Opting to op shop whilst at uni
Well I had a lovely entry to read about op shops thanks to seagreen. I love love op shopping, and in fact it's an entry point to being my friend, that you are prepared to traipse around these joints. Can remember Splatty asking me once how I'd spent a day off and being thrilled that I'd spent it in Vinnies. She was temporarily living in the country and would regularly drag back home objects she got from their Vinnies, such as great vinyl chairs, desks, clothes. (She always has a well furnished and decorated house, with a vision of her character: Feathers, fedoras, paintings, books, music, hat stands) and all done on the smell of an oily rag.
Can also remember my friend Sabby admiring an outfit that I informed her cost less than the price of my new havianas. Oh, the glory. Anyhow, seagreen did put me onto at least one op shop I'd ommitted. Yes, last week whilst in Sydney I had actually popped into Broadway Betty, but felt too overwhelmbed by the stamina required for the Salvos store on Broadway. Then I'd picked up a book and coffee from Salvos (book is about residents of an aged home for Jewish people in New York and their staging of Hamlet: so far so good). But I forgot to check out the op shop down near the post office. And now I want to! Will be in Sydney on Friday, hopefully will have time.
My research workshop last week was lovely. It is always a privilege to be in the company of people who are interested in research, in intellectual enquiry, who have practical skills and a GSOH. There were 14 of us returning from last year's training, and I was regularly paired up with Christian, who just makes me laugh and laugh. Our coordinator was explaining that he and the other vegetarian in our group would have to sit together at our restaurant dinner that evening. "But what if we want to sit next to Christian?" the rest of us begged. Christian's dream is to retire and work as a full time visual artist... he wears cool sneakers. He left Melbourne to get out of the big smoke and so he could bring up his daughter in the country with the beach getting into her psyche... Christian is also known for hitting the shops, for getting lost in the inner city and embracing the vibe.
He and me and another researcher we adopted, could not for the life of us work out how to get from the Sydney Uni education building to King Street. It seems easy, but the campus is big, has several exits and when we emerged on Carillon Avenue we thought we'd ask for help. Carolyn complimented a passerby as looking intelligent and asked for help. He looked thrilled for the approach but said he'd only moved to Sydney the prevoius Sunday. On being prompted by me (""Where have you come from? Name the streets, I'll work it out") he came up with directions that we immediately rejected as misguided and wrong. Jogger girl was asked, she gave identical directions to country boy, who was still in hearing shot for us to yell out our apologies "We're sorry! You were right! We were wrong!" He was pleased enough to give us a double armed victory salute. So to country boy: Hope you're having the best orientation week of your life! (And thanks jogger girl too).
It is somewhat embarrassing to discover that you've missed the short cut to King Street for about 10 years...once there I picked up some sculpture clay and a dress, which unfortunately was new and thus not particularly environmentally friendly. I got lost again, walking from Ivy Street Darlington to the Royal bottle shop and back to King Street for dinner (where some previoulsy unaired flatmate anecdotes from 1998-2001 and 2006 got a whirl) and again in the morning from Ivy Street to the uni (got side tracked by some groovy looking terraces that should have looked familiar but didn't). So inner city Sydney Uni, how I love you for a visit!
Can also remember my friend Sabby admiring an outfit that I informed her cost less than the price of my new havianas. Oh, the glory. Anyhow, seagreen did put me onto at least one op shop I'd ommitted. Yes, last week whilst in Sydney I had actually popped into Broadway Betty, but felt too overwhelmbed by the stamina required for the Salvos store on Broadway. Then I'd picked up a book and coffee from Salvos (book is about residents of an aged home for Jewish people in New York and their staging of Hamlet: so far so good). But I forgot to check out the op shop down near the post office. And now I want to! Will be in Sydney on Friday, hopefully will have time.
My research workshop last week was lovely. It is always a privilege to be in the company of people who are interested in research, in intellectual enquiry, who have practical skills and a GSOH. There were 14 of us returning from last year's training, and I was regularly paired up with Christian, who just makes me laugh and laugh. Our coordinator was explaining that he and the other vegetarian in our group would have to sit together at our restaurant dinner that evening. "But what if we want to sit next to Christian?" the rest of us begged. Christian's dream is to retire and work as a full time visual artist... he wears cool sneakers. He left Melbourne to get out of the big smoke and so he could bring up his daughter in the country with the beach getting into her psyche... Christian is also known for hitting the shops, for getting lost in the inner city and embracing the vibe.
He and me and another researcher we adopted, could not for the life of us work out how to get from the Sydney Uni education building to King Street. It seems easy, but the campus is big, has several exits and when we emerged on Carillon Avenue we thought we'd ask for help. Carolyn complimented a passerby as looking intelligent and asked for help. He looked thrilled for the approach but said he'd only moved to Sydney the prevoius Sunday. On being prompted by me (""Where have you come from? Name the streets, I'll work it out") he came up with directions that we immediately rejected as misguided and wrong. Jogger girl was asked, she gave identical directions to country boy, who was still in hearing shot for us to yell out our apologies "We're sorry! You were right! We were wrong!" He was pleased enough to give us a double armed victory salute. So to country boy: Hope you're having the best orientation week of your life! (And thanks jogger girl too).
It is somewhat embarrassing to discover that you've missed the short cut to King Street for about 10 years...once there I picked up some sculpture clay and a dress, which unfortunately was new and thus not particularly environmentally friendly. I got lost again, walking from Ivy Street Darlington to the Royal bottle shop and back to King Street for dinner (where some previoulsy unaired flatmate anecdotes from 1998-2001 and 2006 got a whirl) and again in the morning from Ivy Street to the uni (got side tracked by some groovy looking terraces that should have looked familiar but didn't). So inner city Sydney Uni, how I love you for a visit!
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