Tonight I saw Japanese Story, a new Australian film starring Toni Collette. I’m not sure I can say anything meaningful about it without giving everything good away. As the director says, “Some people have just gone, like, you know, I don’t get it and I don’t even want to get it, you know? And then some people go, you know, thanks, I got it.” I think I fall somewhere in the middle. But sometimes it’s good, you know, to not “get” every single thing. I’m still thinking about it. I’d definitely recommend it.

Discovery: there’s another Wagamama in Sydney!

Another item for my Christmas list!

The Sheer Stubbornness of the Home Brewer
It’s pissing down, and the Snook is brewing. Outside. It’s a wonder he (or that big steel pot) hasn’t been struck by lightning yet. I told him last night that the weather man was predicting a storm, but he said he reckoned it would blow over quickly. By the time it started he was too far gone in the process to stop. It’s pretty funny. 🙂

Interesting mathematical trivia: The Dewey Decimal System classification number for numerology is 133.335. If you reverse that and add them together…

133.335 + 533.331 = 666.666!

The sign of the beast! Repeated! The math book I was reading thought it was pretty interesting, anyway.

Friday Five:

1. What vehicle do you drive?
A giant natural gas-powered public bus. Well, I don’t really drive it exactly, but sometimes I like to sit behind the driver and pretend I do.

2. How long have you had it?
For the last four years (i.e. the length of time I’ve been living outside the U.S.).

3. What is the coolest feature on your vehicle?
Well, it picks me up right near my house and takes me into the city for only $1.20! I don’t have to park it or pay for insurance or worry about it getting stolen. I don’t even have to wash it! Plus it holds lots of people and we all get happy fuzzy feelings from saving the environment.

4. What is the most annoying thing about your vehicle?
When it rains all the windows fog up.

5. If money were no object, what vehicle would you be driving right now?
A cherry red vintage VW Beetle convertible with a leather top. I wouldn’t be driving it though; it’d just sit in my underground parking space where I could admire it. I’ll stick with the bus.

(Did I mention how stupid and annoying these questions are? What, it’s just assumed that everybody in the world owns – or wants to own – a car? Sheesh.)

I just discovered that the Herald has a regular column about blogs! Now if I could just get a mention…

More Observations About Men Who Honk at Women. (Because yeah, I got honked at again today. And whistled at. And it pissed me off.)

• The lone driver is rarely a harasser. I never get a honk from a guy in a car by himself. There’s always at least one more guy, which leads me to believe it’s a “macho-showing-off-for-your-friends” kinda thing.
• Along with that – and I’m going to be really classist here – most harassers seem to be low-income grunts with bad jobs. There always seem to be about four of them packed into a dump truck or moving van. Maybe part of their rationale is that I’m obviously not a laborer.
• Nice guys will sometimes try to rationalize harassers’ behavior by pointing out that they’re “just trying to pay me a compliment.” Because I’m so beautiful that men are instantly compelled to let me know. This theory is crap. I stand on the same street every single morning and I only get harassed when I’m wearing a skirt. How honk-worthy am I seems to have less to do with my objective aesthetic beauty and more to do with how much skin is showing.
• There’s also another frequently-espoused theory that by honking at you men are trying to get your attention because they think you’re nice and they’re so adorably inept that they can’t think of any other way to approach you. Unfortunately this is also crap, as evidenced by the fact that the guys who honked at me this morning waited until they were just past me to toot. They didn’t care about my reaction; in fact, they probably knew I’d be pissed off. They did it to let me know that they’d seen me as a sexual object. Assclowns.

Sorry to rant (and to tar a lot of nice guys with the same brush). I’m just fuming. This is the first day I’ve worn a skirt all week, specifically for this reason. Do you men understand that? Can you imagine how it must feel to have to change your behaviour to avoid harassment? It’s the height of spring here, warm and sunny, and I have to wear drab, body-concealing clothes in order to wait for my carpool in peace. ARRRGGGGHHH.

The Snook and I tried Atkins Chocolate Chocolate Chip Brownie Mix tonight and we were a little disappointed. First off, it retails for five bucks in the U.S. Guess how much I had to pay for it here? Twenty. Twenty dollars Australian. (With the exchange rate it should’ve been $8 AU, so there was more than a 100% markup on it.) Next, I followed the instructions exactly. Dump the contents in a bowl, add 1/3 cup oil, 1/4 water, and an egg. Mix. Pour into loaf pan. “Pour” was a little optimistic though. This stuff was like thick sticky mud. The Snook kept asking, “Are you sure you followed the directions correctly?” I was sure. The end product was predictably dense and dry. Chocolatey, yes, but way too crumbly. By morning it’ll be hard as a rock. So did I get a bag with a wacky incorrect recipe? Because when I pay twenty dollars for brownies, I expect them to be good.