January

After an interesting New Years Eve, Janek and I returned to reality.

Janek moved out of The Family Home, to a new place a mere two doors down the road from me. It’s like living together only without the actual living together part. Which is great because I’ve found that if I don’t get some space to myself I get really antsy and things get a little unpleasant.

I’ve been insanely busy at work lately too. I’m working on a casual basis with one day as “core duties” and one day for a special project. Between the special project and another big project that’s part of my “core duties”, I’m swamped. I could comfortably work five days a week at this point and still have stuff left over.

I’m waiting for March to come so that things can settle down a little when uni starts. It’s going to be a hectic week: one and a half days at work, three half days and one full day at uni. It’s a little daunting but the amazing thing is that just twelve months ago I never would have thought such a schedule was possible for me! My health is picking up, I can work a full day, study, all that kinda stuff, my only problem is the pain that hasn’t gone away.

So that’s life up to now...

Backdated: New year’s eve

Janek and I journeyed northward to the Land of the Beach, to Lala and Cal’s, for New year’s. The weather was perfect for it, nice and hot like I like it but not so hot that the simple act of moving produces a tidal wave of sweat.

We arrived on the 29th of January, the idea being that we’d be there a few days earlier to help out with setting up the house for the (now traditional) big party that is held there each year. Naturally, little-to-no groundwork was done in the days leading up to the 31st, mostly because Lala didn’t want to do anything before hand (I love her, but she is not the most organised egg in the basket). The day of the 31st consisted largely of Lala getting progressively more stressed as the hours wore on, and Janek, Cal, Alex and I trying to be helpful, calm and above all: out of her way. In the end, Janek, Alex and I offered to go to the supermarket and get the various foodstuffs, drinks, ice, serviettes-plates-cutlery and (best of all) a kids’ blow-up boat to put the ice and drinks into in the back yard.

At the appointed hour, the guests arrived, the music started playing, the barbie was fired up and the drinks began to flow. As time passed, and people began to get progressively drunker, things started to get interesting. There were two incidents that stood out.

At one stage, I walked to the back of the garden where Mary sat at a table, sobbing hysterically. I looked askance at Bee, who informed me the reason for Mary’s tears: “Umm... she thinks someone has drunk half her vodka but she doesn’t know if it was her or someone else.” I blinked. “Right... Perhaps, in that case, she’s had too much to drink if she doesn’t know if she drunk her drink or not?” Bee shrugged. A little later Ade noticed that one girl had a bottle of vodka on the table in front of her. “I think this is my girlfriend’s!” he barked at her. “Go on,” she sneered, “take it.” “Oh, I just did” he said triumphantly, and ran off to Lala, to dob the girl in. What happened next I’m not quite sure of, but it ended in Ade and the girl’s boyfriend involved in the kind of argument that is conducted in terse tones that are intended to sound cool but actually sound arrogant, followed by a shot contest with Canadian Club, presumably in some kind of straight-yet-strangely-homoerotic mating ritual in which they probably compared penis sizes.

So that was New years. It was a good night, apart from that and the girl in question and her friends snorting crushed up ecstasy pills in the bathroom, causing even more drama as Lala indignantly refused to see my point when I pointed out that Mary drinking to the point of collapse is just the same really, if not worse, considering they’re both forms of escapism in one way or another. Lala is strangely anti-any-drug-stronger-than-marijuana.

So that’s it for the backdated stuff ladies and gents... tomorrow, a catch up of January then we resume our regular programming.

Backdated: Space Cadet Junior

I’ve decided on a name for the (not so) new flatmate, formerly The New Guy; he will henceforth be known as Space Cadet, Junior. He is like The Space Cadet only without the sociopathic tendencies, midnight showers or loud music. He loves his marijuana, he never seems to be quite with it when you speak to him, and he has an angry streak. Unlike The Space Cadet, however, he is a really nice even if a little difficult to speak to at times.

The anger became apparent one night when he arrived home, drunk, and had an altercation with his screen door (his room is an external room like mine). It was about 11.30 at night and I was just getting ready for bed. He opened the screen door of his room, then his door, then I heard three loud bangs that made me jump out of my skin almost. Suddenly a calm descended on the house. I ventured outside to see what was going on. As I approached his door he hurled something at the window, which hit just as I was walking past, then threw something at one of the walls inside. I went back to my smoking chair and lit up. A minute later I heard a scream, “FUUUUUCK!!!!!!”, come from his room, followed by a low groan. I was about to go over and ask if everything was ok when the lights went out so I gratefully went back to my own room and went to sleep.

So that’s my neighbour. What is it with that room?

Backdated: So this is Christmas.

Christmas is my favourite time of year. Always. I love the anticipation; I’m like a little kid waiting for the arrival of Santa (which I never was, mind you, because we were never told that Santa brought the gifts down the chimney on Christmas Eve. This was partly because we celebrate Christmas on the 24th so by Christmas Eve we already have our gifts, and partly because Mum thought it was stupid to believe a big fat man brings you gifts only to be disappointed at the age of ten).

Each year we celebrate Christmas on the 24th at Grandma’s place. We arrive at about 5pm for pre-dinner drinks and enough peanuts to sink a small rowboat. Once everyone has arrived, usually by 7, we enter the dining room for prayers. As a child we were never allowed into the dining room until we heard the dinner bell so this is when we’d see the decorations and the Christmas tree for the first time. Since I’ve got older, I’ve been the one who actually puts the tree up, so the dinner bell has lost some of its magic. When we enter the dining room, we kneel before a nativity display that sits atop a table the size of your average dining table. The entire scene has been hand-carved and painted by my grandfather and it’s simply stunning. After the prayers we sit at the three tables, all twenty-three of us, while my grandfather reads the gospel of the nativity story in Slovak, followed by one of the “children” (ie my generation) reading it in English. Then comes dinner!

The dinner is huge. In typical Mediterranean and Eastern European fashion, it is totally over-catered. Traditionally, each household makes three dishes. As we’ve grown older and moved out of home there are more households and thus more food. There is so much food that the two fridges, the standalone freezer and the tuckerbox freezer struggle to contain it all. And it’s all delicious.

Following dinner come the presents! Admittedly this was a little more magical when we were younger, partly cos we were smaller so the pile of gifts looked even more enormous, and partly cos the gifts we get these days are more compact, but still. This year Christmas was just as magical as ever it was. The night passed way too quickly as it always does but I had a great time with Lala, Cal, and the whole family.

This year it didn’t end on the 24th. I decided to organise a Boxing Day lunch at our place so that Janek could spend some time with us and perhaps have an enjoyable Christmas for once. Having working in retail for the past five years, when he thinks of Christmas he imagines rude customers, standing for long hours on the floor at a major department store, and family arguments.

The guest list included Mum, Dad, Sister, Janek, and my aunt and uncle (Dad’s sister and her husband, who used to live with Pop). On the morning I got up and went to say good morning to Mum. “Good morning,” she said, but she sounded a little worried about something. She told me that my aunt had called this morning and that another aunt and uncle were coming, and asked if that was ok. “Sure...” I said, not quite sure what the big deal was. “Well,” Mum began, “It’s just that your uncle is a bit...” Her voice trailed off in a way that meant “your uncle is a homophobe”. “So? I don’t give a fuck if he’s a bit...” I said, allowing my voice to trail off in the same way, “It’s my house!” “Perhaps you should give Janek your gift in private?” she said. To be frank, I didn’t see any reason why I should but I could see the worry on her face so I promised her that we would exchange gifts in the privacy of my bedroom, and promised not to fellate each other in the presence of company. She seemed pleased to hear this.

Janek came, as did the aunts and the uncles, and we had a great lunch. Everyone loved him (but then that was totally unsurprising) and we all had a great time. This has been one of the best Christmases ever.

Backdated

It’s funny how silly we get sometimes. Over the past month or so I’ve thought so many times “Gee, I should blog about that,” but I haven’t because I’ve left it so long. It’s like when you don’t ring someone because you haven’t rung them in so long that you feel stupid doing it now. So I’ve sat down and wrote a few bits and pieces down to catch up...

Busy-ness

Hi all, Janek here, doing another blog update for my wonderful, brilliant, and absolutely fantastic boyfriend (he's been really earning those kudos lately). This has, of course, been keeping him busy, along with work and about a million other things, as per usual. Add little drama with misunderstandings in the family, and it's practically Days of Our Lives with only some of the attractive cast members and half the candles.

This has prompted my post, of course. He promises to post at least 15 times an hour as soon as he gets a minute. Well, maybe not 15 times an hour, but slightly more regularly. Meanwhile, I have awarded him the prestigious title of World's Greatest Boyfriend 2009, because he is. He'll talk to you soon :)