Wednesday, 28 January 2009
Shitshitshittyshitshit
So, I just checked the flight I want to take to the UK and it's GONE UP BY $100. SHIT! Stupid uni. I have a meeting to attend on Feb 10th. I want this sorted and done. I'm going to go email the woman from U Dortmund and have her send me the class listings if they're available.
Tuesday, 27 January 2009
I could buy groceries...
... or I could buy this:
It's $38. It's the cutest thing I've ever seen. Except knowing me, I'd lose the letter part the first time I wore it.
Monday, 26 January 2009
Getting my Wine-on.
So yesterday Bec, Emma, Michael, Simon and I piled into my shoebox of a car and drove to the vineyards for the day. After a tiny detour to Brisbane (jokes! but I did take the wrong turn - and immediately realised my mistake, so it cannot be seen as me getting lost), we went to my cousin's vineyard which is so very far away. Got there, drank all her desert liquers, bought one because I felt like I had to, then went on.
The next place was down the road and really cute (Simon thought the girl was also). There's this sculptures in the Vineyards thing going, and at my cousin's they had rhinoceri (sp?) and at this place they had a big hanging skeleton and a giant pick-up-sticks. Sorry, it wasn't pick-up-sticks, it was reminiscent of the children's game, but really represents the game of life. My bad. So altough this cellar was cute, as you walk in there's a pile of deer skins for sale wih the tag, "skins from our farm," which is a little disconcerting. Plus, there was a great big stag head mounted on the wall, complete with bullet hole near the eye. Lovely. This is probably incredibly hypocritical of me, considering the fact that I eat meat and wear leather, but it just feels so wrong to exhibit dead animals like that, almost as if to say, "Yeah, animal, how d'you like me now? I can beat you cos I have a gun."
Anyway, next we had a picnic lunch at the Hunter Valley Gardens. The boys did their man thing and barbequed, which is ALWAYS appreciated. Have I mentioned how much better food tastes when you haven't cooked it yourself. It's a fact. I read it. In a book.
Next we went to McGuigans which was a total bust. Much too busy and in the end we didn't bother. We tried some cheese though, so that was OK. After that it was on to Tempus Two. We were served by Alannah who was so lovely! She made us try a whole bunch of wines that weren't on the list so we could find some that we liked. She was so helpful and cheery and had wonderful descriptions of the wines, and when we found out she was going to U Newcastle sometime in the near future studying what Simon and I are studying it got even better. Wrote her a nice complement and bought a couple of bottles there.
Next we went onto Bimbadgen, our last stop, and who should I see but my friend Jemma, who I met in Chicago! She's working at the cellar there until she goes to London in five weeks. So weird to run into her after I hadn't seen her since 0-Ball. Everyone put in to buy me a bottle of wine from there, which was so nice, and then we headed home, everyone incredibly tired after a very long day.
The next place was down the road and really cute (Simon thought the girl was also). There's this sculptures in the Vineyards thing going, and at my cousin's they had rhinoceri (sp?) and at this place they had a big hanging skeleton and a giant pick-up-sticks. Sorry, it wasn't pick-up-sticks, it was reminiscent of the children's game, but really represents the game of life. My bad. So altough this cellar was cute, as you walk in there's a pile of deer skins for sale wih the tag, "skins from our farm," which is a little disconcerting. Plus, there was a great big stag head mounted on the wall, complete with bullet hole near the eye. Lovely. This is probably incredibly hypocritical of me, considering the fact that I eat meat and wear leather, but it just feels so wrong to exhibit dead animals like that, almost as if to say, "Yeah, animal, how d'you like me now? I can beat you cos I have a gun."
Anyway, next we had a picnic lunch at the Hunter Valley Gardens. The boys did their man thing and barbequed, which is ALWAYS appreciated. Have I mentioned how much better food tastes when you haven't cooked it yourself. It's a fact. I read it. In a book.
Next we went to McGuigans which was a total bust. Much too busy and in the end we didn't bother. We tried some cheese though, so that was OK. After that it was on to Tempus Two. We were served by Alannah who was so lovely! She made us try a whole bunch of wines that weren't on the list so we could find some that we liked. She was so helpful and cheery and had wonderful descriptions of the wines, and when we found out she was going to U Newcastle sometime in the near future studying what Simon and I are studying it got even better. Wrote her a nice complement and bought a couple of bottles there.
Next we went onto Bimbadgen, our last stop, and who should I see but my friend Jemma, who I met in Chicago! She's working at the cellar there until she goes to London in five weeks. So weird to run into her after I hadn't seen her since 0-Ball. Everyone put in to buy me a bottle of wine from there, which was so nice, and then we headed home, everyone incredibly tired after a very long day.
Saturday, 24 January 2009
Lists
Things that are really difficult to do without contacts:
- Your hair. Unless I'm standing with my face pressed against the mirror, all I see is a blur, but a blur in the Monet sense, and I think it looks good. Then I put my glasses on and get a fright. But try doing your hair with glasses on - not happening. And so, for the last week and a half, I've looked like a hot mess and have just stopped caring.
- Your makeup. Bitch, please. If I can't see my hair, I definately can't see my face. And besides, the glasses cover up any attempt at eye makeup, so it doesn't matter. Or, maybe they don't, but I've become such a frump behind these glasses that I've stopped caring about covering up the dark circles.
- Driving in summer. You know what would be nice? Not having to squint through the sun. I would love to wear my glasses but I can't due to the whole not-being-able-to-see thing. Some people are really particular about that.
- Falling asleep watching TV. When I was a little kid, one of the neighbourhood kids was at my place (that stupid mole from down the road, Alicia, who was the only person in the entire world that has ever made a racist comment to me in my entire life and wasn't joking. Stupid bitch) and left a metal wind-up toy on my bed, which I didn't notice when I went to bed. I was about 5 at the time. I woke up screaming and had cut the corner of my eye on the toy. So I cannot even think about sleep if my glasses are on. These puppies are both metal and glass - imagine what would happen if I rolled over onto my stomach or something!
- Seeing. The prescription on these is from when I was in year 12. I've been practically blind wearing these.
And the stupid optometrist is driving me insane because they have to order me trial contacts. That takes a week.
Also, I've been reading a lot of travel guides lately and even though the stupid uni won't do anything about the exchange until uni starts up again, I've been trying to start organising myself for the trip, because it is in only six months' time! And so...
Things that I WON'T be packing when I go overseas:
- 10 pairs of shoes. Yeah, that wasn't my smartest move when I went to the US. I barely wore half of them, and they took up so much space! So this time I'll just bring: one pair of havaianas, a pair of black flats, a pair of walking shoes (maybe some mary-jane style Colorados), some dress shoes? and maybe my tan flats from Marshalls with the open toes. Oh, and my tan boots...So that's not a lot less. I could maybe cut out the heels, and just buy something cheap if I really need to, or just wear the black flats.... hmmm.... I need to think about this more...
- 3 different photo albums. Really wasn't necessary, although two were gifts from my friends and were great to look through when I was homesick. But really added a lot of bulk. I won't need any photo albums. I have photos on the internet, my laptop and on my ipod. That's enough.
- 2 towels. Did I really need the beach towel? How many beaches did I go to in the US? And my host family obviously already owned towels. It seemed like a good idea at the time.
- The clothes that I never wore at home but suddenly thought I'd wear overseas. I didn't.
- More than 1 book. I took so many books overseas and only read about 2 of the books I brought. I ended up buying a bunch of books and then having to lug everything home. And I ended up leaving a couple of books in the States, like that 2nd hand copy of Wuthering Heights from Martha's Vineyard that was so cute!
- 2 suitcases. I want to be able to travel on those cheap-as economy flights. They barely let you bring one 15kg suitcase, let alone the two 30kg suitcases I had. I may need to purchase a backpack. Yuck.
- A guidebook. I only brought one big one when I went to the US, but I only used it once, and it was crap. So no guidebooks for me.
- So much jewelery. I brought so much to the US, many things I'd never worn before, and ended up buying so much more that there's no point. Plus, I don't really accessorise very much anyway.
Wednesday, 21 January 2009
Yuck
Went for a walk this morning because I haven't been in ages. I woke up at nine though. I should have just given it a miss - it's already so hot by nine, and I'm not one of those people who's face sweats. Does that make sense? It was explained to me in science back in year 9 or 10 (whichever year I had Mrs. Touma) about how your face is supposed to sweat so as to cool you down. Well, I sweat everywhere BUT my face, which turns a lovely shade of purple. Good fun. It's only now, two hours later, that it's finally returned to a semi normal shade. Yuck.
In about 10 mins some people are going to come to look at the house. They're going to be really young - one of them will be 17. Imagine living out of home at 17. No thanks. I'm 23 and I wish I was still living at home.
I spent yesterday cleaning out my food cupboard after realising that somewhere down the line I had spilt soy sauce all through it. Great. BUT, it did allow me to see what was actually in my cupboard. Funnily enough I have four types of sugar in there - white, raw (unopened), brown and icing sugar. All were bought for things I've baked, although I think my grandma gave me the raw sugar (no idea why). Plus, I realised that all of those packets of recipe bases that Lara sent me from Germania expire in February, so I've got to get cracking. See? Silver lining. Except that even after I wiped everything down, it still all smells of soy sauce.
Last night I went and saw Bride Wars with the group. I do love my romantic comedies, but **spoiler alert** I'm tired of movies where they suddenly decide that the boyfriend isn't right for the girl, even though he has been wonderful the entire movie - think Sweet Home Alabama. I dunno, it just bugs me. Especially when they don't set it up properly, and midway through the movie start giving him a few crappy traits. But it still had a happy ending, and that's pretty much all I care for.
After that we went to dinner at a pizza place on Darby St which was very yum, then ice cream on the beach, or at least, looking at the beach.
Today's a bit of a nothing - just waiting for the landlords to come over and the people to look at the place... which was supposed to have been 10 mins ago ... then getting new contacts this afternoon, thank god. I've been wearing my glasses for about a week now and they're so old that everything's still really blurry. I was hoping to get both glasses and contacts, but money's tight, especially considering I have to go to the dentist tomorrow. I had to hit mum up for money. ARGH.
Cannot wait until my scholarship money comes along in April.
In about 10 mins some people are going to come to look at the house. They're going to be really young - one of them will be 17. Imagine living out of home at 17. No thanks. I'm 23 and I wish I was still living at home.
I spent yesterday cleaning out my food cupboard after realising that somewhere down the line I had spilt soy sauce all through it. Great. BUT, it did allow me to see what was actually in my cupboard. Funnily enough I have four types of sugar in there - white, raw (unopened), brown and icing sugar. All were bought for things I've baked, although I think my grandma gave me the raw sugar (no idea why). Plus, I realised that all of those packets of recipe bases that Lara sent me from Germania expire in February, so I've got to get cracking. See? Silver lining. Except that even after I wiped everything down, it still all smells of soy sauce.
Last night I went and saw Bride Wars with the group. I do love my romantic comedies, but **spoiler alert** I'm tired of movies where they suddenly decide that the boyfriend isn't right for the girl, even though he has been wonderful the entire movie - think Sweet Home Alabama. I dunno, it just bugs me. Especially when they don't set it up properly, and midway through the movie start giving him a few crappy traits. But it still had a happy ending, and that's pretty much all I care for.
After that we went to dinner at a pizza place on Darby St which was very yum, then ice cream on the beach, or at least, looking at the beach.
Today's a bit of a nothing - just waiting for the landlords to come over and the people to look at the place... which was supposed to have been 10 mins ago ... then getting new contacts this afternoon, thank god. I've been wearing my glasses for about a week now and they're so old that everything's still really blurry. I was hoping to get both glasses and contacts, but money's tight, especially considering I have to go to the dentist tomorrow. I had to hit mum up for money. ARGH.
Cannot wait until my scholarship money comes along in April.
Sunday, 18 January 2009
Drama drama drama!
So Em and Mel came over for dinner and we watched Roman Holiday afterwards (Gregory Peck, sigh). Towards the end of the film we hear a girl scream, so we look at each other and go, huh? I thought it was a neighbour making a playful scream, but when she screamed again, crying "Get away from me," we all got a little worried, especially after it was followed by a guy yelling and banging.
We crept down the driveway and I, for the first time in my life, and hopefully the last time, called 000. And, everyone knows that I'm not the most concise person in the world, right? Well, add to that the fact that I'm whispering so my abusive neighbours don't hear us, I'm nervous as all hell and I have the shakes from the adrenaline coursing through me. I couldn't even remember my street name. I look at Emma and she's like, "Park something?" and suddenly I remembered I'm on Parkhill. Luckily the 000 call centre has magical maps because they were able to figure out the name of the cross-street where we think the house is (please, if I can't remember my street name, do you really think I'm going to remember the name of the street that joins it?). The woman on the phone also reassured me that I'm not just some nosey neighbour pokin my nosey nose into other people's business.
No idea how it all turned out, but I hope so bad that the girl is OK.
We crept down the driveway and I, for the first time in my life, and hopefully the last time, called 000. And, everyone knows that I'm not the most concise person in the world, right? Well, add to that the fact that I'm whispering so my abusive neighbours don't hear us, I'm nervous as all hell and I have the shakes from the adrenaline coursing through me. I couldn't even remember my street name. I look at Emma and she's like, "Park something?" and suddenly I remembered I'm on Parkhill. Luckily the 000 call centre has magical maps because they were able to figure out the name of the cross-street where we think the house is (please, if I can't remember my street name, do you really think I'm going to remember the name of the street that joins it?). The woman on the phone also reassured me that I'm not just some nosey neighbour pokin my nosey nose into other people's business.
No idea how it all turned out, but I hope so bad that the girl is OK.
Friday, 16 January 2009
Thursday, 15 January 2009
Decisions are hard
** SKIP AHEAD BECAUSE THIS IS BORING... ACTUALLY, SKIP THIS POST BECAUSE IT IS ALL BORING **
Currently trying to figure out which subjects to do this semester. I have 20 units to play around with and I've decided to do all history subjects as I'll have to be doing English subs in Germany. I'm also thinking that I should do Ancient history subjects because I do not want to go through the boredom that was last semester's World in the 20th Century. But then I realised that I want to do a sub called Issues in Australian History, which is 20 units, and a subject that is called The French Revolution and Napoleon, which is also 20 units. As hist is my minor, I can only do 50 units all up, and I've already done 20 units last year... so all up I'm screwed. Either I do Australia or I do the French Revolution. I'd much prefer to do the French rev, but I think because I'd be teaching so much Australian history it'd be much more worth my while to do the issues subject.
And have I mentioned that this uni is stupid because they don't have the subjects that correspond with the history syllabus?? One of the subjects I'll have to teach in year 7-8 is:
Medieval and Early Modern Societies:
- Vikings
- Medieval Europe
- the Islamic World
- an Asian country
- the Pacific
- the Americas
- Africa
- Revolutionary Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Way to go, U Newcastle, not having any subjects (except the aforementioned French rev) that correspond.
So basically I've decided to do an ancient hist subject called Greek society and Intermediate Creative Writing 1.
Done. Can't back out now. Or I can, but I can't be bovered.
So Mary and Laura left yesterday. Sad to see them go, but thank God. Mary's so high maintence, but I love her. My bank account doesn't love them though. Oh My God. They were here for three days but I hesitate to check my account to see how much I spent cos I know it was a lot.
Funny thing Mary told me: her favourite teacher at school is her religion teacher, Mr. Fenech. Yes, Em (if you bovered to read this far), that Mr. Fenech, as is Damien. Lol. She thinks he's soooooo hot and soooooo nice and sooooooo ... By this stage I couldn't hear her over my dry wretching. Damien was in the year above us at school. What I don't get is how someone could go back to their old highschool to work. I understand that Ben, Ang's fiance has done this, but I just couldn't do it. I could never see myself as someone's colleague if they'd taught me and reprimanded me as a kid. But anyway, so he's working at Marian and has all the girls in a frenzy. :P
I received an email from a good friend last night whose grandfather has cancer and they've had to stop treatment and have given him 6 months. My friend asked how I dealt with the knowledge that Nonno was going to die. Honestly? I don't think I did. I was very logical and spoke with him about the fact that he was dying and we joked about it (every day when I visited him at the hospital it was the same joke: me- are you still alive, Nonno? him- if I'd known you were coming I'd have made more of an effort to make sure I wasn't. :P) but there was always some part of me that really didn't think he would die. If it weren't for the cancer he would have kept going for years. He was the fittest person I know, both physically and mentally, and it didn't seem very fair that he should get sick. I'm not afraid of death, and I wasn't afraid of Nonno dying. I think the saddest thing about death is knowing that they aren't going to be there for the rest of your life. Hello? It's been over a year and I'm still not over it. I still think of him everyday (not an exaggeration) and I still get sad. My friend is close with their granddad like I was with Nonno, so in a way, I know exactly what they're going through. But then again I have no idea what they're going through because it's so personal.
I am SUCH a Debby-downer!!
Currently trying to figure out which subjects to do this semester. I have 20 units to play around with and I've decided to do all history subjects as I'll have to be doing English subs in Germany. I'm also thinking that I should do Ancient history subjects because I do not want to go through the boredom that was last semester's World in the 20th Century. But then I realised that I want to do a sub called Issues in Australian History, which is 20 units, and a subject that is called The French Revolution and Napoleon, which is also 20 units. As hist is my minor, I can only do 50 units all up, and I've already done 20 units last year... so all up I'm screwed. Either I do Australia or I do the French Revolution. I'd much prefer to do the French rev, but I think because I'd be teaching so much Australian history it'd be much more worth my while to do the issues subject.
And have I mentioned that this uni is stupid because they don't have the subjects that correspond with the history syllabus?? One of the subjects I'll have to teach in year 7-8 is:
Medieval and Early Modern Societies:
- Vikings
- Medieval Europe
- the Islamic World
- an Asian country
- the Pacific
- the Americas
- Africa
- Revolutionary Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Way to go, U Newcastle, not having any subjects (except the aforementioned French rev) that correspond.
So basically I've decided to do an ancient hist subject called Greek society and Intermediate Creative Writing 1.
Done. Can't back out now. Or I can, but I can't be bovered.
So Mary and Laura left yesterday. Sad to see them go, but thank God. Mary's so high maintence, but I love her. My bank account doesn't love them though. Oh My God. They were here for three days but I hesitate to check my account to see how much I spent cos I know it was a lot.
Funny thing Mary told me: her favourite teacher at school is her religion teacher, Mr. Fenech. Yes, Em (if you bovered to read this far), that Mr. Fenech, as is Damien. Lol. She thinks he's soooooo hot and soooooo nice and sooooooo ... By this stage I couldn't hear her over my dry wretching. Damien was in the year above us at school. What I don't get is how someone could go back to their old highschool to work. I understand that Ben, Ang's fiance has done this, but I just couldn't do it. I could never see myself as someone's colleague if they'd taught me and reprimanded me as a kid. But anyway, so he's working at Marian and has all the girls in a frenzy. :P
I received an email from a good friend last night whose grandfather has cancer and they've had to stop treatment and have given him 6 months. My friend asked how I dealt with the knowledge that Nonno was going to die. Honestly? I don't think I did. I was very logical and spoke with him about the fact that he was dying and we joked about it (every day when I visited him at the hospital it was the same joke: me- are you still alive, Nonno? him- if I'd known you were coming I'd have made more of an effort to make sure I wasn't. :P) but there was always some part of me that really didn't think he would die. If it weren't for the cancer he would have kept going for years. He was the fittest person I know, both physically and mentally, and it didn't seem very fair that he should get sick. I'm not afraid of death, and I wasn't afraid of Nonno dying. I think the saddest thing about death is knowing that they aren't going to be there for the rest of your life. Hello? It's been over a year and I'm still not over it. I still think of him everyday (not an exaggeration) and I still get sad. My friend is close with their granddad like I was with Nonno, so in a way, I know exactly what they're going through. But then again I have no idea what they're going through because it's so personal.
I am SUCH a Debby-downer!!
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