jampy

I called about the crappy Data Entry job. After telling the woman my name, she responded, "Ah, Heather. You're the one who wants to be the student. What's the story with that?" I told her about my degree and my projected availability. "But if you're only going to be available for a month..." she sighed. I then went on to explain exactly why I would be there for more than a month, giving detailed information about my hours of classes, and the days I expected I would get off. Apparently, she was not listening. "Okay then, goodbye!" she called cheerfully into the phone. I interrupted: "Is that a no, then?" She responded only with, "Thanks, bye!" and then hung up.

It sounds rather like what I imagine The Weakest Link would be like if someone extremely cheerful was hosting it. And while I was frustrated at dealing with such absurdity, there was little I could do but laugh, and cheer that I wouldn't have to be working for such a weirdo. I was rather put in mind of the time when my grade 3/4 composite class was taken out to the field for P.E. The team I was on was full of misfits, most of whom were remarkably cynical for eight year olds, and when we came last in a particular relay, Adam, a rough boy from the fourth grade component of the class, led the team in a rousing cheer: "Yay! We lost!" We were absolutely confounded by the teacher's criticism of what she considered to be bad sportsmanship. What better sportsmanship could there be, we wondered, than to cheer at your own final placing?

There's a travel agent I sometimes pass on my way to the bus stop. It has one of those signs composed of stacks of tiny red lights, with messages trailing or flashing across it. One would generally assume that such an object would be in place to advertise products and services. However, this particular travel agent more often uses their dynamic banner to promulgate various pithy aphorisms. On one occasion, the sign's irregular purpose was taken to a new level: Instead of espousing any publicly-relevant message, the sign held a very private one. In flashing red capitals, the sign screamed, "Come on, Greg! You promised me a baby!" (There were more exclamation marks, if memory serves, but I consider excessive use of exclamation marks a scourge.)

I've often wondered about private moments rendered publicly. Television informs me that women find it sweet, and will agree to almost any proposal if put to them in such a manner. I think there are degrees, though: a banner on the roadside proposing marriage is one thing; personally doing so in a crowd of people, all of whom have expectations as to how the moment will pan out and, therefore, something vested in any response, is another entirely. While women on TV will smile, look around at their friends and family assembled at nearby tables, and then agree to the betrothal, my reaction would be rather different. I think I would refuse the proposal out of hand, as anyone who feels the need to have others exerting pressure on such a decision can't be quite right.

The baby imploration seems to fall somewhere between the two categories of publicness. Like the sign on the road, it is not time sensitive, nor are others around to apply pressure. However, anyone seeing it couldn't help but suppose, as I did, that to have access to the banner the implorer could resonably be assumed to be a staff member of the travel agency. Making this kind of private business public doesn't make much sense to me. After all, this is hardly a romantic gesture like the proposal by the freeway. Instead, this is accusing Greg of lacking the commitment, desire or virility to make a baby. The word 'promised' implies disappointment and betrayal. It also occurred to me that possibly the staff member in question quietly tapped away at a keyboard while on the phone to Greg, completely unaware of the fact that her message would be broadcast. After all, I did a similar thing myself in primary school: while performing a stocktake with my fellow library monitor, upon whom I had a most ardent crush, I typed messages about this crush into the keypad of the scanning unit, and they came up as rows of asterisks on the screen. I therefore typed some ridiculously intimate messages, many of which were big-talk I felt safe to indulge in, given that nobody would ever see the messages. Naturally I blushed three colours of scarlet when the librarian, a frightening woman in tweed for whom, judging by smell, it was always that time of the month, informed me that everything typed into the unit came up on the printouts along with details of the books scanned.

I'm plagued with unresolved questions as a result of this encounter. Why would the business be willing for their corporate identity to be compromised by such a stunt? How could a plublic accusation of this type improve the situation between Craig and his partner? How can I find out what became of these two crazy kids? Ultimately, although I think it doesn't bode terribly well about the reliability of the business in question, I remember that particular travel agency far more clearly than other similar business I pass in my travels, and wonder if it was a stunt to induce passersby to pay more attention. A sort of wake up call from aphorisms, if you will. Since the 'Greg' incident, the travel agency has turned its sign to more conventional purposes, using poorly written phrases with typographical errors to advertise travel to Brisbane. Although I was never really their target audience, the experience left me not only suspicious of the agency's professionalism, but afterwards disappointed that they moved from apothegmatic advice to their actual nature of business, trying to sell holidays I can't afford. I'm hoping for more neighbourhood businesses with greater entertainment value, and none of that pesky commercial intent.

Another post about the weather. Sorry, it's hard not to. As of 7:30 this morning, it was 24ºC. The forecast maximum is 39º in the city, and 43º in the western suburbs. We've closed all the doors and windows, but I really wish I could somehow cover the skylight. Today is a good day for staying inside, in front of the fan, and eating chilled grapes.

I was overjoyed to have a typing test/job interview this morning. I was really looking forward to going in there and wowing them with my incredible typing speed. But I got there, and the building was even more shabby than I remembered. The receptionist had no idea what she was doing, the woman who was supposed to be testing me didn't introduce herself or explain anything, just told me to sit at a computer and type the information on a sheet held to a copy holder on the desk I sat at. She then went to answer a phone.

I sat and looked at the computer. It was extremely non-standard, with a monitor that looked like a microfiche reader and was monochrome orange-on-black, and a horrible keyboard with keys that didn't depress properly when pressed, and no raised dots on the home keys. In addition, there was a button where the backspace key should have been whose function was to end the form I was in the middle of typing. It's quite possible that these stone-age machines are standard equipment in their centre, or even for the Data Entry industry as a whole. My data entry experience comes from working for a major bank, processing home loan applications and preparing contracts. We had proper computers, colour monitors, standard keyboards and no scaffolding in the corridor. I applied for today's job by telling them my typing speed in words per minute, which suggests that they were willing to consider candidates who had only ever typed letters before. I don't think it would have been too much to ask for a bit more of an explanation of how the system worked.

So I did my best. It was rather bad, but not surprisingly so, considering it was a system with which I was completely unfamiliar. After twenty minutes of frustration, the woman returned. She then asked me if I was ready to begin my test. I was initially relieved that the cock-up was not the exam, but then annoyed that the practice status of the test was another thing she hadn't told me. My second go was tempered with righteous indignation, but after I had typed less than a quarter of what I typed in the 'practice round', the woman came back over. She ordered me to press certain keys that would end my session, and then indicated that I should follow her to a desk covered in papery crap.

She handed me a poorly photocopied application form, the reverse of which was an upside-down questionnaire filled in in blue pen. I filled it in, having being given a well-worn exercise book to lean upon. She asked whether I was interested in day or night shifts, whereupon I explained that I was a student, so I was looking for lots of work at the moment, mostly day shifts, but that I'd be interested in both day and night shifts when I went back to uni, as my availability would change. She sighed at my explanation that I did not yet have my timetable for uni, despite the fact that it would not come into effect for a month, and then informed me that the night and saturday shifts mentioned in the newspaper advertisement were merely additional shifts when they found themselves snowed under. Vaguely, without making proper eye contact, she advised me to call her tomorrow and she'd tell me how I'd done. Somehow, I suspect I didn't do very well. Somehow, I think they don't want to hire someone with study to return to. If she hadn't told me to call her, I'd suspect that I had been fobbed off.

I'm of the opinion that both applicant and prospective employer should be on their best behaviour at a job interview. With this in mind, I have to say that I'm not so sorry to have lost the opportunity. However, should they respond in the affirmative to my enquiries, I am not too proud to take them up on their offer. It looks like it'd be a short-term thing anyway, and I can put up with whatever horror I've exaggerated here today for a short time, to earn some quick cash. I've found that my seven-month spell of unemployment has had an interesting effect on my expectations: while I thought the best case scenario would be that the job would be wonderful, they'd pay me heaps and worship me as their god, I figured that whatever happened would happen for the best. And when you take the extremely long-term perspective, no experience is negative (death excepted) as they all add to personal experience. I've also found that my attitude to specifically bad experience has changed, as I can't help but consider it all grist for my writing. After all, I'm funny when I gripe, but boring when I pontificate.

This morning, despite my headache (yes, the same one I had yesterday) I forced myself to call up about jobs I'd found in the paper on Saturday. One of them was a wash-out: although the job called for full- and part-time staff, the woman was not interested in any part-time staff with commitments to study or social life. But I regrouped and called about a Data Entry job offering shifts both during the day and evening, six days a week. The woman I spoke to on the phone sounded very pleased when I told her I typed at 70 wpm. Of course, I actually type more like 90wpm, (I tested at 93 here today) but it's nice to type faster and pleasantly surprise people, rather than being slower than your estimation and having to plead that you're nervous and you would type much faster in any job they might give you.

So I have a typing test and job interview tomorrow, at 10am. The really odd thing is that the company is in a building where I used to work, for the Bizarre Job Helping Korean People Improve Their English Over The Phone. I really liked that job, and I love the area it's in. But since that job went pear-shaped - largely because the boss had his bitch daughter doing the rostering, so she elected not to give me any shifts, but also because it was a somewhat stupid idea and they couldn't find any clients and thus couldn't give me money - I wonder if it's a bad omen. I'm probably overthinking this, but it's hard not to, since it's the closest I've come to a job in six months.

I have a suspicion that the ongoing headache may have something to do with the fact that I haven't had any Coke in the past couple of days, a dramatic break from my previous pattern of drinking at least half a litre per day. I'm on the verge of reverting to my coke-drinking ways, but it's a bit scary that I have this much of a reliance. I think I'll try the pain killers before succumbing, and possibly try drinking tea instead.

My head hurts, and I'm feeling snarky. I feel I should write something meaningful yet funny. I feel neither meaningful nor funny.

It's remarkable how little of a day remains between and after seeing the two currently available Lord of the Rings films. Abby and I started the day with FoTR, which ran from around 10am to 1pm. Then we spent a little time eating and ensuring that we were showered and dressed, before heading out to a 4pm session of The Two Towers. I had a headache before the second film, and three hours of all-fighting, all-moody-bass-rumbly-music, all-angst action did nothing to help matters. This was the second time I'd seen the film, and now I think it would take a fair inducement to make me sit through it again. For, much as I love the characters and the story, three hours of deviations from the plot that simply seem to add time, as well as dramatically changing the characters and the way that they can be viewed in future, is a bit of a chore. I'm thinking particularly of Faramir's dramatic departure from wise, humble and helpful in the book to self-aggrandising and hinderous in the film.

I've said before that any adaptation is an adaptation, and should be viewed as such, but I really can't see the justification for some of the changes involved. Yes, Tolkien's narrative style leaves much to be desired, in many cases. But why have Faramir cart Sam and Frodo off to Gondor? Why stack the odds so much more against the Rohirrim, and then throw in some elves to make things easier, but to die in misery? When I saw Haldir die, I actually consoled myself with the fact that it didn't actually happen - not because the story was a work of fiction, but because when I returned to the books they would still be as I remembered them.

Spectacular, Spectacular
This evening I took a short excursion to the local video shop with my mother. However, as I had been reading immediately prior to my leaving, I was not wearing my glasses and I did not become aware of this fact until I was in the shop, finding it remarkably difficult to locate Captain Corelli's Mandolin and Fellowship of the Ring as I was unable to focus on objects two metres away. I frequently go without my glasses when I'm at home, since most of my time at home is spent reading, writing, using the computer or watching television at fairly short range, and since I know my house well I do not notice the absence of this distance vision.

Briefly after I started wearing glasses, I noticed that the the bridge of my nose felt odd when I was not wearing them. I think the physical sensation of wearing spectacles was easier to get used to than viewing the world through such a narrow frame, and this apparently affected me to such an extent that I have found the same rectangles of light at the edges of my peripheral vision in dreams.

Listening: Coffee and TV - Blur

Der Computer und ich sind allein
I started learning some German today. I got a Let's Learn German cd-rom for my birthday, at my request, because I kept picking up bits of German and not knowing what they mean. Having done some Linguistics and Old English, it's much easier than it was when I did a taster course in high school. However, much as I realise that there is a political as well as linguistic aspect to the selection of one dialect as 'correct' in teaching foreigners, this course made things confusing by simply having speakers of several different dialects taking different examples, and not making any reference at all to the differences in pronunciation that could clearly be heard. (I'd demonstrate using IPA characters, but that'd be pretty useless for those without the necessary font support.)

So now I'm thoroughly Germaned out, having taken two lessons today and run through the vocabulary more than I should. I have a tendency to take things to extremes, you see, which is probably why I look such a pathetic, exhausted figure in front of the computer, alone, tonight. The German numbers are scrawled on my knuckles in fine black ink (my sister's response to the way I kept counting in German on my fingers) and so I look like a tough. My favourite words are Vogelgezwitscher, which refers to the chirping of birds; aufgeregt, which means excited; and krank, meaning sick.

My computer is being a cranky bitch. We made the rather enjoyable mistake of installing Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, which sapped our memory no end. Even when nobody had played the game at all since three reboots ago, it still took up a giant thwack of our memory. So we uninstalled it, and that made some immediate improvement, but now I keep finding that Word won't run, and just after I dial up I get nasty messages intimating that my system is "dangerously low on resources". Where these resources are going I can't say, especially since it's been slow and cranky about just about everything. I've been clearing recycle bin and cache at every turn, but no joy. I wonder if general computer misbehaviour and fucking up are covered by my extended warranty? It seems that it should be, since it has to be at least partly because we have Windows ME, a copy that came with the computer.

When the computer is behaving for me (like now, touch wood) it's more fun than ever before. Ladies and gentlemen, I have a pretty new firewall. I was tragically firewallless before this, and not only does my firewall tell me when kids in an elementary school in Seoul try to hack me (oh, how I wish I was joking) it also makes ads go away. So when I have a look at my page, I don't get those horrible popups! It's nice not to be exposed to the pain I inflict on others. I'm working on finding somewhere to move to, really I am, but that might require money, of which I have none. So much for my pies, eh?

Listening: Rage Against the Coke Machine - OPM

I'm back from the rally. It was a bit of a disappointment, really: the time stated was 10am and we got there a few minutes late, but even before 10am the boat had (reputedly) sailed. There were a few speeches, I got handed a bunch of fliers and a badge, and then stacks of people left, and I got a lift back to the city with a few people from Claire's work. I then spent some time in Chinatown, looking at cute stationery and secondhand books before getting the bus home, with a brief stopoff to buy fried rice.

The Upshot: I feel tired, weak and sickly. My legs hurt, my back hurts, my jaw hurts. My throat really hurts. My mum is suffering from similar symptoms as part of a beast flu, and I am concerned that I am coming down with just such a flu. I'm really very bad at being sick. Time for a glass of pepsi and some peppermint ice cream, and then I'll do some more reading.

This morning, Australia becomes the first nation other than the US and Britain to send advance troops to the Gulf, as the HMAS Kanimbla heads out. In a recent poll, 61% of Australians were against Australian involvement in a US-led military action without UN approval. I'm off to protest. Should any Sydneysiders be reading this, I urge you to hurry out and get to the Cowper Street Wharf, Woolloomooloo, by 10am.

There was a fire in a shop on one of the main roads of my bus route. Traffic was backed up for miles, and police were in place to divert all traffic through the back streets. Naturally, traffic was virtually at a standstill, and I applaud the skills of my bus driver in navigating streets clearly not made for such large traffic. When we finally were able to return to the main road, I saw that the firetrucks were centred around a certain newsagent where a certain someone I know works. This was most worrisome, but I knew for a fact that the person in question was not at work at the time, as well as that the shop looked largely intact apart from smoke marks around the door and a large number of large firemen inside. The bus trip took twice as long as usual, but that time was spent talking to a fellow Harry Potter fan, who is also a big fan of Lord of the Rings, which I happened to be reading at the time. It's amazing the way peoples' normal social boundaries are broken down when the normal patterns of life are disturbed, even by something as minor as a bus diversion.

We saw Treasure Planet. Despite expecting crapness at the thought of Disney Does SciFi, I really enjoyed it. It wasn't crap. The character development was good, and the plot made sense. I found it dragged a bit, here and there, but I'm always fascinated when films manage to redeem their villains.

My mum polished up an old pinkie ring of mine that I used to wear, years ago. It's made of tiny silver hearts. Naturally, after she polished it I discovered that it doesn't fit any more. I tried wearing it between the first and second knuckles on my fourth finger, but I found it worked rather better on my second toe. I've never gone in for this toe-ring malarkey, largely because of the skanky girls in my grade at school who wore toe rings under semi-opaque tights under open-toed slides all the time. Also, I have a feeling that feet are for doing useful things like walking and kicking, rather than being pretty and wearing jewellery. In fact, this could jeopardise one of my favourite talents: I am a master of kicking vending machines in order to dislodge purchased but unreleased contents. However, I usually wear boots while doing this, so I should probably just get over it. And the ring makes my toes look so pretty.

Listening: The Ecstasy of Dancing Fleas - Penguin Cafe Orchestra

Laughing at nothing, all by myself.
And now, ladies and gentlemen, a public service announcement in the interest of my sanity. I need to say this here, but I don't need anyone to hear or understand.

GFY. CITDF. AYHTDWRTME.

Thank you for your time. Now returning you to your regularly scheduled sweetness and light.

My plans to take over the family's old 486 may be thwarted. Abby, dissatisfied with the amount of time she gets on the family computer, has finally plugged in the other one. Now, she writes or plays GP while listening to music on headphones. The sound of the simulated rack-and-pinion is mixed with her humming, and she'll occasionally yell, "Curve, my arse!" When the race is completed, she bemoans it, overly loudly due to the lack of aural feedback. "Awww, man, I was like, two seconds behind the other guy. That sucks."

Even more endearingly, she occasionally screams, "Fool! You will pay for your transgressions." I have a feeling she may be a villain, possibly even a supervillain.

my brokenpoem

the gap between goodbye
only strangers notice. wherever you go take
hold yourself by the arms
ears ain't so good either
can do it gently all those evenings
to overcome

I checked out the official statistics, and it got to 44ºC in my area yesterday. That's 111º for the Fahrenheitally inclined.

Thanks to Penny and Chris for sending me birthday greeetings. Thanks to my stalker for driving up my hits. I'm even considering updating six times a day, just so that you have something new to read each time you visit. Or maybe you could write to me and let me know what you and your friends are looking for.

I'm currently pondering Warnock's Dilemma, puzzling at the long bows drawn at the Hol-o-day calendar, and watching many disturbing cartoons by the makers of Mittens. I want a kitty, but not one that'll eat my spicy brains.

Listening: Rocking the Suburbs - Ben Folds

The Birthday was good. After being awakened far too early in the morning so that my sister, who had to go to work early, could give me my present, I spent the day relaxing and playing Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Andrew came over, and gave me my wonderful gift, Frigits, marble tracks that are magnetic, designed to go down the fridge. I have a great arrangement set up at the moment, and no-one is allowed to slam the fridge door for fear that they might jar the positioning.

I was very mean this year, and gave precious little in the way of advice about possible gifts for me. My family traditions regarding Christmas and birthdays suggest that it's polite, if you want something in particular, to speak of this when asked, but giving an itemised list complete with prices and page references for the catalogue you found it in is not tolerated after the age of ten. However, I couldn't really think of anything I wanted. Indeed, having Christmas, and then an anniversary on the fourth of January, and then my birthday on the seventeenth leaves me a bit gifted-up, and at a loss to think of any other materialistic holes in my existance. I refused to give Abby advice on what to get me, and suggested that she instead try to remember the advice I had given at Christmas, namely that she give me stationery, this advice remaining unused as we decided to give each other Black and White for Christmas. She didn't remember, or perhaps she did, and instead elected to give me Menace to Sobriety, much appreciated. My mother gave me Rooty, which I've really been hanging out for, as well as a stack of books, including Twentieth Century Words, a delightful tome with the same feel as my first year Linguistics textbook, which I've been devouring, reading sections aloud to my family. We're all word geeks, so this sort of thing is entertainment to us. What surprised me most, in my first voracious reading of the book, was that 'not', as an interjection indicating that the previous statement should not be taken seriously, was in use in 1900. Before reading that, I had considered this use of 'not' to be one of the scourges of modern spoken English, much as I used it myself. This is yet another reminder that nothing is really new.

Frequent readers will recall me bemoaning the unattainability of mint syrup for having with ice cream. My big sister, Claire, made me two different kinds for my birthday. One is genuine and full of smashed mint, good for making mint juleps, and there's also a delightfully syrupy, absurdly green artificial version. Needless to say, I prefer the counterfeit confection. It tastes like liquid candy canes, and mintifies my frozen desserts beautifully. I should really use the leafy one soon, though: as it features ingredients that used to be alive, decay will inevitably set in, delayed though it may be by the cooking process. In fact, had I the spirits, this might be the ideal weather for a Mint Julep. The weather today, as yesterday and, lamentably, last night, was hot. Hotter than the last time I told you it was bakingly hot. That puts it about 40ºC. Now, it's more like 25º and breezy, and I want to sit on a porch swing. Would that I had a swing, or a porch to hang it on. Perhaps a walk out back through the long grass, gently glowing insects flying in front of me, and then a swim in the dam by moonlight.

The heat on my birthday did impede my lounging, as well as sleeping in the evening. When it's that hot, sleeping in a single bed even with the one you love is an unwelcome challenge. Prior to that, however, there was airconditioned bliss as I went with my family and Andrew to see The Quiet American. It is a superb film, and one I wholeheartedly recommend.

I don't feel any different for being twenty. I have never felt a sudden difference with the coming of a birthday in the past, and why do people always ask me that? However, the phrase 'in my twenties' sounds entirely wrong, and gives me a deep sense of foreboding. This is the decade where I'm supposed to make things happen. I'm feeling the pressure already.

I have fingers in two pies. This is how my mother describes my current job situation, in which I've had phone conversations with two women who may wish to pay for my time, but I have no definitive response from either. The woman I spoke to on Friday I called again on Monday. She assured me that she was waiting to speak to her colleague, but since I haven't heard from her yet, that might be a no.

Also on Monday, amongst my download hassles, my mum persuaded me to call about another job. This one is casual, working 4-7 four nights per week in a neighbouring suburb, which would be very convenient. The woman I spoke to seemed a combination of my two favourite high school teachers, as well as being appreciative of my experience. She asked what my IT knowledge was like, as she was having some network problems, and I managed to diagnose the problem over the phone. Go me! Then, naturally, Word screwed up royally, and I couldn't edit my resume to send it off. I called her back, to tell her I was having computer problems. She advised me to send it tomorrow, or even Wednesday, as she was so busy at the moment that she wouldn't have a chance to look at CVs till then. "To give you an idea of the organisation you'd be working for, I just put down one phone call and picked up another. This is how busy we are at the moment." And yet, that sounds fun.

I'm in a position where I hope that the Friday woman doesn't call because I really, really want to work at any organisation that can have people as friendly and straightforward as the Monday lady. Also, it'd be nice knowing that I would be able to work those times, whereas the Friday woman seemed dubious about my semester availability suiting the position, and I suspect that I'd end up with no work, and would have to find another job at the start of semester. Job-hunting in the first two months of the year sucks; it has led in the past to my positions at The Evil Homogenous American Coffee Franchise and The Sleazebag Jehovah's Witness Accounting Firm. This must not happen again.

Listening: Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious - Me First And The Gimme Gimmes

A Highly Biased Tale of Friendship Gone Wrong
Once upon a time there was a girl named Heather. Heather was in high school, and was friends with a boy who, for the sake of diplomacy, we shall call Tom. Heather and Tom were both very different people, both splendidly imperfect, and although their differences made them see the world in very different ways, their friendship seemed to work, the odd patch of crankiness smoothed over with a dirty joke and furtive grin.

Heather was happy. She was the heroine of her own stories.

As they were good friends, they exchanged their ickiest secrets. Tom's secrets were far more secret than Heather's, and although Heather was pleased to understand him better, she was concerned that Tom would think she thought of him differently because of these insights.

Indeed, one fateful English class in their last year of high school, Tom didn't save a seat for Heather. He avoided looking her in the eye, didn't talk to her and stopped acknowledging her presence altogether. This was very confusing, and Heather wondered what she could have done to displease him so. She had a feeling that her social standing at school didn't help.

But Heather didn't want to belong to any club that didn't want her as a member, so she dealt with it as best she could. Her friend Charlotte was wonderful, and her boyfriend Alex helped a lot too, although he was much older and wasn't at school, so there was only so much he could do.

The situation was made much more awkward by the fact that Tom was still friends with Martha. Martha was good friends with Charlotte, and had an uneasy friendship/rivalry with Heather. Tom had always had a tendency to be changeable in his affections, so when one of them fell into temporary disfavour, it seemed that the other had won somehow.

School ended. Heather got a lucrative job over the summer. Charlotte had a delightful birthday party. Both Heather and Martha stayed the night (Charlotte's house, while beautiful, was in an area Heather considered somewhat unsafe. Charlotte frequently denied this, but Heather's opinion was set as, the first time she had come to visit, the train station had been surrounded by police cars as someone had been shot). Since Heather and Martha were sharing a room, they ended up talking way into the night. Martha told Heather that she knew why Tom had discontinued contact, yet wouldn't disclose details, which drove Heather crazy. Heather let slip one of Tom's secrets. She felt really awful about it, but was surprised that Martha hadn't known - Heather had been asked by friends and even one of her favourite teachers about Tom's secret, so she thought it wasn't such a secret. Surely someone as close to Tom as Martha purported to be would have known? Apparently not.

Heather had done well enough on her exams (it was a close thing for a few of them, but that's another story) so she started university, and loved all the courses she was doing. Time passed. Heather and Tom spoke occasionally on ICQ, and once she e-mailed him about an article she'd read by his aunt. His communications, sporadic and shallow as they had been, seemed to Heather to be increasingly terse, and she could have sworn that some of her messages had gone entirely unanswered.

Tom replied to her e-mail (the one about his aunt), and it became clear that Martha had relayed details of Heather's slip-up to him. Heather then realised that Martha had been manipulating her to gain Tom's favour for some time. Heather called Martha some very unbecoming names (none so unbecoming as 'Martha', it should be noted, and Martha was not present when this tirade took place, so she cannot truly have been so very offended. In fact, Heather had had very little contact with Martha since school, so it is somewhat of a necessity that Martha becomes the villain of our little piece. And although Martha was undoubtedly cunning and not the best friend to her, Heather occasionally finds herself in a charitable mood and wonders whether Martha instead deserves her pity. But this is not the point of our tale.)

Heather explained the circumstances to Tom who remained taciturn, but appeared to have listened to Heather's side of the story. Equilibrium had been restored, but for how long?

Heather found herself prone to occasional but very strong feelings of resentment and hurt towards Tom. Such was her mood when she read something on Tom's website which she believed was about her, and a most unflattering portrayal it was, too. Heather wrote a rather impassioned yet vague and impersonal rant on her own page, and so vague it was that Charlotte couldn't identify it as being aimed at or about Tom. However, Tom went on to misinterpret a great number of Heather's writings as being about or directed towards him, and left several rather hurtful comments on her page, which Heather went on to delete. She wrote an e-mail to Tom explaining her reasons for deletion of said comments, as well as assuring him of the freedom of his writings, and claiming the same liberties for herself.

Tom's reply informed her of his misinformed interpretations of her comments and Heather was shocked that statements she had believed self-explanatory or vague about entirely different situations could be taken personally by Tom. However, she refrained from calling him an egocentric prick not only because it almost rhymed in a most unpleasing way, but also because she had fallen prey to the same folly herself.

Instead, she sent Tom an embarrassingly long e-mail explaining to him her feelings, her hurts, explaining why she did not believe that they could be indifferent acquaintances as things stood, and generally being far more generous about his misdeeds than she really felt.

And Tom did not reply.

In hindsight, Heather felt she should instead have torn him a new one and been done with it - since he clearly wasn't interested in the mutually effective healing effects of communication, she supposed that she would have to snatch her recovery where she could get it. And there was no way she could write to him again - after all, she had sacrificed her dignity to contact him in the past and, once again, if he didn't want to communicate with her, she thought she would do well to be rid of him. Besides, she was near enough to over the whole debacle, and dwelling on it seemed to her to be a bad idea.

There was only one way in which he still inhabited her life. She had begun dreaming about him. The dream in which she sat in his kitchen and was ordered to sew something suspiciously like human brains together for some ungodly salad was bad enough, but months after that, Heather had another dream with ridiculously clear symbolism.

Tom was sitting at the train station in a green shirt, wearing an oversized silver charm in the shape of one of those cause awareness ribbons on a chain around his neck. He watched as Heather got off several trains that went nowhere but were still packed with people. He didn't know how to catch trains, so he just watched the failures of others, as no trains came to his platform at all. Dream-Heather was kind enough to explain this to him, but Dream-Tom still had the same distant, unreadable look in his eyes. And that enormous silver ribbon really looked like a jaw harp around his neck.

Heather woke up at Alex's house with a headache, grumbling at Tom's intrusion, simultaneously shocked and delighted at the harsh way he had been presented by her unconscious.

Alex suggested that Heather needed to gain some closure on the issue. Heaven knew, Heather had been trying ever since Charlotte had first ordered her to get over it. To gain closure would, it seemed, require contacting Tom again, and Heather was far too stubborn for that. No, she thought, fuck him. I'll write about the whole sorry mess in the third person and put it on my blog.

And so it ends.

Dinner with my dad and grandma was great. Since this is the first time we'd seen either of them since Christmas, we exchanged gifts. I now have discretionary funds, which is delightful. My gifts went down rather well, also: I gave my dad an Amazing Fly Gun, which pleased him enough to make him giggle and jamp (a very odd sight, I assure you) and I gave my grandmother a Gilbert and Sullivan CD. She was in a musical society back in the day, and performed in most of the light operas featured, so she was very pleased. We ordered pizza from a nearby Italian place, and it was the best I've ever had. It rivalled even the giant slabs of pizza Margot and I used to sneak off to Norton Street at lunchtime to eat. It was just a Margarita, but the tomato sauce in it was incredible, and had real depth of flavour. I tasted red wine and several different herbs in it. Very impressive.

On Sunday, I met up with Andrew for an odd hybrid meal of breakfast and lunch. Perhaps it's 'elevensies', since that's when we met. He's recently discovered that not only can he pull off my glasses by tugging the arm with his teeth, but that my glasses are rather easy to fog up, and that he can achieve this (often without arousing suspicion) by exhaling while kissing me. Most fiendish, he is. Ah, the cuteness. I'm spending the next two nights with him, but first I have things to do today. Very responsibly, I'm downloading our new Internet Security thing, and it's downloaded 7mb of 71. The horror. I don't think I've ever downloaded anything so large, and I almost considered the Age of Mythology demo.

This afternoon, I'm going into town to buy some organiser refills, as I've been keeping time by counting days back from my birthday, on Friday. I'm not very good at counting, though, so there are small scraps of paper on my desk with 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 scribbled on them. No doubt, I could have more easily made my own small calendar for this week, but there hardly seemed any point. I'm getting rather excited about starting uni again, and with that goes the lust for stationery. I was considering using loseleaf paper and a binder in 2003, but yesterday I saw Harry Potter binder books, and now I'm considering that rather seriously. I could still use one of my many binders, probably the purple one with the velcro thing, or even the furry ladybug one. No, wait, that one's broken. I should really throw that out, along with half my belongings.

Another year over, a new one just begun
This being the twelfth day of 2003, I think I've gained sufficient distance from 2002 to properly evaluate it. That's my excuse for my erstwhile lack of annual examination, and I'm sticking to it.

I think my greatest achievement of 2002 was that I stopped being chickenshit about my writing, and started writing on a regular basis, including the odd non-autobiographical piece. I also improved my study skills and reminded myself that I love my subjects and that they shouldn't be, nor are they, when I behave honestly, a chore. I found it difficult at first to do my best and accept my own weaknesses when dealing with impressive academics. I was more than a little starstruck, but this was a good lesson to learn.

I'm really glad that last year, Abby and I threw aside our childlike hostilities. We're still sisters, ergo we fight when we're cranky, but the bitterness and the blindness is gone.

For the past two weeks, I've been thinking about resolutions. A lot of people seem to be electing not to make any, as they believe failure is inevitable and will only bring guilt. I'd been thinking about 2003 being a year in which I should

read more | write more | cook more | exercise more | socialise more | clean more | relax more

but, with these goals to strive for, I think relaxation would end up grossly underrepresented. I cooked three times in the first week of the year, which made me happy as I had suspected, and I have been reading a lot. If anything, I've been writing a bit less, but it's been fairly good stuff, as well as one piece I wrote a few days ago that I'm just so proud of. In a dozen days, I've fulfilled my first few resolutions.

However, I've decided to abandon my cobbled-together goals, not least because they sound like a rather frightening, perhaps the mantra of an automaton operating in some horrendous Orwellian dystopia, determined on sucking the satisfaction out of life. Instead, I'm adopting two far less snappy and utterly unenforcable, but far more useful resolutions:

1. To be open to new experiences and ways of being; and
2. To let go.

I imagine that these are the only resolutions I'll ever need. Everything else belongs on a to-do list.

Last night it rained, but stopped in time for us to catch the show. However, by the time we got to the outdoor cinema there were literally thousands of people there. The only place we could find to set up camp was right at the back, about 100m from the screen, and the speakers weren't loud enough, so we could scarcely hear the film. We packed up and went home, vowing to rent Bend It Like Beckham on video. Naturally, by the time we'd made it back to the corner video store, all their copies of BILB were already out, probably gone to the cinemagoers around us who, like us, packed up and left, grumbling, when they found that they couldn't hear the film. We rented and watched Monsoon Wedding instead, which I saw last year with my mum. It rocks. I'm on a bit of an Indian film kick at the moment, and I really, really want to see Dil Chahta Hai again, and any other Hindi cinema I can find with English subtitles.

Yesterday, my father called. My Grandma is sick. She spent some time over Christmas in hospital, but since it was so far away (they were at my Aunt's property 400km away), I didn't hear about it. I spoke to him again this morning and it appears that her health is improving, but it's got me worried. I don't visit her or my father as often as I should, so I feel bad that it takes her getting sick to make me get off my arse. We're visiting this afternoon. I don't like reminders of human mortality, much less threats of the imminent death of my loved ones.

My family has an organ. We bought it at the Red Cross kidney depot op-shop this morning, along with some lovely new jeans and a huge sari bedspread. We didn't really feel like hefting it up the stairs, so it's sitting in the garage. Claire's down there playing some of her old piano music, and the strains of 'English Country Garden' work their way oddly up to my window. It's a bit strange, I have to say. It sounds more suited to 'Baby Elephant Walk'.

Half past one in the afternoon and I've already had breakfast, read some of my book, done some washing and applied for a job. I rule! The lead on the job came from my mum, whose workmate's neighbour is looking for someone to answer phones and do ad hoc admin. I find it quite embarrassing that the network spreads that far, that my mother's friend knows that I'm looking for a job and thinks of this when she hears of someone needing staff. Still, if it gets me a job, however temporarily, it's a wonderful thing.

I decided a while back that a job wouldn't come my way until I started genuinely enjoying having time to myself, and committing to tasks that needed doing. Yesterday, I managed to gouge my foot on the antenna of my little black-and-white-and-red-all-over TV as I stepped over it on the way from my desk to the door. It was a fairly impressive cut as it was quite deep, and the wound didn't want to close although it was only 2cm long. This finally got the idea through my head that cleaning up would be a good idea. Also, the plan is for me to have the old family computer on my desk, leaving room down that end of the hall for a possible new family acquisition. Since time on the good, internet connected computer is the subject of heated competition, I'd been thinking that it'd be nice to have a computer in my room so that I could type rather than having to write things out by hand. (Currently, I write almost everything by hand and type it up when it's my turn on the computer. The older one that shall soon be mine has not been plugged in since we got this one in December 2001) Also, this way I can read on my computer not only fanfic, but a big CD of classic (public domain) works of literature that I don't have time to read in my net time. And I want to read Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom.

I may not have much time for cleaning this afternoon, however, as I'm going off to see an outdoor screening of Bend It Like Beckham with my family tonight and, as the only one at home today, I'm in charge of picnic food. I'm going to buy rolls, sparkly apple juice, vegie sausages and Coke, and I want to boil eggs and cook some ricotta pastizzis that are in the freezer. Pray for no rain!

Margot reminded me this morning that my birthday is soon. One week from today, I will be twenty. This is a very strange thought.

The weather blustered and blew with relatively few ill-effects. Our already bleaguered mango tree lost a few more of its precious, unripe fruit. I watched with a joy so shameful that only the Germans have a word for it as the boat in next door's yard filled with rain and hail. It belongs to the creepy landlord of next door, you see, the one who frequently greets me with "Hey, gorgeous!" or responds to my rote enquiries as to his wellbeing with, "I'm always happy when I see a pretty girl." There is little one can do in response to this other than grunt and head for the door. The very placement of the boat in the yard is a contentious issue as it suggests, as does his frequent presence at the property, that he believes his tenants rent for his convenience rather than their own. But it's good to be scared by the weather now and then. It keeps things in perspective.

Adventures in Snarkland
The expectations people hold for films are generally fairly directly related to how much they paid to see them. That said, when you get to see a free film every week, your standards are drastically lower. The last two films I saw were Die Another Day and Two Weeks Notice.

After seeing Forces of Nature, I am unwilling to have high expectations of any film starring Sandra Bullock, and on this basis would not have paid to see Two Weeks Notice. However, this film pleasantly surprised me. The role was apparently inside her range as there were none of the cringe-worthy failures of Forces in which she reminded me all too much of Flo from The Amazing Race. The fact that Bullock played Lucy Kelson, and uptight lawyer, in virtually the same way she played Sidda Walker, a half-crazed Southern-born playwright, speaks volumes to me about her acting ability. Nevertheless, an enjoyable film.

In contrast, I do expect reasonable quality from a Bond film. However, in Die Another Day, the scriptwriting was so poor that I spent a great deal of the film jibbing and swearing at the absent scriptwriters, as well as planning how I could do a better job. The entendres were single, and made Bond sleaze rather than suave, while Graves' lines and constant mugging made him appear a parody of a Bond villain, rather than a villain in his own right. In addition, for all the claims made of Halle Berry's character's professional parity with Bond, she still became a completely pathetic damsel-in-distress when outwitted and trapped. Where were her gadgets? All she seemed to have was a gun with a very shiny silencer indeed, and staff to pick her up when she needed to escape from the scene of an explosion in a hurry. Where was her invisible car, her unbreakable-glass-smashing-ring? The fact that she's an American agent may be, in part, the reasoning behind her being really very crap. It's a British series, after all, and it's certainly not an aim of the Bond films to make the Americans the heroes of the day. In conclusion: Not good enough.

The weather today was baking and still, constantly hovering near 40ºC and sweltering even in the overcast. The air itself seemed to burn the skin. Stepping on the bus, I expected relief as I was out of the sun, but instead the poles and vinyl seats scalded me, the cold carton of pineapple and coconut juice in plastic at my feet providing some small relief from the calidity. As I left the bus, rain began to fall in fat drops on my parched shoulders, and after I'd dumped my packages in the kitchen the rain became a torrent. I stood in the doorway, watching as the rain was supplemented with pebbles of hail, stinging where the splashes of rain merely cooled my feet.

In the house, things were different. Hot air blustered through the upper level, the curtains in my mother's bedroom billowed into angry hummocks, doors slammed even after all the windows were closed. Thunder bombinated, the radio in Abby's room wailed out severe thunderstorm warnings, while the Bureau of Meteorology's warnings page advised me to unplug all my appliances, including my computer.

Back later. I hope everyone's okay, out there.

Distance vision enables me to mocks members of the public.
H: What's with people with superhero symbols on their t-shirts? Do they really think people are going to go, "Hey, there's Green Lantern! He can save us!"
A: I don't think they think that.
H: Or just he's a fat geek who thinks it'll help him pick up.
A: He's not fat. And he's with someone.
H: Look at that hair! She's clearly a lesbian.
A: There's nothing wrong with dating lesbians.

My appearance has changed. Nothing huge, mind you: I got a haircut and a $4 dye job, as well as that my glasses finally came in. My hair is now a fairly uniform deep brown, which is a bit of a relief, as I've been growing out my old red-brown colour and the dip-dyed look wasn't the classiest. If I was a mean girlfriend, I'd get all annoyed when Andrew inevitably didn't notice.

The glasses are wonderful. I'm almost pleased that they took so damn long getting them in, as I did all my stressing about the choice then, and I've had time to get used to the idea. When I picked them up, they had me try them on while focussing on something outside the shop. The giant SALE SALE SALE sign in the shop opposite came into sharp focus, and I think I may actually have gasped at the difference. "Would you like to wear them now," she asked, much like the shoe salesmen of my childhood. I decided to wear them home, but wanted a funky box like my Bubble Gummers came in to take with me. I wandered around the shopping centre, grinning like an idiot because I was able to distinguish the facial expressions of people on the other side of the concourse, because I could read peoples' t-shirt slogans without sneaking up on them, and see what stock shops had before even going inside. On the bus on the way home, the detail I could see of trees, and of people on the street, was amazing. The world is really very beautiful, when you can see clearly.

The Friday Five because I feel like it.

Do you wear any jewelry? What kind?
I don't wear much jewellery because I feel less useful, less able to perform day-to-day tasks, when I'm dressed up and have expensive things to worry about. Also I tend to dress fairly casually, so a lot of jewellery would look stupid like that. I like sturdy silver rings, because my fingers are wompy and little things make me look like a giant. I also like simple necklaces. My two regular favourites are a braided silver ring and a necklace of red glass beads that my mother made me a little while back. I love it to bits.

How often do you wear it?
I wear the ring every day and the red necklace whenever I feel like it, a few times a week. I have other jewellery I wear for special occasions, and heaps of earrings I never seem to wear. I wear surgical stainless steel jewellery in all my piercings from day to day, with reserve jewellery for dressing up.

Do you have any piercings? If so, where?
I have seven piercings at present. I have four earlobe holes - two in each ear. Currently, I wear star studs in the bottom holes and garnet studs in the top ones. I have one hole in the cartilage of my left ear, and in that I still have the ring a friend gave me in high school, which is a big circular barbell with a ball on one side and a spike on the other. I have a pierced right nostril, in which I wear a plain steel stud. That's the newest piercing, it'll be a year old tomorrow. I also have a pierced navel, in which I wear a captive bead ring with a red stone.

Do you have any tattoos? If so, where?
At present, I have no tattoos. I don't think I'm ready for that kind of commitment - the piercings will heal over leaving but a tiny scar, while tattoos are forever. I do have one tattoo I'd love to get, but I suspect if I made the design known a friend of mine would steal the idea. She's a bitch like that.

What are your plans for the weekend?
Tomorrow is The Anniversary. Six years, this time. I know, it's a helluva long time. Andrew has to work, so I'm meeting him after he gets off and he's taking me out to dinner. We may see a film on Sunday, or there may be further snuggling. I'm sure we can find something to do. And tomorrow morning I'm going op-shopping with my mother, as is my wont, after which I may bake cookies.

Listening: Birdhouse In Your Soul - They Might Be Giants

I got another 'thanks but no thanks' letter, this time from the job for which I had an interview on Friday. I feel it's quite chickenshit to write when you say you'll call. In addition, the letter itself is something of an exercise in ineptitude. It makes no reference at all to the fact that I had an interview. There are several fairly glaring grammatical and typographical errors and, worst of all, despite having my full name and address at the top of the letter, it opens, "Dear Hilda..."

I'm rather tempted to reply, attaching a photocopy of her correspondence and drawing her attention to the many errors there included, particularly the careless contempt implied by getting my name wrong. I'd then draw her attention to my previous office experience and typing speed, and suggest that perhaps I could fill the administrative void so clearly lacking in her corner of the world. That's the sort of cheekiness that's called chutzpah in the movies, and people supposedly get jobs that way. Someone should say to me, "I like your spunk." But once again, films have lied to me.

Listening: Starry-Eyed Surprise - Paul Oakenfield

People do like to sleep in after a big night, don't they? It's not just me? One of Andrew's housemates had friends over this morning. At 8am I woke to hear endless thumpy footsteps in the hall, and to some idiot whinging that he really needs to get his drip-filter coffee machine back from someone. I must say, I don't give a shit. I stumbled out in my dressing gown, hoping that she'd/they'd been unaware that there were others home, and seeing my presence would guilt them into shutting up or going away. It seemed to work - when I came back from the loo they weren't there any more, but when I started drifting off to sleep again they came back in with further slamming of doors and thumping of feet, and then went outside again to talk loudly outside Andrew's window. Come on, people, it's a public holiday, and one when it can reasonably be expected that people will have been up well past midnight drinking the night before. Early ruction is clearly bad housemate behaviour.

Add this to the fact that the other housemate had a lingerie party (it's like a tupperware party, except that they sell unmentionables) a few weekends back, without warning Andrew ahead of time, so that we (and especially he, I suspect) couldn't really spend time in the communal areas of the house when we would have liked to be making dinner.

The end result is that I'm really looking forward to Andrew moving, although he's not so keen and we both hate the moving process itself. I'd like to claim that I'm usually fairly tolerant of other peoples' peccadilloes. In truth I tend to notice every little inconsistency, every inconsiderate act, in everyone, including myself. I happily tolerate these acts from friends, but it's harder with people I quasi-live with. It's not a big deal, it just feels like it right now because being woken up like that really sucked. It feels like time to move on.

Apart from all this crap, New Year's Eve was nice. Since Andrew and I have been going out, we've always had something to do on NYE. Mostly, we'd go to parties at friends' houses, but once a friend's father was in a major production of Les Misérables (playing Thenardier) and, since they didn't expect a big turn out, we got $20 tickets. It was lovely. This year, I felt a bit left out that there were no invitations, but I think it was just that everyone felt like taking it easy. (If you know me and elected not to invite me to your brannigan - shame on you! No peeking at my life if you don't want to be involved.)

The plan was to sit around, watch lots of Red Dwarf and The Simpsons on cable and drink a bit. Since Red Dwarf was being shown in reverse order, the first episode we watched was the Smeg-Ups compilation and after watching that I couldn't take the normal episodes seriously, I kept waiting for someone to fall over or fudge their lines. There was plenty of drinking, though - I was rather pleased that I had found an Australian equivalent of my beloved Malibu, which, if possible, is even sweeter than the original as well as being roughly half the price. I tend to be a giggly drunk, which can give people the impression that I'm drunker than I am, so I don't think I can blame Andrew for being nervous when I gigglingly decided to trim his whiskers. In the cold light of day (at 8am, the bastards!) it still looked good, although his confidence couldn't have been assured by my having difficulty figuring out how to hold the scissors. It was really nice being able to have a proper New Year's Kiss without being told to get a room. And yes, I watched my favourite embarrassment, The Amazing Race.

Listening: Golden Brown - The Stranglers