Monday, August 14, 2006

12 THINGS THAT KEEP ME ALIVE MEME

Being able to go to the marriage rally would have been big on that list. Kudos to the ABC for giving it good coverage. Kudos to the weather angels for a beautiful day. Everybody wearing red was also great.

I've been sleeping in the afternoons like an old lady. I should be relaxed enough now but I'm not getting the blood pressure taken for another couple of weeks, when the bills are paid.

I liked this meme from Ampersand Duck and it looked so easy. Wrong! It took me a while until I got the first one but it might have been the crappy mood I was in. I was in a much better place by the time I got down to number 12.

1. Easy to say anything to do with the sea but there's one place that really does it for me. 'The Crags' are about 12kms west of Port Fairy. The sea is never smooth. The colours of the rocks, the sky and the water are always changing.

2. Butterflies. We so rarely see clouds of them in the 'burbs these days that watching one is a treat.

3. Clouds. So many varieties. Sometimes 3 or 4 in one section of sky, always moving and changing.

4. Paper. All of it. Machine made, hand made, embossed, watermarked, white or buff, gold edged, unlined, luxuriously heavy. I hoard it like a miser hoards gold.

5. Fountain pens and ink. I like slim pens with very fine nibs. I love deep burgundy ink.

6. Beads. Glass beads. Lampwork beads. Large, small, faceted, smooth, plain or irridescent.

7. Music that has memory. Music that pulls an image from your mind you thought had disappeared forever.

8. The perfume of flowers. Boronia on a warm summer night. Orange blossoms after rain. Roses at anytime. Freesias in spring. Walking through a cloud of gardenia. Lavender on the cat when he's been sleeping under the bush.

9. Books of all types. But I'm in love with coffee table books. Smooth glossy pages of photographs, history, jewells, places, fashions, too big and luscious to hold without two hands.

10. Finding a note or a card in my son's handwriting. Writing reveals so much and changes over a life time and I have so little of him on paper.

11. Hugs. Hello hugs, comfort hugs, 'oh you fool' hugs, goodbye hugs, children's hugs or a tiny paw hug from the cat.

12. Laughter. Rolling on the floor, stitch in the side, damn, I've wet myself laughter.

13 comments:

Ampersand Duck said...

Ah, that's the ticket. Fabbo list. Thanks!

Anonymous said...

Fountain Pens. The real kind of fountain pen: the finely-balanced one that requires no pushing down onto the paper, the one that simply and effortlessly glides ever so smoothly, exuding the right amount of ink due to its own weight. And the turquoise blue colored ink you used to be able to buy for the cartridge. Yes, Fountain Pens....

Zoe said...

It's a lovely list, JahTeh, and I share a lot of it.

Daniel said...

Ah, Jahteh, there's only one thing I'd add to your list: receiving a comment.

Everytime the little red pop-peepers sign lights up I get a real buzz (not that it happens that often).

Of course sometimes I'm disappointed by the sentiments expressed but at least it shows that someone is reading my posts and all the time I spend is not entirely wasted.

Hugs!

R.H. said...

Hello sweetiepies.

I've just eaten five fish fingers. Very nice. And with loads of salt too - and a lemon from the tree next door. Good. Well that red headed woman next door has always got her head over the fence to see what I'm up to. She likes to ring the council about me, for burning rubbish, or whatever; well I'll tell you this, she is the ugliest woman I've ever seen in my life, no joking. And she knows it; I've told her. If I had a face like hers I'd walk backwards, I've told her that too. Well it makes no difference, once these deadheads get a dirty on you it's for keeps. They'll never let up, even though they've forgotten what started it. Well I remember what started it, she heard me yell out WOG one day, and her old lady is a Slav of some sort. That's right. Well, how unfortunate.

Meanwhile I've had some luck, at Laverton trash market on Saturday I saw Mary Lord's biography of Hal Porter (in hardcover, mind you) for the stupid price of one dollar. Yes, and it's an old Prahran library copy, in very good condition too, and so why they've thrown it out goodness knows. I got it out from Williamstown library years ago - right when it was first published, but now I'll read it again. And with enormous satisfaction. And contradiction; Hal was a charming and vindictive man, a HOMOSEXUAL with a liking for young boys - a Capital Offence, in my opinion. Yet he was enormously interesting. And funny. Marvellous company too. Yes, so what can you say. Art ain't easy. No one is good.

The Editor said...

Mirtazapine...

R.H. said...

Well I guess after this my career as a blog reply person has hit bottom.

So here's some more, I was a Peeping Tom once, but it wasn't my fault. Not really. I didn't even go out, there were three windows in my little loft, and each one had a different show. Hell, what could I do? They didn't care, that's all.

JahTeh said...

Ducky's memes, an internet business enterprise. I can see dollar signs.

Janet, there is a pen shop at Westfield and my DNA can be found all over it. There's nothing like asking if one could just test the balance of the $3000 solid gold one in the far display.

Zoe, you'll have to go into the meme business with ADuck.

You don't get comments Daniel because your posts don't need them. I suggest a smiley button that I can press to let you know I've been visiting.

Rh, the kind of neighbour one loves to hate, air polluter, reader and peeping tom. No wonder you don't blog, you haven't the time.

Hi Bear, is that a new cask wine, medication or my word verification?

Unknown said...

RH, an interesting book, Porter's biography, and a good find.

My local library disposes of fiction titles if they haven't been borrowed for three years or so (usually for 50c each on sales table at the library branches which has enabled me to enlarge MY library hugely).

I'm not sure of their policy on non-fiction but I don't care. Libraries are supposed to be libraries, repositories of books!! It's disgusting policy, I tell you, disgusting!

Janet, I love fountain pens, there is nothing better to write with. I have a nice collection which one day will have a Mont Blanc Meisterstück. (All donations towards this goal are more than welcome.)

Unknown said...

Jahteh,

On the subject of clouds, you might like, even love, this book.

R.H. said...

I hate to love Hal - but since becoming a poet and part-time genius, he epitomises my dilemma: the contradiction of aesthetics in a dirty dog like me. It's complementary. Maybe. I don't know. But there are good kind people who ignore the arts, they are common sense and simplicity, I admire them too.

Davoh said...

OOer, fountain pens .. drools, wipes mouth, pretends to be sober .. f o u nt a in pen s .. ah, bubber it, goes bach to sleep.

JahTeh said...

Thanks Ron, wave an ice-cream under a fat lady's mouth, gorgeous pen and book, BOTH OF WHICH I CAN'T AFFORD.

RH, it's coming up for hard rubbish collection around here soon, I expect I'll see you.

Davo, Sweet dreams.