Late Rain

posted on June 30, 2009 by Michelle

view of our deck during a late afternoon rain shower

5:26 PM | Link to this Entry | Comments (1) | Old Jam - 2008 2006 2004 2000

The Light in Winter

posted on June 27, 2009 by Michelle



The Light in Winter

6:40 PM | Link to this Entry | Comments (0) | Old Jam - 2005 2004 2003

Sing-a-long Friday

posted on June 26, 2009 by Michelle

I am so so stupidly excited about seeing Simon and Garfunkel tonight. I honestly never thought I'd ever see them live ever. Ever! I spent a whole teenage summer, between serving customers at a roadside vegetable stall, listening to Bridge Over Troubled Water on an eight track in my uncle's car. I loved every single song on that album - and most of them still, plus many more, to this day.

Squeeeee!!



4:29 AM | Link to this Entry | Comments (2) | Old Jam - 2005 2004

No Perifs, Bro'

posted on June 25, 2009 by Michelle

I have a lot of experience with falling. In fact, my body has evolved to cope with falling in a lot of ways - unfortunately not in ways that would stop me from falling in the first place - but in ways like being rolly-polely shaped, for instance. My mind has developed a set of hair-trigger protocols which activate from the moment my balance is compromised until the "fall" is either resolved, or completed.

This morning, in a small, but densely packed camera store in downtown Melbourne; Chaz and I were in search of a camera strap when the forward motion of my feet was suddenly stopped by the upward rise of a step. Of course, my eyes had not detected this change in terrain as my periphery is poor, especially in the "see-stuff-aboves" and "see-stuff-belows" areas of vision.

My foot hit the rise of the step very hard (walking pace is faster than it looks) and my cat-agile brain sent an initial warning to my foot there was a step and I would need to raise the foot higher if I wanted to clear it successfully. Unfortunately for me, my foot and the camera shop: this was no ordinary step. My lightning fast synapses sent an urgent directive to my foot to raise to a level to clear a normal step. If this had been a normal step rise, this signal would have been enough and I would have planted my foot as planned and righted myself with only a slight tripping stumble, and little more. I would have remained upright, and maybe, if I had been extremely lucky: no one would have noticed.

This step, however, was not your every day, garden variety step. It was never going to let my feet pass. It turned out it was one of Melbourne's Most Enormously High steps from the olden days, when steps weren't regulated nor standardised. My foot shot this feedback to my brain, which in turn realised this was now a "five alarm fall" and braced for impact as my body continued on its forward momentum and began to topple.

When I have run out of options to save myself from a fall and have fully committed myself to hitting the ground, I try very hard to lead with my shoulder and "tuck and roll". This, unfortunately, was not an option in this classic "Feet Planted Behind a Big Step: Forward Falling, Hands Full of Shopping" position I found myself in. My only option by this stage was the "Hands Out: Drop Shopping: Brace for Impact".

This set of protocols normally works very well. As mentioned before, I have evolved physical characteristics and crumple-zones that help absorb the energy generated from impact with hard surfaces, so personal damage is often minimal. More often than not, this scenario ends with me on all fours on the floor, impact taken on knees and palms, store/service-station/tram passengers looking at me in various stages of bewilderment and/or hysterical laughter.

This did not work so well in the densely packed camera shop. On my way to the floor, my Hands Out position meant I impacted not the floor first, but the display of cameras that was in front of me. While I was happy not to knock the display over, feeling it move a good hand-span or so along the floor under my downward moving hands; I was pretty unhappy to have my hands drag down through the shelves, knocking them, and their contents to the floor.

I think I shut my eyes as I realised that there was a good chance I was damaging cameras. Expensive, digital, cameras, I thought. Oh Gravity, thou art a bitch.

Fortunately for me, the whole display turned out to be thick cardboard, and the cameras were dummies (didn't even know there was such a thing) so all I had to worry about was feeling like a complete idiot and that, I am well versed with.

Interesting point, while Chaz was shocked at my sudden disappearance from his side, and in turns amused and concerned (mostly amused) at my flailing ruckus, none of the people who work in the store, nor the one other customer, seemed to bat an eyelid. They weren't worried about the stand as Chaz put it back together, returning scattered items and shelves to their rightful places. They weren't phased by the fact a middle aged, highly roll'y woman had just crashed into their display, nor were they concerned at all if she was hurt or bothered or any such thing.

I'm not sure I'll bother shopping there again.

2:36 PM | Link to this Entry | Comments (3) | Old Jam - 2006 2005 2004

Wednes Day Links

posted on June 17, 2009 by Michelle


I was lucky enough to go out of town last weekend. My room mates and I drove out down to Warnambool, met up with some other intrepid travellers (the Scots) to do a spot of whale watching (the whales mentioned on this site were *our* whales). We were very flippin' lucky, by all accounts our two whales were the first spotted in nearly a month! Go us! go them! whoo!

It was a great weekend, full of wine, me talking too much/too loudly/too stupid-headedly.

The hotel we stayed at had a revolving door. Upon using it to gain access to the booking-in procedure of the hotel, I took the opportunity to regale my fellow travelers with a tale of an old friend, who, once upon a time and while using a revolving door not unlike the one we had just used to enter this fine establishment, had it explode on and around him, shattering glass firing in all directions across the hotel lobby he was trying to leave. An amazing story, you'll have to agree, and one most vivid in my memory.

Both my room mates looked at me, as they often do, with slack-jawed amazement - I assumed because of my storytelling prowess and gift of pathos, sharing wonderful anecdotes of days gone by. But alas, this was not the case.

It was Fox who broke the silence first "Jesus, Michelle, that wasn't a friend of yours - that was on youtube!" Willo agreed with her and I had to think for a moment. Was it true, it was so vivid in my memory. I could see the entire thing as if I'd been there; as if I had been hovering near the ceiling of the lobby watching down on my poor friend who was nearly wounded from the explosion of revolving door glass; as if I were the very CRT camera that had filmed the.. entire......thing.........

So here's the video: and I am officially a senile old biddy who can no longer tell the difference between the internets and real life.

Things I wish I could change about myself:

  • The volume at which I communicate - god I'm so loud.. so loud. I'm surprised I didn't wake the baby Charlie Fantastic up a dozen times over on Saturday night.
  • The number of times I toss and turn through the night - I'm like a windmill. I wake with the duvet all twisted and yoinked out of place, pillows cast asunder. I would love to just sleep calmly and quietly like a little bird. Not like Borked Big Bird.
  • The amount of words I use in a day - I talk a lot when I talk. Verbalising every thought in my head, at times with no regard for quality whatsoever. Worse when I have a drink or two. After three drinks, it's every man for himself.
  • My insistence that all answers must be hilarious - sometimes I'm funny. Sometimes I get the timing right. Sometimes though, I don't. And sometimes, I fail on the appropriateness of comment vs situation completely.
  • My need to share single, isolated thoughts with complete strangers - which sometimes they appreciate. "That colour looks great on you!" might be okay, but going into a restaurant and handing a man a piece of paper with a score of 8 out of 10 for "lounging" is just plain weird. I gotta stop doing that.

1:06 AM | Link to this Entry | Comments (4) | Old Jam - 2006 2005 2004 2003

Warnambool Whale

posted on June 14, 2009 by Michelle

fluke of Southern Right Whale off the coast at Warnambool

6:38 PM | Link to this Entry | Comments (0) | Old Jam - 2008 2007 2003

Sing-a-long Friday

posted on June 12, 2009 by Michelle


Original


2:02 AM | Link to this Entry | Comments (0) | Old Jam - 2006 2004 2003 2002