Endless Raking.

Yeah, guess what I did all day? Rake. Rake. Rake. Rake. Rake. Rake. Rake. Raakkkeeeeeeee. After looking at that word for a while, it looks a bit funny. Yeah so I definitely spent like at least four of my 8 and a half hour day at the zoo raking paths. Oh I also raked up poo in the kangaroo/emu/deer enclosure. Emus creep me out. They are real sneaky. Bird ninjas. That noise they make coupled with the fact that they just are weird looking huge birds is enough to make me not want to hang out with them. Ha. Anyway, thank goodness the heat wasn’t awful today. Erin thought it was weird that I said awful at some point today. She was like, “Who even says that word anymore?” Apparently I’m weird. Surprising no one. Ha. Yeah so it was pretty nice today. The scud was coming through. Apparently that’s like saying it’s sprinkling a bit. I dunno. Aaron asked me if we used the word scud. Skud? I dunno. Another word they use is skul/skull/scull (I have no idea how you would spell it, but it sounds exactly like skull). It means chug. Like chugging a drink. Adam asked me if I could skull my drink cause he was going to do a devil feed and I was going with him. So of course I’m like, “Yeah totallyyyyyy.... ahem.. what does that mean exactly..??” I think Aaron enjoys making fun of me and my American accent too much. We worked together a lot today on all the raking stuff, as well as feeding the quolls, kookaburras (which are pretty hilarious birds), curlews (also hilarious, mostly just funny looking), swift parrots, monkeys, wallabies, kangaroos, etc.. I feed a lot more animals than I thought I did. Hah. It was fun feeding the kookaburras! We gave them little fishes like we give the penguins. We just hold the a little bit through the holes in their enclosure and they fly over real quick to snatch them from you. Sometimes they find mice around the zoo and Aaron said that whenever you find mice, you should just feed them to the kookaburras. Heh. So yeah more about my day. I hung out with Adam while he chopped dead wallabies into bits for the tassie devils and the australian dogs. He got blood on his face. It was a bit funny actually. I helped him feed the devils, so I got a bit of blood and fur on my hands. In one of the devil enclosures we were at, there was a little water thing inside, but you could reach it from the outside. So I was washing my hand and we didn’t know where the devils were, so he was like, “Oh no worries mate, I’ll let you know if they show up.” Two seconds later he yells, “There coming!” and he slammed the metal fence real hard, making quite a loud noise. I freaked of course, and another of course, he was just messing me. Ruuuuude. I got fairly picked on today. I think it’s cause they know I can handle it. Aaron really loves trying to get me to attempt at saying words with an Aussie accent. I apparently only really sound legit Aussie when I say sport. He told me that when I’m talking to any Australian people to just keep saying sport and they’ll think I’m from here. Ha. So I do my fair share of picking on Adam and Aaron as well, which is another reason I deserve the picking on. Ha. Anyway, I was kindly repaid today when Aaron accidentally dropped a large trash can, “rubbish bin”, on me. Hah. I’ve got a nice little mark on my arm now. Afterwards he kindly offered me some nasty flowers from the trash can. It was very sweet.. Not.

So more rude roommate comments. Today when Adam and I were taking verbal shots at each other, Justine was just sitting there being absolutely silent, which she usually is. Adam commented on her quietness and I was like well yeah she’s a bit nicer than me probably. Of course I’m just saying it in jest because I’m not actually mean. Sarcastic is a better word, but Justine goes, “Well yeah of course I’m nicer than her.” Whaaaaaat the heck. Thank you. We only have to live with each other for the next couple months, thanks for not insulting me every chance you get. You’re the best. Hugs and kisses. Later I was in the staff room with Rob, Erin, and Justine. Rob and Erin were making fun of how I say wheel barrow and I was like, “Okay okay well how am I meant to say it then?” because I enjoy learning about how they say things and stuff. I think it’s fun. I don’t go around trying super hard to incorporate all the words I learn into my daily vocabulary. I just enjoy learning about Aussies. Whatever. As soon as I step out of the staff room with Rob to go do something, I hear Justine go, “She tries so hard to say everything like you guys. I don’t care because I’m proud of my accent.” Ohhhh my goodness. She clearly wants to get punched in the face in the near future. She’s from Wisconsin, so she says her o’s like Canadians do. Why is she proud of that? Sighhh. Now I am just being mean. I’m so frustrated that I have a roommate that I can’t even have any sort of fun with.. Also, she told me that I’m a suck up. There was no reasoning behind it.

Well anyway, more zoo happy things. I fed the Capuchins by myself today. Last time I was in their cage, I was with Rob while he was feeding them and showing me what to do. Yesterday, like I said in my previous post I think, Justine had gotten “attacked”. I think the monkeys were just being punks. She said they were sort of starting to bite her though. Anyway, so today she was like, “YOU can go in there today and see how YOU fare.” Like she’s hoping the monkeys tear my eyes out or something. I went in there and gave each of them little meal worms and so they left me alone for a bit. When I was heading out. One of them came over and yanked on my hair. The other one chased after my feet for a second, but then left me alone. So I mean it wasn’t enjoyable, but it was terrifying. It was like when you’re holding a little baby and they latch onto your hair and won’t let go. Except I wasn’t holding the monkey. Hah. I’m hoping they won’t be violent towards us for long though. I don’t like being new. The animals seem to react poorly to new people and smells. Justine was raking with me for a short amount of time, and she started singing out loud, which is fine, but it was a bunch of either children’s songs or country songs. She was singing that barney song that’s like.. Oh man, I can’t remember it. Uhmm. Ughhh. It’s on the tip of my tongue! So frustrating! I’ll try to remember it. Oh oh ohhhhh. I love you, you love me... blah blah blah. She also started singing, “Clean up, clean up, everybody do their share.” Or whatever. I guess her mom runs a day care out of their house so she knows lots of little kid songs. She also started singing the Lambchop song.. This is a song that never ends.. It goes on and on my friends.. some people started singing it not knowing what it was.. and then they kept on singing it forever just because.... this is a song that never endddsssss... blaaahhhhhhhhh blahhh blaahhhhh. Yeah. The country songs she was singing were so laaaame. They were all pretty much like, “wooooo I like drinking beeeeeeerrrrrr woooo tractorssss are fuuuunnnn yeaaahhhhh I have an annoying twangy voooooooiceee anddd I’m going to sing about beeeer some moreeee!!!!!” Speaking of songs though, Aaron had just watched Chicago the night before so he kept singing and humming the pop six squish song. Hahaha. So I’ve had Chicago songs stuck in my head all day. He also said that he likes Australian country music and that it sounds way different than American country music. So maybe I’ll have to listen to some of it. It was really funny working with him. We talked about differences between America and Australia. Like getting drivers licenses and stuff. He also kept asking me if I have seen *insert any and all movies relating to Australia*. Hahah. I was like, “Are you just going to ask me if I’ve seen any and all movies relating to Australia?” and he said, “Yeah pretty much, but I can’t think of many.. There aren’t many movies about Australia..” Hah. I found out that he plays soccer. So that’s cool. I guess Australia is starting to call it football though. So there’s Aussie rules football and soccer football and they call American football, Gridiron I think. He asked me what my parents do, so I told him. We were then talking about basketball for a bit and he was like, “Why does LA need two teams? One really good one and a sucky one to make the good one look even better?” THE CLIPPERS ARE GOING TO BE BETTER THAN THE LAKERS SOON! Everyone will regret being Lakers fans. It’ll happen. Haha. I didn’t yell at him like I just type-yelled though. He’s an Aussie. He doesn’t know any better. Heh.

I’ve been going to bed really freaking early and waking up at 6 in the morning. How bizarre is that! It feels really bizarre. I wish I had more to do out here.. It’ll be good though. I’m going to try to get out to Cataract Gorge this weekend! Also, Erin is having some sort of party thing. I dunno if I’ll go yet though. We will see. I want to go do touristy things.. Should I be embarrassed by that?? I choose noooooo. There’s also a Platypus world or something. I HAVE to go there. It’s a bit further than just going into Launceston though.. So I dunno how I would get there.. Curses. I have seen all of the other animals specifically found in Australia that I’ve wanted to see EXCEPT the platypus.. I’m so sad they don’t have one here.. Sighhhh. I am rather determined to see one though. I also might go to this big music fest thing going on in a few weeks. It seems like it’s a bit like Warped Tour or something? Except with Australian bands. Erin was showing us a bunch of songs earlier today, asking us if we knew this band or that band. I knew absolutely none. Hah. So it could be cool going to this show just to hear some Australian bands.

One last funny story, I can’t think of much else that went on today. Adam found out my last name is Lamb. So today I was following Aaron around feeding things and Adam walked by singing, “Aaron had a little lamb who followed him every he went” I know those aren’t the words, but I’m just putting the gist of it down. Ha.