Leaf, probably…

I’m clinging to the top of a climbing wall at Fergs on the waterfront. My arms seem to have locked into place - which is a good thing, because I’m tired, and from my last estimate I’m roughly 10,000 meters from the ground.

“Lean back!” Louise is yelling. She’s been saying that for some time now.

She’s easy to ignore all the way up here.

I don’t want to let go of the wall. Perhaps I could climb back down, like spiderman in reverse? I go down half a step, and Louise yells at me again.

Finally I manage to relax my hands and sit back onto the harness. Not too far back, mind, but I’m not clinging to the wall anymore. I’m clinging to the rope.

Louise lowers me and my stomach takes a little longer than everything else to hit the ground.

“That was scary.” I say shaking out my hands.

Louise looks at me like I’m an idiot. “You’re on a rope. I’m not going to drop you.”

“Yeah But I’m scared of heights, and it’s scary leaning back.”

Louise clearly doesn’t get it.

For her the fun bit is whizzing back down to the ground. For me it’s looping the knot before I climb, and the climb itself. My climbs are always slow. I like to think about where my hands and feet are going, and I like to be sure that I’m not going to slip and plunge to the AstroTurf below my feet.

Louise hooks herself onto the ropes, and almost before I’m ready she flings herself up the wall that I just climbed. She gets up it in less time than I did, and casually lets go of the wall, leaning back into her harness with no issues.

I shake my head in wonder. I want to ask ‘What if you fall Louise!?”. I don’t yell out though - I know it will be counterproductive to getting her back onto the ground. Also it would be a really shitty thing for a belayer to say to a friend.

My turn again, and I jump up onto the wall. Two meters up the fear settles itself over my shoulders like a blanket. I shrug it off casually, and stretch to reach my next hold.

As long as I’m going up I’ll be fine.

Ahhh!!! Sex and the City!

Ok, sorry. Had to get that one out there.

So Leslea and I met at Readings before the show. We gulped down a burger from classy McD’s before making our way upstairs. When we got up there - I’m not even joking - we were greeted by a swarming wave of GIRL. Sure there were a few guys up there, but they were the ones in fetal position, at the sides of the room. Most of them evacuated back downstairs until the craziness was over.

The tickets we had procured were from Kinetic Recruitment, sent out to Louise as a thank you for choosing them earlier this year. We felt a little shady about pretending to be Louise, so we slunk by the first wave of friendly recruitment girls.

We found the second wave of recruitment ladies at the door of the theater. I was sure we were about to be thrown out. Around us the other movie goers were greeting their agents and chatting about their new jobs. Instead of throwing us out on our ear, or asking where the heck Louise was, they took our coveted double pass and handed us two cute little Chinese takeaway type boxes full of sweets. Then they ushered us past the pink and white balloons and into the theater.

In the movie theater we were confronted by the third wave of recruiters. They wanted to know if we would like ice cream, and perhaps a bottle of water, or fizzy drink. We did.

The people from Kinetic were genuinely nice (even though they didn’t know us at all) and the ladies were all so excited to see the film. It was catching I think because by the time we got to our seats I was dying to see the film too.

We had a bit of a wait, for all the last minute ladies, and made a game out of counting the boys. There were no more than 11 in a theater of 200, and boy did they all look pleased as punch to be there.

When the movie finally started it exceeded my expectations. Sure in places it was a little over the top, but I had expected downright awful for some reason. It wasn’t. I laughed my butt off in places, and got a little tear in my eye in others. It was a good movie, and enough to make me want to watch all the seasons again (also because I missed the last season!)

I’m not allowed to say too much - or anything - because Stace, Louise and Karlie will all shoot me, but the movie has a lot of raunch.

Also… you see penis… There I said it… This movie is going to be the new Wild Things.

(If you’ve ever been a teenage girl, in a room full of teenage girls watching Kevin Bacon in that movie you know what I mean.)

Despite my assertion that the weekend was going to suck, it didn’t.

I got my exam done, and that pretty much sucked. The rest was pretty awesome.

I went to Leslea’s birthday party on Friday night. She had mini slices on one of those cute three tiered cake things. There was also mudcake from the chocolate cake company, and many cocktails. Has anyone tried Fejoa vodka and Chi, with a squeeze of lime? It’s my new favourite thing. It tastes just like fejoa.

Karlie, Louise and I brought Leslea the Dirty Dancing special anniversary DVD, and the workout DVD. Leslea’s partner, Damon, saw them and wept. With happiness no doubt. I know he’s been dying to do that workout tape for some time now, we’ve just made his dearest dreams come true.

When it came time to leave we realised that I - true to form - had checked the wrong bus timetable. So we walked to Kilbirnie and caught a taxi.

On Saturday Louise, Karlie an I went to the zoo and Karlie photographed anything that moved - and plenty of things that didn’t. She has a new camera, and was super excited about it. You could take a gander at her photos here if you were so inclined…

After that we went for a very late lunch at Kallais in Newtown. It’s a bit dodgy looking on the outside, but the inside is a totally different story. We all ate too much, especially considering we had an early dinner at One Red Dog to go to.

Chris piled us all into his car, and took us out to his place where we met a goat called Buster. Karlie took photos and bonded. Did you know that Karlie daydreams about owning a heard of goats and making goats cheese for a living? No? Well she does.

One Red Dog was good, but then Pizza is always good.

Cats was amazing. I went with Louise, Becks, and Becks’ two flatmates. I got us seats WAY up in the gallery, and off to the side, so we missed all the action in the front right hand corner of the stage. There was enough action on the rest of the stage for me not to give a damn.

I had goose bumps the entire time, it was that great.

Then Louise and I went home and attempted to recreate the magic for Karlie. We would have succeeded too, except Louise wasn’t half as good as me at pretending to be a fat cat. I forgive her though, because she did attempt to sing, and not everyone can be as fabulous as me at this sort of thing. Neither of us attempted to do the splits, and that was probably for the best.

The rest of my weekend was spent eating roast pork, and slaving over the stupid 1000 piece black and white puzzle that I bought from the Salvation Army ages ago. Is anyone out there considering buying a black and white puzzle? Because you shouldn’t. Colours are what make these sorts of things fun. Also… you know… possible.

Why did wordpress log me out while I was in the middle of a love letter to M&M dark chocolate candies?

It doesn’t matter I guess. It’s just that given my well known aversion to work, I’ll never write that post again - and that’s a real pity considering it’s you guys who miss out on reading about the “crunch of candy between my teeth”, and the “delicious, slightly bitter, chocolate after taste”, and how I am a Very Big Fan of M&M’s dark chocolate.

Oh well. Console yourselves because I’m moving on to a new topic.

It’s not quite as interesting as the M&M’s dark chocolate love letter, but then not very many things are more interesting than reading someone elses mail. Especially when it contains details of a sordid love affair.

My backup topic today? The stench in the number 22 bus from Uni yesterday.

It’s not just a stench. It’s a stench. A urine scented stench.

Are you all gagging yet? Because I was, for the entire 11.58 minutes it took to get to the bus stop closest to my work.

In honour of the stench I put together a short poem. I say ’short’ because it’s generally quite terrible, and I don’t like to drag punishment on longer than it needs to be.

This bus smells like pee.

This seat is squishy
if I could move, I would.
Fat sob on my left
has wedged me in real good.

Excuse the terribleness of my poem (Is it too short to actually be classified a poem? Maybe) I wrote it on the bus, while attempting to free my thigh from underneath a very large lady’s butt overflow.

Or I have a haiku version. I’ve never written a haiku before, so you’re going to have to excuse this one too.

this bus smells like pee;
breath frigidly through your mouth.
I wish we could wait

Did you know that haiku’s aren’t actually done in syllables? They’re supposed to be written on the sound counts (when a new sound it introduced). I dont know how to figure those out properly, but I took a guess that in this case it’s the same as the syllables. (An example that isn’t the same? syllables: Hai-ku sound count: Ha-i-ku. Get it? No? Me neither.)

Also Haiku’s generally have mention of the season they were written in there somewhere… Lets just call the word ‘frigidly’, in mine, a reference to winter. Ok? Ok. Good.

So the moral of the story? If wordpress hadn’t picked 10 minutes ago to sign me out without warning, you wouldn’t have had to read bad poetry about a bus that smells like pee.

Otherwise known as the day I got caught looking at my belly in the ladies bathroom, and taking a good gander down my top at my desk.

Confused? I’ll explain.

I was in the bathroom washing my hands, as you do, and I noticed something. Or to be exact I didn’t notice something. So I lifted up the bottom of my shirt to take a look.

Either my jeans are super super flattering, or the lighting in that bathroom is amazing, because my tummy looked nice and flat - like curvy-flat, not flat-flat.

I was basking in the flattering light and admiring my curvy-flat tummy when the door opened and a lady walked in. I pulled my shirt down, and she slid into the first available stall looking a little bemused. I almost told her that the light was super flattering at the sink I was at, but some days you need to rein in the crazy in order to not scare strangers.

I wear my hair down most days, and I tend to molt. So when I noticed my boobs were itchy I figured that I had a hair down my top because it happens all the freaking time - and wow is it annoying.

So instead of sticking my hand down my top to fish around, because that would have been weird looking, I pulled my top out and took a good look around… Then I stuck my hand down there to have a fish around…

Before I could find the source of the itch one of the old delivery dudes appeared at the door with an armful of papers.

Now fishing around in my cleavage is going to have to be added to the list of things I shouldn’t be doing in the office. The things I do just to seem normal at the office…

So I was looking at my stat’s this morning, and I realised a few things. First, this blog has been active since 16 August 2007.

In that time I have written 234 posts. Roughly 233 of those posts were about a Very Important Subject; namely me. You guys don’t seem to mind that so much though, because I’ve had 1,725 comments, also all about me, or the stuff I’m interested in.

In total this site has had 16,630 views - most of which from people looking for “vomit porn”, “pumpkin boobs”, “leaf porn”, and “smokin hot dive babes”. One of my posts mentioning 3 out of 4 of those things has 524 views alone. I expect this post to top that.

Today is a little different. This post is about the fact that I know it’s all about me, and my activities, and my friends, and my house, and the stuff I whine about. And I also know that can get a teeny tiny little bit repetitive.

So today I’m giving you the opportunity to tell me something about you.

What do you like doing in your spare time? What have you done recently to embarrass yourself in public? What really annoys the crap out of you? Would you like to take this chance to whine about something? anything at all? Would you like to tell me about something you’ve eaten recently? Or all about someone you know?

Well now is the time. Comment away. Spill the beans. Hijack my blog for your own nefarious purposes.

Just don’t you get used to it though, because tomorrow’s a new day, and it’s back to being all about me, me, ME. As it should be.

I wen’t to Taekwon-Do last night. Just like I do every Monday and Thursday night.

And just before I tell you this main story about what happened last night, I need to preface with a few facts:

• I don’t like blood.
• I don’t like the thought of blood, even.
• Once when I was in primary school the local youth gang representative stapled himself in the finger while he was threatening the teacher with the stapler. I went white, the world got all underexposed and hazy, I threw up all over the place, and got to go home with Mum.

So last night at Taekwon-Do We split into two teams for team sparring.

One team picks a person for the ring, an the other counters. We were down to the second to last pair, the black belts, and they went pretty hard out on each other. 10 seconds before time was up one took an unexpected hard hit to the face.

He dropped to the ground, and was clearly in a lot of pain. I felt all the blood rush from my face. He hyperventilated, and a thin line of cold sweat appeared on my hairline. The black belts helped him off the mat and into recovery position at the side of the room.

The instructor came back to the mats and called for everyone to gather round. He explained that while accidents do happen safety is of the up-most importance to everyone in the dojang. He told us how most of the black belts had first aid certificates.

Everything looked a bit underexposed and hazy.

The instructor reiterated that that sort of thing was highly unlikely to ever happen to us, at our levels, because they simply wouldn’t allow it. The instructor asked if anyone had any issues with what they had seen. When he was sure everyone was ok, the class move on to learning sparring combos.

I excused myself to go to the bathroom.

I leaned over the sink with my wrists under the cold water and hung my head down to get some blood back into it. Then I went out and plonked myself down against a wall and drank some water. It only took a few minutes for me to come right, so I joined back into the sparring.

At the end of class the instructor came up and said that he was sorry I missed my go in the ring after the accident. I mentioned that I was weird about blood and stuff - even though there was no blood. I couldn’t explain my reaction to my satisfaction. I think he may have misunderstood me because he said that this sort of thing just plain old wouldn’t be allowed to happen at my level.

I was curious as to exactly what had set me off. And exactly why, So I gave my imaginary therapist a call (I have her on speed dial.)

So, someone got hurt sparring today?

Yeah. He was ok later on. I think, it was just a hell of a shock to the system and he needed a bit of help. Someone mentioned something about possible concussion.

I understand you didn’t do so well with watching that?

No I needed to sit down, and cool off. It happens a lot when I cut myself, or when other people get hurt. I’m really bad in the kitchen with knives and cutting myself because I just can’t deal with blood.

So it’s blood that sets you off?

Yup.

But there was no blood.

Maybe it was the suggestion of blood.

The suggestion of blood was enough to set you off?

There might have been blood. He could have broken his nose… At any moment blood could have started pouring out.

Or maybe it’s just the fact that I don’t like the idea of someone being hurt. All I know is I see a person in extreme unexpected pain and it’s scary, and I need to sit down so I don’t fall down. Or throw up.

Is it because You’re worried about it happening to you?

Not particularly.

So not at all?

Maybe a tiny bit. But that’s not the bit that makes me all light headed and fainty. I don’t like watching people get hurt.

So why are you doing Taekwon-Do then if you don’t like watching people get hurt? You know there’s always the chance that something will go wrong - there’s even the chance that you’re going to hurt someone.

I know that they take a lot of precautions in the dojang, and at the end of the day, it is a physical sport and accidents happen. And yeah I’m really worried I’m going to hurt someone one day. But at this stage mostly what I’m doing is so ineffective that it’s more likely I’ll hurt myself.

Or accidentally kick someon in the balls because I don’t lift high enough in some kicks. I’m very paranoid about that. Once my brother chased me through the house with a knife because I kicked him in the balls.

It was so effective at stopping him from being a little shit, that I’ve been scared to do it again until I really need to.

Seriously you kicked him in the balls? And your parents didn’t ground you for life?

Yeah I had anger issues back then. That’s not the point of this phone call though. We were talking about how I understand that accidents can and will happen.

Right, of course.

So you understand that something could go wrong, and yet when it happens you still get fainty and need to sit down? I’m not sure I understand your logic.

I know. It’s freaking weird, and I’m not sure there’s actually all that much logic involved. Here I’ll simplify it:

Taekwon-Do is physical, there is always the small chance that someone could be hurt, it’s a fact of life. I’m cool with it.

When people get hurt they make scary sounds, and there may be blood. I’m not cool with that. In fact a lot of the time I’m so not cool with it that I have to sit down and visualise my happy place with a cold bottle of water on the back of my neck.

It matters very little to me how the blood got there, the fact that there is blood is enough to make me want to throw up.

Right, blood… But you’re a woman… What happens when…

It’s unpleasant, but it’s fine. It kind of has to be fine otherwise I’d be fucking screwed right?

Right. Sorry I know it’s not a professional question to ask, you know me being your therapist and all…

I know… it’s just the first question that pops into everyone’s head when they find out how weird I get over cuts and stuff.

Kat’s birthday was this Saturday (happy birthday Kat) and I went into town to help her celebrate.

We had mexican food (mmm), sangrea (mmm), and beer (mmm). Jeri and Becks were there and we had a good gossip, about work, boys, life, families, and who’s body we would like, and what we’d do with it (wander round in bikini tops and short skirts. All bikini, all day.)

I had more alcohol this weekend than I have had in months, and it was fine, mostly. I got home around 2am (which is also the latest night I’ve had in months…)

When I finally got into the house - stupid sticky door - I dropped most of my belongings as I walked up the stairs. I then made some more mexican food to eat on the couch while atempting to sober up a wee bit before bed. I dropped a laptop on a pile of plates (the noise was at about the same level as a bomb going off next door. Sorry flatmates!) Then I went to bed and slept till mid day.

Now I cannot find my keys. Or the stockings I wore out to town.

I’m more concerned about the keys.

When I was thinking about what I wanted to post today I came up with an idea. Actually I didn’t come up with it, so much as it was whispered to my by the little voice in the back of my head you know the voice?

It’s the one that makes inappropriate suggestions during meetings. It’s the voice that pipes up, right while you’re being reprimanded. And it’s the voice that always has something a little snarky to say to the person in a position of power

Anyway.

Today the little voice thought that perhaps I should have a little fun, and share with you all a few of my most embarrassing cringe worthy moments. I mean, I’d only be telling the entire internet, right?

For some reason I ran with it. As I was jotting them down I saw something in common with all of them.

It was the little voice. The one that assured me I was making the right decision. The voice that thought it would be so hilarious, or make me so popular if I just took this course of action…

Example one:

Like the time when I was 11 and I wrote notes to my older cousin pretending to be a friend of the family. The voice assured me it would be hilarious.

‘They’re going to laugh so hard!’ the voice crowed. I listened nodding in agreement. Of course they would. It was funny.

When the notes were discovered my cousin went right to her parents. The adults all read the notes and agreed: he needed to be talked to. I sat there horrified that they were taking them seriously, I mean, they were a joke. They were funny right?!

It turns out they were not funny. They were creepy, and horrifying, and awful. I wanted to crawl into a cave and hide under a rock so that I could cringe into a tiny stone sized ball. Better yet, I wanted to go to my room and pretend I had no idea who had written them.

‘You should just leave it all up to him to take the blame.’ The voice said wisely. ‘If he had written them, he would deny it, so it’s not like they’ll believe him.’

I took a good hard look at my conscience and realised that I couldn’t let my friend hang for my crimes. My stupid not funny badly thought out crimes.

I also realised that the notes were written in my handwriting and on my heart shaped kitten writing pad - it seemed that this voice of mine wasn’t actually that smart.

I confessed to my Dad later that day, and spent approximately 11 years trying to forget how shamefully, cringingly, awful I was. Now the memory is back in Technicolor… *cringe*

Example two:

More recently, there was the time I got drunk and listened to the voice. I was pleasantly fuzzy, and warm, and enjoying the night, so when the little voice mentioned that perhaps this would be the best time to get a few things of my chest I didn’t immediately discount the idea.

‘You know what?’ I thought hazily ‘perhaps the voice is right. I should let everyone know how I really feel. It’s bound to impress them and make me much more popular.’

What I chose to get off my chest was the fact that I thought one of our flatmates was a total whore cow bitch. This of course would be the same flatmate I had pretended to be best mates with, knowing that she could be a little difficult to live with if we weren’t on side, and the same flatmate who was sitting well within hearing distance.

She heard it all, and from all accounts, I didn’t hold back.

When someone finally managed to get it into my alcohol infused brain what I’d done, I decided I’d fix it.

The little voice concurred ‘you’ve always been excellent at smoothing over conflict’ it said. Again I listened.

I weaved my way out to the lounge, where my flatmate was stewing, plonked myself down on a couch, and tried my legendary diplomatic skills. Only it seemed they weren’t so legendary, because she definitely was not impressed. In fact I believe she called me a two faced bitch.

Flat relations were somewhat strained until she finally left the house.

*cringe*

I totally accept that my trashy two faced bitch seems to be on show when I have cheap vodka in my system, but I’m sure it wouldn’t have reached the epic heights of cringe-worthyness it did if the voice hadn’t been there whispering and nudging away at me.

Conclusion:

That voice of mine, the one that pipes up every so often with a suggestion? Boy am I glad I stopped feeding it cheap vodka.

Now I only have to worry about all the other times it pops up with a totally hilarious suggestion that will make you so popular!

Have you ever done anything shockingly stupid, as a direct result of listening to the little voice at the back of your head? I want details…

My Mini Grading went ok I think (hope).

Us white belts got called up after a whole bunch of higher belts, which gave us an awesome opportunity to take a look at all the do’s and don’ts.

When we were called up we ran through some blocking, punching, kicking, and stances. We ran through our fundamental patterns, and I didn’t screw up in any big way. Then we got asked a few theory questions. I’m pretty confident with my answers, but I couldn’t say who the founder of Taekwon Do was (for anyone interested: General Choi Hong Hi.)

To be honest It was all over pretty quickly. I hope I kept my back heel on the floor, and my forearm blocks at shoulder height - it’s all a bit hazy… And I guess I’ll find out in the next few days.