Clichés Can Still Be Deadly

Despite the fact I know that I have an imagination like a kid with ADHD who has gone off her meds and chugged an entire bottle of red cordial syrup, I persist in watching horror movies.
I know I really shouldn't because it inevitably ends with me shuffling about wearing a crucifix, purposefully cultivating a bout of garlic breath and wondering if there is anywhere nearby that offers classes in how to pilot helicopters, man a machine gun turret on a moving armoured vehicle or kill aliens with your thumb.
Despite all these things, I went and saw I Am Legend the other day and was struck by two things.
Firstly, Karen Healey over at Girls Read Comics is on to a winner with her 'What if Will Smith Was In It' movie game "where one thinks of a movie, and then imagines Will Smith in it, whereupon the movie is instantly improved".
Secondly, a quick assessment finds me to be worryingly vulnerable and chompworthy in the event of any major natural or supernatural disaster.

Let us consider the basics.
I can't run to catch a bus let alone to save myself, even though I can walk for hours at that annoyingly brisk pace that always has the people you're with asking you where the bloody fire is and assuming you aren't the wheezing out of shape wreck you actually are. If not quite power walking is enough to escape the hordes of undead I might last a short while.
I can't physically haul myself over or onto anything that is too high, making fire without the power of matches or a cigarette lighter would be an embarrassing trial and if I had to grow my own vegetables I would die of scurvy because I have a black belt in black thumb.
Of course the last point has strayed into the realm of long term survival concerns, which may be a bit ambitious. You need to survive the initial event before you have to worry about feeding yourself or the joys of dysentery and my initial point was that I probably wouldn't last long enough to worry about what's for dinner.

On the upside I am an inherently suspicious person.
Even a person who has never watched any horror movies should be suspicious of certain situations. Someone who has seen even a modest selection of horror movies will be specifically sensitive to key indicators. This doesn't necessarily offer a straightforward course of action for you to follow or guarantee your survival, especially as you may not know how you perform 'under pressure' until the moment comes.
I present for your consideration the following true life example.

I was the only person in the whole house (first warning sign: nobody about!) and had decided to indulge in a spot of post sunset hanging out of the washing (multiple boo boo: I'm outside! At night! Doing something domestic!), as you do, and whilst our Labrador frolicked at my feet (warning: cute pet! Cute pet!), covering my pants in a fine coat of blonde hairs, I noticed an odd noise just on the edge of hearing (Retreat! Retreat!)
A bit of peering around revealed it to be the tap down the back of the yard in the fenced off and overgrown dog area where no one ever goes (AWOOGA!!! AWOOGA!!!) dribbling in a persistent and wasteful manner.
'How odd!' I thought to myself, 'It wasn't doing that before. Oh well, I'll just go in and turn that off...' (WHAT!?) and then post-horror movie paranoia kicked in. I could almost hear my non-existent audience screaming DON'T GO IN THERE! RUN AWAY YOU IDIOT!

Reassessment: Unexplained, innocent seeming change in environment luring unsuspecting solitary girl down to the bottom of the garden.

Hmm...

There are a few ways I could play out this scenario.


Option #1: Open the gate and let the dog go in ahead of me
Advantages

• If anything is going to jump out immediately it would get the dog, allowing me to scream like an opera singer and run away.

Disadvantages

• If something happened to the dog I would feel like a complete bitch.

• If the dog mysteriously disappeared (with or without that gut retching 'Arp!' noise) I would, being a big old idiot, go running after her and straight into a trap.

Option #2: Leave it
Advantages

• I wouldn't be going in and wouldn't get got down the bottom of the garden.

Disadvantages

• I could be leaving myself open to getting got later on, probably whilst I was in bed where I would inexplicably be wearing a silky negligee.
• If there was in fact nothing 'suss'* going on I would feel like an idiot and a drought-exacerbator in the morning

Option #3: Man up and go in, clutching a weapon or two
Advantages

• I would feel like less of a wuss.

• I might get an advance warning of whatever is trying to creep up on me wholesale.

Disadvantages

• I might get got, leaving the dog bouncing up and down barking excitedly but uselessly as my demise is reflected in her big brown eyes.

Option #4: Go in but take someone with you
Advantages

• I might have a better chance of survival via confusion or strength in numbers.

Disadvantages

• If they get got I might feel like a bastard (depending who they were).

• Whilst I'm waiting for them to turn up I might get got.

After overthinking my options I took a variation of Options #1 and #4.
I went in with my dog whilst talking with my mother on my mobile** phone.
This makes me double wuss as I could have ended up with something happening to the dog, myself getting got and my poor mother having to listen to my grisly and protracted final bubbling sounds. But at least someone would know that something had happened and they could get right to the part where they send in a middle aged cop to investigate, he barely gets away with his life and then gets to fall in love with a glamorous lady biochemist who will then save the day. Or bits of it.
So already I have proved myself a crisis wussie and written myself into the role of 'Oh my God! She's dead!... That was so cool!' anonymous or unsympathetic/unimportant bit character.
I have not even the survival skillz to make myself the hero in my own half hypothetical situation.

From this tale of caution and woe you should take two simple lessons.
One: Always be prepared.
Two: If I ever ask you to take a walk with me down a dark garden path... you should probably take a raincheck.


*lit. suspicious (also weird/off colour/dodgy)
**it's mobile... you can carry it around with you... out in the world... come on, you know this one...

Who Me?

I managed to crap out on my hectic 'once a week' posting schedule.
But I have a good reason.
I was at the beach.

What's that?
Well, yes, the town in question did have a magical portal to the land we call internets.

Pardon?
Yes, yes I am just a lazy hussy who was drunk on sand, surf and... well drinks, to be frank.

Am I properly ashamed of myself?
Well I was raised Catholic so I always feel vaguely guilty about something but I suppose, yes, I am.

What am I going to do about it?
*sigh* I'll post two things this weekend and make a note in my weekly planner to stop sucking. OK? OK.

Huh?
No this is not one of the bloody posts! I'm not that freaking lazy! *

*This is a lie but on this occasion I will overthrow my natural tendencies and produce two more posts to follow this one before the weekend is out.

The Dolmansaxlil Underground Resistance Movement

Shoes.
I'm just not that fussed.
I know as the proud owner of a vagina I'm supposed to be inordinately excited about these sheaths of fibre wrapped around the extra bits on the ends of my legs but I'm not.

I've had some fairly repetitive arguments about this over the years with people who didn't believe me, thought I was trying to confuse or impress them or who would then surreptitiously start checking me out to see if they'd missed something the first time round vis a vis either a penis or any evidence of rampant lesbianism.
One of my friends actually spent part of one afternoon leaning or bending over an unusual amount just to see if she could catch me out peering down her shirt or admiring her rump. So when the opportunity presented itself... I flicked a five cent coin down the back of her jeans. Well, it should at least teach her to buy some pants that fit properly and it had me laughing for a good ten minutes as I am easily amused and find the anger of others rather invigorating. Besides, you watch the realisation dawn on a woman's face that she has to decide between fishing around down the back of her pants whilst in the middle of the street or walking about with a coin lodged in her crevice and I challenge you not to asphyxiate yourself laughing.

What was I talking about? Oh yeah, shoes...
Yes, shoes, they keep your feet clean and unpunctured and I do have some I like (sneakers that are comfy, boots that can double as toe-stompers and nice-night-out-ware) but I hate hate HATE trying to buy new foot coverings. Hate. It.
I seem to end up buying a lot of my shoes from second hand stores because I at least know that they aren't likely to spontaneously disassemble themselves and they do what most 'new' shoes don't which is look like they're made from real and/or durable materials. So many things in the shoe shops look so... cheapy... but it is never reflected on the damn price tags. Even shoes that say they're 100% pure leather polished with the essence of cow flesh which was produced by juicing suede they always look like they're made out of vinyl and are likely to fall apart in a spectacular unfurling ceremony, possibly breaking your ankle in the process.

And then there's the idea of buying shoes that feel tight because they're supposed to 'stretch to fit' my foot whereas if I buy the shoes that feel nice now they'll end up too big. That always sounded stupid. How are they going to be stretched by the foot they fit perfectly? But yes, if the shoes are made of leather or other decent materials they will stretch a bit so you have to buy an uncomfortable shoe and wear it until it becomes comfortable. A-nnoy-ing.
There's all that and the fact that once you've found something you like by the time it comes around that you need some new damn shoes you can never find any that look remotely like the ones you have become accustomed to and far too many of them are designed to show 'toe crack', you know, the top of the toe equivalent of 'plumber's crack'. Either show all of the toes or no part of them at all.
Toes, not that sexy.
That little cracky bit at the top where they split off the foot, double not that sexy.

I know for someone who claims not to like shoes I have been going on about them a bit but I didn't say I was anti-shoe, just that I don't see what the fuss is about beyond wanting them to fulfill their purpose. I would very much like to find a decent range of comfy long lasting shoes made of real not shitty looking components that I could wear until I need some new ones and then get some more of the same. That'd be nice.
I just don't need multiple sets of them in different colours, to stand transfixed in front of shop windows or require 'alone time' with the catalogues.

Shoes. They keep your feet dry. Isn't that enough?

When The Revolution Comes...

Brain... melting...
Found... lolcat 'translation'... of Bible...
Am... trying to block out... vision of... 'ceiling cat'... nailed to cross... drowning brain in bourbon...
Bourbon... not working... fast enough...
Must find... length of garden hose... and funnel... bourbon bong... only hope...

This lolcat thing is going to cause some kind of riot where those who think it's awesome will rise up and immediately be knocked the f*ck out by the infinitely harder people who do not. And that is not even the worst of what awaits them.
I like pictures of adorable pets in moderation but you have to just get a grip people!

For starters, cats are not adorably clueless.
They are evil.
I have two cats and I love them but you know and I know that they are just playing you because you have opposable thumbs and they don't. They would do that cute little waving with their paws thing for anyone with a tin of tuna and the ability to open it.
I mean think about it, if you have ever seen a cat play with a moth/mouse/lizard/small child who is still scared of the monster under the bed and who will sit with groaning bladder on the bed all through the night because of the swipey clawed thing under the bed that attacks their legs every time they try to leave... you know that they are sadistic little devils. As Terry Pratchett pointed out in Lords and Ladies "If cats looked like frogs we'd realise what nasty, cruel little bastards they are."
So let's review shall we?

Cats are: supremely selfish, self-interested, violent, merciless - though admittedly beautiful - manipulative little predators...

And you are affixing deliberately misspelled, grammatical train wrecks of inane captions to their images!

When they rise up and disembowel you for this act of supreme disrespect I will be standing deferentially by with little bowls of scented water and towels for cleaning and drying their paws inbetween victims.

Damn Sexy Vampires And Their Stupid Damn Hair...

There are just some things that just aren't meant to be.

For instance, I have always harboured a secret desire to own a full length leather coat.
Unfortunately I know from a brief heartbreaking experiment that full length leather coats make me look like Silent Bob. I am short and not quite slender enough to pull it off and end up looking like I should be kneecapping people or something.

It was probably because of the whole 'sharehouse summer' thing.
After I was kicked out of my Uni sharehouse for not scrubbing my 'assigned sections' of the house to satisfaction or being sufficiently interested in The War and the glory of Australia, I spent every night of a month getting drunk on red wine and watching either Underworld or Under the Tuscan Sun. Odd selection I know but for some reason I kept getting drawn back to those two; the over emotional sentimentality of Diane Lane versus the almost emotionlessness of Kate Beckinsale. Go figure. For all I know it's because they both start with 'U' and once I'd started slouching about in a maudlin manner I couldn't be bothered to look any further up the DVD tower than that.

By day I would brave the stifling heat and tramp into Carlton to check the window at Readings for sharehouse ads, take down numbers and make calls to organise an interview, just trying to find a new place that was close enough, didn't do 'communal meals' and which wouldn't be owned by crazy 50+ year old eternal students who could sneak a judgemental comment into the answer to 'would you like a cup of tea?'

By night I would cook meals that were almost always smothered in cheese and then basically stick a straw into a bottle of Cab Sav and watch vampires punch werewolves or Americans discover the healing power of having sex with foreign people.
That's probably where the leather jacket fixation really took hold. That and I got a Kate Beckinsale 'Selene' haircut and very quickly realised that that wasn't going to work either. Those 'just got out of the shower' locks don't maintain themselves, you have to keep having showers or gel up like a fourteen year old boy who has just discovered product, both of which I am far too lazy to do.
I would have done better to have bonked an Italian guy and adopted an illegal Polish immigrant ala Under the Tuscan Sun.

I was doing all this at my uncle's house whilst he and my cousins were - with impeccable timing - out of town on holidays so I had plenty of time to realise that I had no idea where they kept anything, be mistaken for a burglar by an elderly neighbour and start to get worked up about how none of the people whose crappy houses I was willing to pay to share were calling me back.

I saw some places that were small and kind of dodgy, places that were big and kind of dodgy, places that were a confusing hopscotch of train, tram and bus rides from town, places that were a backstreet away from a main street and met a lot of strange people. There were the ex-students, current students, big old hippies, young professionals, kids whose parents were still paying their rent or who had actually bought the house they were living in.
By the time someone actually called me back to ask if I was still interested I'd forgotten who they were and just said yes because I was running out of time and wanted to move into a place where I knew where the utensils were kept and didn't have to keep catching glimpses of my grandmother's photo giving me disapproving looks when I had to drag myself up the staircase via the bannister.

Once I shuffled through my notebook of phone numbers and addresses I remembered. It was the sharehouse where, when I turned up, they were all laying on a mattress in the lounge room watching Bad Santa while Bruce the ridgeback watched me and I did my best not to ogle the centrefold pin ups decorating the walls.
Considering my ink count is exactly zero and everyone else living there was tattooed almost from one side to the other I figured I would spend most of my time there hiding in my room and trying not to be eaten by Bruce.
Two nights in I was slouching around with them on the mattress watching The Mighty Boosh whilst my new housemates herbalised the air and Bruce the ridgeback tried to curl up on my feet like a puppy.
A month later the 'Selene' hair do had grown out, the only other girl and I were alternating weird hair dye selections every other week and no one ever complained about the standard of my cleaning techniques.
Nice :-)

My Stinky Senses Are Tingling...

I have a mutant power but it is not one I would have chosen.

The very instant the cat goes poops in the litter tray, I can smell it.

No matter where I am in the house - and even if the air between that spot and the actual tray contains no scent of cat crap - I can smell it.

It is as if I can bend time and space to allow the passage of poop fumes directly to my nose without passing through the intervening space.

Unless I discover some way to catapult cat crap onto my enemies so that I can sense them coming before they are in visual range... this is not likely to be a helpful skill that I can use in the defence of the human race or even of myself.
Unless it turns out that zombies smell somewhat like cat crap in which case I will be hella ahead of the game when the zombiepocalypse comes!

What You Did...

There are questions I will never be able to ask you. Things you will never tell me. Scenes that will play themselves out in my mind, theoretical recreations based on scraps and speculation, over and over again. I will wonder but never ask because even if you were to answer you wouldn't tell me, not really. And so I won't ask but you will know that the questions are inside me and you will stay just out of reach because of what you will not say, of the answers inside yourself.

Without seeing you we raised you up but have only the words of others, information in the system, words on a screen to prove that you are risen.
We have not seen you. Yet you are there.

There are questions I will never be able to ask you because you don't want to say, I don't want to hear and the silences between us may push or pull.
Will we be there if there is a next time and you need once again to be lifted up? Or will you have sealed us off with your silence until silence is forever?