Snug

No one would ever accuse me of being a domestic goddess.

I’m the first to admit I have better things to do than dust, sort, clean and wash.  Like sitting on the sofa doing crochet or reading a good book.  Things I actually enjoy.

Every now and then though I get the urge to clean, sort and wash.  I like to throw open the windows, crank up the tunes and get stuck into it. On Friday when I left work, it was chilly but clear skies.  I was revved up for a weekend chucking stuff out, filling the house with fresh air and finally being able to see the top of my desk.

But conditions needed to be right.

Rain of any sort kills the urge, dead.  Torrential rain just makes me want to hibernate like a bear, tucked into my warm, dry pit.  Eating beans from a tin while wearing baggy tracksuit bottoms and wearing Uggs.  Only going outside to get more wood for the fire.

I have been eating things other than beans, but the clothing of choice has involved sheepskin boots and I have been tucked up on the sofa.  The cats have been happy with this arrangement also.

If I didn’t have to get up and go photograph an event tonight I think I would stay in bed.  It’s warm here.  It’s dry here and I can listen to the sound of the falling rain in the comfort of knowing it isn’t going to get me.

Flower in my garden with fly and raindrops

The rapid pitter patter that ebbs and flows.  The tin roof amplifying the sound of every droplet that lands on it.  Watching the sky’s teardrops chase each other down the window to the ground. 

I like these things from the inside when tucked up snug as a bug in a toasty cocoon.

Mardi Gras

On Saturday I walked in the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. I’ve only ever watched from the sidelines before so it was an experience to be on the other side of things.

I arrived in the float marshalling area just after 5pm wearing a red latex dress, a grey overcoat, trainers and the rest of my outfit in a Coles recycled bag. After I found the Hardcore Heaven float I caught with the people who invited me to walk with them. A~ and GC have been around for a while and they are great. GC has her Adams Apple removed on the 17th and A~ worships the ground GC walks on, following her in seven inch heels. I make a great handbag holder when we’re out and about.

A~ painted my eyes with gold and black while wearing black brief and bra and pink feathered headband and just before being wrapped in a purple and black rope corset. My corset went on much easier than hers. Then I went for a walk amongst the other floats.

Photo 75 is where I lost count. I was walking with a new acquaintance, also dressed in red and black latex and every time we stopped to take a picture, we where hauled into several. The crowd screaming at the railing also wanted to take snap shot. It was weird but strangely exhilarating. I hung around the float for what seemed like an age. I chatted with other float folk, but from the float I was on and other floats.

The float that confused me though was Animal Liberation. The people were wearing shorts and had their bodies painted up to look like Friesian cows. The float had signs that said ‘Leather is Cruel’ and Cows are Cool’, and yet they had a sign that said…’We support Gay Pride’. Why did I find this confusing? Well, while I understand not all gay men or women wear leather, quite a few do. For instance, the Dykes on Bikes where predominantly dressed in leather, the Leather Pride group were certainly dressed in leather, as was Mr Leather and so were many other random people throughout the parade participants including quite a few on the Hardcore Heaven float. It just didn’t make any sense. But I didn’t dwell on at the time.

I just got on with looking fabulous and playing up to my adoring crowd.

I changed out of my trainers about ten minutes before our float started to move. I had chosen patent leather booties with a decent heel for the 1.8km walk, knowing I wouldn’t be walking in a straight line, and actually walking twice that. I was now fully dressed, armed with a sjambok (incidentally, I’d love a leather one, one day instead of the plastic one I have) and ready to put on a little show with my new prancing partner.

Shortly after we started moving I realised how completely insane the crowd was. They were screaming at the top of their lungs. If you went anywhere near them you were grabbed, hugged, kissed and deafened by being screamed in the ear as the hugged you. However, this didn’t stop my high-fiving, running the sjambok along the fence line to produce a lovely ringing sound and pretending to hit my latex friend on the arse. At one point to stop on a bottle top and it stuck in the bottom of my shoe. I was very unladylike as I scrapped my foot on the road trying to get rid of it. It hurt a lot.
I think I heard Joan River, or it may have been Pam Ann, say ‘Ohh, look at the girl wield a stick, she can do that to me anytime.’

The end came quickly. Suddenly I found myself in a park with people collapsed on the grass, hyped up and nowhere to go. But first I had to take my gloves off. I had had nothing to eat of drink since 5pm, it was now nearly 11 and yet I still poured a few millilitres of fluid from the each glove and from the neck line of my dress. It’s one of the benefits of latex, you never need to have a seaweed wrap to lose excess water, ever again.

I went straight home afterwards. I was bushed. On the way to my lift I nearly lose the sjambok, but got it back again after a panic, so that was all good. Just after midnight I peeled myself out of the latex and had a shower.

It felt so good to slip between the sheets that night, even if I was floating just ever so slightly above the mattress.

Harbour Cruise - My Bruised Arse

Saturday morning saw me making melba toasts (cut up bread, place on baking sheet in 200O oven until crisp) for Todd’s harbour cruise while I waited for the real estate guy to come round and do a house inspection. Far too much to deal with a Saturday morning if you want my opinion!

Around noon I left the house with my new red shopping trolley loaded with pate, melba toasts, wine, ice and my camera. I was going to get the bus, but after waiting twenty minutes I jumped in a cab. Once again the taxi won the Taxi V Bus race. I met Todd and some friends at King Street Wharf and we waited for the boat.

Now please bear in mind I was expecting something big and stable to CRUISE around the harbour in. You can imagine my surprise when a sail boat slipped into the pick up position. We all climbed aboard, and settled in as we motored out into the harbour under the bridge. It was actually very relaxing and I took heaps of photos to remember the day, Todd eating nibbles, drinking wine and generally being the hostess with the mostest.

We (there were 11 of us on the boat and the skipper) drank, laughed and chatted. Some of us reminisced about the bad habits we had picked up from Todd and some just listened and thanked their lucky stars they hadn’t known him long enough to pick them up. We stopped and put down the anchor and a few went for a swim. I was happy on board taking pictures.

Once the swimming was over the skipper suggested we go for a little sail. He informed us that because it was a little windy we would only use the little sail at the front. The anchor was pulled up, the sail was unwrapped. It flapped about for a bit then it caught. We took off like a bullet from a gun and the boat tipped. From 0 -15knots (17mph/27kph) like a racing car.

I slipped of my perch, thinking first and for most about the camera I flipped my right arm over the edge of the galley as my legs vanished over the edge of the boat and into the water. My left hand grabbed onto anything (turned out to be a rope winder), my legs bounced about on the edge of the boat as I pulled myself up and finally got a foothold on the little wooden plinth on the side. I wasn’t near anyone, so I didn’t have help like a couple of others that also experienced the pleasures of sailing. I’m told it only took a few minutes to right us again, but it felt like an hour. I was soaked. The only dry thing about me was my camera hand.


The rest of the ‘cruise’ I hardly moved. As the saying goes ‘It’s all good fun until someone get hurt, then it’s bloody hilarious’ I was the butt of jokes. But weirdly enough I didn’t care. If we tipped again I was secure and oddly I was having fun. The adrenaline had kicked in and I was what can only be described as high.

I was however, really glad to be back on dry land when it was over. If it hadn’t of been over dramatic I would have kissed the ground. I went home to shower before our dinner to find a few purple masses gathering under the skin on my legs and arms.

Dinner at IThai on King Street Wharf was lovely, more reminiscing, good food and wine and an early night for all. After the drama of the boat I think everyone was completely knackered.

A&E

As I was preparing to do a little uni work last night in the peace and quite of a deserted office, Kathleen rushed in with tears in her eyes and squeaked out ‘I’m bleeding badly’. She’s seventeen weeks pregnant.

So I bundled her into a taxi and upon arrival at the A&E department of the Prince of Wales hospital in Randwick she checked in we sat down to wait. After about twenty minutes she was seen by a Triage Nurse and asked for a urine sample and had a finger prick test. Then we waited again. Kathleen’s mum turned up but was being a tad negative so I decided to stay until she was called in by the doctor. I was being my usual cheerful self, telling amusing stories and trying to take her mind of the fact she was in hospital.

But we couldn’t help comment on the fact that she was pregnant and fearful for her baby’s life. And despite it all turning out well (she’s got a small infection, not baby related) we couldn’t help comparing the situation to Jana Horska who miscarried her baby in the waiting room toilet of A&E at the Royal North Shore Hospital in late September. There is now an enquiry into waiting times for pregnant women and a list as long as my arm of women who have come forward with similar stories from the last few years.

Surely with all this happening it’s unwise to let the doctor see a drug addict after only forty-five minutes and leave the mother-to-be to wait for three hours?

Global Warming

People bang on about global warming on blogs, in the news and polite conversation.

I’m just going to say that it’s spring, it’s my birthday tomorrow and as someone who would have always been wearing a coat at this time of the year in the UK I love the fact that’s it 34degrees outside today. 15degrees above the average for this time of year.

Just one thing though…can we lose the gale force wind please, it’s playing havoc with my hair.

Martin Place

I had to go into the city at lunchtime today (doctors appointment for vaccination booster, BP -120/60 thank you very much, pretty much perfect, blood test, re-prescription and weight –gone up a little since last time) and I found myself missing Martin Place.

I got off the bus on Elizabeth Street and started walking down the hill. I had a Red Cross Give Blood bag thrust at me only to have it taken away again when I said ‘I can’t give blood’ (I might have mad cow disease according the Aussie Red Cross). Then the Socialist Alliance drones tried to ply me with leaflets about how they are going to change Australia when they get into power at the next election, all I have to do is vote for them. The Bobbie Goldsmith foundation asked me to help fill their bucket and I nearly got knocked of my feet for daring to look around at my surrounding and take in the atmos. This was all before I reached the fountain at Pitt Street.

The flat bit of Martin Place between Pitt Street and George Street was the usual gauntlet of Greenpeace, WWF, some Cancer charity and ‘homeless’ asking for cash, all this amongst many, many office workers (dressed mostly in black) all rushing headlong between their desks and food and back again.

Hustle and Bustle how I miss you ;-)