Seven Minute Happiness

One of my favourite stores that sells purposeless shit ~ and in Japan, let me tell ya, they do purposeless shit to such perfect custom that it has become an art ~ is called Three Minute Happiness. I have 7 minutes to write this post.

Today we were by bike again. Perfecto!! Rita has come to call the hostel that we're staying in 'home' and she is in love with the common room. She has become it's official tea lady; making tea and coffee for all the guests with perfection and grace-full cuteness to the comparative tune of Three Minute Happiness high end purposeless item selling.

Watching her cruise the common room in her new gingham dress, serving the travellers ... gives me at least 3 to 3 million hours happiness.

I'm climbing Mt Fuji with buddy Nate on Sunday. James is worried. I'm beside myself that this long time goal is about to happen.

Ja Ne!!

Kyoto Sento Me Happy

I have only minutes left on my pay as you go internet @ the hostel we're in in Kyoto.
My body is heavy and mildly zingy. I got my guts up to go to the local sento. Bathing public ally in Japan is a world unto itself; a wee social micro-nation with extra rules that, like all of Japan, are invisible. Throughout most of my travels in Japan the invisible rules pass me by like a sideswiping car. In the sento, however, a collision is inevitable. This predicted discomfort is why I had to get my guts up to go. I was growled at only once. Fellow washers moved away from me only twice. So all in all, relatively speaking, it was a screaming success.

I LOVE Japanese public bathing, sentos especially. It's a challenge to sit in front of a mirror on a plastic stool looking at yourself while you lather, scrub, rinse, lather, scrub, rinse to infinity.I love that squeeky clean is dirty to the Japanese who, after scrub sequence # 50, share your bath water. Skinless is more the order than squeaky. The sauna is never mediocre, naver. It's HOT, hotter than hot. I love that the cold pool is easy to sit in after the previous sequences of hot, piping hot and boiling volcanic hot baths, all on epidermisless skin. I love that women shave their entire bodies in the sento. I love that brushing teeth for half an hour is not uncommon, I feel glee as a result of the placement of the jets in the bubble pool (either side of the neck, sacrum, mid spine, backs of knees , each place varies but the jets are smartly arranged for theraputic success).

I have one minute left.
So simply. Today after shrine wandering and bike riding and eating magnificent food, sento made my day (year).

xx
d

Tokyo, Week 1

I can hear frogs outside. It,s late and muggy outside. The house sleeps. Being in summer, suddenly, has been a treat for my skin, hair and general disposition. We,ve walked and walked, cycled and trained, and eaten and eaten followed by smiling loads. I love this city. It,s nearly 10 years since I arrived here for the first time ... it,s hard to believe that so much water has passed under my proverbial bridge.

My mind has been in playback from the past; the smells, old favourite things to do, past obsessions. Mostly though, I feel so lucky to be here with man and child; they love it here too. Tokyo can be so harsh, but to me it always feels so kind.

Today in Muji (oooooo, Muji, ti adoro) I picked up a stamp and asked my friend Masao what it was for. Masao told me about its use and it turned out to be one of those quirky and very cool Japanese things. J (hubby) came over and we asked him what he thought it might be. He picked up his shirt and stamped the stamp on his bare brown belly. In Australia I wouldnt have noticed this gesture, but in Japan I was instantly conscious of onlookers and mostly aware of Friend Masao. He giggled and blushed and looked at me and said * You embarressed?* I replied, Yes, but only because you are. James stood there with a WATHAFUCK YOUZ TWO ON ABOUT face. I could note that this moment was one of those You Had to Be There moments, but truth is, J was there and he didnt get it. It was a Have to Get the Nihonjin Public Sensibility moments. I loved that to me J flashing his whatsit in a store and rubbing the stamp on it was mostly a moment when past and present personal sensibilities collided. I love this place. I adore how polite the people are but the rules and the absence of breaking them is a heavy heavy phenomenon - fucking full on, mate. It goes way beyond my nature, thats for sure. Yet I love it!

Tokyo rained a day ago and the three of us got 2 bikes, one mamma bike with kid seat on handle bars. We three hit the road and it was bliss. Rita sang under her raincoat and brolly and we churned the paths with nowhere in particular to be ... it was near perfect to me to be with my Two seemingly nowhere and everywhere all at once.

We,ve had short conversations on how this trip is shifting our perspectives on our shared life back in Tassie. We tend to not talk about too much for too long. Ease prevails. However I sense an undercurrent of change being motioned toward the mouth of a new river, so to speak.

Tomorrow were off to a crazy kids place called Kidzania. All I know about it is that its got attractions for kids that are occupations and it has an open market where kids work and trade in cash and goods ... (weird). We,re going with our friends and their adorable son, Shin, who speaks the oddest English. Rita likes him muchly. Last night he played Snap for the first time. Seems that our culture does have something unique and odd to offer because Shin responded to it like it was the wildest game on earth. We also gave the kids Cherry Ripes, which they spat out (!!!! Incredulous I am!!!).

Kyoto on Wednesday. Heading for monastry accommodation in the hills.
Ja Ne!!

(sorry about the spelling ~ I cant be shagged)

D

The Week that Went

Dream: Rococo Vintage Under Victorian Charm

I've been sleeping solidly but in odd dream modes of late. Dreams are long and stylised with Period themes. One was 70's C grade crime thriller and the most recent was endowed with interior designed inspired by the rococo period. The 70 crime thriller was comedic. The rococo influenced imagery was more super-wonderful. It was one of those dreams that has lasting and lingering sensations that carry through to the following days, without intention. It was a beautiful and powerful series of findings punctuated with exclamation marks.

The rococo dream was about G, the prolific sewer of Los and Dinny fame, another Lonnie lass who blogs.

Dream Went Like So:
G was in Melbourne and she and her husband had just bought a new home here on the island. She called me up and asked me if I'd go over to check out the builders to be sure that they were all ok. G wasn't concerned. The home was a Victorian terrace house, single fronted and in dire need of renovation. She had told me that they were replacing the plaster in the house first becasue they were in Melbourne and it seemed like good timing.

I went to the site. There was fine white powder all over from the plaster demolition. It made the room seem etherial. The builders were chubby bellied and thick fingered, with attitudes to match. I do remember they were kind men. The foreman had curly hair and a pink ending to his nose.

Said pink nosed man was battering away at the wall next to the fire place. There was a hole in the wall. I asked him to stop for a moment because I could see a small slab of highly ornate plaster work showing through under the plaster that was being pulled away. My curiosity was urged on so I asked him to stop, though I felt inappropriate. I made like an archaeologist and took a fine brush in my hand to clear the section. A breath took me by surprise as my eyes saw that the ornate shape was in fact of gold leaf. I asked Pink Nose to help me carefully remove more of the Victorian lathe and plaster. Time passed and we removed it all to reveal the most incredible under layer of gold and marble rococo style forms and fittings. It was so ornate that it made me feel nauseous: gold, marble, bold, organic.

I went round the house to help the builders remove the old Victorian and unearth the once-rococo. It was captivating and very over the top stuff to look at.

I drove to the city council to find out who had owned the property. I had an underlying worry that I couldn't get in contact with G to tell her what had been found. I was worried because I knew rococo wasn't her taste. I had the information about the previous owners in a scroll under my arm for later reading and zoomed back to G's odd new home.

As we dug and brushed we found furniture, rooms of it, further under & inside the depths of the walls. It was beautiful antique furniture; cupboards, book shelves, chairs - a wealth of remnants from time past. But I worried further because it was not G's taste. I was consoled because Pink Nose reminded me that G (and D, her architecture student hubby, in real life) could sell the found wares to pay for the extra costs I'd incurred for transforming the building site into an archaeological site instead of its original bog-standard reno job. On his incite, we continued the treasure hunt.

Next, we found more furniture which slowly moved forward through time stylistically. It became less ornate. Ultimately the finds seemed to level out at original beautiful plain lined 50's furnishings.

G would be happier with this stuff. My mind relaxed.

The last item found, amongst the white dust within the walls and from under a floor was a beautiful oak ladies closet. Slowly I approached it and turned the rusted key. As the door of the closet opened, it was as if birds began to sing in the moment I noticed that a lifetime's collection of hand made 5o's and 60's dresses were hanging in front of me, all in perfect condition. G will be pleased now, I thought. I'd struck her proverbial mother-load.

The original owner had been an eccentric and talented seamstress who had only ever made her own fabulous clothes. The rococo design of the interior was something that she too had fashioned by hand and her own will. The woman had been high society and entertained her guests in her various parlours in whatever party theme her taste decided. She was a spinster with big hair and long painted nails: she was Miss Somebody.

I made the call to G. She hurried on the next plane, ready to collect her bootie.

Today: windows and round abouts

Today was rain, and rain in blankets. We're taking Rita walking every morning to get her touring legs ready for our trip to Japan. The Tamar River Wetlands project has a 1.5 hr walk in peace and quiet, and birds. Rita thought it was a magical jungle; thrilled by it with ever step.
It was beautiful, wet and momentarily wonderful; only 10 mins drive from home. x d

InterviewProject.com

Just found this great site. It's a series of random video interviews and produced by David Lynch.
Worth a look.

InterviewProject.com

Thematic Repetition Squared & Multiplied by Ten

As is a common theme in my lorf (said in Bogan Australian accent) my to do list has taken a further refinement in style and function. This both thrills and bothers me (another common theme combination of lorf). I'll mind elaborating on this topic; but lets just say that at some point, perhaps next year, I'll get better at ticking items than I am at rearranging them: get flu injections, pay the gardener, pay the accountant, pay school fees, write dance project synopsis, buy Hurry Down Sunshine, write business newsletter, get car serviced, clean hard drives, write 3 sub-business plans, update cv, return bike. Yawn. Blah. Content is the same as every one's and mine-always, but at least it's neater (ping! shaawing!).

We're going to Japan in 3 weeks. More repetition. Lots of work stuff to do before then. I love going to Japan. It's the closest experience to interstellar travel that I've found on account of the 'alien-factor' repeated, squared, then times by ten. Will have a 5-yr-old, a new business eye, an aesthetic thirst to be quenched and we're staying with a beautiful Japanese/American family. There'll be touring, a tad. Can't wait! CAN'T WAIT!!

When we get back, bringing home the bacon will have a new mode, a re-visitation of an old theme, a zushing up of a new theme. There will be more pictures, some moving and some still.

Last night I dreamed of a C grade 70's detective thriller with velvet wall paper, fake furs, bad teeth, chain smoking, no sex, no violence and bloody funny protagonists who held their guns with bent elbows, swinging them about as they threatened pantyhose head-dressed robbers in their ever-so-polite Queens English while smoking a ciggie; not very CSI, not very ghetto. The dream played out from start to finish. I even woke once and the dream resumed (I love that). Best of all, it was funny.

Smooches and wedgies, all at once,
D

PS. We watched a bogan wedding in the park today. It was bee-udifuw.
PSS In my yoga class last week I (again) used the idea of holding a minty between the arse cheeks to describe how one might best hold the arse during a posture, and today in class I remember saying 'bossy yoga bitch'. I've been toying with calling my class Bogan Yoga. It has a ring to it, don't you think? I do believe that I qualify. I do.
PSSS Images below of more days in Paradise.

Sun Up

Gemini Sunshines

Reflection on Rachel Papers Post

I like Rachel Power's Blog. She posts regularly, not often. Each post is worth a read. Her blog style is brief and thought provoking sans provocation.

Below is a link to a post which has had a residual effect on my thoughts. If you've ever been interested in writing bout family or beloved-ones, you may enjoy. I'm clearer on why I don't write about my family than I am about why I'm compelled to do so.

Extract from The Rachel Papers:
The Ethics of Writing about those We Love (click title for full post)
April 5th 2009

"I have found myself having a lot of discussions with people of late about the ethical problems of writing about our families — those thorny issues of boundaries and consent.

Writers, particularly, rarely avoid writing about the people they are intimate with. So, do we have a responsibility to ask our subjects’ permission to publish material about them, even if fictionalised?"

In her comments section I posted this:

D said...

Hello,

This is an interesting topic. My mother took her own life two.5 years ago and I used to write about it. I was cornered by a family member for writing about my mother on my blog. I deleted it.

Now I don't write about it any more. Not even on my computer. I wanted to write about it more, but I stopped. I stopped because, even though she isn't here, if I were ever to focus and aim to publish my account of her story I fear my tarnishing of her memory.

Yet ... I feel as silenced by her memory as I did by her presence. I wonder and fear that one day this (inner) dam will burst. And though I fear it, I suspect I have nothing to fear and more to give by writing about my dear, poor mother's dilemma.

Truths hurts. Written words last forever. Truths can change...um.

Thanks for posting this topic. It's reminded me to remember to, at the very least, not bury My Truth along with my mother and her lies.

Toodle Pip

April 10, 2009 9:59 PM

And Rachel replied with this:

Rachel Power said...

That is such a massive thing to be absorbing, on every level I imagine. Especially as a mother yourself. There is such a blurred line between our lives and those around us, and while writing about other people's lives is tricky territory, surely we all have a right to our own stories, and our own experience. Don't we? Particularly when it comes to our own mothers, where the relationship is so intense and internal--so much a part of us. I can imagine that writing about a mother's suicide, for example, might be vital in coming to grips with such a trauma. And it is when we are at our most truthful and open, that we really touch others and give them a deep sense of solace and relief. In this way, to write is a hugely generous act. I always loved Anais Nin's statement that if you are willing to turn the same cold hard lense on yourself that you use in describing others, then it can only be seen as fair. I hope at some point, D., the need overtakes the fear.

April 11, 2009 10:40 PM

The Nin quote is worth repeating, if only as an exercise for me to forge it letter by letter for my memory's sake: "...if you are willing to turn the same cold hard lense on yourself that you use in describing others, then it can only be seen as fair."

This is an extract from my recent writing that Rachel's blog + comment, my trip to Melbourne to be with friends and time partly inspired:

"I've been arguing a case [in my head] against my mother's murderer. I’m so emotionally conflicted over her death that in my own mind I’ve built a court of law to bring the accused forward to answer for the crime that took our mother from us. Odd but true. The moment I was told that she had killed herself I stopped protecting and defending her behaviour; internally that is.

Externally, we still protect and defend her and on many levels this is killing my brother and I. No-one but us (and my husband) know her real story. She kept a sheer and shiny exterior. I don’t know how, but she did. This lead to our being misunderstood and isolated by mum’s community, bar just a small handful of people who have been brave enough to comfort two devastated and angry adult children.

Grief says: ‘Who the fuck killed my mother? I want justice.’ Then the Truth pops in and says ‘Your mother killed your mother.’ It’s at this point that everything in me splits and I go numb, again. This truth makes my primal self scream. After 2 years the scream has (d)evolved into a muzzled moan.

I point my finger at the accused with a self-righteousness and list all her breeches of moral law: betrayals, lies, conspiracies, stealing, hypocrisies, narcissism, fraud. Then I plot the years, months, weeks and hours leading to the murder to prove that it was indeed murder - not manslaughter or temporary insanity - planed and plotted for years in advance. I show the jury the diaries proving the tragedy no accident, nor a slip in time and rational thinking. My mind’s courtroom is stilled by its empathy for the victim and her family. It’s a grand and emotional scene. They hear of how the victim was a model citizen; a widow, a catholic primary school teacher, the girl next door who married the handsomest Italian in town, who had died from a long, cruel battle with cancer 15 years prior. My mother’s murderer is soon to be proven a-moral, evil and guilty. I turn to the judge and jury as I deliver my final damning statement as an attempt to doom the guilty. But as I turn to deliver the unequivocal truth reality returns. My grief exits stage left and I find that I'm standing alone in an empty room. It’s just little me and big injustice in an empty room, in my own mind, wearing an aftertaste on my bitter, broken breath that mouths "...Oh fuck, the killer got away".

Personal grief-driven mythologies aside, the truth is that all of the above is true. My mother was taken by a brute in cold blood. This brute stole, lied, conspired and plotted then ended my mother's life. She was stolen from us before her time. She was tricked and manipulated. Ultimately she died alone in a hotel room believing that her children didn't love her leaving pages upon pages of bitter letters accusing them as the motive for her death. Whoever the person(a) was who penned these lies and made her sign the letters was indeed without a soul. Some might call it mental illness. I don't care what it was. I only know what happened and I know that it happened in a vacuum bereft of spirit.

The pit of my grief is not that we lost our mum, but that she died alone and without love. I struggle."

Is it wrong to publish this?

Scarlet Fever and Holy Chicken Soup

Holy Chicken Soup!
Child has scarlet fever!

When the doc said "She's got scarlet fever." I almost pooed.

"Eeek. How medieval!" (to have scarlet fever and to poo wherever).

"Kid's got the Scarlet Fever! Quarantine the goats and bring me a chook! I'll fix this lurgy with some Holy Chicken Soup, if it's the last thing I do."

My woggy chicken soup is pretty delicious. I go 'oooo' when I eat it and hubby goes 'hmmm'. Brother goes '... how'd y'make it?' Brother also goes '...why don't you ever mention me on your blog (tongue in cheek- kinda)?'

This one's for you Brother: una ricetta famigliare per te, perche qualcuno dev'essere il eroe, no?

***
Holy Chicken Soup/ Zuppa di Pollo Santo

An important thing to think about when making this soup is to not turn off your sense of smell. It needs to smell 'green' and 'fresh'. Never heavy and rustic. It stays on the oven top for 1-1.5 hrs and you learn to know what to do next by smell. Another tip is to keep a small white receptacle near the broth so that you can periodically pour a spoonful into it for testing the colour of the broth. It should stay bright yellow. If it begins to dull in colour and smell, then it's overdone. Chuck it out. Another must is that, where possible, use all free range and or organic goods. If the veg aren't organic, use double the amount in the recipet. If the chook isn't free range, don't try making the broth at all because it will taste like ruddy water. Capisce?

The broth needs to be reduced to concentrate the flavour. It freezes really well. It's great used with wine and fruit to slow cook lamb. It makes a brilliant risotto, with just an onion, garlic and pea base. It should almost be too falvoursome; good for diluting later if need be. My favourite way to digest this doosie is to drink it like tea all day long if supporting a flu: plain broth with diced ginger in the bottom of the bowl. Primo!

Ingredients
1 big chook
a head of celery
3 onions
3-4 carrots
salt and pepper
1 large clove of garlic
1-2 bay leaves

For serving A
1 egg per/2 people
parmesan cheese
italian parstley
lemon juice
pasta (noodley,risone or tortellini)

Prep
Wash the chook, inside and out. This groses me out. It's a similar weight and texture to a new
born baby in the bath. Plop into an empty, very large pot. Peel onions and half. Chop carrots and celery super coarsely. And bung in anything else from the ingredient list that I've missed out. This takes less than 5 minutes.

Fill the pot with cold water. Hold the chook down as if drowning it because it will float up. Holding the chook down, raise your fingers vertically and stop the water once it reaches your middle knuckle height ie., round 3 inches from the top of the chicken.

Cook
Place on high heat.
Bring to the boil.
As soon as it comes to the boil, turn down the heat to just under medium and cover.
Every 5-10 mins or so, scoop the scum from the top.
After an hour, start testing the colour.
Poke the carrots to see if still firm, but soft.
Try to pick up the chook from the leg.
If you can feel the leg bones begin to detach from the body: you're in business.
Ready to lift.

Lift
If you choose to drain through muslin, it'll be clear and incredible to look at.
If you don't, at least pass a fine net sieve through the broth to get as much goop out as possible.
Personally, less goop, the better.
A clean tea towel is good draining option.

Need a huge bowl and a seive for the drained broth to pour into and another large receptacle for the cooked chook and veg to settle in once draining is done. Once drained, return broth back to pan and cover the set- aside chook and veg for later. Take the dripped juice from the bottom of the drained bowl and pop back in the pan with the rest of the ready-to-go brodo. This takes me about 15 minutes. Test for salt at this point.

The quantity of broth should be about a third of the original amount of water; enough for 4 large serves of soup and enough to make a large 4-5 person risotto.


Serving
Grab another smaller pot and transfer enough broth to serve the number of people you're feeding. Refrigerate the remainder. Add pasta. Bring to heat to a mild bubble, not near boil. Remember to watch the colour. Too much heat will dull the yummy yellow. Keep covered.

When the pasta has cooked past al dente, beat one large egg. Bring the broth to a bubble and
slowly pour the egg into the broth. Gently-gently whisk the egg through and lift. Rest.

The egg should be like long ribbons, not the same
as Chinese chicken and corn soup-style egg.
The temperature of the broth before adding egg is the trickiest part of this
meal.



Serve with a heaped table spoon of good Parmesan cheese, a shake of parsley and a dribble of lemon juice.


Sorry about the quality of the finished product.My camera was just out of batteries, so the focus is shite.

Vedi: Risi con Pisi, made from the stock

Space

I'm really happy with the new space that I'm about to start teaching in (yoga). It took some time to sort it out, but it's set now. My class info is @ www.moveoften.com. I'm really looking forward to getting back into it.

Just been to Melbourne for the weekend and it was perfect to go to, and perfect to leave. I went for a yoga class and some serious Girl friend action. We giggled, got silly, got serious, pointed at each other often, ate pizza, cuddled, smoked, laughed our guts out and now I'm waiting for next time. The conversational theme for the weekend seemed to be the Truth: use it, or lose it.

Rosanna: pizza in the gutter

Rosanna and Michelle: conversationalistas.

Harriet et Maude: lounge and vino.

Anna and Michelle: I hadn't seen Anna in 10 years. She is the same, we are all the same.

When I came, this is what JJ had been doing while I was chatting and shopping and going "Ommm": he's clever

JB

Marriage is a funny old thing. I thought I knew what it was when I started on the path. How wrong I was. Now, however, it's slowly becoming clear. I suppose, also, that as time passes it'll become increasingly clearer. I hope so.

J is one of his names, The Godfather of Soul is another, Jimmy the Cat happens from my mouth every now and then. Whatever he's called, he's the cat's britches, the bull's balls, the ant's pantalones.

He has a quality that makes me smile. It used to make me frown. He gets these ideas in his head, and they seem bonkers, on the outset. In the past I'd disagree with him and make my opinion known. Now I watch him go for it. He's brilliant at turning a mad idea into a real living thing. See, he is one of those people who does what he says he's going to do and he talks about it very little; he walks the walk.

Here are some pics of his latest ideas that I'm looking forward to watching happen, in his way, in his time and to its end. He wants to pull this building down. And by Jove, he'll do it!
Marriage is freedom, an oxymornic comment to some, but it's true; especially in the case of this wild young brown man who my soul adores.

New TIme Zone

... neither J or I have contracts on at the moment so time is fragmented and without sense right now. J is chasing a new contract with a very yummy company and I've started full focus on business plan writing. With R starting full time school next year, I'd be pretty happy for this year to be about gearing into and towards new ways of working. Plan-on-paper time.

Coming down from a tight-time based project also means more time with wee R and JJ. The challenge with work is not allowing it to take all of my focus. I know that I unplug from her and J when I have big work focus and I'm ok with that as long as the projects are short. Time travels thought, and this week R and J and I have been lapping up the family time. It's been a sweet week: going out for dinners, tentative travel planning, long morning walks, both of us taking R to school and picking her up, meetings with good women, visits from friends with us all hanging and enjoying, time alone, anticipating friends flying in for visits in a week, gardening and work that fits into the family rather than the other way around as it is when we're in deadline zone.

We've been back in our home now for a year and it feels very good and very right; the bestest year so far. Nice week, this week. And the sun has been very hospitable, indeed. Isn't it funny how time picks you up and plonks you into new zones of either contentment, discord or fancy over decorated pavlova made of the two, just like 'that'?

x
D

Tassie: you doll!

My friend found and posted this on her blog: http://www.latartinegourmande.com/2007/03/28/tasmania-the-forgotten-island-tasmanie-lile-oubliee/

Ripsnorter!

Today I'm Only but a List

1] pay contractors
2] send letters
3] read old business plan with view to improve
4] print and re-read data on Selective Mutism
5] back up data on dying laptop hard drive
6] pick up babe from school
7] cook dinner
8] bed

My Creative Space

My Creative Space is nice. I found Kootoyoo @ Loobylu.

Works like this: take a pic of the contents of your work space and give it a little blurb. Reminds me of those articles in girlie mags where a star spangled female empties the contents of her handbag under a lens and it somehow tells the viewer all about her day/life/psyche/boyfriend. . I like how this wee web game tells a story, in a doco/reality mode, but we all know that it's kinda set up.

Did I set this up before I took the pic? Yes.

I tried to hide the contents of the budget that I'm working on because we all know that all budgets are a form of a kinda set up reality, innit?

My Creative Space has been chaotic of late, and now it feels truly easy and light. I'm balancing a budget for a job that finished a wee while ago. It was a commercial video job, with briefs, clients and subcontractors, shit to push up hill and a complicated budget that I'm trying to placate.

I've a pink ext-hard drive to back up the data because if I lose it, I'm rooted. I've fave sennheiser headphones for company and a calculator that I can barely understand. Who knows who it used to belong to, because sure as hell I didn't buy it.

Y'see, I'm no number crunching biatch so this creative space feels like prison, but on the plus side it makes me think of my mum. She often had ledgers and calculators, nice pens and neat piles of formal looking papers in front of her at the kitchen table late at night. She ran my father's bricklaying business. She'd roll over in her grave if she saw me being such an "i" dotter and "t"crosser. If she were still alive she would have had this element of post production all nailed up (for me/on behalf of me) and tied together in a cocky clever smile by now (flinger click).

I've all data ready and raring to put into the EXL doc to balance this baby, but I'm labouring over starting that phase. All items on the Budget-to-do are crossed, but the final: the one that tells me how successful, on paper/in the bank, this project has been. That's why my screen save image can be seen. My screen is saving me. I'm procrastinating over opening the telling software, Microsoft Excel, EXL. Eiw.

I'm pleased that I'm becoming proficient in the commercial sides of creativity ... but I still lack confidence. I'm afraid of EXL-ing, are you?

PS

This weeks favourite creative space of another's. This is Frederick the Architect's blog blurb:

Frederick Biebesheimer FAIA
Restoration Architect Specialization in the restoration and adaptive use of significant historic structures. Currently living in San Ginesio MC Italy

His blog chronicles the restoration process of his homestead in Italy. I love his work! Love it.

Production Peeps and Pics 1

Work has been great. Home has been supportive. Exhaustion so deep that it barely knew how to manifest once it was all over. I feel like it is still sitting under my skin. I've been waking during the night standing in the hallway holding a pregnant imperative in mind that's of the production task-to-do-asap kind, when really it is only a stirring child in deeply breathing sleep. My nervous system is still wired for work responses. The people: the teams were really easy, professional and giving. I feel grateful. Melding the Japanese and Australian teams was a huge but right challenge. I've come out of it feeling different, reformed, confirmed. There's a fare amount of personal and professional digestion to do this week and budget to balance.

* Stylist, KR, styling. Assistant, OS, assisting. Actor, RG, enjoying and being a gentle-man.

* Dinner with clients @ The Black Cow, happy Tasmanian beef. SBD, Taku, Hanawa, Tette, Aoki and Nate

* Me and SBD, partner in crime, mentor, navigator, supporter and friend. Watching her work is inspiring. Working with her is ease. She balances Independence and Team better than anyone I've ever worked with.

Tetta, client photographic assistant. As kind as his face tells.

* Shoot from West Tamar Highway bridge

* I love this picture. It is her, how she is.

* Bicheno, Tasmania
* Crew and kids. Patient professional people.

* L, make up and hair and S who played Perfect Mum with Perfect Family

* 1st Assistant Director, Photo Assistant, Director 1, Director 2 and Translator: she and them, at times eons apart, then ultimately swaying to her tune.
* M & O, both Tassie x-pats.

Brag (Not Billy. The One Yo Mama Told Ya Not to Do)

... that old saying "Be careful what you wish for..." strikes again. I love casting wishes. I dig the arse out of it (how's my eloquence?). Arse is my favourite word at the moment.

I'm exhausted. Life for nearly a month now has been sleep > work > shifts on with babe > work> blah. But I feel great, mainly because of one thing. Here's my brag for the year:

Looong ago, James and I cast a wish, back when I still lived in Tokyo and he lived in Birmingham; looong before the Island became home. We wished that one day, in our best most possible dreams we would have a beautiful home, healthy love and life, but that we would also be working in our preferred areas, he animation and I film.

Dang that goldy-loxy wish ... it came true! Snuck up. Snuck in. We are at the tip, the precipice of it. He is being paid to draw for a TV animation and I'm being paid to produce an international small film. And all of it is happening on this Island, so far from the cities of slickness that we sailed from to make our nest.

My brag is over now.

I was just wondering if you would like to have a brag now? ... Tell me, or better, remind yourself of a wish cast and granted. That exercise, remembering and noting the possibility of magic, is worth more than the wish-come-true itself.

Art Making: I dig your arse. Art Making Who Pays the Bills: I blow raspberries on your arse. Two Parents Art Making and Paying the Bills: I fucking pay homage to your rare and precious arse.

This job comes down in 8 days. Then I will return to the cinders, with pleasure.

I like TED.com

Hello,
Here is a link to a nice speech by a fast thinking, full talking Americana. She is Elizabeth Gilbert. Her talk is about creativity. It's a not too shabby thing to listen to, for those of you girls who like to CREATE...
(link to my review of the book that she's referring to 'Eat, Pray, Love')


ENJOY

Just Read: The Divided Heart

The Divided Heat: art and motherhood, by Rachel Power, Published in 2008 by www.rdog.com.au.

Rachel Power is a Melbourne based author with two very small children, Griffin and Freya. On the final page of the book is an informal portrait of the author and her rat bags. It's a pic that makes Power seem closer to life, further from literature simply because she looks very much like one of Us. The entire book resonates the same tone as her family portrait.

In the opening chapter she places herself very honestly and realistically as a regular woman who adores her children, takes parenting very seriously yet has a burning urge to continue working as an author. The book is dedicated to looking at the finer details of the mother-artist theme through lived experiences of woman who share the same vocational urge. She toys with the idea that the creative inner space is often the same space that's required for mothering children: emotional, intuitive and demanding.

" During the day, when my baby slept, I would tidy the house and then sit at the kitchen table to pen a few urgent thoughts into my journal, constantly fighting the urge to check on him. Every 20 minutes or so, the hideous threat of cot death hanging over me, I would desperately squeeze out a few more words before running down the hallway to where my child was sleeping. There his shape would rise and fall; he was pink and warm. My words had not murdered him. Because, spun out to its furthermost consequence, this was the fear: that my baby would die because, for a mere matter of minutes, I put my own self-interest before his precious life - and implicit in this horror was the knowledge that I would lose everything, both my child and my ability to ever again put pencil to paper."

The introduction presents the book's interests clearly with gentle scent of an essay and the conclusion matches her introductions in weight and analysis. The work's style is journalistic. Power interviews 25 mother-artists of varied ages, number of kids and artistic back grounds. All have had success in their fields. My favourite interviews were with women of the 70's. They were less questioning of their choices than Us, gutsy and unashamed. Kinda dangerous too. They had less choice so they romped through life compared to our treading carefully as mothers.

Each chapter is dedicated to one interview which is perfect for the mother-reader because each chapter is short and told in a conversational style that demands little of the mind and time yet fills the imagination in a soothing cup-of-tea-and-a-slice-of-cake way. It's a book of oral women's tradition and it reads as easily as any well told story.

For about 10 chapters I semi-enjoyed this book. Actually I found her interview questions soft and annoying. I wanted her to ask the 'big' questions, but she didn't. Even though I found it a tad soft I continued to pick it up most mornings to accompany my cuppa. In time The Divided Heart became a good friend, warts and all, and that's all I ask of a good book. After all, Rachel Power is a woman after my own heart, a mother and a writer.