Reading me to sleep.

Almost every night, I ask/hassle/manipulate Hell Boy into reading to me as I fall asleep.

And I'm wicked enough to expect him to read to me from books of my choosing rather than his.
Not that I don't like his material, but my final thought at night is better off not being Charles Bukowski practising to be a bum.
That's a day time thought.

I suspect that I fall asleep during the 2nd or 3rd paragraph, but he tells me that he reads 2 pages, no matter what.
I have woken up and roused on him before for not reading to me, just as he's turning his light out after completing the task. TWSS

In just the last few months, poor ole Hell Boy has read to me from the following texts:

• 20,000Leagues Under the Sea - Jules Verne ( he liked that)
  
• Mary Poppins - P.L. Travers (he hated it)
  
• Secret Lives of Great Authors - Robert Schnakenberg
  
• Around the World in Eighty days - Jules Verne
  
• Howl's Moving Castle -Dianna Wynne Jones ( he liked that)
  
• The Lucy Family Alphabet - Judith Lucy (he liked that but won't admit it - he read more than 2 pages and I suspect he finished the chapter silently)
  
• In His Own Write - John Lennon (he liked that)
  
• The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
• The Wise Woman - Phillippa Gregory
• What Katy Did - Susan Coolidge ( he hated it)
  
• Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
• A Life - Woody Guthrie - Jow Klein
• Slaughter-House Five - Kurt Vonnegut ( one of his faves - no problem there)
  
• Rosemary's Baby - Ira Levin ( he liked that)
  
• Romulus My Father - Raimond Gaiter
• When Hitler Stole Pink Rabbit - Judith Kerr
  
• any number of John Marsden books (hated them)
  
• and most recently, Snugglepot and Cuddlepie - May Gibbs (he's really hating it)
  

Additionally, we listened to 6 CD's of Jane Austen novels whilst driving down and then up the south coast on our holiday recently.
His idea.
Sense and Sensibilty and then Persuasion.

Poor, poor man.

For someone who hates anything without the gritty immediacy of Bukowski or the quirkiness of Vonnegut, I have really been punishing him.

This is made far worse when you consider that he reads aloud to classes during the day - usually having to project his voice to kids who haven't read anything since Little Golden books and who never have any intention of doing so.
Having spent the last 13 years of my own work constantly speaking, I know that there are some days you just don't want to utter another syllable.

The other night as I plonked my book on his chest, he groaned and told me that he didn't think he could because that Year 10 class had taken it out of him - he'd read aloud to them for 2 sessions.
Naturally I suggested that he go back and tell this Year 10 that they were to have 2 pages less per session so that he would be OK to deal with me in the evenings. TWSS

I will be doing a nice afternoon tea for them at the end of the term if they comply with my wishes....

I'm thinking orange poppy seed cake, maybe lemon and sour cream cake and perhaps fairy cakes, just so I can see how many of these tough guys will eat them. That's what...ahh you know.

On turning 40.

Bring it on!

My God, what a fuss too.
Why is that? Simply because a number ends with an O, we're supposed to do all sorts of different things to every other year?

Such nonsense.

But worst of all seems to be the inclination to make trite, lame, age related jokes in a 10 year cycle. Is that because these people assume we've forgotten their stupidity from last decade so soon?
Well I certainly haven't, I have an excellent memory - and I use it.
I won't be dispensing any polite laughter at my own party.
Be warned.
If you forget yourself and come at me with any of this, I will leave you swinging- that's what she said.

"Blah blah blah, it's all down hill from here - blah blah over the hill - blah blah - you're not as young as you used to be..."

I wonder how many of these twits I've successfully weeded out of my intimate circle -that's what she said- since my last milestone birthday?
I'll let you know - unless you're one of them.
No, actually, especially if you're one of them - fuck it - I'm 40, I can do and say whatever I want now.

Hey, maybe that's what it's all about - a direct measure of how well you've managed your social life during the last 10 years.
I'm watching you...

How about lashing out with something useful instead like, "You've come through a lot, you've faced all your life lessons head on, and I admire the person you've become."
That's what I tell the people close to me when opportunity arises.

And then there's my personal fave, the obligatory mention of age but once a decade.

Did you take the time to write 39 on my card last year?
Will you be bothered to do the arithmetic next year and the year after when it involves just a little more thought and consideration?

Does everyone forget your age for 9 years in a row and then suddenly feel bad about this and have to display their involvement by demonstrating that they have been paying attention all along?

You see, I don't care about such things.
In fact, I'd be far more appreciative if you celebrate my 41st with gusto for no reason, or my 49th, being that that would mean I have dodged to breast cancer curse and have outlived my mother.
But just don't surprise me.

My original plans for my 40th were just to turn 40 and mind my own business.
But it quickly became apparent that there were those who had no intentions of doing the same.
"I don't want a fuss", was somehow translated into ,"Please ignore my wish and organise a surprise party for me."

Now, I hate surprises. I really, really, really do.
And let's not suppose that that's simply because I'm an uppity sort of a thing with strong opinions about minutia.
There's way more to it than that!

I detest surprises so much, that I will no longer even attend a surprise party even as a guest.

Dreadful things.
Pure hoax too.
Surprise parties have always and will always be about the people/perpetrators organising the thing rather than the recipient/victim.

Anyway, I begged Hell Boy a cool 6 months ago to act as bouncer and to stamp out any such daft pretentions for my birthday.
I knew that a birthday ending with O would make me likely to have to endure this from some ninny.

"Hey, we think this birthday is so important that we went ahead and organised it without even consulting you!"
To which the only possible response from me would have been, "Surprise!" and to walk out.

I had promised Hell Boy faithfully that this would absolutely have been my course of action should such rubbish come to pass.
I believe that he was quite tempted to let it happen just to enjoy the spectacle.
Few people enjoy a spectacle more than him.
It would have made quite a blog too.

But common sense prevailed, and I decided to just do my own thing, my own way. That's what she said.

And I'm glad I did, and not just because it rules out any nasty little surprises.
I'm glad, not because I'll be 40, but because I have gathered around me so many wonderful people, that I think it will be really cool to collect a bunch of them in the same place and see what they all look like together.
Like putting out the good china on the nice tablecloth.

As it happens, I now have a duel reason to be glad of this celebration.

I'm leaving my job after 10.5 years, so it will function as my farewell also.
More on that later, I still don't really know how to compile those 10 years just yet.

So, no, I won't be saying whoop-de-doo because my age has an O in it, but I will be doing a social stocktake at my party on the 27th.
The next morning, I will be standing on the Harbour Bridge, throwing my arms up in the air and celebrating my many triumphs over adversity during first half of my life, congratulating myself on keeping my own counsel and genuinely from my heart of hearts, looking forward to a very powerful, rewarding and peaceful phase of my life.

And to a Souths game in the evening, right after a Yum Cha lunch and perhaps a little visit to the cross stitch shop.

Nothing surprising about that.
No polite laughter.

Bob Log Blog.

The Man.
Not the Man everyone tried so hard to bring down in the sixties, but the hardest working Man in rock and roll, as Hell Boy accurately observed.

My fave.
A one man band from Tuscon Arizona, no less.
A man who surfs the crowd in a blow up dinghy, wears a jumpsuit, crash helmet and sings into an old school phone that is soldered onto the helmet.

Last year, we finally had the opportunity to witness such a spectacle (sans dinghy) and we took along our boys, being at the tender age then of only 22-23.

I don't really know what they were expecting, but it certainly wasn't that.
I think I'd told them that he was a one man band, I guess I had overlooked that fact that not everyone is as impressed by this as I am.
I had also mentioned that he played blues.

Blues is a huge word though.

The boys are well used to bounding up our stairs to the strains of Woody Guthrie's nursery rhymes or to Dylan or even to Pete Seeger's union songs, so they were a little twitchy on the night.

However, by the time Bog Log III descended the stairs, already playing a mean guitar, pushed his way through the crowd, and hopped onto the stage without looking even slightly phased, I saw Stan turn to me with his hands on his head, his eyes the size of donuts, his gold tooth glinting, and mouth the words,

"No waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!!!!!!!!"

Yes way.

The performance was punctuated by each of the lads telling me, "This is fucking unbelievable," or just hollaring and hooting and laughing the arses off.

Afterward, Stan being roughly double this guy's size, just took it upon himself to grab Bob Log III and shake him up a bit like the nerdy, jump suited musical freak that he is.
Hell Boy, not to be outdone, told him, ''Man, you're my Elvis," which shocked the shit out of the poor thing, he covered his delighted face, blushed and and drawled, "Oh, man!!!"
I weighed in and asked him to sign my Souths jersey, something I treasure to this day.
He not only sign it, he took the time and trouble to draw an arse hole onto the Rabbitoh.

Anyway, we're going again, and tonight is the night.

After a bungled Xmas Bob Log III web site merchandise order, we are apparently, on the door for this one.
What an honour!
And odd considering that I'd pay ten times over to see this guy do his thang.

You know, after that show last year, it took us until 10 months to get up the nerve to see another live act.
The very week after Bob Log III last March, we had the opportunity to see QOTSA and turned our backs on it.
At the time, my reasoning was, if you need that many people to make music, something must be really wrong.
And they're one of my fave bands.

We chose Fantomas to finally break the drought as they were low risk of disappointing us.

*sigh*

Damn you, Bob Log III, you've wrecked live music for me.
Yes sir, I hope he wrecks it again tonight though.

---------------------------------------------------------------------

And wreck it he did.

He even busted out the dingy for a spot of crowd surfing. He managed to play almost an entire song from within this dingy whilst being tossed around from one end of the packed venue to the other.
Genius.

He arrived on stage in a dinner suit, which disappointed some folks a little, but promptly ripped it off to reveal a gold spandex jumpsuit all ready to go underneath it.
Never has a stripper received a more heartfelt cheer than he did.
But then no stripper has probably ever had to rip their gear off over great clomping work boots or a crash helmet before.
More's the pity.

When it came time for Boob Scotch, all the women in the room were on the verge of standing poor old Bob up - not one boobie on offer.
I think that the crowd was young enough that they were unfamiliar with the Boob Scotch protocol and they might have thought they had to go topless or such.
Not the case.
Anyway, towards the end of the song, I rescued him and with a generosity of spirit rarely witnessed by shy people, I signalled for Hell Boy to pass the scotch, and I dunked my left boobie and stirred it up but good.
I may have been the first sober woman in history to have done such a thing and I'm almost certain I was the first woman allergic to scotch to attempt it too.
I call the manoevre full throttle nerd and I'm very proud of it.

Bump pow bump bump bump bump pow.

Fair weather friends.

Quick, I've snuck in here to write this one while Hell Boy is out, because we have a kind of agreement that in the interests of my mental health, I am not to discuss the weather.

Hell Boy himself, being descended from a long line of weather enthusiasts, could happily watch the weather channel all day.
That is, of course, if it weren't for me, and my horrifying tendency to making scathing, cynical and let's face it, far more accurate predictions that is commonly offered by the likes of a FOX meteorologist.

Few things wind me up faster that meteorology.
It is a topic that seemingly has some bizarre power over me.
The truth is that weather concerns me very little, but that I get upset by the "profession" of meteorology, as they quite obviously just make shit up and get away with it.
It's the getting away with that I find inflammatory.

Hands up who can afford to be as inaccurate in their job as the good folks at Fox Weather?
My hands are down, that's for sure.

I get so upset that I get to the point where I can't finish my sentences.
I once became so distraught by the nonsense on FOX Weather that I phoned them.
More on that later.

I have season tickets with South Sydney.
Rugby league is a winter sport and our seats are not undercover.
The rain won't stop me going to a game. It would make me wear a hat though.

What the rain will stop me doing, however, is going to the Opera.

Once each year, I like to go to Opera in the Park.
It's something I genuinely adore.

In fact, we enjoyed the best night ever last Saturday despite the performance being the worst choice of opera of the many years that we've been going.

Anyway, we arrive early for this gig.
This year it was 5:30 for an 8pm start.
The picnic before the performance being the very best part of the outing.
Good food, good company, reading, sewing, lying on a blanket under my favourite tree in the world....sigh
Incidentally, this is the very tree my ashes will be sprinkled under one day.
My tree.
And coincidentally it stands right besides Bonnie's tree. How cool's that?

So, 2-3 hours outdoors, and a bunch of picnic gear means that I want to know whether it is going to rain or not.
With that in mind, you would expect that switching on the Fox Weather channel just hours before the event, would in some way illuminate us.

I really do think that is a reasonable expectation.

Imagine my surprise then, to discover that the best they could tell me was that there was a 50% chance of rain.

50%

This statistic means that it might rain, or it might not.
Strictly speaking, that's true of every day, a five year old could tell you that.

Hedging your bets, they call it.
Covering your arse as well.

Not being content with that answer from our dear friends at FOX, I checked their online forecast as well, hoping that maybe they had a more thorough answer available for me.

And they did.

Trouble was that it bore precious little resemblance to the forecast they were showing on the TV at the very same time.

And so I placed a call.

After more than a minute of questioning, they were so kind as to tell me that, no, realistically they didn't actually have a clue if it would rain in Sydney that night at all.
And that's fine, just don't pretend that you do, that's all I'm saying.

Neither did they seem to know why they were simultaneously predicting conflicting weather patterns across their two mediums.

But what really got me, was that they didn't know the answer my final question, which was,

"Are you able to tell me how many billions of dollars of satellite equipment you currently have at your disposal?"

We drew a blank on that one as well.
I took that to mean that they might know how to interpret the information gathered by a satellite, or they might not.
50% chance.

Honestly, these people get away with blue murder, don't they?
At the beginning of each month, they stick up a chart with each day listed and either a sun, a cloud or a sun and a cloud, to let us dumbies know what's going on out our windows.

It is my wish to somehow print one of these gems and to bust out the red pen and correct it as the month progresses.
What would their accuracy be, do you think?

I know that the one month I really had a good hard look at it and didn't forget all about it, they didn't get 2 days without exposing themselves to be total Charletans.
The prediction of 20 days of rain in Sydney during a summer month cannot be dismissed as anything other than a moderately funny practical joke, or mental retardation.
And yet, they made that call.

Why?

Methinks it's because they know no-one pays attention or has the means to compare their calls against fact later, and so they just make the chart look pretty or they're pushing the envelope amongst themselves to see who dares to make the silliest prediction.

And that I might respect. Or I might not.

Forgive me? Worry about yourself, Sunshine.

As I was writing some nonsense on Facebook today, I was reminded that I need to get something off my chest.
I have something to confess.

For those among us who are religious and easy to offend, get thee to a nunnery, coz you ain't gonna like this one.

Even as a child I had bad feelings about organised religion.
This was, I suspect, made a good deal worse by the fact I was born into a quasi-Catholic house to Mr. and Mrs. Closet Cynic.
Actually, closet isn't right. Intermittent is closer.
Mr. and Mrs. Intermittent Cynic.

Yep.

Most children do their First Confession and First Holy Communion around 7 or 8 I think. Just before they start to be able to think for themselves.

I delayed mine until 9, when social pressure caught up to me via my parents.

Due to the fact that my father had insisted on a public school education for my brother and myself - he felt that coupling religion and snobbery was ugly, I had to attend "lessons" at nights and on weekends, run especially for the spiritually backwards children of recalcitrant parents.

Oh, and what a joy they were too!

Sour nuns, and intolerant priests who gave even the stupidest child that distinctly strange, slimey feeling that one looks back on now as the aura of the kiddie-fiddler.
A divine halo.

I never had any fears for myself, but I certainly do remember being always at my brother's side when we were unhappy enough to find ourselves on that hallowed ground.

I don't know what it is that some people give off exactly, at the time I thought perhaps it was authority or unfriendliness, but kids can smell when something's not right, they just don't know to do about it.

Regardless, there I was each weekend for what seemed to be an eternity, trying to stuff 9 years of garbage into my head and finding myself, for the very first time (excluding scripture classes at school), mentally disputing what an adult was telling me.

I never got over the whole Mary was a virgin thing, and I never saw the value of having Our Father or Hail Mary prayer races. What has speed to do with holiness?
Well, as much as virginity, apparently.

I never saw the genius in the statement, "God is good," despite the fact there was only one o difference. I wondered whether the man who presented that to us as proof of God's existence was an idiot, or whether he just hoped we were.

And few things had ever struck me as less sincere than that priest asking,
"Are there any questions?"

I know I squirmed about in my seat and thought the nine year old's version of,
"Well, none that you can answer and fewer still that you won't humiliate me for asking."

Nope. Not buying it.
Not even at nine.

But I went through with it because at nine, I had no alternative, my parents had a party planned and I was to have some lame white dress that I really didn't think made up for it at all.

I still don't wear white and I never, ever feel comfortable in it.
As I write this, I wonder if perhaps that's why.
I have never felt like such a fraud as I did on that day.

But before the communion, there was the confession.

I had to go alone into a barren little cubicle with the very person who made my skin crawl, drop down into a degrading position and beg him for forgiveness.

Ummm, no.

I felt as judged and frightened as a small child might in such an unpleasant situation.
And I felt something else which I now know to be resentment.

Who the Hell was this awful, unfriendly man to be judging my sins?

My turn came - I went in the first batch. Just like going to the dentist - I'd rather get it over with quickly. That's what she said.

My knees hit the wooden kneeling bar and due to my size, pained my instantly.
My nerves were in disarray as I had to participate in the role playing exercise of,

"Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. It has been *****days since my last confession and during this time I have ********* "

Well, with croaky voice and a mounting terror of messing it all up, I got that far due to the gruelling rehearsals of those dreadful weekends.
Unfortunately, this was all they had taught us.

The rest they left to us....

I guess they supposed we'd know what we'd done wrong and that we'd just insert it in neatly after all the rote learning.

Nuh-uh.

During those few defining seconds, instead of pleading my case, I chose to think about what this all meant.

My conclusion was that it all stank.

I couldn't think of a single thing I'd done wrong.
I hadn't embezzled, committed adultery, killed anyone, raped, pillaged or plundered...I was at a loss.
I was only nine years old FFS.

Nothing.

This moment cemented my stance on religion for all time.

"I haven't done anything wrong, you horrible man, but I'll bet you have, " I thought.

So, knowing that the robed ogre was waiting expectantly, judging not only me, but my parents by my response, I made something up.

I lied.

Even as it left my lips I knew it felt bad and that I was probably in some very serious bother.
The kind of bother you can't tell anyone about, but must sort out all by yourself.

And so, when he pronounced his judgement on my soul and told me my penance was two Our Fathers and three Hail Mary's, I said them.
Good and fast too.

But I said them in compensation for lying to a priest during my First Holy Confession.
I think I even threw in a few extras just to be sure.

Now, I carried this stain on my soul around from age 9 until age 38.
Well not really.
I mean, I never worried about the opinion of any God who would judge a small child, but I never verbalised the event except to Hell Boy, and then only for comic purposes.

But, waiting (once again) at Kingsford Smith airport for Yoga Boy to return home from India, I turned to my Dad and suddenly said,

"Forgive me Father, for I have sinned."

I went on to explain the whole debacle and I really did feel relief from offering up such an earnest confession, albeit in such a public place and to someone I respected.

Probably it was made easier for me by the sound of his laughter and the strange look of admiration in his eyes as I detailed my queer childish logic.
He thought it was great.

It was not long after that that I heard him telling a friend that although I look like my mother, I think like him.

Amen to that.

------------------------------------


LOL

After Hell Boy had read this, I asked him, "Do you think I'll be going to Hell for that?"

His reply, "Well I hope so, otherwise I won't be seeing you."

Check mate.


---------------------------------

Fantomas.

Tonight we go to see Fantomas, but they're only supporting Serj Tankian and the FCC - the Flying Cunts of Chaos.

It may not make a huge difference though, as the last time we saw them, they only played for 1hr 5 mins, which I thought was a rip.

I'm hoping they'll crack a sweat tonight and do 90 mins.

I heard a rumour that they're only doing their Director's Cut stuff, which is our fave, so maybe I'll jump off the balcony during Rosemary's Baby, make contact with Satan himself and demand for him to do something about this heat, breakfast radio and to work out something special for Pittsburgh this coming Super Bowl.
Can you score an own goal in the NFL?

Anyway, back to Mike.

I am looking forward to watching this strange little man as he accurately and painstakingly recreates his own compositions of tweets, grunts, Latin, screams and la's.
Aside from Bob Log III, no-one works harder on stage than Mike.

Precision timing using a laptop and mouse with 2,000 people watching you cannot be a picnic. Especially when you're standing less than 2 metres from Slayer's drummer while all that's going on.

Fascinating to watch and somewhat baffling to listen to.
Great merchandise, interesting people.
It's like he flosses your brain clean of all that banal mainstream shite we are subjected to in shopping centres, offices, my dad's house etc when you just can't get away from it.
The kind of music that need a captive audience...weddings.

WTF happens to people for that day?
Stop it. Just stop it.
It's excruciating and it's the reason many people never speak to you again once you're married.
You didn't drift apart, they've just totally lost respect for you due to that fucked up Disney garbage you made them listen to for 5 hours at your wedding.

Mentally objectionable plaque.

Anyway, it'll all be banished from the darkest recesses of my mind by 10:30 pm and I shall once again be new and improved.

Thank you in advance to Mike Patton, the most committed musical hygienest of our time.

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=HrSqZzkCgAU&feature=related

OK

Just fuck off with this heat already.

Thanks, Simone.