Today I was reminded of why I love the interwebs…

I remember about two years ago Melbourne experienced a “devastating” earthquake.  Remember it?  We were sitting on our couch in Southeast Queensland, and before any of the old school media could inform us, Twitter had told us there had been a ‘quake.  Just moments after it happened, and even before the last aftershocks had settled, this is how we discovered the horror that had befallen The Garden State:

We pissed ourselves whilst ringing our friends and family to see if their Jenga games had emerged unscathed.  The funny part for me, was not so much how pisspoor the ‘quake actually was, but the fast response of regular punters sitting at home with their meme makers.

Today the Wonderfully Witty World Wide Web delivered again.

Nathan, for some reason, was looking at Vintage Wooden Boats on eBay (at least that’s what he said he searched up), and was admiring the clean lines, and warm tones of some such vessel when he came to what shall henceforth be known as the infamous Image 9.  Please scroll through the images HERE.  It’s worth your effort, I promise.  Again, we sat on our couch and pissed ourselves at the funny things that people do.

So of course I posted the cover pic on Facey and Twit, and then continued for the next  hour or so to snicker at the juvenile double-entendre flowing in from real-life and twitter friends.  Jokes about being water-tight, and seaworthy, about wood and deep hulls and other such nonsense.  I emailed the seller, telling him how much I liked his Image 9.  I was half expecting a ‘whoops’ and for him to take the pic down, but instead he sent me ‘  …Not even the whole semicolon/half-bracket thingy that people use to denote a wink- just the sleazy winky-eye.

We pissed ourselves again.  IDK why, it’s just funnier that way.  With just the winky-eye.

And that, my friends, is why I love the internet so*.  Not for live-streaming and wifi and research and Dr.Google and time-saving and all the rest.  But for funny shit like this.  I know today there was yet another shooting tragedy in The States.  I know today somebody got bombed, somebody died in a car-crash and somebody else went bankrupt.  I know some politicians lied and some children fought each other in cages. You can find that all out too, if you want to.  But somewhere in Nerang, some dude, sitting in front of his computer, uploaded all the best pics of his boat, for us to bid on, and thought he’d add one last surprise for all the other boat-nerds who happen upon his listing.  It kinda gives me hope.

So are you gonna make a bid?  She seems fairly cheap.

*Well that, and funny cat videos, but that goes without saying.

…From The Ashers xx

Here’s the hits of the week:

1.  These eggs.

A lovely patient gave them to me this week.  Two boxes.  They were meant for the Evil Geniuses, but, you know, the Easter ship really had sailed, and, I think it is best that they receive information on a need to know basis.  So, umm, kids, you don’t need to know about these.  I’ll take good care of them.  Promise.  Hope you aren’t reading the blog this week Liam (Or you lovely Nadine).

2.  A good week.  You know, I can admit it now, but I never really thought Coco would go to school, not formally, and I never thought she would be able to do weeks and weeks at a time without days off to rest and get her energy levels back up.  I have always known that she’s pretty sharp, but I guess I never dared hope that her life would be pretty much like other kids, at least on the outside.  This week it has been fun to look back on how far she has come, from a tiny yellow tot who was pretty touch and go for a while there, to a bright, funny little ray of golden sunshine that skips off to school every day.  Even if she has recently taken to making cawing noises like a crow at 6am.  (WTF?)

3.  Having the opportunity to pick Liam up from camp and listen to the endless chatter, each word tripping and tumbling over the next, to get it all out.  He was trashed, dirty and asleep by 6pm, and he had a wondrous time, treading his own path.  For those RRs, did he come back changed?  Well yes he did.  I noticed a quiet and  confident determination when he said he won’t be sleeping on the bottom bunk next year (he has done so for the past two years at camp).  I haven’t seen that before, usually he  will acquiesce just to keep the peace, but it seems that enough might be enough.  He is also, by his own account, braver.  He said the Giant Swing was “terrifying until I did it, then I was exhilarated.  Just like you said.”  Winning on two counts: He did it, and I was right. (Recording that right here for posterity and teenage years).

4.  I’m a bit of a reader.  I like books, paper books, with covers and scoliotic twisted spines, and pages that want to be loved with spilt food and dog ears.  But increasingly I’m doing more and more of my reading on screens.  Mainly blogs at this stage, but also a book or two.  It’s weirder than when I sold all my vinyl at the record shop in Altona and replaced it with CDs.  Here are a few of the blog posts that I liked a lot this week: Fat Mum Slim,  A Life Less Frantic, and  Anna Spargo Ryan (of course).

5.  And one last thing, regarding all things reading… I might be late to the party, but I’ve arrived.  I am currently reading a prescribed text from my astrologer (yes this is now a thing over here at The Ashers) who thinks I should write some Clit Lit (She may well have actually said Chick Lit, and I misheard her), regardless, she said I must read at least one of the 50 Shades books.  To save embarrassment at my local bookstore I have downloaded it to the iPad, and I’ve gotta say, so far I’m a bit cross about spending the $7.99.  I say a “bit cross” when what I really mean is absolutely outraged.  IS THIS FOR REAL?  Did 50% of the females of the Western World actually get through these.. things (I will not call them books, that is an insult to all of the other books on my iPad)?  I find myself getting very hot under the collar and passionate as I’m reading, not from the sauciness, but form the pure horror at the writing.  And the publishing.  And the waste of paper.  Jeez, if she says Jeez one more time I’m gonna go all Flappy Bird on my device and chuck it onto concrete.  Hard (ooh, but not as hard as Mr Grey’s throbbing member).  But I digress, what I really want to know dear RRs, is: Have you read any of them?  Did you actually like them?  And, if you don’t mind me asking, what did you like the most?  Is it just the dude, or do you like how she is such a twit?  etcetera etcetera.  Do you want me to write you a rudie book like my astrologer says?  And then, finally, why oh why did I just pay a bill online, that had a big throbbing red button saying submit when I’d finished entering the data?

And on that note, have a ripper of a weekend.. Seeya Monday.

From The Ashers xx

I got a sweet message from a friend today, saying that he likes my blog, it makes him laugh and that I have ‘missed my calling’.  He’s not the only one to say such flattering and lovely things.  Sometimes there’s comments, FB and Twitter shares and words of affection, text messages.  They all fan the flames of my heart.    Mainly because it is all so unexpected.  I spend most of my time in my head, making up stories, weaving quotes that I read into narrative, laughing to myself about all of the funny people who live up there in my grey matter (it’s pretty crowded).  I guess that’s why I’m so good at mundane tasks (if I do say so myself), as I’m rarely bored, I just make some shit up to keep myself amused.

I have another great friend who told me in the early blog days that writing is ‘what you were born to do’.  I almost cried.  Partly because I respect his opinion, but mostly from the sheer relief that this secret thing that I love, might be something that others could also love.  Sure, I’ve had some lovely feedback from peeps close to me- Nath and Peter have always been my biggest supporters, but one is my Dad and the other one is probably just trying to get laid.  So they might not be completely impartial.  So coming from someone without any ulterior motives is gratifying.

So I was amused to hear that the big fella thinks I’ve missed my calling, because you see, this blog doesn’t support me in the lifestyle in which I am accustomed to.  SHOCK.  Imagine, who would’ve guessed that I’m not making millions of dollars pumping out this amazing content drivel every day?  I actually have a day job.  I know, I know, how do I have time to deliver you such crafted and wondrous blog posts, sort of look after two kids, and have a career?

These two things: coffee and view. Making ALL things possible…

The interest was mainly because it made me think.  Have I missed my calling?  For this typing-thing that I do really does call me, in fact, if other things didn’t demand my attention with such urgency, then I would probably do it at the exclusion of all else.  And I am able do it without thinking too much.  I can be chatting, watching the telly, or even just taking a couple of seconds between patients to smash out a few paragraphs.  I won’t say it is effortless, but it isn’t too difficult, at least in this fairly raw state.  More polish would demand more attention, but, if you can tell anything about me, polish and poise are not really my area.

I read a thingy a few weeks ago that said something like, “What is the thing you do when you are procrastinating?  That is the thing you should be doing for the rest of your life.”  Unfortunately I also procrastinate by cleaning the toilet and going shopping for shoes, but still, sitting up here in my eyrie is one of the things that I would choose to do.  If there is BAS to be done, there’s a fair chance I won’t be in my office sorting through the Gratuitous Squandering of Time receipts, but rather, you’ll find me up here.  Or in the dunny.

So there you have it: some thoughts that are rattling around my head today.  How about you, have you missed your calling?  Is there something that whispers quietly in your ear in the stillness of the night, begging you to play?  Can you go and grab it, or does it scurry away in the light of dawn and bills and school lunches and urgent things?  And if you are 43, have you really missed it?   Or can you listen to the gentle beckoning at any age, and maybe, just maybe, follow it, even hold hands with it, and find out where it wants you to go?

…From The Ashers xx

….I saw this tweet and it made me have some nostalgia feels.  Here they are….

***

Sunday morning.  Mouth feeling like the bottom of a cockatiel’s cage.  Skin too tight.  Burning in my abdomen.  A sign of a good night.  Or a bad one.  I don’t remember which.  But I woke up in my own bed and that is a good enough start.

What to do with the burning and the spinning head and the aching when I try to lift my arms?  I lie still, trying to ignore the pain that the weight of the doona inflicts on my hypersensitive skin.  I know the cure.  It’s not that far away, but far enough that in this moment, in this body, it feels further away than Everest’s elusive summit.

Unlike Hillary, I won’t be going ‘because it was (sic) there’, but because I must.  Reparation, Repentance and Rejuvenation lie within its lurid walls.  It’s cushioned booths will beckon me with their stop-sign red cushions, but I will choose the position of shame.  The seat of the Sunday morning uncoupled.  The stool at the bar.

Strangely, the bar seating, although not revered by those in the throes of love, or Saturday-Night-Becoming-Sunday lust, are the best seats in the house.  They are where you receive not only eerily prompt and cheeky service, you don’t need to entertain yourself with the drivel of the Sunday papers, you can be entertained by the staff, watch their frenetic activity and become almost one of them, for a time.

Somehow, by some superhuman feat of endurance I’ve managed to get weekend presentable, find a park (albeit two kilometres away, it would have been easier and perhaps almost closer to have walked) and drag my haglike countenance to a stool.

Jimbo is behind the bar.  Good.  He knows what I am going through and he has the elixir at his disposal.  I just nod my head.  Not too much or my brain will hit my frontal bone and bounce back to my occiput, pinging and ponging until I am completely still again.  Jimbo is a good egg.  He starts proceedings.

One: Bloody Mary with extra tabasco and don’t even think about adding a celery stick.

Two: One double-shot cappuccino with as much froth as you can muster.  For Jimbo that is a lot.  He is a master.  I know, people say they are supposed to be milky, but I don’t drink capps for the milk, I drink them because they are a coffee and a dessert in one.  And Jimbo doesn’t fuck around with stupid coffee pictures, the art is in the beans.  And these beans will blow my hangover further than any beanstalk.

Three: Eggs Benny.  It goes without saying that the eggs will be runny. They will not be on toast.  They will not have salmon, bacon, rocket, spinach, or any other bullshit the chef dreamed up when he wanted to get rid of shit left over from last night.  They will be on muffins and the muffins will be buttered and soft.  There will be ham off the bone.  The sauce will be bright yellow, not some insipid, poor, pale, vinegar-tasting imposter.

After, and only after I have eaten more than 63% of my meal will Jimbo nod in my direction, eyebrows like Macca’s arches, and perhaps, if the coffee is performing it’s healing, I will push my sunglasses up on top of my head, and say, “Think so. Think I’m still alive.  I’m never drinking again.”  And Jimbo will laugh, like he does, and bring me another capp, this time saying, “Here’s one on the house, for resuss purposes.  As long as you never drink again.”

I will nod, and we will smile at each other, full of knowing that I’ll be back next Sunday to do it all again.

***

I can’t believe you’re gone Dr Greasy Joe’s.  Such a sad thing for St.Kilda.

Do you have a place you lament the passing of?  Is there some shit Coffee Club there?

…From The Ashers xx

I blame the telly.

Specifically (un)reality television.

House Rules to be specific.  They made it look possible, and weirdly, even kind of fun, to renovate things.  And by renovate I mean tear shit down.

So on the weekend, we thought it might be fun, or something, to do shit around here.

Trees were cut down, fences were painted, new greenery was planted.  Sounds easy right?

Cutting down trees?  It’s not like the movies with a chop-chop here and cry of “Tim-berrr” there, and it falls.  Oh no.  There are ROOTS and STUMPS left behind.  And that screws up what you want to do next (which is, interestingly, to plant more trees).

Painting fences?  Do you know how hard it is to paint a rendered fence a different colour?  Bloody hard, that’s how.  You have to get your paint brush into all the tiny divots in the wall.  And don’t EVEN talk to me about paling fences that have gaps in the palings and you have to get a teeny tiny brush in between.  When it’s dark.  And raining.  And you are painting it dark grey, sorry, Monument.

Sweet baby cheeses, I can hardly move today, but wait, there’s MORE.  I had to go to the garden place today- and, I shit you not, it’s bigger than the MCG- to find more plants.

I do not know what plants look like.  I mean, I know what the word ‘plant’ means, but I have a pretty loose definition.  To me, it means: green, growing-thingy in the ground.  Some people call the things I know as plants, weeds.  I say: expand your definition (and thus decrease your work-load).

Anyway, I had instructions typed in my phone, of quantities and brands and measurements.  (Who knew plants came in measurements?).  The plants over at the plantatorium were not grouped in any type of sensible order.  There was not a category of: Plants that Alison might want so let’s put them close to the carpark so she doesn’t hurt her elbow any more than she already has when she has to carry them.  No.  The plants that I wanted were spread out over three suburbs.

Eventually, and with three trips back to the main office for further compass directions, I had my purchases.  They did not fit into my car. They had to lie down. They did not like lying down.  Neither did they did not like having their bamboo stakes removed.  And the back of my virtually new car did not like all the tan-bark-soil than spread itself around with wanton abandon.

When they got home, I found that the ground that was to house these plants looks like lovely soft sand, but it is not.  Oh no. It is full of the roots and remains of all of the plants that have come and gone before.  Plus some bits of concrete and rogue building materials.  And did I mention MASSIVE BLOODY ROOTS?

I toiled and toiled and actual sweat came out of me and I almost got a blister and now it is done.

Until tomorrow when I have to paint in-between the fence palings.  With a tiny brush.

Remind me not to go on telly.  My language about  the ROOTS is appalling.  I may have done that thing, when you say the word twice.  Like ATM Machine.  But about the ROOTS

So yeah, I’ll be the one in the tent.

Have you ever been inspired by (un)reality telly?

What have they made you do?

…From The Ashers xx

Here’s a little vignette I mucked around with today.  Longer than my usual blog posts I guess, but I think she wanted me to tell a story about her, this Lady in the Cheetah Print, in my mind:

I’ve found myself a comfy spot right next to the window in my favourite cafe.  It’s my Number One Spot in the rankings of places to sit, made even better today because I’m by myself so I get to have the banquette without doing the passive-agressive “you have it, no you have it” thing you are obliged to do if you want to be considered nice, in polite company.  Which I do want, mostly.  Unless I’m with people who know me properly, then I don’t give a shit, but most of them are far far away right now.   I flirted with the Number Two Spot out the front for a moment, Noosa flicked the light on the sunshine for a moment, but the grey-white dimmer clouds have come back in, and anyway, if I sat outside I would have to deal with the retching smell of Subway (The take-away atrocity, not the public transport link.  Similar smell.  Probably how they named it.  I wonder if they have a stale-urine foot long.)

I made myself at home on the Number One seat, and even sneakily put my bag a little outside my area on the bench, so as to softly discourage anyone else taking up Number Three Spot.  So by default I’m getting a massive bargain- Number One and Number Three for the price of one Benny and a Capp.  I gently press my index fingers together under the table- my personal version of a solo high-five.  Sometimes I give myself mental high-fives, but solo high-fives are a step up.  Reserved for successes such as getting car-parks out the front of the shop you are going to at Christmas, or finding a pair of half-price shoes in size 8 (if you are indeed a size 8).

The waiter is on his first day back after a trip up North and so isn’t sick of the sight of all us yet.  He’s calling everyone Sweetie and Darl and bouncing on the balls of his feet as he takes the order of yet another decaf skinny latte with a raspberry and white chocolate muffin.  The ridiculousness of his job and the orders haven’t permeated his epidermis yet.  But they will.  How can they not?  I asked for the wifi password and he said they have taken it away, too many backpackers freeloading downloads I guess, and when I said, no worries, I’ll use the one from the cafe across the road, he laughed and laughed like I was Billy Connolly.  I wish I’d said it with an accent now.  He might have peed his fookin’ pants.

A Lady in Cheetah Prints just walked in and sat down in Number Three Spot.  I say prints because she has a top, pants and shoes, all cheetah.  Or some of them may be leopard.  I’m not really au fait with the identifying patterns of the animal kingdom, but I do know none of them are tiger.  The Lady in the Cheetah Prints didn’t care about my seat saving efforts.  She just whooshed my bag over without blinking.  I heard her tell the waiter it’s her birthday today, and she is of an age where he said “Congratulations” rather than “Happy Birthday”.  She smiled sweetly at him and he bounced off to make some patterns in froth, and I heard her say “wanker” under her breath.

I’m trying not to look at her too much, not because of the Cheetah Prints, even though they are scalding my retinae, but because she has something medical-ey attached to her nose. I don’t know what it is, but it helps her to breathe.  She is so close to me that I can tell that it isn’t in control of her breathing, but rather, she makes it work by doing a little clicky swallow.  From the very tip of the corner of my eye it seems like she pushes her tongue to the roof of her mouth, and then pfftsh, a puff of oxygen swirls into her nostrils.  I can’t see where the oxygen is coming from but it must be in her supermodel sized handbag, and I wonder how such a tiny little bird can carry around a tank of air all day.  Does it ever run out?  And then what?  I wonder if carrying the tank makes her use more of the oxygen.  I reckon it would.  I reckon she needs a little buggy thing instead.  But I can’t say that, I can’t even look, in case she either: a) thinks I’m rude for looking at her medical-ey things, or b) wants to talk to me.  I don’t like talking to strangers, and especially when they sit so close.

Through the very very pointed corner of my lateral canthus I can that see some of her bone-thin thigh has strayed into my area.  She is flaunting the invisible borders.  If I was Tony Abbot I’d send her scuttling back.  Cheetah print, birth day and medicalness aside, she shouldn’t be in my area.  I wish I had more gumption, as my Nan would say, to tell her to move back, but I just can’t.

I’m trying to ignore the click-pffish and eat my Eggs Benedict, but the noise is really off-putting.  The click makes me think of the shells of my eggs being cracked and that makes me think of raw eggs and that makes me think of chickens birthing those huge ovals and how humans shouldn’t complain about period pain because imagine if you were a chicken and you had to push out a period egg every day instead of a gentle trickle of blood once a month and

Now I can’t eat my eggs.

So I sip my cappuccino instead, but the pffish of the rush of air reminds me of the steam being let off by the barista, and that makes me think of milk and cows lined up having their udders pulled by bits of cold steel and the greenish tinge of the mastitis-ridden milk, and the slops of cow shit being sprayed around and

Now I can’t drink my coffee.

I have to get out of here.  I can’t turn my head to the left, because The Lady in the Cheetah Print is there, but there is no other way to get out- I’m sitting in the window.  The pane that represented my freedom and my eye to the world is now a glazed gaol.  I feel myself going over all hot and clammy, my breathing quickens and even as I try to slow it down, calm it back a notch, my lungs are grabbing for more air more air more air.  Sweat is popping out of my skin- behind my knees, in the folds of my elbows, the pits of my arms.  I am trying to stop it all, bring my processes back to normal, but everything is going out of control and it’s like I’m a train and I’m racing through a long long red tunnel and instead of a prick of light at the end there’s just brown

I open my eyes and The Lady in the Cheetah Print is leaning over me, her eyes, rheumy blue and wet are staring into mine and she has somehow disattached the medical-ey thing and is waving it in front of my nostrils.  It smells like talcum powder and Tabu with a tinge of mothballs, and I smile at her and she smiles back as the waiter comes flouncing over with some “water for the fainter”.  We look at each other, The Lady in the Cheetah Print and I, our mouths engraving the same shape into the air, “wanker”.

…From The Ashers

PS  Tell me what you reckon about this kind of post… I often have these little people jostling about in my grey matter- do you like ’em?  Or should they just stay up there and rattle around?