Autumn Arrives

March 1st was the official start of autumn in Australia. However, this past week has felt much like summer, with mostly sunny skies and temperatures in the upper 70's and low 80's. The forecast for the next few days looks like much of the same, but towards the end of the week it appears that temps will start to fall. It's a strange thing to have the days getting shorter instead of longer in March and normally we'd be looking forward to summer right now. We don't have much room to complain though, considering we essentially got to enjoy two summers back to back in 2011! I'm not sure how much color-changing of the trees we will see, but I'm excited to find out what the fall and winter have to hold for us in our new country of residence.

Hoping for a fall season full of sunsets like this one!

This week I actually felt the stress of work for the first time in months. It wasn't completely overwhelming, but I was quite exhausted by the end of the week, and I think that going from not working at all to working so many different jobs actually caught up with me a bit. I also had a very challenging day of CRT (substitute teaching) work at a high school teaching an extremely rowdy group of 9th grade boys, which reminded me of my days teaching boy's freshman health, who were the most challenging group of students I've ever taught. I also had the opportunity to play cricket with a group of 7th grade boys, which I thoroughly enjoyed despite the fact that I was a terrible bowler (a position similar to that of a pitcher in baseball) at the beginning of class. Eventually I did improve my bowling skills and was able to hit the wicket, and the boys actually seemed quite impressed with my progress.

After a long week I was happy to catch up with a few friends this weekend. One of my former workmates is moving to Vancouver to pursue her dream of becoming an actress, and she had quite a lively going away party on Saturday night. On Sunday, I enjoyed catching up with another former coworker, as we took a stroll along the Maribyrnong River and followed that up with a delicious lunch of Columbian food in West Footscray at a charming little place called Besito. The food had terrific flavor and I will definitely be dragging Erik there to try additional items on the menu.

A delicious treat! Arequipe, a Columbian caramel sauce topped with chocolate ganache. AMAZING!

I am absolutely missing March Madness over here. Unfortunately I've only been able to watch clips of the exciting games, and it's just not the same as watching them live. It seems like there have been several huge upsets this year, and even though those games have busted my bracket, I love to see that happen (unless it's Carolina that is being upset, of course!). I'm totally bummed that I have to work tomorrow during the Carolina-Creighton game, because with the tournament on network television instead of ESPN, it is not possible to watch replays of the games. I'll be cheering on the 'Heels in spirit though and hoping that I will have several more chances to watch them in 2012!!