Nifty stuff...

Just got the latest draft of that fucking essay back and the notes were all positive and stuff! One more re-write and I can hand the damnable thing in and be done with it. Hu-fuckin-zah! Plus, the second presentation for my masters that I gotta give can basically be my new, shit-hot essay read out loud. Innit grand? :)

Been looking at grants and stuff as part of uni and found out that for a few of the "You're new here, aintcha? Want some cash?" literary grants you need to already have, like, 10 stories or a couple of books or scripts already published/produced. Now, I know that they're just wanting you to demonstrate that you have what it takes to give them a return on their grant money, but doesn't that seem like "We're here to give you money if you're a new and emerging artists so long as you're established and successful". Confusing.

Oh, and I was looking at Daria's journal and found this nifty little meme...

What would your Anime life be like? by hearthlight
Name:
Gender:
Your looks:	Long, perpetually flowing hair
Your best friend:	Twelve horny alien girls.
Your powers:	Energy blasts.
Your beloved:	A valiant hero.
Your occupation:	Wanderer.
Your ending:	Shocking! I can't spoil it.
Created with quill18's MemeGen 3.0!

There was cutting and pasting, so I hope this works...

Four things I've learned recently;

1. No speech at a wedding should include the words "tag team", no matter how late it is.


2. The military terminology and behaviour (except for a few cock-ups) in Dog Soldiers are very accurate. My Dad said so.


3. People that speed are not above complaining when other speeders nearly hit them.


4. Downloadeable trailers are cool.

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"Now he's shooting my luggage. That's just mean!"
- Fairfax, Payback

Weddings, breakfast, anything...

My first pun subject header. Trust me, it will not be my last. Wanna know what's happened since last we met? Well, for starters; Tim and Charlotte got married!!!
Big congratulations are, of course in order. The ceremony itself was beautiful, even if I say so myself. Y'see, I had the honour of giving a reading. So I have actually spoken, in a church, at deliberate volume to be heard by people other than my friends and not just to make a snide comment that'll damn me to hell. What I read was a brief passage from Twelfth Night, Act 3 scene 1, where... um... the rich chick... the one that Carmen played... says that "love sought is good, but given unsought better". It didnae go too badly, except I did speak justatadfastsothatitmayhavebeenhardtounderstandme. Leila did sing at the wedding also, and was absolutely amazing (as you would expect). Tim don't half scrub up nice in a tux and Charlotte's dress was truly gorgeous.

From the ceremony (which was held at the Kirk of St Andrew in Forrest, for those people that know Canberra geography), we then moved on to the Boathouse for a truly spectacular reception. The food was - as one would expect - stunning, as was the service. I had the veal. Mmmm... baby cow... The band were perfect, low key and groovy, and the speeches were short, amusing and touching. And I was the MC, so in between the short, amusing and touching speeches we had yours truly trying desperately not to look like I was in the middle of a routine at the velvet room at The Sands. Still, I did have people laughing, the bride and groom blushing and only made one grossly inappropriate joke for which Sam IV hit me quite hard.

All the bunnies in attendance scrubbed up well, with my gorgeous lady Carmen and Leila worthy of special mention. Leila's hair was all curly and pinned up and pretty and Carmen was, simply, stunning in her 20s-style dress. Denis's $600 suit was well worth the price, and even I managed to look vaguely decent. OH! And Sam IV was all kilted up. He borrowed Barry's (being conveniently entitled to wear it) and so didn't have to adjust the straps or anything. Also, he had a knife in his sock (a sgian dubh - pronounced "skee-an doo"). We were nice to him.

So today was a nice slow start, followed by crispy bacon, pancakes and eggs for the gang (well, me, Carms, Cal, Ratti, Leila, Denis and Sam IV), with a brief guest appearance by the young master Barry (or Gault-y, as I believe he is called by his RAAF peers. Really guys, at least our nickname has a story). He's enjoying playing with bombs and stuff, and is looking healthy as ever.

Oh, and I'm thinking of applying for a post-grad with DFAT (Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade), so maybe I can become a spy like Sam IV's dad! :)

Four things I've learned recently

1. While it is possible to just 'wing it' when you MC and wedding reception, try and have just a few notes to fall back on.


2. Charlotte was really mean when she was little.


3. Like deep-fried mars bars, I have yet to add successful doughnuts to my culinary repertoire.


4. Don't fire rocket launchers into the wall next to your head.

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"Shut the fuck up, Donny."
- Walter, The Big Lebowski

Agenda setting

I have no agenda.

Don't get me wrong, I believe strongly in certain things, disagree strongly with others, but I basically don't think I have any specific personal agenda. I support the idea that I should have the right (even though I know there's nothing like a 'constitutional' one in Australia) to responsibly use and own a recreational firearm. I think that people should not be held by foreign powers without charge. I believe that putting empty sugar packets back in the sugar bowl at cafes should be punishable by public flogging. I believe all these things, but I wouldn't say that my belief in them constitutes an agenda. But now I have a moderately public forum (so long as people know the address) in which to spew out any agenda I may have, and I think maybe I should be using it in a less aimless way.

Y'see, this blog was just meant to be a random collection of musings and whatnot, based mostly on the very sheep-like notion that all my friends had blogs and they were cool (friends and blogs), so why don't I give it a go? Now I have desires to rant about my issues, try to make the world a better place and I even have a declaration from Jared that I "poke" pop culture. So what do I do? I like pop culture, I have my issues and I guess they should be aired, lest I bottle them up and turn into a bitter, cynical old man. Of course, I also think that trying to work out a raging torrent of anger and social awareness every couple of days might get old. Oh well, looks like the random aimlessness will continue, but with occassional outpourings of issues and pop culture. In fact, I can combine the two. Watch...

It pisses me off that channel 7 (or maybe just Prime) are happy to bump Angel in order to show The Wog Boy or tennis or some other annoying thing, just because it's not a prime-time show. What's so special about The fucking Wog Boy that you have to bump a popular cult show for it? Why couldn't they put it on in a regular movie timeslot? Does it really matter this much? True, it's nice to rediscover one's faith in a series that we all thought was gonna tank from the beginning but actually turned out to be kinda cool. And then there was the whole Connor-evil-pregnant-Cordie-Jasmine bollocks of last season, but so far Angel v5.0 has been pretty damn cool. But why the fuck did they just piss it off 'cause Nick Giannopolis (sp?) hasn't been on telly for a while? I don't get it.

On a brighter note, I saw Dealer's Choice at REP tonight (although it's actually an HMT show) and it was excellent. The accents may have slipped a little when people got excited, but the performances were great! A good geezer play about geezer playing some poker and losing more money than they can afford. Lots of hilarious word-play and insults made for lots of laughs and the occasional spontaneous burst of applause.

And now I'm off to kill Ratbat a lot at Red Faction 2.

Four things I've learned recently;

1. The woman that Mr Orange (Tim Roth) shoots in Reservoir Dogs was Roth's dialect coach for the American accent and always gave him a hard time.


2. He enjoyed shooting her more than is probably healthy.


3. A reggae version of Hotel California, sung in French, is actually cooler than it sounds.


4. Nick from work says 'random' a lot.

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MUGSY: My life flashed before my eyes.
FRANKIE: Was it any good?
MUGSY: No, you were in it.

Um... okay...

Just a quick one. Head over to Jar's place and check out his links to other blogs.

"straps one on and gives pop culture a poke"?

Thanks... I think...

Quiet days

Howdy pardners,

Your chief procrastinator Euan here (well, I would be chief, but I didn't get around to running in the election - ba-doom tish) with more fun tales of a dull life. With a steady combination of work, buying Red Faction 2 and general laziness my essay still remains unfinished (although I am at Uni as we speak, so here's hoping today's the damn day). Of course, I'm still managing to distract myself with blogs, web comics and other crappola, but I am at least not in front of a wall full of DVD and video-based distractions.

Had Nick from work and Sam IV over last night, wherein we did eat pizza, drink beer and play XBox games until I was literally nodding off with the controller in my hand. At 130am. I would say I'm getting soft, but then again I've never been a particularly big one for late nights. Or early mornings.

As for the games we played, Red Faction 2 is oodles of fun with hard-core multiplayer action and lots of shit ye can just blow the fuck up. Really. Wall getting in your way? Blow it up. Door won't open? Blow up the wall next to it. Hidden in a corner and wanna snipe? Blow up the wall again. Actually, the walls are what ye can mainly blow up, but it's still frickin' cool. No Halo-killer, for sure, with the multiplayer lacking something intangible (maybe the tanks), and the weapon noises having not quite the grunt of the Master Chief's arsenal, but for quick and easy, John Woo-ing of SMG fun, RF2 is well worth it. And as for Dynasty Warriors 4, imagine a Soul Calibre-style fighting game that puts you in the middle of an Age Of Empires-style battlefield. You get to run around and either mow down rows of nameless enemy footsoldiers or single out captains and generals for extra fun. They can even call you out, Wild West style, for one-on-one duels. Also, the graphics are fucking incredible (Hmmm... haven't I been the potty mouth today? :) ). All we need now is a big screen TV. Again. I don't know, bloody Callum wanting his own stuff in his own house. Bastard.

Four things I learned recently;

1. The HTML coding to make ordered lists with Roman numerals.


2. My Mum makes really good Chinese-style pork neck.


3. Some lolly manufacturers apparently consider bile an important ingredient in banana flavouring.


4. Just because the Aussie dollar is in a good position internationally doesn't mean I'll suddenly have the money to buy all the crap I want from on-line stores. Dammit.
   

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"Just remember these two things: she's nineteen years old, and the 82nd Airborne works for me."
- President Josiah Bartlett, The West Wing

Cat Empire ROCK!!

Well met,

It is official. They are awesome, sounding just as good live as they do on the CD (better, really) and having the audience eating out of their hands. The vibe was awesome, Hello went for about ten minutes and god I skanked hard. I have never skanked harder than I did on Thursday night. Why, specifically, do they rock? Well, for starters, they played a two hour set, were obviously having as much fun on stage as we were watching them and they even thanked the techies. In fact, not only did they get a cheer going for the sound and lighting guys - who were locals - but they got their touring roadie up on stage to take a bow. How. Fucking. Cool. Is. That? The Wine Song had a couple of groups of people (us included) linking arms and giving it bit of the old Greek-step-kick thing, and then the two groups of people (who had, BTW, never met each other) joined up into a great big step-kicking circle, so basically the greatest ice-breaker in the world is an amazing latin/hip-hop/reggae/ska/swing/gypsy band. A pity there aren't more of them around, eh?

Dinner at the Shalimar went well also, with about 13 people from the various bits of my life - work, social, family - getting together and consuming mass quantities of excellent food and chatting. Of course, I missed about half an hour of that chatting because - peanut that I am - I left my Cat Empire ticket at home and had to zoom back to Narrabundah to get it. Still, Civic to Narrabundah and back in less than twenty-five minutes and only moderate spraining of the speed limits was a good effort.

And I got my last batch of presents! Pirates of the Carribean and Enemy Of The State on DVD from the peoples at work, as well as a photo of me peeking around a corner in an awesome frame. It's a little hard to explain, but it really is an awesome picture and an awesome frame. I also got a slinky from Jim and one of those little metal things you wind up and it wobbles around on the table from Chaedy. Very cool. :)

Four things I've learned recently;

1. Deep-fried mars bars are not yet part of my culinary repertoire.


2. Working on a day you don't normally work, combined with a decent night's sleep, a Cat Empire CD and working with some of your favourite people can actually be fun.
   
3. At least two people more than I thought read this.


4. I may have been premature in my declaration of a 2nd academic wind, but I'm still trying.

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"Good news, everyone..."
- Professor Farnsworth, Futurama

Anticipation and movie marathons

Well met,

Tonight I get to see the Cat Empire live and loud. How cool is that!? I know, all you Melbourne-based readers (hark at him. "all you Melbourne-based readers", like anyone other than my immediate friends reads this...) have already seen them five million times and knew they were awesome decades before Triple J even started braodcasting, let alone playing CE, but for me it's a big deal, so nyer. We'll be having a nice Indian meal at the Shalimar before hand and then... Hchello, hchello!!! :)

Tuesday night saw me doing something I hadnae done for ages, went to see one movie and then went straight back in and watched another. I went to work to pick up my pay (a couple days early so I could give money to the dentist, more on that later) and two of my co-workers (Amanda and Nikki, specifically) said "Hey, we're going to the movies after work, wanna come with?". A quick trip to check out session times later and we're settling in to watch The Butterfly Effect, and boy is it a depressing movie. Don't get me wrong, the concept is pretty clever, the editing and FX shots are well done and the supporting cast is brilliant, but there's just so much wrong shit in the film that if the ending had been three angstroms less happy, I would've had to have gone on a murderous rampage. Oh, and Ashton Kutcher wasnae too bad, but he did keep reminding me of Keanu in The Matrix.

After Butterfly Effect, Amanda and I (Nikki had to go home) met up with a couple of me other mates (Sil and Andrew, if'n ye must know) and went to see The Last Samurai and damn what a movie! Great fighting, impressive cinematography and Ken Watanabe was robbed. I do have one problem, in that a few of the 'isn't Japan pretty, let's film horses moving along skylines' shots made the horses look dreadfully CG. I don't know if they were or not, but those shots and a couple of the big battle shots just screamed computer generated. Couldn't they have flown to New Zealand and borrowed MAYA from Weta Digital? Ye see, I think the Lord Of The Rings movies have raised the bar for massive, CG battles to the point where movies featuring sequences that even two years ago would've been stunning, now look a little hinky. Like The Matrix with fight sequences and Blade and XMen with movies based on comic books, the level of awesomeness in the freakin' massive battles in Return Of The King has basically ruined it for everyone else. Tee-hee.

Oh, and to gloat, I went to the dentist and it was neither as painful nor expensive as I had thought it would be. How cool is that?

And now back to the Uni work...

Four things I've learned recently;

1. Around the BBQ discussions that involve 2 AFP officers and one forensic pathologist are kinda cool, just don't be put off when the phrase 'he'd melted into the couch' comes up.


2. Al Leong may have only been in about 24 movies, but he seems to crop up in all the ones I watch.


3. A 1.5 litre bottle of Grolsch doesn't last as long as ye might think.


4. My blog really does look like a Medicare form.

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"You don't want to get too personal, but you're asking me if my pubes are ginger?"
- David Gorman, response to a question from Will Anderson on Triple J's breakfast show today.

I'm getting old, my hearing's going and my arms hurt...

Well met,

And I ain't kidding. With two hours of rock-climbing on Sunday (some of it upside down) and two hours of Wing Chun (a relatively arm-intensive form of kung fu) last night, they are aching, and with the drilling of various blocking techniques we did I also have a couple of impressive bruises on my forearms. But enough bitching - for the moment - and on to the post.

My birthday - which I have mentioned before, I think - was last Tuesday. In fact, I have now been 26 for 6 days, 23 hours and 25 minutes. A big THANK YOU to all who wished me a happy birthday either verbally, with a card or in that best of ways, with a present. I got a great mix of things this year, and there was a certain theme running with many of my gifts.

My folks got me a 5 ltr slow cooker (which I have used twice and is awesome), my bro got me a deep fryer (which I'm thinking I'll use on Sunday), my beloved Carmen got me a chef's blowtorch (but no butane to put in it, does she not trust me?), the Jar-man got me a jar of this cool, Italian, pre-minced chilli and eggplant thing (that went very well in my chicken casserole, Jar) and another friend got me a knife block so I no longer have to pull out my knife roll every time I want to use my knives. So, do you think people believe I'm something of a foodie?

I also got an excellent collection of old-school video games for the XBox from Sam IV, including Gauntlet ("Elf shot the food!"), Joust and Paperboy, a couple of DVDs from Carmen's folks and bro (just check out 'things I've watched') and a bunch of other stuff of coolness. Thanks all!!

In addition, I got another great present, a second academic wind. For those who don't know, this year marks the 2nd in my pursuit of a creative Masters thesis. Last year, around the end of the semester, I gave my initial seminar and the response was... not what I would've hoped. What followed was a few months of self-doubt and over-thinking the academic side of my project (an analysis of the hero, and looking at the notion of anti- and post-heroes, if ye must know. The creative beit will have zombies in it. :) ), but last Tuesday (my birthday, remember) I met with my supervisor and I don't think I'm in as bad a position as I thought, so yay me! Of course, I do have to have another 38000 words written by the end of May, but that shouldnae be too hard.

Speaking of which, I should probably sign off and get on with it...

Four things I've learned recently;

1. The first time you recognise a specific move in a martial arts film (rather than just 'a kick', 'a punch') is pretty cool.


2. Not every film from your childhood stands up to repeated viewing.


3. But some do.


4. I do not look good in hot pink, Hawaiian print short-shorts.

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"Son of a bitch must pay."
- Jack Burton, Big Trouble In Little China

Onward and upward...

Well met,

And how are we all doing today? Since last we met I've been a little busy with one of the most socially-active 48hr periods in my life. Friday was a generic BBQ with Carmen's friends, followed on Saturday by - in order - a curry lunch at my Mum and Dad's (with various friends), a house-warming for another couple of friends, actually held in Glebe Park across the street from their apartment because said apartment is too small to have more'n about 6 people in it and then a very sedate, mixed-gender Buck's night for another friend. So what does this say, other than I'm making the brave claim that I have more then four friends? Have ye noticed that social events are cowards?

They only ever come at you in groups, choosing to overwhelm and attack you en masse, leaving you with fun choices. Choices like; 'How long do I spend here?' 'Who will be at which event so who should I invite to go with me?' 'I've got four birthdays in three days for people, how much should I spend on gifts?'. and there's no textbook or etiquette manual that tells you these things. I don't think I'm going anywhere with this, I just wish that things could be easier.

In response to Graham's threat of legal action with the name of my Blog, I would like to point out that while he may have used the name first in a public forum, it was definitely as a wind up aimed at me. I've been getting variations on Euan Bowen (my actual name) all my life, and Evan Bowman was one of the versions that pissed me off the most. I think it was because when I wrote "Euan" on the form, I underlined the "U" on the form and wrote "this is a 'u', as in 'uniform'" and they still spelled my name wrong!. Is there such a word as vniform? I specified the freakin' letter, for God's sake! *ahem* Anyhoo, bring on the lawyers, buddy. My girlfriend graduates with her Arts/Law degree in just 8 short months. :)

Four things I learned recently

1. If you think rock-climbing is difficult, try doing it upside down.


2. People spend most of their adult lives denying it, but farts really are funny.


3. Five minutes each side is enough to perfectly poach a Rainbow trout in coconut milk.


4. 1.5ltrs is a good size for a stubbie of Grolsch.

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"You shot Church, you team-killing fucktard!"
- Red vs. Blue

Post The First - actual and for real this time

Well met (again),

And now I have my own shiny new Blog (is it a capital? Is there a convention yet? Do I care?). Of course, now I come to actually write my first genuine, not-just-to-get-a-preview post and I've forgotten all the great Blog ideas that were circling in my brain. I have a loose concept of the format I want to use, sort of a "what's on my mind" mixed with what I've done today and what I want to do tomorrow. I was thinking of making some sort of journal out of this, something that would be 'live' for people to read. Just spit-balling here, but I think it might work.

Read up on mi amigo Unky Gra Gra's blog today, and that's really what started all this. Of course, I'm not going to turn out to be involved with Project Mayhem, or anything nearly that exciting, but I reckon my blog'll still be worth an occassional giggle.

That's kinda it for now. Catchye on the flipside.

Four things I learned recently;

1. The funnier and longer the name of a martial arts technique, the more it hurts when it is demonstrated on you.


2. No matter how tasty the Rainbow trout poached in coconut milk or garlic and basil-basted quail is going to be, if you want people to come over for dinner you gotta give 'em more warning than four hours.


3. You can drive from Canberra to Sussex Inlet (approx. 170Km) without the oil cap on your car, but don't expect the engine to perform anywhere near at peak efficiency for a while.
   
4. When I know what I want in a DVD store I'm in and out in seconds. When they don't have it, I hope you brough a packed lunch...

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"We are now up against live, hostile targets. So, if Little Red Riding Hood should show up with a bazooka and a bad attitude, I expect you to chin the bitch."
- Sgt. Harry Wells, Dog Soldiers

Post The First

Well met,

So I saw my friends shiny Blogs and I just had to have one of my own. It will be - as one might expect - a collection of random (and occassionally misspelled) bubbles brought to the surface from the unctuous depths of my subconscious. And not-subconscious. Actually, this post is rather vague 'cause it said I had to post to get a preview of my blog site. Real first post to come...

peace out
Euan