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The first time that I experienced jet lag was in Sweden 3 years ago. No matter what I did, every night I would lay awake through the night staring at the ceiling wide awake. I wouldn't start to get tired until about 6am, which was right around when I had to get up and go to work. It was awful. No matter how tired I was or how much I attempted to exhaust myself -- either through exercise or booze, I couldn't sleep at night. It took a full week for me to adjust.
I'm experiencing it again. Only this time, the opposite. Every night here around 8pm, I get excessively tired. A few nights I've managed to stay up until 10 or 11, but not past that. A couple nights I've fallen asleep at like 8. I tried taking one of my sleeping pills to encourage me to sleep in a little bit thinking that would help. That night I slept 13 hours and stayed in bed until 10, but it didn't help. It's just so completely independent of how much sleep I'm getting. I'm just prone to this anomaly known as jet lag. I'm hoping it will clear up soon. I'm going to try a power nap today. Because we have going away parties to attend this weekend and it won't be very good if I'm sleeping in the corner.
But I've still had plenty of time during the day to do some really fun stuff. Yesterday we went to the zoo and saw kangaroos, wallabies, koalas and dingos. But maybe my favorite part wasn't the animals, but the expansive view of Sydney Harbor from across the water. It really is a beautiful city. After the zoo we took a ferry over to the opera house. It was pretty crazy to be standing on the steps touching this super iconic landmark. The whole white part of it is actually like regular sized white tiles. I had no idea. So Allison and I sat at the opera house bar, had a cocktail, and watched the sunset. It was so wonderful.
The best part about coming and staying with Allison is that I'm getting a good balance between touristy activities and the locals. One night we went to the grocery store and bought a bunch of ingredients to cook a traditional Paesta. It's actually something we made up on our car trip home from Jervis Bay, but we decided to make it a reality. I remember when my grandmother used to make us a paesta on the holidays. The best thing about a paesta, though, is how it brings together family and friends. It ended up being a terrifying blend of vegetables, pasta, bacon, chicken, heaps of ancho chili sauce, and a few spoonfuls of an Aussie blend of Ranch dressing. It's a good thing that everything goes with ranch. Despite the improvisational nature of the dish, it actually turned out pretty good. So good that Dom had 4 servings -- and nobody is THAT polite, so I think he really enjoyed it.
I think today we're going to take it easy. We are going to get some acupuncture done because neither one of us have ever done it and Daniel always tells me how amazing it is. Aw, the only thing that could make this trip better is if Daniel was here with me. I miss him. Anyway, we're resting up today because tomorrow we're going on a vineyard tour of the Hunter Valley. So it's going to be a helluva day and we want 24 hours of sobriety prior to that. Should be interesting.
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