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Sister Psychic, can you tell me, does it ever get better? [Sep. 27th, 2009|09:35 pm] [Tags | my day, radio, rambling, randomness, rant!, uni, work?!? ] [ mood | irritated ] [ music | Sister Psychic, Smash Mouth ] Today my "It sucks to be me" hat came in handy. As did my "I don't work here" shirt. I had some uni work to do. On a weekend. Self-inflicted injury, but still not one to improve my mood. Since the Internet at home is busted (I think I hit the cap again), I went in to Uni to do stuff there. Things going okay till 6. Suddenly no website not connected to UTS or Google was accessible. Since I was supposed to be having a Skype meeting at 7, this was a little inconvenient. There wasn't much I could do about it, though, so I just connected as best I could. Eventually Skype died permanently, and they forwarded the call to my mobile. I think I now have no Skype credit. *sigh* I caught a cab home. The cab driver was listening to 2GB. The evening shock jock was suggesting that we should ban people from walking the Kakoda Track, since people keep dying. "Maybe soon we'll even have schoolchildren walking it! Where's it going to end? It's not like you're experiencing what the diggers did! They had bullets shooting past them!" ...This irritated me. The attitude seemed to be, "Why take let people take risks?". I think that if they're suitably prepared and wish to go, they should be able to do so. ...Not my scene, but I know others who are interested. So, I asked the cab driver to change channels. He switched to 2UE. It was The Psychic Hour, or whatever they call it. "Hi Cherine. Do you think that if I move house, it will be better for my health? I'm having trouble with the stairs in my current home." ...Lady. If you're having trouble with the stairs in your house, then move. You don't need a psychic to tell you that. ...I may dislike Dad's radio in general, but at least it's better than the alternative... -Mmaster link Be an Angel

[Jun. 10th, 2009|09:55 pm] [Tags | my day, rambling, uni ] [ mood | okay ] [ music | The Fear, Lily Allen ] One exam down, one to go. It was okay. Not brilliant (insofar as an exam could ever be 'brilliant'), but not terrible either - I got at least something down for most of the questions, even though some of the answers were guesswork. I took up the entire time (including my extra time), but I didn't really want to rush it anyway. I actually spent a little time making sure it was formatted properly that might have been better spent answering things, but it was at the "I can't think of anything more to say, but don't want to leave in case inspiration strikes" stage. (It didn't. But at least it meets a slightly higher standard now - I believe typed exam answers tend to be held to a slightly higher standard than handwritten ones, because they subconciously think you should be able to check your answers. Which really sucked in Year 12 when we were writing with Wordpad and thus didn't have spellcheck.) Question: How soon can I be bothered going home to my empty house? Parents left for the UK this afternoon. I haven't eaten dinner, but I'm not particularly hungry, but I've probably just missed the 10 o'clock bus, and according to Google, it's currently 8 degrees outside. Oh, and I stubbed my toe this afternoon and am unable to walk comfortably. On the other hand, I really need sleep. Whee... -Mmaster link Be an Angel

[Apr. 26th, 2009|08:00 pm] [Tags | consumerism, my day, rambling, randomness ] [ mood | okay ] [ music | John The Revelator, by Taj Mahal, Sam Moore and Cab Blues ] The carpet in my room has been looking fairly sad for a long time, and I've finally got around to doing something about it. Parents and I headed to Auburn this afternoon, and checked out a few of the rug shops. We actually did fairly well :- we managed to find four possibles (two designs, each in green and blue). The company has a policy of letting you 'borrow' smaller rugs to see how they look in the room before purchase (though obviously they take down your details so they can charge you for it if you fail to return). Therefore, on my bedroom floor at this moment, I have three rugs: the original one I'm looking to replace, the blue patterned one, and the green plain one. At the moment, I'm tending towards the green patterned one (the blue doesn't really do much for the room), but ideally I'd like to swap it out to see beforehand. Then I need to decide how big I want the thing - my current one covers most of the floor, meaning that half the furniture lays on it (making moving it painful if necessary). The smaller one we borrowed takes up the walking area but doesn't sit under any furniture. The only disadvantage then is that if I roll back with my chair, it's likely to get tangled. Oh, and that we'd need to sand the floor under the chair to make its new exposure presentable. Whee... -Mmaster link 6 Divine Judgements|Be an Angel

"This is some other Dad's problem." [Apr. 14th, 2009|09:29 pm] [Tags | films, lyrics-ish, mm is weird, rambling, randomness, wth? ] [ mood | amused ] [ music | I'll Be There For You, The Rembrandts ] On Saturday night, Chris and I were in Katoomba, at something of a loss of what to do. We wound up at the cinema, watching 17 Again, because it was what was on. It was entertaining, though parts of it were more or less excruciating. The inevitable "Oh no, my daughter is falling in love with me" moment sort of rates on that scale. Don't worry, Stevie, there's a song-and-dance number (well, no song, I guess); just for you. I was bemused to realise, walking out of the film, that Matthew Perry was playing a character whose life could be described by the theme tune from Friends: So no-one told you life was gonna be this way Your job's a joke, you're broke; your love life's DOA It's like you're always stuck in second gear When it hasn't been your day, your week, your month Or even your year But I'll be there for you When the rain starts to pour I'll be there for you Like I've been there before I'll be there for you 'Cause you're there for me too <snip> No one could ever know me No one could ever see me Seems you're the only one who knows What it's like to be me Someone to face the day with Make it through all the rest with Someone I'll always laugh with Even at my worst I'm best with you, yeah ...Now someone needs to make it into a Ned/Mike slashvid. -Mmaster link Be an Angel

He bought me a pretty dress; admittedly, he probably owed me the $100 it cost anyway. [Apr. 5th, 2009|10:43 pm] [Tags | my day, rambling, randomness ] [ mood | sleepy ] [ music | Coin Operated Boy, The Dresden Dolls ] I spent yesterday flailing wildly at the keyboard, and got my half of the PMP assignment done. It's kind of written like a blog post rather than an essay, but that's mostly because I'm really, really out of practice. Last night, as I mentioned, was Thomas' birthday party. This morning I polished off my DBP assignment. I finished it about 2PM. I no longer have any idea whether it answers the task, but at the same time, I no longer really care. It's printed, and declared to be "Complete". Therefore, to get Uni out of my brain, Chris and I went to Burwood this afternoon. We had afternoon tunch at one of the cafes in the shopping centre, then tried to get a few things on our shopping list. The clothes shopping was a success; the belt shopping less so; the switches were too expensive to bother; the carmats were found; and I got High School Musical 3 on DVD. (:D.) We then headed home, and watched the movie. After dinner, he headed back to Mandemar to face the music he's been avoiding for weeks. -Mmaster link Be an Angel

[Feb. 3rd, 2009|10:08 pm] [Tags | my day, rambling, randomness ] [ mood | calm ] [ music | Nine in the Afternoon, Panic At The Disco ] A few more random points: * Having sent my parents back to Officeworks, laminator in tow, I now have a beastie that doesn't blow the power - or at least, doesn't trip the circuit that the other one didn't. I haven't tried the one that blew, because the stuff on that circuit is a little too sensitive. * I also now have six laminated Martian Chessboard Sections. 6 player Martian Go, anyone? * I have not yet put the laminator away, because I'm terrified it will melt the foam cushioning. * Photoshop Elements 7 flickers miserably every time I try to open a menu. I haven't got around to installing it on Bianca to find out whether it's just a graphics issue - Connor really needs a new graphics card, I think. * It is Tysen's birthday today. His birthday party will be held in Canberra this weekend. I don't think I'll be making it. (Which is an interesting coincidence, since it's the dates I originally sketched out for our road trip.) Instead, I'll probably badger Chris and Liz, and we'll drop by during our Canberra road trip. * MSN Messenger was using 50% CPU earlier this evening, for no reason that I can determine. I shut it down and re-opened it, and everything was fine. * Bedtime! -Mmaster link Be an Angel

Randomness. [Feb. 1st, 2009|10:55 pm] [Tags | delayed adolescent rebellion, lists, rambling, randomness ] [ mood | sleepy ] [ music | Signal The Riflemen, Say Anything ] * Today I bought a $20 laminator. When I plugged it in, it blew the power to half the house. I pulled it out and moved it to a less overloaded circuit. When it had been plugged in for twice the expected time and still hadn't marked itself as 'ready for use', I decided that it was probably faulty and should be taken back. * I have You Should Lie With Me by Say Anything stuck in my head (which is why I can't sleep). At least it isn't Fabian's ringtone. * I've been considering getting a motorbike licence and then getting a motorscooter. My parents are less than enthusiastic, but I think they really want me to have some form of vehicle so I stop badgering them to take me places. I haven't made up my mind yet (I haven't done nearly enough research, for starters); but aside from several things that may be major issues (Primarily vision, balance, and visibility, along with the whole "Nothing to protect you if you are in an accident" thing), it would seem to make sense in a lot of ways in place of a car. Admittedly, some of the following is hearsay (or what Liz has told me) - factual accuracy is not guaranteed. - They're a great deal cheaper to run. And, probably, to purchase in the first place - a quick Google search turned up a fair number of second hand scooters around the $2k mark. - I wouldn't need to find 120 hours where my parents are willing to sit around with me while I practice. - I wouldn't be likely to do much freeway driving. - I wouldn't actually need it that often; I catch public transport most of the places I actually go, but for visiting Chris or doing errands (e.g. I will want to visit Harris Technology some time in the nearish future), a vehicle is a damn sight easier. It's ludicrous that Chris' house is only 15-20 mins away, driving, but the simplest way via public transport is to head into the city then catch a train out again. - Parking is simpler. The beastie's smaller, for starters. - More people are getting motorbikes/scooters, so the awareness of other drivers is probably getting higher. Also, availability of rider training is probably increasing. - I don't have to be the designated driver for my friends if we go out, not that we do very often. But I could spend a bit extra to get a seat-and-a-half, so that if, for example, Chris wants to tag along, he can theoretically jump on the back. - Scooters don't make nearly as much noise as a motorbike. Though, I actually have a feeling that a properly tuned motorbike wouldn't be half as noisy as most of the ones you hear coming from three streets away - people just want to amp up the sound to make sure they're noticed. - They have a slower top speed than a motorbike - reducing the chances of accidents, and the chances of serious injury if you are in an accident. Of course, this doesn't account for the behaviour of others on the road - as my father put it, "19 to 25 year old males are invincible". Not that the top speed is likely to be hit very often anyway: most suburban areas top out at 60ish anyway. - The balance on a scooter is (generally) better than a motorbike, I think - the centre of gravity is lower, and the machine itself is a little wider. My balance isn't great, though, so I'm not sure whether that would be enough. * The negatives, as I mentioned above, are primarily the greatly increased risk factor over driving a car; particularly in my case, when I don't have great vision or balance in general. I'm not sure of the best countermeasure for those. I'll have to look into it; but as I said, I haven't even made my mind up in the first place, it would just seem to make a lot of sense. Anyway, it's half past bedtime - and I have work in the morning. Guess it's time to crawl back into bed and see if I actually get some sleep this time. -Mmaster link 5 Divine Judgements|Be an Angel

These lines of lightning mean we're never alone, never alone... [Nov. 12th, 2008|09:28 pm] [Tags | apologising (for lack of entries), hrt, my day, rambling, randomness, work?!? ] [ mood | sleepy ] [ music | Accidentally In Love, Counting Crows ] Why haven't I posted lately? Because there isn't much to say. ...There still isn't, but I'm posting anyway. Go figure. Life's been hectic, in a "Not really doing much, but still don't have much room to breathe" kind of way. I spent last Saturday driving around the countryside with Chris and his father, looking at cars - Chris wants a Volvo. Sunday was spent shopping. *Why* are there so many birthdays in November?!? (Yes, I know about the whole "Nine months after Valentine's Day" thing. I do not consider that an excuse.) I've spent the last week and a half making PowerPoint presentations at work for other people to actually present. They largely consist of screenshots of assorted PDF documents. Having finished them yesterday, today was instead spent polishing off various other tasks that cropped up while I was head down. * I fixed a bug I'd noticed in a report I made. * I added a feature to allow it to be generated to just one group instead of the entire set, along with extracting the "entire set" functionality into a different function. * I edited a "Zip each file into its own zip file" script to suit, then ran it. * I asked the web guy to upload the zip files. * I found out that they weren't supposed to be passworded, and regenerated them sans password (then reuploaded them). * I spent some time assembling a mail merge to tell people about the newly uploaded files, but didn't send it. * ...Then I jumped tasks entirely and made an SQL script to extract data in response to a request, dragged it into Excel, and created a couple of Pivot tables to show what it indicated. Ergh. Meanwhile, I have set myself what I fear may be an impossible task - completing a longstitch in time to give it to my father for Christmas. It isn't too fiddly of a longstitch, really, but if I want to have it framed before Christmas, I'll need to finish it by about the start of next month in order to give the framer time to do so. At a pinch, I can just present it unframed, but it does lose a certain something. In deference to this aim, I've been avoiding my usual pastimes, to a certain extent - it depends on how much time is available to me (and how exhausted I am). Staring at the Internet is reasonably quick and mindless - working on the longstitch requires brainpower and concentration, two things which are in short supply, often. I need to hand in the Internship docs, soon, too. I've done my half, which has already been submitted, but the "Supervisor's report" is sitting on my desk waiting for me to be at Uni in office hours to drop them off to Des. Chris is having lunch with me tomorrow - he's offered to drop them off for me on his way back. Isn't he a nice boy? :). Saturday is Lucy's birthday party. It'll be good to see them again. Hopefully we'll get the ages right, this time. ;). Anyway, that's probably more stream-of-consciousness rambling than you really wanted to put up with, so I guess I'm done. Besides, I think I need sleep. -Mmaster link 1 Divine Judgement|Be an Angel

[Oct. 19th, 2008|12:33 am] [Tags | dorky, geeky, magic footnotes!, mm writes essays of entries, my day, rambling, randomness, sleeepy... ] [ mood | tired ] [ music | The Town And The Hills, The Lucksmiths ] Today was pleasant. ...Well, yesterday, technically, but I've been suffering from mild insomnia*, I figured I'd type it up to distract myself and hopefully be sleepy by the time I stop. I crashed on Chris' couch Friday night. There was an event on at Olympic Park that had appeal, and it's a lot easier to get to Olympic Park from his place than it is from mine. I fell asleep at probably 12:15. I proceeded to be woken up by my body clock at 6:30. ...Yays. I tried to get back to sleep, failed, and decided to settle in to watch an episode of Torchwood. Unfortunately, as I powered everything up, a mass of sound burst through the speakers that I wasn't expecting. This apparently woke Chris up, since he proceeded to wander out around seven - about three hours earlier than he'd planned to get up. We chatted with Liz and Nancy, hung out, etc for the next couple of hours. At ten or so (maybe a bit earlier), we wandered over to the station to catch a train to Lidcombe, in order to catch the connecting Sprint to Olympic Park. "Follow the nerds." We wound up at Olympic Park at 10:15, and went to grab some breakfast. Then we headed over to the Badgery Pavillion (Badger badger badger... What the Hell is a "Badgery" pavillion anyway? Dad says it's named after someone, or something. He would.) to attend the "Atomic PC LIVE! 08". It isn't really a conference, though that's what I heard it described as a time or two by Chris. It's more a (tiny, tiny) convention - "Hey! We're shiny! Buy us!" - Meanwhile, guys in Stormtrooper outfits wander around. We ran into Brinton, and Anne-Claire. We finished there by twelve or so, and then sort of went, "Well, what do we do now?" I remembered that I'd been meaning to check out the Art & About photos in Hyde Park, so we decided to catch a train to the city (which felt really expensive for CityRail; $5.20 for a train fare?). We had lunch at one of the copious numbers of cafes in the QVB. The meal gave me a mild stomach ache, but it may just be "Eaten too much + Stomach cramps = Badness". Since we were nearby anyway, we swung past the Tin Soldier to ask whether monty Python Fluxx had come in yet. It hadn't. *pouts* The pictures were cool, though I didn't "get" several of them (even with the sentence or two of explanation from the catalogue). After that, we wandered over to the King George garden (still part of Hyde Park, but with fountain (that isn't the big fountain) and shade). We sat there for an hour or two, skimming through a Melbourne guidebook to identify attractions that had appeal. We then wandered back to ProgSoc. We examined the contents of our longlist, and compiled them into a shortlist of essentials. Then I remembered that we'd promised to pack up CompSoc for Will. CompSoc is dead, long live CompSoc. It took half an hour or so - I was actually suprised by how much junk CompSoc had accumulated. We rescued Phoenix from Union reaquisition Hell, and even discovered the legitimate Windows XP CD it came with, amongst the detritus. Chris and I then headed over to the Lansdowne to drop in on James' belated birthday party. The rest of the attendees appeared to be Credo members, which kind of left us, and me in particular, out of the loop. We had dinner, and then the rest went off to go clubbing. Chris and I headed to the bus stop and he acted as my eyes to tell me which bus was which. ...Sitting badly and typing on the laptop is starting to hurt my hands. Anyway, it's past one. I think I'll crash and see if I sleep any better now - I'm starting to actually feel tired, which kind of helps, I suppose. I'll take my iPod with me, just in case it's necessary, purely because otherwise I'd have to climb down again to fetch it if I did need it. -Mmaster *Mild, since as soon as I discover tonight's Magic Combo (TM), I'll fall asleep essentially straight away. Last night it was putting some music on. A couple of nights ago, it was crashing on my couch instead of the top bunk - though that messed up my back for several days after the fact. link Be an Angel

[Aug. 16th, 2008|11:31 pm] [Tags | glee!, my day, rambling ] [ mood | :D! ] [ music | Tell Her About It, Billy Joel ] I has a cabinet! :D! Several weeks ago, I put an order in for a custom-built chest of drawers to store my DVDs in. I still have difficulty believing that what I was searching for didn't exist, but we'd tried a bunch of different shops and turn up nothing, so we wound up there. It wound up being $600, which sounds pricey, till you think of the other custom furniture place I went, where the guy did the sums out in front of me: when he told me that it would cost him three grand just to make the thing, let alone the margin, I went looking elsewhere. Unfortunately, one of the feet was mis-applied or got pulled off during transit or something, so we'll need to replace that before I can use the beastie. I probably could take it back and complain, but chasing it up is almost certainly more trouble than it's worth - we'll just head to Bunnings or something and pick up some replacements. I probably need to pick up a table runner or something for it, since I'll be placing my stereo on it, and I don't want to scratch its pretty surface (not that the stereo's exactly known for it, but I don't really want to take any chances). I've verified that the drawers are big enough for the intended purpose, and that they are able to store a whole lot more than the existing drawers. The current system can store, maybe, three fifths as many as this one, and (hopefully) the bases to these drawers shouldn't fall out from inside. They're even big enough to store the BuffyBox of Doom! *Gloat* -Mmaster link Be an Angel

You'll be okay; I'm happy when you're here, but your smile can seem as far away as once upon a time [Jul. 31st, 2008|11:08 pm] [Tags | i wasn't born in 1986!, mm does silly things, mm doesn't drink alcohol, mm fails at pop culture, mm shouldn't be allowed coke, my day, oops, progsoc, rambling, randomness, sleeepy..., tired, what are sleeping patterns? ] [ mood | cold ] So tiiiired... But no chance of sleeeep. I said I'd stop at the end of the second Coke. So Thomas bought me a third one. Which I finished. Oops. Maybe I'll go to bed anyway. The later I go to bed, the earlier I wake up, and it's already eleven o'clock. In other news, tonight was the talk from some guy at ProgSoc on Open Source or something. He seemed to spend a lot of time saying things to the effect of "So. What do you guys think of PostgreSQL?" and expecting this to be enough. I started zoning out when they got into a deep discussion of various virtualisation technologies - it was all very knowledgable, but not really my interest, and certainly not my field. He also went on a moderately long rant about his dislike of MySQL. And Squiz - it's a shame Rob missed that one, though I have a feeling he wouldn't have contributed much beyond "OHGODSYES" or something along those lines. SHIVERING! For dinner, we (Noah, Thomas, Nora, John, Jedd, myself) headed to the Lansdowne. Nora did her best 'turtle' impression when people (primarily Jedd) made jokes that she disliked. And I had three Cokes. Oops. I broke Jedd's brain a little by failing at pop culture; yay for me. In other other news, I have no idea what I'm doing this weekend. I might wind up doing something with Chris, but he's supposed to be either babysitting his sister and her boyfriend, or going to Ikea to find furniture. Plus he wants to visit Smash on Saturday and "annoy Rob" (assuming he can actually get a hold of Rob - I get the impression there will be a certain level of 'Running around like a headless chicken' involved on Rob's part). But if the "coming down with something" he was complaining of today continues, my bet is he'll be flat out in bed trying to sleep it off. So. Any bids? -Mmaster link 1 Divine Judgement|Be an Angel

ancilla Grumionem delectat. Grumio ancillam delectat. Grumio est latissimus. [Jul. 22nd, 2008|08:41 pm] [Tags | laugh at chris, lists, qotds, rambling, randomness ] [ mood | amused ] [ music | Brand New Day, Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog ] Tidbits: * I finally said "Stuff it" for the DVD storage, having failed to find anything that matched what I wanted. I went and got a custom order instead. It'll wind up setting me back around $600. Pricier than a lot of things I've seen, but a much better fit - and cheaper than the three grand that the other custom furniture place ($3000 without even including margin? Oh dear.). It should be ready in three weeks or so. * Chris and Liz have finally (theoretically) found a flat; but they haven't signed anything as yet, just put down a holding deposit. Assuming everything works out, they plan to move this weekend. * Which means I spend this weekend helping. Woo. * Steson is back from Japan. * I'm booking lunchtime on the 6th of September in your schedules for my birthday party. Where it will be held, I'm not 100% sure, but I'm tending towards heading back to the Star City buffet. It has a couple of problems with it, though - mind you, some of those problems I'd have anywhere, so... * Chris has fallen in love with IKEA. * IKEA! Just some oak and some pine and a handful of Norsemen! IKEA! Selling furniture for college kids and divorced men! * The literal translation of several sentences early in the Latin textbook include "The slave girl pleases Grumio. Grumio pleases the slave girl. Grumio is very happy." * This keyboard is sticking badly. * Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog is amusing, though I didn't find it as hilarious as the rest of the Internet seems to. * The EGG SGM is this Friday; I'd intended to attend, but I think I'm going to be busy. Aww. Not that my vote would mean much: I don't know who'd be any good at running the club... * Can you lend a caring hand to shelter those who need it? Only have to sign your name, don't even have to read it... Chris: A penguin used to be the national mascot of the IT Faculty! Mm: ...Um. Which country is an IT faculty? Chris: ...Uh... I didn't mean the "national" bit... -Mmaster link 1 Divine Judgement|Be an Angel

This keyboard... is... sucking... [Jul. 20th, 2008|07:59 pm] [Tags | i love dead languages, mm writes essays of entries, nostalgia, rambling ] [ mood | cheerful ] [ music | Moment In The Sun, The Living End ] Nostalgia is sometimes a surprisingly good motivator. I really loved my Latin classes in Year 8. There were only like ten students (possibly fewer) - the absolute minimum to viably have a class. Miss Hayes was always late. So we'd pull open the window from outside, throw Steven Yangiou through the window (he was the smallest and lightest, hence the easiest to push), and get him to open the door for us so we could all pile inside. Then we'd dig up some chalk from somewhere, and write "Happy birthday Miss Hayes" on the board. She'd never tell us what her real birthday was, so we figured if we tried every time, we'd eventually have it right. After that, we'd sit down to chatter till she finally showed up. One of the times, we had double Latin first thing Monday morning. We did our standard set up, and chattered a bit, etc etc. After a bit, Erin got bored and plugged the TV in, managing to get a very snowy image of Humphrey B. Bear onscreen. We sortof looked at our watches, bemused, as the minutes ticked by. Eventually, ten minutes before we were due to leave for roll call, Miss Hayes turned up: "Get out your books, children!" "Uh, Miss? Class is just about to end." "...Huh? What time is it?" "Nearly ten." The previous weekend had been the change from Daylight Savings to Daylight Losing. It turned out that she had remembered the change, but managed to turn her clocks the wrong way - and had had no occasion to realise her mistake. It was also cool that we were not required to do oral exams, since in most counts it is no longer a spoken language. Fort Street no longer offers Latin, as far as I know; I think my class was the last. They've swapped it for one of the variants of Chinese, I believe - no-one was picking it, so they quietly scrapped it. I think it's a shame, kind of. I liked Latin, and would have continued it past Year 8 had there continued to be a class. They offered it to me as a correspondence course; Black and Richard both took them up on it. I resisted: I had enough self-awareness to know that I had enough trouble getting my work done with a teacher breathing down my neck; something where it was only me acting as the motivator would be continuously sidelined while I found other things to work on. Which pretty much wound up being how they treated the subject, for that matter. But nostalgia can also be that motivator. I had a sudden desire to re-visit it the other day. I had to try three different bookshops to actually find the textbook, then resist the temptation to purchase the entire range up to and including Book Five (we only covered Book One and a tiny bit of Book Two). I got Book One. I'll see if I can find the motivation to work through all of that one - if I can, I'll move on up. I've got through two of the twelve Book One units today. But at the moment, it's still the stuff where I can more or less read it without the word list on hand. We'll see if the motivation and dedication stick around once I get to the more difficult passages. But still. Whether I'm good at it or not, I love Latin. -Mmaster link 2 Divine Judgements|Be an Angel

Twinkies! ...At least they're pilgrims, not missionaries. [Jul. 14th, 2008|06:04 pm] [Tags | lists, my day, rambling, randomness ] [ mood | calm ] [ music | Caravanna, The Lucksmiths ] Mini life updates. * I'm mostly recovered, though people still wince when I cough. * My mother has returned from whereever. * She brought me watercolour pencils. This is good, since Chris broke half of mine and has been unable to find replacements. * Now I need to go buy a new sketchbook. * We have the dog back. * He seems very chirpy to be home. * We could have had an ultrasound done on him to do some more diagnostics, but Mum decided to save it for "When I'm feeling flush again". * We have Fabian back at work. It seems he more or less got off the plane and went straight to work. He was planning on taking today slow, but then his boss showed up, so we had a big meeting about what's next and suchlike. * I have stuff to do at work. This fact is awesome. * Lots of little people bearing yellow-and-red backpacks have invaded my city. Fortunately, they don't really impede on my day-to-day life, since I more or less go to work, stay there for eight hours, then leave again. * I managed to find a torrent of the Lucksmiths album I was missing. Which means I've now obtained pretty much everything they've released (except for occasional non-album tracks). * Now I just need to get the actual CDs for the albums I'm missing. * I got the new albums by Alkaline Trio and The Offspring. They both sound like each band, but there isn't much to remember. At least, from the couple of listens I've given each thus far. Admittedly, I haven't been giving them my full attention. * I was praying for it not to rain today, but I don't think I got my wish. * This sucks, because if it didn't rain today, then the fence can't be replaced tomorrow. Since it is currently held up by being tied to the house with string, and it waves violently in the breeze (or when you close the gate), this is a bad sign. * It also means no electrician coming (we'll be having a powered gate), which means the light fitting destined for my room remains on the hall table in pieces. * Did I ever tell you that we finally hung those pictures I'd been rambling about? We did - before Mum went away, even. They look brilliant. * I've managed to get frames for all the pictures in my room now - except for the ones pinned to the corkboard behind the door. It's amazing how few of those people I still talk to. * The entire house, particularly the living/dining room, stinks of smoke. Mum left a pot on the stove slightly too long yesterday, and it boiled dry and then burnt. Sigh. I think that's most of it. -Mmaster link Be an Angel

[Jul. 11th, 2008|05:12 pm] [Tags | dorky, geeky, my day, rambling, randomness, sick ] [ mood | okay ] [ music | Not The Girl You Think You Are, Crowded House ] *prods BitTorrent* You can find a seed. You've even connected to it. So why, then, are you not actually downloading the file?!? In other news, I'm feeling significantly better today - I actually slept reasonably. Though Chris raised an eyebrow when I told him I'd "slept in" 'til 6am. But still. *Mm wakes up Mm: Great, it's still dark. Mm's brain: Why, hello there, three am. I believe we've met far too often lately. *Mm checks clock Mm: Six am! Yes! Whether the state of "Mediocre (siding to good) rather than terrible" will continue, improve, or deteriorate remains to be seen. And probably depends largely on whether I get decent amounts of sleep or not. In other other news, the dog has liver abnormalities, so they're now doing adrenal tests. When I reported this to my mother, she said she hoped it was just the liver, which would probably just be "He's getting on in years". Sigh. -Mmaster link Be an Angel

[Jul. 8th, 2008|10:29 am] [Tags | hrt, my day, rambling, randomness, work?!? ] [ mood | bored ] Well, that may well be my shortest work day ever. I walked in the door, coughed once, and Greg told me to go home. I finished the task I was working on, asked if anyone had anything else for me to do; when the answer was a general negative, I headed out. ...The trouble is I don't know what I'm going to do now. Pretty much everyone is either at work or asleep (I'm assuming). Maybe I'll go see a movie or something. -Mmaster link Be an Angel

1-2-3-4-Hi5! [Jul. 7th, 2008|08:38 am] [Tags | my day, rambling, randomness, wth? ] [ mood | amused ] [ music | 1-2-3-4-Hi5! ] I got a chuckle out of the fact that this weekend's Sun Herald was offering a competition with the chance to win "some awesome Hi5 merchandise!" ..."Entrants must be 18 years or older." (Yes, I can see the reasoning. Doesn't mean I can't get a laugh out of it.) -Mmaster link

[Jul. 4th, 2008|08:52 pm] [Tags | my day, rambling, randomness, sick, tv shows ] [ mood | sick ] [ music | Can't Stop, Maroon 5 ] Having watched the double-length season opener to Firefly, I can say this: It isn't quite as funny as Buffy is at times. Admittedly, that could easily be blamed on the fact that I've had all the best jokes telegraphed to me progressively over the last couple of years, through encountering its fandom one place or another. Since when I first tried to type "encountering" I wrote 'enoughering', and I'm shivering uncontrollably at random intervals, I have a feeling I should go to bed. Maybe I'll feel marginally less lousy in the morning. -Mmaster link

I'm feeling terribly ratty for no good reason. [Jul. 2nd, 2008|08:37 pm] [Tags | egg, my day, rambling, randomness ] [ mood | ratty ] EGG were watching Futurama: The Beast With A Billion Backs this evening. I didn't find it remotely funny, though perhaps I was just in a bad mood. It perhaps may have been a little less excrutiating if Selphie had not been yelling "What the Hell?!?" every three seconds. However; all through me not watching, but having to listen, all that I could think of was "This brings new meaning to the term 'tentacle rape'." (Chris didn't get it. What a surprise. The rest of the guys just shook their heads and disagreed with me. Whatever.) -Mmaster link 1 Divine Judgement|Be an Angel

[Jun. 18th, 2008|09:12 pm] [Tags | chat log, lyrics, rambling, randomness, yay! ] [ mood | giggly ] [ music | We Didn't Start The Fire, Billy Joel ] [08:40:58 PM] Shoulder Angel: RAR! [08:41:46 PM] Le Adder Noir: ARGH [08:42:04 PM] Shoulder Angel: *giggles* [08:42:10 PM] Shoulder Angel: How are you? [08:42:56 PM] Le Adder Noir: meh [08:42:56 PM] Le Adder Noir: u [08:43:30 PM] Shoulder Angel: I have We Didn't Start The Fire stuck in my head [08:43:44 PM] Shoulder Angel: And I found Lucksmiths music that I couldn't find [08:43:53 PM] Shoulder Angel: And Chris gets back in three days [08:44:01 PM] Shoulder Angel: And then I can play with K9 [08:44:06 PM] Shoulder Angel: And and and *bounces* [08:44:12 PM] Le Adder Noir: oh dear [08:44:37 PM] Shoulder Angel: *giggles* [08:44:41 PM] Shoulder Angel: *squeaks* [08:44:54 PM] Shoulder Angel: What have you been up to? [08:44:59 PM] Le Adder Noir: how much sugar have u had? [08:45:34 PM] Shoulder Angel: Coke at lunch [08:45:38 PM] Shoulder Angel: And icecream just now [08:45:47 PM] Shoulder Angel: But the Coke would be over with [08:45:56 PM] Shoulder Angel: And the icecream wouldn't have kicked in yet [08:46:08 PM] Shoulder Angel: :D [08:46:47 PM] Le Adder Noir: :| [08:46:49 PM] Le Adder Noir: that's just freay [08:46:51 PM] Le Adder Noir: freaky [08:47:13 PM] Shoulder Angel: *glomps* [08:47:21 PM] Shoulder Angel: I has a Steson! :D We didn't start the fire It was always burning Since the world's been turning We didn't start the fire Though we did ignite it But we tried to fight it I read of a drinking game where you'd take a drink every time you missed a name. I don't know how you'd keep up. -Mmaster link 2 Divine Judgements|Be an Angel

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