I got paid today! I was rich until I came home and transferred out the five weeks' worth of rent I owed. Now I'm poor again.


But poor in Australia! Which isn't so bad. Over the weekend I carried out the next leg of my exploration of the Sydney area and took the ferry to Manly beach. Ferry rides are free with the my transit pass, which is very convenient and a significant factor in my being poor.


Manly beach is not very manly; at least, not compared to Watsons Bay, where the walking path to the cliffs leads you past a nude beach and a look-out terrace, so you can stop and see just how manly Watsons Bay really is. You can even take pictures, if you'd like. I did not. Sorry. I was going to take a picture of the 'nude beach' sign, but there was a family with kids coming down the path and I didn't want them to get the wrong idea and give me cut-eye every time we ran into each other for the rest of the afternoon.


While waiting for the ferry back, I had to get some ice cream because my stomach was caving in. Literally digesting itself. But because I was even poorer on Saturday than I am now, I got a McFlurry instead of the high-quality gelato that looked so wonderfully appetizing and horribly expensive. Did you know Australian McFlurries are smaller than American ones? I didn't. Now I do. About two-thirds the size. I felt a little bit cheated, but only a little bit, because a mini-McFlurry is better than no McFlurry, and I love all ice cream indiscriminately as long as it doesn't have nuts or coffee flavouring or fruit that's not bananas or strawberries.

On Sunday it was 29 degrees in the Inner West. 29 degrees is something you can milk for all it's worth no matter how much money you don't have in your bank account, so that is what I did.