Good Clean Fun!

Yes, I have reasons to be cheerful! Isn't that nice?

#1 Soap making - I have finally, finally, since my course in November or whenever it was, got together all the equipment I need to make my first attempt at soap. It is not much of an exaggeration to say, I can't wait! I have a new cheap saucepan expressly for the purpose; also roasting tray, spoon, sugar thermometers (you have NO idea how difficult they were to get hold of; it seems like every homewares shop in Australia has an empty rack of them), measuring jug, caustic soda and even the olive oil I will need.

Once you've boiled up the soap, it has to set for SIX WEEKS until it is ready to use. It will be pure castille soap (dunno what that means but it sounds good, eh), but you can then boil it again with other ingredients to make all kinds of scented, luxurious soaps.

Can you imagine? Making saop from olive oil and nothing else except caustic soda? I am so excited to finally play the mad alchemist, I could burst! I've got Sunday circled on the calendar, so fingers crossed it all goes well.

#2 - Jamming with musos - I have, again FINALLY, found some muso types to jam with. I answered an ad on the internet from two guitarists who were looking for string players to play with, and went along last night to try it out. I've never done anything like that before - playing my violin has always involved someone putting sheet music in front of me, so it was daunting to be expected to just take my instrument out of its case and play it. I didn't set the world on fire or anything, but I surprised myself by not being too awful. There was another violinist there and she was better than me, but then she's had a bit more experience of that kind of thing.

The two guitarists wrote all their own songs, which was quite impressive. It was mostly that dirgy, snooze-inducing folk stuff that has about one chord and 300 verses, but in a way that was good because it was easier for me to try and play along to.

So anyway, quite soon I'll probably be a really famous musician and I won't have time to write here any more.

How to Succeed

This morning when I arrived at work I was dismayed to discover that I had an 8:30 team meeting to attend. 8:30 on a Monday morning? Who has meetings then? I’d spent the bus journey to work talking myself into a good morale for the week ahead, but then I found this in my diary and that was the end of that.

This meeting was chaired by a Sales Manager, who we shall call Tony, a man takes his job way too seriously. If he wasn’t such a thoroughly decent, good bloke, and he really is, I would unquestionably despise him. This is a man who subscribes to Sucess Magazine, a publication I was sublimely content never to have heard of until he decided to bring it up at every team meeting, urging subscriptions on everyone and photocopying articles composed entirely of smug platitudes to hand out to everyone.

According to the website, a veritable photogallery of square jawed 40-something males smirking under titles such as 'Corner Office' and 'How I Do It', Success Magazine is 'What Achievers Read'! (I know, it makes me want to vomit too.) I couldn't find a definition for success, but of course we all know it's lots and lots of money. Helpful advice includes:

• Slime your way up the office hierarchy (networking)
• Care for your nearest and dearest (Keep your body fit so you can work even harder)
• Keep your family sweet so they'll leave you the fuck alone
• Teach your kids important values in life (money management)
• Smugness (giving to charidee - helps avoid those waking up in the middle of the night "What am I doing with my life?" crises - you're a good guy, right?)
• Read books - Even ones that aren't about money!! They might help you with the getting rich stuff. You never know.

Featured heroes this issue include Einstein (because of course Success readers can really aspire to be like one of the greatest scientists that ever lived, though with a smarmier haircut and bigger teeth, of course) and Ray Kroc, who I know from a song by Dire Straits* and let's say, it wasn't terribly complimentary. Maybe if I read the article, I can become more like him! Because of course I want to!

It kind of hurts my soul that this magazine even exists. Can you tell? The worst thing is that I work on a floor of about 100 sales people who all lap this stuff up. I really don't want to share the same air as people who consider themselves 'goal-orientated' and read articles about 'the formula for failure and success'. People who think hobbies and interests are things you have to make time for because you're so busy making money. These are the kind of people who probably think Hugh Heifner is someone to admire.

My colleagues can be summed up in one word: consumers. They are encouraged to think that everything in the world is there for their consumption. Nature is there to ripped out of the earth and made into big ugly houses for their families; primary resources there to be converted into fast cars and yachts; animals are for eating/riding/wearing/being peered at in zoos/turned into pets to keep their bratty kids happy; women are for leering at/giving birth to your children/screwing; other countries are for (sex) tourism and blokey piss-up holidays; do I need to go on? All you need is MONEY. Then you can - indeed it's your duty to! - pay your money and buy whatever or whoever you feel like consuming. You're entitled to. After all, you've spent all year ignoring your family and making lots of lovely MONEY for the company.

Once every year we have a big event to mark the beginning of the new sales year and recognise all the highest achieving sales guys (they're all guys, even the few women) of the previous years. There's a dinner, entertainment (with scantily clad women - this evening is all about rewards, and women demeaning themselves is a reward), speeches, then a nauseating awards ceremony which always ends up with pretty much every sales person on stage, back-slapping and congratulating each other, machismo dripping all over the place like chip fat. Every man there is convinced he's an alpha male just oozing sexiness, dominance and leadership.** I drink at these things. You have to.

Last time I was repeatedly groped and propositioned by one of the drunkest guys there. He asked me if I had a boyfriend, and if I did, if he had a small penis and left me unsatisfied in bed. Maybe he thought he would be preferable to a man with a small penis and no sexual skill. My colleagues are delusional like that.

So anyway, I hate my job. And I will be here forever.

* I trust Dire Straits' opinion more than Success Magazine's.

**Also they all seem to think they're atheletes in training for the Olympics in some very manly, thrusting sport. I know, weird.

Time to Break Up - Again

I'm aiming for this Sunday. I really have no idea how to do it. What's a nice way to break up with someone? I realise e-mail and text message are out, though even if I wanted to be so evil, it would hardly help given that I work a mere metres away from him.

I was wondering, do I drop hints for a couple of weeks so as to soften the blow? Should I generally be a bitch for a while? Or be all evasive when he asks me if he can see me at the weekend, so that he starts to suspect? I know that sounds mean, but is it meaner than brightly accepting offers and then saying at the end of the date, "by the way, let's break up!"

Other methods I've thought of include:

• Suggesting I want babies. NOW! He would run a mile - if he believed me.
• exposing him to lots of beautiful women. He's a bit of a lech so when he starts openly perving at them, I can initiate a mad fight!
• I could leave the country
• I could become really, really annoying in so many ways that he breaks up with me

Pitfalls:

• He'll probably know I'm lying, and know it's an insulting way of me trying to break up with him - not nice
• I can't work up the anger over this one. I don't really care.
• I'd love to, but no money at the moment
• I can't be annoying. Seriously. I'm just not an annoying person. It's impossible for me to be anything but FAB.

So I'm back to square one - date on Sunday then break it to him gently. I want it to be this Sunday so as to avoid all Valentine's Day ridiculousness next weekend. God, I hate these nauseating days The Establishment foist on us, and Other Man is way too conservative to join me in thumbing my nose at them. It has been ordained that official boyfriends must mark the event, and God forbid we should lapse in our duties to capitalism. So the burning question is, what kind of date activity is suitable when you intend to end it with a break up?

Or do you plan a date, meet, break up, then agree not to bother?

Why do they not teach these things in school?!!!!

The Good and the Bad

Things I'm loving this week:

• Salsa! I did two classes (two hours) last night and it was so much fun I could have died happy! I was exhausted though. Sad to think I have only got around doing it at age 30. So many wasted years!
• Haigh's dark chocolate. I got a box of this sent to me by a business contact to thank me for getting something signed. Soooo delicious. It's in my bedroom because I knew if I kept it at work I would eat it all in a couple of days. I am hardly ever at home, so it works out better this way. Each time after I've had one, I carefully close up the box, replace the sticker that seals it shut, slide it back into its half opened golden gift wrap and fold the open edge closed, reverently. Well, it tastes so good, eating it is like a religious experience to me, so I feel a certain amount of ritual is appropriate.
• Chinese dumplings. The Man invited some if his Chinese students round on Monday, which was Chinese New Year's Day as well as Australia Day. I went too and played the hostess, even though I'm apparently Mrs Other Man now. I got to watch the great Making of the Dumplings, and I rolled quite a few too, so now I have dumplings in my cooking repertoire. I'm getting quite excited thinking of all the variations to the fillings that I can do, and the accompanying sauces I am going to create. Really, it's about time some wealthy and traditional man marries me, because I will make an awesome housewife!

Things I'm not loving:

• Sweaty men at the gym. All the stretching mats are covered in grease slicks. Now, is it so hard to cover strategic parts of the mat with a towel? The bits where you know your t-shirt might ride up from your slimy wet back? If I can do it - and I sweat perfume and moisturiser, because I'm a girl, and a wholesome one at that - then so can men. And it's disgusting when they actually drip sweat onto the equipment. Yuck, yuck yuck!
• My job. Don't get me started.
• The whole boyfriend/girlfriend thing. It would be ok if you only had to go out with them, say, once a fortnight. But seriously, I don't have time. It's a simple equation: available free time - time spent dancing = time that could have been spent dancing if it were not for the need to be with man.

A mixed bag: holidays, evil family, paedophilia

I am having a long weekend starting tomorrow. I will be spending it at the Gold Coast, a place I have never wanted to go, with the Other Man, visiting his friend, who I have never met, but given that I despise pretty much all his friends that I have met so far, well. Fun. So why did I say I'd go? I'm just a girl who can't say no! La-la, la-la-la-la laaaaaaaah!

Other news: I spent an absolute fortune just after Christmas, sending a calendar and a desk calendar to my brother and his evil girlfriend, and have not heard from them. So either they are 1) terrifically ungrateful or 2) have changed their address and deliberately gave me the wrong one. I'm wavering between 1) and 2) depending on my mood. Today I'm veering toward 2). Honestly. It's quite possible. They didn't even contact my parents over Christmas, let alone go see them. May a plague take them both! Maybe they didn't even open the parcel. Maybe they thought it was a bomb since it was from me. Their paranoia, and sense of self-importance, knows no bounds.

And finally, having just visited here, may I just say how pleased I am to see a top Saudi cleric speaking out for little girls' rights to get married at 10. How can anyone say the Saudi religious establishment does not have women's well-being at heart? I wish my parents had married me off at 10. The best bit would have been the sex. Imagine having an adult penis rammed into your tiny, pre-pubescent vagina. How nice.

There has been so much publicity about paedophile Catholic priests. But maybe clerics of all religions are doing it. At least the Muslims are open about it - no-one can accuse their clergy of sweeping it under the prayer mat. They're out and proud!

You Know It's Time To Break Up With Someone When...

...when your subconscious does this to you:

Here's the bad dream I had last night: My inner slut likes to come out and play sometimes in my dreams, and last night she decided I was going to have dream sex with this random man. He seemed nice enough, so why not. He had bad skin with red lumps all over, and as I was undressing him I noticed big bumps on his bottom. I thought "Urgh, boils!".

Then he told me to be careful of a lumpy area on his stomach. I asked him what it was, and he said, "Have you heard of the plague?"

I said, "What do you mean?"

He said, "You know the Bubonic plague? That spread like wildfire through Europe in the Middle Ages, wiping out a third of the population and forcing the end of feudalism?"

"You have that?"

"Oh yes" he replied, airily.

So obviously I leapt up and put my clothes back on. Meanwhile, his family members assured me that I probably couldn't have caught it, and that he'd had sex with lots of women who seemed to still be ok. I asked him if it was curable and he was all "No, I'm going to die soon."

All I could think of was that I'd been touching and kissing his plaguey skin!!! YUCK!

So I think maybe my subconscious mind wants me to be celibate. I imagine the inner demons who run my brain, thinking "What's the most subtle way we can turn Sprite off sex?" Perhaps they have been talking to my mother. I see her work in this. If she was allowed to design dreams for me, I'd probably have that one every night.

Nuggets of Wisdom: The Australian Male

Well since the Man and I officially parted ways (though I'm using the word 'since' here kind of loosely, but let's not dwell on that...) I have been dipping my toes into the murky world of post 30's dating.

I know everyone says 'dating'* is supposed to be different and more difficult when you're out of your 20s. I'm not sure about this. I still feel young. I think a suprising number of people actually like feeling old, but I am not one of them, so I'm going to continue to have a young outlook on life. So I don't have a problem with going out with guys as such.

So I don't have a problem myself, but I sure feel sorry for the men in my future! They will all be compared to my beloved Man, who is perfect for me in every way, and if he was closer to my age and we had more chemistry, we would surely be married and living happily ever after.

I was thinking about this last night as I traipsed tipsily home after a pleasant dinner with..erm...The Man and a friend of his last night: The Man has always slagged off Australian males, saying they're chauvinistic cavemen types who drink too much and wouldn't know culture if it slapped them in the face. I always thought he was being a bit harsh because he's an Australian himself, in the same way as I'm sometimes overly harsh about things from my own benighted homeland, bless its rainy little heart. But my new situation has seen me spending more time than I ever have with Aussie men - ie, a bit - and I'm beginning to see his point. Here are some things I have noticed about a certain kind of Australian male:

• Propensity to drink too much. I am not talking about the very young, either. I have always dated older men, so I often hang out with the older age groups, which now translates as late thirties upwards. And by this age, years of overindulgence is beginning to show. And it's not attractive.
• Boringness. I have passions outside work and am very active. A man might not be interested in my particular hobbies - unless he is gay - but have some passions, ok?
• Drugginess. Not cool in the over 30's. A certain amount of experimentation is understandable in 20 somethings, but when you're approaching middle age, and especially if you're married with small children, popping pills to have fun is a bit disturbing! And what is it with cocaine use? I was at a party the other night when people kept disappearing to the bathroom to snort lines. These were OLD PEOPLE. Call me naive but I find this kind of shocking! I look to people who are older than me to be wiser and have their lives a bit more together than I do. Not to be tragic, self-indulgent pleasure seekers. Who become even more boring when they're high than when they were sober.
• Sleaziness. I'm talking about macho jokes and thinking of attractive women as meat, or prizes in some kind of game; and telling you that an interest in porn and strippers etc is an inevitable part of being a guy - you know, boys will be boys, and women have to accept it. Well I know at least one man who isn't in the least bit like that - my the Man - so I reckon perviness is an optional extra, and I am perfectly reasonable in holding out for a non-sleazy bloke. I would also like to say, guys, that I think it's extremely rude to openly ogle other women when you're with a woman - especially if you're dating her! I mean, what the hell is that all about? Do you want me to dump you??!!**

I think there are just too many available women in Sydney and that many men here have let themselves go because they know they are in high demand. But they might find that although there are plenty of women wanting to be with them, they might not be quality women. Some women would prefer to opt out of relationships altogether rather than be with a creep. My new housemates might fall into this category. They are both lovely and attractive women, but do not have boyfriends, that I know of. Otherwise it seems strange to me that such nice women have not been snapped up.

I love how, in view of the above, men are so quick to assume that because you're kind of attracted to them physically, you probably want to marry them and have their babies. Ahahahahahha! I'm looking out for some quality DNA for my children, so they can relax!

I know there are quality Australian men out there. I am just looking in the wrong places, I guess. I know they exist and I would love to find one who is single and willing to go out with me! But until then, I think celibacy is the best option, before I get a completely twisted view of mankind and have to move to Erskineville and become a lesbian.

You may have guessed, I'm 'seeing' someone else at the moment. Let us call him, the Other Man. I like it. It makes me sound more worldly, like I have multiple affairs going on because I'm so sexually sophisticated. I prefer to say that I'm 'seeing him' rather than he's my boyfriend, because 'boyfriend' sounds intimate, and I feel decidedly not. We'll see how it goes. Watch this space.


P.S. I know I've been super bad about maintaining this blog. That's because I got so busy at work a while ago, and it's never eased up. I am still busy, but have decided to take time out to blog anyway. In a sense I am giving myself a payrise. Equal pay/less work = a higher rate of pay per working moment!

*Just so you know, I hate that word, unless you're an archeologist
**Obviously he doesn't. I am a real prize.