Tomorrow.

Hey party people. well that whole "taking attendance" idea failed spectacularly didn't it? Or perhaps I only have one reader? I actually know that's not true. Well Tommie's away for a few days with her mum so I'm a lonely lump of coldness tonight. I finished work tres early because we finished the job I was on (when I say we clearly I mean me - I am the survey queen, I challenge you to say no to my dulcet tones). Which meant I could technically have done something today. Due to a wallet displacement issue (which will be rectified soon) I have about $11.45 in my possession so exciting stuff is out. I was going to continue reading "The Portrait of a Lady" which I'm reading for a subject next semester. I'm only about 10o pages in but it seems ok so far. As with all classics of its ilk the author seems obsessed with describing the heroine in excruciating detail. The heroine is of course not conventionally attractive, not the prettiest sister (as people constantly remark) but she catches some dashing lord's fancy. So I was going to continue reading but I didn't because I'm rubbish. Instead I lay in bed fully clothed (including ugg boots) covered in doona and blanket with a scarf wrapped around my head (my nose was cold) with only my eyes and hands exposed to the cold, and watched the Colbert Report and The Daily Show. Seriously, why did I have to decide to start watching two four days a week shows? It is no good for my net quota.

I was going to talk about work but I have spent too much time there recently to think about it now. Instead I'm going to talk about dream jobs. Seriously, pretty much every time I work I realise that I really must get qualified and get a real job that I actually enjoy. Obviously teaching is still up there. In one of my lectures the lecturer showed some footage of teaching in American high schools and I had a sudden rush, kind of like what I get when someone is saying something I disagree with and I realise I know just what to say. Not that I'd know what to do in a rough American high school but, I have ideas. But aside from teaching i have two other contenders - the unrealistic type. One is writing for Rolling Stone. This is because I'd get to write about the music stuff and the world issues stuff. Which is the fantastic thing about Rolling Stone. Of course I think it's a well established fact that the magazine format is on the way out and I know nothing technical about music. It's also possible that I've just watched Almost Famous too many times. The other option is being a Speech Writer. I think I have an ok way with words, and I've always been better at non fiction stuff. I write ok essays. It would be totally cool to think that it was your words that helped get someone elected. Of course the real stumbling block is who that someone could be. I don't think there's anyone in politics these days I could get that excited about. Certainly not Rudd. Also the real real stumbling block is I have no idea how someone becomes a speech writer. There's also the concern that I just watch too much West Wing and Jed Bartletts don't really exist.

What all, of this amounts to is that I think I'm going to do some kind of writing subject next year. Because of the trip I want to go on I think I'll have room. It will probably be horrible. But I think the fact that things I want to do in life keep coming back to writing is probably telling me something. Also it will add to my HECS debt for no real reason. I can just imagine what AP's dad would say!

There's something in her face.

I'm just going to write this while waiting for the latest Chaser to finish downloading. It really did seem a good idea to set up the net so I could be online while in bed but perhaps in retrospect not such a great idea. So I went back to Tassie for four days. As an aside if you want to ask why only for four days, just don't - I am tres sick of talking about it (seriously I swear Tasmanians have some kind of questions sheet which is circulated). It was pretty nice. It was funny to be back somewhere where the surroundings remind you of things that happened years ago. I was in Channel Court which looks so different than it did in my high school days (by different I do mean horrid: what were you thinking Kingborough Council?) and went into the public toilets (the ones on the way to the pet shop) and I suddenly felt like I was in high school again. I really felt like I should have had a plastic bag full with my jodhpurs and daggy polar fleece jumper. It still doesn't have a mirror which is really annoying. I'm not entirely sure how I survived high school in retrospect. When I think of myself then I'm struck by how defenceless I was. Which is silly because I've had my defence system in place for quite some time.

This is going to be a ridiculously short post because Chaser has almost finished downloading. Next post is going to be about my work. Probably. Maybe.

Also: can I take attendance? I just want to know who (if anyone) is reading this drivel.

The Clara Report

You'd think that someone with an important exam tomorrow in a complex subject would have spent today studying. Because while apparently first year grades don't count (I swear people only tell me that after I go well in things, it's very passive aggressive) , someone might be thinking of going on exchange sometime and that requires a really good grade average. Also if someone had moved states, and is paying considerably more for their degree you’d think they'd want to go well. You'd tend to think that such a person would have re-read some of the required reading, memorised some important names and facts and maybe done a few practice essay plans. But no. I spent the day forming an unhealthy obsession with Stephen Colbert. I also rewatched some QaF I'd seen many times before. It was perhaps the most unproductive day ever. The good news is my exam isn't til two tomorrow so I have some time to study in the morning. Why do I do this to myself?

In good news my philosophy tutor is going to buy us free jugs after the exam. I plan to get very drunk. For future reference I didn't plan to a) embarrass myself or b) stand around awkwardly. If only there was more middle ground between those two options. So anyway, I'll be able to sleep and slob on Thursday (so very different to what I did today...), possibly work in the afternoon and then probably go out on Friday. Then Saturday I'm going home for 4 days. Tres exciting.

Happy Queens Birthday Eve

Hey, hey people. I have a really cute ponytail tonight and am saddened by the fact only T will see it. I really wish my hair/skin would focus on being good for days when I'm doing stuff. Yes, I realise that hair can't focus. I really believe that SwotVac is bad for the soul. It is driving me to watch Big Brother. I was going to make some clumsy segue to this about the soul but I'm too lazy. I went to see the Dalai Lama yesterday. It was kind of cool. It was also funny because it was at a football stadium and I imagine the crowd was quite different to usual. It was also funny because there was a voiceover of some very Aussie sounding guy saying "Welcome to the Dalai Lama's 2007 Australian tour!!!!!" I really thought he would try and rev us up and get people screaming "I love you Dalai Lama". Sadly he didn't. Anyway, so the DL appeared and really, just looks like an old guy with a funny robe on. Not that I was expecting anything else but... Hi's speech was alright but in all honesty got a bit boring. He did talk a lot about nonreligious people not needing faith to be compassionate which I thought was good. Anyway I thought of this a lot while I was there.

In other news I'm massively into french toast with honey. I never quite got the appeal, but it really is fantastic. Also it's very quick to make. And warm. Really there's nothing bad about it... unless you're allergic to egg.

I am such a fan of BBC World. Really, it's great. If i had the TV channel I would watch it all the time. As it is I listen to it when it's on NewsRadio, which is all the time because lets face it the BBC is just much better than the ABC. It's really funny hearing about Paris Hilton from a posh sounding journalist though, particularly that hideous statement she made about jail being hard but that she's "growing as a person". You could tell that the journalist was laughing on the inside. And because what the internet needs is more Paris Hilton discussion let me just say this. What I find particularly annoying about her repeated drink driving is how unnecessary it is. If you're young and poor and live in the country I can see why you might drink and drive. Sure it's still an incredibly stupid thing to do BUT I can see why it would happen. Paris is clearly none of those things, I think she could afford a taxi. She could probably afford to buy an international taxi company. Gah! Anyway sorry for the popcultureness.

Okay so in an attempt to appear intelligent after that, take a look at this excerpt from my Philosophy reader "Insofar as contextualism endorses a justificatory discourse about the delimitation of contexts and the variation of principles across them..." Is justificatory really a word? And if so is it necessary? Damn philosophers, they always use really random forms of relatively common words. It's like some kind of philosophers’ code. Tres annoying.

Also the postsecrets are really good this week I think...

So bitter you think he's sweet.

So today I handed in my less than stellar Media, Politics and Society essay. It was good to get rid of it. I also called my mum which cheered me up. That woman can really talk. It's funny because when I lived at home it seemed we didn't talk much at all. To celebrate essay finishing T and I had coffee at F's work and then I played The Sims and listened to The Libertines & Beulah. How does this differ from when I was essay writing? Very little, although I felt less guilty about it. Tomorrow I'm going to start studying for my philosophy exam. Yipee.

What else? I'm sure there was more...

T's mum came round tonight and I did that thing I always do of talking to my friends parents more than them (although not quite in this case, T and I are pretty much constantly talking). She was asking about my exams and I told her about philosophy and that I was planning to write on Humanitarian Intervention. T's mum is a very peaceful organic tofu kind of person. Nothing wrong with that - so am I sometimes. Anyway, she expressed the opinion that military intervention for humanitarian means was a silly idea and that guns never solved anything - that there were other ways etc. Which is true, sometimes. But I then pointed out that there are times, like in Rwanda that really a military intervention might have been the way to go. When people are already killing their neighbours maybe it's a time for guns. You know, I have this feeling that studying for philosophy (I'm planning to write on Poverty and HI) is not really going to cheer me up much...

Impossible is Nothing.

Thanks to someone’s blog entry I am sitting alone listening to R.E.M. and reading postsecrets. I actually decided today that I would stop listening to sad music and switch to angry music. I also decided I would acquire some less embarrassing angry music. See, I've been feeling sad lately. The word sad implies that something in particular happened. Nothing has happened. If I was more dramatic maybe I would say "depressed" but that's not right either and I know people who are actually, really, properly, medically depressed. And I'm just sad. I'm sad about boring things I can't even bring myself to write about here. I'm sick of myself. I miss my parents. I wish I was a different kind of person. I know it's all silly. Most of the time I'm happy. Sometimes I'm just not sure that I'm doing the right things with my life. Sometimes I feel too like The Wrong Girl. And that makes me feel sad. Sad in the way that baked beans on toast while watching Boston Legal won’t make better. Seriously sad.

But enough about sad, let's get happy! I have been storing up some Funny Anecdotes (always guaranteed to fail to be funny). The other day T and I were watching Big Brother (shutup we only watch it occasionally [how uncool is Travis???]) and they were doing some crazy group laugh thing and I mentioned laughing clubs and T said "I don't think I could take a laughing club seriously." which I thought was hilarious. Ok I have some other Funny Anecdotes but I think I'll keep them up my sleeve...

I'm sorry for the emo post people.