I am home again. After another full day of travel I finally landed back in Dallas a whole 3 hours earlier than I was supposed to. As was the theme of the traveling this time, my original flight home was canceled by the time I was ready to get on it. I got to see Daniel and I gave him his new pants (underwear) and lounge pants (pajama pants) from Peter Alexander, a poncy (fancy) little underwear shop in downtown Sydney. He looks awful smart in them. And my brother was in town for his last day of a business conference, so he took me to Kenny's! What a welcome home!

During my last week in Sydney, Al and I had some fun adventures. First we both went to get our hair did. I love the chick that cut my hair. She went to town on it. Allison called it classic Aussie metro. Then she got her hair dyed back to her natural color and got a real sassy short do. She's traveling for the next 13 months through lots of countries that don't appreciate blondes to any degree, so this haircut should last her through it. After we got all dolled up, we went to Al's leaving do (party) at the Fire House Hotel (pub (bar)) in North Sydney. She has lots of wonderful friends. But it was weird how they want back and forth and around the table and every single one of them was like "Well, it's just like when I lived in the UK for 6 months prior to my year of traveling around southeast Asia." And another would chime in, "Oh yeah, when I lived in the Carribean, I spent a year touring before I got my residency in Australia." And I'm just like who are you transient people? All of them have been all over the world, lived all over the world, and I'm just like Addison! rules!

But it was a really fun party. Two of the girls were especially fun and they called Daniel early in the morning while he was at work and tried to convince him they were Kylie and Danni Minogue. Even tho the accents were pretty authentic, he didn't fall for it. Shucks.

My last day there we took a guided tour of the Hunter Valley (the Aussie Napa Valley). We went to like 5 or 6 different cellar doors and drank some very good wine. I ended up buying 4 bottles, I think, but we drank some before I left. I brought home 3 bottles and some aged goat cheese from some Hunter Valley goats. So ridiculously good. And the Shiraz is just ... huge. I can't even explain it. That was major fun. So we did that, picked up Noodle Star take away (to go) and ate it with the shiraz. And then the next day I left.

So here I am. I do not work until next Tuesday, nor do I intend to check my work email or answer my work phone until then. So if anybody wants to hang out and tan or something, let me know. It's summer again for me and I intend to take advantage this week. Laaaaaaaaate.