My favourite phrase to describe a particular type of rain is “gnat’s piss”. Although it’s a phrase mostly used to describe a weak alcoholic drink, it’s a phrase I’ve always associated with very light rain.
It was a phrase I also mostly associate with my one of my English teachers from high school who used it and shocked us all.
Unlike my hometown, Lismore, we generally don’t have “gnat’s piss” in Sydney. When it rains in Sydney, it’s usually torrential, and that’s what it was like in Sydney tonight when I came out of Swedish class.
We had, in fact, been talking about the weather tonight. “In Greenland they have many words for the different types of snow” our teacher told us, adding… “You have thick snow. Thin snow. Light snow. Heavy snow. Lots of words.”
She then went on to tell us that in Sweden they have lots of words for slippery and icy conditions because such conditions are quite common, apparently.
Perhaps as a result of the weather, quite a few people failed to turn up tonight. There was just two of us.
And it was a tough class, too, as we concentrated on some very difficult grammar exercises. I’d done the grammar homework for class as well as the written homework. In fact, I was never more prepared for class than I was tonight. But then we got into some very difficult grammar that was beyond me. It was like our teacher was speaking in a foreign language :)
On arriving home tonight I’ve switched on the television for a moment or two of relaxation.
I was impressed with my mastery of my new PVR which I’d managed to program well enough to capture Gruen Nation, though I obviously did something wrong and missed the new show by The Chaser.
I thought the Gruen Nation was really very interesting. A worthy addition to the analysis, I thought. Something which went a little deeper some some of the traditional analysis of election campaigns by offering an insight into the way in which political advertising is constructed.
I’m still waiting for The Chaser to turn up on iview, but hopefully that will be there before bedtime tonight.
Something which did turn up – unexpectedly – as I was surfing the net tonight is a new CD on the ABC Shop website. It’s a CD which celebrates the twentieth anniversary of the ABC Radio program, Speaking Out. It’s an Indigenous affairs program, and one which comes under my management.
Although we’ve yet to see a completed CD – still a few weeks away – I’ve seen the final artwork, and was lucky enough tonight to have a CD burn to listen in a proper sequence. And guess what? It’s bloody good. It’s really, very, very listenable. Love it.
Well, it could do with a bonus Sami track… but otherwise very good, and I’m very proud of it.
Great work Rhianna!
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