Here's an entry. No foreplay; no apologies. Anyone who still reads this knows my tendency to disappear, then reappear on another continent. That hasn't changed: I'm in Darwin, in the central north of Australia. Tropical climate, isolated city, lots of palm trees, slightly sinister undertone. At first it was a lovely, indulgent hidey-hole when mum and dad were here, then a fairly boring place with backyardy, beery, friendly punctuation when just dad was here, and now it's just a hot, sticky place full of restless, bored people who've evidently chosen weather over culture. Like almost everyone else who I've met here I don't have a good word to say about the place that's not about the scenery (technicolor green foliage, never a cloud, sparkly, crocodile-infested oceans) but why don't we leave? At least I'm making stacks of cash working two jobs, and the days are ticking by quite fast. I'll probably leave soon, though. I'm tired and Perth is starting to look like an oasis of culture and refinery, which is a sure sign that something's amiss in my world.

Being alone a lot sort of makes you hyper-self-aware. I have too much time to think / enough time to think (delete as you think appropriate) about my state of mind. Yesterday I was walking to work in the late afternoon and the sun was almost down. The light slanting across the path made even the tiniest pebbles and leaves cast long, thin shadows: small things thrown into greater significance. This is what it feels like to have too much time to think. More and more, I become the pathologist of my own feelings. I observe them, quite clinically, and like a nervous tic I find names for them. Saying the word in my head brings me outside of myself - it mutes things. Clearly this is a symptom of too much time. That it is also a symptom of anxiety goes without saying. I am coming to terms with it - again, by naming it. Sometimes I say to myself, "I am an anxious person." Oddly, it makes me feel better about it. Making it a thing isolates it; makes it easier to manage. When I'm breathing fast or tapping my foot, I take note and I stop it. Like a gas escaping, though, it seeps into something else: I find myself repeating words in my head, compulsively. Sometimes the same snatch of melody plays over and over and over again across my mind and I have to distract myself to cut it off.

None of this is so bad as to be distressing, though. On the contrary: I'm better than I've ever been. Oh sure, I'm bored and I'm lonely, but I've finally found a small puddle of calm inside myself that I can find and dip into when I need it. I feel less hollowed-out. More secure. Restless due to circumstance, not due to an army of ants dancing in my stomach and fingers and feet, keeping me ill-at-ease at all times. I'm not actually happy, which is hard to be in extended solitude, but I'm not unhappy either. I also feel better equipped to become happy at some future point, which is nice.

...

Ok, so this isn't an apology for not updating for so long, but it's an explanation. More to myself than anyone else, because I did wonder. And this is what I answered myself: I couldn't update in Berlin, because that would have meant either lying about how things were, or owning up, cataloguing the truth, and thus showing it all to myself, all stark and real. And because I'm a practical person, that would have meant making practical decisions. After all, the default option in most relationships is to stay (and this is really about leaving a person, not leaving a city). To leave is active, to stay is passive (it is when things are floundering, anyway); passive is easy, and we all love easy. There's nothing like the distance between two continents to complicate the simplicity of staying, though. So I left. Obviously. It's a punch in the guts to realise that, using a careless gaze, I probably mistook the memory of love - the sad ghost of it - for the thing itself. But what happened had to happen, and what I have now I will be thankful for. Amor fati: the love of what is necessary. A suggested recipe for happiness, from an unhappy man.

So I left the city and the person, and both partings were awful. I was browsing facebook today, and realised that he and Esme, Sam and Jess were the only significant people from that time who don't make me feel boilingly angry and contemptuous just to think about now. I don't know what it means, yet, that such odd people who are of very little consequence to me now make me so upset to think of. I guess I regret or resent something, but it will take more time and more will to find it out. It's in there somewhere, I just have to make time on my internal therapist's couch to talk it over. But I don't want to right now because it sets off little snappy crocodiles of annoyance in my gut, and it's probably not so important anyway. Maybe it's just as simple as that Jess and Sam are purely good and kind humans, and that he and Esme are the only ones of that small everyday circle of mine who are left with any will to pursue good things with some vigour. And we hate most what we recognise in ourselves. I certainly couldn't be accused of possessing an excess of vigour right now, but I excuse myself by saying I've put off the pursuit of good things until next year. In the meantime I need money, and to wait for my course to start, so the little snappy crocodiles will have to be patient.


I think in a few days I'll balance out this little slab of dreariness and text with a photo post. I've seen some nice things, dear readers, and you might like to see pictures of them.

This feels like a letter, so I'll sign off as if it were:

Yours with love,

Rose.

Ok so we all know that only something super-exciting could pull me out of posting hibernation, right? Something like my family flying from Australia to visit? Starting uni again?

Nope.

I had to update to let everyone know that I put some mixed herbs in my salad dressing last night, and there was a little twiggy, stemmy thing in there that got caught in my tonsil wrinkles, and is now (nearly a day later) still stabbing me a little bit every time I swallow or twist my head. I keep thinking of that episode of House where the gypsy swallows a toothpick and it rips up his internal organs. Obviously it's pretty unlikely that my twig thing is going to go: tonsils....tonsils...LIVER! KIDNEY! SPLEEN! RIP RIP RIP! But I'm worried anyway. I'm a worrier. I tried to dig it out with my finger but I can't find it, and digging around makes me retch.

Going to go drink tea and write in my notebook at BallSac Coffee now. Ho Ho.

Winter has broken my musical tastes: I can only listen to minimal electro.

Someone please halp. Send arse-kicking music to shake me out of it before I slip into a drum-loop induced coma.

Ta.

So I stayed up too late again watching telly, which lead to me giving myself amateur psychoanalysis. (Yeah I know; the things that make sense at 6am, right?)

 

I was trying to work out what it was that appealed to me about all the TV shows that I watch and love. On the surface it looks like it's just because they're procedurals of some kind - mostly crime procedurals apart from House, but then it's been pointed out by reviewers that House (my very favourite thing on the telly) is basically a crime procedural in which the villain is a disease rather than a person. It's not the genre exactly that appeals, though. I don't find 'straight' cop shows very interesting - for example, Paul loves The Wire, and I'm told it's a pretty amazing examination of the dirty, tragic and tangled world of drugs and crime, but I'm not interested. Too much politics and aggressive masculinity. The shows I like always feature protagonists who solve their particular cases using some specialised skill - one that appears almost miraculous to the (layman.) Forensic anthropology, forensic science, psychological profiling, behavioural analysis, intuitive medical diagnostics... All protagonists are supreme believers in rationality and science. They have special skills that give them the power to access truth, dispense justice, and save lives, but also are faced with both the limitation of their particular skills, as well as the emotional involvement and ethical dilemmas that come with exercising those skills.

 

Does this sound familiar? 'With great power comes great responsibility.'

 

That's right - the modern crime drama is a retelling of the superhero myth. All the important themes are there: life&death, awesome powers, sacrifice, the greater good, life, death, truth and justice.

 

This is a useful insight to me, as it was these shows which, funnily enough, inspired me to start writing again. Not because they're deep or timeless, but because they're intensely satisfying. And now I know why - which means I can write to greater effect.

 

I've been stewing the idea of a crime novel for a while now. It was the amazing UK series Wire in the Blood that really tuned me into the potential of the crime drama. The show is compelling and dark, and deals with it's heavy themes and finely drawn characters with great tenderness and care. It's also extremely gruesome and graphic, and I was disturbed to realise that I enjoyed that aspect of it. That's what tipped me off to look for something darker to write about, in the hopes that that fascination and enjoyment indicated an untapped spring of ideas and images worth tapping.

 

Then House came along, and I was so incredibly impressed by such a mainstream American show managing not only to centre itself around an often unlikeable, offensive and emotionally stunted protagonist, but to draw viewers in to the extent that we found ourselves feeling great empathy and affection for that character.  It's a rare thing: a redemptive storyline played out without compromising the integrity and strength of the redeemed character. The writing belies a deep understanding of human psychology as well as a fascinatingly shaded and nuanced view of morality, yet still manages to appeal to a wide range of viewers without a lot of intellectual effort on their part. Plus, it's really bloody funny at times, and has also made me cry like a little bitch on several occasions.

 

Anyway, what I'm getting at is that House proved to me that more 'accessible' works needn't be dumb, and that sticking to genre conventions doesn't have to hamper deep character study - it can even be conducive to it. This is probably old news to most of you, but indulge me. I never watched much television up until this year, so I'm full of the enthusiasm most of you probably got out of the way when you were fourteen.

 

So that's what's fired me up to write my idea down: a crime 'thriller' (terrible word!) kicked off when a police detective meets a philosophy lecturer at an academic conference on judicial ethics. The classic 'odd couple,' and of course, sexual tension. It's the fuel that drives every good crime story! They investigate the case (which has connections to Nietzsche and 19th C Germany) together, and lots of danger and twistiness and excitement ensue!

 

Cheques for advance copies of my as-yet-unwritten novel can just be sent straight to me. Thnx.

And if I could ask for a massive favour: recommend me your favourite piece of 'pop culture' that you feel exceeds the expectations of its genre or its billing. (Whedon fanatics, this is your cue!! Heh.)

Lots of loff to all. A cup of decaf tea for me then off to bed xx

Your result for Howard Gardner's Eight Types of Intelligence Test...

Intrapersonal

18% Logical, 2% Spatial, 35% Linguistic, 69% Intrapersonal, 43% Interpersonal, 4% Musical, 24% Bodily-Kinesthetic and 25% Naturalistic!

Take Howard Gardner's Eight Types of Intelligence Test at HelloQuizzy

So I guess I chose the right major then? (Though the bit about a high level of perfectionism is seriously laughable. I mean, I get pretty serious about finishing off beers and tubs of icecream down to the very last smidgen, but something tells me that's not the sort of perfectionism they're referring to....)



In other news:

I have tonsillitis :( :( :( there aren't enough sad emoticons in the world to express how much I hate being sick. It messes with my usual dynamism and unrelenting flurry of activity. (Har har!)

Speaking of which:

To procrastinate from finalising my university enrolment for this semester, I watched every episode of Bones ever made. That's, like, four seasons. It's the kind of procrastination that many aspire to but few achieve. I got badly addicted, though, and now (like I did with House before it) I'm stuck waiting for new episodes to air so I can download them ~illegally~ to get my fix.

Umm, I'm not sure what else to report. I went on a massive bender the other week (probably what made me sick...) and had a jolly good time. Went to many new nightclubs, harassed many new strangers, drank many beers. Many, many beers. I'm taking a break from drinking until the family-types arrive, though, else I think my liver will explode from horror trying to keep up with dad and his own love of The Beer! Also, I'm getting to be a little fatty. I'm not sure how much I really care, though. I'll just have to buy bigger clothes I guess.

Liebe Grüße!

I've been feeling a bit shitty and stressy - not about very stressful things, but then I have a larger stress capacity than most humans - and am about to start my bi-annual existential crisis (right on cue) but then something came along that made it all seem better....

http://dailyotter.tumblr.com/

Scroll through three pages of this - I guarantee that it will change your life.

...It even made me feel better about my grocery bag splitting earlier, and about thirty euros' worth of food getting smashed up and ruined.



OTTERS.

I had a truly creepy dream.


I was in a bar with some people I seemed to know, and there an art exhibition going on in the same building. It was supposed to be a photographic exhibition about death and dying, but it was labelled as a performance piece, which was odd. I walked into the exhibition space: it was very small room made of plywood within the building, and it was filled with vapid hipsters, and a huge, hulking blonde woman. The 'exhibition' was basically going to be the blonde woman torturing a girl, and taking photos while she did it. All the hipsters were sitting around with rapt looks on their faces, and I had a horrible feeling that they'd spent so much time around "modern art" that they'd lost their grip on reality and didn't care that what they were about to see was real (and that they would implicitly condone it by watching).

I sensed that it was a dangerous place to be in, and was afraid of the 'artist,' so played along with being a spectator for a little while, but just as the woman pushed the girl to the ground and went to put something heavy on her stomach (think I got this image directly from studying the 'burning times' in history, as I seem to remember that it was a bag of rocks in my dreams), I stood up, sighed with resignation, and told the woman I wouldn't let her continue. She faced me down and told me that I wasn't strong enough to stop her, and that no one else would come to my aid so my resistance would make no difference except to get me hurt or killed.

I faced her down anyway, rigid with fear, watching out the corner of my eye to see if anyone in the crowd got up to help me. I knew that if a few people tackled her from behind that she'd be powerless, but I was aware that they probably wouldn't. Just as she lunged for me, I woke up. I had to wake Paul up and snuffle his chest for a little while to feel better. It was quite unsettling.


Things that this dream taught me about my subconscious:

- it hates modern art as much as my waking self. Hurrah!

- likewise, it hates vapid hipsters too.

- I spend too much time in bars. All my dreams are set in them.

- it doesn't like it when I watch five straight hours of serial killer dramas before bed.

- it has a decent moral compass, and has ~opinions~ on the responsibilities of the observer (I should email my lecturer and let her know that her lectures from the 'Literature in an Age of Terror' really sunk in!)

- it also remembers what I learnt in history in first year university. Good to know it's in there somewhere.

And lastly: that old wives tale about eating cheese before bed is true! 'Wire in the Blood' + hunk of blue cheese = creepy, creepy nightmares.

Also, I'm developing some kind of crush on Hermione Norris, which is weird. I guess she's just such an excellent actress and it makes me a little giddy. Or something. Spooks didn't air yesterday for some reason, so I can't get my fix :(



I have lots to write about all my Berlin shenanigans lately, and especially my trip to the FUNFAIR (actually it was the Christmas markets, but they've got all the same gubbins as a funfair), which was unbelievably FUN, but...I don't feel like it right now. I'll save it for an epic post of epicness.



ps: does anyone else snuffle chests, or is that just me?

I have excellent new icons! Quick, everyone comment with a detailed description of their favourite type of cheese, and I'll comment back with my aforementioned excellent icons. EVERYBODY WINS**.

**(TERMS AND CONDITIONS: DUE TO MY OWN STINGINESS AND SUBSEQUENT LACK OF PAID ACCOUNT, I ACTUALLY ONLY HAVE TWO OTHER EXCELLENT ICONS, ONE OF WHICH MAY ONLY MAKE SENSE TO MAIS AND MY SIS. ACTUAL EXCELLENCE OF YOUR ICON ENJOYMENT EXPERIENCE MAY DEVIATE SLIGHTLY FROM THAT DESCRIBED. SERVING SUGGESTION ONLY. DO NOT BEND.)

Also, I've been reminded by the lovely Kate that NaNoWriMo is nearly upon us - anyone doing this? If there are any other brave souls here on me flist (apart from the aforementioned lovely Kate, who I've added already) would you add me? I'm rose.yuille. I know that I'm going to fail miserably, but I'll try anyway. It's good practise for any future failures I might want to attempt.

And because it's my blog and so I can justifiably post endless pictures of myself that I stole from my friends' facebooks:

( MEEEEEE part 2075478484: dicking around in Berlin )

So, what are the haps?

Well, firstly I have a cunting chest cold. I cough up pieces of goo, and have to spit them into bushes which is unladylike but oddly satisfying. Though I can count myself lucky that at least I don't have Paul's stomach flu. Given that I can actually hold down solid food, I thiiiink I got lucky. I'm making him protein shakes and bringing home yoghurts and soups, and generally nursing him back to health because he's adorable and all sickly and wibbly and stubbly and sad. Awww.

So another thing (second of four, just in case you like to keep track or something) is that we have an apartment - a real one with rooms for us to do various things in like sleep, eat, bathe, go to the bog, and store my ever-expanding wardrobe. Excellent! We even have a spare bedroom, which I consider the absolute height of luxury and have to go have a peek in sometimes just to remind myself how incredibly awesome its existence is. It's a really nice place, recently renovated, but is super-cheap as it's in a really crappy old building with disgusting old lino in the halls and views of sod-all but other buildings and patches of dirt. But who needs views when you have a SPARE BEDROOM, I ask you? I gaze upon that instead. Also there's an incredibly beautiful cemetery just around the corner that's old and overgrown and mossy and quiet that I can walk around in if I ever need a bit of 'nature' and all that gubbins. I'm still getting around to taking photos of the flat. Sorry mum, promise I'm on it. I'm just working on ~Rose time~ and we all know how that goes.

The third thing, then, is that I've been learning German. In a sense. Learning implies some degree of proactive-ness, which I'm not sure I've attained. I enrolled in the community college, and while it's nice to have structure and motivation and rah rah rah, it moves SO FUCKING SLOWLY OMG. I can't adequately express how stupid some of the people in my class are. Happy, friendly, smiling bunnies the lot of them but absolutely dumb as rocks. Ok, ok, I lie. My lovely Spanish friends are really smart and we argue about modern art which is always fun, and there are maybe two other people who are pretty onto it, but they all keep their heads down so it's not noticeable. What is noticeable is the motherfucking woman I sit next to, who speaks to me in Chinese CONSTANTLY despite me never having shown any indication of understanding it, and who guilts me with pleading eyes into helping her with her exercises. 'Helping' consisting of a painstaking process of sign language, diagrams, halting Deutsch and little breaks to stick my head under the table and scream silently. I actually managed to convey the difference between the definite and indefinite article to her today, which I was quite proud of. Doesn't sound like much, (and indeed everyone else grasped it in mere seconds) but believe me, the effort of getting it into her skull nearly killed me.

But lo! Light appears at the end of the boring-German-class-tunnel! And heralds the fourth topic of this here post: friendstalking.

When I first registered for classes, I met a friendly New Zealander who was registering for the same class as me. She seemed really cool and I was stoked to think that I'd have a friend in my class. But when I showed up for the first one, she wasn't there (nor was she enrolled) and I was bummed, as well as feeling a bit pathetic for being so bummed about the absence of a virtual stranger. (I've been away from my friends and family for a while, and woe, I am becoming crap.) But! After a couple of weeks of classes I bumped into her outside the campus on my daily coffee-run in the break, and it turned out she'd started a week late. Plus she was similarly frustrated about the pace of the course, so we decided to bail out after the first month and split the cost of a private tutor. I'm so relieved. I don't think I can learn this language on my own (I'm perfectly capable of it in theory, just I'm the laziest fucker in existence and would never get around to it without someone prodding me and assigning me homework!) and this way the course will move at our pace. Just please, jeebus, let her be as smart as she seems! Else I shall weep, quit, and speak bad German forever.

Oh, and there's a sub-section to the friendstalking topic: I met internet type-people last night, which was lovely and fun. Thanks for inviting me, Jessica! I fully intend to lure you out of the suburbs to come and eat pizza by the river with me some time. You too, Sam!

Internet creepiness is a glorious thing. Hurrah.

So my mucous and I are off to bed now. ('Bed' is a mattress on the floor. We haven't actually furnished the new apartment yet, and we have no fridge. Woe!)

Wishing funhappy times to all my frenz xx

Signs that the high-waisted trend might have been around for a bit too long: you want to make a good impression for a flat viewing, so you contemplate leaving your shirt untucked, because you wouldn't want to look like a young, no-good trendwhore. (For the record, I went with tucked in the end, and anyway, I really am a young, no-good trendwhore. I have a hipster bob!)

Saw the most gorgeous apartment today, and right in our price range. MIGHT be in with a chance, as it's a private rental, and the girl who's moving out claims that the owners love young, foreign bohemians...? Makes a nice change from estate agency rentals, that's for sure! Oooh I hope we get it.

HOPE HOPE HOPE HOPE HOPE.


ETA: completely unrelated, but mum thought I should post this:


Best graffiti EVAH, seen in a toilet in Sydney. It's graffiti for nerds, yo.

I'd just like to make a short, serious beans announcement about the American election:

Obama is actually sorta hot. I'd hit that.



...thoughts?


ETA: Ok, I am so obviously about to get my period: ate a whole block of chocolate in one sitting, screamed at my computer when it wouldn't load a page, and now I'm suddenly lusting after politicians. Hello hormones!

(he's still hot, though.)

Ugh. As exciting and even romantic as it is to run off to a strange new country where I don't know the language...it's also really fucking annoying some of the time. English speakers in their own countries who bitch and moan about immigrants not speaking perfect English should really experience living like this - it's frustrating on a very basic level not to be able to express yourself to others in anything but facial expression, gesture, and one or two badly pronounced nouns. Luckily Germans don't have the mean-minded Anglo spirit, and so mostly aren't bothered by people who don't speak their language. Unlike this bastard, who sums up everything that's awful about the English speaking world:



"wanker"

(Actually, check out this whole blog. I was told about it by thecoldacre in London a long time ago, and had to look it up. Essential reading for punctuation fanatics: The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks.)


...So I want to enrol in the local community college to take my German lessons; it's cheap, it's literally across the street from where I'm staying, and it's more likely to have students that are staying in Germany long term than the private language schools that mainly teach American teenagers on a study abroad year. Higher possibility of making friends that'll stick around in the city = good thing. Unfortunately, since it's not just a college for languages but for all sorts of adult educationy things, all the signage, information and even the website are in German. I tried going in to find someone to ask about enrolling, but the building was deserted and I couldn't read the notices. I think I have to go to an office in Wedding to register. Boo. I'll take a trip tomorrow.

But I swear, when I've learned German I'm never going to take a little thing like being able to talk to people in shops for granted again!!

Question for the audience: who here speaks more than one language? Brag to me. Tell me all about it. I'm very interested.

There's this cafe just across the road from where I'm staying, and it's the best cafe in the world for two reasons: firstly because it's run by adorable identical twins who wave excitedly every time we walk past and sometimes slip little packages of butter biscuits into the bag when we buy things, because they're just that adorable. Secondly, because they make their own cakes right there behind the counter, and omgggggg, cake urgh I can't even begin to tell you how good they are. I fucking love cake. I'm having trouble typing right now because Paul and I have just devoured a piece of chocolate tart and an enormous piece of rasberry cream cake, and my brain is slowly turning into sugary cream. Mmmmnomnomnomumgrhhkdkjfdskakl cake!!

Here's a picture of the cafe (no picture of the cake as it's IN MAH BELLEH):






Unfortunately I don't have a picture of the adorable twins. Rest assured that they're super cute.




...Yeah, that's all. I just wanted to brag that I have cake. Someone please come and visit me so we can eat cake for breakfast and dinner and possibly all other meals! mmmmmcake.

HALLO THAR FRENZ!

So I've had an odd few days. Nothing too exciting, just odd. So we had a few days free with no check-ins or check-outs in the flats, and Paul's friend Y felt like a bit of a jaunt. As the only person with a driving license (...err. or the ability to drive - I have the first, but not the second) Y hired the car and set the itinerary. It was Paul's birthday. We were going to Vienna. At this point my body decided to play a HILARIOUS joke on me, and tapped me on the shoulder saying, ' HAY GUESS WUT? SURPRISE YEAST INFECTION, LOLOLOLOL.' Gosh, the female body and its wacky hijinks. As you can imagine, I was positively filled with mirth at the prospect of a seven hour drive with an itchy vagina. Oh yay!

So! We got eighty kilometres out of Berlin and stopped at a service station for burgers and red bulls, then pulled back onto the motorway. Got two more kilometres away before Y starts wondering out loud about how long it's going to take to reach Vienna since the roads are wet, how he doesn't feel like a long drive, how there's a storm over Austria that day. And then...he turns the car around.

We end up at an expensive hotel right in the centre of Berlin, and Y pays for two huge suites, to say 'sorry I'm crap and happy birthday Paul.' They were on special that weekend, and jesus christ were they luxe. We had planned to go out for a nice birthday dinner, but then we spied the room service menu, and that was that. Cue 24 hours of absolute sloth and gluttony. I only left to buy a six pack of beer and a big mac, and spent a good portion of the time naked. Yeh, it was that slothful and gluttonous. I'd almost be ashamed, if I hadn't enjoyed it so freaking much. I even had breakfast delivered to the room! Paul got room service to buy him cigarettes and deliver them! Photos:

( yeah, they're under here. )

Wow, it's been so long that I actually had to stop and think for a moment about how you post an entry on here! But I found it, woop woop.

I haven't looked back yet to see where I left off in this journal, but I know broadly enough: I left off in Australia, and now I'm in Germany. I moved to Berlin with my partner, just over a month ago. We're staying with friends until we find our own place. Hopefully one of the places we're viewing next week will work out, as I'm getting a little bored of being nomadic. I don't speak German, which makes this interesting, but I'm looking at enrolling in a course come September, when all the colleges start up again. Finding out how to enrol is a little tricky, though, as the Volkshochschulen (adult community colleges where the cheap and properly certified courses are run) only give out information on their website in German. Err, thanks guys. The first sentence on the website is, irony of ironies, "Wollen Sie Deutsch lernen?" ("do you want to learn German?") YEAH WELL DONE THERE. WELL THOUGHT-OUT. Ah well, I'll get through to 'em somehow.

Lessee, what else is going on... Ah, I graduated from my philosophy degree! I'm staying on with the university to do an Honours year, though, which actually might be a bit of fun. Ask if you're interested in my ideas for a topic - I'm still thinking it over... I'll only be studying part time (I'll do it over a year and a half) and by correspondence, so I'll have plenty of time to work and play too. And as far as work, I've agreed to take on the administration side of a holiday rentals business that my boyfriend started with two of his friends. At the moment I'm also doing all the cleaning, which is a pretty good gig as I get paid thirty euros per apartment, and it generally only takes an hour plus maybe a little bit of laundry-wrangling. There's no minimum wage here yet, but they're thinking about making it seven or eight euros, so I'm going great guns! And just in time to save up for a holiday to Belgium with an old school friend in September. Woop, I love Belgium. Just wish I could still speak/understand French.

Berlin is a lovely city. I could go on about it for hours, but I think that might be the subject of another post. In fact, perhaps if anyone wanted to know anything about the place they could ask me, and I'll tell you/go find out, and maybe take some relevant photographs? Go onnn. Ask me anything. As long as it doesn't take me more than an hour on the train, I'll go there for you! I'm that intrepid! (Read: lacking in any other demands on my time. Good way to be!)

I hope everyone's well. Just for the record, I am - as always - still reading everyone's journals, so I know what's going on with you all! If my new friends are reading, sorry I haven't had anything for you to peruse so far, but who knows - I might update again sometime! Stranger things have happened.

Big love to all.

I've filled out yanniconny's meme rather than write a real update, sorry dudes. I want to say things, but I don't know what to say. This seems like a good way to say stuff without collapsing under the effort, you know?

My answers have "hopelessly lefty feminist academic" stamped all over them.

( Excellent questions by the way, yanniconny. Ta. )

I madez a lolcat, wheee!


It's a photo I took of the Flat Cat being all cute on my laptop. Vote for it!! If I get on the main page of icanhascheezburger.com, I may just die of happiness.

http://mine.icanhascheezburger.com/View.aspx?icanhasicanh128436441896981250.jpg



(ps: sensible post about old year/new year to come. I promise.)

Work was beyond busy today. Argh argh retail at Christmas. I seriously lack the energy to do more than paste the photos in here so sorry for not many words... Also I'm drunk. And I have no fucking cake. I really want cake.

( here )

Well hello again, folks. I bet you're all glad to see that time has not changed the infrequency of my updates. Same old flower. New petals though! By which I mean I've heralded in the approaching southern-hemisphere-summer with a natty new hair colour. It's on its way to being blonde, but is currently hovering somewhere around the 'ginger' end of the spectrum. Which is fun. But I have peroxide, and I'm going all the way baby. I want to be properly blonde, as it's a hair colour I've not experienced before. And then when the novelty wears off I have a tube of purple to be going on with. Whee!

(Random Note: my sincere apologies to Grinnifer for recently saying that I would update and then NOT. I fear it was a slightly ambitious promise, as at the time I was a couple of days off the deadline for two essays which were barely drafted. Tum tee tum. But they're submitted now and I'm on summer holidays, yeeew!)

Also, in other exciting news, my flat has a kitten. A real one! She's sitting on my foot as I type. My dumb housemates adopted her to celebrate the fact that they'd decided to keep on living together rather than getting separate flats....and then they broke up and girlfriend moved out. BUT kitten is staying here, and she makes me joyous. Except when it's 8am and I'm trying to get my shoes on and rush out the house and she's gnawing my ankle and stealing my shoelaces. She's also developed an unfortunate habit of shimmying up people's legs as if they were coconut trees, which is all dandy when you've got jeans on, but she tried it - claws out - on Paul when he was just wearing boxers, and needless to say it went down badly. There are photos of her. On cameras. I might remember to upload them soon.

Is it terrible that my first thought upon there being kitten was the endless potential for cat macros?

And argh this is the problem with leaving it too long between journal entries: I feel like I have to use all my blogging energy catching up with the little things that have been going on, and then I can't be bothered with the I think, I feel, I wish, I wonder etc. There's just so much to tell, though. Like:

*I got an IUD which is excellent in the fight against BABIES. More effective contraception than sterilisation, how's that for value? SORRY GUYS, WOMB'S FULL. MOVE ALONG.

*Paul has been coding day and night, so there is absolutely no news as far as he's concerned, except that he's still here. Still a hottie.

*I have jobs. Have I mentioned this? At the Fremantle markets, and a shop that sells hats. Why did no one ever tell me how easy retail was?? I wasted YEARS in hospitality, having to fake a work ethic, and now I discover an industry that doesn't even require one! Brilliant!

*I'm on a big Virginia Woolf kick these last few months. Read Orlando and A Room of One's Own recently, in the middle of her writing diaries, and bought To The Lighthouse to tackle next. I have nothing intelligent to say about her, as I'm a weebling fangirl. I remember when I first read Mrs Dalloway; it was so quiet and unassuming, yet utterly devastating. I think I'm smitten. Anyone read anything good lately? I need books for the holidays.

*My oldest and favouritist philosophy lecturer is bugging me to do Honours next year. I'd probably take it more seriously if she hadn't been drunk every time I've spoken to her about it (but then I was drunk too, so mustn't judge) but it is an interesting proposition. I'd just assumed that no one wanted me for further study as I'm an incredibly lazy wench and a second-rate scholar, but apparently she missed that memo. Or maybe she just likes me because I buy her drinks. In truth though, she has hinted that she wants to recruit me for her Feminist Army (by which I mean that she wants me to read feminism OTHER than Simone de Beauvoir and possibly write some of my own) and I'm not sure I'm down with that. Don't get me wrong; I think feminism as a movement is incredibly important, I just think it's important as a *political* movement. Feminist philosophy is so often just pointless re-readings of old texts through a feminist lens, which would be fine if it had any point, but it just seems to be an exercise in misogyny-spotting. "Look! Aristotle hated women! I has proved it!" Well no shit girlie, but what does that achieve? Peta's an ethicist, which seems perhaps a slightly better domain for all that, but unfortunately ethics interests me not at all. I subscribe to a Nietzschean view of ethics and morality: morality is a way of keeping people under control, and ethics are a deeply personal matter to be shaped by and for the individual. As far as I'm concerned, minimise harm then do what you will. Ethics, pah.

But then I'm the first to admit that a society built according to my preferences would be terrifying, so don't take that personally if you're, like, a dedicated ethics scholar. Hiding. On my flist.

I don't want to be a feminist philosopher, though. I really don't. Even if it would give me an excuse to talk about Virginia Woolf a lot.

I can't think of much else to tell you all. Have I missed anything out? Like to register a complaint over the lack of kitten photographs? Please leave details in the comments. I will drink wine and survey them graciously.

Ooh, yeah, here's something: I need new friends for my friends list, but I don't want dumbshits. I want insightful, funny posts! Possibly cat macros! I want people who update approximately seventeen thousand times for regularly than I do (ie more than once a month.) Does anyone have anyone on their friends list that they'd like to pimp out?

Love and kittens to all x

Hello there.

Well, I'm back. Who am I, you might ask? Most of you will know from the username. The rest of you might have to cast your minds back. I've gotten rid of my silly old screen name, and am using my plain old real name instead. It's simple and it works. And I'm looking forward to spending lots of lovely, narcissistic hours writing about ME ME ME again. Ah blogging, how I've missed you.



( What I've been up to for all this time, for those who're interested. And if you're not interested, please defriend me immediately. I don't mind! This is a fresh start after all... )