Hubris.co.nz

Six months in a leaky boat

On Friday December 16, we packed up our offices in the morning, computers, phone cords and everything. I therefore had people yelling at me to pack up my phone when I had just received an email from my mother telling me that Oma’d had another stroke and was in the hospital again. I couldn’t reach her on the phone, so on the pretense of untangling computer cords, I crawled under my desk and cried. We lugged some crap around, and went over to the office building. Eventually I skipped out and took a bus back home for a cold shower, and my workmate came and picked me up and we went to her house to get ready for our Loveboat themed Xmas party – and for those of you playing at home, it took us exactly the length of Purple. Now there’s a flashback. Anyways, so we went back to our other work building and had drinks and then sat around on the street for a while, before being loaded up on a bus, driven down to the docks, and then walking a ways to the Sweet Georgia. The bars along the waterfront were loaded with people, and I was dressed like a bride, so I felt a tiny bit silly – although I suppose there were other people who were dressed sillier. But that’s okay, cos we got on the boat and headed out onto the harbour, and there was much food and booze and Titanic impersonations and a little too much sing-alonging. And there were DOLPHINS! A whole pod of them swimming alongside the boat for ages. And then there was anchoring at Soames Island, and ghosty stories, and eventually there was flashage, although not from me, because I was surprisingly soberish. I still went home and cried on Anji’s shoulder though, because I am a fucking idiot. You can see all of the rest of my photos from the Xmas party in this tagged part of my flickr files.

Call me loyal

On Saturday December 17, I went to my cousin Iain’s wedding, or rather the reaffirmation of their vows. It was held at my aunt & uncle’s place in Waikanae, cos they have a massively huge garden, with ponds and geese and bears, oh my. I didn’t see any bears though. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that I was making the bears up. It was very very hot in the sun, but everyone looked lovely, as you can see for yourself in this part of flickr. My father tried to make a speech, which was rather embarrassing, and Karen mocked me for running away from the geese, and I kept getting locked in the toilet cos the handle turned funny, and yet it all made me want to get married ASAP please. Cheers. Oh, and Iain, if you’re reading this, Karen Anji and I were the ones who didn’t label the gifts, so the 500 thread count sheets (mmmm) and the greenstone necklace were from us. Thanks for having us, it was grand!

Crowded House

After we got back from Waikane around 11pm that night, I convinced my daddy (since Mum and Anji had gone to Oma’s house to try and catch Oma’s cat to take him to a cattery) to take me home so that I could get changed and then drop me at Kartini’s party in Aro Valley. I took nine minutes getting changed. Don’t ask me why I keep telling you how long it takes me – I just feel like telling you. Don’t mess with my self-disclosing. Kart’s party was at Nial’s house, and there were an awful awful lot of people there crammed on steps and doorways and kitchens and benches. I had a long conversation with a girl who’s in an up-and-coming Wellington band, and she made me feel special when she was like “oh, are you that Joanna – you and Heather are the people whose opinions I listen to there!” and I was like awwwwwww and we talked about what works in music and what doesn’t. I saw the boy who makes my vagina go boing, and it went boing, and there was lots and lots and lots of dancing to records. Mike played hip-hop, and then Kris (who I finally didn’t address as Jess – the name of her dog) played Atomic-y type music, and I laughed and laughed and laughed when she played ‘This Charming Man’ and then ‘Love will tear us apart’ one after another the way that the Atomic DJs always do. And then I saw Ammy! And that was very exciting because of course she left the country in Julyish 2003 and I hadn’t seen her since, and so I had to catch her up on two years in ten minutes. The party was full of creative people, from crew on Kong, to musicians, to people who talked loudly about the short films they were making. It was nice and stimulating – so much so that I was out til well past 4am, which was a capital effort on my part, I thought, considering the amount of sun and bubbly I’d had.

Oma

On Sunday Anji, Karen and I made merry at the Mediteranean Food Warehouse in Newtown, pausing not long enough for me to learn how to spell Meditblahblah but long enough for pizza, and gelato, and the buying of many, many antipasto type things (and your knowledge of Anji buying them will come back into play later)

to be continued

And once again, I think it’s been a while. And once again I’m wondering what I have to tell you that’s new and interesting. I got sucked in to reading old journals again today – that happens way too often, and man, my life was just so much more full of drama. I don’t know if that made me more interesting or not. Looking back, it was intriguing to watch me slide down into darker and darker internal circles – having been through that makes me want to clap my hands together and go “aahhahah it’s not funny because it’s TRUE” when those new depression ads come on, with people talking about how they stopped talking to their friends because they thought that they weren’t interesting enough, and how so therefore their friends stopped calling them and it was all self fulfilling prophecy, etc etc. I really like those ads, I think they get the point across really well, and they have the bonus of being all collector-cardy, like ooh, I can collect the whole set. But I think the point was that I don’t feel like that anymore. There are things I miss about the old me, like the fearlessness that allowed me to speak my mind and take the plunge like giving people the pop quizwhen I wanted to. I wonder if anyone besides me and random search engine guests ever read my archives. I know that if I ever find a site that I really like, I do go back and read it all, like Dooce, or the Julie-Julia Project or whatever. Ha, you can tell that I’ve been doing a lot of style guides for print, can’t you, with the way that I italicised the site names instead of providing links. Well, that or I’m lazy.

What do you want for Xmas? More specifically, what should I buy my family for Xmas? I have some thoughts (SPOILERS! Ha.) – Anji and I have decided what we want to get Cousin Iain & Anny for their wedding present, and she and I also plan on getting Mum some fancy schmancy cushions, and I have two CDs for Karen (Sing-sing (ex-Lush singer) and the new Kate Bush CD), and I want to get Anji a paedo-meter, since she hates children so much (hahah oh the jokes just don’t stop coming), and maybe the Pop Trivia Trivial Pursuit DVD, and I want to get the Who wants to be a millionaire? DVD for Daddy, but beyond that, I dunno. I can tell YOU that I want the Freaks & Geeks box set, and also the Veronica Mars box set as soon as it comes out, cos I’ve stopped TWOPing it cos I’m never actually going to see it, cos I accept that I’ll never actually be home early on a Friday night, especially not with the Xmas season upon us, and the assorted dramas that have happened at work lately. As well as our Xmas party, due to our location we’re going to be having a King Kong party when the movie has its big premiere. Wahoo. Over the holidays our offices are going to be renovated. The girls are moving to the third floor – or um, I suppose that’s actually the second floor, stupid NZ system – and the boys are moving down to where we were. Yes, that’s right, we’re segregated so that there are no interminglings – it’s not that most of the techie staff are male and the project managers are female, oh no. It’s all about stopping the intermingling. One of the guys at work was teasing me and another cow-orker about how we’d gone home in a taxi together on Friday night (oh the scandal of living a block apart!) and said he’d taken a photo of us getting into the cab together. I was like “yeah, the sex I had on Friday night was great – I must have come at least three times” and the other guy was like “huh? I didn’t notice” so I waggled my hand at them, which fits in well with me still thinking “why the hell was I giving a virtual demonstration of my favourite masturbation technique on Friday at Kitty’s?”. Oh the hilarity. I suppose given how much we’d hassled the hassling guy the week before, it was only fair. And in answer to my question about Kitty’s, I suppose it was because I was bought a shot of Green Chatreuse, and my skin started crawling, and I felt really out of it, and was worried that I would end up behaving inappropriately so I nearly went home. But I stayed and talked some more shit and oggled the owner of Boulot some more. Mmmmm proscuitto and rocket pizza. Now that’s what I like to have in my mouth at the end of a long night.

Since I’ve got back into the traditional “this is what I did on Friday, now this is what I did on Saturday” story-telling mode, I will say that on Saturday night the lovely Miss Lisa Fur came and picked me up and took me to her house in Brooklyn where we watched Fast Times at Ridgemont High (“you’re a DICK!”), and the The Office Xmas special. I shed a tear or two. Then on Sunday, Karen came over for a roast and so that she and Anji could finally see the rest of Firefly. I shed a tear or two again.

This bad neighbours TV show just compared willow trees to herpes. Nice. Man, NZ shows are so often so shit – which is why it’s so great that The Insiders[sic] Guide to Love is sooooo good. And on a drama note, Brad was down from Whaka-Carnie this weekend, and so he came over and told me that he got a grant for his trip to Philly – wooo – but he’s also going to organise a School Dance as a fundraiser in February. That’ll be k-rad. I’m suggesting he call it a Prom. Except then I’d need to find a prom dress, and I’m already having enough trouble with how much I’m procrastinating about sorting out my Loveboat costume. A slacker is I. I must say though, that having given up four lunchtimes a week does make it harder to get things done. Except for exercising, of course, which is gradually getting easier. I know I’ve been ranting about this lately, but I’ll put it in again for historic value, so that one day I can look back and laugh like how I laugh when I talk about listening to house music or thinking Pacey was hot (Dawson’s Creek reruns on Sundays! Season one! Excellent!). I am in love with the xtrainer. If I listen to swirly guitar music like the Smashing Pumpkins or The Cure, I can shut my eyes, pretend I’m dancing at a concert and stay on it for twice as long. Hurrah! Ha, I wonder what impression people who are new to Hubris would get from reading that sentence. Yes, once again I am all about how other people see me. That’s cos I’ve been reading about many sessions with Kalpana. Ahh history.

In the interests of full self-disclosure, I will tell you that it’s late. I’ll tell you that it’s 12.45am if you would like me to be precise, and I will say happily that I have been drinking since 5.30ish. So what’s been going on? And who is John G?

Haha, I totally forgot what I was going to say, cos I was getting all angry at random other sites, and cos I was watching Momento as I’m sure you already gathered from the title, and the I was posting on Well Urban and then I was talking to Calum, and then I was wishing that you all were Tom,(but like, the auldskool one, not Mr. Beard) just because of the Momento jokes that we used to have, and also because while I do still have friends now, I don’t have many injokes with them, and mostly I just have silly MSN animated gif jokes with workmates, and that makes me feel like a dick. Ha ha, remmeber when I had a life and I didn’t work all the time? Really? Cos i’m not sure I do. And to be honest, I don’t know how much I rally have to offer you that’s new and interesting. I mean, I could tell you that I am wirting this journal entry with my eyes shut and I am looking in the distance, but I don’t think tat me being all “oohn other people” is the way to makie me be all cool and stuff. Also, informercials are fucking me off. And, I’m drunk. And, Plan A is officially (OFFICIALLY!!!) dead in the water, so it can snack on my cockhole. K rad, fun

xojo

Oma’s sick again. She’s in hospital now with gall stones, but on Saturday she was still at home, so on Saturday morning Anji and I set out to visit her. However, we had to go and pick up Karen from a house that was not her own first, which was annoying but was also an endless source of amusement – at least to me and Anji, because Karen was getting more than a little sick of our jokes. I was extremely overtired, and more than a little hungover, so we did the drive-through thing, so then I was hyped up on caffiene. Ethel’s getting on a bit in years so we took her up to Ngaio to swap her for Mum’s car, which has the additional bonus of a CD player. We played Led Zepplin and I waved my arms around a lot like I was Bonzo. Eventually someone suggested to me that I only talk in rhyming couplets, and so I did (*). For like half an hour until we got to Oma’s, and then for a while then when I wasn’t talking directly to her (language and hearing miscommunications would have just made that way too hard). I suggested to my aunt that she might like to take the opportunity of us being there to go out and have some time to herself, which she did – which meant we had to stay for ages. Anji was great, talking up a storm. I was less so. When Aunt Diz got back though, she said that Oma had totally perked up and that we’d worked like a tonic on her. A tonic with gin, perhaps? It had been quite amusing to hear Oma telling us that Diz had been bullying her (much like it’s hilarious when Mum complains about Oma complaining about Mum not returning her phonecalls). Oma was also very very big with telling us old stories, which was great. I could have done without the whole “this is how much you guys are getting in my will when I die” speech though.

On the way back from Paraparaumu we made a short but scary stop in Coastlands for something to eat, and we all pretended to be Britney Spears with frappe type drinks from Muffin Break. I dazzled Anji and Karen with my amazing grasp of geography, managing to figure out a much quicker way out of the mall through the cinema. We went back up to Ngaio and Anji picked up Ethel while I absconded with the car and took Karen home. Then it was nap time, finally.

Later, Miss Lisa Fur picked me up for our hott bear-cub planning date, otherwise known as seeing The Phoenix Foundation with SJD at the Opera House. While we were waiting the long time before the show started, we played the “who knows more people here?” game. Because of the number of musicians present, we made it that you’d had to have at least talked to the person in the flesh for them to count. I only managed four – Mr and Mrs Noizy, Sam Scott and Nato. Umm, not to name drop or anything. But while I AM namedropping, I’ll say that we were sitting by the door to backstage, and sometime during the Phoenix Foundation, someone that I think was SJD came and collapsed in the seat next to me, talked to someone behind me for a while and then sat there texting away for a couple of songs before leaving again. Not cool. The light was really distracting. That said, the Phoenix Foundation was unbelievably excellent. I think I am now a huge fan of sit-down gigs, and large scale production values, and comedy lead teams and cute home movies with adorable kids and and and oh yeah so good. Yes. Fantastic. I think it’s one of my top three gigs’o the year, along with Nick Cave and the Straitjacket Fits. Ohhhhh yeah.

On Sunday, since my parents were at Toast Martinborough and the car was still at our house, I drove all the way around the Miramar peninsula, starting at the old Navy base or whatever it is, and then all the way up to Owhiro Bay and back through Brooklyn. It was really nice to be playing party mix CDs really loud and singing along, and it was sunny despite the wind, and just really great time to myself. Then I grocery-shopped, which wasn’t nearly so interesting, but had to be done. And that was the weekend, with a little laundry thrown in there as well. I am a party animal. At least I got home late on Friday night *), because I am a spaz. Today I am really tired, just for a change, although going to the gym has perked up my mood (who’da thunk it?), and tonight I am going to Serenity again with Lisa, and my mother who needs a healthy chunk of escapism right about now, I reckon.

All of todayk, I have been about to collapse over and fall asleep. I didn’t sleep at all last night. Stupid pre-period bright light, lower back pain, stupid brain going tick tick tick. Stupid girl drinking coke at 7pm. Stupid oversensitive-to-caffiene existingness. YEAH! SO this afternoon, I was very very mcuh like “hi, I know we have our weekly production meeting right now, but do you mind if I fall asleep right here and now?”

As it happened, we were actually bidding farewell to a colleague, and they talked in her speech about the air of calm she gave, and since she was one of my project managers, I can totally agree that yes, she was calm-making. And now she’s gone. But at least we had butt-loads of Pandoro goodies to ease the tradition. And we all know that pandoro muffins are so hot right now. Oh I’m sorry, that’s err “da bomb”. I forgot it was 1996. Also, haha Joel, seriously, you’re all crazy and shit – you are planning on the face punch right? Remind me to put those links in when my ISP actually catches up to reality. Did I say my ISP? Oh you all know I’m using my mother’s account. (Edit: see how I blamed my inability to link properly on my ISP, rather than the many glasses of Church Road Sav Blanc? Nice. That’s what my Grad Dip PR Com was for. But I think I’ve put in the right links now…)

It’s funny, cos for five minutes or so, I was like “huh, those ex-workmates of mine that I’m making fun of – what if they make fun of me?” but then I was like “well, what would they say that I wouldn’t agree with?” and then I laughed some more. But on a more serious note, the directors put on some drinks tonight (*) and we were at the Courtenay Arms, which is where VUWSA had its Xmas party last year when I was like “I’m going to be leaving after Orientation, cos I am 10k short of what I should be making”, and now I am 12k up, and working happily, and not having to deal with RANK ARROGANT AMATUERS all the time (and if I spelled that wrong, it was Anji’s fault, cos she spelt it for me,a nd she has like, a degree in literature) and also just, I like almost all my workmates. Where the fuck was I? I can’t remember.

Oh wait, foozeball. I have searched the archives right now, and am curfrenly laughing my guts out about feta jokes that Bo and I made together. Also, WHERE THE FUCK has peppercorn feta gone? I don’t think it exists anymore. And now I spent like half an hour looking for an obscure reference to our first year Peach Pit environment (yes, htat’s Pizza Pizza I’m talking about) or how there happebned to be some boys who had happened to come across half a Nikki Watson poster from Sandringham Road that haapppened to be in our backyard and I was lying on her boobs in the photograph, and wait, what was my point? I totally forget. But I will say hey, remember that time that I had two girl friends,and then there were these three guys that we all hung out with? And remember how the three of us had it all worked out? Yes.

ALSO! FUCK OFF SHORTLAND STREET! Stop having our motherfucking glasses onscreen! It’s bad enough that our three new water glasses are the stripey ones are the same as the ones in the cafe. Tonight Anji pointed out that our gingerbeer cocktail glasses have showed up in Coltrain. FUCKING SUCK IT, YOU QUEERS! (That’s the OC, k? xojo) Because I am a potter’s daughter. I care very much about the vessel things are served to me in, and I feel like you just fucked my daughter’s navel cavity. Hott! But also, unless it’s you making the mule, back the fuck off!

Ohh, I haven’t made a public update for a while now, so I guess I really should do that (and if you’re the couple of people who are on level 1 who haven’t commented or introduced yourself to me and therefore haven’t got the upgrade, maybe that’s something for you to think about…).

So Jo, what’s been happening? Well Jo, that’s a good question. Boy you’re hot right now (as opposed to being SHRN), you could do with a shower, but that’d be the third one of the day, and that would just be silly. So sweaty and smelly it will be instead. Tonight I worked late, sort of, being a model for some kind of training programme that our company is doing. On Tuesday I got to do voicework for it. Exciting times. Other than work, and the gym (haha, I know! Crazy!), annnnnnnnnnnnnd umm that’s it. Woo! But there are social activities scheduled, honest, like Atomic on Saturday, and hanging with Brad before he moves to Whakatane for the summer (he sent me a text the other day that said “As an exercise for a class we had to create a two minute item that would be performed at our funeral. I did a choreographed dance in a bear suit. Brilliant.” Brilliant!), and SERENITY!!!!!! on Tuesday, and going to the Phoenix Foundation with Miss Lisa Rat Pony, and and umm oh, trying to think of a spunky costume based on the Loveboat theme of our Xmas party (I’m thinking maybe an entertainer? That way I can still look glam and hott and yet still be a team player. Wahoo. Work’s been full of all kinds of dodgy conversations lately (“which workmate would you sleep with?” – my response was “who gets paid the most?” but I was told that wasn’t a valid answer), so that keeps me very amused. As do of course my various actual work projects, naturally.

Okay, let’s try to talk about things that aren’t work-related, so that I don’t seem like such a sellout. Ummmmmmmmmmm.

Umm…

Ummm…….

There’s angst. There’s always angst. This is just the stupid giggly crush type thing, that comes and goes, and my little mousewheel of pessimism and optimism spins around and around. Today I think I am being pessimistic, but given the ache in my gut and lower back, and how I wanted to start crying when ‘I could have lied’ spun up on my iPod, I know that’s just because I am due for a bleed, so I’m not concerned. Mostly I’m just wondering when I’m going to get some clean clothes and do my laundry and that crap. Wahoo! Exciting! At least I had Brad’s text message in here to make it interesting. Please insert your helpful Loveboat tips here, keeping in mind what I look like (so I’m not going to be a bikini-wearing sunbather). Now I am going to go and redo my links page. Wahoo.

Shall we call this a level 2 entry? should I try to censor myself? oh man, I am so conflicted. Mostly I am SO ANNOYED that I left my phone at my old building, but since this is in theory Level 2, I can say that if you want to get ahold of me before Monday (umm…… Lisa?) you can call me on ummmmmmmmmmm 386 4631? But I don’t answer the phone and also I’m going to my parents’ tomorrow night for dinner. While I mention them, can I also add how disturbed I am that they changed their phone number? Yeah, they switched over to Telstra for broadband, so now hte first digits of their number are 970. It’s wrong. It’s wronger than when all of Welly had a 4 put in front of it. You know that the reason (well, one of) that I ahven’t switched to a telecom mobile is cos I’ve had my 021 since it said “bell south” on the phone. I am a traditionalist.

It appears that Sebastian is a tradiionalist too, and has once more run away over Guy Fawkes. This makes it three years in a row, and I know that if he disappears for eight days like he did the first time, I won’t survive. But for now, I will sustain myself on giggles that Miss Rat Pony and I can share over a subject called “A.” and it’s really got out of hand, and honestly, I am sick and diseased and I think I decided tonight that there was no point and that I needed to stop.

Anyways. Tonight I went up to my old office (same company still, but we have two buildings – have I explained that enough?) to watch fireworks above the harbour go bang. I was actually incredibly impressed. After that one time in Japan, when my parents made me (against my wishes) ride a stupidly crowded subway for an hour and a half and then walk for half an hour and then sit on a crowded tapualin for half an hour watching some big display, I have not been the biggest advocate of fireworks, except for sparklers, the occasional bang at Halloween and and that one time that Si, Morphone Matt and I were letting off fireworks that night we stayed up all night drinking barcardi and theyclimbed the tree that’s been cut down now.

I am watching Starsailor on TV right now. I deliberately smoked half a cigarette last night. I wonder if thses things are leated, like that I am trying to sabotage my life, like maybe I am “oh, those things that y7ou want, they’re not going to happen, so why don’t you just crash your ferrari, and kill Razzle, and go to jail?” I have also been rereading The Dirt again, in case you didn’t get that reference. I’d give it all up to have Sebby back here cuddled up to my thighs. And Starsailor says “my wandering soul found solace at last” and wow, I don’t even know what solace is anymore, if I did ever. And I am going to enter Cosmo’s erotica writing competition, and you know I will be good at that, and while we are talking erotica, let me go again “OMG SO SMITTEN” but I decided tonight that I am wrong. Also, while we are talking aobut tonight, can we please get a FUCK YEAH for Mt. Vic being on fire?

Also, since we stayed late, and played silly games at work,I’d like you to say which of these three statements is wrong, since no one else got it: A) I refer to my breasts as Mary-kate and Ashley because of their size discrepency B) I lost my virginity when I was 13 C) I have a fondness for age discrepencies with thte people I sleep with?

Also for right now, I’m praying that someone will heed the invisible signals that were probvably totally inaudible as well and come over and we’ll sort this out> I bet that won’t happen though. Still, a girl has two fingers.

When I sat down and thought about a date to have my belated birthday party on, I texted the three people that form the core of my friendships in Wellington, to make sure that they’d all be free that night, and to reserve them in advance.

On Saturday afternoon, I got a call from one of them saying that he’d had to go to Auckland, and therefore wouldn’t be coming. Okay, two out of three is fine, and I was more concerned for his welfare. Then later, the second one called me, and said that surprisingly enough, complications had come up with something that was bound to get complicated anyway, and so he wouldn’t be coming. Righto. I’m aware that I’m being very much less than supportive here, and that makes me a bad friend, but when I hear through my SISTER about another friend being ***, when my sister doesn’t even know that girl, I get more than a little shitty. And this isn’t about the *** friend, it’s about the inevitable feeling of being replaced (ie: it’s all about ME. And also about the vicious circle of me becoming more pissy and less pleasant and therefore less desireable as a friend). At 9.30pm when no one had showed up and Anji and I had tired of taking photos of each other’s boobs (we were both in corsets, making us go “kaboinga”),

I decided that if the third person from that original trio didn’t show, I would move back to Auckland.

But then at 10pm there was a big rush and everyone (excpet for Karen) arrived within ten minutes of each other, of course. And then it was choice, and mostly very civilised, except for setting off fireworks in the backyard and forgetting that there’s a grannyflat with a very nice nurse called Eve who lives under us. Here’s a photo that doesn’t feature my boobs – or in fact, me at all:

Karen stumbled in very drunk very late and so I made up a bed for her in the study, and Al and Korina were the last to leave around 2.30am. I had a really good time, although someday someone’s really going to have to teach Joel that when you say “oh and this is my workmate”, the correct thing to say is not “but you don’t do any work, Jo, you just post on your site all day long”. Nevermind. There’s glitter on my sheets and also on Sebastian from my very good imitation of a pirate (everyone said I needed an eye patch – I said “I’m a good fighter and I’ve managed to avoid getting poked in the eye”). Miss Lisa Fur and I got to exchange Knowing Looks about something else too, and that was very amusing.

There’s also oh so much mess now. How can fifteen people trash a house so much? It just doesn’t make sense. And cleaning is something I’m pretty much very very over right about now, given that on Thursday night I broke into Mummy & Daddy’s house (oh okay, I used Karen’s key) and cleaned their kitchen and lounge for them as a nice surprise cos Mum’s been very stressed out lately. She rang me today and was very grateful, so yay, good times. And then I cleaned lots on Saturday to get ready for the drinks. Our house looked fabulous, by the way, with fairy lights and candles everywhere. Very civilised. It functions very well as a house for entertaining in, which is great even if my couches are so comfy that Al fell asleep for hours on one. So instead of cleaning yesterday, Anji and I camped out on the couches after a hearty lunch, eating leftover food (there’s still chocolate crackles and garlic bread and wedges if you’re interested, but sixty something jelly shots have been shot) and watching the last five episodes of Buffy Season VII, both of us crying our little eyes out over ‘Chosen’, of course. Keeping it spoiler-free, it’s the final speech that kicks back in as a flashback, with Buffy walking around in her living room wearing a fancy blouse that I can’t figure out if I love or hate, and then the girl with the bat and oh oh the tears they bucket out at that point, every single time I watch it.

I had a long conversation last night with Miss Fur about how dorky I am, in terms of how much trashy television I watch, and the Buffy obsession, and the reading of tabloids, but she says that my dorkiness could be endearing. Hmmm.

EDIT: Here’s another picture of me that Anji must have taken at the party and I rully like it. Please note the partial throwing of goats.

So I end the weekend with at least three more stalkers, and a strained thigh muscle, and a missed opportunity to do some stalking of my own. How did this happen?

I realise that my last entry starts out with me talking about friday night drinks with my workmates. This one’s going to be like that as well. We had a farewell for a much beloved girl last friday, and consequently there were many many drinks. There was also a game of “pick up the box in your teeth without touching the ground with anything except for your feet” and every round the box was cut lower and lower. I got down to three inches before I had to pull out, damn pearls and boobs and hair in my face. This is where the thigh pain comes from, but not the bruises. They’re always a mystery to me.

Then there was a singalong. Hurray! It was rully rully choice and I was drunk enough that I was bringing one hand up as I sang, pretending that I was an idol – or perhaps Jordis. Damn I wish I was Jordis. Also, who has singalongs at work? That rocked!

And then we moved off to Havana Bar where many many more drinks were consumed, and all appropriate levels of self disclosure were breached (since I told my workmates, I might as well tell you guys that I think I have worms, and oh my oh my, my bottom it itches. But Anji refuses to shine a torch up there and have a look. She’s so selfish.) I saw Anne which was strange since it’s been more than a year, and then at one stage I cried quietly in a corner and had some more to drink. Eventually I decided that it was really really time for me to leave, and as I was trying to go, some random guy started trying to pick me up, and then I think I was sitting somewhere and talking to someone and then it was noon and I was getting up to feed Sebastian and pee and then it was 4pm and I felt very very sick.

Anji was speculating on whether or not I had picked up since apparently I did a lot of talking when I got home. I figure it was just Sebastian I was talking to though. I don’t know how I got home. I have no memory of the taxi ride. That’s probably not a good thing at all. I’m really not looking forward to going to work tomorrow either. I’m hoping that everyone was as drunk or close to drunk as I was. They probably were. I’m wondering if I got to tell the girl who was leaving just how rad she was and how welcome she made me feel when I moved into the new building and she gave me the secret directions to the secret solution to the not secret scandal. I hope I did.

Last night I was supposed to go out to Mike’s party and stalk the boy that I’m stalking but there was just no way that was going to happen. It was a struggle to get from the couch to the door to get my pizza (and wow, who knew that Domino’s Vegorama had bacon and pepperoni on it? Not me!). Instead it was pyjamas and duvet and rockstar. Then when I was watching the start of Donnie Darko, my cellphone rang with a number I didn’t recognise. I was hoping it was someone who was gutted that I wasn’t at the party, but instead it was a voice I didn’t recognise. He told me that he’d found my business card and was really intrigued, and I was like “………………..huh?” And he said it was the “I like words. I really like words” bit and he wanted to know what I did. I was like “yeah, I do really like words” and he said something about ti being a hard question for a saturday night, and so I said I was an editor, and he was like “okay cool, thanks bye” and hung up, and I was like ??????????? Where the fuck did I leave my cards?

And then today I got a series of dirty text messages from a random number that started out asking me if they could lick my pussy dry before I licked theirs. I was like “okay, where the FUCK did I go on Friday night?” but I texted back to say “Aren’t you supposed to lick it wet?” and then pointed out that text language made me think that they’d be a lazy lover. A great number of texts followed with me going “hmmmm, I really wonder who this is” before she revealed herself to be a friend of Trixie’s. Trixie – you have strange friends.

AND THEN! Oh yes, it keeps getting worse. I was at the local pub for a roast dinner with Anji and Dave, and then Anji’s friend Jo showed up, and Anji was like “Jo (me) doesn’t remember what she did on Friday night and she’s getting all kinds of stalkings” and Jo said “I bet I know what you were doing…. you were at Havana Bar” and then I just about started crying. Turns out she’d just seen me there but we hadn’t talked or anything cos I was out the back where apparently people were smoking pot. Shocking!

Let’s not have a repeat of these kinds of incidents next weekend, okay, J Crew? Please? Thank you.

Sometimes it’s nice to know that your employer values you – or at least is happy to shell out a large amount of money on opportunity costs of having your entire company running around on Friday afternoon with DV cams making little videos about your company. Did I ever tell you that I work for a New Media company? I suspect that the previous sentence might have revealed that if you didn’t already know. Because we didn’t have any video production people in our group – we were mostly project managers and editors, we decided to take a really ‘organic’ approach and shoot our video in sequence to save on the editing. We went with my idea of making a recruitment video, and loaded it up with really bad puns and me hosting the video with signs, saying things like “To work at *, you’ll need to be great at juggling many projects” – to have the camera pan over to someone juggling potatos, and “it also helps to be really flexible” with workmates doing back bends and somersaults in the background. For the “you’ll be working closely with your colleagues” we had three sets of feet visible under the shower curtain. Hott.

After that (although quite a lot later, cos most of the other groups finished really late although we finished quarter of an hour early), there were drinks. Many many drinks in fact, and although I was supposed to go and meet Karen for dinner, we’d got pizza so I wasn’t hungry, and I was having far too much fun having very inappropriate conversations with my workmates (the word “quiffing” was used a lot, which they claim is a fanny fart. I’m not entirely sure that it’s a real word). But I knew Karen was pissy at me, so I headed over to her house just before 9pm. Arriving with leftover brownies, and also potato chips and wine appeased her somewhat, I believe. So we chatted, and I had a shower (and didn’t puke in it) and we trotted off to Indigo to meet up with Dave and his friend who turned out to be rather cute and exciteable like a puppy – but not Humpy-like, if you get the difference (or even the injoke).

I’m being stalked – again. Friday night, and then today outside my place of work, oh and also that one time in March 2002 (<3 google desktop, although if I ever decide to become obsessed with anything that I’ve been obsessed with in the past, I will be in a lot of trouble – assuming that you define trouble as “reading many old entries” as I sometimes do). But anyways, the stalker. I was at 24 Hour Party People, and I went to the bathroom, and there was a cute girl there who was like “HEY! You’re Joanna!” and I was like…….. and she was like “I’m blah blah blah, and we’ve actually met before” and I was like “oh yeah!” and I did actually remember who she was, which is incredibly impressive for me, and she said she was stalking me, and had a crush on me, and it might have been then that I picked her up and swung her around as much as I could, or that may have been later when she introduced herself to my companions as “Joanna’s stalker”. Awww how sweet! Except I think she was laughing at me today. But like with any stalkers – or indeed the very minute number of people who say that they have crushes on me, it’s like “and then?” (speaking of Chinese drive through people, Anji and I discovered that the Chinese takeaway in Hataitai is awesome. But back to the main narrative…). Or, as Katy – and the bard – put it “Would you leave me so unsatisfied? / What satisfaction can you get tonight? / Howsabout you lick my clit, bitch?” Ahh people who quote Shakespeare, how nice it is to know you.

I impressed yet more of Katy’s friends by not taking shit from them, and dishing it straight back (“Oh, you work at a cinema huh? So what’s your film script about then?”) and we hung out until around 4am when it was time to go home via the takeaway shop and some very amusing discussion with some very very drunk young boys.

Oooooh Nightline just played some remix of the Prodigy’s ‘Voodoo People’ and i got an involuntary flashback feeling in my stomach. Crazy. Nevermind. Let me catch up with myself. Hmmmm, where was I at? Saturday? Ahh yes. Saturday. The day was really weird and I had no idea of what was going on because I’d lost my cellphone – Anji kindly ended up picking it up for me from Indigo and I don’t have a clock in my room. In the evening after the aforementioned good Chinese, I drove her into town for SJD and swung past New World for brunch supplies cos I was hoping that either Anne or Brad would be joining me for Alf’s 60th birthday party the next morning.

As it happens, I ate my brunch alone, and got choked up when they showed a brief flashback of Shane dying on a rock. I am crazy! CRAZY! And I napped, and drove Ethel back into town to pick up Anji, who is the new proud parent of an iPod Mini so she’s gone Walking Crazy, and we did the supermarket shopping, and I made a tangine, and Brad came over for dinner, and Shiny Shiny Steve(n) sang CREED and Oh, I was overwhelmed with a strange combination of lust and amusement.

Work was a bit streesssssssssful today. They’ve put me on the schedule so that I can be booked like any common resource. Oh the pain. Then I had lunch with Mum, which was surprisingly pleasant. The Tasting Room does food + a beer or a coffee for $15. Since I am doing Hard Work (my email to limegreen today said something like “I am supposed to be writing a guide to the wazoo when I don’t even know where it is!” and he said something about how he’d heard how large and impressive my wazoo was, and I got offended, cos dude, who wants someone to say “my, what a large roomy asshole you have”?) so I had the coffee instead of the beer. The steak sandwich was served with really really good fries, and also two big onion rings in it, but it’s on very garlicy garlic bread, so make sure if you eat it you pick up some peppermints afterwards.

I just had a moment of remembering exactly why I used to be so in love with The West Wing when CJ told Josh she’d cook him dinner, and he asked if she’d wear an apron and she said she’d wear anything he wanted, and his eyes went !!!!!!!! I think I’ll stop this now. Oh, and some guy saying to Toby “what if they have seven or eight kids?” and Toby says “tell them to try renting a DVD sometime instead” – remind me again why I stoppped watching this show?