Okay. Stop panicking, emergency over

 

Monday Morning

OMG! We are out of Vegemite!

I've been telling Sam for days it was critical.

Of course, I went to the supermarket myself yesterday morning. Yes, there is that. 😬

Sunday Morning

There is no milk, oh seriously, I think. I've been up 5 minutes. My head spins. Bugger it! I get my wallet and slide on my shoes, crocs,  grumbling. I head off to Coles. 

I put on Real Ibiza and wonder what they are doing on Gaza, when I am still grumpy about having to go get milk first thing in the morning. I wonder what it will be like when the Chinese invade? That makes me look at the day with new eyes.

6.45am. I get to Coles, I walk up to the door and nothing, it doesn’t open. I nearly walk into it in my just-woken-up state. The shop doesn't open until 7am. I look at my watch. Er!

I have 15 minutes to wait. Grrrr. Do I walk home, only to turn around to come back as soon as I get there, or do I wait? 

So, I walk to the nearest seat, which is across the road and down a bit to discover the biggest pool of bright orange vomit lying in front of it. Euw!

So, I head to the next nearest seat, in front of the old post office, to discover it is, of course, the tram stop as well, when the tram comes along and, despite me having my back to it and not reacting, it ding, ding, dings, loudly, after which it continues without actually stopping and I realise they were meant for me. Those ding, ding, dings. They don’t half piece your ears first thing in the morning, let me tell you. And now the cold is starting to seep into my skin. 

(I message my ex-boyfriend Mark for sympathy. He sympathises)

Anyway, I now have 2 minutes to walk to the big slidy doors. Nice chatting... er... journal. Blog? (I was saying that to Mark)

I have some lovely ambient music 🎵 though, so its not all tangerine vomit and ding, ding, dings. (Good thing I uploaded it to my iMusic yesterday)

I get milk and oranges and apples and butter.

Oh there’s a very chatty chick in a rainbow coloured swing dress talking overly animatedly to her male friend who is bare chested in tiny black shorts both chewing wildly passing me in Smith Street as I come out. Oh, I miss those days when they walk right up to me.

Oh, I should have bought two green bags, as I bought kilos of pink ladies and oranges, and with the milk too, I really needed two enviro bags just to even the load.

I think ma shoulder is going to drop right orf before I make it home. But it doesn't, I make it back.

Oh my, my hair is standing on end according to the shadow reflected onto my front door from the morning sun glowing behind me as I slide the key into the lock to open it. I should have looked in the mirror before I left.

I had that time when I rushed off to Coles to get something, early, and I was crossing Smith Street and I looked up and down for traffic then I looked straight across and I momentarily thought, Oh look some old dero is crossing the road toward me, and it turned out to be my own reflection in the big supermarket windows across the road. He laughs nervously.

But, as I say to David, repeatedly, no one cares. No one probably even noticed.

7.16am. I am home again.

I make coffee.

Otto and I sit together on the couch. Me with my laptop, Otto with his chew toy.

 

A Saturday Kind of Saturday

Sam tells me he took Otto out at 4.30am and Otto had a wee and a poo, when I wake up. A small, croaky voice from the depths passing on that vital information as I get up to greet the day.

6am. Otto and I are out the back waiting for Otto to have a wee. The Rainbow Lorikeets are loud in the gum tree, really loud, like fish & chips with seagulls at the beach loud. I could tell Otto wasn’t going to have a wee, he just sat and gazed up at me with his puppy face.

"Come on, more effort than that is required," I say to him.

He just gazes back with his big brown eyes, unmoved by my request.

I put Otto in his outside playpen. It wasn’t so cold that he couldn’t spend 5 minutes out there, even if I felt a little guilty for doing it. I got wallet from the bedroom and my laptop while I was there, tip toeing in and out. 

I headed over to the bakery and got bread. It is the last day they are open until next week, so today is the day.

The baker asked the question why do we need sleep. “I have never been able to work it out?”

Please no difficult questions before I have had my coffee, I think. “Because we like it,” I say. I know I have always liked it. It’s one of the few things I am good at.

“Yes, obviously, I like it too, but why do we need it?”

It was too heavy for me at that time, I could still feel the morning fog in my brain, besides I had a puppy I had to get out of his playpen and encourage to wee.

“Ah? Er?" I feel my eyes widen. "Yes well." I do that head tilt think and the inhale of breath thing. "You have a nice weekend,” I say.

“Yes, you too,” he says.

6.15am. I am out the back with Otto. He still has no inkling to wee. Tapping my foot with him won't help, I know that. Suddenly the Rainbow Lorikeets take off. It is suddenly 1000 decibels quieter. I hear them flying around, some circle around and come back to the gum tree.

“No, don’t come back,” I call to the universe. "As lovely as you are," I add quickly.

Otto takes off inside. Grrr! He and Bruno always seem to know when I am distracted and not exactly concentrating on them. Bruno when I am walking him and I start to text, he'll stop walking and sniff about the place to his heart's content. I run after Otto. I’m still unsure if he should be tackling the garden stairs at his age. He is quick.

I make coffee.

Otto sits on the couch with me.

I can’t remember what I thought of last night for the short stories I am working on – always write it down, I tell myself. Always write it down. I never remember.

Otto curls up and sleeps, as I look at my laptop.

Israel, Gaza, Israel, Gaza. Oh, it is awful, isn’t it. Is it awful that after reading about it for days, I now skip over it altogether? I guess it is?

Surely, Israel should just stop now.

7.53am. Sam and Bruno are up.

I take Otto out for a wee, and he finally does. Yay! Good boy. Good boy! Finally, you little fucker.

8am. I make Vegemite toast and coffee.

8.45am. I make more coffee. I take Otto out for a wee for a third time, puppies need to go regularly until their bladders grow. The little red & white bastard runs back inside. I run after him. He has to go in his cage if he doesn’t want to wee. I can't risk the carpet, beside that is a part of the crate technique of house training, curtail their freedom until they are house trained.

Otto barks in his cage as his breakfast is being prepared. I haven't had a bulldog that is quite so vocal as Otto.

11.47am. We walk Bruno to Victoria Street.

It is overcast, warm, but windy.

I stop off at The Salvos. Sam walks on with Bruno. I don’t buy anything.

I run all the way down Victoria Street afterwards, as I know Sam will be getting the hump by the time I get to him.

12.31pm. I get to The Hive. Sam heads inside straight away.

The wind is picking up.

12.43pm. We’re outside the butcher shop. 

Some drug fucked guy was lying on the footpath writhing about. At one point he pulls the front of his tracky’s down and gets his dick out, in front of all the punters walking past him on the footpath. He has red pubes and pale skin that looks as though it hasn’t seen sun light in decades. Then he stands up and acts as though he is in pain. He seems to be having an episode. He is making sounds like a wounded animal. We should really be asking him if he is okay, but he is incoherent with the pain. Suddenly he takes off down Victoria Street veering off into a laneway heading to a carpark.

Awful, really. Poverty and drug addiction with mental health thrown in. Which condition effects which other condition? It's kind of chicken, or the egg?

The sun has started to shine. The wind has started to blow harder.

12.49pm. We’re at the pork bun shop as Sam gets four pork buns for our lunch. The people, who I assume are the owners, come out the front fascinated with Bruno. People are so often fascinated with him.

The Vietnamese place where we normally eat lunch with Bruno on a Saturday, where the guys who run it are fascinated with him too, will be bold over when we turn up with two of them.

1.06pm. I went to Bunnings on the walk home. I had a disaster with some creeper falling down taking out some terracotta pots. Good thing I don't mind terracotta pots with scars, in fact, it improves some of them. So, I bought glue and terracotta pot sealer.

At the checkout everyone is faffing about. Seriously people get your acts together. I, at least, stand behind a guy with an incredible arse to perve at, not that it makes up for the continuing delays.

Sam waits out the front with the shopping bags and Bruno.

And with shopping bags over both shoulders and Bruno, I said to Sam, "Can't wait to add Otto to this mix."

One bulldog can be stubborn, two will be interesting. You see Buddy always walked off his lead, well, all the time we had him and Bruno together, so he just walked with us. Buddy was just a clever boy.

We walk up Victoria Street/Parade > Cambridge Street, where Sam leaves us to head home to check on Otto and his puppy bladder.

1.30pm. Bruno and I are home.

We ate a big pork bun and a smaller sweet pork bun for lunch.

I start uploading all the other CDs that I have, now that I have a big capacity laptop, which is one of the reasons I bought a 1 terabyte capacity laptop, so I can upload whatever I want. All those ambient CDs I only listen to occasionally, or haven’t listened to in the longest time. Buddha Bar, Real Ibiza, Café Del Mar, Leftism, and Pet Shop Boys, Deep Forest... 

I've got to get on and upload the rest of my CDs to iMusic. The theory is that then I can dispose of the physical CDs that take up so much room, but, um, er, I don't know if that will be happening. I'll store them some where, much to Sam's chagrin.

And that was kind of it, a Saturday kind of Saturday.

Otto has sloppy poo and we continue to take him out the back all night hoping to avoid a soft poo accident inside on his bedding, monitoring because if it keeps up we'll have to take him to the vet.

We ate leftover Mongolian Lamb, Bok Choy and beef. 

We watched Dog House. Some lucky chick gets a blue French Bulldog puppy to take home.

We watch George Clarke’s Amazing Spaces. Some people are so clever.

10pm. Sam and Bruno go to bed.

Bruno arrives back down in the lounge later.

I fluffed about waiting for Otto to wake up. Midnight, I take him outside and then take him upstairs to his night time playpen.

12.30am. Bruno and I go to bed.

Friday

6.15am. I was up. There were green poo bags on my bedside table, which reminded me of some vague memory of a glimpse of something going on last night. I opened my eyes, momentarily, and there were lights on and Sam was walking through the bedroom door, but I must have fallen instantly back to sleep instantly. I am a good sleeper.

I took Otto our for a wee. Bruno came downstairs with us. The birds were loud in the trees. Otto did a wee and then had diarrhoea.

I put Otto in his crate. 

I took the pizza boxes from last night and put them in the bin on the corner. I tip toed out there in the early morning light. Ha ha. I didn’t tip toe, I marched right out to the bin. I get rid of a lot of rubbish in the bin on the corner. That will teach the Yarra Council for separating our rubbish charge from our rates charge so as to circumventing the rates cap. Fuck them.

I got my laptop. I made coffee.

Bruno got up on one side of the couch. I got Otto out of his crate and put him on the other side of the couch. I had a bulldog head resting on each arm as I typed.

7am. Sam was up.

7.30am. I make Vegemite toast and coffee.

Sam feeds the dogs

8.30am. I make more coffee and head out into the sunshine in the back yard with Otto.

I re-write Irish Darren, one of my short stories from my fiction blog. It’s not very good. I am trying to improve it keeping what I already have, rather than scrapping the whole thing and starting again, which I have done with a few of them, or they are so extensively re-written they bear little resemblance to the original. But, that is what you do, that is a part of the writing process, you re-write, and you re-write and then you re-write again.

Irish Darren is still not great, it will need more work.

9.12am. The sun is shining. I go have a shower. Time to take Bruno for a walk. Our house guest Toby is pissing around in the bathroom, so I head out without a shower. Between him and Charlie, what the fuck do they do in there?

9.30am. I take Bruno for a walk.

Toby is coughing up his pot smoking lungs as we leave the house. He smokes pot in his room with the window open. We wonder if he thinks he is getting away with having sneaky joints in his room, when the reality is that he stinks the house out every night. We haven’t said anything because, well, we don’t really care. You think it would be triggering for me having stopped the pot, but it’s not, because, you know, there is no such thing as marijuana addiction, no matter what people like to tell you. 

The sun is shining.

Three tradie types walk towards me and Bruno at Archie’s, the first one and the second one are wearing (yellow/cream leather) cum fuck me boots, with the third one following them in Blunstones. I pictured the guy coming in 3rd fucking the other two, alternating from one to the other, with them on their knees side by side. Tra la la. As you do.

We met a guy from NZ outside the milk bar. He asks me about bulldogs. He says he’s always been interested in them. I tell him all about Bruno and Otto. He says he is staying somewhere close by and that he’d just walked his older married daughter to uni. I suggested RMIT and he thought that was it. His phone rang and we parted company.

We meet up with my neighbour and his Chow, we chat all the way to Nicholson Street. He says he would have owned two Chows if it hadn’t been for what to do with them when he travels. I agree, that is as yet the unsolved problem of having two bulldogs.

10am. We hit the Carlton Gardens. My neighbour heads towards Victoria Parade, Bruno and I head the other way. I get 20 poo bags, well, the roll is full, and I am nearly out. Fuck it. My rates are... of course, I have, actually, stepped into the next suburb, but so what, who cares.

We head down Moor Street.

10.12am. We hit Brunswick Street. It is a lovely morning. The sun is shining.

10.16am. We got to Chemistwarehouse to get eye drops. The chicks behind the counter admire Bruno.

10.20am. The brown and black striped dog with a white chest on a rope that barks at Bruno whenever it sees Bruno comes towards us up Brunswick Street. The dope on the end of the rope drags it across Brunswick Street away from us. I think it has on a muzzle and multiple leads. I’m never that happy when that poor untrained beast is anywhere near Bruno.

10.35am. We pass Faraday Cafe. If Bruno lay down under the shade of the umbrellas outside again, like he did last time we passed by, I was considering just getting a coffee and being done with it, but a guy comes out from inside and takes the last table right in front of us and Bruno didn’t lie down anyway. So we keep walking. Of course, by then, the thought of coffee was in my head, but it wasn't to be.

10.40am. We chat to another neighbour in her front yard whose dog I haven’t seen for some time, and she confirms her dog has died. She feeds Bruno. She says she keeps food in the front yard to feed the dogs passing by. She has put out hints to her family that she wants a new dog, but they say she is too old. So, she says she is just going to have to write to Santa.

10.48am. We meet Barney the Scotty Dog cnr my street. And while it starts off well, Barney soon bares his teeth and has a go at Bruno

10.52am. We’re home.

We ate luxo instant noodles with prawns and sea food for lunch.

2.30pm. I wasn’t going to go looking for CD/DVDs today, especially after doing it yesterday, but I thought, why not, what the fuck else is there to do? Life is short. Ha ha. And I rode my bike to The Salvos. To be quick. Sam had gone for a lie down, after being up last night doing puppy duty and Otto was asleep in his crate

3pm. I buy 3 CDs, Michael Bublé Xmas album, I couldn’t resist. I will never listen to it, but it’s for The Salvos, so who cares. I get Michael Bublé’s ‘It’s Time’ album with two bonus tracks Mack the Knife and Dream a little Dream of Me, and the Dirt Music sound track.

3.10pm. I am back from The Salvos. Sam is awake. Otto has pissed in his crate.

4pm Sam feeds the dogs.

I lay back on the couch to listen to Dirt Music sound track and fall asleep.

We ate leftover pork belly for dinner.

We watched Gardening Australia. Sam likes it, I kind of half tune out, funnily enough as I’m the one who grows the plants.

We watched Jack Whitehall in Italy. I can’t decide if he is funny, or if he is a twat? I like him none the less, twat, or not.

9.30pm. Sam went to bed with Bruno. He arrives back downstairs sometime later. Bruno, not Sam.

I gazed at YouTube.

I watched Mae West on Mr Ed. Oh Jesus, they can’t be serious, but, apparently, they were. There is Mae West being Mae West, it is almost too much to believe. I just don’t think we get her at all, like blacksmiths and wagon train mechanics, her time has well and truly past. She is really just bizarre, and once she was the biggest star in the world, well, America.

I took Bruno out for a wee at midnight.

I went to bed at 12.15am.

I think of things for a couple of the short stories I am working on, as I am falling asleep. I don’t write them down, as I had already turned out the light. I don’t remember them in the morning, surprise, surprise.

First Day Of My Weekend

I dreamed I was driving somewhere. I think it was up Canterbury Road towards Blackburn. No idea why? Someone was following me. No idea who, there was just that feeling of being followed, like in a movie. 

I ended up on this oval complex, I guess you might call it a stadium, but a small suburban stadium, rather than a big arena, where I am trying to manoeuvre the car through big potholes. It was a football field, or a cricket pitch, which I was tearing up.

Then I am in some sort of club house, where I am discussing being followed with some of the members, who seem to know all about who was following me. Some of them may have been followed. Don’t know who it was, but there was some sort of threat involved with it.

7.10am. I wake up. Otto is lying in his crate quietly chewing his bear. (He has a security teddy bear) He looks adorable.

Bruno comes downstairs with us.

It’s raining outside. Still? Otto wees straight away.

I’m busting for a wee as Otto pisses about while I wait for him to have a shit. I decide to piss in the garden. Bruno finally takes a dump, behind the bin where I can’t get to it easily with the long handled shovel. Yeah, good onya.

It’s cold. I make coffee. Otto chews his mattress. (Bulldogs are known for chewing up there beds, so the little guy is nothing out of the ordinary)

Some Trump loving, devout Christian, homo hating, election denier, climate sceptic, anti-abortion, cliche, voted in as new US House speaker, Mike Johnson. That will go well.

I tried having Otto on the couch next to me, but he wouldn’t settle. It is hard to work and to keep an eye on him so he doesn't plummet off the couch.

7.45am. I put him back in his crate.

Otto carries on so much in his crate that I take him outside again, as he only had one shit earlier and he normally always has two. He wees straight away. We run around the car. He suddenly charges off down the stairs and inside. Oh yes, at 12 weeks he has mastered the art of the escape.

Otto is chewing his rope. Then he is playing with a tennis ball. I get down and throw it for him. Bruno gets off the couch and he and Otto wrestle/play fight, for a while, until Bruno pins Otto down on the floor in a head lock and I decide Otto isn’t big enough to play with Bruno just yet and I put him back in his crate.

8.15am. Sam was up, he goes straight to Coles to get bulldog food.

I watch a stuck baby elephant in peril from a pride of lions get rescued by another elephant family charging in to save him. The matriarch keeps at the baby until she has freed him. My eyes well with tears.

I listen to Bette Midler sing All I Need to Know.

Otto carry’s on so much in his crate that, when he is quiet for a minute, I get him out and put him back on the couch with me and he quietens down. I just have him settled down quietly and Sam calls wanting to know if we need milk and I have to get up and check. Fortunately, Otto settles right back down for a second time.

The bulldogs sleep cuddle up to either side of me on the couch.

When Sam returns, he seems to be grumpy with me as is often the case now a days. I don’t know why? What happened to my sweet Sam, I ask myself? 

Well, if you ask him, he would probably say that he feels like he does a lot of the work around here while I have my head buried in my laptop writing. The curse of being a writer, it is primarily a solo pursuit. And writing is time consuming.

In my defence, we do have pre-negotiated roles and I do keep what I have agreed to do done. Maybe, I'm not so good on the 'extra' things. But, Sam does take over and do things, thinking he does things better than me, that is what he is like. It's just on those days, I guess, where he feels tired, perhaps, that he gets grumpy.

The bulldogs sniff noses across my lap. Adorable.

Sam feeds them.

Bruno goes out the front while Otto finishes his breakfast.

Otto comes in and sits on the couch with me. Bruno gets up on the couch too. I move Otto across the other side of the couch to Bruno, as Bruno doesn’t really make any allowance for their size difference and will sit on Otto without a second thought.

I look at Facebook. Oh, Rachel has been posting photos of daughter Amy’s wedding in NZ and I have been looking at them. Everybody went. 🤔

I watch some more Elephant YouTube videos. You know if ever there was a really big symbol for saving this big, beautiful world of ours...

10.30am. I take Otto out the back. We clean up spilt potting mix together. He’s adorable when he hangs out with me. We run around the car together. He is really fast.

11.05am. Otto is in his crate asleep.

I continue with re-writing my fiction blog, trying to make each post better than it had been. Some I just have to re-write somewhat, others I have to practically scrap in their entirety and write them again.

11.25am. I have a shower.

11.45am. I take Bruno for a walk, under the threatening grey clouds

We hadn’t got to the corner of our street and the rain began to fall, so we detour to Smith Street.

We take too long under the scaffolding over the footpath at the new build at 131 Smith Street, because we met up with Bronski the French Bulldog, after which Bruno sniffed about as Bruno does, and the worker says something to us. I don’t really understand what the worker guy is saying, I gather it is something about the dangers of the scaffolding. 

As we head out from under the scaffolding, actually, just walking along the footpath, you understand, I see, what I assume is a supervisor type, watching us. It is not until Bruno and I get a little further along Smith Street that I realise they were telling us to move along, a private developer, telling us on a public footpath to move along. Seriously? Fuck off, I think, some two blocks up the road. Property developers are ruining Fitzroy, I don't need fucken directions from them too.

12.15pm. We go to St Marks Recycle just for a sniff around. Of course, Bruno gets treats.

I get Fawlty Towers, Another Gay Movie (Oh yes, I know, tacky), Poltergays (no, I’d never heard of it either, turns out to be some French movie) and The Mary Tyler Moore show season 2. Why not, I think. I never watched The Mary Tyler Moore show regularly, but I did watch it occasionally in reruns of the reruns. It’s in a thin case and the nice lady behind the counter misses it and only charges me for 3 DVDs instead of 4. Should I have said something? Oh, fuck it, I buy lots of DVDs from them, surely, I would be considered a regular customer?

We left St Marks and headed towards Johnson Street. There was a woman at the take away coffee shop with a Border Collie that was staring at Bruno too intently to be considered friendly without asking. She was a beret wearing, 60 year old airhead to be sure.

“Is your dog friendly?” I ask.

“Som…times,” she says. “But not with puppies.” As her dog tries to bite Bruno as I pull Bruno away. “He’s not a puppy, is he?”

“No, he’s not a puppy,” I say.

We're most of the way back down Smith Street when there is a dog barking on the other side of the road in front of the old post office. I look over to see a middle aged woman with a big staffy/putbull/loser’s type dog on a lead charging off with her barely able to hold on to it. Yay! I think. That's going to go well. Should I keep watching to see when she loses control of that thing completely?

12.36pm. We’re home.

We ate Mongolian Lamb with long beans and rice.

When I realise the Fawlty Towers DVd is only 3 episodes and not a complete season, I look up Fawlty Towers DVDs on eBay? I could get them quite cheap but decide in the end not to spend the money.

1.30pm. David calls. He talks about meeting Torben, one of his ex’s. I take notes as he tells the story.

David met Torben at boiler club sauna Berlin, he’d been doing 5 days of Purple Princess meth, he was emaciated. He went to Torben’s place and saw the shrine to the dead boyfriend taking up centre position in Torben’s lounge room, for the first time, tra la la love me do. (Of course, David thought it was romantic and not weird) 

They were supposed to meet next day later but David went to sex club book shop, it was hot, temperature, he completely collapsed (not sure what other kind of collapse there is?), there may have been G involved, David suggests. (I’m shocked) Eventually, the attendant told David he’d been there all day and he had to get out. So, he didn’t meet Torbene as planned. So, he headed back to hotel tail between his legs, thought he’d messed it up. Messaged Torben and said sorry. Said he collapsed in store, didn’t say what store, for obvious reasons, she didn’t want to look like a complete skank. 

The next day Torben was waiting for him in his hotel foyer, reading a book. (he fell instantly in love with the book reader, didn't take it as a red flag) David cried sorry, sorry, sorry.  Sorry, sorry, sorry.

“Come back to my place,” says Torben. 

And David did. They lit candles at Torben’s. They went to a church, 👀 David vowed to throw his drugs away. Took a taxi to airport. Torben said don’t worry.

It was the year before David’s big birthday so, it was 5 years ago.

We ate pizza for dinner.

We watched The Amazing Race. Harry and Teddy came in last, but it was a predetermined non-elimination leg. Good thing, I like Harry & Teddy. Harry is adorable.

Sam went to bed at 9.30pm with Bruno. They both like going to bed early.

Otto and I lie on the couch.

Bruno arrived back downstairs at 11.15pm just after I took Otto out for a wee, then Bruno and Otto headed outside for a wee together. Adorable, the two of them running side by side.

Then I sat on the couch with a bulldog sleeping on either side of me as I watched Will & Grace until midnight, so I can take Otto for a late wee before he goes to bed.

12.05am. I took Otto for a wee and took him upstairs to his sleeping playpen.

12.15am. Bruno and I went to bed.

Shitting the Bed

5am. Otto had an upset stomach and he shit his bed. Sam got up and cleaned it up, while I pretended to be asleep. 

When I realised what I was doing, I felt bad. Where did this behaviour come from? Is this what I am like?

Sam put Otto back in his bed and turned off the light.

Moments later, Otto shit his clean bed. I got up and grabbed Otto, to try and lessen the probability that he'd get shit on himself. Sam pulled the clean bed apart. 

Thinking about my earlier behaviour, I got dressed and washed the poo off the sheet in the laundry sink. Later, when I said I'd put the washing machine on, Sam took over and did it himself.

Sam said he was going to stay up with Otto. I said I was awake by then and that I would stay up with Otto. Sam said I went to bed later than he did and that I should go back to bed. Sam seemed to want to do it, so I, knowing that I probably wouldn't sleep, went back to bed.

I lay in bed with Milo purring at my back and watched the night outside turn to day. I wondered about my earlier behaviour and wondered if I was that selfish person? Am I a selfish person? Maybe, me feeling a little friendless at the moment isn't all in my head? Or, at least, maybe there is a reason for it? And, of course, I couldn't sleep, not then, not that I thought that I was going to.

So, at 6am. I sat up in bed with Milo and my laptop, but strangely, my laptop wouldn't turn on, it was dead. So, I headed downstairs looking for power.

Sam was cuddled up on the couch with Bruno. Otto was asleep in his crate.

I got the power cord and tiptoed to the study.

"What are you doing?" came a voice behind me from the lounge room.

"My laptop is dead, I'm just getting the power cord."

"Are you up now?"

"Yes, I didn't think I would sleep."

"I'm going to bed then," said Sam. And then he was gone.

6.15am. I made coffee and signed into work. Bruno sleeps at my feet. Bruno's my boy. Well, he's Sam's boy too. Bruno lies against the side of my foot keeping it warm. His snoring adds a slight massaging effect to my feet.

Tuesday

Tuesday... nyr! 

What can I say about Tuesday?

I'm just pissing it away, Tuesday, watching YouTube on my personal laptop, sitting at my work computer in my study. Classic car rescue channels are my favourite. And for those of you who say, see, watching YouTube you should be in the office, not true, I watched YouTube in the office yesterday for two hours. An hour of that was my lunch hour, sure, but the other hour wasn't. 

I should continue re-writing my fiction blog but, you know, there is only so much creative blood I can have drained writing fiction before I have to stop to let my blood supply replenish. I've always known that. So just now I am in a 'replenish' stage. I'll get back to the re-writing my stories soon enough.

I just went outside to check the letterbox, for my new parking permit that replaces the one that expired 10 days ago, and it is really nice outside. Warm and fresh and a great day. It is a little windy, but I have always loved the wind, ever since I was a kid. It's funny being inside all day and missing that, I think, as I come back inside. But, 10 days with an expired parking permit and no parking ticket? Do you think that's how well the council parking officers patrol the parking permit system? Or, do you think they give some leeway to permit holders? Hmmmmm? I wonder.

My parking permit did come in the mail.

Otto's pedigree papers came in the mail too.

I signed out of work at 3pm and took Bruno for a walk. 

Monday in the Office

Monday, I am in the office, sad face. What a waste of time, is going to the office. Companies should just face facts, your employees kept you viable by working from home during the pandemic, so now it is time to offer them the same privilege in return. Nobody wants to go back to the office, except for sado attention seekers who have nothing else in their lives but the office, (I jest, of course, but some people say they need the interaction of the office, weird huh?) deal with it.

I see Boris face to face. That's nice. She asks about my weekend. She asks about Otto. I have to push myself to ask her about her weekend? That's terrible isn't it. And you all thought I was a nice person. You do think I am a nice person, don't you? Funny, that is something I know nothing about. Some people say that is how it should be.

I get to the office at 6.30am. The lights clank on one by one as I enter the floor. All my work is done by mid morning, getting there so early, and all. I have 1 boring meeting with my team in the early afternoon, where they all yap on about goals and achievements and I try to be interested. Grrr! I leave at 3pm. Day done. Not too hard.

Lovely.

I take Bruno for a walk when I get home. It is a lovely afternoon. I can hardly wait to take both Bruno and Otto walking. That will be fun. Hard work. Thursdays and Fridays when I take them on my own during my days off. We'll see how we go.

Sunday It Rained

I went to visit my mate Jill early, to see how she was recovering from her heart attack. A heart attack? Jasus! I needed to take my car for a run, anyway, so Bruno and I went to surprise her. She was surprised.

Sam didn't come. He stayed home and cleaned. 

I listened to the new Rolling Stones album on the drive down. 

Jill had a friend staying looking after her, as it turned out. 

I said, "You've got someone here, so I can just go again."

"Oh, that's lovely," said Jill.

25th - I'm not really sure why I said that, now that I read it back? I'm not really sure why I even write it here? Was I disappointed my surprise was, if I said ruined, it would be overstating it, may be blunted? Made lesser? I don't know? I don't think so. I think it was supposed to be a joke. Was I trying to be funny?

Jill seemed fine.

Her friend was nice. We drank coffee and talked about old times. How we used to like smoking, me and the friend, and drinking, that was Jill and her friend. I have never been a drinker, it makes me tired and low energy, I've never really seen the attraction, or got the buzz other people must get.

We took the dogs to the park, not that Jill is allowed to walk dogs yet, so her friend walked her dogs. There were kids playing soccer in the park, so Bruno, the ball obsessed hound, had to stay on his lead. The park was nice.

I came home and Sam, Bruno and I went grocery shopping. It is easier taking one bulldog shopping than it is to take two. Although, we took two bull dog's grocery shopping for years, so don't be a pussy, I tell myself. What I am trying to say, about which I am not being very clear, is that it is easier taking two bulldogs shopping when one of them is voice trained and off-lead trained and is not a puppy of only months of age.

A couple of weeks and Otto can come too. We shiver with anticipation.

The rain fell. The sky was grey. It has been that sort of weather these last few days.

I slept on the couch in the afternoon, with my laptop on my stomach. It is surprising it hasn't gone crashing to the floor, as I have a habit of falling asleep on the couch with it on my stomach. Oh, wouldn't Sam be pleased with that.

Lovely.

Have you heard Americans use the word drug, for dragged? I hear it a lot on YouTube channels that I watch.

Americans really do have their own English language, now don't they.

Saturday

Saturday? What can I say? The weather is warm, even if it is overcast and a little windy. 

Bruno went for a walk this morning. We met up with another bulldog owner, he said he can't wait to meet Otto. A few more weeks before Otto can go out and mix with everyone else.

Otto is chew, chew, chewing. He's a biter, I haven't had a biter before. His needle like teeth fucken hurt, let me tell you. I have bite marks all the way up my arms, my left arm primarily. The little fucker. I've googled what to do. I'm trying to get him out of the habit.

My friend Jill had a heart attack, last weekend. She had a blockage and consequently had a stent inserted. I picked her up from hospital on Thursday. I was going to fire up my Peugeot and give it a run, it needs a run, down to her place today, for a cup of tea, but I didn't. I piked out on the idea. I am a terrible person.

I can't decide if I am hot, or cold today. I keep taking my hoodie off and then putting it back on. It's annoying. It is one of those day, maybe just a little humid, perhaps.

Now, I am watching a doco on Turkey. We both want to travel, but buying a new puppy isn't compatible with that desire. What were we thinking? No travel for us for some time, I guess.

Ha ha. Already, it is lovely seeing the two bulldogs together. I sat up late with Otto last night. Sam when to bed with Bruno. Bruno came back down late for a wee, and Otto ran out into the back yard with him to wee. They looked adorable together.

Rolling Stones - Hackney Diamonds

Rolling Stones new album, that's all I've been thinking about today. I took Bruno for a walk early so I could listen to it on Spotify

I can't lie to you, first listen and I was a little underwhelmed, but, you know, it always takes a few listens to get into it, to get the feel of it. Always.

In the afternoon, I went to JBHiFi and bought the CD. I still think there is better quality on CDs. Then I uploaded the CD to my iTunes.

The tracks in the middle of the CD are still kind of nothing. But, they'll reveal themselves in time.

The violets are out. Otto has been destroying them, of course, so I thought I'd take a shot before they are gone altogether

 

Tuesday

The referendum? Dutton's Political Tool, I think.

Dutton tanked the referendum just so he could have the Club of Failure with which to beat Anthony Albanese over the head.

It's a shame that First Nation's People became collateral damage at the hands of Dutton and the conservatives.

If you don't believe me, just watch what Dutton is doing with that failure now.

Bruno lies at my feet, as he does most days. Otto is in his crate, which he will be in for another few months. I can't wait for the two of them to be curled at my feet as I work.

Happiness, is a bundle of bulldogs.

Work is slow. Signing on at 6am, right after I make my coffee, I get everything done pretty early.

I am eating an orange cut into 8 segments, what would I call that, morning tea?

David calls. It's about the Miss Saigon tickets. I haven't paid him for them. I had just finished writing out our phone call from yesterday, so I read it to him.

"Your writing is so good, you have to promise me that you will publish it."

"I promise," I say, as I hit publish on my blog. He doesn't know I have a blog. Promise fulfilled, I think.

David Calls

9.30am. David calls me saying now that he was up early, what was he supposed to do?

I laugh. "This isn't early," I say. "Has your house guest left yet?"

"No," he whispers.

"What?" I question incredulously. "Does she not know the 1 day house rule?"

Apparently, she thinks it is a 5 day house rule. "Oh, I don't know how that happened," says David.

"Tell her to get out," I say.

"I told her not to ask me to go anywhere, do anything, walk, ride, go on excursions, or drive her anywhere."

"How many days has it been?"

"She's been making me breakfast and smoothies and she's been cleaning, and been keeping out of my way. And walking the dog. She's been really good."

"How many day?"

"Oh, too many already."

"Did you say that when she finds your staring out the kitchen window, your fingernails making scratching sounds on the glass, with wire coat hangers in the other hand slapping your thigh, all the time you are chanting, "I don't want this, I don't want this, I don't want this, it is time for her to go."

"She's been warned that when it becomes too Mommie Dearest..."

We both chuckle.

The 'No' Vote Won

It really is a shame that Australian's are so hard hearted that they couldn't give the most disadvantaged members of Australian society some help with a voice over their own future.

Really, it is a shame.

You know, we are still going to have to address the First Nation's people's disadvantage, and for all the 'no' voters, how do you propose to address that? 

How do we now look at legislation that address' housing, poverty, employment, education, life expectancy, incarceration for Fist Nation's people when it isn't working under the current system?

This made me laugh, and you have to love the things that make you laugh.

We went out and ate Mexican for lunch, Sam, Bruno and I.

It was overcast, but warm, warm enough for a t-shirt.

We order nachos and enchiladas. 

I should’ve taken a hay fever table. It gets me in the back of the throat now a days, it never used to in the past. I cough uncontrollably. Sam tells me to stop talking and let it calm down, and although I think this advice is stupid, it works. I don't tell him that, after my eye rolling at his suggestion.

We did grocery shopping afterwards.

We didn't do much else for the day.

Our buddy Tim, who has been staying with us, left for the final time. We all said we'd miss each other.

My other mate, Matt, came over and got my possum trap. He's waging war with the Lesbians who live a few doors away. The lesbians' cats keep coming into his yard and spraying. He's now going to catch them and give them to the council. 

"That should go well for neighbourly relations."

He shrugged. "Nyr! What can you do."

Matt bought me a copy of The Ritz, a cult favourite movie amongst my friends.

Other than that, it was just teev until Sam called stumps.

Vote Yes

A rather genteel line at the voting station

We went to vote this morning, Sam, Bruno and I. Sam was suggesting going in the afternoon, but I thought, get it over and done with. 

We stood with a couple who had two Groodles. We chatted dogs.

We all stood in line patiently. There was a 30 minute wait. There was a lady with a cream lab, but Cocker Spaniels seemed to be the dog of choice today with the voters.

When we got to the door, the lady with the Groodles confirmed it was okay to take the dogs into vote.

"Yes, sure," said the offical. "The dogs are more interesting than the people." We all laughed.

And we all went into to vote.

No sausage sizzle though, what was with that? I could easily have sucked on a sausage while I was waiting.

Friday 13th

I've always chewed the skin around my nails. All my life. But, now a days if I chew it, I get infected fingers and thumbs. So, I am careful not to do it anymore. But, I caught myself having just chewed off the skin around my thumb the other day, and hey presto an infection. My doc tells me to soak it in warm water to draw the infection out, but I have found by loading it up with Betadine, that works too. Pretty gruesome, hey? But, I thought a good look for Friday 13th. 

7am. Bruno and I head downstairs.

Sam and Tim, our house guest, are already up chatting.

I make coffee.

I look at the news online.

Israelis Palestinians, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

There is something about Palestinian protests in Sydney have been banned, Jewish protests in Sydney have not. I wonder why?

There are some great photographers covered in The Guardian.

I had the bits I made up in my head when I first woke up to the short story I am currently re-writing.

9.41am. I take Bruno for a walk.

We meet Jackson Wag at the gate. “Where’s Bronco Billy?” Jackson Wag asks. (That was Jackson Wag’s contribution to the naming process)

“Hang on,” I say. Knowing Otto is on the couch next to Sam in the study and easily got, I go and get him.

I bring Otto out. “Here’s Bronco Billy.”

Jackson Wag pats him. “Is he Bronco Billy, or Otto?”

“He is Otto,” I say.

“I don’t care,” says Jackson Wag. “He’ll always be Bronco Billy to me.”

I laugh.

“I think you have done very well with him,” says Jackson Wag.

Jackson Wag walks around to the shops with us. The old barber is going to be a perfume shop. The old dress designer is going to be a pop-up perfume shop. 

That’s a lot of perfume, I think.

I’m listening to Marcia Hines, Queen of Pop.

9.55am. A cute guy cnr Brunswick Street and Gertrude Street smiles adoringly at Bruno. The cute guy has on sky blue track pants that show off his bubble butt admirably. Nice, I think. I’m more attracted to how beautifully he looked at Bruno more so than how he fills his pants, but you know, one can look.

The rain starts to fall as we head down Brunswick Street. Damn, I think! We seek shelter under the nearest awning, of which there aren’t many, Bruno not hurrying for a second, you understand. We head under the awning outside 137 Brunswick Street.

We wait for 10 minutes, long enough for two cute tradies to walk towards us, one of them smiling at Bruno; to giving directions to the Fitzroy Townhall; to having a perv on a tall slim bike rider who appears to want the closed bike shop in front of which Bruno and I are standing.

10.12am. I cross Bell Street typing on my phone with a big white Ute turning left into Bell Street. I can almost feel the agro radiating from the cabin of the vehicle. Mate, I’m well aware of you turning left despite looking down at my phone, but never the less, cars have to give way to pedestrians. It is amazing how simpletons take up points politicians make with earnest determination.

10.15am. An impossibly cute 18 yr old twink comes walking towards me as we pass Vasette, with butter for skin and dimples in his cheeks, with his hoodie hood pulled over his adorable head. When I look back, waiting for Bruno to have a piss, he has the most delectable arse in his grey shorts.

10.17am. We turn right into Johnson Street. Bruno gets some water from the bowl at the shop on the corner. The sky is still overcast, but I don’t mind the cool when I am walking.

10.20am. The bull terrier spins around in the tattoo shop at the glass doors to the street when he sees Bruno, which he often does. Bruno nonchalantly pisses on the glass doors, which is what he often does.

The brown Border Collie bares its teeth inside its shop a bit further along. It’s really surprising behaviour from a Border Collie. Its owner moves quickly towards it. It must be new, it did the same thing yesterday. She looked kind of concerned, as if she would have asked me to take my dog away. Let’s see her give that ago?

10.30am. Bruno wants to go into the dog wash shop, as always. Always. There must be good smells in there.

We meet up with Astroo, the St Barnard’s owner. Astro is dead, and she has had her new dog for ages, but I don’t know what else to call her. We chat about Otto. She says she can’t wait to meet him. I should ask her her new dog’s name.

A bit further up at one of the antique/junk shops, the owner is opening up, I stop to look at some very nice antique draws he has in the window, Bruno goes to pee, the guy says something to me, I can’t hear him because I have music playing in my headphones, Bruno pees, I say, “pardon,” pretty much knowing what he was saying from him pointing at Bruno, but Bruno had wee’d, “Never mind the guy says.” Seriously, are you trying to police dogs pissing in the street, I think.

We meander up Smith Street towards home. We take it at a gentle pace, of course we do. Bulldogs are in no hurry, generally.

10.49pm. An old guy stops me in Smith Street to tell me Bruno is beautiful.

“He is,” I say.

“How old is he?” he asks.

“Four,” I say.

“Well, he is a beautiful dog.”

It is a lovely day for a walk. 

A lady with a Springer Spaniel off its lead crosses the Street and the Springer Spaniel and Bruno do the ‘hello dance of dogs’ in the middle of the street.

10.56am. We’re home again.

Oh, seriously, it must be time for more coffee.

I’m listening to Marcia Hines Right Here Right Now.

I continue re-writing Try To Be A Good Person.

12.15pm. I go to wasabi Saloon and get two karaage chicken bento boxes for lunch. $36.

I chewed the skin off the edge of my thumb the other day, at the time I did it, I knew that I shouldn’t. And as has been the case of late, now it is infected. I have been putting betadine on it for the last, however many, days to try and fix it. The alternative is soaking it in warm salty water at night until the puss is drawn out, which is annoying being tied to that glass for an extended period of time. I reapplied the betadine in the kitchen just before, after which I pulled at the side of my thumb hoping the betadine might penetrate more easily by doing so. You know, Betadine isn’t going to work simply sitting on top of the skin. As I pulled at my thumb, a snake of puss burst out from next to my fingernail, so that was good. I pulled at it some more, hoping that would allow more Betadine to penetrate.

It does feel less hot and solid now.

My CDs arrived. Very excited. These are some of my favourite albums that suddenly became available. Lovely. This is the first time I have had them in digital format.

Sam’s Meta Quest 3 goggles arrives and I played shooting the aliens invading. It was fun.

Do You Work To Live? Or Do You Live To Work?

And my weekend starts, lovely. I wouldn't have it any other way.

5.15am. Otto is awake in his play pen. I see his little head moving in the dim light. I pull on my clothes in the dark and take him outside for a wee and a shit, and he does both.

I put him in his crate in the lounge room and make coffee.

Bruno lies at the door of Otto's crate for a time, as though he is keeping an eye on him, then he joins me on the couch.

I scroll Facebook for the first time in ages, I don't know why. This is why I don’t go on Facebook any more, it becomes a lot of mindless scrolling. I never really know what I am looking for, just something better.

Do you work to live? Or do you live to work?

I have very rarely worked full time in my life. It was always 4 days per week, having Monday off. Now it is 3 days. I did work full time in the 2000s, at the most miserable work place. I'm not sure those two things necessarily go together, but in this case it did.

The CFO was my big boss. The Director of Finance was the next one down. The CFO was nice. The Director of Finance was a psychopath. Unfortunately, the CFO deferred back to the Directory of Finance, and she made all of our lives miserable.

The CFO was a lesbian who operated along lesbian lines, looking to the Director of Finance as her Girl Friday, if you like.

The Director of Finance was mentally unstable, suffering most obviously from anorexia for a number of years.

The Director of HR wasn't interested in doing anything about it, as essentially, there was nothing in it for her. She was an old war horse of years standing, who only ever thought of herself.

The three of them ganged up on the Director of IT forcing him out of the company. He commented that it was like meeting with the Witches of Eastwick in his final meeting.

"Ohhhhhhh." Look of disbelief. "They are first class bitches, the 3 of them."

Anyway, that was my years of full time work. Those bitches taught me it just wasn't worth it. Not the money, not the reputation, nothing.

I took a couple of years off, after that. Then I did contract work. Then I worked full time for a couple of years. Then I quit to write a novel, and when that novel didn't eventuate, I stared working 3 days per week.

Do what you love, if you are lucky enough to be in a position to do so.

7am. Sam is up.

I make more coffee.

I make Vegemite toast for my breakfast. Sam doesn't eat breakfast.

We have a mate staying, Tim. He says he wants to lose weight, so he isn't eating breakfast either. Although, he gives in a little later and feeds his face.

Otto barrels around the house like only puppies can. He leaps about. He hangs off Bruno's face. Bruno looks philosophical.

I am still scrolling Facebook. Somebody stop me.

9am. The rain starts to fall heavily. Last night's weather report said it would only rain for a short time today. Is the TV weather report ever accurate? I don't know.

Sam has started work.

I make more coffee.

I'm still mindlessly scrolling Facebook. I bite the bullet and just sign out of it. There, done! I'm done with that shit.

Bruno and I are on the couch together. Now, where was I with writing?

Otto is back in his crate, after he turned into a biting machine.

I am trying to will myself back to my fiction blog and the re-writing of my stories, which is going quite well.

Vote Yes to the Voice to Parliament

Go on, vote Yes to the voice to parliament.

Why not?

Can you give me a logical reason to vote no?

Because I just can't think of one?

It is an advisory body to legislation that effects First Nations People.

Its only function is to give advice to the government of the day, so that government can pass more effective legislation that effects First Nations People.

That's it.

That's what you are voting on.

Vote Yes To The Voice To Parliament

 Because it is an advisory body, with the power to advise.
And it might just make some people's lives better at no cost to you.
Wouldn't you like to make some of the most disadvantaged people's lives better?

The Yes Vote to a Voice to Parliament

The yes vote for the voice to parliament for First Nation's People, is for an advisory body to advise on legislation that effects first Nation's People.

The only power you are deciding upon is for advice to be given, the only power this body will have is to give advice. Advice that the government of the day doesn't have to act on, if it chooses not to.

That is what the vote is for. First Nations People to have a say in what effects their lives.

It is not a difficult question, despite what the conservative opposition says, which is determined to use the referendum as a political tool to boost their own vote and to diminish the government's vote.

Yes, Peter Dutton is using the referendum as a political tool to gain political power, at the expense of First Nation's People.

So, you can vote 'yes' to potentially improve the lives of First Nation's People.

Or you can vote 'no', to improve Peter Dutton and the Liberal Parties chance of winning at the next federal Election.

It is really straight forward, it is not difficult.

What The Fuck Is Wrong With People

It was a sparkling morning for a walk, still dark, just with the slightest blush of light starting to show in the sky above.

The street lights still dazzled like diamonds against the night sky.

The car headlights lit up the streets further than I could see, or cared to look.

There is something embracing about being cosseted by the dark in the fresh, early morning air.

As I start to cross Brunswick Street at Victoria Parade, there are no cars turning as I start to cross, as I get part the way across a VW Golf pulls up ready to turn left, the driver pointing semi angrily, presumably at the little red man I was then walking against, and without reacting, I think, what kind of miserable half-bit loser are you, buddy, that you can’t let someone cross the street without your sad, little tantrum. You are everything that is wrong with the world today you miserable tosser.

The Sun Shone

It was just lunch, all we could manage on a sunny day. Ha ha. We walked, of course. I don't remember the last time I drove my car? Bruno attended, dutifully sleeping under the lunch table in his resting super dog pose.

We went back to the Vietnamese place where, a few weeks ago, we tried to walk off without paying. They had to come after us. That was embarrassing.

I thought Sam paid. Sam thought I paid. Oops. Eating outside, it was as though we just got up and walked.

I think it was good that they had us back. I think the owner made a joke about it, but I didn't really understand what he said. 

I think he said, essentially, he was pleased that the misunderstanding hadn't put us off returning. That's nice of him, really, I thought, if that is what he said.

Ah, I guess business is business.

Their tables were slatted and later I'd discover Bruno's fur was crusty from the fish sauce we spilt through the slats of the table and onto him below, poor baby. Vietnamese is quite messy to eat, wrapping everything in lettuce and mint and what have you. I wonder if it drove him nuts, smelling it and not being able to lick it.

Sam shopped for groceries afterwards, while Bruno and I sat in the entrance way with our backs resting against the wall, well, my back was resting, Bruno was stretched out across the tiles, guarding the shopping bags Sam would deliver to us intermittently.

Some guy wanted to blab on to me about Jake and the fat man.

"Yes, I know the show."

"Yes, he has a dog just like Bruno."

"No, I never watched the show."

How many times have I had Jake and the fat man conversations?

The sun shone.

Sunday.

My favourite thing at the moment, Blood Oranges

 

I'm up early, it is Saturday, a day just naturally made to be blown off. If only everyday was Saturday, lie would be bliss. I take Otto for a wee and then return him to his sleeping pen in the bedroom. 

I make coffee.

Sam arrives downstairs a couple of hours after me with a puppy in his hands. Sam takes him for a wee.

Bruno is up last.

The bulldogs get goat’s milk, as a pre-breakfast starter. Do you know how much goat’s milk costs? Well, no, neither do I, but Sam tells me it is expensive.

I eat Vegemite toast and drink more coffee for breakfast remaining wrapped in the big, pink blanket on the couch, a very Saturday morning kind of thing.

Probably piss about for most of the morning. Harness up the big hound and head out for lunch, I'm thinking. Sam is too, I just asked him. Otto can't go yet, but soon it will be the four of us finding a table on the footpath for déjeuner. Sam says ramen. Grocery shopping. You know the usual Saturday kind of shit. 

The weather is nothing. That hint of summer we had seems to have been just that, a hint. I'm not complaining though, if all the reports of the summer to come are anything to go by.

Walking Bruno to Bunnings

Midmorning, Bruno and I walk to Bunnings to get something to attach the creeper to the wall. (Oh yes, cross something of the to do list)

It’s overcast, the sky is grey. It’s a bit cold.

They are doing some sort of filming cnr Smith Street and Gertrude Street, don’t know what, but they have big equipment which is all black. One of the camera guys says, “Bulldogs, my Favourite dogs.”

I hear myself say, “I have two of them.” Sam says I always manage to get in the two of them fact, if I only have one of them with me. Prior to getting Otto it was, I used to have two, after Buddy died.

We wander through the streets of Collingwood, me and my dog. It was just the morning for it. Bruno and I. Walking my dog, it is one of life’s great pleasures.

We stop off at the water bowl in Cambridge Street where the nice lady has the shop into which Bruno always wants to go. 

“There must be good smells in here,” I tell her.

She had a friend with her today. They told me how gorgeous Bruno is and I’ll admit that I am vain enough to enjoy that, yeah, sure I am. And soon I will have two beautiful bulldogs’ that people can admire. That is not the reason for buying Otto, no it is not, the unexpected joy I got from getting Bruno was watching what buddies he and Buddy became, it became one of my favourite things watching how lovely the two of them were together.

Of course, I showed them photos of Otto in a heres-one-I-am-preparing-off-camera kind of scenario.

The friend took photos of Bruno and asked permission to post a photo of him to her Instagram page, which I stupidly forgot to ask the name of which. She said she had a schnauzer.

11.11am. We’re at Bunnings. Isle 5 looking for what I rather inarticulately describing as U shaped wire things with sharp ends that you hammer in. I can’t find them initially, so I go find one of the workers to ask again.

A guy with one of those pig-eyed pitbull type dogs (this is a comment on the owner not the dog. My stepson, Fenn, had a pitbull and she was gorgeous) at the end of one of the isles had to calm his dog down and reprimand him when he got excited when he saw Bruno and all I could think was you are the type who will get dogs banned in Bunnings by bringing that thing here.

Like in Coburg Bunnings that day when ‘they’ wouldn’t let Bruno in without a muzzle, with me asking the rather officious Bunnings worker if she thought she could get a muzzle on Bruno. She counter claimed that I couldn’t guarantee that Bruno wouldn’t cause a fight in the store, with me absolutely claiming I could guarantee that Bruno wouldn’t cause a fight in the store, when that rather opinionated 3rd person halfwit chimed in saying loudly, “I’m sure that is what all dog owners claim.” And I told him to fuck of and mind his own business, at which point the you-can-drop-the-attitude-you-only-work-in-shop elderly Bunnings team member, and suspected dog hater, decided my time was over, judge’s decision was final kind of moment. “Duh!”

The guy I ask for a second time gives me more specific directions and I find them. They are called staples. Bruno lies out in the middle of the isle so nobody can walk past, of course he does, as I try to find the biggest size.

11.22am. We’ve got our galvanised staples and we’re heading home.

11.30am. Bruno takes a dump in Cromwell Street just in front of a doorway to an office, or a café, or something. Sometimes Bruno gets a bit of poo stuck in his butt hole, occasionally, which I wipe out with the poo bag before I pick up the turds, and as I do a guy comes through the doorway.

“Wiping your dog’s arse, are you mate,” he says.

“What?” I say, rather instinctively, kind of the answer you give when you don't want to give an answer. 

He is still laughing, thinks it is funny. “Wiping your dog’s arse, are you mate,” he repeats.

No, I am flying a balloon, and, well, you probably don’t need to get your eyes tested this year, simultaneously ran through my head, but I say nothing and perhaps unfairly think idiot. I don’t know, big, tall streaks of Aussie sarcasm stating the fucking obvious, what am I supposed to think?

There is a guy on a small tractor spraying weeds at the edge of the footpath in Langridge Street, which, of course, Bruno wants to sniff, so we cross to the other side of the road. I am still concerned as I’m not sure if I am seeing the residue of earlier spraying, or if it is just the leftover effects of the previous rain. My mind fluctuates from one to the other all the way up Langridge Street to Smith Street.

I would add that I bought my favourite muffin here, thick white chocolate icing, with a vanilla sponge with rhubarb filling, except simultaneously I am in denial about it, as I am not supposed to be eating such things, and rather mysteriously it was stale as though it wasn’t baked today and it was disappointing and when I was down to the last few mouthfuls and Bruno pulled on his lead unexpectedly, as bulldogs do, and it fell out of my hand plop onto the footpath, I wasn’t upset. I left it there in all its creamy glory contrasted against the charcoal grey of the bitumen footpath almost without looking back.

11.40am. Bruno lies down cnr Smith & Gertrude Streets outside Burnside. Everybody comments, people always find it charming, for some reason. Big, boof-head dogs lies down seemingly too pooped to continue, maybe it is tied in with our notions of mistreatment of dogs that are over walked. The lady across Gertrude Street with the shop and the miniature black poodle was there, she smiles, I miss catching her eye to say hello. 

I’m getting Bruno to his feet.

The really cute worker from Burnside comes out and crouches down saying, “Do you mind if I pat your dog.”

“Sure,” Handsome, you can pat anything you want. “His name is Bruno,” I say. But, of course, Bruno is not one to suck up to strangers, handsome, or not, just because they want him to and he walks away.

We head up the Gertrude Street hill to home.

Perhaps, I should Have Made A List

The sun shines down, dappled and soft. The rain has stopped, it seems to have finally fucked off. The water in the pond sounds all tinkly and soft, as the pump pushes it out into a mushroom swirl, so the gold fish can breathe more easily than not. Bruno lies next to me on the big pink woollen rug, which he uses as a bunny, on which to lie his big gorgeous mug, which I have pulled across my knees, like my grandmas used to do when they were alive. Actually, neither of my grandmas needed a rug across their knees, one was too busy at 92 up ladders painting her eves, and the other one was anaesthetised on fags and brandy she’d have drip fed to her throughout the day. 

I have things to do today, none of which now come to mind, as I am just too warm cuddled up to my dog in the morn. It isn’t yet 9am, so I have plenty of time to get things done, however I’m feeling less and less and less inclined as the morning moves along, as I got up frightfully early not long after 5. Next time I will make a list, rather than committing everything to mind.

Otto is in his crate, after bouncing all around the house, hanging from Bruno’s ears, neck and mouth, now he is with his teddy bear as quiet as a mouse. Sam is at his computer somewhere in the house, it is a work day for him, so he is working nice and early as is the way. I hear him laugh, his lovely musical he he, so he must be looking at something other than his programming for the day.

I was going to go to Bunnings, to get fasteners for the vine, that was growing on my back wall, but in the last few days has fallen down. I think those wire U shaped ones that I can hammer in, should just about do the trick to stop it falling down again. I could drive, yes, I could drive, that would be the fastest way to go, but as I am going to take Bruno for a walk at some point today, I guess I should combine the two things and get them both out of the way.

But before I do anything, I should make another coffee pot, and then I should dash upstairs and wash myself and shower off. So, I guess that is a plan, yes I could call it that yes I can, that wasn’t so hard, that came together without too much pain. But, I still have to get my shit together, my clothes on, and my wallet in my hand, get Bruno in his harness, poo bags into the plan, get myself out the door and down the street, pulling it all together one two three.

Oh, I am exhausted just thinking about it. Yes, I am, I cannot deny.

No hurry though, I tell myself, I have nothing else to do today.

Rainy Hump Day

It rained and rained, and then it rained some more. 

So much for the warm weather which we were all enjoying just a few days ago.

The rain hasn't stopped for two days. It has been constant for two days.

Two days ago it was hot, like summer, lovely summer hot. I was in shorts for the first time this year, since winter. Well, it was sunny and warm, not hot hot, you understand. 

You know, different parts of the world have very different ideas about what is hot. I guess, in Australia, we consider something over 35 degrees to be hot, and it hasn't been over 35 degrees. 

40 degrees is certainly hot, a hot summer, but in some countries people think 40 degrees is Armageddon.

It hasn't been anything like that. It had been, you know, 26'ish degrees. Lovely. Really lovely. Friends in northern NSW tell me it is the perfect 28 degrees every day up there, and that is essentially why they live there, of course. Move north, they say, come and enjoy the perfect weather too.

It is pouring with rain as I write this. It is really falling down. Oh, enough with the rain already.

I chopped the hedge we have growing up the side of the front pathway. We don't notice it growing more and more during the dry weather, but once it rains, it is like brushing up against one of those big rollers in an automated car wash. Splosh! I always think to cut it when the weather is wet.

Anyway, I have things I want to get done tomorrow, the first day of my weekend, so Huey, ixnay with the rain ay.