Laughing Kookaburras and such

Sorry it has been a while since our last update, but things have gotten so busy with stuff that is too boring to talk about. Lots and lots of paperwork, mostly. Errands everywhere..blah blah.

Ben and I picked up a little catalog delivery route twice a week. It's about $80 a week (yard saling money!) and we are enjoying it! It's just an easy little side job that forces us to get out and walk. Plus, it's good training for day hikes. We pack our backpacks way up (Ben's was almost 70 lbs. the other day!) and walk for a few miles. It's not something we NEED to do, but it's such a mindless, easy job, we figured we'd do it until we decided we are bored with it :)
Last weekend we went yard saling, and got all kinds of exciting things! A microwave (old school with the dial and everything!), a food processor, a dish rack, I could go on but I can't remember the other stuff. We also got a FREE couch and two chairs! They were in Port Kennedy, which is about an hour north of us, so we took Mark's Suzuki (I smell an adventure!) and loaded it up. So it wasn't actually free--$45 worth of gas, but that's cheaper than any furniture we've see in ads and at yard sales! Here is a picture of the couch and one of the chairs:

And YES! They ARE really comfy. We've also been able to order a new power cube for our wii, so we'll actually get to use it here, so we are happy about that. It was $15 with shipping. We are getting better and better at figuring out Australian Ebay.

I will be doing some relief work at a Child Development center in Withers (next town over) until my qualifications get assessed. I finally got my transcripts in the mail, and now I'm waiting on all my trainings and certificates from my last job. This week I'll be working 8-4:30 Thursday and Friday. Did I mention that I'm getting paid between $18.41 and $19.35? Because I am! It will be more once I'm not being classified as a "Casual Assistant", but until my qualifications go through, that's what I get. Not too shabby :)

Ben's job continues to be lovely. He just finished a "test" to get AutoCAD certified--he'll be the only one in the office with the certification! He had to do a drawing with AutoCAD and he drew a really cool house. It has to include all the structural stuff like beams and stuff--I don't know, I'm not an Engineer. But it looked awesome and he did a great job. Now he just has to wait to hear back if he got the certification, which he will :)

There is a fancy shmancy business dinner up in Perth at the end of the month that we are going to for Ben's job. How fun! We are thinking about getting a hotel room and seeing if Mark/Nat want to go in on it and stay the night up in Perth after. I'd love to see the city at night!

Lately I've been hearing these CRAZY noises when I wake up. It seriously sounds like 4 or 5 monkeys are outside the window doing the "ooh ooh AHH AHH" noise. This morning I heard it again so I ran down to see if I could figure out what the culprit was (not really expecting monkeys, but how cool would that be?!") I saw a bunch of birds fly off when I opened the shades, but one flew to the street sign and stopped. I could see it was white and black so I googled "Western Australian bird monkey sound" and I found out what it was within seconds. Gotta love the Internet. It is a Laughing Kookaburra (which made me get that song stuck in my head..."Kookaburra sits in the old gum tree, merry merry king of the bush is he, LAUGH! Kookaburra, LAUGH! Kookaburra, gay your life must be!" Please tell me someone else knows this song. It may or may not be from Gullah Gullah Island.) Anyway, here is a link to a youtube video of a Laughing Kookaburra--

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S0ZbykXlg6Q

Now imagine this sound, but with about 4 or 5 birds doing it at once! Crazy birds. I think Australia has some of the most awkward creatures in the world. A few days ago, Mark found his passenger side window completely SMASHED out! And guess what it was from? A GINORMOUS possum. Equally awkward animal, with it's nasty little thick ratty tail and weird beady eyes.

I guess that's about it for now. Don't worry, I won't stop updating! Things are just paperwork-happy right now. More adventures to come!