Saturday 30 April 2011

Take a bow

My fave pop song atm. It's a kick arse break up song. I dedicate it to my girls who are cleaning the trash out of their lives atm.

Not anymore

This song used to sum up how I felt when I was sick. It doesn't mean that anymore but it does let me not forget that. I do not ever want to feel like that again.



I hurt myself today
to see if I still feel
I focus on the pain
the only thing that's real
the needle tears a hole
the old familiar sting
try to kill it all away
but I remember everything
what have I become?
my sweetest friend
everyone I know
goes away in the end
and you could have it all
my empire of dirt

I will let you down
I will make you hurt

Friday 29 April 2011

Winning


For the regular readers... yes, Mum, Dad and Candace, you will remember that I had a little issue recently with a crazed stalker bogan. He shall not be named here. That's mainly because he hasn't quite worked out how to spell his own name.

Anyway, I was at a stage where I wanted to get a domestic violence order again him. I was told this would stop the harassment from him and his satanic harem of skanks, who wanted to tell me to leave him alone. They aren't the smartest because I wasn't actually having anything to do with him, which is why he sent them after me. Ahh, bogan genius did not peak at the invention of thongs as formal wear.

I nearly got the restraining order, even knowing that he'd love the attention.

Then one of my besties, Cathie asked me a question that changed the way I saw this situation and every one to follow.

Do you want to win or do you want to be happy?

I wanted to be rid of him and happy. Winning may be important to drug-fueled cocaine snorting washed up TV stars but I knew that wasn't what I wanted. No more drama with someone I wished I'd never made the mistake of stopping to talk to. No more death threats in the mail. No more sentences made of single syllable words. No more.

So yes, I chose to do nothing but ignore and endure. Luckily for me, people with small brains are easily bored and wander off to upset someone else's life.

When someone is making your life hard, ask Cathie's question.

Monday 25 April 2011

Asked and Answered


A guy asked me the other day what I was looking for in love. What would be the traits of my next boyfriend or husband or partner?

I found that so easy to answer.

I am not looking.

He asked why.

I found that so easy to answer.

I am not looking because I already found it once. He was the man I spent most of my life with. The one I married. The one who left me. I'm one of those lucky people who really fell in love like you do in Jane Austin books. It didn't work out but it did happen.

That was it. That was the love part of my life.

Now, it is time for the rest.

He asked if I was still just getting over it.

I found that not so easy to answer.

I don't know. I think this is just who I am now.

Friday 22 April 2011

Mea Maxima Culpa

It is days like this that make me stop and reflect.

Today is Good Friday. There are many reasons that it is good. Not many of them are religious to me. I don't mind people believing in a higher power but it simply is not my thing. Maybe science beat it out of me. Maybe I've never had a moment where I needed to believe so much in something more that the moment came and claimed me.

So, my main thoughts today focused on why things feels so good at the moment. On why I am content. Why life is full on wins for me and nothing seems to knock me down.

The other day, an acquaintance said to me "Prozac nation" and I giggled in response. Not at the fact that this person put down my inhuman positivity and happiness to prescribed SSRIs but at the fact that I'm no longer on anti-depressants. There was no need to tell them that. Let them believe that true happiness is not possible without chemical assistance. It's a little like someone believing in Santa. You don't want to break their heart and tell them that it is possible without rebalancing your brain via a Pfizer cocktail.

Then that means that I'm happy, even if I don't have a quarter acre block to house via mortgage, my 2.3 children with my hypertension driven same sex partner. Am I insane?

Not anymore apparently.

It all comes down to one thing. Look at the past and compare it to now. Look at the biggest mistake you ever made and see how you recovered. Take in the downs and compare it to the stability found now, in purely existing.

I am healthy, especially my mind. I have family who are my rock. I have friends who actually rock. I have a job I love.

I don't live with a man who strips me back to my bones and lathers on the salt. I don't work with people who push me down to gain vertical ground. I don't have frenemies who cut me back at every progression forward.

Life is good. I have learnt from my mistakes. I have grown from the lessons. The scars that once ran raw are healed and reinforced with emotional titanium.

There is only beauty now. There is only happiness.

If you accept the biggest mistake you ever made and take something from it, then you will be fine. No, that is not true. You will be brilliant.

Acta est fabula.

Thursday 21 April 2011

Time fixes most things


Sometimes, I want to help people but I don't know how.

Watching people I love going through tough stuff is always harrowing. When I was suffering, it must have driven my loved one to feel as helpless and lost as I do know.

What I have learnt is that sometimes you can't do much at all. You just have to be there if they need you and make sure they know you love them.

Time fixes most things.

Wednesday 20 April 2011

Please excuse me while I kiss this guy

"I want your ugly
I want your disease
I want your everything
As long as it’s free
I want your love
Love-love-love
I want your love"
-- Lady Gaga


She's a freak but all the best ones are. Like all music, it's how you interpret it that makes it mean more to you than just beats and sounds.

I remember reading an interview with Seal, in the 90s. He said that he never included the lyrics of his songs in the CD because he thinks you should hear whatever you hear. The song should mean something to you and that doesn't have to be what the song writer or singer said it would be. That has always stuck in my head, especially at times when people correct me for singing the wrong words.

There was a great moment once when my sister and I were playing competition Sing Star. That's Sony's version of karaoke. We were singing Culture Club. It was Karma Chameleon. I can't remember the right line now because I've learnt the correct words. Anyway, we were both singing and our scores were so close. Then we both hit a line and we both sang the exact the same words. They were the exact wrong words too.

We laughed hysterically and then she beat my score. She always does. Don't ever take her on when she is singing Torn by Natalie Imbruglia. She will kick your arse.

I guess the point is that the lyrics are whatever they mean to you. For all baggage and lessons learned. For all experiences that made you smile and weep. For all the losses and battles won.

The world is whatever you make it. It is whatever you see it as.

So what if someone else writes the lyrics? So what if someone with a nice voice sings the song? The meaning you give it is yours. All yours.

Just make sure you laugh if you get the words wrong at the same time as someone else :)

Monday 18 April 2011

Like the Lama Guy


Some days I feel all wise and shit. Some days I don't. In the last few days, I've worked out some major 42 stuff and feel a need to share it. This is me sharing.

A few of my good friends are single. They are mid-20s+. They spend a lot of time thinking of whether the last person they dated is their next relationship. They spend a lot of time wondering if they should read this in to that and that in to this.

Lately, I have been reminding them that spending time thinking of these things is a waste of time.

Do you remember the days when we were late teens and early 20s? We lived life planning a future for ourselves and having fun. If we met a person that we fancied, we would think about stuff like if they had time between classes to have coffee or if we'd bump in to them in town on the weekends.

It was not a stressful ponder about if they were "the one"; if the wanted children; if they managed money well.

This is not important when you first meet someone. Focus on if you like them and if they are fun or share interests. Over-thinking the future is not that useful. It interferes with other important things like if the person is rude to the waiter or for some horrible reason wears white dress shoes.

Enjoy life. Like yourself. Don't go looking for too much, too fast. That just sucks the joy out of life.

These boots were made for kicking your...


I have never been the kind of woman who dresses for someone else. My clothes and my style exist for me. They are an expression of what and who I am. They are intrinsically driven.

Other women seem very aware of this. They do not assume that I bought a dress to please some random man in a pub. They do not assume that my heels exist to impress a man driving passed in his compensatory car.

My assumption is the women realise that they inhabit the Earth for more than the aesthetic pleasure of the opposite sex.

Unfortunately, too many men that I somehow end up in conversations with seem to assume that my appearance is to benefit them. In particular, the application of boots.

Let me clear this up now. These boots were made for walking and if you don't remember that then one of these days these boots are going to walk all over you.

Thursday 14 April 2011

Honesty


“We need people in our lives with whom we can be as open as possible. To have real conversation with people may seem like such a simple, obvious suggestion, but it involves courage and risk.”

- Thomas Moore

Saturday 9 April 2011

Like Wil Wheaton said...


There are a million blog posts in my head, at any one time. There are geek ones. There are life ones. There are things I know will be written and never published. There are things that should be written but they will forever ride the neurons, never to become anything other than bubbles on the surf.

On Thursday, I was thinking about how much I enjoy my current job and wondering what makes it different to the places I have been in over the last few years.

Having worked with the best of my generation, on projects that challenged us; bored us; and always taught us something, it is interesting to find a place I like to be in the midst of a big country town.

Then I read Wil Wheaton's post about winning the actor lottery and that summed it up for me too.

If you can get up each morning and look forward to work because your colleagues challenge and teach you while making you laugh until the tears seep from your eyes then that is a good job. When you know that everything you achieve in a day is helping your client do their job better or soon will be then that is a good job. When there is no stupid office politics because people just want to get their jobs done and do them well, alongside you then that is a good job.

It has been a long time since that has been fully satisfied.

Life is fun. Your attitude helps but being around positive and intelligent people helps too.

The huge difference between now and before is that my attitude is different. I don't sweat the little things. I like life. I like people. It takes a lot to stop me from smiling.

The other big variable is people. I finally work with really great people. They are secure, decent, kind, driven, pragmatic, experienced and professional.

If you want to come and work for us then do let me know. I guess I ask only one thing and it's another thing Wil Wheaton says... "Don't be a dick."

Friday 8 April 2011

You don't have to live with them


I'm a bit of a social butterfly. I have friends, acquaintences, people I air-kiss and other people whose faces are familiar so I smile as I go by.

In the last couple of years, time to myself has become a wonderful recharging break from the noise, excitement and stimulation of people.

When once I was 100% extroverted, some balance has been found. This is a good thing. I will always be a puppy dog who likes meeting new people but being alone and mindful is leveling the scales.

Now for point of this rant.

When you work with a bunch of people, you see them for around 40 hours a week. That is a large amount of your waking hours. I am not going to suggest befriending them all and spending time hanging out with them on weekends but at least be civil.

Too often, geeks can be so antisocial. They avoid work gatherings or sitting around the lunch table. If they do join then they sit silently and stare off in to space or talk at your about their latest technical discovery.

If any social emails go around, they immediately ask to be removed from the list. They aren't too subtle or friendly about it either.

I don't understand this. Some social lubrication makes work a nicer place to be. It seems sometimes as if the whole idea of people is distasteful.

Nothing changes for me. I still love getting up and going to work each day. It must suck to be so negative and uncomfortable around people.

Come on geeks, we don't have to live together. We just have to work together.

Wednesday 6 April 2011

My Offer


“I offer you peace. I offer you love. I offer you friendship. I see your beauty. I hear your need. I feel your feelings.” - Mahatma Gandhi

Your style is you


People talk about style as though it is something that you can go out and buy. An acquirable commodity that will appear if you follow a recipe in a fashion magazine. An emulation of the hottest star.

Style is none of those things.

Style is the ability to find a look that compliments your character and expresses who you are.

It is a personal thing. A me thing. A comfortable thing.

When you feel at ease in your clothes and don't trip on your shoes, you are there. Just be yourself and dress in what makes you feel good. That is your style.

Your style is you.

Tuesday 5 April 2011

Scrum to Scum


It was quite satisfying to finally see that the rest of our population is disgusted with football players in this country. The Sydney Morning Herald published a story about the surveyed attitude of Australians to players from all football codes.

It seems soccer players are seen as the best role models. The most popular answer to which code had better role models was "none of them", which would have been my response.

I can no longer accept the behaviour of these morons and their clubs. They seem to be allowed to get away with the dumbest and sometimes illegal actions, as long as they feel great remorse following it.

That is simply not how decent people behave. We think ahead and consider the consequences to our actions and stop ourselves if it seems plain stupid.

It is not that hard. Do not urinate on shop fronts. Do not gang rape women. Do not let 17 year old fan girls take naked photos of you. Do not act like apes.

There are domesticated animals that behave better than these thugs. We need to clean up these sports and start (at least) toilet training these guys.

Even if they are leaving home at 16 and going to work for these clubs, someone has to take responsibility for teaching them how to become adults. Don't cash up a bunch of kids and tell them that they are gods and then expect much from them.

Australian society isn't impressed. Fix this, Mr Football.