night creatures

yesterday I escorted a good friend to a meeting at Lucky Coq. While she attended this meeting of hers I killed time by investigating some sweet as stores on the upper (?) end of Chapel street. The non-club end. I never go out on Chapel Street because it is always way too done up for me and you pretty much always get groped, no matter what you do, say or look like.

Melbourne is quite fantastic. If you forgot or don't even know, here are a few reasons why.

-Lucky Coq in Prahan (and Bimbo's in Collingwood/Fitzroy or whatever - it's on Brunswick st) has $4 pizzas at very accessible hours and they are motherfucking tasty as all hell. I had one that is basically nachos on pizza. I felt that I needed to give it a try. They also have decently gourmet ones featuring the likes of salmon and proscuitto and various cheeses.

-abundance of quirky stores in unexpected places. Chapel street for me is mostly full of icky, glitzy expensive places that I will never buy anything from (see: American Apparel, Ed Hardy, various boutiquey places etc). But if you get off at Windsor train station and walk down towards the main bit from there you go past all these really sweet op shops. I think that if it was just slightly bigger, my new favourite op shop would be Fat Helen's. In terms of price I'd put it lower than Retrostar but higher than Savers. We're talking Lost and Found Market prices. They had a fairly good stash of Sega games and swizzle sticks. Oh and Tintin tshirts ($22, fyi). I also went into this really cool store full of antique furniture. It fell into the category of stores that I will never buy anything from, but it was epicly awesome. The kind of place you wander around quite utterly awestruck. There is also a Very Good bookstore pretty much right across from the train station that, when Shu Shu and I entered it, was home to three cats that clearly owned the place. cats just give everything a real good feeling.

-the train system. I know heaps of people don't really get into Connex in a big way, but I personally have always enjoyed the sensation of being driven somewhere. I get into train journeys. I particularly like the way the city looks when you approach it from a south eastern direction; from Prahan way. You feel a bit lower, a bit less important, and Melbourne seems quite grand and slightly imposing. Plus me and Shu Shu saw a real big dog on the way back to the city (see: picture above)

-general bars/restaurants/cafes. I wish I was wealthy enough to always dine out or be out in general. I passed a lot of warm places up that end of Chapel street.

Hey anyway, I love this city. I guess I wanted to tell everyone about it instead of thinking about some other things that are happening inside me.

what? dirty projectors?

I just decided that I really want to blog more and kinda want to post blogs here at my own whim. I also just got a new layout.. maybe a bit pointless because everyone just RSSs these days.. but it's pretty and it came from this really cool girl (I think it's a girl?) over at yummy lolly. I'm pleased to inform ya'll that the layout - indeed all her layouts - are under a Creative Commons license so they're free and I encourage you to download one for your own use because they are really pretty! Just see mine for details.

I want to tell you a little bit of a story about blog-sploration before I go. When you check your Google reader every day it becomes really boring to have only a few things to read.. so I took it upon myself to add more blogs to my library. I actually was googling the Lost and Found Market in Collingwood to check if their website had been updated to something more than the postcard they hand out when you buy something and no they have not. But I had noticed that some girl's blog came up when I googled the market soooo I went there and found it to have a really good list of local blogs that she reads. I encourage a perusal of this list if you live in Melbourne (by you I mean imaginary compendium of blog readers). From there I got Meet me at Mike's, who have this really cool layout that reminds me of these books that I used to have as a child.. THERE, on her website, she suggests you look at this website along with a lot of other handy hints for awesome blog cultivation. SO THEN I GOOGLED FREE BLOG DESIGNS & THAT'S HOW I FOUND YUMMY LOLLY AND NOW I HAVE A PRETTY LAYOUT.

Incidentally, at the same time I was researching gigs in Melbourne (I don't know why; I'm not even there at the moment) on Faster Louder and then went to this other website which is like a general guide to all that is awesome in Melbourne WHERE I FOUND this sorta.. event suggestion thing that was *we are now approaching the actual incident, the purpose of this rant.. purpose???* mentioned at work the other week. Basically, it's like this exhibition of illustrations or paintings or whatever the hell they are and there's this tattooist in the corner who will give you free tatts of his designs! And this is happening tomorrow the 11th of July and next Saturday the 18th. I would like to go for interest's sake (plus I want a tattoo and getting one for free would be fairly awesome) and to see how many people show up to get themselves tattooed!! And so I have subscribed to the RSS feed of this neat website which is actually called Three Thousand - OMG I JUST REALISED THAT IS REALLY CLEVER BECAUSE IT IS THE POSTCODE OF THE CBD!!!

And that is probably enough general commentary about my travels on the interwebs because I could probably be watching something really awesome like Juvies on telly.

My festival would be at my mum's farm, Redrock, near the Grampians (in Victoria) because it is beautiful there and there would be no sort of venue hiring fee. People may drive to and from the event, but cars are not to be utilised during the festival. Also there's Vline, and there would be special buses taking punters from Horsham to Redrock.

One weekend; one stage.

The Parking Lot Experiments
Great Earthquake
yay local bands of complete win and whimsy

Tinpan Orange
chilled out awesome storytelling folk

Croque Monsieur
gypsy folk insanity for dance fun

Teacups
I must see these girls play

John Darnielle & Owen Pallet
uniting to create the superband Mountain Fantasy

Dan Deacon
cos apparently he puts on quite the show?

Laura Marling
Noah & the Whale
Bridezilla

Jens Lekman
oh jensy jens

Lonely Drifter Karen
German cabaret ftw

There'd also be like artist stalls from Wartook & Natimuk - small local towns full of arty/crafty folk

For food.. I'll kidnap a representative from Lazzat's (tasty Malaysian foodz), someone from 'Dirty' Dumplings, get the Dadswell's Bridge Indian Restaurant to have their stall, there will be a jam donut lady, a baked potato person and a stall bearing wares from Cafe Baghdad (general cafe goods of awesome quality).

Toilet/bathroom facilities would be those weird sawdust contraptions they had at falls. So like NOT port-a-loos. There's still TP though, and toilet seats. And I don't feel there's a particular need for shower facilities seeing how it's only for one night.

Channelling the goodness of Golden Plains, there would be somewhere in the realm of 2500-4000 tickets sold (hopefully)

Actually I just realised that this is all very Wimmera-centric. I guess maybe most festivals begin like that..? you want to showcase bands that are really dear to you, a place that is beautiful.. just the kind of thing you want to share with your friends.

My festival would be at Tapapakanga Regional Park just out of Auckland city. I've been to a festival there and it is really beautiful. It is right beside the ocean and it has a really nice space, not overly huge so it would just be a smallish festival. But honestly, festivals in NZ are so wonderful because they are not so big and overcrowded. The festival will be two days long and there is a camping site just a small hike up the hill from where the stages are. Honestly, the only thing for these types of affairs are Port-o-Loos and they are disgusting but also part of the experience. They would, however, be cleaned regularly. There would be a lot of vegetarian, organic food stalls; but also the normal stuff like burgers, pizza, icecream, breakfast food, café food etc. In terms of other activities/events, there would be clothes and crafts stalls, book stalls and crafty things.

The bands I would invite are:

Sigur Ros, Owen, The Mountain Goats, Teacups, Songs: Ohia, Broken Social Scene, Sufjan Stevens, Tegan and Sara, Explosions in the Sky, Mogwai, Scout Niblett, Leader Cheetah, Kimya Dawson, Kaki King, Joanna Newsom, Jens Lekman, Iron and Wine, Emiliana Torrini, Elvis Perkins, Cat Power, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, Belle and Sebastian, Beach House, Arcade Fire, Band of Horses, Andrew Bird.

I also want to invite comedians such as:

Flight of The Conchords, Eugene Mirman, Stewart Lee, Richard Herring, Demetri Martin, David O’Doherty, Ricky Gervais, Zach Galifianakis.

It would pretty much be awesome.

-Stace

the best you ever had

NEW TOPIC: festival curation!!!

If you could organise a music festival

- where would it be? (consider transport to and from venue, also possible buses to local towns during the festival if it is a longun)

- what bands would you invite? (this can be as realistic or unrealistic as you want)

- how many days?

- how many stages/tents

- what food stalls?

- any other activities/events?

- what type of toilet/bathroom facilities? (cause that's a pretty important part of things, obviously)

- around how many tickets would you sell?

aaand that's about all I think for now. Deadline... before Monday the 6th of July

red wine

Saturday morning.
Wake up
Try to work out why I am awake
Realise that it's because I have left my blinds open
Sit up
Check the time
Not the right time to be awake
clothes on the ground
unceremoniously thrown off
stumble to the bathroom
Check the damage
Through blurry eyes
have I been in a fight?
my mouth looks bloody
or like an anti-smoking ad
Because
Before the un-ceremony
Before stumbling into bed
Leaving the blinds open
I drank
and I drank.

blood red wine

fingers clasp the glass stem

liquid swirls as i sway

to music, so

visceral and necessary.

empty glass -

stained lips.

-Stace

Susan, I have devised a new topic: Red wine.

I am currently drinking a glass.

It was $6.99.

Must be written by the end of the weekend.

Egg

I was sitting here thinking about what on earth I could write about eggs. Then I thought, well, a wise man once said that if you can't write about eggs, write about how you can't write about eggs. Or something.. At first I thought of the physical appearance, unbroken: smooth, brown and fragile, broken: liquid, clear and gooey, cooked: yellow and white. Then on TV, Bender was making a cake with eggs. Then I remembered that Sam made eggs for breakfast. There was this whole new egg world that I was suddenly taking notice off. Funny how we only see things when we are looking for them.

From what I gather there is no strict criteria about the way in which we express a topic, let me know if this is kosher.

-Stace

egg1

It must be a

long train ride

for the woman

peeling a hard boiled egg

one one one

hi everyone.

this blog is going to come back with a vengence (I hope)

Stacey Teague and I will be maintaining this blog across the (Tasman? I never know which one is the one between NZ and Aus) sea. 

said she: I was thinking that we should start some sort of writing exercise thing just between us. Like choose a topic and we both have to write about it, whether it’s prose, poetry or just opinion. Let me know if you’re interested.

said I: Onto your idea. I think that’s a good idea! I reckon it should somehow be separate from our emails. Do you have a google account? If you do, I can set you up as a contributor on my blogspot and we can post our responses there maybe? I think that’s possible. I mean I know we both hate blogspot, but it’s essentially a blank canvas as I rarely use it these days. How would we choose topics?

and um here we are.

Topic of the day: eggs

deadline: 5pm Aus time

stupid things that Susie only just realised recently: Katy and Luke Steele are related! & The opening line of Girl in Port is "let fall your soft and swaying skirts" NOT "look for your soft and swaying skirts"

horrid thing seen on the way home from work: an old man hosing a possum in a tree

favourite moment of Thursday: hearing Olsen Olsen as I walked past Polyester

anyway, let the egg-tries commence!

(wild()life)

Why have you buried yourself in the dirt, My Sparrow?
Are you cold?
You look too fat to be cold.
Maybe you wanted to feel safe for a second, wanted to be held
Without relinquishing

your

self

shantysomething

a precurser to this entry (something to keep in mind whilst reading it)
a way to decipher what I mean (a complaint instead of a triumph)
:
why is it so hard to just ask for what you want?

please find more unhealthy exposure to my mind at

livejournal
&
wordpress

livejournal is a liberated version of this blog; it's a lot less concerned with outside opinions, it's a bit more personal and honest. with that said, I do have the power to make certain entries friends only, so if there seems to be an inordinate amount of time in which I have not blogged, it is probably due to me barring them from mere public access.

wordpress, however, is diametrically opposed. I am required to keep this blog for uni and I intend to nurture it quite rigorously over the semester, feeding it with ponderings, implications, theories and other musings of that ilk.

I pseudo-invite my few blogger cohorts and unknown, keen readers - hey, they may exist (or not) - to seek out my prose at these sites simply because they will be more frequented than these hallowed halls. With that said, my favourites over here seem to have abandoned their respective ships for reasons that I am unaware of and so I feel sadly disconnected from their possibly wondrous existences. I am pseudo inviting/initiating interest some other form of communication from well I don't know, some people, and bashfully remind them that if they are not already aware of my email address, it is certainly accessible from my "profile" here or located in their msn contacts. with THAT said, I realise that most of us are busy.

But that is why I am closing up "shop" here for a little while, recommending other places to find me and being a bit selfish and asking for some attention in other arenas.

I would like to call upon the iridescent Regina Spektor's lyrics at this juncture to round up the blog for a little hiatus in a possibly meaningful and hopefully relevant fashion.

people are just people
they shouldn't make you nervous
the world is everlasting, it's coming and it's going

magic numbers

Lately I've been feeling like things are moving on from their baseless, pointless nature. And I with them.

That said, I am also wondering if it's all just a trick and I will go on feeling so goddamn useless and unsubstantial for [the rest of my life] a long time.

Of course I can't lie and say I constantly feel like that. I forget from time to time. But it's something I return to.

Then I also think that maybe I just don't accept happiness and that I just seek out sadness. Or not even. Sometimes I think that I do the same things as everyone and what I think unhappy is is just normal. Maybe I just want to seem like an anomaly. Lately I also think that people just crave individuality and will do anything they can to seem so. Even feign sadness. Maybe I'm guilty of that.

The image of 'happy' I have in my mind is this absurdly ecstatic, overjoyed person who has everything they ever wanted and is consistently excited about waking up every morning. Happiness for me is often little victories.

What is happy anyway? A feeling? An emotion? Most of the time I think that I'm just 'fine', neither unhappy or happy. But fine has negative connotations so whenever you say that people assume there's something wrong. Maybe that's the problem: people go assuming that fine is wrong and so it eventually becomes wrong.

5.52

Guess what
I only keep this blog for less than 3 people
Others I can talk to in person

I still don't like you, blogger. I despise the animosity that you seem to encourage
I don't feel like I can talk about James Joyce here. It seems the wrong place for him to inhabit

I don't like how I feel I am not allowed to talk about myself - that is speak of I - here.

I'm a working girl now and my computer's coming soon so I'll be able to pay attention to everything here a bit more regularly. But also now I work and uni is starting so there's that also.

Ah and I don't know whether I can go to Summertones this weekend because my sister's decided to have her 21st on that day. That disappoints me not only because I wanted to see PLE but also because I will have to go back home the weekend before uni starts.

Finally. My feet hurt a lot and I'd like a new pair of shoes quite soon.

we'll just honey-soy the chicken then figure out what we're doing

I am writing to inform my "readers" that I don't actually have constant access to the internet and will as such be relying on sporradic trips to my uni's library (which are somewhat depressing given that I don't have any other reason to be there and will be forced to spend time there in approximately two weeks) and my sister's house. I was surprised to note that the latter is actually located quite closely to the Hawthorn Library and felt rather surprised and somewhat violated as my real life semi-intersected with my blogspot life. Anyway. The point of all this is that I don't have internet. Or tv. I find myself watching a lot of dvds and going on a lot of extensive tram journeys. My sister's helping us out with a couple of discs of Strangers With Candy.

For some time I contemplated life as a small bird in a cage. I've got nothing against birds in general - save for cassowaries. And I don't really like chickens unless they are bantams though. Well groomed bantams, mind you, none of this ridiculous feathery crap. Feathered ankles will lead to dirty ankles. Then they will get all lumpy and gross.

maybe they were just dream-like

please pretend it's yesterday on the train.... GO

"Fuck the clouds are so pretty today but I can't draw (at all) with a pen (or anything else) so they will have to remain etched upon my memory. There's a small slit in a sheet of heavy blue clouds and the sun's rays are just getting through it, shining two strong sections of beam down to the ground that now looks like the promised land or as if something holy has happened there. I could pretend like God was sitting behind this blueish curtain with a torch, doing some sort of ethereal puppetry for the amusement of his kingdom. But it's just a large ball of gas and a weather pattern in beautiful desultory union. It all makes me 'excited' for winter; at least convinces me there will be some salvation from the dry, harsh summer"

triple cancer

It's funny how awkward people feel/seem/look when strangers approach them. Even if strangers are friendly they are regarded with suspicion.

It doesn't help if they appear or speak quite eccentrically. Yesterday on the tram this scruffy - the bad kind - middle-aged man was animatedly interacting with everyone around him. Fortunately I had my ipod in so I was saved from his outlandishness. I suppose we protect our personal space very dramatically on public transport with mp3 players, sunglasses, reading material, phones or if lucky enough, a friend. This particular fellow deigned to pat the man in front of him on the knee quite jovially. He was loud and spoke to people who were over a metre away. I even utilised the classic technique of looking out the window to ensue I was not dragged into this odd display.

When he got off all of the people around exchanged glances of disbelief and mirth. We had all been baffled by this man's demeanour. I'm sure those closest were genial about the meeting, but like me I would assume they'd have some anxiety as to whether he would have a funny turn. If he was unpredictable enough to engage in such an exchange, what else would he be capable of? There was an instant where he flailed an arm rather theatrically and yelled irritably at a young man attempting to come down the aisle with a suitcase that exhibited a nasty side of his character.

This seems fairly boring and prosaic but I wanted to document my observations about personal space and general boundaries. If there's a purpose it seems talking to strangers is acceptable. Two girls asked me for directions earlier in the day and I didn't know them, yet acquiesced without a further thought. Admittedly I was sending them away from me, so had they been weird girls I would have been fine anyway. Although with that said, some purposes can go quite wrong. At the bus stop an odd, drunk and wet looking young man was asking everyone for a "ciggie". He was apparently too drunk to understand nobody smoked.

[note: why, when people ask for cigarettes, is the negative response usually "I don't smoke" rather than a mere "no"? Seems to me like a subconscious moral highground]

From his appearance you could tell that you wanted to stay away from this creep. He was leering at a lady with her baby. The same lady had been leered at by a man whilst actually ON the bus; a man who had interjected into my conversation with an old school friend at what most would deem unacceptable intervals. As soon as the interrupter spoke of being stoned I knew we wouldn't be paying much more attention to him. Speaking openly about taking drugs with people you don't know, especially in public places, is something I have also noted to be a significant "no-no". So I felt bad for this poor woman with her baby who appeared to be all alone at the bus stop. I was just lucky that I had someone to stand with while I waited for my mum.

jaundice

My response to former idealism

Of course we lost everything in the fire. My horse perished. I'm only seven years old, how was I to understand? Mum stayed behind hosing down everything she could think of til flames leapt at our verandah. Then she came to join us at nan's. I never even got to ride that horse - hadn't even named it. Now it's just a carcass in a burnt paddock. Maybe we'll go back tomorrow if it's safe. At least the telly's working again, not that there's anything on.

vi-oooh-laaay-tion

After a week of immense heat, minimal thought and Ryan Adams having a hissy fit with tech guys, I woke on Monday to find my computer completely missing. It was stolen from my bedroom whilst I was asleep. Being human I had erred to leave my door unlocked that night - in fact as I have done for about the last eight months - and the perpetrator had obviously just waltzed in of their own accord and, finding that I was asleep (read: dead to the world), procured a shiny new piece of technology.

This loss is worsened by the fact that this isn't actually the first computer that has been treated badly in my care. In June, my sister spilt milk on my first Macbook. It stopped working and was later replaced by insurance. After this latest fiasco I found myself quite enraged and still in utter disbelief that something like this could happen. But then mum called me and said that we can get MORE INSURANCE. So I feel pretty happy about that.

In other news on Saturday I went to see Ryan Adams and the Cardinals. They were brilliant but did not play long enough for anyone's liking. I actually thought it was a joke when they walked offstage at 10.30 after playing for about 70 minutes. I got some decent pictures on both my phone and my camera so I imagine they will be forthcoming for perusal. Also last night I went to see Born Ruffians at the East Brunswick Club because I figured that there was no point remaining in my hovel when I could be enjoying Canadians who wouldn't scratch my arm. I imagine pics will surface of that concert also.

I've been toying with the idea of turning this blog into something actually worthwhile reading. Like actually review some of the gigs I go to and post the reviews here. Imagine, a blog with a purpose! How alarming.

Finally, if anyone has a place for me to live this year, just put your hand up. Then put it down. Then put your hands back on your keyboard and tell me via the typed word. Then I will love you.

note: The previous entry is my latest idea for a movie, though admittedly it is inspired by real life. But I can't explain it without sounding like a complete, malicious bitch so I'm not going to try.