We were minding our own business, as Marita and I walked across Flinders Street from the station on Friday night, to go shopping for a present for my nephew Leo’s first birthday. As we passed Young & Jackson’s on the corner, suddenly there was a man in a bright orange shirt pulling on my arm. ... [More]
There was a teenager on the train, last Thursday night, sitting somewhere behind me. He was asking someone — probably his mother, which stop they were going to… was it the end of the line… where did the train go to after that? These questions answered, he kept talking, to the strangers around him on ... [More]
I didn’t hear this radio programme, but apparently there are a lot of cockroaches in Melbourne at the moment. Danny Katz had a funny piece on them in yesterday’s Age. I’m glad its not just my house that has them. In fact I almost used yesterday’s Age to squash one I found in a glass ... [More]
Two interesting dreams in the last few days. Not that I expect anybody to care except me, but I’m finding it useful to log them somewhere. Dad and the tram In the first one, I was on a tram on a route where they’d been moving the stops (such as Collins St) and we stopped ... [More]
The kids are getting to an age where things like pocket money and household chores should be part of life. In most cases they seem willing already to help with things — there’s always enthusiasm to use the garden shears to trim the bushes, or flatten boxes for the recycling, for instance. As for watering ... [More]
I woke up the other day to an email from a woman I’d never heard of before. The subject line said “Is it really you?” and I came pretty close to throwing it straight into the spam bucket. She said she was my godmother, that she’d lost touch with my mother after they’d moved to ... [More]
About a month ago I rang up the gas company to get my name corrected on the bill again, attempting to finally (after six years) ensure my ex-wife’s name was removed from both the mailing address and the account name. So the other day, a gas bill arrived. I mean seriously… that takes a special ... [More]
I’m finally getting caught up in the spirit. Despite a general attitude of Bah! Humbug! towards organised sport (with the exception of footy tipping, kick-to-kick, watching the cricket and street cricket), I decided to get some Commonwealth Games tickets. I was spurred on by the kids getting bombarded with Commonwealth Games propaganda and it being ... [More]
As the purchase of new tyres and another regular service looms, I’ve been theorising: assuming worse-case scenario, that nothing else changes and there is no great revolution in public transport that sees the whole city given usable services to everywhere, could I get rid of my car without going crazy? The main thing at the ... [More]
Some people who wear uniforms (or other specialised clothing for work) are very obvious. The presence of police and other emergency service workers always makes me wonder what’s wrong. Other uniforms are less obvious. Someone called Elly Lukas apparently runs a beauty school. There seems to be no end of girls with their hair tied ... [More]
Lunchtime Monday… maybe something burnt in the Australia on Collins Food Court? I once asked a mate in the CFA about city fire calls. He said that though most are false alarms, they (obviously) take every one seriously, invariably sending multiple units screaming through the streets.
It’s been almost two years since we went looking unsuccessfully for Mulholland Drive on DVD. Kept looking for it during that time, but no luck, apart from one aged looking VHS copy spotted recently. Finally though, a copy turned up on DVD. Oh, the anticipation. By about midway through, I was beginning to wonder what ... [More]