Always sit next to the crazy one.

Always sit next to the crazy one: a life rule I strongly encourage you all to observe.

It’s the crazy ones who change the world, create the art, shift our thinking. It’s the crazies who make our streets interesting, our buildings soar, our spirits sigh. It’s the nutters who can make you smile broadest, dream biggest and love boldest. Always, always sit next to the crazy ones.

This is a pic of the crazy I sat next to today. Beautiful, colourful, ratty looking thing that she is, we were the only two who had a conversation in our coffee shop this morning. There must have been twenty other people in there – but only two of us bothered to say hello.

She sat with a drawing pad and coloured pens and spent an hour scribbling – words, doodles, patterns – to fill the white space. It was the happiest thing.

And when she went to leave, she smiled, wished me a wonderful day, thanked me for the company, and disappeared into her Tuesday, ecstatic.

All because she sat next to the crazy one.

Ping pong, pony rides and pool play

It’s hard not to look down your nose at the XXX Olympics. Yes, XXX. 30th Summer Games. But they’re not really using that moniker this time around. Usually the pompous inbreds at the IOC love to bandy around Roman numerals. Not this time. XXX is unwelcome by the uptight poms. I haven’t done it yet myself, but I suspect if you Google “XXX Olympics”, you’re going to see a different kind of javelin.

Last night I found myself watching a bow and arrow competition between a bunch of pretty girls that looked as though they would have settled for a Hello Kitty pencil case for winning, ahead of a gold medal. They had cute up-turned hats, pretty outfits, cracking smiles and dainty, flitty way of floating around their archery pitch. Field? Court? What is is that you arch on? The dreamy, lovely girls, in the glow of the London afternoon sun, seemed to be enjoying a winsome moment, without a quarrel or a quiver in sight. Except both.

I flicked a thousand or so channels up to find the grand-daughter of a queen, riding a pony through the wood in a royal park on the outskirts of the city. Thousands had gathered to cheer the blue-blood as she bolted around, jumping Lego houses and bails of hay, as quickly as she could. Sure, there is skill involved – but if a princess can do it, then surely, it’s just about having the spare time up your sleeve for practice (Royals have an extraordinary amount of spare time up their ruffled silk sleeves).

Across on channel 483 a couple of plump lads, straight from the pub, were smashing it out on the ping pong table. We used to have one in our garage, and would organise tournaments with all the kids in the neighbourhood over the summer holidays. One kid, from a couple of houses down, was particularly talent, and barely lost a game all summer. He could top spin, back spin, smash, lob – you name it. If only he had gone on with it, he could have found himself up against the best in the world, rallying for a gold medal at the XXX Olympics. If only. Instead he became an Oncologist. Fail.

The girls and guys that jump in the pool are fun to watch. Pretty, too. We used to jump off high things, like they do, into the river down near my old school. We’d climb a gum tree, shuffle out to the farthest limb, spin out a summersault or two (backwards, even, if you truly lost your grip), then plummet into the murky water below, holding your nose so you wouldn’t get meningitis. The big difference between us and the 14 year olds launching from the rafters of the London aquatic centre is… we tried to make a splash. As big as possible. If you didn’t make a splash, you were a miserable failure. If there were gold medals to be had back then, you’d stand no chance if you didn’t step out of the water with an arse as red as Ken Livingstone, or a belly flopped as much as Fosbury. Puh… no splash. Who do these divers think they are?

I can’t wait to see what’s on tonight.

I’m rooting for China

Australians would get it.

Coffee – the elixir of life

If black coffee made me fat, I’d be Stay Puff’d the Marshmallow Man. I can go without butter, milk, meat, candy, chocolate, sugary drinks – even alcohol. But coffee? Forget it.

Depending on which blog or newspaper or medical journal you read, coffee either gives you cancer or stops you from getting it. It’s either good for your brain or bad for your liver, it’s either a life saver or the kiss of death. For me, it is the elixir of life. If Christians took communion with a croissant and espresso, I’d be in for morning prayer without hesitation.

This blog is pro-coffee (and, though not anti-Christians, it is unsupportive of religion in general). I have an espresso machine at home that, if I were honest, gets handled more delicately, lovingly (and frequently) than any woman I’ve ever had. Oh go on, pour scorn on that – but it’s true. I have consistently blown off more steam with my beloved espresso machine than I’ve had hits from a lover – including a record 19 in one day…. coffees that is. So shoot me.

When I’m not at home, I’m doing it in public. I have a few little coffee bars close to where I live, where I’m known by name and by coffee. I’m in one of them now. It’s kind of like the gym, except people are wearing more, sweating less, and look happier.

I have tried to give it up, but then found myself wondering why? Sure it’s a drug, but it’s legal. Sure it’s a waste of money, but it’s my only vice (and it’s a relatively nice vice). Sure I could switch and drink herbal tea, or chai (blurgh) or just water… but then I would annoy myself as much as herbal tea drinking, chai loving, water nazis annoy me now.

So I’m afraid, my love affair will continue. Unabated. Raw. Frequently. Privately and publicly. If you’re ever in town, and you love a strong one, get in touch. Let’s do it together.

Eating Disorderly Conduct

There’s not much funny about eating disorders.  I’ve known bulimics (men and women) and at least one anorexic.  I’ve suspected a few more.  A lot more.  Once I even wished I had one – bulimia – but I just wasn’t brought up that way.  Oops.

The bulimics I knew at university all hung out together – between the cafeteria and the toilets.  They seemed to be otherwise quite normal people (well, they were otherwise normal – whatever that is), though most of them smoked and spent a fortune on breath mints.  The anorexic hung out in hospital, mainly, or at home when things were better for her.    I can remember shaking my head, trying to understand what was going through theirs, then just accepted that I couldn’t.  The life moved on, I went to work in the corporate world, and people got much better at hiding their disorders.

Then I entered this strange online universe, where people are either disturbingly honest, deceptively devious, or devastatingly disturbed.  I suspect many are all three.  And I accept that the real world is just the same.  But somehow, when it’s in print, it haunts.

There are some people I have followed on Instagram or Tumblr, because I’ve liked the look of their pics.  Ok, I’ve liked the look of the pics of their bums.  They are all impossibly thin.  Some of them have been born with them, some of them have worked for them, some of them have done both.  But some of them have spent their nights on hands and knees, fingers at the back of their throats, purging themselves of whatever they stuffed down there only minutes earlier.  When I work out that the slender bottom, in the seductive pose, with the fingers suggestively draped beneath the elastic of some skimpy black lace, belong to someone with an obvious eating disorder, I ‘dislike’  or ‘unfriend’.  I just can’t perve at purgers.

Same goes when a cry for help pops up on my screen.  A hand-scrawled note craving for someone to ‘like’ them, or they’ll slit their wrists; ‘comment’ or I’ll cry; ‘friend me’ or I’ll flip out.  It’s tragic.  I don’t know you!  I don’t ‘like’ you – I like your pic.  I comment on your pic, not you.  I’m not your ‘friend’, I’m just browsing…  If you need me, or people like me, you’re in trouble.  Big trouble.  And you should probably get off online and get on with things offline.

But don’t listen to me.  Get help.  Real help.  From a real person.

Sweaty Saturday Night

I wish my gym could make me come

Raw honesty.

I’m not in love with my gym. Not at all. Sure, we’ve only be dating for less than two months – perhaps she’ll grow on me – but for now, she’s a bore. Dull. Repetitive. Do I really want to get all hot and sweaty, and use the same equipment, every night? I’ll be honest: sometimes gym just doesn’t do it for me. Sometimes I don’t even come. Er, go.

We had a two week break there in the middle – I had a commitment to a holiday that I couldn’t back out of. While away, I cheated on my gym (and yes, fitness Nazis: on myself) with wine and cheese. But I ran. And hiked. And even did body weight exercises (which is really the fitness equivalent to masturbating, isn’t it?). Then I got home, ran straight into the arms of my gym, and… nothing. Absence failed to make the heart grow fonder… In fact, it probably just clogged it up a bit more.

That was ten days ago.

Since then, we’ve seen each other every day. Some days we’ve gone quick and hard, some days it’s been a more sustained sweat-up. Just the way she likes it. Tonight I’m pumping her like a… gym. But still: just no doing it.

I know, I know, I should give it time. Not rush into this thinking I’m going to be swept off my feet straight away. But something needs to give soon. Some result. Some magical feeling. Some glimpse of being… more. Better.

Anything.

But I’m no quitter.

(Actually, I am. But this time, I’m so determined not to be).

Saturday morning footy

Aussie Rules. One of the world’s great games.

Oh, and winter in Australia. Perfect.

Sundae bloody sundae

Friday night and its sundae night for me.  So much for eating healthy.

I took the family out for some healthy burgers – home-made ones, not the stinky plastic things you get from that Olympic sponsor .  But the burger joint happened to be across the way from an ice-cream shop.  Resistance was futile.  And resistance training was even further from my mind.

Ice-cream is not usually a weak point for me: savoury tempts me more.  But tonight, I was weak.  A scoop of the magic icy stuff, a blob of hot fudge and squirt of cream on top.  Even my kids ate better – lemon sorbet.

I read on someone’s blog earlier in the week that you have to understand the difference between boredom and hunger.  Well, I don’t even have the boredom excuse tonight.  I think I just wanted to be bad.

Bad.  Ha.  Some people pierce their old fellas and ride a hog, I eat a choc-fudge sundae.  So macho.

In penance, I am doing burpees.  And just straight out burps, to tell the truth.  Neither are pretty.  But I’m not about pretty… just read my posting from earlier today.

Train dirty… but wipe up your wet spots

If you find yourself in a room full of people wearing very little, grunting, moaning and sweating profusely, either pray you’re in a gym, or be prepared to throw your keys in a bowl and use protection. Apart from a swingers’ club – or the vinyl floors and walls of a very ‘open’ couples’ bedroom – there are very few places as rawly and fleshy as the floor of gym.

Over the past week or two, my gym has become increasingly popular. While I could put this down to my attendance attracting people, that would be just plain wrong. It’s just a small little place, out in the ‘burbs, nestled between apartments, a drive-thru coffee joint and a fast food store. The irony is not lost on me. I go there at night, usually after ten, and usually after everyone else has gone home to bed – perhaps to get sweaty in another way.

But lately there are more people there. Like lots more. What are these people doing at the gym at ten o’clock at night? (And, incidentally, what’s that guy doing wearing a sun-visor in a gym at ten o’clock at night?). Don’t they get that this is my space, my time and I don’t particularly want to share with them?

I’ve always been cool with sharing. I played marbles as a kid and managed to share my tom thumbs and snake eyes with Dean and Eddy and Daniel and Mark – my playground buddies. I’ve lived in a share house. I’ve bought shares. I’ve even listened to Cher. But sharing at the gym… well, that’s different.

When you go to a hotel, you expect that the couple in the room before you had likely used the king-sized bed as their workbench for however long they occupied the room. Likewise the shower, possibly the bathroom vanity, the bedside table, the lounge chair in the corner, the desk with the internet port and, potentially the window sill. You also expect that housekeeping has come along and changed the sheets, wiped down all these surfaces and provided fresh flowers to disguise the smell. Don’t you?

In a gym – while it is hoped people only secrete sweat from their pores, not other fluids from other oriffices – it comes (if you’ll pardon the pun) about as close to a B&D dungeon as a public space can become. So what do people do to mop up their mess once they’ve splashed all over the place? Wipe it with a towel. WTF? You want me to trust that a quick wipe of a bench with your (stinky looking) towel is enough to make me feel comfortable about going to lie in your wet spot? Forget it. No, not even if you’re the hot chick with the butt expertly squeezed in to the virtually see-thru yoga pants. Although…

I am kidding. I think.

I live less than two minutes from my gym. I finish my cool down, pick up my stuff and head straight home to the shower. I haven’t even set foot in the shower at the gym. It looks clean in there, but for showers – just like humans – if you spend a lot of time with a lot of different naked people… you’re likely to be carrying some kind of bug.

Anyway, the only athelete’s foot I want to play tootsies with is one at the very end of a long, tanned leg belonging to a brazilian beach volleyballer.