Great Snakes!

Snakes alive, Snowy, the snakes are alive!* And ready to party with the best of them. Little yellow signs have cropped up in the flowerbeds, bearing the fearsome slogan: SNAKES SIGHTED. As it stands, no snakes have been sighted by me – rumours of a brown snake sunbathing on the steps outside the bike shed have been chased away by my deliberately loud footsteps every time I ride to uni. A fearsome hissing from ground level sent us running indoors when we attempted to study on the balcony, but who knows what that actually was. Probably just an Australian taking a low blow at the weird internationals. But it’s not just snakes who have started to get friendly. Bluetongue lizards roam the corridors unchecked and spiders attempt to scratch their way through our window frames.

Not getting bitten, eaten or killed is fairly easy, though, as it’s all about mutual respect. Snakes are cool. They’re just doing their thing – whether that thing is slithering around the short grass of the memorial garden or setting up camp in the laundry room, which happened last year. Same with sharks. I for one am a big snake rights advocate. Just so long as they don’t come too near me.

In other news, classes have finished, and my time at Unimelb is almost at its end. Last night I drank wine from a mug on the balcony and perched on the fence at the viewing platform over the Merri Creek, the city a warm shadow on an orange sky. The heat broke at around two and I woke at seven to thunder and lightning. I lay on a park bench in the hammering rain and let the downpour drench me.

*That’s a Tintin reference, for the uninitiated reader.

On our first day of enrolment at Unimelb, Sarah, Louis, and I captured the rather marvellous self-portrait you may admire below. Look at us: young, fresh-faced, and innocent, toothy grins hardly masking the trepidation boiling in the pits of our stomachs. We were the newbies, thrown together by chance, Yarra House, and the 546 bus. We were as unknown to each other as the coming months.

Fast forward twelve weeks and here we are again, quite unintentionally, bright red and beaming at the end of semester ball. The photos from early evening were much more elegant, but this diptych is all about realism. The night gradually unravelled into rakish chaos, much like the bow tie of a certain wildly dancing Flo Rida fan. Gone are the newbie nerves, and with them any vestige of coolness which, like a faerie glamour, might once have persuaded me that these two were anything less than the wonderful weirdoes they truly are.

And these pictures, dear reader, sum it all up quite nicely.

Bumper pack tonight, kids. But watch out. This week we have five swears and one potentially R-rated bedroom.

-

 “Why won’t you let us into your bedroom? What are you hiding? Is it a mail order bride? Or a guinea pig?”

“No, Miriam, Justin Bieber’s not a social construct. He’s just a fucking prick.”

 “Cute sweater vest!” “Thanks. Classes may be finished, but style never goes on vacation.”

"Where the fuck is the fucking bus? Shit, why do I always swear? Shit."

"I'm going to wear my deadlines as my Hallowe'en costume. Because they bloody scare me."