House Maintenance and Then Off To The Country

Rachel messages me early to say she might drop in at 1pm to give me Leah’s birthday present. That’s good, as I’ve been shitty with Leah too and I think I had better collect her birthday present sooner than later, as I should show at least a little interest.

I’m feeling toey about my future. What am I going to do? It is weighing more heavily on my now, now that I realise how much time I have had off and how I have wasted it and how I am going to have to go back to work. Ah! I so don’t want to. But, I don’t want to waste my life away either.

Oh what to do?

However, I get lost in the newspaper reading and somehow I get onto the new book, published some time ago, from my favourite writer, Sam Shepard. I decide that I could simply walk into town to my favourite bookshop, The Paperback, to see if they have got it.

My conscience is needling me some where in the back of my mind that my current trouble with Shane is actually all stuff that is going on with me. Clearly, something isn't right in what I am doing? It is not a good feeling. My passive aggressive streak is playing up big time and I have to some how reign it in, or it won’t end well. The common denominator here is me, lets face it. I think I did the same to David in the months preceding his moving out. They are not doing what I want and I respond in a passive aggressive way, rather than saying how I feel straight out.

Bad me. The things you are yet to learn, hey?

I think a nice walk will do me good. It’s warm but a bit drizzly, I kind of like it as I walk to the city. They have the book, good old Paperback. I buy DBC Pierre’s new book, Death in Wonderland too and immediately feel guilty about all the other books I have bought this year, which I haven’t read.

I come home and effortlessly read for the rest of the afternoon, before I get restless and want to achieve something. 

I look at all the stuff I bought from Bunnings and decide it is now time to act, I have delayed quite long enough. I chop out the hibiscus tree that is threatening to push over the fence. I have finished chopping, it is amazing what a difference a sharp pruning saw makes. I’m sipping on my tea thinking good thoughts about myself, when I see a huge smear of blood on the white cup. I have lacerated the end of my thumb. Bugger. It is cut four times all close to each other and it hurts for days, because any type of use just opens the wounds up again, even though they are small.

Sam arrives at 5.30, Anthony arrives at 6.30 and we get in the car and head to the country for the weekend.

The Calder Highway gets progressively more and more fogged out, until just a few kilometres before Bolago we can barely see a metre in front of the car. It’s a good thing I have driven that road many times, as at any moment I still know exactly where we are.

Working and Being Bothered Yet Again

I was thinking today would be the day to write fiction. No Shane home recovering from whatever drug he did on the weekend and no Sam sick.

First up I was out of coffee, so I headed to the supermarket.

I read 9msn and then about Doc B’s pictorial history of the AIDS epidemic and all the famous people who had died of AIDS, from Ricky Wilson the guitarist from the B52s to the barmaid from Gunsmoke Amanda Blake. I read about the gay kid who got bullied into committing suicide in the states recently, Jamey Rodemeyer and actor Zachary Quinto coming out as gay because of the effect it had on him.

I listened to Chopin’s piano concertos on YouTube.

I decide I need to do something, I can’t just sit around on my arse thinking everything will be alright. I cleaned up the top room. I threw out all of David’s stuff. The next door neighbours up the lane yet again left their bins out, yet again. And I had rubbish. What is a boy to do? So, I filled them with David’s crap. Pay it forward, I thought.

I cleaned up the garden. Weeded, swept, tried to make it look tidy, like Mark so effortlessly seems to be able to do.

I put all the rest of the rubbish in the car ready for a midnight dump at The Brotherhood.

I chatted to Sam, during the day, as I do. We chat all day by various means of communication; phone, email, instant messaging, Facebook.

I sat back and drank tea, at the end of my physical work for the day.

I pondered life.

Wait until I tell Shane that the top room is going to be Mark and Luke’s after Aby has used it. That should please him. I know I’m a bitch, shrug But, Shane has no thoughts beyond himself when he denigrates Mark and Luke to me. What does he really think I’m going to think when he does that? It is kind of baffling, not to mention unjustified.

It is probably a sign that we shouldn’t be living together any longer,] I guess.

I thought I should try to be nice when he got home, you know, be newsy, tell him what is going on in the world, so I told him about Doc B dying.

“Oh really, he wasn’t that old. How did he die?”

“An AIDS related illness.”

“What? People don’t die of that anymore.”

“Oh, I think they do,” I said. “I’ve been reading Doc B’s writing, he said that the second generation antivirals haven’t lived up to expectations and he was pessimistic about a cure.

“Oh, I don’t think anybody is talking about a cure,” said Shane. “It’s funny, maybe ignorance increases your chances of survival?”

He went to lie down, after that. “I’m tired, I need to lie down, before I work out what I’m doing with the rest of the day.” And I felt that maybe I’d been a little insensitive. Maybe that was a little harsh, considering Shane’s HIV status.

Sure, I could go to Bunnings tomorrow, but I might as well go tonight, when I’d only be lounging in front of the TV, then maybe I’d have a clear go at doing something tomorrow. Maybe?

So, I went to Bunnings in Coburg and bought a whole lot of things that I needed; weed poison, creeper poison, hoses, pruning saws, silicon for the leaking windows. I dropped into see Sam, but he hadn’t had dinner yet and his house mate was busy behind the cooker preparing it, so I didn’t stay long. Kiss kiss, bye bye.

I’m going to fix all the things that need to be done. I’m going to replace the cord in the blinds in the spare room, how hard can it be? I’m going to finally silicone up the leaking roof. And I’m going to poison the bloody creeper that is continually growing over from next door. I’ve told my neighbour that she needs to get rid of it twice, both times she has ignored me. So, now I’m going to fix it. I’m going to poison the blood oxalis. I’m thinking I’m going to replace the broken tiles in the kitchen as well. How hard can that be?

I dropped off the rubbish at The Brotherhood on the way home. There was another woman there, who’d pulled up in a VW Transporter, at the same time as me, who carried armfuls of stuff from her car to the dumping spot, just as I did.

“It’s good to get rid of your junk, isn’t it,” she said.

When I got home, Shane was still in his room. The house was quiet. One lamp light was on in the lounge. I made myself tea and it was 8.30 and The Slap was about to start. It was lovely, having the house to myself. I lay on the couch in the minimal lamp light and enjoyed the show.

Halfway through I heard Shane’s footsteps on the stairs and then he was in the kitchen with some guy named Scott, or Tony, or Fred, or something. A boyfriend substitute, no doubt, when any substitute will do. He’ll settle for anyone, I think. Is this the guy from the weekend? His boy shaped plug for loneliness. Is this the dinner date from last night? 

Then they sat on the other couch and started to chit chat.

Really? I thought. Go to your room if you want to talk. But, lets’ face it, Shane has never been that spatially aware.

Then they started asking questions. To fill in the gaps from the beginning which they missed.

“Who is it about this week?” asks Shane.

“Um, Harry.” Don’t start with the questions, please.

“Who it that?”

“Harry’s girlfriend.” I’m trying to listen to this.

“But he has a wife?”

“Yes, he has a wife.” Will this ever stop?

“So, that’s not her?”

“No.” I wanted to scream it. I’m sorry if you missed the first half.

“What’s his wife’s name.”

“Oh… um… I can’t remember.” Do you ever think about anybody else!

“It’s Aisha, isn’t it?” chimes in Scott/Tony/Fred/Whoever.

“No, Aisha is Hector’s wife.” OMG!

“Hector is the one who slapped the kid?”

“No, that is Harry.”

“Hector is Harry’s cousin.”

SHUT UP! SHUT UP! You fuckers! Stop talking. Go away. And yes, Doc B died of AIDS!

Finally, the questions stopped. I stopped answering.

“So how did you get to be in it?” asks Scott.

That is the self focussed factor here. He’s not watching the show for the entertainment value, he is watching it because it is all about him, because he happened to be in it for a microsecond one episode. As an extra, blink and you missed it.

Oh! Sheesh!

Job Interview

Sam is keen on giving wet willies. I shouldn’t complain, as it was me who taught them to him. Right now, last count, he is winning. There are a few wet fingers that he is owed.

I’m up early getting the boxes from the spare bedroom storeroom and throwing them into my rubbish bin and the neighbours bins all up and down the street. It is amazing what you can throw away when you utilise all of the half-filled bins of the environmentally aware yuppies up and down the street.

It’s this week and Aby arrives and there is still stuff of Shane’s up in that room. I don't know when, when I rented a room to Shane, I agreed to him using the spare room to store his crap.

Sam stayed home, two sickies in a row unheard of, as he has a job interview today, 3pm. So it is another day of distractions where I don’t have to give the future any thought. In other words, an excuse not to write. I can piss around without regret. Do you realise that I suffer so on the other days?

We got up and had muesli, much to Sam’s continuing amazement, and coffee.
“How can you not be sick of that by now?” He raises his hands in the air. “It is quite beyond me, really.”

Sam tries on suits of mine. They are double breasted and bordering on old fashioned, but they look okay on him. (My single breasted suits are too big)
We head over to his house to get shirts and shoes. He gets his three-buttoned jacket, which he teams with my black pants and he looks gorgeous in them, of course. I could be a little biased, naturally.

Rachel has a new kitten, and I want to go and see it, but Sam says we don’t have time. “I have a job interview, hello.”
We head back to my place. It is hot. It is suddenly summer, you can feel it, you can taste it in the air.
Sam goes for a his interview. And my cute, sexy smart boyfriend gets the job.

Shane says he is out for dinner and disappears not long after he got home. I’m glad as well as feeling a tinge of guilt, about feeling such thoughts.

Sam and I headed out into the garden to deposit the rat-baits on the roof. Then I got into chopping down the creeper, away from the box gutters. Sam stood out in the lane and picked up all the bits I dropped over the edge. He was a good little worker to have helping me.
He reminded me that he helped me last year, when I questioned him about knowing what to do.
Oh yes, you have been around for a while, I guess. Ha ha, he he.

Sam and I eat soup for dinner, our chicken and my vegetable, from a number of weeks ago, mixed. Sam doesn’t seem to think that soup can last much more than a month in the freezer. I guess, I don’t know really, but I’m sure it can last longer than that.
We got to bed and watch Mad Max until Sam declares it to be “absolute rubbish” and he turns it around to Graham Norton. I didn’t bother telling him that I’d already seen it, I was just happy that it was a program he was happy about.

Everybody is Sick, Some More So

I was up at 9am. I waited until I heard Shane close the front door and I got up. The last meaningful indication before everything goes quiet and I'm on my own to sleep until whenever.

He crunches his car into reverse, and then drives away.

It was sunny, with a beautiful blue sky today. I had made coffee set up my laptop on the coffee table and had slid the stewed apple and pear combination on to my muesli. There was the taste of summer in the air, the morning sparkled bright and alluring straight up.

My sister called and said she would be in the city to give me my mum’s new chequebook. I did kind of feel she could have dropped by on her way and simply put it in the letter box if she didn’t want to stop, but no. I had to go to her, apparently. I guess people think those who aren’t working have all the time in the world.

Now I have to leave the comfort of my warm lounge room. Bugger!

I checked the letterbox and there was a card from my American doctor friends saying that Doc B. had died suddenly last month. Poor B. I didn’t know he’d really been sick and I felt guilty for no having kept in such close contact. All that medical knowledge and it couldn’t save him.

The phone rang and it was Sam, sounding sick, saying he was sick and did I want to look after him for the day. He must have really been sick if he felt he had to leave work. 

Quick thinking. “Hey, where are you?”

“Walking up William Street.”

“Could you walk up to Bourke Street and pick up something from my sister on the corner?”

“I am really sick, you know.”

I felt a moment’s hesitation, thinking I was being far too cheeky for my own good. “You practically only have to walk an extra block.”

“Really? Are you serious?”

And with a little more too’ing and fro’ing and a couple of phone calls, he agreed.

And I had a sick boyfriend, who arrived not long after. He stated vomiting not long after he arrived... at which point, I kind of felt bad for making him do my lazy arse chores.

I put him to bed and headed to the supermarket to buy the ingredients for chicken soup. Grandma’s old fashioned whole carcass chicken soup. Who is it, the Jewish mamas who make the life restoring whole carcass chicken soup? Is that who? Well, that’s who I had in mind as I headed down the street.

The breeze rolled over me, the rays massaged my skin and made me feel alive.

I had crossed over two of the streets and had crossed my road and was walking passed the yoga centre when a man came the other way holding a bottle of wine in a brown paper bag. His face was flushed red and his skin seemed to be slicked with sweat.

“It is soooo fucken hot, ay? Unbelievable!” He rolled his eyes. “Too hot! Too much!” He staggered a bit and his face was flushed red. I wanted to get out my phone and check the time.

“Yes, it is warm.”

“So.” Swoon. “Fucken.” Swoon. “Hot.” He looked dazed, or is that crazed. He tried to grab hold of the tree branch to stabilise himself, but the branch was way above both of us. He stumbled, but managed to grab the nearby fence to steady himself.

“Oh yes, have another drink, buddy.”

“Ohhh,” sounded his voice somewhere behind me.

I thanked the universe quietly that my drug of choice was never alcohol. Poor bastard, I thought, without looking around.

I put the chicken in a large pot and covered it with water. I chopped up the carrots, the celery and the potatoes. Sam gets up and insists on adding tomato to the soup, he is determined. “Add some acid.”

It cooks for 2 hours. Lovely. It fills the house with a lovely, freshly cooked, aroma. That in itself should be enough to make the sick feel well again.

The magical soup is a bit lacking, when we taste it, so we head to the supermarket to get more vegetables, and we buy a bread stick and really fake chocolate cakes and bags of jubes.

We make garlic bread… we are going to be happy, fat boyfriends.

We cut up the vegetables and add them to the soup. Sam adds more tomato.

I realise we forgot the plastic containers to freeze the soup in, so we head back to the supermarket for the 3rd time. Still, it is a lovely day, quite light and new, with the freshness of the summer sun to walk in.

We eat soup for dinner too.

 

 

Too Much Time On My Hands, Really, For My Own Good

I woke up with the idea of writing tHE tOWER, my story on corporate life. It's a decision, something to write to, at the very least. I felt like I had the inspiration, I felt I had the will, I felt like I had the energy. I came down at 9am and set up my lap-top. Ready to go.

Now is my opportunity, I have just realised. Now is my time to write something, the perfect time. God knows I have had four months off already and if I had spent the time actually writing rather than telling myself I can’t do it, or I’m no good, or I’m just not going to get it done, or any number of things that I have told myself over the last four months, I could have banged out a draft of a novel, or a good portion of it, by now. (Maybe not a literary novel, but who cares about that. Commercial is where the money is anyway baby) I have, I have had, the perfect time to do such things and I have pissed it away yet again.

Or, do I simply conclude that I can’t do it and go and get a job?
Which is it to be? Make a decision?
Get on with it, give it a go? Give it up, give up on the idea?

Then Shane came down and said he was staying home. Oh bugger! NOOOOOO! Go to work, don’t stay here and bother me. This is my time. No, no no!
“I’m not well,” he said.
No well my arse, I thought.
He called his PA and told her he’d been sick all weekend. “Couldn’t sleep, haven’t been well all weekend.”
He headed back to bed. I wrote sitting at the coffee table for a while trying not to let the disturbance disturb me. Sometime around midday, I decided that I was going to head to my room so I didn’t have to talk to Shane if he got up ad came back downstairs and decided to yabber on.

Then he spent the rest of the afternoon arranging and rearranging god knows fucking what in his room. Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang all afternoon. I couldn’t understand what the hell he was doing? Even if I cleaned my room from top to bottom (I know people will be laughing now, Sam's mouth has dropped open) I couldn’t have made that noise for that extended length of time. He kept it up for hours and I was silently screaming to myself. What are you doing?

Of course, it was so bad and so disturbing that I fell asleep for hours in the middle of it. Ha, ha.

I managed to avoid him for pretty much the rest of the day, which just suited me fine. Oh, I don't know why. It is all me, of course. Just my naturally hermity traits.

I hear the sad clomp of trade’s feet on the stairs late in the evening. Still going, I think? Still trying to find someone to keep you warm? Still trying to find love?

Eating on a Sunday

We walked to Victoria Street and ate Thai food. There were a couple of kids at the next table watching Dora on an Apple Touch, it was making a lot of noise. I wanted to leave, but Sam didn’t see it that way. He thought I was being difficult, he didn’t see it my way at all.

“Stop being hard to get along with.” Grimace. “What do you want to order?”

What do I want to order?

Bleep, bleep! Blurt, blurt! Barp, barp! Wha, wha! Boop, boop! Zeep, zeep! Rar, rar! Wha, wha! Barp, barp! Blurt, blurt!

I look up at Sam who is reading the menu intently.

“No, I really don’t want to have to sit here and listen to that.”

He stops reading the menu and tunes into the brats behind him.

Bleep, bleep! Blurt, blurt! Barp, barp! Wha, wha! Boop, boop! Zeep, zeep! Rar, rar! Wha, wha! Barp, barp! Blurt, blurt!

“Can’t you just ignore it?”

“Um… no, I can’t.”

“Just read the menu.”

“No, I really don’t want to listen to that throughout my meal.”

“What do you want to do then?”

“Leave. Go somewhere else.”

“What? Now?” Roll of the eyes. Exasperated look.

“Yes.”

He looks around. He sees a table vacant right at the back of the restaurant. Begrudgingly, he gets up and heads to the back of the shop without looking back at me. I get up and follow him. 

He sits down. I sit down.

“How is this?”

It’s a bit dark, truthfully. “It was much nicer in the window.”

Sam rolls his eyes. “No noise, though.”

“It’s okay, sure.”

He thought I was being difficult. “How many cafes/restaurants are there in Victoria Street?”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m just saying we could easily have gone to another eating establishment. One without children playing noisy games.”

Walking around instead of driving is nice, it makes the whole inner suburbs experience so much nicer. The thing is, that our days are so taken up with eating, that by the time we walk back from one meal, it is almost time to start thinking about the next one.

We hang at home for the time in between. It’s good.

We went for a walk to the supermarket to get food for dinner. We had everything for risotto except for the chicken and mushrooms. I saw Brussels sprouts in the fruit and veg section and wondered about Brussels sprout and beacon risotto. Sam turned up his nose, but I’m sure it would be a goer.

I was stirring it on the stove when Shane came down from his room.

“It smells like a Sam. It smells like a Sam,” he said. He came and stood right next to me. “It smells like a Sam.” Shane looked at me, he looked at me stirring the pot.

What, I thought? Not only am I cooking it, but why would it necessarily be a Sam? 

“Yum,” said Shane and he left the kitchen.

I looked at Sam. “Why would it have to be a Sam? An Italian rice dish?” He smiled and shrugged.

I don’t know why, but he is just pissing me off, lately.

What am I going to do with my life is never far from my thoughts, continually bubbling away in the cauldron of stress that I am keeping a lid on.

What did Steve Jobs say, do what you love.

What did Aby say recently, don’t settle for another pointless finance and figures job.

Exercise and Food

Of course, straight people support gay marriage, marriage is normal to them. We as gay people are being sucked into the beige vortex of marriage that is not normal to us, and nobody seems to notice.

This was going to be the next part of my discussion on why I don’t think gay marriage is all it is meant to be, but you know, I was only trying to tell people how I felt, it was never my intention to change anyone else’s ideas.

Get married. Don’t get married. Whatever. I was just saying it wasn’t for me.

But, people get so caught up in trying to convince the other of their position that such arguments always seem to end in bad feelings. So, I decided not to engage any further. I’d stated my position that was all I was trying to do. That’s all.

I open and close Facebook. Sam gets busy in the kitchen. I settle on ninemsn instead. Naturally, the news stream of choice.

Sam makes egg toasted sandwiches for breakfast, anything to avoid muesli. Hey. “This will be lovely,” he says. “And I don’t want to eat your morning chaff yet again.”

"Rude."

I make coffee though. The most important, non-negotiable part of brekky, after all.

We go bike riding. Out bike tyres are practically flat, showing how long it is since we went riding. Shame, shame, shame. Mine aren’t so bad, but Sam’s are surprisingly flat.

It’s nice to be out whizzing along with the fresh air in my face with my handsome boyfriend once again. It’s nice. It’s freedom, like no other. Whoosh. Man against the elements, just your own power to get you through. Lovely. 

We headed to the city to QV. Sam is in the mood to spend the afternoon traipsing around the shops. Me, not so much. But it is a rainy Saturday afternoon and I can’t think of a better idea.

We went to the Asian grocer in Russell Street and bought ingredients for Sam to cook noodles. Yum, yum. I don’t know what number of hours in the cycle we are on before it gets back to food, but it isn’t that many.

Shane had been clearly doing crystal, he didn’t come down for dinner. While Sam and I were watching TV, I’m sure I heard the front door opening and closing with his trade.

Late, Shane said he was heading out to have dinner with Sebastian and D. It seemed like no time at all that he was back again.

Even later, I think I heard the front door open and close with more trade for Shane.

It’s kind of sad really, that continual and fruitless hunt for love. The ‘It Gets Better’ message could be appropriate here, I think as my eyes are closing on me and my bed feels like the most comfortable thing in the whole wide world. Just relax and it will happen, I think.

 

David Didn't Want To Go Up The Bridge

I should have known something was wrong, you know, astrologically, spiritually, reflexologcally when David said he didn't want to go up the bridge with me, when I called him up the other day.

No darling!! Just jump on your own... Dead dust glug glug...

First time refusal. He's always been up for it, wanted it, begged me for it, wanted to suicide together.

I can't jump on my own, you have to come with me.

Not today, hun.

I've always been willing... world, smorld. What have I got to do? Get a job?

All This Time On My Hands

All this time on my hands and I still haven't started to teach myself the finer points of photoshop. Bloody hell.

My Poor Sore Tooth

I went to the dentist and I'm going to lose my front tooth... apparently. A paling in the very front of the picket fence, removed. That is the prognosis. Sad face. And once the tooth is gone, even sadder. Maybe, although I don't want to think about it, worst case scenario, the infection may not go and the tooth ache may not subside. The tooth, it sure has had the death veil lowered over it, so it would seem.

I should call David - who is now in Bali after his European slut-fest - and bath in his the power of positive thinking and word him up for a positive affirmation.

Now, apparently, I just have to decide if I want to pay two thousand or five thousand dollars for a replacement.

Fuck it! Fucking dentists! Why isn't dental covered by Medicare. Of course, I guess what I have to do isn't exactly your standard dental procedure, now is it.

Actually, I shouldn't crap on dentists, it's my own stupid fault for smoking for all those years. How many years? I hang my head in shame, stupid, stupid me.

I've Got Tooth Ache

I've got tooth ache and when I called Sam for sympathy, you know as you do, I mean what else is a boyfriend for, he told me he had a rat, which had been eating his noodles in his kitchen, which he was completely obsessed with, read completely freaked out by and I got no sympathy for the pain I was in.

Poor me.

I went to the chemist, during the day, to buy Savacol, the only mouthwash with an active ingredient, according to my dentist and doctor, that does any good. But they had changed the packaging and of course I couldn’t remember what the active ingredient was, so I lined up to see the pharmacist to ask. Just as I got to the counter, the pharmacist called up a patient to give that patient her filled. The chick whose scripts it was said something about being allergic to the pills the pharmacist was giving her. No, she couldn’t remember the name of the medications she was actually allergic to, but they came in big bubble packs like the ones the pharmacist was giving to her.

Now firstly, if you were allergic to some medications wouldn’t you tell the pharmacist straight up before the pharmacist filled the scripts and secondly, if you were allergic to some medications wouldn’t you remember their names? Well, wouldn’t you?

Idiot, I thought. Stop wasting all of our time, you self focussed moron and get out of my way so I can ask the pharmacist my question.

“Okay,” said the pharmacist. “I’ll prepare some new medications for you.”

At this point the pinch faced shop assistant asked me if there was anything she could help me with.

I explained to her what my doctor and dentist had said about Savacol pointing out to her that the packaging had been changed, asking her if she could confirm that the active ingredient was still the same.

“They all have an active ingredient, it depends what you want it for?”

Want it for? I thought. To turn my tongue green and to give me 10k in the bank. What do you think I want it for? “Antiseptic.”

“Well, they all have antiseptic qualities.”

Now they all have the same qualities. Clearly, another idiot, who doesn’t have a clue. Get out of my way. “Thank you,” I said and I walked away. I’ll work it out myself.

I bought the Savacol and left the shop and hoped for the best.

Morris Minors Never Die

Such Delicate Colour. Gorgeous

The Early Morning

Ah, the smell of the new day, still dewy behind the ears, as the "slow, just beginning" gradually lifts, like a shimmery haze rising, you can almost see it go, if you stand and look long enough. Fresh bread, just cooked; clean air, not yet traffic congested; hard, mentally, big city sweat rising up on the back of everyone’s hopes and desirers.

I’ve smelt it in cities around the world, Venice, San Francisco, Hanoi, lovely mornings; the rush headlong into the day, the anticipation of discovery, the savour of taste bud delight to come. I smelt it in Smith Street this morning, as I headed to the supermarket for milk; that big city urban pheromone, coming out to greet me, wrapping around me, sliding into my nasal cavities, up my spine, C4, C3, C2, laying itself out for me to slide into the day. 

Naked is God! ... er, Good!

My next door neighbour, a few removed, up the lane and around the corner, who I don't know, threw out all of these photographic negatives and, I snatched them up. How did I know? Well, they have this really annoying habit of putting their rubbish bins in front of my house and I went out to put some more rubbish out and I opened the lid to their rubbish bin, thinking it was mine and there they were.

Or was I putting rubbish in their bin? Oh, I forget, but it doesn't matter.

Right in the middle of my negative/slides scanning, who'd have thought. As David always says, these things happen for a reason, not actually a belief I subscribe to, unless, of course, it suits me. Well, I am only human, after all.

I love playing with photos. You never know what I might do with them? Pay them back for rubbish bin dramas? Maybe. Sly smile.

I wonder how free I am to use these photos? I mean, it's not like I'm breaching any copyright, or anything? Is there? I wonder? I don't really care, either, of course. Rules, rules and more fucking rules. I guess the lawyers would say, intellectual property... blah blah blah blah, blah.

I would say to the lawyers, They threw them out! Finders keepers. And then I'd stick my thumbs in my ears, twist my hands around and say, Nyer, nyer, nyer, nyer, nyer.

I'm not going to do anything terrible with them, after all. There are no naked ones.

Gasp! Nudity! Ah! Don't let the children see. Cover their eyes. He has naked photos. OMG! Nudity scandal! Nudity scandal!

No, I said there were no naked ones... mores the pity. There are a couple of cute boys in them, whose todgers I'd like to see.

Contemplation

The lovely Sebastian

Monday Monday

What a lovely day, what glorious weather for us little Melbournites. Lovely! I should get my bike out and ride my fat arse around the Yarra for an hour. I should. I know I should.

I have new photos to scan, though. I went up to Bolago and went through their photos. They weren't the photos I was looking for, but they are good none the less. He he.

I don't know where the missing photos are? It's a mystery. I still reckon I leant them to someone who wanted to do a collage, or a significant birthday album for someone. Moral of the story, don't be so nice to people.

Ha, ha. 

The Boats

Kim, my step son, Fenn, and my good mate Fergus cruising the Yarra

The Boats Picture

Kim, my step son, Fenn, and my good mate Fergus cruising the Yarra in Perry's boat

Day 6 of Quitting Smoking

And as it turns out, I should have staid in bed, yesterday. No, really. 

Everybody was giving me the shits! Big time. I've got three people staying and when I found out that their work had been cancelled today due to the rain, I wanted to kill them. Well? I herumphed.

I yelled at Mark and slammed the phone down on him. 

And when I found myself yelling at Sam and thinking he was a shit... I suddenly stopped myself and thought, Oooohhhhhh... maybe I'm the common denominator here. Then I just had to think, day 6 of quitting smoking. 

Hmmmmm. 

It could be me.

David has always said I was horrible and I've always denied it. Of course, he is wrong and I am right, normally, and David should never read this, as I have given up smoking when he lived with me many times and he didn't even notice, however... there are those occasions when I am a monster and he is right... and this could be one of those occasions.

So, I kissed and made up with Mark and ran away to the country. It's lovely up here, the sun is shining and the birds are singing.

Boys Will Be Boys

Still In Bed Listening To The Rain

 it's not that early, I realise, as I glance over at the clock. I'm usually up around 9am, it's a good time to start the day. It's not 9 am yet, I'm so comfortable. I'm still in bed, I haven't got up yet, I'm still wrapped in my doona, listening to the rain. It helps make sense of the world, it makes the day better, that gentle calm before the day begins. Stretch. Yawn.

Oh, I've got so lazy, I can't ever see myself working again. Can you retire halfway through your life? That's what I've been telling everyone, when they ask, that I have retired. I'm so sick of the, "Have you got a job yet?" question. It shuts them up, if only momentarily. Someone replied to me, "But you must have twenty years of work to go?"

I wanted to go up the Westgate and jump, at that thought.

Wind Surfing in Rarotonga

My Exboyfriend's Nipple Ring

Lauri

My dog

Boy Soup San Francisco

Cleanerphobia

I had to get out of the house yesterday morning, as the cleaner was due, it was Wednesday, after all. Shiver!

Is there really no "home" or "end" key on an Apple keyboard? For goodness sakes.

... but, I digress

Shane had just left the house for work, bang went the door, so I knew it was sometime after 9am and probably not yet 9.30, although it could be close. I stumbled out of my room and down the stairs to answer the phone. I'm not sure why? Still on half-sleep auto pilot, I suspect, way too soon out of the crypt for my cynical, fuck that, gene to have kicked in yet. The (new) nursing home has been calling me daily about one thing or another. Monday it was for the name of Lottie's old doctor, despite the fact that I had given it all to them in writing when I admitted her. Tuesday, it was to tell me that she has shingles, which may explain Monday's call. And yesterday it was about some pharmaceutical requirements. Did I want to buy them? Or did I want them to purchase them? Really? What do you think?

I staggered away from the phone, spied the coffee grinder, lurched towards the cupboard to select a glass for a drink of water, when I heard, "'ello." 

I tensed, grimaced, still with my back towards the kitchen door, spammed, as thought I was Doctor Jekyll turning into Mr Hyde, avoided the Seinfeld'esque intake of air and the wail of "Newman," except in this case it would be "Guadalupe, instead turning and quietly saying, "Good morning," sweetly instead.

I slammed those beans into the machine and ground the shit out of them. I intensely urging the coffee pot to boil faster, come on, come on, come on, as the gas burner licked around the bottom of the aluminium pot. "Come on!" The gwoob, gwoob, gwoob, gwoob, shhhhhhhh, shhhhhhh, shhhhhh, crcrcrcrcrcrcrcrcrcrcr, could not come soon enough. "Fuck you universe about watched pots!" Hands as fists. Get me out of here, I thought, as the vacuum sprung into life.

I showered, dressed and was out the front door in record time.

I had bills to pay, credit card, phone, gas, all a day, or two late. Oh really, what time have I had? Smith Street was bathed in sunlight and a gentle breeze blew.

I went and sat out the front at Kent Street, simply because it was across the road from the post office and I had never been there before, it was always a little too cool for school and it had an outside, smoking area. I wasn’t at all sure if it served food. I wasn’t sure if it was simply a bar, but at 10am in the morning, I thought it can’t just be a bar open at this time. I was feeling a little hungry by this stage and in need of some food and it was nice just to sit. And sit. And sit. And sit. The man next to me was brought his coffee, after which the serving person slipped away like the wind. I didn’t really care it was just nice to sit, after my hurried exit from home. And sit, and sit, and sit.

I looked over at the guy sitting next to me and he was drinking a beer with his coffee. Maybe, it is just a bar?

Maybe you had to go in and order. But surly, they would come and tell me. Surly, they weren’t too cool for communication? But, apparently, they were.

Oh, I should go in. I got up to go see what was what, when I though, actually, I could just leave. And I headed to Rosamond.

I had just been served my breakfast when Sam messaged me and asked if I wanted to have lunch with him. Sure, why not. I’ll be finished breakfast in a read of The Age’worth and I can head right in.

Mark rang a short time after that to tell me about his latest venture in Hanoi 

“Where are you?” he asked.

“I’m in Rosamond having breakfast. I had to leave the house as the cleaner is here.”

“Nice,” he said.

“When will you be down, Sam wants to show you the air?”

“Friday night, can you tell him for me?”

“Sure, I’m having lunch with him after this.”

There was momentary silence on the other end of the phone.

“You are having lunch with him… today?”

“Yes.”

Then there was laughing on the other end of the phone.

“Let me get this right,” said Mark. “The life of the unemployed… you have left the house because the cleaner is cleaning your house, to have breakfast… after which you are going straight to lunch in the city?”

“Correct.”

There was more laughing.

Just rude, I thought. 

“What do you want me to do, get a drug habit and burgle houses?”

“Oh Chriso, only you…”

“What?”

“Aren’t you worried about getting a job?”

“I laugh at your propose sentence into servitude.”

“Well, as long as your sense of self worth doesn’t take a battering.”

“What? As opposed to going back into the corporate world to have my life sucked from me by the self-focuses bunch of blood suckers who frequent the hallowed halls of big business?”

Sam was more horrified that I'd, actually, ordered muesli for breakfast when I could have chosen anything I wanted.

"Muesli," he said with disdain. "So original."

Rush Boys

All the Rush boys are hot. I'd sleep with any of them, all of them. Do you think there is a gay guy in its casting? Or are we just lucky with the times we live in. Whichever, not since Wildside...

There You Go....

Sam found my blog, the first person ever to know about my blog, other than me. Actually, my good friend Panda is... was... the only person who knew my blog belongs to me. She and I studied writing together.

Hello to Panda, if you are reading.

I've got a new lap-top, an Apple... Sam bought himself a new Air and I now have his Pro. I was pissing around on my PC and the lap-top and the lap-top ran out of battery while I was away from it. I didn't think anything about it and continued doing stuff on my PC. That's how things go, you know, so I just closed the lid. (Is it called a lid?)

Sam came over sometime later and he plugged the lap-top in and fired it up to commence my instruction on all things Apple... when... can you guess, up came my blog in front of the two of us sitting looking at the screen.

Whoosh! There is was. Ah! NO!

I panicked... well, panicked is a little strong, to tell you the truth. But, I wasn't expecting it, I was caught completely off-guard. I tried to be clever and I tried to open something else. I tried to open the news to show him something, but there was nothing... nothing I could allude to as something of interest.

And the heading of the first entry in my blog was, It's my birthday. I was sure he would want to look at what I had been looking at online, it was just unfortunate that it was so obviously about me.

Each time I steered him away from it, he managed to come back to it... until finally I grabbed him in a bear hug and said, "I really don't want you to read that."

"Really," he said. "Is that you?"

We wrestled.

I don't, actually, mind Sam reading my blog, in fact, I kind of like the idea of someone reading it... except, that there is certain freedom in not having to answer to anybody about what I write.

I guess, it is hello to Sam, if he is reading. (That seems weird)

But, Shane and Sebastian were at my place and I certainly didn't want Sam blurting it out and everybody knowing about it, as they are all in it, of course. I think if that was the case, I'd have to stop writing it all together.

Not that I've been too diligent about writing lately.

Truthfully, the idea that Sam knows about it has stopped me writing for the last week... just while I thought about it. I tentatively brought up the subject with him, but he didn't realise what I was talking about and I dropped it quickly.

Or... at least... honest truthfully... Sam gave me a photographic scanner for my birthday and I have been more interested in scanning all my old photos than writing anything.

Stay tuned for a pictorial wonder... ha, ha... wander through my past

 

Holy Cock

Can you imagine sucking Jesus' cock? Do you think it would taste like angel hair pasta or heavenly sherbet?

Equality for All

Presumed heterosexual until proven otherwise, still true today. Of the whole world, really.

You know, it just kills me when the biggots, the homophobes and those with religion use the idea that we want special rights when we are asking for equality, don't they get that we will never be equal, no matter how many wins we have, no matter how many rights we get.

They just don't understand how we will always have to live in a heterosexual world, considered by most to be second class citizens.

Driven To Church On Sundays By A Little Old Lady

Men Have Been Programmed To Be Unfaithful

All men have been programmed to be unfaithful, we forget that. They evolved to spread their seed around as many females as possible, to continue the healthy procreation of the species. That is what the male was preprogrammed to do. Woman's groups conveniently forget that fact. 

2011

Except, I don't think I ever was. I've been faithful to all my partners, even those with whom I have had open relationships, as open relationships come with negotiated rules, and I have always been faithful to those agreements.

2023

Clowning Around

The size of your feet being a ratio to the size of your penis, was a rumour started by clowns.

 

The Eldest Son of Dr & Dr Lau Gave Online Grooming Tips To Boys With No Clue

There's Another Way Other Than Shame

It's funny that when a blogsite shows some nudity they tend to get an adult content warning.

Is it because of some screwed up fear that children might stumble across these images? Children whose parents are so concerned about their welfare that they let their children search the internet unsupervised? Children who's parents don't put enough time into parenting? Parents who'd rather change the internet experience for the vast majority just so they don't have to change their “baby sitter” computer.

Do children really care about nudity anyway, until they witness their parent's over reaction to it?

People are so screwed up when it comes to sex that they have no qualms about passing that fear onto their children.

Did you know that dictionary's have been pulled from schools in California because they have the meaning of oral sex in them.

Weird, isn't it. It's the twenty first century.

Imagine if we celebrated the human body. Imagine if we treated it as something to revere, to celebrate. Imagine if we thought of sex as something to enjoy together, not feel shameful about? Imagine if parents encouraged their teenagers to have sex as a way of getting to know someone – with all the knowledge supplied.

Imagine how different the world would be.

Good Tongue Work

Looking Out To Sea To The Horizon

Busy Day

It's a cold day as I sit here with my muesli and my coffee as the day begins. The phone hasn't stopped ringing, and I hate talking on the phone at the best of times. It started at 6.45 when my mate Dean called on his way to work. He laughed when I said I was still asleep. He said the sun was out and there was a full moon and that it was beautiful and I should get up and take a look.

(I've forgotten what that is called? Is that a blue moon? Grimace. I don't think it is)

Actually, it started on the dot of midnight when David text from Berlin to say he was alive and well, having a great time, you old slag.

My brother called at 9am from Brisbane and after that my sleep in was over and up I got.

Shane had left a present on the coffee table of an apple corer and peeler. I laughed. I am a bit of an apple fiend.

My sister called to say hi on her way to work. She was driving down the Caulder highway.

Sam called. He is hysterical when he calls from work, because he whispers way down low and he sounds like what a stalker would sound like, if I had one.

My ex-girlfriend called, she is on the Northern Beaches on a day off, as she is celebrating her fifteenth wedding anniversary with her husband.

And now I am off to lunch with my two oldest girlfriends.

Then it is out to dinner with Sam.

And, for someone who didn't want to do anything today, it has somehow morphed into a busy day. Yay! Lucky me.

Luxury Purple In A Bordello in Bagdad

Unusual Porn... you don't see that every day

Very few things leave me open-mouthed and lost for words, however, Shane managed it...

He showed me (with glee, I might add) a muscular, hairy pre-op female to male transsexual, more masculine than most men you'd see on the street, more masculine than most men you'd see in a leather bar, facial hair, body hair, muscles... but still with a cunt... getting fucked by a really beautiful,  feminine, chick with a dick.

You don't think that was disconcerting? You just naturally shake your head as your brain tries to catch up. It's a bit like motion sickness where your eyes are telling you one thing, but your brain is telling you another. It was like a road accident, I just couldn’t look away.

I wish I could post it here, everyone should see it... just because you should have your mind opened... just because we're not all homogenised, hetro couples with one and a half kids and a beagle. I guess I could, why not? I'll ask Shane for it.

Luscious Lachlan In Limey Lemon

Monday Morning

I don't really understand all of this ceremonial commemoration stuff by America for 9/11? I mean, I do. A  big, ugly building was destroyed. (If you read about the dodgy history about the creation of the twin towers, actually, what happened to it was pretty much a fitting end... obviously not in the way that it happened, of course) and a number of people died and they need to remember that loss. I don't understand the commemoration in Canberra. What is that all about? What really does it have to do with Australia? Why did we have to have the weeks of television saturation leading up to the date and then the postmortem afterwards?

There are heightened possibilities of terrorist attacks in Australia? Really? That sells lots of newspapers, sure, and is a great excuse to ramp up security in all sorts of ways, no doubt - ASIO has tripled in size and it's powers have gone far beyond what civil libertarians would call reasonable - and it gives governments an excellent opportunity for posturing, but we have been hearing this for ten years and so far, nothing, zilch zip.

The world changed that day? Really? The whole world? There has been terrorist attacks in the world since the dawn of time, ever since that tribe carried that cow carcass up the hill and dumped it in the opposing tribes water supply. New York changed, no doubt, but it didn't change my life. I'm sure it didn't change a starving kid's life in Africa.

I think America is kind of like the spoilt child being left stunned and open mouthed after it has finally got what was coming to it for, let's face it, it's bad behaviour in the world. Let's think about just a couple of fun facts here - the C.I.A. trained/created Osama Bin Laden and America installed Saddam Hassein in Iraq in it's meddling in Middle Eastern Affairs in it's early counter terrorism measures against Iran. The list of America's meddling in Middle Eastern Affairs is extensive, go and study it, I suggest to you.

Terrorist attacks have happened all over the world perpetrated by any number of terrorist organisations, what makes America so special? Think Suri Cruise being smacked across the face for the first time for all of her diva'ish behaviour and I think we are some where near the reality of things.

Think about this, 2500 people died in New York that day.

Depending on what source you look at, something like 300,000 Iraq civilians have been killed in America's retaliation for that day. That really is the true tragedy of 9/11.

Do I need to mention that the Iraq WMDs were an American lie and the Iraq war was pretty much bogus. Bogus, in as much, as Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11.

And Just In Case Anyone Is Having Trouble With What To Buy Me For My Birthday

Nice in white