Sunday Walks..

I have a thing with benches,

For some reason they always inspire me. They offer the promise of a quiet moment spent in thought or simply being. I photographed a lot of benches over the years but I’m rather happy with this picture (although I think this one is still my best one ever).

Taken on a wonderful, slightly stormy Barrenjoey walk.

Pretty nifty eh? There is a smuggler’s path, an old highway, sea on both sides, a lagoon…There is even a spot at the lighthouse where you can watch for whales! (not that I saw any of course).

That reminds me, I really should go whale watching sometime soon before the blubbery buggers head off to cooler places..

Anyway..

My last bench of the day was a lamppost-lit one overlooking a stormy sea. I couldn’t quite capture the still and solid beauty of it. But I couldn’t resist posting the picture anyway.

Gosh, I keep being amazed at what being close to the sea does to me. It makes me feel free and at home at the same time. It makes me feel both emotional and light. It’s.. indescribable..

Manly is beautiful..

It is a wonderful thing when you are having a Very Grumpy weekend, and you get to experience the sunset in Manly (technically Shelley beach). The colours here have not ceased to delight and amaze me. The bright blues of the late afternoon, the gold of the sunset and the hazy peach an purple of the evening setting in.

I find it so hard to capture the wondrousness of it all (also, the 3G does not have a great camera on it.. I should really replace my phone). Like this dude, paddle boarding all by himself on that big sea. With my atrocious camera, I just get the suggestion of a man on the sea. Enlarging a cropout just makes the man more hazy.

Man.. Sometimes I wish I was on CSI..

Anyway.. standing there, overlooking the waves, listening to the evening calls of the rainbow lorikeets I had this huge feeling of being precisely.. precisely where I need to be. I’m really not sure why, but it is a rare and very good feeling to have..

So yay for Sydney, and a extra yay for Manly beach..

Accept Change

 

I wish life had buttons like these.. 

Then again,.. maybe it does..

Born this way

Some things you just never forget. When I was little, I woke up one day and decided I would be batman. My parents, as was their amazing habit, just rolled with it and provided me with an outfit. I proceeded to eat my breakfast porridge and then went out to my friend’s house to announce to him my decisions for the day.

He, unruffled by my transformation, decided that he too should be batman. Automatically demoting his younger brother to Robin (because it would be absurd to have two batmen in the same family, obviously).

I’m not sure what we did after that. I assume we would just play the way we usually did. (With this particular friend play was never really ordinary. I remember building a ‘rocket’ with him, writing a play and having several other unusual adventures.)

At supanova last weekend I was reminded of how wonderful it is to be surrounded by people with whom you share a way of thinking as naturally as you share a street. I had never been to anything like it and just reveled in the costumes, the atmosphere and the enthusiasm.

And I got my picture taken with my doppelganger.

When I showed my dad the picture I had taken with the black knight he sent me the picture of five year old me in my costume with the comment: ‘He must have eaten a lot of porridge, I told you that porridge makes you big and strong’.

I really should have listened..

My boys are back

Caught my favourite band on Facebook saying:

OMG – Gearing right into full-on fangirl mode. My band.. here?? Ieeeeeeeh!

But then  I have been more MB20 preoccupied lately because their newest single came out a couple of days ago and I have been listening to it pretty much non stop.

It’s not a MB20 song like the ones I’m used to though. On the one hand it’s kind of hard to accept the direction the route they’ve taken with this, but then it was to be expected after ‘Street Corner Symphony’ and ‘I’ll believe you when’.

I think this comment by a fan describes my feelings best..

It’s true! It has the chords to ‘45’, the Ke$ha bad girl feel and the ‘Uptown Girl’ beat and pronunciation of ‘girl’ But I agree that Rob can sing me pretty much anything and I will love it regardless.

But I’m glad ‘my boys’ are back with a new album, and All I can hope is that they do their Sydney concert (because they are kicking off their tour in Australia!) before the 15th of September. Please Rob? Pleeease?

Pie.. is it ever a good idea?

Today I did the thing Terry Pratchett warns against in ‘The Last Continent’ I had a local dish… Although it is not technically local. As I understand it savory pies are traditionally English and came with the settlers. Which is probably just as well.

Shots of the Vivid festival..

Anyway.. I was slightly hung over and returning from watching the Vivid Festival and my friend suggested we get a snack at a pie shop, which in a bout of originality and humorousness is called ‘pieface’.

 
And the pies do make faces at you..

So I decided to go wild and order a mince pie. Just because I really couldn’t imagine what that would be like. I took it home on the train with trepidation and vague memories of Pratchetts description of the meat pie floater (which, hey.. does exist)  and one of my favorite web clips, which happened to be about pie

Finally, at home, I stared at it for a bit and then slayed it.  It did not look like anything I expected..

What?

Surprisingly it did not taste as horrific as it looked. It is probably even a great deal better than most Dutch snacks. Although as far as easy-to-eat snacks go.. this is not one. Why.. why woould anyone come up with something like this. Imagine if the contents were actually hot!

Anyway. It was an experience. Much like Vivid (which was gorgeous) and finding this poster on all the lampposts around the train station.

What a world..

Schrodinger’s Flatmate

 

I had cunningly devised these message boards to keep track of my flatmates. Not in a scary big brothery kind of way. just be sure when I can blast my music and when I have to keep the horrible singing and uke-playing down a bit.

Alas my Whiteboards Of Reason are no match for my philosophy mayor flatmate who I now believe to exist in a constant state of flux..

Gingko, Life and Nozick

Living close to your workplace has a couple of advantages. One, you are not dependant on public transport so that being five minutes late results in just being five minutes late instead of half an hour. And getting up early really gets you to work early..

The other thing is the walking. Walking to work gets you awake and thinking about the day, and walking away from work helps to psychologically walk away from it as well. But best of all are the amazing pretty little things you get to see. The little surprises he day has lying around for you.

Like this morning.. I spotted a beautiful Gingko tree in full autumn garb.. And the leaves scattered around it contrasted so beautifully with the asphalt it just made me stop and stare.

First I tried to capture the abundance of the tree and couldn’t quite get it. Then I tried for the play of light on the leaves and didn’t quite manage. Finally, as I was about to walk away I snapped a quick one.

Perfect!

I’m sure there is some profound message in that. Something about using the smallest and simplest to express the greatest beauty. Or maybe something about opportunity or getting exactly what you wanted in an afterthought just as you are about to walk away. Or not realising what you want until you get it by chance.

And this reminds me of the thought experiment of  Nozick’s experience machine. I couldn’t have imagined I wanted this, if I had to describe it I would not have described the picture above. Yet it feels like it is exactly what I wanted. This would not have been possible in the experience machine..

I know there is much more to the thought experiment than just the realisation that people generally don’t know what they want, but it’s a nice feeling to have one’s philosophical engines revved up by a leaf on the ground.

I guess Gingko really does stimulate your brain..

Oz breakfast

Bananarr breead and a capp!

I’m not sure what the Aussie fixation with bananas is but I’m to hungry to care. Early day today, and hoping for a good experiment (you know to break the streak of bad ones).

Not sure whether it’s the delirium of getting up at 5:30 or just happiness, but I have this wonderful sense of being right where I ought to be..

Roasting marshmellows at the world bar..