Talking and Comedy

On Friday 30th, after a sunny day off work, my friend Jes and I went to see our last event of the Hello Darkness mini-festival, a talk and slideshow by Ken Warner about his photographs of Halloween from San Francisco.

I hadn’t heard of him before, but a quick search online found some photographs of high interest and good quality. He visited or lived in San Fransisco for twenty-odd years, and photographed the Halloween street parties which were based around the gay community there. He discussed how the parties came about, what people thought about it and some of the experiences he had while there. He showed us colour photos, as he had published a book of black and white photos and felt that the colour photos were something new.

There were some very interesting images involving people with costumes that were certainly worthy of some analysis. The highlight I think was the man who, apparently year after year, wore a costume consisting of pads and tampons with blood-red paint (at least I hope it was paint).

The room it took place in was on Brunswick Street, in an upstairs open-plan place. It seemed like the ideal place for a party, and although we headed off early, it seemed that a party would go on into the night. I even managed to sit on the hard wooden floor for the few hours it lasted. The crowd was an interesting mix of friends of friends of people who organised it, artistic types who were interested in the photos and quirky gothic types who just wanted to go to everything Halloween themed. I’m not sure where I fit in, but I was wearing plastic mini jack-o-lantern earrings.

The longer weekend was fairly quiet and lazy. Saturday afternoon consisted of an impromptu pub crawl and the evening a delicious dinner at the old Dainty Sechuan in Chinatown. Sunday was again, lazy, and involved watching
Flesh Gordon 2: Flesh Gordon Meets the Cosmic Cheerleaders’. We’d seen the first earlier this year, and this was significantly worse, but still amusing and lightly entertaining.

Unfortunately I had to work Monday, breaking up what could have been a five-day weekend. However, Cup eve evening was spent eating good food, drinking good beer and watching good comedy. We had dinner at Red Pepper at the top end of Bourke Street, a tried and tested Indian eatery. At only $6 for a veggie curry, and slightly less for an alcoholic beverage, it’s a great bargain.

Next up we headed over to Spleen, where there is free comedy on Monday nights. Although I’ve had the intention of going many times, this was the first time I actually managed to attend. Adam Rozenbachs was acting as MC and there was a huge set of other small-name comedians. Adam used a lot of the material he had at the comedy festival and when I saw him at the Comedy Club, but had added some new bits and delivered the old stuff in different ways.

Otherwise, Sammy J was fantastic, Felicity Ward was great and Troy Kinne was fairly good too. They were the highlights, but the others weren’t all bad. I think I’ll have to make an effort to go again, but not when it’s too warm – the air-con wasn’t very good!

Melbourne Cup Day was an enjoyable public holiday, and to avoid the racing rabble we headed to the cinema. We saw ‘The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus’, which I suppose is also called the movie that Heath Ledger was making when he died.

Overall, I liked it. It wasn’t amazing, and Heath Ledger didn’t get much of an opportunity to show how great he was, but it was an enjoyable movie and done well, particularly when you take into account what happened. I understand that they had to re-write chunks of it to enable three other actors to fill in (Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell). I can’t say in comparison to how it was before, but the re-write definitely worked and the other three actors stepped up to the mark and did fantastically. Tom Waits also deserves a mention; I think I’m becoming a fan of his.

Otherwise, the movie is a long one, but doesn’t seem it. The story is interesting, if a little confusing. The special effects are beautiful and the costumes are especially impressive.

After that, it was all downhill and back to work today.

Hello Darkness

A friend had pointed this film festival out to me, a special horror movie run just before Halloween. It was to be shown at ACMI, which has become a frequent haunt of mine, with their ‘Freaky Friday’ features. With an interest in most of the movies showing at this festival, we bought one of the four movie passes and picked the following:

Paranormal Activity
There has apparently been a significant amount of hype around for this movie, but I hadn’t heard too much about it other than a website petition for the movie to be shown in certain towns (a rather successful marketing trick). This showing was sold out, but I had low expectations – a hand-held self-filmed movie? I couldn’t help but think of the Blair Witch Project. Thankfully this turned out much better. It seemed to last for a long time, but only because it was so tense all the way through. Despite this the characters created some natural comedy, but not enough to override the tension, particularly later on. I found myself sucked into the story and about half way through I had to remind myself that it was only a movie and it wasn’t real.

I won’t give too much away, but the story was great, if lacking in detail in places and the action was simple and spectacular. The ending I saw (one of three according to most websites) was good, but I felt added too much comedy to it rather than fear. The other two endings that I have heard about sound better, but whether they were executed well is another matter.

The Last House on the Left
This was the recent remake of the original from the 1970s, and I saw it only half an hour after ‘Paranormal Activity’, so obviously my expectations were fairly high. As it was fairly different, it wasn’t hard to expect different, and there was definitely a comedic gore factor to it, as well as some social and moral issues lightly tossed in.

As I haven’t seen the original, I can’t say how it compares, but I can say that it was a good movie. The acting was fairly good (especially the ‘bad guys’), and the special effects of blood and guts was fairly realistic for the most part. It was a scary movie in a different way, because there wasn’t too much tension building (and what there was was short-lived). The fear came in the believing that people could act that way, and that revenge could be that easy.

As I said, I wasn’t scared by this one, but it was still a good horror movie.

Sheitan
The first of two foreign language movies, I was quite looking forward to this one. I’ve seen some French movies, and quite enjoy their quirkiness, but was unsure whether that would continue into the horror-style movies. It certainly did. This movie definitely did not disappoint – there was tension, violence, sex and generally strange things. It was fantastic.

I feel the camera work is also worth a mention, with different techniques being applied to bring out the different moods throughout the movie. This was a strong point for me.

Overall there was a certain element of humour throughout this movie, right until the end, and it helped to confuse the audience. The moments of humour would come at unexpected points, or be so closely linked to the fear that it gave a very uneasy feeling. I thoroughly enjoyed this movie.

Haute Tension
The last movie of my four, and another French one. A quick look at IMDB indicated that this would be different to the oddness of ‘Sheitan’ and a more traditional horror slasher gore-fest; it certainly didn’t let down on the last count!

The story was a little predictable, with an inkling of the ending in the back of my mind. However, the execution was fairly good, with the build up, the action and a prolonged conclusion all being of high quality. The acting was hit and miss at times, but the soundtrack, camera work and blood made up for this for the most part. The plot was also missing in parts, but I still thought it worked.

Probably the weakest of the four I saw, but going by the high quality, it was definitely not a bad movie.

After re-reading this, I feel that I’m being faithful to my ‘resolution’ of sorts to watch more movies!

The Fridge

For a while now I’ve been thinking about buying a bar fridge. I have a lot of film for my cameras and we need more room for food in the other fridge. It could also double as a drinks fridge. So, after doing some research, I work out that it’s probably cheaper and easier to buy a fridge from a local shop, where I can speak face-to-face with someone about delivery and confirming costs etc. I ended up buying from Best Buy Electrical, near Barkly Square on Sydney Road, a small Daewoo fridge. They confirmed that they do delivery, and were willing to take it up three flights of stairs, so I paid the extra delivery cost and arranged my day off work.

Wednesday 21st. I have the day off work. I’ve been to the shops, I’m in for the day. Delivery is stated as late afternoon, so I’m home from midday onwards, hoping it means before 6.30pm when I have to go out. I knit, I bake, I watch movies. No word from them. I figure that late afternoon, if they’re running late, could be anywhere up to 7pm, so I leave the house but keep my phone loud and close just in case. Nothing.

Thursday 22nd. I call the store to question where my fridge is. They have no record of it, they were not meant to deliver anything, what fridge? Eventually they find the order and reschedule delivery for Friday evening, after 7pm when I will definitely be home. Frustrating, but keep those fingers crossed.

Friday 23rd. Hoping that the fridge will come, hoping so hard. 6.45pm I get a phone call. Will I be home in 20 minutes to accept the delivery? Yes. Will there be stairs? Yes, I paid extra for delivery for that. Is there someone there to help? Well yes, but I paid extra for delivery…

They arrive and we head downstairs to meet them. She passes the trolley to my friend and off we go, hauling it up the stairs. The 5′3″ lady they sent to take the fridge up three flights of stairs tries to guide it, but essentially is doing nothing to help. Eventually we get it upstairs, shut the door and start the unpacking business.

Monday 26th. I call the store to question why I paid extra for delivery when we had to take it upstairs anyway, why it wasn’t delivered when they originally said and why I haven’t received an apology for any of this. The lady who delivered tries to come up with several excuses, including that they did try to call several times on Wednesday (this is after initially trying to say that there was no record of delivery – if there was no record of it, why would you call?), if we didn’t want to help we shouldn’t have, and I was charged a normal delivery fee, not extra. After going around in circles for a while, with the excuses getting worse and worse, I give up on trying to get an apology/refund and hang up. I’m still debating whether to write an angry letter (they just feel so good) or to contact consumer affairs/similar.

Either way, I would advise against purchasing anything there – they just can’t get their story straight. I just hold out hope that the fridge doesn’t break and I have to contact them again.

Phillip Island

My housemate and I decided to take a last minute weekend trip down to Phillip Island. We left just after 7am Saturday morning and headed down the Princes Hwy. We made good time, arriving at Grantville by around 9.30am. I’d read about the mini-golf at Maru Koala Park, and being the mature 20-somethings that we are, we just had to stop for a game.

We were the first customers of the day and after a quick coffee we headed out to the extensive pirate-themed course. It was quite an impressive set up, with a large boat (that you’re not allowed on) and several other decorated buildings and themed music. The golf itself was quite disappointing, being fairly easy (not that we were trying too hard). I’m fairly sure we missed a hole at one stage, and at the end, the ball disappears into a Aussie-outback-themed hut. As I only hit mine in, we headed back in with the other and I was getting ready to apologise for losing a ball when they informed me that that’s where they’re meant to end up. Very confusing. We skipped the koala park part and kept moving down to San Remo.

By the time we got to San Remo, we needed some more air, so went for a nice walk down the beach away from the crowds.

Eventually we headed back to the car and we decided to head across to Phillip Island. Within just a couple of kilometres, we saw a sign for a farmers market on Churchill Island, so decided to take a detour there and to the visitor’s centre. Thankfully we managed to pick up a map of the island and were given advice about some beaches to visit and about the Penguin Parade, which we decided we might as well see while we were there.

By the time we looked at the farmers market, it was approaching the time we had indicated to the B&B we would arrive. The place was called Otira, and was easily found by their instructions. We were met on arrival by an old dog (Dougal), followed by Robyn, the owner of the B&B.

Check in, such as it was, was no problem, and the room was beautifully presented in the main house. As noted on their website, we had afternoon tea on arrival (although it was even lunch time) with a delicious homemade carrot cake. Robyn’s husband John came out and told us all about the farm, how it used to be (he’s lived there all his life), how it is now, and offered to take us out to feed the 2 1/2 month old lambs.

Clutching warm milk in old Corona bottles with a rubber teat, we headed out with John to a small paddock. The lambs devoured the milk and headed off for a nap, while John took us down to the shearing shed and show us Dougal at work as a sheep dog. It was great to see a small herd of very fuzzy sheep (the shearing was happening when his sons arrived the next day) and an old dog doing what he loved.

As Robyn had suggested a beach at the end of Ventnor Beach Road, we decided we had nothing to lose in heading down and taking a look. We found an almost empty sandy beach with small areas with rock pools – it was fantastic. We took a lazy walk down to a point and then headed back again to go and get some lunch. We headed into Cowes and tried to find somewhere that wasn’t taken over by tourists – unfortunately that meant eating Burger Edge. There’s something wrong about going away and eating at a chain restaurant/eatery.

After that we went for a drive and completed a loop of the island through Rhyll before heading down to another beach – Smiths beach, which is popular with surfers. There were more people here, but we had a walk down to the rocky end of the beach anyway before moving on to see the Nobbies. Heh.

The Nobbies were even busier than the beach, with several busloads of tourists visiting when we arrived. We stopped for a cup of tea in the generic visitor centre and looked at heading down the boardwalk to take a better look, but the crowds of tourists and seagulls put us off. Instead we went back to the B&B for a rest before the Penguin Parade.

The Penguin Parade was quite an experience. The tourists and crowds were frustrating, but for the most part all behaved themselves. The penguins of course were cute, and arrived just after the sun went down and continued for over an hour in dribs and drabs. I’ve only ever seen them in the wild at Granite Island, in much smaller numbers, so this was very impressive. After they come up over the becah, you can walk along the boardwalk and watch them heading up to their burrows, even see some of the chicks coming out to meet their parents.

An early night was calling, so we grabbed a snack and went straight to bed. Breakfast the next morning was quite an affair – a huge choice of courses including cooked, all fresh and delicious, served in the well-presented dining room with silverware. I could almost get used to that. Another couple had arrived late the previous evening so we stuck around and had a chat with them before settling up the bill, saying goodbye to the lambs and heading off with a loaded car.

Before we left, we thought we’d try one more walk so headed to Pyramid Rock, where you can walk along the cliff down to a beach. We walked to first lookout and found ourselves nearly getting blown away by the winds that had come in overnight and decided it would stupid and probably dangerous to continue, so got back in the car and kept moving.

A few stops on the way home and we were back in the living room by 2.30pm or so. A wonderfully quick getaway.

It looks like the source of my dizzy spells may have been found. I had a referral to a neurologist about a month ago, and after checking my previous results and doing the usual tests said that it could be a form of migraine. Although this doesn’t really explain the earache, he said it would be worth trying anti-migraine medication and see what happens.

The medication he suggested was propranolol, an anti-hypertensive. After the first couple of weeks with only a very mild (positive) effect, I increased the dose. Since then, the dizziness has been significantly better – no nausea, no nearly falling and I can have more than a few beers and not feel like the world will never be still again! The anti-hypertensive effect has been noticable, particularly on a couple of occasions, but overall it’s fine and just a little low.

Not long after I started taking it, I was feeling a little light-headed so I went down to one of the clinics at my work to have my blood pressure taken. The nurse was quite obliging and it came out as low-normal. However, while she was taking and recording it, she was asking about what investigations I’ve had. As I’ve found with many people since this started, everybody seems to know what it could be.

Once people found out I was seeing an ENT last year, they would ask if he had checked for vertigo and Meniere’s disease. It was only with a lot of self-control that I didn’t give a sarcastic response about an ENT not knowing about any of that! Of course, these were the first things he investigated, being some of the most common causes of dizziness and earache.

Over the last 18 months or so that I’ve had this, I’d had that same response many times. People may have the right intention, but they need more common sense (and perhaps a little less ego).

The nurse took a different approach though, and asked what the problem was, what investigations I had had, and I’d already let her know I was on propranolol for suspected migraines. Being a nurse, I expected her to have a little more common sense than the others I’ve been referring to. However, she took a very strange approach and suggested that I needed to visit a cardiologist, as the low blood pressure could be causing dizziness!

I decided not to explain that I was actually just experiencing light-headedness due to the low blood pressure, caused by the anti-hypertensive. The dizziness was entirely separate and my blood pressure was fine before I started taking anti-hypertensives (surprisingly enough!) I decided to leave her with her delusions of medical knowledge and common sense and have since been taking my blood pressure at home. I only hope that she doesn’t try to give her patients advice.

Anyway, it seems that I might finally have found a cause for the dizziness, if not the earaches. Even after just a few weeks I’ve noticed a great improvement in my quality of life, fingers crossed that it continues to work!

The other day after work, I headed down to Parliament train station where I was expecting a ten minute wait for my train. As the time approached, I started to hear announcements regarding platform two (I was on platform three), about delays and cancellations and what the next train would be. However, as my train should have been arriving, I noticed the screen listing the next train as a Cragieburn one – I was waiting for the Upfield train. Waiting, waiting, more announcements regarding trains on platform two, the time for my train passes, more announcements about platform two and finally, the Upfield train is listed on the screen. The man announcing all the trains on platform two then briefly mentioned the Upfield train (before going back to his other, obviously more important trains). So I did finally get home, even though my train was running 5-10 minutes late. Would it really have been that hard for this guy to check his little screen and make a quick, ‘Apologies for the inconvenience’ announcement? He was doing for every other train that was delayed or cancelled.

This isn’t the first time I’ve noticed inconsistencies with the recorded and manual announcements at Parliament. When I first started taking the train to and from work, I was waiting for my train home when there was a manual announcement that it had been cancelled. Fair enough, it had already been delayed so I decided to sit it out until the next one. Some people left the platform, presumably to find another way home. Another train comes through, then the recorded notice that the next train will for the Upfield line. Of course, this causes some confusion. There is then another manual announcement that another train has been delayed and that the next train will be the Upfield. No mention of the fact that just 1-2 minutes ago, the very same person had announced that it wouldn’t be coming at all. So those people that have gone to get a tram or bus home could have potentially waited and had a quicker journey home.

I can only hope that when the new companies come in to run the trains and trams, we’ll have slightly more reliable information available to us. Even in London they weren’t that bad, although they did experience the wrong kind of snow and leaves on several occasions…

Everyone at the moment seems to be holding out hope that all the problems that Connex have will be ironed out with the new guys, forgetting the fact that they’ll be working with the same government, the same amount of funding, and the same basic infrastructure. It would take a complete overhaul (and some more lederhosen) to make it as prompt and reliable as the German train system, which I’m sure we all know won’t happen.

Of the four Death Sauces I bought two weeks ago at the Dutch weekend, I have only tried the Original (on baked chicken) and the Jalapeno (on baked beans). They were both fairly weak, but with a great flavour. The After and Sudden sauces are still to come, and I’ve been told that they’re the fun ones. Of course, the first thing I shall do is report to the Internet.

Over the last few weeks I’ve lost a lot of confidence in myself film-photography-wise. Loading film the wrong way, forgetting to cock the shutter, forgetting to use the ‘bulb’ setting…it’s all come together and helped me to revert to digital. I remember learning the manual settings of a camera on digital and how great it was knowing how I was changing an image with each setting. At the moment, I have three different cameras loaded with 35mm film, and yet I take out either my digital compact or the D-SLR more often than not, simply because I don’t want to waste or ruin any more film!

This weekend hopefully I’ll get out and get some decent photos with the digital camera and that’ll get me back on my feet to take more photos on film!

Heritage

After hearing about the Tesselaar Tulip Festival about a month ago, I found out that this weekend would have a Dutch theme, with food, music, dancing and crafts. Knowing that it could be an improvement on the one I went to at Southbank in April (where high winds and rain buffeted all day and it was all but shut down as soon as it had started).

With a forecast of a chance of showers and moderate winds, we decided to risk it and headed out on a train. The train should have taken us to Lilydale, but instead stopped at Ringwood for a replacement bus service. It was already raining by this point, which we should have taken as an omen. We got to Lilydale station eventually, and the connecting shuttle bus had just left. Another omen. After seeking shelter out the front of an estate agent, we were about to move into Coles for warmth, when what I think was unscheduled bus turned up. Never one to complain, we made a run for it and were on our way, crossing our fingers that the rain would stop soon.

Unfortunately it just varied between heavy and light rain for most of the morning, rendering the grassy areas sodden and the fields of brightly coloured tulips uninviting.

Hoping to find the Grolsch tent that we had seen noted on the website, we went for a short walk and found a small tent serving non-Dutch food, with a fridge containing some bottles of beer and lots of people sheltering from the rain. Braving the weather, we moved around a little bit and I went on a search for some delicious food. First of all I found some Rookwurst (with mustard), which was devoured. After wandering a little more and sheltering in tents with various crafts, we gave up even thinking about taking photos. I had some croquette (with mustard) and bought some siroopwafelen for later.

After one last round, hoping the rain might ease up, we noticed that a previously empty tent was now selling various chilli sauces – Death Sauce, Stupid Hot etc. We had a quick chat with the stall owners while deciding which to buy (I settled on a four-pack, two milder and two hotter Death Sauces).

After this, there seemed little point in hanging around getting wetter, so we headed off to wait for the bus, which came thankfully quickly. It was good to be on our way back to civilisation.

Judging by my recent experiences, I think it’s safe to say that unless the weather forecast is ‘No possible chance of rain, fog or high winds’, I won’t be leaving the house voluntarily soon! I reckon it could have been improved greatly by some rubber matting laid down on areas of grass into/out of the tents, and perhaps an extra tent or shelter or two. As it was, it was unbearable for any extended period of time.

Yesterday was slightly better though. After a bit of research, we headed to the Penny Black on Sydney Road to watch the Grand Final. We had a quick lunch at a place called ‘Empire’, also on Sydney Road (quite good food, fairly standard) beforehand. We had a table reserved, giving a lovely view of the projected game, just next to the bar. It was a shame about the result (it would have been nice to see the Saints win, and more importantly, Geelong lose!) but at least it was a good, close game to finish the year off.

Now however, being a Sunday afternoon, it’s time for warming up, drying off and kicking back until Monday morning arrives.

Chicago

Last night I went to see Chicago at Her Majesty’s theatre, something I’ve been itching for since I heard it was coming to Melbourne. I booked my ticket last week, a seat at the back of the stalls. After mentioning it at work though, someone told me that it’s quite disappointing. She said the outfits and some characters aren’t done very well, and now I know exactly what she meant.

Don’t get me wrong, it was good. It’s a relatively professional stage production of a great musical; it would have been hard to ruin entirely. However there are many criticisms to make – of many different aspects.

First of all, the casting. Caroline O’Connor and Sharon Millerchip (Velma Kelly and Roxie Hart respectively) were definitely not expected; I had been waiting for leggy, young, attractive, confident characters with powerful voices. Instead, two older women, without the bodies (but definitely with voices, don’t get me wrong) were introduced. More importantly, Roxie was being portrayed as a child-like, almost retarded woman, instead of the confused but then reassured character. This was most frustrating, as it added too much humour to it (watching a grown woman act like a handicapped prisoner is funny now?) and distracted from what could have been fantastic songs and acts.

Next up was Gina Riley, who I’m sure many people know as ‘Kim’ from ‘Kath and Kim’. As most people know, she can sing, so that was no surprise. However, it seemed that were relying on that and her fame from television to distract from the fact that she couldn’t really act and had a terrible outfit on. She kept giving the audience little smiles which said, ‘How cool is this, I’m live on stage’, instead of saying, ‘I’m a sexy prison officer who does favours for the in-mates, check out my sex appeal’. Her outfit was a loose-fitting trouser-suit, with a tiny bit of cleavage, and she barely moved around the stage. She should have been strutting around the stage wearing something tight-fitting and/or revealing.

On the other hand, Craig McLachlan and Damien Bermingham (Billy Flynn and Amos Hart respectively) were fantastically cast, their outfits and mannerisms were spot on and did all that was expected of them (by me at least). Damien Bermingham especially did well, with a perfect version of ‘Mr Cellophane’. Of course, the back-up singers/dancers/extras/whatever they are called were all brilliant as well – the bodies, the moves and their voices were great. It’s almost enough to encourage me to take up dancing.

I think the fact that the main character wasn’t portrayed correctly all but ruined it for me. The fantastic singing and flexibility couldn’t make up for the fact that she was playing an entirely different character to what was expected (maybe just from me).

Don’t get me wrong, it was a good performance. A lot of money and effort has gone into it, and it shows. It just didn’t live up to my expectations.

Trying to make use of my day off, I decided to head into the city to look for a new bag. Knowing that my current bag is ready to drop at any minute, I’ve been looking for pretty much exactly the same bag as before. Which, as we all know, is almost impossible.

As I was walking down from North Melbourne, I went into Melbourne Central and had a look at some of the more likely shops, but found nothing close. Instead of heading down Swanston Street, as I’ve done before, I went into Myer, hoping there might be something reasonably priced in a sale. I managed to find a similar style messenger bag in the Dangerfield section of the basement. They said that their till wasn’t working, so pointed to another one which I headed toward. This one had two women at it, neither of which acknowledged me when I approached. I put forward some pleasantries and indicated I’d like to make a purchase, but one walked off and the other informed me that she works for another company and can’t sell me other goods.

They pointed me over to another till (by which stage I’d lost all sense of direction in the windowless basement filled with school kids), where there was also nobody serving. I stood for a minute, looking around hopefully, but could see nobody willing to help. Eventually I started wandering back in the direction I had come from and found someone wearing a Myer lanyard, and hoped that he might be able to help me. He point out the till I had just come from and said that I could pay there. When I pointed out that there was nobody there and I had been sent from till to till, he let out a big sigh and sauntered over to help me. Just in the nick of time, as I was about to walk out with the bag and point out that if nobody was around to take my money, I couldn’t pay…

This is just one of the many, many reasons I hate shopping.

Thankfully I now have what appears to be a reasonably strong, well-priced bag to replace my other one. Hopefully it’ll be another few years until I have to deal with it again.