Ookies for all the people who have hassled me asking me to update this diary...well...*drumroll*...here it is.
For anyone who did not notice, I stopped updating this site last year. Why? Well...last year was a really negative (yes, more then usual!) time for me. Most of my time was spent knowing that I was going to be made redundant from the perfect job, but just not knowing when it was going to happen, which was highly frustrating. Basically, I was told in December that I was being made redundant, but not given a date. I found out about 5 months later the actual redundancy date. I won't talk about it anymore as I signed a special piece of paper whilst leaving that would get me into a lot of trouble if I was to say much more about the whole experience.
Anyways, after the redundancy finally happened, I began selling full time on eBay and doing extremely well, so all is kind of good and well in the world...well...not everything, but more on that later...
I moved out of my "oh so convienient to everything" place in the city early last year after my lease was up, and before the redundancy date was announced. I would have liked to stay there...but...really knowing that I would soon be without a job, having a commitment to pay $330 in rent per week wasnt really a good idea. So, I moved to Blacktown (which is approx 40 mins away from the city) where I got a two bedroom place, which is about $100 per week cheaper. Its nice, brand new, and big...but I think I would rather live in the city again. Soo, I have been spending many hours here looking for inspiration but havent really got anywhere. I'm not game to give the real estate agent notice yet in case I change my mind or don't find the perfect place :( ARRRRRRRRR.
I swear there is someone out there whose sole role in life is to cause me grief. Some might say it is karma but really I don't think I have done anything bad enough to cop all of this (then again, maybe it is because I admitted to working for Danoz Direct a few years ago perhaps? I dont know...) Whoever it is I am sorry for whatever I may have done! Heres a list of some of the stuff I remember that has happened over the last 12 months....
* One week after redundancy happens, my computer dies. Result - approximately 1 week and $1400 later - A brand new computer and a highly stressed out Epod who had a number of eBay auctions to try to manage without a computer. Spending time in those dodgy pielink computers in the shopping centre up the road was not a lot of fun. I also went into one of those bizarre internet cafes in George Street in the city to try to check email etc. This is full 98% of kids playing intenet role playing games. One really has to see it to believe it. Needless to say I was out of there faaaast!
* Dodgy webhost, Infinology suspends my account without notice. This is the same company that I have written about in the past in my diary but have never got around to leaving. So...this causes my site to disappear, and all the pictures in my eBay auctions to disappear as well - unable to be fixed cause there's bids on them already. I call them (they are in America) and they are unable to help until Monday (cause it was the weekend there), so I just got over it and got another wonderful, fantastic webhost. Everything is now hosted by Bravenet. They rock and they have not as yet caused me any grief. Anyone looking for a reliable webhost, go to Bravenet. Anyone looking for a shoddy webhost, go to Infinology. For the record, my Infinology account was suspended because my credit card expired, they didnt think to ask me to update my details, just cancelled my account. Grrr.
* New years Eve - What did Epod do New Years Eve? Weeeelll...I decided to connect my old scanner to my new computer so that I could do some website updating. Sooo...the software was installed, and it said "do you want to restart your computer now?". I was like "okay". Off turns the computer. All is good and well with the world now...right? Ah, no...I switched it on and all I got was a black screen and a cursor. This was approx 1158pm New Years Eve. So as I heard all the Happy New Years from all the surrounding parties I was like going noooooooooooooooooooooooooo! I left it till the next day to call a computer place to try to get it repaired, and it turned out I misheard the quote on the phone for how much it would cost. One hour later, I was charged $264 for something that was easily fixed....arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
* Dodgy neighbours. These people annoy me. They have a dog that they are not supposed to have. They also like breaking things. I heard a crash/bang/kerfuffle/hysterical woman a few weeks ago. Looked out of my window to see what was happening and theres a trail of blood running all the way out to the footpath outside and neighbours are debating whether to get an ambulance. On closer inspection the next day, they had actually smashed a window in the common area just outside my place and there was a trail of blood running all the way down the stairs also. The window was fixed soon after, but the person who fixed it didnt get rid of any of the blood surrounding it first so it was a little creepy. Not to worry, about two weeks ago, I hear a smash in the early hours of the morning and its the same people again thinking it was hilarious. They didnt use a body part to break said window this time though as there was no blood. I tell you, living in Blacktown is all class.
Now the current source of my frustration...Sydney Trains. Another reason why I want to move back to the city. I make a few trips into the city a week and usually come back lugging a big lot of stuff in this dodgy trolley I have. It is like what you see the grannies walking around with, and looks really cool and stylish (not). It is, however, very helpful as my back is not getting sore anymore from lugging stuff in my backpack...anyhoos...enough about me, back to the trains...I was ready to go home from Town Hall station last week but when I got there it was closed...arrr! The security person (who of course was unable to provide me with any information about why the station was closed...) goes "oh you can catch a bus to Central".
Righto I said to myself, with this trolley that isn't likely to happen...so, I walked to Central and saw there was a "fast" train going to Blacktown. It was 1.40 when I got there, and the train in question was supposed to leave at 1.30. The train ended up leaving at 2.00, and was packed with so many people it was like a peak hour service train (I try to avoid these as catching as it is like playing sardines and very un-fun). Then, excited that the train was actually moving everyone was (moderately) happy again...until..."Attention customers, this train has a fault so it will be stopping at Lidcome". (collective groan of noooooooooooooooooo from surrounding passengers.
Announcement at Lidcome was "another train will be by in approx 10 minutes". This, by the way is 10 city rail minutes, not 10 normal person minutes, so around 20 minutes later, another train arrives. The train that arrived, however, was packed totally sardine style with people so it left without really allowing any people on as there just wasnt any room. About 10 minutes later, another train arrived, and it was EMPTY. Yippee! I got home at around 5pm, taking around 4 hours to get home as opposed to the usual 40-ish minutes.
While I was waiting at Lidcome, I heard a city rail employee say to someone that the problem was that there was a gas leak, that had been caused BY THE SYDNEY CITY COUNCIL who have been doing work under a city station. Funnily enough, when I got home and watched a couple of different news services, the source/cause of the gas leak had *allegedly* not been found. Cover up by the council perhaps, or maybe the city rail guy just had the wrong information.
Anyhoos, all this week there have been servere delays/cancellations etc because city rail is short of drivers (I haven't even bothered trying to go into the city). The thing that really annoys me about this is the stupid transport minister who has his dumb mug on tv almost every night - who probably does not catch trains anyway - and his pathetic excuses. City rail are now blaming this on a group of "renegade drivers" who have refused to do overtime. Since when is overtime compulsory? Apparently the issue is that the drivers are not happy with new medical tests etc so they are refusing overtime. Last night I heard the transport minister say they were looking at getting legal advice in regards to how much "reasonable overtime" an employee could do per week. If they make staff do compuslory overtime, lets just see how long it takes for another Waterfall style crash to occur. Don't get
me wrong, I find most City Rail staff to be rude, negative and less than helpful - but it's not fair that they get blamed for the rail system falling over.
Today it has been announced that there will be a weeks free city rail travel BUT it is not for everybody, it is only for those holding weekly/monthly tickets. I think it should be free for everyone until they get their act together (or at least just a week), but nooo only those who regularly commute. Allegedly there will be one free fare day held sometime soon for other non regular commmuters...but in the meantime, non regular and regular commuters have to put up with the mess that the mismanagement of city rail has created.
Oooh The Resort starts tonight! They are offering package deals to said resort to people who want to be exploited on national tv....oooh...hang on...I mean, have a fun, exciting holiday in an idyllic location. To be honest I was like "no way would I go"...then they showed that ad over and over with Jon Stevens going "one day you could be in your loungeroom, the next you could be here with me". and I was like "Oh okay - sold!!! Now, where on earth did I put my credit card!" For the record I am not going, but ah it probably would be fun.
I've been watching The Hothouse, waiting for it to become moderately interesting...but, so far I havent been overly interested, mainly due to the bad editing and the fact they seem to show the same pieces of footage over and over and over again and then they show ads that make it look like theres a big scandal when really its nothing at all. Will watch for another week, and switcheroo over to another channel if it doesnt get any better. All I can say is - some of the couples will be mighty pissed about the way they are portrayed and things blown riiiiight out of proportion...oh well, it is "reality" tv I guess...
I saw a couple of tv shows getting filmed last year which was fun :) Got to sit right behind the judges in the Australian Idol audience which was fun. Ran into a bit of trouble getting home (as expected) but it was worth it! I also made my first visit to Channel 9 to see Merrick and Rosso getting taped as a friend had tickets. Was fun, got past security no problem - hehehe - see cause I was a bit concerned as I figured that maybe Mr Hugh handed mug shots of me to all security going "whatever you do - DON'T let this person on the premises under any circumstances" - hehehe - but no all went well :) Now, if only Nightline started asking for live studio audiences...
Ooops...six months since I've updated this thing and I don't think I will even bother to make excuses for lack of updates this time. Guess I will leave it at "shit happened". Or maybe just give you a rundown of my last six months. Ahh why not...
Well, I learnt my lesson to not sign leases for any more than six months thanks to my unfortunate 12 month stay in Blacktown. It just got worse after my last update. The psycho window smashing neighbours remained, so did their yapping dog. Had I gone and smashed a window or had a yapping dog, I am sure that I would have been evicted pronto. However, given the situation I was living in there, being evicted may not have been as much of a disappointment as one would imagine.
There was this nice house next door that I could see if I looked out of my window and early one morning I awoke to see a heap of workers smashing up the roof. Little did I know that this house was actually in the process of getting totally demolished. I soon discovered that the land right outside my window was about to become a development site for a shitload of new units. Most nights I would be kept awake by the neighbours and/or their dog. Then, every morning around 5am I would be woken up to the sound of the trucks/workers arriving. The noise was so loud that if a window was opened I couldnt really hear the tv or anything else and if a window was opened dust went everywhere. My interest in eBay was also waning so getting the cash together for rent wasnt too much fun either. Put simply, it sucked in a big way being me.
One night around 1am I heard this really loud knocking on the door and was extremely freaked out as I thought omg it is the psycho neighbours. This knocking was extemely loud and it just didnt stop. I freaked out majorly being by myself and all not knowing what I was supposed to do. I figured I would look out the window and see if I could see anyone. Then I see a couple of Policemen and I was like "So you were knocking on my door?" and they were like "Yeah, have you heard anything tonight?". Me "Er no, except for the knocking and given the time of the morning it is and the fact no one identified themselves, I didn't open the door". The coppers went on to tell me that a unit in the complex had been burgled that night and had I heard anything. I told them that sorry I had not heard anything and didn't end up sleeping too well (again) that night knowing that I heard nothing.
I ended up moving to a tiny studio loft apartment in Newtown, which was closer to the city and slightly (but not much) cheaper in rent. It was also a one minute walk to the train station and Oporto, so that pretty much sold me when I was looking at the potential to live in this place. So...yeah I moved in, tried to get the eBay selling inspiration happening again (which I did to a certain extent).
Unfortunately, I ran into a heap of problems every day both getting to, and also inside the King Street Post Office. Being Newtown, I would have a number of people on the street begging me for money in my short 10 minute walk there and back which shit me to no end considering I had virtually no money of my own and any money I did earn was by working my butt off, so I was hardly going to give it away. I asked a couple of them if they were on the dole and the answer was always "yes". I could have taken the easy way out and gone straight onto the dole after my redundancy came through but I did not. I just went on, as I always have, "me against the world" as per usual. There have been so many times in Sydney where I have been totally screwed with no money, but I guess I just dealt with it.
After being treated so well by Blacktown Westpoint Post Office for the year I was in Blacktown, I was understandably concerned that maybe my new Post Office might not be as friendly and helpful. Unfortunately, my fears were realised, and the staff there were the rude and had no idea what they were doing. Arguments ensued almost every day about whether items could be cubed or what was a large letter and what needed a customs form and what did not need a customs form. I ended up going to a different post office after a couple of months of putting up with this. It was a longer walk, but the staff at least were friendlier.
For a long time I have wanted to buy my own place. The main reason being the sheer frustration of paying so much rent in Sydney and essentially having nothing to show for it. My mother finally agreed to assist me in getting a home loan - even though she has in the past refused to - despite my history in paying enormous amounts of rent for around 8 years in Sydney. I was of course ecstatic knowing that I was finally going to achieve one of my dreams. (...and to clarify "mother", for anyone who is reading this stuff for the first time...this is not your usual mother/daughter relationship. As anyone reading past entries in this diary would know, I am not close to any of my family. I do not speak to my father, sisters, and my relationship with my mother is virtually non-existant due to being stuck in an extremely abusive "home" during the teenage years of my life)
I have spent so much time looking at really cheap houses on the internet to buy, and from searching I found a few places which had really cheap houses (ie under $50 000). There are probably a heap of other places I could go that are not on the internet, but this was essentially a good starting point for me. For example, I could get a home for around $10 000-20 000 in Norseman. Norseman is in Western Australia around 8 hours by bus away from Perth.
There's a three bedroom house in Norseman on domain.com.au for $12000 at - that means it would be $5000 (after the first home buyers grant) and I would have my own home! There's also another site - Landstart - in Western Australia which has houses for tender, one of which has a list price of $10 000!
Yes, it is in the middle of nowhere - but - no more rent to pay- how amazing would that be? I also wouldn't need to worry about getting a job as I could continue to sell on eBay. If I didnt like Norseman, there would be nothing stopping me from moving out. Even the first homebuyers grant doesnt have a set timeframe one has to live in a house that has recieved the grant. Of course one would also get the property checked out for structural damage/termites/etc etc as paying $5000 for a house is a dumbass idea if its going to fall apart. I'm not interested in how visually unappealing it looks, I simply want a structurally sound place to live.
Another place with cheap houses is Mount Morgan. Mount Morgan is a much more convienient place to live, being pretty close to Rockhampton. Theres a heap of places there for around $50 000-$100 000. I found a particularly awesome place (which has since been sold) which was this huge hall and it also was like a house with three bedrooms. The place was huge and my thoughts were that I could start dj'ing again and have under 18 nights in it. Sadly though, it was not to be :(
Ookies, so I was really really really excited about all this and well mother didnt go through with it which basically hurt so much, and just made the situation I was in in Sydney in even worse. Basically the phone call ended with me so upset I was throwing up by the end of it. It is the last in a long line of disappointments that she has bestowed upon me, so really it was quite naive of me to take her word for it that she was going to help me get a loan when really she had no intention. I wasnt asking her for money, just to help me get a loan and it was just too much to ask.
I have worked so hard in Sydney in heaps of jobs. I always had the cash to pay rent, no matter what. Unfortunately, the bank does not see it that way and want someone with a more stable employment history. Its really regrettable that rent paid can not be taken into account when applying for a loan. Mother has been in the same job for so many years and has her own home (well she is still paying it off, but a considerable amount has been paid off), so was in a much better position to help me.
After the phonecall about the loan, she resorted to emailing me (always ending the emails with a somewhat patronising "love mum"). One email said that she would buy me a cheap flight from Sydney to Mackay but I had to hurry because the cheap flights were only for another 48 hours or something. I declined. I have wanted to go on a holiday to see my friends for so long and she knows this, but has never offered to fly me to Mackay (nor have I asked that she do it) even though she knows I want to see my friends. It just hurt that it was the first time she had offered to fly me to Mackay, but it had to be a "cheap ticket". The two "cheap" airlines that service Mackay have regular fares that are "cheap" every day, but no - obviously not cheap enough to offer to fly me to Mackay unless they are on special.
Anyways, I get a phonecall saying shes visiting me in Sydney and we can go shopping or out to lunch or something together. I mention I am really busy and will not have time to go anywhere. I stayed up very late the day she was arriving so she could essentially arrive, see she had woken me up, and that it was quite clear I wasnt going anwhere.
So she arrives and says if you come back to Mackay and rent a place, I will pay your bond and also $50 a week for rent. This is after I have told her in her stupid emails that I want to come to Mackay because I have friends there and it is cheap rent, but I dont really want to go as I am likely to be harassed/followed by my father. Note that when I moved to Sydney originally, none of this was offered, I sold all my stuff and ended up in disgusting boarding houses as I had no money for the first year or so. She knew I was considering a few places such as Rockhampton, Ingham, etc, where I knew nobody, but the rent was cheap, and none of my family members could bother me. But no, she wants to "help" me, but only if I go to Mackay do I get this "help".
So yeah basically thats what happened. A couple of days after she visted I found a place in Rockhampton, put down a deposit and two weeks rent without seeing it, hoping for the best. I got myself a $95 Jetstar ticket from Sydney to Rockhampton. Then I get a call from mother saying shes coming down to Rockhampton to visit me on the weekend. Call ends up with me going ballistic about her offers to "help", a recount of all the times she has let me down, and me throwing up again.
Before I moved out of Sydney, I did another massive thing that I never thought I would do, although it was something I considered on more than one occassion. I decided to sell everything I owned on eBay. All the cds, dvds, videos, furniture, appliances etc were all sold and now I have virtually nothing. I figured if I missed anything I could always buy it again on eBay. At the moment I am not really missing anything other than my Henry Rollins dvds/cd, which I have just bought back on eBay, so I will be able to watch them soon. I think selling everything was a positive thing, except I do feel a bit let down about selling all the cds as I no longer have the stuff I need to dj with. Sure I can buy them all back on eBay, but yeah I spent a long time getting all those thousands of cds together...
Anyways, now you won't believe this but I have been in Rockhampton since the 30th of August and I am exceptionally happy :) I have had only one bad day so far which was for an Australia Post related issue where a person is claiming to have not recieved a registered parcel. That is now all sorted now, so I am waiting for the next drama to unfold...
The flight from Sydney to Rockhampton was great and more comfortable than I imagined. I was approached by this airhostess who asked if I had read the safety booklet and I went er no um where is it. She replied with "you're sitting on it". LOL. Anyhoos it seems that being my first flight I have managed to pick the seat next to one of the emergency exits so I need to read this card so that if the exit is required I get to open said exit. Shes like "Is everyone comfortable with this, is there anyone who wants to move?". I really wanted to move but ended up saying "Nah, I'm right thanks" hehe. There was an old bloke who sat next to me who was coughing all over everything including me so I was wishing about halfway through the flight maybe I should move but hehe all ended up okay and I was happy to arrive in Rockhampton safely.
I picked up my keys and signed my lease at the real estate agent. Still thinking omg what if this place is a dump lol. Got a cab to my place and was in shock when I saw it. It was advertised as a 2 bedroom apartment, but wow the place was huge as. The bedrooms were like 3 x the size of any bedroom I have ever seen, and there was like 3 bedrooms, not 2 and a huge lounge room, kitchen and bathroom. I'm happy as with it, but it seems very weird to be living here by myself as the place is so very big. It is fully furnished (with crap furniture), so I won't need to buy a fridge/bed etc. Tis cool as :)
Anyhoos, I ended up wandering around aimlessly, going exploring a few days later and walked past the hotel which is very close to where I live and saw this poster saying that there was a show called "The Big Night Out" and Jimbo was going to be there, at this hotel doing this show. I was immediately intrigued wondering was it the Jimbo I know from Sydney and if so, what was he doing in Rockhampton. So yesshies, I went home pronto and checked out the website and omg yes, it was Jimbo :)
The first time I met Jimbo, I was working at Sega World in Sydney (although at the time I didn't know who he was - I only found out when I checked out his website after seeing him at The Comedy Store that he was also a clown, and had worked at Sega World!). Sega World was fun but one of my jobs there was to stand at the exit gate and say seeya later/go away to anyone who was leaving. To keep me from being bored I bought some juggling balls not really intending to learn to juggle, just something to keep me occupied. Anyhoos he tried to show me how to juggle a few times, and I just didnt get it so one time he kinda attached himself to the back of me, arms around me, holding my hands trying to get me to juggle. Needless to say I freaked out being grabbed by a boy like that and never learnt how to juggle. Hehe. ;)
Anyone who wants to read some of my past Jimbo related experiences, they can be found in my diary here (Sunday, April 14th, 2002 and Thursday, April 25th, 2002)
So...back to the story...I rung up the hotel to check what time he was on and they said 9pm. Dumbass me got there late and it had already started...so walked in and was like I need to hide before he recognises me and picks on me for being late hehe. The show was cool as and at the end I went up and said hi to him and he remembered me. Turns out he's left Sydney and is now on the road doing his show. Had a few huge chats with him since and I am totally blown away by the amazing stuff he's done and his adventures on the road.
Jimbo wrote this awesome huge thing about "Death Coaches", which he said I could share so here it is. To read it, click here
I went to Carla's husbands brothers place last night (hmm I think I got that right?!). Although I had never met her husband until last night, she talks lots about him, so it was good to finally meet him. His brother is an accountant and has a cupboard full of way too many different types of coffee. I don't drink coffee but I was sure as impressed (and possibly a little disturbed) to see such a huge variety and abundance of coffee.
We watched my Jimbo dvd and they all thought it was funny as and I can tell you the conversation during and after said dvd was also funny as. Hopefully we can all go together to see one of his shows. I do not think I have laughed so much for so long. What a cool, nutty, funny group of people :)
Recently I went out to Longreach for the weekend by accident. I was meant to go out there on the weekend of the 18th September but ended up going on the 11th. I went into McCaffertys to buy my ticket and I kinda mentioned that I didn't think that there was anything of interest to do in Longreach. This old lady (you know the sweet old lady characters that can not shut up and talk your ear off lol) pipes up "Love you will have a great time you can go on a cruise blah blah blah". I kinda said to her, "Well I reckon I might take you along as you seem like pretty good entertainment." Somewhere inbetween this conversation, the girl behind the counter goes, "So you want the ticket for Saturday?". I say, "Yes". I got home and looked at the date on the ticket and nearly had a heart attack, but then thought ah why not go out there tomorrow and I did.
Basically, to explain why I was going to Longreach... Back in June I looked up a heap of my old school friends who I haven't seen for years. I found them scattered mainly all over Queensland (Emerald, Longreach, Ayr, Townsville, Mackay, and Brisbane). Unfortunately, I was unable to get the money together to go, so I had to put it off. The original plan was to do a couple of separate trips (eg: Emerald to Longreach etc), but this ended up just being one trip from Rockhampton to Longreach to see an old friend who I went to school with and also was a part of the "Youth Extra Newspaper" team.
The bus trip was relatively painless, and when I got there I found that my mobile was out of range (found out that Telstra is the only carrier who covers Longreach), so had to go and find a public phone to call my friend who said he would pick me up. So...i do find a public phone, and it was "cards only" LOL yay! But i found another one and gave him a call :) He picked me up and then went to his friends house where i was introduced to like quite possibly 20% of the population in Longreach. Then we all went to the RSL, so it was like culture shock cause i never go out to dinner and not with that many people...but it rocked!
I was talking to this older lady and it was all going well until she asked me what sort of books was selling on eBay and i go "craft/entertainment/wicca/witchcraft books", and she freaked out - cause i was selling craft books! (no...just kidding she freaked out cause i was selling wiccan/witchcraft books. Her eyes just about rolled right back into her head when I said it hehe). I tried to soften the blow by saying that they are for harmless things only and she goes none of that witchcraft stuff is harmless. Oops. Anyhoos, I ended up just making a joke about it with my friend about how many people i could offend so all was good and well with the world again :) We then went to the movies and saw a mildly disturbing movie where someone ends up getting their fingers chopped off. ICK and they have a problem with me selling wicca books lol.
After the movie, it was around 10pm and my friend drove me back to the hotel. The reception was closed so I needed to ring the night bell and the lady in charge came out wearing a bathrobe and was not hiding the fact that shes a little (er very) pissed with me checking in late. However, all was well and I was able to get into my hotel room.
The next day, I organised to meet my friend for lunch at the QANTAS Museum and in the morning I thought I would check out The Stockmans Hall of Fame. First thing i saw in there were these handcuffs and whips and thought hmm didnt think it was one of *those* sorts of museums hehe but yeah that turned out to be the only minor moment of excitement there. They charge $20 and its a rip off! Catching up with my friend and his friends for lunch and then for dinner (again!) was great and wish they were not so far away so that we could catch up again sometime.
The next morning it was freezing cold and I caught the Spirit of the Outback train back to Rockhampton, which took 12 hours (yawn!), but the staff were friendly so it wasn't that bad. I am going away at the end of October for about 10 days to visit my other friends and I am really excited about seeing them again!
If I haven't bored you too much (ie you have actually read all this), here's a link to a site which has heaps of fabulous cartoons :)
I have no idea why but lately I have been really inspired to get writing/working on this website again. Let's see if I can keep it up...it may even lead back to the almost daily updates again here, however boring they may be...er, maybe not. Had a pretty cool couple of weeks with only some minor annoyances. Unfortunately, early yesterday morning all the shit happened to hit the fan within a timeframe of only an hour...
Woke up and checked my email and there's an email from the mother wanting to "clean the slate and start over"...This is after I mysteriously recieve three phonecalls in the past couple of weeks from grandma who never calls me but has called multiple times since, apparently not on mothers behalf. The last phone call I had with her last week was one where she berated me for not talking to the mother. I was actually visiting Mackay early next week (to see my friends) and had previously cancelled my accommodation at a backpackers hostel after grandma got upset that I didnt stay with her. I did try to explain it would be best to stay at a backpackers, mainly because I didn't want to run into the mother, but well, she was less than impressed.
Because of this I have thought for the last few days of writing off the planned trip to Mackay as the intention of the trip was going to have fun and catch up with friends, not get into the middle of some stupid family crisis. I have a trip planned that was meant to take me from Rockhampton -> Brisbane -> Melbourne -> Mackay but just been thinking lately that I couldn't be bothered, mainly because of the "family issues" surrounding me in Mackay and then I stuffed up the timing of my Melbourne trip too...
Basically, what happened...a few weeks ago, I purchased a couple of airfares to Melbourne to visit an old friend who I haven't seen for 10 years without thinking about actually asking if they will be in Melbourne during that time. Emailed them to let them know I would be in Melbourne and guess what - they are going to be out of the country when I am flying there...doh!. Yes, and before anyone asks, I thought ah perhaps they booked their tickets out of the country *after* they heard I was visiting lol, but hopefully this is not the case ;)
I am left with two Jetstar tickets that I can really only change the dates I fly, not the actual locations that I am flying to which is intensely frustrating. The main reason for going to Melbourne was to meet up with my friend, so going to Melbourne and not doing that would be a bit of a let down. I listed the tickets on eBay, but they didn't sell. I can always change the dates but arrrr....I suck at planning travel stuff.
I had some stock for my eBay store supposedly arriving yesterday. The intention was that I was going to list it yesterday after it arrived and then the auctions would finish the day I got back from my trip. My phone rings yesterday morning and it is my supplier. They tell me the boxes of books have not been picked up...even though I rung the company who was going to pick them up last Thursday and they had confirmed that they HAD been picked up! So, what date can they be delivered by? Oh the 20th they say. Yes, you guessed it, thats the date I am supposed to be flying out of Rockhampton...
For a moment I thought oh maybe I will just get it delivered the day I come back (around the 25th), but...well...problem with that is if any of the books get damaged in transit, the auctions would have already finished and well there would be some really pissed off people if I told them their books were not available. I thought also of not listing them, but then again I really will need the cash....Ah, I will keep thinking about it I thought, still not really sure what to do.
Next, I get a phone call from the real estate agent/owner in regards to some repairs that have been outstanding since I moved in. After waiting forever for him to actually book a date to do the work, he calls me on the day he's meant to be here (last Friday) saying he's sick. Yeah sure you're sick, no problem whateffer I say. So, he had rescheduled for yesterday but I get a call saying he's broken his tooth (?wtf!) so he won't be fixing said stuff today either.
I then kinda just got the shits and said well like I have been extremely patient with you and I still can not get any kind of resolution on this problem. He then got the shits and said that the real estate wasn't supposed to rent this property out to someone running a business from home. I said that I was crystal clear when applying for the lease exactly what I did for a living, but yeah he wasn't happy with that. He also said that I was making it difficult saying that he could only do the work when I was at home. Er, hello I said I am at home every day. At that point the call ended, and I pretty much wrote off going away anywhere.
So now I have four airline tickets in total that are non refundable. The best I can do is pay $20 extra per ticket to change the dates on them and fly on another date. Problem is I have to do this 24 hours before I fly and I don't know when I will be flying next. I have just decided to change them all to some time next year, and then change them back if I go anywhere sooner.
To add to the above, I have been sick the last few days with a really sore throat and am almost losing my voice. Then my asthma prescription medication run out lol. Perfect timing...So spent approximately two hours of my time at the doctors yesterday which was such excitement.
Ookies on to the cool stuff...
I flew to Sydney overnight on the 13th to get some eBay stock. On the airplanes I had to try to keep a straight face when they went through the safety rules cause I kept remembering a particular Peter Berner standup routine filled with sarcasm in regards to the usefulness of said safety procedures. You can read what he had to say here. That night I went to the Bull and Bush Hotel to see The Big Night Out, which rocked. To read my review, Click here.
Been thinking since my visit that it was perhaps a mistake to leave Sydney earlier this year. My time in Sydney was really unpleasant pretty much since the eBay redundancy was announced -but - I think a lot of it was my fault not really making too much of an effort to get out much and take advantage of all the stuff that is on offer in Sydney. I have another four months here (stupid leases!) and think I might consider giving Sydney another go. This time with a full time real job and perhaps *shock horror*, share accomodation. Or maybe just put all my stuff in storage and stay at the backpackers and do some temp work. Who knows...
On Sunday Carla invited me to go out with her, Rachele, and Damo to Yeppoon with her. I had an awesome time :) First we went to the beach at Yeppoon and then had lunch. Then in Rockhampton we went to see the Rockhampton Zoo. Not being a real fan of zoos (went to Taronga Zoo in Sydney a few years ago and didnt really like it), I didn't know what I would think of this one, but the cover charge here being free, it didnt really matter. Anyhoos we all ended up having an really good time at the zoo. The highlight was the Koalas which reduced what Cara and Rachele were saying to gibberish (they were talking like some people talk to a baby coohie coochie coo etc).
Then we got some pornographic action as we were checking out the kangaroo enclosure. One was trying to seduce another kangaroo (unsuccessfully). Then there was a reclining kangaroo with another one sucking on its nether regions. I kinda pointed to it saying "Um, Carla are they um...". and she was like "Um...er do they feed like that?" Er no, I don't think so lol...so, anyhoos we all had a bit of a laugh and decided it was time to move on.
In other good news, my Henry Rollins dvds arrived in the mail the other day :) mmmmm.... :)
Its 2.38 am and I am awake, still sick as - and really just want to get some sleep :( This stupid throat infection/cough will not go away and makes it even harder to get to sleep than it usually is..*cries*
Yikes what more can I say other than omg what a shit of a week...
Well, at least next week is going to start on a positive note. Tripod are going to guest program Rage tonight! (well Sunday). I have checked the playlist and they have quite a few of my favourites in there, but most notably - The Rainbow Connection! It has been aaaages since I have seen that video so it will be cool as to see it again.
Haven't done too much in the last few of days except be sickly and morbid about pretty much everything. The days have also been spent jumping to conclusions about something. Conclusions that are probably wrong but still I don't know. I just want everything to be alright but I don't know if it is or not. Yes, I have been told it is okay but I just can't help but think it is not. I really don't know....
Anyhoos on that positive note, I will try to get some sleep.
I have spent this week trying to keep my mind off all the crap that was bothering me last week. Although I was not entirely successful, I did spend most of the week in a somewhat semi-positive frame of mind.
I spent a lot of time going on long walks, mainly along the Fitzroy River, which is nice and you never know who you are going to meet! I also have applied for 10 jobs (and counting) in Rockhampton, so that has kept me busy also. Things seem to move a lot slower in Rockhampton with jobs being advertised seemingly weeks in advance as opposed to the "oh, you start tomorrow" line you get from a lot of places in Sydney.
I am still confused as to what I am going to do, but have figured that since I went to so much trouble to move out of Sydney, the least I can do is give Rockhampton a chance, so I am staying here until the end of February at least, which is when my lease runs out (lol...er...that is unless I change my mind in the meantime keke). Surprisingly, I don't have any complaints about Rockhampton - even though most people I spoke to prior to moving here said that I wouldn't like it and that it was a hole. A hole it may be - but - the fresh air is amazing, as are the people here who are so unbelieveably nice and friendly.
In my search for answers in regards to what to do with my life, I went back and read all my past diary entries just trying to work out when everything went so wrong and why I am left in the position that I now find myself in not knowing what to do.
I have gathered that everything went wrong after I quit full time, permanent employment and consequently moved out of my home of three years in the Sydney suburb of Surry Hills. Everything then got back on track for a while there when a few months later I started work at my last permanent job (that I loved), only to find out my entire department was to be made redundant. My belief is that the redundancy, in addition to a lot of other stuff that happened during and after that, led to the situation I find myself in now.
After the redundancy finally occured, I decided to try doing eBay full time. At first, I thought it was a great idea, but after doing it for over a year and a half, it is not for me...well, not full time anyway. Sure, it is great when you have the right products, and they make a profit - and yes I have made (and still make) some unbelievable profits on some of the things I sell - but it does get very frustrating and admittedly, I am losing my patience. It is also great to work for yourself, but it does bring extra responsibilities eg. if you pick up the wrong line/s of stock, guess who won't be eating this week! Well...maybe not that extreme, but hopefully you understand what I am saying ;)
The main problem is not knowing how much money is going to be in the bank each week. The work never actually stops either. If you have a normal job (no matter how crap it is), you can go home and finish for the day, and that is it. Then you know that you are going to get X amount of dollars in the bank. So you are confident that yes I can pay rent, the phone bill, and maybe even go out somewhere. With eBay, and my next to nil business knowledge combined, I just never know what is going to happen.
I used to sell on eBay as well as doing my normal full time jobs. This was back in the day where I could list a heap of items for $1 and they would all be bid right up to a really good price. I hardly ever lost out on anything. Now, I have the same sorts of items, some of which struggle to even get a bid. There are books that don't even get a bid at $1, whereas the week before they may have sold for say $10. It just does not make sense. I have thought supply/demand and so forth could be determining it, but really you can not go past a quality book of (for example, a big name musical act) for $1?
I'm not suggesting that all my eBay sales resemble that in the example above, certainly I am doing well enough to have survived the last year and a half of eBay selling - but it is something that has puzzled me to no end for so long as it has continued to happen more and more frequently. Bottom line is, if I sell a book for $1, I am making a loss, no question about it, hence I have bumped up most of my start prices so that I will at least get the money I spent on the item back. I have read a few other discussions on the eBay boards where sellers are in the same position as me, however there are others that say eBay is great and is really working for them. So, the thought again - is it just the sellers not having items that bidders want?
Although this is certainly a possibility, I do have my doubts. I have suspicions that multiple changes to the search system of eBay has a lot to do with it, but it is hard to prove. For example eBay introduced item specifics progressively to a number of categories in the last year or so. If people do not pick the exact item specifics you chose, they are likely to miss out on seeing your item/s.
There's also a new search bar on the front page and many other pages of eBay. You can actually type what you want in the search box, but if you look to the right there is a drop down box where you can request which category this search is done in. So, for example I might have an embroidery book, that is in the embroidery category, but because someone looks in books they will not find my item. The person of course could have found my item by leaving it as the default "all categories", but really I don't know how many would not change it, not realising there was potentially quite a few items they would be missing out on. Yes, an item can be listed in two categories, but that costs more money to do, so in most cases is hardly worth it.
I have watched a few people try to navigate around the eBay site, and whilst all these (allegedly) spectacular new features will help them search for what they are after, I disagree. I asked someone to click on my shop logo, but they didn't even know that the red tag beside my id was actually referring to a shop. These tags used to have "shop" written on them, but eBay in their wisdom removed the words and replaced it with a line of alt text (text viewable only when someone puts the cursor on it). It just does not make sense. As do most of the stupid changes eBay continues to make to its site. There is a theory called "keep it simple stupid", it would pay eBay to keep that in mind when they have all their great ideas regarding "improvements" to the site.
Ahh on to other news...
I am still sick. Not quite as bad as last week, but still coughing away. Not fair. It (as well as stress I suspect) has been keeping me awake, and I don't get to sleep until sometime in the early hours of the morning. It gives me even more time to think about stuff - which usually isnt a good thing, but a couple of times I have found myself just lying there thinking about the standup stuff I wrote and I have cut it up a lot so hopefully people will actually laugh at it the next time I get around to doing it.
I have found this somewhat bizarre, and I honestly thought it was just a passing thing, but it appears that my move to Rockhampton has somehow led me to giving up my daily chocolate fix. In Sydney, I had a steady supply of chocolate on hand in the fridge, and went though at least one bar a day, accompanied by the obligitory Coca Cola. Now, I have had chocolate sitting in my fridge for the last couple of months and I have not had any desire to so much as touch it.
Yes, admittedly I have had a few other chocolate/sweet related things from time to time, but wow, I have essentially given up chocolate without having any idea why. The Coca Cola is still being consumed, however I am also drinking a lot of water, something that didn't really happen very often in Sydney either. The weirdest thing to come out of all this is that I am actually losing weight. I don't have any scales to measure how much, but its getting obvious enough for me to at least notice that something is going on.
Ah, and Carla has updated her site and there's a groovy picture of me, Carla and Damo at the Zoo here!
Although I was exhausted today from another somewhat sleepless night, I decided that no matter how tired I was during the day, I would not have a nap. I also made the executive decision at around 4am this morning to not sleep on the crappy bed provided in my superbly "furnished" apartment again. When I first saw it when I moved in, I was pretty disgusted by the...um..."special messages" left on the mattress by previous tenants. Judging by the stains, smell and copious amounts of broken springs all over the mattress, quite clearly the previous occupants had had much more fun and excitement in said bed than I ever could hope for.
I sold my comfy bed when I left Sydney, so really I only had this bed to sleep in. I did have a spare airbed which was kept aside for visitors, but I hadn't got around to actually sleeping on it, figuring that this bed would suffice. Unfortunately my back is starting to get sore again (just perfect when combined with the lack of sleep), so I figured it was time to go sleepies on the airbed, which I did and finally got to sleep. I am going to hide the supplied bed somewhere in a dark corner of my apartment so that I don't have to see it all the time. I think I will then just get another airbed. I couldn't possibly force a guest to sleep on it. Not alone...hell, not even in the unlikely event that I was invited to join them ;)
This morning at 7.50, I was awoken by my phone, and it was a Melbourne number. Being almost sure I knew who it was, I answered the phone rather unenthusiastically. "Hi", says the cheery voice on the other end of the line. "Hello", I answer with a roll of my eyes. "Can I please speak to Tenaya?". This lead to me responding, "No...look, we have been through this three times already, I am not Tenaya, and this is NOT her number!" The person then hung up on me, without another word.
See...this is the third time I have been called by the incompetent morons at Link Recruitment in Melbourne, who seem to be somewhat desperate to speak to Tenaya, despite the fact that they have already been told twice by me that they have the wrong number. The first time they called, I let them get away with it cause...well...people make mistakes, and I figured someone had just dialled a wrong number. The second time they did it, they woke me up and wanted to speak to Tenaya again, so I let fly, asking why were they calling me when they are aware that it is the wrong number, and please remove me from your stupid database ...so... yeah, apparently the number was removed. Considering all the above, just imagine my surprise at being woken up again today, for someone else looking for the elusive Tenaya!
Anyhoos, I figured this is getting beyond a joke. Employment agencies being as they are, are like vultures (examples can be found in my previous diary entries). Put simply, when you go into most employment agencies, the person you are speaking to usually will mention "oh, I have only been here for a week". Alternatively, you will hear frequently, "oh, sorry that consultant no longer works here". So, basically it looked like I was going to keep recieving these calls unless something was done, as these people will call everyone on file, desperately trying to fill positions - or get the number of people requested for group interviews, even if they are not necessarily the right people, just to fulfil their quota.
Sooooo...I rung up and managed to speak to a somewhat unsympathetic receptionist, who when I asked to be put through to a supervisor asked me which section the person was calling from - cause she couldnt put the call through to just anyone! Like I know, or care...*pfft*. Meanwhile, it's okay for them to call me whenever they please. Keeping in mind this was a long distance call, I didnt really want to waste any more time talking to her or being on hold, so I ended up just giving her my number and asked for a supervisor to call me back to confirm my phone number had been removed.
Surprisingly, I got a callback rather quickly. Allegedly this person was a supervisor, but they sounded quite like the person who has been ringing...but who knows really. First, she gives me this garbage on how my phone number might have been used by this person before I got this number, so I mentioned that I had had the same number for multiple years, which shot that theory. Then she starts gabbling on about there being some problem on their screen so the persons who had previously spoken to me were unable to remove my phone number and the IT department had to do it. Yes, even though I was told it would be removed - unbelieveable. Getting impatient and frustrated with being fed stupid excuses, I said to her that if I recieved another call I would be taking it further.
She then asked me where I would be taking it considering I was speaking to her and she was (allegedly) a supervisor. To be honest, I wasn't sure, but these people have been requested 3 times now to remove my information, so it could possibly fall into some sort of unwanted phone call category or harrassment. I don't know, and hopefully I will not recieve any more of these calls so I will not have to find out.
Ooooh...guess what...I got a job interview. Such excitement it was to actually get a call back from one of the many jobs I applied for. I was feeling pretty bad not getting any callbacks from some of the many pretty basic jobs that I had applied for. I had it figured that no one wanted to even consider employing me as they probably want the high school kids who they can pay peanuts to.
But...all that changed when I got a phone call saying I had an interview today!!! I ended up going in for the interview and although I could be wrong, I think that it went really well. I got interviewed by two people, one showing their emotion (positive reactions to what they were hearing from me) and another trying to hide their emotion (although I suspect it was positive). I hope it went well, cause I had to drag out the "Sydney interview clothes", which consists of a rather warm jacket, which is hardly appropriate or comfortable in the steaming hot Queensland weather. I was hoping for a quick and painless rejection or job offer, but I have to wait till Wednesday or Thursday.
Out of all the stuff I had in my resume, it was funny that the first thing they said when they started the interview was wow, so you do stand up comedy! They seemed to be genuinely really interested/excited to know about the stand up comedy. Almost so much I was expecting them to ask me to fire off some gags. Thankfully, they refrained from asking. Yeah, I have done stand up but it doesn't mean I'm any good. On my walk home, I was having visions of not getting the job cause my alleged comedic material wasn't up to scratch.
At 430pm this afternoon, although tired as, I decided to go out for a while. Whenever I go anywhere, I double check that I have everything I need, keys, mobile phone etc. Today, for the first time ever, this did not happen. I shut the door, checked it was locked, then muttered a couple of expletives under my breath when I realised what I had done - all in the very instant the door was shut. Onya Epod...arrr. So...yeah, I locked myself out of my place for the first time in history since I have been renting. This has never happened before - ever...cause I am really careful with stuff like this...Anyhoos, luckily the Real Estate had a spare set of keys, and I made it to the Real Estate agent before they closed...and now I have to trek over to return the keys tomorrow. Arrr... crap.
I had a visit from a friend who I haven't seen for years on the weekend which was much excitement. He works in a picture framing shop, and I had sent him a couple of huge Henry Rollins posters that I had ripped off a wall (after I had seen Henry's show) to see if there was any way that he could save them. Given my minor infactuation with Mr Rollins, I had been admiring them on the wall on my way to work for quite some time, so when I actually got to removing them from the wall...which was no mean feat given these are huge posters which have been glued on to the wall....it was quite excitement! Regrettably, they were extremely damaged/trashed etc and just sat at home hiding in some dark corner for a couple of years, me knowing they were awesome, but not knowing exactly what to do with them.
Anyhoos, I sent them to him, expecting him to say that there was nothing he could do except perhaps bin them....BUT...no, this is the exciting bit. He actually was able to block mount the poster for me and flatten it out and it looks amazing! mmmm! Small problem was when my friend arrived, I didnt recognise him...*hangs head in shame*...ooops. I was standing outside my door waiting for him and this skinny, tall guy with sunglasses and a beard rocks up in a ute, and I was like...er...yikes he's looking at me I think I will go hide. Then he turned out to be my friend and said hi to me and I felt rather embarrassed and guilty, but he had changed soooo much, I guess I could be forgiven for not knowing who he was. *slaps self*
We talked about lots of deep and meaningless stuff and then I gave him his first introduction to Henry Rollins, by playing the "Talking from the box" dvd. We had quite possibly the worst mix of food one can have in the one day, with half cooked lasagne from a northside foodcourt for lunch, and pizza for dinner, with garlic bread that I cooked from my freezer cause dumbass me only remembered I wanted to order some when I hung up. I ended up having a few coughing fits which is always exciting, particularly when you have company (not). Anyhoos, he left the next day and nearly run out of petrol getting back to Mackay keke, but did get home safely, so all was good and well in the world :)
Whilst googling around the internet whilst renovating my intensely shithouse and somewhat embarassing comedy pages that have been sitting stagnant for ages, I found this amazing diary by accident. Except... I can't really call it a diary as the writer describes it as, "This may look like a daily diary, but it isn't exactly that".
The thing is, although it is described as not exactly a diary, it is much more of a diary than my diary could ever be. Updated daily, no gaps - and from what I have read - and I have read a fair bit of it, it is a great read. It is written by Richard Herring, who I have only heard of before in association with Stewart Lee. From looking at Richard's site, he has done an incredible amount of work - none of which I have seen, which is totally regrettable and crap on my part considering how much I have enjoyed reading and exploring his site. I guess I will add it to the "stuff I want to see when I get around to it" list in my head...
OMG. I could cry. Remember those airline tickets that I didn't use? Yep, the Melbourne ones. Well...I didnt move them to another date, so consequently lost them. Whilst I haven't heard from the person I was *supposed* to be meeting in Melbourne, I have just read about an event that I have been literally waiting YEARS for. See...in the 1990s, on the Denton show there was this mad comedian by the name of Anthony Morgan who I have always wanted to see live. He is going to be the headlining act at Stagetime THIS Sunday. I would highly suggest anyone in Melbourne to check it out...before he goes back to Tasmania...arrr...crap.
I didn't get a call on Wednesday or Thursday about the job I had the interview for earlier this week. At around 1.30pm yesterday I needed to get out of the house cause I was getting narky waiting for the call I wasn't probably going to get. I then spent the next four hours wandering around aimlessly in the Rockhampton sun, regrettably with no phone call during that time. Today, however, I got a phone call from one of the people who interviewed me and she said that they were *very* impressed with me - but - they ended up giving the job to someone who had worked for their company in the USA. It sucked majorly that I didn't get the job, but I did appreciate the phone call - most companies wouldn't bother to call their rejects back. They said that they were going to keep my name on file...but yeah, not holding my breath there. She did seem very genuine, but who really knows...
Went on an expedition for an airbed for me a few days ago, and returned home victorious. I have now hidden other icky bed and am happy to report that I have slept properly for the last three or so days. Unreal.
Getting majorly frustrated with eBay/applying for jobs in Rockhampton, I applied for a few Sydney jobs today. Some are temp, some are permanent. Will see how I go I guess. Everyone keeps telling me to go on the dole, but with it being so hard to work out exactly what money is actually coming in (and even if they would believe me in regards to what is profit, what is postage etc...), I have continued to give it a miss. To think I could have gone onto it straight after I was made redundant. Me and my morals get in the way again.
After continuing to have no luck in getting any of the jobs I have been applying for, and additionally not having a great deal of fun with eBay, I finally caved on Wednesday and decided to call Centrelink to apply for the dole. I figured that, knowing my luck, I would probably get given a job the day after I went to Centrelink, just to mock me for holding off for so long to go there. I'm not saying that getting a job would be a bad thing, just that it would be like arrr I hold off forever going to Centrelink, then when I do and spend approximately 3 hours of my time applying, the next day I get that elusive job. All that paperwork that could have been avoided, if I had waited just that *one* more day.
Anyhoos...it turns out that Centrelink do part of their applications on the phone now. So...the first person I spoke to did what they called a "pre-registration", which involved them asking me numerous questions and in the meantime apologising profusely for "sorry this computer is taking it's time, it is so slow" etc etc...Then, after they had completed one section, it was on to another one, where they asked pretty much the same questions as the first.
When I quizzed them on the logic of this, I was told that it was because this information was for the Job Network company who I would be matched with because they do not have access to Centrelink computers. You would think with modern technology being advanced as it is, things could be automatically pre-filled if they were the same - but no - here we spend more time answering questions that have already been answered. It is refreshing to know that the copious amounts of tax that I have paid over the years is being used effectively.
At the end of the call, the lady I was speaking to said that another person would call me that night to ask some more questions and set up a Centrelink appointment. Surprisingly, I recieved the call I was promised and the next person seemed to be having the same computer issues as the first, as well as wanting to ask me some of the same questions as the first. She organised an appointment for Thursday morning 830 and said it would take approximately 20-30 minutes. I arrived at 800am to fill out a few extra forms to share the state of my eBay business, and was called at around 845 for an interview.
After going through copious amounts of paperwork for around 45 minutes, the guy who was photocopying my id/checking my application etc said, now we have to set you up with a Job Network member...but you need to go to someone else. So..yeah, waited another 10 minutes for another lady to call me and go through the Job Network stuff. Why the first guy couldn't have been trained to do this, I don't know...but, yet again another sign of the efficiency (or lack of) I guess.
So, the lady goes through all this stuff, and this is where it starts to become depressing and you understand how people can be out of work for so long. Yes, they may not be able to get a job - or just do not want to work - but, the language that Centrelink uses when explaining its job diary and obligations is quite bleak.
Firstly, the lady went all through the diary and said, "When the diary is full, you need to return it to us." No mention of, "Hey, if you get a job and so forth you wouldn't have to fill up this book if you were not eligible for benifits". It just seemed to me that there was some assumption that I would get to the end of that diary, without getting a job, which is certainly not my intention. If for some reason I do get to the end of the diary, I can assure you it would not be from lack of trying to get work.
Well...after around 2 hours at Centrelink, it was finally all over. Given that I had only got around 3 hours sleep that night, I went home to hopefully get some sleep. I was woken up at around 215 by one of the agencies I applied for a job for approximately 3 weeks ago. This is the same agency who called me approximately a week after getting my application (and after my interview) stating that they were having difficulty contacting my referees. As this was quite a concern to me, I did a followup call to them approximately two days later to confirm whether the referees had actually been contacted. The person I spoke to had no idea, and ended the conversation pronto.
Last week, I called again to see if they could confirm whether my referees had been contacted and I was told that I would be called back. I was not called back. So, surprise it was today to be called back by the person who had originally called/interviewed me three weeks ago. They said the job had now finally been approved and could I come in and do some literacy and typing tests. Sure, I said brimming with enthusiasm. Then she said to me, "Can you also bring in your resume?". This threw me a little considering she had interviewed me, and also recieved my resume. When I said that I had already given her my resume she stated that she must have misplaced it and can I bring it again.
I mentioned to her that I had had two phonecalls last week from her collegues who were having trouble getting my referees and whether she had had a chance to follow this up, considering I called her about it last week. I figured that I am applying for so many jobs, I do not want my referees to be harrassed more often than they should. Additionally, one would assume that the agency had my details on file - somewhere - considering they called me. But no, that would be too easy. She basically said that we were going to "start afresh" and I was even going to be interviewed by someone else. When I quizzed her on the start date of said job, she didnt have one.
Yes, I really had to bite my tongue on this one, as I could see where it was heading. Put it this way, the call she made to me was at 215, the interview/testing was for 3pm. Someone was desperate to fill their quota, so guess what, lets call in that chick we interviewed three weeks ago with the intention she was applying for a job. A job, which unfortunately did not appear to exist - even though she was given an impression that she was applying for a real job.
So...yeah I went in and smiled sweetly at her and yes hi its great to see you...blah blah blah...Then I did a typing and spelling test. My interview did not even turn out to be an interview. It was just a meeting with another person and they said that they were going to get a group of us in so he could explain what the company was looking for in interviews and so forth. He did give a bit more information on the job...so at the very least, I am now somewhat confident that it does at least exist.
As I was walking home, the agency called me again and said they had contacted one of my referrees and they had said to him that "too much time has passed since I worked for them, so they could not give an authoritive reference to me". Said person was a company I worked for only a few years ago, so I was pretty disgusted, considering that they had agreed to be my referee. He said that he was speaking to my other referee tomorrow, which was at least something positive. Apparently I am to expect a phone call from this agency person today, so...yeah lets see what happens.
Whilst I am on about my love for agencies...I dropped a resume in person to an agency earlier this week (ie prior to calling Centrelink). I was given a list of Job Network agencies when I talked to Centrelink, and this was one of them. Because of this, I figured I would give them a call and check up if there was any updates in regards to the resume I had left when I had applied for a job they had advertised. I also wanted to mention that I was now a jobseeker with a job network card. IE. I am someone they would rather employ as they get a pay off from the government for placing me. The chick I spoke to said that she has not seen my resume and that it must have been lost. Yes, that is right two agencies, each of which I have seen personally have "misplaced" my resume.
I have another interview today with an agency (that I also applied for a job for a few weeks ago - via phone and email - never to hear from them again). When you get the dole you MUST be matched up with a job network agency. The agency I mention above who "misplaced" my resume was full, so I had to go with this one. I have an interview today and well...I just can not wait as I know how rewarding and how much fun it will be. Especially if they lose my resume.
Had a mildly uncomfortable encounter on my travels today. Was walking down the street and I see this guy who interviewed me earlier this week who has not called me back about whether I got the job - so the assumption is I have not got it. I managed to splutter out a quick hello and how are you but failed to ask if I had missed out on the job. The interview was pretty weird as he walked me into part of the place I hadn't been into before and turns out that he has the bar from The Saloon Bar, which was one of the bars in Mackay (where I used to live). Turns out that he also used to own/dj at a club up there. Lucky I didn't mention what a shit taste in music the dj at said club had hey?
Although from this post it may seem that there were not any positive events this week, I can confirm that there was at least one. I spoke to a home loan company in WA about getting a loan for one of the cheap places in Norseman I have been yabbering about for ages. He went through the figures with me and it turns out I can loan $28K. I got the paperwork for the application today and I am ecstatic. Not sure if I will proceed with purchase of a property out there, however I am stoked as it is great to know at the very least how much I can borrow.
I spoke to some more non believers in my quest to get a building inspection in Norseman - ie "Norseman - why would you want to live there?", "Oh for that price you won't even get a tent", etc etc. I don't know how stupid these people think I am, but I have done my research about this. Furthermore, if I was to purchase one of those $400 K delapidated "renovaters dream" places in Sydney, no one would even blink an eye. I really could not be bothered trying to explain it to anyone anymore...
Always wanted to steal someone's letters? Click here!. A stupid, but somewhat addictive game. Try to write your name or something and see how far you get. Then annoy people by stealing their letters. Heh heh. Kept me busy for five minutes until I reminded myself that I really needed to get a life.
Check out the news here for 26/09/04. Seems I have unknowingly remixed a Sting track. They have accompanied their newsbyte with a picture of Groove Terminator who apparently is me (epod). It's funny how people assume things. I thought I made it clear that it is Epods site yet I get messages in my guestbook saying "We love you Rove!", "We love you Carl" etc. It's all very weird...
Saw a few comedians on tv late last night on this show that is allegedly a show about entertainment related things, but is in fact a thinly disguised commercial. They were bitching about the 2day FM Comedy God competition. Although all comedians will remain nameless, one of them I find funny and have seen them quite a few times, the other I am reserving judgement on. Bascially I saw the comedian in question at the Comedy Store a couple of years ago doing a hilarious routine on how he and flatmates got rid of a spider with the assistance of some hairspray. Problem was, I had seen this same routine on tv just prior to this, and it was being done by a different comedian. Not sure who stole/borrowed what but hmm..yes.
Although I agreed with what they were saying to some extent, they all seemed extremely bitter about this competition. Surely there are worse things to worry about in the world other than some stupid radio promotion? What they were saying was that the $50 000 prize was pretty good for 5 minutes of good material (*insert sarcasm here*) and that comedians are not made overnight. Personally, I'd rather 2day fm ran a competition like this rather than some stupid disgusting competition where (for example) people had to sit in a car for months, the last one left winning said car. Yes, for those who don't know, there was a comp like this and from memory it lasted for around four months.
Robert Nix, the guy who won the Comedy God comp has been around for ages, but hasn't made any money from comedy (allegedly). Although I didn't see the Comedy God finals/heats, I had just seen a repeat on the tv of his performance at Raw Comedy a few years back. He was going really well, and just stuffed up at the end, which was forgivable considering it was being filmed for tv in front of a huge audience. Put simply, I was impressed by his stuff and I am sure that now 2-3 years later he's even better and good on him for winning the 50k! mmm.
I was woken up early yesterday morning by the guy I had spoke to at the agency the day before. He asked if I had a spare few minutes so that he could ask me some questions. Sure, I said not knowing what I had just got myself in for. He proceeded to ask all the "hard" questions that one has ever been asked in interviews - all one after the other. You know the ones. Tell me of a time you went above and beyond in customer service, tell me of how you overcome a problem etc etc. Yep, there were about ten different questions, and each needed an example of an actual time I had done this. Needless to say, I answered all of them pretty well. He then said that he was happy to send me to an interview with the company cause he was pretty impressed. Er, why thank you ;)
He said that he would like to meet again first before the interview, just to go through some stuff and asked me to come in at 1230 that day. No worries I said, I will be there. At 11am, over the other side of town I had my Centrelink arranged interview with the other job network agency. So, I rang the agency and asked if there was any way that I could have my appointment slightly earlier. The lady I was speaking to said that if I arrived early by around 15 minutes and the person that they were meant to see didnt arrive, I could then come in early. Cool. No problems. Excellent. So, got dressed up in the interview attire and walked over to North Rockhampton.
Walked into this place at 1045 and was told to take a seat. I watched with much amazement as all the job seekers who were walking in were attired in jeans/thongs and other very casual attire. There I was sitting in my suit thinking oh my god, what have I done wrong. The clock had moved its way around to 11.10 and I hadn't been called in so was feeling a little stressed considering I had to get to the other side of town by 1230. If I caught a bus straightaway, and walked to the interview it would only take around 15 minutes to bus/walk there, but I don't like to leave anything to chance, and I didn't know when to expect the next bus, hence I wanted to get out of there asap.
Finally at 1120, I got called in by the person who has the pleasure of being in charge of me courtesy of Centrelink. I handed her my resume and she went to photocopy it, me not realising that it wasn't necessary to photocopy it cause it was a copy printed specifically for them. She then asked if I had filled out an application form...er, no. I rolled my eyes and mentioned that it would have been helpful if I had been given the form to fill in whilst I was waited, and she seemed to agreee and said sorry.
Admittedly, I wasn't overly polite or enthusiastic as I was stressing about being late for a real meeting for a real job that it looked like it was likely that I was possibly (er, hopefully) going to get. I had also seen a bloke arrive at 1155 and say that he was here for his appointment at 1130 who got to go in before me, so that had also given me the irrits. She asked what time I had to be at the interview and I told her 1230 and that I was either going to catch a bus, or if there was one or if there wasnt one, I would walk back. She went through my application super quick and after it was finished, I walked really quickly towards the bus stop up the road hoping that I was going to be lucky enough to catch one. I then hear my name being screamed out from up the road by the lady I had just seen.
I said some swears under my breath and turned around and started walking back towards her thinking oh for fucks sake what now...She then said, hey come back in I have got someone who has offered to drive you to the interview. At this point I was eternally grateful to this lady as well as feeling terrible about being so unenthused and somewhat rude to her. So...anyways, this bloke who worked there then drove me to the interview and whilst I arrived there really early, the guy I was supposed to see at 1230 was able to see me earlier, so all worked out well. I still feel shit about how I treated that lady so I am going to go back in on Monday morning and say sorry and give her some chocolates or something. I suck.
The meeting at the agency that I went through went REALLY well. I was told that lots of agencies had sent people to the place in question which had the job but none of them were suitable. Given it is hard to find people with call centre/customer service experience in Rockhampton, I understand what he was saying to be true. In fact, I was surprised that I was able to see a call centre job being advertised in the first place in Rockhampton.
He said that he used to work there, so he knows all the people there, and they allowed me to come in for an interview as they knew if he recommended someone it would be someone who was pretty much what they were after. (note in the first interview I had three weeks ago, I believe that the person I was speaking to said he was a manager there) He said to me that he believes I can do the job and now it is up to me to impress the people at the interview. He went through a heap of stuff with me that they might ask, which was pretty much what he asked on the phone this morning, so I am confident that I will go well. I have the whole weekend to make sure my answers are perfect, so even better.
The job pays REALLY well and is a three month temp job. He also mentioned that there was also the possibility of me getting permanent work as a result of this but of course, no guarantees. The place I would be working is about a 5 minute walk from where I live, so its heaps convienient as well. The interview is on Wednesday this week and I really think I can get this job, but of course stand by cause who knows. I shouldn't get too excited, but I am :P
The mention of permanent work made me think again of the buying my own place thing, so mmm...who knows, it might happen. Rockhampton is somewhat more convienient than Norseman also. Still not giving up on Sydney either. Though I would be renting/sharing if I went back there. Not as stressed as I was about everything last few weeks though. Tis good.
Quite a few momentous things happened this week...
* Mr Hugh let me know he was leaving Channel Nine. He's going to CNN to be their Hong Kong correspondent. Anyone in the Sydney area who runs into Mr Hugh, please take note of my request in my latest Mr Hugh site update. *winks*
* I got the job. I start Monday. It seems like a good job, and pays extremely well, so I am stoked. I hope it is worth it after the almost unbelieveable amount of paperwork/interviews I had to go through to get this temporary job. I do two weeks full time training during the day next week. I then get to work for around four hours every day either starting around 430am or 530pm. It will go through to around Feb/March. Or so I am told... Needless to say, I am looking forward to a huge cd/dvd buying spree when first pay goes in the bank. mmm.
* The home loans people in WA said I can loan $28 K from them. I also get $7K first homebuyers grant. All this would be subject to them reviewing my application BUT they said as long as everything is exactly as I told them when I talked to them on the phone, it *should* be approved for that amount. Not set on going to Norseman yet, but nice to have that option. People still think I am nuts for even considering going out there but well blah... :P
* I got rid of the last of the bubblewrap from my eBay store. This is something that has shit me for the last three months and caused my business to run at a loss since I moved to Rockhampton. I didn't want to write about it here whilst I still was selling it in the instance that my competitors/buyers took advantage of the information...not that it really mattered considering that one of my competitors had totally undercut my price, so much so that they were probably making only around $5 a roll. Not worth it when you consider eBay fees, and wrapping it and lugging it to the post office.
The first time I sold bubblewrap (while I was in Sydney), it was really successful, so I decided to purchase seventy-five 100 metre rolls prior to leaving Sydney, and pay to get them delivered here, figuring that I would make a decent profit. Haha. Not so. Before I left Sydney (and after I had paid for the bubblewrap and its delivery) I see this person listing 100 metre rolls for $17.45. The same ones I wanted to list for $30 to cover my costs and make a profit. So...yeah imagine me waiting on this huge delivery of bubblewrap knowing that I was almost certainly going to make a huge loss. I have at least learnt my lesson, albiet a very timewasting and financially damaging one.
Thankfully, I kept up with selling books, which at least made the loss much less than it could have been had I just sold bubblewrap. *shudders*. Some of the emails I recieved from buyers were ridiculous. I had, for example, listed 3 rolls of bubblewrap for auction, with a $49.99 start price. They have written to me saying how much would it be if you were to sell it outside of eBay. They had said in their email that I was obviously listing it at that price to cover my profit margin, so they wanted it even cheaper than that. Fuck some people and their stupid assumptions. In actual fact, to break even I needed to sell that bubblewrap for around $65. Even then it was a waste of time and effort wrapping it etc. Some people just do not get it.
Just when I thought I knew everything about the internet and blogs and so forth, I found out yesterday that I was indeed incorrect. Whilst updating my comedy site, I stumbled across the rather impressive Tom Green official site. He has written a great piece about his visit to IRAQ, as well as also having a blog. At first glance, this is your normal, run of the mill blog/diary thing...but take another look. Oh go on! There are sound files in it as well! I, of course, was intrigued by this, and on further investigation, this is actually a feature of the blogger site. This is
called "audio blogger", where you can make an audio update at any time - just by calling from any phone and leaving a voicemail message. How cool is that?
I finished my two weeks of training for my new job on Friday, and I am ecstatic. Admittedly the training was very well presented and so forth, however, I am happy that it is over. There was sooo much information to take in, and sitting in a room without windows for 7 hours a day for two weeks was a little too much for me, having not really been in a situation like this since school. Most of my other job training in the past has been pretty quick and/or nonexistant, so this was a relatively new experience.
I take my first call on Tuesday. I hope I am as confident with this as I think I am. When I first started doing temp call centre work in Sydney, everyone usually freaked out after/during training saying that there was no way they would be able to do the job, but when everyone got to actually do the job, everyone - including me - got through it just fine. I have taken that on board but still have some slight trepidation of the "what ifs" if something goes wrong. I have tried to inspire confidence in some of my fellow less confident collegues, so hopefully those who have already done a shift got through it just fine. We take emergency calls as well, and am hoping that my first call is not one of those. There's flashing lights on the roof that go off when there is an emergency call, so I can imagine how my stomach is going to feel each time I see that. Yikes.
The training this week has proven to me how little I know about something potentially life threatening that I use every day. Yes - electricity - it can kill you and stuff. We all know that. However, after this week I have found out about multiple ways that it can do this. For example, if you have ever felt a shock/tingle when switching on a tap or something...that is a potentially life threatening situation. Yes, it can happen for ages and nothing happens - but essentially anything metal in your house could also be live. IE just cause you touch a tap and it only gives you a tiny shock, it doesnt mean that it (or anything metal in your house) won't electrocute the next person who comes along. If I was to speak to someone on the phone about this, they would be instructed not to leave the house, not to touch anything metal and to have a seat in their loungroom until a crew was sent (the crew would be sent straight away). How full on is that?
Something else that I should probably have known before this week, but did not...If you like do something stupid like stick a knife in a toaster and get electrocuted, at a point your muscles will actually spasm so you won't be able to let go of the knife and hence continue to be electrocuted until the power is switched off at the mains. If you have a safety switch installed, that should solve that problem, but woah what a way to go.
There's quite a few other scenarios, the most frightening being stuck in a car with powerlines on top of it. Apparently you are essentially safe inside said car, but there have been situations where the tyres have all melted and so on...and...if you need to get out of a car in a situation like this, you would need to get out without touching anything metal - and hop (yes, literally HOP) out. There are variables like rain for example that make situations like this worse (water being a conductor and all)....so yeah...don't be getting stuck in a car with powerlines on it. Oh and don't go walking anywhere near a powerline is down either, cause you don't even need to touch it to be zapped.
We have had to do heaps of phone role plays with our fellow collegues, and although I can see why it is necessary, it got a bit irritating after the 623rd time, so I started getting a little creative and probably said some things that I shouldn't have. In one call, I rung up and said I wanted to order a pizza. When queried in another call about shock/tingles, I talked about recieving shock/tingles when I hugged a boy at the bottom of my staircase a few of months ago. Sadly there was nothing that the operator could do to help in either situation. Oh well.
In amongst saying too much (again) during a lunch break, I also managed to give out my website address to my collegues. I went into the training room and I saw a couple of them reading my diary. I don't write this thinking that anyone is going to read it, but of course that is a stupid assumption considering it is on the internet for all to see - but - wow to see people in the same room actually reading it was a little unnerving!
Went to Fire in the Sky last weekend which was kinda cool. I went alone (nothing new there) and found a place to sit. I always get a little uncomfortable in situations like this as I am surrounded by people who are in totally different worlds to me. I'm talking about the abundance of married with kids or couples. This young kid sat down really close to me and for a second it was like woah what if I was here with a husband and kids. I don't want any of that, but it always fascinates me to think of how much different life would be like considering I can not even look after myself. Another person in training with me is my age and she has three kids. I just couldn't imagine myself in that situation. I had trouble getting through 2 weeks training, but to think of also having three kids to look after when I got home. Wow.
Anyways, for those who do not know, Fire in the Sky is a fireworks display on the banks of the Fitzroy River in Rockhampton. The local radio station was there playing music to suitably rev up the crowd and create excitement. This was all going very well until I heard Phil Collins blasting out of the speakers. What were they thinking? The music during the fireworks was cool though, but, I thought too much about it and did my usual reading too much into the lyrics thing and nearly ended up having a bit of cry in the dark. Thankfully, I was able to refrain though. Just a bad combination of music/happy families I guess.
I have not listed anything in my eBay store since my last auctions finished. I need a break from it. On a scale of 1 to 10 for irritation, eBay is currently registering a ten. I have of late been recieving more emails from people asking where their items are. They seem to believe that Australia Post work weekends and that their payments go straight into my account the instance that they pay. This of course is not so. Then there are the people who "thought they paid", who only realise they haven't paid after I send them an unpaid item dispute their way.
Ah, and how could I forget. I ordered one of my all time favourite movies, "Dogs in Space" from a UK seller. I recieved it last week but it appears to be nothing but a poor copy of the film. Seller doesnt give a shit and doesn't want to help. They directed me to the web address on the back of the dvd, which redirected me to a porn site which appeared to have nothing to do with said movie. *bangs head against a brick wall*.
I have been working on Jimbo's official site, since the start of this month, so feel free to check it out - even if you have no idea of who he is! Also highly recommended would be the dvd on the merchandise page. A perfect Christmas present for Grandma....maybe not ;)
The weather here has been insane, and apparently it is just going to get worse. It is sooo very hot and I read in the paper the other day that the humidity was 90-100%. Not that I really know what that means, except that it's really hot and humid and in general, just very unpleasant weather. All I need to do is walk outside the door to get instantly covered in sweat. I don't have airconditioning here and although I have three fans on, they only seem to be pushing hot air towards me as opposed to a cool breeze. I have windows open as well, but theres hardly any breeze coming through them either. Yick. I am too paranoid to keep windows open at night, so as you could imagine, I have also been sleeping very well. Not.
The weather has caused me to drink a lot of water too. Funny thing I forgot to mention in my previous post - not that it has anything to do with me drinking lots of water (I hope - lol!)...but anyway...there is a sign up on the back of all the toilet doors at my new workplace. It says "are you drinking enough water?". It then encourages you to check the colour of your urine to determine if you are in fact drinking enough water. Below this are four squares, representing said urine colour which go from a very pale yellow, right through to a quite unnerving red colour. It seems that if your urine is red, you have to drink more water. Quite possibly, it should also mention that you should also seek urgent medical assistance, but no, just drink a few more litres of water and you'll be right mate. Mmm.
As part of my normal "I have no life" routine, I went to switch on the computer early Monday morning and gasped in shock/horror when it failed to connect to the internet. After working out that this did not seem to be a problem with my internet provider, I tried to plug the phone into the phone line and there was no dial tone. This was followed by a dash to the nearest (working) payphone to call Telstra to see what was up. Funny that whenever I try to use a payphone, the first payphone I always see always, without exception, says "cards only". Blah.
Found a payphone in a rather idyllic location, that being a quiet arcade with airconditioning. Trying to navigate through Telstras stupid menu was going exceptionally well, considering that it wasn't registering any of the numbers I was pushing. I finally got to speak to an operator after being asked by the stupid automated system a number of times to push a button (duh, I have). They said they would send someone out, but could not give me a timeframe. Er thanks. I had to be nice though as I figured this was a test as I would be taking the same fault calls the next day, only the faults I would be dealing with would be of the electrical kind.
Checked if the phone was working when I got home and it wasn't. Then about an hour later I tested it and it was working. Cool as! I think wow, Telstra were really fast fixing it. Excellent! After being online for a couple of hours I got a phone call from Telstra saying they are here and I told them that it was now working so all is good, so they didn't come up and check anything out. A few hours after that, my phoneline drops out again. Timing, timing...so off I went to call Telstra again. Soo...they said they were going to send someone out on Tuesday.
Later in the night my phone was working again, but was dropping out heaps. Tuesday morning, it didn't work at all. Dang. Crap. Telstra guy visited and wasn't able to fix it. He said something about there being a lead phone line that was damaged and because they were so old they would need permits or something to get to it as they can't get air into it (or something like that). Then he came back on Wednesday to try something else and it didnt work either. He then said that he needed to gain access to the (empty) premises below mine to try to get said problem fixed.
The problem with this? This meant contacting the owner of the property (otherwise known to me as a four letter word beginning with "c"). Not wanting to speak with the gentleman *cough* that is the owner, I passed his number on to Telstra. Telstra spoke to him and although they offered to pick up the keys to the EMPTY (I repeat - EMPTY!) premises, he was uncooperative. First he was going to meet them there in two days, but somehow Telstra at least got him to agree to meet there today (Thursday).
I, inconvieniently, had a full days training today so for the first time ever I had to leave my key with someone so that Telstra could gain access. I didn't really mind Telstra being there while I wasnt, but the thought of having the moronic owner of the place here when I wasn't left me with a horribly uncomfortable feeling. I rushed home at lunch time to hopefully find a working phoneline (Telstra's original appointment was 9am), but it wasn't fixed and I didn't get my key back as hoped. I am however happy to report that the phone line was fixed around 3pm this afternoon and I am now back online, attached to what is essentially my life support system.
I think I probably have more to write, but will leave that to another day cause my brain hurts!
I have been thinking recently about starting a new religion that does not celebrate Christmas, Birthdays, Easter, and any other special things that seem to hold such importance to the *normal* people of this world. (eg: home/car ownership, getting married, having kids, going out, getting pissed, having perfect hair/makeup/fashion sense etc etc)
Yes, I could be boring and just join a couple of the already formed religions that cover some of these things, but that would be too easy. To be able to say, "Ah, my religion doesn't celebrate Christmas/Birthday/etc or allow me to get pissed or own a house", would make some of lifes most difficult discussions with *normal* people so much easier. People would just nod and understand that even if I wanted any of the above stuff, it just wasnt possible as it was against my religion. No more longwinded explanations to explain how I got to the mindset that I am in today or why I can not partake in *normal* people activities. Too easy.
Anyhoos, this week has rocked. Nothing overly crap has happened (bar one phonecall from the mother which lead me into a temporary outpouring of negativity). All is good. I am sure life will make up for this shortlived happiness though, so do standby for the next disaster to happen as I am sure that I will be able to put it into words here eloquently.
Work is going heaps well. The people I work with are cool as. The pay rates are also unreal. Most people who have called in have been very nice, and so very surprisingly pleasant. I have only spoken to a few people who were angry, but even they were not that nasty and were happy to listen to what I had to say (after they had given me an earful). Fair enough I figure, I would be pissed if I was in some of their *normal* people situations too. I wondered how many of them would jump at the chance of joining my (yet to be named) new religion which would take all their problems away in an instant.
I decided not to go on my massive cd/dvd buying spree that I talked about a few posts back. After this job finishes, I will probably go back to Sydney. I figured my money would be best spent paying off my credit card and saving enough money to get myself set up in a nice place in the city again. There is also a slight chance of permanent employment coming up where I am working in Rockhampton, and considering the pay rates for normal staff (around $20+/hour, weekdays), it might be worth hanging around in Rockhampton for another year or so if a job does come up...
On the other side of the world, 55 000 people (and still counting) have just been killed, and countless people remain missing. On my side of the world, I have spent an evening taking calls from people who have lost their power. The majority of them are patient and friendly, however, quite a few of them were rather pissed about having to wait a few hours for their power to come back on (mainly because it was too hot). Ah, perspective is a wonderful thing. It is good to see people have their hearts and priorities in the right place. I so much wanted to mention to them that compared to temporarily having no power, there are thousands of people who are in a much worse situation - one that can not be magically fixed any time soon.
Yesterday, I went on a smaller version of the massive cd/dvd buying spree I said I wasn't going to go on in the last post. Result? A stack of dvds coming my way sometime soon courtesy of eBay. I only meant to buy the new Henry Rollins dvd, but then thought ah why not start buying back some of the other dvds I sold before I left Sydney. This is not all of them, but a somewhat nice start. Will try to withhold from purchasing anything else, as previously promised. Yes, I know - it is refreshing to see that my heart and priorities are also in the right place. *smirks*.
I have been without a dvd player since I left Sydney (other than one on the computer). I was in Coles yesterday and saw a dvd player for $55. It was only region 4, so I thought ah dang that is no good to me cause most of my dvds are from overseas and are different regions. Still curious though, I had a quick check on the internet to see if there were any cracks to make it a multiregional player, but sadly there were not. Luckily for me though, I stumbled across a chatboard where people were discussing said dvd player. Seems that they had all bought one and found it to be multiregional - despite the packaging saying it was only region 4. So..yeah, wandered up to Coles to buy one fully expecting this one to probably not work for me, but wow it played everything. Awesome as...what a bargain!
The dvd player should at the very least be good company for me, considering that there are not many good things on the telly at the moment, with the exception of Nip/Tuck. This is a show I find rather amusing in a creepy sort of way, especially when they ask "Tell me what you don't like about yourself". Do watch it if you haven't already!
Quote from smh: "I heard what was going on with the wave and so on, and I just thought it was a bit of an exaggeration," said Peter Anstiss, 48, from Sydney, as he shared a beer with his brother in a bar off Patong Beach's main drag. "I didn't think too much about it."
I guess everyone's entitled to an opinion but wow - an exaggeration? (or perhaps a quote taken out of context?). Quite a few other choice quotes from happy travellers in that article also. Do be sure to enjoy your holiday and also have a happy new year! *smirk*.
There have been quite a few calls for New Years fireworks to be cancelled due in respect for said victims. Living in Sydney for so long, I had always thought that the amount of fireworks that are set off there yearly (not just New Years) was a massive waste of money that could go to much more worthwhile things. Personally, I would like to see it going to Youth Off The Streets, who get very little Government funding but do an awesome job supporting young people, most of whom have been through an unbelieveable amount of abuse/neglect/etc...but no, the fireworks must always go on. I think I lost count how many fireworks went off while I was living near Darling Harbour.
I was half watching Channel 10 last night and after Seinfeld and was a little bemused to see that there was an *alleged* Oprah special on. The special was about a book entitled, "He's just not that into you". A concept made up by a Sex In The City writer, which later was developed into the book in question. If you missed it, this link will fill you in on what it is all about.
The book is essentially about ensuring that females do not waste their time thinking about/being with/obsessing about males that are just, "Not into you". This includes males sending (alleged) mixed messages - the ones you chat with your friends about because you are confused about whether said male likes you or not. The theory is, if you are having a chat like that with your friends, "he's just not into you", cause if he was he would have already asked you out. Amongst other things, the book also goes through all the excuses males use in order to not see a girl eg: "I'm working late/busy/etc". Again, the theory is if you have a male telling you this sort of stuff, "he's just not into you".
Taking all this all into account - and despite the show being somewhat interesting - I found it rather amusing as to how this was chosen as prime time viewing (even in a non ratings season). Is there a programmer at Channel 10 who is currently beating females off with a stick because he is so desireable, but he's just "not into" them, and is sick of telling them all he is working late? So much so, he decided to actually "work late" just to ensure that this "not into you" theory was shared with the world, in the instance someone missed it the first time around when it was featured on Oprah during the day? Truly, I am curious.