Customs seems to use more dogs here than in the states. No silly removal of shoes! I have always thought that police and customs should more dogs. Their noses are thousands of times more sensitive than the machinery they usually relay on.
We took a cab to our home away from home in the Paddington area of Brisbane. Robert and Katherine Norton, both PH.D.'s in areas related to business consulting, had stayed in our apartment in our home a few years ago. We did not know then just when we would be in Australia, but we knew we would someday. They stayed with us for a month, and we will use their home for about a week, so we will have some more time coming for our use, or perhaps our daughter Sarah and her family's use.
The home is very spacious, with two levels, a front and rear deck and a back yard with small pool. I tried swimming once, but the water was acually cold, even by my standards. The house had many fans, which we were used to from our time in Panama, and was very open to capture the breezes.
Robert and Katherine dropped by to say hello. Shortly thereafter Graham picked us up for a pre-scheduled visit to his home. Graham was involved in the Rotary which sponsored Sarah's Senior Year of HS visit to Ayer, Queensland, back in 1988. Sarah and his daughter had gone to the Brisbane World's Expo together. She is recently married and has been living in London, but is relocating to near Brisbane. We also met Graham's wife, their son, and his wife and newest of three children.
We had a fabulous buffet lunch in their lovely new home. This lunch helped us to stay up for our first full day in a time zone 17 hours behind Seattle. We had gone through 7 zones and lost one day. We think that, plus our sleeping on the plane as much as possible, plus our use of some homeopathic travel pills, allowed us to avoid any serious jet lag. We were on schedule and alert from our first day.
Graham called today to say hello and see how we were doing.
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