*looks confused*
Nov. 28th, 2005 02:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
puddlesofunI'm back a little early from my weekend camping with Chris, Ali, and Alan (no, a different Alan). The place we were at went by the unbelievable name of Bargoed, near Swansea. Turns out I had loads of fun, and any misgivings I started with were solely the result of early-rising related grumpiness.
My camera ran out of batteries on the first day, though. So I've just written descriptions of all the photos I would have taken if I could.
Snap! Saturday morning, far to early. Me looking out through the window at the rain sodden street, thinking: why did I agree to go camping?
Snap! A traffic light near Beecroft. Ali and Chris have picked me up, and spirits have lifted as all clouds have left the sky.
Ali points at the traffic light: "Witches."
"Huh?"
"Shoes hung over telegraph wires is meant to be a sign of witches about."
"What about shoes hung over traffic lights?"
"I dunno. Blind witches?"
Snap! A "for demolition" sign on the outside of Alan's house. Although notes were posted to his neighbours, both Alan's agent and his landlord failed to inform him.
Snap! The beach, Terrigal. The four of us have stopped for lunch. It may look like that seagull is only frozen in the air by the static nature of photos, but I assure you that not only are the gulls here able to hover motionless over your head, but are also capable of keeping perfect pace with you as you walk, should you have any food on your person.
Bargoed! Our first glimpse of what is to be our home for the next few days. Some bushland, beyond that an amenities block, beyond that an oval, beyond that a camping ground, and beyond that Lake Macquarie. Heaven knows how the Electricity Australia Staff Club came into ownership of the place (it's for members and their guests only). We will set up our tents right next to the water.
Snap! The power station on the other side of the lake, two towers reaching skyward, the whole thing silhouetted in the salt mist of a sunny afternoon on the coast.
Snap! Me, laying motionless completely relaxed but quite hungry on the buffallo grass. Soon after, the others will go swimming. I'll catch up with them eventually, and...
Snap! Four people, two canoes, silly buggers. Avast!
Snap! Coles. Having eventually been told off for taking the canoes out too late, we've headed into Swansea to buy our dinner. Swansea Coles is open until midnight every day of the week, possibly because there isn't much else to do in Swansea.
Snap! Swansea Beer, Wine, and Spirits is almost as big as the afore mentioned supermarket. At least it's a town with its priorities... well, with priorites, sort of.
Snap! Twilight, and an entirely uninteresting shot of some sky across the lake. There's lightning flashes across there throughout the evening, whilst the weather stayed fine on our side. But have you ever tried to photograph lightning?
Snap! Some supermarket bought compound logs burning on a barbecue, onions, vege/tofu skewers and sausages above, and foil wrapped potatoes below. Alan says "potatoes" with a bad irish accent. Ali has banned Chris from doing the same.
Snap! Photo of a possum in the tree near our dining table. Awwwww, isn't he cute?
Snap! Photo of said cute possum stealing Alan's sausages while we're away from the table. Awww, isn't he cute? He has a taste for flesh now.
Snap! We've put the food away, and are sitting on our foldable seats, drinking wine from plastic cups, and watching the storm roll towards us. Aaah.
Snap! The inside of my tent (well, Andrew's tent actually, but the one I'm sleeping in). The storm hit at around twelve. The rain is noisy, wind is picking up the one corner of the tent I had no peg for (I will fix this by putting all the heavy stuff there), and I've forgotten to bring a pillow. In the distance I can here guitars, singing and laughing. I think about going for a nightime stroll and saying hello to the strangers, sharing in their good times. But I don't.
Snap! Sunday morning. The four of us sitting in the verandah of Bargoed's "shed", looking out past the oval. Me reading the spectrum, Ali the travel section. The shed is equipped with a kitchen, which is convenient, because it's pissing down and I don't know how else we would have made the scrambled eggs. We are deciding what to do with our day.
Snap! The gates of the Newcastle Steelworks. The security guard at another place has given us helpful directions. He probably used to work here.
It's empty. The steelworks aren't there anymore. There's just flat ground and a rainy grey void. I wonder where all those people ended up.
I'm the only one who gets out of the car here; the others just wait. A snowman figure in a flourescent green raincoat walks off into the distance.
Snap! A locomotive. Chris has driven across 3 tracks and into the freight train yards. After passing a couple more signs threatening prosecution he changes his mind.
Snap! The concrete silos are grey. The steel walled bridge building around them is painted grey. The sky behind them is grey. The air in front of them is grey. It's harmonious. The whole structure is huge. Chris can't get us in here either.
Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap! A thai place, a cafe, a hobby shop, a cinema. Lunch, coffee, time killing, The Constant Gardener. The cinema is nice and dry, and has a pleasant whiff of quaintness to it. The others were good too, but had too much sleet separating them.
Snap! Outside the old Newcastle Post Office building. Oh, this was before the cinema or hobby shop. The shots have gotten out of order. It's a grand sandstone building of the type that the Australian Postal service were once known for. The boarded up windows are covered in environmentally stencils and graf relating to newcastles part in climate change.
Snap! Inside the old Newcastle Post Office building. Well, of course we broke in. How could we not? Now look: the stairwell, the concrete, the huge area inside, maybe once the sorting area, and what's that blinking light? A silent alarm system? Perhaps we should leave....
Snap! Chris's car being rained on, taken just after we left the cinema. We decided at this point that maybe heading back to Sydney instead of staying another night in the tents would be the go.
Snap! Hills and rain, taken from the car. The silhouettes of the hills look like overlapping felt cutouts in ever lightening shades of grey, until they disappear into the sky.
Snap! Bargoed. It's stopped raining. We use this opportunity to pack our tents.
Snap! A woodfire pizza place we stopped in Charmhaven that we stopped in for dinner on our way back to Sydney, empty but for the staff and ourselves. The waitress is stunning. So what? That's one of the considerations places have when they hire waitresses. But still, she is. I haven't bathed since Friday, but there's no mirror in the restaurant rest-room to bring me down, so I smile back at her. I want to ask: Do you live here? What is it like? Anything to reach past an image towards a person. The tablecloth is paper and there is a pot of crayons on the table. If I was any good at art I would draw a portrait of her, but I'm not, so I draw an old man with sunken eyes (lines in purple) under a street lamp which bathes him in yellow crayon light. His suit is blue and the highlights of his suit are orange. Nearby I draw an eye, and work half a face around it. The lines purple, the eybrows orange, the eye blue, the hair purple and orange. The waitress's eyes are dark, her hair darker. I stop drawing when the pizza arrives. After we've finished, I scrawl something pathetic about felt cutout mountains, and we leave.
A while later, in the car, I will think of her face and not be able to remember it, and regret that.
But not for that long.
Snap! A picture of my bed. Ahh, comfort.
My camera ran out of batteries on the first day, though. So I've just written descriptions of all the photos I would have taken if I could.
Snap! Saturday morning, far to early. Me looking out through the window at the rain sodden street, thinking: why did I agree to go camping?
Snap! A traffic light near Beecroft. Ali and Chris have picked me up, and spirits have lifted as all clouds have left the sky.
Ali points at the traffic light: "Witches."
"Huh?"
"Shoes hung over telegraph wires is meant to be a sign of witches about."
"What about shoes hung over traffic lights?"
"I dunno. Blind witches?"
Snap! A "for demolition" sign on the outside of Alan's house. Although notes were posted to his neighbours, both Alan's agent and his landlord failed to inform him.
Snap! The beach, Terrigal. The four of us have stopped for lunch. It may look like that seagull is only frozen in the air by the static nature of photos, but I assure you that not only are the gulls here able to hover motionless over your head, but are also capable of keeping perfect pace with you as you walk, should you have any food on your person.
Bargoed! Our first glimpse of what is to be our home for the next few days. Some bushland, beyond that an amenities block, beyond that an oval, beyond that a camping ground, and beyond that Lake Macquarie. Heaven knows how the Electricity Australia Staff Club came into ownership of the place (it's for members and their guests only). We will set up our tents right next to the water.
Snap! The power station on the other side of the lake, two towers reaching skyward, the whole thing silhouetted in the salt mist of a sunny afternoon on the coast.
Snap! Me, laying motionless completely relaxed but quite hungry on the buffallo grass. Soon after, the others will go swimming. I'll catch up with them eventually, and...
Snap! Four people, two canoes, silly buggers. Avast!
Snap! Coles. Having eventually been told off for taking the canoes out too late, we've headed into Swansea to buy our dinner. Swansea Coles is open until midnight every day of the week, possibly because there isn't much else to do in Swansea.
Snap! Swansea Beer, Wine, and Spirits is almost as big as the afore mentioned supermarket. At least it's a town with its priorities... well, with priorites, sort of.
Snap! Twilight, and an entirely uninteresting shot of some sky across the lake. There's lightning flashes across there throughout the evening, whilst the weather stayed fine on our side. But have you ever tried to photograph lightning?
Snap! Some supermarket bought compound logs burning on a barbecue, onions, vege/tofu skewers and sausages above, and foil wrapped potatoes below. Alan says "potatoes" with a bad irish accent. Ali has banned Chris from doing the same.
Snap! Photo of a possum in the tree near our dining table. Awwwww, isn't he cute?
Snap! Photo of said cute possum stealing Alan's sausages while we're away from the table. Awww, isn't he cute? He has a taste for flesh now.
Snap! We've put the food away, and are sitting on our foldable seats, drinking wine from plastic cups, and watching the storm roll towards us. Aaah.
Snap! The inside of my tent (well, Andrew's tent actually, but the one I'm sleeping in). The storm hit at around twelve. The rain is noisy, wind is picking up the one corner of the tent I had no peg for (I will fix this by putting all the heavy stuff there), and I've forgotten to bring a pillow. In the distance I can here guitars, singing and laughing. I think about going for a nightime stroll and saying hello to the strangers, sharing in their good times. But I don't.
Snap! Sunday morning. The four of us sitting in the verandah of Bargoed's "shed", looking out past the oval. Me reading the spectrum, Ali the travel section. The shed is equipped with a kitchen, which is convenient, because it's pissing down and I don't know how else we would have made the scrambled eggs. We are deciding what to do with our day.
Snap! The gates of the Newcastle Steelworks. The security guard at another place has given us helpful directions. He probably used to work here.
It's empty. The steelworks aren't there anymore. There's just flat ground and a rainy grey void. I wonder where all those people ended up.
I'm the only one who gets out of the car here; the others just wait. A snowman figure in a flourescent green raincoat walks off into the distance.
Snap! A locomotive. Chris has driven across 3 tracks and into the freight train yards. After passing a couple more signs threatening prosecution he changes his mind.
Snap! The concrete silos are grey. The steel walled bridge building around them is painted grey. The sky behind them is grey. The air in front of them is grey. It's harmonious. The whole structure is huge. Chris can't get us in here either.
Snap! Snap! Snap! Snap! A thai place, a cafe, a hobby shop, a cinema. Lunch, coffee, time killing, The Constant Gardener. The cinema is nice and dry, and has a pleasant whiff of quaintness to it. The others were good too, but had too much sleet separating them.
Snap! Outside the old Newcastle Post Office building. Oh, this was before the cinema or hobby shop. The shots have gotten out of order. It's a grand sandstone building of the type that the Australian Postal service were once known for. The boarded up windows are covered in environmentally stencils and graf relating to newcastles part in climate change.
Snap! Inside the old Newcastle Post Office building. Well, of course we broke in. How could we not? Now look: the stairwell, the concrete, the huge area inside, maybe once the sorting area, and what's that blinking light? A silent alarm system? Perhaps we should leave....
Snap! Chris's car being rained on, taken just after we left the cinema. We decided at this point that maybe heading back to Sydney instead of staying another night in the tents would be the go.
Snap! Hills and rain, taken from the car. The silhouettes of the hills look like overlapping felt cutouts in ever lightening shades of grey, until they disappear into the sky.
Snap! Bargoed. It's stopped raining. We use this opportunity to pack our tents.
Snap! A woodfire pizza place we stopped in Charmhaven that we stopped in for dinner on our way back to Sydney, empty but for the staff and ourselves. The waitress is stunning. So what? That's one of the considerations places have when they hire waitresses. But still, she is. I haven't bathed since Friday, but there's no mirror in the restaurant rest-room to bring me down, so I smile back at her. I want to ask: Do you live here? What is it like? Anything to reach past an image towards a person. The tablecloth is paper and there is a pot of crayons on the table. If I was any good at art I would draw a portrait of her, but I'm not, so I draw an old man with sunken eyes (lines in purple) under a street lamp which bathes him in yellow crayon light. His suit is blue and the highlights of his suit are orange. Nearby I draw an eye, and work half a face around it. The lines purple, the eybrows orange, the eye blue, the hair purple and orange. The waitress's eyes are dark, her hair darker. I stop drawing when the pizza arrives. After we've finished, I scrawl something pathetic about felt cutout mountains, and we leave.
A while later, in the car, I will think of her face and not be able to remember it, and regret that.
But not for that long.
Snap! A picture of my bed. Ahh, comfort.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-11-27 03:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-28 04:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-28 12:00 am (UTC)I don't think there's anything wrong with fleeting, shallow attractions. If that was all you ever had, that might be a problem, but I think that happens to everyone sometimes.
no subject
Date: 2005-11-28 02:04 pm (UTC)What did you do with the bottle?
With the other thing I was just thinking when I asked the question that by the very act of making it public record you can give something more significance than it had or perhaps deserves. But in retrospect, I think I was probably just surprised that I shared so much. And sharing's not such a bad thing. :)
Hey, what's your icon about?
no subject
Date: 2005-11-28 01:52 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-28 02:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-28 08:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-28 02:45 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-29 04:39 am (UTC)