GenesisDreams

Wedding Bells

Friends - General - Personal - Travel Before anyone gets too excited, no I am not getting married! My mother is though, to a fabulous bloke called Rodney, and I am flying back to Australia for the wedding. I fly in on the 25th of March, the Wedding is on the 31st of March, I am staying for Easter, and then flying back to the UK on the 11th of April. The 11th also happens to be my little brother Jeremy’s birthday, and thankfully my flight leaves late at night, so I will have time to celebrate it with him. I will email everyone in due course, as I know that as I so rarely update this blog now, that most of you guys out there will want to know that I am coming back and won’t find out from here. I am looking forward to coming back in March, it will be the first time I’ve been back close to summer for almost four years now. I am really looking forward to coming back. It is a short trip this time. My current visa is valid for the next five years, so I don’t need to faff about with anything to do with that. I have also got things in place at work so that I shouldn’t be bothered too much. I realise I haven’t let anyone know where I am living or really what I am doing at the moment here in the UK. It is a cold Saturday morning here right now, so I am going to take some time to go over it all. First some pictures! I am currently living in a beautiful old house that has been converted into flats. It is called: The Croft! I am currently driving a brand new (well new in September, with 56 plates) Black VW Golf GTI. It allows me to go far to fast for my own good, and I got my first ever speeding ticket in it in the first month of driving it. Here is a picture of me standing outside the Croft, on a wet, bleak Liverpool day, with My Golf! Here are some other random pictures that my friend Viki took when she Ben (ex-housemates) came to stay between Christmas and New Year. This is: My Bed, this is: My Coat Rack, this is My Desk, this is My Dinner Table, this is My Kitchen, and this is not my Guitar. Things have been absolutely manic around here like they have been for the past two years. I am really proud of where I’ve gotten to though. I’m head of department for thirteen people, I have generated turned things around and we are now a profit centre rather than a cost centre, I’ve created new business directly out of our work, and I’m also half way through doing my MSc, just a dissertation to go now! I send all you guys individual emails because I really do want to catch up properly and see how everyone is going. Take care!

Meetings In London

Friends - Personal - Work It’s mid-morning and I am on the train from Nottingham to Liverpool. I had a big meeting with some of the General Dynamics guys in London yesterday. We were discussing the next phase of the project; what feedback they had from the first phase and what features they would like to see in the second. Everything went well; their feedback was positive and their requirements manageable in the timeframes required. It was a very productive meeting. So Nikkie was up last weekend, and because she has finished placement and is on Project week, she stayed a couple of extra days and came down to London with me yesterday. I of course had to work all day, but I jump at every chance I get to spend more time with her. I’m back at work today of course and it is going to be busy as usual. But as I’ve said before, I’m finding it really interesting, I am enjoying it, and I’m getting paid really well too. So enough of my recap of work. That’s all I seem to talk about recently. On to other things! Thanks to all of my friends who emailed me back with status updates on their lives! I wrote about fifteen different emails that day on the train and sent them out to all of you guys who I want to keep in touch with. It was great to hear back from all of you (well almost all of you, you slackers know who you are who didn’t write back, so get on it!! :), I really liked reading about everything new that’s been going on in your lives since we last caught up. Some of you I hadn’t talked to for at least a year! This blog is a very one-way form of communication. I write my entries but get very little in the way of comments. I know people read it; I’ve got stats that show when the site is viewed and where the viewers are. I recognise pretty much everyone who reads the site, who the readers are from Australia, who they are from the US, who they are from the UK, and I’m pretty sure I’ve got that Finnish reader sussed too :) Some of you check the site almost daily, some from week to week, while others sometimes go months without checking. I know you are all filled in on what’s going on in my life (or the small portion of it I have time to describe here), but I feel really left out when it comes to all of your lives. So I’ve done my best to remedy that. If you won’t add comments or (heaven forbid!) create blogs of your own then I am just going to have to pester you with emails until you respond!! Until then, take care everyone.

TrainBlog

General - Personal - Personal I am on the train once more. Perhaps I should rename this blog from Genesisdreams to TrainLog, or RailJournal or something like that because that’s what it is becoming. I’ve got Star Guitar blazing from my earphones as I type this. The quaint English country side whizzing by in time with the beats. I’m hyped up on one too many train trolley lattes and am in the mood to write! I had the most wonderful weekend. On Friday night Nikkie and I met up with all of our friends at bar BZR. After one too many triple vodka and oranges we made our way down to Ocean, our usual Friday night clubbing haunt, and managed to get in without tickets and without too much queuing! They had redone the place somewhat, but they still played the same old cheesey music. It was great! I had forgotten how much I enjoyed clubbing, both Nikkie and I really needed a good long dance. Saturday we did some more stuff, went out for dinner, watched the OC season 3 and the first two episodes of Lost season 2. Sunday we did more stuff, then I got on the train home. I don’t really feel like writing a full account of that stuff now. It was such a wonderful weekend I don’t really want to write about it in detail. I’d like to keep a lot of it for just Nikkie and I. Still I am in the mood to write. I’ve talked about work, university, travel, friends, books, music, and movies in my blog before. I’ve talked about my love life. I’ve talked about my hopes and fears. I’ve talked about my dreams. This blog is called Genesisdreams. I started it more than two years ago now with the intention of providing a link to my family and friends back home. At that that point I was only planning on coming to the UK for a year, on exchange for University. This blog was designed to help me keep in touch with those I left behind back home. Over the years though its purpose has changed somewhat. It now represents to me a record of a new beginning. It’s a history of the beginning of my dreams. I didn’t really know where my place was until recently, I was unsure about my future, about what I wanted to do, where I wanted to be, who I wanted to spend it with. I had ambitions, I had hopes, and I had plans. I had dreams. Dreams about where I wanted my life to go, about what I wanted to achieve with it. Through this blog I hope I’ve allowed you to witness the genesis of these dreams. Reading back over my entries I think you can follow a definite sense of purpose, of direction, leading me to a turning point. We all have a road to walk down, and we face forks in that road every day of our lives. Occasionally though we come to a junction from which there is no turning back. If you take the wrong path you can’t simple retrace your steps and take the other once. Our decisions shape our lives, and I think that looking back over this blog you can see what the major decisions were that I faced, and what helped lead my to my final choices. Go down the wrong path and your dream ends, how down the right one, and it’s only the beginning. Written while listening to Chemical Brothers – Star Guitar

TrainBlog

General - Personal - Personal I am on the train once more. Perhaps I should rename this blog from Genesisdreams to TrainLog, or RailJournal or something like that because that’s what it is becoming. I’ve got Star Guitar blazing from my earphones as I type this. The quaint English country side whizzing by in time with the beats. I’m hyped up on one too many train trolley lattes and am in the mood to write! I had the most wonderful weekend. On Friday night Nikkie and I met up with all of our friends at bar BZR. After one too many triple vodka and oranges we made our way down to Ocean, our usual Friday night clubbing haunt, and managed to get in without tickets and without too much queuing! They had redone the place somewhat, but they still played the same old cheesey music. It was great! I had forgotten how much I enjoyed clubbing, both Nikkie and I really needed a good long dance. Saturday we did some more stuff, went out for dinner, watched the OC season 3 and the first two episodes of Lost season 2. Sunday we did more stuff, then I got on the train home. I don’t really feel like writing a full account of that stuff now. It was such a wonderful weekend I don’t really want to write about it in detail. I’d like to keep a lot of it for just Nikkie and I. Still I am in the mood to write. I’ve talked about work, university, travel, friends, books, music, and movies in my blog before. I’ve talked about my love life. I’ve talked about my hopes and fears. I’ve talked about my dreams. This blog is called Genesisdreams. I started it more than two years ago now with the intention of providing a link to my family and friends back home. At that that point I was only planning on coming to the UK for a year, on exchange for University. This blog was designed to help me keep in touch with those I left behind back home. Over the years though its purpose has changed somewhat. It now represents to me a record of a new beginning. It’s a history of the beginning of my dreams. I didn’t really know where my place was until recently, I was unsure about my future, about what I wanted to do, where I wanted to be, who I wanted to spend it with. I had ambitions, I had hopes, and I had plans. I had dreams. Dreams about where I wanted my life to go, about what I wanted to achieve with it. Through this blog I hope I’ve allowed you to witness the genesis of these dreams. Reading back over my entries I think you can follow a definite sense of purpose, of direction, leading me to a turning point. We all have a road to walk down, and we face forks in that road every day of our lives. Occasionally though we come to a junction from which there is no turning back. If you take the wrong path you can’t simple retrace your steps and take the other once. Our decisions shape our lives, and I think that looking back over this blog you can see what the major decisions were that I faced, and what helped lead my to my final choices. Go down the wrong path and your dream ends, how down the right one, and it’s only the beginning. Written while listening to Chemical Brothers – Star Guitar

Another Long Week

Friends - Fun - Personal - University - Work Well it’s Friday again, and I’m on the train down to Nottingham. I have some time now to myself, to think, to reflect, and to write an entry for my blog! This week was very intensive. I did an all-nighter Sunday night, and another Tuesday night. I racked up more than 80 working hours this last week, so effectively did two weeks work in one. This whole last month I’ve been averaging 60 hours a week. It’s pay day today though, and I’ve got a rather large pay packet coming to me, so I’m happy. ^_^ The drinks are definitely on me tonight!! I’ve been doing some really excellent work recently, and because of it I’ve got another promotion. I’m now the design authority for the Enterprise Project Management system I am producing, which means a lot more authority and responsibility. Hopefully another pay rise too; I’m talking to the boss about that next week. So we are now examining the next phase of functionality. I’m writing documentation and getting everything ready for security auditing. We have to comply with BS779 because of the restricted and secret information that is being held on the system. We are entering an exciting stage of the project and I’m really looking forward to getting onto the next lot of functionality. But enough about work. According to Nikkie I am now officially the best boyfriend in the world. Because I’ve been so busy this last week I haven’t been able to call her as much as I would like. She has been really busy too, doing her neurology placement in a hospital in Boston. She’s been feeling a little sad that we have both been too busy to keep in better contract, so to cheer her up I got a dozen red roses delivered to the ward she was working on in the hospital . She said she got such a shock when they arrived, and has had a massive grin on her face ever since. I’ve had a massive grin of my face all day too knowing about the surprise she would get. I can’t wait to get to Nottingham and see her. In other news I talked to mum and Fragma last night for about an hour each. It’s the first time I talked to either of them on the phone since I got back from Australia! I know! How bad of a son/friend am I!! Mum had a lot of news to tell, and we chatted for ages. She told me that she had received a thing from the University of Queensland saying that I had been admitted to the Dean’s Honour Roll for my Bachelor of Business Management, which I thought was a scream. I hardly use my Engineering degree, let alone my Business one. I guess it’s good to put on my CV, but I still think of it as a bit of a joke considering the amount of work I put into it. Mum said she lost the lapel pin that came with it, but I told her not to worry. I’m never going to wear it. After speaking to mum I called Fragma at work. He works harder than I do the crazy man! Nikkie reckons it is all his fault that I am working this hard. She says he is a bad influence on me :). We chatted about all my friends back home, what they are up to, what new things that have been happening. We also chatted the normal bollocks that we do. It was great to talk to him again. I’ve got to stop being so slack and call my friends back home more. I think I’ve only called Ads and Wulfen once or twice each, and Fragma only a few more times than that. I left some really great friends behind in Aus and I really need to start making more of an effort to keep in touch. With that thought in mind I’m going to finish this blog entry here and spend my remaining battery power writing emails all of those friends of mine who have been slipping away recently. Expect an email soon guys!

Coming Home

Friends - Personal - Travel - Work I started this blog more than two years ago. Boy I’ve come a long, long way since then. So I’ve been really busy these last couple of weeks. That’s not unusual. A lot has been happening at work. That’s not unusual either. There are some big changes in the works though, which has led to something unusual. So, to cut to the chase, and to let those of you know whom I haven’t contacted already, I’m flying back to Australia on July the 12th. I’m coming home. Though I don’t really know whether it is my home anymore. I’m not coming back to stay, that’s for sure. I’ve got a three week trip booked, and it’s predominately a business trip, the emphasis behind it coming from work rather than my desire to come back for a visit. I had originally not planned on coming back for a visit until Christmas time, but things have been steamrolling ahead at work, and that’s necessitated my early return. To explain in more detail; I’ve been promoted! I’ve been given a great opportunity, a great new job focus, and when my boss offered it to me I jumped at it. I can’t quite do what is being asked of me yet, so I’ve got to do some training first. Guess what, the training I need to do can be done in Brisbane! And it’s a damn sight cheaper than doing it in London as well! So I’m flying home on the company dime, to do two weeks of intensive training on the company dime, all while earning the company dime as if I were working as usual, and at the end of it I fly back to the UK to a new, better, job earning even more of the company dime than before! As Nikkie says, I am a jammy bastard ^_^ Speaking of Nikkie, she is coming with me! She has one more week of placement and then she starts summer holidays. I’ve explained to her that I’ll be working most of the time when I’m back home, that for me this isn’t a holiday as such, it’s part of my job, but she wouldn’t be talked out of coming. Not that I wanted to talk her out of coming. I can’t wait to introduce her to my mum, and all my friends, and show her where I grew up. I’m so totally in love with this girl that I want her to know everything about me, to meet everyone that is important to me, to share in these experiences with me. She is so excited !! ^_^ Things are going really well for me here. I’m in a fantastic job, I have a great flat, I’m going out with the most beautiful girl. I’m fit and well and happy and loving it all. I don’t think my friend will recognise me when I get home. Partly because Nikkie has had me out running with her, and physically I am much trimmer and more toned than before, but also I think my personality is a great deal different to how it was two years ago. It’s hard to describe, but I think it has to do mostly with my outlook on life, or rather more importantly, my outlook on myself. Don’t worry, I wont get all philosophical here, I just think that some of my friend will be shocked at the change in me. I can’t even begin to describe how excited I am to be coming home. This time next week will be my last sleep in the UK before I leave. There is so much to do before then, so much to organise, to work out, to plan for. Right now I don’t care about any of that, I’m just too excited! !!!!!! Written while listening to Alex Lloyd - Coming Home

These little piggies went to Amsterdam

Friends - Fun - Guest Entry - Personal - Travel - University This is Nikkie. Michael asked me to do a guest entry so here goes... The physiotherapy course is so hectic that this is the first time in a year that we have been privileged enough to have been given a week off while all the other students are busy celebrating the arrival of an 18 week summer holiday. I grabbed the opportunity to whisk Jade, my best friend and housemate, off to Amsterdam for a wild night out to celebrate her 21st birthday. Before our adventure could commence, we had to endure painstaking revision and an exam which took place on the Wednesday morning (1st June) at 8.45am. Jade and I were both very nervous for the practical exam as you never have enough time to think and appear a fool if you don’t have the answers at the drop of a hat. The exam consists of a case scenario, 15 minutes thinking time and then joining the examiners to discuss all the relevant anatomy and clinical reasoning to arrive at an appropriate diagnosis. Next, you discuss a management plan and have to demonstrate 2 treatment techniques on a model. Finally, after what seems like forever, you document everything done with the patient, including treatment dosage, gained consent, safety tests, advice given and when you would next like to see them. Jade and I were given the same scenario of a patient with tension headaches so we came out of the exam intrigued as to what treatment we had each given. Luckily, we both appeared to administer the same treatment for similar reasons, so with that out of the way we left to get ready for our trip! I drove, for the first time, up to Liverpool. We arrived, after a relatively stress free journey to the city but as we approached Michael’s flat, things became slightly more traumatic. At this point it is fairly relevant to mention that Michael has lived in Liverpool for 5 weeks but still appears to walk around with his eyes closed, hence the reason he (and Graeme) will be blamed for getting us lost! We ended up travelling around a roundabout 5 times until they could meet us there and take us the right way! So, we eventually arrived at the flat, piled our belongings up the 3 flights of stairs and headed out for some lunch in a typical English café. The boys left shortly to return to work and us girls took the opportunity for some light shopping before our lift to the airport. Jade and I are both fanatical about fashion and the idea of retro and vintage clothing delights us! As a result, spotting 4 charity shops to rummage through determined the activities of the following few hours. At around 5pm, the boys had finished work for the day and we hopped in the car, laden with plastic bags full of vintage 1940’s purses, tops, scarves and the odd few bits including a wooden elephant names Widnes! So much for the light shopping trip! Graeme and Michael dropped Jade and I off at Liverpool’s John Lennon airport and I managed to shop as soon as we got there, buying a fantastic golden yellow leather handbag. We boarded the plane at 7pm and by 11pm were sat in a bar in Amsterdam. An exam at 8.45am in a British university, and barring in Amsterdam by 11pm - I love Europe! Staying in a cheap hostel in the red light district ensured we were surrounded by lots of young people. We quickly re-applied some lip-gloss and changed our shoes to heels and headed out. Passing the local chippy, we were unable to resist the classic Dutch chips and mayo. I got back into the swing of the language and was soon chatting to the chip-shop man only having slight difficulty understanding the Amsterdam dialect, which is very different to that I am used to. Once our appetites had been satisfied, we followed the crowds past some very sexy and virtually naked women in doorways to a bar for a beer. Soon after our arrival we began chatting to the barman who, much to our disgust, told us we were not in a ‘green’ café, although smoking in there was permitted. We rushed off to find somewhere selling pre-rolled joints, as neither of us were in any fit state to start rolling ourselves. On the recommendation of the guy behind the counter, whom I now realise we should never have trusted, we bought 4 joints for the equivalent of about £10. Back in the previous bar we lit up and began to chat to a bunch of Aussie men. It amazed me how many Australians there were in Amsterdam, most travelling Europe after uni. Mindless chit chat revealed that these particular guys were all living in London as teachers although one had flown in from Sydney that afternoon. They were a laugh and bought us a couple of drinks so we decided to stick with them for a while. By about 1am, we had broken off and un-surprisingly only two guys remained. We visited a few more bars, smoked and drunk a bit more while playing cards in a chilled bar. The lads knew where our hostel was, as they were in the same one, so we began our walk home. We were halfway there when Jade was cornered by one of the lads and had to apologise that he must have got the wrong idea from her. Realising that he was not going to get anywhere with her that night, he swiftly left. The other guy, however, was more persistent and we had to team up to get rid of him, which we eventually did by hiding in our dorm! Although I had shared a dorm with mates on camping trips ( I was in the scouts) and on school trips, nothing quite prepared me for this. It was a dorm of 20 beds and great fun. We sat up a while chatting crap due to our stoned and drunken state when we over heard a couple arguing over a guy having been in a peep show instead of meeting up with his girl! I’m sure this would have still amused me sober but we were both having serious difficulty in resisting laughter and continued to listen to the bickering trying to work out whether the guy’s story was genuine or he had in-fact been in a sex show as his lady was stating! By about 3am we got ready for bed and fell into light, interrupted sleep. We awoke at 8am with the sun streaming into the room and the dorm already half empty. After showering and attempting to make ourselves look remotely human we wandered downstairs for a full English breakfast, and a mug of incredibly strong tea. Our persistent friend from the previous night pulled up a chair questioning us about where and when we were leaving Amsterdam. Making quick excuses and ensuring we were sufficiently dosed up with caffeine we walked in the direction of the main shopping street – Kalver straat. I had been to Amsterdam previously with relatives living nearby so was slightly more orientated than the average tourist and we found Kalver straat fairly quickly. We shopped, had some lunch in the Vroom and Dressmann restaurant, a definite must for a cheap detoxifying meal, and shopped some more. After a few more trips to the cash-point and laden with bags, we returned to the red light district for some major vintage shopping. I got a pair of ankle height grey slouch boots which I had been on the hunt for ages. All in all, we spent over £200 of our student overdrafts on clothes and accessories, all very worthwhile! After all, you spend what money you actually have, and then the bank decides to give you more! No, I don’t always have such a lax attitude to money but do find it very hard to resist a bargain! By 5pm we were exhausted and grabbed our bags from the station lockers and returned to Schipol airport for a ‘maccy D’s’ (Mcdonalds) and to catch our flight home. We landed back in Liverpool at 10pm and were greeted by the boys who drove us back to Michael’s flat. Shattered from our adventure we went to bed and slept soundly. The following morning, Michael strolled into work at 10am and Jade left to rush back to Manchester to grab fresh clothes for a night out with some old friends in Newcastle! I, on the other hand, pottered around the flat with my eyes half closed all day trying to recover from abusing my body so much. The next few days have consisted of more pottering and trying to get Michael’s hole of a flat slightly more liveable! I have cleaned, washed, tidied and sorted but this is the first and last time I will do, so he will have to become domesticated from now on! We did a very ‘grown-up’ shop of cleaning products yesterday evening which Michael clearly needed some guidance on - he was shocked to discover that bathroom and kitchen cleaner were different! My work here is definitely challenging! On Saturday night we visited Liverpool’s night life which I definitely felt was something else! I felt like I was in Ibiza, obviously without the gorgeous weather, it was very surreal. We sat in a square outside surrounded by bars and a very concentrated amount of gorgeous people. The women were all slim, verging on the border of too slim, had all been bronzed, either by a bottle or some hard work on a sun bed, and were made up with very expensive looking clothing. Graeme, Ben and Michael, un-surprisingly, were in awe of them all, [Editor’s Note: I was more in awe of my fantastic girlfriend of course!- Wigs], as was I, but my eye was placed more on enjoying the surrounding fashion statements. I must state though, the women were some of the best I have ever seen, obviously not including celebs, models etc, only with the downside of the Liverpudlian accent! The men were incredibly well groomed and also in expensive clothing. The music was brilliant, Michael said that it was much like the dance music ‘back home’. Being out with the lads I had to keep up with the pace of drinking which, with a reputation of a lightweight I did quite well, going drink for drink with them. Overall, Liverpool was a great night out, expensive but great. Our trek home left much to be desired. We caught the night bus home after waiting for a taxi for over an hr. On the walk home from the bus stop we got separated losing Ben, our other scouser housemate who had come home for the summer, and fell asleep with him not having returned to the flat. We woke with a startle the next morning realising Ben was still not home. I dressed hurriedly, on a bad hangover, to jog around and try and find him. Michael eventually got him on his mobile at the same time as I came across him asleep in the back of his car! Safe, but still very very pissed he came up to the flat to sleep off the alcohol. I went for a 20minute run along the beach and came back when Michael and I decided to return to bed till 3pm. Another crazy but fantastic night out. To think that a year ago, I was still in Newark Hall, had only known Michael 6 months, was a fresher and living a very dependant life shows how much things can change. Life is fantastic but it has been hard to get to this point; I considered dropping the physiotherapy course during the harder times, Michael moved 3 hrs away from Nottingham just when we finally got together, I moved house and Graeme’s changed university course. The summer is only a month away, I have one more outpatients placement to get through and then I will be back in Liverpool living and working here for 6 weeks. Third year will be here sooner than later and then I’ll be a qualified physiotherapist and will have to become even slightly responsible! On second thoughts, I’ll delay that as long as I can, go travelling, live a little before pinning myself to a 9-5 job. The end of university is so close, yet so far. I’m only two thirds through it and things have changed so much since arriving in September as a fresher. Change is good. Hard but good.

Glorious Saturday Afternoon

Friends - Fun - Personal - Quotes It's amazing to think how much has happened this last year. Exactly one year and one day ago today was the Summer Party 2004 to mark the end of the University year and the official start to student summer (you can read all about what we got up to this time last year in this entry). Well now is Summer Party 2005, and the lot of us, older and wiser, went down early with a disposal BBQ, lots of meat and beer, and camped out on the downs in the glorious sun, and sat off listening to music and having a great time. Karl Kennedy from Neighbours was the "special mystery guest" and he was there with his band playing covers of oasis songs. It was a glorious afternoon. We didn't stay for the whole night (having learnt what a disappointment that was last year), but instead lazed around in the sun having a great time. It's still light out now as I am writing this, and it's wonderfully warm. So we were talking about how much we had all changed since last year and everyone (excluding me the old, responsible, working man) was amazed to think that this time next year they would be finished uni. The topic jumped back and forward between the past and the future. Where everyone thought they would be heading after Uni, where was the best place we travelled to last summer, what was everyone’s plans for this summer, when did we all meet each other originally. Maybe because I am such and old man, and am still looking at it from a semi-outsider perspective, but it was startling to me how much everyone had changed and grown up in the last year. We were playing spot the first years, and I couldn't fathom that everyone with me was a first year just a year ago. They seemed so different. We all grown and change constantly through life, but I think that one of the most pivotal periods is your life is that first year after highschool, when you leave the security of school and enter the real world. I feel lucky to have been privileged enough to be a part of that year for all of my friends here. They are such fantastic people, fantastic friends, and I've really missed them all these past couple of months when we've been apart. I've been lucky like that all through life now that I think about it. Other that a few rare instances I've always had fantastic friends who I get on well with and trust and respect. They have provided support, comfort, jokes and fun. I can just sit and hang out with them all day doing nothing much at all, I can travel to exotic places with them, I can rant and vent to them when I'm stressed, I can rant and rave to them when I'm in love. My friends have been there for me, with me, though so much. I miss you guys, wherever you are in the world. Friends in the US I've never met personally but whom I've told everything to. Friends back in Aus that I left behind. Friends here in my new home, who I don't get to see enough of. Don't walk behind me, I may not lead. Don't walk in front of me, I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend. - Albert Camus Thanks again for The Fall Al. It really meant a lot to me. Written while lying on Nikkie's bed, while she studies for her final physio exam, listening to her sing along to U2's greatest hits. Nikkie is my closest confidant, a fantastic, thoughtful, caring, and wonderful friend. I love her more than the world. I am the luckiest.

Partyhouse - Reunited

Friends - Fun - Personal The partyhouse crew were fully reunited last night in what must be the first time in almost 4 months. We've all gone separately ways recently. Nikkie has moved out and is not living on the other side of Nottingham. Graeme is changing courses and having taken the rest of this term off, is living up in Liverpool. I've started full time work, so I'm up in Liverpool, and that just left Viki, Bruce and Ben in this big old house. There had been exams for the last couple of weeks and everyone was really stressed, but now they are all done (except for poor Nikkie who has one more next week). With the newfound freedom from stress we all converged again on the partyhouse to do what the party house crew are famous for, partying! ^_^ So Graeme and I left work early Friday afternoon and started the drive down to Nottingham. It was a sunny and hot 21 degrees (which is really good for England springtime) and we cruised down the motorway listening to radio one and chatting about how much we missed all being together. Graeme had previous been to the butcher, so we had 12 hamburgers, 12 sausages and 12 lamb kebabs. Mmmm Mmmm Mmmm. After arriving into Nottingham we went to pick up some beer, and then the six of us sat off in the sun in the backyard, drinking and catching up. I took responsibility for cooking the food on the BBQ, having as my mates claim, an innate skill due to my Aussie heritage. Anyway along with all the copious amounts of meat I also cooked some of my patented beer onions, which went down a treat. Viki put her computer speakers out the window and we have some great summer trance pumping out over the garden. We all sat around, eating our food, drinking our beer and wine, and having a great time. It stayed light till almost 10pm, and when it eventually got dark we scavenged all the wood and cardboard we could find and made a fire in the middle of the backyard. We talked and drank and played with the fire and talked some more. Some people smoked a little too. I love these guys; they are a fantastic group of friends. The conversation never lagged, the jokes always kept coming, the funny stories were never lacking. We talked about the coming summer, and the previous one. We talked about plans, and goals and dreams. We gossiped of course, and talked about sex and guys and girls. Everyone got very drunk. I can’t remember the last time I was that drunk, and I can’t remember ever seeing Nikkie that drunk before either. She is a very cute drunk ^_^ At about 4am the sun was starting to come up again and the birds were chirping. We all took that as the signal to go to bed. I fell asleep with the with windows open, the cool morning breeze wafting into the room, and the beautiful girl that I love in my arms. I’ve never been happier. I get by with a little help from my friends, I get high with a little help from my friends, Going to try with a little help from my friends. Written while listening to The Beatles - With a Little Help From My Friends.

Time On Trains

Friends - Fun - Personal - Work I am on the train yet again. I think this past month I’ve clocked up at least 30 hours travel time on trains. Another month of this and I’ll be pushing for a company car! This month I pushed for a new laptop, which is why I am now able to write blog entries while on the train! For some reason I failed to mention that when explaining why I needed one ^_^ I just left Liverpool and am currently heading down to Nottingham. The trip takes two and a half hours, so I’ll get down to Nottingham just as Nikkie finishes work. I haven’t seen Nikkie since I saw here off at Liverpool station last Sunday. I miss her really badly. Of course I’ve talked to her every night, and sent countless text messages, but it’s just not the same. I need to be around her, to touch her, to hug her, to smell her. I feel so alive when I’m with her, when she is there the world just seems that much brighter. It’s been hard this last week without her. I can’t wait until the train pulls into Nottingham. Nikkie is coming to pick me up, and I know that as soon as I step off the train and see her everything is going to be alright. She will fall into my arms, and I’ll hold her tightly, and all my worries will disappear. I’m getting broadband and a phone line installed at my flat next week. The plan I’m getting includes unlimited weekend and evening calls, so I can chat to Nikkie after work for as long as I want. I’m also going to get a webcam set up so that I can see her during the week. Hopefully these things will help keep the loneliness at bay when she is not around. So I have the entire weekend with Nikkie, which is fantastic, but not only that, I’ve organised to do a site visit in Wolverhampton on Monday, which means I can stay in Nottingham Sunday night, do the site visit Monday, return to Nottingham Monday night, then head back up to Liverpool Tuesday morning. Then that leaves only three nights before the next Friday when I get to see her again! It is only a two and a half hours to Nottingham, so if I’m having a particular hard week and I always head down after work, spend the night with her, then head back up early the following morning. It is going to be hard being apart from her most of the week, but, and I’m going to say it here because frankly I don’t care who knows, I’m completely, utterly, and madly in love with this girl, and so I know it will all work out in the end. Anyway, so I feel very professional sitting here in my business clothes, typing away on my laptop. It’s a far cry from the sloppy university student I was just a couple of months ago. At first I didn’t really think I would like this job, but over the last couple of weeks I’ve taken on so much responsibility and done such a variety of things that I now think I am really going to enjoy it. I’m scheduling jobs, managing projects, doing technical work, getting training, going to meetings, doing designs, making decisions. It’s all interesting work, some of it is really cool and exciting, in particular the military contract we are bidding for, which hopefully will get signed off early next week. I know I am going to learn a lot here, and I’m getting paid really well for it too! So you can’t argue with that! I am often asked why my long-term plans are, whether I am just doing this temporarily, or whether I am here for good. My answer to that question has changed dramatically over the last six months. I’ve got a great job, nice flat, good friends and a fantastic girlfriend. I get to party in London, one of the most lively and exciting cities in the world, at least once a month. I get to pop over to an entirely different country for a dirty weekend. I have my some of my family, my cousins, very close by, whom I know I can always rely on. Ok the weather here is crap, but you can’t have everything! I have talked to the rest of my family about this; I’ve talked to my close friends about it too. I don’t intend on moving back to Australia in the near future. To be even more specific, I want to live and work here for at least five years. Long enough to have saved up a very respectable amount (in pounds too!), but even more importantly, long enough for me to get my permanent residency and citizenship. I’ve lived in the U.K. for almost a year and a half now, and I know that I want to always be able to return if I desire. The hassles I’ve had to go through with getting working permits and visas is just too much, I want to be naturalised, have dual citizenship, British and Australian. That doesn’t mean I won’t ever come back home to the land down under, just that I want to be able to make either place my home. So I think I’ve written enough for one afternoon. I’ll post this tonight when I get to Nikkie’s. Sorry if I rambled a bit, I get quite reflective whenever I spend long periods of time on trains. I wrote this while listening to DJ Doboy Trancquility 17. It’s the only MP3 I have on my phone at the moment other than Pimsler Japanese lessons and I haven’t gotten around to downloading any songs onto my new laptop yet.

Beautiful Brussels

Friends - Fun - Personal - Travel My student visa expires tomorrow. If I stay in the country past tomorrow I'll be living here illegally. I had two options, either apply to the consulate for a further leave to remain on a visitors visa, which would cost me £150, or leave the country and come back in during April and get a six months visitors visa for free on re-entry. I opted for the second option. Later tonight Nikkie and I are heading down to her parents place in North London, and then tomorrow we are heading off on the Eurostar from London, down through the channel tunnel, and then across to Brussels. We are staying two nights at the Five Star Sheraton Brussels Hotel before getting the Eurostar back to London on Saturday. I'll be out of the country, have a fantastic time, and come back in getting my visa for the same amount it would have cost me to apply directly to the consulate. I found the deal on lastminute.com, it's fantastically priced for what we get, including Eurostar tickets and two nights 5* accommodation at one of the best hotels in Brussels with breakfast included. The hotel looks amazing, with large rooms, comfy looking beds (^_^) and a heated indoor pool up on the 30th floor with a view over the Brussels skyline. It's right in the heart of the city too, within walking distance of all the major attractions. Brussels is a beautiful city. I've only been there once before, and then only for a couple of hours as I was making my way down from Bruges to Paris, but what I saw made me want to go back and spend more time there. There will be lots of premium Belgium beers to drink, as well as copious amounts of quality Belgium chocolate to consume. I'm really looking forward to the trip, I'm sure we are going to have an amazing time; positively indulgent! Some people may think it's a little strange for Nikkie and I to go on a romantic holiday, particularly to a different country and staying in an expensive hotel, when we haven't even officially been going out for three weeks. It's a big step, a serious thing to do, and for many people it may seem like we are going along incredibly quickly. But we know better. In our minds we've been together for three months rather than three weeks, and we both liked each other long before that. We've been almost inseparable these last three months and have become closer than I would have thought possible. We've lived with each other, we know everything about each other, and we were best friends before we became involved. There isn't a single day since we've been officially going out that I haven't seen her, spent some time with her. It's been very intense, very passionate, and so I don't think you can judge us based upon the time we've been "officially" going out. We're going to enjoy this time away, have a fantastic break, have lots of fun, and then keep going on as strongly as we have so far. Anyway I've got to start packing and getting ready! My next entry wont be for a couple of days, but when I get back I'll let everyone know how it was. Written while listening to Vertical Horizon - Everything You Want (Cheesy, I know! ^_^)

Crash Into Me

Friends - Fun - Personal Well it's been a long weekend. I only just got home. Saturday I got the train down to London to meet up with Anna and Sarah, the two fun and crazy girls I travelled around most of Italy with last summer. Sarah is heading off in two weeks to the Middle East for six months to do some work for her firm. I hadn't seen her since Christmas so I wanted to take the opportunity to catch up with both her and Anna before she left. So I got the train down, had a lovely lunch with Sarah, and then went back to her apartment to find Anna just crawling out of bed after a heavy previous night. We sat around and had some coffee while I enjoyed their fantastic view out over the river Thames. It was good to see them both again, and we had a lot of catching up to do, but soon the afternoon ran out and I had to come back up to Nottingham. Anna and Sarah both wanted me to stay the night, come out clubbing with them to the Kross in Kings Cross, which was open to 6am that night, but I had to beg off. That night was Nikkie's physiotherapy ball and I had to get back! So after a long day in London I jumped on a train heading back home, and thankfully made it back in time. I think Nikkie would have been quite displeased if I had made her late for the ball ^_^ On Sunday Nikkie's parents were coming up to bring her some furniture and stuff for her new house. I had met Nikkie's parents a couple of times before; once while in Newark hall, and once when they came to our house. They are both really nice, but meeting them this time was a little different. I was no longer just the friend/housemate, I was now the boyfriend, the older boyfriend. I was a little worried to start with, but the day actually went really well. I helped Nikkie's dad put together Nikkie's chest of draws and desk, and then we all went to lunch together. Nikkie's mum quizzed us a little during lunch, because she really had no idea what had been going on (!!! I hope she never finds my blog ^_^) but it seemed cool in the end. Nikkie's sister had also come up, and it was nice to finally meet her as well. Nikkie talked to her mum on the phone later than night and said I made a good impression, so that made me feel good. My mum also rang that night, and I told her all about Nikkie and what had been going on. Mum was typical mum, asking all these awkward questions, and telling me to look after her. Of course I will mum! Come to think of it, Nikkie's mum said the same thing to me just before they all left. So come Monday morning, after spending a grand total of about four hours at my house all weekend, I got Nikkie to drop me into town on her way to Uni, and I came home. I'm tired, it was a busy weekend, but a really fun and enjoyable one. I hope all my weekends to come are going to be this good. Written while listening to Crash Into Me by Dave Mathews Band. P.S. Calvin - I'm an emo rocker too according to that quiz. Fragma - I appreciate all the comments, and "D" is the right option ^_^

This Is The Story Of A Girl

Friends - Fun - Personal - Work So this is the story of a girl. Or wait; maybe it’s another story entirely. They are all intermingled really. Or perhaps they are all independent, but just occurring concurrently. I’m too tired right now to actually figure it all out. I just thought it was about time that I told you all about it. Apart from my two random entries a couple of weeks ago, I’ve written nothing since my birthday, more than a month ago now. A lot has happened since then. I don’t even know where to start. Ah yes! There was mention of a girl. I guess that’s as good a place as any to begin. Nikkie and I have finally quit our (in hindsight rather stupid) efforts to resist each other and are now, to quote my good friend Calvin, ”brilliantly, disgustingly lovey-dovey”. I really like her, she really likes me. We have wasted so much time and have finally decided to waste no more. So no more of this random, drunken, fooling around bullshit; we are serious, committed and both hopelessly besotted. And I’m really happy, happier than I’ve been in a very long time. Nikkie makes me happy, she is caring, smart and funny; and of course it also helps that she is a stunning blonde half-Dutch goddess who is almost as tall as me! ^_^ Ah boy I can’t stop grinning lately. Nikkie is moving out of our share house this weekend into a smaller two bedroom house with one of her physiotherapy friends, Jade. This move had absolutely nothing to do with her and my relationship; she starts her final year after this summer, has her dissertation to finish and lots of lots of placements to go on, so she really needed to get out of the non-stop party place that is our house. At the time when she decided she was going to move out she and I weren’t even together properly and so it was a completely independent decision. It’s just a bonus now I think because it means we can have some semblance of a proper relationship separate from that whole living together thing. There are perks though that I’ll miss of course ^_^ It takes about 10 minutes to get from her new place to our place (officially named the PartyHouse). So commuting that distance won’t be a problem at all. It takes about two hours to drive to Liverpool from here, so commuting that will be a bit of a problem, which brings me to my next story. I’ve gone and got myself a nice shiny new job; or rather it has come and got me. I’ve been offered a job in Liverpool, with a great salary, company flat thrown in, and lots of interesting work. It’s a fantastic opportunity, all my working visa worries are being worked out, and everything made easy for me to move up there. It’s just not something I actively looked for (I was headhunted in effect, but it’s a long story as to how that came about). Liverpool has its benefits; my cousin John lives up there (lucky coincidence), I am familiar with the city, and I already know people who live there. It has also got a terrific nightlife (as long as you stay away from the chilli shots!). The only problem is that it’s two hours from Nottingham, which means two hours away from all my friends here, as well as the person who is constantly on my mind and making me so happy. So yeah that sucks pretty hard. I can’t start work properly until my working visa goes through though, and even though I’m doing the occasional day’s consultancy work on my student visa, that means I won’t be moving up to Liverpool until at least mid-April. So we are going to see what happens. I’m definitely taking this job, it would be foolish not to. I’m going to be moving to Liverpool at some point in the future. Two hours isn’t that much travelling time though, and I’ll have lots of weekends free, and Nikkie has her Uni holidays. At the moment we are still in the “disgustingly lovey-dovey” stage, but we’ve talked about it and are going to do the long distance thing if needed. That being said I’m going to London tomorrow for lunch and coming back tomorrow afternoon, and it is two hours each way there, so it’s doable, we’ll survive. In other news Ads is still here, in the UK, staying with me still actually. He is having a great time just bumming around and catching up on all the movies, TV shows and anime he has missed over the past three months. He will move on at some point, but right now it’s great to have him here, and if he has already stayed for two weeks, why not stay for another two I say! ^_^ I know I haven’t filled in a lot of the blanks here, and have more just updated the current status of my life rather than detailing how and why it came about that way. All those unwritten blog entries over the past month were suppose to cover that stuff. I didn’t write them though, and there is just too much to say right now, so be content with what you get. To all of my friends whose emails I have neglected to reply to recently please forgive me. I’ll get around to responding soon, and I’ll fill you guys in more on what’s going on. I’ll also endeavour to start writing blog entries more regularly again. It’s amazing how you can get so caught up in your life sometimes. It’s a funny thing life ^_^ Now I’m off to cuddle with my girl and be blissfully happy.

Feeling Old

Personal As of a few minutes ago I am 23 years old. My housemate Ben, sitting just across the hall in his room, asked me, "You're 38 now, right Aussie?". That's what you get I guess when living in a house full of teenagers. Cheeky young rascals :P I'll write more about my weekend, and birthday celebrations soon.

New Hair

Friends - Personal After the comments made in this entry, I thought I would post some pictures of my new hair cut. They aren't very good pictures, having been taken in the gloom of Tantra last night by a less than sober photographer, but I don't think I look too bad. So here they are! Picture One has Graeme on the left not looking at the camera. Picture Two has Bruce on the left playing the fool. That's Nikkie on the right in both of them... My housemates found out, so it doesn't really matter if I divulge it here now, but after the events I talked about in my Consequences entry, Nikkie and I didn't manage to keep to our decision of not letting it happen again. In fact, when I commented in this entry that it was "A pretty uneventful weekend all round. Not too much in the way of distractions.", I kinda underplayed the fact that the reason I got not sleep at all on the Friday night before my Japanese exam was because Nikkie had just come back from being away on placement all week and so I was otherwise occupied :P Just to clarify now though, we are just friends. We are really close, and get on fantastically well, but nothing more is going to happen between us. We've talked about this over many a cup of coffee, and our decision has held out over the last two drunken weekends, so I am certain that the last time was indeed the last time, and that it won't happen again. I am not just writing this for the sake of my other housemates who will read this (even though we did try and keep the fact that it happened again (and again) a secret originally), I really mean it when I say it this time. We got it out of our systems now, so to speak, and so will go on being just really good friends. Written while listening to One More Time by Daft Punk. No pun intended ^_^

The Party Is Over

Friends - Fun - Personal - University - Work University is over. It's time to retire that category I think. I doubt I'll be writing anything else University related any time soon. I've been lazing about the last week. Well partying about is more apt a description. I decided to take last week completely off, have a holiday, a break, a brief hiatus from the stresses of the real world. So I partied hard the first weekend after my exams, and went out almost every night last week. I hardly got any sleep, and feel great for doing it. We went out to Bar BZA, The Works, Dogma, and a bunch of other places. On Friday night we went out to Ocean. We went there almost every Friday night all of last term, but hadn't been yet so far this term. It was the same as I remembered, crap music, but a lot of fun. Viki had her camera and took a bunch of pics... and here they are! First Picture, Second Picture, Third Picture, Fourth Picture. So the party is over. I've got to settle down now. My task this week, and the following week, and the week after, and for as many weeks after that as needed to succeed, is to get a job. I need to start working if I want to remain in this country. I'm going to try my hardest to stay in Nottingham, I don't want to leave here, leave the friends I've made. This will make it more difficult to get a job, but I'm going to do my best. I want to stay here. I don't know what will happen, where things will lead, but I know I want it to happen here. Written while listening to Crazy Sunshine by The Pillows.

Happy Australia Day!

General - Music - Personal - Quotes

On January 26, 1788 Captain Arthur Phillip took formal possession of the colony of New South Wales and became its first Governor. The fledging colony soon began to celebrate the anniversary of this date. Manning Clarke notes that in 1808 the "anniversary of the foundation of the colony" was observed in the traditional manner with "drinking and merriment" (Source).

Drinking and merriment! That sounds about right to me. We Australian's like our booze. Today is National Australia Day, the day we celebrate the first steps towards the creation of our fine nation (even though we only actually achieved federation in 1901). As I'm writing this the day in full swing over in Australia itself. I got a phone call from Fragma at 2am his time, where only two hours into Australia day he was pissed as a fart and partying hard. Just the way to do it I think. The traditional way to celebrate Australia Day for me has been to hang out at someone's house, with numerous cartons of beer, or kegs if someone has been organised enough to get them, and drink the day away, cooking meat on the BBQ and listening to Triple J's hottest 100 on the radio. I really miss that. I'm not usually very patriotic, I'm certainly not as jingoistic as a lot of people I met while travelling around. I am proud to be Australian though. I would never try to pretend I’m from somewhere else, and I dislike it incredibly when people mistake me for a South African or New Zealander. We antipodeans share a common bond, but we’re not that alike! I often miss my sunburnt land, and wouldn’t have wanted to be born anywhere else. I like Australian’s on a whole, we are an extremely friendly bunch, honest, hard working, and laid back. We enjoy what our country has to offer us, the weather, the sun, the sand. We love our sports, our drink, our women ^_^ I’ve decided to stay over here in the UK. I don’t have any plans to return back to Australia any time soon. This doesn’t mean I don’t love my country; it’s just that sometimes you are drawn away. I know where my home is. Written while listening to Peter Allen's I Still Call Australia Home. I think the following verse is particularly apt. I'm always travelin' And I love bein' free So I keep leavin' the sun and the sea But my heart lies waiting over the foam I still call Australia home.

Going Nowhere, Going Somewhere

Friends - Music - Personal - Quotes - University 'Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?' 'That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat. 'I don't much care where --' said Alice. 'Then it doesn't matter which way you go,' said the Cat. '--so long as I get somewhere,' Alice added as an explanation. ~ Lewis Carroll, from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland Following on from my previous post; some things are going nowhere, because we have decided that is for the best, while other things are going somewhere, because I've finished University for good in less than two weeks, and then I have my whole world ahead of me. Also, inspired by Brendan's effort over on Digital Iris and looking for ways to procrastinate, I decided to make a quiz. So let me present Michael's Mystery Quiz!. Man I am so restless. I really can't get into the mood to study. I am in a Paul van Dyk mood at the moment, and I always listen to trance when I am attempting to study, so right now I'm listening to his We Are Alive.

Consequences

Friends - Fun - Personal This is the Internet. It's public and it's open. In the past I've tended to not to talk some aspects of my life here because they don’t concern just me and I don’t feel right talking specifics about other people without their consent. I censor myself a lot here; in particular I censor myself when it comes to girls and relationships. I don’t kiss and tell. It’s not me and never has been (ok well there have been exceptions when I’ve been really drunk, but that’s different!). I am going to talk about the following here though because, well, I feel like talking about it, and I know Nikkie won’t mind. I am not going to go into specifics; I still don’t kiss and tell. So Friday night, my housemate Nikkie came home from Leicester, where she is doing her current physiotherapy placement. I first specifically mentioned Nikkie back in April last year in this entry. Here is a picture of Nikkie from that post so you know who I am talking about. Nikkie and I have become very close over the past five or so months since we moved in together. She and I get on really well and I’ve found myself opening up to her completely. That’s a rare thing and I’m glad I found it here, I didn’t think I would be able to so quickly. Anyway so we have been getting closer and closer, and at the same time flirting with each other now and then, but nothing even really came of it. Until last night. Nikkie was desperate to go out on Friday after spending all week down in Leicester on placement, but nobody else wanted to go out because we all have exams on at the moment. I ended up being convinced though, and she and I went down to the Bag Of Nails, our local pub for a couple of drinks. We started by sitting next to each other on one of the leather couches there, and talked and talked. As the drinks started flowing we started creeping closer and closer to each other on the couch. The night progressed, it was getting pretty late, and we were getting pretty drunk. We were doing a bit of flirting, and then she suddenly kissed me. I was a little surprised, but at the same time sort of half expecting it, and I like her, so I kissed her back. After a little bit of making out we promptly went back home and, to avoid specifics, we spent the night together. My other housemates will probably read this, but that’s ok, because they found out anyway. Nikkie and I spent about ten minutes kissing at our front door without realising that our other housemate Viki was just inside around the corner watching TV. So that kind of gave the game away, plus the fact that my bed was empty all night and Nikkie’s door was firmly locked with the music blaring from inside… ^_^ So Saturday morning we woke up, made out some more while watching episode seven of the new season of The O.C. and then had a talk, went into town and sat in Starbucks and talked some more. Conclusions: Though we both had a great time, and really needed the release, what we had done was a mistake. Neither of us regretted it, but with the current situation, and future possibilities, we agreed that we shouldn’t let it happened again. We are housemates, we live with each other, we are good friends, we each have crap in our past we are running from, and for all I know I could be in a completely different part of the country in a month’s time. There are consequences to our actions, and though during the night we each said a number of times, "What are we doing? We shouldn't be doing this!", with the clarity of day the full reality of those consequences was made clear. So while my other housemates are currently giving us endless crap about it, Nikkie and I are still sharing cheeky grins about our night of passion, secure in the (rather mature) decision to make sure it is just a single night, and that’s all it will ever be. I suspect Graeme of putting out odds on when he expects us to shag next, but the way we figure it, whatever bets he takes will be on very long odds. Anyway it’s time to go to sleep, back in my own bed tonight. Written while listening to Paul van Dyk – For An Angel, on repeat.

Revelations

Friends - Personal - Quotes I am a kind of paranoid in reverse. I suspect people of plotting to make me happy. - J. D. Salinger I didn't sleep at all last night. I am glad I didn't.

Childishness

Personal - Quotes

"When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up." -- C.S. Lewis.

This is my quote of the moment. I don't know what it is, maybe living in this house, with these friends, with this lifestyle, but I think I am becoming younger by the minute. And I am loving it.

Homelands

Friends - Music - Personal I am current listening to the DJ Tiesto set from Homelands 2002 and it's fantastic, but that's not the reason for this entry. It's almost 5am, and I am not asleep. I have full day at Uni tomorrow, or rather today, it's my only really full day all week, yet I am not asleep. Instead I am talking to Jimmy, back in Australia. I haven't talked to him in months! It feels like forever. I don't want to go to sleep, because I am enjoying catching up so much. I also want to break my nocturnal cycle, go a full night without sleep, so I will feel so tired the following night I go to be early, and thus wake up early... but that's a different story. Jimmy is telling me about his girlfriend. I’ve never met her; at least I thought I’d never met her. Somehow though she knew me. Jimmy showed her my picture and she recognised me. Apparently I am the only redheaded guy who lived in Sandgate (I find that hard to believe) but anyway she remembers me coming into the Chinese shop where she worked and buying some food. She even remembered me being with my grandfather. The thing is, I remember that event, I remember getting the Chinese with Pa that time and I remember noticing that the girl who served us was really cute. So we had met, we just didn’t realise it. Anyway good on you Jimmy, I am really happy for your. We talked about other stuff too, about what I’ve been up to, and about our futures. It made me realise how much I missed talked to my friends back home. I’m sure I’ve said similar things before, but I have such good friends back in Australia, and it’s always great when I get a chance to talk to then. My friends over here are great too, but we just don’t have the same kind of history together. At the same time as I am talking to Jimmy on IRC, I am trading emails with Fragma while he is still at work. Now I really need to catch up with Fragma properly. I have so much to talk to him about email just can’t cope with it. Maybe I am just in this mood because I am listening to trance at 5am in the morning . I can’t get no sleep.

House Party

Friends - Fun - Personal I just got back from a house party at the girl's place down the road. I am drunk, very tired, and still have fresher's flu. What a great life this is. Listening to Gotta knock a little harder off the Cowboy Beboy - Knockin' on Heaven's Door soundtrack.

Play, Rewind, Record

Friends - Personal - University Whenever I think I have managed to get up to date with this blog, something comes up and I manage to get terribly behind. So here are the last couple of weeks in brief. I have moved into my new house! If anyone wants to send me anything, email me and I'll give you the address (as always care packages from home (filled with Vegemite and Tim-Tams and the like) are most appreciated ^_^). We have dubbed it the Party House and there are six of us living there. Myself, Bruce, Ben and Graeme (the three lads I travelled around Europe with for the first month), and Nikkie and Viki. It is a three story house, four if you count the basement, with a nice big kitchen and lounge room. It's about a twenty minute walk from Jubilee campus (where I do most of my subjects) and about forty minutes from University Park campus. There is a hopper bus that runs between the two campuses though, so I just take that when I am feeling lazy. I have been there two weeks now and I am absolutely loving share house living. It helps that I am really good friends with all my housemates (we were all in Newark Hall last year), but just generally I am having a fantastic time. I am not eating well, I am drinking far more than I should, and I spend more time in bed than out of it, but that's what being a student is all about, and I am trying to make the most of it while I can. This is my last semester of University. Lectures start today (I've got a break and am stuck in the library, so that's the reason I am writing this). My holidays are finally over. What a glorious summer it has been, but now it is time to get back to work. Not that I have that much work. With around eight contact hours a week the actual learning I do here is a bit of a joke. Still it gives me the free time to do all the drinking and lazing about I mentioned before. I don't really know yet how I feel about this finally being my last semester. I have done the whole graduation thing already. I have finished engineering, worn my silly gown, and gone through the whole ceremony. I wasn't that excited then, so the prospect of graduating from a second degree isn't really thrilling me either. The prospect of being completely free though is thrilling. I have always seen the end of University to be the moment in my life where I face the most possibilities. Even more so than the end of highschool, finishing Uni signifies an end of an era, and a point of origin for the rest of my grown up life. There are opportunities out there for me that I haven't even discovered yet, and a whole world of possibility for me to explore. I don't think there has been any other point in my life, nor do I think there will be any other point in my life, where I have so many choices. This is it, and I am going to make the most of it. I am not going to let this chance slip away, I am not going to take the easy option, the safe road. I choose adventure, I choose life, and I wouldn't have it any other way. I have already decided that I am going to stay in the U.K. next year. I am currently in the process of looking into working permits and visas and applying for jobs. I know my adventure starts here, I just don't know where it is going to take me yet. But enough rewinding, it's time to press play again. I haven't caught up completely, a lot of other stuff has happened these last two weeks, but some things are best simply summarised I think. We went out, had some drinks, danced a lot. Went shopping, bought food, went to the hardware store, bought stuff, went to Ikea, bought even more stuff (pillows, duvets and the like). Went to the Ark, to Tantra, to the Pit and Pendulum, to Bar BZR. I made lasagna, noodles, stir fry, toast, bacon sandwiches, scrambled eggs, spaghetti bolognese, corknflakes and weetabix. I registered for Uni, signed up for subjects, and (as of this morning) went to a lecture. No more fast forwarding though, it's time to play, and hopefully this blog will do a good job and record too.

Future Thoughts

Personal I am travelling alone now; my friends from Uni left weeks ago, I am no longer meeting up with people I met at previous places, I have shed my last companion and now I am by myself. The consequence of this is that I have had a lot of time to think. There are two things I think about most often, my past and my future. Specifically what I have left behind and what I have to look forward to. At any point in time though my past is finite, whereas my future is full of endless possibilities. I have spent a great deal of time contemplating my past, and as young and naive as I am, and as arrogant and pretentious as this may sound, I have it all pretty much reconciled. I have let go of my burdens, dropped my grudges, relieved myself of my guilt and forgiven those who caused the hurts I carried. I understand my actions and my motivations. I have come to terms with everything is my past. At least I would like to think so. Perhaps I am deluding myself, but really, as much as I have thought about it, I can't come up with anything that is left. I am not troubled any more. That's not to say I was terribly weighed down by my past before, but we all have our little demons don't we? I am sure I will gain more in the future, but for now I believe I have vanquished mine. It feels good. So that leaves looking to the future... I am still working on that one, and will always be working on it, becuase it is ever changing, however there are a few things that I have decided. First and foremost, I won't be returning to Australia when I graduate. I fully intend in January next year to move down to London and start my professional career. I have been contemplating this for a while now, talked about it with my mum (Ed I know you read this, sorry if Mum didn't tell you what I was considering) and it is what I want to do. With that consideration out of the way it opens up another whole world of possibilities. I still have to think more on those, but I will do my best to report back here on what I have decided. This has been the best summer of my entire life. It is the summer of my life. The memories I have formed during these last couple of months will stay with me forever and I will never be the same again. I can never have this same adventure, it has changed me, and for the better. And before people ask, yes I am still in Münich, though I am getting an overnight train to Köln in a couple of hours and NO I am not drunk ^_^

Contacts

Friends - Personal - Travel I have met so many fantastic people on this trip. The back of my journal is now filled with names and email addresses and phone numbers and contacts from people living all around the world. My name graces quite a few people's address books too. It is a funny thing, we slide through each other's lives, we talk, drink, and become friends sometimes over the space of just an afternoon, and yet there are so many people I feel close to that I've met on this trip. People who I want to keep in touch with, people who I want to come stay with me if they are ever in the area, or whom I want to go visit at some point. My mum told me she still keeps in touch with a lady who lives in Boston with whom she travelled Africa with thirty years ago. Those are the sort of contacts I am making. Life long bonds, forged in the fires of the travelling spirit. Some people I am sure I will never see again, but other's I hope remain close forever.

Interesting Times

Friends - Fun - Personal - Travel Wow. What a week I've had. I am in Florence, and have been for the last six days. I love it here, I love Italy in general, but tomorrow it is time to move on. I am getting an overnight train to Bern, then am going to spend the week in Interlaken (and will catch the Swiss National Day festival/parade/fireworks that take place on August 1st). But back to the week that was. Well it certainly has been eventful. Aside from the beautuful city itself, with the dominating Duomo and the wondeful Ponto Veccio, I've taken day trips to Pisa, wandered around under the Tuscan sun and drank far to much for my own good. In the last couple of days I have also been going to this club ("discoteque" here) called Space Electronic. Again, wow. I've got a whole lot of tales to tell, but some of them I really don't think belong on a public site like this. Lets just say that I am having an amazing time. I will probably not be commenting much in the next week or so. Internet access is expensive in Switzerland and I've got a lot to do. I plan to spend days in Bern, Geneva and Zurich while I am there. After that I am heading back up to Germany and will be spending some time in Munich. Access is cheap there so I'll report back in when I get there. I always want to live in interesting times. I miss my past, but I also can't believe how much I have been missing out on living in that past. To quote a previous entry of mine:

"I have communicated, interacted, drank, lost, kissed, fondled, jumped, watched, hid, hit, missed, wallowed, yelled, run, listened, played, bled, shuffled, kicked, washed, fucked, talked, driven, fallen, tickled, tripped, worried, screamed, nodded, waited, learnt, enjoyed, shrugged, slept, dealt, spewed, ate, laughed, thought, hugged, tasted, read, dreamt, wished and longed with a frequency and ferocity far outstripping anything before..."

Squared

Posted by Wigs at 02:36 PM | Comments (0)

Century

Japan - Metaposts - Music - Personal This is my 100th GenesisDreams entry. It doesn't feel like that many at all. Sometimes I feel like I'm slipping away over here into a completely different world. It's hard to explain, and I'm not sure if I like it. My life here now is very different to how it was back home. I don't think I've illustrated that very well in the GenesisDreams entries I've made since coming here. I've accepted it, take it as the norm, and so on the surface, when I write about things occurring in my life, all of the superficial things probably seem very similar to how it is back home. I don't have a very objective perspective, so I can't say for sure, but that's the impression I get reading over what I've written. I don't think it appears like much has changed at all. Would anyone out there like to comment on this one way or another (Brendan, you're probably the most objective person who reads this blog, I'd appreciate hearing what you think). I feel like I've lived a century's worth of years these past couple of months. I have been challenged in ways I never imagined, I have seen things I previously only dreamed about and I have participated in “stuff” beyond my comprehension. I have communicated, interacted, drank, lost, kissed, fondled, jumped, watched, hid, hit, missed, wallowed, yelled, run, listened, played, bled, shuffled, kicked, washed, fucked, talked, driven, fallen, tickled, tripped, worried, screamed, nodded, waited, learnt, enjoyed, shrugged, slept, dealt, spewed, ate, laughed, thought, hugged, tasted, read, dreamt, wished and longed with a frequency and ferocity far outstripping anything before, and in more ways than I can describe. I am still very much myself, but I feel like a completely different person. I feel like nobody knows me now, least of all myself. In the past I would have hated that, I need to know; now I’m just not sure. I really don’t know whether I like it or not. the sun is casting shadows an afternoon is fading I ask, but no one knows the answer to the question my life is like an island where does this ocean go? From Where Does This Ocean Go? by Ilaria Graziano off the Ghost In the Shell - Stand Alone Complex OST.

Possessions

Personal I don't know if I explained it here before, but the reason I'm doing so much packing and why I'm giving away a lot of my stuff, or throwing a great many things out, is that my mother's selling the house while I'm gone (in fact it goes on the market the week after I leave). We three boys have almost all flown the coop now. Jeremy left a couple of months ago, I'm leaving now, and Eddie is due to move out soon too. A large six-bedroom house is just far too big for one person. So Mum's selling up, and she is moving into the middle of the city, to an apartment at West End. She actually got a contract signed yesterday on the place she wants to move to, so she’s really excited. So my room will be gone by the time I get back, and mum won't have anywhere to put my stuff. I've lived in big houses all my life, and consequently I've accumulated a heap of stuff. As of right now though, furniture aside, all of the possessions that I'm leaving behind fit into three small boxes. I couldn't keep all my stuff, so I decided to completely start anew.

Moving, Just Keep Moving...

Friends - Games - Japan - Personal - Travel It's been a busy last couple of days.

• Firday, Fragma and I did some running around, I did some banking, paid my accommodation for the first semester, bought some stuff I needed from the shops, did last minute chores.
• Friday night, Wulfen, Ads, Ruro, Skett, Nash and I went over to Fragma's to watch some Initial D.
• Saturday, I spent boxing up the rest of my stuff. It's almost all boxed away by this point.
• Saturday night, (from left to right) Scuzzy, Ads, Nash, Apollo, Wulfen, Dublex, Jimbo, Ruro and Fragma took me out to dinner.
• Sunday morning, Fragma and I went to see Littlewing off at the airport. She is going on a tour around Europe for three weeks and so I had to say a final goodbye to her earlier than everyone else.
• Sunday lunch, relatives and close friends of the family came over. We drank some beer, watched the cricket, and I was given more advice than I knew what to do with.
• Sunday night, Fragma and I went over to Nash's to see his new PS2 steering wheel setup, then we went to Wulfen's to pick up a copy of X-COM Aftermath, and then went back to my place to play it for about five hours.
• Monday, I started the long process of burning cds of all the important stuff on my computer and I went through all my clothes and got rid of four big garbage bags full of stuff I would never wear again.
• Monday night, Calvin came over (for the last time, our Monday night routine has come to an end), and then (multitasking again) we went to Ads's place to drop of some stuff, then to Wulfen's to drop off some more stuff (I've been giving away a lot of stuff I can't keep) and then to Chermside to play some DDR, Dance Freaks and Initial D for the last time.

And now I'm here writing this. I was going to go to bed, but I wanted to get this all out now while I have the time. It's been a really good last couple of days. I spent a great deal of time with my friends and family, and it emphasised just how much they all mean to me. There are a lot of thankyou's that need to be said, but I'll leave them for tomorrow night (^_^). I really should get some sleep now. I've got a lot of stuff to do tomorrow, there are still so many things left to organise, and I haven't even thought about starting to pack my backpack! Written while listening to Moving by Supergrass.

Prelude

Personal - Quotes "I'm beginning to feel like the curator of my own museum. A huge museum no one will ever visit, looked after for no one but myself." - Haruki Murakami, Norwegian Wood

You Can Never Ever Leave Without Leaving A Piece Of Youth

Personal - Television The series finale of Dawson's Creek was on this afternoon. Joey ended up with Pacey. I wish she has chosen Dawson. I've always liked Dawson's Creek. I started watching it when I was fifteen, when Dawson and Joey and Pacey were fifteen. I've grown up with them, been angsty with them, analysed life with them. Sure it's cheesy teen drama, but I love it. The characters meant a lot to me, their problems were real, even if their vocabulary wasn't. I was disappointed by the ending, I had hoped things would turn out differently. Everyone was happy in the end though, so I guess I must be too. It's almost time to go. I've been listening to Everloving by Moby a lot lately. I'm glad there are no words. There doesn't need to be.

In The Arms Of Sleep

Personal

What Neon Genesis Evangelion character are you? I normally never do these things, though the result on this one didn't surprise me much. To quote Faithless, "I can't get no sleep."

No One Ever Said It Would Be So Hard

Personal Or maybe not.

Nobody Said It Was Easy

Personal It's almost over.

Room Key

Personal - Travel I didn't do very much today. It was so hot that I spent most of my time in the pool. I'm now all shrivelled up like a prune, but at least I stayed cool. My bedroom is so bare. I've taken down all my posters, my wallscrolls, everything. All my ornaments are packed away, most of my books are gone, and there are hardly any traces of me left. I once thought that my bedroom was too childish, that I had held on to all of these things from my teenage years, and that I hadn't really evolved very much from that time. In fact if you took a picture of my room 5 years ago, it would look (apart from being in a different house) very similar to what it looked like a couple of weeks ago. It's like I have a "room signature" of sorts, which represents a compressed, summarised version of me. You could tell a lot about me by looking at the things in my room. Obvious things such as what books I like, the music I listen to, my hobbies, what clothes I wear, and more subtle things such as the way I organise my things, where I put important photos, and if I make my bed (that one can tell you a lot about my personality :P). I don't really spend much time in my bedroom; sleeping, reading, and that's about it. I don't "hang out" there, I don't study there (my bedroom desk is usually completely covered in junk), and I don't spend time with my friends there (they normally graffiti my stuff ^_^). Yet it's full (or was full) of all of these things from my childhood and teenage years. Well not anymore. Most of that stuff is gone now, or boxed away. My room at Nottingham will be rather sparse (and very small compared to my current bedroom) but that will give me a chance to start afresh, to collect a whole heap of new stuff, and develop a new room signature for the new me. And it’s almost time to go. I've been listening to The Scientist by Coldplay a lot recently (thanks Brendan for reminding me of it). At this exact time, two weeks from now, my plane will be taking off on it's way to the UK.

One Month To Go!

Friends - Personal - Travel - University On January 21st, 2004, at 8:30 PM I'll fly out from Brisbane International Airport, on my way to the UK. Ostensibly I'm going becuase I'm enrolled in University over there and I need to finish off my Business degree. Of course I could have just as easily stayed here to finish off my degree (in fact that would have been the easier option by far, the amount of paperwork I've been doing recently is crazy!). So why am I really going? ... Yes that's a very good question. ... To be completely honest I don't really know. I think I've had lots of reasons over the past two years or so I've been planning this. I can't remember what first triggered the idea, but ever since I got the urge to leave, I've never really looked back. Things came up from time to time that provide some reason to stay, and these reasons seem to by multiplying of late. I'm resolute though, deep down I know I've always been, that nothing short of my Mum dying would stop me going. But I still don't know why I want to go. There is the desire for change, and that's a big one for me, but that alone isn't it. I want to broaden my horizons, become well travelled and worldly, that's not it either. I want to be educated at a truly world-class university, but study is well down on my list of priorities for next year. I want to meet new people and at the same time part of me wants to escape from the people I already know. I'm going to miss terribly everyone I leave behind, but overall I think it will be good for me. As sappy as it sounds... I think I go to grow. Maybe that's a cop-out answer. In fact I'm pretty sure it is, however it's the only think I can come up with right now. Next time I'm totally in tune with my feelings and emotions I'll write an entry explaining them in full. Expect it sometime around 8282 AD. So I don't know why I'm going, but I don't really care right night. It was a long process and it's almost over. Well the leaving part is almost over, the living on exchange part has almost begun, and this next month is going to kill me with anticipation. I hope that in a years time, when I've got some perspective, and my exchange is almost over, I can look back, read over this, and laugh to myself about how in the dark I was. I hope I'll understand it then, and I doubly hope that the manner in which I gain that understanding over the next year is most enjoyable ^_^ This entry was written while listening to Art of Noise - Dreaming in Colour over and over again.

Life Cleaning

Personal It's spring cleaning, with a twist. I'm leaving Australia in less than two months to go on exchange to the UK for a year. I currently live at home with my Mum. During the year that I'm away, my Mum is planning on moving house, meaning that my room, and all my stuff, have to be packed up before I leave. Not only that, but a couple of months ago my little brother moved out, and in a couple of months my older brother plans to move out as well. So that means all three of us boys are flying to coop in the space of half a year. So no more big five bedroom houses for Mum anymore, she is planning on moving into a little two-bedroom apartment in West End. So I've got a problem; not only do I have to pack up all my stuff, I have to throw out the majority of it as well, becuase there is simply not going to be anyplace to put it all. So all of that led to me spending most of today spring cleaning, going through my bookcase, cupboards, draws and sorting out what I want, need, cherish, and what is essentially junk I've accumulated over the years. Some of that "junk" was important to me once, but now it belongs in the bin. I've got old primary school assignments, early highschool work, birthday cards going to back when I was eight, an assortment of remote controlled cars and other miscellaneous electronic gear, hundreds of magazines and comics, all sorts of different books, and other stuff to varied to mention. After a short nostalgic browse, about 90% of it all went straight in the bin. My good (fiction) books I'm giving to my older brother for the most part. We have very similar tastes, and are always borrowing each other's stuff anyway, to the extent that we are not really sure who owns what now. He'll probably get my stereo too. As for everything else I actually want to keep, well I'll find good homes for it all. It had been strange deciding what portion of my life I need physical records of and what I can make due with just my memories. It has also been very liberating too in a way, as I could start afresh in effect and throw away all evidence that any of those old times happened. Not that I want to forget my past, but it's nice not having an accumulated weight of "stuff" that represents it anymore. There is a freedom associated with being able to pack everything that really means to you in a single bag, and say, "That represents all the physical reminders I need for my life." Before this little spot of spring cleaning I thought that I really needed all that stuff, now I realise that life just gets too cluttered if you hold onto it all. I feel like a blank canvas now, upon which I can paint another twenty odd years of new memories.

Hair Again

Personal Well it's short, it's different, and I love it. It's amazing how something like a hair cut can completely change the way you look. I'm not going to post a picture, but just trust me, it looks great!

Hair

Personal Give me a head with hair, long beautiful hair. Shining, gleaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen. Give me down to there hair, shoulder lenght or longer Here baby, there, momma, ev'rywhere, daddy, daddy. hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair. Flow it, show it,l ong as God can grow it, my hair. I'm getting my hair cut tomorrow. Why such a song and dance you ask? Well becuase I've currently got long, below the shoulders, hair and by the end of tomorrow... I won't. I had short hair in highschool. We had to, it was a school rule, and for the most part I didn't care. After I graduated and went on to Uni though, I just let it grow, and I've long hair (usually tied back into a pony tail) ever since. Now it's time for a change! I leave for the UK in less than two months, I graduate from my BE in less than two weeks, and it's time for me to start looking somewhat respectable again. I've forgotten what it is like to have short hair; I've forgotten what I look like with short hair. I hope I look good! Meanwhile a strange, middle-age lady said that I had "wonderful hair" as I was getting off the train today. I get that from time to time, people admiring the colour of my hair. It had nothing to do with my plans to get my hair cut tomorrow, just a funny coincidence. I find it unfortunate though that the only people who seem to pay close attention (and actually comment on) the colour of my hair happen to be strange, middle-age ladies, and not the young and cute variety. Anyway I may post a picture of myself post-cut, we shall see. In any case tomorrow certainly signifies a big change in the "me" that has existed over the past four years. I'm interested to see what this new me gets up to ^_^

Memento

Friends - Metaposts - Personal I've been trying to decide how I should go about filling in everything that happened during the past three months. I don't want to focus solely on the past, as a lot of rather important stuff has happened recently. So what I've decided is that I'll do it in stages, talk about what happening right now in my life, but interspace that (during the slow times) with tales of my recent history. For the last couple of days I've been feeling pretty shit. I had a really big fight with my good friend Littlewing while we were out in the valley Saturday night. I was drunk, I was tired, I hadn't slept properly since Thursday (having my last exam at 8am on Saturday morning) and overall I was really on edge. I had had a great day, it was good to finally get everything finished, but the night was a real downer. I feel bad too becuase we were supposed to be celebrating Calvin's 21st birthday, but the whole night was subverted by our disagreement. I'm not going to go into the specifics, but I left feeling very hurt and angry and somehow managed to get home very very late. Things are getting better now, but for a while I felt as bad as I've ever felt. I'm listening to the Gabriel Knight - Anthem Mix by Bart Klepka at the moment, it fits my mood perfectly.

Miles to go before I sleep...

Personal I've been slowly turning nocturnal this past month. In Japan I had to keep fairly normal hours. Most of the youth hostels we stayed in had some sort of curfew, and we usually had to be out by a certain time the next day. Since getting back I average about eight hours sleep a night, which is a lot compared to what I usually get, however those eight hours usually start at 3 AM and run through till 11, sometimes even till midday. Of course the days I actually have to go to Uni prompt me to get up earlier, however in general I work at night and sleep most of the day. I am productive, I get stuff done, I have responsibilities and I fill them. I just do so as a creature of the night. There are fewer distractions this way as well.

Benkyo! Benkyo! Benkyo!

Personal - University I did some work today. For the first time since getting back I actually sat down and spent a good couple of hours studying. Caught up on all the Business Policy and Strategy work I needed to do, and read through my Advanced Database Systems lecture notes as well. I've now pretty much broken even for the first three weeks of Uni, am up to date with everything I need to be up to date with... except for my thesis. Well not so much my thesis itself, but rather the project I'm supposed to be writing about. My topic sounds good in concept, and it actually works surprisingly enough, but I'm really struggling to find the energy (or concentration) to sit down and write some code to take all these digital signals processing algorithms we've created and combine them into one single application. I'll get around to doing it sometime, just not today. For those who don't know, I'm currently enrolled in a dual degree, a Bachelor of Engineering (majoring in Software Engineering) and a Bachelor of Business Management (most probably majoring in Electronic Business, but maybe just Business Economics) at the University of Queensland. I'm currently in my fourth year, and as a result of some serious subject overloading along with some rather specific subject choices, I will have completed all the requirements needed to graduate from my BE at the end of this semester. That will still leave me with another year to do in order to finish off my BBusMan degree, but I will be on exchange then, so I'm not really thinking about that at the moment. It's funny to think that come the end of the year, I'll be a qualified engineer (though of course not professionally accredited by the Institute of Engineers until I've got a couple of years experience under my belt). It's even stranger to think about still attending full time Uni, studying like everyone else, but having the qualifications I need to get a great engineering job. Sometimes I wonder why I bother. Of course if I get a great job offer overseas I might just ditch Business, or at least only do it part-time. It's only really going to come in handy five years down the track (when I'm hopefully fast-tracking it up the management ladder). Of course then there is always the possibility of further post-graduate study. Assuming I don't royally stuff up my Thesis and I graduate with first class honours, I can pretty much walk onto the PhD program at UQ (and presumably most other places). Nash is has just started his Doctorate, so he is committed for another two years at least. I'm not sure how I feel about adding another couple of years to the five I will have spent if I graduate from everything I'm enrolled in at the moment. I've been in some form of formal education for more than 15 years; do I really want to push that towards the 20 year mark? Some people only do the 10 minimum required by law. All of these questions I'm putting off thinking about for the moment. I need to finish this semester first. I'll worry about them when I have to make the decisions. For now I'm just going to get stuck into my work. Study! Study! Study! Actually maybe I'll just watch some more anime ^_^

Australia is boring

Personal - Travel - University I've got the post trip blues. This coming semester of University is going to be one of the most tedious, and yet most difficult, of my student career. I have a thesis to finish (*cough* start *cough*) writing, but the rest of my courses are essentially no-brainers. That in itself is bad enough, but I'm just coming off the cusp of one of the best months of my life, and six months from