Anyway, due to the fact that a certain reader donated generously to Chris's Movember shenanigans, this is going to be My Xmas Wish List: Georgie Love Edition. Even though this certain reader donated to HIS Movember account and not MINE, making his amount skyrocket past mine (not hard as mine is still stuck at $0, I'm going to have to donate to myself soon because everything is a competition, after all.) But seriously, thanks Sal! Chris is detesting his hilarious moustaches but brightened when he discovered your contribution and others', and stroked his fur lovingly, saying, "Well, if this is worth all this money, then I don't mind any more." It is scratchy for smooching though.
I covet this dress immensely, and saw a customer at work wearing it the other day and it looked utterly adorable. Ribbony straps! Pockets with pictures!
Deer earrings, well, we all know how I feel about this particular animal.
(And grey mice ones for those of you partial to meeces!)
This necklace has a spoonful of sugar on it! Shame we're all so health conscious here, huh. *darty eyes*
THESE BADGES SAY POW AND BAM D: D: D:
'nother badge for you smart cookies out there (philosophy does my head in)
And lastly:
Robomonkey. ROBOMONKEY!
She only sells locally made products, all of which I need. NEED.
Other pals, don't feel harrassed into donating! However do say nice things about Chris' moustaches when he lets me take pictures of them, he is feeling fragile about them.
YES I KNOW. Avocado is my PAL, and I eat it in my sushi and salads and sandwiches and whatnot. I LOVE avocado. It's even a great word and it looks sexy. But when I think hard on it, the problem started flaring when I started making avocado/toemahtoe/rocket sandwiches at my old job, carried on when I ate nothing but avocado sushi at current job, then stopped when I had soup instead. It had been pretty much under control, which I thought was due to me cutting back on balm usage, but then I had avocado on Saturday and Sunday and BAM - allergic reaction is coming back full force.
In other news, it is very hot, and in other other news, I can absolutely not deal with the fact that ninemsn has on its lead page a story on Britney Spears lip-synching (gasp etc) and also one that is headed "Spears, axes used in NT footy brawl". It gives me bizarre images of people picking a Britney up from the back of their truck and throwing her at their opponents.
FASCINATING NEWS DAY IN MY HOUSE CAN YOU T
This year Chris and a couple of his pals at school are participating in Movember, much to Chris's horror. He hasn't attempted facial landscaping for years and is dreading it now, but apparently is going to jump in the deep end and have muttonchops to go with his moustache.
The aim of Movember is to raise money for men's health, centring around depression and prostate cancer. Depression is something that needs as much support as we can give, and any dollar helps. My dad had prostate cancer when I was very small, and I didn't find out until I was much, much older how serious it was - he was given a 30% chance of survival - or what had even happened. But he has completely recovered and every advance can help. If you have anything you'd like to donate, the link to Chris's, er, MoSpace is here. If anything, do it for the lulz of Chris being anything but clean-shaven.
In the meantime, here is a stupid I have done. One of my friends shaved his epic full beard off recently, and I said to him, "You've got it all wrong! It's like you've completely reversed the point of Movember. Unless you do a new version, where you shave off your beard! And they could call it, uh, November!"
new_perestroika: the new face of marketing.
I'm sorry, I've spent all day online, I need to stop posting about nothing.
Does it ever stop being embarrassing to buy condoms? I always expect the people behind the counter to drop a sleazy wink or ask for a price check over the loudspeaker a la Woody Allen's movie Bananas (and the first time I bought them when I was a teenager, argh.) I guess you truly know you're a grown-up when you don't get all red in the face for buying something that five million other people in Australia bought the same day. Oh well.
Last night we hired The Descent, turned all the lights off and watched this claustrophobic, terrifying horror movie about monsters in underground caves while a thunderstorm raged outside. People, it was the scariest freaking night ever, and that was before I even remembered it was Halloween.
Consequently I got no sleep. I rarely get nightmares from scary movies but last night, despite realising the silliness of being afraid of critters living in underground caverns in the middle of nowhere in an entirely different country in the opposite hemisphere, I'd be dreaming about happy, normal things, then someone in my dream would turn a corner and BAM, monsters everywhere and me jerking awake and seething over the stupid scares that kept me awake all night.
Also, I'm not enormously well at the moment. It started Thursday night, made Friday miserable, and while I felt a bit better on Saturday morning and went to work I left after three hours because I couldn't stand up properly any more. Chris took me to the after-hours clinic and after some entirely unpleasant tests with at least a very nice doctor (including a tense few minutes while we waited to see if the issue was me being pregnant) I was given a diagnosis, a prescription and permission to drug myself up with painkillers until the problem goes away. I still don't feel great, but the edge has gone and I am functioning a bit better, at least than I was yesterday.
I have this problem when I am unwell where I make jokes about it the whole time and force out the happiest chipperness imaginable. At work I was just as peppy with the customers as usual and wonder if people believe me when, seconds after laughing and cajoling with them, I'm telling them I really quite urgently need to seek some medical attention. Perhaps I should have asked for a doctor's certificate.
Anyway, this left me unable to go to pretty much the only thing that's been on my calendar for an entire year: World Vegan Day. It seemed like a beautiful day for it, too, and we'd made no plans so we could go. But I just really wasn't up for being that far away from home. Therefore, I need to hear all of your stories about it. Also, pics or it didn't happen.
In related news, a year since the last World Vegan Day means another thing: it's been a year since I first met
socraticomatic in person! And meeting her led me to meeting others, and then more others, and eventually heaps of you, dear friendslist. So, dear pal, Happy Anniversary! Strawberry internet flowers for you.
I'm going to internet-give this bouquet to myself:
Mmmmm.
Soooooo, Aduki is up for sale.
I have enquired about the price. If we cashed in every single bit of excess money we have in share and savings, we could actually afford it. But then, no house or holiday or anything fun ever again and three cents in our bank account. But we'd have a publishing company. And I could totally hire all of you guys for things. And then blame you when it goes horribly wrong.
But seriously...should I even think about it?
As I was at work last night, Chris made a stuffed monkey head for the girl as a thank you. (I forgot to take a picture, argh.) He also lost a needle somewhere about the couch/coffee table area, which is basically where I spend 98% of my time in the house. We hunted yesterday and vacuumed and whatnot, but sorry in advance for whoever comes to visit and eventually locates it sticking out of their little toe.
In other news, my belly hurts. :( Also, Michael Leunig came into the store yesterday. Should I make a starspotter tag for my posts? Why, yes, yes I should.
In a big case of awwww, one of Chris's students made me and him a toy each:
Mine's the one on the right, now known as Squidmonkey. Chris's is Tigerpuppy. How utterly freaking adorable are they? If this is what the future generation are doing then I am absolutely not concerned about the future in the least. How sweet that she made one specially for me, too! Chris clearly talks about me as much as I talk about him (ie a whole bunch.)
To thank her I made her this hair clip, as apparently she likes goth-type things (and it's Halloween!):
I can't sew like this girl can, I just used glue. But seriously, how awesome is this girl? If my own future kid doesn't make things this cute at age ten then they are getting shipped off to a military academy.Yesterday I went out to lunch at Soul Mama with my lovely friend Liz who is very talented at keeping me in stitches (the good kind, not the injury kind) and then down Acland Street for to look at shiny things and buy birthday presents for her smoochy-bear. She very kindly gave me a lift to the city afterwards, where I was questing for Mature Cheddar-style Cheezly at Habib Wholefoods but they did not have it seriously what is the world coming to. (And is there anywhere else in the city that sells it? I can get it from Allergy Block in Carlton but that was too far out of the way.)
As I walked home from the station there was a scurrying about my feet. I looked down and there was this teensy ringtailed possum staring up at me from the fence. It was so completely adorable that I wanted to hug it and squish it and call it George, but instead I went through the bags I'd filled from the supermarket and got it a slice of bread to chomp on. I tore it up and held a little piece out for it. The possum looked at me and then launched itself, facehugger style, at my arm, whereupon I dropped the bread in surprise and it ran back to the fence and pretended to hide some more. I tore up the rest of the bread and left it around for it, took a photo with my 0.0008 megapixel phone camera, then went home feeling a bit smilier. I imagined it thought it was pretty tuff, and went back to its teenage possum pals saying, "Yah, I totally took on this monster like a hundred times bigger than me and it dropped the food I wanted and then ran off crying."
Anyway my phone camera really is terrible, but this is what it looked like:babyring-tail.jpg)
It is the first time I have seen a possum during the day. Moar, please.
I caved. AGAIN. Not with the lipbalm this time - well, not just with the lipbalm this time - but I bought another dress for the wedding. I couldn't bear feeling so self-conscious in my tarty acid-green frock and have gone for something much more demure. It's a vintage cream dress with birds on it and blue and red leaves. It sounds a bit insane but is really quite beautiful, and I was going to take a picture to show you and get your opinion, but after putting it on, picking out shoes, pinning my hair up and practising my fashionblogger smile I recalled suddenly that Chris has our Embarrassingly Pink Camera and therefore it was all for nowt. The dress also needs to be be taken in (lazy
new_perestroika will probably do this with a stylish array of eleventy silver safety pins) and a mark cleaned off the front. It's fairly indicative of how unsure I was about the other dress when I will choose an oversized and stained dress to replace it. Anyway, I'm heading to my mum's tomorrow so she will hopefully be able to help or at least convince me I look pretty nevertheless.
I picked this new frock up from Wolf Clothing, a place that is surely enamoured with its Friendly Neighbourhood Bookshop at the moment as no less than three of us bought dresses from there today, and a nice little pile of Wolf Clothing paper bags were arranged in the ladies' locker room with Leanne, Alex and I all exclaiming over our purchases. Purchasing second-hand and therefore cheap(ish) means I have still spent a bunch less than the fantasy purple dress I wanted to buy. Oh lord someone shut me up I haven't been able to stop banging on about dresses all day.

Today after cleaning Theo's food bowl I noticed not one but THREE of his thyroid tablets spat out on the floor in various places. He will regret that when tomorrow night I have to force one down his throat. He also broke into the lounge room yesterday when I was at work and threw up on the part of the carpet where I inevitably stand without looking. He is made of naughty at the moment. Bad kitty. >:(
Which reminds me, I cannot believe none of you got my "SCRUBBERS!" quote from the movie meme. What, none of you have seen Withnail and I? I'm going to need to use the friends-cut icon for this to convey the thin line you're all walking, people.
Yesterday was my Official Wedding Guest Dress-Buying Day with Lian, who is my favourite shopping buddy as she has limitless patience and great taste. Outfit shopping always begins like a movie montage with me walking in and out of changerooms wearing different frocks with Lian shaking her head or nodding, and sometimes I try on something crazy and we all fall about laughing and everything you'd imagine in a romantic comedy. Then by the end that trying-on biz is getting a bit exhausting and my indecisiveness is driving me nuts.
Anyway, the dress I eventually bought was this:

It was on sale and irresistable. And it does look pretty hawt, but I am beginning to think it's too raunchy for a wedding as I have Epic Cleavage when I wear it, and I'll have to wear my mega squishing and tremendously enormous underpants to smooth myself out as it is the clingiest thing I own. My backup plan is to go off and buy this tomorrow:
Though I don't think I'll look so cute as the lovely Lian whose post on this dress is here and whom I hope is not angry that I used her pitcher without asking first. Anyway, what do you think, internets? I really wanted a purple dress with yellow and white dots on it from Ojay but it cost eight million billion dollars, well, $269, and while I could technically afford it I would feel tremendous guilt and if anyone spilled wine on it I would have to kill them with my dessert spoon so their life insurance could pay me back. Also, I don't have any other weddings on the horizon to wear it to, otherwise I could justify it by pretending it was a $134.50 dress both times. Anyway. Sale dress + spotty dress will still equal less than the purple dress so it may be that and I'll just wear my raunchy green one when I am explaining to Chris why I forgot to do the dishes and he will be all forgiveness and it will be totally worth it, no?
So we were back in the city eating some churros to celebrate me being broke when we decided it was such a lovely night that we should have dinner by the water. So Chris drove into the city and parked near Lian's place and we, along with Lian's paramour Matt, went to Soul Mama where the food was nice but it was so flat out that all the desserts were gone by the time they got around to serving us. Pah! Still, lovely company and I am always satisfied when I get dahl for dinner. Anyway, we drove back home where Lian donated a whole bunch of books to Chris's school's sadly bereft library and we strode over to the carpark with our boxes of books to go home.
But the carpark was closed.
CLOSED.
And the sign outside said, "After hours let-out $100".
ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS.
Chris's ticket said he could park until two in the morning, but the fine print did point out that they closed at ten o'clock. By that point we were a bit hysterical over how he was going to get to work in the morning and how I was going to have to get the car the next day and drive it home despite having a fear of driving in the city and overnight parking costing some mysterious amount that could have been about fifty dollars anyway. Do we just shut up and pay it? Come in the morning even though train fares for both of us and parking could come to around seventy dollars anyway? Do we curl up in the corner and cry? I voted for the latter but instead we lapped the building the park was attached to about a thousand times with a very tolerant Lian and Matt until the security guard unexpectedly started lecturing us through an intercom on how we should just run down the ramp next time a resident pulls in. Luckily, minutes later, a car did pull in and we ran in through the suddenly opened door, and hoped we weren't trapped forever inside the carpark to relive one of the horror movies we've been watching lately. Drag Me To Hell, anyone?
So we paid the ticket - seven dollars - and got into the car and pulled up to the door with hopeful and scared expressions. We scanned the ticket and...it let us out.
Such relief has never been felt.
Moral: take the train.
There is clearly something wrong with me at the moment as I have shouted at Chris and burst into tears over disagreements over two different movies so far this weekend, both the brilliant Moon and The Box which we haven't even seen, but apparently the review alone was enough to set me off. They both tested my views on humanity and how awesome I wish it was but how not particularly great Chris points out it is. If only everyone was as saintly as me (scoff) then everything would be FINE.
In health news (puts on stethoscope), I am going cold turkey on lip balm because lately I've been getting a sexy allergic reaction to the new vegan stuff and the old stuff that doesn't give me a reaction is not in fact vegan. Do any of you not use lip balm? Do any of you have any soothing words for my current withdrawal issues? Or chemical/wax-free ideas on anything I could use to get my kisser back to normal?
I miss pancakes, and am far too lazy to make my own. (The first ones I make always go cold before I finish making them all.) Is there anywhere I can get vegan pancakes to eat in Melbourne? Or Coffs Harbour for that matter as I'll be there in a week? Which reminds me: hooray, I get to go in an airplane! Four, in fact. Which reminds me also that I need to buy a dress to wear to the wedding I'm going to. Which also reminds me that I have things to do and should get myself off the internet pronto.
This is just a SUBTLE and NOT AT ALL POINTED REMINDER that Lisa Dempster's book launch for Neon Pilgrim will be held tomorrow evening at Readings Carlton at 6:30pm. More info and some skewy paragraph insanity here. I wasn't able to get my paws on a copy in time to have it read by the event, but I'll pick one up tomorrow and hopefully get Lisa to sign it. I wonder if it will go better than when I asked Eddie Izzard to sign the tour t-shirt I bought, whereupon I showed him the t-shirt and held out a pen, and he said, "Oh, is this from the tour, is it?" And I said, "T-shirt. Yours." He signed it, and I said, "You're cool!" and then I ran away. Stay classy,
new_perestroika!
Anyway, I'll be at the Neon Pilgrim launch, behind the counter with my big cheezly salesperson grin. Tell your friends! Come one, come all! Be nice to the staff, we're a fragile people.
I am a meme sheep, but a cool one like the sheep from Wallace & Gromit.
1. Pick 15 of your favorite movies.
2. Go to IMDB and find a quote from each movie.
3. Post them here for everyone to guess.
4. Strike it out/bold it when someone guesses correctly, and put who guessed it and the movie.
5. NO GOOGLING/using IMDB search functions. Totally cheating, you dirty cheaters.
I'm losing the names but giving a vague description of who says what.
1. Young woman: What the fuck you staring at?
Man: Apparently, the pleasure is all mine.
2. This is called farming! You kids are gonna grow all kinds of plants! Vegetable plants, pizza plants. (Wall-e)
liadlaith
3. Wakey wakey, eggs and bacey. (Kill Bill 2) (We argued over the spelling of "bacey/bakey". It means bacon, anyway.)
invader_kitty
4. I hid under your porch because I love you. (Up)
bamboo_gnome
5. Big Dude: Hey Myers, you're a talker. What's a good word, a solid word for "need"?
Not Particularly As Big Man: Well, "need" is a good, solid word.
Big Dude: Nah. Too needy.
6. Are you a Mexi-CAN or a Mexi-CAN'T? (Once Upon a Time in Mexico)
invader_kitty
7. SCRUBBERS!
8. King illegal forest to pig wild kill in it a is! (Robin Hood, Men in Tights)
bitspike
9. My mother got married in pants. (But I'm a Cheerleader)
liadlaith
10. Home brew my arse! Get that shit down to forensics.
11. Boys, set the terror level at code brown, 'cause I need to change my pants. (I also like from this same movie: "Don't think of it as prison. Think of it as a hotel that you can never leave, 'cause it's locked from the outside.")
12. Man #1: Everything was fine with our system until the power grid was shut off by dickless here.
Man #2: They caused an explosion!
Man #3: Is this true?
Awesome Man: Yes it's true. This man has no dick. (Ghostbusters)
bitspike
13. (Sorry, this is pretty offensive, but oh it made me laugh.)
Gormless boy #1: How were Katie Holmes' tits?
Gormless boy #2: You know the Holocaust?
Gormless boy #1: Yeah?
Gormless boy #2: Picture the opposite of that.
14. I am a leaf on the wind - watch how I soar. T_T (Serenity)
liadlaith
15. But, Mrs. Mulwray, I goddamn near lost my nose. And I like it. I like breathing through it. And I still think you're hiding something. (Chinatown)
infloresence
We ended up watching #7 while I composed this. I actually wanted to put a different line from #7 in, but it's not as funny as I remember, bah.
Edit: goddamit I cannot get the LJ cut to work any more >:|We saw Whip It yesterday afternoon, which was pretty good, and every time there was a family argument or big happy make up scene I'd have to pretend I wasn't crying but had popcorn kernels in my eye. I don't know what it is at the moment. I read the extremely trustworthy news source ninemsn today that new guidelines say you shouldn't let your children watch television before they are two. I don't think they should watch a lot, but surely sticking them in front of it occasionally so you can sob in a corner without them yelling at you isn't the worst thing you could do as a parent, right? Apparently it can affect their attention spans and language abilities. I already spend a lot of time thinking I will be a terrible parent, and disagreeing with that just made me feel worse. I really want to have children, and I believe I'd be supportive of most things, but I'm so fucked up and unable to relax that I sometimes think that the only thing I'd really be able to offer my kids is a great dad. And a lot of books.
Anyway, to stop thinking about my nonexistent sprogs for just a moment, I wondered whether the direction you roll your toilet paper is related to where you were brought up. Is it just that Melbourne (and monkey_fuzz's location) is a society that's been brought up to roll under and not over? Yet more proof that we are the superior city, albeit a minority? Well, I will find out through my mighty Power of Poll!
Poll #1469593 Important Questions on Life
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 15
Where were you brought up?
Melbourne.![]()
![]()
4 (26.7%)
In some other backwards place that at least has better weather.![]()
![]()
11 (73.3%)
I love my new job. My coworkers are nice, the customers are mostly cool (apart from the one who called up today and said, "I just checked your website and it says you don't have this book, so, do you have this book?") and now I work in a cultural landmark. But then something happened yesterday as I went to the bathroom that made me doubt that this change was the right decision.
Someone had changed the toilet paper...and made it roll over and not under.
I KNOW. How am I to be expected to work under such circumstances? It is a FARCE. So, to continue with the theme of classy polls, vote now. It's about time for me to trim my friends list anyway.
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 17
Which way do you have your toilet paper roll?
I roll my toilet paper under, because I am a normal, functioning member of society.![]()
![]()
4 (23.5%)
I roll my toilet paper over. Also, I eat babies.![]()
![]()
13 (76.5%)
