McD's

I finally got around to watching Supersize me last night - I know, I'm slack; I kept meaning to see it and then forgetting to rent it. I can't believe he managed to stomach eating nothing but McDonalds every day for a month! I haven't eaten there in months but what's really disturbing is that after watching the documentary for two hours, even acknowledging the evil of McD's, I was almost tempted to go get a Big Mac. I can't believe one of the guys they interviewed had eaten over 19,000 Big Macs!! That's just plain scary. So were the sizes over in America. I swear they're Supersized fries packet looked about a foot long and they're drinks were almost a litre for some of them!

Giving Blood

I don't really mind needles. They had to take blood out of me all the time when I was sick with glandular fever so I'm fairly blase about it. Funnily enough I've never given blood before though - I've always managed to disqualify myself by having had a cold too recently or something like that. So it was with a great feeling of righteousness that I decided to give up my lunchbreak and go give blood this week when they had a mobile collection near work. The problem was that a whole lot of other people had similar ideas....I was waiting for over 40 mins and they still weren't close to me even having the initial health check with the nurse when I finally gave up and headed back to work. I had an hour long lunch break and that wasn't enough time, which makes me wonder how many people they manage to get through. They should have more collections up at the uni (during semester, obviously), I'd have thought there'd be plenty of people happy to give up some blood in the hope of a free bikkie :)

A.J.

I think Psycho Milt said it best in their comment of "I keep getting drawnback to this blog out of the same sense of horror that has me photographcrashed cars." Check out A.J.'s latest anti-feminist thread:http://agrichristian.blogspot.com/2005/11/this-ones-for-beau.html
I swear the only way this man is going to get laid is if he enters the Brethren (which I actuallywould have thought would suit him). I suppose that's not really a very nice thing to say but his attitudes to women do just piss me off. Mark's comment on that thread was good as well. It's along the lines that using the Bible to enforce some kind of archaic control of men over women and forcing them to a submittive and insuperior position wasn't the intention of Christ since his attitudes were very liberal for the time. If men want to try and use the Bible to force woman to wear headscarves and admit that they are less 'godlike' than men, then perhaps these same men will start obeying the rest of the OT rules found in the books of laws? Such as not wearing mixed fabrics, having tassles on the clothes, and any of the other numerous legislative suggestions.

When the zombies take over, how long till the electricity fails?

Come on, how many of you haven't watched at least one of the Romero movies and pondered this at some time or the other!

Check out:
http://www.straightdope.com/mailbag/mzombiepower.html

Not a good time to be in Australia

It's funny how we normally think that Australia has it so much better off than us - better shopping, better pay, better weather (well the last is certainly true at the moment). We tend to ignore additional taxes that they have, the poisonous animals and well, the fact that it's full of Australians :p But in the last few months the difference has become truly alarming. While we push for a rise of the minimum wage, nice union striking at Starbucks this week, and start legislating improvements to the student loasn scheme, Australia has had quite different things on its mind.

Issue number one is its push from above to change their version of the employment act. It's a way I suppose of fully privatising employment and emphasising a hands off approach from the govenment. They want to see an end to unions and essentially to worker's rights. Things like rights to public holidays are due to go and instead of turning to an Employment Relations Act for comfort it's all going to come down to the individual contract that you negotiated - and boy will you not want to get that wrong. There's already been one protest held in Auckland and hopefully more are due to come.

Issue number two is the War on Terror and the excuse it allows to put in draconian measures. The current push is to allow new legislation that will allow people to be held without charges if they are suspected of terrorism or breaching national security. This doesn't necessarily mean that they've been making bombs or casing public areas merely that they have looked at the wrong website or been seen talking to the wrong person. If they are 18+ then there right to as single phone call can be denied. If they are under 18 they will be allowed to contact one guardian however that person will not be permitted to tell anyone else or they can be charged with committing a treasonous act/breaching national security etc... So, in theory, Daddy might find out but not be permitted to tell his wife? No lawyers, no appeals to the media, not even knowing necessarily why you've been seized and detained...that's pretty scary shit and a good beginning to a police state.

Issue number three for anyone who's been reading the news this week is draconian measures in relation to questions of citizenship. I wish I'd kept the article so I could remember his name (it was in Thursday or Friday's paper) about a guy who on release from a 2-3 year jail term for thievery was forcibly deported to Siberia. The man had lived in Australia since he was two years old and could certainly be considered an Australian citizen. However, since he had been born overseas he was sent to a country that he could not remember, where he had no family and no money and has been captured by international cameras huddled outside the embassy trying to get back home. International courts have already ruled Australia's actions as illegal but this doesn't currently help the guy shivering in a Siberian winter instead of basking in an Aussie summer. In another case investigated a woman had been forcibly deported who had only lived outside of Australia for the first six months of her life.

Great Friday

Yesterday was a bloody good day. I finally got my exam marks in - an A on my core Film paper (wrapping up my minor), an A on Medieval Mentalities (History), an A+ on Renaissance Tragedies (which surprised me as a I found the paper a little lucklustre) and an A- on Theory and the Gothic (stage 3 English). Mum's been laughing at me because I'm bummed out over the last mark, which is fair enough, but I was gutted that I hadn't done better on my first Stage III paper. I did brilliantly on the internal which means they can't have thought too much of my exam. Ah well, fair enough in some ways as I didn't get a handle on the pre-announced question until I was in the exam and marshalled my points then (the marshalling could possibly have gone better I guess). Still, solid enough across the board that I stand a chance with the two scholarship application's I dropped off earlier this week. I've got half my fees covered so I'm hoping to get the rest through one or both of those.
My lunch hour ended up being shoe shopping :) The No. 1 Shoe Shop has a huge store on Elliot St right round the corner from the National Tower and had a 'buy 2 get 1 free sale' so i've got some funky work shoes for our 'corporate environment' and a cute pair of jandles (I got snapped earlier this week for wearing sneakers, I was hoping since they were leather and mostly covered by my long pants that noone world notice :P). On the other hand, it also made them notice that us lugging boxes of files around in high heels was impractical so they've organised a trolley now which is good.
Work supplied many bottles of wine and we get to start drinking at 4pm while we work so I was fairly pissed by 5.30. Had a few drinks at home and then went out later that evening for more drinks and pool on K rd. We played abysmally (having no real skill at pool) apart from a few amazing streaks of luck. Admittedly these were offset by some truly awful shots as well and managing to miss breaking four times in a row! It was pissing down with rain and noone wanted to go clubbing so i walked down to catch the midnight bus (which I missed since he went early) but did at least score an awesome kebab. He either felt sorry for me with my dripping wet hair or thought the bedraggled look was cute cause he made me the most mammoth kebab ever.
When I finally got home, care of Discount taxis, I ended up curled up in bed with purring kitty, hot water bottle and the rest of the kebab watching Jurassic Park while it poured down outside. Very cosy :)

Jono and Mira ~ aw!

Benn expounding on something but none of us can remember what!

Anna, Me and Mira. Such a crap photo of me but Anna's got such a great smile :)

Sridat's birthday! I've been meaning to post these for ages and apologise for the delay :)

The job

I know....I've been slack. I've been out most nights this week and thus I've waited till now, when it's raining and cold and my weekend plans have been ruined, to get around to updating this! Well, not ruined :p just radically altered. The Grey Lynn festival has been cancelled due to 'severe weather warnings' (so glad I'm not working for council anymore!!), the Labour BBQ is off, and the weather's too crap to try and borrow Olivia's bike to cycle out to Cornwall Park. *wrinkles nose* I might even have to go to the gym this weekend! 'oh woes me'. I'm on an exercise kick at the moment but I'd rather walk home from work each day, go cycling or swimming on the weekend than go to the gym and mindlessly stare at some old magazine or Juice Tv while on the cross-trainer.

In other news, the job is going well. Fabian's leaving us to start making his way back to Germany earlier :( So he and his girlfriend are flying out Christmas Eve I think for Sydney and then a resort in Malaysia. It sucks cause he's so funny and they're not planning on replacing him. I think work's rather relieved actually. We're all on contracts to March so they can't really fire us but at the moment there's really only enough work for one person (or maybe one and a half but that just doesn't work!). Rollover was supposed to officially begin last Monday as the merger of the two companies and the swapover of software went live but it's really been more of a fizzle than a bang. The mountain of work that was supposed to eventuate - hasn't, although I suppose it might further down the track. Instead the four of us have spent most of this week doing our best to find ways of looking busy. Our team leader is pretty hands off and doesn't monitor us much since the work is supposed to come from different people in the department so we're pretty much expected to keep ourselves busy. The problem being of course that it's still understood that we can't be actively caught slacking off. So far this week I've read the entire Herald every day, read all of The Noob and have started on Penny Arcade. We've also done a bunch of filing work and even that we've had to drag out. It's not so bad though listening to my walkman and reading webcomics inbetween folders.

Inbetween all that we've cross-referenced data systems and spreadsheets, set up new client groups and customers and done various data work. It's kind of cool to realize every now and then that you're working on well known companies or organisations but in the end I couldn't really care less what they're credit limit is or about their finances so *shrug*.

The Movie Of Your Life Is Film Noir

So what if you're a little nihilistic at times?Life with meaning is highly over-rated. Your best movie matches: Sin City, L. A. Confidential, Blade Runner

If Your Life Was a Movie, What Genre Would It Be?

Science Test

You Passed 8th Grade Science

Congratulations, you got 7/8 correct!

Could You Pass 8th Grade Science?

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang has just come out in cinemas and its fantastic. Go see it!

It has Robert Downey Jr and Van Kilmer in it, both doing good acting jobs, and its a self-referential text that's bloody funny and reminiscent of the 50s film noir/detective films but with a better sense of humour :)

Car Fixed

Huzzah!! Thanks to beloved Dad my car now has a new fanbelt and is purring away happily so we think he's finally fixed.

It was quite a good really, on Saturday, I got to dress up as a giant pukekoe in the morning and get my car in the afternoon. Anna works at ARC and their mascot for Rideline/Maxx is a pukekoe so they've got a big suit they use at schools and different events. Anyway, they needed someone to wear it at the inauguration of the new park & ride at Albany that runs the new motorway bus service through to town. Sweetest $100 I've made in a long while and the kids were sooo cute!

Other Death Date's

According to Find your Fate I've got until April 3 2068, that's Time remaining: 22782 days, 16 hours, 51 minutes, 5 seconds.

According to OkCupid:

According to our research, you'll be dead by
June 2068 at age 87 - probable cause -
cancer
YOU DIE:
87.0 years

AVERAGE FEMALE LIFE SPAN:
77.1 years


WHY YOU DIE?
56%
cancer
24%
car accident
13%
loneliness
5%
drowning of the lungs
2%
wounds


You have 22886.2 days left on this earth.
You've already lived 28% of your life.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That's a wee bit depressing, to think it's 28% gone already!!

The Death Test

According to the Death Test...
Tuesday, September 4th 2046 At the tender age of 65 years old.
On that date, you will most likely die from:
Cancer (10%)
Heart Attack (5%)
Alien Abduction (5%)
"Cleaning your Rifle" (4%)

A. J. Chesswas

Ack, I can see why people would be willing to believe that this guy is just too much to be real. Check out posts like: http://agrichristian.blogspot.com/2005/10/intelligent-woman.html or his reply to Spanblather here: http://spanblather.blogspot.com/2005/11/questions-for-agrarian-feminist.html.

Vast Left Wing Conspiracy

Tuesday night proved an interesting way of meeting other predominately left-wing or liberal bloggers and getting to work our way through several bottles of wine and a huge pile of food at Midnight Express. We had a big crowd there, forgive me if I miss anyone!, including the About Town crowd of Xavier, Tristan, Kate and Paul, as well as Rachel, Stephen, Span; Oliver, Rafe and Sam; Keith Ng and Tze Ming.

The highlight of the evening was definitely About Town's annoucement that they had made A.J. Chesswas and his blog up. That he was in fact a conceptual art project that they had decided to finally come clean about. Now what was truly hilarious is that I was sitting by them when, after bottles of wine, they came up with the brilliant idea of claiming their detested enemy as their own invention and annoucing that they had merely been toying with people's minds! It was bloody funny seeing them trying out the theory on the rest of the table and valiantly beating down any arguements. I see their annoucement has caused quite a storm in a teacup in amongst the blogging community. It's weird bumping into comments written by people I know! Like Iain for instance :)

I think the annoucement might have had slightly more credibility if Kate hadn't just announced the day before the BIG SCANDAL of Tristan shagging Christine Rankin. I feel for you Tris, I don't know why anyone believed it either!

New Job at National Bank

So...I started new job today. We're in Business Support Services and I get to put crap like 'Project Implementation' and 'Data Integrity' down on my CV. It's great, technically we're IT staff but we're basically doing data entry and management. It's much more complicated than I'd anticipated though and using specialized software like Apollo and CBSIS which I'm not familair with. On the bright side, two of the team have only been there 6 weeks and Luzette started with me today. It looks like we get this week in training and trying to get IT to sort themselves out and let us actually access the relevant software.

The place has some awesome bonuses. It's a modern building in good condition, so it's a nice looking place to work in. We don't get the bonuses offered by some of the financial companies so instead we get a free soft drink each day, free biscuits, free access to a daily fruit platter and our very own fridge of alcohol! They do Friday afternoon/night drinks and the company pays for the booze. They've got four or five different kinds of beer and several varieties of wine. I hear there's an even bigger stash on one of our associated floors upstairs! So that's pretty good :)

The downside is a one hour lunchbreak, taking us down to about 37 hours a week. The place has a nice kitcken but there's no seating in it and no staff room in the building. So, wanting to save money and not buy lunch, it's a bit annoying to have an hour to kill in the middle of the day. I'm told that after the next few weeks of project work that we might have the option of leaving work half an hour early and that would be good :)

All in all, it's looking good - especially once we can actually access the computer systems and try to get our heads around all the processes we're supposed to know! I'd hate to accidentally cut someone off from their 9 million dollar STAF!

Boat Trip

Thanks Alex for the awesome harbour cruise organised! We went out with Nick's Cruises out past Rangitoto and moored near one of the DOC islands. We couldn't obtain permission to dock there unfortunately but Pam had a few words with the staff and they let us dive off the access deck at the back of the boat :) It was bloody freezing when I jumped in but Pam was right; the water proved fantastic and she started a trend - even if some of the guys had to jump in wearing boxers :P A truly classic moment though was her throwing the life-ring out to someone and forgetting to attach a rope to it! We got him in alright though and one of the crew tied a good long rope to it and chucked it out for us, to float while we were swimming. There was a strong ingoing tide so the current was hard against us swimming back to the boat, so it was handy to be able to pull ourselves along the rope for the last few meters :P The weather wasn't brilliant but the rain held off and it was warm enough. Besides, the people were of course fantastic and we had karoke to entertain us on the way back.

Minor finished!!

W00t!! My film minor is finally complete as of this afternoon. It was already paper heavy in terms of numbers but I had to do the 'core' paper for it to count as my minor. *does a little dance* Yay, exams are all over for this year!!

Soccer

I've been too busy with exams to post but i just had to post tonight. I hurt...I really do. I mean this is me who goes to the gym every now and then or goes for a twenty minute walk around the block and now I'm playing soccer! Helen's signed the flat up for a 16 week, mixed-gender, social indoor-soccer tournament and tonight was our first game. They were running behind schedule and forgot to allow time between quarters at one point so I ended up playing three quarters and just hurt! We won though :)