Big, Disgusting Spiders

I keep on freaking myself out lately everytime I think about Australia. Not about the flying, the people, a job, etc., but the bugs and snakes!

I don’t know why, and it doesn’t even really make sense, but I keep on having these weird visions of snakes hanging from trees. Like hanging down from branches of trees, just as vines would. And then I picture myself mountain biking and wiping out into a big spider nest and totally losing it. Or seeing a tarantula sitting on the dinner table, and not knowing what to do. It’s so stupid, but I’m kind of worried something will eat me out there. I think I may have to carry a sharp pointy stick with me at all times…


That’s the only thing about Australia that’s not cool – the gross creepy crawley things out there. The birds and wildlife may be pretty and cute, but the bugs look scary! I really really hope it won’t be bad where I stay – otherwise I’ll be accused of acting like a “girl” everytime I start running away screaming from things that have more than four legs. Or perhaps worse yet, none at all! We’ll see how I do…I may have to quickly get a reality check out there, or I won’t have any friends.

So, I only just recently realized I have fulfilled all of the requirements to get my advanced paragliding rating, except of course for the test. I could have sworn you needed 60 hours instead of 50, but apparently not! Anyway, I’m going to attempt to write it tomorrow – the HAGAR test content is coming back to haunt me! Wish me luck!

Good spider-free night. *shudder*

Heading Down Under

Well, well, here I am again making another blog post, but thankfully not as a hypocrite, but as a person who has taken her own advice; I'm going to Australia for 5 months.

This is going to be a fun trip - it's going to be awesome to the "third degree", as my sister and I would say. I'm going to a beautiful place in Australia to fly and to experience all new things: new people, a new environment, a new life.

Maybe some people are jealous of me. They think that I am swimming in money and can afford to go wherever I want whenever I please. Other people think that I spend everything I make and think it must be nice to have no obligations or responsibilities and to make money, travel, make money again, etc. This second group of people have it mostly right, but hey, why be jealous of somebody else's life when you've created your own?

With this new trip I found a great deal on plane tickets, and guess what? I got a work visa too - I will have to get a job out there to pay bills and to pay for my ticket. So no, all of you who think that I will be lounging around doing dick all when it's not flyable are wrong - I have to "pay my dues" on this trip...

But you know what? If I end up working at some shitty restaurant or shitty motel or some other shitty place, I'm going to make it fun, dammit! I know that whatever job I get will only be temporary and that even the experience of working someplace foreign is worth something. And who knows? Maybe I'll get a fantastic job out there at a great place, working with great people, - actually, why wouldn't I?

So yeah, North Americans are funny when it comes to money - it's like this big secret about how much your neighbour makes and it can be offensive when somebody implies interest in your own financial situation. It's pretty silly when you think about it, but I guess even though I can definitely be the same way, I felt the need to shed some light on my finances to everyone reading this, just to create a bit less ignorance and jealousy when it comes to me and my reputation for incessant travel. Not that I normally care or have the need to justify what I do to others, but in this case, I'll make an exception.

Anyway, I'm happy and excited about the decision I've made, and I feel good about getting back on the horse and going after the paradream again. Australia will be fantastic!

Meditation: Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

What's your definition of fun, and are you getting enough?

Fun, fun, fun. I think paragliding is fun. So why don't I do it more often?

I've had a lot of time to think over the last 30 days since returning from Europe. Not that I don't usually in my own head re-evaluate and overanalyze the things I do, but this time it's a bit different.

Most people who know me well, know that I'm not a big fan of working hard without having fun. In fact, I really hate that. I mean, why waste your time doing something that makes you miserable? And I don't mean things like paying bills or washing the dishes, I mean the things that we spend huge amounts of time on - like specifically, our jobs.

With 24 hours in a day, I assume the typical person's weekday breakdown would be something like: 8 hours for sleep, 8 hours for work, and 8 hours for miscellaneous. Therefore, if we ignore weekends and assume most people work overtime, the typical person spends around 1/3, or to be safe, 1/4 of his/her life between the ages of maybe 21 and 65 at work. That's a lot of freaking time!

So then if you spend so much of your life at work, shouldn't you enjoy what you're doing? I mean, shouldn't you have fun on a regular basis when you step into your office, your factory, your store, your 8-hour-a-day-home-away-from-home? Why is it that we have so many people out there who go to work for one reason and one reason only: money...?

Everyone knows that money makes the world go round. Communism just doesn't work - we're all just too damn selfish to make the idea of perfect equality work. So, we're all forced to go after the mighty dollar and getting a job is traditionally the way to do it. We've created capitalist societies, so we should be at least somewhat accepting that money rules our lives.

The problem with our jobs though, is not having to money, specifically. The problem is that we often compromise our values, our morals, and especially our FUN when it comes to work. What I want to know is, who said work can't be fun?

Here's a question I often ask myself - if I had all the money in the world, what would I be doing? My answer is always the same - I'd be flying. Ok, I would hire all the best damn pilots on the planet who would teach me their tricks after being dropped off at launch by my chopper and then we'd venture off to fly mountains and coastal sites that would all be property of ME, but still, you get the point.

So then is what I want just a pipe dream, something that isn't possible, something that's just ideallistic, even if I don't know exactly what I'm after? Should I actually drop everything and say, "screw it, I wanna fly!"

It's interesting because lately it almost like a choice has been made for me; I made a legitimate attempt over the last few weeks to seek out jobs our here in Calgary in my specialty field - internet marketing. And guess what? There are hardly any jobs available. What's that you say? In CALGARY, the HOTTEST economy in North America, there are NO JOBS in internet marketing? Yes, I say to you - check it out for yourself - it's not a field where there are many jobs period, but in Canada if they exist, they exist mainly in Vancouver and Toronto. And besides, I think flying is more fun than marketing.

So...now what? Hah, what a decision to make! Hmmm...shall I travel again and stay this time FOR REAL someplace far for an extended period of time, or shall I find a "real" job in Calgary in something that doesn't need an education (because hell, I'll be the first to admit that the internet is the only thing I'm formally trained in). $10/hour in retail anyone? Or $60,000/year doing reception at an oil and gas firm? No thanks, I say, to both.

I'm not really sure where I'm going with this because I've already made up my mind - when you have nothing to lose, what are you afraid of? Maybe for me it's just the fear of the unknown which makes me anxious, but I also know that when I scare myself a bit, it makes me feel more alive! That's part of the allure for paragliding for me, but that's another topic...

So anyway, I don't know where I'll be or what I'll be doing 6 months from now, and that's scary. I don't know if I'll be in Canada depressed, frustrated and annoyed that I wasted time abroad, or if I'll simply be ecstatic that I invested time in myself to discover who I really am, regardless of my decision to continue flying or not.

I crave fun, no, I LIVE for fun. I surround myself with people who are fun and no matter what the circumstances, who I can have a good time with. When I can walk down the street and think about a friend and start laughing histarically or just simply smile at the thought of a time we shared together, well, that for me it's all about. (Ok, it's important to be serious at times too, but I think those times are few and far between...thankfully!)

Bottom line: I think if you know what you want, you're more likely to get it.

I found this website randomly: http://www.eightprinciples.com/ which I think is fantastic. Maybe I would have added something corny like "have faith in the fun decisions you make", but hey, maybe that's something that I'm personaly struggling with right now and that's why I immediately noticed its absense. Writing a blog post is surely just another way to convince and assure myself that I'm making the right decision because dude, it's scary!

Anyway, I just wanted to share with the world how I'm trying to go after something I think is "fun" right now, but how I'm scared. I'm scared that things won't work out again, I'm scared aoubt not knowing the people well where I end up, I'm scared that I won't make any money, I'm scared that what I think is fun right now, won't be a year from now.

So, maybe I'll just take my own advice and say that I'm going to have faith in what I'm doing, whichever way it turns out. And if I don't have fun doing what I do over the next few months, a new fun journey will have to begin.