Tuesday, September 30, 2008

I done broke it!

Also, I discovered something else today that is a little disappointing.

Last year, my older sister gave me a new alarm clock for Christmas. Not an ordinary one that just tells time and bleeps when you want it to, but one with a unique "deactivation" setting.
On top of the clock mechanism is a small sphere attached to a propeller blade. When the alarm goes off, the blade spins around rapidly, and flies off around the room. In order to stop the clock from bleeping endlessly, you have to find the sphere and place it back on top of the clock. Easier said than done at five in the morning!
Below is a picture of a similar model. The one I have is slightly less durable (as I'll explain shortly). Not my picture, btw, I found this one here.



I used the clock to wake me up on Sunday for the shift I mentioned in the last post (though it turned out I didn't really need it anyway). I switched it off the regular way, but later, when I had a look at the pieces, I realised there were too many. Yes, I done broke the propeller, and now it doesn't work any more!
I was bemused when I received the clock (well, more than a little insulted, actually), but now that it is broken I am sad. So, I'm going to try and glue it back together, if for no other reason than to say, "Hey, I tried to fix it!"

...work, con't.

More work to come... mutter grumble...

Last weekend was, um, fiascotastic. Turns out I had to work a bit longer than expected, but it also meant that I got to leave work and go straight to sleep, instead of having to go home and then back.
I did an eight hour close on Saturday, and an eight hour open on Sunday... with ten minutes sleep under my belt. And I was getting really worried because I noticed myself making really stupid little mistakes, like not giving customers the right change (though luckily it only happened twice, and I picked it up both times).
I was waiting for a co-worker to show up to relieve me, but she got delayed at her other job... which meant that she was working a FULL day as opposed to my eight hours. So I make no complaints, even though I'm still working nearly a solid two weeks.

When I eventually got home on Sunday, I slept for eighteen hours.
I woke up just in time to make my next shift... o_o

In other important news: Hawthorn won! Family happy! PS. Must call Dad.

Also: Noticed that Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood is now available... Want, but not just yet (will wait until next payday). Hopefully my next post will tell you all about it.
And I still can't find a copy of The World Ends With You anywhere around here, though I keep looking...

Friday, September 26, 2008

...work, garbage, holes in my teeth

Ugh. Busy couple of weeks coming up.

I have volunteered some time over at one of the other service stations for the next couple of weeks, which equals twenty-five hours over five days.
Okay in itself, except that I also have to fill in another sixteen hours over the weekends at my usual haunt. No weekends off. I get no days off until mid-October.
mutter grumble...

I bought myself another CD today, Garbage's self-titled album. I bought their Absolute Garbage compilation a few months ago, and so now I wanna get the back catalogue. (Well, I've run out of Beatles' albums to collect, so I gotta switch to something else.)

Also, I re-jiggered the colour scheme of the blog because my Ma thought it was all purpley, when it was supposed to be blue... not that it really mattered to anyone but me.

Oh, and the dentist found a hole in the wisdom tooth I mentioned in the last entry, but he couldn't do anything because his sterilising unit was out of action. He put in a temporary filling in the meantime, but it fell out three days later... and I won't be able to see him again until October sometime. mutter grumble...

That's all for now...

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

More Dental Problems

Today, while standing behind the counter at work, I felt around my mouth with my tongue, and felt something like a seed or a piece of food stuck behind my wisdom tooth...

I picked it out, and found it was a bit of tooth enamel.
Oh, god, not again! I just had that one fixed up a couple of months ago!!!
This probably means I will have to get it extracted, because there really isn't that much of the tooth left! It's mostly plastic filling now...

(insert image of $$$ flying away)

The only problem is, if I do get it removed, there is the risk of the nerve being damaged, because the last X-ray I had showed it was sitting very close to the nerve (which is why I didn't have it extracted before).
So, either I pay to have this new hole filled, or pay to have the whole tooth removed - which has the additional risk of injuring half my face.
DAMMIT!!!
So much for my dental hygiene... I guess I brought this on myself... mutter grumble...

A Big Burning Hole In The Ground

While I was at work on Sunday, I thought, "Gee, the sky looks a bit hazy over that way today..."

Turns out, the big open-cut coal mine down the road was on fire. It's still burning, and will probably continue to do so for a couple of days. Coal fires are pretty hard to put out, especially if it's deep down. The CFA have their work cut out for them (again).

The good news is that no-one was injured, and it isn't likely to inhibit coal production, so no-one will run out of electricity just yet.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Random Facts: Apples

Here's a quick quiz:
How many different types of apple are there?

a. about 12
b. about 30
c. about 50
d. about 150
e. about 7,500

The answer (according to Wikipedia, at least) is... (spoiler - highlight to read)
[e. Yes, over seven thousand types of apple!]
And I've only tried about six of them.

Friday, September 12, 2008

Murals, Street View of

I wish I could show you photos of the "finally finished" murals that I've spent most of this blog rabbiting on about, but unfortunately, getting my Mural group together has been a logistics nightmare. How difficult can it be to organise three people?! Well, very difficult, apparently. (To T. and &., I'm sorry. I know you both are really busy too, but I'll try to get us all together again somehow.)

Anyway, I can't show you any new mural photos... or can I?

You may have heard all the hoopla about Google Maps' Street View application invading people's privacy, and all that whatnot, but thanks to this innovative program, I can show you exactly how the murals look!
Go to the Australian Street View site, and type in this address: 7 Christian Street, Boolarra, Victoria, Australia 3870. Or, try this link. Your PC needs to be reasonably high-powered in order to use this site; it just barely works on mine.
This now solves my earlier question of whether the Title/Stump Mural has been installed yet (it has). And you can clearly see where the Lest We Forget mural has wound up.
You can rotate the camera in any direction, and move along the road to get a better view of the murals. You can zoom in for a closer look of the murals if you like, though I personally think that you find better pictures right here!

Also, see if you can spot all of the murals that were installed on Rutherglen Road in Newborough, postcode 3825... There used to be more of them, but some have been removed (or have fallen off - whoops).

What's Up This Week?

Aside from seeing my nephew in a play (see last post), I've done this stuff, in no particular order:
  • I sent my Dad a Father's Day parcel, and hopefully he's got it by now... basically the same old stuff I usually send him, but it's usually well appreciated - at least I've never heard any complaints from him... :)
  • I worked 20 hours over the weekend due to a serious lack of staff... most unfortunate, but this only happens very rarely I keep telling myself.
  • I found a copy of Zork: Grand Inquisitor that just refuses to run. At all. mutter grumble...
  • I also purchased a DVD-ROM burner drawer for the computer. After a bit of fiddling around with the master/Slave settings I managed to get it working just fine! at least SOMETHING I bought is working...
  • I went and had more dental work done this week, to the tune of $250, entirely out of my pocket because I don't have private health cover yet. I have however paid up my Ambulance membership - I don't fancy paying over $1000 for an ambulance trip when it only costs me $60 to join.
One of the things I would like to do this week is attend my friend's 30th Birthday dinner, but, sadly, I can't thanks to my job. Oh well...
Happy 30th Birthday, Slink!
Hope you enjoy the new PS2 game, whatever you pick!

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Old School (plays)

Earlier this week, my nephew featured in his primary school's play, called "Showtime At Sea".
It was everything you'd expect from a bunch of junior school age children, and more! The funniest part was a little number with a classroom dressed up as fairy penguins, complete with little tuxes and top hats (meanwhile I hope the wardrobe department managed to fix it so that their hats actually stayed on for the whole act)!

It made me think back to some of the beautifully tragic plays that I featured in back when I was around his age.
I remember one year that was particularly awful. All of the kids in Grades 5 and 6 were allowed to put on little plays in honour of Nutrition Week. We were given "carte blanche" to perform whatever we wanted, so long as it had to do with nutrition. The two classes each broke up into groups of six and set to work. It took us about two or three weeks to set it all up (scripts, costumes, props, etc.) and at the end, we performed them in front of the rest of the school.

Well.
Instead of about a dozen different plays, we made the school sit through the SAME two plays, over and over again. Why? Because everyone copied what the rest of the classroom was doing. We saw what they had, and thought, "Hey, why bother with original ideas when what they are doing sounds much better?"
I can only imagine how disappointed our teachers must have been (especially the person who came up with the whole idea in the first place). Needless to say, we didn't have to do anything like that the next year!