I'm chainless. I don't have the power now. and my Hoorays list.

My motorcycle is chainless, and has been towed to Pablo's for repair. Woooohoooooot that nothing worse happened when the chain broke! I mean what if I had been desperately needing to accelerate at that moment in order to avoid a collision? Hooray for perfect timing of broken chains! Hooray for (barely (but honestly, who ever needs more than just enough?)) enough money to get it towed and repaired! Hooray that I get to commute on a motorcycle, which makes my day ever day (excepting on days when it's in the shop, in which case I get to make my own day in other ways (I was sorely temptly to purposely misspell "excepting" as "accepting" there)! Hooray that Jack Mason-Goodall is coming to Melbourne in something like less than 3 months! Hooray Hooray Hooray Hooray!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I was touched by his noodly appendage!

More notes on Melbourne: clocks and Mt. Rainier

One thing I've noticed over the last few weeks is that there are rather a lot of big, public, analog clocks in Melbourne--on the tops of towers, outside buildings, etc., and that as far as I can tell None of them ever have anything remotely like the correct time. This seems strange and pointless to me.

Today I was driving home in the beautiful sunshiny spring afternoon, and out of the corner of my eye I caught a whitish something up above the horizon over that way. I immediately looked over fully expecting to see the lovely vaunted vaulted snowladen top of the beautiful Mount Rainier.

When it turned out to be a bit of wispy cloud, my heart jumped into my throat and my nose got all tingly in that way it does when I am about to weep. FSM I miss Seattle.

Internal basement and balcony people, and power.

Some time ago, I learned a metaphor for thinking about people who either tear one down or build one up--basement people are people who suck the life right out of one, with various toxic, draining, unkind methods-of-relating--balcony people are people who somehow channel energy, life, joy, hope, encouragement toward one with their amazing kindness, graciousness, excitement.

Today I realized in a new way that actually the reason any of those things work on me is because I have my own internal basement and balcony people, who love to pick up on the things those external basement and balcony people are saying and doing and use that as further evidence that actually they are right, I should listen to them, etc. etc.

Also noted--my internal balcony person is generally (these days) much more powerful than my internal basement person. When I say powerful, I mean something very specific. My internal balcony person is able to listen with love and without judgment. My internal basement person is pretty much composed of judgments--if he tried to listen without judgment, he would discorporate. I find that the ability to listen nonjudgmentally is astonishingly powerful.

More things I miss about Seattle:

India Pale Ale on tap everywhere. Little did I know I was drinking especially hoppy pale ale

Also noted recently--someone invited me to an upcoming Christmas Party. The days are getting longer, and much warmer, and we recently sprang ahead with daylight savings time, and ... WTF? It's impossible for Christmas to be approaching.

I continue to be regularly surprised at new things which I have to price and learn that yes, they too are much more expensive than they would have been in Seattle. Recent examples include: hot water heater, washing machine, and helicoil thread repair kit.

However, I can now confidently cross the street with relatively high assurance I know from which direction the cars will be approaching. There's something to be said for this. There's also something to be said for Christmas, which is clearly one of the most depressing days of the entire year, happening on a day when there likely to be lots of sunlight--or at least many hours of daylight. I *shall* learn to love this place. It's happening to me and for me, in spite of myself =). Hooray!!!