Sensible decisions

When faced with a really tough financial situation - low income and big bills - what should the responsible person do?

I know!  Buy a ridiculously expensive Tassie Oak bookcase for the studio.  Here it is:

A couple of weeks ago I decided to re-arrange a couple of rooms.  These were the studio and the spare room.  The object of the exercise was to move as much stuff as possible into the spare room while still allowing room for the inflatable bed when visitors visit.  Anyway, I ended up with two disaster area rooms.  Sent me into a bit of a tizz.

Funny how this type of situation will give you an idea of how to solve the problem and this idea must be followed through.  I decided I needed a book case for the studio.  Went trolling around furniture shops in Devonport for something appropriate.  Thought I'd pick up something cheap, but it turns out that in order to have adjustable shelves in a book case, one must spend top dollar.  All the cheap stuff had really tiny shelves and I needed space for arty books, which are very often very large.

So there we have it.  I now have a new Tassie Oak book case which both smells and looks gorgeous.  It's locally made out of local products so I can pat myself on the back about supporting the local industry.  Just hope the materials didn't come from high conservation value forests.  (Bugger.  Didn't think of that earlier.)

Oh Dear

The challenge of doing a blue collar job with the resultant wage is making life quite difficult.

Once again, I have been seriously contemplating moving back to my home town of Darwin.

I could live there without paying rent and at a really nice place.

So I went outside to have a fag and a cogitate, and this is what I saw:

Wow.

Wow. I think I'm going to be here for a bit longer.

Feral Rabbotts

Just found myself shrieking 'You Liar!' at the the TV as I saw Tony Abbott talking about government advertising.  This is not something I do on a regular basis.  In fact this behaviour is extremely rare.  He was suggesting that the current Australian government spends too much on advertising and that it would probably start a campaign relating to the carbon tax.  I was so shocked that I didn't even swear!

This got my goat because the Howard government, where Abbott was a minister, spent more than any other government on advertising its policies.  Anyone remember 'Unchain my heart'.   And then there was 'Work Choices'.

Fucking Hypocrite.

Bowel cancer

It's been interesting to learn that one of the owners of the factory has bowel cancer.  She's the grumpiest and rudest one and she went under the knife today.  The owners told me about this and I'm not sure whether anyone else in the factory knows.  I'm sure we've all been told and have also been told not to tell anyone. Funny situation.

My response was to be very sympathetic to her parents.  They are peculiar people, but I'm sure they are worried sick about their daughter.

The three people I've known who've had this disease have all died in short order.  One was my uncle.  I'd had nothing to do with him for a long time and so regretted his death for my parents.  One was a woman who I looked up to.  We'd parted on difficult terms.  I'd written her a long e-mail thanking her for her support and admiring her abilities.  Unfortunately, my connection was stuffed at the time and it dropped off the face of the planet.  I never got to say thanks.  The third was a really good friend.  He died last year.  When I heard he was sick, I phoned and had a really good chat with him.  I think we both knew it was a goodbye chat.  I really miss him.

So I suppose that I don't expect anything good from a diagnosis of bowel cancer.

Fingers crossed for her.

New things

I've just finished my first Tasmanian commission.  Here it is:

It's a banner for a stall at an upcoming market - hanging on the washing line to dry the paint.

I was a bit naughty about this.  The client originally came in to work asking for this to be done as a screen print.  Unfortunately, the technology at the factory doesn't go beyond A4, which was obviously not going to do the trick.  I muttered, under my breath and with my back towards the owners, that I could hand paint it for her.

It's funny doing this sort of stuff.  I'm never entirely happy with the results.  I'd like to take it back and be a bit more creative and accurate with the artwork.  The context isn't important.  I'm a mega sceptic, so it's funny to be doing a banner for this type of thing.  But the client was lovely and it's nice to deal with good people.

Long story short, it's great to get back to doing this sort of thing.  It's about fifteen years since I took on commissions. I used to print hundreds of banners for festivals, and also helped to construct and paint massive (15 x 20 metres) banners for some Sydney Olympic events.  I also made bespoke wedding dresses.  In the interim, I've had a proper and well paid job and haven't needed to get out there and do this sort of thing.

Love the way life changes and moves.  I wonder what will come next.

Bubbly stuff

I've mentioned before that I've been brewing beers.  So far I've done two batches of ginger beer, one of pale ale and one of stout.  Each batch gets a name and a label based on this:

The ginger beer is 'Red Cat' 1 and 2.  The stout is 'Black Cat' and the pale ale is 'White Cat'.

So far, I haven't consumed much of the stuff, but thought I'd give it a go the other day.  I've been lovingly storing it all in cartons in the garden shed (which is damp and has lots of holes). Well, I went in to get a few brews only to find that snails have eaten most of the labels.  So now I don't know what is what.  I think it will be easy to pick the stout, but I'm not sure about the others.  I've put the latest batch in the spare room away from the snails to avoid future disasters of this kind.  (Note to self, get a job that will pay me enough to build a proper shed in the back yard.)

As for the quality of the brews, I did find a couple that had enough of the label left to identify them.  I've had a few of the ginger beers before and they are quite lovely (and a little lethal).  I tried the stout when it was very young and it tasted a lot like Vegemite.  Haven't given it another go yet.  Hopefully it has improved after sitting and brewing for a few months.

Yesterday I tried the pale ale.  It was absolutely disgusting.  I'm going to have to turf the lot.  I think it must've picked up a bug or something.  Normally, when the brew is in the vat, you can smell the air coming out of it through the air lock.  It's nice to have the ginger or whatever scent in the laundry.  I should've been alerted to the possibility of a problem with the pale ale by the fact that the air coming out of it smelled a lot like poo.  The smell improved by the time it was bottled, but I didn't do a sample of the flavour.  I now know better.  Early on, there was a suggestion that I should call the brews 'cat piss' and this would be truly appropriate for the pale ale.

The current brew is a cerveza (should that be thervetha?).  It's bubbling away very happily right now and the air coming out of it smells great.  Phew!  I'm working on a name and welcome suggestions.

Positive Reframe

The positive reframe and epiphany seem to have worked.  I'm really happy at the moment. (This is a very weird experience for me.) Work is still robotic, but it's only a third of my time.........

One of the things I have in my life at the moment is this:

I know what is inside this box.  I've had it for a couple of years now, but haven't had a use for the contents.  I'm just enjoying owning a brown paper package tied up with string.

Otherwise, I've had a plant spring up in the garden which wasn't there last year.  Here it is:

Gorgeous ginger, I think.  Got Ruby Suby in the background.  That's what I love about gardening.  Plants will always surprise you.  There are a few things in the garden currently surprising me. Must be all the rain that is getting them to sproing up.

Had some marvellous friends stay last night.  They're down here for a week to try to find a place to live.  I hope they find somewhere close to me.

It was lovely having drinkies and lovely local food with them.  Hope I've talked them into Devonport...