When I was younger I had a substantial lego collection. Years of buying an $18 box with three pieces of lego in it eventually tallied up and I had a bucket full. Imagine my delight when one day when I was in Kindergarten, a school lego contest was held.

I spent a long time deliberating over what I might build, but eventually settled on my final design, finishing my sculpture the night before the entries were due. I was so excited, and nursed my creation so carefully, protected by a plastic cake tray lid all the way to class the next day. First thing in the morning I took it straight to my classroom and left it there so I could go outside and play before the morning bell.

Class proceeded as usual, but I was mostly preoccupied by the thought of delivering my lego landscape to the competition. Eventually, just before recess, the teacher announced it was time for those of us with entries to take them to the Year One classroom, a few doors down in the same building. I was probably the only kid nerdy enough to do it, but I didn’t notice as I proudly took it down to the display area.

When I arrived at the door, I balanced it all in one hand while knocking with the other. The teacher recognised what I was carrying and beakoned me to enter and show the class my masterpiece. I was so proud and nervous that it seemed I had gotten my show caught on the carpet lip at the doorway as I speedily entered. The jolt of the lip pulling my leg back made me loose a grip and suddenly, as if in slow-motion and with lightening speed all at once, my green lego canvas dismounted its cake lid mid air, spun and fell to the floor with an almighty crash, sending blocks of lego shooting across the heads of two dozen six-year olds.

I fell to the ground in a bundle. I couldn’t see my corpse through the tears streaming down my face, and couldn’t take in my surroundings through my wailing. The hoarde of six-year olds, fascinated by my agony, leapt from their grouped tables and clustered around me, trying to get a glimpse of my reddened face. The teacher also leapt, springing into disaster recovery mode. She flung her arms wide as she strained “Give him air! Give him air! Can’t you see his dreams have been smashed!”

A few of the kids retrieved my flung debris as the teacher knelt by me and assisted me up. “C’mon now, we’ll fix it up.”

This statement, and it’s inability to comprehend the complexity of my plastic prison design scarred me like an insult of a grieved lover. With that statement, the final straw, I flung the pieces of lego I had picked up back at the ground and stormed out the door.

They say children can be cruel, but childhood is the cruelest of them all.

It’s time to pop into the time machine and travel back three years to see what my 18th Birthday was like. Well, sorta. It fell on the day my Economics HSC exam (murder, anyone?) but Becky was gracious enough to bake me a magnificent brownie cake. Yes, a giant slab of brownie. It was sensational. Well, the little I got to eat of it.

Becky had even planted my face on the top of the cake with icing sugar, but that wasn’t enough to stop Laura from plowing into it the second I had my back turned. Lucy, cropped from the right of the photo below, also tested it for poison before I got to it. As you can see above, there was already a large chunk missing around the top and right of the cake.

Being our last HSC exam, Carla and I had a box each of textbooks to return to the school. We were walking around the school, the cake atop my pile, handing the textbooks back and saying goodbye, when I turned a corner, tripped a little and sent the cake catapulting into the air only to land face down (literally) onto a rusty drain grill. Carla and I looked at each other with crazed desperation as if we were facing a grim murder scene (and we could well have). We both knew instantly what had to be done as we crazily stomped the rest of the cake through the grill, disposing of the evidence, vowing never to speak of it again for our own safety and protection from Becky.

Years later I confessed to Becky the fate of that cake, cowering from her verbal and no doubt physical abuse. Instead she said, “Oh, if I had known, I would have made you another one!” I guess sometimes you never know how someone is going to react!

In response to The Other Andrew’s photo and blog post, here is why you should not take a camera into the bathroom.

From 2003, taken in some random toilets in the Star City casino complex. If I may redeem myself just quickly, I had been running through the city for about 40 minutes (maybe it was more) in absolutely pounding rain. When we reached the casino complex, we somehow managed to gain entrance to one of the theatre foyers (which was deserted), and found the toilets to quickly dry off. My camera survived the rain (unfortunately, it seems) and so too did my evening.

In order to take a little break from my essay, which is shameful considering I’ve only written a tiny portion of it, I decided to journey back through my life. All the way back to 2003, when I got a digital camera. Now that Flickr wants me to pay again for their service, I’ve decided I’ll do a few photographic series presenting a series of images that are no longer available on my Flickr account, and talk a little about them. It’s also a way of talking myself into buying a new camera.

For my first series I though I’d talk about the annual christmas carols event I used to participate in.

I sang in the choir for about 4 or 5 years before the plug was pulled last year when no major sponsors came to the plate. While I was there, it grew from a choir of about 12 or 15 people to a large massed choir of over 50 singers. The last time it was held almost none of the original choir members remained (I think it was me, Greg and another guy, male wise) due to a new “Everyone Auditions” policy. When they didn’t get the guys they needed, I said I’d join in.

It hit it’s peak in about 2003, choir wise (the actual last event in 2004 had giant video messages and even B+ grade stars!). 2004 was a bit of a chore as the rest of the old men in the choir weren’t good musicians and did the choir detriment. 2003 was our best year, full of strong singers, and all funny and nice people. Even these two, Greg and Adam.

There weren’t many perks to the job. We didn’t get paid, didn’t get real seats to sit on, and we would spend extremely long rehearsal days getting toasted under the stage lights and intense December heat. It never failed to get me into the Christmas cheer singing all the carols. It really brought out the childlike joy in me every year, and it was always exciting to hit the stage to spend three hours in front of a huge crowd of families. We did, however, get to meet a few of the ’special guests’. I have no idea who these two are, but everyone was getting photos with them, so Greg and I thought why not!

Everyone knows who this fellow is.

I miss the Carols and the spirit everyone was in when working on them. I hope that some day they return, and maybe even have a bit of a “revival choir cast”.