Saturday morning round up...

Small font today cos I've gotta lot of crap to spout! It's Sat. morning...have had the annual sleep in (Kid is sleeping over at a friends), the Herald is here, stereo on & all is well..& the last 24 hrs media review is under way...

• Jindabyne - saw this last night with J & guest reviewer L...well, so many things to say! But I must digress...when I was a kid we went on a school camp to Jindabyne, & beforehand we were warned of the dreaded 'jindi bindies'* - a stomach bug that supposedly resulted in high octane diarrhoea...well, thinking about it now, this movie gave me the jindi bindies...just another Australian movie with sweeping landscape shots, 'difficult' characters & human drama. The big question raised seems to be 'are all men pigs?'...but, hell, I fail to see the much lauded brilliance that everyone else is talking about....some parts of this film are just plain dumb & unneccessary, & the whole deal with the film deliberately making things as convoluted as possible just shits me*...I'd rather just see a film based on a story, than a deliberately constructed plot which manipulates situations for a range of difficult outcomes...eg. the dead body in the river isn't just that of a woman, it's a woman who has been raped, murdered & also happens to be aboriginal as well! All deliberate plotting to allow for maximum drama...annoying! Go & rent 'Bliss' instead. As L pointed out, the guys in the film didn't even seem to enjoy eating their fish!!! Stood outside the cinema after & pondered what to do...Byron was crawling with uber-hip Splendour attenders, many of whom were cultivating the Wolfmother look...we got barred from getting into Woolies cos it was closed...so we came home to attempt the very difficult SMH crossword & get annoyed about 'jindabyne'...
  
• Sat morning music line up (in chronological order)...

1. Neil Young - 'harvest'...J's choice not mine...sounds old & fusty & reminds me of bad FM radio...a couple of good-ish songs tho...
2. The Grates - 'gravity won't get you high'...J dissed this band for their American accents (via Brisbane!) & I've gotta agree.... 'to' becomes 'teu' & there's just too many filler 'oh yeahs', 'huh huhs' & girlish yelps. I've seen 'em live & they're great fun - energetic & punchy, & this CD is too, but it's nothing new...altho it is a great morning CD, & The Kid seems to give it props (she's a pushover for melodic punky pop tho')...file under poor man's Bikini Kill...
3. Bluebottle Kiss - 'doubt seeds' 2 xCD...ask J this question: what's worse than a new BBK CD? A new double BBK CD! Yeah, I like this band a lot...& obviously play them too much in our house...even The Kid dislikes them! But the last few offerrings by BBK have been a tad underwhelming...with the feeling that their glory days were 5 years ago when they blew my socks off at the Hopetoun while surrounded by bespectacled earnest back pack-wearing fans...not so at Byron this year...they were somewhat dull... Anyhow disc 1 sounds damn fine - this is great great stuff! Disc 2 will probably be equally great I'm sure. 2 bad points tho...self-congratulatory liner notes, & the whole thing comes in a horrible double jewel case...the most heinous invention of the modern age...ergghhhh...
4. Death Cab for Cutie - 'plans'...there is a linear relationship for bands who do the winsome pop thing which states that as more albums are released the level of winsomeness increases to cloying degrees while the level of pop &/or oomph that attracted you in the first place declines dramatically...(the finger is pointed at YOU Art of Fighting!)...anyhow, as this is DCFC's 4th CD, the rule applies & sadly holds true...where is the oomph? Nice stuff for a sat'dee morning...but that's just it...it's too damn nice!

OK...that's the round up...thanks to sponsers of various burnt CD's... time to read the SMH & get the low-down on yesterdays crossword, fry up some eggs, & listen to more BBK while doing the mountain of washing up that has somehow occurred...L, yr lentil soup is very nice, but it is very resource demanding! bring on the rest of the w/end..........

Happiness is a warm bike...

Had one of those warm & fuzzy parenting moments yesterday which was a pleasure indeed. The Kid cast off her training wheels & entered the enthralling world of..... (distant trumpet fanfare) - The 2 wheeled bike! Yep, it's true - The Kid is now 2 wheels good, 4 wheels baaaaaadddd...the historic moment happened in a park in Tenterfield - what a moment! There were spills, crashes, squashed legs, collisions with a street sign, a near-dunking in a stormwater drain & close calls to a pile of dogshit, but by the end, The Kid rose above & could ride a 40 metre stretch of concrete unaided...very amusing & hilarious stuff...I've gotta admit to punching the air on more than one occasion, & even internally thinking "You go girl!" as well! That's 2 rites of passage in 1 week for The Kid - first wobbly tooth & the bike thing as well...sheesh! what next? Becoming the third member of Smoosh?

Anyhow, other good thing was getting the hell outta here for the w/end & getting out to Tenterfield - cold, rugged & boulder strewn - a damn fine place. Was hoping for snow, or at least sleet...but no deal...had a fine w/end consuming much food & burning much firewood...being at work today hurts....there is a whole world out there to frolic in & I'm not out in it...

thirty-bloody-eight...

Yep, another year, another birthday...I'm getting dangerously close to 40 now! Spent the day at work perversely enough, but managed to stave off the inevitable offer of a birthday cake from my workmates. These are from the white trash bakery downstairs & consist of sponge cakes which are like kitchen sponges covered in whipped cream & jam & injected by an air compressor...Ungrateful? No way! Purely rational...settled for a bad latte from the white trash cafe downstairs instead...

Went down to Ballina Waste Management Centre (aka Ballina tip) to do some vegetation mapping...the sun was out, the sweet smell of rotting garbage was in the air - it wasn't a bad place to be at all! Saw a Black-necked stork too - a majestic sight indeed...ya can't ask for much more than that! Going down to Mullumbimby for pizza from the legendary Milk & Honey (maybe wearing my new B'day undies & shirt too!). I hereby throw down the gauntlet & challenge any pizza to be the equal to one of the mighty creations knocked up by Milk & Honey pizzas... anyone coming up this way can take the challenge...you will be convinced!

Public service announcement...

It's School Holidays, which means The Kid will be having many of her friends over to devour all our food, make sculptures out of anything which can be lifted by 6 year old hands, ask several million questions & (in some instances) sleep over. The sleep over scene is incredibly cute, hearing their excited little whispers after lights out, & then the thump of 2 pairs of feet hitting the floor at 6 am the next day with energy amounts that are scarey...

Yesterday, The Kid walked into the bathroom, then walked over to her friend and loudly announced - "watch out, my Dad's just done a really smelly poo in the Bathroom!". I cringed with embarrassement....sheesh! God knows what The Friend will report back to her parents...for all I know, Chinese whispers rules may apply & by the time the story gets out it might have transpired that I took a dump on the floor or some such horror story...Hmmmmmmmm...

A beautiful sunny w/end complete with much socialising just finished....damn nice too! Last w/end was The Kids 6 years old 'cowboys & cowgirls' birthday party...pics to come when I get around to it...

Caught up with a friend on the w/end who told me an amusing story about a team building excercise his department was ordered to have by their superior (he works in a Govt. dept.). It was decided, seeing as the weather was nice, they'd all go surfing together. On ecstasy...
Needless to say, much team spirit was evoked, & I'm sure plans for more such exercises will be proposed. Good idea tho....maybe all corporate team building sessions should start with. "Now, we'll all just take one of these little tablets...". Think of the positive outcomes!