photo friday: golden waves

golden waves 2007One from the vaults this time...

Actually this is from back in August... my Grand Day Out... but this week has SO been all about the sun, I thought it was appropriate. I know Summer is coming and all, but this is just ridiculous.

Listening to the weather report for around the country this morning during my walk, it was 22 there and 24 there and 16 somewhere else... but not here... oh no... here it was 32! Well bollocks to that I say... BOLLOCKS! Granted there's been a nice breeze all day... but, well... BOLLOCKS!

We've actually had the warmest November in 25 years... so, since I was 8... but when I was 8 we had an airconditioner!

Current Mood:

mypersonality

click to view my personality profile page

Stolen from Sunshine... interesting results actually (not surprising though)... I'm usually either a ISFJ or ISTJ depending on when I take the test... I've been both at various times... but today I'm obviously more thinking than feeling and more perceiving than judging (but only by about 3%).

And I've been classes as Visual/Spatial before too... it is nice to know that Verbal comes a close second though.

Current Mood:

the perky must die

perky o'sIt's no secret that I don't play well with the overly perky at the best of times...

But you know, there's nothing quite as bad as when you're feeling like crap and you have to go out in the world and everybody that you encounter seems to be far too perky for their own, or anybody else's good...

Okay, so nobody in the chemist (and while I'm on the subject, thank the deities for Codral Cold and Flu tablets) was that perky (actually I was pretty much ignored in there for far too long... RUDE)... but a quick trip to the supermarket and there was the perky woman giving out little samples of avocado (which normally I don't like, but it was mixed with sweet chili sauce and put on a spicy cracker thing, and was actually quite nice)... the stupid guy who seemed to me more loud and annoying than perky... but I mostly ignored him... then the overly, overly perky older guy working the register.

Hello... I feel like crap (and sound like crap actually too... I suddenly developed that whole "scratchy cold voice" thing for some reason)... does EVERYBODY have to be all upbeat and really happy? Grrrr...

Current Mood:

random bryan hotness

There's no grand story behind this week's Random Hotness... in fact, I'm not sure where I found these two shots (possibly they arrived in my email, I just can't remember)... but do you really need a reason with a white Calvin wearin, Abercrombie lovin, abstastic and tattooed guy like Bryan here?

I didn't think so either.


Current Mood:

i feel like...

death warmed upDeath warmed up...

Seriously... I feel like crap...

I don't know if it's because I've been sleeping with the fans blowing all night and I got all chilled (although somewhere in the back of my brain I remember reading that being "chilled" doesn't actually mean you'll catch a cold)... or if it's just that time of year, or what... but I have something of a cold with a side order of nasty yucky throat.

Which possibly wouldn't be THAT bad (annoying, but manageable) if the weather wasn't all overheated and whatnot. So add the two things together and I'm equal party grumpy, uninspired and sick.

I only hope that it goes away before the weekend, because I've got WAY too much going on this weekend to feel like this all the way through it *sigh*...

That and I'm having a little difficulty stringing more than about two sentences together at a time...

Current Mood:

yellow

yellow walltriple yellow
Yellow!

More shots from Sidestreets and Alleyways (Rounds Two and Three if I remember correctly)... there are actually more than a few walls around town that are this lurid colour of yellow. I guess because it stands out.

It's too hot here to come up with actual words today, so you'll have to made do with the pretty.

Current Mood:

i love tickets

assassins... do you think i could find a colour version of the poster? no, i could not!To quote Natalie from Charlie's Angels... "I love tickets!"...

I love tickets even more when said tickets are free!

As with the case of Pink's last album before it, the local gay paper, Blaze, does have it's uses beyond random local gay news and some generic scene photography.

In this particular case it's a free double pass to the somewhat odd sounding musical... "Assassins"...
"First performed in 1990, this will be the first time Assassins has been performed in South Australia following a recent Broadway production where it won five Tony Awards. It is a vaudevillian musical farce where eight assassins of US presidents meet at a sideshow shooting gallery. Contemporary political events, the cult of celebrity, and patriotism both here and in the US, come together in this shocking and funny production."
Usually I would have just emailed, but it said to call at 4pm, and I figured, hey, I can do that... so I did... at what my mobile assured me was 4pm... and I got the fax machine screaming in my ear. NOT HAPPY JAN! So I redialled... busy... redialed... busy... redialed... fax machine. I checked the number against the one in the front of the paper, yep, same number. Kept trying, kept getting either the fax or a busy signal (which I figured was just the fax trying to reset itself... or other people also getting the fax... in fact I was getting somewhat "faxed off" myself). So I decided to give up and email instead... but while typing I had the phone jammed between my head and my shoulder and kept redialing... and then suddenly I hear "Hello, Blaze Media"... WOOHOOO!

So now I have tickets. Well, I don't HAVE tickets... since they're not exactly sure if the tickets will be waiting at the box office to be picked up or if Blaze will get them and they'll have to be picked up from there. But the nice man has my number and will let me know.

Could said American presidential assassination themed musical be just plain old bad and wrong? Oh hell yes... but on the flip side it could be a whole lot of fun. Plus, you know... free.

Current Mood:

montage monday: backstreets three

backstreets part tresA very "street art heavy" Montage from Wednesday's walk for today...

There are a couple of "odd" images that I just want to discuss briefly... In the top right hand corner, yes, that IS a shoe... actually there were two shoes there, inside this fenced off vacant lot (I'd slipped through the not terribly well secured fence to grab a few shots... the grey spiral and the Pikachu looking thing in "armour" on the fourth row, and the red wave with black squiggles on the top row)... they looked a little plaintive laying there all on their ownsome. Also, the bottom right corner does, in fact, say Flickr... and that was the way I found it... there was this warehouse doorway (biiiiiiiiig doorway), and on the metal frame on the inside of the arch were what I assume were magnetic letters, although I never actually touched them... there were more words and letters, but my eye went to that one word straight away. Odd.

And speaking of odd, the shot next to the shoes... I may have to run a large version of that, because whoever lived in that house obviously wasn't taking their medication... there were six or seven signs up about how people had been "stealing" the sign maker's songs... people like Madonna... Telstra (with the help of "Lobster Woman"... your guess is as good as mine at that one)... Peter Gabriel (although that one may be the least outlandish, given the title of the song in question)... k.d. lang... and Celeine Dion. Amusing, but sad.

Let's stay in the realm of odd just for a minute shall we... now I've had various and sundry profiles on a variety of "gay personal" sites for some time now. Specifically Gaydar, but other places too... with Gaydar though I'm fussy about what kind of photos I use (one bad experience will do that to you). But last Monday, since I now have the cute, short, new blonde 'do going on I thought I would take some new photos of varying appropriateness levels and update some of my profiles. Which I did... I pulled various things out of the wardrobe and had my own little photoshoot right here in the house. Some of the shots were better than others, as is always the case... but there was one shot that was kind of interesting, because I'd moved my head right when it was being taken, so there was some blur going on... blur, but interesting blur you understand. And I was wearing an all black outfit which is usually always flattering. Now I don't know if it's because I'm in a black outfit and I'm sitting so the edges of my body are a little blended into shadow, or what, but since the photo went "live" I've probably increased the number of people viewing my profile by a factor of about 20... seriously... before I added the photo I got maybe one or two "tracks" a day... yesterday it was just under 20. What shallow little creatures we homosexualists are... of course I say that because people are looking, but I'm not getting any more messages when I would usually get... which is to say... none... *wink*. Shallow, shallow, shallow.

I really didn't want to get out of bed this morning after last night's little excursion... but I did, as always, and toddled off for my walk... and on the way back I kept a special eye out for the Home of Myer Lady... and it was exactly the house that I thought it was. Scary.

I ended up getting an answer this morning from the folks at Norton... well, somebody somewhere in an Indian "call centre" on Norton's behalf anyway... fortunately, after I cleared out the Window's Temp directory of all the files, they stopped replicating on their own... so now I just need to get around to following some of the other advice in the email to clear up the rest of the files and maybe work out what the hell was wrong in the first place. I wasn't overly optimistic when I read the beginning of the email's broken English, but once he got to the portion where he could just copy and past existing answers it made more sense. Unexpectedly helpful actually.

Now, because I have a bad ongoing case of "Inside Legs" (ie they almost NEVER see the sun) I've been trying out the Johnson's Holiday Skin Body Lotion... that stuff with the "gradual" fake tan in it. I don't know about the gradual to be honest... in certain spots it seems less gradual than others. It's not bad though... although interestingly it seems to work faster and better on places where you're already a little bit tanned (like my arms, and oddly enough, my feet... must be all the barefoot/thong wearing)... but my legs do seem to look browner... but it's hard to tell because it IS so gradual... you end up thinking "hang on, wasn't I ALWAYS this colour?". Because it's "body" lotion, I'm not brave enough to try it out on my face (plus I know I'd miss spots and end up blotchy and unfortunate looking)... but I don't hate the results... even if I'm the only one who ends up seeing them. Mmmmm... tan.

I know there were some other things I was going to babble about... but I honestly can't think of any of them right at this precise moment (and the ones I can think of don't seem all that terribly interesting or important right now)... possibly because I need some lunch...

Current Mood:

unconscious mutterings 251

Unconscious Mutterings...

  1. Filthy :: Dirty

  2. Therapist :: Couch

  3. Duck :: Man

  4. Slant :: Crooked

  5. Artist :: New York

  6. Lease :: Rental Agreement

  7. Wish :: Make A

  8. Doormat :: Weak willed

  9. Global :: Village

  10. Apartment :: Hell
Current Mood:

kate miller-heidke concert

the kate miller-heidke bandWell that was quite possibly the most enjoyable $15 I've spent in a long, long while...

Stu called me on Friday to ask if I wanted to come along with him to see
Kate Miller-Heidke (and Band) at The Gov as part of her "Little Eve Tour 07"...

Now I couldn't honestly tell you the last time I went out to see a live band in a venue... certainly not this century anyway. So I figured "what the hell!"... tickets were only $15, which isn't much in the grand scheme of the universe, and it got me out of the house.

We had dinner first, which took forever to come out (they're not usually open on Sundays... but really, you would think that they would have been a little more on their toes. On the upside, the calamari we both had was REALLY nice.

It did mean that we were not exactly at the front of the line as people started going in... and hence, didn't end up getting a seat anywhere. Annoying, but not life threatening.

Then there was the support act... Dead Letter Chorus... or as Stu and I liked to call them "Four Brokebacks and a Sunday School Teacher"... sad but true. They weren't bad... and either they got better as they went on, or else I just got used to them, but they did seem to improve. On the short list of complaints concerning them (not counting the whole "you're not who we came here to see" thing)... the lead singer needed to pull up his (admittedly very, very, very tight) pants (hello black Calvin Klein underpants!) and just not try and make banter... ever (or speak at all actually)... and the guitarist needed to take his medication at a DIFFERENT time than he took it tonight... oh, and just tell the drummer that he's really into him and wants to go steady or something.

Finally though, it was time for the main event!

Now, the only song that I really know of Kate Miller-Heidke is the song Words (she was also on the Arias, but then, I didn't watch the Arias), which is a little bit Kate Bush (I've been playing it on endless loop while I've been writing this)... but then KMH trained as an opera vocalist, so the Bush comparison isn't that far out of left field. And man, oh man, oh man... does she ever make use of her operatic abilities.

In a word... WOW!

She came out on stage kind of looking like 50's Pinup Barbie... with overly quaffed blonde hair, a short, bright yellow dress with lots of petticoat action going on (think "tutu inspired")... and black tights and "wrestling sneakers". Very cool actually.

Not knowing her catalogue of songs, I'm not sure of everything that she and the band (more on them in a second) played, but it was all highly enjoyable... after flicking through the lyrics on the website I think one of the songs was "Space They Cannot Touch", I know she did "Ducks Don't Need Satellites", "Apartment" (or "Shoebox", or maybe both), "Don't Let Go" (which has really pretty lyrics) and "Mama"... and of course "Words"... oh, and "Dreams" which I REALLY, REALLY liked ("I love you, but you don't even know my name"... hello, my theme song).

I do know that she played some songs that had to have been easily identifiable crowd favourites, because people starting screaming and clapping from the very beginning of those songs (and not wanting to be left out, I did likewise... actually I did a LOT of screaming and clapping to be honest).

The "Kate Miller-Heidke Band" was pretty groovy... and much more stylish than the warm up act... there was Sallie Campbell (violin, keyboard, vocals... and who doesn't love a nice bit of electric violin!), Keir Nuttal (guitar), Ben McCarthy (bass) and Steve Pope (drums... who was quite cute in that "emo just finished work at McDonalds" kind of way).

And Kate REALLY knew how to work a crowd (which was doubly obvious after the attempts of the Dead Letter boys trying to make with the funnies and failing)... including "Ding dong, the witch is dead" as a comment on the change of goverment due to the election... and a couple of other bits and pieces that she said in the intros to other songs (which I can't really remember right now, plus, you kinda had to be there). Yes, she did look a little like some sort of demented marionette as she was playing the piano (or, in one other song while she was letting the guitarist do his thing, marching up and down like some sort of toy soldier), but it just fits her, as her website calls it, "slightly loopy folk/pop".

We were also treated to what has got to be the BEST version of John Farmham's "You're the Voice" ever in recorded memory. The vocal gymnastics that woman can do are just amazing! Sadly she didn't do the version of Britney's "Toxic" that Stu was raving about the other day.

Then there was her "Australian Idol" song... which was highly appropriate since tonight was the finale (wait... what do you mean "Natalie won"?)... which pretty much had the whole audience rolling around with laughter (the song, not the fact that Natalie won... I only found that out because Mrs Stu send him an SMS)...
You should go on Australian Idol
You're much prettier than her - she looks like a pudding
'You'll win it no worries love' said my uncle
And I just turned and looked at him like he was something that I stood in.
Hehehehe...

And then, before we knew it, it was all over... *pout*... we screamed and hollered and they came out to do one encore song, which was very slow and cruisy and kind of settled the audience down a bit... and that was it.

A very nice evening out indeed!

Current Mood:

painting: twenty first

twenty first 2007This is the last of my half finished paintings... and it's for J's sister's 21st. I asked J a while back what B's (yes, I know her name is on the painting, but we're just going to stick with this initial thing okay) favourite colours were... but he's fairly useless when it comes to those things, and I got the half hearted answer of pink... followed by the fact that she'd painted her bedroom purple... so pink and purple is was.

Two shades of purple, three shades of pink, some glitter paint (the same stuff I used on Miss Oh Livia) and some white and silver, and voila! This was the painting where I'd originally put the pink glitter paint over the white circle... but it just didn't work... whether it was because you could see each individual little grain of glitter, and see how it all clumped up together, or what, I don't know... but I ended up painting over it, which was something of a chore in itself, since whatever the "paint" is that binds the whole thing together (I actually think it's glue given that it's clear and dries that way), once you put more paint over the top of it, it sucks up all the moisture in the liquid and makes it really thick. But I got there in the end.

Not bad all in all actually... and you can't say that I don't give unique presents (not that this is her only pressie... I also got her one of the Whatever It Takes mugs).

Current Mood:

early morning headfcuk

headfcukGoddamit... it's too early in the freakin morning to have already had this much of a headfuck...

On top of which I appear to have "set fire" to my forehead... but more on that in a second.

Over the last couple of days I keep getting these little popup things telling me that I'm running out of diskspace. Which, when the first lot popped up, I didn't really think about... I mean, I know I only have a fairly small (as these things go) C drive, and that is where I keep all of the shots I take with my digital camera, so I figured that maybe I was running low on space.

So on Friday I went through and moved a truckload of the digital photos over to my external hard drive, figuring that would fix the problem... I had about 3 GB free, no worries. Then last night I got the same alert again... "Low Disk Space". I looked at how much space I had left... less than 100 MB... um... sorry... WHAT THE FUCK!

I just couldn't work it out... I had three gig... now all that was full? Please explain? So this morning I tinkered around to see if I could work out what the hell was going on. And it turns out that, for whatever reason, folders inside one of my Norton Antivirus's folders were just replicating themselves (they can't have been downloading, otherwise my ISP would have sent me messages telling me I was low on download space from them)... and not only that, they were replicating in the Windows Temp folder too... I didn't count how many were in the temp folder, but when I scribbled it down this morning, there were 258 additional folders that had been created since Friday morning in the Norton folder... 3.71 GB's worth. And it can't be a virus, because my virus checker ran yesterday and didn't find a single thing... or, you know, if it is, then it's a brand new virus that the software can't detect yet.

This, truly, is the very last thing I need.

So this morning I sent off an email to the folks at Norton, which could take as much as two days to get answered... and now I wait.

On the upside, at least J is back this week some time and I can always ask him about it.

In the meantime I just have to hope and pray that it doesn't keep doing it... and that I get a speedy (and positive and helpful) response from Norton.

Of course, all this meant that I just felt like crap... but I suddenly remembered that I had some peppermint essential oil, and that a certain blogger keeps mentioning it's benefits... so I got it out (actually I was kinda surprised it still smelled okay, since it's really, really old now) and sniffed it a bit to see if that would calm my stomach, that kind of thing... then I decided to do something that was possibly very stupid, and rubbed some on my forehead between my eyes.

First it was nice... well, except when I moved and peppermint fumes sort of wafted into my eyes a little... then as I was sitting here, the "burning" started... actually I kind still feel it, even though I've washed it off... it's that kind of "so cold it's hot" feeling. Very weird. And just shows you the kind of day I'm probably going to end up having.

It better improve before tonight though, because I have plans dammit... and I'm not about to call them off because the Universe has decided to use me as a punching bag...

Current Mood:

foot sore shopping

shop til you dropTechnically this should have been called "Voting and Shopping"... but my feet are sore/tired, so we'll go with this title...

So, obviously, today is (FINALLY) the election here in Oz... and Ma and I wandered down to the local primary school to do our civic duty at the Crack of Sparrow's Fart (ie, early), like you do.

There were a ton more people there than I'd kind of expected, given that it wasn't that long after 8am, and as far as I'm aware, that's when the polling opened.

As always I started filling out my forms with the people I didn't want and worked backwards (on the green form anyway)... I stood there with the white form for a while just staring at all the little boxes (and that song they use as the title song for Weeds kept popping into my head... "Little boxes, made of ticky tack, little boxes on the hillside, little boxes all the same... etc")... now normally I'm a good little voting citizen, and I number all (in this case) 46 boxes below the line. But I just kept staring at them and seeing things like the "What Women Want" party and the "Shooters" party and whatever other freakshows had their names down there, and you know, I really couldn't be bothered with it all. So I did the thing I've never done before in however many elections I've participated in... I just ticked one box above the line and handed in my forms.

Not that it really matters one way or the other... the two parties that I actually want to be in charge of things never will be. I just want the whole freakin thing to be over with so we can all get on with our lives and not have to listen to all this blah blah blah blah... because, really, a) it's about time for a change (and it does look like that's the way the winds are blowing)... and b) like it really matters anyway.

But enough of my probing and insightful political commentary...

Next came the usual Supermarket Wander... but there isn't really anything much to report there... I usually end up buying mostly the same stuff every week... or at least variations on the theme thereof, so it's not like it's a revelation.

Since I've been hunting around for a couple of extra things to go in the "Goodie Basket" I'm making up for J, we headed into town with only really a kind of vague idea about where the hell we were going.

I swear, we REALLY need to make more of a whole plan thing when we go shopping like this... we must have been up and down and up and down and up and down and up and down the mall far too many times. Partially it was my own fault... I only got inspired about something to get for Showgirl and Rockstar during the second half of the excursion, and because I'd been looking in all the toy stores for something for J, we ended up having to go to all the same places a second time. Less fun. And I couldn't find the particular kind of fluffy toy I wanted for Showgirl, so that was just annoying... I mean I could find the right animal, but not many of them, and the ones I could find just weren't "right". So the search continues.

Strange happenstance while we were in Myer... we found these cute little toiletry bag that were some fashion brand that I have heard of, but the name of which escapes me right now (I want to say "Industri" but I don't think that's right... or even spelled correctly)... in conjunction with Canteen... so they had these quite sizeable bags complete with a (cheap) toothbrush and holder, a soap case and a razor case. And they had both "boy" and "girl" versions. Anyway, Ma decided that she was going to get some for random quasi teenage girlies, so we picked out four and were looking for a register when this blonde woman dressed in Myer black just seemed to walk out of nowhere and usher us over to her register. Turns out that not only had she seen Ma and I at the polling booth in North Adelaide this morning (although neither of us remember her... probably because we were more focused on just doing what we had to do and getting the hell out of there than looking around at the peoples)... but she lives just down the street from me and sees me out walking in the mornings. So the nice blonde lady from Myer could be stalking me. Scary.

Okay, she's obviously NOT stalking me... but I'm going to have to keep a lookout for her house number on Monday, so I know where it is... and can, you know, be all ninja-like when I go past there... or wave if I see her or something.

Oh, and Lush is finally open in the Mall... supposedly they were going to open in October... and here we are at the end of November... but they're open now. And I have to say... it's a bit of a weird store (okay, it's a REALLY weird store when you get down to it... "Yeah, I'll take 200 grams of that soap thanks!"... whatthe?) but I kinda dig it! Expensive, and a large amount of the stuff is kinda useless to me since I don't have a bathtub, but still groovy. I made the either smart move, or else fatal mistake, of asking one of the little Lush girlies (and, hello, where the hell were the cute little Lush gayboys... what's up with that?) about some random product... no, I tell a lie... actually, even worse than that, I made conversation when she commented that something had been knocked over or some such... and next thing I knew she was taking me (and Ma) around the store showing us various things. Interesting, but I'll probably know not to do that again. Unless, you know, they get cute gayboys.

We're actually doing pretty well as far as the whole Christmas shopping thing is concerned. I mean, I know that I don't really have that much stuff I need to get, but I have most of the stuff that I want (other than something to actually put all of J's Goodie Basket stuff INTO... that and the stuff for the remaining two thirds of The Spawn of Sheeba)... and Ma is only a couple of items short of finishing her shopping. Of course, the way the Universe works, those couple of things will take from now until Christmas Eve to actually find... but it's still pretty impressive.

Part of the reason that my feet ended up killing me, other than all the walking we did... was my thongs. Actually I don't know if it was the thongs, the walking, the fact I had body lotion on my feet, or WHAT... but not only do I not have a blister on the top of my foot, but my feet were BLACK under the straps of the thongs (which are also black... hence where the black came from). Icky. I should really have worn my red sandals...

Crap... I just made a list of things I need to do and stuff I'm doing during the next week... it does look as though next weekend may well be one of those "not enough time to scratch myself" kind of weekends. Fuuuuuuun...

And it's only a month until Christmas... then it will be 2008 already. Where did the year go?

I think I might wander off, fall down and go boom now... if you'll excuse me...

Current Mood:

photo friday: outline girl

outline girlOne of the little bits of street art I saw on Wednesday's ramble...

I love the style of this... it's very "Japanese manga/anime" with the minimum of lines and the dots for tears... not to mention what looks like a rainbow on her cheek.

It was at the back of a lot that looked as though it had been a building at one point, but most of it had been torn down... or maybe there were just buildings on all three sides and that spot had always been empty... I dunno. Whatever it used to be, it's currently serving as a makeshift carpark.

And parts of the brickwork had been covered with, I think, old posters at some point, which had been ripped off, leaving some clear white areas for artworks. And there was Outline Girl, hidden down near the grassline, right at the back of the lot...

I don't think I even would have seen her if it hadn't been for the fact that another piece of street art caught my eye on one of the side walls and I'd stopped to look at it.

Current Mood:

twenty questions

I nabbed this one from Muzbot this morning...

  1. Who do you think you are?
    "Some kind of superstar... you've got to swing it, shake it, move it, make it, who do you think you are"... sorry, I was chanelling The Spice Girls for a second there... but seriously, I have no idea who the hell I am... why don't YOU tell me who you think I am?


  2. What turns you on?
    Accidentally revealed flesh (especially lower belly or the small of the back) and kissing.


  3. What is your favorite word?
    As I said to somebody online yesterday, I always like the word "bugger"... I like the way it feels in your mouth when you say it (and you can take that as dirtily or as cleanly as you like).


  4. What sound or noise do you love?
    Rain on the roof (or, more appropriately, since I live in a ground floor unit, on the window and other people's rooves) and/or thunder.


  5. Have you driven anyone insane?
    Oh hell yes... of this I have NO doubt.


  6. What should everyone shut up about?
    Sport, the election (but that will all be over bar the crying and complaining come Sunday) and what celebrity is doing what to whom with which body part.


  7. What advice should you have taken, but did not?
    I can't think of any advice that I actually chose not to take, as much as stuff I COULDN'T take for whatever reason... and the top of the list would have to be "You should really find a bigger apartment".


  8. What do you fear most?
    The unknown.


  9. How would you like to die?
    Quickly and painlessly.


  10. What is your earliest memory?
    I'm not sure really... partly because I sometimes have trouble seperating out what's actually a memory and what's a story I've been told over and over and over with or without photographic reinforcement. Nothing really stands out though.


  11. Do you collect anything?
    Yes... collections, and dust. I don't really collect any one thing, but I do seem to just amass THINGS... books, DVDS, random bits and pieces.


  12. What is your worst addiction?
    Food. Possibly followed by the internet.


  13. Who would you have liked to be?
    Other than somebody wealthy, beautiful and stupidly well hung, no actual names spring to mind.


  14. What did your last text message say that you received?
    Ummm... I don't think I kept it, but it was something about "we're all up and organised and if you can come over that would be good" or something from Sheeba yesterday.


  15. What was your proudest moment?
    Again, nothing really springs to mind, except possibly when I bought my red sofa, since it was the first time I'd actually bought furniture... but that just seems a little tragic when I write it down.


  16. What was your last lie?
    "I don't remember where I was, I think it was in a shop."


  17. What is your biggest challenge?
    Probably myself...


  18. Who's underrated/overrated?
    Underrated: It's really annoying because half my answers seem to be "I can't think of an answer for this"... but this is another one. I can't think of a "who" that's underrated at this precise moment.
    Overrated: The entire AFL industry


  19. What is your most treasured possession?
    My cameras and photographs.


  20. What do your parent think of what you are doing?
    What, you mean right now? For the most part Ma's okay with what I do and/or don't do... although not so much with the whole lack of job situation, but then I'm not real thrilled about that either.

Current Mood:

holding da baby

awwwwwwwwI wasn't sure whether or not I was going to end up going to Sheeba's today or not... we'd made noises about getting together again as I was leaving last week, but I hadn't heard anything from her (apart from a quick, completely unrelated text message)... so I kind of assumed nothing was going to happen... and then I got a text message quite early this morning asking if I wanted to come over.

And I ended up staying there all damn day...

I left here just before 10am, and got home around 9pm... and sitting here thinking about it, I have NO idea where the day went.

I do know that I spent a large chunk of the day holding, sitting with, carrying or otherwise carting around Showgirl (the artist formerly known as Small Child Number 3)... once she eventually woke up (around lunch time I think), with a couple of expections when either I was eating, she was having a feed (although I did give her a bottle and some yoghurt earlier in the day, which was entertaining for all concerned I think) or the couple of times she went back down for a short nap, she was with me. She's just a cruisy little baby... she didn't throw up, or cry (other than towards the end of the evening when she was overtired) or anything... she was quite happy to just sit on my lap (or be carted around) just hang out with me. Actually, I could have put her down at any point, but I really didn't want to... there's something about just having a little person sitting in your lap that's somewhat addictive. Yes, it did mean that I had to take my glasses off for a vast chunk of the day (babies with grabby hands and eyeglasses just don't mix), but that was a small price to pay.

And then there's my whole ongoing thing with babies... they just seem to find me amusing (or at least vaguely interesting) for some strange reason.

I also think that Rockstar (the artist formerly known as Small Child Number 2) got somewhat more used to me after, you know, about the six or seven hour mark. He's still not completely sure, but we'll get there.

Like I was saying though, I have NO idea where the hell the day went (or what the hell we talked about really)... Sheeba and I just sat in the back yard under the veranda gasbagging... ALL FREAKIN DAY! Even after Tikiman (the artist formerly known as Husband Number 2) came home, he hung out with us a bit, then went inside to do his own thing, then came back out again, etc... Sheeba and I still sat out in the yard yacking away about everything and nothing. Well, at least until it was around dinner time and we all ended up sitting around eating pizza and watching Grand Designs (because, of course, Tikiman and Sheeba are both already fans of both that AND Time Team)... but then suddenly it was 8:30 and I just dragged my rather tired butt home again.

It was a hell of a nice day though!

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random disney hotness

Our Random Hotness this week comes via that superstore of artistic expression, deviantART... actually I think it was one of those cases where I followed a link from somebody's blog, but I don't remember the who and where now. But anyway, it lead me to the artwork of 24 year old David Kawena from Israel.

David has this whole "gay Disney aesthetic" going on (although, really, it's not like there are no gay folks at Disney, look at Dean DeBlois, co-director of Lilo & Stitch for example... I read an article he'd done with, I think, The Advocate somewhere online), which is actually quite sexy... yes, yes, I know they're just drawings, but they're SEXY drawings.

Case in point are his series of "Disney Heroes"... the men of Disney movies (usually the actual "heroes" of the story, but not always) all done up like Calvin Klein models in their tighty whiteys... and I have to tell you, narrowing it down to just two wasn't easy, but in the end I picked his versions of Jim Hawkins from Treasure Planet and Tarzan from, well, Tarzan. Sexy, sexy, sexy, sexy...

disney heroes - jim hawkinsdisney heroes - tarzan

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sidestreets part three

space 2007rude boys 2007
Yes, today was another Sidestreets and Alleyways day...

I needed to head into town anyway for something else, so I figured while I was there I'd take my camera and wander around near where I did the last wander, but on the other side of Morphett Street/Hurtle Square.

city - even more south westOnce again I probably missed a bunch of streets, but I wandered between Gilbert Street and Gouger Street (actually I made it as far as Grote Street, which is one street further north, but only very briefly) at the north and south ends and Morphett Street at the east edge and almost to West Terrace at the, unsurprisingly, west end.

And because I wasn't that far away from the last area, it was still that weird mix of residential and commercial buildings, but there seemed to be more street art this time than last time.

Interestingly, like last time possibly the best street art was found down the end of little windy hidden sidestreets. Although I suppose that's not THAT surprising given that the street artists in question probably don't want to be seen while they're doing what they're doing. One of the pieces was the little blue guys (aka "The Rude Boys") up at the top, who, with their little wings and stubble and extreme underbites I think are actually really cute. But then that's me.

The "Space" shot was actually part of the sign on the outside of an architect's office... it actually said "human space", but I quite liked how it looked when it was cropped down like this.

I probably could have wandered around a while longer, maybe even gotten a couple of streets further over, but my camera battery gave up the ghost again (which I knew it was going to, since it's been flashing it's little battery icon at me since last weekend), so once it called it a day, so did I, and wandered off to the Central Markets to grab something to eat (and I also managed to find part of J's Christmas present that I've been looking for with no success for a while now, so I was quite happy about that).

I think when I do the next one of these I'm going to try a different corner of town... maybe something in the north west or even north east corners.

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movies: elizabeth: the golden age

elizabeth: the golden age - woman. warrior. queen.  Ma decided she was going to take the day off today (and that makes three days out of the last four I've spent with her), so instead of going to the movies in the evening, we went to the very first session of the day (which, okay, was actually 11am, but still)... of course that meant it was only us and two other people in the whole cinema (we very nearly were the whole entire audience, but they came in at the last minute... damn them).

And today's movie choice was Elizabeth: The Golden Age... which was the other possible choice from Sunday's movie visit. Neither Ma nor I had actually seen the original when it came out back in 1998 (or since), but luckily it was on during the day last week, so I taped it. Not that we necessarily needed to have worried, this "sequel" doesn't really rely on the first movie very much at all... but it was nice to know some of the backstory to the relationship between Cate Blanchett's Queen and Geoffrey Rush's Sir Walsingham, since they are about the only characters that exist in both movies. Plus I didn't really know that much about Queen Elizabeth, beyond a few random facts, so knowing how she got to where she is in the second movie was a help too.

I will say that it seems like all the royalty of that time period were a little insane... whether it was from all the inbreeding, the toxic substances (I'm think lead based makeup and the like) they would have ingested and whathaveyou... because both Cate as Elizabeth and Jordi Mollà as King Phillip of Spain seem, at points, to have climbed a little too highly up the crazy tree. Mollà especially seems a touch unbalanced (and I don't know, maybe Phillip was actually unhinged)... but at the same time he never really seems that "menacing" as a villain... but I suppose, being a historical drama they couldn't paint him as a complete moustache twirling bad guy, because that would have been disrespectful. I did keep expecting his little daughter to just give him a slap though... she might have been under 10, but even though she never uttered a single line she had that whole disdainful look down.

As far as plot goes, since I already kind of knew how the events (as far as the "war" everything is building towards) turned out, it was a little like Titanic... you know the ship is going to sink, you're just waiting to see when. And like I said before, there was a bunch of stuff that I wasn't aware of that was interesting (although whether some of it actually happened, or happened exactly that way or not, who knows).

Interestingly both with this movie and the original I felt a little like there was some of Cate's performance as Elizabeth in her performance as Galadriel (and given that she played the "Elf Queen" somewhere in the middle of her two turns as Elizabeth, there's probably some more of her Galadriel in this second outing as The Virgin Queen), even if it was only her whole tone of voice on occasion when she's getting all queenly and imperious.

The rest of the cast do really well (although the irony of having Australians in two of three lead roles in the movie kind of amuses me... three out of four if you count the amount of time that Abbie Cornish actually spends on screen, although she doesn't get her name above the title on the poster)... I will say though that Clive Owen just leaves me cold. He's not a bad actor as far as these things go, but he didn't come across as terribly sexy or charismatic or anything (certainly not enough that I was sad he never picked up the gig as James Bond)... to me anyway... I think Ma had a slight moment though.

I'm guessing that a lot of the Queen's costumes were based, at least in part, on paintings done of the real queen at the time, but even if some of them are just flights of fancy, costume designer Alexandra Byrne (who also did the first movie) did a beautiful job, as did the people in charge of Cate's hats (Christian Dior's milliner, Stephen Jones) and "hair tacos" (as Ma called one of the things that I actually thought looked more like a butterfly in Cate's hair). But then they do tend to get those things right on historical dramas for the most part.

All in all it was probably a fairly "level" movie... it was good, but not great... it found its level and I don't know that it really rose much above it (although on the plus side it never dipped down to become worse either). I mean, Elizabeth was always called The Virgin Queen, so that takes care of that plot... and it's historical fact who won the war with the Spanish and what happened to Mary Queen of Scots, so there really couldn't be THAT many surprises in the plot. So yeah... good, not great.

yani's rating: 2 armadas out of 5

angled corners

downpipe corneroptus corner
I was flicking through my Featured Photo folder this morning and realised that the angle of the shots was almost identical (not completely, but then the buildings are two very different heights)... the one on the left is from my first Sidestreets excursion and the one on the right is from the second one.

It's been something of a weird day today... after tempting fate on Sunday morning by saying that I almost never get sick, I started feeling somewhat off in the evening (I'm still not sure why... I only really ate a couple of things (neither of which should have had an adverse reaction on my system) after Ma left, but just felt all conjested and "throaty" as the night went on. I'm still not back to 100%, but I am feeling better than I was.

And I got a very odd envelope in the mail this morning too... a set of eight Christmas cards (plus two bookmarks and a pocket calendar) from the Mouth and Foot Painting Artists... it was one of those "charity" letters I get occasionally, it was just the number of cards (and before I opened it, the thickness of the envelope) that threw me... now one or two cards, to show off their work, I can understand... but EIGHT? And they're not bad either... not totally my tastes, but I'll pass them along to Ma, I'm sure she can make use of them.

Oh, and my old "Countdown to Sydney" counter disappeared over the weekend (the website just ceased to be), so I did find a new one... although it's only counting down to the day, not the time... and it seems to not only be half an hour out, but also have this weird thing when it's before the half hour, the "hour" count is right, but after the half hour the hour drops by one for no reason... weird. But it'll do, since it's mostly the days I'm worried about anyway.

Now if only the change would come in and the weather would cool down, then I'd be a happy yani...

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unconscious mutterings 250

Sing with me and find the key... Unconscious Mutterings...

  1. Toasty :: Roasty

  2. Allegations :: Accusal

  3. Herb :: Spice

  4. Bacon :: Lettuce and Tomato

  5. Neck to neck :: Cheek to cheek

  6. Simon :: Marius

  7. Heels :: Head over

  8. Fundamentals :: Women's basketball has good fundamentals (obscure Futurama joke)

  9. Middle :: Ages

  10. Seasonings :: Mixed

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movies: gabriel

gabriel - far from graceMa and I went out for Round 2 of shopping today down at Marion, mostly so we could go down to this arts and crafts thing nearby that turned out to be a bit of a waste of time.

And because the Marion Megaplex is turning 10 this weekend, all their movie tickets were $8, so after we'd wandered around Marion for a few hours and picked up almost nothing (well, that's not completely true, I got J's sister's birthday present, and we found a mini collapsible tripod for me, and a couple of other odds and ends for various people) we decided to go and see something at the movies... it was a toss up between two movies, and we actually hadn't made a decision before I went up to the box office to buy the tickets, but as I was standing there the first movie title out of my mouth was Gabriel (we'll go and see the other one on Tuesday).

Gabriel is one of those movies that I hadn't heard anything about until quite recently... then I saw the poster somewhere and read a brief blurb about it being about butt-kicking angels, and the trailer (which has been airing during episodes of Heroes for the last couple of weeks) looked pretty cool... all dark and broody and fighty and whatnot.

I did read in yesterday's paper that the writer/director, Shane Abbess, ran out of money part way through the post production of the movie and actually had to go and work in a call centre (I think) during the day while editing the film at night.

My first comment to Ma after the film was over... "He should have worked a little more overtime."

Now before I start slagging parts of the movie off I will say this... the premise is fantastic (although I will admit that until I reread the blurb I'd forgotten it all takes place in purgatory, which, for the purposes of the movie, takes the form of one large city... but that fact actually makes some things make a little more sense)... and what he did with the money that I assume he was having to work with was fairly impressive... a little raw around the edges, but still impressive... plus the lead actor, Andy Whitfield is freakin hot (especially with the ultra blue "angel eyes"). I could even have lived with somewhat sloppy camera focus in a number of scenes (if that had been the only problem)...

My number one total and complete pet peeve about this movie is the quality of the image. After the opening scene with Gabriel which is pretty sharp and crisp it cuts to a scene with a number of the major villains which looked like it had been filmed, not only through a thick layer of muslin, but on a digital file that had then been copied and copied and copied and saved at a lower resolution each time... the quality was APPALLING! Not to mention the addition of some sloppy focus too.

When you have massive rectangular digital artifices appearing in your images, it's time too look at your quality control processes. And it kept happening... although, interestingly enough it only seemed to be in whatever scenes Gabriel wasn't a part of... scenes of Gabriel alone, usually crystal clear... scenes of Gabriel and another character, a little sloppy, but you could have chalked it up to a visual style had it been throughout the whole movie... scenes without Gabriel in at all, HORRIBLE! There's one scene when three of the "Fallen" (ie the bad guys) are talking in a bar and there's some source of red neon that is flashing across one side of each of their faces as they talk... it honestly looked as though their faces were warping or melting or something. Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad.

At one point I was looking at the screen wondering if Abbess had actually had the movie projected onto a large size screen before he signed it off as done, it was almost like he'd spent the whole time working on it on a 15" monitor and then suddenly it's sprayed I don't know how many metres tall and the image looks like crap.

Except of course when your lead actor is on screen.

Maybe they shot all of the stuff with Whitfield on his own in the first week when they still had money for things like a focus puller and visual effects, I don't know. Supposedly the movie was one of the first features to be filmed using the JVC HD101 camera, but I don't know that if I was from JVC I'd really want them to advertise that fact too widely.

And given that the majority of the cast seemed to be unknowns or people who haven't done a lot of recognisable work (with the exception of Home and Away cast member Amy Mathews in a very, very small role which kinda threw me for a second since she was the first "recognisable" face) I can forgive that a large number of the supposed "neutral or mid-pacific" accents kept slipping... lord knows I have enough trouble keeping to one accent when I'm messing around with silly voices. Plus the whole "inexperienced cast" thing somewhat excuses the occasional lapse in acting ability by some of the peripheral characters... as well as the complete lack of charisma from the lead villain, Dwaine Stevenson aka Sammael (every time somebody said his name I automatically thought of Hellboy though... since the "demon dog things" in that movie are also called Sammael) with his freaky white contact lenses (which were crooked on more than one occasion) and passing resemblance to the lead singer of Aerosmith is something else altogether. I'm just glad that he didn't end up as Gabriel as they'd planned in an early version of the script.

I can also understand, given their seemingly tight budget, that you would do whatever you could to save money and I think that costume designer, Lisa Walpole, raided the wardrobe department where the crew from The Matrix movies left their stuff after they were done, because I swear that one of the characters is wearing Morpheus's sweater (that he wears in the real world)... if it's not Morpheus then it was Neo's... I totally recognised the couple of artful little tears in the shoulder and one lower down...

In some ways that's part of the problem with this movie... it's trying to be The Matrix and The Crow and Underworld and probably some other things that I can't think of right now... but without the finances or visual eye (or the acting in some cases) to back it up.

And I will freely admit the final scene in the movie pretty much makes NO sense... but only when you stop and try and explain what it was all about to the person you're with... then you suddenly realise that you actually have no idea what it was supposed to be about.

All in all it's not a terrible movie (image quality issues notwithstanding)... it's not the most original or unique idea ever made into a feature film, but you do get carried along fairly well, and it's not overly predictable (in spots, yes... as a whole, no). But I honestly can't bring myself to recommend it as a cinema movie because of the quality issues. It might be better on the smaller screen, especially if they can go back in and improve the quality, but I can't be sure.

Which is a shame, because it really is a pretty cool concept.

yani's rating: 1 Arc out of 5

germy wormy keyboard

how many germs live on your keyboard?And yet I almost never get sick...

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overheated shopping

Today was something of a shopping non-event I have to say... oh, we went shopping, but it was all a bit blah...

I'm guessing it was a combination of the fact that it's still quite warm out in the world (although cooler than it has been in a few days and with a halfway decent breeze)... plus Ma had her hair appointment this morning, which just delayed everything by two hours (even though I was actually up and out of bed at around 5:45 this morning), which meant that the supermarket was full of stoopid people all going about their business while getting in my way at every turn and taking up space... so I liked that less.

Oh, before I forget... I worked out that the "incense" smell from yesterday really IS my hair... it seems like every time I get it wet it smells like the bleach stuff... which is just weird, and it's never happened before. Dry it's fine, but wet I have a whole "stinkyhead" thing going on. Weird. I might call Tink on Monday and just ask her about it.

So the whole food shopping thing was about the usual... I have a jam packed freezer yet again... although this time it's particularly because of the loaf of bread and the carton of Milo icecream (what... I told you, it's hot)... plus the carton of blueberries and possibly something else. Every time I kept thinking I couldn't possibly fit another thing in the freezer, I'd find one more thing that needed to go in there. Stoopid petite freezer full of leftovers and meat products...

During the usual wander through the Red Circle Boutique I decided to try on a couple of pairs of shorts, since they seemed to be on special... now, me and shorts usually doesn't work, and I certainly never wear them out in the world (my pasty white legs are actually the least of my problems)... for whatever reason I'm just not built for shorts. But today for some reason I was having a good shorts day... whether it was because the changeroom I went into was dimly lit, or because I was having a good day for shorts, I don't know... but out of four pairs I tried on, three actually weren't too bad. I only ended up getting one pair though something nice and basic and black (and fairly thin material, so they'll be good for Summer, even though they are black)... not that that really matters, because about the furthest out of the house I'd be wearing them would be to the mailbox...

After we'd come back here and I'd put everything away we decided to go into town because Ma had to find something for this birthday party thing she went to tonight... so we just kind of wandered around aimlessly for a while. We did managed to visit The Charity Card Shop (we tried a couple of weeks ago but it wasn't open on weekends at the time) which is always fun... and I just realised that Ma took the Virgin and Child card that I got for me away with her, so I'll have to text her a bit later and get her to bring it back again tomorrow.

We also wandered up to The Reject Shop to grab a couple of the three in one canvas packs they had going cheap. I bought one on Monday when I was in town (so my trip wasn't completely wasted since I couldn't get the thing I originally went in for), and we grabbed another two today. Not bad value at $10 for three...

And that was about it really... after that we came back here and Ma sorted out the present (and I did a little bit of quick drawing artwork on the inside of the otherwise blank card... okay, just the age of the birthday individual, but it was all pretty and pink and green and spotty) and then took herself off to wherever the hell it is this birthday thing is... all I know is that it was closer to my place than her place so it didn't make sense for her to go all the way home, then back out.

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visiting sheba and unexpected haircut results

okay, so in this instance solomon was visiting sheba, but you get the ideaLordy, lordy, lordy, lordy... what a day this has been...

I actually debated making this two separate posts... and while it probably could have been... it was actually all one big grand day out, so we'll leave it like that.

I'm currently wolfing down a ham sandwich because not counting breakfast I've only really had a vegemite sandwich and a Chocollo milkshake all day, and it's kinda been one of those days.

So, my visit to The Land of Sheba...

I took off from here a little later than I'd planned... due mostly to having to come back to the house twice because the spider that's been living in my side mirror for weeks finally got the better of me and I had to get rid of the poxy thing (it was a big bugger too... it tried making a bid for freedom as I was pulling out of the carpark and I gave it a helping flick... so long as it's out of my life I don't care where it goes). But eventually I was on my way, and since Sheba only lives around the corner from the last place that I knew she was living, I just let the car kinda take me there on autopilot (which worked out quite well actually).

The weird thing was that as soon as I got there... and given how much time that has passed, it was all remarkably similar to days of yore... and speaking of which, last Sunday I went through all my old photos and scanned the nearly 100 photos that I'd taken during that whole time... anything that was vaguely Sheba-orientated, since she did mention that when I saw her on Saturday... that she'd figured she didn't have any chance (prior to us running into each other) of actually getting hold of copies of those photos... so now she has them all digitally. And that was a slightly weird wander down memory lane when I scanned the freakin things.

Which pretty much just reinforced that today was a whole world of "same same, but different"...

Because we only really had a couple of hours today we couldn't really cover EVERYTHING that's happened in the last three years as well as going over the last year and a bit of when we were still talking but as the wheels started to fall off, so we kind of did a general ramble, with some of the general topics outlined, some of the old ground revisited, a bunch of discussion about reasons why things all went kafluey... that kind of thing.

It's always interesting to see not only events of the past through the eyes of the other person who lived through them with you... but also yourself at that time through that person's eyes. There was stuff that I only marginally remember and some stuff that while I remember the event in question, I don't remember if my behaviour at the time actually matches up with the interpretation... I'm not saying it doesn't, I just honestly don't remember. It's possible that the truth lies somewhere in the middle... between her version and my version is what really happened. But then that's the way of all things really isn't it. Perception is key.

Raury got touched on a fair degree... which is to be expected, since he was the thing that more or less brought us together in the first place.. or if not the thing that BROUGHT us together, certainly someone that featured very largely in our collective relationship.

To some degree today's yakfest kind of reminded me of when we first met... long and involved conversations that would wind their way around a billion different topics... and although we did kind of come back to several of the topics, more than once in a couple of cases, it was all really easy.

Maybe because all the stuff that was brought up from the past has SO much water under it's bridge that it was easy to discuss it without getting all emotionally invested (if that makes sense) in the details. I will admit that there were a couple of things that Sheba said that are/were kind of niggling away in the back of my mind, partially because I think they were probably fairly true, but also because not only were they not particularly flattering but I honestly only vaguely remember the time in question. So we might just have to shove those down the back of the couch in my psyche, see if we can't lose them again.

And I'm still loving Small Child Number 3 to bits... but then me and little tiny people... for some reason it's a whole thing. I don't want one... I just like the ones that belong to other people.

Small Child Number 2 however still isn't sure about me... but he'll get over that in theory (or, you know, not... his choice).

So, in theory, we're possibly doing it again next Thursday... we both want to keep the lines of communication open, and while the nature of our relationship this time around is going to have to be different, if only because we're different people (to greater and lesser degrees) than we were the first time around, I think we'd like to try and find a way to reorient our relationship into something that works now.

And for reasons that I don't completely understand (but which don't surprise me) I now smell of incense... I didn't smell it earlier (although I was out in the world earlier, so maybe that accounts for it), but as soon as I walked into the house I could smell it on me... it's a very Sheba thing actually... and not unpleasant... just weird. Actually, it turns out that it was actually my hair... or at least I think it was... makes more sense anyway...

shave and a haircut, two bitsSo, seemingly in no time flat, it was time to take myself off into town to see Tink and "get my hair did"...

We won't discuss the fact that I seemed to get behind every slow driving, lane hogging, truck, bus and car on my way into town... or the fact that I had to do a whole big loop once I got into town since the carpark I originally tried to get into was flashing the "FULL" sign and had cars queuing up down the ramp. But eventually I got parked and got to the hairdressers, pretty much on time actually.

I'd actually been musing on what I was going to have done for a little while (since I booked the appointment probably)... and I knew I wanted something different... I don't really want to say "radically different"... since I don't think I could even come up with something anymore that was radically different from the hundred million billion trillion different things I've done with my hair over the years. It was, however, radically different from the last haircut I had... if only because we went lighter instead of darker.

My brief to Tink was "very short, and about three shades lighter than the haffundhaffundhaffundhaff colour we've done before"... so off she went to get the colour book and the style book and we kinda flicked through the style book and inbetween perving on some of the cute boys in the book we were pretty much on the same page (no pun intended) with the kind of style we were thinking of (although I'm not completely sure that my hair looks like any of them), and ended up picking out this colour that in the book pretty much just looked grey. But we both know from previous occasions how much red/warmth my hair throws when it's lightened, so I trusted Tink's instincts on it turning out the way I wanted it.

Which was a good trick, because technically I had NO idea what colour I actually wanted, other than "lighter"... and not "bleach blonde"...

In the end the whole style came out a little bit bootcamp, but that's possibly more about the way Tink styled it than the actual cut (or else my hair just does "bootcamp" when it's cut too short), and I'm sure after a little play around I'll find some way of wearing that that doesn't look quite so Village People "In the Navy"... Army... whatever. And the colour is "light"... in fact, the colour is actually what anybody in the sighted community would probably call blonde.

Like I said, technically I didn't want "blonde"... as in peroxide, really yellow and brassy blonde (or "bleached to within an inch of it's tiny life white blonde")... and that's not what I got... what I actually got was a really subtle and kinda natural looking colour... which is also, interestingly enough, almost EXACTLY the colour of my very blonde eyebrows (which probably helps it with the whole "looking natural" thing). So all in all I'm quite happy with the colour. We're going to run some even lighter (maybe white blonde, maybe just regular "fake" blonde) freehand streaks ("freehand" because my fat head is always too big for the stupid shower cap thing) through it just before Christmas... then who the hell knows what we're going to do before the Great Sydney Adventure... in theory I'll have grown this colour out by then... but we might have to do a reprise... since, you know, Sydney...

I always find it weird when you go in and have your hair coloured, although maybe this is just me... the fashion choices you made that morning with the darker (or, I guess, lighter... differently coloured anyway) hair initially seem quite odd with the new and improved hair colour. I have that thought a lot actually... maybe it's just because you've been wearing the black cape for so long (and maybe that's a way around it... just wear black, although it was WAY too hot for that today), the colour of whatever you're wearing comes as something of a surprise.

After I finally made it out of the carpark (I don't know what was going on... I must have hit some sort of mystical "3:30, lets all go home" time, because it took ages to just get out of the building), I swung past to see Stu and pick up my USB drive (FINALLY)... which was crammed full of various bits and pieces of music, which I've been enjoying while bashing this post out.

And that was pretty much my day... long, a little overheated, but with quite successful results.

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