Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 181 - Cesspools of Pus

Oh what a fetching and enticing title that is for a blog entry. Makes you want to rush in, devour every word..... just to make sure that Andrew hasn't completely lost his freakin' ever-lovin' mind.

The intersection of Mitchell Rd and Coulson Streets just near my apartment complex. I took the photo because the trees, the overcast sky reminded me of Vancouver, Canada, a city I love and miss

No, I haven't. Today consisted of going to my dentist for an 8.30 appt (I left at 7.25 expecting awful peak hour traffic and screamed there in no time flat, meaning I got to sit in my car and Twitter and listen to music till they opened the surgery at 8 a.m.) to check on a tooth on the far back left bottom of my mouth that was growing ever more sore, and giving me fever, headaches etc, a sure sign that all was not well in that particular pearly white....

The waiting of the dental surgery. Tres classy huh? I feel like I have paid for most of it! LOL

.... and alas it was not. For below its somewhat marred pretty white surface - it was filled in some years back - at the base of the tooth, I have a 7mm pool of pus. Yes, pus. Delightful. Even more enchanting - but wait what could sound fairer than that delightful phrase you say in surprise? - is the fact that I require root canal work at a cost of $1900! Yes more money spent on my teeth. I could have cried leaving the surgery, since I need all the money I can get right now to finance the drawing up of my book cover, proof reading etc, and that's a fair swag of money. Thankfully it is tax time, but I didn't want to spend my refund paying for part of a dental bill. Depressing news though it was, I had calmed down by the time I got time, antibiotics and Panadeine Forte in hand, and spent the day watching Ellen, and The View, napping in my Panadeine Forte haze, and watching the first episodes of new sci fi shows, Warehouse 13, and Falling Skies, both of which were wonderful.


Unlike my tooth.....

Novel things

I am in the midst of getting my novel ready for Kindle publication and this Vimrod cartoon, the most funny whimsical cartoons ever, really hit the zeitgeist this morning.

.... and this one is just plain silly and I loved it just because...

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 180 - Long Lost Peter

I finally caught up with my wonderful friend Peter tonight and over entrees, mains and desserts at Wagamama, King Street Wharf, we had a marvellous 2 hour catch up. It was brilliant finally having some quality one on one time.

Well worth the long wait. Thanks Peter!

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 179 (Tuesday 28 June) - Walking When The Feet Don't Wanna Move

I have been very slack lately when it comes to exercising, and for that matter, eating in a low caloric manner.

There I said it. True it happens every winter to some degree or another, as I succumb to the twin influences of cold and dark, neither of which overly worries me usually, but which combine during what passes for the coldest season of the year in Sydney (for me that means little to no sweating, which I adore) to make me increasingly reluctant to either pound the streets of Newtown and Erskineville @ 5 a.m. or venture the 500m or so to the apartment complex's pool/gym complex for some zen-like calming laps.

I was very close to yielding to this unhealthy dynamic tonight, but decided it was time to take a stand - a moving one at least - and go out with my good friend Warren for 45 minutes of energetic, rain drop dodging walking around Sydney Park. The added benefit was a good catch up with Waz who no longer works in the City, meaning our trips in and out by train don't happen, and so, neither do our chats, which I miss.

Looking tres glam in my $10 Kmart trackie daks and cheap blue zip up hoodie, in the lift riding down to the lobby, smiling as if walking in the cold is FUN! Turned out, with Waz there at least, it was.

So Vim & Vigour 1, Lethargy 0.

Hopefully I can keep this going, especially when there's no social element involved (unless, of course, I choose to chat to myself at 5 a.m. which is fine since no one would see me; and if they did, its Newtown people - who will really care?!)

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 178 - Give Me Sushi or Give Me... No Sushi?

Yeah death is not really an option there since while I love sushi, it's not that much!

Ah yes the obligatory Facebook check in shot

Yummo! Sushi plates, miso soup bowls and the iced tea detritus

I haven't been to Sushi Train in ages since winter beckons with calls for warm comfort food, but tonight I had a yearning for it, and so after walking 6 blocks from where I had to park - everyone was out on a cold Monday night, which was quite inconvenient for me, thank you very much!), I met my gorgeous guy there (he'd been working in the City and caught the bus straight there), we supped on the usual suspects (takoyagi balls, karaage chicken and lots of sushi options), and I drove him home.

I love our Monday nights together. It what makes me appreciate what is in every other respect, an awful day of the week.

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 177 (Sunday 26 June) - More Chilled Than an Emperor Penguin in a Blizzard

Another chilled day on the couch reading Saturday's Herald, some magazines and making lunch (tuna, chives and cheese omelettes on crumpets) and dinner (Chicken in massaman curry on cous cous plus veges), while my gorgeous guy worked. (This was after running around that morning buying groceries, getting my hair cut, picking up Entertainment Weekly mag from Magnation... that was exhausting!)

A fabuolous mural on a house near where I parked on Wilson Street, Newtown, which some bah humbug Grinch-like neighbours want painted over, with council agreeing. Criminal!

Yummy! The remains of  Cranberry/Pistachio white chocolate Easter egg,  orange cordial (which I haven't drunk in years) and reading material

A perfect no stress day (well for me anyway)

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 176 (Saturday 25 June) - I Need a New Hobby for Old Age!

My gorgeous guy has some lovely friends he's known for years, David and Matthew, who have just returned from years in London, and who I met for the first time at Fahmi's birthday party on June 4. At that party they invited us to Matthew's 40th birthday bash today, which took place at a bowling club (North Sydney this time with views out to the harbour and the Opera House)! That's twice in one year, and while I don't think I will ever take the sport up in old age (I never played much sport as a young man so why start in old age?), largely because while it's fun to play every now and again, there really isn't much to it.

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The scene of my not-much-cared-about humiliation...really lots of fun, self esteem assaults aside

Engrossed in the game

Alex reaidng us the rules and regs. Lots of fun, addicted to absent minded hair twirling, and some interesting scoring techniques

Milling before the lawn bowls facilitated bonding

Even so, it's a great way to bring disparate groups of people together and it worked a treat today. While we tended to largely stay with the people we knew during the nibble foods and champagne section of the afternoon, we ended up in teams not of our choosing and very quickly bonded in a way that spring rolls and meatballs, though they be mighty in fat and yumminess, simply can't manage. Yes I bowled terribly and my team came 5 out of 6 teams - we didn't even get the Horse's Ass award for winner of the three lowest ranked teams - but I didn't care. I had a ball, got to know David and Matthew much better, and their wonderful friends and Matthew's family, met another writer who knows a good proofreader, which will come in handy for my novel, and ate lots of weekend party food.

What's not to love? Thanks Matthew for including us in your birthday celebrations!

The plan was to go home and chill but instead we ended up in the City watching Bridesmaids, which was no where near as laugh out loud funny as people said, and was in fact, enormously average, and eating lollies (was that a wise idea after sausages, and two kinds of birthday cake? No, but I cared not!) with friends Fahmi and Steve and my gorgeous guy. Movie 0, fun with friends 1. Good night!

Yes another Facebook check in shot! Apparently I can't stop myself checking in everywhere! Must stop! LOL

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 175 (Friday 24 June) - Kawai Ne?!

More cute shots of my gorgeous nephew Bodhi out and about with my lovely sister, Rachel....

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 174 - The Shoes Have It

So how remarkable was today and how silly with exhaustion and boredom was I by the end of it, catching the bus back to the City with my fellow Eexcutive Assistant, Sandra?

Well I took a shot of that day's MX shoved down into my shoe.

I'd like to say I was being artistic or making a dramatic statement about the pointlessness of MX and the fact that it's true home is buried in a rank sweaty shoe, but I was just being silly.

As you do at the end of a day shovelling your precious life into the ungrateful maw of the corporate machine...

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 173 (Wednesday 23 June) - Scarfing It Down

I LOVE the cold.

I don't care if you think I am twisted, mad or just plain weird for liking the cold. Its entirely possible I am all three, but as I see it, as someone who sweats at the mere hint of heat, winter is my chance to go about life DRY, and I adore that!

I must learn to smile when taking shots on the iPhone. Yes it takes concentration to get the face just so in the frame, but I am supposed to be looking wildly happy wearing the scarf. HAPPY DAMMIT!

I also ADORE - seriously I am totally in love with - wearing scarves, and today was still cold enough after yesterday's crazy cold snap, to wear a nice big thick scarf.

I was a very happy boy

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 172 - E-Booking in Amazonia

Yes I know it conjures up images of Wonder Woman reading a book and turning the passages with her lasso...OK it doesn't? Hmm, well it's the first place my mind went which probably explains a great deal.


 What I am actually referring to is the course I am attending tonight at the Writers Centre in Milson Point, which in two hours is promising to tell me how to publish my novels in e-book form on Amazon's Kindle platform. While I am unhappy about the hastening disappearance of real world books and book shops - I fear the only place I will be able to shop in coming years will be supermarkets and laundromats, neither of which scream out 'relaxed atmosphere' (the act of screaming that out would, by definition, negate that phrase's real impact right?) - I realise that short of landing a wonder literary agent, this is probably the best way to get my book out there, and hope it gets noticed. Admittedly this is only the first step in a long process that will involve final editing of my book, getting cover illustrations, and starting the viral campaign to end all viral campaigns using Twitter, Facebook, a dedicated web site, etc etc....


But it's an EXCITING first step, and I can't wait!!

Thank you Jeff..... hopefully you will kickstart my longer for writing career!

________________________________________________

The course was AWESOME!!! The presenter Steve Ellis was knowledgable, articulate, funny and personable, the course was chock full of inspiration, encouragement, and really useful practical advice, which means I will be able to use my enthusiasm to good effect almost immediately, which is hugely super-duper exciting! Yes I am pumped! As an added bonus, I will need to learn HTML, how to create a website etc, which is going to be useful for my general work too (and as an added bonus, my gorgeous guy and I will be studying it together!), Kindle is perfect for my series like mine it turns out, and one lady collected all the names, email addresses and phone numbers of everyone there so we will be able to form a support group too! Best of all I got on brilliantly well with a lady called Michelle sitting next to me, and she designs book covers among other things and runs writing weekends. So many great things to pursue and opportunities so I am very excited!

Did I mention just how EXCITED I am? It all begins NOW!!

After a very cold wait it has to be said on the wind swept platform of Milsons Point station....

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 171 (Monday 20 June) - Lates Shot of My Gorgeous Niece and Nephew

Zara and Bodhi playing in a park on the Gold Coast

Could they be any cuter? I don't think so!

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 170 (Sunday 19 June) - Chill Pickle is in the Ascendancy

Chill pickle? Is this my attempt my engineer a new term for relaxation in the English language? Mais non, I protest, cleverly using French to throw you off my carefree experimenting with English word use, it's my friend Warren's term for well and truly chilling out to the point where your body could quite easily turn into a tub of runny yoghurt (if it was compromised of dairy products and more bacteria than a pin head in a petri dish)....

Naturally the shots I choose to illustrate this blog with are from breakfast, which has nothing to do with the above chill pickling, save for the fact that it preceded the grocery shopping which proceeded all that relaxing....tenuous at best but I will cling to it

.... and so today, I elevated Chill Pickling to a high art. While my boyfriend worked in his study - customer deadlines wait for no man's weekend, alas - I lay on his couch, watched 3 episodes of Battlestar Galactica's final season (yes I know it ended ages ago but I got kind of busy for, um, you know, 18 months), read Saturday's Sydney Morning Herald, and both the Sunday papers (lord knows why - I feel far stupider after reading than at any other point in the week), only punctuating all that delightful lethargy to cook a ham/cheese/mushroom omelette for lunch, and tuna mornay and veges on rice for dinner.

Otherwise I chill pickled as only as Chill Picklier can. OK I will stop my debauched experimenting with English words know. Enough syllables have been hurt already.

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 169 -

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 168 : 1000 Posts - OH YEAH!

My closest work friends, Sammi and Sandra illustrate the number of the day

Wow things have a way of adding up, and it's amazing that I have made it to 1000 posts. OK, not amazed so much since it has taken a lot of creativity, dedication and dogged perseverance to keep posting every day, rail, hail shine or frenzied giant blue monkey attack (it hasn't happened yet but it might do...you never know!) but I love doing it, I love the record this gives me of my life, and the way it allows me to communciate to lots of people what's happening in my life with ease. I can't wait to keep to keep posting! Onwards to 2000!! (Posts that is; I am well aware I can't travel back in time but then like the giant blue monkey attacks, who knows?)

To start this epic milestone post, here's some shots of the sky around my apartment this morning at dawn, which keeps alive one of the major aims of this blog, which is to show you my world as it happens.

Looking out towards the city

City direction again, with a star twinkling in the left part of the sky

The moon shines over the Zenix apartments next door...no werewolves sighted thank goodness

......... and here's some TGIF fun to lighten the mood somewhat (not that sunrise shots are exactly suffused with ominous foreboding)

Yes the day included me having to pack up my wonderful window desk to move to a next out in the corridor, not near the window so that my boss's new right hand person could have the plum desk, and I got a migraine last night right before my gorgeous guy arrived home from a week away, but he came over and fussed over me, the painkillers worked well, we had pizza, and a early snuggly night. So in the end, it all ended well.

Of course, nothing ends with this post. Onward, as I said, to 2000 posts! Tally ho! (No, I have no idea why I used a horsey word then but what the hell....)

This time with tongues out!

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 167 : A Chilled Night At Home At Last

While I absolutely love and adore time with family and friends - it's what makes life so special and rewarding - I also love time to just kick back, eat a relaxed dinner, watch some TV, and go to bed nice and snuggly early with a good book and a chat with my guy who's away in Bathurst.

NOICE.

Hands Full of Glitter and Tofu : 2011 Day 166 - Newtown Baby Newtown!

Started off the night at 6.15 waiting for Warren in HUM music and ended up buying 4 CDs. I love immersing myself in new sounds and it's always so tempting to be in the store. Which is probably why I shouldn't use it as a meeting place! I should arrange to meet people in somewhere like a hardware store and yes there is one on King Street.....

Once Warren arrived, we stopped off at Coopers Hotel for a wine - a delightful drop called Devil's Lair Whippersnapper SSB - in their very funky upstairs bar and bistro. They also serve great food too, and really we should have stayed there to eat because....

... the food at Grub and Tucker, while not awful, was not wonderful either, and the service maddeningly uneven, and inattentive. The female waiter was so relaxed and matey as to be comical, and while Warren and I had a fantastic time catching up on everything, it would have been far better done somewhere else. Still, at least the wall art was fun, and gave us the excuse to....

............... pretend to be this statue that was sitting just near us! Oh what fun we had!

Then we walked home, ran into my friend Fahmi, who lives near me and Warren, and his friends Phillip, and Cristina, and had a lovely walk home on a crisp winter's evening.