Thanks to Cheryl for dropping me an email to let me know that Thomas Allen had found some comments we made on her blog about his art work. Fortunately, he thought we were funny.
Who is Thomas Allen? I made a gushing post about him myself around the same time as Cheryl's post. I loved his work then and love it no less now, so I have no problem whatsoever in letting you know that he has a book coming out later this year, called Uncovered. Drop by the man himself's blog to stay abreast of the where, when, how and so on.
24 January 2007
So, We Talked About The Weather For a While...
Discussion of the weather is unfairly maligned, I say. When it's extreme in one way or another it colours everything we experience, so why wouldn't we want to talk about it?
The weather -- or the temperature, more correctly -- has changed very quickly over the past few days, and is indeed having an impact on daily life. For most of summer so far we've been sitting waiting for the heat to hit; that wait is over. This morning at 10.30am it hit 33°C, after an overnight low of 25°C. 25 sounds quite mild, but at 4.30am it's stinking bloody hot. Still, we've had it incredibly easy so far this year, so it seems ungrateful to bitch now.
In other atmospheric events, McNaught's comet is giving our skies a bit of glamour at the moment. Or so I hear. For the past week there has been cloud cover in the South West, the area in which the comet is sitting. I'm really, really hoping that the sky clears before the comet disappears.
McNaught Comet photogallery from Spaceweather.com
The weather -- or the temperature, more correctly -- has changed very quickly over the past few days, and is indeed having an impact on daily life. For most of summer so far we've been sitting waiting for the heat to hit; that wait is over. This morning at 10.30am it hit 33°C, after an overnight low of 25°C. 25 sounds quite mild, but at 4.30am it's stinking bloody hot. Still, we've had it incredibly easy so far this year, so it seems ungrateful to bitch now.
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In other atmospheric events, McNaught's comet is giving our skies a bit of glamour at the moment. Or so I hear. For the past week there has been cloud cover in the South West, the area in which the comet is sitting. I'm really, really hoping that the sky clears before the comet disappears.
McNaught Comet photogallery from Spaceweather.com
16 January 2007
Cornucopia of Crap
About a month or so ago my housemates, Mr and Mrs Fungus, got Foxtel hooked up here at the house. Lofty and I aren't taking part in the paying for it—quite the waste of money as far as I'm concerned—but it's there, I'm largely incapacitated, so I've been availing myself of the vast array of absolute shite it has to offer.
I watched a bit of Hawaii Five-0 last week, and I confess it was a bit of an eye-opener. Not only were the fellas very caring, sharing Nineties kinda guys (not something I generally expect to see in Seventies telly cops), but the main protagonists of this particular story were very engaging in their own ways. The bad guy, for example. Steve and Danno spent some time telling us just what a hard-arsed, bad news grub he is, so I nearly choked when his mug finally made it on to the screen: it was Luis from Sesame Street! All wrong! And the visiting good guy du jour looked familiar, and his name in the credits rang a distinct bell, too: Gil Gerard. Known later to some as Buck Rogers. All this, and the infinite pleasure of the Hawaii Five-0 theme song. Beautiful.
It's remarkable who turns up on these old shows. Recent episodes of M*A*S*H have turned up Patrick Swayze, Shelley Long, Barry Corbin (better known to me as Maurice from Northern Exposure), Pat Morita, Brian Dennehey and Ron Howard. Spotting them has become a sport.
The creme de la creme of appalling Foxtel dross, though, would have to be Hong Kong schlocker, The Mighty Peking Man. What a hoot! Best seen with a bunch of kitsch-lovers in the mood for a few beers and some convulsive laughter.
But when all is said and done, I still wouldn't pay for any of this guff.
I watched a bit of Hawaii Five-0 last week, and I confess it was a bit of an eye-opener. Not only were the fellas very caring, sharing Nineties kinda guys (not something I generally expect to see in Seventies telly cops), but the main protagonists of this particular story were very engaging in their own ways. The bad guy, for example. Steve and Danno spent some time telling us just what a hard-arsed, bad news grub he is, so I nearly choked when his mug finally made it on to the screen: it was Luis from Sesame Street! All wrong! And the visiting good guy du jour looked familiar, and his name in the credits rang a distinct bell, too: Gil Gerard. Known later to some as Buck Rogers. All this, and the infinite pleasure of the Hawaii Five-0 theme song. Beautiful.
It's remarkable who turns up on these old shows. Recent episodes of M*A*S*H have turned up Patrick Swayze, Shelley Long, Barry Corbin (better known to me as Maurice from Northern Exposure), Pat Morita, Brian Dennehey and Ron Howard. Spotting them has become a sport.
The creme de la creme of appalling Foxtel dross, though, would have to be Hong Kong schlocker, The Mighty Peking Man. What a hoot! Best seen with a bunch of kitsch-lovers in the mood for a few beers and some convulsive laughter.
But when all is said and done, I still wouldn't pay for any of this guff.
9 January 2007
If I Only Had a Brain
Email received this morning:
There is so much to write about: the death of James Brown; Tony Abbott's allocation of funding to a Catholic organisation for "pregnancy counselling"; severe water restrictions in SEQ while Tarong and Swanbank power stations continue to chew through 55 million litres a day to produce electricity to sell to NSW; Christmas consumption; the sad, sad show that was The Ashes.... but my brain just isn't able to process these topics to any coherant level. Sorry about that.
I've been reluctant to turn this into a pregnancy diary, but perhaps that's what's going to have to happen if anything's to be written. That's all my brain can focus on for the time being. Those not interested can find the door on their own, I'm sure.
Do you realise you didn't post a blog for the whole of December?Hmph. Yeah, I know. The trouble is that I have no brain. Seriously. These two "creative projects" I'm carrying about have been sucking my creative energy dry.
Man, I’m ripping up my subscription!! Surely it can’t be that hard to knock out some creative genius that titillates the great unwashed??!! Up the duff issues aside, your public needs you. So, get crackin’ slacker!!!
There is so much to write about: the death of James Brown; Tony Abbott's allocation of funding to a Catholic organisation for "pregnancy counselling"; severe water restrictions in SEQ while Tarong and Swanbank power stations continue to chew through 55 million litres a day to produce electricity to sell to NSW; Christmas consumption; the sad, sad show that was The Ashes.... but my brain just isn't able to process these topics to any coherant level. Sorry about that.
I've been reluctant to turn this into a pregnancy diary, but perhaps that's what's going to have to happen if anything's to be written. That's all my brain can focus on for the time being. Those not interested can find the door on their own, I'm sure.
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My latest pregancy joy is heartburn/reflux. I've never had it before, but a hot/cold burning in my throat is now my constant companion, particularly in the middle of the night. I don't know where I've put my packet of Tums, a product I discovered whilst in Canada, and now available in Australia, but only in the orange flavour. They make a nice change from the minty products. I must track it down before I turn in for the night.
On a better note, lying in bed Christmas eve I felt them moving for the first time. It was quite exciting. I'd been wondering when I might feel them, and thought I probably had already but not recognised it. That night it was unmistakable. Lying on one side Betty would drum away, roll over and Bob would take a turn. (Have I mentioned here that we have one boy and one girl? I'm not sure that I have.) Then, on New Year's Day, they were boogie-ing away enough for Lofty to feel them, which was a buzz, too. A couple of nights ago I could make out what seemed to be a leg poking up under my skin. It's a very odd experience, but the thoughts of the dinner scene from Alien are becoming less and less frequent.
It was a bit of a relief to feel them being active since I'd had a minor scare a day or two before. I'd had some painful belly cramping, enough to send me trotting off to the hospital to have it checked out. The staff were excellent. They checked me over and kept me in overnight just to keep an eye on things. No great conclusions on what caused it, but everything seems to be fine, and they encouraged me to come back if I was concerned about anything at all. We like to bitch about our public hospital system here--and heaven knows it could do with some improving--but my experiences have been quite satisfactory to date.
The ward they had me in was the actual maternity ward--my window had a nice view of my workplace, hurrah!-- so I was surrounded by wailing babies and their exhausted mothers. One woman who stands out was baggy-eyed and waddling alarmingly down the hall. I don't know the circumstances of the birth she'd had, but I can't say it looked too comfortable. But hey, what comes comes, so there's no point dwelling on it. I'm just trying to avoid birthing horror stories at the moment. I don't see the point in getting uptight about it, despite the world's seeming desire for me to do so. People seem to have a keen desire to get me to blanch or get all wobbly-kneed by telling me horrific stories. Or by laughing when I mention that it's twins. Well, to those in the latter group I say, can it be any worse than dealing with a newborn along with an attention-seeking two-year-old or two? I don't think so. And to the horror story brigade I say this: fuck off. Seriously. Take your morbid, thoughtless stories and jam them sideways. I really don't care that your friend's friend's sister-in-law's neighbours organs all dropped onto the floor just before their dog ate their baby, who had already died of SIDS anyway. Really. Why would I want to hear that story? It doesn't make me fearful, it just makes me think of you as a sad, maladjusted, self-absorbed, ambulance-chasing idiot. So let's just keep that a suspicion, rather than you confirming it, eh?
This Friday will mark 25 weeks. Although it's beginning to feel as though I've been pregnant forever, it also feels as though it's cracking along very quickly. Good grief, if all goes according to plan, we'll have two squealing pot roasts on our hands in around twelve weeks or so. Ha, and you think my blogging is sad now?
On a better note, lying in bed Christmas eve I felt them moving for the first time. It was quite exciting. I'd been wondering when I might feel them, and thought I probably had already but not recognised it. That night it was unmistakable. Lying on one side Betty would drum away, roll over and Bob would take a turn. (Have I mentioned here that we have one boy and one girl? I'm not sure that I have.) Then, on New Year's Day, they were boogie-ing away enough for Lofty to feel them, which was a buzz, too. A couple of nights ago I could make out what seemed to be a leg poking up under my skin. It's a very odd experience, but the thoughts of the dinner scene from Alien are becoming less and less frequent.
It was a bit of a relief to feel them being active since I'd had a minor scare a day or two before. I'd had some painful belly cramping, enough to send me trotting off to the hospital to have it checked out. The staff were excellent. They checked me over and kept me in overnight just to keep an eye on things. No great conclusions on what caused it, but everything seems to be fine, and they encouraged me to come back if I was concerned about anything at all. We like to bitch about our public hospital system here--and heaven knows it could do with some improving--but my experiences have been quite satisfactory to date.
The ward they had me in was the actual maternity ward--my window had a nice view of my workplace, hurrah!-- so I was surrounded by wailing babies and their exhausted mothers. One woman who stands out was baggy-eyed and waddling alarmingly down the hall. I don't know the circumstances of the birth she'd had, but I can't say it looked too comfortable. But hey, what comes comes, so there's no point dwelling on it. I'm just trying to avoid birthing horror stories at the moment. I don't see the point in getting uptight about it, despite the world's seeming desire for me to do so. People seem to have a keen desire to get me to blanch or get all wobbly-kneed by telling me horrific stories. Or by laughing when I mention that it's twins. Well, to those in the latter group I say, can it be any worse than dealing with a newborn along with an attention-seeking two-year-old or two? I don't think so. And to the horror story brigade I say this: fuck off. Seriously. Take your morbid, thoughtless stories and jam them sideways. I really don't care that your friend's friend's sister-in-law's neighbours organs all dropped onto the floor just before their dog ate their baby, who had already died of SIDS anyway. Really. Why would I want to hear that story? It doesn't make me fearful, it just makes me think of you as a sad, maladjusted, self-absorbed, ambulance-chasing idiot. So let's just keep that a suspicion, rather than you confirming it, eh?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This Friday will mark 25 weeks. Although it's beginning to feel as though I've been pregnant forever, it also feels as though it's cracking along very quickly. Good grief, if all goes according to plan, we'll have two squealing pot roasts on our hands in around twelve weeks or so. Ha, and you think my blogging is sad now?
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