First Post
Gf cnn l
Monday, July 31, 2006
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Kaya again
We bought some kaya jam today. With JOOB constantly demanding our attention I think the likelihood of finding the necessary hour to make it ourselves is pretty low. However I am a little worried by the importer.
Weird Food of the Day
That's artichoke drink for those unable to read something resembling French or German. It wasn't bad btw. It just wasn't good either.
Friday, July 28, 2006
David Jones Drug Den
While using the parents' room at David Jones today, skribe and I observed a young woman enter one of the nursing cubicles.
Nothing odd about that, except she didn't have a baby. Twenty minutes later, she emerged somewhat woozily, washed her hands very thoroughly, then wandered off into the crowds.
Now, I don't like those nursing cubicles anyway: they're tiny, unventilated, and stink of many many used nappies. However, I appreciate that some mothers prefer a little privacy when they nurse.
The realisation that these cubicles are therefore being used for other, dubious, purposes is somewhat unsettling.
Maybe I'm jumping to conclusions. She could have been diabetic. She might have been upset. She could have been power napping. After all, the average nursing booth is a lot more comfortable than the average toilet cubicle. And without the ultra-violent ultra-violet lighting.
The fumes from all those used nappies would have explained her wooziness, but I very much doubt it.
The big department stores like David Jones and Myers provide really decent facilities for parents and families entirely free of charge. I would hate for a selfish minority to abuse these services and ruin them for those of us who actually need to use them.
Oh my gods. I've just turned into Helen Lovejoy: Think Of The Children!
Thursday, July 27, 2006
Football Glory
The Matildas are through to the 2007 World Cup after beating Japan 2-0 in their Asia Cup semi-final. They now play off against the winner of the other semi between China and North Korea to decide the Asia Cup. Way to go, girls!
Also, it is nice to see that Perth Glory has appointed both a coach, Ron Smith, and a CEO, Michelle Phillips. Smith is a particularly welcome addition after having developed the likes of Mark Viduka, Lucas Neill and Craig Moore during his tenure at the AIS.
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Birthdays, Bubs, and Blackforests
I have a terrible secret: I share a birthday with John Howard. Fortunately, so do George Bernard Shaw, Carl Jung, and Stanley Kubrick.
There was a time when I used to look forward to birthdays, but then somewhere in my 30s I just seemed to forget about them altogether.
Like today. I could have spent the morning in bed. Instead, I trekked all the way over into the fashionable end of South Perth so I could join my mothers group to chat about baby-induced guilt trips and paranoias.
JOOB was a little overwhelmed and quieter than usual but then he found his voice again and was soon babbling away happily with his neighbour, and showing off his caterpillar action. Good baby! After all, while nobody will admit it, these mum-and-bub affairs are really just exercises in one-upmanship, aren't they?
Heh. He's the best present I could have wished for. If I'd been planning for my birthday like skribe had. He surprised me with my favourite cake when I got home, and we started into it almost at once.
After all, as we like to say in this household, it's only birthday cake when it's still your birthday.
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
It's the simple things...
For the last few days I've been doing some post-production work on a corporate video for a firm in West Perth. It's all pretty basic stuff (fancy graphics, touchups, titles, etc), but it can be time consuming. Some of them take hours to do one setup. Others are literally five minutes work.
Today I visited the client to show him what I'd done. To see if there was anything I needed to fix. Apart from a few suggestions and a complete rewrite of one of the scenes (not a bad thing because the concept didn't work and it looked ugly) everything went swimmingly.
However, it never fails to amaze me that no matter how much time I spent on perfecting a scene it will always be the ones that I spend the least amount of time on that most impresses the client. Today it was the five-minute job, which consisted of me importing a graphic and applying two effects to it. That's it. But it did look pretty cool when it had finished rendering.
Sunday, July 23, 2006
15 Weeks After: The Fog of Motherhood
Nearly four months on, I'm beginning to appreciate that strange state of existence some call the Fog of Motherhood. Doom doom DOOOMMM!!!
It's like having tunnel vision while on medication. Everything immediately outside of the baby's needs becomes a haze and you seem always to be struggling in slow time. It's a combination of mothering instinct and chronic lack of sleep. Nurturing Autopilot: ON. All other operational processes: you're on your own.
So on the one hand, I've learnt to carry out some chores one-handed with JOOB slung over a shoulder.
But. I also find myself losing track of things all the time; not knowing what day it is or where I've left my keys or my mobile, not remembering there's still unpacked groceries in my bag, not aware of what's just been said on TV while I'm watching it... The other day I caught the Freo train to go to Subi and ended up in Swanbourne.
I've heard the motherhood fog doesn't lift for years. One day, JOOB might be toddling off to pre-school when the fuzziness will just suddenly blink out and you'll wake up to yourself again.
Or not. Meanwhile, I'll just have to tread warily through cottonwool-land and hope JOOB makes it out with me okay.
Saturday, July 22, 2006
Friday, July 21, 2006
This Week's Featured Cool Art
Yes, it's a wooden Ferrari being driven through the canals of Venice.
Livio DeMarchi's a Venetian-born sculptor with a delightful sense of the absurd. Check out his House of Books, which not only looks like a house built from books, but is furnished entirely with wooden sculptures of book-based furniture and wooden drapery and clothing.
QOTD
The best place to argue libertarian viewpoints is face down in someone else’s garden at 4am while you try to ignore the sounds of a dog eating that pool of vomit down the road.
-- Darryl Mason@Larvatus Prodeo
Thursday, July 20, 2006
Eau de Guava
We're out of guavas.
Already, I miss the crisp, clean fragrance of ripe guavas everytime I walk into the kitchen. It is an invigorating scent, a perfume that cuts through that heady smog of tropical fruit smells like a cool breeze.
And they're gone.
Ah, well. Guavas, like coffee, never entirely live up to their aromas somehow.
Growing up in Singapore, I was surrounded by guava trees, and seldom noticed them. Then, for long years in Oz, I only seemed to encounter the guava as a co-flavour in fruit drinks. A few days ago, my neighbour passed on some guavas that she'd been given too many of, and suddenly - WHAMMO! - our kitchen was sweet with the smell of ripe guavas.
And with it comes the memory of the spindly guava tree that grew by the door to my Year 1 classroom, whose fruit were few but always plucked by greedy little hands before they were ever nearly ripe enough. But even then, there was a smell - green and sharp.
There's nothing else quite like it.
Damn. We're out of guavas.
Meetup Pics
We went to the Perth Blog Meetup again last night. Fun with great people as usual. Here are some pics:
Rich explains the concept of Barcamp.
CW and Sirexkat listen attentively.
Simone attempts to ger her Nikon to shoot in low-light.
Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Worship at the altar of JOOB
JOOB will be making another appearance at the Brass Monkey on Wednesday 19th July at 7.30pm. Those wishing to meet the Great One are requested to pay in crisp one-hundred dollar notes (Australian or US currency accepted). We also remind everyone that the 'May the JOOB be with you. Always' T-shirts and mugs are now available online.
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