Australian Open 2008 Day 2 and 3

OK, so that's probably pretty lame of me.  I had no real intention of putting together two separate entries for this past weekend.  Since there wasn't any play on Sunday and I only worked a few hours on Saturday, I didn't feel it merited separate blog postings.

Saturday wasn't too bad.  We got to the hotel and my room was ready.  I discovered that for the first time I would have a single instead of sharing a room.  Now, I don't mind sharing, especially because a 2 bedroom apartment has two separate rooms, including bath so we don't really have to share anything other than the common areas.  It was just interesting to have my own room.  I got up and immediately unpacked.  Then, I called Colleen.  Yes, I'll pay some horrific charge from the hotel because I didn't have a calling card, but I promised her I'd call as soon as I was mostly settled.  I know she's not doing very well with my trip this time around, and it really makes me sad that she's struggling so hard.  We went for lunch at Stalactites, a Greek restaurant that is the favorite eatery of Marcos Bhagdatis.  Mikey likes it as well, so I knew suggesting it would go over well.  From there, it was supplies and back to the room for a shower before heading to work for a couple of hours.

Saturday night marked the party as well.  Now, this is the first time I've been at one that wasn't at the hotel, but I was told that something happened and the hotel wouldn't allow us to host the party there no matter what.  So, they chose Pug Mahones, an Irish pub within walking distance of the hotel.  Not a bad choice, but not necessarily a great one.  Still, free food (canapés and appetizers) and free beer and wine is a good party. :-)  Now, I have to be honest, this party is always a failed attempt at getting the three groups together.  Each of the US, Scoring, and IBM Australia cliques wind up in separate sections of the party, really not doing much bonding.  In the end, I hit the wall very early.  I hadn't been to bed all day, and around 10:30 I decided I'd had enough.  I walked back to the room and was asleep by the moment my head hit the pillow.

Sunday morning I woke up and discovered I was more than mildly hung over.  Of course, that was partly due to being dehydrated from the flight as well.  I got up and told myself my reward for being a dumb ass was that I'd have to go jogging for my workout.  I packed three sets of workout clothes for the trip and I intend to make good use of them.  It assumes my knee will cooperate, but I wanted to make my plans.  I got up and got on all my "bionic" workout gear.  I call it that because I now have a Polar running computer (the watch and a linked heart monitor band) as well as a neoprene strap for my iPhone as I chose to only take it as my MP3 and phone for this trip.  Out the door and into the Melbourne morning.  It was just before 7:30 when I got out the door of the hotel.  I jogged down to the Royal Botanical Gardens.  The path itself has a 3KM marked running track and I chose to see what it had to offer.  It was exhausting, as a couple of the hills were a bit more than I had expected.  Now, I also discovered about 2KM into the run on that course that I was running the wrong way.  If I had run the other way around the track, I would have been running down that hill.  That would explain why it seemed I was running against the current as the majority of the other runners were going the opposite direction.  Saw a couple of landmarks I hadn't seen before in my wanderings, so I made a couple of mental notes to make sure I'd get back to take some pictures.  We never went into work, so I took the chance to hit the Victoria Market and bought a couple of extra t-shirts, though I don't think I'll really need them.  I just liked the style.  We discovered that the CBS NFL game was going to be shown here on ESPN (there are no CBS channels here) and that our best bet to find ESPN was the casino sports book.  So, we walked down to the casino, only to find that what appeared to be every other American in town was already there.  A few of us hadn't had lunch anyway, so we took the opportunity to walk back into Chinatown and have lunch at one of the better spots.  Unfortunately, they were serving Dim Sum, so we weren't able to order from the menu which is what we really wanted.  For some odd reason, we went back again for dinner, I suspect because some of the people here didn't get what they'd expected from the place, and until that need was filled, it was going to be pressing.  Got back to the hotel early and was once again asleep before midnight.  It was awesome!

Well, time to close this entry for the day.  I'll be back again tomorrow ready to talk about my Monday.  Some interesting things afoot. :-)

Cheers!