Tomorrow, I Become Wiser…

… when my wisdom teeth are removed. Yes, it doesn’t make sense but that is how I am making sense of having to go through with this.

I’ll be going into hospital; it wouldn’t be such a big deal if I wasn’t scared of hospitals.

I’ve disabled comments for now because frankly, I DON’T want to hear Australia’s Funniest Wisdom Teeth Removal stories. I’ll enable commenting afterwards so that you can share them with me then — when it is confirmed that I am alive and well.

The best thing about this is having time off work all of next week. I probably won’t be in the mood to do much — was hoping to fill up The Grand Canyon with words for the novel but after hearing about the varying, lingering after-effects of the anaesthetic I really, really doubt it…

UPDATE 4pm: I just found out that the Italy Vs Ukraine game is on at 4:30am tomorrow morning (I had thought it was on Sunday morning and figured I’d be accidentally cheering for the Ukraine thanks to the drugs). Now, this is great; I can get up early to watch the soccer and then I can keep empowering images of Azurri in my head until I am knocked out…

(Hopefully it won’t be a chance at the world cup as well as my teeth that gets eliminated tomorrow.)

UPDATE 3/7/06 3pm: I’m alive. (Comments are back on.)

Italy Vs Australia – Part 3

Official gallery here.

Read a good recount here.

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UPDATE 2pm: I wasn’t going to say anything more but there appears to be some interesting comments circulating in the blogosphere about it being the referees’ game more than anything else and (to paraphrase a random blogger out there) that it’s the referees that are actually winning. Yes, interesting.

UPDATE 28/6/06, 12pm: Okay, even though it’s been on my mind, I really should include my congratulations on the Socceroos getting as far as they did and acknowledge that it was a crappy way to go out: congratulations to the Socceroos for getting as far as you did and yes, it was a crappy way to go out. I’m getting a fair share of ‘we were ripped off’ and ‘we were robbed’ emails but peeps, you’re sending them to the wrong person!

While emotion-charged blame will no doubt rain down on Spanish referee Luis Medina Cantalejo, Guus Hiddink had it right when he said after the game Australia failed to take its chances. After enjoying around 60 per cent of possession, the Socceroos could not find any more than two meaningful shots on Gianluigi Buffon’s goal. Mark Viduka was again impotent up front, and Hiddink arguably made his changes too late in the second half with Italy down to 10 men and with only one striker on until 15 minutes from the end.

Lucas Neill, penalised so cruelly and perhaps harshly at the death, could have perhaps stayed on his feet in the box with more experience and composure. He had defenders inside him that could have dealt with the threat of Fabio Grosso’s run inside the box.

Thank you Toby Forage.

The nation’s spew is here.

Italy Vs Australia – Part 2

This morning I went into Bean Bar on Gawler Place to get my coffee. There was a Socceroo flag hanging from the ceiling. Now, I know that the people who run that shop have an Italian background. To make sure, when the boy behind the counter served me I said, ‘you guys have an Italian background, yeah?’ and he nodded. I continued, ’so where’s the Italian flag?’ He shrugged his shoulders and half-smiled.

Were they concerned they’d cop too much crap from Socceroo supporters? Probably.

(Note that I say Socceroo and not Aussie. Yeah, I say there is a difference.)

Arguably the world’s best defender, Alessandro Nesta of AC Milan, will not play because of injury.

From Socceroos Daring to Dream

(Sob.)

Italy Vs Australia

Yes, I watched Italy at 11:30pm last night, went to sleep for a few hours and then got up again at 4:30am for the Australia game. Was elated to see that both teams are going through to the next round.

My jaw might have dropped when I learnt that Italy were playing Australia next. There’d been a discussion about that scenario before the tournament started, and who I would choose, and the word unpatriotic was mentioned, but I dismissed it quickly because frankly, I never thought Australia would be playing Italy!

‘So, which team do you want to see win?’ Hubby asked me this morning.
‘Well, I am with Italy, but at the same time I will be happy with Australia winning.’
‘In other words, you don’t mind?’
‘No, I want Italy to win,’ I reply. But, is there a difference here? Did my first response mean that I don’t mind either way? I don’t know. Surely I can have a preference for Italy winning but be totally okay with Australia winning, too — without it looking like I don’t know who to support…

The way I see it: full support capacity definitely goes to Italy. And I do feel bad that Australia doesn’t have all of it, but the moment I get the idea to shift a little of it over to Australia, I feel weird.

My sister, a dramatic Italian supporter (God bless her), seems to think it’s a lose-lose situation. For her, it’s obviously upsetting if Australia wins and equally upsetting if Italy win. While I don’t agree, if Australia did knock Italy out, I would feel the disappointment but I wouldn’t feel the loss that deeply: Australia deserves to win, too.

One of the text messages I got from her this morning said that fence-sitters shit her off. I told her that it was to be expected of Aussie-born Italians. I don’t think I’ll be fence-sitting (I’ve already stated which team has my preference) and for goodness sake, I don’t think I’m being unpatriotic, either. So, call it what you want.

Of course, it came up again this morning when I got into work. I tried to be a bit more careful with my response but I know that I amused and surprised and irked my colleagues. You’re born in Australia so wouldn’t you support Australia? And blah. I get the impression that it doesn’t matter that Italy is my background country or that I supported Italy from the very first time I watched the world cup.

(Sis, if you’re reading this, you’re the best! Hehe.)

(By the way, could Cannavaro get any better looking? I don’t think so.)

Baby, You Can Blog My Car

Okay, to be honest, I couldn’t care less about what type of car I drive and the last couple of years have seen me do the least amount of driving. But, while I am next in line from Mad Scientist Matt in the AW Blog Chain, it looks like I won’t be able to avoid the topic of automobiles any longer. (Thanks Matt! Heh.)

Note: here are two exceptions when I had written about my car before; mind you, one entry was traumatic!

Right now, Hubby and I share a car. Amazingly, it works for us. It’s a big car for little me and I feel it most when I’m getting in and out of the garage. Hubby has threatened to blow up the CD player before but aside from that, we love it dearly. For different reasons. I love it because it moves like it should when I hit the pedal and Hubby loves it because it’s a luxury car that has funky, perky and comfy bits in it.

The culture that comes with owning a car can get interesting. For me, this extends to the crap people have hanging off their rearview mirror, lame-ass bumper stickers, hideous “mods” and other fashionable accessories (eh, rice-boy?) and exterior paintwork.

I used to drive a Renault and I named him Vegas (my mother named her car Luther and my dad would call it Bozo because he never remembered Luther). (Actually, if anyone saw that thrashed, poor, bastardly clown of a car they would think the name Bozo apt.) (Come to think of it, it was a great case of unconditional love on my mother’s part so I’ll give her credit for that.) Returning to my point, the most I did to personalise Vegas was ignore the rubbish on the floor, place a religious sticker of a saint on the back window (next to some dangling Elvis legs), hang a small crystal pineapple from the mirror (which my mother had sent to me from Brisbane), and leave a melted Robbie Williams cassette in one of the compartments…

(You’re still cackling over the saint sticker aren’t ya?)

Next in the chain is Kelly Curtis.

This entry is part of the AW Chain – Round 2. Here is my entry from Round 1.

Linkin’

In twenty four hours, I have experienced laughter (twice), repulsion and frustration.

(Enjoy the noun fest?)

Artful Things

Yesterday, I went to the Margaret Preston art exhibition with my mother. It was quite an experience. It was amazing to see the artist’s style develop and change over the years.

And I need to support Adelaide art more.

Road Trips, Soccer And The AW Blog Chain

Following on from Mad Scientist Matt’s AW Blog Chain entry, the road trip concept sounds like it could be fun (it always seems so American to me – not that there’s anything wrong with that – I am sure loads of Aussies go on road trips often!) and when I think of them, I actually visualise the beginning scenes of the film When Harry Met Sally.

When I lived with my family in Queensland, every year we would drive down to Adelaide around Christmas time. My father is the gotta-get-there-in-a-hurry type whereas my mother likes to stop and enjoy the sights. Yeah, it didn’t mix well and somehow (with the smells of the dingy motels we sometimes spent a handful of hours in still on my skin) we always got there in a hurry.

The type of car one travels in usually makes or breaks the experience. Most of our Brisbane-Adelaide road trips were done in a Honda Legend; a very comfy car in my opinion. Our earlier trips were done in a Nissan Coupe. Uh-huh. Gorgeous car but not a family setup. Luckily, our bodies are compact-ish, and even though we fit snugly, travelling for two days in a coupe did take its toll.

As far as travelling alone is concerned, from Brisbane to the Gold Coast was the closest I ever got. It was only an hour’s drive, hehe, but it was still long enough to have to make important decisions like which CDs to listen to on the journey.

Hmmh, icky I think.

And on the subject of travelling and old times, it’s 5:30am right now, half-time between the Italy Vs Ghana match. It is official: I have contracted World Cup fever. I hadn’t gotten it the last time around, or as severely the time before that (though I still got up for all the Italy games) but it was back in the RobertoBaggioDays that the fever first threw up in me (leaving me to deal with the awful sleeping pattern alone).

It was good to see our Aussie boys’ win last night, too – that was completely unexpected, although my favourite team will always be ‘Azzurri’. Bizarrely, it’s kind of sad to see so many new players in this tournament, cause it makes me feel nostalgic. I’ll never forget ol’ 1994. The scenes are still there; like when Zola got “red-carded”…

Next one up in the chain is Kelly Curtis.

This entry is part of the AW Chain – Round 1.