Culture, a film and The Bottie Gardens
On Friday morning we went to The Museum of Sydney for some learning. I'm reading The Fatal Shore, a book on the founding of Australia. It's very interesting, especially reading it here in Sydney where a lot of it happened. Many of the street names are from the era I'm reading about, and I wanted to go to the museum to see some of it first hand. The museum turned out to be very small, and didn't have many artifacts from the 18th and 19th century, but proved to be interesting in other ways. We watched a good documentary from the 1940s on the building of the harbour bridge and there was a fair bit to read. Also good was we got a $4 discount with our YHA (Youth Hostel Association) membership, and so paid only $3 each. Result!

We relaxed in the afternoon. That's a nice thing about living here for three months - we're in no hurry to do everything NOW and can afford to take it easy a bit. Being unemployed has some real advantages, though I imagine we'll tire of it quite soon. We watched The Siege on TV in the evening, a film starring Denzel Washington and Annette Bening, with Bruce Willis in a strange little role. It was pretty interesting, especially following September 11th (2001). I'd give it more than three stars, but probably fewer than four. I guess that means three and a half stars. Hmm, perhaps I should have started off with a ten star system, since having half a star seem pointless. A five star ratings systems seems to be overly-limiting. Now I've started though I will have to stick with it, and just bite the half-star-bullet begrudgingly.

We were up with the larks on Saturday, and the sky was overcast following a night of rain. I took my pedometer, which Anne foolishly gave me for Christmas, and we went for a jog at the park again. The park is 2.6km away, and it took us 31 minutes to walk there (I also used the stop watch on the watch my sister got me for my birthday!) We did a complete circuit (2.9km) in 20 minutes 40 seconds. Last time we jogged (Thursday) we stopped after 18 minutes without completing the circuit. We thought we'd only managed a quarter to a half of the circuit, and walked back the way we came. This morning we realised that we were just a couple of hundred meters from the end, and should have continued walking in the direction we were jogging. We are Bennies.

I later had my third Magnum ice cream of the trip. I figured I'd earned this, having been jogging. This one was a "Chocwork Orange" Magnum (instead of Clockwork Orange). It was truly amazing. Probably my favoutite of the three I've had. I'm now a third of the way through the nine.

Perfectly, it got really sunny and hot later so we spent the afternoon reading the (very heavy) weekend Sydney Morning Herald in the lovely Botanical Gardens ("Please walk on the grass"). I now call these The Bottie Gardens, in a witty satire on the Aussie habit of contracting words and then appending them with "ie". For example, a salt-water crocodile is a "saltie" and a fresh water one is a "freshie", a poker slot-machine is a "pokie" and a school child is a "schoolie".

In fact the "Bottie Gardens" gag is Anne's, but I'll say it's mine and no one will be any the wiser.