Project 289 - Day 44 : A Mall Without BORDERS

I am traumatised. Yes, traumatised.

OK I am also ridiculously melodramatic but that's fun.... and about the only fun I had tonight. OK there I go into hyperbolic melodrama land again! The sad fact of the matter is that tonight I learned that one of my favourite shops in Pitt St Mall, where I often buy "Entertainment Weekly" and numerous books on the way home from work (OK technically I get off the bus a Wynyard and can catch the train from the station there so really 'on the way home' is a very elastic concept), BORDERS, is closing down on May 15 as part of the seemingly endless redevelopment of Pitt St Mall. More and more, what was my favourite place to shop, with some fun one of a kind shops, is being shut down, hollowed out and by all accounts replaced by another generic mall.

Now don't get me wrong. I love malls, and left to my own devices will happily spend Australia out of its current economic malaise. Singlehandedly. However, I also value individuality, especially stores that promised something a little different. Admittedly, BORDERS isn't that, and is in fact part of a massively large US mega bookstore chain. Still, it was for so long part and parcel of my shopping experience going into the City, and along with the loss of so many other fun interesting shops, I will miss it.

Well until I go to the BORDERS at Macquarie Centre, near where I work. Then maybe not so much.....

Project 289 - Day 43 (Wednesday 29 April 2009) : Things That Go Fizz in a Glass

I am normally a robustly healthy guy.

But this year, my dear body, supposedly in the peak of healthy from healthy diet and exercise (which according to an email I have seen a few times simply extends the time I have to....um... eat well and exercise!) has managed an entire week off from work with bronchitis (January) and 3 days off to get my jaw/teeth seen to, and who can't be grateful for all that time spent in waiting rooms with magazines published just after the fall of the Berlin Wall? While I also have had the chance to watch lots of "Ellen DeGeneres" and "The View" - two shows I will say without any embarrassment that I love - I am beginning to question whether my body has decided, independently of my conscious mind, that it's going to act like a body in it's 40s that is filled with fatty foods on a daily basis (it isn't), never gets exercise (all those 4.45 a.m. starts aren't for photographing the night sky!), and is lurching, in a none too grateful fashion, towards invalidhood. (I very much doubt that's a word but in the spirit of linguistic innovation, or vandalism, I am leaving it there!).

So to combat this rebelliousness on my body's part, I took up the offer from work last night to get a flu jab to protect me from all the upcoming nasty viral nasties.... and have spent the last week feeling less than optimal. I appreciate that they are injecting me with the flu itself so my body can prepare it's defenses against any viruses that say "Ah ha. A well tended healthy body - let's trash it!" (yes viruses do act like bored rock and rollers, drinking too much after a concert in their hotel room, and smashing it to bits; no word on whether they are having sex like rock and rollers, but given how quickly a flu can claim you, it's a safe bet they are! Sadly they are likely having more fun that me at times!), but I'm not impressed that while not fully sick (yeah man!), I am sort of off colour and frankly I would rather be properly sick and get it over and done with...... and watch more day time TV which has to be better for you than work right?! 

(Today's photo shows one of the glasses of Aspro Clear I drank todday in a bid to ward off strange weird feverish feelings that left me feeling like a space cadet in orbit at times!)

Project 289 - Day 42 : Just Mad About Mary and Max

Ah good old Tuesday. If it wasn't for the fact that cinema tickets are dirt cheap, it would have to be the most useless day of the week, save for the fact that by the end of it you are one step closer to Friday!

I started off today with a return to walking after a long break due to extreme laziness, and too much socialising (hey at least I am honest!), hitting the footpath at 5 a.m. in a bracing 9 degrees. Refreshed and energised and as always questioning my sanity at getting up so early - I interrogate and interrogate my sanity but it never answers; it just looks around and mumbles incoherently... should that tell me something?! - I headed off to work, threw myself into the endless emails and Outlook tasks that greet me, and finally somewhere around 9.30 got breakfast. Now usually all I do is pour the cereal, grab some water in my cool sleek metallic drinking container and walk back to the desk, and possibly have a quick look at my private emails before hitting the official inbox again. 

But today, trying to multitask, and carry some cleaned up catering trays back to my desk at the same time as taking back my vittels, I put the cereal, water and packet onto the trays and.... ended up looking like room service. As if I don't look like a servant enough as it is in my current role as an Executive Assistant. How much more 'Downstairs' do I want to look ?! LOL Apparently I long for utter servitude, and so I took the photo below, to show just how the years of service in the Cubicle of Death and Greyness have affected me..... plus it does look like I was really planning on breakfast in bed which frankly would have been nice!!

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That night, after a fun-filled day of 3 hour management meetings and endless tasks (Yippee!!), I met my gorgeous guy at Dendy Cinemas for another foray into the cinematic wonders of indie movies. Tonight's pick was "Mary and Max", an Aussie claymation movie about an 8 year old girl in 1970s Melbourne, and the 43 year old Asperbergers Syndrome New Yorker she becomes penpals with through a completely random event. It was a delight, managing to be both hilariously funny, touching, and heart-rendingly poignant all in 90 minutes, and I think it safe to say I have never been so emotionally impacted by claymation characters before. A truly beautiful film, both visually and thematically, and one that will make you realise how valued and important our true friendships should be. An absolute gem, followed naturally enough by some Indian food at Tamana's, just down the road in King Street.

Project 289 - Day 41 : Its Chilly Brr..... Rejoice For Frosty the Snowman is Here!

Winter has arrived!! 

OK technically it is still Autumn, or Fall, for those closest to the Swine Flu pandemic, but the temps are dropping by the day and today was the first day I felt like could walk to the train, and not sweat to death (which let's face it is a big no-no when commuting; apart from anything else, if your fellow commuters get uncomfortable looking at you, imagine if they had to look at your corpse! They'd likely explode from discomfort). At this point, I haven't brought out the Funkiest Gayest Black Jacket Ever Made, but it can't be long. For now, though, I am content to bask in the falling temps, enjoy the chill in the air, and give thanks to any and all deities that the days of perspiring like a mad man are in abeyance for at least 4-5 months. It also saves me emigrating to Norway, which while a lot colder for longer (and full of reindeer, which is a great feature of any country), is not in Australia, a country I am fond of, and would rather miss. Far better to stay put, see my friends and family,  enjoy the chilly weather while it's here, and not have to learn Norwegian, which while a lovely language, frankly could be a little time consuming and may involve excessive one on one reindeer time, for which my beach-rich childhood has ill-prepared me.

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Another lovely part of today was my afternoon catch up with the other Executive Assistant I work with. The ever lovely Sandra & I meet once a week in the Bistro on campus, to talk about work, and our lives, and to escape our respective Cubicles of Death and Greyness (at least for an hour) while sipping machiatos (her) and skinny chai lattes (me). Admittedly it is still perilously close to where we work, but at least we get a chance to unloose the shackles of Outlook, run from reports, and whatever other somewhat poetic work allusions I can make, and that is a VGT (Very Good Thing). Now if we could involve Star Trek matter transportation and beam ourselves for an hour to the Bahamas, that would be even better. Actually if we did invent something that revolutionary then I am fairly certain (and don't quote me on this!) that we wouldn't be working! But while we do work, and I'd say the odds of that continuing are better than creating science reality (especially I failed all major science courses at high school), we will meet at 2 pm Mondays for coffee, conversation, and the sweet illusion of freedom.

Project 289 - Day 40 (Sunday 26 April, 2009): Why Won't the Vlarken Slide Easily into the Mooken?! Why?!

That is an eternal question posed above, and one that sadly I believe has no satisfactory answer.

But enough of the existential swearing-laden responses to putting together Scandinavian furniture, which I am fairly certain is all designed by the same sadists who creates most software programmes, and electronics manuals. I picture a giant factory somewhere, crammed with row upon row of pathological misfits, all scheming to create the most frustrating, annoying and ultimately, rage-inducing consumer items. Their only satisfaction in their tortured love-deprived existence is knowing that somewhere, someone like me is cursing and swearing and wondering what on earth the designer of the happy little instruction for assemblage booklet was thinking.... not happy Disney fairy dust-sprinkled thoughts I am fairly certain!



Of course sometimes in the middle of all the foot stomping, hammer slamming, and obscene language, comes a rare moment of humour, such as the snapshot below, which wisely instructs you not to use your bookcase as a training prop for your upcoming rock climbing expedition to the Swiss Alps. Duly noted, IKEA, and thank you for the sage advice.....

It seems though, that I must be a complete masochist because once again I purchased an IKEA item (yesterday's blog entry) - a fabulously bright red bookcase called a LACK, which is being used in my walk in wardrobe for storage, a use IKEA probably didn't think of when the featured the LACK in a funky apartment lounge room - and spent an enjoyable hour assembling. Enjoyable if you find hot skewers thrust sharply into your eyes a pleasure. If so, then assembling this furniture is your ticket to sensual ecstasy. Hop aboard and ride the pain train people! I get no such pleasure from these occasional forays into masochism land, but I did get the satisfaction of getting all the various bits of red wood into a useable shape that vaguely approximates the completed product on the manual.

Honestly given how badly the instructions are rendered in visual form - I think a team of illiterate armidillos on a ranch in South America are forced to create them in an act that the RSPCA should really investigate - it's a wonder I end up with the item looking like furniture. Many times I have thought I should keep the pieces as kindling and at least be warm in the Winter!

Project 289 - day 39 (Saturday 25 April, 2009) : ANZAC DAY...Lest We Forget

I have to admit something from the get-go..... I did not get up for the dawn service.

To be honest, though I value what the nation's diggers have done for me, and all Australians, I have never got up for a dawn service, not even when I lived less than 100m from the war memorial in Miranda (yes, I know, that is verging on the scandalous!). I have often watched the march on the TV and at times become quite teary when you realise what these men and women went through to guarantee freedom for this country, but I have never gotten up to honour them. I must rectify that next year. Possibly...

What I did do was sleep in with the bf, and awoke to a lovely Autumn day that was eerily quiet. No one was really up and about, and those that were, were far away at pubs and clubs, honouring their fallen mates, catching up with old cobbers (the old Aussie word for friend that my beautiful Granpa used all the time) and reliving the glory days of yore. 

I was content to hold my man tight, have a lazy breakfast of crumpets and honey, and watch the march on TV (see the photos below and above), grateful that I live in a country that allows me the freedom to be so indolent without threat or danger to my own well being or those I love. Of course the anti-capitalist cynic might also note that the diggers' sacrifice also made it possible for citizens of a modern wealthy democracy to go shopping and so we did, snapping up a front loader for the bf's new apartment, and then a new LACK bookcase for me at IKEA (see tomorrow's saga for the fun that I had putting that fire engine red baby together!! God bless IKEA's inability to formulate easy to read instructions). 

Our freedom to purchase on credit thus exercised, we finished the day with dinner at a.... wait for it.... Turkish restaurant (see the photos below)! It seemed somewhat poetic, and strangely perverse all at once, and a slightly left of centre choice in keeping with the contradictions inherent in anything I do.... and no, we didn't finish up with dessert at a Japanese sushi restaurant to complete the odd culinary commemoration.

One thing that struck me as a odd, and tickled my funny bone all at once, was that the diggers fought and died to preserve Australia's way of life, which last time I checked included an almost religious devotion to public holidays. But what does our incompetent state government do? They refuse to gazette Monday as a public holiday! The diggers would have been appalled!!

Project 289 - Day 38 (Friday 24 April, 2009) : TGIF and the Best Laid Plans of Outlook and Men

I am a huge fan of Fridays... what sane person isn't?

Well I guess there are possibly some workaholics out there who mourn the end of the working week, and look with fear and trepidation on a weekend full of relaxing at cafes, shopping, movies, catch ups with friends etc. I am not one of those people and will happily hand my Crackberry to the first person who puts in a decent bid for it! Oh hell, who cares about a decent bid?! I'll give it to the first passerby who looks vaguely in need of time management and the ability to read and respond to emails on the go. Street people, grandmothers anyone really....

The plan today was to go to Macquarie Centre, the shopping mall near work, and fritter away 1.5 hours, using up all the lunch times I don't take in a given week, when I sit glued to my desk eating food faster than a hummingbird feasting on a nectar-laden flower (yes it is a charmingly poetic image - I expect to hear from Hallmark any nanosecond). Alas, my partner in crime, Sammi, who work have wandered into Borders and JB Hifi and eaten gourmet bagels with me, was too busy and couldn't come Friday chilling with me (she has the car) so I sat at my desk and recreated an avian-like moment from a David Attenborough nature doco. So much for the bohemian cubicle-scorning TGIF fun I had planned!

The day, which is supposed to be the one day of the week, where I get to wind down just a little, replete in my casual Friday clothing, actually ended up being reasonably frenetic in the end, which violates any number of Australian laws, I'm sure!! Then I rushed home, grabbed the ingredients for the stir fry at Coles Wynyard (where I bought yet another Green Bag to add to the 2-3 trillion swamping my kitchen cupboard), and changed sheets, cooked food, did a load of washing before collapsing in a heap when my bf walked in the door. 

Perhaps it wasn't as dramatic as that but I was highly tempted! Eschewing the melodramatic touch of the vapours I had been planning, I instead spent a delightfully relaxed evening watching "Midsomer Murders" on the ABC (yes I now stay in and watch old fogey dramas on the ABC on a Friday night....psst don't tell anyone!! LOL) cuddled up with the bf. It was only when walking into the bedroom, finally chilled after an unexpectedly chaotic day that I snapped the photo above, which shows all the thrown-onto-the-stereo speaker detritus of my day, speaking volumes of a day that promised calm wind down to the weekend, and delivered instead a day that would've been quite at home on a Monday or Tuesday.

Project 289 - Day 37 : It's What Southerners in the USA Call "Little Friday", and I am Thrilled to be Here!

I am hoping today will be a quiet-ish day at work.

Not that any day in my line of work is truly quiet, and frankly I'd be bored rigid if frenetic wasn't the prevailing vibe. But just occasionally, a day where nothing needs to be corrected desperately quickly in Outlook, or a document rushed somewhere, or lunches bought in a hurry, is bliss, and I am hoping for one of those days. I really am. It's highly unlikely I'll get it, although if the Greeks or Hindus have a god of the office, then I may just pray to them, and see if that elicits anything! What power they must have though if they do answer, to control Outlook? Not even Microsoft has worked that out yet!!

Stay tuned for the update at the end of the day! (Yes I know coping with the suspense will be hard but take a Xanax if you must, read "Who Weekly" and check back later!)

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By the way, I have just sailed over the 100 posts mark in my blog. That's some kind of milestone (kilometer-stone? LOL) isn't it? At the very least, it deserves a party!! Or chocolate. Definitely lots of chocolate! Well at least I have that in abundance.

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24 hours later.....

Well, the day wasn't exactly 8 Strawberry daiquiris, a paperback novel, and a buffet lunch by the pool (with optional canoodling, and possibly more, with the bartender) but it was quieter than usual, and I managed to catch up on a ton of things that I had been wanting to get done for ages. While not exactly the most thrilling of days, there is something psychically satisfying in clearing away pieces of paper that have been mocking you for your inability to give them attention and send them on their way. (Yes apparently I attract sentient malevolent manipulative paperwork, every office worker's greatest fear, mainly because it signals sanity has truly disappeared in the vortex of busy schedules and insane deadlines!) So the inbox was tamed, pretty much everything actioned, and I left on the 5 pm bus to the City for drinks and a spot of stimulus package shopping with my friend, Waz....

We are both shopping addicts (Kevin Rudd should be giving the gays the right to marry purely out of gratitude for cushioning Australia from the Global Financial Crisis! Goodness knows we are more than doing our part!!) and after wandering through Virgin Music and JB HiFi, and picking 1 to 200 DVDs and CDs, I bought the magazines shown in the photo above, which are among my most ridiculous but fun indulgences. Both "Entertainment Weekly" ($12.95 an issue) and "The Advocate" ($14.95 an issue) are flown in from the USA, and really, while priced well in the USA, are over priced here in Australia. But I love reading them, and along with "DNA", and "Empire", form the Holy 4 of my magazine consumption each month. My rationalisation for spending $40 on 3 mags is that I don't do drugs. barely drink, don't smoke, so buying a few over priced mags (along with the occasional Pepsi Max) is not too bad a vice!

Plus I get 'learned' on entertainment news, and gay issues respectively, and you can't put a price on that. Well I am sure VISA and Mastercard can but that's a whole other story....

Who Doesn't Like To Get a Little Catty Now and Then?

I love cats.

I don't dislike dogs, and actually think they're sweet and adorable, but when it comes to the pet I adore, it's cats, and only cats. I know they can be vexatious, overly independent at times, and even downright sassy (to use an American term that I love) but that's part of their charm; they're also warm, affectionate and loving when it suits them (and often you), and when it doesn't, well no amount of coaxing is going to shift their decision anyway so why try to fight it?

I love the photos above & below (sent to me by my sister via email) because they remind that cats rate sleep as the most wonderful activity ever, and given a preference will sleep till doomsday (and likely right through it!). I had a cat once that would sleep on the top of our pagola (verandah roofing made of wooden slats) and have the front paws over one beam, the back legs over another and the body swinging very uncomfortably (well we thought so; clearly the cat didn't!) in the middle. How it stayed on there, let alone slept, is beyond me, but he loved it, and also made a real effort to sleep on the BBQ chimney as much as he could. They are peculiar contrary beasts but I wouldn't have them any other way!

Project 289 - Day 36 : The Sticky Fingers of the Ghost of Easter Past

The year is racing past so fast that Easter, once a beguiling glimmer of long weekend hope in the bleak non-public holiday desert of March, is receding quickly into the haze of glittery multi-coloured metallic memory....

.... but before it did, I got to relive it today! Sitting on my desk last night, just before I left work last night was a bag of Darrell Lea Easter Eggs courtesy of the consultancy company we're using for a project at work which is aimed at totally transforming the customer service we deliver to our clients. I had an inkling they were coming my way but given my rush to get to the movie I had bought tickets for, all I could do was admire the sweetness (literally and figuratively) of the gift and rush for the exit.

But today, after much resistance I succumbed and and not only looked closely at the lovely gift (seen above, after half it's contents helped to a cocoa-induced sen-like state... well as zen as I was going to get in Outlook hell!) from the consultancy company that I worked extremely hard for while they were at the company I work for, but ate two of the chocolate eggs, which given my rather lax exercise regime of late, and high caloric intake, my 43 year old body didn't need. Sadly though when it comes to chocolate, I can't just be a sticky voyeur; I have to jump in feet first, and gorge myself on the yummy temptations before me.... and today I did just that in a 10 hour day where stress was abundant, and the will to resist making the busyness a little bearable by eating chocolate virtually non-existent by mid afternoon. 

No point regretting it; it made a stressful day a little more fun (yes comfort food - I know! I know! LOL) and gave me a chance to relive a little bit of Easter weeks after it, and the Easter bunny slid into the realm of the past.... well except on my stomach and love handles where I dare say Easter will linger for just a little while yet!!

Project 289 - Day 35 : Love & Death in an Age of Croissants

I love all things French (which would not have made me very popular in a room of right wing Christian conservatives in the USA post 9/11, when the French were blamed for being cowardly in the face of terrorism, when in fact they were a hastily disregarded voice of reason; but I revel in flying in the face of the massed mob's orthodoxy where I believe fundamentals of decent human behaviour are being trampled in the rush to populist activism) and tonight that led me to Dendy Newtown where I saw the French movie, "The Summer Hours".

I had to rush there from a nightmarishly busy day at work but for once the public transport system obliged by actually having trains leaving on time (I know - it's the fourth sign of the apocalypse.... I expect fiery horseman in my apartment block's tennis courts any nanosecond now!) and I got there with enough time to pick up the tickets I'd bought on the net (I love doing most things online!), join Dendy's movie club for 2 years, and buy two Tiramisu-flavoured choc tops (gourmet ice cream in a cone served at the same food bar you can get wine at - tres chic and oh so Newtown, which I adore!) before the bf arrived and we headed into the confines of Cinema 2.....

..... for a movie that was a wonderful exploration of what happens to families after a loved one dies, and the previously taut fabric of their familial existence unravels just enough that they all realise that nothing will ever be the same again. Previously held assumptions are quickly shown to be wafer thin delusions, and reality comes roaring up with a ferocity that surprises people who mere days before were in the safe embrace of a decades long cocoon of family. Of course the family in most cases rallies and unites but with different dynamics driving the interactions between the members, and that takes some getting used to; as does dealing with the fallout from those dynamics coming into play. In the case of the characters in this movie, it means the selling of a home and artwork that one son sees as a treasured birthright to be preserved at all costs while his two siblings, living outside France and subsumed in their own demanding worlds, are not as troubled by it. The bonds of family hold, but everything is different, and there is grieving not just for the loss of the mother but for all that she represented, and it takes time for them all to adjust to a world none were really prepared to encounter.

For all that wonderful rumination on the human condition, I found it a little difficult to warm to the characters. It's not that they were unlikeable; just not emotionally engaging enough for me to truly care about them, and that's usually what draws me into a movie, and keepsme  transfixed - the emotional resonance I find in the film. It was there in some way, just not profound enough for me. Having said that, the bf (seen above contemplating life by the movie's poster), who has a fine eye and heart for these things, thoroughly enjoyed it so maybe I was just having an off night. 

Who knows? But at least the choc chops were yummy, and I had the company of my beautiful man in a cinema I adore in the suburb I call home. Life doesn't get any better than that especially when it ends with a kiss and a cuddle, and a snuggly good night's sleep in the first cosy grip of Autumn,

His Name Was Allegory and He Was In Love With a Metaphor

Project 289 - Day 34 : If Molars Were Horses, Mine Would Be Stuffed

So today I didn't have to go to work! Yay!

But I did have to go to the dentist! Boo! Thankfully my dentist, a good friend, is absolutely brilliant at what he does, and after a fortifying course of croissant and apple juice, I sat down in his chair, got the left side of my face number till I am fairly certain they were able to lift it off my head and work on it away from the rest of me (hey how would I have known it had gone?! (a) I couldn't feel a thing and (b) I was engrossed in Mel and Kochie on 'Sunrise' and the texting services inability to type quickly AND accurately! So engrossed in fact I missed several instructions from the dentist...oops!). There was one small hiccup - the suction system refused to work properly for about 1/2 hour but eventually that got up and running and we were drilling, and gouging and polishing and prodding and poking, while I felt not a freaking thing! Got to love that! (Although you may not love the shot of my mouth with the new molars gleaming in the background - see below)

In the end I was in the dentist's chair for almost 2 hours and the main issue was the cramping of my moving-stressed calf muscles as they lay outstretched in the chair. That made a delightful change from most dentist's where my main concern was how to survive the feeling that they were drilling for oil in the back blocks of my gums. In this case, I felt nothing (bar the enormous slug to the credit card), the dentist explained what he'd done and what should hopefully happen (i.e. a cessation of pain),and I traipsed out of there (yes traipsed.... and why not I say? I had just survived a visit to the dentist!! LOL) for a spot of retail therapy (yes nothing like spending more money as my mouth, and car, sent me happily tripping to insolvency!), a nap and eventually, when the numbing had worn off, lunch.... and drooling... yes, lots and lots of drooling of socially isolating drooling!!!LOL

Project 289 - Day 33 : Cleanliness is Next to Godliness... So We Must Be Freakin' Saints by Now!

There is a god in heaven because I got to sleep in this morning.

Of course my dreams were full of dancing boxes, pirouetting fridges and Ajax Spray and Wipe packs conga lining through my loungeroom, but sleep in I did, and it was bliss. The bf and I lazed in bed, before getting up mid morning, cooking pancakes, consuming them with lashings of... not ginger beer... lemon juice and sugar (being good Anglophiles - well when it comes to food anyway! Hmm well this particular type of food let's just say!), and then bravely jumping in the car, and heading back of yesterday's crime....

..... where box upon hastily stacked box awaited us at the Flea Palace, along with a kitchen that clearly has been cleaned by the Grotty Previous Tenant's (GPT) 9-10 feral cats (we assume he must have had that many to accumulate the fleas he has, and let's face it, why should only crazy old single ladies have lots of cats?!) when they were blind drunk and using their tongue to wash down the surfaces. So as the bf scrubbed away on the fridge and the cavity it had to fit into, I wiped down cupboard door after cupboard door, Chux'd (yes it makes a particularly fetching verb doesn't it? LOL) the shelves and drawers, and developed wrinkly wet hands with crevices so deep on my fingertips I almost lost the cleaning product's bottle in them. No, really, I worked that hard!!

Eventually we tamed the Kitchen of Wishful Cleaning, made the bed up (strike one for a step towards normalcy!) and drove to Marrickville Metro for some key cutting (more on that later), grocery shopping, pizza slice and Michel's caramel tart eating (yes I was embracing the comfort food with a furious vengeance!) before heading back to my place..... where I promptly crashed out for an hour while the bf raced back to his old abode to grab clothes for the week.....

Then it was off to the Union pub for a yummy meal (Cajun Chicken and Chips, not fries! LOL) with good friends  (through driving wind and rain which was so not delightful) before heading home in fine weather, and a night hopefully NOT filled with dreams of anything but boxes, moving trucks and Chux.

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Oh, and the keys? Well the set the bf got cut at work were handed to me because (a) he wanted someone to have a set should he have early onset dementia and leave his keys in the house; and (b), and this is what made my heart go all a-flutter (whaaa I do declare!), he wanted me, as his bf, to have the keys to his apartment. Yes I was touched, and while I know the decision was partly practical, it was also romantic and made my night, sentimental fool that I am!

Project 289 - Day 32 (Saturday, 18 April, 2009): Ya Gotsta Move It, Move it!

I love to be moved.....

Watching the final scene in a dramatic movie, regardless of whether the ending is bad or good, and crying bucket loads of tears (why is there no Gatorade on tap in cinemas where it's really needed hmm?). Seeing someone surmount an impossible obstacle with sheer grit, determination, and chutzpah worthy of a champion. Seeing a friend achieve a much sought after goal and being there every agonising, joyful step of the way......

Oh yes all those moments are wonderful to be a part of, and no doubt, have been denuded of all authentic emotional resonance on some sickly inspirational poster with an eagle on it somewhere..... what I don't love to be moved by is a 3 tonne hire truck as it trundles along to Marrickville, as it trundles along to collect all the world goods of my darling man. It's not that I don't want to help him; I would happily do anything if it made my guy happy. Rather it's that I would have you gouge my kidney out with a blunt HB pencil in a fetid slum than carry boxes, and sundry furniture items up and down tiny stairwells. (Hmm, perhaps I exaggerate a tad - frankly the slum option makes boxes full of cook books look damn near inviting!) But haul boxes, schlepp fridges and dressers, and bags full of kitchen goods up and down stairs I did in a near record 4.5 hours with 3 close friends and the bf, all for the joy of knowing I have saved him a whole heap of stress, and gained a good ol' helping of KFC and Gatorade along the way (see below).

There was some drama along the way. Getting the truck in and out of a narrow driveway down the sides of the apartment block  with just 1 cm clearance below one of the overhanging balconies on the way out; occasional flares of tension over the best way to pack the truck.... and wondering if Jack would get Rose safely off the.... wait, no, that's 'Titanic'.... anyway, we were busy but surprisingly had fun laughing and joking as you do with very good friends, even in sweaty exhausting situations. It's often the only way to get through them....

But thankfully, it was done mid-afternoon, the bf & I returned the truck and then crashed for the night before pizza and a "Vicar of Dibley" episode content in the knowledge that all the boxes and furniture were out of his friend's garage, and ready to be unpacked...oh man! Why did I even let that thought cross my mind?!

Project 289 - Day 31 : I'm Keane As Mustard and Twice As Melodic

It's true. Mustard may be a great condiment, adding zest to sandwiches and dishes alike, but it has no rhythm and has no soul...

But it doesn't need to! What does matter is that, rather poor denigration of condiments jokes aside, is that Keane, one of my favourite bands ever after Coldplay is in town and rocking the Metro Theatre tonight. While you could class their music as Coldplay-like in some respects (in so much as they subscribe to roughly the same Britpop sound), they have a sound all their own; in turn rocking out, while at other times creating the most achingly beautiful, emotion-laden ballads out there that shimmer with an intensity and a lyrical delivery where you feel every lyric, every note. These guys have a gift for capturing the sort of emotion that runs out to the middle of a windswept landscape at 3 in the morning, crazy with wonder or grief, and asks why or glories in the moment, married to a melodic sensibility that matches it to the core. I find them truly moving, and I am looking forward to what will no doubt be a great concert.

Of course to get to that, I need to survive what I am sure will be a madly busy day at work thanks to yet another day not spent at the Cubicle of Death and Greyness thanks to my sore jaw. While I did answer some emails via the Crackberry yesterday - I swore I would never get that addicted but clearly I weakened! - there will be a tad of tasks to get through when I reach the corporate utopia I call home for 9-10 hours a day and I am hoping I survive it all. Ah well, at least I can look forward to pouring all that emotion into the Keane concert, and get it out of my system that way!

POSTSCRIPT: The concert was so much fun! They played all the big hits, the concert was energetic and entertaining, and the Metro Theatre, while pretty much standing room only, was a great venue with the full-on energy of a 1000 fans all screaming and hollering! Add to that a yummy tapas dinner beforehand, and it turned out to be a wonderful night with my lovely guy, that defied the exhaustion of what had been a ridiculously busy day!

Project 289 - Day 30 : Dye! Dye! Xray! Bleed!

I was pumped full of dye today!

No, it wasn't the latest in a long line of attempts to recapture the spirit of the decade of my birth by tie-dying my innards; rather, and this is far less fun than putting funky patterns on my lower intestines, the good folks at the imaging practice filled me full of iridescent harmless goo (hopefully!! I guess we'll see in 5 years time if I grow a third arm or something from the mutating effects of radiation), all the better to see the inside of my jaw which has been hurting me like crazy these past few days. The dentist on Tuesday said it wasn't my teeth and the doctor at the medical practice I foolishly frequent in Newtown wasn't sure what the problem may be and so I found myself today strapped to a bed, being pumped full of rainbow-coloured sludge and whizzed in and out of the scanner, which is apparently so bad for you that the doctor flees the room, and leaves you alone with it!!

The insertion of the goop itself was a treat too. The doctor had issues giving the dye to go into my left arm, despite a bulging healthy vein that practically leaps off my arm begging to be noticed, so he tried the right arm instead (with a vein that clearly was complicit in allowing the slime in - so Vichy of it, collaborative bunch of corpuscles that it is!) which meant I ended up with a cotton wool ball per arm (see how fetching the look is, and why it will be the in-look this Northern Hemisphere Summer, in the photo below). Yes, a delightfully white matching pair that no doubt will be slavishly copied by the hipsters on King Street as the next big fashion statement, after I walked back to my car so adorned (so as not to bleed to death, which while dramatic, is not something I want as a life goal.. or death one, depending on how you see it). 

Not content with scarring me for the day, the goo also gave me an almighty hot flush and the feeling that I was pissing my pants..... I am sure there is some medical scientist, driven to sadism by walking in a dark basement lab somewhere, chortling merrily to himself at the idea of patients feeling that fabulously sensation.... I would hunt him down and make him watch endless re-runs of "Baywatch" but frankly I need to devote all my time to meeting demand for my new cotton wool arm adornments available for $119.95 at all good, and not so good, retail outlets.

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In between becoming my very own medical Chernobyl (no doubt you can see me glowing from wherever you are), I got the fan belt on my car tightened, took numerous painkillers, read some more of my book, napped, bought a CD by Razorlight, ate a ham & cheese croissant followed by a pecan tart, and walked the length of King Street..... and I finish the main part of the day here in my bedroom, watching the sun go down, the lights of the city go on (see the photo below), and wait for my darling man to come over for dinner.... naturally we will eat by the light of my radioactive glow.... how romantic.....

Popping Weasels @ The Zeitgeist Cafe - REVIEW

READING WEASELS

"Flood"

With all the talk of climate change, a topic that consumes a great deal of debate regardless of whether your a climate change believer or sceptic, you could begin to feel like the issue is somewhat remote and academic (unless of course you are the citizen of a country of low lying atolls in which case not so academic!), or simply too large an issue to fully grasp.

Well flail no more in Hard to Grapple with Land, "Flood" does an excellent job of taking climate change, and the future of humanity on our tiny blue globe, and making it something that will resonate with you. While admittedly much of the flooding is revealed to be the result of something else entirely, the book does a very good job of postulating about mankind's fate should a watery apocalypse befall us, and trust me, it isn't pretty, civilised or a glittering affirmation of our essential nobility. Rather we come a lot worse for wear, as the titular flood consumes more and more land, and people are forced to make some very hard moral and ethical choices in order to survive.

Is it OTT? Yes. But it is strangely enough, not melodramatic, the characters work well, and while the plot pacing is a little slow and uneven at times, it's a good read, and after a long day at the corporate coal face, who doesn't want a bit of escapist disaster reading with a brain?

MUSIC WEASELS

"Junior" - Royksopp

These guys are my favourite Norwegians! It's true and they have crafted a third CD of contagiously melodic CD of electronic beats that will you tapping your feet one moment, and then drifting off to dreamy places the next.  According to Svein Berge, one half of the Norweigan electronic duo:  "If Melody A.M. (their first CD) was a relaxed journey inwards on a Sunday afternoon and The Understanding (the second CD)was more uptempo, with more vocals and a hint of melodic catchiness, then the new album is a mix of the two." They have co-opted a host of fabulous artists from the country next door, Sweden, and Robyn, Likke Li and Karin Dreijer of The Knife all add a distinct presence to music that is unashamedly joyful, fun and enchanting, an ode to joyful happy times. Listen to this if you want to feel the heady rush of Spring after the dark days of Winter and SMILE.

 

Project 289 - Day 29 : Twas Always Frantic in Outlook Land

Today I paid for having my jaw flame out on me on yesterday!

I arrived early at work - 7.30 a.m. when no one but the cubicle addicts (and you know who you are!!) were present and accounted for - to finalise a report my boss needed that day, and didn't get on the bus to freedom till 6.05 pm. Inbetween I scheduled and re-scheduled countless meetings, sat in a 2 hour one with my boss and her direct reports, raced across the campus and back getting lunches and sundry other errands, and ate lunch at my desk trying desperately hard not to engage my jaw in any significant fashion. Alas just staring at the food, and willing it to enter your bloodstream doesn't work, and so I had to chew it while rushing like a madman to get all my Outlook ducks in a row. 

That's why today's photo is a snapshot of the 5 calendars I am overseeing this week. It illustrates in a way mere words can't, just how frantic my day gets, and while most nights it takes a great deal of effort to wind down, and do little.... especially now I have my Crackb... er... Blackberry always at my side. I vowed I would not check it outside of work, but I am, and I loathe myself! OK I really don't but mildly unimpressed? Yep. So tonight, I just watched a DVD, read, talked to my man, and then slept and pretended that Outlook, Blackberries and all the sundry other technological enslavements of the 21st Century don't exist.

Project 289 - Day 28 : Honey They Just Shrunk My Liquid Available Cash! Again!

Today was an off day. 

Normally returning to work after a weekend, and a long weekend especially (when one of those New Orleans funeral parades would work a treat as a way of signifying just how un-joyful the day is), I curse the alarm, wish it was yesterday (having failed to gainfully spend the weekend mastering time travel, lots of wishing is all I have!), do all the fabulous fun things I get to do in the morning (like train travel with 100s of my closest un-emotional 'friends')... and arrive at work to marshall up some enthusiasm for the long busy day ahead.....

Only today, the niggling pain in my lower left jaw went ballistic and a relaxing breakfast of cereal, bananas and Blackberry (the communications device, not the fruit, I'm afraid, which to date is pathetically unable to display even a letter, let alone a whole email: must be why I like the fruit so much! LOL) became an urgent call to my dentist, a dash for the next Chatswood train, and that most surreal of experiences, commuting home mid-morning, when everything seems very Alice In Wonderland-ish and wrong.....

It took a delightful (haha!) 1.5 hours to get home, and my quick trip to the dentist (which was actually enjoyable thanks to the fact that the dentist is a friend, and has a brilliant sink-side manner) rapidly became a follow up trip to the doctor (when the dentist found nothing wrong) followed by a sublime trip to the radiologist for an X-ray and a CT scan.... which have been put off till Thursday because that's the earliest they could fit the CT scan in! What a simply super day it was, Edmund! (Echos of Enid Blyton here).

So it seems only fitting that the first day at work, which is technically now rated as a sick day, involved no actual resting from my ailment but multiple drives, parks, waits, and bills.... which to my utter delight will lead to another day of multiple drives, parks, waits and bills on Thursday.... yes I lead a charming existence at times...... at least I got to see the sun set over the City which normally happens on my way home so there are some small compensations on what was an extremely weird day (OK, not Donnie Darko weird but weird enough).....

Project 289 - Day 27 (Monday 13 April, 2009) : Chilling in the Soporific Waters of the Gloriously Banal

Today was the same that we went nowhere much.

After racing up to the Blue Mountains (which were a spectacular blue on Saturday) and driving across Sydney away from the usual well worn footpaths (note, Stephen, that I did not use the term 'sidewalk') yesterday, today was the day we slept in, ate yet more hot cross buns (I am sure there must be a thank you letter from the Australian Hot Cross Bun Bakers Association on it's way to us).... and went and bought groceries! Yes good old essential boring groceries.... yes we did pick up a large Lindt Easter Egg as a gift for a friend but mainly the trip to Woolies at Marrickville Metro (it's daggy as heck but I love it even so) was to get thrilling items like Listerine, vegetables, and juice..... 

We were intending to at least be semi-active and hit the shops to check out the prices of front loader washing machines for Steve's new apartment (yes the Flea Palace is nearing the move in date!), but somehow that noble idea to stimulate the Australian economy (I am also expecting a thank you letter from Kevin Rudd for doing that.... assuming he stays in Australia long enough to write the thing!) fell victim to a lunch of leftover pastizzis and salad, a nap, and then a torrential downpour (and we without our umbrellas!!)....

We did however manage to finish off the day with a delicious $10 steak dinner at the local pub where we joined by my good friend Fahmi who had just arrived back in from Singapore. I thought that I had dodged the remark that always seems to mar the end of any weekend - "Pity we have to go to work tomorrow" - when one of my friends texted it, and so I drank more wine, and pretended that I was one of the idle rich and that this wonderful Easter break, spend with the loveliest man I know, was just another chapter in a life of self-indulgence and sloth (which lasted till approximately 6 a.m. this morning when my alarm punctured that admittedly delightful delusion!)..... 

When Wacky Bunnies Ruled The Earth Part 2 - Bloody Eggs of Death

Project 289 - Day 26 : Be Very Very Fat-Inducing... We're Hunting Easter Eggs

I went on an Easter Egg Hunt today.

In my lounge room. On my way to getting a drink of water for my boyfriend... which it turned out was simply a pretext (yes I was had!! LOL) for getting me into said lounge room, where I would see Easter eggs of all colours (well mainly yellow and red but all colours sounds far more inclusive) on the coffee table, books, bookcase shelves, sculpture, and even on my M & Ms display..... to say I was delighted was an understatement (see me smiling above)! I giggled, clapped my hands and danced around the room - I am fairly certain that there were less gay displays by wildly flamboyant drag queens on Oxford Street! But hey! No one saw me, I wasn't filmed for YouTube, and I got the most wonderful surprise gift from my gorgeous guy.... in return I gave him a very understated Easter gift basket (see the photo) in electric blue material with neon coloured Easter eggs across it. Elegant, sophisticated and the sort of thing all straight men would give as gifts.....ah-huh...yep...no, no they wouldn't.....

With all the chocolate-ty calories given and discovered, we lazed around for hours, ate some hot cross buns (had them for breakfast all 4 days of Easter - YUM!), and went out for what Stephen jokingly referred to as "brunch".... at 2 pm!! After all the to-ing and fro-ing of the day before, I think a slow start was just what the Easter Bunny ordered, and so it was we found ourselves belatedly at Watsons Bay, checking out the walk along the cliff (with an hysterical un-PC commentary provided by Stephen, along with lots of botanical education - see us below), eating fish and chips from the kiosk on a beautiful balmy Autumn day (with lashings of soft drink!! LOL See Stephen above), kids threatening to do us bodily harm at every turn with soccer balls or footballs, the sun shining, and the hours sliding lazily by....

We followed up all the un-holy sloth and indolence by heading to the birthplace of leisurely hedonism in Australia - Bondi Beach (there I am posing on the railing). I was determined to get an ice cream there after a walk along the beach and back, but cooler heads prevailed (thank you Stephen for reminding just how many gigajoules were waiting back at Easter egg central!) and we stuck to walking and not eating at the same time.....

The day finished in a time of calm reflection, meditation and peace..... OR.... we headed to Pastizzi Cafe on King Street, grabbed a dozen pastizzi, a bottle of wine and watched the sun go down at the end of the sort of day long weekends are made for, a day made even sweeter by the fact that WE DIDN'T HAVE TO WORK MONDAY! YEAH!!! 

Project 289 - Day 25 (Saturday 11 April 2009) : Vaguely Pornographic Hills

So what do you do when you can't find reasonably priced accommodation in the Blue Mountains on Easter Saturday? Take your cue from the Mountains' name (nothing like a colour-specific emotional response!), or book tickets tickets for Paris instead?

...... OR realising that your VISA won't stretch to that particular rich person's fantasy (or reality in fact), you decide "Dangnabbit! (Having a rare moment of American colloquial speak where your urge to sound like a complete yokel was deliciously realised) I will not yield! As God/gods is my witness (deep burgundy shades of Scarlett O'Hara there), I shall have my weekend away, but instead of a weekend, it will be a day!" Ignoring the face that one day does not equal a weekend (except in the USA, where every bit of time off is smaller than elsewhere), you make plans to get up early on Easter Saturday, hit the road and enjoy a wonderful day amid the grandeur and beauty of one of Australia's most stunning National Parks....

..... ONLY you sleep in (after a big day of wining and dining Friday), cuddle and chill, and only then hit the road, meaning you are wrapped in the warm embrace of Parramatta Road's bitumen mid morning, and not early morning, resulting in the inestimable joy of sitting in heavy traffic up in the Mountains (see the photo above), achingly close to Leura, your cute village-like tourist-trap (albeit a beautiful one that I adore) destination.....

..... SO thinking quickly, and ever grateful that your boyfriend spent 6 years driving back and forth over the Mountains to and from Bathurst (he occasionally let himself rest, which was sensible) and knows all the back roads (drive like a local baby!), you leave the highway, race like a rally driver (albeit one that fully respects the road rules at all times, naturally) down the back road, and arrive in Leura, just in time for some shopping (where miraculously you buy nothing despite there being a Christmas ornaments shop, a book shop AND homewares shops!! I even emerged empty handed from the ye olde lolly shop! I know!!!) and lunch at what use to be the post office but is now a gallery, a restaurant and goodness knows what else....

..... THE urge to shop satiated, it's off to Blackheath and a chance to get back to nature. Well the tourist-shaped, officially sanctioned bit of nature anyway over at Govett's Leap where you join many other people in taking a breath taking view. You even walk down a very steep set of muddy sandstone stairs (realising all too late that your fabulous shoes are simply not designed for mountain goat hiking darling!), do the "I'm the King of the World!" schtick from "Titanic" (and do it fabulously well, I might add!), ooh and ahh at the scenery one more time, and then die a thousand lung-rattling deaths as you climb the now insanely steep stairs back to the car park where you collapse into your car (OK a tad too dramatic; I slid gracefully but breathing well-challenged into it) before driving to shop for antiques (got my gorgeous man the fabbest present ever, alas in clear view of him, unavoidable since we were driving together) and buying some Logan Brae apple juice that tastes like...wait for it... actual apples!! I know! What madness is this?!

..... THEN realising it's 5.15 pm, and far too early for an idyllic mountain dinner (with 1000s of your favourite fellow tourists), unless you plan to start eating like you're retired 25 years ahead of time (no thank you!!), you hit the road, bidding a fond farewell to one of the loveliest place's in Australia, survive the traffic going home (where apparently it's Drive Like an F1 Driver Day and me without my leathers!! How embarreshment!) and though exhausted, have dinner with two wonderfully close friends, Peter, and Ian (see below), at Cammeray, where you laugh, talk, and enjoy the company of those you love, relaxed in the way only a holiday can do.

..... TILL you realise you still have to drive the last small section home before collapsing into bed, with nary a tariff to be seen (but also alas no chocolates on the pillows either), but also the warmth and snuggleyness (I am sure it's word really!) of your own place enveloping you..... so ends a day away, a day where you realise that the best things in life are simple and free.... well as long as you have VISA or Mastercard, a car, and a job to pay for them.... then they are so free.... yep free as a freakin' bird :)