The Waiting Man

Well... a rather full weekend

We had a wedding yesterday ~ one of The Loved One's cousins married her long-time partner at a Catholic church out in Liverpool & my Sister-in-law was a bridesmaid, so attendance was kindasorta mandatory. When they set out chairs at the altar for the Bride & Groom, you know it probably won't be just a quick reading of the vows, a kiss & off to the pub. Fortunately it wasn't the full Catholic service, which I've encountered before & lost two hours of my life to, but there was still plenty of liturgical call & response during the readings & the set prayers & standing, sitting, standing again... I was coerced into abandoning my principle of not photographing people for the day & was one of quite a few cameras documenting the happy event. I received the ultimate compliment from one of the paid photographers when he came up behind me & stuck his much longer & much more expensive lens over my shoulder to capture the same angle for one of the shots I was taking. It turned out the priest was an ex-wedding photographer too... before obviously deciding it was more fun being a part of the action

A break of a couple of hours & off to the Reception at one of those professional party venues you find all over the Western Suburbs. This was a Chinese/Vietnamese place ~ presumably to keep the Bride's side of the family happy after the Groom's Spanish Catholic family chose the church. Lots of taffeta, chintz & ribbons on the tables, a House Band setting up while their singer wandered around in a military-style jacket & leather pants, chatting up all the young women in short tight skirts & more hairspray & makeup than a Drag Convention. From then on, the night was fun & predictable:~ the food was great, the alcohol endless, the so-called speeches appalling & the descent into debauchery & violence inevitable... with the Best Man picking a fight with another guest & the dance floor a sea of god-knows-what. I spent most of the night with my newly Residential Brother-in-law, but was convinced/dragooned into a couple of dances... Well, conga lines don't require much in the way of co-ordination ~ in fact, the less, the better. Home eventually, somewhat the worse for wear about 3am. Ish

Recovery today at our local café, then it was down to Brookvale Oval to see our Rugby League team beat Cronulla ~ the first time I've been to a League game since 1980something & the first time ever for The Loved One, who enjoyed it so much, we've booked seats for another game next month

Back to work tomorrow to see how the renovations have progressed over the weekend. And for a rest...

Breakfast at the new local... some pottering & meandering at home, then a family late-lunch which spilled over into dinner this afternoon/evening

You know how sometimes you get home from a social gathering at a reasonably early hour, but then can't muster much energy to do anything else, not even enough to commit to watching a whole movie, so you watch little bits of this, then an hour of that, just so you don't have to admit that you'd rather have gone to bed at the ridiculous time of 8.30pm... which you haven't done since you were 8 years old??

Just me then?

Soddit... now I'm definitely off to bed

Oops... missed yesterday. I'm sure you're all waiting with bated breath

Dinner with a recently retrenched friend last night, whose solution to unemployment is simple ~ he's going to Canada for five weeks to see his girlfriend. A bit like our six-week trip to the USA last year in the wake of my redundancy & its subsequent payout. Our friend is already talking of extending his stay over there, so we'll see him sooner or later

Having been presented with the keys to the Kingdom (okay, just the showroom I work at) yesterday, I spent today working solo due to staff illness. I don't mind being thrown in the deep end ~ it's the best way to learn & also shows the Paymasters I'm capable & reliable. The only time I didn't like being thrown in the deep end was when I was 7 years old & learning to swim. Thirty eight years later, I'm still not the most confident of water babies...

Trivia tonight with the old host at the new venue. Nice chicken Caesar salad & we won. I call that a pleasant evening

Off we went to Camperdown tonight in search of a new Trivia evening & found one of our old hosts at a new gig... except he was always doing this gig on a Tuesday, whereas we'd seen him somewhere else on a Wednesday &... you know what? It doesn't really matter... We came, we played, we won

Starting to get things together at work... & projects are lining up, so I'll soon be busier than I have been for the last week. Lots of data entry today, requiring the wearing of glasses... I've been developing a nice little headache since about 3pm that's just about matured

Aarrgghh... bed

A rainy Sunday to round out the weekend

Although the weather wasn't so bad when we were at the Courthouse Hotel in Newtown for farewell drinks with our ex-pat friends, leaving tonight & returning to England... via 5 days in Abu Dhabi to "have a holiday from the holiday". I'd no idea we could be so taxing...

But now ~ rain, a bit cold & a slight headache, so bed & booktime

But I'm only just home, so it counts as the day before...

An odd day ~ starting out rainy'n'windy & more conducive to staying at home, so we did. Then, as the weather improved, we headed out to our various engagements... the Loved One to a wedding & reception & I to a catch-up over drinks & eventual dinner with an erstwhile workmate I've been promising to meet since mid-December last year

The three of us wound up in the North Annandale Hotel shortly before their turf-out time. Now home, perchance to get some sleep before the first day at the new job...

A low-key day, a late breakfast at our new local Café, then a quiet afternoon at home before dinner this evening with some friends visiting from the UK, where they moved to a couple of years ago

They're staying with a relative in Annandale ~ your typical late 19th, early 20th century single-storey terrace off the main street, with postage-stamp sized back yard just big enough for a beagle to run around in. Barbecued lamb & a selection of tasty salads were the bill of fare... A good night. Our friends were always good for interesting conversations & it got late too early... Hopefully we'll see them again before they return home

More interviews tomorrow...

Dinner with friends at an Indian restaurant this evening... Should be interesting, given the reaction my plumbing system has had to subcontinental delights the last couple of times...

Which is extremely annoying, as Indian has been my favourite cuisine for as long as I can remember, so to have it play havoc downstairs is a worry. I don't want to give it up the way I've had to give up orange juice, pineapple juice, dairy milk (mostly) & sundry other things I used to enjoy

And so to bed, to wait...

And so ~ seven days into my Exile from the mean streets of the Marketplace

Let's first backtrack to last Friday, when I spent the afternoon both chasing & pushing pieces of paper around, had a much-longer-than-expected talk with a prospective employer whom I'd visited only on spec, then played a second gig in my low-key return to musical pursuit & performance. Having stood in line at the local MissingCentreLink office for 30 minutes, it eventually transpired that all I needed could be done on the phone. Thence to the most convoluted opening of a new bank account I could imagine... Why do they need so much ID from someone who wants to give them money?

The conversation-which-became-an-interview was with the owner of a business that, 'til last Thursday, was in competition with me but now represents a possible lifeline. Sure, it was Friday afternoon & it wasn't too busy, but two hours talk & a beer was a lot more than I'd expected. Having refused the beer because I was playing a gig that night, my former competitor said he'd picked me as a musician not long after I'd walked in. Now, I've seen myself in the mirror often enough to know I don't have any instruments tattooed on me, nor do I wear a neon sign labelling me... so how do so many people I've met all seem to know that I'm a 'Musician'? And what is it about that pastime/preoccupation that makes it so remarkable to them?

The same was true of the gig that evening ~ a corporate 'Awards Night' for the advertising arm of a major media group, held at the Function Centre at Taronga Zoo. Plenty of wildlife was on display, but it was all in various degrees of fancy dress. Our singer/songwriter works for the conglomerate & had snared not only the gig, but places at a table, drinks & a three-course meal for her guitarists. And again, her colleagues were impressed that the two guys not in costume were 'musicians'... even though any one of them earns more than I do

Our five songs were performed against a cacophony of cutlery & conversation, with polite applause. My only complaints were that we had no monitors to hear ourselves & that we were called up to play just as I was about to sink my teeth into the pork belly entrée which, of course, had been removed by the time we returned to the table

The annual Coffee Festival at the Rocks on Sunday was overcrowded & underwhelming. Queuing for fifteen minutes for a dribble of espresso, then being barged into by the Great Unwashed & their double prams from all directions does not make for a grand day out. The Loved One & I agree it was probably our last attendance

Otherwise, the Jobseeker carousel spins ever around with its jaunty music & painted smiles. How many people want to run away from the Circus, I wonder?

Alors... une soirée avec La Soirée... ce soir.

If you want to know what it's like to be molested by a 130kilogram baritone Drag King/Queen in front of a few hundred people, then I heartily recommend going to see the show before it ends in early February... & get yourself front-row seats right next to the artistes pathway. You WILL be noticed & you WILL find yourself part of several acts, so you may as well go along for the ride willingly & with gusto... I did.

Though how I'm going to explain the glitter in my hair & beard to the guys at work tomorrow will be interesting. One of them is gay, the other's a racist homophobe...

Tomorrow, I'll be taking part in the annual Sydney City To Surf race/run/jog/walk/stagger... Taxi!!!... having been convinced it would be a good idea & fun by my L-SP a couple of months ago.

Now, less than 12 hours before the starting gun, I'm not so sure, but whatthehell... 14 kilometres can't be that far... can it??

I'll let you know how it all went soon... & all the other stuff from the week.

No matter how strange you think your life is... Nature can always go one better...

Now we know where the expression 'Sick as a parrot' comes from ~ Darwin.

We played Mini-Golf with some friends on Friday night, at a course not far from Warriewood Beach, so the air was misty with sea-spray &... mist. There were people on the adjacent driving range who had no hope of seeing where their shots were landing... One of those lost photo opportunities as I had no camera of any kind on me... Bugger! By turf-out time at 9pm we'd only done half of the second nine-hole course, but were quite happy to repair to the nearby Hog's Breath Café for a late dinner. Note to self: Order 'Medium Rare' next time, as my rare steak was a bit underdone... even by my bloody standards.

Rozelle Markets today... See what books & trinkets we decide we can't live without...

A metaphor for life?? All peaceful serenity on the surface, but paddling away like crazy underneath...

Today's my Sunday ~ the second of my days off during the week. Confusingly, the first one is Sunday, which I call my Saturday. Down at Debtor's Prison they're expecting a visit from the company GM today... kind of glad I'm nowhere near that.

Also today... & for the last three weeks... my L-SP & I have been waiting for the latest round of repairs on her VW Beetle to be completed, so that we can finally get a feel for driving the thing. The whole saga may one day be told in a series of nine books à la the Clan Of The Cave Bear novels covering a similarly long era, but suffice to say the latest delay came in the form of the Bug being hit by another car while the mechanic was test-driving it last week. The up-side of that is the two front mudguards are being replaced... something that was on the 'To-Do' list for the car anyway... at no cost to us. I had cleared my leisurely schedule to be ready to catch public transport across town to pick up the car, but there's now a delay in getting the aforementioned mudguards & so another week slips by without the car.

And so, it's been a minor domestic day by default ~ washing, washing up, little chores & jobs that tend to go undone & unnoticed during the working week. Dinner with friends tonight... maybe that will give me something exciting to write about.

So we went to see Lady GaGa last night. My second big American Pop Show after Justin Timberlake a couple of years ago & my third 'Pop Idol' experience. Ever.

At times visually stunning, at times visually impressive, at times pure Rock Eisteddfod cheese, the show & the Lady herself certainly gave you bang for buck. Arty & moody video footage between costume changes? Check. Burning piano during ballad? Check. Giant 'Monster' manipulated & moved by backup dancers/singers conforming to a long line of acts using slightly naff arena-sized props? Check.

Sonically, it was a bit sludgy ~ the guitars & keyboards melding into potent white noise a little too often, obscuring vocals, backing vocals, samples &, as far as I could hear, a completely superfluous harpist & bass-player. Whether that was down to a lot of stuff being already sequenced, programmed & then just mixed badly with the live players, or the well-documented sound-killer qualities of the Sydney Entertainment Centre is, by now, a moot debate. But we had good seats, a stream of GaGa impersonators in the audience to keep us amused before the show & I have to say I enjoyed it. A lot.

All the hits from the album were played, my only disappointment was the absence of a great vocalist (& a pretty good dancer too!!) from her performance of 'Poker Face'...

Time to retire the Debtor's Prison Userpic then... 'til next time.

As of today, I'm a gentleman of leisure ~ except I'm not that gentle & leisure isn't what it used to be. Today has been by turns domestic & trying to be pro-active & productive scaring up the next career opportunity. And chasing up exactly what I'm owed for my sentence time in DP... in case the next opportunity doesn't knock for a while.

( Then... Now... Soon )

Still hab a bid ob a code dough... bud id's a bid bedder, dags por arsging!