Trial Run at Work by B

First off I want to bring to everyone's attention my last post which I posted for a moment about 4 days ago. Somehow that post was perused by EMay and then when she posted a piece of her own, she managed, I believe, to post over what i wrote. I have no idea how that is possible. She is becoming some sort of blogging wizard apparently. Anyways if you didn't get a chance to look at that post before, know that it is available now (I hope).

A couple days ago I had a little tryout at the restaurant in Bondi where Erin works. I was pretty nervous learning the ropes of being a waiter but everyone there was really nice in teaching me what to do. I even got to work with Erin for about an hour which was awesome. The system seemed pretty simple once you got used to it. All the orders go back to the kitchen wirelessly via the waiters' palm pilots. You just select the order from the pop up list there and then go pick up the food from the kitchen when it is ready. My Mom has been getting trouble from people because she still uses a palm pilot which is soooo 20th century, but now I need to figure out the shorthands for writing in one of those things again so I can be a super awesome waiter. So after a little 3hr mini-shift and then an anxious day of waiting for them to call me back, I officially have a job as a waiter in Bondi! So I am very pleased to be working about 3 shifts a week down there. Now if the pizza people will call me back I can hopefully pick up 3 shifts or so there and have a pretty full week between the two.

So things are finally coming together for me here in Oz so I will have some time to think about all the things I am missing back at home. Like the Dodgers who fell apart with me not around to keep them in their winning ways. And like the Lakers who are favored to win it all this year with the monster that is Bynum coming back from injury teaming up with Gasol and Odom to make the hugest lineup ever. Plus the Steelers (my favorite football team since there isn't one in LA) are playing well right now from what I hear. I have been downloading daily podcasts from espn.com and uploading them onto my ipod to listen to during the hour or so I spend every day on the buses and trains and ferries. That is turning into a great system for keeping me occupied while traveling and keeping me up to date on the sports at home. And with everyone doing a great job of leaving comments and sending me emails letting me know what they are up to back in the states, I don't feel too out of touch as a Sydneysider.

A Short History of Nearly Everything
by Bill Bryson

I just finished reading a little popular science nonfiction book, A Short History of Nearly Everything, and decided I would write up a little review of the book here for anyone who cares. I have been trying to get into the habit of writing up a little something after every book I read because I think I get a lot more out of books if I force myself to spend a little time at the end to explore my reactions to the book. In the past I would just write something in a Word document and then delete it pretty much when I finished. But now I have a blog and maybe a couple people who care about what I am reading so I figured I would write something up here.

Anyways, onto the book. I picked up this book after I listened to the book on tape version of In a Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson (a little travel guide for Australia which was really really good and I recommend it to anyone who wants to learn more about Australia) and was not as impressed with Bill's effort this time around. The book walks through a billion different subjects in Biology, Physics, Chemistry, Astronomy, and Geology and pretty much summarizes all the big events in the history of those subjects that have led us to what we know today about the world and universe. Most of the info in the book I had already learned at sometime or another in college or high school going through the human biology major and the premed courses. It was definitely fun to review some of the stuff and hear interesting back stories on how certain scientific discoveries came about, but overall I did not get too much out of the book. Bryson was not nearly as comical as he was with A Sunburned Country which I guess is expected because a lot of the subjects in this book can be pretty dry (like plate techtonics). But if anyone wants a brief overview of a wide range of scientific subjects and doesn't want to fight through a thick textbook, this breezy popsci account of what we know is definitely the thing for you.

Our Rose Bay Apartment

I snapped a couple photos of our place in Rose Bay so everyone could get a better image of where the magic happens. We have the living room and the kitchen here.
Both are very homey. The kitchen might be a little small especially when there are four of us in there making dinner. The living room is nice though with a little game table and a dining table. So if you are wondering what the scene actually looks like when I am dominating at dice or when Taylor is cooking up some of his world famous chili, now you know. Alright I think that's it for now. We went to a rugby game last night for some more Australia culture. We will have a little synopsis of that up soon. Mmiss you all!