Hubris.co.nz

It’s Friday, I’m in love at home
Last Friday night, I didn’t go out. Yes, I know. I was pretty sure that the world was going to implode too. But the one boy left at work who goes out drinking had some mysterious function on (he refused to tell me what it was, apart from a gay pride parade, but I don’t believe him. I am instead suspecting that he’s been drafted in to sell Amway), and I didn’t want to have to make contact with the ex-cows, because eww, boys have cooties (or BIRD FLU) and all that. However, my being lame at homeness provided me with the opportunity to do the supermarket shopping, tidy the house in preperation for vacuuming the next day and spend some quality time with Bart, so that was nice.

Big in Japan, alright / pay, then I’ll sleep by your on my side
It was quite exciting to get up on Saturday morning and start preparing for a Country Club whilst not being hungover. Yeah that’s right, I said morning. And I also said not hungover. You can faint now. But yes, I managed to be so organised that I even had time to go and have coffee with Karen during my errand-running to pick up Singstar Original, ’80s and Rock and bottles of Asahi and Kirin and sexy big cans of Sapporo from Regional Wines and Spirits. Can I just put out a huge big pile’o love for Regional’s website, which is so damn handy when it comes to planning Country Clubs since they list all their stuff by region? Even if the guy at the checkout did pick up my beer bottles and examine them to say “oh, this one’s made in Thailand, this one’s made in Australia…” while I put my hands over my ears and went “LA LA LA LA LA”. Apparently he also did exactly the same thing to Mike when he and Kart were stocking up.

I dressed up as a slutty schoolgirl (gee, that was hard), and went to pick up Lisa and Beverly, and then Karen who was dressed as a ninja, and then Anji and Delwin who were Harajuku girls. We started out Country Club in the dining room, where I handed out specially purchased pieces of paper and pens and instructed people to write Haiku and give Tentacle Porn a go while Karen and I threaded up sticks of yakitori (LITERALLY barbecued chicken, but we also made vege skewers) in the kitchen. What exactly is tentacle porn, you ask? Well I will answer by sucking Lisa’s “bandwidth” (heh) to repost images of her artwork. I hope she doesn’t mind. She shouldn’t, because you can’t even see her hands in these pictures:

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Then we ran out of chairs, as more and more people arrived, so I moved everyone through to the lounge to watch My Neighbor Totoro. I think people were perhaps a little too drunk at that stage to appreciate the simple beauty of the movie, and the absolute radness of the Nekobasu. Philly-steins (Hells yeah, cheese steak and beer. This is my special shout-out to Brad, although I don’t think he reads Hubris, so I can cut’n paste it into an email for him.)! But they were of course, drunk enough for karaoke, and oh how we all rocked that microphone mightily. Well, Katy mostly fell asleep. But others rocked it long and hard. Lisa as the last person to leave left just after 5am. In the time inbetween, glass was broken, many things spilled, so many wacky snacks were consumed, I punched Bart in the face after he took off his glasses and asked me to, and he showed Lisa his Chuck Norris tentacle. I’m shocked. SHOCKED. It was a fucking kickass country club, that’s for sure.

In the cold light of morning afternoon while everyone’s yawning cleaning you’re high tired

The next day I ran away to hide at my parents’ place instead of cleaning up, under the guise of feeding Pixie and doing laundry. I discovered that they had Live8 on their DVD hard drive, so I went through the whole thing, going “fucking wow” at many of the performances (Pink Floyd, Bjork, ummm some others) and scratching my head at many others. And I wondered why the hell they didn’t set out to collect money along with names, because surely they could have raised some amount, even as a side project. Yeah I know i’m nearly a year late to this party. Shoosh.

I’d been just about to cry when I left the house because I was tired, and hungover, and I couldn’t find my glasses. In the grand search for the glasses, however, Bart finally unearthed my long-missed camera cables, so I’m proud to present a selection from the past couple’o months, although you might be best to go look at them directly in Flickr:

Random people who were also at Kai in the City when we were there with Sarah’s Hens’ Party

The Chocolate Mooooooooooooooooooooooooooosse from Canadia at the Country Club

Karen, Bart’s friends and Bart at his Mexican party. As it says in the notes in my flickr account, one of the girls is wearing a note that says “in case of fire, I put out”, which I think is awesome

Russ and Smoo, looking somewhat worse for wear

Spent the afternoon whole day in bed, trying to figure out what it was you said
Queen’s Birthday Monday was dedicated to listening to Tommy which I had pinched from my parents’ overflowing record cabinet, and devouring The Method Actors, which is a book about a fucked up bunch of people living in Tokyo, and it makes me want to box up all my possessions and stick them in storage, and go live the high life over there, teaching English or hostessing or some such nonsense. Just as well I’m not a skinny blonde or I would actually be seriously considering it. I don’t know how I clicked over from hating Japan and all it stood for in my life to craving it. Perhaps it’s because in the book people meet at Hatchiko, and go to Almond Corner in Roppongi, and they draw maps that go past the 109 building, and Tokyu Hands, and Seibu Loft, and oh oh oh I haven’t finished the book yet, but I’m hoping that they will at some stage need to visit the New Zealand embassy so I can see it again through the author’s eyes.

Working nine to five nine twentyish to five thirtyish, what a way to make a living
I have now seen a cow-orker naked. Unfortunately, it wasn’t any of the ones that I want(ed) to see with their clothes off though. Stupid Peti suggesting another woman from work should join my gym. I hate people who talk to me at the gym. I’m there to escape, to replace the noise in my head with the Arcade Fire, or Shihad, or the Walkmen or Britney Spears or whatever else spins up on my ‘Work it out’ playlist, not make chit chat. Yeah that’s right, I said stupid Peti, and I’m glad that she’s leaving. You hear me, Rebbecca? Heh. Boo-urns to the last person on my floor that I have regular conversations with leaving. Sigh. But like, good for her and stuff.

Something’s cooking, I’m at the griddle electric wok
Tonight for family night, I will be making Papas Garbanzo for Bart and Smoo and Lisa. And then we’re going to play Pictionary, cos that’s what families do. Assuming that I do actually have Pictionary. I’m not sure if the board is in the box. Or indeed if I even have the box anymore. And Twister might not work in these jeans. Or even these genes.

One week and two days until my birthday. Woo!

Tuesday the 228th of December – Xmas 2000

Oh my goodness. I thought I saw my trailer’s

I have no idea what I was sayign then.

hehehe tom’s drunk and incoherant. He sucks. I crawled behind the xmas tree but managed to back out again in one piece. I won trivial pursuit. We wrote down some quotes. I think it was somethign about lesbians.

“I hope that fate understands the complexity of my dilema”

“do you have graceland? I hope that you do”

Why is this guy playing with my stereo?

“that’s cool, I like random quotes from me”

“you are sick on so many levels”

Well, so many quotes I may have admittimed above, i am workig tonight to tonighnt convince tonight of from Joanna of this: Paul Simon rawks. Paul Simon: Hi, I rock and stuff. What can ya do?

Tom sucks. I am playing Kate Bush now. Please understand that there is only my parents’ cd collection at risk here. You were engaged? Really? Golly! tehehehe. Heh.

Justine was very cool. She texted me today saying she loved me to pieces, which makes me feel so proud it gets a mention. I have to go to Unity and trade Shirley’s xmas pressie to me in for a book on Yoga. My legs hurt from pulling them above my head (party trick).

Heh. hehehe. Heh.

My cousin Jacinta is currently laughing at me and saying dumb things, but she gets away with it, becxause she is cool. I heart cousin jaacinta.

“Ooooooh I just know that something good is going to happen – I don’t know what it is” – Kate Bush, “Cloudbursting”. I’m inclined to break into a jig.

I like swinney org. I dislike the bump on my neck. “I’m not coming onto you, but feel it”. It’s so cancer. Ahh well, I’ve lived a good life. Our Xmas lights are on random now. I feel like jiggign, but I’d just thunder all over the place. I’m cloudbursting Daddy. Your sun’s coming out.

You told me last night you were a sun now, wiht your very own devoted satelite. Happy for you and I am sure that I hate you.

It’s funny quotign when I don’t have emotions either way anymore. clay rang today asking me to pick him up from Palmy on the way to Taupo and I told him it’d increase my journey to 8 hours and he felt all bad before i laughed and told him the truth. I rang Brad to rant when Home and Away wasn’t; on, then watched “Stars in Their Eyes”. Tonifgt, matthew, I’m going to be drunk Joanna.

Matthew Holloway, I tried emailing you today but it got returned to me. What’s your email addyt?

filler. That’s all.

Ahh well. I suspect Tom’s passed out somewhere. If I was a better person, I’d go see. hehehe I love emails telling me to go to bed. Thanks mum. Well, it wasn’t mum. But still. Kate bush is cool. “Uh OH” is loud. There’s a volume knob on this kmeyboard, hwewre’s that?

I heard breathign coming out of the toilet. Breathing = still alive, right? Sorry Mum & Dad.

I just had to sweep up cat biscuits in the kitchen. Sorry Pixie!

Drunk bys are so so silly. Man, I gotta find someone that has as good a drinking capacity as me. He’s drinking out of a cocoa container right now, because my parents have a shortage of plastic vessels, but I haven’t got the heart to tell him.

Muhahaha. Hehehehe. Heh.

My eyes hurt, so I probably should go to bed sometime. I’m in Wellington. We have a massive looming Xmas tree and funny lights. There are big parcels for me under it which I have fondled and am still confused by. The house is all clean. It’s cool.

I had SUCH a nice drive down today, all lovely sunshine and little traffic. I sang and smiled, young, fabulous and free. I listened to Kiss FM for 2 hours whilst in the Taupo vicinity because Jarrod was dj’ing on it. Innnnnnteresting music selection going on there, Fur Patrol one minue and Meatloaf the next. Oh and speaking of Fur Patrol, how fucking cool is it that they’re the Xmas number one in NZ? So fucking cool. The Xmas number one in the UK is probably “Bob the Builder” which I heard on the simulcast of Top of the Pops somewhere in the Manawatu. Eminemem played “Stan” on Top of the Pops as well, but he was strangely cut off before the last two verses. What a suprise.

My father’s trying to tell me that Robbie Williams is gay. As if.

I got a text message today from an unknown number saying “Are your nipples errect?” . I was a little confused, but unsuprised. When I rang the number back, the answering machine said it was Kate, and later i talked to the Bentons to confirm that it was indeed Kate B. So I sent her back a message that said “yes and I’m all wet and ready for you”. She hasn’t replied.

My cat Pixie is sitting on top of the largest present for me. It’s a bigass box, but I bet it’s just a cd with a lot of newspaper around it. I love Xmas pressies. I have to go shopping tomorrow though, which will be a mare.

Simon’s not answering his phone. We still have nowhere to stay in Taupo. No room at the Inn. I guess I’ll just give birth in a manger instead. Hayley never knows who I am when I phone her. Brad rang me today to ask where the axe is. He also emailed me some addresses for home&away related sites. I like this one – http://www.alfstewart.cjb.net/. Stone the flamin’ crows, Ails, you build a website and then those bloody yahoos come in with their caps on backwards and just smash the place up.

My belly hurts too. I should go, although it’s been great having a yarn with you. Oh wait hang on, what are you getting me for Xmas? This is what I would like:

• A nokia 3210/3310
• Bed linen! Queen size duvet covers, and make sure they’re pretty
• Makeup – ‘Juliet’ coloured Poppy eyeshadow, or anything Napolean, or any kinda lip gloss at all
• Money or vouchers
• CDs: ‘Kid A’ Radiohead, ‘Pet’ Fur Patrol or ‘The Altruist’ (or is it ‘Altruism’?) DLT.
• Lamps, pillows and candles (I wanna live in a harem)
• Alcohmahol or illict substances
• Art works – not movie posters
• Handbags (cos you can never have enough)
• a digital camera
• a cd burner
• a trip to Melbourne/Sydney

Thank you. I will give you my postal address on request. Oh and one last thing – my sister Karen wrote this tonight.

Me (in bear mask)”roaaaaar!” Kara: “eeek!” Me:”Sorry, I didn’t mean to score you. I mean, scare you”

Thursday the 24nd of December – Xmas Eve

If you have had reason to be in my address book, you probably recieved the above graphic already. If you didn’t, help yourself. Or if you just wanna PRETEND like I sent you an xmas card, go for your life, you tragic little puppy.

I’ve got three new people on my ICQ list now, and they’re all fanttttastic. Annette, Brooke and Heather. Go and visit their pages, and read their journals obsessivly like me. Except not Brooke’s, cos I don’t know whereabouts it is. But hey! She did the design for my “Frozen Lake” story so I love her anyways. (Instant friends with Vision!).

Today I woke up early (by my standards – ie before 11) and vaccumed, because Mommy had asked me to, and I’m a good little girl like that. What I didn’t vaccum, though I should have, was the floor under this desk, where Pixxie must have been playing with a bird, unless I’m malting feathers unawares.

I also made dessert – chocolate cake with lemon mousse inside it. I made a stencil and put pretty icing sugar stars on the top, and lemon zest. Someone should so marry me, man. Wow, that was a cool sentence. Double Alliteration. Mrs Turner would be so proud. Actually, all my English teachers, with the exception of Mr Mitchell and Mr Vigeland were proud of me. Mr Vigeland hated me because Beth and I always laughed whenever he walked past because he wore tight jeans and thought he was sexy. And Mr Mitchell knew I was smart but he also knew I thought he was a slack bastard, and that was the reason I did no work in his class (I still got an A for bursary though – but I guess I could have got scholarship if I’d ‘applied myself’ and hadn’t been on IRC all year). Annnnnnyways.

Granny came for dinner. I hid in here. Mummy was good to me, and gave brought me in a glass of bubbly. She understands how I feel, and so I didn’t have to resurface until dinner. Then straight after dessert, Karen rang, so I left to answer and never came back. I’m sure it’d be good to spend some time with her because, realistically, she’s not going to be around much longer. But I just have nothing to say to her, and I hate the way her false teeth move around in her mouth. So yeah.

The amusing part of the evening though was when I said something about Mum’s driving, and Leonie was sitting in the corner pissing herself, because she’d admitted to me that Mum’s driving terrifies her as well, only of course I couldn’t let on to that. So I sat there winking at her instead. It’s funny how I can get on with my aunts nowadays – like, as an adult. I HATED Leonie when she stayed with us for a couple of weeks back in Japan. My My, what a problem child I was (according to Mum anyways).

Amy stood me up for Midnight Mass. This makes her Brian. Happy Xmas and all that, people. Me, I’m going to be buried in stacks of pressies tomorrow. Or today even, given that it’s one am.

Wednesday the 16th of December

I slept in until 3pm today. What does that say about me? That’s cool, cos I loved it. The trouble is, that since my room’s at the front of the house, so in the mornings it heats up a lot. I wake up in the heat to open my windows, stretch out and go back to sleep, with my arms still above my head, in a stretch position. So when I wake up three hours later, they’re all numb from lack of blood. It’s probably not the best way to start the day, eh? Still, it’s better than the other morning, when I thought I could open the door for Pixie and still stay in bed. One arm managed to reach out and lean on the wall, but when the other arm reached out for the door handle, everything went horribly wrong, and I ended up falling head over heels onto the cork tile floor, taking all the covers with me. More than a little dazed, someone I reached up and opened the door. Pixie got one hell of a fright when she came in to be nose to nose with me, I tell you. But probably not as much of a fright as I got, falling smack on my ass.

But yeah anyways, like I said that was another day, and I do believe we were talking about today. The good thing about waking up that late is that the sun is at the back of the house, where one of the bathroom windows is. Since the window’s at head height in the shower, the afternoon sunshine comes in to turn the water into liquid diamonds and rainbows, and it’s just the coolest thing in the world to wash in. It’s like being a faerie, rather than just a lazy bitch in the shower.

After that, we headed down the hill to buy our Xmas tree – YAY! I love the whole tree aspect of xmas. In fact, I love almost everything about Xmas. The more commercial, the better, I say. Some people are all like “but we’re forgetting the whole religious aspect of it” – well, GOOD! What it comes down to is that Yuletide was celebrated a long time before all the Christian stuff came into it, as a way to brighten up an otherwise bleak winter. In my opinion, anything’s a good enough reason to over-indulge and get lots of pressies. In Japan, there’s a day called White Day on March the 14th that was INVENTED by a chocolate company. It’s kind of like Valentines Day, only women are expected to give stuff to men on it. Go Go Commercialism, I say. Personally, I’m hoping that sometime in the near future, there’ll be an International Joanna Day. That’d rock.

So yeah, the tree got trimmed in the evening, and all that fun stuff, cos Karen came over. There was a Father Ted Xmas special (which was a repeat) that was bloody hilarious. Karen and I pissed ourselves at a joke shown in the ad for it, then laughed even harder when it came up in the program, which is kind of unusual. She wouldn’t let me put the plastic baubles on the tree, which I guess is fair enough, because we have so many pretty glass ornaments – bubbles in all different shades. The tree is probably one of the most classically shaped trees we’ve ever had, since we left Germany. It’s pointy and full and superb. It was $25, which is a little more expensive than trees normally are, but it was worth it. Once in Japan, me and Mum paid $200 for a tree. I’m not allowed to tell anyone that, so we’ll keep it as our little secret, okay?

My grudge page seems to be doing pretty well for itself. Matter (his name is Matt, but since he’s not THE matt, I don’t want anyone getting confused) from Vision said he’d do a cgi-script or something for me, so that I don’t have to have it in the ugly dreambook, I think he’s just doing it to make me feel inadequate. Yes, I don’t know hardly any HTML at all, and yes, I do most of my pages in Frontpad (this one’s being done on Dreamweaver, but it’s my first) but I don’t make my life out of designing webpages, okay? I do put my life into pages, but the pages aren’t my life. Does that make sense? I dunno, maybe I’m just being too ungrateful. I mean, I do appreciate him putting his time and effort into it and all, so mmmmmm. Yeah. Get in contact with me. I like feedback, and you have so many opportunities to do it.