Freebies

• I love them. I have been known to put my email address on questionable lists just to get a free tote or water bottle. I'm still getting creepy Tea Party emails because of this. (Damn you CPAC) But one major plus of living in both London & now Perth is the presence of magazine freebies. In the US you have to mail away or enter online giveaways for the free stuff.  Oh no. Not in Pahth (Perth said with an Aussie accent...) Here you can purchase an In Style for $5 (albeit with a random Australian 'celebrity' on the cover) and walk away with a collection of John Frieda travel-size goodies. For free. Hog. Freaking. Heaven.

• So I've mentioned how people are exceedingly nice down undah. As some might have guessed, observations on this blog are not always truthtruth, mainly just Katietruth. But I can assure you that one real truthtruth is that people are freaking friendly. Just happy folk in general. One such example is on the bus: when people get off they say "thank you" to the bus driver. I mean everyone does this without fail. Even when it's raining and he's just dropped you in the middle of a gutter puddle, you say "Thank you!" or "Cheers!" Don't get me wrong, people in DC occasionally do this too (mainly my wee Tiffany Ann) but here it's everywhere. Happiness can exist on public transportation, who'da thought?

• Anyone who liked the US version of "The Killing" I highly recommend you watch the original Danish version. It has a funky Danish name but the translation is still called "The Killing" (shocker). I can proudly say I (mostly) stayed awake during evening viewings of the first season. Anyone who has experienced me at night knows that fact alone is a huge endorsement of the series. Also I can confidently say the series would have been a Scott Tillson favorite. He probably would have learned Danish by reading the subtitles and then attempted to correct native Danes on their pronunciation. This would have surprised no one.

• One element of our movie/tv evenings last week was a surprise bottle of bubbly courtesy of Bob's dad, Dietmar. Between Dietmar's midweek champagne and Ingrid's dinners/breakfasts/freshjuices, our resolve to buy our own place is slowly dwindling. 

• But, not to worry, we have more inspections (aka Aussie open houses) this weekend! In fact, I think I'm a little bit addicted to searching on real estate websites. I even have an app on my phone. Emily "FranFran" Hueber warned me about this addiction because she just casually bought a house herself (yes my friends are way more financially responsible than moi). As per FranFran's suggestion I have promised not to get overly excited about any one property until the keys are in our grubby little hands. Easier said than done, FranFran, but I will keep all readers (aka Pat Tillson) posted on our progress. Here's to years of yard work and paying for our own house repairs!