New Years Eve 2011

New Years Eve, in case you hadn't noticed, and, I guess a recap of the year is in order.

I can't even be bothered going through everything that's happened this year, both on a personal level and more widely. All the disasters, the economy, job hunting, uni, exams, friends, jettisoning of friends, the passing of Steve Jobs, more music released from my favourite artists for me to enjoy, the departure of Fabregas, Sarah's outrageous ATAR score, and many, many, many other things besides, all added up to a year that had its moments, and had its bad moments. And, of course, it wouldn't be a normal year without Arsenal going another season trophyless.

It just occurred to me that this year, my girl problems seemed to have reduced drastically. I think it's mainly to do with the fact that the problems seem to resolve themselves, in that the girls I get interested in are usually taken, and the case is closed quicker than you can say 'sup', and the other ones are just me being gutless. The problems still exist, but I had other things that annoyed me more.

It's been a pretty good year. I mean, I don't think there's ever been a year for me which has been truly horrible. Obviously, it could have been a lot better, but isn't that always the case, to varying degrees?

A big part of this year has been photography. Thanks to my lovely friends gifting me a DSLR for my birthday, I've been able to go on photo rampages of fairly high quality. It's something that I'd missed, because photography with the old SLR was positively correlated to the price of developing photos. In human speak, film and developing photos got really expensive and inconvenient, and, as a result, I stopped using the camera that used film. I need to spend some money on some photography equipment, but that's another story for another time.

It's been a good release at times when I needed a break, or just to get away from things that were bugging me. Just a good opportunity to go and explore a little bit, look at things a bit differently, and it reminds me, whenever I hop behind the lens, that despite all the insignificant trials and tribulations that I have, and all the sadness and madness in the world, that there is so much beauty and happiness in the world, if only I stop to observe. And sometimes actively seek.

Finally, a shout out to my friends and family. My friends, for helping me with so many different things throughout the year. I've jettisoned a number of now ex-friends who were just terrible human beings, and some not so much jettisoned as distanced because they annoy me. Whatever. The thing that I am really thankful for is that I've gotten to be much better friends with friends that actually enjoy my company, and vice versa. Some (actually, most) of you, I've spent less time with than I would have liked to, but that's kind of how the cookie crumbles. You're all wonderful people. You know who you are. And if you don't, or you're uncertain, you're probably not one of them. Or you can just ask me to make sure.

Finally finally, my family. They've been there through my failures, and my semi-successes, and are always there, even when nobody else is. When I've expected them to be disappointed, they've been nothing but supportive. Of course, like with my friends, there are moments when we clash, but they're few and far between, and often quickly forgotten. I'm pretty glad that Sarah got the 99.85. Made everyone really happy, mostly because it was so unexpected, but also because it was so outrageously good, and kind of balances out my academic mediocrity. More on that in another post, I think.

So, friends, and family, I hope you have an even more fun, fabulous, fantastic, and fruitful year than the one that's just passed, and I hope to share many more happy moments, and be able to help you through times of trouble (hope there's not too many of those) in 2012.

See you soon.

Word of the Day: 2011    

Christmas 2011

Not much to say really, other than to wish you all a Merry Christmas.

So here it is.

Merry Christmas! Hope everyone's had a great day/night, full of joy, frivolity, and happiness. The weather's not been too good, but hopefully that hasn't dampened (boom boom) your plans too much.

Word of the Day: Frivolity

The Poltergeist

There's a couple of irrational peeves that I want to talk about today (in chronological observation order).

1. A Southern Cross graphic. It's just not cool. Anywhere. Unless you're a flag. I thought tattoos of them were pretty bad. Then, while shovelling mulch today, I heard/observed a male 'person' driving a fully sick Commodore with a frigging massive Southern Cross on the back.

Yeah, we get it. You're proud that you're white, and you want to let the entire world know that you only ever associate with white people. Well done.

This isn't quite an irrational annoyance. There's quite a sound reason behind it, really. It goes something like: people who have Southern Cross motifs somewhere on their person (or, in this particular case, vehicle) are generally the same people who run around whining 'We grew here, you flew here' to anyone who isn't white (meaning, of course, that they're not born here), as if this gave them some inviolable right to treat you as a sub-standard human being.

Anyway, I generalise. So I guess I'm as bad as these people. I'm sure some of them are lovely people. Or maybe even most of them.  

2. People that try to be funny, but get it hopelessly wrong, because what they're saying is factually incorrect. As in, they think what they're saying is true, and not intentionally saying untruths.

For example, someone on Facebook today was being all witty and stuff, going on to state that a song sounded like 'Empire State of Mind' by Alicia Keyes.

There's just so many things wrong with that statement, I'm not even going to spend time on it. Mostly because I don't want to spend the next hour writing this up.

I don't know why it riles me. I mean, we all make mistakes. Me more so than others. But yeah, there you go. Irrational.

3. Dodgily-designed websites. You know, government websites, school intranets. Those types. The ones that make you bang your head against the table. It just makes you think, don't you guys get paid to design these websites? Did you try using the website before making it available to all and sundry? Why are they so bad?

So, ok, you kind of expect these to be bad, because they have a virtual monopoly in their respective fields.

But Comsec? Seriously? You make a bazillion dollars. Per minute. Surely you could have trialled the website beforehand.

I'm sure there are more. But I think that'll do for now.

Word of the Day: Peeve

People make mistake

Of course, people make mistake.

It's just not often that people make three mistakes of epic proportions, one after the other. 

First mistake

On Sunday, I told Banh that we'd be in the city by quarter to 1, when in fact, I meant quarter to 2. To make matters worse, he even confirmed it with me, and asked me why it was so early. And I thought nothing of it. Felt pretty bad afterwards. 

Second mistake

Drove to Irene's house today, thinking that Zara, her, and I were going for coffee at 2. Waited for half an hour, called and texted several times. Zara finally put me out of my misery by telling me that we had actually scheduled it for tomorrow. Went home and banged my head against the wall for a bit. 

I guess it was karma for my first mistake. 

Third mistake

The typo at the start and in the title. Gotcha! (Not giving Meng a wake-up call didn't count. He's 22. He can't seriously expect me to give him a wake up call at 12 noon. Most people grow out of that by the time they start primary school.)


I blame all of these things on the fact that it's holidays. And everybody knows that during holidays, you lose all sense of time and day. Yeah. That must be it. 

*******

Anyway, on to some decidedly error-free stuff.

Kylie's party on Sunday was quite fun. Even if you take away everything else, it was on a boat. I mean, how many twenty-firsts have you had on a boat?

Time to relive a classic

My only disappointment was the fact that she didn't think to invite T-Pain. Don't know how that slipped her mind.

Also, going to Gold Coast in February with my homedawgs. Yeeeeeeeeaaaahh!

Word of the Day: Mistake

Like a graph

I think happiness is cyclical for me. Kind of like a sine graph or something.

I was troughing a bit until about a few days ago. After that, I was very much peaking. Now I'm definitely, definitely, troughed.

Once again, I'll have to do things the hard way. If it can be done at all.

Word of the Day: Trough

My eyes have always, followed you, around the room

It's fascinating, and a little bit strange, that when I learn to play and/or sing a song, I seem to connect to it so much better than when I just passively listen to it.

I think it may have something to do with me actually actively feeling the lyrics and the music. It just all seems to mean so much more. I kind of start understanding the lyrics, and seeing all the little nuances and subtleties in the music.

This bout of reflection was brought about by me learning how to play 'If I Had A Gun' by Noel Gallagher earlier today.

The structure of the song, in tandem with the arrangement of the lyrics, is actually quite different and clever. Very subtle stuff going on.

I've heard the song quite a few times. I just never really actively absorbed.



On that note, some of my favourite lyricists:

• Noel Gallagher
• Chris Martin
• John Mayer
• Jay-Z

Coincidentally, they also write nice melodies (except, obviously, Jay). 

Their lyrics are very clever, subtle, and take a few listens to understand what's going on. I'd like to contrast them to, say, Eminem, Lil Wayne, Green Day, and Bruno Mars. While their songs may be ok (some more ok than others), their lyrics are somewhat plain and blunt. James Blunt. 

Back to real life. 

So yesterday, I went to see Victory play Gold Coast at the AAMI.

The stadium was quite impressive, but practical at the same time. Quite modern, but not ugly modern like Fed Square. The seats were much, much closer to the action than at the Etihad. Made for a much better viewing experience. 

The game itself was a thriller, but a bit disappointing from Victory's perspective. Any way you look at it, conceding two while being two up against the team that's propping up the bottom of the ladder is poor, even if you only have 10 men. Anyway, they got there in the end, which I guess is a positive. 

They also played a lot better than I expected they would. Very little hoofball, and they actually passed it along the ground. 

All in all, a pretty enjoyable afternoon out. 

Also, Arsenal drew with Fulham, and van Persie didn't score. Coincidence? Maybe. However, the winning streak and the scoring streak had to end sometime. I just wish it wasn't at the same time.

Word of the Day: Nuances

Sometimes...

...I wish I didn't suck so much at life.

Despite that, I'm not actually feeling all that down about anything really.

It's been a pretty good week, all in all. Been having good times, spending too much money, moving firewood, so on and so forth.

But yeah, it's just always something at the back of my mind, which I think I've canvassed enough here. It's just really annoying. So much so, that sometimes I lose concentration at inopportune moments, such as when I'm driving, and end up doing something stupid like going over a roundabout instead of around. At least it wasn't a cat or something. That'd be really bad.

Then, after I do that something stupid, I berate myself, and tell myself to concentrate. Don't know why I've started doing that. It's just plain weird.

It always gets kind of like this during holidays for me. I think it's mostly to do with having lots of free time to think about random things that make me somewhat unhappy.

To finish on a random note, I need more business shirts. Actually, just shirts in general. But I am too poor/frugal to pay a lot for them.

In sum, woe is me.

Word of the Day: Frugal