One More Time

So the Deloitte gig's all over for now, and I managed to secure (and, just a couple of hours ago, accept) a grad offer. Which, on top of elation, elicits from me a massive sense of relief. I've finally gotten something, after all the trials and tribulations and whatnot. I'm thankful that I worked with really great people, most of whom really tried to help me along.

The last few work-free days have been good. I'm kind of starting to miss it already. It's more missing the other vacationers than the work. I liked those guys. Or a number of them anyway. Hopefully will get to see them before we all start back at work next year. 

Also, after what seems like years, I've finally managed to find me a girl problem. As in, a quandary that is in the form of a girl. 

Well done me. 

I'll not talk about it here, but feel free to hit me up about it next time you seem me online/in person/on the phone if you feel like a bit of goss, a bit of romance, more than a dash of unrequited love, and impossible odds.

I should work in movie marketing. Or something. 

So yeah. Work's over, so normal service resumes. Hell, it's so normal, that, right on queue, the day that I finish work, a truckload of mulch and firewood gets dumped on our front lawn. Which, of course, means that I'll have to move it. Much like the time before I commenced work.

The greatest thing about finishing this whole thing is that I get to see my friends again. Having good chats all around. 

Like on Friday, having good old chats with the other vaccers. Learned a lot about everyone, had good times, etc. Should do it again more often. 

Or like Saturday, where my homies and I went to celebrate my birthday/offer with some weird dinner-ice-cream-Time Zone hybrid. 

Iced Dinnerzone. 

What a zippy name. As I said, marketing extraordinaire right here. 

So apart from doing things with friends, this week I am going to:

• Upload a massive lot of photos
• Blog (which is happening right here, right now)
• Continue the revamping of my room
• Plan for Gold Coast trip
• Finish moving the pile of stuff outside my house to the inside of my house (being my garden).

I think that'll do for now. 

I promise the next one will be a lot more orderly, and a lot less thought-spewy. 

Also, more about Noel Gallagher gig next. Get excited. 

I'll leave you with this clip that was promised by the post title. 

Word of the Day: Celebrate

  

Talking to the songbird yesterday

Obviously, that last post wasn't me.

Anyway, life.

Life has been fairly good of late.

Pretty much what's been happening has gone something like this.

We finished the Leaders Program, and had dinner at the Cranlana Mansion, which was pretty alright.

Not two days after that, I had my grand birthday bash thingo. According to a lot of people, it was a blast. Or, at least, pretty fun.

Personally, I thought the pinata was a fantastic idea. I had my doubts, but my friends have this ability to make anything fun.

Actually, I had my doubts about the whole thing in general, because I don't feel as though I'm a very entertaining person in general. But it turned out alright, mostly because my friends and family are awesome are making things awesome e.g. bringing Edward Cullen in as a birthday card. Gotta love it.

I'm yet to send out thank-yous and all that, but hopefully I'll get around to it soon.

Also, I felt like a bit of a beast afterwards, because I had about five shots, a champagne, and a beer, and I was not affected at all, whereas all my alcoholic friends were collapsing like proverbial houses of cards. Good times and all, but seriously, never drinking tequila ever again. Absolutely vile substance. I was mowing the lawn the other day, and I was just thinking to myself, "Man, something smells like tequila." It eventually came to my realisation that it was the petrol.

A few days after that, we went on a roadtrip to Rye. We being a bunch of friends.

A good roadtrip. In some ways, better than the last. The personnel was better (that's not to say that I dislike all the people that didn't come, it's just that some people that did come this time were quite awesome. Well, I have a distinct non-like of some people that came last time, but whatever). It was a bit too short though, but that's life. I also got to test out the spanking-new DSLR that my friends got me for my 21st, which was great. Also, I played guitar. People seemed to enjoy that a little bit, which was good. 'Songbird', by Oasis, I think, will become my party piece. Works out quite well.



Short, sweet, easy to play, and very, very tender. Well, at least, the way I sing it is. Liam, as always, kind of butchers it. It can also double up as my serenading piece.

Another semi-long one

So, I return here having not done this for a while.

It's been pretty bad, to be honest.

Let's start with my birthday.

That was horrible. I had an eye infection, so basically I could only see out of one eye.

Then I found out that my parents hadn't actually gotten me anything, because they were actually serious about paying for my party.

We went out for lunch on Mount Dandenong, which was pretty good, as it usually is.

The day after, we went to Mount Dandenong (yes, again) for breakfast, because apparently it's good to go for a stroll on a mountain on Chinese New Year. Pretty uneventful.

The next day, things got slightly better. My parents decided to get me a suit, and I would pay for my party. Much better. Seriously, I don't know what it is, but I just think that a 21st birthday present should be something lasting.

At least, I thought it was getting better. Little did I know that Chadstone and it's surrounds would get flooded. The signs were all there. The stores below getting flooded. We just didn't know the rain was that bad.

So we finished suit shopping and ran out into the torrential rain. And drove through rivers. Literally. Here's a pic.




Hopefully that's visible to all. We took a few detours, helped a few Koreans drag their car along, and got home in one piece.

And today, my eye has pretty much healed up. The doc gave me some better super magical ointment (different to the super magical ointment he gave me in the first place). Today also marked the start of the Leaders Program. Pretty long day, but petty interesting. Gotta prep for tomorrow when I get home.

Word of the Day: Torrential

Most excellent

The past two days (this one not inclusive) have been some of the best that I've had these holidays.

Well, it was more Thursday that was the great day. Went up Mount Dandenong with some homedogs that are close to my heart (awwwww). Once we got settled down for brunch and started, I laughed harder than I had for a long, long time. No, I'm not crazy. I didn't start laughing spontaneously. It was mainly to do with Rui being a clown.

So after eating, and laughing at Rui eating his scone like a sandwich (amongst other things) and roaming around the mountain like Asian tourists, we went to Cold Rock for dessert. I promptly got lost trying to get Kanji home. It eventually all worked out. The day had already seemed massively awesome up until that point.

Good times. It was like a week's worth of goodness, gloriously crammed into one day, spent with some of my favourite people.

And there will be more to come. Because yesterday, I sorted out the venue for my 21st. And I am so relieved just to be able to get that out of the way.

Hopefully I'll be able to organise some more fun times for next week.

Oh, also, Sarah's coming back from her massive holiday in France. All in all, good stuff.

I'll leave you with this song that I deliberately chanced on today. It fills me with a strong feeling of vengeance and bitterness. But it's such a good little song.

Tell everybody that you know
That I don't love you no more

Currently listening to: I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For by U2
Word of the Day: roaming

Doo bee doo doo, doo bee doo bee doo doo

That's the introduction to 'Singing in the Rain'. Duh.

I don't know why I decided to virtually sing that. It just sort of popped into my head.

Moving on. A whole manner of things are annoying me massively at the moment, but I'm not going to write about them, because (a) there's not a whole lot I can do about most of them, and (b) I have firm hope that things will probably change for the better sometime soon, because these things are cyclical in nature.

I should probably write something about Nigel's 21st at Loop last night, but there isn't all that much to say, apart from the fact that I had a bourbon and coke. Or something. And it was fairly disgusting. I didn't think it could get any worse, but one sip of Banh's scotch and coke reminded me of how wrong I can be about things sometimes. We (being Pramuk, Rudra, Banh and I) had massive amounts of bread, due to the fact that a massive platter of it was placed in front of us.

The massive mountain of bread that us fellas powered through.

Good party as well. I wish they had a mic for my use during the speech-making though. Would've been easier on my voice, which is feeling a bit tender after a night and full day of intensive speaking. If you're good friends, you'll remind me not to attempt to shout louder than the thumping music with my tiny voice next time. Highlight of the night: random old dude who came in and started munching our food. I also think he started making inappropriate comments to the ladies after I left, at which stage Nigel got him kicked out. I'm also not sure that I wished Nigel happy birthday last night, so here it is, just in case. Happy Birthday Nigel!

Ok, so I did have a lot to say about it. But I didn't before.

Currently, I am getting quite the lonely pangs again. It's that time again where I wish I had someone to just randomly talk to at anytime about any number of random things, but that person doesn't exist for me, and I just end up blogging instead to siphon some of it off, Pensieve-style. Don't pretend you don't get the reference. I know you're all Harry Potter nerds.

I leave you with this song. And a great song it is. Listen to it when you're feeling a bit down. It'll make you feel better. Like eating chocolate after being swarmed by Dementors. Harry Potter movie reference this time. I think I have just out-lamed myself yet again.

Actually, any song from them is a pretty good pick-me-up. Anyway, I'll really leave this time. Nothing worse than drawn-out goodbyes.

Word of the Day: Pensieve

Seven times three times a million

Hmm. That downing (it's like a combination between turning and down) point seems to be creeping up on me again. All the good stuff that's happened at the start of this week seems to be slowly evaporating. Like the last of the winter snow disappearing on the first day of spring sunshine. Except not in that kind of positive way. How apt that winter is ending soon.

Anyhow. My expected two interviews has now turned into a definite one. Which is a bit of a downer, as I thought that my 82% on the aptitude test was pretty good. Meng got 88, and he got a call, but I didn't. 82%. That means that, statistically, I am better than 82% of the people working in accounting and finance at analysing stuff and whatnot. And it still does not seem to be good enough. Still, I'm holding out hope that they'll give me a call on Monday.

Also, I have a lot of work due, I want to buy stuff but I've been forbidden from spending too much money, and I have a lot of twenty-firsts that I want to go to, but I can't because I'm a failure, so I'm going to have to pick a few. So here's the list:

1. James. Fo sho. It's been on my radar for a while, and he's in my top five friends. And I'm making a speech. Look out for it. (Also, the dinner should be really nice. Not that that influences my decision or anything).

2. Eugene's. Probably just going to go for an hour or so, due to my massive workload.

3. Rui's. This one, I actually want to go to (not that I don't want to go to the others), but it's quite a bit of money, and I have a vendetta against China Bar. But it's not so much those two reasons as me having a mountain of work to do.

4. Timothy's. Probably not. I don't really know him that well, and yeah. Work.

5. Ben Niles. Most likely, but still in the process of working out the logistics.

6. Linda's. Probably not. I'm fairly sure she doesn't want to talk to me anymore, and she's inviting me just to humour me. We haven't talked for about...I don't even know how long now. It's kind of sad. You know, you're getting along with someone, and, for some reason or another, it just dies.

And I think that's just about all of the one's on my list right now. I'm expecting at least about five more in the near future. I love how August/September/October always try and bankrupt me. Well, it won't work this time. I'm making money from different revenue streams. Except I still have to get a Father's Day present. And birthday presents for my parents. And presents for my imaginary girlfriend.

I seriously don't know how people with more friends than me (and I think that's just about everybody, especially with respect to Facebook friends) would cope in my situation. Probably just not go to any.

My birthday's awesome. It's during the holidays. See, that's how good a friend I am.

Word of the Day: Twenty-firsts

20th

Ok, so it didn't turn out too bad.

Sure, I spent the day doing stuff that I'd normally do anyway. Swimming in the morning, shopping for an iPod case for Sarah, waiting for a message from Linda, watering the cabbages, studying for real estate. Nothing special. No-one really to spend it with. Or, more nobody available to spend it with.

I guess it's a reflection of myself. Not an overly-exciting birthday, but solid.

Emo song lyrics that I've created pending.

The highlight was the text from Linda. Sad, but also wonderful, how something so small can make me happy. Texts from my other friends were also much appreciated. Glad to know that people think of me. It means a lot more to me than I'm willing to admit. Anywhere. Except here.

The second highlight was the sign that Michelle made for me, and the card that both my sister's gave me. Phully the trippiest present ever. Display. In. My. Room. Now. Sarah also made me some blog layouts, which I am yet to try out, but I'm sure they're good. Thanks guys.

And most of the people that didn't wish me happy birthday were of the unreliable type anyway, so I guess, in a way, it was expected. Not forgiven, but expected.

Strange. I just view it as a common courtesy, like saying "Thanks" or "Hi." But then, yet again, I'm not surprised at this turn either. Many people lack common courtesy now. Especially at uni, people find it incredibly, disproportionately difficult to say "Hi" or "Bye." Many people also struggle with the concept of appreciation, and acknowledgement of this appreciation with a "Thanks." "Sorry" is also a bit of struggle word. I hate saying it sincerely, unless it's completely warranted and I'm in the wrong.

In summary, I've had better birthdays. I don't think I've ever had one where I haven't done anything at all during the actual day, but it was compensated for by friends who care. So it wasn't the worst I've ever had. Now I need to think of how to deal with these Facebook birthday wishes. Bothersome, but in a good way. Like...five people calling you one day. It makes you busy, but makes you feel popular. Yeah. Whatever.

Word of the Day: Twentieth

And still I see no changes

Yes, it's that time of year again when I go "Yay, I'm a year older."

It just hit me that I'm 20. Wow, that seemed really old back in the day. I certainly don't feel 20. I don't look 20, and a certainly don't act 20. I look like a 16-year-old, and often act like one.

I think this is an apt time to discuss some changes.

Well, what's changed since I turned 18?

I've become more social. Less of a jerk, I suppose. A bit more mature in my approach to people.

I think I've become less materialistic. I've found that the little things in life, in many cases, are the best things. Like someone showing that they care about you, or they're thinking about you. These little things are mostly conspicuous because of their absence in my life. In plain English, that means that not many people show that they care about me, possibly because they don't, and this makes it all the more valuable when someone shows that they do, in fact, care about you.

Tying in with this emotion, of course, was an emo song title I came up with last night before sleeping, in keeping with me being at my most creative just before sleeping.

Anyway, the day started pretty badly. Like, I'm not even sure if my parents know that it's my birthday. My littlest sister does. And what's weird is that most of the friends that I consider closest to me have not even mentioned my birthday. Some have texted me, and I thank them from the bottom of my heart for that. Others...See, this is what I mean by care. It's just little things like this. I don't know. Maybe they'll do it later when, and if, they remember. Maybe they think it's sufficient having wished me happy birthday a few days ago.

Ah, yes. I had a BBQ a few days ago in celebration of this day. It was good. I have this thing for sitting around and talking and generally doing nothing. And losing at poker, so as to have more time to sit around talking and generally do nothing. It turned out a lot better than I expected, owing to the unexpected move of my family eating dinner earlier than the party, and the fact that most people turned up an hour late. Thanks for the presents, y'all. And more importantly, infinitely more importantly, thanks for turning up. Appreciated.

Maybe it is sufficient to wish someone an early happy birthday and leave it at that. Maybe I'm just being a sulk and a pansy.

Also, nothing much looks like happening today. The person I would like to spend the day with is busy, as per usual. Come to think of it, I think most everyone else that I know is. So I guess I'll just study for my real estate course. Woo hoo.

Word of the Day: Birthday

Annoyed Part 6

So I was looking forward to tomorrow a lot.

Now I'm just annoyed. Everyone in my family just seems to be totally against the idea of simple. They have a tendency to make simple things very difficult.

It's just a BBQ. In essence, it consists of very little.

1. Shop for stuff to BBQ.
2. Prepare the stuff for BBQ.
3. BBQ the stuff.
4. Serve and eat. Arguably could be split into two steps.

There. Four, possibly five if you want to be pedantic about it, simple, self-explanatory, easy-to-follow steps.

Not so, according to my family.

"How will you cook the stuff? Who's going to look after the dog? Women's finals is on tomorrow night!"

I've cooked BBQs before.

The dog can look after itself.

Ok, so the women's final was a slight oversight, but not really my fault. It was either make it a school night, which I got told not to, or tomorrow, or like a month after my birthday. See the conundrum? Who watches women's tennis anyway?

Also, they don't seem to find it one bit awkward, them being there at the table with my friends. It's not like I mind them being there. I love my family. It's just with that many of my friends there, I don't know what they'd do with themselves. My friends and my family. It's like, what we do is different to what they do.

They were supposed to clear the house. But now, after they've used those above arguments, it doesn't look like happening. I should've just made it a dinner in the city or something. Much simpler, less time consuming, less frustration-inducing, almost makes more sense economically, don't have to take care of the dog, get table service, can actually do stuff afterwards. Problem was, I expected a lot more people to turn up. Who knew that half my friends would be overseas?

In summary, this is way more trouble than I bargained for. I just hope it somehow works itself out. If not, I guess my friends will just have to talk to my parents. What should've been a rollicking event has just now pretty much turned into 'meh' at this stage. I hope events tomorrow conspire to change this. Please.

Also, I hope that my friends like sitting outside eating, mucking around with a guitar, drinking, talking and/or listening to music. Because that's pretty much what's going to be going on, seeing as the TV will be taken by women's tennis lovers.

I guess it was a bit jinxed from the beginning. I don't know. I just had this feeling. Sometimes I get this feeling. I think it's called anxiety.

A while ago, I was in a happy state. And I also said that things could change in an instant and screw you over. This seems to be that time. Things just start accumulating and before you know it, nothing seems to be going right. I'll just hang around until the next upswing. I'm good at doing that. Most of the time. Or I could go back to my old habit of punching a wall. There may still be that hole from when I punched it last. Guess I'll just have to find another wall.

Word of the Day: BBQed

Lip sinking

What's the big deal about Britney Spears lip synching? Like, hello, she's been doing it ever since her first album. She's never been a very good singer, so what's new? It's almost like going to a Michael Jackson concert and making a big deal out of him dancing and singing live and not lip synching. I won't say who cares, because obviously people do, but I just think it's been completely blown out of proportion, and the reaction has been way, way, way above anything that I'd have expected. It's like the people that paid for the tickets expected her to not lip synch. When I put it like that, how weird does it sound?

Last night, I went to the first of many social events lined up for me these holidays. Banh had his 20th, and it was Friday the 13th. Nothing bad happened, unless you count Victor burning the food a bit. Good food and cool people all around. Sounds like a party I went to once. Oh, and good music, once I changed it to Ursher.

The food was very good. Vast improvement from when I first ate it. Not that it was bad in the first place. Which makes the improvement all the more surprising. Yes.

Yes. I'm suddenly feeling all pops, to use Yvonne terminology. Which is a very, very foreign feeling. Apart from that, things are starting to look on the up, except for being jobless. I shouldn't have said that. Every time I do, my world falls to pieces around me. But I can't help it.

Word of the Day: Britney

It's been a while

Hey friends. Long time no see. A lot has happened in the 3 months (I think) since I blogged. To put that in to perspective, that's a quarter of a year. It's a long time. Basically, this blog will just sum up all the stuff that's happened so that I can get on to some actual stuff of interest.

So after our interesting journey to Harbin, we came back to GZ. Then we took off to Macau. I'm not going to go in to much detail there, because it's Macau, and frankly, it wasn't that interesting. We went there for a day, we didn't gamble, we went to a swanky hotel, had Boost there (we met an Australian lady there) and ate some Fat Burgers. Later on, we went to a place were they sold pork burgers and were my dad claimed he and Michelle got food-poisoned. Photos will be up on my Flickr page.

So after coming back to GZ yet again, we left to return to Australia. There were many tearful farewells, due to the fact that Carmen, my cousin/aunty (caunty? ausin?) was coming with us to study in Oz. Pretty much everyone cried, due to various reasons. But, I'm a man, and everybody knows that men don't cry. They can't afford to.

So yeah, back in Australia, we realised how lucky we were to be living in somewhere clean, mostly thief-free and just generally nice.

So yeah, birthday party on the 1st of February, 2008. The big one-eight. Basically, not that much to say. Like, basically everybody who reads this blog attended, plus others who don't. Just some thank-yous to be expressed to the people who attended the small humble get-together and thank-you for the gifts. Sorry to those who couldn't come. I tried.

2nd of February was my real birthday. So me and my family, and family friend, went out to dinner. While there, who did I see but Mr. Stalker himself...I mean, Banh. Again. Twice in two days. It was good though. Actually seeing a friend on my birthday. Anyway, dinner was good, along with Banh wishing me happy birthday. An enjoyable day, all in all. Must visit the casino when I get the chance.

Then uni. I'm doing Arts/Commerce, by the way. At Monash, Clayton. Enrolment was terrible. Like, no friends, had to find my way around the freaking place, all that jazz. Orientation was pretty cool. Caught up with a lot of people that I hadn't seen in a while. Had to go in twice due to double degree.

Then it began. The first week was a bludge. all introductory stuff. I wonder why. People (namely Meng) were all pumped about first lecture, first tute, first lunch at uni, first instance of falling on the ground at uni, first visit to the toilet. I just couldn't understand that. I mean, it doesn't have the same zing as high school. Maybe because we've already been forced through that whole acclimatisation process twice now. But then again, so has Meng. So I still don't understand.

I dunno. The moment before the first lecture was exciting, because I got lost along with Stef, so I met my first friend at uni. Then the lecture was riveting. For about the first five seconds. Then I was like: "She keeps going on about coffee and chocolate." That was microeconomics. I'm doing Accounting, Micro, International Studies, and Linguistics. There's a clash between Linguistics and Accounting lecture, so I'm supposed to be in two places at once. I was going to be like "Stuff you, accounting," but the bogan of a lecturer doesn't record lectures. I don't understand that either. Like, he says it's to stop people wagging. Why does he care? I'm understanding less and less.

So yeah, met a few new people. Not that many though. Basically because everywhere I go, I meet comrades who have been through many a battle with me. Not that I go that many places. Law Library, ftw.

Easter break was dumb. Seriously, a week. I have Mondays and Fridays off anyway.

Work's ridiculous right now. That's why I'm blogging. Remember how I had that ridiculous habit, where the amount of blogging that I do has a direct positive correlation to the amount of work I have due. I'm starting to settle into uni life, and starting to feel comfortable with new friends. I'll start blogging regularly from now on. I promise.