personal political

menophobia

I had my first bout of menophobia a couple of months ago ...

train stories

We went up by train to visit my sister in the Blue Mountains yesterday.

two dinner parties

We live in the municipality with one of the highest (if not the highest) average incomes in Australia.

dear reader...

Thanks for still reading my blog even though I hardly ever post and my posts are a bit distracted.

Actually, I've been away for a short holiday in Adelaide, or more accurately for most of the time, in the Adelaide Hills.

more brides

I just don't get it. Or rather, I don't want to get it, as it amazes and horrifies me that women want to do this.

party pic

I was looking for pictures of my friend and don't seem to have any scanned in to the computer, but I did come across one which was taken to 'advertise' our party - it's me pretending to throw myself onto a knife out a window. There's so much talk in the media these days about the prevalence  of suicide, but back then (late 70s) it appears that we could more innocently make fun of it...

someone i used to know...

...committed suicide last year. I only found out this week, which shows how  completely out of touch we were. In fact I last saw her over 10 years ago. But in the 70s and early 80s, we were good friends. Such good friends that we spent a month travelling in New Guinea together and a month travelling through Indonesia. We lived in three different households together. When I think about her, I can easily bring to mind her voice, her wry smile, her hair, the little laugh as she spoke, the determined way in which she walked across a room, the busyness as she cooked ... I knew her very well, then.

brides

Stories like this make me feel simultaneously horrified, bemused and incredibly glad that I've never been anywhere near doing this type of thing.

[I know there was supposedly an anti-feminist backlash in the 90s, but lately I've been feeling like not only is there a backlash going on, it's almost as if feminism never happened, for a large segment of young women, and that's very depressing. Last week in the job-which-never-speaks-its-name, I came across an advice article for a major women's magazine which told young women that they *must* wear make-up to work. Full stop. That's what women do.]]

golden

I sent some photos of Olle to a friend in England and she sent this reply: Terrific pix. I can imagine him looking at those in grown-up years to come, and thinking what a golden time.