Being a public holiday, the Southern Expressway was open late this evening as a cavalcade of motorists made their way back up to the city from the coast. As a consequence my trip sealing drive home was even shorter than I had initially planned, and I had planned on it being short (thanks primarily to my driving instinct to not have any cars in front of me on long roads - an instinct I suspect might have something to do with making long trips less boring).

Joy at speeding along the longest over-taking lane on the Fleurieu soon churned to confusion as my most of a Franz Ferdinand CD trip home came to an end and I realised that although my car was parked in the driveway, my mind hadn't pulled in next to it. Nor was it back in the beach house in Encounter Bay instead it was still drifting back home at its own pace, as usually happens at the end of holidays. It's still not quite here yet, probably stuck behind some older brain who doesn't quite do the speed limit and brakes at times that make you exclaim "why would you brake?!", as usually happens at the end of holidays.

I don't mind waiting a little longer, after uncovering that days that I don't do any work on exist still. I don't know how to feel, now, what with emotional conflict, but it was definitely unforgettable.

http://bradism.com/display.php?jid=27

After midnight, the following things happen:

A new AFL Season. Not only is the first preseason cup game going to be happening in February, but also, as a Bulldogs fan, the long wait since August is over.
As a Bulldogs fan this year holds a lot of promise, which sucks because they're going to lose anyway and sometimes I think it's a lot easier when your team constantly loses after not showing promise. Less heart-breaking and soul-destroying that way...

Calculation of Petrol Costs. $1273 Dollars, ~$106 a month. There were some good months (June, $55) and some bad... days (August 20, $80). Still cheaper than last year, somehow, despite increasing oil prices. Documenting of petrol costs is pretty much the only reason I buy a physical calendar at the start of every year. That plus the excitement of...

Holding off on buying a Calendar. The longer you wait after mid-December, the cheaper calendars become... and the worse your options get. It's a thrill you can't find anywhere else, except perhaps in casino's and anything else involving gambling. Last year I set a personal best with my $4.25 'Pumped Up Down Under' calendar on January 17th. I know this, because I wrote it on the calendar.

Calculation of Speeding Fines. $0

Archives Page gets new sub-heading. I only noticed this when looking up my posts about petrol costs and calendars...

I remember when I worked at ETSA full time; I never found time for a haircut.
At least this time my original haircut was more styled and thus far mullet territory isn't on the map.
The thing is I have to find a new salon to get this cut at because I have a delicate relationship with my hairdresser and she will know that I have been avoiding getting a haircut. I mean, I'm the reasonable one I know I've been busy but she'll take it as an affront to her quality that I keep dragging out my haircuts for as long as possible before seeing her. I can't risk upsetting her. My plan is to get it cut somewhere else, and then turn up a couple of months after that like nothing happened.
I'm almost positive something negative happened to me as a child involving short hair because I always fall in love with my long hair and don't want to get rid of it, but then after I cut it I realise what a fool I've been.

I learnt a bit about myself today.

Throughout the three years that my IT degree degree spanned I met many politely curious people who asked me about what I did. My parents are both quite social.

I would always reply "I do an IT Degree". A vague response, justifiable by the like-naturedness of the actual degree, my response was usually followed up by the query "So what do you want to do when you finish?".

It was a running joke over the last three years to reply with a smirk "Anything that doesn't involve computers". Things have evolved slightly since then, surely, but today does reinforce why I used to feel that way.

I pulled myself out of bed at 11 this morning ready for another consecutive day of primarily working. I pressed the power button on my computer, sat down and waited for it to finish booting up.
It never did.

My first thought, based on the high pitch spinning noise that the computer was making immediately prior to restarting midway through booting was that a DVD was in one of the drives spinning out. Two unplugged, empty drives later and my fears were heightened.

The spinning was a hard drive.

The computer wasn't booting up and safe mode was not helping.

I knew one of my hard drives was dead. Yeah, this shouldn't be a problem because you should back these things up. But who has time to back up two 100gig hard drives every time you shut down the computer, especially on a system you just formatted and set up less than six weeks ago.

At this stage my only hope was that the hard drive that failed wasn't the one that had the 20 hours of work I had done on Friday and Saturday, the two days since my last backup of work.

I carted my computer to Alex's room, woke him up and unscrewed his computer to test my HDDs.

Today I learnt that being so scared you shit yourself isn't a colloquialism. The requirement of shitting is caused by fear and must be obeyed. I did this between finding out that my first, non-work hard drive was ok and watching Alex's computer boot up with the second drive hooked up but not being detected.

This was obviously a fairly stressful moment. Not only was all my work on there, but all of my Bradism files and my 60gig music library that had taken over 5 years to pirate. So I swore a few times, told God that he owed me and made sure the power connector was implanted firmly in the drive. I restarted, the second drive was detected and all my work was intact. I sighed a deep breath of relief. Alex, who was still topless in bed watching my actions with drowsy bemusement but obviously missed me just coming back from leaving the room asked me 'what feels better? getting all your files back or taking a big dump'.
'I've just done both,' I replied. 'So I'm pretty good.'

This still didn't explain why my computer couldn't start up, and it took until 3:30am to fix that problem. Those 15 hours were mainly spent staring at the windows repair progress as it stalled at 'Installing Devices - 34 Minutes Remaining' over and over again. Anyone who finds this entry based on that search term (and based on my searching there might be a few) - If you're doing a repair and this is screwing you over: give up and do a clean format.

I automatically judge myself on my achievements for a day and how the rate against my overall progress in life. Right now, having installed most of what was already installed on my computer in the past few hours, I'd still say that my status has regressed over the last 24 hours, which probably pisses me off more than any of the other frustrations that have occured during today. But I also learnt that sometimes there are situations in life that do get me upset and stressed, and I can still handle them.

Tim informed me late in the evening that Sophie Heathcote was dead. So even though I woke up to troubles today, at least I got the chance to wake up at all. I'm not really saying that as one of those 'be glad you're alive' things because as reasons for accepting shitty days go, that's low on the list. I'm pretty much only mentioning this because I didn't even know who Sophie Heathcote was until I Google searched for her after Tim told me her name and I saw her boobs.

So non-chronologically, things are about the same now. But one thing has changed. Although I do plan to have future jobs involving computers I think my past mission can be extended to 'anything that doesn't involve computers where I have to do tech support'.

And seriously, I don't even know why I ever bother shutting down my computer, I'm going to stop doing that.

Today I got four hours sleep (from 9am onwards), tried to eat noodle box but instead had my car break down and then later one of my thongs broke.

On the 29th of December 2005 I got to see Krafty Kuts live for the first time. It was pretty great. I'm a big fan of Krafty Kuts and his mixes so getting to hear him playing his trademark tune 'These are the Breaks' live acheived one of my life goals. One of many million life goals, of course, it's not like it was religous or anything.

Tonight that song came on at random and I actually listened to the words properly for the first time. Stuff happens, these are the breaks. And after consecutive shitty days, it was helpful. But not that helpful because I already didn't care. Because I went to the seaside. That's what I'm calling the beach now: the seaside. Chilling...

It doesn't count as being unproductive because I did most of it during dinner!

Massive props to Yahoo! for having the best, free international weather XML feed.

Edit: Today felt a bit more like 27...

It's almost the end of another week of Brad's Summer Journal 5. Not a good one on almost most fronts, but good in others. This week apparently being "Former Passions stars appear in mainstream television shows week". I saw Father Lonigan in House and Ethan no. 2 in Scrubs! Also Wallace's mum was in House as well. Astonishing stuff!

Today I spent another $80 on my car and $20 on thongs (neither of which needed money spent on them a week ago). I spent another $6 on basketball which we won, that was good.

But that's not all. Today was calendar day! And by God have I outdone myself this year. It blows away 'Babes with Balls'. It deflates 'Pumped Up Down Under'. Are you ready for... Silicon Valley!

$4.98. It's so hilarious. I don't even need to focus properly to enjoy it.

Weather stuff will be nicened up later.

I'm going to Perth for almost a week for my cousin's wedding! It will be quite an adventure. So, yeah, if I make entries in Perth the weather display will be inaccurate. Like, more than usual.

Perth has Sizzler. Sizzler is awesome. God himself would dine there every night if it wasn't for the extreme expensiveness of the standard $16.95 salad bar being $16.95 plus extra for a drink. But, as an occasional treat for God or myself it is exceptionally awesome.

Adelaide no longer has Sizzler. Adelaide no longer has the complimentary serve of cheese and herb toast that, after you excitedly explain to the manager that you have driven 36 hours across the Nullarbor for the sole purpose of eating cheese and herb toast (casually mentioning a wedding in the process) they will elect to supply you with unlimited cheese and herb toast and you will be like “oh god this is so good maybe I should just ask for the recipe”.

However, the value of coke in Perth is a lot higher than in Adelaide and also is quite unstable. On Friday the price of a medium coke at Subway was $2.25, by Monday it had skyrocketed to $2.30. If it weren't for the fact that I was ripping of Subway with re-used Sub-Club cards I would feel quite mournful in regards to my lost 55c.

In Perth a bus ticket can be of two varieties, zone 1 or zone 2. Essentially if you're not going to be on the bus for many stops, it's cheaper. In Adelaide once you're on the bus it is the same price for however far you can try to get in 2 hours. This is not made clear, so when you request 'One student ticket please' and the driver says 'which one?', it's confusing, especially when expanding to 'university student' and 'single-trip' along with ', I'm from Adelaide' prompt for only the same request. Eventually he said 'Where are you going?' and I told him the street name. He gave me the stink-eye as well as my ticket and said 'I'm not a taxi-driver you know'.

In Adelaide, all you have to do is get in a Taxi and say 'Student ticket please' and they take you where you need to go.

Perth has a lot of hot chicks and a lot of fat people.

Adelaide has a lot of hot chicks and a lot of fat people, but they are all less tanned.

Perth doesn't have an urban growth boundary. They also have the name of the road you are intersecting with visible when you come up the stem of each T-intersection. This is very helpful!

In Adelaide, street signs are optional and when you don't know when you're going it's only the laws of probability and chance applied within a limited geography that ensure you'll eventually get to your destination. If you really get stuck just jump into a taxi and ask the driver for a ticket.

In Perth, you should marry whoever you started dating while you are a teenager and the only purpose of dating is to get married.

In Adelaide it is not so insanely Christian, despite it being the city of churches. The churches are mainly there as landmarks for navigation due to the absence of street signs.

Perth doesn’t have daylight savings, and because it is already out in the middle of nowhere the time difference is two and a half hours from Adelaide.

Adelaide is on the edge of nowhere and because your Dad decides to drive 36 hours straight (no pun intended) to get to the middle of nowhere during which you get less than 3 hours sleep which occurs sitting up and with all the associated jolting and drooling on yourself that ‘micro-sleeps’ entail, you will be so fingered after getting to Perth (and then immediately stuffing yourself at Sizzler) that you will find it difficult to stay awake past 11pm every night and, as a result, rise at around 9am and by the end of the week after you fly back you’ll realise you are still on Adelaide time anyway.

The Perth trip and its associated conservative Christian environment has taught me that I'm not truly that dependant on many things. No Internet, no swearing, no programming... Great news, I'm not an alcoholic! That wasn't a major worry or anything but I went six days without a drink and in fact didn't even notice (OK I had one four X at a BBQ but that barely even counts as a beer). It wasn't until I got back late last night that I even thought about the distinct lack of types of fluids that usually go in (or in some cases leave) my body. I did notice that my lack of bed and sleep ended quite comfortably upon arriving home which signalled the end of all my abstinences.

Today has been a relaxing day for the most part. I slept in until Adelaide time as usual, but this time actually in Adelaide. Then I had a hankering for some basketball and played that until I got blisters on both my feet (I had a head start because I was wearing new shoes). Then the evening was spent catching up with my good friends Internet and Beer. I fixed the weather script and weather display up and went through with my other plan of creating a summery colour scheme. As I continued my reunion with beer on this warm January night mulling over possible seasonal colours I realised the answer was in my hands and I created Beerism and yeah... I like beer and I like summer and I like Adelaide. Jesus tittyfucking Christ it's good to be back!

Chow rang me up for no reason today and advised me that I could get cheap clothing from Jetty Surf - today only!

So I got to Jetty Surf in Rundle Mall and was casually shopping and glancing around for specials when I saw Lori. This is the first time I've seen her since four days before I called and broke up with her.

I don't think she saw me at that instant, so I looked away. My first instinct was to scamper and keep my perfect 'never meeting exes again' game intact. My second instinct was to save money on shirts. So what followed was about four minutes of browsing a rack of shirts intently while occasionally muttering "oh shit oh shit oh shit".

She never came up to me and I got a nice new shirt for $24.

I woke up today and ate my Weet-Bix with 100% Australian Honey, skim milk from Australian cows and Australian grown bananas.

I then dressed myself in the jersey of my favourite Australian Rules Football Team and drove my Australian made Holden Commodore to my mates place for a BBQ. There I listened to the Australian radio station's countdown of the best 100 tracks of 2005 that, like everyday on Triple J, was biased towards Australian artists. Simultaneously I watched the Australian cricket team win at cricket whilst sinking Australian beers sitting in the Australian heat.

I then drove home and made some vegemite on toast.

Today was good times, although I do feel like I should have done something special for Australia day.

I have a very strong desire to go out and buy a giant, expensive flatscreen TV and a Playstation 2 and a whole bunch of games and hook it all up into my sound system and just turn my lights off but I don't know why.

I don't even like Playstation 2's although I bet they would be more reliable than my PC at the moment...

I feel terrible. I finally got around to doing weights for the first time in two months. It's safe to say some muscle loss has occured. Today I woke up and my shoulders and arms are sore. I'm so happy!

I asked Chow what features I could add to the journal that would increase user participation and he suggested that an entry rating system would be succesful on the front page. Would you rate entries if there was a link on each entry?

There's two systems I'm considering. One would be a simple 1 through 5 vote box. The other would be a thumbs up/thumbs down kind of thing. Let me know what you think.

Also, to encourage voting I have been tossing up the idea of a 'comment posted' confirmation screen that I would set up to provide an optional link to a nice pair of boobs or a cute animal depending on your sexual orientation (the script itself wouldn't determine that, it'd just give you the option for both). Who's interested?

Also Also, the weather is now only displayed on the individual entry display page to avoid clutter and because of filthy IE and it's horrible grasp of CSS and parent objects.

I never really did New Years Resolutions and in fact on the first day of this year I announced that I would not have a new years resolution this year.

Australia Day is a good day for resolving to do things because it is more seperated from the "holiday period". This is good because if you resolve to lose weight or drink less beer or something on New Years then by Australia Day you will not be able to drink lots of beers and eat lots of meat. It's also good because it gives you 26 more days to procrastinate about your goals.

I made some Australia Day resolutions. Get back into weights. Go for a run. Some other boring stuff. It's working.

This is my message, I guess, start your new years resolutions on or immediately after sobering up from Australia Day.

I know it's not 1999 anymore, but, I just sniped my first eBay auction and it was so freaking exciting.

With 29 seconds to go, BAM, Brad - a completely unknown bidder - comes out of the blue and bids on the auction. "Congratulations," the page proclaimed, "You are the highest bidder!"
Adrenaline pumping, I watched the seconds tick away.

Then I got sniped with four seconds to go!

I lost, but it was still awesome. I then tried to find something else I wanted to bid on that was going to end soon but I couldn't.

All the while listening to Snyper, by Hybrid.

I never thought I could post this, but, I wasted part of my day watching a game of cricket. I don't know if it was because the first 15 overs or so were so good, but the rest of it was really bad. This was in thanks mainly to the predictable nature of pretty much everything. I think this was also about the time that Damien Martyn got in.

The South African innings was just as boring, but even before that started I was thinking that as crap as 20/20 is at least that would have been over by now.

I guess this post is to support the media's claims that a 12 game tournament is too long. That and part of me longs for the cool days of winter where the Bulldogs will unpredictably win occasionally.

Sunday is my least favourite day.

I spent all day working on CSS and page layouts, and although I could go on for pages about that excitement here is, instead, part 1 of my Big Day Out Review:

The Big Day Out 2006 will not be remembered as the greatest Big Day Out ever. Primarily, the line up attending was the weakest I’ve ever seen. Another factor was the amount I had to drink. Nevertheless, despite feeling slightly ripped off after the second announcement was made and vowing not to buy my ticket next year until after the announcements were finished, I assured myself I would have a good time. A good time I pretty much had.

Gerling
Gerling were the first band I saw. I heard some of Faker but I don’t think I glanced at the stage that often. Sam had wanted to arrive in time for Faker and orchestrated the trip to get us there 10 minutes after their set had started, y’know, in case the band hadn’t shown up yet.
But anyway, Gerling: Yeah, they played some songs and I stood around drinking. They played “Whose Your Daddy?” which was ok and the rest of the stuff they played I can’t remember mainly because of lack of interest rather than extreme inebriation which was to become a theme for the day. A couple of enthusiastic “weoahs!” and the distribution of three earth balls into the crowd garnered their set with some respect. And it’s not like I walked away or anything.
3/5

Mudvayne and a Steak Sandwich
At the conclusion of Gerling there was, surprisingly enough, no good bands playing. This meant it was lunch time. Lunch time at the Big Day Out is all about picking what flavour your greasy meal will be, and I picked steak because the place was out of burgers. The steak was pretty good, albeit intensely greasy. After finishing that off and watching a guy with make up DJ from a parked Ice-Cream truck I decided we should go and see what Mudvayne were like. My main motivation for this came from being introduced to DragonForce not long ago and figuring that some metal can actually be pretty rocking!
So off to Mudvayne we went and songs were played. I remember the storming kick of the bass drum the most, walking towards the stage. Also a lot was said about shoe stealing in the mosh-pit not being very respectful. I like the lead singers of metal bands. Some yelling and a delicious steak sandwich combined:
3.5/5

Wolfmother
The crowd then migrated to the right a little to the Blue Stage to watch WolfMother. One thing I’ve noticed about new Australian bands recently, they all have this kind of warbling, melody-less manner of singing over their music instead of to it. WolfMother are a band that seem to be a little above this.
Wolfmother would qualify as the first band where I actually knew what songs they were playing when they played them. WolfMother rock. They are a rock band so if they’re getting contracted for major rock festivals you’d expect they do this anyway. But they did. However another theme for the day was constantly leaving sets early to see someone else and that applied here. I would have liked to see the end.
4/5

End of Fashion
I have never really listened to much End of Fashion. I know I said to Sam during the show “hey, these guys are alright” but they were on the Green Stage which was right next to the Toohey’s Extra Dry tent and, well, you can see how my opinion might be swayed in either direction.
There was some song I think I liked, but it might have been played by Faker.
1125ml/5

(more)

Soulwax
Before I went to the BDO I downloaded a few CDs by the touring artists to check out what they were touring. Because God knows no one had ever heard of half these shit bands before. However one band I decided not to check out, yet still attend, was Soulwax. The only experience I’d had with Soulwax was through their interesting remixes of tracks such as "Six Days", "Robot Rock" and "Dare". But they wouldn’t be remixing on stage; they’d be playing their own music! I would definitely check this out then.
I don’t remember any of Soulwax and I still have never heard a single song by them.
13 Photos, 1 Cowboy Hat and I think the only part of that concert I remember is actually going to the boiler room bar and buying 2 more drinks/5

Shihad + Hilltop Hoods + The Go! Team???
This is obviously where it starts to get a little blurry, but I remember walking towards the Converse Essential Stage with most everyone else to go see Shihad. The thing about going to see Shihad at the Big Day Out was I’d already seen Shihad last year. I saw them at the Flinders Tavern and my ticket only cost $10! Not only that, but the beer was a lot cheaper there as well. So, in protest I decided that I wouldn’t listen to Shihad at a giant music festival and similarly I also decided I would boycott digesting what I'd been drinking as well.
It kind of went like that. I left Shihad, walked past the Silent Disco and had a quiet sit for a moment while I'm pretty sure Hilltop Hoods were playing in the background. It was beginning to dawn on me that I was altogether fucked. I figured I would be alright if I just sat around for a long time... but at what cost? I'd barely even seen the bands I’d come here for. Well, band - I was at one stage referring to the Big Day Out as 'Franz Ferdinand with many national and international supporting acts'.
I decided to make a noble sacrifice and vomit the contents of my stomach in order to hopefully enjoy the rest of the day. This was actually a voluntary decision, one I spent much time sitting on a toilet considering before finally planting myself on my knees and using my fingers to discover parts of your throat that, seriously, you just vomit. It was kinda wicked.
I walked out of the cubicle and my head was a little clearer. Just in time to catch the start of MIA so apart from Soulwax it seemed I hadn’t missed much. However checking my camera revealed me watching a band on the Green Stage after Soulwax and I thought that Shihad had played on the Converse Stage? Surely my memory wasn't that bad! Turns out it was worse, and I'd been at 'The Go! Team' for at least two minutes in which time I took four photos. It might even have been my idea to see them because they seemed like a better option than Shihad for prestigious reasons. Oh well...
Multiple Jack & Cokes/My Mouth

M.I.A.
Aside from Franz Ferdinand, the other main attraction for the BDO was M.I.A. This chick is truly wicked and I’d been totally digging her album for the past two months. Along the way from my lunch to the Boiler Room I bumped into Sam again (as well as a further eight idiots who felt the need to discuss the Western Bulldogs with me ignoring the fact that I was practically incapacitated). I told Sam we should go see M.I.A. and then I got there and it was just so good. I had to force my way to the front to take some photos and once I was there I couldn’t leave. First of all she has mad producers working on her tunes and they were banging. Secondly she actually sings about things that, after you Google the lyrics and read about them are important and stuff; not only catchy, but also deep and with a true personal voice behind them. I really enjoyed M.I.A. and it was almost euphoric. This was pretty much because I was basically still off my tits, but whatev. I actually cried a little during 'Sunshowers' because I was a little overwhelmed by the happy energy that this girl was bouncing out whilst singing about her family tragedy. Also, yeah, off my tits…
5/5

2006 is the year of the Dog, so I've got a good feeling about this season. After all we've only had two injuries so far!

At a young age I became very aware of the literal implications of what I would say.
Growing up in the early 90's it was an era of "Kill me now!"s and "I would rather die than"s. However being an astute 9 year old I pondered these phrases and decided that I would eliminate them from my vocabulary at the minimum to avoid the wrath of a presumably literal God. This was also the course that led me to the removal of "Oh my God"s and "God damn it"s.

However times change and years of listening to sport commentary on television has ensured that choosing words appropriately has literally taken a back seat in my conscious. More recently, however, at a time when I was struggling to comprehend the meaning of one important word: "love", I realised that I was actually saying it all the time!
"I love House" I'd announce to whoever listened following a particularly sharp verbal jab from the wizened doctor.
"I love Andy Bichel!" I would slur loudly, as he hit a six in the final over to beat England.
But perhaps the best example of the way I use love can be stemmed from the recently ended life of one of the best television program's I'd ever seen: Arrested Development.
I loved this show. From the moment I turned it on it was love at first sight. What were the characteristics of my love?

I would never want to miss a new moment in its life.
I would think about it, even when it wasn't around.
I took an extended lunch break from work one day so I could drive home and watch the episode from the night before that I had to tape.
I sacrificed sleep and cash just to be closer to it... on DVD.

Loving Arrested Development was easy, because it reminded myself of a glorified me. The kind of guy that would perform courageous feats when his team was under pressure; the sharp mind that produced barbs of wit seemingly before the preceding context was spake. Without Arrested Development, I couldn't imagine my life would be as rewarding and enjoyable as it was. But things changed, and in the third season the show devolved into a more narcissistic, over-referencing shadow of its former self. I admit it, I turned on it. Watching it made me feel ill.

Where was my love now? How could I love something that I could no longer stand be around? What was my motivation? A sign of respect to the good times we’d shared wouldn’t do and obligation due the prior commitment I’d already given to the show seemed precariously cyclic.

When old, senile Arrested Development decided that last Friday night (or Saturday night by the time the torrents came out) was the time for it to die. I came along to be by its side. The truth was I’d never left it. This is unlike Family Guy, who I was just friends with but who I haven’t seen since about six months ago when I realised it wasn’t coming back from its walk on the inane side. Seeing no one reads this far in the boring entries my conclusion is I guess while originally I thought that loving something was basically an appreciation that, without it, the capacity for joy in your life would be reduced in some way. But perhaps it’s a little more than that, because I stuck by Arrested Development and the finale was actually good once they started making new jokes again instead of just constantly referencing themselves. Overall, this is something that needs more pondering.

I spent $60 on my girl today. But it was the first time I've filled up with petrol since last month so it's not that big a deal.

I guess I'm whipped.

If this was Google chat this smiley would be rotating 90 degrees and then winking at u ;)

Sometimes I ponder about the future of my journalling. Considering that, initially, my journal was to document the days of summer where weeks of freedom flowed like rivers what will happen when the summers run dry? After all, I'm probably enjoying the last week of Summer I'll ever have in this context right now. And all of that time is being spent working. What does the future truly hold...

Yes, yes that seems like a good entry to explain my lack of updates...

I had one of my best gyms on Friday afternoon. This was bracketed by days of basketball games in which I scored 20 points. Tonight my cardiovascular system seemed to reach a new level as the hill on my route that I couldn't summit a month a go and almost died by the peak a week ago on my runs was beaten without losing breath.

6 months ago I was the fittest and strongest I'd ever been. Then circumstances such as work, basketball seasons and others changed and I started losing it again. I haven't got back to where I was yet, but I'm on my way to being better. It's lovely! I didn't want to be one of those businessmen in their 30s who lamented that the fittest they were was when they were 20.

I can run further, last longer and lift more than I ever could. Yet these skills mean nothing when I need to try and force Internet Explorer to interpret CSS like a good browser would, no matter how fit I am. So perhaps I don't have to worry about being a businessman after all...

What do you do... when you have an idea for your journal system to make a small "ideas notepad" page come up that you can store ideas for future entries in... but you don't have time to code it and you want to forget your idea... XD

Post an entry about it obviously...

A lot of people hate advertising. I don't.

There's a lot of "annoying" ads. For example: the Metropolitan Plumbing ads and the A&R ads. I regularly hear people saying they "hate" these ads, but really, they're very effective. How else could a company like A&R make a profit by just reselling commercially available products at marked up prices? Conditioning is powerful as well as awesome and people who dismiss it as "annoying" are narrow minded, and most likely, the kind of people it will work on.

However, the second kind of advertisement is the one I like best. They're the ones where some new product is advertised that is supposed to be really good but in actual fact is just a regular product with an improvement. I often hear people scoff at these advertisements as if they expect progress to come in giant leaps. But I think they're great. They're the reason I have this air freshener in my room that automatically squirts fragrance every hour. It's also the reason that I have a toothbrush that vibrates in your mouth and the head splits in half and buzzes about like a transformer while you brush.

The latest thing I picked up, and this brings me to my point, was Sunsilk's Shampoo for Men. Once again someone has taken a normal product - shampoo - and improved it slightly so that my life can be improved dramatically. It's just shampoo. It doesn't make your hair shiny. It doesn't make your hair have extra bounce. It doesn't make your hair moist, or lush, or springy, or grow faster, or fight dandruff or anything. It just makes it clean and MANLY. I don't need to use conditioner anymore or any hair styling products because after I shampoo my hair I just mash it down with my hands a bit and let it dry well just like that, instant normal guy hair. I recommend it, it's brilliant.

No one talk about erections....

Hahaha... yesterday the ad was small size and now it has grown to twice as big... :/

...

No time to write in depth; rushed life fragment here:

When I got my first job stocking shelves I was shocked at how quickly my supple, tender hands got ripped to shreds after years of rare physical labour.

After two days at an IT corporation which provides a delightful handwash that, when combined with the gentle warm air on pre-towelled skin, leaves my hands so soft and pink I am equally shocked at the rate of change.

And to be honest, Internet, it doesn't feel very good.

I have been told lately that my journal isn't that likeable. I have also been given the impression that I'm much more likeable than I think I am, which made me curious.

In the interest of satisfying both issues, here are a whole bunch of quizes I did!

Quote:

of course your likable but not many know because u either push them away or u just dont kno how to talk to people and they think u are rude

Take this r u likable?!

Quote:

you are likeable but only by girls dont rate

Are you likeable?

Quote:

You're very likeable... people should be dying to be around you and you fill people with so much joy :D

1 other people got this result!
This quiz has been taken 1 times.
100% of people had this result.

are you likeable?

This one you get good results in if you agree that someone with the name Yri is stupid and possibly a "bimbo".

Quote:

I love you. You are perfect! I want to be just like

you<3

Are u likeable?

Quote:
People think You smell like Poo. You need to take a

shower and wash your ass.

Are You Likeable?

This person is very bitter about having no social skills and probably being unhealthily overweight.

Quote:
you are so likeable, that everyone like likes you,

and its like really cool, bc then like u have

like a lot of friends!!! and like u are also

most def on the preppy side....oh Godddddddd

pleaz stop.....its making my head

hurting......

are you likeable???

Quote:
You are popular, great! the only problem is your

not getting pals for the sort of person you

realy are, you are either being to bossy, a

bit of a bully or you are too vain! just be

your self for a while

How much are you likeable

Quote:
ey--Everyone Likes You! You have just the right

qualities to attract a lot of friends. Keep

up the good work!

Are you likeable?

This one is a thinly veiled rant about being cheated on.

Quote:
as if. u bitch, dont lie to me. everyone hates u.

suck my cock

are u a likeable person?

Quote:
EVERYBODY LOVES YOU! you just cant seem to keep

people away from you! you are nice and loyal

to your friends and family! YAY! YOU COULD

PRATICALLY BECOME PRESIDENT!

Are you a likeable kinda person?

I know that I do my best to be non-offensive and respectful to everyone, because sometimes 19 years of Christian indoctrination can have that effect on people. I also now know that the best way to make people on the internet think you're likeable is to say that you like their favourite band when you answer their quizes. I am honestly suprised that this many quizes were on the Internet.

That clears that all up I guess.

Time is relative.

Follow up Lessons:
- Getting drunk is less fun when you don't drink anything
- My father is a strong demonstration of nature over nurture
- Friday is casual day. When you're the only person in a room wearing a shirt and tie and someone comments 'You look smart!' you say 'Well, I don't feel it...'
- If you tuck your hand into your armpit and take a close-up photo of your inner elbow it looks like a bum.

Interesting week...

You can fit so much more into a day when you aren't hungover and only have one work commitment that day.

It seriously is March.

I paid $11 to have my car washed today by the BP SuperWash. I guess that's a little pricey, but considering it went for about 8 minutes and I loved the hell out of every second of it I think that coming out with a clean car was a bonus!

I believe during my childhood days I was often entertained by televised tales of the lives of mice and other small critters and the adventures to which they belonged. Years later I theorise that this might be the reason that there is a sub-conscious conditioning that being inside anything mechanical is bad. With levers and cogs and hammers moving around everywhere I have been taught that, if I get into this situation, I will be lucky to escape with my tail. So it was with some trepidation that I approached the SuperWash for the first time, primitive instincts urging me to turn back. This was slightly ironic seeing that I was actually already inside a big mechanical object that I was going to be inserting into the even bigger mechanical object.

Whoever designed the SuperWash must have balls of steel. Either that or they drive a van because things get SO CLOSE to the front of your car but never actually nudge it. I just sat there with my music cranked up as the elements (water, air, fucking giant brushes) stormed around my cabin. Exhilarating is a word I could use to describe it. I almost lamented not spending the extra $2 for a deluxe wash because it would probably have lasted even longer.

I want to go back to that SuperWash. I want to get my car dirty. We have unfinished business.

And after being at work at 9am for a whole week I today found it made no difference in how way too hard it is to get up for midday lectures.

The best thing about having no fucking time is that you get everything done so much faster.

After years of being a night shift worker and living the university life, off-peak, I am finally living in a peak world.

I got to the train station a few minutes early this morning, at 8:15am no less and that was despite sustaining a blood nose in the shower that left me nasally-paranoid all day. Today was the busiest I've ever seen the station car-park, and I ended up parking illegally in lieu of missing my train.

I have to give a shout-out of praise to whoever it was that left the pamphlet under my windscreen wipers today. After returning to my vehicle ten hours after I parked it (I was delayed at work by a late meeting, that's how peak I am) there was a small ball of fear, perhaps green-skittle sized, in my chest as I approached. Although secure in knowing that I was at a station where illegal parking was a norm rather than an exception, I was still wary. Of course as I grew closer to my door I scanned the windscreen for tell-tale signs of parking-mischief left behind by council workers. All seemed clear until I spotted the white slip under the passenger side wiper.

I don't think I'll be renovating my kitchen any time soon, but there's not a word on that pamphlet I didn't read just in case the local was hard up for cash enough to advertise on parking tickets. Fortunately someone who is not quite as peak as I am just has a good marketing strategy.

The peak train-ride was free today. For some reason the validation machines weren't working. If this had happened to me last year during the middle of the day, I would have saved less money.

It's hot then it's raining.
Australia set 433 and can't defend it.
Life is confusing.

SPAWN MORE OVERLORDS!

Happy Birthday Website!

I really like you and we've had some good times together. Sometimes I am really happy that I made you. On weekends like these, however, I am frustrated and almost regret that I taught myself to code in PHP.

Today I was terse instead of amiable. Where did I go wrong? Like seriously, I think things are starting to get to me.

It's actually quite interesting, or at least extremely coincidental, that for 2 years I have made this weekend one dedicated to finalising a new website.

Something tells me they used to be too good.

That is my car when they used to be used as Highway Patrol Cars in the 80's. Things were good then.

Filed Under: Nostalgia -> Lego and stuff that reminds me of Lego everyday.

So So busy catchphrase catchphrase

I've noticed that by about 3:30pm, on the days I work from 9, my teeth start to grind and/or generally feel uncomfortable within my jaw. It seems unavoidable as no amount of pre-work stretching or jaw exercises ease the condition. I think its stress, a topic I've harped on once or twice lately in this publication.

My position on stress is that I don't let things get to me. This is easy enough given that I have a 100% record of getting through everything life's thrown at me so far. I think I'm beyond complacency. But stress, as more and more medical reports claim, is apparently not just a mental condition. Physically spending time trying to meet goals before times has physical effects on the body that you can't mind over matter even though you think you should.

I'm happy, I really am. I may not be able to do anything about the physical affects of stress, but nothing stops me destroying the mental aspects.

On the train I came to the conclusion that being a rapper would be the most stressful job in the world. At least with most other stressful jobs they lead to remuneration which leads to goodies. As a rapper you're required to possess a myriad of worthwhile possessions just to be in the game. Where's the reward?

Later on the trip home, I remember thinking about journaling and how I suppose everyone has thoughts about stuff and I'm just one of the many who stops to writes them down. I then reasoned that it was only the really good things I wrote down, and that the rapper insight was probably one of those good things, but after typing it out I realise that it's not very poignant or anything and that I've pumped out an entry that is pretty worthless... It must be the stress...

I've had a lot to think about in the past few weeks. I like thinking on the internet or in front of others or just out loud if I have to, it makes things easier.

One of the things on my list of features to add to Bradism was hidden entries that only I could see. Why I decided that storing things on the internet is more efficient than in my brain... well... time does tell.

As fun as it is to psychoanalyse yourself everyday - and it is - doing it online forces you to engage in much stricter justification for your actions than your brain does when it knows no one else will ever hear your thoughts. Seeing as I haven't had time to code hidden entries nor write down some of the things I've been thinking lately, this is pretty much a summary of the hidden entries that would have been posted over the last fortnight had I ever had the time to code.

• I live my life like a sitcom. This is probably because I grew up with television as my primary role model. I first...
  
• Apparently my relationship is less fucked up than I think. When asked if I'd got back together with Tegan by my Dad a week since I’d last talked to him, I initially thought he was referring to the break up a few days earlier. In actual fact he was talking about the break up two weeks ago. He asked what week it was and I said 'TV Week'. Maybe it's the fact that an on-again/off-again relationship seems to cliché to be real that...
  
• When Mum checked to make sure that I hadn’t got back together with Tegan just because she was upset, I embarrassedly explained that it was actual ‘woman feelings’ that had swayed my mind. Although in hindsight, I seriously can’t tell if I looked into her pleading eyes, kissed her and said "let’s not give up" because I love her or because I thought it would sound really dramatic and would probably be effective in a movie about...
  
• live by the sword - die by the sword. My first ever relationship came about because I was writing a sitcom about dating and I figured I needed a decent reference for material. Mistakes were made...
  
• Here's a faggy insight. When I do something, I try and do it perfectly no matter how interested I truly am. It's a characteristic that means that even if something's not that important to me I'll appear that I'm completely committed to it. This lasts until I evaluate that my quality of life benefits from not doing that thing and then I drop it straight away. This is why people sometimes get confused when I...
  
• Is love confusing or is it confusion? I want to be alone, but I also don’t want her to leave. I want to stretch out but I also want to have my arms wrapped around her. Am I confused because I’m in love or in love because I’m confused? I hate not getting to the bottom of things…
  
• So if I am in love why would I not care if it ended tomorrow? I...
  
• Never post about jobs or girlfriends in the public journal. This is especially true when the public journal is actually known about by…
  

Right now my journal feels like it’s been driven ten kilometres below the speed limit to the shops twice a week and to church on Sundays.

Well it's safe to say, as of the end of this weekend it's the start of a new era. That's right, my website now has an RSS feed. Am I good at developing an application or what?

I started my fifth week of in town work this week. This also hailed the beginning of my fifth week of buying my self lunch instead of waking up early enough to make it - something I did actually do once.

With the Summer of Subway drawing to a close as the last of my 80 sub-club cards were handed over, I've had to come to terms with the choice and price of buying lunch from somewhere else. Although it could never match it, I found a café nearby to my office building that came close. A solid range of tasty meals that weren’t hard on the wallet, combined with a quiet table to sit at and a newspaper to read kept me coming back. Coming back… regularly…

I remarked to somebody, on one of those train rides home from work at peak hour where you inevitably sit with someone you know from somewhere, that I was practically becoming a regular at this café. I was excited about it, initially: friendly staff saying hello to me; guesses as to what my order would be; larger portion sizes although that may have been placebo. I envisioned a good future. Perhaps a paper always saved for me, a few extra chips and even, in my wildest dreams, the trust of a tab.

But things were moving too fast. Everyone kept asking how I was when I walked in and I felt predictable, vulnerable. I was creeped out. I started to distance myself, instead seeking more expensive lunches from further away. I tried to go back today and was greeted by their friendly smiles behind which hid a slight defensiveness about my absence. The extra slice of cheese on my burger with the lot revealed how much they liked me and appreciated my patronage.

I scraped the last of my food onto the fork and ate it. Moments later my plate was being collected by the waitress and I was waved a goodbye and wished a happy day. It was at that moment I knew I would never eat there again.

My lunch break stretched slightly over time today due to me having to walk further to find a new place to eat. Trying to cut down my eating time, I skipped reading the newspaper and instead wandered into the Myer Centre food court to try and find something quick. I settled on Spuds, mainly because it was in the corner of the food court away from this stall I'd looked at on before and then the woman asked if I wanted anything and I said "I'm just looking" and then I left.

At spuds, I picked the baked potato I wanted and my potato artist began serving up the toppings I wanted. She was a big one, drooled with all kinds of fatty layers. She also wasn't called a potato artist, I made that up. But she was very ugly and equally over-friendly. When she asked me if I wanted butter I said no and she looked at me with such an overjoyed expression that the only possible explanation was that she wasn't financially remunerated but was instead just fed whatever butter was left over at the end of the day.

My potato was very dry and had obviously been baked straight out of the ground. The chicken was also quite grimy and oily. All in all I didn't enjoy the meal and I was left quite spiteful towards the restaurant and thus wrote this harsh review of it. Following that I quickly went to JB HiFi to purchase Scrubs S3 and Arrested Development S2 on DVD to make myself happy with material goods.

This whole week each lunch time had held so much promise. I could go anywhere, eat anything. Each day was like an empty plate waiting to be ladled upon.

I made plans with Mum to meet her for lunch as she is currently working across the street. A few hours from lunch, however, she called and advised me of a meeting she'd forgotten and I was told she couldn't make it. It was OK though, I could go anywhere; I could eat anything.

1:30 came around and I reflexively locked my workstation and grabbed my glasses. I was in the elevator by the time I realised that I still didn't know where to go. All I knew is that I wanted something cheap, tasty as well as a quiet spot to read the paper and I knew where I could get it very easily.

As I approached the café my heart started beating faster. What was I doing? Why was their breakfast menu still out? Could I break the vow I made? Was I really coming back here for the cause of another journal entry.

I walked in and joined the line. There were no smiling faces from behind the counter. The mid-50's woman who works the grill and asks 'how are you' brushed past me to clear some plates and possibly dropped her shoulder. It had been too many days.

Oh God. They know about the journal. They've read it and they're going to kill me. I knew it was a bad idea to try and increase Google ad clicks by markering 'Bradism.com' on my money.

I ordered and went to buy a paper while it was prepared - the café was out. I sat to wait and my sandwich did not come quickly. When it did arrive, I was asked if I'd like cutlery. Suddenly the adrenaline left. I wasn't predictable. I wasn't a regular. I was normal. Lunch was still nice and after I got my bill I still had cash left for a Coke Zero. No one said "seeya next time" as they collected my plate and I sighed contentedly to myself as I scooped my change back in my wallet. One clink of a coin stopped time.

Four dollars change...

I looked up at the menu, the world slowly going out of focus and spinning behind me. '$6.90'.

I opened my mouth but no words came out. The man behind the counter winked at me.
'To pay for the paper', he smiled.

Wordlessly, I put my sunglasses on my head, walked out the door. It was at that moment I knew I would never eat there again.

April, with it's advent of the end of daylight savings and the return to rotation of warm and comfortable tracky-dacks, also brought to me a Sunday afternoon swimming with possibilities. I was supposed to spend some of that time on writing a story that, like a lot of my stories, I started writing a very long time ago and never finished.

Predictably, my attempts to write the story failed. Instead, the time I allocated was spent trying to fix Bradism stuff and inevitably spent reminiscing about past life events whilst reading my journal instead of fixing it. Alas, the great Australian Short Story was not going to be finished on this great Australian afternoon. In fact, it seemed more and more obvious as the day went on that I had nothing to write and past journal entries seemed to indicate that quitting my job at Woolworths has had a detrimental affect on my ability to post great anecdotal entries. So here's a great Australian Journal Entry about the Great Australian Nickname.

The Great Australian Nickname is great because of its simplicity. Like a drunken Brad, its humour is amplified by its repetitive irony. It's something I've come to appreciate. The fact that it's funny to call a red-headed guy "Bluey" is beautiful. The fact that every single red-headed bloke in Australia is called Bluey is just so mind-blowingly simple that it's majestic and makes me love my country at girly-feeling levels of emotion.

There was a Great Australian race-horse, called Pharlap who's great bursts of speed won him many races. At Woolworths, there was a nightfiller nicknamed Pharlap... He got fired...

You idiotic bastard! How dare you even try to steal my car? What is wrong with you? Did your parents not love you enough as a child? Were you seriously that badly neglected that you didn't learn the difference between right and wrong? How hard can this be? Stealing a VK Commodore – wrong; stealing a half-decent car with vents that actually idles properly – right. How do you walk into a car park and spot a VK with a snapped of indicator stalk dangling near the ignition – the rich smell of exhaust still parked directly behind it – and say "that’s the car for me!"

Are you aware that you don't need to shove a screwdriver through my lock to break into the car? You only need to bend a coat-hanger into an l-shape and pry apart the window seal to pop-open the door better than the actual key does? Not to mention the fact that you couldn't even start the car. Considering the VK Commodore is one of the most commonly stolen cars in Australia, well, I just hope you’re not planning on making a career out of this. I think the $100 I have to spend to get the lock replaced will be worth the laugh I had as I drove home just marvelling at how far society has plummeted to even produce delinquents of such a nature that the most basic of car thefts couldn’t be completed successfully. You didn’t even rummage through my CDs and I had 'Hello Nasty' in its case just sitting next to the driver's seat.

The funniest thing is that my insurance is due in 10 days that will put me $400 out of pocket as well as devalue my car another couple as another year passes since manufacture. If you weren't so incompetent, that $400 could have gone towards paying my excess and I would've been almost two grand towards my new car without evening having to wash it and try and sell it. I could have handled the loss of some Subway stamps and Josh's jumper for that, I really could of (sorry Josh). It would have been the best insurance scam ever – the completely legal non-scam. Do you think I should drive it back there tomorrow and leave it unlocked in case he or she wants to have another try? I'm seriously considering it. Good work you fucking moron.

Men's Health, the bible of helpful advice for dudes, recommended that I try the McDonalds Deli Choice Turkey and Cranberry Roll for lunch, as it is high in protein and carbs post work out without being loaded with too much cholesterol.

Given my lunch time situation, Men's Health had yet again delivered useful advice where appropriate, as well as the usual monthly diatribe about eating x to prevent y and that masturbation is healthy. So on Monday I went and ate one.

It was really nice, actually. The roll was toasted lovingly and the cranberry spread draped off the turkey like a stylish evening gown. So when I needed a quick lunch today which would leave me with time left to find a new mug, I decided I would get the same again.

The best thing about McDonalds is that if you're afraid of being a regular, you can just go to any one of the six McDonalds within walking distance from your office. Except I won't be going to the Myer Food Court one again because today's Deli Choice Turkey Roll was horrible. It was also oily and I don't understand how that's possible because no oil is used to cook it although the nerd that gave it to me was very fat...

I hate the Myer Food Court and also its lack of decent surrounding coffee mug stores.

Subway doesn't seem so good when you have to pay for it.

Peter Combe made for great in car entertainment when my mum used to drive 'us kids' around back in the days. Now, approaching 4 days since my car was broken into and I returned to the comfort of Mum's car - I haven't heard any Peter Combe tapes - but his life lasting messages have stuck with me every day. Or at least... during lunch.

Newspaper, Mumma. Newspaper, Mumma. Every day.

No matter how cheaply I buy lunch, whether it be the $12 burger at the Iugo business lunch that I crash or the leftover roast chicken and salad rolls that I bring from home, you can always tack on a dollar to the cost. Reading the newspaper is fast becoming my daily release for 30 minutes each day.

However the best part of buying the newspaper is leaving it behind when I finish lunch and then stealthily watching to see who will pick it up and read it when I'm gone. So if you've found an Advertiser in any restaurant on Hindley Street this week - It was me!!! I am the newspaper bandit.

Although perhaps how good I am is in fact an indication of how bad the paper is. The rest of my Peter Combe jokes will be saved for future entries.

Because this week has gone so fast.

I had lunch in the restaurant of a hotel today where there were countless papers so I didn't have to buy one! This totally made up for the fact that lunch cost way more than usual.

Like a stuttering comedian my journal is out of material. So here's what's in the news today.

8 Below.
The dramatic tale of a dog sled team. Based on the true story of "Snow Dogs".

John Howard to face AWB inquiry about links to Iraq. Possible plot for next season of Arrested Development?

It's a boy! Peach? Pear? What will Gwyneth Paltrow called Apple's new bro?

OK I stole that last one from the actual newspaper.

*shepherds crook drags u off stage*

I left work before 5pm on Thursday after spending part of the day eating hot cross buns.

On the way home I bought a carton of TEDs which, now that I think about it, was finished by the end of Saturday.

Initially my plan had been to spend the Monday and Friday doing work on the other website and using Saturday and Sunday for total relaxation. Surprisingly, this is pretty much what happened.

I was benefited by a stunning run of good code fixing on Friday which saw many bugs being fixed in a minimum of time. At the same time as this occurred my dream of organising an Easter Beer Hunt in someone's garden came to realisation.

On Saturday I did nothing. Absolutely fucking nothing. It was awesome.

On Sunday the Bulldogs won, entertaining with both their skill and ability to lose key big men to injuries. Then there was some more nothing. Then my other dream of seeing Final Destination 3 came prematurely all night long in an all night long movie marathon that treated Australian release dates with disdain.

I've been up for less than 12 hours today, but surprisingly it seems the longest day of the weekend. I got even more work done, fixed up stuff with this site and now I still have 50 minutes to iron my shirt for tomorrow.

I even eased my need for a Ryan's Rant update by seeing Ryan when he was picking up some pizzas in Blackwood on Saturday night and getting it orally from him.

This long weekend was long. But it was only four days. This time last year I had an 18 day break and I have no idea what I did with them. Bradism archives indicate I didn't cook my 400 day old muffins, which are now almost twice that old and still sitting in my cupboard.

Today was awesome. For the most part, very boring. For the best part, this:

I was looking forward to my lunch today not only in the hope that some mundane happening might spur some life into my faltering creative journal but mainly because I assumed that every national paper would be running special souvenir editions of Jason Gillespie's Century.

Imagine my further surprise after getting back to lunch as I alt-tabbed on the edge of my seat between work and Cricinfo live scores as Dizzy went on to make 200 runs in an innings. I can only assume the government will be announcing the commemorative public holiday tonight or some time tomorrow. If not that Monday between the weekend and ANZAC day, then perhaps ANZAC day itself could be replaced. Is this really asking too much?

I finished work on Friday and listened to lectures on the train. If that wasn't enough, after getting home I rode our new exercise bike and then spent a while in doing weights. I hadn't even had a beer in a week.

I distinctively remember thinking at one point "man am I motivated, I've almost finished a gym and I still have the whole weekend ahead of me."

I went on to sleep 21 of the next 36 hours. Of the hours spent awake, 3 of them were spent watching the Bulldogs game and shitting myself every quarter because the game was so intense that I shat myself and then needed many hours of sleep to get over the excitement.

Now I can't access my website and fix code errors and I can't study for my exam because the university website is horrible. So I'm just riding on that Friday night feeling and wearing Bulldogs boxers to hopefully carry me through the rest of the weekend.

Today was the day that I finally outlasted the Foxtel Corporation, who are now installing digital television in my house for free and with no fixed term contract, all because I waited for 2 years after they deprecated their analogue service.

The system still works!

Play Risk.
Go to a bottle shop and ask if they have any Turkish beer.
Streetball.
BBQ.

See Angus on the train.
Study for exam at work.
Watch Angus visit my site that night to see if I mentioned seeing him on the train that morning.

---

To be fair, the morning train trips each day are so early and blurry that I'm not entirely convinced that they happen.

Photos of the Month is Back:
http://bradism.com/display.php?id=28

This entry is to test my new "multiple-pages" display format as well as my "automatically email steve any updates" update feature.

Hi Steve I hope!

After parking next to the bowser, close your eyes and feel for the pump. With eyes remaining shut, insert into fuel hole and hold down the handle. Do not ease grip until you hear the click.

Shield your eyes as you rehook the pump and then walk to the teller to pay.

Inform the teller of the number of your bowser and then immediately start chanting "la la la la la" loudly as they tell you the cost.

Pay by credit card. If asked if you want a receipt announce that you do not want any way of remembering this day.

The tears in your eyes as you drive away should blur the price displayed on the sign out the front.

That's all I could think this morning as the train rocked along the tracks at a steady pace towards town and work.

It was the dawn of a new era, I'd only been awake for half an hour and I was going to arrive at the office as fresh as ever. In my ears 'You Could Have It So Much Better' gave contrasting boppiness to the greys and greens that streamed along each side of the carriage.

In my lap sat a Tupperware container, half filled with Weet-Bix and milk. 'Eating Breakfast on the Train Beta' was proving to be a solid success.

As solid as my Weet-Bix were quickly becoming, unfortunately, as the time delay between pouring milk at home and enjoying milk on train played ravages on the sogginess levels. However this is nothing that revision of business design documents for 'Eating Breakfast on the Train' couldn't handle.

Of all the things I won't be famous for inventing in my life, the plastic container that stores milk and cereal separately until the user combines them at the time of eating will be the greatest at typifying my life.
'Here', it will say, 'Was a man whose only greater value than efficient production was effective laziness'.

As a backup the coffee shop at Blackwood Station will only charge you a dollar for coffee milk and they'll let you pour it and optionally can froth it.

Yes… this is the dawn of a new era. And thanks to my genius it will be the only dawn I see for quite a while.

'Brad!' Mum burst through the door, alarmed. 'It's quarter to 8!'
I opened my eyes and to facer her.

'I know.'

She left. I stretched and smiled to myself. This is why some people always walk around with a smile on their face.

This is how sad my life has become.

This may seem like an update for May 1996, but I spent a small part of my largely uneventful weekend actually examining the website 'YouTube' which I have read about lately.

Their database of videos really is quite amazing (you can host your own Rage) and the interface is excellent. Loading times and easy to use embedded video as well show why it's so popular.

So here's a step into the mainstream with some unmarked yet excellently entertaining videos and I think you will laugh if you watch them:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBXal1GAA4A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OiTna_a4TCI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxkr4wS7XqY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jiKWEf2luMY

They're short, but if you got this far without watching any of them at least revisit this classic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxTFAkwlH_s

Despite feeling so rushed during every moment of free time that I have these days, I somehow found some hours last night to read through my last year of journal as well as look at a whole bunch of photos in a typical nostalgia binge; laughing at the good times, cringing at the bad ones.

This initially seemed like a waste of my precious time, but I took some value from it. Lately everything has seemed a bit disjointed and weird as I entertain feelings like "is this going to be like this for the rest of my life!?" and "is this going to be like this for the rest of my life?!" and other combinations with italics in different places.

However in the course of my self-indulgence I read through some of the entries of last May and I recalled that I felt remarkably similar at the same point in time last year. I even went as far as quitting my job for no real reason. The thing is, last year was fantastic! One of the best years of my life!

So I'm feeling optomistic now. But that didn't stop me from still feeling a little strange as I went to sleep on Sunday night. I think it was because I was sober.

I think I might have become an international student because of how passive-aggresive I was in proving to a topic co-ordinator that I didn't need to go to lectures.

Not only did I spend 2 hours in the library tonight after work putting on the finishing touches to my report six days before it's due, but it averages a reference every 30 words...

Today was a pretty good day for one that started with my fly being done up almost an hour after I put on my pants.

Work was more involving than usual compared to yesterday where at one stage I was spending time reading my old stories. But the most rewarding part of the day was immediately after.

Mum caught a later train so I walked home from the station. The introspective fifteen minute walk reminded me of how I used to always come up with those great story ideas on my walks home.

Not that I thought of any new stories, I just spent fifteen minutes thinking about how I used to think about stories.

Please wait 20 fucking minutes for this review to be prepared.

I went to AAMI Stadium for yet another Bulldogs loss in Adelaide.

Except this time they won, and it was awesome! Also they won by a lot and it made up for so many games were they just got thumped.

At the end, I stood in the grandstand clapping as the Port supporters who hadn't left at three quarter time trickled out. After the Bulldog's congratulated each other they walked to their cheer squad and clapped the remaining crowd. Then one of them looked towards my stand and did a fist pump right at me as I stood their clapping! As the only one left standing in that direction I felt very, very special :).

It more than made up for the $20 I tried and failed to put on the Bulldogs to win before the game, which puts that fist pump's value at over $24.50!

I helped out Chow with some guest photos for his 'Chow's Schitzel of the Week' column over on jgkp.com. We're all just internet celebrities. I feel so famous!

You can view it here.

I’ve recently started the Abs Diet, well at least I’m in the transition stage at the moment. This basically involves a lot of fresh salad, high protein and wholegrain foods. As I delve into its six meals a day eating structure I’ve basically originated with lunch and started to move outwards. Three out of five lunches this week have been turkey and salad on wholemeal.
Another aspect of the diet is a balance of all essential nutrients, a lot of which can be covered by sunflower seeds. So it was my lunchtime plan today to go to Charlseworth Nuts in the Myer Centre and get a bag of seeds after finding an appropriate sandwich retailer to match my dietary requirements.

Strolling into the food court I noticed a hubbub around Healthy Habits sandwich bar which looked like it was in the process of its new opening, what with the balloons everywhere and giant sandwich character jumping around.

Now an important part of this story hinges on the contents of my wallet. I only had a $5 plus lots of change including a few golds. However at home in my draw I had $160 in notes that I left there earlier in the week and forgot about. Thus I was quite stubborn that I wasn’t going to go to the bank when I could just get money from home.

Based on their nutritious values Healthy Habits seemed the perfect place to find lunch. I approached the counter and placed my order for a wholemeal turkey sandwich with lettuce, tomato and carrot. This was made quickly, cut and wrapped and looked quite appetising. This was shitting all over Sub Primo, which was about 10 metres to my left with very little business. No doubt people had been reading my site...

"$11.20" said the smiley server, snapping me out of my thoughts as she was placing my sandwich on the counter. I was taken aback, and asked her to repeat the price.

"$11.20."
I opened my wallet and peered within the change compartment, adding up all I could see. No way could I make $11. This was a fucking rip off. But it looked so nice! They didn’t take EFTPOS or credit card.

"I’ll just walk to the ATM" I told her. She smiled back in agreement.
I started walking to the edge of the food court towards the ATMs and then I kept going. I walked around the corner and up onto the escalator and left my sandwich sitting on the counter. No way am I paying $11 for a sandwich, not unless it’s the same size as that giant sandwich guy, who had curiously disappeared over the course of my order.

The escalator was reaching its summit and I was thinking to myself what a great journal entry this would be as I strolled back out onto the mall and onto the search for a better lunch. It was as I stepped into the sunshine that I saw him, the Sandwich. He and some helpers were standing on the mall giving out balloons and bouncing around. I swore to myself, ducked my head and strode off as fast as I could.
"Hey!" I heard a yell, but I didn’t turn around.

I reached another store in a minute or two and bought the same sandwich in roll form for almost half the price. I even had money left for a sugar-free ice tea. I thanked the lady and left to get back to work with my delicious and well priced lunch bagged and in hand.

I strode past the Myer Centre on the way back but kept to the shadows as I passed. Suddenly I heard quick thuds behind me. Before I could turn completely around I was taken down by the sandwich. He trapped me against the sidewalk. I quickly unpinned my arm and grabbed his head and slammed it into the ground. He rolled off me, dazed, and I stood up. I went to kick him but he grabbed my leg and threw me backwards. He stood and tried to catch his breath as we circled each other. I looked at my ice tea, now spilt on the ground.

I taunted him, curling my finger towards myself. He screamed and lunged at me but I side stepped and he caught my elbow to the back of his neck. He turned around and swung but I’d ducked and pulled out my trademark Mortal Kombat II uppercut. He fell backwards and I stamped my knee into his back and ground him into the street. He struggled but couldn’t get up, I no doubt abetted by the fact his arms where sticking straight out the front of his body. I used one hand to lift up his face and then slammed it into the ground. And again, and again and again. I left his bloody body twitching there on the sidewalk and strode through the crowd of onlookers, collecting my strewn bagged lunch as I passed by. I was spattered with blood, but it was casual Friday and I hadn’t even shaved for two days so it went unnoticed.

I figure I’ll have to wait three to five days before I can go back to the food court and get those sunflower seeds. But that’s probably ok because I doubt I would have had the money for them today anyway, and the last thing I need to do is beat the shit out of a giant cashew.

I have a blender that can blend anything.

I also have a Journal Search to make it easier for internet people to stalk me.

Men's Health arrived this month for reading on the train.
Ah, Men's Health, the magazine dedicated to telling you how to improve every aspect of your life so that you can quickly rise the ranks of society and spend the rest of your life living in fear of losing your good looks and dying.

Prostate Cancer is the biggest man killer out there. Men's Health's advice is that ejaculating regularly reduces the risk of prostate cancer and that men should masturbate three times a week. As an alternative, once a day you can eat Brazil nuts. I don't know about the editors of Men's Health but seriously Brazil nuts just really don't rate that high for me.

I was talking health today to a guy I met on the trip home and when I told him that 3 Brazil nuts a day could prevent prostate cancer he asked "wouldn't that hurt?!"

They say "Smile, people will wonder what you're up to!"

I tried this technique as I walked along Hindley St on the way back from lunch and people just thought I was insensitive.

It was a good weekend. I went to the gym after work before cooking a nice dinner and watching the Bulldogs lose a game and a player at Josh's house followed by some 5-alive.

Saturday I actually spent some time in the sun for the first time in a week and taught myself more about socket sets as I pulled apart a basketball ring. Then I played basketball before cooking a nice dinner and then enjoying a social evening at my abode.

Sunday was quiet and cooking a nice dinner and watching the Da Vinci Code while I ironed was a fitting way to settle the weekend.

WesternBulldogs.com.au is the only website for an AFL club that has it's injury list as a main menu item on its website.

Today at work while I was at lunch someone left a Robert Murphy Tazo on my desk in what was one of the cruelest pranks imaginable.
I created a shrine for him with cut outs of the different leaves and flowers that I found on my chewing gum wrapper and ice-tea label.
My prediction, based on the Bulldogs site's header banner is that Cooney is the only one left to go.
:(
Oh God the more I look at it the worse it gets. Giansiracusa is so obviously twinging a hamstring, Murphy looks as if he's just got thrown into a fence and the way Darcy is twisting that knee... I just wish Cooney didn't look like he's just stepped into a divot at full sprint because his face appears as if he's twisted his ankle and will be out for six weeks from as soon as he hits the ground...

I'm pretty adamant that I don't want kids, ever. This is part of my
"work reasonably hard" and then "retire reasonably early" financial
plan that just won't work with more than one mouth to feed.

However,
today on the train this guy got on with a baby. The baby sat in a pouch
around his chest and it had a little shield to screen the baby from
wind and weather. After getting out of the cold and onto the train, the
dad didn't push the shield down far enough and I spent 10 minutes
facing the cutest freaking baby ever just trying to peer over this tiny
wall and gazing so curious and innocently at everything on the train. I
was stopped mid sentence several times just in awww of the adorable
little guy in his teeny little coveralls.

So it made me think, I
still reckon I don't want kids but now I'm a little less certain. Maybe
I could change my mind? I might want a kid... I want that kid...

Greetings,

Although I am not a regular Boost juice customer I am a fan of your product.
It's not so much the juice or smoothie you provide but actually the firm and sturdy yet easily disposable cup that everything comes in.

I recently started working full time and after three years of university getting up early in the morning really hurts. As a compromise I developed a scheme for eating my breakfast on the train to earn 15 minutes of sleep each day. I then changed my diet and bought a blender so that breakfast in the morning could be even healthier. However I am
now struggling to transfer my smoothies aboard this train dining strategy. This brings me to my enquiry.

I am interested in obtaining a quantity of large cups, lids and straws to use each week that are of the same quality as Boost cups. It has also occurred to me that if as an organisation Boost were to act as a supplier of cups, lids and straws charging me a minimal fee it may provide some benefit to Boost. After all, I am on a very busy train for over forty minutes which equals to high brand name exposure for Boost given the labelling on your cups.

In this context consider that there is a Boost outlet within close proximity to the Adelaide railway station (the only
stop to dismount for work on in Adelaide). Also consider that many people do not have time for breakfast in the morning and catch the train hungry (I have no academic evidence to back this up). If there are not already dollar signs appearing in your eyes, understand that I am also the owner of a popular internet website that receives almost 50 unique hits per day! I would of course feel liable for ensuring that my mainly Australian audience appreciates Boost's role in my slightly quirky life.

I would love to talk more to you if you are interested in supplying me with enough cups for 1 home-made smoothie per business day for the next couple of months. I could even collect them from an outlet if it's more convenient for you! You can contact me on my mobile or reply to this address.

If you are not interested in this opportunity then thank you for your time and I hope this concept at least supplied you with one smile!

Regards,
Brad

I injured my ankle and was out for 4-6 entries.
I wish I didn't have to stop taking my legs for granted.

To fit the entire smoothie in the Boost Cup there is a friendly mid point between too much mixing and not enough mixing where it hits a minimum.

The way to win money on TAB SportsBet is to bet on one of those three game dealies.

Some things about photoshop from work. I love the training courses at work, they cover everything! If anyone from the 80's calls me I am prepared for communicating with them professionally and effectively.

Time to buy a brown suit and brown tie...

Quote:

Dear Brad,

Thank you for your email and inquiry.

At Boost we have reusable insulated mugs for sale as an option to the polystyrene cup. We would encourage you to buy one of these as you can fill it with your own drinks and when you visit the store you get a FREE Boost Supplement each time they bring it to be refilled.

Love Life
Boost

Sure, but where's the hilarity in that!? This solution would, however, have prevented a few of the spillage problems that my current ad hoc smoothie holder is causing.

The battery that vibrates my toothbrush when I clean died today.

Now it's just like brushing my teeth with a regular toothbrush.

It was only a coincidence that I told everyone that I spoke to this week that the Indie Rock band The Red Paintings show on Saturday night was one not to miss. In actual fact I just thought they were alright and I figured pumping them up as much as possible would improve my chances of recruiting people to come with me. In the end I could only pull Sam.

The two of us arrived at 8:20 but the doors didn't open until 9 so we got some subway. That part isn't really important other than we saw some members of the support band, Brillig, outside the venue and it was awkward when we then walked away again.

We returned after 9 and settled into a seat at The Jade Monkey which truly did live up to its description of "like listening to a band in your living room". I had a few beers from the fridge and we sat through the drum machine backed Brillig who closed with a Phil Collins cover.

Then there was some radiohead in the background as indie people shuffled around and we stood up to watch the beginning of the theatrics.

The Red Paintings truly impressed me. They were classy and for the most part extremely professional for a band unfortunately playing to only ~150 people. It's only a truly good band that can use gimmicks, in this case hulking robot decorations and sci-fi voice overs combined with Japanese orientated costuming, to enhance rather than support a set.

Having only heard the "Destroy the Robots" EP which helped me categorise TRP as "up and coming quality" I was stirred by the strength of their live performance. The aforementioned gimmicks added frills to a passionate and energetic two hour set that rode on the crowd throughout.

The lead singer, Trash McSweeney, was a beacon of this energy; a stark contrast to the serene facade presented by the other standing instrumentalists (bassist, violinist and cellist). All extremely talented, they delivered their sound cohesively only to alternate to posed statues whilst the song ebbed in a new direction. With the violinist providing backing vocals often embracing some excellent albeit creepily delivered spoken word from the cellist it was a joy to hear three such superb, distinct voices compliment each other so well.

Not to be left unmentioned was the drummer who although appearing to be left in the background provided the rhythm required for the rasping string section and wailing guitar to be so effective.

In two hours this band produced so many good songs that I lost track. Some stand outs were Pickles, Send My Love, Mad World, Destroy the Robots, It Is As It Was and I’ll Sell You Suicide. Definitely a band you cannot afford to miss live. At the end of the show, after I bought an EP, I saw the lead singer as we walked out and I got to say to him "that was a great show". I wasn’t lying.

Every 4 years something special happens. Somehow I get a copy of FIFA
World Cup for PC and I spend hours obsessively playing it and swearing
at it until I win the world cup with some obscure nation.

Finally
after I've waited 32 years Australia made the world cup. This is in
real life as well as the game. I went and watched it last night at New
Yorks with Angus and some others and it was
entertaining, intense and probably the only good game of soccer I've
ever seen. There were a lot of soft free kicks and softer players
taking dives, much to the ire and moans of the Australian supporters in
the bar. It really ruined the game, why did they have to be easily
upset about it? What sport did they think they were coming to watch?

After eating an apple a day for what seems like months, I decided to engage in a fruit mix-up and bought some oranges at the start of this week.

However it was only this morning, after I finished my thing of yoghurt and pulled the orange out of my drawer that I realised... I have no idea how to eat this fucking thing.

Imagery flashed before me; for some reason I believed it might be incredibly juicy and literally leak all over the desk if I punctured it. That was assuming I could actually work out how to properly remove the skin from it. Frightened, I reached for the phone and dialled 0, 0 and hesitated over the third zero.

Thank God for the internet. I changed my mind and turned to my IM contact list and beseeched Bradism No. 3 commenter Zoe for advice. She was equally clueless, but thankfully a quick Google search produced accurate results. And as the internet specified I began using my spoon to peel small portions of rind off. As each section ripped off I cringed in fear of the surely impending geyser of juice. It never came. All in all morning tea took about 45 minutes.

Up until today I figured that if I was trapped in the wilderness I, given my general health and ingenuity, would do well enough to survive. I think this misconception was finally truly shattered about 3 minutes into eating that orange when all nearby heard me mutter "what the hell... there are seeds in this thing?"

The movie "Cars" is produced by Pixar and I thought it was quite good
and met their lofty standards. It's the tale of a race car who is quite
good at what he does in a controlled world and is very focussed on
doing well at all costs. However when he loses control of his world he
realises that sometimes in life what's important is not where you get,
but how you get there along the way. In the end the moral of the story
was that it doesn't matter if you win the race, it just matters that
you get a podium finish and go on to open a succesful chain of hotels.
There was a fart joke too, so fucking 5 stars from me.

After I left the theatre and filtered through the car park towards my commodore, it was quite eerie.

2003 Part I

Quote:
January 13 2003
Today
I started "Operation: Lose Some Freaking Weight". I was going to go for
a run in the evening after it cooled down but the cricket seemed more
interesting so I ate a bannana. It's the second bannana I've eaten in
the last 7 years. The first I ate about August last year during
"Operation: Stop being so Freaking Fat".

This was
suprisingly one of the more effective enterprises I started. Years
later I read a lot about nutrition and I discovered that throughout
Uni, particularly in 2003 when I lost about 10kg, I stumbled across
excellent weight loss techniques without trying! Big breakfast with the
majority of the days carbs and low GI whole wheats, plenty of low fat
yoghurt high in calcium. Binge drinking... Well anyway It was pretty
cool. I miss bananas.

Quote:
January 15 2003
I
do about 20 reports per day and seeing that my handwriting it's pretty
shocking it's kind of hard to tell apart my slashes and my 1 for
January. Well, on about the 9th of January I forsaw that if I had to do
reports on the 11th of January, it would suck because that's a lot of
ones and slashes that could be confused with each other. Fortunately
the 11th of January was a Saturday so I wouldn't be working. Sure, that
doesn't seem that important but then I said to myself "hey Brad, that's
really important, people on the Internet want to know about this stuff"

I was starting to get the hang of this journal thing.

Quote:
February 2 2003
Brad:
If you ask a chick to dance, and she gives you the finger and licks the
finger as she gives it to you, what do you think that means?

I was not starting to get the hang of this "women" thing.

Quote:
...Really,
when it comes down to it all I'm just recruiting more people to give me
attention. Yes, it seems I'm an attention whore, a shy attention whore
who lacks self confidence. Bizarre as that sounds, from now on I think
I'll be introducing myself to women like this; "Hi, my name's Brad and
I plan on never having sex with you"

Oh God the constant self-analysis is starting!

Quote:
February 20 2003
I
figured I might have been pretty harsh and, well, slightly unfunny in
my unprovoked rant against Cowan yesterday. Today I planned to create
him a new Resume that would be much more fun and less fabricated.
Instead I finished the game "Spiderman: Seperation Anxiety" on the SNES
emulator at work. It seems like a waste of time now, but I say it was
worth it.

It was worth it...

Quote:
February 27 2003
The
thing about transition is that it involves a lot of sacrifices, and
generally a lot of phone calls… far too many phone calls. Oh, and let’s
not forget about the uncertainty. It’s not “am I doing the right thing
with my life” it’s more “am I getting off at the right bus stop here?”
And now there’ll be like, thirty times as many people as there were at
school who can only think up two different things to say to me before
they walk away after a minute of uncomfortable heel rocking (“Hi how
are you” and “[random expletive] you’re tall”).

My opinion of uni before I started is so contrasted to my opinion of it now, it's insane!

Quote:
May 15 2003
I
was thinking about arrogant people and how I really don't have any
problems with them being arrogant. Even when they're driving and
someone decides to be a dumbarse and overtake someone in the left lane,
I just go "yep, ok." I don't try and speed up and overtake them again.
I'm just pretty chill.
In this survey thingy there was a scenario
where some guy, who didn't do any work, was better than you at
everything. You had to say how you felt about him in all these
categories, whether you liked them or not, how you felt when they
failed etc. I wrote that I was happy for the guy. I mean really, anyone
that's better than me at everything must be quite the character. That's
a fairly good effort. According to this scenario he can even write
longer journal entries than me. I mean, wow, this guy is good. No, I'm
good, so he must be great!

Some self-confidence is forming!

Quote:
June 2 2003
I wish I could fix the part of my brain that keeps saying "Super Nintendo > Homework" but alas.

This seems to be a chronic condition.

Thus concludes today's look back at the first half of 2003. Reading old journals is remarkably easier than writing new bollocks.

Through coincidence, the 500th entry celebration continues today with a
look at a period in my life where relationships were a priority... or
at least an interest.

2003 part II - 2004 part I

But first...

Quote:
June 30 2003
this isn't a bitch. I'm pre-writing my own biography. I can't write an autobiography because I'm unable to get that personal.

God, if only. Probably the only thing I wrote in my wintry journal that wasn't a potent insight.

Quote:
December 18 2003
I
feel like trying to get a girlfriend is like trying to download a
1.4gig DVD rip of "Attack of The Clones" on a $10 a month dial-up
connection. First of all, I have no idea where to start, because I
don't know of any good sites. Then, when I finally do find a site,
well, progress takes forever. Have you ever tried to download 1.4 gigs
on a crappy 56k? It's very slow, very frustrating, perilous and
unfulfilling. I don't even have any "Download Clients" to "assist" me.
Also, prostitutes cost $390 dollars an hour, and I don't have $9.75 to
waste. Oh wait, I fucked up the metaphor...

Well this explains some things...

Quote:
January 4 2004
How
the hell do you let yourself get so vulnerable and open with another
person? I mean, I can't even piss if I know someone's within earshot.
What, and now I'm just supposed to get completely naked and ejaculate
in someone? There's no fucking way that's ever going to happen. Can you
imagine how awarkward that would be?

How times change. I did this just today! Didn't even spill any on the floor either.

Quote:
January 11 2004
weddings
are supposed to be special, so to make up for the lack of formal
clothing the service will be held over the top of an active volcano.
The Bride and all the helpers will come down the aisle on office chairs
in a race. The minister who marries us will not be religous and might
possibly be Chris Grant or Luke Darcy or BOTH! Fuck, maybe I'll marry
Luke Darcy instead... Mmmmm, weddings.

Probably getting ahead of myself at this stage.

Quote:
April 30 2003
Things to do:
...
-Trick a woman into going out with me
...

Quote:
March 2 2004
...
-Trick a woman into falling in love with me.
...

Now I was making progress. I was also making plans...

Quote:
April 9 2004
Which doesn't help with women. The conundrum:

I need a woman to help me find an appropriate shirt.
I need an appropriate shirt to find a woman.
For years I've been deadlocked in this deadly embrace.

I'm sure the fact that I was making database references on a daily basis contributed nothing to this dilemma.

Quote:
April 24 2004
Everything
has fallen into place. I bought clothes and I have finished installing
the car stereo and have found a girl who likes me. That's really cool,
because she's sweet and mad and goes pretty loud and still sounds good.
The girl's ok too.

And there I was, at the very beginning of my first relationship and already not taking it seriously...

It was the shortest day of the year today. I tried to take a photo.

After this morning's 2:2 victory... uh I mean draw, which I slept
through, I decided to get more information from the man who has been
the face of Australian football the past 2 weeks: Gus.

This interview is made of direct quotes from the chatlog between us this morning, almost all are completely in context.

Brad
The Socceroos have come from behind twice to draw with Croatia and
qualify for the final 16! What were your immediate thoughts following
the final whistle?
Gus Pure ecstasy
Brad At what stage in the past two weeks did you know, without a doubt, that the Socceroos would qualify for the next round?
Gus: I never did
Brad How many men in the past 3 games have you hugged?
Gus Too many. Slight wood has been felt also during these embraces.
Brad
Would you put this "wood" down to the adrenaline or is this more
related to the exuberant shirt removal that follows goals, victories
and sometimes just a good through ball
Gus ...pass.
Brad How do you react to claims that Australia are too physical?
Gus I wish they would be more physical.
Brad With you?
Gus I think they are awesome
Brad How... patriotic...
Gus You can't pretend to be patriotic by wanting to talk about it after it happens.
Brad Some sort of "Don’t Kiss and Tell" policy?
Gus Move on! Well, actually, don't move on coz I am going to bed. I stayed up and watched Australia.
Brad I was hoping to remember this day forever through your words
Gus That's like someone walking into a shop after it's been robbed and saying that they were involved in the robbery.
Brad So you're saying that the Socceroos are robbers? common thieves? is that why they are so violent?
Gus No. Talk some sense
Brad Man of the Match, for you?
Gus The Hamburgular.
Brad If Tim Cahill asked you to look after his Pets for a weekend, would you do it?
Gus I'd look after all his assets

So there you have it, Angus apparently wants to manage Tim Cahill's finances and Australia through to lose to Italy on Monday.

The soccer was intense last night. 0:0 at half time. 3:3 at full time. No goals in the extra period. Australia beats Italy 5:4 in the penalty shootout. Lady Sovereign's "9-5" chavs up my room as Australian players do their pre-programmed dance across the monitor and the option to replay or quit to main menu comes up. I almost missed the start of the actual soccer because of that goal that Totti scored in the 89th minute to equalise and send the game into extra time. Nevertheless I have probably not yelled at my computer that much since ten weeks ago when Ballard signed onto MSN the exact second after I selected shut down from the start menu.

Alas EA Sports' 'FIFA World Cup 2006' can have no bearing on real life save making me spazz out like a maniac as I drive hurriedly to The Vic to watch Italy play Australia in the Round of 16. Post midnight kick-offs on work nights be damned, I wasn't going to miss out on a piece of Australian history! I figured I'd get there, have a beer, leave at half time with Australia 3:0 down and 32 years later tell my unplanned children "I was there!"

I hate soccer. It's such a stupid game. Yes, it's skilful and there can be good goals and they're fit, athletic, but it's still stupid. One night whist camping and drinking Josh and I began playing a game of Trouble with alternative rules. We had reasoned that if you needed a 6 to get a guy out of home then (logically) getting a 1 would mean having to put him back in. Although I can't remember the other rules in detail there were four land mines that also sent pieces back home (played by white M&Ms) that you could move around the board when you didn't have any guys out (which was pretty common). We played 'Cunt', as it became affectionately know as, until we ran out of alcohol and neither of us managed to get a piece to the goal.

The game was fun enough, but obviously we never played it again. Although some skill and strategy was involved it was just too fucking hard to reach the goal. However in a scenario where 'Cunt' was played regularly after our fathers, and our father's fathers and all our friends played it so often that it became part of our way of life, you can imagine how passionate we could be about it. And sure, we could place mines perfectly and execute flawless piece formation as we travel around the board... then still lose because your opponent just hits four consecutive sixes and gets one guy halfway around the board in one go. But it'd be stupid.

I think the ending of last nights game was perfect. Not because I support Italy or want Australia out or anything. I think it's great because it says "Check it out Australia; this is the game you're following." It also means I can get more sleep again. Finally, the game was entertaining as fuck and I think Australia have really added something to this World Cup at least. Still, bad luck boys. Maybe now this country can ignore soccer again... time to turn our focus to World Cunt Championships, Sri Lanka 2009.

I wonder how long a formula of substituing one strong coffe per hour of sleep lost would work before my kidneys freaked out.

Current Scientific Study Results:
1 Day
4 Coffees
Pee Colour: Pale Yellow

A year ago I got home from an exam, made lunch and sat on the internet when I discovered that Google Earth was now covering the suburbs of Adelaide. I was really excited because seeing stuff from space really does it for me. I think this is why I have a similar obsession with visiting a tiny town.

Anyway I was supposed to make an entry that night about how I'd seen my house from space and then go on to explain that I have an obsession with visiting a tiny town. But I put it off, forgot about it and I never made that post.

This won't happen anymore because I have an ideas pad which I mainly use for storing phone numbers that I look up at home but need to call at work. However upon reflecting about how I would write it today I noticed some differences. Now it seems wrong to be so naive about the power of a web application, after all I'm supposed to build them not like them! But mainly I noticed that if I wrote it today I would never be able to convey the innocence and wonderment of a boy who had longed to see his house from space and to have photos taken of himself next to tiny cottages. This is not because I've lost my innocence, it's just because I'm not trying very hard at writing!

A lot of my favourite shows have gone down a particular path. Scrubs, Family Guy, The Simpsons even Arrested Development all got to the stage where instead of continuing to build their success that just tried to recreate what had been successful. They stopped trying.

I have an exam on Friday morning. I haven't been to a single lecture or tute the entire semester. I haven't started studying yet. I am really hoping I Simpsons this one, and don't Arrested Development it up.

After studying yesterday for about 12 hours I went to my exam and
kicked the shit out of it. I even had time to write out the
short-answer questions at the top of the page for the questions I
answered. My thumb hurt at the end of it, but that's the kind of pain I
can afford to trade for an entire semester of turning up to classes and
reading anything.

You
ever play basketball, or some other other sport where you're just
screwing around and you take a stupid shot from some wack angle and it
just goes straight in? You're like "yeah, awesome, I didn't even try"
and then you get the ball back and just shoot again and it goes in
again! And then again! Everyone has a laugh. This analogy sums up my
entire three and a half years of uni.

In fact it also sums up most of my basketball career.

After
the exam I went to Marion for my traditional reward program of buying
myself shit for being so good at exams. I bought a CD and a slice of
pizza. Then I went through Myer and was accosted and doused with some
fruity cologne. Then home, cleaned my room, then gym, then pool, now
sleep. This afternoon will be my entire uni holidays so that sucks.
Because I usually sleep half of my uni holidays I will have to catch up
a lot.

I remember the day when I decided that I needed a toothbrush that
vibrated in my mouth. I thought it might take a little effort to obtain
one, but it eventuated that they were very accesible. You just had to
go to Woolworths and buy one. For months I've enjoyed the service of my
toothbrush but a few weeks ago mine died. Since then I have been
relegated to brushing manually. But finally I said "enough is enough",
I'm strong minded, handsome, well to do! And so I got a new toothbrush.

It
was a good weekend. I glorified the attending exams not lectures
lifestyle, won basketball and the Bulldogs beat West Coast. I also got
cookies working. Good times.

Eating is really good. This year I've learnt a lot about foods and cooking and really I've found that Turkey is pretty much the best meat ever. In fact if I had to select a song that perfectly captured my true feelings for turkey it would be DJ Sammy's 'Heaven', which I sang to about 300g of lunch meat late friday night.

Quote:
Now, nothing could change what you mean to me.
There's a lot that I could say
But just hold me now,
Cause our love will light the way.

Baby you're all that I want.
When you're lying here in my arms
I'm finding it hard to believe
We're in heaven.

And love is all that I need
And I found it there in your heart.
It isn't too hard to see
We're in heaven.

Another food source that's really great are the new 'UP&GO ENERGIZE'. They're like delicious protein shakes that are cheap and fulfil all my health fag needs. I stumbled into Coles tonight and they were on special! While I drank one I crooned:

Quote:
Wise men say: Only fools rush in,
But I can't help falling in love with you.

Shall I stay - Would it be a sin,
If I can't help falling in love with you?

As a river flows
gently to the sea
(This is where I stopped singing to drink it)
Darling so it goes
Some things were meant to be

Take my hand - Take my whole life too,
For I can't help falling in love with you.

I also think that tinned sweet corn is rocking as well. However singing a camp love song to a tin of corn seems a bit psycho to be honest.

This is my tribute to Ryan. He hasn't posted an entry in over three
months now. Once upon a time he updated daily. He was a good kid.

I
am going back to uni one day a week starting soon. I was hoping to
offer him the opportunity to just follow me to uni one day a week to
maybe break up his life with some fresh uni moments that he could then
write up in his journal. I really miss him. I really miss having a site
on the internet that often mentioned me.

Today I caught a later
train because I was at work a little longer than normal. It was dark on
the train and I was tired. It was also busy and I was crammed into a 4
with an old couple right in front of me. I kept falling asleep in the
dark and then jerking in spasms as my body tried to keep me in the
realm of reality. The jerking didn't convey that though, it conveyed
"this guys a crack addict".

By about the fifth jerk, I just said to them "It's ok... I'm a crack addict".

Ryan
would have told that story of severe social awkwardness so much better
than me. And now he's dead. I miss you little buddy. Please click some
ads to raise money for his funeral.

Alarm Swear Shower Smoothie Toothpaste Moisturiser Idle Drive Train
Computer Work Coffee Work Dump, Stretch Work Meeting Work Woolworths
Work Lunch Work Train Nutri-Grain Drive Abs Lats Chest Quads Hamstrings
Shoulders Up&Go Shower Flex Dinner Crappy Journal Entry Sleep.

They
say that Alzheimer's can be caused by having too much routine and not
doing enough lateral thinking. I would believe this but I didn't
understand it until this morning when I drove into the station and
reached over to turn my silent stereo down as I approached the car
park. You've got to keep those synapses sharp. I might try doing some
Sudoku, I have time on the train in the evenings I could probably fit
them in each week quite easily...

Either that or quit binge drinking...

Note to self: Investigate correlation between eating giant schnitzels and the distortion of space-time.

(The
only proof I was here today is that the Previous/Next Page links for
stories are now W3C compliant because their accessability now caters
for MORONS!)

This is basically a parody post but to sum the day up anyway I saw that
pelicans have huge mouths during lunch, went to the gym after work and
then had tea with Dad.

One improper dismount after doing external shoulder rotations on a back
extension machine is all it's taken me to add 60 years to my life. To
think that 6 hours prior I was walking through Rundle Mall and gazing
at the back of an old man with two walking sticks and I steadily
overtook him, thinking to myself "I'm an advocate of perseverance, but
I'm glad that ain't me yet."

The
day had earlier started so well. That is after I sat on a wet seat on
the train. But I went to Woolworths and found that they had both
Nutri-Grain bars and Up&Go Energize's on special. I should have
seen the omen, that they only had caramel, as a sign of things to come.

After
seeing a physio today (who hasn't charged me yet but I have fears of
the expense considering the session included the shaving of my upper
posterior) I have learnt that I'm not even allowed to sit down for 3
days. It's all either lying down or standing up. I average about 45
seconds to transition between. No sitting means that I've had to
elevate all the important peripherals of my pc. As it stands now I feel
more like a DJ than a journalist, and have a strange urge to throw my
hands up in the air when I change tracks on the occasions I use it. On
some advice for my predicament I tried to attract some hot chicks into
my room to ease the boredom of standing by playing Lil' Jon's "Get Low"
but none were forthcoming and the one time I tried to get low it caused
me to spasm in pain. Needless to say, I dread toilet but equally
unfortunate is that it also hurts to fart.

Dancing is underrated and I miss it.
Blow drying your hair is awesome and I will miss it when I lose the strapping off my back.
Eating standing up is weird. Eating lying down is horrible.
The meaning of the term 'Pelvic Floor'.

You are my favourite friend who picks his nose, eats it and doesn't care what you think.

I've young manned myself, sort of. I can almost do things like reach
over, pick up things and sit down. Suffice to say the last week has
been quite a shitty one. Pretty much because it has been so harrowingly
unproductive!

It
took time, but I finally started getting better. This morning I managed
to get out of bed without the aid of any pain medication and I've been
clean all day. This morning in the shower, after taking off my pants
was finally rendered trivial, I triumphantly ripped the strapping on my
back off and dramatically threw it in the trash can as I walked back to
my room. I unfortunately missed and had to spend 20 seconds squatting
down to pick it up again so I could dramatically and more accurately
throw it in the bin again but the intent was there.

I get to go to work tomorrow and I'm looking forward to it for the first time in a while.

The problem with essays that have no due date is that it's hard to effectively procrastinate. It's like having a while loop with no stopping condition. I guess Lichtenstein owe that much to their FIFA World Cup 2006 victory in professional mode this evening.

Besides, this essay is supposed to be a reflection of what I've learnt in my time at work. A reflection of what I did during a period of time? By golly that sounds like a giant journal entry for marks, really!

Unfortunately my bedtime rambling limit seems to stem at around 500 words and so it's been hard to truly pump out 3000 of poignant insight and self-analysis that finally someone other than me will have to read. This essay should write itself.

But even when I broke the essay down into so many sections and sub sections that to meet the word limit I only needed to write 200 words about fifteen unique things I do at work, I couldn't finish it. Furthermore after inserting the notes from my log book, and dot points from my speech I still can't do it. I guess the problems with essays that write themselves is they, inevitably, don't end up writing themselves.

I have uni tomorrow, I haven't even started yet and I am already up until early hours of the morning doing assignments. I swear the air is warmer, I love it!

Oh God. Uni is so good. It's like a sweet, refreshing rain and I am
like some foreign, clueless farmer who has planted crops during the
wrong season and is now realising my horrible fuck up might be
completely erased. So I guess that's joy? 'Joy' is probably more
concise.

I
got up at 9, went to some lectures, played some ball at the gym albeit
crippledly and then went to the Coopers Bar where I didn't actually
drink anything but I could of drunk during the day and then I got home
at 3. Every inch of that campus is dripping with potential.

I
can't really say anything bad about the whole return, but this quote
was in my ideas pad for potential use in my 'back to uni' entry:

Quote:
Skipping
subjects isn't cool anymore? I feel like I'm the dad in a sitcom where
he goes back to college and everything has changed.

- Clean Shaver
- Shopping
- Fitness Circuit
- Bulldogs Game
- Cook a meal
- Iron
- Journal Entry
- Finish photos for potm
- Cut fingernails & Toenails
- Change sheets
- Clean Floor

This is copy/pasted from my Sunday grocery list.
My back's getting better but I still feel old!

You are the stupidest month ever. When have you ever done anything
good? Not this year. Not last year. Not the year before. None of those
other years that I remember. Humbug!

Now that we can put July behind us the only way things can go is up! It's August, every day I check WeatherZone to see how many extra minutes of sunlight I get that day (usually 2). This year things haven't been exactly going to plan but it's now time to arrest the trend.

The answer is so simple: If last year was so good, just live last year again. After all, nostalgia and denial would be at the start of the motto on the Brad Coat of Arms if I knew jack shit about Latin. I'm going to skip lectures, drive the same car, listen to same music, kick ass at basketball. Everything assigned to me I'll do at the last minute and still pull out exceptional results. It's worth noting that the job I have is essentially a uni assignment, I did organise it right before the deadline and, at least according to my work breakdown structures, I am doing it exceptionally. So I guess I won't be reliving the three months in 2005 where I was just unemployed anytime soon.

I'm going to resume fearing my long term goals, instead of chasing them.
I'm going to be a little less confident in the hope it will make me less of an asshole.
I'm going to quit being that guy that just takes a small point and keeps making jokes about it over and over again to the amusement of no one but myself.
I'm going to start saying 'they' instead of 'their' in general dialect as well as whatever university essays I might need to write (at the last minute).
I'm going to write more stories.

The return of the laid back, well rested and more creative Brad is imminent. I will do it well and I won't post anything about doing things at the last minute in this entry!

Uni is my reset switch. I'm going there tomorrow and It's going to fix me. I'll be like a freshly rebooted machine, whirring and ready to take on anything that challenges me.

Today I came home sick from work and spent some time in Blackwood while I waited for a prescription. I went and bought my tickets to The Red Paintings for Saturday night from the new sports store that for some reason sells tickets. There was a cute blonde chick working there and I managed to talk her down $6 on a pair of tracksuit pants, which I can only imagine intensified a lust for me.

Other than that today has been spent sitting and coughing and feeling my throat hurt. It's definitely time for that reset!

Uni is teaching me not to take life seriously again. It's fantastic. It's the optimum environment for taking the piss. I spent 10 minutes in a tutorial debating with other academic minds about issues that I first learnt about an hour ago while skimming the lecture notes and eating a bagel.

Then after the tute the tutor said to me "I'm glad I instruct the third year courses where I can experience students like you who have gained a solid knowledge of economics and can show a true passion for it!"

I said "Actually I'm an IT student, the last time I did economics was in year 10 when I just copied supply and demand graphs off this guy called Wiggles."

The tute was also great because I met the hottest girl there. She was the hottest girl I have ever seen in real life. She came into the tute late and sat across from me. At one stage I turned to watch her again and she was gently chewing on her pen. It was indicative of how hot she was that I thought to myself 'I wish I was that pen'... and then spent the next five minutes actually weighing up in my mind if I would trade my body, my life, my friends and all my aspirations just to be erotically suckled by the hottest of girls for a few minutes. In the end I decided I wouldn't, but it was close. I guess no one can be truly perfect.

Uni is all about learning. So much knowledge, so much insight into things that take life's simplicities and give them meaning and understanding. For example, today I learnt that the best way to get all of the Up&Go out of the carton is to first drink normally, then leave the straw in your mouth and violently crush the carton as small as possible. With each clench the science will make it squirt into your mouth and you will get much more Up&Go for your dollar.

I also learnt that this trick and associated noises will not impress incredibly hot women or even economics tutors.

I looked forward all day to going to 'Moon Underwater', the new incarnation of an old pub. After a week of sickness and shitness I was looking forward to being with people again. The day had been reasonably good as I was prepared to tell everyone:
"You know, one of those days where you spend hours trying to work out some problem or equation and then finally at the last moment it all makes sense, you finish the work and celebrate by eating a bowl of mini-weats".

By about 10pm however it had changed to "You know, one of those days were you think things are going well and then every part of your body decides to act violently towards you to such an extent that immediate sleep is the only possible option."

As soon as I'm feeling better I'm going to beat the shit out of myself.

I saw The Red Paintings and Fourth Floor Collapse last night. Both put on good sets. The Red Paintings weren't quite as phenomenal as they were at The Jade Monkey two months ago. And they only played 90 minutes instead of two hours! For a band that is supposed to be so indie they sure are selling out!

This time the costuming was more sci-fi orientated and there were slightly more props such as body painting on stage during the show. I still love the way that whenever someone on stage isn't playing a part of a song they just stand there like a statue looking very serious. If they didn't do that I think their whole theatrics would fall apart.

Fourth Floor Collapse played their best (only) set I have ever seen! After feeling favourable about the band ever since I heard 'Make Believe' years ago I was stoked to find out they were playing the support for this show. This is something I told the lead singer before their show when I met him at their merchandise table! Then during their show they played Make Believe and he dedicated the song to me! He'd forgotten my name and said 'This is for the guy in the crowd who I talked to before the show and his name has a "D" in it!' If I was a girl I would have been wet. That track was on my first mix CD after I got my car stereo and it meant a lot to me at the time and then to have it dedicated in real life made me feel very special.
Then I talked to him again twice over the night and bought a CD that they all signed. Their new CD is good too! It's called 'Books with Broken Spines'. They are such a good band. I think we're friends now. I might leave a comment on their Myspace and see if I can become a groupie or webmaster for them and live next door to one of them in Melbourne. Wowow.

Is to be a dork.
And to be healthy.
And some Sunshine!

I had a rough couple of weeks. When life takes away your ability to sit, exercise, play sport, work, taste, get drunk, pee and not cough up phlegm all at the same time it sucks. When it then takes away your ability to bitch about all of that on the internet to strangers it should have been the last straw. But it wasn't. Who knows why? I danced this morning in my room because I was happy to be awake!

I don't really have much else to say about the week. Other than I feel pretty hardcore for the 182 line PHP script which, in 15 seconds, finds the cached versions of all my entries in Google and then recreates them as MySQL inserts and then performs those inserts and tells me that nothing went wrong. The whole time I was doing testing and watching it work I was just reminded of the time I made the journal title that hopping rabbit and Gus was like "Wow, how did you do that?" except multiplied by about 100! Today I finally ran it on production and that's why things are basically back to normal. However, although I did add some extra features today, this is not really Bradism 2.0 it's actually 0.61!

This morning I woke up the lightest and richest I've been since puberty and ever respectively. Being melodramatic is overrated. People live hyperboles while I narrate them. The world is my dead racoon and every day I feel like a kid with a stick. I think this might be one of the reasons I spend so much time alone. People seem to be so busy and stressed and whenever I try and emulate them I end up feeling stupid. I think what I really should try is more poking. I should also probably stop being so distractible and write more prose. But probably's are complicated and I'm too simple for that. I'll just continue to cruise and spectate. The sun will shine for me and small woodland creatures sing with me which is hard to explain to the people walking past your cubicle. They understand why we're singing but they don't understand why they're not in the woods.

It's Summer Preview time of year again, those days in August where winter loses its momentum and there's a few days of sunshine as it tries to regain its bearings. I guess that's why I'm starting to suffer from hayfever. Hey Body, what the fuck did I do to you again?

Using all the experience in understanding weather patterns that restoring 4 months worth of weather entries for my journal has given me, coupled with having a 9th story window for most of the days, I predicted that today's top of 24 would actually get beaten. I also predicted that it would rain by the end of the day. I was right on both counts. It's probably not that impressive. Still I found a couple of opportunities to spend some time in the sun today. I walked a few coffee stores further to get my daily brew, which I didn't even want on account of it not being cold and I not being tired.

After lunch, as strong gusts brought above me the first of the streaky clouds I realised I had little time left to enjoy a full dose of sunshine before Winter shook its head back and forth rapidly and then set back along it's original course. I headed down to the river where sparrows mingled with gales producing for me a live version of what Funniest Home Videos would be like if it starred only birds. I sat by the bank letting my skin absorb the rays of the sun as I gazed across the water. As swans bobbed by and the clouds continued to congregate above I relaxed and pondered the important things in life like whether ducks can fall in love and if anyone's likely to have noticed that my desk has been abandoned for the last hour.

It was Uni day again today and it was splendid. Once again I skipped the Marketing Management lecture to sleep in and in the wash-up ended up learning more about marketing than I probably would have at the lecture.

There I was creating an awesome bowl of breakfast, mixing ingredients witch style, when the phone rings. I picked it up and forgot I wasn't at work until halfway through my salutation: "Good Morning, you've reached the kitchen, this is Brad". I heard a mumbled prayer to Ganesh uttered on the other line, before the pitch began.

I, sir, had been the most fortunate beneficiary of a brand new LG phone. It would be delivered and set up with no costs to me! How could I say no to that? With some difficulty, it proved. I first revealed that there would, in fact, be some charges. I then heard the same spiels over again. It would be rude to just hang up. Then I asked 'What if I just accept the phone and then sell it on eBay?'

There was some floundering and she asked me to hold while she got her supervisor. Needless to say I didn't get a phone and they didn't get my details.

I then went off to Uni and spent the largest percentage of my time in the gym. I had 30 minutes after that to drink an Up&Go and scan the lecture notes in preparation for arguing with people in the Business Strategy tute which once again I LOVED. Telling people they're wrong about something they're completely apathetic about is too fun! As usual at the start of the tutorial everyone had to write their name on a piece of paper and then underline what they preferred to be called. Except this time I didn't underline Brad McNaughton, I Underlined Brad McNaughton. I Love uni!

Question 1. Are quiz nights fun to have at home?

Answer: Yes. Bonus points for fun powerpoint presentations and Tim stirring a curry at the end of each round.

Everyone has challenges in life. For the most part they're drawn out and thus not very exciting. However when you're not faced with problems it's also dull. This happens to me at work sometimes. Then out of the stagnant waters will burst some problem that I have to solve.

Suddenly I'm chasing data relationships through labyrinths, ducking and weaving around obstacles and chasing ghosts until I find the foreign-key relationship that the old manuscripts would have talked about had I had a copy of them to read.

Or I will be plodding along the seemingly repeating landscape, moving from one end of the world to the other carrying only small amounts of uninteresting goods when all of a sudden a wizard will appear and demand I solve a riddle in order to get the next bland, uninteresting item. Then a quest is launched and I have to assemble a team of different procedures with different skills and oft times conflicting personalities to complete the wizard's quest and deliver this bland object to the kingdom.

At least these challenges are defined. It’s obvious when you get this kind of problem; my eyes will widen as I feel the ground give way beneath me and I plunge into the poorly crafted pit trap that I would have noticed if I’d been paying more attention. The single drop of dew on the leaf beside me will blur into the sea of green as my neck snaps back and I watch the sky disappear. Stumbling in the darkness my heart rate will increase and I’ll find whatever source of light I can to start working out just how I’m getting out of this one.

But I always get out ok, shake myself off and maybe clap my shoes together over the garden so I don’t traipse mud through my cubicle. And if you kinda squint at my access pass, from an angle, it does sort of look like "The Blue Key".

Outside of the tower though, away from my computer where I can’t press tab to look at a map, challenges aren’t exactly harder to find. It’s just in the real world I think fiction starts to blur the facts and I can’t notice when I’m supposed to be on a mission and when I’m just walking back from lunch after buying a coke.

Life would be more fulfilling if every time I was faced with a puzzle the Pacman theme would sound and every time I solved a problem the Puzzle Bobble Level Clear would play. At least that way I would know what the hell is going on.

This is contradicted by 165,325 hits on Froogle, but whatever.

I have a four day weekend starting tomorrow night. Four days without work and thus four days without pay. OK not quite without pay thanks to the glory of taking your birthday off as a cultural holiday - fully compensated.

Some people live life like their goal is to make as much money as possible. This reminds me of University where for a time every Saturday night the goal was to drink as much as possible. Both goals have the same outcome: Short term gains and white man dancing, followed by pissing off a lot of people and eventually crashing back down on your arse.

I'm sure there are a lot of billionaires out there who would prove me wrong and contest that I should be more driven to earn more money. But I don't need your money old man! I will take some though or if you're a billionaire and reading this please click on my ads! For the love of God I am so close to the internet buying me a keg.

It's a question a lot of people ask me: 'Why didn't you write about me in your journal? I was at x! I played an important part in y!' Or the most common: 'You said you would write about me in your journal!' Which isn’t exactly a question.

It's true that I don't do a lot of name dropping in my journal. In 593 entries Ryan tops the pile with 18 mentions (now 19) mainly because for most of the last 3 years my journal has been retelling funny things that happened at uni and Ryan basically Josh Ryan Evans'ed that whole period for me.

However I'm not one to stick to blindly stick to traditions, and when Jonno told me on the train today that if I mentioned him in my journal then he would hook me up with a free IQ test next Friday I was all over it. I can't even remember what I was supposed to say about him other than he's a cool guy who's determined to make flannel popular.

I'm basically shitting all over tradition with this one and hoping that it will cover up for my lack of point so this is the first non-Timmy entry ever too. Probably appropriate since Ryan is dead now. Unless he wants to post another update about his life just to spite me...?

Assumption 1: Workaholics who work long hours and don't see their family are alcoholics
Clarification: Working long hours makes alcohol more affordable.

Assumption 2: People get married because they love each other.
Yes, just like people go to their jobs because they like what they do, and how people go to church because they believe in God.

Assumption 3: When you get older you can grow a beard
Wrong!

Assumption 4: People value their lives more than anything else
Untrue, people will often sacrifice their life for noble causes such as their country, their family or in some cases to just to avoid being impolite.

Assumption 5: Your Birthday is the best day of the year
Wrong!!!!!!!!

Sometimes Christmas is!

My first Saturday night as a 22 year old panned out along pretty much the same lines as my last night as a 21 year old.
I wasn't expecting too much to change in the seven days between Saturday nights. I've been so busy the last few days with birthday things and birthday jokes and birthday binge drinking that it actually slipped my mind that I was 22 until about 30 seconds after I turned 22 when it all hit me and I cried out loud to the heavens about my ill fate. After that I sort of felt a bit better, so it was worth it. But only because it was really loud at Shenanigans and I doubt anyone heard me anyway.
However, I am different on my first Saturday night at 22 than I was during my first Saturday night at 21. Change is a gradual thing. However the one thing that does seem to remain constant after each of these first Saturday nights as an older person is the lingering hangover I feel after my annual, age-acceptance-assisting bender comes to a conclusion.

My first Tuesday as a 22 year old panned out nothing like my first Tuesday as a 21 year old. Back then I was a struggling IT student with sketchy employment. Now I'm graduated, employed and all mature'n'stuff. I liked the last Tuesday better though. Possible acheivement hangover detected?

I guess these days I'm in a new direction. (That is a reference for people who read the last years entry)

The UniversityLand Resort is the perfect place to spend a fun-filled day the entire family will enjoy. From the charm of University Drive, Bedford Park to the whimsy of the Tavern explore seven fantastic "lands" of nostalgia, colour and delight. Let your imagination run free in a magic kingdom where life is a fairy tale and dreams really do come true.

ATTRACTIONS
The Lake
Join a goose and a shitload of ducks as you sit in the sun near some hot chicks and gaze at the lake. Bring lecture notes to read for the lecture you're skipping or just listen to an MP3 player and take a nap.

The Sports Center
Team up with or against Asians once again and battle for court supremacy. Or head downstairs and use the newly refitted weights room. Court Access is only a dollar.

The IST Building
Tetris, last minute programming assignments and the occasional firing of group members are all regular shows in the IST building located overlooking the hill that you just slaughtered yourself to climb up.

ENTERTAINMENT
The Tavern
Discover the joys of drinking during the day with pints for the price of schooners on Tuesday AND Thursday!

The Library
Need a reference for an assignment and can't find anything on the internet? Like the smell of billions of books? Need to use a toilet and only know where one is? The Library.

Mickey's House and Meet Mickey
Meet the world's most beloved mouse up close and personal inside his very own home.

Your Bed
Lie on the large, comfortable mattress and doze as sunlight filters through the curtains. Your Bed is open during all morning lectures and tutorials and some early afternoon lectures as well.

I was actually happy to wake up at 7:20 on Friday because it was just so goddamn sunny. After managing to get myself sunburnt on the last day of Winter I'm assuming vitamin D was flooding through my body at the time and possibly releasing endorphins.

Winter was crap, and that's not just because at the start of it I bought a tent for below the marked price and then never got to use it. After suffering through a barrage of injuries, illness and dullness I now don't care about them because, well, it's just so Goddamn sunny. I almost missed the train the other day because I stopped to look at the flowers. Hence the scheme.

I feel stronger now, filled with more potential and pollen and I can do anything again. Like eat an 18 inch schnitzel, code a host of massive changes for this site and possibly go camping in my discounted tent.

Steve Irwin is dead. I used to hate him. First of all, an apology:

Quote:
Sunday, 27th of January, 2002
I watched "The Crocodile Hunter" for the first time tonight. Before my hatred [of Steve Irwin] was simply based on the fact that he was ruining Australia's Reputation and in my opinion if they are going to let some moron have his own TV show, why the hell can't I have one?
As far as I can see the main purpose it to annoy the hell out of the viewer. You see good ol' steve dive into the water inhabited by man eating critters, he swims near them, kisses them and narrowly escapes death a few times, however, you know that he's narrated the story after they taped it and that he's fine and dandy and the exact opposite of Dead and it just burns you up inside.

I was wrong to say this. Eventually he doesn't get back to narrate it. I'm amazed at how nuts the internet has gone over this whole Steve Irwin is dead thing. I'm pretty sure this morning people were apathetic about him at best. It's even affected me! I feel bad that he's dead. Someone psychologise that!

The thing about Steve Irwin is that he was just a big kid, even down to the pudgy cheeks, blonde hair and boofy haircut. He was a boy who never grew up. This, of course, was the reason he was so annoying. Still that didn't stop me from initially mourning him and watching hilarious YouTube videos about him all afternoon.

Yet everyone is caring just a little too much. I didn't like him and, really, I still don't like him. I just lied about liking him so that I could go home early from work.

Steve, you're in Heaven now; catching angels and kissing them.

That is assuming he's gotten past the inevitable stage where he arrives and stands gobsmacked just saying 'Crikey' over and over and over again.

RIP

Car parking stuff.

Dream Park
The best possible, legitimate park available at a site. Characterised primarily by proximity to site entrance although other factors may effect the exact Dream Park eg. shade, lighting, cover/weather protection and ease of exit.

Confidence Parking
The act of navigating directly to the location of the Dream Park and other best parks in a car park even though they are most likely all taken. This includes ignoring any available parks en route. See Self Fulfilling Prophecy.

Throughy
A car park that can be entered one side and left on the other side. This is often prized because it requires two 90 degree parks to be in line with each other so that you can enter the ultimate park at the wrong end.
If car parking is sex then a throughy is the girl getting you a beer afterwards.

Car Park God
Lord of the Car Park. Giver of Car Parks and taketh of Car Parks away. Provides Dream Parks and Throughy's to true believers who utter the Lord's Prayer.

Quote:
Oh Car Park God, feared be thy name, thy car parkers come, and then be gone, at Marion as it is at Uni. Give us this day our daily spot, and forgive us for parking too close to the line as we forgive those that park too close to the line on us. And lead us not into disabled parks or loading zones but deliver us from walking too far, amen.

But this time I like I'm 21 again >_<

The first time I found my shell was on a family trip to the seaside when I was very young. I wandered away from our towels and over a dune. In a refraction of the sunlight I spotted my shell, half buried in the sand. Stumbling down the dune I dropped to my knees to admire the curves, the layers, the colours that had been picked when the earth crafted one of its most successful creations.
Hearing my name yelled aloud shattered the moment just as I reached forward to lay a hand.
'Come back', I was instructed, 'that's not for you.'
'Mother', I pleaded, 'please!'
She was resolute; her eyes told me no. Her eyes told me I didn't know where it might have been and it might not belong to me.
'Look but don't touch' was the direction. 'Come back to the family right now' was the undertone. I turned back one last time and I know somehow I connected before I was dragged away.

Using the journal to try and force me to write a story has been a pretty spectacular failure.

This morning I skipped the Marketing Management lecture which may have been a mistake. I actually got to uni during the middle of it but decided I would study and wait for my tute which, I was soon to learn, was empty.

My other tute was also cancelled today meaning there was now no reason for me to have actually come to uni. But it's always good to have a backup plan and I grabbed my basketball stuff from the car and made my way to the sports centre. They told me that the hall was booked from noon to 4pm.

As it was only 12:15pm at the time, too early even for me to start drinking, I decided that I needed to shake some shit up. So I got back in my car and turned left towards the beach instead of right towards my house. It was a sunny enough day; I could kill some time at the beach probably by reading my notes for tomorrow’s exam and even if I didn't have fun I would still be able to gloat about going to the beach to everyone who had to work today.

I parked my car, abandoned my shoes and like a baby turtle I fumbled across the sand until I found a spot to study Economics and Business Strategy. Predictably this got boring after a short while and I figured that while I was at the beach I might as well poke my head out of my shell and relax. So I attempted to tan myself while I lay and pondered where I was going to find the inspiration to finish my seaside tale from Tuesday. Of course, life was not forthcoming with any inspiration and it was very hard to think with the noise of some 5 year old girl going on and on to her Mum about a shell she had found. Yeah, thanks a lot seaside, my story is about a boy.

Then I went and had a baguette and read more until finally it was 4pm and I could go play basketball where I somehow managed to earn myself a blister, a victory that comes with the prize of having an excuse to wear thongs for the rest of the weekend.

The shell... it's actually a beard!

My day of thongs and exams was brief and intense. There was twenty minutes to fill between finishing my exam and my replacement tute so I went to the plaza to get an ice coffee.

Just as my goal was in sight I was accosted by student politicians who wanted me to vote for them in the current student elections. I'm guessing these are the people who actually pay the student services fee after VSU just so they have some funding for their hobby. However I realised that buying an ice coffee probably wouldn't stretch to twenty minutes and figured I could find the time to vote. I was immediately handed a 'how to vote' pamphlet and was about to trundle to the voting tent when an opposition party politician ran up with the opinion that I should listen to the other sides policies as well. This was going to lead to a much better way of killing twenty minutes.

After a bit of banter and sledging between myself and the candidates I then gave them 15 seconds to give me their best policies. They both did with some enthusiasm and I had to interject during both speeches to ensure they stuck to their 15 second limit.

It became apparent that the were both pretty much running on the same policies, so I gave them another 15 second window to tell me their best policies that the other party didn't have. That started turning into one of those debates where two people argue in front of you so I simply said to the guy that had come up 'Look, you both make compelling arguments but I think I'll just vote for Meg because I met her once at a party a few months ago and she seemed nice.'

He furrowed his brow and said 'OK but I really think you should only vote based on policy.'

I smiled and said: 'Oh I'm sorry, do you take this seriously?'

Seriously it was midday on a Friday and I didn't see either of them going to lectures. Why don't they get a job and then expend energy in avoiding that job by going to uni.

In the end it turned out I had to go to some website to cast my vote properly and I gave up on the whole ordeal. I can never seem to be bothered putting effort into things on the internet.

I saw Ryan for the first time since I think Easter on Sunday. It was a good time despite still receiving wavering reminders of the food poisoning I got Saturday night. I've checked his site every day since then, but no updates.

I was in the IT Building at uni today and recently seeing Ryan reminded me of his, Mark and my epic times there over the years. As I pulled into the car park I thought back to this time a year ago where my journal indicates I was in the middle of a data mining report and if Ryan's archives worked properly they'd probably talk about how he was playing games online instead of doing the same.

I wondered how the IT students of 2006 were faring with what was probably slightly modified versions of the assignments we did last year. Then, as I looked into the IT lecture theatre I saw the exact 2006 versions of us. You see, there were these three white guys.

I saw Miami Vice and asked my friends to review it in exactly 5 words.

"That really was quite shit" - Chow
"Not worth my fifteen bucks" - Josh
"Crap Crap Crap Crap Crap" - Burrett
"I should of downloaded it" - Tim
"An uninspiring tale of pyrotechnics" - Brad

I forgot what Tom said. His first word was 'colours' and I thought he was going to reveal a poignant lesson he learnt from the co-operation between interracial federal agents working undercover. However I think his next word was 'detailed' and whammo, I lost all train of thought.

The movie was entertaining enough at times but it did reek a bit of someone just taking themes and concepts from several stories in the same genre and just combining them into a new film without any sense or originality or creativity. I mean what is this, year 8 English?

The rocket bar is three stories up and offers exhilarating views of the strip club across the road. Satan's Cheerleaders played there tonight. I asked my friends to review them in exactly 6 words.

"Trendy jazz funked metal student band" - Craig
"I really like them, Shenannigans don't" - Brad

I went to Martin's party and asked my friends to review it in exactly 7 words.

"So could of done with more pirate" - Sam
"I got my peanut in Andy's beer" - Chow
"Brad was impressed by a baby's scrot" - Josh
"Chow got his peanut in my beer" - Andy
"There was chocolate and there was nuts" - Martin
"Where was the fucking pirate? Jesus Christ!" - Brad

And according to "Inside the human body" when a baby is born its scrotum is already at normal size. I was apparently the only one alarmed at the possible snags that this threatened. I never want to read that book again.

"I should improve at reading chicks obvious signals" - Brad

But at the nights conclusion:

"Oh God, I really love Up And Go" - Brad

I asked my friends to discuss when this gimmick would start getting old in exactly 9 words.

"I'm thinking not that long after you started it" - Sam
"Probably around the time I started padding with profanities" - Brad
"It's pretty damn annoying and I'd reallyappreciateifyoustopped but ienjoyhowyoumakeitanextrawordeverytime" - Zoe

Netball is the sport of Gods. Not because it is intensely good, it's more a literal thing. Netball just seems religious when you analyse it: There are people divided against each other, confusing rules, it's played on a Sunday. You can also ask everyone there what they came for and they will say 'Netball' but in their actions it's evident that half the people are not really taking it seriously.

I filled in for Tim in mixed netball yesterday and had my prescribed 'Good time'. I think I scored 5 goals and only got one obstruction. In true ringer form I also managed to take out an opposition player however the details on that are still fuzzy. All I know is that I'm standing there waiting for a ball to fall into my arms when I feel this knock on my elbow. Next thing I know this girl has thrown herself about four feet across the court and is now lying on the ground clutching her face. It was pretty awkward because technically she was my direct opponent and as far as I knew there are no subs in netball. However they bent that rule and the girl that replaced her didn't impale herself on my elbow and seemed quite nice.

After the game I went to offer apologies/condolences to the injured girl but she wasn’t very friendly and just glared at me. So I said: 'How are you going, feeling any better?' and she just increased her glare.
'Yeah, sorry you got hurt. I hope you recover quickly' I sold her, in exchange for apathy.
'Your nose should be ok I reckon. I mean, you're not a model or anything are you?' I laughed nervously.
'No' she muttered.
'Yeah you didn’t look like a model...' And there was more glaring. 'Well... Thanks for the game!'

We lost

To set the scene: The month was a few months ago, the day: unspecified. I was working in the IT industry for an IT company on an IT project. Surprisingly, despite this entire IT context the IT project was behind schedule and over budget. Now I wasn't management here so I'm not completely positive whether this was just normal "it's IT" controlled, planned behind schedule and over budgetness, or whether this was full blow "holy shit we are actually behind the behind schedule schedule and totally over the expected over budget budget". Nevertheless several of the million emails I've received this year were distributed en masse containing recondite buzz words about new schedules, delivering value to key stakeholders and some footnotes about restructuring of existing structures. All of this was then redacted by the incoming Project Manager who jovially encouraged us that despite the hardships currently upon us we were all capable people that, when we worked together, could overcome these hurdles and deliver this IT project under the expected over budget and in front of the expected slightly over schedule schedule.

After all, the email stated in its opening motivational thrust, 'This is Applications Delivery. This is what we live for!'

Several months later it seems I have a peccadillo. It's become more apparent that it's not Apps Delivery I live for at all. In fact other than just being my badass self I struggle to specifically identify any cause, noble or otherwise, for my existence. Whilst getting up early to live in the grown up world of IT development has rendered me the newest parvenu on the block it's increasingly obvious that its motivation and rewards are purely financial, both in short and long term. With this epiphany billowing away a haze it seems extremely evident that my intention to spend $24k on my new car is far and away an over-compensation. Over-compensation for what? It has nothing to do with phallus, it seems my logic is just skewed into believing that having a fully sick automobile might somehow make the months I spent earning that amount somehow more valid and worthwhile. Still, it is a Goddamn nice car...

Roni Size with Dynamite MC was tremendous. He didn’t just play music, he played a set. It was like what I would do with Virtual DJ if I was good at Virtual DJ. Whereas I usually run out of steam after 20 minutes his set went for over 3 hours and it was really good, especially at the end. Then again if I had someone good to MC for me when I was using Virtual DJ I might last longer.

I swear I attract an unusually high amount of traffic no matter where I am on a dance floor. I watch other parts and there were no ant-like streams of people constantly pushing past them. I think part of it is everyone just telling each other 'meet me at the tall guy'. I saw at least one chick write that message with her phone and send it.

Some people in the crowd are pretty stupid. Like the guy who blamed me for the fact that he couldn't stop getting knocked as he tried to roll a smoke in the middle of the dance floor. But it was still a good night, got home at 6:30 and ears stopped ringing around midday.

Waiting seems to be my number one occupation these days: Waiting for my back to get better; waiting for Summer; waiting for the weekend; and waiting for the Big Day Out line-up announcement are all tables that I seem to be checking on constantly and metaphorically delivering meals to. In the past one thing I did when I was waiting was to play basketball in my driveway, which was good because it would take up time as well as make me not care about whatever it was I was waiting for. I can't do that anymore because my basketball ring is about as busted as my back is. So these days that's been replaced with Minesweeper.

It's a sordid past I have with the Windows Games collection. They got me through high school and they continue to get me through uni as the greatest source of procrastination available to mankind. Minesweeper is in excellent favour at the moment because it keeps your mind sharp and because each round lasts less than 2 minutes as that is the time I'm trying to beat. However mindless entertainment and time-wasting isn't the extent of Minesweeper's portfolio, it actually has a plethora of real world uses:

Blood-Alcohol Level Indicator
There is actually a totally scientific correlation between your blood alcohol concentration and the time it takes you to complete Minesweeper on intermediate. If you can't pull it off in less than 100 seconds you're going to blow over the limit. If you can pull Expert off in the same time you should be fine to pilot a small aircraft or drive a road train. If you can't pull off beginner in 100 seconds I'm guessing you've already passed out.

Pad out work
All work, whether it is school, personal, private or public sector orientated, will have phases where your input will comfortably reach the required level of output with time to spare. It's in this scenario that you can find work boring, job satisfaction can drop and counter-productive behaviour can be bred. The solution? Minesweeper. Padding out work with intense games of Minesweeper against the clock will increase levels of adrenalin and improve concentration. Even if your entire day is padded out there is no way you can spend 8 hours trying to beat Minesweeper and not leave feeling like you've toiled solidly and effectively.

Girlfriend Filter
When it comes to meeting the right girl it can be difficult and time consuming to work out whether the lass you just took out for dinner is a completely daft or was just nervous. Minesweeper can cut the whole first month of dating down to several minutes. They don't have to be really good at it, but anyone who can't beat beginner is probably not a good long term prospect. A good time in expert, though and you should lock that down.

Practice for sweeping an actual minefield
One day when North Korea or Iran or New Zealand eventually declares war on the free nations and World War 3 erupts there will be minefields. As stated in the Geneva Convention all minefields must be labelled with numbers on the ground to indicate the number of mines nearby in each direction. One day there will be a big minefield, too big for any normal team to effectively map a path through. It will be the time for a hero. I am that man.

The time it takes for me to get from sitting in the waiting room to being embraced and snapped by a large man with a shaved head is probably about fifty seconds. Oh sure, he asks me how I’m going and if anything’s improving but there’s no genuine pleasantries prior to my ass being in the air and crazy alien chiropractic equipment is let loose all about my spine. I mean normally I’d have to at least buy a dinner for someone before I got to do that kind of thing. Seconds later I’ve been rushed out the door and the next person is wafting past me.

The chiropractor is a strange and exciting place which I both dread and anticipate. There is a part of me that loves the chiropractor. It’s the part of me that says ‘that was fucking awesome’ every time I crack my knuckles so loud that the people watching TV in the next room come in to see what’s going on. There is a part of me that hates the chiropractor. It’s the part in me that knows what a skeleton looks like and knows what cracking sounds like and can’t find the equation that results in both these things equalling something positive.

Today I took my back X-rays in for his perusal. He wasn’t able to give me a solid diagnosis, other than to reaffirm my need for a CT scan but he did finally take a few extra seconds during one of my appointments to step back and admire my spine in all its radiographed glory. A wave of silence suddenly ebbed over him and I saw a mist in his eyes as he admired its perfect, restored straightness with the sense of pride that a new father would have for his first son. Shortly after, when he was bending my legs in different directions on the platform my knee brushed his crotch and I swear I felt he had a half wood.

'I still say it's an interesting question. I will talk to Kevin and provide further clarification next tutorial.' Despite the upper-class English accent, this response provided no justification to support the currently debated theory.

'The fact is the book says "Diversification" is the act of expanding corporate interests into other areas of business.' I believed and argued simultaneously. The air was full of tension as the dozen economic students deliberated on whether or not a business that employed a strategy of selling their same, existing product for a cheaper price with a different label somehow qualified as 'corporate diversification'. It clearly didn't. Even Wiggles would know that. The only way this scenario should have even come up is if the tutorial question had asked 'please come up with the only possible business level competitive strategy that does not involve corporate diversification in any way, shape or form.'

Unfortunately it seems the nature of all social science/humanity topics is that any answer is correct assuming you can write a paragraph explaining why using, although not necessarily semantically correctly, the appropriate buzz-words. My IT based humanities compiler was having none of it though. There was no way I could casually accept the accurate definition of corporate diversification being knocked around like a volley ball on a Brazilian river mouth. Especially since the tutorial was a quarter done (three quarters complete chronologically) and I hadn't even prepared for the last two questions. So when it was suggested that the concept of selling your baked beans with different labelling at a cheaper price could be in any way defined as corporate diversification I put my foot down. Did even the simple concept of 'industry' escape these people? Or were they simply just asking shit, spontaneous questions as if to provide a fuel to my fire for debating economics with people who, unlike me, had probably actually even read the lecture notes for this week?

Nevertheless adrenaline flooded me with the force of a sixteen year old football player having a wet dream after not getting laid for six weeks because of so much goddamn training. I eventually managed to convince a classroom full of people who completely did not care that diversification required resources being applied in two or more separate areas that could, although did not require, a synergy that ensured both areas of effort resulted in increased value for the organisation/entity. If a company produces two types of baked beans and sells them with different labelling for different prices that is NOT diversification. I learnt this in the 10 minutes I spent organising for the tutorial right before it started. During this time I also ate a peanut butter and jam sandwich. For anyone who knows corporate strategy economics: Studying and eating a sandwich at the same time, now that's true corporate diversification.

Becoming a wealthy philanthropist is more challenging than I initially expected. Having begun my marketing and economic post grad degree this year I predicted by late spring to at least be in charge of a couple of franchises as well as planning a few strategic sales of previously acquired small businesses. OK, that's not technically true. But I did expect to be able to work out the 'own business' section of my tax return quicker than 3 months after the end of financial year.

The problem is coming up with innovative ideas to market is really hard. The best I've come up with so far is to create a business plan where people invest in me to come up with good business plans. The main drivers were something about how I needed more "free time" but that time wasn't free it was expensive. However then I shouted that if other people paid for my free time it would be cheap and I could then somehow make them money. It all collapsed when I sobered up the next morning and I couldn't even read half the stuff on the napkin but I did convince the taxi driver to invest two 1000 Rupee notes which I still have pinned up on my wall for motivation.

My latest business idea is to navigate a hot air balloon around the earth. It doesn't sound very profitable but successful philanthropists do it all the time. I figure I've got it all wrong, if I do crazy rich guy stuff now the cash and accolades will simply follow automatically. Hot air balloon rides are probably the best place in the world for coming up with good, creative shit. They at least have to be better than the place I'm sitting at right now writing this.

The first day of the week had ended. There I was, sitting on one of the last express trains I would ever catch with my sunglasses on and my headphones aloud to possibly be the best 'staring straight ahead, not acknowledging the existence of anyone else' on the train.

Then a guy sat next to me. This happens in tales of comfort zones and forbidden love. He took his jacket off and rested it across his knees. It flirted with my thigh but I ignored it, playing it cool. The doors chimed and air was herded in as the train set off. It billowed softly towards my face, taking in the scenes of knee-coat next to me on its way. That is when it hit me, the urine. Not literally, because this is the Adelaide metro system not New York. But the dude next to me totally smelled like piss. This was far from charming but I didn’t immediately think ‘Hot damn, here’s my journal entry for today.’

Instead my course of action was to wrinkle my nose and look uncomfortable. This was partly because of the disgusting smell and partly because I was sure the smell was greeting other people simultaneously and social transport logic dictates that if you look like you’re offended by a smell then you can’t be blamed for it. Also having headphones on and being wrapped in sunglasses makes your nose the most potent communication device at your disposal.

What makes this whole epic so noteworthy, though, is that within ten minutes of departure as well as not having yet reached a single stop the urine smell was slowly replaced with the scent of fresh yet manufactured lavender. As far as I could tell no one had moved at all, except lap-coat now had a wry smile. One stop, two less passenger and another ten minutes later that lavender smell now was the more pungent, sour smell of urinal cakes and there was no doubt the semi-professional guy reading a ‘New Energy’ report next to me was the only one emanating smells with extroversion in the entire carriage.

Are you shit? This is a warning.

According to my Chiropractor my physio doesn't know anything about fixing a back.
According to my Physiotherapist a good way to avoid further back injuries is to lie on my back and tighten my sphincter about 45 times while breathing steadily.
According to my GP I shouldn't be getting my spine violently snapped by a large man because it could be bad for it in the future.

All three don't rate each other, yet all three have delivered the same verdict for recovery: Time. Three months later and what the fuck is achieved? I've bought a new bed and sat in a spa every day for the last fortnight and my own treatment has already got me feeling almost normal again. I've also got an appointment with a neurosurgeon in the apparently minimum waiting time of three weeks. October 31st forces me to wait beyond what I normally would before I get back to life. He will tell me that I'm officially allowed to smash shit up. As long as his opinion is that I'm back to normal I will make him say those exact words. Hey, for $190 per half hour appointment you may as well get your moneys worth.

So as of October 31 I am going to be on a mission to smash as much shit as possible. There will also be some yelling, maybe a bit of swearing and then drink some Up&Go’s and sleep like a baby.

I don't know why, but, for some reason David Jones have an independent radio channel that they stream into their restrooms. I went there during my break at uni to purchase a pretty sweet new shirt and some new shorts. This was due to being uncomfortable at uni already due to it being too hot today and my summer wardrobe was somewhat lacking.

While I was there nature yelled.

I also don't know why, but, for some reason David Jones were playing John William's Jurassic Park's 'T-Rex, Rescue and Finale' - otherwise known as 'that Jurassic Park song' - on that channel while I was doing my thing. The end result was the most over-dramatised crap I have taken in some time.

When I get my dream home I am going to program my toilet to play crescendo building classical movements every time I have a crescendo building classical movement.

Today was bad luck. I went out for a schnitzel and while I was waiting for it to come I got these stomach cramps which sitting, breathing and walking couldn't get rid of. Fortunately I was educated enough to work out that my stomach couldn't possibly cramp if it was bulging with schnitzel.

I also almost accidently attended a Kate Cebrano concert. But I heard she didn't play her cover of SexyBack so it wouldn't have sealed the day much anyway.

Having spent a lot of nights in recent times being drunk and doing stupid things I approached tonights cocktail party with a sense of trepidation. Trepidation was then processed into journalistic opportunity as I realised that the obscurity of each drink I would consume to much would allow me to benchmark exactly how alcohol affects my body and its desires.

Drink 1:

I wanted my cocktail drinking image to be one of extreme class, but also one of extreme homosexuality. The mirage delivered.

Drink 2:

The Mojito was next. It was easy to drink. It reminded me of a time I was running through the garden and fell into a bush - I think it might of been a repressed memory. Coincidently I think that happened when I was drunk.

Drink 3:

The Jelly Bean was my favourite drink of the night. It met requirements in the camp stakes as well as the upper-class image stakes. It's the kind of drink you see kids drinking at their 8pm board meetings on Tuesdays. In the background is Angus drinking his attempt at the same drink. His version was later renamed "Shameful Gus version 2".

Drink 4:

This White Russian is photographed with bonus cocktail-party-effort-attempt jacket in mirror. Also a butterfly.

Drink 5:

This was at the stage where Chow had stopped making me drinks and I just had another White Russian. This one has a parasol though.

Drink 6:

This is a Traffic Light. Chow was back but he'd gotten rusty. There was supposed to be a green, yellow, red layering in the glass and then, later on, in my stomach. Unfortunately substituting Galliano for Banana Liquer only resulted in this traffic light being set to 'Don't Go'.

Drink 7:

This is a Jaffa. It has some orange stuff in it. I think it's orange.

Drink 8:

This is a Screaming Orgasm. I only drank the front one. I also at the strawberry.

The Results
Drinking affects the mind and body in different ways. This experiment has taught me that it is after 6 drinks that I begin to think that an Up&Go should be consumed soon.

Massive Props to Chow for bartending duties!

Drink 9:

I'm behind schedule on the integration testing for some database stuff at work. This is totally my fault. There's a problem with my work that has set me back at least a week. Now I'm under pressure to finish everything by Wednesday night. On top of that, I also have entered uni assignmentpalooza for 2006.

I think I will sleep well tonight. This week is going to be great! I've found if there's anything that makes me feel more real, it's pressure.

.. Eh, too hard.

A hangover is the world where my mind lives between 6 and 15 seconds behind my body (depending on consumption). You can tell I was drinking heavily the night before if you're in a car with me and I suddenly exclaim "NO MAN! THAT CHICK WAS FUGLY!" about 170 metres past a girl on the side of the road that looked fit from a distance but up close might have some apes in her recent ancestry. Because I've also usually slept very little on these days I get lazy and just let my body guide me around the world with contempt for taking anything seriously.

This is why it's bad for me to go shopping when I'm hungover. I make bad decisions and I only realise they're bad decisions when things are being scanned at the checkout. Today: poor choices in oily food and ridiculous brands of energy drinks.

I have taken Arnott's Shapes and turned them into my own delicious pizza snacks!"
This is what it says on the box, this is also what I was singing in a deluded Italian accent as I drove home from the supermarket, about 10 minutes before I realised that it said that on the box or in fact that I had this box. Papa Giuseppi! *shakes fist*

You see I like pizza and I have for a long time. In my year 7 graduation book my quote was “I like pizza. I like cows. Here is a picture of a pizza cow" and then there was this picture of a pizza cow. It was pretty cool.

But I don't like pizza shapes and I don't like tiny pizzas. I knew they were going to be tiny pizzas because it says on the box “ACTUAL SIZE" next to the picture and the actual picture size is tiny.

But wait! They're not even pizza shapes, they're all stuck together and you have to break them apart for yourself. It's also not even lunch time, what the fuck am I doing? I swear I was taking these photos and I thought this had mad potential for a journal entry but I think I knew even then that the entertainment value would be that I had no idea where I was going with any of this.

This is why it's also bad for me to cook what I get when I go shopping when I'm hungover. I also didn't get one of those cardboard chef hats to put some string in and wear for the rest of the afternoon.

That weren't that bad though. They broke into the proper shapes pretty easily later on, and tasted ok. I'd eat them again, although that's more of a testament to the likeliness of me getting intoxicated again rather than any appraisal of their actual quality.

Which is what makes it so awesome. I went for my first adult swimming lesson today to learn some technique for my summer of aqua-cardio. $10 for 30 minutes of tuiton in a class of 3 old birds and myself. Today I learnt you can make old ladies blush just by saying their full name and winking.

Swimming is supposed to be some great way of recovering from a back injury. I suppose that's why I found it hilarious that after the swimming not only did my back hurt, but all that underwater kicking highlighted the weakness/caused soreness in my leg where I broke it 4 years ago.

But that didn't matter, because at the end of all that swimming I was rooted and it's been a very long time since I've been rooted. Who knows why being physical makes me feel so good. It's probably nothing to do with satisfaction because I was quite unimpressed that having strong, heavy legs just makes me feel more spastic when I'm trying to use my legs and a kickboard to get to the other end of the pool as fast as I can and I'm travelling about 20 metres a minute.

Maybe it's just that endorphins taste nice?

The kind who knows there's 1000's of words to write on an assignment that's due on Thursday and still decides that tonight should be the night I learn how to play Sudoku.

Sudoku is really easy. I don't get it. What are these people spending so much time on the train doing?

I still managed to get 1000 more words done too. Looking forward to the all nighter tomorrow. I swear if these assignments didn't say "Assignments done at the last minute generally receive only 3 to 4 marks" I wouldn't feel so required to take up the challenge.

Fell asleep last night after watching South Africa vs Sri Lanka in the Champions Trophy.

Woke up this morning dreaming of a cricket match between South Africa and the Western Bulldogs. Bulldogs were bowling second and Brad Johnson had just got Graeme Smith caught and bowled, the commentator said something about who truly was the greatest captain on the field. We were killing them, they were like 6/80 when I woke up. They could never win.

Why was this the best dream ever? No injuries >_<

Playing basketball against a team of spastic midgets. That's what this assignment felt like. The whole time I knew I could beat it, there wasn't much I really had to do after all. But where's the satisfaction in finishing an assignment and handing it in more than 30 seconds before it's due after streaming down the hill via Tim's house after he prints your assignment for you? Nowhere, I assure you. The only reason I'm possibly feeling still awake now at 3am on Friday morning after sleeping 9 hours of the past 48 is because of the sheer amount of adrenaline and sugar-free Red Bull that i've consumed during it. That and the drinking and drama at Shennanigans after (watching ) basketball this evening. Basically living only seems fun when there's pressure from some aspect of your life that makes everything else seem more critical. In tomorrows case it will probably be a hangover. Whether that's a phyiscal condition or a social condition remains to be seen, but it will be interesting. And also not as exciting as I make it seem. I realise now after finally internalising it that of everything that happens in my life I ignore the most important thing 95% of the time to ensure everything else succeeds. Either that or I'm lazy and I procrastinate when I'm doing work, assignments or in long term relationships. I guess a new shirt will help me take control of everything.

Thursday night and it's time to go out, so I enjoy the popular tradition of pre-game beer in the shower. This actually helps cut down the time between finishing sport and being drunk.

Friday morning and I'm late for work. I drink an Up&Go in the shower as some sort of ironic bookend to the past 12 hours. I can go from asleep and stinky to clean and on a train in under 23 minutes.

"Well that's good, because I don't think you'll have much of a career."

This is how the neurosurgeon breaks it to me that I have degenerative disc disease. Apparently for $190 per half hour appointment they really will say anything, but it's mainly asshole comments like that one.

I probably could of taken being told that I will have to manage back pain and reduce physical activity for the rest of my life a little easier if he'd been a bit nicer. If you ask a stupid question like 'Are you looking for a quick fix?' of course I'm going to say yes. Don't treat me like an idiot when I'm really there trying to find a timetable. Although I've now got the kind of timetable I really could do without.

I suppose I have my asshole neurosurgeon to thank for pissing me off enough to be motivated to do whatever I can to conquer this.

So shorterm at least it's no basketball or smashing shit for at least another month, probably more. Maybe a jog will be my Christmas present and I'll join all the other unfit bastards on the roads at the start of a new year. Until then I'll keep up my pilates and walking whilst avoiding the urge to self-destruct.

I went for one of those walks this evening, meandering throughout the hills leaving a trail of steam behind me. Along the way I saw a chick walking a dog with three legs. The 3 legged dog was bounding around ahead of her and looked blissfully goofy as he loped up the hill. It kind of inspired me. If nothing else cures me, I will resort to stupidity.

Before this goes much further I should say I don't need any sympathy for being a cripple. I'm still better than who you are.

Also, Photos of the Month are up.

I saw Cooney tonight!

He accused me of wanting to make love to him even before I told him I was a Western Bulldogs supporter. I guess he saw it in my eyes.

I congratulated him on his confidence and made the suggestion that it would be beneficial for us both if he could use that confidence to shake taggers in the AFL.

Also Beau Waters was also at Marion in the night I coined as "AFL gangbangs real life at Marion". Cooney was having a domestic with a girl I graduated primary school with when I approached him. I couldn't let it go. I can't handle this much AFL or this much real life in November to be honest.

There comes a stage during every night out getting crunk when they play SexyBack and you know that means they're not going to play it again for at least another hour. Sometimes you stay, sometimes you go home and code an awesome phocumentary class for your website that will increase the ease and reusability of insite images by a large amount thanks to a great database back end.

Guess which one happened tonight!

It rained last night as I fell asleep.

When I washed my bowl that contained the weet-bix I put in my breakfast smoothie the water pressure was too high and angles led to my pants getting drenched.

When I got to work I tried to drink from my water bottle but the lid wasn't on properly and my shirt got soaked.

I got drunk on a Tuesday night and danced to SexyBack.

Got Drunk.

Didn't dance to SexyBack.

This is not a metaphor.

I could of used a beer.

Edit: I tried setting 'Today's Weather: ' to this

but it's too hack proof.

Every exam seems to be the same. Reading time starts and I'm using the scrap paper to make notes. Suddenly every question I look at leads to an overwhelming flow of answers from my brain to the pen. Before reading time is over I manage to write down a keyword or point for every mark in the exam.

It doesn't seem to matter that 90% of the effort I put into this topic was during the three days prior to the examination using pattern recognition techniques and past exam papers to logically determine the most likely questions and the most non-rejectable answers to them. Nor does it seem too important that 6 hours ago I wasn't in bed or even doing last minute cramming, but instead was playing Sudoku and rocking out to Enya. I think The Exam is the stage where all of the subject's information in my brain realises that it's on a sinking ship - this knowledge won't be required after I walk out of here - and there is a stampede as it all bandies to find a new home in the pages of my answer booklet.

The flowing stream between my brain and paper advanced to a new, literal level today as 20 minutes into Marketing Management blood began pouring from my right nostril and onto my shirt towards the paper. I lost 5 minutes in the bathroom cleaning up but I still left the exam with an hour to go. I headed home, blew my nose some more and climbed into bed for a 2 hour battle against my stupid nose. My head rested and I closed my eyes as I watched the hull of COMM 2002 sink gently to the mind's ocean floor. There it will sit from now on, in the graveyard of topics I have torpedoed the shit out of. But, when necessary, scuba divers can go on tours to visit it and bring back small treasures when I need them.

I had to look professional today for my first of two days of work that are an island between long stretches of absences. It felt like a Monday today, but it's actually Wednesday! I didn't mind this feeling, especially considering tomorrow is Friday!

The first of my final exams was on Tuesday morning, so the weekend was set aside for studying. I lived whole days cramming inside my room, as it actually rained more this past week than it did through the whole of Winter. But I made the most of my internal isolation and spent 6 days growing a goatee while listening to my lectures for the first time this year: Study and Stubble.

One more day of procastination seasoned study, one more exam to pass, one more day until The Ashes.

Nipple Grabbing Excitement THREE

I spend a few weeks in November trying to study for exams while every thought in my mind seems to be the best possible use of my time ever. I always feel there are so many projects or things I could be doing, but have to delay them for study. Then finally exams are over and I can't remember any of those brilliant, distracting thoughts and I end up just watching cricket and napping.

NOT THIS YEAR THOUGH

I have kept a list of all these important things I feel the need to do while studying so that when I have the time I can actually do them.

• Make new colour scheme for site (possible "Beach" theme for Summer)
  
• Play StickCricket
  
• Create "Choullage 2006"
  
• Tidy my Room
  
• Continue coding my HTTP MySpace Wrapper
  
• Follow up short story ideas
  
• Choose tracks for Summer 2006 mix CD
  
• Bradism feature coding and bug fixes
  
• Lie on the dining room table for about 5 minutes
  

Passed Exam, watched cricket, napped.

I have occasionally been known to admire my abilities at studying for, and passing exams. Yesterday was different. Yesterday I almost literally ate a text book and shat it onto the pages of my answer booklet. Pretty much the only thing I wrote in 9 pages of answers that wasn't a word for word sentence from the textbook or lecture notes was on the last page where I wrote in big letters

NOW HOME!
WATCH

CRICKET!!

I am also glad that the hard refuge trucks have come and taken away the rubbish so I can feel confident leaving my car parked on the side of the road again.

If you were a real boy you would be 5 now. And also in love with Charity and about to die to save her life so she could marry Miguel and rid the Earth of evil.

Violence Against Women? Australia Says NO

Message brought to you by the department of making the ads at the start of a movie awkward for everyone on a date.

I find it kind of representative of our current society that I couldn't find the actual ad on the internet, but I could find over a dozen badly made parodies on YouTube.

Today was an epic day. So much was acheived, it went on forever. I went to my first high school presentation assembly in 5 years. It was 5 years in the making and thus intensely boring. Do you know how many irellevant people can win awards in FIVE YEARS?

Epic day was ended with an epic 99 stock game of Smash Brothers, 1v1, both JigglyPuff, homerun bats only. It only takes 70 minutes to seal off a day like this.

Are you serious?

Alcoholics spend all their money on booze.

Binge drinkers think they spend all their money on booze but then wake up to find almost 30 dollars of coinage in the tiny pocket of their jeans.

It is nice to come back to my comfy kneel chair and deliver this, my 600th entry on the site. The last 8 days I spent in Queensland and for the most part I didn't actually do anything. It was pretty awesome and gave me some time to reflect on what has been a pretty relentless year without having to continue dealing with those things.

So what would be more appropriate for my 600th entry than to share the few Bradisms I came up with over the week and saved as drafts in my phone? I don't think I meant for that to be a sentence!

"A week is a long time."
As far as fractions go, 1/52 is pretty insignifcant, yet so much can change.

"You can't change your past, you can't control the future, you can only make the best decision with the information and values you have in the present."
I think Hugh Jackman said this in a movie I saw a few weeks ago. It seemed pretty poignant when I was drunk.

"My problem is that I'm so adept at complex things yet so satisfied by simple things."
Eating a cucumber and chicken sandwich and playing Sudoku is just so goddamn fulfiling.

"Your greatest insights in life will be ruined when you knock over the glasses on the table."
I knocked over a whole jug after I saved that draft.

"Ironing your shirt for Monday before the weekend can reduce the depression over weekend loss on Sunday night dramatically."
I used the time I saved to shave.

Happy 600th entry, website :)

Brisbane doesn't have photos of the month. Adelaide has photos of the month!

So today I was doing my usual thing of living and making observation about things that happen, and then filtering potential journal entries from there. Today was a strangely optomistic day. Well I approach every day optomisticly that's for sure, but today it felt like my brain had excess capacity for genius. But I wasn't a genius, instead I just got distracted by the term "excess capacity" and decided to apply business strategy logic to the ideas I had for my journal entry today.

I want to say thank you to the shaver shop lady who sold me a new block as well as foil when I just asked for a new foil. Thanks to the new everything I had probably my most effecient shave ever today. In ratio of hair to begin with to hair after shaving it was a monumental achievement. I've started with more, and ended with less, but today was a big stretch thanks to a bevy of new equipment.

Gap in market discovered: There should be a way of using your shaver to inform people at the shaver shop that even though they ripped you off by outsmarting you and forcing you into a more expensive purchase, you appreciate their contribution to your life because now your face is all smooth n shit. This would probably be done with some high tech nano-technology in which, after an improved shave, a tiny butterfly or perhaps winged minotaur would rise from your shaver station, fly to the person who sold you new equipment and say "cheers, biatch" to them.

Cons
Small market segment
Limited Growth
High Cost, would need a highly differentiated product and effective marketing to be succesful.

Pros
Probably none, as a flying robot horse that thanks the lady who sold you a shaver foil is possibly the second to only CyberRebate.com as the worst business plan ever conceived.

My experience driving to the physio today I was heading towards Norwood along Fullarton road when I spied flashing lights and a potential traffic delay ahead. I hesitated, and then banged a left to endure a voyage of side streets to avoid delay and replace it with adventure. I don't know how, but I know for sure the silver blue sedan behind me also decided that the Slate commodore in front of him had a better idea than waiting in traffic, and thus began following me. What endured was a coming of age driving adventure where I navigated and rounded many side streets in search of a quicker way. The blue sedan followed me, commited to the cause it had decided that we were going to accomplish or run out of petrol trying.

Eventually I found the way to the main road again, bypassing the traffic disruption and making it to my physio on time. The blue sedan was close behind.

Market gap discovered: There is a distinct lack of technology geared towards letting cars high five each other.

Strengths: Proprietry technology, possible licensing monopoly could lead to sustainable competive advantage, strategic alliance with major car manufacturers could lead to long term network benefits.

Weaknesses: Possibly the stupidest idea ever. Would also have to develop technology to let cars "Psyche!" and "too slow" other cars.

Life is good!

Trees everywhere. I love Christmas.

Ignore the pain. Forge ahead anyway. This was the fucking point of growing stronger.

Every time I talk to a girl I still get the same adrenaline rush that I did back in year 8 when a brief second of eye contact would warrant a fifteen minute epic retelling at the next sleepover. Hell, even 4 years ago in 2002 the vague expression of some level of attractiveness required at least thirty minutes of dedicated fabling using a variety of conspiracy theory big foot sighting metaphors to pass any possible lessons on to peer generations.

There's no doubt about it. I cherish every second of girl talk, be it a sideways glance or a three month relationship, with the same giddy panic that I always have. I always believe that it could be the last moment of girl interaction I have. What the past year has taught me, at least, is that just because a girl is currently interested in you that interest could last merely a fraction of a second. In return, there's no real value in trying to invest in it when your stock could crash at any minute.

If there's one thing that being a dork has taught me, it's that being funny won't get you laid. It might get you friends and it might get you attention, but on the dance floor or in the coffee shop there's a completely serious, alpha male intent that, if you lack it, only female insecurity will win you a date. What being funny will provide you, though, is guaranteed entertainment in the place of unpredictable sexual conquest.

"Do you have any friends? Because that guy over there is my wingman and he's going to divert them while I dance with you."

"I can't hear what you're saying; I'm assuming you're asking why my wingman isn't helping me out. He's pretty distracted at the moment. We're new to this and still trying to work it all out."

"You're from Holland huh? The land of windmills? That's me trying to be both funny and meta again. You should probably just ignore that and I'll grab your ass."

Remarkably, this level of funny will get you a dance because it is accompanied by confidence. Alcohol fuelled confidence, but nevertheless when you break up a dancing girl square and start a conversation, there's no doubt that word spreads.

But time has a habit of out-sprinting your unfit, thumping heart and when it's apparent that your humour isn't backed up by a killer drive/a rugby player like instinct to tackle everything to the ground the dance floor moves away without you and you're left dancing to Maneater on your own like a 6 foot 6 totem pole of grinning idiocy.

But then your wingman finally comes back and says "Brad, you listen to me. You go hook-up with those Irish chicks and don’t let a god damn thing stop you!"

"Irish, they're from Holland. Ah fuck it, it's all the same continent".

Today's Lesson: Trying to pull off an Irish dance to 'SexyBack' will not impress two girls from Holland and one girl from Germany. The very image may make the cab driver laugh as he drives you home alone, but that's the point. It's funny. If you can’t help but be stuck in year 8 you may as well have a laugh.

Is to get really drunk on Smirnoff Twists and then meet The Nextmen and Dynamite MC!

Oh, and replacement discs...

MERRY CHRISTMAS INTERNET

The year is drawing to a close, my Christmas Letter to the Internet seems to be lost in the mail but that doesn't mean I can't begin the parade of annual inspection of my life. This year it is starting with a new gimmick. A listing and description of some of the more life influencing purchases I've made over the past calendar year. Enjoy.

My plan to compensate for my tiny penis is a sports car away from success.

Next year I will:
Procrastinate Less
Drink more wine
Write

Tonight I have:
Made a head start on all of these things.

Prediction: If it's anything like this year it will probably be a headfuck.

Happy New Year Internet.