30 August 2010

Hitting the road

On Saturday morning, we said goodbye to Tess and hit the road.

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First stop: Sydney, where we stayed with Ned and Dins and Henry.

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We also caught up briefly with C, A and Bonnie Bee. It was a frantic hour or two of the latest stories and laughs.

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We had dinner at a German Club, where I went ahead and ordered a pork knuckle.

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Rosie and Harry tinkling the ivory.

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Emily, Henry and birthday boy Ned

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Then a whole lot of this.

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And this

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We landed early in LA, which looked amazing from the plane window. LAX was eerily deserted. I exchanged all my Australian dollars at a rip off place.

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Good floor

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The final leg of the journey!

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Bit of this

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Scottie met us at the airport!

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We were freaking out in the cab on the way to his place. Skate spot:

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Metal curbs!

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Crazy lift at his house

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Not exactly living in squalor!

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Not a bad view from the roof. Bloody hell.

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Pretty good!

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Our gracious hosts Scottie and Andy.

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It's nuts over here!

24 August 2010

17 August 2010

the wizard of the oz

One night last week, there was a violent storm. When we went for our morning walk, the creek was completely flooded - quite a scene.

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We saw relatively famous comedian Frank Woodley while we were out walking; he was jogging from end to end of the soccer oval barefoot. We exchanged pleasantries, and I remarked the storm was like 'the wizard of the oz', tongue-tied as usual around fame. He said Tess looked a bit like Toto and Rosie agreed, but said Tess was more refined.

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We went to a screening of the film Boy, followed by a Q&A with the friendly director Taika and the young 'boy' star, who was really shy and answered nearly every question with 'I was out of it'. It was very enjoyable, especially considering Rosie's brother Sam was responsible for the soundtrack.

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I made some new chino pants. They're not bad, if I do say so myself! The slit pockets take ages to do, real mind-benders. The mass-produced ones use machines that do it automatically - I'd love one of those machines, or maybe a bag of money to pay someone to make them for me.

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Striped pocket details (including a change pocket on the waistband), button fly, brushed cotton with a bit of stretch.

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Went out to Footscray the other evening, and of course we paid a visit to Olympic Doughnuts. This is their jam dispenser - pretty good.

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The reason we were out there was to attend a special mini ramp competition. The main reason I was there was to see Joey, who was in fine form.

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It was a no-frills event attended by industry folk and skate nerds, so we fitted right in. Not many girls to be seen, apart from a few unfortunate partners. There was a wheelbarrow full of VB tinnies.

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The comedy pairing for the evening.

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The skating was ridiculous. Top mini-ramp skaters were invited from all over Australia. This young chap Max is very loose limbed and a pleasure to watch on the board.

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This fellow had a silly little camera on a stick.

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Impressive stuff.

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Ryan was filming the whole thing on Joey's VX camera, which was resplendent in terrible Flip stickers.

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Egged on by yours truly, Jason created a stir over on the satan box.

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After the comp began the main event. Joey kicked things off by throwing Jason's board into a garden centre for no apparent reason, then climbed over the spiked fence to retrieve it.

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Predictably, he ripped his pants on the way over. Upon locating Jason's board, he immediately stomped on it and threw it back over in two pieces.

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A truck drove past and ran over half of the broken board, breaking it even more.

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Joey then threw the other half over another fence, claiming Jason owed him a pair of new jeans. It was a ridiculous, hilarious few minutes.

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Jason took it all in his stride, secretly enjoying Joey's violent yet inspired humour.

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We agreed to a short visit to the south side, to the Yellow Bird. The long hair/beanie thing really is prevalent among the youthful trannie skaters at the moment.

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Days on, the creek level has dropped, but sections of the path are still flooded.

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Tess is loving it.

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10 August 2010

Art fair

Business as usual at this end. Raph was back on Friday night for our burger fix, followed by a beery discussion of skate trivia at the Great Northern. Sam has now set this image as his screen saver.

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The art fair was on over the weekend. Joey and Mems very kindly got us tickets, for which we thanked them by arriving an hour and a half late.

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It's quite an extensive operation. We adopted a harsh but fair approach, judging booths by vibe. It may have resulted in a few missed gems, but what the hey.

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This was one of my favourite paintings, by Ben Quilty. I like portraits of people's faces. Also, it reminded me of Scottie, because he has a quilted shirt I refer to as 'Ben Quilty'.

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Jason liked this one, I think the artist's name is Chuck Klose. Close enough, anyway.

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Rosie was very keen on this work by Nathan Grey, which I also enjoyed. Dion hated it, but that's art.

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One thing we were all agreed on was the mastery of Mental as Anything stalwart and Mambo mastermind Reg Mombassa.

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These heads were full on. They made me feel like I was falling over.

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I wished Tess could have come too.

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Lots of spirit levels. Fittingly, they were a bit off centre.

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I've noticed the beauty in stacked chairs before. Dammit, should have taken a photo, now it's abd.

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This stall was awesome, by Arts Project Australia, of artists with intellectual disabilities. I wanted to buy 'Airport'.

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Brendan had his own stall, which was all buzzy and exciting. He is killing it.

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On my way home, I stopped in to wish another of my favourite artists Milo a happy birthday.

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