I think I’m now officially a North Queenslander. Not only did my first weekend in the tropics include a trip to a Cowboys game (well it was really a trip to a Manly game but who’s counting) but I also managed to survive my first cyclone scare. Tropical cyclone Larry managed to cause all sorts of mayhem up north and even though it didn’t hit Townsville it managed to postpone my first day of work. Well, it at least put it off until lunch time. I arrived in the office at 2pm in a fairly exhausted state having spent the previous night watching cyclone updates on TV. I wasn’t particularly worried about Larry as I have no valuables up here other than my car which is fairly comprehensively insured. Larry passed us by, leaving winds and rain in his wake. Many stupid local residents braved the killer jellyfish to experience a rare bit of swell at the beach. I was not one of those people. The prospect of being attacked by the killing stroke of a jellybean sized ocean dwelling monster doesn’t appeal to me at all.
In other news up here… The Cowboys beat Manly in a scrappy game which featured some dubious refereeing. I went to the football with an old friend of mine from Maclean, it was cool seeing someone I haven’t seen for many years and even if he is a Broncos supporter it’s nice to have someone else up here who isn’t in the grips of Cowboy fever. Football is like a religion up here.
I’ve found a permanent abode, I’m living in a house next door to the church up here. My housemates are Tim, a marine biology/science student who was president of the AFES group up here the same year I was president of QUT Christians, and Dave, A graphic designer who works from home. Dave is clean, Tim is messy and I’m the happy medium. Tim is also a wrestling fan. Those of you who have plotted (as in observed on a graph, rather than planned) my descent into wrestling fan status over the last year will probably be currently sighing or making disapproving clucks. It turns out wrestling fans have this different level of conversation that other people just can’t appreciate. Words that are foreign to others are now commonplace. It seems jargon is not restricted to the church. It’s nice to be part of another social subset.
Other than cyclone excitement things up here have been surprisingly smooth, new city, new house, new job, new church, new friends, new appreciation of fruit… someone once told me changing all these were amongst the most stressful human experiences. I’m not feeling it yet. In the wake of the damage to banana farms up here I went out and bought a kilo of yellowy goodness just to beat the price hike.
Kudos must be given to some commentators on my last post – Kutz for his grammatical prowess and my cousin Miriam for her cyclone pun.
I’m at work at the moment so no musical eliteness (or should I say 1337ness for you internet geeks) this week. However next post I aim to use song titles as many times as possible throughout my text. So that’s something to look forward to.