A Recap of My Desk Calender May – June: Birthday, Billie Eilish & More

First thing’s first, I don’t have a desk – so don’t let the title mislead you or anything. I do, however, have a treasured desk calendar – one of those little ones that stand up. It lives on top of my bedhead. It keeps my life together. It is a deep and sincere joy for me. When someone asks me when I am free, I tell them that when I’m home, I’ll consult my calender. She helps me remember things. She gives me something to look forward to. You get it, she’s the boss. All hail the desk calender.

Note: If you’re a Google Calender person, fair enough, but it’s NOT the same thing. I respect you, but I do not agree with you.

I recently flipped over this desk calendar of mine to June. As I took the month of May between my fingers and gently tossed it aback, my poor desk calender sighed in relief. May was a hefty one. All 31 boxes had a task, a job or a due date on it. That said, I have amazed myself with how much I can do in a month. 3 weeks ago feels like 3 months ago. I had handed everything in, and June was looking slow and peaceful. And I can take this time now to engage in one of my favourite pastimes – reviewing. So, below you will find a brief review of any notable days in May & June. I cut out the days where I was just working or studying, to save us both some time and boredom. Feel free to trickle through, take what interests you and dismiss the rest! Thanks, bye.

Note 2: I started writing this at the beginning of June. As it does, time flew by, so although this is May-focused, it has some June stuff in it. Hope you understand.

Days in May, Chronologically

May 3 – My Birthday

I had a really nice chill 23rd birthday. I got to spend basically the whole day with my girlfriend and friends. Snake and I had a tasty breakfast. The coffee guy tried to make a 23 out of chocolate powder. We had some variation of Vietnamese soup for lunch with a friend, and then we went home and more friends came around to watch Clueless. Clueless was as good as it has been every other year. Everyone was really cute with their presents. My favourite was a gift from my incredibly cool and artistic best friend Taylor -she drew me and it’s incredible. She got the shading in my arms scarily correct, and the colours are delicious.

May 10 – Little Trip to the Highlands

One fine day in May, Snake took me to the land of her youth, Moss Vale. She showed me different things and places and we hung out with her family a bit. I considered deducting a star because we drove up Maquarie Pass to get there, and that freaks me out – but Snake is a wonderful driver and we survived, so no harm done. Plus, Snake’s auntie made a great big sandwich and offered me wine before we left, so the trip down Maquarie Pass was significantly more fun. The highlight of this day for me is a really cool old car in a garage.

May 11 – Comic Gong

To finish my interning hours with The Illawarra Flame, we went along to capture Comic Gong. Comic Gong isn’t something that I’d attend on my own accord. Respectfully, I’d rather do anything else before watching a Marvel movie or anything of the sort. It was a very rainy day, and the event takes place between multiple buildings in Wollongong CBD, so some points are deducted for our troubles. However, Snake and I always manage to have fun regardless of the activity, and we had many laughs. I also like some pictures I took that day, and we had some funny conversations with the randoms in attendance.

May 14 – Teaching at TAFE

I have yapped about this extensively and have already written a post about it – because it was very fun and exciting to me. It was a really beautiful day; the sun was shining; the people were fun, and the experience was delightful. I have deducted 0.1 star because I regretfully left my laptop at the TAFE at the end of the day, and had to go back to retrieve it.

May 17 – Journo Lunch, American Psycho story due, Billie Eilish Album!

On this day, The Illawarra Flame officially concluded my internship and offered me freelance work in the future. So far, it has been fun and I would have been sad to stop working for The Flame, so I am glad for this. I met my internship supervisor and editor of The Flame at Mt Kembla pub, before being joined by a handful of older & wiser local journalists from different publications. The pub meal was huge and delicious, the pub was cute, and people said nice things about my work. While I was waiting in the car, I finished listening to Billie Eilish’s new album, which had come out that morning. Needless to say, I loved it. Along with this, my calender notified me I had a story due for The Flame – about a production being shown in Wollongong. This story tickled me greatly, as it was American Psycho… the musical. I didn’t see the show but I’m sure it was great, and hilarious.

May 18 – Women Illawarra Fundraiser

I had the pleasure of capturing Women Illawarra’s annual fundraiser again this year. The theme was great, and I adored the decorations. It was different to last year, as I’ve grown as a photographer, the lighting was beautiful and I’ve developed a hearty friendship with my workmates at Women Illawarra over the last year and a half. We had a lot of fun with a 360 camera, that Snake nicknamed “The Glam-bot’s cousin”. I deducted a star because of a tummy ache I had on this day.

May 20 – Assignments Due

Not all of my university assignments were due on this day, but I am going to talk about them as if they were – for summary reasons. There are 3, one for each of my subjects. My photography assignment involved a series of 4 images I shot in Port Kembla. I am fairly proud of them, as a visually cohesive set, and I was very excited to have them printed and tangible. My visual design project involved putting together a little booklet, including a collage that I had a lot of fun making. Again, creating a physical thing that I can pick up and look at made me giddy. The third was a portfolio and reflective essay about my journalism internship. I deducted stars as all of this caused a bit of stress – but I am happy with what I’ve done and excited to finish my degrees next semester.

May 23 – Launch of Dreaming Inside – 12th Edition

One Thursday night, I was sent to photograph the Launch of Dreaming Inside’s 12th edition. Dreaming Inside is an incredible project led by Aunty Barb Nicholson, which involves publishing the written works of Aboriginal inmates at Junee Correctional Centre. It was a moving night, with multiple speakers from the community and beautiful art up for auction. I like the photos that I took that night and it meant a lot to me to be witness to the conversations had there. I bought a copy of the book on my way out, and it might well be the best read of my life.

May 25 – STARS of Nowra

2/5 Stars

Cancer Council had me photograph the STARS of Nowra Dance for Cancer event. It was a great night, in terms of performance, and it was for a great cause. Cancer Council even provided me with a dressing room and gifted wine as a thank you. I have deducted points for a few rather mild reasons. First, my girlfriend, who kindly drove us both to Nowra, wasn’t permitted back stage, and regretfully had to hang around for about an hour before doors officially opened and we could be reunited. Second, some minor lighting issues challenged me. Third, we got home rather late after the event and I had to go to work early the next morning. And finally, I had left myself with almost 2000 photos to pick through and edit, which took weeks admittedly.

May 31 – [Redacted] Art Exhibition

This night, I attended an exhibition. Generally, I enjoy such an outing. People at art events tend to have interesting conversations and, in my experience, art folk are friendly. This night, however, was full of bland conversation at best… rude and unseemly behaviour at worst. I found myself crying on the drive home and the whole situation left me feeling confused and frustrated. Perhaps I was in some sort of mood that day. Perhaps I am intolerant of people in a higher tax bracket to mine. I have granted this night a single star, because I am an optimist.

Days in June, so far

June 7 – Middle Kids at Enmore Theatre

Many moons ago, I was walking to Women Illawarra listening to Middle Kids, and messaged Sinead to express my love for the band’s music. The angel got us tickets to see them shortly afterwards. It was a really fun night. There were confetti canons, and great merchandise. We had a nice dinner before the show and missed the first train home afterwards. We stuck around until the next one and wandered around the nearby venues. I loved it, hence the stars.

June 19 – Rising Up Film Screening

We went along to this event at UOW Science Space, and it was unexpectedly moving for me. Which is to say, I really want to take part in a beach clean-up and I picked up a piece of rubbish on the street the other day. Points are only deducted because it was cold.

June 21 – Winter Wonder Women’s Solstice Swim

The other night, we went along on a Flame job to photograph and interview women who are part of a winter swimming group in Austinmer. Somewhat unexpectedly, we had a great deal of fun. The women in that group exuded a lot of energy, and we had such a great time talking to them, drinking with them, and they quickly convinced us to get into the ocean pool, despite the cold of the night. I like the photos, but I deducted a single star because our clothes got wet and cold.

Also – we hit post #300…

The other day, my WordPress articles ticked over to number 300. It has since ticked on past this milestone. 300 posts is a crazy number to reach – and in recognition, I present you with my top 3 favourite posts on this blog site, in no particular order.