Monday.
I set my alarm for 6:15 this morning. When it went off I was in the middle of a dream. I turned my alarm off and dozed back to sleep in an attempt to finish my dream. I didn’t finish my dream. Mum woke me up at 6:30. Really wish I had finished my dream.
Bus. Work. Bus. Dinner. Iron
Tuesday.
I set my alarm for 6:00. When it went off the first thing I thought as I reached for my phone to turn off the alarm was my name is Helen Palsson. Still thinking about that one.
Wednesday
I set my alarm for 6:00. When it went off my first thought was I wonder how the casserole I had in the oven went over night.
Bus. Work. Bus. Dinner. Laundry.
The Breeders new album, Mountain Battles leaked (how many albums these days don’t leak? I am not instantly in love with it. Which surprises me. I was meant to love it from the very first note I heard. This is The Breeders in terms of shaping musical tastes, they were the first “modern/current” band that I fell in love with. I am going to listen to it for the next couple of days and see how it grows on me. I am on the second run through now and bits are starting to grow on me but it is very much not how I thought it would be.
Yesterday the Cathedral across the street from where I work stepped one step closer to completion with the spires lifted into place. Each spire weighs a whopping 9 tonne and they were lifted into place by a 350 tonne crane on the back of a truck.
I had read in Friday’s paper that the spires were going up on Saturday but there was no mention of the time. When I woke up I rang the paper, the radio station, the tv station and the cathedral and I couldn’t get any answers either due to the phone not been answered or people not knowing. I then rang work and was told that one spire was up already. I packed a camera bag, jumped in the car and rushed into work. When I got to my level at work, I saw that they were still working on the first spire and there was a sizeable crowd in the square below. I figured that I would wait in the air-con, doing some loose ends at work till there was some movement on the ground with the second spire. When I saw things moving into place for the second spire, I raced to the elevator and willed it to descend faster. Oh it was a sight to see. The spires are almost as tall as the building itself. There were lots and lots of cameras and video cameras of all shapes and sizes. From Kodak disposables to a Leica to compact digitals and DSLRs, everyone wanted a photo.
If you mouse over the photos, you should get the titles, otherwise you can click through as always to the larger photo.
Then it was over, I went back up stairs (well up elevator) to say bye to the people at work, who were still shaking their head at how I found the event exciting, then it was back to the car and home again.
Yet another post condensing most of a weeks activity into one blog post. I am so behind. I have dreams of posting a blog sooner after an event but I just get sidetracked. I have a whole week where I actually did things to blog about/process photos. Sunday I was at two concerts, Tuesday I baked, Wednesday Andrea and I went to the movies, Thursday I went to photograph Clap Your Hands Say Yeah at the Zoo, Friday I went out to dinner with Andrea and some of her friends, this morning I went into the city to watch the spires lifted into place at St John’s Cathedral. This arvo I went to the movies. Quite a week and now I am busy catching up.
I probably should start off with Sunday.
I had one goal for the arvo and that was to see Yeo and The Fresh Goods at Rics and that I did. Right next door at Kaliber, Nightillion were doing there Sunday afternoon sessions/jam thing. Fusing all sorts of musical goodness together, it was nice. Meanwhile at Rics, Mr Laneous (pron. similar to miscellaneous) were taking care of getting the arvo started. A wander round The Valley and then it was time for Yeo and Co to fill the stage at Rics and play to a bar full of Shiny Happy People. I was fancy free and relatively footloose or really it was a Sunday where we weren’t’ going to The Farm as Mum had taken Grandad road tripping and left us all at home. It is a catch 22 of sorts. I would love to go more of the Sunday arvo session at Rics/Powerhouse/etc but Sunday arvos/night is the time we spend with Grandad and I am smart enough to know that those days are a whole lot more numbered than Sunday arvo sessions at Rics. It was so great to see Yeo play live. Tom and Tiana were outside and asked me what sort of music Yeo plays, I described as sort of electro reggae, I much prefer the three myspace genres; French pop / Punk / Reggae. Much better.
Yeo, (click image for the gig gallery).
Random Valley Shot. 56/366
Sunday evening it was the Creative Vibes shindig at The Troubie, not much of a turnout but it was still good, the couches were “pulled” from the walls and arranged in a few more social friendly rows near the stage, made it feel even more like a lounge room than it normally does. The bill for the night was Tess Henderson (what a voice), Tom Woodward (see x previous posts on Tom) and Justin Grounds (technically interesting but I was too tired to appreciate it). The light seemed to be at half strength to what it normally is at the Troubie which was a bit bleh for me.
Tess’s piano player, (click image for the gig gallery).
Random Desk Shot.
Monday. 57/366.
Yep Christmas Cards are still up, it is only February (when this photo was taken) after all.
Tuesday. 58/366.
I was really tempted not to take a photo on Tuesday, was just so tempted to chucking this whole project in but I took a photo of my saeng cover, I love those flowers dearly. Yay for Ikea.
Wednesday night. 59/366.
Andrea and I went for fish (Barramundi-Andrea, Calamari-Me) and chips and a movie at Portside (Hamilton). We had 1hr 45mins between when the fish and chip shop closed and when our movie started. Granted we probably didn’t leave the fish and chip shop till a good 25mins after it closed, it meant we had quite a bit of time to laze around by the river talking, laughing, chatting and playing. The movie we went to see was Charlie Wilson’s War, which was not as funny as I thought it would be.
Thursday night I went to photograph Clap Your Hands Say Yeah and Manchester Orchestra at the Zoo. I met Alain Bouvier, that was a laugh. I started talking to one of the other photographers, he said he was French etc etc, I asked if he knew Ange Takats, he said of course and we laughed, we knew of each other through Ange, that was a laugh. Music wise I preferred Manchester Orchestra over CYHSY, I left shortly after our three songs were up for CYHSY. I think that explains it.
Manchester Orchestra, (click image for the gig gallery).
Drinking Receptacles. 60/366
Friday was a hell of a day at work, just never seemed like I was going to get my work done. I got it all done though.
Friday night I went out to dinner at Sitar with Andrea and some of her high school friends who I had met round her parties before.
80% of us had the deluxe banquet. I was glad I wore a dress as I wasn’t unbuckling a top button like the others. Oh it was good, of the four curries we picked, the only one which we all disliked was the Bengal Prawn Masala most likely because the prawns were like rubber. The Lamb Korma was oh my and don’t get me started on the Peshwari Naan. I could eat that for breakfast, lunch and tea for the rest of my life.
That brings us to today, Saturday which will very much be another blog post as that has photos, photos, photos of the spires going on St John’s.
Yesterday, I went to Campos and didn’t get a coffee. I got a iced chocolate instead. It was a spur of the moment trip. One girl, five guys (they all had coffee). Where are all the girls with cameras?
I went to Rics, for a Sunday arvo session. It was quite comfortably filled, and every single person had this smile on their face.
I sat round the dimly lit Troubie whilst it was bright sunshine outside. That was weird. Waiting for people to turn up.
I watched a group of people turn the Troubie into a lounge room and listened to a few songs.
I shook my head at boy who has hair like an Icelandic sheep and smirked with a girl who I should always be sitting down when talking to.
Today though.
I set the alarm for an extra 15 minutes.
My lunch was two matching containers of tupperware, one with a chopped up mango (honey gold thank you) and the other with grapes (green please).
I am reading Kabul in Winter. Which must be the fifth, I think, book on Afghanistan post 2001 that I have read in the past few weeks. It is really good to see how a lot of the main people and history are written in the different books.
I have numerous photos that I could illustrate this post with but strangely I have no desire to put photos with these words.
I watched the last episode of Alias season 1. I had forgotten there were only five seasons, I kept on thinking there were seven and I had the timeline stretched out a lot longer in my mind.
I just found out that one of the girls from high school who I have probably kept the most contact with works in a building across the street from where I work. We catch the bus from the same stop each afternoon. weird.
I haven’t taken my photo for today yet.
Tomorrow.
I have a bunch of kids enlisting. That means I get to wrap med docs in brown paper (it was that, not the view that cinched me taking the job). Every week or so it is like Christmas. Wrapping all those “presents”.
I will make biscuits when I get home.
I will wake up at 6am and get out of bed at 6:03am.
I will watch an hour of something trashy on TV and shake my head the entire time at myself for watching it.
I well who knows what else I will do because tomorrow is tomorrow.
It has been a very busy last few days at work. One of the girls has been off this past week extremely sick and then the other girl has been off after having her wisdom teeth out. Which has left myself, the other new girl, our boss and our part timer trying to catch up. It has been keeping us very busy. Thursday though I had to get out of the office and have lunch in the square which is where a few of these photos are from. Friday though I finished at 4pm, ever growing stack of files could wait till Monday. I caught the bus into The Valley and went to the Thai grocery/DVD store to get a few things I was after from the cooking class with Leanne the other week. Friday night Mum had a slideshow with the three other ladies that she went walking in NZ with. That was quite nice. So many nice places in the the Fiordland area.
Saturday, yesterday, I didn’t do much, it was a stinker of a day. We turned the air con and I watched some more Alias before making some pasta for lunch. Then I watched some more Alias. Then I went to Taste in the Valley for a Moghul cooking demo with Gaynor Long. Then I watched some more Alias, cooked tea (Harissa grilled steak with cous cous and a pea/capsicum/sundried tomato mixture. I then crashed to the sounds of classics on 4MBS.
I woke up at 6 this morning. I couldn’t sleep. I had breakfast, made some not so melting moments (the still taste ok but just not like melting moments) and then went back to sleep for a little while longer. Just taking it easy, I’m going to go out later for some music and assorted fun. As I type this now though, I am listening to a piano CD I have from ABC Classics, the current “song” is Adagio from Beethoven’s Moonlight sonata. I have my desk cleaned off and actually creating for the first time in ages, I had forgotten how it feels to write with a pen on cardstock. To look at photos, thumb through papers.
It is by far nearly bed time. I should be in bed right now but I feel like typing. There are lots of things I want to type but they can wait. Tonight I will type about some photos from the last few days.
Somehow still managing to take a photo a day. However it is so often a struggle. I take my camera to work. I take my camera home with me and most times it is not till some time in the evening that I finally press that shutter button. Today though the photo that I picked was from when I was waiting at the bus stop after Pabbi had just dropped me off. Still getting a lift to and from the bus stop at the moment. Though I have ditched the walking cane and am moving much easier round the place. I can almost walk down stairs properly too albeit slowly and with much thought. That is all with the brace on though. With out it is a whole new story.
This 366 thing gets harder and harder during the week, on the weekends it us fun. It is not that I don’t want to take photos, I love it. However you have grander and grander images in your head as you look at something and think of how you would love to take a photo of it, from this angle, with light there and with that as the focus point etc etc. Then you take the photo and due all those environmental or technical variables that you didn’t control. You only end up with a photo that is 5% of what you had in you mind. Then you think someday.
This is a Blue Ginger or Ornamental Ginger, it grows in our back yard in the very back corner. The flowers sure a pretty and the leaves are that not quite glossy dark yet rich green.
On Sunday we went to the Farm. As we do :), I mean how could you not want to go see Grandad? He rocks my world. We don’t speak very much, but then we share a smirk or he comes out with a line and you just go hell yeah. This was at the farm the other day. Grandad has pumpkin vines growing just about everywhere. There is also the cherry tomato plants that would live through a nuclear war, those things are indestructible, however it is not their season at the moment. There are a few little green cherries on the plants but only one red I saw. I carefully picked it as it looked like the skin was about to split, gave it a polish and a little fun with it.
I bet you haven’t seen a pumpkin flower that looks like this before 🙂
After I took a few photos, I put it in my mouth and enjoyed that short moment of sweetness and tartness before it was gone to my stomach. Then I took this photo. Pumpkin. Almost ready for picking.
I got Season 1 of Alias on DVD from the Library the other day, slowly making my way through the discs. I had forgotten how much *fun* the show was. I must admit I like watching it on DVD as I can fast forward the bits where I get scrunch up my eyes and get slightly scared. Even though I know what happens in the end I still go slightly eek.
