Sunday outing

It was one of those rare Sundays...Nathan actually had the day off! We decided to start out day with brunch at Amici Bakery and Cafe on Chapel Street. We could have taken the train (which would have been heaps quicker) but opted for the tram instead. We got off at the corner of Toorak Road and Chapel Street and walked to the bakery/cafe.

After brekky, we decided to cross the road and take a look inside the Chapel Street Bazaar where I nearly regurgitated my breakfast after seeing a fluffy white dog throw up over it's owner(who was carrying it at the time).

From there we walked to Tarlo and Graham to check out more bric-a-brac. Nearly bought myself a stuffed tawny frogmouth, which is a kind of bird that looks stuffed even when it is alive (see photo) but Nathan talked me out of it...I guess we don't really need any stuffed animals in the apartment.

After Tarlo and Graham, Nate and I caught a tram over to St Kilda. Went into a store called Urban Attitude and picked up one of these for my soy sauce (it makes up for the tawny frogmouth).


Had the best gelato EVER at some random ice cream shop, then caught a tram back into the city. A short walk and we were on Brunswick Street having afternoon drinks at The Provincial Hotel. As can be seen from this photo I randomly downloaded from the web, it looks a little run down on the outside but is actually a really nice venue.


More walking, another tram and finally home. My legs are like lead. Nathan is crashed on the couch.

Uni 101

The new semester starts in a couple of weeks and our campus will soon be packed with undergraduates. Blessed.

University life can be a real eye opener for many first time undergraduates. It is a time for self discovery, to start anew. Anyone with emotional baggage can choose to leave them behind at the campus gates. Most people wont know who you are. In the dimly-lit lecture theatre, amidst a sea of a 1000 faces, you can be completely anonymous. You can pretty much dress how you want, study what you like, socialise with whom you choose, state your views, join whatever clubs or political groups you wish. No one will care. At uni you can be as chaste as you choose or as debaucherous as you desire.

The vast majority will adjust brilliantly and quickly settle into university life. Some will have way too much fun to the neglect of their studies. And a small minority will find it a real struggle.

Van Gogh no go

Nathan and I tried to see the Masterpieces from Paris exhibition at the National Gallery today. We arrived around 10.30am (the gallery opens at 10) but all the carparks near the gallery were already full. We finally manage to find a parking spot a fair distance away, walked over to the Gallery and got so far as inside the gallery foyer. We took one brief look at the horredous queue and promptly walked straight back out the revolving door.

Happy New Year (again)

Nathan and I are in Canberra this weekend. We are back for chinese new year (aka wallowing in excessive feast). This is the time of year when chinese people go all out. We greet one another with auspicious chinese greetings. We eat weird things with auspicious chinese names. We visit family and friends and katow to our ancestors in front of make-shift shrines covered in fruit and flowers. And we hand over red packets of money (well, the parent hand it out; the kids gratefully receive). Nathan is being immersed in my culture...luckily, for a country boy, he is not squimish about eating pig trotters with black moss vegetables.

Last night we went out with all the extended family...aunts, uncles, cousins and partners. It's an interesting observation that no matter how old you get (Nathan and I are both 33), if you are at a big chinese gathering you still get assigned to the "kid's table". I guess this was good for Nathan because the "kids" all prefer to communicate in english while the "adults" generally speak (loudly) in various dialects of chinese.

During the dinner, the nosy waitress asked me discreetly (in cantonese) if the person sitting next to me was my 'girlfriend'. I thought this was a rather rude thing to ask on so many levels but then I realised she was actually asking about the girl sitting to my left (rather than Nathan, who was sitting to my right). I politely told the waitress that the girl was actually the youngest of my cousins and gave her a look that made her feel awkward for the incenstuous untones of her inappropriate enquiry. I decided to let her figure it out for herself how the white guy fitted into the story.

The excessive feasting continues today with dumplings (must remember to warn Nathan that some of the dumplings have coins hidden in them....it would be awfully inauspicious if one accidentally choked on a five cent piece).

Happy chinese new year everybody!

Commitment

My friend, T, is in a relationship with a guy who cannot commit. This is not the first time T has dated a 'commitment-phobe'. Her ex was one. They were together for 8 years. They bought a house together. They moved overseas together. And then...out of the blue, he got cold feet and voided the relationship. Just like that. The ex has since moved on and managed to very quickly commit to someone else. Was this a case of timing (i.e. the ex was not yet ready in his life to commit) or was T simply not the right one for the ex to commit to?

T is worried her current relationship is heading towards a similar trajectory. The problem is that L can't even commit to buying a house with T. This is setting off alarm bells. T wishes to confront him about it, to force his hand. She reckons that the pain of being rejected is better that continuing a relationship wrought with uncertainty. The fact is that T is a great catch. She is attractive, kind and intelligent. So what's wrong?

I wonder if guys are more afraid of commitment than women. Women certainly feel the tick of their biological clock a lot more strongly. I've also posted before about the so-called trading up hypothesis, a phenomenon recognised by evolutionary biologists whereby animals are expected to trade up when a better suitor comes along.

T spent 8 years of her life with a guy thinking that he felt the same towards her as she did towards him. That's a substantial investment. I don't think she is prepared to sit back and let history repeat itself.

Drinking problem?

I think Nathan's 'friend/former colleague' has a drinking problem. This is the same guy who, only a few months ago, had cut his face up pretty bad at the greyhound after he was allegedly set upon by thugs (it later transpired he had fallen over in the courtyard in a drunken stupor). He seems to always be drunk.

We caught up with the same guy at the pride march on Sunday. At 1pm, he was already off his face. And when we left him at 9pm, he was stumbling back to the Prince of Wales (even though we had advised him that this was probably not a good idea).

During conversation with him on Sunday, he mentioned how he had woken up on new years day in the emergency room of a hospital in New York after he had got himself drunk on vacation.

The problem is that neither Nathan nor I know him that well. And he doesn't seem to have any other friends. I wonder if it appropriate to hold an intervention nonetheless.

Comfort words

I just finished writing an email to an interstate colleague I haven't seen for a couple of years. We've only ever met a dozen or so times but he has always been very good to me. Unfortunately, he is suffering from a terminal illness and the purpose of my email was to let him know that he was in my thoughts. It's an email that should have been written several months ago when I first heard he was sick. I guess I was scared. I didn't know if he would react badly to having someone contacting him out of the blue (sometimes these things are deeply personal and people want to deal with it in private). Finding the words can be difficult too. What the fu*k are you meant to say? I had to write a card a few years ago to another colleague whose son had committed suicide. It took me an hour to write the message, which I then tore up and tossed into the bin. The second attempt was better. It was shorter and less encumbered by what I thought the family might want to read and more informed by what my heart was telling me to write. I hope this colleague with the terminal illness reads the email in the same spirit in which it was sent.

Currently enjoying

...a soothing cup of chamomile tea.

Chamomile is a recent discovery for me. I like the taste of the tea, especially with honey. I had no idea it had so many medicinal benefits too. According to Wikipedia, chamomile has been touted as a cure for everything from gastrointestinal conditions and the common cold to open penile sores and vaginitis. Interesting.

Can we be friends?

The answer is 'no'.

I was speaking to a colleague last night who was having issues with one of his graduate students. The problem is that my colleague tries to be friends with his students. I think this is a recipe for disaster. It blurs the supervisor/student relationship and undermines authority.

When I was a student, I had an excellent working relationship with my PhD supervisors. This relationship has now grown into a friendship but I would never have expected them to be my friends while I was studying, nor would I have wanted them to be. What I needed were people that I could consider credible, who would critique my work and, when appropriate, kick me up the bum if I was being slack. It's a bit like parent/offspring relationships. Some parents want to be friends with their kids (instead of being parents). They're often the ones that end up on the Jerry Springer show.

Hot Science

Scientists are no longer the geeky, socially maladjusted people they used to be. A few weeks ago, when we had a hoard of teenagers running around campus for a science summer school, I was taken back by just how cool the kids were. Recently, we had a PhD student start his studies here in our department. He used to be a springboard diver. Needless to say, he had a body to match. And then, today, I was visiting my colleague at another university and noticed this extremely good-looking german postdoc in the tea room with an amazing body covered in tattoos. Talk about hot, hot, hot.

The problem with babies...

Sure, they're cute. But they cry...and they get sick. My friend had to cancel a brunch on me this weekend because her baby was not feeling well. "The baby just puked everywhere", she texted, "so I don't think we can meet up tomorrow morning". Bugger.

Then again, babies can also be the perfect alibi when you can't be f^&ked. No one ever questions the credibility of the parent if they use their baby as an excuse. "Sorry, cant make it. The baby is sick" or "Sorry, cant make it. The baby is sleeping" is much more believable than "Sorry, cant make it. I'm sick" or "Sorry, can't make it. I'm sleeping".

New additions...

I added eight of these to my office aquarium today.

They are called spotted hatchetfish and are one of only a few species of fish that can actually fly. They do so by flapping they enlarged pectoral fins. This obviously requires quite a bit of power which is why these fish have such a weird shape (aerodynamics, attachment of muscles for powering flight). Mine are already settling into their new environment, darting around the roots of the water lettuce, and hanging out near the top portion of the aquarium.

Unforgettable toilet experiences

My uncle has been in town for work. Last night, after dinner, I took him up to the Sofitel for drinks. The toilets on the 35th floor are a major tourist attraction. Seriously. It has one of the best (free) views of the city, with floor to ceiling windows overlooking Melbourne Park and the suburbs beyond. So that was the real reason why I took him up there...for the view of the city (the drinks were just an excuse). The Sofitel loos, I dare say, are the most beautiful toilet I've ever seen. Afterwards, it got me thinking. What are some of my other unforgettable toilet experiences? I've compiled a list:

1. Most fancy. This one goes to the 5-star hotel I went to in Hong Kong (can't remember the name). I was suffering from a severe case of food poisoning (I literally shat my way across the island). What made this toilet experience my most fancy was the fact that there was a toilet attendant stationed at the wash basin to help you dry your hands.

2. Most embarrassing. There are some things that your boss should never be permitted to do for you. Unclogging the toilet after you've been to the loo falls into that category. I blame Mexico, with their weak sewer pipes which are not capable of handling toilet paper being flushed down the bowl. We were at a ranch in a remote village. I had just finished my business, went to flush and, to my horror, the water level and the contents in the bowl started to rise. Fortunately there was no spill over (unlike that time in Argentina when I was 11...you'd think I'd learn from my latin american toilet experiences). I quickly told my boss. Before I could stop him, he calmly took a clothes hanger from the closet and proceeded towards the toilet saying "Dont worry. I know what to do." He never managed to unclog the loo (that was left to the owner of the ranch) but I appreciated the effort nonetheless.

3. Most bizarre. Incinerator toilet in Finland. I don't understand the logic of doing your business down a fiery pit. Seems very risky to me.

4. Most frugal. I can understand why, in some third world countries, people are charged when they want to go to use a toilet in a public space. But one thing I don't understand is how anybody can be expected to get by with 4 squares of toilet paper. That's how many I was given after paying my pesos for the privelege of using a toilet in Mexico (a different one to the one I had earlier flooded). And what is it with Mexican toilets? There are never any toilet seats on top of the bowls! I was instantly faced with having to make one of those difficult decisions. Use my 4 squares to clean the bowl before I sit down or to save the paper for use 'afterwards'. I opted for the latter, but it was one of the hardest decisions I've ever had to make in my life.

Some greenery for my fish tank

I went to Bunnings today and picked up some of these for my office fish tank.



They're called water lettuce. Not surprising really, since they look just like floating heads of lettuce (but with long feathery roots that grow into the water). Being natives of the mighty Amazon, they also fit in well with the South American theme of my office aquarium. I just hope that my silver dollars (vegetarian relatives of the pirhana) leave the plants alone.

The tank, on the whole, is looking really good now....makes me want to settle into my office sofa, stare into the tank, and drink capaherinas all day.

An instant Aussie family

Andrew, a friend from Canberra, texted me out of the blue. He was in town over the long weekend and wanted to catch up so we arranged to meet at Federation Square. Andrew had driven down to Melbourne with his partner Sharon and her two teenage kids. I had never thought of Andrew as the father-type before and this was the first time I had seen him interact with Sharon's children. He was great and the kids genuinely seem to adore him. Andrew and Sharon have been going out for three years now. Before that, he was the typical aussie bachelor. He lived on his own. The kitchen was a mess. The lounge room was 'yobbo minimalist': a TV set, a playstation, a reclining chair. Now, he's practically married (with kids)!

The rejection

I got an email the other day. It was from my friend Pete. It was a letter in regards to a job that Pete had recently applied for. By the looks of it, Pete was unsuccessful (yet again).

This is not the first time that Pete has forwarded me his rejection letters. I'm not really sure why he does it to be honest. He knows I am empathetic (we are both scientists) but I think he wants the sympathy. He likes to compare his situation with mine and, in particular, just how much more of a struggle it has been for him. But that's his point of view. I don't think he realises that it is tough for people in my chosen field of research too. I don't want to perpetuate the victim either. I've told him that to his face. I remind him of all the good things that have come his way but all he sees is the bad. I don't think I will reply to his email this time.

Here we go again...

I'm on leave again. Yay! But I have too much work to do. Boo!

It's the grant writing season at the moment. Researchers all over Australia are trying to cobble together their ideas and submitting their requests for funding from the Commonwealth Government. Last year, I nearly went insane cobbling together my proposal. I even experienced what I thought was a heart attack (you know its bad when you accept that it might actually be better for the heart attack to kill you than to persist with the agony of grant-writing). After all the heartache (literally), the project still didn't get funded.

So...this year, I'm trying a different tact. I have a pile of papers I need to read but I've decided not to go to the office (since I'm technically on leave). Instead, I'm going to plant myself in the corner of the coffee shop at the NGV, order a soy chai latte, and try and enjoy the experience.

Overheard on the train

Woman talking on her mobile phone...

W: What do you mean they can arrest me if I turn up to court?

Later in the conversation...

W: Well, If I'm not back by five (voice trails).

Later, still, taking to a different person on her mobile...

W: I don't know why they call it 'morning sickness'. I've been feeling crook all day. A guy must have come up with the phrase.

The Monogamy Myth?

A conversation this past week with a (straight) work colleague ventured into the topic of monogamous relationships. The colleague's best friend, who happens to be gay, married his same sex partner a few years ago in NZ. Since then, my colleague had regarded his best friend as the ultimate example of a committed monogamous relationship (gay or straight). During the conversation with my colleague, he recounted the shock and horror of learning that his best mate was, in fact, in an open relationship.

This conversation reminded me of a story told by one of my lecturers when I was studying at uni...

This is a dunnock, a drab, unassuming (some might even say, prudish) little bird from Europe and parts of Asia.


Back in 1853, a Reverend Frederick Morris urged his parisioners to turn to the Dunnock for guidance on moral behaviour. The Reverend wrote that the dunnock "exhibits a pattern which many of a higher grade might imitate, with advantage to themselves and benefit to others through an improved example." I guess the poor Reverend would have been turning in his grave when, more than a century later, the latest advances in paternity analyses revealed the dunnock to be, in fact, a highly promiscuous species.

So much for monogamy.

Fish Therapy

The health benefits of aquarium fish are well documented. Gazing into a fish tank, even an empty one devoid of any fish, has been shown to reduce stress and lower blood pressure.

Regular readers would know that I am a scientist and that I do research on fish. However, since taking on an academic position, I'm finding that more and more of my time is being absorbed into teaching and administration. As a result, I am finding less time for research (i.e. staring at fish) and I think these changes are taking a toll on my stress levels. Fear not, my friends; I'm trying to remedy the situation.

A few years back, I was given a huge aquarium. It takes up about a fifth of my office. I dont actually look at the tank much. The lighting was crap and I had only a single fish living in it (Sam, the saratoga). A few months ago, I decided to replace Sam (who was beautiful but way too belligerent) with a more peaceful bunch of 'community' fishes and fixed up the lighting so the tank is now looking a whole lot brighter.

I started off with six of these.

They are called Eartheaters. As their name suggests, mine spend a lot of time poking their snouts into the sand in search of food. They are really fun to watch (I think my work productivity is going to drop).

I also got one of these.

It's called a sailfin plec. Mine spends most of its time plastered to the side of the tank with his (or her?) cute sucky lips. I've been feeding it slices of boiled zuchini which I throw into the tank in the late afternoon (Plecs are nocturnal). Mine is still a bit shy (though I have ocassionally seen it swimming around the tank when the office and tank lights are off).

These are banded leporinus. I have one in my tank whom I've named Dr. Zeuss.


This is a giant pencilfish. I've called mine Mr. Squiggle.


The latest addition is Miffy, a fish that is popularly known as a silver dollar (though, in reality, the one I have is the size of a small tea cup saucer). These fish belong to the same family as the infamous pirhana. Miffy, however, is a vegetarian.

Fuck it

It's been one of those weeks. The kind that actually feels like you've packed a fortnight's worth of stuff into the span of a mere five days. I left work at 7.30pm tonight but 'yay!', I survived.

I survived a committee meeting that lasted 5 hours at the start of the working week. I survived the challenges of organizing a three day science event for a hoard of screaming teenagers (and even found it rewarding). Miraculously, no child died under my watch and only a couple suffered (minor) injuries (one kid fainted and another suffered a dislocated knee at the BBQ/disco event). Sure, there were a few minor hiccups...someone left their mobile phone in a lecture theatre, I forgot to return a set of keys by the 5pm deadline, and there is a box of weird chemicals sitting in my office that I'm going to need to palm off to someone next week. But you know what? Fuck it. Fuck the phone. Fuck the keys. Fuck the chemicals. I'll deal with them on Monday.

It's the weekend....and I intend to make the most out of it. Fuck the email I just received telling me that a progress report I was suppose to write by 7 January is now overdue. I'll deal with that later. And fuck the thief (or thieves) who stole my student's video recording equipment. The insurance will deal with the equipment, karma will deal with the thief (thieves).

I'm in my pyjamas, my dinner is ready, and (once I hit the 'publish post' button) I intend to savour every minute of what the weekend has to offer.

Student performance

Earlier in the week, I sat in on a committee to discuss the fate of students who had performed badly in the last academic year.

The process on the whole was quite supportive. It's nice to know that a lot of effort is made to get to the root cause of poor academic performance and to help students wherever possible.

Still...it was pretty obvious that some students simply just aren't cut out for university studies. These are the serial offenders, the ones who are given chance after chance but still perform badly. The excuses can be quite interesting too! One kid admitted acting out because his/her parents forced them into the course. Another was grieving over the loss of a family pet. The reasons for failing were quite an eye opener for me. I guess I was one of those nerdy, over-achieving types and the idea of failing even a single subject (let alone receiving straight fails) would have been absolutely mortifying.

Jared

I only met him once. He was a friend of a friend. We had a coffee at Bruneti's. He was witty, intelligent and handsome (I remember he had a beautiful jaw-line). My friend told me about this a couple of days ago. Such a waste.

Technically on leave

I've been on leave since the start of January but I've been bad. Yes, I've been going into the office almost everyday this week, everyday except today. Today I managed to get away from the city. I hired a car, dragged along some company and took in the majesty of this:

Decade in review

Was inspired by Andrew's blog to take a look back at the past decade. It was actually quite an important one for me, both personally and professionally.

2000: The year 2000 marked the start of my PhD studies. I initially started doing research on pipefishes (which are related to seahorses). My field sites were out in Botany Bay, just across from the airport. Not very glamorous at all. Every few minutes, a plane would be buzzing overhead. There was a supicious oily scum floating on the water's surface and signs warning people not to swim in the water. 2000 also was the lowest point in my life personally in terms of coming to grips with my sexuality. I shed a lot of tears that year when I was alone in my office or when I was going to bed at night.

2001: This was the year that pipefishes turned into a pipedream. The little shits were very hard to study. I soon decided to work on a freshwater fish instead. I went on a collecting trip up along the east coast of Australia with a buddy I had known since primary school. It was an amazing road trip. I got to visit some pretty special places. The highlight was lying on my back, gazing into the night sky and watching bats fluttering about in a place called the Blackdown tablelands which is situated in Central Queensland. The scariest was trudging into a river near Ingham, fully aware that there were crocs lurking nearby... the things scientists do!

2002: Went to my first international conference in Canada. I vowed never to fly with Air Canada after that trip. What a shit airline. My section of the plane was serviced by the flight attendant from hell who took a disliking to me the moment I got into my seat and went out of her way to be rude and obnoxious. This was also the year that I had my first scientific study published and it received a lot of international press, which was an unexpected surprise. Definitely a much needed confidence booster after the pipefish debacle.

2003: The highlight of the year was a round the world trip through Argentina, Brazil, the US, Finland and Singapore. The trip started off in South America. I caught up with a friend in Buenos Aires a day before the conference and we had the best steak...ever. It was in some random steak restaurant that we happened to stumble across by accident. The menu was in spanish, the waiter spoke minimal english but, somehow, through sign language and blind faith, we managed to order a fantastic meal. It pains me to say that Argentinian beef blows Australian beef out of the water. The conference itself was in Florianopolis in southern Brazil. Florianopolis is an island paradise. Even the dolphins went to there to die (as we found out when we went for a walk along the beach on our first day there). I bought a gigantic fibreglass fish ornament from a flea market in Florianopolis which I then had to cart with me throughout the remaining stop overs on my trip. Boston was terrific. I went to visit the lab where I ended up doing my first stint as a postdoctoral researcher. From the US, I headed up to Finland, where I saw my first woodpecker in the middle of Helsinki (which, I am told by bird fanatical friends, is quite a treat). I also developed a fondness for mushrooms on that trip (the edible ones; not the mind-warping varieties) after an outing into some nordic pine forest to go mushroom-picking. From Finland, I headed off to Singapore (still with fibreglass fish in tow) and some of the best food I had ever eaten (managed to gain 2kg in 3 days!). A month after I got back from my trip, I submitted my PhD dissertation.

2004: Headed to the USA for my first postdoctoral stint. It was my first time away from home and a really important year. There was something extremely liberating about heading to the otherside of the world. For the first time in my life, I finally felt comfortable in my own skin. I came out to myself on that trip. The first tell-tale sign that I was in a really happy place was when I realised I was walking to work each day with a big, fat smile on my face. The work itself took me on an amazing fieldtrip to study fishes in Mexico. Wow! What a trip. I got to trek through montane rainforest, sample real tacos from a taco stand, and meet some of the happiest people on Earth. The year ended with a long trip home, a PhD graduation ceremony, a devastating tsunami, and some liberating conversations with family and friends about the real me.

2005: Another stint overseas, this time in Finland. Another amazing year making friends and getting paid to do research in beautiful places. Here is where I can also attest to the health benefits of a nordic diet. After subsisting on forest berries and atlantic salmon (at 5.90 euro/kg, who could resist?) for seven months, I returned to Australia in top health. My cholestrol levels were at an all-time low. Later in the year, I moved to Melbourne where, not long after, I was offered my current job.

2006: My first year as an academic! It felt weird to be taking on my own students and starting my own research group so soon after finishing my own studies.

2007: Decided that Mr. Right was not going to fall from the sky and that I needed to be more proactive. Geeze...I thought coming out was hard. The dating scene can be really, really scary. I went on my first date (coffee in St Kilda), experienced my first crush (with a guy called Mick), and then...I met Nathan. It was easter. We organised a meeting at the Melbourne University tramstop. We had pizza on Lygon Street. He paid (how nice).

2008: Not a terribly eventful year though I did get to go overseas twice for work. The first was to the US for a conference, the second was to attend a thesis defence in Sweden where I was the opponent. The ferry ride from Helsinki to Stockholm is one I will never forget.

2009: This was quite a stressful year on the job front. They say that the first year of an academic job is usually the hardest but my first year was a walk in the park compared to my application for promotion this year. The whole process turned out to be much more intense than I could possibly have imagined. My worst enemy I think was definitely a lack of self-confidence. When the promotion came through, I was actually more relieved than I was happy.

Appearances

Nathan has a friend who looks like a drug addict. He is skeletal, has intense eyes, facial piercings, lives in Newtown and is covered from neck to toe in tattoos. Despite his appearance, Carl is one of the nicest people you could ever expect to meet. He is decent, honest and thoughtful. When I got back to Melbourne yesterday evening I was pleasantly surprised to see Carl waiting for me at the gate. He and his girlfriend were flying back home to Sydney. And even though their flight was soon to depart from another part of the airport and even though I have only met the guy two or three times, he made the effort. How nice was that? A pleasant surprise (though I think his appearance may have frightened my sister and her fiance).

Catching up with Carl had me reflecting this morning about people judging others by their appearance. The owner of Carl's local asian take-away once said to Carl's dad "your son nice boy but he look like junkie". Imagine that. You go to the shop everyday to buy your vietnamese spring rolls and the whole time the woman behind the counter thinks you're a heroine addict. I'm not any better. I once stood next to a black guy on a desserted train platform in Boston. He wore one of those black puffy jackets, had a baseball cap on his head, and had his hands in his pockets. I actually thought he was going to pull a knife on me. He didn't. The train soon arrived, we both got on, and went our merry ways (well, actually, I ended up catching the wrong train and got lost... bad karma for racist thoughts?). In hindsight, it WAS the end of Winter (the temperature was still minus-God-knows-how-many degrees) so wearing a puffy jacket and having your hands in your pocket actually makes good sense. And yet the things that ran through my head on the platform that day still disturbs me. True, I guess we all make judgements about people based on appearance. but it's not always grounded in reality and it's not always right.

Art in the Capital

I went with one of my sisters to visit both The National Gallery of Australia and The National Portrait Gallery yesterday arvo. The NGA was absolutely packed. It seems that the Masterpieces from Paris Exhibition is drawing quite a crowd. But we were there for another reason.

The NGA has been undergoing major renovations. As new sections are starting to open up, the collection has been shifting, literally. The famous Sidney Nolan Ned Kelly series has now moved downstairs into a purpose-built gallery that I was keen to check out.

I was also keen to see an exhibition of indigenous art which included a spectacular piece by my favourite aritist, Tommy Watson, who currently holds the record for the highest price ever paid for a painting by a living indigenous artist at auction (damn I wish I bought one of his paintings when they were affordable...got a spare $240,000 anybody?). This image of the painting doesn't really do it justice. In real life, the dots in the painting creates an optical illusion that causes them to pulse on the canvas.


After the NGA, we wandered over, past the High Court, to the newest public institution to open in Canberra, The National Portrait Gallery.

There, we saw portraits of many famous Australians (often, themselves, painted by famous Australians). Some of these portraits were actually donated by the actual people who appear in the paintings. I wonder what motivates someone to donate a picture of themselves to the national collection? Is it a selfless act of philantropy? Ego perhaps? Or maybe because the person who commissioned the painting couldn't stand having the picture hung up at home?

Which reminds me of a portrait by Mexican artist Freda Kahlo. The painting came about following a conversation between Kahlo and a woman named Claire Booth Luce who thought it would be nice to have a portrait painted of her friend, Dorothy Hale, who committed suicide. Luce had planned to give the painting to Hale's 'poor mother'. Imagine, then, Luce's surprise, when this arrived in the mail:

The painting now resides in the Phoenix Art Museum.

Fierce

A friend (and fellow foodie) gave me this book for Christmas. It's called "Fierce Food: The intrepid diner's guide to the unusual, exotic, and downright bizarre".

The book describes 215 food items, of which I have sampled just over 10%. Perhaps the most bizarre is cordyceps which, upon reading the book, I now know to be a parasitic fungus that has taken over the body of a catepillar. This probably explains why the thing I was eating was shaped just like a catepillar. Duh (see below).

A wet Christmas

Woke up this morning, opened the window, and laid in bed listening to the sound of rain. Simple pleasures. Merry Christmas!

BBQ in Kingston

Went to a friend's house last night for a bbq. I wish I brought my camera but, alas, I didn't. Thanks to google image search, however, I have been able to recreate the evening's menu...

Started off with a delcious hot spinach dip which I helped to create. Isn't it beautiful? Mine looked almost exactly like this one except that it had melted cheese on top and was served in a far less fancy dish (i.e. baking tray). But for the presence of spinach and spring onion, the dip would have been 100% saturated fat which is probably why it was so God damn tasty.

Every bbq has to have salad. Ours looked like this but with carrot instead of fetta. We each took a little so we didn't feel so bad about all the dip we ate.

Mmmm....corn. The best thing to have come out of the New World. Doubly good smothered in lime butter and cooked on the barbie.

The centrepiece was the kangaroo. Honestly, I have no qualms eating marsupial, especially when it is cooked well (i.e. rare)....

...and topped with a generous glob of this (anchovy butter)

Parma at the pub

Caught up with some friends for dinner last night. Met up at Dave's place in West Brunswick and headed to his local, The Union Hotel. The food there was excellent. As usual, I opted for a parma which turned out to be a great choice.

Afterwards, we went back to Dave's apartment and hung out with a very nice Spanish couple who were staying with him for a couple of days. Dave has a great social consience and has been hosting travellers for quite a while now as part of a programme called couch surfing where people offer their couches (or in Dave's case, his spare bedroom) to travellers. It's quite a nice concept and, as a bonus, Dave gets to meet lots of interesting people.

Am going back to Canberra for Christmas today. No doubt, I will be wallowing in excessive feast for the next week.

Release me

I am so loving this right now.

The mysterious case of my trouser button

I was standing in front of the urinal after having just finished my wee. I went to button up my fly and felt the top button pop off (I blame the poor stitching!). I looked down and the button was no where to be seen. Puzzled, I proceeded back to the dancefloor. After a few minutes, I felt something in the bottom of my left shoe and realized it was the button! How the hell did it manage to land in my shoe??!! I surmise that it had either slid down my left trouser leg or was catapulted directly into my shoe.

Two Christmas parties in one day

Both Nate and I had our respective work christmas parties yesterday. Mine was first. An afternoon BBQ event. Kids everywhere. Family friendly. I ate way too many sausages.

Nate's party was at the Docklands which meant that we could get there (and back) by foot. It was held in one of the old sheds near the water. Fancy drinks. A wok station where you can pick up little bowls of stir fry. A dance floor with DJ. No kids. I ate way too much salt and pepper calamari.

Perks of the job

One of the nice things about my job is that ocassionally I get to escape the chore of admin and get out into the sun for a bit of fieldwork. Yesterday was one of those days.

Some colleagues and I headed off to Gippsland to collect fish. We spent the whole day fishing for them using small barbless hooks baited with corn. The fish we were after are not native to Australia. In fact, they are from Central America.

Even though these fish are essentially tropical, they have managed to establish themselves in a huge cooling pond downstream from a power station. The water in the pond was about 30 degrees which is perfect if you happen to be a tropical fish. Indeed, more than just one kind of tropical fish has managed to establish in the pond...During our fishing expedition, we even managed to catch a couple of species native to Lake Malawi (Eastern Africa)!

Stuffed chickens and industrial lamps

This is, without a doubt, my favourite shop in Melbourne. It sells the most ecclectic collection of stuff you can possibly imagine, from taxidermied animals, bowling pins and religious icons to old lamps, african masks and laboratory glassware.

In my four years living in Melbourne, I've managed to amass a collection of really weird stuff from this shop including a marble sculpture, a bunch of old metal signs and a gigantic gable mask from Papua New Guinea. On each ocassion, it's been a real achievement haulling my purchases onto the train at Windsor station and dragging them home to my apartment in the city (all the while trying to ignore the weird looks from people along the way).

Greyhound Christmas show

My sister from Canberra is visiting Melbourne this week. Took her to The Greyhound last night. One of my students, who works there as a barman, had earlier told me that they were putting on a staff Christmas show. Arrived a little late so didn't actually see his main performance. Still, the rest of the show was pretty damn good. None of the performers flashed their titties this time. However, I did see a fake fingernail fling off the stage. Luckily no one was impailed.

Lab Christmas Party

Had my lab Christmas party on Friday. In an earlier post I mentioned that I had requested that everybody bring along a hand made gift. Wow! Several students made yummy baked goods. One brought along some beautiful ceramic bowls. Another created a lovely knitted wallet! What a talented bunch of people....Their efforts really put my two legged needlepoint horse to shame.

My slice of Amazonia

I've decided to liven up the aquarium in my office. With a tinge of saddness, I will be getting rid of Sam the Saratoga and creating a community tank for fishes native to the Amazon.

I'm planning on getting a school of Geophagus earth-eaters (not sure what species yet), maybe a giant pencilfish (or two), some catfishes, and a few other cool-looking things.

The revamp will take place in the new year since my office will be without power over the Christmas/new year shut down when the University is officially closed.

Cringe

It never occurred to me (until 5 minutes ago) that sending a bunch of raw video footage to the ABC without first listening to the audio could be an embarrassing mistake. The footage documents a field trip earlier this year to central Australia. We had not intended the video for public viewing and, in any case, a lot of the actual video shows me and my colleagues sitting in the car gossiping and talking shit. Some of this has, of course, ended up on the footage sent to the ABC who are going to use it for a popular science program...private conversations potentially broadcasted to a million viewers. How embarrassing.

A few battles ahead

Caught up with three friends yesterday, each of whom appear to be facing some formidable challenges ahead.

The friend I visited in the morning with Nate just got out of hospital after suffering a stroke caused by initially undetected damage resulting from a bicycle accident many weeks earlier. She is only 33, which makes it all the more upsetting. My friend's speech is fine but she has blurry vision and seemed a little unsteady on her feet. Her outlook was very positive and it seems that the distress is coming more from the people around her. She is, however, realistic about what lies ahead in terms of recovery.

The other two friends I saw are both thinking about major career changes (one of them currently works with hearing-impaired patients, the other is a journalist). I think it's very gutsy to be able to walk away from something familiar and to push oneself in a direction that is less certain, more risky but potentially also more rewarding.

Needlework disaster

I decided to go to Big W and buy myself one of these needlework craft kits.

I figure that this could be my 'handmade' gift for the lab Kris Kringle on Friday. I mean, how hard can it be? It's suitable for kids as young as six!

Well...four f*&%ing hours later, I've run out of the black, brown and white yarn. My horse has a gigantic head and only two legs (no hooves). It looks like a piece of shit. What a disaster.

It's the weekend...yay

I've been playing catch ups all week at the office to try and get back on top of all the work that had accumulated on my desk when I was away.

And although I'm glad it's the weekend, I'm afraid there won't be much time for rest. It's going to be one of those social weekends, catching up with friends whom I've been feeling guilty about not seeing for the last 18 months (Yes...18 months....What a horrible friend I am).

I also need to go and get started on some shopping for my lab christmas party next week. I suggested a Kris Kringle where everyone has to make a gift. In hindsight this was a stupid idea....As if I have the time. Nate suggested I make a picture out of pasta, maybe something like this:

Hmmm...I don't think so.

I need to make something that looks good but is simple and time-effective. I'm half tempted to pass off some home-made rum balls a friend gave to me earlier this week. I can pretend I made them myself. No one need ever know. Sneaky.

Recent movies

The flight to and from Europe allowed me to catch up on a whole bunch of movies that I had wanted to see (but never managed the time).

The shit-talker

I hate people who talk shit. I hate even more people who talk shit with authority. Take the young man who shared my flight from Frankfurt to Melbourne. Mid 20s. Spent a year in Germany. Coming back home. Still a year to go on his VCE. Talkative. I don't know his name but, for the sake of convenience, let's call him Shit talker (ST for short).

At the gate in Frankfurt, whilst we were waiting to board, ST struck up conversation with fellow passengers. He tells them that he went to Galipoli for Anzac Day in January. One of the fellow passenger looked perplexed and asks "Do you mean Australia Day?" The shit talker replied, "No. Australia Day is in February"....Cringe.

It gets worse. ST decides to talk about politics. Apparently, "Howard was the best prime minister we've ever had" (probably because ST isn't old enough to remember any other). On the topic of immigration, ST turns to an American guy and says "There are no Australians left in Melbourne. There is a suburb called Springvale. It's full of Vietnamese people and none of them speak any english. I went there once and I was the only Aussie in the whole street."... Double cringe.

Back from Berlin

I'm back from my whirlwind trip. Had a great time but I don't think I ever got into the European time zone (had a hard time sleeping and was waking up at weird hours of the morning). The conference went well. The food was fantastic...the Germans seem to really love their pork and cabbage. Hunted down and devoured a bratwurst (and a currywurst too).

Berlin was beautiful, just as friends had said. Lots of museums. Architecture was outstanding. Spent a whole day wandering the streets and taking in the city.

Notable trip highlights include:

1. Listening to the flight attendants bitching about vegetarian passengers and exchanging tips on how best to keep unwanted leg and armpit hair at bay.
2. Eating a hotdog purchased from a Christmas night market at Unter den Linden.
3. Picking out postcards from a street side vendor.
4. Shopping at H & M (bought a hat and scarf for me and a shirt for Nathan).
5. Checking out quirky carboard farm animals and dinosaurs at an exhibition called Shitrospective at Contemporary Fine Arts near the museum island (see installation view below).
6. Meandering through the Jewish memorial.
7. Devouring the best breakfast ever on an airplane (sausage, scrambled eggs, hashbrown, mushroom, tomato).

At last...

The exit row seats for my trip have finally been secured. Am now pretty much ready to go. Yay!

Bratwurst in Berlin

Less than a week to go. My talk for the conference is pretty much done. I'll practise it today and try and get some feedback.

It's going to be a ridiculously short trip. Fly out Saturday. Arrive Sunday (German time). Conference is from Monday til Wednesday. I have half a day to explore the city on Thursday (and look for a bratwurst hotdog stand). Then it's homeward bound on Thursday night. By the following Saturday, I would have gone half way around the world and back.

Seat pitch

As far as long-haul travel is concerned, I am one of those people who always turns up extra early at the airport in an attempt to secure an exit row seat. At 197 cm tall (yes, I know I am a freak), such a seat is a necessity rather than a luxury.

Qantas has started charging for the privilege of this extra leg room. That's $160 bucks a pop each way from Australia to Europe.

In truth, I don't mind paying if it lessens the anxiety of potentially missing out (especially if it's actually my work that pays). However, the whole process has turned out to be quite tedious. First up, it doesn't seem like travel agents, or indeed Qantas staff, have much of a clue as to how the whole process works (judging by the long, awkward silences and the 'umms' and 'ahhs'). Second, if you do manage to find out how it all works (and eventually, I did), it would appear that (1) booking an exit seat online involves the use of a fickle online booking system which may not work, and (2) booking over the phone is only good during regular business hours. On top of it all, no one can actually access the system until one week before departure (that's next Saturday for me).

So...in the long run, I probably haven't really lessened the anxiety after all...just moved it forward by about a week before departure. The question remains: will I get my exit row seats to Germany or not? I guess I'll know tomorrow (if the computer system works) or Monday (if I have to call the 1300 number).

As a postscript, the Sydney Morning Herald published an article today bitching about airlines charging extra costs onto the price of the ticket. One of the things they discussed was, of course, Qantas' decision to charge for exit row seats.

Man on train...

...pacing back and forth, moving between carriages. Occassionally his head jerks back and forth involuntarily. I wonder what's his story.

Different version of the same event

A few weeks ago, Nate and I went to the Greyhound and met up with one of his mates who is a regular there. We later heard that he had been bashed when he left the nightclub.

Anyhoo.I was speaking to one of my students today who works at the nightclub as a barman and he tells me that, contrary to what they had also been told, Nate's friend wasn't bashed after all.... He actually fell over and hurt himself when he was in a drunken stupor. I guess being set upon by a couple of thugs sounds a lot more impressive than falling over and breaking your own nose.

Art for art's sake

I spent my morning marking exams in a coffee shop in the city yesterday. After I was done, I went for lunch in Chinatown before catching a tram out to Richmond to pick up the painting I had bought a couple of weeks ago.

Nate hadn't previously seen the painting and his reaction, upon viewing the canvas, was one of surprise and utter disbelief manifested, rather irritatingly, in a fit of uncontrollable laughter.

Nate (between bouts of laughter): "Jesus Christ. I could have painted that."
Me: "That's not the point. Look at the colours and the brush strokes."
Nate (still laughing): "It's shit"

By now, I felt like I was the National Gallery of Australia in the 1970s, just after it had bought Jackson Pollock's Blue Poles for a cool $1.3 million. Like Nathan, the Australian public just didn't get it. But look at the value of Blue poles now! It's worth hundreds of millions. Nathan found my over-the-top anology most amusing. So, feeling defeated, I crawled off to bed.

The ultimate sea urchin experience

Sea urchins are spiky echinoderms that creep around on the seafloor on tiny, retractable tube feet. Unfortunately for them, they are also very tasty.

Took my dad and one of my sisters to Shoya on saturday night. They had the degustation; I opted for sushi.

Being the greedy pig that I am, I also ordered a side of 'uni', or sea urchin roe. The delicate slivers of yummy softness were presented inside the halved, spiky exoskeleton of an urchin that sat on top a leaf perched on a block of ice. It was almost too beautiful to eat. Almost. The roe was soft and sweet and delicious....Heaven from a bottom feeder.

The health check up

Had to go to the doctor yesterday to get a health check before my trip to Berlin (a condition of international work travel). Was hoping to get all my immunisations in the one hit but, of course, it is not such a simple process...I was going to need blood tests, another appointment with the nurse blah blah blah. On top of it all, I hadn't realised (until I was standing in front of the receptionist) that my medicare card had expired. Sigh. It was one of those days.

The woman with the bags

I was waiting at the train station yesterday afternoon minding my own business when a woman approaches the bench where I am sitting and asks me for help. I look up and notice she has three large bags next to her on the platform. She explained that some guy at the previous station had been putting his bags onto the train when the door suddenly closed, shutting out the bags' owner and stranding him at the previous station. Apparently, as the train was leaving, the woman shouted to the man through the glass doors to tell him to meet her at the next station (i.e. mine) but, after two trains had come and gone, she was starting to panic. I helped her with the bags onto the next city bound train. She needed to get off at the next station. I told her to speak to the customer services people where she was getting off. I helped her get the bags off the train. I felt bad for the lady (who was obviously trying to do the right thing herself) but I'm not sure what more I could have done to help...it was late and I needed to get home.

The email that made me smile

It hasn't been a very good start to the week. The ARC, Australia's national competitive research scheme, released their list of successful grant applicants on Monday. Unfortunately, neither of the research proposals I submitted for consideration got funded.

My disappointment, however, was tempered somewhat by an email from a colleague from Finland who will be visiting Melbourne in the new year. I offered for my friend and her youngish daughter to stay at my place. She emailed me today to tell me that she had told her daughter that I am living with a man. The daughter and I have interacted in the past (when I was working in Finland) and she remarked to her mother that I 'seem so normal' (I guess even kids have stereotypes). Still, my colleague told me that her daughter was very accepting in the knowledge that her mum won't be getting any attention from me and Nathan when they come to stay.

The surprisingly pleasant weekend

I must admit that I had pretty much written off this weekend. It's honours thesis deadline for one of my students and I thought I'd be stuck at home all weekend correcting drafts before the due date on Monday. Fortunately, the student sent me a draft on Friday night which I proceeded to edit that evening (and again on Saturday morning) and that was that. Finished! The rest of the weekend pretty much still ahead of me.

I decided to reward myself with a visit to a gallery in Richmond to see an exhibition of aboriginal art. I had gone to the same gallery a couple of weeks ago with Nathan where we shown the works sitting at the back. The spunky chick who worked at the gallery showed us two paintings that had already been reserved for the National Gallery of Victoria. One was a huge collaborative work comprising multicoloured circles. Another was a smaller, more abstract piece with paint smeared over the canvas in blocks of rich plum and straw yellow. Most of the rest of the paintings were rather average. Some looked like crap.

Anyhoo...on my return visit, the exhibition was up. The spunky chick had hung all the paintings and did an amazing job grouping the pieces together that even the crap ones looked absolutely superb. She tells me that the NGV had decided not to take the smaller canvas because they already had some good works by that artist in the collection. After much deliberation, I decided to buy the painting for myself.

Evening was spent with friends of Nathan's at a vietnamese restaurant that wasn't Minh Minh's. This was most unexpected as it seems that Minh Minh's had been THE venue of choice everytime we go out with these people. The food at the new place was good but very westernised.The dinner was a birthday celebration for the ex of one of Nathan's friend, Ad. The ex is a lovely man...italian, beautiful and a really decent guy (and I suspect most of us actually like him more than Ad). Still, all the people at the dinner were friends of Ad. This I found a little odd. Either the ex has no other friends of his own or the birthday was really just an excuse for Ad to get together with his friends. Regardless, with the exception of Nathan's singing (they had a karaoke), I had a really great time. And no, I didn't kiss the birthday boy.

Newtown

Been chasing reptiles in Newtown in Sydney the last couple of days. The collecting site is an old cemetery just off King Street. At first, it felt a little disconcerting clambering over old graves and flipping over broken tomb stones to get at the lizards but by day 3, we had become quite accomplished at grabbing lizards (whilst avoiding disused syringes). It's amazing how many people use the cemetery, either as a quiet place to sit and read or to walk their dogs.

Just got back to the motel with our quota of lizards. Reptiles are all happily feasting on baby crickets (purchased from the petshop at the Broadway Shopping Centre). Lizard catchers are happily resting up after three days of intensive fieldwork.

Daylesford

Nate and I took a couple of days off work and headed up to Daylesford with some interstate friends. We stayed at a lovely B&B owned by a couple who decided on a seachange and had purchased the building on a whim after falling in love withit during a weekend visit nine years earlier. The building has since been lovingly restored. By far the highlight was the fireplace in the reading room which was a welcomed retreat after a wet and cold drive up from Melbourne. During a brief break in the weather, we decided to leave the warmth of the reading room and ventured outside for a stroll around the main streets. Among the purchases during our foray into town was a gollywog from an antique store (whom we later decided to name "Bob"). In the evening, we took a short drive to the Lakehouse, a restaurant that was highly recommended by colleagues back in Melbourne. We were not disappointed. The food was amazing.

The next day, we went for a stroll up to the Botanic Gardens and then took a drive to nearby Hepburn Springs. A brief visit to the Convant gallery was followed by a drive up to Castlemaine for lunch, afternoon tea in Bendigo and an evening stroll on Mount Macedon before getting back into Melbourne in time for dinner last night at my favourite restaurant, The Waterfront (try the snapper curry...it is absolutely amazing).

Chasing reptiles in Sydney over the next few days around Newtown for work. Should be fun!

The art gallery...

Had a rather busy Saturday yesterday. It began with brunch with some friends at a restaurant by the banks of the Yarra and ended with a night out at the Greyhound watching some weird-ass tropical-themed drag finale.

Perhaps the thing that stuck out the most for me yesterday came from a visit to an aboriginal art gallery that is about to put on a show of artworks from one of my favourite (and also one of the newest) art communities located in Western Australia. The NGV had bought half a dozen paintings from their first sellout show a couple of years ago (some of which are currently hanging on the walls at the Ian Potter Centre at Fed Square). It will be a much anticipated show. Several of the paintings have already been purchased even before the show began (including two pieces for the NGV). What struck me, however, was the quality of the works. Some were beautiful but there were also some that were real shockers. Yes, I know...art is subjective and what may be a shocker to one person may be seen as a masterpiece to another but some of the pieces were of genuinely poor quality (even the person working at the gallery was amazed that they had made their way out of the studio). I guess even the best artists occassionally produce crap. However, whereas most non-indigenous artists would be self-selecting, Aboriginal artists may not necessarily share (or understand) the aesthetics of hungry art consumers and, in the aboriginal art world, there is a greater role for the mangers of the community art centres to impose quality control and to ensure only the 'best' works go out to market. The pressure and demand for aboriginal works, however, is intense and poor quality works routinely appear for sale. At the end of the day, I think it does a huge injustic to the artists.

The week after the conference

It's been a week of playing 'catch-ups' at work after the conference in Canberra. It's amazing how much stuff can acculmulate on your desk when you're away. This was also the week that two of my friends decided to come to Melbourne for a last minute sojourn before packing up their belongings (including two dogs) and moving to San Francisco. I will miss them both very much. D and I have been friends since the 4th grade. We hung out a lot and he knew my colleagues very well (even though he was working as a computer games animator andwas therefore outside of science). Funnily, back in the closeted days before he knew I was gay, he used to tell everyone that I was his 'heterosexual life partner'. Thinking back, his comment still makes me chuckle....the poor guy.

Beautiful Canberra (and a bollywood twist)

My visit to Canberra is almost coming to an end. And what a fantastic visit it has been. I caught up with a bunch of friends and colleagues at the conference last week, including several whom I haven't seen for many, many years.

Took some colleagues sight seeing on Friday which saw us visiting most of Canberra's major tourist offerings (old and new parliament house, the National Gallery, High Court and War memorial).

Nathan came up from Melbourne yesterday to join me at the wedding celebration of one of my oldest friends (whom I've known since primary school). It was a backyard affair, celebrated under a huge marquis with giant japanese laterns and cherry blossoms (pilfered from the streets of suburban Canberra the night before). The bride was so beautiful and my friend looked absolutely dashing in his suit. The ceremony was one of the best I have ever attended. The speeches were amazing, sad at times, but also funny and touching. The bride even quoted Shakira.

After the wedding, Nate and I caught up with some other friends in town for yummy indian food at the Blu Ginger. I also had indian food the night before at a restaurant called Bollywood Dimensions which is owned by a Bollwood dance instructor. The restaurant had a TV playing bollywood video clips. The people in those clips always seem so happy. I've always wondered what they might be singing about. Perhaps this...

Ooops...

The conference ended today but not before I managed to embarrass myself by going into the women's toilets by accident. You'd think the lack of a urinal would have been a give away. No. I only realized I was in the wrong toilet when I was mid way through my piss and noticed that there was a sanitary napkin disposal unit next to the toilet bowl. It still took me a split second before reality dawned on me. Fortunately, no one walked in.