The Case of the Elusive Ectotherm

OR...

Somebody stole my bloody fish!!

(Disclimer: This pic ISN'T of the fish. This is a pic from Wiki Images. MY fish, I didn't take pics of, as it was earmarked to be cooked. wrapped in bananna leaves, with ginger, shallotts and garlic. Which I was unable to achieve. Due to its STOLEN status.)

so. I've moved haus. No more Petyon Place, No more illegal bus stations right outside my bedroom window, with PMV drivers shouting "Lae, Lae, Lae, Lae, Lae. Market, Market, Market, Market, 2 Mile. 2 Mile, 2 Mile" from 6am to 8pm. No more living in the only street in Lae City that provides ingress (and illegal egress)  from the shopping heart of town to the main thoroughfare. No more neighbours playing their music at 11  on the stereo, from 9.30pm to 3am on Tues Wed AND Thurs nights. No more BBQ's with freaky weirdos telling me about Lae's Swinger's Club (whilst furtively licking their lips). No more visits from 2 Kina maris.

No more gun shot victims moaning outside my back door, on their way up the ramp to the 24hr Medical Clinic, No more rock-fights between gangs of Highland and costal boys.  No more waiting 6 months to get the cracked toilet seat changed. No more dealing with the compound managers who refuse to believe that a swimming pool requires chlorine and maintanence to function, and must believe that swimming in custard-thick green slime that smells of effluent is the way we expats like to take our leisure.

Every time I drive past the old compound, I break into my own version of Rose Royce's "Love Don't Live Here Any More":

"Just a vacancy, 

I don't live there, anymore"

CanI have a resounding "HELL YES!!" With a follow-up "BOO-YAH!!"??

So. I've moved to down-the-hill, right at the back of the staduim. Where I swam in my fresh and lovely non-slimy pool and watched the Independence Day fireworks go off RIGHT ABOVE MY HAUS!!!

I have 3 storeys of polished floorboard happiness, 4 bedrooms, 5 staff, a spectacular view across to the Yacht Club and out over the Huon Gulf. I have my quietude broken only by the sound of the next-door-neighbour's kakaruk crowing to greet the gloaming, and the satisfied snurfle grunts of my dog, as she chases skinks in her own back yard. With grass.

I earned every last second of this life, and now I have a haus that I can be safe and happy and content in. It matches my safe, happy and content life. 

EXCEPT, as I was unpacking everything I've accumulated over the past 8 months, a vague feeling of unease washed over me. Now, that in itself is not unusual, given my penchant for conspiracy theories and thet fact I live in a malaria-rich environment, but it's taken my up to a week to identify the case. 

Last night, while nomming on BBQ seafood (mussels, prawns, calamari and fish goujons at the Yacht Club), I realised what was causing this underlying sense of "un profond sentiment de malaise"

When I unpacked my freezer, I hadn't seen my fish.
 

This fish wasn't just ANY fish. This was a 3kg schnapper, caught for me off the reef at Salamaua. This was a fish I was keeping to really show-case my fishy-cooking skills, and share at the housewarming I'm planning. 

This was a fish caught to SHARE. Destined to be handled with love and anointed with organic garlic, lemongass, ginger and shallotts. THIS was a fish I was even thinking about whole frying Asian-styles. (or wrapped in plaintain lif and served with roasted kau kau and fried bananna.. THis fish hadn't made up its mind yet.)

This was a fish with a destiny, people. This fish had POTENTIAL.

This fish is no longer in my care. This fish has been relocated.It could have been one of the movers, on of the plumbers, one of the electricians. ANY one of the 30 or so workman who've been swarming over the haus, helping me move and getting the solar/airconditioning/sliding doors/paint up to standard.

To whomever unburdened me of making decisions on behalf of the fish, I hope it was freezer burnt and you choke on a pinbone. I hope that as you crawl up the ramp of the 24hr clinic, clutching your throat, gasping for breath, the last thing your conscious mind registers is the smell of rotting vegetation from the pool at 4th Street and your ears are assaulted by a cover version "Back In Black" on  loop,

I'm  piscean, man. You do. not. fuck. with. my. fish.

Bah.

CFD/AFD

No, it's not some trendy new diagnosis of children who obsessively wash their hands while screaming that they have nut allergies, it's my new mantra.

And, as every good Buddhist knows, mantras MUST be abbreviated to TLA's (which in itself is a joke, three letter acronyms? geddit!!)

So, this weekend, past, My delicious friend, Peakie and I embarked on my very first Blonde Ambition Tour.

Peakie is (sometimes, even erstwhile) blonde, as are some of her besties, and they all get together on various girls weekends, in the country and overseas, and each one of these girls weekends/weeks are referred to as a Blonde Ambition Tour.

Very similar to my Namaste Bitches sisters and our Florida Tour last year

(pee ess, The Namaster Bitches 2011 Tour is to the UK to see THE OPENING NIGHT OF THE FOO FIGHTER'S WORLD TOUR.. more on that later!)

And what happens on a Blonde Ambition Tour STAYS on.... well, you know the rest.

Except this time, we decided to be a gang, The Blonde Ambition Gang, which of course, leads me back to the topic of this post.

BAG.

Thus we all had to have gang names.

Mine, I am proud to announce, was Lemon Iced-T (BAG). And rocked the SHIZZ out of the Torquay Caravan Park. We TOTALLY  played Lilly Allen's "Fuck You" really loud. Like on 4. At about 6.30pm.

We were ROCK STARS, man, we kinda slumped around that Caravan site causing fear and havoc in the hearts of all who saw us. Although we replaced the hoodies and bandanas and low slung jeans for one piece bathers with built in spandex support and sarongs, we were FEARSOME, dude. Our slumping gang skillz even had a zed.

We even had someone knock on the caravan door at 10.30 and tell us to "Keep it down" . It was one of the proudest moments of my life.

Now, Girls weekends, I've had a few. But I can honestly say that I have never come home from a weekend having only existed on chicken twistees, blue cheese, havarti and cowboy shots.

Seriously. That is all I consumed for an entire weekend. Maybe a few random CC's in there, and there is a vague memory of a handful of BBQ Shapes. And possibly a mouthful of  2 minute noodles.

Did you know that you can re-use the pre-fab Cowboy shot glasses, and make BETTER ones? Like with Baileys and Scotch?

Believe me, after your 17th, they taste AMAZING!

Tip for young players?

Make sure you get the angle of the weird little curvy plastic divider in said pre-fab shot glasses right, or it just dribbles out of the side of your mouth, and you look drunker than you actually are.

And you waste alcohol, which is a violation of both BAT and NBT rules.

So, this past few days have been deemed CFD/ AFD's

Cheese Free Day and Alcohol Free Day.

Quite seriously, if you put a wodge of  Pule in front of me, I'd just about vom.

So, Sunday night, after the above weekend, I had this:



Tofu and chive Asian dumplings, with wilted choy sum, tomato and cucumber.

I could actually feel the nutrients returning to by blood stream and forcing the chicken twistie badness from my liver.

I'm too old for this. 

Dis-Ease.

There's a trendy new one coined every day, or so it seems. Road rage is SOOOO last millennium.. the latest too-have disease is Phone rage. Wanting to reach through the receiver and rip the jugular out of the pillock on the other end, wanting to tell you all about the benefits of their new mobile phone plan.

Ha!!

What about ADHAD?

No, not the REAL disorder related to hyperactivity.. I mean Advertising Heightened Audio Disorder. The syndrome by which you just KNOW that ads are markedly louder than the preceding programme, but are unable to prove it.

Or PCOS?

Nothing to do with ovaries.. it's People Chatting out of Setting.. a disorder daily put up with by receptionists and check-out chicks everywhere, by which the sufferers actually thing you MEAN it when you ask "so, how's your day?", and proceed to tell you. In excruciating detail.

I discovered this weekend I am afflicted by the most heinous of these new syndromes.

Tolerance Intolerance.

As you might remember, dear reader, I have given up the smokes.. 8 weeks now and counting. My desire to bite the heads off live toddlers a-la Ozzy is waning. I no longer stalk smokers around my local shops, madly sniffing their wake like a scent hound... or a crazed middle-aged psychic reading their aura.

BUT.. I am still a little needy. A little snappy, if you will. A little quick to anger. To bridle.

And it's Xmas. My most un-loved holiday of the year. And I recently took a nasty fall and am dealing with a fractured rib.

So while traipsing around The Glen, looking for presents for people I don't actually like, spending money on things that I wouldn't personally be caught dead with, dealing with my desire to furtively lick the neck of the not-particularly attractive older male smoker in front of me, I decided that I am most definitely a suffer of Tolerance Intolerance.

I don't wish good will to all men. I am more likely to wish you "Happy Eugenics, and thanks for removing yourself from the gene pool". Silent Night? I don't think so, Bubka.. You ever tried living on a main road in "Drunken Idiot leaves Xmas Party at 4am and thinks he's Fangio" season?

Away in a Manger? If only, but Furry got retrenched last Friday, so it will be more like "Away in the Lounge Room" for OUR holiday this year.


We Three Kings From Orient Are, in our house, We three Gift Vouchers from K-mart Are.

Bah Humbug.

So when you ring me/email me/ send me a holiday card, and I reply like Doberman with 'roid rage, please remember.. it's not me. I am just suffering an acute and seasonal form of Tolerance Intolerance.

And depending on the lag between the festive bunting coming down and the East Eggs going up, it could be a few months before my syndrome is under control.