Tonight is the first night of my new course.
I have new pens, new notebooks, new binders and a whole new and improved attitude to study (I think).
And I’ve been listening to the 24 Hour Party People compilation CD here at work featuring lots of New Order and Joy Division – sounds that I seem to remember accompanying Uni the first time round. (They certainly drifted out from under the doors of many bedrooms in share houses where I lived.) (When certain people weren’t playing Billy Joel or Andrew Lloyd Webber show tunes, that is. Go on, you know who you are!)
Actually, tomorrow night I’m going to see 24 Hour Party People at the Sun cinemas in Yarraville. That will be a lovely night out – I hope turning up at Uni will be similarly lovely.

Which didn’t have anything to do with the weather.
Which wasn’t actually an accident.
Which shows that historians, too, can ignore any obvious evidence which gets in the way of a good story.

Scene: a certain workplace.
Time: a Monday morning.
Activity: while sneaking a smoke out the back, a certain employee spies a glass pane from a louvre window lying in the brick courtyard.
“How did that get there?” Hmmmmm.
Takes conundrum indoors and upstairs where the fine brains behind history teaching in Victoria apply themselves to the mystery.

Some time ensues. Finally: Eureka – the answer!!

Deftly ignoring the evidence of:
large painters’ ladders in the courtyard,
a fresh coat of paint on the window frame,
the fact that they had been dodging painters’ debris for three days over the previous week, and
the very fine weekend weather,
the collective agreement was that a freak, cyclonic gust of wind had swirled through the courtyard and travelled up the wall with such forceful violence as to not only dislodge the glass from its place in the window but then to suck it out of the building before laying it (gently) to rest on the bricks in the courtyard.

My, what clever fellows we are! There is no accounting for that weather! Dangerous stuff that.

Enter: logic and a staff member who clearly has a greater grip on reality.

“Guess what, guess what?”, we say. Proceed with explanation of freak wind episode and danger of flying glass in courtyard, should be paid danger money, etc, etc.

“Errr,” says she. “I think the painters did it.”

Oh. Quite right. Is that the phone?

Since I placed my desire for a cheese-on (toast) yesterday on the record, I have had to face the accusation that I am food obsessed and/or prone to writing about snacks.
A highly selective reading of the subject matter hitherto addressed, I would respond.
So I won’t mention the luscious lamb shanks with creamy polenta and roasted quinces I ate last night. Or the lovely, lovely rubarb and apple flan extravaganza. Or the smooth, smooth merlot which accompanied the food.
That might provide grist to the mill, so to speak.
However I will mention how much I enjoyed having dinner with my comrade, Damien. It’s been a hard won friendship in many ways, but it has stood the test of time.
So, to you Sir, t’was a sparkling evening indeed. Thank you.

I’m going out to dinner tonight.
Hmmm, but where to go?
Somewhere old – somewhere new?
Do I impress out of town visitor with something tried and true or walk on the wild side a little?
Perplexing.
I wonder if there’s anywhere we can go that’ll make me a cheese-on (toast, that is). That’s what I really feel like now. Long way for a visitor to come for something he could easily whip up in his own kitchen though. Better make that a gourmet cheese-on – pass the sliced tomato and the decorative sprig of parsley please!

I had a very tasty soup for lunch. It was a mulligatawny – steaming hot and delicious. Served with roti bread. Scrumptious but hard to spell. Not that that’s an issue. Regarding soup, scrumptiousness is more important than ease of spelling.
But, as I’d decided to write about the deliciousness of my lunch, I thought I’d look it up and get it right.
While hot on the trail of the spelling of mulligatawny in my trusty Pocket Oxford Dictionary, however, I was completely distracted and then entranced by ‘mugwump’. It’s a noun. It means “person affecting superiority to party politics”. It’s derivation is from North American Indian (?? Which North American Indians??) for ‘great chief’. I think I know some mugwumps!! But I’m still not sure on the spelling of mulligatawny. I’ll try looking it up again tomorrow.

School holidays have kicked in – so the office of any organisation which exists to resource teachers and students is naturally more quiet than usual.
Lots of staff take the opportunity to have holidays – my boss is away overseas and other staff members are also away today. Normally the phones are buzzing at this time of the day (just before school starts) but today – blissful quiet. I can enjoy my morning cup o’ porridge (tres daggy, but it’s winter and cold outside, OK?) and cup o’ tea in peace. I can put any CD that I like on and play it at whatever volume I choose. I can admire my new cover for our magazine which I’ve just finished and very much like the look of. I can fix poor grammar (see previous sentence) or not (see also previous sentence).
There’s a whole list of things I need to do, but for the time being – I’m queen of the office.

Well, I’m now enrolled – or at least part enrolled – in my new course (the prelude to my new job and grand new career! Remember?)
The road to enrolment has not exactly been smooth. And the problems, disturbingly, have mostly related to poor communication. Does this bode well for learning good practices? Maybe it’s a test. When I front up for the first tute in Communications 101, perhaps we’ll all be asked to critique the process?
Last week prospective students received their confirmation of the offer of a place in the course on the same day as another envelope which contained an invitation to attend a pre-enrolment session – scheduled for that same evening. I’m figuring attendees were low at the information session.
Then, true to form, this morning in the midst of enrolments the computer system crashed. Nothing doing. Enrolments were checked by hand. Confirmations will be sent when the data can be entered into the system. And we all have to go back at an alternate time to pick up student cards. A bit annoying.
Still the two subjects I’m taking look good, and I’m really looking forward to starting. Bring it on!

I guess it had to happen one day.
Scene: 6.30 am. Radio tells me it’s 5 degrees outside. Contemplating how long can stay in bed where it is much warmer. Over the low murmur of the radio comes the (not so) dulcet sounds of the garbage truck rounding the corner.
Damn. Did not put very full bin out last night as was too cold.
I know the truck’s still two bins away. I make a dash. Out the front door. Pink hippo PJs flapping in the crisp air. Scary morning hair bobbing madly. Grab the bin. Roll it to the curb just as the flashing lights and long extension pincers on the garbage truck move into bin picking-up range.
My job is done. I turn to make my way back into the house.
Garbage truck driver toots horn loudly. Marita jumps out of skin – fortunately keeping PJs on.
Gargage truck drives off. Driver smirking. Marita curses savagely.
Time for a soothing cup of tea.

Why should your birthday only last for one day? My preference is to extend the birthday season over several weeks of treats and general, all round good cheer.
Bring on the cake, bring on the sparkly drinkies, bring on the dancing boys (hey, where’d they come from?) ….
Anyway… the weekend just gone saw a lovely sunny Saturday arvo spent with coffees and conversation in one of the ‘scray’s finer cafe establishments. I left with such a warm glow. There is nothing like a bunch of your friends getting together to talk loudly and hoover down coffees to make you feel special!
And the slow trickle of celebratory mail continues to make the trip to the mail box ever so much more exciting!
And, it’s not over yet!!
I’ll be 33 and then some before the festivities abate.

My housemate, Justine, has been way for a couple of days. While it’s very nice to have the house to self, it’s also nice to have someone else around to talk to, share the dog walking duties, shout at the TV etc, etc.
So, her return is appreciated on many levels. Not least because she probably has not forgotten her house keys and is, therefore, able to get into the house – unlike me who did forget and therefore can’t.
May resort to borrowing a neighbour’s child and making them crawl through the dog door to unlatch the back door (again).
Fortunately the kids seem to find this a hoot. (Much better than mowing the lawn which is the other usual reason for them to be in my backyard.)