Speed blogging

I have decided I would like to have Louis Theroux over for dinner. And a drink or seven. He seems like a charming individual, although I fear that Ben and I are a little less interesting than the weirdos he usually finds himself hanging out with.

As work descends into absolute chaos again, I am finding the gap widening between things I have to say and the time allocated to saying them. Here’s a brief rundown:

- Ben and I went to the south coast for our 1st wedding anniversary. We saw whales, completely by accident. It was awesome.
- I got another postcard. It’s dangerous.
- I went to my second gospel choir practice. It sounded pretty.
- I have not been riding my bike, because I suck. Must get back on tomorrow.
- I finished reading The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. … I can’t even think of what to say about this.

I have many more things to say on all of the above subjects but for now this will have to do. Come to the Sly Fox tomorrow night if you want to talk to me about them in person. Dusker are onstage at 9.30pm.

Lonely hearts in Georgia

All is not right in the world of John Singer. Mick’s little brother accidentally shot Baby in the head, and now the family has to pay for her medical costs and can barely afford to live any more; Willie, the doctor’s son, had horrific things done to him in jail, and now Copeland is losing faith in the world; Mick has moved from puberty into a heartbreakingly sad little exploration with the opposite sex; and Singer still misses the only person he considers to be a true friend, Spiros. I have a feeling this can’t end well.

I'm gonna let it shine!

Things that maybe should have been more obvious before last night:

1. Alto! I am one!
2. Sight singing! I am good at it!
3. My ears! They are clever!
4. Gospel harmonies! Beautiful and amazing! If I pay enough attention, this could do wonders for my songwriting.
5. Vocal warm ups! What a concept! I should do them!

I totally did not suck in my new gospel choir, which is super awesome news. Self esteem win. They are brilliant! There were only 10 of us last night, 3 of whom (including me) were new to the group, so it was a lot smaller than expected, but what they lack in numbers they make up for in volume. The choir leader was lovely and welcoming, big on charisma and obviously very good at what she does, and my nerves settled quite quickly as I came to terms with what I was doing and the sound that was being created around me. Having got through the initial awkwardness of the first session, I feel like a part of the group already. They are an affable, friendly bunch, and I can see myself looking forward to Tuesdays.

We started with some stretches and warm ups, and followed with a 'Circle Song', which is basically any kind of simple gospel standard, sung while standing in a circle with ours eyes closed, holding hands. This was a bit weird at first, particularly as I didn't know the song, but I started to get the feel for it and just let the voices wash over me. I later learned that there is no structure to a circle song, everyone just picks up a random harmony as the verses go along (sometimes resulting in a little more dissonance than intended, but mostly wonderful), and throwing in an old fashioned holler every now and then for good measure. We then learnt three songs (I figured out that the tenors get all the best harmonies – the weird ones like the sevenths) and at the end of two hours, had another circle song to close, before dispersing into the night with light in our spirits and souls. Hallelujah!

Bike face

Wow, getting back on the bike after 3 days off is a killer. It’s mostly a mental leap, though, I think. How ‘hard’ I worked is often reflected in the colour of my face on arrival. Today was somewhere around fuchsia.

Holy lasagne

I finally heard back from my old parish priest. Let me explain. Heath's challenge was set out thusly: Re-organise a meal with Father Harry Cotter (wherever he is) and have all the original people there that was at the first one, and cook the lasagne.

Back in my early high school days, I attended a small Catholic school. I'm not going to lie, it was a bit horrible. Not because of the school itself, I suppose, more to do with the fact there were only 14 kids in our graduating Year 10 class, only 4 of whom were girls, and most of whom I shared little-to-no interests with. Music, however, was always a good salve, and Heath and I spent a lot of time singing in church for school masses. Heath is actually the only person I spent my entire school life with. Our stage debut was in Kindergarten - a production of Peter Rabbit where he played Mr McGregor (I can still picture him waving his tiny pitchfork at that darned rabbit) and I was a garden cat (it was a non-speaking part that mostly involved staring into a fishpond). In second grade, I learnt I could hit more high notes than most and was cast as Snow White, which is ironic since I was possibly the darkest kid in the class. Heath was already well aware of his musicality and was cast as Prince Charming. So began years of eisteddfods, school choirs, stage productions, performances, and a thankfully-short-lived covers band in which I convinced myself I could play drums for a while.

Anyway, I digress - during our later stints doing psalms in 2-part harmony, we started getting invited over to Father Kevin Barry-Cotter's place after church for what has gone down in history as some of the greatest lasagne ever created. Now, I remember the Christmas where we accidentally set his advent wreath on fire (don't worry, we managed to extinguish it before Father BC came back into the room), but I'm slightly ashamed to say that I don't recall much about this group dinner that Heath is talking about. I have a fairly good idea who would have been there. I've contacted a few of those people and so far all seem remarkably open to the idea of a reunion, even though nobody seems to know exactly who was present.

I tracked down Father BC. I had actually already tracked him down prior to my wedding when I was having a small religious crisis, but it turned out he had no recollection of who I actually was. Reassuring. So I was pleased to receive confirmation this morning that he is still in Cootamundra, a town 400kms-ish from Sydney, and a few hours from my old hometown. The message was from one of the Sisters on his behalf as he is on sick leave, but apparently he is delighted to hear from me! So I've been advised to call after the 17th when they expect him to be back on his feet. In the meantime I guess I should figure out who else was at dinner.

PS. Working on a public holiday is great. I'm actually getting stuff done. They should let me have the building to myself more often.

Sponsorship grovel

The countdown is on to Wollongong. Who are my mystery benefactors? I have been wondering this for some time. I had 2 donations of $10 each, and somebody very generously donated $120. I don't know who it is so I can't thank them, but I guess they must read this blog, so whoever you are, thank you. Between the three of us, Team Hollier-Pask (or Team HP for short) have raised $1335 for MS so far. Not too shabby.

Due to the rain I've not ridden for 3 days, so that's a bit bad. I didn't want to talk to my Wii Fit after it told me that my 2 weeks of riding had gained me 2 kilos. Self esteem fail.

If you've not donated yet, please sponsor me! It's for a good cause and it's also tax deductable!

Ring a ding ding

It's an overcast, dreary evening, at the end of a week where the weather decided to skip from winter straight to summer, and then suddenly remembered its supposed to do spring first. I spent the morning stretching my vocal chords (and spending some quality time with my new super best friend Bam the staffy) at Day Job Studios with Briscoe for what is going to be one hell of a record. We're about to head over to Matt & Cassie's place to partake in several wee drams of whiskey, but first I thought I best catch up on a few things.

I've taken to riding my bike as my main method of getting to work. Changing my thinking so that 'this is just what I do', rather than 'should I do this today?' seems to be working. There are only 36 days left until the Gong Ride and if I think too hard about that, it makes me quite anxious. So I just get up, get on the bike, get into work, and now it is just a part of my day. I can make it up the 'big hills' now - Terminus Street, Trade Street, and to a lesser extent, Albermarle Street, and while I always have to talk myself back to earth after Terminus, I'm definitely improving on some level.

I've been thinking a lot about the utilisation of a bicycle for making strangers laugh. You can ride straight in and out of the situation for maximum impact, which works if you get the laugh, but more importantly, works if you don't get the laugh and need to escape with embarrassment. Dogs are another good 'in' point. They are such a great catalyst for conversation.

Being a hesitant cyclist, I don't use my bell very often. Generally if I'm on the footpath, I probably shouldn't be, so I'll just trundle on behind pedestrians until I get a chance to move around them. I only use them if I'm on a bike path.

With these things in mind, Thursday's cycle was successful in 2 ways. I was coming home along Baltic Street, and 2 guys were sitting out on their front porch, singing with bar-room enthusiasm. One was vigorously strumming a ukelele and they seemed to come to the end of their piece just as I wheeled past. I rang the bell as my offering to the finale. One of them threw his hands up in the air in triumph and they both whooped and laughed. Thank you, occupants of Baltic Street, for being my second laughing stranger(s).

Coming up the home stretch, my legs fatigued and so I moved onto the footpath. A small curly-haired toddler seemed to think I was the most amazing thing he'd seen in ages. "Mum!" he hollered, "Mum! Bike! Bike! Bike!" As I went past, I rang my bell at him, and his little face lit up. "It's a nice one!" I overheard him exclaim to his mother, before yelling "BYE!" after me. I returned the farewell and rode the final block feeling pretty sunny inside.

The toddler didn't actually laugh so I can't count him, but I still thought it was a nice story.

The following night, my back light fell off and smashed and it took me ages to fumble around in the dark lane looking for where the batteries had rolled to. Then closer to home, I had my first altercation with the part of the chain coming off. For a while I flusterred over it, then I calmed down and realised it was very easy to fix. My hands got greasy. I think that means I'm a proper cyclist now.