Yes, that’s right, I don’t update for a month, and then when I do, all I write about is tidying my house. This is how I roll, yo. Oh okay, I will talk about how I’ve been Xmas shopping, and making plans for the dinner that I want to cook, and preparing secret potions and all that kind of thing.

I’ve been feeling a bit thoughtful the past couple of days. As you may have seen me twittering about yesterday, it was ten years since I first had sex. So that was the guy that I had my first relationship with. It’s been a year since I began my second relationship as well, which I call a relationship because he did, and because it was more than just fucking, even though it shouldn’t have even been that. Although I didn’t want the first one to be, the second one is most definitely a secret. In 2010, I’m going to meet someone who will love me so much that they will shout from the rooftops that they’re with me. That’s going to be really fantastic. Oh yes indeedy.

I don’t really have that much else to say, because it’s been so long that all the stories I wanted to tell you have been forgotten. Instead, I will grab some photos of me from Flickr with which to start conversations, okay?

SPICEWORLD

Still the greatest movie ever made. We had a most awesome night of watching it and then I stayed up til 3.30am talking to Amie. She cleaned up in the morning! Best houseguest ever until the next lot showed up.

ROLLER DERBY!

Richter City (Wellington) played Pirate City (Auckland) and three of Auck girls stayed with us. Turns out one of them was Hannah who was Iva’s friend when we lived at Volcanic, so she’s also slept with Lance. Hilariousness ensued. Also, Roller Derby was AMAZING, even though we got creamed. It was edge of the seat jumping up and down and yelling and cheering and fantasticness. And look who happened to be in town for it and managed to get in on the sign and fascinator-making?

Yeah that’s right, that’s motherfucking KateH! It was very very nice to see her again after years overseas. Plus, I am now the Popular Kate of Wellington, which makes me feel allpowerful. In fact, I’m the Empress of the Internet. Bow down.

I went to the Havana Club cocktail championships and wrote about it on the Wellingtonista. Speaking of, holy fucking shit, next week it is the FOURTH ANNUAL WELLINGTONISTA AWARDS. I am crazybusystressed sorting it all out plus I don’t get to buy a new dress which is sad but hopefully it will all go smoothly enough.

Oh yeah, duh, flickr reminds me that there’s this:

I got an infected ingrown hair on my stomach, and it developed into full-blown cellulitis and I spent 48 hours in the hospital. Almost two weeks later, I still haven’t finished my antibiotics. Kind of a bit bored of talking about it, so here’s this:

o, so 48 hours of IV antibiotics and crazy Syrian ladies yelling in the bed next to me and NO WIFI (omg death) and so many things beeping and being woken up at 4am all the time so they could change my drip and then at 7am because apparently that’s when they wake up usually anyways later, I cried and begged them to send me home so they have with lots of codeine and also fuckloads of antibiotics, and now my stomach is much better but my arm is in immense pain from where my veins collapsed under the harshness of the antibiotics and it all leaked into my tissue instead. Moral of the story: ingrown hairs are not a good idea.

Many people were wonderful and came to see me in the hospital or afterwards and it made me so happy to have such lovely friends and family and flatmates who provided me with food so I didn’t have to eat the hospital slop and so I had clean laundry and access to technology to keep me from going crazy.

So yes, even though things are far from perfect (I still don’t have a job or a flatmate), the awesome things in my life kind of outweigh the sucky, and that’s the way I would like to keep things, thanks.

Thank you two, I love you.

And so in the past couple of sessions, I mentioned to Kalpana that I’ve been having more down spells lately than I feel are right, given that I’m supposed to be on the mend, I’m swallowing my 20mg of cipramil every day, I’m getting my expensive therapy and I have a job that meets all the criteria that I realised through my sessions with her that I was looking for. I mention to her that maybe I should think about upping my meds, but then come up with a thousand reasons why I’ve been getting the down spells, and she defaults to my feelings, saying “well, we should keep an eye on it, definately”.

I ache. I ache all over, hollow and empty and just so fucking lonely, and it feels like nothing anyone should ever have to feel, but it’s very familiar to me, and it always keeps coming back, and I want to call out for help, but what can anyone do to plug the gap? Nothing. Nothing at all. And so I let myself sink lower and lower. I forget to fill my cipramil prescription and then it’s the weekend and my chemist with thelovely old chinese man who gets it faxed in for me is closed. I find myself on Saturday night sitting in the kitchen crying on Bopha and Allison’s shoulders, because even if this is PMS, I cannot go on feeling like this for a couple of days every month, and Allison agrees with me that I need to get my meds adjusted. I thought cipramil was great because it stopped me from feeling suicidal while still letting me have SOME feelings, unlike Fluoxtine, but then it came back. I could feel myself shutting down again as basic functions fell by the wayside. And each time I have one of these episodes, it comes on much much faster than the last.

Cue me today trapped in my room, crying my eyes out, unable to leave even to get tissues because that’s the form and shape that depression takes for me, trapping me, leaving me imobilised. I hate being fucked up I hate not being able to sleep I hate that when I do sleep all I have is nightmares I hate the whole body ache, I hate being the girl who always seems fucked up I hate relying on my friends I hate not trusting my friends I hate being unable to ask for help I hate having to ask for help I hate that most of the time it seems like no one is able to help me. And I hate that all I could think about was the codeine in my drawer. So I texted Tom, and told him I was scared. He called my landline immediately, and we talked for ages, me crying and blowing my nose intermittantly into a towel. He calmed me down some but at the same time, while i was making jokes about expired condoms, I was combing through my medicine drawer, making a tally.

The codeine would be enough to make me sleep almost instantly. The brufen and the voltarin would probably rip my stomach to shreds. Worse case scenario, I would down them all, and then wake up, crippled from damage to my internal organs. I just want to sleep, I just want it to stop, I don’t want to kill myself, but I want to be somewhere else, anywhere else. Maybe I want that cry for attention, the suicide attempt, I want the bed in the hospital for a few days, people by my side mending bridges and all that crap. I just want to not be me anymore, to not have to battle this goddam fucking disease which seems so totally incurable.

The afternoon stretches on and on and on and I desperately try to get ahold of Nikki. Of course, I have her cellphone and her new flat doesn’t have a phone. I call her mother because that’s where she said she was going to be. Her mother calls me back to ask for Nikki’s number. I call her friend Gina, whose number I find in Nikki’s phone. She tells me Nicola’s number. Nicola’s voicemail says her name is Hayley. I am trapped on the floor in the corner of my room by my door. I can hear Bopha walking around outside and I can’t call out to her, which is fucking pathetic. And then I hear her on the phone, dealing with her sister’s crisis. I definately can’t call out now. When she knocks on my door to ask if I want dinner I say I’m fine.

I have a sore throat coming on, and it’s dry from crying so I don’t know how I’m going to swallow the pills if I take them. Maybe if I wash them down with a bottle of something, they’ll be effective enough that I won’t wake up. But the only liquor in the house that I can think of is half a bottle of kristov. I might as well swallow a box of panadol. I don’t want to try and fail. I don’t want to leave my friends and family behind, I don’t want to hurt them in any way, I know that they love me, and if I could just reach out, they’d turn heaven and earth over to help me. But I don’t see how they can help, because I’m just too far gone, I don’t see any light at the tunnel,and I am so tired and so fucking weary of having to fight this all the time, I just want to live and be okay and not have to worry every fucking day if I’m going to go psycho again. I’m tired of inflicting that worry on the ones I love as well, I’m just so fucking tired. I don’t want to be fucked up, it’s not cool,it’s not glamourous, it’s just flat out fucking exhausting. I don’t see how I’ve been an awful enough person to deserve this. And I know that there are squillions of people out there who suffer a fuck load more than me.

There’s no razors in my room, and that doesn’t work anyway. If I was to try the hot knife on my leg again, that’d mean getting up, going into the kitchen, facing the world, and besides, there’s only so much relief that that amount of physical pain can give you. My new idea is to take the codeine. Six tablets won’t kill me, but it will knock me out. Then maybe I can wake up feeling better. But what if someone walks in, freaks out. That’s not fair to do to flatmates, it’s what has stopped me before. Two pills then. But if I take two, I’m going to take more. I can’t stop my teeth from shaking, I can’t fucking handle this, and I need Nikki to come and save me NOW. I am always waiting for the knight on a white horse, and it never shows up, and we can trace that back to being 14 again, and I am so tired of therapy and talking and crying and wondering what’s the root of what and I am so tired of thinking and I am so tired of trying to keep myself alive so maybe it’s the turn of someone else and I just want the pain to stop, and surely that’s what painkillers are for and I’m tipping the codeine out into my palm and putting them back in the bottle and tipping them out again and I’m terrified so I super selfishly call Tom.

He’s in Christchurch asking if I want him to fly up, because he’ll do that on a moment’s notice for me, but I can’t get him to do that. He says he’ll call me back on the landline and I say no, I can’t go out into the lounge to get it. What I can get him to do, and what I force myself to do is admit that I really need to see someone, maybe KateH, and I tell him that I can’t call her, because it’s too fucking hard to ask for help, and so he tells me that he’ll call her, and we get off the line and I sit here and shake and my teeth bang against each other and I try to keep my breathing at an okay rate and he texts me to say that KateH is on her way and I cry some more and rub my nose raw on the towel.

And 20 minutes later she comes in, and I’m still sitting on my bed in the dark, doors and windows open wide, shaking in cold and fear and sickness styles, and she’s brought me flowers and chocolate and throaties and so I cry some more, weird animal noises onto her shoulder and have a semi panic attack before I manage to breathe and blow my nose and hand her my box of pills and ask her to take them away and we talk about pill dosages and i reiterate everything I’ve written above, and it’s the first time that I have ever told anyone in so much detail – with the possible exception of Kalpana – about how suicidal I have been/am whatever tense you want to use, and so that’s fucking terrifying as well, even if I end up listing stupid reasons why I can’t kill myself (ie – we wouldn’t win at Quiz Night anymore and she’d have to give the QM one of her specialty letters saying “no Jo didn’t kill herself cos you have a g/f you pompous git” etc) and just when I’m starting to come down, Ammy comes in and I so don’t want to talk to her at that time, and so when I try to explain that basically, I need to have my meds upped, she says “well everyone has down patches”. Yes, everyone has down patches, true. I have good patches, sometimes. That’s the difference. That and bad patches should never ever feel this way. Luckily Ammy leaves pretty soon, and KateH says “she has good intentions” adn I know that, but I just can’t deal. KateH is wonderful and nice and calms me down, and we even get in a little gossiping before she has to go off to work, taking my pills with her – promising to return them to me at a later date, because really, codeine in one-pill-at-a-time is lovely, and she drops me off at the shops so I can buy dinner and avoid my flat.

And here I am now, having eaten, and read half of Metro, and having had big long lovely cuddles with Sebastian. My eyes and nose are still stinging and my throat is still sore, but I’m a fuck load calmer, and have been rendered incapable of doing myself any harm tonight, even if I wanted to, which I don’t think I do. I’m seeing Kalpana on Tuesday, and I will try to see Dr White ASAP to get a new med script. Why did I write this up here? Attention seeking, some of you are saying. Sure, why not. Maybe. Maybe because I needed to write it. Maybe because I’d like you to know that if you’ve ever felt this way, you’re not alone. Joanna the altruist, yeah, that’s me. And yeah, I still ache, and I guess I always will.

After work on Tuesday, Karen and I went to jump into the ocean by the lagoon. Something went wrong with the way I was holding my head as I jumped off the plank though, and as I plunged into the water I felt as if I was receiving an enema through my nose. Not a pleasant feeling at all, I tell you. In fact, it made my throat and ears ache, and made me feel really sick. Add to that the teenage boys yelling “stingray!” at each other, and then the something solid that brushed my hand that made me swim and hide behind Kar, and when she saw a jellyfish I was well ready to get out. So I texted the divine Miss Fur and she came to pick me up and we went to the fish’n chip shop in Lyall Bay then drove out of the sun to go eat on the pier by my secret beach.

On Thursday Anji and I went to a pilates class at our gym for the first time. It seemed easy enough while we were doing it, although I got trembling holding my left leg in the air for so long, but afterwards, my abs were screaming. Oh yes, I apparently have abs. And for the rest of that night and all of Friday I felt like I was wearing a corset, I was so aware of them. I drove out to the airport to pick up Lani and three of her giggling friends who are staying with us, and then Lisa came to get me again for the Julia Deans (that’s her from Fur Patrol for those of you not in the know) solo accoustic gig at Happy. We got there shortly after 9pm, and were told it wasn’t on til 10 so we went to Karen’s house and made fun of her for a while before going back. Man oh man was I tired. Ryan Prebble didn’t start playing until after 11, and even though I’m sure he’s a lovely man and that some people were into his music, I started having fantasies about his guitar strings breaking as he was twanging them so hard and cutting him and him bleeding out and dying on stage so that Julia could start sooner. And then the taste in my mouth let me know that I’d actually fallen asleep for half a minute. But when Julia finally started singing, ti was all worthwhile. She did lots and lots of new stuff, no old Fur Patrol, and ‘Freak show’ and wow, her voice sure is stunning. The annoying part was that someone had brought along a baby, who cried. What the fuck? Yes, the baby was wearing ear muffs, and yes, apparently the mother was known to Julia who stopped and said “I know it’s not the volume cos that baby’s been to Shihad gigs!” but hi, you are not Gywneth, and this is not Live8 (and no one should ever aspire to be Gywneth anyways, because dude, could you pick a more bland milksoppy role model? Maybe Andie Mcdowell. But still.). I can put up with screaming kids at the beach because I suppose I do swim by the kids’ playground so I’m asking for it, but I don’t care if Happy was the first smokefree bar and it was fairly quiet, children are totally inappropriate in that context. Yes sir. But yes, apart from that, good times. I thought about how I can totally see the way I’m replacing you in the role that you used to have, and how even though I know what I’m doing is dumb it’s going to happen anyway, but meh, maybe I will go with this week’s counselling work whereby instead of being all “I should be doing this or that” or whatever, I can be all “I am making a choice to do blah blah blah”. I totally dig on how she gets my semantical issues.

Because Lani’s friends were sleeping in the lounge when I got home I couldn’t have my usual unwinding time with the television when I got home, so I couldn’t get to sleep for ages so Friday morning I was dreadfully dreadfully tired, but hopped up on excitement about the forthcoming weekend. After work I went to the ministry social club drinks where Lani introduced me to her friends – many of whom know my father, and I laughed at where a couple of the boys apparently thought my eyes were. I suppose the Mary-Kate and Ashley locket I was wearing that Martha made me buy at Craftwerk did help to draw the eye down to Mary-Kate and Ashley, which was of course totally the point. But it made me feel appreciated. Yes. I only stayed for one glass of wine though, because I ahd to go home to eagerly await the arrival of KateH and Shirley, hurrah! We had a couple of bottles of bubby while doing much gossip catch-up, and it was lovely. A couple of times I felt a bit weird, because I always used to be better friends with both of them than they were with each other, but of course now I live in Wellington and they don’t, so they have all these stories about people I don’t really know and tales to tell about nights together and I was just like “waah, left out”. But Shirley has just moved to Palmy now to finish her grad dip, so the balance will be restored again. Muahaha. We’d planned to go out to dinner but instead I fished bolognaise out of the freezer while they went for more wine. Then we went to Fia’s birthday party, and I didn’t check the address so we wandered around the top of Ghuznee St for ages trying to find a number that didn’t exist, being invited to student parties playing Metallica before I checked my phone and saw I had two digits wrong. So we got there in the end. Mostly I just talked to Karl and Amber, and laughed at the very very drunk very very young lady who tried to hit on both Shirley and KateH because she was missing her girlfriend. When we were in the taxi home I rang Lisa and decided to go to her house to panda-dance, so the girls went home to watch taped Daily Shows which Shirley didn’t like and is therefore off my weddding guest list.

It was a Saturday the next day, strangely enough, but much like last weekend when I didn’t get to sleep in because I went to the Petone fair with Shayne and Lani to see the wonderful Sue and Martha, I had to get up early to make the most of the day. This meant Shirley, KateH and I taking the bus in to the Cuba St Carnival, leaving like before 11am! I know right, haaaaaaaaaardcore. We were as awake as lemurs. Even though I’m sure it got much more crowded as the day went along, Cuba St was buzzing, and I was so fucking proud to be a Wellingtonian. I was also stoked that all of my “I am the boss of the weather and it will be sunny tomorrow!” blustering had paid off and it was still and baking. We wandered around for an hour or so, People’s Coffee from Plum in hand (I actually don’t really like it. Stink), and KateH bought a top, I found a hat that actually fit my huge head in Frutti so I bought that, and Shirley got a hat too. We also popped into Slowboat to see Ev, and now she probably thinks I am insane. Nevermind. Then it was just after 12 and we’d seen everything so I decided we should go home to get my car and go to my secret beach. So we did. KateH and Shirls were all “oooh eeek arrrgh too cold!” so they sat on the beach and read “Next (heh), while I had a bloody nice swim.

Lani and her friends were on salad duty, which cut down on my prep work for Country Club: Australia rather substantially. I went to the supermarket for beer (VB) and assorted snarlers and charcoal and ice and so on and so forth while Shirley and KateH did the dishes. We made dips, filled up a tub with ice and beer and then I turned our washing line into a pavilion in the style of Spiceworld (remember? In the grounds of the big old spooky house and they’re all wearing different coloured bathrobes, sucking chuppa chups and planning how to set up Debra and Clifford) with the help of a large couch cover, some pegs, some lime green netting curtains and assorted mattresses, pillows and lanterns. It looked bloody marvellous by the time I was done, even if it didn’t provide quite as much shade as I’d hoped. The absolutely fantastic Jimmy turned up and for a very long time it looked like he was going to be the only boy there, so he had to Make Fire by himself, although I stood around and fetched beer. Luckily Dave showed up to be manly with him. I had a period of total Hostess Anxiety because the bbq was going slowly so we thought we might have to cook some things indoors, and I didn’t know what, or when or how, and Lani’s friends were in the house so I thought if we took the food outside they might not get anything, and my friends Anne and Frances were in the kitchen preparing respectfully shrimp and falafel and I wanted to talk to everyone at once and make sure that everythign was going okay and the ghetto blaster on the stairs kept skipping on the mix CD Lisa brought (AC/DC and Powderfinger and Icehouse and Midnight Oil and the Vines and Jebidiah etc) aaaaaaaaargh freak out! So I made a choice to just sit down and have another beer. And things got much easier from then on in. I grilled some venison burgers indoors and the shrimp and falafel were fried, and people ate, and the boys tended the bbq most faithfully and more people came adn the sun went down, and ahhhh bliss. Lisa left for a while to go see the Phoenix Foundation play, and Lani and her friends took off, so it was just my posse hanging out. Instead of eating the pavlova I’d bought to be controversial, we toasted marshmallows and pears over the coals and the sugar cominded with the mango margaritas once the beer ran out made me incredibly fucking hypo. I jumped around and danced in the garden to CDs that reminded me of Volcanic and also the Pulp Fiction soundtrack that soundtracked my first-ever pash, and was just very very amped to go back into town to meet up with Shirls and KateH who’d left earlier and see the Battacuda Sound System, or whatever the correct spelling is.

We managed to squeeze six of us into Miss Lisa’s car so we could drop Frances home, and so Kar and Dyl and I were dropped off by Manners Mall to head up to Swan Lane to the big stage and crowds. I was still VERY VERY HYPER and yes, I am writing much like I was talking and jittering. It was fun. While we were waiting for the band to start the boy from the Great Blend showed up, so we chatted for a bit and it was nice to see that contrary to the stoogling results I’d turned up, he is actually just a secret ginga. Heh. Battacuda were SO MUCH FUN! I danced like a crazy person and so my calves are still aching today, because apparently dancing on concrete is not as soft and accomodating as you might think it could be. If you were stupid. I was all very hyped up so we went to Havana after, and danced some more. KateH and Shirley went home but Dyl was all let’s stay out! so I did, and then after one more drink both him and Kar were like “tired now, let’s go” and I was like you guys are DICKS. But there was a taxi right outside the door, and so that was handy. I told Karen to remember it was a black’n gold one, and texted her when I got home fine. I wasn’t that drunk, but I’m trying to form good habits in case of insane drunkenness at a later date. Ahh taking care of myself, nice work.

When I woke up on Sunday I felt like I’d been hit by a truck, what with the calves, and the pimple just inside my nose, and the cut on my foot and the scratches from Sebby who was a little unnerved by the masses of people at the BBQ – so much so that he almost didn’t want to eat steak – but he dragged it away to eat in private and emerged much calmer – and all, but I still managed to get showered and dressed and to take the girls to the Maranui Surf Cafe for breakfast. We had to wait for aaaaaaaaaaaaages to get a table and then for our food but it was well worth it because dude, Wellington is so fucking rad. I dropped KateH in town after that and said sad goodbyes to Shirley who had to return to Palmy for her first day of school today. I spent the afternoon lying in the pavillion reading Prep (so good! although I expected more sex and panties from a book set in a boarding school) and then bonding with my couch and HDD once the wind got too strong. I did a mountain of dishes and threw away salads and prawn heads, but cleanup wasn’t too bad thanks to the wonders of disposable plates. I discovered that Smoo wasn’t actually dead in a gutter but had instead gone to Hammy with Bart for the weekend. When they got back they came over to bbq up the leftovers. But it turns out that Jimmy is teh BBQ King and they can’t even touch him. Much like Hammer. While Bart trying to catch flaming pieces of paper with his bare hands was somewhat entertaining, we resorted to cooking on the stove instead. Smoo ate about a thousand chops, so KateH and I were looking forward to seeing Bart polish off a whole pavlova, but that didn’t happen, sadly. So there is still some passionfruit pav with Kiwiberries (so weird!) in our fridge if you are hungry. Okay? Okay.

Today I got up early to take KateH to the airport, but she fetched me coffee while I was in the shower so I love her for that. And that’s about all I have to say for now, I think.

Monday 6th December
I finally managed to have myself a merry little sleep in, tucked away in Oratia, which was certainly very pleasant, even though I felt terrible cos I got a text from Martina going “Okay I’m ready! Meet me on K’Road” and I had to reply going “umm I just woke up, see you in an hour or so?” But eventually I made my way into town and picked her up, and since it was a gorgeous sunny day we drove over to Devonport and had lunch at Manuka. Then, because it was so very nice and because we both found ourselves being the only other people we knew who wanted to do it, we set off to look for a beach. Now, you’ll of course recall that I once spent the summer working for the North Shore City Council and that my job then seemed to consist of little more than driving around all day getting suntanned. However, that was a long time ago, so we went for a rather extended drive up the motorway to Greville Road and then a long way back down East Coast Bays Road (which pretty much doesn’t go past the sea at all!) trying to find a nice little beach, before I took drastic action and found our way to Milford Beach.

There weren’t very many people there, which was great, and there was a changing shed with showers and an open-roofed area like an Italian courtyard which was great, so we got suited up and tried to get away from any boys on the beach. The water was very very cold and it made me hyperventilate a little bit (“sorry Martina, I know I sound like I’m heavy-breathing at you…”) but it warmed up a little, at least enough to frolick and try to do headstands in. When I started trying to do yoga poses and pretty much ended up nearly drowning myself, it was time to call it a day. The showers weren’t warm, but at least they weren’t salty. We headed back to the right side of the bridge to Occam for some more food and a perusal of Civic’s video sale (Cruel Intentions, Far from Heaven and umm something else for $12) before Martina left me for a ride home. I was waiting for Iva to call me so we could meet up, so I found myself a park to sit in and cuddled up with The Dirt. It’s soooo good. I wish I was in Motley Crue, for serious.

It turned out that Iva was trapped on the shore, so we decided to see each other the next day instead, and I eventually made my way towards KateH’s, via a phone call to La to see if he wanted to come along to the party we were going to that night, for a girlie website that I won’t name – which, after I uttered the magic words “free booze” of course he did, so I told him where the party was at and he said he’d meet us there. At Kate’s I believe we probably watched Shortland St together, and got poshed up, me making the last minute decision to switch from my party frock to my cleavage top (and of course SHRN yellow scarf), which I think in hindsight was quite fortuitous, and we set off to pick up her friend Olly, who is British but edits a certain ‘lifestyle’ paper. Haha, that’s me exercising my ‘get out of jail free’ card again. I get to say “but” because we all know that I find British accents ridiculously hot, BUT I try not to waste my time hankering after boys if I know straight away (as opposed to at Ruby on Friday) that they’re gay. Y’dig? Yeah. Anyways. We had to trek around and around and around The Secret Garden looking for La, cos the entrance isn’t actually on the street that it says it’s on, but eventually we kind of gave up and went in, keen to get started on the free liquor. Or at least I was. Given that KateH was driving, I imagine that she was a little more restrained. I got severely fucked off because Horrible Gay Jonny (and let me point out here that the ‘gay’ tag is used because before him I’d had another Horrible Jonny flatmate) was serving drinks and grrrrrrrr he makes me so mad with his theiving and then his fakeness. Bah. I’ve vented about this already. But I am setting the scene for what comes later by giving a partial reason as to why I downed so so so many glasses of bubbly very quickly ie: I was angus and also a little bored until La showed up. KateB was at the party too, but she left pretty early, so mostly I just talked to Olly and KateH (although they knew lots of people) and La, until much later in the night when we were out the back adn the bubbly had run out and I’d switched to beer and was talking to a whole bunch of random guys and a couple of other people I knew. Now, in further stage setting, let me tell you about the toilets at the Secret Garden – they have shower curtains for doors. Yuck! I’d had one piece of cheese that went straight to my bowels and I was like aaaaargh, but then I thought “Well, you know what? These girls here jostling for space to adjust their makeup, I don’t respect them, why should I care about what they think of me?”. Later though the toilets were all floody and still really crowded, so I couldn’t have a quiet puke, which meant that all the beer and bubbly stayed in my stomach. Foreshadowing.

Eventually almost all the people I knew had left – KateH with the oh so subtle “call my cellie when you get to my house – or if you should happen to be staying in (certain address implying that I would be in someone else’s bed), I can come and pick you up from there”. Aww bless her. I imagine I said something like “Well, I’d like to say that’s not going to happen but I’d probably be lying”. Needless to say pretty much as soon as she’d left, perhaps, I found myself making out with a boy, and soon we were in a taxi on our way to his house. Now, I’ve made out in taxis with three other boys before (oh hush, not all at the same time) and the drivers have always been the embodiment of discretion. This driver was an ASSHOLE. Okay, admittedly I can’t remember exactly what it was that he was saying, but I think it was of the nudge nudge wink wink “go on my son” type commentary which was really really unnecessary, and which probably contributed a little to my later unease. Anyways so I found myself in a house that is very familiar to me, and in fact on a bed that I’d been on before, peeing in a bathroom where I’d peed so many times before mid-coitally, and it was just a little bit strange. Before I knew what was what, he had a condom on, and I was like “woahhhhhhh, wait a minute….” I know that I’ve bitched for a year and a half about my total lack of sex, but what with it staring me in the face like that (so to speak, of course), and the feelings that being back in that house stirred up again, I suddenly realised I couldn’t do it, and I told him so. I’ve been without sex for so long I’m a second-time virgin, and I just think it’d be really wrong to do it with someone that I’m not in love with – or failing love then at least Ridiculously Hot wrists-tied-above-my-head, him-whispering-in-my-ear-about-all-the-things-he’s-going-to-do and then how-he’s-going-to-pass-me-onto-all-his-friends-cos-I’m-such-a-fucking-whore Dirty Passion Violent Fucking. Giggly-drunk-friend-scoring isn’t good enough, unfortunately. So instead, I went down on him (well, I would have anyway) but I was in much more of a hurry for him to hurry up and come so that he’d stop begging me to let him fuck me. He still had the condom on at the start, and that was strange, and of course, his dick was hitting the back of my throat, and I was still full of beer and bubbly, so what happened? Oh yeah, I started gagging and my mouth filled with vomit. Now, I thought I’d just swallowed it back (heh) but after he’d finally finished, he was like “umm, I’m going to go sleep in the lounge, cos you threw up on this side of the bed” and I was like “omg, wtf?” and then I got all offended and was like “FINE! If you won’t sleep with me then I guess I’ll go to Kate’s” (cos you know, I totally had the moral highground on my side – hahahaha) and after he’d left, I groped around in the dark (some more, haha man, how many fucking double entendres can one entry have? I guess this is like, a year and a half’s worth poured into one night) trying to find my clothes, since he doesn’t have a lightbulb in his room. I left without a skirt (luckily I was wearing pants underneath) but with pearl necklaces (haha, see previous-to-previous brackets) and hiked up to the main road to get some cash and find a taxi and hope that my cellphone battery didn’t die, which it seemed to be doing. Somehow though I managed to get a taxi, and the driver seemed much nicer when I complained about the previous one, and KateH got up and let me in and all seemed well in the world.

Tuesday 7th

I woke up around 10.30am, feeling pretty damn sorry for myself, let me tell you. Kateh had left a room outside the room that I was sleeping in with her worknumber on it, so I gave her a call cos I knew she was supposed to come home and turn the alarm on when I left. When I told her that yes, I had gone home with the boy, she briefly wondered why I hadn’t just stayed the night there then, but accepted my explanation that it was weird. I don’t know if I mentioned the puke thing or not – I probably tried to conceal it so that she didn’t worry about her flatmate’s bed. Who knows? Anyways, it transpired that she wouldn’t be able to make it home until lunchtime so I had a cold shower (like I should have had the night before, but nevermind) and settled down with my laptop to write the ‘Things Not To Do Whilst Sucking Cock’ entry that only my Hubrettes can read, and to contemplate how much my black and silver skirt meant to me vs the having to go back to the boy’s house and pick it up. Well, when KateH finally got home it was 2.30pm so I realised I couldn’t put it off anymore, so it was off to the boy’s house with me. Him and all his flatmates were all sitting out on the back porch in the sun. I had no idea what he’d told them, but I do know that the walls there are paper thin (and that the girl he shares a wall with is a prudey little virgin, hahahah). I tried to play it all casual, just “hey, how’s it going?”. He was laughing at me when I had to say “so um, did I leave my skirt in your room?” so I double-casualed it by saying “haha, that sounds really bad”. Yeah I’m going to pretend that your flatmates didn’t hear me faking an orgasm if I want to, okay? Sweet. They were like “oh what are you up to today?” which meant I had a trump card up my sleeve – I told them I was going to go see Iva, which was true but also I knew that there was bad blood between them all, so they started going blah blah blah which took the heat off me and I got to leave holding my head up high. Phew!

Next up on my agenda was a visit to Wendy’s and then to the shore to see Iva Beaver. we sat in the sun and talked about Bernard, amongst other things. Ahh sweet sweet dusty cups. Then I went to meet up with OLIVIA and STEVE and KYLA, once I finally found her house, that is (stupid Americans saying “eighteen” instead of “seventeen”, or more likely stupid hungover not-awake&capable of listening me). After cruising Franklin Road to see the lights and marvel at the audacity of the house with a COFFEE CART in front of it, we went to Joy Bong for dinner, where I struggled to question how the tofu was done in a tofu and eggplant dish I was eyeing up (when I’m around vegans I eat vegan). I got a different dish instead cos I was afraid it’d be the squishy kind I don’t like, and as Olivia said of my tofu, it turns out i want it done like it’s a bouncy castle. It was so great to see them again, cos I haven’t seen them since umm forever, but they were tired from the flight, and I was tired from the debauchary and found myself only able to say “the thing with the stuff” and “so hot right now”. Whatever happened to Verbacious Joanna? We fought over the bill and I thought I won and paid it but the next day I found some cash in my bag so either they slipped it in or I am just terrible with money. Then we went back to Kyla’s to watch half of Harry Potter 3 and make dirty jokes about paedophilia. Have some chocolate little boy, and all of that. Of course the night didn’t last nearly long enough, but sigh, I guess I’ll get to see them again in a couple of years or something.

Wednesday 8th
Having stayed at Kateb’s again, I got up in time to do some research on a Certain Band Who Have A Lot of Members adn Wear Robes because I was interviewing their frontman. He was a little grumpy and the line wasn’t that good. Sigh. Then I drove back to Welly and Sebby was overjoyed to see me. The end.

That’s the whole list. Cheers.

Last night I went to the nzgirl.co.nz party with KateH and KateB – well, I went with KateH as KateB’s date, but they didn’t check invites at the door anyways, which is a good thing because it meant that we could smuggle in La (“hey La, do you want to come to a posh party with free booze?”). It was so very mwah mwah darling. Gay Horrible Jonny was there serving drinks and he was like “hi, mwah, I haven’t seen you in ages” and I was like “oh maybe that’s cos you moved out without giving any notice…” and he was like “this is a party, we’re not going to talk about thsi now”. I wanted to punch him in the face very very much. He could have just poured me another drink and not said anything. I don’t get how people who have burnt their bridges in two cities by making off with half of everyone that they’ve stayed with’s cd collections can not know that oh gee, maybe people aren’t very happy about it. La was like “let it go…” but the thing is that Jonny and I weren’t on bad terms to the best of my knowledge when he moved out, which is what makes it worse. Anyways.

I had about eight glasses of bubbly before that ran out and then I had to switch to beer and god knows how many of those I had. A lot. Right now I am at the lovely KateH’s house but at some stage I will have to go and find my skirt at the boy’s house which I don’t especially want to do. Fuck I hate lecherous taxi drivers. Like, if people are macking it in the back of your cab, sure, watch, but DON’T COMMENT. Fuuuuuuucking hell.

It’s funny cos tomorrow when I will call the land lady to give her three weeks notice, it will be exactly a year since we moved in here.

So yeah. That’s me. Of course, to the people in the Internet world, it won’t make any difference since I’ll still be online. Chances are to the people up here it won’t make much difference either. <!– I’m going to go back to Welly where I feel like people really do have my back. –>

Oh my god, one of Dana’s friends has her kids around, and they’re crazy. It’s been a long time since I nannied. Maybe I oughta see if I can babysit when I get back to welly. But oh my god, the kids I used to babysit for will all be in high school by now almost. SCARY! I’m tired of growing old. I can’t wait to go home.

Before then I will have to 1) get rid of my car 2) get rid of excess furniture 3) pack up all my stuff and put it into storage up here 4) pay off bills 5) say goodbye to anyone who cares, 6) cancel the electricity, washing machine, telephone etc etc. Thank the lord my mummy is coming up on Tuesday to help me with it. I’m going to fly back with Sebastian on the 20th, when I already have a flight booked, then come back up on the 27th to clean and resolve anything that’s left unresolved, spend New Years hopefully with Thomas and Jo, and then go back and yeah.

For a nice guy who told me that he hadn’t had sex outside a relationship before, he still managed to fuck me in half a dozen positions, transitioning seamlessly between them.

Yeah! This is going to be fun. Plus this way I get to pretend that I’m still hot and desirable instead of sitting around wearing old jeans in desperate need of a decent haircut and some proper shampoo.

So, Jo’s life as of November 25th. Well. Still searching for the perfect job. Still not sure how she’s going to pay the bills. Still questioning the meaning of life. Making sure she takes her pills regularly every morning and never lets doctor&pharmacys fuck her around again so she ends up going ten days without them.

Other than that, what ho? Hmmmm. Sebastian went AWOL for eight days, causing me no end of worry. I pashed a hot boy who looked like he was from The Strokes, but he was British, and British boys NEVER come home with me. I don’t know what’s up with them. What’s up with you Brits eh? Are you all prudes? (Actually he had a girlfriend. Whoops). I need two flatmates. I moved my bedroom furniture around. I may move the lounge furniture around although now that La’s gone I no longer have a willing helper monkey. And that’s it. That’s all that’s happened to me in the past shit, nearly two months. Fuck.

So it doesn’t matter that he seems like he is a sexual deviant. It doesn’t matter that he rejoices in my hairy legs that he takes the time to rub his cock up and down. It doesn’t matter when he licks my armpits, or tries to fuck me in the morning when he’s still wearing the same condom. He is no one. He is nothing. It doesn’t matter.

I don’t have new things going on in my life which is kind of a problem given that I need constant stimulation to keep me going. I feel very out of the loop now that I no longer receive free movie tickets and cds. I haven’t left the house in ummmm two weeks to go anywhere but the shops. No work and no play makes Jo a dull girl. No work and no play makes Jo a dull girl. No work and no play makes Jo a dull girl. You get the general idea. So right now I’m trying to correct that, in the sense of downloading free mp3s from NZm to see if I can find a great new NZ band I can love and hopefully I’m going to a show tomorrow night. Must. get. out. of. the. house. Of course, all donations of mix cds, tapes, old books and magazines will be most gratefully accepted.

I also should be creating more than I am. Maybe I oughta do my portfolio site. In fact, there’s absolutely no maybe about that at all. A few more job applications wouldn’t go astray either. I’m bloody sick of rejection letters though. If only the dole paid about $50 a week more – or my flatmates were able to cough up for their bills instantly – life would be so much sweeter. I could go out! I could do things! Oh yeah, did I mention that my car is totally dead? That kinda sucks some ass too.

What I need I think is a makeover. Maybe the Fab Five could come over and laugh at my clothes (“you have HOW MANY bonds tshirts? and they’re all tight on your nipples like that?” “What are these shoes? Silver plastic? Are you from the Jetsons?” “Christmas lights? Tack city! And what’s with all the saris?”) and change my life. Already half the time I think I have Joss Whedon doing commentary over my life (“And in this scene, Jo’s watching TV. Again. The empty dishes piled at her feet adn the newspaper opened to the ‘Situations Vacant’ are there to really drive home the loneliness she’s feeling, while soon the demons she’s battling will come back cos we’ve cut off her cipramil”). I think maybe instead I need less TV in my life. But Heather Havrilesky is the best thing about Salon, and if I never watched TV again, how would I know what she was talking about?

His hands are on my head, pushing back my head to secure his view and to make sure I don’t move my mouth away. I can taste his tang and it’s all I want for now, all that I could ever want, but there’s a knocking at the door, and he says that it’s her.

Oh yeah, crack out the porn, Jo. I do think that I’d probably have a good career in Erotica writing. I just need to get me a laptop so I can be more savvy about it. How exactly does one become an Erotica Writer? Or rather, a Writer of Erotica Who Makes a Living out of it? Perhaps even An Erotica Writer With A Shiny Laptop AND an Aeron Chair? An Erotica Writer with a Shiny Laptop and an Aeron Chair Who Can Afford to go see Her Hairdresser Again And Fill Said Hairdresser With Accumulated Scandals and Gossip, And Who Can Also Find Another Pair of $30 Jeans from Farmers That Fit All Lovely Except That Now They Have Big Thigh Holes And Are Thus Rendered Useless. Yeah, that’d be sweet.

PS: my hubris mail went down for a couple’o days, so if you emailed me and didn’t get a reply, try again. Cheers.

The hot German girls are staying with us – again. I knew they were coming up cos they stayed with my parents a couple of nights ago, and inadvertently stole their toothpaste. Allison is also still here, and Bo’s definitely staying, so that fucking rocks my world more than I can express here. This morning she and I went to the press preview of “Spirited Away” which is by the same people as “Princess Momonoko” – not that I’ve seen it – and it was amazing, so totally dreamlike. Cheesy happy ending, but I guess that’s a good thing.

I forgot to go to Summer Series, so I missed out on DImmer which sucked, but we listened to it out on the porch under the faerie lights, so that was good enough. What else should I talk about? Hmm. Oh, KateH is going to lend us a single mattress for Megan, so that Ammy can get her bed back, and then therefore give Bo back her bed. And apparently Jonny has been paid so he might buy a bed and we’ll get our pullout couch back – either for the ballroom or the lounge, I haven’t decided yet. We have at least four boxes of empty bottles out waiting on the curb, that’s terrible Muriel. And very shortly, I will mobilise the troops and get us to all sneak our extra rubbish into everyone else’s bins.

I can’t get my bond back from the last flat til Clay comes back from America cos we both have to sign the release form, but then I will buy a TV, hopefully before a certain gentleman arrives in the city, because fucked if I would actually want to CONVERSE with him! And speaking of other Gentlemen, well… last night I was all like, no hope, but I have renewed optimism. God bless you young lady, even if I did call you last night and tell you that i hated you.

We had nine people in our house last night – me and Seb, Megan, Jonny and Ting, Ammy and Darren, Bo and Leo and Allison and Louise, and yet it didn’t feel at all crowded. I HAVE MY BO BACK! Fuck I feel good today.

Shit man, it’s like the Bic Runga song – something good has come my way. And so maybe my heart is taking on retro stylings, but it don’t bug me at all. And sure, Seb pooed on my bed again this morning, but with every stroke I feel my blood pressure dropping. Oh and Louise just topped up my glass, what a gem.

Oh yeah, but I guess I should remember that there’s a mad man with his finger on the nuclear button. Well hey – I have flat feet, so the army won’t call me up.

So it’s Anniversary Weekend in Auckland right now, which means that I have the day off tomorrow, which means that i’ll probably spend a large chunk of the day rolling around in bed with Sebastian, and reading ‘The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay’, although unfortunately, I’m quickly running out of pages left. It’s a great fucking book, and it reminds me a lot of ‘Carter Beats the Devil’ which was also excellent.

When did I last update? My job is still bliss, I’m writing all the copy for the first issue and I’m rocking at it. Plus I have my first feature story on the go now as well. The whole office had brainstorming sessions on Friday morning, and then semi team building exercises that consisted of putting up our new tent, and then we were all taken out to lunch at the Mexican Cafe. Note to self: Mexican chilli oil is HOT, and is not at all like ordering thai or Indian as ‘Hot’. Oh no. This is the red liquid of death, so I was unable to finish my meal. But I was still overflowing anyways, and drunk off two coronas. Luckily, we had the afternoon off afterwards, so I went home, and was dazzed enough to let Megan talk me into going to the pet store with her, hence why I am now the loving mother to a tiny little kitten called Sebastian. He is so sweet! He is so gorgeous! He is going to be completly loved to death! Peter came over later to see the kitten and to hang out, and umm what else did I do? Probably polished off the last of the Anne’o Green Gables books I borrowed off Nikki. Is it totally wrong of me to be picturing Anne and Gilbert having sex? I guess so. How VULGAR of me. Heh. That’s KateH’s and Nikki’s and my new catchword.

On Saturday there were huge big thunderstorms and rain in the morning which made it perfect weather for reading and catcuddling in bed. KateH came over and joined us, and then Nikki rang so I invited her over for the evening. KateH left to go home for a nap as soon as Nikki showed up, bringing with her a couple of bottles of wine and a lot of beer. So she and I sat down to start drinking and talked our jaws off. KateH came back in time for the spinach soup and of course we all called each other vulgar a lot. Eventually we were sitting in the ballroom and KateH went to go change the tape (Ammy has her cd player with her in Welly) and she found an old “Sounds of Garland” tape, and so of course she put that on, and so of course we got up and shook our collective booty. Eventually Katie put on her suit and slunk out the back door for another function, and Nikki and I stayed up talking and drinking more til I had to tuck her up on the couch with a bucket at her side. That’s what friends are for.

In the morning’o today, Nikki went and picked up Kate from her house so she could pick up her car, and the two’o them helped me dump the big couch out on the back porch. Nikki also filled my car battery with distilled water, and apparently it might even work now, once I get someone to jump start me. Hmmm, i think Sebastian has mountainclimbing urges. He’s perched on my shoulder now, clawing at my hair. You go little kitty, you go. Oh, we also have a washing machine now, rented at $36 a month which is much cheaper and more convient than laundromat fees. Now I can think about getting a tv. Our house is totally a home now. Bop’s had her mail directed here and she’s coming up next week. I am filled with glad tidings.

In the best journalistic tradition, I spent today and yesterday (when I could actually log on at work) rewriting press releases. But then again, it is kinda PR cos it’s for our publications offering stuff. I think I’m rully rully going to love this job eh. I get to be creative, and I feel like I have my finger on the pulse, and all the ideas I’ve had so far have got the go ahead. YAY. I deserve good job karma.

Ammy came up to me tonight and put her arms around me and thanked me wholeheartedly for making this flat work, and that was just totally sweet of her, and it’s just really cool here and nice and stuff, and yay. Even if we still don’t have a tv (or washing machine) which meant I had to go to KateH’s last night ot watch SS. Not that that’s any hardship of course (well at least not for me). And then I met Ammy and Darren and Megan and James in town and saw LOTR again. I texted Tom right before it to say hi, but told him not to reply cos it’d make me vibrate. He replied a couple of hours later saying “Now if I can just time this to be at the same time that Aragorn opens the doors, won’t I be the man?”. He got the timing wrong but still, I appreciated the sentiment!

Mazzy thought that I would write about how she told me that she couldn’t come to my party but then showed up as a surprise in a “bear” mask, but she was wrong. My skin is peeling off in big chunks from everywhere – it looks particularly gross around my neck. I have too many boys on my mind right now and I can’t figure out which ones I’m using as an excuse not to fancy the other ones, and it’s driving me crazy, but not must-find-cash-for-Kalpana crazy. What else? We have a “staff development day” at work on Friday which means a talk, and then lunch at a bar, and then early home. Asskicking. Just as long as they don’t try to make me wear a polarfleece. My god but it’s hot in Auckland! And I have finally been bitten by mosquitos here. Oh well. Also I’ve made the disturbing discovery that Jonny plays the bagpipes. We’re planning on getting him to march up and down in front of the houses across the street playing them, since we figure that one of them must have called Noise Control on us.

Tomorrow I am doing a market survey on soft drinks. Crazy.

xojo

The next day, Brad had to go back to work, so eventually, after I ahd to endure hours of “Aladdin and the King of Thieves” on TV waiting for Katie to come back from the radio station, Kate and I drove to Hamilton, via Burger King and Rotorua. She let me stop off to go wading somewhere along the way, but she wouldn’t let me get a float from Macdonalds, so instead I got total Passenger Arm instead, and screamed at roundabouts. And then Mazzy Star made us cokefloats in her new house in Hammy, so that was cool, and we went to Briscoes cos it was airconditioned and I didn’t buy any bed linen, and then I took the bus back up to auckland.

Then on the Saturday, me and Megan and Peter went out. Lumiere has yummy cocktails. Peter sucks at playing High-Low, unless your definition of it is taking 40 drinks to get across the cards. Megan is very amusing. Deschlers was shut at 2.30am and I nearly cried. Sunday was boring, and I put my bed together adn tried to sort out my room. Today I got to work at 10.30am, and (umm fuck, did I have a psuedoname for her?) the girl I work with and I had a rather lengthy lunch and then after work she came here and we demolished a couple of bottles of wine, gossiped and I cooked risotto for her and Peter. And so now that’s like, NOW. And I’m up to date. Kickass me. OH! And hi, have you sent me a package lately? because according to megan, there was an envelope in my letterbox for me one day when she went to work, and when she came home it was gone. Mystery! xojo.

When I was walking back to The Slab after work where I’d parked my car, a guy on a bicycle said “Sexy!” at me so I scowled at him, and then he stopped and asked me for directions to High Street, so I thought maybe I’d misheard him, and then as he rode off, he said “you’re still really sexy” so that was a little odd. I smiled after that though.

I swear, if my ex landlady calls me ONE MORE TIME I will totally lose it. In fact, I’d almost be willing to forfit the whole $1200 bond she owes us if I could have a guarantee I’d never have to encounter her ever again.

Megan is super cool. We still need a fourth flatmate. Megan is serving at my work Xmas party tomorrow, and then at the Shortland St function at Ammy’s work tomorrow night. We’re so good to her.

I still haven’t come to terms with the fact that it’s less than a week til Xmas. I feel decidedly unfestive.

I had a job interview today (yes, another one), for an NGO. I think they liked me. I also think that maybe i’m not qualified enough. Well, I can do pretty much everything they want, EXCEPT, and this is a big except, budgeting. Bleh. However, I do have another job interview on Monday, and I think I am ideally qualified for that job, so we’ll see.

I boxed some stuff up today, and also met a potential flatmate, and I think we clicked really well, so hopefully when he sees the inside’o the place, he’ll still want it. I hate looking for flatmates.

Kalpana rang me today to see if I wanted to make another appointment before Xmas (sheesh, psychologist stalker styles) and so I capitulated, and made one for next friday morning. Actually, it’s not a question of capitulating at all – I really fucking need to talk to someone right now. And at least if I’m paying her, then she’ll have time for me. (And if you think that’s a dig at you, you’re probably right. You know, Anji hasn’t returned my calls in nearly 3 months? When she did call, she was so drunk all she could do was talk about how she was in love – she has no idea what’s going on in my life. And don’t get me started on everyone else. Yes, I know you’re all busy. You also know I’m incredibly self absorbed and IT’S ALL ABOUT ME, goddamit).

Stupid bloody notes from stupid bloody landladies. Let me get some sleep you vile creature.

PLEASE LET ME GET SOME MOTHERFUCKING SLEEP, CONSTRUCTION!

I hate boxing things up and packing and cleaning.

There’s restructuring and turmoil at work, and people’s personalities are really starting to fray.

I just wish I could have my old flatmates back – maybe ummm say Brad and Simon to balance out numbers for me and Bo rather than having to answer stupid people’s stupid questions. How many fucking times do I have to tell you that no, you can’t see the place until the 15th? Grr. Oh yeah, you do want to move in with me, by the way. Email me.

I emailed Shirley today, for like the first time in about three months, so I had to recap all the shit that I’ve been going through, and that’s never fun. On a similar vein, I’ve been keeping a list of things that I want to talk to Kalpana about, next time I can afford to go see her, and I’ve included on that list something that really, I very much would rather not talk about, but i guess if it still affects me then maybe actually I should. Ick. Maybe I will book my next appointment in for the afternoon after our staff Xmas Party so I can at least be drunk and it’ll be a little easier. Except then I’ll just end up bawling and I haven’t done that yet. She only has one box of tissues in her office. It’s way too sterile.

I had a job interview today and I think I impressed them a lot. I’m afraid the job environment could be very Foodstuffesque though, so I will be forced to think very very very long and hard about what my priorities are if they offer it to me (pay rent or feel like I’m going somewhere? pay rent or feel like I’m going somewhere?)

Tomorrow Ammy and I will be interviewing prospective flatmates HERE, rather than at the actual house. Personally, I think the most important thing is that the people are cool and we can get along, and if they don’t feel that way well then that tells you somehting.

Tonight I had emmediate and watched “Not One Less” instead of drinking vodka. It was a good movie. I have leftovers.

2. I have also read Harry Potter 2 and 3, and they’re okay, but they seriously don’t stand up to C.S Lewis, although the whole kiddie-Internet-Porn aspect of the Chamber of Secrets was amusing (oh come on, young girls SHOULD NOT be writing in diaries to random strangers!)

3. There’s an ad for our flat up on the channel z website, clearly stating the cost’o the rooms, and that there’s OSP. I got this email about it: “Hi Joanna Just seen your advert on the channelz site for a flatmate. Im 23 yr old prof male. Is there off street parking? How much are you charging for the room? Im a great guy to have around on those mornings when your car wont start! Cheers” On second reading, I realised that his email address is wrx_channelz@* . I’m not very enthusiastic about the idea of him moving in, eh.

4. We had our last ever Party At The Slab. Much sangria was consumed. It was fun.

6. The Departure Lounge has put in booths now, yay. However, they’re now serving Allpress instead’o Gravity. Semi-boo – it’s still nice though.

7. I would like back the three hours of my life that I just gave to Pearl Harbor tonight please.

8. Clay and Bo have both started boxing stuff up. WAAAH!

9. I very very much need to find some flatmates ASAP. Gorgeous house in Balmoral, and all that good stuff. Tell your friends. Email me. Thank you.

10. I got rather drunk at the Admin lunch on Friday. Office ladies oggling waiters – scary.

11. If you’re planning on sending me Xmas pressies (or my late birthday present even) you should email me for my new address, or send them to my parents’ house, cos I am moving out in ONE WEEK’S TIME.

12. I dropped my cellphone in a glass of water. D’oh. If anyone has an old vodaphone they wanna lend me til after Xmas, I will kiss your feet. I miss txts, especially Tom, like crazy.

13. I can’t even afford Therapy anymore. Ick.