Five thousand miles from anywhere

After reading Tim Parks' "A Season With Verona" to roughly coincide with Italy's soccer ascendancy, I am now reading "Travelers' Tales: Australia" to coincide with another, albeit slightly less, momentous occasion.
Any day now I should receive my anniversary gift that Jill purchased from Amazon -- an import "best of" CD by Mental as Anything.
No worries if you haven't heard of them. I will ramble on and on about them once the CD arrives. For now, simply think of them as an Australian equivalent to Canada's Barenaked Ladies crossed with England's Madness. They were a funny band of art-school students who could churn out hit singles (in Australia) with astounding ease.
Reading, I am deep into the collection of Australian essays. Distinguished travel writers such as Paul Theroux, Bruce Chatwin and Pico Iyer are writing about Aboriginal songlines, the Great Barrier Reef and sheep shearing.
Uluru -- Ayer's Rock -- features prominently in my armchair travels, as do strands of spinifex (the Aussie equivalent to Nevada's sagebrush).
My musical choices betray my current reading choice. Midnight Oil, Slim Dusty, Ratcat and other Oz bands have spilled out of the iPod in recent days.
It's all in anticipation of that Mentals CD. I hope it comes before I finish the book!