Question of perception

It’s interesting how the different people in your life see you differently.  A friend posted this list of questions she asked her partner, and I thought I’d ask them of a bunch of people to see how their answers varied:
From Mr K:
What is something I say a lot?
“I’m going on a pokewalk”
What makes me happy?
“Schnitzel.  Yesterday, but depends on the day.”
What makes me sad?
“US politics.”
How tall am I?
“Five foot.”
What’s my favourite thing to do?
“Pick up our son from school.”
What do I do when you’re not around?
“Same thing you do when I am around. Fuck all.”  
What makes you proud of me?
“Weight loss”
What is my favourite food?
“Sashimi.”
Where is my favourite place To visit?
“Somewhere you haven’t been.”
If I could go anywhere, where would it be?
“This is not your life. If you want to go somewhere, you just go.” Me: Just pick somewhere… “Moscow.”
Do you think you could live without me?
“Oh, physiologically, yeah. Would it be my preference? No.”
How do I annoy you?
“Oh fuck… you take too long between when you are asked a question to respond. It’s like you have lag. Mum has a ping problem in her brain.”
You get a phone call to say I am in trouble, who am I with?
“Historically speaking, Steph… but she’s not here, so probably Angus.”
From Angel:
What is something that I say a lot?
“No.”
What makes me happy?
“Us, me and Dad.
What makes me sad?
“Going away on long trips without us – being away from the family.  And stupid people.  Mostly stupid people.”
How tall am I?
“Five foot, three”  Bzzt!
What’s my favourite thing to do?
“Hang out with the family or Pokehunting”
What do I do when you’re not around?
“Pokewalk ummm… and watch TV”
What makes you proud of me?
“The fact that you tried so hard to have me.”
What is my favourite food?
“Avocado on toast with feta… or sushi.”
Where is my favourite place To visit?
“Wellington Point, no, I’m being silly.  London.”
If I could go anywhere, where would it be?
“Well, where haven’t you been? Places you haven’t been yet – Antarctica, India, maybe some of Indonesia. Mongolia – does Mongolia still exist?”
Do you think you could live without me?
“No. Living three months without you was really difficult.”
How do I annoy you?
“Umm… you don’t annoy me. Unless I am trying to get something that I don’t need.”
You get a phone call to say I am in trouble, who am I with?
“Why are you calling me?”
 From yaleman:
What is something I say a lot?
“all sorts of wise things, also that you’re sore”
What makes me happy?
“your people, engagement, sushi, cuddles”
What makes me sad?
“people disappointing you”
How tall am I?
“5’1″ in the morning”
What’s my favourite thing to do?
“Be with your people.”
What do I do when you’re not around?
“Pine for me and play pokemon”
What makes you proud of me?
“Recently, your drive to get healthier.”
What is my favorite food?
“Hottate aburi.”
Where is my favourite place To visit?
“anywhere”
If I could go anywhere, where would it be?
“everywhere”
Do you think you could live without me?
“yes, but it’d suck”
How do I annoy you?
“your short term memory”
You get a phone call to say I am in trouble, who am I with?
“not me, because I’d keep you out of trouble”
From BigSal:
What is something I say a lot?
“I bought some new gin!”
What makes me happy?
“Angus cuddles, laughing with favourite people.”
What makes me sad?
“When loved ones aren’t there anymore, passed or removed from your life for other reasons.”
How tall am I?
“5’1/2” ”
What’s my favourite thing to do?
“Travel.”
What do I do when you’re not around?
“Nearly everything, we don’t spend as much time in each other’s physical company as I’d like xxx”
What makes you proud of me?
“Your strength and tenacity. I wish you didn’t have to be so strong. xxx”
What is my favourite food?
“Sushi.”
Where is my favourite place To visit?
“Canberra? You visit there heaps.”
If I could go anywhere, where would it be?
“Mongolia.”
Do you think you could live without me?
“No. Mean question.”
How do I annoy you?
“I think we’re too similar for your peccadilloes to annoy me. Rarely happens now, but I used to feel emotionally manipulated from time to time.”
You get a phone call to say I am in trouble, who am I with?
“Dr Nick!  :)”
From my little sister:
What is something I say a lot?
“Hazzah.”
What makes me happy?
“Angus.”
What makes me sad?
“Dad.”
How tall am I?
“154/155cm.”
What’s my favourite thing to do?
“Take part in a meaty Debate.”
What do I do when you’re not around?
“Don’t know.”
What makes you proud of me?
“Your attitude, to do what you want no matter what.”
What is my favourite food?
“Sashimi & Cheese.”
Where is my favourite place To visit?
“Movies or a cruise boat.”
If I could go anywhere, where would it be?
“Is there anywhere left where you haven’t been? Russia?”
Do you think you could live without me?
“Yes but prefer not to.”
How do I annoy you?
“No not really, we have distance.”
You get a phone call to say I am in trouble, who am I with?
“I can’t remember his name but the guy you were with when you had an accident in Tassie.”

Australian Pokédex awesomeness!

A very talented Australian animation artist named Paul Robertson has turned his hand to making a uniquely Aussie Pokédex… and it’s just brilliant.  I imagine non-Australians might have some trouble interpreting some of these Pokémon creations – you’ll just have to trust us that it all makes sense!

Saving here for future reference, via @probzz on Twitter.

Twenty years later…

Time seems to pass so quickly and this all feels like it happened just last year, but this story unfurled a little over twenty years ago… starting around the middle of 1996, maybe???  I had been single for while, I mean, not very long in the big scheme of things, but I was lamenting the lack of intelligent and refined young gentlemen in my general circle of acquaintance to a friend of mine, Peter.  It was a typical, “Where have all the good men gone?” conversation – I was sick of meeting guys who couldn’t hold up their end in a meaty conversation, guys who didn’t know or care about anything outside their own small world, guys who wanted to get you into bed but who had nothing of any substance to offer you over breakfast.  Peter offered me a some very good advice: ‘You need to separate the wheat from the chaff.’ said Pete, ‘What you need is a good pick up line…’  I had no idea where he was going with this, but he then said to me, ‘Next time you meet someone, ask them what they think of the Chinese Government disbanding the Hong Kong legislature.’  I laughed in his face – Oh right… how is that going to help me meet an interesting guy?!

But over the next few months, I found Pete’s pick up line was extremely useful: I would be out with the girls at a bar, and a guy would offer to buy me a drink or we’d be playing pool or something, and I’d pull out my conversation starter, ‘So… what do you think of the Chinese Government disbanding the Hong Kong legislature?’  I got a lot of blank looks, a lot of ‘Huh?’ responses.  I got one, ‘Are you drunk?’, and one guy who literally just turned and walked away.  It turned out that Pete’s one liner was a huge success at getting rid of repetitive conversations about cars or surfing, etc.  So I kept it. And used it to good effect.

Several months after I started applying my pick up line to my all and sundry social interactions at the Alex Hills and Colmslie Taverns, (Yes, I know, in hindsight, there was my problem, right there!), my sister came home from her first Rowany Festival (a large medieval camping event that is held annually near Sydney).  She was full of enthusiastic stories about the tavern, the wars, the wonderful people she’d met, and all the general merrymaking and shenanigans she’d experienced.  She showed me a whole pile of photographs of armoured fighters all decked out for war, and medieval campsites, and costumed people playing games on the green… it all looked like a lot of fun.  She showed me one picture of herself with some friends, and I said to her, ‘Who’s he?’

She replied that his name was ‘William the Admirer’, but that she didn’t know his real name, and then she related a story where ‘William’ was engaged in a flattery competition that involved several guys who were engaged in offering delicate sentiments to compliment the Princess at the time, and how ‘William’ had declared to all that he would henceforth change his name to ‘William the Admirer’ in honour of the Princess and her beauty and accomplishments… or something like that.  I laughed, but at the same time was quite taken by the idea of a young man who could pull off something like that in a social situation, and told my sister that she should invite him to a party that we were hosting soon, so that I could meet him… and so she did.  Several times apparently.  Each time she saw him, she apparently reiterated the invitation and he had promised he would come so that I could meet him.

The party in question was one of our then, annual Tequila Parties (complete with sombreros, ponchos, heavily laced sangria, nachos galore and a pinata filled with alcohol minis and condoms!), and when the night in question rolled around, I kept an eye out to see if the young man in question was going to turn up… but alas, he never did.  So I did what every sensible young woman does when being stood up by a man who didn’t know he had a date – got blind rotten drunk to the point where I was doing tequila shots and thinking, ‘This tequila tastes strange…’ only to double check the bottle and find it was vodka!  After that, I pretty much forgot all about ‘William the Admirer’.

About a month passed, and my sister informed me that she was going to a housewarming party in Annerley and would I like to come? At the time, I wasn’t really all that keen on going a party where I wouldn’t know anyone, so I declined the invitation… and then she said to me, ‘That guy from the photo is going to be there.’  Oh well, in that case, I decided ‘What the hell.’, I’d go.

We went to the party and I met a lot of new people and engaged in a lot of small talk – as you do when you are surrounded by people who know each other very well, but who you know not at all.  They were all laughing and telling stories and I was politely watching the party warm up.  Several hours and several vodkas later, it was obvious that the elusive ‘William the Admirer’ was not going to be making an appearance – yet again.  So much for that!  Unbeknownst to me, he was on a date (Which was going disastrously – that’s what you get for letting your mother set you up on a blind date!), and he was probably delivering his unfortunate date home around the time I was rounding on my sixth or seventh drink*! (*important plot point)

I was sitting outside under the patio when I saw him enter the dining room and thought to myself, ‘Hey there’s that guy from the photo! Finally, I’ll get to meet him!’ This much I do remember… from there though, things get a little hazy and versions of the story start to differ.  🙂  Apparently, while I am thinking this, he claims to have been thinking, ‘Who is that short blonde girl in the pink jumper, outside?’ (Yes, somethings never change).  I’m not sure how we actually met, though I am confident no one made an actual introduction, but HE claims that he was standing in the dining room, talking to Stefano and that *I* came up to him in a very familiar manner and said, ‘Hello’, and put my hand in his pocket!  What a brazen hussy!  As I said, it was getting late, I had more than a few drinks, and my recollection is pretty sketchy but… it is possible that this occurred in this manner. I guess?!  :/  Stefano looks at him, he looks at Stefano, and they go, ‘Okay then.’

Over the next hour or so, I sobered up a quite a bit as we are exchanging pleasantries, and I think to myself, ‘I like him. A lot. He seems smart.’.  Still a little tipsy, I asked him a very important question, ‘So… what do you think of the Chinese Government disbanding the Hong Kong legislature?’ He looks at me for a moment, and then launches into a full-on dissertation on the political climate in China, and how the residents of Hong Kong are going to be affected by the move from English to Chinese rule and… I stop him right there, and confess that I don’t care, but I am won.  He knew what I was talking about and that was more than good enough for me.  🙂

We talked and canoodled until 5am, and three weeks later he declared he was going to marry me – to which I smiled incredulously and verbally patted him on the head by saying, ‘Ahuh, sure.’  But he proved me wrong and two years later we were married.

Mr K, I hunted you down from a photograph, and I am so very glad I did.  Sometimes the last twenty years feel as though they have been filled with more trials than triumphs, but the one constant has been us, and I am so looking forward to the next twenty years  <3

*and doubly glad that your date that night crashed and burned!  😉

Pop Up Globe

Mr K and I are not far from hitting a momentous anniversary… it’s almost twenty years since we met.  To mark the occasion, my wonderful and thoughtful husband decided to take me to Auckland to see the Shakespearean productions being put on at the highly reputed Pop Up Globe Theatre, in honour of our first date, which was to go see Kenneth Brannagh’s four hour epic, ‘Hamlet’ down town.

You see, he wooed me with Shakespeare, back in the day, making this Big Weekend O’ Shakespeare an entirely appropriate way to celebrate having spent twenty years with that special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life.

The Pop Up Globe itself, is seriously impressive.  It is an inventive and intimate modern space to host the Elizabethan plays and allows a uniquely accessible style of Shakespearean theatre… probably very much more in keeping with how period audiences would have experienced the plays.  The space enables direct interaction with the audience that is quite impossible on a traditional stage with the cast a chasm away due to the orchestra pit.  The groundlings facilitate this direct connection to the players, as the cast interact with the groundlings, the rising crowds in the galleries feel very much connected the the groundlings – leading to a feeling of being part of the play through this chain of people.  The result is that the audience feels more a part of the play, being in among the players, and almost participating in the scene, rather than what we have become used to with Shakespeare – passively watching some poor sod in a ruffed collar proclaiming, ‘How now, brown cow?’ sounding like he has a plum in his mouth and a rod up his arse!  It feels very much how I always imagined Shakespeare should be… rather than what we have been accustomed to.

Our first show was on Thursday night – fabulous seats in the Middle Gallery, front and centre, for Much Ado About Nothing – my favourite of Shakespeare’s comedies.  At first I was a little confused, we seemed to have a crowd warming Dogberry encouraging us to sing the Banana Boat song for reasons that eluded me entirely, but somehow it set the scene perfectly – encouraged the crowd to not just passively watch the classic tale of mistaken identity, overheard gossip, boy meets girl, they hate each other but eventually discover they love each other, narrative. Instead the crowd are encouraged to more immersively engage in the acts that followed.