♥ Campus A Low Hum - Day One ♥

It's taken me ages to write all of this and now I'm worried that it just reads like an appalling story written by a small child ("And then I went to the Zoo, and then I had an ice cream, and then I rode on the train"). So. Just saying.

I cadged a ride with the Boy up to Bulls the day before camp started and decided to have an early night, which mean that I woke up full of PEP and VIM on Saturday morning, CALH Day One. It rained all Friday night and on and off for most of Saturday, but in an effort to be mature and responsible I had checked out the weather before I left (indeed, obsessed over it) and had brought a pair of gumboots and some awesome plastic ponchos that made me look like I’d just been picked up from the drycleaners.

I spent the first part of the morning haunting the canteen and looking forlornly towards their espresso machine (i.e. the Teat from which I Prefer to Suckle) because OH MY GOD I NEEDED COFFEE. This need was a combination of the beer I’d drunk the night before that was still hanging out with me, and all that fresh out-doorsy air.

Shannon and the RNZ crew were working the first part of Saturday and the rest of the people in my tent party (Bex, Luke, Bryna, Peter) had bustled of to Marton for gumboots and umrellas, so I was left to my own devices. I lurked ex-workmate Ange and gf for a bit and then wandered off to look for Lippy with whom I was supposed to be doing skating stuff. As soon as I started looking for her she appeared like magic and we managed to get a skate in and try out the floor before attending life drawing classes, which were being run by a friend of Lippy’s.

Lippy and Me getting arty with ourselves

This was great, but apparently it was vitally important that I made a dick of myself during this class, mishearing “gesture drawing” as “jester drawing” and thus making a douchey-smartass comment completely inadvertently. I’m actually blushing just thinking about it. Anyhow, it turns out that I’m not as shit an artist as I thought – with the right patience and guidance, two beers and my Derby Wife by my side, THIS is what I can achieve:

Dude! It kind of looks like a person and not a series of blobs!

It was already well past midday before I got around to seeing any bands – the first I saw was Parking Lot Experience who were a bunch of guys from Melbourne. I can’t remember anything about the music, but I can tell you that they made a very impressive human pyramid on stage and then performed a Chinese dragon dance that became a conga line.

We had a quite a nice relaxing afternoon and evening featuring more alcohol (a theme for weekend), gumboots and a deep and meaningful between Bex and me (kisses darling). At some point after we’d drunk copiously we noticed what the time was and toddled off to see the Dodos play. Shannon and I ended up perched on the edge of the stage which was awesome fun; he gave a boost to a small girl who was trying to climb on top of a stack of speakers. That was one of the most fun things about Camp – even if you were doing something that was basically kind of dumb, there were no grown ups telling you what you could and couldn’t do (with the exception of climbing the water tower. That was Verboten). Oh, and as always the Dodos were fantastic to watch! I enjoyed this gig much more than when I saw them at San Fransisco Bath House at the end of 2007 because the sound was just too loud for me. I ended up having to stand right at the back of the bar and even then my ear drums were quivering with fear.

After the Dodos had played, Bex and I changed into our toga/sheets for the Orientation party which had been billed, essentially, as a non-ironic bogan fest. We danced to some seriously bad 90s music in the gym, including that KORN track about doing it all for the nookie (still stuck in my head). I was disturbed at the amount of nostalgia that the music and the situation made me feel and I felt strangely affectionate towards the situation instead of horrified. Indeed, I was thrust back in time to 1998 when I went to all these trashy parties with Hayley and her Chilton friends, parties that also featured a whole bunch of gross Hutt Boys and a fair amount of RTDs. Dude, I was THERE again. I was feeling it. I requested "Barbie Girl" from the DJ.

 VIA Sean

Later during the Orientation party, having cleared an enormous dancing space for ourselves, Bex and I decided it would be an awesome idea to slide around on the floor on our knees and I promptly bruised myself on top of an earlier bruise I’d got from roller skating.

NEXT WEEK: A crocodile, two holes, and I actually see some bands.