Heaven costs about $4000

There's not much better than stepping out into the autumn chill and being swept up against leather and a Paul Smith shirt, and that voice saying, "Hey, baby." On the Wednesday before my Easter break, The Boy came down to rock my world.

The food

I think I ate my own body weight's worth of fatty food. After his first visit here last year, where The Boy discovered me in a state of emaciation (in my case, the Freshman 20 was lost, not gained), it appears to have become his personal project to stuff me to the gills with yummy delicacies while he's around. I have no complaints.

We ate Indian. We ate pizza, fried chicken, roast chicken, Asian, Turkish, you name it, we ate it. The Boy cooked for me too. Rosemary herbed marinated grilled steak, corn on the cob, pumpkin, roasted pork, steamed vegetables, bacon and eggs, long beans with bacon bits, broiled crab, he can do it all. Witness:



And he'll even wash up shirtless too. That's my kind of man.

The entertainment

To my immense surprise, it was The Boy's idea to go clubbing. It's not his usual thing. Sure, when he was 16, he was perfecting the running man and having the chicks swoon at his feet. This has changed though, and while I'm slathered in body glitter and burning up the dance floor with the Honey Trappers or RunsInStilletoes, he's fast asleep ("Call me when you're done, baby."). Deeply intrigued by this sudden about-turn, I agreed. Unfortunately, this decision was made after I had eaten a poultry farm's worth of butter chicken at an Indian buffet. I feel asleep at 10 pm, woke up abruptly at 1 am, and staggered out, saying, "You wanna go dancing?"

We went, we saw, and I:
1. Got humped from behind
2. Twice
3. By a girl
4. Who was my platonic friend
5. Who I thought was straight.
6. I don't think so any more.

And then they switched to trance.

The Boy and I ended up on the roof with the guy who kept piranhas and chain-smoked some Djarum before calling it quits. So much for my hidden agenda to convince him that clubbing could be fun.

We had better luck on the next few days, where we exploited my connections at the university to go reptile fondling, and managed to molest a respectable number of snakes and lizards before we reluctantly left the reptile park. We also got to play with dingoes, although I suppose it was less "play" and more "sit still and make no sudden movements" until we were led out of their enclosure.


Pretty. Want.

We played chase with sea lions at the aquarium and goggled at the biggest damned manta ray I've ever seen, and sat on a beach watching the sun go down.


How much do you love that nose all smooshed against the glass?

We watched 300. It's my personal opinion that they should have paramedics on standby to shoot some IVs into women who become dangerously dehydrated from uncontrollable drooling. It's the Chippendales meets ancient history. What genius costume designer came up with the happy invention of the leather loincloth? I want to give that man a medal. It was all rippling abs and flexing muscle, and every movement made was poetry. I confess, I had some terribly geeky lustful moments where my primal female core met and melded with my inner medical geek, and I thought things like, "Holy fuck, look at that beautiful sartorius!", and "Check out his rectus abdominis!". Mainly though, I just kind of whimpered in my seat as my loins turned into golden liquid butter. I thought I would need to be stretchered out. Oh, and it was beautifully shot, with stunning visuals and gorgeous set pieces.

He let me drive illegally, which was fun (for me) and he didn't even scream when I screeched into a parking lot within a whisper of the neighboring car's bumper.

We had conversations like the following:
The Boy: "Hey, will you give me a blowjob?"
Slinky (sleepily): "Okay."
The Boy (delighted): "Whoa, I was just testing. Really?"
Slinky: "No, I was just testing."
The Boy: "You're a mean person."

[after The Boy sat in ONE lecture on glands]

The Boy: "So if you’re not well your glands swell up!"
Slinky: "Yes, I know."
The Boy: "Hey, I'm quite sure my glands are swollen."
Slinky (not looking): "No they're not."
The Boy: "No, I think they might a bit swoll-"
Slinky: "Shut up."

We took walks along the coast and watched 'Angel' and chilled out at home and took turns sleeping on the floor (the bed isn't big enough for two people, particularly when one of those people is The Boy).

We watched the West Coast Roots and Blues Festival, where I came to the realization during the that that I really, really loathe Australian music. The first set we caught was Missy Higgins. I'm sure Australians will chuck dead wombats at me when I say this, but she sucked monkey butt. During a later conversation with the cuz, she said, "Oh yeah, she's what I put on when I don't want to sing along." Hardly a ringing endorsement. It was as vanilla as vanilla gets, and only chain-smoking Djarum got us through. I was so bored, wanted to rip my ears off and feed them to iguanas. I had to amuse myself by trying to gas the fat underdressed Australian Indian chick next to me with Djarum smoke, kind of like what Constantine did with the spider, but on a more ambitious scale. By the end of her set I risked being torn apart by an angry crowd of signing, swaying and obviously brain-damaged Australians when I said rather too loudly, "Oh thank God, she's finally done."

We watched John Mayer play and have discovered that as advertised by Buddy, the man plays one hell of a tight set, even if you do get the impression that he buys into his own hype a bit too much. ("I love trying to connect to different culture, and I feel so at home here, and when I got off the plane after 27 hours, it was like it had never even left the tarmac!" Champion brownnosing, Johnny boy. And you never once mentioned which city you were in.) I'm not a fan at all of his music, but with The Boy wrapping his arms around me and singing along to "Your Body Is A Wonderland" and watching his fingers dance over the frets in some seriously good improv guitar masturbation during "Gravity", I totally forget that.

But the best act was when we watched Bo Diddley lay waste to the audience in a set which was worth the price of admission alone. The man is pure genius. He just has to breathe and the crowd goes wild. Bo Diddley just rocked up, said, "I had an operation a week ago, and I could have cancelled, but I couldn't disappoint you guys,” and then went on play some fierce blues guitar. He slayed the audience. It was a privilege to be there, listening to that rich smoke and bourbon voice roll out and have everyone scream. It sounded like flash Cadillacs with tail fins, running red lights, Cajun cooking, smoky clubs and some serious shagging. And the man is 80, for the love of god.

And then there was the puppy.

The cute overload

I had agreed, in a moment of weakness, to puppysit a friend's friend's puppy as a favor. Unfortunately, there was some lying by omission as to the puppy's toilet-training until I had actually agreed to take care of her for the week. The Boy was dying to see the puppy, so she was dropped off at our place the night before he was due to leave. This is her.




Yes, that is Johnny. Indulge me.

I think puppies should be used as a tactical tool of war. They should be dropped over enemy camps. Little crates with parachutes, saying "This Way Up" containing puppies with exceptionally large eyes and waggy tails. They would float gently to earth and land in the laps of soldiers. Upon opening the crates, enemy troops will be assaulted by little pink licky tongues and happy smiley puppy faces. The other side won't fight because they might hurt the puppies. The enemy side won't fight because they have puppies. Wars would be over in hours.

This ploy would not work in China or Korea though. They'd eat the puppies.

After the first night, she was renamed Little Miss Pissy, which was a far more accurate name for her than her actual, rather clumsy, name. I've seen the size of a dog's bladder in situ, and can confidently say that her output defies physiology and the laws of physics.

By Thursday though I well and truly tired of having the puppy around. It meant not being able to study properly because on eye had to be on guard for possible pre-excretory behavior. It meant being unable to sleep in. It also meant that where you went, there was a little puppy trotting eagerly at your heels, just waiting to trip you and your hot tea up. I also got well and truly tired of prising open puppy jaws and fishing out dead bees, stones, herbage, grass, thread, inner soles and various miscellany coated with saliva, and happily handed her back.

And then it was Monday and I had two exams and The Boy had been home a week. Sigh. 9 more weeks, baby.