Georgiezine

Political Context : KRudd back. Julia Gillard handled herself with dignity and grace, left a legacy, chipped the ceiling Egypt-overthrow president> what does this mean for Arab spring? Bolivia-president emergency landing in Austria because Spain et al denying airspace, suspect plane offering political asylum, South American nations very angry at the snub Cultural context or how 80s arts and culture is still having an effect on contemporary life Asked this question of someone recently and then, attempting to answer it myself, got in a twisted corner. Hard question!  Music I am listening to: When the kid lets me (he always wants to play the "twinkle star" CD) I have been listening to stuff added to my record collection.  Social context: Kylie was on my train this morning. She has been out, gone, outback, far off places, just moved back this week, and lives around the corner. She was my go-to person back when my older sister wouldn't let me read Dolly magazines wit...

Wow. Two week holidays are bliss. I love this. I haven't done the dishes once this year! Has been great to have a second week hanging out at home, trying to redecorate a bit. Andrew has ridiculous ideas about room usage which I have decided shouldn’t be followed. For instance, he doesn’t want the kid to have his toys in his room; they’re to be kept in the back room, also designated as Andy’s study. Right now, his “study” is a dumping ground of every envelope he doesn’t want to open, every piece of paper he’s avoiding filing and every small bit of clutter he wants to keep, but doesn’t have a space for. It’s sprawled across a desk, filing cabinet and bookshelf and litters the floor as well. He also has an entire wall of builts in to keep all this in! So the kid’s toys are stuffed into a corner of the back room, and he’s forgotten about them. Am loving the time we are spending together (when I’m not writing, or fobbing him off with Shaun Sheep DVDs or building amazing tower bl...

The family went out on Friday night. This would be the first time all 3 of us have been out at night time since Louis was a few weeks old (then we took him in his car capsule to British India with Geoff; it was spring, he slept all the time, it was easy). The evening worked, thanks to a variety of factors. Firstly, the destination was 5 minutes from home. Secondly, I had the help of friends and acquaintances-Rach carried him around the bowerbird markets; NC let me sit in his studio whilst I fed him and chatted to me, then we left the pram there whilst we visited Casablabla; his friend C carried The Kid's pram above the heads of 20+ people at the long dining table at Melt. The restaurant upstairs room is renovated with dark almost black walls, a long tiled white bar, long tables for large groups, an odd underutilised unisex bathroom (not many men opted to use the urinal adjacent to the unisex stall and basin). There were nearly 100 people seated upstairs, in this space lit by mo...

I made a fortuitous call to Rachel on Saturday afternoon, and scored an invite to join her and Adam at the Semaphore Workers Club that evening, where Dave Graney was playing as part of the Semaphore Music Festival. As spring weather had finally started, it was good going out in the evening, though no less of a battle to try and work out what to wear besides blue jeans (managed black pants, red top, striped short sleeved jacket). I love the workers club, have written of it before-an old villa with bay window overlooking the beach, large terraced garden at front, huge room with 2 pool tables, memorabilia laden walls and now there are refurbished bathrooms which are fabulous! We met up with 2 guys, who initially I assumed to be a couple, due to them both being decently dressed, and over 40 with no obvious wedding bands/wife references (told my husband this, and he sadly agreed that neat men, of a certain age, get cliched). Anyway, they were both fun to meet and talk to, so the 5 of us c...

The visit to my home town is for family reasons, but fortunately not my family-made a pragmatic decision to spend time with A's family (who are in need of us this time round) and avoid the dramas of my own. This is a quick visit, with only today to myself. Had an amusing conversation with my 2 year old nephew last night. A showed him a picture of me holding him when he was a baby. "That's not me" he said confidently. "I'm not a baby". Trying to explain the concept of time ("no, you're not a baby, but once you were") was kind of pointless. It seems that being a baby is a ridiculous and unworthy idea. He is growing up fast, did a wonderful multiple verse recitiation of the Bob the builder song, complete with a drum performance and dancing (very Taikoz) and then sang and danced his way through a Jewish nursery rhyme he learnt from The Wiggles (it has a detailed dance move involving arm crossing that he did particularly well). This morning he h...

Has been a busy week, travelling across three states, seeing Gretski again (pictured, getting all shy), avoiding conflict, embracing the opposite of conflict (peace, authenticity, being in the moment?). Adelaide was so so, there were good moments (watching the kids play soccer, Gus calling my name from the top of the playground cubby house, Ash saying "Thank you Georgie" multiple times and seeking my style assistance with his fisherman pants, buying new-to-me affordable clothes at Hype and Seek (oh the smugness of wearing recycled clothing!), reading The Flying Troutmans by Miriam Toeuw who is a genius Canadian writer, seeing my sister, spinning the colour pods in the night light with Ned and Gus (see photo), seeing my friends, hearing that one had passed her exams!). Then with a massive head cold, we travelled across the border to Melbourne, proving to the disprovers that one can get to Melbourne in a days driving. A and I stayed at St Andrews at Baldessin Press, which was ...

Went to the Format festival zine afternoon for the Fringe, and bought Mr A a copy of “Yoga in your forties” for his 40th and a zine by a rent subsidised girl (lived in series of parent and co-op subsidized inner city places-very envy making). Noted girl was apologetic for still doing zines at 35 “not wanting to be the mutton amongst the zine-lambs”. Mr A makes a strong argument that this is a pointless notion and excludes you from the fun if you imagine you’re the wrong age for it. Then Duckworth said to me something like “Oh and you’ve seen Ianto?” and I shook my head, never having been introduced. Ianto wrote my favourite zine (Westside Angst) and I keep wondering who he is, how D knows him. He is the sort of guy that can analyse the male dynamic, and wrote something on his blog that recalled the Michael Wilding short story I was reading out aloud when camping at Cygnet Folk Festival. (Two guys sharing a house with insufficent bedding for the cold winter, one works at a theatre res...

And it was a relief to welcome the new year. Different things strike me. Like other ladies who write, I have been admiring the president elect of the US (it's not the looks, it's the integrity), and feeling as though I need to spend a little more time at home. So this year I hope to do it, even if it's not for as long as I wish, I want it to happen. Felt very envious hearing of an acquaintance of mine that gets to work at least 1 day from home, she's at an organisation that is innovative in that way. I work for an organisation that wants to cut costs (don't we all) but can't do that creatively. My sister said to go for it; that when you work full time you spend more money than when you work part time; you shop better, cook more, enjoy yourself at home, garden, fix things, make do. So if I see my income go down, I'll have to remind myself that as long as my income paid the rent and the bills, it was all I needed. (And I might have enough time in the day to wo...

The other night I got a text from a friend telling me she'd finally got around to watching LOVE MY WAY. I'd first watched this series over a long weekend in March 2006 when living in Hobart. All my social circle had gone away for mini breaks and I had the house to myself. Í'd spent 2 days of it at a drawing class, where my drawing teacher had adopted me and told me her story of being a single mum living in a large narrow terrace house in the worst street in west hobart, until finally she'd found love second time around and moved to melbourne and was about to get married. Some of her children had followed and some had stayed behind; she wanted to reassure me that things would work out for me too. Other parts of the weekend were spent lazing in the garden on my purple yoga mat, resting my head on a favourite blue silk cushion I picked up from the sadly departed Orange Lane markets in Norwood. Not all things stay the same and not all things are there for you when you retur...