Chapter 23 - Snaaaaake! It's a snaaaaaaaaaake! Ohhhh, it's a snaaaaaake!

In which our hero has a close encounter of the snake kind ... 

OK. Now, before you all panic at once, it wasn't actually that close of an encounter.  But the first rule of show business is to draw in the punters, so why not use a bit of exaggeration?

What happened was this.  Last Sunday I got up at like 9ish or 10ish.  The first thing I saw was Sarah and Grandpa heading down the stairs by the deck into the back yard.  I didn't really think much of it.  Carried on with the morning routine.  Then I needed to ask Sarah something, so I went down into the back yard, in my bare feet.  Naturally.  I saw Sarah and Grandpa standing outside the chicken house, one with a shovel and one with a longish 2x4 type thing.  (Actual dimensions may vary.)  So my first thought was, "That looks like a snake situation."  Then Sarah turned around and saw me and said, "Stay there! Very big, very deadly snake!"  So I high-tailed it back to the house.  There is not, I regret to say, a visual aid for this bit of the story.  You'll understand, though, I'm sure, because by the time I actually saw the snake it was a twitchy decapitated mess in a plastic bag.  Apparently it was like 5' long.  Also, it was an eastern brown snake, which is like the second most deadly in the world or something?  Good grief.  Saved again by Grandpa with a shovel.  Just like old times.

Also, in relation to snakes, on Monday the fam came home from grocery shopping, and the munchkins had managed to convince Sarah to buy them lolly snakes.  That's gummy snakes to the rest of the world.  I was going to take a picture of one as the visual aid to my snake story, but I kept forgetting, and now they've all been eaten.

Not to panic, though.  There will be some pictures.  Just be patient.  Or not.  Scroll down now if you want, but good luck finding your place in the text again.  I'll first update on my general state of mind and being.  When last we spoke I was in a bit of a panic.  I've had two weekends in a row with hardly any work getting done.  And now this week I've been sleeping badly, and not long enough, because of all the stuff that's on my mind.  I still haven't done anything about that electromagnetics assignment.  The MATLAB test is over, though, and I think I did well.  I discussed Friday's maths test with the prof, though, and it turns out I got all the questions right.  So that's something.  And I did well again on the tutorial quiz.  And my lab partner and I worked on our electrical machines lab report until midnight last night, and got it done, and submitted today.  I did most of the electrical machines tutorial questions, which were also due today, but didn't actually finish because I ran out of time.  I decided it was better to hand it in on time with one and a half questions missing than late and completed.  Oh well.  Sometimes you just have to accept those kinds of losses.  Also, in relation to maths, the prof was kind enough to give me the year one semester two maths notes so I could refresh about ordinary differential equations.  Which, I can't remember if I mentioned this, but not only has it been 3.5 years since I did any, but the way it's taught here is very different from how I was taught.  So that explains why when the prof got going on them, none of it seemed familiar until he said there was three basic types of solutions, which gave over-damp, under-damp, or critical damp.  It has to do with dampening oscillating movements, such as a building wobbling in an earthquake.  Critical damp is the one you want to achieve, because it's the best chance of the object coming to rest fairly quickly at it's original position.  With under-damp, it'll stop moving eventually, but in like ten years, so the prof said.  That was probably a bit of a joke.  With over-damp, it'll stop moving fairly quickly, but not likely in it's original position.  You'll end up with a sort of Tower of Pisa situation.  If you're dealing with a building, obviously.

Right. So anyways.  All my stupid work for the week is done.  I'm very tired.  I hope I can sleep well, and be well rested finally, and continue to focus tomorrow.

Now the fun stuff.

Here are some windblown palm trees in a parking lot.

Windblown palm trees in a parking lot.

This reminds me.  Here they don't say they're finding a parking spot.  They say they're finding a park.  As in, "Sorry I'm late, sir, but it took me 45 minutes to find a park."

Here is a cool koala that's on campus.  It only appeared in the last couple weeks.  The little artist's statement thingy says that he was going for the camouflage paint jobs they did on ships in WWI and WWII.  I don't remember why.  But it's cool.  Apparently they're popping up everywhere, like the mooses in Toronto.  This is the only one I've seen so far, but I don't really get down to the beach area too much, or at all.  Apparently there's some there.

Kamo-ala.

Here is a construction worker's water jug/cooler/thingy.  You'll have to forgive the profanity.  I thought it was funny.  It reminded me of that time when I wrote "mine" on my Irn Bru, so both Annie and I would know who's it was, and then I went and drank her's by accident.  Good grief.

Here is a shot looking straight up from my study spot on Tuesday.

This whole week was Harmony Week at school.  It was all about multiculturalism and things.  The original information I got said there'd be film screenings, but I kept forgetting to check the online events list because I was so busy, so I basically only saw about ten minutes of the Harmony Day festivities on Tuesday.  There was free poutine being given out by some Canadians, which was fun.  Observe.

And there was also some Chinese dragons.  That was pretty cool. Observe that as well.

I couldn't stay long because I had to scurry off to MATLAB class.  That day there was also a meeting and BBQ for the Griffith University Young Engineers club, (GUYE) (or "gooie" :D).  So I got a free lunch as well as free poutine.  Plus my MATLAB quiz/test thing went well, I think.  After my maths tutorial I went back to see if there was still something going on for Harmony Day, but it was just getting packed up.  They'd been selling t-shirts earlier for a gold coin donation, which I assume means $1 or $2.  I figured I'd get one, because proceeds probably went to future such events.  When I walked up to the girl who was folding them up, though, she said "Want a free t-shirt?", so naturally I accepted.  Now I have an orange t-shirt.  I was just thinking the other day on my lack of orange clothing.  Not that there's anything wrong with that.  I don't especially like orange.  I don't really own anything purple either.  It was just an observation.

Also, now, in the continuing gallery of foodstuffs, look at this that I spotted in a shop.

"Two scoops of sultanas in a box of sultana bran" Just doesn't have the same ring to it, does it?

It's interesting.  This isn't like the decadent chocolate chip cookies.  It's properly Kellog's. You can see the logo.  It's just different names of things.  These are the things I find interesting in foreign countries.  Like Frosties in the UK.  Or Sultana Bran here.

Now on Thursday I decided to eat my lunch in the engineering courtyard, which I only discovered on Tuesday because that's where the GUYE BBQ was.  It's nice and quiet, with a picnic table and some benches, and a big sun shade thing, which is not an uncommon sight in those sorts of public spots.  So when I approached the picnic table there was a caterpillar making it's way along one edge.  I decided to sit on the other side so as to not disturb it.  Later, when I went in to my tutorial and set my bag down, I was thoroughly surprised to find a caterpillar on my backpack.  Really quite likely the same one.  I'm just glad I didn't squish it by accident when I was donning/removing my backpack.  So I used my considerable powers of persuasion to convince it to climb onto my finger, and then I carried it out to a bit of leafy branch outside.  That's a very nice thing about here, is 'outside' is never very far away.

Also, just today I believe, they poured some cement around a section of the light rail tracks by the bus stop.  I believe the last picture you saw was on my first day on campus, and it was just two little bits of rail sticking out.  OK, four bits.  Two pairs.

Also, lastly and most excitingly, I got another postcard from Emily of the Arctic.  It's got doggies on it.  And this one was actually from Eureka, whereas the other one, despite it's beauty, was from Yellowknife, I believe.

See? Doggies.  Fluffy snow doggies.