that he cooked the food in his pajamas...well, they looked like pajamas. And he visited all the customers at their tables when there was a lull. He studied Mexican and Tex-Mex cuisine in Santa Fe, New Mexico so his stuff was very genuine. We're happy that it still exists and now has two locations!

• Right now, before we leave, Olga's highlighting Raelene's hair in the kitchen. Rae's is wearing something that looks like a water polo cap...sorta reminds me of the parade in Sydney (see photo above). The cap part, that is. Then you pull some hair through some holes and highlight those suckers.

Theeza plane, she's a-quiet, she's a-big, she's a-plenty nice-a...
....but her regular economy seats suck!

• We tried to get Premium Economy seats for our flight back to Los Angeles next week on the Qantas A380 since our regular Economy seats pretty much weren't to our liking. However, it would have cost us $2,200 EACH to upgrade since our current tickets were bought with restrictions. Well, okay, fine...we'll fly regular economy one more time, Qantas, but that's it! We'll gladly spend the extra money to get Premium in the first place and be a little more comfortable on that big plane. You know there are only 32 Premium Economy seats on an A380? That's more seats than the First Class "apartments" on the same plane (just 14). Meantime there's 72 Business Class seats and 332 regular economy seats. I'd love to ride Business......

• Jonnene and I have decided that we want to weigh as much or less on our return to the States than we weighed when we left for Australia. On our last trip we ate tons and gained quite a bit when we came back...visiting relatives who want to feed you will do that. So far we're doing okay. We're still eating, but not as much. I'm about 1.5 pounds lighter right now and I think Jonnene is around 2-3 pounds lighter. We're also running nearly every day and it's hot enough to make us sweat a lot. And we're walking all the time. Seems to work.

Dogs in Oz

Angel sneaks a peek into our bedroom window early one morning.

Ben walks along the beach after a quick dip and a roll in the sand.

I've had a couple of unexpected run-in's with dogs on this trip that weren't pleasant. As a result, I have a hole in a pair of shorts from an attempted bite and a pair of mangled Bolle' sunglasses. The hole was a result of a large dog named Chase who belongs to Jonnene's cousin, Christine. We had visited their house the same time we went out to see her aunt and uncle. I was the only male at the cousin's house and Uncle Bev had warned me about Chase earlier, that the dog was aggressive and had bitten a neighbor. I wasn't that worried about it and was confident that I could handle the situation, simply by ignoring the dog and staying away from it when possible. When we arrive, Chase is barking like crazy and spinning in circles behind the fence...a very anxious dog....not a good sign. And he's pretty big. So we go in the house, visit a bit and go out the back to see Christine's beautiful back yard. Chase comes up to me and tries to "herd" me away from the ladies in the group. I ignored him and walked by him, and once we're in the yard everything was fine. He did show signs of claiming space so he was definitely territorial but pretty much left us alone and even played. Then we walked back to the house and suddenly he was trying to separate me out again. But he seemed friendlier this time and I stopped to pet him. Initially it seemed to be going good but I saw the demeanor in his face change and he started to growl. I stopped touching him, stood up and started to walk away. He didn't like that, I guess, and went behind me and took a bite of my shorts, probably trying to bite me directly. The nice thing was that the shorts are baggy and he didn't come close to my hind quarters at all. But he put a nice hole in my shorts...it was a bite meant to do damage and it did. Since he belonged to someone else and he hadn't actually bitten ME, I yelled at him and he backed off a bit. I told Jonnene what happened and she relayed the message to everyone else. Christine moved the dog away (probably not the right thing to do because it doesn't teach the dog anything) and we went inside to inspect the new redesign of my shorts. Christine was mortified but I told her it was okay, no harm was done. However, I do wish I had come back at the dog and showed it that it didn't own the space it was protecting. I wouldn't have hit it but I would have come back at it to show who was dominating who.

Then there's Angel, my sister-in-law's new dog which is a Kelpie mix. Actually a very nice dog but energetic, anxious, and has a few habits that it'll either grow out of or will have to be dealt with. But she's sneaky and we learned to keep doors closed to keep her from taking things that don't belong to her. She'll take things outside, chew them up, bury them, or hide them somewhere. In a way, it's funny but not all the time. Well, she managed to get hold of my Bolle' sunglasses with the prescription lens insert...somehow she managed to sneak into our bedroom without anyone noticing. We came home from an errand and Raelene found the glasses with the earpieces totally chewed up but, fortunately, my lens were shaken loose and were in pretty good shape. I'll just have to order a new pair of frames when I get home and things will be fine. But now we're keeping an even closer eye on Angel.

Fortunately I've had some better experiences with dogs on this trip. We got to see Sophie's old playmate, Ben, this past Sunday. He's a few years older with two new hips but still has a playful disposition and doesn't sit still for long. I met Ben on my very first trip to Australia in 2003 and he's always been a friendly dog. You show him some affection and you've got a friend for life. It's always something to see when he meets Jonnene...he sniffs her, realizes who it is, and immediately begins looking around for Sophie. Alas, Sophie's in the States and the two former playmates never see each other again. It really makes you sad but that's how it goes.

Australia 2010 - My Sixth Voyage

The Sydney Opera House as we saw it last Friday, February 26th.

Yeah, yeah, I know. I'm way late on updating this blog as far as our trip to Australia is concerned. It's been busy enough, it's been fun enough, and the trip is going well so far. This entry is mostly quick thoughts and observations of the trip so far.

• Our flights to Los Angeles were excellent examples of how to cut an expected 4-hour time cushion in LAX in half. We got to the airport in Shreveport in plenty of time. Mom brought us over and hung out with us until we felt it was time to proceed through security to get to our gate. Jonnene took a little longer to get thru because her arm sling needed some extra going-over by the TSA folks there. When we got to the gate we found out that our flight to Dallas was going to be delayed by almost an hour, and it was. Well, almost, about 50 minutes later...and our jet had been replaced by a turbo-prop. Well, okay, the pilot puts on the burners but we still get to DFW much later than planned....but we manage to get to our connecting flight (on the opposite side of DFW, by the way) with time to spare. But it didn't matter....we actually leave the gate, pulling out about 50 yards when we stop for a long while. Then the pilot comes on, saying that we're returning to the gate because he doesn't like the sound of our left engine. We couldn't tell if the sound was odd but if the pilot doesn't like it then I'm fine with not flying! We find out that a hydraulic pump in the engine has to be replaced and we leave the plane to sit around the gate area. About two hours after we were supposed to be in the air, we finally reboarded our flight and headed on to LA. We arrive at LAX with just over two hours before our plane to Australia is supposed to leave, so we rush to get our bags over to the Bradley International Terminal and check in. Well, miracle of miracles, we fly through check-in and security with hardly a wait in line...and find ourselves with over an hour to kill before we even start boarding the plane!!

• We flew on the new Aerobus A380 that is the jewel of the Qantas fleet. First off, the plane is NICE...it is extremely quiet (you can easily talk to anyone without raising your voice and be heard clearly). It is big and has plenty of amenities such as a "pantry" you can visit at any time to get drinks and food. You can see a tour of the aircraft HERE. However, we had our problems with the economy section. First off, we're never flying it again after this trip. It has its pluses but not enough to overcome the tighter spaces and the amazing amount of tilt the seats have that let the one in front of you practically hit you in the head if you're leaning too far forward when the passenger in front drops his seat back. Suffice it to say that we will fly Premium Economy whenever we fly Qantas internationally in the future. More leg room and wider seats...of course you pay more for it but both Jonnene and I think it's worth the extra expense. We'd prefer to fly business but I don't think we can afford the +/- $10,000 it would cost for a seat round trip!

More to come....it's Saturday night here and my eyes are drooping....