L~A’s pet Kookaburra, he comes to our house everyday to be fed. At least someone will miss us when we leave. L~A also has a pet currawong, and an injured magpie to feed.
However, there are 16 brand new, bloody awful, tracks of my terrible music just here, “Atmospheres.” Anyone choosing to listen to them does so of their own free will. You can stuff your feedback up your hole.
Oh, and there’s a couple of new poems in the poetry section. Again, think “monkey and nut” if contemplating feedback. Apart from Clarkie and Catherine that is, as they are wise, cultured and erudite.
Not a single word of praise or criticism for the nude images of my bottom in last month’s gallery? I’m shocked. I thought at least one of my gay mates would give it a thumbs up. Perhaps I should rephrase that.
Well that sense of “bargain!!” didn’t last long.
Remember I was telling you about how I had bought a new car, and the daft bugger selling the new one had given me $1000 trade in for the old one, when I was only going to ask for $150 for it? Ha!
I went to the “Govvy Shopfront” to get it registered to us as owners, and to pay the “Rego” fees. “Where’s the roadworthy certificate?” asked the nice young man behind the counter. Oh balls. Over here there is no MOT as in the UK. “Neat!” you may think, and I agree with you. Except that when you buy a new car over here, either the seller or the purchaser has to get a “Roadworthy Certificate” for it before registration can be changed. We’d forgot about that.
Leaving it, as ever, until the last minute, (you get two weeks from sale date,) I got it booked into the local testing station. Smiling winsomely at the mechanic I said; “May as well give it a full service while it’s here.” God, I’m a twat, it could have waited a month for that. Later that day I got a phone call; “It needs few bits, tyres, wiper blades etc, you can collect it tomorrow.” The next day found me down there, with the mutts. It’s a 15 minute walk through the local trading estate, I thought they’d enjoy the change of scenery from their normal walks.
I got the bill. It was $1450 Then I drove to the Govvy shopfront again, and paid them $600 for transfer of ownership and Rego. So bang went double what we’d got for the old car, fuck my luck.
I don’t mind paying Rego over here though, as it gives you third party insurance, and a limited roadside assistance. Unlike in the UK, where your car tax doesn’t even give you a nice sticker anymore.
Bethy’s bought a new car too, a shiny nearly new Hyundai diesel.
My car is better than yours Taff.
It’s a bugger of a thing when your kid is driving around in a more expensive motor than you have. Her car cost, well, combine the price of my last two cars, then double it. Luckily she’s let me have a drive of it, and it’s rather nice. She’s driving us up to Sydney in April for us to see Dara O’Briain at the Opera house, so I’ll let you know more after that.
Oh, on the subject of boys toys, L~A finally relented and let me buy a dashcam. “WTF do you want one for them for?” I hear you ask. Well discount on car insurance for one thing. Also, I’m making a series of short time;apse videos of well worn routes of mine here, as “aide-mémoire” for when I’m back in Blighty. I know, I’m a sad fucker. BUT I’m also a sad fucker who habitually drinks away his remaining memory cells.
Here’s the first two couple of efforts. I like them, you can fuck off.
I’m also doing a series on “Shite Canberra Driving”, I’ve already got a fine collection.
Ah, talking of walking the dogs, as I was earlier, that’s another issue we’ve had. I told L~A that after walking the mutts to collect the car from the garage, Ginger, (aka “Spud”,) was absolutely knacked. We had got their coats cut right back at the beginning of the summer, ok they were a bit traumatised, but they soon found that they enjoyed the cool. Their coats haven’t as of yet fully grown back, but yet again Spud looked like he was suffering in the heat. Then, a couple of days later, after we’d been down to the lake, and he had been leaping into the lake for a belly flop or twelve, and played a few games of “stick”, when we got him home he was, yet again, puffing and panting and heaving for a long time. Not looking happy.
So L~A took him to the vet. The vet gave him a good looking over, and came up with the diagnosis; “He’s fat.”
OMFG!! My dog’s a porker, oh how embarrassing!!! I’m so glad I wasn’t there. She followed this up with; “I won’t be able to tell you any more till he’s lost the weight, he may be arthritic, I’ll do some bloods, but his main problem is his weight.“
He weighed 14 kilos, he should weigh 12. You may think 2 kilos doesn’t sound much, and, much to my shame, I’ll admit I’m about 6 kilos too heavy myself at the moment, at 95 kilo. But whereas I am 6.5% overweight, he is 16%. Not fun.
Not only that, but we were told that Digby and Millie were also slightly on the lardy side of fit. So all the dogs have been put on a diet. Their food has been weighed out, and they get 30 mins to eat or it gets taken away. They are learning fast.
There has been a noticeable change, Ginger certainly is more sprightly, and they certainly all seem a lot happier.
Of course the biggest problem has been with the mother in law, (as ever,) as our dogs spend most days at her house. Mary is a compulsive feeder. Constantly on stupid and unrealistic diets herself, or at least pretending to be on one, while still going for daily “light lunches” (cake and coffee and cake, and more cake,) with her loopy mates, she overcompensates for this by overfeeding her dogs. Strong words were said.
Here’s a classic from her; when we left the dogs with her so we could go up to Sydney to see the Damned, (more later,) we weighed out individual meals for each dog, and bagged them and labeled them, so she’d have no excuses. One day L~A was on the phone to her mother from Sydney; “Well I don’t know what this food is you’re giving them, but they point blank refused to eat it until I cooked it for them. “
She. Cooked. The. Dogs. Food.
Hmmm….
Oh, going back a bit, some of you who may be dog owners may wonder how “Sticks” is played. It’s a great game! First find a tough stick, one capable of being fought over by two Jack Russels. Then throw it as far away as possible. When the dogs have chased it, fought over it, and Spud has won it, he will come back to you. Then he’ll run away with it again, refusing to give it back. You then chase Spud all over the nature reserve yelling; “Bring that stick back you little shit” until you are exhausted.
Find another stick, and throw that one. Repeat.
A small caveat to that. The other day I lobbed the stick in the lake and walked off. Ginger did his belly flop in after it, and Digby awaited his return.
Swimming Spud and stick.
Funnily, Spud loves the water, he will spend all day in it given the chance, Digby won’t go in at all. So I walked on a bit, and Digby turned up with the stick, which was odd enough in itself. I waited, but there was no sign of Spud. So I walked back to where he’d gone in.
The thing was, seeing as the lake is a bit low at the moment, poor Spud had found himself unable to get out of the water. Digby, seeing his chance, had leaned over off the bank, taken the stick out of poor Ginger’s mouth. He then walked back to me, trying to get me to throw it again. Thus abandoning his brother, who was now stranded in, and drowning in, the lake.
There’s brotherly love for you.
We went and saw the PM’s XI playing the Sri-Lankans. Great match, and we had wonderful seats right down at pitch level.
Pitch level.
I got to see “Slinga Malinga” bowl, which I’d wanted to do for ages.
Slinga
I’ll miss having such easy access to first class matches when I leave, but it’ll be one way for L~A to persuade me to come back for holidays.
Aiming for his head, obvs.
Note to Clarkie: if you really cannot bear for me to come and collect you from Sydney, Murray’s coaches are slow and boring, but cheap. Flying via Qantas or Virgin, is fun and quick, but expensive. I’m definitely driving you back to the airport though. You know what happened the last time.
So, The Damned. We took a bus up to Sydney, as we couldn’t be arsed with the parking situation in Newtown where we were staying.
Note to Clarkie: Good Sydney accommodation can be booked online at Stayz, Triviago, Tripadvisor, and Wotif. Alan and Jo did a AirB&B place, which worked out ok, and was cheap, we’ve not done that, so cannot advise. Before booking anywhere ask me for advice. Newtown is a great part of Sydney to stay, cheaper than central. But as you’re only there for a couple of nights you may want to lash out on a CBD or harbourfront room.
We love Newtown. If, god forbid, I was ever forced to move to Sydney, I’d want to live there. It’s so trendy and funky, there’s a massive LGBT scene there too.
L~A had found us a sumptuous, two bed house, to rent. No problems getting across Sydney, the public transport there is fantastic, (though a young lady of our acquaintance may differ on this.) Just to add to our ease, the lovely Mr & Mrs. Harness had kindly left us their “Opal Cards” , which we topped up while on the bus up there.
Note to Clarkie: We’ll post you the “Opal Cards” for your use, after we go up to Sydney for Dara O’Briain. They are already loaded with cash, so you will not need to pay for transport around the city.
Isn’t that just fantastic? Stop and think about it for a minute; we were on a coach on the motorway to Sydney but still able to top up our train/bus/ferry tickets by using a phone? Again, on the bus on the way back I bought tickets to see a play, “The Play That Goes Wrong” which is coming to Canberra. I had checked my work roster, on the phone again, via email, to make sure I was on a night off when the play was on. When we were kids, that would be the stuff of science fiction! I’m so glad all this stuff has come in while I’m at an age to appreciate it, Bethy and Brandon will not know how it was like before, so may appreciate it less.
We got Goth’d up for the night. Why not?
Goth chick
Goth twat.
I love dressing up, and will always be the first to do so. I haven’t worn face paint and lippy for so long, so this was a treat for me. There’s a line in the film, “Calendar Girls” which has always resonated with me; “I’m 55 years old. If I don’t get me tits out now I never will.” Love it, life’s too short, have fun, be stupid, fuck what the neighbours think.
Anyway, we got dressed up, and went into Sydney’s CBD on the train. We were lucky as there is a direct train from Newtown to the CBD, only three stops. I got some funny looks on the train, it was dark, I was wearing sunglasses, hit it.
9 while 9.
We stopped at a pub near the venue and got a beer. The bouncers thought it was a huge hoot when I informed them, “It’s ok, I ‘m not really weird.” A nice couple took our photo, the barmaid avoided me.
Addams family night out.
The gig itself, well obviously rammed with aging punks and Goths, and therefore all the more fun for us to be part of it.
“Happy Talk!!”
The support band “The Hard Ons” played Ramone style metal/punk/thrash too loudly. However L~A bought one of their T-shirts as it was ripping the piss out of a local evangelical con-merchant’s church. I got a Damned tour T-shirt.
I now have a collection of tour T-shirts, (Alice, PIL, SLF, DCD,) all of which I’m saving for wearing in Blighty, just to keep up my unique individual dressing style. Fuck off.
The Damned? Well, like all seasoned veterans, they were superb.
“Happy Talk!!!!!”
Dave Vanian and Captain Sensible are still in the band, so that’s all good. Also as “Machine Gun Etiquette” is still one of my fave albums from that time, (1977-82,) and they played most of it, I was well chuffed. They did a cover version of “Alone again, or” by Love which was rather splendid. I’ve owned the album; “Forever Changes” by Love, which that song is off, on vinyl, cassette, CD, and MP3, I love it to bits.
Here’s a bit of phone video I got of them, doing “Love Song”, a great piss take out of … ermmm… love songs.
I spent all night yelling ; “Happy Talk!!” at Captain Sensible, in the hope of being told to fuck off.
The Captain was a hoot as ever, and his playing is now exceedingly good. The rest of the band were on form too, Monty Oxy-Moron, the new keyboard player made the sound far more full and lush. I was a bit disappointed in Dave Vanian as he just didn’t seem to connect with the crowd as well as I thought he would.
Still a great night out, and a fab chance to be daft and different.
The next morning we were hoping for a lie in, unfortunately the room was far too light for a good kip, which was a shame. I need pitch blackness to sleep well. We decided to go shopping in Newtown, first stop, brunch. We found “12 Newtown” which looked good. But from the off the waitress seemed a bit confused. We ordered a flat white, a mug of tea, poached egg on toast, and eggs Benedict, not too much to ask for you’d think?
However, we didn’t realise that when they said; “all day breakfast” that they actually meant; “wait all day for your breakfast”.
Waiting….
After ten minutes we got our cutlery, then my tea arrived. A cup of tea, full to the brim, with no room for the accompanying milk. The waitress then approached and asked; “did you order a flat white?” We got that.
Then even more bloody cutlery arrived. Then….
We waited for an hour, a full fucking hour, but no food arrived. There were only 19 people in the place, some having arrived after we did, none seemed to be getting fed. We gave up in the end. We paid for the rubbish tea and sad coffee, and cancelled our order. I’d have been happy to just pack up and piss off leaving a few bucks on the table, L~A is more polite than me. We got no apology, nor any thanks for paying.
Just down the road we found Cafe Newtown Mezze Bar, After our dire and foodless experience at “12 Newtown” we decided to risk brunch here. They had a good choice of food, reasonable prices, and, thank god, quick service. L~A had the “Newtown breakfast”, stuff on toast basically, I had “salmon on corn fritters” bloody nommy, we both had flat whites.
best breakfast in Newtown
The food was generous, well cooked, and the service was very amiable. Inevitably for Newtown, our waitress was a stunning, as they tend to be, Thai bird. They are all so gorgeous aren’t they, and they do a good impression of being interested and servile to aging Welsh perverts. I rather enjoy that.
The only thing that knocked a star off was the road noise, and passing smokers, yucky. Not the fault of the cafe I know, but part of the experience. I’d sit inside next time.
Sated and full we ambled about. L~A wanted to buy shoes. The last time we were up here, every other shop was a frigging shoe shop. This time we found just one. It sold expensive shoes, we didn’t bother. One thing Newtown still has is a load of book shops. In the past this would have been seventh heaven for me, since I got my kindle, not so much. (Sorry Mr Gale.)
The only purchase I made was Elvis Costello’s autobiography “Unfaithful Music” . A bloody superb book, I wouldn’t mind his fame and success. Mind you seeing as I read it just after finishing Dave Stewart’s autobiography, “Sweet Dreams Are Made Of This”, I ended up feeling totally inept and talentless. As that’s my normal default state, there’s nothing new there then. They are still a pair of wankers though. I view talented people with a mixture of envy, hate, admiration, and distemper. Apart from my talented mates that is. I just hate them. 🙂 Dave Stewart got to screw Annie Lennox when she was in her prime, how can you not envy and hate him?
That evening we met up with our lovely friend Debbie Midwinter, who lives in Bondi. She was rather flustered getting there, having checked the buses and trains she’d need to catch, she found it would take her half the bloody night to get out from Bondi. She got an Uber, I’ve never done that, have you? Driving away from Bondi they hit the traffic chaos of Sydney, not fun. We eventually got to meet in Webster’s Bar. We sank a few, and caught up and gossiped as old friends do, and then decided to go for a Thai. Debs had heard good things about “Thai Potong”, which was rated as Sydney’s best Thai restaurant, it was just down the road.
I must say from the off that I’m not a big fan of Thai food, but I was happy to admit it was a bloody good meal, and so once again I’ve got~A back trying to convince me I do like Asian food. (I don’t.). Unusually, they had two queues at the door, one for those who had booked, and another for idiots who had, like us, turned up on spec. Surprisingly this worked well, and we did not wait long to be seated.
The wait people were very efficient, charming and attentive, (more tasty Thai birds, natch,) there seemed to be hundreds of them. Considering the size of the place, the number of diners, and the range of dishes, the food came to the table rapidly, with little wait. Incredibly efficient.
We stuck to entries and mains, no desert. We had cocktails with our food, I had a “ladyboy cocktail.”
Ladyboy
It didn’t taste of Ladyboy, but went down easily, and so bottoms up then. (Come on, I’m setting them up here.) The food was very well presented and flavoured, I had snapper in chilli sauce. I still hate it when my meal stares at me.
leave the bones in, why don’t you?
It was de-boned at the table for me by a waiter, a great touch, if not entirely successful.
mutant crab
L~A and Debs shared a few plates, including this beast.
The ambience was hectic, I prefer quiet dining, the decor was nicely traditional, abet with some weird huge “transformer” statuary on display, and some erotic art in the Gents. This was “interesting” to say the least, I didn’t hang about in there.
I can see why the place gets its reputation, not really my cuppa, but a great night for those who enjoy Thai. After eating L~A was knacked and headed back to the digs. Me and Debs sank another couple more in Webster’s. As it was Saturday night in Newtown, and we had a window seat open to the road, we watched a great display of nearly naked people of all genders and sexual inclinations parading by. I wear more to go swimming in the sea than some of those girls and boys and undecideds were wearing for a night out. Unfortunately then Debs had to go, as she was getting up early to do “A March” with her surf lifesaving team. Much respect to her for that.
The next day we tried to do some shopping, but yet again failed. We had breakfast in a little hipster cafe; “2042”. We both had eggs Benedict, mine with salmon, L~A had bacon. Beautifully presented and cooked, but not over generous in size. I got this lovely snap of L~A there.
gis a kiss
We picked up some oven cook stuff for later that evening.
The afternoon we went and saw “Trainspotting Two”. Utterly lovely, like meeting old mates again.
Not as “cutting edge” as the original, but with loads of nods, winks, echoes and in jokes referring to T1. The updating of Rent Boy’s soliloquy is great;
“Choose life.
Choose Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and hope that someone, somewhere cares.
Choose looking up old flames, wishing you’d done it all differently.
And choose watching history repeat itself.
Choose your future.
Choose reality TV, slut shaming, revenge porn.
Choose a zero-hour contract, a two hour journey to work.
And choose the same for your kids, only worse, and smother the pain with an unknown dose of an unknown drug made in somebody’s kitchen.
And then… take a deep breath.
You’re an addict.
So be addicted, just be addicted to something else.
Choose the ones you love.
Choose your future.
Choose life.”
I’m really glad they fitted in the “Begbie’s father” scene. This was in the original T1 book, and explained not only the name of the book, but also why Begbie was so radge.
I’ll get it on DVD when it comes out, just to go through it at a leisured pace. I must watch T1 again too. Oh, bye the bye, I’ve got a copy of the original Trainspotting book, I bought it for $2.00 in our local Salvos. It is signed by Irvine Welsh, and has a little note to his mate in it!
After the movie we went to Webster’s for a couple of beers/wines, and a grabbed a window seat for a bit of people watching, before going back to watch “My Kitchen Rules.” (We’re both addicts.)
We made some new friends.
Me, in 5 years time
Mr Miagi’s gone to seed.
While at the bar I noticed they had a 30 year old Laphrohaig on sale.
Lust is.
I asked the barmaid how much a shot, she asked us to guess. L~A guessed $25, I guessed $50. She opened up the price list on the till, and searched for it among the 300+ whiskies they offer there.
“It’s $325 a measure!!!!” (roughly £200) she said, going a bit green at the thought. I asked her for a small taste to see if it was worth buying a whole dram, she declined politely. Would you believe it, no matter how much I begged L~A was insistent I wasn’t getting a shot of it! I only wanted a double FFS!!
But all good things must end, and we took the bus back after a very pleasant weekend away together.
Retirement plans (you can stop reading now if you want.)
First off I need to make an apology to my oldest mate Jamesy here. For the last couple of years, I first, nagged, then threatened, then planned to excommunicate him, as him and the lovely Rachel haven’t been over to stay with us. He’s my oldest and best mate FFS, we’ve known each other since we were in nappies, (he still is.) Funnily enough, they have been to almost every other country on the planet, bar Aus. I was putting this reluctance down to him being a bit “Bryn Road”, as I have a tendency to be, (L~A said he was “Being Welsh” about it.) . Then I thought it was sheer belligerence. Then that he was being a total pain in the arse, just to annoy me.
It turns out none of this is true, and I have now received vague but reassuring messages, indicating they may come over.
Therefore, apologies Jamesy, mea culpa.
One of our biggest retirement hurdles is over. L~A has told her mother she is going to live in the UK. An emotional time for them both. But L~A has promised to return after two years, and to stay then as long as her mother is alive and kicking. I was wondering whether Mary was still going to be talking to me after that. (I was hoping she wasn’t.) The next day, when I went round to drop off the dogs, she said; “I don’t want to talk about it.” But I had to remark that it was only fair that L~A took her chance to live abroad for a short while, though I didn’t have the gall to add; “You know, just like you did.” L~A was actually born in Cardiff, when her mother and father were there working for some years.
Bethy on the other hand talks about nothing but how many holidays she’s going to have with us, and is virtually pushing us out the door.
We went to the seminar, organised by our Super fund, PSS. We didn’t think that there would be much to be learned, but had a few questions that we wanted answered. If we wanted 1 to 1 Super advice they would charge us $185 an hour, but lots more an hour if the situation was complex. Complex like; say for instance you wanted to pack up and piss off to the UK with your super, that sort of complex, cost $325 an hour. We were hoping to get our queries answered there for free. It was in a local hotel, and we were seated near the front.
Just in front of us was that fucking woman. You know the one , she attends every fucking seminar on god’s green earth. The poor sod taking the seminar, (he was great BTW,) made the fatal mistake of telling people to ask questions as he went along. Bad move.Barely had his lips started moving when;
“Can I just ask, I don’t know if this is the right time, but my situation is this. I started in the public service at age 19 back in 1948. I had a break for one child, then I went ill for a decade, then I returned for ten weeks, but caught leprosy and was moved to a cabin in the woods. Then I had another child. But my budgie died and my husband was eaten by wolves …………(carries on giving her complete life story in intense excruciating detail, this lasts about an hour)…………… then, if I get retired before my 80th birthday, but after my 90th, eat my shoes, marry a Nigerian prince, and sell my soul to Beelzebub. Would I be better off not taking my full super until I die or until the sun explodes?”
He replied; “That’s a bit complex, can I come back to that later?”
Ten minutes later; “Can I just ask, I don’t know if this is the right time, but my situation is this. I started in the public service at age 19 back in 1948. I had a break for one child, then I went ill for a decade, then I returned for ten weeks, but caught leprosy and was moved to a cabin in the woods. Then I had another child. But my budgie died and my husband was eaten by wolves………..”
Anyway, we did eventually manage to sneak in the questions we needed answering, and gobsmackingly, got the answers we wanted! I can take the “tax free” portion of my Super early and without penalty, and L~A doesn’t have to work until she is 59 to claim her pension, (albeit she’ll get a lower rate by going early.) Oh deep fucking joy!!!
So, our situation is this; on December 4th 2017 I will leave work. I will have paid holiday until January 7th I will be asking for my long service leave, (4 ½ months,) to be paid in cash, and any other leave owing to be paid out too, that should add another month to the pot.
On January 7th I will officially retire. I’m putting in for the “tax free” portion of my Super to be paid out at this point. The rest will remain in the Superfund until I am over 60, then I can claim that portion tax free as well, neat? This is one of the things we wanted to clarify if possible at the Super seminar, the nice man said “Yes, that’s all good.”
I’ll fly back to Blighty on or around January 15th to commence my next life chapter. L~A will carry on working and living with her mother until after the house in the UK is all fixed up. This will be a major job, basically we’re gutting the whole interior, only one internal wall will remain in place. Sometime during this our two mutts will take a plane flight to Heathrow. (Our two dogs will be better travelled than some of my family.)
L~A plans to be over in about May.
Wish us luck eh?
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