The bits of stuff that fall in the cracks between Life, Music and outrageous fortune.
 
 
 
 
August
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1) Mixmaster's Mick Wordley inspects Mike's studio 2) Mike meets up with the Secret 10's Judy Adshead at Fresh

3) Kerryn Tolhurst is the centre of attention 4) Kerryn, Rob Price and Chris Stockley perform at Fresh @ Elwood
Sunday
31.8.09 - With Robbo being over in Libya with the Rats, the band wasn't about to work on the weekend and so I invited Dick over to Camberwell on Saturday night to watch the Wallabies not play to their potential for the fourth time in a row. Well, that part wasn't actually in the script, but that's the way it worked out - we had a pleasant enough time nevertheless. The next day the Wordleys (pic 1) who were in town for the Arias, (I wasn't invited - again), took the No. 70 tram to Camberwell to take tea at my humble shack before we all vanned over to Pat Wilson's Fresh @ Elwood to watch Aria Hall of Famers Kerryn Tolhurst and Chris Stockley with Rob Price run over a few tunes in the beer garden. Well, it's a beer garden now - a few years ago when I was playing there it was a courtyard with no licensed bar and virtually no protection from the elements - and barely a soul there. That's all changed and there was a large crowd on hand, including some old friends like Judy Adshead, (pic 2) casting an approving proprietary eye over the trio.
 

1) Hi Ho, Silver Lining, it's the Robbos 2) Chris Wilson and Mia came in a convertible

3) Birthday bloke Jimmie
Jimmie Sloggett's 70th
25.8.09 - The weather had turned quite nasty by the time I left Camberwell for the confusing suburb of Glenhuntly - I've been to Jimmie's place three times now and got lost three times. I had to park about a hundred metres down the street, but I could hear the chatter almost as soon as I got out of the van. Musos. It sounded like a lot of 'em too and Jimmie and Gloria's place is not that big, but when I let myself in the front door I discovered that a marquee had been erected out the back to accommodate the overflow. It was a 'hat' night and there was a range of not-that-silly hats with musos and their wives underneath talking at a hundred decibels. I caught up with Trevor Young's story and of his and Jane's rebuilding their lives subsequent to the fires and of their pet wombat 'It's alright', and I chatted to Chris 'Darkie' Wilson (pic 2) about the Arthurs Creek gig and how we're all going to miss Lil' Fi, and we all sang Happy Birthday to Jimmie - and then I suddenly felt it was time for me and my stetson to leave, so we did..
 

Phew! That could've been me under those bats..
Missed by that much..
21.8.09 -
There's more than one newsagency in Camberwell - in fact, I can think of four off-hand in the immediate vicinity of the Junction - but this one I'm quite familiar with, because I browse there when I can't think of anything else to do while waiting for the No. 70 tram home. I was taking a short-cut to the Post Office through this very newsagency yesterday morning when I happened on this scene of carnage (pic) that I gather had occurred only moments before. The false ceiling, laden with fibre-glass insulation bats, (and only installed six months ago I heard the manager say), has collapsed, and right about where I usually stare distractedly at the music mags rack wondering if it's worth putting on my glasses. How lucky was that?
 

1) Ah, so that's where it went - a Cattapan work in the RACV foyer 2) Tom Gentles is bushwhacked by Mikecam

A brief encounter with Dr Tom Gentles
20.8.09 -
Back in !977, when Tom was just eighteen, he stayed with me and my family in Surrey Hills before embarking on a wider investigation of the planet, so it was good to catch up with him again, albeit ever so briefly, last night in the city. Tom's a paediatric heart specialist from the Auckland Heart Group and acts as a consultant to Australian heart institutions when they run into trouble, so you can see he's highly respected in his profession and has done well with his life in general. He was staying at the RACV, so I took a tram in, and while I was waiting in the foyer I discovered a painting/installation by Jon Cattapan (pic 1) that I thought I'd seen previouly in exhibition, but which must've been commissioned for that particular space - an painter's equivalent of a corporate gig, I guess.
Tom and I wandered down to the Yarra and ended up in the Crown Atrium Bar, where a pianist was playing a grand piano, miked-up to overcome the music emanating from the (famous) Atrium. The cacophonous aural background was discouraging, but we managed some sort of conversation and I caught up with the goings-on in his immediate family, before Tom yawned, (after all, it was after midnight at home), and we plodded back to Flinders St. There we shook hands and he reminded me to send him a copy of the EP before we finally parted company, hopefully to meet again in slightly less than thirty-two years..

 

1) Nik (left) and his trusty lieutenant pretend that I'm not snapping them 2) Dr Wazz in his new Bulleen abode

3) Why you don't want your pic taken at my tram stop..

Yesterday - and other things..
13.8.09 -
A lot of driving yesterday, but all of it necessary. I delivered an order to a website customer in North Balwyn and then dropped some EPs to my mate Nik (pic 1) down at Audiophile, (so that makes two whole shops stocking the thing). Nik was very excited that Gil Matthews had officially requested him to take some photos at the Ross Wilson concert tomorrow night - Aztec is filming the show for a possible DVD.
I then dropped in to see my mate, Dr Wazz, (pic 2) who was very pleased to have scored a job as a research assistant at Latrobe. Wazz's new pad is in Bulleen, just down the road from the Manningham Hotel, so we'll no doubt see him and Marg there on Sunday week..

 
Acceptional..
5.8.09 -
You might be forgiven for thinking that I'd allowed my campaign against thoughtless and sloppy signage to lapse, but the sad truth is that I've rather succumbed to the tide of ineptitude that I'm confronted with on a daily basis and it takes something exceptional.to warrant my highlighting it for my coterie of ASR subscribers. In times of crisis we can always rely on the Post Office to deliver in ways that exceed its traditional mandate and I was particularly struck by this offering (pic) at my local Camberwell branch. Of course, a partially sighted person might struggle to read the sign in the first place, but the clincher is they've got the sign up on the inside of the door..
 
 
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