More Weird Events from the Life of Paul

Sunday Night, I went off to see the band Root! play at the retreat in Brunswick.

As I was crossing the road, I spotted a staggering drunk guy in a bicycle helmet weaving around the footpath. I was looking at the traffic, when he staggered up to me, squinted at me, and we had the following exchange:

Drunk Guy: I know you. We went to RMIT together.
[I looked at him for a bit, and under the four-day growth and the staggers, he did look vaguely familiar.]
Me: Yeah...
Drunk Guy: I'm Dean.
Me: Paul.
Drunk Guy: I remember you. Hey, I started a business...
Me: Did you now? Hows it going?
Drunk Guy: OK, it's only been going a month.
Me: What's it do?
Drunk Guy: Sustainable brewing, here, I've got a card...
[Fumbles around in his pants, produces a business card, which is slightly damp on one corner.]
Me: Dude, this is a bit soggy...
Drunk Guy: Yeah, I've been swimming
Me: Hey, I've gotta go see a band
Drunk Guy: Cool. Nice to see you.
[He staggers off back onto the footpath. It looked like his friends were loading stuff into a panel van, so hopefully someone was looking after him!]

Went and saw Root!, who are OK, but they're no TISM - the lead singer used to be known as Humphrey B Flaubert. What was scary was the number of TISM nutbars who where at the gig and who remembered me. TISM fans are the craziest in the universe, even crazy vegetable lady was there (long story...)

Other Stuff I Have Been Up To

Lets see. Saturday I... OK, the early onset Alzheimer's is kicking in here... What the fuck did I do on Saturday? *gets out nerdphone/diary*

OK! In the morning we quickly looked at a house in Brunswick, although it was so far north it was about 20 metres from Coburg. Nice place, big bedrooms, new appliances. But only one bathroom, and the more I thought about the commute from there to my new office on St. Kilda Road, the less I liked the idea. It looked good mostly because it was available and they liked us... I'm prepared to be a bit fussy.

(Rent's have got "interesting" of late. When I shared in Northcote in 2000-2004, my rent was a bit over $400 a month. Then I moved into a two bedroom place with the then Fiance, and my rent was about $600 a month. When I moved from there to my current place, my rent was about $800 (it's gone up a bit since.) Now we're looking at three bedroom places to share, my rent is likely to be in the $680-700 region... Which is an increase of, what, about 75% per room over about four years... Something is well wrong here, maybe I should just buy a place! Or be a bit less fussy, but then, I don't want to move into somewhere which is worse than my flat...)

Saturday arvo I took my mother out to visit my grandmother (my father's mother, not hers) out in Doncaster. My grandmother is a bit deaf and a bit vague, but heck she's 96 so we can't complain!

Lets see, what else did I do? Ah, that's right, Deb and I went to a great housewarming in Ascot Vale. The house itself was cool - it was on an oddly shaped block, so some of the rooms were triangular! Like the little study, and the laundry and the bathroom. There was also a vaguely trapezoid pantry/room which was almost as big at the kitchen. Deb and I decided it was the coolest room in the house, so we decided to hang out in it.

The best part of the party - they fed us! I had ace soup and various other tasty treats. Which was nice since I hadn't had dinner.

Then we played table tennis on a hopelessly warped table tennis table, and discovered that we're both really really shit at table tennis! I also got to see some amusing family bickering between one of the housemates, her sister and her brother. I teased them all about that.

Deb was a bit grumpy, which is a change from her usual constantly chirpy mood. I thought it was actually good to see her in a different mood. And when I say grumpy, it was like seeing a hungry kitten! Kinda cute grumpy!

I think that was all I did on Saturday. Too damn busy!!!

Fuji Lives!

(In a side note, why did I download the "Cabaret" sound track? And why is Marvin trying to chew a sticker off my desk?)

I took Fuji (my 19 year old Subaru Station Wagon, for recent listeners) to the radiator place today. As you'll recall, I was concerned that Fuji was on his last legs, after almost cooking himself on a drive back from Geelong a few months back. I was so worried I applied for a car loan in order to replace him - reluctantly, said sticker covered car has been in my life for eight years now.

Anyway, I called the Radiator Guy and asked if they could flush the cooling system. He said if it's running hot, there's a good chance something else was wrong - which I agreed was highly likely!

He was right, the radiator was really blocked, only about two thirds of it was working. Also needed new hoses, and was about to crack a water pump. Not to mention needing a new fan belt. All of which they fixed, along with some new coolant. So Fuji is alive again! Hooray. The longer he lives the longer I can go without buying a new car. Even if it's only until about this time next year, that'll be great... Not that I'm sentimentally attached or anything :-)

Might be time for a trip to the drive in :-)