Hubris.co.nz

We got back the videos of our seminars today (I got an A) so I’ve been watching that tonight. Bopa and Emma say it’s real good, and I’ve even heard Emma reiterating stuff I said down the phone to her friend, but my mind’s so not there. In between thinking that I gesture too much, and watching the pen slowly slip out of my hair, increasing my hair-pushing-back gestures, I’ve been thinking “fuck, no wonder no one’s shagging me” thoughts. There’s nothing like watching yourself on TV for confrontational thoughts. It leaves me contemplating how sometimes I think that maybe I should just become morbidly obese and give up all hope of anyone ever fancying me, but then watching myself on TV I feel like I’m already there. And I hate this, because this generally isn’t me – I don’t tend to talk weight very much in my journal because the last thing in the world that I wanna be is one of those verdana girls, but arrgh! You know, I’d like to think that I’ve always had a pretty healthy relationship with eating, May/June 2000 and the whole stress related thing aside, but maybe that’s just me trying to talk bullshit to myself, and suddenly the reason why I’m sleeping alone just makes so much more sense to me. ( And then there’s a boy who enjoys calling me fat and pretending it’s just his way of being straight up, and while I try to excuse it as him trying to find out what buttons to push to piss me off I want to scream “YOU CALLED ME BEAUTIFUL MOTHERFUCKER! WHY ARE YOU RETRACTING THAT NOW?”)

And the other thing that fucks me off is that I know how closely entwined my self esteem is to my stress levels, and I know that right now my stress levels are almost at boiling point (And I know it’s seldom that you read my journal, and you know that i love you, and that yes, I’m fucking worried about you now, and yes, it’s stressing me out a fuckload, but that’s only because I care so much about you). We won’t discuss that further, but I had a big talk with Joseph my lecturer today and luckily I got an extension on my last Com Strat assignment til Tuesday. That’s kinda relieving and stuff. Plus yesterday, I sorted out one of my issues – or rather the girl whom I’d very childishly not been contacting cos’o a spat emailed me (thank you so much for doing that, seriously) and we made cool. And I get to see my Katie this weekend (oh you know you’re ALL my katies, Kate, but in this instance I mean KateB) and that’s gonna be so excellent, as long as I don’t end up being overburdening.

I can’t remember what else I had to say. Probably not much. I’m due at work in less than eight hours, I should really go to bed. I’m really worn out (but if you’re reading this, please please know that I am ALWAYS here for you, and it’s not just you that makes me exhausted, and you’re not an unfair burden or anything, it’s just the way I feel, okay? and yeah, all that stuff which I know you already know). Plus 2 litres really isn’t as much as you’d think that it would be. But I took two herbal sleeping suplements so hopefully I can fall asleep real soon and then not have to spend tomorrow morning with my head under the covers trying to make the whole world go away.<!– I CAN’T HANDLE CARING ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE RIGHT NOW! like, there’s a primary, and a secondary, and a thirdly, and aaaaargh, and also, what the fuck’s wrong with me and where’s my compassion?) –>

Okay, it’s bloody cold today, totally and utterly freezing. I probably should put another layer on, but i’ve been sewing, and so I’m modelling my creation (and when I say sewing, I mean using a pair of scissors on an old top).

Scissors go snip snip, top goes awesome

I don’t know if you can tell from the photos or not, but I now have a semi-off the shoulder top, in this charcoal coloured semicobwebfeely fabric. It’s real nice. Cool. But not especially warm.

Today I staggered in to my 8am class, freezing all the way down, and then spent a very very long time at the bank getting a new eftpos card – the one for my rent account expired in April and of course they didn’t bother to send me a new one. Now my two accounts are loading on the same sparkly pretty card. Then I discovered that there’s a new juice bar right next to Oporto – this could be very dangerous. I had the yummiest smoothie for my breakfast before hightailing it back home to scan the paper, check my email, jump in the shower and run off to work.

I like the stroll to work, it’s relaxing even if I’m always rushing cos I’m running late. Work itself is good too, even if they haven’t quite figured out what to do with me. I’m doing a lot of backreading, and I also got a tour of the place, which is huge and includes a secretish network of spooky tunnels running all over the city. I kid you not (although possibly I exagerate a little). Just for the record, I’m working Mondays, Thursday mornings and friday afternoons. All the other times I have classes. Busy busy Joanna.

But I’m not busy tonight, no. Instead i parked my ass on the sofa to watch TV under the safety of a duvet and a wooly jersey, cos it’s FUCKING COLD. I’m jealous of boys with open fires in their lounges, although I guess it’s okay as long as they provide you with plenty of pot when you go over there last night, even if it means that they can’t make conversation. Tomorrow night Nigel will be in town for his birthday (back from somewhere near Warkworth where he is making porn with a kumi kumi pig – nothing nondodgy ever comes out of that area!) and so there’ll be going out and drinking and dancing I imagine. Excellent. And then next weekend’s a humdinger, what with parties and KateB being up, and Brad being up, and PACIFIER concerts and all… so I should go get a good rest now. Yeah. Night!

Monday March 25th, 2002

I know I’m supposed to be writing my essay right now. Why do you think I’m tidying my room and throwing out old junk and singing Beth Orton too loud and doing laundry I haven’t done in weeks and contemplating what I’ll do while I’m in Wellington and rereading No Logo (although that’s kinda related to my essay) and going through & deleting the 198 remaining emails in my hotmail inbox and wondering if I should change my sheets?

So he says “it was lovely having lunch with you” and I say “yeah, and now you’ve given me my stuff back I can finally stop bugging you!” and he says “well, if you want to”. And that’s not at all what I want, but it’s what I think is probably the best decision, because there’s nothing quite as pathetic as a girl blindly chasing after a boy she fancies who isn’t interested in her. (And KateB, I know what you’re going to say right now, and believe me, I’ve said it to myself).

I watched the whole of the Oscars ceremony today, on Sky Digital, but in black&white because of our dodgy widescreen TV. I cheered every time LOR got something, obviously. I’m a good kiwi. Clay and I made witty commentary through it which Ben of course couldn’t keep up with. I hope i hope I hope that Bopa can get it together. But having said that, I’ve no doubt jinxed it. I knocked on wood, maybe that’ll counteract it.

OD you remember a couple of years ago I was reading No Logo and I put all these references to in into my journal? Well yeah, I was so cool before everyone else. I am a trend setter rather than a mainstream buyer. My head is so full of marketing lingo these days. I can’t wait for my essay to be over, although I do keep thinking of other wonderful examples to throw in. Examples are worth 20%, and the reference list is worth 20%, and so I figure I can probably get most of that. Presentation being 10% of the total, I can probably do okay on (apparently he marks it really hard though) and then I only have to worry about getting half out of the 50% for actual argument. So it all works out nicely, right? And besides, it’s not due til Thursday,so maybe I’ll get more done by then. Just in case any of you feel like writing it for me, the topic is “Discuss how an understanding of the dimensions of branding should enhance the effective intergration of marketing communication in an organisation”. (And if you’re scratching your head over the very question, then you’re in teh same boat as me).

I’m missing Shortland Street right now becasue I really feel like I should be working. I might go and heat up some eggplant and pumpkin curry and then scurry back to my room to go over my notes and read more and stuff. Plus maybe people are trying to call and love me, so I should probably get offline so that they can. But meh, sounds like so much effort!

There’s a competition on Channel Z right now where you either win a trip to London to see New Order play, or you have to have a colonic irrigation. I really should have entered, because man, with those stipulations, everyone’s a winner!

You know, if you stick a ‘w’ in between the ‘A’ and the ‘HREF’, your links stop being links.

I sat down to write a review of sorts of this year, then I just suddenly got hit by this big patch’o blue, which I am taking as a good sign, because while I feel like shit right now, this means that my period won’t be due for a couple’o days. I’d forgotton about how ridiculously low I always get for no reason beforehand. Once again, I feel like i am two seperate people – there’s Joanna who wants to curl up on the couch and cry, and there’s Joanna who knows that the other Joanna just needs to balance out her hormones a little, which is the same Joanna who’s been absolutely fantastic for the rest of the day.

Once upon a time there was a princess who lived in a big castle on top of the hill. The princess lived all alone, although the kitchen was fully stocked and she had a fleet of vehicles at her disposal. The princess spent her time dancing around the house in her underwear, and taking many showers, practicing breathing, napping on the couch and calling her friends because she could.

I was watching myself dance today, because I am a pervert, and I was just really really happy. It’s possible that I’ll be hanging out with people in Taupo that I met five years ago, and haven’t seen since then, and it just amuses me how much I’ve changed, thinking about the shy quiet girl I used to be. I mean, I am still shy now, but I try not to let people know that, and I do dance, I don’t sit in corners. I could almost drop into the Year in Review now, but I think I want to sit somewhere beautiful by myself and write it into my faithful red book rather than type it into Notepad straight off. Plus with half of me being all melencholic right now, it just wouldn’t sound the way it should be, now that I am mellower.

But in case I don’t write again this year, I should probably put in some thank yous. I oooooooooh i’m still alive yeaaaaah I ooooh I’m still alive. Etc. Tech friends – you’re wonderful. Sydney Crew – you’re the reason I’m still sane. Also a huge ta very much to all that listened to me whining and whinging and crying and laughing and smiling. Thanks to those that made me realise just how strong I actually am. Everyone else, well, thanks for reading. I perform best with an audience.

This is dumb, I’m so annoyed by my womanly functions. Grr. There’s this battle going on in my head, and quite frankly, I’m a little tired of it. Fuck you, Downside! I’m beating you! Muhahahaha. Okay, I’m going to go watch some telly. If i don’t come back – have a fantastic new years. I intend to.

xoxox

I have never taken my pants off while driving before today, and I must admit it was kinda fun. It’s fucking hot coming home in the late afternoons, and traffic moves slow enough to allow you to do things like that – if you’re wearing a skirt over pants as usual anyways, that is. I wanted to take my shirt off and just be in my sparkly singlet as well, but as my singlet was on over the shirt, that might have been a bit too much of a mission.

No driving today except for the commute which seems to get more and more annoying every day. I did make lots of phone calls and send out lots of official emails and stuff. I write up my every move on my task list in Outlook and it’s way too satisfying to be able to tick things off. I also emailed my dad and he called me an Angel. I thought that was so very sweet you can see it here. Yes, new page section alert. It’s kinda sparse right now. Kini gets it though, so she rocks.

Shopping in The’Puna at lunchtime, I came across a store called “Between the Sheets” and so I’d just like to actively encourage you all to spend $429 and buy me the duvet cover set on the first bed in the store. Thank you. I found what I wanna get Clay – a book on under $15 wines (Or maybe i should get him a book on under 15 girls), and we’re getting Jeremy one of those barking flipping dogs (don’t ask) but I could not find a book about Bears anywhere. Well admittedly I only went into two book shops. So instead I rang Karen in Welly since she does work for the best bookshop in the country, and told her to find me one. You know, more people should write books about bears. In fact, I think that all you people out there planning on writing novels should just flag that idea and write bear books instead. If you’re too poor to actually photograph bears, get your friends to dress up in animal costumes and photograph them instead. IN FACT, do both animals and animal suits if you can. That’d be great. “Bears and Bear Costumes” – how good does that sound?

I got my final results today – straight A’s, unsuprisingly. Well, an ‘A’ in Instructional Design, a slightly disappointing A- in Multimedia Project, and an A+ in Multimedia Broadcasting. I got an ‘A’ in Multimedia Production last semester, and I should have got an A in Graphics only I fucked up the exam and got a B+ so I did pretty well. (We just won’t mention the B- in 3D modeling, cos that was to be expected, as was the C in Mass Comm). Who’s a little girlie swat? Who’s a little girlie swat?

I’m applying for more jobs already now. I think an eight page cv/portfolio was waay too excessive though. I must learn to be more abrupt. “Order! Order!”

7am, I’m lying happily in bed, fast asleep when all of a sudden Maree comes in my room and jumps on my bed. Who gave her a key to our house??? Oh yeah, that was me. Whoops.

Oh, just before I go any further, Helen Urban – email me!. I have no contact details for you, girl. Ta.

Today I eventually got my shit together and went into tech to burn a copy of my cd rom, and put my other stuff together, but the goddam fucking lab was being rehauled so I couldn’t. I went to another lab to print out my cv, but of course in that lab, the printer was un-networked. Grrrrr! Very annoying. So I went home, then went to the bank to pay rent, and did the vege shopping instead. Vegtamables.

Later in the evening, Brad and I went over to Maree’s to watch “3rd Watch” because she’s being The Nanny Named Fran again, and couldn’t leave the kids. Brad went back home afterwards to eat dinner, so Maree and I sat around her kitchen table drinking tea and feeling like terribly old adults, me reading Christian magazines while she talked to James on the telephone. The rest of Garland came back with Brad – well, Jeremy Clayton and Kara anyways, and we played Postits. Clayton was Dirk Diggler, and we all guffawed mightily when he asked if he was known for just one thing. It felt strange to have the whole posse there, but to not actually be @Garland.

Kate B officially moves her stuff out on Thursday. Yesterday it was a year since Simon told me he was moving out, thus setting in place a chain of events that has been….interesting… to say the least. Well. I’ve been doing pass-throughs of her room to retrieve stuff that belongs to me – makeup and jewellery and towels. She gave me five boxes of condoms from Family Planning, because yeah, I really need them right now. They’re extra thick ones, which Jeremy told me are like gumboots. Nice.

I don’t know how to cook Roast Turkey, but we’re doing Roast Turkey for Thanksgiving Lunch on Sunday. It was going to be dinner, but Miss World’s on that night, so we have to watch that!

I haven’t written up my crazy night on Saturday, have I? Well, should I do that now? Possibly yes, yes I should. Okay then. It was Andy’s 21st, so me Clay and Brad drove out somewhere way way west in my car – I was happy to drive, because as the invitations said, by request there was no alcohol but a delicious fruit punch would be served. It was in a sports hall, which was a little newer than many sports halls, so that was cool. Andy’s mother’s kept the most amazing records of him growing up – writing down all his funny quotes and recording soundbytes of him ever since he was two. Listening to her speech, I was just thinking “awwwwww, i want a baby so i can follow them like this too!”. Incidently, Kate Benton dreamt that I was actually three years younger, and also pregnant with my ex’s kid. Thanks Kate!

Anyways, lots and lots of Andy’s friends and parents and church members made speeches. Brad and Nigel did one together, and played the “Big Tittie Monday” song Andrew wrote to promote Ryan&Jarrod’s Big Tittie Monday radio show – I dunno if the Salvation Army members fully appreciated it for the true piece of genius it is. I’m so going to get a copy of it. I must make a multimedia section for my site – I can also put in the video footage of Kate M talking about my horrible death, and oooh the video of Dancing Simon. Heheehe, I love that video so much! Anyways, eventually all the speeches were over, and we’d even prayed a little (which I thought was kinda nice actually, although when I prayed it wasn’t to any religion or to any being that I feel I know) and we all ate far too much sugary food. Andy wanted to dance then, so naturally, the Gang was called on to start off the dancing, so we did. Sugar sugar sugar is a mad thing – I even ended up dancing a jig, or trying to anyways. Nigel stagedived off a chair and we caught him. It was also nice that it was good wholesome alcohol free fun too, for a change. Not that it’d last though…..

Okay, I’m bored now. Tomorrow I will write up motorway chases, banging on windows, bathroom conversations, long walks, Brendon Lovegrove talking about my clit, barking, and the casino.

“am I famous for just one thing?”

Okay, my minute entry starts…. NOW!

Got home at 5am this morning with Nige, Pete and Brad. Convinced boys to stay up til the sun was up drinking gin. Went to bed. Woke up to swear at marketing people calling me at 10.30 on a sunbloodyday. Went back to bed. Woke up around 1.30 to find boys all in lounge watching very odd movie with Charles Gronin from ‘Beethoven’. Movie was followed by odder cartoon. Lunch at Wendys. Retrieved my car from Ponsonby, burnt hands on steering wheel. Came home, talked to Jeremy. Watched TV. Sat down to write CV. Rang Kini instead. Read too much of new favourite website about Eighties Toys, minute up!

“Maybe later – I’ve got creamy goodness in my mouth right now”

I’m on my way
From A U T to hamilton today
ahuh ahuh ahuh

Ahuh. Project reports were all proffesionally bound and handed in today. I am free. Life is good!

Hi Michael Shadbolt. I liked your set on Pulp last year.

Second night of the expo went much better than the first, because I was handing out name tags and was therefore able to grab people’s attention as they came in, and also because I was wearing my New Media Pants. So there. Some interesting oppotunities have arisen as a consequence, which i will get back to you on as more details surface. But for today, I’m going to Hammy to see Andeee and Amy and go to Shihad/Weta/Fur Patrol, wahoo! Suck though that Andee doesn’t have a ticket, but we might scrape a doorsale through. Hopefully. Either way though, it’ll still be fabo to see her and drink instant coffee and hope to bump into the old boys and stuff.

Tomorrow night I’m back to Auckland for Trudie’s 21st, maybe Kate Orange’s 21st and Justin’s farewell party, and then on sunday morning, I’m flying to welly for a week. I’m getting picked up at the airport and then it’s straight off to Oma’s house for lunch, wahoo. So yeah, busy busy. I guess i should go pack now, but that’s boring. All I’m taking to hammy is cheap wine and a change of clothing anyways.

Going out after the Expo was fun – hundreds of us at the London Bar. Clay was there with his tv buddies, so that was cool. Jodie was very sly, which impressed me. I had a conversation with Ben and Kyle about celebacy (I can’t even spell it) and romance as opposed to sex, and it amused me. Later at Macdonalds, Nick Jodie and I were talking about scoring tech people, and when I said I’d snogged a person from tech, Nick was very sure that I’d snogged Brad, which I haven’t, and I never ever will, because no, that’d be like ewww, snogging a brother. And we all know I’d never screw the crew (again). So that was disturbing. The fact that I only paid for one bottle of wine the entire night and yet got bollickingly drunk on drinks bought for me was not disturbing. And having six business cards when i got home was impressive, I thought.

Okay, really must go now, I guess. I like driving, but I don’t like driving in Hamilton – I always get lost. Still, needs must! xoxo “Maybe later – I’ve got creamy goodness in my mouth right now”

I sent a summary of today’s expo to my list so you missed out if you’re not on it, unless I write about it in more depth which I probably will. But more importantly, you can watch me. Tomorrow. On the Internet. http://www.aut.ac.nz/multimedia2000. I’m in Group 10 – the last one, and we’ll be broadcasting live from 8pm til 9pm NZ time. If you can’t see it, it’s not our fault, it’s the fault of the techies. But do watch. It should be really cool.

“Maybe later – I’ve got creamy goodness in my mouth right now”

Okay, this is SUCH a bad sign, that’s it’s 3.15am on Tuesday morning and I’m still awake, unable to sleep so I’m at my computer, shivering in my slip and writing a journal entry. Arrrgh fucking aarrrgh fucking grr. Mind is very wound up right now, eh. Just a little bit. If I hadn’t left it in the lounge where Anji is sleeping, I’d be rehersing my speech right now. I mean, hey, I wrote it at 3am a couple’o nights ago anyways!

From midday until 9.45pm, I was in the computer lab, working on our broadcasting assignment. Well, that included a break for a trip to the bank (damn you Internet banking that promises to do rent transfers and then doesn’t) dinner with Andrea at Boiger King (misspelling intentional to proclaim pronounciation) and a five minute phone interview with a reporter from the Herald. Hi, I’m Joanna McLeod, and I want a job producing content for the Internet. Bob King asked me to answer the reporter’s questions, as apparently, I’m a sort of spokesperson for the course. Yay me! I was actually really proud, especially when the PR woman in Bob’s office who was doing name-badge stuff for the expo whilst listening to me told me I’d given a good interview.

Today I wrote a story about microchips in vending machines that make their products talk that went along with a video piece Trevor and Andrea did. I also did some page laying out, and wrote blurbs about the people in our group, and that kind of stuff. I was so so so proud to teach trevor how to align pictures to the left right in the middle of the text – something people who never used Frontpage Express or any other really bad WYSIWYG programs might never have learnt. And Joe and I did a layout in Fireworks that worked real nice. Wahoo. Yeah, sweet ass. Anyways, around 9.30pm I got a call from Garland and when I answered my cellie, the voice was liek “Hello stinky poo” so I realised that my family had arrived at my flat, so they agreed to come pick me up from tech. Goddamit, it’s SO cool having your parents pick you up from stuff – I think that’s what I miss most living in a flat. They were all hungry, so I took them to D72, but the kitchen was closed, so I suggested bread and hummus from foodtown, and got aggressive defending that situation, because I was just waaaaay too tired to think about another cafe. And as Mum and Neil and Anji had just driven up from welly, they were pretty tired too and took my advice.

Back at home, we ate yummy things on bread (brie! baba ganosh! smoked beef! parents’ money!) and drank (parents wine, Anji and I the last of my vodka) and watched first Clayton’s brilliant documentary on BFM, t then his sitcom. It was the third time I’ve seen the sitcom (and the doco, actually) but I think the tiredness and alcohol proved to be a winning combination, cos i kept giggling and giggling. Then I showed them the Flat Video, that covers my audition for Life On Tape – talking about kicking out Leyton, Clay’s 20th birthday dinner and Simon dancing, Brad doing spicegirl moves for my CD ROM, and our Survivor Final Episode Party. They were very very impressed, and laughed a lot. Then Mum and Neil went to their motel which is just 100 metres down the road – I worked there for all of two days – and Anji and I had another drink. We had the absolute best gossip. It was Anji who told me all the way back in 5th form that giving blow jobs was empowering, and I’m very grateful for that advice – even if I didn’t give one to my best friend’s b/f like she was suggesting at the time. Thanks Anji and Cosmo – my god, how scary is it the first time you go down on someone and you have no fucking idea what you’re doing? Until you remember Cosmo going “there’s no wrong way to give head” and you relax a little, that is. I think drinking from Pint Glasses probably wasn’t the smartest move ever, eh. What you think is a reasonable three drinks is more like six. AND I STILL CAN’T SLEEP! GRR! I hate being so intelligent and thinking so much!

I’m reading this really good book r ight now which I can’t for the life of me remember the name of – something about Johnny Thunder, and it’s about a girl falling for the wrong guy, and her lifestyle reminds me of Anji, and the writing of it’s so real I can see every scene, and if my light was on, I would tell you the name of the book so that you can read it too, but it’s all dark and stuff, cos I’ve been trying to sleep for ages, so I can’t tell you. Woah, that was a very long sentence. Sometimes I think you need a map to navigate these journal entries of mine. My eyes hurt, so I should probably crawl back into bed now. I’m so so so nervous about tomorrow -it’s the first day of the expo, and I’m making a speech and all. One of the grad dips came up to me today and said she was really glad it was me making the speech, since I’d done so well presenting our project to the class, and I just thought that was really really lovely of her. But yeah. I think I’m going to go shopping with mummy tomorrow to find something to wear – I haven’t washed my new media pants yet, and I really should have. I didn’t expect to be at tech so late. “Maybe later – I’ve got creamy goodness in my mouth right now”