Sadly, I think the subject of this post could be about either of the two events that have been dominating my time/mind lately: my graduation from college and *hangs head in shame* the American Idol finale. Discussion of the latter subject will have to wait, as I’m sure there are enough people on the internet debating the showdown of the “guy-next-door” versus the “guy-liner.” (Oh Seacrest, where will my Tuesday nights be without your witty punnings…). Yes, the internet certainly doesn’t need another thousand words about how Kris, despite what Simon Cowell wants you to think, is incredibly talented, interesting, and entertaining, and about how it’s possible for both Adam and Kris to be successful, and how Idol producers got a big Eff You from the American people and, and…*breathes deeply* Yes, clearly, I’m focusing on more important things in my life. Graduation. Yes. That. Let’s recap: 

Two weeks ago I headed into Boston for probably the last time in a while. That fact has yet to sink in. I probably won’t be back to Boston for at least a year or two. *Deep breath* Ok, continuing…the first part of my week there was dominated by Senior Week events. Saturday, Jillian and I headed to Martha’s Vineyard for a rainy day excursion. Highlights of the day included eating at a ridiculously cute diner right out of “Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives” and seeing this: 

The other events were all essentially drinking parties in various “exciting” locales. First up was a beach party in Quincy, MA, which was really just an excuse to get us all to ride on school buses one last time and have a large dance party. 

Jillian and I on the bus!

The next event was a Habor Cruise which should really be labled awkard encounters at a party you can’t leave, as that is really what it is. Luckily, there was ample space for dancing to forget the awkwardness, and I got to wear my fierce new green dress.

All in all, the night was a success for nothing else than for allowing me (and pretty much everyone on board) to break out into a rousing rendition of “I’m on a Boat” at least once.

Later in the week, I got to start checking off items on my “Things I Always Wanted to do in Boston” list. First up was going on the Sam Adams Brewery tour. Our tour guide was super fun, and not just because she gave us three glasses of free beer, PLUS a free glass! 

Surprisingly, one of my favorite events was the COM (That would be the College of Communications) reception, as most of my friends throughout college were in COM, since I lived on a COM floor my freshman year and most of my classes have been populated by the Communications crowd. I saw and talked to a ton of people I haven’t talked to in forever, realized even more people I know are moving to LA, and caught up with one of my best friends who is doing Philadelphia Teaching Fellows next year, who promised we could swap war stories next year and start our own Charter School in two, which will be named after some Arrested Development quote as that is all we talk about most of the time. 

Friday, my family descended on Boston. Stephanie arrived super early on the red eye. Her friend from grad school, Jenny, came later in the afternoon, followed by my parents and grandparents. We all hung out Friday night, me taking pictures of everyone else playing street baseball. (I guess I should note here that I have three cousins between the ages of 6 and 9 that live in Boston. It wasn’t just my grandparents playing t-ball.) It was like something out of an adorable suburban movie. 

Saturday, we did the final touristy thing I’ve been dying to do since I got to Boston: the Duck Tour! It was epic, of course. We heckled people from out hot pink boat, and I got to drive in the Charles River. Cheesey fun was had by all. (Pictures are coming, and will most likely go on my photoblog. All the the pictures on here are from my point and shoot. Duck Boat pictures, obviously, required the DSLR.)

Saturday night, we headed out to my favorite restaurant in Jamaica Plains for my final celebratory dinner. We got cupcakes from Sweet (again, photos on my other camera have yet to be uploaded….), and everyone toasted to me, as I toasted to my family in Boston for being amazing these last few years, and everyone got full of off a crazy good meal. 

Sunday was…surreal. Putting on my cap and gown, I felt like a fake. College graduates are old. They are adults. They don’t scream and fall on the floor when their favorite Idol contestant wins. (Yes, that happened, followed by my yelling “You’ve got to be f*cking kidding me!” when an emergency alert came on 10 seconds later.) They don’t sing at the top of their lungs to Miley Cyrus every time they get in their car. They have jobs and houses and *gulp* families. Yes, I know I’m getting ahead of myself, but this is my last milestone before things like “marriage,” “kids,” and..ugh….bills. I don’t feel old. I don’t feel like an adult. So sitting there in that cap and gown thinking about how long ago the last time I donned one of these ridiculous outfits seems yet how fast it all went. The actual ceremonies were surprisingly great. At the COM ceremony, I realized how many people I actually knew in school and got completely weirded out by seeing them all in cap and gown. We had a speaker from the TV industry, which to all us TV and Film kids was a ridiculous shock after four years of having Journalism and PR shoved down our throats (and being pointed to the basement of the arena for line-up.) The speaker for the undergraduates reminded us all about our first class in college, and I flashed back to the day I received my first C ever, in that very class, and cried about it for days and the amazing feeling I got when I ended up with an A- in the class. Ah, memories. Then I walked up on stage, shook my department chair’s hand, and got my diploma folder. 

After a ridiculously quick bite to eat at U Burger (oh, U Burger french fries….I think I’ll miss you most of all…) I met up with Jillian to line up for the big, all-university commencement. It was madness. Larry Bird AND Steven Speilberg were awarded honorary degrees. Our Congressmen, Mike Capuano, gave an excellent speech that started by giving a verbal beat down to all the haters and complainers that seem to flock to BU in huge numbers for bitching about how uncool our commencement speaker was. Afterwards, I filed out with thousands of my fellow new alumni, gave Jillian a huge hug, and left the BU campus with my parents for an indefinite period of time for the first time since I was 18. 

So…I’m done with college. I know (kind of) what the next two years of my life hold for me, but after that, who the heck knows. It’s weird that my life now has nothing guiding it, nothing organizing it, nothing saying this is where you should be at this age: there is just me, making decisions, living my life, doing what I can and what I want. It definitely hasn’t sunk in yet. 

(And now, even though I liked my commencement speaker a lot, I’ll leave with you Ellen’s message for the class of 2009, because she’s awesome.)

Yes, it’s true. Even though I’ve been slacking on blogging here, I’ve found it necessary to start up ANOTHER blog. It seems crazy, but really, I think it will make me blog more, because I keep wanting to post pictures here, but I don’t like how small I have to make them to fit into the columns, so a new one-column blog it is! 

So CLICK HERE, and check it out! It’s obviously still a work in progress, and I’m not sure if I’ll just be posting pictures or posting how I took them or what I’m learning (as I’m clearly still learning)…hopefully, I’ll figure it out soon enough. Until then, go! Look! Yay!

Today, we called the Toyota dealer to tell them we’d be in this Friday to give the Prius one last look before “deciding.” My mom mentioned that my only qualm with the car was the lack of AV hook-up for my iPod. The dealer then mentioned he might be able to do something about that – 45 minutes later, he calls back and says the mechanic there can change out the stereo system and add in an AV hook-up…all for the same price! I feel like Hannah Montana over here…you know, cause I’m getting the best of both worlds? Nothing? Moving on…

The rest of my day was filled with Passover shopping (I’m attempting to keep Passover this year, at least from Wednesday until Saturday. We’ll see how this works out) and work. Mainly, this week is going to be the obstacle in the way of  my beautiful new (to me) car.

I’ve been in a weird funk all week, internet wise, and I’m not sure why, because I’ve had some things I could’ve blogged about.

I started working part-time job at a portrait studio. It’s actually the perfect part time job for me, besides the fact that I can only work for about three months before I leave. They knew that hiring me, though, so I don’t feel terrible about it. I’ve been training all week, learning how to use the fancy equipment (by photographing adorable stuffed animals on baby pillows) and memorizing all the package prices. It’s fun to utilize my burgeoning photography skills into a money making situation and to learn a little bit about portrait photography in the process.

Using fancy DSLR’s all day, however, was making me more and more sad that I hadn’t been able to buy my own DSLR that I’d been lusting after since July, especially now that I’m making money (and got a sweet tax refund), which had been my excuse for not buying a camera for the past two months. That mild sadness and frustration then combined with stress over my TFA readings (which are alternately making me feel mildly prepaerd and unbelievably unprepared) and the occasional lonliness of being at home with only  my parents to hang out with, thus making me super fun these past few days. After being sick of the funk, I  instigated many, many mildly tense conversations with my parents about how I’d really like to use my money to get this thing I’ve been wanting to get for months and months as a small reward for working hard, graduating early, and living at home to save money. I somehow convinced them it was a sound idea, found a way to finance it  and today, I went to Best Buy and got myself……

A BEAUTIFUL, WONDERFUL, NIKON D90!!!! SUPERPHOTOEXCITEMENTWOOHOOO!!!!!

I, of course, came home, waited impatiently for my battery to charge, breezed through the user’s manuel, and started snapping photos of my only available subjects:

My mom’s uber cute, super tiny dog, Sookie.

My dad – who happily posed for a ridiculous amount of photos.

And of course, myself, in the obligatory mirror shot to show off myself and my beautiful new toy. (There was one where I looked way more exicted, but I figured I’d attempt to look cool for a brief moment.)

Hopefully, I’m now offcially snapped out of the funk. This week I’m finishing training at work and will hopefully be moving on to photographing actual children soon. Next Sunday, I’m meeting Jillian in New York to see Sleepwalk with Me (more on that soon), then a week from Tuesday, I’m heading back to LA for a week!

For now, though, I’m going to go take pictures of snow.

In an attempt to counteract my general laziness of late, I’m going to try to cram the rest of my Australia trip into one post, or I fear it will never be recorded for posterity. This is going to be epic. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

(To read my first two recaps click on over to here and then here.)

After Sydney, we headed down to Sarah’s parent’s beach house on the Mornington Peninsula. (It’s like Cape Cod for Australians!) We made a quick stop at her mom’s work to FINALLY meet the famous Helen. She was, of course, 100 times lovelier than I could have hoped and quickly became my Australian mother. After a quick lunch we finally headed to the house, which was adorable! It was covered in amazing flowers and trees, with an oasis of a backyard and a huge screened in porch. It was beachy and homey and just absolutely fabulous.

That night was Christmas Eve so we settled in to watch Carols by Candlelight, a Melbourne tradition of famous Australians singing every Christmas Carol known to man. We danced to High Five and cried at Silent Night and then settled into bed. Christmas morning was a little emotionally overwhelming. First, we opened presents! Sarah’s parents got me an Aussie Bar-B-Q cook book along with some other fine Australian items (chocolates, Tim Tims, Australian ice-molds, etc.), which was ridiculously sweet of them. Despite my amazing trip thus far, I ended up calling my family and getting choked up that I wasn’t with them. It was the first time I’d ever been away from my Dad’s side of the family on Christmas, and even though I’m Jewish, it’s still a big time of year for my family. Sarah’s mom gave me a big hug and all was alright, espeically when we got dressed up, and drove down the coast for an amazing five course Christmas meal complete with ocean views and party poppers filled with paper crowns and plastic mustaches.

The rest of the Christmas and Boxing Day was a blur of enjoying Entourage marathons, playing with Sarah’s dogs Jackson and Griffen, pushing our way through crowded Boxing Day sales at the mall and generally relaxing.

Sharon and Jackson on the beach

Saturday, the day after Boxing Day, Sarah’s parents had a big Bar-B-Q with all their friends and family. It was great to meet more of Sarah’s friends and talk with some more real Australians about our trip. Sharon and I figured out at the end of the day that we ate for 5 straight hours – starting out with meatballs, meat pies, sausage rolls, and other hors devours and ending with grilled lamb, chicken, and anything else you can think of. I’ve never been more full but it was completely worth every bite.

Sunday, we had another shopping excursion on Chapel Street, meeting up with Sarah’s friend Taff, who looks like an Australian Lauren Conrad but way nicer. We shopped and ate (sadly, at TGI Fridays…why must these thing spread?) and ended the day seeing Slumdog Millionaire, which Sarah and I then talked about the rest of the night. (Seriously, if you have not seen this movie, stop reading immediately and buy yourself a ticket. Right now.)

Things get a little blurry in my time line here…I believe the next day Sharon and I took off on our own to take in the Melbourne Aquarium. My favorite part was probably seeing all the real life Finding Nemo characters and convincing Sharon to face her fear of sharks in the Shark exhibit.

Nemo!

Monday night things got a little interesting – We decided to take in Melboune by night, which we hadn’t done yet and which was beautiful. After walking around a bit, Sharon decided she wanted to hit up the Casino along the Yarra River, since she’d never been gambling before. After taking in the Casino’s spectacular light show (note the intense sarcasm) we made our way over the slot machines. Having both been to Vegas before, Sarah and I explained to Sharon how to play the slots then sat by and watched. After a few rounds, some chairs down the row opened up and we decided to play a few rounds ourselves while we waited for Sharon. I put in a $2 coin that quickly ran out then put in another, figuring that would be my final bet as Sharon was going down quickly. Then, Sarah had some luck and won $8! We were excited to be able to pay for a cab ride home. On my end, I was down to my final 2 cents and bet it all on one last go. I was about to get up, when the guy next to me shouted “Oo, you are doing so well!” I was confused, but then I saw that my last bet had turned into one of those mini-games that comes up sometimes. The guy next to me seemed super excited about it,  but I had no idea what it meant. It reminded me of the game that came up when I won $15 in Vegas, so I figured maybe I’d add to our cab fund. The game involved flipping over cards, like in a memory game. I started picking cards randomly, because honestly, slot machines make little to no sense to me. But then the cards kept matching and the guy next to me kept getting more and more excited, until I turned over one last card and everything started flashing. The guy pointed to the top of the game yelling ” You won big! You won big!” I thought for a second he was pointing to the $64 prize, and I was pretty pleased with myself. Then Sarah noted that the big prize was flashing…the $1850 prize. Yep, I won the big jackpot. On my final 2 cent bet. Sarah and I started absolutely freaking out! People came over to congratulate me. A woman from the casino came and made me sign a slip of paper then brought me out cash in a locked black box. All the while, I looked like this:

I still can’t believe I won. I also can’t believe people asked me if I was going to keep playing. Hell no! I took that cash and ran. I really wanted to go out and get drinks, but Sharon was a little miffed about my winning when I didn’t really want to go gambling in the first place, so I settled for going home and attempting to explain to my dad in a 4 minute phone call what had just happened. I’m currently saving my winnings (which are sadly much less in US dollars) to buy my new MacBook!

After the excitement of the casino, I was glad to be headed back to the beach on Tuesday to stay at a huge vacation house with 20 of Sarah’s closest friends for New Years. Looking back, I think our three days at the beach house were some of my favorite days of the whole trip. For three days, we watched the boys play their own weird “catch” game based on cricket (complete with beer and cigarettes in every hand that wasn’t holding a bat or a ball), played cards (I totally kicked ass at poker), watched movies, played drinking games, lounged on the beach, and talked and talked and talked.

The boys playing "cricket"

Everyone hanging out our first night at the house

Hanging out with Sarah’s friends added so much to my trip. I wasn’t just a tourist in Australia. I got to talk to all these people my own age about their lives, their views, their jobs, and about things of absolutely no importance. I loved seeing how they saw America and vice versa. They were also unbelievably accommodating  and friendly and so much fun. I wish I could be friends with them all the time! New Year’s Eve was especially entertaining as everyone got mildly ridiculous and I got an excellent Australian New Year’s kiss (or pash as Sarah would say.) I was more than a little sad to say good-bye to everyone come Thursday.

Luckily, Friday was filled with the excitement of Sharon and my tour to Phillip’s Island. Basically, we got on a bus in the morning, and headed to an Australian winery, then to a wildlife park where we got to feed Kangaroos and pet a baby Koala. (Sadly in the state of Victoria, you can’t hold the koalas. Fail.)

Sharon and the Kangaroos!

The day ended on Phillip’s Island with the world famous Penguin Parade, which is this huge tourist attraction where you go watch the tiny penguins come up the shore and into the dunes on the beaches every night. It was amazing – all these little penguins waddling together in giant packs up the beach and into the hills, all like they knew exactly where they were going, totally unbothered by the mass of spectators there. I recommend it if you think you can resist grabbing a tiny penguin and running home with it.

Saturday, we had another outing with Sarah’s parents, who by this point were officially our Australian parents. They took us to a place called Soverign Hill, which is an old west type town from Australia’s gold rush. They had horse drawn carriage rides, gold panning, and amazingly cheesy street performers, including a little old man who played the accordion and told us he had a niece who was a gynocologist in Kentucky. “Maybe you know her!”

Us with some (we assume) struggling Australian actors

This man was AMAZING

Sarah’s dad entertained us by buying a large walking stick and showing off his color guard moves. All in all, a lovely day.

Sunday was mildly depressing, as Sarah had to leave us. During the course of the trip, Sarah and I realized we are truly soul mates. I didn’t think I could feel much closer to her, but I can definitely say she is and will probably always be one of my best friends, despite the fact that a 20 hour plane ride separates us. She completely understands me (my love of staying in and watching television, my love of Nikon digital cameras, my love of adorable Australian boys…the list goes on and on) and provided me with a once in a life-time trip. Saying good-bye to her was definitely the only downside to the whole experience.

Sharon and I attempted to cheer ourselves up with last minute shopping, and later that night, Sarah’s friend Nick (who may or may not have been my New Year’s kiss…) surprised us by renting Pineapple Express and taking us out for our final dinner. (I told you Sarah’s friends were freakishly nice!)

Monday Sharon and I, somehow miraculously, packed up all our stuff and headed to the airport to fly back to the good old U.S. of A.

Somewhere over the Pacific Ocean

I ended up staying in LA for the next week, catching up with my best friends from the LA program, Grace and Patrick, hanging out with my sister, shopping with some sorority friends, and showing my future LA roommate Josh around the area I hope we end up living in. I, of course, hit up Joan’s on Third and had a major celebrity sighting (Jennifer Anniston, Courtney Cox, and David Arquette had dinner where we were getting drinks then walked RIGHT BY US out the back door and into a swarm of paparazzi. Total LA moment.) The whole time, though, all I could talk about was Australia.

I sincerely hope I get to go back one day.

"Victoria - THE place to be" - I couldn't agree more.

THE PITTSBURGH STEELERS ARE GOING TO THE SUPERBOWL!!!!!!!!!!

My family has been tense ALL day waiting for the Steelers Ravens game, as half my extended family loves the Ravens and has been talking smack all season, especially at dinner last night, making this extremely gratifying.  

PLUS I get to watch a Steelers Superbowl with my dad for the first time since I was about 8 when we lost to the Cowboys and broke my tiny elementary school heart. It’s times like these I wish I still lived in Pittsburgh. I can only imagine what the city will be like tomorrow. 

Closer to the Superbowl I’ll be sure to give my speech about why the Steelers arean amazing franchise, but for now, I’ll leave you with this….

HERE WE GO, STEELERS. HERE WE GO!

(To catch up on my recaps, start here And now, the adventure continues: 

Saturday was a big day for us. We started out in the morning by heading to Victoria Market in the heart of Melbourne. It’s a huge outdoor market with anything you can think of: food, clothes, shoes, jewelry, souvenirs, bags, and hats. It was overwhelming. We had to just take it row by row. I picked up a fun pocket watch necklace and presents for my mom and dad, while Sharon made out like a bandit, with souvenirs for all her friends. Sarah and I wasted time proving my theory that I look good in all hats. (It’s totally true, and Sarah agrees. I credit my haircut.) 

After a quick food court lunch (it sounds lames, but was actually amazing – their food courts are kind of lovely.) we took a tram to the South Bank (I think that is what its called…Sarah, you can correct me.) where we planned to go up in the Eureka SkyDeck, a new residential building that is now the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere. It’s a sweet building – the top is actually coated with gold!  They have an observation deck on the 88th floor, along with something called the Edge Experience. Basically, it’s this little room, a little bigger than an elevator, that is entirely made of glass and moves out of the building! So, you are standing in it, the glass windows are all fogged up, then you hear a cracking noise and the windows go clear, and it’s like you are floating 88 stories up. Being mildly afraid of heights, I had a minor heart attack, especially because Sarah kept making worried faces at me when there was any weird noise just to freak me out, but in the end, it was just ridiculously cool. Also ridiculously cool – the entire thing was free as Sarah knows the people who run the SkyDeck. Our tickets even said VIP. Score. 

Saturday night we finally met the rest of Sarah’s friends for our big night out. We started out drinking some Australian wine in Sarah’s apartment with new friends (to Sharon and I) Nick, Dan, and Steven – all of whom, I must say again, were awesome – then headed out to Chapel Street, a very posh shopping and dining street by Sarah’s apartment. We met some more people at the bar, while I marveled at the relative cheapness of cocktails. We then, for some reason, stopped at Friday’s (as in TGI – yeah they have them there too…), and Nick and I instantly bonded over our intense desire to leave.

Finally, we headed out towards our final stop, a cool Irish Pub, where the rest of Sarah’s friends were. Anna, Taryn, Sheeho, and Kate were all there again, and my love for them further solidified. We drank and attempted to dance the rest of the night away, while Sharon and I rejoiced in staying up past 9PM. All in all, a successful night out. 

Sunday, we headed to Sydney! After a short plane ride (before which, no one checked our ID’s! It must be nice to live somewhere that doesn’t anger the world…) we met up with our camp friend, Matt, at the airport, as he was nice enough to pick us up. After a short driving tour that included driving over the Sydney Harbor bridge, Matt drove us right up to Circular Quay, home of the famous Sydney Opera house. You should be thankful at this moment that I’m using Sarah’s photos and not mine, as you are being saved from my 100+ photos of the Opera house from varying vantage points. (“Here’s me right in front of it! Here’s me on the other side of the Quay! Here’s the back! Here’s the view riding away on a ferry!” What can I say? I was excited!) It was extremely cool, though, to be in front of something I’ve seem in pictures hundreds of times (not to mention animated in my favorite Pixar movie, Finding Nemo.) 

That first day is a blur of lunch, photos, dancing to terrible street performers (where is the video, Sarah!?), and taking in the city. At some point, I think Sharon and I walked around Darling Harbor, which was right behind our super fancy hotel (thanks again, to Sarah’s dad!) 

The next day, after riding in a circle on the monorail singing the song from The Simpsons, we headed back to Circular Quay to go jet-boating! This was by far my favorite activity from Sydney. Basically, you get on a poncho and get in what is essentially a 30 person jet-ski. The driver does all kinds of tricks and turns and you get soaking wet in the process of seeing the entire harbor, which was absolutely gorgeous. It was ridiculously fun. I would recommend it to anyone. 

The next two days in Sydney were filled with shopping, eating, movies (I’m ashamed to admit I may have seen High School Musical 3 a…hrmmthirdhrm..time. It’s an addiction I’m dealing with…) There was room service and long waits for buses and museum visits and entirely too much fun. Sadly, by Wednesday it was time to leave, but luckily for us, it was Christmas Eve! 

And with that, I’ll break for the day. Up next, Carols by Candlelight, Christmas presents, Boxing Day madness, and a ridiculous amount of food. Stay tuned…

After a ridiculously fun and exciting month away, I’m back! I can’t believe that my trip is over, and I’m still a little jet-lagged, but I want to get everything I can down about the trip before it all starts to slip away. I don’t know how I’m even going to begin to tackle this, but I think it’s all still fresh enough to recount to my satisfaction. And to Sarah’s, as she’s told me she is looking forward to my recap, and I don’t want to disappoint! 

But a quick note before I do: I want to thank my lovely sister, Stephanie, for keeping my blog company while I was gone. She’s currently loving LA and getting closer and closer to getting a job everyday. She’s definitely doing much better than she’d been doing in NYC, so I’m happy for her!

And one more note: I wanted to make this recap complete with amazing pictures, but unfortunately, I’m the forgetful type who leaves cameras and iPods in my sister’s car before getting on plane rides home…so no pictures as they are currently traveling home through the kindness of UPS. Fail. 

So…here we go. 

On Tuesday, December 16th, I left my house at 4AM (painful, I know) and traveled to LA. I ran into my American camp BFF, Sharon’s, arms around 2PM Cali time, and we proceeded to spend a ridiculous EIGHT hours in LAX, waiting for our flight. (My dad wanted to pad my flight time, just in case…they wouldn’t even let us check our bags until 6!) It seemed an endless wait. Finally, at 10PM, we boarded our 15 hour flight (economy seating surrounded by 4, yes FOUR, babies…for 15 hours.) Luckily, I’d been up for about 22 hours at that point, so I fell asleep halfway through Mamma Mia, which I couldn’t even see as in economy, the only screen you get is a giant projection at the front of the section, which short people can’t see. Again, fail. 

But when we got off the plane in Melbourne, it was totally and completely worth it. We walked out of baggage claim, and standing in the middle of a huge crowd of people, was Sarah’s smiling face. She screamed. We all ran to each other and hugged, and I instantly felt somehow at home, halfway around the world. 

That was instantly tested when we got in the car, which if you don’t know, is doing the whole other side of the road thing, which you don’t think will be that weird, but it totally is! Every time Sarah made a quick left turn, I had a heart attack. On the drive, Sarah pointed out some landmarks to us as we drove through the heart of Melbourne, and I could tell how excited she was to tell us about the city. 

Sarah warned us that the first day would seem like a blur, and she was definitely right. I know we got back to Sarah’s apartment in a very posh neighborhood on the cutest street ever, before heading out to explore the city. We walked around one of the big shopping streets then met Sarah’s dad for lunch (who, over the course of the trip, became one of my favorite people ever), but the whole time, I just felt weird. I thought jetlag was just tiredness, but it was really just an off-feeling. It was bizarre. 

That night, I somehow pulled it together enough to make a good first impression on all Sarah’s friends at their favorite pub, the Knott. We (Sharon and I) got a Pot and Parma (pot of beer and chicken parmesan - omg, so delicious!), and met some fabulous people – Anna, Katie, Taryn, Sheeho, Dan, Steve – I didn’t know it then, but many of them, too, would soon become some of my favorite people. I should have expected that Sarah would have amazing friends – I mean, she’s friends with me! – but I was surprised by how welcoming they were and how genuinely excited they were to meet us. Sadly by nine, the jetlag got the best of us, and we had to head home. 

Friday we hit the ground running. We drove about an hour outside Melbourne to hit the first of many elementary field trip-like  attractions we would visit on our trip. Seriously, everyone we told about this outing had the same reaction – Oh  my god! Puffing Billy! I haven’t been there since I was four/three/two! (The age somehow always got younger.) Basically, the Puffing Billy is a historic steam train in the Dandenong Mountains. It’s tradition for kids to sit on the railings with their feet hanging over the side of the train (affectionately know to us later as sitting “Puffing Billy style”) We thought we would go for a half an hour ride (courtesy of Sarah’s dad – a big wig in the tourism industry who, along with Sarah, a force herself in the industry, got us tickets to EVERYTHING.) We got on and enjoyed the ridiculously beautiful views of the countryside. When we got to the first stop, however, we were ready to head back. Unfortunately, we were told we had tickets to the next stop then an hour “layover” of sorts until the train went back the other way. We made the best of things and decided to get lunch at the little snack stand, which we were told was the only place to eat. We ate outside, where Sharon and I had our first sighting of a magpie, a freaky looking bird who got entirely too close to my sausage roll. (I also tried my first bite of meat pie!) We then walked around the area to look at some more animals when we discovered an actual restaurant with indoor seats and non-microwaved food. Thanks Puffing Billy workers for that tidbit of information. Oh well. We had fun. On the way back, we got an indoor “private” car, since it was a bit chilly, and had some…interesting conversations until a couple got in the car behind us and proceeded to make out the entire ride back! 

We then rode back into town to meet Sarah’s work friends for drinks, but not before stopping at her office and taking some ridiculous photos. (They’re coming, I promise!) Sarah’s work friends were lovely, again not surprising, but also not surprising, jet-lag kicked my ass again around 6, and we had to head home before I fell asleep at the bar. 

And, now I have to go get ready to go grocery shopping with my mom. This recap is going to take longer than expected…luckily, nothing interesting is happening to me at all right now, so I feel like I have time to do this trip justice. 

On one more note: class starts today at my college, and for the first time in four years, I’m not there. I’m trying to ignore this fact t0 the best of my ability.

My giant suitcase is packed. My to-do list is all checked off. I’m officially ready to get up tomorrow at 4Am to catch my 6:30Am flight to LA and then sit around LAX until 10:30PM when I’ll board my 15 hour flight to Melbourne. Yep, that’s about 36 hours of straight travel, but hopefully I’ll be in a Tylenol PM induced sleep for the better part of that 15 hour flight, and at the end of it, I’ll be able to see Sarah’s lovely, smiling face waiting for me at the airport Love Actually style. (This is for real: Sarah told me the Melbourne Airport has big double doors like at the end of Love Actually. I told her I’d sing God Only Knows to get the full effect.) Plus, most of the sitting around time at LAX will be with Sharon, so we can keep each other excited. 

Don’t worry, though. I’m not leaving you all here high and dry. My sister will be blogging in my place  for the next few weeks. She’s attempted to blog a few times at her own little space, but she is hoping this will motivate her to start doing it regularly. She’s pretty much my twin, so you might not even notice a difference. Right now, she is also in the midst of moving to LA, but to pursue a job in television (just like I used to be doing!) So..yeah, be nice to her.

I may try to post a bit while I’m gone, but I don’t know what my schedule or computer access will be like, so I don’t want to promise anything. Don’t blog too much while I’m gone, or I may  have a google reader related breakdown when I get back! Happy Holidays!

Today, I officially finished college. Well…I had my last class on Thursday, but today I put the finishing touches on my (horrible) plays for playwritting, which I have to mail into my professor tomorrow. Thus, I consider today my last day. And I’m not quite sure how I feel about it.

The last few days have been tough, to say the least. In fact, yesterday, I ended my day by crying for a half an hour at a Mexican restaurant by my parents’ house, after snapping at my dad. I think I had been teetering on the edge of being really sad all day, and him spoiling the season finale of Dexter for me was somehow the final straw.  

Thursday night I had a little party at my apartment with a lot of friends I wanted to say good-bye to, where I drank entirely too much champagne, then headed out to the bars, where I got a nice confidence boost from a very drunk UMass student in the form of ridiculous compliments. 

Friday was spent packing until my parents came to pick me up for dinner with my uncle and cousins. I almost cried twice at dinner thanking them for giving me a place to call home in Boston and basically being my surrogate family for three and a half years. My immediate family has never lived close to my extended family, so getting to see my little cousins regularly for the last few years as really been a treat. Plus, they let me get off campus and have a home-cooked meal without having to fly home. I’m really going to miss my night’s out on the town with my uncle and getting to spend an afternoon playing with my cousins…and I’m going to make myself cry now.  After dinner, I went to Harvard Square with Jillian and Megan for a relaxing last night out at John Harvard’s and Grendal’s. It was nice to have a quite, very Boston, last night out. I, perfectly enough, only ordered Massachusetts local beers. Mmm…

Saturday, my dad came to get all my stuff. I said good-bye to my little sis from the sorority (and one of my best friends), Lynn, and my other favorite sorority gal, Ali. Both are going abroad next semester, so even if I work out staying in Boston next semester (which is looking possible…stay tuned), I won’t be in school with them again. 

Finally, it came time to say good-bye to Jillian. Even though I know I’ll see her soon, I was still in tears. With moving so much, I don’t keep friends (physically) close for very long, so knowing Jillian for over three years and living with her for two and a half is quite a feet. (We met in writing class and at Bay State freshman year, lived together sophomore year, went to LA together junior year, and shared an apartment this year.) She was truly the perfect roommate. We’ve never fought. We both clean like crazy, and she’s unbelievably considerate. She’s an amazing friend who makes me do things, even when I don’t want to, that turn out to be super fun. She listens when I complain. We hate all the same people, and she’s the only reason I know what’s up in the world of celebrity gossip. I don’t know how I’m going to survive in LA without her, because the only reason I ever knew about good restaurants and cool bars was because of her. It’ll be tough to adjust to living with anyone else. She says I have to add Pop Sugar to my daily routine to even attempt to replace her. 

I really can’t believe I’m done with college. I can’t quite process it yet. I want to write a wrap-up of everything I’ve learned in college, but I don’t have enough space from it to do it now. The problem is if I wait until I get back from Australia, that’s obviously all I’m going to talk about. Maybe I’ll attempt it tomorrow. Luckily for my sanity,  it’s looking like I might not have to mourn leaving Boston just yet. My uncle has offered to let me stay at his house next semester, which isn’t going to replace living on campus, but it’s SO much better than being in Wilmington, friendless save for my parents and pets. (My parents moved here my sophomore year of college, so I don’t know anyone but them. So staying at “home” is not the ideal living situation for the next four months.) The details would still need to be worked out in January, so I don’t want to say it’s definite, but I really want it to be. 

So…now onto the next thing. AUSTRALIA! IN TWO DAYS! Yep, now I can actually be excited about it without thinking about all the stuff I have to do before I go. Sarah called me last night, and all I could say was so “Oh my god, I’m so excited!” Tomorrow I’m officially packing, so wish me luck! I’ll say a proper good-bye tomorrow.