Sunny Monday

I'm embracing my Kindle and buying books to read, rather than wasting my life on YouTube. I just can't spend the rest of my life mindlessly scrolling YouTube for something interesting. I almost feel like I become part of the problem when I continue to do that. It just adds to that uncomfortable suspicion that I have really wasted my life.

I have finished One Thousand Miles from Care, so it is time for something new to read. The problem with Kindle is that there is no book shop into which to wandered to peruse the colourful titles on the shelf.

So, I typed in Tim Winton, I had just read an article in the Guardian by him about climate change. I decided on Eyre a novel by him that is a few years old now.

I also typed in Sam Shepard, Christos Tsiolkas, and Patricia Highsmith. My list of authors has become a little rusty with me having been hijacked by online news/platforms over the last few years.

I struggle a little to think of more, all the time ignoring the two huge bookcases of novels I have read in front of me. Duh!

I think of Bridget O'Connor and that fabulous book of short stories Here Comes John, about which I was so excited only to discover she had died quite young of breast cancer. I typed her name in anyway. There is another collection of her short stories, but it reads like it is compiled from previous collections and not new stories as such. I'll have to research that a little more.

Anyway, I'm now sitting at my work desk enjoying a little Tim Winton, feet up on a footstool, having got all my work done. Otto is asleep on the couch behind me. The sun shining in through the window. Bruno is through the atrium, sleeping next to the ottoman in the lounge room looking in my direction, well, he would be if his eyes were open. He rolls over to realign himself with the patch of morning sun on the carpet coming in through the window which had moved with the passing morning.

You Made Her Very Happy

I am walking up Bourke Street this afternoon with Bruno and Otto having left Sam at the hairdresser. The wait at the salon was uncharacteristically long. Sam said it was because it was all women in front of him having woman's hair done. Sam usually has his haircut while I wait outside with the woofs, then we swap when I have my hair cut.

Bruno, Otto and I are crossing Exhibition Street and I can see a couple on the other side of Exhibition Street looking at us intently. As we get to the other side the lady asks if she can pat my bulldogs.

“Sure,” I say.

The lady crouches down and pats Bruno and then pats Otto, as she does she holds their faces and gently tells them they are beautiful. She stands back up and thanks me wiping tears way from her eyes. She turns away. Her husband says that she lost her bulldog two months ago and that I had made her very happy. I just smiled. It was kind of nice.

Therapy dogs, I wonder.

It was a moment on the corner of Bourke and Exhibition, just us three. (well, five) I smiled at the husband, he smiled back, then he turned and took his wife's arm. I turned and took my Bruno and Otto's leads in my hand, glancing down at them as they turned and followed me up the hill.

I Joined The Gym

There, I did it, I joined the gym, so that's done. I got it done this morning, after we washed Bruno and Otto. I don't know why I get slightly anxious about such things, but I always seem to with things I am doing for the first time. I've joined gyms before, of course, but never that one, that's the first time bit.

I don't know if that is just me, or if everyone gets anxious with suchthaigs. Does everyone else? I don't know. I can only speak for myself, of course. In the end, I just have to set a course, being the last minute always seems to spur me on, you know, when I seemingly have no other choice left. Then I always get things done.

We walked the dogs to Carlton for lunch.

After which, I even went and did a gym work out.

There. Done. Girl trainer will be pleased, or at least not disappointed.

It was LouLou's birthday, so I rang her at 8am and sang her happy birthday. As the phone was ringing, I did wonder if it was too early, but then LouLou answered croaky voice and all. She said it wasn't too early, she's looking after some kids and they'd been trying to get her out of bed since 6am. 

"You are my first birthday wishes," she said. "I guess now I should get up."

Well, That's That

It's a public holiday today, the day before the footy grand final. Grrr!

I was going to go join up at the gym, but it's not attended by staff on a public holiday.

Oh, I am so slack. Can you believe it, all the days I could have gone and joined up, any other fucken day truthfully, and I leave it to the last minute when it is some bogan public holiday.

Damn it!

I so often need the pressure of the 'last minute' to get me to do stuff. I have always been like that. I need some pressure greater than me to prompt me into action, otherwise I just let things pass.

I can go tomorrow, of course, and I guess I will have to. Go on the weekend, it's not ideal when I have days off during the week.

Really, I am so fucken slack.

It was a glorious day today, it sparkled. We ran the dogs down by the river. It was really lovely to be out in it with no pressure to do anything else. I love the lack of pressure to do anything, it is invigorating. 

I was going to go for a bike ride, since I haven't done a second workout for the week, but guess what I did instead? I bet you can't guess?

I slept on the couch with Bruno cuddled up to my back like a hot water bottle. Girl gym trainer will be pleased.

I woke up just in time to catch the 6pm misery. Good job Christian.

Bruno got the all clear at the vet yesterday. He and I are now in bed together. Sam is downstairs watching Aqua Man. All those super hero movies are just shit, I can't watch them. I don't even think Jason Momoa is anything special, certainly nothing to look at. But, you know, I'm sure he probably thinks the same about me. Chuckle.

Off To The Doggie Eye Doctor

I'm off to the doggie eye doctor today with Bruno. His eyes are better, the problem all seems to be cleared up, so good job to my favourite doggie eye doctor.

And now it seems like an awfully long trip out to the outer suburbs to have her say, "Yes, they look fine. $250 please."

But, that is what you do, they?

Just my contribution to the 33 billion, or so, dollars Australian's spend on their pets each year.

And I could only get a really early appointment, as I like doing these things in the morning to get them done, so we have to leave really early to get there on time.

45 minutes to get there, I guess that isn't so long, depending on the traffic. Bruno loves a car trip, though, so, I guess, it isn't total waste of time. Ha ha.

Anyway, just enough time for Vegemite toast before I go.

That is all I have to do today, so I guess I can't complain too much. 9.30am my day should be done.

Up Early Hump day

I get up early, it is still dark. Bruno gets up with me and pads down the stairs behind me.

I make coffee. Bruno lies out in his super dog pose in the middle of the lounge room.

I take my coffee and I sign into work when it is still 5 something. Okay, it was 5.59am, but still 5 something. Bruno comes and climbs up on the study couch and resumes his sleep. He didn't want to go outside, like I suspected he did. 

I answer a few emails. I wonder if the people I email ever see the time I email and wonder why the hell I am doing work at that time? I don't care. Are people even that observant?

Milo comes into the study and glares at Bruno on the couch, as if he is willing him to evaporate. He lies out on the carpet and close his eyes.

The day turns light suddenly after 6am. Funny how that has happened when you look up.

I get my emails done, and rejig a couple of spreadsheets. Then I am done until the rest of the company wakes up and logs on.

I open the online news to see what misery has befallen the world.

I contemplate another coffee.

It's quiet. I like getting up early for precisely that reason, not that I have any control over the time I wake up. I just wake up early now a days. I love the stillness of seemingly being the only person moving in my world.

The birds sing outside.

I think of Vic in hospital and the rain starts to fall. Is the world outside responding to my thoughts? I think the birds even stopped singing. I see them in my head with their wings across their chests and their heads bowed.

Bruno lets out a snore.

I open my own laptop and write this.

Last Day Together

It is my last day of supervised gym work. We did a lot of increased weights to test the limits of what I could do. I can always lift heavier weight, it would seem.

At the end of the session, I thank girl gym trainer for all she's done. We will keep in contact because the program goes on even without us meeting. There is supervision by app, remotely as I get the gym work happening on my own.

We have that fleetingly awkward moment when our last second together arrives and we freeze for that millisecond where we think we should do something, oh I don't know, embrace, be thank over again, have some sort of acknowledgement but neither of us really know what, then we turn and walk away and that is done.

I felt kind of sad riding my bike home in the sun shine. The trees waved over head as I cycled through the park. The sky was blue, the sun shone. It was a good day, I thought.

Monday

I message Adriana for her birthday. It is a big one. But, she is in Bali partying and she doesn't care what milestone she is passing.

Partying in Bali, that's Adriana for you.

I wish we were all parting again. Dancing on podiums in Sydney. Dancing under the mirror ball at warehouse parties in Melbourne.

I wish Fergus and Steve and Tom and Anthony were still alive and we were all partying together.

I just heard about another friend, the incredible Victoria Brown, in St Vincents in palliative care with terminal cancer. I'd go visit her, I am just up the road, but she doesn't want to see anyone, going away like an elephant to die, I guess. I can understand. There will never be another like her, they broke the mould with Victoria Brown.

So, that is very sad.

I make coffee and contemplate the meaning of life.

I think coffee is as good a meaning as anything.

Life is coffee. I like it.

Sunday Bike Rides and Dog Walks and a Spot of Lunch

I wake up with a dry mouth. I must have been breathing through my mouth?

What was I dreaming? No, thinking about my dry mouth, the dream is gone. It woke me up though.

6am. I was up. It was dark in the loungeroom still at 6am. I didn’t want to turn on the light because the lights are too bright. Let’s hope no one gets up and gets startled by not seeing me sitting here initially.

Metabolism and diet are linked to root of bipolar depression, say researchers. Illness could be treated as a physical, rather than mood, disorder, according to scientists in Edinburgh.

Not all men, but a lot of them: will Gisele Pelicot rape trial finally change France’s attitude to sexual abuse?

6.30am. I thought I started watching the shorter Friday addition of Coldwarmotors, but I actually stared watching the longer Sunday version.

7.40am. Bruno wanders into the lounge room.

7.45am. Sam and Otto wander into the lounge room. Otto briefly chases Ollie. Sam tells him off.

8am. I make vegemite toast and coffee.

8.30am. I watch the shorter Coldwarmotors from Thursday which I hadn’t watch.

9am. I go for a bike ride. I am expected to go. Girl trainer will be pleased. Of course, I should go for reasons beyond such expectation.

9:07am. I’ll leave for my bike ride. The sun comes out.

Napier Street > Edinburgh Gardens > Park Street > Royal Park > Dynon Road.

There are so many people walking their dogs in Edinburgh Gardens and along Park Street and in Royal Park.

9.40am. I’m at Dynon Road. The sun is shining as I stop for a moment. I realise they have built a whole new off/on ramp right across where I used to stop at Dynon Road.

I turn for home. Of course, I play a game of Would I Suck You Off with all the joggers jogging towards me. It starts off as definite no’s. No, No. No. No. But then suddenly, it is all yeses.

There are lots of people with golf carts around Royal Park Train Station, getting in the way, taking up the whole pathway.

10:18am. I’m home again. Otto is excited to see me. He leaps about in his unrestrained puppy way. It’s really lovely. Another living creature showing unrestrained happiness.

The sun is shining.

I have a shower.

I sit on the couch with Otto.

12:03pm. What are you doing come on? Let’s go what are you doing down there… my dictation catches me again, even before I start talking. 

We take the dogs for a walk to The Hive.

It’s overcast with rain, clouds and kind of windy and cool.

We meet up with a Boston terrier as we walk down Victoria Parade, with which, of course, Otto wants to play. Bruno takes little notice after a cursory nose sniff. The Boston’s owner says the Boston is a puppy too.

12.30pm. We’re at the Vietnamese eatery. 118 Victoria Street Richmond. We sit outside on the tables on the footpath.

The sun is shining. It is hot sitting in it. I take my hoodie off.

12.38pm. The sun goes away. It is such a spring day. I might have to put my hoodie back on.

Matt calls me to say Victoria Brown is in palliative care in St Vincent’s with terminal cancer spread right through her. She doesn’t want to see anyone, but she’d like those she was closest to, to know.

I breath out long and slow after the phone call. That is very sad. I take a moment to think about her. Life will seem just that little bit smaller without her in it.

Sam looks around, just as the nutter drops his groceries onto the ground, pulls the bedspread over his shoulders like a cape and walks up to the front wall of the Hive and starts yelling at it as if it is a person.

I see a Mercedes with a BMW numberplate. It makes me chuckle.

There is a big, rough looking guy in a brown hoodie – is it brown, or is it just dirty? I’m not sure – sitting on the tram stop seats. Another guy comes along, who looks like a Chinese spiritual guy with a crinkly beard that looks like it has been ironed flat. He sits next to the big rough guy. Moments later, the Chinese guru pulls something from his pocket and hands it to the big, rough guy, who fiddles about with it surreptitiously before sliding it away into his pocket. The Chinese guy gets up and quietly walks away. The big, rough guy gets up not long after and also walks away.

12.51pm. I’m sleepy sitting in the sun. I’ve been really sleepy lately, I wonder what that is about?

1.43pm. Bruno, Otto and I are in the entrance to The Hive.

Some old bitch is standing in the entrance to The Hive with me and Bruno and Otto with her phone on loud loudspeaker yapping away to some fucker. I so want to tell her to shut the fuck up, well, to take her phone off loud speaker.

1:46 pm. Sam reappears and we crossed Nicholson Street and sit outside Minh Phat. Would you stop getting twisted up in your fucking lead what is wrong with you... my dictation catches me out again.

1.51pm. Sam reappears 

2.15pm. We’re home.

I call Mark and tell him about Victoria Brown. Mark is not well himself at the moment, but we have a laugh.

I do the Facebook thing collecting historic photos. I get lost in that for a while, longer than I intended.

I watch tasty Classics and his Ford Granada.

5.30pm. We eat yogurt and blueberries for an arvo snack. The day is quickly drawing to a close. Monday morning is rushing up quick.

We ate curry for dinner. It was very nice. I don’t eat the rice, Sam isn’t too pleased about that. Shrug.

We watched The Amazing Race. The Matilda’s are awful to watch. Humourless and serious. How many times have they said they are elite athletes? Over and over. Yes, we get it, you are elite athletes. How many times have they said they hate losing? Hey girls, nobody likes losing? They are just awful to watch, such blokes.

We watched 60 Minutes and flight SQ321. It is a very sad story. The lawyers are trying their hardest to make Singapore airlines responsible, you know, like lawyers do.

Sam wants to re-start the modem, and 60 minutes is dragging out the plane turbulence story until we are starting to look to our laptops and ipads for relief, so we turn the TV off.

Then we do screens.

10.15pm. We go to bed.

I looked at images of Robert Fuller.

10.38pm. Lights out.

That is Sunday done. That is the weekend done.

Lazy Saturday

I only remember the end of my dream, the part where I woke up. ex-bitch-girfriend Leah Borg locked herself in my place, getting in the shower and ignoring me and not letting me in. (I am unsure why she keeps turning up in my dreams?) As I was standing on the very steep steps to my door, which just bought me up to the bottom of my front door, I knocked on the door with my phone, which popped open at the top and I could see that she had taken the sim card out of my phone.

5am. I got up and had a wee, that developed into an early morning shit the way it does only when I am taking Ozempic.

I got back into bed, but the lovely thoughts wouldn’t come, only the negative thoughts and I didn’t fall back to sleep. It isn’t nice to feel like a failure.

5.25am. I got up.

I made coffee.

Ollie and I sat on the couch together. Ollie is warm against my left leg.

A monster: lawyers for Mohamed Al Fayed’s alleged victims liken case to Savile. Barristers acting for 37 women announce intention to bring civil case against Harrods over late owner’s alleged abuse.

Rapper Shyne says former mentor Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs ‘destroyed’ his life. Belize’s House opposition leader Moses Barrow ‘takes no joy in anyone’s challenges’ after recent charges.

Axing negative gearing won’t cause a rental crisis. Here’s the maths. When an investor outbids an owner-occupier, they do add to the supply of rental houses – but that’s only half the story.

I watch a lot of anti Trump YouTube until I was sick of hearing about him. He really is like passing a car wreck, you can’t help but look.

I watch Mr cutie pants Rocky Dale Davis standup.

7.35am. Sick of YouTube, I start reading A Thousand Miles From Care.

Milo jumps back up on the couch and cuddles up in my blanket, nestling on the blanket between my legs.

8am. Bruno was up. Milo jumps down off the couch and runs off. He hears the bulldogs before I do, but I guess he needs to the way the two of them bully him.

8.15am. Sam and Otto were up.

8.30am. I make vegemite toast and coffee.

I continue reading A Thousand Miles From Care.

9.45am. I make more coffee.

Sam heads into the study with Otto.

There was a lot of lying on the couch and looking at my laptop first up. News online. YouTube. You know the goings on.

Man arrested in Italy nearly 50 years after two Melbourne women found dead in their home. Victoria police seeking an extradition order for the 65-year-old over the 1977 deaths known as the Easey Street murders.

The great unsolved murder could finally be solved, wow.

I read for most of the day A Thousand Miles from Care, curled up on the couch with my kindle, and Bruno and Otto too.

We ate noodles for lunch.

2:19pm. We take the dogs for a walk. The day is kind of warm. The sky is overcast and grey. We stand on the corner of our street. The wind blows around us.

“What are we doing?”

“Fitzroy Gardens?”

“Nyr.”

“Carlton Gardens?”

“Yes.”

We walked to the Carlton Gardens, once around the park. It was nice, the day cheered up for us as we took our walk.

There was some great huge wedding happening in the middle of the park, with food that didn’t look nearly adequate enough for the number of people present. 

Then it was home down Moor Street > St David Street > [our] Street.

3:18pm. We’re home again.

I read A Thousand Miles from Care until I was sleepy and I slept on the couch, again. I have done a lot of sleeping on the couch just lately. I guess, it is kind of nice really, and I shouldn’t question it. What the hell?

I woke at some point during the 6pm news, but fell asleep again.

I woke at 7.30pm and we ate pizza from Ladro. Capricciosa and a mushroom lovers.

We watched On the Eve Of destruction. Pia Miranda and Zachary Ruane. Humphrey B. Bear and Pia’s grandmothers church book and a collection of Empire magazines and the art work from the first play Zack directed.

We watched Have You Been Paying Attention, Robert Irwin hosting. Against type, I think Robert Irwin is a cutie. Yes, I’d like to see him in his undies.

I watched Vice Grip Garage and his De Tomaso Pantera

10.30pm. Sam and Bruno went to bed.

I kept watching Vice Grip Garage and his De Tomaso Pantera, but I kept falling asleep.

12.40am. I’d just woken up again when Sam called to say Bruno was on his way downstairs. Bruno arrived downstairs moments later. He had a wee, Otto had a wee & a poo and they both went to bed.

1am. I finished watching Vice Grip Garage and his De Tomaso Pantera. Truthfully, I had fallen asleep on the couch yet again and I had to back track to see the end of the video.

1.15am. I went to bed.

I forgot to spray my nose, I think just as I am comfortable. Damn it.

Heal Little Plant

I picked up this plant in the street. Someone had pulled it from its pot/garden bed and tossed it into the gutter.

Sam thought I was weird. "Oh, just leave it there. Why do you want that?"

I didn't really want it. It isn't really an unusual plant. 

But, I just couldn't leave it lying there, all folded over and shrivelling up exposed to the sun and the elements, dehydrating to death.

It didn't cost me anything, it took me minutes, at the most, to put it in a pot and give it some water. I already had the succulent soil ready to go.

It was all floppy and bent over, with its leaves - whatever you call a succulent's leafy bits - drooping down, but look at it now.

I don't know, it felt like a good deed, saving a living thing. Maybe that is crazy?

Rainy Gym Day Curled Up With A Book... er, Kindle.

I was fucked after my gym work out today. Girl trainer pushed me hard on the exercise bike with the resistance pumped right up to double figures. Boy trainer, back from holidays, supervised.

Today was supposed to be my last supervised session, but girl trainer said we had to do tests, or data, or something, still, so I now have one more session next week. 

I was happy for today to be the last session.

I am joining a gym close to home, and I must get around to that rather than just talking about it, so I should be able to keep up the sessions on my own.

That's the theory anyway. Ha ha. No, not the theory, it is what I am going to do. 

I've lost weight. I feel healthier. It is good.

I lay on the couch when I got home and read A Thousand Miles From Care, a book about a gay hate crime in the late 80s, specifically about Scott Johnston the brilliant mathematician who changed the world of mathematics only to be thrown from a cliff by a homophobic low life. I haven't been reading so much lately, I have been taking up my time watching essentially brain rot YouTube. It's nice to read again.

My legs were tired, in the afternoon when Sam wanted to take the dogs for a walk. Well, it had just been raining, and I reckoned it was going to rain again, so I told Sam to take the dogs on his own. He wasn't so pleased.

I can't remember if it rained again, or not.

Bad Christian

Sam has one of his rare days in the office. He leaves home at 8.20am.

So, 8.25am. I am ready to head to the bakery to get some cake, but Bruno decides he wants to go for a walk outside. He and Otto are at the front door when I go to leave for the bakery, noses together as if they are discussing some conspiracy.

So, I get Bruno's lead and harness and I lead him outside into the glorious sunshine, but instead of waking he just stands there.

"Oh come on, I say. "Either walk, or I am going to the bakery." He just stands and gazes back at me. If he'd shrugged, I wouldn't have been surprised.

A woman walks past saying, "Isn't he adorable."

"Isn't he," I say.

So, I wait for a few minutes and then I head back inside, and he follows, slowly, sniffing every thing on his way. I want to give him a push, but anyone who has bulldogs knows they can't be hurried along.

Not long after, I am at the bakery getting the last coffee scroll, after an apparent rush on them this morning.

Riding My Bike

I can't tell you how happy I am to ride my bike around the city.

Last night leaving the gym, the main road in front of the gym was unusually banked right back with one great line of traffic at a stand still. Car drives were unsuccessfully trying to jockey for a better position, but there was no where for them to go. Some of the 4WDs were illegally mounting the centre tramway strip and doing U-turns, but really the other side was only marginally better.

I don't know what had gone wrong with the traffic. Shrug.

It's moments like these you realise how mean employers are making workers go back to the office. You think govts would be encouraging work from home to alleviate peak hour traffic congestion.

I peddled casually out between the stationary cars, crossed over the road to the park, and peddled through the serenity of the green grass under the gorgeous trees, with the sun shining down on me.

Lovely.

The Bloated Orange Criminal

Who thinks that Donald Jessica Trump is doing so badly in the election that he organised his own assignation attempt?

Trump is such a low life that it is exactly the thing he would do, you know anything, to give him a bump in the polls.

Hitler is in the Berlin bunker, it is the last days of the 3rd Reich and consequently, he would do anything, even con a mentally deranged man who will risk going to jail for life. Eggs. Omelet's.

Wet Weekend

It's raining. I'm lying on the couch. Fuck it, the weekend already feels like a right off. I'm staying indoors.

It's my birthday. What shit weather for my birthday.

Bruno is cuddled up next to me on the couch keeping me warm so, you know, I hate that. Ha ha. I'm watching car shows on YouTube, and Bruno is snuggled up to my left side snoring away like a snoring hot water bottle. And I am keeping him warm too, of course.

Not an unpleasant way to spend the weekend.

The rain keeps falling outside.

I hope everything the roof guys did yesterday has dried before the rain fell on it. I guess it has. I guess I should think positively and think it is a good opportunity to check the leaks are fixed before I pay the bill? Oh yes, that’s very sensible.

Getting The Roof Fixed

The roof guys have been fixing the roof for two days. All done today, apparently. They are two not unattractive brothers up above the kitchen clomping about.

One of them, I think the younger one - they are both in the 30s so younger older doesn't really mean a lot, just a fact - is really very cute. He's really taken with the bulldogs and he is really gorgeous with them when he's down at their level patting them and just being a cute human being.

I even heard him saying to his brother how he'd got to say hello to Bruno and Otto. They replaced the sky light in the kitchen roof, so a lot of the time it was open to the air and I could hear what they were saying.

And no more leaks. 

Going To The Doctor

I took Bruno to the eye doctor. He's got ointment and pills to try and fix his eye problem.

Out to the outer south eastern suburbs by 3.30pm, a 45 minute drive. Not my ideal choice of appointment time, I'd much rather do such a trek - to foreign territory - in the morning.

And I tell you what, the traffic for the drive home was horrendous. The freeway on which we came out was a carpark heading back into the city at 4.30pm. So, Bruno and I continued on right across the outer easter suburbs to the northern side to take the other freeway back into town. We live in the northern inner suburbs so it makes no real difference where we drive across the city, out there, or in close. 

That drive across the outer eastern suburbs was really really heavy with traffic, but for the most part it kept moving, even though the road was heaving with cars.

Is this what the commute is like for all these people every day? I tell you what, if I had to do that I'd be chucking a rope over a tree branch, erm, ah, well, I just wouldn't be doing it. Work from home, that is what I say.

There was a report recently that calculated that workers have saved 85 billion dollars since they all started working from home. Hello? That is why we don't want to go back.

We made it home in just a fraction over an hour, so really that wasn't so bad.

Back To Normal

And my weekend starts. Oh, it is so nice to be back to a normal week. Not that it was hard working 5 days, but two days off isn't much. The weekend is so short that way.

It is good that Boris is back. She had a nice time while she was away, so that is the main thing. Good for her. And you know, I almost mean that. Ha ha. No, I do. If you can fake sincerity, you will go far in life.

I haven't joined a gym. I haven't even looked into it. But those things don't take all that long, do they? No. I have a gym in mind, the one closest to home. What other criteria is there? Now, I just have to go and enquire. So, I have a week to get my shit together. They used to make you do tests, back when I used to go to the gym. I wonder if they still do?

Anyway, now I get to do all those things that I'd normally do on my days off. To start with, I am taking Bruno to the eye doctor tomorrow, way out in the outer suburbs, so there is something that will get done, crossed off the list, as they say.

The roofing man is finally coming tomorrow too, so that's a good thing too. What did he say in the beginning? He'd be here in 8 weeks. And I think that was in April. Good old tradies, huh?

I poured with rain today, though, so we'll see if it rains tomorrow.

So, that will be crossed off the list too.

Now, for that Tattslotto win, you know, so I can cross that off the list too. 😄

Tuesday Gym Day

Okay, off to the gym for the afternoon.

Apparently, this is the last week, maybe second last week, of my personal trainer.

It's a 12 week program, but only the first 6 weeks is supervised.

After that, I'm on my own, to exercise for the remaining 6 weeks, whatever it is, which my trainers will supervise from afar, through an app, of course.

I have to decide to do it for myself, that is the idea behind all of this.

So, I must get ready, wish me luck.

Bowie's Final Albums

I've been listening to a lot of David Bowie recently. Young Americans, Station to Station, Lodger, Black Star, The Next Day.

I've tried to like Black Star, I really have, his final masterpiece, people say. I've tried to like it. Just give it another listen, I've been saying to myself.

I have to say, I much prefer The Next Day to Black Star. The Next Day has some great songs on it and is exciting. Black Star, not so much. It's more like an ambient ode to death, not so exciting really, as Bowie takes his final breath, that's what I think.

Sunday

I fertilised all of my indoor plants, it being spring and all. Winter is over people. I've been meaning to do it for days, but have been too lazy, and too weak to pull my sorry arse away from online screen time. Its a sad indictment... on the world, really.

The wind returned as did the rain. Still, we managed an hour of walking with the dogs in the park snatching some sunshine. The park was busy, lots of people, all rushing out the door while the sun shined, I guess.

It was my brother's birthday, so I rang him and wished him a lovely day. We have one of our two phone calls per year. His birthday, and my birthday. 

We generally catch up in person at Xmas.

I got sick of myself and YouTube, so I read for the afternoon, breaking out my Kindle. I read A Thousand Miles From Care: A Hunt For A Brother's Killer. The death of Scott Johnson, the gay, American maths genius.

And then it is the end of the weekend and Monday looms large again. Reading is lovely, I forget how much when I don't do it and then I do it again.

And that's it, the weekend is done.

 

The bulldogs flat out after the walk home from lunch. The tiled floor cool on their tummies.

We ate Japanese Curry for dinner.

After the misery hour, we turn the teev off.

Sam keeps researching new coffee machines.

I lie on the floor and listen to David Bowie. Lodger, followed by Station to Station, followed by Young Americans.

Saturday.

I’m up early, pushing myself clear of the two bulldogs now taking up the middle section of the bed between them. I encourage Bruno onto the bed in a weak moment how many months ago when I was sick and he and Otto were fighting. Now the two of them have made up we can’t get them off the bed. Stupid me.

I make coffee. I breath in the new day. I upload my new Spanish film.

Loli calls to ask me about me. Luke told her when he called her recently to tell her about Mark, who is back in hospital with heart issues.

She’s been in hospital herself having her gallbladder removed after experiencing incredible pain recently. She tells me she is pre-diabetic. I tell her I was diabetic too. That and the heart thing happened pretty much together for me.

She tells me her brother had a heart attack, all his arteries were found to be blocked. He had a difficult recovery, she even had to nurse him. So, I guess I should feel kind of lucky, I had a minor coronary event, as the cardiac specialist put it, and I didn't even take one sick day off work.

Loli and I promise to keep in touch more in the future. Sam and I must head down the beach to see her new house, which we haven't seen yet.

Today, we're walking to Carlton for lunch. We're taking the bulldogs, of course. Now we just need the sun to come out and for the grey sky to turn blue.

And as I wrote that, the sun did come out.

I must tell David. He'll say it is my power, or the divine intervention of the planets, or some such bullshit. And I'll tell him it is a coincidence, like the ones that happen every day.

The same applies to thinking of Loli yesterday and having her call me this morning.

David would say it was all apart of some great cosmic process, or some crap like that.

Off On A Small Adventure

9:16am. I am sick of myself lost on the couch falling into the YouTube rabbit hole like I have been doing lately.

It is my first day off in how many weeks?

I leave home in search things to see, get some scripts filled, have a sniff around some shops, but mostly just to venture forth and not spend the day on the couch.

Sam’s working anyway, so I should be able to entertain myself for a few hours.

I buy a passion muffin at the bakery, but it isn’t very nice so take it home to Sam. and give it to him then I keep walking.

I cut through the commission flats grounds, and I think how ill-conceived the Labor Party’s policy of demolishing the towers and giving the land over to private developers to build tiny cities.

It is windy as I walked down Brunswick Street, very windy. 

I’m listening to Tina Turner, Rough.

I pop into Chemistwarehouse.

Brunswick Street is pretty quiet this time of day, the emptiness feels reassuring that the world isn’t such an overpopulated place. Maybe that is true, or not true, but there is something about early morning being so calm it doesn’t really matter.

I walk the length of the Fitzroy part of Brunswick Street and most of the shops are still closed, not ready up and going for the day.

9.50am. I’m on the corner of Brunswick Street and Alexandra Avenue. The sun is just starting to shine. I take a seat on the public seat on the footpath and contemplate the day. I don’t know where I am going, and you know, that feels good.

There is a strong smell of car fumes here on the corner. It is a busy corner. Alexandra Parade never gives up its traffic.

There is suddenly a whole group of 30something professional types with children and prams and noise and commotion, sucking up all the oxygen in the place seemingly settling into the tables outside Blonde. (I wonder if it is the same Blond that used to be in Smith Street?) Oh go away, I think. And eventually they do, as they weren’t settling in, they were just getting all of their shit together to go.

I’m sitting looking at Patel’s Pharmacy which says in big, bold print that it opens at 10am. I look at my watch.

10:06am. The tram comes and I get on the tram and go to North Fitzroy. My first house was just here and this used to me my local shopping centre. I haven’t been back here in a while. It doesn’t look as though it has changed very much. How long ago did I live here? Rachel and I used to buy 12 iced chocolate donuts from the supermarket and eat them with tea in my back yard. I don’t fancy chocolate donuts any longer.

10:15am. I’m sitting at the tram stop in North Fitzroy waiting for a tram to venture further a field

10.31am. I get off at Holden Street, the next group of shops along the tram line. It is where my doctor is. There isn’t much here. I start to walk, but I only get to the next tram stop when a tram comes.

I’m heading up to St George’s Road, I don’t really know where I’m going now. It is nice not to know where you are going sometimes, we don’t do that nearly often enough.

St Georges Road flashes by. I think I will get off at Bell Street. Bell Street is so often the outer limit of ‘my inner suburban zone.’

10.41am. I didn’t get off the tram and now I’m heading off down Miller Street away from where I thought I wanted to be, but of course the tram doesn’t go up St Georges Road to Bell Street, you have to go down Miller Street, if you want to keep going on the number 11 tram.

This is where my friend Loli used to own a house. I wonder if she still owns it, as she didn’t sell it when she first moved to, um, where did she move to after this? Point Cook as an interim house on their way to live in Torquay.

10.49am. The tram signs all say Gilbert Road. This is Preston, even if I don’t ever think of it as Preston.

I reckon I could keep going with the number 11 tram to Bell Street, then catch the bus down Bell Street to High Street, then catch the 86 tram home.

There are a couple of very tasty looking bakeries, but I’ve turned down all the opportunities of buying cakes, but I am thirsty now. I’ll find a supermarket.

There is a couple of old women chatting behind me at the tram stop yapping on. I don't look around. Grrrr! I think, Oh go away. Weirdly, as I get on the tram the old women get on behind me and when they pass me to find a seat, they turn out to be two 15 year old boys which was kind of a mind fuck. Shake of the head.

10.54am. I’m at Bell Street. It’s kind of nice going about the city by tram, on a little expedition. There is something really freeing about travelling by public transport. You can get off it at any point and just forget about it, until you want to move on again, then it appears again just like that.

The two lads follow me to the bus stop, but keep walking.

The traffic on Bell Street is noisy and plentiful. It is the main traffic artery in the north, I guess. The cars thunder past.

11.02am. I catch the 514 bus. It is only a few stops to Plenty Road.

11.07am. I get off at Plenty Road. Now where is my lovely 86 tram?

I walk down Plenty Road. I am still thinking about a drink. I come to Woolies. I go into to get a peach iced tea and come out with a bag of mandarins. I eat them as I walk along. Every time I see a bin in the distance I peel another mandarin.

There has been a huge amount of apartment development in this part of, what I would call, Preston. They have wiped out all of the old brick factories and built tall concrete stumps in their place. I think it is a mistake, to wipe away your past, but I guess, that is progress.

I start walking down High Street.

11.30am. I’m in Vinnies (885 High St, Thornbury VIC 3071) looking at the cds, and just before I am finished one of those guys with apparent mental health issues comes in and starts banging through the CDs in the CD rack. He pulls the CDs out of their racks and makes piles of them on top of the DVDs in the DVD rack, for no apparent reason. I’ve seen this before in opshops where guys do this like a preoccupation, resorting and rearranging things. And then he suddenly leaves, leaving the piles of CDs all over the place. 

They had Funny Girl and A Star Is Born, but they wanted $3 each for them, for CDs I will probably never play, so I left them there.

12pm. I’m in Lions Thrift Shop (735 High St, Thornbury VIC 3071) I get a Spanish language film, A Gun In Each Hand. It sounds interesting, six intertwined tales of love. And the Spanish are beautiful.

12.12pm. I’m halfway down High Street @505 and I have sore feet. The walk has been nice, though, the gentle sun on my face, fresh air, colour and movement.

I’m on my third Tina Turner album, acid Queen.

12.26pm. I am in the Sacred Heart OpSop on the corner of Separation Street and High Street. (387 High St, Northcote VIC 3070) It is the really big opshop, one in which I never have any luck. I buy a Kransky Sisters CD. I love the Kransky sisters, they are very clever.

I head across Separation Street and go to Chemistwarehouse. 

12.31pm. I’m in the Salvos. The CDs and DVDs are up on a mezzanine. They don’t have anything.

I walk up High Street knowing that I am done and it is time to set sail for home.

12.43pm. I’m at stop 32, I guess it is Northcote. I ‘m waiting for a tram to take me home. It is that super stop in the middle of High Street.

I’ve walked the length of High Street.

It’s been a good walk. If you had ever told me I would walk the length of High Street I would have said you are kidding yourself, but it’s been nice, to tell you the truth.

I bought a Spanish film, and a CD all of which cost me $4. The mandarins were $2.90. I guess I spent $5 on trams and buses. I feel quite pleased with myself.

12.45pm. Here comes a tram.

12.47pm. There is some dick with a staffy on the tram. Seriously? Not that I really care. It looks like a beautiful dog.

This tram driver is rocking this tram along like he’s late for an appointment, or something.

1pm. I’m at stop 24 on Queens Parade. I stopped in Clifton Hill to have a sniff about, but it was really a waste of time. I wanted it to be more, but it wasn’t. Or perhaps, I was really ready to head home and I should have just stayed on the tram.

Now I’m waiting for another fucking tram. I’m getting ansy waiting for the tram to arrive. It doesn’t help that there had been 3 coming out of the city while I have been waiting.

1.07pm. Finally, the tram is coming. Hooray.

Oh god, the tram is full of people, which hadn't been the case all day before this. Just take a look at them, I thought, what a bunch of fucking losers. What a shallow fucken gene pool is represented here. I say that because there wasn't a smile, or a happy face, between them. It looked as though they were all trying to complete the grim task of just trying to get somewhere, maybe in life too. For some reason, they all looked like they needed a good shower. They all seem to eye me off suspiciously as I entered the tram, as if I was an intruder, or maybe my look of disdain, which may well have been my imagination, of course.

Maybe, I had just walked too much.

1.13pm. Some bitch gets on in Smith Street yapping into her phone loudly. Grrr! Oh shut up! I only call her a bitch as her phone is on loud speaker and we are all privy to both sides of her conversation. Phones should be banned on teams.

1:21pm. I’m home.

Sam asks if I went to Brisbane for shopping?

Ha ha, I say.

Otto is very pleased to see me, leaping about enthusiastically. 

Then he sees his ball on the coffee table and he is transfixed.

Training

David calls, early, we have a laugh. I tell him that I am off to my gym session and how my girl trainer got just the slightest bit cat’s bum lips last session when told her I forgot my training watch for the second time last week. They run everything through apps and the watch provides the data for the apps. "I guess that is what they know," I said.

David said, "Oh, forget it again and tell me the look she gives you." 

I send him a photo of it on my wrist with a thumbs up. 

David answers "Noooooooooo!"

I tell him how my girl trainer keeps asking me to set goals? 

"Goals," I say to David. "How about not having another heart attack? That’s the only goal I have." I say. 

David laughs.

"Anything beyond that? No. I’m too fucking old. Fuck off. Goals, dreams, aspirations, wants, whatever? No, I don’t have any of those any more. That shit is for twenty year olds. Seriously!"

We both laugh.

I get on my bike after that and head to the gym. I send David a photo half way to the gym as some form of encouragement to get him to take his dogs to the beach in Ballina, like he said earlier that he should do. But it doesn't work.

I Don't know

I don’t know if I’m a nice person? I don’t know? I have awful thoughts about people, but I pass that off as just my arse of humour, it is dark. I do things that favour me and then bitch about selfish people. I don’t know that I’m overly generous.  But then, I’m good at not getting caught up in other people’s shit. I’m good at keeping people’s confidences. You know, secrets. I tend to be easy going. But, I lack empathy, I think sometimes. Things that upset other people, you know when they hear the sad plight of somebody and get upset. I just don’t get upset by sad stories of people I don’t know. I don’t cry at stranger’s misfortune like so many other people seem to. I don’t feel inclined to sign petitions regarding injustices, despite feeling strongly about equality in the world.

Tina Turner

I've been listening to Tina Turner the last couple of days. I love Tina Turner's music.

Some people wonder why Aretha Franklin had it in for Tina Turner. Apparently, Aretha Franklin felt that Tina didn’t show Aretha the respect Aretha thought she deserved being the Queen of Soul, and all. 

She didn’t think Tina Turner showed her the appropriate amount of respect, it is thought.

Really?

Okay, I’ll say it, the reason Aretha Franklin had it in for Tina Turner was because Tina Turner was better than her. Tina was a better singer, Tina was a better performer, Tina was a better person, Tina was more attractive, and Aretha knew it.

Tina Turner was simply the best. She was the biggest singing star in the world there for a while.

Of course, Aretha was the best too. And we are talking about singers who were the very best. And it was stupid that Aretha felt threatened by Tina, but, apparently, that’s what Aretha was like.

It is why she had it in for Dionne Warwick and Patti LaBelle. Dionne was impossibly cool and poised. And Patti LaBelle arguably had the greatest voice of anybody ever.

Aretha sounded as though she was prone petty jealousies, which, I guess, meant she was subject to insecurities and anxiety about herself.

Stupid, really. She has been voted the greatest singer to have ever lived, twice, so it really was stupid.

Monday

It was Monday, a nothing kind of day. You know, as Mondays often are. It wasn't even a nice day. The best that could be said for it was that it was changeable. Don't you love the way changeable is so often wielded as an insult, when changeable often means inventive and interesting, but not when it comes to the weather.

Armageddon was predicted with the weather last night and today, with a severe weather warning, but it didn't quite seem to eventuate, well, where we were anyway. It rained a bit, the world turn white for a moment with the hail, but that was as bad as it got. The sun came out.

My big boss rang me and asked, "where's Wally?"

"I'm sorry, what?" I asked. "Who's Wally?"

"Boris," he said. He laughed. It was a boss joke, I guess.

"She's got today and tomorrow off and is back Wednesday."

"Oh," he said. "Why did I give her all that time off?"

"Weak moment?" I said deadpan.

We both laughed.

He thanked me for all the work I'd done. He wanted to know where I was going away on holidays?

"I dunno," I said.

He thinks I should take some time off.

Maybe, he is right.

The sun came out again long enough for us to take the dogs for a walk.

We played it safe though and walked the main shopping strip with all the shop verandas for shelter, if need be. As it turned out, we didn't need it.

There was some poor down-and-out who had police in attendance halfway along the strip. Then the boy and girl cops walked behind us as if they were a police escort. We walked until there were no more verandas for shelter then we turned around. Not that it rained while we were walking, but the wind did blow, and it was quite cold.

Woke

It’s almost funny how conservatives have invented this term ‘woke’, well, they have appropriated it to be more correct, as a shortcut, all encompassing, umbrella term to represent all of the grievances they have against anyone who doesn’t agree with them now a days, and yet there’s virtually not one conservative who can tell you what ‘woke’ actually means, as they use it.

Take note next time a conservative is asked to define the woke agenda, they have no doubt been banging on about, and they will stutter and stumble and they will not be able to explain what it is they are complaining about.

Oh course, woke does have a meaning, it's just that all the conservatives who use that term as a pejorative are unaware of what that meaning is.

For those of you who are interested in what it actually means, it means when black people become aware of the discrimination in society against them.