Hold the presses! I know, right? I’m the only one.
I can’t believe that I’ve become an avid internet shopper. I mean, what about the sensual experience that you can only get from walking into a shop, trying something on, squishing the new wool, smelling the pure leather, sliding your fingers across the surface of a porcelain plate or noticing the resin drips on the surface of a painting.
Well there’s still a place for that but the veritable enormity of products online means that the world is not just your oyster, it’s your clam, your very own pharmacy and art gallery all at your fingertips.
Sometimes both at once. Take this example. I’ve been looking for an interesting spice rack to go in my new kitchen and discovered this:
But they don’t ship to Australia! So I decided to get creative. Who knew you can buy real test tubes on the interwebs? WHO KNEW?
I mean, I know you can get anything, but test tubes?
And then I discovered all this other stuff I seriously didn’t know I needed.
So for weeks now, JJ has been teasing me about how he’s got me the best birthday present ever and how he’s completely outdone himself. Now, I happen to find that hard to believe because, well, here’s a very short list of the birthday presents I’ve received from him over the years:
Shopping trip to Penang. I know. It’s pretty freaking extravagant , but seriously, it’s just that we have no kids. And anyway, I saved us SO much money buying fashion in Asia.
Red and black cord coat from Dizingof
A necklace from William Griffiths not too dissimilar to this one (except mine has a heart instead of a gun!)
So he’s pretty good, right?
Well, I have to say that all that stuff is pretty ordinary compared to this year’s pressie on a number of fronts. I mean, he ACTUALLY managed to keep it a secret, and even managed to get Momo and Tim to keep it secret.
When Momo was in town recently after her superstar jaunt to the Australian Fashion Festival, I yelled at her thus:
“Tell me what he freaking got me for my birthday.”
To which she replied:
“No”
I don’t care for surprises, just like I don’t like to know what I’m having for dinner. There have been many disapproving conversations with JJ that have gone something like this:
JJ: What do you want for dinner?
Me: Oh I dunno, can’t you just decide?
JJ: How about macadamia chicken?
Me: Really? Can it get any more caloric?
JJ: Asian noodle soup with silverbeet?
Me: Silverbeet, hey? Hmm, sounds boring.
JJ: [Big annoyed sigh] Steak and salad.
Me: Hmmm…
JJ: Forget it. I’m just going to make something and you’ll love it.
It’s true. I mostly do love it.
I prefer a surprise when I don’t know I’m getting one. By all means, surprise me, just don’t let me know about it because it’ll drive me crazy!
But it was all worth it this year because BEHOLD!
JJ COMISSIONED A PIECE OF ART BY ONE OF MY FAVOURITE ARTISTS, CHRISTINA GORDON. You may have noticed a link to her artwork on this site. She’s glorious and talented and I love her and I love this! Its called “Yoyo and Peaches perform“. How clever of her to know that Peaches would be the one jumping through the hoop while Yoyo cowers… THANK YOU JJ AND THANK YOU CHRISTINA.
Oh yeah, my birthday’s in a few weeks… He couldn’t keep it a secret that long.
It’s true, it does take me a while to cotton on to things. So, I only just joined Facebook (and subsequently left it) a few months ago. I may recently have said something like:
Me: Hey, are you on Facebook? It’s really cool, huh?
The rest of the world: Um, yeah, right.
So anyway, here’s my new toy. Isn’t she beautiful! Her name is Helga, the Holga.
I’ve already crossed to the wrong side of the railway tracks and photographed the silos, as well as Momo’s beautiful kidneys – not on the wrong side of the tracks.
Yeeha! I am going to take some spectacular shots of neighbourhood.
Well I’ve set myself quite a task. Remember how JJ and I tried to crack an egg or two (make lebabies) and how it didn’t work, well since then I’ve embarked on a hella adventure to find THE THING that I’m here to do instead. And despite discovering the Meaning of Life, which helped me to see that maybe none of that shislik is important, I get this godawful, uneasy feeling that I’m supposed to be doing something. Last week, JJ and I thought that it was possibly because I’m going through the change – albeit VERY EARLY (and it would explain everything), but aside from this symptom, I haven’t feel the need to buy a sports car or get a divorce. So anyway, I’m NOT going through the change although I did allow myself a few blissful weeks feeling as though I was.
So I’ve been looking, looking, looking. I even studied and became a life coach (as seen on the Gilmore Girls – not me, Paris’s Life Coach after the meltdown). But helping others to find their bliss still left me feeling short changed. What about me? It’s like a Pyramid Scheme – you help others to help other to help others but nobody actually finds their bliss….
Whatever, so I discovered that I’m a writer and that’s the reason I’m here. OH RIGHT, that old chestnut. Because I sorta realised that when I was a young teenaged lass and wrote a novel. Oh, and that other novel I wrote and have been rewriting. Oh and the short stories and such. So there I’ve been, scampering around looking for something OTHER THAN the thing that’s under my nose.
Good, huh.
And then I was reading this book, Living Oprah (which is actually not so great because it really could have been so much more, so I won’t link to it). But it did get me thinking of doing something similar – a la Julie and Julia or Supersize Me. You know, where you take a concept and live by it for a period of time.
But what?
Because I like to follow arrows as I have mentioned before, it had to be something that has a step by step plan, something that I can follow absolutely. So JJ and I brainstormed (may have been altered for dramatic emphasis):
Me: JJ, I still haven’t worked out my Life Purpose. Do you have any suggestions?
JJ: How about following Anthony Robbins? He has a purpose.
Me: Well sure, but I don’t want a jet plane.
JJ: How about a million bucks then?
Me: I’d go for that. But I can’t be bothered following Robbins. He kinda freaks me out. I don’t think he sleeps.
JJ: Martha Stewart?
Me: Well you know how I love Martha, and she’s the source of much revelry. But she doesn’t sleep either.
JJ: That’s how she comes up with all that creativity.
Me: Hm. Yes. That and prison.
JJ: Well how about writing a novel?
Me: Oh, that old chestnut.
Pause for 2 days.
Me [today via Skype]: JJ I’ve got it. I’m going to kill two birds with one stone – I’m going to do The Artist’s Way and blog it. How do you like them apples?
JJ: Delicious! I’ll do it with you!
So that’s it. New project to come. Now if only I could find my freaking copy of the book.
JJ and I are renovating the pad. Renovating. Now that’s quite a loose term. Is it “renovating” when you don’t have a:
kitchen;
toilet;
bathroom;
running water that doesn’t contain loose lead bits?
It’s like a freaking dump site with missing plaster, doors, concrete floors (tiles now), staples in the kitchen floor that are wrecking my socks – my good socks from LA.
Luckily the neighbours, J’Red and T’Red, have graciously allowed us to use their bungalow dunny at all hours of the day. But really, I simply can’t bring myself to traipse all the way over to their backyard at two in the morning. Seriously, why is it that I get excruciatingly thirsty just before bed, anyway?
So I’ve found the perfect nighttime loo: the backyard drain/ground sink that all Aussie backyards had in the 50s and 60s. Much like a squat loo in the Middle East. I’m a pro with those. I became more than proficient after 3 months in Turkey and Egypt. Problem is that the opening to our “toilet” is rather large and my balance is not so great in the middle of the night. So there I was.
And so to the title of this blog post… Say no more. Please.
So on Sunday, my friend’s 10-year-old came over. It was his 10th birthday and we’d given him some smooth cashola – because we know what kids want…
Anyway, so I ask him what he’s going to get with him money and he says, “an ACDC” CD.
And I say, oh, you need some musical education. Because this is the same kid I gave my guitar to last year.
He’s going to be a rock god and he’ll have me to thank. So I’ve taken it upon myself to educate him. Musically.
So I say: “Tell you what, I’ll make you a mix tape*”.
And he says: “A what?”
And I think that when he’s old enough, I’ll have to lend him “Love is a Mix Tape” by Rob Sheffield because nothing says LOVE like a mix tape.
Like the author, I too used to listen to Casey Kasem’s American Top 40 in the 80s and I’d madly try to tape my favourite tracks but Kasem’s voiceover always ruined the beginning and then end of the songs, but what was I going to do? Records were expensive and I didn’t have a job!
Actually, the one thing that said LOVE more than a mix tape was a Long Distance Dedication on Sunday Night’s AT40. Ahhhh….
*Yeah, I am still fond of saying: “yo JJ, let’s get a video from the video shop.”
So this morning I was watching the early bird news. Possibly not so early for many people, including: mothers, shift workers, insomniacs, miaw-miaw tweakers. Anyway, it was 7am and I had sat down to a cup of Brevilles “Expresso” and muesli when I saw this:
My muesli felt rather unsubstantial.
And on Monday, JJ got a bee in his bonnet about joining Costco -that modern-day marvel of convenience stores that stocks everything from Samsung TVs to 100-day grain fed beef and fresh-baked cakes. It’s true. We went for the 60-roll pack of Kleenex toilet paper.
So anyway, being all white trash (because, let’s face it, who the hell pays a $60 annual membership fee so that they can get “discount” shopping? Me and JJ, that’s who) we took our wide load shopping trolley – that was bursting with a big box of zip-lock bags, a huge box of snack-sized sultana packs and ten years’ supply of deodorant and toothpaste – to the “cafe“. I swear I have never seen so many fat people, and I mean, REALLY FAT PEOPLE, outside of The Biggest Loser – and that’s TV!
Don’t get me wrong, as a slightly overweight person, I have a great deal of sympathy for the weight-challenged among us. And a trip to the Costco “cafe”makes it so evident why Americans and Australians are among the FATTEST in the world. How can fresh food compete with a $2.49 hot dog – with all the self-serve fixins – plus a 590ml soda with refill??? Do I have to remind anyone that 2x590ml is more than 1 litre of Coke, or Pepsi or Mountain Dew or whatever… A litre!
Being a little less white trash than most, JJ and I went for the $2.99 pizza slice – no soda included. I’m sorry to say, Melbourne, that it wa one of the best pizza slices I’ve had in years.
How ironic that I went back to Weight Watchers last night.
I went to a vintage shop in Daylesford recently. It was a cross between a lovely frock shop, Mexican curio cantina and antique dealer with just enough of a dash of dodgy earth-mother-fisherman-pants-flouncy baby-doll dresses. But anyway, in the back room, I discovered the costmetics area, complete with vintage perfumes.
Years ago, when Frank and I used to sell our old stuff at the Camberwell Market (and Frank would make a killing from offloading designer work samples) I’d wander around to see what the other stall holders were selling and there was always someone who had a cosmetic basket filled with half-used jars of Oil of Ulan and empty Charlie perfume bottles. Who the hell buys that stuff? It seemed like they just grabbed everything they could see in that last minute dash out the door at five in the morning.
So I wasn’t at all surprised to see that little area in the back room with its curious little bottles and jars. In fact, I was totally delighted by it. And there was that familiar cylindrical bottle with the blue and gold label.
It was half full of yellow liquid. Sure, it could have been toxic but i felt driven to do what I did next. I picked it up. I removed the lid and then… I spritzed. Because you don’t spray 4711, you spritz.
Talk about a serious whack to the nostrils! Was it the alcohol? Was it the passage of time? Was it just the fragrance itself? There are a few fragrances that bring me back to a certain time:
FelceAzzurra talc in a sachet
Impulse “perfume”
PinoSilvestre cologne
And 4711.
I swear I only spritzed once but as I walked back into the main area of the shop the “fragrance” lingered longer than I would have liked, or imagined.
It certainly turned more heads than an Impulse ad.
So it’s going to be 43 degrees today. Even more impressive is that in Farenheit it’s 109.4
This is followed by yesterday’s top of 44.5 Celsius or 112.1 Fahrenheit
And that was followed by Wednesday’s top of 43 Celsius or 110.12 Fahrenheit
Or Tuesday’s top of 36.4 Celsius or 97.5 Fahrenheit
And to be nicely followed by tomorrow’s delightful 35 Celsius or 95 – thank GOD!!!
So what do us Aussies do on such days considering that we have the biggest hole in the ozone layer right above our pates? Well I’m pretty happy at work in the air con. But here’s what other Aussies are up to.
From The Age: http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/its-time-to-enlarge-our-closed-family-circles-20090104-79t2.html
It’s time to enlarge our closed family circles
Brigid Delaney
January 5, 2009 – 1:20AM
FORGET wide brown land, forget the drought — when I returned to Australia after a two-year absence, the country resembled a fecund cabbage patch.
Australia was having its biggest baby boom since 1992 and many of my close friends were doing their bit for population growth.
Suddenly my life was filled with new people — new little people: Jacks and Matildas, Rorys and Charlies and Olivias.
I’ve got enough friends, thank you very much, I thought, but like it or not I was going to have some more.
A generational shift occurred when my back was turned and suddenly I had become a family friend.
It’s a big responsibility — but I wondered, what does it entail these days? How would I do it? What’s the role now anyway — and does it even exist?
Parenting manuals, websites and chatrooms tell you until your ears bleed how to be a good parent, but all are silent on how to be a good family friend. “Family friend” is a phrase almost absent from any public discussions about
family.
It is used sotto voce when discussing abuse, as in he was “once a trusted family friend” or a “family friend” is wheeled out to make statements to the media after a tragedy when the immediate family is too distraught to talk.
But other than that, the family friend has somehow slipped away from public discussions about family life.
The notion of family has contracted — suspicion lurks in the public swimming pools and in the parks.
In England, The Guardian reported recently that a grandmother was questioned by police for playing in semi-secluded woodland with her grandchildren. Several joggers had reported seeing something “suspicious” — that is, someone playing with children who did not look like the mother. In these days of fear and loathing, of stranger danger, you are either a parent or you’re not. There is no middle ground. But I would like to think there is something in between — someone who cares for the child in a parental way, who the parent trusts — an older friend to the child, a long-time friend of the parents — that is, a family friend.
When I was growing up, besides my parents and grandparents, family friends were the most important adults in my life.
Not only did they look after us, they played a major role in keeping my parents sane — companions on the odd night out away from home and a friendly ear when they felt overwhelmed by four small children.
When I was older and away at university, it was family friends that moved me into college, and it was in their houses I stayed when I felt homesick. They were an extension of my parents but now, as an adult, they have become my friends.
Recently, some family friends (university buddies of my parents) met me for dinner in London. It had been many years since I had seen them, yet there was a special warmth in the room that evening. They knew me before I even knew myself, maybe felt me kicking in utero; they knew my parents when they were first married and younger than I ever believed them to be. They babysat me and my brothers when we were little, and we went on family holidays together. They had, over the decades, nurtured me. Now as adults we were sitting down and having a meal. Maybe that’s what family friends give you in the end — history, and a feeling of being known in a deep and abiding way that new faces, brief encounters and fresh friendships can’t provide. Family friends have been privy to my tantrums and tears and changed my nappies — which is not something I can say, thankfully, for my own friends.
Back in Melbourne, I hold the Jacks and Matildas — all the new babies — the way my parents’ friends once held me. I also see us 30 years ahead — in a restaurant together, talking, marvelling at knowing them before they knew themselves.
There I was on Saturday night, weeding the front yard, watering the newly planted flora and all when I hear this “whhoooo whoooop whoo whoop”. No, not an owl on acid, but a hotted up car with craaazy wheels doing a zip zip zip up the hill, and within seconds, a cop car with its siren a-blazing. “Sheesh,” I thought, “there goes the neighbourhood”. And I yelled out to the puppies to run inside quickly because I really wouldn’t like to live with the irony that the dogs never got injured when we lived on a busy road only to get run over on the quietest street in our ‘burb. Anyway, so then there’s this bang. The kind of band when steel (or fibreglass) hits something solid. J’Red comes running out of the house next door going “what was that? Was there a smash?” And I duly told him of the whhoooo whoooop whoo whoop and the cop car and yelling at the dogs to get inside, while still yelling at the dogs to get inside and watering the newly planted flora.
So, being the ever-vigilant copper that he is, J’Red gets into his car and races off in search of mystery and histrionics. I go back to watering, because the plants couldn’t care less about the mayhem and I wants my flowers to live!
But then, holy crap, I see a guy running off a few meters away from our driveway, followed by JJ holding a pair of serving tongs. He’s yelling out at the guy, “that’s him!” I say, “no, that’s a cop, he’s got a CB!” JJ says, “no it’s not, that’s him!” I say, “no, it’s a cop, he’s got a CB!” And then JJ goes running after the guy, wielding his tongs (they were really longs ones), yells at T’Red to call J’Red, and runs off around the corner. Meanwhile the street’s a-buzz with activity. Naturally, I tell everyone to “go inside! Go inside!”.
And I go back to watering the flora.
A few minutes later, JJ returns, tongs raised, and says, “that was the guy the cops were chasing in the car.” And I say, “no it wasn’t, it was a cop, he had a CB.” And JJ says, ‘oh yeah, check out the side fence.” And I head down the driveway and see this:
It seems I may have been wrong about the guy being a cop. But he did have a CB.
And the breathalisers? Well I found a few in the driveway after the real cops left.
Last weekend, Jazzy Jeff and I took the neighbour’s kids to an auction. That’s right, an auction. So you might be thinking, Betty and JJ are off their nut if they think that taking a six and eight year old to an auction is going to pique their ADDD-riddled attention. Well think again. We’re not the greatest ever childless couple for no reason. Seriously, the barren celebs might think they’re doing it for the kids simply by buying them out of their poverty and giving them, oh, whatever they want and all, but JJ and I are to the suburbs what Nicole Kidman was to motherhood (pre-Sunday Rose). So, to live up to our Number 1 slot, we took them to a
PINBALL and ARCADE GAME AUCTION
In Campbellfield, butwhatever, right? I mean, there were around a hundred pinball machines and arcade games for sale. And you could play any of them FREE. It’s like when I worked at Timezone on Bourke Street and had the master key and after work I’d go upstairs and play the Dr Who or Adaams Family pinball And no, no amount of Law of Attraction wishing and hoping could bring the price of an Adams Family pinball within a sniff of my budget ($500 – it sold for around 4 grand, whatever) but JJ did get this:
The idea for next year is to get seriously active. No, not by running around the fields of Matthews Hill, but by making all manner or stuff that has no useful purpose. We started a very adhoc stitch and bitch this year and the plan is to keep up the momentum. Maybe get involved with the Melbourne Craft Cartel? There’s such a huge indie craft community on the web but is there anything local? Is it time to start something? Or maybe I’ll just keep it cruisy, send out some invites and see what comes of it.
So here’s the plan for the coming year – starting now:
Watch less TV √
Finish recycling Mr Lincoln flower wrap – I have all the parts and I’ve sketched it up
Make pouf √
Make prototype felt kits before Christmas – ideas and sketches done
Organise one Stitch’n'bitch before Christmas – on its way – I’m calling it the Crafty Cnuts
See the shrink one more time before the end of the year
Work out why I’m feeling so shitty
Figure out what my soul’s gift is – um, yepp, I’m listening to some self help podcasts
Take a boy and a girl and dump them in the middle of what is often referred to as “boy town” and what do you get? A boy and a girl suffering from sleeping-tablet induced jet lag and in desperate need of some non-airline food. So off we went up a huge freaking hill the size of Mount Hotham (seriously – have I mentioned how I hate to climb?) and in the distance, past Johnny Depp’s Viper Room and past the Chateau Marmont, where Jim Belushi died met a rather undignified end, and there it was. The promised land. No, not Taco Bell, but Pinchas Taqueria – the best damned taco stand this side of of Tijuana.
LA Insight #2
The three guys sitting next to us in the fancy kebabery on Santa Monica Blvd are probably in the movies (they are), as is the cute French dude in the cafe (he was writing a play). Everyone in Hollywood is a movie star and they have the tan, white teeth and great body to go with their aspirations. Driving through Beverly Hills is like being dropped into an episode of All that aside, I now know that Seinfeld was NOT filmed in New York and that Dr Phil and his wife are NOT getting a divorce.
I’ve been reading Naomi Klein’s No Logo and, frankly, all that talk about multinationals, workers below the poverty line and abuse of corporate power gave me a hankering for a lukewarm piece of fish slapped with thick white pickly sauce huddled between two sugary buns.
That’s right, this pescatarian went to Maccas for a filet-of-fish or, as Jazzy Jeff scoffs, a “fillay” of fish. Those pesky Americans know all the fancy foreign words.
Oh, and I had some fries with that.
Anyway, this pescatarian hasn’t stepped foot inside a Maccas or a Hungry Jacks or any of the fancier fast food restaurantslike Nandos for nigh on two decades. True, there was a time when my feisty metabolism allowed a McFeast here and there, not to mention some fries with that, when I hopped off the bus from Bundoora on my way home from uni, in my 2nd heyday. But that was only during that short lapse – from 1991 to 1995. Up until the hot dog with bacon incident, I’d been a card carrying member of the vegetarian cult since anorexsix- that’s 1986 – the year that my friend Annette and I decided to see who could out starve and out spew each other on our way towards the tightest dresses ever seen at the end of year formal. We both lost 20 kilos in 3 months, which could explain fairly average HSC grades.
But back to the hot dog with bacon. I was at the Chevron with Frank and the others and I might have been a smattering on the wrong side of sober when I announced: “I wanna hoddog wif baco-”
It lasted a while, this carnivorous descent, up until I arrived at mecca – that would be the biggest prawn I ever did see, sitting at a street stall in Malaysia – not literally. But I went cold turkey after that.
Not literally.
Luckily I lapsed again just before the China trip because I was faced with this mother.
It was pretty much downhill from there. Once you’ve eaten a live crustacean, raw, you don’t have such a hard time with rainbow trout or even McDonald’s hake. But I do stop at anything with feet, or hands. Although, given that my fillay didn’t taste anything like my mum’s blue grenadier, I have doubts about its actual ingredients, much like commercial dog food and Macca’s fudge sundaes, so I might have to give it a miss in future. And I may skip the fries as well.
JJ and I are about to buy a new house. I can’t bring myself to say where. However, I must admit that it’s the kind of suburb that I used to scorn (still do actually), and scoff at its inhabitants (and when I see 30 year old mum dressed in the same Bratz outfit as teen daughter, I still scoff). I’m judgemental, but with reason, I think.
So this new house needs work. This is good because I have never lived in a perfect house. This is also good because I fear that a perfect house would need to be Enjo’d more than once a fortnight. I’m not only judgemental, I’m also a little lazy when it comes to cleaning. The pooches seem to have approved of the new house. Nennah and the kid have also approved.
And JJ is delighted to have a Games Room. That’s capital G, capital R. It really is a bona fide GR. And despite not having made an offer on the house yet (I’m playing cool as an icy pole, saying things such as: “Oh yeah, it’s okay, I s’pose. I mean, we will have to get rid of the asbestos in the shed.” That sort of thing), JJ has already planned the takeover with plans for a pool table and a doctor Who pinball machine all laid out.
Despite the asbestos.
Oh, and the snakes. Look, I’m not saying that this suburb is in the sticks. In fact, it’s 15km from the GPO (the old one) and has a delightful park beneath these great looking, graffitied silos (no longer in use and I think they were for flour or something). But therein lies the problem. Along the (dried up) creek of said delightful park, there are a series of signs with cute little illustrations on them. Something like this:
Umm… Yes… In spring, the odd tiger snake or two, after a few months of burning off all that summery goodness, they’re ready for a juicy treat. But they’re not only at the park That’s right. One of our new neighbours has informed us that they also like to slither down the street from the park. I’m sure that Yoyo and Peaches will be delighted. My aunt’s got Jack Russells who actually do protect her country home from snakes (although she tends to lose at least one dog a year – luckily the leftover pups have no problem procreating with their mother, father, sister, brother, grandpop, aunt… you get the idea). Anyway, I wish one would slither over to our place right now and wriggle up our clogged shower pipe. You’d think that my hair was made of Steelo or something. Seriously, jeff shoved draino down there 4 times and we got one of those snakes from Bunnings and everything, but nothing worked! Nothing.
I got lost in Hong Kong recently. I had a map but I’m not very good at reading maps. Hence, this not uncommon scene whenever Jazzy Jeff and I go travelling:
So the problem with Hong Kong was that it wasn’t a shopping centre and the streets, well, I don’t read Cantonese, even in English. Oh, and I didn’t really care. I figured I’d get where I needed to go, eventually.
I don’t like to ask for directions. It makes me very very anxious. It could be that when we were in Egypt in 1997, the tourist police always gave us the wrong directions unless we offered some Baksheesh. Or it could be that my mother brought me up to be very wary of people, nay, to simply not trust ANYONE except for her and my dad. However, as the years have passed, I’ve grown less and less trusting of everyone, especially mum and dad (but that is another story that I will no doubt share some time). I just HATE asking locals for directions. It’s a very un-ladylike condition – it’s what women do. But in our case, it’s Jazzy Jeff who will stop ANY hunched-over, wizened old timer who is more likely to be able to do handstands than speak our lingo. And then I get frustrated. Then he gets frustrated at me for getting frustrated and for becoming frustrating. And sometimes it ends with me walking away. When the time comes for me to look at a map, we have to stop. Completely stop, and not assume a direction. Like if we’re in the driveway, if JJ reverses while I’m checking the Melway it drives me crazy.
So, alone, and lost, in Honkers I took the left road, the right road, the high and low roads without passing one single landmark. But I found the coolest carry bag and JJ called me out of the blue so everything was ok. Did I get out my map? Nup. Did I make it back to the hotel? Yep. In time? Nup, but nobody seemed to mind.
I got lost walking to Nazareth once and just hoped to see some palm leaves along the rocky road, which I didn’t. But the town looked like an oasis in the distance. It didn’t look so oasis-like from up close. But I felt like Jesus must have as the group I was with (Jazzy Jeff was back at the Kibbutz sleeping) were greeted warmly by a milkbar-owning Arab family who treated us to lemon wafers with our bottles of Fanta and 7-Up. The moral of that story? Jesus wore leather sandals and long gowns for a reason - walking through Israel’s potholed terrain dressed in a rather short dress and thongs is something worth reconsidering if by chance I end up in that situation.
I like arrows. There aren’t enough of them. Arrows help you decide which way to go so you’re guaranteed to see everything. Which brings me back to my point about the Melbourne Aquarium. There are no arrows. But there is a map, so I’m double screwed.
