When do we meet Buddha?

Being jobless and homeless so much over the course of the past month has left us a bit drained.

In addition, we have quite a few large life issues we must address... like what we will be doing with the next months and years of our lives. Please... even more pressing, we need to figure out what we will do with the next DAYS of our lives.

While fruit picking was a great source of meditation and gave us hours with our own thoughts to reflect upon the world and our place in it (Anna did more of that, since I had my Ipod) it left us with blistered thumbs and bruises on our toes from gumboots.

So, we have decided to undertake a new challenge as a means to bring clarity in our pathetic, muddled lives of hotel waitressing, flight researching, and hanging out with 3 year olds. (there is NOTHING lame about hanging out with 3 year olds, especially Audrey, but I've got 20 years on the girl.)

A self-created 7 day Bikram Yoga Challenge. It works perfectly for seeking enlightenment and fits into our super cheap lifestyles. One week unlimited 90 minute Bikram Yoga Classes for $20. So we send this into the blog world so that I can't back down on going to Yoga tomorrow... and Anna will get out of bed to go to yoga in 2 hours. At the very least, we hope to be able to touch our toes at the end of this. (and maybe in 7 days time, Jackie will have a job).

Cristina, Be proud. The day has come. Jackie and Anna in Yoga class. Maybe Acupuncture next?

Namaste, homies.

Its a cold, cold world out there....

...when you don't have any hair. Well, at least when you have a five o'clock shadow growing on your head. (or on your friends head... who you have to walk around with, be seen about town with, and console when an entire family of five stares her down for WAY longer than socially normal.)

As the poll results to your left may indicate, the public spoke, and we listened, once again. As of Monday, the 19th of April, 2010 at around 5:30pm, New Zealand time, Anna DeMattei Wheatley joined the ranks of the bald headed. Pictures can be viewed via the link on the sidebar if you haven't witnessed the process already. Viewers be warned however, it gets a bit...hairy...in the middle.

The theme of the last two weeks has been: "Pull Your Life Together." A theme we have reinforced by making our very own calendar. Complete with the smiling (actually mean mugging) faces of us truly. We were bored that day.

Last week was spent in the lovely small little tiny town of Oamaru. Known for its cheese factory (loved by the cast of Scrubs), and its yellow eyed and blue eyed penguins (not loved by Jackie - let's just say they aren't the most exciting creatures to watch from a high cliff emerge from the ocean). We were in Oamaru on a work exchange, working for a couple hours every morning cleaning rooms and making beds in exchange for free housing, free breakfast (read: toast), and free internet. Naturally we made pretty good use of all three. We spent a lot of time going over possible options for what the next couple months could look like; going back and forth over which is best, trying to weigh out our options and, naturally, ending up with something completely different. As to what those plans for the next couple months are....well we aren't going to spoil those just yet - tune in next time.

Currently, we are back in Dunedin. Anna is working the breakfast shift at a hotel restaurant and Jackie is considering picking up a paper route (Take that Jesuit education). It short, our lives are nothing short of glamorous. But its a few extra bucks to fund us on our upcoming travels. Its getting cold here. Anna is slowly, very slowly, learning to love fall and cold weather again. Jackie is quickly, very quickly getting bored with life as an unemployed member of society. But as always, we're doing well, and wearing some pretty stylish hats on a pretty regular basis I might add.

We even have a semi-permanent address (until mid June) if anyone wants to send us some love. (Especially since so many of you wanted to last time...not)

As we start to get more and more serious about upcoming travel dates, we have but one question for you all:
Who's meeting us where????????

Big Gulp eh? Welp, see ya later,
Jackie and Anna. Anna and Jackie. Janna. Aackie. We're pretty much interchangable at this point (except for the hair). Its sick.

All That and a Bag of Cheetos

Life in short since Skydiving....

Finished working for Tom Pearpicker, who we miss everyday. Moved out of Nelson. Got talked out of going into the Wildfoods festival in Hokitika by the guy selling tickets at the front gate. Got our money's worth out of our tent. Got our money's worth out of our car by sleeping in Stew. Checked out Greymouth. It was Grey. But there was a pretty sweet brewery. Attempted to swim with seals in Kaikoura (we were foiled by weather) so we walked along the peninsula instead. Crashed a pub crawl on St. Patrick's. Stayed with a friend of Beth Purpur (Kathryn) from her time in India who lives in Christchurch. Picked up 4 bags of Cheetos from the airport. OH, I mean picked up Andrew Backus from the airport for SpringBreakNewZealand010. Dominated a quiz night. Got Scrumpy. Went to two glaciers... Ate Cheetos there. Picked up a package from Robin from Connor Clements...ate Cheetos there. Met up with Della Tall and her friend Carly who were on their way through NZ. Hiked to the foot of another glacier. Had the greatest dinner with the greatest friends...ate Cheetos with them. Saw Sebas off to Los Angeles. Went to Queenstown, to find that we dislike the city more than we dislike sandflies. Put Alissa on a bus to begin her journey home. Got Backus kicked out of a hostel. Went on a SeaExpedition on Milford Sound...ate Cheetos there. 12 degrees is cold water to go swimming in at 9pm, ask Anna. Hit up the southern most point of NZ sign... just to get the tshirts...and to eat some Cheetos there. Sent Backus home to get his diploma. and that is where it all went downhill..... from then to now, we've lived in our car, eaten topp ramen from the bag, , skipped Easter mass because it isn't appropriate to go after sleeping in your car, job searched, sadly, very sadly finished our last bag of Cheetos...at a backcountry hut that we had to climb a mountain to get to cause we had no where else to stay (that was a definite low point), left Wanaka to head to Dunedin, went on a Brewery tour, stayed with the most amazing Stock family, job searched, failed, and now we live at a hostel where we clean in exchange for beds and breakfast. PHEW.

Soooooooo. How about them Mariners?

We uploaded a few more photos of our most recent days. We'll caption them when we can.

Miss you all,

And then there were two....