Hubris.co.nz

Thursday June 20th

Happy Birthday Daddy! I’ve fucked up everyone’s birthdays lately – it was Shirley’s on the 15th, not Andee’s. Andee’s was yesterday, not o’s. And o’s is tomorrow. Happy birthday o!

This morning I dragged myself out of bed and the house into the most miserable weather ever (three sleeping pills (relax, they’re just herbal) had actually allowed me to get a decent night’s sleep beforehand) to go down to tech and sit my Intergrated Marketing Communications exam. I decided last night that I’m going to get an A on it. I wrote about telemarketing, databases, heirachy of effects and the implications of new media in 2010 on IMC. I kick ass.

After that, back home in the horrible weather for a few quick puffs on a spliff with Bops and Emma and then it was off to Newmarket for my half hour massage. Ahhh bliss. I just wish that the guy hadn’t had coins in his pocket that kept jangling. I also wish that I wasn’t so tense and that I didn’t feel the need to fight back when someone is pushing me. At least I’m more comfortable about strangers touching me. Oh shut up.

Home again to laze around, completely relaxed except for Bopha scaring me. I had a lovely nap and mooched around doing sweet fuck all, except for baking a birthday cake for Emma. Her birthday was on Tuesday, but we were slack so we’re gonna celebrate it tomorrow along with Brazil/England. Come watch the soccer with us. (Oh also, Mazzy/Kate; yes Emma HAS moved out, don’t get worked up! We just like hanging out with her, okay? Good!)

Blah blah blah blah. I want the other half of my massage now please. I was afraid that I’d end up gurgling on the table but luckily I didn’t.

Today was a long leisurely lunch with KateH, devouring the wonderful vegetarian antipasto at Roasted Addiquition (I can never spell that right) <!– She said terrible terribly funny things –>. After that she asked me to drive her to St. Lukes to buy socks, so I said okay, temporarily forgetting how much eviler malls are when they’re crowded on public holidays. But hey anyways. So she got socks, and then cos there was a big sale on we went and looked at underwear and she said “you’re going to write this in your journal aren’t you?” but I’m not going to write what she thinks I am going to write, so HA!. Apparently I am not to email her to her work address to ask what kinda panties she’s wearing though – go figure. Bonds panties kick ass. PANTIES! PANTIES!

Then I sat on a sofa in a clothing store and read magazines while she tried on other clothes. A girl stripped off her top to try on something else in the middle of the store – I was suitably impressed. I heard someone else say “Bok! Bok bok!” so I immediately thought it was o and I spun around but it was just someone random commenting on a feathered top. Stink. I guess I just had panties on the brain. After that there was lipgloss and eyeliner purchases at Kmart and we walked around for ages and ages trying to find a present for her younger brother. I was full of helpful suggestions like “what about a toaster?”. She ended up buying Singing in the Rain for herself, and we went back to her flat to watch it. That film kicks ass! (Sidenote: when we were in Farmers, there were tshirts with lame logos like “girls kick ass” on them. There was one that was okay, but fuck, I can’t remember what it said now, except that it should have had an apostraphe in it but it didn’t, so she couldn’t buy it). But anyways, yeah, now I am wishing that I was a tap dancing star, and lusting after all the clothing and houses and stuff in the movie. While we were watching it the phone rang and Mazzy scared Katie by singing the title song down the wire at her, because she was after me and Clay had told her where I was and what I was doing. I love my stalky stalky friends.

After that I went home in time to meet my mummy and her friend Paul who have been in Auckland for a potters’ convention. We went and had dinner at Fraser’s in Mt. Eden, which was really really yummy – I had a kaffir lime infused risotto with bok bok bok choy and crusted chicken breast, mmmm. And because the place was unlicensed, they had to come back to The Slab afterwards to drink a bottle of wine, and it was uncomfortable cos Ben was around and he was being his usual stupid moron self. They’re gonna be back here in exactly eight hours to pick me up so I guess I should finish packing and get some sleep. I’m all warm and glowing from a bath using the passionfruit and echinecia bath bomb that Willow Shoes sent me. Also, my willow shoes are great and I love them a little more every time I put them on.<!– gee, look at how fucking self centred I am – “I” had lunch, “I” drove to St Lukes, “I” am self centered – that’s terrible, I’m such a terrible person –> (Explanation from 2010: the Hamilton guys attacked me in my guestbook for daring to be upset when I found out that Scott had died in the cheese factory)

So how are we all then? I’m fantastic. I’ve had a brilliant day. My cellphone’s been beeping constantly, and I’ve just talked to all these wonderful fantastic people and it’s just been ace. Yeah. Sorry, when I get all happy sometimes I just can’t express it very well. I think I’m better at expressing sadness or longing, which is dumb. So I will try and just explain how at peace I am right now, how mellow I seem, and how secure I feel, but I can’t really. It’s kind of like waking up every day to the sun shining on a spiritual level, but that sounds too hippy.

So I got presents that made me happy (wok! toolkit! lots and lots of books! big day out ticket!), and I gave presents that made me happy because they made the receivers so happy, and that was fantastic. And then the Bentons came over, and that was ace too, because surrogate parents and all. Hayley came over for lunch, and she was sweetness and light and just lovely. I rang Olivia and told her we were having Tuna steaks for dinner, and that it made me think of her. She said “every girl should think of me when they’re eating tuna”. I talked to Kini and told her we ate eggplant which made me think of her. I talked to Leigh last night and that was choice. And there was phone calls to Kate B and Maree and texts with Shirley, and then there was an email from Justine which said she was in Wellington. Oma came over for dinner , and I got feisty with her and threatened to kick her ass if she didn’t do our dishes. But it’s never polite to beat up your grandmother, so after she went, I went and met Justine.

Hi, I’m Joanna, I’m studying Anthropology with Justine at Canterbury – I’m originally from Wellington, but my boyfriend wanted to do his masters in engineering which is why we moved down. We’ve moved around a bit, but we mostly live in Fendalton. I took her on a drive-through tour of the city, and probably bored her to tears, but hopefully i was more entertaining that family watching Notting Hill. I haven’t met anyone off the ‘net in aaaaages. The last person I met was umm well apart from that, it was the fabulous Leigh. Meeting people is easy. Now.

Karen and I just watched the end of a very odd movie staring the Pet Shop Boys. Spiceworld was much better. Meatloaf has had a very diverse range of movie roles, hasn’t he? Dances with Wolves is on now, but I’m not paying any attention – I just like the sound on to cover the ticking of the lounge clock. Tick tick tick tick tick. Does it make me paranoid that I can’t stand to hear it?

I really really wanna watch Last of the Mohicans now, cos we were playing the music from it before, but no, it’s a goddam Kevin Costner Injun movie on, innit? I didn’t get any cds for Xmas, but I really cannot complain. In fact, what I can do is be absolutely stoked with life in general and I am.

Today I went to go read the thing I’d sent to my mailing list about the scratches on my arm, but then it turns out I didn’t actually send anything to my mailing list at all. I did write about some bushes on Swinney.org though, and I guess that’s like the same thing, kinda. Last night I was sitting around crying after the season finale of Shortland Street, so I rang up Penny and asked her if she wanted to come around and get drunk. Of course she did. Jeremy came to the bottle store with us too, so we decided to have a cocktail night.

Sparing you all the details, we drank and laughed a lot. Penny and I reminisced a great deal. We gossiped. We danced on the front terrace. I rang Kini&Olivia and was terribly hurt that neither of them want to live with me. We took a series of dumbass photos which you can view here. We rang random people from Penny’s cellphone list that she wasn’t sure she knew, and had very amusing conversations. One guy had just been fined $13,000 for reckless driving. Jeremy gave us random numbers to call too, and then his friend kept calling him back. I bit Penny but didn’t leave any bruise marks, to our deepest regret. Around 2am we decided we’d go be larrikans out in the streets. I refused to go the park around the corner, so we walked up to Shell instead, then walked back playing Pringle Soccer. I had my camera so we took a succession of fantastic supermodel pose shots. We poll danced. Jeremy climbed a tree. I found myself unable to balance walk along a wall without holding onto Penny on one side, which made me mad cos I was really really good at the Beam in Primary school. Penny jumped into a bush which looked like fun, so I did the same, except it wasn’t all boingy like I was thinking it would be, in fact it was sharp and ouchy and I have deep gashes from it.

Today I woke up to say bye bye to Penny (also cos her phone with a goddam novelty ring kept going off in my room) but then went back to sleep, which is always fun to do cos the heat makes me have dirty dreams. I got up much much later then, and spent an hour reading the herald and stuff. My saturdays are so so cruisy. In the evening we did a tremendously huge heap’o dishes and cleaned up the kitchen proper, which was good. I did laundry. Stuff like that. At night, Jeremy and I were watching “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” (I LOVE TV3 for deciding to screen 80s teen flicks every Saturday) but Kara kept ringing for Clay who’d gone to bed with an infected foot. She was going to bus over, but I told her I’d go pick her up from work, cos she’s much too nice to take a bus home at 11.30 at night. It’s just as well I did pick her up actually, cos there were literally hundreds of people waiting for buses in Newmarket cos of Christmas in the Park. Ick. “Order! Order!”

So I’ve been online for like 30 minutes and I still haven’t managed to read a single one of my emails yet. I really must change email accounts.

I bought two heads of brocoli today at 15 cents a head each. This is a good thing. I got them in Northcote, if you’re interested. Today again I was driving around the Shore investigating venues. It’s great. I like Rob in the car division – he gave me a manual drive car today when I told him about the stupid things I did with the automatic last week (I was wondering why the car braked so damn jerky when I was being super gentle until I realised that I was using my left foot on the brake, which as we all know is wrong). There’s a couple’o pajs parked down in amongst the company car pool too – I’ve promised Brad and Clay I’m going to try my hardest to get to take a paj out for the day and I’ll come and pick them up and we’ll drive through Remmers darling. Anyways. So yeah, Northcote/Birkenhead in the morning, then Devenport and Albany in the afternoon.

I had a meeting with the PR Consultant lady I’m working with who’s only in 2 days a week and gave my report and she said I was going well, and that I have full authority to go ahead and book the venues and start drawing up a timetable. Scaaary! I’d much rather someone was checking me every step of the way, but I just don’t have that at work – they leave me up to my own devices. I’m very good at looking busy. I have email at work now, finally my own key and login, but so far I’ve only given my email address to essential contacts (read: Kini and Olivia). I’m trying to be good. I don’t want to fuck this all up. I’m alredy worried about finding a job in February, because I know I have a tendancy not to be very good at seeking things out because basically everything i ever need falls in my lap. Except for my paycheque – grrr! I don’t get paid for a fortnight, and I’m in malls and shopping areas for half the morning – all my xmas shopping could be done by now if I had a cent left in the bank. Ahh well. Tomorrow I’m going to be in a working party conference anyways. Have I mentioned that I get business cards?

Wank wank wank wank wank. I actually am often left without anything to do, so I call Shirley, and since I’m in an open planned office, the people around me would hear
“Hi, it’s Joanna here from *, is that you Shirley? How are you?…….. Right, I’m calling in regards to the communication briefing I received the other day……….. No no, that’s fine……..yes I was in contact yesterday but we decided to not pursue that avenue any further for a while…. yes of course it’s re-occuring….I appreciate that…. absolutely, I’ll just make a note of that…….. yes…. yes….. well would you have some time free for a meeting?…….. how’s today for you?…..alright well we’ll scheduale something for next week then” and then my boss will come back and I’ll want to ask her something so I’ll hang up on Shirley really abruptly going “Great, well thank you very much for your time”. I’m SO a kid in heels and pearls. Nevermind the fact that the rest of the office spends their lives on the phone having really boring conversations with their car insurance and real estate agent places that I can’t help but evesdrop on. Or maybe they’re all speaking in a secret code too. Hmmmmmmm, intriguing!

Because I spent so much time driving today, I came up with a list of memorable car moments that I jotted down because I was bored. You know how I like my lists. Sheesh, anyone would think that I was incapable of stringing together anything more cohesive. And ha! I’m going to alphabetize them by the first letter in the sentence:

• A memory from Primary School; the greatest day of my life ever at that stage was when I got to sit squashed up next to my Crush – Andrew Carnegie – to and from a netball tournament
• Amy and Andee taking me over the harbour bridge by mistake, playing the Spice Girls and bumping the car to cheer me up
• Anji and Greg taking me up to Auckland for Pearl Jam when I was 14, determined to corrupt me and we picked up a dumb hitchhiker who said “Youse guys”
• Countless Welly/Auck drives with Kate B, listening to Cat Stevens, blowing bubbles and taking mad photos left right and centre
• Driving myself to Wellington thinking so hard that later I wrote a 7 page essay on the appropriate course of action to take as a consequence of that thought process
• Driving to Welly with Simon and Matt Sawkill in the backseat, me giggling away to myself like the cat that’s got the cream and is mixing its metaphors like a DJ with religion.
• Going to Waiuku for Kate H’s goodbye party, Justin putting the car in neutral going down a hill and it kept going, freefalling
• Kim speeding along Greenlane West at 3am in the fog when we were on a mad sugar rush and couldn’t see 10 feet ahead of us
• Kini in my rear view mirror, the magical drive into the Coramandel
• MM in the MR2, subwoofer under my seat, lost in Remuera at 4am trying to find food cos we’d been up arguing all night
• Pajero pulling up outside my house in Mount Roskill, Shirley and Dee Cavalry coming to be with me when I found out that Opa died
• Pixie’s friend Sam’s orange pumpkin car, tinnie house in Te Atatu right next to a primary school and I thought we’d be beaten up by protective westie parents
• Roadtripping to Waihi with Shirley, her doing crazy overtaking manouvers and making Trudie scream when I dared her to drive down a bank
• Sung Song association all the way to St. Heliers with Brad in the stereoless Grey Ghost
• the other night in Jeremy’s car, cold from swimming, falling asleep on Clayton’s shoulder

I warned you that i have full stationary cupboard rights – notepads are perfect for lists.

“I think you’re crazy, maybe, I think you’re crazy.”

So my official title is “Communication Assistant” and I know how much I’m getting paid per week, and it’s quite nice – well, more than three times as much as my current income anyways, and yeah, it’s all quite exciting. I start next wednesday, and before then, I have a whole mountain of paper to read my way through. It’s slow progress, but by the end of February, y’all will be able to ask me ANYTHING about wastewater and I’ll be able to tell you. So that’s exciting.

Today there were chainsaws and sunshine and landlady’s sister, and as a consequence, there’s no nasty tree outside my window. Hurrah for that! And Brad mowed the lawn, which inspired me to do the lawns, and clean out the drain in the bathroom (some bitch sheds her long brown hair all over the place!) and put out about 12 bags of newspapers for the paperchase. House cleaning is good. Kate B ran off with my car for a couple’o hours cos it has a tow bar and hers doesn’t to put her stuff in storage. Jeremy hasn’t moved his stuff out of the lounge yet though.

Jeremy was watching The Muppets Celebrate Jim Henson this afternoon, and I got teary. I conceed that I’m a headcase, yes. But Jim Henson DIED, okay? Have you ever seen muppets crying? It’s not a happy sight, I tell you! I made vegetable soup, and it was really nice.

Brad’s got part time work at More FM. Clay’s working at a media monitering place. We’re so Savvy. Of course, I have a PR job instead of a multimedia job, and that’s just fine with me. Clay rang on the way home today and asked if I wanted anything, so i said “summer ale”. We moved the lightest couch onto the deck out the front of the house, which we foolishly have neglected until today when the bushes had all been trimmed back and sat out there. I was hoping to do some dancing, but then Jan – Clay’s friend that we don’t like – showed up and her and Clay went off to get dvds and stuff from the supermomarket. I rang our friends and made sure they were invited to Thanksgiving Lunch. Hayley got all confused, cos I’ve never talked to her on the phone before, and straight away I was like “Hi, this is Joanna McLeod from Garland here; I’m just ringing to confirm your reservation for Sunday”. Well, I thought I was pretty funny anyways. Godboy Peter can’t come (we have a $500 that he’ll ADMIT to being Christian again before 2005) but pretty much everyone else is. I was stoked that Helen can make it. She sent me email yesterday that said “THis is so freaky deaky, trippy dippy. I just came into your website to try and find your email details, and there you leave me my own personal details to get in touch. ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh, how lovely. I’ve always wanted to be the person who gets their own message. ” which made me giggle for ages. And Andee sent me email today too so it’s been a good day, emailwise. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want you to email me anyways! I like email from people called Ernest.

I hope it’s as sunny tomorrow as it was today – I want to do lots and lots of washing and stuff. I’m trying to tidy the house and my room before I start work next week. I was going to clean my room today, but then I somehow got sidetracked into talking to Olivia about rockstars. Well, no ‘somehow’ about it – I talked to Olivia because she’s the bee’s knees. Jeremy mentioned later something about our dumbass oven and how it dropped open on him at a part one time, and I was like “do you feel kind of like you’ve always watched these pop stars on telly and now you’re meeting them finally? I mean, you always used to come to parties here, and now you live here”. He just laughed at me. I guess that’s the appropriate response. I laugh at me. Time goes by so fast.

“am I famous for just one thing?”

I swear, I never drink alone though, eh. I wanna take hallucenogenic drugs again. I wanna go back to Sydney again! DAMMIT!

And now there’s enrique on the radio and I gotta dance alone be right back

Woah, I’ve never danced in my hall alone. I should have had brad there, or clayton. Odd. How do my flatmates have lives and I don’t? Oh wait, yeah, cos I’m SICK! Fuck you Health, I didn’t want you anyways. I’m home alone instead of beuinbg out on the town, and I’m BORED! I went to Cess’s party cos I was yelled at to go, but then everyone went to town and I knew I was too sick to go, so I’m home.

It’s really annoying, because I look so good tonight eh. Well, bored enough to turn the cam on Random anyways. I’m wearing a nice sari tho. Tho? Though. Okay, no fucking abbreviations for me!

It was Brad’s last night at Liquor King tonight, so he bought htis assortment of imported beers. I brought them home with me after Cess’s. The Sapporo was in the sexiest can ever. Then again, everything is sexy right about now. Well, almost everything. Oh Alcohol, how many marriages have you arranged?

I came home for the first time this week in daylight. Oh yes, I handed in my ID today, and it felt great. I got home at 4pm instead of 10pm, and that w as very very exciting. Then Kate B interograted me.
“Did you have someone over last night?”
“No”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes”
“Are you lying to me?”
“No – why?”
“I’m just using my detective skills – when I got up this morning, there was a bowl of water with wax floating in it on the dining room table and a chair was missing, that’s all”
“Oh you mean the bowl with vicks vapour rub in it? and the chair I took because my desk chair is too low?”
“Well… yeah”
“What the fuck were you thinking?”
“I figured you had someone over, and had some floating candles in a bowl to create atmosphere, adn then you went off to your room, and took the chair with you…”
“What the fuck did you think I was doing with the chair?????”
“I don’t know”
“who did you think I had over?????”
“(name)”
“Fuck you! no way!”
“well, i thought maybe you had a few more beers and said what the hell…..”
“there is not enough beer in the world!”

Kate’s going on the 30th. So is the cat, I guess. This evening, I was home alone, enjoying actually being home, doing laundyry and cooking and tidying

Oh yes, Kate Morrison. I wnet and picked her up from Ponsonby, cos she was carless. I advised her on the wrong perfume – it wasn’t my fault. In gratitude for me picking her up, she bought me lemonade and chuppies. We came back here and drank vodka, and sat on the couch outside, and had a throughly decent gossip. She figured out who I ahd a crush on, and said we were suited. I giggled. We talked about other stuff too which made me giggle more. ZThen Maree rang up and yelled at me to come to Cess’s party, that she was coming in half an hour to pick us up, so I said “okay fine” although I was sick. So I got all dressed up and stuff, and we went over, and like, 15 minutes later, everyone was going to town. So Maree dropped me home, adn I was all bitter, cos I looked so good, and no one to see!

hehehehe telephone conversations with people more out of it than you are so amusing. Actually I can’t remember anything, and it’s only like 15 minutes later. that’s a bad sign, righft? i have a craving right now to light all the candles in my room, thanks to Olivia, but I believe Kate B has stolen ALL my matches, so i can’t. I just went and took a candle to my car and tried to light it off my cigarette lighter, but that didn’t work. Where oh where are those cretins that smoke in my room NOW when i need a lighter? Grr!

“You got nipple licking? I’m so jealous!”

Just briefly, before I go stick my head over a bowl of boiling water and vicks vapour rub:

Bad:
Getting to tech to find out that you put your underwear on inside out because you were so tired and sick that morning when you put it on, wrist pain, neck pain, back pain, dry mouth despite having drunk literal litres of water, not eating 5PLUS today, Kate B going away soon, not having had a single piece of personal email today, still being awake at 5am today, the guy pacing at the bus stop tonight, Static being off air all day, probably not being able to camp over at Kate H’s goodbye party on account of being sick, Leigh refusing to marry me to spark a ratings crossover, only having five days of stress left, not being able to fit in a Casino Night before I go away, how much I’m looking forward to getting drunk next Wednesday night, one of the boys i had a mini crush on having already moved out of Auckland, dumbass grad dips calling each other unproffesional over the class email list, still not having changed my sheets

Good
Clean towels, getting clicked, PJ Harvey, giving Nigel my Welly # (although I think I actually wrote my auck one by mistake) so we can hook up in Welly and go to Barney’s, my brilliant glossary indexy idea in my Phone project, finishing my Phone project with ten minutes of labs still being open to spare tonight, coming home to find Justin and Maree over, sandwichs in the company of Kate H and Bradley earlier today, Brad having an Alex Lloyd cd now, Anji arriving in the country today, Olivia (full stop), the satisfaction of knowing I did ALL the Phone project instead of taking shortcuts, planning what I’d do on a large salary, Justin giving me exciting ideas about the job future, telling Clayton off for buying condoms (“Son, I think it’s about time we had a little chat), having finished my Special Technological Challenge Report, getting to deliver a seminar tomorrow (look at me, look at how in control I am), my sneakers cos I feel so athletic in them that I jumped over obstacles today, Song Association, Brad filling me in on the past couple’o Home&Aways and us making a date to watch TV together next week, managing to restrain myself from singing along really really loudly to A Life Less Ordinary in the lab today, accidently opening up thousands of porn windows on Joe Fisher’s Internet account at tech today while looking for pictures of a body builder, taking photos on the digital camera of myself for our broadcasting project going “just one more” until Trevor reminded me that we only had a half hour of tape, dreaming that Kini was being courted by a guy dressed as a peanut m&m

“You got nipple licking? I’m so jealous!”

There’s something a little wrong with your taxi driver giving you tips on how to become a high price hooker, isn’t there? I mean, even if he’s just giving you advice on where the rich men hang out. The George in Parnell, apparently, and I was like “sweet mate”. I think I’d just been saying about how I didn’t want to get a job and shit, and he was like “find a rich man, that’ whbat women do, isn’t it?”. Actually, come to think about it, he was a real sexist prick – going on about how much stuff women carry in their handbags, but at the time he seemed funny. I’m gald I didn’t tip him, even if I had to run into the house to get cash. Oh man, apart from paying for the taxi, I didnyt’ spend a cent tonight – how cool is that?

I found myself spending the evening in the bedroom of some apartment overlooking the sky tower and the harbour bridge. There was blue carpet and it all smelt of CKone, because everyone was spraying that on themselves. I realised eventually that the bed was the same one as we sold, and I was like “well no wonder this feels so comfortable” and Jody and I laughed a lot, and then probabyl danced some more.

Oh man, i got the best quote outta Jody tonight – almost “I have a cock in my mouth!” but I can’t remmeber it. Oh wait, yes I can – “if I was drunk enough, I’d do anything with you” – but we were talking about me asking her to sing spice girls with her at Karaoke – honestly. Damn I’ ve been using a lot of dashes.

Tech at noon, group meeting. There’s a computer hooked up on a 56 modem in the lab now, running IE 3.0 and NS 3.0 for us to do testing on, and we discovered that our site doesn’t work at these browser levels. BUGGER! stats from the NSCC say that only .48% of people have used IE 3.0 so we don’t really care about that, but 3.78% of people use NS 3.0 so we gotta do something about that. Well actually, I d unno if we do really, cvos it’s only a couple’o pixels out. And if you’re using a browser that old – even if you’re doing it ironically – you get what you deserve.

Eventually, it’s like 4pm and I’m tired of working in Quest, and having to reboot every half hour, even emails from Kini telling me what she’s eating aren’t inspiring enough, so I go get food with Kate M and Brad, and at 5pm we show up at the TV studios to provide canned laughter for Clayton’s sitcom thingie. It was funny, as were the 3 minuters we made in 1st year that we watched some of. Fuck, first year seems like yesterday, and a life time ago. Arg. I’ve fucked 3 people and snogged 4 others in less than the past year. Nothing like making up for lost time.

After the videos, we head down to London Bar, and Andrew Melville, radio tutor, calls me Joanne and buys me a pint. If people buy me alcohol, I forgive small details, especially when he amends himself to “Joanna” later. After Brad and Kate M have gone, and I’m sitting at the other end of the tables pushed together, Becks Jody and I realise that we’re magenta yellow and cyan in my case. Kate Hamlin buys me a vodka. Stuff is good. Jody Cess and I are the only non radio students – they’re a very inbred group, you know. I laugh a lot observing their social rituals and the inside stories going on. Oh the gossip! Oh the drama!

Eventually we felt like we were under threat of being kicked out becasue we were so loud, and also everyone was hungry. The group seemed to spliter in two, a nd I went with one group down to Glengarry on College Street, which was shut, and many questioned whether or not Randy actually knew where he lived. But we got there eventually, and it was posh. Bex ordered pizza, and got my handful of change to pay for it. There was drinking and drinking – alcohol the radio gang bought w ith the money they’d made f rom the static launch party. They’re not programming it anymore, which sucks cos it’s finally streaming across the Intranet. Dancing to old scary music – Bon Jovi, much stroking of someone’s chest. I got asked if I’d put out for someone in an animal costume, but I think I’d be laughing too much.

“Lydia” by Fur Patrol plays, and it seems group consensus that this is the coolest song ever around right now. It’s such a jilted woman song, and I sing it with a group. Then Jarrod plays Hootie and the Blowfish, and I complain that it’s only ever Saint Pats boys that like this kinda crap, and he’s like “you know nothing about St Pats boys” and I laugh lots, because actually I do. Dylan taught me how boys wank, after all.

Dance dance, drink drink drink, smelly smelly shoes. Gossip gossip, my head hurts, call a taxi, taxi comes, arguing with driver, he’s implying that I’m a whore, runnning into the house for cash to pay, pay, back home, computer on, requests to see my titties, so what else is new? Fuck I’m tired. It w as fun hanging out with people that I don’t know that well. It was also fun to discover the other day that someone I was afraid of hurting has a parallel agenda to mine, so wh00p for that.

More goddam meetings tomorrow, time to feel less sick and then go to bed. It’s been fun. Heh, I amuse me much, thanks Shania. I wonder if everyone’s going to Bar of the Stars now. I wanna go to Karaoke with Olivia again. I was talking to Brad today about Skid Row, and he just had no idea.

I’ve got chills – they’re multiplying

These are highlights from my journal that I kept in my red book in Australia. Obviously, it’s not everything. I was doing a whole bunch of thinking, and no one needs to read all of that. But these are the entertaining highlight parts.

Thursday 29/6/00

Interesting… Kini gve me directions to to the Sydney Museum, but I have a suspicion I fucked up, cos I’m currently sitting on the steps of the New South Wales Art Gallery. This is also fine with me. I realy should go to more exhibitions! Serves me right for following a bunch of school kids, I guess. Maybe Adrian can take me to the museum in the afternoon. For now, it’s lovely and sunny and the gallery opens in ten minutes.

My stomach is doing funny rumbly things. This is not a good sign! I spent yesterday at Kini’s house again, relaxing. Her room is so light and airy (it’s just like a CKone bottle, I’ve deiced) it feels like some expensive private clinic I’ve been checked into. Betty Ford perhaps. I’m going to clean up my addictions!

*****

Later – 11.30ish

Actually, I’m really glad that I didn’t make it to the museum, because the art gallery was realyl really cool. I know where the museum is now – i should have gone right out of Hyde Park instead of left to the Land Office that looks like a fucking museum! If I’d been wearing my contact lenses, I might have realised.

But anyways, I feel really good and cultured having been to the art gallery. I am so glad I did Art History in 7th form, because it helped me to understand things better. Plus the whole fact that we _had_ to go to exhibitions made it easier for me.

The first colleciton I looked at was 20th Century Australian Art. There wasn’t anything too striking htere, although I picked up on Colourfields, Impressionism etc etc. A couple of artists had work that looked a lot like Rita Angus. Next there was 19th Century Australia Art, which was kinda boring too, but that dissolved into International Stuff, and I became more intrigued. I love myths, and classics. I really oughta learn mre. I think when I’m in Welly, I’ll try and borrow some books of myths off Karen. One picture I especially loved was of Ipheginia sleepign, while this guy Cymon was staring, transfixed by her beauty. I want to be enchanting. I want to be beautiful. I think I’m tempted to start writing mythical stories instead of journal entries. The 21st century needs greater inspiration. Where are our gods? Christianity just isn’t as interesting. We need divine love, and loyalty and faith and honour and compassion and courage and revenge and anger. We need deities who can be humanised.

Off my soap box now. One other piece that really inspired me was this statue of a man, woman and child that was half carved into a flat surface, like the Athena Nike from the Arcropolis. The female clung to the male, in complete love, and together they held a baby. I hope I misinterpreted the look in his eye – it seemed almost as if he was thinking of someone else. But that’s probably just me projecting.

Then I went downstairs to an exhibition of contemporary art. They had a lot of stories of installations, without the actual works, which was kind of a shame. But there was lots of other cool shit as well. In one room across a wall there was a whole line of sardine cans, made in shiny metal, with trees groing out of the top and human body bits in the can. They were were quite breathtaking. The trees were exqisitely detailed, and the body parts were so realistic. There were penises and vaginas, sure, but the parts that attracted me were the curves of the back. I got to know one person’s back so well – maybe that’s symbollic. Or maybe not. In the ame room were beaded coral sculptures that seemed to float inside their glass cabinets. Beautiful.

I have fallen in love again. In one room of the gallery, the lights were dimmed and opera music was playing. A circular track around a pile of bricks had two projectors moving around, shining their images onto the bricks. The first was a close up of a man’s face. The second was his whole body, twisted by at rest. He was looking at me! I feel i know him so well, eyes pleading for me not to leave, to help him become real.

There was another installation nearby, where a huge screen took up a whole wall. Projected onto it was video footage of about 15 men, standing still. I went and sat down to watch, because they didn’t really keep still at all. It was really fascinating, actually. The young guy at the end didn’t seem to move at all, but eventually I caught him blinking. That meant I could leave satisfied. Art gallery padded benches are so comfy. I admit, I would love to fuck on one.

On the top floor of the gallery was a collection of black and white photographs by Olive Cotton. She’s amazing. Yet again, my favourite pieces were the portraits of Max, her two year husband, and the photos he had taken of her. I’m obsessed with finding true love I think. And I so want a man who’d want to take photos of me!

Now I’m sitting in Hyde Park near the fountain. It’s really windy, so every so often, huge big mists of water drift around. It looks amazing. Unfortunately, it’s starting to cloud over a little. I hope it doesn’t rain! there’s a man talking to a spunky young Dutch tourist on the bench to me – I think it’s so lovely when people are nice! The man’s gone now, so maybe I should volunteer to be tourguide! But then again, I’m scared it’s about to rain. I’d better go get underground. Brr!!

1pm

Tiny moments that make me believe the human race as a whole is going to be okay? An old woman in the middle of the hustle and bustle of the QVB sitting calmly on a bench pouring herself a cup of tea from a thermos.

Kni and I were driving home the other night, and the radio was tuned into some love songs request program. This guy rang up and was dedicating Chicago’s “Inspiration” to his princess, who’d made his life so much better even though they’d onyl been together 3 months. We were mocking, but it was so sweet that Kini started crying. And then I cried because I thought that was so unbelieveably cute and because I want to be someone’s princess too, dammit!

4.39pm

Goddam my fucking feet hurt big lots! I went to meet up with Olivia where I’d always met her – outside the posh foodcourt. She showed up, looking radiant as usual, and gave me my birthday present. It’s a tiara – yay! Just a little one, attached to a comb, and it’s very cool. Just before i met up with her, I bought myself a hair scrunchie. And when I say “hair”, that’s exactly what I mean – tufts of synthetic blue and blakc hair sprouting from an elastic band. It rocks!

Both Olivia and I were really hungry, and i had a hankering for some Chinese, so we proceeded to a foodcourt underneath Grace Bros. It was completely pack. Once we’d got our food – peeking beef and sweet & sour pork for me – we searched for like five minutes trying to find a seat. We had absolutely no luck, so we jumped on an escalator to find a bench to sit on. We found one – sharing with a very sleepy old man. It wasn’t the most ideal eating environment ever, but the company was great.

****

After lunch, we went to Woolworths Metro to look for red plastic cups like the ones they have at every single American teenage party. Kini promised that she’d seen them, but there was no joy. We searched the entire store. I almost bought a set of minature books for $1.20 but couldn’t ick any catergories. I also almost bought a crystal ball lamp, because they were only $13, but as Olivia pointed out, there was no way to change the light bulb inside it. Hmm, what a mystery! But Oh was very smart to spot the fatal flaw!

Then she had to go back ot work, and I had to go meet Adrian on the town hall steps. Because it was raining, Iw as waiting under the cover at the top of the steps when some dumbass doorman guy told me to move to the side. Like i was fucking blocking access! So I went to go stand in the rain, because I was feeling spiteful. He told me I could stay under shelter, just to the side, but I pretended I didn’t speak English. es, I was being dumb.

I was almost hoping that Adrian wouldn’t show up, cos IW asn feeling a little sleepy and not that sociable, but then he arrived. Since he had no plans, I suggested we should go to the museum, and he agreed. Since it was my idea, I paid the $8 each, and I’m glad I did, cos goddam, the museum was crap! I would have felt realyl bad if I’d made him pay for that! The first room was full of different kinds of skelatons – including a man on a horse called “The Bone Ranger”. Oh dear! On the mezzanine leve around the bone room were fascinating exhibits on rocks. Really really thrilling stuff! The highlight, of course, was passing the Gem Vault and having Adrian comment “you belong in there”. Heh. There was also a lot of dead birds and insects that did not hold our interest. We went to the Discovery Centre and looked at bugs under microscopes and cd roms, but restrained ourselves from going on that Internet thing. Kids World was only for 1-5 year olds, which is a shame because it looked like the most interesting area! Kini rang me while we were in the Evolution Area. She was like “where are you” and when I said the museum, she was like “Still????” so I had to explain. The dinosaur exhibit was boring as well, kids running crazy. We found their makeout room though, cunningly disguised as “the music room”. In some other section, there was a tiny little bug room that I folded myself into, although i’m not entirely sure why. So yeah, it was a crap museum, but it filled in some time, and at least I can say I did something. There was a sperm whale skeleton in the foyer – I said it was huge, Adrian thanked me.

Then he was feeling peckish, so we went to get some food at – oh god – Cafe Americana in the QVB. It was just like a cafe in Japan, only without hot towels and the plastic display food. I was feeling very sleepy by that stage- I could have quite happily put my head down on the table and slept. But that would have been rude. Adrian paid for my (crap) ice cream sundae, and we went to Soup Plus to make a booking for tonight. Then he took me to Coles, where we again searched fruitlessly for red plastic cups. He reckons they’re contraband in NZ – I’m not sure I believe him, eh! We were talking about Melbourne vs Sydney, and I suggested that the difference is that Sydney has no soul, much like Auckland vs Wellington. Adrian went hom, and I came up here to the Sky Pub in Kini’s building. I rang her to tell her – she really doesn’t seem to like the idea of me hanging out here for hours. I don’t know why. I’m only on my second vodka. And it’s not like anyone is trying to pick me up. They should be, dammit! I give great head! Maybe I should tattoo that across my forehead. Or maybe not.

Okay, it’s 6pm now. Kini should be down soon.

****

Did I mention that my bag strap broke? That really really pisses me off! I’ve had to carry it around clutching it all day. Not comfy! I’m also pissed off that i had to pay adult fare of $8.80 return on the train today. My student ids just weren’t good enough, apparently!

Gosh they play a lot of crap music here! Ah well, at least my second vodka was only $2. Happy Hour must be over – they just made a beeping noise. We’re supposed to be meeting Leigh in six minutes. Where oh where is Kini? She should have called. I should call her I guess, and go meet Leigh by myself. Or, after calling her, I oculd just meet her downstairs in ten minutes. What a great compromise! Olivia wants to go to Karaoke tomorrow, and has suggested that Kini and I stay over at her house afterwards and go to the airport from there. Anyways, I should probably get my shit togehter and go now xoxo

Friday 30th June

So, here I am for the last time on the train to the city. O nly this time, it’s the afternoon and I am by myself. Oooh brave me! I almost got on the wrong train, but luckily I didn’t. Oooh smart me!

I’m really sad to be leaving Kini’s house. I love her so much and it’s been so restful, just chilling and relaxing. I feel heaps calmer and way better equipt to deal with my life. I just wish it had never come to this in the first place! Ahh well.

Tonight Kini and I are staying at Olivia’s house, and hopefulyl going to Karaoke beforehand. It’ll be weird being in Oh’s house, just like it’ll be weird in Kate Benton’s room as well, I guess. I dreamt about Kate last night. We were going to the school ball with a whole bunch of people like Nicola, but then it was like 1am and we still hadn’t left. So then Kate and I decided to go to the casino instead. We somehow were in Mississipi then, and it so it was really hard to get a taxi. We ended up on some pushpull railway cart, being fed red wine by the two drivers. It was odd. Oops, I skipped two pages. Where is my mind?