Two hours, forty four minutes and forty one seconds is all it takes
I've had a week which bears telling, from where I sit, in my corner of the world thoroughly enjoying myself and appreciating what I have.
Things ended rather swimmingly, it's Australia day now, it has been for two hours and twenty three minutes as of writing this. That in and of itself is nothing to snuff at, but consider what's brought me to this point and perhaps the illumination clears up confusion. I decided to hold a barbecue, a day early, the day before the day we celebrate. I really didn't mean to get things jumbled I just didn't take into account that Sunday came day before Australia day.
It went off wonderfully, Julian pitched in providing a cooker - our house is yet to settle on a barbecue - rolling around a gas bottle to boot. Marvel that he is that Julian. Shortly thereafter the rest of the troops came pouring in and we took off to Coles filling our shopping trolley with a random assortment of Sunday eats and drinks, piled high by the many hands we drew on the bill was sizeable. We'd left Ziggy at our place, he's our new French house mate, he's here teaching balance to little kids for a year to pay for his surfing holiday along our coast. Ziggy was making two types of salad, one warm one cold and cooked with citrus. Add to that a pile of sausages, a mountain of cheese, caramelised onions, and plenty of sauce. Kebabs were also on offer as was chicken, olives and all the usuals. Daniel the Brazilian Japanese man we interviewed as a flatmate also came over, he was a nice guy, he didn't get our spare room but we said we'd call him up for a barbecue if we had one, so we did.
We ate and drank and laughed and jibed. Eventually we sat down to some good old fashioned poker and duked it out for a couple of hours till the stakes took their toll and Jon walked away with the pot. I came out just behind him and got back what I put in so all was well. We sauntered about in comfort playing this and having a go at that, the sun went down and we were still going strong so Matt put together some Teriyaki chicken and combined with what we had left over we dinned well a second time. It got late and more people arrived, we went searching for pepper corns and I made Chai. A man named Jack came back with us from the 7/11, he studies philosophy and was good to talk to. I'm tired now and the day is cleaned away, I am glad things went so well.
Vivian and Stephanie are moving away, they're going to live in Melbourne, Step will study and Viv will work, they chose Saturday to say good bye. We dressed as monsters, I made a box monster. We listened to Viv's decks all night long as they spun records and people intermittently twisted knobs. I talked to people I have not seen in years and met a woman who prior to serious injury had been a serious Army Career Officer. I learned a lot from her as I have been bubbling with questions, I am so curious about the life they lead, curious beyond all reason. I am now more than ever convinced that far from barbarism it could be a lifestyle I live. Robin has been studying Mad Cow Disease in a lab for the last year, prodding it poking it and gene sequencing it. Did you know that the incubation time can be as much as 40 years and that is why there is that tick box on blood donation forms that asks if you were in the UK during 1986. Also that the disease is so resistant to regular decontamination and sterilisation techniques because of it's bonding properties to metals, that regular techniques do not work for cleaning and all instruments must be thrown away. We keep a very strict log of all these instruments, even dentists, if they touch your tonsils with tools must throw them away. There was ritual cannibalism in the Pacific Islands until the fifties.
Kat turned 27 a few weeks ago and chose The German Club as the venue for the celebration of her birth, on a Friday night. We sat around long tables in a decorated hall, there were many faces I did not know, none of who I made an effort to know. I was saturated in interesting people already and I talked a fine rot with them as we descended into the alkaloid sustained abyss. I met a man named Dave, who Rosie lives with he seems like an intelligent and involved person to talk to, lets see. Our meals arrived hours after we ordered them, my Ploughman's platter tasted great.
I planted a garden, though every other step was very much a team effort, the actual laying of the plants in the earth was all me. Tam valiantly soldiered through the day and even took Sanjay and I to a wonderful Hare Krishna place for lunch. Tam provided knowledge and locations and drove us all around to places to buy what we needed, and we had nothing so think about that. She gave us special fertiliser and Tomato plants she's been growing and made our day our week - I've been showing the garden off to everyone. I need to give Tam's tools back.
I went to a movie with Sanjay, Slumdog Millionaire, I realised once we got there it was about India and filmed there. I say here and now that the depiction of India is accurate, albeit tidier and cleared of people in some scenes. You cannot depict India in the 70's and 80's accurately as it just doesn't exist as it did. The trains they show in the movie are exclusively modern. They did not exist in India 10 years ago. The dirt and grim and human shit everywhere made me feel such nestalga, knowing the locations, it was kismet as it made me think on how lucky I was to live where I lived at the time I lived with as long as I did. A simple story told so well, had me riding on a wave through the first half of the movie, the last half just seemed to slide by as it should, I recommend this film.
My Phd Supervisor agreed with me and I begin research with desk space on February 16th.
On Thursday I enjoyed Jennifer's company for an entire day, no small feat considering the lady is days away from handing in a thesis which has journeyed through numerous nations. I met her an hour late at the Gallery of Modern Art to view the Australian Optimism exhibit. Brilliant, quite a lot of the art, gathered from new, existing and long time Australian artists, was simply brilliant. The well of talent we draw from is not nearly at a low. I wonder at how much more there would be had they the space to contain multiple exhibits from some of the artists who deal with large, large scale art. An entire house was on display, in part.
We wandered and were rained on, we nearly lost our steam until we sat and drank and talked of all things and softly too. We ate later when we realised we should, Turkish, we ordered too much and ate what we could and were picked up for a night of Theatre. Good theatre, vivid and confronting theatre, nude theatre, theatre spoken in Belarusian and telling a story based around Harold Pinter. It was damn outside and not that late, a movie was showing on the wall of a building, it looked free, isn't that good?
And two hours, forty four minutes and forty one seconds is all it takes.
Things ended rather swimmingly, it's Australia day now, it has been for two hours and twenty three minutes as of writing this. That in and of itself is nothing to snuff at, but consider what's brought me to this point and perhaps the illumination clears up confusion. I decided to hold a barbecue, a day early, the day before the day we celebrate. I really didn't mean to get things jumbled I just didn't take into account that Sunday came day before Australia day.
It went off wonderfully, Julian pitched in providing a cooker - our house is yet to settle on a barbecue - rolling around a gas bottle to boot. Marvel that he is that Julian. Shortly thereafter the rest of the troops came pouring in and we took off to Coles filling our shopping trolley with a random assortment of Sunday eats and drinks, piled high by the many hands we drew on the bill was sizeable. We'd left Ziggy at our place, he's our new French house mate, he's here teaching balance to little kids for a year to pay for his surfing holiday along our coast. Ziggy was making two types of salad, one warm one cold and cooked with citrus. Add to that a pile of sausages, a mountain of cheese, caramelised onions, and plenty of sauce. Kebabs were also on offer as was chicken, olives and all the usuals. Daniel the Brazilian Japanese man we interviewed as a flatmate also came over, he was a nice guy, he didn't get our spare room but we said we'd call him up for a barbecue if we had one, so we did.
We ate and drank and laughed and jibed. Eventually we sat down to some good old fashioned poker and duked it out for a couple of hours till the stakes took their toll and Jon walked away with the pot. I came out just behind him and got back what I put in so all was well. We sauntered about in comfort playing this and having a go at that, the sun went down and we were still going strong so Matt put together some Teriyaki chicken and combined with what we had left over we dinned well a second time. It got late and more people arrived, we went searching for pepper corns and I made Chai. A man named Jack came back with us from the 7/11, he studies philosophy and was good to talk to. I'm tired now and the day is cleaned away, I am glad things went so well.
Vivian and Stephanie are moving away, they're going to live in Melbourne, Step will study and Viv will work, they chose Saturday to say good bye. We dressed as monsters, I made a box monster. We listened to Viv's decks all night long as they spun records and people intermittently twisted knobs. I talked to people I have not seen in years and met a woman who prior to serious injury had been a serious Army Career Officer. I learned a lot from her as I have been bubbling with questions, I am so curious about the life they lead, curious beyond all reason. I am now more than ever convinced that far from barbarism it could be a lifestyle I live. Robin has been studying Mad Cow Disease in a lab for the last year, prodding it poking it and gene sequencing it. Did you know that the incubation time can be as much as 40 years and that is why there is that tick box on blood donation forms that asks if you were in the UK during 1986. Also that the disease is so resistant to regular decontamination and sterilisation techniques because of it's bonding properties to metals, that regular techniques do not work for cleaning and all instruments must be thrown away. We keep a very strict log of all these instruments, even dentists, if they touch your tonsils with tools must throw them away. There was ritual cannibalism in the Pacific Islands until the fifties.
Kat turned 27 a few weeks ago and chose The German Club as the venue for the celebration of her birth, on a Friday night. We sat around long tables in a decorated hall, there were many faces I did not know, none of who I made an effort to know. I was saturated in interesting people already and I talked a fine rot with them as we descended into the alkaloid sustained abyss. I met a man named Dave, who Rosie lives with he seems like an intelligent and involved person to talk to, lets see. Our meals arrived hours after we ordered them, my Ploughman's platter tasted great.
I planted a garden, though every other step was very much a team effort, the actual laying of the plants in the earth was all me. Tam valiantly soldiered through the day and even took Sanjay and I to a wonderful Hare Krishna place for lunch. Tam provided knowledge and locations and drove us all around to places to buy what we needed, and we had nothing so think about that. She gave us special fertiliser and Tomato plants she's been growing and made our day our week - I've been showing the garden off to everyone. I need to give Tam's tools back.
I went to a movie with Sanjay, Slumdog Millionaire, I realised once we got there it was about India and filmed there. I say here and now that the depiction of India is accurate, albeit tidier and cleared of people in some scenes. You cannot depict India in the 70's and 80's accurately as it just doesn't exist as it did. The trains they show in the movie are exclusively modern. They did not exist in India 10 years ago. The dirt and grim and human shit everywhere made me feel such nestalga, knowing the locations, it was kismet as it made me think on how lucky I was to live where I lived at the time I lived with as long as I did. A simple story told so well, had me riding on a wave through the first half of the movie, the last half just seemed to slide by as it should, I recommend this film.
My Phd Supervisor agreed with me and I begin research with desk space on February 16th.
On Thursday I enjoyed Jennifer's company for an entire day, no small feat considering the lady is days away from handing in a thesis which has journeyed through numerous nations. I met her an hour late at the Gallery of Modern Art to view the Australian Optimism exhibit. Brilliant, quite a lot of the art, gathered from new, existing and long time Australian artists, was simply brilliant. The well of talent we draw from is not nearly at a low. I wonder at how much more there would be had they the space to contain multiple exhibits from some of the artists who deal with large, large scale art. An entire house was on display, in part.
We wandered and were rained on, we nearly lost our steam until we sat and drank and talked of all things and softly too. We ate later when we realised we should, Turkish, we ordered too much and ate what we could and were picked up for a night of Theatre. Good theatre, vivid and confronting theatre, nude theatre, theatre spoken in Belarusian and telling a story based around Harold Pinter. It was damn outside and not that late, a movie was showing on the wall of a building, it looked free, isn't that good?
And two hours, forty four minutes and forty one seconds is all it takes.