This is what I’ve done in the past 3 days:  had Xmas in Ottawa with my kids, flew to BC on Xmas day to be with Leon, worked furiously on paint touch ups and packing the house and packed my luggage for a year away.  Phew!  I am exhausted and I haven’t even left for Australia yet.

Tomorrow we leave for LA and Fiji in the early afternoon.  I hope dearly I will sleep on the plane for much of the long flight over the Pacific and wake 36 hours later in a new land.  It’s not a 36 hour flight, but we lose a whole day as we cross the date line.  Neat!

My exchange partner left Melbourne about 4 hours ago headed for San Francisco.  She reports that our car is now parked at her house in Bendigo, while her car is parked in my garage back in Ottawa.  And so the exchange begins.  I can’t imagine what living in Australia for a year will be like.  But after all this preparation, I just want it to get going.