Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Dec 18

Variety is the spice of life they say. If that's true, I really think I've had enough of curries.

Drove to Dunedin this morning, abandoned mum and dad and went shopping. Good times, wandering round town listening to Kora, chatting to sales assistants. New clothes! Stoked! It's been a while... Hooray for a paying job finally!
Met up with mum and dad for lunch, sat in the sun in the octagon drinking coffee and eating good food, then more wandering around town. The wind was howling a gale but it was a good 30 degrees out... Celcius that is.

Met up with mum and dad again around 2pm. Went up to the crematorium. Dear grandpa arrived in his home made coffin on the back of Kelly's ute. This is the first “funeral” I've ever been to. It consisted of saying hi to my aunt and two uncles, passing the hugs around. It's the first time we've all been in one place in probably 6 years. Then we backed the ute up to the back entrance of the building (grandpa wanted nothing to do with the chapel.) Slid the coffin off and onto a funky motorized table on wheels. Had a chat to the dude working there and watched him open up the kiln and scrape the remains of the last occupant to the end (I saw the head of a femur and half a pelvis still intact) Then the funky motorized table thing fully HURLED the coffin in and sparks flew everywhere until the door came down again. We all peered in a tiny little window on the side at the flames. Auntie Alison took bunch of photos of the whole thing. Everyone had a bit of a weepy moment, more hugs were shared around, then we all got in various vehicles and left. The whole event took twenty minutes. Max.

Mum and dad dropped me back in town about half past three. and I walked up to Fix to meet Tama, a guy I dated for a full three days in 2004. By this I mean we had coffee a couple of times, then he asked me to the movies. The movie was so boring we made out the whole way through. That was Friday. By the following Wednesday he'd stopped speaking to me entirely. This is the first time I've seen him since. Got take away coffees and sat in the park talking for ages, then decided it was too hot and migrated to the pub. Mmmmm Emersons Pilsner. Yum.

Said goodbye around quarter to six and walked back to the other end of town for dinner with the family. Amazing food, good wine, excellent company. (yellow fin tuna steaks. Roast pear, bacon and walnut salad. Italian chocolate torte, macchiato, chardonnay, shiraz.... you get the idea.) Apparently some guy my mum worked with when I was a kid told her I was a Mystic. Cool.

Sat in the back seat on the way back to Lawrence, with my knees pulled up to my chest, staring at the scenery flying past with tears dripping off my chin. Didn't stop crying the whole hour and a quarter long drive. Laughed at myself for being a melodramatic emo kid. You ever get that? Where some part of you is so full of feeling, and another part of you is looking at your behaviour and thinking, “well Fuck this is stupid.”?

Uncle Jack is staying with us. Mum gave him his Christmas present already. An Inflatable leek. He loves it. Yes, my family is WEIRD. Really. (This is the man who gave me two dog bowls with my name on the side in big pink letters. He'd asked me what I wanted and I said, “something I've never had before.” I guess I should be thankful he didn't go with his first suggestion: "How about an octopus down your trousers?" Another year he gave me a block of chocolate and “something to eat it with” - a teaspoon.) No, he's not crazy, he just has way too much fun with life. He is a librarian with a semi automatic rubber band gun.

In summary:
Shopping! YAY!
Funeral. Suck.
Coffee date! Yay!
Dinner. Lovely, but uncomfortably tense and emotional.
Drive home. Sad as fuck.
Tea and inflatable Leeks! Hysterical!

... Can't I just have good days and bad days? These frequent emotional ups and downs are getting too much for me.

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