Step into the light

Take your seats. We may begin.
When we last parted, despite it being sweet sorrow I moved on, I was preening myself for my man-date. Friday night I watched Click (wow) and went to sleep. In the morning, I did my usual weekend-rounds of calling the family (as a result of class schedule and the rotation of the earth, weekend mornings are the only time I can call the States) and then biked out to my old neighborhood of West End for the farmers' market. My oh my what a market it was. It was much bigger than two years ago, hopping with people, organic produce, and hippies. I was drooling and, shortly after, so was my wallet. I filled up my backpack to the point of no return while reminiscing with my long-lost hiking-partner Justus. We went back to his house with his girlfriend, made a nice healthy lunch, chatted about old times, chilled in the garden, and juggled. I was able to juggle 3 balls for 5 consecutive rotations, a personal best by far.
We then set out, veggie and fruit-laden, for his girlfriend's house via bicycle. The ride was pleasant enough; we stopped to get some Passion Pop. This triumphant end-product of Australian Innovation (Ausovation) is a cheap, fruity champagne that gets the job done. We each grab a bottle and head to her house. "Why?" the astute reader asks, "surely Michael doesn't like being the 3rd wheel, regardless of the vehicle."
"Oh precious reader," I respond, "it's because this Irish-Italian-British lass (who's spent most of her life in the Caribbean and Tanzania) has a pool!"
It was a gloryhole of a late summer afternoon: sitting by the pool, legs lazily dangling in the water, drinking our fruity libations. At 6 we made to depart.
Warning: this is where I poetically wax.
I don't know what it is about Brisbane, but something about it makes me poetic, or inspired, or poetically inspired, or inspirationally poetic. Anyway you splice it, I often stop and shake myself and ask, "how can this place be so fucking pretty?" and I get to feeling a little romantic. Not 'tacky romantic' but 'Romanticism romantic'.
My bike home was sublime. The requisite amount of alcohol sluicing through my body. The wind rushing past my body. The downy warmth of the slowly-setting sun making me relish the fact that I have efferent nerves. And the Light. I capitalize it for importance.
There's just something about the Light here in Brisbane; between 5:15 and 6:15, this strong-yet-soft, soft-yet-bright, bright-yet-painless ether seems to clarify everything, give everything a saline rinse, highlight inner quality... I do not know and I certainly cannot convey it. Much like Jodie Foster's character in Contact, I feel that they should have sent a poet to describe this Light.
I got that out of my system. But I was being serious and not trying to show-off or anything, I really do feel this stuff, yo. So anyway, Saturday evening I went out with some friends from school, taking the CityCat (water-bus system on the river) to the bar. What a way to transport, let me tell you. Dark river, full moon overhead... I'll stop myself. The bar was nice, the atmosphere was pleasant, and the time-had-by-all was good.
Sunday I biked around for quite a while. This city is amazingly hilly which has its pros and cons. Pros are, of course, the downhills. Never underestimate the downhills.
My first couple days of the week have been fine. Yesterday had classes all day - uneventful. Today I only had one class (at 8) so I was productive the rest of the day: went into the city with a friend and she and I did immigration stuff, bank stuff, food stuff, and beach stuff. So far, so good.
Jesus, I didn't know that !1
This one might be a cop-out. As we all know, macrophages eat invading bacteria and other stuff. They spot these little guys by a process of chemotaxis (chemo = chemical, taxis = yellow cab), i.e. it picks up chemical signals and moves in that direction. Well, we got to see a movie of this happening and it was awesome. The bacteria has its own chemotaxis that it uses to flee, and it really looked like a huge monster was chasing after some little guy. And then it ate it. All it was missing was sound effects.