Blitherings of Innate Idiocy

O HAI I MAYD U A BLAG BUT I 4GOT 2 UPDAYT IT

2009-04-29T19:49:00.002+10:00

Remember me? I live here now (sorta): http://beezageeza-life.blogspot.com

End Title. Meant.

2008-08-06T07:29:00.003+10:00

So I’m sitting on the train, yet again, tapping away in the face of “artistic” futility. Yeah, who am I fooling? I can barely write code, let alone a meaningful, first-person analysis on the Lifestyles of the Repressed and Cynical.

There was a chap on the platform this morning… early 20s, about 5 foot 7, looks like a shorter version of Ioan Gruffud (read: hawttie). I’d seen him around before and had a fairly passing appreciation of his aesthetic… until today. He’s actually really good looking, and in an uncharacteristic (and masked) display physical attraction, I checked him out. Oh my, did I check him out. Horizontally-striped “sailor” t-shirt, perky arse in denim, two earrings in the top of left ear, light olive complexion, tiny waist and fairly buff. Yanno, flattered-by-the-too-tight-t-shirt type of buff. Good arms, which were apparently impervious to the late-winter cold of my rural area because they were quite, quite bare up to just below the shoulder.

The guilt kicked in soon afterwards – I’m not often so deeply, deeply shallow as this – and it occurred to me that I’m now officially a dirty old man. You don’t have to be old to qualify – just subtly lecherous and devoid of the burdens of regular shaghood. That’s me all over, I guess.

*sigh*

I haven’t had a lot of time to myself lately. The stress of my daily commute and fast-paced, thoroughly unimportant job is taking a toll on my health. Last week I came down with a somewhat brutal cold which refused to acknowledge the sovereignty of my immune system for a good deal longer than any curable virus should, and when it was finally vanquished, it decided to play the scorched earth card on my lungs. Self-medicated leftover antibiotics (yes, I know, very bad) had the organs back and up and running, but at the loss of my weekend from Friday to this morning (Monday). Hardly a trade-off; I stayed in bed almost completely, except for a quick run to the shops. Out the window went my plans for a Sunday night jaunt to the cinema to see… well, whatever’s playing… even though I can’t afford it because completely broke and won’t taste any rental income until the end of August, thanks to a slight oversight in my expectations of landlandyship. Oh well, payday Wednesday, I can slum it until then.

In my copious time, free from the distractions of penile stimulation or social life or, yanno, health, I’ve had ample opportunity to ponder an increasingly pronounced sense of discontent with my life… and it seems to resolve itself into one big issue:

Entitlement.

I hate entitlement. I really do. There’s so much of it going around, rather like a virus, and it’s shitting the hell out of me. Who is anyone to just expect a free ride? How can anyone be so god-damned deluded?

You’re standing on the platform, waiting for a train, hoping desperately to find a seat so you can sit down, whip out the laptop and do a bit of overdue blogging for the ~60 minutes you’d be otherwise wasting, and then you get pushed out of the way by some rampaging, government-sponsored infant factory with a veritable elephant-trail of offspring stretching half the carriage. Oh, she’s entitled to a seat, and you’re not, because she’s got literally hundreds of kids, and you don’t.

You’re walking down a busy street, trying to avoid the crush of people moving in all sorts of insane directions. Some moron with a surgically-implanted mobile phone is rushing to some extremely important corporate wankfest and raving like a schizophrenic, obviously distracted by the desire to appear important. You’re headed straight for each other, blocked into a narrow corridor of free space by street hawkers, pamphleteers, the aforementioned baby factories and their produce, and psychotic, Evel Knievel bike couriers. There’s nowhere to go but forwards, and at some point, someone is going to have to stand aside to let the other through. Being the smaller of the two obstacles, carrying less and being far more manoeuvrable than Cellular Lunatic, you decide to dash a zig-zag between the human traffic, clearing a blockage and facilitating an open corridor for a whole stack of people stuck behind said Lunatic, like an impacted bowel movement blocking an intestine. Mobile Schizoid decides (correctly) that your inertia is less than his, goes for an icebreaker tugboat kind of shove, pushes you out of the way with a glancing blow to the shoulder and leaves you within the slowly dissipating free space, pushed back a few steps by his obesity, then pushed a few storefronts further back because you can’t go forward into the human pressure wave, you can’t go sideways into the slipstreams, you can’t crowd-surf over them and going under them is not an option, unless you want to break every sliver of bone and cartilage in your body. They’re entitled to take over the whole left side of George Street because there’re more of them. He’s entitled to bulldoze you out of the way because he’s as wide as he is tall. You’re not because there’s only one of you, and you’re only about human-sized.

It’s 9AM on a Saturday. Your biological alarm clock didn’t just go off, it went completely ballistic at 8AM and woke you like a gunshot. You’ve spent the last hour phasing in-and-out of the sleep-time continuum because you work what is effectively a 60-hour-week, you’ve had a major cold/flu combo, you’ve barely eaten a meal in days, it’s freezing outside and you’re FUCKING EXHAUSTED. There’s a knock on the door and a parent decides to make sure you’re awake so they can let you know that they’re going out for a walk. This is not to let you know that they’re going out for a walk around the block and they’ll be back in an hour, so you don’t suddenly get up and flit about the house in a mild panic, wondering if aforementioned parent has been abducted by aliens, fled the country, or been killed, diced and consumed by a serial killer in the night. No. This is your Saturday morning wake-up-call so you can get up and do your laundry (which you absolutely insist on doing yourself), because this parent cannot detach their inactivity-paranoia from your life quite long enough to realise that maybe you deserve a lie-in, because hey, it’s been a big week, and further, maybe it’s not up to them about what you deserve, because it’s your life, and if the laundry doesn’t get done, it doesn’t get done, and by the way, your laundry actually doesn’t have anything to do with them at all. Their disregard for your physical and mental health, because they think laundry is more important, is itself more important than maybe letting you rest-your-weary-everything. They’re entitled to decide what time you should be awake on a Saturday morning after a very, very long week/fortnight/month because they’re stuck in the childhood you left behind so long ago. You’re not, because you’re merely an independent 29-year-old who works absurdly long hours during the week, is almost completely unconscious on a Saturday morning, and therefore powerless to prevent the invasion of his slumber.

Your parents are on holiday in Western Europe for a month, again, leaving you and your brother to look after the house, the dog, the cat, the birds and the chickens down the backyard. Your brother does bugger-all to maintain the house, despite working only half an hour away, and will occasionally feed the animals. You work in the city, a good 90- to 150- minutes one-way and often get back when it’s dark and bitterly, bitterly cold. Not only must you feed random animals (though not to each other, sadly), there’s domestic upkeep, cooking, laundry, self-preservation and sleep to contend with. A friend suffers a technical disaster with their PC and asks you to drop around and take a look. You do what you can to salvage the situation, offer a spare computer as a replacement (which subsequently fails… of course), try to make time in your already overwhelmed schedule to continue repairs, and generally put yourself out for many hours at a time, often not getting home until much, much later in the evening than is practical, starving oneself of food, relaxation and sleep because of some sense of duty to your friends. A large amount of data, for which you rather nicely provided a temporary home, must be returned and returned pronto because it’s more important than anything you’ve got going on in your own life. Your parents have returned and your schedule has lightened up, but you still find it difficult to meet the supposedly reasonable demands being made of you. You make a special journey to the letterbox of the owner of said data and leave it all, fully intact on one of the ever-decreasing numbers of spare hard drives you have lying around. They are entitled to what they want because they are your friends and the data is extremely important, moreso even than your health, wellbeing or personal obligations. You are not because, well, it’s you and you’re supposed to fix every major computer problem that comes your way, and everyone has every fucking right to be shitty with you when you can’t solve their myriad technical ills with a mere flick of the mouse.

You’re stepping out of the office to grab some lunch from the subterranean eatery across the pebblecrete plaza. There’s a homeless chap hovering around the garbage bin, wearing a groove into the ground between the cave of culinary capitalism, the steps down to the other street level, and the automatic swinging (not sliding, swinging) doors of your building. You’re starving because you generally don’t get a chance to eat in the mornings, it’s now 1PM and you haven’t eaten since about 9PM yesterday. He doesn’t just ask you for spare coins, or even silver ones for that matter, he demands that you reimburse him in gold for his time. You actually have nothing on your person at the moment, and politely decline. He launches into a surprisingly verbose hissyfit about your supposed lack of generosity and how you never donate anything unto him, because somehow, of all the thousands of people who cross this one patch of perpetual shade, he’s remembered you, and your coat in particular. He’s entitled to your pity and guilt because he chooses to ignore the virtually infinite options available to him, like shelters or rehabilitation or other such initiatives – many of which are planned, sponsored and run by the very organisation you work for – and decides to stay here, in the plaza, day in, day out, every day for six months, in the middle of winter or not. You’re not entitled to say anything, because to do so would be in extremely poor taste and would also likely convey a sense of ignorance, greed and absolutely mercenary lifestyling in the face of ugly, rank economic oppression.

You’re blogging away on your laptop, quite badly wanting to purge, through words, the depression, frustration and general dismissal you feel on a daily basis, and you repeatedly choose to go easy, in your blitherings of innate idiocy, on the people who are royally pissing you off because, hey, they’re only human, they have their own battles, right? They’re entitled to sleep easy each night under the impression that they’ve gone and been perfectly reasonable about everything they do, and you’re not, because everything since DAY FUCKING DOT has been your fault, your responsibility, somehow due to your own ignorance or inadequacy or incompetence or general MARAUDINGLY EPIC FUCKDOM, and you drive yourself mad trying to find some other outlet for your not-so-latent misery, and physical exercise isn’t possible because you’re tired, hungry, sick and your shoulder’s playing up like it usually does in winter; you can’t actually talk to anyone because you’re either on the other side of the planet, in a different state, surplus to their requirements or because you know that everything you say will be memorised and used against you later on, when necessary or not, and your blog, once the last bastion of sense and reason in your own seriously conflicted and completely warped existence, is looking as barren and empty as a Tom Cruise sperm sample, and you finally, finally decide to shut it all down because it no longer serves the purpose you, at long last, understand. Everyone’s entitled to have their feelings protected because it’s them, and you’re not because you are actually much less important than anyone else and really, you should just shut the fuck up and deal with it.

So there. Rather than go all FUCK ENTITLEMENT, I’ve decided to take it up as a hobby. I’ve decided that people aren’t owed anything anymore, they have to fucking earn it from now on. I’m not putting myself out there, I’m not offering anything, and I’m not obligated to do or be anything for anyone. If that makes me a COMPLTELY SELFISH CUNT, so be it, I’m not going to be stomped on and used and implemented and disposed of and bypassed. It’s my fucking time that’s running out while I’m busy helping everyone else. I’m fucking entitled to a bit of leniency within my own life, and it starts now. This blog ends, and another... infinitely less visible one... begins somewhere else.

THE END.

Something good in everything I see.

2008-07-19T22:44:00.002+10:00

*SPOLIER ALERT*

OK, if you haven't seen Mamma Mia!, look away now. Really. Just click on by.

...

...

...

I would happily - HAPPILY - live in ANY universe where Meryl Streep sings ABBA and Colin Firth is a posh, English, straight-acting hommoh-seckshual who plays guitar, likes to get it on with the younger chaps and bounces around like he's dropped an E, without a shirt, under a spray of water. I AM SO SEEING THIS FILM AGAIN.

Gosh darn it.

2008-07-17T13:56:00.002+10:00

*sigh* I was going to post this big-arse entry on the topic of World Youth Day, but it's likely to offend a whooooooole swathe of people - plus, in real life I've already told all the good jokes I'd intended to use here. It seems churlish to recycle them to same people.

Instead, I shall (eventually finish and) post my musings on the unsustainability of public transport and land ownership with respect to 21st-century civic development. Fascinating stuff, I'm sure you'll agree.

The Confessions Of Zelda

2008-07-06T16:44:00.004+10:00

What would happen if someone took the to the opening track of one of my favourite albums ever - "Hung Up" from Her Madgesty's Confessions On A Dance Floor - and vaguely redid it in the style of 1980s Nintendo console game theme tunes (for example, 1986's The Legend Of Zelda)?

Well, now you know.

(P.S. I love SeeqPod)

Linky because he totally deserves it.

Pull up to the bumper, baby...

2008-07-06T10:29:00.002+10:00

I am now the proud owner (loser?) of a stolen car.

Hooray! At least now I don't have to sell the thing when I go to London*.

Of course, as long as I drive to the train station in the morning, I'm screwed. Could life get any more meaninglessly complex?? Or is this yet another kick in the complacency for someone who, admittedly, needs a cattleprod-esque jolt to his copious behind?

Until whenever

*WHICH, by the bloody by, SEEMS LIKE A BETTER IDEA ALL THE FUCKING TIME.

UPDATE
It's been found. Relatively intact. Certainly driveable. And only a suburb away.
What awesome luck, eh?

Good sport Granny WINS AT LIFE.

2008-07-02T21:46:00.000+10:00

You want me, baby.

2008-06-27T21:30:00.002+10:00

Okay, minor FREAK-OUT time.

Hedwig and the Angry Inch is touring! AGAIN!

Free plug because they fucking deserve it: http://www.hedwig.com.au/

Three times I've seen this show. THREE TIMES. It's only love I have.

Location, location.

2008-06-27T10:26:00.002+10:00

It's so strange seeing your home as the featured rental property on a real-estate website.

Gotchya, you evil, menacing technoslag.

2008-06-24T18:36:00.001+10:00

Dear REM ReplaceTokens,

You're my donkey bitch now.

Regards,
DeeMacGee

*FREE TICKETS - THIS IS NOT A JOKE**

2008-06-10T17:06:00.002+10:00

Don't worry, my account hasn't been hacked. It's not spam.

Anyone wanting two FREE tickets to the 7PM session of Frank Woodley's Possessed, at the Opera House TONIGHT (yeah, that's just under two hours from now), EMAIL ME STAT: deemacgee@gmail.com, and I'll give you instructions on what to say at the box office. Seriously, peeps, I can't make it. Won them this morning, and they're going to waste otherwise.

Until Whenever (but before 6:55PM).

Waste

2008-06-10T16:54:00.003+10:00

You know your social life is up to shit when you can't find anyone to use the second of two tickets to a comedy production down at the Opera House, which you've won in a competition only a few hours before.

When even a parent won't come with you.

For free.

To a not-inexpensive show.

*sigh*

It's all just greed.

2008-06-10T10:28:00.002+10:00

This pisses me off so badly.

http://payrise.careerone.com.au/

It's greed. They are appealing to your sense of greed.

Not professionalism.
Not passion.

Greed.

I especially detest the top-right hand corner. Are they saying that an income of at least $55,000 per annum will stop the rain? No fucking wonder there's a drought in this country.

Shameless marketing cunt scum - as though CareerOne, or any of the vermin agencies who infest it, have any regard for your career beyond the spotter's fee they'll so happily, parasitically "earn" by desperately placing you in a job which often bears NO resemblance to the one they've advertised.

It could happen.

2008-06-04T12:46:00.005+10:00

I should really go into business for myself.

No, really.

UPDATE:

Now I'm deadly serious.
So much of what I do is designed to circumvent the human element in this particular aspect of technology, and today was a good day for such things. It's like SkyNet without the psychosis, or a Von Neumann machine with a hard-coded kill switch.

I'm so proud.

Actually... I think I could take it one step further and turn Windows into a fully-fledged virus. Wouldn't that be awesome?

Excuse me whilst I fire up VMWare.

Kill it with microwave radiation.

2008-05-30T21:22:00.000+10:00

Interjection

2008-05-21T23:13:00.002+10:00

Very quick post because it's late and I'm tired.

1. LCD Soundsystem is the new Pet Shop Boys.
2. I'm 29. HOLY CHRIST, I'M 29.
|there's a video clip coming soon|
|no, not of me|

Extra nutty fruitcake.

2008-05-15T11:59:00.002+10:00

For the most part, I'd not give that fucking Nazi Bill O'Reilly the time of day.
This is part of the reason:

Remember, though - for every action there is an equal and opposite overreaction. Praise be to whomever put this together for managing to wring just that little bit of goodness out of FoxFuckFace:

I'll never know if they're minty or sweet.

2008-05-08T18:38:00.002+10:00

The special edition box set for Madonna's new album Hard Candy actually does come with... hard candy. Whoda thunk Madge'd be so literal, eh?

Destined for greatness.

2008-05-04T09:57:00.000+10:00

Looks the same from everywhere

2008-04-21T23:43:00.000+10:00

I am in such fucking limbo right now.

Argh.

Just rip it from the wall, shall I?

2008-04-13T23:46:00.004+10:00

I may need to shut down this blog in the very near future, so if Blitherings does vanish, you were warned. Things are getting a little too... too. It's my own fault - of course - plausible anonymity will get you only so far.

In other news: there are some major life changes I've been putting off for way, way too long which simply must be attended. We're all running out of time (whether we admit it or not) and I intend for my thirties to be somewhat different from the security-building, indoorsy, sedentary, hibernatory decade of my twenties. I've earned myself a bit of fun, dammit!

But first... one must prepare.

Anyway.

Oh, and my family pisses me off. But that's hardly news.

Until Whenever

Update: Heterosexual men - simultaneously the bane of my existence, and yet, apparent reason for living. Ugh, please don't make me wake up tomorrow morning.

Oddly arousing.

2008-04-12T14:57:00.001+10:00

Damage alert: do not watch if you want to keep your happy Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles memories...

...enter at your peril.

Demonoid is back!!

2008-04-12T11:41:00.000+10:00

No, seriously - it is.

Somethin' up in thaya

2008-04-08T20:13:00.002+10:00

Someone will come fo' yo' ahbatrarahly angry ass when it's tahme fo' yo' appointment.

Walk on by, walk on by. Foolish pride.

2008-04-06T02:50:00.005+11:00

Currently listening to: I'm taking back the knowledge / I'm taking back the gentleness / I'm taking back the ritual / I'm giving in to sweetness / Come preacherman / shoot me with your poisoned arrow but I dance on Vaseline / and I'm tripping out / working on a revolution / you don't let the music in / I'm taking back the children / I'm taking back the ceremony / I'm taking back my offerings and I'm taking back what you mean to me / you're dangerous / shoot me with your poisoned arrow but I dance on Vaseline / and I'm slipping out / working on a revolution / don't let the music in / and war is all around us / your gods are dead and buried underground / I was a silly putty / your big ideas are useless to me now / my baby saw the future / she doesn't wanna live there anymore / it's lousy science-fiction / it's on your skin and seeps into your bones / come preacherman / shoot me with your poisoned arrow but I dance on Vaseline / and I'm tripping out / working on a revolution / don't let the day begin / and you're dangerous / shoot me with your poisoned arrow but I dance on Vaseline / I'm slipping out / working on a revolution / don't let the music in / it started in Oklahoma / you always think it happens somewhere else / this madness is attractive until the day it happens to yourself / and power might seem sexy but check her in the cool grey light of dawn / a legislative body and all at once your lust for her is gone / and I'm tripping out / working on a revolution / don't let the day begin / we'll turn you down time to time for evolution / don't let the music in / and I'm tripping out / working on a revolution / don't let the day begin / we'll turn you down / make a time for evolution / don't let the day begin
Dance On Vaseline / Feelings / David Byrne

I hate the world right now. I hate myself; I hate my life; my eccentricities; my physicality (most especially these wisdom teeth); my fears and doubts and uncertainties and all those endless, distasteful things that spring to mind when I try to conceptualise I... a self-image which rather resembles that picture of Dorian Gray after his years of debauchery. It's a sensitive topic, like a pus-filled, weeping wound is sensitive, and every glance thrown my way is a bony finger, forcing itself deep into an infected ego: blunt and unnecessarily intimate. I walked down to the International Passenger Terminal at Circular Quay after work a few days ago and found myself hyperconscious of every look cast over me: buskers, businessmen, bimbos, bums and babies all gorging their ocularity on my reflected photons. To notice is not the same as observing; viewing is not monitoring; looking is not seeing is not watching...

...have you ever seen the inside of one of those places? The laughing and the tears and the cruel eyes studying you?
Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins)
Psycho (1960)

...eye contact is the worst. I can barely do it with people I know, let alone workmates or strangers, and certainly not with those for whom the heart doth toll quite rapidly - unless I summon up every last milligram of illusion and blast it out to give the appearance of a presence, a soul, behind these eyes. It's not often convincing, but that's all there is once the innards have imploded, gone rotten or just generally dropped away.

Despite the obvious happymaking of the above paragraphs, I am... in some fashion... getting over the most recent insanity. As explained to a friend in email the other day, my bouts of quasiromantic collapse take the vague form of catching a cold or the 'flu: there's an incubation period, then I'm completely flattened by it and unable to do anything, then it's a slow and uncomfortable climb back to relative health, and then I'm immune to infection for a period of time (usually 6-9 months). Strange that I didn't notice the parallel before. Not that it matters, of course; there's probably no vaccine for this - aside from what we administer unto ourselves...

...though having resigned myself to the fact that he's too good for me - which was a harsh but effective (and accurate) rationale - I've been somewhat altered by this iteration. There's a pervasive singularity about everything I do now; it's impossible not to notice that all my friends and familial peers (but not my brother, oddly enough) are now attached, involved, engaged, or on the very verge of matrimony. I say this only out of interest, observation and curiosity, and without the implication of background violins... but... having flown north for the weekend to celebrate a birthday and an engagement... no, I can't tell it like this.

It had been an exceptionally big fortnight and getting away from Sydney for a couple of days was a welcome break - an enormous statement for someone who generally doesn't go on holiday. Dear friends opened their home (thank you, my darlings!) and we caught up; discussed the world and life and plans for our impending 30s... I slept like a fucking LOG (as in, fallen tree trunk - you filthy-minded people), but had still not recharged fully before the second evening's celebrations. Big battery, you see. Anyway, party in swing; guests rockin' out on the dancefloor to the hired band's version of a Shakira tune and I noticed that virtually everyone was a couple. Aunts and uncles, parents, cousins, friends, strangers and other randomites all twofold gyrating... and me, exhausted by 11PM, nursing half a glass of San Pellegrino (was barely drinking, for better or for worse), lying on the couch on the back verandah in full mutual view of the dancefloor and, spontaneously - inexcusably - an horrific, horrendous wave of solitudinous resentment descended. Completely unspottable (facial repression still fully functional, thank you very much) but by god, it did not hit gently. I had the most overwhelming desire to crawl inside, find a soft, flat surface, curl up and fall asleep... the usual response: cope through a coma. So, there, I'm officially - after six years - Feeling the Single Life. Perfectly timed, now that the rest of my existence has reached a reassuring pretence of equilibrium and stability. That is, if you don't count the finances, the living arrangements or the travel plans. *sigh*

You live from self-induced crisis to self-induced crisis.
Saffron Monsoon (Julia Sawalha)
Absolutely Fabulous, "Fashion"

Truer words were never spoken in a sixteen-year-old sitcom.

Even after pumping all that paralytic venom into my own bloodstream, I'm still no less together. Moving around the city during lunch and after work and it's couples galore; a freaking pairfest, everywhere I turn. Small mercies that I'm glitching now and not six weeks earlier; had Valentine's Day* crept up on me - as it does every year - in the midst of this particular funk, and there'd be a severe sense of melancholy pervading this post and invading your monitor. I blame Entropy, of course, which is completely pointless because it fixes nothing.

So here am I; moving in circles I'd never expected to see (again?), and which itself makes another case against blaming Entropy.

Once a man has changed the relationship between himself and his environment, he cannot return to the blissful ignorance he left. Motion, of necessity, involves a change in perspective.
Commissioner Pravin Lal
Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri

But the least comforting thought by far, in an electrical storm of synaptic self-destruction, is being aware of my potential for utter cluelessness in the event of finding myself in a romantic scenario. Quite simply, I would not know what to do. How does one behave? What sort of action, or interaction, is appropriate? What do couples actually do? It's been so long since my last relationship that I've forgotten the details. No, truly - what did we get up to? When we weren't at our respective jobs, or in transit, or asleep... how did we make use of our time together? (Your automatic response was predicted, and by the way, not funny.)

What is it that retains a person's interest in their significant other, even after years of togetherness? At least if you're going out somewhere, you're occupied and have a common experience to share - that seems logical enough - but being surrounded by pairs of people (or reading their blogs, for that matter) doesn't make the answer obvious. I can only assume there's talking... but what about? And when the words run dry, what then? Sitting on the couch, staring at walls? Or the TV? Or each other? I am filled with dread at the idea of awkward silence. It's enough to completely undo the recent rethinking; I'm convinced I'd be useless to the other person if ever I were to couple up again - why should I put anyone through that?

Sooooo much concern, apprehension, doubt, fear! How do I find time for the rest of my "life"? On the upside (there's an upside?), I've stopped biting my nails. Oh, and I've dropped a few kilos... which you'd expect if your appetite had completely vanished. It's hardly a fair trade-off, but it's something.

I seem to be stuck in this place of self-absorption and introspection. Going over history and discerning patterns might reassure me of my sanity, but it's not a course adjustment. I'm not sure if that's even possible, but regardless, I think perhaps it's best if my past stays in the past. No more dredging up of distant detrius through social networking sites (*points at Facebook in particular*); no more Googlestalking the loosening annals of my personal then; no more reading of blogs written by the war criminals of a mostly internal conflict; no more misguided communication with those who should, in future, only ever be referred to in the past tense. An end to contact with severed history, and an exit from this purgatory of personally pescatorial pursuits. Easier said than done, isn't it? To clear the calendars, contact lists and chats of at least the last decade is not an insignificant task (and I can't find GMail's block function), but then, necessity has a way of being difficult. Maybe when I'm better-adjusted, I can put my TARDIS in reverse... but for now, moving onwards and upwards seems - feels - right. Not that I could be accused of living in the past per sé; but perhaps if I show a smidge less interest in parts of my earlier life, it might not so closely and constantly resemble my present. I'm honestly not sure... but I'm willing to test this theory. However: I'm really only talking people and places - some patterns of my existence cannot be excised in the same manner. My life needs a relaunch but exactly where it should be is a topic undergoing much examination. Part of the answer (cause AND symptom) is known, and that's a big thing... the rest is still very much the proverbial iceberg.

For now, though, it's time to reformat a few things and hope for the best.

Until Whenever
(for values of "whenever" which equal "the future")

*yes, I know it's completely artificial. But still.

"...to think of yourself as a fraction, is already problematic."

2008-03-20T13:13:00.006+11:00

Currently listening to: Forgive me for I did not know / 'cause I was just a boy / you were so much more than any god could ever plan / more than a woman or a man / and now I understand how much I took from you / that when everything starts breaking down, you take the pieces off the ground and show this wicked town something beautiful and new / you think that luck has left you there, but maybe there's nothing up in the sky but air / and there's no mystical design / no cosmic lover pre-assigned / there's nothing you can find that cannot be found / 'cause with all the changes you've been through, it seems the stranger's always you / alone again in some new wicked little town / and when you've got no other choice, you know you can follow my voice through the dark turns and noise of this wicked little town / it's a wicked little town / goodbye wicked little town
Wicked Little Town (Tommy Gnosis Version) / Hedwig and the Angry Inch / John Cameron Mitchell and Stephen Trask

What, so I just *cannot* let myself be happy for any stretch of time? Pathologically anhedonic? Utterly incapable of lasting joy? What's my freaking problem, exactly? Where am I going wrong? It's a small mercy that I'm conscious of this chronic fuckdom - I think - but how could I not be?

Edina: It's like a mirrorball, spinning around inside my head! WHY WON'T IT JUST STOP?
Saffron: For most people your age it usually does.
Edina Monsoon (Jennifer Saunders) and Saffron Monsoon (Julia Sawalha)
Absolutely Fabulous, "Birth"

I would really like to get off this god-forsaken horror ride and move beyond the sheer stupidity but it seems... impossible... I have as much control over circumstance as I have over this week's lottery numbers. And the more I ponder this situation and all its previous incarnations, the more it seems like a form of gambling: you have to be exceptionally lucky to break even, let alone hit the jackpot.

Likely none of my warblings are revelation to the vast majority of you, my dear and tiny readership, but this is all new to me. I have no problem with tough lessons - I just wish I wasn't always failing the class.

Being philosophical about It All is becoming more and more infuriating; what's going to happen when I run out of rational road? I nearly skidded off altogether the other day, when the realisation slammed into me with all the force, impact and detonation of a small atomic warhead: I'm not particularly gifted in any way (except maudlin); I'm chronically aloof (despite my best efforts otherwise); I am a near-total anachronism to my generation (whoever they are) and I am culturally isolated from almost everyone. The short version is: I actually have nothing to contribute or offer to - well, anyone - beyond a blogfull of self-indulgent, faux-intellectual, emotional seppuku, typed out for an audience who is as bored of reading this shit as I am of living it, over and over (and over and over, like a monkey with a miniature cymbal...). How could I possibly, realistically, logically even, expect not to be disappointed when I am, myself, the very avatar of disappointment?

Anyway, that extemely uplifting thought was enough to send me straight to the little boys' room, where I took a seat and severely angered myself back into a state of focus. The remains of the day were much smoother after that, though I'm still aching inside and out (which could be as much the weight training as anything else).

What really got me in all this, because, let's face it, I am way too crazy to be damaged in any simple or obvious fashion, was being so easily knocked down by a catastrophic sense of inferiority. I'm pretty sure I got over that, yanno, years ago.

But no.

...to think of yourself as a fraction, is already problematic.
John Cameron Mitchell
Interview on DVDFile.com (link)

I am ~~feeling~~ particularly worthless ~~right now~~... and it seems, amazingly, all those "why-does-this-always-happen-to-me"-type questions now have the same answer from this perspective: Because I Deserve It.

Until Whenever

They'll bring him back when there's a cure for old age.

2008-03-19T16:00:00.001+11:00

RIP Arthur C. Clarke.
You will be missed.

Squinting into the sun.

2008-03-18T13:32:00.005+11:00

Ah, pedestals. I love them... so grand, so functional, so impossible to scale. Maybe it's a phallic thing. Maybe it's about keeping that precarious balance. Maybe it's because I'm fundamentally damaged and seem to enjoy setting impossible, defeatist tasks for myself - not so much putting someone on, but more trying to get them down. It's not in me.

I could not wipe the grin off my face yesterday, on the train home - it's insane what a single, simple comic gesture from relevant parties can do to my mood when I'm in this state - and I spent half the evening trying to shake off the ridiculously unjustifiable good mood. Then I gave up and revelled in it for the other half of the evening. Now I'm on the EXXXTREEEEME COMEDOWN. Why do I keep doing these fucking things?

DeeMacGee is a stupid, stupid man who really needs to just resign himself to the abject inevitability of his situation.

Grow the fuck up, you idiot.

Dual Colds

2008-03-16T09:47:00.002+11:00

Currently listening to: I never understood before / I never knew what love was for / my heart was broke / my head was sore / what a feeling / tied up in ancient history / I didn't believe in destiny / I look up you're standing next to me / what a feeling / what a feeling in my soul / love burns brighter than sunshine / brighter than sunshine / let the rain fall, I don't care / I'm yours and suddenly you're mine / suddenly you're mine / and it's brighter than sunshine / I never saw it happening / I'd given up and given in / I just couldn't take the hurt again / what a feeling / I didn't have the strength to fight / suddenly you seemed so right / me and you / what a feeling / what a feeling in my soul / love burns brighter than sunshine / brighter than sunshine / let the rain fall, I don't care / I'm yours and suddenly you're mine / suddenly you're mine / and it's brighter than the sun / it's brighter than the sun / it's brighter than the sun, sunshine / love will remain a mystery but give me your hand and you will see / your heart is keeping time with me / what a feeling in my soul / love burns brighter than sunshine / it's brighter than sunshine / let the rain fall, I don't care / I'm yours and suddenly you're mine / suddenly you're mine / got a feeling in my soul / love burns brighter than sunshine / brighter than sunshine / let the rain fall, I don't care / I'm yours and suddenly you're mine / suddenly you're mine / got a feeling in my soul / love burns brighter than sunshine / brighter than sunshine / let the rain fall, I don't care / I'm yours and suddenly you're mine / suddenly you're mine / and it's brighter than sunshine.
Brighter Than Sunshine / Strange and Beautiful / Aqualung

I'm sick. Well, we knew that; what I really mean is that I have a cold. (*sniffle*) See?

Obviously, this is a physical disadvantage at a time when I really don't need to be laid up... but the fucked-up sleeping patterns (it's pushing 9AM as I write this, and I've not slept since about midday yesterday), the sniffling and the sneezing and the constant stream of wet handkerchiefs absorbing a few clearly-running streams of their own isn't the worst of it. Being viral, as I am, comes with the even more uncomfortable side-effect of being rendered emotionally vulnerable... and I could do without that at the best of times, let alone right now.

Those who know me know just how closely I keep my feelings in check - having them running rampant around my life is, quite possibly, the last thing I need (or want) and has only ever caused Sadness, but keeping the inner thermostat on low is a difficult state to maintain when you're in a self-indulgent, self-pitying funk.

Plus which, I'm on schedule (and target, sadly) for another of those infamous crushes. The need for immediate, internalised refrigeration is pronounced to say the least, now that I've worked out how to minimize the impact of developing an impossible fixation on someone who, for whatever reason, cannot/will not/does not acknowledge your existence but it's a very tricky path to navigate without the Rational Sensibilities - and that's where I am right now. They've been taken offline thanks to this bastard bloody cellular invasion. To quote one of my favourite films:

Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do / I'm just crazy all for the love of you / It won't be a stylish marriage / I can't afford a carriage / but you'll look sweet upon the seat of a bicycle built for two

HAL 9000 (Douglas Rain), immediately after having his higher logic circuits disconnected.
2001: A Space Odyssey

Sing it, baby.
(Is it worth pointing out that HAL's failure was diagnosed as the computer equivalent of psychosis?)

Normally I wouldn't be in such a frizzy tizz about this - shit happens, and on a loop for me - but the paralysing question did occur: now that I exist primarily in a space with a much greater density of people than I'm used to... should I expect an increase in the frequency of this particular glitch in the DeeMacMatrix? Am I likely to more often run headlong into new and different people who spark that otherwise frosty firepit somewhere down near the cardial cockles? Because if that's how it's going to be... wow, this is going to be an interesting couple of years. Sydney is big enough to induce concern... London is... another story...

And yet, in spite of all this present and historic talk of free, unfettered, happy singledom (marred only by those controlled, regular plunges into Infatuation Purgatory), I don't think it's going to hold true forever. Things have changed a lot since last August - travel plans, work, ambition, finances, self-awareness, domestic circumstance, health! - but I don't think I'm done with the evolution revolution yet. The thought of being attached, being close, being intimate in various ways, is not as... offputting... as it has been. The idea of meeting someone... is... well, it's beginning to regain the appeal it hasn't truly had since my last relationship ended, nearly 6-and-a-half years ago. Not that I object to singledom; I love my personal space and would go completely postal without it (worse luck for me)... it's just... sometimes you just need a hug, yanno? And not just a friendly hug; not just a comfort hug from friends or family (and don't get me wrong, they do a great job!), but an embrace that means... I don't know what, exactly... something along the lines of sharing intimate, arm-wrapping personal space with someone who feels that they need to be right there, right then, for themselves and for the other person... and all the whateverness that sense of need or entitlement might imply.

Like a pacifist who takes up weapons trafficking in a desperate measure to provide for his family - I'm not as averse to giving or receiving arms as I used to be.
(*boom boom*)
What can I say? I'm a hug fiend.
Rawr.

Noone is more stunned by this than I, even though it's possible a few of my close personal friends are right now sitting with jaws agape at this seemingly incredible reversal of a position I've so firmly held since 2001. These are strange and complicated days for DeeMacGee, and this is a strange and complicated post for his readership. If you've made it this far, I thank you.

Until Whenever

Pasture. Now.

2008-03-12T19:54:00.000+11:00

Iggy Pop ruins a perfectly good song at a perfectly inappropriate moment. Seriously, shouldn't he be dead by now? And when did he get a gut?

"I'm gonna live forever!"

2008-03-11T21:21:00.001+11:00

Christ, I LOLed.

I love the New Media...

2008-03-08T11:25:00.003+11:00

...'cause you can use Daft Punk to make brilliant stuff like this:

and this:

I've got the Baileys, but I'm fresh out of everything else...

2008-03-07T22:09:00.001+11:00

Memes are easily stolen.

2008-03-07T10:57:00.002+11:00

Yet another from Todd in Hell's Kitchen:

Your Mind is Blue

Of all the mind types, yours is the most mellow.

You tend to be in a meditative state most of the time. You don't try to think away your troubles.

Your thoughts are realistic, fresh, and honest. You truly see things as how they are.

You tend to spend a lot of time thinking about your friends, your surroundings, and your life.

What Color Is Your Mind?

Ever-decreasing social circles.

2008-03-05T21:03:00.005+11:00

You know what's really scary? Going on a Facebook stalk and finding out that the people you were in high school with, the people you went to Uni with and some of the people you used to work with are all directly linked to one other.

If Facebook had had the same penetration a few years ago as it does now, I would be firmly trapped in a deep, dark and fatally sticky web of uncomfortable social awkwardness. It seems timing and chance have been well on my side in the last decade-plus since graduating... I'm very impressed by the distinct lack of coincidental run-ins with my Past, though I imagine luck will run out at some point. Sydney's not all that big, which makes it inevitable (Mister Anderson).

The last happen-upon was about a month ago, but it was one of those people you'd happily live without seeing if they were still likely to project the same sort of rampaging cµntdom now as they were quite willing to back then. Why would I even stop to greet them, anyway? Our only exchanges involved the word "faggot" and a fair bit of contemptuous snarling... what now? Would they gloat about their accurate gaydar? Feign interest in my professional accomplishments since our parting of ways? Would they have invited me to join them in that mid-city sandwich bar? Somehow, I doubt it... and I'm pretty bloody certain of my own nil-rated concern factor about what (or whom) they've been doing in the last hundred-or-so moons. Shocked disbelief at the (confirmed) rumours of sproglet is probably all I can muster right now.

I have no real links to my educational past; it has been slowly relegated unto the darker pages of (t)history's ~~book~~ blog. On some level I feel better for it - I'd rather not be reminded of the specifics of the worst six years of my life - a horrible period that launched a series of cycles I'm still, even now, trying to unwind - and yet occasionally, there's a fundamentally damaged nostalgia attached to this endless list of names and faces with whom I spent a particularly influential (for better or for worse) time. Oh, my temporal fetish for the 1990s probably has something to do with it... but even with all the inherent complexity and psychological brutality of the era, it still - somehow - seems simpler than Now, when really... it wasn't. It was traumatic and oppressive and traitorous and I could easily go until Judgement Day (whenever that is) without talking to 99% of my old schoolmates. There are very, very, very few I'd choose to interact with these days... I've developed a preference for watching them from a comfortable, digital distance... but regardless of the conceptual geography, the past is a scab I can't help but pick. It's not altogether sucky, but sometimes it's not worth trying to satisfy the curiosity. That is an unstable middle ground; it's like the proverbial car crash where you can't look, but you can't look away, because in this case - egotistically or otherwise - either way, you're looking at yourself.

And we all know what happens when you look into the abyss.

Until Whenever

The chills that you spill up my back...

2008-03-01T19:42:00.002+11:00

Whilst I'm still uncomfortable with the ongoing degeneration of Mardi Gras from all-out spangled, glittery fabulousness to pissweak political bitchslapping, for those who care:

Happy Mardi Gras!

Boing!

2008-02-29T15:28:00.001+11:00

Happy Leap Day, everyone!

Not my meme.

2008-02-27T23:19:00.003+11:00

But I'll do it anyway.

1. Pick up the nearest book (of at least 123 pages).
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people.

Yeah, what do you want?
I want to report a murder.
Okay.

From Stephen Geller's "Pretty Poison", 1966
(originally published as "She Let Him Continue")

Anyone who wants to steal this stolen property is free to do so. Sharing is caring.

"I will box your ears and leave you here stripped bare."

2008-02-24T11:42:00.011+11:00

(Not the same mix)
Currently listening to: Have a dream / We all have a dream of a place we belong / the fire is burning and the radio's on / somebody smiles and it means "I love you" / but sometimes we don't notice when the dream has come true / you've got a home here / call it what you want, you've got a home here / to return to when you can't face the world and you need some support to succeed / you've got a home / we all make a mess of our lives from time to time / it's part of the process that you stumble as you climb / and if you ever feel the pain is far too big a deal, I say with pride: I'll be on your side / you've got a home here / call it what you want, you've got a home here / you're gonna want it when you can't face the world and you need some support to succeed / you've got a home
Here (Pet Shop Boys New Extended Mix) / Disco 3 / Pet Shop Boys

So I'm packing it all up, and in, and it's deeply emotional because for the first time ever, I'm moving out of my home - not my parents', not a rental, but a place that I've put my soul into since the end of 2005.

There's some comfort in the knowledge that I'm not selling it, so I can return to it pretty much whenever I like - and I'd rather lose a trip to London than my home - but it's still pretty wrenching.

And lately, I've become so bitter over how completely fucked up the last few years have been - the emotional upheavals, the trauma, the usage, the betrayal, the search for meaning, the meaningless journeys and time wasted away from here, and the endless debt of being a single 21st-century 20-something with a mortgage. So much has happened in life since I moved here, and this place was always an integral part of it - mainly because it was home; sanctum, cave, monastery, library, laboratory, retreat - whatever, this was the place I found healing.

I remember saying to my ex, back in 2000, as I was going through a series of living spaces: "Maybe home isn't a place. Maybe it's a person." That thought was of great comfort when I had no sense of domestic stability... and it still holds true these days, being I think of my apartment as an entity of its own - which means that moving out isn't just a moving out, it's also a breakup...

I keep telling myself that it's all part of a bigger plan - just a pixel in a larger bitmap - but still. So much left unfurnished, undone, unfinished... or unhung, like The Decemberists' poster I never got a chance to mount... all these little homely touches that a mere two years and substantial income drainage could not permit. So I'm angry and sad and bitter and excited and terrified all at once, and it's more exhausting than I can handle. I really want to open the Absolut Pears and get hammered, but... no, that won't fix anything... and I don't need my carpets stained again...

It's confusing these days / but moondust will cover you
Hallo Spaceboy (PSB Extended Remix) / Disco 4 / David Bowie and Pet Shop Boys

Until Whenever

Perspective

2008-02-22T21:52:00.001+11:00

And I was whinging about my hand... this guy MUST have felt his impact. Surely.

Today I am a furrow.

2008-02-20T13:27:00.004+11:00

Oh my. Last night, whilst doing the dishes BY HAND (because my dishwasher is dead), one of my black glass tumblers decided to shatter into... two... pieces. The smaller one gouged out a section of my knuckle flesh - which is likely still floating in the sink - and left me in considerable (though bearable) pain. Worst of all, I'm pretty sure I've exposed bone... either that, or the white stuff visible beneath where my skin used to be is actually beef dripping... which would not be too surprising, given my diet up until January.

Anyhoo, think happy antiseptic thoughts for me. And if you see a chap wandering around Sydney with his left hand band-aided to buggery between the index and middle fingers... stay away from him. He's in a shitty mood.

Shameless Pluggery

2008-02-17T21:23:00.003+11:00

~~Read~~ View my new photo blog. If you like. Yanno, no pressure. Maybe if you've got a few minutes spare or something.

Camera-sound-effect happy.

2008-02-12T13:06:00.002+11:00

My new Black/Crack/Smackberry comes with a camera! And not a bad one, either.

Here's a shot I took at lunch.

I must now atone.

2008-02-11T11:34:00.000+11:00

I CANNOT BELIEVE I MISSED ATONEMENT AT THE CINEMAS.

Argh.

BE WARNED!

2008-02-05T19:53:00.000+11:00

43%

Care of Todd and his Postcards From Hell's Kitchen.

splash splash splaaaaaaaaaash trickle drip drip flush

2008-02-04T14:43:00.000+11:00

Let's face it, women will never be equal to men until they can piss standing up.

Well, then - a solution is at... err... hand.

Temporal Trivia

2008-02-03T00:54:00.000+11:00

Completely pointless trivia:

Yesterday was Groundhog Day.

Today is The Day The Music Died.

That is all.

Update: Evilly funny macros are evilly funny.

Stale Spices

2008-02-02T11:50:00.000+11:00

The latest news is that the Spice Girls are finishing their tour after Canada at the end of this month. That's a world of suck, right there. They screwed us ten years ago by not touring here, and now they've done it again.

Dear Spice Girls,

Thanks a fucking lot, bitches, that's twice you've knifed us in the heart. And here I was, with more copies of your albums than any one person really needs. I still plan to get that hot-pink box-set with the friendship (HA!) bracelet and the bonus remix CD, but after that... if you ever dare release anything ever again...

Until Whenever

P.S. Spare me the OMG SPICEGIRLS SUCK DIAF KTHXBYE messages
Spice Girls, Daft Punk and Madonna were the 90s for me. This is big news.

Trudging towards the future, clawmarks in my wake...

2008-02-01T01:53:00.000+11:00

Currently listening to: Some things never seem to change / kids still call each other names / should get better, but it's sad and strange / every insult still the same / growing up in small-town hell / they bide their time 'til the dinner bell / take a swing with a bag, and they wait by the school gates / all this pushing and shoving when you need a little loving / a little human kindness / but where you gonna find it? / Where you gonna find it? / So you close your bedroom door and you kneel down on the floor / 'cause you don't want to get caught / packing the bag that your mother doesn't even know you bought / "So it's come to this" you cry / and not even time to say goodbye / you pack some cigarettes and your A-Z / push the suitcase back under the bed / you've been balanced on a knife / will the city save your life? / You've been waiting for so long just for somewhere to feel like home / you've been balanced on a knife / will the city save your life? / Your life is waiting for you / love is waiting for you / so pack your cigarettes and your A-Z / it'll be just like that book you read
A-Z / Out Of The Woods / Tracey Thorn

Quote Of The Day: (used twice in two different conversations, both discussing Anne Heche - specifically, in Gus Van Zzzzzzzzzzzant's 1998 Psycho "remake")

Heche is not a family value.
DeeMacGee

So it was probably just before Christmas that I really decided it was time to move on. It occurs to me that my 20s have been... unintentionally... filled with the pursuit of that which most others of my generation would leave until their 30s - deliberately or otherwise. Sure, I could be wrong - the housing crisis may not leave us and the income of my peers may be directed, European-style, into investment in things other than property - but assuming things follow a vaguely similar trend, I'm about ten years too early for self-induced near-bankruptcy. Especially solo. Even if I'm enjoying the enforced change of pace. Anyway, the plan is:

1. Finish Packing.
HOLY CUNTING MOTHER OF FUCKING GOD. I have so much shit.
It's only just now become apparent how much money I've spent on stuff in the last 15 years. I'm slowly cataloguing everything as I load it into a series of (what feels like) cargo containers; another box filled and another jaw-dropping estimate of cost slaps me across the face. Those three boxes full of DVDs - music, concerts, documentaries, tv shows, mini-series, movies, box-sets, special editions, collector's editions, director's cuts, rated, unrated, unreleased, re-released, imports... freak me sideways... and DVDs have really only been available for the last eight years (ALREADY!) or so. CDs have been around quite a bit longer... and though smaller, they have another three boxes dedicated to their safe storage. None of this may seem as sizeable to others as it does it myself, but that's not the point... it's more the realisation of exactly how rooted - take that as you will - I am by my possessions (right now).

2. Evacuate The Premises.
I have a mortgage, we've just gone through the holiday season and I've just recently started working. Have a guess at what that means for my finances. I'm not starving, but I'm not dining on McDelicacies, either. In fact, I've resorted to buying food in the raw state and ~~doing that thing with the saucepan and the heat and that flat, plastic thing for moving it to the plate~~ cooking it myself - perhaps a desperate measure in itself; perhaps a manifestation of a desire to claw my way up the sides of this stale and muddy rut. Certainly quite dangerous, either way.

3. Get Someone Else To Pay My Bills.
No, not a sugardaddy - the insulin rebound would kill me - but a tenant. (Neil Tennant, perhaps? Or maybe David Tennant? Har! Har!) I'm quite apprehensive about the prospect of total strangers residing in a place I would still be calling home under different circumstances, but since my first choice of inhabitant is seemingly incapable of keeping this place, or indeed himself, clean for any significant period of time, the options are few. *sigh* The plan to leave this continent is not going well, but chances are greater if I'm not spending 45% of my... historical... income on a mortgage which almost totally precludes any sort of travel (or escape).

4. Re-Enter The Womb.
The progenitors have approved my request to move back home. Isn't that nice of them? Of course, it means I'll have to get my car fixed... and sacrifice any hope of a one-night-stand in my old bedroom (chance would be a fine thing).
You know that's a joke. I don't fornicate like you Hu-Mons.

5. Turn Funds-Transfer Hell Into Funds-Transfer Purgatory.
At least Purgatory has an exit, yes? There's no shortage of bills and owingses with which to wallpaper the fridge, but there's no soothing, comforting pattern to be observed afterwards. Plus, the door won't open if you wrap them around the side like that....

And now, some randomness. Last night, in celebration, I practically inhaled one of these. For those of you who don't recognise the picture, it's a small vat of Connoisseur Cookie Cream Commotion icecream, the greatest ever conceived. It Is God's Own Jism and took me only 45 minutes to JennaJamesonise the WHOLE ONE LITRE BUCKET of creamy, divine ejaculate*. Fittingly, there are no words (or psalms, or hymns, or parables) to describe just how seedy I feel at this moment - I avoided sleep ALL FRIGGING NIGHT, because dozing off after a hit like that would have guaranteed an epic carb hangover. Uh, pass.

Mind you, there's no guilt attached to this binge - I've been very well-behaved lately (I'm a good girl, I am).

In other news, a major shout-out to one Ryan Heath; social commentator and personal hero**... and you know me, I don't do heroes, baby. One has been touting and spouting the clout of That Book to all and sundry, from hither to yon, since purchasing it 18 months ago, and now that I'm firmly in the grip of the resultant changes it ~~encouraged me to~~ demanded I should make, it's only just become apparent exactly how much I've taken to/from this little Orange (Catholic?) Bible - a particular emphasis on Chapters 1 through Infinity. Recent contact with ex-coworkers at that rampaging cµnt of an ex-job makes their lack of vision quite plain. So far as anyone can (will?) tell me, things have gone straight downhill and off a cliff since my voluntary excommunication... of course, prickish, blind managers can't tell the difference between falling and flying - until they stop - and Gravity is just biding Her time. Plus, the barely-latent rumours of openly warring factions within my old territory certainly warm the cockles of my offal.

Terrible, isn't it? This perverse enjoyment in playing voyeur to their impending self-destruction? Yes, truly 'tis... but if evil is a delicacy, I am a recent connoissieur. I certainly picked a good time to evacuate... so, thanks to Mr Heath for writing the one book wotz ever managed to severely kick me in the complacency - and a well-timed booting it was, too.

What else? Yes, that's right - I've noticed: there are so many brutally attractive people in Sydney. Also, there so many brutally unattractive people in Sydney. Remember - I've never worked in a major CBD before (I'm not counting Canberra and neither should you), so this EXTREME HUMAN DENSITY is completely new to me, and fluctuating pockets of severe hotness and severe notness are teasing my very-carefully-repressed eyeball reflexes. Good thing I have the sunglasses to mask my failings (Rule #1: subtetly above all else IRL)... but even in the office this trend continues, and mercilessly. 'tis a challenge not to salivate from the optical socketry. Small mercies - I sit facing the wall. Not even peripheral vision can betray me from that angle.

And the conversations all these random city people have, in and out of the office! Insipid and inspired talkbytes galore - quite a few overheard exchanges worth jotting down and (anonymously) publishing, methinks. The new workphone is also a Smackberry and a camera (or something), so this blog might find itself upgraded with vision and real-time updates from your friendly (ha!) neighbourhood DeeMacGee. Should prove interesting.

Jeez, it's late. And I go at sleepy-time...

Until Whenever

*reminds me of this joke:
Q. What's white and stringy and hangs from the clouds?
A. The Second Coming of the Lord.

**And cute to boot, but that's totally irrelevant. I will say that he has a touch of the Perkies about him... but I've been seeing that in a lot of people lately.
In fact today, on train home, was a subcontinental-edition Perky lookalike. Ishnd dat wyrrd? Slight men with slight lisps. That's a type, isn't it?

FUCKIN' OPPORTUNISTIC BASTARDS

2008-01-24T20:10:00.000+11:00

Clovertrek

2008-01-19T10:43:00.000+11:00

Oh man, how busy was my yesterday?

1. Working Girl
Visited my new employer and picked up the necessary paperwork. Monday start. Not the most appealing of jobs, but at least they're using my preferred utilities. I keep telling myself "it doesn't have to be permanent"... but there's only ten months to go before shipping myself out, and finding a job with the particular critera I'm trying to pursue is very, very difficult.

2. One down
I did it. I wandered down from Pitt Street, across Hyde Park, past the Art Gallery and The Domain, through the Botanical Gardens and followed the seawall to the Bridge side of Mrs Macquarie's Point. In the drizzle. Then I sat and listened to Iva Davies' The Ghost Of Time - all 23 minutes of it. Twice. Why? Because a sopping Sydney is gorgeous from any angle.

City on a rainy day down in the harbour / watching as the grey clouds shadow the bay.
Great Southern Land (2000) / The Ghost Of Time / Iva Davies

3. The new Star Trek trailer
Dear J.J. Abrams,

For years, I believed that Federation Starships were assembled via Phase Transition Welding. Having just gone back to double-check that phrase, it seems that YOU HAVE MANAGED TO PURGE ALL REFERENCES OF IT FROM THE INTARWEBZ. Only two sites mention PTW and now I'm on the verge of psychosis because I KNOW it exists in Trek Canon. And I only bring it up because the teaser trailer for your new Star Trek Rebooted shows a whole lot of metalworkers WELDING PANELS ONTO THE OUTER HULL OF THE ENTERPRISE.

Uh, no. It's a starship, not a fishing boat.

Trek Canon. You know why they call it "canon"?
Because if you FUCK WITH IT, it will backfire* on you.
Be-Very-Careful

4. Cloverfield
I have been waiting to see this film since April and it did not disappoint. My fucking god. I was still shaking after we left the theatre - what a mindfuck was this film?!?! There should be a law: once every ten years, someone MUST make a kick-arse, first-person, hand-held, cinema vérité-esque film that will completely immerse and terrify the shit out of you. The Blair Witch Project was the last one... now this... what's next?

Until Whenever

*yes, yes, I'm playing with the spelling.

Get it done.

2008-01-18T13:22:00.000+11:00

We leave so many things unfinished in our lives.

Dr Tolian Soran (Malcolm McDowell)
Star Trek: Generations (1994)

...and it's about time I started clearing them off - hence the new sidebar section called "You've been waiting how long to do that?" Items will be marked off appropriately as I get through this list.

London, of course, will have to be the last one, since everything else is based in this country.

He can leave them on if he wants.

2008-01-16T13:36:00.001+11:00

Sonder over at Left Exiled posted this little chunk of hilarity.

Slow news week, anyone? Apparently there's been bugger-all else to report, except maybe for that alleged cricket racism thingy. It's quite amusing to watch the intellectual geriatrics swallow their false teeth over this guy, his alleged lack of respect or remorse and, as per this interview, his sunglasses. Why the fixation with this kid's glasses? What does it actually matter whether he leaves them on or not?

My contempt for public witchhunts like ACA and Today Tonight is legendary. This arrogant, patronising bitch, with her overinflated sense of importance and self-proclaimed role as Avatar of Collective Social Outrage is typical of the self-righteous editorialising which sullies the pursuit of journalism in this country. These shows aren't news media, they're a Frankenstein of the Two Minutes Hate from Orwell's 1984, and those late-night infomercials. There's no credibility to be had here. None.

And by the way, if you want to talk about a bunch of irresponsibles trashing innocent neighbourhoods, remember - there's still a war in Iraq.

I guess he's joined the Ghost World now.

2008-01-16T12:25:00.001+11:00

RIP Brad Renfro (shown here with Thora Birch and Scarlett Johanssen in one of my favourite films, Ghost World).

Such a shame.

Sure, McLovin', I'd like that.

2008-01-15T16:00:00.000+11:00

Random chicks I'd probably find attractive if things were slightly different

2008-01-09T19:00:00.000+11:00

Nigella Lawson

clink

2008-01-09T00:18:00.000+11:00

Is it perverse that I'm enjoying near-destitution?

Wait a minute, it must be Bhutto! Bhutto, I tell you!

2007-12-28T03:28:00.000+11:00

RIP Benazir Bhutto

Here's the cheer

2007-12-23T00:06:00.001+11:00

I bought this single back in 1997, only ever saw the videoclip once.

Happy holidays to everyone!

UPDATE:

A Christmas gift for my fellow techy-science nerds.
The last time I saw this short film was 1987. I shit you not.

I have a dream...

2007-12-15T18:05:00.000+11:00

...ABBA + Meryl Streep + Julie Walters + Colin Firth = OMFG, I can't wait to see this.
The stage version was brilliant.

Get-out-of-my-head!

2007-12-12T01:32:00.000+11:00

Stolen from Dr Nic, who's really awesomely random.

Ever wanted to market a product so hard that it induces psychosis in your audience? Now you can!

It's a little bit too pushing-the-boundaries-of-your-sanity for my tastes. Isn't it enough that my physical senses are bombarded with commercial pollution every single fucking day? Honestly - TV, radio, print, internet, outdoors... the only ad-free medium in my life is a heavily-branded iPod. And now, some capitalist pigfucker wants to turn the inside surface of my head into the ultimate directed-marketing tool? HELL to the NO! Keep your Danoz and your Demtels away from my cranium.

Request

2007-12-11T21:21:00.000+11:00

...does anyone know what's happened to The Alphabet Challenge? It made for truly enjoyable reading and vanished some time ago.

I miss it. :o(

Recommendation

2007-12-11T20:23:00.001+11:00

For those of you who get Blitherings via their feed reader, can I point out that I'm a big fan of making changes to entries post-publication? What you see via RSS may not always be the final edition...

...not that I'm trying to get people to hit my site directly - I'm not selling anything! - this is just a courtesy notice for y'all.

More hate than love.

2007-12-11T20:20:00.000+11:00

I'm really, really starting to despise IT. It's cut-throat and it's predatory... and thanks to bullshit like ITIL, it's rapidly losing the sense of creativity I've embraced since I first started tapping away on my uncle's Amstrad about twenty-five years ago. IT Recruiters are the worst; 99% of them have NO IDEA about IT and seem to enjoy spouting things like "oh, sorry, you don't have this TLA* on your CV", despite not knowing that the FLA** replacing it is actually a bigger acheivement. For those of you who were wondering, Melbourne was unproductive, unfortunately... four interviews cut down to two; of these, one was a meaningless exercise in "look-here-I-am"-ness with a recruiter who has just recently changed names, and also lost the vague exclusivity upon which my entire application was based. "Wait until January", said Agency One, "we'll see what happens". Infuriatingly, I may not have a choice.

The other... well... apparently I was a) under-experienced, b) asking too much, c) not having a car wasn't helping matters, and by the way, d) it's 50% sales. Now, a) is subjective at best, particuarly regarding the specifics of this job, and c) can be remedied. d) is just really annoying because I asked Agency Two specifically if this was a sales role and was told, emphatically, no. I'm an engineer, not a salesman.

But b) disturbs me no end - not because I think I'm worth more (or less, for that matter), but because I didn't give Agency Two an hourly rate to work from. I'm not exactly certain what sort of figure had been presented beforehand and I didn't want to ask, but until I get a really, really good explanation for that unexpectedly dollar-ous bombshell, I won't be applying through them again. Discussions of rate were deliberately omitted prior to the final interview for the simple reason that I did not want to be perceived as a mere expenditure, but rather as someone with something (however insignificant or diminished it might, in their opinion, be) to contribute to the prospective employer.

The unpleasantness of funding and budget is relatively minor compared with getting someone right for the job. Once you've found them - or something near enough - then you can duke it out, cash-wise. I have an issue with companies who seem to go into an interview situation with the idea that their potential new staff member is out to screw them for as much money as possible, because we're not always like that. I'm a professional and I love what I do. There's a bare minimum rate that I won't go under, because I like to be able to eat and take hot showers and maintain the financial "security" I've built up over the latter-half of my 20s... but beyond that, my living expenses and savings generally don't vary too much - unless I'm relocating between capitals, in which case, I think it's only fair to include the expenses associated with that sort of movement. I don't think it's being mercenary, and let's face it: if they're willing to recruit from interstate, the need is obviously pronounced enough to warrant a bit of respect for the candidate's obligations. In any case, I put out for my profession - companies don't see that until you pull that big wad of cash out of their field of vision.

Recruiters, though, see you purely as income. There's no loyalty once they've got their spotter's fee, andI am getting sick to death of being fucked around by these Recruiters who are only in it for the cash, so if there are any reading this blog right now (ha!), LISTEN UP. The ongoing saga of occupational placement is NOT MERELY a source of income for you. My profession is NOT some CHEAP TRINKET to be waved in front of those clients of yours, who justsortakindamightmaybe in the market for one. It's impossible to take the process seriously when this sort of greedy, deceptive double/triple/quadruple-dipping goes on and on and on in lieu of actual placement. I'd rather not know how many times I've been the donkey for a more promising candidate from the same agency, and don't tell me that shit doesn't happen. 'course it does. If you couldn't be bothered to get an understanding of who am I, what I do and what I want to contribute, then just pass me off to someone who is.

I've been looking for a meaningful job which makes use of skills for almost a year now. I've lost count of the number of applications I've submitted, the number of times I've re-written my CV (I have FOUR DIFFERENT VERSIONS NOW), the number of phonecalls and emails I've had to make when chasing up an agency which seems to have forgotten they were going to get me an interview, and exactly how many times I've been told that the client was going with an internal recruitment, or a less experienced and therefore less expensive candidate, or they've decided to move in a different direction altogether, or that I'm just not suited to the job because it turned out to be NOTHING LIKE THE ORIGINAL ADVERTISEMENT, or have ended up seeing the same job advertised for weeks and weeks and weeks. It's total lunacy and I'm seriously considering pulling a massive stunt in my non-native Bullshit by completely fudging my CV(s) and filling it with piping-hot, positive crap... just to see what sort of results I'd get.

Until Whenever

*three letter acronym
**four letter acronym

Think nice thoughts

2007-12-10T01:21:00.000+11:00

So here I am, in Melbourne, smashed on fizzy wine (it comes in a can; will find you a link soon) and feeling very, very sleepy. My travelling companion and I walked something akin to this...

View Larger Map

...in fairly cool weather - an awesome change from Sydney's gruesome mugginess. Melbourne is quite pretty, from what we saw, trudging down one of the Little streets; cafés still open and people still wandering about... it's very classy. I could handle it... perhaps... mind you, the last time I considered a move to a different capital city, it turned into something of a disaster. All judgement has been reserved until later this week.

We shall see what happens before I form any emotional attachments to this town.

Until Whenever

Random guys I find attractive

2007-12-08T04:45:00.000+11:00

James McAvoy

It's all about meme.

2007-12-08T01:32:00.000+11:00

These are terrible but I'm bored so nyyerrr.

1) Where did you begin 2007?
At my place, with good champers (Moët) and better friends.

2) What was your status by Valentine's Day?
Hopelessly infatuated with a dead actor. The usual.

3) Were you in school (anytime this year)?
In a manner of speaking, yes.

4) How did you earn your money?
Tech monkeydom.

5) Did you have to go to the hospital?
Umm... I think so, though I can't remember why.

6) Did you have any encounters with the police?
Oh, yes. Footy-bally thingy player stabbed in apartment block across the street. Gorgeous policeman at the door.

7) Where did you go on holiday?
"Holiday"? That means nothing to me, unless you're referring to Madonna.

8) What did you purchase that was over $1000
Oh, my new laptop! *kisses it* We're very close.

9) Did you know anybody who got married?
Yup, but not in 2007.

10) Did you know any body who passed away?
My grandfather, for starters.

12) Did you move anywhere?
Canberra for six weeks... and (*fingers crossed*) to Melbourne!

14) What concerts/shows did you go to?
Tori Amos, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Miss Saigon, my old schoolmate Bryan Estepa at the Rose of Australia, and some drag show down at the seediest club in history, The Imperial.

15) Are you registered to vote?
Uh, yeah.

16) Who did you want to win Big Brother?
It's mortifying that I can answer this question at all: Jamie.

17) Where do you live now?
Suburban Sydney. Home sweet home.

18) Describe your birthday.
Blissfully quiet.

19) What's one thing you thought you'd never do but did in 2007?
Seriously consider moving away from my apartment.

20) What has been your favorite moment?
Quitting that motherfucking, soul-sucking government job...

21) What's something you learned about yourself?
...knowing full well that I can still handle The Real World.

22.) Any new additions to your family?
Oh, one or two.

23.) What was your best month?
So far, August.

24.) Where will you be ending 2007?
With family, friends, or both. Preferably surrounded by fizzy boozé.

I'll have it if he won't.

2007-12-06T20:56:00.001+11:00

I've been laughing myself silly at this for the last few minutes. Juvenile, I know...

It's either time for EVOLUTION, or some good shopping.

2007-12-05T17:25:00.000+11:00

To the tune of "I Am Evil Homer":

In-ter-views to-mor-row!
In-ter-views to-mor-row!

In-ter-views on Mon-day!
In-ter-views on Mon-day!

In-ter-views in Mel-bourne!
In-ter-views in Mel-bourne!

Not bad for someone who never really got into The Simpsons, eh?

Oddly enough, today I ran into one of my old bosses (the really nice one) down at the shopping centre, picking up my drycleaning. Whilst chatting with him, I missed a call from this particularly poorly-known, but sacred-place-in-my-heart-holding company, and I'm still intrigued as to what they were after. No voicemail, no callbacks, and redialling the number took me to their computerised directory assistance.

What an interesting day. And I was just thinking, earlier, about how I needed to really reboot my life, disinfect my existence, scour away the oldness, tidy up (or cut off) all those niggling little loose ends and Move The Fuck On.

Random guys I find attractive (Everlasting Swoon Edition)

2007-12-02T18:45:00.000+11:00

To celebrate the first anniversary of finding the guy who snapped me out of the traditional Psych-le (har! har!) of falling for totally unavailable men, I present unto thee...

Anthony Perkins

Still the last obsessive and impossible crazy crush on a long list thereof.
So glad that fifteen-year-old bout of self-destruction is over with.
Thanks, Perky!

Random guys I find attractive

2007-11-30T23:02:00.000+11:00

Edward Atterton

Groovy!

2007-11-30T13:07:00.000+11:00

This is just plain awesome.

hic

2007-11-28T20:06:00.000+11:00

Thanks, Dr_Nic!

It would take 10 Long Island Iced Teas to kill me

Fresno Dating

Flying south... for the summer?

2007-11-27T15:39:00.000+11:00

What is it about Time and Change and Chaos? Some sort of twisted cosmic threesome always in bed with each other, and never leaving their cozy little arrangement except to slam the door in the faces of those pesky mortals who come to question them. My toes are still sore.

In the last few days, it has become apparent that the major upheavals in my life have always centred around Home - idea, reality or otherwise. I've spent the last six weeks in Canberra, escaping its apathetic clutches (on the eve of the election which gave us an entirely new gaggle of politicians and their clutches - yes, like the eggs - of policy. As I said before - The Ruddster had better not let us down; twelve years of gradual domestic and international dehumanisation had better be worth something to those of us old enough - or young enough - to remember what it was like pre-Howard). Moving there was - in a way that isn't professional, personal, fiscal, social or intellectual - a fairly good idea, and one that I'm rather proud of, even if the reality turned out to be as dull, bland, misleading and unfulfilling as my cooking. 'twas indeed a powerful maneouvre on my part because, although my savings are shot, my faith is shaken and my car is an aluminium-foil wreck of a vehicular corpse, it proved to me that I can survive Out There. Living in a place that isn't Sydney didn't kill me; being three-and-a-half-hours from the place I call home did not signify the end of my existence. Sure, the homesickness was crushing for the first couple of weeks, but it passed...

...strangely, now that I'm back, I'm even less willing to mill about here all day, watching Gimme Gimme Gimme or Absolutely Fabulous or Perky movies on a loop. I've been investigating jobs in... wait for it... Melbourne lately; one in particular has grabbed me by the career interest and has been slowly, slowly tugging (at) me for the last week. My application looked good, resumé well-suited, intermediary was somewhat impressed, and the desperation of the prospective employer isn't hurting my chances either. If only they'd call back. Blah blah blah, whatever, point is: I would never have considered a move until hitting my own desperation a little under two months ago - change cities for a job? Ludicrous! DeeMacGee, live somewhere else that isn't Sydney (or possibly London)? Are you mad? A psychological umbilical cord thicker than your average undersea telecommunications cable, and quite a bit stronger too, kept me from experimenting with geography. No more. Did it snap? Did it fray? Did someone have a go at it with a laser? Who gives a fuck? Point is, I'm not bound by the same sense of territoriality I once was - though it'd still be nice to come home to a clean apartment once in a while. Carpet should not be crunchy, and I blame my housesitter for that.

Still, once I've secured something new for my 40-hours-a-week-of-productive-citizenship, I'll be heading off to find a dwelling somewhat nearby. The car is no longer an option, as far as I'm concerned, and I really don't need much to live on. With rental income, the apartment can take care of itself and I'll be guaranteed somewhere to come back to once I return from my still-in-planning overseas jaunt next year. So far away, so far away, all these place... but not really. To work in Canberra: three-and-a-half hours travel time by the limited opportunites for buses and trains. To work in Melbourne: just over an hour in a plane, and they leave twice every hour. It's a frigging eighteen-hour-a-day shuttle service between Sydney and Sydney Lite! Putting aside the raw kilometric distances... which is actually closer? You save about an hour going from Melbourne to Sydney, and that's including the associated shuttle buses, taxicabs and Sydney trains.

Anyway, whatever. My point is: as far as concern over employment-related uprooting, Canberra's the tougher option to sustain - and I lived it for about six weeks!

Melbourne would be a doddle.

Oh, I do love making such grandiose plans... particularly when they seem quite doable.

Until Whenever

Dodecanevitable

2007-11-25T19:16:00.000+11:00

Dear John Howard,

Suck it.

Dear Peter Costello,

Suck it harder.

Dear Kevin Rudd,

Don't let us down.
You have 12 years of new voters to keep happy.
Sign Kyoto, pull the troops out, abolish WorkChoices... and get rid of HECS while you're at it.

(ref: Australian Federal Election, 2007)

Slip-sliding away...

2007-11-20T12:24:00.000+11:00

There’s been a lot – a lot – of good music put out in the last few weeks. Annie Lennox, The Killers, Pet Shop Boys, Spice Girls... they’ve all released great albums (or best-ofs, or recaps). Lucky me, with all this brand-new audio for my long trips to-and-from Canberra.

Alas (ha!), these journeys inland are coming to a thankful end. My time in The National Capital is almost over, praise be! The madness has reached its endgame. Obvious question: what the fuck was I thinking, transplanting myself 300 kilometres south-west? I’ll tell you: this was supposed to be my recovery. This was the job to engage my professional sensibilities, to prove my capacity as a full-blown engineer, and to generally help me get over the nasty break-up of my previous employer. Tragically, this position, and the effective spendable dollar rate, were heavily misexplained/misinterpreted/mis-whatevered.

Employing someone in a particular technical capacity necessitates access to even more particular regions of the system they’re expected to maintain, no? I am the only one who thinks this way? I believe I might be, at least in the working environment I call my own... until the end of this week, at least. My most immediate co-worker (who has absolutely no sense of immediacy about him... is that real irony or just a cheap attempt thereat*?) recently saw fit to question, amongst other things, my seemingly misguided expectation of higher access.

“Do you really think you’ll go in to some new place and be given elevated privileges as soon as you start?” asked Alpha-Wannabe-With-Little-Man-Syndrome; no attempt to mask his incredulity, or mockery.

“Yes, actually. I do. How else is someone supposed to get their job done?” replied I, with utter deadpan and a hard stare... thinking: “Tell me I’m wrong. I fucking dare you”. To his (temporary) credit, he did not.

Alpha-Wannabe-With-Little-Man-Syndrome’s approach to “getting the job done” overlapped that of my manager, Venom Gland, and quite neatly, too. Came the proclamation: “You have to earn your stripes” . It’s kind of there that everything went really gravitationally-influenced. Ponder that total absurdity late one night and it might occur to you, too: if I had not “earned my stripes” during the interview which actually gave me the job, how else was I supposed to prove myself? How does maintaining the freakishly-inoperative status-quo prove my worthiness as the “fresh set of eyes” and positive force for “meaningful evolution of the system” so excitedly described in our first meeting?

Were they waiting for my indoctrination into Their Ways? Slamming my expertise up against their brick walls until it was nought but tenderised carcass – much like that kangaroo from a few weeks back – was not an appealing prospect. Was I supposed to let the remains of my soul leak away until the mindless repetition of a technological 2002 took its place? Long-time readers will know how unlikely that is – since when do I compromise my beliefs and/or professionalism for a mere employer? Nu-uh, Venom Gland, you don’t get to subvert my principles. Only I can do that, and it’s generally accepted that death itself will happen first. I’ve read Nineteen Eighty-Four, I know what you’re planning.

So from there came the head-butting. Venom Gland: “Tell me what you think about [topic]”.
And I did.
Venom Gland: “Oh. *pause* Well, I supposed I asked for that.”
Indeed you did, VG, though it’s not like I insulted your family, set your phone to detonate and torched your house – you asked a question and I provided a good page of response. I could do no less – it’s my job.

Never ask a question if you’re not prepared to hear any answer.
DeeMacGee

The first solicitation of professional opinion left me feeling... well... useful, despite the tepid reception. Here, have a perspective! Have several! I’ve got a whole swag of approaches here, pick one you like best. You’ll notice they’re all marked “CHANGE”? This is not a coincidence.

The second, third, fourth, etc, requests for opinion were not as fulfilling and it became FUCKING OBVIOUS: appeasement, ego-style, was in play. How rude... and pointless! I have a blog, goddammit, your attempts at masturbation are unnecessary. Why not try taking me seriously instead? (Oh what a portent, though unrecognised it was...)

Apparently I’m too whacked-out and left-of-centre to let loose amongst the empty “complexities” (*snort*) of Their Environment. Not their words, but the terror on Venom Gland’s face and the free-flowing river of Meh from Alpha-Wannabe-With-Little-Man-Syndrome made it pretty bloody buggery clear that I was perceived as a dangerous individual, to be contained at all costs for fear of effective demonstration and proof-of-concept. What if I was right? The(ir) world might end.

It wouldn’t shit me so much if they’d been clear about their expectations. To describe the situation as A in the interview, and then a week later describe it as B, where A and B are exact opposites is misleading (at best). How can you equate “evolving the system” with “we’re not really in a position to change anything”, keep a straight face whilst saying it, and sleep at night knowing you’ve suckered someone into relocating their working week to a totally different city under the pretence of an appealing function which, not only does not exist, but is virtually impossible to accomplish in this particular environment? (Note to self: ask them.) When did everyone start doublethinking?

I’ve wasted everyone’s time, my savings, fuck-only-knows how many potential opportunities for employment, and now I’m even more burnt out on corporate mentality that before... as though it were even possible.

The hope now is that this is an aberration; some heinous one-off. Oh, GOD, please let it just be bad luck that these people are so far removed from my expectations of the corporate world. There has to be a company out there somewhere which actually appreciates and respects an employee’s willingness to actively better the current operations. Put ego aside and stop denigrating the six years of knowledge, expertise and proven effectiveness I’ve brought with me, and which presumably had some influence over your decision to hire me and not one of the other candidates.

That last contracting gig I took a few months ago was a very different experience: three weeks of great people, appreciative bosses, operational validity, good humour, enjoyment and professional respect. Why is it so hard to respect someone’s capacity, or at least their potential? I’ve never criticised my colleagues or condemned the way they’ve performed their functions, despite receiving no such decency from the two people I work most closely with. (Now that I’m leaving,) I’m freely flinging tips, suggestions, professional recommendations and/or outright criticisms of procedure and obvious lack of progress... which seems more of an affront to them than if I’d hurled a few choice personal attacks their way. But they’ll just have to deal with that – what can they do, sack me? I brook no discussion with their ilk; this is my job and this is the best way I know how to execute it. Turning that into an “us-vs-them” with me as the villain is, as always, a much easier option than acknowledging their mistakes. Do they understand how it could also be construed as poor recruitment and poor judgement, not necessarily a poor candidate? Quite possibly they do... and they’d also understand how the recruitment process was all them. I’m leaving for a more meaningful and respectful environment – that’s not a good reflection on them, and particularly not with the staff exodus of late. This is my sixth week, and I’ll be the eighth or ninth employee to vacate my desk. It speaks volumes... but unfortunately not with sufficient volume.

Regardless, how this week plays out will be very interesting... to say the least.
Onwards, ever upwards, dear readers.

Until Whenever

*Is thereat even a word?

Not... quite... yet.

2007-11-13T23:43:00.001+11:00

Currently listening to: Around the world / around the world...
Around The World / Homework / Daft Punk

You don't seriously expect me to type out all the lyrics, do you?
Jeeee-sus. *shakes head*

Resigned my new job yesterday. 2002 was nice and all, but I don't want to work there. It's sooo first-half-of-this-decade. The obvious upside is, of course, that I get to return to civilization (read: Sydney). I shouldn't say that, really, everyone here has been quite nice... but there's no sense of urgency; no drive to be really, insanely productive. I'm through with treading water - it's time to swim. Or sink.

If I wasn't going to London next year, I'd totally look into starting my own company. I have this truly awesome idea for a techy start-up (well, have had it for years), and it's well suited to my particular 1337ness; I know what it needs and how to get it going, but without any customer-relations skills (or even people-skills), it's kinda dead in the water. I don't often throw questions out to my... errr... "audience", but has anyone ever thought about starting their own company, was it difficult, and what did you end up doing?

Until Whenever.

And it's time, time, time that you love...

2007-11-03T14:27:00.000+11:00

Currently listening to: I want a dog / a chihuahua / when I get back to my small flat, I want to hear somebody bark / oh, you can get lonely / don't want a cat / scratching its claws all over my habitat / giving no love and getting fat / oh, you can get lonely and a cat's no help with that / I want a dog to walk in the park / when it gets dark my dog will bark at any passers-by / oh, you can get lonely / I want a dog / I want a dog / a chihuahua / when I get back to my small flat, I want to hear somebody bark / oh, you can get lonely / I want a dog
I Want A Dog / Introspective / Pet Shop Boys

...and it's all just moving too slowly, or too quickly, or never the same speed twice, or never the right speed even once. This week, I keep running into the only dimension I've ever had interest in (or trouble with). Jezzy posted this awesome meditation on our individual plans and where we see ourselves going from "here" (whatever that means). This crazed obsession with planning; a side-effect of the Industrial Revolutionaries and their Clockwork (Orange) Precision - "Thou Shalt Be Here At Nine AM" - as though the world, or the cogs, would stop spinning if that otherwise empty desk were still vacant at 9:01 AM. Fuck that for a joke, who seriously believes Time is solid? Some sharp-edged, tangible object with which to slice, dice and generally CUT anyone who might get in its way? Einstein said it best: Time is RELATIVE, dammit, and even when you take away the big numbers and the fancy equations of his proof and their seemingly adequate applicability to The Universe In General, his point is pretty obvious: Time is not a motherfucking rock. It's not material. It's not tangible. That watch on your arm, that clock on the wall, that elaborately gaudy timepiece on the desk in your study - they are not Time. The slow ticking of the cosmos is not under your personal influence. It does not happen merely because you own some device by which to observe it. Yanno, sorry to break it to you, but Time Is Not Your Bitch.

It's actually the other way around.

Funny that.

So stop waggling your finger in my direction, and spare me your exaggerated sense of entitlement to my chronometry.

That's not actually a reference to my new (but soon to be "old") workplace, because strangely enough, most people my age seem to GET this without a great deal of head-stress or mind-work ...although, I did try to explain my "cultural temporal singularity" theory* to someone the other day, and it was met only with a confused expression. Perhaps it was inappropriately presented.

Until "when"ever

*the short version is this: my generation is the last generation; the sum total of documented history and art is available to us and everyone who comes after us, on-demand and with ever-increasing realism, via the Internet (and subsequent technologies) - so we all become the products of *human* culture, not isolated, temporally-specific, geographically-specific events - like World Wars, Woodstock, 9/11, the Moon Landing, etc, etc, etc, etc, etc, all the way back to the beginning of, yanno, like, everything (one day).

You are hereby on notice.

2007-11-03T14:07:00.000+11:00

Your attention, please.

I have, for some time, been unable to finish a rant. You know, those really epic ones that don't make sense, aren't funny, and/or serve no purpose other than the wholesale masturbation of my hitherto repressed "linguistic" side. Either I'm just not into globally-expressed bitchery like I used to be, or my attention span is dropping.

Whatever; from now on, I'll post whatever I write, be it finished, coherent, humourous and/or wanky.

BE WARNED, dear readers, for I am often a non-sequitur incarnate*.

*in-carn-ate: "having taken the form of meat", yes?

He's obviously digging it.

2007-10-26T18:26:00.000+10:00

Mildura sent this through and it totally deserves advertising. It's not that I want to damage Kevvie's political credibility, but my GOD, this can't go unnoticed... if only for the "eww" value.

Keep an eye on the guy in the top-left. Would he like a shovel?

And to think, he's the preferred option as Prime Minister of Australia.
Oh well... at least he's proven himself human, not like that solider-murdering fascist zombie we've got now, or his greasy, slimy, smarmy git of a sidekick.

...the door's open.

2007-10-23T00:38:00.000+10:00

One of these women is Melissa Etheridge, whom I love. The other is Jodie Foster in The Brave One, which I saw last week and rather enjoyed.

Dear Jodie Foster,

Bitch, please just come out already. The man-hands, the jawline, the hair, the voice... who are you fooling?

Anyhoo.

I'm not loving Canberra. There, I've finally said it. It's depressing and average and I'm just as disconnected from my age group down here as in Sydney. There are many different flavours of geekdom and nerdiness and, once again, it's all about being the singular example of another type of dorkery. I'm missing my home turf - friends, family (sorta), my couch - and lovely as this hotel room might be, it's just not home. How could it be? I've spent the last (first) 28 years of my life in Sydney; specifically, the south-western corner where the leakage of suburbia dries up into wilderness. I'm acclimatising to this little civic hole in the landscape - it's not altogether bad, sure - it's just that everything closes about two hours too early and I'm feeling very alienated. Would that I were back home with Jennifer, Perky and James. *sigh*

It doesn't help that I'm dismally unhappy with this new job. As it turns out, I'm not good at taking orders. Well mother-fucking-DUHHH. I do not understand how someone can be hired for their expertise, only to have all sorts of vague, procedural criticisms hurled at them. You'd think, if the new guy spent six years doin' hyas thaaaaaaaayng for a much larger organisation - and solo, too - his opinion might be worth a smidge more than just your raised eyebrow and poor attempts at a diplomatic dressing-down. I got results without breaking the law because of my unconventionality, so have a little fucking faith and let me do my job. I don't need this shit and it's not getting any better. I'll be here for at least another month (to recoup at least some of my losses - keep reading), but after that, it's open season and back to Sydney by Christmas.

Add to this that my income was greatly - GREATLY - misrepresented. I won't throw around the exact numbers (that'd be obnoxious and plain rude); suffice it to say that I'm about 33% out of pocket overall, and it's exactly that 33% I had planned to use in eradicating my Visa debt, and funding my trip to London, and perhaps furnishing my apartment a little more. But nooooooooooo, apparently it doesn't matter how many times you ask for clarification/explanation/truth, you're not guaranteed to get anything even pretending to be a right answer. The short version is that this entire situation is only marginally more profitable than the job I've just escaped - and that's simply not enough to warrant being so far from home, lonely, miserable, frustrated and disappointed. Maybe it'll pick up. Maybe it won't. Either way, I have options, I just need to stick it out for the next four weeks.

Beryl: Anyone ever tell you you're fickle?
Linda: Nah, I don't hang around long enough.

Beryl Merit (Rosalind Knight) and Linda La Hughes (Kathy Burke)
Gimme Gimme Gimme, "Who's That Boy?"

Oh, and I managed to run over a kangaroo on my way down this weekend. Poor thing's probably less Skippy and more Limpy now. Or maybe a Twitchy. Actually, given the force of the impact and how it almost completely totalled the front-outer-passenger side of my car (no left headlight, highbeam points to the ground, left blinkers broken and I can't open the passenger door), that ~~oversized native rat~~ large marsupial is most likely a Rotty, The Remains Of A Bush Kangaroo. Clearly a major setback to whatever finances I may - or may not - have left, and just one more cunt of a thing I did not need to deal with right now. Why won't it just stop?

Oh well.

Dear Channel 9,

Do NOT fuck with this Federal Election. This is not the USA.

Spare us your endless justifications of inflamed editorial opinion and accusations of censorship, and just report the fucking news, free of bias. The Worm indeed. I mean, really.

Until Whenever

Sleepy Hollow

2007-10-17T01:55:00.000+10:00

Currently listening to: If you've done nothing wrong, you've got nothing to fear / if you've something to hide, you shouldn't even be here / long live us, the persuaded we / integral, collectively, to the whole project / it's brand new, conceived solely to protect you / one world / one reason / unchanging / one season / if you've done nothing wrong, you've got nothing to fear / if you've something to hide, you shouldn't even be here / you've had your chance, now we've got the mandate / if you've changed your mind, I'm afraid it's too late / we're concerned you're a threat / you're not integral to the project / sterile / immaculate / rational / perfect / everyone has their own number in the system that we operate under / we're moving to a situation where your lives exist as information / one world / one life / one chance / one reason / all under one sky / unchanging / one season / if you've done nothing wrong, you've got nothing to fear / if you've something to hide, you shouldn't even be here / you've had your chance, now we've got the mandate / if you've changed your mind, I'm afraid it's too late / we're concerned you're a threat / you're not integral to the project / one world / one life / one chance / one reason / all under one sky / unchanging / one season / if you've done nothing wrong, you've got nothing to fear / if you've something to hide, you shouldn't even be here / you've had your chance, now we've got the mandate / if you've change your mind, I'm afraid it's too late / we're concerned you're a threat / if you've done nothing wrong, you've got nothing to fear / if you've something to hide, you shouldn't even be here / we're concerned you're a threat / you're not integral to the project / sterile / immaculate / rational / perfect
Integral / Fundamental / Pet Shop Boys

So here I am, now a resident of Canberra... for the next few months anyway. Last Wednesday onwards has been a blur of forms, photocopiers, cute policemen (long story), writer's cramp, driving-endless-driving, hotel rooms, homesickness and a new, intimidating, workplace. Forgive me if I dispense with the relatively minor details. There's a lot to get in over the next few posts.

Canberra. Canberra is the "city" of ultimate complacency. Coma-inducingly anodyne. White lego-block buildings. Huge avenues where ten cars at an intersection counts as a traffic jam. Supermarkets that close at 10PM. Manufactured natural features. People who think, speak and react at about half the speed of your average Sydneysider. It's all very pretty and clean and logical... but it's also dull and kind of empty. No matter how much culture they invoke/induce/install, it's still just a big town with too many roundabouts. And here am I, bang in the middle of it, berating my new stomping ground after only two days of seeing it from the hotel room balcony or the windows of my new workplace. Hardly polite behaviour, is it? I mean, it really does deserve a chance to prove itself before being judged unworthy or inferior, doesn't it? Of course it does. Large regional centres are people too. But by god, I've had no trouble sleeping this week.

Speaking of which.

Until Whenever

Drumroll, please...

2007-10-13T11:23:00.000+10:00

Stay tuned.

I think there's something in that for all of us, don't you?

2007-10-09T02:34:00.000+10:00

More power to Chris Crocker; neo-prophet and cultural activist in the making.

Ties die

2007-09-30T13:53:00.001+10:00

A collection of ties I'm about to put into storage, either because:
a) they're an affront to anything even approximating a sense of fashion,
b) I haven't worn some of them since 1994, or,
c) I don't see myself being able to non-ironically accessorise them before 2020.

(Ye may clicky for a much, much larger picture.)

Random guys I find attractive

2007-09-17T03:13:00.000+10:00

James Dreyfus

Flobbergasted

2007-08-23T19:25:00.000+10:00

This is so fundamentally damaged, I simply had to share it.
You'll need to log in -
username: tadaa
password: tadaa

Clicky here!

...I ...I ...I ...

2007-08-18T14:31:00.000+10:00

I think I'm going to cry.

Cryptic Transparency

2007-08-10T18:26:00.000+10:00

Temporary

Reprieve

Granted

That is all.

Sing it, baby - parts 2 and 3

2007-08-09T07:24:00.000+10:00

You have no idea how brutally applicable these comics are.

A billion nubile virgins to Scott Adams.

SPOILER ALERT. Bwaaaaahahahahaha

2007-08-02T23:32:00.001+10:00

Harry Potter ending sarcastically revealed on morning TV.
http://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/14341773.html

Sheesh.

Oh, and I've been saying this for years: get them ALL together and just make one six-hour film. Hollywood needs to get it out of their collective systems. (Not the new Halloween movie, the bit under it.)
http://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/14341597.html

Toxic. Waists.

2007-08-01T16:53:00.000+10:00

I've been pretty sick since Sunday night. This has nothing to do with watching The Simpsons Movie and everything to do with the cold virus jumping into a genetically compatible host.

(Translation: I caught it from my father.)

I can't tell you how disappointing The Simpsons Movie actually is. It's even less funny than an average episode of the TV show - kinda sad, really, since they've had (effectively) twenty years to make it. It's almost as though the writers had taken the best offcuts and omissions from the whole history of the series and blended them up to pad out 90 minutes of screen time. Not that I was expecting much - The Simpsons has never really grabbed me - but still. I laughed-out-loud exactly twice. Even Transformers was (intentionally) funnier than this... which is saying something.

Oh well.

I was really, desperately hoping to see the teaser trailer for 01.18.08, or whatever the fuck ~~that rapist of a screenwriter~~ J. J. Abrams is calling it. See? I'm susceptible to viral infections and viral marketing. Curse my immune system. I am only human, no?

Bleh.

I bit the bullet* today and had a good (though short) poke through the Techronomicon which supplanted deemacgee's Digital Divinity for Dummies. Like any good portmanteau involving the word "Necronomicon", it was - as expected - written in blood and bound with the skin of a flayed computer support victim. I had to hold it up to a mirror, upside down, and even then it only made some sort of insane sense when I spoke the inscribed words aloud and backwards.

(Similar to reading Trainspotting, really.)

This "New" system has holes in it, some wider than Paris Hilton's wajeena (even). Has that joke been done already? Probably. Whatever. I shall continue my investigations tomorrow... if only to kill time between bathroom breaks and waiting for the 'phone to ring.

Tonight, my mother and I went to see Evening. The common tagline for this film... or, at least, the one being spouted on the mid-morning talkshows for bored, slightly-pre-menopausal housewives, is "bring a big box of tissues". Now, I took along several small packets of tissues instead... and yet, a half-full** handkerchief was more than sufficient. It's a sad (that's a generic sadness) film... but, look, it's no Beaches. There was some ocular dampness, don't get me wrong - but being kept on the verge of tears is like being kept on the verge of orgasm: after a few hours, it's just downright rude.

None of it matters, though, because I still love Meryl Streep.
Despite Adaptation and The Devil Wears Prada.

And The Manchurian Candidate.
Oh, and Prime.

Yes.

Especially Prime.

*shiver*

Anyway.

In slightly lighter (though less artistic) news, a fellow blogger - or, rather, livejournalist - posted a link to a forum where people were shamelessly Muppet-ising movie posters for their perverse enjoyment. Enthralled and inspired, I followed suit. Please consider. Be kind, though, I'm a technogeek... not a graphic designer.

And now, it's time for a trip to whichever nearby all-night grocery store is still peddling flavoured milks at this hour. I am such a (diary?) dairy queen. (Yes... a joke for you American readers out there - enjoy it, because usually I just target your Government.) I'm rather... err.. gagging (unsurprisingly) for a McDevil's thickshake... but regularly "dining" upon the poisonous (toxic) offerings of that establishment has wrought havoc upon my pants: they're a bit tighter around the midsection (waists). Not good news, but motivaton enough to get back to a previous regimen of physical jerks... err, when the weather warms up.

Until Whenever

* God, what a horrible phrase... but I'm sick, dammit, and creative phrasing has escapéd me. Accented characters, apparently, have not.
** Don't ask.

Karma Afterburner

2007-07-30T01:09:00.000+10:00

I don't usually make fun of people here, but special dispensation has been granted unto myself for this Cletus:

BONUS REMIX!

Tit-ular Mastectomy (as in, this post no longer has a name).

2007-07-26T06:25:00.000+10:00

I'll do this quickly, because it's past 6AM and I've yet to snooze.

Caffeine and I are now officially estranged. My life seems so much happier without the constant upping and downing; my wisdom teeth aren't throbbing and giving me the usual brain-shaking quasi-meta-agony and I'm (strangely) a little more lucid during the obligatory "waking" hours.
I am coming slightly closer to finding that elusive new job. Well... I'd have to be, really, 'cause the Law of Averages must kick in at some point, right? I mean, there's 31,000 techy jobs on it.seek.com.au - I just want one. Today was promising; three applications, three callbacks, yanno, 'cause everyone just luurves my CV. *eyeroll* The sooner the better (UUUH DUUUUUUUUH) too, because my boss is rapidly becoming the vindictive, vengeful male equivalent of a phrase (the incredible, wonderful, intellectual and gorgeously sexy-as-all-hell*) Carole Morgan used to describe the festering, abortive mass otherwise known as Ann Coulter: "ballistic shrew".
Yes, I know the previous sentence is barbarically composed. My keyboard is made of uncured hide.
Saw Pretty Poison at the Chauvel on Monday night as part of their Cinematheque series - a new experience for me, to be sure, but getting comfortable with solo out-and-aboutness is my new New Years Resolution. And only seven months too late. Sitting in a large, darkened and generally empty room might seem a bit of a cop-out, but for someone who has traditionally preferred sitting in judgement of rank society instead of acknowledging, on some conveniently mild level, his latent agoraphobia (which most likely comes from years of increasingly histrionic, Chicken-Little misanthropy), it's a biggish step. I still hate being in public, particularly alone, and I still hate people, but that'll never change...
To quote from a half-prepared blog entry tapped out on my 'phone just prior to the film:

"I'm never early for anything, and I'm never anywhere alone. Tonight is an aberration, then, whilst I'm waiting for (yet another) film to start: not another Hollywood burger movie, but a proper classic from 1968 - and not in my local, abandoned-on-Mondays Gigaplex, but a reputable 'arthouse' on the upper edge of Sydney's famed dreaded Oxford Street. Normally, being here alone would terrify (or annoy) the living manure out of me... but I'm in a rare good mood today and figured I should take advantage of it."

That "good mood" probably had something to do with point 1.
Oh, and Pretty Poison was great - as always - though the print was an original 4:3 pillarbox and very scratchy. Big Screen Perky is just as ah-doh-wahable as Small Screen Perky... only larger.

Next week's Cinematheque is Croation Animation. Ummm... pass... but thanks anyway.
I have finally given up on The Difference Engine: it's excruciatingly dull and a burden on the mind. I cannot bring myself to care about Edward, or Mick, or Sybil. A shame, too, because it's William Gibson, The Father Of Cyberpunk - folk hero and storyteller supreme for techynerds. I mean, I love the whole concept of steampunk, but this book is as dry as stale Weet Bix. Instead, lighter fare - Prelude To Dune: House Atreides. Along with Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, Herbert's original Dune series has been the most influential literature I've ever read, so Prelude: Atreides is almost guaranteed to hold my attention span.

Yes, that should cover it for now.

Until Whenever

*Yeah, I don't get it either... not that it matters... but c'mon. She's hot. And that accent! *purrr*

Mediocre Quartet

2007-07-22T23:31:00.000+10:00

My, oh my. I'm going to make this quick because the hypersize Diet Coke is starting to wear off.

Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer - *sigh* I don't get it. The first FF was rather good, I thought; this sequel has the same director and one of the same writers who, incidentally, wrote for Twin Peaks aaaaaall those years ago. FF:ROTSS (an oddly, if somewhat cryptically, applicable acronym to be sure) is a totally average and disposable piece of filmic fluff. Really. I mean, where do I start complaining? Here? A little to the left? Okay...

...sure, planet-threatening bad guys need to be stopped. And our heroic collect-'em-all did just that, if you don't count the SHAMELESSLY RESURRECTED BAD GUY and the TEXTBOOK DEUS-EX-MACHINA ending. This argentine Big Kahuna - who looks a little like Billy Zane - flies around the universe tagging planets for some cosmic ulcer, and then just suddenly decides "wow, she looks like some chick I used to bang on my home planet; perhaps right now would be a good time to renounce my 'accessory-to-terracide' ways. Woah, dude!"?

Ya-huh.

Let's see, what else? Oh, that's right: why the fuck was Victor von Doom not sealed in a block of electrically-insulated cement and then deep-frozen, in the Arctic, in an über-maximum-security cold-storage facility under constant watch of the relevant authorities... intead of being stored in a castle, like some... some... fucking antique? Wouldn't that be the logical course of action?

Oh, and then there's the shameless product placement. Mr Fantastic can't seem to "put down his PDA". Extreme closeup of this gizmo on a cinema screen and the usually tiny Nokia logo is about two large popcorns high and three wide. Yeah, let's market a $400 piece of technology to impressionable kiddies, shall we? *sigh*

Dear Andre Braugher,
I used to love Homicide: Life On The Street back in the mid-90s, despite never really being a fan of police shows. You were tough and gritty (like good birdseed), but still stylish and... err... a bit slimmer. I know you can do better than this tripe. PS: diet.

Dear Ioan Gruffud,
You have an extremely rubbery forehead. I know CGI when I see it, and this wasn't. Either you're exceptionally supple or you've had latex implants. By the way, I fucking loved you in Solomon and Gaenor, and even (especially?) with that little tummy you're growing like a Chia-pet, you're still feouhhkun' lush and I would happily allow you to invade the later end of my digestive tract at any time.

Dear Jessica Alba,
Fake hair, fake contacts, fake special effects, fake boobs and I'm sure that was a CGI corset. Sorry, I just can't come up with a closing statement.

Dear Michael Chiklis,
Not bad. More clobberin' next time.

Dear Chris Evans,
Meh.

Until Whenever

Here 'tis

2007-07-21T02:32:00.001+10:00

This clip has evaded me for the last four years. No longer!
The Panadol joke is, quite possibly, one of the funniest I've ever heard. Ever. 'tis my style of humour.

WHY, GOD? WHYYYY?

2007-07-19T13:38:00.001+10:00

I'll take Cookies and Cream any day.

#If I were a Simpson... na na na na na na na na na na na na na na na#

2007-07-18T16:33:00.000+10:00

What's most disturbing about being Simpson-ised is not that cartoonish, badly-coordinated mediocrity seems translate perfectly into the two-dimensional, production-line animation (I really do look like that)... but that the sun-deprived, jaundiced complexion is a little too close to the truth.

I'm loving the hair, though.

$4625.00

Mingle² - Free Online Dating

You know, I'm really just picking random words instead of trying to come up with legitimate titles for these bouts of spasmodic literacy.

I've been whoring myself to the cinema lately and I'm only halfway done with my ~~ocular prostitution~~ list of films to see. Living so close to a moviehouse has benefits - especially in winter. BE WARNED: potential spoilers.

Shrek The Third:
I love any movie or TV show built on pop-culture references ... but the second one was better. I'm a bit disturbed that the character voiced by a black actor had interbred, but the lead roles voiced by white actors had sprogged pure-blood offspring. And then there's Justin Timberlake voicing unwilling (and undeserved?) royalty, for whom there is apparently no adequate racial slur akin to "apple" or "banana" or "coconut" - at least, not one that I can find. "Vegemite sandwich" seems applicable... but might be lost on international readers. Or maybe I'm just reading too far into it all.

(Please note that I am being sarcastic, not racist. Thank you.)

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix:
You know... for me, nothing has yet topped the glory of Philosopher's Stone. Prisoner of Azkaban and Goblet of Fire came close, but the epic wonderment of that first film has stayed with me. This new one... well... okay, it was a really thick book and Rowling has a way of cramming sooooooooooooo much detail into soooooooooooooo few words that something, inevitably, would be lost in the cinematic translation - though I would have happily sat there an extra hour if they´d tried to include it all.

Alas, they did not.
And it was over all too soon.

No, really.

Glossed over.

And there were no real OWL exams. (Or is that in the next one?)

Anyway... in short:

Tonks is hot. And I mean, hot.
(Like, "I-would-turn-for-her" hot.)
I'm totally in love with Luna; a freak after my own heart.
(I do hope she and Neville live happily ever after.)
The "Dark vs Light" spell-rumble at the end is fucking awesome.
(More that in the last two films, please!)
There really wasn't enough grief on Harry's part, re: Sirius.
(Tears, for the love of fuck, tears!)
Not enough Kreacher!
(You know, it didn't occur to me until just now that "Kreacher" is, like most other things, a pun - this time, on "creature".)
Umbridge - too much sugar, not enough spice.
(She's supposed to be closet-nasty, not closet-unpleasant-bureaucrat.)

Yeah.

Beside all these, though, the one thing that really stood out for me was the casual sprinklings of magic in the most domestic and pedestrian of circumstances. The Ministry of Magic, for example, or the Weasley's Christmas tree. It's gracefully and effortlessly elegant and a joy to behold. Aaaaah.

Transformers:
Oh, look, the jury's still out on that one. Incredible special-effects, and Peter Cullen's voice is pure sex... but Hugo Weaving as Megatron? Shia LaBeouf - who are you again, and why? Jon Voight? Josh Duhamel? WTF? Oh, and that token Australian in the US Department of Defense - what was that, some sort of "geez, yyyah, iouh Ahw-strayl-aaahns uehr seeehw kooohwahl" thanks for helping invade Iraq? Bah!

Who is Michael Bay fooling?
Which reminds me:

Dear Michael Bay,
"Cleverly" slipping an Armageddon reference into Transformers makes neither film any cooler. Or better.

But thanks for leaving the ending wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiide open for a ~~sequel~~ franchise.

Tonight, assuming I don't fall unconscious before then, I'm planning to see a late session of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer before it's erased from my local Gigaplex. Should be... err... interesting.

And to finish, a special treat because it's nice to end posts ~~with such things~~. Those who know me... or who've read the appropriate hero-worship posts in my blog... know also of my deep affinity for the works of one Shaun Micallef, who created a character after which this blog's ostensible author is named. The following sketch, which I saw for the first time only a few minutes ago, is an outtake from Season One of The Micallef Program (first broadcast in 1998).

I invite you to partake of the (allegedly inadequate) humour:

Done? Good-oh.

Now, it's not tremendously, side-splittingly funny in the traditional ha-ha sense of the word (not that Mr Micallef's sense of humour has ever been particularly traditional)... but it's still pretty amusing, and (as those who know the real-life version of DeeMacGee might have figured out by now) quite dear to me.

Why?

Because my exceedingly-uncommon real-life surname scores a mention on the roll-call.

Yes, it's trivial, but given there's only about four thousand people on this planet who share my last name... and only a few hundred of those in this country... well, yanno, it's kinda cool. Especially when I've been such an enormous fan for about half my life.

So, yeah, enough gush.

EDIT: I completely forgot to mention - July 18th is Mr Micallef's birthday... so... Happy Birthday to Him.

Until Whenever

drain

2007-07-14T05:47:00.000+10:00

Paris Hilton: she's just one huge downward spiral of self-referencing suck, no?

Good on her.

2007-07-10T04:11:00.000+10:00

Finally, something resembling even a smidgen of Journalistic Integrity from the US.
Snaps to you, Mika Brzezinski.

UPDATE:

Michael Moore goes ballistic.

moore on cnn
Uploaded by dollarsandsense123

Blitherings of Innate Idiocy

O HAI I MAYD U A BLAG BUT I 4GOT 2 UPDAYT IT

End Title. Meant.

Something good in everything I see.

Gosh darn it.

The Confessions Of Zelda

Pull up to the bumper, baby...

Good sport Granny WINS AT LIFE.

You want me, baby.

Location, location.

Gotchya, you evil, menacing technoslag.

***FREE TICKETS - THIS IS NOT A JOKE****

Waste

It's all just greed.

It could happen.

Kill it with microwave radiation.

Interjection

Extra nutty fruitcake.

I'll never know if they're minty or sweet.

Destined for greatness.

Looks the same from everywhere

Just rip it from the wall, shall I?

Oddly arousing.

Demonoid is back!!

Somethin' up in thaya

Walk on by, walk on by. Foolish pride.

"...to think of yourself as a fraction, is already problematic."

They'll bring him back when there's a cure for old age.

Squinting into the sun.

Dual Colds

Pasture. Now.

"I'm gonna live forever!"

I love the New Media...

I've got the Baileys, but I'm fresh out of everything else...

Memes are easily stolen.

Ever-decreasing social circles.

The chills that you spill up my back...

Boing!

Not my meme.

"I will box your ears and leave you here stripped bare."

Perspective

Today I am a furrow.

Shameless Pluggery

Camera-sound-effect happy.

I must now atone.

BE WARNED!

splash splash splaaaaaaaaaash trickle drip drip flush

Temporal Trivia

Stale Spices

Trudging towards the future, clawmarks in my wake...

FUCKIN' OPPORTUNISTIC BASTARDS

Clovertrek

Get it done.

He can leave them on if he wants.

I guess he's joined the Ghost World now.

Sure, McLovin', I'd like that.

Random chicks I'd probably find attractive if things were slightly different

*clink*

Wait a minute, it must be Bhutto! Bhutto, I tell you!

Here's the cheer

I have a dream...

Get-out-of-my-head!

Request

Recommendation

More hate than love.

Think nice thoughts

Random guys I find attractive

It's all about meme.

I'll have it if he won't.

It's either time for EVOLUTION, or some good shopping.

Random guys I find attractive (Everlasting Swoon Edition)

Random guys I find attractive

Groovy!

*hic*

Flying south... for the summer?

Dodecanevitable

Slip-sliding away...

Not... quite... yet.

And it's time, time, time that you love...

You are hereby on notice.

*FREE TICKETS - THIS IS NOT A JOKE**

clink

hic