It's Cold

Wow! It's freezing this morning. I thought the weather girl with the nasal voice said warmer days were on the way? Well? Where are they?

I'm sitting here eating my breakfast toast and drinking my coffee, hugging a bulldog, who is keeping me warm. He's lovely and toasty in my arms. My four-legged hot water bottle. I sit on the floor at my coffee table and he just naturally fits in my arms.

Our floor heating hasn't been working, and I have been meaning to get it fixed, but haven't as yet got around to it. Oh, stupid me. At night we have a fire so it doesn't matter, but on these cold mornings, there is no heating. And on these super cold mornings, it is really cold. I must get onto it, but, you know, it is one of those things I tend to think of when it is cold, and then when the cold passes it just kind of goes out of my head. Is that what we call human nature? I don't know?

In the mean time, I'll just hug Bruno. He is the perfect size to wrap up in my arms and keep me warm.

Wow! It is really cold.

I listened to Bob Dylan all day.

The sun came out, but it remained cold. I quite like those bright, sunny cold days though.

A Joy To fart

I had diarrhea for an afternoon and a night.

It was like the Lake Geneva fountain coming out my arse.

You take for granted what a joy it is to be able to fart with confidence.

I'm listening to Teddy Swims. Just my kind of music.

Happy Birthday Otto

Otto's birthday today, he is one.

Happy birthday Otto 

Out In The Rain

I think one of the prerequisites for a boyfriend is their own driver's license. Here am I and Otto sitting in the car on top of Doncaster Shopping Town in the car park while the fucking rain pours down so Sam can return one of his many purchases that he no longer wants. 

There is something slightly annoying about those who don’t have drivers licenses who just blithely let everyone else in the fucking world chauffeur them about, even if he is my darling boyfriend.

Otto and I we’re gonna run around the car park and generally piss about and have fun, except the rain started to really fall heavily as we drove up the freeway towards Shopping Town and that put paid to our excursion of silliness. Here we both sit with sad faces looking out foggy fogged up car windows with nowhere to go. Boo-hoo.

Otto started leaping about at one stage but I pulled his tail and he stopped.

Oh, I don't mind driving Sam around most of the time, it's just some days it gets tedious.

Good Idea

Today? I don't know. I worked all day. End of the week. A week I am happy came to the end. Bring on the weekend, I say.

I don't want to work full time any more. And, it's my first week. 2nd week? Piss weak, I know. Although, working from your hospital bed doesn't put the week in a good light, admittedly.

Anyway, I don't have to go to the office for at least 8 weeks. My big boss is talking about getting a temp in, to do Boris' role. He's just talking about enquirinng, getting a back up plan in place.

"I just don't want to put any more the pressure on you, Christian."

"I'm fine, big pooh bah," I said.

"You don't need any more pressure, though."

"I'm fine."

"Yeah, but."

I guess he has to ensure all the wheels keep turning, no exceptions. I started to get my back up. Seriously? I can do it. But only for a second. Then I was... um... erm... ah? What are you thinking, I told myself. Idiot. This is your escape.

So, now, I'm thinking get a temp. Good idea. And I can put my feet up. I never wanted to do it in the first place. I was just helping Boris out.

 

More Tests

So today I got the MRI

I guess it was 8.30am when all the doctors came in. Doctor Bailey, who looked like Paul Walker spoke. “Oh yes, I hate MRIs too," he said.

Paul Walker had said he could organise Valium to calm me down for the MRI.

No sooner had the doctors left but Gavin was at my door.

9am. “I’m here to take you to your MRI,” said Gavin. I told Gavin that I thought that the last, and only, MRI that I had was the closest I got to having a panic attack. I'd pictured every part of a Jaguar Mk2, starting from the rear bumper to the shiny grill and then back to the bumper to stop myself panicking.

Gavin was impressed with my Jaguar Mk2 story.

I mentioned to the MRI operator that the doctor had said he could give me valium, but she said that wasn't communicated to her.

She said it was going to take an hour, and when they put the contrasting die hot sauce in there would be 20 minutes to go. 

So, I thought about the places in the world I'd been. London, and Amsterdam, and Los Angeles, and New York, and New Orleans. Then I imagined T-Rex’s coming into the control room and eating the operators and me being forgotten in the big white machine. That was the beginning of the world being destroyed outside and I was forgotten in the machine. 

But, that just kind of made me laugh, you know, what a way to go. And you have to keep very still when you are having MRI imaging. So, then I thought about bulldogs. And then she was putting in the hot sauce and then she said it was done. And it didn’t seem to take long at all.

The MRI was fine.

The MRI operator said, "You didn't need the Valium?"

"No," I said. "I didn't need the Valium."

Anyway, I am home now.

Hump Day

Okay, I've been quiet.

I haven't quite decided if I am going to tell you why.

But, we will resume normal transmission soon.

Okay, I'm in hospital. I went in Monday to have some tests. I had one yesterday. That was pretty quick. I was supposed to have another today, but it got postponed to tomorrow. I heard the anguish in my own voice when he doctor told me about the postponement.

"But it was supposed to be today," I whined. "The nurse promised me last night."

The doctor looked at me as if to say, Nah buddy, I said tomorrow.

Anyway, that's just how it goes sometimes.

So, I had to wait.

I took my work laptop in and I worked most of the time. One of the nurses said, "I can't believe you are working."

"I'd only be on my own laptop, which I also took in, looking at YouTube, anyway, so what's difference."

"Yes, I guess," she said.

There Is A Better Way

Sunday, the weekend goes away. And then I am back to full time. I have 5 days in front of me, I wonder if it will go quickly? At least I am working them at home. I don't mind how many days I have to work, if I am working them from home. If I had to go into the office 5 days it would be a misery, especially after we all discovered there was a new way to work, thanks to the pandemic.

There is a better way, lest we forget. We should never forget. We should never let our employers forget. We should never let our employers forget that we saved their businesses by working from home. And we should never let them forget we preferred working from home. And that we still do.

Saturday Morning

I dreamed I was in the office and I was wearing a bright blue shirt with bright yellow and red splashes of colour on it and I had it unbuttoned down to my stomach, something I have never done in my life. Someone said to me, I should tone it down and wear a smart casual shirt as the shirt I was wearing didn’t qualify as smart, or casual.

And then there was a (real HR name) type person (Theponytail. I’m not going to remember which (real HR name) in years to come, well, I hope I’m not going to remember her. Noone wants to remember the lesser people in their lives) who was crying out for office supplies which were coffee and bags of stuff and silver metal things and she kept whining about them and asking people to get them and no one was getting them. The more she whined the faster her pony tail spun like the rotors of a helicopter. 

Finally, I took it upon myself to get the office supplies. I had to go to Arum’s office And I didn’t know where Arum’s office was and I had to ask people and no one would tell me, but somehow, I knew it was 50 floors up and I just wanted to go, but I didn’t want to get there and have no idea where I was going... and then I woke up, “Ah!” With the sense of oh, thank the universe that was only a dream and all the pent up tension slipped away.

It was 8am. Otto and I went downstairs together. He initially sat on the 1st floor landing and looked up at me as if to say isn’t this great, as he does. I had to coax him downstairs after that.

I closed the study door and the dog proof gate on my way, so he couldn’t scamper back upstairs and jump straight onto the bed to a sleeping Sam and Bruno.

I took him out for a wee and he had a poo, which I needed desperately, a wee, not a poo, so I was pushing him back inside, which is kind of silly as I could have just left him out there, except he is still very much a naughty puppy and you never quite know what mischief he will find to get himself into. 

There was a big wet patch running away from the back left hand tyre of my other car, and I kind of wondered what that could be? A big dog, it would have been Jack Whitehall’s big red dog, Clifford, though? Had someone hosed the corner of the car? Why anyone would do that I didn’t know.

Anyway, I motored back inside to have a wee and I thought perhaps it was the petrol tank, it had been sitting so long it had leaked, you know, a seal, of something, had perished. So, I thought, I had to be a reasonable person, and not a lazy arse, like I usually am, and I had to go back out there and investigate, so I did. (Bored already) I lifted that corner of the car cover and water that had been trapped there, presumably from all the rain we have been having dripped out, so I assume it had still been dripping out, so I was pleased it was only that and not something more serious.

Otto deserted me and went and lay on the couch in the study.

8.33am. Otto joins me on the couch in the lounge room. He lies his fat head on my left arm as I try to type, as all our bulldogs have done.

The news is all boring stories that I will probably live longer if I never read them, all piss and nonsense. When did the Australian news become so interested in American politics. Okay, I do keep up with it on YouTube, but I’m not a national news service.

I do read two articles. One about Scott Johnson, the 27 year old American maths academic who was killed in a gay hate crime in Sydney in the late 1980s.

‘He was a beautiful man’: one man’s long journey to justice for the killing of his brother. After a decades-long battle to discover the truth about what happened to Scott Johnson, his brother Steve has written a book about never giving up. He has written a memoir, A Thousand Miles from Care.

I teared up reading this article, what one brother did for another.

8.50am. Sam and Bruno were up.

I made Vegemite toast and coffee. Bruno and Otto took over the big couch, so I sit on the floor and eat my breakfast.

9.20am. Post shit, Sam feeds the dogs, actually, he was still only preparing their gourmet diet.

The second news article I read is about an Australian abstract artist.

‘I thought, I’ll show you guys’: eye-popping artist Lesley Dumbrell finally gets her due at 82. Since the 1950s, Dumbrell has fought sexism and conservative thinking to be recognised as one of Australia’s most respected abstract painters – and she’s nowhere near done.

She has an exhibition on in Sydney until November, I’ll have to watch out for it coming to Melbourne. I do love modern art, more so than abstract art, but it still sounded interesting.

9.53am. The rain started to fall again. More fucking rain? I guess it is winter, hey?

I realise the fire still has hot coals from last night, so collect sticks of differing sizes from the garden, and I get it going again, all the time supervised by two bulldogs, Bruno anticipating lying in front of it, and Otto trying to get one of the sticks I was using to chew.

10.15am. I make more coffee.

It is going to be one of those wet, Saturdays so I down load 1000 Miles from Care to read as the flames in the fire place crackle.

10.30am. Sam feeds the dogs. Bruno wants to go for his morning wee, and of course Otto wants to go too, so I heard the two of them outside and Bruno wees in the same spot he always wees, he is a dog of habits.

I collect some fire wood for the fire even if I have decided it isn’t as cold as I first thought, still it’s nice to have a fire.

The bulldogs take their sweet time coming back inside, and when they do, Bruno takes up his position sitting in my lap – I sit on the floor at our coffee table – using my right arm as a head rest.

10.45am. The rain started falling again and I was thankful I had revived the fire after all.

A Cold Full Time Week

And then it was Friday, and I had worked the whole week, and when I got to the far end of it, it just didn't seem all that hard.

It was cold all week, so it was probably best to be indoors, anyway.

The sensation of a breeze all week had been chilling, the coldest winter since - you know they often ruin that sense of climax by saying 2021 - records began, or some such thing. The effect of rippling sun light trying to escape the barrier of grey clouds had been kind of lovely, lighting up the cracks in the crazy paved grey sky. The colours of winter pale, almost white on occasions, some days, with the texture of light through the branches of the winter trees broken like children had thrown sticks in the air.

How many weeks to go? I get out my cold fingers and count.

I listen to music of Paul McCartney all day.

I have no problem joking about the Trump shooting, no matter what conservative, it is only free speech if it is our free speech, types say.

I hear that Joe Biden is going to implement nation target practice classes for all school age students.

Good One Boris

Boris left me some written instructions, so today was the day to get some of her work done.

So, off I go. Um, erm, what the... ah. Oh, no that doesn't work.

Maybe she meant, er... no. That isn't it either.

No, not that. And... not that. Roll of the eyes.

Grrrr!

I'm already feeling fucking vulnerable, or as the current crop of princess' would say, in a valley girl accent, I'm not feeling safe with all of this. 😆

Anyway, after half an hour of fumbling about like a virgin with a condom on his first date, I chucked out Boris' notes, saying to myself, you want something done, you better learn how to do it yourself, we all know that.

And, bing, bang, bong, all done.

Jesus fuck me dead, you can't fucken trust anyone any more. 

Seriously, Boris, your notes were rubbish.

Anyway, big exhale, good thing I am moderately clever, hey?

I sent Boris a questioning email to Lapland.

I've been listening to Wings, Band on the Run. I forget how great this album is.

I Love The Smell of Coffee In The Morning

I got up early before anyone else and I made some coffee. I actually love getting up before anyone else and making some coffee and having that part of the day to myself. Bliss.

Then, I saw I had no bread for my toast, so I went to the bakery, which opens early, 6am, and got some bread. Nice to see smiley cute/ugly guy in the mornings.

When I came back into the house, the smell of coffee was strong as soon as I walked in. I think that is my favourite smell in the world, freshly brewed coffee.

I think that is why I love waking up in the civilised cities of Europe, the smell of coffee invading my senses on those lovely, gorgeous, early mornings. European cities have a particular smell in the mornings.

Ah, it is the best smell. That gorgeous fucken smell. It is home. It is life. It is family. It is neighbourhood. It is the greatest smell in the world. I could follow it to the end of the world, and back, and have, of course.

Not That Much Fun

The problem when I work full time for Boris is that not really knowing what I am doing makes me feel kind of useless. It plays with my sense of self worth, it does. That kind of winging it, it makes me really feel like I don't know what I am doing. And, I know, it is true that I don't really know what I am doing for a lot of it.

I've had all sorts of people calling me and asking me for things with which I don't normally deal. Even Boris has been giving my directives of things to do, mostly which I have done before, but not for years and not for this company. I'll have to make a list.

I don't really like the feeling. It really makes me, I have discovered, feel uncomfortable.

Of course, I have to get it done, whatever it is, and I do, because I have no choice, I'm the one, and that makes me feel anxious.

I don't enjoy being the person with whom the buck stops, I mean I don't even think about it in my role, but being in Boris' role and having every other guy come to me for something... already... and it is only day two... blur.

That probably sounds pathetic, I don't know. But it's true. I'm never really sure what I am good at, or capable of? I know with my own work, I can always put in more. I often feel I have an unending amount extra to give to get the job done. But, when I am doing someone else's work, I kind of lose that certainty.

But then when the extra role is over and I go back to my own work it always feels like it was easy.

Nyr!

You Nearly Saved The World

Something bright orange,

And really fucken fat.

How could you miss, answer me that?

Gender Fluid

You know, the whole gender fluid thing is nothing new. I know, conservatives will have you believe otherwise and they will use it to push their ideology, sadly, putting people who vary from the norm, if in fact if there is a norm, down.

People have lived beyond the normal genders since time began, probably secretly, probably relocated to the outer areas of society.

For want of a better expression, there have always been men of more and more levels of femininity, and women of more and more degrees of masculinity. I know that's not really the deal with gender fluid, I use it more for illustrative purposes, however. There have always men who live as women and women who live as men and everything in between.

These variations, feelings of self, the way people have felt have always been. It really is nothing new.

The difference now is that we are giving it a name, and it is coming out of the shadows to be seen by society, and we are accepting people who are different.

It is sad that conservatives, who have no idea of life beyond missionary position and Sunday school, chose to use some of the most vulnerable members of society to make their ideological candles burn brighter.

Imagine how much better life would be for all those people of non-conforming gender if the 'conservative religious biggots' stopped using them as a punching bag.

Friday

I dreamed I was being mean to someone, was it Jill, after chatting to her last night? Mean, as in withholding information, or excluding her. And I’d just got caught out, and I was having to confess to my mean deed. And I woke up, and I was genuinely pleased it was a dream. I mentally went from confessional, to genuine relief at it only being a dream, lying there in my lovely warm bed with all my lovely bedclothes, with Bruno and Sam lying next to me.

7.15am. I woke up.

I made coffee.

Milo dashed about, as I sat on the couch and wrote this. He has to get all the attention he can before the bulldogs get up and ruin his day.

7.28am. Sam was up. “It is D Day he said. “Today is the day, I want it now.” Finally, the day when his new Apple goggles are being delivered.

Shelley Duvall, star of The Shining and Annie Hall, dies aged 75. The versatile actor, who was Robert Altman’s muse and also appeared in McCabe & Mrs Miller, Nashville, Popeye and 3 Women, has died Shelley Duvall, the much-loved US character actor and star of films such as The Shining, Annie Hall and Popeye, has died four days after her 75th birthday. Duvall died in her sleep of complications from diabetes at her home in Blanco, Texas, according to Dan Gilroy, who had been her life partner since 1989.

Biden’s position tenuous amid reports campaign secretly testing Kalama Harris’s popularity. US president’s advisers and aides also discussing how to persuade him to stand down, reports suggest

8.20am. I make vegemite toast and coffee.

8.30am. I take the dogs out the back after they have eaten, the ground is still wet from the rain. Neither bulldog is keen to get his paws wet, and they hesitate at the back door, and I have to give them a push.

I re-write my early journals. They are a mix of actual events, less so, and fiction, more so. I mostly re-write the fiction parts, but I have no qualms about re-writing the facts. I mean, adding to them, rather than changing them completely. It’s amazing how much I can continue to remember when I re-read them.

I write all morning.

10:55am. I take the dogs for a walk.

As we leave the house, a cute boy in a leather apron, or is it rubber, from the pub comes out and gets the big bins. He doesn’t smile when I smile at him though, so fuck him.

The ground is wet from the rain, the sky is grey with clouds, while it isn’t freezing, it certainly isn’t warm and sunny.

Bruno is consistently not wanting to walk. He is always slow to get moving, as I say he’s up and running after we've cross a couple of streets, but this morning he’s really stopping and not moving forward.

A woman stops me and asks me if she can pat the Bulldogs. She thanks me afterwards for letting her pat them.

If there is anything Bruno could’ve done to be uncooperative and unhelpful, he’s done it by the time we finish walking in Gertrude Street.

11:11am. We turn into Brunswick Street. The outlook is bleak. The sky is grey with just a hint of the son – I love the way my dictation makes it someone’s son, just a hint, the mid boggles. Is that a bare thigh? – sun hiding somewhere behind all those clouds.

A car with the numberplate that says I ❤️ BLY. Not really sure what that means? They love bulldogs, is all I can think. There is a shiny new Land Rover Defender all in black. A group of aged Asians on walkers come towards me en masse, outside the Connie Benn Centre, like crabs, or something out of Doctor Who. If their mouths had start gumming the air, and their eyes had turned fluorescent green, I wouldn't have been surprised. A woman with a pink fluffy hat with ears down to her shoulders is sorting out multiple bags of tatt outside St Vincent de Paul. I meet the old Asian guy on his bike and he asks is that the baby, pointing at Otto. “That’s the baby? That’s the baby?” as he always does, in his broken English, English so broken it is practically dust as it falls from his lips. He’s sweet, though, always happy. A guy in a red Hoodie and tight black shorts with incredible legs, one calf with tattoos, passes me from behind. I just happen to have my phone in my hand, I think to take a photo almost too late.

11:18am. The guy in the tight black shorts and the red Hoodie opens Snap Fitness, 224 Brunswick Street. He comes back out Snap Fitness and I see he has a mass of curly hair inside his hoodie hat, and a huge cock in his tight black shorts. The girls must fucken love him. Do girls go for guys with big dicks, I wonder?

Not that I was going for him, you understand. I was just observing the day, watching it going on around me, one of my favourite things to do, watching the world, it is interesting, it is plentiful, and it costs you nothing. And really without judgement too, just observation, but not always, of course.

11:22am. We turn into Johnston Street, neither dog wants to drink from the water bowl on the corner. I push them towards it to encourage them, but no. Fine, I say.

There’s a father with the little kid looking in the bedding shop window, 124 Johnston Street. The kid is super cute, you know just having learned to walk, that kind of cute.

The sun actually comes out as we walk up Johnston Street – it wasn’t someone’s son this time, coming out, although the handsome jogger running towards me in tight red running shorts would have fitted the bill.

Petrol is still $1.74. I really should go and fill the car up with petrol. The inspiration diminishes quickly, though, when I think that my car is more than half full with petrol and I haven’t actually driven it since I got the dogs desexed, which I think was in April.

There is a black mini convertible corner of Napier Street looking shiny and new with a heritage B&W number plate.

11:25am. We turn into our street.

I get a plant pot from amongst the junk outside the house from yesterday. It’s heavy with all the soil in it, so I empty the soil onto the garden strip cnr Greeves Street.

11:33am. I see you the same pale skin, blue eyed, dark haired boy in baggy jeans walking up St David Street, as I did yesterday, funny how that happens, with who I’d like to think is his boyfriend. He’s making drumming sounds as he chats animatedly to his, er, boyfriend, as they walk towards me.

11:41am. We’re home again. 

11:45am. Sam gets deliveries he's been waiting for, so he is happy about that.

Otto drinks continually from the water bowl in the kitchen and I have to continually dry his dripping mouth? He slops water all over the titled floor. Why did the two of you not have drinks when I tried to get you to have drinks on the walk, I say? Like they understand me. No, we don’t want to drink, you said at each water bowl at which we stopped. They stand over the water bowl and just look away, to tell me they don’t want to drink. If I said I want to slap his face, it would be way over stating it, but I do grind my teeth in displeasure.

Sam is standing in the lounge doorway hugging the new white box in his arms, as I try to dry Otto's mouth before he drips water all over the carpet. I try to step around Sam, who seems to be more than one person as he gets in my way trying to get to Otto, I have to step around Sam, as he goes into stasis with Apple Derangement Syndrome. 

I lose him for the rest of the night.

I’m rewrite Neighbours my suburban sex story. A story where sexual orientations blur and everyone is very busy getting into each other.

I had been further inspired to write it after re-writing my old journals and imagining a threesome between my beautiful ex-girlfriend, Leah, and my ex-boyfriend from school, Alex. It so turned me on to think of me and Leah and Alex having a threesome together when we were beautiful newbies. Like a weekend in Paris, being very French. What was that movie called? The Dreamers. I loved that movie. I wanted to be them.

Leah loving me and Alex, Alex loving me and Leah, and me loving Alex and Leah. I wish I’d thought of it way back then. Ha ha. I barely knew how to scratch my own arse back then.

3:45pm. We take the dogs for their second walk.

It is cold walking up the street, so we cross the road to the other side with the sunshine.

4pm. We turn into Nicholson Street and are bathed in gentle sunshine. 

Bruno slows down to a crawl as soon as we turn the corner. I’m not really sure why? Maybe he was enjoying the brief sunshine too. Bulldogs are very much sun bathers.

There is sunshine almost all the way down Nicholson Street. Warm against the cold air.

4:09pm. We turn into Bell Street.

4:11pm. We’re at the corner of Mahoney Street and Bell Street. There is the good old Bell Street sunshine, because there are no apartment buildings around here. That is what high rise development takes away from us, sunshine. Property developers should compensate every house from which they block the sunshine. Is it just me, am I the only one who thinks of property developers as Les Paterson’s running around ruining the city for everyone else?

4:30pm. We are home.

We ate sweet lamb pies for dinner. They were in silver foil trays and we ate them on wooden chopping boards straight out of the oven in front of the TV. They had a rich tomato and lamb sauce inside. I guess you’d call the filling of modern manufactured pies sauce? Rather than meat?

We watched Have You Been Paying Attention. I love that show, good old Working Dog. Those guys make me laugh.

We watched Graham Norton. It was a repeat, I’d seen it before. Dominic West, Michelle Keegan, Jacob Anderson, Alan Carr. It was worth watching a repeat for Alan Carr’s impression of Celine Dion alone. And I can always listen to Teddy Swims sing.

There was nothing much else on after that so we turned the TV off.

I continued to re-write my sex story Neighbours. I was going to publish it next on my fiction blog, but later in bed I decided against that. Still, I have it re-written as a much more substantial story now. But, I should be able to write stories that aren’t always gay sex stories. Maybe, I need to read more? My reading has so dropped right off over the last few years.

We went to bed at 11pm. 

I looked at YouTube. Rykter a Norwegian series and Mathais & Erik, two gorgeous guys, one of which is the gorgeous Teo Tomczuck.

Sam announces lights out. “Shut it down, I’m tired.”

11.30pm. Lights out.

Get Out Of My Way

I hate old bitches on mobility scooters, they think they own the footpath. They drive those things like nobody is watching, and they will run you down as quick as look at you. 

Always racing through, no thought for anyone else, get out of my way, or else!

I guess it is the one time in their lives they have some sort of power, when you think about it, and right at the end, no wonder they wield it with abandon. 

One of these old cows stops on the footpath as Bruno and Otto and I are outside Nelson Bailey, where the dogs are sniffing. She just sits there waiting for us to move out of her way, with a sense of entitlement, when she could have easily gone around us. If it had a petrol combustion engine, she would have revved it. Those beady eyes, that fixed stare, that mouth nearly forming a grimace, with too much makeup on, really, on balance. Blue eyeshadow, rouged cheeks, jungle red lipstick. What's this, is she going on a date, I think, I can’t help but laugh to myself. Mobility scooters at 20 paces. 

I should’ve said, we’re gonna be a minute you better go round. But, I didn’t think of it quick enough and, instead, I step out of her way.

And she raced away way too fast for a suburban footpath. But they don’t care, those old cows. If you listen really carefully, you can hear their cackle on the wind.

Working Full Time

Boris is making her sojourn back to the motherland, or whatever it is she does when she heads overseas.

Would I fill in for her? In a moment of weakness, I said yes. Stupid me.

Anyway, then she emails me and asks me to confirm that I will be working 5 days per week. Jesus fuck, will this never end, I think. So, of course, I said no. I don't want to work any more days. I will do whatever work that is necessary to be done while she is a way.

So, then she calls me, will I log in every morning to check emails and do whatever it is that those screaming the loudest want? Yes, I can do that.

Sam says, just work 5 days, but then sam is always trying to get me to work 5 days. He thinks I am wasting my talents. Ha ha, ho , ho, not he doesn't think that. He thinks if he works 5 days so should I. That's closer to the truth. I guess, he really thinks that I have no reason not to work 5 days, so I should.

Anyway, I get to thinking about it, and if I am signing in every morning to see if anyone wants anything urgently, well, I am only essentially going to be home writing my blog, or a story, or watching YouTube, so I might as well just stay logged in and they can pay me full time, if I can work the extra days from home. 

It will be easy, more likely than not, I won't have anything to do anyway.

So, of course they have agreed to it and now, some how I am doing what I vowed I would never do again, I am working full time for the rest of July and all of August. I decided with the black law firm that life was too short to waste full time hours on an employer.

Fucking hell, how did I agree to that?

Sam is smiling.

This Weekend

This weekend is Rachel Le Vine's birthday bash. I really wanted to go as I really haven't seen much of Rachel lately. 

It is a road trip to SA to the beach on the coast, it would have been great. I haven't been on a road trip to SA for years.

David Monsoon and Harry De Wit, of course, are going too. Rachel's best friends. The pretensions David and the poisonous Harry, I like to call, Harry Half Wit. Fuck he is awful. Loud and overbearing and opinionated.

David was apart of our friendship group when we were all fresh faced 20 year olds.

David used to be my best friend way back then, but he got really, you know, "it and a fucking bit" in his mind some where along the way. 

Rachel thinks Harry is hilarious, I think he is a rude, arrogant, small minded, bitter, hateful pain in the arse.

Anyway, Rachel sent us invites the day after Bruno and Otto first started fighting, so, you know, not knowing what the hell I was going to do with the two of them, back then, I had to cancel. Rachel is a dog lover from way back and she completely understood.

"I'm so sorry to hear that, Christian," she said.

Anyway, now it is here, I'm rather thankful to the dogs.

Oh, er, imagine spending the weekend with David and Harry, seriously, no thanks. This is our latest thingamy. Here's our really expensive whatsis. Here we are being fabulous in some exclusive wherever. It would have been worse than death, at least if you are dead you don't know anything.

So, there you go. Good old bulldogs.

Happy birthday, Rachel.

These are my fighting bulldogs who can't get along together? Next to me in my study as I work

I could bang there heads together, seriously

Sunday Haircuts

We walk into the city mid morning. The Sun is shining and the sky is blue as we leave the house. We’re heading into the city to have haircuts, we take the dogs.

It is nice walking in the sun to start off, but of course, eventually, we change angles with the buildings and the city and the sun is no longer shining down on us, and the day is a bit cool.

Sam goes in and has a haircut first. I wait outside with the dogs, sitting on a seat, unfortunately, not in the son, who’s son, um, er the sun. It’s a bit cold.

People walk past in coats and scarves, boots and gloves, rugged up against the winter day, even if the sun is warm when you are in it.

A couple stop and take photos of the bulldogs, as people often do. I’m never really sure why. I wouldn’t take photos of other people’s dogs. But that’s okay, hey, it’s good that we are all different. It makes the world go around. (Despite what conservative politicians might tell you)

I’m freezing, if the truth be known. Oh well, it is good to feel all the temperatures the year has to offer. How boring would it be if it was always the same temperature. One life, please, luke warm.

Nah, not for me.

I wonder how much longer Sam is going to be?

Sam appears moments later.

We ate soup sitting outside in Russell Street with one of those outside heaters warming us. Only Melbournians would sit outside like idiots on such a cold day. The bulldogs lay on the fake grass and chewed on old chopsticks quite happily. 

The Bulldogs

The dogs have been getting along fine, for quite a while. We really thought the de-sexing had fixed everything.

In fact, the two of them have been sleeping on our bed. And while Bruno has never slept on the bed, he's always slept in his own bed on the floor of the bedroom, however Otto has been jumping up on the bed to sleep. Even if we put him in a bed next to Bruno, he will jump up on the bed at some point in the night.

Recently, Bruno has wanted to sleep on the bed too.

There have been quite a few mornings lately when I have woken, admittedly with decreased mattress space, with the two of the asleep face to face, with their bums and hips out kind of diagonally, their shape roughly forming a love heart, with a little imagination. Ha ha, cheesy, I know.

So, while two bulldogs sleeping on the bed is not ideal, with the recent history of the two of them, it has been kind of heartening seeing them getting along and sleeping together happily.

Anyway, yesterday morning, Bruno slept on the bed all night, and Otto slept in one of the dog beds. At 6am, Otto jumped up on the bed, I suspect he stepped on Bruno's back leg, and we were woken by a dog fight in the middle of our bed.

That was less than ideal.

And, that was a step backwards.

Grrrr!

Friday

Bruno slept on our bed all night. Otto slept on the dog bed all night.

6am. Otto jumped up onto the bed – the two of them have been sleeping on our bed happily for days – and Bruno objected and the two of them fought in the middle of our bed. Suddenly, a dog fight in the middle of our bed in the dark. Yay! I grabbed Bruno, Sam grabbed Otto. There was even blood on their faces.

I got up, as you may well understand.

I took Otto downstairs.

I made coffee.

6.30am. Sam and Bruno were up. Otto and Bruno fought again in the lounge room. Otto went into his crate.

I looked at the films of Horst Buchholz. I still want to find a copy of the English version of The Empty Canvass. I looked at some of his earlier movies on YouTube. Some of his movies are on YouTube in their entirety. He sure was a handsome, sexy young actor. I might collect a few more of his movies. I mustn’t mess up and buy his movies that are available in full of YouTube though.

7.25am. Sam makes coffee.

8am. I make smoked salmon on toast and more coffee. I’ve got to love some smoked salmon for breakfast instead of Vegemite toast just occasionally.

I read about the landslide to Labour in Britian. The awful conservatives are out. The only thing I think is why did it take so long for the English to boot the Torries out, as the Torries have been fucking Great Britain up the arse without lube for years.

All the losers, May, Truss and Bozzo the clown and the recent guy with ten thousand pound shoes?

My one question though, how could anyone vote for that lizard Farage who fucked up Britian with Brexit? Seriously, what do some people think sometimes?

10am. I go and have a shower.

10:39am. I take the woofs for a walk. 

It’s grey and overcast, not quite as cold as yesterday. but not sunny either.

10:52am. There is a cute wog boy in skin tight pale grey track pants playing in the commission flats grounds with a group of friends. How sweet does his arse and his thighs look in those body hugging pants?

We are walking down Brunswick Street, wondering if the wog boy in the skin tight track pants and his friends will catch up to us.

They don’t.

11:02 am. Just after we crossover Greaves Street, we see an old guy in a low cut, I think they call them, shoe string strap dress with huge tits exposed out the top of the dress. Good for him, I think. I hope he is happy.

It is the one thing that worries me about Fitzroy, with piece of shit property developers fucking it over with bigger and bigger apartment developments and that is Fitzroy used to be all inclusive, a safe place for anyone who wanted to come and live here, whether they are straight, or gay, or a guy in a dress with huge fake tits, this was the place you could be what you wanted to be safely. But with the huge influx of residents to fill the multitude of dog boxes on which property developers from somewhere beyond this suburb were getting rich, is that diverse acceptance going to change?

Johnston Street > Our Street.

Parked right at the corner of Greeves Street, illegally, is an over made up blond in a matt finish blue BMW 3 series convertible. Titts and lips out to here. A face that was as artificially smooth and finished as the paint work on her car. Blonde hair pulled so masochistically tight in a pony tail on the top of her head, I wouldn’t have been surprised if it pulled her map of Tassie into a gottee. I think to myself, matt finish blue might be all the rage, but I’d still have a shiny coupe, and I wouldn’t have that.

By the time we cross the last street before home, I am beginning to sweat under my layers of thermals. I didn’t take them off before the walk, when I stepped outside momentarily to test the day and it felt cold. I certainly didn’t need to wear them today. I can’t wait to get home and take them off.

11:23am. We’re home again.

Sam was in a meeting when we got back so I didn’t speak to him, it is forbotten. But I did need to change as I was sweating. It wasn’t as cold as yesterday and I certainly didn’t need my thermals on for the walk.

11:30am. I head down to Smith Street to sniff around the shops.

11:33am. Sam called me as I walked down Webb Street to ask me where I’d gone? He harrumphed when I tell him I was going to Cash Converters and the op shops to sniff around the CDs and DVDs. 

11:55am. I’m at my favourite op shop. I get the gay film Shelter, a film I loved when I first saw it, and which I had considered buying for a lot more that $1 on numerous occasions. I also buy La Cage Aux Folles. Truthfully, it is a little too cliched gay for my personal taste, but I can’t deny I laughed hysterically at it when I first saw it many years ago.

1209 films in my film collection.

I head home.

Midday. There’s a nice piece of arse in camo pants walking ahead of me, as I head for home. Strong glutes, thick thighs to which the camouflage material clings. Pert arse with just the right amount of swing with each step that he took. Black boots. Nice thick dark brown hair, kind of long to his collar. Green knit covering his torso with just the right amount of V

12.04pm. I’m home.

Sam heads down to the supermarket to get ingredients for a stir fry, which I have to say I wasn’t really looking forward to. You can eat only so many stir fries before you start wondering about all the other cuisines of the world. Of course, getting my lunch made for me every day, removes any say I have in the matter, naturally.

12.30pm. Sam is back.

We ate pressed sandwiches with ham and coleslaw for lunch. They were very nice. Did Sam read my mind about the stir fry, I wondered?

3:38pm. We take the dogs for a walk. Their second walk for the day. It has been one of Sam’s strategies for the aggression they have been displaying, walk it out of them, exhaust them so they sleep in the evening and don’t even think about fighting each other. It may well be working.

It’s still cold.

Gertrude Street, we met the nice lady from our street, an ex-housemates  grandmother, who said the council had decided to get rid of all angle parking in Fitzroy because it was dangerous for bike riders with angle parked cars backing out, and she was organising a petition, she gave us a copy to complete.

Nicholson Street > Bell Street > St David Street > Gore Street.

4pm. We’re home.

Sam went to Victoria Gardens to get a new game.

I watched Shelter until Sam came home, then I turned it off. I want to watch it with him, so I didn’t want him to see me watching it, silly, I guess. Sam and I have such different tastes in movies, he likes adventure movies, super hero movies, si fi movies and the like, where I like real life stories. If I want to get him to watch Shelter I can’t let him think I have already watched it because if he knows that he won’t want to watch it. He would think that was just stupid.

The light had gone out of the afternoon by the time Sam returned home.

I watched YouTube Coldwarmotors with Scott making a section of the boot floor for his 1960 Chev Impala 2 door, while Sam played his new game.

We ate roast duck and stir fried cabbage and greens and rice for dinner.

We watched Weeds. My favourite series, but Sam wasn’t really into it, which makes anything less enjoyable to watch.

10.30pm. We went to bed.

The bulldogs are still being feisty with each other.

Bruno in his bed. Otto in his crate.

I tried to look at YouTube, but I was tired.

11.11pm. Lights out.

Use Cash

I use cash because I don't want to pay the banks any more fees than I have to.

It's not that hard to get cash out, I know how much I use and I pass by an ATM at least once in my week.

And now when I go to a shop and order something and they come back to me and say, "Oh sorry, we don't take cash."

I reply, as my tiny protest, "Oh sorry, I don't want it then." And I walk out. 

I've done it with an ice cream, I've done it with a coffee, I've done it with a sandwich, I done it with a pastry. The employees have complained on occasion, more a roll of the eyes than anything vocal, but I have already turned on my heal and left by that stage. If they aren't going to offer a full services as a seller, I'm not going to offer a full service as the buyer.

In future, I will know which shops don't take cash, and I will avoid them, but for now, this is what I do.

Or maybe I will go in and repeat the procedure as a protest against card only. No, I won't do that, but the thought amuses me.

And funnily enough, on a few occasions, I have got a discount because the shops that do take cash haven't had enough change to give me.

Coldest day

One degree this morning, and we are shivering through it. My hands were so cold when I stuck them up under my shirt, I jumped. 

Now, the sun is shining and the air is cold, I don't mind that, as I slip into the suns rays it's quite lovely. Of course, that doesn't really help you indoors. The winter sun is gorgeous though.

Both bulldogs have crawled into my lap for a cuddle, at different points in the morning, they like the warmth. They love to sunbaked in the sun. The de-sexing seems to have almost cured their fighting, so that is good.

I played Lisa Stansfield all afternoon, her music is great.

It is my Friday and I wind everything up, before I finish for the week.

Work less, relax more, that is what I say.

Are The People Of This Planet Just Getting More and More Stupid?

I have to stop watching American politics now. It used to have some comic element to it, the obese orange buffoon gave me a laugh, to an extent. That narcissistic idiot said what? His toothless supporters claimed what? But now it is looking more like American may actually vote Hitler in as president, it is just tragic, especially now the religious right infected supreme court has ruled in favour of some sort of immunity for this dishonest megalomaniac.

I don’t know why the population has ditched all critical thinking? I blame it, perhaps, on air pollution, too many of us and not enough oxygen to go around. It is baffling why people fall for the lies of conservative governments, even here, how many people actually believe that Dutton is going to build even one nuclear reactor. Some huge number of Australian’s are in favour of a nuclear industry, when the only reason Dutton has announced it is because it is a slightly more subtle way to denounce climate change and to extend the life of fossil fuels.

There will never be a nuclear reactor built in Australia. Dutton is lying to you.

I do wonder now if the general population understands that climate change is going to kill all of us, not just the poor. And now it is going to happen sooner than later.

In England, they might vote that lizard Nigel Farage into a position of power, the guy who wrecked their country with Brexit.

In France, the far right has a good shot at power, apparently. And we all know how the far right has worked out for Europe previously.

Why are the populations on this planet voting for politicians who are not going to govern in the population’s best interests?

It is beyond me, really.

Anyway, I think I am now going to disconnect from the world of politics. I don’t think I can continue to watch the human race disappearing down the shit hole mostly by its own doing.

So, I'm going to write some stories and write some poems and hope that when I start choking to death on the poisoned atmosphere of this planet, it won't take too long, or be too painful, to die.

Monday Morning.

6am. I am ready to leave for the office. No, I am not that eager, I wake up early anyway. If I go in now, I get several hours without having to put up with people, and then I leave early so again I have several hours I can avoid my colleagues.

I'm sitting in front of the fire with Milo purring in my lap, the bulldogs are still in bed, they are not early risers, and Milo is getting some love when he can get it. I can hear the rain falling outside, and it is at this exact moment that I curse having to go into the office, more than I normally curse about going to the office. 

Why do I have to go out in the rain, when I can work just as well from home? Grrrrr.

Why do I have to push my happy cat off my lap just to satisfy the ego of managers running businesses?

Seriously?

Fuck them, that's what I think.

I catch the tram in the dark. What a miserable bunch of cunts, I think, as I gaze down the tram at the sad, cold faces, with headphones and smart phones to protect them from the real world. I chuckle to myself at the thought. It’s all puffer jackets and beanies and crossed arms and grimaces.

In the office, the first email I receive is from an employee I like to call Ms OCD. I close it. Life is too short for that shit.

I get out my headphones and switch on some music.

I go and make some coffee.