I can’t wait to fall in love with you

[Summer Love – Justin Timberlake]

So I am aware that I haven’t written much for a while. Mostly, life has been pretty routine – I meet up with Mela, I go to work, I have some shifts that are terrible, some that are fun. Mela and I have had a few small arguments but nothing close to a fight. I’ve gotten her Christmas presents and she’s gotten me some as well.

As you can imagine, last night was NYE 2011. Putting aside the “oh my God it was only, like, yesterday that I went to the city for NYE 2010”, I was pretty excited because we’d gotten a hotel room together in the city. Awkwardly, the room was right next to my work, the very place where I can’t be seen because I was “home sick”, so I spent a lot of time cowering behind Mela when we passed my work in case the managers were about.

We met up at Glen, as usual, and took the train up. There was still time before check-in, so we had lunch at this Vietnamese place, except I felt like fried rice, so of course I ordered a Pad Thai Fried Rice at a Vietnamese Pho restaurant. After eating our fill, we took the tram down to our hotel room, checked in, got all excited at the prospect of a night together in a decent for how much we paid hotel room. But not 10 minutes into our honeymoon beyond the threshold mania did Brendan call for me to pick him up from downstairs. There was a bit of a whinge on Mela’s behalf who, understandably, seeing as we hadn’t seen each other properly in a few days, wanted some time alone first. But I got Brendan, and we hung out in the hotel room for a bit watching TV until we went to Coles at Melb Central to get some snacks because I remembered being hungry the year prior. Took almost an hour to decide what alcohol to buy and ending up buying a tiny bottle of butterscotch schnapps which I will say now, sucked. We passed by Dani and Ben eating crepes outside of Harajuku crepes, thus seeing a 2nd year of accidentally coming across Dani in the city on NYE. We went back to the room and watched Man Vs Wild until Brendan had to go see his friends. So then Mela finally had her time alone with me.

At around 7:50, 8, we headed off to go have dinner with Jen in Richmond, seeing as it was also her birthday that we were counting down to. We went to Pacific House on Victoria Street, and since we arrived late, they ordered already. It was fine, because the food was amazing. Once again, we ate our fill and with bulging stomachs hugged Jen goodbye to catch up with my uni group in the city.

Caught up with Jacky who was standing waving his arms in the middle of Swanston Street looking for us, and we went to Gin Palace (a small bar just off Lt Collins) for a bit. Jacky brought along an entourage of our lunch group, including Clare whom I haven’t seen in what felt like forever. We didn’t stay in the bar for long, seeing as it was already 30 minutes to midnight. We went back to Fed Square, and on the way, Mela, Little Sam and I lost the rest of the group. After a good quarter of an hour desperately pushing through crowds and trying to get calls to go through, I finally got through to Clare, who told us where they were. Running like mad people and hurting, I am sure, numerous merry-makers, we managed to run from Fed Square, through the crowd and down to Southbank opposite the Langham in around 5 minutes, arriving to where the group was a mere 2 minutes before midnight.

Missed the countdown, as we always do on Southbank because we don’t have speakers there, but we knew that we’d ushered in the new (and final?) year when the fireworks flew into the night sky. We watched in awe as this year’s (which was much better than last year’s) fireworks lit up the Melbourne skyline, and then we watched in amusement and some degree of horror as the top of the Art Building spire caught on fire, sending massive flaming debris down.

Mela and I trudged back to our hotel room, somehow managing to get there before 1am. We had our showers, then snuggled up in bed with the schnapps which were quickly abandoned. We ate some bread and ham that we bought, even though she was still full. We hugged a lot and told each other many sweet things before feeling fatigue pull its veil over our eyes by 2, and going to sleep.

Sleep was a bit difficult, for me at least, because it was quite warm, but it was nice to be able to cuddle the one you love at any given time during the night. We woke up and had some more cuddles and sleepy talking before her phone went off to let us know that we had to get ready for check-out. Quick packing up, a few moments of Ben 10 on TV, and we said goodbye to our first hotel room together.

The day was already heating up monstrously, and we ate congee at the same restaurant as I had last year with Annie, Anna, Josh and Julia. Then we took the Cranbourne back to Oakleigh, and said a long and sad goodbye as we took our respective buses. But the goodbye wasn’t for long, because I can feel that 2012 is going to be the year where I don’t (and really shouldn’t) feel like I am alone at any time.

Alex.

Fly, Birdies, Fly!

Today I went to see 2012 with Katherine.

I met up with her at Glenny station, even though the silly bugger stood behind a wall and couldn’t see her. Went to make an appointment for a haircut tomorrow (yep. Bee, I’m gonna get one) then went to get the tickets. Saw Charlie and Pricilla on the way and I failed to recognize Charlie because he dyed his hair and was wearing sunnies. I don’t think he appreciated it.

We had heaps of time before the movie starts so we walked to the McDonalds in the Glen were we sat and played on our DS. It was epic. Failed at Bomber-man but was an epic win in Mario Kart. Poor Katherine was winning until she got hit by a Bo-omb and blue spiny shell (are those the names?)

Then we walked back to Village only for me to want to get caramel popcorn from Coles. We walked all the way back, got the caramel popcorn – in my haste to be the one who pays I all but threw my coins at the check-out lady – then walked all the way back to Village and it was hot!

Anyway, we arrived at the cinemas way early anyway so we sat around a bit. Gave Katherine a big hug! Awwwwww.

Went into the cinemas and realized our seats suck. Besides there’s a strange teen Asian couple in front of us and it was awkward. So we moved to better seats but got kicked out when their owners came. Got new seats again and this time a bunch of dumb sounding Asians sat in front of us (I say dumb because in the movie the President of the United States is African-American and one of them asked, “isn’t he meant to look like Obama?”).

The movie was pretty good. Very cliche, and don’t get me started on the improbable way the main characters survived. There were also quite a few biblical symbolism in there. One of the funniest and dumbest bits was the main character Jackson having fallen down a huge crack in the ground in a van. By all means he should be dead, but nope he climbs back up and make it on a plane taking off. Also, he, an author, managed to drive through a collapsing city (literally) in a limo missing a door and without breaking it.

There was this guy in the movie called Charlie, who was a bit iffy in the head but he knew everything was happening. There was a scene where he stood before the ground erupting like a volcano and birds were just hauling ass outta there, and he stood there waving his arms and saying “fly, birdies fly!”

Well, won’t give more away. I do recommend seeing it on the big screen. It’s pretty funny at bits. It was a fun day too! Lots of laughs.

Hope to hang out with Katherine again some time.

Also, for many people, they’ve just finished all their exams. Congratulations, guys! To all those with a few more left; kill them good!

Alex

/edit Oh crap almost forgot! Today when Katherine and I were walking around the Glen, this really tall guy passed us. I was just making a short joke about her when the guy, instead of stepping aside so his arm won’t bump into Katherine, simply raised his arm above her head and kept walking.

Okay, now I feel better having said that.