road trip!

what a great sunday i had!!! i spent the morning and lunchtime looking for a digi camera because i sent mine home and ended up buying a kodak one and a 512mb memory card for only $260 aus. if any wants a sony pro memory card let me know, i've one for sale and it's been sent back to my dad so if ay swann gys want one then you could pick it up from my dad in bourke st. anyway, so then the irls nd i went on a road trip up to wisconsin. we had a stop off to do a tour at the jelly belly factory cause we saw it when we were driving along so decided to go to that and it was fate cause we got there right on time for the last tour. with replenished snacks we headed further north and decided that we'd go that far already that we may as well go to milwaukee. so we ended up downtown driving around looking for a park. we had to find two though cause i had my car and magda had the mini van. we ended up going to mo's restaurant which is an irish pub and had a dry meal there (the food was dry, not juicy). by this time we were all a bit tired and krissi, sharmain and i weren't all that jungry thanks to all the junk food we'd consumed in the car. krissii had managed to open everything she'd bought at the jlly belly factory and sample everything within 5 minutes. we had 80's tunes to keep us going. then we decided we'd go home via I94. it's the first time i'd driven on an interstate and wasn't too scared until i witnessed magda's driving and since she was in front of me i had to follow her. i swear to god i was shaking, then we had a cowboy trucky driving like he was insane and was sitting on madga's arse at one point and swerving all over the friggin road. so when i got up to 80 miles (130 kms) to get long side him sharmain and krissii put the windows down nd hung out the car telling him he was a dickhead, can't drive, giving the finer and all that. so we had to floor it after that to avoid upsetting him and having another incident. my nerves were so frayed. plus magda's bad driving continued along the interstate, which is the one place where you need to be a little responsible... by the time we got home we were all very exhausted so sharmain (who'd left her car here) drove her and krissii home and i went and watched veronica mars and grey's anatomy in the ds. gey's anatomy fans - whoa! can i tell you a secret? meredith sleeps with george (she is such a bitch) and or veronica mars fans veronica and duncan are back together... i dunno how that happened as i can never work out which tv show is on which channel, all i know is that they are on the tv at that time. last night i got lucky and found them.
so this morning i didn't start til 10 and last night i drugged myself to sleep (i have to slow down on the mersyndol as i'll run out at this stage) so i culd get rid of the headache and have a good sleep. so emily went down for a nap just after 11 and i'm about to go and do some ironing and watch the end of the longest yard since the tv remote is working now and the dvd remote was found! hopefully this will be a good week!
oh and it's my dad's 45th birthday today. or feb 28. today in australian time. he's getting on. i hope he liked the shirt i sent him. i'm going to call him at midday. kerry or jojo or someone at swann, if you read this before 11:30am (your time silly duffer) email me your number and i'll call you for a chinwag!
take care

Update

The weekend has been alright. My 14 hours on Friday were slightly trying but I got over it. I can't remember if I mentioned I'm a little sick again, it's my tonsils - again. So that made Friday even better as I was in a fever and having cold and hot sweats and often completely disorientated with what the hell I was doing. But, I pushed on, and went out Friday night when Pat got home. We went bowling. I so didn't do near as well as I did last week. It was terrible. But it was fun and then we went and hung out at Burger King for an hour Burger King is ssssooooooo not as good as it is back home. And the chips taste different at both Macca's and Burger King and I'm thinking it must be the difference in potatos. Burger King aren't near as good, but Macca's are still pretty good. Then on the way home lucky me had a copper following her half the way but he didn't catch me doing anything wrong because I'd seen a silhouette of his flash lights so I knew it was a police man. I was driving like 10 miles under the limit and he was sitting a little back from me so he must have been going at a snails pace. Hahahahahahahaha. Then when we hit Liberyville I'm guessing it was out of his area cause he had to do a U-Turn. Sticking it to the man. I never had a speeding ticket at home and I sure as hell don't plan on getting one over here, even though the fine's are like piss weak.
Last night we went to Mickey Finn's but I was pretty tired. I'd drugged myself out of my mind at 5am that morning and because I only slept for an extra 5 hours I think my body was just over the assault of drugs and lack of sleep.
I bouhgt a pair of Levi's though, I think they make jeans for short people... I was trying on all these and the ONE pair (out of about 15) which went pass my ankles were the ones I bought since every other pair hit my ankles and went no further. I don't get it. At home I always have to get them taken up but over here they must be tight on their fabric. Whilst I was going through this degrading process (I never thought I'd find a pair of pants which for long enough and that I'd be here for a year having to get my sister to buy me jeans and send them over) I noticed that the black pants I've worn less than 10 times which I bought before I left home has a hole near the zip on the fly, this would be why I always feel like the zipper is coming down. How embarrassment I thought. So lucky I found one pair of jeans which passed my ankles because I had to get them to replace the bad quality black ones. I tell ya, I was pretty damn annoyed by this point in time.
The tv remote has stopped working, the dvd remote had gone missing (I just found out Pat had found it in the laundry, that's where I keep my remote's all the time...) and I had my three Netflix movies I've been dying to watch but can't because a) I couldn't flick scenes to where I was up to in the movie I was watching because of the dvd player remote) and b) because with the tv remote not in action I can't flick to the dvd player and you can't do it on the tv either because it doesn't have a button for it. So all of this has made me decide I want a laptop. I'm not one for rash decisions but I want a laptop where I can watch my movies in my room without the kids or anyone else and I can be warm. I also want it because when (if) Pat gets wireless in the summer I won't have to be upstairs to use it, I can stay in the basement. Brilliant idea, I know. But first, I have to buy another digital camra as I've just sent my new one home to have it refunded back in full (they wouldn't want to not refund it all back to me cause I'll be ferocious). I need a camera before Florida.
Anyway, I better go. I want to straighten my hair. Want/will two different mind processes. Either way, I'll be thinking about it nice and hard, hard enough that it might be like I'm doing it. Oh I'm going on a raod trip today with the girls an to Best Buy to look at laptops and cameras. Best Buy is like our Good Guys or any electrical store.
Have fun!

Just quickly...

I checked my horoscope on Cainer.com this morning and he is such a good forecaster. Check this out:
Each day, you are seeing a picture more clearly. As more is revealed to you, you realise that you have been making plans and promises on the basis of insufficient information. As fast as you adjust to your new perspective, you make yet another discovery and this obliges you to rethink your latest rethink! Others can tease and criticise you as much as they like for this apparent inconsistency. What else are you supposed to do? You cannot and must not, ignore the importance of all you are learning.
The first two sentences are how I feel everyday!
Bring on March 14 when I can get some alcohol into me!!!

on the up and up

I am feeling better now. Than earlier. You didn't know I wasn't happy earlier but I was just exhausted and tense. Now I'm not.
Massively big day. I will not go into detail about the screaming or the crying or the sheer desperation I felt when all I wantedto do was sleep and all Emily wanted to do was play. Mind you, it didn't phase her, I could sit there with my eyes closed and she didn't care for once that I wasn't actively playing with her.
Apart from that, I gave up the opportunity to go to some football homecoming tonight (I mildly regret that decision but we all know how horrible I am when I'm tired). Never did mention the extra hours I'm working, I felt too bad even thinking about it. And I'm wondering is she'll be kind enough to let me take the car up to Madison on the weekend?? Probably not because it's too much mileage. Ah well. I'll wait and see.
Now much else to report on. After tomorrow it's 49 weeks of self inflicted pain. It's not that bad but sometimes the bad days take a long time to go away.
Home got my parcel with some added goodies which were added after I closed the box... I had no idea what magnets she was talking about when she said she loved them, nor what toys she was questioning me sending... I've no idea what happened there. But I'm glad she liked them!! I wonder what they look like??
So, apart from the usual nothing going on. Am planning my drip to DC for Memorial Weekend, thinking about no internet in Florida (good god, I'll have to find an internet cafe) and looking at prices for hiring a car or flying down to Nashville when the folks get over here. Lots of plans. Need to execute them.
That's all, take care everyone, hope all is well. No doubt something exciting will happen soon. Or I'll just make it up!

dream analysis

i've been having strange dreams. overly strange dreams. there have been 6 strange ones. the first three were about 3 males, the first night johnno, the second night aaron (good god why? we haven't spoken since that horrible night at the drive thru when i managed to not be able to say a word, i know it's me! how could i have no words, but i didn't) an then it was dean (don't ask, i've no idea, i won't live it down now seeing as i mentioned it but in order to explain the dreams i need to give all details). then i had a bit of a break from them and came back with one where i was pregnant in it! like i actually woke up and went what then checked my belly. then i had a dream aprker died. i don't know how that fits in, no idea what so ever. i just dreamed it and woke up and it was so life like. then, last night, this was the dream to top all weird dreams so far, i was at an abortion clinic and for some reaosn the girls waiting for an abortion (there were quite a few) had to go and sit at this discussion table and talk about it (now i know they don't do that in real life) anyway, some are there with partners and others are alone and michelle is waiting for me in the waiting room but she can't come in and at the last moment (i think we are given a vial of what it looks like when they suck it out [my mind is completley fcked]) i get up and walk out saying i can't do it. i get outside and then aaron appears (why is he in my dreams???) and he's like you don't have to if you don't want to and for some reaosn i'm at a beach and he's like we can have the baby and i'm like how (all very dramatic this dream was) and he has no money coming in but can apparently look after the baby and then we're toing and froing and finally we go in at a different time and i assume i have an abortion. how fucking off the planet are these god damn dreams? so, good old michelle who i've been informing her when i wake up of these dreams (i don't know if she actually reads them at like midnight or 1am but who knows) emails me today with this analysis (she has no degree in this by the way):
It's kinda wierd your dreams all have a male in them as a focal point,either a male or a baby. Maybe having a family is playing on your mind a little more now because your looking after a family that isn't your own and maybe you're wondering how you would be as a mother.
aaarrrgggghhhhhh what the? she could be right though because yesterday i was sitting on the couch watching emily and i thought to myself, god i said i was ready for kids but i don't want this shit. no doubt it'd be different with my own but hell, emily is so damn stubborn i don't want a stubborn child. maybe that's why i had an abortion last night, because that notion has changed and it was killed off in my dream. i dunno. it's just weird.
thanks to angela's advice i've enabled comments to be made. or i think i have. you can always test it and see if it works, if it does i'll find out, if it doesn't then email me if you're that desperate.
pat is at icu again tonight. her dad is in a very bad way. i don't know if he will make it. emily pooed, oops, pooped in the bath tonight so that was gross. apparently matthew likes scooping it out with a cup thing but he was in the other bath so i didn't want to ait and did it myself. gross gross gross. but at least she did one today.
emily and matthew have been good. i enjoy spending time with them but find it hard with emily demanding attention, she doens't do the play on her own thing when we're in the room, she has to be included. which is understandable. it's just she rips the pages from the books matthew and i read and look at together.
anyway, my toes are cold and my back hurts so i'm gonna go lie on the floor.
hope all is well!

completely fudged

i feel like crap tonight. i'm cold which is annoying me and my back hurts and now my stomach has started. on top of that i'm exhausted. last night i was supposed to get to bed early and whilst i got to bed my body wouldn't slow down and go to sleep so tonight i'm really pushing myself to ensure i completely pass out. pat isn't here, her dad ended up in icu today so she came home at 4 and looked after the kids for 2 hours so i went scrapbook shopping, damn vice. anyway, so i put them to bed and have since planned my scrapbook which i'm going to start, looked at accommodation in washington dc and was waiting on a reply from chelle and/or dad but realised both of them have probably just left work for the day. oh shit and i need to ring dick smith about my camera. it's being returned. i need to get that number after this. so nothing exciting going on. i just wanted to waste some time to see if i got an email. how funny, i didn't. ha. going to bed. hope all is well. woe is me. oh funny thing though, my sister sends me an email, informs me my parents are arguing but am not allowed to mention it then tonight dad says something about mum and then says "DO NOT REPEAT" exactly like that. meanwhile, mum just comes out with her snide remark like i want to hear about it. oh happy days.

Friendly Advice YOU MUST TAKE

Do not go and see Date Movie. Don't waste your money. I rarely cover my eyes in movies, this movie I think I spent half looking away and covering my face. It was friggin gross at bits. And stupid. I hate those types of movies. Ew. On the movie side of life, I joined Netflix today, that means I get online, order movies I want to see and I'll get the three at the top of my queue sent to me for me to watch. When I'm done I can send them back or hold onto them til I am done. They just charge my account every month. So I can't wait for my first movies. And I can cancel at any time. The list currently contains one comedy and the rest being romance, I never thought I was a sucker but I so obviously am. I also bought a shrug cardy thing for all of $3.20. How cheap is that? Yeah, everything is super cheap. And tonight I went to a scrapbooking workshop which was fun. And because I did that what I bought afterwards was discounted! And Pat asked me tonight if I'd do a scrapbook for her dad for his birthday.
Oh and the big news of the day... I'm going to Spring Break baby! Yeah I'm heading down to Florida and being paid for and to go!!! We'rd going to Siesta Keys. I dunno where that is, I'm gonna Google it. I don't know if I'm very Spring Break-esque but who cares! That means I need to go to the gym and loose a heap of weight in a month. Oh fuck! I just realised I'll be 21. Oh dear god I'm going to wet my pants from excitement!
Anyway, calming down from that little moment. Chicago was lovely. Nice buildings. Did I say that already? I can't wait to go back in. The girls were all very testy yesterday so everyone was insisting they wanted to do things their way so Sharmain and I left early before there was a giant eruption of hormones and everyone got angry at everyone for not wanting the same thing. I then had an Indian lady at Dunkin' Donuts roll her eyes at me when I asked for a hot chocolate because she HAD TO MAKE ANOTHER ONE. Well it was so damn cold what does she expect and what the hell made me the one who got the eye roll? Anyway, apart from all that not much else to report. Nothing funny has happened to me lately as American people realy don't do the random funny stuff. Or the ones I've encountered, although I am asked "Oh I like your accent, where are you from?" And bogan me goes "Wha? Oh, Stralia" I'm so nasal.
Alright, I'm going to bed. Big week this week. And I need to think about a good moment to bring up the extra hours... I'm shitting myself about that one.
Have fun!

Something different...

Top 10 Things I Miss About Home (In no specific order)
: The smell of home.
: Mum's cooking, I'm dying for spag bol. Actually, all of mum's cooking.
: Work days at Swann, including having Dean and Lance tormenting me. Plus my back and forth emailing with certain people.
: Chelle.
: Mum, dad, Rachel and the dogs.
: Jojo.
: TV channels where I can actually find the TV show I want to watch!
: Having the temperature said the right way.
: Clinkers.
: People understanding my sense of humor!

I can't do a Top 10 Things I Don't Miss About Home yet as at the moment there isn't 10 things. There probably isn't many things.
Don't take this as a post of me being all depressed, it's just that there are things I often dream about, like this time of night I think about Swann and how much fun I had there, working or otherwise engaged. I know I bitched and moaned a lot, but the people are awesome. And also, I love my family, I don't think I understood how much until I walked through those doors at the airport and I thought my heart might burst out of my chest. And Clinkers, good god, American's can't do chocolate. But ya know, there's stuff I like about being here. The shopping, the history, the architecture in Chicago (where I finally went today!). So maybe the list should be "The Top 10 Things I Like About America". It's so cheap here. And there's so much to do, I don't know how I will ever get to do it all! Plus I forever feel like I've walked onto a movie set, it seriously is like I've already been to the country because of the movies.
Apart from that, I'm good. Spoke to home last night and I love listening to my mum waffle on. I've been driving heaps which is awesome. I spent some time on Friday night driving around and around in circles in a carpark to wait for the car to warm up while the other girls took forever coming out of the restaurant, Krissii thought it was the bestest (good grammar) fun ever. It was insane. Then I pretended to drive straight at Magda and slammed on the brakes at the last minute. Great fun. Lucky there ice hadn't hardened at that point cause I would've spun out of control. I didn't think about that at the time.
Anyway, I'm going to do some research on prices and go to bed!
Take care.

Springfield

So I can now say I've been to Springfield! No Simpsons mentioned anywhere but a helluva lot of Lincoln. A breif history lesson, Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation in 1862 and called for the use of black slaves to cease, basically to free the slaves. This affected majority of the Southern States as the blacks were used to work on the cotton fields, a major industry. So when this law was bought in it started the American Civil War, the Yankee's verse the Dixie's.
I found this is all very interesting as I never knew what actually started off the Civil War. Unfortunately, Alex didn't and at one point was walking around saying "Boring" over and over again in a loud voice so I had to rush around it with her. I only got to see the Early Years and the Presidential Years in fast forward but I spent a few hours in Mrs. Lincoln's Attic which is a hand's on area for kids, it has dress-ups, building logs, books, a dollhouse, period toys, a kitchen with pretend stuff to play with. So the kids liked that part and Pat had gone off to do her presentation so we hung out. Oh but! I managed to get a few photos in the areas you werne't supposed to because I didn't know that so I was just taking pictures until security came up and told me it wasn't allowed... Whoops. Good photos though!
We stayed at the Hilton which was nice, except the building creaked all night thanks to strong winds, a tornado warning had been issued that morning. Thank god I didn't know about it until I was there.
We went to an Italian place for dinner called Saputos which had THE BEST lasange. It was delicious.
On Friday morning I went and took a couple of pictures but due to the severe change in weather I felt like my face was cracking because of the cold. When we left I got a couple of photos of the State Capitol and we also did the drive to Lincoln's tomb, which resembled a war memorial excpt was different because there was an actaly body buried somewhere underneath it. Sort of like the Unknown Soldier at the War Memorial in Canberra.
The drive back was alright, exhausting sitting in a car for so long. We stopped off at Pat's parents and I met them Pat's dad had a stroke less than a year ago so he is disabled now. I know some people say you shouldn't feel sorry for handicapped people but I didn't because it was so hard or him to spit words out, he has them in his brain and they wouldn't just come out. I thought it must be so frustrating. But anyway, it's hard to say how I felt without because I don't know. I just thought I'd throw that in.
Last night I went out to the Olive Garden for dinner with the girls and then we went bowling at a place that could probably be referred to as dodgy and prbably where a lot of the underages go because they have nothing else to do so they go bowl for $1.99 per game or play pool. Lots of Hispancis. They're always interesting males. Anyway, point to this was I won the seocnd game!!! I cored 118 which made me the overall winner of the two games we played. How exciting! I got two strikes in a row. I was so proud of myself. I even made them print out a copy of the score for me.
Today I'm looking after Emily for the arvo. I'm in desperate need for a massage or something has I buggered my neck in the car and my headaches are starting to come back. It feels like forever ago that I left Australia. And I've been having really, REALLY, strange dreams.
Anyway, nothing else going on. Tonight I'm talking to mum then think I will chill out and go to bed as I got in very late last night/this morning, and tomorrow I'm finally going into Chicago!! Oh and guess what the temperature is right now???? I bet you'll never guess! -17 celcius. I went outside to put some postcards in the letter box for them to pick up and I got in the groceries for Pat. That will be the extent of my going outside today. This cold is not doing my skin any favours and keeps drying it out. Not nice. Apparently, according to Krissii (another Aussie, been here about 6 months), this is going to be the coldest day on record for the whole U.S. I dunno about that but it's cold alright. I didn't think I'd be able to survive -12 degrees let alone -17!
Must go, Emily has been asleep for an hour and I'm hoping to get another hour out of her and I have stuff to do.
Speak soon!

So behind!

First off, I am going to apologise to the people who are emailing me and I'm taking forever to reply. To tame my inbox to be slightly respectable it's tkaing me a good 2 hours at the moment, so the next time I get on I plan not to spend so muhc time but then the next time I have to spend like another 2 hours on it. I read all your emails, I love getting them, my replies are just slow. So don't stop sending them. Just forgive my delay if you experience one.
So, I'll try and keep this short and sweet as I just looked at my blog and I must give some of you numb bums making you read for that long!
I found scrapbooking heaven. I thought I found it on Saturday when I went to a craft store, it was good, but it was like a warm up for The Real Thing which I found yesterday at Gurnee Mills, the outlet mall near me. Archivers is like a hub of scrapbooking activity. I had to rush out when I walked in because I thought I'd wet myself if I didn't go to the toilet, I knew it wouldn't be a quick visit to that shop. It was great. I got so excited I wanted to start scrapbooking again but I'm still debating if I start my America or wait til I get home. But I want to make one of my favourite pictures so I could always do that. So much money!
Over the weekend I got out a bit. It was also when I was feeling better. Today I got outside and played "kick" with Matthew and Emily ran around. I think the 3 of us got drunk on fresh air, doesn't beat Bundy though which my mouth is watering for.
Thursday I'm off to Springfield as Pat has a convention and I'm looking after Alex and Matthew, Emily is going to stay with her grandparents overnight. I'll get to see the sights down there and learn about Lincoln. So that'll be a bit of history for me. It was Lincoln's birthday weekend just gone so hopefully something interesting will bo going on.
Sunday I'm going "downtown" and the girls want to go and check out the Greek district so I'm going to do that. And I've Monday off again so I might go downtown again by myself. Oh big and scary.
This weekend just gone I had my first LCC meeting which was in an antique shop (odd I know) so we looked at that, had some Valentine themed sugary food and then with the usual group of au pairs who I hang out with we went to Starbucks and veged out. I'm meeting some other au pairs tomorrow night from Pat's LCC group and then am out again on Friday night with the usuals. Going to Springfield on Thursday means I miss ladies night at some bar and kareoke, there's always next week! The girls play pool but let's not go into detail about my piss poor effort at that game.
Apart from that, nothing much else to report. Not so homesick anymore. Am trying to focus on making decisions about next year whilst also trying not to think about that. Bring on my 21st so I can start drinking because I'm dying for a drink. Only Krissii can drink so I'm going to get her organised for a big night out. Or down in the basement. Oh and screw not smoking. I had a mad day today and I'm dying for one right. Dying for a cigarette, interesting combination really.
Anyway, I'm going. It's almost 10 and I start work at 8 and I want to be alert, especially after today! By the way, we're expecting -12 celcius on Saturday, if the weather man is good at predicting weather!

I'm Alive

What a week... I got better, I think I mentioned the anti-biotics so I started feeling better yesterday. Then the computer broke on Wednesday so my contact with the normal world was pretty much cut. Which meant I called home to tell them I was alive and got all upset and was told I wasn't allowed to come home, except the best thing might be for me to come home. But yeah, basiclaly mum summed it up by saying you can't make the decision to come home without setting yourself up into a routine, once that happens I'll know how I feel about the place and won't be just coming home because I'm a big cry baby (they are my words, mum didn't say that). One good thing about being sick, I lost weight. And I didn't have an appetitie til yesterday so I was only eatting dinner each day and that was like less than what a sparrow eats. Imagine that! I used to sit at my desk and eat all day and now all I want is ice. I'm living off ice. I love it.
So I went shopping yesterday, not big shopping, I just wanted to check out a discount card shop and party supply place, I'm not planning a party but I love looking at that stuff, and I also went to a craft store, which I have named "Craft Heaven". Oh man, I already spent over $50 in there. I'm going to spend so much money in there! I bought all these cool things for scrapbooking and making cards to send to people and coloured pens and stickers and it was so good. Then I thought we might get a bit of a dumping of snow last night but I'm not THAT lucky. We only got two inches.
Today I'm off to Libertyville for my first LCC meeting so I'll meet a few other au pairs. A girl from Pat's (that's my host mum in case you forgot) group (she's an LCC too) called me earlier and I'm meeting up with her and Madlen (Pat says she's pretty immature) on Wednesday night. On Friday night I went out and had Greek then finished up at TGI Friday's with some of the au pairs that I went out with last weekend plus a couple of others. I miss my friends at home though, but lucky I'm so comfortable with myself that I'm happy to have a conversation with me.
I'm settling in better too, except Matthew worked out before that I don't like someone jumping out at me and decided to do that to me twice and made me pretty pissed, especially since I'm not working and don't want him to keep bugging me. I'm so mean. But the kid scared me, thought it was hilarious and I have to ensure I don't say the f word around him. I've already said shit twice in front of him, and a few times in front of Emily, thank god she can't talk properly yet. Potty mouth Kelly. Plus he's sick. And Alex, the almost 11 y.o, shits in her pants and did it before but does she go and change it? Nnnoooooooo, she sits down! I was disgusted. Pat went mental. Things aren't so peachy but if I don't think about this stuff then I'm fine with them. But when I'm a parent, things will be done much much much differently.
Anyway, I'm getting cold and need to get directions to where I'm going today. Sorry nothing exciting is happening, all very boring at the moment since I'm still in my whinge whinge whinge mood. Oh except I did a fantastic rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody before with the whole orchestra thing. It reminds me of singing it at kareoke once, I think it was Fritz's farewell. I love Queen.
Take care!

Sick as a dog

I'm so sick. I've never been this sick in my life. It started last night with a quesy tummy then I ended up with both ends going, I'd be sitting on the toilet with my head in a bucket. I'd expect something like that to happen if I went to Vietnam or Thailand or somewhere, no America. That went on for 9 hours so I had minimum sleep cause I also had chills and hot and cold sweats. So obviously my first day alone didn't happen cause I could hardly move. It even got to the point where I'd just start vomiting before I got to the toilet, cause I had the bucket. It was gross. So this arvo I had to go to the doctors, because I thought I might have caugth strep throat off the kids. But the test came back negative so I'm on antibiotics for pharangytis or whatever it is. The doctor fee was nothing but for 10 tablets it cost me $US53. And they didn't give me enough so I rang back and I'm getting the other 10 tablets free of charge. But I swear to god, I had a day of pain. In a foreign place. And I just wanted my mum. Even now my stomach is very weak. But I did drive myself to the doctor and the pharmacy, which is drive thru... Strange concept. Tomorrow I will actually start work. But in order to do that I need to go to bed now. For everyone who has sent me emails in the past 48 hours I did read them, and I will reply, my concentration is just a little shot at the moment, plus trying to email with people yelling and running around behind me is a little hard...

Chicago

So, I'm here, in Chicago. I got here on Friday evening, late, thanks to a delayed plane. Pat reminded me of Lynette of Desperate Housewives, she's pretty nice, stressed because of the family situation and because she has 3 very head strong kids to take care off plus having to say goodbye to someone who knew things backwards then saying hello to some (that's me) who has no idea how the hosuehold works. So yeah, massive adjustment for everyone.
So I'll start from Thursday, which was New York City. And what an awesome city! I'd never really had a massive desire to go to NYC but there is so much history and sites to see that it's on my must do list. It was hard because the tour was crammed into an afternoon and whilst the bus stopped at red lights we couldn't take decent photos of the sites being shown to us because the windows were dirty when thesun hit, so the glare in pictures sucked, plus i wasn't writting down what I saw. Here's a list of what I saw but might not be everything, it's just what I remember right now:
Empire State Building
Madison Ave
7th Ave (also known as Fashion Ave)
Times Square (absolutely amazing)
Statue of Liberty via the ferry from Mahattan to Staten Island and back (not a good view cause we weren't close, apparently it's been re-opened to climb to the top again so I'm going to do that!)
Macy's
Blommingdale's
Tiffany and Co.
Park Plaza
The horses and bussy's which you can ride through Central Park on
Battery Park
The Globe which was wrecked but not completely on September 11
Ground Zero (which they are building another giant tower on! Did you know that?)
And heaps more I think but can't remember. So I want to go back again.

Friday was a fairly big nothing day, I spent majority of the day waiting at the airport then got to Chicago and met the kids.
Yesterday (Saturday) was really overwhelming. I thought I was never going to be able to do this, but felt wwwaaaaayyyyyy better today. Emily (the 1 y.o) really took to me by this arvo and was coming to me to be picked up and didn't mind when I changed her dirty "diaper" so we'll have fun together, plus, if she wants to throw a tantrum go ahead i say cause screaming doesn't phase me. My family is loud anyway! Matthew is the 6 y.o and a pretty good kid but I can see might be somewhat painful when it comes to taking orders as such. Like today, it's Superbowl today, and Pat's sister and her partner came over and gave Matthew a mini football so he was running around and throwing it, plus their dog Maddox was here, and saying to Matthew don't throw the ball was like a waste of time. He didn't listen or care. Otherwise he's good. I guess it's over excitement. Alex, the 10 y.o with the disability is pretty alright. She is managable. So at this stage I'm thinking it'll be a routine thing. I'll work on that.
I also drove today for the first time. I drove to the grocery store which is a whole other experience! They have everything pre made, so if you want a platter with celery and carrots and dip and cheese, it's right there for ya, already done, just pay for it, take it home and take off the wrapping. The variety here is double our variety at home, if not more. They have fresh meat and vegies and fruit too, which I was a little amazed at... I am so stupid! But yeah, so that was interesting. I'll be able to go back and look at everything when I have Emily by myself.
Last night I met up with other au pairs who live in the area. Sharmain from central Qld came and picked me up last night in her Beetle which her host family gave to her, and we went to Krissii's house to pick her up then onto TGI Friday's. I had a nice pineapple drink. I'm trying to do the healthy thing. I met a girl from Austria and Germany plus Marcella was there, who's from Mexico and was at the school with me so we knew one another. Kellie was busy I guess and didn't come. So it was nice to get out of the house. Next weekend I have Sunday off but have to go to an au pair meeting and also Monday so I'll ventrue around Gurnee on those days to check everything out, there are SO many shops here, it's incredible. I'll probably do downtown when I can go with the other au pairs. They're going next Saturday arvo, but I have to work for a couple of hours at that time.
So, not much else going on. I am doing more driving tomorrow and Pat will probably have to go out for a little while during the day so I'll be here alone with the kid/s. Then Tuesday I've got a half day alone so that'll be good to get the routine started. I started having a look at college courses today and thinking I might do a jewellery one working with metal!!! But anyway, I'll update you on that another time.
I hope everyone is well. Please keep me informed as to what is going on. I'm hoping to be able to keep on top of things now that I'm settling down. Plus I gave in the first day I arrived and asked mum to send my olld mobile so I can get a US sim card, that way I can call people and text. But I deleted everyone's numbers when I gave it to Rachel so please please PLEASE send me your mobile number (I had to say cell today so I was understood. Some people here don't understand me, weirdos).
I'm going! Have fun. Email me. Love you.