Not much happened this week beyond the usual boring work, laundry, shopping stuff, we all have to do to live. The exception being this last Saturday was the championship game of Footy. 
Think of it as the superbowl of Australian Rules Football. Something like 14 of the 16 teams are from Victoria. So it’s HUGE here in Melbourne. All week long it’s all people talked about. There was office gambling (you know I got in on that!), debates over who will win, and even the Crown Casino had set up a big enclosed outdoor stage and large screen TV for it’s elite club members to watch the game in style from. I had to walk past it every day, twice. Saturday morning before the big game people we’re milling about getting ready for the game to start at 2:30. Someone in my building was decorating the door to their apartment with the team colours. Blue and white for the Geelong Wildcats. Yellow and Green for the Hawthorne Hawks. Geelong being the highly favoured team winning 52 of their 57 matches this year. I went to the gym that morning, before the game. While getting my cardio in, I noticed everyone walking into the grocery store below my gym was coming out with either ice, beer or both! Parties were set up all over the city. Every pub in town, house parties, and public open spaces all had gotten ready for the throngs of people. Plus the more than 1000,000 people crammed into the Melbourne Cricket Grounds, where the game took place. I missed the first half of the game but did make it to Federation Square (Pioneer Square of Melbourne) for the second half (4-20 minutes quarters). The place was packed. Surprisingly this square was an alcohol free zone, unless you were in one of the restaurants around the edge. Which were all gated off and I was told at capacity even though there was open seating and more room than in the courtyard area. Coke Zero sponsored the event so there was free soda, meat pies and merchandise for those interested. I walked around a little to 
get some pictures from different angles. Then settled into a nice spot along the wall in the shade. They only have SPF 30 sunscreen here and my SPF 50 is running low. I’ve loaded some pictures and videos for you to get the feel of the event. The event even came complete with fire works at 9pm. Which I watched from the balcony of the place I'm staying now.
Think of it as the superbowl of Australian Rules Football. Something like 14 of the 16 teams are from Victoria. So it’s HUGE here in Melbourne. All week long it’s all people talked about. There was office gambling (you know I got in on that!), debates over who will win, and even the Crown Casino had set up a big enclosed outdoor stage and large screen TV for it’s elite club members to watch the game in style from. I had to walk past it every day, twice. Saturday morning before the big game people we’re milling about getting ready for the game to start at 2:30. Someone in my building was decorating the door to their apartment with the team colours. Blue and white for the Geelong Wildcats. Yellow and Green for the Hawthorne Hawks. Geelong being the highly favoured team winning 52 of their 57 matches this year. I went to the gym that morning, before the game. While getting my cardio in, I noticed everyone walking into the grocery store below my gym was coming out with either ice, beer or both! Parties were set up all over the city. Every pub in town, house parties, and public open spaces all had gotten ready for the throngs of people. Plus the more than 1000,000 people crammed into the Melbourne Cricket Grounds, where the game took place. I missed the first half of the game but did make it to Federation Square (Pioneer Square of Melbourne) for the second half (4-20 minutes quarters). The place was packed. Surprisingly this square was an alcohol free zone, unless you were in one of the restaurants around the edge. Which were all gated off and I was told at capacity even though there was open seating and more room than in the courtyard area. Coke Zero sponsored the event so there was free soda, meat pies and merchandise for those interested. I walked around a little to 
get some pictures from different angles. Then settled into a nice spot along the wall in the shade. They only have SPF 30 sunscreen here and my SPF 50 is running low. I’ve loaded some pictures and videos for you to get the feel of the event. The event even came complete with fire works at 9pm. Which I watched from the balcony of the place I'm staying now. I’m sure you’re all dying to know who actually won the game. Well, it was the Hawthorne Hawks, of Tasmania, beating the local favourites. The winning team came down to Feds Square after the game. (I was long gone) Then they went to the casino for a banquet dinner. Drunken people were everywhere that evening. Out of 20,000 cars (according to the news the next day) stopped and tested for DUI only 2 people where arrested. Melbourne and all of Australia are very conscientious about responsible drinking. So all the drunken people were walking about, riding the trains or trams, and using the thousands of cabbie here. So just strolling around that evening was very entertaining, from my sober perspective.
Well then next blog update I hope to do will be after I move into my new flat with Michael on the 8th of October.
I need to say HAPPY 50th BIRTHDAY to Ed Sharick. His big day is October 7th.
PS please go to my websites if you can, I need some hits from within the states PLEASE.
http://www.shopcheaperhere.com/ , and http://www.koistores.com/
The final seconds of the footy match, I'm way up to the left in the photo above when I took this video, in the shade.
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