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Okay so this is my first official entry. The rest have been emails that I copied and pasted. so I have a lot to write.

Funny story I forgot to tell you guys about. We met these two girls from New York that were staying in our room in the hostel. They were really cool so we decided to go sightseeing with them. Meribeth and I went to breakfast fully dressed and left the hostel to go to the IEP office. The girls were going to go upstairs after breakfast and get dressed so they can meet up with us. Well the girls show up at the office and one of the girls was wearing the exact same outfit as me. Pink skirt with a black tanktop and a black zip up sweater. I couldn't believe it since she saw me wearing it before I left. haha it was funny though and we laughed about it all day.

As far as softball goes, the girls are great. There are 3 teams that we practice with, A1, A2, and A3. A1's are the best and that will be our team. The girls are decent and we should have a lot of fun. i've been playing outfield and it looks like that's where I'm staying when I'm not pitching. It should be okay though because the teams should be pretty good, so I'll get a lot of balls. I've had a few pitching lessons and the girls seem to be doing pretty good. i had 2 more girls come up today and ask for lessons. It might be hard though because Meribeth and I want to move closer to the city which means farther from the field. We will see...
So today it happened, my first major encounter with their crazy wildlife here. We came home from practice and I walked into the kitchen to make a sandwich and a spider the size of a small country came crawling out towards me. I ran and leaped out of the kitchen to escape and the thing came running after me! What kind of spider keeps chasing you?? I screamed bloody murder and can you believe not one knock on the door to see if we were okay. Believe me they heard it, you can hear everything in this place. Anyways, Meribeth was brave enough to grab her shoe and start pounding on the thing. It finally died and it is sitting on our kitchen floor under a shoe because we don't want to get close to it. IT really was the size of like a peanut butter jar lid. Never seen any spider so big outside of a cage. If they get any bigger I'm getting on the next plane home!!
So, so far the animals I have seen outside of the wildlife park is an owl, wallaby's, cockatoos and other birds, possums, a gigantic spider, a gecko, and we have a very noisy fruit bat living in our back yard. We have a small mango tree and we think he eats off that. One of the girls I give lessons to, said she plays with the fruit bats and their friendly. I said that's cool come make friends with ours so he leaves our house.
The same girl got sooo excited when a goose came around the field. She said wow we don't see those very often. Out of all the things they have around here, she gets excited about a goose. It's so funny the differences between there and here.
Hmmm, lets see, the major differences... They write their date with the day first than the month. So October 5th is 5/10/2006. We're all confused. They use mostly military time here also, so we look at the date and minus 12 from the time. haha it takes us 10 minutes to figure out the time and day. no j/k but it does take a second look.
Obviously they drive on the other side. Scariest thing too when you see someone in the drivers seat knitting, or looking towards the back seat.
My favorite is when they talk they say things like I need to have a sleep, or I'm going for a shop. It makes me laugh. I said what's up to our coach the other day and she said up? nothing's up. haha. Apparently, that's not said over here. When we were giving lessons yesterday we saw a bunch of guys come down and play cricket. What a crazy sport that is. We're going to go to a match soon, the season starts up soon I guess, So that will be exciting. I'll take pictures.
There buses are pretty easy. We just get on the bus and ask the driver what to do. haha. They're all very nice so it's easy to do that. We can't understand the maps at all. They make me feel like we went to a country that didn't speak english. We always figure it out though and the buses are really nice, and they seem pretty new.
Tomorrow we're heading out to Byron bay, which I heard is one place we just can't miss. It should be a good time. We're taking the Canadian with us. Around the field we're known as the Yankees or the Yanks. Can't say I've ever been called that in my lifetime. But it's fun. So it's the three yankees and a canadian. I wouldn't be suprised if they don't know our names. haha. It's all in good fun though.
My mom and Julie have been calling me everynight on skype. It's an internet phone you can call people on for free. I can't say I've been in the best of moods when they call, but it's always right after our 20 mile hike from the bus stop back to the house and I've been looking for jobs the last few days. so it's been a little frustrating. We'll find jobs though and perhaps a new place to live. so far we're having a good time.
Well I guess I've rambled on long enough and I've told a lot of you all of this anyways. feel free to email if you have any questions or want to know about anything.

We have jumped right into life here. We've had three practices now with the team. They're okay. They're a great group of girls. We play on grass so that gets a little difficult, we practice from 7-9 so under the lights. We had practice last night and I played outfield the whole time, so I'm a little interested to see where I'll be playing when the other girl is pitching. We were leaving practice last night and we saw three wallaby's out on the grass. They're like kangaroos for any of you that don't know what it is. Um, I saw an owl in the tree the other day. We have a bat living outside of our house because we have a little mango tree. So we're thinking about moving to the city and taking a bus to practice. We're in the middle of nowhere right now and feel there is not much to see here. We're kind of stuck. We're going to look for jobs near the city. this weekend we are taking off and going to byron bay for three days because our first game got cancelled. I have been set up for pitching lessons, and I'm helping coach an under 16 team. so that will be fun. they're a little behind on skills here so that will be fun to work with that. I have been using skype with mom and julie, so if anyone wants to talk sign up with skype. It's free and it works great. except now I'm expected to do it everyday with them. So we're thinking about going skydiving over here. You can do it right on the coast. We figure if not now we may never do it. Right dad? We're planning a river rafting trip as well. Byron bay should be a blast and so we're really excited about that. it's about a 4 hour train ride but it will be worth it. The birds are amazing here dad, cocatoos, parrots, cukaboros (sp?), they won't shut up in the morning but they are beautiful, you would love them. Okay that's it for now.

5/27/06

I made it safe. The plane ride wasn't too bad. We slept most of the way. I almost got killed walking out at the airport because the cars come in the wrong way. haha but I made it. We took a shuttle and now we are just waiting for a room. It's been an experience already. It looks exactly the same as America here. The billboards are huge though and there are advertisements everywhere. We are going to head out and see the sights as soon as we can store our stuff. As most of you saw we brought way too much stuff. haha. but oh well. I don't know what it is but people were staring at us all over the airport. We must look completely out of place or something? I don't know. Anyway, the hostel is nice. We already met and English guy named Ben and a group of Australian guys just coming back from the U.S. and that was just at the airport. so I have a feeling we'll make lots of new friends. =) well I guess that's it for now.

9/29/2006

well, It's 5:30 in the morning here. This jet lag is killing me. I was feeling pretty sick with this cold and exhausted from jet lag so I feel asleep at 5:30 p.m. last night. haha. oh well. We still saw a lot of stuff. We saw the Opera House, it's pretty cool looking. We went over to the Rocks, which I took literally and thought we would see huge rocks everywhere. haha but no it''s just a place with stores and restaraunts. We ate there and I had a chicken sandwhich. I only had one meal yesterday because I fell asleep so early. So I can't tell you about any exciting food yet. Vegemite is a spread they put on toast and pretty much everything. and it's the worst thing I've ever tasted. It's so strong too. Everything tastes a little different, like the mayonaise, and ketchup and stuff, but it's all pretty much the same. And Palmer, I will for sure try one of the kit kats. I'm thinking mint or cookie dough. I really want to try these things called Tim Tams that I've heard a lot about. They're cookie (biscuits is what they call it) and chocolate filling or vanilla filling. Anyways, we also took a ferry over to manly beach. Let me tell you, so far Sydney beaches have nothing to offer compared to California beaches. They're small, and over here the water is freezing cold! The funny this is though the kids are all playing touch rugby instead of touch football. It's just weird to watch. Without the tackling and stuff rugby seems so wussie. haha. The ferry was pretty cool though. We almost got attacked by a bird though walking through the ferry. It flew up right toward are faces. haha us Americans are always making a scene. We planned on going to a bar last night but none of us made it. We all passed out and coudn't get back up. Another girl said by the third day you should start getting used to it, so hopefully we're up past 6 tonight. Tonight we get on a plane and go to Brisbane. Should be interesting with all our luggage. We'lls ee how it goes. We meet the coach and she's taking us to dinner. It sounds to me like were we will be staying it won't be so touristy so I think that will be good. Sydney isn't too exciting to me and I feel like we're in San Fran. It's so crowded here I can't believe it. The streets are filled with people at all hours of the day. The buildings are gigantic too. And I thought there was only a bunch of white people but over here it's just as diverse as America. So far anyways... I have a feeling where we're going will be a little different. We will see. That's all for nwo. I will try and write when I get to Brisbane but I'm not sure what kind of internet we will be able to find since we won't be at a hostel. I wil probably check my email one more time today so write back!! Love you guys!! miss you. Tell Jayden hi. and somebody let grandpa know, if he's not checking his email.

9/30/2006

A lot has happened in the last two days. We flew into Brisbane, and met a bunch of people at the airport again. Fun stuff! They were cool, offered to let us visit when we traveled around the country. Then we ended up over in Brisbane and got picked up by Tracie. She's super nice and all our luggage fit in the car. thankfully. We went to dinner with a bunch of the people in the club. They are all so nice and great. It's awesome here. So much nicer than Brisbane. We saw giant wild turkeys, and the prettiest birds I've ever seen wild. We're waiting to see Kangaroos and kaolas. We just moved into our apartment. It's cute. Very different, but okay. My room is kind of outside from the rest of the house which is weird. You wouldn't believe it though, there are 5 different sections of a house that they rent out, and the guy above us is American. I moved all thew ay to Australia to live next to an American. Crazy guy though let me tell you. I met two Jodie's today. One plays and one is someone's sister. Apparently, it's a little more popular here. We played softball today too. Itw as a lot of fun. Wow, I miss playing. It was awesome. We'll fit in fine here. They're about the same level. We are at a BBQ right now that we were invited too. These people are so awesome you have no idea. They treat us like we're family. We tried Tim TAms which are biscuits. mmm so good. I'll have to send some home. They claim they're chocolate is so much better than ours, but really it just tastes like chocolate easter bunnies. They don't really celebrate Halloween here so that's a little sad. um, lets see. Different words... Dodgy means like a bad job or sketchy. hmm, I just drew a blank. I'll come back to that. The prices at the grocery store are kind of crazy. Very expensive. Good food so far though. You're right they have chicken everywhere. Tehy tried to get me to eat lamb tonight, but I said I have to work my way into that. OH they call the bathroom the Lou here and they laugh at bathroom. A nappy is a diaper, a dunny is a toilet, oh ya and my favorite, the girl we came over to the house for a bbq and they said that you have to bring your togs. We were like what the hell? They meant your bathing suit. So funny. We tried some new beer, we met some police men. One of the ladies is a police officer so she's working on getting me a t-shirt for Jason from the fire station. They call Firemen Firery. They shorten pretty much everything. A mossy is a mosquito. Okay well that's probably long enough for now. I'll write more later. I have so much to say !! I will write a journal when I get consistent internet and pass it along to everyone. Love you all and miss you! Hope you all are well. Don't forget to print this out for Grandpa. I tried to send this to Ralphy but I do'nt know if that is his correct email so forward this to him. Talk to you all alter. I'll try to write by Monday. We're doing so much everyday it's hard to keep up and remember it all.