The Teeny Tiny White Thing

One minute you're trucking along, totally normal, going about your day. The next minute, "Ahhhh, get this microscopic stabbing thing out of my eye!" That was me Monday. I was taking a shower around 5pm and all of a sudden I felt something in my eye. I've dealt with this about a thousand times before, so I did the usual stuff. Since I was in the shower I flushed my eye a little with water, I closed my eye and moved it around, I tried to flush my eye with eyedrops, and I even held a hot compress on it after a half hour of other things not working. Eventually it came down to, "If I don't take a cab to the nearby clinic in the next few minutes, the clinic will close and I may have to deal with this pain all night". I also didn't want to damage and irritate my eye any further than it already was in my attempts.

It's a good thing I got to the clinic five minutes before it was about to close. The first doctor couldn't get it out. The second was able to get the teeny tiny white thing off my cornea my after numbing my eye and using a device that was essentially a pin; if he hadn't been able to get it out I would have had to go to the hospital. Apparently this mysterious white thing had lodged itself into my cornea, and it was scratching up the inside of my eyelid for the last hour. 

Now my eye is on the mend and I have some eyedrops to keep it from getting infected. The whole ordeal of going to the clinic and then getting a prescription only took about an hour and I was still able to make it to trivia only five minutes late. 

Beware of teeny tiny white things, though. They strike when you're least expecting it. 

What an exhausting weekend.

Saturday we went on the Sydney Pelagics and Nature Watching Tour (the above photo was taken by someone on our tour). This is no little two or three hour tour, it's an all day affair. The boat went out to an area where there is an underwater mountain where fish and sea birds tend to congregate, and then to the continental shelf. We saw several species of albatross, which are quite majestic and graceful since they have such a long wingspan. We also saw a few other bird species we hadn't seen before, several humpback whales. and dolphins. Bird photos can be seen in Michael's Flickr album (the new photos are mostly under the "Albatross, Petrels, and Shearwaters" heading. The trip was pretty fun except for the two times they stopped the boat for extended periods and it was rolling from side to side quite a bit, making us not feel so great. I could have done without that. As soon as we got moving again, though, things were fine and it was a nice, cool, sunny day to spend out on the water. After returning, we had another delicious dinner at Micky's and relaxed.

Sunday was all frisbee all day. We played in a local one day tournament, mostly with and against friends and local rivals. It was good fun and we brought home the victory. And now we are sitting on the couch under a big warm blanket nearly about to pass out before 8pm. 

Ticket to Ride

Perhaps re-watching Parks and Recreation subliminally inspired me, but made arrangements for us to visit Yosemite National Park during our trip back to the states in September. Michael and I love the national parks and are want to see as many of them as we can. Yes, we own the National Parks Passport and collect the stamps. Between this, seeing Lake Tahoe for the first time, enjoying attending a wedding with friends, and seeing our friends and family back home, these next two months cannot pass fast enough. 

I've been away from the states for a year straight at this point; the longest ever for me. It'll be nice to go back when the weather of both places will kind of match up. Last time I went back from the middle of winter in Australia to the middle of summer in the states. Early spring here will be sort of similar to early fall back home, I think. 

On an unrelated note, since Michael and I go to boardgame nights semi-regularly, I have found a new game I love: Sheriff of Nottingham. It's a game that involves bribery, mind games, deception, and lie-detecting, and leads to a lot of laughs. It's also simple enough that you could play it with people that are not necessarily gamers. This game has shown me that I am at best an average liar, but I am really good at detecting when other people are lying. Michael is the opposite; he is pretty good at lying, but bad at detecting when others are lying. 

Add this to the list of reasons we know Michael's brain works very differently from mine. I'm left-handed/ambidextrous, he's a righty. I can visualize anything in my mind's eye, and he does not think visually at all. I often think in words, like an internal monologue, he doesn't. Brains are so interesting. 

Mmmm... brains... I have no way of bringing this post full circle so I'll just end it here :)

All the Time and Energy

My two-week-long school holidays are in their final days. It has been a pleasant change to have all the time and energy to do everything I've wanted and needed to do. Appointments complete. Errands complete. Extra projects complete. Apartment clean. Travel reservations booked. I think the school break will end just as I start itching to have more work again. 

Proud from Afar

So proud of the US team for winning the Women's World Cup! 

Independence Day Activities

It took a year, but we have kind of got a regular climbing thing going now. We usually go late Saturday morning with a few friends and then go out to lunch afterwards. This weekend we tried The Pie Tin, which we have only heard people rave about. It lived up to the hype. They have traditional Australian savoury pies with mince or steak, but they also have more modern/fusion ones like mac n' cheese with spinach and pumpkin, duck, spiced lamb, lentil, etc. The crust is just perfect, which I think is what sets apart a mediocre pie from an amazing pie. On the side you can get a choice of salads or chips (fries) or kumara chips. Kumara is a fancy word for sweet potato, and they are delicious. They also have a ton of sweet pies for dessert, like whipped lime, tim tam, snickers, oreo, lemon meringue, etc. They are all also picturesque and delectable. We will definitely be going back to the Pie Tin. Between eating there and the Bourke St. Bakery, I'm gonna need to climb, run, and bike more. Worth it.

After lunch we went to see Avenue Q at the Enmore Theater in Newtown. It was an impressive display of puppetry, and of course it was funny. I suppose this was the most American thing we did on the 4th, other than over-eating. 

We ended the long day with dinner at our friends' place at Bondi Beach, which included playing some classic Pac-Man, tasting homemade crackling, and discussing terrible riddles.

Happy Independence Day!

Flatball

Last night was the finals in my Wednesday night frisbee league. We lost the game at universe point, making a big comeback (but not big enough). We came in second in the league, which is pretty good, especially considering our best thrower/captain was absent for the last two games and I had to act as captain. Michael came to cheer us on; it was his first time visiting the league even though he knows a lot of people who play there. It's funny to end on a loss but still consider it a victory of sorts. In two weeks the league will start up a new season and I will have a new team.