The Electric Chair

Under any other circumstances I would have been delighted to wake up to find someone stroking my hair.

It took me a moment to return from my Happy Place, to which I had retreated earlier to zone out the unpleasant feeling that my ribs were pushed up over my head. The feeling was unmistakable - my head was being caressed.
I enjoyed this dreamily for a moment and the hands moved down to play with the tops of my ears. This was definitely very nice but I was becoming vaguely aware it was making me feel guilty and couldn't work out why.

Then I took in a deep, contented breath, inhaled Kleenex and realised I was in the massage chair at work.

Our fortnightly massages are one of the perks of being keyboard-bound, and we are very fond of our regular therapist, who brings in photos of her cats, joins us for Melbourne Cup lunch and remembers that I like having my hands done with that nice warm pepperminty stuff. But, alas, she's succumbed to a painful bout of dermatitis and won't be able to pummel us for a while.

The new girl is scary.

It was initially something that no-one talked about, each of us convinced that we were the only ones with a problem - and so began one of those weird workplace conspiracies of silence.

Scary Therapist had asked each of us to tell her if she was working us too hard, but Boy Captioner, being the only man in the office, thought he'd look like a wuss if he asked this slip of an 18-year-old to ease up on his back. Baby Captioner had to go home and put a heat pack on her neck to ease the sensation that all her verterbrae were pointing in independent directions. Girl Captioner complained about the use of excessive force but then just felt like she was being tickled for the rest of her session. And me? I wondered if I was being propositioned.

Now that we know each other's stories, we've spoken up and done something about it - but doesn't it speak volumes about the pack mentality, that a group of normally mature, assertive human beings would rather assume there was something wrong with them than trust a gut instinct?

Oh, and head-caresser required. Apply within.

For the Love of God

Look what I've just had to caption.
This is why they don't pay me enough.

(Tracey sings)

# Oh, I wish I was a little cake of soap
# I wish I was a little cake of soap
# I'd slip and I'd slidey
# Up and down everyone's hidey
# Oh, I wish I was a little cake of soap. #

Many, MANY types of wrong.
And it should be I wish I WERE, you pillocks!

But apart from that...

(Trout sings) # Oh, happy day... #

(Grins idiotically)

From 'The Little Prince'

If you haven't read this beautiful little book by Antoine de Saint-Exupery, please do.

Here the little prince meets a fox who will not play with him because he is not tame:

"To me," [says the fox] "you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys. And I have no need of you. And you, on your part, have no need of me...but if you tame me, then we shall need each other. To me, you will be unique in all the world. To you, I shall be unique in all the world ."

Later the narrator of the story fears that the little prince, whom he has befriended, will return to his own planet. The prince promises that he will not be left alone:

But I was not reassured. I remembered the fox.
One runs the risk of weeping a little if one lets himself be tamed.

'Scuse me while I kiss this guy...

I've had more than enough of our national anthem this week, what with the Games on and all, but I think I might have found a way to make it bearable.
I sing my flatmate's little sister's version...

Australians all love ostriches, for we are young and free...

Infinitely preferable, I think - I don't think I'll be able to sing anything else
ever again.

She's not the first to alter a lyric in my mind forever. When I was about 13 and very into Led Zeppelin I was convinced that a line from 'Misty Mountain Hop' ran...

Crowds of people sitting on the grass with flowers in their hair said,
"Hey, boy, do you want a scone?"

Oh, how sweet of the hippies to provide snacks.
Now I can't think of it any other way.

Of course, there's our family staple - I wish my dad hadn't told me that Kenny Everett was convinced that the first line of 'Bohemian Rhapsody' was...

Is this the real life?
Is this just Battersea?

If you see me in traffic, that's what I'll be singing.

A Box of Stars

It's called moping and I'm quite good at it : )

Every so often all four winds blow at once and everyone I love - it seems - is out of reach, physically or emotionally or both. I'm not upset about that itself, particularly not with those of you who've been hit about the heart with the love stick, but it means that I'll have to be a big girl, cope without regular deep-and-meaningfuls and rock myself to sleep for a while.

You do what you can to skirt the edge of the yawning void. Sometimes I hit the gym, other times I write a lot or just go into hibernation. This time, however, I've been a frenzy of origami. Yes, origami. Lovely and utterly,
utterly useless.

I am master and commander of a flotilla of tiny paper cranes, folded and unfolded and refolded until the creases are knife-sharp and I don't need the instruction leaflet anymore. I'm not watching the television, I'm seeing the sightless head take shape and angling the flightless wings just so. I line them up into delicate squadrons. They are too silly to leave on display, too beautiful to throw away.

Sillier is the galaxy of glow-in-the-dark origami 3D stars in their origami box. These are really clever - folded from a single strip of paper, dead flat until the final pinch of the fingernails, when they fill with air. It takes me 20 tries to form the first one, the prototypes blowing across the living room floor like tiny tumbleweeds. They are quite fascinating, these intricate little stars, but what the hell am I supposed to do with them? I make one for each of you for each day you are away, then let Ziggy chase them around the house until I can't remember who's who anymore.

You'll be back, but until then I miss you : )

Pain...

..is discovering at 11:30pm that you misread your roster for the week and you're going to have to stay at work another two hours to make up the lost time! Oh, God, I'm going to need caffeinating : (

Things to Smile About

It must be the sunshine.

The guy on the opposite side of the intersection must have been listening to the same radio station I was, because his finger-drumming on the roof of his car was in time with mine : )

Couldn't help grinning at the guy who passed me later in a shiny new Volkswagen - his shirt was exactly the same explosive yellow as his car : )

The Great Divide

In television, as, I'm sure, in every other media industry, there is a wall between cast and crew, talent and production. Look no further for a concrete example than the staff kitchens at the station I work for:

The Marketing Kitchen
Upstairs in Heaven, the floor with carpet and windows, this kitchen has pretty vinyl tiles, marbled benchtops and a gleaming sink with a mixer tap. You can take your water chilled if you so desire. A selection of coffee and tea, a variety of sugar and sugar alternatives and stirrers and spoons are arranged tastefully in a series of little bowls. There is a choice of courtesy mug for your client or guest. You could eat your dinner off the microwave - handy, that - and the fridge boasts a range of milks, even soy, each bottle well within its use-by period.

The Tech Kitchen
Downstairs in Hell, the floor haunted by the sun-starved ghouls from Editing, the once-cream lino is scuffed, torn and grey. The tin of coffee is opened by way of the only utensil in the kitchen - a plastic spoon tied to the (empty) towel rail with a piece of string. Abandon all hope ye who enter the microwave. The milk, all full-cream, definitely requires exhaustive sniffing, and most of us choose to go black over the weekend, when the Pearly Gates are closed. The sign over the - eww - sink reads 'CLEAN UP YOUR MESS' but has gone unheeded for far too long. And it's all pointless, really, because unless you're one of the chosen few whose mugs are so tide-marked that no-one else is game to steal them, there isn't a styrofoam vessel in sight.

Today is Sunday, so it's the Devil or the deep blue sea. I'm having a Coke.

This Week's Band Name

Is 'Brine-Washed', in homage to the box set of DVDs about, of all things, CHEESE that we're in the thick of captioning, editing and converting. True cruelty is being forced to watch parmigiano reggiano being grated over penne con salsiccia e zucchini or French chevre being melted on walnut loaf when you know you've got BAKED BEANS ON TOAST with NO CHEESE (not even plastic mousetrap) for lunch. Sigh.

Gran(nie)

I am fortunate enough to still have both my grandmothers, even if I don't get to see either of them as much as I would like. Perhaps, though, Gran didn't feel quite the same way. She'd just hung up on me. She hadn't, however, hung up very well, and the line was still open at her end. My mother, who called her back and confirmed her number was engaged, agreed that, blunt as my grandmother can be, this was a bridge too far.

Gran is of Scottish descent and frequently greets me with a frown and the words, "Love, you've put on weight again," and steadfastly refuses to put more than one sugar in my tea when I visit her. I remember telling her at about age seven that my father's mother had just written to tell me that I must call her 'Grannie' to ease the distinction between 'English Gran' and 'Australian Gran'. "What an awful name," said Gran, but she left it at that.

I met my Grannie when I was 10, and she won my instant admiration by telling me on our inaugural visit to the Canterbury Tesco (from the obsession of the same name) that she wished the shopping trolleys had bars on them so you could ride them like scooters. Grannie was the one who sent me 'Sergeant Pepper's' and who had seen 'A Clockwork Orange'. Grannie is the one who chats up waiters and was brought a red rose by one of them at Oktoberfest in Munich.

(Sings) # My Grannie lies over the ocean
# My Grannie lies over the sea
# My Grannie lies over the ocean
# Oh, bring back my Grannie to me... # etc.

Grannie posts me cartoons she's cut out of the local paper and says she's so glad I handwrite her letters because email's such a bore. She took the holiday snaps of Melbourne I sent her to a stay in hospital in London because the "dishy young doctor" on duty there is Australian...and from Melbourne, the poor man.

But back to Gran. As long as the line was engaged she wouldn't be able to receive any calls and start freaking out the rellies, so I rang her retirement village and told my story to a nice supervisor there. "Happens all the time," she said. "I'll send one of the boys down." Soon after my phone rang.

"Oh, love, I thought it was that ruddy telemarketer man again. He rings every day about this time. I got so sick of him I just hang up on him now!" So I know she loves me, really. And it's mutual - she's an amazingly strong, fiercely generous woman and lets me tease her unrelentlingly, even if she does still threaten to smack me.

And today she posted me some vouchers for Donut King : )

Awake

There is a difference between 'tired' and 'sleepy'.

I am very tired. It's been a long day for the night-shifter, conscious before 7:00am. Now it's late and I'm due out out at the uni before 9:00 the next morning, so I desperately need to get to bed if I'm to stand any chance of being on time. I am tired, but I am not sleepy.

The sheets on my bed are fresh, still smelling of sunshine. My pyjamas are warm from the dryer. This is Horlicks for your outsides, and yet...
I am tired, but I am not sleepy.

I've left my book in the car, so I take an ancient James Herriot from the pile beside my bed. Eight chapters later, I am tired, but I am not sleepy.

I get up, take out my contact lenses, change the cat's water, fetch his trembling mouse out from under the hot water tank, feed the goldfish, clean my teeth again, smother myself with moisturiser, drink a glass of water and go back to bed. I must, must sleep. I extinguish the line of candles along my windowsill and turn off the chicken lamp. In the dark I cuddle up to my pillow and try to be lulled by the rustle of the trees and the whisper of approaching rain. I try to think myself dead.

I am tired, but I am not sleepy.