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Archive Category: Rants
Stupid Camberwell
Monday, 18 November 2002
Oh, I think I must have done something bad….bought too many clothes in my lifetime or something. My market day sucked :o( I thought it was going to be lots of fun :o( Wah. I got up at 4:30am and made myself a flask of tea to take (that would be a thermos for you Scott) as well as taking a little esky (um…a cooler…or….a car fridge?) with the essential 33 degree day supplies of tangelos and water. Packed the car, drove to market. Spent 15 minutes trying to manoeuvre the tank into an impossibly small gap in between my neighbouring stall holders….Then I made the horrid realisation…I had too much stuff!!!! I hired a clothes rack, set up my card table and distributed clothes in boxes, on the ground (on a sheet) and on the car. Then sat back and sipped tea in what I hoped was a cosmopolitan manner….absolutely surrounded by my sins of excess.
Frustration Nation
Tuesday, 19 November 2002
oh….I am v.frustrated….I have too much to do! It’s driving me nuts that I am at work with this kick-ass connection to the net and yet can’t tweak up this page and have too many other things I need to be doing to feel good about doing it at home. [clutches head] Tomorrow I have to go to a workshop at the Bureau of Meteorology on Snow Probability Forecasts [downcast]….argh. I have two free nights this week and one of them is going to be repairing Mung’s computer….which, at this stage, I would prefer to throw from my office window because: 1) then it would be gone forever 2) fresh air would get in I have to write two website reviews by Friday of Media Watch Youth and Girls Inc. - this is while I’m learning Sneeze songs, and…omigod…that right!! I’m in the
middle of doing my masters! have I had time to even look at anything now I’m apparently two weeks into ’summer’ semester? That would be a B I G F A T N O!!!!
http://www.girlsinc.org/gc/
Old Before Time
Thursday, 21 November 2002
Argh! I’ve been getting a bit blog-happy and have been trawling around various related sites - I put [m i a o w] on Globe of Blogs where you can look up people’s blogs by name or birthday or geographical location….of the people born on my birthday I am the oldest one!! This is scary! I used to think I was young because I was born a year after most of my friends….now people who were born in 1980 are 21/22 years old!! Freaky. I’ve added a blogroll to my page - this is v.cool as I can add links just by right clicking on them when I stumble on to a blog I like. There are too many - I am attempting some self control.
A 30% Chance of Rain?
Thursday, 5 December 2002
Great. I get to hang around with a meteorologist. If my blogger posts had imported correctly, you would know that my recent exposure to meteorologists has left me considerably underwelmed. Shall I just throw a few words around? Lets try: scientific, uncharismatic, obsessed with attaining accuracy but not concerned about how to translate the information to the end user (read: Joe Bloggs) um….quite nice but not the kind of people you would want to be trapped by at a party.
Furiousness & Some Relief
Tuesday, 10 December 2002
My account of yesterday’s astonishingly traumatic visit to the dentist got eaten by an accidental click in Movable Type and drowned my words forever. The moral of this sad story being… to always type up your musings in notepad or something similar and save as you go. I scoured my temp files for ages, but all for nowt. *sigh*
Poor Mow (Rhymes with Cow)
Tuesday, 17 December 2002
I am having terrible trouble concentrating today – it’s a beautiful day outside and I’m stuck in this icky room. My visit to the Bureau of Meteorology went OK (I hope) – because I’m looking at the public’s perception of weather forecasts I don’t actually have to be a tech-head (a minor fact that keeps evading me). So now I will talk about cats. I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before, but we have two cats. One is more ‘mine’ – he is pretty – orange and white with not short fur, but fuzzy fur. He is getting fatter – and it’s because he sucks in his breath and looks at our neighbours like he is starving…it’s fairly tragic. His name is Saffron – he used to be nice almost all of the time, but since he has had his feline space invaded….. The other cat is Mow (rhymes with cow) and he is a total fuzzball – he had so much fur that he could hardly deal with it all. He has a very sweet temperament and is almost always very quiet except before having food. This is kind of why what happened to him makes me feel so bad…
Humber Hell
Thursday, 19 December 2002
Well today is more lovely weather – about 29 degrees, but with a breeze that stops it from being too hot. I am waxing lyrical about weather because I am trying to keep my mind off how much my mechanic has charged me to fix the car. Oh. My. God.
It is lucky that I love my car because otherwise I’d tell them to keep it. (Mae – if you’re reading this, don’t tell dad.) My brain has started to boggle and my mouth needs a Glenfiddich infusion. It was not supposed to cost so much!! The other really great thing that happened is that people in the US can’t see this site :o(
Don’t know why. Am heading off now to collect my car and never will it return to the evil clutches of the mechanic – for what I, well, actually, my Mastercard, is about to shell out, my car is going to drive like a dream for the next ten years – and it better, because it’s the only way I’m going to be travelling!! I am never going to be able to afford to leave the country, let alone try and fly away before next May.
[Clutches head]. I need a drink. Two drinks. And a nice lie down…
Death By Housework
Tuesday, 24 December 2002
Christmas for a pagan is all about three things
Not four calling birds or five golden rings
But the things that really matter – they make everything more pleasant
The first is food…the second is Present!
And the third thing happens when glasses go ‘clink’
Number three? A celebration drink!
Christmas for a Cat can be thrilling or quite boring
Depending on whether your owners are adoring
You could be given tinned food – the same as any other day
Or you might be slurping oysters from solid silver tray
Sitting underneath the table is strongly recommended
(Stay there until the end when the pickings should be splendid)
Christmas for a Cat should always be quite special
Nothing rhymes with special.
The End.
Lazy Sunday Evilness
Sunday, 29 December 2002
Spent too much money!! Went shopping and got groceries and somehow ended up with face creams and a lipstick. I haven’t bought that kind of stuff for way more than a year (M’s mother supplies me with Cetaphil). Oh my. I am bad. Now I have buyers guilt.
The wind is so strong today it’s blowing the peaches off the trees! I think I’m going to have to stew them or something as I am a fruit snob and only eat perfect ones. Gotta go - am going to see The Two Towers. Hooray!
Here Fishy Fishy
Saturday, 4 January 2003
Oh shit! I just looked in the fish tank and the black goggly eyed fishy is floating on his side making vague gulpings. I have no idea what to do!!! R said that she brought these fish down from Sydney with her and she’s had them for years and now I’ve pretty much killed one and I didn’t even try!!! The other fish are all just normal goldfishys and are fine! The only thing I think I could have done that was bad was burned essential oils nearby. Would that of done it? Oh god - I don’t know what I’m going to do if it dies! They are never going to get me to house sit again. I will be known as the Fish Exterminator. It’s so unfair - I’m trying hard to be a super-tenant, writing down all my phone calls, watering the garden, eating all their peaches…this really sucks.
Like Bob Geldof Said…
Monday, 13 January 2003
I don’t like Mondays. Ugh - woke up today trashed out and ick courtesy of weekends excesses. I didn’t eat badly, I just ate *way* too much! Not to mention yesterdays combination of beer, lemon cordial, white wine and red wine. Goddamnit - you would assume that our bodies are more important than anything. If you had a Porsche (or something more cool but similarly expensive) would you ravage it with crud? No. You’d put in bloody premium quality petrol and treat it beautifully so it purred like a kitten. Ugh. I am so feeling like a clapped out 1977 Datsun180B.
The excess of food has also squashed my inspiration and so instead of writing more, I have been forced to do my 500 word responses - so far I have done two and thus have only one to go for this semester, which must be kind of good?
Mozzies Deprive Sleep
Wednesday, 15 January 2003
Last night was spent, as usual, staying up late to tire myself out enough so that I would not lie away listening for burglar noises. I was aided in this by the attentions of a mosquito that seemed to be larger than my head. It buzzed around the room and I threw a few things at it, but it was deft and weaving. Finally, after pursuing it around stealthily I remained unvanquished, and to prove this, I sat for twenty minutes with my bare leg extended as bait that was not taken. Bastard. It was my only experience of fishing for mullet – they just all around the boat as I tried to beseech them on to my hook. No joy. Resorted to head under pillow. My eyebags trip me up every second step. Can type no more as I have to throw together a dazzling overview of ‘What netball means to me’ for Iowan viewing.
The Temperature’s Rising
Friday, 17 January 2003
Am heading in to minor meltdown territory. Too much to do, and of course, my job eats my life in huge mouthfuls. Bloody January is plagued by social events, which would be good, if I didn’t have to get this bloody writing done! I have a review for Crime Factory which is chronically overdue (and all the more horrid as I’m having lunch with David today and have already sent him an email of apologies and explanations of slothfulness), and an essay I need to write but don’t seem to be able to (must consult with the person who is supposedly known as my ‘tutor’ even though I never hear from her/them/it). Yum. Just ate sicko chocolate mud cupcake together with some Earl Grey Tea. A definite spirit improver. But still, for those who think I whine (you know who you are), here is my weekend…
Lunchtime Rhyme
Tuesday, 21 January 2003
When I was out walking
It was 23 degrees
With cooler air than yesterday
(No sweat behind my knees)
Tuna, chives with parmesan
Was my roll of choice
Supplemented by a raspberry tart
That almost stole my voice
Sitting on a wooden seat
Outside the Library of the State
I read my Ian Rankin
While past my toes did skate…
Boys; still on holidays
Without any thought of end
I envied all the moves they pulled
Hanging with their friends
I ate my roll and it was good
My tart was even better
Then a stinky man sat on my seat
His stench – quite unfettered.
Somewhat perturbed I moved away
To be captured by
Melbourne Central shopping sales
My credit card shut it’s eyes.
Now back at work and poorer
Fake air and no blue sky
Tea is good, as is a late lunch
At forcing time to fly.
Anyone for Tennis?
Thursday, 23 January 2003
No tennis for me! The Australian Open website scared me off with their ticket prices which annoyed me to the point of refusing to watch it on TV. I thought this year I would get to go…however I hadn’t planned on being a casual worker and thus not getting paid for a month courtesy of Christmas Holidays. Goddamnit - if I lived in the US or preferably (for this rant) the UK I could have swanned into every match, drunk like a fish and worn out my neck from swiveling. But no. I notice at What’s New Pussycat there is a bit of Haiku action. Now it is always useful (I have occasionally found) to indulge in a little bit of Venting Via Haiku. Having to fit your bitterness into such a restricted space is always a challenge.
My tennis tickets
Did not materialise
Stamping did not help
This angst is followed by…dress fittings and more Humber pain.
Zero Probability
Friday, 24 January 2003
For weeks now I have been sitting here learning more and more about probabilistic weather forecasts, not really knowing to what purpose this might be, (whilst daydreaming about whether to hit the Big Day Out, or to cough up and see PJ Harvey on her own). Important stuff like that. Finally my boss calls through from home (which he is convinced is going to be razed by bush fire at any moment) and has decided (after the debacle in Canberra) to concentrate on fire. So I have just been informed to tie up my research into a report to clear the way for new work…I am soooo dumb. I asked him how long he wanted it. Silly, silly moi.
‘Short and punchy – about ten pages should do it.’
I fall off my chair.
I still haven’t figured out how to use this Endnote program we’re supposed to use for referencing and although I have a pile of information taller than my head I don’t think that even I can wank on for that long. I’m debating whether to begin pulling out clumps of my hair now, or just simmer quietly over the long weekend and commence full-blown self-mutilating stress disorder on Tuesday. Probably the latter.
Sad Cars
Thursday, 30 January 2003
This is so sad! I was looking at Rootes Group cars for sale in Australia and found this awful picture of two little Hillman’s in a paddock. Here. WHO is the loser that would do their shooting ‘practice’ on a car?? Particularly this one (a new plastic bumper barred no-soulmobile I could begin to understand) - it’s kind of like a teeny panel van - sort of like those old Ford Escorts. *sigh* I think if I had a property I would collect sad little cars like this and keep them in a nice warm shed…actually, a shed like my dad is building…at his house in the country!
[Looks thoughtful]
Runaway Train
Tuesday, 4 February 2003
Driver chased runaway train: witness - theage.com.au
A man named Ben told radio 3AW he was standing at Broadmeadows station when the train he planned to board started rolling silently down the tracks.
“All of a sudden the doors were opened, the lights were on, it just silently crept up the tracks,” he said.
“The driver came out of the room and asked: `Where’s the train?’ and someone said: `It’s over there’.
Tee hee.
Mo Mo Mo Motown
Wednesday, 12 February 2003
I just saw Standing in the Shadows of Motown. See it. It’s kickass. I went into this cinema just around the corner of my hotel and it turned out that Wednesday night is $7 night, I’d wanted to see the Motown film and it just happened to be playing at 7pm. So I had early dinner (btw, never go to a joint in Canberra called Caffe Della Piazza - it was uniformly crap: overpriced caeser salad that was basically lettuce, bits of bacon, a couple of anchovies, stale white bread masquerading as croutons and icky mayonaisd. Icky also summed up the white wine. You have been warned. (I cannot believe this place got a ‘best restaurant’ in Mietta’s last year. What are they judging it against? McDonalds? Pah.)
The movie, on the other hand, blew my little brain. Read a bit about it here. It sounds like the DVD would be even better due to the amount of footage that they had to cut out. The Funk Brothers cranked out more hits than anyone ever has - it’s quite bizarre. I feel so uninformed. But now strangely enlightened - I want to read the book that it’s based on.
Oh god. I feel like I’m wading through treacle. I’m in this darkened room on the second floor of this seedsville hotel, have paid $5 to get exactly 47 minutes of internet time, and of course they didn’t enlighten me that I would be struggling through the quicksand that is an antique Pentium 166 MMX. I feel like I’m falling back in time. It’s horrible. Have had no luck with Canberra food thus far. Can’t remember what Bill Bryson wrote about it - but just looked it up (though I’m sure Scott could tell me)…oh. Well. The nicest thing he had to say was that the beer here is cold. He’s pretty funny about our charisma-ridden leader though:
ROTFL
Tuesday, 25 February 2003
Tee hee. Last night was 10Speed’s second ever gig. Events conspired against us - we had to get there at 7pm but didn’t get to play our three songs until about 11pm! Of course song competitions are not our strongest suit (actually no competitions are) - and that fact, coupled with drinking beer for four hours did our nerves no good at all. We played truly horribly. Oh dear. I played everything in double time. We could hear ourselves too loud on stage and were thrown for a loop (or eight). I went straight home after we played cause I had to get up early for work, but Christine stayed like a trouper and called me when she got home. We came second. SECOND!? How bizarre. I think our songs were strong, but our delivery of them sucked big time. So now we have to play at the Epsy sometime in April…weird.
Hallelujah!
Tuesday, 25 February 2003
Oh. Such relief! Today I gathered up my courage into a little sack and took myself to an appointment with someone in a profession that I have previously had no contact with.
“Who?”
This leads me to try and think of others. Hmmm. Weightlifters, swimming coaches, acupuncturists, welders, botanists..jeez…I could go on but I won’t.
I went to see An Accountant!
He was the one Heidi suggested both because she said he was good and because if I went (referred by her) she gets a $100 Myer vouchure. Not bad! Now I’m going to refer Oliver…I’m already putting together a Myer wishlist in my noggin ;o)
So further on my accountancy romp…I went with a sense of doom due to the facts that;
2) I worked as a contractor for one year and put aside my own tax, which stayed unmolested for another year and then I spent it on eye laser surgery
3) Which meant that I probably owed the tax office an equivalent amount
4) I’d never been to an accountant before (or, to my best knowledge, even met one).
But it seems (fingers/toes crossed) that my punt on the side of slackness (the kind that very rarely seem to pay off) did! The tax from my other years covers the amount I owe and (hopefully) then some. So I shelled out my $300 via my exhausted piece of plastic as happily as could be expected, and now am wait wait waiting for ten days time when all will be revealed.
And So I Cried…
Monday, 3 March 2003
Have been too depressed to blog – I didn’t get to see The Breeders on the weekend. Drank large amount of red wine to try and drown my feelings of guilt…it did put me to sleep so I suppose it did work. Goddamnit. Christine and I worship The Breeders, but by the time we had money to buy tickets they’d sold out. We are the only band in Melbourne that had a track on the Breeders tribute compilation…however, we weren’t considered for a support slot because…well, because either people hate us or we don’t have the ability to schmooze. *sob*
That’s all I have to say on that subject.
Took Friday off to concentrate on thesis (and because if I had not had a day off I would have been arrested for turning in to a rabid Alsatian and terrorising inner-city Melbourne with my foam drenched fangs). So – I did my little research bits that I’d been putting off, I am within 500 words of the total (20,000) and I am waiting to look at the edits that my friend, the lovely Pegs DeLeur (that is what we agreed her pen name should be - click here to see her with the Marching Girls) has done. Meanwhile I have begun my 3000 word essay on writing family history *gags* and my aim is to have all finished by the end of this week. On Friday night my friend Jock turns 30 and is having a rather large bash – which I am hoping will double as my end-of-thesis celebration.
Broadband Ate My Day
Thursday, 6 March 2003
I am an addict. How can I work on the most boring project in the world when I have unrestricted broadband access every minute of the day? I swear I have seriously thought of turning off the browser proxy settings to stop myself surfing. In fact, I did do this, but nothing happened, I was free to surf away. I would be profoundly depressed if anyone added up the accumulated hours of my life that have been snaffled by my online addiction. If our boat (name as yet undecided, current top three names = Velouria/Surfarosa/Seabiscuit) every ventures on a sail longer than three days I will then see how I will cope. I suppose I can always SMS people or send email through my PocketMail/PalmPilot combination. Yep. I’m hooked up. It’s getting scary.
She Hates to Wait
Monday, 17 March 2003
I am very bad at waiting
I am very bad at waiting
I have not been sleeping
Just anti-ci-pating
I hate to wait for buses
I hate to wait for trains
I hate to wait while waiting
At tram stops in the rain
I hate to wait for others
To get things sorted out
I hate wait impotently
With a nasty lack of clout
I hate to wait on tables
I hate to wait for things
I hate waiting for decisions
I beg my phone. PLEASE RING!!!
Too Fast For Taurus
Thursday, 20 March 2003
Taureans (and in speaking of Taureans, I speak of myself) do not like to be rushed. They like to wade methodically through every possible option checking out the scenery along the way. It is not good for Taureans when they feel compelled to make snap decisions that, if given time, they would have spent three hours over lunch discussing and then possibly researched for the rest of the week. I made snap decision last night and now am running around doing damage control for my psyche (…long lunch, cure-rash cream, blog…). It does not suit my temperament. Humph. Glad to know Claire (of the departed Fascinating…. is no longer sick - I must laud her for her dentist recommendation. Oh my god. That dentist was the most down to earth woman I have ever met. She even laughed quite a lot when I explained that the reason that I flinched when she touched my wisdome tooth was because she said the word ‘nerve’ at the precise moment of impact. I didn’t feel anything at all…I suppose ‘flinched’ is an understated way of saying that she had to pry me from ceiling.
I am being mysterious, sorry Scott and Marie, but I think that divulging my plot online will jinx it into a large deep hole. So for a few more days I have to tiptoe around what my plans are…though I will definitely confirm that they do NOT involve babies!!! (Unlike other people I could mention…in my band….) Feel free to guess though.
[waggles eyebrows & logs off]
Skink-Free & Chromed
Wednesday, 26 March 2003
| All bow to the wonders of this combination. As a follow up to the story of ‘The Chemist Who Wouldn’t Fill My Prescription’ comes the tale ‘The Chemist Was Right!’ Medihoney is kickass. I have never used anything that has been so effective as well as being cortisone free. I have been using it in conjunction with one anti-histamine tablet a day and the Lucas PawPaw ointment at night. I’ve only used my half-strength cortisone once since Monday. This is v.cool. My face is almost skink-free. Had to wake up M this morning to do skink-free-face dance. |
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Men, Cars, & Me
Thursday, 27 March 2003
I think I must destroy all mechanics. Or a large percentage thereof. Or maybe I’m wrong, maybe I am just invisble and I haven’t noticed? We went to drop off the Humber to have it’s windscreens fitted (M drove it there minus front and back windows a la convertible while I followed in borrowed car). This is all because the windscreen guy came to our house yesterday to refit them and took one look at the car and said he needed to call back to base. So then he got on the phone and started talking about the ‘Hummer’ (yeah - it’s really like a tank) with the outcome being that they needed to do it at the shop, even though we had explained to them the whole situation. Obviously coming face to face with it was a different proposition.
Noise Restrictions
Wednesday, 2 April 2003
And while I’ve been whinging about the demise of my plans, the Empress (totally cool pub that supports local music where Bidston Moss are playing this Friday night) have been slugged with noise restrictions. We have to remain under 85dba. For those that don’t know how loud that is, read this - it’s not very loud at all. As in, we’ll have to play totally snore-core without drums and without miking up our amps. If we even sing too loud they have to kick us off. This sucks. Big time.
REGRETFULLY AT THE PRESENT TIME THE EMPRESS HOTEL HAS NO ALTERNATIVE BUT TO COMPLY WITH THESE RIDICULOUS LAWS AND AS SUCH IS RELUCTANTLY CANCELLING SOME OF THE OF THE ADVERTISED BANDS WHO CANNOT MEET THE STRINGENT REQUIREMENTS DEMANDED BY THE CURRENT LIQUOR LAWS.
IF IS WITH GREAT SADNESS AFTER MORE THAN FIFTEEN YEARS OF AWESOME MUSIC THAT THE MANAGEMENT HAS BEEN REDUCED TO TAKING SUCH DRASTIC MEASURES BUT UNLESS THIS IS DONE AND WE CAN SORT THIS OUT, THERE IS A VERY REAL THREAT TO THE MELBOURNE LIVE MUSIC SCENEWE RELY AS ALWAYS ON THE SUPPORT AND GOODWILL OF ALL MELBOURNE MUSICIAN S, THE LIVE MUSIC INDUSTRY IN GENERAL AND OF COURSE ALL THOSE MUSIC LOVERS PAST AND PRESENT. THE STAFF & I WOULD LIKE TO THANK YOU FOR YOUR PAST LOYALTY AND TRUST YOU WILL GIVE US YOUR FULL SUPPORT AT THIS DIFFICULT TIME
(ALBEIT QUIETER MUSIC 85 DBA)
Sincerely
Sandra Eunson
Licensee
The Empress Hotel
Any support would be greatly appreciated.
Any questions please contact Natalie (03)9482 4604
The Shape of Pear
Wednesday, 30 April 2003
Though my blog has been online, I had a major drama with Movable Type - yesterday I was suddenly unable to log in. So that really sucked - and after trawling the support forums and harrassing my poor server person, last night I gave up. Then, this morning, in response to my second plea for help in the MT Support Forum, someone suggested I remove the mt-rebuild plugin that I had installed. I did. It was like someone had waved a wand. All fixed!! (Regardless of the fact that I had reinstalled MT three times to no avail….). So that’s that drama over.
Here’s the pic I was planning on posting yesterday.
Eyebags are great, aren’t they?! Ugh. Due to a phone call I got yesterday from the bank, all my housing plans are thrown into disarray again. This time it was mega-stress. Everything has to be sorted by Friday (which actually means Thursday, so they have Friday to sort it out) and they call me and say that because the house needs some work done on it, they will be witholding up to 10k of my loan while I get the work done (and I’m not allowed to do it myself, I have to get a tradesperson in to do it) who will then invoice me for all the work, and I will give the invoice to the bank who will pay out the tradesperson. Oh, and btw, they also need a building inspection done.
Saucy Gibbon?!
Monday, 19 May 2003
Now behave! First of all (you may attempt to correct me if I’m wrong, but…) the Gibbon was never saucy! It was Funky! Wasn’t it? (Evil seeds of doubt have started to grow in the mushroom compost of my mind….) Anyway, the point is that now I look ridiculous because I started honking hysterically at the thought of calling Boat Saucy Gibbon and then laughing even louder at someone actually seconding the motion. It is wrong. No one in my office knows I blog, and I’m trying to keep it that way….giggling into my monitor is not helping.
For those people who have been asking me why I’m not decked out like a cheerleader (it’s what my mother always wanted for me) celebrating the entrapment of my house….the settlement date was extended to this Wednesday after much nail-biting negotiation directly with the owner. Speaking of my mother, she asked me last night whether I was going to break out the champagne on Wednesday…I think that I will buy a bottle (if it all goes well), but only to use for for great effect when I clout myself over the head with it and slip into blessed unconsiousness. About three days would be enough.
NO SAUCY GIBBON. Personally, if we’re sticking with that theme, Boat has three hulls and I would like them each to have a name. Thus I would name them;
1. (outside hull) - MARGE
2. (main hull) - and
3. (outside hull) - TINA
(…please excuse me, I have no idea why I find myself so endlessly amusing. Tee hee hee.)
Soup Nazi
Wednesday, 21 May 2003
Last night I went out for pizza with the two people that I share an office with and three other girls that used to work here. Since the majority of people live in Brunswick we decided to go to the pizza-to-die-for place called I Carusi. I’ve been there a couple of times before and the pizza is quite amazing. O booked for 6:30pm but then we realised that 7pm would be better, so he called up and asked whether we could move our booking forward to 7pm and the evil soup-nazi guy that answered the phone screamed ‘NO!’ and put down the phone!! O was horrified. It really is quite a soup-naziesque place; you can only pay in cash, it’s byo and they don’t answer the phone during the day, only at night. But, like I said, they do make the best ever pizza, and most people are willing to put up with all the other stuff. We did. And they were perfectly nice to us when we got there…
Remember to Breathe
Wednesday, 4 June 2003
Well, [m i a o w] did ‘coffee’ with the null device and swapped our respective bits and pieces, then wandered back to our mutual place of work and took turns peering at each other’s offices. I realised later that the null device almost blew my blogging cover when pointing at my desk he said ‘I recognise that from the picture you posted!’
N pricked up her ears and said, ‘Posted?’
I feigned nonchalance and tried to steer everything in another direction. Hee hee. I will be gone before my blogging is ever discovered, mwah ha ha ha.
Am in the pleasant state of being continually surrounded by clumps of my own hair - torn out in a riot of general frustration and overload! Have to get my weather thingy finished before Friday (and so why am I blogging I hear you ask? Don’t ask.) and now it seems that the content for my next webpage project will not reach me until Monday…cutting out a whole bloody four five (stupid Queens Birthday holiday) days where I could be working on it. Argh.
Freak-Out-Time
Tuesday, 10 June 2003
A warning to all and sundry of my friends and aquaintances. I am going INSANE. Just so you know. The house looks like it’s been harbouring a Labor Party meeting, still haven’t bought a trailer, haven’t finished the website I’m working on (which is slowly morphing into it’s own hazardous area) and I am fighting with M. (Who will probably demand I remove those five words from this page if he ever discovers them here.) It all comes down to what different people think is OK and not OK to throw out. If I went into details the explosion would ricochet around the globe for days…so…lips pursed and fingers stiff…I shall stick instead with an uneasy peace.
Death, Divorce & Moving
Monday, 16 June 2003
Can’t blog. Too inundated by huge amounts to do. This seems to have been going on for faaaaar too long. Haven’t even checked email since Thursday or so!! Terrible state of affairs. Am firmly convinced that I will never leave this house, I’ve just entered some sort of purgatory where I will clean it endlessly with no visible improvement for the rest of life as we know it. Apparently my father is coming tomorrow - this instils me with great fear - he’s going to take one look at this house and kick me all the way to Queensland (which admittedly would be a quicker way to travel). I just do not have time to write about all the people we’ve seen who have helped us, said goodbye, helped us some more, Friday’s gig, the continuing debacle of the trailer, the non-existent brake lights, the new whitewall tyres, the scary carpet, our inability to leave town on time…I could go on and on, but it’s after 1am and tomorrow is going to be the most full on day so far (considering we were supposed to have left yesterday). Have included some pics from the past ten days - and have just been mail some from Dyl taken at Friday night’s excellent show with Mrs. Pinkwhistle.
Sorry that I barely saw you at the gig Claire! I feel B-A-D! :o(
Roosters of Doom
Monday, 30 June 2003
Life is…well, I won’t say trundling along, but kind of staggering in jagged steps. Am definitely not used to living a ten to fifteen minute drive (depending on where I need to go) from things. The only supermarket that is open in Hervey Bay on a Sunday is way at the top end of town *sigh*. I have to try and break away from my ‘two-minutes-from-everything’ inner city thinking.
The other day M decided that it would be good to ‘tack up a flyscreen’ on one of our bedroom windows and then proceeded to spend all of one afternoon making an elaborate frame, fitting it to the window, planing off the edges, fitting it again. I didn’t point out that he wouldn’t be getting a trophy for his efforts, but just continued to fill the three million nail holes in the walls that have to be filled before we can paint. Anyway, the screen was finally completed and we left the window open during the night as moths threw themselves against it from the outside… And then I learnt a valuable lesson. Not only are the many windows in Queensland homes highly decorative, they are also made of Very Thick Glass. As the night progressed, neighbour no.1’s dog would bark, which would set off neighbor no.2’s dog, which in turn would set off the rest of the dogs in the street. This would have been bearable, but then all the dogs in the street then woke up neighbor no.1’s rooster (yes, that’s right) which then found itself in competition with neighbor no.2’s rooster, followed promptly by neighbor no.3’s rooster. All the rooster noise then put the dogs to shame, everything quietened down, only to repeat the whole performance every hour or so…
Needless to say, my eyebags were impressive.
Pine-ing. Where are my friends?
Saturday, 12 July 2003
See our friends, see the sights, feel alright!’
- Supergrass
Let me just break down the above into my current state of mind.
‘We are young…’
OK - we are young. Compared to most of the people in Hervey Bay - we’re barely born.
‘We are free.’
OK. More so than we were.
‘With our teeth, nice and clean.’
Our teeth, I have to say, are not as clean as they could be. This is something that happens when you’re only access to running water is outside the house in the carport.
‘See our friends….’
This is where the problem lies, I will expand on this in a moment.
‘See the sights…’
Well, no. We’re renovating.
‘Feel alright.’
Feeling actually OK, except for missing friends…..
I suppose this has all come on because we’ve just gone out AT NIGHT for the first time since we’ve got here. M’s sister and brother-in-law threw a BBQ for their neighbours and we were invited…well, not invited exactly…it was just assumed we would be in attendance. So of course, we were. One set of their neighbours have only been in residence for as long as we have… The female half of the couple was quite nice to talk to, though I did have a hidden fear that she was about to turn around and display some bizarre racist personality disorder. It didn’t happen, but my suspicion was there. Her other half, on the other hand, was just a scary guy…full of talk about guns…killing animals, tasteful things like that… I endeavoured to avoid him. Successfully.
There was no one there that M or I had anything in common with. I miss my friends. I can’t say this is a surprise, but until now I’ve been too busy to mope
:o(
I moped. I want someone I can have a giggle with…
Sleep now.
Grrrowl.
Sunday, 27 July 2003
Bloody laptop. No wonder it’s stolen. It just crashed and ate a huge post that I’d written up discussing the peculiarity of Hervey Bay and it’s strange habits of garage sale attendence. Bloody laptop. To paraphrase my post as I’m too frustrated to type it all again from the black hole that doubles as my brain; on Friday I went to a garage sale and bought a book by H.G Wells The War in the Air published in 1908 ‘only for distribution in India and the Colonies’. I found it on a rare book site when I got home selling for about $200. Huzzah!
Today M and I bestowed our presence on Koala Markets and purchased books (another Carl Hiassen), tomatos, snow peas, potatoes, a shirt, boat books, a digital answering maching (to replace ours which is a cassette one and still buried in a box somewhere) and….tra la….two couches!
The Splendid Floral
The Splendid Pinky Thing
Must wave a big hello to Merimbula where Ellise’s dad has been reading (and apparently enjoying) [m i a o w]. I toasted you with a glass of cheap white, Terry! On the same topic of personal greetings, Bean, if you’re out there, please say hello from whatever country you happen to be in at present so I know that your existence continues unabated ;o)
Sick
Tuesday, 5 August 2003
Feel as if I have had a large stinky bird fall from the sky and land on the top of my head and sit there, unmoving. All joints achey and lots of shakes. I don’t understand. I haven’t been sick for a year. Out! Get out of me! The only thing that could be worse than dragging a suitcase, guitar and laptop from Brisbane to Melbourne via about five train stations is doing it when ill. Grrrrr. Have just hung out all washing that needs to be dry in time for tonight to pack. Luckily I am in Queensland and it will happen….back in Melbourne I would have just hung everything on the heater. (Just to keep the whining note of this post intact) whilst hanging everything on the line I almost perished of heat exhaustion. When will someone invent the hat that is invisibly attached to one’s person, able to be whacked on your head whenever necessary? Feeling vile makes me more irrational than normal.
If anyone in Melbourne is keen on crime fiction there is a cool night on at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image next Tuesday that I’m going to try and get along to. It looks like it will be v.interesting. Click here for the flyer. The other thing I’ve been doing is revamping the Bidston Moss website; seeing as the facists have their hold on the domain until the 7th of August, I though the time was ripe. If you are curious, you can take a peek here - though it’s nowhere near finished yet! Excuse me now while I go and subside into a little heap of sore joints and floppy limbs. I have to leave at five in the morning, yes, five in the morning, to get the stupid $50 train to Brisbane. Ugh.
Shoot Me Soon
Tuesday, 12 August 2003
If I hear the words ‘methodology’ and ‘paradigm’ and ‘community’ and ‘preparedness’ one more time today…this page will become vewy vewy quiet. Yes. I am CONFERENCED OUT! And I have to go to another one tomorrow where they will probably all waffle on about the same words, though it will be a different topic. Goddamnit, I can’t stand being locked in a room all day with freaky people who use those words as casually as they breathe. Argh. Argh. Argh.
I Just Had To
Thursday, 21 August 2003
I keep forgetting to do frivolous posts (what post isn’t frivolous?) with my freaky style plugins. Obviously you can see from this one that I’m cockney, but if I wanted I could be a Swedish chef, a valley girl or just talk to you in jive. Hee hee. Hello to the lovely Claire with whom I was supposed to see a movie tonight - we will get our culture shot next week (well, I will, Claire is dripping with cinematic culture already…half her luck).
Burn the Banks
Monday, 25 August 2003
On Thursday I transferred some money online from HSBC to my credit union account. No joy - Friday came and I was still broke. I called up HSBC (which, if you’re interested, henceforth stands for His Satanic Bastard Conglomerate) and they primly asked me for my ‘transaction reference number’. Now collecting these numbers is actually one of the few organised things I actually do, so I went to seek it out. Naturally for the first time ever, I had recorded everything about the transaction except for the reference number. Teeth gritted, face beet-ed, I said I would live on rice for the weekend and in the meantime would try…again.
On Thursday I transferred some money online from HSBC to my credit union account. Now it’s Monday. Still no money. But this time I had the transaction reference number and rang His Satanic Bastard Conglomerate rigid with righteous fury. I became one of those people who used to haunt me when I worked at call centres. I would not be placated, I would not be put off, and most importantly… I would not hang up. Ever. So I waited. I refused to give them my number so a supervisor could call me back when one became available. During one of the interminable hold periods, the ever-polite David finally ceased insisting that my transaction didn’t exist (but that if I wanted him to do it for me now, that was fine, though there would be a FEE involved… gah) and spoke to the onsite internet guru (his words). Guru found my non-existent transaction waiting in line to be fixed. Which was just great - if they could have just let me know that it needed to be ‘fixed’ in the first place, I may have been slightly more amenable.
Finally, after about 30 minutes, what it came down to was that they had a problem with the BSB number I had provided for my credit union account. This is despite the fact that I had provided it on the phone last Friday when I called to make sure that the transaction was not going to get ‘lost’ or ‘misplaced’. And they had said it was ‘fine’. So they have ‘a problem’ with the BSB number that hundreds of other banks use successfully everyday, they also have ‘a problem’ with numerous and unrelated petrol stations; when you try to buy your petrol using your card, the machine rejects it and you are left feeling humiliated and scrambling for that other tool of satan…the mastercard. (Naturally the question now arises… why do I bank with them? It’s for one reason only. They have totally free EFTPOS. And for the million and three trips to Bunnings while renovating to tiny budget, this is a good thing. This was a good thing.)
They tell me to call the credit union and then… make the transaction again. What they mean is, ‘we’re going to palm it off to the other party that’s involved and you may try, if you have the patience, to transfer your money FOR THE THIRD TIME. So I call the credit union. I speak to a nice person. She says that the BSB I’m using is fine, everyone uses it. Then her voice drops lower and she confides that there is in existence another, secret BSB number for those crap banks that can’t get their acts together. She tells me what it is.
Once I get off the phone for the first time since arriving at work, I decide that I am not going to give His Satanic Bastard Conglomerate another chance. I have bills to pay that I need to sort out today, and more to the point, I have no money. (Well, I do have some money, but it’s my sisters and I don’t want to use it.) I strap on my Uzi and gather my hand grenades and set off, sturdy of gait, stout of heart, and with jaw resolutely set. I head for the city branch. I storm-trooper my way in through the convieniently responsive automatic doors. I stride down to the back of the bank, become disoriented, and decide, sulkily, to line up for a teller. The tide turns. I get Teller of the Year. I tell her all the angst her bank has been causing me, show her my famous transaction reference number, give her my drivers license and say, with trembling lips, ‘My card is in Queensland and I have to withdraw this money. Please….please be the one brave enough to end this vicious charade of customer service. Blight it bluntly to the ground!’
It only took about seven minutes. It was extraordinary. This transaction was something I’d been sweating on for days, and Teller of the Year didn’t even perspire. And she gave me $20 extra… I’m not sure whether this was her way of commiserating with my suffering or it was just a mistake, either way, I felt vindicated. I took my money over to the post office, deposited it into my credit card account via the wondrous GiroPost and there it sits. Ready to be eaten by my debtors. I have organised for my pay to NEVER go into the His Satanic Bastard Conglomerate account again, and hopefully I will be able to close the account at some rosy point in my future. Banks suck. Use a credit union.