The Christmas Present

The band and I played again at the pub on Sunday night. This time I did three songs instead of two, so I feel good that progress was made! The guitarist shamelessly introduced us as an ‘up and coming Sydney band’, and I got a free soda water and lemon afterwards, so it must be true! It’s only a matter of time before people start giving me free drugs.

The Man came last night as well, and was official photographer. I have been spending loads of time with him lately, after our bumpy two or three weeks recently. I think I am slowly coming back from nervous breakdown territory – I am calmer at work today too, so it’s all good. I really had an awful few weeks recently. A few times I found myself wishing I could just stop breathing and quietly die. Melodramatic, I know. It was like suddenly being sixteen again! Talk about shock to the system! But I am back to being me again, with my uneventful but satisfying life. All I ask is a resident male to cook for. Is that too much?

Having said that, maybe my standards are higher than I think. Other Man (you know I’m talking about him) is in Phuket at the moment being a complete sleaze. I still get a bit panicky when I think of how he might have given me AIDS or something almost as bad. No, I still haven’t had myself tested for STDs. I’m too scared. It’s not a health issue, because I feel fine and undiseased, and until I decide to have sex with someone else, it’s not a moral issue either. (Unless I get raped, but I think rapists can take their chances). But I was thinking about it again this weekend, because a friend of mine has two HIV positive guys in his (admittedly enormous) circle of friends. I can’t imagine how frightening an HIV + diagnosis would be. I don’t know how this friend of mine manages to be so generous with his sexual activity. It’s weird how people know STDs are out there, but it doesn’t put them off indiscriminately sleeping around. You’d think his two HIV POSITIVE FRIENDS would be a wake-up call. Does he think he’s immune for some reason? Does he think straight people have never caught AIDS before?

Anyway, in honour of my continuing fear that I might have diseased sexual organs, I’m going to round up today’s post with one of the greatest hits of Other Man and my late relationship! Cue drum roll and trumpet fanfare…this story is called:

The Christmas Present

I was feeling sort of weird about the whole obligatory gift giving thing around November/December/January – we both had birthdays, and of course there was Christmas. I was stressed enough with getting everyone else presents that I was supposed to, let alone worrying about feeling awkward about getting something for somebody I’d only just started going out with. The Man has always said how he gave up on extravagant Christmas spending long ago, and he’d hate someone to go through stress on his behalf, and end up spending a load of money on something he didn’t want anyway. So I said to Other Man, how about we don’t worry about presents for each other? Reasoning that men aren’t into it anyway, and think it’s a chore they have to do to please women, so surely he’d be relieved. I would have been so happy if I could have written off that worry – I was having a hard time, organising a trip to Melbourne and gifts, sending stuff to my family, moving house, and a lot of emotional stress. The last thing I wanted was the worry of what to get a guy I had just started dating, and worrying about the protocols of how much to spend.

And I really don’t think he was at all interested in the gift exchange thing, but he refused to let it go, because he has this idea that you HAVE to buy presents for your girlfriend because it’s the DONE THING, and God forbid we should break the rules. So we agreed we’d get something for each other in January, when the stress of Christmas was all over. Every time he mentioned it, I’d say, “Really, I’m not bothered. I don’t want anything.” And then, not to be too difficult and a pain, I’d end up saying he could get me some orange blossom water. Kind of ridiculously cheap, but I wanted it for cosmetics making, and couldn’t for the life of me find anything. I thought, if he really wanted to get me something I wanted, orange blossom water would show thought rather than extravagant spending, and would be very useful. On another occasion, I also suggested a sugar thermometer – again, something I really wanted, and not expensive. The last thing I wanted was for him to think I was greedy for expensive gifts, in case he hadn’t already got the message when I tried to talk him out of any gifts at all. I don’t know why. Guess I have low self-esteem somewhere deep inside and need to be thought of as low maintenance.

This story has foreshadowing…turns out I should not have mentioned Chanel! Big mistake!

So, it turns out my groundwork was pointless. Apparently, men don’t buy girlfriends orange blossom water and sugar thermometers, according to ‘Men’s Health’ or whatever Other Man’s relationship Bible is. Even if girlfriends want orange blossom water and sugar thermometers. Apparently, men buy their girlfriends perfume. He brought up the subject of presents yet again, and said he’d decided to get me some perfume. My heart sank because even though I didn’t completely despise him (yet) I’d begun to notice his sense of taste might be described as ‘crass’ by the unkinder observer. Perfume is a very personal thing and there’s no way I’m going to wear some foul stinky stuff, to appease anyone. So I told him I only wear Chanel, which is true. I thought of immediately saying something along the lines of “But it’s so expensive, please don’t buy me that” but I find the money talk a bit vulgar, and anyway, I’d gone on and on enough about how we maybe shouldn’t bother with presents, I didn’t want anything, just get me something really small and token, etc, so I thought any more would be going overboard and start to be embarrassing. And possibly sound like I was protesting too much, and was really testing him. So I left the perfume issue at that, and reiterated that I’d love some orange blossom water or a sugar thermometer. Seriously. Orange blossom water or a sugar thermometer. Have you got that, readers? Have I not said it enough times?

One day in January the end of the working day rolled round, and Other Man asked me if I’d walk with him to his car. On the way, he told me he’d been to the shopping centre that lunchtime and got me something. He told me he’d gone to the perfume counter at Myer’s, and the perfume was so expensive, he thought it was too much. Well he’d thought about getting it for me, but it would have set a precedent, wouldn’t it? Then I’d expect something like that every time. Something really expensive. He could afford it of course, but he felt it would be too much. So he got me something cheaper – hope I didn’t mind. He went on and on like this for a while, meanwhile, me thinking “Wow, how crass – he could have just ignored the perfume thing. I mean, it’s not like I’ve been pressuring him for it! But I’m sure he doesn’t mean to be tactless. It’s just his way. But I really hope he shuts up about it now.” He asked me if I’d like him to go home and wrap what it was that he had bought me, or should I just go to the car with him and he’d give it to me now? It’s kind of hard to be graceful when somebody has just gone to great lengths to tell you you’re not worth something, but I tried, and smiled and told him no, he didn’t need to wrap it and I’d come down to the car.

We got to the lifts to the car park. And still he went on about it. “I don’t want to set a precedent,” he kept saying. (Which is interesting, because if we were still together for next Christmas, and the Christmas after, in that case I’d be a long-term girlfriend, and men who by their own boasting ‘earn a shitload of money’ generally don’t mind buying expensive perfumes for long partners, at least you’d think.) With every repetition I felt more and more humiliated, as if I was being slapped down for being a grasping, greedy bitch. Funny when I’d pushed to not have a present at all, then asked for something cheap, and kept telling him a thought would count and all that. Clearly, grasping for expensive gifts is Something Girlfriends Do (from his relationship Bible at again?), and no matter that the whole time we’d been together, I’d told him I didn’t want to go to expensive restaurants (true), paid at least half the time whenever we went anywhere, never complained about boring evenings, given him little things to show him I was thinking about him (ie baking samples from whenever I baked) – none of this mattered.

By the way, this was in the same week that he had told me he’d won several hundred dollars in a sports bet, and had sent some of it to Thai Hooker to help her out with her child. He had plenty of spending money and wasn’t averse to giving it to women, just not to me. I had hoped, by being low maintenance, I’d never have to find out how little he was willing to spend on me. Oh vain hope!

As he blathered on, I wondered why he hadn’t just written me a cheque for whatever he was prepared to spend, since money was so obviously an issue here. I’ve never before received a present that was so blatantly about exchange of wealth. I kept thinking "Please stop saying it. I don't want to start shouting at you and make myself look even worse. Just let me keep it together and save face until I can be alone."

In case you’re wondering, it turned out he had bought me a very nice cookery book. He told me he thought that was much more suitable, not costing too much or too little. I don’t know how much it actually cost because he didn’t give me the receipt. (You've got to hand it to him – he has class!) I took it home – not wrapped, of course – and thought I’d never use it. Just looking at it made me feel sick and humiliated. I thought I’d give it to charity as soon as we broke up.

Nearly three months on, I haven’t given it away, and I do use it. It’s a bloody good book, and useful for something. Unlike some men I know.

So there you are, a story that shows that I am perhaps over-sensitive, and Other Man is both tight-fisted and has no tact or social skills at all! And there are plenty more stories where that came from!

An Update

So...it's all been a bit crappy lately. Further to my last post, there has been even more emotional drama, leaving me simultaneously drained/running on nervous energy. I don't even know how to feel any more. I certainly can't be bothered to run through everything that has happened on this blog. Just the thought of writing it is exhausting!

Work is also getting me down. I despise my job enough anyway, and the workload is so huge these days I need to be 100% to even think about staying on top of things. First thing this morning, my idiot boss rang me up and said airily I'd have to change a couple of tomorrow's videoconference meetings - about the hundredth change. I started crying once I'd put the phone down. I feel like a whipped dog sometimes, you know? My PDR is coming soon. I wonder if I can persuade them to fire me, with a nice little redundancy payment thrown in of course.

In good news, I played in public with my little band on Sunday! (Good for me, not so good for audiences everywhere...). I was so proud! As they say on Kath and Kim, I love myself sick! I only did two songs, but I am a legend in my own mind.

So anyway, that's my super-interesting update. Just thought I'd write something, so as to keep up the habit of writing, lest the unthinkable happen and I abandon this blog to dust and cobwebs.

Feeling Green On St Patrick's Day

I've had a rough few days lately.

I got it into my head that The Man was seeing another girl and was getting quite close to her. My jealousy was flying out of control. I was going to write a seething blog entry yesterday about what a revolting, man-chasing drip she is, and how I couldn't believe The Man would replace me with HER, and how he obviously never really loved me and I wasted the last few years of my life on him (I broke off our relationship and have been out with Other Man since, but hey, I see no need to be reasonable) Fortunately, I had no time.

So yesterday after work, I was on my way to ballet class, feeling all tearful. I got off the train and thought to myself, I really don't want to do this. So I crossed the platform and got on another train home. Now normally if I decided not to go to ballet, I'd call The Man and we'd have a cozy dinner together, but I'd decided to stop hassling him all the time as he now had Collossal Drip in his life. So I wandered around for a bit. That's something I never do, just wander the streets taking everything in, and I thought it might be good for me. I sat in a cafe and ordered a pot of tea, wondering if I'd happen to meet some clean-cut lovely young man just like happens in the movies and live happily ever after and never see the Man again. Then the cafe closed and I went home.

A few minutes after I'd arrived, I heard the familiar whine of his motorbike outside the house, so I opened the door. There he was in his helmet and bike jacket, holding out a bag of takeaway Thai food. He said "Oh! You're home! I thought you were at ballet! Why didn't you tell me? I was just going to drop this off so you would have something to eat when you got home, because I knew you'd be hungry." It was all I could do not to burst into tears.

We went out and walked for a while, and found an Irish pub (it was St Patrick's Day, and seemed to make sense to aim for a pub that would be ridiculously packed on this one day of the year). I had a massive glass of wine. It was delicious. Walking back, the conversation came round to relationships and such, and I finally found the courage to ask him about Collossal Drip. He said I shouldn't ask him about it, but I said actually it was my business because I'd hate to drop in, as I do several times a week, and find her there wilting pathetically in a corner (no I didn't put it quite like that), both of them expecting to have an intimate evening together. He then told me there was nothing going on. HOORAY! Suddenly, all my contempt and hatred for her (ok most of it, not all) fell away, and I felt human again!

We talked some more about how he'd eventually start going out with someone, and I would too, but we still wanted each other to be around. I blubbered a lot, which is always lovely when you're in public, and my eyes are still puffy today. But I feel a lot better. I still have to accept that he's trying to pull away from me somewhat, but I'm still his number 1 girl. I think. I'm going to stop obsessing about it anyway.

Feeding the Homeless - Well Thinking About It, At Least

The other night I caught the end of a program about homelessness on the streets of Sydney. (It turns out it was a part of ‘A Current Affair’ – if I’d known that I’d have switched off immediately; I mean, I am university educated). So anyway, it was kind of sad and made me thing about the plight of the homeless. I have thought about it before, of course, but like the melting polar ice caps and those bears whose glands they drain in order to get some drug from (am I making that up?) and the human slave trade, it’s not generally at the forefront of my mind.*

But I was thinking how I ought to be more giving to the homeless (starting from zero, ‘more’ wouldn’t be too difficult, would it?) They’re not my top cause ever, but seriously, how hard could it be to make a small effort to make someone’s life a bit better? I don’t think I’ll ever be homeless myself (on account of how I’m so educated, sexy, have a vibrant personality, am loveable etc) but I can imagine – almost – how scary and lonely it would be to have nothing and be hungry, and to have people walk past you not caring.

I very rarely give money to the homeless. Because you know, I reckon they’ll probably spend it on drugs, etc, etc. I mean I do generally believe that it's a high likelihood, and I don’t want to be subsidizing that. But that doesn’t mean that I can’t give in kind, rather than in money form.

On the documentary (OK, it was A Current Affair, but let’s pretend it was a documentary by serious, intelligent people) someone gave a homeless man a bag of breakfast in the morning. That would be nice, wouldn’t it? Sometimes in the past when I’ve bought myself a pie on the way while I'm on the run I have thought of buying two, one for me and one to give away, but chances are I wouldn’t see a homeless person and then I’d be stuck carrying around a spare pie which would be a bloody nuisance.

The whole food giving thing takes some planning, but I think it would be a good idea. I suggested to the Man that I could combine my new role as Nice Giving Person with one of my favourite hobbies, making banana bread. There’s a soup kitchen for the homeless near our suburb, so we could pop down there one night and make a donation. The Man was pretty excited as his dream for me is to achieve world domination through selling banana muffins. Well one of his dreams for me, along with the one where I become one of Sydney’s popular local musicians and he manages my band. I did suggest that the pathway to riches wasn’t from selling muffins to the homeless, but he said I could practice on them. I guess that way any accidental food poisoning deaths won’t be so noticeable.** I think making muffins for the homeless would be so nice, and one day I will do it.

The program had a good point, but was also just the kind of preachy crap you’d expect A Current Affair to peddle. So as well as making me want to be a nicer person, it also makes me want to have a shower to wash the slime off me. Just so you know. I’d hate for you to think I can watch A Current Affair without feeling icky.


*though I did have a dream last night that I was one of a group of girls who’d been sold into sex slavery, and it was the night before we were supposed to be pimped out, and I was secretly sending texts to loads of people to try and get them to rescue me! Thanks, Other Man. This nightmare was YOUR work.

**Sorry, tasteless joke.

AND...In Other News:

• I am insulted in a team meeting!
  
  In a team meeting today for one of the teams I support, we had birthday cake for the boss. One of the sales people, we’ll call her Jane, told me last week that she was organising it. Since I support very many people besides this team - two large, national teams (because I’m so extraordinarily competent) - and since I was off sick a couple of days last week and didn’t feel like taking on any MORE work, and since I don’t recall any specific items in my job description that say I have to organise birthday cakes, I thought sure, let her do it. I mean, it’s not such a big deal, surely? But she unveiled it at the meeting saying “Since I’m an ADMIN PERSON NOW and do ADMIN THINGS, I’ve organised this cake”. I should point out I was the only admin person at this meeting and incidentally, the only female besides her. So when she said that – instant humiliation! I surreptiously looked round to see if anyone was looking at me. They weren’t, but I’m sure they’d have all picked up on the implied insults that a) I should have organised the cake but didn’t bother, and/or b) being an admin person is infinitely beneath her and hence her comment was amusing.
  
  Maybe she didn’t mean it in either of those ways, but if not, it’s hard to imagine what she did mean. Possibly it had nothing to do with me, and she was trying to impress upon the other guys that just because she’s a girl and organised a cake doesn’t mean she will be fetching them coffees next; she is kind of hardcore that way. I hope so. But I feel so humiliated that she obviously doesn't consider me in her league of womanly achievement. Maybe I should explain to her that as someone who considered very bright at school (I’m pretty sure I would have wiped the floor academically speaking with most of my sales team, had we gone to school together), I have a massive inferiority complex about the fact that I’ve washed up as the person who takes minutes and books meeting rooms, and I don’t appreciate having it rubbed in. I feel like enough of a failure as it is.

AND...

• And I find solo aerobics vastly amusing In our gym at work there’s a room where the classes are held, and at all other times gym members can use it for weights, stretching and whatever else they want some space for. When I went in there this afternoon there was a woman doing an aerobics routine all by herself, complete with loud music pumping on the room’s stereo system. Is it just me, or is that weird? I must say I had trouble suppressing a smirk as she buzzed frantically around the room, earnestly doing those mystifying, jerky movements that aerobics people do. By herself. Ha ha ha!
  

The Ex Files - Horror Stories Part 1!

I’m only just beginning to realise the full extent of how angry I still am – mainly with myself – over my involvement with Other Man. In fact it’s getting worse and I need to resolve it before I turn into an embittered old maid who can’t bear the thought of letting a man touch her…or is it too late for that…?

This Monday, which is about two weeks after we broke up, Other Man finally felt able to suggest we go for a coffee together, at work. He spent most of the time whingeing about some stupid commission that work is cheating him out of, and also answered my questions about how the rest of his life is going. As usual, he didn’t ask me anything about myself, which is fine by me as I’m a pretty private person, and just because we’ve slept together doesn’t mean I expect him to have any interest in me whatsoever! As we were walking back to our desks he mentioned he was going away in a couple of weeks, to Phuket. I didn’t think much of it at the time because to be honest I wasn’t listening that hard anyway – well, would you?

But the next morning I remembered what he’d said about going to Phuket. Of course – he has this ‘friend’ there – a poverty stricken Thai woman who he sometimes sends money to and in return she calls and e-mails him saying how much she misses him and asking him when he’s coming to visit, and he’s all flattered and charmed and everything. You know the drill. Basically, Other Man is one of the droves of men who like to go on holiday in Thailand and take advantage of the poverty of the local women to get sex and ridiculous amounts of flattery.

Unfortunately for my conscience, Other Man did actually tell me about Thai Hooker before we ever had sex. It was weird. It wasn’t like a confession at all, it was more like “by the way I’m this really great, generous guy and women adore me and want to have sex with me because I’m so hot and such a nice guy, including this cute little Thai girl who I just happened to meet in Thailand, and I send her money because she’s desperate, and she just happens to want to be my girlfriend, presumably because I’m so great and hot etc etc. I was wavering between thinking, "he can’t possibly be interested in me if he’s telling me he maintains a Thai hooker", and thinking "well if he is interested in me, I must be misinterpreting this". And so, because I’m such an idiot, and hadn’t had sex in so long, I decided to let the Thai Hooker thing slide when he told me he wanted to go out with me, and I had sex with him. And now I’m left terrified that the next time I let my health get run down, I’ll break out in genital warts or something. I mean, I could have caught anything from him. And the worst thing is that on some level – and not very deep down either – I knew this before I first went to bed with him. How stupid am I?

I’d like to make one thing clear. I have nothing against Thai Hooker herself. I’m calling her ‘Thai Hooker’ here to illustrate how deeply offended I am by Other Man’s behaviour, not by hers. I don’t believe I am in any position to judge her. Her life sounds dreadful. Apparently she has a baby and was dumped by her husband, and works in a shop for basically slave wages; the baby lives with her family and she sends as much money as she can. Recently, the baby was sick and needed an operation, which Other Man paid for, otherwise it would have died (well so I’m told, anyway). She’s been dealt a pretty raw deal in life and I’m sure I’d be befriending male tourists too if it meant a bit of desperately needed extra money. At least that’s better than hitting the bars every night looking for customers (assuming she doesn’t). Sex and companionship with Other Man probably isn’t such a bad exchange – after all, I did it for free. It’s not that bad, honest. But it’s pretty disgusting that she and so many other Thai women have to barter themselves like that to keep themselves and their children alive.

So what disgusts me is not her, but Other Man’s side of the deal. I could totally get on board with it if he just sent her money, but if sex is being had – and I’m sure it is – then that’s not ok. Buying companionship and sex from anyone, especially a poor woman, is NOT COOL. Whenever I go to Thailand, it disturbs me more than I can say to see all the single guys getting off the plane with me and knowing they’re probably there to take advantage of the local women – buying sex from woman so poor they have no choice but to sell themselves is just a great holiday for these guys. And it disturbs me even more than that to know that I have slept with one of these guys, given part of myself to him. I feel like I’ve degraded myself, and I don’t know how to get my dignity back.

You know what’s really weird? Other Man seems to have dressed it up a bit in his head so that he doesn’t seem to notice what it is. He honestly seems to believe he’s a real hero, a friend of women. I suppose it says something for him that he doesn’t get off on just paying some poor streetwalker to have sex with him, and that he has to maintain some kind of ‘relationship’ through phone calls and e-mails. But can he really be that naïve? Or is it just vanity? He really seems to believe she is actually very keen on him. She’s all “you very handsome man” and “you no have much money but very generous”, you know, all that big white hero stuff. When it’s clear to me that she is in effect calling him plead for the life of her child, and for enough food to eat. He says “She really didn’t want me to send her money!” Umm, yeah right. And does he not know how it looks to me?

Vying for top place among the insults to me, along with exploitation of women, and being tacky enough to do it in Thailand, is the fact that he was so open with me about it. It seems like there are no boundaries any more in how a man will behave towards a woman, and we’re supposed to accept it. When Other Man and I first got together, he actually had the gall to tell me I was lucky, because at one point he was thinking of bringing her to Australia as a de facto spouse, but then decided he didn’t want the hassle of a baby to look after. (No, it’s not romantic – this is a man who told me he’d given up on ever getting an Australian woman as he had no luck in relationships; this is a man who hasn’t got the social skills to get a woman of his own culture and class so toys with the idea of buying a poor woman who’ll have to put up with him.) It’s the first time a man’s told me I am in competition with a Thai prostitute and am lucky he chose me (but then, there have been a few firsts with Other Man). It’s interesting that he didn’t consider himself the lucky one, and believe me I was very sweet to him and enthusiastic with the sex. And he got me for free.

Maybe I’m over-reacting. Maybe I shouldn’t be this angry. Maybe my anger isn’t really for him. I suppose I’m really angry with all men like him. And that a poor country like Thailand has this huge sex trade thing going on, where they sell their women flesh to men all over the world, and many people seem ok with that. It’s offensive to me as a woman and as a human being.

But I guess mostly I’m just scared he’s given me herpes or something. Time will tell.

Making Soap

So I finally made soap!

I went to a workshop sometime near the end of last year to learn how to make soap. It has taken me that long to collect all the necessary equipment, and so it was with great excitement that I assembled all tools and got down to business last weekend.

This is how I did it:

1. Add water to caustic soda. The temperature rapidly rises so that the water steams and the glass measuring jug is hot to the touch. (2 or 3 tiny caustic soda pellets fell onto the floor somewhere and I couldn't find them - I am SO hoping no-one steps on them with damp feet...) I put blue swimming goggles on to protect my eyes - I don't have proper science-y goggles - so from this point on, my memories of the process are marine tinted.

2. Start heating the olive oil. It's supposed to reach a certain temperature, 38 degrees or something, at the same time as the caustic soda cools to that same temperature. I over-estimated how much heat the oil required and consequently spent the next 20 minutes or so frantically trying to cool it, pouring the oil in and out of various containers, dunking it in ice and so on. Panic!

3. Then add the caustic soda/water to the oil, and stir until soap tracings appear on the surface. And then I realised, I had no idea if I was meant to be heating the mixture while I stirred! (Oh no! And what in God's name is a 'soap tracing'??) So I hedged my bets, stirring for a while without heat, then adding heat. You see, can't possibly go wrong!

4. Pour into pan. Over the next three days or so, stir morning and night to ensure oil is blended in. Only, by the next morning, half of it was solid already. Oh dear.

In the end I called the instructor, who'd kindly given us her mobile number in case we had any problems, even though it's all so easy, and she confirmed that I wasn't meant to heat it in step #3. She's agreed to look over some samples to see if I have ruined the soap completely (ie probably yes!) so I posted them to her on Saturday. By Australia Post, so she probably won't receive them for days and days...anyway. I am looking forward to the verdict.