Thursday Andrew and I went down to King O’Malley’s pub in the city for a Movember party. Movember is to bring awareness to prostate cancer and men’s depression. To do this guys grow mustaches and people donate money for them to do this throughout the month of November. Of course Andrew had to participate, thank god it’s gone now but it was a month of ridicule at Andrew’s silly mustache. A lot of the people at the party dressed up to highlight the mustaches, we had builders, 1920s gangsters, the Swedish chef from The Muppets, 1970s cops and so on. It was quite a group. So I could fit in a bit I bought a fake mustache to wear for the night. It worked pretty well and I even got called out by the politician hosting the event as a nominee for Miss Movember. Since I was nominated I had to get up on stage with three other girls, all the guys we were with said I was robbed when I didn’t when but it was all just good fun to even be nominated.
Friday was Andrew’s big department Christmas party. I had to work but after I had Andrew’s mom drive me into the city and drop me off at one of the pubs to meet some of Andrew’s friends Jamie, Dave and Steve. The four of us hung around with people from their department for a while before we decided it might finally be time to head over to King O’Malley’s to meet up with Andrew and some of his other friends. We journeyed on to a few different pubs eventually before finally hailing a cab home.
Saturday we did a bit of shopping to get some stuff for the house and some things for the Thanksgiving meal I was making on Sunday. We also had to move some more furniture over and Andrew’s computer which made him really happy, he quickly set up his computer and projector so we could watch tv giant size. It works really well, with surround sound and everything. I tried making the sticky buns for Thanksgiving like Jess and I used to do with Mom every year, last year in London they turned out great…this year, not so much. I don’t know what I did wrong but they were not good. It was a bad start to my first Thanksgiving where I was going to have to cook a whole turkey for the first time by myself.
Sunday we got up bright and early to clean and so I could start cooking. I got the turkey into the oven on time and it made the place smell great. Before we knew it friends started showing up, first came Damien and Bonnie, who just had their first child Connor a little over a month ago. Then Kate showed up and finally Will and Pip, each bringing something with them to help make my day a bit better so I didn’t have to do everything myself.
We let Damien carve the turkey because neither Andrew nor I trusted ourselves to do it. The turkey turned out really well, moist and tasty. After we stuffed ourselves we took a short break lounging in the living room while Will finished baking the apple and blueberry pie he made. It was so delicious and the perfect ending to the meal. I would steal the recipe from Will but he didn’t end up following one, instead he looked at a few of them that Pip printed out and then did what he wanted, it turned out so well.
Everyone went home briefly before Will came back to grab Andrew and I to join Damien and Nathan to go to the Tuggeranong festival which is a weekend festival in the suburb we live in. Ian Moss was playing Sunday night and the boys were really keen to see him, he wasn’t too bad and they did a nice little fireworks display at the end, which was kind of cool. It was a good end to a fun filled weekend.
Monday I received official word that I was hired on a 3 month contract to work at ASADA which is the government sports anti-doping agency. Kate works there and when there was an opening she talked to her boss about me. It’s a big pay raise and government work means I get some great public holidays. I have to talk to my boss about what I can do to keep the job, it probably means getting my permanent resident visa a few months before I was going to but if it means keeping the government job it will be completely worth it. With the offer on the table I told my boss at the motor village that I was giving my notice. She was very understanding and happy for me, everyone at the motor village was really happy for me. So I start next Thursday, which will be awesome. I work in Kate’s team, which is just three of us. Stephen, our boss, made sure to ask us both if we would be ok working together, so it pays off big time that we get along so well.
I’ve been trying to keep up with jazzercise as much as I can, I went once this week and even stood in the front row. Instead of going for a second night I instead went to something called “Personal touch” which is done by the jazzercise people and I got a free trial of since I’m new. It’s a small class and you work on muscles, so we did a lot of stretches, moves with weights and resistance bands. Most of the moves engaged our core which means today my ribs have been so sore, I can hardly bend over without feeling a pull. I know it means the exercises are working but it’s killer right now.
Tomorrow morning Andrew, Kate and I get up at the crack of down to catch a plane over to New Zealand. Both Andrew’s parents are from there and we’re going over to see the relatives and go to the Walker Christmas party, which is held this weekend every year. So it’s going to be a big meet-the-relatives go round, only fair since Andrew did it with my entire family last year after we’d only known each other a few weeks.
I will tell all about the New Zealand trip and starting my new job next weekend.
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