Busy Tuesday
I went to the launch of a comedy festival today, to be held later this year on Cockatoo Island.
A festival that was “officially launched” by Kevin Rudd. Or more precisely the comedian Anthony Ackroyd who does a terrific impersonation of Kevin Rudd. He arrived in his local “campaign vehicle”, a white ute, a reference that probably means little to anyone who reads this blog from overseas. It was bloody funny.
As part of the festival launch, we were also taken on a brief tour of Cockatoo Island which, oddly enough, I’ve never been to before.
I’ve been to Fort Denison. I’ve been to Goat Island. But oddly enough, I’ve never been to Cockatoo Island.
And what a pleasure it was. The island remains largely undeveloped, though there were quite a few tourists wandering around. Essentially though you might imagine that, with the exception of an absence of workers, the island probably hasn’t changed that much from the time when it was a regularly working shipyard.
After wandering around, we headed back to the city.
At one point I sent Damien a text asking, rhetorically, if there was anything better than catching a ferry around Sydney Harbour, as it was such a beautiful day outside on the water.
My fellow travellers on the ferry didn’t seem to enjoy the level of excitement I did though about the outdoors trip. While I was outside for both ends of the ferry trip, pretending I was Kate Winslet in Titanic, almost everyone else remained inside. It was a spectacularly beautiful day, and so I remain surprised more people didn’t get outside to enjoy the beauty of Sydney Harbour.
And then later, I caught up for dinner with a mate who is looking for some career advice.
As we enjoyed a simple meal at The Gourmet Viking, we chatted about life, the universe and everything, and job prospects, an issue which is also weighing fairly heavily on my mind at the moment.
On the way home I wandered briefly into work to pick up my house keys. For the second time in the last six months I managed to walk out of my office leaving the keys in the door. On both occasions I’ve put my jacket on, and then have been distracted by something which has taken me away from my office. I don’t think it’s middle-aged forgetfulness kicking in just yet, though you never know.