Friday, September 30, 2011
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
Monday, September 26, 2011
Sunday, September 25, 2011
Saturday, September 24, 2011
Smells like...sex magik?
So this day 20 years ago marks an anniversary for not one awesome reason, but two.
First and foremost Nirvana released their groundbreaking album, Nevermind, and subsequently shot the Seattle grunge movement into the global playing field.
Anyone with half a brain and taste in alternative music is likely to have an opinion on how they felt when they first listened to the album, and i for one am no exception.
Of course being 6 years old at the time, i didnt quite just save my lunch money for months and line up that day at Red Eye Records, spark up a fat blunt and musically dissect it there and then on my walkman (though i must say, that was quite a lot of fun doing that years later)...
No - my first memory of Nirvana was watching Rage, seeing the film clip for Smells Like Teen Spirit and trying to pretend i was one of the docile cheerleaders in the video with some dishtowels.
Needless to say, i was too innocent to understand.
But fast forward 6 years and i was smelling the teen spirit like the rest of the angst ridden grungers that came before me.
The next album that must be mentioned on this glorious day of musical anniversary is Blood Sugar Sex Magik by the Red Hot Chili Peppers.
Fucking fantastic album.
'Nuff said.
It was as if the Gods aligned and conspired to ensure that September 24th 1991 was to be a day of epic proportions for the scene and i am rather grateful they did. Kudos, guys, kudos.
I only wish i was old enough to really grasp the impact those albums had upon their release... though i tend to feel that way about a lot of things and, well, conceptions a bitch.
Nevertheless, 20 years on and i can still safely say both albums are with me for life.
Some songs severly overplayed, yes, but more importantly should never be discredited for mistakes made by commercial radio.
And so, i dedicate this week NEVERMIND, ITS SEX MAGIK! week - and i will provide us all with a little bit of 90's glory every day.
You're welcome.
First and foremost Nirvana released their groundbreaking album, Nevermind, and subsequently shot the Seattle grunge movement into the global playing field.
Anyone with half a brain and taste in alternative music is likely to have an opinion on how they felt when they first listened to the album, and i for one am no exception. Of course being 6 years old at the time, i didnt quite just save my lunch money for months and line up that day at Red Eye Records, spark up a fat blunt and musically dissect it there and then on my walkman (though i must say, that was quite a lot of fun doing that years later)...
No - my first memory of Nirvana was watching Rage, seeing the film clip for Smells Like Teen Spirit and trying to pretend i was one of the docile cheerleaders in the video with some dishtowels.
Needless to say, i was too innocent to understand.
But fast forward 6 years and i was smelling the teen spirit like the rest of the angst ridden grungers that came before me.
The next album that must be mentioned on this glorious day of musical anniversary is Blood Sugar Sex Magik by the Red Hot Chili Peppers.Fucking fantastic album.
'Nuff said.
It was as if the Gods aligned and conspired to ensure that September 24th 1991 was to be a day of epic proportions for the scene and i am rather grateful they did. Kudos, guys, kudos.
I only wish i was old enough to really grasp the impact those albums had upon their release... though i tend to feel that way about a lot of things and, well, conceptions a bitch.
Nevertheless, 20 years on and i can still safely say both albums are with me for life.
Some songs severly overplayed, yes, but more importantly should never be discredited for mistakes made by commercial radio.
And so, i dedicate this week NEVERMIND, ITS SEX MAGIK! week - and i will provide us all with a little bit of 90's glory every day.
You're welcome.
Monday, September 19, 2011
Thursday, September 15, 2011
Monday, September 12, 2011
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Where were you?
I was 16 on September 11th 2001.
I'm fairly sure that before that morning when my mother screamed that America was under attack that she had barely spoken to me since grounding me for my own teenage terrorist actions.
See i was your typical rebelleous rapscallion. Breaking rules, skipping school and just generally doing things that good girls shouldnt. So of course you can imagine my mothers dismay that i had not been at school for 3 months and needless to say i was deserved of the silent treatment.
But that day changed everything.
As we sat in our living room, watching footage of the second plane crashing into the World Trade Centre building, the silence was mutual.
I knew that we were thinking the same thing.
...Why?
In the coming hours, days, years the answers of course became clear... But at that moment, all i could think of was simply... why?
Mind in overdrive, i got ready for school. (Yes, by this stage i was back and under close supervision as if i were the poster girl of wayward girls programs). Images of people jumping out of the flame engulfed building. Sounds of the morning news reporters echoing the same words over and over as if they were also trying to make sense of it all.
I walked to a friends house on the way to school and sat in her living room for what felt like hours. Doing the same thing. Silence.
Already, in my second week of my second chance at school, i was late.
But something told me no one would care this time.
For once i wasnt skipping school to deal with my own problems. For the first time i felt connected to something bigger. Something communal. Something we could all go through together.
But i wasnt about to fuck up again and miss checking in with my probation officer, so off we went to school. But only to a school we had never been to before.
As we walked into the classroom for roll call, we werent met with the usual yells from the teacher that we were tardy. No, this time she was crying silently and her nose buried in a newspaper that looked like it had been read already a hundred times.
Small clusters of groups sitting on top of their desks chatting intermittently through their hands that were covering their mouths with disbelief.
I checked off my name and went and sat with some girls sitting on the steps outside, listening to George Bush address his nation through a small transistor radio. All of us trying to press our ears closer than the others. We still knew nothing.
I looked around at the girls i was sitting with.
They were hardly people i called friends. In fact, im sure most of them barely knew each others names. But there we were, huddled together on that overcast day, hanging on every word we heard and holding each other.
I remember thinking to myself what it would of been like being a schoolgirl when World War 2 broke out. Listening to a transistor radio. Waiting for war.
I remember thinking what it would be like at that moment if this tragedy happened in our own backyard. Sure we were all far enough removed from the situation, but the fact is that whether we realised it or not we were all involved somehow.
When the most powerful country in the world is attacked, you cant help but feel that your own world feels a little less safe. A little less sure. A little less right.
And at our impressionable age, who had never experienced anything like this before, acting like we knew it all (as most sixteen year olds do) suddenly didnt apply anymore.
As the bell rang, and we filed ourselves into the quadrangle for recess, we saw another sight we didnt wish to see that day.
Joy.
A small group of students were clapping and chanting 'Down with America!' and throwing out other ignorant obscenities that shall remain unsaid here.
I couldnt believe how anyone, regardless of race, religion or political persuasion, could be celebrating death of such magnitude with such blantant disregard of humanity.
Images of the people jumping from the burning tower ran through my mind again as i watched them drumming happily on upturned rubbish bins.
Some other students werent as reflective as i and took their emotions also to the next level and inevitably fights ensued.
As i watched silently while an army of teachers pulled them apart, dragging the offenders into the assembly hall kicking and screaming, the symbolic irony of the whole situation became clear to me.
This wasnt just about the skin layer of the days events:
The planes.
The towers.
The destruction.
The death.
This was something buried deep in the core of what some people in this world stand for.
Us.
and Them.
These students, dominantly Islamic, were celebrating in revenge for their own battles they felt had to be fought through this event. I doubted afterwards whether they even realised the broader nature of their actions in further segregating themselves as a minority in our community, but i can see why they did as it is stereotypically what the world expected.
Following the attack on America as we all saw in the media, the gap certainly grew between Western and Middle Eastern cultures. Though this is a subject for an entirely different post.
Needless to say, this day forced me to open my eyes that litle bit more, and the world got more complicated from then on. But strangely and selfishly, im glad it did.
"9/11" changed me. And im not ashamed to say it.
I didnt know anybody who was there. I didnt know anybody who knew anybody that was there. I wasnt covered in ash or watching the smoke rise from a highschool in New York City.
I was a young girl in a highschool in Birrong, Australia whose life events up until that point revolved only within my circle. I felt i had lived too long in the walls surrounding me and was growing out of them. Desperate to escape and craved for more. And that day opened up a whole other facet of the world i didnt know existed yet.
And it taught me many valuable lessons.
Too many in fact to go into great detail here for fear of boring you all any further.
But one of which (the segway to the personal ramblings of paragraphs passed) was that i finally understood where my mother was coming from.
If i can ask myself why people could inflict terror on the world, or terror in the playground, how am i any less guilty of inflicting unnecessary terror at home?
Now of course the scales are vastly different, but that is besides the point i am making.
As i said one of the valuable lessons i learned was that love and understanding has to start at home. And to gain respect, one must earn it.
As i went home to my mother that evening, i let my own walls down and down they stayed.
My superficial war of adolescence came to an end and amnesty was gained.
The world was in shock that day. And ten years on the remnants are still there. To those who lost their loved ones it will probably always stay.
But personally it changed me for the better.
I gained ultimate clarity from something so surreal.
And i could be guilty about that.
But im not.
Because 9/11 definitely had a small part in who i am today as a 26 year old.
Still in Birrong, but in a wider world.
I'm fairly sure that before that morning when my mother screamed that America was under attack that she had barely spoken to me since grounding me for my own teenage terrorist actions.
See i was your typical rebelleous rapscallion. Breaking rules, skipping school and just generally doing things that good girls shouldnt. So of course you can imagine my mothers dismay that i had not been at school for 3 months and needless to say i was deserved of the silent treatment.
But that day changed everything.
As we sat in our living room, watching footage of the second plane crashing into the World Trade Centre building, the silence was mutual.
I knew that we were thinking the same thing.
...Why?
In the coming hours, days, years the answers of course became clear... But at that moment, all i could think of was simply... why?
Mind in overdrive, i got ready for school. (Yes, by this stage i was back and under close supervision as if i were the poster girl of wayward girls programs). Images of people jumping out of the flame engulfed building. Sounds of the morning news reporters echoing the same words over and over as if they were also trying to make sense of it all.
I walked to a friends house on the way to school and sat in her living room for what felt like hours. Doing the same thing. Silence.
Already, in my second week of my second chance at school, i was late.
But something told me no one would care this time.
For once i wasnt skipping school to deal with my own problems. For the first time i felt connected to something bigger. Something communal. Something we could all go through together.
But i wasnt about to fuck up again and miss checking in with my probation officer, so off we went to school. But only to a school we had never been to before.
As we walked into the classroom for roll call, we werent met with the usual yells from the teacher that we were tardy. No, this time she was crying silently and her nose buried in a newspaper that looked like it had been read already a hundred times.
Small clusters of groups sitting on top of their desks chatting intermittently through their hands that were covering their mouths with disbelief.
I checked off my name and went and sat with some girls sitting on the steps outside, listening to George Bush address his nation through a small transistor radio. All of us trying to press our ears closer than the others. We still knew nothing.
I looked around at the girls i was sitting with.
They were hardly people i called friends. In fact, im sure most of them barely knew each others names. But there we were, huddled together on that overcast day, hanging on every word we heard and holding each other.
I remember thinking to myself what it would of been like being a schoolgirl when World War 2 broke out. Listening to a transistor radio. Waiting for war.
I remember thinking what it would be like at that moment if this tragedy happened in our own backyard. Sure we were all far enough removed from the situation, but the fact is that whether we realised it or not we were all involved somehow.
When the most powerful country in the world is attacked, you cant help but feel that your own world feels a little less safe. A little less sure. A little less right.
And at our impressionable age, who had never experienced anything like this before, acting like we knew it all (as most sixteen year olds do) suddenly didnt apply anymore.
As the bell rang, and we filed ourselves into the quadrangle for recess, we saw another sight we didnt wish to see that day.
Joy.
A small group of students were clapping and chanting 'Down with America!' and throwing out other ignorant obscenities that shall remain unsaid here.
I couldnt believe how anyone, regardless of race, religion or political persuasion, could be celebrating death of such magnitude with such blantant disregard of humanity.
Images of the people jumping from the burning tower ran through my mind again as i watched them drumming happily on upturned rubbish bins.
Some other students werent as reflective as i and took their emotions also to the next level and inevitably fights ensued.
As i watched silently while an army of teachers pulled them apart, dragging the offenders into the assembly hall kicking and screaming, the symbolic irony of the whole situation became clear to me.
This wasnt just about the skin layer of the days events:
The planes.
The towers.
The destruction.
The death.
This was something buried deep in the core of what some people in this world stand for.
Us.
and Them.
These students, dominantly Islamic, were celebrating in revenge for their own battles they felt had to be fought through this event. I doubted afterwards whether they even realised the broader nature of their actions in further segregating themselves as a minority in our community, but i can see why they did as it is stereotypically what the world expected.
Following the attack on America as we all saw in the media, the gap certainly grew between Western and Middle Eastern cultures. Though this is a subject for an entirely different post.
Needless to say, this day forced me to open my eyes that litle bit more, and the world got more complicated from then on. But strangely and selfishly, im glad it did.
"9/11" changed me. And im not ashamed to say it.
I didnt know anybody who was there. I didnt know anybody who knew anybody that was there. I wasnt covered in ash or watching the smoke rise from a highschool in New York City.
I was a young girl in a highschool in Birrong, Australia whose life events up until that point revolved only within my circle. I felt i had lived too long in the walls surrounding me and was growing out of them. Desperate to escape and craved for more. And that day opened up a whole other facet of the world i didnt know existed yet.
And it taught me many valuable lessons.
Too many in fact to go into great detail here for fear of boring you all any further.
But one of which (the segway to the personal ramblings of paragraphs passed) was that i finally understood where my mother was coming from.
If i can ask myself why people could inflict terror on the world, or terror in the playground, how am i any less guilty of inflicting unnecessary terror at home?
Now of course the scales are vastly different, but that is besides the point i am making.
As i said one of the valuable lessons i learned was that love and understanding has to start at home. And to gain respect, one must earn it.
As i went home to my mother that evening, i let my own walls down and down they stayed.
My superficial war of adolescence came to an end and amnesty was gained.
The world was in shock that day. And ten years on the remnants are still there. To those who lost their loved ones it will probably always stay.
But personally it changed me for the better.
I gained ultimate clarity from something so surreal.
And i could be guilty about that.
But im not.
Because 9/11 definitely had a small part in who i am today as a 26 year old.
Still in Birrong, but in a wider world.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
The Marriage of Heaven & Hell
Drive your cart and your plow over the bones of the dead.
The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.
Prudence is a rich ugly old maid courted by Incapacity.
He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence.
The cut worm forgives the plow.
Dip him in the river who loves water.
A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.
He whose face gives no light, shall never become a star.
Eternity is in love with the productions of time.
The busy bee has no time for sorrow.
The hours of folly are measur'd by the clock, but of wisdom: no clock can measure.
All wholsom food is caught without a net or a trap.
Bring out number weight & measure in a year of dearth.
No bird soars too high, if he soars with his own wings.
A dead body, revenges not injuries.
The most sublime act is to set another before you.
If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise.
Folly is the cloke of knavery.
Shame is Prides cloke.
Prisons are built with stones of Law, Brothels with bricks of Religion.
The pride of the peacock is the glory of God.
The lust of the goat is the bounty of God.
The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God.
The nakedness of woman is the work of God.
Excess of sorrow laughs. Excess of joy weeps.
The roaring of lions, the howling of wolves, the raging of the stormy sea, and the destructive sword, are portions of eternity too great for the eye of man.
The fox condemns the trap, not himself.
Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth.
Let man wear the fell of the lion, woman the fleece of the sheep.
The bird a nest, the spider a web, man friendship.
The selfish smiling fool, & the sullen frowning fool, shall be both thought wise, that they may be a rod.
What is now proved was once, only imagin'd.
The rat, the mouse, the fox, the rabbit: watch the roots; the lion, the tyger, the horse, the elephant, watch the fruits.
The cistern contains; the fountain overflows.
One thought, fills immensity.
Always be ready to speak your mind, and a base man will avoid you.
Every thing possible to be believ'd is an image of truth.
The eagle never lost so much time, as when he submitted to learn of the crow.
The fox provides for himself, but God provides for the lion.
Think in the morning. Act in the noon. Eat in the evening. Sleep in the night.
He who has suffer'd you to impose on him knows you.
As the plow follows words, so God rewards prayers.
The tygers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction.
Expect poison from the standing water.
You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough.
Listen to the fools reproach! it is a kingly title!
The eyes of fire, the nostrils of air, the mouth of water, the beard of earth.
The weak in courage is strong in cunning.
The apple tree never asks the beech how he shall grow, nor the lion, the horse, how he shall take his prey.
The thankful reciever bears a plentiful harvest.
If others had not been foolish, we should be so.
The soul of sweet delight, can never be defil'd.
When thou seest an Eagle, thou seest a portion of Genius, lift up thy head!
As the catterpiller chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, so the priest lays his curse on the fairest joys.
To create a little flower is the labour of ages.
Damn, braces: Bless relaxes.
The best wine is the oldest, the best water the newest.
Prayers plow not! Praises reap not!
Joys laugh not! Sorrows weep not!
The head Sublime, the heart Pathos, the genitals Beauty, the hands & feet Proportion.
As the air to a bird of the sea to a fish, so is contempt to the contemptible.
The crow wish'd every thing was black, the owl, that every thing was white.
Exuberance is Beauty.
If the lion was advised by the fox, he would be cunning.
Improvement makes strait roads, but the crooked roads without Improvement, are roads of Genius.
Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires.
Where man is not nature is barren.
Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believ'd.
Enough! or Too much!
From: William Blake's 'The Marriage of Heaven & Hell', 1790
Monday, September 5, 2011
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Happy Fathers Day, Pop.
My hero and the man i look up to.
Who loves me even when i plant the gardenias wrong.
I love you.
Saturday, September 3, 2011
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