( All under here )

This index was last updated 11 MAY 2009

Current Mood: busy

Well, after a weekend spent getting at least some use out of my new XBox 360, I have the following to report:

1) Their wireless controllers appear to have a small design glitch, which means occasionally the batteries slip out of contact with the contacts, such that one has to stop every so often to get the wretched thing to reconnect to the system. This generally involves either pushing the battery cartridge up or tapping it a couple of times to ensure everything falls into place.
2) The Last Remnant is designed for people with a large, flatscreen TV. As a result, the majority of the text on my normal sized little CRT telly is so small as to be unreadable. Given this includes things like descriptions of items, battle commands etc, this is clearly a Bad Thing, and means my next purchase from fairy money is going to have to be a new TV.
3) Squeenix have clearly decided their party structure from FFX and FFXII is the ideal one, since I can clearly identify the main character of The Last Remnant as a clueless nitwit who has no idea about polite behaviour (if you've ever met either Tidus or Vaan, you'll know what I mean); there's a grumpy older female character (Lulu or Fran); and I'm sure the plucky younger female character would have shown up within about another ten or so minutes (Rikku, Penelo). So, we just need to find the strong, silent male character (Kimahri, Basch, Auron), the snarkier male contemporary of the hero (Balthier, Wakka) and the serious third female contemporary of the hero who's actually the focus of the plotline (Yuna, Ashe). I've no doubt they're in there somewhere, but I couldn't handle the amount of squinting I was going to have to do in order to keep playing the game.
4) Assassin's Creed has one serious deficiency which I find annoying: there don't appear to be subtitles available (plus it's designed for people who have the larger screen TVs as well... this appears to be a regular thing with XBox games). Given I need either clear mouth movements or subtitles (preferably subtitles) to make sense of dialogue when I'm faced with a tangle of syllables and noises which could be words but which aren't particularly clear. The other alternative is raising the volume to levels where the neighbours are being disturbed, which isn't my preferred one.
5) Tales of Symphonia is a very good game, with an interestingly complex morality woven through it. Bad things happen to good people, the world isn't just "good guys" and "bad guys", and the problems the protagonists are attempting to resolve are believably complex. I like.

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Current Mood: awake

This week I received my tax refund cheque. $600 dollars and change, being the sum total of all the income tax installments I paid to the Australian government in the 2008 - 2009 financial year. Yays, moneys. I could be a good girl, and use it to pay for all kinds of things, but I have a long-standing tradition of regarding tax refund cheques as "fairy money", which is reserved for treats.

So I went out and purchased myself an XBox360 Elite (the one with the 120GB hard drive), plus a few games. My rationale is that it appears Square Enix are moving across to this platform now as well as the Sony ones, so having an Xbox means I'll be able to enjoy their plots some more. I now have a new toy to play with, so blog posts may be a little light on the ground for a bit while I try it out.

The games I now have: Lego Batman, Pure (motocross, I think?), Forza 3 racing, Kameo (it was supposed to be a copy of Assassin's Creed, but while they had the box, they didn't have the disk, so I got to pick another to the same value), Last Remnant, Eternal Sonata, and Assassin's Creed. Lego Batman and Pure came with the console. The next two were part of a package deal at the place I bought the console (Target, for my Aussie readers - it was the cheapest there at $429 for the bundle). I got the other three games at EBGames, because I'd seen a copy of Last Remnant in there the day before.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to unpack my new toy, and start playing.

*boing!*

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Current Mood: glee

It's interesting, really, when so-called "Christian" spokespersons get to talking about other religions in the media. For example, Australia's favourite Christian Democrat (imagine the scare quotes around each of those terms, please), the Reverend Fred Nile, has spoken up following the deaths of thirteen people on the Fort Hood military base in the USA to suggest the following:

"Australians would like to be assured that our defence forces have in place a system of assessment and review which would identify any person whose adherence to any alien ideology might one day override loyalty to mates and loyalty to the Crown." [...]

"There is an argument for suggesting that the safety and morale of our troops may warrant a ban on dedicated Muslims joining the armed forces, who may be influenced by Islamic fundamentalism." (quoted from the article Muslims in ranks a recipe for disaster: Nile on the ABC news website)

I'm not a Christian by any stretch of the word, but I seem to recall from my reading of the various gospels (and most particularly the gospel of Mark) one of the key things Jesus Christ (remember him?) said about following in Christ's footsteps was you had to put your loyalty to God before your loyalty to anything else - country, posessions, employment, even family. For examples of what Christ had to say on the matter, have a look at the following biblical passages: Mark 9: 43 - 48; Mark 10: 17 - 25; Matthew 5: 29 - 30 (the sermon on the mount); Matthew 6: 19 - 21; Matthew 6: 33 - 34; Matthew 10: 37 - 42.

It should therefore be reasonable to suggest there is an argument (in order to assure the Australian defence forces are able to "identify any person whose adherence to any [..] ideology might one day override loyalty to mates and loyalty to the Crown") for dedicated Christians to be banned from joining the Australian armed forces. Surely this is a more reasonable criterion than banning Muslims, since the religion of Christ, and particularly the version of the religion of Christ created by Saul of Tarsus (aka St Paul), is strongly opposed to the notion of warfare, fighting, and conquest in the first place - and therefore antithetical to the concepts on which the Australian Defence Forces are based.

It might also be reasonable to suggest the best thing the Reverend Fred Nile can do, in all Christian charity with the relatives and friends of those injured or deceased as a result of the Fort Hood shootings, is to shut his bloody gob, and re-read his bible. Maybe this time he could pay more attention to the gospels than to the eighteenth chapter of Leviticus.

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Current Mood: annoyed

My day so far has been... um.

I started off the day by having nightmares. Gods alone know why (although I suspect it has something to do with the raw skin on my right hand smallest finger, where a hangnail got too persistent) but I was dreaming I was the TARDIS in human form, and I know I woke up once all in a rush having thought someone was drilling into the back of my head. No, really. I could hear the drill. Scared the bzuh! out of me. Fortunately I got back to sleep again, although the nightmares didn't stop. I really should take a couple of Nurofen when I have something owie before trying to go to sleep.

The next thing to wake me up was a phone call from a real estate agent regarding a rental property I'd seen advertised online. As some of you may know, our house is currently being repossessed by the bank, which means we have to be out by 5 December, and handing over the keys for vacant posession by then. So we're looking at rentals. Given we're both on the dole, this isn't easy - I'm setting an approximate value of $200 per week (which is roughly half a fortnightly dole payment each) on the rent we can afford, and the result of the searches is... interesting. Let's just say if we wanted to live in rural splendour, we'd be spoiled for choice - there's places galore in spots like Kalgoorlie, Bunbury, Manjimup, Northcliffe, Geraldton, Norseman, and Kambalda West. Unfortunately, none of those are precisely convenient for jobs in Perth (plus, of course, if we moved to any of them, we'd be moving to an Area of Lower Employment, so our dole payments would be either cut down or cut off for about three to six months. Hoo-flippin'-ray).

Anyway, I have an appointment to have a look over this little 2 bedroom cottage in Bassendean that I put in an enquiry about. Now, given Bassendean is about 10km out of the Perth city centre, there has to be something wrong with this place for the rent to be this low (the next lowest rent is something like $260 per week, and the more likely one is $350 per week) - so I'm going to be looking carefully at the location, the neighbours, and the house itself to try and find out what the issue is, and why the rent is this low. Hopefully the issue is something liveable, such as noise, or a bad area (noise I can live with, a bad area I have lived with) rather than things like missing doors and windows, or a hot water system which doesn't function. From the maps I'm looking at (the map online, and the street directory I have handy) it looks like the problem's more likely to be noise from the railway crossing and passing traffic - in which case, I can live with it for the rent we'd be paying. Himself will just have to start sleeping with earplugs, or move in with his parents - his choice.

Aside from that, I've also been moving on to the next stage with my job search: cold canvassing. I've written up the letter, I've drawn up my list of candidates (I went through the yellow pages last week and drew up a list of all the mining companies listed) and now I'm chasing up contact information, checking details against websites, and getting email addresses where possible. So far I've sent out 10 emails today, I have another 10 planned for tomorrow, and I'm going to keep on at 10 per day until I've emailed all the ones I have email addresses for. Then I start on the mailouts - 10 per day every day until done. Once I've done all of those, I'm going to make a list of the oil and gas companies, and then pick my economy sector from there. If I haven't got a bite for tech work by the time we have to move out, I'll start looking for general admin stuff (but I'm hoping I'll get at least a nibble for the tech work).

NaNoWriMo update: I'm not doing it. Writing cheery, upbeat, positive letters to 10 companies per day soliciting work is quite enough fictional output to keep me busy. Even if it is mostly copy & paste.

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Current Mood: okay

Marcus Einfeld has bipolar, court hears

If you read the article, you'll discover the lawyers for this particular former judge have brought up the possibility that he has a long-term, previously undiagnosed bipolar mood disorder, and are offering this as a reason why his two year minimum sentence should be altered.

From the article: Einfeld is serving a minimum two-year jail term after pleading guilty to perverting the course of justice and making a false statement under oath to avoid a speeding fine.

The 70-year-old claimed that an American academic was driving his car when it was caught speeding, despite knowing she died the previous month.

I don't have bipolar disorder myself. What I do have is a chronic mental illness, which so far hasn't prompted me to do anything illegal, or to consider myself above the law. Strangely enough, there are a lot of mentally unwell people out there (and out here, come to that) who go through their entire damn lives without once coming to the attention of the police as anything other than victims of crime. But when mental illness is mentioned in the media, it's generally in the context of someone claiming a previously undiagnosed chronic mental illness which apparently severely affected them only at the time of the crime they're being charged with, and never before or since.

Now, it may be that Mr Einfeld was under the affect of either a manic period, or maybe a depressive episode, when he said something damn stupid in order to try and avoid a flippin' speeding fine. Or maybe he was an ordinary enough bloke who just didn't want to have to cop the fine, and chose to make a stupid lie to the police about who was driving his car at the time it was speeding. Having made this stupid lie, he then stuck by it, and wound up getting the book thrown at him, particularly since he was a flippin' Federal Court Judge and therefore should have known better than to try it in the first bloody place. But either way, the mania or the depression didn't make him do something so bloody stupid.

If Mr Einfeld has had bipolar mood disorder for a long period of time (and has coped with it admirably, one presumes, since he's now seventy and nobody apparently noticed until this psychiatrist he's talking to now raised the option) and has been dealing with his demons in solitude, that's a tragedy. I know depression is enough of a hell on its own, and I have every sympathy for the man. But being mentally unwell isn't an excuse for illegal behaviour, and it shouldn't be claimed as such, or reported that way.

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Current Mood: annoyed

Okay, it's been three weeks since the major meltdown, one week from the mini-meltdown which was averted by immersing myself in FF:Dissidia to the point of obsession (I'm now dreaming Dissidia battles... time to cut the playing down a bit). I'm vaguely sane at present (which reminds me - meds!) and hoping to stay so, even though the universe appears to be trying to make me go completely bonkers. My give-a-damn still isn't, so I'm currently behind on cooking, cleaning and doing anything other than levelling up characters on the PSP.

Dissidia is ... interesting. I've managed to get one character up to level 100 (Cloud) and I'm working on my second (Squall). Discovered that the guy who's voicing Squall isn't the same guy who voiced him in Kingdom Hearts, which says a lot about my hearing, doesn't it? The story mode is sorta fun, although there's a limited amount of enjoyment I can get from it (mostly because I get bored by running through the same thing over and over) - so far I've found the best fun comes from running through story mode for each character once, then coming back and doing it again after they've levelled up a bit (I ran Cloud back through his on level 80 or so, which was a bit like swatting flies with a sledgehammer... for some reason I got a perfect score for section completion after that; Squall went back through at level 30). So far I've beaten Chaos once (he's a right whatsit to beat - three-stage boss, so you have to kill him three times rather than just the once) and seen the final little FMV cutscene, which is cute.

I think one of the things I like about Dissidia is they have the age balance right for Cloud and Squall. One of my pet peeves in KH fandom is that people tend to assume Squall is older than Cloud (probably because Squall has a deeper voice). In fact, it's t'other way round - Cloud starts his game at age 21, while Squall is a good four years younger at age 17 - and if you assume each game took 1 year to run that has Cloud ending up at age 22, with Squall coming in at age 18. Advent Children takes place 2 years after the initial Final Fantasy game, so in Advent Children, Cloud is at least 23. Dissidia Squall looks younger than Dissidia Cloud, which makes me feel all is right with the world again. And yes, I am a picky fangirl.

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Current Mood: okay

Murdoch warns Google: it's time to pay

News Corporation Chairman Rupert Murdoch has launched a stinging attack on Google and other on-line entities for stealing content.

At a conference of World Media Executives at Beijing's Great Hall of the People, Rupert Murdoch has taken aim at search engines like Google as internet parasites.

According to the News Corporation Chairman, the so-called "aggregators" on the internet steal content from tradition media organisations and, he says, the time has come for them to pay for it.

"If we do not take advantage of the current movement toward paid-for content, it will be the content creators - the people in this hall - who will pay the ultimate price and the content kleptomaniacs will triumph," he said.

Let's see - "the current movement toward paid-for content" is being generated mostly by News Corporation, which, if I recall correctly, is the corporate media entity largely owned by Mr Murdoch's family. News Corporation also controls large shares of the media markets in Australia, the United Kingdom, the United States, and several other countries, the most notorious branches of which are the Murdoch tabloid newspapers (such as the UK "Sun" and approximately half of the major metropolitan daily newspapers in Australia) and the Fox News cable channel in the United States (commonly nicknamed "Faux News", because of the lack of resemblance between life as reported by their so-called "journalists" and the consensus reality of the majority of human beings). Do I sense perhaps the petulant foot-stampings of an old man who is terrified the global media empire he's spent a lifetime building is being threatened by the content aggregators, who collect into one space not only the Murdoch empire's view of the world, but also all those other views as expressed by people who aren't part of the News Corporation conglomerate?

After all, if people can choose to see multiple pictures of the same event (or multiple views from many different sources) they might just start to realise things aren't the simple black-and-white over-simplifications of Mr Murdoch's beloved format. If people can pick and choose from dozens of news sources in a single page, they might start asking questions about some of the articles from News Limited. Questions like "why is this news?" (for example, why are we being constantly told in the Murdoch press about the private lives of soi-distant "celebrities"; why do we never hear about "causes" without a so-called famous face to attach to them; why are the bedroom games of the British royal family such an all-consuming matter etc) or "why is this such a scandal?" (Famous star comes out as gay; female celebrity gains or loses weight; celebrity couple divorces) or even "why aren't we hearing about X?" (media conglomeration; media gatekeeping; corporate censorship; corporate abuses of power; non-capitalist economic theory; challenges to right-wing prejudices; shall I continue?). The news aggregators offer a view of a bigger picture, rather than the small-minded, small-world images Mr Murdoch wants to keep selling us. They offer a picture of a complex world, one where people aren't just one thing or another, but might be both at the same time, or even something completely different.

The news aggregators threaten Mr Murdoch's livelihood, just by offering a diversity of links to a variety of stories. They take away his control over the shaping of opinion, and threaten his ability to offer up a world where everyone is just like him: white, wealthy, upper-middle class, educated, heterosexual, cisgender, Christian, Anglo-Celtic and male. What the news aggregators threaten isn't the rights of people to create content, but rather the assumed right of Mr Murdoch and his social equivalents to dictate how the world looks to the rest of us. They threaten Mr Murdoch's privilege - and how dare they do that?

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Current Mood: cynical

Gods, where to start? It's been a bit of a frantic week-and-a-bit. Let's see - how about I give a rundown of "good things and bad things" and then an expansion in TL;DR below.

Good things:

• Meds packaged in blister pack, Silver Chain stuff almost up and running.


• Purchased Dissidia on Tuesday, already 9/10ths of the way through the initial part of Story Mode


• Heard from my folks, they're coming back to Perth early

• Still depressed


• Court hearing on Tuesday resulted in an order to hand over the house


• Still unemployed

Current Mood: stressed

It's been about a week since I wrote the "I need help" post, and about a week since the breakdown which prompted it. Since then, I've had a few things happen. I've contacted the Silver Chain people about getting some assistance with ensuring I take my medication regularly. From what I've read on their website, they're probably the best people to provide the kind of help I need, which is someone dropping in on maybe an "every second day" basis, in order to ensure I'm taking my meds regularly and getting out of bed at a reasonable hour. They've returned my contact, and advised me to get a referral from a GP, which I did on Thursday last week. Now I have to wait for them to get back to me again, and let me know whether it's possible for this to happen or not.

I'm back to taking my medication, and I'm going to try and keep consistent with it, even though I know I have problems with this (see the above paragraph). So far I'm on day two, and I'm suffering the understandable side-effects of restarting psych medication after about two weeks without it. Or in other words, I'm dizzy, dopey, and a bit distracted at present. This too will pass, but at the moment I'm trying not to move too much too quickly.

( More under the fold )

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Current Mood: wheee!

Sparked by this article:

Jack Hayford Backs Odd Theory: Sex With a Demon Drove Down Japanese Stock Market

If the Emperor of Japan has had sexual intercourse with the Japanese sun goddess, there's an even bigger worry to consider: he's been involved in an incestuous act with one of his ancestors (the royal house of Japan is said to be descended directly from the sun goddess Amaterasu) and may well have been sexually assaulted by this divine-level being. The matter needs to be investigated, and appropriate criminal charges laid (not just the goddess in question).

There are numerous cases of divinities sexually assaulting their followers and/or descendants; one of the more famous ones occurred circa BC 6 in the vicinity of Nazareth, when Mary (betrothed of Yusuf the carpenter) was assaulted by Yhwh (the local barbarian deity) and was later made aware of this assault by angelic visitation. She subsequently bore a child of this assault who followed the typical life path for such children - forced relocation from their homeland, a nomadic or disconnected childhood, and lack of acknowledgement by their maternal or paternal relatives, and a certain amount of searching for a stable identity, followed by a period of recognising their divine origins, reclaiming whichever kingdom they happen to be heir to, and eventual assassination. Subsequently, cultists affirmed this child had risen from the dead (which is a standard demi-deistic ability).

It appears this particular case was an exceptional one, leading to action being taken at the divine level, since subsequent claims of divine sexual assault appear to be the maunderings of hysterical females. However, it appears this practice was once widespread (as per the stories of Heracles, Perseus, Helen, Clytemnestra, Castor, Pollux, Theseus, the royal houses of both Northern and Southern Egypt, the royal house of Assyria, Romulus, Remus, the royal house of Japan etc) and this raises concern. Given this tale of resurgent divine interference in the affairs (both sexual and metaphorical) of humans, it could be we are due for another round of demi-deities being born into a world which is no longer set up to accommodate their demi-divine abilities.

Should there be a rash of people resurrecting themselves, the consequences for the funerary industries alone are startling. However one of the regular demi-divine abilities, which is freely attributed to any number of demi-divine beings (for example, Asclepius) is the ability to heal through the use of demi-divine power. This leads to some serious implications for the health care provision industries, and a clear and present threat to the American way of life should a demi-god or demi-goddess walk amongst the American population. If such a being is able to heal simply by laying on hands, should they be permitted to do so when their ability threatens the livelihoods of doctors, nursing professionals, medical researchers, medical administrators and insurance company executives? As they generally refuse payment for such services (this is a documented phenomenon in most cases of healing by divine beings) their existence could very well drive down the profit margins in the medical sector, leading to increased co-payments being required by insurance companies. Indeed, the existence of a single demi-deity could be a greater threat to the American Medical System as it stands now than any public health provision being argued through Congress.

In addition, demigods in particular tend to have extremely powerful warlike abilities. One of the more regular ones is enhanced strength, another is enhanced skill in battle (and therefore presumably in sporting activities). The more active demigoddesses also demonstrate these traits. As yet, there are no standardised means of testing humans for demigodly abilities (although there are rumours they have a persistent halo or aura, visible in darkness) which opens the door to the possibility of pantheistic countries such as China deliberately breeding their deities with humans in order to improve their standing in international sport. Has Caster Semenya (a demigodly name if ever I heard one) had her parentage checked for possible divine antecedents?

Clearly we must be on the alert for further symptoms of divine and demi-divine interference in our way of life.

I shouldn't have to say this, but just in case some of my readers aren't aware, the above is sarcasm and satire. Reading the sparking article - particularly the bits about "prayer walking" - had me wondering whether all of the implications of the divine sexual encounter on the part of the Japanese emperor had been appropriately considered. As well as whether or not the people who are Prayer Walking are also claiming credit for the reduction in attacks by man-eating badgers on the populations of the places they're "protecting"...

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Amanda "Brocky" Stachewicz had everything: a loving family with children, a great career as a doctor and a home in the western suburbs. The former St Hilda's schoolgirl got top marks for everything and was beautiful inside and out.

But at her funeral at her old school in March, mourners were stunned to hear about how she felt before she died.

"I'm tired and I don't want to suffer any more," Brocky wrote before she committed suicide.

Her schoolmate Karen Heagney is running in November's New York marathon to remember her friend and do something for mental illness.

"Depression is a hidden disease," Karen said this week, as she limbered up for a training session at Perry Lakes. "If you suffer from a physical disease it's visible and tangible and people ask how you're going. With depression often no one knows."

This is an excerpt from an article which appeared in our free local paper[1] this week. It was one of the things which pushed me over the edge into absolute screaming hysterical fury today, and got me breaking down.

( More under the fold )

[1] Mosman Cottesloe Post, Vol 36 No 37; September 19 2009.

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Current Mood: depressed

Found this one on the ABC ticker last night:

Robb takes leave over depressive illness

One of the Opposition Front Benchers in the federal House of Representatives here in Australia has a biochemical disorder called diurnal variation, which is a depressive illness. He's taking three months leave of absence.

Now, when I first saw that, I didn't have a clue what the heck "diurnal variation" meant in context of depressive illnesses (I knew it meant "daily changes" but heck, that's a pretty broad term). So, off I went to Google, and discovered it's the technical term for feeling like hammered crap in the mornings. At which point I went "yes, and?", because I've had that for over twenty years now, and I was under the strong impression it was pretty damn normal. Then again, I'm depressed, so are both my parents and a fair chunk of my relations, and possibly this skews things. My second reaction was along the lines of "ooh, there's a word for everything in this discipline!", because I hadn't been aware my feeling worried and anxious when I woke up (and the consequent wanting to go right back to sleep and stay there for another few hours) had a name, aside from "oh shit, another bloody morning".

Someone really should point out to Mr Robb's spokesweasel that using the big words for everything doesn't exactly win you the huge sympathy points in this day and age. Far too many people know google, and know how to use it - and many have stronger google-fu than I (my google-fu extends as far as being able to narrow down my search by picking appropriate terminology to search on).

But at least Mr Robb is getting lots and lots of sympathy for feeling like crap in the mornings now, and there's supportive messages from all and sundry, and lots of people saying "yeah, we're on your side, we'll keep your old job for you" and similar. So I'm going to try not to feel like I've been cheated by just having been told "suck it up and live with it" since I was fourteen, and get on with my life. I'll also try not to feel cheated by realising I have to hide my depressive illness, because otherwise I won't be able to get a job short of begging.

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Current Mood: annoyed

So for the last few days I have been mostly playing City of Heroes, or reading the stuff on porn_battle on IJ, chasing down the FF7 anonymous kink meme on LJ or just generally futzing around the web a bit. I've also gone through my plot notes for one of my great big pieces of fic (the one that's at 24K words and counting) and re-organised them into some sort of structure, so I can actually find things. This involved a lot of copy & paste work, and as a result the whole business is now blown out to about 24K words as well. So I have an equal amount of pagespace spent on the plot notes and the actual factual plot. I'm not sure whether this is a good thing or not.

( ISAGN:Spelling checkers with definitions available )

( City of Heroes rambling )

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Current Mood: moody

Well, for some reason getting out the two longish pieces I've been working away at on and off over the past year or so and doing some more of the epicyclical rewrites I'm prone to (I call it editing, because that sounds ever so much more purposeful) appeared to have worked to dispel the cranky mood. By the time midnight came around, I was able to kick off the download without wanting to bite the update program, and when I eventually went to bed at close on 3am this morning, I was just fine.

What was even better, I'd added some new content to both of the pieces I'd opened, which really helps. One of them's up to 24,000 words plus, while the other's only at 5,000 or so, but they're both going to be walloping great bastards when (if) they're eventually completed.

I'm still fine this morning, having created my first character on City of Heroes and completed the initial missions. It's an interesting little game, that one. I think I shall see about creating a second character, and see whether I can get any further. One of the only complaints I have is that if you're playing a trial account (as I am) there's a persistent little box in the dead centre of the screen telling you you're playing the trial, and asking whether you want to buy the full version. Mind you, I can live with that for a week or so, while I decide whether or not I want to keep playing. So far the answer is "yes", but that may alter.

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Current Mood: hopeful

I'm cranky. I don't know why. I've been taking my meds all week like a good girl, so in theory I shouldn't be feeling this irritable. Unfortunately, this isn't theory, and I'm currently feeling tetchy enough to bite the heads off live chickens just in order to satisfy my craving for something destructive to do.

The annoying bit is that I really don't know why I'm so cranky. I suspect it has something to do with the fact that I cancelled my WoW account today (and got rather irritated at their cutesy "you made the peon cry" bit in there, while I was at it). Unfortunately, I didn't actually have much choice in the matter - Blizzard appear to have chosen not to continue supporting the graphics hardware I'm using, and I'm not in a financial position to be able to pay largeish amounts to upgrade my laptop just so I can play one damn game. I went looking around at other MMORPGs, and decided to give "City of Heroes" a try, but installing it requires downloading the software, which means I have a flippin' 10 hour download waiting for me. Yays. To make matters more interesting still, Himself decided to confide in me that we're coming up to the limit for our bandwidth for the peak hours (ie everything between 8am and midnight - off peak is between midnight and 8am) so if I want to do this download, I have to wait until midnight to kick it off. Hoo-fucking-ray.

Ach, I think I'll get out the bits of fiction I'm working on and see whether I can come up with anything for those. After all, if I'm going to be cranky, bad-tempered and frustrated, I may as well do it to some purpose.

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Current Mood: cranky

*THUD*

owie

(Or in other words, I didn't get the job. Beaten out by someone with a bit more hardware knowledge.)

Current Mood: bruised

Just had an interview for a possible position, for a damn near immediate start. I think it went well, but I can never tell with these things - my instincts are all over the place, it seems. As a result, I'm now second-guessing myself all over the place and panicking about whether I might have put the potential employer off - was I too dressed up, too dressed down, too friendly, not friendly enough, did I give off the right vibes, the wrong vibes... aargh.

I've just let go of the trapeze bar and performed my triple somersault backflip with the half twist... now to find out whether the other bar is where I think it should be. If not... this is gonna hurt.

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Current Mood: worried

It's been a pretty good week so far. I've managed to complete a fortnight's worth of job search inside three days (okay, a fortnight's worth of job search equals ten jobs, but still...) and one of those was a contact from a temp firm regarding a possibility. I've also managed to take my meds for three days running, which is a plus given I've been skiving off on the whole job for the past few weeks.

So, before I head in to my appointment with CRS tomorrow morning at 9am, I have to come up with a list of ten occupations I'd be interested in, and a list of about ten companies I'm going to be cold canvassing for work over the next fortnight or so. Oh, and a template for a cold canvassing letter to run a bit of a mail merge on (why spend hours typing out each one individually if I can get the computer to do the hard stuff for me?). Oh, and fill in my fortnightly form for Centrelink, but that's not really a hardship - they're not even asking for details of where I looked for work this fortnight.

Then I'm back to playing KH2 (even though it's one of the few games I've finished out of the pile). I was playing FF8, but I've given up on that for a bit, mostly because I've found myself up to the final disc, and we're up against Adel, and it's just battle battle battle, and I'm bored. So KH2 is a bit of a relaxation exercise, even if Aerith and Queen Minnie do seem to be battling it out for the position of "Ms Valium" (or possibly "Ms Hash Brownies") in their early appearances. About the only thing I have to watch out for is to set the timer on the fridge (it's a small digital cooking timer with a magnet on the back - hence "on the fridge") so that I finish playing at a reasonable hour and get to bed early enough to get enough sleep for my appointment tomorrow. One of the joys of Squeenix games, I've found, is that they don't have a natural "stop" point, where you can say "okay, time to get up and do something different". I mean, yeah, I can fully understand why, but sometimes it's just a little annoying.

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Current Mood: okay

A big thank you to stopthatgirl7 at IJ, who gave me the invite code.

I don't know whether I'll be using this account regularly, or whether I'm going to be sticking with the IJ account for default posting. We shall see.

Now to go looking for all the folks I know who might be on here and see whether I can find them.

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Current Mood: cheerful