montage monday: blue

blue 2006This is the last of the Monday Montage Colour Themes... Red and Yellow and Pink and Green, (I already did) Purple and Orange and last but not least, Blue. I have no idea what, if anything I'm going to do for next Monday... we'll have to see...

I'm in a weird kind of mood at the moment... possibly because it's my birthday tomorrow, and that always gets me musing on things.... Ma is coming down at about 10:30 for my pre-Birthday Birthday... I still have NO idea what we're going to do, or even where we're going to go for lunch... the weather is cool but it could rain, and I don't know that I want to go tromping about the place, plus it's a public holiday, so everything is shut.

On my 30th Birthday Ma and I went down to Glenelg (ie, the beach) and had Oysters Kilpatrick (amongst other things) down by the Bay, and I got a temporary henna tattoo on my forearm... this bigass curvy tribal thing... but me being me, it faded after like three days instead of the promised week and a bit... It was also a bit of a mixed blessing birthday, since all the people who I expected to either phone or text me to wish me a Happy Birthday didn't, but a bunch of people who I DIDN'T expect it from did it instead.

Last year I don't remember what I did with Ma on the weekend for my pre-Birthday, but I know that on the actual day my buddy J came over and gave me a beautiful carved wooden Laughing Buddha statue (who actually isn't Buddha at all) and we hung out watching Mythbusters, as we always did on a Monday evening... I can't for the life of me remember what we did for dinner though... maybe I cooked, maybe we got takeout...

This year I'll be spending my actual Birthday at Camera Club... haven't decided if that's a good thing or not yet...

One of the things my birthday always gets me thinking about (at least in recent years) is Amelia and Fiona... or, more accurately, their birthdays (or should that be two things)... Amelia and Fiona were in my junior primary classes with me (Fiona ended up being in the same schools up until high school, whereas Amelia moved away to Victoria)... Amelia's birthday is today, the 13th, mine is tomorrow, the 14th and Fiona's is Wednesday, the 15th. It was like being between two very lovely brackets. To be honest I hadn't thought about either of them in years, Ma had seen Fiona a few times in the bank (where Fiona worked), but never around my birthday. Then four or five years ago, just after I'd turned either 27 or 28, and I could see 30 staring down at me from on high, Amelia came to mind really really strongly, and I had this urge to track her down. Not to contact her, just to know that she was still in the world. I ended up finding her on one of those "old school friend" websites... although it took some doing, since she was married and had never listed my junior primary on her list of schools. It does mean though, that I think of her again around my birthday.

The other weird childhood memory that keeps floating around in my brain lately is possibly even stranger, and I have no idea WHY it keeps floating around, although maybe its all the walking... I was never an "athletic" kid... I hated sports, dreaded Sports Days... the whole deal... but every year when I was in primary school we had tryouts for the interschool athletics competition... it had it's own name, but I don't remember what it was... anyway, one year, when I was probably around 10 I guess, we were doing these tryouts, and we were doing some sort of short dash/sprint thing... probably like the 50m sprint or something... and for reasons that I no longer remember... either somebody gave me crap about my chances, or I just got bored with being expected to fail, I don't know... but I just decided to go flat out and see what happened. And I did... I went full speed, surprised even myself, and came either third or fourth... but I was nearly neck and neck with the kid who came in in front of me... the only problem was that whatever place I came in was one less place than the people who got on the team (I'm pretty sure I came fourth and the first three went off to the competition)... I never bothered again... But while this little thought has been wandering around my brain I have wondered how or if my life would have ended up differently had I come in the first three...

Further weirdness came from another one of my odd pseudo dreams on Saturday morning... I don't remember all of it, only that I was at some kind of boot camp (but without the actual army thing), along with Anthony Callea and a ton of other people... the "drill sergeant" person was testing everyone by throwing one of their personal items into a shallow section of ocean right next to the jetty type thing this boot camp was being run on... I remember that Anthony was there because his personal item was a beautiful SRL digital camera that the sergeant took apart and threw into the ocean in pieces... and my personal item? Turns out the thing I treasured most was a six pack of cans of Guinness... I have no idea what that was about...

Slightly more contemporary (and non-dream related) news now... when I checked my stats on Friday, there was a massive jump on Thursday up to over 230 pageviews... so I swung straight to the "Coming From" links... turns out it was because of my inclusion of Brent Corrigan in Random Hotness... Brent added both a link to the Random Hotness post as well as a link to my blog in his blogroll... and since then I've been averaging over 120 pageview a day... Cheers Brent!

I haven't heard back from the Stamp Man either... like I mentioned in last week's Monday Musings, I took my stamps in to sell, and he said I would have to leave them with him so they could work out what they were worth (which will pretty much just mean adding up the postage)... he said it would take a couple of days, so I expected to hear back before Friday... I'll have to call him tomorrow... he was kind of weird (even within the already defined weirdness of "works in a stamp shop")... he had two thumbs... on the one hand... his right thumb (I think) was actually split into two baby thumbs... it was so very weird and creepy and it was very hard not to stare at it...

Current Mood: just strange

only child...

You Are Likely an Only Child



At your darkest moments, you feel frustrated.

At work and school, you do best when you're organizing.

When you love someone, you tend to worry about them.

In friendship, you are emotional and sympathetic.

Your ideal careers are: radio announcer, finance, teaching, ministry, and management.

You will leave your mark on the world with organizational leadership, maybe as the author of self-help books.


I am indeed an only child...

Hmmmm.... Ideal careers: no, no, no, no and no...

Current Mood: barfy feelings

further hair adventures

Yep... it's been a while, but I have new hair... yaaaay!

I pretty much followed the same formula as last time, appointment at 9am, went into town around 8:30, grabbed some breakfast, then wandered down to the salon... only this time, the very cheap and very lovely 20c carparks were all full, so I had to park in one of the multistoreys. The plus side to that is that at 8:30 in the morning on a Saturday, you can pretty much park wherever you damn well like...

I got to the salon just as Tink was opening up which meant I didn't have to lurk around outside looking shifty again... always a bonus...

We basically did the same thing with my hair that we did last time... similar cut, although I asked her to go a little more texturey on top, which I think she did... I wasn't really paying attention at the time since we were chatting about Skyshow and movies we'd both seen and the zoo, amongst other things.

Once she'd done the cut, we went with the same colour again (the four halved, half 9A half 510, half 6% and half 9% one... which she explained to me that two of them are colour and two of them are developer, hence the four halves)... and again I got her to do the "reverse streaks", stripping the colour off in various places... although this time I got her to do it right after she'd put the colour on, thinking that she wouldn't actually get it all off, so my hair would still lighten a little, but it would have some variation... which I think it does... either that or it's just the differences between the bits with more product and less product...

When Tink was doing the conditioner massage thing that I love so very much once my colour was finished, Ma called me to check up whether I was done, since we were going to do a little shopping before it got too hot. I got home about five minutes before she got here and we went off to grab a few bits and pieces at the shops. I'm seeing her on Monday for my pre-Birthday Birthday (since I have Camera Club on Tuesday and Monday is a public holiday here... Adelaide Cup Day... yes, we have a day off for a dumbass horse racing carnival thingy)... so she didn't hang around for too long...

So, yeah... that was my Saturday morning... now I just have to try and stay out of the heat for the rest of the day...

Current Mood: still feeling a little odd... maybe it's pre birthday jitters?

photo friday: dragonfruit

dragonfruitThis is a Dragonfruit (aka Pitaya)... I bought one last week when I was shopping... it was pretty expensive at, from memory, $14 per kilogram, but it looked so weird I just had to try it. I only bought half a fruit, and I have it propped up a little in the shot.

The flesh was white with little black seeds in it, and tasted a little bit like a cross between lemon and kiwifruit... very refreshing though.

I should have taken a shot of it before I ate it, but I really like the skin.

Current Mood: a little tired

the five love languages

My primary love language is probably
Physical Touch
with a secondary love language being
Quality Time

Complete set of results
Physical Touch: 9
Quality Time: 8
Words of Affirmation: 6
Acts of Service: 4
Receiving Gifts: 3

Information
Unhappiness in relationships, according to Dr. Gary Chapman, is often due to the fact that we speak different love languages. Sometimes we don't understand our partner's requirements, or even our own. We all have a "love tank" that needs to be filled in order for us to express love to others, but there are different means by which our tank can be filled, and there are different ways that we can express love to others.

Take the quiz

Eddy stole the Klein Sexual Orientation Grid thingy from me, and in turn, found another quiz on the same site... so I'm stealing that from him. He and I SO speak different languages... but then I knew that already...

Current Mood: okay but a little weird

random brian hotness

To celebrate my birthday next week I'm doing another Howard Roffman related Random Hotness... this time from his new book, Loving Brian...

"At 18, Brian was more sexually open than almost anyone I’d ever known, yet still a complete sexual novice. He longed for experience. In that longing I sensed an opportunity for both of us. We made a deal: as he explored his sexuality, I would document the journey on film."

Guess what I want for my birthday...

loving brian by howard roffmanloving brian by howard roffman

Current Mood: mmmmmm hotness

sofa's comin home!

big red sofa 2006*sings to a conga beat*

Sofa sofa sofa... my sofa's comin' home'a....

FINALLY! After five weeks and two days, my lil red sofa is comin home to daddy! Granted, by the time it gets home it will be six weeks and one day... but who's counting...

And better yet, it comes home next Tuesday... on my birthday... yaaaaaay! Oh... I just realised... that also means that I will be getting cute delivery boys for my birthday, since Le Cornu's uses the cutest delivery boys... double yaaaaay!

The down side to all this is that I've had to do all the chasing up about it... they never rang me to say it was ready, they never even rang me today to say it was back... I had to chase them about it. Granted the woman I just spoke to said that it had "just come back"... but who knows what that means...

Current Mood: very happy about the sofa... not so happy about the service

movies: rent

rent - no day but todaySometimes you go to see a movie even when the critics have panned it, and you're rewarded with something good...

Sometimes the critics know what they are talking about...

Rent was, unfortunately, one of the latter...

I know... there will be people after my blood for saying that, but it just didn't work for me. I like my musicals with some actual plot between songs... not back to back to back to back songs taking the place of dialogue... especially when some of those "songs" are basically sung dialogue.

And I would have preferred a little more set up to how these people do or don't know each other... I mean Mimi dated Benny who used to live with Mark and Roger, but Roger doesn't know Mimi... and Mimi knows Angel, but Roger and Mark don't, yet Mark never bats an eyelid when Angel takes off "her" wig...

I mean, c'mon... boho and openminded is one thing... but even if he already knew that Tom only has a thing for drag queens... it's still a stretch...

It wasn't all bad... I'm very fond of the opening song, Seasons of Love... and for reasons I can't explain, I already knew the song and a lot of the words... I'm thinking I must have seen a documentary about the stage show at some point... that's the only thing I can think of that would explain it...

And there were some moments that made me smile, including the Tango Maureen number and the La Vie Boheme song in the restaurant, as well as whatever the song the two lesbians sing to each other at their party.

But I didn't connect with any of the characters... I didn't feel particularly involved in their stories and lives for the most part... whether that was the music distancing me from the emotions, or what, I don't know, but it didn't connect me to the movie.

There weren't even any stand out performances for me... I mean everyone was good, solid... and seeing that the only two lead cast members who didn't reprise their stage roles for this film were Rosario Dawson as Mimi and Tracie Thoms as Joanne, you would kind of hope that they knew what they were doing. But nobody stood out as being exceptional... of course on the other hand, that also meant that nobody stood out as being bad... which is a good thing I guess.

And there wasn't even any real eye candy... Wilson Jermaine Heredia was kinda cute when he wasn't wearing a skirt, and Anthony Rapp had a couple of nerdaliscious moments... but there wasn't anyone I just enjoyed watching every time they appeared.

I'm not sure if there were problems with the original story, or with Chris Columbus's directing, or just taking something that is so completely stage based and converting it to a movie, or some combination of all three, but while Rent had some nice moments, it just didn't grab me.

yani's rating: 1 bohemian out of 5

montage monday: north terrace

north terrace 2006I've giving the Monday Montage Colour Theme a rest for this week... instead I used a bunch of the shots I took at Tuesday's Camera Club shoot...

Oh, and thanks to my little accident on Friday, I now have a great honkin' scab on my knee... very attractive... not... Add that to the blisters on the balls of both my feet... yeah... less fun...

One of the plus sides of the Adelaide Fringe is seeing random quasi famous people in and around town... on Thursday it was Ross Noble, then on Saturday when I was out with Ma, Akmal Saleh (who I actually don't think is the least bit funny) and possibly Eddie Perfect (he was wearing sunglasses but it did look like him)... the down side of the Fringe? Getting buskers from around the world coming down and clogging up the Mall... never fun... especially those buskers who either have amplification for their act, or just aren't as funny as they think they are, or both...

Today's big plus so far was listening to the radio during my walk this morning... the boys on Triple J's breakfast show had Josh Pyke on the show! And they did a "punk" version of Josh's Middle of the Hill... which included the weather around Australia... very cool... *big girly sigh*

My sofa is fixed! Yes, finally... That doesn't mean I have it back yet... but I called them last Wednesday after I hadn't heard anything, and the woman at Le Cornu's rang the manufacturer and then called me back... the sofa is fixed, which means they will deliver it to Le Cornu on Tuesday, which means I should have it back before the end of the week... yaaaay!

At some point this week (probably today) I have to head into town to try and sell "my" stamp collection that Ma and I unearthed during the overhaul of her spare room... I say "my" because technically it was never mine, it was started for me as some kind of possible investment... we'll see what, if anything, comes of it...

Current Mood: a little sore but happy

il cielo che danza parte due

the dancing moon 2006After the less than stellar evening Ma and I had on Saturday night at Il Cielo che Danza, aka The Dancing Sky, we did end up going again tonight...

What a difference a little forward planning makes!

We left about an hour an a half earlier, meaning that we left my place just after 5:30pm (quite something when you consider the fact that the actual performance didn't start until 9pm). I took my tripod (which made ALL the difference). We managed to score a park out the front of my old apartment building (yes, we could have walked it, but we still had to walk down the hill and past the cricket grounds both there and back, so we decided to "cheat" the last bit between there and my place). We'd staked out the places that we thought would be good spots last night and headed straight down there tonight, staking out a claim while there was still a fair amount of space to spare.

And like last night the people kept coming and coming and coming... good lord... standing up after it was all over and looking back up the slope it was just a sea of people... and because they'd closed the main road off, we ended up walking along the road on the way back to the car along with what felt like a billion other people... I said to Ma that it felt like we were doing some kind of protest march, walking along on the road with that many people.

Anyway, getting back to the actual performance... because we were basically front(ish) row, just off center, we had a fantastic view of the whole thing... and when you could actually see it, it was SO much better! I did have to keep reminding myself in certain spots to spot taking pictures and actually look up at what was happening, especially since just about every shot I took I got the "This shot is blurred" message on...

I was just happy that I managed to score a clear image of the "moon" balloon and dancer... it was my favourite...

Current Mood: still tired but much happier than after last night