Blogging politics, culture, sociology and life from Brisvegas
So, since we don’t live by politix alone (I sincerely hope), what did people get up to this weekend? Join in, share some tales, regulars and lurkers all!
And just by the by, here’s a photo I took this arvo that sums up what’s happening on the other side of the river (in much more public fashion) parallel to some of the “urban regeneration” trends that I described in this post about The Valley yesterday.
Please read the comments policy. If you would like an icon beside your comment, please register a Gravatar.
There is a Comments Preview function below the typing box which activates when you start typing.
Larvatus Prodeo is an Australian group blog which discusses politics, sociology, culture, life, religion and science from a left of centre perspective. more»
I had a thoroughly lazy weekend wherein I did the grocery shopping, the washing, and lazed around in bed reading Jasper Fforde novels. I’m always amazed at the people who can do so much on the weekend. I need to spend most of it recovering from the week I’ve just had and preparing for the one on the way. At least things at work are rumoured to be much quieter after Friday!
Slept off hangover. Did shopping. Went to pub for FC game, surprising number of fans (this is just my local) there, watched frustrating 0-0 game. Raced home and slapped together a stir fry (OK, needed more oyster sauce). Now alternating between another Erikson novel and ‘The Worlds of Hermann Kahn’.
The stuff of legends.
Yesterday, hung out with my two best mates one after the other. I meet Mate #1 and her daughter, my de facto goddaughter the aerospace engineering student (who said yesterday ‘I’ve decided I think feminism is fabulous, and I’m really glad I was born after it caught on’), every Saturday morning for coffee. Mate #2 lives in the Adelaide Hills which are blossom-filled and glorious at this time of year; over lunch and through afternoon did the conversational rounds of APEC, Bush, the Chaser boys’ stunt (contentious), Rudd’s Christianity (also contentious), separation of powers, how to prune a rose bush, Buddhism v Hinduism, termites, Mandy Patinkin, J. M. Coetzee, Germaine Greer’s bucketing of Stephen Greenblatt’s book about Shakespeare, and whether it had been a disaster that she (R not Germaine) had left the fetta out of the fetta and zucchini fritters. Drove home down through the hills into a pearl-rose-and-aquamarine sunset.
Today, bucketed a lot of water onto garden, transplanted retarded hyacinths, read blogs, cleaned stove, finished new spy novel by Stella Rimington (former — and first ever female — head of M15, now writing novels) and started Annie Proulx’s Wyoming Stories.
Also the stuff of legends.
Did Germaine bucket Greenblatt? I haven’t read her article, but I read his book last year and thought it fabulous.
So I’m told. I think it was in the Guardian Weekly.
Ah, ok. Life’s too short to read everything I guess, but I can honestly say Greenblatt’s book was one of my favourite reads of 2006.
I’ve just spent a lovely, and surprisingly warm, Sunday arvo at the Theckla with my flatmates. We’ve spent the best part of the afternoon sitting in the sun and drinking apple cider. Bristol is packed with pubs that serve up a good roast or fry-up on Sunday afternoons. When the weather is good, as it has been today, the pubs are pretty packed out. The Theckla is a pretty fab venue as well, it’s an old boat which has been converted to an indie club/cafe. The Hoodoo Gurus played their a couple of weeks back!
Btw, I’ve told my tale on Facebook in a photo album!
A weekend in Yuendumu.
Saturday decided to make a start on preparing some garden beds inside the latticed prison walls that my significant human other built to keep our fluctuating population (was 20, now down to about 15 - who counts, who cares?) of canine significant others.
The town is very quiet because both the junior and senior AFL teams (the Yuendumu Magpies) are in the Grand Finals for the Central Australian Community Football Competition
Disappointed no Alan Ramsey in Saturday’s on-line SMH…
Prepared Coir blocks & horse manure (collected from around town - lots of horses and cattle roam the nighttime streets here) in the wheelbarrow. Dug, and dug some more.
Had a long chat with a fellow raptor enthusiast about how to approach confirmation and data collection of a breeding site (as yet not quite confirmed to my satisfaction) for the rare Grey falcon. Checked out long telephoto lens to take photos of same.
Took dogs for a long walk (we drive out to the borefield, drop the dogs off and pick them up about 7km later), saw an unidentified Blind Snake (the dogs walked right past it while it lay still across their path…).
Came home and was disappointed to see that the Magpies-Swannies game was on a delayed broadcast, so listened to it on radio and then watched the first quarter while the third quarter was on air. A glorious victory! Think of cold beer.
House is a mess with dogs, dirt and dust throughout and furniture etc still piled up from having the house painted over the past week or two, unwashed plates etc - forgeddaboudit…at least until significant human other returns from the DESART market and exhibition in Alice Springs on Monday…
Early to bed then up early for a few more hours finishing off the garden. Traipse more mud and dirt inside while the dogs and I watch Insiders (LOL from the Bolta!). Collect more horse shit, prepare more fertiliser, coir & horse-shit mix for garden beds. Dig beds. Get hot. Think of cold beers.
Make dog food (dog bones from the Butcher in town, some leftover bacon and potato from camping last weekend - put in big pot - boil. Add rice, frozen veges & 2 x cans prepared dog food - result = happy dogs!).
See Grey Falcon flying low through the trees in town harassed by Crows - happiness. Talk to neighbour about his immigration woes, how to install a sliding door and truck issues. Lend him a hammer drill.
Water garden (with a sprinkler!!)
(Almost) finish garden - 4 beds dug in - 1 to go.
Listen to Yuendumu Magpies give the Papunya Eagles an absolute thrashing…
Take dogs for walk. See a dead Military Lizard, look for (and find) new nests for Red-backed and Sacred Kingfishers in the tall eroded walls of the creek at the bore-field. Deal with puppy that refuses to get into the truck while all the other dogs wait inside…go home under a star-carpetted sky, watch Spotted Nightjars hawk for insects on the truck lights.
Feed dogs and discuss quality of food and life. Concensus - a dog’s life is good.
Speak to significant human other - concensus - she will bring tomato seedlings, stakes etc from the Alice. Retire. happiness - all three Magpies teams have wone glorious victories!
Wake up at 4.30 am Monday with tired bones and muscles.
Wait for impending invasion.
Ooops - concensus, should read consensus….
I went to a fundraiser for a group who woks with people with a mental illness and great fun it was too.
And to cap off a good weekend and start a new week - the pre-dawn eastern sky this morning has the merest sliver of moon sitting under a bright Morning Star, both soon to be chased away by a rising sun.
Mark et al:
L-O-L
1.Picked some home-grown vegetables - delicious.
2.Quaffed a big glass of a neighbour’s home-made beer - also delicious.
3. Listened to the radio [ABC Background Briefing on local councils getting caught by triple-A financial duds].
4. Read a few pages of a history of Europe just prior to The Great War - we will never learn, will we?
5. Overcame my loathing for the mongrels who are turning SBS into a commercial failure and watched the program “Moon For Sale” on the new space race - b.t.w., is that a nose cone being fitted to a multistage rocket in the 3rd photo?
I went down to the rally at Town Hall on Saturday morning. For me, the highlights included dancing up Park street to ‘Lust for Life’, and having a chuckle at the red caterpillar. It’s amazing to me that such behavior was deemed to require the police presence that it did.
Saturday evening I ate pupusas and watched a rather good episode of Doctor Who.
On Sunday we moved all of our furniture into the kitchen and the bedroom, because today the carpets are getting cleaned. The rabbit is already upset, but when I move his cage into the bathroom this afternoon, I’m predicting genuine anger.
I live by politics alone; I had State Council all weekend.
Glorious sunny weekend in Melbourne; we visited and caught up with old friends from Adelaide. We from provincial Victoria, they from… err,… Adelaide. Always interesting to see new public amenities in Melb, e.g. free tourist bus on an extensive route - well, new to us hicks.
Also good to see the better rains of last 2 months have greened Melbourne’s wilting lawns, etc. Sorry to hear Adelaide’s still so dry Pavlov’s. Our Adelaide friends seriously thinking of installing ‘desert’ garden beds.
cheerio
PS: is Germaine now chiefly Queen Bucket in her antics?
Or is that ‘Bouquet’?
PPS: a friend who knows much of Shakespeare heard Queen B interviewed on radio about her Hathaway volume. Her Majesty cheerfully admitted the book was speculative, but our friend found her arguments interesting. For instance, Will and Anne being Protestant, were likely to have been taught reading, and to have read widely.
Took kids to usual swimming lesson, did a few laps and felt very virtuous and finally free of the flu after 3 weeks. Played fetch with dog. Picked up dog poop. Mowed lawn for the first time this season (bugger - I hate mowing the lawn). Sprayed weeds in new (soon to be) vegetable patch. Loaded up remains of dead wattle tree I cut down 3 months ago into Jeep and took it to the green waste dump. Looked at unfinished wall inside the house, nearly picked up no-more-gaps, sighed, left it. Replaced drivers side front disk brakes and pads on never-ending Alfa 164 project and washed it (might even get it registered this week). Played with baby. Her indoors made delicious lamb roast. Drank coopers. Fed baby. Fell asleep on couch with intention of watching rugby world cup game but lost interest when the fools at Southern Cross 10 decided not to show it in High Definition (can’t show the ads out in the boonies in HD apparently). Weekends are not long enough.
It wasn’t that great a weekend. My father is seriously, terminally ill, so I visit him and mum every Saturday. My wife came this weekend as well. My sister is visiting from London, so I caught up with her too. The whole day was pretty grief-ridden, to be honest.
Sunday was clean-up-the-house day, in anticipation of today’s inspection.
Toyed with the idea of going to some APEC protests, but ultimately the imperative to get my thesis finished within the next twelve months proved more important– I spent most of the weekend studying, but took most of Sunday afternoon off to go grocery shopping, muck around on the computer, and make yummy lentil and ham soup.
Kick-arse weekend, thanks for asking. Two days’ tracking for a mate’s new album at Atlantis in Port Melbourne, where the sun comes in on your back in the drum booth. Brand new snare came up a treat, snappy and gutsy even with brushes.
Microphone porn all over the place; this 1930s Zephyr ribbon mic as big as my head on the grand piano, Neumanns everywhere. Yay!!!
Plus the Eagles lost.
On pension day (last Thursday), bought a whole heap of books -John Julius Norwich’s The Middle Sea, Diana Purkiss’s The English Civil War: A People’s history, and at the second-hand bookshop, John Pollock’s biography of Wilberforce and Augustus Hervey’s Journal, 1746-1759.
Decided not to do any work this weekend. Spent it reading Norwich’s latest book. (Which I mainly got for the Siege of Gibraltar). There was the usual Greek/Roman stuff, and if you’ve read his borks on Norman Sicily, Byzantium and Venice, a lot of the material is reworked in this. Excellent on Siege of Gibraltar, Greek War of Independence, and Ottoman Empire. Indeed, his treatment of Islam throughout was fascinating.
Got back into Pollock’s Wilberforce, (which I’d already started on Thursday night.
Sat night. Caught up on news about APEC protest on Ch.10 (Alex Bainbridge was magnificent) and ABC. Watched Dr. Who - Jack’s back - I won’t go on about Torchwood on the graveyard shift at 10 - and The Bill. Will Shane get away with being an accomplice after the fact to Honey Harman’s murder and run off with Kristin.
Sunday. Morning, watched Insiders -astounding “conversion” of Andrew Bolt -sent e-mails, links to friends in Zurich and Bonn about APEC, Oz politics, delighting in coming demise of JWH. Then, reading, again. Night, decided to give TV a miss -not in the mood for Thomas Hardy or The Runaway Jury. Finished Norwich, got back onto Wilberforce.To bed after cooking some fishcakes in microwave for a late supper.
Mark, what a top thread — I love reading about people’s lives. Adam’s upset rabbit is a highlight, and Bob’s life is amazing. Don’t suppose you’d consider making this a regular feature?
Re Shakespeare and so on, as I understand it the outrage of Greer trashing Greenblatt was not the bucketing as such, but rather that she was bucketing him for doing exactly what she has now done and speculating wildly about the Bardic life in her book. I haven’t read Will in the World yet but I know a lot of Greenblatt’s earlier work and agree that he is fabulous.
(I know one scholar of the “Shakespeare was not Shakepeare, it was Somebody Else” school — and these people are serious literary scholars and for all I know may be right — who will be laughing his head off at both of them.)
Why not, Dr Cat?
I should reread Will in the World before I say too much but Greenblatt is very careful to signal what he’s inferring and why, and he doesn’t have much good to say about the “Shakespeare was not Shakespeare…” school or the “The plays and the sonnets are written in secret code” school. I think his approach was actually a self-reflexive and ethical one to the question of how much can be written about Shakespeare’s life.
I like easy questions and with no work hanging over me it was a very lazy one.
Made banana and passionfruit pancakes for breakfast. Got medieval on my garden’s arse with some weeding, lopping and pruning. Then went out and bought The French Connection, Ain’t Half Hot Mum Series 4 on DVD and a System of a Down CD. Then we bought a replica Noguchi coffee table that I’ve been hankering for for its clean and curvy modernist lines and the nice fact it was designed in the same year as our house. Also bought a 9volt Boss pedal adapter and browsed strollers.
Answered the question about whether it’s possible to have a dinner party without getting completely hammered with a decisive no and I think it ended with the unsuccessfully host trying to put Pick of Destiny on the DVD player. Sunday was working half a bottle of whiskey out of my system, bacon egg and sausage sandwich for breakfast a nap and then a lamb and green lentil casserole for dinner while feeling a bit nostalgic for Excalibur.
Picked up a copy of “Inland Empire” at Rocking Horse… but didn’t get time to watch it. Yanzi took off for a holiday in China, and I had to reacquaint myself with Rousseau for tutorials on tuesday.
Enjoyed the sunshine in Melbourne with my wife (though we need some rain, the drought’s grip remains tight) - went to Ballarat for a look around and an unsuccessful attempt to catch an escaped lamb and get him back in the paddock near his mum. At least we got him in the paddock next to his mum!
Went to the local Indian restaurant for dinner - am now hooked on Gulab Jamun!
Sunday was spent in the sun at the MCG watching my wife’s beloved Cats chalk up a big win over the Roos. Alas, my slightly larger footballing cats have not been so good this year.
All that and some gardening, fertilising the cacti and succulents, trimming the natives and watching the honeyeaters and their ever frantic efforts to feast on the grevilleas we have in bloom.
A half-decent weekend.
Sat outside my local pub on Sunday arvo in glorious Melbourne spring weather sipping sparkling and discussing “aspirational goals” with a friend. She aims to have an exhibition next year and I to get my book proposal accepted and published. We are not sure where we will be in 2012 though. Hopefully still sipping away in the sunshine. Much of the rest of the weekend was spent in bed with the boy wizard as the final book came my way from the library.
Almost forgot - the other highlight of the weekend was making chocolate mousse (5 eggs, 1/4 cup of sugar, 2 yes 2 blocks of lindt dark chocolate and a touch of vanilla) - then waiting 12 hours til it set. Oh and eating it on Sunday night - it’s the closest and athiest will ever get to heaven
Had some top quaility Joeeeeeeee on Saturday night, but have declared Sydney a No Party Zone. The music was abominable everywhere, no many how many ‘mood-elevators’ one guzzled.
Got bad news about my uncle, whom I haven’t seen for many years, from an upset mother so I spent some time helping her talk it out. Put “Missing” posters in all the neighbours letter boxes with pictures of our missing cat, before calling on the neighbours next door and discovering missing cat had been living in the lap of luxury for a week and chose not to come home. Took cat home and locked him in the house. Neighbours hinted they would be happy to have him back. Watched Justine Henin win the US Open for the second time. Happy for her, but disappointed the match was over in two sets. Did a big cook up with hubby on Saturday afternoon so now freezer is bursting with heat and eat meals. Enjoyed Dr Who. Did some shopping on Sunday, found some Bart Simpson thongs (flip flops) for a delighted four year old, a couple of cute stripy t-shirts for his little sister and a $15 cardigan (marked down from $45) for me. Went home and did some more cooking. Relaxed on the verandah in the afternoon sun with husband, kids and books for about 10 minutes before demands for iceblocks, other chairs, biscuits and cuddles started. Lasted another 15 minutes after that. Roast Pork for dinner. Put the kids to bed and watched Idol Sunday night. Decided they could cut straight to the chase and kick out all but four contestants. Suspect they will do it the hard way though.
Down and Out of Sai Gon, I am very sorry for the troubles you and your family are going through. I hope that there are ways to still share good moments with your father in these days. I’ll keep you both in my prayers, and I’m sure that many others on this site will, too.
* * *
What did I do this weekend? Worked. Took occasional breaks to hang out here. Worked some more. As the Sphinx once said to the newsreel camera, “Monotonous, isn’t it?”
Tanks for asking Mark!
Went to the Blue Mountains along with half of Sydney, where it rained for most of the weekend, making the bushwalk that we’d planned impossible. Began reading Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell instead, among other things. I have become completely hooked, even though it requires more concentration than normal, due to its unusual structure. I think that it will be worth it.
We also discovered a quiite wonderful 2nd hand bookshop in the main street of Katoomba, called Mr Pickwicks(?) I think. Well worth a visit if you’re in the area.
Saturday rode road-bike from Bonbeach (Melb bayside) to friends’ place in Kallista (in the Dandenongs). Brilliant day, left about 12:30. Travelled along bike paths – the Carrum Dandenong path is a mess due to the Eastlink road works, past Dandenong up Dandy Creek to Heatherton Road, along the road to south of Lysterfield Park, through the park - took a wrong turn in the park and ended on Belgrave-Hallam Road, instead of riding through the bush, and ended up riding up the hill into Belgrave South.
Bloody big hill.
Stopped in Belgrave to look for house-warming pressies. Given I’ve only got one pannier, I had a volume limit and couldn’t get anything fragile. Bought the compulsory 6-pack of Coopers, a decent red and a bottle of sunshine (quality muscat). Headed off to Kallista and took another wrong turn. Up a bloody bigger hill to Grantulla Road - fantastic view overlooking daffodils, across the hills to Melbourne, the bay and beyond. Worth the climb. Got to Kallista mid afternoon, having done about 50 kms, the extra 5 due to the two wrong turns.
Sat night caught up with friends I hadn’t seen for yonks. Talked ecology, environment and politics and what those who had managed to turn up were doing. The house being warmed looks down into a fern gully and the owners – Michele and Pete – both indigephiles had already scrubbed out most of the weeds. Enormous mountain ash in the back yard, tree ferns, blackwoods and silver wattle both in flower. Possums visit at night and birds during the day.
Next morning up in the morning sun and the big breakfast.
About midday headed back towards the big smoke, and found the top entrance into Lysterfield Park that would see me through the bush instead of on-road. However, got a flat partway through and wrecked my spare putting it on, so patched the puncture. Couple of km down Heatherton Rd, the patch hadn’t taken, so with a slow leak I pumped up the tyre every 1.5 km until I got to Dandenong, where the bike shop was OPEN. Hooray. Bought two new tubes and swapped one in. Halfway back to Carrum another puncture on the track-works, front tyre this time. Bugger. Swapped my new spare tube in.
Fantastic weekend, even with the Sunday saga of flats. My fault for going cross country on 23 mm slicks.
What I did find out was how short the trip between the bay and the hills really is. Two and a half hours riding up and two back (even with the slow leak slowing me down) but trip time up was 3 hours up with the half hour stop in Belgrave and 3 and a half back with puncture and pumping time outs.
Will definitely be doing this again – perhaps with different tyres next time, or at least more air in the ones I’ve got.
Mark,
I agree. Think it’d be great if this were a regular post.
Down And Out Of Sai Gon, my thoughts are with you,and I hope all goes well as it can for you and your family.
Oh not that much, since you ask puny Tellurian.
Did a little gardening, walked the dogs, went for a Sunday drive and dropped in on the neighbours.
And how about Degolis IV on Saturday!!?? Go Blood Worms, go!
But just because I share rare glimpse of your future supreme masters freezing on during defcon 1 relaxation period, do not imagine for one Tellurian 86,400 sub unit of a planetary rotation that the iron eye of Boskone is not blinking from its unwavering resolution not to waver in realising our resolute vision of the visulation of the macrocosmic all.
You may be sure I still found the temporal space to keep a breast of the mostest up to date intelligence briefings providing by *untranslatable* on potentialing but ultimately futile Tellurian shock terrorists who may attempt to resist your inevitable incorporation into Greater Boskone Co-prosperity Sphere. Juicy!
Rest assured though that Boskone is not entirely without mercy for suffering of Tellurians. Even as I dictate this, special turbo dedicated Pain Amplifer is being assembled just for Uwe Boll.
Drinking beer and eating crab in a place called Sihanoukville. Perfect.
A quick scan of posts reveals possibly only one participant in what the MSM would call the real world - the blogger who thought about attending the APEC protest. Now that has to be a significant indicator of other peoples’ lives so lived and in all its glorious mundanity.
Maybe if this is to be a regular thing then bloggers save space with ‘highlights’ - just a thought.
Me? Spent too much of both days wrestling with my demon of the moment - collecting aluminium cans. I find I can’t go past a discarded roadside can without stopping. But it’s good exercise and it does something for the environment. I am also theorizing that some of the newer spirit mix cans with their extra metallic sheen and concave base are potential fire starters. I’m also anticipating a big price boost with an eventual carbon tax before they eventually become the amphoras of the fossil fuel age.
And finished reading ethnographer Gillian Cowlishaw’s revealing study of life on both sides of Bourke’s main street in “blackfellas whitefellas’.