The Old Military Prayer...

So I was at work Monday the 18th, right? I had got a single, not a return train ticket, because the day before my manager had given me a lift home. She apparantly hadn't brought her car Monday, so I was forced to take the train.

Now, as I ran down to the station at 11:30, the gates were open (as they often are late at night), and my train was leaving in under a minute. I figure, bugger it, I don't have time to grab a ticket, they hardly ever check. I hopped onto the train, went to Redfern, switched platforms (noticing the gates were open here too), and caught the train to Newtown.

I get off the train and walk down the platform, playing Craig's gameboy advance (a boon to the commuter). As I reach the bottom of the stairs and look up, I stop dead. There are two train guards at the top, checking tickets.

I freeze, about-face, and start walking back up the platform, muttering "ohfuckohfuckohfuckohfuckohfuck..." and other such intellectual expressions. My brain is whirring a mile a minute. I walk up to the timetable and see that in 20 minutes, at 12:15, there's train back to Redfern. I can always walk back. I also check my wallet. Might there be an old ticket I could bluff with? Nope. All I find is a Newtown to Hornsby return from the 13th. Oh weel, I'll be ok, as long as they don't come down onto the platform, right?

Oh shit, they're coming down to the platform. They must have noticed my ever-so-stealthy deer-in-the-headlights pose at the bottom of the stairs. I don't look up and pretend to be engrossed in Final Fantasy Tactics.

Guard: "'Scuse me, mate, but could we see your ticket?"
Me: "Umm, yeah sure." *hand them the Hornsby return from the 13th with a straight face*
*pause*
Guard: "Oh, ok. Here you go. *hands ticket back* There's one last train from here, isn't there?"
Me: "Ummm... yeah, the 12:15."
Guard: "You must have just missed the last one."
Me: "Must have. Heh. Heh."
Guard: "Ok, thanks. Have a good night." *returns to his post at the top of the stairs*
Me: *dies*

So I wait the 20 minutes, calling Tanja and letting her know I'll be a bit late (and waking her up, poor thing). I get the train to Redfern, step off, and there are guards there too. I walk up, hand the the Hornsby ticket, which they hand right back, I walk up the stairs and out the open gates. Homefree.

So, that military prayer in the title? It's an old one, but a good one.

"Thank the Lord for people stupider than me."

"My God, you're a beard with an idiot attached."

Whew. While since I updated.

Really fast recap: Tanja and me. Noosa. Lovely weather, got a tan, shopped a lot, went to the beach, met Steve Irwin. Drank in swim-up bar.

After I got back, I “quit” the CCA-regime and the field of telemarketing (the quotation marks are because I haven’t actually told them yet) and joined the ragtag motley crew at Borders Bondi as part of the music team. It’s not bad, actually.

Things I’ve learned since starting at Borders:
:: Black Books is wonderful (the boxed set of all three seasons selling at $41 actually wooed me away from buying Shaun of the Dead… at least until next pay), and Dylan Moran is my hero.
:: Shelving books and organizing things is strangely calming. It’s kinda Zen. It’s “Ze”.
:: I am the only one in the store who cares about the graphic novel section. You can’t put American Splendour next to Ultimate X-Men. It’s not RIGHT!
:: Sometimes managers (with names beginning with W) are not the knowledge centres of their sections, and you’ll learn more from a part-timer who started 4 weeks before you.
:: When people change the display, you can get free posters!
:: The film “Hero” is about saying three phrases, then flying at people with swords. Repeat, later, rinse,stab.
:: Little French guys in camouflage will get upset when you tell them that electronica is in the Dance section. “Bhut, electah-roh-in-CAH izznot dance! Then they’ll spent an hour and a half looking at the whole section, and then ask to listen to seven different CDs for ten minutes each (during which, I’m not allowed to leave information) and then get angry when I won’t take an import CD out of its cellophane, and then buy that one import, and leave all the ones he listened to.
:: If your microwave gets broken, a sandwich-maker will appear like magic within a day.
:: Sushi is only good when it has chicken in it.
:: I need more money, as there are many fancy and expensive things I wish to purchase.

Warning!

simulcast from Marathon Men:
"T-Minus 12.5 hours until Lord of the Rings Special Edition Marathon Begins. Aw fucken' yeah. that' going to be 11.5 hours of Peter-Jackson-y goodness. And it'll be the best kind of Peter Jackson-y goodness. The kind where we don't see Peter-Jackson."

Yes! Tis true! Der Marathon begins tomorrow morning! Fear us! Fear for us!

Hmmm...

Captian Carrot You scored 84 intelligence, 67 morality, and 75 physical strengenth!

You are an intriguing character. Good hearted, incredibly strong, and a headful of information that makes that Jeopardy guy look like a bar trivia hack. No one knows what to make of a six-foot tall dwarf who dates a werewolf, and may be the true heir to the throne of Ankh-Morpork. But you can make everyone get along, and are a born leader.

My test tracked 3 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 12% on intelligence You scored higher than 91% on morality You scored higher than 83% on strength

Link: The Which Discworld Character Am I Test written by smirkette on Ok Cupid

Not my first choice... I figured I'd be more Vimes-y. But I can deal.

Guess what?

Tanja's pished on wheat beer! It's funny! She's watching Frasier and laughing at the... less intellectual jokes. Like "good-cop-horny-cop".

Tidbits

I put on Monty Python's And Now For Something Completely Different last night, despite Tanja's boredom at The Holy Grail. She laughed uproariously at the little old lady getting blasted out of her socks in the opening. My intellectual girl, ladies and gentlemen. Of course, this is the same woman who bought chocolate chip hot cross buns yesterday. They're an atrocity! A yummy atrocity, but still!

Rented Red Faction II for PS2. I'm a bit meh... graphics good, but the weapons are either too good (grenade laucher makes you damn near unkillable) or useless for various reasons (the machine guns can't hit shit, even when you're right in front of the guy, and the big weapons like the railgun fire beams so narrow that you have to be dead-on-balls-accurate to hit anything). Also, no manual aim OR auto-aim! There's a crosshairs at the centre of the screen which moves with your guy. It's frustrating. Oh well, back to TimeSplitters 2 for me!

Someone send a memo to the people of Australia: YOU CANNOT BE ELECTROCUTED BY BEING ON THE PHONE IN A THUNDERSTORM! It's an urban legend! I had never heard of this until I got here, but everyone in Oz is paranoid that if they have anything electrical running when it's raining, they could die. How stupid is that?

On a sadder note, Daddo from work has decided to give up the telemarketing game for his return to Uni. I'll miss his punk ass, but also, I'm jealous. Want better job!

I'm downloading whole albums of Radiohead, Led Zeppelin, and the Rolling Stones! Fear my musical wrath!

Must go buy broccoli. Oh, and some thing came in the mail that says that I'm a permanent resident. Or whatever.


OH, and Shaun of the Dead is coming out on DVD the 24th of March. Aboot fuckin' time!

Are you now, or have you ever been Even Steven?

Six new comics, by the way.

So Sunday night, Tanja's set to meet up with her friend Ros for drinks and dinner. We think, hey, James is nearby, let's give him a ring. We do, he's into it, and Catherine comes along too. Before we leave, we see it's bucketing down rain, so I take the two bottles of wine we're going to bring for pizza in my backpack to avoid having to come back to the flat. We meet up, have four or so cocktails, change tables a bit, discuss gym memberships and garnishes, before Catherine leaves, and we head off for pizza. We're five steps out the door and Tanja says "Do you have your backpack?" so I go back in.

I can't find it. I get mad. Kick the wall, storm to the front bar, and start interrogating the bartender. He gives me a coaster with a number on it and says to call the next day. Since we're down two bottles of wine, my sunglasses (in what I consider another example of the universe taking my sunnies away from me constantly), and a lovely fountain pen Tanja got me for the first birthday I celebrated here. Bugger.

Off we go to supper, with James, Tanja and Ros each buying another bottle of wine. We demolish two pizzas and the three bottles, Ros leaves, and James, Tanja, and I stagger back here to watch Empire Records. Tanja staggers off to bed, and James adopts the couch, and proceeds to laugh at the jokes, only stopping every so often to go "Wow, Liv Tyler's so hot." Tanja calls me in, and she's been sick, poor dear. I help her clean up, and James heads off.

So.

The next day, after work, I swing by the Bank Hotel, and ask if anyone turned a bag in yesterday with a Canadian flag on it. "Yes, it's right here." Everything inside still there. Feel the wrath of Even-Steven!

Also, I have plans to make a wicked tequila punch for Craig's birthday festivities.

That's all. Go about your business.

Ups and Downs Part II

A quick post-script to last entry: once I got to Immigration, at 3:45, I saw the doors were shut. Big sign on the door says "Open until 4, Mon-Fri". I thumped the door loud enough to get the attention of a security guard, who informed me it was actually 4:25 and my watch had stopped. Bugger. And no, I wasn't allowed to leave it for the case worker, so he shut the door in my face. Upside, I was able to get to work early and get the seat I wanted.

Ups and Downs

New comics, that took forever. Go see. And stuff.

I feel all even-Steven the last few days. Good thing, bad thing, bad thing, good thing, etc.

Examples? Why yes, I do have them.

Upside: In the city the other day, I find Empire Records on DVD, which I've been looking for frantically for the last month. Hurrah, it's only 20 dollars. Downside: it's at HMV, so the Borders gift card I was hoping to use for it is useless. Upside: Tanja likes it, and it inspires her to think of owning a bookstore. Big up. Downside: It's 20 dollars that I wasn't expecting to spend, which knocks my budget for the week all to hell. It leaves me eyeing my finances very carefully, since Craig's birthday bash was to be this Friday. Upside: Craig's management (his mom) has rearranged the party to next week, so no financial worry. Downside: no crazy partying this week. Boo-urns. Upside: We recieve the Criminal Record check from the RCMP in the mail yesterday! Apparantly, despite my history of teenage deliquincy, including throwing coffee creamers at buses and shoplifting chocolate bars, it's clear! Hurrah! No more worrying! I can get my Visa! I can get it to the case officer and he can have my Visa ready in a week or so. BIG FARKING HURRAH! Downside: For the last hour and a half, the people upstairs have been, from the sounds of it, building the miniature of Helm's Deep. It's hammering and grinding and possibly drilling. And maybe welding. All I know is it's drowning out music, new Buffy, and various other things I'm trying to do. And it's like wham, wham, wham, wham, BRRRRAAA-AAAAAA-ARRRRRGGGGHHHHHH wham, wham, wham, BRRRRAAA-AAAAA-AARRRRRGGGGHHHHHH wham, wham, wham, wham, wham,BRRRRAAA-AAAA-AAARRRRRGGG-GHHHHHH wham, wham, wham, wham etc. Headache makers. Argh.

But hey, the good things are very good, and the bad things are just annoying. So I say I come out on the positive. Go me.

Friends In Low Places

So it was Tanja's and my anniversary last night! Hooray! We celebrated the morning by grocery shopping! And I found a glass drinking game that I had been eyeing since before Christmas had been marked down from twenty dollars to five. So I bought it. Huzzah. It's like Naughts and crosses, but with shot glasses. Very posh looking. Oh, and we booked a holiday to Noosa in Queensland. Lovely and wonderful. But the drinking game. THAT was the big event. ;)

So, then dinner. We had some Chandon bubbly, and some lovely Thai food (money bags, choo chee prawns and ginger pork *drool*), and toasted our lovely relationship. Then headed off to meet the usual suspects at the Bank Hotel. Very crowded, a few misdirections, a badly mixed apple martini or two (shocking when standards slip) but everything turns out ok. We have a few cocktails, a few laughs, and changed tables at least three times. I was finally able to give Anna her Christmas present (a Hot Hot Heat t-shirt), and get my Wee Free Men book back. She also said my Killers t-shirt looked just like her official one. Huzzah! A bootleggers dream! We then (we being Craig, Ted, James, Catherine, Anna, Annie, Mark, Marcel, Tanja and myself) then headed off to Kelly's for Karaoke Night. We get in, find a table, and grab a drink.

Then as we're going to sit down, I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn around and there's this big guy I don't know. He slaps me on the shoulder, says "How ya goin', mate?" And then the world spins, and I'm deaf in my left ear and sitting on the floor. Looking up at him. He'd hauled off and decked me in the side of the head. It happened fast enough that Tanja didn't even have time to get up from the table and I was down. I was so disoriented that I couldn't even get up, just sat there holding my ear and yelling, "What the fuck is wrong with you? What'd you hit me for?" etc. Well, I raise my glass to the bouncers and bartenders of Kelly's, who bundled the bastard straight out into the street and on his way. I was ok, as my hearing and equilibrium returned, and suffered a fat lip from my own teeth and a slightly damaged sense of tone (which may have assisted my singing later). The weird thing was, another guy I didn't know came up to me later and asked if I was ok, and then explained that he worked with the idiot who hit me, and how he's not a bad guy, but he "had a few screws loose". Hoo boy.

We recovered nicely from this event (I was assisted by a shot of Sambuca {thank you Jimmy!} which the bartender wouldn't let me light on fire), and went on to have a pretty good night. I sang Zoot Suit Riot by the Cherry Poppin Daddies despite it being much too high for me (I think the outer ear damage helped me in this respect). Marcel perked up his courage and sang Paint It Black by the Stones and did great. He had been practicing all week, poor guy. We tumbled home at 1:00 or so, sadly missing James and Craig singing November Rain and Chop Suey, respectively. We kept trying to push Tanja into singing Roxette or Ace of Bass, but to no avail. Maybe next time. Very fun night, all in all.

So this morning I wake up with a whopper of a headache and a voice croakier than Gavin Rossdale. Before she went to work, Tanja got me some water and some tablets (brick potato llama), and after two discs of Seinfeld and two pieces of raisin toast, I'm feeling better. I still called in for work this afternoon, because of my voice. Who wants to buy raffle entries from Leonard Cohen's younger cousin?

Now where's that coffee? 'Cause these pretzels are making me thirsty!