.: seven :....oh gods be spanked, I'm becoming addicted to not smoking !@%&*

today is my rostered day off. I worked Sunday you see, which isn't as bad as it may sound... I had only 3 calls, one of them from a manager asking if there had been any calls for his particular client and another two simple ones from a lady in New Zealand. See... easy. I did some work for this frontline management course I have undertaken through work. It's ok too, there's a lot of psychology in management I find.


The day before (often known as Saturday) I went to the Macquarie centre and bought a nice new fish tank for work (this one is large and plastic, I can't vouch for the durability of the 'old' one [don't want to come in and have to clean up 40L of dirty fish water AND explain to my manager how I'm going to replace a few thousand dollars worth of computer equipment])... it's a bit larger than I thought it was, but i think that's better than being too small. I ducked into work quickly after buying it (work is just down the road from the shopping centre) and quickly set it up, then went into the city for an afternoon of beer, pool and eating steak with my friend Link. I smoked a few cigarettes too, although as I'm writing this I have had no nicotine whatsoever for about 36hrs (that includes nicobate gum), so that's good.

I actually surprised how much I wanted a cigarette on Sunday morning... damn those things are stupidly addictive. The novelty is over, time for them to go. As I've been saying to people : cigarettes just aren't making me seem as cool as I thought they would.


Oh yeh, I lost my debit card Saturday too, so i'm running on empty for (according to the bank guy who I spoke to to order a new card) at the latest the 19th. That's 12 days. Of course, technically I can get money... I'm not going to starve to death, but it's an interesting experiment to play with yourself.

This is linked I guess to my previous post (all those months ago), I have this preoccupation with life needing to feel real. I'm not sure if I can explain that more clearly : I'll try....

When I lived in Wagga, things just seemed more vibrant, time passed more slowly, my senses seemed more alive (well, most of the time). I was earning less money, had no car, but life was good. Now it seems to meld from typical day to typical day... and like some of my other friends, I spend the weekend trying to recover from the week. To quote Office Space : "we're not meant to live our lives this way!".


I've just come back from a nice walk along some bush trails in my area and found myself analysing how and when I use different senses while at work:

• sight : limited focus length (at a computer screen) ~ part of the job
  
• hearing : listening to customers and managers and colleagues ~ part of the job
  
• touch : inanimate objects (kbd, mouse), occasionally someone with come up and play with my hair.
  
• taste : when I have lunch, or a cup of tea, coffe or a snack during a break.
  
• smell : when I have lunch, or a cup of tea, coffe or a snack or a walk outside or in the atrium during a break.
  

...Both smell and taste are never used in the course of my work, and touch is usually only of inanimate objects. Even if we give touch the benefit of the doubt, I'm only using half of my senses during my working day. It doesn't sound so strange that I've started growing flowers at home, having remedial massage and enjoying cooking. I'm being starved of sensory input.


I had a second massage on Wednesday evening. I can still feel the difference a week later. Magic. I plan to go again in two or three weeks.


I had a dream last night that my gf of a couple of years ago, JM and I were having coffee and cake and talking of getting back together. It felt sweet, uplifting. But I woke up, and she wasn't here. I still miss her quirky insights.
I'm the only one of the three of us living in this house who is single. It's lonely for sure... but there's always a flip side... (no matter how horribly practical it is), I'm spending more time on my art and music, and I'm crawling ever closer to being debt free, it may still take 18 months or so, but things will be amazing when that time comes. I'm going to reward myself with a holiday I think. The grand plan after that would at this stage probably be looking towards a deposit for a house, although I'm keeping my eyes on the news re: interest rates and the housing situation in Sydney, by that stage it may be time for a move elsewhere, although I like that there is always something happening in Sydney, although do I like WHAT is happening?.
I guess seeing myself make statements like that only reaffirms that I possible don't yet have a well-formed overview of Sydney yet. I've been here for what? 5 years now? I've lost count.

plug. plug. I stumbled across the blog of dazelie...and I think you should read it.

...That's about enough of my ranting at the moment. I hope this finds you well.


...more soon.

.: six :. the other white meat


...You might be relieved to read that I am a bit surprised myself to find that the motivating factor in adding this entry was a line from 'pinky and the brain', the topic being the importance of recreation by, of course, brain.

"recreate.... you must recreate yourself by persuing diversions apart from your quotidian responsibilities."

...now dictionary.com lists recreation as being :

"\Rec"re*a"tion\ (-?"sh?n), n. [F. r['e]cr['e]ation, L. recreatio.] The act of recreating, or the state of being recreated; refreshment of the strength and spirits after toil; amusement; diversion; sport; pastime."

and quotidian...

quo·tid·i·an (kw-td-n)
adj. Everyday; commonplace: “There's nothing quite like a real... train conductor to add color to a quotidian commute”


...and for some reason that phrase just clicked with me... I've been working on so much for so long now (being a logging system for kids holiday activities for a council down in melbourne) that suddenly to have it finished-and-delivered-and-working to the customer has left a gap in my headspace that i'm now searching now to fill.


I have plenty of things to do: music, art, website stuff, graphic design, I could even include in this list things that i would put on my 'to do' list like learning to cook something new, learn another language, ...yet i procrastinate.


...and i was wondering why. And it's not just me, I have several good friends which i have talked to about this, and they feel similarly.


...The above 'pinky and the brain' quote, while i won't go overboard and say caused an epiphany, made me realise at least one reason why this might be. Everything i do has a goal, be it in itself or part of a bigger picture. I don't really do anything 'just for', for the fun of itself (ok, perhaps bar a few drinks with friends on the weekend). I have always wanted to put together a comic strip, not become a side-character in one.


So I am going to get out there and experiment with this...


I remember saying not so long ago how much more ready for work i would feel on monday morning if i had got out on the weekend and just 'done something' (typically walking around the city, going to the markets, perhaps the beach, shopping, dinner somewhere..) and i previously offered some reasons why that might be:

• exposure to sun after a week in the office gives me a vitamin d boost [known to decrease depression],


• physical exercise releasing endorphins,


• buying new *stuff*, otherwise known as 'retail therapy'


• perhaps just simply: doing something different,

....and i think i can add my new reasoning to this.

...In other news, last Friday night was our work xmas party, complete with elvis impersonator. It was held at 'le montage' restaurant.
... I cooked prawn curry for dinner. It was good.

....later.

:: five :protective shells :: I have nothing to say to you people...

Good news everyone!
...and good news that I'd almost (ok, i had) forgotten to add here.
The first ever Klang* has finally come full circle.... thats right... Mick tried tofu...and i actually think he liked it.
Again, a laksa was involved but it must be about 4 years since... well... read on....

...to steal from the junglehouse messageboard (but thats ok, coz i wrote this bit there too) :

"Eggs dont have a protective shell" ~ mick.

"We were all out at noodle king in lane cove eating laksa or similar, when mick, our culinary indiana jones, basically refused to try tofu. We tried to convince him from all different angles...the "try something new, variety is the spice of life" angle, the "it doesn't really have a taste of it's own" angle... somebody said something along the lines of "it's kinda like a cross between egg and bread"...to which mick replied "...but eggs don't have a protective shell".. i think more laksa was spat in outburst in that moment than had been eaten in the last ten minutes.. He tried to explain what he meant to say... which only resulted in his please being brushed aside and the phrase "what i meant to say was.." outlawed forever in Klang defence. The Klang was born... "

*Klang
The awarding of a "Klang" is an age old junglehouse ritual that involves the "Klangee" saying, or doing, something that causes those around them to react with wonder, laughter, surprise and/or ridicule, when what the Klangee "meant to say" or, do was entirely different.

:: four :: snowboarding, sydney's first flashmob, birthday surprises.

Welcome. Ahh to have fallen into the same trap as soOo many in this online age, the unfulfilled promise of the update.
"More soon" they cry. Terrible last words.
Today is the day after my 30th birthday, and i feel great. The guys surprised me with an awesome dinner out at Taings in Darling Harbour on Saturday night, which was a friendly little thai place with awesome food : highly recommended. Let me see: who came : Fredescu, Mchunraha, Link, Miguel, Myles, Gibbo and myself. Other than the first two, who are my current housemates, it's terrible how little I get to see my friends in this great age of interconnection. I like the idea of future mobile phones having a buddy-list like icq or messenger and alerting you when someone on your list is in the vicinity. I wish that :
A: this was my idea
B: the technology was more easily available for the layperson to dabble with. Such a system would require a close vicinity network in order to be truly useful, but such network are the backbone of the *new wave of wireless mobile computing* ie; grabbing your mobile phone/pda and requesting : "
"Where is the nearest restaurant selling seafood laksa for under $13?" or "For gods sake, will someone tell me where the nearest public toilet is?"
All too soon, no doubt, there's money to be made.
Anyway, now where were we?
Aha. the night of the birtthday... after dinner we ventured (in the start of the winds and rain that blasted sydney [up to 140km/hr!] the next day) across to the Star City Casino and up through it's imposing atmosphere, to the cocktail bar on [i think] the 7th floor. That was a sweet time, often whe we organise group dinners [omg it's been way too long] the thrilling part for me, while it's fantastic to have everybody i love around me, is often the feeling that I'm perforating an atmosphere that I would not normally. That is...
...And i hate to give the game away...
but the lives of my friends and I are not usually [or at least that often] what you would call the swinging, dapper, cocktail crowd.
But i guess thats not the point, and if it IS the point, then it's probably a fairly obvious one.
Most people love the escapism from the trudgery that throwing on your best clothes and sipping cocktails above the city affords them. And.. Hell! living like a little bit of a slob part of the time not only saves you cash for such high-flying ventures, but also enhances the appeal when actually out and at it. Until you come home that is.

so yeh, anyway, the big surprise that i had not expected was a shiny new hp scanjet 3750c waiting for when we got home. Thanks guys, I know i said it at the time, but here it is officially. a VERY nice gift.

A couple of weeks ago a group of 6 of us guys (mostly from work) took a week or so off work to head down south for a bit of snowboarding. And maan was it great. SoOo very addictive, Its not going to be the last time that i strap on a snowbaord i truly hope. After a week of that, and the associative partying, I bid the lads farewell and caught the bus down *south from canberra to melbourne. I was wondering why it was so cheap ($60) and that became obvious when I realised it was Canberra to Melbourne via Wagga Wagga ... aah t'was grand to see my old stomping ground again, if only for 3 minutes as we passed through.
The important thing is that I got to Melbourne eventually, (and quite frankly was relieved to be able to sit down for 9 hours) and *shock* horror* actually met Dale who I have been friends with for approx 3 yrs now via web and phone. We got to spend some quality time together, and I really appreciated him making time. I also was able to see my friend Tamara, and had a great day at the Outre Gallery with Trina, a friend I made via one of our corporate customers at work. The gallery is highly recommended. Go and support them, there should be more places like that on the planet.

Dale and I spent a day and a half in Ballarat, we did a couple of tourist things, which were surprisingly interesting, and I managed to hit the town for a night as a local... getting back to the hotel at 4am. Its amazing how you dance when you realise you'll most likely never see any of these people again.

Sydney had it's first flashmob on Saturday 23rd August. Naturally I had to go, and I'm happy to say that it was a resounding success, mad props to all involved, I can't wait until the next opportunity to engage in a little en masse tom-foolery.

..aah thats about enough for the time being.
..more soonish.

:: three :: concerning transport and visitors from afar...



well, here we are, a month older than our last chat. Quite a bit has been a-happening...
I've actually picked up my car. Shock! It was a little bit of a hair-raising journey, but we made it in one piece. Much better at getting around now, in case anyone reading is considering launching into emergency driving tactics when they encounter me next out in peak hour. Sydney traffic is a strange beast. I try to not get caught up in all the hoohar and just think how it pumps around this great city of ours, like the blood I guess traffic, in essence is. What would more constitute the blood flow of a city than the seemingly endless ebb and gush of cars, truck and motorbikes. I'm pretty dissappointed with Sydneys attempts at bicycle lanes. I guess congestion is peaking enough without sacrificing another slab of the all-so-precious roadway to such a minority. Pity. I'm also going to be a bit of a nancy-boy and say that good ol' Syd is a bit more hilly than Wagga, for instance, (and to be honest, Sydneysiders are a little softer than the country folk, the taxi drivers are often telling me that bizness takes a savage downward turn at the first hint of a cooler change. Maybe thats just cabbie talk though. Maybe it's not.)
So, yeh, i'm vehicled. Not sure I'm sold on the idea entirely, I've said it before, but i LIKE public transport. All the complaints that ppl may have, that it smells, that there are strange ppl around, that it's unreliable, it all in a way feel like just part of the adventure of getting somewhere. Perhaps part of me is still a bit rural?, but i don't really feel like that. In fact, i never really felt like a rural, even though i spent the first 18 yrs of my life there.. I never ever, considered the option of staying in Leeton, which is odd in that personally, i always considered myself to play it pretty cozy and safe, yet i ran as soon as i could.



Amiko came out from Japan on the 25th may for a week of madly running around sydney with me. We had a great time, went up to Katoomba, in the Blue Mountains, which is definately a place i'd like to explore a bit more. It was nice to have my shedule completed uprooted for a while. The fog in Katoomba was amazing.
Did i say that i had to call the NRMA for the first time this evening, I got out of work to discover that I'd left the lights on and the battery was dead flat. Aah, i think it's almost an initiation isn't it?
Whatever.
Anyway. 2moro is saturday and i'm rostered to work from 10:30 till 7. Hope it's quiet.
I've got some music to listen to.
goodnight.