the aftermath

so, christmas is over: the presents have been opened, the left-overs are glad-wrapped and a whole of people are going to have a bit of trouble getting out of bed this morning. not me; i'm on antibiotics, so no alcohol for me (not that i drink much, anyway).

usually my family opens the presents before breakfast, then our half-brothers matt and mick, grandma, nan (dad's mum), uncle laurence (mum's bro - not dad's family, there are a few issues) and his partner, her son and (as of recently) her sister come round and we have lunch. (mick's girlfriend yuko would've come also, except she's in japan at the mo'.) then open more presents.

instead, we slept in (signs of children growing up, sleeping in on christmas day), waited til ally (older sis) came back from work (red rooter opens 'til 1pm on christmas day), then had a massive present-opening. takes me back to the old days when we used to see our extended family on mum's side - 2nd cousins and that - at christmas. i like having cousins. frank (uncle's partner's son) is a fun kid (especially when his attempts at bluffing give me all his money in poker), and his english has gotten pretty good in the past 12 months or so, if he is still shy.

so yeah, we played poker and rickety kate (another name for microsoft hearts, only you can - not that we do - play with different rules), ally and i did garlic prawns for dinner, and dad went out on christmas day to get my repeat of antibiotics for my deafening ear infection. i feel so loved.

this post has entirely too many parentheses.

anyway, i cleaned up alright, what with various crafty things and books and such (1 of 6, my older bro matt's getting pretty good - he bought us jewellery!), and more beads than anyone could possibly need in their lifetime. i don't know when i'll have the time to sort through them all. the bead co. shop up at hursty changed to empire beads, so they chuck out bags of beads for $16. if you saw what was in those bags, you'd realise the bargain that it is; some of the beads in their cost a fortune. and i have 37 (38 but i gave one to grandma) miniature (thumbnail-sized) gold handbags. yes. handbags. i dunno what i'm going to do with them. maybe decorate someting. like a handbag.

oh, yeah, and money, which is especially useful. it should keep me going until i get a job, which i'll have to really start looking for even more when i return from mission. yes, i'm going on a christian beach mission (third year) down the coast, ministering to and running activities for kids in years 3-6 in the caravan park. there are other groups catering for littler kids, high school kids, year 12 and uni age peeps, and ladies' craft and s[ecret]m[en's]b[usiness]. it'll be a hoot. i miss them more than i thought i did. hopefully the bad-will in sydney hasn't spread down there - the campers are there to relax, mostly, so they'll probably react angrily towards trouble-makers. wondering whether that's good or bad.

so, see you in a few. 12 days. whatever.

just a number... right?

so, yeah, the time finally came around and i got my uai...

well, that was a disappointment. of course, i didn't do very well - kudos to all my friends with smarts who worked so hard for their high marks. i was actually somewhat surprised - i guess so many people continually affirming that i'd do well anyway almost gave me hope. not that i'd get high enough for my desired courses (90+), but still. however, i definitely deserved my not-so-good marks, seeing as i did literally no work in the past two years. ah, well - at least i scraped a band 5 for japanese.

i'm actually pretty happy, though, seeing as i'm going to tafe. it'll be fun, whatever i end up doing. and people i've spoken to so far have been supportive; no uni-snobbery yet.

i'm a big moviestar now!

so, the hsc. yeah.

results came out today, apparently. i haven't checked them yet, but i'm not expecting anything shiny, and i won't even know what it means in uai-language, so i'll wait until tomorrow to hear the bad news in full-force. or wait until monday, when i'll have already seen most of the people i don't want to talk to about it. let's see how long i can hold out (or how long the site remains crashed).

mel's party rocked - i got to see both bugsy mallone and the power rangers movie, the latter i'd never seen previously. would you believe that my family never owned the movie, but that we've still got the 'making-of-'? yes, disturbing, ain't it.

apparently rachel wong rocked indonesian cont and indonesian ext, in the form of topping the state, though that's just hearsay until the mass media tell me so, after which it shall be fact. kudos to her, though.

also, dexter fletcher has a fan club. and a fan site. which i can't access. is it just me, or does the entire internet not work today? ah well, if anyone can make it work, let me know if it's any good: http://dexteronline.ms11.net/ or if it exists.

that's just mental

so, new journal. mel will be happy to know that i've abandoned my lj for the meantime, though i'll still pop in to say hi when i get bored, i suppose. the name is taken from a tea i tried at the third rock cafe last night. it reaffirmed my assessment of myself as well and truly NOT a tea person. yes, my screenname is a beverage. i've seen worse.

i missed _manitou's shoe_ on sbs last night, though mel saw it. it's a shame really, because like mel i came in late when i saw it the last time sbs showed it. guess i'll have to wait another 8 months for it to come around again.

when i turned 18 last week, i felt no milestone crashing down on my head, but on saturday a truly amazing thing happened: my mum bought mi goreng. to asian families, to many people these days, this is nothing, but let me tell you now, i was truly stoked. we've only ever bought 2-minute noodles (i never know the brand, just that it's the one with the noodolbot promotion) and to buy actual mi goreng, well, it felt good. especially now that mum spends so much time swim-teaching - she still feeds us, but sometimes i don't feel like vegemite on wholegrain or soy and linseed bread for lunch. the world makes sense again.

well, maybe not:
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20051211a1.htm
i'd once heard of a young japanese schoolgirl killing her best friend as they became more academically competitive, but what takes the cake is that this is the third schoolgirl in japan to be slain since november 22. and that the attempts of employers in checking prospective employees' criminal records can be difficult "because universities often refuse to disclose such information, citing students' privacy". surely that info should be given to employers, especially when the employee would be dealing with children?

enough griping. let us celebrate, for the race riots made it to the top of the news column on the wiki main page:
Race riots erupt in Sydney, Australia, with thousands gathering on the beach to target Arabs, in response to the assault on two surf lifesavers the previous weekend allegedly by a Lebanese gang.
bravo, australia. we're looking real multicultural, aren't we?

still, even when we're being relatively 'multicultural', it's still okay to bag out other nations, so long as it's the kiwis or the poms, right? apparently the english soccer coach or management was nervous about the prospects of possibly facing australia in the world cup (before saturday morning's draw, which yes, i got up to watch at 6.15) because australians like to beat england. not that we're likely to make it past the second round, but we've got 6 months to go before that crops up, and in the meantime there's always cricket. and golf. i've decided to be a fan of matty goggin and nick o'hern.

on a final note, RIP nando's bunny sam, killed by the neighbour's dog last week, and the sound garden at hurstville, the best second-hand (and new) cd store around, which is closing down soon.