Yes, well I survived the Australia's hottest day on record. The picture does no justice. It takes walking around in the searing heat to truly understand. A few days before, when the temperature reached 45 degrees, I likened it to walking around with a blow-dryer on full blast directly in your face. The only way to survive that day was to dash into the local trendy book store, grab any old classic, and act conflicted about purchasing in a speedy exchange for free air-conditioning.

I thought that was bad enough but Friday was even hotter - 46.3 degrees and more if you were unfortunate to be stuck on a train platform for 40-forking-minutes - delayed cause (get this!) the overhead wires were "melting". 

To put it into perspective, I bought 12 bottles of water from a store and put them in the freezer. The theory was I was going to get healthy and drink one of the little suckers every day. When the heatwave arrived, I considered myself well prepared. I took one bottle (half a litre) out of the freezer and plopped it into my handbag. It weighed a tonne. By the time I reached the station and waited for the train - a mere 30 minutes (at THAT stop) it had bloody well melted. 

Having said that, I appeared to the unsuspecting onlooker, as a well prepared traveller and for a while there, I felt guilty at not sharing my prized possession. To tell you the truth, I hate water. I shouldn't. It's the best thing since sliced bread when your gasping for fluids. I'm just a little late in realizing that. But that day, I used it as an immediate respite, like an ice pack, against the searing sun's effect on my skin - it truly was like standing in front of a heater, only it was 360 degrees of heat and once you eased the burn on one part of your foot, or shoulder, or neck or..... you went back to the foot, the shoulder, the neck...it was a full-time occupation - like someone suffering from silent tourettes and a frenzied body rash.

I moaned like shit in New Zealand about the weather and how I couldn't wait to be continuously warm. I yearned for warmth. I dreamed about it. I guess, it's true what they say: "Be careful what you wish for"... right?

Take a right, here...

Yes, a profound thought.... reminds me of a saying:

"If you put your ladder against the same wall, don't expect  a different view"

Or something like that. Actually, it was nothing like that but you get my point. You're smart, right?.

No, what I am trying to say - very badly - is I am sick and tired of writing what I think I should write. (VISUAL) ...Eye balls rolling.... (my eyes, that is).... followed by deep heavy sigh..... 

I will continue to write about ACC and my somewhat tragic experience with them and, more so, the events that made me HAVE to deal with them, but today, as I sat on a bus overhearing conversations about life, I thought - I want to write, just write - write about things that tickle my fancy, things that have made me weep with laughter, things that are sometimes so UN-PC that, that is what is funny. I want to write about the people that enter my life, sometimes, thankfully - very briefly, and the comments they make that can turn your morning, travelling to work on an overcrowded bus, just all the more brighter - the nuances of language and how, yes, it can be literally, lost in translation, and how, that can just bring a smile to your face when you least expect it.... 

I guess I am asking those that have looked at my blog for that "RA-RA Anti-ACC" rant to also realize that we (myself included) are not defined by our experience with them. There is so much more to us than that. To focus only on ACC is like pointing out the colour red in a landscape - it makes everything else, all the other colours, detriment to what the image is, as a whole. ACC can remain red - a rather fitting colour - but let's not neglect the other parts of who we have become: the blends, the hybrids, the combinations of colours/experiences that have made us the complete portrait of who we now are, and ..... lets stand proud in our colourfulness.

I'll go first.

Enya