Merry Christmas from Chiang Mai

We spent our Christmas Eve playing with elephants. I just wanted to wish everyone a happy and safe Christmas, wherever you are! 

Good afternoon, good evening, and goodnight.

Last night we went to the Nerd Cave to play some boardgames with friends. It's essentially a community center for people with nerdy interests. Michael and I are baffled as to how this place exists/stays in business because we can't see how they make much money. They provide a space for people to play boardgames for free, computers set up for gaming (which cost a small fee to get a pass to use), and they have a DDR machine and a small handful of arcade games. They sell a few game-related items and candy and snacks, but that's it. I think when I was 15 I had a business idea for a place like this, where people could go to hangout until late at night, where they didn't feel pressure to spend money. There are couches and tables and even a minimal kitchen with a microwave. The Nerd Cave reminds me of a "grown up" version of the YAC from my adolescence, without the middle school dances on the back porch. It's in a decent second-story location very close to Central Station, so the rent can't be that cheap. In theory it's a nice idea, but I'm not sure it's a long-lasting business model. It must work because of people's love for the idea of a place like it, and that's how it gets its support. I feel like we should donate some money to them or something. Also, I'm not even sure if anybody really works there. There are usually two guys hanging out at a desk playing Magic the Gathering or something, and they say "hi" when you walk in, but they could just be anybody, or volunteers. In any case, the fact that this place exists makes me happy because it is essentially an anti-consumerist business. 

Tonight Michael and I are attending an advanced screening of Big Hero 6 at the Moonlight Cinema in Centennial Park. We will get to use our picnic backpack for the first time.

As the holidays creep closer, it still feels not at all like the Christmas season.  We are preparing for our trip to Thailand and Laos, where we will spend Christmas and New Years. My current expectations are that I will fall in love with gentle giant elephants, Christmas and New Years will be loud with fireworks, and that I will eat pad thai, pad see eu, and mango with sticky rice every day. I am also anticipating the city life to be overwhelming, in a sensory way: the smell of exhaust, lights, everyone trying to sell you tourist things, hustle and bustle. If we can't enjoy the same traditional family Christmas I've come to enjoy for the last 30 years, then why not go 180 degrees the other direction and do something completely different. 

Since we will be travelling for the next two weeks, my blog updates will be inconsistent. Happy Holidays, everyone!

December Events

The Melbourne Hat tournament ended up being a lot of fun. I don't know if it quite lived up to the high expectations that were set, but we certainly had a good time. My team came in 5th, which is better than one can usually expect out of 24 teams. Michael's team didn't fare as well, but he had a decent time too. The fun thing about a hat tournament is you end up getting playing other teams that you have friends on, and we ended up seeing quite a few familiar faces.

This tournament also supplied a lot of meals, the best being breakfast on Sunday morning. Fried eggs cooked into toast with a side of bacon really hits the spot when you've burned a lot of calories and have a lot more to go. 

The Saturday of the tournament was very sunny. I always wear and reapply sunscreen, but this time it was such a long sunny day that I ended up sunburning a little of my scalp near my hairline, because who puts sunscreen in their hair. I learned my lesson; there's a reason Australians are known for wearing hats all the time. 

Switching gears, if you've watched the news lately, you've heard about the crazy siege that went down in Sydney yesterday and early this morning. Personally, I was affected very little by the ordeal, other than the fact that most parents picked their children up early from the center. Michael was downtown when everything happened, and was mildly inconvenienced. He wanted to workout at his gym but the gym was fairly close to Martin Place and was closed. He left work early and was unable to take his regular bus home, but was able to catch a train after a slight delay and work the rest of the day from home. 

Obviously it's sad that this happened, period. It hits close to home when it literally happens close to home, something many DC area natives like us faced during 911. My heart goes out to all who were affected and I am happy and proud of everyone involved with #illridewithyou. I would participate but my commute is not long enough to help anyone. It would be more like #i'llridewithyoutwobusstopsthenyoureonyourown. 

I noticed in my groupon email today that the Lindt Cafe (where everything went down) still has a deal right now available to buy. I wonder if the cafe will be able to bounce back from everything, or if they'll be shut for some time. 

Anyway, this time next week we'll be in Thailand. Hopefully the rest of the week will be smoother than the start.

Door to Door

Michael and I have started using Box Fresh, a fruit and veggie delivery service, and it's kind of wonderful. It's similar to a farmshare, like many of some of our DC friends subscribe to. The difference that I like about Box Fresh is that you don't need to sign up for a certain number of weeks or months. If you want a box one week, you order it. If you want to set it up to come every week or every other week, or some other frequency, you can do that too. You can see ahead of time what will be included in next week's boxes, and decide based on that. The produce comes super fresh, so I don't have to dig through a bin of avocados to find the perfect one, and everything lasts several days (and some items a few weeks in the fridge). 

We end up with some fruits or veggies we might not otherwise buy, and then have to get more creative with our cooking/prep. Sometimes the creativity goes well, like discovering kale is really good in smoothies. Sometimes it does not go so well, like discovering that arugula is awful in smoothies. 

The most wonderful thing about this for me, personally, is that I don't have to lug it all home like I have to do with almost all of our other groceries. They just appear at our apartment, like magic.

Frisbee Players in Hats

Just a quick post to say we're still alive, just busy as usual. This weekend we will be away for a big ultimate frisbee hat tournament, which we have been told by several people is one of the most enjoyable annual tournaments they have ever been to. Needless to say, we have high expectations. 

ABC's

Art and Adventure. Boats and Birds. Cars and Cocktails.

Saturday, Michael and I went to the Sydney Olympic Park area, which has several parks within it. The whole area is very bike-able, and we were able to see some of the old wrecks in Homebush Bay which now have trees growing on them. We were also able to do the Brick Pit Ring Walk , which is supposedly home to some rare frogs we couldn't hear because of the incredibly loud Sydney 500 happening very nearby. We peaked over the fence to watch the cars whizzing through the tight curves for just a few seconds. We saw a wide variety of birds in the nearby marshes and mangroves and made it back to the train station, yet again, just in time before it started pouring and storming.

Today we had ate lunch at the Royal Botanical Gardens and Michael (with some help from a park guide) sighted a badass powerful owl, the largest species of owl known to live in Australia. 

This was the first owl either of us had seem in the wild, so it  was a pretty exciting (yes, I know we are nerds). 

While there, we also visited the POP art exhibit at the Art Gallery of NSW, featuring art from Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein, Keith Haring, etc. After Michael left for frisbee practice I went on to the Chuck Close exhibit at the nearby contemporary art museum. They were nice exhibits, but overpriced (I say that as someone from DC, the land of free museum). 

We topped the weekend off having a drink with neighbours at the annual building holiday party, a very informal affair that is still going on in the hallway as I type.