The · Opera · Populaire · Ballet....

Well, it's time to go get knocked out and hacked up again. I've got a nasal polyp operation scheduled for the 2nd of February. It's been four and a half years since I first had them removed; nobody knows how they form, but they do know that if they're hacked out there's a 30% chance they won't come back! Who can beat those odds? :-)

In fairness, it's not a stationary probability distribution; each time I have them removed the probability of recurrence is reduced. It's somewhat amazing that nobody knows why they happen, the accepted treatment is to hack the things out... and I find myself looking forward to it.

Surgeon seems like a nice bloke. I presume I'll have to go see an anaesthetist, and I've got a CT scan scheduled for Monday. The thing that always amazes me about the medical system is how it lurches from inactivity to activity; you wait a month or two for an appointment, and then bang, everything is happening :-)

On Prednisolone for a week, then for a week before the surgery. Slightly freaked myself out reading the side-effect list, but that list is fairly scary for most medication.

For those of you in Perth, Alex and I will be back for a month come February 17th.

Plans for our time in Perth include dinner at Utopia (firstly probably on the 18th), then O-Day on the 19th of Feb. We may throw a party / games night some time, assuming we find a suitable venue (we're still not quite sure where we'll be staying). I want to go to the beach! And have a picnic in King's Park!

My parents have accepted teaching jobs in Onslow so we'll be flying up to see them for the long weekend on 26th Feb. I've never been there before, so it should be interesting.

In other news, we're flying to San Francisco tonight, and thanks to the Canadian Air Transport Security Authority, we are not permitted any carry-on bags. Accordingly, I will not have my laptop or my iPod with me and thus I will be offline until we return on Sunday night. Not that you'd notice on this LJ, but you might have become accustomed to seeing my name in your instant messaging contacts.

Brain a little scattered so I'm going for point form.

*Got Xmas holidays off, even though my shop was open in that time. Enjoyed lazing around a lot and wearing funky coloured nail polish.
*Managed to maintain my weight over Xmas and not gain any while indulging in lots of yummy stuff, by being smart and selective about it.
*Got back into the groove of work very easily, almost like I haven't been away except with the benefit of a really good break.
*Think I have found an excellently priced venue for wedding stuff that does the thing I wanted for guests. Very exciting, as all my research before indicated I'd have to give it up. Get to check the venue out in a few weeks, not sharing any more than that with anyone until after then.
*Birthday coming up on the 24th, but close friends flying out before then, so moved the festivities up to this weekend.
*Discovered last weekend that there was an 8th book in the Incarnations of Immortality series by Piers Anthony. Nox! Reading at traffic lights isn't smart, but hard to resist.
*Curling ribbon is a marvelous creation.
*My glasses broke yesterday morning. Big long story short, they were 12 days within warranty and I managed to get things organised so they were fixed yesterday afternoon. Being able to see properly is a good thing.
*Colouring-in is very time consuming, but greatly enjoyable and relaxing.
*Planning to go to the eastern states sometime within the next six months to visit a dear friend of mine. Looking forward to both seeing her and checking out far off Australian places.
*Friends currently in Canada are arriving in Perth for a visit in a bit over a month. Be good to see them again!
*Zig is awesome.
*The Steam holiday sale was hard to resist and involved me spending $200+ on games. I'm mostly a pirate cos I don't agree with the price of the games, but damn, that sale was good. And costly to my credit card!
* Got two Threadless t-shirts in the mail yesterday that I ordered back in December. Very happy with the purchase.

INVITES - comment/contact me for more details if interested.
*Everyone invited to come to a strip club with me on Saturday 9th 8:30pm - I imagine mostly male friends will come, but interested ladies welcome too.
*Everyone invited to come to dinner with me in Northbridge on Saturday 9th 7:15pm - venue yet to be decided. RSVP preferred so appropiate sized table can be booked.
*All lady friends (and their lady friends too) invited to come to the C restaraunt (it revolves!) for High Tea on Sunday 10th 2:30pm. RSVP needed by Friday, restaraunt requires it.

Sometimes reality is far better than the fantasy...

These women are so much more *beautiful* than the photo-shopped images I usually am bombarded with...

*WOW*

http://models.com/v-magazine/v-size-2.html

In the tradition of a couple of friends' I've been thinking what I want 2010 to be about for me. I think what's becoming clear to me (though not set in stone) is the idea of 'connectionism'.

What this means for me (given it's not a real word) is:
- being connected to people
- promoting things that mean others get to be connected
- learning about what connection means, looks like, feels like etc in as many ways as possible
- connecting with new people
- deepening my connection with current friends
- being and living a life that gives people an idea of what connection is and can look like
- sharing what I know and have learned and experienced about connection with interested parties


That's the overarching theme to the year. It fits in well with the overarching theme to my life, which is 'love'.

I don't think I am in a space where I can begin to break that one down to such neat little dot points, so I will trust simply that it is obvious that the person I am is an expression of and intertwined with the associations of love :)

Other things I'd like the year to be about:

- cooking for and with friends, spending time and learning skills, teaching skills in the kitchen
- getting to know friends better, really appreciate them and what they're doing in their lives - what matters to them
- meeting new people and seeing the world through their eyes
- enjoy my love affair with academic learning, explore the wonderous things I get to think about and learn about, and do well marks wise in the process.
- continue my love affair with Fremantle, because I'm just head over tea-kettle for the place. It's the place I fell in love with here in Perth, first.
- cook new dishes!
- practice course meals and make gifts of these to people as pleases me
- continue to be open and honest about my life - the results of this have been stand out and phenomenal, I suspect this is something that will just become natural and fade to the background.
- fall in love as often as possible, and delight in it every time (this is actually standard experience for me, but I want to really notice it - I never want to take it for granted.
- spend time being less well behaved, in control and out of trouble - aka, have spontaneous, wild and wonder filled adventures in unlikely places.
- start learning French
- travel interstate and spend time with people who I'd love to be closer friends with
- see what it's like being an independent, hippy arts student exploring the country :) (and later - the world!!)
- inspire others in themselves, the things they're doing, the things I'm doing, and to come on spontaneous adventures with me just *because* hanging out and doing something unexpected will be *glorious fun*

I've been squeamish about horror movies since I was little - I never grew out of it. This is despite my healthy imagination, ability to point to reality and not reality and my appreciation for good story and dark fantasy (probably other things, but that kind of list is boring). I've had it in my head that it was actually frightening, that what I was experiencing was fear.

It's not - not even close.

I'm squeamish from distress. It upsets me to consider that someone could do that (whatever 'that' is at any given point) to someone...

Some things it's easier for me to talk myself down from the experience of horror and upset. Other things I just don't deal with well - and gore movies are definitely one of them. I can even deal with true thrillers better than I can gore films...

I feel a little liberated in this realisation... it always bothered me to be scared of something that I knew very well wasn't real. It doesn't bother me in the slightest to be upset or distressed by the kind of suffering and torture, mind games and fucked up things that horror films glorify in.

I don't begrudge the genre - I certainly believe that fictional spaces are far better for the exploration of these kind of things than the real world.

But I don't need to 'overcome this' now. There's no fear to face... just a knowningness that I am not the target for the story and that there are other things out there for me to enjoy.

I feel my explanation is a little ambiguous... like I'm circling but not really nailing a point. What do others think - is anyone else out there in the same boat as me?

Many moons ago, we booked tickets for Canada, leaving Perth 24 June 2009, returning 17 Feb 2010. We couldn't book them for the exact period of time we wanted.. plans were to stick around for a year, so we thought we'd just change dates.

Well.. erm. We like it here. So we're going to take the tickets home, clean up some loose ends then head back here again in early/mid March, probably on a return ticket that would have us back in Perth during Christmas 2010/ NY 2011.

Plans for our time in Perth include dinner at Utopia (firstly probably on the 18th), then O-Day on the 19th of Feb. We're also heading up to Karratha to visit family on the long weekend of Feb 26-Mar 1. I've never been there before, so that should be fun.

Not entirely sure where we're going to be staying while we're in Perth, since both of our parents are talking about renting out their homes, but eh, that's part of the excitement :)

Life, love and the pursuit of happiness lead me to pimp out these photos I've recently uploaded..

( Read more... )
The two sunset ones were taken with my nifty-50 lens. The two plane ones with my 100-400L. Both lenses have their place :)

twenty ten, two thousand and ten, whatever. I say meh to you both. It's MMX.

Sinfest covers the New Year's change quite nicely this year, I think. (over 6 panels, 3401 to 3406)

Please don't forget the Egoboo group is doing the Aus Spec Fic Carnival this month ! If you know of any articles, posts, discussions, launch announcements, anything that is Aus Spec Fic related, then please post a comment here, there, or email me. (CALLISTO AT G MAIL DOT COM)

:D

With apologies to flyingblogspot, this does seem a neat idea; so here is my list of retroactive resolutions for 2009.

Start a project to be happier

De-clutter; give away lots of stuff

Move out of Nedlands and into an exciting new area

Continue with my photography hobby

Start getting into birdwatching as a related hobby

Make a bunch of great new friends, get out of the house more

Spend much less time watching TV; partially achieved by no longer owning one

Be greener (recycle more, waste less water and electricity, …)

Upgrade bike with panniers and a rack to make it much more useful for bulk haulage

Get outdoors, do gardening

Reconsider a number of strange preconceptions

Read more, and on more varied topics

Attempt to lie to people less, even when that is difficult or lying is the socially normal thing to do

Loose weight, slowly over a longish period

Start attending weekly half-assed running group

Start eating smaller, better quality (nicer) meals

Perhaps stop making so many things impossible, when they really aren’t

… and now I’m off birdwatching / a-photographing. Have a good day people :)

So the other day, callistra and I mused about having a dinner party. Rather, she mused and didn't feel like doing all the cooking, with me then volunteering to do some of it. We decided to keep it small and just invited kae_dash and aescapulius being that schedules have made it far too long since they and the Parkers crossed paths for any length of time :P

Today when I went shopping for ingredients with Calli, we got a bit carried away and planned grand things, allowed some common sense to reign and kept it to 3 courses, asserting that the cheese platter really wasn't necessary (though would have been awesome).

We did a whirlwind of cooking - all five of us, and accomplished huge amounts in a small amount of time. While the idea of Beef Wellington appealed to both Calli and I, we decided to prepare a bit more for that (both of us have been watching a little too much Hell's Kitchen, which features a strong thread of Beef Wellington).

What did we make:

Starter: Garlic Bread

Entree: Butter, roasted pumpkin, sage and bacon fettuccine topped with crumbled goats cheese.

Main: Roasted chicken with cashew nut stuffing with a green salad on the side.

Dessert: Crepe torte with mascapone vanilla cream and strawberries.

This complimented by a bottle of Moet & Chandon that was a renewal gift to Calli and Chesh. First time tasting such a well known bubbly - and I can say I could taste the difference. It was far lighter and fluffier, less heavy on the palate than other sparkling wines that I don't enjoy as much. Now eager to taste the Bolli and Christal (sp?) as well for comparison.

Notes:

* We didn't home make the garlic bread but it was tasty and allowed us to other cool things
* I fudged the butter sauce for the pasta from a few recipes, and we were quite delighted with the end product, though more walnuts and sage would have been good.
* We home made the pasta - my first time, and now I know how the process generally works, what to look for etc I'll be trying it here at home.
* Dessert ended up twice as awesome as the original plan as the crepes didn't quite happen as originally planned (rolled with fruit filling and topped with cream).


I loved the ease of conversation and the being together-ness. It was really lovely. After we ate we sat down and introduced aescapulius to Alton Brown's 'Good Eats' which he in his geeky glory, delighted in.

Tonight was just a perfect experience of friendship, and sharing, and creativity, conversation - connectedness. This is what I want for 2010.

I think that this is what my year will be about. Still a few conversations to have around that before I'm sure though, then a post of it's own.

As promised, here are balcony garden photographs (click to see the set on flickr):

I'm feeling quite happy with how it's going :) Next thing is to make a trip to Bunnings and get some more soil, and then plant some of my vegetables. I'm excited about the Bok Choy, I've read reports it grows very well in container gardens, so I think I'll plant that next :-)

The Bokashi bin is up and running, yay!

Was going through some old digital photos (2002 :P) and came across one of a Qantas 767 with a white tail (instead of a red one). Did some reading up on it. They operated a couple of them after Ansett's collapse in 2001.

One in particular was frame 27909/591, built in 1995.

Turns out this plane gets around a bit. Since 1995, it has been operated by:

• Lauda Air


• Vietnam Airlines (with Australian registration..)


• back to Lauda


• untitled with US reg


• Kenya Airways (again with Australian reg)


• Qantas


• back to untitled with US reg


• back to Vietnam Airlines (with Vietnam reg)


• Air China


• Varig


• and now with Ethiopian Airlines

I think I'd be worried about hull thickness with the number of times this has been stripped and repainted :P

1. What did you do in 2009 that you'd never done before?
Be present to the birth of a new human being.

2. Did you keep your New Year's resolutions, and will you make one this year?
I've taken to looking at a central concept that I want the year to be about... 2009 was exploration and expression. Not sure what 2010 is about yet :)

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Yes! A few people actually - and one I got to be part of the birth experience :)

4. Did anyone close to you die?
Thankfully no.

5. What countries did you visit?
None, but I did do a lot of travel interstate :)

6. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?
More snogging! Also, more money :)

7. What date from 2009 will remain etched upon your memory?
August 23rd

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Being a support person for one of my closest friends giving birth


9. What was your biggest failure?
Femmeconne didn't happen, which I'm disappointed about.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
I had many tension headaches, which have reduced significantly since I left Prem and Cab, also my feet still hate me a lot.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
Tickets to Melbourne and Brisbane. Tickets to see Amanda Palmer. Awesome tea and teapots. My new phone.

12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
Kaneda, Daniel, Cameron, Mum

13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
No comment.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Mortgage. Flights. Bills

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Swancon! Going to Brisbane to help welcome the new baby! Uni! Going to Melbourne and Bendigo.

16. What song will always remind you of 2009?
"I'm Yours" - Jason Mraz

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. Happier or Sadder?
About the same - which is to say worlds apart experiencially but absolutely happy

ii. Thinner or fatter?
About the same - I did loose some weight this year, but believe I've put it back on over the holiday period.

iii. Richer or poorer?
Poorer! But wiser and happier.

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Hang out and get to know people.

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Working for the government.

20. How did you spend Christmas?
Woke up and got picked up by prk and amarillion for Christmas Lunch - a tradition and one that I dearly love.

21. How did you spend New Year?
Partied at the House of Books and Ducks, then on to mossiah's NYE party :)

22. Did you fall in love in 2009?
Almost daily :)

23. How many one-night stands?
None of the traditional kind, but a few one off lovely experiences.

24. What was your favourite TV program?
White Collar

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
No.

26. What was the best book you read?
MythOS - Kelly McCullough
Zoe's Tale - John Scalzi

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Regina Spektor

28. What did you want and get?
Trips to Melbourne
To have adventures
To travel
Trip to Brisbane to help welcome a baby into the world.
To spend loving intimate time with special people
Cam moving in with us

29. What did you want and not get?
A new relationship here in Perth (though 2010 may have taken care of this already, we shall see)

30. What was your favourite film of this year?
Star Trek

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 29 and spent the day in the Swan Valley with Kallen, then a picnic with friends in Ellenbrook watching Othello :)

32.What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
A teleporter.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2009?
Same same.

34. What kept you sane?
K and my amazing, dear and wonderful friends.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Tilda Swinton

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
No one thing, but generally disappointed.

37. Who did you miss?
Too many people to list!

38. Who was the best new person you met?
Ewen, Robin and alexmoon

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2009:
That my life is my own, I am the source of it and no one, and nothing else is.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
"You are my sweetest downfall"

Five personally significant events of 2009:

- The ending of the 'official relationship' with e_dan. I fell in love with him again, and we were both beautiful to eachother. Now we just get to be awesome at one another and enjoy the closeness without it needing to look like someething.
- Being there for the birth of babalon_93's second baby, and living it up Brisbane style for a few weeks.
- Getting a job in the non profit sector for the first time ever.
- Realisation that one of my background conversations is about keeping myself small, and putting a lot of work into learning to let that go - still in progress.
- Going on a date with a lovely man from Brisbane and falling for him :)

Five things I want to do in 2010:

- Enjoy my relationships to the fullest
- Meet new people and get to know friends better.
- Continue doing really well at Uni
- Cook for friends
- Continue my affair with Fremantle :)

Five people I'd like to know better in 2010:
There are quite a few - too many to list, and I will inevitably miss someone :P

Above is bunnycronkite. Playing about with the video recording on my SLR; that was taken using my 35mm prime lens in fairly decent light, with a very small aperture. The bunny manages to stay in focus a lot of the time. Terrible camera work, etc, etc, though :-)

Camera can do HD recording, and has a microphone. I've muted out the audio, as nobody wants to hear me struggle to breathe Vader-style.

Hope everyone has a great new year!

I started the meme where I go through my last ten years, but an awful lot happened in the last ten years which I can't speak about.
:-)
( Stolen from Dr K )