The kin…

Bradley you tick all of my boxes… Bradley come tick all of my boxes

This entry will probably turn into a stream of consciousness.

I’m currently sitting on the couch in a holey bathrobe, astounded at the fact that the Argentina – Korea game currently sits at 2-1 just after half time. Wow.

Yesterday was my sister’s 17th birthday. It’s so weird, my 18th last year seems like only yesterday, yet my 17th seems a lightyear away. I had some errands to run so didn’t end up going to the waterfalls with Liv, mum and a family friend – although I got home earlier than they did, and spent a whole hour decorating her cake. This is why I am not, and will never be domesticated.

1 hour + 3 different icings later = the following: (and the last photo is the amazing dinner mum conjured up, mmm)

Whilst mum was busy snapping away the obligatory smiley, flashy birthday-girl photos, I decided to get my lens out and do my usual moody-ness. The cake looks better in colour, but I just wanted her face and candles, not all the hair and clothes and pink and blue. This is the second pink and blue cake I’ve decorated this month. I must remember to post pics of the other one, I was rather proud of it too.

I’ve forgotten what I had wanted say with the blog title from when I was in the shower thinking about it earlier. The title is derived from a song that was stuck in my head (urghh) that I heard live last week. The originalname used was “Malcolm” but I’m reaaally not a fan of that name – it makes me think of “Malcolm in the Middle”, that awful tv show from back in the day, plus it just doesn’t make me think of an attractive man.

Actually… it’s like 1.20am, I’m watching the footy, I can’t form coherent sentences, I will write about whatever it was… later.

Darling I’m down and lonely with the fortunate only. So sentimental, not sentimental, no, romantic not disgusting yet

Today is the last day of lectures and lessons of semester one, 2010. Today, I had my last improvisation playing assessment. I had got virtually no sleep, and no, it didn’t go well. I am just hoping that I will pass. Today is also the start of the long weekend for Queens Birthday. Although I didn’t even know that, because classes have ended so I will not get Monday off anyway. Plus, I have soooo much work to do over the weekend in order to prepare for my repertoire jury assessment next Wednesday.

Thanks to the combination of beautiful (however freezing) weather and the start of the long weekend, the ferries I had taken in and out of town to university were both relatively empty compared to usual. There were a lot of school aged kids milling around the city in the afternoon for a spot of shopping as they had finished classes early. I rather miss being excited for the hour early, 2pm finishes that we used to get at college last year and prior. It feels so weird not being young anymore.

Speaking of leaving college though, my sister just had her last official day of school – at the age of 16, she’s now “graduated early” (on paper, at least) or “dropped out”, in order to attend Pepperdine University, Malibu, CA, on a full Women’s Golf Scholarship. She had a shared lunch at school today, and her friend made her the cutest cupcakes ever. You can’t really tell due to the flash in this photo, but the white bits are actually indented to look like golf balls – how adorable!

On the topic of cakes, this is what my (rather hastily made) birthday cake from my sister looked like. It tasted great, but I swear, they don’t look as amazing as they used to… shhh.

I am sooooo looking forward to freedom and late nights out starting Wednesday next week after my assessment! So far I have plans for Wednesday, Thursday and Friday already. And very likely Saturday. Inebriated shenanigans with loud music and much better clothing than my daily 5-minute scramble, I’m sure!

Her off beat dance makes me fantasise

I’ve been missing for over two whole weeks now. And to be honest I have noooo idea where those two weeks of mid-semester break went!  I hate how that always happens to me – making plans in my head about how I’m going to spend my short holidays, and have it whiz past without me having achieved much, if anything at all. I hope I’m not the oooonly person that does that? I think a lot of it can be attributed to me simply wanting to fully relax after such a wound-up 5 first weeks of university.

Actually, to call it mid-semester break is highly misleading. There’s two more weeks in this ‘half’ than prior the break – because they’d aligned it with the Easter weekend, grr! I thought I had it baaad last half, it’ worse now. Crunch time. But I’ll try my best to keep blogging, because all of my pent up stuff isn’t really helping.

At the moment I have so many mixed feelings. Whilst I do not regret having chosen to major in Jazz instead of Law, I guess my tertiary pathway isn’t exactly soothing all the doubts and worries of “what happens after?”, etc. Also, in terms of the more pressing changes in my life that will be coming up in the next few months:
1/ I will be 19 in one month and two days. I’m not excited. At all. I don’t want to be in my last year of being a teenager! Not to mention it will be during the height of my stressful days.
2/ In June/July during semester break our family’s going on holiday to Australia. Whilst that just sounds like fun and games, it’s just really going to lead to a messed up denouement at the end of it (I reaaaaally shouldn’t think like this!) becaaauuuseeee…
3/ My younger sister is moving to Malibu, in the great City of Angels to attend Pepperdine University. I’m not ready to see her off (and she’s nervous as hell to leave as well), nor live in a house alone with my mother, and have 4 family members in 3 different countries. It sounds downright selfish and pig-headed, but I somehow feel as if I’d be happier if I were the one leaving home first, rather than feel like I’m left behind?

Oh shit, I don’t know.

One good thing of the day: I did my best ever solo in Improv class today. And trust me, it still wasn’t great, but my lecturer (also my bass teacher) and I are both glad to hear that I am making some progress. Albeit slooow and painful. But it’s progress nonetheless!

Friend’s EP Release gig this Saturday night. I shall be less gloomy!

P.S. Lottie – this blog title is just for you, and so is this “P.S.”
xx

Start a few fires and have my way

I got an expensive haircut today: my sister’s hairdresser doesn’t work on Fridays and I was impatient, so I paid a little more for a “more experienced” (aka more expensive, and apparently more popular) stylist; which resulted in me having to wait for a whole 40 minutes from the appointment time I had made, before he finished with the previous client!

These are photos pre-cut. I can’t be bothered with any post-cut photos yet, oopsies.

I’m feeling rather strange about the fact that I watched two compleeeetely contrasting movies today: Nine and Valentine’s Day. Mum picked me up from the city as I finished uni slightly earlier on Fridays, and we managed to catch the only remaining screening time of Nine. As I hadn’t had lunch and was feeling peckish, we decided to be naughty and snuck in food from Burger Fuel – though I must say, I don’t think the Bacon Backfire (huuuge burger that has bacon, chicken and brie in it!) that we shared was half as good in the dark though… It’s just not quite the same as being able to see the yummy, unhealthy goodness ooze into your mouth… mmm.

Anyway, the movie itself – compleeeetely different from what I had expected. I was very curious about it, but wasn’t prepared to pay for it (and I actually didn’t), but the main reason I agreed to see it was because Mum really wanted to, and had no one else that was willing, haha. I think overall, I only mostly enjoyed the visual and audio appeal. I liked Fergie and Kate Hudson’s song and dances the most, but the entire movie was just a bit too frustrating for someone who isn’t exactly a musicals fan.

Then, just before, Charlotte and I caught a late screening of Valentine’s Day. Yes, yes, I know it’s almost a whole month after Valentine’s Day, but I don’t think that two girls catching a lovely, light-hearted movie at the end of a tiresome week needs any justifying!

In other matters, Mum caught this photo of me earlier today, which shows what I wore to uni: MinkPink singlet dress; grey slip (the singlet is freaking see-through!), Aqua Dr Martens; Mi Piaci Laine bag; Le Specs; and my good ol’ bass on my back – weighing me down all day week!

We share the same skies

I’m finally back! Actually, I’d arrived at 5am on Friday, and then was at the university merely hours later for my orientation day – resulting in about 38 hours of no sleep by the time I fiiiiiinally made it into bed.

I know, I’d intended to blog whilst on my holiday in Taiwan and Japan, but then my laptop broke within the first 2 days of arriving in Taipei, which royally screwed that plan up. I really should be sleeping now though – the first official day of university is tomorrow and I should try to kick my university career off with a decent night’s sleep… but knowing me, I will be browsing the web until I doze off eventually.

Asides from getting reacquainted with my bass (and any form of technique at all) after a whole month of being thousands of kilometres from it, the other hurdles I really need to tackle this week is my sheer nerves and anxiousness about starting uni itself. It’s exciting, yes, but I’m scared shitless at the same time – I’m doing Jazz Performance for goodness sakes! It’s a far cry from the would-have-been alternative… sitting comfortably unnoticed in a crowded law lecture and being able to do my own thing without putting myself out there – until I was read, at least. But now… I’m crapping out about having combo and improvisation classes, etc etc. Yikes.

In other matters, yesterday evening, the family decided to trade bedrooms – which equals bigger room for me, yay! The only (but huge) problem is that, now that we have fiiiinally moved the furniture contents of 3 bedrooms around, the wardrobes will remain unchanged until we can get it together enough to get everything back in the right places. Despite the bigger room, I still can’t see any carpet, simply because half of what I own is sprawled on the floor. Wish me luck with that…

And last, but certainly not least: Last night I attended The Cribs show at Juice Bar with a couple of friends. It was AMAZING. The best concert I’ve been to in a long time. The Jarman brothers (and yes, who could forget Johnny Marr) had amazing stage presence, everything was tight, energetic, a thousand times better than on record; and their shared vocals were done just so, so perfectly. The sweetest thing was, Ryan had a picture of Kate Nash stuck on his Gibson, under the strings, between the pickups – super cute! I’m just jealous that Gary (which one’s that? the hot bassist, of course!) who’s only 29 is married to a 42 year old! Granted, she’s meant to be pretty amazing (mixed an album of Elliot Smith’s, etc) but still… Gary was well worth the leg pain that comes with a barrier-less venue!

Anyway, I will endeavour to post about my trip in sections along with photos – when I eventually get around to sorting them all. For now, here are some shots that I’d taken on film. All unedited, directly from scans. It’s good to be back!

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