BIG DAY

Grapes of Wrappiness

You know you have picked lots of grapes when you start to fantasize about having grape-picking super powers.  Like unrotten grape honing vision and grape stem laser beam eyes and inspector gadget box holding arms.  And then you know you have picked even more grapes when the idea of having a grape-picking intern makes you laugh hysterically for no less than five minutes.  Hysterical laughing for no less than five minutes over the idea of having a grape-picking intern is actually one of the stages of grape picking exhaustion and I would tell you the other three but believe me you don’t want me to.  But when the grape-picking day is over, you have the 4 b’s to look forward to.  Bacon, back rubs, bon fires and business ideas.  Business ideas like bacon and pasta food carts.  Time stamp.  Other things you have to look forward to when the grape-picking day is over that don’t start with b are as many grapes as you would ever want to eat ever, authentic Indian meals made for you by Mewa (incidentally, he started feeding us after he caught us catching escargots for dinner one night), and log-like nights’ sleep.

Murray River sunset

bonfire

tailgate fire

so many grapes, so little time

grape-packing skills 

catch and release and catch and eat.  phase release.

green porno

Fred the grape farm dog

Accidental Oasis

South Australia, Bananas

As of this morning, we were on our way to Perth (west coast), but then our hearts told us to turn around and go to Brisbane (east coast), so we did.  What I mean by that is we talked to a girl who made 23 AUD’s an hour making coffee in Brisbane, which apparently is the going rate, so after a short discussion regarding finances (specifically the $300 in petrol money we’d save not driving to Perth and the draw of a lucrative barista career in Queensland), we promptly turned around.  The drive west wasn’t totally in vain, as we did stay at a couple lovely campsites (we are developing very refined tastes in campsites) and got some great drive-by pictures of Adelaide.  But this kind of indecision comes at a price when you are getting 5.5 k’s to the L and petrol is $1.50/L.  To crunch those numbers into a meaningful/American figure, every mile costs us about 50 cents.  Whatever.  But then we got a flat tire in the middle of the South Australia bush.  And then the spare tire got flat too and so we got stuck in the middle of the South Australia bush until further notice.  And then we found out that the only west-bound highway within many many k's is closed until even further notice.  I would say nevermind about the $300 we saved, but that wouldn’t make any sense because thank goodness we aren’t in the middle of the Western Australia bush with a flat spare tire with no useful highways within many many k's.  Brisbane here we come.

Eat Sauce Adobe

THREE INTERESTING THINGS:

1.  A DIPE is a Documented Instance of Public Eating.  Like when suspiciously thin celebrities tweet about eating large hamburgers and stuff.  It seems to be an Australian tabloid term.   

2.  Adelaide?  Casey from Wells Fargo customer service calls it RAD-alaide.

3.  It's good that we called the Australian Department of Immigration and Citizenship before we slave labored for three months in hopes of being granted a visa extension based on our contribution to Australian society.  We didn't tell you that we were going to do that, probably, but we're not, so don't worry.  Secret Plan A was to apply for our second year visas and spend summer wherever it was in the world (Minnesota or Australia) for the next year and half.  It turns out our visa subclass does not allow for an extension.  We'll see you in August.