the ’sham

A few vignettes. One about seeing a fire-safety demonstration at the railway, “I stand and watch through the cyclone fencing, my fingers clinging onto the wire.” The other from a few folks at the bowlo, a flasher reported in North Petersham, and the proximity of a couple’s house to the club enabling it to operate a bit like an extension of their living room.

Listen to the entry here [4 min, 1mb, mp3].

Read the original posting here.

A free-form Haiku episode, three sentences.

And a contribution from my brother: Bert Newton’s brush with Petersham.

Listen in here. [2min, 1mb, mp3]

Read the original blog entry here.

A small episode in which I am feeling rather antisocial. I go to “yoga for anxiety” class and find out that the White Cockatoo pub was not robbed after all (thank goodness).

Listen to the podcast Security is Important [mp3, 4 min, 2mb].

Read the original post here.

Having just returned from a trip to Melbourne, I’m catching up on my recordings. The latest development (which emerged from reading aloud together with Lizzie during the trip) is that the recordings are a bit more interesting when they have a live audience. Lizzie was a good audience because she had never read the original stories before.

Today, sitting with Vanessa and Tim in my loungeroom, I recorded “The Lost Vignettes” which was posted last year on the 19th of April. Both V and T are familiar with the stories, so there is some reflection and chatting about the events and places depicted. We share the reading of comments contributed by blog readers - Vanessa does the female voices, and Tim does Alex Bruen, which is kind of fun.

In “The Lost Vignettes” we hear about Marie and Chris, punks, “tag” graffiti, the Palace Pantry, and we sit in the sun with Bruce watching the dogs in Petersham Park.

Listen in to the story here [15min, 15mb, mp3]
Read the original posting here.

…in which I seem to have gotten over my anxiety from yesterday (good grief) and catch up on events from the previous days. A visit from my mum, a visit from my dad, a Petersham pub crawl, a garage sale attended by a priest, a radio interview and a pilates class.

Listen to it here [8 min mp3, 4mb]

or read the original posting here.

Wednesday arvo:
I call up Neil, Mayhem’s friend who works for the railways. There’s a RailCorp training centre in Petersham, and I’d love to see what goes on there. But Neil says he’s not stationed in the ’sham at the moment, and besides, he’s just a trainee. Best to contact the folks at HQ and get permission through the proper channels. Of course, I never get around to making that call.

But as I’m walking past the station, I spy a group of uniformed rail workers huddled around a fire in a metal box. One by one, they all have a go at putting out the fire. Big clouds of white steam drift into the air. Each worker hunkers down with arms extended, upwind of the flames. The trick is to get the extinguisher as close to the fire as possible, while keeping your body at a safe distance. Once the fire is out there’s a small ripple of applause from the rest of the group. Then the boss takes his gas applicator and starts the blaze up again for the next person’s turn. I stand and watch through the cyclone fencing, my fingers clinging onto the wire.

Thursday night:
The Petersham “radio talent committee” meets at the bowling club. I arrive late, accompanied by Mayhem. In fact, we’re too late for dinner, but Fiona serves up some hefty and delicious apple crumble. It’s a meal in itself. The latest news is that the broadcast is going to happen on evening of the 21st of June. It’s going to be a big affair, with music, bowling, food, drinks, with James O’Loughlin riding the airwaves from right inside the clubhouse.

Marie (who’s on the committee) tells me that one night, a few months back, she was flashed as she walked up Palace Street in the dark. The flasher stepped out of the bushes, presenting his naked body in a proud display. Marie sprung back and cried out, aghast. She hurried along home to call the police. She remembers only a few essential details. The man was naked, wearing only a headband (not a tennis sweatband, more of a printed bandana), gymshoes, and a beer gut. And yes, we had to ask…apparently, he wasn’t particularly well endowed…

I also meet Danni and Gary, who live just across the way from the Bowling Club. So close, in fact, that you can see their place from the window. The clubhouse is like their second living room. Tonight, for the first time, their experimenting with a hi-tech radio transmitter. They’ve left their baby fast asleep at home, and in theory, the transmitter will alert them at the first sign of crying. In the middle of his beer, Gary pops home just in case….

A fragmented day.

I went in search of Anthony at the bottle shop. When I first met Anthony (weeks ago now) he recommended I visit this fellow who ran a real estate / immigration agency on New Canterbury Road back in the ’60s. I’m pretty sure, from what Anthony was saying, that this guy was responsible for finding houses for lots of Portuguese folks around Petersham. Hence the large Portuguese population here. But I couldn’t remember where Anthony said I could find him. So I stuck my head in the bottle shop to find out. But Anthony wasn’t in. He was off delivering booze somewhere.
(more…)

Rain starts to fall in heavy drops. The cats slink back inside, fur plastered down. I put aside my coffee and stand in the doorway, smiling benificently at my lettuce seedlings.

Vanessa says, “You never seem to remember your dreams in Petersham!”

But this morning, two small dreams stick with me.
(more…)

The African couple that lived in the apartment across the street has moved out.

At least, I think they were African. I never actually met them. I always wanted to. We used to sit on our balcony, eating dinner in the summer, or more recently, drinking coffee in the orange afternoon light. The door to their balcony would swing open, presumably to let a little air into their small flat. The husband, if he spotted me, would wave his arm in a big arc and grin, and I’d do the same in return. Often, I saw them both, husband and wife, running off up the street, or returning home with a plastic bag of chicken from Silvas. We always waved and smiled. But we never actually met. Now, carpet cleaning men, and window repair men, come and go. Wooden wardrobes, a single blue innerspring mattress, and a floral armchair, sit outside the building, awaiting council pickup.

*

Saturday night games at Janine’s. (Janine lives downstairs from Alex). Bec and I make a batch of new friends. Most of them are hyper-literate bookworms, and they crush us at Boggle. I fare a little better at a crazy card game called EcoFluxx, even winning once or twice, but I must admit I have no idea why. It’s a game which changes its rules almost every round. I suppose this is meant to simulate “real life,” but I just find it bewildering, and it irritates me vaguely. I have the feeling that maybe I could follow what’s going on in EcoFluxx if only my attention span was better developed. Perhaps this feeling is exacerbated by the red wine, my oncoming cold, and the vast quantities of junk food we are consuming. It’s like a teenager’s dream: chips and jellybeans and nachos and pizza and a remarkable punch with watermelon liqueur, champagne, ginger ale, and lemonade. Games nights at Janine’s are really something. Sometimes, she says, they go on ’til four in the morning…

Janine tells me that on the evening of Easter Sunday, at the Opera House, she met someone called Perry. Perry had just come from a very strange lunch in Darling Point. Throughout this lunch a certain young man in attendance - in fact, the nephew of the host - had worn a blindfold. And he was from Petersham.