Wrapped in Plastic

This blog is dead! I have decided to move with the times and create a new home, afestein.net.

I'm sure you will agree that it's for the best. I'm sorry blogspot, but things just weren't working out. I just need some me time.

If there is anybody left still reading this, please keep in touch and update your links, bookmarks, RSS feeds, tattoos, and messages written in blood. Please do not stop sending me fan mail.

GOODBYE CRUEL WORLD

Screw you, AFE and Ernie

Upon investigating a new URL for my possible whizz-bang personal website, I'm rather disappointed to discover that Australian Fishing Enterprises exists. More frustrating is the fact that an even better URL - afe.net - simply has a garbled message from 'Ernie'.

It's the same old story. It seems every time I try to do something worthwhile in life, Ernie comes along to screw things up. Yesterday, when I went to get my ham and avocado sandwich out of the fridge, there was a note:

"Thanks - Ernie.
P.S. don't like wholegrain."

I shake my fist at you, Ernie, and I spit pins in your direction.

I hurted my mindbrain

Shit! This coding stuff can be hard, sometimes. I've spent about 5 hours trying to nut out some CRAPPY WEBSITE MENU PROBLEM and I'm ready to kill somebody. Instead of murder, I'm going to try writing here as therapy.

I think I need to buy a better chair. I'm sitting in a $2 wooden chair and it's just not good for my posture. I find myself curling up into ridiculous positions and twisting my legs around constantly to stay comfortable. Me needs a chair. Oh, and a flat screen monitor.

A bit like Jesus, except without the good content

This blog was probably due for a bit of a rebirth, considering that it died somewhat of a slow and painful death over the last six months. I've removed my shitty template and installed something atrociously boring. I think I like it. I've also added a Twitter widget, cleaned up my links and got rid of the Google Ads. My revenue was about 22 cents over the last year or so. I feel so clean.

Now that I'm a super ninja web designer I'll probably eventually leave Blogger and make a personal customised website instead, but that will take time and effort. There's scope for a work-related blog, but I think it's important to keep that separate. My clients don't want to read about my bowel movements.

Blogging seems to be generally in decline, and many of my old pals have lost interest (like myself). I've also lost interest in Facebook. Twitter seems interesting, though.

Work-wise, I seem to be getting pulled into the web development field rather than web design lately. A couple of project opportunities have lead me to spend a great many hours reading manuals and fiddling with Apache, Drupal, CakePHP, and Wordpress recently and I've probably learned more in this last week than I ever knew. Being slightly more nerdy than designery, it could be a good path for me. Less client contact would also be a bonus.

From the bowels of the tECHNOlaB

Didn't you know, blogging is sooooo 2005? It's all about Twitter or Facebook or something now. In fact, Facebook is sooooo 2006. No matter what you do, you're behind the times. That's why I'm just going to sit at home and eat cheese from now on. I don't even have a touch-screen television on my fridge!

Assuming Chocolate Rain wasn't enough information about what's been going on in my head for the last few months, I should probably fill you in. Now that my income depends solely on freelancing through my web design business, I've been intermittently panicking and shaking my hands around like a little girl. Sometimes I feel superbly confident, sometimes I feel like jumping out my office window and bolting. Nonetheless, things are going reasonably well considering it's early days. I wear ugg boots, drink tea and often don't speak to anybody for the entire day (except the dog). Working from home is the BEE'S CHEESE.

~~ THE WORDS ENDS HERE ~~

I probably didn't even read these.

I'm posting this now because I am behind the frickin' times. For posterity, my 2007 reading list:

• White Teeth - Zadie Smith
• A Time to Kill - John Grisham
• London - Edward Rutherford
• A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
• Better than Life - Grant Naylor
• Mere Christianity - C.S. Lewis
• Some book about body language
• Cannery Row - John Steinbeck
• East of Eden - John Steinbeck
• Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
• Franny & Zooey - J.S. Salinger
• A Long Way Down - Nick Hornby
• A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
• The Last Juror - John Grisham
• The Dark Arena - Mario Puzo
• Red Dwarf - Grant Naylor
• Chart Throb - Ben Elton
• Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens

AH THE GOOD TIMES

My new favourite song

I'm outta here

From now on, I will blog once per month, no more. The screaming fans outside my house were getting a bit much.

What have I been up to? Let's see.

• Our new baby doggy is growing up and behaving herself nicely. Her name is Lulu and she likes chewing things and running around in the back yard and being cute.
  
  
• I launched the brand new snazzy website for Blackbird Solutions. I am a proud father!
  
  
• This week I decided to try out this whole freelancing web design thing and work from home. Mostly that means staring at my laptop while I wear ugg boots and scratch my butt. But I also work! And they give me money. This is a good arrangement, and I think I will do this full-time soon.
  
  
• I went to a wedding and drank some beer, which tasted nice.

Right now I am very excited, because tomorrow I am going to live on a houseboat for 4 DAYS with 4 FRIENDS on the Noosa River. We are going to laugh and drink beer and catch fish and eat crabs and throw our heads back and laugh some more.

Ooh!

Breaking news:

This is a picture of me, riding carefully on my new ride-on mower. I ride it up and down and all around, all day long. Sometimes I wear a big hat, sturdy leather shoes, and a jumpsuit made completely of denim. I look very good in my jumpsuit made of denim.

I use it to cut the grass so that my new dog won't get bitten by an Eastern Brown Snake which has recently been spotted on my property. The snake was in fact spotted indoors, and was spotted attacking the spotter in his shed while he comfortably watched Neighbours on television. This proves once and for all that the Eastern Brown Snake does not like people who watch Neighbours.

Being arsed

Generally speaking, I really couldn't. Be arsed, that is. Since returning to Australia I seem to have been sucked into a vortex of busy boringness which is draining my will to write music, or write blog entries, or really do anything but fix things around the house and work on my sideline business. It's not that I'm not enjoying life, it's just that it seems to be going about 5 times faster than usual. This is starting to sound like one of those whingey posts that I hate reading, so feel free to lose interest and roll your eyeballs at will.

Something interesting is happening. I've got a month or so left on my full-time work contract, then I'm on my own. I've set up my own web design business, which I'm hoping to actually use to earn a living from the middle of the year. Crazy, I know. I've got a few jobs on the go right now, and hopefully things will heat up so I can work from home full-time eventually. With little experience in the freelancing front, it's going to be an interesting experiment. It should be fun, and I'm not really worried. Yet. I'd better start getting serious about marketing pretty soon though.

The past few weeks have also been spent building a little doggy fence for our newest addition - a female Golden Retriever puppy we're picking up this weekend. Trish is completely beside herself with excitement, and pretty much speaks of nothing else. Adjusting to becoming puppy parents should also be an interesting experiment.

Monkey on a motorbike

Dudes! It's a monkey on a motorbike!

John Lemon

Continuing my series of dodgy artist profiles, this is a picture of John Lennon according to a frequently incorrect Russian music site I referred to recently.

I'm not sure if it's the silky flowing hair that bothers me, or the disdainful "I'm going to break a pint-glass over your head" look.

I am a garden gnome

How's your March going?

That's enough about you, let's talk about me. When we returned to Australia, we bought a Land Rover, which by all accounts seemed to be a reliable car. Unfortunately the Land Rover turned out to be evil, and we had to destroy it. Several nasty mechanical things went wrong with the car in the following month, which meant we were about $4,000 out of pocket. Ouch. Instead of gritting our teeth and hoping for the best, we decided to act quickly and trade the car for something more reliable. Now we have a much more expensive Toyota Corolla which I think suits us much better.

Also part of our homecoming plan was a puppy. Personally I'm not a huge dog person, but I like dogs. Sometimes they lick your face, and you are allowed to beat them when nobody is watching. Trish is extremely excited, and really, really REALLY wants a dog, so I'm happy to oblige. Our little Golden Retriever doggy will be ready to collect in about three weeks from now. I WILL PUT IT IN A BASKET AND CUDDLE IT EVERY DAY.

The question of a dog also leads to big questions about our crazy overgrown block. We have a particularly nasty weed on our block called Silverleaf Desmodium, which is also known as Shitweed. According to popular legend, the vine was developed in hell by Satan himself. The weed has a tendency to stick to anything that moves, and when it goes to seed, the results are even worse. Small green seeds attach themselves to everything, which is possibly the most irritating thing in the world. The only cure for Shitweed is to shave all your hair off and cover yourself in baby oil. It doesn't take too much to imagine what will happen once we have a Golden Retriever loose on the block.

So as you can imagine, I've spent many a grand weekend so far poisoning the shitty Shitweed and slashing the shitty grass. It's itchy, itchy work my friends. A big hairy man came in a big bobcat a couple of days ago and cleaned up half my block, which was very helpful. Unfortunately he also managed to completely destroy my frangipani and mango trees, which made me sad. Luckily my sapling lemon and lime trees survived.

Speaking of gardening, let's talk about gardening. Guess what my latest obsession is? It's GARDENING. I've started a super amazing vege patch. It's got little pumpkins, passionfruit, tomatoes, and carrots, all of which I assume will be delicious. I also have herbs - mint, coriander, parsley and basil. That's right, I enjoy gardening. One day I will show you pictures, but only when you have earned my trust.

I M GETN

I M GETN A NEW DOG

I M GETN A NEW CAR


YAY

Simon & Garmunkel

According to a music site I visited recently, this is a picture of Simon & Garfunkel. Man, those guys have gone downhill since the 60's.

Special note: THAT IS NOT SIMON AND THAT IS NOT GARFUNKEL

Observations on the return of your humble hero to the sound of one hand clapping

On the 12th of January, I had a homecoming party. None of my old friends showed up except John. I was sad. Evidently slightly more effort will be required on my part to rekindle old friendships, and perhaps I need to make some more friends. Lots of Trish's friends and mutual friends showed up, so it was still an OK party.

As the next couple of weeks wore on, my ego became slightly deflated as I realised that 99% of people are really not interested in what I've been doing in 2007. When we returned, everyone else was exactly the same, however I felt like I had been on a completely different planet for about five years. In fact, I felt like a different person, and assumed everyone else would also be different.

I also assumed everyone would be itching to gather around and listen to my travel stories, but everyone was the same, doing the same thing, and not particularly interested. I felt exhilarated, and excited about life, but everyone else seemed... bored. My greatest fears of returning to normal life were beginning to be realised, and I started to think that perhaps in fact, I should have moved to Canada. Shoulda coulda woulda.

Anyway, we have been enjoying the novelty of being back, catching up with old friends, living in our old house again, and appreciating all the great things about our old life. In stark contrast to our backpacker life, material possessions seem to have become the central focus of our existence. Among other things, we've puchased a car, a DVD player, two couches, and a microwave. Domestic bliss, here we come.

Speaking of which, I'd better go to work so I can pay for all this fancy crap.

Sufjan and the magic hula hoops

On the 9th of January we went to a concert by Mr. Sufjan Stevens, American multi-instrumentalist and performer extraordinare.

He played piano!

He played guitar!

He played with hula hoops!

He also played a banjo and sang a lot. It was an excellent concert. I would recommend his amazing music and performance to anyone and everyone and all. Now I must go and drink some beer.

Home Swoit Home

Freaking freakazoids. I'm still over a month behind with this blogging thing. Why won't my life slow down? Here's some January action comin' atcha in stereo.

January 4th - After one whole year of backpacking and separation from everything familiar, we arrive back in Australia. We feel different, and excited about being home. The first thing we notice are the strange broad nasal accents over the airport loudspeaker.

"Paassngers on floight twoo-six-one ploise procoieed to gaate thiiiry-twoooo."

Alarmed, we look at each other and say, "By jove, darling, what kind of primitive backwater is this place? They sound rather like dying cows." After the initial shock of getting accustomed to the Aussie drawl, we also notice that everybody is dressed as though they've just come from the beach. A distant memory stirs in my mind as I recognise my old uniform - shorts and thongs.

My parents collect us from the airport and it's great to see them. As I step outside, my skin starts to soak up the beautiful humid air I grew up in, and it feels good. Very good. The weather is tropical and my parents tell me it's been raining for several weeks. Sure enough, it's raining, but it's warm. Home, sweet home.

That night, we drink beer, have a barbecue, show off our photos and enjoy some long overdue family time. I discover that now I'm back in Australia, I start to taaaalk a looot slooower.

5th - One of our top priorities when we got home was to buy a car. After several email exchanges, we had arranged to buy my sister's Land Rover from Sydney and drive it back up. True to form, we didn't waste any time and flew down to Sydney to pick it up. Road trip time!

Once there, we enjoy some more family time with my sister, brother-in-law and their two young kids in Sydney. We're pampered nicely, and we get to know our niece and nephew again.

But all was not peaches and cream, my friends! That night, I had the most awful dream. I believed there were two burglars in the house wearing animal masks. I could see one of them moving slowly in my room, and I see one moving about in the kids' room. I wake up, and in the pitch black darkness I watch the figure creep to the corner and then stop. By this time, I am wide awake, frozen, sweating, with tears rolling down my face. I honestly believe there is someone in the house, and I decide to stay completely still until they leave. I fear that if I move, I will put the childrens' lives at risk, not to mention our own. After several minutes of this petrified torture, I decide to fumble around quickly for the lamp switch, only to discover there is nobody in the room. I get up and check on the kids, and everything is normal. Spooky.

6th - More family time - we catch up with my Aunt and Uncle and a few cousins in Sydney. For the first time in over a year, I go for a swim. It feels good, and the back of my paper-white neck gets burned. I feel like an English tourist.

7th - Time for the road trip. We take our spanking new car and say our goodbyes, having enjoyed the trip but relishing a bit of time on our own. The car is solid, comfortable, and drives easily. An excellent car for a road trip. We take in some of the beautiful Australian scenery and have a good old yarn. Trish's brother is renting a new (unoccupied) house in Port MacQuarie, so that's our first port of call.

It's an easy drive, and after arriving in the afternoon we have enough time to warm up the credit card and do a bit of shopping. After being denied certain luxuries and having to trim down on all our possessions for the previous year, we badly want stuff. Lots of stuff. We need new phones so we get the Nokia 6070 - nice and simple. I need a razor, so I get a good quality electric one. I also stop into Dick Smith's and buy an FM transmitter for the iPod so we can listen to tunes on the road. After a good Aussie pub meal we go back to the house to play with our new toys.

8th - Today's a big driving day and we go all the way past the Gold Coast to Trish's brother's house. More family moments, this time with a different set of niece and nephew. We drink beers and catch up.

9th - Big Wednesday. The day we move back into our house. We polish off the rest of the kilometres and arrive back at our magnificent Queenslander on 1 acre at the Sunshine Coast. We're fretting about the tenant and really, really, really hoping they cleaned the house properly.

Unfortunately our fears are realised when we open up the house and discover that the place is nowhere near a rental tenancy standard clean.

We've had lots of experience renting places before, and we know how strict the agents are - unfortunately we're the agent so it's our problem. We also want to move into our house immediately and get on with our lives, but unfortunately the house will need to be cleaned beforehand. After some interesting phone discussions, the tenant agrees to pay for a cleaner and we get one to start immediately. Even so, Trish and I are destined to spend the next three days and several subsequent weekends cleaning in our spare time. Pooh pooh!

Episode VIII, in which we see a minor Hollywood star acting suspiciously

2nd - What's this? The last day of my super magical trip of joy? Crap. Actually, this is quite exciting, and I ring my Mum for a chat. We check out of our super dooper private room and start killing time until our flight at midnight. Through lack of anything else interesting to do, we go back to Farmer's Markets for lunch, where we have some strange spicy Jambalaya type food. I'm going to have some serious ring-sting tomorrow.

Nothing more interesting happens until we decide to go back to our Mexican restaurant for one last plate of super nachos at dinner time. Walking towards us on Melrose we see a rather large gentleman wearing all black and looking quite suspicious. I feel threatened, and I draw my pink cashmere shawl around me in a moment of unconscious body language. He looks at me strangely, and after I pass him, I realise it's none other than Abraham Benrubi, AKA that dude from E.R., Parker Lewis Can't Lose, and various other Hollywood type things. That's our super Hollywood star sighting! We are satisfied, and ready to go back to Australia now.

Episode VII, in which I challenge Jack Nicholson to a light-sabre duel

December 31st - Since our budget has gone out the window, it's only fitting that we participate in an expensive tour of L.A. We catch Venice Beach (again), the Hollywood Walk of Fame, the Kodak and Chinese theatres, a grand view of the Hollywood sign, Rodeo Drive, and a bunch of filthy-rich movie stars' houses. We check in on Leonardo DiCaprio, Jack Nicholson, Nicholas Cage, J-Lo, John Travolta, and Elton John, and everything seems to be in order. Jack Nicholson shows me his Nazi stamp collection and original Darth Vader helmet. He puts the helmet on and we play Star Wars for a few hours until he has to go to a New Years' Eve party. We embrace, each promising to write, and Jack waves sadly from his black limousine. I miss his little bald head already.

It seems to be New Years' Eve. We walk up the road and revisit the rather wonderful Chinese restaurant we discovered a couple of nights before. Deliciously healthy. It's going to be a pretty quiet New Years', but we feel satisfied. We've organised to stay at the hostel with a couple of friends, since they're offering all-you-can-drink for just seven bucks. Bargain!

Unfortunately I seem to be in a rather depressed mood (perhaps I'm sad that my super magical trip of joy is nearly over?) and spend most of the night ignoring our new friends and staring into my plastic beer cup. I put on a silly pointed hat but it feels meaningless. I don't feel like partying, I feel like going to sleep. I'm depressed that our trip is nearly over and that my new-found freedom as a world traveller is nearly at an end. On the other hand, I'm sick of sight-seeing, sick of living out of a backpack, and looking forward to the challenges of the new year. I've got mixed feelings. Perhaps I'm turning into a woman.

January 1st- Fortunately the beer kicks in at about midnight, and I suddenly find myself in a silly mood talking to strangers. We meet a cool German dude and an incredibly beautiful Japanese girl who I stare at for the rest of the night. The German dude says he's leaving the next night unexpectedly, and has a private room which has been paid for for the next couple of nights. After ascertaining that he does not want to have kinky sex with us, we agree that this is an excellent idea and have another drink together. He is now my new best friend. I stare at the Japanese girl a bit more and we talk about Sushi Train while I wiggle my eyebrows meaningfully.

In the morning we discover that we are not hung over and I am no longer depressed. I should get drunk more often. It's time for a quiet day, and after a greasy Subway breakfast we decide to go down to Farmer's Market for a quick look around. We get coffee and do a spot of shopping. That night, we discover a magnificent Mexican restaurant nearby and stuff our faces with nachos before heading off to see Lars and the Real Girl. It's a good movie, and I think Ryan Gosling is hot, hot, hot!