Long time no see, you're looking good! What have I been up to? Oh not much, you know, working my ass off, finding a place to live and moving in one week.

Yes its been a while since I blogged. Mainly due to being sore ass busy with work, and also finding a place to move to, and now the move itself.

If anyone out there is renting in Sydney, you've heard what its like. Brutal. I have been living in this kick ass place in the lower North Shore for a bit over a year now. Expensive but I love it. Sadly a month ago they raised the rent $60 a week and it went from expensive to extortionate. So then I was looking at places, in the Inner West (to bring out my Inner Westie).

So anyway going to inspections is like some sort of sick joke. One bedroom unit, $370, 40 PEOPLE! 40. FORTY. People walking in and offering the agent a deposit without even looking at places. Signing forms before looking. People racing to fill them in first. I got a place, and spoke to the agent who said they stopped taking deposits at the inspections since people get into a bidding war and it gets a bit out of hand (sounds like a win win situation for the agent to me but whatever).

Of course, being blonde, I didn't fill in the form properly - instead of saying I would move in on the 17th, I put the 7th. They rang me to say I'd been accepted and I could move in on the 7th - when I asked to have that moved out a bit they said that the only difference between me and another application was the date we wanted to move in at. So I'm moving in on that day! Which was a week after I signed the application.

So yeah, busy. Hows things your way?

Message tone

On a lighter note... I struggled to get a SMS notification tone I really liked... so I wrote my own. Simple, short, original.

If you would like to hear it, or use it yourself here it is. Its a midi file just so you know.

You're welcome.

Only when its cold and lonely

As I may have previously mentioned, I studied music at university. I majored in whats called musicology (which I was really good at), despite the fact that I really wanted to major in composition (which I totally sucked at).

Anyway my lecturer in musicology was a full on modern feminist, and she was quite up front about how that affected her teachings. In order for me to do 3rd year musicology I had to do a feminism and music course. I attended this (as the only man) and found it to be generally quite a good course. At the end of it we had to give a presentation. Obviously I couldn't do mine from a feminist perspective (you know, being a bloke and all), so I did mine from a generic gender and music viewpoint.

Anyway my lecturer loved the idea and asked me to present at a conference she was hosting. I agreed without asking too much about it as ... well I was stupid really, and I thought it would be good practice for my presentation at the end of the year.

I walked into the conference hall ... and immediately felt a very hostile energy. The speech given before mine was titled "Dead Men Don't Rape". Which is true, but still, not very welcoming. My presentation was treated like it wasn't worth a squirt of goats piss, with dead silence at the end of it, and I sat down glad to make it through it alive.

But as I was getting a lift from a friend who was also presenting, and they wanted to go to the after conference party, I went along to that too. Where things only got better.

I was sitting with a group of fellow students when I spotted a girl I'd met once before (and quite fancied). Now given that the people there were nearly all gay, my hopes weren't up very much, but I went over and started chatting. Of course her girlfriend comes over. Her girlfriend is about 20 years older than her, dressed like a man and introduces herself as "Biff". I'm not making this up.

"Biff" sakes me what I was doing there, I tell her I was giving a presentation. She looks horrified and says "What right do you have to present here? You're a Penis Wielder!"

Well yes, but only when its cold and lonely.

Too Busy to post...

Sorry for the lack of postage, took a few days off and spent a long weekend enduring this. Tough work.

Clear Spirits = Clear Mind

Theres something to be said for drinking vodka all night at the Lenin Bar. Firstly, though I had 3 cocktails and then about 6 or 7 vodkas afterwards I only felt mildly tipsy. Bust best of all, I woke up extremely clearheaded.

Its a win win situation. I win twice!

Breathing the universe in cycles

I've lived in some strange situations and I thought I'd go over a couple of them, involving bad flatmates. This will be a long post so make sure you are comfortable.

When I first moved out of home I lived with a couple and another guy. This guy was just plain weird. Firstly, he only ever ate food from tins (or takeaway) - even things like tinned sausages (urgh). He was incredibly private about his room and there was always a waft of something pretty gross from his room.

Anyway one time one of my flatmates borrowed a CD from him and wanted to return it - he wasn't around so she thought she'd leave it on his bed. She opened the door and was nearly sick. I thought she was exaggerating (as none of us really liked him much) so to prove it I wandered in and took a deep breath. Oh. My. God. The most pungent disgusting smell filled my nose, mouth and lungs. Turns out he would leave his wet washing in his room in bags. So you know that wet clothes smell? His room REEKED of it.

He also had no sheet on his mattress, he just slept on the bare mattress, and he had a tshirt for a pillowcase.

Even weirder? He had a girlfriend. Who would sleep over. WTF?

Anyway he was kicked out shortly thereafter but I always thought I could catch the hint of the smell.

Fast forward a few years. I go to a place to hopefully move in, interview with the lady who lives there. It all goes well and I move in. Now I thought it was just her there. On the day I move in no-one is home, so I go to get groceries and when I came back there is a guy spreadeagled on the loungeroom floor. He senses my presence and says "don't worry about me man, I'm just breathing the universe in cycles" (on telling this story to Lucy she said I should have made that the title of my blog. Damn it, she's right!)

I had moved in with New Age freaks. Now I'm all for a little positive thinking and all that. But these people were borderline insane. So of course I stayed for over a year. I just kind of adjusted to weirdness in my life every day.

Fast forward a few more years. I have a nice place by myself in Kingsford but thought getting a flatmate would be a good idea. I advertise and interview this woman who seems perfect (had a job, was easy going etc) so on the basis of a ten minute interview I let her move in. At first things went well, she paid rent, she was a bit manically energetic but otherwise quite nice. Then she started bringing guys home. Every day. A different skeasy guy. On my lounge. Watching my tv.

But you know she's an adult and can do whoever she likes ... so I didn't really say anything. Then she started dissappearing for long stretches. Rent wasn't paid, then she'd pay 6 weeks in one hit, then I wouldn't see her again for a while. She once asked if we could work out an alternative rent paying arrangement. I had no idea what she meant (I was thinking wash my car, cook for me, none of which I cared about) but I was being terribly naive. She had other services in mind instead of rent. I kid you not.

Anyway, when I did see her she'd be wasted all the time, I saw her drinking what would have been a full scotch glass of JD at 9 in the morning after just waking up. That became a regular thing. Yep she'd gone alco on me. Again, not what I'd bargained for but its her life and she was harmless when drunk so I just asked her to not drink out of my good crystal scotch glasses and that was that.

Then she started getting paranoid. If she was home when the phone rang, she'd run out saying "You don't know where I am, you don't know who I am, don't tell them anything" - and I'd be like "Dude, its my Mum, chill out".

Then ... a few weeks later, I get a knock on the door. Two big guys there. "Is Sarah home?" "No, no idea where she is". The two big guys look at me and say "she owes 20 grand, and we're going to come for it, tell her that".

OMFGWTF? F? FFFFFSF?

I took up a vigil by the front door until she did her trademark run in run out trick at 3am. I grabbed her and said "I'm moving out in a few days. I don't care what you do but I suggest you move out too".

Her story was that she'd fallen in with the wrong crowd (duh) and they asked her to carry something from one place to another, but when she found out it was something dodgy she wouldn't do it and they said that cost them 20 grand. All I heard was "blah blah blah I'm screwed up blah blah blah".

In case you were wondering, I live alone these days :)

Taxi Drivers

Is it just me, or have cab drivers perfected the art of driving in a manner that makes you want to hurl? I can go out for a few quiet drinks, walk out of the pub, feel great, get in a taxi and as soon as it leaves feel like being sick. Slamming on the accelerator, slamming on the brakes, all for no apparent reason! Going round corners at breakneck speeds, it seems they want to have you throw up in their cab.

Seriously, why, when the road ahead is totally clear and there are no upcoming traffic lights, roundabouts, or anything else, do they accellerate, then brake, then accelerate, then brake and so on and so forth. Can someone please anwer that eternal riddle?

Of course, it has nothing to do with consuming 8 pints of guiness. Not at all.