Cataclysmic but slowly and not without joy

We were up to our necks in love. Well that's what it felt like to me as I danced across the kitchen and down the hallway while about a dozen people sang their hearts out in my lounge room. 

The idea was simple. I wanted to drink some and sing a little. Gemma had the bright idea of throwing a singing party at The Peach, so I did. 

The night was dark and stormy (I have always wanted to write that and mean it). Some guests arrived drenched and shivering, clutching a guitar under one arm and a six pack under the other. Some swanned in shaking out umbrellas holding bottles of wine and one or two appeared in the kitchen as though teleportation was possible.

The singing began slowly but the chorus swelled until we were delirious and not one person was silent in the house. We had three people with guitars, Spencer, P. Street and Jeremy Smith, Robert on the floor with a tambourine and a snare and enthusiastic singing from no less than one dozen people at any one time. We wandered recklessly through musical history and modes of good taste, anyone got a go, anyone from Samantha Fox, David Bowie and Robyn Hitchcock to The Pixies and even Counting Crows. No one was more surprised than me to realise that all of us, without exception, knew all the words to Mr Jones.

Someone started up a Neil Young song so Spencer grabbed his bag and tipped eight harmonicas onto the ground, testing them drunkenly one by one to find the right one, he emerged from the floor in the nick of time to perform a note perfect solo. Wild applause erupted from the kitchen where some were making mulled wine and others danced as they poured chips into bowls and piled baklava onto plates.

The weather, jetlag and tour dates kept us to a small and merry band. From time to time one of us would look up and around the room and get a little misty because while we were singing just for the hell of it we were also saying goodbye. At midnight I gave a toast to The Peach and all who have sailed in her because Grizelda and I are moving out, for good.

Mr Oddweird the landlord has gone and done it this time. He has defaulted on his mortgage and The Peach is being repossessed by the bank. I have lived in fear of the day we would be forced, by one disaster or another, to leave this house but when the day arrived I surprised myself. I don't really mind. 

When I first came to The Peach I'd been most thoroughly shredded by the tragic end of a long and dramatic relationship. I wasn't sure it was possible to feel worse than I did, perhaps not even possible to feel like I did and stay alive for a whole day at a time but I did. It hasn't always been easy here in The Peach but I have loved it, every difficult, horrible, euphoric moment of it since I first walked through the door carrying nothing but a game of boggle and a plastic bottle full of water. 

Its been almost seven years since I signed the lease and handed over all of my savings for bond and two weeks rent in advance. The cat and I were both astonished by the light and noise of what we call the city when we first moved in. The cat spent the first fortnight in my wardrobe refusing to come out for anything but to use the litter tray or take a small drink of water. Now the cat roams the house freely and I can sleep through just about anything.

Mr Oddweird has let me down as a landlord over the years. The water has been turned off three times because he didn't pay the bill, he took off with the inside front door handle four years ago and never brought it back. The back door has never had a lock on it and he failed entirely to make any repairs to the bathroom after the mirrored cabinet crashed to the ground and smashed about six years ago.  Last year he began renovating the flat underneath The Peach (which has been vacant the entire time I have lived here) by removing the floors, walls, kitchen and bathroom and digging large holes in the now dirt floor. But this time I suspect he has mostly failed himself.

It seems strange to me that I am almost looking forward to the move. I'm ready for a new adventure. Grizelda and I are headed just three suburbs away but around here that's like a whole new country. We'll be setting up shop in a beautiful little house with polished floorboards, a dishwasher in the kitchen and a neat little courtyard out the back where I can plant strawberries and herbs. Sylvia the cat and Grizelda's new pain in the arse kitten Oscar will be making the move with us as will Edith the gold fish and most of our stuff.

I've been giving away belongings, throwing things out, selling furniture I've carried with me from relationship to relationship. Junking all the built-up useless things and jettisoning the ballast. When I pack my bags and make my way to the new house I'll probably be carrying a few little heartaches and a head full of memories but I'm going to put my teapot in the cupboard anyway and see what happens next.

Lyndal Irons will sneak up on you

Photo of Madam Squeeze by Lyndal Irons

When I die I hope Lyndal takes photos at the funeral, they'll be awesome, like all her photos are, except for the one she sent me where I'm staring like a crazy lady, but I don't suppose that is her fault. I've sorted out someone to impersonate me at my funeral, next I'll make a mixtape. Maybe I'll wait a few years and see if any more good songs come out.

Click here to visit Lyndal's website.

More stupid than you can poke three simultaneous sticks at or Spencer pulls off the most ridiculous birthday idea ever or Spencervision Part I

Spencervision* saw us all reaching spectacular new heights on the peaks of Mt Stupid, but it was also kind of miraculous. I never had any doubt that the idea would work, just about everybody Spencer knows was already itching to write and perform a song about him, which is kind of odd when you think about it. What I didn't know was just how far some people would go, like me for instance.

Thinking it might be best to collaborate with someone I coerced The Walk On By into coming over and working on a song with me. Obviously The Rolling Stones were my first choice but they were all in hospital being reconstructed by German engineers so I settled on The Walk On By who are lovely, despite having an alarming fondness for yelling rude words loudly on stages all over Australia and Europe.

When it came time to actually perform the song I was starting to have a few second thoughts. The other contestants included members of The Holy Soul, The Laurels, Psychonanny and The Babyshakers, Quaoub, Madam Squeeze and about twelve times a crazy amount more. Adalita from Magic Dirt showed up and by that time things were getting a bit wild. Spike performed something he was calling a Mexican Rap entitled Gusolino Got Punched in the Eye-o and the non-Spencer members of The Holy Soul performed something akin to the Wu-Tang Clan, disguised as diamond pandas. Photographer Lyndal Irons installed an astonishing exhibition in the Spencer's lounge room title Spencervision: A photographic exhibition.

The Walk On By and I bravely took our places on the small stage, well I bravely took my place, the others are kind of used to it. The bass player kept pushing the microphone closer to my face which made me unhappy because I was hoping to become not only invisible to the eye but inaudible to the ear. We managed what turned out be an award-winning performance, thanks to Solomon, Leah and Dave being actual musicians despite having me as a temporary imposter in their band.

Spencer drunkenly donned a sombrero for the award ceremony which was just about as shambolic and raucous as an award ceremony can be. I proudly accepted a ballet trophy for coming second, Sol, Leah and Dave were decorated with lovely silver-coloured plastic medals. The overall winner was announced, Madam Squeeze, no surprises there, and then Spencer raised a fist in the air and screamed 'let's get fucked up'. I was deafened by the roar of the crowd, who most diligently and immediately began to follow Spencer's instructions.

The party pressed on into the night with an almost terrifying joyful abandon. Just after midnight there were three of us perched at the top of the stairs, we ventured up to go to the toilet but found ourselves unequal to the task of navigating back down the narrow stairway. Soon enough there were about twelve of us all in the same predicament. It is the first time I have ever waited in an 'after the toilet' line.

Spencer's huge and rambling house was filled to overflowing. Darkness didn't stand a chance against that kind of energetic light. They told themselves they came for all sorts of reasons, to witness the stupid songs, to take a chance to make fun of Spencer in song-form, to drink, dance or just stand in a joyful crowd of friends but I knew why they were there. They came because they love him, in whatever form that takes. Some of us have shared years in his good company, others meet him on King St for coffee every once in a while, some first saw him hollering into a microphone and thought 'who in the hell is that?', but all of us were united by the kind of love usually reserved for funerals. If Spencer ever has any doubts about his place in the world, if he ever catches himself in a moment of unexpected worry about falling into isolation, he can sit down, cross those long legs of his, and remember this night when all of those fears were silenced forever.


*Spencervision: A song for Spencer, you can see already how this might work, just imagine Eurovision on King St Newtown. Spencer decided to celebrate his birthday by judging songs written and performed in his honour. The rules were simple, the song had to be about either Spencer's awesomeness or an awesome Spencer-related topic.

Fake rock journalist breaks solo streak by busting in on The Drones

The life of a fake rock journalist is lonely sometimes. I've been rattling from gig to gig alone, just me, my cigarettes and my notebook but not tonight. By the time Pavement came out for their encore I'd had enough of solo time so I split, flagged down a taxi and made it over to The Annandale in time to see the end of The Drones' set. I didn't have a ticket so I just marched straight through the doors, around the bar and through the black curtain to side of stage. Spencer was standing there leaning against a partition and grinning like a goon. Lyndal was shooting the band and The rest of The Holy Soul were standing in line nodding their heads in unison, Madam Squeeze was out dancing with the crowd.

Spencer cheered when he saw me, held up his arms and made room for me beside him. I don't think I would have gotten away with such a spectacular level of sneaking in if Spencer hadn't just played support for The Drones about an hour ago. Luke from The Laurels was there and Loene Carmen looked like she had just snuck in too. I stuffed my earplugs back into my ears and let my eyes wander over the crowd. The Drones were cranking out their new version of stadium rock and the crowd was going just a little mental right down at front of stage. The huge speaker stacks were moving the air in my lungs for me and for the first time in months I thought now this is really something. After the show we all headed upstairs to drink, smoke, talk and watch that crazy old man named Doc stand on his head in front of a giant mirror. I forget sometimes how unbelievably lucky I am not just to see all these bands but to be there, right there, side of stage, front of stage, backstage, just there.

When you go down Dixon don't order a special wife

We ordered the Special Wife Cake because it was called Special Wife Cake. Madam Squeeze tore it carefully in half, pausing mid operation to ensure the halves were even in size. The cake was tiny, flat and round like a raised biscuit made of pastry but in the centre something was lurking. At first glance the cake appeared to be filled with reconstituted apple-flavoured squid or half-dried superglue but it tasted much worse than either of those two things combined.

We tried turning it into a game, animal, mineral or vegetable but my mouth would not decipher the taste. The pastry flaked but tasted short and emitted a malodorous vapour detectable only once mastication had commenced.  Madam Squeeze tried dipping her half in jasmine tea but claimed it did not in any way improve the flavour. I tried leaning back in my plastic chair and smoking a cigarette but that also had no effect.

I almost made it through my half of the Special Wife Cake, almost but not quite. Three bites worth of cake lay listless on the white square plate on the table between us. It felt important to me that we finish the cake because of its special and possibly mystical name. Try as I might I could not finish my half. Madam Squeeze, in an act of selfless bravery, attempted to finish my half of the cake but could not in the end stomach it.

I'm not sure that I want to be anyone's special wife but as I walked away that minuscule piece of cake taunted me, saying 'This will be the reason you rattle through the world alone'. Madam Squeeze asked me 'Who do you want to believe, rational thought or the imagined voice of an undelicious cake?' I said 'rational thought' but I was thinking 'cake'.

And now back to the studio

Well I don't suppose it's everyday you get to run off into studio 2 at Albert's and play Harry Vanda's guitar whilst drinking one of Daniel Johnston's mountain dews. Words about this, to come later, for now please enjoy my terrible photography.

Above is Daniel Johnston and Old Man River doing live recording thinger in next studio. Think was being filmed by JJJ.

Above is Spence recording guitar for Belle Phoenix. Didn't want to turn on the flash and distract him.

Above is Daniel Johnston and Belle Phoenix with Spencer in background.

 Above is me playing Harry Vanda's guitar with Madam Squeeze having a nice cup of tea. Harry Vanda, from The Easy Beats, donated the guitar to the studio.

 

 

Spencer recording some more.

One porter, one cider and one beer or Christmas Eve in the graveyard

I don't know what he was singing but everything stopped, the bells, the chatter, the wind in the grass. Everything except the backlit clouds stopped a moment to hear his song. We were sitting in the graveyard drinking, we had about twelve people, two guitars and one tambourine, we had beer bottles in brown paper bags and a thirst for howling out songs. It wasn't until I decided I had better go home, after Madam Squeeze and I picked out our careful moonlit way through trees, over fallen grave stones and down a path towards the gate that I remembered there was such a thing as churches.

The big church near the graveyard gates was busting at the seams with the bespectacled and the solemn. We snuck into the vestibule as the congregation rose as one and began singing a slow and ancient song. I had grass stuck on my dress and tinsel sticking out of my hair. I was holding three empty bottles, one porter, one cider and one beer. The stench of cigarette butts coming out of the empty beer bottle would have knocked out a lesser mortal than me but I felt quite sure that while I was happy to sit an old grave and drink beer and sing I wasn't happy to leave the empty bottles there. The song was slow and ancient and though they must have numbered in the hundreds I could hear above their voices that good old racket coming from the back of the graveyard where Spencer was perched on a headstone leading his own small congregation in song.

I sat at the edge of the circle in the graveyard tonight, lying on the grass to sip cider and puff smoke at the impossibly fast clouds moving across skies, trees and moon. Spencer and Madam Squeeze were there, Madam sitting comfortably beside me, Spencer perching up high strumming out songs. The rest of them howled, sang and rattled with their accustomed abandon, some of them waltzing like the possessed in a clearing. I'm not sure what I was doing, you can tell just by looking at me that I'm more careful with my heart, mind and songs. Some us of talked about ritual and the good urge for joining together in grief, joy, love and song. I wasn't quite ready to howl at the moon as the others do but I can tell you one thing, I'd rather be drinking on a gravestone than don my spectacles and stand in a congregation miming the art of music to what should have been a moving and ancient hymn but had instead the eerie effect of guilt, obligation, ironed trousers and isolation.

I think I need a brain wash

I have decided to give my brain this one chance to explain to me why it woke up at 7:45am this morning, a Sunday morning, after we (my brain and I) went to bed after 3am. I'm wide awake, ready to throw on shoes and run out into the world but I'm not going to. Rational thought tells me I need to rest and drink approximately seven thousand litres of water.

It was never my intention to drink about a bottle of champagne before going to the Excelsior last night but the waitstaff just kept cruising past. There were round and shining silver trays seamlessly floating past my elbow approximately every three minutes with free drinks. I was starving and the food was much slower to circulate than the wine. I was crammed into The Argyle with five million people dressed in sailor suits, formation shark unitards or Hawaiian shirts. The Argyle is one of those divine buildings where the floorboards seem like they're constantly being crossed by the ghosts of convicts but of course they've turned it into a hideous bar for shiny people. It was one of those work Christmas parties that have a budget so large it's frightening. I'm more used to the annual staff lunch where all five staff at a non-profit arts organisation go across the road to a pub and choose the cheapest things off the menu and share one bottle of wine, then go back to work in the afternoon. I wasn't ready for the shock of five million gyrating people in full fancy dress throwing back as much booze as is humanly possible.

I left after an hour and discovered, as I walked along the quay that it wasn't the green harbour swaying in waltz time but me. I made it up three flights of stairs, onto a train and then up the hill to The Excelsior. I arrived with a lilt, a pocket full of miniature plastic sea creatures and a plan. Each miniature plastic sea creature was assigned to a specific person based on strict criteria that made a hell of a lot of sense at the time. One seahorse for Daisy, one shark for Spencer, another shark for Madam Squeeze and the sparkly lilac seahorse for Halogen. Spencer, Madam Squeeze and Daisy hadn't arrived yet so I presented a bemused Halogen with his seahorse then sat down and proceeded to talk such nonsense that several people offered to go and fetch me a glass of water. Three hours and seven glasses of water later I was decidedly more sober and beginning to regret my decision to present Halogen with a lilac sparkly plastic seahorse, Spencer, Madam Squeeze and Daisy are of course more used to my ways and present no problems in the area of miniature plastic sea creature presentation regret.

After I had achieved an ideal state of kind of sobered up I found myself having a real good time. Spencer's band was magnificent, as always (seriously people if you don't own a copy of Damn You, Ra yet then I don't know what you are doing) I had one of those nights where conversation is easy, interesting and free. The music did it's job of providing a reason to breathe. I keep rediscovering how live music builds my bones, kind of courses through me like temporary architecture holding up my ceiling.

Soundcheck City

Everyone was checking sound this afternoon as I walked home to The Peach. Notes, the Greek restaurant with surprising concrete walls and the unnaturally shiny counter, were broadcasting broken horn lines and and an arrhythmic sequential tapping of drums. Buskers were unfolding themselves from hardcases, tuning up their old guitars and getting ready for the public disappearance of self into the appearance of sound. The Enmore emitted the classic 'one two tchoo two tchoo' and lost another battle in it's fifty year war to reach the number three.

I was laughing about the preparation of noise as I collected my drumsticks and began another assault on rhythm coordination and purpose. I was thinking of Spencer and how he can make music without notice, music enough to kickstart your heart or bend your neck in rememberance of something you haven't lived through yet. I was laughing at preparation with my joyful anarchic heart until I decided to water the front garden and the door knob came off in my hand. I am trapped in The Peach.

The Peachettes are out of town this weekend. Spencer has gone on tour and just about everybody I know is somewhere else today. I thought about panicking but instead I attended an interstate party at The Hive by telephone. I was passed around the guests like a favour and I believe that I had a grand old time. Gemma was lamenting her yesterdays' drinking as she cooked for the party tonight. Retro was feeling drunk and generous and the whole thing sounded all right.

I was tempted to panic but instead I persisted in telephoning Madam Squeeze. Luckily for me Madam Squeeze decided to sit this leg of the tour out and I knew if I kept calling that I'd eventually catch her between songs in her busking set on King St tonight. She's on her way now to rescue me and I suppose this fact has put one more fear to rest. It seems that when I am locked and alone in my house I will not die and be eaten very slowly by the cat but attend interstate parties by telephone and make pots of peppermint tea.

That penguin plays rough or welcome to the zetabet

She said she was twenty-one and I could see that this was half of her problem. She asked me if I was a good writer so I said yes, might as well say yes as no, it was all the same to her. I think she was wearing shorts, with tights, the way I used to wear shorts with tights when I was at high school but she was also sporting one of those haircuts, those Gwyneth Paltrow in Sliding Doors haircuts but without the combing, smoothing down and tucking behind the ears. She was dancing with a Greaser girl, Newtown's full of them at the moment. I can't get behind this Greaser girl fashion movement, the men seem to make it work better, they incorporate heavy but short leather jackets into their outfits while the girls have gone mad for white singlets and red high heels while they turn shades of blue and purple in the mid-winter night. If I was going to be a Greaser then I would be a Greaser boy with boots and and socks and a jacket.

The dancing Greaser girl thought too much of herself, even the usually non-judgmental Madam Squeeze admitted this quite freely. They were dancing where the crowd sat not ten minutes before, the young one and the Greaser girl trying their hardest to make sure that every remaining set of eyes turned towards them. I don't care if people dance but it annoyed me that the young one had determinedly sat at the top of the stairs away at the other end of the hall while the writers' read their work. She only appeared in the big room once the crowd had dispersed. She told me that all this writing, sweeping her hand from one side of the room to the other while her cigarette ash fell on the floor, was too self-contained or all wrapped up on itself. She said the ends all finish. I scrawled the letter 'y' on the back of my hand with a piece of white chalk. I nodded at her but I was thinking what kind of idiot doesn't allow a work to be self-contained. I imagined individual letters running loose and wild down King St. Z stabbed A through the heart in a bid to reorder the alphabet.

She snuck down the long hall to listen to a little of Josephine Rowe's final reading of the night, she heard two lines then stomped back down the hallway saying 'AWFUL" in a stage mutter. This is the part where I disagree with her. Josephine Rowe is a fine writer and an astonishing performer. I guess that's why close to a hundred people sat spellbound, leaning forward in the hope of being the one to catch her next word. The twenty-one year old smoked three cigarettes, grabbed her housemate by the arm and marched down the stairs yelling "I'm going to google you!". It sounded more like a threat than a promise. I breathed out only as the top of her head disappeared from view and she stomped out into the street.

Give me back my notebook please or I really like it when the haridresser shoves their towel-covered fingers into my ears after washing my hair

I am tired of mysteries. I have no idea if Julia Romeo is a real person/object/monument/pet canary/cigar or if some anonymous person has decided to leave false clues, for kicks. I guess it beats the usual death threats or notes encouraging me to top myself. By the way, have I ever stopped to thank those kind individuals before? I don't think that I have so thank you for taking the time to write me death threats and notes encouraging me to kill myself. It is a very special gesture to take the time to sit down and write somebody a little note but I'll just make one request. Please draw a picture of a pony on the next one. I like ponies.

Spencer said that all artists have a great lost album and that maybe I should consider this mine. That's a fine theory but the contents of that fairly new notebook are most certainly not great. The last time I held my notebook in my hands was at The Townie where I made some vague and drunken notes about how a friend of mine was wishing she could invade men, physically, the way that they invade her, I think. It was hilarious at the time, she was miming actions and thrusting imaginary appendages while Adam Ant sang about Prince Charming on the jukebox and Madam Squeeze and I held our hands above heads in the gesture known universally as 'awkward house'.

Spencer recently beat the world record for distance covered whilst dancing the Adam Ant Prince Charming dance. I believe he made it nearly all the way from The Sando to my second birthday party of the day which was a fair distance indeed. He deserves either a large trophy or a swift slap to the side of the head, I can not decide which would be the better course of action. The second birthday party of the day was held in a secret enclave in the land of square mansions. This wonderland of largeness in architecture is a mere two blocks from The Peach. I sat in an astonishingly comfortable mid-century armchair high on a balcony, with my green pony dress spread greenly across the seat, and stared contentedly at the giant houses whilst sipping on my glass of Jameson.

I noted that at one point all the people on the balcony, except me (of course), are in extremely excellent bands. In fact one of the men I was talking to flashed a tiny flash of annoyance across his face when I asked his name. I could have been imagining it but I suspect it has been some time since somebody asked him what his name was at a party. In this instance the annoyance was probably justified seeing as the balcony I was standing on was attached to the bedroom of his fellow frontman and if I was in that room then I probably should have known what his name was. I suppose I could have told him that I am hopeless at recognising people* but I didn't hence his, possibly imagined, flash of annoyance.

I wandered in to the bedroom occasionally to stare at the unusually blue walls and neat shelves of books, record and cds. The bedroom was close to ideal and for a mad minute I had a strange murdering fantasy where I became the new owner of the ideal bedroom. I dismissed this thought as uncharitable and set about wondering how I could paint The Peach blue. I don't know if that will be possible but one thing is for sure, everything would be easier if I had my notebook back.




* List of people I would definitely recognise if I saw them on the street.
Mum
Dad
Brother
The horse
The Spatula
Spencer
Madam Squeeze
Gemma
Tex Perkins
Santa Claus
P of London
Artboy

Elemental mendicant

I thought about using a nautical themed fabric for the trim but Madam Squeeze wisely pointed out that the rest of the dress is grass green and covered in pictures of horses, she thought the lighthouse trim might be just that little bit too much. I spent hours thinking the phrase 'elemental mendicant'. I am pleased with how the words sound in my head. I am afraid, quite afraid, that the words might end up being edited out of manuscript. That would be a damn shame.

Obfuscation

Madam Squeeze said I must have lime juice still stuck in my nose from when I tried to clean my fingers with a piece of lime and it went squirtily wrong but Spencer agreed with me, the mysterious fog descending like a dropped cloth over King St most definitely smelled of lemons. The fog appeared suddenly, as if a switch had been flicked and the whole world went soft focus. It wasn't there when I tripped out of Kelly's after drinking snake bites with the people I call the Psychonannies but it was everywhere when we emerged half an hour later with bellies full of hot soup. At first we were confused, thinking it must be steam from a street cleaner or that somewhere a raging bushfire was being doused with lemon juice.

Spencer swore at the fog in amazement, then he bowed and explained how boy scouts shake hands. We bobbed around like corks in the sea suddenly overjoyed at finding ourselves in a new landscape. I've never seen King St shrouded before. It always snakes the same clear path. I've hung meaning on every lamp post but tonight I was in new territory and I couldn't be happier.

I took the back streets home, losing my way momentarily, every brick, tile and street corner felt vague and unfamiliar. I came across Spike's brother dancing in the middle of the road, his unbuttoned coat billowing like a cloak. He was pretending to be Jack The Ripper but he looked more like that singing chimney sweep from Mary Poppins. He stopped dancing to talk to me but he was hopping from foot to foot. Periodically a happy noise would escape his lips and he'd start dancing all over again. When I walked away he started running down the road yelling joyful words, arms held out like an aeroplane.

I can hear the hollow calling of boats in one of those harbours. The Peach rocks blind and steady on top of this hill. It is warm inside and soft with furnishings but I'd much rather be out there, in the new landscape navigating the footpath like a submariner.

Purple reign

He was wearing a unitard in ideal purple and I couldn't stop staring. Ever since listerine started advertising their new pruple listerine I have wanted nothing more than be the precise same shade of purple. Standing next to purple unitard man was a woman wearing a dress made out of playing cards but the next woman over, white unitard and swimming cap, was talking to Paul Mac. I stepped carefully down off the wooden pontoon and walked away. Paul Mac was the most famous in the room and if the past is anything to go by then he was in horrible danger of being mildly injured in an unlikely incident caused by me. He wasn't even wearing anything remotely interesting, except for sunglasses, at night. I walked carefully over to Spencer and Madam Squeeze, matching cowboy outfits, and watched the purple unitard man through the small gap in between their giant cowboy hats.

I once performed an awkward intellectual swan dive into purple, covering every spare space in daubed patches of mixed pigments trying to create the perfect purple. I interviewed everyone from colour consultants and historians to church curates in an attempt to understand the historical significance of the colour. Years later I sat spellbound while Tony Robinson smashed molluscs and watched it ferment into a stinking dye. He had a more difficult time than I did with my pots of blue and red pigments sitting precious as gemstones in neat rows on my studio floor. I had forgotten about that strange and experimental month until I found myself greedily eyeing advertisements for listerine. Tony Robison came closer than listerine did to my long forgotten ideal hue but it seems my personal ideal purple is subject to change.

Trotting home from the shops with my new bottle of ideal purple made me indescribably happy. The bottle was sitting on top of my other shopping (underpants and plums) inside a purple shopping bag. It took me two days to break the seal on the bottle. On the third day I scrubbed myself clean, washed my hair, brushed my teeth, climbed into my new purple underpants then ripped off the plastic seal and measured out the correct amount in a medicine glass. As I swished the strange burning but pleasantly minty liquid around my mouth I experienced the incredible sensation that if this is as good as it gets then I couldn't be happier.

Glass hammers and the pleasures and perils of time travel

Returning from 1952 I hit a touch of turbulence and made a pit stop outside Nuremberg. It was decided amongst the locals that their cheese was in all ways superior to all French cheeses. I declined to taste the cheese and was cast out of space and time, I did not know the German word for lactose. Fortunately Spencer, Madam Squeeze and I had already made plans to visit Penrith which exists outside of space and time. My brother was there in a tuxedo playing the trombone with a glass bottle of cola at his feet. The band leader, noticing they were outside of space and time, had instructed them to remove jackets and ties. It was a casual affair. Shops with literal names were visible from all windows. Spencer was momentarily relieved. Last week he walked in Thaitanic expecting a pleasant ocean cruise but came away with chilli and lime stuck between his front teeth. It is important to note that Gareth Liddiard plays an important part in this tale.

I reconfigured the flux capacitor by wiring it directly to the Eye of Harmony. We reappeared at The Annandale where Gareth Liddiard sat perched on a stool. He began strumming at an acoustic guitar. The room fell silent and the crowd tilted their heads and set back their shoulders. You need to brace for this music or you will come undone. I tilted and braced but the onslaught was thorough. We all know he works with the geography of sound but I wasn't expecting such a terrible revelation. I've been hitting things with glass hammers.

Gunshots?

There were five or six sharp loud noises in quick succession. I was confused as to what could of caused the sound but Madam Squeeze looked like a woman who was ready to take cover. Spencer had a rabbit look of heightened alarm and I just stood there thinking surely not, couldn't actually be real gunshots. My main explanation for the sound not being gunshots was that there were no sirens. In the light of day this logic seems faulty.

We sat in a row on the stone railing at Town Hall waiting for Artboy's car to come and collect us. This was our second time of watching a spectacle go down George St. It began early this morning with marching bands and that annual city echo of dissonance and rhythm. Artboy was visiting the city to hear Jon Hunter play one of his excellent noise art sets at Serial Space and was kind enough to not only drop us off at The Metro but pick us up afterward as well. I'm not sure what surge of kindness overtook Artboy's senses but I was glad of the lift. The CBD is my least favourite place to be on a Friday or Saturday night. Everywhere you look the shivering women in identical blue satin strapless dresses are drunkenly turning back time and erasing the Women's Movement. They walk in groups, huddle in gutters, vomit in garbage bins and stand on street corners close enough to the passing traffic to cause me concern. There are men, nondescript men, hanging a drunk blue satin woman off their arms or walking in groups behind them leering drunkenly. I don't what has possessed the young, boring and mediocre women of Sydney to robe themselves in blue satin, become drunk and tempt me to use derogatory language but I don't like it. Not one bit.

I didn't get to bed until after three in the morning and I couldn't sleep until my ears ceased ringing. I will now remember to take ear plugs to every gig. The four of us sat up sitting tea and discussing our new collaborative group project of assembling the rules for time travel as explained by film and television. There was some debate about whether magical time travel fell within the scope of the project until Artboy raised Clarke's third law and settled the matter but this wasn' the most interesting part of the night.

I've been recalibrated by The Drones. I feel like I've been shot. I stood silent as a seawall while the sound broke over me and the crowd surged in tidal response. I was pushed into a cave while the universe formed around me. The Drones are terrifying and magnificent. Spencer has long thought Gareth Liddiard the best songwriter in Australia but I think I'm going to make my own small category of Australia's Best Human Recalibrator.

My review is in serious danger of never being written. I don't think they'll publish the single word review of "Wow!".

Some guests don't dance no matter what

It's fair to say that Grizelda's guest was a tad surprised when Madam Squeeze started playing the Mexican Hat Dance and Spencer and I started dancing. We constructed an appropriate dance space carefully, first laying down Madam's hat then perched my miniature wind up Mexican American on top. The guest refused our offer to dance but to his credit did not run immediately out the front door of The Peach and onto the street never to return. I suspect that Grizelda might have been cross with me if he had.

We bagan sedately with my curious pokings on the accordion but things soon gained momentum. Spencer decided to play all of Revolver, from memory, on guitar. Madam Squeeze joined in on accordion, I located some maraccas and fashioned drumsticks out of chop sticks and before anyone knew what happened we were up to The White Album which strangely took a turn for John Williams and The Peach's spontaneous pre-dawn service but good lord is that the time. I have to be up very soon.

One of seven possible reasons and the dandelion shadow of El Alamein

Possible Reason One. Somebody snipped the lightning rod in two. It used to be there buzzing and smelling and burning cracks through other ties. It was a sure fire thing. A reliably electric connection of eyes, ears, memories and the transmission to fingers. Today I think of it in cloud form free-floating and gone but it used to rub at my ankles like irons.

I traversed this goddamn city from one end to the other and it was beautiful. I found James Joyce scuffed in a pamphlet under the dandelion shadow of El Alamein. I paid two dollars to hold it in my hands and my handbag. It sat next to the two plates of fish and chips we shared between the three of us. I was tempted to smear grease on it to lessen the unbearable sense of having unearthed a treasure.

It has been a while since I've walked through The Cross. Been a while since my feet followed my eyes. I was searching for a way to jump off the page and stand in the streets of novels and poems. The Cross felt like a tree house. Ever present elevation and movement of air. Long shadows and a built feeling solid and enduring with a canopy of leaves. Newtown feels like a sketch now.

Rich men wear shorts on Sunday in Rushcutters Bay. I despise them for their rock hewn foundations and the combination of sandals and elderly dogs. I sat a on a sea wall in the sun. I bent my head and stared through the bottle green harbour to white sand below. This is a harbour city but I had forgotten the bouyancy of boats and the tidal pull of salt air. Things swim with purpose here.

I was ordered to take off my boots on the steps at Manly Beach. We stood in a row pulling off our boots and stuffing our socks into our pockets. It seems all three of us have now taken to the regular wearing of knee length stripy socks. Madam Squeeze frolicked in the sand, running in circles and waving her arms. I made an uncertain line for the water stepping over bluebottles and trying to remember the remedy for stings. The ocean was cold, we arrived there by accident, taking a wrong turn and crossing the bridge in Spencer's big old car.

There was more to this day, the lightning rod may have been snipped in two but I remain faithful to the idea that this is only one of seven possible reasons.

Vote now

I met Spencer and Madam Squeeze on the steps of a church. Spencer was wearing eyeliner and Madam Squeeze was laughing about it. I think more men should wear more eyeliner more often but I guess that's a little hypocritical of me seeing as I never wear the stuff. Spencer also had traces of lipstick in his moustache. The makeup was leftover from yesterday, Spencer explained it was proving difficult to scrub off. He'd been wearing a dress and dancing in the dark for a music video for a friend's band. The theme of the video seems to have been transvestite zombies.

The three of us set about the serious business of lounging around the coffee houses of Newtown until well after midnight talking over things trivial, important and necessary. They are the parliament houses of my life, long live the coffee houses of Newtown.

Electric illusions, sticky fingers and the ruination of the ordinary

I started with floor tiles but soon returned to the idea of a Faberge crack opening the swinging doors to my brain and pouring the fantasy onto the dance floor in a basement somewhere in Sydney. A dance floor that was wooden, raised 2.75 cm above the Spanish kitchen tiles covering the rest of the floor. We were in the back room, I spent some minutes pondering whether the room was a large small room or a medium sized room or perhaps a small large room, for this kind of venue. I gave up on my pondering when I first noticed a man with personal on-board lights carrying a round drinks tray ringed with red lights and empty, always empty.

I attempted in vain to describe, to myself, the fantastical nature of everything. I wandered in thought over inadequate ready-made descriptions, masquerade ball, opium dream, mardi gras, carnivale, Oxford secret society or Gatsbyesque but none of these descriptions fit. The men wore dresses or heels or both in a way that defied stereotypes of gay, camp or queen, more disregard for modes of being than anything else. One charming man wore tuxedo trousers, cummerbund, tuxedo shirt and a black pleated ruffle that emerged from his waist band and crawled up the centre of his torso ending in a magnificent arc behind him like a frill neck lizard. On his feet an elegant pair of what can only be described as wingtip stilettos.

People kept assuring me that the turnout was unusually low for the monthly event. I am glad there were not more people, I might not have had the opportunity to study each costume in detail. I spent a great deal of time leaning against a pole, sucking on complimentary lollipops and smiling from ear to ear. If there had been a supply of opium and a chaise longue I would have willingly sunk into a new kind of oblivion.

More happened and didn't happen than I expected, a man from The Follow followed someone (not creepily), I was invited to be in the new video for the band Regular John, I narrowly escaped an unwise snog, a man ran a beeping electronic device over my entire body and at one point I looked up to find Spencer standing in front of me licking at a palmful of cream like a cat. He has since explained how he came to be standing there with a palmful of cream but it this has not lessened, in my memory, the inital shock at the sight of him. Madam Squeeze performed an elegant galloping dance whilst juggling pieces of artificial fruit.

The unexpected nature of everything, the clarity of inidividual vision, the dedication and sophistication of the execution of detail in costumes has developed in me a distinct distate for the ordinariness of everything else. When I emerged from the venue the usual pulsating life-filled nocturnal city streets seemed nothing but plain and bleak and left me with that feeling of everything delicious being gone except for the sticky parts left on my fingers.