I really do not mean to stereotype any one (or two) nations, but what is it with this place (and Canada)? I have got to say, dealing with Canadian customers in the US and dealing with Aussie customers here the parallels are uncanny. They pick your brain for every what if situation, and look for any way to not pay for what they need. Its hardcoded in their collective circuitry. I'm not on the phones all that much here, so my interaction with customers is not too heavy, but I just got off the phone with a customer who had a problem. I can understand his issue. It is valid. But the sheer quanitity of hot air spewed forth is amazing. What was really a 5 minute call - OK, this is your problem, so try this and call back and let us know if that resolved the issue - went on and on for a good 50 minutes. Unfortunately, I couldn't grab the matches to light myself on fire. Torture I tell you.

No calls yet on the pager. But our enterprise/3phase tech was sick today, so I had a few symmetra calls. I've noticed people in the office take sick days waaay too often. Bunch of sissies I tell ya!

Did I mention I'm on a 10baseT network here? Its really cool downloading stuff from the corporate site. Makes me all nostalgic like its 1996 all over again.

Eeked out a win in my fantasy baseball league. 2-0 in the young season, but looking at this week, I'm not too optimistic at going for 3 straight.

Pager duty begins today. No seibel access should make this interesting. That and the fact that it lands on a 4 day weekend is not cool.

Apparently customs called work. Should have my stuff soon (fingers crossed).

Happy monday y'all.

So there are a few good shows coming up down under. First off you've got Love following Brian Wilson's lead and touring in support of one of the greatest Albums ever made. And the Donnas are playing out on May 14th. J. Mascis on May 5th. I haven't seen him since he used to play open mic nights at the now defunct Baystate Hotel in Northampton. Then there are 2 aussie bands, Gersey + Gelbison are playing the allendale hotel on the 25th of April. They've got some good press so it looks like that'll be a good intro to aussie bands. Thats enough shows to keep me busy. Still would rather have seen Yo La Tengo/Portastic at Lupo's and Spoon at the Met, but it'll do.

Next weekend is a 4 day weekend - we get Good Friday off, and Easter Monday off. But I have the pager, so plans for getting out of Sydney are unlikely.

Still no cell phone, no cable, and no items from customs.

After recovering from friday night out with co-workers, I took Jesse's advice and checked out 24 Hour Party People on Saturday. Made me want to hear some New Order. Now all we need is a movie about Creation Records and the 80s/90s english rockers history set will be complete.

In pancookery news, I made chicken with a passionfruit buerre blanc for my housemates the other day. I think the passionfruit could have been more ripe/sweet, but it was decent.