Guess who has to spend more money on a physiotherapist this week?

*jumps in the air and waves madly* MEEE. Memememememe. Me.

Today's day at work has been the most frustrating in a long time. Firstly, I've been stuck most of the day on a large register (which is generally not so bad, but because I'm taller and the registers are, well, not so tall, I have to adjust the whole thing ergonomically or I'm rather stiff and sore at the end of the shift from standing half-cocked for four hours) so time has been moving slower than frozen treacle. And it must be payday somewhere or for something, because people keep presenting me with $50 notes. It's not too much of an issue when you're on a big lane, cause you generally start the day well-off, cash wise-- but when you're in Express and get presented with $50s for everything, it's often a battle to hang onto the little change you DO have. Which is why I cracked it so bad when some bottle-blonde, manicured tart with her phone sandwiched firmly against her ear came through my register and tried to pay for a $1.50 bottle of water with a $50 note. I wanted to scissor-kick her in the face. I don't mind if you genuinely don't have the change, but when I can see that you have a wallet full of shrapnel and stuffed with small notes, yes, I am going to try and melt your face with my mind.

The reason that I need to go back to the physio-- at least for a touch-up appointment-- is because of a woman who put two 30 can crates of Coca-Cola on the conveyor belt. When I told her that I couldn't pick it up for both my own health reasons and because OH&S reasons prevent me from doing so, she just fixed me with a stare that clearly said, "Well, I'm not gonna pick them up. You gonna magic them off the register?" So yeah, I picked them up. As we were finishing the transaction she turned around to me and said, "If there's gonna be that much of a problem with how heavy they are, then maybe you guys shouldn't pack them so heavy..."

...WHAT. WHATWHATWHAT. Where on my uniform does it say, "Employee of Coca-Cola Amatil"? NOWHERE, BECAUSE I'M NOT. You got a problem with their product, take it up with them! A close second for the dumbest customer question/statement ever, only succeeded by the gem "Do you have to be in a wheelchair to go through the wheelchair accessible aisle?" Dohh. I also ended up hitting a guy in the head with a mop later on (accidentally, I was moving it around so I could get at the barcode), at which point I cracked a serious case of the shits and went on my dinnerbreak to calm down.

Later on it switched violently in the other direction and I could not keep a straight face most of my last hour. Especially when I was trying to fill out an account for a woman from the Catholic Archdiocese of Canberra and all I could think about every time she talked to me was how much she sounded like Bluebottle from The Goon Show. "Oh, I love sausinges!"

I don't expect it to be much of a problem for the rest of the working week though, as I'm mostly supervising and will only be on registers for short bursts of time, and for that I'm pretty grateful. I can only imagine how miserable I'd be if I still had five more days of 7-8 hour shifts stuck lifting people's huge bags of rice and Lucky Dog. Plus I imagine I'll feel much better after I go for my hour of poundin', even though the masseuse will do her usual and cluck and shake her head at the state of my back. Ahh well, like I keep saying to customers, beggars can't be choosers.

Ahhh well. $6.00 cocktail night at the Hellenic Club, I think there's a Fruit Tingle or six with my name on it!

Injuries sustained by myself in the past week (keep in mind, it's Monday. I'm counting Monday-Monday here.):

- Large black bruise on side of knee from falling out of the shower
- Banged tailbone and back of head simultaneously on pole in centre of the house after a doona tug of war with Toby, burst into tears as I scared the crap out of myself
- Caught the hairdryer with my face this morning
- Went to leap a moving trolley at work, caught my toe in the top and crashed into the rollcage full of drinks opposite
- Broke off half of my big toenail this morning, I have no idea how. I just looked down and broken toenail and blood. Go figure.

I think I need to start living inside on of those Zorb ball things, if only so I get to live until 30.

I can't take Ted Levine seriously doing slapstick comedy. It just seems wrong to me. Damn Silence of The Lambs. Now all I can picture him doing is gyrating around in a cellar, pinching his nipples and grating, "I'd fuck me. I'd fuck me hard". 

Maybe I should explain a little.

I'm in self-imposed quarantine at home until tomorrow while I'm getting rid of the last traces of my flu/tonsillitis, so I asked Toby to rent a few DVDs for me to keep me occupied. Something "light and fatuous" that I don't really have to concentrate on. Apparently his taste in thoughtless comedy is a lot different to mine. I got these handed to me when he got home:

Police Academy 2 and 3
Still Waiting
something called The Big Bounce
and... Flubber.

So I'm watching Flubber. Don't you judge me. I'm fucking bored. So yeah, I'm watching Jame "Buffalo Bill" Gumb throw himself around like a squeaky dog toy. And it just feels wrong to me. Maybe it's wrong of me to pigeonhole him. I dunno. I haven't really seen him in much else. And I don't watch Monk. Hell, I was so sick last night I couldn't even sit through an episode of the Amazing Race that happened to be on, and god knows I love uptight, screaming, crying Americans whose relationships are imploding. Still. Trip to the doctor's office really paid off in the end, even if my own doctor-- the Indian version of Dr Hibbert from the Simpsons-- was fully booked and I had to go to the crusty, bogan-filled drop in health centre at Phillip. Fortunately, because of a night spent in bed mewling and wailing and not sleeping, I got there so early in the morning I only had to be in and out of conciousness in the waiting room for a little over an hour. (I thought it prudent to go to the doctor to get checked out for the porcine flu, being as one of my friends came and visited me shortly after she got out of quarantine and 3 days later I got sick. Coincidence? Luckily, no.) I felt like the only genuinely sick person in the whole waiting room, bar another guy opposite me who was also drifting in and out of consciousness, and a little kid with a deep, hacking cough. Everyone else just looked like they were waiting for public transportation of some kind. The doctor was obviously surprised to see someone ill as well-- there was continual gasps at my exhibition of symptoms:

After sticking digital thermometer in my ear: Oh! You have a fever!
After palpating my throat and me wincing and pulling away: Ooh! Your glands are all inflamed!
After looking in my throat: My, your tonsils look sore and swollen. Is your neck stiff at all?

Me: *sitting there wheezing, hacking and sweating* Umm. There may be a slight chance, yes. *rolls eyes*

So now I'm dosed up to the gills with Cephalexin, and all is (nearly) well again.

I listened to the same Billy Joel song 4 times yesterday. A true sign of illness. I also haven't really eaten anything in about 3 days. My clavicles are emerging. Amd I've drunk maybe 2L and upwards of orange juice, so I can practically feel my teeth eroding. Kevin Smith should not use Twitter, cause most of his twitters are about sexing his wife. And this is slowly becoming a stream of consciousness entry. Sorry. Maybe I should go have a shower and try to eat something.

So, Livejournal. It's been six weeks. Have you missed me? That's almost 2 months. That is a long time. And I have at least 4 hours to kill before I go to work this afternoon (which I am currently destroying by listening to all my old Live albums) so I thought I'd come in here and be all, "What the fuck is up, LJ?! D'yall miss me?" to which I imagine the answer will be resounding silence. But you can't fault a girl for trying, I guess.

I'm a bit wired on cold and flu medication, having my second case of the flu in a month (rassum frassum stupid dirty customer service job, etc etc) so this entry might be a bit frenetic... everything I've tried writing in the past few days has pretty much ended up on the side of "fevered rantings" and I have summarily discarded. I haven't even got it together to watch the stack of DVDs that I have sitting in front of the television... it's not that I don't want to watch them, it's just that I keep thinking I should be doing something more productive, and then I always end up in the same place-- slumped on the couch perusing random sites on my Macbook and watching some dreck I've watched myriad times and not really paying attention to it.. Which is not productive at all. Mind you, I've at least managed to pull my finger out enough to do some loads of washing today, so that's a start. I'm still not dressed, but hey. It's my house. Other things I have achieved in the past 2 days:

1) Have only had one meal in the past 2 days. HELL YES FAMINE RESPONSE TO ILLNESS. Probably not good to not eat, but at this stage and with this body, I can only see it as an upside to all the codeine and vasoconstrictors I'm currently pumping into it. Simply not hungry. Will attempt to eat before 4pm however, so that I don't fall over behind my register and inconvenience people.

2) I did a nifty drawing. That is pretty much it.

-- This journal entry was paused somewhat when the bathroom decided to flood --

Okay, back. I'm irritated that our bathroom/laundry doesn't have a drain in the floor for when the washing machine decides to dance its outflow away from the sink and all over the tile... this is maybe the 4th time it's happened? Irritating. Although it could be argued that our washing machine is just shit, but hey. Bloody jumping ol' rusty piece of crap.

Okay, so little things that have happened in dot points:

- I got a promotion at work. Awhooooooooo. I'm starting my supervisor training next week, so that basically means: More money, less to do, but means that I also have to flex my assertive muscles a little more than I'd like. I'm sure it'll be fine though. I should just imagine everyone as younger than me, which will probably be easy because, well, they are. Going to be good for my back as well, but I haven't had much trouble with that lately (actually, I haven't had much trouble with it at all in the past few weeks. It's just disappeared. I wonder why?) so hey. Promooootion.

- Hopefully starting uni degree at the start of next year, and until then I have 2 months of bridging studies to complete at Canberra College so I can be accepted for said degree. Do not expect it to be particularly hard. The bridging subjects, that is. I imagine the degree will peel my head and turn it inside out like a juicy ripe Valencia orange and I will not eat or sleep for a period of time, but I will do it. I WILL DO THIS. (she says, and the second it gets hard she runs away screaming "ARRGHH NUMBERS" Put money on it, people. It's certain.)

- I went to Tasmania for a week. It rained the entire fuckin' time I was down there. The only time it didn't rain was when I made the day trip down to Hobart, and the weather there was so reminiscent of Canberra's winters -- freezing, but bone dry and a bit windy-- that I actually felt at home there. Caught up with a number of people I haven't seen in years, which was great. Got drooled on by Bec's gorgeous kid Samiu, which was also fantastic. I like babies but but because I've never really spent much time around kids, I'm not fantastic with them, and a little nervous-- which I'm convinced they can sense. My parents had a roaring party for my Mum's 50th, which I deejayed-- well, assaulted people with Rolling Stones records, anyway. At least my Dad appreciated the Devo I put on for him. Spent a lot of time with other friends as well, being as I don't think I'll be able to see anyone in Tas until after Xmas, which depresses me somewhat but shit happens, I guess. I also visitied my grandfather, which just made my heart ache because he cried half the time I was there. Then I got stuck inside the anti-wandering, locked-from-the-inside ward doors, which cheered the other occupants of the ward immensely. "Hostage! Hostage!"

...There is other stuff, but my brain is wandering like a senile, deaf old dog that has escaped from the yard, so I'll leave it for now and come back to it all later. I should iron a shirt. And eat something. And watch Irreversible. Or just sit here until I really have to move. We'll see what happens.

GRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH. Stupid work.

I've just had the last two days off, thanks to a medical certificate that my doctor wrote me, and this afternoon my supervisor calls me up and asks me if I can work over the weekend. ALL weekend. Starting tomorrow at 7am. Which would be fine, but the fact that I'll be starting at 7am will mean I'll be the first checkout operator there, which means I'll be put on a big register (not the 15 items or less aisle) and there I'll stay until 4pm. And Saturday is ALWAYS a completely spastic day from about 7.30am onwards, so there'll be a billion and one people there, all with insanely heavy shit (who the fuck needs 12 litres of milk at a time? Who?!) and I'll have to lift it all day. Here, I'll put it in recipe form for you:

Take one Pippa, preferably fresh.
Add one cash register and a scale and mix.
Then add the following ingredients:
One cup of incessant noise (children screaming, background roars and Annoying Bitch On The Loadspeaker yelling "Woden Fishmarket. Woden Fishmarket!" are all fine).
Half a teaspoon of $50 notes to pay for purchases under $10.
A generous sprinkle of stupid questions.
One cup of rude people (sifted) who think I'm an ATM/automaton, not a person.
200 odd kilos of heavy crap.

Place Pippa into casserole dish and pour other ingredients over the top. Place in a hot oven and leave to simmer in its own rage. When you hear frustrated ranting coming from inside of the oven, it's done. Serve with copious amounts of alcohol.

Rage pie, bitches. It's gonna be a bad weekend.

I just sat down and calculated how many times I've been to the doctor/physiotherapist in the last month pertaining to my back problem, and the figures are these:

Doctors Visits x2: $58 each (but at least $40 of each of those are reclaimable through Medicare, so I'm only out of pocket about $40)
Remedial Massage: One $50 session, 3x $90 sessions, putting me out a total of $320
Not to mention all the ibuprofen, codeine and Voltaren I've been plying myself with... let's say that all comes to $40.

Grand total: $400.00

...fuck.

I'm not particulary fussed about the amount of money I've spent, as it's helping for the most part and I'm still working where I can (and getting paid for sick leave) so I'm not out of pocket in the slightest, but it paints a picture to me of just how much people with chronic pain or medical conditions must spend in a six month period, let alone what they might spend over a year or, god forbid, countless years of nothing much helping them. It must be awful. I'll be fine though, it's just irritating the shit out of me that there's no instant fix for it. I'm such an impatient patient. =P Right now I've got a few day's off work thanks to a doctor's certificate, so I'm at home on the couch, rocking out in the doona boots and not doing much else. Winter is heinous in Canberra.

Okay, so most of the things I wanted done today for the inspection tomorrow have been completed. Mostly.

kitchen cleaned and squared away
dusting
general tidying
vacuuming
cleaning/scouring/demoulding bathroom
shampoo carpets in bedroom-- not as done as I'd like it to be. I kinda applied the foam win waves instead of an even coating, and I'm guessing the carpets haven't been cleaned in there for a while, so when I vacuumed up the dried foam as per instructions, I ended up with tiger-stripe floors. Which I'll admit are cool, but I'm not sure if the realtors will be as impressed as I am.

And now I have fresh lilies, new candles from Dusk and brand new blinds that were installed just today. My house feels clean, warm and girly now. All I need are a few throw cushions and a mohair rug for the couch and I imagine my ovaries would go into joyous spasm.

I hate winter for only one reason-- my lips get so dry and chap/split on a regular basis. Regular (i.e. every 15 mins) applications of Blistex Lip Conditioner are not doing much. Think I need to drink more water.

Also my slippers have a hole in them. Hmm. Maybe I should invest in a pair of Uggs, but I love Leeroy and Jenkins so much i don't think  can bear to part with them until they're practically falling off my feet.

I had a one hour remedial massage today and my back is killing. me. So sore. Massage was fantastic, but I've got to stop doing these amazing full-body rages when I'm at work, tensing my muscles to the point of pain isn't helping. But that isn't going to stop any time soon. Not as long as people continue to drop 50 points of IQ as soon as they step through the door. Geesh.

Also I've applied to do a nursing degree. Fingers crossed.

Intense frustration on the bra front. I've put this bit under a cut though, for those that don't want to have to read about my funbags yet again.

( Rassum frassum boobies. )


Sorry for going on about it again, it's just a constant source of irritation for me. I was so shitted with it last week that I was tempted to hurry up the surgery and have them cut off then and there. (I don't know if I've talked about it before, but after I'm finished having my children I intend to have a breast reduction. I want to wait until after I've had kids because of the risk associated with not being able to breastfeed properly or at all, and I think by that time I will be sick of the damn things. It'll be a novelty, that's for sure.) But anyway.

I had my hair cut. I have serious fringe going on.

I'm watching Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog for maybe the 15th time. *happy sigh*

Bacl to study this week, which makes me feel guilty for not thinking better about my future and tangible lack thereof during my semester break. Grrr, I lack so much drive and ambition. It shits me. I'm thinking though that my best option at this stage is to maybe do the Pathology Sampling course and maybe the EEG (or is it ECG? I forget) on top of that, and maybe search for Phlebotomy jobs. The other idea I was toying with was doing a nursing degree with intent to study midwifery after that, but I'm not totally sure about that-- what with taking 2 years for the nursing degree, and possibly a year of prac after that, and then what? 2-3 years of midwifery training? I'd be 30 by the time it was all done. Which wouldn't be a major issue, I just can't shake the feeling that I should have started planning all this years ago. Yay apathy, I guess. Hmm.

(This was one of those annoying "notes" that was in high circulation in Facebook a while ago, along with all the other ones (Facebook has nearly completed it metamorphosis to a copy of MySpace now. All it needs are glitter icons.) and I wanted to do it, but something stopped me. Maybe it was because I could flesh it out a lot more on LJ and no one would care. Plus hardly anyone would read it. I don't know if I want some faceless gimboid that I met one night at a drunken party knowing everything about me. So here it is. Hopefully it's mildly enjoyable and is a distraction from your day-to-day existence. It certainly was from mine.)

25 Random Things About Me (our generation uses the word "random" far too much. And "surreal". *grinds teeth with irritation*)

1. I'm missing a joint or a bone or something in the third toe on my right foot, so that it doesn't bend completely in unison with all the other toes. Plus it's a little shorter. My munted toe. <3

2. I secretely think my dogs are better than everyone else's, because they refuse to eat Schmacko's, dried pigs ears, Dentabones and all that other prefab doggy treat shit you can buy at the supermarket. I dunno, maybe it makes them seem more vulpine in my eyes or something. They don't eat any of that faffy My Dog canned bullshit neither. Just Meaty Bites. Off the ground. Hardcore.

3. I can pretty much gives you a backstory on every scar on my body. One on my right index finger-- infected catscratch from a tussle with a feral cat at Compton St (that actually burst while we were going through the Hungry Jack's drive through. Gross.). Big, purple one on my back-- cut by a broken stubby, outside of Canberra Casino, winter 2008. 8 stitches. Ones on my face are generally pimples I couldn't leave alone.

4. I have an astigmatism in my right eye, which tends to only play up after extended use of a computer with shitty screen resolution. Which is a pity because my glasses are kewl.

5. I CANNOT STAND PEOPLE TOUCHING MY FEET. Period.

6. I am not just any grammar nazi. I am Grammar Goebbels.

7. I'm currently attempting a diploma in Laboratory Technology (Pathology) but I'm not even sure right now that's what I want to do. I hate how indecisive I am, but I know I'm not going to change any time soon. Current career dream-- midwifery.

8. I would like to have a tattoo, but I haven't yet decided for sure what I want, which I guess is pretty indictative of the fact that I'm not yet ready for a tattoo.

9. If I could only do one thing until I die, I would read. I love to read almost more than anything else and cannot understand people that deprive themselves the joy of regularly slipping into someone else's skin, into another world. Currently I have five books on my bedside table that I'm working my way through in fits and starts. My bookshelf in the loungeroom has piles of books on it that I can't wedge into the shelf space. Time for a new bookshelf, methinks.

10. I have a terribly short attention sp

11. I do my best thinking when I'm walking somewhere. I can't run for shit, but I could walk to the ends of the earth and back.

12. I love that I have a dad who calls me up just to tell me he saw an albatross, or something natty the dogs did, or that he saw a pod of dolphins while he was out fishing... I'm so lucky to have parents/a family like mine. (Additionally, I'm mildy irritated by the fact that whenever Dad goes fishing without me, it's like he lands in the middle of a David Attenborough documentary but when I go we don't catch any fish, see any marine life and I get seasick. Pfft.)

13. I like to sing, even though I'm no good at it. (I'm not off-key, if that helps.) I sing when I'm in the bath or the shower. I sing when I'm doing the housework. I make up random songs about what I happen to be doing that very moment and sing them to the tune of something else. I sing in my head to get me through the day at work. I sing with headphones on, which I know is wrong, but I don't care.

14. Customer service/retail is the most soul-destroying, misanthropist-creating job in the whole of the world, but the people I work with are so cool, I couldn't give a fuck.

15. I'm probably not as shrewd with my money as I should be, but I spend money to enjoy myself, and I've only got one chance to do it, so who cares?

16. I'm intensely disappointed by the fact that I can no longer drink as much as I want and still feel invincible the next day. Nowadays, I can only have about 6-7 full-strength drinks before I cross the "Headache Hangover" line to "Hunched Miserably Over The Toilet" Land. Truly a sign of the ages. Or my age.

17. I love smells, and the memories that come with the smells. One my first memories I have is accompanied by a strong smell of lavender. There is a particular flower that blossoms in a tree that evokes something in me that I can't decipher quite yet. Also, I remember people's smells quite vividly-- their perfume/cologne/deodorant, or their fabric softener, or their shampoo, or maybe just the way they smell after a day rock-climbing (like my dad-- chalky and vaguely musky). The guy I'm currently seeing has a smell that I can't put my finger on but it's a delicious one.

18. I have a hot-water bottle in bed with me most of the year, and I talk in my sleep and grunt, groan, thrash and carry on. I'm wild in bed, and not in a sexy way.

19. I love to cook, but I'm always nervous cooking for other people in case I fuck it up.

20. I know that no matter how hard I try, I'm always gonna be a big-boobed, big-arsed, wobbly paroady of what I shouldd really look like, but I do have days where I look at myself and don't want to cut bits off myself with a straight razor. Hopefully things will get better.

21. I can get really uppity about television shows and bands that I know have been around for ages suddenly skyrocket into the mainstream, causing me to get a serious case of the humphs and mutter about "been around for years" and "hate their new stuff" and "sell outs". Cases in point- Green Day and Kings of Leon. I hate that Green Day are now represented by the wrist band wearing, black eye makeup wearing "punks" (although they'll be closer to punk than Avril Lavigne ever will) and that every bogan with a Southern Cross tattoo now whacks it to Kings of Leon. I hate the superiority complex, but I can't stop. Sorry.

22. I very rarely get sick, but when I do (happens maybe twice a year) I get siiiiiiiiiiiiiick. I actually have a deep trough on one of my tonsils where I had a tonsillar abscess a few years back.

23. I can get overly excited at the smallest things, and I know a lot of people can find it embarrassing when I squeeeee over stuff with them present-- like Alastair and the fish-- but it's part of my nature and I'm not stopping. Nor am I stopping sticking my head out the window when we drive through wet eucalypt forests. They smell great, so no. I'm not stopping.

24. A good, medium rare juicy steak can actually be better than sex. But nothing beats a good spoon in bed. (Regardless of which spoon you happen to be.)

25. And finally-- if you're reading this, I'd never say it in real life, but I value you more than I can say and I'm happy to have you in my life. *hug*  Thanks for taking the time.

PEOPLE! Graahhh. People.

I have HAD IT with people at the supermarket today. Completely and totally had. It. Apparently it's "Take A Screaming Child To My Place of Work Day" and nobody decided to inform me before I got there. Things that have annoyed me so far today have been:

-- People complaining about not enough registers being open at 7am. Seriously, well done you for having the drive to be up before everyone else on the planet is, and all you want is the newspaper, some fresh bread and perhaps a prune or two, but Johhny-Come-Early here had the same idea you did and has managed to complete a trolley-load of shopping in the time it took you to find those three items, so yes. You do have to wait behind him. And why don't we have more registers open? Well, I'm sorry that we didn't realise you were coming in this morning, sir. If we had, we would have opened the special gilt register just for you, and wiped all your purchases seperately with pieces of raw silk. It's 7.10 in the morning, we can only get so many employees to work at this time. Just be patient and learn to wait.

- People who want to give their children the whole supermarket experience, cause god knows their child is a delicate, unique flower who can do no wrong. By all means, let your 20 month old put each item seperately on the conveyor belt to the trolley, telling them what each item is and telling them they're a "good girl/boy". By all means. But, umm, do you want to do it when there aren't 50 million trolleys waiting to be served at each register? People aren't gonna get shitty at you, they're going to get shitty at me for supposedly not going fast enough. So... no.

- $50 notes, and being paid in them-- you'd think Canberra doesn't have any other type of currency. I had so many of these today I wanted to throw the till across the room.

- Generally being so busy that my arms feel like they're gonna drop off, and the fake sympathy from the shoppers:
Them- "You look tired. How long have you got until you finish for the day?"
Me- "Another 5 hours."
Them. "Awwww. Well, I'm off to roll in my pool of money and gallavant in the sunshine and buy 15 puppies or whatever it is Canberrans do on their weekend. Sucks to be you. Ha."
Me- *simmering with hatred*

And I still have another 4 hours of this to go, I'm just on my lunch! Wrrrrrrrrrrrrryyyyyyyyyyyyy

What kind of guy doesn't hug a crying girl? At the very least they could pat you on the shoulder.

Meh, meh and double meh.

There is this guy in my classes who, admittedly, I feel neither here nor there about. Because it was a classmate's birthday on Friday and our Instrumentation class went for all of an hour, we trooped down to the on-campus cafe and had a few coffees afterward-- myself, H (the birthday girl) N, D and S. While we were all sitting around talking about nothing in particular, S asked if he could have my phone number. Thinking it would be useful, say, if I ever missed a class and needed to find out about notes or some such, I gave it to him.

WORST DECISION EVERRRRRR.

This guy has not left me alone all weekend. Seriously, man, I don't get this many txts in a weekend from my best friends, and that's saying something. I've recieved all up about 25 messages, all progressively getting creepier and creepier. I've had to end up throwing the subtle I was liberally applying out the window and go straight for the 10 kiloton harshness bomb. He even turned up at my work Friday night, came through my aisle - with one item- and stood there giggling while I served him. His brother was with him and eerily said "S has told me heaps about you" in between talking to each other in Urdu. (he's Pakistani.) These are examples of the texts I've been recieving all weekend:

What time do you start/finish work?
What time is your break? Maybe we could eat.
Do you want take dinner before work?
Do you need lift home after work? (for those who don't know, I work at a Woolworths that is quite literally a 2-min walk from my flat. Geesh.)
(after work) What are you doing? Are you going to sleep?

Most of these were met with either silence or very short, clipped messages back. I'm pretty sure I only replied to every 6th or 7th one, if at all. After a while I asked a friend of mine if I could refer to him as my boyfriend to put S off a bit. That didn't really work either. Then it was a whole spate of ones like this:

*Friends name* is the luckiest. Maybe I will not be the lucky one this time.
Maybe you and boyfriend could come over? For coking (sic) and enjoyment.
Why didn't you accept my invitation? Make a decision.
And then this one which frankly made my skin crawl-- Let's go for a long drive.

Yep, he wants to kill me, skin me and wear me as a dinner jacket. 

I replied to the last msg saying that I was tired, not feeling well (which was true) and I just wanted some peace and quiet, which did make him leave me alone for a few hours. This morning I've been pretty terse to him and making a point of not sitting near him and not saying a whole lot to him, though he keeps trying to sit near me and talk to me. I was just out the back of the cafeteria sitting in the sun, eating lunch and my phone rings:

Me: "...What?"
S: "Hello, it's S. Where are you."
Me: "...I'm eating my lunch!"
S: "You are at lunch. (Ummm, so are you, gimboid. You finished class the same time as me, didn't you?) What are you doing next?"
Me: "Studying."
S: "Okay. Maybe I will study too. Are you coming to the library?"
Me: *exasperated noise*
S: "Okay dear, I will see you there."

I just want to be left alone! Why me?! *sobs* 

Have to go to work yet again tonight. *sigh* This'll be the 3rd time this week, and I have a 7-hour shift tomorrow, and a 6-hour shift on Saturday. *sigh* When the supervisor called and asked me, I burst into tears as soon as I set the phone back on the cradle. I just wanted ONE night where I could sit in my trackpants and watch crappy digital television and maybe do some homework, and not have to stumble in at 10pm, feeling like I've been hit by Motley Crue's tourbus. (Maybe that's a bad analogy. I don't even know if Motley Crue are touring anymore. Who can we use instead? ...I just looked them up and apparently they are still touring. Whatever. It just seems like the skankiest, most out of control one I could use. Being hit by Hanson's tourbus would be like being swatted in the face with a bunny. Anyway. I digress.)

So now I'm working from 7-10pm, which is only a 3 hour shift, but a) I'm already tired, b) I'm in no desperate need for extra cash, even though being able to pay the rent and such is always swell, and c) I don't want to get behind on my study. Some of the subjects I'm struggling to keep up with anyway --just in a matter of comprehending them properly, I'm not behind or anything-- but that doesn't mean it'll be okay to fall behind. And that's what is going to happen if I end up working a six-day week, like I did last week. *sigh* Arghh. Why can't I say no to these people?! I worked 3 hours last night at the last minute, and ended up staying to close. I'm happy to fill in whenever they need someone, but I'm supposed to be studying full time, working part time- not full time which I'm doing at the moment, and still find time to eat and sleep and study outside of classes in there somehow.I know I'm the most convenient person for them to contact when they need an extra person because I live less than 5 mins away and can be there at a moment's notice, but that doesn't mean I have to come every single night of the week. Surely there are other people they can call. Don't ask how I'm managing to keep up the schedule, I myself have no idea how I'm doing it at the moment. Maybe if I sleep on my textbooks I can absorb the information while I sleep. =P

Have Hairy Lemon, will work/study/survive I guess. Nothing else to report. School is fine. My Dad hates Paypal, which is funny. I could curl up and sleep for a million years. That is all.

Edit-- I have just recieved a letter from Cunterlink in the goddamn mail telling me that they've finally decided to pay me Youth Allowance, which they've unceremoniously dumped into my bank account without telling me. So I havne't had a chance to declare my earnings for the last fortnight, so NOW I OWE THE GOVERNMENT MONEY. Motherfucking shitballsassholetwatlickermotherfucker. That is fucking fantastic. Oh yay. Just what I needed. I actually thought they'd decided against paying me Youth Allowance, being as I had heard fucking diddly squat from them since I applied for it, and last time I went in they told me my hours of study weren't enough to be considered, so I had to study full-time, work part time and still be looking for work so that I can get Newstart Allowance. I am SO ANGRY right now. The last thing i want to do is go to work and deal with the mouthbreathing public servant assholes on the checkout, but I technically owe them money now, so I have to.

RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE.

Why can't I do maths? Why? Why?!

Everytime I sit down in a class and the teacher starts either writing equations on the board or hands me a pieceof paper with problems on it, all I can conjure out of what's written there amounts to nothing more that numerical vomit. I'm sure it means something, I just cannot figure out what that something is supposed to mean/be. And as a result, I freak out completely, crack a serious case of self-doubt and start talking to myself in my head (generally it sounds like this: "Oh now what the fuck is this happy horseshit?? There's a number there... and another there... and a line... and then an x... what's an x doing in there? That's a letter , not a number! Surely it's gotten lost on the way to-- oh shit, there's another one! I can't do this I can't do this... No one else seems to be having any trouble though, look, they're all conferring about their answers. What have I got? Just a doodle that says "Arrrgh my brain's exploded". I should just go home. I give up. I" *brain actually explodes*) and sulk/feel sorry for myself for the rest of the lesson while everyone else climbs the academic ladder. I hate it. I want to do it, I know I actually can do it to some extent, I just can't. And I wish I could fix it. I love my other subjects-- Anatomy/Physiology, Bio, Genetics... but get me to any of the classes with maths in them and I'm like a petulant child that's been denied a Kinder egg.

Too add insult to injury, what I previously thoughb was a coffee hangover from the other day now seems to be some sort of nerve damage in my shoulder from work. It's an itchy, tingling sensation that never quite goes away, and flares up especially when I'm at work. I've tried applying Deep Heat to it and putting a hot water bottle on the area, but it doesn't help much. I guess I'll just have to wait for it to go away. Work, on the other hand is, to quote Clerks: "This job would be great if it wasn't for the customers." I got my first trial by fire on the Express queue last night (I'd never been on it before) and had:
- A woman that only bought four items and insisted that I bagged each one seperately (because she apparently didn't like her groceries touching. I squeezed her bread to get back at her).
- A woman that went off at me because the people in front of her had more than 15 items, and why couldn't I do something about it, and why couldn't I count the items before I served her, and they were making her wait, and why couldn't I get the supervisor over to remove them from the line, and blah blah fucking blah.
- A French woman who, when I stuffed up her EFTPOS transaction a bit, decided to slip back into her native tongue and have a rant about me to her husband, who was standing right to her (while I fixed the problem) because APPARENTLY the fact that she was speaking bourgois pig was masking the fact that she was bitching away happily about my incompetence. Firstly, you're in a supermarket. Don't expect me to kiss your ass all the way out of the checkout. Secondly, if you wanted to bitch about me, that's fine, I accept that. I did make a mistake, after all. But if you're going to do it, wait 5 seconds until you're out of the checkout and out of my earshot and then feel free to do it in any language you like. French, Yiddish, Esperanto, I don't care. But just speaking rapidly in French, gesticulating wildly, waving at me with your card, scowling and throwing your hands in the air... just because you're speaking a different language doesn't mean I can't tell what you're saying- angry sounds the same whatever language you're speaking- and don't assume that just because I work on a checkout that I have a brain made of tofu and am about as dumb as the same. Grrrrrrr!

And just to top off an already outstanding day, the button on the front of my jeans decided to pop off, and the only way to get iot back on is by hammering it into place-- which meant that for 5 minutes today, I had to stand in my underwear in the ladies bathroom, furiously stomping on my jeans. God, is it the long weekend yet?

I went and saw this this afternoon. (On my own, by choice, and everyone else in the theatre stared at me. Until this afternoon I was unaware how freaking sad it apparently is to see movies on your own. I can only see bonuses to it, myself. You don't have to share your armrests, or your Skittles, and you don't have someone pointlessly jibber-jabbering at you for half the movie. Win-win situation, far as I'm concerned. Anyway. I digress.) Y'all should go and see it. It's funny, sweet and oh-so gross. Lots of cussing. Score.

I bought my lab coat and safety glasses today, even though out teacher maintained that we didn't need goggles if we wore glasses... not quite sure about that one. I'm all for my eyes not getting dissolved by some noxious chemical, but I don't want Harry Potter-esque spectacle burns around my eyes. Plus I'm pretty sure my spectacle frames are plastic and they would melt, rendering me into some blue-ringed equine scientist mutant for the rest of my days. So safety glasses have been obtained. Science, bitches.

I'm attempting to make ginger beer. For also apparent science-related reasons. Hmm. I'm hoping for no gingery explosions all ovcer the house. We shall see.

What I did this week:

-Learned to calculate molecular mass, which is actually surprisingly easy. (Doesn't stop me from having an arrhythmia every time I read over the rest of my Laboratory Mathematics course, though. Geesh.)

-Got all excited about ginger beer momentarily, then had a mouthful and turned the desire right back off again.

-Found out we'll spend the majority of Anatomy and Physiology I dissecting things, starting with rats in two weeks time, and did a little internal dance of joy. ...I know that sounds a bit screwy, but mostly I'm thrilled about how hands-on this course is going to be. In 4 weeks time we'll be extracting DNA from Drosophila fruit flies. That incited another little dance.

-Decided to name the 4 plants in my wheat germination project Inky, Pinky, Blinky and Clyde.

-FINALLY GOT MY BAG BACK FROM TASMANIA. It only took a week. I think Fastway Couriers should consider a name change.Surprisingly the return of my belongings didn't start a massive cleaning frenzy-- most of my belongings are still in piles on my floor. Oh well.

-Got me a job at Woolworths. I've got my first shift tomorrow. It's not going to be pleasant, but the hours ae flexible and it's part-time, which means I'll get sick and annual leave as well. I've have to practice my bleeping technique.  Bleep. Bleep.

Today's the first day I haven't had to get up before 7am. *falls asleep* I'm 'zausted.

A short rundown of my last few days in Taswegia:

-- Went and visited Grandpa at Cosgrove Park and felt bad for interrupting his breakfast. He's well, but a bit forgetful (as you would expect for a man of 97) and as morose as ever. When I told him I'd see him when I came down next, he said, "Ohh, I don't know where I'll be then." I asked him what he meant, as Cosgrove Park is building a new wing and there were some mutterings about moving Grandpa over to a new room, and he mumbled something about being "dead by then". Poor ol' Grandpa.

-- Mowed my Nan's lawn. Got in trouble with her at the supermarket for moving a bag of sugar with a hole in it, causing it to spill all over the floor. That and I was apparently being way too haphazard with the trolley. But she bought me a packet of honeycomb Crush TimTams, which are absolutely divine. Go out and get some. NAO.

-- Went out with my cousins for dinner, where I was presented with the biggest box of chocolates everrrr from my cousin. Seriously, it's like an A3 sized box. And now it's trapped inside my suitcase. Where is the justice?!

-- Had lunch with Bec Gugliotti, whose son insisted on repeatedly kicking her in-utero while we were trying to eat lunch. =P

-- Went over and met Chloe and Nick's 6 month old son Arthur, whose pictures all over Facebook do him no justice-- he is just so cute. I had him bouncing on my lap half the time I was there. And such a happy kid. Even though their house looks, like Chloe said, that "Toys R Us came in here and threw up all over the place". There were probably loads more people that I should have caught up with, but simply didn't get a chance to or it was geographically impossible. I promise though, next time I'm down there I'm making a trip down to Hobart. I can see the Hobbitons cowering in their seats already.

After what felt like the longest night everrrrrrr, I eventually got home alright. The backpacker's place that I stayed in actually wasn't as bad as I imagined. It was fairly clean, warm (perhaps too warm-- it was about 25 degrees inside) and the people there seemed friendly-ish as well. I felt bad that I wasn't in that good a mood to enjoy it though-- I was sullenly typing away on the in-house computer while people of all creeds and nations were merrily chatting away behind me, eating whatever backpackers eat... tofu. Lentils. Fuck knows. The bathroom even had a coin-operated hair straightener. A GHD one. Gohh. My only gripe was the beds- I (stupidly) decide to take a top bunk, and the bunk beds were the the squeakiest ones I've ever slept on. Seriously, I moved my arm and the whole thing squealed, making the French girl below me mumble about parfait and foie gras. Plus the pillowcase provided was freaking filthy, but I remedied that by sleeping with my jeans under my head. I got up at 5am to catch the Skybus back to the airport, where I had a cheeseburger for breakfast, dropped mustard on my jeans and nearly had a very overtired, overwrought screaming tantrum at 7am in the international departures lounge.

Got home, took what felt like- and what may have been- a 20-minute long shower, and stayed in my pyjamas for the whole day. Shitty situation remedied. Apparently my bags won't get to me through the courier until next week, maybe Wednesday at the latest. I'm told that they can't just put a bag on whatever flight and send it to me, they have to let it sit at Melbourne Airport until they fill a crate with stuff being shipped to Canberra. So I have to go out and buy new clothes this weekend so I actually have something to wear this weekend. And school starts Monday. Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahh! Let's hope the sore throat I have now doesn't progress any further. Maybe I picked up some mutated traveller virus from the backpackers.

Only 11 more hours, and then I'll be back in Canberra. I never thought I'd say it, but I am itching to get home like nothing else. (Like, at this stage, I'm literally itching. I'm not sure, I guess I'll fin out tomorrow, but I think this place has bedbugs. I had to wrestle with the sheet for my bed for about ten minutes before I could get it straight and where it was meant to be, so if bedbugs are present they are quite possibly upon my person.) Due to a fuckup with Jetstar, I have no baggage with me-- apart from my hand luggage which contains all my essentials including some toothpaste, a toothbrush and other small toiletries placed there by some miracle of forethought-- and my packed suitcase is sitting in the loungeroom of my parent's house in Launceston. Why? Because I "turned up too late to check my bags in", even though I'd already checked in online for the flight AND another person for the same flight had just checked in in front of me. Just as well I'd checked in online I guess, otherwise I'd be sitting on my parent's couch sobbing right now. Whatever. Then I had to pay again for the room (bed) I thought I'd already booked at the backpacker's where I'm staying, so now I'm yet another $53 down. *sigh* I just want to go home.

Dear IGA Lady Interview Woman Foul-mouthed succubus from Hades,


Thankyou for seeing me about the position vacant at your supermarket this afternoon, and taking the time out of your busy schedule to talk to me. I know it must be hard to run a whole supermarket with just you and your husband in charge, and gee, things must get really stressful for you. It's hard to be the boss, especially when everyone below you is stupider than horse shit and just as disgusting. I get it, people are gross. And it must be just as frustrating when they don't automatically know what you want, either. I mean, people should just know, shouldn't they? If you put a job ad in the paper that reads there is a vacancy for a "shop assistant/checkout operator", they should just know that particular description has nothing to do with what you really want, shouldn't they?

Once again, I'm very sorry for "wasting your time" (as you ever so politely put it) because I didn't read between the invisible lines or get the telepathic message that was attached to that particular want ad. You said that you had a problem with getting or keeping staff. Would that have anything to do with the fact that you advertise one ad and expect the successful applicant to do another? Or is it that when they ask you about that particular job you treat them as if they're so dumb they couldn't navigate their way out of a paper bag? I stepped out of the room while you took another phonecall with what sounded like a much younger girl than myself, and recall being shocked at the way you were talking to her. I thought to myself, "It must be because you're not face to face with her that you're speaking that way to her-- I hope you don't speak that way to me..." But oh, how lucky I was! You spoke to me in exactly the same disinterested, dismissive tone, and then --because I'm obviously thicker than shit-- I had to have it reiterated to me just how dumb I was, as it obviously hadn't got through the first time! D'oh!

I cannot BELIEVE that someone would ever think that it was okay to talk to or treat another human being- a complete stranger who had taken time out of her own schedule to come and see you about a job- like they were nothing at all. I've had some pretty weird and wonderful interviews, but yours takes the cake. Especially since I was obviously the one at fault, not YOU for putting a misleading (and possibly also an offence under the ACT Fair Trading Act and the Trade Practices Act) advertisment there in the first place. I mean, for fuck's sake. I'm supposed to be the simple one according to you, and even I could tell that you'd spelt "position" wrong in the heading of the thing. And then to insult me, refuse to take a copy of my resume and just tell me that I "might as well just leave and stop wasting my time"... I'm surprised you have any employees at all. To be treated like that at an interview let alone while you're working there, I would say you're lucky to have the employees you do. And good luck finding any more in the future. I hope you don't treat your family like this, otherwise you're going to die a lonely, bitter old woman.

Giffar,

Pippa Haas