Two more down... not cockroaches

I wasn’t able to post on the 17^th of this month. This day marks two full months in Perth. I’m still counting down days! Things are going much better since Danielle arrived but I still want to get this over with and get back to Canada.

22 months remaining before I’m done the MPharm.

23rd Birthday

I’ve been having lots of trouble getting online the past while. Lots has happened but I don’t think I’ll have time to post details

I celebrated my 23^rd birthday with Danielle last Friday. After my compounding lab Danielle and I spent the day together. We went to some shops because I wanted to buy some clothes but we didn’t find anything. Danielle bought bicycle later in the afternoon which is great because now we can get around much faster with a greater range. After some biking around Danielle and I went for pizza at a local pizza place called Chelsea pizza. Good times.

My medicinal chemistry exam last week went surprisingly well. I was right on class average and I’m really happy with that since chemistry is by far my weakest subject. I still can’t wait for this term to be over. Lots of late nights and I’m getting sick of it. It’s project after project with lab reports and lectures on top of it all. I’ll get through it though.

Anyway, I’m going to bed early tonight so that is enough for now.

I will be sure to update tomorrow IF I can get online.

Bed Part Two

The bed stayed intact throughout the night. I looks like I’m not going to be able to get to Ikea until Thursday so hopefully the bed will last that long. In Perth, shops close at 5 most days but Thursday is an exception and its called “late night shopping”. On Thursday some stores remain open until 7:00 or in some rare instances until 7:30. It’s really annoying because my classes run 9-5 Monday to Friday most weeks.

I spent all day studying. Danielle and I took a short walk to get some bread at “Cobs”. Except its actually called “Bakers Delight” here but it’s the same company as Cobs – founded in Australia believe it or not. A loaf of country grain bread costs me $3.00 AUD. Is it more than that in Canada? I don't remember.

My medchem exam is this Wednesday and I still have lots to look at by then. Its grueling really.

Simple task… buy a bed

The bed I have been using since my arrival at 7 Colin Street was on loan to me until the owner needed it again. It would soon be time to give it up so I proactively sought out to purchase a bed. If I had a car or truck I probably would a looked for a used one but I didn’t have time to mess around so I was searching for a new bed. I’ve actually never had to buy a bed until now so this was a first. There is a mattress store not too far from my house so I took a look around there. The cheapest bed with box spring combo was over $500 AUD so I kept looking. I checked the Ikea website and they had some good deals. I ended up buying the cheapest bed and mattress combo Ikea had to offer (no box spring required!). Delivery was cheap and so I was happy.
My stuff was delivered today which meant that I needed to assemble the bed – great fun. Assembly was annoying and time consuming but worst of all one of the boxes is MISSING. I only discovered the missing box after Ikea had already closed so it was too late to get the parts (their also closed tomorrow oh course). This might not sound like a major problem but when things generally aren’t going very well this sort of thing becomes the last straw. The missing pieces were essential because they are required to keep the mattress on the frame. How could this happen!?! To solve the problem I angrily went to the back yard in search of any wooden planks. After finding nothing I decided to pull some boards off of our half falling over decrepit fence. The mattress is currently sitting on the fence boards and it seems to be sturdy enough for the time being. Definitely a shoddy solution.

Now I need to get a ride to Ikea, which isn’t going to be easy, to get the missing pieces. Why can’t anything go smoothly?

I’m gong to bed now and one of two events will likely occur:

1) I wake up well rested after night one in the new bed.
2) I wake up in the middle of the night, on the ground, surrounded by broken fence boards.

I think we all know which event will most likely occur.

Wednesday

Today was uneventful. Danielle made me some good food though. Including a toasted tuna sandwich for lunch and pasta with from scratch cream sauce for dinner. Thankfully, I haven’t had a can of soup since she arrived.

I’ve been studying lots as I have a medicinal chemistry exam next week. Wish me luck.

Eggs…

In Australia, if you find yourself wondering around a grocery store somewhere near the bakery or bread aisle, you might be surprised by what you find next to the bread. Well, maybe you wouldn’t but I sure was because in Australia eggs are kept at room temperature and they are often located next to the bread. I shake my head every time I’m in the local IGA and I see crates of eggs sitting at room temperature. It seems so strange to see hundreds of eggs sitting out … shouldn’t they be in a fridge? Who decided that it would be best to leave them out and why haven’t they shared their secret with any grocery store in Canada? It seems very odd to me.

After you have wrapped your head around this whole room temperature egg concept you also might begin to think that maybe these eggs are cheaper than eggs in North America. Possibly because these eggs don’t require refrigerated transport or storage. If you thought that then you’d be wrong because a dozen eggs, here in Perth, will cost you more than $6.00 AUD. I’m sure they can be found for cheaper but at present I do not have a vehicle so my local IGA is where I shop.
Enjoy your eggs!

Back online…

I haven’t been able to post because our internet was down AGAIN!!! I can’t stand the inconsistent availability of internet at this house. I rely on the internet for school and skype. A couple of weeks ago we ran out of bandwidth because we were using too much. Then the wireless router was not working. After that was fixed, my macbook broke. Now I don’t know what’s wrong but I think its on the ISP side so I can’t even deal with that myself.

Anyway, Danielle is here now. I’m extremely glad she’s here. Things don’t seem so bad at the moment. Stephen drove me to the airport to pick her up. We had a really tough time getting home because the signage was terrible on the freeway. We ended up driving past the zoo three times but finally made it home.

I have a lot of studying to get done but I hope Danielle and I get to do some fun things. She brought my camera cord so I will be able to post pictures on the blog.

Keep checking for updates or subscribe to the blog.

Cockroach kill count

I’ve killed five of these terds since I moved into this house.

The first one was scurrying across the carpet late one night. I promptly crushed him since I’m always wearing my shoes in the house. I only take my shoes off to sleep since I need them to fight off these insects as well as to keep my feet warm.

The second kill was in the laundry room. I wonder what he was doing in there? Maybe, eating soap or something. I know they can metabolize almost anything.

I made three kills at once while taking out the garbage this past weekend. When I pulled the bag out of the garbage bin they started running around. I killed them and left their bodies under the cupboard. Hopefully the corpses will deter others from the area. Not likely though.

I haven’t seen any roaches around my room to date. Keep your fingers crossed for that one. I actually don’t mind the roaches so much since they don’t bite or move fast like spiders. I would make a spider kill count but then I’d be posting every day.