What started out as a plan to take myself out for breakfast followed by a trip to buy something in the storage oeuvre turned, instead, into a distinct lack of either of those things and, as the pictures would suggest, a mini street art safari.
I did actually take myself to Melbourne Street (where I have two vouchers for two different cafes) but they both looked kinda busy and to be honest I was a little intimidated about going into either of them to eat alone. Normally I don't have a problem with that, and I did have a bag full of Collect magazine, iPhone and headphones, but even so it just felt weird, so after wandering up and down the street I gave up and went back to the car.
I'd planned on heading down to Arndale to see if I could find a suitable "toy box" (and yes, the quotes are there for exactly the reason you think they are... those kinda toys), but since I was already that close to the city I figured I would swing around the long way, snap some photos of the street art we discovered yesterday and be on my way.
Best laid plans of mice and men, as they say.
I really need to start carrying some 10c and 20c pieces in the car for parking though... if I'd originally planned to head that way I would have stuck some in my pocket, but as I was flying by the seat of my pants I didn't... in fact I was completely without change having not spent any money by that point.
And sadly, since they cancelled the Rundle Street Markets on a Sunday the car park is no longer free... although $4 for the whole day is pretty good.
When I hit Rundle Street I actually wandered off the wrong way down to Cocolat to get a hot chocolate (m'eh... hot, but I've had better) and then wandered along Rundle Street slowly swigging away on it.
I felt very boho hipster actually when I made it up to where the street art was... I still had some chocolate left and was taking photos with one hand and swigging away with the other. Completely pretentious, although slightly less so because it only looked like a giant coffee.
Although the Rundle Street Markets are no longer there, a number of the stallholders got together and decided to move the whole thing over to Hindmarsh Square, so I wandered over to see what was going on... and I have to say, it all felt decidedly low-rent. Actually, it just felt like some sort of school fete (okay, the stuff people was selling wasn't that bad, but there was a very fete kind of vibe to the whole thing)... needless to say, I didn't stay very long, just did one lap and then legged it.
Since Ma and I wandered around Rundle Mall yesterday, I wasn't really in the mood to do it again today, so I called it quits and wandered back to the car park, detouring for some street art on the way (that's where the Tavistock Lane picture comes in).
Thinking about it, today really came down to my routes from Point A to Point B... I was already in Melbourne St, so the city was closer... from Rundle St I figured I would detour around and head off to Arndale via the Morphett Street Bridge...
On my way through the city I realised that I wanted to stop off and actually photograph the Morphett Street Bridge thanks to this...
However, I know it's always a pain in the ass to find a park around that neck of the woods, doubly so without the aforementioned coinage, so I ended up doing a couple of laps and was driving past the Grace Emily when I saw the Be Free girl at the top of this post, and decided to just park there.
That meant I had to wander through the backstreets to get to the bridge and instead of going the more direct way I figured I would swing past the car park behind Higher Ground on the off chance there was any new street art.
As I was walking down the side street, I noticed the piece at the end seemed to be new, or at least I didn't really remember it... and as I got closer I realised it was really, really, really new... as in it was still being painted!
When I got closer I looked at the guy doing the work (I was directly behind him, so I couldn't see his face) and had the strangest feeling that it was Benzo... but figured it couldn't be because last I heard he was overseas.
He finally turned around and it was Benzo! He also remembered me (even though we've only met
twice... and I'm sure I came across as a total fanboy geek the
first time), shook my hand, and stopped to chat for a bit.
Part of me wonders if it's just because he's nice... or whether he partially remembers me from the first time we met, but the other two times he knows he knows me, but can't exactly place me. That right there is what you call Low Self Esteem ladies and gentlemen!
Anyway, we had a slightly surreal chat (surreal for me anyway... and not helped by what I'm guessing were TAFE students doing a fashion shoot in the background and being all half dressed girls and whatnot), then I wandered off towards the bridge.
And the bridge is actually more impressive than I thought it was going to be... although impossible to photograph all at once, and I think I'll have to slap my panorama program into shape before it will do what I want it to do (maybe I just need to stitch the photos together one at a time). It's also there the ampersand at the top of the post came from... and given that I do have a little bit of a thing about ampersands (if I had the room I'd probably collect them), I made sure I got some good shots of it.
Then after a quick detour on the way back where I discovered the whole side of a two story building covered in what I think is a very minimal Store design (that's the white cloud tentacle thing at the top) and a very bright and colourful unfinished piece, I wandered back to the car and called it a day...
But what with editing all the images, creating a bunch of posts for later and writing this up, I seem to have lost a big chunk of the afternoon/evening.
Current Mood: 
