Lalala - weekend things and stuff and Key Learnings and weather and whatnot.

Hello there peeps.

There has been some deadset doolally weather round these parts. I spent a few days up the coast at the Slapdash Family compound and there was a hum dinger of a hail storm while I was getting my hairs done at the, what I call, hairdresser. All us ladies there pressed ourselves up against the glass, robed in our capes and curlers, squealing and screeching things like "Oh me car!" and "Should we get some towels?" and "Everyone insured?".

Luckily the Noble Honda Civic that is our chariot of choice seems to have survived with the merest ding in the roof, despite veritable CRICKET BALL sized hailstones.

Then yesterday our Gracious and Tree-lined Suburb* was at the epicentre of another nutty storm that rent the kiddies daycare centre sun shades in twain and caused no end of consternation amongst eager local social media users. The magic of modern technology meant I could see a video of the hailstorm as it happened two houses away from ours, even though I was in the city at work. It's like living in the future!

Anyway the long weekend up the coast was very pleasant, as my brother, the prodigal son, had returned for a brief visit and my parents killed the fatted calf and whatnot**.

Here is evidence of said fraternal visitation.

During the visit I learnt some Key Learnings. The first of these Key Learnings was focused on my mother's dog. He is a sort of cattle dog and has been, for most of his life, rather neurotic and barky and disobedient. Push came to shove recently and Mum was forced to employ some Expert Assistance. aka Dog Whisperers.

They taught her how to show him who is boss. Apparently he had been stressed out because he thinks he is Pack Leader and frankly he is just not up to the job, being small of brain and feeble of character. So hence the manic barking and stress pooing and mentalness.

Mum had to give him what for and lay down the law and set things straight and so forth. Which, essentially, consists of sternly saying the word "BAH!" to him when he is playing up and carrying on like a pork chop. Apparently "BAH!" is a Universal Dog Sound that speaks to canines on a Profound Level and signals to them that All is Right in the world and that they are not pack leader, so they should just chill the hell out and relax and take it easy and enjoy a responsibility free lifestyle.

Weirdly enough it seems to have had a remarkable effect on the beast. So there you go.

The next, darker and more disturbing Key Learning, is as follows.
 My mother starkly revealed to me on the weekend that, even though since 1997 I have laboured under the illusion that I received the Highest Possible Mark for Senior English, thereby rendering me the Best English Student that my teacher had ever had, I did not, in fact, receive the HIghest Possible Mark and it is possible to get a Higher Mark then the mark that I got.

I know.

I basically don't even know who I am any more and have essentially been living a lie.

I had to have a good lie down after that revelation I can tell you.

Moving on from the destruction of lifelong belief systems, I had to race home from the coast in order to gussy P up in her ballet tutu and a face full of makeup for her official ballet photographs.

I am not cut out for this ballet mum caper. We still have a dress rehearsal AND a concert to go.

Not only will I need a lie down after it all but I daresay I will need a stiff drink or two by the time it is all over.

Cute though, right? Cute as a bug's ear.

In a final point for you this evening, I present an utterly hilarious and deadset clever piece of satire from the Tunnel Presents website. I've heard the person who wrote it is really good looking, nice smelling, kind, clever, generous, an excellent gardener with a high commitment to personal hygiene and permanently well styled hair. Ahem.

Good night readers. And good luck.


*and by Gracious I mean Bogan-acious
**by killing the fatted calf I mean shouted him to a bloody spensive steak at the local tavern

Death and taxes. But mainly death.

I haven't blogged for ages. I once read a blog post somewhere that said the worst thing a blogger can do is apologise to their readership for being absent because AS IF anyone actually cares or notices.

I wouldn't want to seem up myself! God no.

So I ain't apologizing to nobody.

Anyway.

I went to a funeral a couple of weeks ago. An old teacher friend of my Dad's, who taught me back in the day, died suddenly of a heart attack. He was only 60. It was very shocking for his family.

I went with Dad to the funeral. It was at my old high school, where he and his wife have both been teaching for over 30 years. My parents taught there for a goodly period too.

There were more than 1000 people in attendance. Amazing.

His Year 12 Physics class formed the guard of honour. They were all weeping hysterically, poor kids. You know what teenagers are like. I guess it was probably one of their first experiences of death. Facing mortality and all that.

It was disorienting being back at school. At the wake, I was served hot nibblies (including cheeerios and sauce) by my old teachers. Weird.

His wife, my former English teacher,  was distraught, but their three daughters were amazing.

I wasn't sure that they would remember me.  I gave the middle daughter a hug, and said "Do you remember me? Sarah?"

She said through her tears, "Of course I do! I vomited all over your house when I was a little girl once."

"Really?" I said. "I don't remember that! Look, all is forgiven. What's a vomit between friends!"

We all had a good laugh. Well, good-ish. Wake-appropriate.

There were a couple of people from my year there. It was nice to see them. High school seems simultaneously a long time ago and only yesterday. I had the strange feeling that everything was physically smaller than it used to be. I guess school looms large in your memory.

Anyway because I don't have a smart phone these days and I never remember to take the camera anywhere, here are some photos from the archives. Of my 10 year high school reunion. So sort of in theme.

Fascinating I know. Crazy times.

I think about death ALL the time. Odd I know. I'm always convincing myself that I've got a terminal illness.  I recently bought a necklace with skulls in it because I'm constantly getting all memento mori on everyone's arses.

I thought about Mr H dying so suddenly, and felt compelled to tell M that if I were to die suddenly, I request that;

- I be cremated
- The funeral is held at Dad's church
- I want nice music to be played that makes everyone think fondly of me and weep tears of bittersweet bittersweetness, which is totes my favourite emotion
- If they want a memorial stone or something then put it at the Buderim cemetery.

I will think further about my funereal music choices and advise you when I am decided. Hopefully I don't die before then.

Memento mori, people. Memento mori.

The public v private debate, or "Daft Punk is for weirdos"

Recently, my semi-retired mother returned to work as a part-time high school teacher. For the first time in her life, she is working at a fancy pants private school. After a lifetime of channeling Michelle Pfeiffer in Dangerous Minds (aka working at huge state high schools in low socio-economic areas), and championing the public education cause, she is wide-eyed in amazement at how the other side learns, and is loving every second of it. Loving it SICK. The traitorous wench.

She admitted to me the other day, "Oh darling, it was SUCH A RELIEF! I mean, I was really worried that somewhere like [insert name of my old high school here] would ask me to work there. Oh it would have been simply AWFUL. I am SO RELIEVED they didn't ask me to work at [insert name of my old high school here]."

I rolled my eyes and said, "Yeah. Yeah HOW AWFUL. I mean WHO WOULD SEND THEIR KID TO A SCHOOL LIKE THAT!? I mean IMAGINE! THE HORROR! IT'S PRACTICALLY CHILD ABUSE! Oh, hang on, hang on. WAIT A MINUTE! THAT'S RIGHT! YOU SENT ME THERE! YOU! CALLOUS UNLOVING PARENT! Pshaw! Pftt! UGH!"

It was a little unfair of me really, she has had a difficult* year and couldn't have coped with the stress of it all. She bloody deserves to spend some time teaching in a school where she's not working in a 20 year old demountable with the walls kicked in, and where the kids don't tell her to "Oy! Get FUCKED, Miss!"

"At [insert name of fancy pants private school here], the kids are ALLOWED TO GO TO THE TOILET DURING CLASS!" she told me in awe. "We used to have to fill out FORMS and PAPERWORK before a kid could do that at a state school! And they have a COFFEE SHOP! And a THEATRE! All the classrooms are AIR CONDITIONED!"

"Bastards," I said bitterly.

Ah, the public/private divide.  That old chestnut.  That old sausage. That old grey mare, she ain't what she used to be.

Most of my friends from primary school went to private high schools.  It was only a couple of us that went on to the local public high school.  I remember clearly, on the last day of Grade 7, we all cried and wailed in an embarrasing display of pre-teen hysteria.  As we sat in the middle of the oval, clutching each other and weeping, one of the private school destined friends said earnestly to me, "Sarah! Promise me you'll never EVER wear a short straight skirt with your uniform, or wear your hair hanging down your back. PROMISE ME!"

"I won't. I won't EVER!" I vowed, so sure then that short skirts and loose hair were the quick road to ruin.

HAHA! AS IF THAT LASTED! You know as soon as I got there I was begging Mum to take my skirt up to bum-skimming heights and was wearing my hair hanging loose round my shoulders like the public school hussy that I was.

So the years went by. We stayed in touch with our beloved friends but things changed a bit. They went on to win the Rock Eisteddfod, we went on to lose it. They went on to have an arse-kickingly good concert band that probably won the Fanfare competition, we went on to play gigs at the local shopping centre that involved standing up and shouting "Tequila!" in the middle of a song. They developed passionate interests in theatre and THE ARTS,  we developed unhealthy obsessions with the dudes from Green Day.

Towards the end of high school, I think it was Grade 11, two of the private school friends had a big party, and they invited us, the public school friends, to come. It was to farewell them as they headed off on year long student exchanges. We were to wear red and white, the colours of their host countries.

Because we were NERVOUS and TRYING TO BE COOL and it was THE NINETIES we decided the best idea would be to wear white petticoats, red and white football socks and Doc Martens. SO HOT! HOW COULD ALL THOSE PRIVATE SCHOOL BOYS REFUSE? They would never know that we were all DAGGY DORKS, they would be tricked into thinking we were HOT STATE SCHOOL REBELS MAN! YEAH!

This is us circa 1996/7. Not at said red and white party. At another party. I am on the far left. I've used this picture before. How good are my pants? They totes fit into the Fashion Fails themeing we've got going on for The Lounge this week, I will say that much.

We got there and to our shock a group of the COOL BOYS from our school were already there. Apparently they had part time jobs in the same place as our hosts. Our cover was blown. They looked at us in surprise, like they hadn't realised that we might exist outside school hours. We lurked in a corner watching everyone dancing to the actual live DJ who was there. He was, like, just dropping some BEATS and spinning some PROGRESSIVE HOUSE MUSIC or something.

We didn't recognise anything they played, until a Daft Punk song came on. Daft Punk was not our THING, man. We groaned, and rolled our eyes. "Ugh! I HATE Daft Punk!" we all said, wrinkling our noses.

All the other guests squealed, and ran excitedly onto the dancefloor. "I LOVE THIS!!!" they cried in unison. We watched on, incredulous, as they popped some moves. How could we be so OUT OF IT!? We shuffled uncomfortably and folded our arms, until it finished, and the next song came on.

It was that sexually suggestive R&B song "Pony" by one hit wonders "Ginuwine". Remember??? GHASTLY.

We squealed and clapped our hands together. "OH WE LOVE THIS SONG!" we shouted, running onto the dancefloor to join the other guests.  They all stopped in their tracks, announcing "UGHHHH. HATE THIS SONG! HATE IT!". They left the dancefloor as quickly as we joined it.

We danced a little more self consciously then. I started to realise how crass the lyrics were, and tried to dance IRONICALLY to it, but the jig was basically up. I felt the eyes of the room on us.

    Ride it, my pony
    My saddle's waiting
   Come and jump on it...

After the song finished, we slunk away. Our beloved friend, one of the hosts, L, said to us "OH! I just KNEW you girls would like that song! SO FUNNY!" she smiled and laughed, genuinely (or should that be "ginuinely") delighted. We laughed nervously and changed the subject but I still felt  embarrassed.

Anyway I'm not sure exactly what the point of this story is except that it sticks in my head as a defining example of the difference between private schools and public schools. Like;

Fancy theatre/no fancy theatre
Air conditioned classrooms/75 million year old decrepit demountables with holey walls
Long skirts/Short skirts
Rock eisteddfod winners/rock eisteddfod losers

SEXUALLY SUGGESTIVE R&B ONE HIT WONDER/PROGRESSIVE FRENCH ELECTRONIC MUSIC OUTFIT DUO

VS

  

SEE how crazy big the public/private divide has become??? SEE??? It's a bloody travesty.

I think that there is something in that for all of us.

What's that you say? This whole post is rambling and makes no sense and the parallels I am drawing are confusing and you're not sure what I am getting at?

SHUT UUUUPPPP! IT MAKES SENSE TO ME OK? GAH!


*Understatement of the millennium

School formal creative vision. 90s hair.

This time of year I am always transported back in time to those halcyon days at the end of your school life.  One of the girls across the road was out in the front yard on Friday night getting some pics taken before she headed off to her school formal, with an earnest looking young man at her elbow.  She was wearing a very elegant long navy number and I must say she looked pretty good.

My formal outfit was a little, um, unusual I suppose is the best word.  I wanted terribly badly to look different from everyone else.  I still think my dress was beautiful.  Mum found it in a local boutique, and it was made from this amazing hand painted orange silk.  I'm hoping that Mum has it somewhere because I don't.  My shoes were also totally amazing.  They were these sort of disco gold numbers with a stacked heel.  Mum and I bought them in Brisbane which was definitely the Big Smoke for me back in the day, and they cost a fortune (more than $100 I think which is pretty ridiculous).  I don't know where they are either, I hardly wore them.  So annoying.  I wish I had them now.

But it was the hair and makeup that crazied up the whole ensemble.  I had a creative vision that I found difficult to express.  The dress and shoes really were a sort of 1970s vibe and I think what I really wanted was for my hair to be a bit like Jerry Hall's in this picture, sort of crimpy/wavy.

[Source]

But the problem was that it was 1997, the Spice Girl star was rising and Gwen Stefani was on the up and up too so I also had this kind of hairstyle stuck in my head...

Baby Spice and her look in this pic was one of my muses [Source]

Interestingly this photo was captioned "Gwen Stefani - Bad Hair Day". Obviously I didn't think so at the time.  I think this photo is from the early 2000s but you get the idea of the weird 1990s hair vibe that was swishing round inside my brain at the time.  [Source]

I tried to convey this to the middle aged suburban hairdresser and this is what the end result was. Really she did a good job because she was probably thinking "What the hell is she going on about, why doesn't she just want a nice updo with curls at the side like all the other girls".

You can't see the full effect obviously but the makeup job really was the worst element.  I think the work experience girl got her mitts on me, and layered foundation on with a trowel, topping it all off with garish lipstick that was slightly unevenly drawn.  All I wanted was a noice nat-chur-al dewey ingenue look a la Jerry in the first photo but that ain't what happened.  Very disappointing.  The experience scarred me so much that I was determined to do my own hair and makeup for my wedding years later. Which I did.  And it looked excellent if I do say so myself.

Anyway people on the night were a bit surprised at the whole ensemble I think and kept wanting to touch my hair, so I went with it as a talking point and told everyone my creative pitch to the hairdresser had been "Spice Girl on Acid" and I think they just thought "God she's weird" and left it at that.

For years I have been embarrassed of the photos, but more recently I have decided that even though I looked like a clown next to all the surfy cool girls with their long slinky dresses and dead straight Gwyneth Paltrow hair, at least I get points for trying to look interesting.  

Alan Partridge. Lunch. School memories.

Pretty sure I've got a broken toe.  I was negotiating the piles of toys and crap on the floor yesterday and kicked the hell out of it on the coffee table.  I tried to pretend it was ok until I awoke last night in a cold sweat.  Oh the pain, the pain of it all.

Today it has become an angry purpley blue colour and is alternately numb and painful.  I tried to take a photo of it for the blog but was frightened by the similarity between my foot and a close up of the gnarled talons of, say, a hobbit or other such hirsute creature.  My feet do not stand up to close scrutiny at the best of times, let alone when they are exhibiting a hideous purple swollen toe.

We had plans to have my old school friends D and L and their kidlets round for lunch so I soldiered on, even though I was possibly in danger of comporting myself a little like Alan Partridge did after he impaled his foot on a fence immediately prior to giving a keynote speech at the Dantes Fireplace sales conference.




Anyway I pulled myself together and we had a wonderful time.

Baby B and Baby O getting to know each other.  We successfully negotiated a suitable bride price from her parents.  I think several goats and a decent number of shekels should do it.

The children played quietly together, and after lunch we encouraged them to practice their piano scales and arpeggios, before we joined them in a singalong of rollicking showtunes.*

L, D and I reminisced about school (hi guys!).  D remembered how I dobbed on him for throwing water balloons at us, and I gently reminded him of all the good-natured ribbing he and his chum gave me in music class, mainly about my teacher Dad's crazy old blue Volvo, but also for making a teenage feminist statement by letting my armpits go free range.  Oh, the memories.  How is it that we are so old and brittle of bone now?

Anyway it was really a fabulous day, and I exercised my characteristic restraint by scoffing huge quantities of the delicious cheesecake L made.  It was delightful.

If it doesn't rain soon I don't know what's going to happen to the garden.  Rain, damn you, rain!  We've planted a whole lot of new things and if they cark it I will not be impressed.

Hello you Nasty Urchin you.

Lavender, with added rogue weed-type grass infesting it.  Die, you awful weed!

*Not an accurate representation of events.  See previous blog entries for explanation.  The square nanny may have been involved.

Concussion. Patterned pants. Teen style.

Had a nasty old day yesterday.  P hit her head at kindy which eventuated in what was most probably a mild concussion.  Vomiting and wooziness and an ambulance trip to the hospital ensued.

B playing with the vomit bag.  Hours of fun.

Awful.  I am sorry to say I panicked like there was no tomorrow and was not the cool, calm, collected parent I should have been.  But luckily all's well that ends well.  This afternoon she perked up and is really back to her old self and I even got a chance to shampoo the vomit out of her hair that had been there for over 24 hours.  And in a pleasant coincidence the gardenia outside her window is in bloom so I picked a couple to disguise the vague scent of old spew that is wafting round her little den.

Favourite smell in the world.  Way better than old vomit.

Hopefully tomorrow she'll be absolutely as good as new, capricious little despot that she is.  Yesterday morning (before the concussion incident) she stood up on one of the dining chairs, threw her arms out in the air and shouted, "The world is ours!!!" I asked her where she'd heard that. She answered, "In my ears!" 

Hmm.

As is my wont, I've been distracting myself from worry by thinking about sartorial issues.

So I've noticed that patterned pants are all the rage at the moment.  Although I've embraced the coloured skinny jean with a wild and gay abandon, I'm hesitant to do the same with the patterned pant.  I've been erring on the side of, "Never in a million years could I wear a patterned pant!"

And then I was looking at some old photos from my high school years, which, let's be honest, weren't yesterday, and I found these.

Check it out!  Patterned pants!

I'm the one with the jauntily cocked knee.  Like my metallic Doc Martens?  So 1997 people!

Here they are on another outing!  I must have loved them.  You can see here my friend S (far right) is also embracing a patterned pant, however I think you will agree mine are FAR SUPERIOR (sorry S).  So blue, so boot-legged, so be-checked.

Looking at these pics reminded me that when I was in my final year of high school, there was an American exchange student who we hung round with a bit. At one point, toward the end of what I think was a generally rather disappointing stay in the Land Down Under, he looked into my eyes and said that there was this girl he really liked.
"Oh yes?" I said. "Who?"
He looked meaningfully at me and said, "Well, she has really bad dress sense."
"Oh," I said.

I thought to myself, "Well that rules me out then because nobody could possibly say that about me.  AS IF!!!??  Because I have totally AWESOME and UNIQUE fashion forward style.  I am totally WITH IT and TRENDY and NOW!  Sometimes I even wear my blue checked pants with a MAROON TIE-DIED SHIRT! And who doesn't like tie-dye?"

And then later that night someone told me that I was the one he had the hots for.  This caused me a major rethink and challenged my perception of myself as a stylish, yet quirky, individual.  WHAT!!??? I thought, BAD DRESS SENSE!!!?  Who knew? I was HORRIFIED.

Looking back now, I say, you go girlfriend!  Rock those tight checked pants and transparent blouse, kick some ass in those bad boy boots, let the world see your dark coloured bra underneath your transparent white blouse, work that tie-dyed t-shirt from Just Jeans.  What  do teenage boys know about FASHION and STYLE and being downright FUNKY anyway?

I think I am inspired by my younger self to go the patterned pant.

I don't know if I could go quite this far though...

These are from ASOS, in case you want to just throw caution to the wind and dive into the trend that is the patterned pant with matching crop top.  No judgement here my friends.