Originally published by The Clifton Courier, December 2, 2020

We’re well and truly into barbecue season. 

Sundays previously spent curled up on the couch in front of yet another screening of Cougar Town are now spent basking in the sunshine in parks and backyards. And I’ve reached an age where attendees are required to bring something more than a single packet of two-for-price-of-one chippies (keeping the second bag at home for later, obviously). We’ve grown. We’ve matured. We’ve gone past the age where our scummy habits can no longer be written off as youthful cluelessness and will be seen as serious character flaws.

You don’t want to be the friend who offers to bring the plates to the barbecue and turn up with a packet of flimsy paper disappointment discs when someone brought 10 steaks and someone else brought enough sparkling wine for all.

We’re better than that now. 

I mean, I’m not saying that it’s a competition, however, it’s a non-competition you don’t want to lose. It’s no longer enough just to bring something (yes, even when you’re told not to bring anything). You have to contribute.  

But I will say this, trying too hard to win this competitive non-competition can also feel like a stinging loss. 

I remember one time I put on a picnic and offered to make an array of slices, thinking it would be a casual afternoon in the kitchen the day before. But it was not. There were three different slices with three different processes and the oven was on well into the night. And it was January. So it made for a sweaty, stressy time. 

Never again.  

And, yes, most of the time you can’t go wrong with a cob loaf. But even with my cheeky stovetop shortcut, it still requires a bit of oven time. And, let’s be frank, if you plonk one of those babies down next to the Bega slices and Jatz, it’s going to be very, very clear that you’re being competitive in this non-competition. A cob loaf is a show-stopping power move and it’s less-than subtle.

So, when I’m confronted with a group chat full of offers to bring drinks and desserts, I gently assert myself with guacamole. 

Now, it’s just a dip, but if you do it right, you come off as a fancy and thoughtful but still rather laid back friend. And, again, I’m not saying that friendly barbecues are competitions, but you do come out as a winner if you can hit that trifecta. 

I’m very well aware guacamole is essentially mushed avocado and a recipe for it could be three-words long: “mush the avocado” but I’ve never been one to cut a long story short. And, to quote the scripture of Australian cinema, “it’s what you do with it”.

The first thing you want to do is get yourself a novelty serving dish. You want it to stand out from all the other offerings on the table. I recommend the most garish receptacle you can find at a second hand shop. I have this dish that’s shaped like a large avocado. The base and the lid are bumpy and dark green and it comes with a smooth, brown spoon that looks like the seed. It’s fabulous and Nigella Lawson has one just like it (something I never fail to mention each time I use it). It’s undoubtedly my best op-shop buy. 

Then you grab two ripe avocados. You can check for softness without destroying the avos for other customers by lightly pinching near the stem instead of squeezing/bruising the whole thing.. 

Mash up your avos in the skin by slicing them in half and scraping at the flesh with a fork. 

Scoop the gunge out of the shell and into your novelty holder. Some people say to use lemon to keep the avo from browning, but then everything tastes like lemon and, to paraphrase a young Hugh Grant, if you wanted lemon you’d just buy lemon. No, squeeze in the juice of a half a lime for zest, aesthetic and to feel like you’re doing something more than just mushing avocado. 

Then sprinkle in a pinch of salt, about the same amount of pepper and as much chilli flakes as you deem appropriate. I reckon maybe a teaspoon is enough, but I don’t really measure the amount; I just shake the jar until I’m mildly concerned about the heat. 

Then snip in one to two finely-chopped stalks of shallots/spring onions/scallions, depending on how comfortable you are with the barbecue guests to have onion breath around them. 

Mix until all the flecks are evenly distributed and, if you really want to impress, serve with fancy corn chips – the thick tortilla kind. 

Place on the table with a flourish to distract everyone as you snag yourself your fifth Tim Tam of the night.  

Originally published by the Clifton Courier, November 25, 2020

Yeah look, it’s been a while. I meant to only take a break for Christmas after posting this video:

..but I never got around to posting the video. Turns out I was super busy, but I can’t say exactly what I was busy doing. I will let you assume that’s because that’s because my activities are classified secrets, rather than because I simply lost control of my life for a while there. Anyway, all you need to know is that I’m back now.

I forgot to put the bins out last night. 

My housemates are away, meaning I’m the Woman of the House (which, I suppose, means I’m able to answer my phone with “lady of the house speaking” so that’s something I should embrace with gusto).

I’m responsible for closing the windows when it starts to rain. I’m responsible for fetching the mail. I’m responsible for cooking up elaborate schemes to protect my house from bungling robbers.

I’m also responsible for ensuring the household waste is collected. 

The kitchen tidy was full last night and I had made a mental note to take the rubbish down to the bin. 

* I was going to do something with a wheelie bin, but they are either very hard to draw or my brain is broken. So I drew a person with a bag of rubbish for a head instead. The t-shirt slogan is a reference to the Weasley twins shouting “that’s rubbish” in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, when they were barred from entering the TriWizard Tournament because they were underage. I just love that this was the response that seemed fitting of two rowdy 16-year-old boys who were expressing their deep displeasure at something.

But there’s more to putting the rubbish bag into the wheelie bin than just depositing a rubbish bag into a bin. 

The wheelie bin is kept underneath the house and under the house is unsealed. And most of the time that’s perfectly fine. We don’t hang out under there. We don’t hold dinner parties or do yoga under there or anything. We don’t need a fancy concrete slab. 

However, when you’ve already had your shower for the night and the only shoes you have by the door are thongs, you do find yourself longing for a slab of concrete. 

Because even though I’ve spent a great deal of my life in thongs, I haven’t yet masted the ability to not flick ground filth up at me while wearing them. Perhaps it’s something in my gait – I do have a distinct rhythm when it comes to thong wearing, with my signature combination of flicks and slaps being so individual my sister can recognise it across a crowded hardware store – or maybe I’m just wearing the wrong size thongs. 

But, whatever the reason, I find that I feel I need to wash my feet when I come in after taking out the rubbish. It’s very biblical of me. 

Plus, now that it’s getting warmer, there’s the very real threat of encountering cane toads after dark. 

I mean, I don’t care how wussy and squeamish it makes me sound, I don’t think anyone would want to risk potential exposure to a cane toad if they can help it.  There’s a lot many of us would disagree on but I think I can speak for all of humanity when I say: “cane toads are yucky”. They are universally unpleasant.

And when you’re wearing thongs, the risk of touching one with an unsuspecting foot is very high. 

So I went to bed, pledging that I would deal with the rubbish situation at first light. I even set my alarm nice and early on my day off.

But my alarm was not early enough. 

This morning my slumber was rudely disturbed by the screechy brakes, bin-grabbing hydraulics and tumbling of household refuse in the metal belly of the truck. I bolted out of bed, grabbed the rubbish bag and raced out the front in my bedclothes*. I wouldn’t say I was scantily clad, but I certainly wouldn’t wear that…outfit to work.

* I can’t remember what my bedclothes consisted of at the time, however, I think it’s safe to assume that I wasn’t wearing pants. Like, I get away with some pretty casual outfits at work, but even I have my standards. One has to draw the line somewhere, and I draw the line at the criminal definition of public indecency.

The garbage truck was on the other side of the road when I triumphantly landed the bin on the curb. I reasoned that, given the garbage truck woke me from across the road far up the street, you’d think I’d have woken if the truck had been getting to work right outside my window. Surely, it must not have been through on my side of the street. There might still be time. 

But then I felt the weight of the red-lidded bin my more punctual neighbours had placed out on the curb. It was unsettlingly light. It could have been empty. 

However, I held out hope. 

I made myself a cup of tea, put on some long pyjama pants and have been sitting out on the front veranda ever since, waiting for the garbage truck like a child waits for Santa’s sleigh on Christmas Eve.

But it’s been more than an hour now and there’s been no truck, only commuters walking past the house on their way to the train station.

So I think I’ll wait an hour or two before bringing the bin in. Not so much because I’m hopeful for redemption, but so there’s no one around to witness my walk of shame – wheeling a full garbage bin back into the yard.

The ultimate suburban humiliation.