Part II of a series. Man, if I’m ever ever to have a hope of getting through all of these, I’m going to have to be a lot more terse.

Australia: Jason almost becomes a resident

This isn’t a great story, but it was quite memorable. I remember very clearly standing at a payphone in King’s Cross Sydney, for several hours, arguing my way into getting myself onto a flight to the US. For reasons I wont get in to, I managed to invalidate my return flight. According to the first 15 Qantas Air reps I spoke with, the easy (and only) solution was to simply by a one way ticket departing the next morning, for the low cost of 4,000 bucks. As I settled into the thought if either becoming a permanent (homeless) resident of Sydney or committing a crime worthy of extradition, I decided to try a different tact and start making international calls the US branches of Quantas. The first person I spoke with was able to change my ticket, for no fee, in less than 10 minutes. I don’t think that Australian’s are particularly mean, or Americans are particularly nice, but hey, that was easy.

Red Sox: Standing Room Only

I managed to score SRO tickets to one of the few sox games I made it to this year from a coworker who couldn’t go. When she told me they were on the right field roof and that I would be standing the entire time, I was a little skeptical, but figured that myself and my young, robust, friends can handle it for a couple hours. Turns out that the right field roof is fantastic – either standing or sitting, especially if you don’t want to watch baseball! The game was hard to see, but roof-top based beer and food were 20 steps away and always line-free, bathrooms readily available, and a number of stare-worthy events taking place in the stands managed to distract us from our aching legs. This was by far the best baseball game we ever didn’t watch.

Orcas Island

In the San Juan Islands, off the coast of Washington State, lies Orcas Island. Liz and I zipped down from Vancouver last October to catch an early morning ferry to the island where an ocean-front cabin waited for us for a few days of doing nothing. (Doing nothing has quickly become one of my favourite vacation pastimes, as has spelling favourite with a “u�.) We both had our own priorities – mine was how quickly and how long I could get the wood-fire stove burning, hers was where our next meal would come from (it’s not like we we’re in any danger of starving here – the island has a grocery store, a few restaurants and several hundred full time residents - Liz just likes food [side note: She’ll love me for saying that]). Other than that, I concerned myself with taking the sea-kayak out, reading the paper, and well, that was about it.

Hurricane Kartrina

Not much to say on this one, but it certainly was dismally memorable. I was glued to the TV for days. Never before have I so strongly been compelled to just “go down there and do something to help.� I never got a chance to though, as that pesky thing called a job caught up with me before I could do so. I still keep my eyes open though, and am incredibly curious to see what New Orleans will look like five, ten, or fifty years from now.

Moving to New York City

I had managed to talk about it for the last year or two, and finally got my act together. November 1st, I moved in to a great little apartment in Hell’s Kitchen, Manhattan. A lot of things have been pulling me towards New York in the last few years, and it’s great to have finally arrived.

New Job, EchoDitto

One of the driving factors for finally hauling my butt to New York is my current employer. I’m a tech developer for a small, progressive, firm that just might make the world a better place. I must admit, I’ve been a little intimidated based solely on the fact that everyone is so damn smart. But I’m learning fast, enjoying the work, and loving the people.