Adelaide, Melbourne
It’s amazing when you seem to find time when you thought you had none. This is happening to me right now, and I’m quite enjoying it. See, we came home from Adelaide a day earlier than planned, as Cal and I both had things to get to, and it seems like we won’t be going to Hamilton before New Year’s (or at all), because my grandma is staying here for a while on her way home from Melbourne. So, I basically have a heap of free time between now and New Year’s to do whatever I like (okay, so it’s only a couple of days, but still a couple of days more than expected).
I really like going to Adelaide, it’s nice to see my cousins growing up. They seem to love seeing us, too, and we often have a hard time getting some time alone (it’s okay for a while, but that’s part of the reason we came home a day early). Christmas lunch was delicious, as always, and I will have to get the recipe for roast vegetables from my aunty (she puts a variety of fresh herbs and stuff from the garden on them).
The trip home from Adelaide involved the first real incidents I’ve had in my car, and both of them happened with my brother driving (only one was his fault, though). The first happened when Cal was backing out of a park, but he accidentally had it in first instead of reverse. Luckily he was quick on the brakes. I should say, even though he’s on his Learner’s (almost finished his two years…), he’s still one of the best drivers I’ve been in the car with, and almost certainly in the top two or so young drivers. So what happened wasn’t totally his fault, it’s partly just that the gearbox in my car takes some getting used to. When I first got it, there were a few times when I started in third instead of first, because I was afraid of putting it in reverse. It’s fine now, and it’s a lovely gearbox once you get used to it (and the car will usually take off in third, anyway…), so yeah. He won’t do it again!
The second incident invoved the air conditioning, which has been a bit of a problem since I got the car. First of all, the dial doesn’t have a knob, so you have to turn it on and off with a pair of pliers. That said, once you get it on, it works fantastically… For a while. Then the fan would start to overheat, and eventually the cold air would die down to just a drizzle – not worth having on. What happened was partly my fault, although I couldn’t have predicted the outcome. When we first started driving, I noticed that the aircon was turned on a bit, but nothing was coming out – fair enough, Dad used the car yesterday, and mustn’t have turned it off. I just left it as it was, it didn’t seem to be causing any trouble.
But when we were halfway through the trip, Cal and I started to smell something strange… Like burning plastic and/or electrics. Strange, but no idea what it would be. Then, suddenly, smoke starts coming out of the aircon in the middle of the dash! Eek! Pulled over, had a look around – definitely appeared to be the aircon, everything in the engine fine. So turned the dial off, opened the windows, and continued on our way. Then, shortly after, more smell, and even more smoke! Oh no, how do we get rid of it? Pulled over again, checked the CD player and stuff to make sure it was definitely the aircon – yes. But it’s already off! Then Cal had the brilliant idea of taking out the fuse. So I opened up the fuse box, found the aircon one (I love my fuse box, actually, it’s oh so easy to navigate), and took it out. Hrm, that’s strange… The ends of the fuse appear charred (and were actually so burnt that I could pull it apart), but it hadn’t blown, like it should have. Seems like somebody put the wrong kind of fuse in! Anyway, that fixed it, and the rest of the trip went smoothly (except for my P-plates constantly falling off).
The reason I wanted to get back was because I planned to meet up with a friend – Alex – in Melbourne yesterday. On the way there, I rediscovered my love for driving… Alone. It’s so much fun – music (of my choice!) up loud, less stress about other passengers, etc. When I’m in the car with Cal, he has an obsession with the Kooks, the Fratellis, the Cat Empire, and now Little Red. Now, considering I introduced him to these bands, I don’t have a big problem with them, but a lot of the time I want to have other stuff playing – B&S, SSLYBY, Emiliana Torrini, etc. Also, I have an obsession with smooth driving – gear changes, stopping and starting, that kind of stuff. So when it’s only me, I don’t have worry so much.
Anyway, my time in Melbourne was super fun. Alex is a few years younger than me, so whenever we catch up we tend to do a lot of slightly immature things and have a lot of immature (but witty!) banter. It’s nice! We also checked out an exhibition in the Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, which can basically be summed up in one word: odd. We managed to get lost numerous times travelling between only four rooms. I also scared a small child by making ghost noises outside a walkway (you could see in, but not out).
We encountered a strange guy who worked there, who used to teach art but got bored of it so he now works at a gallery talking about art to random people like us. He thinks contemporary art should be taught in schools, a thought which sparked a small debate, in that we reckoned you couldn’t really learn about contemporary art before having some knowledge about art in the past. Fair point, though. He also said that people think he’s Russian, and he kind of just goes along with it. Which is strange, because he doesn’t look or sound Russian. If I had to place his accent, I would have to say ‘gay’. Like, not quite Carson Cressly gay, but a good halfway there. Anyway, this sparked Alex, who is actually Russian and speaks fairly fluently, to start speaking in Russian a little bit. That got him!
Because Alex was a bit late to arrive in the city, I had a bit of time to wander around, and got some shopping done, mostly at JB Hi-Fi. I picked up a few new CDs, including And then nothing turned itself inside-out by Yo La Tengo (because I keep having them recommended to me), Challengers by the New Pornographers (because I keep being told to venture out from just Mass Romantic), The Stand Ins by Okkervil River (because I really liked The Stage Names and I’ve been told this is also realy good), and The Sunset Tree by the Mountain Goats (because they were pretty excellent at Meredith). I’ve only listened to The Sunset Tree so far, which was excellent, but I’ll get onto the others very soon.
Anyway, I’ve probably written enough for the time being, I’d better get out of bed and get a few things done (like ‘eat’, ’shower’, and ‘wash car’ – it’s a hard life). Catch you later, alligator!
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