Worst Weekend EVER!

The weekend started off with potential. I spent the Friday night at Liz’s testing out my new breathalyser toy which we all agreed was a piece of junk and totally unreliable. I don’t think it would count when talking to the police after being pulled over. “Yea, offiker, I bew under 0.05 on mi ittle brethamalyzer ere, I is gud to go, yea?”. I was also accused of being too positive. Me? positive? Miss I’m positive the world is going to end and we’re all going to die? mmm.

Woke up early and pottered around the house cleaning and putting stuff away until some people came around mid morning to collect the tv unit. I had put it on e-bay and it got one bid. So it sold at a ridiculously low price. And I was obligated to sell at that price under e-bay’s rules. So I was mighty pissed off. He came to collect it with a trolley. And to me that says he plans to flip it and sell it for double next week. Damn you e-bay! *shakes fist angrily in e-bay’s general direction*

Jason rang to say he was lost and after careful guiding he found my new unit and off we went to pick up my new bed frame. But when we got there the frame wasn’t packaged in anything so we had to go back home, grab some blankets and go back. Lucky the store was around the corner. No time to put it together off we go again this time to Super A-Mart. We talk to the guy about the outdoor setting i want. Out of stock, won’t come in until September. But… I can sell you this other lovely setting for twice the price. Hmm, no. Grrr

Back at home with no more Jason, I have someone come to look at the desk. He wants me to throw in my $200 chair for free. Hmm, no. He offers me $50, I had asked for $60 down from $100 in the ad. Grr. Fine, take it and be gone.

On my own again I start to put the bed frame together. I run into problems when one of the struts is 18cm longer than the other, making the frame askew. I send an email to the store owner. Not much more I can do. Grrr.

A lady then comes round to look at the bed base I no longer need. I asked for $30, she says she only has $20 in her wallet. Grr. Fine! take it and be gone.

Then I get a phone call from the Futon place guy about my dodgy bed frame. I’m trying to explain it to him and I’m saying the wrong things and I accidentally say headboard 3 times in a row and he’s like “Woah, there is only ONE headboard!” Aw.

I had been watching an auction on e-bay and I get a email saying it has ended. I had forgot to place a bid. So I missed out on a cool Wii World tour game. Aw.

That night I was going to have a bbq with Jason and Landa, but by this stage I had left it to late to go shopping for sausages. Grrr. I could go into the city they would be open. Where would I park. grr. bugger it. GRRR.

So I ring Landa and Jason to tell them and they suggest just to go round to their place. Well, I have no bed, I may as well sleep on their couch, grab some supplies from the shops, bit of dinner, and off I go trekking all the way to the northside now that they had moved out to Chermside. Oh my god they live far away now. Just as I move into the city, they move out of the city. Aw. So we play games, drink and I try to forget my woes.

The next day I take the offending futon piece back to the shop and he just chops it to size with a circular saw leaving a rough untreated end. I could have done that. Grr.

I ring around the super amarts and the one down in Logan Central says they have the table and the chairs in stock, so I go down there and well “No sorry we don’t have them in stock, but I can sell you this other table for twice the price” GRRR.

So I leave in a huff and go to the K-Mart next door. They also sell the table, but it’s not in stock, so I use the store phone to ring around the K-Marts and the one in Browns Plains has the table and chairs in stock. So off I go. I am now a very long way from home. I get there and the guy in K-Mart says “No sorry, we actually don’t have that table and chairs in stock, but I can sell you this bigger table that won’t fit in your house for twice the price”. GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

In a huff I storm out of K-Mart jump on the gateway motorway and drive to Cannon Hill. The highlight of my day was when my new via tag went beep as I went through the e-toll gate. Woo hoo.

So Cannon hill has the table but not the chairs. Get the table home. Assemble the bed. Assemble the table. Feeling slightly better with a drill in my hand Making holes and constructing stuff. Mwah-ha-ha. But still shittest weekend ever. EVER. Why can’t store peoples actually check the stock when they say “Oh just let me check the stock we have” instead of luring me there and trying to get me to buy something more expensive. So very pissed off. At everything. At e-bay, at buyers, at Super A-mart, at K-Mart, at the futon place, at the whole world! And to top it off all I hear everywhere i go is bloody Michael Jackson songs!

My hero

I’ve been so stressed out lately, that after a getting up at 6am to deal with house issues and finally getting to work around lunch time, I thought it would be a good idea to close my eyes….. just for a second. Then and hour later, my boss rings me wondering where i am, apparently they didn’t know it was me that sent a cryptic sms a few hours before. So much for just closing my eyes for a second, my internal clock must be in a different timezone or something.

But wait, it gets better. So before closing my eyes in my car I had driven into the carpark in the rain, so my lights were on. I didn’t get out of the car straight away so i didn’t get beeped at for leaving them on. So I got a flat battery. Note: Central locking doesn’t work without battery, darn.

When it was time to go home, I gave the RACQ a call, chatted to some people then went out to wait for them and lo and behold they pulled up. I mustn’t have been waiting for more than 10 minutes. They is Speedy Gonzales RACQ peoples. Maybe they’ve feed their cars too many of my Mario’s magic mushrooms.

So was good. Quick jump to get going again, I said I knew the drill, half an hour etc etc. Apparently when it rains they get a lot of jump start calls. But anyway he is my hero.My hero with jumper cables. And a hat, don’t forget the hat…

A Magical way to spend a day – wait that’s Magic Mountain

Another year older. Time is too precious to be unhappy or angry. Like -that- another moment is gone. Never to be recaptured. So we should make the most of it. 

I went to Seaworld for my birthday yesterday. I initially slept in, which is forgivable on your birthday, but it didn’t matter. Even leaving half an hour late we got there on time, I must be a speed demon, that or google maps failed me. I had to be there early to check in for swimming with the dolphins. It’s strange but my friend Sarah and her husband were behind us in the last stretch to Seaworld and she rang my phone, which Coral had to answer (taking hold of her passenger duties) to say that I would have to merge over soon so i didn’t miss the exit. lol. I was thinking spy satelite maybe cctv cameras. It was a bit strange.

The Dolphin thingamabob was awesome. Really truly. I got to play with Mokey. Who weighs in at 200 kilos. And yet she was quite content to let us pat her and take photos, etc. I got to see them speed by underwater which was cool; and do flips right in front of us, also cool. One thing I think they should have let us do was to be able to hold onto the fin and get zoomed around the pool. We got to see the trainers do it, but not us.

We hung around to watch the dolphin show, some of the tricks they do are amazing, and afterwards, while the others waited patiently outside I went into the water park to change out of my wetsuit. However I couldn’t resist myself and ran/walked swiftly to the pool and jumped in. ahhh. Then I quickly got out and got changed. Ha ha ha.

We got to see the polar bears duking it out in their enclosure. Nothing to see in the underwater section when the bears are on land but we walked through anyway and continued on to the sting rays. I got to feed them and pat them. Very different to a dolphin. Where a dolphin is firm and rubbery, and sting ray is soft and rubbery. I can’t see how they could possibly kill Steve Irwin, unless he was trying to molest it.

Then we went on the rides. We all went on the jet rescue ride, that locks you into fake jet ski’s that zoom around a rollercoaster. Much fun. They even spray you with water mid ride. Then Sarah and Dan lined up for the corkscrew, so Coral and I went to get drinks and came back, drank them, got told off by the staff for sitting in a naughty area, continued to sit there, wandered up to the ride, and they were still waiting. When they did manage to get on,  I caught the best action shot of them while zooming around. Very cool. Afterwards Coral and I went on the Bermuda triangle, I don’t remember it being so lame. Oh no! A hot female alien was amongst us the whole time! C’mon. 

Then it was home time.

When I got home and the hunger started to settle in, I wandered down to Sizzler, in my car. Wandering requires a car in my book. Sizzler has this deal for take away salad bar for $9.50, so I got myself the lot, including a piece of birthday cake.

Happy birthday to me.

Another year older. Time is too precious to be unhappy or angry. Like -that- another moment is gone. Never to be recaptured. So we should make the most of it. 

I went to Seaworld for my birthday yesterday. I initially slept in, which is forgivable on your birthday, but it didn’t matter. Even leaving half an hour late we got there on time, I must be a speed demon, that or google maps failed me. I had to be there early to check in for swimming with the dolphins. It’s strange but my friend Sarah and her husband were behind us in the last stretch to Seaworld and she rang my phone, which Coral had to answer (taking hold of her passenger duties) to say that I would have to merge over soon so i didn’t miss the exit. lol. I was thinking spy satelite maybe cctv cameras. It was a bit strange.

The Dolphin thingamabob was awesome. Really truly. I got to play with Mokey. Who weighs in at 200 kilos. And yet she was quite content to let us pat her and take photos, etc. I got to see them speed by underwater which was cool; and do flips right in front of us, also cool. One thing I think they should have let us do was to be able to hold onto the fin and get zoomed around the pool. We got to see the trainers do it, but not us.

We hung around to watch the dolphin show, some of the tricks they do are amazing, and afterwards, while the others waited patiently outside I went into the water park to change out of my wetsuit. However I couldn’t resist myself and ran/walked swiftly to the pool and jumped in. ahhh. Then I quickly got out and got changed. Ha ha ha.

We got to see the polar bears duking it out in their enclosure. Nothing to see in the underwater section when the bears are on land but we walked through anyway and continued on to the sting rays. I got to feed them and pat them. Very different to a dolphin. Where a dolphin is firm and rubbery, and sting ray is soft and rubbery. I can’t see how they could possibly kill Steve Irwin, unless he was trying to molest it.

Then we went on the rides. We all went on the jet rescue ride, that locks you into fake jet ski’s that zoom around a rollercoaster. Much fun. They even spray you with water mid ride. Then Sarah and Dan lined up for the corkscrew, so Coral and I went to get drinks and came back, drank them, got told off by the staff for sitting in a naughty area, continued to sit there, wandered up to the ride, and they were still waiting. When they did manage to get on,  I caught the best action shot of them while zooming around. Very cool. Afterwards Coral and I went on the Bermuda triangle, I don’t remember it being so lame. Oh no! A hot female alien was amongst us the whole time! C’mon. 

Then it was home time.

When I got home and the hunger started to settle in, I wandered down to Sizzler, in my car. Wandering requires a car in my book. Sizzler has this deal for take away salad bar for $9.50, so I got myself the lot, including a piece of birthday cake.

Happy birthday to me.

Lest we forget

I awoke to the drone of bagpipes and instantly felt sentimental. I quickly got ready and walked at a brisk pace up to the pub.

Annerley is trying to taunt me by pointing out how close everything is. Soon a gym will open up around the corner, restaurants, train, bike path. You cannot sway me Annerley! I shall not stay.

The march started precisely at 7am. There were two cars filled with veterans followed by a bagpipe band then more veterans, then schools, girl guides and anyone with someone to remember. I walked along adjacent to them on the footpath.

The interesting thing about marching down Ipswich Rd, is the 3 lanes of traffic each way. The police had one of the lanes open to traffic, including an ambulance with alarm blaring, which worked fine until “Lane ends. Merge Left”. I thought the cars were going to start honking. Luckily the police stepped in and blocked off the whole road for the rest of the march.

The bagpipe band played such hits as “Wheeze drone wheeze” and “Drone wheeze drone”. I can never distinguish different songs. But as I was walking along I caught a riff and realised hey! they’re playing Waltzing Matilda. It was a very strange version but all the notes were there. I felt very proud to be Scottish walking beside (but over there…no, bit more… yep that’s it) a bagpipe band. It was only later when I was reading the day’s program that I found out they were an Irish band! bah.

I remember when I was little and I would be marching in the parades in Pambula that at the end, all the kiddlings would get front row centre for the rest of the proceedings. Poor little guys were relegated to the rear of this one.

Other than that it worked well. They had a PA system so everyone could be heard well. It was sunny. It wasn’t overly long. Was good.

I always find singing hymns somewhat comical. Here is a group of paper with lyrics written down on paper. Orchestra playing. No one actually knowing the tune except for the loud church going old lady at the front. Everyone else sort of humming/mumbling the words. At least everyone knows (or should know) the words to the first verse of the national anthem. I wonder if they still drum it into the kiddlings every morning of primary school.

There was a bit of drama during the ceremony, one girl actually fainted and an ambulance came tearing into the park alarm blaring during the laying of the wreaths.

Even with all the drama, the whole shebang was tenfold betterer than the Anzac ceremony I went to in Wollongong a few years back, I might try and see if i have the blog post on my myspace. I’m a sucker for tradition though and I do so love the bugle part. The “Last Post” brings a tear to the eye.

They shall not grow old
As we who are left grow old
Age shall not weary them
Nor the years condemn
At the going down of the sun
And in the morning
We will remember them

Lest we forget.

Rollercoaster

I hate how people can make me want to cry. I have run the gamut of emotions today. I woke up feeling a bit nervous. Went to have my blood taken for some tests. The guy at Sullivan and Nicolades is a genius. Martin. Wonderful man. Friendly, talkative, happy, great at taking blood. I have difficult veins and he is fantastic at making my veins produce enough blood to fill three small vials. Others have stabbed me eight times, or sent me away to try a different nurse another day. But Martin, genius, he’s brilliant. So after such a pleasant experience I was in a good mood.

For the rest of the day I managed to get my code to do my bidding, so I was quite pleased with that. Still in good mood.

Then I went to my solicitor. Now this may come as a shock, but the reason I havn’t been blogging with usual frequency is that I am in the process of buying a unit. I submitted an offer and it got accepted and I went to the solicitor to sign the contract and on the first page it lists the body corporate. Something twinges, I borrow the solicitors calculator. It turns out the fees are significantly more than that advertised by the owner. So I put off signing until tomorrow.

I ring the owner to ask if there was a typo or if she got a discount or what the deal was, and she starts to yell at me. Why havn’t I signed the contract yet. She accepted my offer on Monday morning. If I’m not going to buy I’m wasting her time. She wants a signed contact by tomorrow or else she’ll advertise the room over Easter. I pointed out to her that it was not my solicitor who had the dodgy fax machine that delayed my offer 2 days.

So obviously this puts me in a bad mood. I’m not going to be rushed into a life decision like this.

Coral was there though to give me a hug and give me advice. What a great friend I have there. She thought maybe I could amend the offer.

So I go back to work in a terrible mood, and fail to think to the best of my abilities, leave soon after and get ready to go out and drive into the valley. Landa convinced me to try speed dating again. But as soon as we got there she was like “Crap, let’s get out of here”, soon after a guy walks up to us and offers to buy us a drink. He actually went out with Landa for a bit.

Meh, the night is picking up. Cute guys, 8 minutes focused on me, lovin it. Then I get to Landa’s ex. They had just finished having a yelling match in their 8 minutes. Then… it’s my turn. The reason guys don’t want to date me is because I’m not sexy. Guy’s don’t go for a girls personality these days. It’s all about looks, and you don’t have it. Look at these other girls around here, you need to wear more makeup. Low cut tops, do your nails, pierce your ears and wear earings. You’re too much of a nerd and that is not a good thing. Are you wearing lipstick? You need to wear contacts, those glasses are terrible, maybe get black square frames.

Suddenly I’m back to feeling like shit. And I couldn’t seem to shake it for the rest of the night. I’m never going to do one of these things again. Landa would have to offer me a pretty significant bribe.

And to top the night off the cab driver taking us back to Landa’s got lost and Landa gave him a tip. You give someone a tip for a -good- job. Not for getting lost and charging more money because of their incompetence. So Landa and I had a fight about that on the way up the stairs.

What a rollercoaster. I shouldn’t let other people affect me so much so that I wish for a car to mow me down crossing the street. I wish I could go back to this morning when I was happy.

bum bum bum

It must be that time of year, as I have fallen on my arse again. At least I have a bit of cushioning. I was in a great mood, the last few weeks have been very exciting, and I was thinking of blueberry muffins walking down the stairs from the carpark at work to the office, and suddenly my feet were up above my head and I was slamming my butt on on 8 consecutive steps before i came to a sudden stop in a crumbled heap on a landing.

I was screaming for about a minute before i realised no one was around to care. So I called my boss. Cameron came out and help me get down the rest of the stairs without injury. Then Melissa made me get a doctor’s appointment. So I just sat/kneeled/stood around until a bit after lunch.

The amount of forms needed for workcover is ridiculous. I understand the need. Like if there were complications from falling on my arse and I had to have a third hand grafted onto my back. Workcover would be able to pay for me to be able to scratch my arse and type at the same type as it would be required to make me able to work to my full potential.

I have more xrays of my bum now. It’s a very nice bum. And as an added plus I can see that i’m not pregnant. There is a void above my bum. A Black hole. If I fall down the stairs any more I’ll have nuked my baby maker beyond functionality and i’ll never have a mini me.

Two of my friends are actually pregnant. And they have been throwing up without respite for months now. That does not paint pregnancy in a pretty picture.

But for now I rest my bum as I have been forced to stay away from work by my stoopid doctor saying i was unfit for work… you don’t need to sit to code. I can code standing on my head! But letting me anywhere near the office would make work liable for bad stuff.

So… I’ll just remote desktop in.

Rumourific

My highschool friends Suzi and Sarah have been in an uproar this weekend when they heard a rumour that I had been in a car crash and died and that is why I have been absent from facebook and my blog.

What did not allay their fears was that my mobile had run out of battery this weekend, so they couldn’t reach me and they didn’t have my home number.

So they rang my parents. My parents had gotten an email from me minutes before so they tried to reassure them I was ok. They obviously wern’t too concerned as they just sent an email my way to let me know about the goings on. And Sarah was relieved because also if I had died they would most likely not be in Pambula going about their day to day business.

So I would just like to tell everyone that no I was not in a car crash. No I’m not dead. And that it’s totally awesome that people would start rumours about me. Love it.

Maybe next time they can work in a Panda bear somewhere.

Rawr.

What does nothing smell like? It smells like chicken!

I havn’t been writing much, mainly due to not doing much.

I went down to the Gold Coast to see Sarah the weekend before last.  Just hung out watching movies. I was itching to go for a walk while it was sunny. Then it started pouring which made packing the car fun under an umbrella. My precious macbook took pride of place on the front seat.

You know the front seat is not the best place for anything other than teddy bears that can wear seat belts to prevent head injuries to their soft mushy foam like brains. I remember driving along to Uralla on my birthday last year and I had to stop really suddenly at a roadworks, by stop, I mean run off the road into the foliage. And my macbook went flying. So definitely not a great spot for anything breakable. Unless it can wear a seatbelt. I’m still waiting for the release of the macbook seat belt harness.

Usually on my trips down to Sarah’s I go with shitloads of stuff and I come back with even more shitloads of stuff but this time I had no hard drive space. I had given my 60GB hard drive to my dad packed full for Christmas and hadn’t bought a new one yet. I will just have to go again soon. It’s always good catching up with Sarah. Except she doesn’t want to go to the reunion this year. Which is annoying because everybody disliked me in Highschool, I’m going to go anyway, but it would be nice to have an ally. Oh well.

This weekend just gone I went and splurged on hardware.  $600 worth of parts, wireless card, 4GB ram, 1TB hard drive, 500GB usb drive… lots of goodies. I have so much space now, I should download the internet. My pc can be a mirror for the internet. Maybe I might need more than a terrabyte…

I was meant to go to Wet and Wild on the weekend, but all of the people I was going to go with went awol. So I just defragged my other drives in my tankini, now that they have space. Gee defragging takes a long time. No wonder I never do it.

I think I just realised what destroyed my tankini. I wore in in the spa last night at the gym and it had turned into a baggy t-shirt. I had left it in the back of my car, which gets super hot here in Brisbane, and that must have destroyed the fabric. This is my sad face.

So as you can see, not much has been going on. I’ve felt like I have been too boring to bother writing about being boring, because boring is as boring does. And it would be boring to read.

Lazy Dayz

I wasn’t feeling very well last week so when Friday came along and two of my friends asked me to come out with them to parties I stayed home. My new roommate, who’s a miller from South Africa, brought home a stray dog, so we dogsat until the owners came to collect her. Such a cute little dog. But I’m still a cat person, even though I’m allergic.

On Saturday I went for a walk around Southbank with my workmate Helen and we stopped to have breakfast at a little cafe, we squeezed through at 11:05am and got Eggs Benedict. I’ve never had it on muffins before, nor do i want to again, too hard to cut. The best Eggs Benedict I ever had was on top of a pancake at Pancake Manor. Mmmm pancakes.

Helen had to duck into work so I went over the road to chat to Coral who was finishing up in an hour or so and we decided to go check to target (you have to say it french style, taar jey) and go to the gym.

Target was a bust. But Sumo Salad is fantastic. They make the absolute best salads and they really fill you up. More than a big mac would anyway. And a tad bit healthier too. Mmmm salad.

A few weeks ago Coral mentioned she wanted to buy shakes for lunch, something quick and easy so I gave her a few of mine to try and on Saturday she went the whole hog and signed up to Tony Ferguson, a bit to late to get in on the sign up a friend promotion, but meh. So now I have to give away the packet of frozen wedges that i bought when Dave came to visit awww

I wasn’t in the mood for going out after the gym because I did something to my hip and walking was painful so Landa suggested going to see Transporter 3. So I drove, train-ed, and hobbled to the city and when I got there (via the Krispy Kreme doughnut store, mmmm glazed devils food doughnut) Landa and Jason were still at home and weren’t going to make it. The first cab I got rejected my fare and told me to go to the last taxi in the line for my short fare to the valley. Bah!

So Landa and Jason walked and I hobbled down to RG’s but I really wasn’t in the mood for going out, so I went home, and bumped into the security guard at the train station and had a yarn to him about topics that should never be discussed in open conversation. Slightly disconcerted I hobbled onto the train home.

Coral invited me over for a spot of bowling and burritos not at the same time on Sunday and it was so nice to just veg out on the couch watching TV, checking the score on the cricket, constantly patting their bulldog because she would get upset and jump on you if you stopped. I don’t know how an animal can be so ugly and so cute at the same time.

Gotta love lazy weekends.

Lions, and tigers and bears, oh my

I don’t like the valley sober. It’s a terrible place. You don’t notice all the litter, the homeless people, the broken glass and the crazy people when you are stumbling around completely drunk. I even had an egg thrown at me and Landa.

I started off the night by driving into the valley and picking up Landa’s cousin Jason from Landa’s house. Landa had a big date and would join us later. And so the two of us drove to the Paddo. We really had no idea where we were going, but I’m a walking GPS so we just drove around and lo and behold ended up in Paddington, at the Paddo, no less. The girl, Jean, from speed dating that Landa and I were going there to catch up and compare notes with, disappeared. I couldn’t find her.

So Jason and I sat outside in the gorgeous smoking area, working on our cancers (I shall name him mini-me). And this English girl from Manchester comes up asking the guys at our table is she can just stand there to have a fag, they’re totally ignoring her so me being friendly pipes up “Come over here, you can chat to us ” yes I even said smiley face. You have to make clicking noises for the bracket. Jason ended up hooking up with the girl and I hope he got her phone number because she was really nice.

Landa showed up after a while, and we chatted for a bit about her date and stuff and I kept checking my watch, because I was sober and was getting tired. For some reason dancing comes more naturally when drunk. And you don’t mind getting pushed and shoved. Eventually we left Jason at the paddo and went to the Bank so I could meet up with the security guard from the train. But he is not there.

There was a girl passed out in the toilet of the bank and paramedics carrying her out up the stairs on a stretcher. Crazy stuff. It was so crowded and the air conditioning was a godsend. Then we became overwhelmed with the munchies and left to fulfil our desire for fatty food where we ate drank and were merry. Sated we had two options, go back to the bank or go home. Not knowing if the security guard would show up we started walking home when I got a call saying he was at the bank. So back I go. Navigating the mine field of broken glass and homeless bums.

Unfortunately by this time I was very tired. So we chatted for a bit, then went and had a coffee, chatted some more then he walked me to my car. He’s nice. He’s in my phone as “The security guard” which although descriptive is a bit vague when it comes to his name. I did feel safer walking the streets with him by my side. Vagrants beware!

It’s nice to be back home though. Time to get some good quality sleep. Not a good idea to go to the valley sober.