quiet weekend

woodchop
Originally uploaded by Scootie.

This weekend was fairly quiet. With me on Lates and Joe in Sydney there was no real impetus to go out and get drunk on Friday, so instead I had a couple of quiet drinks with a colleague who was down from Sydney and then headed home at a reasonable hour.

Saturday I was ken to avoid any entanglement with the footy Grand Final, so I decided to head off to the Royal Melbourne Show and see if I could find a few photo opportunities. The show was quite small this year, particularly because of renovations occurring on the main showgrounds, so only half of the showground and grandstand were actually available, the rest being fenced off. The show itself has only a few things worth seeing, the events such as woodchopping, equestrian, dog showing, livestock judging, etc. Then the showbags, which as a kid were the main draw of the show but as an adult can be seen for the garbage they are :) Lastly the show has all the usual array of carnival rides and games of chance. Every tent had its own tout with a microphone hooked up to their PA shouting out to the crowd about how their game of chance is the best to play and how they are the ones giving away all the big prizes. As a rough count I saw about 6 'water race' games, about 4 basketball hoop games, 3 'magic ticket' games, 3 laughing clown games, a few ball toss games, one shooting game, and that's about all. :)
A highlight was overhearing a carny explain to a pair of twenty-somethings how the laughing clown game works, and the smirk on her face as she wondered the same thing I did, how you get to be 20+ years old without ever seeing the laughing clowns before :)
The rides had a few new faces this year, basically all working on the round-and-round-up-and-down principle, and most of the same old things like dodgem cars (three sets) ferris wheels (two) and roller coasters (two) were still there.
I went back later in the evening for some night shots and basically photographed everything there was to shoot at least twice :)

Sunday was spent on the couch watching crappy tv :)

Late shift

Originally uploaded by Scootie.

Been on the late shift all last week, which gets kind of boring towards the end of the week, but at least it gives me the chance to wander arounf the city shooting some night shots, which is becoming a bit of a tradition with me when I work lates.

Woo Hoo, I am a Weener!

Originally uploaded by Scootie.

I have won a photography competition! Woo Hoo!
This photo has been judged Best Action Photo from amongst 1500 other images vying for Best Action, Best Landscape, Best Personality and Best Overall photo in the Victorian Alps. The Competition was run by the Vic Snow Report website and winners were just announced and I won Best Action!
In true Scootie style, I just submitted some entries and went about my day, not really thinking about it, even when their mail systems stuffed up and lost a few entries and we had to resubmit, and even after they sent out an email saying the judging was delayed etc, I didn't really think about it, because frankly, how could this really apply to me? In fact I didn't even notice I'd won, but was asked by a colleague "did you win an amateur photo competition" to which I replied "I don't think so" because I couldn't think of any I'd entered. Turns out another KPMG person had entered and was keen to see if they'd won and one of my friends was looking over their shoulder at the time and recognised my name.
I'm pretty happy that I won (still a little stunned) because I am very proud of this image. I had to stand in the snow for hours, freezing my fingers (and ass) off, despite wearing gloves (yes, shooting in ski gloves, I love my gloves, they rock, but that's another story) and I was shooting on Manual exposure and Manual focus, because the action was too fast for the camera to react properly, and I knew I'd gotten some really good shots at the time, and had a few "Eureka" upload moments when i put them on the computer. Add to that the fact that I nearly lost all these images when my HD crashed!
Also, in other related coolness: this ski trip I had come to the conclusion that my goggles were stuffed, as the foam was finally going, and they tended to fog up now, and also that my sunnies were in need of replacing, as they were slightly scratched (titanium lenses, very hard to scratch) and the rubber joints were disintegrating, and the lenses were out of position and needed to be refitted, and especially the fact that I lost them on the way home, all added up to Scootie spending some hard earned moolah on new eye wear before the year was out. But no! for Scootie has just won some prizes, including new Bolle sunnies and Goggles. Now technically, I'm an Oakley man, but who in their right mind would knock back free sunnies? not me, that's for sure :)
So there you go, lucky to get the shot, lucky to keep it, lucky I was able to resubmit it, and lucky to have won, luckily winning something I really needed!

Of course, my luck is now officially all used up :) But you get that on the big jobs.

Earthdance 2005

Originally uploaded by Scootie.

Saturday was a special day, with the arrival of Earthdance 2005. Earthdance is a global event where simultaneous events are held in over 200 cities in over 50 countries, where everyone is dancing to the motto: Give Peace a Dance.

The Melbourne event was held in Fed Square and attracted a few thousand people by the time the day was over. The weather looked a bit iffy at first, and even rained a bit earlier in the day, but this didn't really do much to discourage us hard-core types :) Sure, a few people drifted away when it started to rain but most of us just tucked down a bit more into our coats and stayed where we were. I don't even think the hackie-sack game was even interrupted by the rain, although they did change to a dryer hack when the rain stopped.
Overall the day was fantastic, really good music, lots of good people and a pretty good mini-crew of flickrites. Joe was there of course, as was DJ Mudgutz and I even met up with WenDee from flickr too :)
The highlight of the day for me was seeing some of the costumed capers that are quite common to this event and to Earthcore, such as three people dancing on stilts, two dressed as trees and another dressed as a mermaid, dancing around a large sun while red painted jugglers danced with them. My favourite of all these was three girls 'breaking free' from their urban confines, dressed in ragged suits and ties that had started to become entwined with nature, sporting leaves and tree branches, all the while elevated on stilts made out of milk crates. One of them is pictured here and they were obviously having so much fun it was infectious :)

The Music was top notch and the dancing great fun and we just had a blast. Being the neo-flickr event that it was, we even ran into s2art as we were walking away, as him and his wife Nikki were heading out to dinner for Nikki's birthday. They were going to Transport but we suggested it might be a bit loud with all the DJing going on and that they might try elsewhere. :)

Friday again

Originally uploaded by Scootie.

Last friday was fairly standard fair. Started at Yak for a few beverages, managed to convince my team mates to come along for one or two and also met up with DJ Mudgutz which is now considered normal and won't be commented on especially.
We had a few at Yak and then headed off to The Long Room to meet up with a few friends of Mudgutz's, which turned out to be rather attractive women, so we stayed for a drink or two there until the overpowering scent of pretentious people (not our friends, but most of the other people there) was too much and then skedaddled home for a fairly early night.

a warm house is a happy house

kate shakes her booty while the cardinal entertains the foreman sisters
Originally uploaded by Scootie.

Saturday night was the evening of Tania's housewarming, and quite a big night it was :)
Tania has bought a nice flat in Kew, just near the Cotham Rd/Burke Rd corner, which is a very roomy, 70's built, two bedroom apartment, with quite a nice view out towards Doncaster.

The party officially started at 8pm, and we arrived not long after that, a bunch of us having met up at The Palace beforehand (Mick, Joe, Steph, Dan & Cath). The party itself was fairly small, with us, Tania, Katrina, Kate and her new boyfriend Nick, and some friends from Tania's work, etc, all in all about 16-17 people. The party started with the usual amount of milling around in the kitchen, then slowly but surely headed towards a mad dance party in the lounge room :)
The party steamed on, and everyone seemed to be having a good time.

It was good to finally get a chance to talk with Kate's new boyfriend Nick. I'd technically met him at the Sexy Party but we hadn't really chatted that much. He's a pretty cool guy and didn't seem too phased at being thrown it at the deep end and being grilled by so many of Kate's friends :)
After much drinking and much dancing, the official party ended up about 1am, with taxis called to ferry away the party guests, leaving myself, Joe, Tania and Andrea (from Tania's work). We decided that we needed to go out and headed into the city to Brown Alley where Joe and I had planned to go to hear Superpitch DJ.
We arrived in good stead and had no trouble getting in due to Joe having arranged for a spot on the guest list. I hadn't been to the club before and I was pretty happy with it. The layout is a bit weird, with only a tight spiral staircase between the three levels, but we hit the main dance floor downstairs and there was plenty of room to manoeuvre. Not long after arriving Tania and Andrea left, looking for some 80's music, so Joe and I stayed on and later met up with Becy and some of Joe's other friends from the In The Mix forums.
The music was great and we danced until about 5am when I was finally too tired and had to leave. We jumped a cab home and I spent a very lazy sunday at home surfing the net and loading songs onto the iPod mini I'd bought the day before (they're cheap now that they're being discontinued in favour of the iPod nano)

Another Friday passes

Originally uploaded by Scootie.

Yet another friday, passed into oblivion this week, as all time goes once it's been used, it's destroyed, forged into the ashtrays of the future, or whatever happens to time when it's used up.

The day turned into an amusing end, with a little more time spent at Yak and Lustre with some of the usual crew. The original intent of the evening was to spend more time with Peta and Clare, as we hadn't really caught up in previous weeks, merely been at the same places, so Lustre was designated as the official meet point, with intention of heading to The Lounge or to Loop later on. But, as Robert Burns wrote, The best laid schemes o' mice an' men Gang aft agley, and we actually started out at Yak. There were various reasons to do with the timing that Clare finished work, and the need to meet Mick and Steph and 'Teen in a place easy for them to find, and so we started at the usual, where we were joined by Clare, Peta, Mick, Steph, Mudguts (from Flickr), and more than one or two alcoholic beverages.

We moved on down to Lustre at about 6pm, and who should we run into down there but Felicite and Sarah, almost like a mini copy of the previous week at Lustre :)
So we settled in for a few more drinks, and were joined over time by Erin, Stuart (Flickr), Dean (had been working late) and some friends of Clare and Peta's. After a few hours the crew started to break up and go their separate ways, so Joe, Mudguts and I eventually headed over to De Biers for a few minutes to say goodbye to the girls. It was very hard to maintain to Mudguts the concept that we hardly ever go there when we greeted by one of the barmaids like long-lost friends (she used to work at Yak), and also happen to be up on the photo wall of fame (the manager and Joe went to high school together), so I don't really think he believed us :)

On the way home I did the usual drunken stop at Macca's, made more difficult by the occasional spouts of torrential rain from the severe thunderstorm we were in the middle of, and while walking back home I spied Mick, Steph and 'Teen over in The Bridge having a drink. I popped in for a quick pot and then went home and managed to get some very nice lightning shots off the balcony.

The funny thing was that with all the people that ended up showing up, we didn't really get much chance to catch up with Peta and Clare :) oh well, maybe next time.

Te Kotahitanga

Originally uploaded by Scootie.

Last Saturday was the New Zealand Te Kotahitanga (Unity) Festival at Federations Square, including the launch of the Te Karangatahi Waka, and due to the fine efforts of fellow flickrite Kiarobro, we were on the list as official photographers for the whole day's festivities.

The day started early with preparations for the arrival of the Waka, a hand crafted boat which were traditionally used to move between the islands and invade other territory. The crew of the Waka disembarked on Federation dock and were greeted by the elders of the Wurrundjeri tribe, the traditional owners of the site.

Later the day saw a whole lot of New Zealand and Polynesian/Maori celebrations, including some traditional dancers and some more modern fare.

There was also an attempt at the world record for the most people performing a Haka outside of New Zealand. The previous record was 505 people, and this event had over 2000 registrations, so they are likely to be awarded the record after Guinness scrutinise the video of the event.

It was a great day and we took a lot of photos, that are to be cut to a DVD and given to the organisers, but otherwise we've gotten some fabulous stuff for Flickr :) I really enjoyed myself, despite being a rare aussie in the crowd, everyone was so happy and having a great day that even my cheering the Wallaby's was met with good natured boos and hisses :)

So you've decided to move to Melbourne

(this is something I just whipped up in am email, to tease a friend who we're trying to convince to move to Melbourne from Canberra)

Congratulations on your choice of moving to what many refer to as "The World's best everything ever". In order to smooth your transition into this multi cultural melting pot that is the great City of Melbourne, the following questionnaire has been prepared to help us, help you.

Please be sure to answer all questions as it is necessary to fully profile your Melbourne experience to meet your needs

Desired Future Living Area:
(a) Central: CBD, Melbourne, North Melbourne, East Melbourne
(b) East: Richmond, Hawthorn, Camberwell
(c) South: St Kilda, Brighton, Elsternwick
(d) West: Footscray, Kensington, Williamstown
(e) North: Carlton, Fitzroy, Brunswick
(f) Non-Cool: all other locations

Originating Area:
(a) Melbourne Outer Suburbs (section (f) above)
(b) Country Victoria
(c) Other: Please don't specify, we're not that interested

Reasons for travelling to Melbourne:
(a) Always wanted to move there
(b) Work transfer, plus always wanted to move there
(c) Backpacker, plus always wanted to move there
(d) Homeless, plus always wanted to move there
(e) I've always been a heavy drinker

Marital Status
(a) Married, but looking
(b) In a relationship, but looking
(c) Single, and interested
(d) Single, and easy
(e) I've always been a heavy drinker

Please also rate the following sports on the scale provided:
Footy (the good one) - Really Great \ Great \ Good \ Willing to learn
Footy (the meathead one) - OK \ Stupid \ Pointless \ I support the All Blacks
Footy (the round ball one) - Good \ Boring \ Confusing \ I Don't watch SBS

Please also rate the following beer brands on the scale provided:
Tooheys - OK\ Poor \ Bad \ Very Bad \ Just Like Emu Bitter
Four X - Really Bad \ Very Bad \ Extremely Bad \ Never tried
Carlton - Great \ Good \ OK \ Good \ Great
Boags\Cascade - Great \ Great \ Great \ Great \ Good

Please indicate which of the following activities you are likely to participate in while in Melbourne:
Drinking Heavily - Yes \ No
Watching Footy - Yes \ No
Riding Trams - Yes \ No
Going to Fed Square - Yes \ No
Visiting the Shrine - Yes \ No
Driving up and down Chapel st - Yes \ No
Going out to clubs/bars - Yes \ No
Going down laneways to drink - Yes \ No
Eating Chinese food - Yes \ No
(please note that a 'No' answer to any of these does not automatically
preclude you from moving to Melbourne, it merely means we may need to
interview you further)

and after skiing?

Birthday Girl
Originally uploaded by Scootie.

So what have I done since skiing? Well, I spent a week at home sick. I won't go into the details, but whatever I had, you definitely don't want. It was one of those things where I didn't even have any appetite, so I didn't go out and shoot photos or anything because I didn't have any energy. I think that from Sunday night until the following Saturday I at the sum total of: three serves of toast, 5 biscuits, and about 10 potato chips. That's it. So I spent the whole time on the couch, or doing a little work from home on the computer, although the motivation was very poor indeed.

I had a pretty negative attitude all week, especially since my external hard disk died on the way back from the snow, so I didn't have access to any of the pics I took until Georgie burned them to DVD for me (I'd kept a copy on his laptop). Even without pictures to upload, all of that time should have led me to a frenzy of flickr activity, but to be honest, I was completely unmotivated to do anything except sit on the couch, half asleep, watching DVDs.

The next week was a bit more exciting, being back at work and all :) although it was actually a lot better, what with being actually able to eat and everything :) The week was ok, started getting my socialisation back on track, went to dinner with Kate on wednesday night, to a nice little Thai place near her, although I forgot we were supposed to be going to dinner so I brought over some chips, much to the amusement of her housemates :)

Friday I was up to my usual antics, drinks at Yakbar with Joe, Peta, Clare and John, where we were joined by fellow flickrnaut DJ Mudgutz. We had a few drinks at Yak and then moved on to Lustre lounge to meet up with Felicite and the crew for her birthday drinks. While we didn't officially meet up until Lustre lounge, I actually accidentally met up with them at the ATM between bars, which was funny because they didn't realise they were standing behind me until I turned around. As well as Felicite we also had Dean, Bec, Julia, Paul and Sarah, plus the crew we dragged down from Yak.

We had a number of very fine drinks, although I was on call so I had to curb my beverage intake somewhat. After some time at Lustre we headed off to get some noodles at a very good (and very friendly) noodle shop next to Robot and The Deanery, and then headed over to Pony, and since the music wasn't what we were looking for we headed to Loop. That's where I left the crew, as I had a photog gig on Saturday, but more about that in the next entry :)