I'm still here! i promise!

wow. wow. wow. looooooong time, no update, huh. so so sorry! Well I'm going to try my very hardest to make it up to you? how am i going to go about this task? i'm going to attempt to regain your love and forgiveness by posting lots and lots of pictures! deal? ok... let's give it a shot. :-)

First off -before i update you on my goings ons... i realized something. Aside from a couple early shots of my kitchen... i have never showed you where i'm actually living. well my friends (and family)... that's all about to change.

here is a tour de my (really really dirty) room (sorry! i actually just cleaned it... these pictures are from a while ago), the area around my house, and my school from a distance:

one side of my room:


my desk/window and such --> my desk is a mess due to massive paper writing fun that was occurring at the time.


one more - this is one of my very unmade bed. yeah.. most people who take pictures of their rooms clean first... so as to create at least the illusion of order... me? me i'm into truth. reality. ...it's definitely not just that i was most likely too lazy at the time to clean.. no no no way... reality.



ok. i think you've now got a good enough idea of my room... how about the area around my house. welll.. you look out my window and you see this:


yeah... a nice little courtyard. and see the fountain? it fools me at least once a week into making me think it's raining. it's a tricky little bugger if you ask me.


here is door to my building (taken from the courtyard). Wondering which one is my window? didn't think so... well i'm going to tell you anyway. ok. stay with me. ok. 4th floor up (not including the first floor w/ the door)/4 balconies up - and then.. you can't ACTUALLY see my window.. but it would be the 3rd window - aka right in the center of the top of the photo. cool. i'm glad we did that together... i feel much closer to you now.

anyway.. moving on.

here is my building from the across the street (that street is Broadway by the way incase you were wondering):



my building is the big one in the back - though you probably already figured that out.

here is another one of my building and broadway:

now... if you turn around from where i was standing in that last picture.. you can see me school (the huge tower with "UTS" on it --> which was also the first thing i notice out the airplane window when i first landed in sydney)!:


it's a massive building. last semester i had class on the 19th floor. oh.. and by chance.. i'm actually sitting in it right now (my uni's fast internet makes my life a million times easier when it comes to uploading pictures online for you).

Here is another picture of one of UTS' buildings - i had my gender class in this one:




allllllrriiigghhhhtttttttttt... now that we are all oriented... now it's time for the fun stuff... to start with, let's go random:

first of all... i want to prove to you that i DO do LOTS of work here..... see!


so many books! -- those were books i was using while i was writing a paper for my gender class. I carried 11 books home from the library in one go. i felt so so so studious. man alive. oh. it was actually almost kind of tragic. like i said, i was carrying all these books home, and i was talking to my friend amanda on the phone at the same time (multi tasking to the EXTREME!). anyway, i was in the middle of crossing a street and suddenly one of the books slipped off the top of ths stack and onto the ground. well. i didn't want to get hit by a car. and i didn't want to lose the book. and i couldn't pick it up because of everything in my hands. so what did i do? i kicked it across the street. however... what i didn't notice about the other side of the street was that there was one of those sewer/gutter things that goes into the curb... and right in front of that thing was an actual gutter with slates. luckily i kicked it a little to the right... otherwise i totally would have been spending the rest of the afternoon battling a gutter -hoping hoping hoping- to get the book back. PHEW. sorry. long boring story. well YOUUUU are the ones that said you want updates... so there! :-)

ok more random things...
i went to a friend of mine's birthday. it was a picnic down by the water at the botanical gardens. on the way home i saw something that made me realize just exactly where i was. recognize this?


on another day i went on an adventure to the beach, which was really really nice, and i hope to get a chance to do that more;


let's see.. what else can i show. you. oh you want to meet some people? here are some of my closest friends:

(left to right (and back row to front): (back row) bel, brooke, (middle row) emma, amanda, dani, Chloe, (front) Dee, and Marie)

here are a couple more pictures of people:

Me and Vesna at the Newtown Festival (i'll come back to this outing)


(L to R): Me, Marie, Emma, Amanda, and Bec


Amanda and Me at the Newtown Festival


Laura (in the back), sara, me, and amanda


Me and Katie


alright - now back the Newtown Festival (which i mentioned i would talk about in more detail). It was a huggeeeeeeee event in a park in Newtown (which is an area of sydney near me - and it happens to be the area (on King Street) where i spend most of my time). Anywho, this festival was really really fun. it was a beautiful day and it was just so nice to be able to hang out with people outside. there was lots of good food. and soooooo many people:


there were also hula hoopers - which was pretty cool to watch! :-)


by far, though.. this was my favorite moment of the whole day:


i looked up and saw this gothy looking guy talking to the woman who i felt looked as though had just walked straight out of a soda shop. :-) It was just a cute moment that i hope can at least be understood a little through this photo.

so yeah. that was a really really great day. - one of my favorites so far. :-)

oh.. and afterwards i went to a little gathering... where i met my new best friend:


:-) :-)



ok. annndddd nowww... it's time for holiday fun!

first off.. halloween! soooo i was just laying down for a nap when my friend bel phoned me and asked if i wanted to carve a pumpkin. my answer was (of course) "YES! YES! YES! More than anything!!!" (Halloween is my favorite holiday! :-) ) soooo we went on a mission to find a pumpkin. Now, in case you didn't already know... most Australians do not celebrate Halloween. (i know. crazy. i don't get it either) so anway, we walked into this grocery store and bel asked a guy working there "Do you have any carving pumpkins?", immediately i was bit confused... in my mind (also long as it's not in a can) any pumpkin can be carved. The guy gave us kind of a funny look and then said "uh. i think we have two left" and disappeared. . When he came back he had two middle sized pumpkins. i examined them. Both of them had really really really short stems... so i chose the one w/ the slightly longer of the two. As we walked to the checkout counter i looked at the pumpkin I had cradled in my arms. There was, what looked like, mold growing by the base of the stem (and i later found out on the bottom). When we got to the check out counter i asked the lady if we could have a discount because of the mold... she was like "no! They always come like that. thats normal, all pumpkins have that." and I was like just like "haha. uh. no. no they don't...." but i didn't argue her on the subject.. just laughed. then this other guy who worked there came up to us and asked us "Arrre you guuys going to like cut a hole in that? and like put a candle in it." i looked at bel and then at the guy and said "why yes. yes we are." I swear, i suddenly felt like a crazy person... like i was inventing a tradition.

anyway, it's hard to write out the humor... but it was really really funny. oh and the pumpkin was $25.85AUD!!! expensive little bugger. oh... and did i mention that they totally bagged my pumpkin? As in i turned to talk to bel for a second.. and when i turned back around... they had put my pumpkin INTO a bag. YOU DON'T BAG A PUMPKIN! haha... when i laughed at it and carried it w/ the bag's handles they were like 'oh... do you want me to double bag it?" haha.

i then skipped through this train station with a bagged pumpkin. it was just so strange.. i cannot describe it.

sooo then we walked up to the street level and started searching for a bus.... i looked around me and people were -pointing- and -gasping- and even -drooling- a little... they were SO surprised to see the pumpkin... a bunch of people even exclaimed "OH MY GOSH! IT'S A PUMPKIN! AH!" when we briefly stopped into a store on the way home the people working there all stopped what they were doing as we walked in and were like (almost in unison) "A PUMPKIN!! IT'S HUGE!!" haha.

now i dont have very many pictures from this night... my friend amanda has the good ones - but i haven't gotten them from her yet... so just to tide you over until i get them:

our handsom pumpkin - Punkie



oooo i also cooked the seeds (w/ salt) and they turned out so so so soooooo good! i was really proud of myself!!!! :-)



YUM! :-)


nexxxxttttt holiday-- YESTERDAY! THANKSGIVING! YUUMMM!!!! :-) :-) Once again my friend Bel (her girlfriend is American - originally from Boston, so they alway invite me over when there is an american holiday that needs to be celebrated. :-) ) invited me over. This time it was for a HUGE feast. About 40 people were there.
these were just the appetizers!


one of the two turkies being carved:


and... are you curious as to what i thought of the food?

well... i have only one thing to say-

BEFORE:


AFTER:



SOOOOOOOOOOOO GOOOOOOOOODDDDD! :-)

let's see - anything else new in my life...

well, i'm done with uni! which means IT'S SUMMER! wahhooo!!! :-) Have spent the past week trying to get all my classes approved both by SLC and UTS.. Finally think i have everything figure out, and that i'm officially registered. If all stays as it is i'll be taking an Audio production workshop (which, while it's not film, will be good for me becuase i'm so not confident when it comes to audio [even in my films] - so it will be good to work to over come that fear), another writing class, and a class called Power and Change in Australia.

yupyupyup! that's about it as of now. until then i'm hoping to travel heaps. however, before that happens, i'm allowing myself a couple weeks just to relax. the end of the semester was HECTIC... and i think if i want to stay sane... i need to allow myself time to let my brain turn to mush... at least a little. :-)

last but not least... and you can't get much more "up to date" than this... here is a picture of me waving at you as i sit here on the floor of my uni because my computer ran out of batteries and i had to move close to a "power point" in order to plug it in so i could finish this update... listening to music... and writing you to you:



there ya have it folks! A long overdue update! I hope you're at least a bit satisfied.

know i think about you all the time, and love each and ever one of you very very much! i hope you guys all had wonderful thanksgivings and ate more then you probably should have. :-)

miss you!!!!

love,
Alex

ps: i totally do read you comments when you leave them. and they make me really happy. so in response to them
*hi jenny and sammie! i hope all is well on the 400 block of grove! i miss of you heaps - give my love to the rest of the family!

*dad - glad you liked the pictures of the farm. :-) thought they might make you, anni, and uncle steve and aunt cathy proud! :-) definitely felt like i got in touch with my roots during that trip. :-)

*Mo - did you notice... the 60 sign made into this entry. proud? because you should be. :-) <3 <3

*emily - (in regards to you comment about my gender class) - yeah i actually wondered if maybe it was similar to yours. From the little you've told me about it it seems like it covered similar topics. I forget, did you like yours? love-

*hey uncle steve and aunt Cathy!!! -- oh there was definitely no doubt in my mind that i was heading to the farm. How could i choose anything over a farm stay? yeaaahhh... noooo way! Made me think so so much about the days i used to hear uncle steve getting up at like 4am to feed/milk the cows and i'd rush to join him. i even fed a calf while on the farm JUST FOR OLD TIMES SAKE! :-) some of my favorite memories have taken place at little prairie dairy. i hope you guys know that! :-) love you both so so much!

*Melissa - you rock my life. oh and you + me + the outback stake house = immediately when i get home. for serious.