…Smile

1. Rumour has it… It’s 22 degrees today and word on Meteorology Street is Sydney’s in for an early and warm spring. I’ll hug the sun itself* if this is true.

2. The trouble with fun of being myself. Pretty much everything I do these days – from learning to working to socialising to interwebz – feels a little bit like a genuine celebration of unapologetic absurdity. It makes me feel warm and fuzzy to be a happy dork.

3. My peeps. Y’all make it worthwhile. Fo’ realz.

*I keep hearing about “the power of metaphor” in writing. Well, this one is so strong it burns.

…Pizza

1. The clock’s ticking, dude.  I think the Ninja Turtles are responsible for my pizza obsession.  I won’t even begrudge them for once giving me the idea to bake my frozen ham-and-pineapple with jelly beans on it.

2. Gots the dough?  I’m a fan of making my own pizza because you can control the toppings (all the good stuff without the dreaded onions) and, hence, the nutrient/fat content.  Less fat in pizza = more pizza = win.  Fresh pizza dough is amazing and if a culinarily unco person like me can make it, anyone can.  I bought some pizza-specific flour (which I think means normal flour with a pizza dough recipe on the box), dried yeast, bit of salt, warm water.  Knead.  Let it expand for a coupla hours.  Divvy it up (my recipe made enough for 8 bases and you can freeze the dough for later), flatten, top, bake.  BAM.  Amazing.  

3. That wood-fired family flavour.  So there’s been a lot of hoohah about the wood used in pizza ovens in Naples – the fuss being that it may be from exhumed coffins.  Yeah, that old chestnut.  Prior to this, the hoohah was about the pizza itself – apparently the best in the world.  In Eat Pray Love, Elizabeth Gilbert talks about how pizza in Naples is so good it makes you cry with regret over all the mediocre crap you’ve ever eaten that was merely masquerading as pizza.  The stuff in Naples is the real deal.  If it’s that good, and it takes a few contraband logs to make it, then I say dig away…

…Jessica Watson

1. A traffic jam when you’re already late. 16-year-old Aussie Jessica Watson circumnavigated the globe, only to return yesterday to a pack of tired, time-filling journos whinging about the fact she was late. Weather conditions aside, did you see the traffic in that harbour? This is Sydney, people – even if you’ve sailed solo for seven months, chances are you still won’t be able to find a parking spot for love nor money.

2. Passport and boarding pass, please. After not seeing another human for more than half a year, I’m sure the first faces anyone would love to see would be Australian customs. You know, for all that foreign fruit you’ve brought back FROM THE MIDDLE OF THE OCEAN. Were they expecting her to have a boat full of refugees? Vials of human growth hormone? Swine flu? They know she has to do a bunch of official business on the Opera House forecourt, right? Do they want her talking to Sandra Sully in a face mask? My guess is, it was Channel Seven’s attempt at grabbing a piece of the pie through a special episode of Border Security.

3. Meeting The Man. Among the throngs greeting Jessica after her extraordinary achievement were PM Kevin Rudd and NSW Premier Kristina Keneally. Would Jessica have known who Keneally is? Hasn’t NSW been through 17 premiers since she set sail? But our attention was first drawn to the Designated Lunatic, who handed her his hand-crafted mini replica of the Pink Lady. When interviewed in the media filler segments beforehand, the Designated Lunatic spoke of his vision for his replica’s completion, the perils of his quest, and his ultimate success after a lot of hard work. Because, after someone has just solo circumnavigated the globe, the intricate details of handicraft always sound really impressive and interesting – especially when you talk about painting a miniature hull as though you too have sailed around the world. But while you’d expect platitudes from the Designated Lunatic, they’re less forgiveable when uttered by the nation’s leader. Oh Ruddbot, you know you’re not Barack Obama, right? Who wrote your speech – Telstra? Not without your signature punctuational phrase, “You know something?” a la afternoon TV special. But the sticking point was the cringeworthy overuse of the word ‘hero’. It took the woman of the hour, Jessica Watson, to call the PM on his bullshit. She’s not a ‘hero’, she told us, she’s a girl who fulfilled a dream with hard work and belief and determination. And that’s something that any of us can do. Even when people tell us we can’t or shouldn’t. Regardless of age. Off a boat, on the fly, sleep deprived, overwhelmed, spun out, wobbly-legged, this teenager managed to say more in a few genuine, heart-felt lines than two politicians and their teams of advisors. If we weren’t impressed with Jessica Watson before, we certainly are now. In fact, I’d venture to say, she’s a hero. No, wait…

…Generation X

1. Undefined. To a value of X, Planet X, X number of things, the X factor - for a long time, possibly since the invention of mathematical expression, X has been the go-to letter for things undefined.  This week, an allegedly prominent demographist said Generation X is a valley of nothingness (wedged between the peaks of greedy Baby Boomers and self-absorbed Generation Y-ers).  In other news, ‘mono’ means one and ‘rail’ means rail.

2. What is X? As I was born in the Generation X-Y overlap, I feel qualified – read: postmodernly ironic enough - to define the indefinable.  Here are some things Generation X have endorsed over the years which I believe go towards defining them: mullet haircuts, giant shoulder-pads, the spiral wave perm, imposing synth soundtracks in action movies, slam dancing, slam dancing to imposing synth soundtracks from action movies, and Wham.  Their generation emerged during the tail-ends/aftershocks of the Vietnam War, the sexual revolution, the civil rights movement, and the invention of portable music and Pop Tarts, yet they made no contribution to any of these.  Until the naughties, Generation X brought the world nothing but Nutrasweet.  And they have the gall to whine about their Baby Boomer parents ruining the world’s peace/economy/environment and spending their inheritance!  Poor diddums!  Now they’re all grown up, they’ve invented a bunch of iCrap which they’ve marketed diabolically to Generation Y, while maintaining their signature jaw-dropping nerve to bitch and moan about said generation’s dependence on technology.  Pack.  Of.  Whingers.  Meanwhile, Generation Y, in case you were wondering, is a network of interconnected pipes or tubes which transfer data from one point to another.

3. Generation S. The Simpsons generation.  Arguably, it was a Generation X-er who first brought us this way of life but, you know, if The Simpsons has taught us anything it’s that you can spend 20 years making a grand, sweeping mockery of pretty much any group you want, for fun and profit.  Talkin’ ’bout my kinda generation!

The thing I like about getting older is seeing the patterns in things.  There’s a comfort in having experienced ups and downs before and knowing that, while what goes up must come down, what goes down most of the time eventually drifts upward again.

What may be le suck one week can be awesome the next.  What can be amazing can fade to blerg.

The exciting and terrifying part is, you never know where the peaks and troughs are – how far up  you can climb or how long you’ll ascend for, or how fast or imperceptibly you can fall.  It’s not like you have no choice in the matter, but it’s not all in your hands.  There are too many variables, which can be hard to swallow if you’re a bit control freakish.  Like me.

Many things for me right now are on an upward curve.  Work is pleasant and plentiful.  Friends warm my heart.  My hard slog creatively is getting rewarded.  All the sweat and talking to myself and bizarre exercises and wishing and hoping and dreaming has been diverging into yeses.  But part of it is, I’m getting better at knowing which jetstreams to jump into and spend time in – and when.  It’s as much about quitting as it is persistence.

The entanglement of sine curves in a life adds up to a plate of spaghetti.  Sure, it doesn’t make much sense, but it is edible.