vaycay

well, i'm sure all six (no wait, seven if i include jeff) of my readers where devastated when i didn't post last week, but it was a choice between write up my blog or head down to the beach bar for another jar of sangria. it's a pretty easy choice...

i honestly, hand on my heart, almost started crying when we walked out of newcastle airport last night. it was about 3 degrees, it was dark, and most importantly, it was windy. the whippy kind of wind that blows directly into your face no matter which way you stand.

but i'm feeling ok with it all this morning. a week long of relaxing will do that i suppose.

in a way this is kind of the first vacation i've ever been on. i've been on holidays where i've toured around cities, we went on camping trips when i was a kid, and i've flown in planes big and small to visit family, but i've never rocked up to a resort village and spent the week doing nowt.

as much as i enjoyed it though, by the end of the week i was getting pretty antsy. i'm nothing but amazed by people who can do it for more than a week at a time. i should point out by nothing i mean we went for some long walks, read books, ate food, drank sangria. it seemed to me while we were there that there were plenty of people who did even less than that.

i suppose you're all expecting me to make some sort of disparaging comments about the beaches as well, as we aussies are want to do. actually, i thought all the beaches were lovely, and i was quite charmed by the beach chairs and umbrellas on the beach that you could rent for the day. that shit would never fly back home! the conversation, i like to imagine, would go something like this:

"oh look dazza, they have beach umbrellas and sunbeds to rent. ooo, how european!"
"hey, you're right shazza! let's find out how much they are. Excuse me mate, how much for a beach brolly and two of them banana chairs?"
"it's $20 for the parasol for the day, and $10 each for the sunbeds."
"how much?! you're joking right? why would i pay that much when i've got my own beach towel i can sit on. you're a joker mate! come on shazza, this guys a joker!"
"but dazza..."
"c'mon shazza! this guy's a stubbie short of a picnic if he thinks he can charge people that much!"

and so on, and so on. but the aussies and the brits do approach holidays differently, i suppose because of the landscape around us. people genuinely suffer from the winter blues over here, and the thought of escaping to warmth and sunlight, even if for a few days, is somewhat of a balm to depressed souls. in oz, particularly in the northern states, it's warm (well, hot) all the time. i think peoples desire to escape oz has less to do with the weather than for people who flee great britain. and i'm beginning to understand why.