- Cold
- Closes early
- Rains a lot
Lists
14
May 09
40 Useful and Creative Infographics
I’ve always been a big fan of well put-together infographics. You can digest big picture statistics in just one glance, which is useful if you are a bit lazy or a bit stupid. Combine it with lovely graphic design and you have a statistical masterpiece.
Cue 40 Useful and Creative Infographics, courtesy Six Revisions. What a nice little collection.
Personal favourites:
28
Apr 09
Things about my parents’ house
- lace doilies
- china cabinets and tea sets
- LivingTV
- Antiques Roadshow
- knick-knacks
- plastic tablecloths
- malt biscuits
- home-made soup and scones
- cups of tea in bed (single)
- teddy bears on spare beds
- mirrors that require ducking down
- the biggest washing machine in the world
- random hearing aids
- organised pill collections
- brown velvet sofas
- multiple foot stools
- cats with human names
26
Apr 09
Things you can’t do on dial-up
- View any page mere seconds after clicking a link
- Look at friends’ drunken antics via Facebook photo
- Watch YouTube videos
- Load email using GMail’s standard view
- Download an illegal movie
- Masturbate and download porn at the same time
- Not get frustrated (see above)
- Not throw the computer out the window
- Whoops, sorry Mum – GET BROADBAND
How is it that anyone is still on dial-up? What is the point of the internet without broadband? Why even own a computer?
So many questions…
3
Aug 08
A Recent Life Synopsis
A quick synopsis of my life since March:
- I herniated a disc.
- I found out I had some bone disease when I was a teenager.
- I also found out I have some nodie things on my vertebrae.
- I got my first cold sore which turned me into a hideous monster.
- I got a trachea infection.
- I got ill from the trachea infection antibiotics.
- I got the flu.
- I moved flats while I had the flu.
- I coughed for so long I cracked a rib.^*^
In short, in the past few months my body stopped caring about me and I have been rather sick. It all started with a little stress from moving to Auckland, and then a wee little disc herniation to cause stabbing voodoo knives and the inability to walk. I am since able to walk, and can for the most part function again with some limitations.
But to look on the good side of life: I am enjoying Auckland; I am loving my new flat; my social life is excellent, and my BFF from forever will be in Auckland in less than two weeks. Goblin is also as cute as ever, even if she continues to shit on the floor because she poos with her ass hanging off the side of her dirt box. There is nothing more I love than to clean up warm, sloppy cat shit.
So anyway, hi. I am alive. They say what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, right?
^*^ This is unconfirmed, but I am convinced this is what I have. With everything else, what’s one more thing? Next up, EBOLA!
17
Mar 08
Auckland: Initial Observations
I have officially been a JAFA for precisely 16 days now. It’s starting to feel a bit more like I actually live here, instead of how it has been feeling which is that I am housesitting for someone with all my stuff and my cat, and that I am temping in someone else’s job. It’s quite an odd feeling really, and I feel like I am going to go “home” to Wellington any day now.
Things to note:
- Auckland is very muggy. I live no more than a 15-minute walk to my new job and start at 8:30am each day. For the first two weeks I would walk not entirely too strenuously because at 8:15am it already muggy and hot. I arrive at 8:27am, grab my water bottle and take some swigs of yesterday’s water, take it to the cooler to refill it, and then go to the bathroom to run my wrists under cold water and daub my forehead and upper lip with a paper towel. In 2002 I coined the phrase, “There’s a rivva in my boobies,” and sadly the rivva has returned.
- The coffee is terrible. I have not had a single good cup of coffee in Auckland. Everyone’s beans taste burned and bitter, and lattes arrive thin and watery, to the point I would consider going to Starbucks out of preference. That is deadly sin in Wellington, the land of delicious coffee.
- Everything is very far apart. No longer can I waltz down to the post office at lunch, or quickly grab some new stockings when the ones I’m wearing run, or wander around Farmers looking at cheap make-up and new hair straighteners. I don’t work in the city centre, rather in one of the closest suburbs which although very nice is overrun with stupidly expensive clothing boutiques and many cafes selling crappy coffee. And because Auckland is so large and sprawling, everywhere seems to be a destination shop. A 20-minute drive to Briscoes, a 25-minute drive in another direction to go to Freedom Furniture, and a short drive into town for a lot of other stores that you would want to shop at if it were not a requirement to try for a ridiculous amount of time to get a car park. Perhaps I will be needing a car after all, and my poor little Vespa will need to be sold. That is as yet undetermined.
- The shopping and eating choices are never-ending and fantastic. Being in a city that is 3.5-times the size of Wellington of course the shopping is going to be better. There are so many great little boutiques (that I can’t afford but can wish) and lots of stores Wellington just doesn’t have. There are loads of new restaurants to choose from, and a lot more delicious Asian foods to try which is a wonderful by-product of having a larger Asian population in the warmer north.
- The houses are way prettier. At least in the area I live in. In Wellington, the areas with the beautiful historic Victorian villas have had many demolished to make way for hideous townhouses and apartment blocks. Instead in Ponsonby and Grey Lynn, most of these are being restored to their former beauty. I love going for walks in my neighbourhood just so I can look at the houses and dream that one day I am going to win the lottery that I never enter so I can afford to own a home in a suburb such as thing. However, chances are that it will never happen.
So, I’m getting along alright up here. I miss my family and I miss Wellington (good days only), but I’m sure it won’t be too long before I start replying with “Grey Lynn” instead of “Wellington” when people ask me where I’m from.
14
Feb 08
Happy Love Day
Almost a year ago I met an amazing guy called Duncan and fell in love. It was like nothing I had ever experienced before, and I was completely head over heels. I remember the first time I realised I was in love with him as clear as it was yesterday; lying in his bed next to him watching him look at me, trying to take a mental photograph of his beautiful eyes (greenish/blue-gray with yellow around the pupil) and thinking to myself how wonderful he was and how he made me feel like no one had ever before. I felt like my heart was quite literally going to explode in my chest. It took some time for me to get the courage up to tell him how I felt, but it wasn’t hard because I was sure he felt the same about me.
The last year has truly been the best year of my life, and I have never been so happy. Sometimes I feel like I have to pinch myself to check that I am not having some super awesome romantic dream after watching a stupid and cheesy Hollywood rom-com. In the past year we have:
- Danced to Shapeshifter outdoors on the first weekend we met, followed by another time, and then another time
- Been chased by rabid Tongan dogs while riding pushbikes
- Gone on a surprise weekend away to a secluded bach, courtesy of Duncan
- Visited the biggest tree in New Zealand
- Introduced each other to our families with no dramatic consequences
- Travelled to a 5-day drum and bass festival for New Years where Duncan DJed, requiring me to wake at 5am, which I did because I love him and his lush beats
- Day-walked the start of the Abel Tasman track
- Seen a whale
- Conducted a failed Tongan kava ceremony in the bathroom of our fale on Fafa Island
- Gone shopping for jeans together no less than 28 times
- Taken photos of each other “levitating” while jumping on a trampoline, resulting in me acquiring a bung knee
- Become frequent flyers and professional travellers
- Quite obviously danced to lots of drum and bass together
I have also become completely smitten. I have had so much fun, and can’t wait for all the fun 2008 will bring. Baboo, you are the best thing to ever happen to me. Happy Valentine’s Day!
25
Feb 07
Drum and Bass FTW
Going to PHAT did something to me. I’m not sure what it was, what exactly changed me, but suddenly I have become obsessed with drum and bass in a way unknown to me before, even though I used to go to a lot of gigs back in the ’90s (although the lovely Russell got it started last year by taking me to Shapeshifter). Since leaving my humble abode in Wellington just after Christmas last year I have seen:
- Grooverider
- Bad Company
- Klute
- Adam Freeland
- Andy C
- Dylan & Robyn Chaos
- Some others I can’t remember
Plus locals:
- Agent Alvin
- SAL
- Pacific Heights
- snax
- Some others I can’t remember
And soon I will also see:
- Tom Middleton
- Ed Rush & Optical
- T-Power
- Shapeshifter (again)
I am seriously addicted and feeling the love. Mmmm yeah! Weee!
11
Feb 07
Almost One Month, Too Busy To Write
- Turning 27
- Dancing ’til I can’t dance no mo’
- Meeting new people
- Remeeting old people
- Getting rowdy
- Eating food at Epic
- Drinking many long blacks
- Cruising on my scooter
- Taking photos
- Falling in love with Metalocaplyse
- Cuddle-neglecting Goblin
- Let’s go do that now.
8
Jan 07
2006: The Movies
On October 4, 2005, for some unknown reason, I started noting down every movie I watched with the date and a rating from 1 to 10 in my Moleskine. I’ve become rather obsessive about it, but I have noticed that either I only watch good to excellent movies, or my rating scale has a very fucked up bell curve. I am very keen to give 8s and 9s, but hesitant to give anything less than a 6. I’m far too generous, perhaps. Anyway, these are my movies of 2006.
10 – My Favourites
Crash
Mon Oncle
Bad Santa
The Weatherman
Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid
Clerks II
Nacho Libre
Roger & Me
9 – Movies I Liked A Fuck Of A Lot
Garden State
Shaolin Soccer
Howl’s Moving Castle
Freaks
House of Flying Daggers
Office Space
The Hebrew Hammer
Waking Ned Devine
Click
12 Monkeys
The Brown Bunny
Fast Food Nation
Ed Wood
Night on Earth
Casino Royale
8 – Movies I Liked Enough To Probably Watch Again
In Her Shoes
Eddie Izzard: Circle
Love Actually
Lost In La Mancha
Ellie Parker
Sky High
The Pink Panther
Microcosmos
American Pyscho
Mysterious Skin
Pirates of the Caribbean 2
7 – Movies That Were Still Worthy Of My Time
Rumble Fish
Shopgirl
Just Like Heaven
The Exorcism Of Emily Rose
The Legend of Zorro
V For Vendetta
Silent Hill
The Departed
6 – Movies To Watch When There’s Nothing Better To Do
The Fog
The Wedding Crashers
The 40-Year-Old-Virgin
Dear Wendy
Final Destination 3
Miami Vice
Saboteur
5 – Movies I Wish I Could Have Decided Not To Watch
King Kong
X-Men 3
4 – Movies I Should Have Turned Off
Melinda & Melinda
3 – Movies That Never Should Have Been Made
Elizabethtown
Conclusions I Can Draw From This Data
- I am really far too generous with my ratings.
- Some of those top 10- and 9-rated movies would switch around, for example, Shaolin Soccer kicks the arse off (no pun intended, really) Clerks II, but obviously at the time of watching Clerks II I really liked that movie, more than the brilliant Shaolin Soccer.
- I am a sucker for romantic comedies, and really any movie that makes me cry.
- I obviously don’t like Alfred Hitchcock as my previously second-lowest rated movie was The Birds.
- I really like Johnny Depp and Steve Martin.
- Daniel Craig is the best Bond ever.
- Adam Goldberg in shiny blue Speedo underpants with visible cock outline is so hot.
- Adrian, I’m really sorry I didn’t like your movies. You should tell the directors to have better scripts next time.
- I have questionable taste.