lishesquex: (iconomicon - picassocean)

I had a wonderful evening with Jackie and Xin last night. We ate at Circuz, then came back to my place because we wanted Xin to teach us mahjong and I wanted to show her my chakram.

So we played mahjong, badly, but it was a lot of fun and I'm glad that I've finally (sort of) learned the game.

And now it's a rainy Sunday morning and I'm crying because I just read a bunch of REALLY SAD Code Name Verity Yuletide fics.  It's been a long time since I read that book, but, like I said at the time, it has a sort of sadness that seeps into your bones and doesn't ever really go.

By the way, is anyone able to send me an invitation to Archive of Our Own? 

lishesquex: (iconomicon - dancing R2)
I went bike riding with [livejournal.com profile] junet_ today. Almost 25km to Burnley and back. I think I wanna aim for reaching the city next time; the 25km seemed like nothing at all. And it was super fun! It goes so quickly when you're cycling with a friend. I've set myself a goal on RunKeeper to cycle 500km this year in total, and I've decided that if I reach that goal, I'll buy myself a new, proper bike. My current one is over ten years old because I got it when I was 15, and the wheels are kind of small. RunKeeper tells me I'm already 16% complete with my cycling goal and the line graph, if projected, shows me as being done by March, but I doubt I'll keep up my current upward trajectory once work starts. Also winter is going to be a problem.

I'm pretty pleased today because our school's Director of Ops just emailed through the master timetables with the yard duty allocations for this semester, and my timetable is looking pretty good. Last year I had really inconvenient yard duties that would occur on lunchtimes or after school during days when I could have left earlier. This year my yard duties are mostly during recess, I have no after school bus duties, and two of them are in a computer room (and I love computer room lunch time duties because that's where all the nerd kids hang out). All the days where I have a spare period 4 or 5 have nothing scheduled in the afternoon, which means that, if I'm not too busy, I can totally leave earlier. I have no Period 5 class for four out of the ten day cycle, so... theoretically, that should be pretty good!

Tomorrow is the last day of my summer holidays, which is woeful. But I have Miriam's birthday party to look forward to, and at least Tuesday is just a staff preparation day. My aim is to really focus on keeping a good work life balance this year. I've spent much of the last few weeks getting fit and doing the things I love, like playing guitar, reading, painting, reconnecting with friends... I really don't want to give that up like I usually have to during the school term. So. Less internet time, I think, because it's such a time sink, and a more relaxed approach to work. I can never be a slacker about my work because I'm a perfectionist, but I'm not really prepared to go the extra mile I did last year where I was running lunchtime discussion groups and stuff for my Year 12s.
lishesquex: (xena - big sword fandom)

Yesterday I watched The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey with Rianna.  There were parts that I loved and parts that I was a bit "meh" about.  I have complicated feelings about it.  But mostly, it made me very, very nostalgic about the Lord of the Rings movies.  The night before, I finished reading the books for the first time.  It's terrible that it's taken me this long to get through them (I started them in 2010 after reading The Silmarillion) but I got stuck for a good while on the first third of Book 1.  I'm very glad I read them before watching The Hobbit because I think it made me appreciate the movie more. For example, the scene with Galadriel and Gandalf in Rivendell, and the light behind them was this soft pink golden dawn - I wondered how much that was because it looked pretty, or whether someone had actually wanted to portray Galadriel as being of the morning ("And I shall not be dark, but beautiful and terrible as the Morning").  Probably the latter, I guess.  But I might not have noticed, if I hadn't just read The Return of the King with its night-imagery descriptions of Arwen.

Anyway, here's a cute thing that happened: there was an ad before the movie for New Zealand which had me all squeeing because it mentioned NZ as being the land of "warrior princesses" and I was like OMG XENA REFERENCE.  Hah. Rianna rolled her eyes, of course.

Today I'm sitting around drinking tea and waiting for the Lord of the Rings: Online to finish downloading on Steam. Reading the books has made me all fangirly enough about LOTR that I will risk my soul on another MMO.  I don't think there's any danger of becoming unhealthily addicted though - those days are behind me, and it's unlikely I'll get super into it without my guildies.  Still, are there any out there on my Flist who is interested in playing with me?  It's free-to-play so you wouldn't have to pay anything.  I will probably be joining the server Elendilmir because it's apparently the unofficial Oceanic server.

lishesquex: (Default)
Uggghhhh.  I am updating my CV for the first time in four years and trying to figure out what stuff isn't relevant anymore.  Pretty sure where I went to primary school isn't relevant, but what about scholarships I got in high school and uni?

I hate doing this stuff.  But I'm forcing myself to do it early Saturday morning so it's out of the way and I can enjoy the rest of my weekend in peace.

Currently I am reading "Never Let Me Go" by Kazuo Ishiguro.  Anyone read that?  There is a lot of foreshadowing.  I am also watching Arrested Development, which is fun.  I managed to sneak in one episode last night before I fell asleep at approximately 9:30pm.  Yep, my life is pretty tragic at the moment.

I am determined to do some gaming this weekend.  I haven't played any games (other than board games - yay WoW monopoly!) for two months now.  I feel like a legitimate adult.  It's awful.  So... gaming!  Help me decide which of these games I should play next.  I bought them during various Steam sales and just haven't had a chance to play any of them yet:

[Poll #1873396]

And no, Ingrid, "World of Warcraft" is not an option!
lishesquex: (voyager - only slightly lost)
I saw this post on Tumblr and decided to paste it here instead of doing the usual Tumblr reblog because there are a couple of things in here that I really like:

Things I want to tell people, that I wish people had told me:

  • You don’t have to achieve great things by the time you’re 25
  • You have intrinsic value above and beyond your perceived utility to other people and society at large. 
  • You don’t have to have sex, or have sex in any way that you find uncomfortable or unpleasant, to keep anyone’s love or good opinion of you. They didn’t love you or think very well of you to start with if they demand it. 
  • You don’t have to stay with someone who isn’t meeting your emotional or sexual needs because they need you, or you’ve been with them for awhile, or you need to be in a relationship. You need you. Your time is your own and it is finite. 
  • It’s OK to work at a job you enjoy that doesn’t make you miserable even if it’s not a career and it won’t “lead to anything.” 
  • Your life is not a narrative. It is not leading to anything, there is no overarching thesis, it does not have themes beyond the usual shared cultural experiences of your time and place. This is OK. It does not mean that your life is without purpose or meaning. 
  • It’s OK not to like or get along with the vast majority of people you encounter, so long as you afford them the same respect, courtesy and dignity that they afford you. 
  • Expensive is not always better. 
  • Failure is temporary if you’re still alive. 
  • People are both much better and much worse than you’d suspect, but usually not all at once. 
  • Stop thinking of your future self as a different person and it will be easier to prevent money and health problems. 
  • Let people help you, lean on them when you need to, and be available to help, but don’t swing too far in either direction. Try to carry your half of the life basket as evenly as you can. 
  • Set boundaries, and do not be afraid to kick people out of your life who disregard them. You will not end up alone and unloved. People who love you will be OK with your boundaries. 
  • Your power does not come from money or beauty, but from seeing life steadily and wholly, from a curious and thoughtful mind, and from your ability to say no when you want to, and yes when you want to, and I don’t know when you don’t know. 
  • There will be bad times, maybe lots of bad times, but not only bad times. 
  • Love will not heal the wounds in your soul, but love can give you the impetus to begin the work of healing yourself. 
  • Life might be a long series of starting over, and that’s alright. 
  • You’re really cool, you’re really beautiful, you’re really special. Really. Not to everyone, but to a lot of someones sometimes.
lishesquex: (xena - xena on argo)
I bought a guitar!  I'm so happy to have a real guitar.  And real guitar equipment.  Like a strap, and a capo and actual picks.  I don't have to use a plastic paper clip anymore.  :D  The new guitar (a full sized Yamaha acoustic steel string) sounds 239847128374234 times better than my old one (a banged up 3/4 sized Valencia with fraying strings).  It makes me very happy.  I am currently learning how to play a couple of Missy Higgins songs.  And a Backstreet Boys song.  Don't judge me. 

I bought the guitar from a Retravision in Springvale - a guy acquaintance from high school went with me.  We had a drink and reminisced about World of Warcraft afterwards.  (And no, [livejournal.com profile] wickedkiwi, I'm still not coming back.)

Another highlight today was playing Left 4 Dead 2 with Lyan.  I haven't played a shooter in about ten years, but it was super fun.  I forgot how fun shooters are when you have someone to play with. 

I wish I had another Sunday in which to practice guitar and play games, but alas, the weekend is over again. :-/
lishesquex: (iconomicon - mirrors lie to cats)
This long weekend has been productive and restful. 

One of my past students told me about Memrise, a memory/flashcard based website you can use to learn languages and various other topics.  I started off learning about cheeses, but have since expanded my areas of learning to include two Norwegian vocabulary lists and the second 500 most common Chinese characters. After cheese, I'm going to learn about goats.  I've always wanted to know all about goats.  If anyone wants to join (it's all free), you should make me your mempal and we can compare scores.

I recently started talking to a Finnish girl, who intrigues me.  I don't know what it is about her that is intriguing me, exactly.  I guess the mystery of it all, since I don't know her very well yet.  The freshness of a new friendship.  She is 26 and lives in the eastern part of Finland and will soon be doing an internship in Montreal.  She is an ENFP which I know from past experience is a personality type that I am very attracted to but never ends well for me. So I should probably be careful there.

I caught up on Game of Thrones season 2.  I'm two episodes from the end.  Really enjoying the series still.  Although I kind of wish now that I hadn't read the books first, because I can see how some of the surprises/reveals would be super mind-blowing if I hadn't known about them beforehand. Oh well.  It's also nice having the background knowledge though.  My favorite character at this point in the TV series is definitely Arya.  I think my favorite character in the books (at this point in the events) was Tyrion, followed closely by Brienne.  Have any of you guys been watching?  Who are your favorites? 
lishesquex: (xena - looking down)
Thanks guys for the comments you left on my last post. Not going to individually reply to them all since... what do you really say to words of condolence? But thanks, I really do appreciate them.

This week has been pretty difficult in terms of work. I was battling a cold for most of it too which just made it all the more miserable since I was too busy to take a day off. I won't go into work stresses in this entry though.

I find myself posting on LJ less and less these days. Partly because I've had nothing much to update, but also because it increasingly feels pointless - does anyone even read this anymore? It makes me sad, the way that my flist becomes more and more empty.

I finished watching Season 2 of Lost Girl which I thoroughly enjoyed. Some parts of the writing made me go "but that wouldn't HAPPEN", but overall I really love it. The Bo/Lauren interactions are wonderful, and Kenzi is the best sidekick evar. Also, it reminds me of TV shows from the 90s.

Is anyone playing Diablo III? My battletag is lish#6552 if you wanna add me. I haven't played all that much due to lack of time so I'm still a level 20 in Act II.

A couple of days ago I found out that Missy Higgins was touring again after a long break and that she'd just released her new album. Her music was basically the soundtrack to my life in the last couple of years of uni so I was super excited. The tickets to the two Melbourne shows had been more or less sold out (I checked - they only had Restricted View tickets left, and only singles at that) but saw that she would be performing in Boston on the 22nd of September which is when I will be there. So the plan is to go with [livejournal.com profile] dangerosa and grab tickets when they go on sale this Friday. But then I was like "what the hell" and bought a ticket to the first Melbourne show anyway. It's Restricted View, Row W in the Stalls, seat 15. I dunno what kind of view (if any) that will give me, and I'll be going alone, but... whatever. Maybe I'll meet my lost antarctican inuit girlfriend there.

Also, I am going to update my bucket list to include:
- Go to a Eurovision concert and be one of those people at the front waving a big ass flag... probably a Norwegian flag.
- Watch Gro Hammerseng play handball at a live game.
- Actually, I already forgot what my third thing was. Nevermind.
lishesquex: (buffy - faith this is life)
You know when you've spent too much time on Tumblr when you see a really good LJ post you like and you start looking for the reblog button.  Heh.  Guess I'll just have to link it the old fashioned way.

I'm currently drinking chamomile tea due to teh cramps of doom.  It's actually from a container of Lipton chamomile tea that Julia gave me years and years ago.  I don't do chamomile unless I have bad cramps, so it's lasted all this time. 

Last week was Year 7 camp.  I did most of the activities along with them, including canoing, mountain bike riding, abseiling, walking across a suspended wire bridge across a lake, navigating a completely dark 'cave', walking across a bed of nails, and having a python wrapped around my neck.  I really like my Year 7s this year.  They're a good vintage.  I'll post some photos of camp once I get some time.

Tonight was parent/teacher interviews and I just got home at 10pm, so I'm pretty drained.  Haven't had any time to play Skyrim which [livejournal.com profile] junet_ dropped off on Sunday.  I watched a couple of episodes of Spartacus Vengeance on Sunday night and was a little disappointed.  It's nice to see Lucy Lawless and all, but I found myself missing Andy Whitfield - the new guy just isn't the same.  I'm super excited about Season 2 of Game of Thrones though.  I saw the trailer yesterday and was like ZOMG. 

Kitteh came running up to me when I got home tonight.  Ah little things.  <3
lishesquex: (buffy - faith this is life)

It currently hurts to type with my right thumb because Kitteh mauled it accidentally yesterday while we were playing in the garden.  The night before last, I was playing some TOR before bed when I heard a soft little meow that sounded different to Kitteh's usual meows.  I went out into the corridor to investigate.  It was dark and I didn't bother to switch on a light because I could triangulate Kitteh's location from her meows.  I bent down to pat her about the same time Rianna opened her door and switched on the light.  As soon as she did so, she let out a bloodcurdling scream, ran back inside her room and shut the door. I looked down.  There was a HUGE RAT right in my face next to where I was patting Kitteh. It was still alive so I took it outside using the dustpan and set it free in the front yard under a tree.  That was the sixth rodent that Kitteh has brought us since I came back from Europe.

I'm enjoying my Year 12 class a lot this year.  I've only had them three times but so far they've been really responsive and switched on.  I've been putting in a lot of extra effort for this class because they were my lovely Year 11s from last year and I want to prepare them as best I can.  Every single one of them did the holiday homework, which is pretty damn amazing.  I'm not connecting as well with my new Year 11s yet, but it's early days still.  Respect and rapport takes a while to develop and only happens after some growing pains, I've found.  They'll grow to love English Language too.  *plots*

In other news, I has a spaceship!  I renewed my Star Wars: The Old Republic account after all (though I had been planning not to) and played a lot over the weekend.  Lish, my Sith Warrior (marauder), is now level 18 and Gro, my Bounty Hunter (mercenary), is level 16.  Once I got over the unintuitive different to WoW controls and UI, I discovered a lot of gameplay elements that are superior to WoW.  I still miss WoW a lot sometimes (mostly my guildies... except [livejournal.com profile] chewy3479) and certain WoW zones (does Elwynn Forest feel like home to anyone else?), but TOR has successfully sucked me into its universe and is refusing to let go.  I love the fact that you can roleplay your character.  I love having a companion with a backstory and a personality.  I love being able to get a spaceship.  :-D

Time

Jan. 30th, 2012 08:53 pm
lishesquex: (voyager - only slightly lost)
I'm sitting here at my computer desk watching a beautiful golden sunset at 8:30pm.  There's something to be said about being back in a southern hemisphere summer.  Driving home from work, I kept noticing how green the leaves were on the trees. 

I'm feeling nostalgic today for a whole host of reason.  Facebook informs me (via the official Star Trek page's status updates) that Star Trek Voyager premiered today sixteen years ago.  Sixteen years.  Wow.  I got into the fandom later than that, obviously, but it still boggles the mind how long ago it all began.  And Xena.  The final Xena con was today.  I'm sad to have missed it.  According to [livejournal.com profile] xena_and_gabby's status update, Lucy and Renee kissed?  People who were there, please oblige me with pics.  Immediately.  :-P

Work started again today.  The beginning of the school year is an interesting time.  I always dread going back, but there's a wild energy to it once I'm there.  I feel pretty lucky to have a job that I care about, actually. 

I've adjusted to the jetlag pretty well this time, coming back.  The trick is to set your watch to destination time as soon as you get on the plane, and refuse to think in terms of where you just left.  Eat your dinner like it's breakfast, and stay up all night watching movies.  Then try to sleep in the middle of what used to be the afternoon, fail, watch more movies.  Arrive back home in the morning, then stay up all day until the sun goes down before you finally let yourself rest. It works.

Now I have an hour to spend on whatever I like before I need to sleep.  Time feels like such a luxury right now. 

lishesquex: (Default)
I haven't been posting on here because I've been busy with life.  But let's recap July.  It's been a big month.

Movies I watched
The Trip
Inglourious Basterds
Sucker Punch
Tangled
Captain America

TV shows I watched
The Killing
A Game of Thrones
Star Trek: DS9
Black Books

Books I read
A Feast For Crows (Song of Fire and Ice Book 4)
The Monkey's Mask by Dorothy Porter
The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson

Games I played
Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
Red Dead Redemption
Sims 2

Other achievements
I kissed a girl (well, she kissed me)
One of my poems was accepted for publication

Yep, all in all, a pretty good month.
lishesquex: (WoW - belf female)
I am not lying. There are pictures under here. )

So that was my week in pictures, more or less. Tomorrow I start work again. Meh. The eve before work starts again is the worst. I dread it so much. When I'm actually working, it's not so bad. But Sunday nights are always hard.

At least Term 3 is only 9 weeks long, and then it's off to the USA.

lishesquex: (star trek - same thing we do every night)
It's that time in the school holidays when I can't help but start counting down the days before work starts again. :/ So let me tell you about what I've been doing.

Recently, I spent two days reading through thirteen years of paper journal entries (oh god the emo, so much emo) in an attempt to figure out my brain and patterns of behaviour. I like to think I've come away from it wiser, and maybe I have. Time will tell.

Last night I tried to watch the USA vs. France semifinal but only lasted until 3:30am at which point I started falling asleep intermittently. Even close ups of Hope Solo could not keep me awake. Clearly, I fail at lesbianism.

This afternoon has been spent reading The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson, which is a 13th century compilation of Scandinavian literature from which we get most of our information on Norse mythology. I'm only up to the bit about the Primeval Cow because I'm a nerd and spent too long underlining bits of the 35 page long introduction. Also, I bet you didn't know that, according to the Vikings, the clouds are made up of a giant's BRAINS. So typical. I love it. Many thanks to [livejournal.com profile] quew who technically gave me the book since I bought it with her gift card.

I've been trying to get back into WoW. But I honestly think my WoW playing days are behind me. I can't even muster up the enthusiasm to level Lish to 85 even though I'm ALMOST THERE. Guess I'll try again tomorrow. One effect of reading through thirteen years of my life has been that I've been thinking a lot about what makes up the value of a life: what makes one year better than another, and what makes life worthwhile. There are years like 2003 during which so many things happened - I grabbed life by both hands, or life grabbed me (lots of grabbing, either way) - and I met people who I'd count as some of the most important people in my life. And then there are years like 2009 which... well, the only redeeming feature of 2009 is that I read some great books. I remember the Prince in the final chapters of The Leopard where he's tallying up his life, counting all the moments that were actually worth something and finding that the pile is actually rather small. I want to find/create as many of those moments as possible, so that I don't look back on my life and find big swathes of pointlessness. Anyway, my point in all of this is that all this introspection and "I want to grab life by the tittehs" sentiment isn't conducive to playing WoW.

Did you know there's a tumblr for ridiculous pictures of Celine Dion? Me neither.
lishesquex: (Eurovision - This is my life)
Today feels ~full of possibility~.  So full of possibility that it even has ~tilde wings~. 

This morning, [livejournal.com profile] selina_ taught me how to play Carcassonne which is a ridiculously fun board game involving strategy and ruthlessness. Anything that involves making castles and conquering kingdoms is totally my type of game. There is a free online version of the game, so if anybody wants to play with me...  *hopeful look*

Red Dead Redemption also arrived, so later I will be cowboying it up in the Wild West.  Unf.

I was sad to hear that Brazil beat Norway rather resoundingly in their recent World Cup game.  Norway wouldn't have lost if Gro had been their captain, I'm sure.  (She used to play soccer, too.)

Here, have a picture of Gro:

lishesquex: (iconomicon - pwnstar)
I spent way too long on Tumblr yesterday because I couldn't deal with my the world's issues, and Tumblr is like rainbow crack that makes everything better. 

Today turned out to be a wonderful day.  All (two) of my English Language classes went really well.  My smart Year 11 class enjoyed the lesson on Beowulf and Old English; I'm so happy.  And I didn't have to see my Year 7s all day - BAM, instant win. 

Then I read two articles in the newspaper that made me feel like the world was okay:
1) To know us is to let us love 
2) Missing for eight years, pet cat turns up 

I'm still holding out the hope that Stormy will come home one day.  When he's done travelling Finland. *nods*

The last and best thing about today was that I came home to find a package from [livejournal.com profile] red_said.  There's nothing quite like getting real mail.  <3
lishesquex: (xena - snow)
How do you let go of a dream? Grain by grain, drip by drip, morning after morning, until the day comes when you write her name on the foggy glass from habit rather than from that original, impulsive need. It is still a comfort.

I'm not the type to let go easily. The truth is that if I've ever loved you once, there will always be a part of me that loves you still. But if the old songs still haunt me, at least I know not to listen to them too much.

I've been happier lately. Somewhere along the way, I started looking again and I found a hundred little hopes. Some of them might even survive for longer than a day.

///


P.S. It's 2:08 am and the rapture hasn't happened. I guess Jesus must have skipped Australia.

P.P.S. Speaking of hopes, here's one that just got dashed: Gro will not be competing in the Handball World Championships this year. She's taking another break from the National Team. :( OH UNIVERSE, YOU ARE SO CRUEL TO ME.
lishesquex: (star trek - kitteh lifesign)
Today was the longest ever. I had 28 parent teacher interviews, which doesn't sound too bad until you start counting the minutes. 10 min x 28 = 280 minutes.  I feel like curling up and just hiding from the world for a while. 

Things to look forward to:
- Eurovisionnnnnnnnnnnn zomg!!!!111onesqueee
- My trip in September
- Gro calling to declare her undying love once she receives the kangaroo

The highlight of my day was my 5am dream of naked steamy shower sex with a hot girl. 
lishesquex: (buffy - faith this is life)

- Blonde Gro
- New weekly episodes of Xena
- Arts degree lectures that are like brainsex
- Holding hands
- Morrigan from Dragon Age: Origins
- My old bed
- Getting letters from people
- Saturday night phonecalls
- A time when LJ was not crippled by DDoS attacks or spam
- 90s fashion
- Reading fanfic at the age of 13 when my standards were lower, which meant almost every fic was amazing
- Hugs

lishesquex: (star trek - same thing we do every night)
Today was nice. I took a rare sick day, and felt terribly guilty doing it, because I'm not genuinely sick. I had a flu shot yesterday and felt achey for a while, but I'm actually better today. But w/e, I needed a day off.

I finally did my washing for the first time in like... a month. My underwear woes, let me tell you them. So I've been meaning to do my washing for a while now. I still had clothes that were dirty from camp, that's how bad it was. Last weekend I was busy and this past weekend it was rainy, so today seemed like the perfect washing day. Everything was fine until I need to hang up the washing. (Mum got rid of the dryer a few months ago so doing the washing is a highly strategic matter that requires being able to avoid the 3 other people who need to use the washing machine, and timing it to coincide with dry weather.) But then, as I was taking my newly pristine clothes out to dry, I discovered that our boarder had decided to hang out her sheets and sun out her doona. Again. I get that sunlight kills germs, but DO YOU REALLY NEED TO SUN OUT YOUR DOONA EVERY SINGLE DAY, WOMAN? I couldn't, in all politeness, move her doona. So I had to wait. And while I waited, I tweeted passive aggressive tweets. But eventually I was able to hang up my washing, and finally, my underwear woes were resolved.

I was going to write about something else, but I've forgotten what it was after recounting my saga of Doing the Washing.

Oh wait, I remember now. I am pwning Chewy and Junbo at Words With Friends, which is rather enjoyable. But Ingrid is beating me in our current game (for the second time ever), which is stressing me out. How can this be? It's unnatural.

You know what else is unnatural? Chicken BDSM.

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