BLOG Mar 9 Every time I jump on Facebook, I start feeling depressed as all hell. All I see are lost friendships, people I once considered bosom buddies, who have since moved on. They've either gotten engaged, or moved to an entirely different country - all sorts of other important milestones I had no idea about. Call me crazy, but I can't easily pop a simple hello message to these people. "Um, hi. Want to be friends again after 5 years?" Let's face it, they have their own lives to live, and it doesn't include me in it. The irony of it all is that the one time in my life where I now have the freedom to do whatever I wish and see whomever I wish, I am basically devoid of any friends that fall outside the boundaries of family or work. Big Fat Zero. Pretty sad when you think about it. But in my defense, things weren't always that way, and probably wouldn't have turned out that way had I not started seeing a particular someone who stripped my rights as a human being, one of which included having a social life. But there's always the other side of the coin. I like my workmates. I love my family. My partner is my best friend. It's better to have few but close friends, than to have many friends who you don't really share any connection with. My favourite line is that if things hadn't turned out the way they had over the years, Dave and I may have never crossed paths. But why not pop me a message. Say hi. Let's be friends again? I have DDR at my house. You know you want to. +++ Jul 15 I can play piano with all the dexterity of a 15-legged alien. Means I have good hand-eye-foot coordination. I played WoW better than all of you. Means I am alert, hyper responsive (?) and adaptable. So why can't I drive a manual car as well as I should? It's so frustrating! I wonder if I can write a poem about it.. I'm so crap at driving manual My learning curve seems much too gradual While everyone is overtaking me I'm still trying to reach 70 I perspirate heavily when the car stalls Drowning in sweat while people beep their horns Jerking the car like it's a rodeo All because of my heavy toe. ROFL. Okay, I'm not THAT bad. I'm just starting out after all. And thankfully no one's actually beeped at me, but that's only because I have my Loser plate on. I suppose it's just come as a surprise to see that it's going to take a while to really be able to drive smoothly. Normally when I go to learn something, I tend to pick it up really quickly, thanks to my competitive nature. I just have to be the best and do it right! (e.g. Guitar Hero and Hold 'em Poker.) But the same doesn't seem to apply to driving. +++ Jul 5 Gazillion new photos are now up from Dave's birthday as well as our lovely getaway to the Blue Mountains. Even for someone who detests walking and the extreme cold, I found it immensely enjoyable. And it was COLD! At one point, I had on: - Thermal leggings - Jeans - Knee-high socks - Boots - Thermal long-sleeve top - Skivvy - Jacket - Scarf - Beanie! My only regret was not having a balaclava. I would have been an impenetrable unit with that. I highly recommend the Blue Mountains for anyone considering a break. The great thing about this place is that it's only 1 hour from Sydney, yet all the sights and smells make you feel like you're hours away. There are also tonnes of interesting things to do and see. I'd tell you all about it, except I'm too lazy. The photos will give you a good idea of how much fun we had anyway. +++ May 20 Many thanks to all who wished me a happy birthday! I am most certainly feeling ripe at the tender age of 24. Threw a Bling Bling birthday (first ever themed party I dared to attend/host) and it was an absolute hoot. Bling: $20 Outfits: $80 Decorations: $60 Food and grog: $150 Poker table and chips: $250 Laughing at family and friends in iced out gear: Priceless! Make your way to the photo gallery and have a giggle at the mamas and pimps. +++ Apr 25 Dave and I have been wistfully toying with the fantasy of moving away from the city some time in the long-term future. People these days drive me absolutely round the bend. Have you noticed the slow degradation of civilisation in recent years? Schoolkids hog train seats and don't get up to make room for standing, paying passengers. On top of that they carry on as loud as possible without giving one thought to other people on the carriage. Then there are the shoppers standing in the middle of busy, narrow walkways with their trolleys chatting to friends. Drivers indicating at the last minute, then leaving it on and forgetting to turn it off. Asian grocerers charging $12 for a box of Mi Goreng. 5-year-olds saying "shit" and "fuck" whilst playing on the street. The most recent incident, and most memorable for all the wrong reasons, was seeing an Asian dad walk past, and kick an empty McDonalds fries packet on the ground. Disgusted, I gave him a massive dirty. But it did not end there. His young son, following behind him, kicked the same packet as he walked past. And then his younger brother followed suit and kicked it as well as he walked past! At that point I swore very loudly and forcefully held back my strong desire to throttle all 3 of them. It just goes to show that stupidity breeds more stupidity. One of these days I'm just going to click, and grab someone by the collar and yell in their face to grow/shut the fuck up. Or I can get out of here altogether and live a pleasantly quiet life in the bush away from the inbreds. Or perhaps both? +++ Mar 14 Went bowling with the sis and respective BFs. Was great fun, until towards the end of the evening we decided to put $4 into a DDR machine and have a go. The machine wouldn't budge from tutorial mode, and the staff guy tried resetting the machine to no avail, so he said he'd give us our money back. He referred us onto the manager. Dun dun dun. You'd think it'd be no big deal right, getting 4 bucks back. She wanted to give us tokens back, but we weren't happy with that. We put dollar coins into the machine, we didn't want to play anything else, we just wanted to go home, we wanted a refund in gold coins, she could have checked the coin box in the machine, she could just take it from the till or out of her own pocket. But she could only give tokens back, she couldn't open the till, could only give tokens back, couldn't open the coin box, could only give tokens back, the machine wasn't part of her section, could only give tokens back. We weren't budging, and neither was she. Dave then asked for a bowling ball so he could smash the shit out of the machine so he could get his money back. After about 10 minutes of yelling back and forth between the two parties, I came to the rescue. Me: Look, this isn't going anywhere. Can we speak to your manager? Manager: My manager's at home. Dave: So?? Manager: Alright, fine. [Starts picking up the phone] Look, if I give you your money back, will you just leave? Dave: That's what I've been fucking saying for the last 10 minutes! Manager: [Opens the till, takes out 4 dollars and hands it to Dave] Dave: See, that wasn't so hard, was it? And that's why you don't argue with people who work in IT helpdesk support! We felt pretty good about it for a while afterwards. Obviously it was never about the money, it was about ethics and pride. Dumb bitch could have done a billion things to resolve the situation, but nope, she just wanted to exert her authority because she was The Shift Manager. As soon as the situation was going to escalate to her manager, she crumbled. Had she gone through with the call, her manager, who was probably in the city having a good time, would have gone through the roof and told her to fuckin' give them their money and stop wasting time over 4 bucks. +++ Feb 11 A month on, and this time I'm fighting a losing battle against a cold. I'm now lovingly referred to as a walking petri dish. Personally I've been calling myself a walking biblical plague. Our "son" Riley has developed a limp in his front leg, so we'll be taking him to the vet to have it checked out. He's an old boy, coming up to his 60s in human years, so his age finally be catching up with him. +++ Jan 20 You know you're the ultimate nerd couple when your conversation goes something like: Dave: Do you think I'm a WYSIWYG kinda guy? Me: You're more of a password protected kinda guy, I think. Woke up this morning feeling like pus. Had a headache, body aches, hot and cold flushes, and it hurt to look out the corner of my eyes (??). Hauled myself to the local medical centre, only to be asked a whole bunch of seemingly irrelevant questions, and finally told I couldn't be given anything because I "didn't have any symptoms". Like WTF man. Medical centres are so BS. You have to wait 230572305 hours until one of the dodgy ethnic doctors will see you, prod and poke you, and sign your medical certificate without bothering to tell you what you're even sick with. +++ Dec 8 The festive season is upon us, and it's about that time where the booze comes out and everyone goes mental at parties. I have to say I have never been completely tanked. The closest I've ever come to that state, if you could even call it close, is being led off by my mum (oh I'm such a dag) from a high school birthday party, whilst turning my head back to mumble idiotic confessions to a member of the opposite sex, who I then called up about 15 minutes later to insist that I wasn't tipsy and that I really meant what I said. OH DEAR. The thought of getting out of bed and making a beeline for the nearest toilet to hurl up the night's delights is a pretty good deterrent for crossing the threshold between tipsy and drunk. Somehow it just doesn't seem worth having a few crazy hours, only to wipe out the rest of your weekend. Or is it? Perhaps you could enlighten me. Being the bystander more often than being the drinker has left a fairly solid impression that being female and having a lot to drink wins you no favours. You just look like a desperate tool, and if left to your own defenses, end up in a potentially regrettable situation. Don't know about you, but I would would much rather be in the comfort of my own home, surrounded by close friends, yelling along to Singstar/Guitar Hero while I'm downing my poison. +++ Nov 11 I can now legally drive! Whether I can actually obtain the required skills to keep 4 wheels on the road is another matter altogether. I suppose for a noob I didn't too badly. Day 1 of lessons included stalling and neck-jerking movements. Day 2 consisted of roundabout mounting. To celebrate, I've bought myself a Dashboard Monk. Not only does his body move about, his head bobs as well. Godly! Cayenne pepper was a failed experiment for me. It might have worked temporarily, but the sore throat aspired to stay on board for another week before it finally succumbed to stronger antibiotics. Stick to honey instead. Geddit? Aharhar. +++ Nov 2 Went to the RTA along with Dave and his mate to get our L's - motorbike licences for the guys, and car licence for me, because I'm a lazy tard and never bothered to learn how to drive until now. It wasn't until I got to the booth and went over my application form one last time, that I realised I'd forgotten my glasses. $@& #%^* #)%^ %@*$#!!!! So because I wouldn't have been able to pass the eyesight test, I had to reschedule it for next weekend. Guitar Hero World Tour is coming out soon, looking forward to smashing that. On a random note, I would also love to smash people who use their mobile phones on the train like a boombox. I have had a sore throat for 2 weeks. I've been on a dose of antibiotics, countless Strepsil lozenges, Betadine for gargling, and no improvement. Desperate to rid myself of this soreness, I am now trying Cayenne pepper, as recommended by hundreds of people on the net. Ingredients: 1/8 tsp Cayenne pepper 1/2 lemon, squeezed 2 tsps honey 1 tsp raw sugar Water, boiled I'm a fan of the original honey lemon water (good ol' Mum's recipe!), so this concoction is not much different, except it has a nice kick to it. This drink surprisingly goes down nicely, despite not being a fan of chilli and spices. Though it may sound like a crazy recipe for ridding sore throats, there is some basis to it. Scientists have found that aspects of chilli and capsicum make good painkillers, without any side effects. Will let you know it goes! +++ Sep 8 Pulled out WiiFit the other day and slaved my way through every stretching, bouncing, hip-gyrating exercise regime available in an effort to ditch the fat deposits accumulated in winter. As I bent over and heaved and huffed in an effort to touch my toes, I couldn't help but yearn for the days when I could accomplish all sorts of amazing things in my supple youthfulness. Like touching my toes. I was once the MVP of the girls' touch footy team in high school. Nowadays if I sprint for 20 metres I'll subsequently go into cardiac arrest and let the dogs on the leash drag me home instead. Spare a thought for today's generation of kids. Remember when we used to ride bikes in the street with our fellow neighbours, and play at parks? You hardly see that anymore. Kids are more likely glued to their PSPs or their computer chatting on MSN, and at a much earlier age too. It's no wonder our nation is one of the fattest. And rudest, for that matter. On a train heading home from work, a lady next to me had finished eating her orange. She proceeded to lean right over me, open the window, and promptly hurl her peelings out the side of the carriage. I wanted to punch her lights out. I wish I had now. Need more rage. +++ Jul 26 Once again I have decided to resurrect my site after months of inactivity. Though little has changed, you should find an abundance of pics that I cannot be arsed to upload to Facebook (yes, I still refuse to conform). Those loyal to my website will also notice that I now have my very own domain! Yes, I finally have given up leeching and forged my own space and name. So what's new? Not much, funnily enough, except to say that Dave and I hit our 1-year mark this month, it's my sister's 21st tomorrow, and I've moved from taking calls on the helpdesk to doing onsite technical support. One great thing that's come out of it is some bicep bulge, from carrying around all sorts of equipment all day long. Baby got muscle! Keeping it short and sweet. Enjoy the new pics in the meantime. +++