welcome to the world

I just got a facebook friend request from a brand new world citizen. Congratulations to Guitar Boy and Miss Ivy! She's gorgeous, but I'm not sure how little Miss Solitaire managed to use the keyboard, she doesn't look like she can really hold her own head up yet. You may have some kind of prodigy on your hands there.

Recent news

Well greetings blogland, from Adelaide. City of a growing number of groovy bars. Apparently they've changed the licensing laws to make it easier to create smaller, potentially less commercially viable places than when I was a lass. Speaking of bars, this is the site of a man I met in bar in Amsterdam, a busker film-maker, who is a fan of Henry Miller. When I said "Oh Henry Miller was a misogynist" , he replied "Why do all women say that?" - which was either very quick and dryly funny - or a little dumb. I chose to assume the former.

Being int this town right up to the morning of new years' eve means I get to go to Rockabilly Riot at La Boheme - any readers want to go.? Do I have any Adelaide readers? Anyway got to go get the house ready for the rellie bash. Happy Christmas, ho ho ho.

Starry skies

Well the support from the Astronomy sector for the big move keeps on coming.. Mystic medusa says:

You're so open-minded at any rate, the whole world knows it and yet now you are ideally entertaining a new degree of flexibility re where you live or conduct business. Something is shifting, if only your fantasies or business plan.

Phew. Not fighting the planetary alignments on that one hopefully. Anyway, kats and kittens, sorry if I've been terribly vague this last week or so. The forecast says that is set to continue. I shall be flying my Southern arse down to de-laide this weekend for a fleeting goodbye to the folks. (And dump more stuff at their house, ah how they love having a 30-something teenager in the family!)

Hang in there, with only sporadic buzz. I'd love to give you all more stories of interesting things, and things that are going on outside the brain-pan of my endlessly fascinating self, but sorry, there's just too much fretting on the forward plan to post interesting critiques and articles, etc. If you're into that kind of thing, there's some stuff from back in 2004, or 2005 that you might like.

I'm melting

No not in the swoony romance novel way, but actually. Melting. In an immortal quote from a uni-era housemate, matt, I think there is a small patch of skin behind my left knee that is merely warm rather than unbearably hot. Hello from Adelaide! Where the standard speed limit in the suburbs is 50 kmh because in summer it is just too darned hot to drive faster. Miss Ivy, if you read this, I've tried to call yr fella but sadly I don't have your mobile or a home number. D'oh! are you able to get in touch? Oog I just thought - you might have a number in the book like real home owning grown ups.

Paging Aunty B

Friday night. Weigh check-in luggage to ensure it meets the weight limit of budget airline that flies Adelaide-Sydney once per day. (And crossing a 10 year time-zone in between ha ha). 19.5 kilos, perfect.

Saturday morning. Discover unpacked CDs, suncream, shampoo, reference book, thongs, and bolivian pillow covers, that must be added to bulging pack.

Saturday 1.15 pm. Bsharp and mjs arrive at airport, as they call for all passengers to check in immediately. Proceed to check out desk. Pay Aus$21 for the extra weight. Bugger. Informed that flight boards at 1.20.

Saturday 1.17pm. Team sharp proceeds through security carrying the *other* 20 kilos as hand luggage. Pause on hearing .. "Paging Miss Sharp, will Miss Sharp please proceed to .. mffle mffle mffle grrble". Mjs helpfully comments "oh that's you! they're paging you, I've never been paged before.. well my ex-boyfriend did once".

Saturday 1.19pm. Remember how if you're delaying the plane, they just take your luggage off, no more pages. Start jogging (in skirt, boots, and carrying unwieldy file box).

Saturday 1.20pm. Approaching boarding gate - the last on the concourse - gate is still closed, just to hear second page..."Will Miss Sharp, Miss B Sharp, please return to check in counter 39, to pick up your ID card. Miss Sharp please return to check in counter 39." Faaaack

Saturday 1.23pm. Back past 10 gates, double back along check-in counters, get ID ("It was up on the top counter" - yeh right, I know how you budget airlines like to play with people), back through security, down to gate, and mjs waiting diligiently with all unwieldy hand luggage. Get into last place in queue.

Saturday 1.30pm. Boarding plane, and a country lad now sitting in the front row with his parents says "you got your id then?" Big grin. Grit teeth, smile, laughs, "ah yes thanks".

Satuday 4.00pm (EST). Waiting at baggage carousel at Sydney Terminal 2. Glamorous blond about to take large lime green faux croc skin bag off the belt smiles and says "oh so you got your ID then?". Yes I did you horrible, organised, blow-dried person. Now LEAVE ME ALONE.

World Cup

Being in the cup rocks. For all those a bit foreign to the round ball...this is the best place to look up match times, click the mousie on the time to get a little auto-conversion to wherever you are in the world. Ok so our house has traditionally been fairly non sport-oriented. (Except for Mum playing the North Adelaide SANFL matches on the radio on the weekends while doing housework and occasionally watching the grand final). Dad always had a preference for the round ball, being a Pom and all, but I think in a more intellectual way. He's more your book readin' type. I think I picked up Ma's enthusiam for the crowd mentality or the hive mind. I'll never forget her yelling the loudest when watching the AFL final on the bigscreen in a certain National Science Museum theatre in my years as a student. It was the Crows playing for a second-year-running win and I think the phrase bellowed out over the heads of my post-grad classmates was "C'mon stop playing like a bunch of gerrls" .

Anyway, I love the shared mindless celebration. Call me populist. I love being a in a pub with yelling happy people all staring at the screen. I especially love when the screen shows other people all over the world with the same level of interest in their team. I like to think that the World Cup encourages a kind of global solidarity, where everyone is chuffed to see other countries' supporters in their colours, there is such a global diversity that very few get riled up with that viciousness born of binary frustration. (Celtics-Rangers, Boca-Juniors, Blues-Doggies, Liberal-Labour, for example). So I bear no ill will to Mother. Her genes helped me get absorbed into the last world cup while in the other hemisphere, together with countrymen of my second nationality. It has also been useful in at a couple of live Port Power matches in Sydney, and a running of the bulls in Central Spain.

Finally, check out my mate Johnno's blog. He's actually over there catching all the Australian Round One games. Now that's good value Buzz.

Where in the world is Aunty B

Well today, in Adelayed. From sometime in the first week of July AT THE BEACH. A well known beach in Sydney - the Southern hemisphere's Emerald City. Me and Mr B have scored a flat from a friend who will be changing the world from State-side for while. It has two whole rooms (count 'em) plus a kitchen. You can gaze out on an uninterrupted view of the waves crashing on the shore from the front windows. And of course hear them too. You can also use the roof do yoga, drink beer, hand washing, or practice belly dancing if the mood takes you. The word is a hot French chick uses it to sunbathe nude, not minding the former male resident to hang out and chat. Haven't told the boyfriend that, but maybe he'll get a pleasant surprise one day.

Have been given the run-down by the current resident on the characters who regularly use the outdoor exercise gym right in front of the window, sounds like an extended eccentric family. I am unbelievably excited about all this. And the phone has even started ringing on the work front, maybe there's something in the stars. So today the divine mjs and I went to Officeworks, and submerged ourselves in a veritable wet-dream of coloured folders, recycled paper reams, card holders and the like. You see, I don't want to actually do any work from a home office, I just want all the beautiful stationary to match.

Open up and say ... Ikeeaah

If you'll pardon the lame ass Poison (as in the glam band) reference there, if you were hapily ensconced in an innerwest enclave of groovy yet distinctive and handmade* homewares, you will have happily missed the kerfuffle in Adelaide last week as they got their very own ikea store!

I laughed to myself like a sad old nanna in a large rattly house when I saw that they'd picked it up on MediaWatch on monday night. A very rough estimate by a local PR guru put the value of all the frothing at over 100k, easy. It was a very big deal. I was here. People thought there would be traffic queues delaying entrance to the airport. There weren't. Anyway, I've got a very trivial bit of marketing waffletalk to share, just for my own amusement, and if you'd rather eat glass than talk about marketing tactics then just look away now.

Clearly all the Adelaide competitors to aforementioned flatpacked furniture specialists are bunging on as much tv advertising to avoid taking a major hit. You remember them.. "love it, at LeCornu" etc.. and they all feature a barrage of products and prices kind of spinning and leaping out of the screen. Now icky-ah have a totally different tack. Their classy, clean, ad feautres a six year olds voice talking about what he likes about the store. Not a single couch or magenta lamp to be seen. Just some chicken nuggests and a ball crawl. Perhaps there's some soft-focus flat packs being surreptitiously slid into the station wagon as he says "not bad ...for a shop". So right, in layman's terms, they're not actually trying to sell you any furniture, they're trying to sell you an experience. Horrible, isn't it? Its a leisure activity, all this shopping business. With its own car park, playpen and cafe. And if you happen to buy some nice homewares at the same time, thats just lovely for them isn't it. Now I am first to admit Ikea has some nice things, I've had a good old browse there on more than one occasion. But better that kind of consumption be done by consenting adults, in the privacy of their own credit ratings, surely?

*By old Sri-lankan and Peruvian ladies.

Reading

My old flat mate's step dad, has had a book published. Its called Ghost Writer and its by J. Harwood. I intend to check it out.

The 'laide is still there. I must say the pubs are definitely improving and they're cleaning up some of those old sandstone building a treat. Lovely place to visit.

Shout out to my bratty old mates and their portagaffs, fitness habits, and children's fantasy film doubles. T-man why didn't you say the local art house was screening *Labyrinth* (as well as dark crystal)?? Ooh David Bowie in tight vinyl. Damn.

I have lots of mozzie bites.

I think maybe that its not such a hot idea to take clear fell fromheritage forests , and use the leftover bits for electricity. Macadamia shells on the other hand, bonza. I have no other news.

Deck the halls

Yes, its been a while. Soon to get private internet access. Very soon.

Ooh, just saw that Betty has been making secret late-night posts. How exciting.
Mate.. Consumption as recreation? Only when you have no actual need of the goods. Then it is fun to buy.

And too old to crash with friends? Never. If they don't let me stay, well then do they really fit the definition?

I because I am a slave to chronology, so: The things that stay in the memory of the last 2 weeks.

Homebake: “Like dying flies on a pin/ In the heat and in the din”. This year the majestic Mr Cave managed to make me feel like one of those moths from my second year Zoology prac. Pinned to a board and only able to flutter ineffectually and blink in time to the music.

Saddam Hussein: Notice how perfectly the raid was timed so that they squeezed him out of that bolt hole had an examination, identification, organised an international press conference, and statements from Washington, all just in time for the breakfast broadcast in the US. Fifteen hours from capture to media. Notice how the cut of the video they used was timed to dramatic perfection, cut to a millisecond’s precision to extract a gasp from any viewer, as he turned matted messy head from the wall, to face the camera. The US military is the best media machine in the entire world.

Work stuff. Betty Sue is gone! My partner in crime, compadre, and understand-er of the many layers of life, cognition and other people. Its just a stinky office with the usual beige computers, pine desks and small-minded automatons now. Happy Christmas, Betty Sue, send me funny posts from the subcontinent. OR ELSE.

My bikini wax (okay so these highlights are in no way related). Three words. She drew blood. She drew blood, for Christ’s sake. That’s not beauty. That’s not grooming. That’s gross. And it’s uneven. Enough said. Unsurprisingly, I was appalled.

Men: Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water, they turn around and act almost unbearably sweet and all human (and fallible) on you. How do they manage that?

Adelaide: Everything changes, everything the same. They really are a pack of groovers down here. S. Archer is taking a break from the cube farm so we may not hear from her for a bit. However, hopefully we shall share a bevvy or two in the near future.

ho ho ho everyone. Make sure you get pissed at the expense of your family. Now that's the real spirit of Christmas.