Okay, here it is. My confession as to why I have been so slack with the posting of late:
1. Assessments. Okay, I shouldn't whinge because it was my choice to undertake a university degree, and you know what else? I'm proud I'm doing it. But the downside is assessments. My current subject is Creative Writing and, in theory, this should be a piece of cake for an author. But here's the catch or, in this instance, creative metaphor: I don't actually like cake very much. Seriously. Sponge cake is a device of Satan's baker. On the bright side, the subject is research portrait and I chose Marc Bolan. I watched concert footage and a documentary, so I enjoyed the research very much. Also, I got to use my own novel Silver Studs and Sabre Teeth as a reference in the bibliography section of the assessment. Do many others get to do this? This was a first for me.
2. Work. It's been constant.
3. I had a doona day on Sunday. Don't worry, I wasn't depressed; just wanted to unwind with some binge-watching after finalising my assessment. I wallowed in Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist and watched the movie A Promising Young Woman, which is a very topical movie lately.
4. Tutoring - but this is a good thing because I happen to really enjoy it. If I can borrow from Keith Richards, it's 'like a well-paid hobby'. What I'm finding rewarding is that a fourteen-year-old boy is enjoying the writing of Tom Wolfe. I showed him a copy of the first page of A Man in Full, after which I asked questions such as: What sort of person do you think Charlie is? Would you continue reading? He said he would, so I took along the novel to our next session and he continued to read and was very interested in the technique used by Wolfe of writing Charlie's dialogue in Southern US-speak. Anyway, by introducing a young person to some awesome writing, I feel I have achieved something.
5. Kind of protesting/agitating. Well, if attending a proposed debate is a form of protest and agitation, then that's what I've been doing. Last week, I attended a venue where there had been a debate called to discuss the scurrilous sale of one of the local TAFE campuses. The minister involved didn't accept the challenge, so it turned into a community forum. I had looked forward to some robust debate, but the minister said he wasn't going to play politics. Well, although I was not to have been a participant, I'm going to offer my rebuttal to that, and it starts with one word that calls to mind bovine scatological matter. I would also like to ask why the NSW Libs think it's okay to criminally undersell the land at a rate of $4 million and give just $1 million back to the community and expect them to be pathetically and grovelingly grateful for the miserly crumbs. I want to know why they think it's okay to just sell off the Scone campus to NSW Racing with no thought to the fact that not everybody in Scone wants to study fields related the equine industry. How are we supposed to rebuild post-Covid when nobody can learn other trades without the inconvenience of travelling to a far-off campus? Not everybody drives and our public transport options are scarce. DIS GUVVAMINT SUX!
So, that's it in a nutshell, folkeroonies. I've been working and studying. When not engaging in these activities, I've been doing my physio exercises, although I haven't been able to get to the practice and use the wobbleboard to work on my balance. I have been doing my home balance exercises and there has been some improvement in that I have progressed from having the coordination of a drunken ragdoll, which is pleasing.
Before I go, there is something that I would like to ask you all: do you also happen to think Pink Floyd are overrated? I listen to AM when driving, and as a home care worker I do a bit of driving, and whenever one of their songs comes on, I just groan. Money came on the other day and Good God, it's a fucking boring piece of twaddle! I also cannot bear Another Brick in the Wall. Is it just my experience, or do the people who rave about those numbers listen to them whilst pulling cones? It's probably the only way one can tolerate the listening experience.
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