The unbearable hotness of being

It's quite warm today: 30 degrees celsius, which is the inordinately high-sounding 86 degrees fahrenheit.
This is not unworkable heat- admittedly, it makes things more difficult, but I can still go about my business. This is, sadly, not the hottest it is going to get. I have heard differing accounts, but the range has been between forty and sixty degrees (I presume celsius, because otherwise...). If memory serves, which it doesn't always, the hottest I have ever experienced was forty five degrees in Fatima, Portugal. And that really was unworkable.
Honestly, I'm not surprised that people had 'visions' there; they were more than likely delirious from the heat. The thing I keep telling myself is that I have air conditioning in my room. This is all well and good, but what about when I want to leave my room? For example, if I go to work, or see a film, or just need to buy groceries? What then?
And, truth be told, I don't have an answer. I will just have to suffer through. Probably not in silence, as that's just not how I roll, but with what dignity I can muster. This will at least allow me to gage whether or not I can live in a hot climate in the future, but will probably also leave me dehydrated and grumpy. Alack.

When God closes a door

I had a room inspection yesterday, and I passed with flying colours! It only took three years! I'll admit that I had to do a bit of a spruce-up afore the landlord came a-knockin', but there's no law against that (although Mark seemed to be under the impression that I keep my room that way all the time. I decided not to disillusion him. However, when I was tidying up I decided to do a bit of decorating, since I had some light weight mementos and more blu-tac than I knew what to do with.

Opportunity came a-knockin' and got its hand stuck on the blu-tac.

So I bedazzled my door with memories. It might not look too impressive in the photo, but all three people who've been in my room since I did this have commented on how cool it looks. And I really like the effect; every time I enter or leave my room, I'm reminded of all the cool stuff I've done since I came here (I'll admit, there are a lot of penguin pictures); I've got my tickets of admission to the opera, the sea life centre, Looper and something funny happened on the way to the forum on there. I've also got some maps of Melbourne, the coles Gift card I won at the open mic night and a drawing of me that Milly did during my first week here. 

In other news, I went to see Frankenweenie with Adrien and it's...fine. The animation is gorgeous and the story is fun, but the script is lacking. Alack.

Pretty little picture

This weekend I bought some pink headphones: I needed headphones and the pink ones were the cheapest. The shop hand tried to play on my insecurities and said 'yeah, they're cheaper, but they're pink', and when I took them to the counter, he raised his eyebrows and said 'oh, you've gone for the pink ones' and I replied, no joke, 'yes, I'm secure enough in myself'. So, I walked out, having saved seven dollars, and feeling very good about myself. I relate this story only to share my moment of glory and explain to those of you who skype me know that I haven't suddenly admitted to a newfound love of pink.

In other news, Geoffrey Rush was fantastic. The show was amazingly funny, and Jason, Adrian and I have a whole gamut of new inside jokes; it was actually very sweet, because this was lil' Jason's first trip to the theatre and he was obviously enraptured.

They don't really mean what they're saying! What is this magic?!

 

The music was delightful, the cast were exceptionally strong (apart from Geoffrey Rush, there was a guy playing the slave Hysterium who was bloody hilarious). So, money and time well spent.Yay!

And finally, I may have made a friend at work, which is nice: she's from Dublin, she's a cinephile, she's heard of the bechdel test. We went to see 'Savages' together because we'd both turned up to a shift that wasn't on, and were the only ones in the cinema, and spent the screening sporadically laughing at the ridiculousness of that. It was very fun. Her name's Queeva and I'm making her a tag now, because it worked out so swimmingly with George.

Educate good times, come on!

George returned yesterday, proving it's never too early to create a tag for someone. I also got another 'I no speak English', proving I defy the god of CATI*, whom I've deemed Katy, and am some sort of Telephone Marketing Research messiah.

I'm now done with tutorials for the year; take that, people from Uni back home (depressingly, I don't think that there are any Edinburgh students reading this- you don't count, Dr. Fowkes, being a staff member and all). I have one more week of lectures and then I am done with Uni 2012, which is kinda scary. Thinking back to January this year, and how absolutely awful I felt about my course, I couldn't have imagined I'd actually be interested in what I was studying- but, looking over my Language, Society and Culture text book today, in preparation for my upcoming test, I was actually genuinely piqued by the ideas inside. I've said it before, and I'll say it again: if I have a future in Linguistics, it's in Socio-**. Syntax continues to prove the bane of my very soul and the enemy of life itself, but I guess you can't have it all (and with Syntax, you really shouldn't have any).

I must say, I prefer the Australian school system- the idea of choosing modules (including some which aren't directly related to your major), and thus not feeling trapped into drawing upside-down trees for however bloody long, is much more condusive to work, if you ask me. If I ever have children, I'd want them to be in a university system like this (I believe the American system is similar), because it allows you to actually find out what you like, as opposed to the British system, which just tells you what to take, like it or lump it. And I lumped it. Of course, were I enrolled in Edinburgh this year (and when I eventually return), I would be given a degree of choice within my degree of choice, but I kind of see this as too little too late. Alack.

*Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing
**Fuck you, James Reid.

Consistently congenial

Hey guys, just a quick note to let you know I had my first shift at work yesterday, and that there are a LOT of disconnected phone lines in Australia. I think about 40% of the calls I made came up with 'I'm sorry, the number you have dialled has been disconnected', a further 50% was answering machines and only about 10% got through to actual people...about one third of whom would actually answer my questions.
That's a 3% success rate. Go me. Also, interesting story, my first call ended in 'I no speak English', which I was told happens once in a blue moon- so I'm not expecting another one for another 1.7 years. Or until there suddenly appears before me the only one my arms will ever hold.

Not what I meant, but I'll take it.

In other news, this week is hellish. I'm working again tonight, have a class test tomorrow and a syntax assignment due on Friday. But then, on Friday night, something brilliant will happen. It will be my treat for surviving. For, on Friday, I will see Captain Barbossa perform live on stage. And he will be singing this:

 

Almost, almost, almost worth doing syntax for.

Suma-ho!

The walk I just came back from read like a bad piece of fanfiction; Aspen started off by talking about how much everyone loves her, and how lame her best friend is by comparison. There were some pop culture references- "have you played the Pokemon PETA game?" "When will Blizzard make a Warcraft 4?"- which served no purpose other than to date the fic for anyone who reads it in two months' time. There was a section where we spoke about our feelings in overwraught language-" I think I want kids" "It's just so hard, you know, being this perfect?". There was even a really awkwardly shoe-horned in Chekohov's gun, when Aspen, for no reason, pointed out a random path and said "that leads up to my favourite restaurant", which came in handy to solve the completely contrived plot conflict- another key indicator of bad fanfic- which appeared when we got completely lost and had to clambour up a slippy hill in the rain, grabbing onto random weeds, which our scrambled brain kept on seeing as snakes; Aspen spotted the same path and managed to lead us back. And, of course, Jason delivered his catchphrase:

Neato!...Derp.

Honestly, my dialogue was handled well, it was extremely sharp and made me by far the most likable character in the history of ever, but apart from that it was overly long, kinda repetitive and just a bit...wet. (Get it?! cos it was raining!)

Echo de Menos

I'm forgetting people's names. I don't know if I should be worried. Last week, it took me three days to try and remember Amadeus Alasdair's full name- this was someone with whom I shared a room for five days during NSDF, and I genuinely couldn't think of his surname. It was distressing. I actually exclaimed "Wilson!" aloud in the street when it occurred to me- I was tempted to go the full Tom Hanks, but I haven't actually seen that movie and I didn't want to get it wrong and look like a freak.

Now today I can't think of the second name of Rachel-who's-the-ents-manager back in Edinburgh. I want to say 'Madow', but that's a left-wing newsreader from Americaland; I have a feeling it's 'Meyrick' but if I had to put money on it, I just wouldn't and keep the money for myself.

But on the reverse side, a couple of nights I dreamt that Rosie limped up to me in the street (she'd broken her foot again); I keep seeing Thom Louis in the street, or Chris Craig Harvey on the tram. These aren't people with whom I'm particularly close (although I did lock lips with Chris SEVEN TIMES), but I keep seeing them. I don't know if this is normal, but I didn't see Shrewsbury people in Edinburgh, and it's not like it's just a physical resemblance- they always seem to be wearing clothes that I associate with them.

The natural conclusion is just that I miss them (it's true I miss Chris' lips), but then why am I not seeing Esmond, or Daniel, or Rice Krispies?

These are the clothes I associate with Daniel. They are, naturally, his mother's.

It's harmless, obviously, but it's weird to keep double-taking at strangers on the street. Also, if this blog isn't here for me to obsess over minor details then what is?

P.S. Rachel's second name was 'Murray' (just looked it up) but I'm pretty sure I had a 'Rachel Meyrick' on Facebook. The plot thickens.

EDIT: Rachel Meyrick was in my year at sixth form.

Working hard to get my fill, everybody wants my will

I had to do something unusual during training on Monday (no, not that, it's not that kind of call centre)- I had to decide where my 'super' would go if I didn't claim it before I died. This apparently refers to a superannuation fund, and I think it's like a pension- they were using lots of unfamiliar words like 'work' and 'standard'.
Anyway, I'm not gonna say who I decided to leave it to, but I want this on record- if they do get ahold of the money, then they have to use it to par-TAY. And I mean so hard it hurts. I want them to shave at least five years off their lifespan over the course of a Krazy (with a Kapital 'K') weekend, spent doing all manner of depraved things in which I can no longer partake. Game's on, Mr. Sage. Damn, gave it away.

In other news, training was alright, my co-workers seem cool, the job doesn't seem too difficult, but I imagine the first time I actually make a call to someone I'll freak out and end up insulting their mothers- true fact, this is how 90% of first conversations go with me.

We just had a meeting of the Blank Slate theatre company, of which I am the Producer; queue to the left for the casting couch. It was really fun; we played some games (name games are another facet of theatre that is universal), then we made some tableaus on the theme of 'connections' (honestly less wanky than it sounds). Hopefully, we'll be meeting weekly, and it'll be nice to get back into some theatre stuff- this has been my first semester without doing any plays at all, and I've missed the camraderie and sense of whimsy that accompanies the best productions; I've not missed the self-consciousness and irritation that accompanies not-so-good productions ('Alack! The Killer flees!' 'Killer fleas? Where?!). But I have a good feeling about Blank Slate; I have a lot of good feelings now-a-days.

Oh, look at that I'm ahead of you

Just a quick note to all those reading this blog, I am now ten hours ahead of the UK, as opposed to the previous nine, just so y'all adjust your phone calls and whatnots accordingly.
P.S. The title should be read like this:

http://youtu.be/AdtQ-zW0fHM?t=3m13s

First world problems

I am facing an essential dilemma, and one I would genuinely appreciate opinions on, so please leave a comment telling me what you think.

So, I was just asked by an Aussie friend to show them a picture of Esmond; I searched on my computer and found exactly one picture. I then searched on Google and found exactly one picture. That's two that I have access to; one for every year he's been my friend.
I know I'm being precious- I still know what he looks like, I still have the memories that photos are meant to invoke, and, most importantly, I'll see him again, and can take pictures then if I so wish. But I got to thinking: I have few pictures of my first term in Edinburgh. Or my second. I uploaded them to Facebook and then deleted them from my hard drive, supposedly to save space (notably my flight details for Belgium are still on there). Now I no longer have Facebook, access to those photos is gone. And this is where the dilemma comes in: I could easily reactivate my account, download all the photos I have stored on there, and then redeactivate it (remember how I snuck back on a few months ago to create the cast page?*). The problem this creates is that my Facebook page is finally gone for good- I don't get updates, or pleas for my return, and if I want to reactivate my account then it will take a full 24 hours (I've done my research); if I reopen it, however briefly, I go back to getting invited to crap I wouldn't go to even if I were in Edinburgh, people who blatantly haven't paid attention to anything I've said for the last five months writing to me as though I'm their best friend...all the stuff I've come to resent. I don't want to seem a contrarian- I freely admit that Facebook is a brilliant social tool, just not one I can allow myself access to, and so I have to play up its negative aspects. But this isn't even really a problem- I can just ignore it, I'm a big lad. The problem is the moralizing that inevitably accompanies this move.
See, I feel I shouldn't need the photos; I reiterate- I still have the memories. But even memories need stimuli, they rarely come unbidden. But then, not all my memories are positive ones- do I want to go remember all the bad stuff that happened over those two years? On the other hand, if I somehow forget all the bad stuff, don't I run the risk of making the same mistakes? However, there are some extremely positive memories, which I want to hold onto, some of which are probably already starting to fade, if my inability to remember names or events are any indication (which is kind of scary).
But then, I come back to the idea that I shouldn't need the photos. I'm meant to be living in the moment. And I don't mean that as in a 'this is a philosophy I'm espousing at the moment' kind of way. I genuinely think it's healthier to focus on where one is currently than where one's been/where one's going. I want to live that way. I want to be healthy. I want to be able to let stuff go, not hold grudges, not be bitter and resentful. Leaving has helped with this, but it can't do all the work- I have to make a concentrated effort not to dwell on things I can't change.
But the photos would make me happy...I think. Or, at least, they'd sate a thirst. But then, sating some thirsts can just lead to bad habits (alcoholism springs to mind)...

This goes on and on. And on. And I never reach the end. I don't know what to do, I don't know which argument to listen to, and, unusually, I don't know what I want. So, I beg you for your opinions- I implore your wisdom.

*And somehow failed to get any pictures of Esmond. Alack.

Diary of a call girl

'Twould seem a first is going to be broached while in Oz-land; I have gained my first proper, salaried job.

Laying the foundations for my future. Get it?

I've had jobs before, obviously- I was the longest serving paperboy the Shropshire Star ever had, thank you very much- but this is my first adult job in that I will be paid a fixed salary and will be working for predetermined shifts (the paper round took me between forty five minutes and two and a half hours- depending on how much I let the OAPs talk at me).

When he started talking he was just a joey.

I imagine this is going to be one of those facts about me that I think are fascinating but never seem to hold the same amount of interest for anyone else. If I read in one of Stephen Fry's autobiographies that his first salaried emploi was antipodean in nature, I would have given a 'huh' or a 'fancy that' (I don't think anyone from Cherry Orchard is reading this, but if you are, that was for you); for some undiscernible reason, I do not hold the same sway as Mr. Fry. Alack.

 I can't possibly imagine why.

If you're interested (or, like Daniel, are merely pretending to be interested out of a misplaced sense of gratitude), I'll be conducting telephone surveys for a living. Just like Phoebe in that friends episode. No, wait, she was selling toner. No...no I can't think of anyone who conducted telephone interviews in fiction; I guess I'll be the first. Ever.*

This has been a year of many firsts.

Of course, having a salary does change the dynamic of this year: if I'm thrifty, I could maybe stay longer; if not, I'll at least have more money to blow on luxuries. Yes, believe it or not, this development could end up extending my stay a further month and a half- my visa isn't up until August 30th. Sadly, my ticket runs out mid-July; I'd can't ask my parents to pay for another ticket just so I can have more jollies, but if I can afford a ticket myself, then there's no guilt attached. It could also mean more travelling (because more money), and will hopefully help stem the holiday blues a wee bit (because something to do). Yes, the implications are endful. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. We still need to last the first day.

*That's right, Logan, I went there. Whatcha gonna do about it?

Ice to meet you

I turned on the air conditioning last night. I felt bad (not just cos I didn't really know how to work it and ended up chilling my room to Morgue levels), I know there are horrid environmental impacts, but I was just so hot. It was giving me headaches. Sleeping with the window open is out since I've now had dreams where I've encountered a) spiders, b) rats and c) adders (why?) in my room, having let themselves in through the window. I'm still not sure if the spider one was a dream, which is concerning because the bugger was the size of my fist.

Meanwhile, my writing was compared to Joss Whedon, again. Someone in my writer's group compared my script to Buffy and I was over the moon. Sadly, it wasn't the doctor himself, but it was gratifying all the same.

You'll soon be mine, precious.

I met with Andrew again, and the theatre company (of which I'm secretary, don't you know?) has been officially created, so, yay! There was even a suggestion of putting something on; a very special something; something both ancient and modern all at once; something that has marked every single journey I've made since I started tertiary education. But more on that later. Or probably never.

I went back to Queery, and we discussed gender. It was...polite; I can't bring myself to 'interesting' or even 'informative' because we all just seemed to espouse different versions of 'gender is a spectrum' (is anything not a spectrum these days?) with a side order of 'aren't labels terrible?' (I kept oddly silent on this matter). As I've said, the people there seem cool, but I've found that trying to form a friendship with someone just cos you're both gay, or not heteronormative, in this case, doesn't really work. I'm sure I'd get along with these people if I met them in a different context, it's just that meeting in the queerspace dictates that we should talk about being queer, and I've been queer so long, it just no longer interests me.

Finally, I had a job interview yesterday- it was a group interview, which I'd never done before, and I was the best dressed there, which is also an unprecedented event, plus, I didn't make a tit of myself, which marks a turning point in human history, I think. Sadly, I was also the least experienced person there, so I'm not holding my breath- but, at least if I don't get the job I'll know it's not cos who I am but because of what I've done, or not, as the case may be and, in fact, is.