Blog America: The First Post

So in case you don’t know, I’m living in Seattle for the next 3 months whilst I work for Microsoft. So there’s that. 

This blog is a web log of zany adventures, or just anything that I find interesting, in this crazy backwards country of a whole bunch of United States that probably have more differences than similarities. 

Now before I continue, two references:

1. The website title, macca-d, is a reference to a) people with Mck in their surname being called Macca, or variants thereof, and the stupid name for McDonalds here. 

2. The title of the blog is a reference you need to figure out for yourself.

With that out of the way ... 

As I type this, I’ve been here almost two weeks. So I’ll go over that. For those interested, there won’t be much Microsoft stuff here, cos I signed a NDA, and people can carry guns in this country. 

Day One: Saturday.

HOLY COW SNOW OH MY GOODNESS SNOW WOW SNOW SNOW SNOW!!

I have been to the snow once before, when I was really young. Australia has snow in fewer places than I have fingers on my right hand, as I understand, and our snow to this snow is like Maccas (or, as they say here, Mickey D’s. I still find this hard to believe) compared to real food. 

So there was snow everywhere 

I went for a walk along this hiking trail, and there’s snow over the plants, like one might see in a movie, and I can stand on, not in but on, puddles. And icicles are pretty cool. Hahaha.

We went to a restaurant called Five Guys for dinner. When we walked in, there were five guys behind the counter. A sixth guy entered, but another guy left, presumably to bring balance to the force. 

Locals kept noticing my accent. I will never get over this. Even after years of me mimicking accents from around the world, I still find it hilarious that I have an accent. 

Everything closes really late. Shops, in Australia, close at 5pm, right? Maybe 6 on special occasions. 

Your bog-standard store won’t close til … 8? 9? Normally. 

And tipping. Oh boy. 

Anyways, so after that, I got to work on Monday ok.

I did not get fired after day 1

I work in my very own Microsoft Office with Windows. 

AND NO ONE ELSE IN THE OFFICE THOUGHT OF THAT JOKE WHAT IS THIS

Seriously. How does no one think of that?

Apples are restricted. If you get caught eating an apple, that’s one strike. Three strikes, and someone else replaces you on that batting pitch thing (I’m not sure of all the baseball terms).

Anyone using Google is immediately punished, by making them manually search through the building for an arbitrary item decided by the rest of their team. We are forced to use IE, and whenever we want to ask someone to move, we have to say "Xbox, go to [place]". It's in our job description.

There was evening, there was morning, the first day. 

Everyone sticks to their stereotypes. I love this. 

All Americans think that every animal in Australia is deadly and out to kill you. 

I did some research, and this is more true than I thought. We fought a war against emus, using machine guns, and lost. How the hell did Captain Cook ever survive in the first place?

Some funky needle thing

Anyway. So there was this event on thursday, and we drove past some tall thin needle-like building. I’m told the Centre-Point Tower is bigger. Admittedly, the Space Needle looks cooler. The event took place at an aquarium, which had otters, which are so damn cool. I love otters now. 

It also had a ring of jellyfish that looked like an MRI, and an octopus that looked like Cthulhu, and probably had a similar mood. 

That blue thing is a ring of jellyfish. Jellyfish sandwich.

First week of work done! Plus it’s Matt’s birthday, so let’s go to IHOP. 

Shameless plug: IHOP is incredible. Food is so damn cheap here. You see what I’m eating? That was less than $8. And wow were those pancakes good. 

IHOP. This is amazing. The closest two plates are mine. That grated potato is called a "hashbrown"

Sunday was church time, and so I dressed up appropriately. 

Bring it on, church

Oh look, the entire teaching staff at the church is female. I’m such a heretic. 

Take that, Sydney Anglicans

Nintendo has offices nearby. Like across the road from where I live. I should go say hi.

On an unrelated note, they have corn chips here. 

This is good. 

The corn chips, I kid you not, come in bright red, like Coke red, and dark purple, and taste like prawns. 

This is … weird.

Well, that’s it for now in crazy American things. There’s plenty more I missed out, because if I told you, you would be bored, or Microsoft would have to kill you. 

Stay tuned for more weird things about America!!