TGIF

First things first, let's clear some things up from earlier in the week. No, I didn't eat a lot of cheese on Tuesday night, so my cheese dreams came as quite a surprise. I did, however, eat a lot of cheese last night to see if I could make myself have crazy cheese dreams again, but not so much as a turn-up-at-work-naked dream was had. Just goes to show that cheese dreams can strike at any time. 

And now it's Friday! Hooray! Back in the day, J had a great Friday playlist that she would listen to on her Friday morning commute and it was basically a recipe for a party mood. I wish I had that playlist now. But I don't. But here are two songs I will listen to today. 

The first is for the mellow mood at the start of the day. It's September Song  performed by Lou Reed. Even though it's called September song, it evokes autumn so it's appropriate for the Southern Hemisphere April/May. 

The next one is far from mellow. It's for when you're in the mood to crack this day open like a fancy dessert form Masterchef that looks like a golden orb but when you crack it has something oozey and delicious inside. It's He'll never be an old man river by TISM. 

Have a nice weekend, Crabbies. 

Eat cheese

HAHA. Perv! Yesterday's post made me wonder if K really ate a lot of cheese on Tuesday night to have those weird dreams. And what kind of cheese it was. It also made me think about how Baby recently asked me what I wrote about on Miss Soft Crab. Or rather I asked him what he thought I wrote about. He said, "Your kids, your life...?" Yeah, I told him. And other stuff too. Things I ate or did. "Or thought about?" He asked. Like he somehow knew. Or jumped to the obvious conclusion. Yeah, I told him. All sorts of things. "Eating cheese?" He asked. He thinks it's funny to interject "Eat cheese!" all the time, so when he asked it was a joke. But I told him, yep! Quite a bit.  "Really?!" he asked. "Really!?" He thought he was being silly. And I guess he thought no one would write about eating cheese. Eat cheese. It's more than a hilarious joke to a 6-year-old. It's a way of life really.

Weird dreams

I had a bunch of weird cheese dreams last night. 

The most memorable involved me going to the toilet at the Forum Theatre, and while sitting there and doing my thing, looking up and noticing that someone was leaning over the top of the cubicle, watching me.

"Get lost, you PERVE!" I shouted at them.

They got spooked and dashed out of the bathroom. I chased after them, past that long queue of people waiting you often see waiting for the loos at the Forum, shouting "Stop that Perve! I caught them perving and they're not going to get away with it!"

Haha. Perve.

It's ANZAC day

These holidays are coming thick and fast!

Visual diary

KB's childcare centre is a half hour walk from home. I'd say it's a pleasant half hour walk which is somewhat true, because walking is pleasant. But East Preston is not one of Melbourne's lushest neighbourhoods so it's less pleasant than a walk through one of those.  There aren't a lot of trees. There are a lot of abandoned shopping trolleys. The cats seem like they've been through a lot. But it's home, so we've grown to love all those things. And the footpath graffiti is particularly amusing. The following sample comes from the stretch between home and childcare and is just a small taste. Join me for this little stroll! 

See if you can spot when we cross into Thornbury and things take a turn for the serious. 

 

 

 

 

Keep it to yourself

I've always found Todd Sampson highly annoying. Oh sure on Gruen he may say some interesting things but I'm always too overwhelmed by his self-satisfaction and smug-fuckery to notice. So when I heard he was getting his show I just did a massive eye roll and loud groan and changed the channel. (Just jokes I only watch ABC.) And when I heard that his show was about trying to succeed at amazing human feats well I rolled my eyes so hard they practically fell out of my head.

Needless to say I've never watched any of his shows. And it is disappointing given the content. I love tribes living their ancient ways in today's modern world. And I love human feats. I'd love to watch an episode about the Sama-Bajau. But as if I could sit through a whole show hosted by Todd Sampson, especially if he gets his shirt off. Keep it to yourself Sampson.

You're not the message, man

Did anyone watch Bodyhack last night? It's that show with Todd Sampson in which, to quote Wikipedia, he travels around the world to meet "some of the world's most extraordinary people...deconstructing and decoding how these incredible people live, what they do differently from the rest of us and how this impacts the human body." 

I used to enjoy watching Todd Sampson on Gruen. I found him pleasant and informed and he had interesting insights that led me to better understand advertising. 

But I guess at some point someone decided that he was so good at delivering messages that he should be the message. Because from what I can tell, BodyHack is basically a show about him being worldly and adventurous and a thinking person's tough guy. He goes to live among people who do super hard stuff, like Sherpas and French Legionairres and takes on the physical challenges that are part of their everyday lives. Last nights episode he lived amongst a group of people who are seaborne, called the Sama- Bajau who do seem super fascinating. 

They can walk on the sea floor, holding their breath for some time to do it. And because this thing is super awesome and super hard, Todd just HAD to try it. But did he really? I mean, when I am informed that someone can hold their breath underwater for four minutes and walk along the sea floor the equivalent of six floors below sea level, I can use my mind grapes to interpret that and be damned impressed. When I see footage of a person doing exactly that, I am further impressed and amazed. When Todd Sampson then tries to do it, i just think he's a smug fuck. And I think get out of the way man, you're not the message, they're the message. But that's what this whole show is about. Todd telling us some truly interesting things and visiting truly interesting people, then lodging himself smack back in the centre of the action. And he wears a lot of active wear, or gets around topless. Keep it to yourself, guy.

Where to take this

I hope K feels better soon. 

As autumn really settles into being autumn, with rain and cold days I've really been thinking about my winter wardrobe in earnest. And by winter I mean autumn, because of course when winter comes around I'm just going to be in jeans and woollen jumpers constantly. And by cold days I'm not talking about this week which is forecast to be in the mid-20s all week. But I think we know what I mean, right? Right. By February I'm already thinking about my winter wardrobe because I way prefer cold weather clothes and by now I'm bloody gagging to get my skin all covered up. Oh, yeah.  I feel like this season I'd like to do a bit of sartorial exploring, but also set some personal challenges. One of my concepts for my winter dressing this year is 'skivvies under everything.' Whereby I plan to wear skivvies under everything. And rather than just settling on a seasonal look and then trying to dress to it once in a while I'd like to set myself the challenge of dressing in that look everyday for a week, thereby actually seeing if I can do it and if it is a good look for me and hopefully, if everything goes well, just committing to it better because I have the lived experience of it.

Another thing I want to do this season is just fucking go for it. I have this tweed vest in my cupboard I think about wearing but never do, but not any more. This season I'm just going to fucking go for it!

Monochrome! Natch. Autumn is the perfect time for monochrome dressing, and this season I'm going to do it everyday for a week. And then a bunch of other times.

I'm excited about these dressing experiments guys! I can't wait to do them! And then tell you about them! But right now I'm just excited about getting my jeans on!

Two weeks ago again

Remember two weeks ago when J was not feeling well?

Well it's two weeks ago for me now. 

I swear if I can just feel ok again I'll be a much much better person. 

Easter Monday

So K loves Savage Garden now. It's cool. It's Easter and JC knew whaddup.

See you next Tuesday! (And by that I mean tomorrow.)

Good Friday Secret Surprise

It's Good Friday, which is bad news for Jesus but great news for everyone else. Miss Soft Crab usually enjoys a little break on a public holiday, but I sensed an opportunity that I'm going to seize. 

J will be expecting me to write a little post saying "it's a public holiday, see you on Monday. If that, as her expectations of my blog posting are probably pretty close to rock bottom.  But I'll tell you what she 100% for sure won't be expecting: a secret post where I confess something that I both want to tell her and don't want to tell her. 

Here it is. 

The other day I was at one of the fruit stalls at Preston Market and a certain song came on the radio. It was from the very early naughties, a pop song that she and I ridiculed hard and often. As I heard the first few bars I thought "Ha! They're still playing this shit!!" and got ready to snigger at it as it built up to the first chorus. 

But you know what happened? Reader, I married him. What?! That's not what I meant. What I meant is that I started to really enjoy listening to it. Not to make fun of, but because it was in and of itself pleasing me. 

How could I tell J?! I couldn't. I can't. Except like this. 

enjoy, readers.

Haiku Thursday

Thanks for asking

School holidays, ay?

How are they? A nightmare of

Vomit, stress and mess

And yet

Somewhat less stressful

Than term time, with its lunches, 

Wake ups and lunches

Eight legged freaks

I am totally shitscared of spiders, and I'm not going to lie to you, it's my mother's fault. She is totally shitscared of spiders and broadcast this fact loud and wide when I was growing up, so I became terrified of those eight legged freaks too. It's not genetic, but it's definitely inherited.  

I know it's irrational and I've thought about trying  to train myself to overcome the fear but I think we all know I'm too lazy for that. But I don't want to pass it on to KB, so I've been trying not to show fear whenever I see spiders, which is all the freaking time at my house. 

I'm doing a great job, I have to say. Every night over summer a very large orb weaver would weave a web between the camelia bush and wisteria vine directly outside my front door. And there it would sit all night waiting for its prey, and waiting to greet me in the morning. Eewwww. Appleheart grew a soft spot for it through admiring the beautiful intricate design of its web and started to call it Orbie. Even I came to admire its work ethic. And though I was shuddering inside every time I walked past it, i would never let on so KB has been none the wiser. I'm very mature you guys. 

In the last few weeks she stopped turning up and Appleheart grew sad. He turned to google and found out that she probably had a whole bunch of spiderbabies at the end of the summer and then died. I was a bit sad about it but mostly glad I didn't have to confront her again. Also, I was too busy thinking about  all those spider babies to stay sad. I had some fear to nurture! 

Today, as I was hanging out the washing in our undercover clothesline/baby transport vehicle depot, I spotted one of orbie's babies. 

Here's a wide shot. 

 

Here's a close up.

 

Suspended in a perfect web that her mother would have admired. She's no threat now, but sooner or later she will grow and then my troubles will begin. 

I wondered what to do for a bit. Should I get rid of the problem now, while it's still a small problem? Or should I respect the circle of life and let Orbie's baby have a shot at it. Soon enough, KB lost it over something or another so we went inside for cuddles and when I went back to finish hanging out the washing, I forgot about Orbie Jnr.  I think she's still there but let's not bother to check, shall we? Great. 

It's next week!

HEY! Remember last week I was all "Errggghhhh, I'm sick...bigger and better next week!" Well it's already next week and I'm a little better. But I'm not bigger and I'm not really great. And on the weekend I actually got WORSE than I'd been last week. But I'm not going to give you the details. I'm going to tell you something else. At the moment it's Passover and that means it has been six Jew years since Miss Soft Crab. Next week it will be the six-western-years anniversary of Miss Soft Crab!

When we started this blog we were all "All the blogs we read are going downhill! Let's start our own!" Who thought six years later we'd still be here in our own downward spiral! Just jokes this blog is awesome!

Anyway next year in Jerusalem!

Sometimes

Sometimes I'm on the tram, and it's stopped to pick up people and then the lights inexplicably go off and it makes a sound a bit like a power off sound. It's quite disconcerting. 

See you next week

This week there has been a lot of illness in my house. At least it feels like that to me. There has been snot, vomit, tiredness, body pain. Flu.😫 Basically there has been flu. And I have not been immune. Literally. I was not immune and have been feeling like shit. Last night I went to bed at 7:30 and that helped but I'm still feeling pretty off. And its school holidays which means that I have to find something entertaining for Baby which doesn't involve him watching hours of television. (Don't get me wrong, he's been doing heaps of that but I can't let him do that all the time). So now I'm going to leave the house and go to the movies. Oh sure, it's just like watching a giant TV but there will be some sunshine on the way from the house to the car so at least there is that. Let's hope next week I'll be back better than ever!😖

Agreed

Agreed. Fuck you dove 48 hour antiperspirant. 

And the horse you rode in on. 

Fuck you Dove 48 hour antiperspirant

Last week I saw an ad for this deodorant which I found highly offensive. It had a bunch of women lifting up their arms so you could see their underarms. It clearly felt it was pretty confronting and cutting edge showing all those underarms. Like, hey! We're all women! We all have underarms! 

But you know what all those underarms had in common with each other? They were all hairless. You know what they didn't have in common with my underarms and a bunch of other women's underarms? They were hairless. If you want to actually show what a normal underarm looks like why don't you include hairy ones? Stubbly ones. If that ad ain't been so in love with itself I probably wouldn't have cared.  Seriously Dove, that ad was so offensive I would never by your products again. Except I already don't buy your products because I'm trying to minimise my impact on the earth and avoid the shit you put in your products. 

Topknots and tears

It's no secret that I like football. It's also no secret that I am a woman, have been all my life. So I'm sure it comes as no surprise that I watched the women's football league, the AFLW, pretty closely and pretty enthusiastically. 

Women have been playing amateur football for a while, but only this year has the AFL had a women's league. So these past few months have been the first time that I have seen women's football regularly and up close. I went to a bunch of games, the kind where you get to stand against the fence and can see the sweat on the players faces and the ripple of their muscles when they run. So basically, how tough and cool they are. I loved it. It's football, but with more topknots than you get in the normal home and away season. And more tears. Not from the players. From me and the other supporters. 

At every game I went to people were talking about how great it is, how much it means to them. Mostly these comments came from women but Appleheart also made the good point that it's given him a chance to appreciate football without having to feel compromised by the misogyny. Win win. 

The thing that made me shed the most tears was watching these people use their bodies fearlessly, risk injury, risk the potential disappointment of losing all for the pleasure of playing and the potential thrill of winning. I just love that. I never learnt to love sport when I was little because I was always worried I would get hurt, I would be too shit at it and other kids would hate me, and maybe I would lose. It was a pervasive mindset for a long time and so I love seeing people who have the very opposite mindset. And they are so tough! Muscles for miles. 

 

See what I mean?! 

Anyway, I love AFLW and I think we should all go to a game next season. Go Dees. 

Winter doona

On Saturday Chickpea had a birthday party doona and I told anyone who would listen that I was super excited that I was going to take off my summer doona and put the winter doona on the bed that night. On the way home I told LB that I’d told everyone about our winter doona and he suggested I was boring. But I don't even care because when I got under the winter doona that night I was so gdamn happy I wanted to tell the world about it. I'm in love with my winter doona and I don't care who knows!