This weekend I went to Melbourne to see my friend Glen.
It worked out much better than the last time I'd tried to go see him when he decided to fly to the Philippines the same time as Tiger canceled my flight
Aside from actually seeing him, though, well, I'll leave you to judge how successful the trip actually was.
Don't get me wrong: it was a great trip and he was a great host. It's just that I'm really rather more looking forward to my next visit.
I read on the bus from the airport to Southern Cross Station that Melbourne is famous for three world records (not just in the Southern hemisphere for once!): continuous DJ-ing, Zorba dancing and the most people in superhero outfits in one place. Can't go wrong with recommendations like that, really. (No, that wasn't sarcastic!) Oh, and a man on the train (from Southern Cross Station to Flinders Street, which is one stop but costs $3.80, which was .60 more than the exact amount of change I had) gave me his seat, which also raised Melbourne considerably in my estimation.
Anyway, when I got to Flinders Street, I was under orders to "find the theatre." Being the tourist, I stopped and asked the nice guard if he knew where the theatre showing Hamlet was, but he didn't. I said my friend thought it might be somewhere with "Art" in the name, so he recommended The Art Centre, but said I needed to exit from the other end of the station (I should have known that exit looked too easy). At the other end, I found an information desk where I was directed to the Art Centre, which I shortly found. I was a bit suspicious walking up to it as they had plenty of playbills outside and none of them mentioned Hamlet. I got inside and it was ridiculously snazzy and I asked the nice lady if they were the theatre showing Hamlet that night. She regretted to inform me that they were not.
"Would you like directions to the theatre that is?" she asked kindly.
"Yes!" I said, then remembered. "Please."
Thankfully the Sumner Theatre was only a block and a half away, though they refused to give me my "under 30s" tickets until both my friend and I could identify ourselves as legitimately under 30. Seeing as Glen wasn't there yet, I sat on the steps in front and waited for him to arrive with ID, which he eventually did.
We had a great dinner and loved Hamlet, though left with one of us bouncing off the walls and the other supremely exhausted. Why I don't know, seeing as one of us managed to get quite a decent chunk of sleep during the middle of Hamlet.
We arrived home and one of us proceeded to have a fit of the giggles, followed by a fit of violent coughing, while the other tried to insist on Going to Bed Quietly, but eventually peace descended on the household.
I awoke the next morning to find Glen's redheaded flatmate curiously eyeing the pile of pillows on his couch and trying to figure out if it was alive or not. It turns out it was.
After we got all introduced properly, which we had plenty of time to do while Glen went to the chiropractor and then came home with a migraine that sent him to bed for a couple hours, Tom (the redheaded flatmate) and I discovered that!! We had actually met before!! Can you believe it? Do you recall that part of the story a few paragraphs back now wherein a lost little American girl was desperately trying to find her theatre? And she stopped to ask for directions at the information booth? Voila! Tom was working there! How amazing! We'd actually met before the episode on the sofa! It turned out we had even tons more in common and spent the rest of the morning and well into the afternoon chatting. (He'd just played the Beast in Beauty and the Beast -- how cool is that?!)
After awhile we got a bit bored and put on a DVD we found lying around, just as Mr. Sleepyhead woke up and came to join the fun. So, we all watched a DVD before embarking on the Great Jeep Transformation of 2011.
Glen, it turns out, has recently acquired a bright blue lesbian Jeep Wrangler named Susie. (Which bears, might I add, no resemblance to my best friend Susie who ironically happens to have a green-ish gay Subaru Outback named Hercules.) Susie the Jeep, however, was quite new and had never yet had all her rooves removed. She had two: a hard back and a soft back.
Thus, my reading material for the trip comprised of the Susie's owner's manual and warranty (not strictly required reading, but I got a bit bored while Glen called customer service, but we haven't quite gotten there yet). As I read out the manual, Glen managed to spend much longer than I'd have taken seeing the top, say, three major sites of Melbourne undressing his Jeep. Unfortunately, after considerable effort (the poor thing did have a migraine, bear in mind), he called customer service and discovered that they had forgotten to sell him the integral screwdriver for removing the top. So, we redressed Susie and drove her to an auto parts store. Fortunately they had the necessary screwdriver, so Glen, Susie and I then drove to Melden, which is really quite far away, but is where Susie needed to be to pick up the new washing machine, which was being sold to Glen by an Australian ex-pat who'd moved back after 17 years in England and three months later decided to hightail it back to London.
After 45 minutes of Transforming the Jeep in his driveway (I could go on and tell you about the ex-pat's Dutch wife and how they want to have children soon, and how backward Australia seems to them now, and how England is so much closer to her family, etc, etc, anyway, if you wanted to know), the washing machine was finally secured in the back just in time for Glen and I to drive away and make it to our second play of the weekend.
That was all well and good, and followed by a lovely iced chocolate at San Churros, where I finally felt like a tourist (sort of) for more or less the first time at 11 pm at night.
The next morning, we finally made it into the city (Oh, yes: there was a major traffic jam on the way home. Of all the things to make it on facebook, that was the one Glen picked. Boys.) and I got a brief tour (read: take as many pictures as fast as possible to prove I was actually not in the parking garage of an apartment building for the majority of my weekend trip!) of the city followed by what was really a very nice brunch on a little island type endeavor in the middle of the Yarra River called Ponyfish, aside from the minor detail of Glen forgetting to invite along the cute boy he'd promised to let me get to know while I was in town.
From there, it was off to the airport and back to Sydney. Like I said: a lovely trip, but really. I just can't wait for the next one!
It worked out much better than the last time I'd tried to go see him when he decided to fly to the Philippines the same time as Tiger canceled my flight
Aside from actually seeing him, though, well, I'll leave you to judge how successful the trip actually was.
Don't get me wrong: it was a great trip and he was a great host. It's just that I'm really rather more looking forward to my next visit.
I read on the bus from the airport to Southern Cross Station that Melbourne is famous for three world records (not just in the Southern hemisphere for once!): continuous DJ-ing, Zorba dancing and the most people in superhero outfits in one place. Can't go wrong with recommendations like that, really. (No, that wasn't sarcastic!) Oh, and a man on the train (from Southern Cross Station to Flinders Street, which is one stop but costs $3.80, which was .60 more than the exact amount of change I had) gave me his seat, which also raised Melbourne considerably in my estimation.
Anyway, when I got to Flinders Street, I was under orders to "find the theatre." Being the tourist, I stopped and asked the nice guard if he knew where the theatre showing Hamlet was, but he didn't. I said my friend thought it might be somewhere with "Art" in the name, so he recommended The Art Centre, but said I needed to exit from the other end of the station (I should have known that exit looked too easy). At the other end, I found an information desk where I was directed to the Art Centre, which I shortly found. I was a bit suspicious walking up to it as they had plenty of playbills outside and none of them mentioned Hamlet. I got inside and it was ridiculously snazzy and I asked the nice lady if they were the theatre showing Hamlet that night. She regretted to inform me that they were not.
"Would you like directions to the theatre that is?" she asked kindly.
"Yes!" I said, then remembered. "Please."
Thankfully the Sumner Theatre was only a block and a half away, though they refused to give me my "under 30s" tickets until both my friend and I could identify ourselves as legitimately under 30. Seeing as Glen wasn't there yet, I sat on the steps in front and waited for him to arrive with ID, which he eventually did.
We had a great dinner and loved Hamlet, though left with one of us bouncing off the walls and the other supremely exhausted. Why I don't know, seeing as one of us managed to get quite a decent chunk of sleep during the middle of Hamlet.
We arrived home and one of us proceeded to have a fit of the giggles, followed by a fit of violent coughing, while the other tried to insist on Going to Bed Quietly, but eventually peace descended on the household.
I awoke the next morning to find Glen's redheaded flatmate curiously eyeing the pile of pillows on his couch and trying to figure out if it was alive or not. It turns out it was.
After we got all introduced properly, which we had plenty of time to do while Glen went to the chiropractor and then came home with a migraine that sent him to bed for a couple hours, Tom (the redheaded flatmate) and I discovered that!! We had actually met before!! Can you believe it? Do you recall that part of the story a few paragraphs back now wherein a lost little American girl was desperately trying to find her theatre? And she stopped to ask for directions at the information booth? Voila! Tom was working there! How amazing! We'd actually met before the episode on the sofa! It turned out we had even tons more in common and spent the rest of the morning and well into the afternoon chatting. (He'd just played the Beast in Beauty and the Beast -- how cool is that?!)
After awhile we got a bit bored and put on a DVD we found lying around, just as Mr. Sleepyhead woke up and came to join the fun. So, we all watched a DVD before embarking on the Great Jeep Transformation of 2011.
Glen, it turns out, has recently acquired a bright blue lesbian Jeep Wrangler named Susie. (Which bears, might I add, no resemblance to my best friend Susie who ironically happens to have a green-ish gay Subaru Outback named Hercules.) Susie the Jeep, however, was quite new and had never yet had all her rooves removed. She had two: a hard back and a soft back.
Thus, my reading material for the trip comprised of the Susie's owner's manual and warranty (not strictly required reading, but I got a bit bored while Glen called customer service, but we haven't quite gotten there yet). As I read out the manual, Glen managed to spend much longer than I'd have taken seeing the top, say, three major sites of Melbourne undressing his Jeep. Unfortunately, after considerable effort (the poor thing did have a migraine, bear in mind), he called customer service and discovered that they had forgotten to sell him the integral screwdriver for removing the top. So, we redressed Susie and drove her to an auto parts store. Fortunately they had the necessary screwdriver, so Glen, Susie and I then drove to Melden, which is really quite far away, but is where Susie needed to be to pick up the new washing machine, which was being sold to Glen by an Australian ex-pat who'd moved back after 17 years in England and three months later decided to hightail it back to London.
After 45 minutes of Transforming the Jeep in his driveway (I could go on and tell you about the ex-pat's Dutch wife and how they want to have children soon, and how backward Australia seems to them now, and how England is so much closer to her family, etc, etc, anyway, if you wanted to know), the washing machine was finally secured in the back just in time for Glen and I to drive away and make it to our second play of the weekend.
That was all well and good, and followed by a lovely iced chocolate at San Churros, where I finally felt like a tourist (sort of) for more or less the first time at 11 pm at night.
The next morning, we finally made it into the city (Oh, yes: there was a major traffic jam on the way home. Of all the things to make it on facebook, that was the one Glen picked. Boys.) and I got a brief tour (read: take as many pictures as fast as possible to prove I was actually not in the parking garage of an apartment building for the majority of my weekend trip!) of the city followed by what was really a very nice brunch on a little island type endeavor in the middle of the Yarra River called Ponyfish, aside from the minor detail of Glen forgetting to invite along the cute boy he'd promised to let me get to know while I was in town.
From there, it was off to the airport and back to Sydney. Like I said: a lovely trip, but really. I just can't wait for the next one!
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