^ via wish to peace.

Aloha,
Long time no blogs! C and I have a 3-hour train journey home from Sydney later today, and after painfully lugging my four bags through the streets of Redfern yesterday I'm really wishing I'd brought a whole lot less stuff. We got back to Sydney on Tuesday, leaving Launceston at 6am, and making a connecting flight from Melbourne to Sydney. I fell asleep on the second flight and woke up going 'Where the hell am I?' and realised I was 6000 metres above the ground. I am not enjoying having returned to sickly hot New South Wales weather. I miss you Launceston and I hope to return to you again soon. Last night my friend Paige, C and I went to the Annandale Hotel to see my favourite band, Why?, and they certainly delivered. We got there really early and could see Yoni, the lead singer, sitting in the bistro eating his dinner. C kept telling us we should go over and talk to him, but Paige and I couldn't think of what we'd say so we decided to just watch him. They were thoroughly enjoyable and totally surpassed my (already high) expectations. I am really looking forward to getting back to my bed, the cats, my mail and the mundanities of being home. During this holiday I have slept on some of the most uncomfortable beds ever.

Bits:
♡ Gorgeous hand-calligraphed envelope seals from K is for Calligraphy (via Letter Writers Alliance);


♡ Postcups! You write your message on them with a special pen and then put it in the oven to seal it;


♡ The Johnson Banks Post Office self sealing aerogramme letters, so cute!;


♡ French foot long mallows, aaaamazing (via Incredible Things);


♡ (via)


♡ Amazing wall adornments from Da Da Da Studio;


♡ Awhh, pleaaaaase... 12 Months of Colour Daily Planner;


♡ Incredible desk sets from Elum Designs, expensive, but full of amazing things;


♡ Yann Tiersen, one of my favourite musicians, playing on 6 iPhones (via swissmiss);


I have almost 900 items in my Google Reader waiting to be read when I get home, eep!

^ link.


Obviously not much time to post of late, but as soon as I return to hot, hot Newcastle on Thursday, regular posts will resume. I just wanted to show you a cute little cupcakery we found today while we were rushing around the sprawling mall of sunny (then rainy, then sunny, then rainy) Hobart.



We got back from Hobart today where we camped, wandered around Port Arthur historical site for a day, drove around one of the most beautiful coast lines ever and stayed with our friend Mel's parents. When we get back to New South Wales on Tuesday we're staying in Sydney for a few days to see friends and watch my favourite band Why? perform at the Annandale Hotel (tickets very kindly donated to me by my friend Jade). I have about 600 items waiting for me in my Google Reader and I'm feeling totally out of sync with the internet world (which isn't all bad of course). Still considering a move to Tasmania, but also looking forward to getting back to my comfy bed and our cats and my mail!

Here's some outgoing mail I found a little bit of time to write this week;


^ A cow postcard I picked up at Ashgrove cheese farm; three postcards from a postcard book I picked up in Launceston this week called 'If You Don't Love Books, You're Going To Love This Book' by SomeEcards, some of the postcards actually make me laugh out loud; and my last little Tassie devil postcard sent to a very worthy recipient.

I'm currently watching an awful movie on SBS starring Billie Piper, using up all of the tissues in C's parents' house on my (always) runny nose and wishing the bed in the spare room would spontaneously become comfortable and not crippling!

Only two blogs in a week, how miserable! This update will probably be photo heavy and I will go on and on about how lovely Tasmania is.

Here's me with my friend again. This has basically been my uniform while I've been down here. The weather here allows for a lot of layers which I enjoy. Even on 'hot' days here you don't sweat and can wear a jacket and it's still comfortable. Lovely!

Handmade knitted hat C bought in a tiny country town we visited
Vintage green jacket with customised teapot buttons found in opshop five years ago
Hand me down Sportsgirl jeans from my mum, folded over at the bottom because I have very short legs
Red check Betts ankle boots
Dangerfield scarf
Black T.

^ Tiny Bianca with Launceston Post Office. I'm fairly sure it's been used continuously as a post office since it first opened. I haven't posted anything there yet.

^ Tiny Bianca with town hall. This building looks amazing. It's hard to pick a favourite building in this city as every single building is immaculate, very very old and extremely well taken care of (unlike any building in Newcastle).

^ We stopped in a tiny little town called Latrobe on our travels the other day and this place caught my eye. Interesting shop name.

^ Yesterday we stopped at two sets of markets and as we were sitting down eating our lunch we saw this van with an interesting numberplate. I can remember when Obama first got elected and Australia totally had Obama-fever.

^ I found a great deal of old postal paraphernalia at Evandale markets, but only picked up a bundle of things. These old postcards were about ten cents each. There were lots and lots of collectible envelopes with first edition stamps on them, but I didn't trust myself to get too many as I'd probably want to cut them up or repurpose them.

^ C bought this box of post themed rubber stamps for me at the markets. I've seen these in a shop in Newcastle for $60, but we picked them up for $20. They make me squeal how much I love them, ahaha. As soon as I got back to C's parents I stamped them all over everything.

^ Other markets finds; cheap organic tea, a gorgeous red silk kimono style jacket, a canvas bag that says 'Holiday Knitting Bag' which I am going to turn into my holiday mail bag (I'll have to find an appropriate patch to stick on it), two cute match book pads and a handbag I'm still deciding whether I like or not that I got free.

Yesterday we also did a little tour of an old estate called Clarendon House and made a visit to the magestic Cataract Gorge. Definitely somewhere I'd like to go again, I wish I'd taken more photos. Last week's trip to the honey factory, chocolate factory and cheese factory all in one day was wonderful.

I've been picking up a few postcards everywhere I go and here are a few things I've found so far;

^ The die-cut wombat and Tasmanian devil postcards are definitely my favourites (bottom). I picked up the lovely writing paper (left hand side) at a little information centre in a town called Deloraine. The two cow postcards came from the cheese factory we visited. They gave the life size (plaster?) cows to primary schools all around the area to paint and now all of the cows stand around the cheese factory property. Those two were my favourites. The yellow one was actually stolen from the property and they've never been able to find it. We're going to visit some of the lavender farms pictured on those postcards this week too.

^ Here is the Tassie devil postcard biting C's finger before we put him in the post box. C said it actually hurt. The postcard is so small I could only just write a paragraph. I hope his recipient likes him!

Houses to rent in this area (and in Tasmania in general) are ridiculously, irresistibly cheap. For the price we pay for our tiny little house in one of the 'bad suburbs' of Newcastle, we could live in a gorgeous, well maintained four bedroom house with a huge yard. Oh to dream.

^ This house is advertised for rent, and only around the corner from where we're staying and I have totally fallen in love with it. C's parents nearly bought it when it was for sale last year and they said it is amazing inside. I can't get enough of that red door. $250 per week and right near the university and the bus stop, WANT! I'm trying to convince Sophie to move to Launceston and live with me in it! I'm letting my imagination run wild with how lovely it would be to live in Launceston. The listing for the house is here, have a peek if you like :P

^ At C's parents.

On Saturday we went to meet up with a guy C met last time he was here and he basically listened to us go on and on about how beautiful Tasmania is (he's lived here all his life). He said we've been "bitten by the Tas bug", C made a joke that "now we'll have to go to the hospital again".

Entirely irrelevant to anything, I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but back in June when I first bought my Macbook, a week into owning it one of our cats knocked a cup of hot chocolate on it and it screwed up the screen. As it is very expensive to fix and having a slightly impaired screen doesn't really bother me too much I haven't done anything about it, but I just thought I'd put a picture up and show you what it looks like, haha. It's basically like having a big see-through mushroom cloud on your screen;

We're going camping this week in Hobart (the South city of Tasmania) so no internet for me! Today we're going for a 'historical walk around Launceston'. Hope you're having a lovely start to your week :)

^ An old photo/postcard of Launceston circa 1881 (link).

So, I am in beautiful Launceston. It is my third day here and so far I've been to the museum, wandered around the town a little, enjoyed the beautiful weather, though most notably, I have spent much of my time taking in the wonderful sights and sounds of Launceston General Hospital and had a minor operation.

We caught the train to Sydney from Newcastle on Sunday night, stayed with some of C's friends and in the morning caught the Jetbus to the airport, just made the flight, and due to my very swollen, sore tail bone the flight was pretty tear inducing, teamed with feeling like I was being repeatedly stabbed in the face on the descent due to my bad sinuses readjusting to the pressure. We arrived in very fresh 11˚C Launceston and not long after driving back to C's parents house and dumping our things, the pain was too bad and I was taken up to the local hospital where I waited in emergency for three hours. Of course, I forgot that being really pleasant to the desk staff and downplaying your intense pain doesn't mean you get in sooner. The characters in the waiting room were kind of amusing, most notably a slightly white trash family with a whole bunch of kids and a daughter named Shakira. Eventually I got in, after much wailing and shaking in the waiting room, and got put into a tiny little stall. A doctor with a delicious American accent came in and I showed him the damage. An hour or so of lying with my butt in the air, he operated, but my pain medication came only a few minutes before the procedure was to begin, so I basically was cut up with a scalpel on my very swollen tail bone with NO PAINKILLERS for about forty minutes. I definitely feel as though I've well extended my pain threshold now. Sadly I can't remember the doctor's name (the pain and the drugs), but I have basically been referring to him just as "my dreamy American doctor". He did have glasses, was in his mid thirties and was slightly balding but I loved him. He apologised each of the 15 times he made an incision into the flesh around my tail bone. Haha. I basically just murdered the pillow that was under me by grabbing it and pulling on it each time he made a cut and screamed and cried loudly and bit the pillow. Today when I came back in to have my bandage changed the woman at the desk said "Oh were you the girl who was yelping on Monday night?". Yes, yes I was.

Anyway, all very painful and unpleasant. My medication makes me tired and queasy, sitting, lying and walking are still painful, but I'm not going to complain about it any more because it's all on the mend :) The rest of our stay, although slightly marred by my sore butt, will be spent doing fun things! Tomorrow we are going to a chocolate factory, a honey factory and a cheese factory, and they all offer tastings :P

Last night we all went out to the movies. C and his parents went into one cinema to see Van Diemens Land and I went to see New Moon (yes, I read the books, yes I saw the first movie, no I absolutely don't think it's any good). Launceston has five candy shops and the one across from the movies is very strategically placed. I got a huge mixed bag. C's parents have been lovely and I've been taking their little camera around with us wherever we go, so I have some photos to update you with! Hoorah;


My first photo in Launceston, after just getting back from surgery, obviously I'm having an awesome time so far. And me with a big red train they had at the museum.


My lollies from the movies, the photo doesn't do the never ending bag justice.


C's mum stuck in a room in the museum, it was amusing. All of the dust from the museum got in my eyes (see below) and I couldn't stop rubbing them. I swear I am just illness prone.



C was taking photos outside the museum while we waited for his parents to come back with the car and I sat with my head in C's jumper to stop myself from scratching my eyes. A man walked by us and saw C taking photos of me looking like I was crying and asked C what he was doing and if I was alright. Aw, nice Launceston folk looking out for me.


Here's me posting some posty goodness this morning. Also, if you've never seen an Australia Post box before, there you go :)



Then I had to go back to the hospital to get my wound checked up on. Sadly the dreamy American doctor wasn't there :'(. I did get a sweet female med student and another American doctor, but he wasn't as hunky. Here is me having a heaps good time;



This is me leaving the hospital, and waiting for the bus. I did spend a lot of time here, so C thought it was necessary to take a photo of the hospital as "one of the main places we went on our holiday";



C told me there were monkeys in town park, but I didn't believe him. Turns out there is just a random monkey enclosure in the middle of the park. How cool is that? Little school boys were throwing things at them, it made me angry;



And here is me with an old fashioned post box that is still in use. I LOVE IT! I'm going to post all of my letters here (even though there are like three post offices way closer);



And I thought, just to show you that I am still working on my mail and writing letters down here (though I haven't actually written any yet), I'd take a photo of the 'mail kit' I brought with me. It's full of supplies for making mail (pens, glue, etc), some stationery, letters to respond to and envelopes needing letters put in them. I spread it out on the little table in the backyard. C's dad came out and looked shocked. I love that it was still so lovely and bright out at that time of night. It was about 8pm when I took these pictures;



Anyway, that has been my 'holiday' so far. I will try to update a few more times while I'm down here :) I hope you enjoyed my really fascinating, awesome holiday snaps.