Zubeneschamali

Hi, LJ! This is the first of at least three posts that I've been meaning to make for a couple of months now. I traveled to Kentucky in February, and I have some interesting pics from that. Then I went to New York in March, where I got to hang out with bewaretheides15 and tebtosca, both of whom are as awesome in person as online (not that you had any doubts, right?). Next week, it's up to Chicago for my annual super-sized academic conference (6,700 papers are being presented in 5 days), and then the semester will be almost over, whee!

( The rest of this post is an update on my running, so feel free to skip it if that's not of interest to you. )

I find it really hard to believe that we've been here for a month already. Feels like we just got here! On the other hand, New Zealand seems forever ago, and Melbourne is starting to feel familiar. There's only seven weeks to go, one of which will be in Sydney, so it also feels like it's all going to be slipping away soon. :( I don't know if I can handle going back to a place without five cafes on every block, and worse yet, a place where they don't have flat whites. There's no brewed coffee here, just espresso (short black), espresso with water (long black), lattes, or something like a cappuccino but with micro-foamed milk (flat white). So coffee is always freshly made and always really flavorful. And it's everywhere. Sushi bars, Thai restaurants, fried chicken shops, pizza parlors, ice cream shops, etc. I decided early on to set myself the challenge of having coffee from a different place every day, and so far I haven't had to deviate more than a block off my usual walk to campus. :D

So I'm loving the coffee, and I'm loving living on the 16th floor overlooking the city and one of the many parks/gardens that fill the city (and are great for running in; thanks to pedestrian overpasses and riverside paths, the distance you can cover without having to cross more than one or two streets is incredible), and I'm loving that I'm missing one of the coldest and snowiest winters the Midwest has ever had (sorry not sorry). Here's the view from our bedroom, followed by two shots from the balcony:

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When my name was posted on spn_summergen today, they accidentally left out the underscore and it looked like my account was gone. D: But this made me realize that zubeneschamali, the name I wanted all along but had been taken when I first joined LJ, had been deleted and purged. So I snatched it up. :D

All of the links to this journal and all of my friend connections should still be as they were, but let me know if anything's hinky. And you can leave out the underscore from now on.

I feel like after years of making do with clothes that weren't the right size, I finally got clothes that fit me. Ahhh. :D

My numb3rs_bigbang is done!  It's the suckiest first draft ever, and it needs so much work before it gets posted, but I actually finished writing the whole darn thing by the deadline (with two and a half hours to spare, no less!).  Thank you, ficfinishing cheerleaders and the mods of the big bang for providing me with a deadline and motivation.  *bounce*

So it turns out that roll-on sunscreen has its advantages and disadvantages...

( Picture inside the cut )

Also, it's hard to take a picture of your own knee.

On the bright side, my yearly Father's Day gift of baseball tickets to my dad this year was actually used on Father's Day.  The home team lost, but it was still a good game; the stadium was awesome (the new Nationals park in DC); and my parents and I all had a great time.