Saturday 31 January
I think Ronnie covered most things in his post, but for those of you not up to date: James, Tully and Rachel living experiment ending in the suitably dramatic roof blowing off of their house, Peter Beattie showing up, James helping little old ladies, Peter Beattie helping little old ladies, all now shacked up in the Elephant and Wheelbarrow, now with pictures!

Thursday 29 January
Life moves in fast and convenient circles. The hospital called today and they're looking to take me on for "work experience with a view to more permanent paid work". I start on Monday.

In other news I'm spending my day off (I did end up quitting my job, by the way, hence all the free time) making a doll and it's really fun! I'm just looking up designs for a dress now. It's going to be red and oh so very cute. And if I get that finished I have a list of about 5 other things that I have to do. My room taunts me with its uncleanliness, but it can wait.

Wednesday 28 January
If you accept that all actions that have and will be are inevitable then there's really no point in trying to do anything. If you try to make the world a better place there'll be some other you who also tries to destroy it. Saying that, what kind of a world do you want to live in?

Wednesday 28 January
The crazy world of telemarketing isn't paying off. Yesterday's shift earnt me $2 an hour (including travelling) which really isn't cool. Besides the part where I'm not making any money and not seeing any of the money I'm making, Telemarketing is fun. Favourite phonecall yesterday was talking to a twenty something guy in a conversation that went something like this:
Guy: "Hello?"
Me: "Hello, it's Chloe here. I'm calling on behalf of Precision Cuts Hair and Beauty and I was wondering if there were any ladies around?"
Guy: "Ladies? No, no ladies around here."
Me: "Well, any girly men?"
Guy: "Only one and he's completely bald... darling"
Meh, it was cute. By far the most intense conversation would have to be the lady I called who told me, when I asked how she was, that she'd just left her husband. Jesus. I eventually got out that she was very brave and I wished her all the best, but damn that was a scary conversation. And no, she didn't want any beauty treatments.
Anyhow I'm thinking of quitting today, though maybe not telling my folks. A legitimate reason to leave the house at that time every day shouldn't be wasted.

Another big thing that happened in my life recently was waiting at a bus stop and I started talking to this guy. He'd been trying to get his dog back from his ex-girlfriend with no success. Anyhow we got talking and eventually he told me a large chunk of his life story which was extremely interesting. When he was about 18 he ran away from home and had spent most of his time since then living in the bush and searching for spiritual enlightenment. He'd delved into just about anything he could get his hands on and eventually decided to take a more passive approach. If he was meant to be enlightened then it would happen. Along the way he had seen some amazing things, though. Interesting thing was that the passive approach had only started a good few days ago. Since then he'd hitchiked from Nimbin and ran into a lady who told him all about the Source, made an almost too-strong connection with a beautiful woman and had that long conversation with me. Cool. He had some great ideas anyway and gave me a lot to think about.

Saw some Sommerville girls on the bus home from their first day of school for the year and laughed at them. Bahahaa! That'll never be me again!

Am listening to excerpts from Air's new album. Cool stuff. More accessible than the other album of theirs I own. Well, not as accessible as the tracks Beth Hirsch sang on, but more accessible than the rest. Just a tiny bit indie.

Sunday 25 January
Looking at it all objectively this is probably just PMS mixed with the normal amount of weirdness in my life. In its own way that's quite comforting.

Sunday 25 January
It strikes me that very few events in my life happen in isolation. Last night was very weird. In fact the last few days have been very weird and I have to sit here and not question why. I tried questioning it, realised that at this point none of the pieces fit together and then decided that this wasn't one of those things that was meant to make sense. It really does feel like it's building up to something big and for once I'm not the only one who can feel it. Kind of cool, actually. I think what's missing is one really huge piece of information. Maybe it was what I was meant to have found out with my epiphany. Anyhow, lay low kids. Keep your ears to the ground.

Friday 23rd January (at a decent hour)
It's possible that life never ever turns out how you plan it. Which is a really good thing if you make crappy plans.

Friday 23rd January
Yesterday I didn't buy eggs.
And today I didn't play snap!

It was exciting and like all good exciting things scary once you start to think about it. Scary but not too scary. My head is spinning and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Thursday 22 January
Working is hilarious! My boss is the biggest idiot. He thinks he's really funny, but the best joke he's come up with so far is the amusing nickname "Party Trick" for a guy called Patrick. Good one. Ha. Ha. He's also kind of sexist which is annoying, but meh. I have an interview with Subway tomorrow so hopefully I won't be stuck telemarketing for too long. Another amusing element of my workplace is the sixteen year old hardcore Christian rapper who's trying to crack onto me. He told me I was as pretty as the flower I was holding and I told him that I would never ever give him my phone number. Ever.

Speaking of, I've had some quite amusing encounters of the stupid male type recently. On my way home from work I got picked up by a guy who in highschool was known chiefly by the name "Treestump". Although I had just met him on the bus and he was quite obviously putting on a fake Italian accent I agreed to have drinks with him because, well, it was funny. By luck we ran into Rachel (she was the one who recognised him from Kenmore and told me his rather unfortunate nickname) and a whole bunch of her friends and I ended up spending the night with them. Meanwhile our friend Treestump told Alisia that his penis was almost down to his knees, generally acted like he had hardcore Mafia connections and asked every woman at the table (3 of us) if she'd go to a hotel with him. Poor guy. I hope after all that effort he did get laid that night. He left before 10:30 after which time we all got roaring drunk and I'm certain I could talk about that and the rest of the night for quite a bit, but I'm abstaining because I know how much I dislike hearing about other people's drunken stumbles. It's empathy, man.

Monday 19 January
I started work today. It was pretty good. I made a double sale ($27!) and my co-workers were really nice. I called Ronnie on work time and read him most of the script, which was pretty funny. He better get online soon because I want to talk to him.
Big Day Out was excellent. I've never had that much fun at a festival! I hung out with really good people with brilliant taste in music, it seems. It was really exciting seeing a whole bunch of bands I didn't know and being pleasantly surprised each time. I even saw rapping in action (I'm almost certain that's not how you'd phrase that) and finally understood its appeal. It's really cool! It seems to be a whole attitude thing. Hmmm, I don't think I can explain it so I'm not going to try.
The bands I saw in order were: The Darkness (godly, funny, rock and roll), a bit of the Datsuns, a bit of the Black Eyed Peas (not too good, though I should have recognised by the crowd that I wouldn't have liked it. The problem with those pop kids is that they're not at all polite in a mosh pit), Peaches (hilarious! Like every member of the live Machine Gun Fellatio show rolled into one) The Dandy Warhols (at last! And I enjoyed every second of it! Now there was a nice section of crowd! Didn't see the Pixie Girl until later, though I knew she'd be there), a bit of Muse, Definitive Jux featuring Aesop Rock & Mr Lif (felt completely out of place until I started getting into it and ended up having heaps of fun), the start of the Mars Volta (they were fucking MAD! I mean, I thought they'd be good but I wasn't prepared for just how insane our Cedric would be. After the initial shock wore off I spent a lot of time thinking that I understood Kritzler better for having seen him), Aphex Twin & Luke Vibert (a bit of a let-down, to be honest. Spent most of their set in a toilet line wishing I was still at the Mars Volta but not willing to lose James, Laimen and Grace), Magic Dirt (HATRED!) and The Flaming Lips (like one huge party, just more surreal. Looking up to see all the balloons, the confetti and the cheering people I knew exactly why the lead singer had a huge smile on his face. The happiness in that tent was intoxicating. At the time I was half in love with the rabbit wearing glasses and just about everyone else in the room. I thought the whole thing was a wonderful end to the night. In unrelated news, when Wayne Coyne was blowing up that enormous balloon onstage, all I could think of was Liberty flipping out when it burst. With every passing second I was tensing for the scream. It turned out that she wasn't there. We would have heard it if she was. She's fucking loud enough with a normal-sized balloon. I also loved that singing nun. That was hilarious!).
So that was my Big Day Out, except for all the bits in between which were also hella fun. For the first half of the day I got to hang out with the Kims, which is always hilarious and fun. Kim Sauer and I especially have an obsession for shoes that wasn't quite satiated surrounded by brown leather in biology. The festival was just the thing. Much to our joy their were endless combinations and millions of Converse as far as the eye could see. The best pair, it was agreed, were the red Mary Janes with the rainbow (normal-sized) socks! It was adorable! We were going to ask for a photo of them but neither of us thought of it until the girl had walked away. The second half of the day was spent with James, Grace and Laiman (who I thought was rather a lot like Klayman from the Neverhood, but in reality they probably don't have that much in common). These are three very cool people, though everyone was hilariously agreeable. It seems that "...but I'm fine to do what the rest of you are doing" works best in small doses. We might not have gone anywhere but for some deft agreeing and common taste in music.
The Big Day Out was heaps of fun. The path of good seems to lead to good times. Now I choose to discover the path of bed. Goodnight.

Sunday 18 January
I was going to expose Ronnie with the following:

You want credit for not feeding on bleeding disaster victims? says:
Xander: You are one crazy troll. I-I'm not choosing between my girlfriend and my best friend. That's insane troll logic!
You want credit for not feeding on bleeding disaster victims? says:
(OOOOOHHHHHHHHHH!)
You want credit for not feeding on bleeding disaster victims? says:
(REVELATION!)
"Don't cry for me. Just keep me alive in your heart." -Grace says:
HAHAHAHA!
"Don't cry for me. Just keep me alive in your heart." -Grace says:
is the revelation that Ronnie is completely unoriginal?
You want credit for not feeding on bleeding disaster victims? says:
yes!!!
You want credit for not feeding on bleeding disaster victims? says:
muahahahahah
You want credit for not feeding on bleeding disaster victims? says:
it just keeps comin' doesn't it?
"Don't cry for me. Just keep me alive in your heart." -Grace says:
it sure does, Lord Ratspeaker
You want credit for not feeding on bleeding disaster victims? says:
they spelt it with a hyphen, goddamn it!

But this is so much better!

According to Ronnie, the menstrual cycle is controlled by THE TIDES!!

Heh heh heh.

Saturday, 17 January
That fucking people over thing really isn't working out for me. As could be predicted it resulted in badness. I don't know much, but hopefully it's not as bad as it looks. Essentially two, possibly all, of my school friends are over at Hunty's house. I say all because I can't see Hunty inviting Altec and Kim Jiminy without inviting the rest. I suppose she might have. If it's just Hunty that hates me that's cool because... well, I just don't care. Oh man, this is that mean thing that I have to stop doing. It's totally horrible to only like half of a group, but that's the way I feel. Maybe I simply shouldn't have told anyone. I can see how it would create extreme awkwardness in social situations. Not that I go to an awful lot of social situations, either. And my birthday party was a complete cock-up. I really wanted to invite my school friends but I thought everyone would hate them and I couldn't really think of a explanation so I tried the famous "I don't think you'd get on with anyone" line. Suave move. And then, too late, I realised that if I just didn't invite the Indie kids then I could invite them. Bam! All problems solved. Except at this stage they've already been insulted and how I sold it to them made it sound like I was doing a favour to them and they were really second choice. Fuck my command of the English language. I really hope that they didn't read the situation the way I would have. Hah.
Anyway the long and short of it is that it's likely that by being choosy I've pissed off the school friends I still wanted to know really badly. Even if it turns out they're not pissed off I still regret doing it. It seems such a horrible thing to do.

Friday 16 January
When posed with the request to tell me about her past or bananas, Grace answered thus:

Anyway, when i was younger and lived in venezuela, you could buy a snack called bananitos. they were thinly sliced fried plantains, which are like savory bananas. they were similar to potato chips. i have never again tasted anything quite like them. they were great but nothing else can replace them
that was about my past AND bananas

She is a god.

Thursday 15 January
My latest endeavour.
http://www.freckington.com/library/badnews1.gif

Tuesday 13 January
I received the most wonderful mix tape from Grace! Thank you Grace, it's made me want to discover every band on it! Especially the great mind behind that anti-smoking tyrade ;). Right now is such a great time for new music! Between that tape and the CD I got from James whole new worlds are opening up to me. It's astounding how much there is out there that I haven't even heard of. You know you've been living in the dark when entire new genres rear their heads. Or entirely dismissed genres can be forgiven as is the case with James' CD. Anyhow I'm grateful. Ever since highschool ended music has only gotten better.

Tuesday, 13 January
A lot has been happening lately. When posed with the question "What have you been doing?" I can't actually answer, but it feels like a lot to me. I just emptied my inbox of every email except for the two that I haven't yet replied to. That's hundreds of emails down the drain, years worth of memories. It felt very good. In amusing news my Dad has contracted scabies. Not only is this funny in itself, but because of the treatment I can smell him coming. Too good.

I recently spent a fantastic afternoon riding my bike. I didn't find what I was looking for, but it wasn't a wasted afternoon. The atmosphere was electric. Once you start riding out past the suburbs you will find some of the loneliest places on earth. On this particular day there was no-one in sight. All noise was muffled by an oppressive layer of low, dark clouds. Riding through this I felt incredibly insignificant. It felt like I could scream forever and there wouldn't be an answer. It was that kind of an afternoon.

That morning I sat and watched the sun rise over a still Brisbane river. Now that I think of it, it was a pretty incredible day.

The evening before I went to Rachel, Tully and James' housewarming party. It gave me a lot to think about. I realised that I'd been fucking a couple of people over which is extremely bad. I guess I have to work to make amends and all that, but I wish I just never fucked people over in the first place. That seems like a much more elegant solution. It's so hard to not hurt other people. There are those out there who seem to do it effortlessly, but I guess I have something of a selfish/insecure streak in me. No surprises there really. It's the thought that it all comes back to that, coupled with the hours riding my bike, that means I haven't been too down about it. Sure it probably looks bad from here, but I figure I'm a lot better than I used to be and I'll probably only get better as I mature. Like old cheese. Yeuch.

The party itself was pretty alright. I liked seeing Jonbot in person (I always like seeing Jonbot in person!) and the new flat was cool. Especially the location. I don't think everyone had as good a time as I did, but it helped get a lot out in the open. It resulted in a fairly tops conversation between Ronnie and myself later.

Now, just to bugger up the reverse chronological order of this post, last night. Last night was wonderful. I saw a horrible movie with a bunch of cool people, then we went to see some bands. While everyone else enjoyed watching Nicole Kidman getting repeatedly raped, I spent a large chunk of the movie talking to the girl at the counter. She made me go in right at the end to watch everyone get shot which was extremely satisfying. When we got out it was raining. Everyone went a little crazy. There was some dancing in the middle of a main street. James made a bag protector and a poncho! Can that boy do no wrong? We ran into Megan and David who joined us in walking to the Valley. On the walk I got to talk to Becky properly for the first time in ages and it was great. I've found I can respect her again which is quite a relief. Once (illegally) inside Rics, we listened to Delpino make marvellous* sounds. Grace had, unsurprisingly, chosen a fab band. Halfway through the band I noticed Salter and, grabbing Ronnie for "Can you ignore these eyes?" value, I persuaded him to give us a gig. Support act for the Gin Club in March. Sweet! There was pizza, talking, watching Salter in his most enjoyably dumb band so far (all the songs were in the line of "get fucked, yeah, fuck. Fuck fuck fuck!") then the train ride home. Indooroopilly came too quickly. Smelly bogans lied to me after that. It was funny. The best thing about last night (and it was an exceptionally good night) was getting home and seeing how much of a mess I looked. Hair in a mess. Pimples. Dumb shirt. Unshaved legs. Under the harsh fluorscent light of my bathroom I pissed myself laughing. It was perfect.

*the problem with liking so much stuff is that sooner or later you're going to run out of adjectives.

Saturday, 10 January
One of my first experiences with alcohol was shotting tequila with Ronnie late one night when he accomodatingly took me in for a macabre celebration of the beginning and the end of things. With such little experience, the initial shock of the alcohol quite literally took my breath away. I chased it, I staggered then, when breath was regained, the swearing began. This was quite like that. The kind of news that will find you on your knees swearing in shock the moment you regain your ability to speak. Unlike the alcohol, though, this was wholly unexpected. Tonight will be another late night I will never forget celebrating the beginning and the end of things.

Like the alcohol, I can certainly feel it now but I'm not sure the full ramifications will sink in until morning.

Sunday, 4 January
Go my family for eating all of my chocolate in front of me to "help me out" with my allergies. If I end up a psychopath it will have started tonight.

Sunday, 4 January
Everytime I talk about music I get really paranoid that somebody's going to shoot me down. I can see Nick right now reading my last entry and going "Well actually, the saddest song ever written was a symphony in the 12th century. Interestingly enough it has been banned four times simply for being too sad. Interestingly enough your opinion is WRONG!"
That shouldn't scare me but it does.

Sunday, 4 January
I think that possibly the saddest song ever written has to be "Evaporated" by Ben Folds Five. The way he sings in that heartbroken way. One cannot synthesize that sort of raw emotion.

Sunday, 4 January
You know why I make such a fucking great insomniac? Because sometime past twelve thirty I develop resolve. Man, if I had resolve like this all the time I'd be a fucking genius. People would love me. None of this spineless shit. It's great. You feel brilliant, intelligent, vocal. You get things done. It is one thing that I truly miss throughout the day. Unfortunately the rest of the world doesn't share my vision and likes to go to bed at a reasonable hour. Do me a favour whoever reads this and never call me before 11:00am again.

Saturday, 3 January
Making webs of sticky tape with Ronnie that day did rule. What he didn't mention is that we SET THEM ON FIRE!!
That's what kind of a year I had.

I have so much to do! My party is so very soon and my invitations aren't arriving until the day of the occasion. If anyone doesn't get invited... well it's because I hate you. Anyway, even with time restrictions I think I can still make it. I hope all my plans work out and everyone has a great night and nobody ends up hating me or anyone else. Eep! OK, I'm not going to think about this anymore or I'll freak out.