Thank God I'm A Country Boy...

Well, Tuesday started off a lot like Monday. The weather is still kind of cold, and my legs are still kind of stiff. Shocking, I know. Although with both of these things, Tuesday is a slight improvement over Monday. It is a little bit warmer outside, and I am moving a little better today.
I got into the office this morning, and was the second person there, as usual. The first person is a lady who works there, but has an office outside of the area where I sit. So I was the only one sitting in the main area when the third person came into the office. She set things up, started her day, and finally came over to me saying, “Okay, Jenny, it’s too quiet in here. You need to do something to entertain me. Talk, whatever.” I told her I could do a little dance for her, and she quickly turned and said, “OKAY!” I laughed and said, “No one wants to see that.”
So we started chatting while she was getting the office going, and somehow music came up. I laughed and said, “I have to tell you, I was quite entertained by your ring tone.” (She’s the one I mentioned the other day as having a country music song as her ring tone.) She started telling me how much she and her kids liked country music. I said, “Well, it’s interesting. When I heard your phone, I thought, ‘Well that’s funny. I think that song is the first country song I have heard since I have been here.’ Country’s not too popular here, is it?” No, it's not. She started telling me how in the city of Canberra, the big capital city, there are no country music stations. She told me that every once in a while, there is a local station that will put on some country music. But she said the station is run by old people, so they play a lot of old-timey bluegrass. All I could do was laugh at the thought of some old Aussies square dancing in the radio station. But I digress. Point being, after making that comment, this lady had to tell pretty much everyone who walked in the door that I was a huge country music fan. I don’t remember saying all that…
A little while later, Andrew, the guy who is the main manager on the audit, came into the office. He flew down for the day to review some files and work with me on some things. We ended up going out to lunch with the accounting folks from the office. Basically 4 out of the 7 people who work there, plus the two auditors. The accounting staff was fun to hang out with. The CFO was very interested in talking to me about what I was going to do the two weeks I am here on holiday after my secondment is over. So the rest of the folks spent most of lunch trying to tell me the best places to go visit. Then we talked some about travel around the world, as the CFO has been spending a lot of time lately traveling internationally for work.
Then the conversation shifted to the Olympics. A lot of you have asked, and here’s the deal: Yes, the Olympics here are pretty big. There are two TV stations that show different events. According to the Controller of my client, there was only one channel during the last Olympics, and unless there was an Aussie competing in the event, it wasn’t being shown. So the coverage has gotten better, in that they are now showing a lot of different events. Now, since Andrew is from the UK, they started giving him a really hard time about the medal count. They said, “How’s your team doing?” Andrew said, “Okay, I guess. I don’t really know, since the only news you get over here is about how the Aussies are doing – no one else!” It’s true! So for those of you who have been asking: Yes, there is lots of coverage, and yes, people are pretty into it. In fact, today there was an email from one of the admin people that went out to the Sydney office to let people know that Stephanie Rice was competing in her first swimming final at 12.40, and the event would be on the TV in the kitchen area for anyone wanting to watch. (Since I am day late posting this one, I won't surprise anyone be letting you know that she won and set a world record.) So it will be interesting to see if people are crowded around the TV, cheering on the Aussies, when I am in the office later this week. But outside of the brief updates I might hear on the TV or radio, I really have no clue how the US is doing!
After lunch, we headed back to the office to try to get through the audit files. I ended up leaving work a little earlier than I am used to (6-ish) to give Andrew a ride to the airport. We got directions from one of the guys in the office. Yeah, I don’t know what road he told us to turn on to, but it wasn’t there. So we had to stop and ask for directions. Poor Andrew – I know he was sweating it, trying to get to the airport on time! But we made it there with a little time to spare. I then had to figure out how in the world to get back to my hotel from the airport. Yep, you guessed it – I got lost. Well, not entirely. I was on a road and didn’t recognize anything around, and I figured out I was headed away from Canberra, when I wanted to get to the other side of it. So I turned around, headed towards the city, and eventually figured out the right direction to get back to my hotel in the suburb. Don't ask how - I'm still not sure what roads I was on, but I knew the general direction. Good enough, I guess.
I got back to the hotel, and walked out to the shops to figure out where to go for dinner. There was a place I decided to try. In looking from the main street, you can see a big neon sign inside that says “Dessert.” Mecca! It was calling to me last week, but I never made it there. I wasn’t sure what all they served (the restaurant was upstairs, so you really couldn’t see in), but it looked like a buffet. I thought I had hit the jackpot!
Apparently I hit the crap jackpot. Well, maybe crap is a harsh word. Greasy jackpot? I got inside, paid, and figured out it was a Chinese-type buffet. What is “Chinese-type”? I have no idea. It was mostly Chinese food, but they threw some random stuff out there, too. Like cold boiled shrimp. (I stayed away – I didn’t want to die.) Although this place was the first one where I have had a salad. Awesome - I'm all about salad bars! Yeah, here's the options: Lettuce, tomato, salad dressing. And there you have the entire salad bar, other than some pasta and the scary shrimp. Interesting... The food was pretty greasy, even for Chinese food. I got some fried chicken (make your own sweet and sour), bit into it, and decided I now knew what deep fried grease tastes like. I don’t think I ever found the chicken in there…
Although the entertaining story of the night comes from a guy who was there, wearing his fancy winter boots. It was cold, but it's not like there was ice or snow outside. Did I mention they were fur snow boots? I think his date was jealous of them – her boots were quite plain! Or maybe he stole them from her…
After dinner, I headed back to the room to take in some Olympic events and type up the blog post for you guys. But I think I need to call it an early night tonight. I have a conference call tomorrow morning at 7. I was lucky – it was originally scheduled for 6 am my time and got moved back. Good thing - you guys all know what a great morning person I am!
To close out, I thought I would share a link with you: http://city2surf.sunherald.com.au/results08video.php?intbib=36712
Don, if you can tell it’s me, here is my proof that I am in Australia. The guy announcing is Australian. The website is the official City2Surf site, and has my official time and position. And the link provides some video coverage. If you can spot me, I come into the picture in the center, then move to the far left corner of the screen as I walk out of the shot. So look close, and you can see me crossing the finish line. I have on a white hat and a dark shirt. I turn my stopwatch off just as I cross the line. If you pause it when you hear the guy say, “Hello, hello” (about ¾ of the way through the video clip), I am dead in the center, just to the left of a guy in a yellow hat. So there you go: Official proof that I finished! Plus I beat over 50,000 people! And you can all be happy – I think I am officially done talking about City2Surf in my blog posts! Woo hoo!