Burnt but sorta alive

Friday was picking-up-Sal-from-the-airport day. Seeing as E-man and I have miniature mobiles, Amber was the vehicle of choice. (Sal goes to the airport in the buttless 205, and leaves the airport in the biggest butted thing we could hope to take up there.)

Adventure home involved some uber fun second hand book buyin', kebabs, some talk about people walking over Sally's grave, Sally being reminded of how much she loves being jabbed under the ribs, a dehydration headache and... the purchase of the Ambo's very own guard cat (black of course, and still nameless, I think) for only 50 cents.

Friday night our night church ministry team and Bible study leaders headed down to Minnamurra for what used to be called the planning weekend, but what then became the vision weekend : / Whatever you call it, it was pretty cool. Thanks to God it was (I reckon) pretty productive and encouraging. People had some really cool ideas about things we can do in the coming year to help our church move forward.

The place was awesomu too. Right next to the water. Aaw yeeeeah. In our break on Saturday arvo, Stu, Eltham & I went to swim in the river. The current was ultra strong so when swimming against it became too much, we ended up repeatedly running up the bank and floating back down with the current... Mmm, lazy.

Thanks to the Saturday night plaiting efforts of a few of tha kidz, I had frizzy hair on Sunday morning. Well, sorta frizzy. Not much plaits can do for thooper thtraight hair. For some reason I felt the need to run when I arrived home and the intended 3 or 4 km somehow became about 7, which I'd usually be pretty sore after. I think that was some kind of proof that we're not 'supposed' to sit around thinking too hard for a day and a half straight or our bodies go crazy.

Anyhoo. Too many lollies tonight. Teeth feel like they're needing some cleaning.

Ten Points to Australia

I thought Blade Trinity was good. After seeing the first one, I didn't bother with the second one. But tuesday night saw me BORED, so with some of the Bob kids, sit in front of the cinema screen I did. There might've been a bit too much 'tude for me, but all round good deaths and fun fights.

Then Simon, Eltham, Chug & I proceeded to watch what I think was one of the WORST movies I've EVER seen... Hell Asylum. Oh, there was NO JOY and MUCH PAIN involved. I'm not recommending it to anyone. In seven words... Like something WE would make, only worse.

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Hooray for Australia! Even if we celebrate our country's day on the date that the Brits invaded the place, I reckon this is a pretty top spot to live, and so I happily waved a made-in-China 99 cent Australian flag out the window of the car as Li, Ro & I drove down to Macquarie Pass for a bit of a bushwalk and swim. It was my first time there & it's an awesome spot. The swimming was most excellent after a morning hanging out at Rhododendron Park with a whole buncha da kids from church. It was hot!

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This morning, kicked out the jams with Simon & Steve for a while, which was orrite, even if Sim does write country... :p

After mum's birthday dinner at Roppongi, it was back to singing with our fun fun gals barbershop group. (Our first sing as a group for the year.) The group is still without a name, though I'm still an advocate of "Bunch o' Girls", even though Eltham would probably prefer the name "Eltham's Girls". The sing was fun, and after... I got to check out some Ultra Mega Supersonic Ninja Death Monkey sounds running Paul's Clav through his puter. I think I could sit there all day playing with that gear, but thought I should leave it for another time :D

Bye Kati :(

Yesterday arvo a bunch of people from around here met up at the botanic gardens to hang out & chat about the different beach missions that have been happening. It was really cool & encouraging to hear about stuff that's going on at some other beach missions, especially some that are happening really close to home. It feels kinda funny hearing what's been happening here, when we trek it all the way up to Byron for mission :)

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Last night we said our goodbyes to Kati, as she's about to jet off to France/Belgium for a year (and I'm sure she'll be doing some trekking around Europe). It was a fun party at her folks' place - a really nice night even though it was raining a bit. 'Twas probably warmer in the pool... as Jance & I found out the hard way...
While we stood at the pool edge plotting to throw Kati in, Jance was pushed in by Dave. And while I was laughing heartily at her misfortune, I fell subject to Kati's "making it even" and ended up wet too. Aah, all very stupid and fun.
Hopefully the mechatronics kids will keep meeting up through the year, even though now most of them have graduated. Kati usually did most of the organising... : /

Too Many Spiders

Yesterday I spent way longer than I thought I would going through all my clothes, working out what to get rid of. In the end I had 2 massive bags full of stuff for the Salvos, and enough cupboard space for all the junk I own. Yay.

Today was pretty cruisy. A good slow morning spent drawing and stuff. Then Kester, Cath, Eltham, Sally D. & I went to the beach in Cath's lunch hour. It was cool to see Sal after her year of Euro trippin'. It wasn't the best down at the beach, so we ended up at the rock pool.

The arvo saw an adventure to The Warehouse, where many a quality product was purchased - ahem - including a $5 copy of Heavy Metal the game. The rest of the arvo was spent laughing at the main character Julie's bootie-shakin' as Kester tried to figure out all the tricks.

To celebrate Eltham & Justin's getting into uni, kinda, we got some tasty stuffu from Roppongi & drank Kester's Christmas sake. Mmm. Then back to the rock pool for a nacht swim. The water was uber salty today. A bit extreme. I'm still feeling all salted out and thirsty...

There have been too many spiders in my room lately. All kinds. Crazy kinds. Kinds that I can't recognise.

200 minutes

Aaaaah. Long time no unimovies. Good to get back. Team America was on first. I found most of it entertaining, and heaps of it funny. But I think that 99 minutes of South Park esque humour gets a bit much... for me anyway. I was afraid that Shaun of the Dead might have been too talked-up for me. (Alice & Shaggy were both giving it a big thumbs up.) So I really tried to go in not expecting too much -- difficult, when I could remember Alice's huge grin when the name of the movie came up. Anyway... I thought it was awesome, once it got going. Abundant death, fun modes of death, plenty of blood, not too much schlock in the relationships part of the plot, cool characters. Yeah.

I'm starting to get this weird feeling in my head (and sometimes in my gut) that I think stems from leaving thesis thoughts on the shelf... Eugh :O The weather's been nice. The to-read books are numerous. There are musical instruments to attempt to get good at... Meh. Some time in the next few weeks I'm going to have to take a few full days out to learn how to program the bot I'll be using this year for the whole thesis thang. Someone hold me to it. Discipline eludes.

Flying Monkey

Saru flies for the first time!

We adventured up to the airport in everyone's favourite buttless wonder - the little 205. Hooray for buttlessness... makes for easy parking. And hooray for aircon. Whoa yeah. After half a chicken melt and some awesomu white chocolate cake at the airport, it was time to bid saru farewell. Portishead's Dummy kept me company on the way home. It was kinda making me sleepy though... :) I wonder whether listening to certain albums when you're going to sleep can have the effect of making you sleepy whenever you hear them - whatever o'clock it is.

I found a cool dress that was uber cheap but the wrong colour. I don't think it's a thing to make/sell black summer dresses, so I'm going to try to find some black dye for it :)

Just now I've been attempting to clean all the poop off my desk so that i can use it again. That got boring pretty quickly. Even when i was listening to cool nerdy game soundtrack music that i ended up with as a result of this morning's drive.

Maybe some eats now, before unimovies...

I love ebay.

Hooray! Janet Lopez wins an awesome black dress for only six doru!

After borrowing clothes from Lilac Ook (she loves that XD) for weddings and stuff, I thought I really should invest in some fancier-than-pants-&-a-shirt kinda clothes. So invest i did!

Ebaying is one of the very few things that brings up cause for lamenting over living in Australia and not the US. Ebay Australia doesn't have enough of the less-than-popular music I'm looking for... A true tale of woe.

Everyone loves to be jabbed under the ribs.

Especially Lila, Kester and Saru (who barks like a dog when jabbed).

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Yesterday was uber fun primary skoo esque let's-decorate-our-diaries day, which involved drooling over awesome pens in officeworks for way too long before getting anything done. I could live in the pen aisle.

Felix the cat is everywhere.

Saw Elektra the movie & really liked. I got super excited when the ninjas showed up - Oh yeah! (Even though they got dominated... but we'll ignore that.) It got a bit schlocky at the end, but there was enough killing and trippy ESP & split-second flashback action to make up for it.

...Followed by a trip to trendy town at the Tea Emporium with Sal & Elthumbo. They have nice shelves where the packaged tea is kept. Really nice stain colour on the wood.

The Thexy Three then went to ye olde Bob & proceeded to make one of the bestest birthday cards ever, with the additional bonus of super fun potato stamped wrapping paper. Oh yeah - somebody is going to feel loved.

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In other news...

Thanks to the LAN mistress, the online quote book has finally been realised! WOOT!

http://wordliness.blogspot.com

Arigato, Saru-san

Argh. It's hot. This is when then downstairs bedroom factor is good.

Been listening to Dream Theater's Train of Thought... thankee Sal! Bit of a change up from what I've had in my ears lately. Some pretty cool stuff on there.

The Beatson Park Fig - No Longer a Stranger

Eltham said I'd never do it. Then in E'bo irony he was there to witness it...

Yesterday Sal, Sim, Eltham and I went to climb that fig I've wanted to climb for years! (The fact that this climb had been on my to-do list for years is what makes the event blog-worthy.) The bottom branches were way higher than they'd appeared in my hundreds of drive-bys, and the whole tree was even bigger than I'd thought. Simon was the most monkey of us, climbing from the ultra fat base of an ultra long branch to the very end where it got thin enough to bend under his weight & lower him to the ground. Very entertaining.

http://hayseed.black-panther.us/evilfaction/stillmonkey.jpg

http://hayseed.black-panther.us/evilfaction/jne.jpg

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This morning as I was waiting to see the doctor, there was a whole bunch of other people standing there playing the waiting game too. About enough people to play the roles of the various characters in a Cube-esque movie. And all sorts too - which is probably why I started getting Cube-esque scenarios in my head. You know - you're all standing there saying nothing, doing next to nothing... so you start thinking about which character is really going to get on your nerves in this Cube-esque life-threatening situation. There are a few candidates. And then there's the frail old lady who'll need a boost every time the group enters a different room - especially if it's one of those weird anti-gravitational ones. Stoopid anti-gravitational rooms. There's the guy with his baby in a pram. That's always gonna be a worry. I think the baby would cause more problems than it would solve in this whole let's-solve-the-mystery-of-the-Cube team effort thing.

Anyway... Just read John Dickson's If I Were God, I'd End All the Pain again. I'd remembered it being a good lil book & thought it might be cool to read again before lending, since some people here are having some issues with the idea of a good God, given all the poop in the world. It really is a helpful lil book for a quick read.

'Tis all for now. Too much junk in brain.

Ultra Lazy Day

Went down to the lagoon late in the morning and sat around reading. Just finished Peter Carey's Wrong About Japan - a Christmas present from mum. I thought it was a pretty good read, but I'm not sure that i would have found it ultra mega interesting if i didn't already have a fascination with Japan... which, I guess, is why mum gave it to me :)

Jonnie and Speed watched TRON, but I just wasn't in movie mood. Took another opportunity to escape from reality and gave in to the sleepiness caused by sleeping too much. Freaking endless cycle.

Been listening to From a Basement on the Hill - Elliott Smith's last album - that Jonnie so kindly gave me. Not best buds with the album yet - not enough listens. I love the chord prog at the end of the verses in Pretty (Ugly Before) that i'm sure the rest of the world loves too. I'm afraid of finding out what the prog is because I'll probably do my usual trick of overusing it, and then wrecking the sound in my head of Elliott's version of it.

Getting kinda hungry. Probably gonna head to Planet Bob for a movie after dinner.

Simon wants chocolate.

It's true. It's true of all of us. Maybe not at this moment in time, but definitely at some point in our lives. For some, the want is daily. For others, perhaps, weekly. For Simon, it's now.

Why is it that when i walked down the street today and saw eggs cracked and splattered on the road, i immediately assumed them to have been thrown, rather than accidentally dropped? Does this say anything about me and/or the world?