Friday, July 30, 2004

We spent the whole day helping Mandy at work finish her PhD thesis, printing out, fixing pictures and graphs. Her project was on the New Holland Mouse which are sooooo cute, unfortunately they are extinct in Victoria now :(  She handed the thesis in half an hour ago and it is all very exciting :) I cannot wait to hand in my own PhD thesis although I have not even started yet hehe... Better finish the Masters first.
We have a very nice neighbour which is called Ron. Ron is a widower and was very happy to get to know us and he walks past our house every day with his dog. When we went to the conference we asked him to collect our mail and he was so happy to have something to do that he still does it. We went over to him with some chocholate  when we came back but he still puts the mail under our doormat. Its a bit strange, we cannot be annoyed and ask him not to do it but it is a bit weird to have a neighbour that is a bit too nice. He is the sweetest thing so we dont want to hurt his feelings... A bit tricky situation...
Anyway, have a good VERRRRSLUNARMANNAHELGI weekend everyone, happy camping, BBQing, hiking, sunbathing... everything that I cannot do at the moment... :o) I will be relaxing at home, preparing myself for a busy week, going to help Kylie trapping and the forecast is RAIN... lovely...

Tuesday, July 27, 2004

We got a very high electricity bill the other day so we had to stop heating up our house as much as we did... so now I have got a new lifesaver... A lovely wheat-bag-thing i put in the microwave and it heats up... ahhhhhhh... nice and warm. The house is absolutely freezing (yes I know I keep complaining sorry), but we just cannot afford another electricity bill like that. So we just have to survive untill it warms up again, and I cannot wait for that to happen. The wheat-bag is definately one of the best things I have got here... Winter in Victoria is like camping on cold days in Iceland :) But I am a Viking and I will survive this and NO more complains I promise :)

Monday, July 26, 2004

Lazy and a bit sickishie weekend has just passed, me and Ellen rented soo many videos :) Ellens dog Ladi (Aladin) came to visit us yesterday and spent an afternoon there and that cheeky dog found some of my mums precious dark chockolate in my room and ate it !!! He is a Beagle and is getting a bit old and constantly thinks about food, very greedy but extremely cute so I forgive him :) Last night we went to the movies and saw King Arthur which was not too bad, very different :) At first we thought we would be the only ones in theatre, but then a couple came in and then another couple and of ALL the seats available they had to sit right in front of us stinking of cigarettes. How ruuuude !!!

Friday, July 23, 2004

Ohh, been sick all week. Still a bit sickish but could not stay at home any longer, day time tellie is soooo bad :) I will remember this year as the coldest year in my life !!! And now we got a very fat electricity bill so we need to cut down the use of our heaters... which is like stepping back to the stone age for me. I cannot wait for spring ... (autumn euro time).
I went to Melbourne last weekend, it was Kylies birthday on friday and we went to a great indian place for dinner. Saturday I went over to Fred and Judy's and met up with the whole family which was great. Peter is going overseas and wont be back untill I have left so I dont know when I will see him again... :( It was great catching up with them all and I was very happy when little Kate wanted ME to read her the bedtime story :)
I am looking forward to a relaxing weekend so I will hopefully be fresh and jolly again next Monday :) Gus and Frank are playing tonight in Geelong and me and Ellen might check them out but we will see how we will be tonight. Ellen and Kylie have been trapping all week and are very tired, the minnies they trapped all have POUCH YOUNG already :) jeiiiii.

Friday, July 16, 2004

We are going to Melbourne tonight :) yeiiii, its Kylies birthday today and we are going out to celebrate. Tomorrow I will catch up with my australian "substitute" family which I have not seen in ages and ages. Peter is going overseas next week and wont be back untill I have left so I am losing my surfpartner... :(
Hope you all have a great weekend :)

Tuesday, July 13, 2004

I knew I had forgotten to tell something from the conference... The SCRUFFY awards :) To scruff is to hold an animal on the back of its neck, like lionesses do with their cubs to move them around... A very common thing for a mammalogist to do when handling small mammals. But in the Australian Mammal Society they made the special Scruffy awards, and they go to the person who says something scruffyish or acts in a scruffy manner, that is makes a fool of himself. Last year the award went to a guy who presented his data but then said it was very dodgie data but he wanted to present it anyway :) This year went to an elderly guy which had behaved in a scruffy way for years. Among the scruffy things he had done was not to provide enough alcohol to a conference few years ago and then he had spilled some of that precious wine on another guys shirt :) I guess you had to be there :) A Scruffie award candidate this year was a guy who turned up a day late to the conference and missed his students presentation...

Steinunn sent me this one... I thought it was hilarious :)

Two tourists were driving through Wales. As they were approaching Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch, they started arguing about the pronunciation of the name. They argued back and forth until they stopped for lunch. As they stood at the counter one tourist asked the blonde employee, "Before we order, could you please settle an argument for us? Would you please pronounce where we are...very slowly?" The girl leaned over the counter and said,. . . . . . "Burrrrrrrr, gerrrrrrrr, Kiiiiiiiing."

Monday, July 12, 2004

Ahh Im back :) Had a great week in South Australia... We drove to Tanunda in Barossa Valley on Sunday and the conference started Monday. Lots and lots and lots of mammal presentations, some more interesting than others. I was glad to hear that koalas in over"koala"populated Kangaroo island were not going to be killed like they said in the news few months ago... And it was interesting to hear that contraception has been produced for kangaroos... they also talked about truckdrivers moving feral pigs between places (very strange and NOT easy to move grumpy feral pigs), neonsticks put on little gliding marsupials (like flying squirrels) to see where they fly to and radiotracked cats who go once a week to a football practice because they have sausage sizzles after the game... They kept the best presentation for last and the conference ended with everyone wetting themselves and crying of laughter listening to a very special french lady speaking about the Echidna Spike and orchid seeds, with french accent and high pitched voice... I know it may not sound very funny but it was priceless... We could not go to Barossa Valley withouth doing some wine tasting so that is what we did :) Lots and lots of wine drinking and I bought a lot of bottles of course... I dont regret buying them though because it is the best wine I have ever tasted, nammmmm... We went on a half day tour on thirsday to a sancturay where they have bilbies, voylies and bandicoots hopping around in feral free areas. And we got a special treat, the guid had rescued a baby wombat when its mother was hit by a car and had it in his beanie (hufa), it was the cutest thing I have ever seen... :) When the conference was finished we drove to Adelaide and spent one night there in a bit dodgie motel and then we went to HAHNDORF... yes it is a litle german village with bradwurst, sourkraut, lederhosen, coockoo clocks, rauchmannschen and old fashioned candy (lollie) shops and ice cream shops... I was in heaven and it felt like Christmas because as you perhaps know my family still celebrates german Christmas since we were there in 1982... We stayed in a very cute hotel called Zorro where there were Zorro posters everywhere and the owner was called Zorro and the cook was called Mama... Warrawong earth sanctuary was next and there I saw PLATYPUS for the first time in my life... jibbiiiii, it was very cute :) Yesterday we drove back home and it took the whole day. The highlight on the way back was driving past a group of EMUUUUS which completely made my day :) I cannot understand people who dont love them...

Friday, July 02, 2004

I spent the morning washing our uni car we will be taking to the conference... very very dirty and smelly. The stinky car smells like rat poo so I will have to buy a car deodorant... Sunday I am off to the conference and probably wont be able to check my e-mails. We will be there for a week, my poster is ready and is looking very shiny and new :) Hopefully it will be a bit warmer in South Australia than here... :) Have a great weekend everybody !!!! :o)