Well, it’s been another one of those weeks. You know the one: The one where you walk out the front door and a bird craps on your jacket. So you go inside, get changed, check for collateral damage, head back out into the thick of it and the little bastard craps on your head. Yeah, that one. It was also the one where you’re desperately groping around in the dark for the exit because some comedian thought it’d be funny to switch off the exit sign. But nobody’s laughing!

Yeah, so I’ve been sick and I’ve been miserable. But it’s a new week, the exit has miraculously appeared and I’m moving onward and upward. Enough about that though, let’s reflect a little on last week’s adventures instead.

Top of the list was my trip to The Art Gallery of NSW for another black and white Japanese flick. This time, it was Akira Kurosawa’s Throne of Blood. Now, with a name like Throne of Blood, you’d expect something akin to the wonderful Game of Thrones. Sure, there were supernatural elements, there were sword fights and powerful warriors. But I couldn’t get over the feeling of the uncanny when Toshiro Mifune graced the screen. Could Mifune be the long lost Japanese ancestor of Deadwood’s Al Swearengen?

Throne of Blood is a reworking of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, which in itself is nothing to feel uncomfortable about. But seeing “Swearengen” in a samurai suit was absolutely off-putting. I kept expecting to hear filthy expletives flying from Mifune’s mouth. But there were no cocksuckers. No whores. No pissing or farting or demands to know who cut the cheese. Not from the actors, anyway.

Calamity Jane wasn’t there to save the day or protect me from the dirty animal sitting in the seat behind me, who burped his way through the entire film. His belching was so bad, I was seriously concerned he was going to vomit all over the back of my head. It was a truly terrifying experience! And to top it all off this supernatural Shakespearean Deadwood samurai tale ended with a Tolkien-inspired Ent attack. Seriously, what was Kurosawa thinking?! It was too much for me to handle, so I raced off into the night, my (thankfully) vomit-free hair flapping in the wind, and made the ferry home with seconds to spare.

But I can’t complain. An adventure is an adventure. As the wise Bill Shakespeare once said:

 There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.

And my thoughts on the rest rest of the week are pretty good. There was a trip to Chatswood to overindulge in Yum Cha with my wonderfully funny and highly decorated brother, Matt and his beautiful and forgiving (when it comes to chocolate thievery) bride-to-be, Lan; a healthy dose of multi-tasking as I did the Spit to Manly walk-and-talk (and brunch) with the delightful Sarah; a fabulous farewell to Cambodia-bound Ronan over a much enjoyed mulled wine. And I even had a small lottery win!

So there you go, proof that when life looks tough and you feel stuck in the mud, if you get off your butt and get back on the horse, there’s always another sunset to ride off into.