Mistress Ketchup Quite Contrary

This weekend has been a whole other experience in its own. Filled with mature decisions, philosophical conversations and intellectual enlightenment.

Yeah. That's a lie. I had a ton of fun this weekend. Nothing intellectual about it. Just pure stupid, drunk fun.

My first day back in Coogee after the festival was one of much sleep. I didn't get out of bed until 11. It was glorious. After I got up for a few, I decided to take a nap. I was pathetic. I knew I didn't have to be at work until 5pm, so it wasn't a big deal -- no obligations makes Mariah a boring girl.

Going back to work was actually good. I enjoyed everyone I worked with and we closed a 1/2 hour early. Basically, we close when no one is in the restaurant, regardless of time. And I still made decent tips. Lisa, one of the girls I work with, told everyone to meet at the Coogee Bay Hotel (CBH) for drinks after work. I went home, changed and met Pedro, Lisa, Kate (another American girl) and Christian in the Beer Garden. It was crazy packed, but they had a nice table that faced the ocean. As soon as I got there we started to play drinking games. When did I enter a sorority? I don't even know.

Some random stranger next to me decided to strike up conversation. He was from Canada and really bizarre. He asked me what city I was from to which I responded Florida. He proceeded to yell at me because "THAT'S NOT A CITY." So I told him Jacksonville and he said that's not really Florida. Florida is like...Miami. Shut up, Canady. He was with another guy from Scotland and a girl from Canada as well. Our conversation ended there.

Of course, alcohol consumption was flowing, so what to do next? Ah yes. Spin the Bottle. This was Lisa's idea -- hmm...wonder why. Will explain in a minute. Promise :-) At first no one wanted to really play so there was a lot of hesitation. But eventually we all got drunk enough so we were all kissing each other. I kissed Pedro, Christian and another co-worker Joe (who showed up later on).

Christian and Kate. I love Kate's gangsta pose in this one. She's hardcore.

Pedro. Drunk.

No matter what. I couldn't get a pic of Lisa.

Not even this one.

Joe & Cookie.

Lisa & Joe kissing. This is for blackmail later on.

Remember Canady? Yeah, well his friends left him and he started to talk to me again. He was really annoying, but I dealt with him. I guess he decided to compliment me by telling me he knew three things about me.

1. I have nice hair.

2. I have nice eyes.

3. I have good skin.

Seriously?

His friends came back and the girl sat down next to me asking me if she should date the douche. I told her two words. Two very important words that my friend once to me.

"RUN AWAY."

What happened next? She didn't run away. Or perhaps she did, but she ran away with him. Leaving the Scottish guy with...who else? Me. Stewart and I got to talking and ended up hanging out the rest of the night. I think all we talked about was how weird his friend is and how I have nice boobs.

Score 1 for Mariah.

Drunk Face!

Stewart!

Awww! Haha!

Only one thing scandalous happened. Pedro and Lisa started making out. Whoops. Kate told me Pedro still kind of has a girlfriend -- and they're all friends. Uh oh. More blackmail!

Saturday wasn't very different from Friday. I slept in til 11:30. YES! It was awesome. Although I did finally get myself out of bed, did my laundry then met up with my new friend, Murray.

He's Australian, very nice and lives about 45 minutes outside of the city in a place called...Brooklyn. He's in finance, but does DJing on the side. His favorite singer is Michael Jackson -- no seriously, he's obsessed. "Shomowa!"

He picked me up at the train station and took me back to his place. I met his older sister Kathy, her boyfriend Bruce and his dog, Gypsy. They live in this really cute house right on the lake that overlooks the harbour. Tons of boats, great view, awesome lifestyle. Only thing. Brooklyn is very small. So small that there's only 2-3 restaurants and you still have to drive to get there.

Murray took me "into town" and we walked around the lake. There were a lot of people bringing their boats in. It was really awesome. I want to go back and do some kayaking on the river -- if Murray will have me back. I might just show up. Hmmm....not a bad idea.

After we walked around, we went to the "local pub" and decided to have dinner there. I ordered something I thought that would be simple -- Local Blue Swimmer Crab Salad. Sounded good, thought it'd be the healthier option. Oh. It was. Except. I had to work on the crab like it was my last meal on a deserted island. It took me about an hour to eat the damn crab. It was rather embarrassing honestly. Not quite the 1st meal you want to have when you're hanging out with someone for the first time. *hangs head* pitiful.

Big Rock.

Extreme Close-up by Murray

The lake

I thought it was cool?

Murray drove me home, thank goodness I didn't have to take the train back to Coogee alone. I had to be at work at 7am -- booo! -- so I needed some sleep. Not really. I mean, I have only been sleeping in til 11. Pathetic.

Had a tough day at work thanks to the boss man. He's such a dick (hm, I never use that word, eh?) and I think he still thinks I'm too new to work anything. One thing I've learned, if you aren't running around pretending like you're working, you'll get sent home. So we all just run around, looking busy (regardless if we are or aren't) so we can make our time and a half. It's kind of sad.

The highlight of my work day was the sound of sirens. No, not like ambulances or police sirens. The sound of a siren going off because there's going to be a terrorist strike, or a tornado has touched down, or a warning for a tsunami. Except it has nothing to do with all these natural (or not so natural) disasters. It has to do with something pretty typical in Australia. At first, I was confused because I had never heard that siren before -- I had no idea what it meant. Then everyone in the restaurant stood up and went straight to the doors and windows. Everyone was looking out towards the ocean. I just happened to be bringing drinks to a table and overheard what the fuss was about.

Shark sighting. It was crazzzy and, frankly, scary to see all the people swimming as fast as they could towards the shore. I never saw the shark (boo), but was a bit shook up. Thankfully no one was hurt.

Oh. That reminds me. When we were at the festival, our stupid boss had to change out the gas tanks and almost blew up the tent. The first day we were there, one of the guys (Jason to be exact) set the tent on fire. It was blazing and we had to scramble to find the fire extinguisher to put it out. I handed over the extinguisher. I saved the day. I win.

Anyway...the second day, Chris was switching out the propane tank and all of the sudden we heard a loud gas sound. I just stood there watching then looked up to see everyone running as far away from the tent as possible. Huh? Oh sh!t! RUN! I hesitated for a minute then figured out that the whole tent was in jeopardy of blowing up. Duh. Luckily nothing happened, but I was shaking for a bit afterwards. I thought I was about to get blown up. Awesome.

Tonight (Sunday night), I met up with a buddy -- Blain from Canada. You may remember him from Christmas. He was one of the guys on the couch on the beach. We've been facebooking and we decided to hang out tonight. He suggested we go to Darling Harbour and have dinner at a place called Hurricanes. It. Was. Scrumptious.

Best. View. Ever.

I wasn't ready for the pic to be taken!

We ordered ribs. Hi, thighs. Nice to see you again.

Darling Harbour at Night.

We took this ourselves. Not too shabby!

The best part was my bus trip out to Central. Some guy's phone kept going off -- doing this really annoying sound everytime he got a text message. I was listening to my ipod, so I just turned it up. The bus driver didn't have it that easy and ended up stopping the bus. Just stopped the bus in the middle of an intersection and told the guy to turn off his phone. The guy said absolutely not. They went back and forth for a little bit, then some lady behind me started cussing him out. She was yelling so loud and hard she was literally spitting on me. "Turn off your effing phone! F You Mate!" I was kind of hilarious. Eventually they stopped yelling and the bus driver started driving again. Then, the girl got out of her seat and took her jacket off. I was like OH HELL NO! I thought it was on. Turns out the guy got off at the next stop and she ran after him and hawked a BIG loogie on him and told him to F off. She was livid. And the bus driver was totally on her side.

"That guy is lucky I'm in uniform..."

Holy God. What is up with the aggression, people?! Then some guy got on the bus at the next stop and told the lady she needed to shut her mouth. He hadn't even witness what had happened earlier. The bus driver told him to shut up and sit down. It was awesome. I can't even repeat the words that were exchanged between these two people. And they were easily in their mid-to-late 30's. Nice.

That was my weekend. Had a really good time and look forward to doing/experiencing more things like that! Trying to live it up in Sydney. Trying -- at least my fat lip is gone!

In other news, my Uncle Craig (Stan Adams) suffered a massive heartache this past week. He was rushed to the hospital and was very fortunate to have gotten there when he did. He has a stint in one artery and should be getting another one in 4 weeks or so. He's doing much better, but please keep him in your thoughts. It was tough to hear about him, but I'm really really happy to hear he's going to make a full recovery. I was worried and wasn't sure what was going to happen next or what I would do. So please, no one get hurt while I'm gone. And I mean it damnit. Please be safe.