Smooth Talker

My sister, Gill, picked me up at 11am and we took mum out for lunch for her birthday. We drove over to Camberwell and ate lunch there. Her old stomping ground, as they say. We both asked her if she knew where she was and she said she did, but I don’t know. She bluffs, whether that is on purpose or learned or just reacting to stimulus. Who knows, it is hard to tell, as it all becomes a part of the general babble.

Both me and my sister used the “E” word at some point. “Nothing good euthanasia laws wouldn’t fix.”

Or a dose of influenza, as it says at the door of the home, not to enter if you have it. Really? Wouldn’t that be a good thing? A bit of a clean out? But, I guess, they want the five thousand dollars we give them every month.

We both always laugh. Well? If you didn’t laugh you’d cry. The next time we have a cold...

… poor mum. To even think this way. To think it would come to this. To have thought twenty years ago that this is what we’d be thinking.

Her grey hair, her stained clothes, her dead-eyed gaze off into the distance, all unbelievably odd, really when I think about it. It kind of feels like some strange reality I have been sucked into mistakenly.

I was home by 2pm. Sam had just been to Huxtables and got a burger. We first went there to get burgers when they first opened and they messed up our order, gave ours to someone else and gave us the wrong order. We haven’t been back since – the burgers are small and not as nice as Grill’d and are more expensive too. This was the first time either one of us has been back and they messed up his order again.

“Bloody stupid blah blah blah, gave my order to the wrong person again. Do you believe it?”

Sam and I polished the car in the warm winter afternoon sun. Lovely it was too. Oh my poor car, that was the first time I have polished in the time I have had it. How shiny it is now. Lovely. I was applying the polish and Sam was coming along right next to me buffing it off again. We’re a good team, a good team of car detailers.

Sam and I went walking, late in the afternoon.


“Come on, we need some fresh air,” said Sam.

We bought ice creams on our way. I had lemon and passion fruit, Sam had Dorian. He waved his Dorian cone towards me.

“It smells like your bad undies you have been wearing all week.”

“You’re a smooth talker,” said the woman behind the counter.

It’s funny, Sam is the one to push me out the door to go walking and then I am the one who makes us go for a long walk. Once we are out there, he so often says “Let’s just go for a short walk.”

“No, it’s an hour,” I say. “We need to go for a decent distance.”

I lit a fire and made tea when we got back, just as the day was turning to dusk, just as the winter afternoon was turning to night, that quiet of transition.

Christian Fletcher 5:47 PM

Are you on the couch?

LouLou Brown 5:48 PM

Of course! Are you?

Christian Fletcher 5:48 PM

I am, with a fire burning

LouLou Brown 5:52 PM

Nice. The house I worked in last night had 3 big old fireplaces burning and wood fire stove going too, all lovely but toooo hot for working!

Sam cooked noodles. He made note that we didn’t have to go to the supermarket today. I’m always complaining that we go to the supermarket every fucking day. He says it is to get fresh food. I cheered about not going.

We watched the Sunday program about the oldies in America and marijuana. Go grey power somebody has to teach this world some sense. Relief from pain. Relief from fear. A surrender to pleasure. Whatever? Who cares, it is just a choice.

Then we watched The Dukes of Hazzard. I’ve never really been a Dukes of Hazzard fan, but a few years ago there were porn films which were parodies on real TV shows and one was The Dukes of Hazzard. I always wished I’d bought it and some how it has always made me more interested in the Dukes of Hazzard ever since.

I guess that doesn’t make much sense.

This, of course, was the new movie and while I’m not that interested in Johnny Knoxville, which is odd as he should be just my type, I’d sure like to watch Sean William Scott playing with his thing sans clothes.

😛

Grumpy Fucken Bitch!

I got up and lit the fire. The house was quiet. The day was still. I love that.

It was cold outside, but the sun was shining, which had the effect of making it feel quite fresh, as I headed out to get the firewood.

I built a fire and switched on my laptop.

Sam slept in.

I just love sitting around and pissing the day away on a Saturday morning. Did you know that? Had you worked that out? An open fire, my computer and a cup of coffee, and I’m set. Sam, however, likes to do things, achieve things, get things done. So, we washed the car in preparation for polishing it.

Sam was ordering me about and giving me the shits as soon as he came downstairs. Not working full time and stupidly telling him how I could have got things done during the days I hadn’t worked, but had chosen instead to be slack and piss the time away, just seemed to convince him that I needed organising.

It is probably true. Him saying that I could do these things on my time so we could do other things when we wee together was probably true too.

Washing the car didn’t seem to satisfy his need to do something, it just seemed to get him going. 

I went to sit my arse back down.

“Did you fix the sink, yet?”

The seal sealing the sink to the bench seems to have failed and water is leaking into the cupboard. I had all of the equipment to attempt attempted to reseal it. The edge of the sink was still wet and the silicone didn’t seem to stick very effectively. It just wasn’t as easy as it should have been. I was bending backwards into the cupboard lying on the floor attempting to look up to where the sink was no longer sealed to the bench. I sat up and banged my head. Sam kept yabbering on until I told him to, 

Shut the fuck up! AH! 

Of course, it was his fault that I hit my head and the silicone wouldn’t stick.

It was one of those gorgeous sunny winter's days. Sunny, blue sky and lovely fresh clean crisp air.

I tousled his hair in a conciliatory gesture and said we should head out for food.

Feed the beast and he will be pacified. We all know that. It’s either blow him or feed him.

We launched ourselves out into the day at midday, with some kind of idea of hunger. We walked to Victoria Street and ate Thai Soup, which was quite lovely really. We ordered exactly the same meal, which Sam said was romantic. When I said maybe it was just unimaginative, the waitress sneaked a quite smirk.

Afterwards, we shopped and bought fruit. 

I wanted to buy a sweet rice dish, but Sam stopped me, because he was being mean. Oh, maybe not so mean, he kept saying something about the rice dishes that I wanted to buy being made in factories with lots of preservatives and that I wouldn’t like them.

All I could see was him stopping me from having a sweet treat.

We walked to Punt Road and he stopped at Ying Thai to buy me, what he said was a lovely desert, but I turned the corner into Punt Road and the afternoon sun was so lovely that I closed my eyes and kept walking and before I knew it I had walked all the way to Langridge Street, which was quite a surprise. When I turned around it was even more surprising that Sam was nowhere in sight. 

I wondered where he was? I momentarily wondered if he thought that I was such a grumpy bitch that he had walked off up Victoria Parade avoiding me altogether. But, not sooner had I thought that than his sweet face came walking around the far corner way off in the distance.

I crossed over at the lights, we both needed to be on the other side, after all, so why waste the opportunity.

Then he proceeded to cross Punt Road like a great big girl. Always the same, unless he is at a set of lights, he’s too tentative to cross in a gap in the traffic.

When he caught up to me, he produced a banana rice dish wrapped in a pandan leaf, telling me that’s what he’d found for me, that’s what he’d been doing.

We had risotto for dinner, which I was going to cook. But, of course, no day would be complete without a trip to the supermarket. We needed butter and milk.

Oh groan! Not the supermarket! Does anyone go to the supermarket more than we do?

I am such a grumpy bitch, when Sam wouldn’t cook the risotto as was required, I harrumphed off to the couch in a pout.

I sometimes wonder if there is something wrong with me. I’d been cranky all day, I’m getting crankier with life in general.

I think I was still grumpy about going to the supermarket. 

Well, if you want me to cook, I will follow a recipe. If you just want to throw things into the saucepan in any old fashion and order, don’t expect me to be a part of it.

We ate risotto that Sam cooked. He still bought it to me on the couch. We watched TV. Graham Norton – Danny Devito, Charlotte Church. She was one of the first people to sue in England about the phone hacking. I couldn’t recognise her, although I knew her name. I googled her and she still didn’t look like anyone I recognised.

I love Graham Norton.

I love Saturday nights with my baby… despite how it may seem, despite being a grumpy cow.

YOU ARE PROUDLY SOUTH AFRICAN WHEN:

You call a bathing suit a "swimming costume" or a "cozzie".

You call a traffic light a "robot".

You call an elevator a "lift"

You call a car hood a "bonnet"

You call a car trunk a "boot"

You call a pickup truck a "bakkie"

You call an outdoor grill a "Braai"

Employees sing and dance to show how unhappy they are.

The SABC advertises and shows highlights of the programme you just finished watching.

You get cold easily. Anything below 16 degrees Celsius is Arctic weather.

You know what Rooibos Tea is even if you've never had any.

You can sing your national anthem in four languages and have no idea what it means in any of them.

You know someone who knows someone who has met Nelson Mandela.

You go to braais regularly, where you eat boerewors and swim, sometimes simultaneously.

You produce a R100 note instead of your driver's licence when stopped by a traffic officer.

You can do your monthly shopping on the pavement.

You have to hire a security guard whenever you park your car.

You know a taxi can move twice its certified number of people in one trip.

You travel 100's of kilometres to see snow.

You know the rules of Rugby better than any referee! THIS IS DENNIS. LOL...

More people vote in a local reality TV show than in a local election.

People have the most wonderful names: Christmas, Goodwill,  

Pretty, Wednesday, Blessing, Brilliant, Gift, Precious, Innocence, Given, Patience, Portion, and Coronation.

"Now now" or "just now" can mean anything from a minute to a month. THIS IS ME... LOL

You continue to wait after a traffic light has turned to green to make way for taxis travelling in the opposite direction.

Travelling at 120 km/h, you're the slowest vehicle on the highway/freeway.

A bullet train is introduced but potholes can't be fixed.

The last time you visited the coast you paid more in speeding fines and toll fees than you did for the entire holiday.

Prisoners, Doctors and Nurses go on strike.

You don't stop at red traffic lights just in case somebody hijacks your car.

Rwandan refugees start leaving the country because the crime rate is too high.

You accept a high crime rate as normal.

You actually get these jokes and pass them on to other friends from SA.

VIVA !!!!!

HeHe , love Anthony

a "robot", "bakkie", "Braai"? You are very strange, you lot.

Christian

I can always tell when Anthony has had a few wines. Can you? The clue being that he is well written when he is sober.

I kind of forget now a days that Anthony is South African. I forget how we were such young pups together way back when and that when he was around his mum his accent would change so completely is was completely amazing. He’d go from a relatively well spoken Australian to a full on Africans. The change was simply stunning.

Hi , I still think this way but i just dont express it , just to accommadate you wierd buggers in OZ you cant handle the truth . How foreign am I , Very .Get with the program . Love Anthonyx

Hi , Comming from a bi-lingual country where English was a minority language some Afrikaans words are well established in the English language Braai means cooked meat over an open flame , very important when enteraining . If you are inviter to a Cheese and wine you automatically know is a social gathering gathering ,that we know as a cocktail party as appposed to a braai which means you are going to be fed . Everybody get very exited over the food especialy the Wors(sausage) just like Italians . Get with the program Christian . Love Anthonyx

Hi , further more if you are having a Braai then the food must be displayed and the entire conversation after inspection is about food The Wors defines wether the Braai will be succesful or not . Its called Boerewors , must be tryed and tested carefully before inviting company. Not ever Butcher can produce perfect Wors(sausage) . Now you know. Love Anthonyx

Sleep and Noodles

Christian Fletcher 9:18 AM (to Mark) Oh, I fell asleep with my computer on my bed. Lovely it is too, although I am disappointed not to have got to talk to you.

It makes me sad that Mark my best friend doesn’t think I want to talk to him.

I stayed in bed all night, I didn’t call anyone. Warm in my bed, me and the cat, wrapped in my doona, the two of us. The lights turned off, just the flicker of the blue light from the TV screen, the glow from my laptop, the world and the winter cold effectively locked out. I am good on my own, perhaps a little too good. I’m sure it is not such a bad thing. I guess those who don’t like their own company would probably disagree.

I can listen to Randy Crawford and Friends indefinitely, I never get sick of either. Are they then the two greatest forms of entertainment? I fell asleep last night watching Friends.

Randy Crawford has been silent for a while. I haven’t had music in my life much lately. I’ve preferred silence just lately. Inside my head is noisy enough.

I was awake at 9am, just as Shane left the house. Crash goes the front door. He was pulling a suitcase behind him and I gave out a small cheer involuntarily when I saw it. Bad Christian! Oh yeah! He’s going to Sydney, clearly for the weekend to see his… oh, whatever he is called… Yay! Yay, for me.

I was so excited I got straight out of bed and brewed coffee and made a fire, there and then in the morning. The first fire all week, I gave a wicked laugh. Sam would be over tonight, after all. I wouldn’t be heading to bed to hide away in the evening… take to my bed, wrap myself in my doona.

I can hear him now, The house is cold, you are avoiding me and not lighting the fire so it is too cold to sit in the lounge room. And you charge me a premium rent for a cold house.

Illogical, grabbing at straws. The heavy load of those who only think if themselves.

No Shane, I just charge you normal Fitzroy rent now, you had it cheap for many years. If you thought beyond yourself and instead of running that electric heater in your room and turned on the central heating, and light a fire in the lounge, you wouldn’t be cold.

That is how he’d justify his inability to light a fire. I’m sure, because when I ordered the wood, I didn’t order the bags of kindling too.

I can’t make allowances for stupidity.

I wrote my blog all morning, caught up a few days, I always seem to be “catching up a few days” now a days. I don’t know why, I have more time now than I have ever had… well, for some time, some years.

I ate bananas on toast and nutella on toast the tasted of which was washed away with cups of strong black coffee and paradox. I love these days, but if I have too many of these days will, most likely, lose everything.

I had a headache and took aspirin. I think because my open fire was smoking, or so said Sam. “Too much smoke, get some fresh air.” But what he really meant was for me to get off my fat arse and do some exercise.

I loaded the fire and watched two Cary Grant movies, His Girl Friday and Penny Arcade.

One of my favourite actors. The greatest movie star of the 20th Century. Those good looks. How handsome he was. The quintessential leading man. He was once, supposed, in love with Randolph Scott. 

I think it was a shame that he was of a time that he would never tell the truth of that love affair. Not at the end, not when he was old and it didn’t matter, not ever.

Another tragedy caused by our enemies who made our lives shameful and mean nothing. Something we still haven’t completely got over. Usually by bigoted Christians who, let’s face it, have nothing to base their bigotry on except the inconsistent myths they want to convince everyone else of being real. Sad really.

I was relaxed and nearly falling asleep, just about asleep, when Sam arrived, after work, post salt mines.

Christian Fletcher 7:10 PM, 

hello

LouLou Brown 7:11 PM, 

Hello, how are you?

Christian Fletcher 7:12 PM, 

I'm good, eating chips

LouLou Brown 7:14 PM, 

I'm waiting for roast chook, mmm, yum... followed by box of posh chocolates that were on special, very yum.

Christian Fletcher 7:15 PM, 

Yum. How are you? I'm waiting for Sam to cook noodles

LouLou Brown 7:22 PM, 

I'm good(ish), feeling more motivated to find a better job at the moment, so I am doing that (while it lasts). Am having lunch with Miss V at Mt. M Pub tmrw, it re-opened last Friday after 5-6 years, so that will be fun. Then tmrw arvo/eve i am waitressing a private function on Mt M... not so fun but good $. Then Sunday I am on the couch.

Christian Fletcher 7:36 PM, 

On the couch is lovely

LouLou Brown 7:47 PM, 

I know, it's our favourite thing to do Chriso my friend. How were your noodles?

Christian Fletcher 7:51 PM, 

he's being a non cooking little bitch, but we did eat a packet of chips

LouLou Brown 7:56 PM, 

Oh-oh, sounds like someone's in trouble??!... Meanwhile I await chook... chocs are looking good, perhaps I should move them of the coffee table until after dinner.

Christian Fletcher 8:01 PM, 

Only me, with a fat stomach, who is the one in trouble

LouLou Brown 8:16 PM, 

Oh Chriso, that's just a comfort lump, not fat and it's keeping you warm and fuzzy.

Christian Fletcher 8:16 PM, 

no, it's fat, not enough of moving my fat arse

LouLou Brown 8:19 PM, 

Well maybe you could walk to the shops and buy noodles... won't that balance things out?... Although perhaps it's a bit cool for a stroll?

Hooray, i've just been called for my dinner.

Christian Fletcher 8:36 PM, 

I've just been called for my dinner too

LouLou Brown 8:37 PM, Enjoy!

Sam cooked noodles.

David came over for a cup of tea and ate dinner. He regaled us with stories about his failing love life. He’d just been to the sauna where he said he sucked on what was on offer like an Ethiopian child.

Christian Fletcher 10:02 PM, 

I ate my dinner and then chatted to Mark on his balcony

LouLou Brown 10:06 PM, 

Bet it's warm on the balcony, how is he?... I sent him a skype message before.

Christian Fletcher 10:06 PM, 

he said it was about 36 degrees. He seems really good, really good, even. He is surrounded by cute boys so he is smiling

LouLou Brown 10:11 PM, 

Oh good... but i hope my earlier message doesn't change his bliss... Simon asked me to ask Mark if he could talk to him re sewerage at Bolago?? I was scared to ask Mark 'cos I know he doesn't want to know about it anymore... I await his reply (or not).

Christian Fletcher 10:13 PM, 

His reply, or not. I'm sure he'd be willing to write you a message, I just don't know he could be bothered with Simon directly

LouLou Brown 10:15 PM, 

Ok, thanks for that... Would you like one of my posh chocolates?

Christian Fletcher 10:18 PM, 

yes please and a cup of tea and a joint and a chat

LouLou Brown 10:21 PM, 

Oh yes please... I am thinking of coming to Melbourne in next weeks, will be in touch when I devise a plan. Have you rented my room out yet?

Christian Fletcher 10:22 PM, 

No, I haven't rented your room out. You can still come and stay whenever you like

LouLou Brown 10:22 PM, 

Excellent!!

Christian Fletcher 10:25 PM, 

You know, Simon should be able to work the septic out himself at Bolago, I would have thought, it is a fairly simple septic system

LouLou Brown 10:39 PM, 

Well yes, i will give him credit for trying.  But it is flowing down the stairs like it did at that wedding (albeit not nearly as much) and the grass area between the front steps and the vegies patch is very soggy. He will get a plumber out but he was just wanting advice from Mark on what could be going on 'cos the sewerage isn't coming out from that big cement hole in the ground at the side of the steps, more like seeping up through the ground around it, so he was wondering if there was anything he was meant to have done that he hasn't... hope that makes sense, i'm a bit tired & over it for now... it's not serious to Simon at the mo (although he is concerned) 'cos the new baby is arriving Monday and they are not up for a couple of weeks.

Christian Fletcher 10:42 PM, 

When that happened, although it would normally be coming up through the top of the pit in the garden, it meant that the pump that cleared it away had stopped working. It meant that the pump needed some attention

The pump isn't clearing the water away into the disbursement pipes that take the waste/water and distributes it out in the garden and the pit is filling up with water and over flowing

LouLou Brown 10:46 PM, 

Thank you Christian, that's a big help. I will let Simon know. xxxxxxxx

Christian Fletcher 10:47 PM, 

It isn't usually a big deal, just a bit of attention to the pump and it would be fixed

LouLou Brown 10:48 PM, 

A bit like myself really.

Christian Fletcher 10:49 PM, 

me too honey... just a little attention and I'm ready to keep gong

LouLou Brown 10:50 PM, 

We are nearly twins.

Christian Fletcher 10:50 PM  

We went to bed and watched Titanic. I have always found it so grim, an ordeal, not really entertaining at all. It wasn’t any different this time. All those dead bodies and death and sadness. The two of them being separated by him dying, it is too much. I always found it too sad.

Rapper Frank Ocean's Gorgeous Words About Coming Out And Telling The World That His First Lover Was A Man

Whoever you are, where ever you are, I’m starting to think we’re a lot alike. Human beings spinning on blackness. All wanting to be seen, touched, heard, paid attention to. My loved ones are everything to me here. In the last year or three, I’ve screamed at my creator, screamed at clouds in the sky for some explanation. Mercy maybe. For peace of mind to rain like Manna somehow.

Four summers ago, I met somebody. I was 19 years old; he was too. We spent that summer, and the summer after, together. Everyday almost. And on the days we were together, time would glide. Most of the day I’d see him and his smile. I’d hear his conversation and his silence until it was time to sleep. Sleep I would often share with him. By the time I realised I was in love, it was malignant. It was hopeless. It was no escaping, no negotiating with the feelings. No choice. It was my first love. It changed my life.

Back then, my mind would wander to the women I had been with, the ones I cared for and thought I was in love with. I reminisced about the sentimental songs I enjoyed when I was a teenager. The ones I played when I experienced a girlfriend for the first time. I realised they were written in a language I did not yet speak. I realised too much too quickly. Imagine being thrown from a plane. I wasn’t in a plane though. I was in a Nissan Maxima, the same car I packed up with bags and drove to Los Angeles in.

I sat there and told my friend how I felt. I wept as the words left my mouth. I grieved for them, knowing I could never take them back for myself. He patted my back. He said kind things. He did his best. But he wouldn’t admit the same.

He had to go back inside soon. It was late and his girlfriend was waiting for him upstairs. He wouldn’t tell me the truth about his feelings for me for another three years. I felt like I only imagined reciprocity for years. Now imagine being thrown from a cliff. No, I wasn’t on a cliff. I was still in my car telling myself it was gonna be fine and to take deep breaths. I took the breaths and carried on. I kept up a peculiar friendship with him because I couldn’t imagine keeping up my life without him. I struggled to master myself and my emotions. I wasn’t always successful.

The dance went on…I kept the rhythm for several summers after. It’s winter now. I’m typing this on a plane back to Los Angeles from New Orleans. I flew home for another marred Christmas. I have a window seat. It’s December 27th, 2011. By now I’ve written two albums. This being the second. I wrote to keep myself busy and sane. I wanted to created worlds that were rosier than mine. I tried to channel overwhelming emotions. I’m surprised at how far all of it has taken me.

Before writing this, I told some people my story. I’m sure these people kept me alive, kept me safe…sincerely, these are the folks I want to thank from the floor of my heart. Everyone of you knows who you are….

Great humans, probably angels. I don’t know what happens now, and that’s alright.

I don’t have any secrets I need kept anymore. There’s probably some small shit still, but you know what I mean. I was never alone, as much as I felt like it. As much as I still do sometimes. I never was. I don’t think I ever could be. Thanks.

To my first love, I’m grateful for you. Grateful that even though it wasn’t what I hoped for and even though it was never enough, it was. Some things never are…and we were. I won’t forget you. I won’t forget the summer. I’ll remember who I was when I met you. I’ll remember who you were and how we’ve both changed and stayed the same. I’ve never had more respect for life and living than I have right now.

Maybe it takes a near death experience to feel alive. Thanks.

To my mother, you raised me strong. I know I’m only brave because you were first, so thank you! All of you, for everything good. I feel like a free man. If I listen closely, I can hear the sky falling too.

You Got It Good, Buddy, So Stop Your Bitchin!

Stray cat in the back yard

I was soooooooo comfortable this morning, warm and contented in bed, when the alarm went off. Oh? Do I have to get up? Do I have to get out of my warm bed? Do I really? Have to go to work? Really? Oh? I do? Do I have to? I have to. I have to. Oh, I have to. I really have to.

Oh? The salt mines beckon. Chip, chip chipping at the walls of the cave to extract the salt, for 12 hours a day. Okay, so it only feels like 12 hours.

The mornings are still really cold. Chilled. Outer Mongolia, as David would say. So cold that I felt the chill at the thought of heading out into it just in my suit, as I got dressed in my room. 

I’ve got my gorgeous quilted leather jacket, which is so often too hot to wear because of how thick the quilting is. It seems to be especially made for very cold weather, colder than Melbourne usually has to offer, but especially made for the weather we are having at the moment, it would seem. Today was the day made just for it? 

I pulled it from the wardrobe. I remembered it to be missing one of its buttons, but today it was missing two. I was surprised! But then I remembered that the last time I wore it, whenever that was, I threw it onto the Otterman at the end of the day and the button hit fire surround and broke in half, just like that. The only bit of the jacket to make contact with anything. Of course.

The first button to break, broke in half in my hand for no apparent reason. Damn buttons!

Should I wear it missing buttons? Is that too “warby” as Mark would say? Should I not wear it? Oh, wear it, nobody is going to look at what I am wearing. We all think we are the centre of well, everyone else’s, attention. I don’t normally. I shook my head and slipped the jacket on.

I stepped out onto the front veranda before Shane was out of bed. He gets out of bed at the time most people are getting to work. 

You know, that sometimes I think Shane just doesn’t realise how good he has it here. He criticises me and the house and really, he has it so good. 5 minutes from work, to name just one advantage. Maybe it needs me to kick him out to prove it to him. Maybe?

But, as Sam says, oh calm down, he’s got an interstate boyfriend who he’ll be spending many weekends away with.

Good point.

Today, I had to catch the Brunswick Street tram. I live in the best area, I have trams that take me anywhere, right at my door step.

The other day it was the Victoria Street tram. And not long before that it was the Nicholson Street tram. All of them taking me to the clients I had to go to all over the inner suburbs.

I’m lucky. I live in the best place. I don’t have to drive very often. Yay.

A woman got on and sat opposite me and called on her phone immediately having sat down. She started talking with an obvious bad cold, Can you tell mummy if she has left her glasses on the kitchen table?

Ah! I thought as I grabbed my bag and made a retreat to a seat I could see at the front of the tram. I sooooooooo don’t want your bloody cold, lady.

I text Jill from the front the tram, away from snotty woman, about the jacket. I asked her if she knew where I could get my buttons sewn back on. One of those buttons has been broken since just after I bought the coat. I need to get onto it and get the, now, two broken buttons replaced before next winter comes around.

She replied with, A tailor or anyone who does alterations. Alternatively, call a good leather shop like Siricco.

Really Jill, I had, actually, worked that much out for myself. Do my friends think I am stupid? Or am I just grumpy?

I wondered if I could reply without being rude? Do you know of a particular establishment of which you speak? I saved it into drafts rather than send it. I’ll work it out for myself.

I quietly suspected I’d be thinking the same thoughts next winter.

Well, I’d tried. Maybe next year?

I text Beck as I was heading down Collins Street towards her office. I must keep in contact, it takes so little effort, really. I must learn from the friends I have already lost.

OMG! Some women never stop talking, I’m sitting next to one on the tram. Yabber, yabber fucking yabber. OMG! She just got off and some guy just sat next to me talking loudly on his phone. Bugger! Anyway, I’m just ridding passed your building and I thought I’d say good morning.

I text Sam on the tram, just as a girl with an ipod replaced the man talking loudly into his phone. 

Ah!

I want to retire.

Yes, yes, now move your arse and get to work so you can support me as I retire - Sam.

I’m at Spencer Street already. I’ve sat next to a woman who never stopped talking to her friend. Then an Indian man who talked loudly into his phone, with that high pitched kind of accent Indians have.  Then a girl with a clearly turned-up-full chicka chicka ipod. And when that annoying little bitch got off an old woman came and sat next to me and she pulled her phone out and started talking to her friend with the words, I couldn’t talk on the train for fear of getting cut off, SO how are you? People are just annoying.

You’d think I’d like the iPod to shut out the world, but you’d be wrong. I hate them. We’re all turning into automatons making irritating chicka chicka noises. No, I like to hear the sounds of the world around me as I move from place to place, despite the annoying people.

Or is it Christian’s chi still unbalanced? I believe this theory - Sam.

I got to (name of street) Street in no time. Everything is half an hour away by tram. Lovely, I thought. I contemplated a pineapple muffin, but decided against it. Actually, that isn’t true – my god, I’m lying to you, as well as to myself – the bakery didn’t have pineapple. It’s my favourite thing at the moment, pineapple muffins.

The company with the funny name was an advertising agency. Nice building. Old. Victorian. Quite sushy inside. I’m going to like it here, I just knew. You know, when first impressions just wrap you up in velvet and gold and massage you tender spots.

Do I need to wear a tie here, I mouthed to the receptionist as she called my contact to announce my arrival.

She shook her head. No.

Yay. The noose can stay in my brief case. Actually, there are so few workplaces where ties are worn now.

“Up the stairs to the top.”

Advertising boys are cute and smiley. Sexy and friendly. Is that where the cute boys are hiding out these days, in advertising agencies? They all seemed to have pretty faces, nice arses and something padding out the fronts of their trousers. Nice. Just how all guys should present.

Oh, groan, it wasn’t so simple. They had the wrong version of the software, despite the instructions they are always given to check it before I get there. People are so slack. Really. The technological era and people are ignoring it. We had to down load the new updates. Lovely.

Then he said he wasn’t so sure about some of his figures and could I check some of his redundancy calculations? Really? That’s a little outside the scope of what I’m here to do, I thought, your work. However, I was obviously feeling a sport about it all, the pretty boys and the nice décor clearly had had a positive effect on me. I had to fix one entry of figures and tidy up some other calcs he’d done.

He was nice enough though. He said I should have rounded my time to the nearest hour. Okay, fine by me.

I left at 13.30. The sun was shining brightly, even if it had no warmth in it. That cold chill was in the air, to be sure. But it was nice to be out in the fresh air, none the less.

I had coffee with Beck at Guy Grossi’s restaurant at the Rialto. She laughed about my morning text. She told me about the man who is in the next office to her. He continually clears his throat and coughs and wheezes and gags and spits and clears his throat. 

She says it is driving her insane.

I told her that we should stop pissing about. We should start looking after ourselves, the nice people. I said, Just go and put some poison in his coffee and kill the bastard. Get rid off him. The world isn’t short of annoying people after all. I can assure you.

Beck says she misses working with me. She said something about how boring everyone was.

I walked up Collins street. I went to the discount bookshop and looked for Sal Mineo’s biography. I resisted buying any more novels to not read, despite there being some I could have easily added to the pile of novels I already have which I am not reading. Still, it’s nice moseying around bookshops in the middle of the day.

I bought a raspberry muffin. I’m weak, I know. I was only going to buy a pineapple muffin, but I caved in. Bad me. Bad FAT me.

I went to Collins Place to look for Sal Mineo movies. They didn’t have any. The guy said I was the second person to ask him in as many weeks. As I walked away, I thought that I was probably the first person also. Was it only two weeks ago? I guess it was.

I bought a tuna salad from Nashi for dinner. I knew I was going to retire to my bedroom, escape from the world, and I was just preparing for the exit.

I was home by 4pm. I walked all the way home from King Street. I figured that was good exercise. That was enough to justify lying down for the rest of the day.

I made coffee and went to bed.

I watched Millionaire Hot Seat. I got most of the questions. Sam still thinks I should go on it. I’m cap with the sports questions, but.

I made dinner; tuna salad, baked beans, toast, a cup of tea and an orange.

I was out of cat food, which was threatening to scuttle my escape to my bedroom plan. Shit! I could dash around to the milk bar and buy a can of cat food. Crap! I could go to the supermarket, really. Damn! But, at the last minute I saw that I had a tin of sardines, which saved the moment. Missy scoffed them down like the pig that she is.

Shane came home sometime after 6.30pm.

I watched Friends, Big Bang Theory and MasterChef. I watched the lovely Andy win the elimination test. Ben would be pleased. He’d have ripped off Andy’s undies and slapped his arse later. I want to see the two of them make out. Sam and I think Ben and Andy are lovers.

Missy came to bed and slept as I watched Modern Family.

I love my bed. I love my bed more than anything else in the whole wide world!

Crash, sounds the front door. Shane left the house about 20.30. Looking for company, no doubt. 

I was so comfortable. My pillows were arranged just right. That heavy body resting feeling was washing through me. I was sinking into the bed more and more every minute.

Crash, sounds the front door. It was Shane returning around 21.50.

I must have dozed off.

I watched Stephen Fry’s 100 best gadgets.

Maybe it isn’t a better mousetrap that we are looking for. Maybe, we are searching for a better corkscrew, after all from corkscrews comes wine. Indeed.

And the best gadget?

He told the story of a friend of his in PNG and how the Papa New Guineas were very impressed with all of the gadgets the white guys had. So, on the last day, Stephen’s friend thought they would be very impressed when the aeroplane came to take them home. So, he watched the Papa New Guineas reaction as the aeroplane landed and they seemed to be very under whelmed. So, he asked them,

“You don’t seem to be very impressed with the aeroplane.”

“Well, of course you can fly, you can make fire come out of the ends of your fingers.”

So, it is fire, the lighter, giving the ability to have fire at your fingertips, which is the greatest invention, especially if you think of the alternative. Rubbing sticks and all.

Around 11pm, just as I was dozing in front of the Teev, just as my eyes were closing gently on each other, Shane was suddenly in the bathroom bashing and crashing and smashing things around. It sounded like he’d dropped bowling balls onto the tiled floor. There is nobody on this planet but Shane, of course. Then he was clippering… for ages. He must be seeing Tulli, I thought. Maybe, he is going to Sydney, I hoped. It gave me a thrill of pleasure. Yay! Make as much noise as you like.

Mark, “why don’t you ever call me.”

Call started 12:22 PM

Call ended – no answer12:22 PM

Call started 12:24 PM

Call ended – no answer12:24 PM

Shopping as Entertainment

I am awake just after 9am thinking about all the things I am going to do today. The first think I must do is put the rubbish out. Wednesday morning? If you want something done and all that…

Then I hear Shane’s footsteps come crashing up the stairs. I look over at the time, it is 9.15. Wow, that is late, even for Shane.

I’m thinking that is good, as I am so comfortable and warm in bed, that I didn’t get up already. I must close my bedroom door when I leave, then the house will be the same for Shane tonight when he gets home, cold and dark, as it has been all week.

When did I become such a bitch? What is the basis for all of this? Well? It was mine and Anthony's birthday last year and his abominable behaviour, which I'm sure sealed the deal. The weekend away at Jane’s just kind of added to it. Then the clearly hushed tones when he and David were discussing it the night we went to Ga Ga reinforced it. Clearly, I was deliberately excluded from those group activity. I can tell, it is my intuition. You know, when you just know things. There was carnival day. There is the total exclusion when he gets a new boyfriend. It is the knowledge that I get swept up in his co-dependence when he doesn’t have a significant other and how I get dumped when he does. It is the “me me me” it is the total self focus on himself. It is the “I’m out for dinner,” when he is out with a friend of both of ours. 

It was the constant rubbishing of Mark and Luke. 

“Oh, not the country people,” Shane would say. “We don’t want the country people here!” They are my best friends; how did he think I would feel? But he was too focussed on himself to ever think about that.

And really, I am just doing what I want to do. I am just living my life. The trifling nasty bits are just fun, a game, something to amuse my twisted little brain. He doesn’t know what it is that I am doing, and he probably doesn’t care, if truth be known. 

But… was it Shane, or Jane, though, who excluded me from the most recent weekend, that I don’t know? When Jane is pissed off with Mark, I often get lumped into the hatred as well, so I can’t really be sure about that one. Except, that the last weekend away at Jane’s, Jane asked me to go herself, and that was well into the current hatred of Mark. So?

Shane left at 9.27. Crunch went his car’s gearbox into reverse. Again. Practically every morning, wouldn’t you try to do something about that? Oh, I’d just have to master it, just for the sake of it, if nothing else. If he said, “It is a company car, what do I care?” Doesn’t that buy into the world’s resources? More of the world’s resources, than would be otherwise necessary, would need to be used to eventually repair the car? And ultimately that leads to global warming?

Anyway, no time to dally, I had to be somewhere. Jill had said to be at her place by 10am. I had a shower, got dressed and headed down stairs. When I have to be somewhere, I always have a shower and get dressed so I can leave at a moment’s notice, if need be. Then I just fritter the time away.

I was on my laptop and eating my muesli at 10.15 when she rang. 

“I guess you are still in your pyjamas?”

“No, I am dressed and ready to leave as soon as I finish my breakfast.”

I said I’d be there by 11am. I don’t think I left until after 11 though. Oh, Jill’s always late and I was trying to get an entry of my blog down, as I was already two days behind. I’m always behind with it lately, I don’t ever seem to be up to date.

I’m sure I was, actually, at Jill’s before midday.

We headed straight out to eat cherry pie in Balaclava. Lovely. We drank coffee, we ate a main. Jill had a second serve of cherry pie and then when it arrived told me I had to eat half.

Then we headed to Camberwell so Jill could spend money on things she didn’t need. I was supposed to be doing bookwork. It is funny that we, so often, go to uni to get high paying jobs so we can fritter the cash away on things we don’t ever need.

Jill bought a chair and a TV cabinet she just so didn’t need. Okay, maybe the chair at a push, but the TV cabinet was a complete waste of money. She already has one that is not that dissimilar.

She bought blue glass ornaments and blue glass cups and candles, and it is probably only the candles that she needed. She was replacing blue glass ornaments with blue glass ornaments. 

Is that the great con? We are coned into believing that we need degrees and high paying jobs for security, but really it is just to keep the economy expanding so the very wealth and the politicians are even more successful than they otherwise would have been?

Or am I just a tight arse? I’m not sure. But, it is true, that I have very little need to go out and buy things just for the sake of shopping.

Jill told me about her online shopping addiction. The shit she has bought? A small fridge for tea making facilities in her bedroom, which she will never do, a ring, 24 aqua face washers, ornaments, glass bowls, coats, jumpers, clothes for her niece and nephew, clothes for her sister and her father, to name the ones I remember off hand, the list just seemed to go on and on. She said couriers are arriving every day.

It is a sad indictment on modern society when shopping is the main form of entertainment.

We came home and did some work in the afternoon, rather than go to Ikea to waste even more money on a wine rack she clearly doesn’t need.

I was supposed to be sorting out Jill’s accounts. Her paperwork was a mess. I worked through it all, though, and got it all done.

I left by 21.30 and had to leave, wanted to leave, as I had to work the next day.

David was at my front gate as I drove up, wrapped up in mittens and scarves. Shane had no doubt invited him over, to keep him company to stop him feeling alone. It is always the same way, not a night passes when he is on his own. I guess I should feel sorry for him, but I don’t.

David was talking holding court in the lounge room when I came in from out the back. Look at me! Listen to me! But at least David has a certain charm to his self focus’ness. I guess it’s called smart. They had no fire burning and it felt cold. Really? Not smart enough to manage that? Clearly! It is really fucken cold in Melbourne this year.

My roller door had not stayed down, several times before I came in. I reminded David about the day he was in the lounge room with a friend and I had come home and in the rain the roller door just wouldn’t stay down and how I had got so pissed off as I had got so wet in the rain because of it. I’d come in and there were cheap, badly coloured orchids on the bench. I took one look at them and said, “Could you have bought uglier flowers.” Of course, his friend had bought them for him. They were watching, The boy in the striped pyjamas and unperturbed I launched into, Could they be watching an uglier movie! Then I headed to my room and David and his friend had both dissolved into tears.

We laughed. David said he’d seen his friend just the day previously and they had discussed it.

“You were both spineless pussies. Fancy dissolving into tears?”

“You were mean,” said David.

“Oh, you pair of girls.”

Then I spun on my heal and headed upstairs. I had to write down the details for my job in South Melbourne for tomorrow and to work out where it was and how I was going to get there. One of these days I just know I am going to head off without the address, or something. I’m trying to be organised and have every detail covered.

I keep forgetting to take my sign on details for my company website with me. 

(Ed note – as it turned out, I forgot those details yet again. And for a moment it looked as though I needed them, as the client hadn’t updated his software. But head office sent him a sign on. Phew! I must remember to take those details with me in future. It is not going to look good if I get caught out. That is why they pay me to do what I do, after all. I can be soooooooooo slack.)

I hope Sam doesn’t read this.

I chatted to Sam and Luke online, as I pulled my details together for tomorrow.

Christian 4/07/12 10:49 AM 

It is FREEZING here. We're all artic monkeys now

Luke 4/07/12 9:54 PM 

Well i'm sitting here in shorts and singlet & sweating... it's Luke here... you know i doubt that i'll ever see a winter again...

Christian 4/07/12 9:56 PM 

It is cold cold cold here. David says it is Mongolia. It certainly is chillwha

Luke 4/07/12 9:56 PM 

so, we've changed our flights again... were back in Melb's on the 17th Aug. Is your heating working?

Christian 4/07/12 9:57 PM 

it will still be cold August 17th

Luke 4/07/12 9:58 PM 

yes i was thinking that... but not as cold hopefully...

Christian 4/07/12 9:58 PM 

no, not as cold

Luke 4/07/12 9:58 PM 

no it would be nice for a change...

Christian 4/07/12 9:59 PM 

Come to Melb to cool down

Luke 4/07/12 9:59 PM 

instead of dripping with sweat...

Christian 4/07/12 9:59 PM 

scarves and coats

Luke 4/07/12 9:59 PM 

is David there

Christian 4/07/12 10:00 PM 

Yes, he was at the door as I drove up. I just got home

Luke 4/07/12 10:00 PM 

from???

hey how was GAGA

Christian 4/07/12 10:00 PM 

Ga Ga was great

Luke 4/07/12 10:01 PM 

i was so close to flying to Bangkok to see her... i so should have...

Christian 4/07/12 10:01 PM 

A bit too much in between music that all sounded the same, but I guess she had to get changed

Luke 4/07/12 10:01 PM 

and do some meth...

Christian 4/07/12 10:02 PM 

yes... that’s what I said, Oh look she's off doing more lines

Luke 4/07/12 10:02 PM 

speaking of... we had pills here on Sat night... they were awesome!!!!

Christian 4/07/12 10:02 PM 

she sang well and her dancers danced their arses off

really? So, there are pills that still work?

Luke 4/07/12 10:03 PM 

yeah they were great... i was rattling around for hours

Christian 4/07/12 10:03 PM 

rattling around by the swimming pool?

Luke 4/07/12 10:03 PM 

couldn't sleep so i came into the cafe and rattled around in here for a few hours... and then went to the swimming pool...

Christian 4/07/12 10:05 PM 

What? swimming pool, cafe and back to the swimming pool?

Luke 4/07/12 10:08 PM 

no... we went to a big music gig that Steve put on Sat night then the swimming pool on Sun

Christian 4/07/12 10:08 PM 

oh, I see

Luke 4/07/12 10:09 PM 

we've met this great kiwi chick – (her name) – she's hilarious and off chops most of the time... but she lived in Melbourne for years, and was all over the gay scene, so she's sort of adopted us... our new fag hag apparently...

Christian 4/07/12 10:12 PM 

what does she think about being called a fag hag?

Luke 4/07/12 10:13 PM 

oh no she loves it... she just came out of a 5yr relationship with a bikini model, had to leave melb because they were doing too much crystal...

Christian 4/07/12 10:13 PM 

is she a lesbian?

Luke 4/07/12 10:14 PM 

she came to one afternoon and realised she'd left her 15yr old son at the airport for 6hrs – and decided it was time to stop.

Well… she says she loves cock too much to be a real lesbian... but obviously has swung that way

Christian 4/07/12 10:15 PM 

good for her liking both, not leaving he son at the airport

Luke 4/07/12 10:16 PM 

oh i don't know... 15 yr olds can be cunts

Christian 4/07/12 10:17 PM 

Oh yeah, 15 years old isn't that young now is it

Luke 4/07/12 10:18 PM 

there was a good show on Australia tv last night – some guy taking on troubled teens on a property up in NT somewhere... those little fuckers were horrible... i'd be going all Ivan Milat on their arses...

Christian 4/07/12 10:19 PM 

 me too

Luke 4/07/12 10:19 PM 

hang on have to go and help the crew for a minute...

David left without saying goodbye. Shane went to bed without saying good night. Of course, I didn’t make another appearance for them to be able to.

Shane has a small electric heater and he isn’t putting the central heating on, which makes no sense at all as his room has central heating radiators in it. But, I have long since given up trying to make sense of what Shane does. All he has to do is turn the central heating on. Oh well, whatever he wants.

I watched Shane Ferguson and Dave Letterman and turned the light off around 1am. I had to work tomorrow, of course.

 

You Get Back What You Put In. Yeah, Right

Anthony. Good old Jesus. Did he bring his 12 boyfriends with him? I reckon back in the day, they must have been having a jolly old time back in the bunk house. Oh yes, the old tree weeping blood routine. It is all apart of their marketing strategy. The parishioners drop below a certain number and they wheel out something that weeps blood. A tree, Mary, a crucifix, it doesn't much matter. Just get the blood flowing and the printing presses printing and low and behold new believers. Yes, very popular in the early nineties. christian

It’s still cold and wet, in fact, it hasn’t stopped raining for days. It could be the big flood if it continues this way for much longer. Did we ever have flooding, usually, historically? Any time in the past? I think not.

I‘m dressed and eating my breakfast in my room, as I write this first bit. Well, I don’t much like the television blaring with the morning news, which I don’t particularly care to watch, as Shane does in the morning. Even if I suspect he isn’t even out of bed yet. He turns it up and up and up and up so much so that I wonder if he is, in fact, going deaf. I suggested it to him once, I don’t think he liked it. Maybe it is some sort of side effect of his HIV infection? Does HIV make you go deaf?

I can hear him now, yawning loudly, in his bedroom below mine. He does that every morning, yawns so loudly in his room that he can be heard all over the house. Like it is even “look at me, look at me” before he even gets out of bed.

I like quiet in the morning, a chance just to be and become one with the morning and gentle slip into the day.

I headed down the stairs, spotting the light on in Shane’s room but with the door closed, so I headed straight for the front door. As I swung the front door open and stepped out, Shane opened his door. I pulled the front door closed at the same time, with the thought, oh oops.

I’m such a bitch.

I am so over him.

I am going to have to find some way around this, some way to claw this back – that is reverse the situation, not get nasty – otherwise it is going to end in tears? And as it is my house, I can tell you now they won’t be my tears. I know the reasons why, I’m just not sure why I have let them get to me at this point in time. Usually, I can let the stupid actions of others roll over me, just not exactly sure why I can’t now.

I worked at the (name of company) today, which is in Fitzroy, so it was an easy walk. I bought coffee in Brunswick Street on my way there, as I remember them only to have instant coffee in their less than adequate kitchen.

Usually, I filled in for the permanent person, but today I was working with her for the first time. I got to meet her. (name of employee) was grossly fat, like Jabba the Hut. She’s freakishly fat, but I didn’t let on as she waddled towards me to greet me first thing. I’m good like that, such a poke face when I need to. She had no neck at all and rolls of fat under her arms which stopped her putting her arms down by her side and a skirt of belly fat which hung down over her abdomen, or was that her abdomen hanging down? She had to squeeze into the office chair and she wheezed and gasped for breath a lot of the time.

She had chips on her desk and spoke about loving McDonald’s quite a number of times. That, laugh, was no surprise to anyone.

After two too few updates, or two updates too late, or a system that wasn’t so well maintained, we were done and I walked out of there at 14.30. It’s nice to finish at that time. I walked up Bell Street, with its impressive terrace houses, as the afternoon sun shone weakly, but kind of brightly, even if it didn’t have any warmth in it. 

Brunswick Street looked kind of nice in the afternoon, warm and inviting with people doing, what looked like, enjoyable things, things that they wanted to do. 

Suddenly, standing there on the edge of café society, I wanted a little something. So, what if I had a muffin with lunch, I wanted one sweetie more.

I headed down Brunswick Street to La Gourmet and bought a lemon tart. $4.80. I just thought I’d take note of the price for historical reasons. How often do you read about someone having an oatcake and you wonder how much one paid for an oatcake in 19XX Well, does that ever happen? Now, in fifty years when someone is reading this they’ll know what a lemon tart cost.

Then I headed home, with my cake box in my hand. Don’t you just love a cake box in your hand?

It is nice walking in the mid afternoon. Free in the afternoon, it’s nice. None of us should have to work in the afternoon. Actually, fuck all of you, I shouldn’t have to work in the afternoon.

I was going home to make coffee and crawl into bed with the coffee and my lemon tart and my laptop, I knew I was. I could feel it already, soft and warm and safe. Maybe I spend too much time inactive with my laptop, lately I bed. I’m sure that is not good for me. It was still relatively early in the afternoon, I could still do things instead of putting them off, like usual. Forever putting things off. I’m in danger of putting my life off, I’ve half “put it off” already. I headed down Smith Street and bought apple cider vinegar, finally. I’ve been out for weeks. My wonder tonic. And I had a haircut, which I have put off for a week now, at least.

I can do stuff in the day light, I don’t have to disappear into my room straight away.

The lemon tart was sitting on the kitchen bench and suddenly I felt guilty about that. I pushed it across the bench top with one swish of my hand. How long have I been putting my exercise off? I went for a walk for an hour between 4pm to 5pm easy, just like that. My feet were still sore.

Of course, the lemon tart tasted even sweeter, having achieved so many things before I ate it. 

Do you, actually, believe that?

That’s like saying good things come to good people, or that karma exists.

I had dinner at 6pm. Baked beans and the rest of the roast pumpkin and roast carrots. I know that sounds lame, but, you know, I eat such rich, fattening food on the weekends with Sam, I reckon that it is a good thing to eat very plain, fat free food during the week. It is like fasting, just that I’m not getting as plain as just water.

I remembered to feed the cat. I’m not sure she was fed last night. She was awfully good about it (read quiet) if I didn’t, but I don’t think I did.

I scuttled off to bed tea, beans, pumpkin and carrots in my hand.

Shane came home at 7.20pm to a cold, dark house. 

I’m just living my life, though. I’m thinking about me, that’s what everyone else does, isn’t it? It’s about me. It’s not about Shane.

Let’s see if Shane heads out? He hates being on his own. It’s psychological, I adore being wrapped up in my doona on my own. I expect to hear the front door open and close.

Lots of footsteps backwards and forwards, downstairs. Walking, walking. Nervousness, fast, repeated. Backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards. Walking, walking. Like a whippet, or a Jack Russell. Walking, walking.

8.40pm. Shane leaves the house.

9.40pm. Shane returns home. He must have gone to the gym, which he started going to when he met Tuli.

 I fall asleep watching TV. I think the First Tuesday Book Club had just finished. What do I have to read? Wallace Stegner, Crossing to Safety. I woke up at 3am. Missy and I get up, I go to the toilet. Missy heads off down stairs. I scratch my arse as I head back to bed.

You'd Have To Be An Arctic Monkey?

Sam and I left the house together. Matching suits, well, they were both black. It was raining, Sam had the umbrella up and ready. You can be sure about that. I always ask him if he is scared that his hair will frizz?

We both caught the tram together.

There was a woman at the tram stop with an annoying voice talking to her male companion. I commented to Sam. He whispered “complainer.”

Sam was too slow getting on the tram, he’s too sweet, he won’t push the bastards out of the way. Of course, I got to sit next to “the annoying voice” on the tram, isn’t that always the way. What you resist and all that. Her companion stood over us with his cup of coffee, which he proceeded to spill all down his front and over me. Except I moved my leg out of the way. The top wasn’t quite on his cup properly, the cup was ceased in a bit and I watched him spill it all over the scarf he had wrapped around his neck, and over the guy sitting opposite me, before he moved his leg out of the way. It seemed like divine payment for his friend’s awful voice droning on in my ear. It amused me, it fell like a waterfall, it just poured down and poured down and poured, every time he took a sip. That was until the woman with the terrible voice, pointed it out to him.

I worked at (not for profit organisation) for the last time. That’s it, done. My boss said the other day that I have got rave (okay, he didn’t use the term rave) reviews from all my clients, so (not for profit organisation) must have been one of them. Really? When I think they are a nightmare?

(the boss) was away. I don’t know where or, at least, I think she told me but I have forgotten and (my colleague) left early of course, she’s a mum. I signed my time sheet as starting at 8.30 and I was there at 8.30… ish. I left at 4pm, so it was still only 7 hours so no one will question it, but I still effectively got an extra half an hour and still got to leave early. 

Sam says it isn’t wrong. “No, that is just human nature. That’s what human beings do.”

The same happened last week. I get the skinny black chick to sign my time sheet for me. She is so genteel and beautifully, if softly, spoken. She smiles so sweetly and almost blushes in her willingness to do something for me. I felt mean cheating her.

I felt a bit vague all day to day, I hope I didn’t make any mistakes.

I got off the tram in Swanston Street. As I walked up Bourke Street from Swanston – they still have Swanston dug up constructing the new “super” tram stops – Jill sms’d me asking, 

“Where are you, I thought you were coming over?” 

I started typing a reply, when I thought that I hadn’t arranged to go over to her place. No I hadn’t? What is she talking about? Did I, had I… then I saw Breadtop and I slid my phone back in my bag without sending the message and all thoughts of Jill were gone. I walked up Bourke street, to home eating the custard bun and the vanilla crunch. Well, I was walking and not catching the tram.

When I got home, the front door wasn’t deadlocked and the kitchen and hallway lights were on. Yay. You’ve got to luv that!

I spoke with Jill once home. She’s finished work, her contact finished June 30th. When we’re not working, we hang out together. I help her clean up her paperwork, she messes it up again and when she is off work again, we repeat the process.

She said, "So my trick sms didn't work?"

“Nearly.” I laughed. “Then I saw BreadTop and I turned into Hommer Simpson.”

We both laughed. Both Jill and I have sweet tooth’s. Read: we’re both turning into fat bitches.

I arranged to go over there on Wednesday. I sat up in my bed with the crackly old phone. I told her about Sam’s efforts to get me to purchase a new phone. “Right,” she said. “I’ll put that on the list.”

What is it with people around me wanting to organise the slackness out of me?

I took to my bed before Shane got home. Lovely it is to, to slide my fat arse into bed on a cold winter’s night. 

Shane hates being on his own. And still to this day, even after years of instruction/example he can’t light a fire. He still gets two large logs and puts a fire lighter underneath them. Then he feeds the whole thing newspaper until it lights. Except, I don’t buy newspapers any more, maybe that is why he hasn’t had a fire burning when I haven’t lit one?

He should have practically gained the skill by osmosis by now, if nothing else.

Shane got home at 18.45, way passed my bedtime. I’ve been having dinner at 6pm and then heading to bed, to get warm in the arctic coldness we have been having lately.

Just because you don’t think that you can, it doesn’t mean that you can’t, all you have to do is try.

You have to learn to be fearless.

David would be proud of this affirmation.

I stayed in bed all night, it is nice, it is winter. And I love my bed, after all.

Hi , As expected Jesus has arrived . This evening God bless him . I feel his presence and am over whelmed the tree outside id weeping blood and i am thinking of calling channel  7 to film it , i may make a fortune here . I was a bit naughty and made it brutally clear that Jesus is in fact not here. So deal with that if you want to deal with me .Love Anthony

I Guess Cleaning Would Have Been Much Easier

There was the Italian Pork and Pistachio Terrine, which had sat in the back of the refrigerator for quite some time. I’m not sure how long exactly, but certainly as long as those that turn into science experiments have in the past. It was vacuum sealed so it should have kept okay, you would think. Surely? Isn’t that what that sort of packaging is all about? Shrug. And then there was the new packet, just purchased. Shane was terribly poor at, what shall we call it, stock rotation. He was completely hopeless at cleaning, particularly cleaning out the refrigerator of all of his “leftovers”. It annoyed me. Oh yes, like the many other things that annoyed me about him. Stupid is as stupid does? Is that the expression?

There we had the new and the old vacuum sealed Italian Pork and Pistachio Terrine. What to do with them?

He had the ability to buy things, new things, and bring them home, but no such talent at cleaning up the mess that the old purchases caused. Just as he had the ability to turn on lights, but not turn them off again, or the ability to put washing on, but never take it out of the machine, or fill the kitchen sink, but never empty it, or run up bills, but never pay them, despite constant reminding.

So, to amuse myself, and yes I may not have thought this through thoroughly, I swapped the old packet of terrine, which had languished in the back of the refrigerator, for the new packet. Yes, it amused me, like when you deliberately don’t wash you hands after taking a shit and then come back into the room and fingered all of the peanuts in the bowl, or when you have gone out to the kitchen and masturbated into all of the pots on the stove. Then you watch your poisonous aunt eat he meal at the dining room table.

Oh yes, it was the pretentiousness of the purchase to some extent, sure that encouraged me to act. I don’t deny it.

A couple of nights after, I was woken from a deep sleep to voices downstairs in the hallway and some sort of commotion. There seemed to be a number of people all talking, inexplicably. I wondered what it was all about? If I hadn’t been so comfortable I may have got up and investigated. It was probably just one of Shane’s drugged out piss swallowing buddies reacting to something.

Then there was someone calling out, kind of official, who seemed to want some sort of attention. After some time, I realised that it was me who they wanted. Begrudgingly, I got out of my warm bed into the cold night to see who it was who wanted me. I tip-toed to the top of the stairs and peered over. Below was an ambulance officer. Uniform, jacket, all blue, white and red. He said something about apparent food poisoning, a severe case and that they were now taking Mr Wilson to The Alfred Hospital for treatment.

“Oh… okay,” I said.

Then there was a rattle of the stretcher and some sort of gurney on the front veranda and hoses and what appeared to be breathing apparatus and then a rattle and a clunk and voices giving directions and a click of the door lock to closed and they were gone, the front hallway was empty and silence fell over the house again.

A severe case of food poisoning, I thought, in the darkness of the stairwell. Really? Goodness.

Then my feet were cold and I wished I had some slippers to cover my poor sore toes and I headed back to bed.

Fancy that. Who would have known about the failures of vacuum sealing?

I didn’t wake until late and I was in the kitchen brewing coffee when the phone rang. It was Helen, Shane’s mum. She sounded very distressed and then she was saying something about Shane not making it, with his compromised immune system because of his HIV infection, his body couldn’t fight off the food poisoning. She thought I should know. They would be in contact in due course. Then she hung up.

Oh? I took the phone from my ear and put it in the cradle, staring at it for some time. I felt kind of numb, a chill of some sort ran up my spine, it seemed to spread out through my muscles in a tingle and an ache. Wow? I wondered? I could feel my eyebrows raise up and my bottom lip curl over, my jaw bone curved into a frown, I could feel it.

“Oops.”

Then the coffee pot started to rumble and I turned my attention toward it. I grabbed to handle of the pot and poured the coffee into my cup. I spilt some of it, as I wasn’t concentrating, completely.

I laughed. I bought my hand up to my mouth, as if to stop the thought. That’s a tough lesson to learn. I laughed again. I guess, next time, he'll opt to clean out the fridge and not always leave it to me.

My hand was shaking as I raised the cup to my mouth. The coffee was bitter, strong, comforting.