Wot I bin watchin on da box

The usual ABC dross. News, 7.30 Report, The Bill, Australian Story, Catalyst, Foreign Correspondent, Gardening Australia (odd, since I don't have one), Collectors (don't have old stuff anymore, except the b/f), never miss Media Watch (usually watch it on the PC) and Stateline. I have broken my New Years resolution and missed Landline a couple of times.

R corrupts to me to commercial TV, with All Saints, Greys Anatomy, Seven's six o'clock news and Today Tonight. I still refuse to watch Ugly Betty. I corrupted myself by becoming hooked on Desperate Housewives. I just love it. I want to marry Gabrielle and have Bree as my mother.

R also likes a show called Deal or No Deal. I have seen it many times and I still don't understand how it works. Bring back Graham, Noeline, Noel and Ugly Dave in Blankety Blanks please. Not that I watched that often.

This is only meaningful to those who are devoted to ABC tv and radio. Weekend news and Stateline presenter Kathy Bolan is great on tv. She was awful when she was on radio. Sounded so harsh. Whereas I don't like Ali Moore much on Lateline Business, she was fabulous when she filled in on ABC Melbourne radio.

Quite a few years ago, at home alone, I watched Cape Fear, the nineties remake. It was the most edge of my seat movie I have ever seen. (The Birds was a contender, as was The Exorcist)

Most tv shows don't do that for me, but Spooks from the BBC certainly does. You cannot sit at your pc futzing and watch it, you must just sit and watch it and concentrate. It is gripping. Interestingly, from vague memory, filming of this series we are now seeing was wrapped up a day near the day of the London bombings. It was held for a while and then the terrorists were changed from Muslims to Jews.

I never watch daytime tv, although I break this rule for something I have taped and R does not want to watch it. I catch an occasional bit of daytime tv when a tape is rewinding, such as Judge Judy. What a harriden she is.

I suppose the implausibly name Rupert Penry-Jones (pictured) is the star of Spooks. He is hot as. Perhaps I could have a threesome with him and Gabrielle? Maybe I will just watch.

Gimme some old Razzle Dazzle

Yeah the movie Razzle Dazzle. Went nowhere really but what a cast and what acting. Kerry Armstrong is superb.

Cast list in order of pics:
Kerry Armstrong
Noeline Brown
Barry Crocker AM
Toni Lamond AM
Ben Miller
Nadine Garner
Tara Morice
(Later addition, Denise Roberts and all formatting has now been screwed)

Someones partner's birthday

It was the usual get together of thirteen or so at the usual dodgy venue, the Balaclava Hotel.

I don't know what will happen when the anti smoking laws regarding pubs start this year. Dame M is in a quandry. We think it will be a good opportunity to to change to another venue, as we are well over it.

Brigthon Antique dealer was in fine form. We have met her younger sister a few times. She is very nice.

BAD: She did not speak to me for many years. She said I used to dink her around on my bike and make her wait for ages while I did things. I can't recall that, except at the bike shop. I used to spend hours in the bike shop. (insert sniggering from audience) Stop it, I was only eight or ten. Also I used to get things from the shops and just tell them that my (well known locally) father would pay, and he did. He never did that for my sister when she got to the age I was then. I am not sure why. She was not very gratefull for all the bike dinks I gave her. I think she was jealous.

R received a few bottles of liquid refreshment, great cards and a glass paperweight that comes apart and you can insert a small photo and it enlarged by the glass. I will look very fine in it sitting on the desk.

Tunnel Trouble

As tragic as Melbourne's tunnel accident was, this is one tunnel I really would avoid.........or maybe it the drivers who you would need to avoid.

What a day

I really know how to choose my day off. Not really, it is just one of my days off for the week.

I left the aircon on last night and as well as sleeping extra well, it was lovely and cool to get up to when it was 27 deg (80F) outside in the early morning. Over the day the temperature climbed to just on 37 deg (98F). Bit unusual for late March. It is supposed to be Autumn.

After futzing at the pc for a couple of hours, eating, showering and dressing, I was off shopping at around ten. Just before I left I heard that the City Link tunnels were about to close.

A neighbour in the lift was heading off to his house in Mount Eliza via his cardiologist. Not going on City Link are you, I asked. No, he replied.

By time I arrived at the shops in the car, there were reports of a massive accident in one of the City Link tunnels and the other had been closed to evacuate people by foot as there had been an explosion and fire. Smoke was pouring from the ventilation stacks at South Bank and Richmond. Three plus were killed.

By the time I was home the disaster was becoming clearer. Gallery here and here.

Then workmen ruptured a high pressure gas pipe just off Glenferrie Road, Malvern. Trains on the Pakenham, Dandenong and Frankston line had to be stopped as did the Kew to the City via St Kilda tram. Glenferrie Road remained closed for hours.

I had plenty to do at home and only ventured out again to across the road for coffee. I ran into a neighbour who had just come from the city and she said the police were at Flinders Street controlling the crowds who were waiting for trams that were not arriving, no doubt due to the traffic congestion caused by the closure of the tunnels and the Glenferrie Road gas leak.

Fires were starting up in various outer Melbourne areas because of the wind and weather.

A truck on fire on a major country freeway.

A dust storm in Colac.

What a disaster of a day. It was interesting to listen to everything as it unfolded on the radio and the online newspapers as the day went on. The Age, after a slow initial and more cautious start, soon caught up the Herald Sun and overtook them in the tunnel accident coverage.

I also got a lot done at home, furniture moved and vacuumed under, skirting boards cleaned, ironing, etc etc. Quite and satisfying day and an interesting one as well.

Suduko

I have heard plenty about Suduko and Itried to ignore it. A workmate left an almost completed Suduko puzzle from a newspaper lying aroung and I looked at and could not understand it. There was a web address included, so I had a look see.

I then understood Suduko.

Another workmate caught me looking at the back page of The Age and suggested we turn back a page and have a go at Suduko.

He gave me a quick personal, as against web site, understanding and it was quite fun. I did some more of it later, but I made an error somewhere and could not be bothered any more. It was labelled a hardish one.

I struggle keeping up with basic newpapers and mags. When would I have time for Suduko. (Perhaps I should spend less time writing blog posts?)

So now I understand Suduko and if you like doing them, I now understand why.

Nice Neighbours

Neighbours of ours, a couple, have a property in Yea. I have a vague idea of the direction of Yea, but that is the extent of my Yea knowledge.

I first met her on the stairwell when the building's fire alarm went off not long after we moved here. She must have seen potential in me or us and invited us onto the body corp committee at an AGM soon after. Apart from them both being loopy about some things to do with the building, I admire her. She is more tenatious with council or any department than I am. While she may have some ridiculous thoughts, she won't let go and has benefited this building and the area very muchly.

They spend most weekends at Yea and as an aside once she said that we should come up and visit them and see the place.

It has become more pointed now. She sent an email specifically inviting us up on a Sunday for arvo tea or similar. Sunday before was The Patch, last Sunday I worked, this Sunday, something on too. We will go, but it can be hard to find the time.

Not speaking for R, but it made me feel quite good to be invited. They are nice people.

Shocky Shocky. Work place safety

R and I were sitting in an el cheapo breakfast location in St Kilda Road yesterday. Five dollar bacon and egg sandwich and decentish coffee included. Look at that, I remarked. Stopped because of traffic lights was a Jim's Electric Tagging Service van. What isn't this Jim's Mowing guy into? Just about everything it would seem, including born again religion. Not a bad effort for someone who started off mowing lawns though.

For your information, many if not all workplaces need to have all their electrical appliances and tools checked by and electrician at regular intervals.

The sight of this van led R onto a rant about his workplace, which he is managing at the moment. It seems his type of workplace is being targeted by the inspectors and they have given him a hard time over a couple of matters. These matters were solved by updated information from the workplace's cleaning contractors.

Last night there was a body corp committee meeting and of course R attended.

I recently read a piece in the paper about the making of a Bollywood movie at Docklands.

Wasn't the tv show about the building of the Sydney Harbour Bridge fascinating?

Now, to tie all the above together.

Workplace safety, especially in large workplaces, can seem onerous and silly at times. But in my workplace, I know some of the seemingly mundane and irritating workplace safety regs that have saved people from being injured.

How many people get electrocuted at their workplace. Now, zilch I think.

During the making of the Bollywood movie, as reported in the paper, the Indian technicians and lighting wallahs ran away yelling shocky shocky when a brief rain shower happened. It had to be explained to them that no shocky shocky in Ozland.

During the committee a sometimes painful member of the body corp committee was banging on and on about emergency procedures in the building, in the the light of my locked in the lift experience. The body corp manager told her that she had no idea how much protection from fire there is in high rise buildings. There is not a chance in hell that you will burn.

In the tv program about the bridge, 16 construction workers died while building the bridge. There was a terrifying image of a worker hand feeding steel sheets into a press in the factory in England that supplied the steel for the bridge.

Yeah, we can quite comfortably sit back and moan on about occupational health and safety rules, building regulations and costs etc etc, and the over protection and and nanny state but the rules did not just fall out of the sky. We don't die in highrise building fires, we are not electrocuted at work, we don't have our hands inches from a metal press all set to be crushed and we don't fall off a 100 metre plus tall structure into Sydney Harbour.

Letter from a friend update

Mercboi. I can't say precisely what I wrote. It was jumble of words, some of which I carefully considered but mostly just ran out of my fingers. He won't respond. He just needed some reassurance that there is life for a gay after 35.

just dont seem to have any other interests in life outside of their self adoration and their committment to gay night life. David, this is true about him I guess but I would not say he is an excessive goer outer. And in Australia, we don't have the culture of just normal pubs where you might gather a few nights a week for a drink with whoever is around or mates. A gay pub pretty well has to have shows to survive, although there are one or two exceptions. Clubbing is the thing and I don't think they smoke much or drink much, except water. They do take lots of other stuff though and not much point going before midnight. Pleased to hear you are holding up ok. I am not.

Jah Teh, his personality is just so gay, I cannot imaging him not being. A bit of mature age sophistication has it all over a plastic fantastic. I agree, but you and I are seeing it from a different perspective. One of his nicks used to be PlaStiC.

Jo, thanks for the opportunity to say what I think rather than try to paint a good picture. But our changing physical experience as we get older, is hard for most people, no? Or do gay men prize youth and beauty above all else? They do, and I do too. It is rammed down our throats (pun intended) daily through gay media and the net. But for me this only extends to basic sex and a handbag and I think that it is much the same for other older gays. Of course it makes it harder for gay men once they are over a certain age when youth is so prized. Many widen their horizons to other ethnicities where they can still meet youngish people. Some just like other ethnicities.

Changing physical appearance is not great for anyone, but yes harder for gay people. We have all heard about how a woman becomes invisible after a certain age. That is, how guys stop noticing them. That is me now in the gay world, the invisible woman. I accept that.

As for your mother's friend, I am trying to think of a gay couple who have successfully got together at the age of 40 or more, and I cannot. I don't hold much hope for him getting a life partner, but then one advantage of being gay is friends and f*** buddies, and sometimes they can be both. I quite like this break down of the traditonal style relationship and I do know that this can work even until people are quite old.

The real reason I could not give him a really meaningful response was that I grew in a different time. It was not like that for me. While it was not quite the checked shirt and tight jeans era (slap your face Jah Teh), it was pretty close and you either dressed similarly to that or were over the top efem. There was no muscle culture at all that I recall.

All this thinking is doing my head in. It is probably clear via my blog that I don't think much. Maybe more on the subject some time. I'll just round off with the last words in my second email in response to my friend.

Anyway, don't worry about it so much. You will automatically adjust your mindset and adapt. And don't forget, you'll aways be lalala years younger than me bitch.

This week's flowers

Nothing like some bright red gladdies to cheer the mood.

The Landline

Our phones are cordless except for the one next to my bed. While you get used to cordless phones, when I used the landline this morning I noticed how crystal clear the sound of the voice is when the sound travels only through wires.

The phone next to my bed gets used once in a blue moon and that is to ring into work to inform them that I am unwell and I am unable to come to work.

So yes, I used the phone this morning to ring in sick. I felt much better an hour later. Should I have called back and said I will come to work after all?

Does anyone seriously think I would do that?

Danger. Stay away.

Stop laughing, this is getting serious. It is a dangerous corner.

Letter from a friend

It is an email actually from my friend in Sydney. How nice it would be to receive a letter. He is all of thirty one. I dont really have any wise words for him, but I will make something up. He is totally obsessed with his appearance and has turned from when I first met him from a slim cute pretty boy to a handsome muscle hunk. I kinda liked the old him more. Although he is the same person, I just feel so totally out of my league to the point where I would not inflict myself on him in public. (What is the connection between that hot guy that old queen?) But that is not to do with how he behaves towards me.

Note the bit about me being overly cautious, not sure where that came from, but perhaps it is correct.

I got a question..

As you got out of your 20's and on in years how did you mentally deal with ageing?

I mean for example how did you sort of come to terms that you won't be what "gay society" likes in a youth orientated culture?

I mean now I look thru DNA and see these f***ing twinks in their early-mid 20's and think...f*** that's amazing.

Yes, through plastic surgery (as you know i had a temple lift, dermal fillers and i'm getting an endoscopic mid face lift done soon to lift my cheeks back to 19 again), I've managed to stave off the years probably so I pass for early to mid 20's.

I still get my ID checked at clubs sometimes, but it's getting more and more difficult for me to maintain this illusion and one day I'm going to be past it and feel like I'm on the scrap heap and it's driving me nuts. I almost feel terminally ill.

I guess I don't know that many guys who I can talk to you like I can talk to you.

You seem to understand me a bit better.

I mean you're very overly cautious about things...as you are with everything which is just how you are but you always manage to put things in a way that makes sense to me.

I don't know if this has come out the right way actually, I hope it hasnt' offended.

I mean I'm just looking for some pointers basically.

Hope I'm not overstepping the mark by asking.

Men

I have had a play around with Highrisers's Celebs, that is pics of famous guys I like or have liked in the past and uploaded thier pics to my account. I have not looked at the site for months and I notice some have been deleted, probably because they were too revealing. I can't remember now what pics were there.

I have added some new ones and it is a work in progress, but don't hang out for any new stuff for a while.

Most of them are from my youth or twenties, but there are a few later additions.

The link on my page is called Guys, Dudes, Blokes and Fellas and underneath is the active link highriser celebs. You can have a look here. My faves? Well, I loved David Cassidy when I was a teen. In my twenties I loved Leif Garret. In my thirties ...........well, I became much less choosy. You are most welcome to work out 'my type' from the pics, but given I don't really know, good luck.

Grand Prix

Another Melbourne Grand Prix has finished. Who was expecting me to rant about it? Well, I am now, post GP. It seemed worse this year. Apart from the screaming distant noise, it had little impact on us in Balaclava. I cannot say the same here and after four years I really am over it.

• While I was at work today, R walked into town for some shopping. Guess who had to walk home as well as the trams were too packed to get on.
• My alternative route home from work when traffic is heavy is around Albert Park Lake. I am barred from doing that for two weeks and restricted off peak for weeks before and after.
• Two weeks ago we went for a walk, as we do, and I wanted to check the water level in Albert Park Lake. Our two normal walking paths were blocked and we ended up walking the back streets of South Melbourne instead. While there is still access, I am not sure how for us who live east of the lake.
  
• Trams and buses are both mucked up for the four day period.
• The noise is extraordinary. R is in a grump because he did not have his arvo siesta.
• Much water has been extracted from the lake to water and put on a good 'green' show for public.
• I worry about the ducks and swans while this event is happening.
• We have met the owner of the Jolly Roger sailing club. Nice bloke. He is elsewhere now, driven away temporarily.
• Thousands or tens of thousands of people who were trying to go about their normal weekend business were inconvenienced Saturday and Sunday.
• Private people (a person in particular) are making a lot of money at the expense of state government coffers.
• It costs the government (you, the taxpayer) a fortune to stage each year. They argue the benefits to the local economy. The race must happend against a city backdrop. Well, just on the news tonight, I did not see any city backdrop. Who around the world watches it anyway? Rev/motor heads. No one else would.
  
• It is just some strange cars driving around in kind of a circle. Show us Holden and Falcon racing against each other and it might have a little more interest.
• After four years, I do not find the Roulettes so fascinating and nor is the RAAF Hurcules (Hurcules is not what I meant to spell out wrongly. Ta Daniel, F18s.) The para gliders with flags were new I think, but I could not even be bothered rushing for the camera.
• Appropriation of public property for private profit.
• The clincher for me: They put up temporary lights that shine straight into my bedroom and light it up. They are there for weeks. I don't like that, but it also stops me gazing out to sea from my bed, looking at the buoys, the ships, St Kilda etc.
• Yes, I have been, two years ago when it was free on a Thursday. I did not/could not see any cars racing, but the atmosphere was ok. But then I always enjoy a walk in Albert Park.
• The whole buggery thing is so impersonal. I believe when it was in Adelaide, you could get close to the cars and talk to the drivers. No chance of that here.
• Can I avoid it and go away? No, I have to work during the Grand Prix.......always and it is not just for four days for us.