M-ra, Princess of Power!

Help?

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 02:14:17 GMT

I have a technical problem. I have an intel MacBook which means I have a limited number of region changes on my DVD drive. Currently the drive is set on region 1 and I have one change left. Since most of my DVDs are region 4, I'd like to change the region back to that (all my research has suggested that making an intel Mac's DVD player region free is currently not possible unless, apparently, I want to run Windows on my Mac, which sort of defeats the purpose of having a Mac in the first place). But every time I try to change the region it says "There was an error changing the drive region. Error: -70001" and won't let me change it :( I don't want my laptop to be stuck on region 1 forever! Why is this happening and how do I fix it?

ETA: The problem seems to be solved! I'm back to region 4 now.

Also, I'm getting a migraine. The top right corner of my vision is mostly clear, but everything else is sparkly or blurry. It doesn't hurt yet but it will. I hear there are people who get migraines without the warning visual issues, but I'm not sure if this is better or worse. On the upside, I know I'm going to be incapacitated before it happens, so if I'm driving or planning to go out or whatever I can enact defensive maneuvers! On the downside, I can't see and I have to sit around for some indeterminate amount of time not being able to see just waiting to be in horrible pain :( And I was thinking of going to see The Princess and the Frog today, too.

I never used to get migraines until a few years ago. They suck.

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 10:08:47 GMT

Somehow this didn't get posted, which probably made my subsequent post slightly confusing. Uh, here it is. Imagine you're reading this yesterday.

Merry Christmas to those of you currently celebrating it, Happy National Leftovers Day to fellow Australians, and happy Friday (or Saturday) to those of you who don't care about Christmas ('cause hey, Fridays and Saturdays are pretty cool too, right?).

My 25 December was actually quite pleasant and low-stress this year, which is unusual and awesome, and may be because I hadn't really realised it was Christmas (despite singing Christmas carols almost every day since November) until the day was already half-over. We managed to leave the house on time without tears and recriminations, and although there was child-obnoxiousness (a seriously spoiled and rude cousin), present-embarrassment and one irritating drunk person (we poured about six bottles of wine into four people) the day was relaxed and enjoyable. And there were lots of animals! Braveheart the Shetland pony and his life partner Beans the horse (seriously, they are inseparable), a box of baby chickens just starting to shed their down, an exciteable young Border Collie called, somewhat confusingly, Polly (Polly is a male dog, named after footballer Polly Farmer), several cats, and on the wild side of things, masses of little brown rabbits bounding through the paddocks, and two huge eagles circling overhead (possibly eying off the bunnies for Christmas lunch...).

M, my aunt's mother, introduced me to her Autoharp, which is an instrument I'd never heard of before but seems kind of fun. It's like a zither but with chord bars that can damp selective strings and let you strum one chord at a time.

I have been given the gift of Bittermints (squee!) AND information on where to buy more of them in Melbourne. You know what they say, give a woman Bittermints and she'll eat chocolate for a week, teach a woman how to buy Bittermints and she'll soon have no money left and leave a wafting cloud of peppermint wherever she goes. I blame you for my Bittermints addiction, uniquid. I also have two cookbooks (CWA and Donna Hay, mmm), a diary, a Murder Mystery Party Game that I will have to host some time in 2010 (possibly while serving food made from my new recipe books!), a giant Chuzzle and rather a lot of money. And a first aid kit, which seems a weird present but I actually kind of love first aid kits (they're so full of little things that are useful!), and this one can go in my car, and I am perhaps inordinately pleased about it. Oh, and I have a new phone! Not an iPhone or anything, but a Motorolla RAZR which has always been my favourite phone and which I kept having and destroying or losing. This one was imported from overseas because apparently you can't get them in Australia any more, so the manual is printed off the internet and the predictive text dictionary is full of words like aggiornamento and stiamo (weird, because the phone was from China where they don't speak Italian often), but it's awesome. And not purple, so hopefully not cursed like the previous three RAZRS I had and destroyed/lost...

Today I'm going to the pub for lunch with the other half of the family, and then maaaybe going to see Sherlock Holmes with splatchtrock if we can get in anywhere. Then tomorrow I'm hitting the post-Christmas sales with the lovely rhyannonf

I have since hit aforementioned sales and acquired the most adorable dress in creation. I was going to wear it to the NYE barbecue I'm going to, but it's white so possibly not BBQ appropriate. I got another dress that is more suitable and almost as awesome (especially since it was $20 reduced from $160!). Photos will be here or on fatshionista (or both?) eventually.

Phone Numbers?

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 07:00:27 GMT

Oh, the down side of the new phone is that my old phone apparently did not save my address book to the sim card, so I have lost all my numbers unless I want to transfer the sim back into the old phone and painstakingly write out every number by hand. Which obviously I don't. So if you think I should have your number - whether you know I used to or you don't think I used to but think I should now - send me a text message that includes your full name, or the name I'd know you by.

Last time I did this, I got one message saying "here is my number" and not otherwise identifying the sender. Not so helpful *facepalm*

If you haven't got my number (or you haven't got any credit *s*), comment here and I'll add you to my address book the slow way because you're extra special :D (all comments are screened)

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 23:52:01 GMT

Dad is coming home from hospital today. The final diagnosis is pancreatitis (which just means he has an inflamed pancreas, there's no definitive explanation as to why) which means he has to change his diet to Super Bland to avoid future "attacks". Apparently lots of people live with a rubbish pancreas for their whole lives, and manage the painful attacks by eating as little fat as possible, avoiding spicy food, and other things; there are various theories about what is a good diet for pancreatitis. But it can be a chronic illness, so dad will probably have to be strict about his diet forever (which means food at my house is about to get extremely boring). Only time will tell.

Thanks for all the well-wishes, everyone. This has been a stressful weekend, but it's getting better :)

Baking

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 01:43:24 GMT

I really enjoy baking, and baking for other people, but there are often a lot of things about baked goods that make them unsuitable food for some of my friends. A few years ago I discovered the fun of converting recipes to make them vegan, and have had quite a bit of success with my vegan vanilla cupcake recipe, but I've never tried gluten-free baking before, and the substitution method doesn't work out as well for gluten-free as it does for vegan recipes. Gluten-free flours simply don't behave the same way as regular wheat flour, and so a straight substitution isn't going to cut it. The best way to deal with gluten free baking, then, is probably to find a tried and tested gluten free recipe that others have liked, and go with that.

Of course, this gets more complicated when you have other intersecting food intolerances and allergies to contend with. I find myself currently in a position where I want to bake cookies for three people, one gluten free, one yeast free, and one who cannot have gluten, eggs, dairy or too much fructose (which means regular sugar is out, as are many fruits that might add sweetness and interest to relatively plain gluten free cookies otherwise). The positive is that this third person can have as many nuts as she wants (which makes things a little more interesting), but the just-gluten-free person doesn't eat nuts at all. I'm pretty sure they can all have chocolate (provided it's not fructose sweetened or milky) but I'll have to check that.

As complicated as all this sounds (and I'd really love advice on baking for any of these food issues, if you have any wisdom to share!), I did manage to find an excellent website that has a plethora of simple gluten-free recipes, many of which are vegan as well! It's called Elena's Pantry and while I haven't tried any of the recipes yet, some of them look delicious. Double chocolate mocha biscotti! Crispy ginger cookies! Chocolate chip! I think with some variations I can probably make them fructose friendly as well (agave nectar is obviously out, but I believe I can use honey as a safe sweetener).

It's sometimes fun to make cooking into a puzzle, and I like being able to make things that everyone can enjoy, not just omnivores who don't have allergies. If you've got any favourite allergy-friendly recipes, I'd love to hear them!

Thank you.

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 13:50:27 GMT

I baked lots of cookies with splatchtrock (baking is very soothing) and watched some silly TV and ate pizza and played Guitar Hero, and that made me feel considerably happier. And I called dad at the hospital to see how he was because I couldn't get in touch with mum (her phone was turned off because she was at the hospital visiting him). He asked me about my car, which is emotionally-stilted-dad-speak for "I love you and there's nothing more serious than your car to worry about" so that was oddly comforting.

And then just now I checked LiveJournal and found this awfully sweet Uhura/Gaila fanart from my yuletart mystery artist, and a lot of very sweet comments on my last post from my lovely friends, and now I'm feeling quite okay, really. So thanks friends, and Mystery Artist, and splatchtrock and everyone who has helped today be a bit less awful than it was in the morning.

<3

mawaridi@gmail.com — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 04:05:26 GMT

Augh. When I had my honours application meeting with the honours coordinator for sociology I asked about enrollment and he said I don't need to do anything, the department will handle enrollment on my behalf if I get a place in the honours year. But now the university is sending me emails saying "WHY HAVEN'T YOU RE-ENROLLED YET, YOU'RE GOING TO GET A FINE, YOU'RE GOING TO LOSE YOUR PLACE, AAAARGH!" and it's freaking me out.

*breathes*

This week has been a little stressful and busy. Mostly in a good way, with excellent social events and catching up with people I don't see often and some nice singing, but I am feeling rather frazzled and worn out, and I still have More Stuff To Do.

I did read Kristin Cashore's Fire over the last two days. I wish I could do the book justice with a proper review but the most I can manage to do right now is wibble lovingly and say that any YA reader who isn't already in love with this author either hasn't read her books yet or is insane. She not only writes beautiful prose and great stories, but her characters are wonderfully realised, especially the complex, strong, vulnerable, brilliant heroines. I loved Graceling, Cashore's first novel, when I read it last year but if possible I liked Fire even more. I feel vaguely melancholy now that the story is finished and I can't read any more of it (although I think I might re-read Graceling soon). In short: read these books, they are wonderful!

I also saw Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs which was entirely silly and hilarious and a lot of fun. There was an annoying fat stereotype (Oh look, a grotesquely fat bumbling villain! How hilariously disgusting that he can't stop eating!) but other than that the heroes were total nerds, there were touching moments and a house made of jelly and a SECRET LAB and the whole thing was charmingly bizarre. And there's a monkey sidekick character I actually find funny! Monkey sidekicks are usually annoying, but this one's awesome.

Speaking of monkey sidekicks, I also saw Night At The Museum II which was great apart from the monkey sidekicks :) Again, utterly silly, but fun!

Continuing on the subject of random tangents about movies, I am perplexed as to why they have cast Dwayne Johnson as the astronaut in Planet 51 and then made the animation of his character white. Perhaps a PoC astronaut being cast as a terrifying alien when he ends up on a strange planet would have been pretty race-faily, but isn't whitewashing Dwayne Johnson kind of race-faily too?

Unrelatedly, I get to go to (at least) two weddings next year! Whee! I love weddings :)

Concert!

mawaridi@gmail.com — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 02:41:44 GMT

On Saturday 12 December I am performing in a choral Christmas concert at St Andrew's Church Brighton (on the corner of New Street an Church Street). You should come! It's going to be a lovely concert, with a selection of Christmas carols both traditional and Australian, Gounod's St Cecilia Mass, and "Five Days Old," a piece by Australian composer Christopher Willcock that has never been performed on the Australian mainland.

The concert starts at 8pm and tickets are $30 for adults and $20 for concession (students, pensioners, health care cards, etc.). You can buy tickets at the door or order tickets by calling 0400 620 326, or by email at monucs.committee@gmail.com. Alternatively, if you're going to be seeing me before the concert I can sell you your ticket in advance :)

Things that made me happy today

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sat, 14 Nov 2009 10:22:25 GMT

splatchtrock reports on the creation of a new and improved version of the old favourite "Rock, Paper, Scissors" And no, it's not "Rock, Paper, Scissors, Lizard, Spock", although that is also cheering :P

70 Baaaaaby Animals!

Some very clever and sligtly disturbing photo manipulations by digital artist Jan Oliehoek. They're awfully impressive, but some are freaky, like the zebra-frog o_O I want to live in the house :)

Now I am about to watch Sky High with splatchtrock and pink_crayon16. Whee!

My icon has never been more appropriate!

mawaridi@gmail.com — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 05:49:59 GMT

I had my driving test today (take 2, as I failed the first time). I passed! After a year and a half of rather expensive lessons, three goes at the Hazard Perception Test (OF DOOM), one test missed due to illness and one test not passed and thus rescheduled, I am finally allowed to drive my car all by myself :D

I have spent all day realising new and exciting things this means I can do (Going to the shops whenever I want! Getting to uni in half an hour instead of an hour and a half! Going swimming at uni without having to carry a giant extra bag! Getting to carolling gigs by myself!) and being gleeful about it all over again. Whee, I can drive!

Picnic in the park

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 01:08:58 GMT

why_am_i needed a sleeve "tattoo" for her Lyn-Z costume at a Halloween/birthday party last night, so while picnicking with friends on a lovely sunny afternoon she handed me some textas and I had fun with her arm :) The resulting tattoo doesn't look anything like Lyn-Z's (we were working from some action shots on a mobile phone screen, so it was hard to make out what it was meant to look like) but it was so much fun to draw and I think it looks pretty cool. Plus, what an awesome alternative to getting a real full sleeve tatt - have one just for the day! Then you can have the fun of skin art without the stress of trying to pick something you'll never get sick of (the main reason I have never seriously considered a tattoo is because I am flightly, not because I don't want one).

Also, the picnic was awesome. Lots of cake, a lovely warm day without any rain (until the evening, when it poured down and there was lightning and it was all dramatic and exciting) and excellent company. Then in the evening splatchtrock, beachy_woods and I went to a trivia night, which was awesome even though we didn't win. It was nice to get a trivia experience that didn't involve me making tea, setting tables or trying to cook party pies for forty people.

You play doctor but I've lost patience

mawaridi@gmail.com — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 01:50:49 GMT

Dear world of entertainment,

Please, please stop using fat as visual shorthand for evil, ugly, stupid or dirty. It's lazy writing and it's amazingly insulting. We get it, you think we are disgusting and hideous, you really don't need to harp on about it.

This message brought to you by the letter F (both for "Fat" and "FUCK YOU"), Liz Evans' book Cue The Easter Bunny and Merlin episode 205.

No love,

A fat woman who is nice, intelligent, clean and nice-smelling, and trying not to call herself ugly any more, thank you very much.

I need an awesome fat woman icon, I think. Any suggestions?

mawaridi@gmail.com — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 09:59:40 GMT

Tonight at yet another aggravating WW meeting we were told that we shouldn't starve ourselves to lose weight. A sensible suggestion, yes, but why shouldn't we starve ourselves? Because apparently eating too little makes you fat.

As someone who lost a lot of weight through self starvation, and knows several people who have become alarmingly thin through disordered eating, and also, you know, lives in the real world and has heard of anorexia, I say: THIS IS BULLSHIT. Of course you will lose weight if you don't eat. The reason you shouldn't starve yourself is not because it will make you fat, you shouldn't starve yourself because it is bad for your health, it will make you depressed and miserable, and you deserve to not be depressed and miserable if you can possibly avoid it.

I really wish these meetings would put more of an emphasis on what is, to me, the most important part of any change in one's diet and lifestyle: the fact that you deserve to be happy while you are fat, even if you are planning or trying to be thinner. I wish they would advertise plus size clothing in their magazines and try to teach members ways of learning to love themselves while they're on their "weight loss journey" or whatever crap they're calling it nowadays. But no, all they want is to make money off us, so it is in their interests to keep us as miserable as possible, and keep telling us the only way we can be happy and lead full and normal lives is by giving them our money every week.

I am still going because I need to be kept accountable for continuing to eat and exercise in a more aware and health-conscious way (both physically healthy and mentally healthy), and this is the most convenient (and, interestingly enough, least expensive) way for me to do that. But fuck.

For anyone who's interested, I have lost some weight (I don't think it's noticeable, but some of my clothes fit more comfortably). But more importantly, I have only binged once in the two months-ish I've been going to meetings, which is kind of cool. I have taken on some other coping mechanisms to deal with stress that are not necessarily any better than bingeing, and I clearly need to work on actually reducing my stress levels rather than just swapping my coping mechanisms around (since it was giving up an old "bad" coping mechanism that spawned the binge problem in the first place) but it's a nice first step. And I can't really reduce my stress levels for at least the next month, there's too much naturally stress-inducing stuff to do that I cannot avoid doing.

Edit: *facepalm* Um, yes, I know that not eating enough for short periods of time and then eating normally can have an adverse effect on weight loss, and I know that long periods of starvation tend to fuck with your metabolism and make you gain weight faster and more, and that it will often also be harder to lose in the future. I know commenters were just trying to be helpful, but I don't really need a lesson on the science of weight loss, thanks.

Hey Hey It's Racism!

mawaridi@gmail.com — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 11:22:40 GMT

Q&A is on TV, a panel show on the ABC where a selection of people talk about topical events, and they're talking about the blackface incident on Hey Hey It's Saturday recently. And I am SO FURIOUS I may have to turn the stupid show off.

We have a smug white journalist (Janet Albrechtsen from The Australian) talking about how "we" (Australians) insult everyone in comedy (fat people! old people! school girls! nobody finds that offensive!) and she thinks it's good to mock everyone and people should be less "precious" about it (also, guess what guys, blackface on TV has no relation whatsoever to racist violence!). We have Germaine Greer derailing the conversation and making it about sexism and British people being mean (!?!) instead of racism. And we have a stupid politician saying "this is Australian humour! We push the boundaries! This has been blown way out of proportion! None of the non-white people I know have ever complained to me about racism in Australia so it's obviously not a problem!"

The only sane person on the panel (on this issue, anyway) seems to be Todd Sampson, who pointed out that we are kidding ourselves if we insist that there is no racism in Australia and, like me, is utterly baffled that all these people on the panel are so invested in asserting that Australia is totally devoid of racism.

NEWSFLASH: Blackface is racist. Defending your right to watch and laugh at blackface, in the face of numerous complaints that it is offensive, is racist. Yes, racism is alive and well in Australia, the fact this argument is even happening is proof of that, and no, incidents like the Cronulla riots and the recent attacks on Indian students are not isolated.

mawaridi@gmail.com — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 06:48:54 GMT

I want Neil Gaiman's House

Otherwise, the world is making me ANGRY at the moment. Particularly the sheer mind boggling hypocrisy of feminists pulling the tone argument and refusing to educate themselves when they get called on their able bodied privilege (I don't watch Feministing usually but logansrogue posted about it and I got drawn into the rage - the trainwreck is here). It's seriously depressing to be able to play privilege bingo on a feminist blog. I know there's an established critique of (Western) feminism as a movement having some seriously problematic issues with focusing on female oppression and forgetting about other axes of power and privilege, but seeing it happen so very viciously was kind of horrifying.

The other thing that hasn't made me nearly so angry, but a bit uneasy, was the most recent episode of Merlin. Merlin is my happy fluffy time show and while it has some fail I think it has so far been reasonably mild apart from the "PoCs are always servants/evil/dead" rule (*sigh*). I don't want to be angry about every single episode of this show, though (that's what Supernatural is for!) and I'm concerned by the direction in which Morgana's plot arc is headed.

SPOILERS FOR MERLIN 203

(This is copied with some elaboration from a comment I made on mon_starling's journal)

Up until this point, Gaius had been giving Morgana sleeping potions ostensibly to soothe her, because her nightmares were awful and frightening. He had his suspicions that she was displaying prophetic powers, but it seemed mostly like he was trying to help her. Now it's become clear that she has magical power and the sleeping draughts have become sinister alongside his total refusal to discuss magic with her at all, it's reading far too much like a hysterical woman being given drugs so she won't cause a fuss. I found Morgana's distress that nobody would listen to her or talk to her about what was going on really upsetting; I really loathe the plot trope of keeping important things about a person secret from the person in question, perhaps especially when it happens to female characters, because it feels too much like "oh, Morgana is a woman, she couldn't possibly be strong or mature enough to cope with this information and make her own decisions about what happens to her".

Gaius encourages Merlin's "gift" even though he tells him to be careful with it, but he doesn't trust Morgana with hers. Despite the fact that so far in this series, Merlin is hopelessly reckless and not at all trustworthy when it comes to keeping his magic hidden! Morgana has certainly had a few episodes of recklessness herself (hiding Mordred and later plotting to assassinate Uther) but not more than Merlin, who seems to be on the brink of revealing his powers to anyone and everyone in every single episode. I know Morgana's analogue in the traditional Arthurian legends doesn't bode well for her using her powers for good (well, depending which version you believe *s*) but Gaius doesn't have that kind of meta knowledge, and so his motivation seems to be that Morgana can't be trusted with important secrets because she's a Lady and might have a fit of the vapours or throw herself off a tower if she found out the truth, or something. I'm really frustrated that Merlin didn't tell her about his own powers, too, especially after (I think admirably) standing up to Gaius about being honest with her about magic. He knows that Morgana is tougher than she might seem to Gaius, and yet he didn't trust her either. I think in general it's about time Merlin's magic was revealed to someone other than Gaius, it would open up a lot of new plot possibilities.

I actually loved watching the episode and have liked where the new season is going so far, but I'm worried about what's in store for Morgana. Please don't make her evil or dangerously unstable just because she's a powerful woman :( There haven't been any powerful women in this show who weren't dangerous or evil yet.

More happily, there's an awesome fictional-and-non-fictional-people-of-colour love-in happening at choc_fic for spring/summer (or autumn/winter, I guess, if you're one of those weird northern hemisphere types :P), 100 Days of Colour. Looks like fun! Thanks to glockgal for pointing it out :D

ETA: Oh, and I like this post on Shapely Prose - Shrödinger's Rapist.

Help!

mawaridi@gmail.com — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 04:57:46 GMT

Hi guys, I need a bit of help for a research project I'm doing. Part of the project involves doing an analysis of Craft magazine and I can't find copies of it anywhere. I am able to get hold of issues 6, 8 and 10 but my local library and the uni library do not stock it. I can buy back issues from the website, but they're US $14.99 each and I don't really have that kind of money at the moment. So my need is thus: if you have any issues of Craft you'd be willing to lend me for the next month, I will love you forever! Alternatively, if you have some you'd like to sell me, you can suggest a price and I'll see if I can fit it into my budget :) Please comment here so we can work out a time/place/date for me to pick them up!

If you could pass this request on to people you know who might be able to help, that'd be great.

<3!

mawaridi@gmail.com — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 10:06:55 GMT

I was a bit skeptical about Celebrity Master Chef at first. I loved the original Master Chef Australia and I thought adding the gimmick of celebrity contestants was a bit silly; the show is supposed to be about people who really love cooking. But so far I'm pretty psyched about who's going to be on the show.

I'm a bit perplexed by the format, though. Did I miss the start, or have they just jumped straight into the middle of the show? I guess they didn't need to do auditions and selection rounds. It's a bit weird having only three contestants introduced at a time.

Plus I am enjoying perving on Indira Naidoo while she gets her hands dirty making meatballs. You've got to love an intelligent, sexy woman who loves food <3

I stole this verbatim from splatchtrock <3

mawaridi@gmail.com — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 08:18:59 GMT

Are you:

a) dying to display your knowledge of the almost totally useless?
b) wanting to take part in a fun and exciting event?
C) enthused by the prospect of winning fabulous prizes?
d) any/some/all of the above?

Then the MonUCS Trivia Experience is for you!

Taking place on the 17th of October in the fabulously appointed Redeemer Lutheran Church (25 Cypress Ave, Glen Waverley), the Experience will be a thrilling night of trivia, minutiae, nit-picking and split hairs. Assemble your team of 6-8 people and turn up at 7pm for a night you'll not soon forget! If you can't make a full table, come anyway and meet new people and help them to win fabulous prizes! FABULOUS PRIZES!! They're fabulous. This will be a great chance to introduce your other friends to the choir. Bring your parents. Bring your friends' parents. Bring your parents' friends. Bring your friends' parents' friends. "How much will I pay for this literally once-in-a-lifetime opportunity?" I hear you ask (I have very good ears) and to you I say "15 dollars!". There will be snacks and nibbles! BYO alcohol.

To recap!

MonUCS Trivia Experience!
Saturday October 17
Redeemer Lutheran Church, 25 Cypress Avenue, Glen Waverley
Starting at 7pm
Cost $15 per head
Tables of 6-8

Got a question? Comment below.

A Little Bit of Art

mawaridi@gmail.com — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 05:22:34 GMT

elightful "daily drop caps" by illustrator and typographer Jessica Hische. What a fun way of spicing up an otherwise uninteresting blog post, like a story about my cat or another dull ramble about how behind I am in my work. Thanks for making my post a little less depressing, Jessica.

If you want to add a fanciful drop cap to your blog posts, you can find out how right here.

Meanwhile, I'm still woefully behind on all my work, still suffering from "writer's block" if there is such a thing, despite trying a whole bunch of alternative work processes and thinking therapies to break said block, and being given even more things to worry/stress/feel crap about. Whee.

Thank heavens for Big Bang Theory and Merlin, that's all I'm saying.

mawaridi@gmail.com — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 11:21:46 GMT

Watched Merlin season 2 opener with pink_soprano.

THEIR LITTLE FACES!!!

<3<3

Yuletart! And Life.

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 00:42:16 GMT

You guys, yuletart signups are up! Is it that time of year already? Yikes! And also yay! I still squee every time I look at the beautiful (NSFW) Buffy/Satsu art dualbunny drew for me in last year's exchange.

Today I am writing an essay about representations of gender in Australian magazine advertisements for domestic products in the 70s and the current year. Very specific. I'm not sure if I find that helpful, or hindering. Hmm. The problem is tracking down the older ads, as I have left it really late to work on this in any detail. Too many other commitments in my life, it seems. I think it will be fine, but I would have preferred to use an earlier era than the 70s, and now I'm stuck with the 70s because that's what my mother has examples of in the house.

In general life is pretty good, albeit busy. I have multiple assignments due and several social events on next week, and a test that I'd completely forgotten about on Monday (luckily it's open book), but so far things seem mostly under control. I think.

I finished therapy last Wednesday, which was kind of exciting. In the past eight months my DNA test score has gone from "extremely depressed" (and moderately anxious and mildly stressed) to not depressed or anxious at all, and only mildly stressed due to recent actually stressful events. I haven't been not depressed at all for about ten years, so it's kind of an awesome feeling.

The closest thing I have to a singing icon.

mawaridi@gmail.com — Tue, 08 Sep 2009 01:37:06 GMT

I'm not sure why I didn't post this weeks ago, but I have a concert coming up this weekend! My choir is performing a bunch of excellent songs from musicals throughout the last century, from Pirates of Penzance and Gershwyn to Sweeney Todd and Avenue Q. I even have a small solo, which is pretty exciting. You should come and see it, because the music is an awful lot of fun, and also because the tickets are really cheap! Just $20 for an adult ticket, and $15 if you have a concession of some kind (student, health care card, pensioner, etc.).

It's this Saturday September 12 from 8pm (I suggest arriving at 7:30 as seats are not allocated) on campus at Monash Uni Clayton in the Music Auditorium. It's right near Robert Blackwood Hall, and there will be signs so you can track us down (or just follow the sound of Awesome). There are several methods of ordering tickets as you can see below.

Sorry if anyone caught the version of this post with the GIANT print quality poster. Eep.

mawaridi@gmail.com — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 06:19:31 GMT

I haven't posted in ages and I haven't got much of value to say, but I feel like I should...touch base or something. I haven't had a great week, it's been busy but largely unproductive. I had a lot of stuff to do, and some of it I did, but sometimes I played computer games instead. My mood was pretty rubbish.

Today I've done none of the things I was supposed to do. I have a few excuses as to why, but they're just that, excuses, not valid reasons. As a result I am feeling fairly bleh.

Toast is not really a satisfying meal.

Tasty Noms

mawaridi@gmail.com — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 04:45:58 GMT

Last night I went to the Shanghai Dumpling Restaurant in Tattersalls lane and had a fantastic dumpling banquet. All you can eat dumpling feast for $12 per person (for 7 or more people, I think)! The restaurant is cramped and crowded, there's hilarious neon signage to the dingy toilets, AWFUL piped music, and there's amusingly bad (or just confusing?) service (Tsingtao = spring rolls? We don't have lemonade, only Sprite. HAVE SOME MOAR DUMPLINGS!) and communal self-serve tea in a huge vat with plastic mugs, but the food is delicious and it's really cheap (apparently if you buy the vegetable and mushroom dumplings alone it costs $6.50 for a plate of twenty o_O). I highly recommend those mushroom and vegetable dumplings, by the way. Om nom nom. Also, they let us take home leftovers, so I had dumplings and fried rice for breakfast, while watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles :D I'm extremely mature.

I also did my homework, though, so I'm not just eating dumplings and watching cartoons. Productivity abounds!

mawaridi@gmail.com — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 11:02:09 GMT

Attention Australian and New Zealand peeps: We Love Colors is offering free shipping to Australia and New Zealand until the end of August when you use the special code "runway". Brightly coloured tights, shoelaces, leggings and other stuff, including totally glorious tights that go into plus sizes (up to 6ft tall and 375 lbs/~170 kg). Go forth and buy exciting hosiery! Thanks to naturalredhead for the tip :)

I have been officially granted 6 credit points for one of the subjects I studied at Melbourne, so I don't have to take a summer semester subject and, provided I pass everything this semester, I can safely apply to do Honours next year. Yay!

I have Merlin on DVD and am currently watching the first episode with my mother and the cat, while eating chicken parma and drinking bubbly. Good times.