Life Down Under

I'm back!

Sorry for my extended absence, everyone! Had I known this past week was going to be as crazy as it was, I would have told you earlier that my presence would be scarce at best. But I think that life has settled a bit, and I am finally sitting in front of my computer again.

The rugby game was great - definitely a cultural experience! I still don't have too much knowledge of the game itself, so I found the rugby a bit hard to follow.....but it was definitely more interesting live than it is on TV. And whenever the game got a bit slow, fortunately there was a bit of entertainment from the Irish fans who came to watch their team lose to the All Blacks. Yes, we did win.


Here we are!!



A pre-game shot of the field


We had a great week with Marty and Candice. Lots of good food, good times.....it was fun to catch up with friends from home. It was a pretty full-on week, though. I also taught (and hence prepared) two classes for the internship this past week - doesn't sound like a lot on paper, but believe me, that made for quite a full week!

So this past weekend we had a much-deserved break, going down to Lake Taupo with Marty and Candice and Josh and Misty to enjoy a few days of R&R at Marty's parent's lake house. It was great fun - Taylor even slept in until 8am - which meant that we did, too! The weather was lousy, but thanks to a blazing wood fire, we were nice and toasty warm inside. The best part of the weekend, no doubt, was that on our drive home, it was snowing! Now, you have to understand that it New Zealand, it never snows on the north island, unless you're in the mountains. But it was so cold today that the rain definitely changed to snow - it was awesome!

So it's great to be home, finally get caught up on blogging and my emails, and begin to think about this coming week.