Amazing how a little flirting can turn the day around.

OK, a lot of flirting.

Overheard on the tram

- I got a text from Famous Man today. He's engaged.
- To a woman or a man?

I have my life back

I worked night shift last night, so had to make myself go to sleep like any other day. Woke at 2 and forced myself back to bed. Good thing, too - when I woke again at 4:57, the website still said "Exam results will be posted at 5pm".

I've checked about 12 times, and it still says that I passed.

So I can now start to move on from 18 months of study and try to remember what it is like to relax again.

After tonight's shift.

Go Mum!

http://www.katecooperriley.smugmug.com/gallery/4788498_X3Jmp#284351190_U5qZr

by the way, i passed.

Cotton tales

Whilst on a jaunt to Our Nation's Capital recently, I did something very important. I bought myself new underwear.

Yes, it was Target 15% Off Day, so I loaded up with slinky Bonds undies - and a few pairs of socks for good measure. As always happens, the checked was manned(?) by a boy too young to shave, but who may perhaps be old enough to drive himself to work - being the ACT & all. Now, I can talk body parts & functions over dinner, bring up the awkward all too often, but when it comes to myself, well, the cringing 14 year old in me always wins. A boy! selling me undies! eek! To which the mature voice in my head says - if not get over it, then at least try not to blush.

So I duly handed over my underwear.
He scanned.
I blushed.
He gave them back to me.
The checkout chick next door took the hangers off her customer's undies before putting them in a bag.
I decided to be proactive. I started removing the little individual hangers.
He said - oh, sorry. I normally do that, but you looked like you would use them.

And I spent the rest of the day trying to decide exactly how I project "I use hangers for my underwear."

14 days out

2 days at home & the cabin fever's set in already. have managed to study a decent amount, but am boring myself & others in the house with nothing new to say. Unless it's about PFAPA.

Finally

I've finished my questions!

This may not mean a lot, but it's taken a year.

27 days to go.

Bleached

He & his parents have been in & out for the last few weeks. At his best, he strums and wisecracks. At worse moments, he falters, picks, can't spell, can't think. But smiles, and reminds me of my brother.

Yesterday, he fitted for an hour. We put lines in his arms, gave him drugs. The monitor alarmed as we all frantically tried. I stood at his head, holding his jaw, put a tube down his throat. He didn't stop.

His parents latch on, asking, asking...
If only I had something to reassure them.
If only I could stop it.
If only I had an answer.
If only I could tell them, it'll be alright...

And I try to find something to reassure me.
To stop it.
An answer.
That it'll be alright.

Because he reminds me of my brother.

Temperature rising on New Year's Eve

1995/6: Dad's. Due to a miscommunication between us, I stayed in & watched videos. Dad went out to party. I quietly grumbled.

1998/9: Manila. First trip overseas, arrived on New Year's Day to the humid city of 11 million. There a full day before the rest of my group, I'd got all the travel warnings & read all about the perils of travel in foreign cities. Got water from the shop & sat wearing my moneybelt in my bare hotel room in the heat. Gunshots cracked out across the suburbs all night. Tried to sleep.

Realised the next day they were fireworks.

June 1999: World's First Millenium Party. Still think of New Years on hearing Greatest American Hero.

Dec 1999: Penthouse, Queen St highrise. Formal 21st that had been 21 years in planning. We held our breath as the clock & computers ticked over, then drank litres of champagne as the city kept humming below us.

2001/2: Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe. Spent the whole day white-water rafting and collapsed, exhausted and sunburnt, at 8pm. The racous backpackers outside our window convinced us to go out for one drink. The barman insisted we wear sunglasses before squirting the vodka-filled supersoaker into our mouths. Swam after midnight. Met fire-twirling Irish Zimbabweans who offered to sell me into slavery. Chose not to go for a walk with them and watched the sun come up.

2006: Inadvertantly stuck on the Yarra bridge in the midst of the fireworks. Kissed. Watched the city surge with people and hold its breath.

2007/8: Another sticky hot start to the year. Drive slowly home from camping and wallowing in the river. Melbourne hangs out of cars & shouts greetings. We visit a halal kebab shop for dinner, my bare shoulders goosebumpy in their airconditioning as the cook, in hijab, chops. The party is pumping but all I want to do is sit with my feet in their wading pool. We wander home across radiating concrete and retreat to the fan. The first day of 2008 brings sun and eventually freshness.

Welcome, new year.

I like sake

Ventured across town last night, to the coolest japanese restaurant in melbourne. Feasted and chatted, and pondered the big questions:

What exactly are those little translucent cubes in the fruit salad?

get on the bandwagon

So, everyone's talking about burma.

Keep it up!

It's been going on for decades and rarely in the spotlight. George Orwell wrote a novel called Burmese Days, about his time there in the British Army. But it's a running joke that he actually wrote a trilogy: the others being Animal Farm & 1984.

Join a protest in solidarity with the people of Burma: 12pm 6th October in major cities across the world.

Write to your politicians.

Talk about it and read about it:
www.irrawaddy.org
Burma Campaign UK

Don't let it slide back into darkness.

Amateur Astronomy

The three of us stood outside, peering through the washing on the Hills Hoist.

It that it?
Maybe.
Isn't Mars that red one there?
It said it's the brightest thing in the sky next to the moon. It has to be that one.
No, that's... thing. The dog star.
Sirius?
Is that the dog star?
Yeah, like in Harry. Sirius. Dog. Sirius.
Yeah... but it's not Mars. I went to astronomy camp!
OK. But it's supposed to be the closest in 60 000 years. Surely it's bright?
Let's google it then.

Mars came its closest to the Earth in 60 000 years on August 27...
2003.
We missed out by 4 years.
And now, it's the lunar eclipse, and banks of clouds as far as we can see.

Bangkok bus

I wait with my friends for the big new bus. Eight hours ahead, but at least it's airconditioned and no changes required.

The elderly monks climb in at the same stop. Their orange-clad figures claim the back seat where they can lounge. I sit and watch the familiar hills slide by, the golden pagoda fade in the distance. The river Kwai is swollen beside the road yet the raft houses are high and dry - the water feeding the electric lights downriver. I wonder when I will return again, yet a tinny Jingle Bells keeps interrupting my thoughts - the senoir monk's mobile phone runs hot.

We stop at the 70km point, 2 hours in. My seat neighbour knows English for "15 minutes" so I stretch for 3. I have a plane to catch and wish to leave when the bus does.

In Kanachana, I am more brave. Hunger and the need for the loo have me miming to the conductor, who assures me it's ok. Even so, I rush and end up eating a fake tuna sandwich on fake bread - a Thai speciality in a land known for its food.

My new seatmate has a six-month old baby, who gurgles and bubbles and grabs. She is cute; I am used to blocking out kid noises. Tim Winton's Australia fills my imagination instead. Jingle Bells...

After 4 hours, her mother plucks up the courage to use her smattering of English. She used to have a Belgian boyfriend, she tells me with sadness in her face. She lives in Kanchana but she will not go back. This bus is her escape - she has her daughter and one bag, and she will not have to see her husband again. The violence of my novel is personified in the delicate Thai face beside me.

Later, she points out the Chao Praya river - we are here. We smile, I wish her well. I still have 24 hours of travel ahead - she has a whole new life to build.

As I board the plane, I catch myself humming Jingle Bells.

Night owl

I've just realised something that has not given me joy, but perhaps will allow me to face reality head on.

I'm not working another day shift until the end of July.

Ethical Dilemma

No, not one of the big ones. But somewhat significant to my mental health.

I just got the roster for my next 3 month block. Now, this includes 2 months of nights, which is week-on, week-off, before I go on leave.

Only I'm only listed for 3 weeks of nights. Which means 8 weeks of leave. 2 unpaid, sure, but another glorious fortnight. And only 252 hours of work in a whole THREE MONTHS.

So: to just gleefully (and quietly) book my flights, or to point out that there appears to be a slight glitch? The principle of beneficence is calling.

Nobody expects the spanish inquisition

Today, my severalth-day-in-a-row at at home, I'm looking on the bright side.
I have

• made yummy banana bread
• finally emailed an old friend and potentially set up a week in a house on the Cote d'Azure (sp?)
  
• finished knitting a scarf
• planted some beetroot seeds
• eaten figs

All of which are soul-nourishing and will hopefully sink in.

Corporate greed kills patients

Deliberately inflammatory title, I know. But most people with HIV/AIDS in most of the world cannot afford treatment and those who can access it are kept alive by cheap generic medicines. Having been beaten by the courts in South Africa 5 years ago, Novartis, one of the multinational pharmaceutical companies, is taking the Indian government to court to try to change existing patent laws. This would mean skyrocketing treatment costs, loss of access to drugs for those who need them, and thousands of unnecessary deaths.

And don't even get me started on R&D costs. Novartis made a gross profit of 23.7 billion US dollars in 2005, of which it spent 4.8 billion on R&D - mostly in West-oriented drugs like anticholesterol and niche anticancer therapies: the total R&D cost being half of what it spent on marketing. It's not exactly ploughing money into a noble quest to benefit mankind.

So - please, go to msf.org.au and sign their petition. Thousands of people will thank you.

One handed typing

... and no, it's not related to many people's reason for using the internet!

i'm avoiding turning this into a litany of injuries. suffice to say that i'm on the patient end of things for at least a week and hence may be spending somewhat more time at my computer than recently.

So hello there, how's life for you?

International Wig Day

The signs appeared the day prior. No further information supplied. Just clipart poster and a huge pile of wigs.

Oh, the possibilities...

First I went for a long chestnut ponytail. But it was too tame - I was told it looked like my own hair. And I've been watching Kath & Kim recently.

So I went the complete opposite of tame. Took it home in order to figure out the hair flattening arrangement and to get used to the idea. Dressed up a little the next day, heels, stockings, the lot. And my new crowning glory - a sleek electric blue bob.

Funny to walk down the street as another person. My new identity flashed out for my fellow commuters, who responded with definite Not Staring. Making a statement is a little meaningless amongst strangers.

The walk into work was a different story. A whole institution - and that slight fear you get before a fancy dress party, that no-one else will have joined you. Colleagues I've never talked to suddenly grin - but aren't really sure what to say. They think it my real new look, a bold but perhaps ill advised move. A wash of relief crosses their faces as I proclaim International Wig Day and they don't have to think up creative compliments.

At our usual morning meeting, the whole team is unrecognisable. Green curls, long blonde locks and afros are the order of the day. We all swagger and stalk throughout the day, our inner drag queens out on show. The kids love us; parents forgive us. We are the showstoppers we imagine ourselves to be.

Out for the afternoon, I take it off. Home on the tram, back in grey Melbourne. The world sags a little, the sparkle washed out by the rain, until I spot another colourful rebel through the crush of people. 70ish, she sits resplendent in buttercup yellow suit, pink boots, fuschia hair.

It heartens me to know that although every day is wig day for some, they also sometimes use it to let out their inner Queen.