one of the things that my one counselling session taught me was that i too often over book myself monday to friday and then spend weekends at home thinking i have no friends. but not doing anything about it. it is my form of being socially spastic.

but it doesn't happen every weekend.

this weekend was all highlights, all the time.

i should probably start with blackalicious.

fifteen out of ten. it was off the charts. or off the hook. or whatever the young kids say. i know i'm old cos i turned up two hours early for the show. but pay off! cos i also got to be pretty close to the front when blackalicious came on stage and - after getting caught literally in the middle of a fight - i heard opportunity knock and found a posie right at the front. close enough to get serenaded by gift of gab during some love song i didn't know. and at some point in the song we locked eyes and he pointed at me at the part in the lyrics where he says "you complete me" (this may not literally have been the words but it was the subtext). i have thought about it since, and i should have stayed for the after party. but if i did i probably would have hooked in to gift of gab. on the plus side he is tall and famous, on the down side i'm more into his home boy lyrics born, and i also plan to marry kanye west or simon le bon.

on saturday, i day dreamed about what my life would have been like if i'd succumbed to the obvious chemistry. but mostly i distracted myself with an art gallery tour of wellington. the dowse for craft 2.0 (and some stationery. have i mentioned i heart stationery?) and pataka for the patricia grace related exhibition.

i heart craft 2.0. but there seemed to be fewer people there this time. not that i ever notice the people really. only when they get in the way of me and notecards. the sun was a plus and there were even stalls OUTSIDE. just like a summer market.

i also heart pataka. they have a shantytown you know!!!! you must check it out. if only for the shop window display....

what the???

there is also an exhibition of photos by my favourite photographer ever. desiree dolron. check out the pataka website here for clues at how awesome she is. or deireee dolron dot com here.

being cultured is exhausting though so i had to have lots of pit stops for coffee, tea, berry crepes and fruit toast (the latter coming from the aunt daisy cafe in titahi bay, 8/10 for decor).

in the evening i went to 24hr pp. and it was awesome.

have i told you i'm so in to robert palmer right now? this outfit was loosely inspired by the simply irresistable girls. plus with a lime green bow how can you go wrong?

i had sore feet so was waiting for sux, or less good songs, but finding a chance to sit down was impossible. as i tried new dance moves (more twirls and footwork as well as some bgirl fusion - adapted from blackalicious the night before). hrc and i also got to dance with some of our favourite dancefloor celebrities as well as adopting a new friend for the evening who knew almost as many words as i do. almost. luckily the verve was played at some point and i had an excuse to leave. that point didn't come until after three sometime.

then this morning i went to the zoo zoo zoo with ryles. he was less interested in the animals than in pretending to be one. there was a heartbreakingly cute moment where he saw three otters lying in the sun and he demanded that he be put inside their enclosure so he could play with them. i could understand that. otters look like they would be wonderful to play with. he ws disappointed when i wouldn't lift him up. and when i said that if anyone was getting otter hugs it was me. but i handled the resulting tantrum the way any good aunt does. with ice cream.

then i spent the rest of the day watching dvds and trying to rest up for the working week. i watched the original (not harrison ford remake) of sabrina (7/10 overall, but 10/10 for the wardrobe and for audrey hepburn's eyebrows), and pillow talk with doris day (7.5 for the movie, 12/10 for rock hudson for being dreamy).

too tired to be original, i'll begin by repeating my facebook status update... "[i] can't remember being warm". i am being quite literal.

i am in bed because i once watched a movie at school on the evils of tramping and the voiceover said that if you were getting hypothermic you should get in your sleeping bag. i figure getting in to bed with your electric blanket on full would be the same thing. but actually as i type i am wondering if i will get frostbite on my fingers. plus even with the trusty leckie blankie, and thermals, i wouldn't say that i was warm exactly.

you know who else has been cold? ernest henry shackleton.

hello, i'm sir ernest henry shackleton. trying to cross the antarctic on foot was COLD.

i know this because i've seen an episode of shackleton the tv show. he and i have another thing in common too - we are both explorers. for shackleton, it was polar exploration. for me, it is the following....

• board games. this week i played settlers with the ships and something or other extender pack. not all explorations are successful, but like shackleton it is how i recover that sets me apart from my peers. in other words, i lost big time. but i'll bounce back.
• parties. i went to the matariki ball at te papa on friday night. if you went to law school with me you were probably there. everyone else was. it was a bit lame though. so the big discovery was it isn't only in highschool where balls fail to deliver.
• baked potatoes at midnight espresso. friggen delicious, even if at the time i was disappointed because i wanted them to reopen the kitchen to make me a ham, cheese and onion toasted sandwich.
  
• dancing to interpol. so, yeah, i've done this before. but at 24 hour party people on saturday night i may have even beaten my own record of awesomeness in interpol dancing. also i co-discovered the new best male dancer at 24hrpp... yellow pants. that's our nickname for him anyway. as john travolta to disco, so yellow pants to brit pop. basically.
• pineapple fritters and red bean jelly at dragons yum char. both were too sweet. but both were new and exciting. dragons yum char was just so efficiently run too. apart from no mango jelly it was the near perfect 24hrpp recovery breakfast.
• bagladeshi cinema. i went to see bricklane tonight. so sure, it was from the UK, but you get what i mean. i needed to go to the bathroom from half way through. which may have reduced my enjoyment somewhat. pretty good. maybe 6/10. if slow moving pieces that make comment on the crazy times post 9-11 this could be your cup of tea so you'd probably rate it higher. what stopped me rating it higher was the weird flashbacks and arty shots and not enough screen time for the younger male lead REOW.
  

see, shackleton and me, not too dissimilar. and actually, after starting with my facebook status, i now might have to end by changing my facebook status line. because i'm starting to defrost and i no longer fear frost bite. i knew the leckie blanket wouldn't let me down. i'm sorry i ever doubted it.

since the whole cat incident my easter weekend has improved. i spent friday doing laundry, which obviously is an improvement on the cat. and watching so you think you can dance. my quest to bring tele back continues.

saturday i just about passed out from exhaustion numerous times. i went to craft two point oh where i saw about eight million things i wanted to buy. i restricted myself though. because i'm going to vietnam in under a week. i will hold off buying unnecessaries until then. i couldn't resist the cupcakes however. and got a sugar rush and a headache immediately after.

i also did my new favourite saturday activity: la cloche followed by playing with the puppies at animates. rounded out by a trip to the supermarket and looking for trendy but unrequired homewears at nood, my day just kind of evaporated.

then i went to the palliser hotel. the what? exactly. some of my readers will appreciate that. anyway, it doesn't have a website but since i'm evidently all about links today, try this. it was for my cousin's 21st. the theme was black and white....



and my cousin did the mtv standard birthday party appearance dressed in red. so super sweet sixteenth. there was lots of food. and speeches. and singing (they even sang my favourite song of childhood) and some fights. i even went to break up the fight i saw. the three taekwon do lessons i had that time have made me cocky. but there was no need as my cousin got there first to do same.

after speeches, pavlova and some dancing i left to head back to town for 24 hour party people. i was just about dead on my feet by that point. in part because instead of wearing sneakers, which would have been sensible, i was wearing black girl shoes to match my black and white outfit. my feet just about fell off. and my eyes were just about permanently closed. but i managed to dance up a storm to the arcade fire and interpol in particular, but to most of the awesome music generally. and my favourite barman was there. and he recognised me. it really must be love.

but even that adrenaline couldn't keep me on the dancefloor after two thirty. by which time the line to get in was metres and metres long.

yesterday i brunched at the recovery room, where i was also recognised by staff. i am such the girl about town. then AL and i read fashion and gossip mags at scorching bay where we could feel the jealousy of everyone else at the beach who wished they were us on our pink beach chairs. i also got to play cards with my family and eat a sunday roast care of my mother.

today though is when it starts going bad again. today i'm trying to get a bit of work done. i just have a few things i want to finish off before vietnam. damned sense of responsibility. it is so lame. i wish i could be more devil-may-care. anyway, so far i've put in about thirty seconds. i have spent the bulk of my time being an excellent aunt at the swimming pool and shopping for new slippers at the warehouse (what happened to the reserve i displayed at craft two point oh i wonder?).

oh and it is my birthday this week. i've put some energy into pretending it isn't real. but i am starting to come to grips with it. it being old age obviously. maybe the black cat that attacked me was just the shadow of old age rather than the shadow of death as i first predicted.

i can remember exactly when i decided my life's ambition was dancing to interpol. i was standing on the dance floor at 24hr party people and heinrich maneuver came on and i realised at that exact moment that it was more than a good song. it was my FAVOURITE SONG OF ALL TIME. of course i have had about fifty 'favourite songs of all time' since then.

then i went to new york and discovered that i would miss seeing interpol play there by a matter of days. and i was heart broken. making my desire all the more intense etc...

and thursday night: dream came true.

they played the auckland town hall. and the line to get in (if you had tickets) was about a hundred metres down the street. due to the most inefficient wrist banding of all time. EVER.

anyway, the queue meant i got in about five mintues before interpol came on. ie perfect. (btw pre interpol snack: kura on queen st, recommended).

the man from world who sold me my new skirt (confession, i've been spending like money grows on trees) was there. i am madly in love with him obviously. so avoided his gaze. then i realised it might not have been the world guy. because auckland is full of attractive, tall, well dressed camp men.

anyway interpol came on. and they rocked my world. i sang along until at one point my throat felt raw. and i danced as much as i could, but was restricted by the making out couple to my right. bloody february 14. bloody st valentine. auckland goes for vd in a big way. it is one of auckland's less charming qualities.

at the door i lied and said i didn't have my camera. but just as well i did. here is the only photo i took.... f0r a beautiful moment the crowd parted and i could see paul banks.

the band are not really charasmatic crowd engagers in between songs. but they are awesome. and i would rather powerful music than witty banter from a band (pj harvey's banter was one of the low lights of her concert for me, for example). and they played nearly every one of my favourites. NYC may have made it into my top five interpol songs based on thursday's performance. and evil was awesome as you'd expect. and rest my chemistry... i don't have the words.

the review in the herald said they played no i in threesome. which is my actual FAVOURITE SONG OF ALL TIME. but i must have passed out from how good it was. cos i don't remember it.

but i remember every other moment. vividly. and will be reliving it for months to come. i just can't get enough of intepol right now.

tonight i watched casablanca. this is a still from a scene in the movie...


it was the second in the classic movies series. last week was the first. gone with the wind. it is going to be pretty hard to top. but anyway, casablanca was good. some viewers even liked it more. not me, i would still marry rhett butler in a heartbeat.

but rick is a bit of all right.

anyway speaking of which, even though it isn't a new year's resolution as such this year is the year of getting ON the beer goggles. well, sort of. this year i am going to grow to love martini's if it kills me and i shall drink them at every opportunity.

except when i don't feel like it. like last night. i went to 24hr party people. which anyone who even glanced at this blog last year knows is just about my favourite night of the month (or two month period, since it is roughly once every two months). i was sleepy and more in the mood for coffee than martini. i settled on cranberry. and even though i was sleepy i danced like a maniac maniac on the floor. but i'm the first to admit i wasn't the most maniacal. that award goes to the chick who often shows up in her floral leggings and swim suit. she was there again last night. in all her high kick glory. oh also i had to retire injured. this dude from work jumped on my heel. it wasn't his fault as such - only in that he wrongly thought he was jumping straight up and down when really he was all over the place and often that meant banging in to me. i told him off and then he said sorry. anyway sorry didn't stop the bruising buddy. but whatevs, i'm over it.

speaking of being over it... the heat! i am basically sitting on my fan in an attempt to cool down. so far... limited success. but i feel super guilty for resenting the heat, given that i spend seven months of the year cursing the cold. so on second thoughts: heat - bring it on.

my heart is full. basically because i've had the time of my life this weekend.

first i got to eat homemade and organic pancakes (well the blueberries were organic, not sure about the rest) and drink tonnes of coffee at the ex internet dater's love nest on saturday. best start to the weekend ever. over the coffee i realised i had no life plan. which was initially a bit shocking but then when i got home i watched three hours straight of gilmore season six instead of doing laundry and i noticed that rory gilmore also has no life plan but she's going about finding a life plan all wrong. ie with logan and not jess. so i felt like i wasn't so bad afterall.

then i spent like five years getting dressed to go to 24 hour party people. i am all about functional clothes but for some reason i decided to wear like a million layers. because that's what you need when you're dancing - to be dressed for sub zero conditions.

as a warm up for 24hrpp i went to hrc's house and we watched the special features on the 90210 (season 2) dvd if you recall i've already watched them but they were AT LEAST AS FUNNY the second time around. probably because nothing is funnier than how brandon thinks menial labour is righteous.

speaking of righteous: 24 hr pp. i don't even want to talk about it because it was so awesome. and i'm someone who basically passed in the middle missing my favourite song a design for life. i think it is hilarious how i spent the entire nineties avoiding manic street preachers and now when that song comes on - BLISS OUT.

and at the same time the song was playing and i was lying on a table on the balcony with my head next to a dirty ash tray i got hit on twice. that's right, i was looking so hot in my millions of layers that boys couldn't help themselves. which is super frustrating cos usually i put so much effort into looking kempt or whatnot but apparently all i need to do is look like i'm about to pass out. boys are an enigma. or simple. one or t'other.

after i'd upped my sugar levels and rested in the relative cool of midnight espresso i returned triumphantly to the dancefloor where i was basically given the eye a million times. but then it was also odd because i thought everyone thought hrc and i were lesbian lovers. due to the way she wore a tie and how every two seconds we had to whisper in eachothers ears. but the whispers were always about one of three things: how much we love whatever song was playing, how awesome the night was or how we could get into photos. there was another line of whispering, all about how one of our favourite dancers was talking to us like we were his new besties. but when i say us, i really mean me, because hello he didn't say a word to hrc.

anyway, danced, drank water, took off more than half of my clothes. and lasted til the end when i went home and started taking photos of myself so i could see what was so hot about me that boys couldn't resist themselves (and girls too actually, we were hit on by everyone).


i think it must have been the blue bow (which you can make out if you look hard). which was a gift from the ex internet dater. which is like how this post began. what a well rounded entry.

i bet that you look good on the dancefloor....


you'd be right. and at last i have photographic evidence of the fact. my new nikon is pocketsized which meant that i could take photos and videos of me dancing my heart out.



and that is like at two in the morning too. look how serene i am when i'm in my natural habitat. but note too many girls crowding me. i almost basically got into a fight with a drunk woman who kept stomping on me with her awful boots. and then banging in to me and drinking my water just cos it was there. she had a sense of entitlement i didn't appreciate. she literally asked if i would hit her. i was like (a) i doubt it and (b) i battle on the dancefloor honey.

despite what the photo shows there were lots of boys there. which is in contrast to the last similar event i went to where there were lots of mature men. dancing and 'whatnot'. a happy medium would be better. late twenties, hot, single. as opposed to the nineteen and hot or the 45 and not. anyway i was there for the music.


we don't talk about love, we only want to get drunk....

before 24 hour party people, i went to the cross to spend my bar tab from the quiz earlier in the week. the money was spent on the first drink a cosmopolitan.

the adorable barman was there and he adorably spilt the second cocktail we ordered all over his pants. adorable. i would have married him right there.


eyes without a face....

and here is my parting photo for you. which is evidence of the fact that in four in the morning simply pushing the shoot button on the camera is an achievement. this late night selfie was the best of about thirty. but that's what is good about me (apart from my dancing skills) i'm not afraid of public and late night self portraiture.