Peninsula Hot Springs [Belated Post]

I can't believe I forgot to blog about our trip to the hot springs!
We went there on the night of Friday the 22nd of February. We had originally booked to go a month earlier, but around the time which we had to leave, it started thunderstorming. Although the idea of being in hot springs in stormy weather holds a certain appeal to me, it's just not ideal.

I did not manage to get any photos. But overall I really enjoyed the stay, as we went at night it got dark and the lights near the pools at the highest point went out so that was scary because I hate walking down steps/stairs to begin with, let alone in the dark. Actually, the power in general I believe went out in part of the facility, so what was  meant to be the hottest pools were only luke warm :(

We also experienced a Turkish steam room. It was enjoyable in a suffocating kind of way. It was so humid every breath was like inhaling a lungful of water (but in a good way?). I was, however, wearing contacts, and I think I had some trouble with that in the steam room as I couldn't see at all after 10minutes. It wasn't painful, just annoying.

The drive back was tiring, next time we will stay somewhere in the peninsula :)

Love Lisa.

'Mid' Semester Break

Four weeks into the first semester and we're already having our mid semester break. Does that make our semester only eight week long? In my dreams, after this mini hiatus from uni we have eight weeks straight of uni. Joy.

On Friday, we celebrated Jenny's 20th birthday at her house with a hong kong style bbq. It was my first time ever having it and it was pretty yum. I can't relaly describe the process so here is a picture of the setup:

 
(Photo: Julia's facebook)

Although I was dead tired that day so I didn't actually bbq anything myself, her parents I think had pre-bbq a whole bowl of sausages and fish balls so I was just eating from that.

Now to the story of how I turned up an hour late. All seemed well and dandy as we were driving to Springvale, until we went onto Springvale Rd. Long story short it took about half an hour to drive a 1km. There was a level crossing that had trains going past every 5 minutes (bizarre, as it was a public holiday, why were there so many trains). Not only that, once we got up to the traffic lights, and I was waiting to do a right hand turn at an intersection. The traffic lights stopped working. Just my luck.

Love Lisa.

Uni, GAMSAT, Life in General

What can I say.
The GAMSAT was what the GAMSAT is - a soul-crushing experience.
I love being melodramatic.
After a week of feverish studying, I think the pressure really got to me. More than any exam ever has, including VCE exams and any end of year uni exams. I broke the cardinal rule of not over-studying the night before. I really hope to improve on my result from last year.

So now it has truly been one of the longest hiatuses I've had from blogging. Could be due to the fact that I have been stressing over and studying for the GAMSAT since the middle of the summer holidays, which put a real damper on what should have been time to relax and have fun. So much for having a break, huh?

Uni has been alright. After much deliberation at the end of last year, I decided to major in Pharmacology, thus far it has proven to be a sensible choice. I find it interesting, it's not overly difficult and the department has really great people. I'm not sure if I posted about how much I liked studying anatomy last year, but the thought of handling and dissecting cadavers on a weekly basis much too unnerving and confronting. So that ruled out the HSF major. I also found Microbiology and Immunology (my selective for semester 2 last year) very engaging, I like learning about diseases, parasites and so forth. But the immunology aspect had too much content for me to handle.

Aside from that aspect of my life. Jenny and Pauline's birthday were last week and were celebrated accordingly. Pauline had a joint birthday with Yiana, who I also went to high school with, at the Harp in Kew. It was meant to be a dress up theme, it seemed like only myself and a few others actually followed this. Not many of my close friends went that night and I had uni the next day so I didn't stay for long. I did catch up with Sophie, from high school, who I have not seen since Year 12, I discovered she lives incredibly close to me so I gave her a lift home.

On Friday the 15th, we celebrated Jenny and Pauline's birthday with pizza and drinks at Jenny's cafe in the Docklands. I definitely ate too much. Once again I couldn't stay for long, I had to drive Michael to the airport in the early hours of Saturday. Zinta's 21st birthday is coming up next week! As far as I can remember, I've never attended a 21st birthday celebration, so I'm excited! But truth be told, I'm not excited for my own 21st, just like I wasn't excited for my 20th. A little depressing when you consider that my 18th and birthdays prior to it, I was always ecstatic to celebrate and organise.

I have a mini haul to share in my next post, some ebay purchases and online purchases delivered to Michael's hotel while he was in America.

Love Lisa.

PS. Major craving for katsu don and ramen at the moment.

Valentines Day

[Seems that I forgot to publish this post until now]

Wishing you all a belated Happy Valentines!

If you've kept up with my blog since last year, you'd know we celebrated Valentines at Big Boy BBQ. So we kept the tradition up and went back again. Bout time as well, I forgot how amazing their ribs tasted! We went there on the night of Friday the 15th as I had an assignment due on Friday morning, hence I didn't want to stay out on Thursday. But on the 14th I was presented with a rose and a very sweet card hehe :)

If you're wondering what I bought for Daniel, it was the Professor Layton game for 3DS, since we've both wanted to play it. It's funny because the night before I planned to go buy it I had a feverish dream that it had sold out in every store, ridiculous, I know. -__-


Dinner was heavenly. The chicken wings were so so, the potato salad was very good as a side (first time I've opted for something other than chips), and the ribs, of course, were the piece de resistance. Slow cooked, tender lamb, slathered in BBQ sauce. The thought of it still makes me salivate. Hahaha, but seriously, this is my kind of meal.


It was a nice, balmy summer night to have dinner outside. I wish I could explain it, but the past 2 days have been the happiest I've felt in a long time. It really is the little things that can make the biggest difference.

I'm so lucky to have someone to share moments with, moments that can just make me smile upon recollection, moments that I'll forever cherish.

Love Lisa.

Chesterfield Visit #2 [Pic Heavy]

So on our drive to the car park of the farm, we saw some cows in an outer paddock, we went to go pat some and then this cow (below) ran up to Daniel! What a sweetie pie, she recognised us from out last visit aww *melts*.


Playing on hay bales.

The bunnies grew up so much!

The piglets were also much more calm compared to last time.

This lamb was the cutest thing I've ever set eyes on, eeee D;

This time we found the horse paddock!


I loved the donkey, I wish he was kept with the horses though, he was all alone in his own fenced off area. And donkeys are actually social animals!

Fallow deer basking in the sun.


Love Lisa.

Chesterfield Farm [Pic Heavy]

I've always loved animals of all kinds, I know a lot of people might say that, but some of my earliest memories were borrowing piles of books on dogs, cats, horses, wild animals etc every week from the library as a child. I didn't just solely love animals, I wanted to know about them in every aspect, I dedicated all my time to learning about and watching documentaries on them.

So naturally when I found out that there was a baby animal farm in Melbourne, I was desperate to go. Daniel passed his driving test the end of last year and bought a car the start of this year! Hehe ;D Makes going places so much easier as I don't have a car, even though I have had my license for nearly 2 years now, but I digress. Here are an assortment of photos from our visits there (yes, we've been twice now).

First Visit

The first animal we fed, Mr Duck.



Mia is the sweetest dog, totally knocked out during the day.


I know some of you will find the below image less than endearing (euphemism to the extreme haha), but I find rats and mice so cute. Look at those tiny pink babies.


Pigs have surprisingly human eyes.

Daniel feeding the emus.

He managed to convince me to feed one after saying it didn't hurt. The emu's beak cut me! I know it doesn't look like much but it stung all day.


2 part story about this gorgeous cow.

I know it looks like I'm trying to keep my body away while touching the llama, but if  you could have seen me from the other side of the fence you'd see my face is literally smooshed onto the wires in my desperate attempt to touch the llama.


DOE, a deer.

Goats <3


The lambs that made me melt.


Sow!


Second photos will be in the next post.

Love Lisa.

Thoughts: Being True To Oneself

I feel as though all of last year, I was always caught up with something, one worry or stress turned into a another and the culmination of negativity took both a mental and physical toll on me. The past few days, I've really been thinking, just contemplating the past, my experiences, and my own reactions at the time.

I am somewhat old fashioned. Not in a superficial manner, or in any way that you could tell just by looking at me. But it's hard to explain, ever since I was a child I was concerned with things beyond my years.One of these is money. I've diligently scrimped and saved since I could comprehend the concept of money. I know part of that was instilled in me by my parents (indirectly) but I think it's so much more than that. I was acutely aware of how difficult life would be without money, without ever actually experiencing it myself, that I agonised over any money lost, wasted or spent unnecessarily as a child. Bizarre, right?

I am sentimental, to a unhealthy degree. I become what would be considered irrationally upset when people are unable to understand why something that they hold little significance to, means so damn much to me. (How's that for a convoluted sentence?). I know that people 'hooking up' with strangers at parties, clubs and so forth is a incredibly common and normal occurrence, for people of varying ages, am I correct? The thought of myself partaking in such an act, actually unnerves and dare I say, disgusts me, in a inexplicable way. I don't find it strange when other people do it, nor do I disapprove exactly, it's just something that I, personally, never have nor ever will do. And when I say I will never do something, it's not difficult for me to uphold promises like that.

The values that I hold are so deeply ingrained in my being. None of the examples I can give really exemplify the intensity of what I believe in, in fact, they're barely scratching the surface.

Love, Lisa.

PS. I think the word I was looking for in my second paragraph was 'old soul'. Not that I believe I was wise, but I think I've understood far more than I should have as a child, which, in turn, prevented me from ever truly being 'just a kid'.