Finally, a quote worth taking out of context.

"My nipples are not magical buttons of fun!"

(I have grape juice. And lo, it is good.)

I have never seen red white-spotted mushrooms outside a Disney-esque picture.

There is nothing more.

We survived. Stop packing, Jono.

The play was called "The Glass Garden" and it was motherfucking surreal. We're talking weird lighting and sound effects, a man in a bunny rabbit suit dancing to a grammaphone, chicks costumed as blue gorillas anally raping the hero with a carrot-penis. It had moments of sheer brilliance within this bizarrity (Brazil-style), but generally it was too conscious of its own insanity, too caught up with being profound and managing only to be gauchely, clumsily questioning. It lacked the confidence and subtlety that would have made it truly brilliant.

But the performers were fantastic, and the experience very interesting.

Call of the night: Blondelet #1 (henceforth to be referred to as "Brazen Hussy" as she has embraced the title for her own) after the first act: "Well, I left my LSD at home, did anyone else get that?"

Tonight we're going to that mystery play in an unknown location. Entry is "by gift" so we're taking a bottle of wine. I still maintain this is just a ploy to lure us into the suburbs and mug us, leaving our bodies in an open grave. Hey, it's art.

In other news, as of today, we (read: the Male) officially own the flat. If we're never heard from again after tonight, feel free to move in, boys.

This is a post about people. And slightly about bathrooms, but mostly about people.

Over the weekend (when John and Jojo were hogging my bathroom... and incidentally, guys, one of you left your shower gel. I'm tempted to blame Jono, because it's pretty purple and so is he, but I think it's probably John's. I'm holding it ransom, in any case. You get three guesses at what I want in return)...

Where was I?

Oh yes, over the weekend I got one of those random out-of-the-blue emails that kinda change your outlook, or at least your day. Because this one was from one of the old-skool. As in, the school that is so old, it's actually high school. Yes, you can flee through three states and change your name (though the change from "Diana" to "Dee" is, I suppose, rather minimal) but there's nowhere to hide from the power of Google.

Melodrama aside, it was actually quite delightful to hear from Phil again (this not being Phil-in-Canberra, who I swear I will email back one of these days, I promise). He helped bring the random to the dreary latter days of formal education, and the power of random is never diminished, not by time or distance. Even if he did go on to study science. What is with you people? And why do I have so many BS friends?

(I'm leaving that sentence just like that. Yep.)

Just another bathroom note to round it all out: I'm never letting a tall person use my shower ever again. Shower head adjustment is the sort of thing a girl should only have to do once in her life. I had it perfect, dammit.

Yesterday I left my notebook at work. Did this worry me? "Fucking freaked" does not even begin to cover it. I was numb with the intensity of my panic. I got stressed when the Male picked it up and opened it. The thought of complete strangers or workmates reading it...

(I just started shaking again at the thought, and had to stroke the recovered notebook to reassure myself. gollumgollum.)

The notebook is where I scribble ideas, jotting, snippets of writing. It's like the creative kettle. I put things in there and wait for them to simmer and bob to the surface and congeal into something edible.

I've never liked people reading over my shoulder as I wrote. In fact, I hate it. I wreak violence upon people who do so. And reading the notebook is worse than that. It's worse than seeing me naked. It's seeing my thoughts, my creativity, naked.

The very idea gives me shudders.

So I dashed out this morning, ran into work and uber-casual-like said: "Oh, I think I might have left my notebook here." And then snatched it up and clutched it to my bosom.

(gollum)

My house is now guest free. The week just gone in twenty words: Lots of guys spending money, getting pissed and watching movies. And there I was, stuck in the middle with an editing assignment. OK, twenty-two words.

It was great. Highlights: Congratulations to John for joining the "fuck-off cool boots" society, you may now continue to associate with me and Jojo; 28 Days Later is brilliant, well-made, and also features a pretty boy covered in blood (which is just how we like them); predictive text prohibits sending messages about pesto ("serum") and, I later found, doesn't like the word "smut" much either.

Also, I ate kangaroo. Not, like, in the wild or anything. In a restaurant.

In other news, I'm considering NaNoWriMoing again this year. Because I'm mad John mentioned it and I'm mad I won't actually be in school in November. Everything seems to finish around the first week of November. Plus, I'm mad I got an idea for it on the way home from work. And, yes, I admit it. I'm mad.

So. Marilyn Manson concert last night. I didn't go.

Fuckses.

Rosie on Tripe J: So if you're heading out to the Manson gig tonight, we'd love to hear from you...
Dee: No we fucking wouldn't, shut the fuck up!

I just got invited to a play being performed at a "secret location" to which inquiring patrons are given a page of directions and a mudmap.

Sometimes I just love this city.

Run, don't walk, to the cinemas. Pirates is the most rollicking, giggling, swashbuckling good time you can have in a cinema. Plus, Johnny Depp so camp he's warping the sexuality field of everything around him. What's not to love?

Witness my decadent lifestyle. I'm sitting here, eating Sara Lee Cookies & Cream and drinking coffee (the former because the Male and I had a binge, the latter because it's still too damn cold to be gaily eating ice cream, even though spring is bouncing around and making me think that I mightn't move to Queensland just yet).

Last night, we ate at the Hard Rock Cafe. On a whim. I love being able to have whims like that. The waiters were my sort of cool, the hickory cheeseburger was a finger-cleanliness disaster, and the next table was full of some posse. It was hilarious. It was the most fun I've had eating out in a long time. So what if they don't do duck. (They don't do fillet mignon either, and big double bonus points to anyone who knows why I was looking for it on the menu.)

I have this horrible feeling that I'm going to fall into some sort of pattern whereby I only update this blog on Monday mornings, while I'm in computer class.

Eep.

On Friday, we went to see The Italian Job. This was possibly a bad idea, because both the Male and I adored the original, but there was nothing else on we wanted to see. So Wahlberg and the unhappy Mr Norton it was.

The movie was mediocre. Extremely mediocre. There are precisely three good moments, though we disagree on what those three are. My three:

1. "There are three things you do not mess with - mother nature, mothers-in-law and motherfrigging Ukrainians."
2. Opening the car door and smacking the motorcyclist. Yes!
3. "I command you to turn left!"

The Male disagrees with the third one, and liked the opening-five-minutes exchange of: "I'm sending you something."/"Does it smell nice?"/"No, it's sparkly."/"Does it have a receipt?"

Quite a bit of fun, but not class. And what a waste of Edward Norton.

The Scar by China Mieville.

So, technically I finished it, in that I turned the last page, read the last word, and realised that the story had come to a conclusion that was somewhat satisfying.

But what the fuck? I mean, that went nowhere. Literally. A motherfrogging huge city puttering around in the middle of the ocean, powered occasionally by something we couldn't see, heading to a place we never reached, contemplating its own navel in poorly-revealed, petty, grubbing politics.

Bad post-modern fantasist. No Hugo!

OK, overreacting ceased, attempting rational thoughts.

The key characters were good. Bellis, Silas, Uther, the Brucolac... all great. Tanner pissed me off, thought, and Shekel. The rest were somehow rising above the everyday, but those two were fairly stock-standard. Bellis was a new iteration of the cynical-bitch heroine (though occasionally just too pansy-assed and oddly insipid), Silas was intriguing, and the Brucolac was that most amazing of things - a vampire that doesn't take over the whole book. Uther was so fucking cool I kept waiting for him to stop being gratuitously cool and start being usefully cool... but it never really happened. I have this niggling urge to call him Uther "Mary Sue" Doul, but that might be being unfair.

The plot, however, was rather mundane spec-fic normality, hidden behind a new sort of setting. What's more, it lacked any sort of really thought-provoking, larger-than-life climax, rather just disappeared up its own fundament and trickled to a halt. (And regarding said setting, it was fun, but I certainly hope China at least bought M John Harrison and the other cyber/steam punk fantasists a beer.) And his writing style really lacked grace, elegance or subtlety. It had loads of confidence, but occasionally that just meant it felt like he was bulling his way through.

But still, better than most. And it was fun. It was an experience. It was not as spectacular, innovative or brilliant as I was lead to believe it might be. Maybe I should have read Perdido Street Station. Maybe one day I will.

Just in case anyone's forgotten, Fellowship of the Ring is a damn good movie. I don't think it's just because I'm a raving fangirl, though that might have something to do with it. It's just solid gold, y'know?

Is it December yet? Surely the calendar goes June, July, August, December.

PS: Cookies are also good.

(Yes, it was another boring fannish week. It's my life.)