Sunday

It's not a Sunday, but it feels like one. I bought shoes. The practical pair are black ankle boots with pointed toes and stiletto heels and straps across them, with little buckles on the straps. There are also a pair of bejewelled satiny turquoise pointed-toe heels, and a pair of black strappy shoes with gold detailing and ridiculously high heels. YAY SHOES! Alas, poverty.

Am thinking about what I'm going to play at Andrea's upcoming nuptials. 'Makin' Whoopee' has been over-ruled, as has 'Don't Marry Me.' Have offered to make a horse noise on my trumpet but this has also been declined. No idea why! Audience would expect to see a horse! Then I had the thought that actually Andrea and David could LEAVE the church in a two-person horse costume. It would symbolise the way that two must move as one as the marriage trots along. And I could make horse noises on my trumpet, and people in the pews could knock coconut shells together, as is the time-honoured tradition. As the dutiful wife Andrea would, however, have to be the back end.

Dad and I wrote a highly catchy tune last night. "You got a txt while you were shavin' your face (x3), I wonder who it's from?" "Txt from Barb while I was shavin' my face (x3), that's who it was from." It was based on a true story in which Dad got a txt -from Barb- while he was shaving his face. I could've played it at the wedding, if we hadn't decided by now that actually Moon River will be the song of choice.

Dad told me a story the other day, when we were talking about tomatoes. It goes like this. Bear in mind that it's coming from my retired father, who does not normally tell such stories. "I was in a flat in my younger days, and my mate Tim grew tomatoes, because they're good for hiding dope in." I sort of went 'wait...what?' at that point. "Yes...only, the dope grew all tall and thin and twice the height of the tomatoes and wasn't very well hidden at all. And so we were all sort of sitting around one night, stoned out of our heads, and we thought why not tie little bunches of tomatoes onto the dope plants? To better disguise them, like. But it didn't work because there's actually not anything you can tie tomatoes onto dope plants by. So there we were, outside, trying to stick needles through tomatoes. But then we gave up and went for a walk- there were four of us- and we were quite convinced that the only thing keeping the world spinning was our feet, pushing it backwards under us. We walked for hours because if we stopped, so would the world." Pause. "Funny things you do, when you're doped out of your mind."

Funny things indeed. Up there with Vic's story- it's sort of his party story from what I can gather, he keeps bloody telling it- about the time he woke up in a driveway with no pants on, and didn't know whose driveway it was.

In other news, fuck Mahler. I am sick of him and his fascination with mortality and his constant harking back to his childhood and his love of the flugelhorn. Told this to a friend who was not familiar with the word 'flugelhorn' (fair enough, really), and the conversation went downhill from there. Suffice to say I am never going to be able to listen to someone say "I polished my instrument last night" with a straight face again.

If you could have an extra body part, what would you have? I would have a tail.

Gloom and Doom and Fumes

Lots of all of these at work today...we did finish early, though. Realised at lunchtime that we weren't going to get any more rootstock in to cut up before the weekend and said to John, "If we finish that early, can we go home?" A little light dawned in his eyes and we all worked a lot faster and went home at four. Nice, it was. And I dyed my hair blue-black. I also dyed the bathroom walls blue-black, after the style of Pollock. Tomorrow I am buying Jif and steel wool.

Date with self last night went well...got to bar, sat down, got chatting to middle-aged gent who turned out to be record exec and needs trumpet player to record a little on debut album of next nz pop princess. Said, "I don't suppose you're a trumpet player?" I lied and said I was. On that note, Ryan has offered me a big band gig. This would be more exciting if I wasn't so suck!

Claire wants to be mentioned in my blog! Perhaps every day I shall Feature a Friend.
Claire is my one and only Irish friend. She lived in the backpackers with me and sent some fabulous txts.
"just been sick & trying to put sock on. v difficult. 5 mins."
"jacob turner has longest tongue in the world! this has flustered me greatly," and so on.
Also we had a bad habit of going down to Murphy's of a Friday night (Claire sweeps into the Lodge, does a circuit of the tv lounge, and says "Ally. Want to go for a pint?") 'just for one,' and still being there hours later, totally pissed and attempting to chat up the band while dancing badly and cackling like elderly spinsters. I miss Claire. The other day I had to sit soutside Kitty's on my own and have a glass of wine! It was all wrong. Also, Claire always gave me cigarettes, back in the day when I had no savings and always ran out by Sunday and spent the next three days annoying the shit out of her by begging cigarettes during the ad breaks in Dr. Phil. I am going to GO TO IRELAND soon(ish), and once again the pubs will ring with the sound of us singing along to U2 tracks, played by an average pub band, while totally wankered, waving our arms about and trying to catch the eye of the most shaggable man in the band (who isn't actually very shaggable.) Then stumbling home via BK, complaining about things whilst finding them very, very funny. Then having a wee vom, going to bed, and waking up at some ridiculously early hour, feeling like death, to have another vom and do a postmortem on the night.

Claire! I miss you! You never screw the crew or shit on your own doorstep (it's just not nice). Sorry you weren't mentioned better, but it is late and I must go out drinking. I may mention you again tomorrow!