Philadephia - Random "Facts" & Thoughts

• I will never get used to the toilets in the US (random, but true and the reason I make this comment is it is almost like they were built on the basis that no American is over 5 ft - the toilets are tiny)
• We were bought Philly pretzels for breakfast this morning as we had to start super early as we are way behind the agenda – and they were revolting.  As an FYI in case you are ever in Philly and anyone offers you one…  I was encouraged to put mustard on it – which I did, which increased the revoltingness by about 10x
• I ordered salmon for dinner last night with steamed vegetables – and forgot to ask for everything on the side (you laugh at the American movies when this happens - example Steve Martin in L.A. Story - remember when a coffee was ordered - here's the clip.  It seemed extraordinary to me at the time, now it makes sense:  LA Story - Ordering Coffee LA Style).  Any who I digress..  My healthy dinner came out covered in BBQ and chipotle sauce on the salmon and a litre of butter on the vegies - destroying my healthy dinner...
• I went running this morning at 5am – very crisp but nice.  In Australia we see dead kangaroos, possums and stuff (well, actually where I live I do not see dead anything except for the odd family pet who ventured onto the road) BUT here there are dead deers just randomly on the side of the road – they are HUGE – and it is kinda sad
• I told someone I was going to NY for the weekend and all they could talk about is Ebola – sigh, I think there is more chance of being mugged, stabbed or kidnapped by the Russian mafia and used in a prostitution ring (I have had Law & Order SVU on most of the time I have been here, thus my creativity/imagination) before I catch Ebola. 
•  I think I am managing 3 hours sleep a night.  While I don’t have jet lag as such, sleeping is near impossible due to my body clock – so by Friday I will be super grumpy (perhaps meaning anyone who tries to mug me may decide not to once they get “the look”?)

Steer clear of these...  But I guess my dislike of Philly pretzels is only
equivalent to their dislike of vegemite...


Streets of Philadelphia Day 2

I wondered if you would surface jetlag.  And you did.  36 hours after I get here.  Thank you.  You didn't disappoint.  Tossing and turning till 4.30am is always a treat.

On the upside - my hair is doing great guns over here - no humidity!  Who knew you could achieve straight hair so easily..

And so Sunday in Philadelphia begins..

Streets of Philadelphia

I'm in Philadelphia.  It took nearly 30 hours and 3 flights to get here but I am here.  I was worried about the jet lag but luckily I travelled Premium Economy (not quite business class but let me tell you, it is a far cry from economy) and got here after midnight so went straight to bed AND I woke up okay..

I'm here from work with all the other talent acquisition leads from round the world, which is exciting as I've only ever spoken to most of these people a few times a week for the past few years.  I'm appreciative I have a job that allows me to travel and see parts of the world I wouldn't normally see (China being point and case, I would never choose to go there).  To be honest I probably wouldn't have made it to Philadelphia if it wasn't for work but I'm glad I am here.

It is a pretty city.  It is currently autumn (or fall if you are American) and it is what I remember autumn in Tasmania to be.  The oak trees have leaves that are hues of orange and yellow and they crumble under your feet when you tread on them.  I saw a squirrel while I was out for a walk (cute little critters).  The air is crisp, the sky is blue and it has a kind of small town feel about it.

Tomorrow I get to go to King of Prussia - a huge shopping centre, so I have been told AND the best part is I get 3 days in NYC on the way home, which I am very excited about.  Me in a very big city fending for myself and trying to blend in with the crowd..

I was sitting in my hotel room this afternoon just as Australia woke up, looking through Facebook and considered what life would be like if I lived here.  I saw posts from my friends who are enjoying the weekend and the sunshine.  I realised if I was to come and work in the US I'd miss everyone terribly.  Is it a reality?  Maybe...  Is it something I want?  Perhaps..  I guess I'll find out as time goes on.  For now I will enjoy my week here and enjoy my days in NYC.  And wait to see if I end up here one day.

My Home

I'm home.  Home being Sydney.  I've settled back into every day life, although it took a day or two.

I just reread a blog I wrote when I was down there (You Can Take the Girl Out of Tassie) and I cried.  Just a little. 

Never take your home for granted.  Never take what you have for granted.  And never beat yourself up for occasionally going back in time and wondering "what if".  Life is full of what if's (refer to another blog:  What If's - gosh I was way before my time with a lot of things I've written and thought over the last few years!).

All I can put all of these thoughts down to is getting older.  Let's call it more mature (it had to happen sooner or later, I am 39+3 soon to be 4).  You start to think about things more, evaluate your lot in life.  And you know what?  My lot is just fine.  And for that I am thankful.

You Can Take the Girl Out of Tassie...

I’m slowly coming to the realisation that you can take the girl out of Tasmania but you can’t take Tasmania out of the girl. 

I am lucky enough to have a job and a boss where I have flexibility.  So this week I find myself sitting in Tasmania having left my Sydney home for a week, working for the most part but being able to spend time with my family, which I haven’t really done in 25 years on a regular basis until recently, about the last 18 months.  (At this point I encourage you to read a previous blog from a few weeks ago:  Sweet Home Alabama - it ties in nicely with this blog.)

I hear some of you gasp in horror.  Hell, I gasp in horror when I think of how long I have been away from home and my family and the amount of times I have been here.  Having said that, I think it does somewhat come with the territory when you leave home.  Let me explain. 

I left my home state at 18, seemingly dying of a broken heart, as only an 18 year old can do dramatically and with such flair.  I needed to put as much distance between my home and the tumultuous final teenage years when I changed from a “Miss Goody Two Shoes” into, well quite frankly, a bloody nightmare.  I’d fallen madly in love with a boy, who it turns out was quite a bit older than me (I was very mature is my excuse).  Long story short, it didn’t last and my heart was broken.  I left and settled in Sydney and a whole big wide world awaited me.  For a while I hated everything Tasmania represented.

Fast forward 25 years and I have only just realised how much I love being home.  I was at lunch with some old school friends on this trip, people who I have connected with on Facebook over the years (without FB and social media this would probably be a very different blog, but I digress) and we were chatting about being parents (them) and career people (all of us).  I was saying how “easy” it is to be home.  They asked what was easier.  I thought about it and said: “I think I am a nicer and better person when I am here”.  Upon being called on to explain, I thought about it for a minute or two.  Those minutes gave me time to digest what I just said.  But in a nut shell I am not as stressed, I am not as busy thinking of 101 things and I take time to smell the roses.  I connect with my family.  I listen to people instead of trying to multi task.  I really listen.

This trip I visited some places I haven’t been to in a long time.  I took a photo of the house I grew up in.  I met up with some people who at some stage in my 18 years here meant a lot to me.  And as I write this I realise it has made me sad.  Sad that it is only now I don’t take where I grew up for granted.  Sad that I have to leave in 36 hours and return to the grindstone that is Sydney.  The 3 hour commute to work (16 km drive each way); the hard core job I have, the day to day responsibilities I have.

But I am not ungrateful for my life outside of my home state.  I realise I need to be thankful for my family and friends in Sydney who love me and the flexibility and salary my job provides me with.  While I am not quite at the CEO level I dreamed of at 21, if I had of stayed in Tassie in 1990 I’d be married with 5 kids and probably a couple of grandkids – at 42…  And that is okay.  But I don’t think it was ever going to be me.  And if it had of been me – would I have tired of it by now?

Who knows.  They are questions I will never know the answers to.  And I guess that’s okay.  While I can get on a plane and fly home whenever I choose, I can’t rewrite history.  But I can be thankful for my wonderful family and the freedom I have to be me, the overseas trips I take as I am not tied down by children and my great life.

Thanks mum and dad for making me the person I am.  I probably don’t tell you that enough.  Thank you Tasmania for being an awesome place to grow up in and most of all, thank you for the memories.  I’m going to start making new ones.  I don’t know what they quite look like yet.  I’ll just have to work that out as I go along.  I look forward to it.

Tip Toe...

Further to my blog of yesterday regarding the gym.....

It is just after 7am, I am still half asleep, despite having been to the gym, and I realise we are having a casual day at work and I need to find jeans and a top to wear..  I can't just throw on a suit and walk out the door - today needs consideration..  Need to wear a top high enough not to show my back tattoo (previous blog:  Women & Tattoos), something that is classified as smart business casual and something which does not show too much of anything - essentially, as I used to tell my team "wear something you would wear out to lunch with your grandma". 

This needs thought.

I decide on suitable clothing and I put on my black boots.  They felt odd..  So I changed to my red boots.  They felt weird as well and were obviously too big.  By this stage I am convinced that getting up at 5.10am and doing a work out from 5.30am to 6.30am is sending me loony and perhaps I need a rest.

Then it clicks.  So I go try on a pair of shoes and guess what?  They are too big.  The gym is paying off people; I am losing weight in my freaking feet.  Awesome. 

Maybe in another 7 weeks my butt will be smaller.  Or my feet will have gone from a size 8 to a 6 and then I'll look stupid - 5 foot 7 and a size 6 foot.

It's all I've got today.  I am too bloody tired after waking up at 4.53am this morning in anticipation of the alarm going off at 5.07am.   Ignore me, I am just cranky.  Got out of bed the wrong side.

#Gym #WeightLoss #IAmSerious

Step by Step...

So, as per a previous blog, I joined a gym..  I thought it would be filled with a lot of beautiful people.  "Posers" if you will..  I'm really glad to say that I was absolutely wrong..  The gym I have joined is full of people of all ages all with one thing in mind, to get a little fitter and look a littler (or a lot) better than they do now.

Three to four days per week I drag myself out of bed at 4.55am.  It is winter.  It isn't easy.  I am at the gym by 5.25pm and on a machine by 5.32am.  I work out for 60 minutes.

The first six weeks didn't really herald any physical results.  But every day I went a minute or two longer on the cross trainer and had a steeper incline on the walking machine.  Now I am up to 40 minutes on the cross trainer.  No sweat.  Okay, that is a lie - there is a lot of sweat and I curse the damn thing for the first 12 minutes or so - a few times I've nearly just stopped and thrown in the towel.  But I didn't.  I kept going.  And bang.  Last Friday someone told me I was looking good.  Was I?  I had given up looking for results, I was happy with increasing my fitness.  The next day I noticed my jeans no longer fitted me without a belt and even then I looked like one of those ridiculous teenagers who wears their jeans down around their butt showing off their underwear..  Next stop..  Shopping for new jeans.  In September - the end to be precise.  I am not rushing out to buy new clothes now, I am going to wait a bit to see what other physical changes take place..

I don't love the gym but I know that in order to regain the confidence I seem to have lost I need to do something to make myself feel better.  Having said that I don't hate the gym either.  It has just formed a part of my day - like lunch.

So, if you are thinking about joining a gym I encourage you to give it a go.  They are not all places full of beautiful posers who really don't need to work out.

I have a gym "buddy" - a friend who gets up at the stupid hour every day to go to the gym with me.  We don't really speak, we probably grunt (who is at their best at that hour?) - but it is motivating.  I can't let her down and she feels she can't let me down.

So stay tuned, I'll report how I feel again at then end of September - just under 8 weeks away!