Easily Confused

Wassup interwebs?

2009-07-16T13:13:00.002+10:00

Hey there y'all.

I'm one month post-surgery and the shoulder is healing well. I developed some pretty awful postoperative depression and anxiety, which y'know happens sometimes. I've increased my SSRI meds so now I'm sleeping better and trying to eat more.

Partner geek has been a total rock as usual. I've had a birthday. Lots of trips to Physio. Watching lots of daytime tv and spending hours sitting in the winter sun.

See ya on Twitter.

Winter morning Fud

2009-06-16T07:29:00.001+10:00

Twitting, Surgery, DVD recommenations...

2009-06-14T18:28:00.009+10:00

Yep another twit - @epacris71.

Final essay for semester is all printed and stapled. So don't expect anything fancy here like sentence structure or um, stuff.

I go into hospital Thursday so they can do this to my shoulder, don't look if you've got a weak stomach. After the surgery, six weeks of recovery wearing one of these:

I'll be doing lots of sitting around taking pain drugs. So, I want some DVD recommendations. Series preferably, but movies are good too, can put 'em on the Quickflix thingo.

Here's the shows I've seen already:

The West Wing
Everything Trek
Babylon 5
Battlestar Galactica
Firefly
Torchwood
Stargate SG-1
Boston Legal
Arrested Development
Blackbooks
The Office
Extras
Wire in the Blood (the lot)
Cracker (the lot)
The Forsyte Saga
Frasier (lots, not the whole 11 seasons!)
Terminator Chronicles (first season only, is the second season worth getting?)
30 Rock (first season)
Mad Men (first season)

What do you recommend?

Here's a thought

2009-06-12T15:08:00.007+10:00

Deep in note taking for an essay. Thought I'd share with the class, from The Anatomy of Freedom by Robin Morgan:

"Dinnerstein: "The major thing men can do is child care. This would profoundly alter all gender arrangements". The comparable big step for women would be to let men do this, despite our sometimes understandable unwillingness to relinquish the one little area of power we're allowed. This issue is central because any society where the person who takes care of the next generation is female (and seems to have life-or-death power over day-to-day existence, however little objective power she has), then the female becomes the scapegoat, in Dinnerstein's words, leaving "another category of human being (male) who by contrast burns clean and pure and is just plain human...When men take an equal part in early child care, men will no longer represent uncontaminated humanity."

UPDATE - Porn for New Moms: Cultural ideas about what Dads don't do from Sociological Images.

One essay to go...

2009-06-08T14:16:00.006+10:00

..and this semester is done and dusted. The tally so far: one HD, three distinctions and one credit.

What a girly swot I am.

Everybody has joined twitter! No doubt I'll soon follow you sheep-like and become yet another twit.

Now & then

2009-04-23T16:10:00.003+10:00

This is odd and new for this place. I keep wondering who the person is who will be watching in real time (click to enlarge):

View looking south along Memorial Drive, Ettalong, c 1920s.

Hello blog

2009-04-21T09:45:00.001+10:00

It's semester break, so here's a hello.

Full-time uni is good, it's words words words then luxuriously long breaks. Writing words, filming words, next up recording words to transcribe and analyse. I don't seem to have many words left to blog. They're a supportive bunch at uni too, I'm getting through my work despite the gammy shoulder. Surgery booked to fix it in June.

I've set up a Flickr thing. I'm liking the idea of blogging in pictures. I'll put a link up when there's something there to see.

Back to school blog break

2009-02-24T15:57:00.004+11:00

Going to limit my typing to uni stuff for a while.

Take care y'all.

Hey DJ, look what arrived in the post today.

I have nobody to talk to, so you get a link dump

2009-02-22T13:33:00.010+11:00

I'm staying home resting my shoulder(s) and I've run out of West Wing episodes. I've talked to everyone on the phone and I'm too scared to join Twitter in case I have no Twitter friends. Thank gawd uni classes start tomorrow.

Partner geek is currently lugging his giant brain around San Jose chatting with other giant-brained nerds about photolithography. Specifically how they get the little squiggles and writing on a bit of silicone (I think) so that I can watch videos of funny pugs on YouTube.

Here's a video (with extra cheesy commentary) on how they make computer chips. The interesting bit is 5.30 minutes in where they show a dude walking around a cleanroom. The idea of a cleanroom is both fascinating and frightening. I'm so disappointed that Partner geek won't get a chance to suit up and walk around in a cleanroom. There's 500 people at the conference he's attending, so obviously it's not practical. Still, I'd love a white-suited photo of him for my wallet.

Here's some stuff I've been looking at in between obsessive visits to slaptear.com:

The Normal Breasts Gallery. It's great, such an antidote to all that ridiculous photoshopped perfection we're all exposed to everyday.

Saying no to handouts from Sociological Images, I keep looking at these pictures. As the S.I post says:
"What caused this woman to write such a strongly worded set of rules? What does it imply about how people have treated her in the past? Homeless people have personal boundaries too."

God's Little Toys: Confessions of a cut and paste artist by William Gibson. This is an old article, but a good one. I looked for it again online after I found an old print out of it in the bookcase the other day. My interest in Joseph Cornell's art started after reading Gibson's Count Zero. Here's an excerpt from the article:

"But I already knew that word processing was another of God's little toys, and that the scissors and paste pot were always there for me, on the desktop of my Apple IIc. Burroughs' methods, which had also worked for Picasso, Duchamp, and Godard, were built into the technology through which I now composed my own narratives. Everything I wrote, I believed instinctively, was to some extent collage. Meaning, ultimately, seemed a matter of adjacent data."

The Aeolus Airship, a human powered blimp. Pedal power! It's been all over the web already, but maybe you haven't seen it. Look at this beautiful concept art:

Watch this video, Golden Girls Behind Bars: Aging Prisoners Yearn for Freedom. From the article accompanying the video:

"The few who get the nod from the board then must be approved for parole by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who, they say, wants to please victims’ rights groups and be viewed as tough on crime.

“The board gives us a release date, and the governor takes it away,” said Jane Benson, 60, a prisoner of 22 years at CIW, who succeeded in persuading the parole board to free her the fourth time she came up for parole. But she said her luck ran out when her papers reached the governor’s desk."

Manic Pixie Dream Girls are The Scourge of Modern Cinema from Jezebel:

"The A.V. Club defines the MPDG as "that bubbly, shallow cinematic creature that exists solely in the fevered imaginations of sensitive writer-directors to teach broodingly soulful young men to embrace life and its infinite mysteries and adventures."

Lastly, I think I may have made Bron's day with this one. Barack Obama is tired of your motherfucking shit. Fantastic.

Shrug

2009-02-21T06:12:00.005+11:00

After experiencing increasing pain and very limited movement in my shoulder after my FOOSH (doctor lingo for 'fall on outstretched hand') nine weeks ago, one x-ray, ultrasound and MRI later I've been diagnosed with a SLAP tear. Follow the link to wiki for the long version explanation.

"The shoulder joint is a very shallow ball and socket. For increased stability, the joint has a collar of cartilage called the labrum. The bicep tendon attaches to the labrum at the top of the joint. A SLAP (Superior Labrum from Anterior to Posterior) tear or lesion occurs when there is damage to the area of the labrum where the bicep attaches."

The short version is that my shoulder and arm hurt a great deal, pretty much all the time.

The good news? The fracture in my hand from my FOOSH has healed well. The physiotherapist is happy with my gradual progress in getting back use of the hand, it's being slowed by the amount of referred pain I'm experiencing all down my arm from the shoulder though. I still can't write with a pen for very long for example or open a can. It's also tricky to work on strengthening the hand when I can't really carry anything with that arm.

Here's the bit that I'm trying not to get too depressed about, the shoulder will more than likely need surgery to repair the tear. Thankfully this can be done with arthroscopic surgery, two small incisions for camera and instrument, rather than a big frackin' hole. But here's the kick, the full recovery time can be up to six months. Here's a timeline of the recovery period. Yep, from slaptear.com, whouda thunk it? It's a really informative site but I had to stop reading it after a while, it was making me worry more.

I see a surgeon in two weeks. I'm kinda freaked out here blog buddies. Partner geek's response to the news was "So, this could have been diagnosed six weeks ago?". He has a point, but from what I've been reading it's not unusual for these things to take some time to diagnose. Plus there's the fact that MRIs are very expensive and my GP couldn't order one done until every other avenue had been explored. Also, for weeks everyone thought the pain in my shoulder and upper arm was from the weight of the cast on my hand and forearm and the way the cast restricted normal arm movement.

Here's why I'm slightly freaked out. My right shoulder and arm hurt all the time. I haven't been sleeping properly which is apparently very common with shoulder injuries, it's hard to get comfortable. I am completely freaked by the long recovery time from the surgery, for the first three to six weeks after it you have to wear one of these all the time. It also sounds like the first week after surgery is bloody awful. My left shoulder and arm have started hurting over the past week or so, it's been doing all the work for nine weeks so I guess it makes sense.

Uni semester starts on Monday, say I have this surgery in the middle of a 14 week semester how much time will I miss? Probably about 3-4 weeks. Two of those weeks I probably wouldn't be able to work at all and after that my arm would be strapped to my body in a sling. I'm thinking of asking the surgeon if it's possible to put off the procedure until June when I'll have seven weeks off between semesters. The physiotherapist says it's a bad idea generally to put off surgery, he also said it depends on how well I can cope with the pain I'm experiencing now. Panadiene Forte takes the edge off but makes me dopey. I keep going over and over all this in my head. I'm trying to stay positive and accept there's not much I can do until I see the surgeon. Give OCD an inch though and it'll take a gazillion miles, so round and round it goes.

On a happier note I have a new toy, I'm typing this on my new HP Mini. I realised I wouldn't be able to take notes at uni properly for a while, I can only write for a short time before my hand seizes up. I'd usually take notes in lectures by hand, I've seen lots of the kids using laptops in lectures and just thought it looked like a hassle lugging a laptop around. I also can't carry much and my current laptop weighs about 4.5kgs. This little mini wonder has a good size qwerty keyboard, weighs about a kilo and fits in a medium sized handbag. Yep, I'm completely, utterly spoilt.

Time for more codeine, insert joke about eventual trip to the Betty Ford Clinic here.

Pug vid

2009-02-12T10:03:00.004+11:00

This cheered my morning, hope it brightens yours too.

Mr Hector Dudley from Historic Houses Trust on Vimeo.

Please donate

2009-02-10T12:22:00.004+11:00

This is a post for my overseas blog friends, many Australian blog friends have posted the same request.

Please consider making a donation to the Victorian Bushfire Fund via the Australian Red Cross, you can do so online here.

Remember even a small donation can make a difference.

David Tiley at Barista has written an extraordinarily moving piece, "we lived again but life was different".

Blueberry jelly by the sea

2009-02-02T18:21:00.008+11:00

As I mentioned in my previous post, things have been a bit stressful at Chez Umina. On Saturday partner geek and I headed around to Pearl Beach for a lovely, indulgent lunch, a well deserved treat. The photo above is the view from our table on the restaurant verandah. Pearl Beach is just a short drive from our home, it's the next beach along from Umina Beach where we live.

After a difficult few weeks, the fog has lifted a great deal. My thoughts are no longer stuck in a frantic cycle. It's hard to express how much I appreciate these times when things ease.

I started physiotherapy on my hand today, it's very gradually creaking back into use. I also had some scans done of my shoulder (yes, more scans). My rotator cuff is not so good apparently. Whatever you do kids, don't rush for trains!

Here's some more Pearl Beach pics from the weekend:

Boy meets dessert, blueberry and white wine jelly with panna cotta.

Boy collapses on beach after large lunch. There's about a dozen abandoned catamarans on Pearl Beach. They've been there for ages, but now have stickers on saying the council will take them away if they're not claimed.

Cakile edentula (Sea Rocket) flowering on the foredune.

I had a dip in the Pearl Beach Rock Pool. This heritage listed pool is badly in need of repairs, it has concrete cancer (the metal inside the concrete is rusting). The local progress association is trying to raise $200,000 for repair and rennovation work. It's a beautiful place to swim, you can float on your back and look up at the Eucalypts and Casuarinas on the cliff above.

Cast off

2009-01-29T19:27:00.008+11:00

I haven't updated for a while, several things have been on the blink. I'm sorry if I haven't been commenting much lately. If you're in my blogroll I'm reading you.

I got my cast off today. You too can have a scaly, peeling, smelly (after several washes) weird flattened hand! Just apply medical-type bubble wrap and a fibreglass cast for six weeks.

It's quite sore and very stiff. The scans were all good though, so onward and upward says the physiotherapist.

My right shoulder and upper arm are painful and have restricted movement, probably a result of my pre-Christmas commuter collision. The doctor is sending me to get the area scanned. I think it will improve with normal cast-less movement.

My OCD & AS have not been so good. I saw my psychologist (yes, another ist for the list) yesterday, she thinks it might be a good idea to increase my SSRI medication. Her concern is that if I continue with high anxiety, sensory overload and migraines it might stuff up starting uni full time next month. I haven't been dealing with things very well. Yesterday I felt like one of those awful old TDK ads, all giant eyes taking in too much at once.

Jeez, what a cheery update this is. What else? I've finished work and have a few weeks off before uni starts. This is a damn fine thing considering all of the above. I've been watching the sublime Mad Men and have developed a huge tv person crush on Christina Hendricks. The woman has hips and a lovely, ample bottom and she's on the teev! Plus she's not playing the "fat girl". Amazing.

I've been reading lots online, not so much commenting. Sometimes when my thinking is not very clear, I just can't think of anything to say that doesn't seem horribly trite. Or rather, I can't think of anything to say that doesn't seem trite to my muddled mind, busily determined (as it is at times like this) to pass harsh judgements on nearly everything I do.

Well, I'm off to experiment with moving my wrist more than a few centimetres.

OCD by xkcd

"There were 150 of us livin' in happy meal box in middle of the motorway."

2009-01-05T20:42:00.007+11:00

I just found this at Shakesville. I can be a terribly serious bean I know, but rest assured I also have a sense of humour about teh poverty. A happy meal box! I laughed 'til I stopped.

Enjoy.

Back to work today and pleased to report no trouble at mill. If your holidays ended today too, I hope you had a good day.

"Context is so little to share, and so vital"

2009-01-04T13:05:00.015+11:00

This post probably would never have been written if my Mum hadn't called and asked what's a bogan? She was watching something on tv and didn't know what they meant by bogan. My partner stumbled about for an explanation, then passed the phone to me:

"Love, what's this bogan thing?"

"Well Mum, it's what they're calling people from the Western suburbs who don't have much money."

"Ohhhh"

I could tell Mum was finding it a bit confusing so I added "You know, like a westie. I don't really like it, it's kinda offensive"

"Oh, okay. Well, I'd rather be a westie than a bogan!"

**********************
'The term bogan (pronounced /ˈboʊgən/, rhyming with slogan) is Australian and New Zealand English slang, usually pejorative or self-deprecating, for a person who is, or is perceived to be, of a lower-class background. According to the stereotype, the speech and mannerisms of "bogans" indicate, poor education, cheap clothing and uncultured upbringing. 'Bogans' usually reside in economically disadvantaged suburbs (often outer metropolitan) or rural areas.' Wikipedia

*********************

I grew up in Western Sydney. Mum was a sole parent living on a pension. We lived in rented houses and flats, then a couple of Housing Commission places. We never watched the ABC. I watched the lengths my mother went to so that we would get by. I watched her mind snapping and her heart breaking. I saw a community of women left with children. I seethed and raged at the mental illness, alcohol abuse, cruelty and violence around me. I turned my anger inwards like a good girl and ate too much. I never let a boy touch me until I was 21 so much did I fear the trap of pregnancy.

For a long, long time I was very angry at my mother. Then one day I was reading a poem and a line jumped out "still blaming Mummy after all these years". It had never occured to me to blame my absent father and his $25 per week 'maintenance'.

I ran away, I ran to the city and remade myself. However, twenty years later I realise that no matter how many coats of middle class gloss I apply, the shame is always there. The knowledge that my family is seen as 'other'. Stupid bogans. Welfare scum. Poor white trash. Peasants. All racists. Having babies for the money. Too fat. Comical. Pitiable.

**********************

"Lawler starts her article with Orwell’s provocative quote, "the lower classes smell" to introduce her discussion of the social production of the alterity of working classes for the middle classes. This quote summarizes a central point of Lawler’s article, that the middle classes are disgusted by the very existence of the working classes. Such disgust is constitutive of the essence (as socially produced) of the middle class habitus. Such an habitus is constituted in opposition to an "Other", the working class. The identity of being middle class is tied to being opposed to "these disgusting people." And things haven’t changed much since Orwell’s times: the middle class is still disgusted by the lives of the working classes." SocProf

*********************

I've been told time and again that class doesn't exist anymore.

In my twenties I joined a socialist group because they at least talked about class, but I got bored selling newspapers and reading the words of what my brother might call "old dead cunts". It all seemed to have so little to do with anything real and lots to do with a bunch of middle class people getting into an excited lather about the 'workers'. I was so naive, it took me a long time to realise they had no idea and that it was all some kind of game. My politics remain deeply, rabidly left wing, but I will never join another political group. Probably the most surprising thing about the socialist group was their utter ignorance about class privilege and entitlement.

*********************

"Entitlement, I have told them, is a matter of feeling like we rather than they. You think you have a right to things, a place in the world, and it is so instrinically a part of you that you cannot imagine people like me, people who seem to live in your world, who don't have it. I have explained what I know over and over, in every way I can, but I have never been able to make clear the degree of my fear, the extent to which I feel myself denied: not only that I am queer in a world that despises queers, but that I was born poor into a world that despises the poor" Dorothy Allison, Skin: Talking about Sex, Class and Literature

*********************

I was on a panel at a writer's festival once, I'm no writer obviously. I was there talking about an independent media project. I can't remember the context but I was talking about being working class "not that anyone in my family worked much!" I joked. Big laughs from the audience, lots of straight white teeth and university degrees. Acceptance! Intoxicating, delicious acceptance. Out of the corner of my eye, my child self, nose in a book eating a pile of thickly buttered toast.

The other thing I remember about that festival is being ashamed in front of a couple of hundred people. The festival organiser was having a rave to the crowd about how it's impossible to buy a pair of sneakers without a logo. I didn't think quickly enough and called out "Go to Kmart!". "Well, there's the solution!" he replied sarcastically, much laughter. Of course Kmart is a major corporation and not the answer. I sat and cried hot, shameful tears. I'd stuffed up, I'd shown my roots. I'd spoken like westie trash instead of the well read, inner city activist I wanted the world to see. The writer Christos Tsiolkas was sitting near me, he saw straight away and offered a comforting hand and kindness. Later, I talked to him and I said why don't they get it? He said they haven't lived it.

Years later, I saw the play Who's Afraid of the Working Class? I sobbed all the way home the recognition was so painful.

**************************

"Representations of working-class people are marked by disapproval or disdain, not for the ‘objective’ markers of their position, but for (what are perceived to be) their identities. Everything is saturated with meaning: their clothes, their bodies, their houses, all are assumed to be markers of some ‘deeper’, pathological form of identity. This identity is taken to be ignorant, brutal and tasteless." SocProf quoting Stephanie Lawler.

************************

I learned to pass as middle class. I learned so well that sometimes people are shocked to hear where I grew up. I copied the way hip, lefty middle class women dress. I even became a vegan for a while. I stripped away anything that would betray my class origins, keeping only funny anecdotes that would serve to illustrate how far away I was from being welfare scum.

**********************

"I thought, of course, of how often I and many of my formerly-working-class friends have learned to just not talk about what our parents did, about how we’ve learned that if we do, we should expect not admiration but condescension when people learn that we walked away from such backgrounds, even when our leaving required much more than packing our bags and calling home for the money for a bus ticket out." janevangalen

*********************

It's interesting, writing about class has proven more difficult than writing about my disability. There's a rage that is difficult to articulate. There are things that I fear are saying too much. Like the way news reports of women killing their own babies of course sadden me, but don't shock me. I think of the women in my childhood, poor, often medicated, desperate and wonder that so many of us made it.

The thought of my mother's utter isolation when we were kids breaks my heart, the fact that my painful, disjointed childhood was not much, much worse is astonishing.

"Since respectability is coded as an inherent feature of ‘proper’ femininity, working-class women must constantly guard against being disrespectable, but no matter how carefully they do this, they are always at risk of being judged as wanting by middle-class observers. And this is a double jeopardy since if working-class women can be rendered disgusting by disrespectability and excess, they have also been rendered comic or disgusting in their attempts to be respectable." SocProf quoting Stephanie Lawler.

"Love, what's this bogan thing?"

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

Notes:
* The title of this post is a quote by Dorothy Allison from Skin: Talking about Sex, Class and Literature
* If I've quoted you and you're unhappy about that please let me know easilyconfused07(at)gmail.com
* This is obviously not an academic exploration of class issues, it's a personal perspective. Arsehole-ish comments will be deleted. I also won't get into a discussion about whether or not class exists.

A poem for Boxing Day

2008-12-26T19:48:00.006+11:00

Yesterday sitting digesting my large lunch, I noticed my Mother-outlaw's copy of The Best Australian Poems 2006. I had a leaf through and read again with pleasure Mal McKimmie's Jubilate Agony, a very clever shot at our former Prime Minister.

This evening I'm digesting again and bored and unable to do some busywork or other because of my &*%#ing cast. So I've typed in Jubilate Agony for you to read and enjoy, all with my left hand, forgive any typos.

If you're not familiar with Christopher Smart's Jubilate Agno, go here and read that first. Lots of you cat owners have probably come across Jubilate Agno. I'm not the least bit religious but I do feel for Christopher Smart, perhaps locked up for what sounds like a bad case of OCD.

Jubilate Agony
by Mal McKimmie

After Christopher Smart

For I will consider my Prime Minister, Johnny.
For he sits curled at the far right hand of God, and knows
what the left is doing.
For he is the cat that has got the cream and his Cheshire grin
will not disappear.
For we have invoked him thrice and his spoor can be found
now in every house.
For having received votes and won office he begins to
consider the media.
For them he performs in ten degrees.
For first he looks upon his perpetually clean conscience.
For secondly he grooms himself assiduously.
For thirdly he attunes his antennae whiskers, that he may
know his adversaries.
For fourthly he pricks up his ears, that he may hear what they
say about him.
For fifthly he extends his retractable claws.
For sixthly are his claws sharpened by minions.
For seventhly are his minions sharpened by claws.
For eighthly he sprays his scent where he will, to establish
there is no limit to his ministry.
For ninthly on his hind paws he prances, his little pink penis
waving like a flag.
For tenthly he purrs his soporific purr until all good kittens
are sleeping.
For having considered the media and himself he will consider
his enemies.
For when he takes his prey he is merciless.
For one mouse in seven escapes to the backbench.
For he counteracts the powers of Labor by his electoral sins
and glaring lies.
For he counteracts Beazley, who is fat, by brisking about the
block.
For in his morning walks he loves the media and the media
love him.
For he is of the tribe of President.
For the Cat Prime Minister is a term of the Tiger President.
For he has the hissing of a serpent which in public he
suppresses.
For he will do destruction and be well fed, and he will spit
when he is cornered.
For he purrs in thankfulness when George tells him he’s a
good cat.
For he is a blunt instrument for public schoolchildren in their
learning.
For every university is incomplete under him, a spirit lacking
in his blessing.
For he is a fan of Andrew Lloyd Webber, but not of
T.S. Eliot.
For he will not say sorry to Mr Mistoffelees, the Original
Conjuring Cat.
For he has surpassed even Macavity, who was called the
Hidden Paw.
For he now can not only defy, but can create the Law.
For his supporters suffer from Stockholm Syndrome.
For they do not have to stand in queues, which is patience
upon approbation.
For they do not have to fetch and carry, which is patience in
unemployment.
For they do not have to jump over sticks, which is proof
positive for Centrelink.
For the ease of his defense is an instance of the love of the
media to him exceedingly.
For he knows that the media is his saviour.
For he is a master of camouflage.
For he is the most pernicious of tomcats.
For he is of the Lord’s rich, and so indeed is he called by the
rich perpetually – Help Johnny! Help Johnny! The poor
are biting at our throats.
For I curse the name of his Lord Jesus that the rich are made
richer.
For his tongue is like sandpaper and he has whittled us to the
bone.
For he is loved by the hypocrite and the miser.
For the former has no fear of detection.
For the latter escapes the charge.
For he backs the camel through the eye of the needle at the
first notion of big business.
For he made a great figure in Afghanistan and Iraq for his
signal services.
For he has captured his Icneumon, and detained it
indefinitely.
For his motions on the face of the country are more
destructive than any other quadraped.
For his voters have blessed him and the variety of his crimes.
For he can tread to all the measures upon a march.
For I am a poor cat and must swim for my life.
For claws don’t kill people, cats do.
For he is a creep.

Deck the halls dudes

2008-12-24T15:49:00.010+11:00

It turns out my scaphoid is fractured, so a cast for four weeks and then another scan. No washing up for me! Here's some hand advice. If you fall over, land on your hand and it's initially diagnosed as a sprain, but still really hurts after a few days then you need a bone scan or an MRI done. The scaphoid is a very small bone, but if a fracture isn't treated properly it can cause big problems.

Thank frak for waterproof casts and sports bras without clasps. The cast is so long to stop all wrist movement.

I'm not sleeping very well with my new fibreglass fashion accessory. The past few days I've been really anxious. Special occasions makes me jumpy. I enjoy seeing everybody and eating too much. It's just the change in routine or something.

The geek and I did one last Christmas shopping run this morning and of course the shops were nutso. We were in and out of Deep Water Plaza like a couple of commandos. On the way back to the car reeling with sensory overload I said "I don't care if we've forgotten someone, I'm not going back there" the geek said okay and I said again "I'm not going back there!". Then I burst into tears.

The geek has done a stellar job this afternoon wrapping presents and getting them organised into bags for our annual three day road trip of the Greater Sydney Region. He was last seen heading for the study to play WOW armed with half a box of dark chocolate selection, chocolate coated ginger and a muesli bar.

Here's some fun festive stuff:

The Ten Least Successful Holiday Specials of All Time, hat tip to Danny.

David Sedaris reading bits from his Santaland Diaries. Worth a listen just to hear his Billie Holiday version of Away in a Manger.

10 Holiday eating and drinking tips from DJ. I think it's okay to replace the eggnog with beer, or in my case with large gin and tonics. Avoid all carrot sticks.

Remember it's not Christmas if you haven't bought your pet a squeaky toy with Santa on it.

Wishing you and yours all the best.

Typing one-handed

2008-12-15T14:08:00.009+11:00

Thursday evening last week I was rushing for the train at Central, ran into some poor bloke and fell over.

It was quite surreal first being lifted by complete strangers and then sitting in a chair surrounded by first aid dudes in the busy country trains section of Central. Things got weirder getting wheeled out by ambos to get checked out at St Vincent's Hospital, but it was just shock and happy gas weirdness. I kept thanking everyone and wishing them a Happy Christmas.

I must have landed on my right hand and left knee. The hand still hurts like a bastard, so despite the x-rays showing no fracture, the GP wants me to get a bone scan to check my scaphoid is okay. Did you know you have an anatomical snuff box? The doctor at St Vincents seemed to relish the opportunity to say it - anatomical snuff box.

My knee was very swollen but has settled down after a few days of ice, now it's competing with my wrist in an interesting bruise colour competition.

What else? Long time no update I know. I finish up at work in late January. I'm terribly disillusioned and mildly depressed about my workplace. Some of the cynicism and coldness I'm witnessing is exhausting.

Here's some happy news. When I finish work partner geek and I are going on holiday to the Snowy Mountains for a week. This means lots of good walks and a chance to go into full plant nerd mode. Alpine vegetation! Bogs! Feldmark plants! Each time I get excited about seeing alpine bog plants the geek reminds me of the summer horse flies. We'll bathe in insect repellent! No problem.

The wrist tattoo means woman. A long time ago I got a bit excited about my first girlfriend and decided to mark the occasion. Mum said - Woman? Is that in case you forget? Bless her.

Bits & pieces

2008-11-29T08:55:00.004+11:00

People say odd things when they don't know what to say. Last week, I obviously had the day off work when Ruby passed away. When I returned to work the next day and people did the Are you alright, not the flu is it? thing, I explained why I'd been off work. Several people said immediately Are you gonna get another dog?. Um, no. Probably not for a while.

Having said all that, if someone knocked at the door right now and needed a home for the so-cute-your-head-may-'splode duo above, Fud would be getting used to some new buddies. More pictures here, from the fabulous Cute Overload.

In other news, why can't Flickr and Picasa just get along? Why won't partner geek consider using a photo storage thingy that talks to Flickr? Stubborn geek! Ah well, my photo a day thing didn't happen (it did for a little while!) so now it's me photo blog.

We have a friend visiting from Sydney today so we're taking him to Fisherman's Wharf at Woy Woy to stuff ourselves silly with seafood. They have this seafood platter the size of a coffee table, called the 'Bob Platter'. They also keep bringing chips (fries for you American readers), bowl after bowl of them. Why so many chips? Who's Bob?

Have a good weekend y'all. Thank you for all your lovely comments on my Ruby post.

Vale, little soul

2008-11-27T17:59:00.010+11:00

Happy dog on the road, Christmas 2005

On Wednesday last week our Ruby passed away. It was early in the morning and Matthew and I were still in bed. We were woken up by a loud yelp-ish dog squeal and M said he heard a thud. When we ran into the hallway, we found her and she was gone. M noticed that her little feet were damp, she must have just been out the back for her morning business.

Ruby was 13 years old. In November 2007 she developed a persistent cough and some weight loss. For her last year Ruby was treated for a heart condition. M and I were always very careful about not wanting her to suffer. We checked again and again with the vet. Esther, our wonderful vet, would always be very honest about Ruby's quality of life. Esther would assure us that yes, if Ruby is eating well and trotting around the block with M in the evenings, wagging her tail and eager for car rides, then we were not doing that thing where people keep a pet alive for their own sake.

I'm starting the story at the end. Here's some of the start.

Ruby was a gift, the most precious gift I've ever recieved. In 1995, about six months before Matthew and I got together, I was driving down King St in Newtown with a lovely woman, L. I can recall I was musing out loud about getting a dog as we drove. Next thing on a whim, L and I were in Newtown Pet Shop picking a little black and white whippet X bundle from among her squirming puppy brothers. L paid for her, and that was the beginning for Ruby and I.

We took Ruby to a park and I have the clearest memory of this little puppy with a collar and lead on for the first time, just not getting that when the human pulled the lead thing you're supposed to walk. She sat on her bottom and I sort of dragged her along a bit. I let her off the lead and she walked ahead of us and then sat on her plump puppy backside again just looking at the big world. It's like a photograph in my mind, little Ruby with her back to L and I, sitting and looking.

Running on the beach, May 2004

Several years later at the park in Erskineville where we walked Ruby, Matthew and I learned about her history. A woman walking a beautiful whippet said to Ruby "Hello Donkey pup!". It turned out this woman had owned Ruby's mother and the whippet with her was Ruby's Aunty Lucy. Ruby's mother was a purebred whippet called Tiger Lily and Ruby was a result of a local hound breaking into their yard and having his way with Tiger Lily, who died soon after Ruby and her brothers were born. Aunty Lucy nursed the pups and then off they went to Newtown Pet Shop. The "Donkey pup" name was because Ruby was such a stumpy little thing when she was very small.

Ruby grew up to be whippet thin and stayed thin no matter how much she ate. She loved to run and she was fast. When we walked her and met other whippets who were faster than her it was like she'd get a little shock. She was never very into fetching a ball or stick, instead one of her favourite games was to chase us on our pushbikes around and around the cricket field at Sydney Park. Another favourite was when M and I would stand either side of a large park or oval and whistle and she'd run back and forth between us, sounding like a very small galloping horse as she got close.

Rhubarb pausing on the beach, May 2004

Ruby was a scallywag and a princess, at one moment a regal little hound whose poise several people compared with an Egyptian temple cat. The next moment a rowdy rough nut tearing around stealing Fud's tennis ball and 'breakdancing', our name for her funny, joyful rolling and squirming around on her back.

It's so sad and strange around the house after all these years of having the two dogs. Fud was a bit quiet for a few days last week and is clingier than before, no doubt missing his little buddy. I miss her so much, I don't have the words for it.

After we found her in the hallway I held her on my lap and patted her and told her that it's okay to rest now, that her little heart had been working so hard and she'd been such a brave and good girl.

We're going to spread her ashes at the beach where she loved to run so much.

On holiday in Melbourne with Fud, 2002

Snoozing in the sun, one of her favourite things to do. August 2007

'To me, fair friend, you can never be old
For as you were when first your eyes I eyed,
Such seems your beauty still.'
- Shakespeare

Mauve carpet & work news

2008-11-16T14:42:00.014+11:00

Our front yard is so lovely at the moment. The jacaranda is blooming and the grass is a carpet of fallen blooms. Each year when the jacaranda flowers appear the geek says "Too late to study for exams!", remembering the jacaranda in the main quad at Sydney University.

I have a new camera, a Canon EOS 450D and this extra lens. I'm still playing with it and working it out, as you can probably tell from the blurry puglet in the previous post.

Looking up in our front yard.

The Pandorea is blooming too.

My big news is that I've put in my resignation at work. I'm finishing up at work at the end of January 2009 and returning to university full time. The part-time work and part-time uni combo hasn't worked. I kept getting sick doing what added up to a six day week. I'm in the very, very fortunate position of having a partner willing to support me while I study. It's also time to move on from work, obviously I won't go into lots of detail, but things are changing there and not all for the better. I've done what I can in my time there and I think I've done it well. I've been thinking of leaving work for several months and returning to uni was one of the options, after much discussion with the geek I've decided to give it a go.

The size of the change has increased my anxiety, most AS people don't do change very well. I'm dealing with it though. Yesterday afternoon and evening I dealt with it by watching almost the whole of season one of Heroes again. I'm eating too much junk too, stress eating. Why do they have to start selling fruit mince pies in November? Compared with just a few years ago, watching Heroes until I have a headache and eating too many fruit mince pies is really not so bad.

I've barely seen the geek this weekend, he's spent most of the weekend with this guy, expansion set time!

On Friday night he was pretty cute, it was like a kid with a new Harry Potter book. He dropped his bag and rushed into the study, came back out and said "I'm just getting it loaded". I started discussing what we should have for dinner, realised the geek excitement levels and said I'd just bring him something. He was all "Are you sure that's okay?". He's always wary of being the clichéd gamer neglecting his partner.

We recently hauled a whole lot of the geek's childhood junk home from his Mum's place. He went through it and took pictures of some large bits and pieces rather than keep it all. Here's a 1982 geek game effort. Teh cute!

Puglet

2008-11-16T14:20:00.002+11:00

My friend R has a new member of her family, meet 14 month old Charlotte. Last weekend I did some puppysitting for R when she went to Canberra overnight. Actually dog, cat, fish and chicken-sat.

I've never spent time with a pug before, for some reason I assumed they were a bit prissy. Charlotte is a total scallywag, a "little-big dog" is how R puts it.

I'm now slightly pug obsessed.

Pug yawn!

Watching Wallace & Gromit together.

R's other dog Noodle is gradually adjusting to the puglet arrival.
They had games while I had my breakfast. Submissive pug above.

Kung fu pug attacks!

Time for a female Doctor Who?

2008-10-30T14:53:00.011+11:00

It's official, David Tennant is handing in his sonic screwdriver:

"Doctor Who star David Tennant has announced he will leave the hit science-fiction series at the end of 2009.

Tennant, who has played the tenth incarnation of the Time Lord since 2006 after taking over from Christopher Eccleston, said he will leave the role after completing production on the four special episodes to be screened in the UK in 2009 and early 2010, according to report from the BBC website."

One would hope that by 2010 fans could cope with a female Doctor Who. There's been rumours of a female Doctor. Russell T Davies says here that introducing a female Doctor would be too confusing, introducing the awkward topic of genitalia into family viewing:

"He is not a man to shy away from controversial comments, and says Tennant's eventual replacement should not be female. "I am often tempted to say yes to that to placate everyone but, while I think kids will not have a problem with [a female Doctor], I think fathers will have a problem with it because they will then imagine they will have to describe sex changes to their children.

"I think fathers can describe sex changes to their children and I think they should and it's part of the world, but I think it would simply introduce genitalia into family viewing. You're not talking about actresses or style, you're talking about genitalia, and a lot of parents would get embarrassed."

What a heap of shit. Though I guess there is the danger of fanboy heads assploding.

Here's my pick.

Emma Thompson:
Not a realistic choice I know. Thompson is an Oscar winning actor who more than likely wouldn't even want to do a tv series. Plus there's the fact that she's 49, which equals 157 in female actor years, especially on the teev.

I'd love to see her having a turn as the Doctor though.

So, who would you cast as the first female Doctor Who?

Fud's 'Heroes' power revealed!

2008-10-27T17:44:00.006+11:00

from Toothpaste for Dinner

Life with a 14 year old dog can get really, really smelly.