This is one of the story’s that Rod especially would have me tell often and it does work best when i can act it out for you but it has to make a blog entrance. I used to work for a beautiful organic luxury skin care brand and at the time was the state promotions and trainer for QLD which meant on some weeks i would be driving 2 hours up the coast, then doing back to back facial treatments in beauty salons and spas from 9-5 then driving 2 hours home to do it all the next day. The product and facial was a beautiful treatment very much base on aromatherapy so the treatments were highly relaxing and half way through the facial there was a face and decolatage massage i performed. Now Looose Dolly on this certain day had been out with Rod the previous night at some television launch – so naturally we HAD to go and mingle and i remember there was a lot of alcohol that night, and we stumbled into bed at 5am only for me to have to get up an hour later to drive the 2 hours up the coast and do facials all day. Now in the facial rooms the lights are dimmed, there is oil burners going and enya (WHY did EVERY salon have to play enya!) playing on the cd player. Now this particular customer was about halfway through my day. I was just starting the massage section and as you can imagine was struggling big time, exhausted, & feeling utterly hung over, so knowing the customers would always close their eyes to enjoy the deep relaxation of the massage, i too thought that i would just close my eyes cause the felt like they were going to pop out of my head at any point. SO there i was eyes closed, massaging this lady, lights down low, enya singing “sail away, sail away” and without me realising i nodded of to sleep but the downward gravity of my head ended up CRACKING this lady for head to for head during the most relaxing t ime of her facial. I immediately snapped out of it and without thinking (but still the whole time keeping my hands massaging the lady as i had been) just sat up as normal and smiled at the lady as if it was all part of the facial massage process. At my non reaction she closed her eyes bewildered and i continued on. We cracked foreheads cause i fell asleep on her and i tried to play it off as a shiatsu move! LOL. THe funniest thing is the lady rebooked again with me 6 weeks later and when i came to do her facial that day i had smack her forehead with the palm of my hand this time to try to ‘re-enact the same massage technique used the previous booking. I wish i could act this one out for you cause it better with a demonstration but there you go! The pics i posted were from many facial days at the mint minge motor inn – this one of me and rod doing ballet moves while in our mud masks is hilarious, plus one of me when i was at the farm where we made the skin care products – sorry no pics of me smacking customers in the head! Cheers for now! LD
Author Archives: loosedolly
Loose Dolly B’day of Islands and Apples
So Ive been busy the last week, but wanting to write a blog today, and flicking through the Loose Dolly photo’s – which then inspires my blog for that day – my eye caught the few photo’s i have of one of my Birthday’s – I would guess at this being my 24th birthday in 2004. It is even more special to me now, as one of my friends is not with us any more from this day. Apples (that’s his name!) was some expert in the Australian special forces, but to me he was simply the craziest man i had ever met . When i first met him he immediately tried to put on a puppetry of the penis show (nothing sexual between us, this was in front of quite a few people!!!) and then tried to make a deal with me to touch ‘it’ but i could wear oven mitts…..Or was always coming to me with an idea for a gravitational experiment we could do…on my boobs…..Or we would go and climb trees and suddenly he had decided to do this naked, in the front yard in Suburbia….He never got anywhere but was a character that was larger than life and tried shock you from the moment you met him. Naturally Loose Dolly wouldn’t blink and eye and come up with witty responses, and try to out ‘shock’ him back. Anyhow – this birthday i remember Apples flew down especially from Townsville and i remember thinking i had only met him 2-3 times but i was so touched that he went to so much effort to celebrate my birthday. All i remember o the Saturday night going out session was that we went to Monistary night club (not a place o worship LOL) and it was messy. We ended up back at Rodney’s as usual on the Sunday and some random who had found his way back to the house was suggesting we all go to this Island where we could have our own private beach – now this meant a lot of people to organise, pack, drive, ferry and walk which i don’t think has ever been attempted on a Sunday like this but it was one of those days where it just happened – and my friends who hadn’t been out the night before would call and see what was up and would decide to come too. I can’t remember now if the Island was Coochimudlo or Russell island, but it was the most wonderful relaxing afternoon with close friends. That night – ever on a quest to outlast the other, i decided to put on The Muppets movie. it was then when Apples turned to me and said ‘please take this movie off, the Muppets are freaking me out!’, and i celebrated having outlasted this hard to beat fella. Sadly last year Apple’s died tragically in Afghanistan in the helicopter accident – it was major news here and his face was splashed all over the news and papers for days. Somewhere i hope he is relaxing on that beach and staying away from the Muppets. Love this birthday – it is one of the only ones that really stands out to me as with my birthday 12 days before Xmas and working in retail i choose not to really celebrate them now, but im glad i had this one.
The Mint Minge Motor Inn… my place
The Mint Minge Motor Inn – was on the richest street in Brisbane but in the worst house! This place came about when i had my 3 weeks off over xmas and had to move in that time – well that was the Byron Bay, Heath’s wedding, Summerfield days, etc and before you know it i was down to the last day of business before going back to work after the weekend and hadn’t even thought of moving. This all hit me as we were having a great little gathering at Rod’s Yellow Banyo house and i started to panic – well the crew who were there that day all just rallied around and we had someone on realestate.com looking and this was the first one we saw. We decide to go and see it right there and then, all 6 or 7 of us! We arrive and the agent is showing all 6-7 of us the place, we decide its perfect, drove to my mums to get the necessary documents, applied for the place and were back at Rod’s in a matter of only a few hours to continue partying as we were earlier. I lived here by myself and loved it – it was painted bright green, had the smallest kitchen that was fire engine red and carpet, yes carpet in the bathroom. Someone once said to me it was like what the imagine a motel room that Marilyn Monroe OD’d and died at, to look like. What was funny is that so many people would squeeze into my tiny 1 bedroom place (you can see in some pics everyone was quite happy to jam into doorways even) . This place along with the Yellow Banyo House was where Loose Dolly will always remember and feel most at home. I’ve posted these pics cause you can see the detail in the room in the back grounds.
The Yellow Banyo House …
I have so many memories that are from the Yellow Banyo house that was Rodney’s that i decided i needed to write about our places in general. HIs place – THE YELLOW BANYO FIBRO – I had helped him move into the yellow place from what we used to call the big house.. the big house was on the opposite side of the street and twice as big. When Rod sold the big house we decided to just move everything over the road by hand and not pack anything. 3 very rainy days later we were still going – Rod always says i proved my friendship that day and since has never asked for help moving house. This house was just beautiful and pretty – yellow paint, white on features and beautiful fuchsia creeping flora that could cover the house. We constantly changed his furniture around – bucket seats in the lounge room and all dark and ‘royal’ theme, or white leather couch and pink shag pile rug…. it was always changing in the lounge room. His kitchen there though would probably be, if i could call anything, my ‘safe’ place. Big table almost filling the room, his cabinet filled with some expensive blue and white crockery behind us, the 2 doves on the wall, the pink weird light, the bowl of heaps of coins – and just conversations and cups of tea…..Bliss! I had my own room here and always felt home in my bed there, Rod’s bed was brilliant though – he has a church pew as his bed head which is just fabulous.
Our Greatest achievement in this house was the Fruit and Veggie garden that took over half of Rod’s back yard – im devestated i dont have any pictures besides the one where you can see the start of the garden behind me and a friend in our bikinis. We had every kind of fruit and veggie you can think of growing at some point – we decided the first thing you would have to walk through was ‘corn as high as an elephants eye’ and when the corn grew to this high it was just so so cool. We used to put any randoms who had slept over after a big night out get up, get into the smallest shorts we could find them and get them to toil the earth! Many a blow up pool and hay bails were bought in next to the veggie patch in long hot summer sundays to be loose in the sun – i distinctly remember a bunch of us in the blow up pool doing a ‘Summer rain’ rendition – great times here.
Loose Dolly costumes and characters
I always knew I would make sure I captured some of the costumes or looks that Loose Dolly went out in every night the highlight has been my dear friend Diana the naughty giraffe finding an old photo of the two of us at a friends party – Loose Dolly dressed as Marilyn Monroe in white dress just looking for a subway airflow , and her as Audrey Hepburn doing breakfast at Tiffany’s. As usual we were the hit of the event, went out to Monastery (we stood out … fabulously) but why need an event to dress up and look different from everyone else – it always had a lot of people wanting to talk about why in costume, and it generally said to the other social sheep who just follow each other that im proud to be more fun than you! This carried on into more than just going out and on many a random morning I could become a character or have a style whipped up from random pieces of stuff and things around the house – now watching people’s reaction to this was also priceless as some were just not sure how to take it – other times everyone went with it and wanted to be in costume! The all time favorite that I wore out many a night was the naughty detention outfit – when I met Chris he claimed he knew me by sight from that outfit! There is army girl, marching girl, and a day I thought I was Steve Erwin wife, 80’s themes, Paris and Nicky Hilton, Rods in velvet blue jacket and cowboy hat (this was the costume for when we would sing Quando Quando Quando) Beatrice bush rise to fame in the same white Marilyn dress…. Sumo suits that didn’t survive long, and Chuggington in a Mumu. He will kill me….. with a pen! What amazes me is i hardly spent any money on clothes – the white skirt from the naughty detention was something Rod and i just cut one night, everything cost me next to nothing (except those fabulous red velvet peeptoe bow shoes – and they were so comfy!) There are to many funny photo’s for me to go into them all but all will come up again later when i get to individual memories.
Power to the Hair and make up team
So on working out where to start with this jumble of memories, and looking through my pics, the Hair and Make up team ( Rod and I respectively) were, and still are, the most powerful team anyone in fame, public notary or just anyone with an innate sense of fabulousness, needs to appreciate. The power of presentation – on how the world see’s your face whether or not your outfit is understated or glamourous…..So basically don’t under pay us, bring any diva attitudes and kiss my feet and praise my talent when ive completed the artistry on your face and hair style. Rod and I used to drive our friends insane – part of the whole going out process was to spend hours, and I mean hours getting ready. We would constantly do facials, manicure, steam baths, hair treatments and would gladly not leave to go out some nights until 2am in the morning having started getting ready in the afternoon. Rodney was amazing with his hairdressing skills and what he could find arround the house to pin-up, slick back or make hold on crazy hair styles – sometimes just held together with a paper clip. There was no rush, the process of him and I doing ‘beauty’ while drinking tea from his blue and white china tea set left us not only looking great, feeling relaxed, and by the time we would make a grand entrance to the clubs, well, everyone else would be sweaty, with mascara running, hair frizzing and no matter how gorgeous they may have been, were never looking as fresh as we did. It just further created this Loose Dolly entrance every night with new make up and hair styles (I wont go into costumes yet!) that meant we had the crowd’s attention. I was make up – and Rod was hair – and he could make me look different every night. When a girl has great hair you can see why Loose Dolly started to take over….God i miss my long blonde hair looking at these pics, and living with a highly talented hair stylist
Presenting Loose Dolly
Loose Dolly to many will just seem like a typical tale of a young person reminiscing on being young, and fun and fabulous. But Loose Dolly to me is so much more – she is my favorite part of me, the side of me that will always be laughing too loudly, having way too much fun, brimming with confidence and worrying about how she would pay the rent when she would need too on Tuesday – but for those moments – I truly lived life. She became part of me when I was working in a huge sales and management role that I never even believed I could do until my dearest friend Rod, gave me the confidence and understanding of who I was and that I could do this. He made me realise that I didn’t need to change who and what I wanted to do and be when I wasn’t working and in fact, I didn’t have to explain or give myself excuses to anyone because it was none of their business and I could keep my work and personal lives completely separate. It was part of the thrill being larger than life, generally in costume doing random things, that to others were out of their comfort zones but to me was just fun – and watching society assume who you are based on your outward showing of having fun. When they would then discover my job, what I did and how many teams I looked after, how successful I was so young, people naturally have a different approach to you. To me that was the greatest costume I ever wore – not the clothing I was wearing, watching how people react when they realise your actually fun on purpose and unashamed and as much as my name is Loose Dolly it’s not cause im a bimbo airhead. I have no idea if anyone will ever read this blog – I just started it because I have so many stories that immediately warm my heart, make me laugh and are the so cherished in my world that I wanted to be able to write them somewhere and reminisce before I forget about them forever.
loosedolly 