Move That Fat Arse Fast Fat Boy

I've been back walking for an hour each day after work. I think I am resigned to the fact that I am going to have to do this on a permanent basis. We all have to exercise, after all, and I spend a lot of my work life sitting at a desk and I spend a lot of my home life sitting behind a computer. You've just got to move about, sitting crossed legged on the floor at the coffee table does nobody any good.

So, off I went at 5pm, at dusk. I'm still getting used to the winter dark. Funny how it comes around, as though for the first time, and the world changes so completely. Sunshine, grey. It has been raining all day and the evening wasn't any different. I got half way around my hour long circuit before the rain started, so that was good.

But then the rain came down. Me, with my $400 head phones on, with the rain falling down on my head. It was the head phones I was worried about, I didn't care if I got wet. I stood under a shop veranda, on the corner of Canning Street, when the rain was the heaviest. I wiped the water from the head phones, as I danced on the spot, as the rain drops fell in sheets in the street lights, like a million fairies floating to the ground. I danced because it was cold or, at least, so I didn't get cold.

The rain stopped, so I set off again. Thinking ahead, there were no more shop verandas to take shelter under until Brunswick Street, so I ran, fearing for my musical ears muffs. I used to run when I was in my twenties and I used to love it, but I don't run now, usually, you know, due to the issues with high impact, but, I enjoyed it. 

I ran from Canning Street to Brunswick Street when the rain came down again. I stopped and danced again under the awning just passed Brunswick Street, as the rain fell heavily. I wiped the water from my headphones, like doing an exercise of hands on heads, rubbing my hands across the head bow.

The rain stopped and I ran all the way home. It felt good. I floated along the foot path and I was home in no time. I felt good to run, I hardly ever run any more. Funny the rain, rather than driving me back, it propelled me forward gloriously.

I had rotten bananas, so I stripped the black skins from the translucent fruit and I cooked a banana cake. I bought apples and pears in Victoria Street yesterday, as Sam bought the real groceries, and I stewed them.

Pizza Pie, literally

On what planet, or in who's reality does this make sense? All that pastry, crust, shiver. My real question is simply why? You have pizza and you have pies. Buy some of each, get yourself a coke and dig in. It is easy, both are freely available.

This is like interspecies breeding. It is the Frankenstein of the food world. It is more American bastadisation of the world's pallet. Big business proving they are willing to do anything to make a dollar.

How did the board meeting go that decided on this? "How can we bleed the stupid poor some more? How do we appeal to the lower socioeconomic levels of society this time?"

It is truly disturbing. Okay, so there are worse things, little boy fiddlers, female genital mutilation, but those things withstanding, this is disturbing.

The More You Do, The More You Do.

I had four weeks off and I sat on my arse and didn't fuck all. Nothing. Niente. Nada. Now that I am back at work, I am walking for an hour every night after work. I had all day every day for four weeks and I didn't move a muscle. Now, working a full day, I'm straight out the door after I get home - after I have had a cup of tea and some vegemite toast, of course - headphones on doing my hour long circuit. It doesn't really make sense. 

The more you do, the more you do.

Is this just me, or does everybody do this?

Look at that gorgeous light

As I was driving home yesterday afternoon, I could see the Fitzroy commission flats and I could see the ugly new block of flats they are building in Collingwood and it occurred to me that they don't look that much different  See the Fitzroy commission flats in the back ground. Who would have ever thought they'd repeat the mistake and call it progress? See the new ones being built in the foreground. (Yes, I know, it is a bit hard to make out, but trust me the new version in Collingwood is going to be just as ugly)

This whole area of Collingwood should be evolved into a fabulous warehouse precinct, it shouldn't have ugly high rise blocks of flats built on it. The historic nature of the area should be preserved. We shouldn't lose it to property developers lining their own pockets with money at the expense of everybody else. Old buildings should be evolved and not obliterated by greed.

Dave

I'm lying on the couch watching the last Dave Letterman show with the cat on my lap, so it is difficult to type. The fire is burning, Buddy is lying next to me on the floor. Sam is sitting on the floor next to Buddy. It is a grey day.

I just want to say that I like Dave Letterman, I always have. He's funny, if a little repetitive, and he doesn't seem to take himself too seriously. Thanks Dave for all of the entertainment.

Out of Pocket Expenses

None of my surgery is claimable on Medicare, nor private health insurance. Can you tell me why this is not claimable? This is everything that is now wrong with our health system. How can having skin cancer cut out not be a claimable medical expense? I ask? 

It is because I went to a private clinic and not to a public hospital, that is the reason. 

How is this good at preventing more serious claims down the track? 

But not able to be claimed on private health insurance? What good is private health insurance? I think private health insurance is a waste of money. I've had mine for years and I have never really claimed, other than when I go to the dentist... and then my dentist told me that extra dental cover was a waste of money, you get far less out of it than it costs you and that we'd all be better off putting the extra cost of the extras cover into a separate bank account instead of paying to health insurance companies.

I guess I am lucky that I can afford it, but really, what does that say in itself? What happens to the people who can't afford it?

I really believe that politicians are in power for the good of all of the countries citizens and not just for the corporate honchos and themselves, which is clearly the case today.

Under the Knife

Tum di dah, the rain comes down at the end of the day, quite heavily. I had to drive Mark to the airport as he headed home today. It was as if the rain held off until the whiny northern NSW'er headed home, so we didn't have to listen to how cold it is down here.

I had my squamous cell carcinoma cut out at 2pm. It took longer than I thought it would, he seemed to be cutting for much longer than I thought he would. Tugging, pulling, wrenching, actually, there was very little of that. I could work out what he was doing with the movement of his hands, however. The stitching was easy to pick.

Now I have an Elastoplast starting at the corner of my eyebrow going diagonally up over my forehead. It feels kind of strange, like I have lost the movement in my right eyebrow. This is how people who have had Botox must feel.

Then I drove home. When I'd got home the whole thing, including driving time, took just 1 1/2 hours. Pretty good, I reckon.

Change, Change, Change, My Head Was Spinning

Jack called and changed my assignments, yet again. I had the last 2 weeks in April off, lovely. I was supposed to start work again on May 01st, now, it is not until the week after next. 

I've got 2 assignments with 2 companies that were supposed to cover May and June and possibly some, if not all, of July. The 2 fitted together nicely, I should have known it was too good to be true.

Both assignments have since changed multiple times, every week since I got them. And my bank balance is heading south. Grrr! But, okay, I think I've got it. I just have to remember Monday week, the last week in May. (not the first, oh no not the 01st)

Then Jack called yesterday and asked if I could go straight into help out the company closest to home, within walking distance. They'd lost data, their systems were down, he couldn't tell me when they'd be up again, but could I drop everything and wait for the call.

The sun was shinning, my still steaming lunch was waiting on the kitchen bench for me, it was an absolutely glorious, sparkling day, the sun was shining in through the atrium's glass roof. I said, "I could absolutely go in tomorrow." We've still got plenty of time before end of month.

"Oh, tomorrow? Oh? Okay, cool," said Jack.

Well? Everybody else just seems to be serving themselves here, as I have seen over the previous 3 weeks, so why shouldn't I? Hey man, why are you spoiling my buzz? I'm cool, why aren't the rest of ya all cool? God dang it!

Succulent

Those colours are so gorgeous, they are the colours of life itself

Napier Street in the afternoon sun

The golden afternoon sun shining across the dog park

Bird of Paradise

The earth growing arms and reaching to the sun

Falling leaves

 

That was much better in real life, with lots of falling leaves, and you can see some leaves falling in the video

Throw Open The Windows

I've just been for an hour's walk. I start off with opera that slowly turns to garage. It is a gorgeous day. I walk back in the door to Passion, Gat Decor.

Sam doesn’t really like me/us (Sam, despite all of his objections to buying a stash, he still has not turned one j down) smoking around Buddy. Buddy doesn’t like us burning our “Joss Sticks.” The sun is coming in through the window. Buddy is laying in the sun on the carpet next to us. Sam and I share a j, as reward for getting all of our house hold chores done, and exercise complete. We blow the smoke out into the sun streaming in through the window. I think seeing smoke I had just exhaled into the bright sun light and watching all of the patterns form and then disperse, was one of the things that attracted me to smoking in the first place. We can see the cloud slowly engulf Buddy. He rolls his head over his shoulder to look at us, in typical old man bulldog fashion. “Hey, I’m choking over here!” Then he gets up with a harrumph! Coughs. He turns around slowly and sits looking at us with his back in the sun. He coughs again. “How long are you two going to be smoking those things?” (I swear he looked from my eyes to my hand) Cough. Cough.

I open the window after that. The smoke swirls around in the streaming sun up high, it doesn't get a chance to fall to the floor any longer. Everybody is happy.

The sun is shining, the sky is blue. It is a sparkling day, the colours are so vivid and bright. The light glistens in the air.

The Sands Through The Hour Glass

I saw this car when I, and Buddy, were waiting for Sam to shop at woolies.

This is a previous issue number plate. It means that it has been in continual use since it was issued, or this driver has had it reissued as a personalised numberplate because his name is Hayden Andrew Oliver and he was born 8th March 1980. Number plates have never been reissued in Victoria, except for very recently when the black and white plates, starting with AAA000 were offered as a standard issue alternative to our complicated new standard issue, blue and white 1AA1AA. The AAA000 was issued initially starting around 1978.

HAO 383, would have been issued as standard issue plates in Victoria in around 1959. This means that this plate has certainly been on another car, possibly as far back as 1959.

So, it would have been on a 1959 Holden.

But, I see it on a, 1959 Vanguard, something just a fraction more unusual for the times.

The people over the road from us had one of these (so, it was 10 years old, I was a kid) there's was pink and grey and I used to think how unusual it was. How stylish, with its two toned paint work and its lashings of chrome. Apparently, my first words were, "Same model, different colour." I kid you not.

Say, in 1959, parked in the outer suburb of Aspendale drive way of our young married couple, electrician Gerry and his teacher wife Barbara. They'd made do with Barbara's 1950's Prefect, Barbara hoofing it out to her Glen Waverley school every day without any problems. That was up until they had the kids, Robert and Jane. They'd done alright, Barbara was a good little saver, so they could afford to up date, get something bigger. And it would be ideal for their Xmas beach holidays with their cousins. 

Gerry drives his work issue panel van to work every day. Barbara drives the new Vanguard to work, dropping their two children off at primary school on her way. The primary school is just at the end of their street, so the children walk home in the afternoon and are home for a few hours on their own, until Barabara returns from work around 5pm. Gerry is home around 6pm when they eat their tea around the TV.

Gerry buys the business for which he has worked for ten years, when the original owner retires, with encouragement from Barbara and Barbara's diligent savings. The business flourishes. They move to Hawthorn. Barbara grew up in Kew, all of her friends live near by. Gerry grew up in Box Hill but his only brother and his mother live near by the house they are leaving. Gerry says that Barbara has always wanted to get back to Kew, but Barbara always claimed it was because of the children's private schools. Robert becomes a scientist, Jane becomes an accountant. They have 2 children each, a boy and a girl for both. The Vanguard has long since been traded in. Gerry drives a Volvo, as does Barbara.

Now, the number plate belongs to a 30 something Fitzroy gay man, Jeff and his Asian boyfriend, Tommy and their Pug Eugene... as observed by this gay man and his bulldog, Buddy.

Flowers on a Grey Day

In a week of grey days, wet and cold and grey. It has been a grey week, wet and cold, winter is here

My Wrist Phone

Sam shows me all the things he can do with his new Apple Watch.  He can change the TV and close the curtains with it... apparently. It's like the Jetsons and Get Smart all rolled into one, as he talks into his wrist phone. He purrs as he does the voice over for the Apple watch advert. "How stylish. How beautiful." His hands do the fluid "Price is Right" model hand movements, sweeping backwards and forwards.

He asks me if I want one, so we can send heartbeats to each other. He says I should get one, it tells us hourly to stand up and walk around. It would replace my Nikeband, which now has bulldogs teeth marks in it. We were playing. Buddy and me, not Sam and me, you understand.

Grey Day

I was awake at 5am. It was raining outside. It was cold. The fire had burnt away to two red stars dying in the hearth, not nearly enough to bring back to life.

I built a new fire, fortunately my fire basket had enough sticks in it for kindling and I didn't have to go out in the dark and the cold. The rain stopped briefly around 6am and I ran out and got a couple of middle sized pieces to take the fire to the next level.

It was still dark outside.

I like watching the fire, adding bigger and bigger logs, and watching the flames spread, the fire grow. Loading on more wood and watching that fuel combust into flames.

It is possibly the only thing that I am good at, building a fire. I never fail at it, I can make fire from a few twigs, if necessary. (oh, and a fire lighter pretty much all the time now, but I am quite capable of going old school, with sticks and paper. Don’t test me with a magnifying glass.)

The rain pours down.

Twinkle Toes Bulldog is suddenly gone. I find him at the bedroom door upstairs in the dark. I let him into the bedroom at 6am.

There sounds like people are running over the roof in the rain. I started imagining someone jumping onto the kitchen roof, coming down in the back yard off the veranda roof. Suddenly right there, a metre away. Then turning and running up the garden and across the neighbours and over the roller door into Little X Street.

It creeps me out.

I put Boyzone on. I made a mixed recording from all of the tracks I had on my itunes, which I inherited from Sam. I put it on just to listen to see if I was ever going to listen to it again. should keep any of it?

I feel like I am the only person in the world. Dark on the inside, light just beginning to seep into the world beyond the windows.

I hear Milo come back into the house. I hope he isn’t wet.

Suddenly, I have smoked too much and drunk too much coffee and I get the distinct wobbles. I go and watch the fire. Staring. I lie down with the big, orange cushion. I kind of like Boyzone, it is like being serenaded by blokes. I feel sad about Stephen Gately, not that I had ever heard of him until he died.

I listen to the rain on the roof, it rains heavily. I hear the fire crackle. I push the wood further apart and the red coals glow hot on my left hand side.

I hear the rain stop. I run out into the yard, between the branches dripping with water to get more wood between down pours. I slide the new piece into the gap between the other burning logs. I watch it smoke. I watch it burst into flames.

The fire glows orange right across the hearth.

The rain begins to fall again.

The rain hammers on the roof. I’m glad I cleaned out all the gutters yesterday, was it? In the last few days.

Suddenly, a saturated Milo appears next to me like a ghoul out of the dark. He is so dripping wet his fur was slicked back on his face like a 50’s rocker. I forgotten that trick of cats.

I got a towel and turbo dried him on the carpet in front of the fire. He thought it was a game, he leapt about like a kitten. At least I had one of my animals to curl up in front of the fire with, as he snuggles up against me and purrs.

The day becomes light around 7am.

The lead singer has a nice voice, which is kind of sad, as I think of him dead.

Milo lies between me and the fire, like any cat worth his 9 lives.

I love the feeling of lying in front of the fire, warmed on one side, chilled on the other, as if the heat can pass right through you, sucked through because of the cold.

I turned my laptop around and typed from the other side of the table, now my back was facing the fire.

The sun tries to shine at 8am. Morning sun flutters outside. I hear more rain, the light outside dims. It pours with rain again. The world drips.

The glory vine is crimson treaded through the other vines in the morning sun.

Sam comes down at 8.30. He says the rain has stopped. We run outside and drag the rubbish bins to the street.

The only thing to do on a rainy day, put The Preachers Wife on and listen to the rain fall.

Sam made coffee

I ate muesli with bananas and honey. Basil and tomatoes, tomatoes and olives, crackers and cheese, chocolate and raspberries, orange and chocolate, baked apple and cinnamon, stewed apple and vanilla ice cream, bananas and honey, honey and oats, pancakes with berries, strawberries with clotted cream, all classic taste combinations.

Buddy lies in front of the open fire.

Sam had a telephone interview at 11.30am.

Sam was going to catch up with colleagues for lunch but the weather was lousy, it rained all morning. He was going, he wasn’t going, he was going again, he wasn’t going again. Then he left.

I was to meet him some where at some time. I was hazy, smoking joints with breakfast will do that to you.

I had no idea what I was to do. Have my haircut. Fortunately, Sam text me that said, “have a shower.” So I did. Then he sent me another text, “Leave Now.” So I did. (chuckle)

I don’t remember walking into town at all. Some where I bought egg tarts. I slid down Bourke Street under the huge trees, into the Tivoli Arcade, dark and black, into the salon with far too many mirrors for anybody to be in any way comfortable. As I got to the door, the hairdresser pointed to the seat in front of her. I hurtled through the occasional furniture and thud into the chair. I mumbled, “Short on the sides and a bit longer on the top.” So that is what she did. I never give them clipper sizes, too easy to mess up really quickly, at least with scissors there is some wiggle room.

That must be the most uncomfortable moment in my month, sitting in the hairdresser’s chair staring at myself, for that long, relentlessly. It is thoroughly uncomfortable, fortunately I was so stoned I nodded off without any embarrassment.

When I looked up, Sam was standing behind the hairdresser. He went to the toilet, out a secret squirrel door in the arcade. Then we were walking home eating green tea ice cream.

My exboyfriend wrote me an email.

The last few months have been tough. Today I found out the lymphoma has returned in a more aggressive form. Means a new intensive chemo treatment. 3 days in, every 3 weeks for 3 cycles, stem cell harvesting. Then a month in hospital at least for the final knockout and near death experience in isolation

We gave in and watched teev around 4pm, always a bad sign if the teev is going on, I have always felt. We lay back in the lounge room and watched all of our recorded shows.

We ate spicy chicken and rice for dinner.

Sam played school ma’am, waiting to catch me with my eyes closed. “Okay, off to bed.” Clunk! Off goes the TV. Finger pointing in the direction of the bedroom.

Buddy's Busy Day

Lovely Buddy

A Letter to Post

I was up at 7.30am. It is a gently, sweet morning, gentle blue skies.

I searched for Connor Habbib, as I drank my first coffee, he’s a fine boy. I have my wallpaper set to the folders of photos I have collected throughout the year, at present it is on 2013. Connor’s beautiful face was looking back at me this morning. I promise that is the only reason, I’m not normally search for porn stars over breakfast.

Sam came down at 8.30.

As I look around at the dim lounge room with the open fire burning and the cat making crunching sounds in the next room, my eyes felt tired, I wonder what we are going to do today? The days are drifting into one another.

The electricity company is in the lane replacing the street light at 8.45am. It seems a little early to be blocking the laneway for people heading out for the day. I decided to run up to the third floor and have a look. Just two guys with spade.

I paid mum’s bills. A couple of those creditors, I am sure, do a cheer when they get my cheque. (I know, cheques for mum’s bills, its old school) I’m not that diligent with mum’s bills, all that writing, cheques and envelopes) some times it stretches out to 3 months, all except for her accommodation, I pay that, kind of, on time. I don’t want them turfing her out any time soon. So when I get them paid, I want to post them straight away.

I headed out into the grey day, without checking myself in the mirror before I left. It came to mind in the middle of my street, as I crossed the road. All I’d had was 3, um, er, coffees, what did I look like? In my house uniform. As I got to Gertrude Street I thought, well, I’m going to find out any moment in the first shop window. “Oh?” Deflated. Congratulations, I think, you have achieved bag lady status. Old tradie hoodie, a size too big, I think it has a few paint stains on it. My new track pants, now old. (How do you do that to clothes, I hear Edina say) Big woolly socks into which my track pants are tucked, finished off with red crocks. I’d attained some-who-had-officially-given-up status. What happened, I think? It is funny, I often have this very thought as I walk down the Gertrude Street hill to Smith Street. I can remember the multitudes of Christians on this hill, walking that particular piece of footpath. I think I have experienced every possible hour in the day at varying times on the Gertrude Street hill (yes, you do feel it in your calves) up the hill from Smith Street. I think that is the essence of Christian right there on the stretch of footpath.

The rain was drizzling. I scurried across Gertrude Street carefully as the socks were huge.

Letters to post. I think I will always think of Luke as I post my letter in the letter box. “Oh, you know, I had a letter to post,” would be Luke’s stoned words in response to me asking him what sort of day he’d had. For years.

As if to confirm everything I had been thinking, there was Jackson Wag waiting on the corner of my street for me, dressed exactly the same. A mirror image of my decrepitude. We looked like the derelict and his old, queeny brother.

“I came out my door and there were the polemen.”

“Just when I was getting used to the dark.” I said. They took the light out of the lane a few weeks ago. Today they were putting the new one in.

“Dangerous. It was dangerous. I could never find my front door, talk about dark,” said Jackson. I remember the story he told me about coming home maggotted long before the light was ever taken away.

He headed up the laneway waving behind himself as he went.

I headed back in my gate.

I scurried back inside.

But, you know, if you just sit inside your lounge room and do nothing, you have nothing to write about.

Buddha Bar plays chilled out science fiction trance relentlessly.

Why Do These Things Happen?

The leg of my track suit pants flipped up and tucked itself into the waisteband of my tacksuit pants, just as I was standing on one foot sliding the other foot in the right leg of my track suit pants.

Momentarily, I was stuck. "Ah!" My mind raced.

I was teetering on one leg. I couldn't even wave my arms around to get my balance, as I was hanging onto my track pants. I thought I was going to fall over.

I let go of my track pants, just in time.

Looking to the Sky

I don't know what the 3 green marks are on this image, they don't appear on any of my other photos. Who knows?

Gnarly Tree Root

Gnarly tree root bulging out of the ground

David Cameron

I dreamt that I was kissing David Cameron. I was sitting in his lap, well, I guess, I was straddling his lap and kissing him passionately. 

His lips were moist, wet, as he kissed me. We were face to face, nothing separating our faces. He kissed like he wanted to kiss, he kissed like he really liked it. I kissed him back. There was some unspoken understanding that he was cheating on his wife. He didn’t seem to care, he didn’t hold back.

It woke me up, with a start. 

Well, not in a terrible way, either, but at 6am, I opened my eyes gently and gazed around my bedroom as the light began to seep into the room and thought to myself, Well, how about that?

I'm really not sure where that came from, oh, except for the English election, of course. But I've never thought that before... no, I haven't. I'm sorry David, but I still don't think about you that way.

St Marks

In the village

A Day On The Couch In Front Of The Open Fire

Things hurt as I came down the stairs, back, calves, feet. "Oh, ouch, oo." This is going to take more than a cap of fish oil and a vitamin D tablet, I thought. Concentrate, was my next thought, as I hesitated on the turn in the stairs where, if any one is going to slip,  people fall. 

Sam and I had “partied” the night before, just the two of us, for the end of the 4th week that we’re both off work. Why not, we thought. But, consequently, I was feeling quite “tired” all day. Yes, lets say tired.

I did nothing much all day, except lay on the couch with my lap-top. I read the news online, first up, as you do, which lead to reading gay news online, which lead to what the nutty Christian Right is up to. The Truth About…. American’s for something or other… Peter LaBarbera seemed to be the name that featured most.

Why do men who claim to be straight and Christian fixate on homosexuality? It has always seemed odd to me. Peter LaBarbera, our own Fred Nile, to name but two. There was a study done recently that concluded that anti gay bullies generally grow up to be gay themselves.

A couple of quotes from the internet, from RationalWiki

LaBarbera has earned the nickname "Porno Pete" as he loves to spend his free time attending gay fetish events like the Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco and International Mr Leather in Chicago. While surrounded by hot gay men in leather chaps, he does what any good Christian heterosexual family values campaigner does: grabs a camera, takes dozens of photographs and puts them on the web.

On 9 February 2012, LaBarbera called for the arrest of Dan Savage for launching the "It Gets Better" campaign. His reasoning? That the campaign was actually making suicides among LGBT teens worse.

I should find these guys infuriating, but I find them endlessly fascinating. Why do grown men who have supposedly found the basis of life in their religion get so caught up on what must be a minor part of their faith and their lives, namely gay people? It always smacks of men protesting just way too much.

There was some South American (I have no idea if he was South American, but he had a Spanish sounding name) right wing Christian writer who tried to make something out of American serial killers being gay. Nine out of ten American serial killers, the top ten, most, all, I can’t remember what he said now. So then I read about American serial killers.

Initially, I was surprised to see how many gay serial killers there were, but when I counted them up roughly (very roughly) it seemed like about 10% of the total number of serial killers were gay, so I guess that is right. I reckon you could, probably, expected there to be a greater number of gay serial killers when you think about it. Straight serial killers have never been accused of being deviants because of there heterosexuality, unlike gay serial killers, so you could almost expect there to be more gay serial killers because of this fact.

The fire burned and the pages of serial killers flowed. Goodness me there are some doozies.

I found that a good number of serial killers, gay or straight, had bible thumping Christian parents. So there is a thing.

OMG! Some of them. Really? What happened to them in their lives? Ed Gein what he did, shiver up the spine.

I lay on the couch pretty much for most of the day. I was feeling poorly for nearly all of it. Well, not so much poorly as tired and grumpy. Yes, tired and grumpy.

It was a quiet Saturday night, to be sure.

Eventually, I got up and cleaned up the kitchen, which I thought was never going to happen, but as Sam got up and diligently cooked for both of us, I had no real choice, no matter how tired I felt. It is the misery function, cleaning the dishes. There is nothing creative about washing dishes. It is just congealed fat and leftover scraps. Lovely.

We watched Struggle Street and English detective shows on the ABC.

We went to bed at 9.30pm, at which point Jill responded to my text about going to see a therapist, I know, about her weight. I thought she was at Leah’s 50th (the one I wasn’t invited to) and surely it would be in full swing at 9.30pm. Why would she be looking at her texts from me at 9.30 if she was having a good time? I ask you?

Yes, I want to, she said.

I was out like a light.

My Friend Jill

One of my oldest friends, Jill, from that circle of friends you have as a teenager, who are still, pretty much, friends to this day, has got so fat I'm afraid the next stage for her is shut-in. Jill and I like to joke about it, we both have a sweet tooth, we both like to eat.

I wrote this a few days ago, after Jill called out of the blue and wanted to know if Sam and I wanted to go to the movies.

We met Jill at The Jam Factory at 5.45 to eat Mexican and then watch the Avengers Movie. I haven’t seen her for ages, she’s not been calling, when we used to call all the time. Something has changed, I'm not sure what. She's been looking after her elderly father up until recently, I just thought she was having time to herself.

I've been stoned since the weekend, since my Mark visited. Mark the gardener.  He commented on my garden, that is the first time that has ever happened. And while it is true I have planted a few new plants to fill in the obvious holes, all I have really done is water it. It is amazing how much difference water makes.

"What have you done, it looks great?"

"I gave it some water."

"Ah, one of the closely kept secrets about gardening." He smiled. "Don't tell everyone.

He even took photos.
This has nothing to do with what I am writing here, but it was the very first time Mark had complimented me on my garden.

So, I was a little groggy, so to speak, hitting the fresh air. Nice and relaxed, one might say. We caught a tram in Victoria Parade just after 4.30pm. The world seemed like a busy place once we were out and about in it. I like the change that catching a tram brings to driving some where.

We ate burritos and a choc top, mine was salted caramel. Actually, Jill turned down the choc top saying that she had already had soo much sugar this week. That's a first. 

During the dinner, Jill asked me why she does these things? (eat food) “I’m going to go blind, or lose a limb, why do I do it?” I didn’t know what to say, she caught me off guard. We usually joke about such things, I wasn't really prepared for the change of focus, and I stumbled and I didn't steer the conversation back to the topic. She has got worse ever since she inherited all the money after her father died. I guess it didn’t make her happy.

We talked about Mark Iceman, her brother inlaw, he is now terminally sick from cancer. He has a rare form of Lymphoma. He’s been going to the doctors for the last, maybe, 5 years, because he felt there was something wrong, so by the time he was correctly diagnosed, he was in stage four and untreatable. He is a well respected psychiatrist, so he has some medical training. At one point they thought he had motor neuron disease, but there have been other diagnosis’ too.

Jill told me she was going to Leah’s fiftieth birthday. (my girlfriend from back when we were all young, who I have fallen out with recently, and who has made no attempt to call and reconcile. She just cut me out of her life, as I have done her) Then she told me some cute little anecdote about some mix up with the party that you would tell a close friend who was probably going to the party too, without any realisation about what she’d just done.

I bristled and um'd and ah'd.

Jill hesitated, as if she wasn’t getting the correct response from me.

I'd been contemplating writing Leah a birthday card, as a way of a  truce. I'd thought about it several times, thinking it would be the nice thing to do, you know, but I hadn't done it. We haven't spoke in four years, so I am guessing both of us are happy with the current arrangement  But a party? Of course there would be a party.

I fell asleep, I think, through the first half, at least, of the movie. The new Avengers Movie. Modern action movies are often confusing even if you are awake through the whole thing, so... I don't know when I woke up. There was a lot of explosions and action. I kept wondering if Captain America and Thor were going to get on with each other. I could see Chris Helmsworth pulling down Chris Evan’s tights. Chris Evans would have a nice, white arse. All I really remember was looking around the cinema, trying to focus, with what seemed like the end of the movie coming, interminably, impatiently waiting for the credits to come up. And then they did. I felt stunned, more can’t think than violent smack, as it was all over and we could get up and stretch our, my, legs. The Hulk looked like Mark Ruffalo.

I love the Jam Factory building, that main auditorium is fantastic, but the rest of it has always been a little tacky. The toilets boggled my head, coming and leaving, with its warren of grey painted hallways. When I came out before and after the film, I was in a bunker, seemingly in military colours, the correct direction in which to exit, I had no idea. Both times, the actual exit corridor seemed like an after thought, a minor side alley. No wonder I had trouble finding it.

Jill made us walk her to her car, a pet peeve of mine... I'm still miffed clearly about her saying no, bluntly, “Ah… no!” to driving us home the first time we went to the movies. No way, was the implication. Rude, I thought. Then she expects us to do the gentlemanly thing and walk her to her car. I mean, 8pm in a busy Prahran car park? What does she think is going to happen to her? Seriously? And just as I suspected, her car was parked in the premium car park, closest to the doors, Miss Jill isn’t going to walk too far. She’s just a princess, (or has sky high sugar levels) who expects it all to about her. Nothing has changed. Funny how you love and hate people often for the same qualities. I think it has something to do with me being stoned. (I was tonguing for a joint as we came out of the cinema)

I was texting David as we walked to the car park. Sam says that I then just flicked Jill off once she was in her car.

“Can I drop you somewhere?” (She meant at the front of the Jam factory)

“No thanks.”

Well, what else has she got to do if she doesn’t drive Sam and I home, resume eating on the couch? I mean, really. Sad but true, that is the subtle change in her personality that I am detecting, her food addiction is way out of control.

What Sam doesn’t take into account, Jill and I have known each other for bloody years, since we were kids together, we can say good bye anyway we like, by this stage. It won’t matter, we’re like old shoes, never to part. I must take her aside and resume the conversation seriously about what she is doing to herself? Oh Jill, if this is still about Steve who broke her heart twenty years ago, I’ll slap her. She needs to get serious about it now.

I don’t care if she doesn’t drive us home, even if it sounds like the opposite. I love zipping through Melbourne by tram. It is my preferred mode of transport, out there with the real people, sucking lungs of fresh air.

We got home at 9pm, on the tram. There was some mad woman, with, what was probably, her worldly possessions covering the floor of her pod. She was prostrate on the floor, excavating under one of the tram seats. She had a completely possessed look on her face. I gazed down and pitied her, as the underneath of the seat cracked and broke under her mad efforts. She had long hair, which covered her face every time she came up for air, and as she tried to brush the hair away behind her ears, she gave a damn good impersonation of Munch’s Scream.

Poor thing. “This is the result of government funding cuts,” I say to Sam. “All the loons have been let out. Once upon a time, she’d have been locked up somewhere.”

Sam nudged me and said, “She can hear you, why do you think she keeps looking up?"

Oops. It was true. She dug under that seat as though she was the last person left on earth and she was burrowing to a better place.

A Story About David

David is the only one of my friends who entertains the thought of me writing about them all. The rest of my friends don't think about, I am sure. David still treats it as a bit of a myth, do I, don't I? He thinks I might one day. So here is a story about David.

David has every aspect of his life pretty much worked out. He is successful professionally, people love him, he is the life of the party, with a tendency to over share.

The only aspect of his life that is rubbish, is his love life. David sets himself as the wise one, but in the matters of the heart, he is a little boy, still reacting in a childish way. So his love life is a mess.

So it is a big deal when he starts seeing someone new. He puts so much store in them right from the outset.

David calls. He slept with Lachlan for the first time. Lachlan snores. David can’t sleep.

So David got up and took a stillnoxs, but that wasn’t enough, he still couldn’t sleep. So he then had a valium, but that didn’t work either, so he took another stillnoxs, by which stage he was off his chops out of it.

By this stage Lachlan stirred. He starts talking to David, asking him if he was alright.

David ends up slobbering into Lachlan's chest, “You were snoring, I couldn’t sleep. Your snores are irregular, there is no rhythm to fall asleep to. I had to take 3 sleeping tablet.”

“You took 3 sleeping tablets?” repeats Lachlan, some what alarmed.

“Will you stay with me forever,” dribbles David.

Lachlan laughed.

I tell David it paints a pretty picture.

They’ve only just met a week ago. This was the first time they slept together.

David says he is a hopeless romantic.

I tell him he will never see Lachlan again.

More Fanatical Christians

Is it any surprise to well, anyone, that Russian legislator Vitaly Milonov, the main proponent of the homophobic law, "laws against gay propaganda," is a Christian.

I know, I hear your collective gasp.

This Christian young man was an assistant to Vitaly Viktorovich Savitsky, chairman in the 1990s of the existing Christian Democratic Union of Russia (CDU). During this time Milonov was also chairman of the "Young Christian Democrats."

In 1991, Milonov joined the Baptist church. Later, in 1998, he converted to the Russian Orthodox Church.

Really? It is almost a cliche, now isn't it.

The fanatical Christians are like a demented yapping dog over the back fence, we just have to ignore them the best we can and move forward.

The people I feel sorry for are the Russian people, not only are the fanatical Christians ruining their country, (to uphold their own chosen, mythical christian beliefs, shrug) but the Christians are making it clear to the rest of the world that Russia is still the backward country it has always been.

Stressed backwards

Do you know what stressed is backwards?

Really, better than sex, lets be real. Sweet and lovely, and leaves a much better taste in your mouth

Who Wants to See Kick Masturbate Like a Monkey on the Carpet?

I was watching Agony on the ABC and Kick Gurry was talking about smart TV's and the possibility of them spying on you, filming you in your most private moments. Should we be worried about this potential invasion of privacy? He laughed and was kind of dismissive and he said, "What are they going to see, me masturbating like a monkey on the carpet?" 

Well, you know something Kick, why don't you show us and let us be the judge of whether you have anything to worry about.

Okay, give it your best shot, and we'll be the judge