A weekend of good finds

I’m fully mobile again. Stitches came out on Friday and the pain is subsiding. Baba and I struck gold with some great local finds.

First was lunch on Saturday when we tried a new pizza joint that’s just opened a couple of minute’s walk away. Pizza Mario has a tacky name and kind of chain pizza joint logo and imaging, but the pizze that came out of their wood oven were magnificent. Yokohama friends no doubt remember il Gabbiano on Isezaki mall. Mario’s pizze are almost exactly the same as those yummy ones that we had for luch almost every weekend. That kind of napolitan pizza with a soft, thin base, chewy crust and very high quality lumps of mozzarella is a real rarity in Australia. I note that pizza mario belongs to some Italian accreditation scheme – the only such establishment in Australia. Japan, on the other hand, had a couple of dozzen such members. Perhaps that says a lot about the Japanese obession with certificates and “licences” as proof of some kind of authenticity – particulary where exotic European food and wine is concerned.

Our second find was a little courtyrad cafe attached to the back of a cute little flower shop in trendy Paddington that we’ve walked past hundreds of times. (For the life of me I can’t remember the name of the place and it’s not coming up on a google search or in the yellow pages….) The flower shop is quaint and quite European with “softer” colours and flower styles than the typical garish Sydney gerberas and birds of paradise. The cafe is good because they do simple lunches cheaply, fairly good coffee AND dogs are welcome so we can take Chai.

The final good find was a fabulous second hand book in Gould’s Books in Newtown. Gould’s is just a big barn with zillions of dusty books stacked floor to ceiling, vaguely sorted according to category but without so much as a nod to trifles such as alphabetical order. When I was writing my honours thesis on China, I went in asking whether they had an English translation of Mao’s Little Red Book. The grumpy, ruffled, bespecticaled, slighlty smelly man with a nicotine-tinged grey beard behind the raised counter (Mr Gould, presumably) nodded and said that there may be a few copies “upstairs, somewhere in the back left-hand corner”. I spent a good two hours looking over shelves that were stacked two-deep and through boxes of books on the floor in the aisles…to no avail. I learned that day that one should never go to Gould’s looking for a particular book, but rather just go in any time when one has a few hours to kill browsing and exploring. Today, Baba found me a great book on flower arranging written by “artist, writer and socialite” Fleur Cowells. It was published in the mid ’80s but Fleur’s arrangements and philosophy are totally contemporary and the book could be reprinted today with little, if any need of updating. It’s brilliantly written with a rather camp, fluffy tone and will hopefully give me lots of inspiration in my efforts to become the best floral designer in the world.

Guns are bad mmmnokay?

…and still the yanks carry on about their right to bear arms. They say it’s always the mental state of the guy holding the gun that kills people, not the gun itself. Reality check: if someone with mad-psycho-killer-tendancies can’t get their hands on weapons, they’re not quite as likely to go on a shooting spree.

Sympathy please

I have a sore bum and I need a stiff drink.

Public hospital: not too shabby

I think i’m an alcoholic.

The whole operation on my bum thing got started on Sunday afternnon. Baba by that stage still had no idea why I was going to hospital on Monday – he thought I had a pimple on my bottom (!!). He’s a very visual person, so I did an image search on “Pilonidal Sinus” which brought up lots of sufficiently gross pictures of what the doctor was going to do to me. While searching various related things, I had a look at general anesthesia. I knew that I had to fast from 6am on the day of the operation, but wanted to see if it would be okay to have a drink on Sunday night.

We had two events to go to: the first called FagTag which is a fabulous monthly event where hundreds of poofs and dykes “invade” a pub or club which is usually straight. This month’s venue was the White Horse, a fairly swanky pub up the road. After a while we went to LOUNGE to hear a friend of a friend DJ. The reason I think I’m an alcoholic, is that it was very very difficult to keep ordering lemon squash and mineral water all night.

All of that was an exceptionally long preamble to the main event: my first experience under the surgeon’s knife. Through a long and complicated chain of events, i ended up having to have the operation at Bankstown Hospital which is about 45 mins on the train from the city. Bankstown is a part of Sydny I’d actually now like to go back and wander around because it’s very ethnically diverse meaning there are lots of really interesting food shops, restaurants and knick-knacks to be found. We finally found a cab to get from the station to the hospital. I filled in paper work at admissions and was sent up to the day-surgery reception where I was asked all the same questions I’d just answered at admissions. It turned out I was asked the same questions by every single person I saw that day – name? DOB? what are you in for? do you have any alergies? Have I been fasting as ordered? I’m guessing that at some stage in the past someone was given the wrong operation so they now make extra certain that the right person gets the right “procedure.”

After an hour or so in a crowded waiting room, I was called in to speak to a nurse who asked all those questions above and also asked about any drug use. Aparently the one or two joints I smoked years ago and the e’s that I take about once a year these days can work against the anesthetic, so it was decided to give me an extra strong dose. We had a bit of a laugh trying to spell marijuana. After talking to the nurse I had to change into a very skimpy and not very fetching hospital gown and a silly hat. I was weighed, heart and blood pressure taken, asked all the same questions again then shown to a bed to wait my turn.

After another 15 minutes or so the Anethetist came and asked me all the same questions and went away again. After another half an hour or so the anethetist’s nurse (a spunk called Paul) came and asked me all the same questions again before wheeling me to the operating theatre. I was in a little anteroom. In the theatre its self I could hear the previous operation just finishing, the doctor thanking everyone then lots of clanging and noise as they cleaned the room ready for me to be wheeled in. A needle was stuck in my hand and I was out cold almost straight away – forget all that stuff you hear about gas and going off to lala land. No time for that. knock the patient out. Do the operation. Wheel them out so that the next one can come in – rather like weddings at a Japanese wedding hotel.

I started to wake up with an oxygen mask on my face and a nurse shoving a thermometer in my ear. Aparently my body temperature had dropped to 35, so they were pumping warm air under the blanket to warm me up again. It was so comfy. I really didn’t want to wake up. However like a private school matron, the nurse ordered me out of bed and into my clothes, despite my protestations that i was still very dizzy and really thought it best that I should stay in bed a bit longer. Problem was that by this stage it was five to five and people obviously wanted to go home. During that haze the doctor may have come to speak to me – but I honestly can’t remember for sure if he did. I think i probably just gave my name, DOB, no alergies, pilonidal sinus response to whoever came to speak to me.

They gave me a chciken sandwich and some apple juice and rang dad to tell him to come and pick me up and I rang baba who had been loitering around the hospital kiosk all day. I wanted him to come so that I could have a hug and some sympathy after it was all over. Selfish bugger just told me how boring it was having to wait all day.

All in all, I was very impressed with how happy all the nurses and staff seemed and how professionally they went about their work. The doctor who actually did the operation only spoke to me for about two minutes before hand (he’d been briefed by the doctor who did the initial examination a couple of months ago). Another intern came and introduced herself too – she may well have done the actual procedure due to the fact that as a public patient (i.e. I didn’t have to pay for anything at all all day) I had to sign a form saying that I agreed to be operated on by any doctor of the hospital’s choosing who may or may not include the doctor I orginally saw.

The real test will be when the stiches come out to see whether I end up with an ugly scar on my back entrance.

ADENDUM: July 2007 – a few months after the operation:

The weeks following the operation were a bit miserable but bearable. I had about 1 and a half weeks off work and limited mobility. The 1st week I felt woozy from the anesthetic, painkillers and strong antibiotics. The second week the pain increased. Sitting was difficult, so going into the office was impossible. I tried to go in after a week or so, but only lasted a couple of hours and took a few more days off. The stitches came out after 2 or 3 weeks which reduced the pain considerably, but not entirely. Now I have a small scar and a row of dots a few centimetres long where the stitches were, but my toosh isn’t grossly disfigured. There is still a bit of pain if I sit on it for too long in one position.

After a few weeks the stitches

A day amongst the vines and lump on bum

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NB* Those who googled “Lump in Bum crack” or something similar, follow the link and have a look at

this post

to read about my experience of having a Pilonidal Sinus removed…and go and see your GP; the internet won’t cure you.
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Now, back to the blog…

No…the title isn’t a cryptic crossword clue, but a summary of what’s happening in my life this week.

Last weekend (Easter) Baba and I drove up to the Hunter Valley for a day of winetasting with T & H – the Yokohama lesbians. We met the grrlz right on time at
10:00 at the agreed rendezvous point – a slightly tacky “village” of ye olde worlde shoppes. We had coffee, wandered in and out of some shoppes and decided it was high time to start tasting some wine.

First stop was the Small Wine Maker’s Centre which acts as a cellar door for half a dozen or so boutique wineries around the Hunter and beyond. Baba and H-san went gaga over a non-botrytus dessert wine while I was quite impressed with a Viognier from Orange (a cooler climate wine region a few Hundred km west of the Hunter).

Second stop was Tamburlaine a winery baba and I visited back in 2001 on our first visit to Australia together. He wanted to go back for two reasons. 1) Their wines come in very “kawaii” carry bags and 2) an exceptionally good dessert wine. I wasn’t all that impressed with any of their other wines but bought a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc out of politeness/obligation. After a little wander around the grounds of the vineyard we decided it was time for lunch. We ended up at a really really lovely little restauraunt in the quieter Lovedale Region of the the Hunter Valley where we sat on the terrace and enjoyed good food and each other’s company.

After lunch we visitied Pepper Tree wines where the woman at the cellar door became really firendly and chatty when she realised I knew a little bit about wine and could engage in semi-intelligent wine-speak. I ended up buying a mixed dozen of some very good wines. (plus 2 free bottles thown in for paying by american express…) Of particular note was their grand reserve Chardonnay. Now, I’m not the world’s biggest fan of Chardonnay…I find that it often kicks one in the teeth and makes one’s brain a bit foggy after half a glass. I told the server as much when she offered me a taste of their cheaper Chardonnay. She then went and got a bottle of the grand reserve and said “well okay then, try this”. I was speechless. The wine was so smooth on the palate and had delicious buttered toast aromas and an almost creamy palate that lingered on the tastebuds at the sides of my tongue. It was splendid. Suffice to say a couple of bottles ended up in the mixed dozen I bought. I promise to save a bottle to share with the first friend from Japan who comes to visit (hint hint to those who have been prominsing for ages to come to Sydney for a holiday!)

So that was the Hunter Valley…all of which had nothing to do with the lump on my bum which I have to have surgically removed tomorrow. In my almost 31 years on the planest, I’ve only been to hospital once since I left it as a wrinkly pink baby…and that was to have another certain useless pink wrinky bit removed from a particular appendage…I don’t remember anything about that fateful trip to hospital at all. Tomorrow they’re actually going to put me to sleep and cut a hole at the top of my bum crack to remove the lump that is there which occasionally flares up and becomes painful. They then some how sew a flap of skin back over the hole and stitch it all up. Fortunately it’s just a day procedure. As I’m having it done in a public hospital, as soon as I wake up, they kick my out of the bed and give it to someone else. I can expect to be in a lot of pain over the next week or two and totally unable to sit down or lie on my back.

Wish me luck and pary that I’m not one of the one in 250 000 people with a fatal alergy to anaesthesia!

Melbourne was great

well, baba and I went to Melbourne last weekend – actually really only for Saturday. We arrived at midnight on Fri to cold, drizzly windy weather (and bumpy landing with crosswinds). M-san picked us up at the airport and drove us to the lovely little house he’s renting about 10km out of the city in the slightly unfashionable Norther n Suburbs. The cat curled up on the sofa bed with me and baba and we had a decent night’s sleep. (Anyone who knows me knows that I hate cats!!)

The main reason for going down was to go to the Melbourne International Flower and Garden Show. Not to sure what the International bit refers to because all the floral displays were from floral designers and students from Victoria – not even interstate. For me the most interesting bit was seeing the design contest for students. There were two levels on display: Advanced and Intermediate. The brief for the advanced students was to create a display for the opening party of an interior design firm. The intemediate students had to create a table setting for a romantic dinner for two. For an aspiring florist it was fascinating to look closely at the students’ work; to see those who had creative and original ideas and the varying degrees of success to which those ideas were executed. It was also interesting to see that the judges (of this particular competition anyway) seemed to rate quirky creativity over the potential commercial viability of the desings these future floral designers were creating.

That evening we had a lovely dinner at European, a trez hip restaurant/wine bar. Melbournians take their food and drink very seriously. Sydney people like to think they do too, but in this town its more about being seen in the hippest joints – and being served by the rudest, snootiest waiters. Dining in Melbourne was a lovely experience. For my main I had barramundi (not bad but there was a bit too much going on on the plate) and two glasses of an Italian Pinot Gris. A true rarity in Australia, all the wines on the menu were from the old world. Not a single Hunter Semilon or Coonawarra Cab Sav in sight.

Baba and I are very seriosuly thinking of moving to Melbourne in the futire – particularly when we are thinking about buying a house.