1. The (wonderful) Wagons. We saw them the on the first night of summer, at the groovy, atmospheric, and once Nazi-frequented Speigeltent (according to Henry Wagons). A fantastic show, with dark and moody country music, sometimes funny and sometimes painfully awkward patter from Henry W., a delightfully irreverant hiphop song in the encore, and a so-cheesy-it-hurts-my-arteries interval version of Believe It Or Not (I'm Walking On Air)! And may I say, a washboard never sounded so good!2. 32. No, not the meaning of life, in fact ten less than that, which gives me a decade to work it all out. My 32nd birthday. Also my brother's 37th birthday, although he reckons he waited for me to catch up at 32 and is still there, but I don't think it works like that. My brother is currently overseas, and although due to fly home on our shared birthday (a fluke date) last Saturday, he remains in Brazil, tumbling head over heels in love. I had an email from the lass the other day - she sounds lovely and equally enamoured with him, which pleases me, but it's the first time in memory that I haven't spent some time with my bro on our birthday, and that makes my bottom lip quiver a bit! In fact, until I was finally able to reach him on his OS mobile on the morning of the birthday, it had been precisely a year since we had spoken. Waaaaaaay too long between drinks. And yet, like it was only yesterday.
3. Went to the in-laws house way down on the coast for four days, to get the hell out of Dodge and breathe some fresh sea air, ramble about looking at petrified forests,limestone caves, Blue Lake and generally get well-fed by the folks.
There's nothing like getting out of the concrete jungle and into the world. I especially liked when Daniel almost put his foot through a huge mound of rotting whale blubber on the beach! (No, Zoe, it's definately a rock, look, I'll show you... URGH!!!!!)4. Christmas ... bloody Christmas. I love the giving and the planning of the giving and the making of the giving, and if I find a just-the-right-thing, I love the buying of the giving, but I don't love that I never seem to have enough time to enjoy all those aspects and it all seems to turn into a frantic babble of second-bests. And permit me a short vent about christmas in the corporate environment: we have a non-compulsory-but-if-you-don't-play-you're-a-bit-of-a-scab kris kringle at my work, which on principle I am refusing to join. I neither want to give or receive a thoughtless $10 present to/from someone I barely know for the mere sake of bowing to formality. Even in trying to be a bit of a scrooge at this time of year, I find my list of people I'd really like to give at least a little something to is plenty long, so anonymous work colleagues be damned I say! (Ebenezer...yes.)
5. Life. It's a funny old thing. It keeps on getting in the way of all the wonderful things I think I want to do. Like sewing myself a special sun-shade shirt (not just an ordinary shirt, but something groovy and yet protective), making lino-prints, lampshades, badges, Stella pictures, pickles, and of course a cure for cancer.
So they're my reasons for being absent of late, though am I only telling this to myself anyway? Have I stayed up too late essentially talking to myself?! Am I the crazy lady at the intersection of the internet superhighway?! Can anybody give me a lift?
