Cosmic Nutty Backpackers!

Had a really good night down the Fords Bridge bush pub the other night! It was really good because it was so quiet! At one point it was just Andrea the bar owner, Heather, me and Zoe so we had a proper girls night until the bous Swino and Robbo turned up. We chatted and drank a good few.. it was the most H had had since before she was pregnant with Zoe and since I had taken painkillers for my earache I was feeling pretty happy myself (and after 4 vodkas I had no earache!!) But was surprised me most is the nutty backpackers and hitch hikers they have all met, they have enough stories to keep you entertained for a week!
They seem to have all picked up a hitch hiker they couldnt get rid of... one put up with one sleeping on the sofa for 6 months before they put their stuff out the front door.. and this girl called Cosmo camped outside the pub for months driving everyone insane and being a complete mung bean star gazing freak who shouted at everyone for being capatilists! Swino picked up a couple who started trying to kill each other in the car and went mental at him...! It was at this point they all said hitch hikers were a nightmare and I told them yes I was a hitch hiker...! ( and a backpacker - what a combination!)

The days are disapearing so fast I cant believe it! When I arrived I said I would stay a maximimum of a month because after all this is a big country and I have to keep moving if I want to see it all! So a month has been and gone... luckily they have no intention of chucking me out, Heather says I'm the best babysitter shes ever had so they are very happy for me to stay on.. but I'm definately leaving at the end of the month! (or i'll never get to see it all!)
As usual loads of different fruit are ripe at the moment, we have been making raisins with the grapes as Heather has a drying machine, the mangos are just ripeneing and I am munching my way through a bucket of fresh figs... no chance of starving here!!
I have been babysitting Zoe alot to allow Heather to do jobs.. she doesnt like her out of her site though so i have to entertain her in the shearing sheds etc so I have been teaching her plenty of songs which she really loves and is always asking me to sing (by asking since she is only 17 months she screams if she wants Row Row the boat because the you have to scream when the croc comes and she stamps her feet when she wants When your happy and you know it! Shes really cute and copies everything I say and do and as soon as I come into the room she wraps herself round my legs and sits on my lap at the table..!

I have started to get a tan. not intentionally, no sun bathing or anything... so am I looking anything like those girls I saw in surfers when I first arrived?!
Yeah right! well theres no chance of me wearing hot pants, I'm not a size 6, my hairs not been brushed in 3 days, I'm covered in bruises, scratches, mozzie bites at varying degrees from the fresh white lumps to the mangy scabby ones, I cant be arsed to wax my legs, I have ripped dirty clothes on, and am usually covered in red dirt and animal shit.. mmmmn how attractive! But actualy I dont give a shit, this is the first year I have not made a New Years Resolution.. how refreshing! I've spent so many years making them and being disapointed with myself for not sticking to them. But actually I'm fine as I am, thank god I dont have to stress about applying makeup or breaking a nail...

My bank card has finally arrived and it is also a visa card which is great!! i love the aussie bank system! So now I just need to put some money in the account and I can do online booking and stuff! Yay!! I've desperately needed this for booking planes and buses and stuff!

To say there are bugs here would be an understatement. After the rain we had a couple of weeks where the mozzies were everywhere, all the locals said they had never experienced anything like it, thankfully its calmed down to a normal level again now but for a while there you had a coat of them on you at all times... flies are still a pain int eh arse, especially before rian or when you are wet, when i got out from swimming Be happy the horse yesterday they just swarmed round and glued themselves to me! nice!! I swallowed a fly today and was just choking todeath and aboutt o throw up and managed to spit it out,, then gulping for air when another one flew in and the whole process started again... I came inside for a juice to help my raw throat and it started again,,, theres always ants in everything, they climb in juice bottles, they run over you and bite you when your sleeping...
I've never been afraid of spiders or snakes or anything, I used to rescue my sister from spiders and ctach snakes out the river when I was small so I have to be reminded to be careful here... not to walk through webs, and I was ready to put the animals to bed in the drak the other night on foot when Heather said no we had to do it on the motorbikes as we couldnt see the snakes in the dark... kinda scary!

I have taken a ridicuolous amount of photos!! About 800 to be precise!! I just cant help snapping away... I think my camera is on its way out though... its battered and scratched and looks like its years old rather than the 7 months it actually is.. when I switch it on sometimes it says lens error and then other times is really blurry and will only take blurry photos... dont know what i should do.. I guess it might have a 1 year warrenty? But I will hate being without a camera while that is sorted out.. Its okay at this moment though... but it'll be a pain if its not when something important happens like seeing ayers rock or Snows babies being born (am patiently waiting for little snowdrops - snows a goat!)

I find the water in the taps mad here.. you'll switch a cold tap on and the waters hot...! that is cold water here... you can have a hot bath from the cold tap! you need ice cubes to make your drink vagulely cool! switch on the hose in the garden and you could burn yourself from the water in it...! I guess its just so hot that the water heats up so much!!!

I dont have a job sorted for the Blue Mountians now, but thats okay, am sure I will find a job somewhere, and it will be good to have a few days off inbetween.. I plan to book the bus ticket there around the 27th Jan, I have to stay the 26th as its Australia day which will be a big basj at the bush pub!