There’s barely four hours of sleep in me, but what a night! We had a bit of a gay pub crawl around the city and ended up crawling home at 4am.
I’ve always marvelled at the uniqueness of the “back room” concept at gay bars. Really, it’s just ticking the last missing box for the reasons most people go out – to pick up and cop off. When you take a step back, it’s completely bizarre; and I’m having trouble imagining this concept at non-gay bars (although it would be hilarious). Club Retro in Melbourne is one notable exception, although it’s a venue I am slightly too terrified to step foot in again – they have these creepy lockable cubicles with suspicious shuffling noises usually resonating from behind them.
Things have been quiet on here of late – I’ve been busy tying up work for the year, and have also been sorting out some volunteer work for 2009. This was something I’d been meaning to do for some time during 2008 but never got my act together. There’s an an element of counselling to this work, so I’ve got to complete some courses before I can begin, but am ready to get my teeth stuck into things. My only fear is that I won’t know how to handle some of the more confronting cases.
For this reason, I’m starting to think it would be nice to have a Semi-Concerning Problems Hotline for me to practice with. Kinda like Lifeline running at 25% power, or an enhanced version of the Omo Stain Removal Hotline. Solving problems like “how can I get my son to eat his crusts?”, “why does Internet Explorer keep crashing?”, “how can I stop my elderly neighbour hissing at me in spite?”, and “why won’t the cat stop vomiting?”.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Bollocks to the “semi-concerning” bit, I say peddle to the metal, foot to the floor:
Dear Jeb,
I’m worried about the future. Can you suggest three ways that will ensure that 2009 is a better year than 2008 was for me.
Bearing in mind that 1 = a really bad year, and 10 = an excellent year, 2008 has been a five for me. In an ideal world I’d like to turn it up to eleven.
I await your reply eagerly.
I know this was a while ago, but how did it all work out? Did you end up helping the people out good? Was it a helpline or a face to face thing. I’ve often wondered how i could help others, maybe by being someone on the other end of the phone who can just connect with someone and be a support for them.
It was a helpline, and to be honest, it ended kinda badly… the training was incredibly full on and dealt with some nasty and uncomfortable topics. It ended up being more than I could deal with, it just left me feeling depressed and shitty every week.
I felt bad for bailing on a charity like that, but I’m donating to them instead, so it’s something. Muchos respect to anyone can do this kind of work, it’s really challenging.