Fas-cinating... in a verbose way. Pt 1.
So. You want to hear about a ski holiday.
You don't?
We left at midday on Saturday, after three days of crazy preparation and two days of non-stop exams. The next part of the holiday consisted of driving until around midday on Sunday, and reading textbooks and Asimov novels (and slowly becoming a fangirl of R. Daneel Olivaw. It took what, three chapters? =P The rest of the book and series merely consolidated that. And of course there was the business of looking for Altair. There were many points where I pointed to the brightest star in Aquila and giggled.)
Unusually, we missed Sydney on the way down. Normally, as a matter of course [accidental pun], we drive through Sydney and Canberra. At Sydney, we generally eat breakfast (and I brush my teeth) then wander through to Canberra, where the best part of two hours is spent running around Questacon. Unfortunately, the last time we went (a while ago...) the exhibit had been the same as it had been for two years. This was the reaction to the Brisbane Sciencentre moving out of its gorgeous building and into the Museum. The corollary of this is that the flow of special exhibits has been halted; this results in us avoiding Canberra. Well, perhaps the fact that we spent all of our wandering time completely lost in Canberra's winding and perplexing streets contributed slightly.
All of this conspired to mean that we passed the Parkes radio telescope at three am rather than eleven am. This is not a problem. Except that we missed visiting the telescope. I'm inordinately fond of it, but did not complain at the time. (Too busy talking about the deep and morally resonating theory of windshields. Anything sounds deep and morally resonating when you've taken the late turn in the "Keep the driver awake or we all die in a horrific car accident on a dirt road!" game.)
At half-past seven we reached Cooma Ski Rental, where we were offered hot chocolates with marshmallows. It was excellent hot chocolate. =D In short, we were all supplied with gear. I got the boots which I usually get. Unfortunately, my inners had remained in my school shoes. Which were in the shoe-rack at home, two thousand kilometres away. So the boots were a little big, and my skiing was subsequently more than a little crappy (Feet need to be the right shape in the boot for to ski properly. My feet... well... they could belong to a lungfish without trouble. The orthoses give them some semblance of human shape.)
In any case, we reached the resort at about midday. Mum spent maybe half an hour arguing with the Station staff as to how many breakfast tickets we were entitled; we were four short. To cut out half an hour's worth of dull and repetitive arguing, she lost.
The room we were assigned was the same size as every other room in the resort. It was set out in precisely the same way as the others, but had a marginally different type of drying-room as the others. (This one didn't work.) Everything in the car magically moved into the room within a minute. Within another three minutes, we were ready to ski.
After we drove for ten minutes, waited for five and then spent twenty in the skitube, of course. =D
It was fantastic skiing again. It took me three hours to remember how, but there's nothing quite like frantically avoiding pylons and giggling at the Milo kids. They're sooooo little! So superior to most skiiers on the mountain! (I've seen them ski down the Kamikaze. Double black diamond run. It's more than a little humbling. And so cute! *cough*)
Anyway. There were nine public lifts open at the Perisher Blue resort, five of which were only accessible by bus or skitube, and one of which was almost completely melted. So we spent the rest of the day on the Lawson t-bar and the V8 chair.
This interminable series of events retold in a dull, plodding manner will resume soon. Maybe next week. For now, the computer isn't mine. Sorry for the misappropriation of vocabulary words.
You don't?
We left at midday on Saturday, after three days of crazy preparation and two days of non-stop exams. The next part of the holiday consisted of driving until around midday on Sunday, and reading textbooks and Asimov novels (and slowly becoming a fangirl of R. Daneel Olivaw. It took what, three chapters? =P The rest of the book and series merely consolidated that. And of course there was the business of looking for Altair. There were many points where I pointed to the brightest star in Aquila and giggled.)
Unusually, we missed Sydney on the way down. Normally, as a matter of course [accidental pun], we drive through Sydney and Canberra. At Sydney, we generally eat breakfast (and I brush my teeth) then wander through to Canberra, where the best part of two hours is spent running around Questacon. Unfortunately, the last time we went (a while ago...) the exhibit had been the same as it had been for two years. This was the reaction to the Brisbane Sciencentre moving out of its gorgeous building and into the Museum. The corollary of this is that the flow of special exhibits has been halted; this results in us avoiding Canberra. Well, perhaps the fact that we spent all of our wandering time completely lost in Canberra's winding and perplexing streets contributed slightly.
All of this conspired to mean that we passed the Parkes radio telescope at three am rather than eleven am. This is not a problem. Except that we missed visiting the telescope. I'm inordinately fond of it, but did not complain at the time. (Too busy talking about the deep and morally resonating theory of windshields. Anything sounds deep and morally resonating when you've taken the late turn in the "Keep the driver awake or we all die in a horrific car accident on a dirt road!" game.)
At half-past seven we reached Cooma Ski Rental, where we were offered hot chocolates with marshmallows. It was excellent hot chocolate. =D In short, we were all supplied with gear. I got the boots which I usually get. Unfortunately, my inners had remained in my school shoes. Which were in the shoe-rack at home, two thousand kilometres away. So the boots were a little big, and my skiing was subsequently more than a little crappy (Feet need to be the right shape in the boot for to ski properly. My feet... well... they could belong to a lungfish without trouble. The orthoses give them some semblance of human shape.)
In any case, we reached the resort at about midday. Mum spent maybe half an hour arguing with the Station staff as to how many breakfast tickets we were entitled; we were four short. To cut out half an hour's worth of dull and repetitive arguing, she lost.
The room we were assigned was the same size as every other room in the resort. It was set out in precisely the same way as the others, but had a marginally different type of drying-room as the others. (This one didn't work.) Everything in the car magically moved into the room within a minute. Within another three minutes, we were ready to ski.
After we drove for ten minutes, waited for five and then spent twenty in the skitube, of course. =D
It was fantastic skiing again. It took me three hours to remember how, but there's nothing quite like frantically avoiding pylons and giggling at the Milo kids. They're sooooo little! So superior to most skiiers on the mountain! (I've seen them ski down the Kamikaze. Double black diamond run. It's more than a little humbling. And so cute! *cough*)
Anyway. There were nine public lifts open at the Perisher Blue resort, five of which were only accessible by bus or skitube, and one of which was almost completely melted. So we spent the rest of the day on the Lawson t-bar and the V8 chair.
This interminable series of events retold in a dull, plodding manner will resume soon. Maybe next week. For now, the computer isn't mine. Sorry for the misappropriation of vocabulary words.