My brother sat perched on a bar stool peering out the window at people scurrying around in Surry Hills. He kept exclaiming, "Look at all the people! All those people going places! Look at that guy, and that guy, look at them over there!" like he couldn't believe the volume and variety of humanity of going about its business.
I used to exclaim like that when I first moved to the city, even sit for hours making notes. I couldn't believe my eyes. It felt so strange to see so many people moving about all around me after decades of knowing three streets away from wherever I was there was nothing but distance, mountains and sky. You could walk out the front door of my old house and walk for hours without arriving anywhere at all.
The city feels like a dreamscape sometimes and I still want to exclaim but I'm more likely to close my eyes and see if I can feel it, as well as see it. I'm still waiting to wake up back in the old town and realise I've had the most amazing dream.
A.H. Cayley's Confession Booth and Rhys Muldoon's fake santorum
I seem to have accidentally joined a hypothetical band with Adam Lewis* and Matt Banham. When I say joined what I mean is bullied into saying "Maria" when pointed at by Banham while Lewis croons a long 'ooooo'. I think we will be very popular.
I've never met Matt Banham before but people, like P. Street tell me that I should have. The first thing Banham ever said to me, and other people in the room, was a long drunken tale about shitting his pants twenty minutes from home. Yes it was crass but not quite as crude, when listened to first-hand, as the story Rhys Muldoon told about concocting fake santorum in his kitchen to fool Ben Mendelsohn with. I do not know why this occurred, or when.
I knew it was going to be a strange night when Mr X cancelled last minute, citing exhaustion. It's a good thing he is not a celebrity, we all know what 'exhaustion' means when someone is a celebrity. In the case of Mr X I suspect it was a case of being very tired indeed. The strangeness began when I immediately rang and booked a taxi for myself without pausing or making a clear strategy for using in case of emergencies, which is what I usually do when I have to get picked up in a taxi by myself. This time I calmly thought oh well Mr X is tired, sucks to be him, and then went about my solo-taxi business. The taxi cost five million and twelve dollars and fiftybillion cents, due to traffic. Strange event number two, I cared only mildly.
Many odd things occurred but none so odd as my catching the train without bothering to look at where the train was going, after I had already decided to catch a taxi home. I wound up on a fast train to Bankstown, for those who don't know where that is don't worry I don't either. Judging from the other passengers on the train it is a sub-level of hell. I had some time to think, on the trains, about the oddness of the evening. It is a great shame that I am now too exhausted to write about it, a great shame indeed.
It is good though that no one has changed any of the signs at Central Station so that they read Entrail. This would be possible by the simple removal of the letter C and the small addition of an I.
* Listen to Adam Lewis's radio show, it's quite good.
Oh and the reason I left the house with box of PAN magazines was to attend A.H. Cayley's Confession Booth. A.H. is the Chief Sub-Editor of PAN magazine and once pulled all the legs off a spider, I believe she was an infant when the leg-pulling incident occurred.
I've never met Matt Banham before but people, like P. Street tell me that I should have. The first thing Banham ever said to me, and other people in the room, was a long drunken tale about shitting his pants twenty minutes from home. Yes it was crass but not quite as crude, when listened to first-hand, as the story Rhys Muldoon told about concocting fake santorum in his kitchen to fool Ben Mendelsohn with. I do not know why this occurred, or when.
I knew it was going to be a strange night when Mr X cancelled last minute, citing exhaustion. It's a good thing he is not a celebrity, we all know what 'exhaustion' means when someone is a celebrity. In the case of Mr X I suspect it was a case of being very tired indeed. The strangeness began when I immediately rang and booked a taxi for myself without pausing or making a clear strategy for using in case of emergencies, which is what I usually do when I have to get picked up in a taxi by myself. This time I calmly thought oh well Mr X is tired, sucks to be him, and then went about my solo-taxi business. The taxi cost five million and twelve dollars and fiftybillion cents, due to traffic. Strange event number two, I cared only mildly.
Many odd things occurred but none so odd as my catching the train without bothering to look at where the train was going, after I had already decided to catch a taxi home. I wound up on a fast train to Bankstown, for those who don't know where that is don't worry I don't either. Judging from the other passengers on the train it is a sub-level of hell. I had some time to think, on the trains, about the oddness of the evening. It is a great shame that I am now too exhausted to write about it, a great shame indeed.
It is good though that no one has changed any of the signs at Central Station so that they read Entrail. This would be possible by the simple removal of the letter C and the small addition of an I.
* Listen to Adam Lewis's radio show, it's quite good.
Oh and the reason I left the house with box of PAN magazines was to attend A.H. Cayley's Confession Booth. A.H. is the Chief Sub-Editor of PAN magazine and once pulled all the legs off a spider, I believe she was an infant when the leg-pulling incident occurred.
You are boring
Work - challenging (in an odd but not bad way)
Home - peaceful (and mildly clean)
Friends - all fine (unless they are pretending)
Family - no problems (and presumably still alive)
Manuscript - going (yes)
PAN - in progress (a way to go but in progress)
BORING.
All work and no play makes Dale a dull girl.
I'm not seducing disaster, merely making an observation, pass me the champagne.
Home - peaceful (and mildly clean)
Friends - all fine (unless they are pretending)
Family - no problems (and presumably still alive)
Manuscript - going (yes)
PAN - in progress (a way to go but in progress)
BORING.
All work and no play makes Dale a dull girl.
I'm not seducing disaster, merely making an observation, pass me the champagne.
If I could turn back time
I would swap Paul McCartney for John Lennon. There is a reason Paul was never asked to join The Traveling Wilburys.
Portraits & lemon wheels distract island resident
 |
| I took this dodgy photo of Lyndal |
I planned to spend every waking moment from Friday after work until Sunday night in a deliberately blissful state of writing reverie but as it so happened one or two things popped up. The first thing was work, stupid fucking work, I ended up working until almost eight at night, until Spencer came in the office door with a Rolling Stones poster and the pronouncement that he was bored and sick of waiting for me to finish. We had planned, earlier in the day, to travel together to official distraction number one.
Official distraction number one was having our portraits taken by the excellent photographer Lyndal Irons, who happens to be a friend of ours. The portraits were Lyndal's idea, not mine. When we got to her house the lounge room was transformed, huge light panel thingos and boxes that look like amps but aren't, they were giant light-controlling box things. We all sat in the back yard drinking beer and yammering in our way until Lyndal called us in one at a time to take her shots. I don't like having my photo taken, I'm not at all photogenic, I'm all surface, no shadow, unlike Spencer who has more angles than a geometry lesson, but when Lyndal asks me I'll do it.
It was odd just sitting there, occasionally being directed to turn a little this way or another. Lyndal looked busy, changing settings on everything from her camera to the giant light-controlling boxes, moving big things on stands around. I have no idea at all about anything to do with photography, except this, when she works there is a beautiful intensity about her. She becomes transformed and it's mesmerising.
Official distraction number two came the next night. I had two to choose from, one party where Spencer was the dj and I'd know about a billion people. The kind of party that I might easily find myself still at as the sun rises or a party at Mr X's house where I would know almost no one and would most likely stay well within the limits of tame. I chose the wrong party if my purpose was partying. I went to Mr X's house to help his lovely housemate celebrate her thirtieth birthday. It was a mild party, the housemate's friends were over-groomed and simultaneously over-confident and embarrassed. The embarrassment became evident when the housemate declared it was time for an air guitar competition. There were grown men hiding behind the lounge to avoid being called up to compete. If I had declared such a competition at my birthday party a few weeks ago I'm fairly confident that at least three pieces of furniture would have been destroyed in the resulting mayhem. As it was Spencer, Madam Squeeze and AHC performed a five minute interpretive dance piece, with moonwalking, P Street and E from next door waltzed mightily into the refrigerator, Abdullah did something entirely unexpected and I injured myself jumping around with a bucket on my head, and at least three highly shocking yet hilarious events occurred before midnight.
At Mr X's tonight three sets of people competed in an abashed manner and then rejoined the herd as quickly as possible. The poor birthday girl tried getting everybody to do it at once, and then tried to do just general dancing but nothing would work. They all stood there hoping not to be noticed. I felt sorry for the poor girl who is obviously quite a bit more fabulous than her general network of friends.
Around midnight a serious case of the yawns set in, just as Mr X reappeared from the kitchen with a mug of gin and tonic that included a whole wheel of lemon. I suppose I might have stayed and talked merrily with Mr X and the small band of people I have come to know but the yawns got hold of me mightily and skulked back through the back streets to The Peach. I wrote for a few more hours but now I'm giving up for the day. It's three in the morning and I've run out of steam.
I'm hoping tomorrow, with no scheduled official distractions, I can get back to island living.
Don't go changing
Years ago I read both of Lauren Bacall's autobiographies. I remember little about them, in the first volume she married Bogey, it was difficult to convince him to buy a house and then he died and she kept his silk shirts to wear as her own. In the second volume Ms Bacall set about ridding herself of most of her earthly possessions because she was ageing and didn't want to die with a big house full of furniture.
I might have reached the second volume stage of my life. I used to want options, for everything. Options about pens, ballpoint, cartridge, fountain, quill, expensive, very cheap indeed, glow-in-the-dark, blue, black, orange, green, purple. This one example of pens may give you some idea as to what is going on inside my cupboards, drawers, shelves and wardrobes. I want it gone, everything except the silk shirts.
I might have reached the second volume stage of my life. I used to want options, for everything. Options about pens, ballpoint, cartridge, fountain, quill, expensive, very cheap indeed, glow-in-the-dark, blue, black, orange, green, purple. This one example of pens may give you some idea as to what is going on inside my cupboards, drawers, shelves and wardrobes. I want it gone, everything except the silk shirts.
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