A wet weekend.

July 29

My weekend was fairly uneventful. It was rainy and cold, and so I don’t think anyone felt like going out much. On Saturday, Andrea and I were going to go to dinner and see the Dark Knight, but tickets were sold out by the time we got there (it just came out here in NZ last Thursday). So we ended up getting dinner at the Hog’s Breath Café (yum!), stopping by New World for candy and Mountain Dew, and ending the evening with TV at my place.

Sunday was much the same, except I didn’t venture into town. I braved the rain and went up to the library for a few hours to get some reading done. Normally, I would never do this. At home, I certainly would never do this. But the library is heated, and my flat is not. So my cold fingers and toes won out, and I drug them and the rest of me to campus. When I got back, Dani and I watched “Just Like Heaven” on TV, and I went to bed far too late.

It was back to classes on Monday, with me being really productive in the in-between time. I read about half of “Songlines” by Bruce Chatwin, which is one of the books I’m reading for my Travel Writing class. It’s really interesting, and very well-written. Chatwin has this theory that humans – all of us – were designed to be nomads, and that we weren’t actually meant to settle down and stay in one place. Our boots (or, really, our feet) apparently really were made for walkin’. So, in this book, Chatwin is in Australia, trying to learn about Aboriginal songlines. A songline is a sort of “map” of the country, with each song representing the path an “Ancestor” took back when the world was being created. The Aboriginals believe that everything that exists on earth was sung into being by the ancestors. And, when following in the footsteps of your particular Ancestor (because everyone has a certain one, be it Perenty Lizard, Bandicoot, Wallaby, etc.), you have to sing the correct songline so the world can be “re-created” as you go along. I’m probably not doing a very good job explaining it, but it really is interesting. Especially since it gives two looks at the Aboriginal people – the view of the common Westerner, and then the view of those who actually know and work with them. Cool stuff.

After lots of reading and such, Jamie and I went out to Chicky’s for dinner. It’s a chicken place right down the road from me that makes really good sandwiches and decent fries. It was a tasty way to end the evening. Then it was back to the flat to chill out with the girls and watch some TV. And lend Tina my phone so she could text a guy. A guy who, since then, stood her up for a date. I take no responsibility for this.