I came to Melbourne to be the surprise guest at my aunt's birthday party (held in a Tyrolean-themed restaurant in the Dandenongs complete with oompa band in lederhosen which gave me the perfect Bad Joke opportunity to respond to her "I thought you were in Germany" with a wave at the dining area and "So did I", and haven't i milked the crap out of that line since...). After that I spent the weekend at my cousin Ana's place, generally being totally unhelpful but nevertheless present while her partner, former drag racer Tom Easton, fiddled with a very yellow Torana and weighing down the left side of his "that feels like about 560 horsepower" Shelby Cobra replica which was a lot of fun.

Later my dad and I went for a walk around the CBD, discovered that the museum with a planetarium is now an art gallery with, well, out a planetarium and ate Nandos burgers that could have done with some peri-peri in the Very Cold next to the Yarra. I then drove around the Albert Park grand prix circuit at the unimaginable speed of 40km/h. The next day the car's fuel pump died, enabling us to enjoy a hazy view of Melbourne from Mt. Dandenong while waiting for the RACV, learn how to do percussive maintainence on the fuel tank and finally walk 3 km back to my aunt's house in the dark. yay. In the morning my dad and my uncle got a new pump and replaced it just in time for them to drive me to the airport where I forgot the food I was sposed to take for the flight, nearly missed the check in cutoff cos Virgin Blue's at the other end of the terminal and then joined all the buisness travellers going home to Brisbane for a nice headache followed by a few hours wait for my connection to Darwin.