One Week On

Seems a while ago now, and indeed it is. I'm actually typing this offline now, so can't remember what the last bit that I wrote about Australia was. A couple of things that I meant to write about though involved traffic.
I noticed this first in Bordertown, when staying with Kerynn, but on returning to Perth, saw a couple more examples. They have drive through off-licences! Now I'm not sure what the drink driving laws are in Australia, nor how rigorously that they are enforced, but I can't see the idea going down well in the UK.
The second thing that I noticed was lane discipline. When traveling with Kerynn, I asked her what the ruling was. She said that it was pretty much the same as in the UK i.e. keep left apart from overtaking. However it was pretty much free for all in practice. This was certainly borne out from what I saw. The big difference being that no-one seemed to mind too much about being overtaken etc. Maybe it's down to the lesser volume of traffic, but there didn't seem to be the impatience that you get on British roads, and this was both in the city and the rural areas. Obeying the speed limit was also much more evident. The sort of roads that I drove on were pretty clear and straight, yet everyone seemed to pretty much stick to the limit.
Another point, whilst I'm talking about traffic, is pedestrian crossings. There only seems to be one kind, and this is your standard push button type, with the red man to stop, green man to go. Now, in the UK, if we want to cross a road, we will have a look and pretty much cross at the first available opportunity, whether we've pressed the button or not. In Perth, I noticed that almost always, people stand and wait to be given the green light to cross. They don't go if there's a gap, they will stand and wait. Fascinating stuff for a people-watcher like me.
I'm sure other observations will be thrown in as I think of them.

What else to talk about?

Facebook? Specifically The Jewel Of The East. I'm not going to go into too much detail, but for those who don't know, Facebook is a social networking site on the internet. It facilitates building a group of your friends and interacting online. "Jewel Of The East" is a group that has arisen from there. It is led by a marvelous chap (I have to say that as he has been known to read this blog). Anyway, it's all good fun. We even had a pub crawl last Sunday involving a good handful of the folk from the group. Much fun to be had. Photos are on my Facebook profile (link on the left of this page).

My week off has been spent doing exactly what I planned - not a lot. Much rest and relaxation interspersed with a bit of cycling, running and walking.

I'm still not relishing the thought of a return to work on Monday, mind!