the sound of green

Back in October last year, an event took place that changed the lives of both Beth and I. And our housemate. And our parents. It changed the lives of a lot of people - Beth and I got married. However, according to this blog, that event never happened. Somewhere in around that time there was the unfortunate loss of a certain server that hosted both my work site and this blog, and much to everyone’s chagrin, no one had a backup. Myself included.

At that wedding, we had a page boy. His name is Jack. He was undoubtedly the world’s cutest page boy, albeit a slightly uncooperative one. Jack’s parents are great friends of ours, ones we made a trip to Thailand earlier in 2007 with. What we found out after the wedding, however, made life a little more exciting - they were expecting another bub. Fast-forward the better part of 6 months, and bub was due. Beth had been the first to see Jack after he was born, and was adamant that we’d be the first to see the new bub. And we were - and welcome little Oliver into the world.

Since then it’s been something of an experience for me. I’ve never been around a newborn this much, nor been as close to the parents of one either. And while admittedly that will change (housemates are expecting their first early November), it’s been a great time getting to know little Oliver. And, more importantly, taking photos. Because when he’s this cute, you just can’t help it.

… Things will be a bit quiet around here. Why? It’s Olympics time.

Yes, I am one of those people, who camps out in front of the TV as much as possible once every four years (or three times every two years, if you count Commonwealth Games and Winter Olympics). I love the competition, I love the fact that the world comes together for 16 days, I love watching (most) of the different sports. And so far I’m keeping it contained enough to not annoy my wife.

I’ll be back later.

Inspired by the recent reoganisation of our living areas at home, as well as the colleague who currently  has a completely spotless desk, I decided to eat up some work time by rearranging my desk.

Not that there was anything wrong with it before, let me  tell you. In fact, it was quite a nice, homely little desk that was very functionable - let’s just not look behind where my laptop and monitor sit, to see the mess of cables and inches of dust. However, this new desk is so much more. It’s comforting. It’s inviting. It wraps around you and coccoons you in a way that makes you feel like you’re floating along in streams of mindless bliss. It’s solved my picking-phone-up-with-wrong-hand issues. It’s solved my not-enough-free-space issues. But it’s left me one glaring issue.

What do I do with all this extra space?

I never new that moving a telephone could make such a difference to the feeling of a desk, but amazingly it has (the cleaning probably helped).

There is now so much empty space to my right, which will come in handy when it hits crunch time with the three or four major projects I have coming my way very soon. And hopefully will be a nice little resting place for a certain figurine I’m planning on.

But for now it will have to sit unadorned, until I can fill it with drafts and page trees and piles upon piles of proofs.

Over the weekend, I managed to pick up my camera in a non-work environment for the first time in a long time. While I’d shot a few frames over our stay in the Sofitel, it was quite shooting purely for the enjoyment.

Saturday night I grabbed the 50mm and started with the closest subject I had - Zahli. May quickly joined us, and although I rue using my camera at more than 800ISO, I just had to bite my tongue and deal with the noise. It was worth it - and I had no option.

The situation repeated itself Sunday afternoon, once more grabbing the camera and shooting away with the puppies. I sorted through the photos that night, putting a whole lot online, and came across a realisation as I did so.

The term fur child gets used a bit, and previously I’d shrugged it off. But I don’t really think that’s entirely true. Considering I spent a couple of hours sorting through all of the photos of her to find some recent ones, uploaded them to flickr while Beth added them on facebook, and I updated her facebook page, it became pretty obvious.

She’s our baby, there’s no denying it.

It’s 9:25am, and I’m sitting at the glass-topped desk in our luxuriously appointed corner suite, 43 storeys above the ground. In the Sofitel. Jealous, much?

For Beth’s birthday, she forewent any traditional wrapped-in-paper type presents, and instead wanted a night out in the city. Staying in classy hotels is somewhat of a hobby of ours, even if it’s something we can’t indulge in quite as frequently as we would like. This place, however, has to top the list of any hotel we’ve stayed in.

Walking into the lobby downstairs instantly raises your class factor. The place announces style, from the furniture to the fittings – even to the shaped ceiling lights. Walking in, all my dreams of being a person of standing, spending their time in such establishments were realised in a small way – I feel immediately cooler just standing there. And that was before we saw our suite.

The corner room offers 180° view of the city skyline and Port Phillip Bay. Our south-east facing suite enabled us to see from Kew, down the Yarra, and straight out the Port Melbourne – Station Pier is as far as we can see. In between we have uninterrupted views of all of Richmond, the sports complexes of the MCG, Rod Laver and Vodaphone Arenas, Olympic Park, and – much to Beth’s delight – the ferris wheel in Birrarung Marr.

Automatic lighting greeted our arrival, with the entry and bathroom lighting up as we walked in. A lounge setting of 2.5 seater and two armchairs take up half the room, with this desk tucked away to one side. The other half of the room is dominated by a 42” plasma screen on the wall, and the world’s comfiest king-size bed.

If that bed could fold, it’d be in our suitcase.

In all the hotels we’ve stayed in before, their version of a king-size bed has always filled a certain criteria of practicality – it was always two single beds held together with king-size sheets. Finally, and to much excited discovery, we’ve found a bed that is an actual king size bed. Equipped with down pillows and doona, lying in that bed is a little piece of heaven. Overnight, neither of us felt the other move, and for the first time in a long time, I slept in any position in total comfort – it conforms to your body as you move, yet offers complete support the whole time.

These beds are for sale, apparently. Those of us wanting to can have our own little piece of the Sofitel and sleep in such comfort every night. And while I dare not look at the price tag, if we someday find ourselves willing, I’d more than happy buy one. For now, we’ll have to settle in and enjoy it for the remaining hours.

Breakfast is on its way up, which I’m sure will continue to impress as everything else has. There such a level of class here that blows away every other hotel I’ve stayed in, and I’m not sure I want to ever go back.

—

Note: Breakfast arrived, much to our absolute delight. None of the typical covered plates. Try a table wheeled in that folds out, already set, with an actual toaster to make our own toast – no more cold, dry toast. And our hot food? In a heat box that sits under the table, keeping it all warm and fresh for the trip straight from the kitchen to our room. Seriously. I want to live here.

It’s cold in here today. The heating shuts off over the weekend, and when I arrived at 7:15am, it was still freezing inside. It was a bad sign when I got into the lift and didn’t immediately feel the urge to shed my outer layer.

I spoke to Jon in the kitchen as we fetched our respective breakfasts, the sun coming up outside the windows. Apparently the heating doesn’t switch on until 7am, and for some reason it was taking a long time to kick in today. Throughout the next hour there was some noise and excitement as air started to flow from the vents, and for a while it did start to heat up. However, it’s now after 1pm, and I’m still wearing my hoodie (usually off by at least 10am), and I’m even feeling cold. Thankfully, my MacBook Pro puts out some significant heat, and I’m able to keep my fingers warm. However, none of this was the reason I started writing.

Every so often, I’ve come across a certain comic that does make me smile. However, today I stumbled upon it once more, and this time it stuck. It’s quirky, it’s occasionally off-beat, but it does ring true about photography and other subjects it touches on. And it has ducks.

I present to you What The Duck.

The bottle of Solo in my fridge was tonight telling me to not miss out on a chance to enter their awesome competition, in which I could win a fishing trip with Andrew “Roy” Symonds, of the Australian Cricket Team - in their aptly named Rod, Reel & Roy.

Unfortunately, upon reading the fine print, Roy’s not guaranteed. In fact, the whole Roy component depends on you picking the right date. And don’t even think of trying to pick a date over summer. Usually two out of three wouldn’t be bad. But in this case… It just doesn’t even come close.

Monday saw me spending the second half of the day driving around on assignment, from Berwick to Albert Park and back again. Throw in Heathmont for some good measure.

Today, however, sees me gracing the suburbs of Pascoe Vale, Sunshine, Glen Waverley and - wait for it - Millgrove. Yes, that Millgrove, the one next door to Warburton.

It’s going to be a long day in the saddle.

After weeks of talking about the football with my father-in-law, and hearing about how his beloved Richmond Tigers were (or weren’t, to be more precise) faring, we decided to head to the Richmond v Essendon game on Saturday. Both of us brought our wives, which was a good distraction in the end, because had it been just the two of us, I don’t know how I would have handled the result.

Over the past several years, I’ve become increasingly less and less of an interested Essendon fan - to the point where I can’t tell you who they’ve played, which games are coming up, and can only tell you whether they win or not due to the office footy tipping competition. However, take me to a game, and I’ll get well and truly into it again (it just may take me a while to get warmed up).

I will admit I was confidant. I was hoping we could continue the streak, and when in the start of the third quarter we kicked five goals straight, I was very pleased. However, to be pipped at the line (so to speak) by some very inaccurate kicking, was not a good feeling. That and the three Richmond supporters I was with.

One of the best selling points of my job has to be the fact that my hours are fairly flexible - and flexibly in a way that I determine. There has never been a discussion from either my supervisor or manager about what days I should work (my contract is currently for 0.8 - looking to go 1.0 next year), nor that it would be ’suggested’ that I work on certain days. To be entirely honest, on paper it would make sense for me to work Tuesdays of all days, as most of the field staff are in the office then, and it would mean that coordinating and designing their print jobs would be a lot easier than trading emails. However, Beth’s RDO is Tuesday, so I deliberately work every other day. I had total power over setting when I worked.

The continuing aspect of that flexibility is juggling hours around in my weekly schedule. If I need to stay late to finish a job that’s urgent (most of my work is deadline work), I take some time off later in the week. Or if I need to leave early one day, I work later another day. Today’s been one of those days. Friday my Mum is flying off to Malaysia (to continue her jetsetting ways during her long service leave), and as we haven’t had a chance to see her before she goes, the plan is to meet her out at the airport before she boards her plane, perhaps fit some lunch in. All it meant was a bit more work today.

The kicker? I left for work at 6:50am this morning, while it was still pitch black. And I got home at 6:02pm as the final vestiges of the day faded from the sky. With no window visible from my desk, it’s kinda weird not seeing the sun.