Gone June 29, 2006

I woke up at 7 o’clock this morning to a phone call from a school asking if I could come in today on relief. As my mum prodded me and handed me the phone, I sat there gasping ‘Mum, I can’t talk! I can’t talk!’, but alas, she couldn’t hear me, and subsequently returned to her room.

So I sat and coughed and spluttered, phone in hand, untlil I thoguht I had mustered up enough throat juices to talk into the phone and be heard.

I was wrong.

“Hello?” I croaked. Halfway through that miniscule word my voice cracked again and disappeared. “I’m sorry, but my voice isn’t working today,” I was forced to whisper. Come on, it was 7am. Give me a break.

“Hi Annaleis, I was ringing to see if you could come in today, but it looks like you’re sick. Seeya.” Click. She had hung up.

My voice, or lack thereof, had just cost me $200.

I went back to bed hoping that a few more hours sleep would help my vocal chords get it together. It didn’t help a bit. I think they’ve just gone AWOL.

If you’ve seen them lurking in a cupboard, or have felt them whispering sweet nothings in your ear, drop me a line. I’ll come and get them. And they’ll be in trouble.

Pikeleteers June 26, 2006

I've just arrived home from visiting my good ol' grade one class. Those little darlings! I arranged with their usual teacher (from whom I took over) to come in and do some cooking with a small group. As it turned out, I had two budding girl chefs, and one budding boy chef to look after (who you might remember from a certain previous blog entry).

First things first: wash hands in soap AND warm water! Vigorously!

The whole process went relatively hiccup free; one girl sneezed all over the flour until I directed her to turn around. I caught her just in time as she was about to delve her snotty digits into the flour once more, and ordered another good hand washing. One potential case of food poisoning avoided.

One egg was dropped onto the art-room floor (which doubles as the thoroughfare for the classroom), and was promptly scooped up by yours-truly, because I had to face facts, we needed that little sucker!

After spending a few minutes picking odd-looking black bits from the white, I proposed a motion that as the presiding adult, I crack the second egg. Success! None of it landed on the floor! Both of these eggs were whisked with 4 teaspoons of sugar and dumped into the mixing bowl.

The butter melting went beautifully, and we finally got all the ingredients together with plenty of time to cook the pikelets, and have a flippin' turn!

Byuudaful! One half a pikelet for each class member! Little did they know of what was really in them…

 

Like that would have phased them.

 

Disgusted. June 23, 2006

I have officially disgusted myself.

Today I decided to jog up and down my driveway to try and determine some sort of 'fitness' level.

I did 5 laps, which was my goal. This equates to about 150m (very rough estimate).

I was shattered.

Maybe I'll try again tomorrow. Or just join a gym.

The Job Hunt continues June 21, 2006

Here I am, still sitting in Tasmania waiting for The UK Guy to ring me or email me.

Since turning down the Devon job, stupidly assuming that there would be plenty more to follow, I have only had one other sniff of a UK teaching placement. This one is in Chigwell, Essex. Not to be confused with Chigwell, Tasmania.

The Guy asked me about applying for a grade 3 class in Chigwell, and was hoping to arrange and interview over the phone with them. Since then he has realised that the school may not be allowed to employ me (me being a first year out teacher) because they are a 'special measures' school, which means that they are having some sort of management difficulty, and need to pull their socks up.

The Guy is currently looking into it for me.

As I type this blog entry, it is 10 of the AM in England. He still hasn't gotten back to me and I'm starting to get a little anxious, a little annoyed, and a little tired of waiting.

So, as it stands, I could be living and working in Essex, which is north-east of London, but if this latest teaching bid fails, I have asked The Guy to start looking for places in London, which was previously out-of-bounds for me.

There's also a rather nice looking position in St Albans too that looks pretty good…

I think I've broken down those barriers in my head about living in a city, and I'm telling myself that if only he could get me a term's worth of work in London, I could get another job for the next terms out of London, and end up in the Cotswolds or something!

The other thing I like about London is that there are a fair few 'reception' jobs going there. I'm not sure why they don't just call it Kindergarten like everyone else!

Wouldn't that be grand?

So, come on, The Guy, email me!

Holiday Rundown June 20, 2006

Did ya miss me?

You don't have to answer that, I can see the answer in your eyes. The way you roll them towards the ceiling really does speak volumes.

As some of you know, I've done a round trip of Tassie in the past week. Except I accidently missed out the West Coast. Oh well, maybe next time. There's some beautiful scenery down there.

As it happened I traipsed east along the Bass Highway, then turned south onto the Midlands Highway and stopped when I got to Hobart. I stayed with Al while I was there, and we got up to some evil shenanigans! I also got to see a lot of other friends, which I was really happy about, especially since Al ended up doing most of the driving. It might be the last time I see them for a while, if I still get to go to England this September! (But more on that another time…)

I saw Flugel and Steph, Ally, Cat and Wally and their kiddies, and another friend Claire, who I hadn't seen for years, and her husband and new baby, who is only 6 weeks old! (Aaaw…)

Gotta love 'em, Alastair and Flugel, those crazy coots!

I dragged a rather silly Al out to Claremont for a Cadbury Factory tour. Value for money, I say, even if it is a little boring. That probably had something to do with half the workers knocking off around 1pm. Right when our tour was. The highlights of the tour were as follows:

• We all had to wear silly hats, so our hair didn't fall into the chocolate;
• The tour guide was bitter and twisted, and half her hair was hanging out of her hairnet;
• Alastair had to wear a beard net as well as a hair net. HA!
• Although the tour guide stessed the importance of not contaminating anything, she flagrantly ignored a moth that was flying about near a mixing machine;
• We got lots of free chocolate;
• On the way out I spent over $45 at the chocolate shop.

This is what I bought:

5 kilograms of chocolate in a lovely brown box

Turkish Delights, Fruit and Nut Dairy Milk, 2 blocks of dark chocolate

and the free box of 'Favourites' they gave us on the way out

Unfortunately, we could not eat it all on the way home in the car, so now it's at home being picked at by choc-vultures.

Come Saturday morning, Al and I packed up our swags, checked our oil and drove on up to Launceston. Land of Smog. There we had a bit of a party, in celebration of Brendan and Al's birthdays! During this time, Gio lost one of my gloves (that fiend!), and Brendan lost his top-hat. A sad occasion for all. We made up for it by drinking lots then walking back to BC's house to sleep.

"The Penguin? Does it look like Batman is my nemisis to you?!…"

…and what a ripper of a party it was…

I will leave you now to gaze serenely at some of the pictures I took on the Bass Highway last week, between Elizabeth Town and Deloraine. Enjoy.

Winter in Tasmania eh? No such thing!

Shopping update June 15, 2006

Yesterday was a successful day of shopping with Alastair.  That madman. 

He drove me to the thriving capital of Hobart: Glenorchy, where we witnessed short people, people in wheelchairs trying to ram into people with their broken legs, and lots of cakey makeup.

And yet I was not disappointed.

Target provided all my thermal needs, and Hungry Jacks provided all my grease needs. Thanks for dragging me there Al!

I also bought the new Eskimo Joe album for a pretty good price, $21 or something. Unfortunately I haven't been able to listen to it yet

Right now we're going to CADBURY'S! for a factory tour, and to buy lots of sweet gooey things.

After that we're going to see Cat, then later tonight, Flugel.

More updates later, and maybe photos. Of chocolate.

Oh yeah, what do you think of the new theme?   

Hobart is the only place in Tasmania…according to Hobartians. June 13, 2006

Hey! I'm in Hobart! Also known as Hoe-bart, Whorebart and Hobbiton.

It's pretty cold here; the snowy peaks of Wrest Point Hotel Casino gave it away, but there is one vital difference between here and Brendan's place in Lonny.

Alastair has a heater that he's willing to turn on.

Here are the things I intend to buy whilst Hobarting:

• New pyjamas
• Eskimo Joe's new CD
• a Belle and Sebastian CD
• Long groovy cool awesome socks (because I can't knit them…yet)
• Thermals…because it's bloody cold in England. Perhaps I'm being a bit eager here.

More news later!

Oh, and photos. Brace yourselves.

And now for something completely different June 11, 2006

Ah holidays, it's what everybody wants. It's what everybody needs. It's what everybody craves. Until they get them. You factory workers and child laborours of course think of it as a miracle, bestowed upon you from some bloke with a beard and sandals, or whoever it is you work for.

Of course, you would be right; the first days you get to sleep in are nothing short of miraculous. But then it hit me…

I am the only one here on holidays.

My family and friends are all out working jobs that ignore the sacred school holiday tradition.

This is the catastrophic, unsettling life that I lead. How do I do it?
It seems as though I've been holidaying for an eternity, and perhaps the boredom that I encounter from these long hungover holiday afternoons has begun to play on my mind. Holiday fever, if you will. It is this fever that prompted me to consent to this:

I now have straight hair. For today anyway. There is precious little to keep my ears warm now, and I feel about 5cm shorter than I normally do.

At first it seemed as though my peripheral vision had been impaired, but fear not, I soon found that the halo which previously surrounded my head like a knotty aura of mayhem had been heat treated into submission, collapsing into a decadent, silky (darest I use that word?) waterfall of auburn.

But what shall I do with this new do? It stays behind my ears a little too well, I can comb it, I can 'slick' my hair back into a ponytail now, just like in the magazines. I also discovered I look half decent with the top part of my hair pulled back, a la quiff, which was never a possibility before. I have also discovered that my hair now posesses the ability to refract and reflect light evenly, so when i'm typing messages on my phone I get distracted by the pretty colours bouncing around my unswerving shafts.

It's a whole new world. I have had but a small taste of the power of straight hair, and yet I pass the test. I will diminish, and go into the West, and remain Annaleis.
Well, tomorrow when I wash it anyway.

Now all that hype is over, I've still got another week of holidays to fill in. I might get up and do something constructive, if only I could stop touching my surreal hair for five minutes.

There. Did it.

Launceston June 6, 2006

Aah, shopping, it's what all females love to do. A fair few of you blokes do too, Yessss, I know your secrets! You cannot fool me!

Because we're on holidays, my good friend/former roomie Bread and I took an overnight trip into the foggy realm of Launceston. There was some good shopping to be had, and some 1 star accommodation at Chateau Brendan; where the sinks are grey, the taps scream of the unholy terrors of the night, and God-only-knows what you're sitting on. And even he cringes.

Upon Lonny arrival we hit the shops, pretty hard, barely stopping for breath. Bread swiftly set the challenge by buying a pair of shoes, and I opened the shopping-throttle further by acquiring a trendy glasses case at a reasonable price. She quickly retaliated by dragging me into 'My Habitat', thereby forcing me to thrash back by ransacking a CD shop, and losing a significant monetary sum in the process!

(I bought Eric Bibb's album 'Friends', and the new Whitlams album 'Little Cloud', both great albums so far!)

We hunted hither and thither for bargains, and soon came tumbling out of Birchalls, noses twitching and jaws salivating for more shops, clutching bags of educational books and cards in our sweaty hands.

We scourged the mall until 5pm, then drove to K-Mart, and that, dear reader, was a bad move. We were in there for a good hour, just playing. Twenty hard-earned dollars later and I emerged brandishing some must-have sale items.

In the end, we had to overcome the shopping demons, for there were no more shopping frontiers left for us to scour. We slowly wound down from the fray, and checked into our accommodation.

Chateau Brendan was comfortable, but bitterly cold. The guys there had a 'no heating' policy, which they refused to budge even a tiny bit during our stay. Unfortunately for Bread, I baggsed the good couch, and had posession of a magical sleeping bag which could withstand temperatures of -5 degrees celcius. Thanks to this small mercy, I only developed a few stallegtites by morning.

Poor Bread had to make do with two blankets a doona, a jacket, three pairs of socks and her pyjamas. And if that wasn't bad enough, she had to get up during the night to set up her bed on the ground, because her couch just wasn't cutting the comfort-cheese.

I used a crow-bar to prise her frozen bum off the floor this morning. I'll sell it on Ebay if anyone's interested.

I'll leave that statement ambiguous, if you don't mind. You think what you want.

I have only one regret about this expedition. I failed to buy a pair of shoes. I found the perfect pair: comfortable, stylish, easy to wear with evening and casual dress, and no fiddley zips or laces. The deal-breaker was that they were one size too big.

Until next time, Volleys! I shall be waiting for you. Goodbive!

Next week: Annaleis and Brendan tackle the polar-capped southern regions of Hobart. Stay tuned!

Boring teaching spiel, aka ‘the current currency conversion is a killer!’ June 4, 2006

I didn't quite know what to do with myself this weekend, because of the end of term holidays and the fact that I am now unemployed as such, it seems that I am at a loose end. So far it looks like I will be doing day-to-day relief work next term unless something else pops up unexpectedly, like the last job did.

To tide me over until I leave for England, I'm pretty sure I can get a decent amount of relief work from schools I have done some pracs in, or have worked in before. Even last term, when only one school was offering me relief (because of a malfunction with the Tasmanian Relief Register, E-Pool), I was still getting one or two days a week. Next term is renowned for having ample work for relief teachers, because of the amounts of sick leave permanent teachers take. So with any luck, term two might turn out to be pretty busy!

Let's hope so anyway, because face it, with the Australian/UK exchange rate as it is, I'm going to need as much money as I can get!

Current Currency Conversion:

1.00 GBP United Kingdom Pounds

=

2.50684 AUD Australian Dollars

So far I have enough money for the economy class plane ticket, and a happy meal. They cost about $14 AU in England. I'd really prefer a McOz, but they might only have a McPom on the menu. I don't think i'd really be in the mood for a burger that whines every time you take a bite. On second thoughts, I might be willing to eat anything after spending 10 hours on an aeroplane with nothing to eat but the fluff off the seat in front of me.

Oh crikey, I'd better start saving big-time! What could I do for a second job? Anyone?

I suppose I could sell things on Ebay, or wait tables, or… I don't know!

Help me out here people! The trip of a lifetime depends on it!

Desperate times call for desperate measures.