Gotta Luv a Pair Of Pale Grey Track Pants

7.30am. We took Buddy and Bear to the dog park.

Cute blond guy was there with his two dogs, throwing the ball for which they eagerly wait between each throw. He’s got a big smile and floppy blond hair and a round, handsome face. He’s lovely really, such a boy, always with a smile and a laugh, always has a friendly, toothy greeting, fit and into exercising with his dogs. This morning he had on pale grey track pants. Sam and I walked around the reserve, as I did I was looking at cute blond guy with his pale grey track pants. I wondered if it was just me and I was just about to say something to Sam when he said, “Has he got a hard-on throwing the ball to his dogs?”

I don’t know if he left the house without his girlfriend seeing what he was wearing, if he’d had a big night and he’d woken up less than aware, I don’t know, but he’d clearly forgotten to put jocks on this morning. He seemed to be oblivious to the display he was putting on. He walked over grinning (as if he was aware) when he was done with the park and was heading home, it flopping around, noticeably, with each step he took towards me, but he is a smiley kind of guy and that was how he normally greets us. It was hard to keep my eyes on his face.

“Hi guys, how are you?”

All the better for seeing you my friend. “Yeah, good,” I said. “How are you?” (I resisted the urge to say, How’s it hanging?)

“Great. It’s a lovely day. The dogs are exercised. I’m heading home for breakfast.” And off he went, dogs following along behind.

I looked at Sam, he looked at me, eyebrows raised. “Well,” he said.

“Good morning to you too,” I said.

My chores for the day were to cleaned up the front yard and to go and get a new scooper net for the pond so I could spend the day cleaning the pond. I swept the front yard in the morning, intending to throw all of the garden debris straight into the bin, but something really stunk in the rubbish bin, like there was something dead in there, and I ended up dry wretched all the way to the door after I flipped the lid open, eyes watering, heaving involuntarily. I can’t tolerate that smell of death, it just gets to me, that and the smell of mould. I stood on the front veranda waiting for the heaving to stop, wiping my eyes dry. I kicked the bin lid closed.

So, that’s not going to work. I had to open and close the bin really quickly between each panful of debris. Not so bad, it slowed me down, but soon the front yard was all cleaned up.

Sam came home at lunch time and cleaned the pond filter as it had clearly started to block up. It was full of shit when he pulled it apart. We are really asking the new filter to do too much cleaning a filthy pond, but we’ll see how it goes. The alternative is to empty the pond and replace the water something neither of us really wants to do.

We ate stir fried chicken and rice and veggie leftovers for lunch.

Jill has had all her boxes delivered to my place, as she thought that would be easier. I now have a hallway full of them. She messaged me to ask if she could have her car delivered here too. It is being trucked down from Queensland. I kind of thought, ‘really?’ initially. What the hell does one do with an extra car in the inner suburbs? Then I felt mean. Then I thought, she is in an apartment block in St Kilda Road. So, I thought that I could find a car park, surely. So, I said yes. Ah, I’ll squeeze it in somewhere, the mind boggles, that’s what friends do, after all.

Sam came home from work and cleaned the pond filter yet again and then we did a bigger clean up of the pond. He pulled out a lot of the spider plant hanging down into the water, and bucketed out lots of shit, which I tipped all over the garden as best I could. It is going to take us some time to clean it, it is that dirty, without emptying it completely and replacing the water. Still, at least the fish are no longer continually gasping for air.

We ate frittata for dinner, and very nice it was too.

I headed down Smith Street in the afternoon and shopped for the new pool scoop, surprisingly, the $2 shops only had cheap and flimsy scoops. Still at $2.50 who cares if we break it.

I watched (two friend’s names) wedding live on Facebook. Good for them. At least now, we can all stop hearing about it, even if the posts about it on Facebook seem to be never ending. However, we must be nearing the end of it now. I did post a “congratulations”, just because it is the right thing to do… not really because I meant it. It was more congratulations that we are all collectively getting to the end of it, more so than anything else. Oh, I did mean it, as much as I would say it to anyone. After all, I didn’t write, congratulations, you attention seeking whores. I mean that in a nice(ish) way, (it is really just my perverse sense of humour) nothing wrong with being a whore, (I was really good at it once. I remember counting up 20 guys in a month, one January, probably because I was on holidays. Big smile) and the attention seeking speaks for itself, which, I am sure, is needed to change society in the way you want it changed. (Do you accept that?)

I don’t have anything against gay marriage, despite what it may seem from what I have written in the past. If you want to get married, of course, you should get married, there is no reason in the world why you shouldn’t. I just wonder if it is all a part of our new conservative world, where monogamy is best and you save yourself for Mr Right, where sex is bad, and anything resembling sexual innuendo, and the like, should be avoided. You can’t say, or do, anything which may offend another person. The new conservative sensibility closes our world down and makes it smaller, it doesn’t expand our thinking. It makes all our possibilities less.

Would I get married? No. I don’t see the point of it. It’s a cliché, and a failed institution, in my opinion. Having said that, I guess if Sam was really keen I’d possibly consider it.

Let’s look at it in the hard reality of day, if there had always been gay marriage, and I was marrying Sam today, it would be my third marriage, and what does that say?

We started to watched the end of the first series of American Horror Story, then we started to watch the second series, but it proved to be just a little too freaky, it was a bit like horror overload. I’m more of your chick flick kind of guy, oh, not really, but if I had to describe my tastes in shorthand that is how I would describe them. I like real stories about real people, well written and well acted. So, we changed back to Grace and Frankie, with Lily Tomlin and Jane Fonda, (Don’t have any more facelifts, Jane, you have had too much work done already) until I fell asleep on the couch and Sam said it was bed time.

I Perved At His Sexy Arse As The Crazy Lady Made My Ears Bleed

I was a wake at 6am. Bear came downstairs with me. I made coffee and had a cigarette. Today is quit day, not a good start. Holiday smoking should definitely be over by now.

Sam was up at 7.20am.

We took the dogs to the park at 7.30am. The Crazy Spud Lady was there with her dog, who yacked on to me, after I said Buddy had just turned 7 and that it occurred to me that I’d need to buy him senior food, she replied with, Don’t make him old before his time, which she stated in multiple, and varied, ways, until I could feel the smile freeze solid on my face and the blood start to drip from my earlobes. She is a crazy bitch. I like her and all, I like crazy, but she sure can talk. That was until a greyhound stuck its head in her bag looking for treats and I could walk away. Some people like to talk, I guess. 

The cute South African guy was there with his curly-coated dog. He’s nice. I perved at his blue undies and his furry arse crack when he bent down to attend to his dog. I imagined licking that out as the crazy woman pounded me with her conversation. (you know, as you do) He wears shorts and he has nice hairy legs, not to mention his open, handsome face. 

Bob was there, he likes a chat too, he’s nice. A small adorable Boston chasing a ball. There was a French Bulldog look alike of a friend’s dog that looked so much like my friend’s dog that I caught myself scanning the reserve for my friend more than once. The German short-haired Pointer was there chasing its ball. He’s a gorgeous dog.

We were back by 8am. Sam cooked porridge with blueberries. He left for work just before 9am.

I put washing on. Oh yeah, back from holidays now.

I pissed around all morning trying to get some writing done, not getting too far in all reality.

We ate Pad Thai for lunch.

I headed into Cash Converters to see what Xmas CDs had been sold off. I got Norah Jones and Mary J. Blige’s greatest hits.

Jill called me as I was shopping in Woolies and asked if she could come over, as her job interview had been a disappointment, rather than say she was starting, they asked her to complete a proposal. This was a job she had been offered. This was a job for which she had moved herself back from Queensland. She had been offered the job by the chairman of the board, but there seems to have been a lack of communication between him and the operational staff. Jill was none too pleased.

“Oh well, I can always find some other work for six months.”

I bought a custard pull a part bun after Jill told me that cutting up one coffee scroll would certainly not do the trick. I was just trying to think of our waistlines. She bought cakes and spanakopita, all of which we woofed through in no time.

Jill said Bear looked healthier already.

“It’s only been 2 days, Jill.”

“Well, what can I say, she does.”

“It can only be the exercise…”

Jill pulled a big-eyed look and said nothing more on the subject. Jill, what can I say, is not one for exercise, as her ample waistline clearly makes apparent.

Jill fell asleep on the couch for a while. Post sugar rush, come down. She’s exhausted. We helped her pack up some of her stuff while we were in Queensland. We left two days before she did and on my way out, my last look back, I thought to myself, there isn’t a hope in hell she’ll get this shit packed up in time. She got her cleaning lady to come for those two days and, apparently, between the two of them they got it all done. Fuck knows how, would be my only comment.

Sam called to say he was at Bunnings and he’d found a pond pump. Our poor fish have been swimming around in their own shit for who knows how long.

Jill left in her red rented Hyundai. Bear looked devastated when Jill walked out the front door without her. If she’d had a huge thought bubble above her head with “WHAT THE FUCK” in capital letters I wouldn’t have been surprised. You could honestly see it on her face, as she stood gazing around the hallway wall with huge eyes.

Sam came home with the pond pump. It seemed to have an instant effect on the pond water, although it was way noisier than I would have wished. Sam fiddled around with the nozzles until we found the quietest setting.

We ate stir fried chicken and rice and veggies for dinner.

We watched American Horror Story on Netflix. Jill got us into watching Designated Survivor while we were up north. So, when we got home Sam found a free introductory offer for a month, so we could watch the rest of designated Survivor. If we’d signed up while we were hooked up to Virgin’s inflight WIFI the free offer would have been for 3 months, Sam was cross that he’d missed that. He doesn’t usually miss such things. We have been ambivalent about joining up to paid TV, as we record many things from free to air and we never seem to have enough time to watch them all. I don’t know? In all reality, it is just more American crap, still, some of it is enjoyable crap. I always think that I want to watch less TV not more. Then again, Netflix is pretty cheap.

5 In A Bed (room)

We flew home from Queensland with Jill's dog, Bear, which we are going to look after for a while. She'd just moved up to Mooloolabah, to get away from Melbourne's congestion, to live a simpler life, she had just rented out her house in Prahran, when she was offered a job in Melbourne unexpectedly for 6 months. So, in the short term, she is going to live with a friend in an apartment in St Kilda Road. Then she'll sort somewhere to live, where she can hopefully have Bear.

Sam has decided that Buddy should sleep in our room now a days, especially since he has got it into his head that he sleeps on his bed on the floor next to us and not in the bed with us. I'm not really sure why this change has occurred, I have asked Sam a couple of times, to which he has mumbled a rambling response which made little sense. I don't really mind though, don't get me wrong, it's nice to have Bud sleeping next to us. Sam on one side, Buddy on the other, both snoring exactly the same way. (I still fall asleep within 5 minutes listening to the two of them snore)

So, of course, Bear sleeps in our room too.

Last night, Milo decided he didn't want to be left out, so it was the five of us sleeping together. Milo doesn't always want to sleep on the bed, but sometimes he does. He sleeps between my legs. The problem with that is that he never wants to stay the whole night, and he can't wake me, nobody can wake me I sleep like the dead, so when he wants to head out he walks on Sam's chest, and taps him on the face to wake him up. Sam is never too pleased about that.

40 degrees in the CBD

Wet T-shirt Competition for Guys

We drove to Budrim and looked at all the nice houses. We gazed at the views, and enjoyed the countryside.

We walked along the beach front at Moolooalaba, there were many people on the beach. The sand was white, the sky was blue. We wandered along the boardwalk, watching the bush turkeys and the lizards basking in the sun. We bought fish for dinner and prawns for tomorrows lunch at the fish markets.

We wandered back as the afternoon shadows grew longer and the people started leaving the beach.

All those boys washing the sand off under the beach showers were a sight to be seen. Wet and muscular with their shorts sticking to them, it was like a wet t-shirt competition for guys. And of the guys showering together, (sharing the beach shower, not actually soaping each other up, you understand) I imagined as boyfriends. I pictured which one did what to the other one, you know, as you do. Or is that just me?

You've got to love the beach. It takes me back to all those years spent down the Great Ocean Road, and all those bare-arsed surfers changing on the side of the road between their panel vans. But, of course, it is more than that, it is the smell of the beach and the taste of the salty air on your lips. It is the sunshine and the crisp white sand seemingly all perfectly framed by the blue of the sea. The squeak under your feet, dipping your toes to feel the temperature of the water, the first splash on your skin, before swimming out to where the waves break, then riding the rollercoaster back in. It is freedom and inhibition, it is the endless possibilities as vast as the infinite expanse of water in front of you.

Sightseeing

We went to the Eumundi Market. We managed to find a carpark in the main street, which Jill put down to my presence and my uncanny ability to find a convenient car park, not something I think is necessarily true. It is a vast market with many stalls. There were lots of handcraft stalls, it is a handcraft market after all, there was even a stall that only sold wooden bow ties. It was busy with people and obviously popular. It was hot, but there were plenty of shade trees which were nice. Jill bout a couple of dresses. Jill is an enthusiastic shopper always managing to find something to buy whenever we venture out. Later, when we were helping her pack up all her stuff.

“The problem is that I just have too many clothes.” She managed to sound somewhat surprised

“Well, I have seen you buy three dresses in two days, Jill.”

Raised eyebrows.

But, I’m not a shopper. You could blame it on my mother’s frugality, I guess. She always said, “Don’t waste your money on little things that you don’t need, then you can buy the best quality things you do need.”

I say, I just don’t need any more stuff. I have lots of stuff now that I don’t use or need. I have a house full of stuff, what more do I need?

We bought a new table runner for the coffee table, which we hadn’t been able to find travelling through Europe. We drank strawberry and passionfruit slurpies, not exactly slurpies, but you get the picture.

We headed to Noosa for lunch. The traffic was backed up heading into Noosa, so we dropped a u-turn and stopped just before Noosa, which I think was Noosa Heads, and ate a French bakery eating French cuisine, pate, salmon, and nicoise salad, the food was scrumptious, even if they didn’t seem so happy to give us some extra bread for our pate when we’d run out.

The traffic into Noosa had eased up after lunch, and we managed to find a parking spot in the main street, “You see, again,” said Jill, so we wandered down to the beach and walked in the warm, shallow water. There were lots of people on the beach, lots of beautiful girls and muscular boys, in nothing more than shorts, well, the boys were. You’ve got to love summer. There was one guy with very bad sunburn, the sight of which made me wince. He will certainly be feeling the pain tomorrow, I thought.

I expected Noosa to be over developed with high rise buildings, but it isn’t. It has a beachy village vibe with lots of trees in the township. Noosa reminded me a little of Port Douglas.

The roads are winding, and the surrounding countryside seems to be mainly untouched bush, which is really quite lovely, even if that makes all the roads look a little the same.

Hit The Road Jack

We're off to the Sunshine Coast to visit Jill for the last few days of our holiday. I have never been further up than Brisbane, other than flying to Cairns, and Port Douglas, on different occasions, so it should be fun seeing new places.

Just thinking about the last time I went to Port Douglas was with my best mate Tom, so he could have a break from his cancer treatment. He treated me, I said he didn't have to do that, but he said there was no one he'd rather go with.

"It could be my last holiday ever," he said with his usual cheeky smile, rather prophetically as it turned out. I can still picture it. Not that he really believed that at the time. We had fun, that's all I should remember now. I had my first helicopter ride, which I absolutely loved, (I want travel by helicopter ever where I go) which Tom bought unbeknownst to me. 

"Let me do this," he said, when I said I'd pay for myself. "I don't know when I'll be able to do this again."

Not long after we got home, he got a brain virus, which would be benign in the rest of us, but with his compromised immune system from all the chemotherapy for his leukaemia, it killed him in 24 hours. He was 39 years old. The best best friend a boy could have, funny how that didn't become crystal clear until he was gone.

That was the last time I had been to Queensland. Still, onward and upwards, new things to see, hey?

Sunset, ah it does the soul good to see such natural beauty

2018

Happy New Year, to everyone. May 2018 be happy and sunny and filled with light.

View from the deck at Mark's place in Northern NSW

Muggy, Muggy Morning

A grey Goshawk flies passed. It does a big loop of the cloudy sky with a currawong chasing him away. A kookaburra lands in the farthest trees. Another Kookaburra flies over the house and into the trees behind. The first kookaburra flies to the trees at the back of the house. They laugh together at the world.

It is very muggy on the deck this morning, possibly the muggiest morning we have had. There is a wisp of a breeze, cooling us just a little.

Maybe it will rain? Hopefully it will rain. It should rain. The rain would cool things down.

Ah, life in a tropical climate, barefoot every day. Shoes become obsolete. One never feels cold, not even in the night. Lovely.

The bird’s cheap, so many different bird calls, sounding all around us.

We should go swimming in the river. The cool water will wash all the sweat away. We helped Mark weed his garden in the mornings before it go too hot, and we swam in the river in the afternoon.

It rained as we swam, each raindrop like a fairy jumping up as it hits the surface of the river. Millions of tiny fountains momentarily come to life, disappearing back under the surface almost as quickly as they appear, sending their ripple of life out into the world.

And then we drank tea and ate cake.

Sunset on another relaxing day

More friends came to stay. Mark’s cousin’s son, Lachlan, and his daughter. I was pretty taken with Lachlan, what a cute 21st century thinking man. Pretty gorgeous, actually, and really easy to have around.

Luke came home having worked over Xmas. He cooked roast pork for dinner, and I reckon it was the best thing I have ever tasted.

We stayed up late talking to 4am, smoking pot when the daughter fell asleep.

Banana Cake

I have made a banana cake nearly every day we have been away. I have added sultanas and an apple, just for a change. It was good too. (And I still wonder why I have put on weight) Besides, the bananas were going off in the tropical heat. When we ran out of bananas I substituted mango, and the cake was really moist.

Tea and cake in the afternoon, when the cake is still warm out of the oven. Lovely. (not that I really approve of eating a cake before it has cooled, call me old school, but the rest of them couldn't wait)

Lunch in Town

Pat

We drove to Mullumbimby for lunch. The sun was shining, the day was hot. I ate Pad Thai. Mark had fish cakes. Sam ordered an entry of fish cakes and some noodle thing.

The waitress looked at me and said, "Are you Pat's uncle?" It was like being back in Bolago all over again, everybody knows everybody in a small town. I never liked it when I first went to Bolago, but I kind of liked it by the end.

"No, I'm not," I said. I didn't bother to add that I was from Melbourne, what would have been the point?

"Jeezs, you could be," she said.

I smiled back at her and shrugged.

The Pad Thai was average. Oh, that's mean, when you come from Melbourne that arguably has the best food in the world, it is easy to judge... and I have a little place in Smith Street that cooks excellent Pad Thai. There was some confusion about the fish cakes, as the two serves came out on one plate, who does that? The noodles were noodles, I mean if you can't cook noodles...

Rural Internet

I’ve got shitty internet in the hinterland of the northern rivers, so it is hard to post.

The sun is shining, so what do I care.

Holidays

Sam and I are spending a couple of thousand dollars on ourselves going on holidays. That’s our Xmas spending for this year. 

Happy Xmas

I spent the sum total of $3 on xmas presents this year. I think that is pretty good going.

Gone On Holidays

Gone on holidays, up north, be back in two weeks.

The Jacarandas are in bloom again

The plums are ready to pick, pity we're going away. I guess the birds will enjoy them

It Was A Glorious Day

I went for a bike ride in the morning, it was a glorious day. That's every day this week. I might need to get a pair of those bike shorts that I hate, as I'm getting a sore bum. Walking just doesn't seem to shift the weight I want to shift. Of course, Jill tells me that it is mostly diet that causes the extra kilos. Oh, please, surely not. She's probably right, but who wants to diet? Food is good. I'm trying to stick to the main meals, no snacks in between, so that is something, surely? I don't eat junk food, I never drink soft drink, and I rarely drink alcohol, but, I must admit, I do like a bit of jam and toast as a snack in the afternoon. Jill just rolled her eyes when I told her that. "Sugar and carbs," she said, as if they are both the devil.

Hello Handsome

I was riding up Peel Street at the end of my bike ride. I had just come to Oxford Street, when a tall, blond, handsome, athletic guy stepped in front of me, as we both got to the corner at exactly the same time. Really handsome, Chris Hemsworth handsome. Just stepped off the runway handsome. Strapping, tall, take me to Paris handsome. Pale blue polo shirt, baggy white soccer shorts, muscular legs, tanned skin. I was pushing myself, I was hurting, my feet pained me, my thighs groaned. I like to get from Gipp Street to Smith Street without stopping. I was single minded about finishing my ride. My glasses were riding down my nose, music was playing in my ears, which always kind of puts me in my own world, (Christina Aguilera, so that's pretty fucken gay) I looked up in exhaustion and thought, Hello handsome, except I didn’t think it, I said it, wheezed it out. 

“Hello handsome.” 

Jesus, did I really just say that? Dear universe, what the hell is wrong with me? My filter was, down, clearly. He pulled his head back and kind of cocked it to one side. I died inside, well, not really, I was taken aback a bit, and I would have been embarrassed, if I hadn’t sailed on right passed. 

Shit, shit, shit, I thought – and I did only think it this time – as I peddled across Oxford Street and up the hill. Thank the universe I was riding, and made a relatively quick getaway. Of course, if I hadn’t been riding, I doubt I would have said it, but still, it was nice to make a speedy getaway. Peel Street Collingwood though, there was a good chance he was gay anyway, and just took it as a compliment. Truthfully, he probably just thought, “Who was that weird guy.” But it makes no never mind. I rode on.

One Out of Three Ain't Bad.

Is the weather department becoming like the little boy who cried wolf? In the last three months, there have been three occasions where the weather department has given warnings of dangerous thunderstorms, severe weather events, tonight is one of those occasions. The problem is that the severe weather hasn’t eventuated. What rain? Is the weather department becoming hysterical like our news services? Anything for attention? Surely, the Bureau of Meteorology doesn’t get ratings? You'd be excused for thinking otherwise. The problem is that very soon the public won’t be listening.

Some time after I wrote this...

Perhaps, it was me, speaking too soon. It deluged with rain, we had a leak in our roof. Okay, I have to concede that maybe they got this one right. In my defence, I heard the weather warning hours before. So that is one out of three. Well, with the last warning, the weather did blow around Melbourne and there was huge rainfall in the country, I do have to say that.

Birds

OMG! I have changed my mind about gun control. There are two of those wretched blackbirds sitting on the fence chirping in discordant unison. No matter how many times I run out there like a complete loony and chase them away, they come back to exactly same spot on the fence and start again. "Peep, peep, peep. Peep, peep, peep." I want a gun. I want to see their feather go POOF when the bullets hit them.

Then I moved Milo from the wicker chair where he was curled up asleep, where he likes to sleep on warm, sunny days. And the birds stopped peeping.

Buddy's Birthday

Buddy's birthday, he is 7. Happy birthday Bud. He didn't get anything special for his birthday. He got taken to the dog park in the morning, where all the other dog owners wished him happy birthday.