better bigger faster stronger

so, the shower: not so bad! there was a vent that wouldn't close up in the corner of my stall but other than that..it was relatively easy to get a good temperature and had decent pressure..also..someone left a radio in there that constantly plays and while i was lathering and rinsing, kanye's 'stronger' came on which a) i have never heard on the radio and b) i have never heard on the radio in AUSTRALIA so that was quite the pleasant surprise, kanye would be proud. now i'm playing that on repeat (along with young folks) and it's pretty badass, i must say. so now that you know that you should also know that i am back writing this so soon because at this point i just want to get it over with. i could/should do this by pen & pencil (abby got me that nice journal!) but i am a lazy bum when it comes to handwriting anything (which is why you all have not got postcards yet) and this is just so much easier. except when technology fails on me - go figure!

so the room is still the same temperature as it has been, but i since amassed a total of 7 blankets (and i sleep under all of them). it seems like everyday i come back and there's another blanket sitting on the foot of my bed (which i am quite okay with) so sleeping is much more pleasant. except for the dreams i've been having.. i basically never had dreams back in the states (lack of ambition and whatnot) but here my mind is like a kid with add downing pixysticks. the other night i had a dream about a tornado touching down in a mall as i ran to avoid it, and last night i was dreaming of running along this path that looked an awful lot like bluff road, lemont, il, but was in australia.. i ended up in a truck rig somehow with a medley of killer animals (lions, tigers, and raccoons! oh my!) but none of them wanted to eat me. i was also at one point in an american car trying to drive on the australian roads (opposite sides). i woke up while i was trying to escape the truck rig (now i'll never know what happens to me!) maybe it's the southern hemisphere water doing crazy things to my head. or the beer.

so.. when we last left the spectromagical life of alycia it was monday. it's friday now. i am now fully enrolled as a student at melbourne uni, woo! my purpose of this semester is finally actualized. now i just have to go to class: which shouldn't be hard... i have a total of 10 hours of class time for the WEEK. 10 hours. i wouldn't even be a full time student at home (yet i am getting 16 credit hours for this semester (shhh loyola)). check out this schedule:

monday: OFF!
tuesday: 11-1230 apartheid in south africa lecture
415-545 migrants and refugess in australia lecture
wednesday: 10-12pm Australian political economy lecture
12-1 Australian political economy tutorial
thursday: 315-415 Apartheid tutorial
415-515 Migrants tutorial
515-645 sports and education in australian society lecture
friday: OFF!

clearly, my semester will be a rough one. i hope i can handle it.

as for my past week, let's see. tuesday i went out on a pub crawl with some kids from my college (aussies!). um, hi. i LOVE australians. they are possibly the greatest people alive. we started out in the city center and went to a bunch of different pubs (don't know names, don't ask) before ending up at pugg's for the night (surprise!). i ended up learning what skulling is (chugging) and the art of throwing a 20 cent piece into someone's drink (forcing them to skull). and at pugg's i met up with the rmit villagers which was cool, because it was definitely weird not going out with them (and no team awesome!). most of the night though i got to know the aussies which was pretty cool. when we finally decided to leave it was raining (big surprise, melbourne!) and we decided to run home so we wouldn't get soaked (hello marathon training!). so as we're sprinting up elgin st or whatever road it is, one of the aussies shouted "welcome to australia!" which i'll take as my official welcome. it was just cool hanging out with australians..kind of crazy. like, hi, i'm in australia. whoa.

wednesday we did the whole enrollment thing and later on at night went to go see harry potter at the LARGEST IMAX IN THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE, woooot! it was pretty sweet, especially since the last half hour was in 3d. it was also nice to take a break from going out for a night (we were home by 930, woo!). me and kristen ended up going to hang out with andrew (aka, mr. illness) because it had been too long since we all hung out together (like 6 hours, whoaaaa).

thursday i finally got my ids (i accrued like 72 of them in a 2 hour period) and then instead of doing the amazing race thing we opted out to exploring the city. we walked around and window shopped before stopping at myer (like macy's) and got our makeup done for the night at the cosmetic counters. the lady who did mine and siobhan's went a bit overboard (think pornstar) and we definitely felt awkward when we left to go to the dinner for the race. made sure to stop in a bathroom and lightened up the purple just a little bit. unfortunately we didn't get a picture but i'm sure it won't be the last time we get our makeup done (way to be cheap ass students, us!).

so later that night we opted out of the pubcrawl that we were supposed to go on. instead we went to casino night at rmit and then headed to pugg's (again!). i saw a bunch of the aussies i knew so i hung out downstairs with them instead of going up to the CROWDED dancefloor. dancing at pugg's on thursdays is great but yesterday it was ridiculously packed..could barely move..and i hate getting TOUCHED by random people and also it smelled badly of bodily odors. so i stayed downstairs and met a bunch more aussies (who are all going on a ski trip this weekend, so i won't see boohoo).

and now here i am! i'm going to lunch now and then after i think i'm going to some thrift store shop with some aussies to get stuff for O2 week next week. there's a back to school pub crawl (think catholic school girl) and an 80s-retro turn in the JCR. so we'll see what crap i come home with (i mean, quality clothing goods). alright, kids. i can only listen to so much kanye. that's a lie. young folks is on repeat.

see you yesterday! <3