Coolest thing ever!!

In stark contrast to my otherwise quite geeky status, I do not play computer games. I'm really just not interested. That is, with a couple of very important exceptions. I love Mario Bros. I love the original retro versions. I love the new Wii versions with new mini games. I love Mario Cart.

And I love Little Big Planet. Many thanks to the friend who introduced me to it. I love the sack boy. I love that it its narrated by Stephen Fry (seriously - Stephen Fry, what is there not to love about that?). I love that I don't have to be exceptionally co-ordinated to play it. And I love that I don't have to kill anything. My favourite bit ever is where you have this thing that looks like a gun, but shoots paint splats everywhere. It appears in several levels where everything is black and you have to shoot stuff to make it visible. You can of course shoot yourself and other players - which results in no harm but some interesting colour effects :D

So. We have established that I love LBP. So what have I deemed to be the coolest thing ever?

This: http://www.thinkgeek.com/geektoys/plush/d2af/

I want one. In fact, I want several so I can dress them up in various silly outfits.* (For those unfamiliar with the game, this is the true point of it - you run around collecting stuff that you can then use to dress and decorate yourself and your 'pod', the little home you have in the LBP world.)

I will be investing in one of these. Its one of those items of useless junk that I feel I really must own!

*I just reread that sentence. Wow, I sound like a 12 year old girl. Scary!

Being a woman sucks (Yes adult content within)

I know, I know. You've heard it all before. Every woman has her rants about how awful it is to be a woman. I would that this point make it clear that every woman I've ever met also LOVES being a woman, just hates certain annoying biological certainties that go with it. (As one friend put it when you weigh up multiple orgasms against menstruation, it isn't really a competition.)

So this week is one of those weeks that I hate being a woman. Not because of menstruation per se, but because I have been reminded that I really don't have any control over it. It happens when it feels like it - ie. at the most inconvenient time possible. (Think camping trips, long distance travelling, a day at the beach..... its like anything fun is a menstruation magnet!!!!)

So I had plans for this weekend that have now been ruined.

Another example of why if there is a god, there is a seriously warped sense of humour involved - but more likely, gods a man!

How do you hide in blog world?

So, the boy is apparently going to go looking for this blog. I've read through it again and there isn't anything that's too embarrassing. But if I'm honest, I really dont want him to find it......

So, given the small circulation of this blog, I think it will be difficult for him to find. It will be interesting if he tracks it down though.

Weekend on my own

Its funny how you get used to good company very quickly. After just a couple of weeks hanging out with my new boy, the prospect of an entire weekend without seeing him is distinctly lowering.

He's out of town visiting rellies this weekend, and I'm spending the weekend cleaning house (inspection time), shopping for a one year old's birthday present, and watching tv. Just isn't as much fun.....

Bring on Monday!

OUCH!

I found a bruise on my foot last night.

I know that doesn't sound very interesting.

But this is one of those interesting bruises thats worked its way slowly up from deep inside to appear weeks after the event as a ghostly brown/green mark lurking mysteriously, apparently unassociated with an injury (because surely you would remember it).

I am almost certain its from the shoes I wore at the wedding a few weeks ago. I certainly had a sore foot afterwards, and its in the right place. But who knows for sure!

In other news, for the 4th night in a week I am meeting up with the new boy. I think I like him. A lot.

Perks of the job

One of the unique features of working in this city is the very real possibility that you can run into very important people in the hallways of your workplace. On Friday, I stepped into the lift with a couple of work colleagues,  descended 3 floors, and the doors opened to the Peter Garrett, the head of the department and a couple of advisors. In this microcosm of the world - you dont get much more important people.

But Peter Garrett is a pretty cool guy. He shook our hands and asked our names. One of my colleagues commented that his wife would love it, as she is a huge fan.

Now, I have a bad habit of finding something funny to say at pretty much every opportunity, and at that moment it seemed perfect to make that old joke 'I'm never going to wash this hand'. At which (after an awkward moment of silence) Peter Garrett laughed and responded with 'No, I'm never going to wash mine either'.

It is one of the things I love about this country - that slightly irreverent sense of humour that makes it ok to have a joke with anyone - in good taste of course.

Almost perfect

So this weekend has been fun. Dinner date on Friday. It went well. Repeat Saturday, it went well. The housework took 10 minutes because I had done most of it through the week while bored because there was nothing on tv :D So the rest of time has been lazing around on the couch under the doona (is been COLD). This afternoon, to cap off the fun weekend, I'm catching up with a friend.

Why almost perfect?

Well, it rained a lot Friday night and I got up yesterday to find that there is a leak in the roof. Water was dripping onto the floor just centremetres away from expensive electronic equipment (luckily undamaged). Thankfully the rain has stopped, because I cant get hold of the landlord til Monday!

Buildings shouldn't move.

Today the office shook. As it is on the 9th floor of a 12 story bulding, this was not a comfortable feeling.

Given that this building had a few issues during its construction, we aren't feeling very comfortable at the moment.

I think if it keeps up that I might become unwell and leave.

10%

This is a follow up to my last post - re: internet dating.

It went well.

There was lots of laughing, the guy managed to keep up with my ability to talk about pretty much anything, pretty much all of the time - he even manged to get a word in edgewise :-D

Altogether we spent nearly 4 hours talking, laughing, drinking beer and eating.

For those novice internet daters out there, this only happens with that 10% I mentioned. Otherwise its a relatively short, stilted process where either one or both of you try desperately to come up with some excuse to end the date as soon as possible.

We are going to have dinner again sometime this week.

Back in the dating game....

I received a 'Kiss' the other day in the online dating world. He seemed nice so I sent one back. In the 4 days since then there have been over 50 emails back and forth (it seems we both have email enabled phones.....)

Online dating is a seriously weird operation. You make judgements about people based on a couple of photos and about 2000 words (max). Then you send disembodied messages and emails for a while until you feel comfortable enough to meet them. In my experience, you meet them and in about 90% of cases you work out that you really don't have any connection - regardless of the amount of disembodied communication you have had.

We are meeting for a beer this weekend. It should be interesting to see if he is the 90 or the 10%.

Why I will never get married.....

I should clarify at the outset that this doesn't mean I intend to be a spinster for the rest of my life, or that I will just 'live in sin' as the quaint old saying goes. What I mean is that having observed several of my friends going through the process of getting married in the traditional white wedding way, with all of the attendant hysteria, I have absolutely no desire to drape myself in yards of white fabric* and parade myself to be judged by a group of people most of whom I really don't know very well and then feed them all at my expense.

That said, I have a very real appreciation for the intestinal fortitude involved with either wedding option - to face down the stress of actually organising a wedding or to face the family having chosen to run off and do it quietly somewhere without them!

As someone who merely attends a wedding, you don't really have any idea how much is involved. As someone actually involved in the process, you see just how much effort goes into it. Even the apparently simple element - the table setting - is a nightmare. There is the tablecloth, the napkins, the name tags, the centrepiece, the bonbonniere, the glitter sprinkled on the table. And someone to set it all up.

But that said, apart for the expected stress and the unexpected screw ups, last weekends wedding was ultimately a lot of fun. We got to do all the girlie stuff that I never do - hair, make-up, nails. Fizzy alcohol and strawberries for breakfast**. I discovered that cars honk at bridal vehicles. Stick some ribbon on your car and see for yourself. People stop and look at people wearing silly dresses***. They like to try and get into the photo's (thanks to that lovely woman who stopped just inside the shot and scratched her bottom for a good 5 minutes - seriously, 5 minutes while she waited for someone to come up from the beach). And someone opens the door of the car for you - and stands just right to hide any inadvertent show of knickers as you scramble out of a low slung classic vehicle.

I also got to be a bit trampy. The dresses was fire-engine red satin, just above the knee with a black tulle underskirt. Perfect for draping provocatively across the bonnet of a gangster style classic car.****

But I wont be doing it if I can possibly help it. I'll take facing the family disapproval and elope. I'll buy one of those package deals where you trot off to Vanuatu or Fiji and its all organised for you, you get the pretty pictures to show your friends but all you have to do is bring your clothes and get on a plane.

* or whatever slightly not white tone you care to choose.

** well - I stopped for Macca's on the way to the hotel - I dont cope without protein in the morning.

*** ALL bridal dresses are silly - be it the wedding dress or the bridesmaid dress. They are always impractical, are either too short, or too long so you either trip on it or inadvertently show someone your knickers.

**** Photo's may come later (depends on how trampy they turn out)

Woes for two wheels....

So - 'new for old replacement' means 'the same thing you had' - in other words, they hunt around and find a bike the same model and year as the one they wrote off. Guess what! there are no 2008 models left in Australia, so to get the pretty bike in the picture from yesterday I would have to pay nearly $2000 anyway to 'make up the gap'.

So I'm going to take the cash and run.Because I can do that and go and buy a brand new 2010 model for about the same amount of money. And I can also take my money, add the same extra dough, and buy a second hand upgrade (2007-2008 model with less that 10,000 km on the clock) for the same kindof money and then have something that looks like this:

But without the custom paint job - shiny black is good enough for me :D

So, I haven't really decided what to do. Take the money and run, take the money and upgrade. Or sit on the money and wait till I can afford to buy new.....

Follow the yellow brick road.

This week has developed the tendancy to feel rather like a trip to Oz. This is mostly because of the slightly delusional state induced by recovering some of the lost sleep of last week. I seem to be drifting from one bizarre interaction to another with no real link between them.

Note to self: less than 4 hours sleep a night cannot be maintatined for longer than 2 days without severe negative consequences.

I arrived back at work to over 300 emails (of which only about 20 had any real importance), a new boss (at the top end of the chain), a remarkably empty office (not sure who is on holidays and who has quietly left while I was away) and not that much on my plate.

I am also cold. 2 weeks in warmer climes is certainly enough to get used to being warm. This morning it made it down to -0.4 degrees. I am no longer equipt to deal with this.

Note to self: do not holiday in the tropics during winter - the pain of the return to the cold far outweighs the benefits of 2 weeks of warmth.

In brighter news, it has been confirmed that my insurance company are giving me a brand new bike in replacement for the one they wrote off 2 weeks ago. I should be back on the road in a matter of weeks. In fact, just in time for when the weather here finally works out that its spring and warms up :D Here's a picture:

I will get around to a full wedding wrap-up at some point. After I've caught up on sleep and dont feel like I'm rambling off into the distance.