Invasion of the bogong moths

Last Thursday, as I walked to dinner with some friends, we noticed an abnormaly large number of moths collected around any light source. And I mean a lot. The entire sides of buildings were covered in moths. Crazy, we thought.

The next night, as some friends and I drank some beers on this headland overlooking the ocean, we noticed even more moths gathered around a light pole. There were enough that even when simply walking under the pole, they were flying in our faces. Strange, we thought.

And that's when they descended from every which direction. Moths in apartments. Moths getting into your food. Moths all up your face. Moths everywhere.

Turns out this happens once a year, when hoards of bogong moths (whatever those are) migrate. But because of some unusual winds this year, Sydney's seeing many, many, many more moths than normal. And how better to take advantage of this than to eat them! Ummm, or not.

Anyway, to the moths: it's been fun, really, but it's time for everybody out!

Who has two thumbs and doesn't have TB?

This guy!

(Uhhhhh, I guess it's important to note that I'm currently pointing both of my thumbs at me.)

But yes, I had a chest x-ray on Friday and despite rumors to the contrary, it came back tuberculosis free! So for those keeping score at home, that's one step further away from deportation and one step closer to a work visa.

I've had a pretty bad chest cold for the last few days, so leading up to the exam, I was positive that I had somehow contracted tuberculosis. Kind of like how, at some point in all of our lives, we convince ourselves that we have cancer. So when the woman at the health center studied my x-ray for what seemed like a full minute, while she had seemingly glanced at every other one for a few seconds, I was fully convinced that I was on the next plane home in my own little plastic bubble. But no! I'm safe for now.

Despite this cold, I forged through on Friday night, determined not to let a little illness ruin my time here. (Let's look past the fact that it's not like I'm here for a week or two; I probably could have taken the night off.) And much like the news team brawl in Anchorman, the night escalated quickly. A few beers soon turned into a few cocktails, which soon turned into shots.

Flash forward to 7:30 the next morning when I'm woken up by the guys in the apartment I'm staying at because they're getting ready to play some cricket. And my throat is on fire. I can hardly speak. Genius, Andy. Really genius. Anyway, the rest of the day was spent trying to make it through the rest of the day. Which was quite the struggle. Needless to say, I took it easy that night, stayed away from the alcohol and even passed out before England finished off Australia in the Rugby World Cup.

Still don't have a place to live, but I'm seeing some more places today and hoping to hear back from a few others soon. Let's hope it comes soon... living on a sofa in the living room of an apartment for four isn't really my bag.

The Pom-Pom Baseball Playoff Preview

Watching the Cubs-Diamondbacks playoff game earlier today, I noticed that the Diamondbacks had distributed white pom-poms to their fans. Naturally, this infuriated me. In fact, I was so enraged that I've decided to do a baseball playoffs preview despite the fact that we're three games into the playoffs.

Now granted, this was the first baseball game I've watched in at least three weeks, so most of my thoughts and musings are based on severe biases that have lived deep within me for years, a couple of articles I've read recently and just about every baseball-related podcast on the Internets. Without further ado, a team-by-team look at the playoffs:

Arizona Diamondbacks
There's really nothing more to add here. They gave their fans pom-poms. As in the things that cheerleaders wave. Then again, this is the same team whose local paper actually published a "Guide to Baseball" spread when they first made the playoffs in 2001. Somehow, this spread inspired them to a World Series. Will history repeat itself with the pom-poms? Ummmmm, no.

California Angels
If you're going to pass out anything for your fans to wave around over their heads, it should be a monkey. Uhhhh, and Chevrolets, goat cheese pizzas and bottled water. Anything else is un-American.

Cleveland Indians
I got nothing here. But here's to hoping they beat the Yanks on the backs of two starters, two relievers, Trot Nixon and nothing else.

Colorado Rockies
It's part smoke, part mirrors, but who cares? They're steamrolling right now, and based on the last three weeks, how can anyone not pick them to go deep into the playoffs? I say World Series.

Boston Red Sox
My very unbiased pick to win the World Series. And I know it's already been beaten into the ground, but J.D. Drew ended two innings in today's game (including hitting into a double play), leaving three runners on base.

Philadelphia Phillies
If the Sox don't win the World Series, I hope it's the Phillies. Because as everyone knows, they're my fourth favorite team. But really, let's let Philly win this. For the sanity of that city, and the stability of the entire Northeast. Think that's a stretch? Well, think of it like an SAT question. Philadelphia is to Iraq as the Northeast is to the Middle East; if that one area becomes destabilized, the entire region will be thrown into chaos. Santa Claus will be universally booed, people from DC to Boston will cheer when athletes suffer potentially life-threatening injuries and most importantly, we will continue to throw batteries at J.D. Drew. We've come to a tipping point, and it's about to spill over to the rest of the I-95 corridor. This is not a joke.

Chicago Cubs
If the Sox or the Phillies don't win the World Series, I hope it's the Cubs. Although I'm not sure what Lou was thinking when he removed Zambrano after six innings and only 85 pitches. Maybe there was a legit reason (as gracious as the local pub was to turn on the game, I wasn't about to press my luck and ask them to turn on the sound), but with the way he was pitching and his rubber arm, Big Z was good for at least another two innings. Oh, and Bartman really needs a hug.

New York Yankees
If the Sox, Phillies, Cubs, Angels, Rockies, Indians or Diamondbacks don't win the World Series, ummmmm... ummmmmm... I hope it's canceled. But here's my real dilemma: I want the Yankees to resign A-Rod. For three reasons. One, it makes it that much easier to hate him and the team. Two, despite being a very good player, A-Rod's teams have never won it all, which presumably precludes the Yankees from doing so as long as he's on the roster. And three, in the years after he left his previous two teams, those teams improved by a combined 43 games. Which means that A-Rod's potential departure will markedly help the 2008 Yankees. And I really don't want that. So although he's had only four hits with no RBIs in his last 41 at bats in the playoffs, here's to hoping he has a playoff performance just mediocre enough for the Yankees to resign him, but not good enough that people actually think he can perform in October. That's a reeeaaaal fine line. I'm thinking 6-for-19 with two HRs, five RBIs, one slightly-costly error, four strikeouts (one of which ends a rally), five walks, two SBs and two GIDPs in a hard-fought ALDS that the Yankees lose in five. But he has to hit that right on the head. Better or worse either way and I'm screwed.

Honestly, I have no idea what's going to happen in the playoffs. Minus the Diamondbacks and their pom-poms, I think any of these teams could win it all. As long as that team isn't the Yankees and there's no Red Sox-Yankees ALCS, I'll be happy. Because 2003 and 2004 left me more drained than Chuck Sheen at Heidi Fleiss' place. (Heyooooooo!!!) Although even if there is Sox-Yanks III, I don't have to deal with Yankees fans anymore. And that alone might be worth being here.

Holy crap, that was fast

When I came here, I figured I'd go some time without a job offer, let alone a job. A month? Probably a tad optimistic. Two months? Sounds about right. Three months? Wouldn't be surprised.

Try two weeks. No. Less than two weeks.

Still have to give the official acceptance, but barring an amazing interview with another agency tomorrow morning (with a very solid offer to boot), I will be a Junior Account Director on Tuesday.

Hot damn, I'm good!

My boring life

God, I wish I had something exciting to say about my life from the last few days, but it's actually been overwhelmingly and surprisingly mundane.

My last day of work was on July 20, and the 67 days since then have been fantastic. But now that I've actually started to look for work, I think the unemployment bug has finally caught up to me. And being in a new city and country doesn't seem to make it any better. I guess that the monotony of jumping through the same hoops for different headhunters every day can only be so fulfilling, regardless of where you are.

My one constant source of entertainment? The vicious Portuguese Chicken War being waged in my neighborhood. But it's late and I'm tired, so an explanation of that will have to wait for another time.

The defence against hating cricket

In response to my first post from Australia, some of you have told me to quit my bitching about cricket (and other Aussie sports), that I'm in their country and that I should heed the very motto of my own blog and just deal with it.

To those people, I argue that you don't understand what you're talking about. Why don't you get into your car on a warm, sunny Sunday afternoon, drive over to a field in your local Pakistani neighborhood, prop down a lawn chair and sit through hour upon hour of the most boring sport ever? Then, and only then, can you truly appreciate my misery.

I'm not saying that Australians (or the English or South Africans or Indians or, yes, Pakistanis) are somehow wrong or stupid for liking this sport. I'm just saying that I can't see how I personally could ever warm to it. But there are a lot of things out there that we as a culture can't understand. In China, they eat some ungodly animals. In Russia, a man once offered my family a spoonful of the lard he was eating out of a jar. In the Utah desert, Bear Grylls once ate two bird eggs: one that was raw (followed by the shell) and one that he cooked on a rock. (Or maybe he didn't eat those. But that's an entirely different topic, and if we went down that path, it would only infuriate me.) Or perhaps more aptly, Australians love vegemite.

In fact, I'm going to hang my hat on that last one. Liking cricket is akin to liking vegemite. It's not something you can learn to love; any appreciation for it simply comes from growing up with it. Now if any American out there can actually swallow a whole piece of toast with a nice layer of vegemite on it, then maybe I'll have to revisit this theory. But until that time comes, when yeast extract is at all palatable to an American, I'm okay with not liking cricket on the theory that I wasn't raised on it.

And this argument goes both ways, too. I can understand how Australians don't like baseball or football (gridiron, to them). They already have their own (bastardized) versions of both of these sports, so for them to appreciate our (perfect) versions is probably impossible.

There is one caveat to this argument, and that's the introduction of alcohol. For as we all know, alcohol makes everything better. I learned this firsthand the last time I was in Australia, in December 2004, when I went to my first professional cricket match. And while this game was going on in front of us, most of the crowd was intent on drinking their watered-down beers, collecting the plastic cups and building these:

That's right, BEER SNAKES! One section of the crowd would build their beer snake, hold it triumphantly over their heads and scream like the Scottish army in Braveheart after the They make take our lives, but they'll never take our freedom! speech. Then another section would follow suit with a slightly longer snake, so the previous section would respond with a snake, such as:

And this went on. For hours. And in between, the crowd heckled anyone who walked by in a suit, viciously booed anyone who didn't participate in the wave and joined in a very drunken rendition of Waltzing Matilda, as this man walked by:


So lest you think I'm giving up on cricket, rest assured that that's not happening. For once the season starts, I will be heading out to the Sydney Cricket Ground for some grog, a few more beer snakes and some Matilda.

Jobs, meat pies and The W Hotel

Had my first real job day today, with meetings at three recruitment agencies. And it's looking good for work! To be sure, the visa issue makes things more difficult, but everyone I spoke with was fairly optimistic that I'd be able to find employment relatively quickly.

In between the first and second interviews, I spent an hour looking for this meat pie stand outside of The W Hotel that Hannah raved about while I was in LA. In describing this place, Windward School's favorite photography teacher gave me every indication that The W Hotel was in the middle of the city, and even went as far as to say it was on George Street. But after an hour of aimless wandering, I gave up.

After some research back at my place, it turns out that The W Hotel in Sydney is in Woolloomooloo, which is nowhere even close to where Hannah described. (Also, on top of being one of the most ridiculous names ever, I believe Woolloomooloo holds the record for having the most O's in a city name. You know, in case that ever comes up in Trivial Pursuit.) The lesson, as always? When it comes to memory-related issues, never, ever, ever trust Hannah. Draw your own conclusions from this.