Elly Was Here

Why don't I ever update this thing.

2009-09-21T09:52:04Z

Things that have happened lately:
- Job situation is worked out for now, I got another placement up to the end of January, but in a different section. Don't mind this too much, since my job is quite cool, right now I'm searching through the old church records for people's family history stuff. S'awesome.
- Massage school unit number 1 (Swedish) finishes tomorrow with my practical exam. Nervous.
- Hopefully going car shopping this weekend for this, or similar. Woo!

Things that have happened lately but have happened continually or repeatedly for some time and are therefore less noteworthy:
- I keep spending too much money on books
- I am irritated that I never draw or paint anymore, and need to find more time for both
- Constant niggling drive to move out again, fed by time spent browsing rental properties online

Hope everyone's well!

You win some and you lose some

2009-08-09T09:38:33Z

Lose:

- I find myself suddenly, unexpectedly, and quite unfortunately without a job, for "technicality" reasons that have absolutely nothing to do with my work, my expertise or even my personality, with no sure guarantee that I can go back to workplace in question. Quite a long an convoluted story so I don't think I'll go into it all here.

- Along with said job termination (even though I may well be reappearing in the same workplace in a couple of weeks) comes all the other stuff, including my leave being paid out. This appears to be good on the surface (nearly 4 weeks of leave to be paid in a lump just as I'm leaving ... almost a severance package) but, ever since I started at this job I've been saving my leave in the hopes of taking all of December off for 2 separate trips that are long overdue. This means that even if I get my job back, I have no leave and either have to beg them to let me take it unpaid, or work through Christmas for the ... well, I was going to say for the nth year in a row, but I've never not worked through Christmas. So this was supposed to be my awesome December.

- Loss of job also means no car can be bought anytime soon and car funds have now become survival funds.

- Still have to go into the city two evenings a week for massage lectures and bellydance classes. Big pain in the ass.

Win:

- Leave payout + car money = I have loads of cash either to live on for ages or to live sparingly on and hopefully get the car as soon as I get employed again.

- I have justification to sit on my ass for a while.

- This is the big one. I COMPLETED THE SYDNEY CITY 2 SURF TODAY. Never been in it before. For the non-Sydneysiders, it's a 14km (9 mile) run/fun run/walk from inner city Sydney to Bondi Beach, based on the San Francisco Bay to Breakers (although it's longer than the B2B). There are 4 different categories: Red for runners who can finish in under 75 mins, Green for those under 100 minutes, Blue for open semi-serious runners, and Yellow for walkers, people with prams and people in funny costumes making a spectacle of themselves. I put myself in Blue and tried to get a time that will qualify my for Green next year. Times aren't published for another day and a half but I either juuust made it or juuust missed out. Either way I am both totally exhausted (and knees are fucked) and incredibly proud of myself for acheiving a seriously challenging goal.

- Chinese food.

Where does the phrase "working out" come from anyway? You're pretty much always indoors

2009-07-15T08:43:11Z

Silverchair is so underrated. On the proviso that you only listen to Frogstomp and Freakshow. Kinda goes downhill after that.

Had a very chilled weekend at home, mostly lazing around playing games, watching House, and half-assedly working on hobbies and cleaning. Wouldn't mind doing that a lot more often actually. Working on a nice little painting set that I might post when it's done.

Tom's place last night to watch Kung Fu movies. Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon was awesome but I didn't quite get the ending, Once Upon a Time in China we turned off after 15 minutes because it was weird and not making any sense.

Moving at a crawl-pace towards the money I need for the car. Always happens, I start saving and the money stacks up really fast, then it hits a certain dollar figure and I can't seem to get past it, expenses popping up all over the place. For me and the car it's $1000 short of what I need to go shopping. Very frustrating. Trying very hard for the next week to make sure I don't mess up again, then hopefully car shopping will start on the weekend after next.

Work is stupidy stupidy stupid but when isn't it. Hopefully will improve significantly in about 2 weeks though.

Reading Dracula for book club, it's hard to get into (being over a hundred years old ... wow it's weird to think I'm reading exactly the same thing that someone else was in 1898) but it's good so far. Also have the novelisation of 30 Days of Night to attack after that one.

Joined a gym! Going at lunchtimes and such to do running training and some weights. It's weird having a shower in the middle of the work day.

Massage school starts in a week. I am SUPER EXCITED.

We accept the love we think we deserve

2009-07-06T08:11:06Z

Ohh maaaaan I haven't touched this in ages. No idea why. There's been plenty going on. My internet's been on the fritz though so I've been kind of limited in what I can get up to online.

Went up to Terrigal this weekend with Tom & Family, and had a wonderful wonderful time. The weather was lovely even though it was cold. We walked up and down a few of the beaches yesterday, and explored a car boot sale (people sell some weeeiiiird stuff). I honed my pool abilities a little more. Mostly though, just had a wonderful time being with Tom, lots of movie watching snuggled up on the couch.

I went to the Sydney Craft Show a few weeks ago and bought (among many, many other things) a sewing machine. They had to order it in for me, and assured me it'd be there by the end of the week ... 2 & 1/2 weeks later it FINALLY arrived ... but I've been having so much fun messing around with it that I barely care. And I got a pretty huge discount because I bought it at the show. I'm making a couple of silly cotton handbags first, I'm going to give them to the little girls across the road if I can bear to part with them. Might put up some progress shots of one of them as I go.

The Sydney City to Surf is in ONE MONTH oh my god. I've been sort-of training but I really need to be doing more than I'm doing. For those outside Sydney, it's a 14km run (2km uphill!!) from Sydney city to Bondi Beach. I've never done it before and I'm trying to clock it in under 100 minutes.

I started a book club at work that I'm really excited about. First meeting is tomorrow, so tonight I've got to pick out some books for the other members to read. And I'm still in the middle of two of my own books!

I have so much to do! About 6 books to read, sewing to do, tapestries to finish, running training to do ... I have enough hobbies to last me three lifetimes.

And I haven't done any drawing or painting in forever! Augh!

That'll do for now.

ellywashere @ 2009-05-06T18:54:00

2009-05-06T09:25:35Z

Using only song names from ONE ARTIST, cleverly answer these questions:

Pick Your Artist: Bloodhound Gang, just cos the song titles are funny.

Are you male or female: Hooray for Boobies

Describe yourself: Legend in My Spare Time

How do you feel about yourself: I'm the Least You Could Do

Describe where you currently live: Strictly for the Tardcore

If you could go anywhere, where would you go? The Ten Coolest Things About New Jersey

Favourite time of day: This Is Stupid

Your best friend is: Earlameyer the Butt Pirate

Your favourite colour is: Yellow Fever

You know that: A Lap Dance Is So Much Better When the Stripper Is Crying

What's the weather like: Boom

If your life was a TV show, what would it be called: Foxtrot Uniform Charlie Kilo

What is life to you: It's Tricky

What is the best advice you have to give: Lift Your Head Up High (And Blow Your Brains Out)

If you could change your name, what would it be: Ralph Wiggum

How would you like to die: Asleep at the Wheel

Your favourite food is: We Like Meat

How do you encourage a loved one: You're Pretty When I'm Drunk

Aporkalypse

2009-05-01T12:47:04Z

Dear The World,

Please stop panicking about the swine flu.

Especially you, The News Media.

Thanks.

The Two Things

2009-04-28T10:12:16Z

I was reading some random columns in the paper today and came across by Sam de Brito one that talked about a game called Two Things. It involves asking friends or strangers what the Two Things about their job/hobby/etc are: "For every subject, there are really only two things you need to know. Everything else is the application of those two things, or just not important."

De Brito says that the Two Things you need to remember about playing the Two Things game are:

1. People love to play the Two Things but they rarely agree about what the Two Things are.

2. That goes double for anyone who works with computers.

Some of the Two Things De Brito listed in the column were:

The Two Things about modelling

1. You're there to be seen and not heard.

2. Don't get fat.

Human Resources

1. We serve the company's, not the employees', interests.

2. Compliance, compliance, compliance.

Trading

1. Buy low.

2. Sell high.

Binary Systems

1. 0

2. 1

Computer programming

1. Idiocy increases faster than idiot-proofing.

2. All compiling errors boil down to a missing semicolon.

Computer maintenance

1. Disk scan, defrag, virus scan, update drivers, wait 30 days, repeat.

2. Never download Kazaa.

National security

1. Bring overwhelming force to bear.

2. Let them hate, so long as they fear.

World conquest

1. Divide and conquer.

2. Never invade Russia in the winter.

Studying philosophy

1. Nobody was right.

2. Everything is relative.

Civil engineering

1. Dirt + Water = Mud.

2. You can't push a rope.

Child welfare

1. If they don't get it when the kids are taken away, they ain't gonna get it.

2. Err in favour of the child.

Blogging

1. Everyone who runs one is a kook.

2. Everyone who comments in one is a kook.

Parenting

1. There's no such thing as too much affection

2. It's not so much what you say, as it is what you do

Boxing

1. Hit.

2. Don't get hit.

Being a house husband

1. That can wait until tomorrow.

2. That can too.

I like the Binary and Boxing ones the best =D All that being said, these are mine:

The Two Things about learning to draw:

1. Use as many reference pictures as you need to.

2. For the first few months/years, almost everything you churn out will be rubbish.

The Two Things about martial arts:

1. Be prepared for getting the shit beaten out of you a lot.

2. Your body can do whatever your mind is strong enough to tell it to do.

The Two Things about working in the Public Service:

1. Adherence to procedures is valued higher than serving the public.

2. Your job is practically guaranteed, even in an economic crisis.

The Two Things about bellydancing:

1. Master isolation and you can master any dance move.

2. If it's gonna jiggle, let it jiggle.

Make up your own and comment with them, do it do it do it.

Biker gangs and BBC

2009-04-21T12:47:03Z

Here's a fun story.

Biker gangs stole my microwave.

When I moved back home I extended-lended my microwave to my next door neighbours since my folks already had one, and I had no use for the other. They put it in their caravan, which was stolen from a caravan park a few subrbs away several months ago.

The big news story in Australia at the moment is the biker gangs (Hell's Angels, Rebels, and Comanceros or however you spell it). Drugs, shooting, bashing people to death in the middle of Sydney Airport. Cops are going nuts. In the papers every day. Anyway, in order to look busy, the cops do a raid on the Rebels' HQ, about 10km north of here, nearer to the city. They find my neighbour's caravan! Totally empty of course, everything in it had been taken or sold off.

Bikies stole my microwave! Hah.

Next door neighbour is also a really high-ranking police officer, which I think makes it even funnier.

Jess got me hooked into some BBC fantasy shows, namely Robin Hood and Merlin. Thanks to the trusty iPod converter I've binged my way through all of them in about a week. Good stuff if you can resist taking them too seriously. There's plenty of faults with both, not least the tendency to get really formulaic, but they're pretty fun.

Decided to have a stab at the City to Surf in August. For those outside Sydney, it's a 14km run from the inner city to Bondi Beach, with a 2km stretch of uphill (called Heartbreak Hill). Hoping to qualify for the second bracket of runners, which means I've got to finish it in under 100 minutes. I've got a long way to go, but around 3 months to train. And it's good to have a goal, even if it doesn't really affect anything.

I'm starting heaps of books and not finishing them. Pttthht.

ellywashere @ 2009-04-07T18:36:00

2009-04-07T08:47:13Z

My computer/internet is being a bitch.

It was my birthday yesterday. I went out today and spent one of my presents (gift voucher) on Empire: Total War, which I've been playing at Tom's place a bit. Huge game. Really addictive too. Now if only it would install. Taking forever.

Work is getting monotonous and every time something happens lately, it seems to be a downer. I'm getting to the stage where I don't want to do this office monkey stuff any more but I really have no idea what else I can do. Like *no* idea. Every career I think I can see myself doing seems to need a 4-year doctorate in something, and even most of the entry courses have prerequisites I don't fulfill. I'm slowly going into panic mode since I'm now 22 and have no clue what I want to do with my life - made all the more urgent by the fact that everyone around me seems to be getting their shit together. Auuugh. This shit is really doing my head in.

Having Jess over for part of the long weekend this week = lots of happy. Been missing Jess-time a lot and I think I'm in need of a quiet hangout with an old friend. Yes, Jess, I'm referring to you as an old friend now.

I'm sure there's other stuff but honestly my mind has been cramped up so badly for the last 2 days with this career-panic that I can't think of much else. Guh.

Woo, long time

2009-03-30T11:41:47Z

Been ages since I've done anything on here.

Things that be doin:

1. Started martial arts again after 5 years of "I'd really like to go back". Dilemma being I loved my old trainer so much I didn't think I could work well under someone else, so solution = no trainer. Joined a group of about 10 or 11 guys who do a boot-camp style session that is VERY HARD. First week I ripped my knuckles open, took 2 weeks to heal. Second week got told to sit out cos I'd gone white, third week puked, and finally, tonight, fourth week - survived with nothing to report. It's god damn hard but man it feels good. Nothing so good as high impact exercise.

2. Addicted to podcasts from HowStuffWorks.com, especially the one called Stuff You Should Know. The cover some awesome topics and make it so interesting. Check it out on iTunes. These guys should be paying me for publicity.

3. Been to Terrigal a few times with Tom & Co, been very enjoyable. Who doesn't love sitting around in a gorgeous beach setting in perfect weather. Here's a sketch of the big hotel you can see from the balcony:

I need to draw more.

4. I donated blood 3 weeks ago and I still have the mark on my arm. Wtf. I hope people don't think I'm a junkie.

5. Going to a debate with Tom tomorrow night that I'm really excited about. The topic is "Freedom of expression must include the licence too offend." Awesome topic I think, I'm really going to get into this one. I'm waaay in the affirmative, if you hadn't guessed. It's a bit of a moot point here, since we don't actually have anything in our constitution (or equivalent) that states we have the right to free speech ... it's more just ... implied, I guess. But I have a feeling the debate will have a more global outlook. Either way, got my mind all psyched. Woo.

Lower back is killing me after training for some reason, so I'm gonna go slap a heat pack on it.

The cake is not a lie

2009-03-01T20:00:53Z

Whee! Look what I made...

Happy

2009-02-03T10:18:29Z

That's what I am now.

I'm just coming to this realisation, very slowly, in the last few weeks and maybe months. Some days I do nothing except go to work, read a book on the train, have dinner and then bum around watching TV, but still feel I had a great day. It feels awesome.

It's such an uplift from most of last year ... well, let's face it, I was unexplainably depressed for a lot of the time. I was always bummed out, on the edge of tears all the time, horrible to be around, all without a big, serious reason. I went looking everywhere for ways to get happy when I was so uselessly sad, and nothing seemed to stick, and then somehow, months and months later, just looked up and realised that I am happy - more than that, it's happiness that isn't based on an external person, or series of events, or anything. I don't need to be "put" in a good mood. I'm just happy in my own right.

Stuffed if I can figure out for the life of my how I did it. The job change helped (even though it's essentially just another office job), and reconnecting a bit more with some friends, but that doesn't feel like it's the whole reason. Not much in my life has changed. Somehow, veeerrrry slowly, my outlook just changed, and now everywhere I look I'm just astoundingly thrillled and thankful with pretty much everything. Everything just seems brighter.

Well, I'm not going to keep trying to question it. I think I'll just enjoy it.

Totally forgot that was tomorrow

2009-01-19T12:14:22Z

So, today's Bush's last day in office. Yeah, woot. Gotta figure out the time difference so I can listen to the inauguration speech. Being on the other side of the world is annoying. Not that I'd want to live in America. No sir-ee. But it's fun to watch, like an action drama. Except with wars.

Had a really fantastic weekend. Spent almost all of it with Tom, and really, just had a really great few days spending time with him. I love that man ever so much. He started me watching a TV show called Brotherhood, about the Irish mob in Rhode Island, and it's addictive. Jason Isaacs! The show gets extra points for poignancy on top of awesomeness, since you get the idea that a lot of the stuff - especially the underhanded political stuff - actually goes on in real life.

We went to the races - I've never really done the races thing before - and I had an awesome time. I picked 2 winners! Walked away with double the amount that I bet, so that's always good. Tom gets very overexcited in the last 200m =D

I got an "art tour" of Tom's house too - his dad was deciding which paintings & photos to take to the other house, so I kind of followed them around, and it wound up being me asking what every piece was, and hearing the cool stories behind some. They have a lot of nice pictures in their place!

Back into the full swing of things at work after the holiday "break". Not loving it, I seem to be more tired than usual lately, I'm trying so hard not to develop a caffeine addiction. Still, the general population keeps me amused. Best baby names this week:
Midas (boy)
Ginja (girl) (ninja?)
Ruby Bluebird (girl)
Rainbow Star (girl)
Bowie (boy)
Zyzyx (boy)

Decided to take a term off from language, pick it up again in the second half of the year. No Italian for Elly this term. Bellydancing is still on, though.

I had lunch in a food court in the city yesterday, and people-watched while I waiting for my laser-tag buddies to show up. Could not BELIEVE the amount of hugely fat children everywhere. Like ROTUND children. Like developing back problems at age 8 from their enormous bellies and equally enormous KFC trays. Seriously. If I do nothing else for my future kids, I'm going to make sure they don't get colossally fat before age 18. What they do after that will be their business, but I'm am not having round children, dammit.

ellywashere @ 2009-01-19T06:35:00

2009-01-18T19:38:26Z

I have a kind of expensive leather handbag (Jag) and the stitching has started to come undone on one of the handles, probably just from overuse. I refuse to dump this thing - does anyone know of a hangbag repair or leather repair place that could fix it? Anywhere in Sydney, but the city would be great.

Double-booked

2009-01-04T05:45:43Z

Nabbed from Jess, I'm going to keep track of all the books I read this year. I'll keep updating this entry and then at the end of the year I'll repost.

Starting with what I'm in the middle of reading.

A Thousand Splendid Suns - Khaled Hosseini (great book, very moving.)
Blood of Elves - Andrzej Sapkowski (gave up ... got boring, I think mostly because it doesn't translate well from Polish.)
Empire: How Britain Made the Modern World - Niall Ferguson (history book)
Eat, Pray, Love - Elizabeth Gilbert (highly recommend)
Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason - Helen Fielding
Thanks for the Mammaries - short stories from several authors (meh)
Wicked - Gregory Maguire (original book version of the musical - much darker than the musical. Also a bit MA15 )
Newes from the Dead - Mary Hooper (true story of a girl who was hanged in the 1600s, pronounced dead, then came back to life 2 days later)
The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
The Collected Works of Oscar Wilde (various parts thereof)
The Jungle Book - Rudyard Kipling
Diary of a Young Girl - Anne Frank
Do's and Taboos: The Complete Guide to International Etiquette - Roger E Axtell (not as comprehensive as I'd hoped)
We Need to Talk About Kevin - Lionel Shriver
American Gods - Neil Gaiman (AWESOME!)
Dracula - Bram Stoker (highly recommend)
30 Days of Night - Tim Lebbon (novelisation of the movie of the comic ... don't ask)
Harry Potter #6 - reread
Harry Potter #7 - reread (the epilogue is still stupid and pointless)
How to Win Friends and Influence People - Dale Carnegie (fascinating! From 1936)
The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
The Big Sleep - Raymond Chandler
The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie - Alan Bradley (quite cool)
The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
Christian the Lion - Anthony Bourke and John Rendall
Does My Head Look Big in This? - Randa Abdel-Fattah
The Giver - Lois Lowry (EXCELLENT)

Do graphic novels count?
The Sandman: Preludes & Nocturnes - Neil Gaiman

I've had to concentrate while writing the date all day today

2009-01-02T08:55:11Z

Hiya all! Loooooong time no post. Happy New Thingy to everybody.

I didn't do a whole lot on the night in question, I'm not much of a partygoer so I went to Tom's house and cooked - an experimental, and not wholly unsuccessful, chilli con carne; and a TOTALLY STUPENDOUS blueberry cheesecake. Possibly the most delicious thing I've ever cooked. I'm going to make more, and I'll take photos or something.

Also, Tom discovered that eating cheesecake directly after chilli (which was dosed with extra cayenne pepper at his request) is not a clever thing.

New Year's Resolutions, too. I actually kept all of mine last year (and there were a lot!) so I'm more motivated to make some this year.

1. Get a good camera and take lots more photos. I want as many photos as good times.

2. Get my provisional driver's licence.

3. Buy a car.

4. Apply for every good promotion that comes up at work, even if I keep not getting them.

5. Learn to cook some new meals (rather than just delicious baked goods).

6. Lose 5 kilos, or get my cardio-vascular fitness really up. Or both! Exercise is good either way.

7. Finish all the books in my bookshelf that are currently unread.

Funnily enough, the only one I'm worried about is the last one =D

For posterity

2008-11-30T13:28:54Z

Just to highlight how amazingly bloody quick my hair grows - this was me then (sometime in 2006):

And this is me now:

It's really hard to take a picture of myself and fit ALL my hair into it. I had to take a picture of the mirror, which is why the photo looks so weird.

Nothing really out of the ordinary going on at the moment, eveything is just sailing along pretty well. I set up our giant Christmas tree today, and I gotta say I'm really looking forward to Christmas. Mostly the making fruitcake and watching people's reactions to presents parts. I like those parts.

I'm serious.

2008-11-25T10:18:39Z

Smushy, smutty romance novels starring Vikings that time-travel to the present day. Seriously. From Feather and Fan:

Hot and Heavy, a time-traveling Viking meets Navy SEAL romance novel by Sandra Hill. I am not kidding. I actually read this book, and it really epitomizes fun, fluffy summer reading. I picked it up at the library one day and was fascinated. Let me sum up the plot for you. It’s kind of amazing.

A feisty Viking woman with big boobs time-travels from 1013 A.D. to modern-day Iraq, where she meets a handsome young Navy SEAL with rippling muscles, who’s on a mission to take out a high-value Iraqi target. He thinks she’s the Iraqi’s lover, so they capture her. Then they realize she’s not really an insurgent, they get married in a marriage of convenience (I forget why–green card, maybe?) that they plan to annul later, but what they didn’t count on was the strength of their mutual attraction, due to their both being extremely sexy. So they stay married. Or maybe they get it annulled and get married again. In any case, they wind up together at the end, and have a lot of sex, and then the time-traveling Viking discovers that her Viking relatives have also time-traveled to the present and established families, so she doesn’t have to miss her dead relatives in the past anymore. Also, people in this book say “Hoo-yah!” a lot.

There is an entire series of these time-traveling Viking and Navy SEAL books! There are SO MANY of them. I looked at, like, 10 of them trying to figure out which one it was I had read, and I hate to think what my Amazon recommendations are going to look like next time I log on. Here are some others you might enjoy: The Very Virile Viking. My Fair Viking. Truly, Madly, Viking.

!!!

2008-11-05T06:09:00Z

Yaaaaaaaaay!

Hooray for Obama. It was totally worth all those months of campaigning so his kids could have a new puppy.

Also congrats on being the first president to mention puppies in his victory speech.

...in all seriousness, I'm thrilled. I used up all my phone credit texting workmates who *didn't* have the day off when Obama won Ohio, then the western states. I am feeling very happy and optimistic right now. And, I think I just experienced one of those huge moments in history where you will always remember where you were. The only other one of those moments I have is 9/11, so thankfully this one is a positive one. ^_^

If you'd asked me any time in the last few years, I'd say I never thought I'd say this, but YAY AMERICA.

To rule the world

2008-11-04T10:55:36Z

American brethren:

I really hope none of you need reminding but just in case, plleeeeaaase remember to go out and vote. Make your rational, sane voices heard.

Man, America really needs compulsory voting. I've no idea why they don't have it already.

Rest assured I will be watching closely, on the edge of my seat, from a very, very safe distance.

Quote of the week

2008-10-30T08:20:55Z

'I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies. If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issue of their currency, first by inflation, then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around the banks will deprive the people of all property until their children wake-up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.'

Thomas Jefferson 1802

Also, holy crap

2008-10-28T10:42:25Z

There is a TWILIGHT FAN BAND. My god. I just .... ah. This actually exists.

Surely someone else must be as boggled by the insane popularity of these books as I am?

Simple happy things

2008-10-28T10:34:45Z

I have a fish at work called Gary. He's a blue Siamese Fighting Fish, and he's adorable. He used to belong to my mum but after she nearly killed him (she didn't clean his bowl for too long and he got sick, he's now blind in one eye) I inherited him because I love him more. He so cute. He plays with his food flakes and buries his head in the gravel in his bowl. It's surprisingly awesome having a fish at work. I do feel sorry for him though, trapped on display as he is.

I saw Burn After Reading this weekend, which was hilarious but also weird and disturbing (WHY DIDN'T ANYONE WARN ME ABOUT THE CHAIR). Thumbs up, but I'd be careful about recommending it to anyone who wasn't my age. Watched Miller's Crossing to keep the Coen Brothers theme going. That's a cool film.

Summer is coming! I know because there are mangoes (sp?) in the shops now. I love mangoes. I'm like a 4 year old eating one. Summer fruits are my favourite things about summer. NOM.

It just started raining.

...And just stopped. Huh.

Crispy mint m&ms = food of the gods. Gods of sugar.

2008-10-24T07:32:17Z

I check my friends page on here all the time, but keep forgetting to actually WRITE something.

Really enjoying watching the US presidential debates, and all the news stories that follow. I think most of that enjoyment is coming from the fact that, with Obama sliding ahead in the polls, I'm not watching it with a sense of impending world-crumbling. And regardless of the fact that it's a different country, I still feel it affects me, so I'm loving the discussions that come out of it everywhere. Main things:

- Sarah Palin will only be funny so long as she's not vice-president

- Joe the Plumber earns $240,000 a year, so they picked a really bad candidate for the "everyman"

- Whenever McCain/Palin says "Obama voted in favour of <issue>! Isn't that horrible and shocking!", odds are that McCain did too.

Tom and I hit 2 years together last week, which is rather cool. We went to the fair near his place (where we went on our first thing-that-resembled-a-date), and as every year, he got horribly sunburnt. This year it was so bad on his face that now his lips are all blistered and split. Poor guy.

I did a very pointless, very long training course at Parramatta for half of this week, so I stayed at Tom's for convenience of travel. I really liked it, it was nice seeing him so much and I love his family, especially dinner time. Everyone stays at the table for hours, talking about absolutely everything (my family just eats while chatting a little, cleans and disappears, though I do it too so I can't really complain).

Been playing looooooots of Warcraft. I can't help it that the game's addictive as hell. Plus I'm trying to play two characters at once, one Horde and one Alliance, and enjoying both. I'd love to try some other classes as well, like druid and priest, but I know if I let myself do that then I'll end up with two dozen level 20 characters.

Started bellydancing again. I'm actually learning the right techniques now, which is great, but it also means I suck at everything again. Lots of practice is required.

Getting a bit frustrated at work, mostly because management takes a lot time to get back to me about anything, like whether my contract is going to be renewed (which I REALLY need to know soon) and if my December leave is going to be approved (so I can hop up to Terrigal for a few days, which I'm really looking forward to). At this rate I'll be given about a day's notice.

ellywashere @ 2008-10-02T20:57:00

2008-10-02T10:00:30Z

Woah haven't been here in a while.

Things have been good lately. Very good. I'm in one of those nice little spans of time where just about everything is pretty peachy. So that's always good news =D

I went to Brisbane for a weekend to stay with Shawni and check out Picasso, and enjoyed the time with Shawn and Chris exponentially more than seeing Picasso. Majorly overrated, that dude. Brisbane is quite pretty in places too, and seemingly convenient to get around.

So who loves Google Chrome? If you don't have it yet, try it. It's lovely. And so intuitive that it actually took me a fortnight to realise there's no menu bars or anything at the top of the window (when it's maximised, at least). Only problem I've been having is that when I try to go on to my LJ friends page, it come up warning my of malware. I finally figured out today whose journal is triggering it.

That's right, fake_saxophone .

I have no idea what you're doing, but Google is believes you to be harmful.

Speaking of harmful, I may also have taken up, once again, playing a horrible soul-consuming game that I probably definitely should not have picked up again. Shawni's fault. Or at least that's what I'm telling myself.