It was 10 AM and four suited figures had gathered in the centre of a derelict site. An exchange of weapons, drugs and cash could have easily taken place.

“This is it,” observed Ian. “This, here, is all contaminated.” I looked around at the twisted trees, uneven land and piles of illegally dumped construction debris.

“There’s asbestos scattered all over the surface,” Paul said. “Some of it might even be buried underneath.”

“What does it look like?” I asked.

“Greyish. Flat. About half a centimetre thick.” Nuno picked up a piece of masonite. “Like this but with tufts of white fibre at the edge. The fibre is the asbestos. If you bend it over, it’ll stay bent. As long as the fibres are bunched, then it’s fairly low risk. You’re in trouble if the fibres are free — that’s when you can breathe it in.”

“Here’s a piece!” Paul called from atop a grassed mound. He brought it over to show me. “The problem is if we leave it here and there’s a dry summer, then the sheeting will dessicate and crumble, releasing the fibres.”

“There’s a primary school there,” Ian pointed south. “A skate park to the north. A school for disabled kids to the east. You can imagine the kind of press that will get.”

We wandered around the site and soon Ian, Nuno and Paul had each found at least three pieces of asbestos.

“Joan,” Paul warned. “We’re not leaving until we all find some asbestos.” The other two grinned at me.

“That’s not fair!” I said. “I haven’t developed my asbestos eyes yet.” But I took the challenge with good humour.

I focused on the ground for another five minutes as the three men discussed the remediation plan.

“I found a piece!” I shouted triumphantly. Proudly, I held it up between my fingers.

“That’s it,” Nuno agreed. “Congratulations!”

“I’m part of the now club, right?” I said. “This bit of asbestos is my membership card. I can put it in my wallet and wave it in front of all my friends!”

Our group of trained Occupational Health, Safety and Environment professionals all started giggling madly.

I was attending a training seminar at a rival consulting company’s offices. They have a lovely view of the Yarra River. It was morning tea time, so we all grabbed our cups of coffee, a biscuit, and then wandered over to the floor-to-ceiling windows to admire the view.

People were strolling along the river bank, pushing prams, skating, sitting on the grass. I noticed a couple standing in a sheltered corner. The two tiny figures looked about two metres apart. He was gesticulating madly. She looked tense, with arms folded. She pointed accusingly. He stepped back a little.

I looked across. There was a row of about ten of us leaning into the window, clutching our coffees and looking interestedly at this fight unfolding before us.

“Gee, they’re working themselves into a frenzy,” someone commented.

The female figure flung her arms up and brushed past her companion. She walked quickly away. The male was rooted to the spot then followed slowly.

“Oooooh…” we all murmured.

She must have relented because she slowed down and he caught up. They continued walking separately, yet together.

“Well,” our teacher finally said when the couple disappeared into the distance. “That was fun but it’s back to work now.”

“Joan, I feel sorry for some of my electrical eng friends, you know.” Meng shakes his head.

“Why, Meng?”

“Well, some of them went from boys high schools straight into electrical engineering — and it’s like going into another boys school. I’m all right because I do psychology as well but a lot of my friends are really scared of girls! Like, when a girl comes up and asks for help with a problem, they’d get all confused and shy.”

“That’s no good, Meng. They should join dancesport.”

“Nah, they’re not sociable, like me. Because I do psychology and all, they like to ask me for help. Have you heard of the Wingman Theory?”

“No…”

“In first year, one of my friends really liked a girl but it was hard for him to talk to her because she was always surrounded by a gaggle of her girlfriends. So we electrical engineers coordinated a campaign to give him a chance. We planned it! We had a briefing and we modelled our strategy using toy cars. The target girl was a Ferrari, her best friend was the Volkswagon…”

“Hahaha, really?? What happened?”

“Well, we were the Wingmen, you know? As the group of girls walked into the lecture theatre, we swooped. We all took a girl each and drew them away from the target girl, so she ended up walking into the theatre by herself. My friend finally got to talk to her.”

“Heehee! That’s crazy!”

“Yeah, yeah. We had one of the guys positioned at the top of the lecture theatre to watch the campaign so he could…”

“Report back?”

“Yeah. There was a debriefing afterward.” Meng sighs. “It actually didn’t work too well. You see, it just looked really weird, this one girl walking into the theatre and then followed by a whole group of people. It just looked weird.”

“A learning experience, then?”

“Yeah…”

Yesterday was the first time in a while that my whole family was at home. Let’s see what happened…

Mum

Mum watched as I scooped freshly made fruit salad from the big silver bowl to my mug. Mmm, more mango… As soon as I put the lid back, mum whipped the bowl open again and looked at me reproachfully. “Joan, you left a hole in the fruit salad again!”

She picked up the ladle and nudged some watermelon, pear and apple back into the depression.

Dad

“Joan! Have a look at this.”

I wandered over to my dad sitting in front of the computer. “What’s up, dad?”

“I’m thinking of buying shares in this company. IBA just announced a takeover bid for HCN.” He clicked and pulled up a chart. “Look at that!” We both marvelled at the single day vertical rise of HCN’s share price. “We’ve missed the boat on that one, of course, but IBA might still be a good prospect…”

Click, click and we soon had a graph for IBA’s six-month performance. “Oh,” dad sounded disappointed. “It looks like the price has already risen.”

“Dad, you have to think of the future potential, not the past performance. Remember when I bought WOW? You said that if you had seen how much the price had already risen, you would never have bought it. But look how much I’ve made on it!”

Dad nodded thoughtfully. “That’s true. Okay, I’ll do some more research.” And he happily continued clicking.

Jason

“Joan! Joan! I have an exam tomorrow. Do you have a pencil I can borrow?”

“Yes, take the grey pacer. *Sigh* I’ve lost my yellow pacer. It’s my favourite.”

“I’ll need an eraser and pacer leads, too.”

I handed them over.

“Thanks!” and he dashed back to his room to respond to an ICQ message.

Five minutes later, he came back in with his school bag and a sheepish smile on his face.

“Er, Joan? Remember the last time I had an exam? Well, I borrowed some stuff then.”

He laid out the grey pacer, combination pen/pencil eraser and box of HB leads I had just lent him, reached into his bag and pulled out a yellow pacer, my favourite eraser and a box of 2B leads.

I looked at him and started laughing. “All right, Jason. Which set do you want?”

“Um.” He compared them critically. “I’ll take them both, just in case.”

Mum woke me up with a new fashion goodie.

“Look what I bought for you, Joan! Wear this today. It’s going to be sunny.”

It was a deep purple t-shirt with the word “Active” in silver across the front. Hurrah! I donned my t-shirt, ready for the first real spring day at university.

I walked right into student elections. There were swarms of student politicians, activists accosting bewildered students with pamphlets and well-rehearsed harangues. It is the most hated time of the year.

The largest political party is called ‘Activate’… They wear deep purple t-shirts, with ‘Activate’ emblazoned across the chest.

Oh, what badly timed fashion! The worst time I could have picked to break in my new t-shirt. All day, people were coming up to me, saying, “Joan, I didn’t know you were involved in student politics!” I’m not, I’m not!

Hehe…