Afternoon activities

Didn't quite make it within the week, but I'd say one day late isn't too bad :) 

Don't get me wrong, being raised primarily by a single lawyer mother who spent years fighting for a spot in the industry, gave me a strong understanding of women's rights and the occasional tendency to act on blind feminist rage, but even I know that there are some things girls can not, and should not do. I take you now, to a sunny afternoon after school, and a little too much Milo, to when my sister and I discovered one such activity. 

I blame the school , we had been learning japanese that term and had been recently shown a video on Sumo wrestling, that (coupled with a few videos on male bonding) had made us aware of the chest bump ritual. An action commonly seen amongst pro sports jocks, large territorial animals and people that are completely off their head. It involves two individuals running towards each other, leaping in the air with chests out, and slamming their torso's into one another to then fall back hopefully in a stance position. This can then be followed by a celebratory high five.... or a trip to the emergency ward. 

Well blame it on the fresh air, or too much sugar, Alex and I decided to give it a go. Now before you make assumptions I would just like to point out that we are not completely stupid, we did decide to have a practice run with pillows. We started by both holding a pillow against our chest, learning quickly that it was important to full commitment to the act, otherwise the result was a mess of arms and legs. Then, similar to a game of musical chairs, we threw a pillow away and continued. This was met with mild success, we were fast learners, so bracing ourselves, we moved onto faze three.

Having discarded both pillows and taken a few more steps apart to insure maximum run up potential, we counted down to impact. THREE. TWO. ONE. We were of, running at full tilt, screaming like men on helium, getting closer with every second. counting down to impact, we were close enough to touch, to hug. insert screeching sound here. We chickened out moments before impact. We started laughing, at this point I'm not sure if it was at the fact we bailed or the absurdness of the situation. Which ever it was it did not deter us, and after a good laugh we decided to try again, pinky swearing our allegiance to the cause. 

One, Two, Three, we took steps back, forever keeping eye contact. This time we were ready, visualizing the pillows, we counted down. THREE. TWO.....Two, and a half.. two and three quuuuarters... two and.... we had run out of fractions, there was nothing for it RUN we did... closer, and closer, our feet pounded the lounge room floor, one second till impact, I could see the beads of seat on her face, half a second.. there was nothing for it, I shut my eye's and braced myself. NOW leaping into the air we slammed into each other with enough force to knock down a small elephant. I felt my bones shatter, and my boobs become concave. I fell to the floor dazed and sore, trying to breath. Eye's closed and lying still on the floor I called out to her... "Alex.... you dead"? 

"No", came a small reply... "but I think my boobs are". 

So my female readers, I write this as a cautionary tale. Sure, your all strong, intelligent and independent women who don't need men to complete you. But the next time a guy tells you that women can't do everything men can do, stop, think about Alex and I, and tell him honestly, Your right... we have boobs. 

Until next week... or later this week really ^_^ 

TITANIC

Hey everyone, sorry this comes so late, its been absolutely hec.. ok I'm going to stop myself there, there's really no excuse for how lazy I've been with the blog. But lets move on, shoulda, coulda woulda and I'm gonna right now. 

So I chose this story for a couple of reasons. One, its a bit of a funny one which I thought would be fun to read and two, the most recent drawing I did was based on the sea so I can cheat and use it (just between you and me). 

little side note - my fingers are flying over the keys, its funny, I always seem to dread writing, putting it of till the last minute, only to re-discover how much I like doing it everytime I begin again.  

Now for the story, I'm pretty sure I've mentioned before about the summers I would spend in the country in Lemon tree with my mums family. For those new comers though (First of, Welcome) just a little back story, my mum grew up with her family in Lemon tree, a rough but friendly little town that still has a few dirt roads, a quant Marina my granddad actually owned at one stage and was proud to receive their first helicopter pad the year before last. We'd usually stay for a couple of weeks (longer if we were successful in begging mum to go home without us) at our Auntie's house who'd spoil us rotten as the two girls she always wished she'd had. Instead she married a 6 foot 7 Train engineer and had two equally tall boys that would rather lick a toilet seat than do anything remotely girly. 

So for a few weeks out of every year we'd shed our shoes, don a hat and spend the days riding, playing, watching tv (something that was banned at home) eating a ridiculous amount of two minute noodles and being treated like absolute princesses. If your starting to imagine a heaven like place full of no worries, no responsibilities and constant fun, you wouldn't be far off Lemon tree. In fact on arrival, after an attempt to uphold the structured routine we'd lived with through the year or asking if we were allowed a treat, we'd get "Your not in Sydney anymore, remember it's Lemon tree, you can do what ever you want - no worries" Like our own personal "hakuna matata" 

I'll go into more on another entry but to round this up I'll tell you about one of our favourite games. Down on the beach, the one a minutes walk from the house we found an old tinny (little row boat) that was badly beaten. Feeling as though we'd just discovered buried treasure we decided to adopt it as our own. Now before you start to relay a sweet little montage of us fixing the boat up ala the birth of Chitty Chitty bang bang and other such nostalgic uplifting films, we instead flipped it over, grabbed some sticks and beat the boat to death. Once it had a few more holes in it (and some small dents curtesy of my and my sisters attempts) we dragged it out to the middle of the bay, climbed in... and sank it. 

Right now your probably horrified, but before you file me away under delinquent hear the rest. After singing the theme tune to Titanic and letting the boat sink to the bottom (an act that took about 2 minutes) we then spent the next 2 hours pulling it from the depths and dragging it back to shore... We repeated this process roughly 4 times that day until my auntie called us in to tea. The next day, you guessed it, we began again... in fact that boat was rescued more times in the week than all the boats in the marina from the last 20 years put together. We loved that boat more than it had ever been loved, because it wasn't just a little tinny to us, it was adventure and imagination in its purest form... and that was what Lemon Tree was all about. 

Hakuna Matata everyone ^_^