expose yourself

Originally I wanted to do this as a Monday Montage, but it just didn't quite work... so I'm going another way with it...

This is 50% inspired by Eddy's first Expose Yourself post (which, in turn, was actually inspired by Nathan's ongoing Expose Yourself theme) and 50% inspired by the regular Inside Story feature in the Sunday Mail's Home liftout where various local "people of interest" are photographed surrounded by belongings that mean something to them and the image is surrounded by little blocks of text for each item.

  1. Wooden Staff
    This is the first of several "Me and J" stories that seem to go along with all this stuff... I did mention it briefly in my original post about him but basically he showed up on my doorstep one night carrying a tree branch and a handful of sandpaper so we could craft me a walking stick/staff... and all I'd done was say to him that I wanted to ask him about making one... next thing I know, he's there with not only the wood, but the tools (okay, just sandpaper) to craft it. We ended up going and sitting on the grass in a nearby park in the middle of the night so we didn't get sawdust all over my apartment. It doesn't show up in the photo, but it has this great curve in the top of it, and I've added a white cockatoo feather I found during one of my walks, and a wolf pendant I got a few Christmases ago to the top.

  2. Farmers Union Iced Coffee
    I'll admit... I'm an addict... I've mentioned this Iced Coffee more than a few times in various posts, but it's my absolute favourite beverage in the whole wide world. It was named as a BankSA Heritage Icon in 2004. And with good reason! No other brand tastes as good, and if they ever stop making it I will cry... a lot...

  3. Macquarie Dictionary
    I've had this dictionary for over half my life... the inscription inside says "With love on your 15th Birthday, love Mum"... and it's served me well in all those years. I also like it because it's an Australian dictionary, so it has stuff in it that you wouldn't find anywhere else. It's the same dictionary I mentioned in my first ever blog post too...

  4. Mobile Phone
    This is more than just my phone... it's my radio (for when I'm on my daily walk), watch, reminder, alarm clock and calendar... and if I have to leave the house without it because it's charging or whatever, I feel a little lost...

  5. Dragon
    This adorable guy was a present for either Christmas or a birthday when I was a teenager... he used to sit on top of the teevee in my bedroom when I was living at home, but a tumble resulting in a broken neck and dislodged "bubble" put an end to that. His feet hook over the edge of either a shelf, or in his case, a couple of books layed on the top of one of my bookcases.

  6. Bladed Ankh
    I got this bladed ankh (and yes, the "tail" of the ankh actually does have a blade on it, although the point is actually sharper than the blade itself) pendant on my first trip to Melbourne back in 1998 at the St Kilda Markets. I hardly ever wear it (and it actually needs a good polish), but it appeals to my love of all things vampiric and gothic, as well as my connection to the ankh symbol.

  7. Laughing Buddha Statue
    I mentioned this guy on Monday... he's the statue that J bought me for my birthday last year, and he sits in pride of place on top of the stereo speaker next to the teevee. I've lovingly oiled him over time until he's basically soaked to the gills and the wood isn't going to split any time soon. As a result he's also a little darker than he was when I first got him.

  8. Film SLR and Compact Digital Cameras
    Not surprisingly with all my other photography related entries (9, 11 and 14), but I had to include not only my digital camera (although in truth that's just my empty camera case, since I was taking the shot with the camera), but my big Pentax SLR too.

  9. Camera Club Medals
    These are the two medals that I won at my first Camera Club Annual Exhibition... you get big trophies too, but only for a year, whereas the little medals are yours to keep. I'm very proud of these (especially since I may never win anything in the Annual Exhibitions ever again).

  10. Sunglasses
    Never leave home without them... except at night... my eyes are pretty light sensitive (probably from spending too much time indoors) so I can't go anywhere without my sunglasses, even in winter. I also never pay more than about $20 for a pair, since I drop, break, lose, fiddle, scratch and generally mistreat them. This pair is the ones that I scored at the post-Christmas sales last year.

  11. Photographic Negatives
    These two folders contain all the negatives from my photographic work... 114 rolls of film... somewhere between 3000 and 4000 photographs... if there was ever, god forbid, a fire in my apartment, this is one of the things I would save.

  12. Red Sofa
    Yes, with all the recent drama over my sofa, it's been a recurring blog theme for a bit, but I love this sofa for two reasons... firstly I've had this obsession with red sofas since I was a kid... I don't know why, I just have... secondly, this was the first piece of furniture I ever bought for myself with my own money... everything else in my house is either stuff that's been bought for me, or stuff that I had at Ma's place when I was living there and has travelled with me ever since.

  13. Dragon Sword
    I'm not sure whether this is actually a wakizashi (the blade length is about right) or if it has another name, but it was a going-away gift from J when he was headed to London... whatever it is, it's very obviously only ceremonial, but it works in nicely with my love of dragons.

  14. Jeff
    This is my favourite from three images given to me by the photographer Chris Reynolds. We met through PhotoSIG and emailed back and forth for ages. He told me to pick out a shot or two and he would send them to me (just because he liked me... I'm very likeable). They're only inkjet prints, and I think they've gone a little sepia over time, but I like that. He's been published more than a few times, and Gaydar also used to use his images as part of their website design. I framed all three shots so that they kind of looked like the images framed in the top left of this photo.

  15. Parlour Palm (Chamaedorea Elegans)
    A year and a bit ago I decided that I actually needed some greenery in my apartment (probably around the same time that I got my red sofa actually), so one Saturday morning I went out to one of those huge Hardware/Garden Centre type stores and got a little palm and a small square pot and some pebbles and potting mix. I was more than a little bit surprised that I didn't kill the thing, but it actually flourished. Around the time I stopped working the little palm had grown and grown and it's roots had actually pushed their way into the water well in the pot, so it was off to the hardware store again for a bigger pot, more potting mix and more pebbles. I split the clumped palm into six smaller clumps, put four of the palms into my new pot and repotted the other two in the old pot and gave it to Ma. It's still growing like crazy (Ma, on the other hand, managed to half kill her palm by leaving it outside in the afternoon sun).
Current Mood: i love this stuff

2 comments:

Sunshine said...

I can't believe you found my first Exposed Yourself post! But you had to make yours so much better, didn't you??!!! :P

yani said...

Hehehe... actually you can blame Nathan, your post was linked from one of his Expose Yourself theme posts...

I did see your post back when it first appeared though, and have been planning and plotting to do a similar post ever since... :)