News?

Maybe this isn't very newsworthy, but...

I have been doing a lot of thinking over the past few weeks about what I want to do next year. I might be crazy, but I'm thinking very seriously about returning to uni to do my masters (in Education, probably specialising in Literacy, I'd say).

I'm not ready to leave Tasmania. It's not a good time to look for teaching jobs in Tasmania, either. I also really like my job now, and don't want it to be over at the end of the year. Pretty much, they're credentials I want, and I don't want to wait, or, get caught in a fulltime job that'll hold me back, or, whatever.

Plus, when I do get a teaching job, I'll earn way more money! ;)

Alison Cosker, Perpetual Student.

The proof is in the pudding...? Visual proof I was ever in the US.

Okay, because apparently I'm likely to lose my job if I don't post pictures soon, I'm going to do that. It's raining outside, and I was supposed to walk over to uni and get some things, but I really just could not be bothered. Darn rain.

Anyway. Here we go. Because blogger is being a bum, here are pics from the the Kina show, Street Team meet up, and a few from Chicago with Casey and Cynthia.





















More to come!

Stories from the sky...

So, I'm home, and still fighting jetlag. It's not pleasant! Anyway, I was totally shocked at how little time I had to blog during my trip. Here are a few attempts at blog posts I wrote when I was flying around the US:

Alright, so, yesterday I wrote a really short entry because we didn’t get home until late, and Casey and I were exhausted. We had been out at her parents’ house, and I met her grandparents, aunt, uncle, cousins, etc etc. Casey felt like she should have charged to parade the Australian circus monkey around, but, anyway! Casey has a really great and funny family, and I enjoyed my short amount of time hanging out with them. I heard a lot about them while she was living in Tassie, and it’s so cool to see the people who have all contributed to who she is. Casey is really somethin’ else, as they say, and as it’s been an hour since I said goodbye, I’m feeling sorta grumpy ;( Anyway, it’s fine, I’m on the plane, (I’m flying to Atlanta, GA before going to North Carolina, so it’s sort of out of the way! That’s like driving to Hobart to get to Devonport, but, anyway. Casey and I spent the morning today with the two kids she’s just started nannying for. These two kids are so precious, and hilarious, and even though Casey (affectionately known perhaps only to me as ‘Quesadilla’) (I’m so pissed off, I keep getting the pink Mentos and have nowhere to put them so I’m eating them anyway even though I don’t really like them) . Anyhow, these kids are from a VERY well-off family, and we spent the morning hanging out with them. I played basketball in their playroom (indoors with a rubber ball and about 5.5 foot plastic hoop) with the oldest one, the boy, while Casey played hangman with the little girl. It was actually a really fun time. Turns out, I really like kids!  I’ve only just now recovered from the teary goodbye with Casey, but, oh well. I’m a bit of a wuss, that’s no secret!
So, I have lots of catching up to do. I’m going to try and fill in a few gaps since I posted about the BEST day EVER (Kina Grannis is still the coolest person ever, PS) (so far I’ve had only one orange Mentos, and I am VERY unimpressed! Don’t they know I’m emotionally fragile!?) (update: 33,000 feet) (it doesn’t take long to revert back to the old ways of imperial measurement!).

So:

In LA, after the BEST day EVER with the Granni and the Kinerds, I spent Sunday with Katie and Daniel (my cousins who are only a few years older than me) I slept late on Sunday too, accidentally; my body was SO confused! I’m still a little out of whack, actually., Once we got moving, we spent the afternoon looking around LA, going to a Chinese restaurant chain called P.F Changs (which was pretty darn tasty) and going to a movie at the Fox theatre (there are generally a lot of red carpet events and movie premiers there, so it was pretty cool, but no such glamour that night! We saw Angels and Demons, which was a pretty weird and crazy movie, and I hadn’t read the book, (Dan Brown is fairly outrageous, I feel), but it was a fairly interesting movie and I enjoyed hanging out with Katie and Daniel. On Monday morning, Katie had to work, so I just hung around her apartment in Brentwood (a beautiful area in West LA) and got my stuff organized to go. I caught a taxi to the shuttle in Westwood (where the Fox, and UCLA are) where I got a ride to the airport. The shuttle had free internet on board, so it’s very easy with an iPod touch! I didn’t actually take many photos during that time. Obviously I took HEAPS with Kina et al, but hardly any with Katie and Daniel. I think I just forgot! Lisa, I know you’re ashamed! I made up for it in Chicago, I swear!

From LA, I flew to San Jose, where I was greeted by Carolyn, (Katie and Daniel’s mum; my stepdad’s brother’s wife) where she gave me a huge hug and then proceeded to tell me how terrible my luggage arrangement is! Hehehehe! I have a huge backpacking backpack courtesy of my good friend Katie Brumby, and another backback. It’s pretty intense but I feel like I’m on the Amazing Race, so it’s good fun! It was so lovely to see her. We drove back to their house (where I spent 6 weeks right before we left to return to Australia in 2005) and Kipp (John’s brother) was there. He’s a lot like John in some ways, but also very different. Either way, he’s a great guy, and I love catching up with them! We went to a sports bar called Double Ds for dinner. For the record, I had a turkey burger and sweet potato fries. Very delish. On Tuesday morning, Carolyn got up and went with some of her friends on a 5.5 mile hike (about 10 kilometres, can you believe it!? Thank you bootcamp!) It was great, and there were beautiful views, but much to what I can only guarantee is Lisa’s dismay, I did not have my camera with me! (I swear, I’m getting to the pictures!) Carolyn and I went downtown to Los Gatos (the town where they live; it’s so storybook and awesome) and looked around the shops and met a few people.

We went to Santa Cruz on Wednesday and looked for some shoes. Didn’t find them. I ordered them online instead. Yay.

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Another story from the..road?
I’m at Raleigh Durham airport. My flight is delayed by nearly an hour. That would really piss me off if my connecting flight to LA wasn’t delayed too, but, it is, so, I’m fine. I’m sitting here, listening to Kina. It’s entirely true that now that I’ve met her, and spent time with her, that her music is infinitely better than it was before, and you know that I was a huge fan before. So, that’s good. I feel like I understand her more than I did before. She truly is the coolest person I’ve ever met (excluding Lisa King, obviously ;)! )

I had a good time seeing my grandparents, aunt, uncles, and cousin. It’s hard to say goodbye to my grandparents, because I never know if it will be the last time that I see them. They’re wonderful people and it sucks that I don’t get to see them very often. Anyway.

Right now, I don’t know, but I’m kind of in a bad mood. I’ve got a bad feeling about traveling today. That is probably ridiculous and unnecessary, but, I don’t know. I’m worried with two delays that my bag will be lost. It just needs to get to LA before I need to check it in at 830pm west coast time. I guess it has plenty of time,

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This is boring without pictures. I'll do a big post for pictures soon.

And we love, and we love, and we love and it comes back to us....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pOIt2sG3P0

Look for the moments where I am in complete, utter disbelief. :D

Best day I've ever had.

Birthday Breakfast! :D

I have so much to blog about, but no time to do it. I'll be a monster blogger when I get home, I swear! (If I'm quarantined, that's probably all I'll be able to do!)

But, I just wanted to show you what I had for breakfast thismorning. SO delicious.



What a beautiful start to my birthday! ;)

The quickest snapshot...

Casey and I are ZONKED (don't care if that's not a real word) and so although I have stacks and stacks of stuff to blog about (we've been all over Indiana and up to Chicago), I'm just going to show you a few pictures, and blog about it in more detail over the next few days. I leave for North Carolina tomorrow, so I sort of have no idea when I'll do it all. Oooo! On the plane! Good idea!

Here is Chicago:



That is NOT my beer! That would be illegal! Plus, I hate beer. Just for the photo op with the Chicago style pizza (amazing, ps.) See that water in front of my right hand? THAT'S my real drink!

We took a Segway tour around the city. It was amazing.




Gorgeous skyline! :D That's the famous Sears Tower. :D

That's all I can do for now! I'm exhausted! I'll do a good one tomorrow, I swear!

Having so much fun! :D

The BEST Day EVER.

Yesterday was quite possibly the coolest and funnest day I think I've ever had in my whooooole life. Let me enlighten you:

It started fairly ordinarily because my body had no idea when I was supposed to be asleep. I slept from 1030 pm on Friday night until about 230 am on Saturday morning, and I was awake from then on.

Anyway, after getting organised, Katie drove me to Santa Monica, where I was supposed to wait to meet Ron and Sherina to drive to lunch about an hour before Kina's show. BUT, there was an art fair on, and the corner where they were supposed to pick me up was closed because the fair was on the road! So, I went into the Apple store to get on twitter so I could let Ron know I was just going to wander around and wait. I was using a macbook (still desperately want one, by the way) and just looking at twitter and facebook. I look up, and on the computer across from me is none other than Kina Grannis. (!!!!!!!!!!!! Aaaahhh!!!!) So, stunned, I put my head back down and was thinking "wait on, what am I even worried about?" and said "Kina! Alison." Anyway, she was excited and we hugged and then her dad, Dr. G came over and introduced himself to me. He is very awesome too.

We wandered down to where she had reserved for her show, and there was Mama G! :D Kina said "look, we found an Australian!", Mama G screamed (happily, I think) and gave me a huge hug. We sat around talking about TimTams, me being detained, my jetlag, Kina, etc. LOTS of fun.

Kina started playing her show at around 2ish. It was SOOOO good. She had taken requests the night before and played every song I'd asked for! I was filming and taking pics, and had to remind myself to look at Kina in real life and not through the camera screen! But, it was so surreal standing there watching and listening to her sing! She's sooo good in real life (she's so good in not-real life, too, but, ya know!) and it was just so cool.






Kina's show on 3rd street promenade

After the show, we walked up to our Street Team meeting place. I had 21 packets of TimTams (Kina spent a semester in New Zealand and loved TimTams, and the phenomenon has just exploded since that), and we did a big group TimTam slam! (well, actually, I didn't because I didn't have a hot drink). We just hung out, got our street team packets (with awesome tshirts and bits and pieces) and the highlight; jammed with Kina and Emi; singing, uklulele, guitar (I played guitar with Kina Grannis! Aaghhhh)
It was surreal. There were several times during the day where I was sure that I'd wake up in my bed in Launceston after having a dream!


Kina, me, and Emi (Kina's little sister)


Dr. G (Kina's dad), me, and Mama G (Kina's Mama). They're so awesome.


Me and Kina. :D

It was just such a great, great day. Lots of laughs and fun. Everyone is so awesome.
I could talk about this all day, every day, but I'll spare you! It was so, so good, though!