Sunday, June 25, 2006

Sleep when you're dead, or something.

I should never go out on Satuday nights. I know that now. But I had to last night! Marika's friend Nick is down from England (he's a champ), and at lunch yesterday we decided we would take Nick on a bar hop after Stef and I finished work. I've never been out in the city on a saturday night before, it was really cool. Marika, Nick, Stef, Brendan and I headed out about midnightish. Went to Robot first and luckily a group was just leaving so we got a spot to sit down. Funnily enough every single time I've been to Robot (and I've beena few times), I've always sat in exactly the same area. Two girls that I know were sitting close by, but there were so many people milling around that I didn't get to say hi.

After a drink (and some freaky guy coming up to me and offering me cigarettes/lung cancer - he was just strange) we headed to Gin Palace, which is my favourite bar out of the few I've visited. Again we were lucky, there was a little spot with a couch and some armchairs free around a couple of tables, so we settled in. I had peach schnapps and lemonade for the first time. It was very good.

We stayed there until closing at 3, then headed out to find food...wandered around a bit in the freezing wheather...took photos at a blakc and white photo booth at flinders st...(sorry for the vague posting, I have to go eat dinner and go back to work real soon)

anyway it was a great night, and I got home just before 5, so got about 5 hours sleep before work today. I was hoping for a quiet day, but no such luck. Front of house were one short so when Iw asn't washing dishes I was out at the bar doing their glasses. I even got sent out with food at one point, and had to revert back to waitress mode for a few minutes. Seeing as I'd had a very bad night's sleep and I have a cold, I think I did okay.

anyway I'm off to eat and then work (yay). I'm going to Queensland for two weeks tomorrow and I won't be going out of my way to find a computer, so there might not be a blog for a while.

-R

Friday, June 23, 2006

It's hip to be detached and precious

Haha I should stop underestimating the Socceroos. Well done lads. Although they're playing against Italy yet...even the more optimistic fans can't fail to see the likelihood of them losing there...But it's good to have them in the second round.

Yay for holidays! It's nice, doing whatever you feel like, no plans. Let's wander aimlessly around and just drink in the view because we don't have to be anywhere.

Oh shit! I was going to write a fairly hefty entry but I just realised I haven't packed yet. Haha go me. Hopefully I will be able to write another entry before I leave for Queensland.

-R

Monday, June 19, 2006

La di da da

I'm listening right now to this Bob Evans song called 'Rocks In My Head'. I LOVE the chord progression in it. It's G Bm Bbm Am C. There's something about that - that semitone drop from B to Bb then A, that just makes me so happy. I've played chord progressions like that on piano, in old jazz songs and such. I think there's a little three-quaver progression in 'Try A Little Tenderness'. Every time I play it, I think to myself 'Damn, that is a GREAT chord progression'.

Haha. I'm such a nerd. I was actually pretty proud of myself because I figured out the chords from watching Bob play at the instore - I can recognise a few chords now! hooray. Still can't play bar chords though. Le sigh. I just need stronger fingers. Acoustic guitar looks comically large on me too, like the bass guitar. My sister's decided she wants to learn bass, so I've decided I'd better learn guitar. And I've also decided, hard decision it was too, that instead of travelling I'm going to buy myself an electric guitar and laptop. I'll still learn bass though. The guitar will just be to jam with my family. I think it'd be awesome to play with Kathryn. She knows nothing about guitars but she has an ear for music. Today I was singing along to a Crowded House song that she'd never heard, and she came in perfectly with the harmony. Once her voice has matured a bit she will be a force to be reckoned with.

I went to the ballet last night, it was 'Giselle'. It's tragic and I wish I hadn't worn mascara because it was hard to not cry at the end of both acts. I'm a sucker, I always cry when you're meant to, those horribly emotionally manipulative moments with the strings soaring away and all the drama swirling. Pass the Kleenex please.

-R

PS Australia lost! I'm not surprised. They've got no hope against Croatia. Ah well.

Thursday, June 15, 2006

I went out to see if I could fall in love again - that was my mistake

I haven't blogged for a while. I know. I haven't even bothered looking at my blog to see if there are comments telling me to get my lazy arse into gear. So here is a new one. And it may be a long one, just because I haven't blogged for a while.

First point of business: I saw Split Enz on monday night (hence the lyrical title). Evermore were the support act, and were pretty darn good. The only song of theirs I knew was 'It's Too Late', but I'm a fan now. My dad joked about booing the support act off - so he hasn't entirely lost his rock and roll roots! But anyway, onto the headliners.

Geez. Awesome doesn't even come close to describing it.

I'm not going to try and gush about how fan-fucking-tastic they were; It'd take me all week. I feel incredibly priveleged to have seen them perform (especially considering that they disbanded 2 years before I was born). It is telling of their collective songwriting talent, especially that of the Brothers Finn, that the songs still sound so fresh and exciting today. It was everything we could've hoped for and more. They came onstage under a shiny silver blanket, revealing typically strange suits (although sadly nothing on Eddie Rayner's red one-shouldered number) and a number of surreal backdrops. It was a long gig, something like 25 or 26 songs over two hours. Neil Finn pulled out Titus and really put Eddie on the spot for the keys solo, which he performed admirably for someone who hadn't played it in years. 'We'll have it down by Perth'. Tim Finn still dances like a maniac, arms and legs everywhere. Eddie and Neil had a frisbee throwing contest, which Neil won convincingly with a throw that soared over the court area of Rod Laver Arena and into the stands on the other side. Noel Crombie showed everyone how it's done with the spoons (and I've decided that's my next instrument). Of course Six Months In A Leaky Boat got the biggest cheer, but my personal favourite was the beautiful Message To My Girl. Strangely, or perhaps not very strangely, I wasn't on my own in the Generation Y stakes. The majority of the crowd were baby boomers but not by much. There were heaps of young adults and kids with their parents (like me), and groups of young 'uns there by themselves, testament to the legacy of Split Enz and perhaps also the Finn brothers.

Second point of business: On tuesday Brendan and I went to JB HiFi to see Bob Evans (AKA Kevin Mitchell from Jebediah) do an instore. Brendan learnt to never let me loose in a record store as I immediately snapped up a copy of the Crowded House promo vids DVD (well it was $11!) as well as the second Bob Evans album, Suburban Songbook. I really like his stuff, which is surprising as you can definitely hear some country influences in his simple acoustic guitar pop, and country's usually lower on my list of preferred music. Maybe part of the reason I like him so much is because he's Kev from the Jebs, and therefore was my reason for existing from the ages of 14-18. Nice bloke too.

Brendan decided he would hide at the back. Because that doesn't make him look strange at all...

Guitar's coming along surprisingly well, both bass and acoustic. I can actually do chord changes (albeit with simple chords like G, A and D major) now, rather than stopping for 5 hours to put my fingers down in the right place. I still can't play a bar chord to save myself, but a few weeks ago I couldn't change chords to save myself, so hopefully that'll come too. I'm wearing deep grooves into my fingertips, or at least that's where the skin hasn't come off yet. Bass is happening slowly too. I just discovered today that I can actually play off a real score when I found the bass part from 'It's Only A Paper Moon' (probably from my sister's short-lived stint as keyboard bassist in the school's stage band). Piano of course is going how it always is. I've got a song that I could probably record and upload any day now but I can't find the damn mp3 player that records things.

Actually that reminds me of something I was thinking when I was watching Tim and Neil Finn jumping around onstage together and bantering on Monday night (at one point Eddie and Neil were pretending to argue and Tim was breaking them up - 'look at everyone else, can't you at least act professional for just one night?!' lol) and wondering what it would be like to be in a band with one of my siblings. Either one of them could feasibly do it. Byron's very fucking coordinated and is good at pretty much anything he lays his hands on, but Kathryn's got the rockstar persona, man! She's 14 and probably more streetwise than I am. Not bad on a piano either, nice little voice and that...now if only we could somehow steal the Finn's songwriting ability, then we could make a go of this.

We were arseing around the living room tonight, walking using the same arm and leg, then tryign to skip, then running (which is really hard) then doing 'jazz runs' and basically cracking each other up. It was quite silly but I haven't laughed like that since God knows how long.

Shit, my wrists hurt. Too much guitar! I'm going into the city tomorrow. I might go have squiz at that bloke who's trying to set a world record for the world's longest DJ set, 100 hours or something. Be interesting to see if he makes it.

-R

(how's that for a post, suckers)

Monday, June 05, 2006

I (think I) can die happy.

OH MY FUCKING GOD.

I'm so glad I decided to go online tonight, despite the late hour.I went on the Franz Fan Forum as usual and in the Australian thread they were talking about some webchat with Franz. At first I thought I'd missed it but and was kinda pissed that I'd decided to watch the last ever Blue Heelers even though I haven't watched it for years and didn't recognise anyone. But then I read further and realised it was starting in half an hour! So being the dutiful friend I am I jumped on MSN and luckily George was on so I alerted her (and she's posting a blog about this too).

So anyway we both logged into this chat thing, and we waited for Franz to come on. It turns out only Nick came on because apparently the rest of the band was watching Kaiser Chiefs. The chat was moderated so only certain people could post things and at first both George and I weren't 'voiced' as it were, so we kinda sat there growing incredibly impatient with waiting.

George was voiced first and she asked some questions about them meeting Bowie and other Bowie-related queries (surprise, surprise!). She's blogging about this too so I'll let her tell you her side of the story.

So anyway I finally got voiced without even realising it and posted my question more than once by mistake (which made me feel like a complete fool). My exact question was:'Hey guys! Hi Nick, I was just wondering if you remember me. You kissed me ont he cheek during your Melbourne gig this year. It was the most rock and roll moment of my life. Thank you. (I'm the other aussie girl who was at the DYWT shoot in NYc last year - it was incredible!)'. Someone pointed out that I'd posted my question a few times. Whoops.

BUT.

Nick replied to my question! I honestly thought he wouldn't. This is what he said:


*dies* Omigod. Omigodomigodomigod. Excuse me while I go completely fangirly. I'm sure you understand.

The rest of the chat was fun too. George and I nearly wet ourselves with excitement when he replied to her saying that he loves Oscar Wilde. Apparently his grave is covered in kisses. (what is it with Nick and kisses? Not that I'm complaining of course!)

So there it is. A very pleasant sunday night surprise for me. I honestly was not expecting to be chatting to my number one highly unrealistic crush and receiving a virtual kiss from him when I logged on tonight.

Needless to say, I'm very fucking happy tonight. VERY fucking happy.

-R

Saturday, June 03, 2006

I'm feeling so uninspired. I've been sitting here in front of the screen for five minutes now, trying to think of a subject for this post, because it's boring when I just tell you what's happening with me, and it also means I have nothing to tell Brendan when I see him because he's read it all here.

Right, I'm going to talk about trends, fads and that kind of thing. Why do people follow them? It's something I'm actually quite curious about. What in our head makes us actually really like the look of a trend (let's say, flared jeans) only to really think it's ugly a few years later? The jeans themselves haven't changed in appearance but our perception of them has. Would we still find them cool if it weren't for advertising cramming the next big trend down our throats?

I have to admit I have found this happening a lot with myself. Take skinny jeans for example. I used to think they were absolutely horrible and swore I'd never ever wear them, let alone own a pair. Yet a couple of months ago I went out and bought a pair of black skinny jeans from Sportsgirl and I love them. I don't know how I came to like them. Maybe because I saw people I actually admire wearing them - mainly musicians. Maybe I am more influenced by advertising and popular culture than I'd care to admit.

However on other trends I've gone backwards - like my view on suntans. I used to always want to be a toasty golden brown just like in the magazines, and I suppose I'm lukcy in that I tan quite easily so I generally was pretty tanned, but recently I've done a backflip and now I actually find pale skin much more attractive.

So what's your take on trends and how you follow them? Do you find yourself following them after disliking them at first like me, or are you completely immune to advertising?

-R

(hey, for an uninspired girl I reckon I did ok! Even if it did take me half an hour to write!)