15 April 2012

Flying High is on TV

"Surely you can't be serious"
"I am serious. And don't call me Shirley"

Flying High is on TV. It's never gets old! I was starting to feel like the comedy festival was going to pass us by like every other festival. Happily, Jenny got us tickets to see David O'Doherty's show on Friday night. He's Jen's mate from Dublin and is also one of my favourite comedians. It was great. We even went out for a beer with him afterwards and I was suitably star-struck, though he was very nice. Rosie told him the story about the time she looked after the baby rat - the story that won my heart. That story never gets old, either.

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On Saturday, a group of us chaps got together at Dion's for a skateboard day. Lots of beards, sports shoes and fathers were in attendance.

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We drove for hours and hours to skate a few skateparks. They were all a bit average, but we did have a fun session in the carpark.

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Dave

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To be fair, this park in Drouin was fun, even though it was full of mysterious yellow poo and kids riding bikes. Tim did some lovely ollies over the hip.

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We found a narrow path that wound down the pretty hill next to the skatepark. It was hilarious and very, very quick.

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It was great because if you wanted to stop, you could just run off on the grass.

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It didn't quite work out like that for poor old Jason.

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All his pants look like this.

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We stopped at an eerily quiet petrol station on the way home.

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"I guess the foot's on the other hand now, isn't it Kramer"

9 April 2012

bushwalk

I forgot to include photos of our bushwalk on Mt Macedon in my last update. Here they are, using an 'appreciate my image making prowess instead of chuckling at my words' approach.

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Oh I can't help it! Tess found a chop bone and spewed it up on the way home - on Tim (coincidentally the only vegetarian in the car)'s lap.

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Detox Easter and the preceding times

Bonnie celebrated her second birthday last weekend with a party at Clifton Hill. It was the place to be. Harriet and Patrick whipped up this Metallica-inspired slice - just a taste of the delectable morsels on offer. We're on a detox diet, so the furthest I got was some nut mix. And a beer. I'm not that strict on the detox, but we've been eating lots of salad, which I'm always a fan of.

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Amanda made this awesome train cake, direct from the Women's Weekly cookbook. Everyone seems to know about this book - it's a legendary publication, and rightly so. Unfortunately, noone could find the candles, so Conor improvised with some matches. Bonnie was so happy!

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I went skateboarding with Jason and Pete - this should come as no surprise.

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Prior, a less regular but equally welcome attendee to our weekend sessions, came along too.

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We skated the new park in Croydon, a slippery, scooter-ridden affair, but fun nonetheless. It will be a good one when the crowds die down a bit. Dave, who is in the midst of a season at the Comedy Festival was also in on the action. A consummate professional, he brought along two pairs of sunnies - just for laughs.

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On my day off last week, I rode over to Niagara Galleries and had a look at the Martin Parr show, which was in its last few days. It was very inspiring and now it is gone! Ah well.

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We went to a show by the Wellington Ukelele Orchestra, who do cover versions of songs on the ukelele. It was fun and smiley, and not as whimsical as it sounds. My favourites were 'Africa' by Toto and a song by David Kilgour from the Clean. Oh, and 'Cry Me a River'!

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It's been quite cultural around here lately. Joe Miranda's Independent Photography Festival was on last week. I was feeling guilty for not submitting prints to the group show, but discovered there were around 200 people in it! A crowded event. Some impressive photos in there, too. I especially liked the one of the kangaroo on the hill and the fox in the sink. One of Tess would have been good - maybe next year.

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Tait and Joe composing the presentation speech.

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The speech - the kangaroo picture won best photo! You can see it up in the top left corner there.

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Another IPF event, there was a screening of old friend Phil Evans' 'Format Perspective', a documentary about skate photographers. I wrote a little piece on it here.

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It was attended by a-listers such as Dale, who is about to move to an island up north somewhere, the lucky bugger.

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Jaymie and fellow Irish Jenny give their seal of approval.

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As do I, following a cleansing detox beer.

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We're onto our fourth day off in a row, thanks to Jesus. It's been great - I've nearly forgotten what it's like to be at work - packing lunch, getting guilt trips from Tess, thinking the same OCD things every day on my ride, emailing publicists, juggling words... none of that. We've been taking it easy, eating healthy food (only one hot cross bun!) and going for the odd bushwalk. This dog was fetching a tennis ball from the other side of the yarra.

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I lost my sunglasses here when I chased after Tess moments after this photo was taken. We had to drive back to search for them.

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