Mirror, mirror, on the wall

I stood in front of the mirror, talking to myself.

I do this a lot. Well, a lot when I’m drunk. Well, drunk or tipsy. If I’ve had a drink. Or am considering having one. And by ‘drink’, I’m including ‘coke zero vanilla’.

My one-on-one bathroom chats are usually brief but practical. I tell myself to have a glass of water, to remember that I’ve already had dinner and don’t need a bowl of fries and a pizza, and to stop talking about Emma Stone’s voice in such glowing terms, because people are no longer making eye contact with me.

I just want her to read me stories.

In these mirror discussions I become my own mother, essentially—but in an exemplary parent/child relationship, one where both parties agree unanimously on every issue.

Yes. It’s weird. I know.

Years ago, I was practicing my over-the-shoulder duckface in my bedroom (in my defence, it was after an America’s Next Top Model marathon, also, I am not a cool or hip person) and one of my male friends walked in. I’m not sure what it was that horrified him – the activity itself or my reaction to being caught, which was so dripping in embarrassment and shame that it planted the action in the same camp as something truly damaging. Like being caught stroking a picture of your own face. While masturbating.

Regardless of what shocked him, he turned purple from the shame of it and started apologising profusely as backed out of the room, eyes cast downward.

I distinctly remember thinking, “well, that’s done. I guess there’s no way we’re ever getting married”. Before this moment I hadn’t even considered marriage with him, a man with whom I shared little in common. But it’s a weird feeling, knowing a door has closed, even if it’s a door you didn’t care to open. I don’t like knowing that someone’s opinion of you has permanently changed. Maybe prior to this he’d considered me a woman of some mild mystery and intrigue, what with my almost-complete-collection of Buffy on VHS and my insider knowledge of local haunts such as Mr Bun and the Readings foodcourt. Maybe he’d just been waiting to make his move.

But after this? No. I was firmly in the friendszone. This left me feeling petulant, and for weeks after I considered that maybe I DID want a relationship with him. Well, sort of. In my fantasies it was a relationship built on vague amiability, with no romantic or sexual elements, where I had thought ahead to our divorce and how lovely it’d be to have space to myself again without him breathing down my neck all the goddamn time.

In this situation, I was definitely the Xander. Or the Willow. Or the Buff… wait, did EVERYONE in that show have an unrequited crush?

This is why I am delighted that no one has ever caught me in my restroom repartee. Goodness, an innocent posing session led to such embarrassment! Imagine someone witnessing the strange Jekyll/Hyde display of me saying “only two more tequilas, Katiepie, then you probs should stop”, giggling in agreement with myself, then fumbling through an “ooh, you” hand flap.

A few Saturdays back, I stood in front of the mirror, washing my hands and baring my teeth like a wild dog to check if they were clean. I questioned if I should have more to drink. With the question, mumbled aloud, I noticed my facial expressions switch from an imploring beggar to a admonishing schoolteacher. The absurdity struck me as I saw my forehead change, and I realised I was at a crossroads.

Do I put an end to this ridiculous display?

Or do I commit to it?

We could split into two Kates. The disciplinarian would go by Katherine, and she’d speak with perfect elocution while maintaining rigid posture. She would frown upon alcohol and would figure out what a multivitamin is and where to buy one. She would understand how to make pivot tables in Excel. The other Kate would be known as Katie, but would pronounce it ‘Kyay-eh’, as she would develop an arbitrary cockney accent almost immediately. She would be constantly searching for places to lie down for naps and would throw full-body tantrums when things didn’t go her way.

Fortunately one of my friends has a lack of hand/eye coordination while holding beverages, so I have some experience with tantrums.

The idea seemed appealing. For a moment I considered it, eyes wide with the possibilities. I would never be lonely or bored again. Plants vs Zombies would no longer be necessary to keep myself entertained, as now I’d have a guaranteed friend for always. This would mean I might as well sell my iPhone—and just think of the money I’d save on international calls! (Sometimes after a few beers I call my sister in Brisbane and sing her the New Zealand national anthem, because I enjoy her bewildered reaction to this practice. It is not a cheap hobby.)

After some consideration of this plan, I realised that my brain was attempting to find ways to assure its own destruction, justifying it under the devilish guises of “friendship” and “cost-effectiveness”. Surely, despite the positive side effects, brain-self-destruction is a bad thing? Surely I should stop this ridiculous mirror madness? Surely I should move on, be a grown up?

Luckily, Katherine stopped Kyay-eh throwing a tantrum about it, and as we left the bathroom together, myselves agreed – one more drink? Yeah, it’d probably be fine.

Traditionyule

When I was little, we lived in a pretty nice area of Tauranga, New Zealand (shut up, yes, there is such a thing). Our area was comprised of subdivisions full of snobby middle-class people, all sure to stress the second half of the suburb. “Yes, I am from Cambridge HEIGHTS. HEIGHTS. Oh, we have a decent acre of land, a double garage, a microwave, but it’s really no big deal. Please, please, there is no need to avert your gaze.”

The letterboxes in our street were either white or wooden, adorned with the fancy numbers. You know the sort, the gold or brass ones, the ones you need to screw in, definitely not the stick-on kind. Folks may have had personalities inside their homes, but on the outside? No. The outsides were kept uniform. Tidy. Orderly. Vaguely, um, Germanic, if you catch my drift.

Same same, only, not different.

After a few years, a new family moved in down the street, in a house that was set back from the road. Obviously missing the pattern laid down by their double-denim-clad neighbours, they installed a sickly-yellow-green letterbox. Against the white and wooden parade this was garish and ugly, a horrifying pimple on our street’s perfect face. To express our discomfort with the bile-toned box, my family would make vomit noises every time we drove past, punctuating our retching with emphatic hand gestures to show the path that our upchuck would take. Splash on the back of the seat. Slosh out the window. Oops, ha ha, there’s some on Mum’s head.

This was my first taste of tradition, and I loved it.

For years I tried to force traditions to catch on, a practice that makes everyone feel slightly affronted and thus uncooperative. I found that my parents were more agreeable around the holidays, as they were filled with an overwhelming sense of fatigue.

I managed to get a Christmas Eve reading of The Night Before Christmas to stick, my poor mother shuffling up the stairs to my room to sleepily read aloud every year, even though I don’t think anyone actually enjoyed it. I mean, it starts off great, everyone’s pumped for that first verse. I didn’t know what a sugarplum WAS, but it definitely piqued my interest, as did the slumbering mice. But after that it’s all downhill, petering off into an absurd fantasy. I don’t think it helped that Mum’s delivery was tinged with the weariness of knowing she’s going to have to get up at 4am to put stockings out and then let some fictional bearded bastard take all the credit.

When I was a teenager I saw It’s a Wonderful Life, deciding before it had even begun that it would be a perfect Christmas tradition. I felt a strong sense of nostalgia for phrases like “hot dog!”, wind-up telephones and small towns – a strange emotion, given that these were things I’d never really experienced. Looking back, I am almost positive that the nostalgia was actually just a mutation of a strangely intense sexual crush on Jimmy Stewart, an emotion my mother and stepfather did not share, as they would consistently manage to find excuses to avoid the TV. Sitting alone in the lounge weeping at the Baileys singing Auld Lang Syne – it was a tradition, sure, but probably not one I should take pride in.

I am not lying when I say that just looking at this picture makes me misty eyed.

A few years ago I packed three Christmas movies in my luggage to watch with my Dad & stepmother, figuring that one would catch on. They politely sat through – and promptly fell asleep in – It’s a Wonderful Life, leading me to finally retire it from family viewing. The next night I made what some might consider a slight error in judgement… given that my father’s favourite tradition is to hold hands when giving thanks to Our Lord before dinner, I probably should have reconsidered the recommendation of Bad Santa. Then again, sitting between my parents, watching Billy Bob Thornton have sex with Lorelai Gilmore in a car while she screams “fuck me Santa” – these are memories you can’t pay for.

The next night I redeemed myself with Love Actually, and now every year I get thanked for introducing them to it. If you’ve ever watched this movie with your family your traditions are probably the same as mine – chortle at Hugh Grant dancing, titter at Colin Firth attempting to speak Portuguese, and sit rigidly and unblinking during all of the simulated sex scenes. Seriously, so many nipple shots in that movie. Maybe I’m overthinking (certain people in my life will not be surprised to hear this) but watching Love Actually with your family is to acknowledge that oral sex exists, and this is not something I need on Christmas.

Those who read my Fiji blogs will be unsurprised to hear there is one Christmas tradition I never had to force, and one that stuck immediately. Every year it changes slightly, but it always centres around the same two things. One, sort of media consumption. Two, a competitive eating contest: where the competitors are “myself” and “my pride”. I vividly remember the first year I did this, lying on my bed with a new Babysitter’s Club book and a box of Roses chocolates (first digging out the strawberry ones, ending with a deep stomach-expanding breath and the classic fudge). Later years had me sitting on an inflatable chair, watching the South Park musical and groaning through bowls of salted cashews.

What could be more festive than this?

Before Christmas this year I had been focused on two food items: declaring the two-punch combo of ham and scorched almonds to be my Christmas “goal”, to anyone who would listen. I was thrilled when Annie bought me a box of those little chocolate-enveloped-nuts, despite our multiple agreements that we wouldn’t “do” presents this year. I was then delirious with delight when my stepmother needed both hands to lift the ham from the back fridge, as the thick slices of pork had been dancing in my mind since, well… about July.

Sadly, I am not the best at quote unquote self-discipline, and I accidentally ended up overdosing on yellow-bag Doritos and bubbles while watching The Sound of Music. I woke up at 5pm, face stuck to the leather couch, Captain von Trapp’s heart now as full as my distended belly. An hour later dinner was served. I was definitely still full, but managed to fit in two more glasses of bubbles and a plate of turkey and ham and potatoes and mayo-soaked salad.

Sure, I had to arch my back to fit it all in. But I was hardly going to say no to Christmas dinner.

It’s tradition!

Refined Tastes

6.30am

My phone buzzes, ripping me from sleep. It’s a text message from Annie, that simply reads “being awake is so not legit.”

It’s a Sunday. It’s 6.30am. Normally my Sunday routine is to rise around 11am, making whimpering noises until I have a cup of coffee. I then spend the next half hour slumped in a café booth, alternating between checking twitter, pretending to read the paper, and wincing at loud noises.

Annie’s right. 6.30am is so not legit.

7am

I prepare a bowl of cereal and a cup of coffee. Annie pops the lid open on her second beer of the day.

Today we have tickets to Toast Martinborough, a wine/food/music festival held amongst the wineries of the Wairarapa. It’s my third year attending, which means it’s the second time I’ve ignored my own advice from the year prior to never, ever, ever return. Each year I’ve arrived home with no money left, sunburnt skin, and mascara-stained cheeks after the inevitable fight with a close friend.

Unfortunately, I’m not very good at saying no. So once again, I have agreed to part ways with my money and sense.

8am

We walk to the bus stop in dresses and jandals. A car passes. Without explanation, Annie screams, “stop judging me, dicks! My life choices are legit!”

Two breakfast beers on an empty stomach have obviously left their mark.

8.30am

The queue at the train station coffee cart is lengthy, which justifies my decision to buy two cups.

In Canada, I believe they call this “double fisting”. Those Canucks are so innocent.

Meanwhile, Annie buys two huge cans of beer from the supermarket. It comes to a grand total of $5.98, and it’s clear from her first sneaky taste that the beer’s cost-effectiveness is definitely its only selling point.

She doesn’t want to get caught drinking in public, so her surreptitious sips are accompanied with suspicious stares around the station. I gulp down the rest of my coffee, handing her the cup so she can refill it with her cheap ale, which she does under the table.

She peers inside the cup, frowning.

The foam at the top is half beer, half coffee-froth, and it quickly separates from the rest of the beverage into a single floating mass. She hooks her finger and scoops the pond scum onto a napkin. The spume starts evaporating, wobbly gas pockets popping open with little lactose farts.

She continues to drink from the coffee cup, her eyes wary.

“I should have brought a goon sack” she laments, sighing about her poor planning.

9am

We meet our friend Michelle on the train. As it leaves the station, Annie fills her coffee cup with beer for the third time. Meanwhile, Michelle paints her fingernails, a bottle of candy-floss pink squeezed between her knees.

9.25am

The rest of the carriage is filled with husbands and wives, passing sections of newspapers back and forth wordlessly. Annie leans in and nods her appreciation. “I like when like, old people come to these things. And wear like, pants. With a shirt. It’s legit.”

This guy is “legit”. You heard it here first.

9.30am

Annie stops mid-conversation to say, “oh, hold on, I need to take my anti-babies”.

As she rummages in her bag for her contraception, she announces she texted Becky.

“Who’s Becky?” I ask.
“Oh, that girl we met that one time at Public, remember? She showed us that penis picture on her phone?”
“What did you say to her?”
“I said, remember that one time we met at Public? And you showed us that penis picture on your phone?”

9.35am

“Ooh ooh, she replied!” Annie shouts.

I try to shield my eyes from Annie’s phone as she waves it in my face. Unfortunately, Annie does not give up easy, and so I once again find myself looking at an image of a man’s genitals photographed next to a bottle of Tui (for scale). I’m impressed with his ingenuity but the image still leaves me feeling dismayed. He couldn’t have picked a classier beverage?

10.15am

There are mandatory bag checks in place at the train station, to stop people sneaking in their own alcohol or food. Annie & I are waiting outside the tent when Michelle storms up. “Well, I’ve already had my first fight. Shall we go?”

“So he found my croissants, and said I had to throw them away. And I said well, excuse me sir, but is this encouraging responsible behaviour, with the binge drinking culture we have in this country?” Michelle furiously spits out.

You may be able to tell that it is not Michelle’s first fight. She even made a guy cry once. To be fair, he started it, by introducing himself as “Hey ladies, do you know where Helen Clark lives? I want to give her a piece of my mind”.

10.40am

We huddle under a marquee tent, rain pouring outside. I hop from foot to foot and complain that I’m cold and that straightening my hair was a waste of time. Annie scoffs at the people smart enough to bring rainwear, muttering “golf umbrellas? Fuckers. Who do they think they are?”

A group of girls scuttle past, clad in floral mini-dresses and wearing candy coloured heels. Annie derides them too, saying “Heels? Idiots. Why would you wear heels?”

She then launches into a story about how she met a woman in a pub and told her to wear jandals. In the time it takes her to tell the story, I’ve finished a glass of wine and caught up on the last three hours of my twitter feed. This is because the drunker Annie is, the more context she includes in a story. Given by how far she rewinds in this one—starting with “I was having lunch, and”—the train beer has obviously left a mark.

11am

We sip our second glasses of Riesling and agree that, whatever happens, at the end of the day we will definitely split up and leave every man for himself. Annie suggests a motto of, “we are friends, with no responsibility”.

I make a note of it, as I am dedicated to blog accuracy.

11.15am

The sun comes out and everyone in the area cheers, throwing hats and ponchos onto piles of handbags and flocking out of the marquee.

11.17am

The rain comes back. We all awkwardly crowd back back in, embarrassed of the fuss we’d made moments earlier. This process repeats itself three or four times.

Noon

We arrive at another winery. I’ve eaten an entire bag of macaroons before we’ve even sat down, washing them down with a glass of sparkling rose. The combination leaving me feeling like my teeth are coated with moss. I quietly hope that Mum forgets to ask how quitting sugar is going.

12.15am

Annie waves the camera around, hissing at me to pretend to smile so she can zoom past my face to take surreptitious photos of some guy in a white shirt.

12.30pm

I listen to the band, who seem to be working their way through the Pretty Woman soundtrack. The nineties numbers are broken up with the singer’s attempt at audience banter. “Who, is, um, from Wellington?” he booms. “Who, um, took the train?” His questions are met with polite “woos” from a few people who take pity on him, but mostly the audience is indifferent.

1pm

Annie gets too excited telling a story and flings her arm in the air, spilling wine all over her dress. We head towards the bathroom: a caravan atop a flight of stairs, which wobbles with each door slam. The toilets inside are filled with blue water and the floor is dotted with clods of grass, making it feel like a mix between a barn and a hospital. On wheels.

As I wait outside for Annie, a woman sidles up next to me. She stands close enough that for a second I assume we must know each other, but she’s unfamiliar. “Yo”, she says, as she reaches up under her skirt, digging for a moment, before snapping her knickers back into place. As fast as she arrived, she’s gone. I feel used.

An approaching girl is weeping, wiping her tears away from under her glasses. As she gets closer, I catch snippets of her conversation. “She got cash out (hiccup hiccup) and I was like, but this is (hiccup hiccup) NOT what we agreed on”.

Annie emerges from the toilet caravan, her dress still splattered with the wine stain. We find Michelle and decide to move on.

En route to the bus, Annie declares “by the way, this is NOT jizz on my dress, Michelle”, answering a question that no one was asking.

1.15pm

As we exit the bus, Michelle throws a “thanks, driver” over her shoulder. He replies, and she stops abruptly, turning and screeching, “did you just say thanks WOMAN?”

Bewildered and shocked, the driver replies, “no, I said you’re welcome?”

“Oh”, Michelle says, pausing for a moment to consider if she should still be offended. She shrugs off the potential squabble and skips across the road to the winery.

2pm

I make peace with the fact that I’m not going to be able to decide between the pulled pork ficelle and the lemon cake, so I get both.

No regrets.

Meanwhile, Annie’s telling Michelle about two of our friends that ended up in bed together recently. Michelle doesn’t approve, and I try to ignore her gagging noises while I eat. “If I go out, and I need to vom but can’t, even after I touch that little dangly bit, I am going to think about her and that guy” Michelle announces.

2.15pm

Michelle flops back in her chair, her nose scrunched into her face. “Is it still an abortion if you find out you’re pregnant and then you kill yourself? Or is it just suicide?”

An elderly couple shuffle up to our table and gesture to the two empty seats.

“Do you mind if we sit down? You can continue your young people’s conversation!” the man says.

2.30pm

“Well, back in the ‘50s, if a woman didn’t get married, she was an outcast! What a load of crap!” he says. His wife nods in agreement. “You don’t want to marry a crapper, you’d get stuck with him for the rest of your days”.

Emboldened by their use of language and their progressive message, Michelle jumps at the chance to tell them about her divorce.

Annie’s not here. I’m not sure what it is about the older couple that frightened her off, but my theory is that it was the dawdling pace at which the woman ate her salmon pie. Each mouthful was tiny yet she chewed it like a cow might – deliberately, using her whole jaw, and frustratingly slowly.

3.30pm

“Just with her vadge?” Michelle hisses across the table at Annie. “Or with her mouth?”

She gets no response, so increases her volume.

“ANNIE. VADGE. VADGE. HER VADGE?”

Annie is not paying attention, as she is texting a boy. It’s easy to spot. She only smirks at her phone if a boy is involved.

Michelle loses patience trying to get her attention and turns to me.

“KATE” she barks. “Do you know? With her vadge? Or mouth?”

I glance over at the four strangers who graciously allowed us to sit at their table. All four are in wide-brimmed hats with shirts buttoned up to their necks. They haven’t spoken since we sat down, and are currently staring straight ahead, actively ignoring this exchange.

“I don’t know” I hiss back, to Michelle’s question about what part of our friend touched our other friend’s genitals. “Stop talking about it. It’s gross”.

3.45pm

Michelle heads to the dance floor to aggressively shrug her shoulders, and Annie jumps up to join her. I’m full of pork and bread and cake and macaroons and poutine – not to mention the wine and the diet cokes and breakfast. Shaking my overstuffed and distended belly seems like a downright dangerous activity.

I choose an activity that’s risky in other ways, and head off to join the long queue for the portaloos.

I passed this couple on the way. Clearly a bigger day for some than others.

3.47pm

Two girls approach and stop suddenly. “No fucking way am I standing in that line” the blonde says, and the brunette concurs. They stumble over to the urinal, pulling up the back of their skirts and backing in slowly. The 50-somethings in front of me are horrified. “Are those girls going to use the… the urinal?” one asks, her eyes wide behind her bifocals.

The girls emerge frowning and traipse off into the vineyard, their attempt obviously unsuccessful. I’m still in the queue when they lurch back, untucking their skirts from their tights.

4pm

“Katie! They swirled me! They touched me! They are in the army! What should I say to them? I’m thinking about saying, touch me again!” Michelle says, giggling, and pointing to two men dressed in sexed up fatigues, clearly not in the army.

She hops up and grabs my hand, leading me to the dance floor. We try to get into a waltz position but run into problems as we both try to lead. “Who is dom and who is sub?” Michelle asks, having learnt a thing or two from Fifty Shades of Grey. It’s revealed that she’s more of a Christian than an Ana, when she forcefully pulls me into her arms then spanks me.

After a lot of twirling, Annie cuts in, and I leave them to it.

4.30pm

At last year’s festival, we brought a houseplant with us, insisting that people pose for photos with it.

With great success, I might add.

While she’d speculated that this year she’d try to collect snaps of “penis or female nip”, this year Annie’s been taking pictures of us in the reflection of other people’s sunglasses. It has produced some great shots – super-close ups of the nostril hairs of strangers, with our faces blue and fuzzy in the corner.

It was hard to explain the process to tipsy girls at noon, so it feels like a losing battle when Annie grabs the arm of a stumbling drunk and asks him to help. “What… whaddo I get outta it?” he slurs, talking to her cleavage.

“Nothing, just shut up and stand still” she barks with irritation.

“Can you buy me a drink?” he asks.

“Yes, yes, fine fine” she replies, waving her hand impatiently .

“Here, try-themmon” he says, dangling them from a finger. She looks through them and snorts.

“Bullshit!” she says, shoving them back onto his nose.

Annie then tries to employ logic to get him to stand still.

It does not work.

5pm

It’s definitely past the time we need to leave, but trying to round up Michelle & Annie is not an easy task. Annie wants to “smash another sav”, and Michelle keeps telling me to chill out, waving her arm around, saying my eyebrows look too angry.

I realise I’ve made a mistake in staying almost-sober, but it’s too late now, and so I resign myself to the role of mother hen.

“Nope, we’re leaving now. Too bad. Chop chop” I say, ushering the girls to the roadside. The buses going past are already overstuffed, with people crowding the aisles and tired-looking girls squished in, buttocks pressed against the glass.

5.15pm

I’m getting worried; gnawing on fingernails out of stress.

A ute approaches with two men in the front, honking their horn and woohooing out of the window.

“HEY BOYS GIVE US A LIFT?” Annie shouts, and they ask what she’ll do for them.

“Bit of nip?” she replies, reaching into her dress, untucking her right breast and waggling it at them.

“She just did that” a girl says, behind me, dumbfounded. “I just saw her nipple”.

5.50pm

By some miracle we’re at the train station. A school group is manning a BBQ, and I buy us all sausages wrapped in bread, no onions, lots of sauce please. Annie takes hers and then stumbles off towards the portaloos, and Michelle just looks at it, confused.

“Where did this come from?” she asks.

“I bought it for you?” I reply.

“Oh, Katie, you’re the bestest person the whole world” she says, leaning in to nap on my shoulder.

6pm

A group of girls stands near us, going over the events of the day with frantic intensity. One is so into her story that she doesn’t notice that she’s tipped her glass of wine upside down, and with each arm gesture she spills more down the front of her apricot dress. One of her friends touches her arm and tells her. She looks down at her saturated frock, shrugs, and goes back to her story.

6.15pm

Exhausted, I made the decision to fall asleep as soon as we got onto the train. Unfortunately, Annie’s volume made actual sleep impossible, so I’m faking it by leaning against the window with my eyes closed.

Annie rummages in her bag, pulling out two cans of tuna. She opens one and bends the lid into a shovel, scooping meat into her mouth before passing it to Michelle. They eat both cans this way, never stopping their discussion about the smell of spew on the train.

They also amuse themselves by taking pictures of me.

6.30pm

“I fucking hate tunnels!” Annie declares, for the fifth time.

“FUCK FUCK FUCK!”, she yells, her voice reverberating throughout the carriage.

I’m not sure if she’s always had claustrophobia or if it’s a recent development, but it seems to be at a level of intensity that would usually necessitate some sort of medication.

6.45pm

Annie’s claustrophobia has the welcome side-effect of shutting up the rest of the train, as forty drunk people all pretend to go to sleep to avoid having to ask if she’s ok.

8pm

We’re on the couch. My grey trackpants have a racing stripe, whereas Annie’s are black and flecked with paint. I shovel fries into my mouth after swiping them over the sides of my McChicken, tidying up surplus mayo. Annie smashes another beer.

I’ve spent all my money, have sunburnt my back, and have probably picked up a variety of diseases from the portaloos. Am definitely never ever going back.

Well, probably not.

Zen and the art of unrequited romance

Back in July, one of my friends got me a voucher to get a massage, a half-hour shoulder rub to ease the stresses of a busy life. It took me until November to redeem it, which I can only assume means I pass the test of being busy enough to deserve it.

I was seven minutes early to the day spa, which is definitely not my style. I prefer to rush into appointments a minute after they are supposed to start, my life a tangled mess of earphones and sunglasses and bags and effusive apologies. So it was with some confusion that I said “Um, I’m Kate? I’m here for an appointment… soon?”

The receptionist took my name then gestured towards a chair with an exaggerated swoop, a motion that used her entire wrist, and that could have passed for an OSH exercise.

My favourites are the ones that could double as dance moves.

After a moment a petite woman came to get me, introducing herself as Priya. She led me through a maze of corridors to a little room that smelled like a rose garden bathed in oil. The blinds were down and soft music was being piped in from somewhere. It was immediately relaxing on every level, and I let out a full-body sigh. I’ve seen drug-addicts in the movies who relax in a similar way, their shoulders dropping all the way down as a grin spreads across their face, and I am now of the firm belief that the right kind of lighting and aroma is the equivalent of a… snort of… meth. Or whatever it is you’re supposed to do with it.

“Please take your clothes off and get under the sheet”, Priya said. “You can leave your underwear on”.

She was barely through her sentence before I was wriggling my shirt over my head, putting this five-foot-tall woman at the eye-level of my turquoise bra. “Um, I will be back in a minute?!” she said, and I realised that I was probably supposed to wait until she left, not enthusiastically disrobe for an audience.

She stepped outside and I took off the rest of my clothes and scooched under the sheet covering the table, laying face down. I smashed my toe into the table in my attempt to rearrange my legs, but aside from that, I was in heaven. The attention to detail was amazing – not only was the hole in the table cushioned with a little towel-donut, they had put frangipani flowers on the floor underneath the table. Just in case my eyeballs got bored, I guess.

She came back in and asked if I was ready. “Yush” I mumbled into the face towel donut and she began.

I think it was probably only two minutes in when I had the surprising realisation that I was definitely in love with Priya. But why? Was it her fingertips deftly prodding my spine? Her dainty hands cupping my love handles? I mean, they must be called that for a reason, right?

My thoughts were interrupted. “Is the pressure ok?” she whispered, breathily. I guess it was part of the whole schtick of making this room a quiet sanctuary, but it felt like Priya was definitely flirting. “Mmmm” I murmured, and it accidentally came out a little too groany. I guess I was a bit dopey already from the smells and the sensations, but I honestly didn’t intend to be quite so… guttural. Priya can now count herself amongst the handful (or two, but who’s counting?) of people who have heard that noise while my top’s off.

Our relationship was obviously progressing quickly, and so I started making plans.

Priya could spend her days massaging out the stresses of my difficult life, and I could, well, I dunno. Bear her children? Maybe? I guess her brother could get involved for donation purposes, is that how it works nowadays?

We could probably go back to her home country, if she would like. I’m not sure where it is, but I can only assume the food there is great. I will get really fat because I will insist on only eating whatever national dish has the most amount of butter in it. Don’t worry though, because the extra padding will be good for the baby.

At this point I’ll take any excuse, really.

Privya started on my lower back, shifting the towel down to get better access. Much better access. She shuffled my knickers down too, giving her a view that only a handful (or two, but who’s counting?) have experienced.

We’d call it a “plumber’s crack”, but I remember saying that once in high school and being reprimanded by a classmate. She was a blonde American, sweet an innocent as apple pie (the food kind, not the euphemism kind), and her big blue eyes widened when she heard me say it. “Naw, Katie!” she said. “Women don’t have plumber’s cracks. Call it a ladies split!”

Priya was now squirting oil on me, dangerously close to the aforementioned ladies split. I suddenly wondered if I needed to fart, and if I did, what would happen? My new potential romance was now the furthest thing from my mind. Imagine farting, basically into someone’s hand, as they rubbed frangipani oil into your tramp-stamp-spot. Oh god. I blushed from the idea of it alone. There’d be no way Priya would marry me then. Unless it was one of those situations where the awkwardness would bring us closer together? Like in Sex and the City, when Charlotte and Harry vomited together all night?

Priya abandoned my back and started squeezing her fingers down my arm, reaching my hand. I tried to think about something else, because it didn’t seem appropriate to think about farts while my future wife stroked my fingers.

I relaxed my hand but I wasn’t sure if that was the right response. Should I keep each finger stiff, to show that I am strong? That I will take care of her? That I will weather the difficulties of the world and will remain steadfast in adversity? Well, maybe. But the music sounded like happy whales sighing happily about how great the ocean is, and there’s no way I can ask my muscles to do anything other than ‘slump’.

We get to swim all day! Plankton tastes amazing! I have a tail!

After Priya tended to my limp digits she asked me to flip over. “Mrhhhm” I managed to gurgle, doped up in a haze of aroma and blissful orca chatter. With concern she asked “are you ok?”, perhaps worried that she’d accidentally massaged my spinal cord into the wrong place.

“Oh, yes. Just very, um, happy” I said, immediately regretting my choice of words. Ugh. “Very happy?” You couldn’t have picked more impressive words, Kate? Dazzled her with some vocabularic trickery?

She held the sheet up and turned her face away, and I wriggled myself over on the table. I imagine the effect was not dissimilar to flipping an upside-down car back onto its wheels. After my awkward flop from belly to back, she placed a perfumed wheat bag over my eyes and started massaging my head, her fingers kneading oil into my scalp.

“Massage all done” she announced, after what was probably half an hour, but what had felt like five minutes.

“Oh, oh… ok” I said forlornly, as she took the wheat bag off and my eyes adjusted to the light in the room.

I looked over at Priya and was alarmed to discover she was a real person. With a crash I was back to reality. We’d never work. What was I thinking? The height difference was considerable, the language barrier was problematic, I was straight, and—most traumatic of all—our names weren’t easily meshable to form a catchy portmanteau. Kiya? Priy…ate? The options were grim.

“I leave now, ok?” she said, and I just nodded mutely, feeling myself blush. I wanted to thank her, but I felt like If I started talking I’d end up confessing that while only half an hour ago I was in love with her, I had since fallen back out of it. And while I’ve never experienced it, I get the feeling that being removed by security from a day spa is probably not the best way to get closure after a turbulent love affair.

Kate’s Guide to Makeup: Part Two

Welcome to Part Two of Kate’s Guide to Makeup!

Hopefully by now you’ve tried the daytime look we covered yesterday, and you’re busy fending off phone calls from persistent gentlemen (I’m free next Tuesday?) or eager ladies, if that’s your thing (one at a time, gals!).

This tutorial will show you how to upgrade your daytime look to a flashier one. Do you have a ball to attend? A wedding to go to? An awkward family dinner with that one aunt who always talks you about her really specific and gross medical problems? No problem!

As we are going to build on the daytime look, you will need to follow the steps from yesterday’s tutorial. Have you done it yet? No? Ok, we’ll wait.

… not sure how long to give you. It doesn’t take that long, but that’s if you have everything ready. If you’re rushing around trying to find a clean sponge, it could take a while, I mean, I don’t know the layout of your kitchen.

All done? Great!

STEP FIVE: BLUSHER

Blusher is important because it makes you look like you have killer cheekbones. It all goes back to this contouring lark. You just want to make your face look like a series of ominous shadows.

… woah, is that a sci-fi series yet? If not, you can have it. Please just name a character after me.

Normally blusher is applied with a brush, but if you don’t have one, just use the other side of your sponge (environmentally-minded folks will be pleased to note that this is also good for the planet). To apply blusher, smear some on your sponge, then suck in your face and schwoop it up. Sorted. Now for the other side.

Suck in and schwoo … oops.

Ok, sometimes these things happen. Sometimes the dog runs away, or the apples fall out of the basket, or you try to put blusher on and somehow make it go across your cheekbone instead of along it. Nevermind. You can catch the dog, pick the apples back up, and re-draw the line.

Even if it takes you three goes to work out how it’s supposed to feel if you’re doing it properly.

STEP SIX: LIPS

Lipliner is important for making sure that your lipstick stays on. I think. To be honest, I’m not really sure what lipliner is used for. All I know is that when I was 13 and I would wear brown lipliner with a layer of Vaseline on top, people would make fun of me.

As a result, I haven’t owned any since then. Which is why I needed to improvise for this blog.

Coloured pencil seemed like a good idea, given that it’s a colour and it’s a pencil, just like lip liner.

Unfortunately, coloured pencils don’t really stick to skin, especially when it’s covered in a thick layer of contour and foundation that is already starting to flake.

So I upgraded to a pen. Now, I used an Artline 220 Super Fine 0.2, but this is a highly personal thing, and you should select the pen that feels right. Ink is subjective, and I won’t be the one to bark orders from on high about which stationery you should employ.

Now, I can’t see the point in lip liner if you’re not going to make it work for you, so I made sure to go over my actual lip line, by just a smidge. This smidge might make the difference between getting that marriage proposal or being passed over for that girl who works at Subway who doesn’t charge for double cheese. Don’t leave your future to chance, ladies!

With your lip liner you’ve created a boundary to be filled, and now all you have to do is colour it in with lipstick, staying between the lines. Maybe this is why people use lip liner? So you don’t accidentally just keep applying lipstick until it covers the bottom of your entire head? Something to think about.

Make sure to get your lipstick all the way to the edges. If you’ve gone over the lines a bit in some places because your hand-eye coordination isn’t that great, make sure to colour these little anomalies in too.

Now is probably a good time to practice your industry-party laugh. You’re going to need it.

STEP SEVEN: EYELINER

Ok, so maybe I’m a bit smug I have a real eyeliner. From a real brand. Of course, if you aren’t as blessed as I am in this area, then you can probably use a felt-tip pen or a Sharpie (depending on how thick you want the line to be).

Now, remember back to the lip liner, when we drew a line around our lips? We’ll do the same thing with the eyeliner, except this time we’re drawing a line around our eyeballs. Keep it as close as possible without putting the stick into the white part of your eye. Pro-tip: if it hurts, or if you go blind, you are drawing too close.

If your line looks a bit like one of those seismic activity charts, don’t worry too much. Just colour in the little shaky bits with more eyeliner. Consider your eyeliner a frame for your peepers, and maybe it can be one of those pretentious fancy picture frames where there’s a tiny picture with like six metres of wood around it.

Practice some answers for when you’re interviewed by Vogue. Maybe you want to start your own range of cat… bling? Maybe your beauty secret is that you drink six litres of water every day and test the pH levels of your urine? You’re going to want these answers at the ready. Nothing’s more embarrassing than umming and ahhing your way through an interview with a Wintour underling.

STEP EIGHT: FACE HAIRS

Part of being a lady is picking out your favourite face hairs, and making them darker and stiffer. This usually means eyebrows and eyelashes, but I’m not one to judge – the following steps would also work well with sideburns or moustaches.

Applying mascara is easy, if you keep a few simple things in mind.

Firstly, you want to get that brush all the way to the base of your lashes, which means opening your eyes wide.

Secondly, you are also going to want to open your mouth really wide. Don’t argue with me on this. It’s like how you can’t sneeze with your eyes open. I heard that a girl at my high school tried to put mascara on with her mouth closed and the next day she woke up dead. It happened. Just ask anyone.

If your mascara is clumpy, or feels tricky to put on, it’s probably because your mouth isn’t open wide enough. Don’t be afraid. Crank that jaw, ladies.

Excellent.

Now that that’s done, we’ll have to do something about those eyebrows.

Some people have fancy eyebrow pencils, but this product is largely a scam on the part of the makeup industry. Just use your mascara to define your brows.

I mean, think about it, your eyelashes and eyebrows are all the same face hair, right? Why should one be treated any differently to the other?

Once your eyebrows are filled in, we’re done!

RESULT!

You have made a frame for your face – from the lipstick chinstrap to the black mascara you’ve combed into your brow hairs. You’ve drawn lines around some of the most useful features (eyes are the window to the soul, and lips make kisses). Pop a breath mint and you’re ready to hit the town!

And who knows? Maybe by following my advice you’ll end up going places you never even dreamed of…

Until next time,

Kate x

Kate’s Guide to Makeup: Part One

“So, um, what do you do?” asks the stranger in front of me as she sips her beer. We’ve been introduced by a friend who knows us both, and as it’s about 8pm on a Wednesday, she’s not really that drunk yet, and our conversation puzzle is not going to fall together easily. Eventually we’ll either (a) have too much to drink and arbitrarily declare ourselves best friends, or (b) will find something in common – maybe she agrees there’s nothing funnier than that one bit in Wanderlust where Paul Rudd talks to himself in the mirror – and it’ll be fine.

But we haven’t worked that out yet. So, for now? It’s awkward.

“Oh, you know, I faff with Word documents, whatever. But more importantly? I have a BLOG,” I say, desperate to talk about it, but not really talk about it, because actually I’m quite shy about these things in real life.

“Oh, what’s it about?” she asks, and I’m immediately stuck.

“I just sort of like, talk. About stuff?” I reply, and she nods her head slowly, desperately searching for another topic.

“So, um, how do you know Christine?”

**

This isn’t a once-off. This scenario has played out maybe five times. Having a blog where I just write about nothing is fun, but it also makes it hard to define in bars.

I was thinking about this on the way home yesterday, wondering if I should pick a topic to concentrate on.

Then it hit me.

I’ve spent some time in the fascinating world of YouTube makeup tutorials recently, all-the-while feeling that these guides would benefit from a more static medium. And honestly? It can’t be that hard. I wear mascara every day (I know, I know, I shouldn’t brag) and have a webcam.

So without further ado, may I present, Kate’s Guide to Makeup: Part One.

STEP ONE: PREPARE YOUR CANVAS

Ok, so, full disclosure, maybe I have left it a bit long between fringe trims.

I can wear it two ways: Visually Impaired Cousin Itt…

…or I’m Sorry Suzanne, I Promise I Will Book an Appointment Soon.

Regardless of the level of infringement of hair upon one’s forehead (see what I did there?) it’s important to work with a blank canvas when applying makeup.

Pull your hair up into one of those butterfly clips. Hope that even though you have just piles of hair, it will somehow all stay up and will not fall out.

Try not to take it too personally when you are thwarted by your villainous mop.

Add a headband for good measure, then get distracted checking Twitter for a really long time.

All done? Great, now you’re ready to go!

STEP TWO: CONCEALER

From what I gather from the back of the bottle, it is important to cover up any blemishes, pimples, scars, moles, potmarks, pores, hairs … divots … just sort of anything that isn’t a little patch of skin. Though you can feel free to cover that up too, I mean, when in Rome.

Layer it nice and thick, because you wouldn’t want people seeing your blemishes.

I’m sure it was Shakespeare who said something like, “to blemish is to perish”, and we wouldn’t want that, would we?

STEP THREE: CONTOURING

Contouring is something that’s a bit new and special, I think. I picked up a book in Whitcoulls with a whole section on it, and it looked very interesting but also very complicated, so I put the book down and went to see if they had the new NW so I could decide Who Wore It Best. Spoiler: it’s usually the one that doesn’t go too crazy with the accessories. Come on, Hollywood. When will you learn?

What I gathered about contouring, from the brief time I spent with the book, was that you can basically redefine the shape of your face with makeup. Got a weak chin? No problem, just draw on a new one. An uneven hairline? No worries, just paint over it.

Start by contouring your nose, because this logically seems like the bit that should be contoured, as it sticks out more than the rest of your face does. Note that in this context, “contouring” means “put some concealer on it because it is the lightest makeup you have”.

Now comes the fun bit, where we add the… anti-contour. Do this with… what’s the opposite of concealer? Not sure.

What else comes in stick form? Lipstick?

Ok, that’ll do.

Colour in the side of your nose to make the top bit stand out more.

Be mildly alarmed at how good this looks already, and we haven’t even gotten to the jawline!

Colour in the jawline in a similar way, scribbling under your chin too, because nothing is worse than makeup that isn’t blended in, and also, this will make your face look slimmer. I’ve read Cosmo‘s advice to put dark colours on wide hips. I know how these things work.

Stare at your new face in quiet amazement. “Have you lost weight?”, “have you had work done?” they’ll ask, and you will just smile to yourself, knowing the secrets of a good contour should not be shared with workmates who constantly steal the last biscuit.

STEP FOUR: FOUNDATION

Now that we have our contouring done, we need to apply foundation. This will give even coverage over the rest of your uncontoured face.

Start by applying some foundation to a sponge. If you don’t have a sponge, feel to improvise with the corner of a kitchen one. A sponge is a sponge, right? I mean, as long as it’s clean. I got this one new, just for the record. Because whatever is going on with the one we have on the bench at the moment, I don’t even want to begin to think about. I think it’s basically a mini petri dish. Soon it may become sentient. I will awake one morning to see its once-blue-now-greyish form flopping over my face, leaving an oily sheen in its wake.

Moving on. It’s important to dab the foundation on instead of wiping it, so you don’t wipe all your contouring work away. When the sponge starts to feel dry, just add some more foundation. There’s no such thing as too much.

I really wanted to quote from the Spice Girls’ hit number Too Much here, but it turns out they make the opposite point.

Keep going until you’re all covered. Get the lips done too for good measure. Really, just do everything. Otherwise you may have to pick a point where eyes or lips begin or end, and who are you to decide that?

All done? Congratulations!

You’ve laid the base now, creating a natural look that can work for all sorts of daytime activities.

Picnic invite? No problem!

Day at the beach? Don’t mind if I do!

Of course, sometimes a lady wants to look extra special… so make sure to come back for the next instalment, where we will cover how to transform your daytime appearance into an evening look that’ll make those fellas clamour for more!

Grooming for the modern woman

It wasn’t until after lunch on Wednesday that I realised I’d pushed my “meh, I’ll just wash my hair tomorrow” mantra a step too far. My hair had formed two distinct and unique factions, and they were at war atop my head. My fringe was greasy and had formed thick strands, looking like I’d dumped a tablespoon of gel into the roots then had taken to it with a wide-toothed comb. If only I were good at smirking, I would have seamlessly fit into a 90s boy band.

Style inspiration.

While my fringe strands were binding together to form cohesive units, the rest of my hair had not received the memo about teamwork. It was a fluffy birds nest of disorder and mayhem. Each strand seemed to repel every other strand. One would curl, another would wave, and their third neighbour would rebel against the status quo and stubbornly lie flat.

The worst hair days always pick their timing well. I had dinner plans, and I didn’t realise the horror of my hairdo until about 4pm. After looking at myself in the mirror I was thrown into panic, and emailed my sister. She’s pretty, and her clothes always look nice, and she buys beauty products from places other than New World. I knew I could count on her.

“Just use dry shampoo” she suggested. “Or if you don’t have any of that, some talcum powder”.

I like the world she lives in, where she thinks (a) I would know that dry shampoo existed or (b) I might casually just have some talcum powder in my desk drawer at work.

I went back to the mirror and managed to get my fringe to sit together as just one fat clump instead of several thinner clumps. I wasn’t sure if this was better or worse.

I went back to my sister, this time taking a picture to try and emphasise the gravity of the situation. Worried that my phone might slightly pixelate the image—maybe smoothing some of the more offensive lines—I made sure to make my face match the hair.

This also doubles as my pirate impression.

“Looks great!” she sent back.

Obviously I was going to have to rely on my own ingenuity.

I stood in the work bathroom and attempted to fix it. I didn’t have a hairbrush, nor any products, so “fixing it” just meant “rearranging it with my fingers, probably introducing more grease to the situation, sighing heavily about the futility of it all”.

I clomped back to my desk and emailed her again.

“Is it crazy to cancel dinner plans because of bad hair?” I asked.

“Yes.” she replied.

Ok, fine. I guess I’ll just rely on my … personality? No. Ok. Back to the bathroom.

I appraised my hair from all angles, deciding that the birds nest was salvageable, it was the fringe that was causing me the most consternation. Reaching a breaking point, I turned the taps on full and dunked my head under, before I had time to decide if this was really a good idea or not.

Now I had a fluffy halo, wet hair in my eyes, and no hairdryer. I attempted to blot it with paper towels, but with ten minutes to go before I had to leave, this was not going to cut it.

I looked at the hand dryer, wondering what would happen if my hair got sucked up into the mechanism and caught on fire. I decided the risk was worth it. I squatted underneath the hand-dryer, waving my left hand around on top of my head to keep the airflow going, fluffing my fringe with my right, hoping that no one would walk in. I’m not sure of the legality behind judging a workmate for their bathroom behaviours, but I feel that in this case, the damage to my reputation would be justified.

Five minutes later and it was dry. Aside from the bits at the side—which were now jauntily flicking outwards like two little ski jumps framing my face—it looked exactly the same. The grease had stayed put, even through its water bath. Part of me was a little proud of its resilience.

Returning to my office, I rummaged in the work drawer for some perfume or lipstick or something, anything, to make me feel like I could approximate a woman who had her life sorted. Nothing. Well, not nothing. An broken eyeliner pencil and a bottle of Mariah Carey’s Honey Lollipop Bling.

Now, to Mariah’s credit, this fragrance does smell a bit like honey. Sadly, it’s a step removed. It’s more like honey-flavoured cough lozenges, dipped in sugar.

I am definitely too old to own this product.

Deciding that smelling like a teenager’s medicine cabinet wouldn’t help, I set off to the city, planning to dash through Farmers on the way to dinner to steal a spritz of something fancy that I wouldn’t be able to afford to actually buy. Perhaps if I smelled like Gucci’s idea of a flower, my dinner companions might be tricked into thinking my hair was intentional. Some sort of avant-garde, retro-throwback, half-and-half-juxtaposition ‘do, something they were doing in France, that just wasn’t here yet.

I made it to Farmers and immediately realised their shop layout was going to work against me. Perfumes were displayed in towers, little testers all begging to improve my life … and all behind a counter.

“Um, hi” I said to the woman behind the counter. “Can I smell the um, the new, um, Kenzo?”, picking the first brand I’d heard of.

“Which one, dear?” she asked, immediately calling into question my trend knowledge.

“Oh, I’m not sure. I just, um, travelled internationally, recently, and I smelled something at the airport that I liked” I said, making sure that she knew that I could afford a plane ticket, thank you very much.

Maybe it was wishful thinking, but I swear she stood a little straighter.

“What was it like?” she asked.

“Um, sort of, fresh? Ish?” I said.

She tapped her finger on her chin, thoughtfully, perhaps wondering where on the financial spectrum I sat between “shove her towards the deodorant aisle” and “talk her into Givenchy’s latest aroma”. When she said, “well, Madonna has put out a fragrance?” I won’t lie, I took it personally, and cursed my fringe again.

She sprayed bits of cardboard, I smelled them. She asked me what I thought and I made “mmm?” noises. She talked about base notes and I nodded gravely, staring into the middle distance, trying to look like someone who understood what she was talking about. After declaring I didn’t like lemon, but that I did like cupcakes, we seemed to be narrowing towards a decision, and I felt pressure mounting to pick one.

“This one, the green one? This is good?” I said. “Ooh, Versace” she said. “Lovely choice. Would you like me to package it up?”

“Oh, I might just wear some for the day, I think, then decide tomorrow?” I said, hoping she’d leave me alone to apply it in privacy. My plan was thwarted when she gestured for me to roll up my sleeves and I realised in horror she wasn’t going to leave, and that I was going to get a shop-assistant-applied, barely-there spritz, instead of the full-body douse I’d been planning on.

I was tempted again to just cancel. Then I remembered the Body Shop.

Ten minutes later I sat at dinner, sporting a 90s fringe with 60s side-flicks, wild birds nest hair, and a vague hint of Versace under a liberal application of something called ‘Love Etc’.

I was exhausted. Thank goodness I wouldn’t have to rely on personality.

The Sniffles

Sunday. Woke up. Sick. Properly sick.

I tried to sip water. Nope. My throat was tighty-rolled sandpaper and the pathetic dribble of water felt like a very large brick.

My ears ached too, but on the inside. How can ears hurt? It seems illogical. But they throbbed, and I felt like I could hear a very distant concert inside my brain. I pictured tiny insects inside my head, screaming “ARE YOU READY TO ROCK?” They all held guitars and one played on my eardrums with tiny sticks. Yes, it was sort of adorable, and in my sickness haze I was kinda proud of my eardrum pun, but still, I hated these tiny bastards. Throbthrobthrob.

There’s probably a “Beetles” joke in there somewhere, too.

I lay very still and sighed. Why did this have to happen to ME? Why was I the one to be tormented?

I tried to sip more water. Nope, swallowing was out. I tried filling my mouth with liquid and just lying very still, hoping it’d drip down the back of my throat due to gravity. It almost worked. Then my stupid in-built crappy instincts kicked in. Swallow, whimper, ow.

I reached for my iPhone and swiftly diagnosed myself with throat cancer, downgrading it after a moment to tonsillitis, because it seemed slightly more reasonable. Sigh. Tonsillitis? To me? On a Sunday? WHY, lord, WHY ARE YOU PUNISHING ME?

It seems to be the Kiwi Attitude that we just power on through. Get your leg gashed open by some number 8 wire and you say, nah mate, it’s all good, just chuck me some L&P bro, she’ll be right. Not I. I embrace a more hypochondriac-ky sense of doom, a – dare I say it – American approach. Obviously, I was going to have to take my tonsillitis to the doctor for an IV drip and several months off work.

The internet had warned of some side effects to tonsillitis, including dehydration, inability to eat, and imminent death. I was probably only ten minutes away from having my throat close up entirely. But my doctor’s office was closed – apparently people don’t get sick on the weekends – so I called Healthline for advice, hoping they would just skip all the preliminaries and send an ambulance.

I’m going to take a wild leap and say that the woman on the end of the phone did not start her speaking life with the Queen’s English. To widen our language barrier, my voice sounded scratchy and husky—it would have been sexy, if it didn’t also sound like I was speaking past a golf ball. Obviously, communication was awkward. Giving her my name, address and age took longer than it should have, and I started feeling even more sorry for myself.

She asked me to look inside my mouth, and I wrenched my jaw open as far as possible to inspect it in my hand mirror.

“Umm, it’s all red. The bits at the side, in the back, I mean. Also that red bit in the middle, that dangly bit, it’s huge.”

“Your uvula?”

“Ew. Yes?”

Obviously, in choosing to not enter the medical profession, I made a big mistake.

“Were you drinking last night, Kate?” she asked.

Why is it that a question with your name added at the end feels so much more judgemental? “Would you like a plastic bag?” means “are you ok to carry all this stuff?”, but “Would you like a plastic bag, Kate?” means “why not add some more destruction to the planet with this item that will never decompose, maybe just set fire to the world’s forests and overfish all the salmon while you’re at it?”

“Yes, I had a few” I meekly replied, not wanting to say “I have been drunk for the past four nights in a row, because I love people and bars, have no self control, and also recently discovered how great wheat beer is.”

Those Germans know what they’re doing.

“Well, you need to drink water, Kate”, she said, “especially as you drank alcohol last night.”

I felt like she was cross with me. I felt sad and small and alone. It was the first time since I kicked my boyfriend out – five months ago – that I missed him. If he were here he could be doing this for me, maybe while giving me a neck rub. Then I remembered that he was scared of making phone calls, especially to strangers, and that neck rubs required negotiation.

I paused my self-pity for just a moment to consider that no, life could be worse.

Of course, optimism and logic at a time like this is no fun, so I switched tack, and decided to start missing my mum. If mum lived in Wellington instead of Brisbane, she’d bring me soup and give me hugs. WHY, geography? WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO ME?

The woman on the phone gave me a long list of instructions of what to do. Take ibuprofen. Gargle warm water. Sleep. Drink water. And if you find that you can’t breathe, call an ambulance.

Ok, that’s more like it. A big noisy proper ambulance? For little ol’ me? I let the wave of melancholy wash over me, my eyes stinging with tears and my voice catching in my already-choked throat.

“Ok thank you” I managed to squeak out before hanging up the phone and weeping, thoroughly enjoying my complete self-absorption and cathartic tantrum. I’d sob, and think about how sad I must look right now with my gloomy bloodshot eyes, and I’d sob harder.

When I cry, I look like Dawson. In case you needed a visual aid.

Surely this is the height of dismal narcissism, thinking of yourself being sad, to make yourself sadder, on purpose? Actors say that when they need to cry they access a terrible memory, but I now doubt this is true, as (hopefully) they are far more narcissistic than I am.

After I was over my emotional outburst, I trudged downstairs to make soggy Weetbix. Eating it turned out to be less of a challenge than I’d been ready for, as was taking the nurofen and sipping a cup of water. I felt slightly affronted that I already felt better.

I slept for an hour and woke up feeling like I’d be able to participate in the world, even if it would be in a limited capacity. My life-threatening tonsillitis was apparently just a life-irritating cold. Despite this, I was not ready to give up my pity party just yet, and went to social media with sad-face emoticons in tow, practically begging for likes and aww nos and for people to offer to bring me things.

It worked, and I was forced to begrudgingly admit the world isn’t completely terrible all the time.

Today, I’m in the worst part of the sickness window. I’m well enough to get out of bed, but too sick to taste anything. Well enough to go to work, but too sick to socialise. I want to just trudge around in trackpants and get sympathy hugs, but I’ve exhausted the opportunities for sympathy given that all I’m afflicted with is an average cold, exacerbated by my own lifestyle choices.

Still, I’m cheered by the thought of James Van Der Beek, crying. Not because I want him to be sad, but because now I feel somewhat confident that as he weeps, he’ll be imagining himself weeping back.

Beautiful Day, Isn’t It?

I remember when I was young and my mother mentioned that grownups talked about the weather to make small talk.

“What about the weather?”

“Oh, just what it was doing, what it might do later.”

It seemed… unfathomable. As a child, my hobbies were completing jigsaw puzzles, reading books, eating vast amounts of nutella, and being fat. It’s raining? So what? The only downside to rain was that the cat would smell kind of weird after she came inside. Have you ever hugged a damp cat? It’s horrible. You end up wearing the pong on your stripey polar fleece for the next week until your mother finally calls you a piglet and puts it in the wash.

Totally worth it, though, look at this little fluffball of love!

When I was 11, our Intermediate school offered Japanese language lessons for a few terms (before you ask, the only thing I’ve held on to is “genki desu”, and no, I don’t remember what it means). After teaching us that we already spoke some Japanese—mitt-soo-bish-ee, kam-ee-car-zee—our teacher asked, “now, what’s the most common thing that people discuss, just to chat?”

We sat there and looked at her, blankly.

“You know, perhaps if you’re meeting someone for the first time, and conversation is a bit awkward?”.

The group of 11 year olds stayed silent. What did she mean, awkward? If you meet someone for the first time your mum tells them what your name is, then you both just stand there. Maybe you ask if they can giz some chips, but only if they have chips to giz. Conversation isn’t awkward, it’s absent.

Our teacher looked at us suspiciously, like we were playing a trick on her. After a pause she said, exasperatedly, “well, you’d talk about the weather!”

We all looked around at each other, baffled, and I realised that maybe I wasn’t alone in my lack of interest in what was going on in the sky.

Mrs Abernethy handed out A4 sheets of paper with suns and rainclouds and 14pt text. As a result, the first conversation I ever had with another human being about the weather was in Japanese. We were paired up and sat across from each other, awkwardly playing at being awkward grownups.

“My name is Kate. It is raining.”
“My name is Amy. It is sunny.”

The first few times I ever talked about the weather as an actual awkward grownup, I remembered my conversations in Japanese, and felt doubly self-conscious. A voice in my head would say “is this it? Are we doing it? We’re talking about the weather, this is small talk, you’re an adult now? Act natural!”

This monologue of confusion naturally spilled over into my speech, and made me sound affected and strange. I couldn’t do it casually like other people could. Wide-eyed, everything as a question, I’d stutter through “um, yes? It’s… raining? Yes?”

I yearned for other small talk topics.

Why weather, anyway? It seemed so… arbitrary. At some point, of course, I clicked that it’s one of the few universal things that we all experience, even if as an 11 year old I didn’t notice it. Generally, too, it’s inoffensive. Saying “oh dear, it’s windy” won’t make people feel uncomfortable, whereas if you try to bond over the looming spectre of death that hangs over us all, you might have less luck.

Of course, none of this is a problem after a few drinks. Aside from girlish giggling about our skirts blowing up in the wind, I don’t think I’ve ever engaged in weather-related small talk with a fellow drunk person. No. You force big talk down to small talk’s level. Last weekend I started a conversation in a pub bathroom with, “Can you teach me how to rock and roll?”

I didn’t catch her name, but apparently it’s all about swishing your frock about and spinning on your toes while cackling manically. Because that’s what we did.

She also looked exactly like Magda from ‘There’s Something about Mary’. The experience fulfilled a life goal I didn’t know I had.

After a few drinks my small talk turns into some sort of public service where I try to boost the self-esteem of drunk Wellingtonian women. Not only have I complimented stranger’s outfits with the enthusiasm of a puppy with a new chew toy (“ohmygod that colour and where did you GET IT and can I try it on I don’t have head lice I promise”), I’ve tried ice breakers like “your face, my god, you should be a model!” and “that lipstick, ok, I don’t ever say this, but that lipstick is the best shade I have ever seen.”

I’ve tried impersonations of Canadian accents that have morphed into cockney halfway through (eh, how’s aboot you let me do yer accent eh guvnah?), I’ve argued about the best gum flavour (green, obviously), I’ve shared a popsicle with a stranger lying on the street (ok, yes, maybe not the smartest thing I’ve ever done, but I didn’t catch anything or get hit by a car, so let’s just call it a learning experience, and move on).

Taxi drivers bear the biggest brunt of it. I’ll hug the passenger seat from the back (sometimes I like being the big spoon, alright?) and will ask them about where they’re from and what do you think this text message REALLY means and what is the food like, in Somalia?

“I’ve had three drinks” is a fantastic excuse to get to leapfrog over the introductions and get straight into friendship. I’ve tried translating my approach into sobriety and it just doesn’t work.

Once logic is in play, appearance-based compliments come out just as awkwardly as my thoughts on the rain. Given that my wardrobe is stocked almost entirely with items that were on sale at Glassons three years ago, I feel like a fraud if I tell someone their skirt is cute.

I also suffer from the unshakeable conviction that during the daytime, sober compliments will make people will think I’m hitting on them. Panic about this will make me blush—something I am very good at. Other people get cute little flushed cheeks, little girlish rosebuds of innocence. Not me. My face ramps it up to 11. It starts in the cheeks, and it usually isn’t long before I feel it pushing through my eyeballs and spreading like an ink stain down my neck. Once I start thinking about the fact I’m blushing, I blush harder, turning scarlet. No, not scarlet. Wrong word. Now I’ve given you the mental image of O’Hara or Johansson, and this is definitely not as pretty as those ladies. Let’s go with, I turn the colour of a… turkey whattle.

My brethren.

Then I think about how weird it must be for this woman I’ve accosted with my compliment. She’s out shopping, minding her own business, and she’s interrupted from her daydreams by this increasingly reddening tomato, mumbling something about her coat before scuttling away.

Despite this, I continue. Surely it beats the alternative—where I clear my throat uncomfortably, raise my eyebrows in confusion, and question, “Genki desu, my name is Kate, it is raining?”

Regularly scheduled programming

I slide into the booth, trying to untangle my sunglasses from my hair with one hand while I unbutton my coat with the other.

“Sorry!” I say, “I know I’m late, but I’ve been hungover as balls for two days and couldn’t get anywhere near my blog, I could only face bad movies and deep dish Dominos. How are you, anyway? Honestly, I feel like I haven’t talked to you properly in ages, it’s been just all Fiji blah blah blah for forever.”

I pick up the menu and flip flip flip until I get to the drinks page.

“Let’s get milkshakes!” I say with an exaggerated dorky grin, then screw up my nose and put my head in my hands.

“I’m sorry,” I groan, “that’s just way too hacky, isn’t it, to make a reference to the blog title. I just can’t help myself. A shoe-horned, winking, awkward shout-out? Nothing’s funnier. Except maybe a Dad pun. Or maybe lowest-wit sarcasm. Or making references to things that were funny ten years ago. I’m still persisting with That’s What She Said, even though Wikipedia says it’s been ‘ancient’ since 1973. 1973! That’s almost 40 years of it being uncool, and yet I can’t stop myself from getting it out.”

Some probably do not find my buffoonery amusing.

I chew on my bottom lip and look at the milkshake list. “Ok, well, obviously I’m getting the caramel one, I don’t even know why I’m pretending to read this”.

There’s a piece of hair in my face, hanging over one eye. As I talk, I battle with trying to untuck it from under my fringe.

“So, anyway, after writing a thirteen-part-epic about everything I ate in Fiji, I’m kind of… adrift. My sister emailed me last week to ask what I was going to blog about when I’d finished talking about my holiday, and I said I didn’t know, probably just go back to what I used to do? And she said, what was that? I’ve forgotten. “

The waitress takes our orders and I try to read her tattoo without making it obvious that I’m trying to read her tattoo. She sees me staring and says, “it’s Voltaire”. I nod, wondering if I’m allowed to ask her what font it is, or if that’s too personal. Before I’ve decided, she’s gone.

If you think fonts are boring, google ‘Eric Gill’, the guy who invented Gill Sans. Yikes.

“Anyway, I can’t even remember how to write these things, either, if I’m not transcribing events. How do blogs even… work? It’s just first person, right? But without putting us somewhere? I just… talk? About what? I feel like I can’t just leap back into regularly scheduled programming. It’s like when you have a fight with your friend, and then you technically patch it up, but then you see them again and you’re like, um, how about this weather, and they’re like, yeah, and then no one says anything for what feels like a really long time, and then when they pretend to get a phone call you’re thrilled, and you realise you haven’t been breathing properly.”

Our milkshakes arrive in huge vessels, giant vases full of thick creamy goop with fat green straws poking out. It’s a test of good a milkshake, how thick the straw is, and I’m delighted to see that I’d probably manage to get my pinky finger into these ones. Another test of a good milkshake? If you can tip the glass upside down and the gloppy mass takes a moment to start moving.

I guess, if we’re being honest, I just want to drink melted icecream.

I sigh and scrunch my face up. “Is this too much, making you come out for a virtual milkshake? It’s all terribly self-indulgent, isn’t it, and it’s not like I can say that I studied at the IIML to get away with it.”

“Should I have just told you a story about Annie? Who, before I forget, is on Twitter now? Ok, I can do that. So we went out with some friends on Saturday. Annie had started drinking on the bus on the way home from work, and by the time dinner rolled around she was definitely drunk. She was in this little peach dress, and at one point she hauled her leg up onto the table to show us her snakeskin shoes, all while trying to keep her knees together. Meanwhile, there’s tables of families all around, and a guy behind her says ‘ooh, do THAT again!’ and his wife is definitely not happy about it, storming off to pay the bill. But instead of chasing her, he poses for a photo! The next day Annie’s looking through her phone pics, and has no memory of any it happening.”

I’m slurping the dregs of thick caramel from the bottom of the cup, deciding that if I’m going to pay $6.50 for milk, I am going to get every last drop in, even if the rattling sucking noise I’m making is definitely unladylike. I finish it and push the cup away, deciding that I won’t slide my finger around the inside to get every last little bit, because I caught the bus here and I haven’t washed my hands since.

Buses, man.

“Ok, I could definitely drink like, at least six more of those. But after Fiji… Jesus. I told you how much I ate, right? I think something in my brain is broken. I read once that bees are the same. They don’t have that internal signal that tells you that you’re full, like, they will just keep eating until they explode. Hold on, I’ll find it.”

I dig my phone out of my pocket, tapping Bees Eat Explode into Google, and I scan the links.

“Woah. Um, ok. Sooooo apparently bees genitals explode during mating? And I can’t find anything about food, it’s all just genital explosion. Aww, poor little bees. Do you think their junk grows back? Or do they have to live as little bee eunuchs?”

That hair is still in my face. I try one more time to fix it before giving up and rummaging for my wallet in my handbag.

“My shout, ok, to thank you for indulging me in this? And next time things’ll be back to normal, I promise.”