Earlier in the week I posted on my dear wall-o-FB that I was on a ‘Very Hot Dinner Date’. I apologise to all those housing secret crushes (male or female – because I don’t judge – that don’t exist) out there who took this seriously, as it was merely a play on words. My friend Spugs required very hot Indian food to clear out his sinuses. The upside of this? Getting awesome Indian food. The downside? It wasn’t ‘Very Hot’ at all. It barely even registered on the spice scale. I’m going to request that they aim to kill me with spice next time around, otherwise it’s just not going to do the trick. Taking a restaurant to task over the lack of near-deathly levels of spice may very well be the biggest and simultaneously useless nitpick I’ve ever undertaken.
This led to Spugs and I sharing an awkward date-like moment where I commented that the spice was nowhere near satisfying enough, and he responded with, “I was going to say something, but I wasn’t sure if that was just me.” And then we both looked bitterly disappointed, like someone just took a crap right in the middle of the table. Stay tuned for ‘Very Hot Dinner 2: Electric Vindaloo’.
But part of the motivation behind posting something intentionally fake was twofold. One, far too many people treat what is posted on Facebook as gospel. Two, I’m a smartarse who likes to stir my very small and limited pot occasionally. What I find curious about the evolution of social media is how often people these days are using Tweets as a viable or credible source of information. The phrase, “Someone Tweeted that…” is quickly storming up my very own shit list.
Nanowrimo has kicked off for another year and I’m nowhere to be seen inamongst the action. I signed up to try it out once and I think I managed to write about 2,000 words before I got bored with my story and returned to procrastination and not writing. Those of you doing it this year I wish all the best to. Unfortunately the most writing I’ll get done this month is exam-based. Poo to that. I plead that four exams and working full-time is enough to justify not writing a novel in a month.
My road trip, however, will provide me with an opportunity to write a hell of a lot. I’m even considering purchasing a mini tape recorder as I’ll be driving the entire time. For whatever reason, I’ve always wanted one, even if it was only to record random thoughts that popped into my head. The practicality of me owning a mini tape recorder was always relative to how close I was to becoming a private detective. Something to investigate (slightly intentional pun), that’s for sure.
Other things happened this week. A horse won a race and this was important to some. A fame-mongering slattern skipped town and this was also important for some reason. She also had some sort of sham marriage, it seems. I could launch into a rant about how little I care about celebrity gossip, but that would actually require stirring up passionate, emotive language. In the end, this would disprove the initial point I was trying to make.
By the way, if you Google ‘fame-mongering’ a reference to the very person I’m talking about pops up as the first example. When the whole Internet is aware of the value you actually present to the world at large, one should probably take heed of this.
Back to the road trip briefly, one of the places we are staying at called me to inform me that a primary school had booked out the entire backpackers section of their residence. This meant, however, that we received an upgrade to their hotel free of charge. I was tempted to push for free breakfast as well, but considering we’re now staying in much nicer digs for half the cost, I figured I should quit while I’m ahead.
Other highlights of the week include…
- Catching up with a cousin I hadn’t seen in some time due to her work commitments with a big ‘ol family dinner.
- Watching a ridiculous amount of television that I actually wanted to watch.
- Seeing a friend I hadn’t managed to see in the past two months or so due to my insane levels of busy.
- Receiving my final internal marks back for another subject that I was slightly worried about, only to find out I rocked it.
- 30-minute gym session during a lunch break at work – leg press, 600M run, chest press, 500M row, assisted chin-ups, push-ups 7kg medicine ball squats and a 2-minute plank to top it off. Looking into custom designing a workout this week.
- That awkward moment when foreboding classical music is playing while you’re sitting in a dentist’s chair awaiting treatment.
- Watching people’s shock and awe upon finding out that Oreos are vegan.
- Turning a craptacular end to a work day into a wonderful evening on Lygon Street with great company and great food.
And then came the day that I was awake for 23 hours. I didn’t wake up knowing this would be the case, but sometimes you just gotta roll with where a day takes you. Getting up at 5am to help out a friend with a lift to work led to arriving at work 30 minutes early. After finishing work at 3pm, I had made plans to catch up with a friend who’s currently working on his PhD in the city. By 5:30pm, I’d met up with a friend from Sydney who was visiting Melbourne for the weekend and her friend who is due to return to Tokyo after five years in Sydney. Red shoes = a free glass of moet, apparently. Alas, I do not own a pair of red shoes, but my companions did.
We ended up at the Portland Hotel (or the James Squire Brewhouse – make up your mind, silly location!) where another good friend of mine was and drinking solidly from 6-9pm. At this stage we decided to get some food. Upon arriving at ye olde trusty, Shanghai Village, a chance encounter outside with another good friend of mine led to man hugs and renditions of John Cougar’s ‘I Need a Lover’, including the backing vocals, no less. I have verified that he was John Cougar when he performed ‘I Need a Lover’, not John Mellencamp and not John Cougar Mellencamp, because the devil is in the details with that kind of stuff, people. Not that mistakenly quoting said information could cause something to become undone at a later stage… But you never know. Potential re-tellings of this story have now been proofed to hold up against random music buffs.
After two bottles of wine (!) and a random shared dinner with an American guy, Alex, and further recipients of two bottles of Kirin after the large group of guys at the table next to us got booted for throwing a dumpling, we’d hit 11pm.
Reconvening with man hugs and John Cougar took place at the Imperial, where more alcohol was consumed until approximately midnight.
Midnight until 3am was spent at a karaoke bar on Bourke Street singing all manner of random power ballads (Including some Robert Palmer, I believe) and I even struck up and quickly shut down a rendition of The Carpenter’s version of ‘Close to You’. Prior to this night, I had made a vow that I would not partake in karaoke until I had undertaken some singing lessons as I felt that I had done my part in causing pain to enough ears over the past three years. My apologies go out to my fellow karaoke singers, but drunken Paul = open to suggestions Paul.
If that isn’t a good introduction to Melbourne, I don’t know what is. I can’t recall the last time that I was awake for 23 hours straight, though… Probably once when I was 11 or 12 years old at a friend’s sleepover party where we stayed up all night playing ‘Nightmare’, that VHS-controlled board game where you had 60 minutes to defeat The Gatekeeper, or this guy…
..and he would yell at you at random times throughout the game and ask you to respond, which had no bearing on the actual game because it wasn’t like it could HEAR you. Back to the future!
Getting home at 4am, slightly more sober than I was a few hours earlier, did not bode well for the fact that I had work at 10am.
I managed to get there and barely survive the day, only to try and carry on and party at a friend’s housewarming in Collingwood. Unfortunately, by 8:15pm, I hit the wall and headed home to get some much-needed and well-earned sleep.
And now it’s time to stick my faces into some books and get some damn study done.
Oh my God! I loved Nightmare. My cousin had all the supplementary packs. One of them was a witch who made you whisper, “Mea culpa Anne!” at the television frequently. The eighties have a lot of explaining to do.
PS. You wasted a good dumpling?!
Haha. It was so cheesy, but so much fun. And I’m pretty sure as 10-11 year old kids, we called him ‘Gaykeeper’ all the time, because it was hilarious to do so.
No, no! It was the table beside us. There was about nine guys with a slab of Kirin and a goon bag. They managed to get through most of it and then decided to throw a dumpling. To get asked to leave Shanghai Village is when you know you’re in for a big night.