Indecision

I lay in bed waiting for the front door to close, well, to bang and for Shane to leave the house. It didn’t happen. He had decided to stay home, I thought as I swung my bedroom door open. He’s been getting a cold, the outcome from crystal meth binges for the previous two week ends and now he’d decided to have a sickie. I knew that.

I came down and made coffee and muesli. What am I doing with my life? Is writing this blog, actually, doing me any good, or is it just a distraction from the sort of writing I should be doing to be successful and to make a living? Is it simply a distraction from reality?

I’m writing my journal and my blog. Is that going to lead to anything? To something? Am I just the equivalent of an ostrich with my head in the sand? Am I just destined for something small? I always felt as though I was destined for something great, but I’m beginning to loose faith in that feeling… as I head back to office work.

Shane came down later and said he was staying home.


I was restless and wanted to do something. I realised that the bills I made out for mum a week ago, which needed to be paid a week before that were still sitting on my desk, in their envelopes just needing stamps. I decided the first thing to do was to go to the post office to get a book of stamps and a 10 cent stamp.

Ha ha, the 10 cent stamp saga. I had a bunch of 50 cent stamps for which I bought the requisite 10 cent stamps. I miscalculated and didn’t buy enough 10 cent stamps so I attempted to buy some more. However, the post office was out of 10 cent stamps on several occasions when I went.

“No sorry, luv.”

“No sorry, luv.”

“No sorry, luv.”

But, then I finally bought the 10 cents stamps, yay for me! All was right with the world again. But, then I had a couple of A4 envelopes to send to the accountant, to hurry him up with late tax payments and diabolically late self managed super fund paperwork, which took $1 postage, two of my fifty cent stamps, twice. Then it turned out that I had 40 cents worth of 10 cent stamps left. So, I bought a 20 cent stamp to address the deficiency, only to find it was 30 cents worth of 10 cents stamps that I had, 3 of them attached to each other in a L shape and not 40 cents, so I still didn’t have enough stamps to post a letter.

So today I wanted a book of stamps, you know, for normal cheque payments for my mother’s expenses and a 10 cent stamp to make up the required amount for my on going, pet, stamp project.

I got the stamps out of the paper bag, where I kept them, just to check. A 20 cents and 3 10 cents all connected to each other. Finally, get to clear that away.

It was drizzling and my track suit pants were long and dragged on the ground so I would need to change them if I was to go out onto the wet footpath. Could I? Couldn’t I? Will I? Won’t I? Can I be bothered? You can’t drag your sorry tracky bottoms through the puddles, like a bum. So, I put on jeans and I put colour in my hair, you know just for good luck.

Before I left the house, Shane came down and said he was heading out for some lunch. Apparently, it was with D, although he didn’t tell me that.

But then, I have to add at this point, why would he? I’ve been a bitch. I haven’t been nice, I’m not sure why? Is it stress? Well, of course it is stress. Stress about my future. Stress about my failure to elevate myself beyond some tiny little job that I had and that I now have to return to. Stress about even that failing. Stress about my inaction.

I need to learn how to stride forward positively. I need to learn how to march ahead with confidence. I need to learn how to be giving and loving and not small and mean and wallowing in my own shortcomings. I need to learn the secrets of success. There, now that is the truth.


I went to the post office.

“Book of stamps, no problem… and a 10 cent stamp?” Raised eyebrows.

Here we go. “Yes.”

“No problem.”

When I got back, I matched up my 10 cent stamps with the rest of the small denomination stamps and only my 20 cent stamp was in the paper bag. They original 10 cent stamps had just vanished. What, I thought? How could that be? Gone. Inexplicably. I was mystified. What could have happened to them? I laughed. For such a stupid inconsequential thing, which had taken on so much more significance that it had ever deserved to, it was just funny. It really was nothing and it had become “this thing” quite by circumstance. I laughed again. I had no idea what had happened to them, it was a mystery and I decided it didn’t matter. Who knew what happened? I didn’t have to know. It almost felt like a fitting end to such a dramatic insignificance. It was one of those unexplainable things, that could remain unexplained.


I felt hungry, so I went to the bakery for food. I bought a smoked salmon, cream cheese, capers and rocket, sourdough roll and a peach pistachio muffin. I stepped back out onto Gertrude Street where it was humid but overcast, warm but threatening to rain. It was that heady mix of damp and heat and wet air and threat of immanency... is that an expression? There was that feeling that an almighty power could be unleashed at any moment.

I stood and felt it all and thought that I should go and visit Nicholas again. I didn’t really feel like going, but it was more the case of being lazy and slack rather than not wanting to visit Nicholas, than an inability. I stood torn, wanting to head across the road to home and wanting to be a friend to Nicholas. It had been two weeks to the day since I had visited last, which was the latest of only a handful of times in over the previous twelve months.

Go? Don’t go? Go? Don’t go? I dithered. Dilly-dallied, as Sam would say. My feet felt like lead, planted to the footpath, seemingly sunk into the bitumen, glued to the ground below me. Frozen with indecision. I stood and figuratively spun in circles, without moving at all. I stood and looked up and down the street. I was in indecision.

Would I have enough to say to him? Would I be able to be interesting enough to sustain a whole visit, on my own? Would we have enough to talk about? Have I let us drift too far apart?

I carried an entire conversation with Damon, yesterday. I managed to carry an entire coffee date, I managed a whole hour, or thereabouts, with Damon, someone who I know less well and probably have less in common with.

Cars whizzed up Gertrude Street and whizzed down Gertrude Street, people came and went and there I was perched on the incline of the hill clutching my two paper bags staring up the street and down the street.

So, what do you do when you have indecision coursing through your veins? What indeed? I just somehow force my legs to walk, as if pushing against a very strong current running quickly in a stream and forward they move. I could have stood there all day quite easily, frozen, stationary, still, stopped, as the world passed by. No problem. Somehow, I let go and auto pilot, or my sensible small voice, or my logical mind, or guilt kicks in and miraculously the Titanic is re-floated in that moment and the bow breaks above the sea line and the pointy end steers itself in the direction of the correct destination, in this case, the Epworth.

Still, wandering through East Melbourne is always nice, even if I am fighting my natural reticence all the way. I really do have such self-doubt. Maybe it isn’t self doubt may be I do just think too much about things. Everything. Every move I make, every decision I make, I think the hell out of them all. I over process everything, every move, every decision, every choice until I have immobilised myself with receptor overload, threatened borderline depressive bonkers episodes, threatened mental disease with the paralysing confusion generated.

But, I don’t want to walk away from something just because it’s doing my head in.

I stopped in at Holly Trinity Church, possibly as a delaying tactic, as a distraction, telling myself I just wanted to smell that smell that churches have; wood and stillness captured, caught and aged in serenity, just for a moment. It is something known to this atheist, something from my past – as you don’t think I came to my atheist beliefs without having hung around churches in my past so as to have some basis for those beliefs – that smell that all churches have. The smell of god? The smell of delusion? The smell of good intensions?

I hesitated several times, turned for home a number of times, before I pushed myself on. Turned and turned again. I don’t know how I came to have such self doubt, read patheticness. It was two steps forward and one step back there for a moment in Hotham Street, in the overcast afternoon. The sky was grey and cloudy and threatened to pour down the whole way.

I pushed myself though, as Shane was home and I might as well be out visiting when I can’t be home on my own, and anyway, I’d only have to go on Monday, or some other day soon. This way I’d be one visit up, you know, on if I piked and didn’t go.

I found Nicholas in the rehab room charming the old ladies, as only the handsome Nicholas can. His handsome face, his floppy hair, his toothy grin, his infectious laugh, I could see all of the old girls in for treatment responding like girls.

He sent me to his room to wait for him to finish his rehab.

Nicholas came in on his crutches. “Hello, hello.” He fills a room. He swapped to his wheel chair and I wheeled him outside for a smoke. The sun was shining. He told me how lucky he was and how he almost died. He told me how great everyone had been. He said it is going to take another 3 months to recoup and be able to walk properly again.

We came back in and Andrew, Nicholas’s roommate, who has cancerous tumours throughout his body and has had them since 1994, was taken away for treatment.

His wife got teary when she was explaining how previously all of her husband’s tumours were slow growing and that he was unusual to have survived them all, but the most recent one was aggressive and he probably wasn’t going to survive this time.

Nicholas was his usual cheerful self and told her he was strong and that she was wonderful and she should stay strong for her wonderful husband.

She said she believed that were we weren’t ever given more than we could handle.

Nicholas agreed.

Really? I thought.

No. There are so many people who had crumbled under the pressure they were put on, the history of the world is littered with people who have collapsed and failed and gone insane and died under the “lot” they were given.

“You are wonderful young lady.”

“You make me feel so much better just calling me young lady.”

When Nicholas saw that she was teary he said, “I think someone needs a hug, come here and let me give you a hug.”


She left. Nicholas said her husband, Andrew, was a gonna. We chatted for a while

Helen arrived, we sat and chatted the three of us.

Nicholas said that Tim had been in every day, he hadn’t missed one day.

Andrew came back from whatever treatment he had gone to. He has several tumours in his head, as well as the tumours in his lungs.

I saw that the sky was very grey and threatening to rain, so I said I was leaving.

As I stood by the back door the rain came down. I had to wait a while for it to even stop.

I had to hide in doorways as I walked as it rained again. I stood and watched it fall, heavy and light, sprinkling down. Eventually, I had to pull the hood of my hoodie up and walk hunched shouldered in the continuing light sprinkle.

Sam arrived after work. Ringing the doorbell over and over until I flung the front door open and threatened him with my outstretched hand. He laughed and asked how funny I thought he was?

Sam, Shane and I drove down to Victoria Street and bought duck, pork and rice.

We went to bed and watched Oz. A couple of old Beverly’s, in bed by 10pm. You know, I kind of like it.

Good Bye Ice Queen

Christina Welcome, the ice queen bitch CEO of the black law firm, apparently, suddenly retired. Beck told me. I'm not sure if "suddenly" is actually true, but no one seemed to know about it up until the moment it happened. Maybe that is the corporate way... maybe? Really? For the boss? The head bitch?

"Well, good luck to her," I responded to Beck's message. "I hope she gets everything back doubly, that she has given to all of her staff over the years, in retirement."

I can't tell you my initial response, as people now a days don't like to hear the negative. We're all to PC beige, coddled in a myriad of rules that stops anything harsh and pointy making it to our 21st century thin skin, to want to hear any critical.
Don't use a negative, always try to make it a positive. "I positively hope she gets everything that is coming to her."

I met up with Beck yesterday for lunch and told her that my initial response was I hoped she had cancer, or something terminal. Beck laughed and said she knew exactly what I meant.

Retirement is probably a good thing, as Christiana was always banging on about retiring partners who returned as employees to work part time. According to Christina, once you are over 50 years of age, you are losing brain cells at a huge rate of knots and of little worth to the company. She was reticent to play tokenism to post 50 year old, over the hill partners.

"I'm just not convinced of their usefulness returning as employees? Why they don't just retire I will never know. We've paid them enough, let's face it." Then she'd give that look, the purse-lip smugness of she who is always obeyed.

But then, Christina never did know much about the human animal, all she new about was profit and loss statements, budgets and forecasts, anything even vaguely resembling a human emotion was quite lost on her. She'd give that quizzical look of the automaton. Lieutenant Commander Data with uncertainties.

Christina never liked her age to be known, and I don't know if the above reason was the reason, but she's now clocking some where around 55 years old herself, and I'm sure she'd hate to be a hypocrite. Ha ha, I do make myself laugh. Evil ice queens have no concept about hypocrisy, there is only how she acts and how everybody else acts. Anything else is quite mysterious.

And, because she had no people skills what so ever, I don't think she would understand the concept anyway. Allegedly, when she was a partner in the accounting world, her company sent her on "being human" courses, in some vain hope that she would be able to learn to treat people like... um... er... people.

It failed.

Christiana used to look down Beck's shirt, the big Lez. I used to watch her, like a straight man. She stand over Beck as Beck sat at her desk and Christina used to ask Beck something and when Beck would, invariably, try to her computer and look for the information Christina wanted, I used to watch her peeve down Beck's top. Every time, the big licker.

She used to tell her Special Councils that they would never amount to anything as they didn't possess any ambition or had abilities above first year law students. I remember her latest PA was absolutely devastated when Christina just came out of the blue (allegedly) and told her she was completely useless and that Christina was left with no choice but to get rid of her. In those words. No, actually those words. She was a frustrated high school teacher the way she would grade lesser executives work. She would micro mange until everybody was bleeding.

Christina's evilness percolated down. The greasy-haired, shirt hanging out, Fat Boy slob of a CFO was a bastard, elevated to way beyond his capabilities because he was a back stabbing yes man. I always imagine him to resemble some fat mediocre grammar boy, standing in the corner, sniping at the more competent, as he sucked his thumb and stamped his feet in tantrum. That is the confidence he engendered.

The Melbourne Finance Director, Anorexic Belinda, is in the latter stages of anorexia and is universally despised due to the fact she is a moody, temperamental, unstable bitch, who I suspect is having braincells eaten away by the advance stages of her illness. She now has what appears to be ginormous hair, due to the fact that her facial flesh has now melded to her skull in the absence of any fat cells. He teeth protrude like some long since dead embalmed corpse and her muscle tissue is so completely wasted that I'm sure soon she will be able to sue for neglect and unreasonable hardship. She was never pretty but now I'm so complete unsure how she doesn't frighten people.
Apparently, she howls at the moon whilst masturbating with with effigies of Christina. Bitter that she will never achieve what Christina has achieved, hostile because she knows already that she has been elevated beyond her talents, angry because she knows that everyone under her hates her guts.

The self perpetuation bag of wind who has replaced Christina is like a walking vacuum of his own voice. Nothing else exists when he is present, as he never stops talking or directing the attention to himself.

These are the inmates who Christina has left in charge of the asylum.

Oh the corporate world and the rarefied, mentally absorbed types it is seething with, leaves our world in very odd hands, let me tell you. The types who are only interested in profits and them selves and their own reputations and the very moment in which they inhabit.

If this world, on it's knees and begging for help, is to survive there will probably need to be a renascence in the business leaders allowing those people who actually give a damn about something other than themselves to assume command.

Of course, getting rid of a cyborg queen like Christina is a good start.

I would suggest that every business leader now last century. Sadly,because the politicians are feltching their collective arses, nothing is going to change.

Oh well, at least the loony Christians will be please when Armageddon comes... they'll get to see their boy.

We Have Eggs

“We have eggs,” said Myron.

“Eggs?” asked Arif.

“Yes, eggs.”

“Free range?”

“Caged.”

“Oh.” Arif’s lips made an "O" as the sound of the “oh” lengthened and faded.

Myron’s head twitched, it was involuntary. “They are perfectly good eggs.”

Arif grimaced. “Battery?”

“Caged.” Myron sounded enthusiastic like a salesman.

“Battery.” Arif looked stern.


The two boys stared at each other; Myron with the grey, cardboard carton hanging from his right hand, Arif with his hand’s raised in the air.

“So is that a no?” asked Myron.

“I think it is.”

“Aren’t you hungry?”

“No, it’s a matter of principle.”

“Really? Principle? They are chickens.” Myron emphasised the “ch” sound.


Myron bought his right hand, with the carton of eggs in it, together with his left hand, and he held the box in both hands in front of him. He looked down.

“These are the only eggs I have.”

Arif raised his hands in the air. “We can’t eat them.”

“What would you have me do with them?”

“I have a suggestion.”



Arif smiled.

Myron put the eggs down on the kitchen counter.

“Which would be what?” said Myron.

“You can shove them up your…”

Myron smiled, he couldn’t help it, he felt his cheeks crease.

Arif pushed his top teeth over his bottom lip, slowly.

Myron slid his fingers across the cardboard carton, the grey material felt porous and dry. He ran his pointer finger down over the front of the packaging and slipped the tip of his finger under the lip and flicked the lid open, all the time holding Arif’s gaze.

They both looked down.

The brown domed tops of the eggs lined up in two rows… like soldiers… or university professors… or the terracotta warriors

Myron looked at Arif. He looked down at the egg. He took the very last egg in the packet between his fingers. He lifted it and rolled his hand over at the wrist and held the egg in the air, gripping it with all five finger tips.

He moved the egg steadily up through the air to his face and slid the egg into his left nostril until it disappeared out of sight.

He selected the next egg in the carton, also raising it to his face and sliding into his right nostril, completely.

His nose resembled the engines of a Lear jet.


“Is that what you meant?” he said, seemingly from the back of his throat.

“Not exactly.” Arif lifted his hand and slapped the left side of Myron’s nose, sharply. There was an audible crack!

Myron resisted the urge to raise his hand to his nose. A wet globule, like a large oyster, dislodged from Myron’s nostril and yellow and white, slippery and wet, fell thick like-mucus over Myron’s top lip and chin, hanging down in strings, tendrils of slime, stretching to the counter like a bungee cord.


“Better?” asked Myron sarcastically.

“No! I like tomato sauce with my eggs.” Arif lifted his hand and punched Myron hard in the nose. Drops of blood fell immediately in splatters onto the egg box, where they soak in like blotting paper and onto the bench, where they sat in small spheres.



“Ouch!” Myron lifted his hand to his face.

“Now you know how the battery hens feel.”

“Is that a debeaking?” Myron slid his hand under his nose.

“A debeaking?” Arif nodded his head and winked.

Myron touched his nose gingerly. Scarlet blood dripped onto the back of his hand.

Snorting Poppers

Stressing

Sam left at 7.30. I got up and made coffee and muesli. Then I went back to bed.

I didn’t know what to do with myself today. The walls were closing in a bit. I’m stressed out about my future. I don’t know if I am going to make it.

I decided I wasn’t going to write my blog any more. It is time for it to stop being a distraction for me, a reason to sit on my arse and do nothing. Besides, I don’t think I am much good at it any more. But, of course, I decided I needed to finish February 2005. 

So, I ended up doing my blog for most of the day. Yay.

I’m a big cabin fever. I could feel it all day. Brrrrrr!

I’m a bit depressed. At the world. At my future. At my prospects. I wish I was really successful, I wonder what that feels like? What must it be like to be one of those people who just slides through life being fabulous? I wish I knew.

I spoke to Mark on Skype. He asked if I have been dying my hair. I told him I’d been putting the cream on.

He told me I looked very handsome with my new hair.

He told me I needed to get on and rent out the room. He says he is making money for us in our old age, and I need to keep up my side of the agreement too.

I don’t know what to do. Some pissy job, some stranger in my house. I want to scream at my failures.

So, I ran away to my bed at 5.30, of course, like the depressive that I am, closing the door behind me.

I went down at 6.15 to get the rest of the Japanese curry for dinner, hoping that Shane wouldn’t come home as I was doing it. Which, he didn’t. I snuck back upstairs.

Then there was back to back episodes of Friends on and I forgot about my funk. The looser watched those who have been phenomenally successful and the loser was happy.

Ted Moseby, How I met your mother. He looks just like my buddy George. No really, he does.

I should have gone and visited Nicholas in hospital, I forgot. Stupid me.

I don’t know what life I’m living any more.

I think I am just nervous at all the changes in my life. I do like routine, (as sad as that is) I know that. I do like knowing what I know. I’m sure it is all going to be fine once I get into the swing of it all.

Suddenly, I’ll have worked it all out and I’ll have worked through it and I’ll be looking at you like “what fuss are you talking about.” And I will be denying all of the above, naturally. I do stress at knew things. I do have my moments of wobble when I am stepping into the fray for the first time. Take no notice. Having to wait until the end of the month to start putting my new training into practice is pissing me off just a bit. I’m just forgetting it by the day.

You are so together, you are so capable, is what I have been hearing all my life.

It’s odd when I feel less than those things. It can make me feel a bit crazy.

I’ll be fine, don’t stress it.

You Can't Quit

Up, down, around and around. Look this way, look that, look this way again. Sit right back. Sit forward. Put your feet up. Put your feet down. Don't put your feet on that! Make a tea, drink it down, swill it around and around and around. Up and down. Don't frown. 

The mornings gone, stifle the yawn, from staying up until dawn, party streamers drawn. 

Coffee might do it, speed you up, get a grip, give it your best hit, take a kip. Ha ha, such whit. You're funny, we all know that. You brighten the office. You know you can't quit.

Woman in Water

No photos, please

Ha Ha. Funny. Ha. Ha.

One of my little, silent tests is the dishwasher stack. It's an indication of intelligence, of cleverness, how astute one is, how logical, organised, together you are.

It is a microcosm of the planet, the world where things have a natural order, a pattern. There is a place for everything and everything has a place. If you can't stack a dishwasher it is an indication of how you are going to tackle things outside.

It is one of those simple tasks that can go so horribly wrong, right from the start sometimes. If you don't follow the natural order, it can lead to chaos. So quickly.

You'd be amazed how many people can't stack a dishwasher.

But then again, maybe you wouldn't. There are, after all, a lot of stupid people in the world.

These were the thoughts that were going through my mind this morning as I gazed down at the dishwasher in despair. Oh, I guess it should serve me right, such thoughts.

I was finishing my coffee and was about to leave for the city to do some training that I had arranged for myself in my new head office for the day. I was just drinking down the last drops of rich, aromatic coffee.

Ring, ring, ring, sounds my phone.

"Hello."

"Oh Christian?" It was my new boss, Hayley. "I'm sorry, but they are doing some sort of testing in the training rooms all day, so, sorry, today is not possible."

Oh good, lovely. Great. "Oh, that's a shame."

"Sorry, you haven't left home yet, have you?"

"No, I was just about to."

"Oh good."

Oh good? Oh good? Oh good? What's good about it? Dam! I so wanted to do that training, get into it, at least feel like I was doing something. At least feel like I was moving forward. Oh well.

Hayley is a particularly humourless Y gen type who takes everything terribly, terribly seriously. You know the type, a misery with an arts degree. Oh, maybe she is new, maybe she is just starting out, maybe she has just graduated and this is her first job, and she is scared and nervous just like the rest of us, oh maybe? I don't know really.

Last week, when I was walking home from having lunch with Sam, I looked up and there was Hayley walking towards me, with the usual dour expression on her face. She was eating a sandwich, no doubt grabbed between busy appointments. I opened my mouth to say hello, just in case, despite the her not looking at me, when she tripped and came flying towards me, hands and feet flailing, as though she had stepped on marbles rolled out on the ground. I almost expected a cartoon'esque drum roll to accompany her. She didn't she me as she flew passed, all her attention taken up with staying up right.

Well, there you go I thought. You should have seen the sudden startled expression on her face, the most expressive that I'd ever seen her. How funny. I did chuckle as I continued towards Queen Street.

So, I was dressed and ready to go this morning, apparently with nowhere to go. So, I decided to head out the door and have that long overdue haircut.

My hairdresser, Abdul, has been away. I think I told you that fat boy has been filling in, Branco. Cute, in a fat-boy kind of Polish/Hungarian way. But Abdul was back today. He told me how it was hard to continue working 6 days a week with a new partner. Remember, he went back to Iraq to find her. And he did. He’s been very pleased with himself ever since.

He said remind me how you have your hair?

So, I said, “A number 2 on the sides, a number 3 on the top. Shorter on the sides, longer on the top. You know, something like that.”

Well, he clearly didn't really remember and he picked up the clippers attached a comb and pushed the clippers right through the top of my head. "Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz."

He must have missed my sharp intake of breath, as he continued without hesitation. I kept talking, so did he. No beats were missed.

I should have said something, I guess, but what is there left to say when a huge stripe of hair has been removed from the centre of your scalp. "OH NO! Not that short?"

Of course, it was my fault, stupid me. I mentioned the clippers and combs sizes putting it into his head.

However, he has, essentially, shaved my head. So, there you go I thought. Lovely.

I haven’t had my hair this short for years. Don’t worry, you will, of course, get used to it, I told myself. But, every time I have caught sight of my reflection since, I have jumped. “Oh!” (But, you know, the good thing about hair…)

So, what else was there to do? I came home and put on an old Bette Davis movie and made a cup of tea. You know, as you do.

I keep thinking it will look okay, that I will get used to it. But it doesn't and I haven't. There is still that same sharp intake of breath when I catch sight of my reflection.

I watched Bette Davis movies all afternoon, you know, as you do. I wrote up old entries in my blog, you know, like I am the least bit concerned about my future. Well, I guess, these are the last days of my time off. Well, that is what I think, rightly or wrongly.

To tell you the truth I am a bit bored now with, essentially, doing nothing. My writing hasn’t, exactly, gone full stream ahead during my time off. I haven’t, exactly, mastered the changeover to writer. And, sadly, if I haven’t managed to do that, then, really, I should go back to boring old office work. I think I may have just missed a golden opportunity. Stupid me.

I walked into town and met Sam after work, latish. It was a lovely day, the sun shone down as I made my way into the city. We met up in Bourke Street just as we both got to Exhibition Street. It was a busy Friday evening at the cafes all along that now popular eating strip.

The crowds parted on the footpath in front of me, and Sam greeted me with big eyes. “You should never have your hair cut like that again. You look like you have just come out of the army.”

I’d like to say that I’d almost forgotten about my bad hair by then, but I hadn’t. “I was hoping you’d say something nice about it.”

“We could perhaps take you in for some implants, or at the very least emergency hair colour.”

“Really?” Sad Face. “You don’t like it?”

Laugh. “No.”

Cool Car

The Daily Grind

You've got it all wrong. There is no god-like moment. There is no amazing pinnacle of human endeavour. There are no rarefied animals placed upon this earth who deign to entertain us, luckier than the rest of us, greater than us poor souls. There are no gods, or goddesses, there are no amazing gigs, even if there may, occasionally, be amazing performances. There are no celestial beings, breathing rarefied air. It is just work and then there is more work. There is no sad end for a great person, there is just a life lived. How it should be.

There is just the next thing to do, the next job. Then there is the next thing. It is all hard work.

And then, I guess, not.

Just like for all of us. There is this moment. Then the moment after that. It is day to day to day. It is for the rest of your life. That is the meaning of life. That is what you get, a lifetime. You get to toil for your trouble. Work hard, live long. Work hard, live well. All of your hard work is rewarded with more. There is always more. And more. And more.

And you had better be goddamn happy while you are doing it, otherwise you’ll miss those moments. Those are the happy moments, the moments of life. You won’t get the most out of it, and you can’t go back, if you didn't live it, when it is happening, was happening. Once one moment is gone, it is gone. And if you look back at that moment and wonder, for too long, you'll miss the next one. Gone. And the next one. Whoosh.

When does it get easier? It doesn't. Life is like that. It’s booster rockets on all the way, on and on. Next. Next. Next.

When does the relief come? When you climb that last peak and stare into the oblivion. The black. The dark. Nothing.

Blink. Blink. Stop.

Tide Washing Powder

Tide, washing powder, the hottest stolen product on the American black market. So much so, that these humble bottles of washing soap powder have their own electronic alarms attached to them.

Apparently, they are a basic household item, everybody uses it, it is a staple, and criminals can move large numbers of it.

In a recent sting operation, more bottles of Tide washing powder were discovered than their were illegal drugs.

Apparently, Tide is black market currency.

Who'd have thought?

Just Relax, Will You. How Badly Could It All Go Wrong?

I woke up some time after 7am when Sam did. I imitated his morning iPhone chimes to him, which made him push me away, or is that push off on me to sit up. He headed off to have a shower, after

Missy was very vocal in the bathroom, so I went and collected her so Sam could shower in peace. She curled up on the bed next to me.

The next I knew of Sam was when he was rubbing moisturiser on my face. The he was kissing me. I love his sweet lips.

He left before 8am. He forgot to take muesli, of all things, so he stopped for BreadTop on the way. Sausages in buns, or something.

Shane left at 9.22.

I started to read the news and then I segued onto the stars and their cars, McDreamy and his Porsche and antique Jaguar, Lindsay Lohen and her Mercedes, John Mayer and his orange and pale blue GT40 and then onto a list of 64 stars and their cars and then onto Farrah Fawcett driving her dark blue 911 Porsche convertible through LA, then to articles about her death and then to the infamous David Letterman appearance in 1997 when she was clearly drugged out on something.

It’s funny that people are shocked by such things, really what do they care. I think it is funny. She was very amusing and I’ve seen anyone of my friends act just like her when they have been off their faces on drugs. It makes me like celebrities more, it makes them more human, makes them seem more real.

Then I watched all of Farrah’s Letterman appearances.

Then I began to feel kind of guilty about work. Here I was pissing the morning away on Youtube watching stupid things to pass the time when my bank balance is starting to tick tick tick.

I began to stress all over again about my work situation. I kicked myself for letting it get to this stage. I screamed inside at the prospect of having to get a new housemate for financial reasons. I chastise myself for not getting a job sooner, shaking at my inaction, quivering at the possibility of everything crashing around me.

Ah!

Then I took myself in hand. Realistically, I have enough of a buffer in my mortgage for it not to get critical any time soon. Sure, I’d have been in a much better financial position if I’d looked for work when I first became unemployed, but I didn’t so move on. If the worst came to the absolute worst I could borrow money from my mother’s assets, we have recently liquidised some of her assets and my brother and sister would let me do that before I lost my house, or anything that drastic.

Still, one day a week work until May. Shit! I have to work exclusively for them for only 3 months. That will go quick and then I will be able to find a full time job.

At which point my boss, Halley, boss of, Jack, who is allocating my jobs to me, called to ask how training had gone and to confirm that Jack had found me my first role, down in the in the beach side suburbs. She stated that it was only the beginning and that they would find me more work.

I told her that I wondered if it was too far, which was answered by a deafening silence on the other end.

“Oh, but of course, it is just great to get back to work.”

I said that I wished I had work before the 28th.

She must have chatted to Jack… you know you can’t be negative today, “they” don’t like it. There followed a flurry of emails about my immediate role and the fact that all things going well with this first role there was no doubt there would be plenty of work for me in future.

Hello there

You should have no problems when you start using it, they have good systems.  We don't cap the super so I'm not sure how the system works... can you believe that, we have high income earners paying super on all of their salary up to any amount.  I asked the question of HR, but they don't seem to worry that some people might prefer the cash.

Have you heard about any jobs yet?

Beck

Wow! You don't cap super at all? Goodness me. And here am I thinking that capping it on a quarterly basis, so that the last month of the quarter may not be the same as the first month of the quarter, was different. It works so that when the earnings reach X in one quarter it stops accruing super until the next quarter rolls around.

Do HR understand any of this?

And on the jobs front. They have offered me one day a week on a Wednesday in Mentone for 6 weeks starting on 28th March. It was the first work they offered me, so I said yes, thinking it was better to say yes than no, if I want more work, but I don't know. Mentone? Really?

For 6 weeks, how bad can it be??????? For 3 of those weeks the permanent person will be there and he (the (name of company) guy whose name I can't remember, John or Jack, I think it is Jack) says it will be an easy assignment to start with.

He said he would fit more work in around that, but thinking about it, how easy will that be when Wednesdays are taken out of the days I can work? So, I don't know. Grrrr.

I'm wondering if I should call him back and say Mentone is too far?

Oh, I don't know, I've said yes now. I guess these things happen for a reason, not that I really believe that, to tell you the truth. They happen because he has work he has to fill. I'm trying to be a good sport by saying yes, hoping it will get me on his good side.

I'm beginning to wish I hadn't taken so much time off. I'm beginning to wish that I had started this temp work last year, so I would now be further down the track. But, I guess, that is just stupid really.

Then I think, I will just keep looking for jobs and if I find one just take it and pay them back the cost of the training, which is $X.

Then I think fuck the black law firm and fuck bloody Anorexic Belinda. (by some psychopath with a broken tree branch)

I just want a job in the city that I can go to now.

So that's me. I want to start working now to get back into it, you know, if I have to work. And I do. I'd really have liked to have been thrown in the deep end this week with some work, that would have been the best thing after the training. If I have to wait until March 28th, I'm going to forget most it. I was trying to read through the manuals yesterday and fell asleep on the couch trying.

Grrrr. I feel a bit like I am waiting around now.

christian

That's a bizarre way of doing the super, I just had a look at ours and found we do have one person capped and have set up a code with a maximum contribution set up for each fortnight.

What a bummer, hopefully he'll find you more work before the 28th, otherwise, it's not really fair that you can't apply for other jobs.

It's hard getting back into it after time off, I had 6 months off including the sick leave. Even though I'm enjoying working here, it's not as challenging and I miss sitting in our big office chatting away.

I've got my own office here, it gets a bit quiet and boring some days. Other days just fly. Someone said to me the other day that I'd had so many jobs recently they couldn't keep up, made me feel like a complete loser!  I don't think anyone really understands what the black law firm has done to us, it's not just a matter of finding another job and moving on. It's amazing how one skinny (Ed note - anorexic bitch) idiot can stuff up your life. We were both really settled there, I'm still catching up financially...in hindsight we should have sued them!!!!!

Beck

You've had so many jobs they can't keep up. Really? That's not true. Three jobs isn't that many, take no notice of them. Clearly, someone who isn't happy in their current job. Some people have 3 jobs a year.

I just got a call from (name of company) Halley Kennedy asking if the training was okay and to confirm that Jack (His name is Jack) had found me a job. I said that I wished I had work a little sooner and she said I can go in there any time and use their training rooms. I said, as quick as a flash, yes, when can I do that? Yes please. So I have organised to go in on Friday to go through all the training on my own. That will be good.

Do you want to have lunch on Friday?

Yes, it is a bit unfair that he can't find me work before the 28th, when I have to work for them for three months. "Actually Jack, I want 3 months of full time work, thanks buddy."

My money situation could be heading for the desperate side by May this year, so it is good that I have a fall back position. I'm banging Shane's rent up and I'm going to rent out one of my other spare bedrooms. I have done some research and have found out that rents in Fitzroy have increased. I don't really want another housemate, but I may have to for the next little while. And then I have another bedroom after that, if things get really desperate. But, with two flatmates and temp work with (name of company), it should all be okay, I think. I had money saved for a new car and probably I could do with a new car, but that isn't going to happen now as I have spent the money.

I think about our office at the black law firm and miss it. It was good. We had fun and we had it sorted, despite the obvious problems. It is a great shame. Some days I think that if only I had said to you that day, "Don't resign, we will get through it." I mean, I was already to go back to full time hours just at that stage. 

But, then I think, it really was insane! Anorexic Belinda is completely f*cken loopy with her faux-CEO Christina persona, mental checking disorder... I'm sure there is an acronym. I mean, especially when previously she used to mock CEO Christina and her ways. The memos Anorexic Belinda had that idiot brown-nose Rachel Gore doing to accompany every piece of work she gave to Anorexic Belinda was completely absurd and an amazing waste of time... but, I think Anorexic Belinda, no I am sure Anorexic Belinda made Rachel do all of that stuff because of Anorexic Belinda's continuing mental decline. Unless she has had therapy lately, I don't understand how she is functioning. She wasn't functioning properly before.

And now Lexie Lou has f*cked off, surely that side of it must be better. Oh, I don't know, maybe we'd have that idiot head of IT to contend with.

The thing is, it should have been a good job, it should have been easy for us and they had the best people to do the job. But, I guess, they didn't agree.

Yes, we should have sued them. I could sue them now. But up until this moment I haven't wanted to revisit it. And up until this moment I never felt like I would be believable.

Oh well, you live and learn.

christian

I can't do lunch on Friday, but should be able to go for coffee in

The morning sometime.  I'm having half day off, I'm going to Echuca for

the long weekend with K and I. What time are you coming into

(name of company)?

Beck

I'm coming into (name of company) at 9.30. I'm just working on my own, it isn't any formal training arrangement, so I can have coffee at any stage.

christian

Cool, I'll text you at some time later in the morning, maybe about

11.00.

Beck

Oh my goodness me, I just got conformation for my first job, the hours

are 9am to 1pm. Not even a full day.

11am for coffee sounds good.

christian

Wow, hopefully they come up with something else!  At least you look keen if you're going in to do your own training.

Beck

Jack just messaged me with "If I do find other work to fit around the Wednesdays would you be open to it?"

I messaged him back with "yes please, I am keen to do whatever work you can give me."

That's not too suck up, is it? 

I just figure the sooner I know the system back to front the better. I've seen adverts on Seek wanting (name of system) people for three weeks, four weeks, five weeks. Eventually, I'd be more than happy to do jobs like that, if I haven't got a permanent job somewhere. I might even get brave and demand a certain amount of pay from them, if I did. If I'd had knowledge of a system that somebody knew instead of stupid Attar, I might have taken on short term work in the last eight months. However...

christian

The keener the better, they love people who want to work. I'd imagine people are still crying out for experienced finance people.

Beck

So, all I have to do is confirm with Shane if he is going to change rooms and increase his rent from $140 per week to $200 per week. I am increasing his rent because he is changing bedrooms to the larger bedroom. If he staid in the bedroom he is in now I wouldn’t increase his rent.

I could possibly get $250 for that room, so he is in effect getting a discount.

Then I can increase his room to $200 as well.

I reckon I go back into gay share and reduce my lower age limit from 30 years of age to 25 years of age and see what matches I get with that.

Just get some young gay guy to live with us, you know, like old times and stop worrying about it all.

The increased rent will subsidise my reduced working hours and will lessen the impact of the money leakage from my account for the time being... until I get a full time job in three to six months. All I have to do is stem the flow out as much as I can and things will be just fine in the short term.

And, of course, my temp work will increase. I’m acting like the work they have offered me is all I will get. Get a grip.

In due course, I could rent out the forth bedroom, however for now, just the two rented will be okay.

And mum will die.

I called Mark and Luke, I saw that they were on line on Skype and thought it would be nice if I called for a change. They are dealing with idiots. Well, not so much idiots as those without the ability to see the most efficient way of completing a task, nor the ability to complete a fine finish on work. Mark had re-tiled the front of the hotel, complete with inspection points and removable panels for drainage, when there was a blocked drain and the workers came along and proceeded to smash the tiles with hammers to get to the blockage. That was until Mark ran out and stopped them. Then afterwards they proceeded to hammer everything back together again until Mark got blocks of wood and gently tapped everything back into place.

I spoke to David in the afternoon.

“When do we get to put our feet up? When do we get to relax? I’ve worked long and hard enough, when is it my turn? When does it get easier?

David laughed and said he’d just been through the same thing last week. “How long do I have to keep doing this? When does it get easier,” he asked a friend.

“David, it never gets any easier.”

I text Rachel about how long it takes to drive to Mentone, as she lives down that way.

“I don’t know, I don’t get to Mentone very much. This is a job, I presume?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Have you gone back to work? Can we have lunch?”

“Yep, a job placement for 6 weeks starting March 28th. Let’s have lunch.”

“Back to work?”

“Yes. Oh, shouldn’t I be able to relax by now? When does it get easier?”

“When you die.”

“Well there is something to look forward to.”

There was no cat food, so I had to go to the supermarket.

I bought roast chicken and made salad for dinner.

Shane went out for dinner.

I wrote my journal, in the lounge room, without turning on the TV all night. I kind of like it that way. Of course, I got to playing around with photos. You know that. Play with some sexy boys from years ago. I’m cutting out the images of my friends and just leaving the sexy boys. It’s not quite porn, of course, but who wants porn. They are supposed to end up artistic shots, something of beauty and artistry about them. Not porn at all. Just Gay. Maybe that is what the coffee table book will eventually be called.

Do you like that?

Shane came home kind of early around 10pm and went straight to bed, saying he was tired. So, again, I didn’t get to talk to him about the bedrooms.

I went to bed not long after that. Why not? Bed is where the home is, after all.

Some where close to midnight, I was playing around with some of Mark’s old new Zealand photos, when I decided to come down and get the negatives and number them properly. When I headed onto the first floor landing, I could hear Shane typing away furiously on his keyboard. So much for tired. I wondered if he’d taken the last of the meth from the weekend, but presumed he didn’t.

I found that box of old writing stuff, which of course had been sitting in the middle of the study ever since I bought it back form Bolago, so found isn’t exactly the correct word and in it I found old journals from school days and just after, so I got my photos and I got my box of goodies and I scurried back up stairs.

Not long after, I heard Shane head down the stairs, then I heard the tell tale open and close of the door. He’d clearly picked up some trade over the internet. Tired, I thought?

But, I was “busy here” typing up old journals that I didn’t know that I had. Funny that I am still adding to, my now decades old journals. I’m still gathering the information together is these years later.

Pity I didn’t write more.

I heard the trade leave around 2am. It is surprising that Shane can actually close a door quietly… I thought he was genetically incapable.

My eyes were sore by this time and I took it as a sign to pack the day in myself.

Twins?

How Far And When? Will I Be Able To Eat Until Then?

I woke at 5am, cold from my balcony doors being open to air out the room. I pulled my second doona over me, my winter doona, which really doubles as back support during summer for sitting up in bed and watching TV, and gazed at the ceiling. There was shadowy light across the roof of my bedroom, but I could still see how the ceiling looked beautiful with its new coat of paint. I was somewhat pleased that I hadn’t asphyxiated from the paint fumes, I was pleased that I didn’t wake up dead, if you know what I mean. It is always a bonus. I drifted back to sleep almost immediately, in the cool stillness of the night.

Balcony doors open, or not, it was the first time this year I had to engage my winter doona. Balcony doors open, or not, it seemed early in the year for that, usually that doesn’t happen until late April, early May. 

No, I’m sure our climate isn’t changing.

I was awake at 7am. The first thing I did was pull the doona back off my face and gaze towards the ceiling. Lovely. How beautifully finished is that? How long did that take? I don’t know, I can’t remember. I’m glad it is done now, so nobody can say, you still haven’t got that fixed.

I sat up in bed and typed on my computer until Shane left. Online news, photo editing, writing in my blog… well, writing a piece that could be in my blog.

I got up with the idea of going to go visit mum. But, as we know Shane leaves late, 9.15, or so, and by the time I had this realisation it was already pushing 10am. 

They should call with work today. He said he’d give me a call early in the week, after all.

I had a shower straight away, might as well give visiting my mum every chance. I made coffee and prepared my breakfast. 

In the end, I didn’t visit mum. I have to get going earlier to visit her. It was pushing 11am by the time I was ready to leave. It takes half an hour to get there and she has lunch at midday. There just wasn’t enough time, in the end. I felt bad.

How long is it since I saw her last?

I sat at the kitchen bench and read my (name of system) notes and read online news and chatted to Sam and listened to the builders next door crashing and bashing. The renovation is coming along, but bejesus they are noisy today.

I ended up editing photos, for a time, that will surprise one and all. I kept catching myself, after which I sent myself back to study my manuals. But, reading my notes, those manuals, continues to send me to sleep, sadly. I keep trying to read, but somehow, I end up getting distracted.

I need to go to work and use the system for real.

Early in the afternoon, Jack calls to ask me how far I am willing to travel.

“Oh… um… most places.”

“Is Mentone too far?”

“Oh… um… Mentone?” Fuck me! “Oh, no, I guess not… um? Er?”

“It is one day per week for 6 weeks.”

“Oh… um… yes, what time do I have to get there in the mornings?”

“I don’t know that.”

“Yes… sure.” Why am I saying sure? First job, I shouldn’t say no, too fucken far buddy. But I don’t.

“We will, of course, fit other jobs in around that.”

“Okay, sure.” But the midday of the week kind of breaks is up.

“It will start 28th March.”

And here I was thinking I might be starting tomorrow.

The problem, of course, is that one day a week on a Wednesday precludes any full time work during that period. I was kind of thinking full time work.

Oh shit! What the hell am I going to do if I am only going to work one day per week until May? That is no exactly going to pay the mortgage.

I started to panic. What am I to do?

Anthony called. Why is life so unfair? Why is it so hard? “Where is my TattsLotto payment?”

“Of course, I agree,” said Anthony. “We’ve invested enough, surely in Mr Adams?”

“Exactly.”

“When is it our turn, I ask you?”

Mark called, they have been really busy with the restaurant, working 24 7. He had a whole new staircase made for $700. That’s Hanoi for you. I should have gone with them, setting up a new hotel in Hanoi now that would be exciting.

I think I was getting a bit housebound. I think that I was worrying about what the hell am I gonna do? What if I run out of money? What the hell happens if I don’t have enough money to pay my mortgage? What happens then?

“What are you doing for dinner babe?”

“Nothing yet. Do you want to meet up for dinner?”

I walked in to meet Sam after work, to clear my head and get fresh air. 

“Are you ready to leave?”

“Yes.”

“Ready to leave right now.”

“Yes.”

“No dilly dally?”

Intake of breath. “No, I’m shocked you would say that.”

“Then move!” said Sam.

Of course, I had to turn off my computer and put it away and I had to find shoes and socks and my wallet and my phone and my key and my glasses case, but other than that I was ready to leave. Big smile

He walked towards my place and I walked towards him, both of us walking on our usual route home to my place. 

We met in the treasury Gardens, just across from the Princess Theatre. We walked to Grattan Street for Nasi Lemak. It was very spicy.

“Ridiculously,” said Sam.

And he likes spicy food, so if he said ridiculously, then you know it is.

We sat outside, there weather was lovely. The day faded gently into the evening.

We came home and watched TV a fascinating program about the world of Manta Rays, in Australia, Stradbroke Island to Lady Elliot Island and the Maldives.

Sebastian arrived with silver beet and some gluten free produce for Shane. He complained that he’d eaten a sausage with gluten in it. He’d asked the vendor if it was gluten free and the vendor had said it was. But a few hours later Sebastian realised the vendor had lied, or was mistaken. Sebastian said he didn’t feel well.

Shane arrived home sometime after that.

Top Gear was on at 10pm after the cricket finished, right when Nana Sam was making noises about going to bed. I told him we had to watch Top Gear in bed and that he’d like it. He didn’t. He whined until I turned it off at 11pm and we went to sleep.

To Discuss Something Once, Apparently, Is Only The Act Of Opening The Dialogue, You Must Keep At Them Until They Succumb To Your Demands... Er... Point Of View

I woke up early, before 8am with Sam.  Since I have to go to bed early when Sam stays, I’ve had my eight hours – and I only reckon I need six – so it is time for me to wake up too. I made coffee and muesli and went back to bed until Shane left for work. 

I prop myself up on my pillows and absorb the morning. Mornings are truly lovely. Really.

What to do today? My employer – wow, listen to that – could call at any moment and give me a work assignment. Oh, wouldn’t it be lovely if it was tomorrow instead of today? Tomorrow would be just fine. Mondays off and all that. That way, with a call tomorrow, I wouldn’t be working until Wednesday, which is my preferred way to ease into the working week... the new work cycle.

When I found the paint, Summer Range, last week, for the front bedroom repairs, I also found the paint for my bedroom ceiling, Jade Blue. My bedroom has a blue ceiling, green walls, a sand coloured cornice with mustard in the cove. All of the woodwork is light sand coloured with dark sand picked out highlights. I painted it all myself, albeit quite a few years ago now. They are all heritage Edwardian colours from the Edwardian period.

I had talked to Sam about finally painting over the mess Kim had made of my bedroom ceiling when he flooded my room, and flooded the bathroom, twice. That’s what you get for living with junkies. I would advise against it, sharing with junkies. He was a speed freak for a propensity to get things done, WAM! NOW! LET’S GO! NOW! GO! GO! GO! …like the elaborate sprinkler system, he had for his few hanging baskets. It was a feat and completely over engineered. Just pity those times when he ran out of steam and didn’t realise he’d left the watering system turned on and primed, so that the pressure built up… and up… and up… and… out the water escaped. For 3 days while the rest of us were away for a long weekend and he was KAPUT!  In a stupor.

Oh, how many years ago now? Ten years ago? Maybe? Well, I’m sick of waking up in the mornings and having that damage to my ceiling being the first thing I see, when I lay back to take a few extra moments.

Buoyed by my work in my spare room, at the ease at which I completed the task. Feeling good that I still have the talent, even if it has been a long time between renovating drinks. 

How long could it take? I thought. I could get this knocked over in the morning? One ceiling. Sure.

First, I had to sand off the patching, which Kim at least did. On a ladder up close and personal to the ceiling, I was soon covered in white powder, like a dusted sponge cake, or a maniac at a cocaine snorting Saturday night.

Cough, cough, cough, cough. I was off to find my face mask in no time. My glasses acted somewhat like safety glasses, but not enough like, and my eyes soon started to sting with the contamination.

I started painting by hand with a brush. I painted over the patched areas by Kim, which kind of confused me in the end, I should have been more scientific about it. I soon got to the point where I wasn’t sure what had been painted and what hadn’t. It all got a little confusing.

Then I had to cut-in the whole ceiling with the different coloured ceiling colour to the cornice work colour… blue over sand. Sky blue, too. If someone said they had a sky blue ceiling I’d think, oh really. But I have one. Funny. 

I had a third of the ceiling painted by early afternoon when I was sick of it. Really sick of it, no more. Oh, what to do? Oh, I wish I hadn’t started this. Oh me, oh my. I can’t see the end, it is not in sight. I can’t see it finished, I can’t feel the delight.

Oh. Sigh.

I had been painting by brush because a roller splatters paint everywhere and I didn’t want to have to empty the room. I can paint quite efficiently with a brush without spilling it everywhere. But it takes much longer.

The room was pulled apart, the bed was in the middle of the room, the mats were taken up, the tables and chairs all removed to the hallway. But the bed, the desk, the TV, the paintings and all of the odds and sods on the mantelpiece.

But now I was sick of it and wanted to speed the process up. So… think? I’ll will go and buy some cheap plastic covers from the paint shop and just cover everything in plastic. I’ll get a roller and an extension handle and I will paint the last of it with a roller. Fuck it.

And that’s what I did. It cost $25. Money well spent, let me tell you.

I had it finished by 4pm. I had it all cleaned up by 5pm. My arms hurt and my back hurt and my left foot seemed to have pins and needles, so I had a shower and took to my bed.

I stayed in bed until 8.30. Shane came home but I didn’t feel like talking to him much. I have to sort out the front bedroom with him. I suggested I wanted to rent it out and he said he’d pay the extra. Except, I have already been waiting for him to change rooms since Xmas 2010. More fool me, hey? It’s disappointing that he just seems to think he can do whatever he wants with it, suit himself, but then again, I guess I need to tell him. 

I find that hard. (What I find hard is having to continue to tell him)

I always figure that people are going to do what they say they are going to do. But, I guess, I have to keep on it. To discuss something once, apparently, is only the act of opening the dialogue.

I sat back and admired my handy work in the fading light of the day. And I could feel what it felt like to have completed the task. I could feel what it felt like to have finished. Dare I say, I felt pride in the outcome. I felt clever about my efforts. I was pleased, after all this time of being patched, that my lovely ceiling was restored to its original beauty.

There You Go

Shane buys Earth friendly products from the supermarket and then leaves every light on in the house.

But then, city people think they can have green credentials and drive big petrol guzzling 4WDs at the same time... so, I guess, it is the way of the world, really.

It is the reason why we are not going to make it as a race, climate change dysphoria. Why we are heading the way of the dodo. Gone over. Say good bye to your kids, guys.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but I am. I don't get it. It's just delusional.

Be one or the other. Don't give a shit about the environment, if that is what you choose, it is a valid choice, if that's what you want to choose, but don't be a two faced hypocrite.

Lazy Sunday

We didn't get up too early. I looked over at the clock after gazing at Sam's handsome face in the quiet of the morning, you know, listening to his breathing and any twitching he might do. It was 9am. I woke up earlier and chatted once Sam opened his eyes and said something, I can’t remember what. I thought I was being very clever, Sam wanted to sleep. It is a game we play now, see who can be annoying enough to wake up the other one who wants to sleep. This morning it was my turn.

We went out for lunch. No more pancakes, not even sweet ones for breakfast. Sad face. No, get dressed and straight out the door. We walked to Lygon Street. Lovely.

I ate Nasi Lemak, one of my current favourites. Yum yum. It was one of the few foods, in recent times, which made me say, “Wow, I’ve never tasted something like that before.” Sam had curry, which wasn’t a good choice so, of course, he scoffed into mine. I spent my time grabbing mouthfuls and fending him off. (It sounds like rough sex, hey?)

Then we went over and cleaned Sam's house. Really? Cleaning? he's the cleaner, I am so not. He likes it, you know how "cleaners" like cleaning. The mind boggles. I did some study while he vacuumed. I did training Thursday and Friday for a new system for a new job. So, I lay on his couch and read up the manuals.

We made Japanese curry for dinner. It was supposed to be spicy, but it wasn't. I'm a spicy convert, clearly.

Holden Special

Shop Shop Shopping

Rain, rain, rain rain, it hasn't stopped raining. Drip, drip, drip, drip, the water hasn't ceased dripping from the skies. Water falling, wetness covering everything, like dew. It is winter again. Cold and wet. Grey and cold. It was 39 degrees last week and sweltering hot and today it is drizzly, cold, windy, wintery wet. You know, I kind of like it. Cool and lovely. Pitter, pitter, pitter. The car wouldn't demist and we got rained on every time we got out of it, but it was nice. Patter, patter, patter. Jumpers and jackets.

But, having said all of that, who are the people who still deny climate change? I mean, I ask you? It's obvious, we can see the change. Our weather is now different, it has changed.

We walked around Chadstone. Speaking of climate change, we viewed the resources of the world being presented in every shape imaginable, in every variation, the full spectrum. We dropped down a level as soon as we got there and we seemed to walk around in one big slowly bending corridor arc, all in cream like one big nuclear fall out shelter, with retail, until we seemed to end up back in the same place that we started, seamlessly, mysteriously.

Amazing... really. It just kept going. Not stopping, never stopping.

People shop for entertainment now. People shop for socialising. People shop to keep out of the rain.

It rained all day. It rained on us as we dashed from the car park to the shops and it rained on us as we dashed from the shops back again.

We didn't buy anything, not even the pecan scroll, as I was told I was fat. "Fat fat fat!" Apparently.

We were looking for an iPhone case, the one with a pocket at the back. The online shop had them, but the Apple "temple" at Chadstone didn't stock them. Online shopping won again. Retail is second rate, even to the biggest and shiniest and the best. The fat chick in the blue genius shirt said, as if she had said it a thousand time,

"We don't stock all the products that the online store stocks." Smile. Like that was really good enough. That's all that needed to be said and we headed back home to our computers to buy. 

Nathan was waiting for his mate, Lachie, to come out of the bathroom. They had both been out drinking to celebrate Nathan’s great new job, and Lachie’s much deserved divorce. They were both pretty drunk. Nathan had drunk as much as Lachie, but Lachie seemed to be suffering more than Nathan. In fact, Nathan thinks he can hear Lachie throwing up in the bathroom. The walls aren’t thick in these new apartments.

Nathan hoped a bout of vomiting wouldn’t get in the way of what Nathan had in mind. Lachie had been giving him signs all night, which had exited Nathan more than Nathan ever expected that it would. Lachie seemed to be keener with every drink that he consumed. Nathan was into the idea too. He’d never really thought about it before just recently, when he and Lachie got much closer the more Lachie’s relationship fell apart with Eve.

Nathan was now pretty excited sitting there on Lachie’s bed waiting for Lachie to come out of the bathroom.

Lachie eventually came out of the bathroom.

“You, okay?” asked Nathan.

“Me, okay? Yeah, sure,” said Lachie.

“You were in there for a while, that’s all.”

“Er, beauty doesn’t come easy.” Lachie laughed.

“No, I guess.”

“What?” said Lachie. “You don’t have to worry.”

“Me?”

“Yeah.”

“I have to worry as much as anyone.”

“Listen to you?” said Lachie.

“If I have nothing to worry about.”

“You don’t.”

“Neither do you.”

“It takes more than some hair gel and moisturiser for me.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Did we get those beers?”

“Here.” Nathan hands and open stubby to Lachie.

“Cheers.”

“Cheers.”

Lachie and Nathan clinked beer bottles.

“Up your bum,” said Lachie as he put the bottle to his lips.

Nathan laughed.

They both drink their beer.

“Good night.”

“Good night.”