crustacean frustration

Last Friday night when I was still deciding whether to venture out or not I got a call from Cliff, a friend in Melbourne, saying he'd be in Sydney the following night (for one night only). This made things easy for me. I stayed in on Friday night and had a night on the tiles with Cliff on Saturday. We hadn't seen each other since his last trip to Sydney in April, which is when I introduced him to Palms (my favourite dance club cum pick up joint on Oxford Street). So Palms is where we headed once again. It's always good for a dance if you're into trashy '80s music and homo-disco tunes (think Dolly, Madonna, Kylie etc) and the crowd is attitude free (at one point, late in the night, I stumbled to the bar treading on two people's feet - oops, sorry - and not a nasty word was said - not to my face anyway).

That first time I took Cliff to Palms ended up being a very trashy night (it's also the night I met Jon), but this time we both had commitments the following day (Cliff had to work, I was participating in a photo shoot). It's a pity I was on the horn. When Palms shut at 3am Cliff got into a taxi and went to his hotel and I went home... er via a gay sex-on-premises "club". It was a bit of a waste of time and money ($17 if you're interested and no gratification, despite a fumbled attempt). By the time I got home and into my bed it was 5am. I haven't done this sort of thing for a long time (guess I didn't need to when I was bonking Jon).

So, anyway, a couple of daze later I'm cleaning out a shelf in my cupboard - the sort of 'medical supplies' section: bandaids, sun cream, condoms etc - when I find a package containing crab cream (yes, lotion for dealing with pesky pubic lice. Actually I found two packages of the stuff, but one had already expired so I threw it out). Thank goodness I haven't had to deal with crabs for a while, I thought, as I put the unexpired batch back in its paper bag and shoved it to the back of the shelf. See, apart from putting something out of its misery (which is still an awful dilemma for me) I really don't like killing anything whether it's an ant, a spider, a cockroach or whatever. No, I'm not a Buddhist and I'll admit mozzies give me the shits, but I'll only swat 'em if they land on me and start sucking my blood. Self-defence. And that's why, when I started feeling a bit itchy yesterday I had to do something about it. First thing this morning I fished around in the back of the cupboard for that hidden package and proceeded to follow the directions on the box. How frustrating, especially as I said earlier I wasn't even sexually sated for my trouble. Anyway, I can't sit around here complaining all day, I've got to go and put a ruddy load of washing in the machine...

(Hands up everyone who now needs to scratch)