Back home

 


These are some feather posies I made while away. We were staying on a rural property in the Strathbogie Ranges, beautiful countryside.

P is flying now, on her way back home. We texted when she got to Istanbul airport and she checked in, all smoothly. Texted again when she arrived in Dubai but plane was late and looked like she might miss her connecting flight. But all was fine. So now, she's headed back to Melbourne with 'lots of stories' she said. We spoke once on the phone while she was away, and at the beginning of her trip there were several long texts back and forth but as she settled, they dwindled to maybe one brief exchange a day, in my evening when she'd just woken up. That everything was fine, she was going to be doing this or that.

Her last few texts she said she'd be sad to leave her dad but excited to come home. She said also she was 'so glad' she went, which is fantastic because she was highly ambivalent about the trip.

In other news, it's Christmas is upon us and I'm not a person who loves Christmas. I can, and sometimes do, but often it's all wrapped up (heh) with lots of scratchy feelings. This year Clokes is having his family here and P and I are shipping off to my sister's. Last year P and I boycotted the whole thing in terms of family and stayed here, ate nice food and watched lots of episodes of whatever it was we were watching at the time. It was certainly stress-free but not really *Christmas.*

So hope everyone has a good break. I'll be back in January I hope with more to say. I'm still coughing badly, but feeling so much better. It was a nasty whatever it was, annoying.

I've got lots of things to look forward to next year, including my trip west. And hopefully big publishing stuff in addition to the two smaller things that are happening in January and April.
 

Gone fishing

Back at the end of the week chickens. Stay safe.

Another Friday update

Well I'm SLOWLY starting to feel better. Went back to the doc yesterday and he gave me more antibiotics, different ones. I don't like to take them but I think I need it. It's good, my cough has started to dry up and I feel much better today.

No news on the book edits, I'm hoping they'll come through over the weekend.

I'm going back to bed now with breakfast, coffee and reading.

Hope everyone is well.

CROAK

Oh hai again. I'm still sick, worse than last Friday when I was on here, having a whinge. Went to the doctor yesterday, got antibiotics, have taken three and would have expected to be feeling a little improved today. Not so.

I sit/lie here in my bed, laptop on lap (hurr, hurr) writing like freaking Babs Cartland, except there is nothing pink anywhere near me, and no dogs are in here.

My voice is a mere croak; manly and deep, and it hurts. Nasty, yet 'productive' cough (as the doctor said) - I feel worse than yesterday but really I haven't been able to rest for the last couple of days and yesterday was a real race-around in the car, doing 'stuff' to get P ready for her departure tonight.

My mum is coming over in an hour before she goes to Ring #1, and daughter is on the way home. We are going to put up the Christmas Tree and pack. Flight is tonight at 3.30am, so at airport at 1.30am, so no bed I don't think, or if so, just for an hour or so. Blech.

This is just a quickie. No edits yet from agent but they will come through I'm guessing on the weekend or early next week. She said we need to move quickly. I love how exciting that sounds.

That's all for now. Sad about Mandela but annoyed at how everyone on twitter is bleating about him. Hope everyone is well, especially you Alex, haven't heard from you for a while. You might be on a trip but do hope you are fine!

Oh hay

It's Friday and I have a headache. Have had for a few days, and feeling a bit off. I blame the reduced dose of Vit D! I have to teach, will get through it, and then tonight Clokes is taking me somewhere fancy for my birthday (which is next Monday, oh yay me.)

Tomorrow I'm hosting either a lunch or dinner for my birthday (time non-specific as I wait to hear back from my sis who is on school camp and without phone reception it seems, until maybe tonight when they are 'back at base'?) I'm hoping she can come and we'll make it dinner if so; if not go ahead with original plan of lunch. Reasons why: I can't be bothered explaining but be assured they are dull and not important.

I have no agent news yet, but today is Day 9 and tomorrow Day 10 - allowing for time difference - and she said it would take her a week to 10 days. I told her not to rush, so who knows? Maybe Sunday.

Princess has finished her exams and today has an oral presentation. She has results day Monday and Tues a Group 4 project (some IB thang) and Wednesday final assembly and then Prefect meetings. Did I tell you she is a Prefect next year for Year 12? And then she goes to Turkey next Saturday for 2 weeks. Did I tell you that?

It's all happening.

I'm planning a petite getaway with my mum, to Malmsbury to visit an old school friend of hers who is also my godmother - yes, this staunch atheist was christened and has godparents - unbelievable right? we'll stay one night there, and then the plan is to go to Ned Kelly country and stay 2 or 3 nights there. I can do some writing, mum can read and meditate. We can go for small walks, drive around. It'll help distract me while Princess is away. Make it less like the last Waiting for Princess Vigil. What a time. Here's the link for people who weren't around then. She was just-turned nine and went to the US on her own for three weeks with her Dad and her dad's then girlfriend. (I may have put some of the posts into drafts, they might not be there because at that stage I had this blog linked to from my public blog. I keep changing my mind about that too.)

So it's coffee time, I'd better go. Melbourne's weather yesterday was shit - rained all day. But today looks dry. Who the fuck knows.

I hope everyone has a good weekend.

The thing, it be done

 


Well, I sent off my manuscript to the agent. She said she'll take about a week to ten days to get back to me. Am I shitting myself? Yes. Do I feel relieved? Yes. Can I stop checking my emails? No. Will I die if she doesn't like it. Yes.

On another matter, the act of reading. I am learning more and more that reading is such an intensely personal thing. For a long time I didn't really think about it, or if I did, thought the above sentence meant that people will choose different books to read, and like different books, based on individual taste. What I'm learning is that even when people read the same book, it's a different experience for everyone.

Exhibit 1: all the reviews I've seen for Barracuda are either glowing (Peter Craven) or reasonable.

Exhibit 2: yesterday on twitter I saw a thread of people BAGGING Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch. When the week before I'd said how much I ADORED it.

I told my mother about the second thing.

Oh you don't have to read all that, do you?

(Maybe she thought the twitter people were conversing with me, and disagreeing with my take on the book. I don't think she gets twitter. Fair enough, many don't.)

They weren't talking to me, mum, I said. They were talking to each other and I was eavesdropping. Twitter is public like that.

Oh, she said. (We had just been to a talk on the Cult of Wagner, ft. The Ring Cycle, more about that later) and I was in her place borrowing some hideous '70s stuff for a themed party coming up. I was also having two spoons of Maggie Beer's Passionfruit ice-cream, which mum had in the freezer and had mentioned as we were driving hom.

Back to the twitter thing. It's true that if I say I don't like eating fish, and you do, neither of us find it an insult. But if you say you hate The Goldfinch and I say I love it - because somehow it's connected to either intellect or judgement - it's possible to get your nose out of joint. Yesterday, reading the thread, didn't bother me but it did fascinate me. They used the word 'hate', they said it read like a first draft and was filled with 'howlers'. I was too scared to ask what a howler is. Is it a mistake? Is it something that is cringingly badly written? Both?

I wanted to intellectualise my response, and theirs. All of them were young, under 30 I reckon. Whereas me and Tartt are of a similar era. Actually just looked her up, I'm precisely 3 weeks older than her. So we're twins.  The books we've grown up reading, particularly the maximalist 19th century novels such as Dickens, whose works her book echoes and who she read as a child and young woman, and for John Irving, reading him as a teenager/young woman, and Irving was influenced by and loved Dickens, I wonder whether that context has something to do with it. We love to read what is familiar and comforting. If we can have comfort food, why not comfort reading? I like different and new but the books I can really get lost in and forget I'm reading, are books like The Goldfinch.


And so, to The Ring. Last night the Wheeler Centre hosted another event (I've been to a bunch lately) and it was Julia Zemiro talking to a bunch of people about Wagner's The Ring Cycle. (Bunch of people being director Neil Armfield, foodie Maggie Beer, poet and writer Peter Rose and arts-theatre person Robyn Archer.) It was a chat about the cult of Wagner and how some people (like Rose) are just nuts about The Ring Cycle. Mum is going, she got last-minute tickets after thinking it had all been sold out. So she's thrilled and excited and I'm wondering how she could possibly sit through 18 hours of opera when I have fallen asleep in a normal show (Carmen, late '80s, not my bag baby.) What fascinated me was the way people talk about this production, and the stories attached. Rose spoke of seeing it in Germany and the performers almost staggering around on-stage, swilling from water bottles as they performed. Archer spoke about the audience applause - for the performers, for the orchestra and also for themselves for enduring the thing. Characters like Brünnhilde and Siegfried, and Valkyries. Well, I do have a thing for German characters and the language, and while I don't have a thing for opera, I am going to find out more about it. It appeals.

If anyone is interested in reading more of what Peter Rose has to say about it, here is an article in the Australian Book Review. 

But it will have to wait, because for now I move onto the next project, a novella which is Bladerunner mixed with Helen Garner's The Spare Room. I'm excited because it's not like the previous two (let's call them my 19th century lyrical novels). This is realist and short and in the first person. As Borat would say, wa wa wee wah.

CONGRATULATIONS Sarah. How does it feel?

I've been thinking of you tonight, at your launch. I'm sure it went brilliantly, and look forward to hearing all about it.

Yay Salt Story by Sarah via A WineDark Sea.

Tim Winton's EYRIE

So what do we think of Winton generally and has anyone read Eyrie? There seems to be a bit of Winton-bagging that goes on in this country, I'm not wrong am I?

I'm trying to work out what it might be about him. Is it the ponytail? Is it the success? The blokeiness and the fact that he doesn't seem to give a rat's arse about celebrity and fame.

I'm wondering whether we need our heroes to be failures? A la Kelly, Burke & Wills, Eureka. Sports people who always come unstuck (off the ground is okay, on the ground is not.)

What is it about us as Australians that makes us want to tear successful people down? Are other nationalities like this?

What's the deal?

And in other news, went to the beach yesterday god it was lovely and quite surreal to be there in the warm sun, in bathers, while today back in Melbs it's cold, wet and 16 degrees.

Books

I went and saw Anna Funder talk at Melb Uni the other night. She was gorgeous, and I loved her story about a bear and a family camping holiday. She also talked about ex-Stasi men and how they use a lot of Brycreem. She also talked about imagination, that of the reader and that of the writer. I bought her book Stasiland and got her to inscribe it to my daughter. I told her my daughter is doing IB History - Oh, how is she finding it, she asked. I didn't tell her about my daughter's obsession with Nazis in general and Aryans in particular.

I just finished reading Toni Jordan's Addition. For some reason for a long time I thought this was a memoir or NF. It's a novel and a bloody good one I thought. It surprised me, I don't know why. I expected something light a la The Rosie Project, but it is much much better than Rosie. (I draw comparisons though because they each have protagonists with conditions - OCD 'counting' in Addition and a strongly-insinuated Aspergers in Rosie. While TRP, I thought was trite, lacked credibility in many ways and had unconvincing characters who you couldn't connect with or care about, especially Rosie I have to say, Addition was the complete opposite. The cataloguing of compulsions was fascinating but also sad, but the writing was matter-of-fact, never over-wrought. But the thing is, the important thing is, it's FUNNY. It's a while since I've read a book and been so compelled, laughed several times, grinned to myself a lot and cried TWICE towards the end. Jordan has also written Nine Days which is historical fiction, not my usual choice but I might have to check her out because I was seriously impressed with her style and management of her prose.

Now I'm back on HHhH (which I'd put to the side, and which my daughter consumed; see above reference to Nazi obsession.) I also have Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries which I started about three weeks ago mostly to see how she's constructed her form for the story (and it's since won the Booker Prize. Remember I said if she won I'd hate her because she's 28 and it's her second book. I may not have said that here.) Well, she won and I don't hate her, I think yay for her, yay for bigger books, yay for being experimental and writing what you love, not tailoring books to what you think will sell. So yay.)

Also Alice Munro won the Nobel and I had never read anything of hers so I looked up a few articles to get some info of how to work into her oeuvre, and came across a short story (she only writes short stories, but they're long) and it was pretty interesting. I don't think I've ever read a story like that and how she manages time shifts is interesting - she can pack a novel worth of stuff into a long story. She also breaks the 'rule' of show-don't-tell; she is pretty much all tell with some show. But who cares? It works. I look forward to exploring more of her stuff.

*

The last two weeks I've been teaching a lot and not doing much of my writing. But I have to finish my best version of the second book to get to the agent in November. I had said early, it might be mid. I'm getting it to my reader on Monday and that is a freaking freak-out sort of situation.

And then, and then I've been having thoughts about the first one. Once the second is off to Brooklyn I'll go back to the first and rejig. I have ideas, I have notes, and it's true as Tim Winton said in recent radio interview with Fran Kelly:

'You don't really finish books, you give up on them I suppose.'

I think they're aren't finished until they are published and then there's no more you can do. But you probably would if you could.

Sarah, how goes your book? I think it's out soon?

Thought it was time for a new post

But I have nothing. Seriously nothing.

I taught all day today so am knackered. It's windy again and it seems to be blowing the internet somehow. I cut my hair, oh wait, I already said that. Princess got a prefect position for next year, so that's pretty good. Um, Gigi is fine. I'm reading Eat Pray Love which is hilarious cause I bagged it when my sister was reading it in Bali two years ago, or not bagged it, poo-pooed it and rolled my eyes.

You know what, it's pretty good.

I bought for two bucks recently at Savers, along with a whole bunch of other two-buck, three-buck, four-buck books. All in good nick, all (apart from that one) books I wanted for my shelves. I watched Elizabeth Gilbert's TED talk earlier this year - I don't know if she's done more than one or just one - it was really good actually, I was impressed. For some reason I expected her to be a bit of fluff but she's really not. The only thing with Eat Pray is the god stuff, I just can't come at it, but the rest is good. Apparently her next book is pretty good and I intend to buy it too. Apparently it shows she can write. I reckon already it was clear with EPL. Just a shame, maybe, that the movie turned it into something else? I know Ubud has been ruined by it, people say.

That's about it.

Windy old Melbourne Town

September always seems windy. My daughter was born in September, and I remember the trees thrashing outside the window as I walked the flat, my mother sitting on the couch timing contractions.

Since we got back from Hong Kong, we've been pretty busy. Princess had her wisdom teeth out last Thursday so I've been nurse: dispensing medications from the infirmary (a kind of table thing in the hallway), making soft food, taking her ice packs, making her swish salt rinses, mashing food, heating up tinned Campbell's soup. That sort of thing. The swelling is going down but she's still got a bit of bruising. I was a bit anxious because she'd never had anything other than a local anaesthetic before and she gets heart palpitations (which I again need to get checked out by a cardiologist) BUT it was all okay, and I could put away the catastrophising scenes of doom that filled my head as I sat in the waiting room. The dentist had also said one of the teeth had a hooked root and was perilously close to a large nerve in her jaw. There a no signs that it's not gone perfectly well.

It's the second week of the school holidays (third for P) which means no teaching for me and lots of writing time (ordinarily, and the last couple of days I've managed a lot of writing.) I've been walking the dog, continuing my healthy with my food. Day before yesterday I chopped off my hair. It had grown very long, down my back, and while I kind of liked the wild woman effect a side ponytail gave me, when I got up Saturday morning with what other people call bed hair and I call playdough hair, I realised the ends were just so ratty and all uneven (because I have this thing, you see, where I cut my own hair) and so I went into the bathroom and pulled it forwards and chopped it off on either side. So it's just past my shoulders, or on them, a long bob and a bit hacked at the back. Good for summer.

We finished Season One of Orange is the New Black. It is fucking amazing. Alex, have you managed to see any of it? I recommend moving it to the top of your list right now. We are pottering through West Wing, up to about early Season 5. And we re-borrowed Sopranos from Clokey's sister on the weekend and so I'm watching that (again, for me) with Princess.

Seriously, too much goodness.

Clokes and I are watching Big Brother but that's all I'm watching on tv. Did not re-invest in either X-Factor or any other reality tv. The other day caught five minutes of Winners and Losers. Oh my god. How can people watch it? It's so saccharine. Reminds me of what little I've seen of that Asher Keddie show, but much worse. The state of television is terrible and people moan about reality tv?

Reading: am reading various books. I am struggling to settle and go deep. Am flicking between different ones, including reading printed-out articles, interviews all to do with writing (The Paris Review series of interviews are amazing, if you like long-form and even writers you don't read, they are always insightful and interesting.) They go back to the '50s man, and you can search by decade or by person's name. Sometimes I think it's the best thing on the Internet.

I have started Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries, which is on the shortlist for The Booker Prize. She's twenty-seven, it's her second book and I hate her. She uses an interesting form in the book which is partly why I'm reading it; partly too I'm reading it because it's so frigging long, more than 800 pages and I'm curious to know how she sustains it well enough to be shortlisted in such a prestigious prize; alsoam curious to see how's she's done it at all. I also bought the shortest on the shortlist, Colm Toibin's The Testament of Mary.

Writing: over the weekend I wrote a long piece to submit to a journal that has a theme of SEX. I don't write sexy stuff but I'm a sex ed teacher so thought to angle it from there. We shall see. Then this morning I rejigged a piece I'd done on gadgetry and my hate for Apple products, and incorporated some commentary on the hate people have for Jonathan Franzen (and to a lesser extent, Tim Winton.) Not sure what I'll do with that, it's pretty ranty. And THEN I got an email last Tuesday from one journal to say they wanted to print something I'd submitted (it's a creative non fiction piece, kind of) and then last night, an email from a small publishing house who want to include a poem I sent them in their annual collection of stories. So. A few little things happening.

My big writing thing: I have to get my second manuscript to my agent early November. She wants to get it to publishers I think in February. They are keen to see it which is good but so much pressure because what if it's terrible?

Let's just look at this for a moment to calm down:  Putting time in perspective

Gone fishing

Back in a week.

MELBA'S PARTY SATURDAY 7 SEPTEMBER, 2013 - starting now

I can't promise much I don't think but let's see what evolves?


Well, let's get started with a sausage sizzle, some Cheezels and a beer, yes?


 














Fuck. It's happening isn't it?


3:46PM Ramon has arrived; Alex has made an 'enquiry' about my sister. The party has started! Sarah is here all the way from Albany too. Geelong seem to be struggling a little, and I have just come back from getting Princess and a few friends after their rained-out picnic. And because they gorged on crap (as well as all the chicken sandwiches I made), it means there are leftovers for the football people down the back of the house:



 



 So. I guess we wait?









Couldn't find cheese in a biscuit.

But I have dance music Alex:





And non-reluctant dancing dude:

Friday fun with Pauline Pantsdown

This is good. Don't be a fucking idiot on Saturday.

Click here

Just in case you think things are too funny - Toormina Video

This one's for you mostly Alex, but everyone else I recommend it. It's wonderful.

See the whole thing here.

I think this week laughter is key

So let's do it

New information

So the Sex Party is preferencing One Nation.

What the fuck?



Now what do I do?

You know what?

I think I'm going to fucking do it.

Big WTF

Here I was thinking 'oh, there are no good comedy shows anymore, no one taking potshots at pollies, doing parodies, oh woah are the young in this country, missing out on comedy gold.'

Not so friends. I know at times my life is like living under a rock. I'm secluded, I do my thing, and I try to filter out the static. But I think I'm also filtering out a lot of pretty excellent stuff.

Like this for example:

Explanation of preferential voting system from Dennis the Election Koala

Go here and all is explained.

And this

 

THIS

Hipster versus indie versus everything else

OK, I asked my daughter about this. While I'm trying to work out how to embed an audio file into this blog, here are the notes, transcribed verbatim from Princess:

P: Hipster's more mainstream, sort of more 'brandy' will wear the Chinos rolled up, the Vans. That have that certain type of hair that's more quiffy, and sort of shaved on one side a little bit more edgy than the indies. And they might have piercings or tattoos or that stuff, they might have been skaters but then they started to decide to dress vaguely nicely.

And then like indies are more like opp-shoppy, you have mainstream indie now, it was in the shops a while ago but it's become a bit more rocker-chicky so that's changed. Um, indies wear a lot more layers, there's more girl indies than boy indies and you would never see a hipster with a ukulele. Ever. 

Me: A girl indie will carry a ukulele?

P: Not always, it's not like 'I'm going out of the house. Take a ukulele!' But [friend's name] has one. A good indie has a ukulele. Boys as well.

Me: But there aren't many boy indies.

P: There are plenty of boy indies.

Me: You said you won't see many boy indies.

P: [keeping patient, for the interview] I said you won't see many girl hipsters.

Me: Oh. What about the Ned Kelly beard? Like I was saying before...

P: Well, indie's younger. Maybe indie turns into hipster as they get older, I don't know, because none of my friends who are indie have facial beards! I'm sure they'd love to grow them but... they're not allowed, and they're teenage boys.

Me: You said before that confidence is important for indies because it starts younger and you have to be confident to wear opp-shop clothes, non-mainstream clothes...

P: Well not always opp-shops but they sort of come from little boutiquey shops a lot. Like if you find a true indie, you'd never find them shopping at Sportsgirl, they might find one thing and that's like a specialised indie one thing... Yeah so hipster, it's a lot more branded, like shops like Globe, General Pants, American Apparel. But we all like American Apparel, it's just too expensive.

Me: You were saying before [we were talking before I started taping] that indies are into jumpers and hipsters more into jackets. And you were saying the guys wear puddle pants with the Vans, rolled up-

P: With no socks.

Me: No socks. Could that have originated as an indie look?

P: No, because Vans are branded. And really expensive. You have to think about the money here as well. Indies are dressing at opp-shops because they're thinking... consumerist... blah blah blah...  Whereas hipsters have no qualms about that.

Me: So there's also an intersection between social politics? Attitudes? Conservation? Philosophies?

P: Maybe [sounding doubtful]

Me: What about dumpster diving? Have you heard of that?

P: That's Feral.

[laughter]

Me: Just talk quickly about 'bogan' and 'yobbo'

P: Okay. Yobbo is bogan, no one uses the word yobbo anymore, because saying 'yobbo' makes you sound like a yobbo so you don't say it. You say bogan, so... yobbo just shouldn't even be in the dictionary. I've never heard it, from someone. It's ridiculous.

Me: So there's another group?

P: Oh yes, we have heaps. So then there's like, crossing over from that you have the North Face Guys, right.  And they all dress in, sort of like, a little bit hipsterish cause they'll wear the Chinos but they'll wear the Chinos with runnery kind of, not runner runners, but you know those Nike things with the really thick white bits?

Me: ...

P: And they wear those North Face jackets zipped right up to under their chins and have the hoods up so they can mug people. They always have a backpack, always. Like a sports backpack and they go to parties and never take it off, because there's usually illegal things in there.

[Recording finished.]

The only other thing I learned was that you know how we say 'google it' they also say 'image it' so when I said what do hipsters wear, she said 'image it.'

So here we are:







 

 

 





Some pages on the differences

 Hipsters - lots of definitions on the one page

 The hipster test

Just to say it: this whole exercise I feel is very unhipster, however, it seems also that no one wants to be a hipster or if they do/are, then they are original hipsters and everyone else after them are bogus.

So

if fellatio can be abbreviated to fellashe - a not inelegant phrase if you ask me. Then, the question is, what syllable would cunnilingus be truncated at.

Has to be cunni, but then you could only use it if you were wearing this type of apparel:





drinking this type of beverage:




rocking this sort of hair:





and listening to this sort of music, oh and dancing like that too:

I do love a Saturday morning

And then I do love the rest of the day as well.

Things that were good about this week:

Seeing this in the media

Here's another one:

Full story here. Although you know it won't really be the Full Story, because that can't really be written down anywhere.

Then there was this, a visual tree guide:

I hope you can make it bigger, it was bigger on the website.

There was some good writerly news that I mentioned might be imminent a little while ago. One of my short stories is being published in the Big Issue Fiction Edition, out on 16 August. Without knowing who else is in it, I'm sure it won't be hard for people to work out who I am. It's a bit exciting though which means there's been three bottles of champagne consumed this week. Not all on one night and not all by me.

That news came through on Wednesday, and that was the same afternoon my mum and Princess and I went to see Monet at the NGV. There is a pool with white bowls, much like the ones from my kitchen. The water moves around and the floating bowls chime against each other. It's gorgeous:



The Monet exhibition was beautiful. We went in at about 4pm and had an hour. It's a good time to go and often we make this type of stealth-approach on a Wednesday afternoon to see the exhibitions. They aren't crowded and it's a lovely mid-week treat. Loved seeing three of his paintings of London in smog/fog. Very Turneresque and just divine. Particularly this one:
 

There was only one painting of the waterlilies and the iconic green bridge but that was well-advised I think, if it was deliberate. Everyone knows about the waterlilies and the little green bridge, so the "Nymphaea" room was filled with paintings of the waterlilies (and even a few irises thrown in) and there was one in particular, round-framed and delicate. So pretty.

In one of the text boxes, a quotation from Monet:

It took me a while to understand my waterlilies.

This resonated with me so much, especially as this week I've been trying to work out what my second book-thing is 'about'. Who the fuck knows? I read today that EB White, when asked by his publisher why he chose to write Charlotte's Web gave a lovely response, describing his inspiration and why he chose to write about a pig and about a spider, then at the end he wrote: 

I haven't told you why I wrote the book but I haven't told why I sneeze either. A book is a sneeze.

I don't know if either of these sentiments make much sense to you but they do to me.

This was good. A panorama pic of Tokyo and you can zoom right in. When I zoomed right in it made me think of some of the scenes in 1Q84 like when they go down a ladder off the side of the freeway. I think I want to read that book again. This week too I bought Murakami's Wind Up Bird Chronicle. I have a lot of books on standby. They are patient.

Tokyo zoom

Then this piece of excrement:

Misogyny lurks in Winton's world of fiction

Such bullshit but it niggled at me and I spent far too much time thinking about the reasons why she is wrong. Luckily, other far more articulate people than me got into the letters pages to rebuff this stupidity.

And finally, this was waiting for me at the back door when I got home yesterday. I know it's not right to call one of your children stupid but really, when there's a shed open and available for shelter. Also a fucking garage...

I wrote a book review and it almost killed me

It's like, how do these people do it for a living? I suppose they get into a groove, they know how to do it, they are paid to do it, and they get better the more they do it. But FUCK, talk about hard work. First you're worrying about if the author reads it, and if the publisher reads it. Then you worry if you seem like a dickhead. And THEN you worry about not making sense.

Writing fiction is much easier.

The problem is on my 'writer website' I have set myself up to do these things. I have put it out there that I want to do them, want to learn how to do them, and will do them. I put this one off so long it was ridiculous. The other stupid thing is I said I didn't want to do superficial reviews, I wanted to get meaty and in-depth.

So now I can't even just do some trite ones to tick the box.

I'm an idiot.

All I can do is do a few, but every so often. Do them right, but not frequently.

I mean it took me ALL DAY.

(Not wanting sympathy or someone to advise, just wanting to complain. Thanks!)

Hope everyone is good, and that no one is writing a book review. Just read books, don't worry about trying to work out what it is you do or don't like.

HEY ALEX remember 1Q84? That was fun...

That time of year again TIME FOR THE FRENCH DINNER

Tonight we have our annual French meal, as part of the Tour de France obsession I share with my brother-in-law and now my daughter, and which is secondarily tolerated/shared by my sister and my husband, Clokes.

We have our French wines, our non-French cheeses (fuck that, they're too expensive and no one ever really loves them anyway. Let's face it, compared to a King Island Quintriple Brie or a good old Castello Bleu, you can't beat that?)

They are doing main, I am doing dessert and in about ten minutes (as soon as I've finished my Internet Ablutions) I'll decide whether it will be cherry clafoutis or tarte tartin.

This year I'm dressing in yellow. Need to pop to the op shop to try to find something that will complement my yellow cardigan. I told Clokes I am wearing 'as all yellow as possible' and he said: Great, I'll wear my red, white and blue striped top (that we got at 'Tomy [sic] Pony' in Hong Kong. Not Polo and not Tommy Hilfiger - a kind of blend, you know. He knows I hate him wearing those 'fucking polo tops' but he also knew I couldn't say anything because he'd mentioned the tri-couleurs. Smart.

It was quite the big week. I had four teaching gigs, including a new school (primary) and then secondary schools. Thursday was a big day, taught back to back 8.40am to 1.30pm with an hour off in the middle which was cannibalised by me driving home in between, grabbing some fruit, refilling my water bottle, going to the toilet, offloading some materials from first sessions and getting back in the car. I know you love these details; I'm here for you.

Then yesterday I spent ages online working out which Melbourne Writers Festival sessions to go to. The last few years nothing has interested me but this year, fuck. There are HEAPS so I have booked for a bunch of sessions and if I go to the Trivia Night and the Closing Party (unlikely) I'll attend 16 sessions over the ten days or whatever it is, mostly two weekends. Man.

I also might have some writerly news in the next couple of weeks. Not to do with the book, but something short storyish. I've been shortlisted in a local thing which is a big deal, with a wide-circulation. Publication is 'likely but not - as yet - definite' so I am excited, I have cracked a bottle of The Widow to celebrate the shortlisting, but I'm trying to keep it low-key until I have confirmation.

But likely to be published? They wouldn't say that unless it was, er, likely, would they?

Better go and look at the recipes. This was my week, how was yours? What are you reading? Are you happy? Are you wearing yellow? How is the weather? Any holidays on the horizon? What do you think of the POLITICS AT THE MOMENT? Or should we not go there. It is quite the exhausting subject and as I've demonstrated above, it's possible to live in the light and keep things happy.

I'm back, and talk about feral

1. I have a dreadlock and while that in itself is pretty rank, what's even ranker is I didn't realise until yesterday. YESTERDAY. This is a thing that's as thick as a sausage and is so tightly bound up it makes that section of my hair look a full 4 inches shorter.* Today I intend to get in the shower with plenty of conditioner and a wide-tooth comb. And take care of it. I promise.

2. I have no clean underwear. Which means I own precisely 15 pairs of undies.

3. I just realised both my bras need a wash too. And I'm teaching in two days. And I've already done three loads of washing. Maybe I can wear my sports bra.

4. My bowels were bad for a full ten days then they started to go to normal, very quickly. The good thing is that I didn't drink alcohol for that time. The bad thing is I couldn't try the Tuna Tartare and artichoke salad until yesterday.

5. I didn't get sunburned which is good cause I'm getting a thingy cut out on Friday from my back. It's the second thingy, it's not a bad thingy, just one of those basal cell thingies.

6. We watched the Tour every night on the Eurosport station. Commentators Carlton Kirby (come to think of it, I didn't get to see what he looks like.) To google...

Hey, exactly what I imagined.


 And Sean Kelly, we did see. He is hilarious and made us laugh every time he was on.

That's Sean on the left below, he rocks when he speaks and does not have eye contact with anyone other than the road when he talks. We love him. On the right hand side is the unintelligible someone else who does interviews and then there's a really annoying girl who gets flirty eyes with the spunky riders, especially Marcel Kittel.
 


Princess loved sprinter Sagan last year but has dropped him to go for Kittel. I think this is partly because Sagan has a bad facial hair situation going on, and partly because Kittel looks like this:



 Princess: He's a hot Aryan. I love him.

Come on, she's 16. This is to be expected, I suppose.

The other big thing was we realised that Cadel's chin cleft is angled which is very disconcerting. I am still hopeful he will 'do something' but Princess has moved on.

So tonight we have to make do with SBS, and two hours later. It's going to be tough but I'm determined. This week is mountain week and it will be exciting and then on Saturday we have our usual TdeF meal with my sis and bro-in-law all the talk is chamois and sticky bibons, who is pottier (Carlton versus Phil Liggett) and who has the calves which can best be compared to the size and hardness of frozen chickens (probably Andre Greipel.) We will eat, I think, duck cassoulet, eat some French cheese and drink some French wine. Dessert is undecided but I will let you know, bien sur.




* I had dreadlocks in my early 20s for a period of about 6 months. I just stopped brushing my hair and kept washing it and they started. I thought I'd have to get them cut out when I was sick of them but in fact managed to comb them out. It took all day, in sessions, and much patience. When I told this to Princess she almost gagged and physically recoiled when I made her touch my dreadlock.

P: OH, you were one of those people.
Me: I was one of those people BEFORE those people existed.
P: Those people have always existed, Mum.

Gone fishing, back later.

What a good week to just fuck off and get away. Stay well all, stay warm you southerners, stay away from politics and stay away from inferior vodka.

West Wing and Game of Thrones

So. At the end of a week which has seen twitter (and the wider world) mired in a series of yuck after yuck after yuck stories, it's time to feast all eyes on what TV I've been distracting myself with. (That has to be the worst-written sentence in the history of the world.) We are also watching MasterChef (no surprises there.)

Sorry about the captions being centred. They look horrible but I can't be fucked working out how to just have the text under the pic. Works for the top one, not the bottom and I can't be buggered spending more time on it. Have a great weekend.  Stay safe, don't read the fucking papers, don't get depressed. Keep it together, we'll be fine.

It's something about his voice. The way he articulates his words, managing to sound very high-born but filled with pathos at the same time. Not saying I fancy him but he is one of my fave characters. How could he not be?

The way Josh walks, his backpack, the side-looks he gives people when he's tired. I also love Toby so much.

Too much and nothing

I have nothing much to say. I'm sad about Turkey, some of the footage coming out is depressing, but images of protesters cleaning up Taksim and people leaving food and drink for people in heaps around the city, they were inspiring and heart-warming pictures. I hope the people prevail, that's all I can say. While Turkish police are some of the hottest dudes I've ever seen and their uniforms are so cool, they are fucking brutal. I'm wondering where the military is, and what they make of it. Historically, the army steps in when the government strays too far from the principals of Ataturk, there have been a few coup d'etats. But I'm not sure whether the current government has made legislative changes and reduced the power of the military. It's something I've not kept up with over the last ten years or so.

I am writing. I'm struggling to think about writing a book review, something I've promised myself I'll learn to do and then do one properly.

I'm reading High Sobriety by Jill Stark. It's literally sobering. When it was recently critiqued on the First Tuesday Book Club Show or whatever-the-bloody-hell-it's-called-now, 3 out of the 5 panellists hadn't had a drink since finishing it. So that was Marieke H, the young guy on her right, and I think it was Sophie Cunningham? Can't remember. The only two who didn't say they'd taken a break were Jason Steger and Jennifer Byrne. That's not to say Steger didn't take a break, he just didn't indicate one way or the other. Byrne put her hand up and said nothing had changed with her.

Last night I went to a local reading thingy, it's a pretty cool soiree affair once a month where a couple of people read and then they have open mike. This is the second I've been to and I enjoyed it again and it's the closest thing to an old-style literary salon I think I could ever be part of. The atmosphere is very warm, open and welcoming - none of the snobby exclusivity that you can find in any world. Nevertheless, I think it's pretty brave of me to rock up on my own, there's a whole table of people having food and drinks beforehand, and I just insinuate myself onto the end of the table. Thank god the organiser recognised me (from last time) and smiled at me and said hi. So high school, so pathetic. I am a true introvert and while if you met me I'd not seem it, I am rawther reserved. But the lure of the evening and being there outweighed - again - the promise of sticking out like a sore-thumb loner. Most times I'm happy to be a loner (as much as anyone with three children and a husband can be one) but some times, the 15-year-old schoolgirl that lives on inside of me just wants somebody to sit with.

I've listened to a couple of open mike people. Really, there's no microphone, just people sitting around a table, no more than 10 or 12. I've read my stuff in front of workshops and groups before. I like reading my stuff (let's face it, anyone who wants to write and get published also probably has the ego to read aloud in front of strangers). This is something that 15-year-old inner schoolgirl would not be able to comprehend. Read aloud? Voluntarily?

So I may work up to it. Let you know.

I'm not teaching at the moment, there's a bit of a lull for a month or so. Which is good and bad. Bad because no money but good because time to write. I'm working on number two, there is little constipation; this is something that has been with me in essence since end of 1999/through 2000. That's a a while. It's like an affectionate homage to Turkey (the love letter to Turkey is another project, a (gulp) memoir. Ha.) I have struggled with the form and structure of it, but think I am getting there.

The family is fine, things are fine. Muddling along. We head to Bali at the end of this month which will be nice, despite catching a stupid segment on Leigh Sales last night about violence to Australians in Bali. I have never watched Leigh Sales apart from the youtube clip of her interviewing Tony Abbott. I thought she was reasonable quality and that her show would therefore be of reasonable quality. The Bali piece was crap. What the hell. No wonder I don't watch tv other than sitcoms and reality stuff.

So we started watching MasterChef last night. The whole battle of the sexes was predictably sick-making. And of course there were the predictable hate-making personalities, as well as the usual array of hat-wearing tools. It's a bit of fluff I like to watch.

We have about three Game of Thrones to catch up on, as well as we need to finish our latest run-through of Seinfeld. We are almost at the end where Jerry and Elaine are just so over everything, George is shouting a lot and Kramer is... the same. Princess and I are watching West Wing too (me re-watching, she watching for the first time.) I love that show. There's not one bad character apart from lispy short-haired girl, but she goes soon.