Some inanity from the day

I meant to write something tonight about the process of reverse gentrification going on in my suburb but fell asleep on the couch at eight o'clock and have just woken up now... in time to go to bed.

In lieu of anything actually worthy of your time, please find below a photo of something we saw at the park this afternoon:

Surprisingly it's not a giant, disfigured cotton bud but some wacky man-boy wrapped in bubble wrap hanging upside down on some ropey play equipment with his two friends.

Here he is again launching himself down the hill between the slippery dips:

Why anyone would do this is a mystery to me.

On the plus side, we saw some pretty ducks:


Then we looked closer and realised they were crazy alien zombie ducks:



You'd think with all the red lines I draw on photos I'd be better at it, but no. On the other hand, I'm not sure I made the duck look all that much worse, considering his/her zombie status.

So overall and in summary (as I used to start the concluding paragraph of all my year seven essays), it was a largely mystifying day.

Share the love: what's mystified you this week?

From Ramones reject to t-shirt queen in 15 easy years

The first time I went to Homebake I had t-shirt issues (as you do) so a friend lent me one of hers. It was black and fitted, with a rather nice design on the front. It was for some band called the Ramones; I hadn't heard of them but my friend assured me they were quite good, as far as bands go. So on went the t-shirt and off we went to Homebake.

That I was wearing a t-shirt for a band I didn't know apparently incensed my friend's younger sister who said (quite rightly, I see in hindsight): "You can't wear that. You don't even know who they are."

To which I answered:

"Well... um... so what? Yes I can."

Not my finest moment, that. So over the many years since then I've had this thing with t-shirt authenticity. Since that moment I've wished, wished for a chance to right my karma in the t-shirt universe.

Finally, my moment arrived last week.

I was in the park with my boy. We were hanging out on the swings and beside us was a gorgeous Goth chick, dressed head to toe in black just like her gorgeous Goth baby. We got chatting, as you do in the park, about parenting and tv and what we did before our sticky, busy children arrived.

It turned out she had studied Comparative Literature and Classics at uni in South Africa so we nattered about the books we'd read and the poetry we were forcing on our poor children. We chuckled about how great but economically worthless our liberal arts educations had been.

We laughed, we sighed, we smiled at our kids.

Then it came to me, in a flash of t-shirt brilliance. I knew exactly what to say. Never before had the stars of conversation come together like this. I turned to my new Goth friend, straightened my t-shirt and said: "My worthless degree means I can wear this t-shirt and mean it."



Lame? My lordy yes, but for that moment I ruled the t-shirt universe.

So tell me, how do you get on with the T-Shirt Gods?