Crappy Valentine's Day!

I'm a bit of a rare breed. For reasons aside from any of the obvious neuroses you may have already picked up on that is (have we met?). I hate VDay. But I'm not single, and can only remember one year since I turned 13 that I was (technically) on the day. Plenty of people dread Valentines day. Most, because it reminds them that they haven't got that special someone, and maybe they should be feeling alone right now. This, despite the fact that it probably doesn't even bother them on the other 364 days of the year, when they're basking in singledom.

Others, particularly men, resent VDay due to all of the pressure that is unfairly placed upon them. It turns love into a competition- whose boyfriend will send the most embarrassingly large bunch of red roses to their work/school/home? Who will induce the most jealousy on the 15th when they're exchanging tales of the romantic surprise dates they embarked on the day before?

And then, there are people who hate Valentine's Day because it's lost all original meaning, having been reduced to a commercially-driven, Hallmark run excuse to increase the prices of flowers.

As for me? It's all of the above and more, I suppose. Like marriage, I find love because-the-calendar-says-so is not romantic in the slightest. I mean, sure, give me flowers and take me on a surprise date- any other day of the year. I'm all for declarations of love for me emblazened accross the sky by an undoubtedly well-paid but probably very dizzy pilot, so long as it's any day EXCEPT the 14th of February. In fact, it's probably best to leave any impulsive, crazy expressions of love on the backburner for that whole week. Just don't do it. Honestly, if someone I was romantically involved with gave me a gift on Valentine's Day I would actually be annoyed, simpyl because they should know me better than that. And don't even get me started on VDay marriage proposals!

To put it simply, I just don't celebrate it. In fact, last year I tried to organise a "Valentine's Day sucks" Ladies dinner, but apart from 2 or 3 single friends who clicked that cursed "maybe" button on the facebook event, the response wasn't great. I was actually shocked. I assumed anyone who's not completely pathetic realises that VDay is a joke. Maybe it's more a case that they don't care, and would rather enjoy the day without questioning whether it's worth a mention on the calendar or not. I know I seem like a total cynic, and I'm sure someone out there is supressing a giggle as I assure you I'm not. I just don't believe in believing in something (marriage, VDay, Christmas, etc.) simply because I'm supposed to.

(I'm just a rebel without a cause, baby.)

-m xx

Nostalgia

Take that, hot-chick-from-Scott-Pilgrim.

(Back almost three years ago. When I had no respect for my hair and didn't know how to dress myself.)

Balls to You

Yupp. What she said.

It's hot.
Really hot.
Actually, if I'm honest, today isn't so bad. My house however, has been converted into an oven due to the heat this week, so it's hard to appreciate that today is colder than yesterday.
Yesterday was the hottest February day in Sydney in 85 years.
It hit 30 degrees at 8:30am.
By 9:30am, it was 36 degrees.
It hit 40 at 11am.
and the maximum of 42 at 2:45pm.
It was 35 degrees at 11:30pm last night- the hottest night in Sydney in recorded history.

And when did I go to bed? Oh about 11:45pm. Yeah, not fun.
Me and J lay flat on our backs, with a wet cloth which we moved every couple of minutes so another body part could experience to delicious coolness. I woke up at 7:30am, for absolutely no reason.
It's 10:30am now and it's already hit the predicted maximum for today- 32 degrees. This does not bode well...

I'm just hanging out for the cold change coming this evening- end of the heatwave! Mid to high 20s next week- oh the joy! Never before have I thought of that as cold.

-m xx

Why Write?

The new(ish) Sydney Westfield, Pitt St.

If anything, it was only when stopped thinking about what I hoped to gain from my writing that my writing really began to improve. This is why I believe the single most important question you can ask yourself as a writer is not why you write, but if you would still write if there was absolutely nothing in it for you. If noone published it, if noone liked it, if no one - not even your loved ones - could be bothered to read whatever it was you were writing, would you still have the urge within you to sit down and drag the words out?



If the answer to that is yes, then that is why you write.


Because you're a writer


-Daniel Clay

MIA

So I know I alluded in my last post to my brief absence. And to a pretty darn good excuse for it! I had plans for a busy day filled with wallowing in self pity over my current lack of future and doing some blogging (between googling "certificae 4 photoimaging sydney" for the umpteenth and flumpteenth times) on Tuesday. Then at about 10am I received this text from my currently-unemployed and often company-seaking friend Kasey:

"Laura tells me it's going to hit 42 degrees todayyy
I have put you in charge of operation get Kasey out of house and into a body of water
...Gooooooooooooo"

So we headed to Balmoral beach, which is quite possibly my favourite Sydney beach (oh but there are so many to choose from!). It never has waves. I hate waves.

It's a match made in heaven.

After close to two hours of buses, we arrived. Being responsible sun-and-lack-of-ozone-aware Australians, the first thing we did was slap on some cream. Then jump in the water and fail to reapply for the rest of the day. Sun protection fail? Most definitely. Sunburnt? No, (except my scalp, which I didn't sunscreen, for the plain and simple reason that WHO THE HELL GETS A BURNT SCALP WHEN THEIR HAIR ISN'T EVEN PARTED?!) I'm magical. I am a nice crisp brown though. Kasey was less fortunate- she refused to sunscreen her legs, because legs "never get burnt" and ended up with a lovely pink hue to the back of them.

The visit was followed by dinner with a few of our friends who have just headed to Thailand for 3 weeks (lucky bitches) at Woolwich Pier, where I had possibly the most amazing salad of my life.

Sydney skyline. If you look close you can actually see it.

So Tuesday was out- simply no time to feel sorry for myself and blog about it with such a glittering social life. I'm sorry, I'll try to do better with the self pity in future. Like now, perhaps, as I tell the next leg of my why-I-wasn't-able-to-blog-for-2-days story (what an exciting tale!)

At about 1am Tuesday night/Wednesday Morning, my body decided it hated me and clearly my stomach no longer enjoyed the most amazing salad of my life, because I spent the next two hours puking and hating life. Miraculously, I didn't wake my mother up. I even had a shower and she slept right through my misfortune. Needless to say, on Wednesday I was far to exhausted and in large amounts of pain to do much other than lie on the couch at my Dad's (courtesy of Mother driving me down the hill) and watch my shows on the foxtel IQ in blissful 22 degree conditioned air.

So, as you can see, I have very good reasons for not being able to blog. between having an awesome life and having a crap one, there was simply no time for frivolous activities. except for going to the beach and finishing season 4 of Skins and having my mind BLOWN by that ending. Seriously. My mind? Spread accross four corners of my loungeroom, unable to deal with that cliffhanger that's not a cliffhanger because it's the last episode about those characters and we'll never know what happened, really. Cliff-fall more like it. If you're not a skins watcher, maybe don't start. It's fabulous but it WILL TORTURE YOU!

-m xx

The Day that Was

Yes I know, I've been MIA for a few days.

(I have an explanation I swear, but that's for another post)

And I know you're all DYING to know the story with my TAFE interview. Frankly, parts of it are quite embarrassing. Don't say I'm not good to ya'!

So basically on Friday I made my way into Ultimo for my interview. On the way there, however, I ran into my maternal grandmother (fondly referred to as Shep). She was disembarking from the very bus that I was about to board. We did the super speedy "hihowareyoubye" thing but as she went to walk off she touched my arm and said "Oh I have to tell you something, Steve has cancer. Tell your mum"

Shock makes people abrupt. Or maybe it's denial.

In the 15 seconds I had to spare I managed to get a small amount of information out of her. My uncle, Steve, has cancer of the lymph nodes and lung. Now, if I'm 100% honest, I wasn't all too upset or surprised by this notion. Only last year, my uncle stopped drinking after god knows how long of being unable to. The catalyst? Not having any money to drink. If you believe Shep, who lives with him, that's the only reason he doesn't drink. I like to think if he really wanted to, he'd have found a way- most likely by raiding Shep's purse. She does have a rather dangerous habit of carrying around large sums of money for weeks on end.

The saddest part is that it's now that he's no longer drinking that it catches up with him. But who knows, maybe he was sick before the drinking stopped. As for the reason it didn't upset me all that much, it's probably no surprise if I say we're not close. But that's to be expected. Not that I'm blaming him of course. Alcoholism is a terrible, unforgiving disease. Unlike most, the body doesn't want to fight it. It is far easier to drink, and get worse, than it is to stop and get better.

So I went to my interview. I pushed the news from my mind because I knew there was no point thinking about it. In fact, there isn't much now until something new happens. The part I was most dreading was telling my mother. I mean, she should be the one telling me that her brother is ill, not the other way around. Maybe I was more emotionally sensitive than usual. Really, I have no idea if things would have been in any way different if I hadn't run into Shep.

The interview process wasn't how I expected it to be. I found the room, filled with about 15 other people, sitting there in silence. There was a board for us to write our names on on arrival, so that we'd go into our interview in order. On the board were the other time slots. About 20 names on each before ours. I could only assume that each time was about the same, and that both days had the same volume of interviewees. I estimate it to be about 250+ in total- way more than I had been prepared for.

The interview itself had a grading system. With questions about our equipment, experience, drive. I got 67 out of a 100. Apparently the average is about 75. Below average is not something I am comfortable with or accustomed to. On top of this, I hadn't brought my High School Certificate with me, to prove that I was even eligible for the course. I hadn't been told we required it, it hadn't even occurred to me. After my interview, feeling shaken and stressed, I had to visit the head teacher and tell him I didn't have proof of my HSC. He looked at me and said "...and?" - clearly expecting me to suggest a solution. For reasons I still don't really understand, I started to cry. Then of course when it got to the point where I couldn't pretend my eyes ere brimming with tears and I had to say something to acknowledge it, the crying only got worse, as it always does.

After a few deep breaths he suggested I scan my certificate and email it to him. Of course. What other option was there? Not only had I done poorly in my interview, but I had presented myself as either a) a nervous wreck or b) someone who was resorting to crocodile tears in an attempt to gain sympathy points. Truth is, I'm neither. But I don't think that affected their decision not to grant me a place, really. 250 people is a lot to compete against.

So that was that day; the day that was. I was about 90% sure that I hadn't got in, even before I got the rejection email, so at least it didn't come as too much of a surprise. Then of course came the question that still remains- what now? I want my diploma. I want to learn as much about photography as I can, so why not get qualified while I'm at it? And since I chose not to go to university, I don't want my time wasted. The facts are I need my certificate to get my diploma. There is only one place in Sydney that offers the certificate, and they only run the course once a year. Basically, this means I have to wait till next year to even apply again.

Next week I'm starting a short SLR course at Sydney community college. I hope I learn something new from it. In the mean time, I told my boss today. I don't know whether it was sympathy or what, but an opportunity for some paid photography work may be coming up soon (not giving too much away!). For now, I'm just taking life as it comes and playing things by ear, because there isn't much else I can do. I mean, is there ever anything we can do other than just live? They say the best way to make God laugh is to make a plan. Now I don't need to tell you what a screaming atheist I am, but it's true. You can make all the plans you want but life won't always fit them. That's something I struggle with sometimes.

Cheerier things on their way, I promise!

-m xx