Kevin = Not Homeless!

Hostel living has its advantages and disadvantages. First off, it's a lot easier to meet fellow travellers if you're in the same room or sharing a bunk bed. They show up, you say hello, and you're instant friends (providing they can speak English). It's also usually cheaper, and close to alot of the good things about the town. For example, the hostel in which I was staying, Beaches, has a bar right outside the front door, an Internet cafe on the main floor, and is pretty much right in the centre of town. I'd be able to go home on my 2 hour break from work, eat lunch, and snooze for a good hour before heading back. Times were good.

The downside to hostel living is that you're pretty much never alone. People come in to the room at all hours of the night, usually blind drunk, making noise and/or vomiting all over the place. In fact, I've had more than one occasion where people would get up in the middle of the night, and pee right in the middle of the floor, then go back to bed, not having any idea that they just whizzed on someone's backpack. Yeah, that's fun. Also, no hostel that I've ever been in has had a bathtub, all just showers. I haven't had a bath in months (I have showered, you smart-asses).

I have, however, been able to remove myself from that situation entirely by renting a room in a house just outside of town. Basically, I'm living in a 4 bedroom house with one woman (the owner of the house, but she's leaving next week to go to Brisbane for some massage course or something like that) and a retired motorcycle repairman. We're the original Odd Couple! Luckily, it's fully furnished, has a huge deck and an amazing ocean view. The downside is that it's a half hour walk away from town, and though the bus goes right by, th bus service in Airlie stops at 10pm, so I'll likely have to make a lot of long walks home at night. I'm sure I'll live, my legs are pillars of steel and rubber balls.

If anyone feels the need to have my address, email me and I'll be more than happy to send it to you. I wouldn't post it, for fear the Feds get a hold of it, and send out more assassins. Luckily, my protective wombats are deadly fast.

Other than my newfound residence, nothing much is happening. I'm still waiting to hear about the sponsorship, and will be looking into extending my visa any way possible. Anybody know any Aussie ladies that would be willing to marry me in the next 2 months? Anyone? Anyone? Beuller?

Bah...

Well folks, things seems to have stalled in Airlie Beach for now. Turns out that sponsorship may only be available for skilled labour, and bartending/waiting tables doesn't count. Luckily, we may be able to apply for a tourist area consideration, which basically means that since not a lot of actually live around here, and it's mostly backpackers or vacationers, then they may make an exception. I'm just crossing my fingers about that though.

In the meantime, I'm looking into getting my visa extended through legal and possibly grey-market ways. I won't get into it, in case the feds are on my tail (aren't they always?) but it involves a large box of scotch tape, 3 gorillas and a whole lot of peanut butter. I may already have said too much.

Other than that, I don't have nay more pictures to show anyone right now, but I will hopefully have more to add in the next couple days.

Cheers!

Whew...

While reading through some of my older posts (and honestly, who doesn't read month old posts on blogs?) I've realized that it's been a while since I had any pictures on here. Truth be told, the biggest obstacle to that is that my computer's USB ports don't work. Also, I don't have my camera anymore, and will have to find camera number 3 somewhere. I do still have my card, so I'll use this time to post some pics some people may not have seen.

Oh, before I do, those of you who are on Facebook, feel free to add me as a friend. I'm on there fairly often, and I have updated pictures there as well.

Here goes:



Evidently these pics will be in a completely random order, as I can't preview them before I post. Anyhow, this was on my birthday weekend in Byron Bay. Gani fell down below the ATMs, and Andy decided to act like a bum, and pass out next to her. Really, this is just one of many times we all fell on the ground. I have a number of random shots of the sky from this night, and pics taken from ground level :)



A nice shot of Ashley, Andy, Gani and me. 2:30 and we're gonzo.



Francis yelling at me for some reason. I "believe" that's a shot of tequila, you know, since I'm holding a lemon, and grimacing like I just got kicked in the balls.



Francis is showing us the proper technique to "slap the goon" (Goon being a bag of "wine" that's super cheap, and gives you the worst hangover imaginable).



This is a shot of the every popular "Pleasure Chest", a chain of... um... 'dancing' clubs around downtown Sydney. I've never been inside, but I hear they're pretty skanky.

OK, that's all the pics I have for now. I'll update with some more later today or possibly tomorrow.

Cheers!