Is to make this optimistic, fresh new year feeling where I can achieve so many goals if I work hard enough last until at least mid March.

It's also to learn to play the piano. It was going to be to learn mandarin but I might save that one for Chinese New Year instead.

Cough Cough, Snot Snot... Best Year Ever!

Today, finally, after months of corporate dicking around my new desk was deemed fully operational. It's a lot like my old desk, except they've added a motor and levers so that the desk can go up to about five feet high. What this means is that I can raise it to three feet and sit typing blissfully at a desk I actually fit under!

For everyone small enough to fit under normal desks, you are right now taking for granted how blissful it is to be able to sit at a desk without your knees being pressed into its base. A 2008 of ergonomic success looms! The ribbon cutting is tomorrow.

Today was a fine, cloudless day of beach games and more good music.

We're into the meat of this year's top songs now. All of these can be sampled here.

35. Studio

Origin (Shake You Down by the River)

Origin is my favourite track from Studio’s album Yearbook 1. The whole LP is full of long, building pieces of electronic music, mostly constructed by layers and layers of looping beats. The tracks are long and minimalistic, but Origin stands out in particular as it takes a warmer and more upbeat tempo than the others. There is a Wild West sounding feel to the riff that flows throughout the piece and the whole thing just feels like something you could listen to crossing the desert by horse along a railway line.

Continue Reading Top 50 Tracks of 2007 part 2...

You can do a chin up with an overhand grip on one side and an underhand grip on the other. Fuck symmetry!

Not being able to squat down on my right knee or start running without things like pain were - after three weeks - finally motivation for me to see my physio today. And so by 1:15pm this afternoon I was on my back being routinely jolted with pulses of electricity in an experiment that was theoretically supposed to help ease the fluid from my knee and return me to my normal athletic, shirtless, kitten saving self.
Now I love my physio. Not in a gay way kind of love where I nervously watch him from afar and send him flowers anonymously every week. But more a kind of worship that most religious proselytes could empathise with. After all he has regularly demonstrated miraculous healing powers. And although core human behaviour has evolved since the Middle Ages there's still an overwhelming desire to apply divinity to those who exhibit healing ability. So I love him like a God. Although according to Christian philosophy which is this country's official religion God is love which serves to raise metaphorically fuddling paradoxes that surely go beyond the curriculum of short-to-medium journal entries or the small talk we shared as my knee was tweaked and twiddled.
Yet it was during this small talk about, appropriately, small ligaments that I brought up my shoulder. Observe that since the three weeks of no gym that I got as an unwanted, nonrefundable Christmas gift I now experience sharp pain in my left shoulder after doing, of all things, tricep push downs. This is somewhat ironic given that the shoulder doesn't really get worked in a tricep pushdown although it does exist as a stabliser.
So this wasn't some sort of metaphysical demon work that needed divine intervention.
But fortunately due to paradox the God I was praying to also had the very human skill of (no pun intended) biomedicine. Following a short demonstration of my tricep pushdown technique he deduced it was either because I wasn't accustomed to the exercise or I was using too heavy a weight. I knew neither could be true because this was an exercise I'd done regularly for years and the weight I was using was less than it was before Christmas because January gym returns are a good excuse to be lazy.
The only diagnosis was that it had to be a posture problem, but what would cause my posture to change in the three weeks since 2007?
Disturbed and confused I returned home to ponder and, as often is the case during recent introspective moments I turned on Wii to see if I could 4 star Knights of Cydonia on hard. And as I slipped on the guitar strap and began frantically mashing buttons I felt a similar tightness in my shoulder.
'No shit,' I thought. 'I have a Guitar Hero injury.'

I was browsing the server stats today and I noticed in the past few months the following search strings have landed new visitors to my website. I'll share a few of them with you. It's like a showcase of the last few years of my life:

is bradism a religion?
how to face up fast supermarket nightfill
how to sculp rice krispies treats
drunk on houseboat
hot girl poo
angus wallpapers
pepsi max cans special
is darren lehman married
inflate your chest
18 inch schnitzel
freecell runs
vk commodore indicator stalk
recipes with weetbix
mens linen pants
dj naughty adelaide
using regular peanut butter in smoothies it that healthy?
spa balls between my legs
interesting immature things

About a third of my search engines hits come from sneaky perverts hoping for private crotch shots by searching for open directories with files containing the name *panties*. When I first created this site many years ago I happened to upload this image:

http://bradism.com/images/panties.JPG

Sorry, perverts..

We returned to Adelaide Shores Mini Golf today. And I hit a hole-in-one. No one else did during the whole course, and I have the fucking certificate to prove it. The fact that I got a hole in one kinda makes my score of 73 over 18 holes seem even worse though...

2008 could learn a lot from mini golf today. Although at times holes seem tough or challenging, just by adopting a less serious attitude and employing a little bit of creativity (like involving the Z-axis) you can still have fun.

The strongest, straightest drive I've ever done with a golf ball was performed today with a putter.

I was in the kitchen of my family's 1980s built, double-brick Australian home today and I noticed something that irked me. By the dining table, on the cabinet that until a fortnight ago had been adorned with standing Christmas Cards from friends and family the returning empty space had been seeded with a single greeting card. It was a Happy Australia Day greeting card.

Now this immediately turned me irate because Australia Day is one of the only untouched, commercial-less day of significance on the calendar. The fact that its celebration is so casual is a testament to the very country, continent and culture it represents. The only items that need advertising prior to the 26th of January are beer and meat. No greeting card company should be lining its pockets with our flamboyant jingoism.

That was what passed through my mind as I stalked the card, picked it up from the varnished wood and leered inside. I was determined to identify which pom, yank or misguided caregiver that had felt the need to defy such seemingly obvious custom. On the inside was a printed message consisting of the lyrics to our national anthem and a graphic of the Southern Cross. Above that was the website for the real estate agent L.J. Hooker and it was signed off with a note that free value appraisals for properties could be organised by contacting the local branch.

And at that stage I didn't know who to be more disappointed in, the real estate company trying to drum up revenue by abusing a national holiday, or whichever one of my parentals felt the urge to put spam on our greeting card shelf.

Setting Citrus Alarm Clock to wake me up with Men at Work's Land Down Under on a three minute fade in was an awesome idea.

The complete buy out of Farmer's Union Ice Coffee from one of the largest Woolworths in the state before lunchtime was also one of the most Australian things I've ever seen.

Writing was done today!

The Melbourne part of my Big Day Out in pictures is now up!

And now you can see all the Big Day Out pictures from Adelaide. These ones are better than Melbourne, tbh

Transport shitty holiday beard to office cubicle (on face).

I last shaved on Wednesday night, although I did trim on Saturday.

Right now I have typical shitty beard, but something inside of me is saying that it might, just might, be passable at work seeing it is business casual and I have seen worse (admittedly on less scrutable people than I).

So, on my return to the office after my Big Week Off I am going to try and smuggle it in. How? Misdirection. I have pressed my finest shirt and polished my shoes. I might even wear a tie tomorrow. No one wears a tie at my work after their first week. I think it's in the New Employee Handbook on the intranet that you should wear suit and tie your whole initial week until you rock up to your first casual Friday; feel like an idiot; and vow to never do your top two buttons up again.

Well, how many times has it happened? I walk around with five days worth of crappy facial hair and every time I glimpse myself in a mirror or reflective surface I gently reassure myself "man, that kinda-beard looks good. Totally run with it, just a couple more days. It'll come good."

Then, finally, I submit. I shave my chin and it glistens in the bathroom mirror and I have to endure my monologued lecture. "Dude, you looked terrible, clean shaved is so much better. Never forget this." And I don't forget, for a couple of weeks usually.

So there I was again, this morning, with my best shirt ironed and hanging in the bathroom all ready for crap beard diversion. And I was staring at myself in the mirror thinking as usual "Clean shaved is so much better. Never forget this."

BUT this time I wasn't clean shaved. I took the beard with me into the shower and it came out and looked semi-passable when it was shaded darker with moisture. With my heart a flutter I knew it was time. Even when I realised a button on my good shirt was loose, and had to resort to back up ironed shirt I still went through with it, I took crap beard to work and no one even noticed. Here's why.

First, half the office weren't even around. Not even a challenge!

Also, I went downstairs for two coffee breaks so while people on the street thought I was an idiot with a terrible beard, they weren't co-workers who do peer appraisals of me.

Finally, just before lunch a guy was walking out of the lift and someone who probably knew him was nearby, but behind him. When lift guy got out the other guy started yapping like a dog at him, really loudly. It sounded very realistic and scared the shit out of lift guy.
Funniest thing I ever saw. At work. Today. That wasn't my beard.

The Sunglass Hut is a boutique store that has spread like unchecked cancer across the world. There is at least one in every mall and shopping district I've ever been to. However I don't have any problem with a successful franchise, even if their sunglasses seem a bit overpriced. Despite most of the sunglasses on display costing more than what I traded my car in for last year, there is still a lot to like about the Sunglass Hut:

Their primary awesomeness is that they seem to always be staffed by attractive, young girls in tight or revealing clothing. This is even in the middle of winter. Something about all those downlights in a tightly packed store creates an artificial, spring warmth that keeps long sleeves to a minimum.

But they don't just look good, you're also able to get your sunglasses cleaned for free at any Sunglass Hut just by asking. This policy technically applies only to sunglasses purchased there, but as long as you walk in looking confident the girls will screw tight and wipe down just about anything. This saves money on buying sunglass cleaner and a cloth, assuming you live or work close to one. And I work close to two, both down Rundle Mall. And I don't need much convincing to walk down Rundle Mall with a pair of sunglasses...

But Sunglass Hut babes have another redeeming quality, their booksmarts... or lack thereof. After losing my sunglasses at the Big Day Out and not being able to even collect up the pieces to cradle in my arms and sob, I needed a replacement. Yesterday I visited one and picked out a pair I liked for $150. That seemed exorberant, and I did know that if you signed up for the Sunglass Hut VIP mailing list you got a $50 gift voucher in exchange for an email address to send spam to. I asked for the discount without the details, but they declined. I asked them to hold and said I'd return with the voucher on Thursday.

At first, that evening on the internet, I despaired. Upon closer examination of the voucher I realised that the discount only started kicking in after reaching a minimum spend of $150. Seeing that was the exact price of my sunglasses it was useless. So when I returned today to collect my sunglasses I showed them the voucher and asked what similar pairs they had closer to $200, because I do love using a coupon if it meant a chance to upgrade.

Fortunately for me the blonde on duty that day furrowed her brow at the coupons wording, glanced at the $150 pricetag on my potential eyewear and said "Yes, it says minimum spend is $150 and these cost $150 so you get the discount."

"So how much are they, all up?" I asked.
"$100, silly!" and she giggled.

"Pay cash." My inner monologue screamed. "Pay cash and get out now."

That bargain left me feeling pretty :cool:... This cool, in fact...

Extremely Wanky Pose...

Smoking Ban successful and in full effect.
Lights now 12% darker to recapture original level of blurriness and fumbly pick ups.
All songs mentioning hands being put or placed up should not be played.

But what's this in the internal mail? A blurry envelope from Chow? What could be inside? More LEGO?!

An interesting shaped package. Awesome, I was afraid it might be some sort of work.

It IS a tuna! And some bubble wrap that Chow will probably have to fudge away on a a spreadsheet to make sure a certain government department doesn't lose any of their budget next year.

For a short while my new Seeded Mustard tuna joined his new family. Then I got hungry and ate it.

Dreary... or Exciting! You decide.

My District Basketball Career:

23 and a half years ago I was born and the doctor said "Ma'am, it's a boy, and he looks like he has mad hops."

16 years ago I played my first game of basketball in a team, for my Primary School. We were terrible and there was a lot of infighting about who would get to shoot the charity goal when the other team didn't play defense so we could at least score.

About 14 years ago I was getting better at basketball and playing for schools and churches. I desperately wanted to play junior district, but apparently we couldn't afford it.

Then, 12 years ago at a Basketball clinic at primary school they organised this guy to come:

6 years ago my little brother, who always gets the things I never got when I was growing up, got to play District. I was jealous.

4 and 3 years ago I went back to back winning the Best and Most Valuable Player for the D Grade Men in the Church of Christ Basketball league. But I couldn't afford to play district.

18 months ago I could afford to play district basketball! But I ruptured my spinal disc and couldn't bend over to tie my shoelaces up.

4 months ago my physio announced I was able to try and play competitive basketball and I started training with a district team.

1 week ago I got my uniform and the time and location for the first game I would play. Wednesday 13th of February. 7:20pm. Wayville Basketball centre.

6 hours ago I was wearing that uniform and preparing to leave in my laidback but kind of nervous way.

5 hours and 30 minutes ago my computer exploded in a blinding flash of green light and then a lot of smoke. It went PIEW PSHSHSHSKSKSHS and then it went silent and the whole house lost power. It was very scary.

Last February I saw Jacob Oram crossing North Terrace near the Adelaide Casino but I did not wave and say hello because I thought it would be embarrassing for the both of us.

Today while I sat at Mekong Thai I saw Ishant Sharma walking down the street and I called out to him "you bowl really well!" which I thought would convey my appreciation of his entertaining bowling without sounding too personal or bogan. But he just gestured dismissively and ignored me.

Makes me wish I hadn't ignored my first instinct to yell as he passed by "HE'S SUCH A SHARMA OH NO".

Charmer Sharma

I scored points tonight by accident, not even trying.
The other 7 I got I did have to work a fair bit harder for though. I guess you can't accidentally tip the ball in when defending yourself during a rebound for all your points.

More than double my last weeks points, I guess not having a computer explode is much better preparation.

What's this? After two years of running Google Ads on my site I finally got a cheque in the mail. All it took was yelling "Click Ads" at people and clicking ads whenever I checked my website at other people's houses to get to this stage, this beautiful stage. One HUNDRED American Dollars:

In the last 2 years my hosting and domain registration has cost $118 Australian dollars. Which means that all the effort I've put in over the years has led to profit. PROFIT! Sweet Internet Profit! You have to ignore the thousands of man hours but I'm in the black!!

Until I spent my profit on American Soft Drink:

It was worth it.

Good work to everyone involved. Good work internet.

Only $98.85 worth of clicks until I get paid again. See you again in 2010 Dr. Pepper...

I'm sweaty from plodding at pace from the train station very early on a Sunday Morning. Almost 48 hours earlier I was plodding in the opposite direction to leave for work on Friday. Thus ends my very long stay in the city for work on Friday. Here are some thoughts on Laneway now.

Okkervil were boss as, best set of the day.

CYHSY sounded great as well, like their albums but more three dimensional. Played most of their self titled, few songs (yankee go, satan said dance) from the second album. Didn't like the second album but they made it sound great live.

Feist - I love Feist. She's multi-talented: great voice and can shred to start with. She also walks with a little spunk and you know that if she's getting it and he's good she'd be making a lot of noise. Didn't play mushaboom.

Gotye probably wont do the same shit in other cities, but he did his one man show with loads of samples and him percussioning everything he could. He is a very good drummer. He played a highly enjoyable mash/remix of A distinctive sound and MC Hammer's "Can't Touch This". Also played the Fourth Floor Collapse version of Worn Out on the piano. Didn't play Heartsamess (omg. i didn't mind).

Presets were loud and I think played the same set they did on Friday night.

Broken Social Scene played a lot of self titled and some Spirit If. Played Shorelines with Feist and a few guys from Stars on the horns - that was well good. Last song they asked the crowd "we have one song left, do you want to hear Ibi dreams of pavement or Backed Out?" and everyone went "duuhhh what?" I was yelling out "PAVEMENT! PAVEMENT! Is J Mascis here? No, then pavement!" Then they played Backed Out... Sadness.

Panics - almost fell asleep a few times. Not that I don't like them I was just really tired.

Stars were much better than I thought they would be. I've never really been fanatical about their music, more just enjoyed it in the background. But they put on an energetic and very polished performance. It helps you realise how this bands get popular before they release albums compared to bands that are produced the shit out of and get popular after their albums. Good work Stars. The lead singer chick was either hungover or jetlagged (or both), but still put on a flawless performance. Professional!

My only gripe was the timetable got raped. Fortunately I was at the one stage the whole time. While the small stage kept to timetable pretty well the mainstage set up time was between 25-50 minutes (I'm looking at you Feist). Seeing as only 20 and 25 were prescribed, the Presets started an hour after they were supposed to finish. A lot of waiting around was to be had. Adelaide stage set up did seem a bit cramped though, so I don't know if it will reocurr. Most of the time seemed to be spent doing sound checks.

To make up for 36 hours of drunken meat-heading this weekend please reflect on this poetry by Robert Frost. It is called The Road Not Taken.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Two fat women trying to get off the lift at the same time. Beautiful. Thanks Monday.

Today marked the sixth month anniversary since my last birthday and therefore the sixth month point before my next one. To celebrate this occasion I got gifts!

First thing I got at work was a message to visit reception. Up there, waiting for me wrapped in plastic, was my new chair. Finally, after two years of being in this office there was a chair that I could fit in. I wheeled it to the elevator and enjoyed sitting all day.

A few hours later I received another email from reception announcing another package for me. It was my new MP3 player I ordered for $24 off the internet a week ago. I wanted it because my iRiver and massive headphones don't mix well with gym and riding a bike for half an hour is boring.
I plugged the little thing in and started transferring my BULKTEMBER folder of mainly amped up hip-hop, angry sounding electronic industrial and any house/dance/latin-funk that had girls or boys singing "Pump it up!" anywhere. First thing I noticed was that the MP3 player came with Aqua's Barbie Girl on there as a free sample. I left it on in the hope I can squeeze out a mad bench to it.

Finally tonight I went to see Interpol at the Thebarton Theatre and they played out the last few hours of my half-birthday. They were great.

It's good. Who's looking forward to it? I bet you are. You all love it.

Leave a comment telling me what colour socks you're wearing today.

I think my right forearm is the most tanned I've ever been.

To celebrate this milestone and my decreasing tolerance for the old colour scheme I knocked up a new background and logo. It's called sounds. This was in lieu of, you know, fixing the multitude of bugs in the code which are now even harder to fix after the dev box which I used mainly for watching movies exploded.

While making the colour scheme I was browsing through my Photoshop temp directory and came across a few... intriguing site themes I started and either never finished or decided not to release into production. So what better way to celebrate the 800th entry than to share a few of those designs.

The first was this rip off of WeatherZone.

You may recognise it because this theme actually did get launched into production in August 2006, a day before my hosting company's server died and they tried to fix it by formatting the back up server.... After that incident I lost a few dozen comments and had to write an awesome regular expression script to recover thousands of lines of data from Google cache. I didn't bother to recreate the Bradismzone theme though, probably for the best.

The MySpace theme.

A few months after that MySpace became too popular too ignore and I decided that instead of getting a MySpace I would just make Bradism look like one. After dicking around with the logo one day I decided "Fuck it" and decided to write a whole MySpace wrapper. After almost another day of trying to code that I decided "Fuck it" and used my MySpace as a host for a couple of photos and to track how often people from High School and ex-girlfriends would check my never updating page (not very often).

The Up&Go Phase

As 2006 continued I hit the Up&GO! Energise phase where I was obsessed with drinking one of them after any vague period of exercise or drinking. Yes this was a real design that I never finished. I think it's pretty obvious why. It's just half assed, and I\'d never anything half assed on this website.

Happy Birthday Journal!!

Please leave your words of encouragement for Journal in the comments form below.

Seeing William McInnes.

Maybe even meeting him.

Hell. Yes.

Writers Week: Women's Memorial Gardens Adelaide. I spent my lunchbreak here in the sunshine.

William McInnes! WILLIAM MCINNES!!!

General writer's week crowd: Me, Authors, major loads of old people. William McInnes looks old too. Really old.

There he is. Gideon Haigh is in the middle gas-bagging on. Gideon Haigh was actually the best person on the table by far in every stake except BEING WILLIAM MCINNES. Gideon has written some columns for Cricino and handled question time the best. For those who have never been, I was surprised to learn that at writers week \"Question Time\" is actually \"Troll the Panelists Time\".

WILLIAM MC-FREAKING-INNES (rollover)

I did actually spend some time in the office today.

Today discovered new goal.

Being a man has so many awesome side quests.

I was going to post an entry titled "My Summary of the Adelaide Heatwave so that I can relive it later in life" and the body of the entry was going to say "It's really hot." Hilarious, I know, but as this sunny punishment (sunishment?) continues unabated I've discovered there's more to heatwaves than just consecutive days of heat:

- It's really hot.
- Like most sunny days, going to the beach is a regular activity but it's now too hot to play beach cricket.
- I've finally learnt how to write Fahrenheit and Celsius without having to double check my spelling.
- My recently celebrated right forearm tan is now so brown that when I'm sitting on the loo my thigh feels stereotypically uncomfortable to be around it and can only make small talk about Eddy Murphy and basketball.

I think I'm starting to adjust to this weather because it hasn't felt that bad this week. Maybe it's the tan.

One night a man had a dream. He dreamed he was walking along the beach with an Up&Go Energise. Across the sky flashed scenes from his life. For each scene he noticed two sets of footprints in the sand: one belonging to him and the other to the Up&Go Energise.

After the last scene of his life had flashed before him he looked back at the footprints in the sand. He noticed that many times along the path of his life there was only one set of footprints. He also noticed that it happened at the very lowest and saddest times of his life. This really bothered him and he questioned the Up&Go Energise about it.

"Up&Go Energise, you said that once I decided to drink you, you'd walk with me all the way. However, I noticed that during the most troublesome times of my life there was only one set of footprints. I don't understand why when I needed you most you would leave me."

The Up&Go Energise replied, "my precious, precious child, I love you and I would never leave you during your times of trial and suffering, when you see only one set of footprints it was then that I carried you."

It was almost the hottest of the heatwave days today, maxing out at 40.1°C/104.2°F. It was also the last. I drank a Monday Smoothycino and it was pretty killer, to be honest.

Walking to the Bean Bar near work I was struck by a premonition and a 13km/h Northerly fresh from the desert. I knew there was going to be a Smoothycino shortage for some reason and by God I was right. They were out of ice. So I had to walk another block to the next Bean Bar.

Back of my neck got dirty and gritty.

I'm not going to comment on the irony of my "Goodbye Summer" party that prologued Adelaide's record breaking heatwave. However if you comment you may be the first to appear on my latest feature: The 'Recent Comments' list on the sidebar.

If you have a funny remark to leave about a less than recent entry, why not post it knowing that others are now more likely to read it?

The heatwave was over. This was the view from my office window this evening.

Nothing like half a month of intense sunshine to make the first instance of overcast dullery for the year so poetically captivating. After I rode the train into and over the hills (yes the hills in the background) and to my car I found myself even more poetically motivated. "Beautiful Gloom" I called it as winds buffeted my pass at the driver's seat. I drove with the windows down letting the wind in and my introspective Winter mix CD from 2005 out. It was cool.

54% of the adult population (7.4 million people aged 18 years and over) are classified as overweight or obese.
17% of men and 25% of women suffer from chronic insomnia.
39.4% of surveyed men reported chronic erectile dysfunction.
More than 70% of women are unable to orgasm during sex.

I love this country.

I was driving this evening, leaving the gym in the kind of mental stupour where less essential brain functions are dimmed while my body concentrates on muscle replenishing and on drinking an Up&Go.

It's on these trips that I often find myself muttering things to the cabin about me while my inner monologue boots back up. Tonight I heard the words "I love traffic lights" come out and I paused a moment and thought... Why did I say that?

After pondering I realised one of the many super-efficient applications running on my OS is traffic light awareness software. I can seemingly calculate traffic-signal patterns with high degrees of accuracy based only on instinct and the time of day. I doubt I am the only one, but sometimes I feel like a traffic light genius when I'm ready to go the moment before the green light appears while everyone besides me clunks into action a second after it, like a drunk having his first go at Guitar Hero. Is it my idiosyncrasy or just a characteristic?

Whatever this attribute is categorised as, my brain seems to place more importance on it than it does inner monologue.

For those in the dark, Earth Hour was a government/media funded awareness stunt to promote the cause to reduce carbon emissions. To this end all people and businesses of Australia were encouraged to save energy by switching off all lights between 8pm and 9pm tonight. The promotion started in Sydney during the week with the ironic launch of a giant hot air balloon shaped like a light globe.

My opinion of Earth Hour:
On my own - boring.
After other people came to my house - entertaining.
While driving to the pub - dangerous.

I got home from the gym tonight and my mum had lit the fire. I guess that means it's winter now.

On Friday I went to Myer to buy a new hoody. Having worn my old one almost four years I wanted something different. After trying a whole bunch on I bought a very plain, dark Bonds one. It doesn't look remarkable but it's so soft and warm. It feels like someone who loves the shit out of me made it just for me.

My tradition of microwaving soup and then carrying the hot bowl with a hoody sleeve as my oven mitt also started today.

Brrrr

I have finally discovered the secret to 5 starring 3s & 7s in Guitar Hero.

I just need someone else to play a second guitar and a third guy on wii keyboard.

And thus ends my epic runs of shows and festivals that was Summer 07/08.

I reviewed last nights Guitar Hero 3 double feature at the entertainment centre. I know you guys hate words so you can not click on this.

Seriously I swear I spend more time with Sundays than I do any other day of the week.

This week coincidentally literally.

---

Some Sunday's I spend time reading random chunks from my journals. Sometimes when I do it I discover some mental block or attitude change I've had or have and adjust for the better. Every time when I do it I realise in the last five years I've been like ten different people.

I mentioned last week that the Smashing Pumpkins were a major musical role model in my peak adolescence. I also described a 25 minute wankfest Billy Corgan played during the final portion of their otherwise solid gig and during this indulgence I found myself distracted and bothered to start creating in my head a definitive mixtape of that era just to see how heavily the Pumpkins would feature on it.

Then over the weekend I actually attempted to compile an 80 minute track listing of my early teenage years (90 would probably be more appropriate, but alas). These are - for the most part - songs that shaped my attitudes or that I totally loved the hell out of. So it's personal rather than symptomatic of the era itself (no Hanson or Chumbawamba). The first conclusion I can come up with, given the tracks, is that I had absolutely terrible taste in music a decade ago.

I think I've gone great lengths in improving my taste and knowledge of music as an art form since then. I have to think that because I often write about music and need to at least affect the allusion that I'm qualified to determine what good new music is.
When I read reviews or summaries of new music they are often littered with references to obvious influences or sounds of bygone times. As a reviewer, given my taste when I was growing up, I have extremely limited ability to comment on things like this. Indeed while I was referencing and confirming the suitability of my Adolescence Mixtape I realised just how many artists and albums I wish I'd been introduced to or heard on the radio that I might have been able to experience their quality then.

A quick survey of releases I could have listened to (released 97/98) included Ween, Elliot Smith, Belle & Sebastian, the Apples in Stereo, Death Cab for Cutie, Queens of the Stone Age, Beck, Jay-Z, Pavement, Bowie, Yo La Tengo, Radiohead, Missy Elliot, Cypress Hill, Dandy Warhols, Jurrasic 5, Spoon, Neutral Milk Hotel. A few of those albums I listen to the hell out of now (In the Aeroplane Over the Sea!)

Oh, and it seems like I was growing up in a boom time for electronic music with landmark releases from Chemical Brothers, Air, Boards of Canada, Daft Punk, Prodigy, Massive Attack, The Crystal Method among others. Albums that were shaping a whole genre that I would end up being fascinated with, and for the most part it was completely ignored (is this why I spent most of 2003 listening to Trance?)

Indeed all this good music and what was I listening to? This:

1. Smashing Pumpkins - Bullet With Butterfly Wings
2. The Offspring - All I Want
3. Green Day - Brain Stew
4. Smashing Pumpkins - Today
5. Everclear - Everything to Everyone
6. Blink 182 - Dammit
7. Bloodhound Gang - Why's Everybody Always Picking On Me?
8. Foo Fighters - Monkey Wrench
9. Live - Lakinis Juice
10. Fuel - Hemorrhage (In My Hands)
11. The Offspring - Gone Away
12. Smashing Pumpkins - Zero
13. Rage Against The Machine - No Shelter
14. Sugar Ray - RPM
15. Primus - Shake Hands With Beef
16. Presidents of the USA - Lump
17. Regurgitator - !
18. The Living End - Prisoner of Society
19. Grinspoon - Just Ace
20. The Mighty Mighty Bosstones - The Impression That I Get
21. Placebo - Every You Every Me
22. Smashing Pumpkins - Tonight, Tonight
23. Smashing Pumpkins - Disarm

If it had been economically viable at the time to burn these songs on to a CD and give them to my pubescent self it would I would have been ecstatic! Or at least some mood between "angsty" and "goofy" which judging my the selection were my only two moods back then. This has all been highly embarrassing but I feel cleansed now. Thanks Billy.

Also I listened to this compilation and could sing every line of every song. Yeah!

Ouch. In basketball tonight I strained my groin. Yes it is as painful as it sounds.

I would honk the horn. A lot.

Note for future entries: include content.

As a white, western boy whose basic securities are provided for I find I need to spend my time analysing life and finding lessons and enlightenment in the environment around me in order to justify my survival.

This weekend the world around me has been primarily Super Mario Galaxy as I spent my weekend nursing an adductor muscle strain and being generally unproductive. So what have I learnt from Super Mario Galaxy that I can possibly apply to my own life?

Don't Underestimate the Power of Money
Money is critical in both life and Mario Galaxy. Money keeps you healthy. Whether that's increasing your life back to green after getting knocked upside the head by a piranha plant, or paying for your private health insurance so that your physio can poke his hands around your dangle.

Achieve your Goals by Keeping them Simple
When Mario wants to do something like rescue a princess or invest in the real estate market he doesn't sit around planning every last detail. Instead he just picks the first thing that needs to be done and then does it. Then he picks another thing that needs to be done and does it. If he fucks up half way through and falls into a black hole does he care? Doesn't even register. Persistence gets the princess.

It's important to Network
I'm pretty sure Bowser would not be letting Mario board his evil princess kidnapping fleet-base if he and Mario hadn't met at a party or eight in the past.

Seize All Opportunities
In life there are opportunities everywhere and it's up to you to take them. In Super Mario Galaxy a penguin might say "did you know you can swim in the water?" or a Toad dude will say "Wow the wind is strong I wonder what it would be like to drift in it?" and next thing you know Mario is drifting in the breeze inside a giant bubble or plucking 1-Ups out of the treacherous mouths of clams. The point is don't fuck around, be assertive in your environment be it inside a giant beehive, in the office, at a nightclub or navigating obstacles on a giant, moving rocky road.

Guess who's back, back again
Pink Lady's back. Tell a friend.

I spent like $25 at Woolworths, Rundle Mall today and I'm going to talk about it now.

$5.58 3x Mother Energy Drink 250ml
Woolworths continually discount these for clearance but can't get rid of them. I love them! Energy drinks that are low-GI, it has me written all over it.

$4.60 4x John West Tuna 105g
Multi-buys, buy four and save $2 something. John West is the healthiest tinned tuna available but pretty much the only flavour I actually savour is Mild Indian Curry. So I bought four of those.

$4.30 Berry Fruity-Bix 405g. I didn't cook lunches this week. If I don't cook I can get 2 lunches and an afternoon tea out of a box of Fruity Bix. That's less than $2 a meal, assuming I steal skim milk from the level 10 kitchennete. Bargain.

$2.00 Daily Juice OJ 500mls. To drink after lunch/breakfast.

$4.00 1kg of Yoplait Tropical yogurt. I picked Tropical because I fleetingly thought that it would remind me of being on holidays at a beach on an island. This is one of those thoughts 9-5ers have as they realise they're lying to people when they arrive at the office Monday morning and are asked "how's it going?" and reply "good".

$4.30 3x Pink Lady, extra large. Pink Lady is finally back in season and available in giant form again. This is like a milestone of every year, for me. Go fuck yourself Fuji apples!

Last Monday I collected my academic dress ready for today's graduation ceremony. After being dressed in my robe, funny hat and thingy-thing by a squat, old woman I looked at myself in the mirror and felt something. Starting back at me was an evil super-villain or black wizard. I realised that four years of University was mainly to teach me that robes are freaking sweet. So, I wore the robe most of the week. Academic dress is like a rental tux, wear it as much as you can before you return it. Fortunately at work we had a casual week to celebrate a contract win so I got around the cubicles decked in gown. I think it was around Wednesday afternoon I was drafting the ground rules for my religious cult so that I could be a robed leader following graduation. Life was good.

UNTIL Friday morning when, after waiting for 20 minutes at the front of the ceremony hall for Graduation to start the whole upper echelon of the alumni strode on stage in the craziest collection of funny robes and ridiculous hats I had ever seen. And all of a sudden I felt very plain.

Also no one else threw their hat in the air at the end. Awkward...

1. Degree in Innovation and Enterprise in the field of Science and Technology.
2. First ever published work, record review in Rip it Up.

Achieving unrelated goals in parallel = woot.

Even though it's mid-Autumn I decided that today's forecast top of 25 degrees and sunshine would be a good excuse to bust out my linen pants.

I decided Linen does not feel right in Autumn. But at least today was still sunny. Given the little rain that's graced us recently I was thinking about ANZAC Day and how it's usually about when the year starts getting really wet. Back at the office internet confirmed this:

Wow.

I was putting away my clean washing today when I realised with a chuckle that I subconciously use my best, straightest coat-hangers on shirts that I've recently picked up in. Or that have got me attention from the opposite sex.

Even though I know now, I think I'll keep doing it.

But, as those who've spent any time around me can attest, I'm not the most manly of men. Sure, I like going to the gym; playing ball sports; I never ask for directions no matter how lost I am; and I find myself often staring at stranger's breasts multiple times a day. But I struggle at other core masculine concepts. I once nearly set my car on fire changing its transmission fluid, I can't wolf whistle no matter how hard I try, I don't own any flannel and, critically, I can't grow decent facial hair.

My facial hair, attempted beards and pre-grown camping ruggedness have often been discussed in this publication. The fact is my whiskers leak weakly. If I want to look handsome for a date or party on a Thursday night I'll do my final shave Wednesday morning. This has been a tactic for a while, but recently I got to thinking more about facial hair strategies. In particular while I was at the gym this week, muscles engorged in front of a mirror as I hoiked heavy dumbbells up towards my three-day growth and back again. I noted to myself that my goatee area looked kind of alright, but it was just ruined by the rest of my cheeks being covered with patches of facial hair like puddles on the pavement the day after a storm.

But then the sun came out! I realised that by choosing when I shaved different parts of my face, with the right timing, I could highlight certain features of my beard while controlling and blocking out others. If I pulled it off right and every part got shaved at the right time I would have a glorious window of decent facial hair. I decided to go through with it, effectively running basketball plays on my face.

Yesterday I pulled of my best day of facial hair ever. Coincidentally I also had basketball that evening and me and my superb goatee got their highest score in district so far! Success.

Ouch. In basketball today I smashed my coccyx. I remember thinking, seconds before hitting the ground, that I should have hit the ground by now.

At 0540 my alarm woke me up and I couldn't shred curtains to let sunlight in to wake me up. But I didn't dawdle in the darkness, just ran a shower had a quick breakfast and left to walk the few kilometres between my house and Blackwood Soldier Memorial where a Dawn Service was being held. My intention was to walk as a tribute to those who surely had walked through the darkness to face challenges before. My walk was obviously much less monumental but it gave me time to think and reflect.

The one point the struck me on this walk was how distracted I could be by other things that weren't Anzac related. At first I was disturbed by my relatively trivial thoughts on a day for fallen soldiers. But in the end I deduced that their efforts went towards the freedom I enjoy to be concerned by trivial things. At the service words were spoke and wreaths were laid - it wasn't all that personal. But for the first time I saw a sunrise occurring that didn't immediately make me feel like I should be in bed. I felt moved as the streets of Blackwood slowly flooded with channels of golden light. When I looked into the sky between the flaky clouds to see darkness disappearing I felt maybe a connection to others who had seen similar over the years and felt optimistic and alive. So thanks, Anzacs.

Following Anzac day and the first installment of what will be my traditional pre-dawn hike I pondered what other calendar related traditions I have. While I pretty much follow the Western Calendar in work attendance at least, I'm aware of my natural sway towards particular dates and my own cultural way of celebrating them.

Anzac Day There are three things that make up Anzac day now. One is waking up to darkness to remember the fallen. Then, probably after a nap, is the AFL match between Essendon and Collingwood. Finally there is the celebration of rain, which happens without fail every Anzac day.

Easter and the Easter Beer Hunt The last three Good Friday's have seen the hosting of a beer hunt in a new location. This involves the hiding of green labeled beers in gardens and/or bushes by designated hiders around sunset, before hunters with torches and baskets search for beverages and then drink their winnings.

My Birthday Every August 25th is the same: drink heavily, mourn my childhood, wake up in a pile of Lego.

Australia Day This day is dedicated to doing all the Australian things I do anyway. Driving a Commodore, drinking Coopers, watching cricket, wearing singlets, listening to Triple J, drinking ice coffee.

Christmas eat as many animals as possible with as many friends and family as possible.

I woke up and found this on the kitchen bench this morning and the first thing I thought was "that looks delicious"

I'm definitely allergic to waking up early.

Last night for lack of anything better to do I found myself at the Marion Friday Night bar scene, and while there encountered a few socially outlying tumbleweeds.

Because, it is awfully quiet down there on a Friday night. At just past midnight I was surprised that anyone could even be that drunk that they'd be kicked out of a bar. Yet, to quench my disbelief I watched while we waited for a ride to come as a generic looking white boy was denied entry to the pool hall. Our eyes followed as he sat dejectedly on the wooden picnic tables outside and tried to light a cigarette.

Conversation returned internal for a moment before our attention was fondled again by a slurry voice.
"Brad?"
We all turned to look at him, he continued to look at me. "Brad?" He said.

And so my mind raced. Who was this person, and how did he know me? And then I realised, perhaps... perhaps my little journal had grown to such size that I was now recognised on the street by regular people. Drunk people, sure, but they were maybe but one of the many demographics who use the internet and, therefore, knew who I was! This was how celebrities felt! Identified on the street, their names shrieked or hollered! Demands for attention interjecting their routine conversations.

I patted my pockets, but I had no pen for an autograph.
"What's your name?" I asked. "I can't give you an autograph but maybe I can give you something better!"
In my head this very entry was being drafted and structured by neurological nanites.

"Brad..." he drawled. "...I know... your brother."

"Next time." I thought to myself, as he tried a few times to put the cigarette between his lips. "Next time..."

Having been lazy over much of the past week I haven't come online and got all personal in my web journal. Without effort it's hard to come up with things to write about that I think other people would like to read.

So, I am now breaking for questions, tea and biscuits. And to make this seem more efforty I have set up a gmail account for you to send any questions about me and my life you'd like answered. I will answer them over the coming week in entries. That address is: question.bradism@gmail.com

You can email anonymously so that I approach all questions objectively. http://www.sendanonymousemail.net is a good anonymous email thingy.

If no one emails me any questions I will pretend people did and answer questions I make up.

Quote:
Do you have any good health tips today? I love hearing every day about health tips

Yes. Pink Lady apples $3.43 a kilo at Woolworths this week starting today. That's like 40% off. Best Monday in a long time!

Quote:
How tall are you really?

Good question.

Somewhere between giraffe and fridge.

This week I'm answering anonymous reader questions. You can email question.bradism@gmail.com to ask your questions. You can email anonymously from sendanonymousemail.net.

Quote:
i was wondering Brad, what is your ultimate colour of dunlop volley?

My ultimate colour of Dunlop Volley is pretty much irrelevant, because like most companies Dunlop Footwear does not feel justified producing size 16 shoes. And nothing pisses me off more than climbing down my beanstalk to go shoe shopping and finding out that sand brown Dunlop Volleys only go up to a size 13.

Quote:
Brad,
What ply toilet paper do you use? I usually go for the 3 ply, the added safety of multiple layers without the thickness of a 4 ply.

Ah, toilet discussion. Seeing I'm 23 now and have just hung a shirt up ready for my day in the office tomorrow this is perhaps a subject I avoid broaching. Then again, I'm also a boy and thus find fascination with the shape, size and colour of pretty much everything that comes out of my body. And with that attempt to qualify this entry as highbrow now failed I shall now confess. I use primarily 1 ply toilet paper. But this isn't by choice, it's because I'm Scottish and do all my poos while on the clock at work. And because where I work is Scottish we only get 1 ply toilet paper.

But, because I don't pay for it, I usually use two sheets of 1 ply equalling 2 ply all up.

Quote:
Do y..

Yes I fold.

Well, I feel like sharing this with the internet. It's about Mario Galaxy on Wii. I've been playing it a bit recently and aside from one entry about it's influence on the meaning of life it's gone a bit underrated. That's probably because I did underrate it. I mean it was fun and all, but I couldn't tell if I was getting all the stars and solving all the puzzles because it was infectiously fun or if that was just my OCDish tendencies peeking through.

I've read a few reviews of the game and they've all raved about it, but I never really saw why Galaxy was essential gaming. Until tonight when I tackled The Sinking Lava Spire in the Melty Molten Galaxy and experienced the perfect blend of platform gaming, clock beating, puzzle solving and breathtaking, cutesy graphics that tickled my fancy so much that I felt compelled to immediately journal this feeling.

I recommend this game.

For work, I carry a pager around with me all the time. It's not the primary reason I get paid but it's pretty important. So I was kinda nervous when I couldn't find it anywhere after I got back from basketball today and it wasn't in my bag.

I asked a few people if they'd seen it, and they said "no, have you tried paging it?"

It's been a year! Which is pretty much forever. I can eat schnitzel again!

Today was one of those days which seem to be really long because they're broken up into many separate chunks. I like these days. I go to bed with a sense of accomplishment even though I lived the same amount of hours. But each of those hours are divided into different contexts.

But.. I worked my 8 hours today? How could I possibly have fit so much into a day with a one event/eight hour handicap?

Well, first, I made my breakfast smoothie on Sunday night, left it in the blender in the fridge outside and instead of spending six minutes preparing it this morning I spent just 30 seconds mixing it. This was freaking awesome. It didn't taste quite as good as it does fresh, but the sweet taste of five minutes extra sleep every day will more than make up for that.

However the true secret to my day's achievements was through breaking up the work day by scheduling meetings. Lots of meetings. And they were good meetings today! First, at 11AM, I met with my old PM who had offered a new opportunity to work in an Applications role again. This made me excited. I will be thrust into the testing sphere (exactly as sexual as it sounds) where I can apply my uni education (use cases, so much Visio-ing) and then hopefully engulf a .NET developing opportunity.

Then at 1PM I met with Dad for lunch and to make use of soon to expire Entertainment Book vouchers. There we discussed opportunities and the IT Industry in general terms and I ate a half decent kangaroo fillet.

At 3:15PM I had another meeting with my current PM about me transitioning into the new role. Which he has been really cool in helping me get to. And he also bought me a coffee.

After that there was no more meetings planned and the rest of the afternoon was spent at my Level 9 vantage point watching a hopefully not symbolic thunderstorm descend onto the city from the sea. After work I emerged to the dark city streets and ran through the rain to my surprise next meeting - Johnno on the train. We chatted about life and Supermild and music. I got off at my station and drove to the gym, smashing down a Mother as I swept past rain. More smashing of exercises was done and then home. Here I have written a new review for Rip It Up, busted out a 2005esque journal entry and now I'm about to fall asleep watching cricket.

I have to say that after a few taps on the steering wheel of life to point me in new directions yesterday, coupled with binging on the first ten months of 2005 entries before bed last night, I was feeling good today.

2005 was a fantastic year. I was fit and healthy and though I was dealt a good serve of challenges I took them all in my stride, grew a little and had a lot of fun. So when I went about life today I tried to inhale a little bit of that 2005 spirit into the things I did. I aimed to be more personal, and less insecure. I intended to write more and be more confident! I felt charged, like this was a turning point.

Before tonight was up I decided to pick up reading where I left off last night - November 2005 - and to do that I clicked the archive link for 2007 and was about to reduce the year argument a couple of digits when the first post grabbed my attention. And as I read through the month I realised that the same feelings, the same intentions of confidence, direction and extroversion I was having today I was writing about having last six months ago.

And then when I did get to November 2005 I realised the same thing had happened again. I was more skittish and unsure about my future then than I thought that year. And in 2005 as the summer sun first came out I was making the same vows and self-evaluations. It became clear to me that every year I seem to cycle from - to steal a life experience from a baby turtle - shell to the great wide sea. Only to every year wake up and find myself digging out of the sand again. So I had an epiphany but it seemed so useless now.

But, the difference is, this year I'm getting my groove back way before Summer.

It's really difficult playing basketball against people who look like TV show characters. Tonight I was playing some defense and posting up on me was Dective Batista. This was off putting. I didn't want to foul him because if I did anything wrong he might arrest me, but I couldn't get angry about this because I felt sorry for him and I wanted to ask if he'd got his daughter back.

I was also self confident enough to convince myself to shoot three 3s, one of which went in.

As my man Pos from De La Soul once rapped "Sometimes the body needs to feel stress to appreciate the joy". I heard this thesmorning in my car as I crawled along South rd listening to my Happy Hip Hop Mixtape. It was about 8:15 AM and I was for some reason already dressed and on my way to work! That reason was team breakfast, something I begrudgingly accepted to attend at 8:30 in the morning because the team is pretty cool and, hey, free breakfast!
What I didn't expect, having spent the last year catching the 8:50 train and enjoying the freedom of working 9ish to 5ish is that by God the roads are busy at 8am. I naively believed that, after I missed the train because of the traffic jam leading to the station, I would be able to cruise to work because I was up so early the streets should be deserted. Instead it took me almost an hour to drive and arrive at 8:45am whereas when I leave at 8:45am I get to town at ten past nine!

So, considering my morning was waking up early plus an hour of creeping in traffic all while being grumpily hungry, I should have been pissed. But, I wasn't, because while listening to my Happy Hip Hop mixtape all the way through, twice, I realised it was days like today that made me appreciate all the other days I have where I get to work with no hassle. Anyway, that's what cut a smile across my face today.

They say people have pets that look similar to them. So you must have a really hot dog.

My long weekend was very fun. I played in the Tanunda basketball carnival and we bowed out in the semi-final this morning. After arriving at the caravan park on Friday night after some slight being fucked over by whereis.com.au the weekend was divided into four categories: basketball, sleeping, drinking and stretching.
I played for the enviable, independent club "Turbulence" (team dance: waving hands alternatingly up and down) and we represented two mens and two womens teams. I hit like 12 threes over the six games which was pretty epic. But the best part of the weekend was undoubtedly Saturday night where basically all the teams converged on the only pub in town. There my teammates and I played pool and then worked our way into conversations with all of the women's teams until we ended up in conversation with the best looking ones. This was notable because they'd watched our last game earlier and despite never having spoken to them they'd come up with nicknames for our team members. Alex was "The Face", Buff Sam was "Nugget" and I had been deemed "The Arms".

Now, I do go to the gym a lot but that's mainly because I'm a health fag and I like to be athletic for basketball. But this wasn't the first night at a pub that I've had girls tell me they like my biceps. It's an awkward problem, but I have no idea how to take this or use it to my advantage. I might like a girl, but how do I know she likes me and not just my arms? Especially when half the time I spend with girls they continually feel my muscles and lift up my shirt! All I do is feel embarrassed and self-conscious and this does not lead to phone numbers. After having my pecs groped a few times I inebriatedly decided to pluck "now do I get to feel yours?" out of my pick-up-lines-to-be-vetted databank but apparently this is "creepy".
I'm only saying, I want girls to like me but I want them to like me, not just my arms. I have a personality too! When am I going to meet a girl in a pub who calls me "The Journal"?

I think it's an interesting, human thing the way it doesn't take much of a change to compartmentalise your context.

For example, for pretty much the whole long weekend my only focus was on basketball games, basketball strategies, stretching and beer. Left behind in Adelaide were friends, family, careers, to-do lists etc. I thought it was pretty amazing how everything that was important or attention grabbing earlier in the week could disappear with only a 90km change in isolation.

While I was away I lost my tracksuit pants which, I think, were perhaps one of the only things in this world that made me think unconditional love existed. In the context of the weekend it seemed inconsequential as it happened between winning games and trying to win the next game. But now I'm home and have resumed serving normal context I can't shake the harrowing feeling of loss and hollowness that grips me every time I walk by The Berkley on Hindley St.

This morning I woke up 3 hours premature to this:

Which was obviously disappointing. Someone crept down our driveway last night and hucked a tin of oil based paint on my car. I don't know what beef they have with me or why they don't have the courage to confront me about it.

Nevertheless I decided I wasn't going to be angry about something I couldn't change. After filling out all the necessary paperwork with equally unhelpful police departments and Allianz insurance I visited the Holden Crash department and they showed me that with certain paint strippers I could remove the paint - slowly - by myself. Instead of making a claim on my insurance, paying an excess and losing my rating I could buy $10 worth of Turpentine and do the work myself. Fortunately I have a cool boss who felt sympathy for my situation. So I spent 11 hours today in my driveway with rags and turpentine cleaning off my car.

It was slow going of course, and I had plenty of time to think. One of the first things I noticed was that I listened to the radio today rather than CDs to avoid creating psychological associations between a messed up car and certain artists.

I was going to post an entry today along the lines of how the first thing I thought of this morning was about how this would make a good journal entry. And maybe post some passive-agressive rant about how it would have been a much better prank if they'd done it during summer when the paint would have a chance to set harder overnight, and that next time maybe they should have the balls to come all the way down the driveway instead of flinging paint from two steps in and then running away. But I'm not going to do that. I'm not too worried about creating further motivation for my car to be vandalised and damaged again (though if it happens after today's workload I'll obviously be disheartened). Instead I want to dedicate today's entry to saying how thankful I am to have friends, particularly the collection of them who came to my house today to strip paint, help wash and buff, and make jokes about ejaculating all over my car at every opportunity.

So although my day might have revealed I may have an enemy out there, it definitely has confirmed I have valuable friends.

So obviously being cut up and teeth gnashing gets difficult to drag out over more than a couple of days. Still, I've compiled a list of possible suspects for the unrequested painting of my car:

• MIA, who I once accused of being crazy in a journal entry. And she does know how to use the internet, sort of.... Alibi: Was playing Bonnaroo last Friday...
  
• Camille - A French singer who I also gave a negative review in Rip It Up a few weeks ago. Is an artist and seems to be a least a little crazy. At this stage, prime suspect.
  
• Zoe. Former Bradism.com commenter, now St. Kilda supporter. She sent me an angry text message last weekend after I SMS'd her the Western Bulldogs theme song in all caps. Alibi: grew up in Queensland so it's doubtful she has that much football passion.
  
• Zippo. Number 1 Bradism.com commenter who would predict that Zoe would be mentioned instead of her, despite her having more comments, thus causing rage. Alibi: way too nice, also this scenario is kind of recursive.
  
• Professor Plum. I stole his carpark when I drove to work on Thursday.
  
• Forlorn looking woman in Marion carpark. I went there last week and as I was reversing from my spot to get home I noticed her standing with a puzzled look in front of an empty car space. I didn't have time to help her and find out if her car was stolen. Mainly because I'm not a detective.
  
• Karl the Painter. May have discovered what I wrote about him a few summers ago and is now more assertive and wants revenge. Evidence: has access to paint.
  
• Craig Lowndes. Motive: Doesn't like Holden.
  

I have a few other suspects, but they're kind of drawing a long bow.

Every morning that I go to work I spend between seven and nine minutes preparing, blending and gulping my breakfast smoothie. But I haven't had one in the last week, since my unlucky Friday the 13th. Friday, of course, I was too preoccupied by other things to prepare a delicious smoothie. And each day this week I've ended up rushed for breakfast and have instead opted to save time by putting Weet Bix in a bowl, adding equal parts milk and honey and smashing that down.

But with my low-fat, sugar reduced vanilla yogurt about to expire I made the effort this morning to blend up a healthy, vitamin rich breakfast. And it was all going well until half way through the puréeing when my blender started grinding and not stirring. Figuring some ice was stuck, I removed the lid and stirred a little and resumed, but nay! Still more grinding. I put the jug on the bench and gave it an almighty stir, sifting half crunched chunks of ice and lumps of protein powder and peanuts trying to remove a blockage that I was to find didn't exist! No, instead I found that the gear on the base of the jug had its screw filed through! When the motor said "spin!" the blades said "how!?".

So now there were metal filings and grease all over the bench and my hands, which I had to avoid as I gulped down my health fag flavour of a frozen coke to try and avoid running late for work. And as Beastie Boys lyrics and an ice-cream headache had a date in my brain I realised that, what should have happened last Friday is, I would have suffered through a sabotaged breakfast attempt and escaped from my frustration to a paint covered car. Had my mother not alerted me to it before breakfast.

Possibly jumping at shadows here. But I still have to fix my blender somehow tomorrow. Hopefully won't need any turps.

I think I redefined binge drinking. It's ok though, Mens Health said I could do that occasionally.

Hey there, just thought I'd better put an entry up today because I knew some people from 2003 would be reading it. Have a good one.

I'm more productive under the steady guise of To Do lists. I think it's because I told them one night about my propensity to procrastinate and generally pass time without absorbing any of its vital nutrients.
Todoy... I mean Today I had a long one and impressed myself by getting everything on it ticked off well before Sudoku.com.au rolled over to tempt me with clicking and logic challenges.
Thus, I can go to bed tonight with that charming feeling of relaxing into a well earned sleep, unlike some days when I have to relax into a possibly nicked sleep from someone else who worked hard.
I even had time to iron 4 shirts, which wasn't actually on my to do list! This will set me up for well into next week, which is good because now that it's winter and freaking cold it's a lot harder to pass off my "shit I forgot to iron so I'm wearing a polo" off as permissible business casual.

My office isn't exactly what I would call scenic. It's early 90s style with cream desks and has unoffensive, solid colours as felt dividers between cubicles.

However for people close enough to a window - like me - the environment can be enhanced by spinning in the appropriate direction to take in the view. It's an awesome view, you can see over Hindley St and towards the West End of the city while the main CBD's skyscrapers block the other third of your vision. Central you can the southern suburbs stretching away into the Adelaide hills and I can watch what the weather is like at my house.

Amongst the awesome sunsets, cityscapes and nighttime spectaculars I see from my window I also get to watch rain sweep in from the ocean and spray across the plains in scattered patterns. And on dreary Thursday afternoons when the overcast conditions outside seem to be slowing down the passage of time this provides entertainment. When the showers end there come rainbows and they launch from behind the city buildings and arch over my head and away. Of course I only notice them when I spin around for a moment, as does anyone else.

At work we use Microsoft Office Communicator which is like MSN Messenger but with all the fun taken out of it (no nudging! But it has emoticons). As the afternoon dawdled I was cheered by the sight of an unexpected rainbow, and had the following IM conversation with another cubicle facer.

(3:32) Brad says:

We're gonna make it after alllll..

I'm not a fan of Mondays at any stage of the year, but Winter is the worst. Not even the proximity of being filled with delicious, cheap petrol on Tuesdays can help brighten my mood after long, cold nights of rain and frost and being woken up early for short, panicked drives to train stations. The contrast against cruisy weekends is grating.

So I've got this problem lately, and I know it's a problem but it's hard to talk about. It's my remote central locking and the fact that recently it hasn't exactly been remote. Most of the time it works and it's fine: when the time comes to open up, the correct button is pressed and the lock springs skyward. But other times no matter how firm or softly or rapidly or closely the unlock button gets pushed, my locks just stay closed.

Let's talk design flaws, I don't know why any car being unlocked by it's own key should be cause to set off it's long, honking, abusive alarm. But when a VZ gets unlocked manually, instead of activated by remote central locking, it honks like a wailing toddler turning its car park into an uptown department store of bad-parenting embarrassment for anyone who probably just needs to get the batteries replaced in their keys.

Car Park God works in mysterious ways and sometimes, on Mondays when he's lazy, that results in mysteriously parking on the top floor of open car parks in the driving rain. And Sometimes those car parks have big puddles up there on the roof that you don't notice in the post-sunset Winter gloom until whoever gets out of you steps into them and swears. AND sometimes cars park close by to you making it a squeeze to get in, especially when whoever's driving you is carrying a thick, unyielding gym bag over their back and trying to balance a water bottle in one hand and keys in their other and tip toeing through a giant puddle in the rain, squeezed between two cars and jamming their finger up and down on your remote and begging your doors to unlock. But, your doors don't unlock. And so your horn start screaming like a fat kid being chased by towel-wielding bullies because someone dared to try and open you with your own key.

But, that one I can't blame on a design flaw. On Mondays, I just do it because it's piss funny.

This morning I woke up to Tuesday irony when I realised I wasn't strong enough to pull the lid off my new 6kg of vanilla protein powder for breakfast smoothie.

Seriously, album of the year?

- Close, hard fought Bulldogs victories
- Nailing 3s in a winning game of basketball
- Parking in dream parks during peak demand
- That point of inebriation where every note coming out of the speakers seems to surge down your spine and bounce around inside the four chambers of your heart for much longer than the note actually goes for
- Beating Raining Blood on expert
- Running
- Squats

Three of them walked into the bar. It was Thursday night, a premature celebrate of an impending weekend. There was no sport on the TV. Instead the dimmed level of light was brightened by flashing, sex filled R'n'B music videos and advertisements of drink specials for ladies and Asians.

One of the three boys strode with purpose to the buffer of a queue about the bar. The others hunted a table, drawing a circular, knee-high end table into a corner and then standing around protectively guarding the kill. They each faced away, gazing onto the dance floor and into nearby booths, taking in the sight of skirts and fishing for eye-contact. Both were garbed similarly. Trendy trainers took to the sticky floor. Distressed jeans and off-colour belts drew the eye to snug fitting logo Tees, of distinctive colours. Their faces were not memorable.

When the third came to the table carrying drinks his outfit was identical – in function. However, over his baby-blue tee he wore a contrasting, modern, two-button Dolce & Gabbana suit jacket; the top button was done. He had dark hair and eyes like slowly moving water.
Drinks were downed and the third found confidence in perhaps this, or perhaps a glance. Something set him across the dance floor to a solo dancing girl in a cotton dress. He raised a palm parallel to the floor and penetrated her peripheral vision. She looked up at him.

'Is there a pick up line you haven't heard tonight yet?' he asked.
She had reduced her dancing now, feet moving only to every second beat. There was gazing, as she checked his body, and his face for sincerity.
'Why are you wearing that jacket?' she finally spoke. His chest swelled.
'I'm wearing it ironically.'
'So... what? Wearing that jacket is supposed to achieve the opposite of its purpose?'
'Right, it's a statement. In the context of the outfit. In this place. It's a piece of formalwear thrown into reverse.'
'Hmmm..' her lips moved. 'I think you wore it because you think it will help you pick up.'
He laughed, and deliberately laid a hand on her shoulder for the count of two seconds.
'How do you think that's working for me?' he winked.
'Ironically.'

I have decided that the thing that creeps me out the most about working in my office is the bin in the kitchenette. It's just a regular plastic bin, not unlike this. And the lid is always on. And it smells like rubbish which is normal. What's not normal is that everytime you push the flap open to deposit rubbish in it, your hand always feels the warmth of trash. It's not a natural warmth. It's bin warmth and it's hot and it freaks me out. No matter what time of the day it is (after I get to the office around 9:15) it's always hot in the bin.

It's like there's a tunnel to a furnace coming through the floor into the bin, but I prodded it a few times and checked the carpet underneath but nothing. I don't think the tea-bags and the paddle-pop sticks for stirring boiling coffees could create such a constant warmth. It scares me and makes me sad. Everytime I throw away my little, empty tub of yogurt I get longings for Summer.

Starting today. Better late than never.

I woke up to the really harpy strings of Alfred Hammond Jnr's GfC this morning. And because I'd been watching a movie last night my stereo was up ridiculously loud so even with Citrus Alarm Clock's morning friendly 5 minute fade in setting I was jolted awake quite quickly. This was appreciated actually; I'm getting sick of meeting bands in my dreams.

The first thing I do every morning is to give a Neanderthal heave on the curtains to blast as much sunshine into the room as possible and stimulate primitive brain parts that declare sleep over when they see light. It dawned on me, as the Strokes lead guitarist riffed away prettily, that it was a very frosty sunlight. I regretted not making my wake up song Damn I'm Cold from 'lil Wayne. But that may be for the best, as I found out during my day of multiple listens to Como Te Llama that Hammond Jnr had fallen sick from a throat infection and was canceling his Australian tour. Not that he was coming to Adelaide or anything, I just think lil Wayne could've handled the alarm clock curse better.

So, I was very cold and was about to shower. For the past few weeks I have been sporting trendybeard. Trendybeard is like shitbeard but I use the shortest trimmer to trim it to societally acceptable lowness everytime I have to go out. I was hoping after three weeks of permanent stubble I might have cultivated some extra growth and made the rest of my hair follicles believe in themselves a little. But I decided last night as I was counting the hairs in my jazz tuft that - if I could count the hairs in my jazz tuft - it probably wasn't working yet.

But as I prepared to trim down to stubble again for work I looked myself in the eye and said, know what? Fuck it. I'll do a proper shave. After all, I'm sober now. And then I chuckled a little to myself as I shaved away.

I spent 5 minutes waiting for a train on the coldest morning in 25 years. Guess what, that layer of stubble has really been helping ease the wind chill factor of winter. On the plus side I look a lot younger now.

I've written in the past that I don't critique music as harshly if it's attempting to express or investigate some concept. But sometimes, even when an artist is exploring a concept I will still call it fucking terrible because the concept is just so obviously retarded. Take, for example the new Kid Rock song (linked so you can listen to it for as long as you can stand, without having to endure video of aging Rap Rockers driving boats around with their shirts off). The concept was some sort of Summer of 69 retrospective opus which I initially thought was heavily influenced by Leonerd Skynnard, before quickly learning was completely ripping off Sweet Home Alabama and... I just can't understand how anyone justified this as a good idea during the production process.

That said, another terrible concept for a nonetheless publicly released song was Busta Rhymes teaming up Linkin Park for the track Together we made it. Now, Busta Rhymes has never claimed to be an intelligent MC but teaming up with mid-30s teen idol Chester Bennington to deliver rhymes over angsty rock didn't really work for Jay-Z, so why is he ripping that off? I don't even remember why I first got a copy of this song, other than for the lols. But a funny thing happened, on a day I was performing a particularly arduous software release after hours. Most releases usually take about 30 minutes to backup, run scripts, compile and finalise. But this one had come upon a few errors and was dragging out. I'd even turned my music off to focus on the problems. After I sorted everything I turned to my music inbox and for some reason felt it necessary to celebrate my success with:

And inevitably I became conditioned to rock out to this song everytime I overcame some large, but in hindsight melodramatic challenge. Like today when I had another release, also with it's problems. This time I was working with a client over the phone as we fixed their issues so I could finalise the release. It was taking time, outside it was dark and trains were leaving without me every 18 minutes. But eventually we succeeded, we overcame and finally I had someone to sing with! But he was clearly not as chirpy as I was following the success, and just grunted in satisfaction that the release was done. So I sung Together we made it!! but he'd hung up the phone. The cleaning guy looked up at me but I don't think he got the reference.

He walked the path by the river. It was Thursday lunchtime, a chilly yet sun-drenched testament to nature, within the confines of the CBD. There was no swimming in the river. Instead the swans and council-installed fountains contributed a relaxing, metaphoric haze into the air.

The boy strode with purpose past the queue of silently standing benches occupied by business suited sandwich eaters or resting single mothers. He hunted his own location, tracking an exposed wooden bench facing the tiny river waves. Wind whipped his hair as he unfolded the notebook and unsheathed a biro. Trendy trainers pounded the footpath past. The elderly and the middle-aged strolled by. Their faces were not memorable.

As he sat writing the wind stroked his stubble thoughtfully, perhaps coincidence or perhaps cause for the periods of frantic scribbling and the moments of pensive, pen-in-mouth pondering. Occasionally he glanced up, sparrows appearing in his peripheral giving him chance to peer about.
Words were put down and the writer found confidence in perhaps this, or perhaps a glance. His gaze followed a solo, walking girl in a cotton dress. With pen held he smiled at her; she approached his bench.

'What are you writing?' she asked.
She had reduced her walking now, feet moving only in passive shuffle. There was gazing, as he checked her body, and her face for sincerity.
'It's a story about a jacket?' he finally spoke. His chest swelled.
'What kind of jacket?'
'An ironic one; it's an ironic story.'
'So... what? You're writing to achieve the opposite of the purpose?' she questioned.
'Umm, the jacket's a statement. In the context of this notepad. In this place. It's a piece of fiction throwing something into reverse.'
'Hmmm..' her lips moved. 'I don't think you're invested in that story and I don't think your writing's ironic. I think you're writing because you want it to help you pick up.'
He laughed, and deliberately laid a hand on her hip for the count of two seconds.
'How do you think that's working for me?' he winked.
She looked at the story, it was finished.
'Ironically.'

On Tuesday they announced that Starbucks would be closing 61 Australian stores including every one in South Australia. It was about time, because seriously you can't go a half-hour in certain directions without coming across another Starbucks. Sheesh.

I've had Starbucks once or twice from Rundle Mall but I'm not a fan. Those ventures were mainly brought upon by days when Bean Bar was out of ice and I couldn't make me Smoothycinos.
But I was still touched by the news of the closure. And I thought as they had one last day of trade I might go there and passive-aggressively buy the largest, most expensive and most decadent coffee they could produce. In my head it seemed funny, a kind of in real life troll where I mock the coffee giant by purchasing expensive beverages from them.

Starbucks Rundle Mall, it looks a bit dilapidated. I mean, looked.

So, I tried to rationalise it as, like, when you drive past a crash on the motorway and you slow down to gawk and hopefully see some gory details. And sometimes you might even stop and get out to poke the corpse with a stick, and if they don't move you steal their wallet? Except in this scenario replace "car crash" with "extreme corporate downsizing" and "stick" with "frappuccino".

It became 10:30 am: coffee time, so I strode confidently into Starbucks ready to deliver my troll and said to the serving "partner" 'I hear you're closing down, so I'd like the most gratuitous, expensive, exorbitant coffee you've got.'

And she looked at me with sad but hopeful eyes and said 'Aww, that's ok. You don't have to try and help us out.' And immediately I realised my folly. Then with no warning another girl behind me spoke with an American accent and suggested I get a enormous concoction of caramel infused hot chocolate with triple shot of espresso. Helplessly, I agreed and got this.

In the end, I was only able to justify my troll as a slightly entertaining way of killing part of my morning at work. Good enough for me!

That if I sit down to post an entry every day, no matter what, I can produce content regularly and perhaps unexpectedly. So I shall post an entry every day no matter how short and pointless it is.

Today I won basketball; went to Hahndorf randomly; and successfully removed a malignant tumour on Wii Operation.

As an Australian I regularly enjoy Milo in its many varieties. Of course Milo is a sometimes food, meaning it's ok to drink Milo sometimes. Like when you're about to go off and do something that equals the metaphoric intensity of a high blood sugar spike that a tablespoon of Milo brings. So basically doing the things pictured on the tin, such as white water rafting or BMXing or basketball. Unfortunately I am yet to receive a holographic action card in a box of Milo Cereal showing off some guy at a desk modifying config files on a UNIX box, but when I do there's Milo in my office I can drink for free.

Someone once taught me an excellent trick to make drinking Milo better. When mixing with cold milk, Milo usually ends up mostly lumpy and floating on the top. The handy fix for this problem is to add a tiny amount of boiling water to the Milo first. This creates a thick chocolate syrup that you can add milk to and thus create effective, delicious Milo drinks.

Having learned this in my childhood I decided to apply the same principle to my Milo drink today which I was also combining with a tablespoon of similarly clumpy mixer - Redbak WPI protein powder. I tried my boiling water trick and while it worked spectacularly with the Milo it had the inverse effect on the protein, creating a clumpy eco-system of trashed protein in my large and hard to finish glass.

I could have been a chemist, you know.

Today started as so many work days have lately: me sitting in my car thumbing through CD tracks with the steering wheel as I wait nervously for the train to pass through the Blackwood level crossing. As soon as it's gone I'll have something high-tempo playing so I can then race it to Eden Hills and get on there.

I had what I could define as a perfect, prototype moment of human communication today. With my car left parked I went running down the hill to catch the train that was loudly rounding the bend and moments away from leaving without me. As my business shoes pounded the green path between the trees I approached an elderly volunteer who stood, performing some garden maintenance.
We made eye contact as I sped towards him and I gave him a smile that was flawless in it's delivery. This smile contained everything everyone feels about the craziness of modern life, the empathy we share for our fellow human beings and - although we often spend plenty of time ignoring the majority of people around us - a glint of how we're all in this together. It was the kind of smile I wish I could give whenever, to whoever. He smiled back. We connected. I caught my train and made eye contact with a Douglas Coupland novel for the rest of the trip.

I had my last game of district for winter season today. I saluted my final game with my lowest score of the year, but outside that aspect I think I played well. After such an intense beginning I've found my game and fitness increasing and now have to wait a month until Summer season, possibly a new coach and even more self improvement.

Driving home from the game I thought about spending the rest of the evening drinking the last 3 Coopers Sparkling stubbies I have sitting in my fridge. I haven't had any alcohol for 10 days now, partly because of that aforementioned pre-season which is why I'm currently in the midst of a more low-key version of last years Bulktember. But, now it was the day of the end of the season - six months of sweat and effort, highs and lows - surely I deserved to celebrate?

That's when it hit me. Since when did alcohol become synonymous for celebrating? Why was it mandatory to drink beer out of my Blackwood Recreation Centre 2006 Div 2 Summer Premiers pint glass to commemorate achievements? This is what all that Kevin Rudd, binge-drinking-problem thing is about. For better or worse, it has become ingrained in Aussie culture to celebrate anything with a booze up.

Thus I decided to celebrate with other indulgences. I ate strawberries and cheesecake while I watched the Robot Chicken Star Wars special. Then I put my headphones on and jammed to Battles while I played minesweeper. Then a few song on Guitar Hero III and finally I sat in my spa and contemplated life, my rebounding skills and fairy light patterns.

Now I'm going to bed and I'm reflecting on my evening of celebration, how I didn't drink any alcohol, but I still had plenty of fun.

But it would have been way better if I did all that buzzing.

Earlier this week Google Maps launched Street View Australia and I responded with giddy excitement. I've spent way to many hours looking up places purely because I visited there before .

Honestly, I'm confused by how excited things like this make me. I don't think I've been this stoked since 2005 when they launched the high res satellite shots of Adelaide. I know I have a fairly ubiquitous Web 2.0 thing but this goes beyond that. I wanted to spend this journal entry drilling into my psychological theories about why street view is so exciting, but instead I wasted hours just playing with street view. That and today's work->gym->unexpected netball match combo has left me too tired to analyse.

Oh shit, I'll just blurt out my theory: I'm a geek, an introvert and thus a voyeur.

I don't want this to seem rude. I understand people in wheelchairs are normal people and deserve respect, nay, equality. Spiritually there's nothing that separates us save whatever afterlife bonus you get for having massive forearms.

But we all populate the same bustling metropolis and I can't imagine they really enjoy traveling at slower speeds than the rest of us more than I like being stuck behind them. So is it wrong - if we're heading in the same direction - if I grab their handles and push them towards our mutual goal at speed?

I've loaded on a lot of creatine today.

Last Saturday's theory seems to be working well. I've written a bit of crap lately. But, as someone said tonight, I'm in journaling form.

That someone was me.

I'm still very sober which is only exacerbated by also being loaded with creatine, phosphate and B vitamins. I'm saving so much money. The only cash I outlaid while out tonight was $1 on the jukebox at Chalkers. I finally found a jukebox with Big Country's In a Big Country and I queued it up.
We never got up to it in the hour I stayed there after. But much like these journal entries, I walked away feeling satisfied because even though I wouldn't hear it immediately, I knew in the future it would forced upon everyone to enjoy.

I'm still still sober. I only keep harping on about it because I discover new things that require sobriety as context.

So while I've been dry everyone else has been drenched. We've almost reached the average August rainfall by today. But occasionally the sun does break through the clouds. I took this photo from my desk at work on Friday.

Unfortunately I didn't realise it was actually 3:45ish. But that didn't stop most people around me from immediately packing up and going to the pub. Not me, obviously.

People amp their vulgarity up absurdly when they're pissed. I was telling that tale last night when a scotch infused Wiser blurted out "Oh yeah, rainbows. the other day I saw a hell fucking rainbow."

Meanwhile, in Hell:
Lou: Lord Satan, Harvey and Petrie are here to see you about this weekend.
Satan: Harv's, Drew! What's cracking?
*crash*
Harvey: What the fuck was that?
Lou: OH GOD IT'S SO BRIGHT!
Petrie: THE COLOURS! THE COLOURS!
Satan: ARRGH. Is that... does that smell like... Vaseline?
slurpy noises

I live at home with my Mum. I'm kind of over it, to be honest. But it has its advantages. Like usually when I get home from the gym there's a meal with a good balance of carbs and protein waiting for me to eat within the 30 minute window of exercising.

Then there's days like today, when I get home and Mumsies is only halfway through cooking dinner and I'm forced to find other sources of sugars and amino acids to kick-start muscle recovery. Fortunately I had a box of Milo cereal atop the fridge and I ate a few handfuls of that as I watched Mum cook. The Milo tasted good, and with mouth half full I said 'Thanks Milo, you're always there for me.'

To which Mum said 'That's OK Brad, you're there for me too.'

'What did you think I said?' I asked.
'"Thanks Mum, you're always there for me"'
'No.. I said "Thanks Milo, you're always there for me.".'
...
'Brad.. when are you moving out again?'

NEED HOUSEMATES, HOUSE.

So tell me about your day, internet.

At the gym the other day I was helping spot a random, handsome stranger. After he squeezed out a few extra reps and sat to feel the burn I asked him what he was working on that day. And he said 'Triceps.' No joke, he then spent a good hour just working out his triceps.

How insane is that? My response that day would have been 'upper body'. This guy wasn't even a massive tank - just athletic - yet he's somehow got training down so much that he can dedicate one whole day to a single muscle group.

I saw him again tonight and he said he was doing 'Biceps.' As I left the gym and struggled gingerly into the cold evening he silently jogged past me. And without slowing, he ran down a path and into the night, his giant triceps swishing back and forth in the moonlight.

It was Lisa's birthday today and Monday I started organising a surprise lunch for her to celebrate it. This involved secretly telling all the people who worked in town - and some who didn't - to stop being sucks and come out for lunch occasionally. Lisa's surprise and enjoyment was the primary goal and a good excuse to make them do this.

It wasn't the first surprise birthday party, gift or celebration I've organised though. For some reason I feel compelled to set them up whenever the opportunity presents. I admit, I enjoy the fun of acting like I'm forcing someone to do me a favour or making them feel a little bad while deliberately ignoring it's their special day, and then unleashing astonishment on them. Maybe a little too much. But in my mind it heightens the delivery of the surprise!

It was only as I walked Lisa away from where she wanted to go to lunch, neglecting to mention the birthday so obviously bubbling inside her, and antagonised her about how there was no special reason at all for us to get Wok in the Box that I realised... The surprise parties I organise I'm actually trolling! But at least with a happy ending. :)

The corkie I took to my hip during basketball last Saturday has finally bruised up to the surface, in time for tomorrow's game.
Along with the egg above my left eye, it was good pain this week. Pain from winning. I could rub my inflamed skull and feel victory inside me.
I like basketball.

I have a corkie in my ass. Everytime I stand or sit I feel losing inside of me :(

Indian rain dances were a primitive, complex sequence of moves often performed in special costume by large numbers of the tribe. The intent was to seduce heavy rains from the Gods.

They could have saved so much effort by just posting smoke-signal blog posts about how nice and sunny it was.

Four straight weeks of sobriety and now I have the shirt to prove it!

I think I'm starting to understand what the Olympics is all about. Last night I was passionately rooting for Steve Hooker to win gold in the Men's pole vault. Before last night I'd never heard of him. A day later and he's just a memory. And a day later for him, he's probably in the olympic village right now having a threesome with a British relay runner and a Japanese synchronised diver.

It's kind of about supporting your country through blind jingoism, but in the end it's about uniting the world.

Also, contorting the human body in every imaginable way: http://stuff.thdesign.be/forum/varia/OS.html

I'm 24 now, and it's probably beyond me to become the following things:

• Doctor
  
• Lawyer
  
• Architect
  
• Detective
  
• AFL Player
  
• Race Car Driver
  
• Stockbroker
  
• Pilot
  

However, I'm not ruling out the following:

• Olympian
  
• Fireman
  
• Economist
  
• Author
  
• Actor
  
• Journalist
  
• Comedian
  
• Chef
  
• Personal Trainer
  
• Musician
  
• Photographer
  
• Meteorologist
  

As anyone who I spoke to on the weekend will attest, I spent most of Saturday and Sunday pumping myself up to achieve the next level of weight on my bench press on Monday.

And, at around 3pm yesterday as I reveled in having my birthday off work as a no questions asked cultural holiday, I achieved that goal. I wore my Bulldogs singlet to the gym to inspire me. And on the final, difficult rep I screamed internally it's my birthday!!!!!! (the extra exclamation marks are there because it took a while to get that last rep to the top).

In fact, most everything I did yesterday I performed with optimism because it was my birthday. And due to that optimism everything went well! And today I was thinking, why don't I live every day like it's my birthday? Why save special moments, mochas and music for once a year?

Of course, yesterday did also have the advantage of being the first sunny day in weeks and the first time I've had beers in a month so they may have helped my mood.

I got a lot of sleep last night. During Thursday I felt telltale tickles in my throat as well as congestion in previous thoroughfares. I think I was getting sick. Being a man this was BAD NEWS. However, I'm still fueled by the flaming a random doctor gave me last January about being a bitch just because I had a cold. So I went to basketball practice, ran around in the chill for 90 minutes and - according to websites with calories calculators - burnt about 900 calories. Afterwards I felt sick.

But I refused to be a wuss, and after 9 hours sleep I nursed myself to work and lasted about an hour before a big, pouty kid in my head went "I WANT MEDICINE I'M SICK!!!" Off I went to the pharmacy. There I was customer serviced by a young Chinese pharmacist who asked me if I needed help.

'I'm sick,' I told him. 'But not really sick. Just man sick.'
'What kind of symptoms do you have?' he asked.
'Sore throat, congestion, that sort of thing. But it's, like, not that bad. I'm just being a wuss.'
'Coughing? Runny nose.'
'I.. well... not really...'
He looked puzzled, and then gave me Lemsip First Signs capsules (Echinacea plus vitamins I probably got through breakfast).

I thanked him, then grabbed a bag of Vicks Vapor Drops on the way out for good measure.

Now I'm having another early night, and a big masculine nap, because Saturday there will be a culture clash between my manly wussiness towards sickness and my manly tendency to ignore pain and illness to compete in ultimately pointless, casual sporting events.

At the end of my shower this morning I turned the hot off and let the cold water pound my body for an extra sixty seconds. This was a habit I picked up during the heatwave and something I've now stubbornly done every day of Winter. Sure, it may be torturous, but my skin has never been so firm and healthy!

The thing about having an online journal is that I know I jinx myself a lot. Like Friday's entry about my sniffles, which has now blown into a respiratory infection and conjunctivitis and sent me into a course of anti-biotics. Wow, thanks journal. I know if I hadn't mentioned and mocked my sickness on Friday I probably could have got over the sore throat by the end of the weekend, but no.
Sometimes I wonder if it's worth the pain I cop writing about something when I know I'm setting myself up for being screwed over later. All this just so I can have the benefit of being able to tell the internet what music to listen to and about how I bought a rockmelon the size of my head really cheap ($3.20!!). Rockmelon is so cheap. Tomorrow I'm going to pulp the last quarter of it into a smoothie with low fat yogurt and passionfruit. I probably won't be able to taste it.

Thursday - Freshly shaved "I'm not sick and back in the office" face
Friday - Handsome subtle-stubble for handsome Bulldogs victories at the MCG
Saturday - Party stubble for a night of Melbourne shenanigans
Sunday - Droopy stubble, for long, hungover drives home

I think you can tell which journal entries I plan and which ones I come up with as I'm cleaning my teeth before bed.

OK I think I'm starting to sober up.

Flinders University IT Student Brad founded Bradism.com in 1939. The company's first product, built in a Palo Alto garage, was a vital statistics email — basically an excuse to mail out a few quotes from the last shindig and a photo of a model in underwear. One of Bradism's first customers was Walt Disney Studios, which purchased eight oscillators to develop and test an innovative sound system for the movie Fantasia.

When World War II began, all Bradism.com facilities were placed at the disposal of the U.S. government. Bradism.com's product line expanded to include bombsights, rifles and engine parts - in all, more than three dozen major ordnance items. Brad set a nominal one percent profit on those products and used the money to establish a fund for widows and orphans of Bradism.com war casualties.

In 1979, just prior to the overthrow of the Shah of Iran, Bradism.com was the company that developed the Iranian social security information system. Two American executives who worked for Bradism.com in Iran were arbitrarily imprisoned during the revolution. After regular military avenues failed, Brad hired "Bull" Simons, a legend from the Green Berets, to plan and execute a breakout. With the help of envelopes stuffed with cash, Brad, Zippo, and a team of Bradism.com employees organised a clandestine rescue and managed to spring the two executives in a series of high-risk escapades without anyone getting hurt.

In March 1999, the company moved from offices in Palo Alto after quickly outgrowing these sites. The company leased a complex of buildings in Mountain View at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway from Silicon Graphics (SGI) in 1999. Bradism has remained at this location ever since, and the complex has since become known as the Bradismplex (a play on the word Bradisiomplex, a 1 followed by a Bradism of zeros).

However, Bradism would encounter more turmoil in March 2004 when antitrust legal action would be brought against it by the European Union for allegedly abusing its market dominance. Eventually Bradism.com was fined €497 million (US$613 million), ordered to divulge certain protocols to competitors, and to produce a new version of its BOJ platform — called BOJ Home Edition N — that did not include its colour scheme chooser. Bradism was also ordered to produce separate packages of BOJ after South Korea also landed a settlement against the company in 2005. It had to pay out US$32 million and produce more than one version of Bradism.com for the country in the same vein as the European Union - one with Bradism Colour Scheme Chooser and Weather Feature and one without.

In 2005, after attracting over seven users by mid-year, bradism.com was bought in July for US$580 million by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation (the parent company of Fox Broadcasting and other media enterprises).

Currently, in a field where customer service is not always at the forefront, Bradism.com aims to change client's expectations when it comes to service. Bradism has a "hands on" approach to design, construction and management of each project.

Journaling for so many years has often had me wonder if I will reach the stage where I stop feeling the need to post things on the internet.

I don't think that's happened yet.

Advice No. 1 Don't Drunk
Advice No. 2 A $2 Punnet of Strawberries can be dinner
Advice No. 3 Jamie should play his bass at the front of the stage and everyone should buy Satan's Cheerleaders CDs
Advice No. 4 Bulldogs players can't hear you yell through the TV no matter how loud you try.

One of the things I've been busy irl with is moving into my new house, which I'm renting. It's right near town and it looks like this:

This is my house, or as it's hereby known "Bradism.com HQ". Don't tell my housemates that. By day, in the sunshine it is a very pretty house. At night it's cold and empty and lonely. The garden is also very pretty during the sun. But I didn't take a photo of that. I only took this photo because I wasn't sure what kind of roof I had and I needed to consult so I could answer the questions on my home and contents insurance form.

Having no internet and journal, I've felt the need to post short quips and bradisms through other mediums. Don't use the washing machine.

These are flowers picked from my pretty garden. I didn't have a vase so I put them in a Schutzenfest stein. The lavender smells nice. Our toilet opens into the kitchen.

Yesterday afternoon I rushed home from work on the bus so that I could get into the backyard before sunset. This meant that I could see the lettuces growing in the vegetable patch and find some lettuce for my dinner. My dinner was sandwiches, because we don't have a microwave yet. But it's ok, my lunch was dinner because we do have a microwave at work. And cutlery.

A close in shot of some of the awesome storage I have in my new bedroom. I can fit everything in my robes now. That brandy glass has almost 90 dollars in loose change. Which I think will earn me a massive discount when I go to The Good Guys to buy a microwave.

Could it be any more like The Sims?

Have little money and have to prioritise between needs when deciding what furniture to buy, and what I can live without. Like no table for a week.

Overpowering urge to buy a burglar alarm everytime everyone's at work.

Bath turned brown almost instantaneously, after a few days of use.

Cooking meals and then observing everyone eating together at unorthodox places due to lack of table, then conversing.

Lava Lamp - Room +3.

Friends of housemates, and neighbours, come around and then interact with me and I can see little green ++ and red -'s appearing above our heads when we talk.

I think before The Sims came out this was just classified as independence. Except for little green ++ social indicators and the occasional slap game that we play sometimes.

I know that most people only read Bradism for the monthly music round up, and it's ok, it's coming. I'm just a little internet handicapped at the moment.

It will be average.

So, Internetivity has been limited lately. So no new music yet.

On the plus side it's not even half spring and I'm already sorta tanned.

Also almost every lettuce leaf I eat comes from my own garden.

Also. Also. I now have internet and am downloading Linux ISOs at 1.2MB/s and that's awesome. Plus today it was super sunny. I think I will just post a mega music round up at the end of October with a bonus phocumentary too.

The St. Jerome's Laneway Festival first announcement was issued this morning and the lineup is a veritable who's who of Bradism.com Best New Music roundup. Actually, there's just 5 as well as Jay Reatard who I didn't really listen to before returning that CD to Rip it Up. Oh and Four Tet had a decent EP earlier but I didn't review it. Anyway, the point is Girl Talk is coming to Adelaide!! And The Hold Steady, Daedelus, Pivot and Stereolab. Plus some others that might end up getting reviewed before February. It was a really fun day this year despite being there on my own for most of it and having an epic hangover and lack of sleep from the Fringe Opening Night party the night before. So wherever you are in Australia, go to Laneway.

The current US election features one Joe Biden as democratic vice-president and for that I’m glad. While I’ve been clouded in my own ignorance to most of the happenings in the drama that is the US election process - save the occasional entertaining conspiracy theory YouTube thread blaming Barrack for the sub-prime mortgage crisis – the appointment of Sarah Palin as republican vice-president candidate has made it impossible to ignore the increasing quirkiness defining each of the players involved. Besides Obama the potential first black president there’s McCain the close to death War Hero backing up for the republicans, fighting alongside Palin the caricature conservitive mom ready to usurp the moment his heart fails. And it's not too early to forget steely Hilary and her close second to be presidential candidate featuring the support of her saxophone playing, stood-by husband.

I can't convince myself that to even get to the senate it wouldn’t require a supreme level of intelligence and determination. However, 2008's election candidates seem cut by the same typecasters responsible for the next spinoff of Grey’s Anatomy. With all their weirdness, are these seriously the best people that could be running for office? Out of the whole country? Say what you like about Australian politics but at least here you know an election is going to be contested between one generic, middle-aged white guy and another generic, middle-aged white guy and that the elected will more likely win on the strength of their policies (and the effects of tall poppy syndrome) over being the contestant television audiences related to the most. This election seems like it was built for entertainment, or worse like it's a sneak peak of the future where President is won in a political equivalent of American Idol broadcast for a season on in prime time and occasionally pre-empted by Sunday Night Football.

It's simply dangerous the amount of room for character development among the candidates. Any season of Lost should be enough to convince you that when individuals with controversial and demographic differences combine, plot twists are inevitable. And frequent! Will Palin poison McCain to accelerate her conservative agenda? Will America struggle with personal demons and vote for Obama just to prove they're not racist? Will a hidden secret in Bill's past come back to haunt him at a critical time? Will Biden… Oh God, compared to the rest of them he’s so vanilla I just want to say skip the elections, make him president and let's avoid the drama. But, I'm afraid a shot of him behind the desk in the Oval Office, on the phone with Osama and confirming that everything is falling into place could make the best end of season cliff hanger ever...

Living on my own is certainly teaching me many life lessons.
For example, if you do a load of washing on a Friday morning and your housemate dumps it in your only washing basket friday afternoon, by Sunday night the clothes will be dry without you ever having to hang them out.

Also, it is way hard to eat a whole loaf of bread in a week.

And I now know how to use the clothes dryer we inherited with this house.

One of the four lift control panels scattered among the six lifts on my floor has it's "down" light jammed permanently on.
Some days, usually Fridays, I know how it feels. Stuck there in plain sight looking like it's busy, but really just doomed to wait indefinitely for a trip to the ground floor that never comes. Well, ok, it does come eventually. At around 5pm usually - unless it's POETS day. It was today. Today I was fucking Shakespeare.

I was particularly keen to vacate because my prerogative was gym this evening. I haven't been there much lately and I think my body gets accustomed to moving heavy shit around regularly, and when I don't it stores that energy as bound up tension that escalates into a need for 'push metal above head'.

When it comes to stress relief gym exercise differs to basketball, which is what keeps me from getting to the gym as much as I used to lately. At basketball you have to talk up and use team strategies. At the gym you say "Hi" at the front desk then just stare blankly at your reflection for two hours in silence. Internally you choose some heavy thing and start pushing or pulling or lifting it but not a single word needs uttering until you get back to your car and sing every word you do and don't know to every song you hear and drink an Up&Go.

Streamer seems to only work in Firefox. I'll fix that maybe.

As promised, I deliver two months worth of Best New Spring Music in one giant article. With hopefully easy to use music streamer.

Jupiter One – Fire Away

Fire Away
Jupiter One have an impressive array of commercial tie-ins given their freshness. Knowing that they've helped the scores for Heroes and Flash Gordon and advertised Mazdas and EA Sports before listening to their self-titled debut album prepares you for exactly how they sound... Commercial. Coming from a billboard adorned, multicultural hub like New York, they're a band under the weight of influence overload, and most of those influences sell.
The underlying canvas for Jupiter One is a new wave weave of star-wipe synths and punky guitars. Jupiter One sound like they've travelled back to the 80s to battle Devo and The Cars and have brought with them quad-core powered synthesizers, supercomputer guitars and some fancy brand of amplified future-drums. Or, basically what it would sound like if Flood and Brandon Flowers produced a contemporary Talking Heads cover album. There's definite attempt on The Killers style of digitally washed out guitar solos and 30-second-advertisement rhythm sections; the kind of psychological rock that makes you sway around feeling like you're creating nostalgia, and also feeling like you should buy a 7 Up. It's a lot like those annoying advertisements that grow endearing after a while.

Mr. Scruff – Music Takes Me Up

Music Takes Me Up
There's a producer named Mr. Scruff. He's pretty darn white, with a Manchester accent. But that hasn't stopped him juxtaposing hip hop and jazz for some of the funkiest and hottest tracks over the last decade. Probably best known for Get a Move On, the delightfully titled new LP Ninja Tuna – his fourth on the still consistent Ninja Tune label – contains plenty of similar, upbeat lounge hits. Music Takes Me Up kicks off the album with the soulful vocals of Alice Russell riding over hi-hats and jazzy, scruffy funk.

Evil Nine feat. Toastie Taylor– Dead Man Coming

Dead Man Coming
Music since the dawn of time has changed a lot. We've invented ReacTables and we dance around in front of lasers and strobe lights on giant pyramids. A fair change from the lurching around campfires in loincloths and ochre we used to do to simple beats. But the one thing yet to change in music is its most primitive component: rhythm. Drums have a ceiling of sophistication and nothing seems more natural to bop to than a steady, cadenced thudding. Without heavy pounding on different shit, music wouldn't be worth listening to.
This is something Evil Nine know pretty well and 2004's You Can Be Special Too introduced their very simple trademark pounding break, normally accompanied by some sort of post-punk guitar hook and sinister synth. All their works, compositions and remixes, are easily identifiable but it's no criticism to point out their drumming always sounds similar. That's the same as dissing a collection of Monet's because they're all done on canvas. It's what Evil Nine do with a drum beat that makes them successful, layering over it disco synths or lurking dub frequencies or turntablism. One of their best jobs is selecting vocalists with enticing timbres to salt their tunes. Whether it's the NYC grit of El-P, the Taylor Dane wannabe Emily Breeze or Dead Man Walking's reggae monologue from Toastie Taylor they all have one thing in common. They want to be played loud.

Eagles of Death Metal – I'm Your Torpedo

I'm Your Torpedo
Throbbing, crushing bass? Pounding rhythm section featuring big, tribal drums? 170 BPM? Reference to "torpedos". Josh Homme on slide guitar... no, wait, Josh Homme having any influence in the song writing process at all?
Got to be fucking music.
Continue Reading Best New Music - September/October 2008...

How many sugar packets are you allowed to take when you buy a coffee from a coffee place before people (say, co-workers) deduce that you're not going to be using all of them for your coffee and instead will be supplementing your own pantry with them?

Last night I saw the movie Death Race which is, contrary to my original beliefs, based on the 1976 film Death Race 2000 and not the 1996 Remedy Software game Death Rally (although it is worth noting that Death Race was a working title for Death Rally and the original film made up probably a smidgen of the inspiration).

Death Race the film really was just Death Rally the game made into a motion picture. The movie was 75% racing/shooting scenes and even stooped as low as having power ups that appeared on the ground around the track that drivers had to speed over to collect. Essentially it reminded me of an afternoon I spent at a primary school friend's house in early 1997 where I was forced to watch him play Death Rally for 2 hours while I occasionally interjected with "Can I have a turn?" between races and him replying "soon". I only had 4MB of RAM at the time ranking me towards the bottom of our friendship group's caste system.

By the end of the movie I was struck with the idea that it would have been more entertaining – and much cheaper – to have just downloaded Death Rally and played it for the same amount of time. This idea was remarkable given the movie was the type to numb the brain. So today I did that and while I may not have reached the intermediate stage yet I am close financially to upgrading to a cruiser although I do have spikes bolted to the front of my VW Bug that should help me out the next few races.

1.5 Stars.

- Paddle Pops for Dinner

Enya has been hovering a while on the outskirts of my top 100 most played artists on last.fm.
People seem to find it surprising that I have an affinity with the Celtic songstress, which peaked recently when I got excited about the leak of her new album And Winter Came in a few places. It's not a great album, but it's kind of good. It's like a cross between Watermark and a CD of Christmas carols. OK, what it sounds like is not important I'll undoubtedly include it in a review post later. What is important is that Enya seems to be seriously under-appreciated by young people.

When I was in year 5 we had a strict but loving but very strict teacher who cultivated independent learning by allowing talking during class "as long as I can still hear my music" and every day she would play Watermark at the lowest audible level possible. For years I disliked the opening bars of Cursum Perficio as they brought to the surface a deep seeded, childish anger. But come the end of my final year of uni where I was doing a major assignment at the last minute for about 3 months straight I somehow managed to conjure Watermark onto my computer and used it's conditioned response to complete many IT essays.

Also someone once made a cool mashup of Orinoco Flow and the Prodigy's Smack My Bitch Up which I think is what motivated me to download Watermark in the first place.
Orinoco Bitch

Is it time for a backup today?

On the way home from basketball tonight (I hit a 3) I stopped by the supermarket to buy the food I needed to last me through the week, which happened to be limited to just bread and milk.
As I approached the checkout chick to distract her from a sunset I felt like a self-conscious stereotype. So I bought some gum from the impulse purchase rack next to the checkout as well.

The longer I got without posting anything the more I feel like I should post something long or epic or insightful to make up for the gap.

Part of me knows that's stupid, and that it's regularity not quality that is the heartbeat of a blog. Part of me thought, "screw it, why write a dozen words comeback about buying some Milo cereal this week when I can really get all personal with the internet."
So here's some music, some life and nothing about Milo cereal.

The music of January was broken into 3 distinct phases. The first week of the month was mainly spent in and returning from the Falls Festival. When I did get back I set about listening to and finishing my Top Tracks of 2007 feature in my time off work, although somehow I did find the time to listen through the whole Spoon discography at least once.
Spoon – Believing is Art [Girls Can Tell, 2001]
With that done I immediately set about listening to anything marked "2008" I could lay my hands on, with optimistic plans for the "Best New Music" feature I planned to write once a month. So while there was a fair injection of Big Day Out artists injected into January's playlists in preparation for my week off, the rest was made up of the Postal Service-Pop of Cassettes Won't Listen, experimental low-fi pop-rock from Magnetic Fields, British Sea Power's stadium anthems, Hot Chips nerdy dance and the verbose indie-rock rap-overs of Yoni Wolf's Why?
Why? – The Vowels Pt. 2 [Alopecia, 2008]

Major events of February included taking a shit-beard to work for the first time, playing my first game of district basketball and making a sweet-as DJ Bradism Valentines mixtape. At one stage this month I received my twenty dollar, 2gig mp3 player I got online for use for gymming. Aside from the regular assortment of ego-inflating hip-hop I put on there to help me get the extra reps out (assuming I could hear it over the gym's radio blaring Fresh FMs chatroom) was the reggae influenced riddims and rhymes of French-Canada via Brooklyn Ghislain Poirier whose Ninja Tune released album No Ground Under was racing to top place on my admittedly fetal best albums of 2008 list.
Ghislain Poirier feat Face-T – No More Blood [No Ground Under, 2008]
Other events in February included listening to the Vampire Weekend album for the first time - because the more I try and pretend to have my finger on the pulse of music the more I feel the urge to ignore hyped bands. But in the end I liked it. I also spent most of one weekend drifting around the city attending the Fringe Opening Party and then later the Laneway Festival where I saw Okkervil River play one of the best live sets I saw all year. They represented a fair chunk of my February 2008 listenings after I decided that The Stage Names wouldn't be enough material to go see them by. So I obtained all of, and fell in love with half of Black Sheep Boy, particularly the overdramatic For Real. Interesting fact about this song, as it progresses through each stanza it's supposed to get more pained and unruly and the recording of it took a few hours of drinking. Basically they took different stages of Will Sheff's inebriation over hours to create the whole thing.
Okkervil River – For Real [Black Sheep Boy, 2005]

In the first week of March I saw Interpol at the Thebarton Theatre and they put on a very polished show, so their albums dominated my first few days of March listening. Immediately following that the new Tapes 'n Tapes album leaked and it was full of contemporary, grungy indie rock which I was quick to try and relate to. Also at this time there was a massive heatwave. Despite the warmth, or perhaps avoiding work at the office one casual Friday, I headed to David Jones to try and create a Tapes 'n Tapes outfit for myself after listening to Walk it Off several times that morning. So I bought a red, flannel shirt with buttons that I was going to leave undone over like a navy blue t-shirt. And sort of jeany-jeans. It was a good plan, the outfit cost $200 and I hardly wore it, but it was a nice day.
Tapes 'n Tapes – Hang Em All [Walk It Off, 2008]
There wasn't that much captivating new music this month that I noticed. The Futureheads had a massive hit with The Beginning of the Twist which still sounds good but the rest of the album couldn't match. There were a few other good tracks from Son Lux, Hercules and Love Affair and Gnarls Barkley. Elbow and M83 released solid LPs, Adam Green released a terrible one. I listened to it about 10 times trying to find something to love – it was the first album I reviewed for Rip It Up. Midway through the heatwave I went to Future Music Festival to sweat and listen to Aesop Rock, Evil Nine and The Chemical Brothers. Most of last summer I dug the metropolis-rhymes of Aesop's Labor Days, because nothing makes you feel bummed about office life more than 15 days straight of blinding sunlight in the window over your shoulder. Not much of Adelaide shared my enthusiasm for the New York rhyme-master; when he played in the gazebo in the Garden of Unearthly Delights it was only me and one other guy who were pressed at the front of the barrier looking excited. Aesop Rock said he loved me when I cheered him on stage, I felt special. I was kinda drunk at the time not to mention the heat exhaustion.
Aesop Rock – 9-5ers Anthem [Labor Days, 2001]

April brought with it cooler weather and seemed probably the right time for labels to start releasing the "good" music without worrying they'd be forgotten by the holiday season spending/end-of-year lists. But, first the month kicked off with an epic Queens of the Stone Age/Smashing Pumpkins double header. A decade earlier I'd have been gagging for a Smashing Pumpkins live show, but I found on the night that Queens of the Stone Age have to be the more rocking and far more reliable band of the two. Watching Josh Homme strut about on stage with his priorities mainly lying in rocking out, getting drunk and touching as many girls as possible, well, it was inspiring on a primitive level. The show forced me to revisit the Queens back catalogue and discover most of it was painfully rocking.
Queens of the Stone Age – Battery Acid [Era Vulgaris, 2007]
Back to the quality new releases and Portishead, Black Francis, Frightened Rabbit, Yah Mos Def, Wolf Parade and Cut Copy were getting high rotation, mostly based on quality but some because I had to review them for street press – something I was very proud of. The Midnight Organ Flight by Frightened Rabbit was a particularly inspiring album, revealing that despite falling in love with and then despising the emotive, Scottish Snow Patrol in 2006 I was still a sucker for relationship woes set to engaging riffs and a Scottish accent. I remember thinking at the time that I needed a rocky relationship to help me appreciate the music even more. Probably didn't need to set myself up like that.
Frightened Rabbit – The Modern Leper [The Midnight Organ Fight, 2008]

May, as a month, doesn't really add much to the year besides spacing. When people talk about how fast the year has gone it's because everything from June onwards is fresh in their memory and everything from January to April seems like a distant memory. But things that happen in May it's like, eh, who cares. Things that happened to me in May: … fuck knows. The Bulldogs did play spectacularly awesome in a few matches, Adelaide got four millimetres of rain above the monthly average and there were good albums from Ratatat, Cazals, Black Hollies and Death Cab for Cutie.
Death Cab for Cutie – No Sunlight [Narrow Stairs, 2008]

But then there was June. It's probably one of the most dramatic months I've lived and it started with listening to albums from the Nordic, ambient beauties Tape, more Ninja Tune beat heavy tracks from Daedelus and the electro-hip-hop mashup frenzy that was Ludacris' gratuitous mixtape from 2007 - Bangfest. That mixtape in particular made it almost all the way through as I drove to Port Adelaide in peak-hour to play (at the time) the best district game I'd ever played, nailing 10 points in the first quarter and leading our team to victory. Days later I listened to it again as I drove to Tanunda for my first annual Tanunda basketball carnival and it was perhaps the overt sexual confidence of fifty assorted rappers, the electro beats, or both that helped me carry confidence from that mix into every game I played plus every pub I went to those nights. Despite losing my favourite tracksuit pants somehow over the weekend and being knocked out in the semis I was on a high. Even the throwaway pop lusciousness of Mystery Jets' Young Love and Estelle's American Boy were so easily digestible that I'm not sure if I like them still because I was so self-confident at the time or if they're good pop songs (Kanye does drop an awesome verse).
Estelle feat. Kanye West - American Boy (Remix) [American Boy white label, 2008]
Within a week of my return I woke one morning to find my car doused in house paint sans provocation and I was doubtlessly dark. Fortunately I had good friends at the time to help me clean it and distract me, and it worked a little. Then, as if fate decided I needed cheering up the new Girl Talk album was released and it could not have come at a better time. It, and Mario Kart Wii created this fantastic bubble where any superfluous angst I was feeling could be doused with hectic kart racing and the best party album ever.
Girl Talk – Here's the Thing [Feed the Animals, 2008]
My car got wrecked Friday the 13th. Feed the Animals was available for download a week later. It was amazing how quickly that album filled any gaps in my life. It's the kind of album that sends you searching for samples, and when one track pointed me to an 80s Scottish outfit Big Country I somehow managed to shed my contemporary obsession and obtain a copy of 1983's The Crossing. Even today Girl Talk's album is my number 1 for the year not just for its encapsulated quality but because it somehow thrust me into the 80s in a year where I was supposed to be obsessed with the now. Only eight days after a vandalism that affected me more than I realised at the time I went out for a night on the town where I blindly asked every dance floor DJ I met to play Big Country or Girl Talk, instead met a girl who I'm still in love with today, and then went home and listened to more Big Country. A band where they engineered their guitars to sounds like bagpipes. Brilliant!
Big Country – In a Big Country [The Crossing, 1983]
There were other good albums in June as well, The Bug, Studio 1, Shearwater, Clinic, Dr. Dog and Dan Friel all had an influence on my feelings. I also went to Canberra to visit Steve. It was a very busy month.

July was slightly less busy and dramatic and a bit more fidgety, a feeling probably best summed up by Ratatat's Falcon Jab, an instrumental, mathematics driven song where I think they digitally sliced off the start of the notes. I don't know what it is but the tar-bubbling opening 30 seconds of this track still make me do an upper body jostle.
Ratatat – Falcon Jab [LP3, 2008]
July was a lot like May in its drollness, but unfortunately recent enough to remember. I struggled at not being an introvert and even the Bulldogs started their slide at entirely the wrong time. Albums by Beck, Albert Hammond Jr., What Made Milwaukee Famous and Santogold/Diplo made the peripheral.

Then, completely unexpectedly, was August which I don't think went to pattern at all. At the start of this year I'd set such a lofty list of goals and expectations that not even a stat-load of Girl Talk and Big Country plays could overcome not meeting. But, it seemed like procrastination was hard to put out of form and slowly through the month everything I'd wanted to achieve in January but hadn't really found focus since gained sharpness. There was other music of course, Bomb the Bass released a new classic record, Stereolab seemed to conjure psychedelics where they didn't deserve to exist (and in one visit to an organic cafe in Stirling, where they did). Plus The Tallest Man on Earth, The Grates, The Hold Steady and Buffalo Killers released great albums a few of which I reviewed in my opinion superbly.
The Tallest Man on Earth – Pistol Dreams [Shallow Graves, 2008]
But it was remarkable how things seemed to come together by my birthday. I was loving basketball, writing good reviews, getting promoted, kissing excellent lips, forging housemates, breaking bench press records all while feeling that swell of pleasure that your body gives you when you wake up and realise you haven't had any alcohol for a month. The sunlight and flowers were natures' way of saying Spring was crowning. With little effort it seemed that things were simple and good.
Spacehog – In The Meantime [Resident Alien, 1995]

If my life was simple enough to never involve third stanzas it would be welcome. The fact is after whale bellies things are just as likely to take a turn for a worse as they are to happily-ever-after. Immediately after my birthday/bench-press-record I received an illness, drank through it in Melbourne as I fuzzily watched the Bulldogs be destroyed by Buddy, ruptured the Distal Radioulnar Joint in my left wrist and then destroyed the passenger door of my car trying to park next to a pole the next morning. Unperturbed I still progressed to move out, discover things about relationships a normal person learns in high school, run out of money the day before I find out my responsibilities are increasing but my pay is not, and 29 degrees and sunny. And so I fell asleep on the grass beside the river Torrens one lunchtime, not sharing a single percent of my crap as TV on the Radio portrayed to me that complication need not mean a lack of beauty.
TV on the Radio – Stork and Owl [Dear Science, 2008]
Things were complicated but balanced. Sure, the Bulldogs could have beaten Geelong if they kicked straight, but I had a pretty garden. Sure, I could get paid more but I was still invaluable to multiple project managers. Sure, my wrist hurt unbelievably when I tried to do a chin up but... well, a beautiful girl kept coming to my house to see me... As if relationships are ever simple; I watched too many sitcoms growing up.
The Strokes – Hard to Explain [Is This it, 2001]

It is very kinda funny the way I introduce myself to artists. Exposed to a lot of press releases where obscure, shit band A is compared to awesome band B and epic band C it's sometimes required to listen to an influential new-wave band from the 80s in order to write 300 words about a British new-new-wave band of 2008. It's a pretty big stretch comparing the unknown Jupiter One with the tentatively Scottish connected Talking Heads, but it only took a single listen of a Talking Heads Best Of to ask where David Byrne had been all my life. It was appropriate that I was supplied that best of by a work colleague for my office PC; Once in a Lifetime has barely escaped a replay during any of the tasks I've completed since October.
Talking Heads – Once in a Lifetime [Remain in Light, 1980]
That's not to say I've had my head in the sand since then. I've played good games of basketball one handed, I was still upright rowing 90kg until an orthopaedic surgeon told me it wasn't helping, I was immensely proud to be made a groomsman. Amidst the blur of October I still went to parties, sadly lost kilograms and listened to notable albums by Evil Nine, Parts & Labor and T.I. But upon reflection it does appear I was pretty detached during this whole month.
Ratatat – Breaking Away [Ratatat, 2004]

November essentially revealed how little I'd actually changed no matter how much I thought I had. Once again I smuggled a shit beard to work with little awareness it was no better than the first time. I believed my passion for The Hold Steady's One for the Cutters came from some arcane passion for the harpsichord but in reality I was just as easily surfeit by well produced pop music as always. I started getting up early to chase passions and get writing done, but I still couldn't get a best new music article out by the end of the month.
The Hold Steady – One for the Cutters [Stay Positive, 2008]
Half of the month I spent idling, waiting for Houseboat 2008 to berth but ended up wasting half my relaxing weekend worrying if I was relaxing enough. That was pretty counter-productive, although one Sunday afternoon when I wasn't at all concerned about work the next day I did listen to the new Cure album for the first time and at least on one level of my neurological skyscraper it turned the lights off and declared annual targets were met, so I was content at least for a day.
The Cure – The Only One [4:13 Dream, 2008]

It's hard to succinctly sum up December with less than half of it passed, but it's a time for reflection (obviously) both autobiographically and musically. I learned that if there's anything to learn from this year it's the fact that things get complicated and busy but that's no excuse to not meet goals or match expectations. And that there's great albums by The Rosebuds, Puppetmastaz, Enya, The Notwist and Oxford Collapse that I missed. And that you understand that noise is a part of life and beating noise makes things even more worthwhile even if it's also harder. Well, you can romanticise it however you want. Everyones' life story is different, but at least for me music does an awesome job of keeping things compartmentalised and traceable.
Oxford Collapse – Young Love Delivers [Bits, 2008]

With music and life summarised I can get back to what I do best: social stumblings, health-faggery and wobbling independence.

San Remo make an excellent line of wholemeal pasta, which until recently was limited to only spaghetti and spirals. Some time recently they expanded to include penne. I'm not sure when, because I last bought pasta back in September when it was 19c off and I grabbed two baskets worth, but sometime since then it's been introduced. Wholemeal Penne is so much better for you than regular Penne, obviously. Because... it's got more fibre or something. It's brown.

Note: Penne collapses and condenses a lot more than you think when you put sauce on it. My lunchware was topping out when I left for work, but when I got it out to reheat at lunchtime it had sunk about an inch downwards. Most people are probably familiar with this. But if you've been eating only wholemeal pasta the past few years you won't have had a chance to experience this yourself until now.

Also, bacon. I'm not even sure I like bacon really. I like the principal of bacon, but when I eat it in a meal I'm never really sure if I can taste bacon. I didn't put any in my carbonara and I didn't miss it at all. Now to work out what to put the $4 a month I save on bacon towards.

The one stating that if you consume alcohol during lunch you're not allowed back to work for the rest of the day is probably the least well thought out.

Wrist Update - I now have to wear a plastic splint on my wrist for 4-6 weeks after the cortisone injection did bupkis. I hate it, it has no redeeming values.

Things My Wrist Splint is Good For

Around about a year ago I was sitting quietly with my journal musing on the cover story of January's "Men's Health" in an entry that is now perhaps appropriately hidden after it was bombarded by spambots countless times.

Quote:
2008 will be my best year ever. At least, according to this months edition of Men's Health and its pages of weight training tips and monthly reminder to masturbate regularly to avoid prostate cancer. Sure, I might not be able to get a promotion whilst having the greatest sex of my life and raising a family who can bench press 150% of their body weight. But I think I can take something from this issue: a positive attitude. Because I was just going to approach 2008 like every year, expecting the average. But now, it's going to be the best year ever! Needless to say, it's very exciting.

Now in reflection it seems 2008 was perhaps not my best year ever, although it has plenty of positives and negatives. I think rather than celebrate or scratch the last 12 months I'd rather relive them and try and head off a few of the things that happened that I could have lived without. But what might happen to serendipity? Would I still stumble upon a bio for obscure Bloc Party-wannabes Jupiter One and discover I have manlove for David Byrne? If I hadn't procrastinated on leaving home so long would I be living somewhere shitter than I do now, a place without apricot trees?

I mean in actuality I did achieve a lot of my goals and kept pace with my resolutions from January. Although I didn't learn Mandarin. The problem seems to be the old monkey paw wish conundrum; my resolutions just weren't specific enough. I actually did get that promotion - and a whole bunch of extra responsibility and stress - but international mergers and "Global Financial Crises" meant I didn't get the accompanying payrise. Similarly I smashed my bench press record one great day in August, got sick a few days after and then the day after that destroyed the cartilage in my wrist which still hasn't healed. I'm not even going to mention sex in case I do anything to jinx my winky in the last 24 hours.

And then, after inflating such hopes for this year 365 days ago, the new January Men's Health arrived with the cover article "2009 Your Best Year Ever!" Delivered completely nonchalantly as if 2008 being the best year ever was some flight of fancy and only the idiots wouldn't realise you were supposed to wait until 2009. So fuck it, 2009 is going to be less about goals and more about addressing any and all pressing issues on any echelon of Maslow's Need Hierarchy in whatever patterns they're thrown at me. Less disappointment that way, and it makes it much harder to procrastinate. I'm also canceling my subscription to Men's Health.

Top 50 Songs of 2008 featuring a Harpsichord
50-4: N/A
3: Vampire Weekend - M79
2: The Hold Steady - One for the Cutters
1: Ratatat - Dura

Happy New Year