Shades of blue and brown

Another photo from Manly. Wouldn't mind having this as my local pool...

No more grey hair

Thank god for Makismo.

Street art

Great little shops

A day in the park

...with Hugh Jackman!! Here, hanging out with "our" (well, George and Nadia's) little Max...


What a nice dad...!

Headlines

Lovely Manly

A spectacular day

It doesn't get more beautiful than this.

Sydney

Now, where could this be...?

Delicious

Morning traffic

bumper to bumper...
On days like these I really think I should be cycling to work...

Lovely afternoon skies

I just love these afternoon skies. Light fluffy clouds and golden light.

Wednesday morning art

The coffee machine was broken at work today so I went across the road for a takeaway coffee. It's cool, the little things you find when you are really looking. I'd love this as a poster!

Space

Tuesday morning

One from the archives

Koh Lanta, Thailand. March 2002

The goddess is dancing

I had to share this story from my friend S...

"Last Wednesday I decided to try one of the classes at my gym for the first time which I probably should have done earlier but, you know, cardio is for pussies and everything. It was a yoga class. I'm kind of at the point now with this gym, where I am just looking to learn stuff that I can do at home and give my membership the ass at the end of the year. It's a big chain gym where they have salespeople selling memberships the whole time you are there. This is despite the fact that there are already more people, per square inch, than downtown Lan Kwai Fong on New Years Eve and at least there everyone isn't wearing Lynx Phoenix. Anyway....... The doors to the 'studio' open at 7.30pm and there are about 25 of us that go in there. Me, two other guys and the rest are women . Everyone gets a mat and starts taking off their shoes and swinging their arms and stuff. I do the same except for the arm part. The instructor puts on her headset and introduces herself. She is American. She has the psychobabble voice. It's got the whiny flavour. It's got the kind of tone that is just perfect for telling someone that they are 'blocking'. Personally, if I had a voice like that I might consider getting into some tantric horseshit or something just because it would be funny to hear myself talking about it and sounding so convincing. In short, at the point of her mouth openage, I knew. Trouble. She started telling us that although it was supposed to be yoga tonight we were going to do something different but really, really great. It's a little bit more cardiovascular. It's called "*&^%". I can't remember. It sounded like a made up hippy word, maybe 'PRAHNAM' or something. Then she explained that it was an acronym and she was like "Physical, Reducing, Active...." The acronym contents were so crap that it seemed obvious that the hippy sounding word came first and the 'this letter stands for that' part came later. (But, of course, why not?) Then she said something that made all the blood drain from my face. "It's like a cross between Jazz Dance, Free Dance, Tai Chi, Yoga, Martial Arts.......". Put some thick echo on that sentence. It seemed to hang in the air forever.....like it had been bellowed from an icy, Nepalese mountain pass. I expected at least five people to mumble something and leave. Nothing. I looked at the other guy around my age . A stupid grin on his face and bouncing on the spot. Pumped! She had provided no exit clause in her opening address. Put my mat back in the box, put the shoes on. I played the movie in my mind. It was a hideous Lars Von Trier film. I could't do it. I felt that if I left the room, I would be the grumpy right-wing guy.I was either one of them, or some nazi cock who traded shares on a PDA. So I stayed feeling weak and stupid and within five minutes I was freeform hippy dancing like a dickhead to some Angelique Kidjo remix in a room with mirrored walls. It lasted an hour. She was just making stuff up. We did everything from Staying Alive style "and 5... 6.... 7 ...and 8" to energy ball holding to can-can dancing in a circle. Every once in awhile she would tell us that it was time to do 'whatever our bodies wanted to the music'. That there were 'no rules'and 'no mirrors'. Well there were mirrors. Everywhere. I have images from those mirrors forever burned into the farthest reaches of my psyche. I'll be doing something and there'll be a momentary flash of myself in 'sumo stance' waving my arms around like a monkey. I can even hear a short burst of that electric 'flashback' noise like from a Tesla coil."

Fuzzy phone photos from Friday

It's all coming back to me now...
Espresso martinis and ... Darren Lockyer...???
The Bouwery

Crispy Sauvignon blanc

Rainy Sunday afternoon. Lovely fresh Sauvignon blanc at Cru.

Friday afternoon

Golden afternoon light.

A day in the park

A lovely day in the park. Beautiful weather, good friends, beer & bubblies... A good way to spend a Friday!

no coffee no workee

Thursday morning. A nice coffee, sunshine through the window.

blurry blue