Cool Mercedes, I've never seen this model before

Silver Mercedes

CLA200

Blood Tests And Then Coffee And A Muffin

I've just been to have my cholesterol and prostate blood tests. Oh, please don't let my cholesterol level be too high. Shudder.

I should have been healthier.
I should have done more exercise.

I stopped smoking again on Thursday, so that is a good start. I read in a magazine while I was waiting for the doctor that smoking increases cholesterol. I knew it didn't help, but I didn't realise it, actually, increased cholesterol.

I bought a new pair of running shoes, but I haven't been running... oh, I wish, walking. I've been sitting on my fat bum all week doing very little. I was so going to exercise while I was on holidays, but I haven't.

I haven't had my cholesterol tested for, um... er? I usually have it done every year and I keep saying that I missed my test last year, however I suspect that isn't, exactly, true. What I am saying is that I missed my test in 2012, as it is now, in fact, a new year. So, realistically, it means I haven't had it tested since 2011, which could, actually, shrug, kick the ground, mean not since 2010.

Oh, I don't know now. The years fly by and the time disappears and suddenly it is eons later. I still think I am 25, let's face it.

I used to go to the gay clinic in Fitzroy, which used to cost me $60 a visit. $70 a visit. It was going up in price all the time. And for that, I had great trouble seeing my doctor of choice, usually having to wait weeks to see him.

I went to that clinic for years, from the beginning of the old clinic in Carlton. My doctor used to take my blood. Then they had a nurse that used to take my blood, but still at the clinic. Then they stopped taking blood altogether and sent me to Dorevitch, or one of those pathology clinics and, of course, that was when I stopped having blood tests. I meant to go, I really did, but really, it was hard enough making a doctor's appointment, let alone turning the whole thing into a two-step process, first the doctor and then the blood clinic. And my blood tests ran off the rails...

Now I go to Doctor Johnny, who bulk bills and it doesn't cost me anything. I can usually make an appointment with in days of wanting to see him. I can always see him on Saturday, if need be. And today, he actually took my blood like a doctor, I didn't have to go and see somebody else. I just have to go and see him next Saturday for the bad... er... um... good news.

So, last time I had my cholesterol tested it was 7. But, as with my brother and sister, I have very high good cholesterol and 7 has never really been a problem. Cross my fingers.

I Took Buddy Into Work

I quit smoking today. Finally. How long has that taken? I can’t remember. I just looked it up in my journal, it has been since December 06^th. Bad me. I’ve had all those smokers around me, Xmas and New Year. Weak as piss, I know. It’s been a bad season for it, the Xmas season, the silly season for booze and smokes.

There was no Buddy on the bed this morning, probably best. He is already getting the idea that he can retire to our bed any time he likes and it is no longer a treat. We, I, have created a doona monster, actually, it is the pillows he likes. Mr lush puppy.

Sam wanted to yabber on, standing over me in bed looking down, at 7am, but I was comfortable.

“I can’t hear you.” 

I told him off last night for being a nag and he had pretended not to speak to me since. Can’t we keep that act up, I thought? At my sleepy morning best, not speaking is preferable. He pulled the doona off me. Grrrr!

But, I slept in, anyway, it was glorious. I woke at 10am, or near enough to. I so love it when my sleep-in mojo returns to me, I have been so long without it. It is so relaxing. It is so glorious. It is so lazy. It is so dreamy and luscious. And I love it.

I wrote a bit of journal. I’m trying to keep it up. It is too hard when I leave it for a week, I can’t remember it by then. It has gone.

Then I took Buddy to the dog park. When I got to the park, I pulled out my phone to look at the time and it was 11.11. Buddy ran around. There was a gorgeous Frenchie named Lilly. There were greyhounds and Labradors 

The sun shone down with some heat. Bulldogs tire quickly in the heat.

A Golden retriever tried to play with him as it was about time to leave, at which point Buddy ran over to the water bucket, drank and then stood at the gate. He looked around to see where I was as if to say, Come on, I want to go home now. I’m done.

I took Buddy into (company name) to meet everyone. We all talk about our dogs, so I thought since I was in the neighbourhood. Alli the receptionist jumped up and patted and cuddled Buddy and said how beautiful he was. It felt strange marching through the company hallways with my bulldog buddy. Cate and Alice and Christine were in my office. They all jumped up and patted Buddy in the middle of the room. Cathy and Shayleen were at Laverton, sadly as they are two of the biggest dog people. I got buddy a dish of water in the kitchen. Alice came out with me. We said hello to the accounts department, as we were leaving. Buddy is very social. We saw Valerie on the way out. It was fun. Cool. I liked introducing my little mate around. I have spoken about him so often.

I went and looked in Blah Street for my neighbour Gordon's new house. And while there weren't any houses with boards up with for sale signs on them and while I didn't know the number of the house that my neighbour Gordon has, actually, bought and, sure, I may have missed the only nice house in the street, there is nothing nice in Blah Street that I would yearn to live in. Maybe no 27, at a pinch. A modern double story town house… if that is you want.

It was a hot day. 33 degrees.

I talked to Mark on Skype. 

Mark thinks that, maybe, my neighbour Gordon, quite possibly, is running from old age. A new house, a new beginning, a new life, everything new… maybe?

Mark’s depressed. He’s upset about his son Fen. He feels ignored by boyfriend Luke, who is smoking a lot of pot and is either studying, or on Facebook. And with his father, Rich’s death, he feels his mortality and he feels as though he doesn’t have a lot of time left.

I ended up watching, What’s My Line, in the afternoon. Bad Christian.

We ate Indonesian chicken.

Sam cooked Beef Rendang at the same time for tomorrow night’s dinner. Yum.

This was the only flower photo that Buddy didn't photobomb

I’m Still On Holidays

I waved Sam good bye first thing in the morning. 8am. He went back to work last Monday. Buddy and I, paw and hand oscillating gently in the air as Sam walked along the footpath and disappeared out of view.

I wasn’t going to watch YouTube again, as I have spent two complete days absorbed by Youtube. I was going to write my journal/blog, I promised myself. However… perhaps just a little Youtube. I can’t just go cold turkey, I'm sure that is bad for one's psyche, or some internal organ.

I watched Q&A with, David Marr, Barry Humphries, Jackie Weaver, Miriam Margolyes and John Hewson. Has there ever been a more left leaning panel? Who cares, really? I cried laughing for an hour, mostly because of Barry Humphries, but not completely. They all derided Gina Rinehart, which was great. You’ve got to love somebody who suggests idiotic things – let’s pay the workers $2 an hour to work – getting justifiably derided by people who are infinitely more interested in the world than themselves.

But, it was a day to leave the house, smell the air, feel the sun on my skin, feel the breeze in my hair.

I met Jill at the dog park at midday. I got there first and there was no sign of Jill or Bear. Jill called me soon after and said she’d be there in five minutes. I shook my head and replied,

“You didn’t have to call me.”

I see it as one of the great wastes of our times, calling someone up when you are, literally, a minute late to tell them you will be there in five minutes. It is ridiculous. I guess it is yet another product of our “fearful” society.

The dogs played. The owners stood still, as is usually the case. The sun shone down. It was hot.
A man with a Shar pei said to me that he had to watch his dog as his dog and my dog were both still "intact" and that his dog may hurt another "intact" dog.
Shrug. I don't know what some people think. If your dog has, even the remotest, tendency to "hurt" another dog, then take your dog home and don't bring it to the dog park.
I didn't say anything. By not saying anything was I being disloyal to Buddy? What if the Shar pei then bit him and Buddy was hurt? I don't know? I tried to keep Buddy away from the Shar pei, though.

We walked around to Bridge Road and ate lunch, all four of us; Buddy, Bear, Jill and I. We ate tortillas sitting out on the footpath. Jill suggested them, of course, the tortillas. Fat people are always the best people to suggest the food. Well, Jill always is.

Many good sorts walked by. No, really, they did. I have to conclude that if you want to see sexy boys head down to Bridge Road for lunch.

A couple stopped to say they’d been trying to buy a bulldog and they asked all about Buddy. Yes, I would recommend a bulldog very highly. Even the waitress knelt down on the footpath and cuddled armfuls of Buddy and Bear saying, “Aren’t they beautiful.” And they are beautiful.

Jill’s having a lovely time spending her money with justification, now that her father is dead. She now has free rein to spend whatever she likes, no father any longer acting as a pseudo-conscious. It feeds right into her shopping addiction. She is just lucky that she has a large amount of money to her name. I said to her that she didn’t buy the Sunshine Coast house, recently, simply to have a holiday house, she bought it to facilitate her on-line spending addiction. She now has the perfect justification to keep buying “stuff” that she has absolutely no need for because she now has a new house to furnish.

She shrugged and agreed.

Still, I guess, it is compensation for a life time spent on her own. It fills the empty space of never having had a partner, I guess.

Money? Or love? Which would you rather?

I was back on YouTube when I got home, despite promising myself that I wouldn’t. (It is my addiction) I’ve got to write something. I haven’t written anything for ages. The week has drifted by almost unnoticed, as I have been distracted by the small screen.

I watched Joan Crawford being interviewed by David Frost, who seemed to be flirting with her. She seemed drunk, was drunk. She seemed full of shit, too. She had little interesting to say other than essentially “look at me.”

I watched and Janis Joplin sing on Dick Cavett. The great Janis Joplin. A key member of the 27 Club. She was great, she was a great singer. I guess Amy Winehouse was almost the equivalent to Janis dying? Huge fame. Death. Then Gloria Swanston came on. Could you get two different artists, I thought. I think Dick Cavett is kind of cute, I’d flirt with him. He has the most endearing smile.

I spoke to (neighbour) Gordon on the way down to Smith Street for dinner. He has bought a new house in Richmond, a modern townhouse in (blah) Street, which is actually near my work. he's retired. He’s selling his house, which he has owner for forty three years. Forty three years? Imagine leaving after all that time? He bought the house in 1970 when Fitzroy was a slum, when banks wouldn’t even lend money to buy houses in Fitzroy. He said, "When Gertrude Street was a dangerous place to walk along."

I’ve lived in Fitzroy for a long time now myself. I am heading to half the years Gordon has lived here, frighteningly quickly. It has gone so quickly. I can kind of understand how he must feel.

We went to Masak Masak with our coupon for dinner. The place was full and we were supposed to have booked. Oops. We should have read the coupon. It looked like everyone there was on a coupon… and gay. Lots of gay boys on coupons. There was a muscly cute dark-haired boy who sat facing me with his back to the door, who eyed off all the men as they entered or left. He didn’t miss any, well, any men under forty. He had good taste.

We went to Woollies afterwards. It was quiet. They have hot cross buns on sale already. I complain about Xmas starting in November, but Easter in January? I think that must be the earliest I have ever seen a seasonal product in the shops. When is easter? Two months away? Three months away? Talk about marketing changing the celebratory seasons, global warming of sales where the seasons are changing. Who can know when it is Xmas or Easter any more?

It was a warm night. Buddy loves a warm night, as we leave the back door open and he can wander in and out of the house as he pleases.

I love the carefree nights of holidays, the seemingly endless days of being off work. Sara Beeny was saving Rise Hall. I’ve seen it before, but it bears watching again. Can you imagine having a 90 something room house? All that space? The size and the grandeur. It must be amazing for children to play hide and seek in. Rise Hall is incredibly lucky, I’m sure saved from ruin by the skin of its teeth, by the paint on it’s decaying window frames, by one person. If it wasn’t for Sara, and her (cute) husband the house would be joining the ranks of grand British homes in ruins, I am sure.

It is fascinating to look at the derelict homes of England. Those amazing monuments to grand wealth of which that the wealthy have let go and which are now slowly crumbling to the ground. I always think that if the owners from the houses hey day could see the places now what on earth would they think? It would almost be inconceivable to them that such a grand structure could be allowed to decay.

Sam went to bed as I watched The Straits for the first time. Nana S, off to bed at nana time 10.40pm sharp. There was a program on car accidents that sounded interesting, after the Straits, so I lay back on the couch and waited for it to come on.

Then I was in my old neighbourhood, walking through the old laneways. At the first street intersection, (or street T-intersection as they are) one of the old houses up the lane from my parents house had been trucked away and another, much more elaborate, house had been trucked in, and the new owner was standing out the front telling anybody about it who would listen. I walked up the laneway a bit further to the next junction and that house had been turned into a kind of kiosk that opened directly on to the roadway, in which the only one of my cousins who I haven’t seen since childhood, was working. They were listening to some sort of woman’s football. My cousin spoke as if she was the commentator. Everybody seemed to be interested in this broadcast match. I wasn’t at all interested in it, of course, and I was somewhat perplexed why everybody was? It was announced that it was half time in the proceedings, just as I turned to walk back to my parent’s house. There were two women walking in front of me, who also seemed to have the games commentary coming out of their mouths. The woman with the new house at the first intersection seemed to have the commentary coming out of her mouth. When I got to my house my parents seemed to be speaking in that infernal sports commentary. They all spoke in that monotone commentary speak. Ah! I thought I was going insane. Why is the whole world speaking that way? If they all had to speak in the same way there were much better styles of talking in which they could talk. Stop it! Why wont they stop it? Stop! Stop! Stop!

I woke up. It was 4.30am. I’d fallen asleep on the couch. There was woman’s football on the TV. That commentary droned on and on. I found the remote and switched it off and, of course, it stopped. Glorious silence. Who cares about woman’s football? I went to bed.

I haven't been able to think of anything to write, for this last week, actually, since my last post, I'm not sure why? I've written something most days, but none of it has turned out to be much. So, while I am waiting for my writing mojo to return, here is a photo of Buddy asleep on my bed with me today. We spent the day in bed, me watching clips on YouTube and Buddy snoring next to me. Isn't he cute? You've gotta love YouTube, it is the easiest way to waste a day

I Spent The Day In Bed On Youtube

I spent the morning in bed with Buddy watching Youtube. I was watching Richard Dawkins discussing evolution with creationists.

He is a great thinker. I find him fascinating to watch. He has a great mind. Some say he is mean to people, and maybe he is, but then maybe he has to be? So many stupid people with which to deal.

I don't know how he does it, really I don't. The creationists are nuts. They think the planet is no more than 5000 years old, despite all the evidence to the contrary. “I just don’t accept that,” crazy eyes, would be their response. Of course, believe in what you want, I don't care. If it makes you feel good, that is great. But don't try and inflict your ideas on somebody else. The great problem Christians have, they can’t keep their ignorance to themselves. I mean sure, discuss it if you must, discussion is great, but don't try to bring it into the school curriculum. Don't teach it to impressionable kids.

I had frittata for lunch. Sam made it, and without bias, I reckon it was the best I'd ever eaten. Without bias I say, it was the best of the best of all of the frittatas ever made in the history of frittatas. How's that?

I could spend the rest of my life on YouTube. I love it. An hour of exercise in the morning, every morning, I don’t want to become a 20 ton shut in, being removed from the attic bedroom, it is always the attic bedroom, now isn’t it, by a large crane, all bubbles of fat cascading down, like a rather sad Michelin Man, looking miserable and embarrassed and in pain, as I am placed on the back of a flatbed truck to be taken away. Nobody wants that.

And then Youtube could entertain me for the rest of my time. The world and its people are fascinating, if you can filter out all the shit, the lies and the baggage people carry. If you can just watch the interesting stuff, the cool stuff, the stuff that makes you think, go wow even. Don’t we all want to go wow. Expand my mind. Don't twang my nerves. Don’t make me put my fingers in my ears and hum.

A lovely life... sure.

Is it wrong to want to do nothing? I suspect it is, on a deep intellectual level.

Can Smart People be Stupid?

Apparently, I have an IQ of 140. It was something that my private boy's school, Smithton Grammar, always got very excited about when it came to discussions about me. It actually translated into the fact that I was something of a problem for my teachers as I became a very good conduit of wickedness. The fact that I put my powers to evil stumped the men of my learning institution. Oh not real evil, no I left that to the Greek boys. Mostly it was just back chat, and more report cards often said that I could be a disruptive influence.

As an adult, I had an acquaintance who did something with lawyers and the training of them who used IQ tests for something, or other. He always wanted to test my IQ as, you know, it was his thing. I resisted for a while but eventually I did submit and my IQ did come out at 140. I was surprised and pleased, I don't think that I ever really believed it myself, not completely, it was just something teachers said.

My mother always said to me that she thought she had some sort of brain disconnect that made it impossible for her to learn the piano. And she struggled at university. She said it was very difficult for her in so much as she nearly didn't pass. But, she did pass her university qualification in the 1940s.

I struggled at university, it was always a great disappointment to me. Rather than it being the joyous time in my life, as so many people have come to say it was for them, I hated university. I found it an endurance test, one with which I struggled the entire time. After 10 years at a private school, I found myself to be very alone suddenly when I went to learn. I found it to be a hard and isolating. I found it rather unpleasant. It wasn't until I returned to study some years later to get an English qualification did I, actually, love it like I should have loved it the first time. Maybe, it was just the miserable business school?

I have never found my, supposed, high intelligence to be a benefit to me. I haven't, actually, excelled at anything. I can truthfully say that I have never felt good, well not so much good, as successful at anything.

Can smart people be stupid?

What did I learn in 2013?

What did I learn in 2013? 

I learnt that the Australian public can't be trusted to vote in decent human beings to run the nation. The public can't differentiate between decent human beings and self serving, elitist cunts.

I learnt that the general public doesn't really care about the environment, and therefore, I can only assume, they don't care about the future of their children.

Otherwise, maybe, they are just stupid. You've got to wonder?

I'd be happy to interpret the election against the carbon tax another way, but what would that alternative interpretation be? 

(We aspire to be billionaires? We swallow the conservative talking points without question that the rich are good for us? Which brings me back to most people are stupid)

I was shocked (that is sarcasm) to learn that most super foods are only super because some marketer said it was so.

Don't buy undies in Vietnam. Vietnamese boys guys have smaller arses than Aussie boys guys. Vietnamese boys guys are petite, and you can't stretch Vietnamese boy's guy’s undies across Aussie boy's guy’s beefy bums and expect them to stay in shape. Six months and they are falling apart.

Boys again necessary because of the stupid amongst us

Hot and Sticky

I was awake at 8am. I’d been dreaming about schools, no country roads, no tracks and… oh… um… (Sam has now put a computer game on the TV and I can’t think) people were trying to get somewhere, me included. I think there were muddy roads and difficulty travelling.

I got out of bed, the light was still shadowy. I bent over to pick up my laptop from the desk and I involuntarily farted. Burble burble.

“Lovely.” Sam’s voice broke the quiet.

Oops. He was awake now, I thought. So, I let the rest of the fart go. It burbled long and low.

“Just lovely,” said Sam. 

Way to start a Sunday, Christian, I think. The thought makes me smirk. (but you know, if you smirk in the dark at a fart and no one sees you, did you really smirk at all?) Farts are funny, it is a universal truth.

I don't know what to write? I sit there, but my mind is blank. It is a quiet Sunday morning. Sam and Buddy and Missy are sitting next to me. I adore them, but they are not conducive to writing.

Buddy tried to play with Missy and then Missy headed into other rooms with a cat harumph.

We watched cats doing funny things on YouTube.

I made toast and coffee.

We did our chores, of course we did, it is Sunday, they are all done. Sam did the dusting, he always seems keen. I did the vacuuming, I never seem keen. What is that saying, I have it on my fridge, a mind is a terrible thing to waste on house work. The kitchen is clean, the clothes are washed, the back yard is swept. Good for us.

It is overcast and humid, dark and sticky, grey and thick. Lady Gaga sings Applause.

I walk to the supermarket to get milk. 

It was raining as I headed off. My old legal firm umbrella is the umbrella of choice, it’s a golf sized umbrella, it keeps me the driest. I guess, the company had to be good for one thing. That is the only thing about carrying that umbrella, is that it is advertising the “hell” company. I want to get a black texta and write, is a shit firm, and, is a shit place to work, graffiti style on the white panels. 

Ah, the supermarket on Sunday morning, everyone looks a little bleary-eyed.

I got port wine jelly and blueberries. I also got whole meal bread, thickly sliced for toast.

On the way back, I saw an abandoned bag of supermarket shopping, followed by a smashed pair of sunglasses, followed by a discarded pair of, somewhat, stretched pink knickers. My mind reeled with plot lines. 

Her sunglasses were ripped from her face, she never saw that hand coming. Her shopping was knocked from her hands, she was shocked. She was bent over the brick fence of the nearest house, her birthday present knickers were pulled down her slim legs. 

“No,” she called out. 

There was two of them, bigger and easily able to over power her. She didn’t stand a chance. She cried out for help... but none came

A bit further along, Awesome Dog was sitting on the veranda of his student house, in his canvass pants, with a discernible bulge in the front, his cute blond-hair-framed face, flushed red, with ever so slightly wonky eyes, he’d choofed already this morning, even I could see that.  

He thumbs up’d and muttered, “G’day mate.” I didn’t have Buddy with me, so he didn’t smile broadly and say, “Awesome Dog.” Gorgeous though, he is gorgeous, with his blond hair and his blue, er, red, er, blue eyes. 

“Hey?” I say. 

A bit further along and not far from home, a strapping builder crouched down in front of me and started doing something with the floor of the house he is renovating, facing me was his tan pants, the elastic top of his white undies and the delicate hairs of the top of his furry arse crack.

Working on a Sunday, I think. Good to see. So much of him to see, too. I’m sure I prefer him from this angle than any other. That bought a smile to my face.

After that, it was just a lazy Sunday, for what Sundays are truly meant. The day of rest, but not because some mythical god did I whole lot of supernatural stuff and then was too buggered to do any more. What, he created universes, and civilisations, and eco systems and species and worlds, but by Sunday he couldn’t be fagged? No, that doesn’t make any sense.

No, a much more believable explanation was that Aunt Violet made scones and cakes and after we’d finished filling our fat faces with them, we just had to rest. Much more believable. 

The Knitted Xmas Tree Project... I think that is what it is called.

What to Write?

I haven’t known really what to write, because I just appear to have forgotten about the fact that some other individuals who “view an issue I wrote about” for what it truly is and may perhaps not agree with me. I might be turning away a decent number of people who might have been supporters of my website.

The issue was smoking a joint.

The fact is that I think marijuana should be legalised. There is no real reason that it shouldn’t be. Nobody has ever died from a marijuana over dose.

If you substituted the joints in the piece for glasses of red wine, nobody would think anything about it. Alcohol kills how many people a year?

I'm sure there would be an argument that could be made that if all the "boys" boozed off their minds on alcohol in King Street on a Saturday night had smoked a joint instead there would be far less violence and possibly lives saved. Not to mention, dare say, that if they taken ecstasy they'd be hugging each other rather than punching each other.

The only real long term out come of banning drugs is to make a great number of criminals very wealthy.

If we took all of the money away from policing the drug problem around the world, that would include the budget of the jails to house the people who were caught smoking a joint, or whatever it was they were taking, from all around the world. If we put all of that money into the health budget, I am sure, that everyone, including all of the drug addicts, on the planet would have access to the best medical treatment, all around the world.


I think the rich should be taxed. Lower taxes with more emphasis on flat taxes has only made the divide between rich and poor wider, so that social experiment hasn’t worked.

Successive conservative governments have lowered taxes and sold off assets to afford it and now we are broke because of it. We used to be a country that offered free education and free medical. We should try to become that country again.

I think The UN’s powers should be expanded and they should be given authority over food distribution, there is enough food on the planet to feed everybody well. The UN should also be given authority for environmental controls, because modern politicians are too self interested and too piss weak to pass the laws that are necessary.

Otherwise, the human race is simply not going to survive. I don’t really care if the human race survives, it is too self-focused and too selfish and too stupid to really matter, but I know a lot of people do, so lets give this ago.

I think abortion should be uniformly legalised through out the country, there is no substantive reason why it shouldn’t be. I think voluntary euthanasia laws should be passed and yes, tired of life, should be allowed as one of the reasons.

 

Bad Habits

I left at normal time. I stopped for the last cigarette at the normal place in North Street. I thought those days were behind me, shiver. Still, all the smokers are coming to stay because of the funeral.

I got to work on time. Yadder, yadder, yadder. My (working) life is safe and on time. Keeping busy, with so few demands on my time. You think that would be good, be it isn’t really.

I went to sneak out at lunchtime, 12.30, to have a cigarette before I ate and down came the fucking rain. (Even though I have fessed up at work, I still do it behind their backs.) "@#$%^&*;! Oh, of course!" I don’t think it has rained all morning and it choses this moment to piss down. Bloody hell!

I had my computer in my hand. I slung it over the right hand side of my face, as if a vampire caught out in the morning sun shine. Or a witch in the rain.

 

I had a mornings worth of work, that I stretched out for the whole day. Yay. So easy. Put my feet up. I wished.

Sam was just making the short walk home from the corner of Gertrude Street to our front gate, when I turned the corner into our street tonight. He smiled and waved.

I went in the back door. He went in the front door. I stopped and patted Buddy at the roller door half expecting Sam to walk up the laneway, but he didn’t. As soon as Buddy heard Sam opening the back door, his ears went up and he leapt out of my grip and sprinted to the house. I was left crouching in the driveway, the roller door up and my car door open, on my own.

Who’s dog?

Sam decided that we should head straight out into the sunshine, to buy food. Translation – no joints.

“We need to get ready and leave, now! Move, move, move!”

“Oh, come come,” I said. “If you are going to take this ridiculous attitude, I’d better roll one right now, even before I change out of my work clothes. (I always get changed first)

“You still haven’t learnt that if you follow my instructions you will get on better in life.”

I looked at him with the mull bowl in one hand and the mulli in the other. I laughed. “No.”

Sam adopted his “just poisoned” attitude and called for tea. I’ll follow your instructions to anywhere, baby.
Sam decided that it was seafood risotto, unless I could come up with a better idea for dinner. I’m short on ideas for food, it is too hard. Thank goodness for Sam.

“I see, you just don’t want to stand there and stir.”

“That’s not true.” It was true.

“So what it your better idea?” I didn’t have one. Looked as though we were having risotto.

So we drank a cup of tea, dunked what was left of our Scotch Finger biscuits. Then we smoked another j, with a sustain objection from he who wants to be obeyed. Once he’d got over his second bout of head spins, we saddled up the dog and headed to Woollies.

We walked down the street to the supermarket. Sam headed inside to do the shopping. Buddy sat down and wouldn’t take another step, all the time gazing in the direction in which Sam had gone.

A cute man in a truck babysitting what looked like his daughter said, 

“Look at the doggie,” or some such thing. He smiled at me.

I’ll look at your doggie, I thought.

“Nice dog, mate.”

I smiled back. Cute.

Buddy still wouldn’t budge a muscle. No, nothing. And to all you people who think I was being a wimp, you have never owned a bulldog. They lie down and look sideways at you, as if to say, you’ll never move me. He would not put one paw forward. Not one. Not interested. The sun may have been shining weakly, but I was getting cold. I text Sam to hurry up in there. I accidentally typed “bored” instead of “cold.” Oops.

I dragged Buddy across the road to the sun. Sometimes it works if you cross the road, and on this occasion it did. As soon as he was on the other side. No, that’s as far as I am going, no further forward. The bulldog sat down.

“Goodness me, you can’t wait while I am doing the shopping…” said Sam when he reappeared.

“I meant to type cold not bored.”

“I see,” he replied. “Let’s go.

I stirred the risotto for, what seemed like, hours.

Rich Dies

Buddy came inside this morning, while I was having a cigarette on the wicker chairs. When I looked around, Buddy and Sam were cuddled up in the middle of the lounge room floor. After Sam got up to make raison toast, Buddy looked alone in the middle of the lounge room, with a very sad face. Still, not to be perturbed, he just headed off quietly upstairs to find a bed to keep him warm. He is as silent as a mouse when he pulls that move. Sam tried to stop him, but Buddy was determined, so Sam said when he appeared minus dog at the kitchen door. 

“Go get him,” was the order.

“He’s your bulldog.”

“He’s your bulldog.”

I had to retrieve Buddy from our bed.

Sam said that the Waterdales will all be here for Xmas, more than likely, as we brushed our teeth. Sam wondered if he’d head OS to visit his parents, he’s been thinking about it for a while. 

“You know there will be drama.” 

He’s not one for drama. He has wondered if he should visit his parents over Xmas for some time now. I told him he should go if he wants to, he has mentioned it quite few times. I don’t want him to go, but I also don’t want to stop him going either.

I was leaving early this morning, before 8am. Well, I couldn’t have that, so I switched on my PC and pissed about on it.

There were a whole bunch of updates and the computer, of course, was slow to download them. They took forever after I’d finished what I was doing. I went outside and had a cigarette. I went outside and had a second cigarette.

It finished after 8.15, so I had to get my skates on. I still got to work by a minute after 8.30.

We had spongy, creamy, chocolaty layer cake for morning tea. Christine bought it in. I think it was her 18 year olds birthday cake. I thought about Jason in his new birthday undies momentarily, as I held the spoon over the wedge of cake. Shake of the head. Focus on the triple chocolate portion. Push down the cutlery. The cake was nice, layers of sweet fat.

I ate sushi for lunch. No sweetie.

Sitting in the long line of traffic in Langridge Street, waiting for the impossibly short lights at Hoddle Street, I thought to myself, I drive like a burglar, I don’t need you to let me in. Who needs to be let in, if you drive intelligently, there is always some other doofas who doesn’t have a clue that us smart drivers can always take advantage of.

So don’t look at me, who has sat in the line of traffic for twenty minutes waiting for the green light, to give you anything. If you are stupid enough to get yourself into that mess, get yourself out.

I hate the traffic, it makes me grumpy.

Rich Waterdale died at 8.30am this morning. Mark called and left a message. I skyped him. Rich died with a nurse with him. (sister) Chris was on her way, but she didn’t make it in time. 

Mark is trying to change his flight back. The airline is being difficult, call centres and recorded messages.

Sam was home when I got home. We dunked Scotch Fingers in our tea.

“Oh, I made a few mistakes today.” I said to Sam, “I wonder why?”

He replied with his customary, “Er!”

as I passed him the joint.

Sam cooked stir fried vegetables and egg with bitter melon. I hate bitter melon, but he thinks it is good for us.

“I want to see the proof,” I said.

We sat on our fat arses and watched TV. No walking. No leaving the house.

I put together Rich’s funeral photos. Old Rich. Grumpy, cantankerous, generous, inclusive Rich. It must have been hard for him to accept all of his son’s gay lovers, but he did. All of us all say that he was always lovely to every one of us, no exceptions.

The Day Drifts By

I had a cigarette outside on the wicker seats this morning, as Buddy went back to his kennel and didn’t reappear. He reappeared once, to hang a no smoking sign.

It was a very over cast morning driving down Victoria Street. The light was blunted by grey clouds and a still atmosphere, the air was still. Everything was on matt finish, the weather was threatening to turn to something else.

Big rain drops fell before I made it to the smoking spot to have my last cigarette before work. Standing in the street. I had to pull up somewhere new. I had to think quick. I pulled up in front of the pub, badly parked.

The sky was matt grey, the heat arguable. Indecisive. I didn’t bring a jacket, and I had to walk to Vic Gardens at lunchtime to get food, it could be a problem.

Sam sent me an email during the morning to say that I ignored him over the weekend, too fucking out of it, is what I think he would have added if it wasn’t a work email.

We had spongy, coffee marble type cake for morning tea. Cathy bought it in.

The walk to Vic Gardens at lunch time was over cast with the possibility of stronger rain, as there were rain drops falling as I left, in the slight humidity no doubt the rain was causing.

I bought sushi for lunch.

It poured with rain for most of the day. Heavy, pouring rain.

We ate the leftovers of the stuffed turkey roast, it was yum.

Mark called. He has had all of his lower front teeth removed. Apparently, they were a mess underneath, rotting and infected. 

He called to give me an update on Rich, who is still struggling along, so nothing had really changed, and Mark was in too much pain to talk for too long.

Mark will be home next Thursday.

Jane called for an update on (grandfather) Rich. I told her what I knew, but then told her she should call (Mark’s sister) Chris.

Emily sent me photos and I pulled together a collection of Rich photos for his funeral.

I don't care what anyone says, I love the spring sunshine

Who's Your Daddy?

I was up at 6am. Awake. Bam! You know when you know that you are not going back to sleep, a sixth sense that humans are so good at. So, I got up. Sam will say, “Ah yes, the goddess called.” He will say that when he gets up, I can be assured of that.

I put on Joan Armatrading, strictly the her first cd, it is a work of genius. I watched Tom Dailey youtube. He is a sexy little beast.

At 7am, Buddy woke up, stretched next to me, stretching his front legs out and his neck up, I said to him, “Do you want to go and sleep… er, okay, I did say daddy,” but I swear I would only ever refer to Sam in such away strictly when it is only me and Buddy, I wouldn’t dare utter those words in public, too cutesy. Buddy followed me up the stairs, he powers up, not so elegant on the trip back down. He was straight into the morning-sun filled bedroom and up on to the bed.

“Oh, why did you bring him in here.” You’d think I’d take this as my first clue? But, no.

On the bed, sneeze. That's my bulldog.

Not repentant, I closed the door.


I came down stairs and I rolled my second j.

Marvin Gaye followed Joan.

An hour later, the boyfriend and the bulldog arrived back into the lounge room. "Why would you do that?" Truthfully, that should have been my second clue.

"Don't you want to sleep with you bulldog?" Then I offered him a j. Truthfully, the joint offering was probably the biggest mistake.

He flung open the windows and the doors. The wind blew in cold at 8am.

He's not in favour of the pot head boyfriend. Shake of the head. Not so much.

I pointed out to him that he just got blogged in real time. I wrote it as it happened. He smiled. He switched on his laptop.

"Where's my coffee?"

Leo Sayer followed. He was a great song writer, and singer. The man can sing.

Muesli, milk, banana and honey. 9am.

Sam played Diablo, accepting the "poison stick" intermittently.

The bulldog got washed. The front and back gardens got swept.

There was a walk to the supermarket, where I was promised free range at whatever I wanted. It was a “sweetie” run and I could buy whatever I wanted. Could I eat all I wanted was also checked, in case there was trickery afoot. Yes, apparently, I could. Then Sam said he would come too.

Donuts and cakes were dismissed immediately. “No!” The Venetian cookies were scratched from the shopping fairly early. Actually, we wanted Scotch Fingers and Venetian cookies, but they had to be the same if we wanted the “special” to apply, so we got the Scotch Fingers as Sam wanted to dip into his tea. Ice creams were scratched too, but we were allowed to get a tub of ice cream, which we weren’t allowed to eat today. Chips were allowed but, again, they couldn't be eaten today.

We ate a whole packet of Scotch Fingers dipping them into two cups of tea each. Yum. I love the way the short bread biscuit goes all “puddingy in your mouth.”

We ate rolled turkey with macadamias and cranberry stuffing and roast vegetables.

Perfect Weather Today

It is the most perfect day in Melbourne today. Sparkling sunshine.

We ate Pho with David, he's been waking up crying every morning for three months. He denies it is to do with the cocaine binge he and his boyfriend did in Amsterdam in August. He seemed fine today, but Mike has packed his bags and gone somewhere for a break. David can be a nightmare, although I never let him when we lived together. I'd slap him and tell him there were people in the world who didn't have access to fresh water.

Sam and I walked home in the sun. The sky is a beautiful blue.

Anthony called to say he was expecting a lovely dinner tonight, he'll be over soon. He wouldn't believe he and LouLou were supposed to come for dinner last night. At least LouLou messaged and apologised.  He insists it was tonight. He wants to see LouLou's apology texts when he got here.

"It was definitely tonight, don't be ridiculous "

That usually indicates he's back on just the "one" wine with lunch. 

"Just the one bottle. I'm perfectly fine."

We're eating fried rice, despite the pre-approved menu being fish. Anthony always likes to check, maybe suggest an alternative, subtly, if the suggested dish was not to his liking. I made a mistake, I should have check with chef before making any promises.  He'll have fried rice and like it.

Being the perfect host, I sedated everybody and out on stand up comedy. I must admit, I was, shall we say, sleep on the couch. The night drifted away.

Study in blue and grey

Stood Up

Both LouLou and Anthony bailed. LouLou, at least, messaged to say she couldn’t come, Anthony, nothing. Nelson Mandela died, so I just assumed Anthony was deep in morning over the great father’s demise. Still, LouLou only responded to my where-are-you-text. I’m guessing if she hadn’t heard from me, she wouldn’t have messaged. You know, you just know sometimes.

Somehow, I’d allowed myself to think about smoking this evening. And when I said that I wanted some, Sam simply said go call Guido. Guido messaged back in minutes, he was just down the road, come down and see me, which I did. I had it in my hands only an hour after I first truly thought about it.

Sam and I ate leftover noodles.

I spent the rest of the weekend stoned off my bonce.

I was trying to photograph the sexy blond in the shorts, but the car got in the way

The bike riders seem to come in packs

Delicious

I’m a breath over 90 kilos. That is what my new fandangled scales said to me first thing this morning. The ones Sam bought… for the boyfriend he now calls “fat Boy.”

I haven’t done any walking in my new running shoes, as yet. The new running shoes that I bought because my boyfriend has taken to calling me fat boy.

“Maybe, you should walk to work,” said Sam, just as he walked out the front door, just before I headed out the backdoor to the car.

I should walk to work, but it is currently just a bit far, it would take me close to an hour, and I currently start at 8.30am. And I’d need a shower when I got there, as some of the cute boys do… but, too hard.

Everybody drives with their windows closed in the mornings. All of them. Every window closed. The sun glints off the closed glass as I can only imagine their air conditioning whirring away inside. The selfishness of man, wasting the world’s resources for their own comfort. Not to mention, that we are becoming so cossetted, so protected, so well, lets face it, beige for no real good reason. Not me, I have both my windows open letting the fresh air gush in. It was, actually, lovely this morning.

What to do today? The same problem as yesterday. (main boss) Peter appears to be away today too, so there is nobody to check up on me. Lovely.

Daydream? Read the news? Piss around? All of those things, and then some more.

I started to clean up, throw away all of my working papers that I’d generated thus far, but no longer needed. I started thinking back over the old days at the black law firm. I’m not sure, now, what prompted me to think about it? I think it was a discussion about the new bullying legislation we’ve had recently. I’d written on a pad, a doodle of regret about those times at the black law firm. It was my regret not having sued their arses for bullying, I would have had an excellent case. It was those notes I read and then threw away in my clean up.

The Gord Bitch became my boss, after the mentally unstable Anorexia Stupenda bullied my lovely boss Beck out of the place. Rebecca Gord, she didn’t have a fucking clue. She was nice to my face, oh so nice, but she blamed all of her incompetence on me behind my back. She had no qualifications for the Beck’s job and I’m still pretty certain she was licking out Ms Chest Pains on a regular basis to get the role. She had to have been. Favourites, that’s what she was. She was forever in Ms Chest Pains office with the glass door slid shut.

I should have got the role, I was the natural choice, but of course, I wasn’t one of the sisterhood, I didn’t suck clit. (2016 – oh could you imagine, in that den of miserable cunts? I made a lucky escape out of there)

The Gord Bitches’s boss was Ms Chest Pains – who tried to do so much she constantly suffered from chest pains in her late 30’s, she told me once in a rare spasm of sisterly generosity. She was the greatest disappointment, Ms Chest Pains, as she was a colleague once, but she abandoned all of that for status and prestige of the upwardly mobile career of middle management. She told me when she was a friend about the chest pains.

Our head of department was The moody/mentally unstable Anorexia Stupenda. She’d always been a piece of miserable work. The rapid weight loss and the excessive exercise regime only exacerbated her natural unpleasantness.

The problem you have when you have a whole line of female bosses, is that start to menstruate together and then they become diabolical. (As told to me by a senior, female HR manager) They become the proverbial Pack of Blood Bitches. I was simply waiting for my eligibility for long service leave to click over to resign, otherwise I would have got out long before I did. I would have resigned the day Beck did. But, I figured, that it was the only time I’d ever get a long service leave pay out and I wanted it. Upon reflection, that was a mistake, no amount of money could make up for the treatment I suffered at the hands of the black law firm and, as the IT Director called them when he was managed out of the place, the Witches of Eastwick.

I thought about those days when that Gord Bitch became my unbearable boss after Beck left, after Anorexia Stupenda had bullied Beck out of the place, before Anorexia Stupenda started on me. The day I sabotaged the Gord Bitch, just the thought bought me a whole lot of satisfaction all over again. It was a great retribution. It was a thrill, as though I was getting away with something.

I chose to sabotage the Gord Bitch because she repeatedly stabbed me in the back, as she smiled and gazed into my eyes and told me she had no problems with me, or my work. All the time she was feeding lies to Ms Chest Pains to cover up for her own mistakes, who in turn, I can only presume, was telling Anorexia Stupenda.

Anorexia Stupenda was calling me into her office to have performance issue discussions, which enabled me to realise I was being done in by the Gord Menace. It didn’t take too many meetings, with the astoundingly ugly Anorexia Stupenda (2016 – okay, personal attacks are not okay) to work out that some sort of retribution was needed.

The Gord Hag, when she clearly wasn’t coping, which was often, would leave early, there by leaving me to do as I pleased. I selectively destroyed documentation in those windows of opportunity. I never destroyed enough to create a pattern, but I destroyed enough to make the Gord Bitch look incompetent or, at least, more incompetent. It just started off with some letters she had left to post. She said something like,

“I’m glad I have finally got that done.” And then turned and left at 3.45pm, with the look of distain she reserved, it would seem, exclusively for me. That was what gave me the idea in the first place.

I was cleaning up, ready to leave, I had that mail in one hand, to take to the mail room on my way out, and some documents in the other hand to shred. I nearly shredded the wrong handful by accident, just stopping myself before I did, swapping hands.

“Oh you idiot,” I said out loud.

Then when I looked down to see what I had in my hand for the mail, I saw that it was Gord’s superannuation paperwork being sent to all the funds. It was a big job, a monthly chore, so many super funds. It just came to me in a split second, you know, like a light globe moment.

“I’m glad I have finally got that done,” her words repeated in my head. I’m so pleased, that you are pleased, I thought.

And then, I simply pushed the letters into the still spinning shredder without another thought. That was how it started. It gave me such a fucking thrill, I can hardly describe it. I felt like an espionage agent as I strode to the lift, my dirty little secret hidden amongst the indecipherable contents of the shredders belly.

I told myself I wouldn’t do it again. I told myself that it was really wicked.

But then the remaining four months had to tick over before I could resign. And the Gord Whore continually blamed me for mistakes she had made. I was called into Anorexia Stupenda’s Office on and off, for mistakes I never made. I was told what the issue was and, so often, my only truthful answer was, “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

So, the destruction of the superannuation documentation escalated, deliciously as I had absolutely nothing to do with that work, that was all the Gords doing and she couldn’t blame me for it in any way. Well, I guess she could…

I think my greatest triumph was the HR girl, was it Hannah, who came back to the black law firm to work for 6 months, I think? That idiot Gord bitch had messed up Hannah’s superannuation, somehow joining Hannah up to the companies default fund, rather than her choice of fund. Hannah was understandably annoyed, but even more so when The Gord Idiot fumbled the corrections. I think she messed up the corrections twice.

After many phone calls and much effort by the Gord Liar the problem was fixed. Hannah was furious, but placated that it was finally fixed. The Gord Hag had completed all of the paperwork and had written out a cheque and the proper payments were being made. I listened to the Gord Bitch apologise profusely and promise sincerely to Hannah that it was all fixed. Definitely! She was posting off all the paperwork and the payment that day. All done.

The Gord Bitch grovelled, oh the simpering was almost too much for me the stomach, and Hannah seemed to be pacified. No she wouldn’t escalate the problem to the HR Director now that the Gord Bitch had promised, seemingly on her mother’s grave, that it was all fixed up. Definitely. No exceptions.

All I could think was, I need to get my hands on that paperwork. I entertained myself with the thought, not really believing that I would. I didn’t really care, just the thought was enough. Then, as luck would have it, the Gord Whore left early for the day, tossing the paperwork into the mail tray, telling me not to forget it.

Don't forget it. I watched the Gord Bitch remove her fowl body, stinking of inauthenticity, from the office, disappearing through the door to the lift wells. All that work, I thought. So many mistakes. Such an angry, position of authority, employee. All fixed now.

Oh, you can count on it," sounded Gord's insipid tones. Let me just apologise again, I got a thrill, which I enjoyed just a little too much, as my hand wrapped it self around the multiple envelopes.

The shredder was a big mother, there was no amount of paperwork that it couldn’t cope with. It went zzzzzzz. Lovely. Gone, in a millisecond. I shivered all over with excitement. It was one of my funnest moments.

It would have been delicious. I only wished I could have been there for that next phone call from Hannah.

Hannah would have been beside herself with rage, when her super was not fixed. The Gord Bitch would have been at a loss to understand what had happened. She was dumb, really. She knew a bit, but really she got by on her looks and her rat cunning. But, I tell you, her looks were beginning to fade when I left. Her face was puffy, she had bags under her eyes. Hannah would have added to that degeneration by the time she was finished with her. Hannah was connected at the black law firm, she had friends in very high places. She was a very senior employee only removed from her position by child birth. I like to think that my effort with Hannah’s super drama expedited the Gord Bitch’s exit from the company.

But, I had resigned by then and I had left a few days later.

It would have been great.

I heard that the Gord Bitch resigned not long after, apparently, of her own choosing, but, you know, maybe not? The only disappointment with it was that I never got the feedback on what happened, due to my handi work. Sad really. I hope, in my own way, that I added to the Gord Bitche's demise. I can only hope. She was way out of her depth. She had no idea what she was doing. I can only assume it caught up with her. Ha ha.

And I wonder if she ever realised that, as Sebastian loves to say, you should never cross a queen?

I should have put in a bullying claim, I really should have. Still, it does do me good to think about my retribution occasionally. Ah, good times, snatched from the jaws of bullying.

The day drifted away after that. I did nothing much before I went to lunch. Noodles. Yum!

Then it was back to work. Yay.

I was going to go for a walk, in my lunch hour, but the weather had turned, yet again. We are back to winter, incomprehensibly. We are back to cold and overcast with rain. I was almost going to brave the elements, I went outside to gauge how it was all looking and it just looked a little too unpredictable to risk it. It looked as though it could really rain down hard at any moment.

So I went back to my desk and read the online news.

Shayleene and Cate went to Vic Gardens to get me a chocolate bar. (Yes, that will help)

Peter came in early afternoon.

Christine went shopping.

I twiddled my thumbs for the first part of the afternoon.

I guess I should be concerned about doing my work and being productive? Why exactly? I’m not going to get a good performance review? I’m not going to get a performance review at all? I’m a temporary worker. It is up to them to make sure I am kept busy. I don’t get tenure. I’m out of here in less than two months. I don’t have a career that I have to attend to.

It is better that way, as most bosses are cunts and they will use any employee’s performance review as a means to further their own careers. Performance reviews are bullshit.