In which our hero signs on with two major networks and goes walkabout without sunscreen ...
So. Tuesday, my first full day in the land of Oz. I was still quite tired, and more than slightly overwhelmed. I started by activating my SIM card, purchased the previous day, on the Vodafone site. Then I made another unsuccessful attempt at accessing my Yahoo mail, which I couldn't do because I couldn't remember the answer to my security question. It was so strange that I can't even fathom why I set it as my security question. Blarg.
Later in the morning Wen Ying had a job interview, so I decided to go with, and get some shopping done. We first went down to the nearby shopping centre, Helensvale Town Centre, on a mission to get a printer cartridge from K-Mart. They didn't have one. Nor did anywhere else. We also needed to find a place to print some resumes, which we didn't. I did manage to get a battery, though, for my $4 Timex watch. Part of the expedition's mission was to get me a mobile internet USB dealie. We got that. It's necessary because there's no internet at the house, because apparently there's already too many houses on the street that are hooked up. Whatever. I'm sure if they really wanted to have more customers, they could figure it out. It's from Optus. The fellow, James, was very helpful and knowledgeable, and set the whole thing up for me, so all I had to do was plug it in, which was very good because I'm sure I wouldn't have had the energy to do it later. So you can thank him for the first blog post, and whatever emails and FB stuff people got on Tuesday.
So on to the job interview, which was in an area called Labrador. I decided to go for a bit of a walk, as I could see water like two blocks away. I don't think it was technically the ocean, more like some kind of bay or something. It was still quite nice, though. I walked on the bit of beach, and up several blocks, and then back down, and was back where I started. It was quite nice. I took a few pictures, as you see.
This is also when I acquired the choco mint Drumstick, mentioned above. Or below. Whatever. By then the interview was over, and we continued with the expedition. Next stop was the local bike shop, in Helensvale Plaza, to fix a flat tire. I've neglected to mention, I think, that this is a car expedition. I'll be taking over the bike soon, I think. Anyway, tire fixing success. Also in that plaza we achieved success in the printer cartridge and resume printing departments. Then, back down the road to the Town Centre because I forgot the first time to buy some pre-paid charge on my phone. The girl at the Vodafone kiosk was not very helpful. She didn't explain things, just showed me the pamphlet that said all the pre-paid payment options. So I picked a $30 thing, and payed, and we went home.
All this time we'd been driving around with the windows down, and my left arm was frequently sitting on the window ledge. (Remember that they drive on the wrong side here, so as the passenger I was on the left.) Anyway, at some point I started realizing that it felt a bit like it was getting burned. And it looked a bit pink, and slightly tender. Then I noticed that my ears felt hot, as did the sides of my neck. Oops. What kind of fool walks around Australia at high noon without sunscreen? Like, seriously? Luckily I brought a bit of aloe vera goo for just such an eventuality.
So later on, I did some emails, and blogging, and my head was starting to hurt, and I was seriously doubting the sanity of the whole expedition, as I think I mentioned. But after writing a bit, and messing around with my phone, and figuring out how to set the date and time (which I thought they all did automatically, but I guess not) also how to use a song from my collection as a ring tone, and how to set a picture of my darling Friskey as my wallpaper, I felt considerably better. So Wen Ying and I made a cake from a mix, and it was done just as Sarah finished her music lessons. Then we ate it. It was good.
Then evening stuff, stayed up too late doing the blog, headache got worse, went to sleep.
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