Dissolute Diary

Still glowing from the sunny weekend.

The impending and supposedly ominous deadline for two projects of mine on the same day - friday next week - refuses to create a sense of dread in the wake of a string of sunny days and a weekend with friends. But its not JUST that. The office has finally decided it would be a good idea to employ someone with office management skills, whose main task is to ensure that all the projects are adequately resourced, without tantrums and bitching and people working till midnight and falling over in exhaustion. 3 years 4 months 2 weeks I've been complaining about it.
 
How modern.

The weekend included a gathering of nudists, an alcoholiday among mates in the cross, intense yoga session with my new teacher, tender filthiness with b-bear, vegetarian roasting experimentation, Harry Potter, industrial-architecture-porn, wanky/creepy art installations, sunning on the harbour, and a little bit of housework. And I found a lamp on the side of the road that works perfrectly. It has a ceramic cube base that looks like woven leather, and a white linen cube shade on top.

How modern.

I think I might see what kind of unlikely jigsaw I can create this weekend. That was fun.

I am reading 'The Bilnd Assassin' and ejoying it thoroughly. Margaret Atwood, delving again into small town domestic disfunction in Canada, managed to put the experience of finding Atheism into a single sentence. In this case as a consequence of witnessing war.

"Over the trenches God burst like a balloon, and there was nothing left of him but grubby little scraps of hypocricy."

Thankyou Margaret.

Today I'm on the way to a site meeting at the school I'm designing for. I caught a taxi or the taxi caught me, let me explain.

I left the office and started to cross the street, and a taxi stopped on the other side before I had made it off the kerb. Good fortune,
I think. I tell the driver the suburb and he asks me what I do for a living.

I'm an architect. I design schools.

Thats very.... impressive. He seems to be trying out conversation.

The driver pulls out a wad of pages and asks me in reasonably good second language Engish could I check his grammar in something he had written for his class. I look at it without saying yes, and within a few seconds I scan and glean the theme.

Ah, look no, I don't think i will if you don't mind. I'm glad of my habit to always take the rear seat and never sit beside the driver. Essentially it was an exercise for Bible class.

Oh really? Handing me a pen. Just write over anything that might be wrong.

No really I won't. I'm sure somebody else can do that for you.

Disappointment, silence. So you have not met Jesus Christ?

Ah. No. I grew up in a religious family and was taught in depth all about Jesus and studied the Bible for many years. i came to the conclusion that the stories are not real.

So for you the Bible is just a book full of stories?

Yes. Interesting stories, and many have good lessons but all just stories. God doesn't exist.

Then came  a look of incredulous horror. He looks up into the rearview mirror to see if maybe I had two horns and he hadn't noticed before. He stumbled into the old chestnut - you know the one - So all these buildings, right, they were all designed by somone. So .....

Look don't try to tell me that the world was made by God because I know it wasn't. We design things. The world wasn't designed by anybody. We don't need a god to explain how we got here.

No its different. Oh if you knew God you would know the truth.

No thats not the truth. It might be true for you but not for me.

Oh I feel sorry for you that you have not met Jesus personally and let him into your heart.

Don't feel sorry for me. Look there's this idea which you call God. Its just an idea. I have my ideas about the world. They are just ideas and we disagree.

No but God real. God in all our life, without God there is nothing. His english is getting ragged, he's getting twitchy and frantic-eyed.

Well that might be your idea of life but I see it differently. I have a very good understanding of life without god.

Oh I pray that one day you will meet Jesus, and you will know, you will know. You are lost.

Rubbish. Do you understand how insulting it is to say that? Do you know how many times I've heard the same words from other people? You just repeat what somone else tells you to. You sound like a child. Turn Here and then Right at the lights. You can let me out at the next corner.

We stopped out the front of the building with the enormous steel cross on the front wall. His face dropped and I got out without another word.

On the weekend I baked some stuffed capsicum, veges & beets. And leftovers the next night.

For two days I pissed rose coloured water. Its enough to put a spring in my step in the morning

This morning a man fell flat on his face in front of me on the train. It didn't quite register at first, I just heard the muffled crumpling sound of a body collapsing on the floor. He was unconscious only for about 30 seconds but all my emergency response adrenaline was pumping before I knew it. He was alright, just fainted. But what struck me was the expression in his eyes as he came to - a slowly emerging surprise, like slow motion panic. I was watching closely of course to see how he was, all the signs of panic but none of the darting sudden movement.

Over about another 30 seconds I watched his consciousness reassemble in little steps. He was confused, didn't know why he was on the floor or where he was, suspicious that I had hurt him, maybe, or someone else, then slowly working out he was on a train and eventually remembering feeling a bit off colour. Sweaty face, bloodless skin, eyes wide he eventually sat up and was starting to feel a bit embarrassed and grateful when it was my stop and I left.

Few things cut through the defensive barrier everyone projects when they are crammed on the train, everyone hermetically sealed in their headphones, books, vacant distant stares - anything to avoid acknowledging the person pressed against you. But this morning a couple of complete strangers stopped to look after someone, touch him, talk with him and care for him.

Haven't been in these parts for a while - lets see.... Jeff's birthday, and then his birthday again, hmmm... there are a few holes in that week.

I finally got my taxes done for the past 2 years, and as of this time next week I will be up to date completely including the previous 3 years and the one we are just finishing. Yep I'll admit that with finances I am in complete denial. If I don't want to see it it isn't there. Thats why I have to work hard and earn lots of money because otherwise I'd have to work out how to manage it properly.

We had a big family gathering last week for Dad's 70th birthday. It was a full day project - all effort going into resisting the obvious frictions and animosity. All smiles for the visitors. But one interesting incident - my uncle (dad's brother) asked why I haven't had a girlfriend for a while - WTF? He was so embarrassed when explained. I was really amused - they obviously don't talk. In 16 years, my sexuality, my relationships and the several major arguments in the family over the issue never rated a mention.

I guess that goes to show the level of denial and the highly advanced avoidance techniques my parents have perfected and beqeathed to us. I can only watch in admiration.

We came to a conclusion today (not agreement: nobody is happy with it) that Bro 3 will from now on own the family home, hocked to 50%, and his business hocked to 70%.

It is bound by several other contracts which mean he can't do anything with the house, can't sell it, can't refinance it etc, and Mum and Dad are lifetime tenants. The 4 bros are end owners when his debt is paid, if it ever is.

It means rewriting the title deeds, his will, my parents will, 3 new nuptial contracts to keep bros wives out of it, and .....I made my own proviso that from here on, since his business acumen is now the arbiter of our asset, that I am now a non executive director in his business, on behalf of my parents, for whom I am legal guardian. I'm party to all his major business decisions from here on. Fuck.

In some bizarre twist of fate I just became a real estate agent.

In other news I visited my friend Rick. His puppies are beautiful and fluffy.

A few weeks back I got a call out of the blue from a stranger, telling me he had just arrived from Israel and had a gift for me from my ex Ziv. I was shocked - we have not been in touch for at least 3 years, maybe 5?, and we had no way of contacting each other anymore. Except my mobile number hasn't changed - ever - and Ziv apparently managed to remember one important detail about me through the fog of an allday/everyday dope habit.

So last night in the rainstorm I met up with Raphael, only to realise I know him - as Michael - and had a long glass of wine and told stories for hours. The parcel had a couple of israeli pop music cds, some photos and a hand written (bizarre scrawl!) letter. Its very sweet and made me cry.

Today I wrote back by email, and attempted to recap my life in its essentials, which is hard but revealing. Seems that nothing really changes.

Yesterday I had a call from one of my brothers (bro2) to tell me that another brother (bro3) is in such deep financial shit that his business is threatening to take down my parents house and savings with it. I spent all day talking between each of my brothers and parents trying to get the story straight, trying to keep them from killing one another - and trying to find a short term solution to a demand from the bank for $250k cash by monday (yes this monday). And I succeeded at all of these impossible tasks at the expense of the work that I was actually supposed to be doing, and despite the fact that I haven't spoken with any of them since I was deliberately treated like shit on Christmas day.

It turns out that the financial situation was partly known about by several people back then (bro1 and bro3) but nobody was speaking openly about it. Instead a poisonous undercurrent of accusation, resentment and anger was churning around the room before I walked in the door. It all suddenly makes sense but I am once again left wondering who the hell my real family is because this bunch of molluscs has nothing to in common with me on any human level. Emotionally crippled, uncommunicative perriwinkles.

Today I go to the family ranch (if its still ours) to negotiate a settlement. Seems bro3 is something like $1.2M in debt. Fuck. He has known since August. He waited until this week to put his $100k car on the market. Cunt.

Yesterday on the train Billy Pilgrim said "So it goes".

On the train tonight I finished Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood and I am convinced it is one of the best things I've read in my life. A wholly satisfying story perfectly told through the voice of a woman, who you never can decide if guilty or not of a savage double murder. That takes some skill. I love the minute detail of her daily life, a servant in a small remote town in colonial Canada; washing, cooking, sewing, preserving food, all by hand before chemical or machines. And woven through with awkward archaic turns of phrase and antique etiquette. Today i learned a new name for 'dust bunnys', 'floor fluff', or whatever else you call the tumbleweed of hair, dust, dead skin and insect fragments that gather under beds and behind cupboards: "Sluts Wool"

Thankyou Margaret for expanding my essential vocabulary.

But its useless to say its the best thing I've read in a long time since its not true. In the past 18 months I've read a surprising number of excellent books and I just keep getting blown away. I had an irresistible urge to list them in reverse, back to when I finished the marathon of Les Miserable at the beginning of 2008....

Alias Grace - Margaret Atwood
Player of Games - Iain M Banks
The Philosopher & The Wolf - Mark Rowland
Consider Phlebus - Iain M Banks
Payback - Margaret Atwood
The Velvet Rage - Alan Downes
The Steep Approach to Garbadale - Iain Banks
Look to Windward - Iain M Banks
When You Are Engulfed In Flames - David Sedaris
Whit - Iain Banks
The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins
Leviathan - John Birmingham
24 Hour Party People - Tony Wilson
The Crow Road - Iain Banks
Mates And Lovers - Chris Brickell
God Is Not Great - Christopher Hitchens
Excession - Iain M Banks
The Vintner's Luck - Elizabeth Knox
A Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
Wicked - Gregory Maguire
Les Miserable - Victor Hugo

That's 21 books in 18 months, 3 months on Les Miz alone, & 7 books by Banks. A testament to the hours spent on public transport, my hermitage social life, or an abiding love of words. Or all three. I'm especially happy to have been introduced to Atwood and Banks - big ideas in tiny detail.

I'll start Use Of Weapons tomorrow.

At the end of another 4 day week I've decided that a four day weekend once a month or so would be just about the right pace for me.... I'm proud of my forethought to book extra time off around the workshop in Melbourne. I got to spend time catching up with Peter, seeing a few galleries and a trip to the zoo. And as a bonus he practiced some photography on me, giving me a few surprisingly good portraits. I made some comment in conversation, that ironically enough I have very few photos of myself. When I arrived home next night he gave me a disk with literally hundreds of pictures of me from the past 5 years or so. Jaw, floor.

Evidently I can't post pics since I am downloading software updates and I have The Slowest Internet Service in The Western World Rudd 2007,2008,2009

Body Electric was well worth the trip. And it was a trip. For it to sidestep my abundant skepticism and armory of cynicism toward nery a sniff of quasi religious touchy feely, I applaud the guys who put this together. I'm still processing my experience, it was pretty intense, in a good way. 

The weekend before, I had my parents around for lunch. I cooked them roast lamb and, since it was a warm day, I served a greek salad with the warm lamb on top. I've been pretty pissed off about the way Christmas panned out this year. So I haven't been back to see them since, and haven't spoken with my brothers. I decided that if I'd prefer to see the folks without the rest of the mob, the decades-old pack mentality sucking the air out of the room. I swear its like Lord of The Flies. I refuse to be Piggy.

By the time they arrived and I found myself talking in a friendly way with a couple of frail old people. Nice people, with nice stories and interested in listening to mine. It was hard to be angry with them. Of course they know there is nothing they can do to affect the behaviour of my brothers now, if ever. So they accept that I won't be joining the family gatherings for a while, but I will make an effort to see them in our own time at least as often. Win win.

My eldest brother won Mum entry to a Nova FM formal ballroom event with that weird kinda creepy Austrian guy with the ugly hair, some kind of Orchestra Spectacular!! Err...  Well its exactly the kind of thing they love, so she's over the moon. They also got tickets to Caberet for May 14th, which happens to be her birthday. Could it be better? I'm really happy for mum, she's ecstatic.

Mmmmm .... bed

The return to homeland reality has been a bit odd.

Alot of things seem really silly all of a sudden. Like when one of the client stakeholder on one of my project threw a tantrum in a meeting this week, it was all I could do to stop laughing at her. How is that otherwise intelligent educated mature and responsible women can go spastic like a 6 year old girl and expect that everyone around them will take it seriously? I know it works on most straight guys but.... well, maybe she's menopausal.

And then there's my boss who seems to be in a perpetual state of panic. I find it hard to be motivated by another person's irationality so its a bit counter productive. I have to keep focused on the task not his attitude.

Happy music memories still drifting back to me from ConFest this week.

There was one piece of amplified music - the Silent Disco. Imagine a corral made of twisted branches with a sand dancefloor inside. A series of trees all painted black with little white and flouro hieroglyphs scribed on them, and a group of UV ilghht suspended in the trees above. Then imaging a DJ booth  playing to a group of say 60 radio headphones and a dancefloor full of people dancing full steam. From the outside you hear nothing and just watch everyone move - totally silent and surreal. Perfect place to spin UV flags and do some dervish whirling in my flouro yello skirt.

Another night there was an impromptu gathering at the chai tent - a pair of female singers, with guitar and cello, a couple of arabic drummers and an arabic woodwind instrument and a gypsy style violinist. They just jammed for a couple of hours enjoying learning new tunes from each other as they invented a beautiful new mashed up sound.

On the last night about 1.00 am a didgeri do player brought his sound into the steam tent. Something about the moist air made the sound reverberate in a strange way, and since many of us had attended chanting, meditation and yoga workshops over the preceeding day, it seemed only natural to start a vocal drone alongside the didge. Slowly a few long low OMM's built up and soon there were about 30 naked people all holding their own note, layered over each other, cutting in and out as each person took a breath. It went on for ages, with pepole taking their notes up and down each new breath, but two amazing things came from it. One was the way the sound accumulated into a deep physical reverberation that yuo could feel in your chest, coming from the people around you, the other was how far the noise travelled through the camp. People walked the whole length of the campsite to find out what the noise was. Almost subsonic.

This week I've been listening to some old CDs and reminiscing about my 20's.

Next weekend I'll be going to Melbourne so I think this weekend I'll be looking for some good music to dance to - So far th e best option seems to be Mad Racket at Marrickville Bowlo. Any other ideas?

Well I arrived home last night from a few days camping in the bush at ConFest near Denilequin, about 10 hours drive away, and I can't say I'm glad to be back.

I still haven't had a shower or washed any clothes yet (I think I'll be fixing both those problems in a few minutes). Haven't yet had a proper sleep in my own bed - we got in late and my bed was not made so I crashed on top of it with the same dusty rugs and stuff I've been slobbing in all week. I haven't had anything alcoholic or psychoactive, nor any meat, for a week. Nor have I heard any amplified music since wednesday. I did pack my espresso maker and gas stove however. I'm not capable of doing it that rough.

I can't say I was missing any of what is on offer at home or in town but my travel companions had to came back for work and it would have been a long walk.

I spent most of the time wandering around the campgrounds in the sun, meeting amazing people from all around the world and hearing some of the best live acoustic music I've heard since Israel. Highlights a-plenty and they'll probably keep coming to me over the next few days. There were workshops and activities all weekend but I did very little. I did do a comedy yoga session. And a joined in a game of human twister (no mat with spots... think about it).



And I made a massive structure with dead branches over the course of three days. Its about 2.5m diameter and more than 2m high. I couldn't reach any further so I had to stop.


The area has had no rain all year so it was literally bone dry, the ground and every leaf covered in a fine grey dust. So swimming in the very low Edward River was like icy heaven, and it was a dry 30 degrees every day with no cloud or even a strong beeze. The river was a nude beach about 1km long. Men women kids all playing in the water and rolling in mud. I don't think I've seen as many different types of penii in all my life as I did this past week. People are freaks. Hooray!

Just beside it was the steam tent - a 24hr sauna like I've never seen before. A long timber framed tent for about 30 people with a big fireplace and water drum and steam piped throught a tree stump and a basket of gum leaves. Between the fire and the sauna were hot showers, a big hot tub and an even bigger mud pit. It was pretty easy to forget about clothes after a while. What a great way to start the day - jump in the river (about 10C) then run to the sauna (about 60C). At night it was about 6C, so people would stand around the fire chatting then duck in and out of the sauna. You had to rotate in front of the fire because it was too hot facing the fire and too cold facing away. So everyone would just squish in and constantly swap places and turn. Like pink penguins.

The dryness meant that the bush was completely distressed, dead wood and leaves all over the ground. There were water drums and fire wardens dotted everywhere in case a fire broke out, and it was easy to imagine the whole camp going up in a few minutes if a fire escaped. Understandably there was a total fire ban except for a handful of places. One was the sauna, another was the fire circle. This is where the major drum-up was every night (around 15 - 50 drummers from just before sunset til sunrise) and a massive gathering of fire-twirlers and dancing around a big bonfire. Feral drumming and fire spinning tends to be far from annoying when they have actual skill, and this week it came in spades. But the dust cloud would choke you from 100m. I'm still blowing black out my nose.

Good thing I don't have to be at work till next week - it's going to take some time to change gears again. And to get the knots out of my hair. Shower Coffee Food......

I'm not sure exactly why but LJ has been a bit outside my radar lately. Might be the intense work time. Might be the boring and long bout of depression - thats never fun to share. Might be the fact its summer and when I have some time to myself I've been doing nice stuff in the sun. Or it might be that even in bad weather there has also been the B-Bear for indoor fun, at call, everyday.

But here I am and I still don't exactly know why. I guess I just like talking to an empty screen.

No backchat.

I cheered myself up the other day with a new keyboard/mousey thing with no cords.  And it feels as good as it looks. I needed a keyboard that was at least as sexy as the computer. Need.


Work looks like this... 70's retro colour scheme in an otherwise neglected 80's university shell.

  

Other than that I've written a couple of amazingly bleak, unpublishable stories, made dozens of banal but cthartic drawings, and recovered from pneumonia this week.

Kooky tomorrow night.  YAY!

Well I just got home from the opening night of Sydney Festival and I'm a little tired. I spent most of the evening in Martin Place watching various dance performances by everyone from Bangarra to Oz Dance theatre, Sydney Dance Co etc at one end, with Capoiera, crumping and break dance troupes at another end. Good shit.
And even the categorically dorky idea to teach every person on the street a piece of choreography so that Sydney could have the biggest dance performance in the world went off as a huge piece of fun since everyone did join in and laugh at themselves in theh process.
The city set up about 7 stages  on all the closed off streets and had different music styles playing at each. Some ravey, some clubby, some jazzy, some latino, some hip hop, some pop. the place was packed and lively but surprisingly sober and friendly. I did not see one person pissing or throwing up anywhere. What is that?
Highlight for me was dancing in front of parliament house to My People by Presets with about 20,000 young hipsters, a full streetblock bouncing up and down in unison with their fists in the air. Made me tingle.

I'm home, its late and just got to eat. Next bed. But first (thanks j-ho) I need to say that Wendy James played the most awsome set on saturday at Handlebar. Yes you do remember that name. Google.
Beastie Boys, Pink, Velvet Underground, Stevie Wonder and Pixies..... and she's really really small, cute and dykey. After a day in the sun drinking beer and then back to the three bears house for some more, then Handlebar and then I went home to.....



The Apocalypse

The concept of calling or actually meeting in person when arranged has become a little too complicated for some people in the modern era. Rower put me off again today (thats 6 times if you're counting) 1 hour before we were to meet, but after I had left work early to meet him. I'm really not that difficult to satisfy: turn up or call when you say you will and pay attention to me when I'm there.

But I'm in such a buoyant / exhausted mood (read: deliriously fucking tired) that I'm even more amused than I was on saturday. I think I'm going to string this along just to find out how many times this dick thinks he can put me off and have me still a-waitin'. I think its going to be a few times more yet. Its such a familiar pattern I'm wondering if I have a radar for the socially inept. Not entirely sure what I'm going to say when or if we do finally speak face to face but its not going to be very polite. Still after a 14hr slog yesterday, an early night will do me good. Bring on Friday deadline!

Meanwhile the park delivered its ripe fruit on saturday evening as always. I arrived as the rain came pouring down and the one wet soul there motioned me to come to his car. We came back to get warm and dry. Cute. Young, but very cute. After 6 months, my first gentleman visitor. Sleeping with someone in my arms. Flatmate and boyf were very considerate - went out for coffee in the morning and never came back.

Working today so I can take a good break tomorrow. That makes about 60 hours this week and I'm pooped. Time for a lunch break - I couldn't eat breakfast today cos I was so full from dinner last night. Furry Chris carbo-loaded me on beefy pasta, with a txt invitation during the afternoon: "I hope you're hungry". He's so sweet. I was home in bed by 10 and up at 6 rearing to get in here (I know its sick: deadline friday).

But how do I take four invitations from guys in 24 hrs? Yes the slack bastard got in touch this morning, another furry friend called last night when I was in bed, and two others have sent messages today. I've been putting out my 'feelers' so to speak for months with virtually no response. All want suddenly to catch up with me this weekend, when I'm up to my eyeballs in work! I have a flaggers gathering tonight and a bbq tomorrow, which at best leaves brunch or dinner tomorrow for meeting up with one of them.
 
So: The ex Priest, the Musician, the Bear, or the Rower.
How do I decide who to gamble on meeting?

I was sitting in the cab about 3am, kinda slushy and sad. The cabbie had his iPod plugged into the stereo and playing something sweet.
Bon Iver..... I don't know either

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrMmr1oMPGA

He don't do video, burt he's cute'n'furry

Having decided about 18 months ago that perhaps, just maybe, I might be feeling nearly almost kind-of open to the idea of, maybe having a relationship again after 6 years single, the excruciating truth is I really have no idea how.

The men that I find myself attracted to have repeatedly revealed themselves to be the kind of person I find it hard to be friends with. This is a problem. My freinds of course think its hillarious. And mostly it is. Except when its hopelessly and repetitively tragic.

Just before heading away to New Zealand I happened to go out on both the friday and the saturday night with mates, and the lovely Boffinbear. That weekend some Twilight Zone twistedness unexpectedly thrust into my company all four of the men I had attempted to couple with through the previous 18months. Each of them reacted to suddenly seeing me in their own ways, and of course my reactions were stray in kind.

Various states of inebriation, the nature of the end of our affairs, the length of time having passed all were factors, but I was left realising that, out of the four: I had made two real and deep friends I will cherish; met one psychiatric patient; and that there is one who I just can't fathom at all - a mass of hot/cold mysteriousness that I find hopelessly frustrating, but pathetically attractive.

Last week I was at the pub waiting to meet Rick for dinner when an old aquaintance, (and friend-of-friend) approached me to let me know that he had been flirting with me two years ago when we met, but that I apparently hadn't been interested, and now he wondered if that had changed. I was a little gobsmacked because I had thought he was 'too handsome' and just being flirtatious because he found it fun. So I bit my pride and asked him out and he gave me his number.

What has followed is a week of me calling/texting and him putting me off til later. I have kept open my plans every day on the stupid assumption that he might eventually make good on that meeting, and now its friday and I have no plans, and no date again.

Men suck. And not in a good way. The park is just so much more reliable.

The potential for drag names of course is endless, and yet a few seem to be re-run over and over, worn out like old lame. But the new Special K ad  has a gem : "keeps feeling fuller for longer" 
I imagine Fula Falonga to be about 120kilos of voluptuous Samoan princess.

Then after having my hair zchuzhd the other day, I mis-heard another gem this morning for my bouncy hair:
More volume than a pensioner's tele. I nearly wet myself.