31.5.13

In which Lizzi goes on a feminist rant. [long ranty post warning]

I had an exchange with someone this morning after I heard him complaining about the lady who had made him pasta for lunch. Please bear in mind, this is an adult male, forty-plus if he's a day.

"She's a real Italian," he said, "got a moustache and hairy armpits and hairy legs... disgusting."

At which point, I piped up and said that I have hairy armpits and hairy legs - so what? And then I explained that it's cold out still (oh, BC how I love thee), I'm covered up, so why am I going to care about something no-one can see when it takes an extra ten minutes in the shower and I could be doing useful things in those ten minutes like making a lunch or whatnot?

His response was that I disgusted him. That it's gross. That sure, I can do what I want to, but it's revolting.

I chose not to answer aloud. This is my answer.

I don't shave my legs or my armpits when I don't have to, but I don't know a single man who shaves his legs if he's going to be wearing shorts, or going swimming. There is no earthly reason why I am therefore more disgusting than my imaginary example man. I shower regularly, I wear clean clothes. I am not gross.
So why am I disgusting if I choose, for practicality, to abstain from an optional step in the hygiene procedure? And why is a man who chooses not to shave his face (oh, another optional step!) not equally disgusting?
Is it perhaps, then, that I am disgusting to you because you feel that I should conform to your ideals of what a woman should be like? Well, let me go back to an earlier post to remind you that no-one should come from a cookie-cutter. Just as we're different sizes, we're different people. My sister wants to be a homemaker, and doesn't want a career. I am not my sister. I'm actively pursuing a career. Neither opinion is wrong, even though they're nearly polar opposites, and I have to say, I don't always understand my sister's opinion, but I can allow for a difference. In the same way, just because you have a certain idea of what womanhood and femininity should be, doesn't mean you get to invalidate my understanding of what womanhood and femininity are for me.

Actually, if you think about it, men should have less opportunity to criticise these things, because they are not women. Let's put it in very ridiculous terms, overstating the concept for clarity.
Take, for example, an orange and a fish.
The orange could say to the fish, "You are not swimming properly. Don't they teach you these things in school?"*
Or the fish could say to the orange, "You're not juicy enough. Try harder."
Neither of these things make sense, because the orange is not the fish, and therefore cannot determine between proper swimming and useless flapping about in the water; but neither is the fish the orange, and therefore cannot see what difficulty it would be to change its very nature and makeup.

I use the analogy both ways, because women equally ought not to tell a man what manhood and masculinity are made up of, but the issue under scrutiny right now is chiefly men specifying womanhood and femininity. Because to be honest with you, I see the latter much more than the former.

And one of the things that really tweaks me the wrong way is the act of womanhood being defined on my behalf. I am a woman and therefore I have womanhood; I am a female and therefore I am feminine. My understanding of that cannot be thrown out as being outlying data. Doing so would negate the fact that I have a gender, whether or not my femininity is different from your perception of what it ought to be. And this holds true for every other woman you will ever meet, even if we all approach womanhood from our own angles and viewpoints, it's still womanhood because we are women. So even though my sister and I are very different in what we want from life, I cannot say she's more or less feminine than I, or that she's more or less of a woman than I.

Anyway. Wasn't intending to make this a full-on rant, but it sort of turned into one. My apologies. And semi-congratulations, if you read the whole thing. I won't judge if you didn't, though. Also, I didn't realise I was this emphatic of a feminist. Heh.

Oh, and for the non-redditors, yesterday's post title beginning with TL;DR - it's shorthand for Too Long; Didn't Read. You're welcome.

Toodles.

*pun very much fully intended.

30.5.13

TL;DR: I got stuff, went places, did things, ate food, went to work, lifted stuff, and have an opinion.

The last couple of days has been mildly interesting.

Some news that any of you readery types who aren't friends with me on facebook won't have seen: my OUYA arrived on Tuesday. It's a teeny tiny game console built on Android. Unfortunately, I still haven't been able to try it out, because I don't have a TV. I do have a computer monitor coming, eventually (i.e. when I can pay for it), so that's what I'll be hooking it up to, but in the meantime I might go over to the parental carbon units' place of residence and see if they have an appropriate screen I can try it out on. Because gaming. And when not gaming, the monitor will be attached to my laptop. Because dual monitors. I have dual monitors at work and it's glorious; I need this in my house.

Tuesday I also went for a walk in Queen Elizabeth Park in Vancouver with my friend and her sister. The park was so beautiful, even in the rain. Plus, just for kicks I piggybacked my friend for a good long distance, and due to her height she has several pounds on me, so I felt strong after that. Was fun.

Yesterday I was in a regional IT staff meeting from 8.30 am til 3.ish pm. My boss was there too, and he actually told me not to bother coming in to work after that, since I get off work at 4, so there was no point in even starting work. It was kind of odd - but they ordered pizza for everyone, so hey, free food is free; I'm not going to object.
The other thing yesterday was the whole my-phone-is-on-crack-let's-take-it-apart thing. I'm so glad that got sorted out (even though I have no idea how).

Today I got in to work to find that a bunch of ceiling tiles had taken a holiday away from my office due to flooding. As far as I know, they were the only things that really took a hit, happily. Then I got summoned to set up a computer - yay for crawling around unceremoniously on the floor. My boss and I also muscled around a Xerox colour laser printer, and he asked me afterwards if my back was okay - "Yeah," I said, "I've deadlifted more than that before." And I have. I've lifted over my own bodyweight in deadlifts before. Damn, I love deadlifts, and they even come in handy in the real world. HAH.

In closing: I think that Comic Sans is really not appropriate for work emails, and I don't understand the users who choose to make it their default.

Toodles!

29.5.13

So that went surprisingly well, I guess

Remember how I mentioned that my phone got left in the rain for several hours, and then was acting erratic yesterday?
Well, it continued to act erratic (although I suppose it was slightly better after the bowl of rice) - including the power/sleep button not working properly, and just other generally unusual and improper behaviours - most of yesterday evening and then all day today.

So then when I got home from work and it wouldn't charge, I got fed up and said, "Phone, I'm going to expose your guts now."
And that's what I did. I took my sonic screwdriver (because I'm cool like that), removed the back of the phone, and detached the circuit board from the front.
I wiped off the bits that looked like they might possibly still be damp, and put the whole lot back together.

Lo and behold, the power button works properly, somehow, but now the speaker isn't working - which means if my phone rings, I can't hear it. At all. Even though that was one thing that worked fine even after the rain incident.

What do I do but take it all apart again, cos clearly I didn't put it back together properly. Except I did put it back properly the first time; there was no reason for it not to be working. Put it all back a second time.

I turned it on. Now the speaker's not working and the power button's gone screwy again, same as before the surgery. Bah!
Take it apart for a third try, then put it back again.

Crossing my fingers, I turn it on for the third time.

Everything works. What the actual fuck. I changed exactly nothing between the first time I took it apart, and the third time I put it back together, and yet somehow, I broke it worse and then fixed it. Don't ask me.

At any rate, I have a working phone again, after three of what I might just call autopsies. Yay.

And that's my update. Toodles!

28.5.13

In Which Lizzi Goes Out Monday Night ....

.... And wakes up Tuesday morning feeling like it's Monday again. But it was worth it.

Last night I went to see Sigur Ros with my friend Amanda. She is a lovely and wonderful person who tolerated my Pathfinder geeking with commendable patience. She also has the most awesome hat in the world. It's like a tiny adorable knitted viking helmet with little nubby horns on it. I was a little jealous of the awesomeness.

The show was out in Burnaby, in a park, outdoors, and because BC is and always will be BC, it rained. The entire time. Well, maybe not the entire time, but for enough of it. We had a blanket to sit on, but the water on the ground went right through that, so I sat on my Bag of Holding (it actually is one: Thinkgeek Bag of Holding) and that kept my backside dryish - at least it did til the Bag got soaked through. Whoops.
I think I had a notebook in one pocket of the Bag too... I should check if that survived. Yeah....
There was one chick wrapped up in a tarp, and other people huddling under umbrellas and donning those cheap plastic ponchos you can get that look like you're wearing a garbage bag - oh, and there were actually people wearing garbage bags too. Gotta do what you gotta do, I guess.
It was also Hipster Central - but I guess, if you're going to see an obscure Icelandic post-rock band, you really shouldn't expect anything else. Oh, the beards and the plaid and the skinny jeans and boots and slouchy hats and scarves. And dear god, all the secondhand pot smoke you could possibly wish for. I'm sure if I'd have tapped on someone's shoulder they would have happily shared a joint with me, but I had no interest in such.

The music, of course, was fabulous. Jonsi Birgisson has a spectacular voice and an impressive set of lungs - he drew out one high note for at least three full minutes. The ethereal noises out of his guitar were glorious, but he absolutely destroyed the horsehair on his bow - and then he played so violently he flung it away behind him by accident on the last song, which amused me greatly.
They did one song where he actually sang the refrain into the guitar pickups - looks utterly idiotic, with your face covered by guitar, but sounds amazing. I haven't been a super major fan of them up to this point, but I may have to listen to them more often. They did do a couple songs I recognised - Glosoli, after the encore, and another one earlier that I can't remember the name of. I wish they could have done Fljotavik, but even without - and despite the rain - the concert was still very very good.
Thank you, Amanda, for bringing me.

The unfortunate part is that for the entirety, my phone was nowhere to be found, even though I was certain that it came with me. So I have no photos or video, even though I was fully planning on taking photos on my brother's behalf (the poor boy was incredibly jealous - he's a fan of obscure music of all sorts, and if it's in another language, even better!). I was mildly anxious for the whole length of the show, but it was not in my bag, not in my pockets, not under the blanket...
So we get back to the car, and it's just quietly sitting in the grass right next to the car, having been rained on, but not having been stolen, and (I hope) not having been permanently ruined. I checked if it would wake up, and it woke up just fine and behaved properly the whole ride home, but once I got it plugged into the charger before I went to bed it went a little sideways on me, and this morning it was still slightly erratic. So I left it home while I went to work, laying in a bowl of rice to dry out. Here's hoping it's okay.

So that was my evening. Today has been run-of-the-mill same-old work stuff - imaging computers, wiping computers (I think I wiped a dozen computers today; Friday, when I'm back at this office, I'll see if I can do eighteen), dealing with user issues. I'm getting better at finding my way around here, I think, which is good.

Also, last and sort of least, burnt my hand yesterday when I was making food to take along to the concert. Just a little burn, but it hurt.

That's it. Toodles!

27.5.13

Beginning of a new week...

It's very much a Monday today, or has been so far.

I woke up this morning and didn't want to get out of bed. I also decided that since it's Monday, and I didn't feel like showering, that I didn't have to if I didn't want to; a little bit of deodorant and putting my hair up goes a long way. And you can't tell me you've never done that either.

At work I have about 30-40 computers that I have to wipe, one by one. It takes about an hour and a bit per computer, but fortunately you can move the disc as you go. On the other hand, all the currently burned discs of wiping software have expired licenses. So I have to burn a new one, which requires installing burning software onto my computer. Oh the runaround. So I'm off to burn a disc.

Oh yes, and I get to see Sigur Ros tonight. Thanks Amanda :)

Toodles!

24.5.13

short and sweet

Well, my wonderful father fixed my computer - apparently my /tmp/ permissions got fubar'd royally, and he did stuff and put it back the way it was supposed to be. Thanks daddy!

It's also Friday and I don't want to be at work today, even though this was already a short week, but the day will be over soon.
I think I might also drop in on my parental residence to use the maternal carbon unit's sewing machine, because mine is without a presser foot, and sewing by hand is impossibly tedious. I know you'll be reading this, so may I, mother?

And on Monday, I'm going to see Sigur Ros with my friend, so I'm leaving work early by two hours. It'll be good.

Short blog today, but I don't have much to say.
Toodles.

23.5.13

In which a lot of stuff happened.

Well. Yesterday was an interesting day.

Last night on my way home from work, my phone decided that the SD card I had had in it for several months was "damaged". When I tried to plug it into my computer, I got a "could not read Superblock" error. Tried all kinds of things, and I think I ended up borking my computer somehow - because gnome now won't load, suddenly. But before I got to that point, I figured I may as well format the SD card, because I wasn't getting that back any time soon - losing me every photo I ever took (luckily all the important ones were on Instagram...) and all the music, so I had to load that back on after, and now I have all my music back. Doesn't save my photos, but that's life...
So back to my poor computer.
Lucky me, a year and a half ago, I decided to make a bootable USB of Ubuntu 12-something, or possibly 11.10, I'm not quite sure which, but it doesn't matter really, the point being that I got my computer to boot off the flash drive - and it happily loads up the hard drive as an external drive, so I can still get to all my files, yay!
BUT, unluckily, the password for the wifi at my house is stored under my regular profile, and I can't access it from the external boot, nor can I get it out of the wifi settings on my phone, it's all hidden and stuff.
BUT, luckily again, I rooted my phone. So I googled (from my phone) on how to access the wifi password file, opened a terminal window on my phone (because I have one of those - finally it comes in handy!) and did this:
$ su
# cat /system/etc/wifi/wpa_supplicant.conf
and scrolled through to find the one I wanted. So now I have the wifi password, so I can access the internet from my poor borked laptop.

Fortunately, without the external boot, I can still log into the command line (it's just gnome that's not working), so I suspect the next thing I will have to do is figure out how to log into the wifi from the command line (shouldn't be too difficult, right?) and run a proper update (did I mention I'm still running Ubuntu 11.04?) on my computer, so it should then overwrite the borked files and still keep all my data. Hopefully.

So all that happened, and then I check facebook from my phone and find that my dear parents got in an accident while they were across the border for their 25th anniversary, and while they're fine, the car is totalled. *sadface*

And then on top of all that, UFV got my first cheque. Because I'm working a co-op, it's technically a 6-credit course, meaning I have to pay for it. I got paid for 7 or so days of work (first cheque, it's always the way of it), so I got 690-something deposited into the bank yesterday morning. All well and good. 40 went straight to my cellphone bill (because I haven't paid that in ... well ... a little while - I just haven't had the money) leaving me with 650-odd. Fine. I went to UFV after work yesterday to register and pay, and found that the cost of the co-op is 629.76. Fuck.
I wish they had some kind of deal such that the employer would take a portion out of each of my paycheques and just send it straight to UFV, thus spreading that 630 over the course of four months, rather than a lump sum directly after the end of the last semester when my money's running thin anyways. Thank God my landlords are gracious and will wait til my next cheque to take rent out, and thank God I have a wonderful friend who's buying me groceries today - but not everyone has that. It's stupid, in my opinion, that they don't have such an arrangement.

Yeah. Life has been interesting.

Also, a quick note pursuant to yesterday's warning of long and different blog posts coming:
apparently 1 & 2 Tim and Titus are very possibly (indeed, very probably) not Pauline epistles. This blew my mind, and makes my argument even stronger. See: http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/goodspeed/ch21.html.
Yes, I will be blogging about the Bible and Stuff and Things... I warned you it would be different.

So that's it for today.
Toodles.

22.5.13

In the interim ...

I realise I haven't posted in a couple of days. There are a few reasons for this.

1. Monday was a holiday. I did dick-all. Including not blogging. It was marvelous and rather restful.

2. Tuesday I just didn't get around to it.

3. I have one or two long and different sorts of blog post planned, and they're currently percolating in my head. This started because of something I sat through on Sunday, and continued because of a conversation I had with a friend last night over facebook. They'll be a rather different flavour from my usual sorts of blog posts, but they're not ready, so it may be next week before they properly emerge. But they're one more reason I haven't posted yet.

Oh yes, and dear lord - the Doctor Who finale was MARVELLOUS, but damn you, Moffat, and your cliffhanging ways. I don't even.
I watched it at 2.00 Sunday morning after my friend dropped me off - she texted me at 11.30pm wanting to drive to White Rock and wanting company (you should really stop ingesting caffeine that late, dear...). Got to bed at 3. Watched it again with my brother Sunday afternoon. And another friend is coming over Saturday morning to watch it with me before D&D. Good thing I enjoyed the episode - but the suspense hits all over again, every time, and then I want November to be here already. Damn it, Moffat. Why.

Anyway, that's it for today. Look for a couple of longer posts in the near future.

Toodles.

17.5.13

On Roundabouts. [profanity warning]

Dear drivers,

You are all fucking idiots, and you have not got a bloody clue between the lot of you of what roundabouts really mean.

When I'm standing waiting to cross the fucking highway entrance, and you got there before I did, don't sit there at the top of the bloody on-ramp like a dumbass, ESPECIALLY when I'm motioning you on.

Because here's the thing. While you're sitting there, being a goddamn Canadian, three cars are lining up behind you and filling up the roundabout in such a way that no-one else can get into the roundabout. You really think that being polite in that situation will actually help anybody? I can wait; it takes, what? thirty seconds for the roundabout to clear? Your idiocy (under the guise of politeness) is actually more likely to get people hurt, as they pile up behind you.

Yes, I realise, it's not entirely your fault, it's the fault of the rules of the road. In North America, pedestrians come first. In the UK, they don't, and the UK was our wonderful roundabout inspiration. So we have two different rule-sets intersecting, and it makes for not a great system. So I understand that.

But please, for fuck's sake. JUST GO when I'm motioning that you should go. Because I can see the lineup forming behind you, and yelling at me about it won't help an ounce. JUST FUCKING GO. Don't be so stubborn about it.

Much love to you, idiot drivers. Try driving in the UK sometime.

Toodles.

[disclaimer: if you're not an idiot driver, this was not addressed to you specifically. but please treat roundabouts the way they're meant to be treated anyways, idiocy aside.]

16.5.13

Batman, crying, metal show.

Last night I was forced by my friend to watch the worst and cheesiest Batman movie in existence. It featured George Clooney as Batman, and while he did his best with the role, he should never have been cast in it. It also had the Governator as the bad guy - and overwhelming numbers of terrible puns in an Austrian accent about freezing and cold. And the Batsuits had nipples. I facepalmed so hard.

After my friend left, I decided to try the "No Cry Challenge"; it's a playlist on youtube and the challenge is to watch through the playlist - without crying, oddly enough. And I can't resist a challenge. I made it through the first seven videos (admittedly, two of those had been removed from youtube; thanks copyright stick-up-the-ass people - so it was really the first five) - but the eighth, the ten-minute compilation of soldiers coming home, finally broke me and I bawled like a baby.
It was oddly refreshing, though. I don't cry often - there's not much in my life to actually cry over. I get teary if I get stressed, but I don't really full-on weep, ever. Mostly because I don't have much reason to. But it was somewhat nice to let go and cry for once, sort of run my emotions through the laundry or something.
Call me crazy, I won't argue with you on that point. But if anybody wants to take the challenge and see if they can get farther than I did, go to this link. I dare you.

Anyways, that's all I got. It's been a slow couple of days. Tomorrow night, though, I'm going to a metal show. It'll be fantastic and I'm super excited. One of the bands that I was actually going specifically to see dropped out though, their drummer apparently quit the band. So that's slightly disappointing. But the other band that I'm going for is still on, so that's alright.

So, yeah. Toodles.

15.5.13

Hey teacher leave those kids alone // Everything she does is magic // Time keeps on slipping slipping slipping into the future // I am the Eggman, I am the Eggman, I am the Walrus....

Unfamiliar desk; Blue Screens Of Death; Classic Rock from a Washington station playing on my left; and a wide-open door on the right.

Today I'm at a different location than on previous days. This means new stuff to learn, different systems of doing things, and lots of blue screens of death if you don't change SATA settings to IDE in the BIOS, at least on specific machines....

I'll be here Wednesdays and Thursdays for a while; until the end of May, after which, I'm here Thursdays and Fridays. The other three days of the week I'm at the old location, so I'm back and forth. Keeps things interesting, I suppose.

Last night I voted in the BC election. I have decided (like most Canadians, I suspect) that I don't like politics, and that sometimes the lesser of two weevils is the best option. The irony, of course, is that at UFV I'm totally involved in student politics - you can't help it, though, if you're President of a student Association. Still, doesn't mean I have to like it.

Tonight I'm going to rewatch last week's Doctor Who with a friend who hasn't seen it yet, and I'm kind of looking forward to watching it again as well - have I mentioned how fantastic of an actor Matt Smith is? I'm fully expecting my friend to get very excited for the season finale (which, let me remind you, is this week!!). I watched two older episodes last night, for kicks - The Pandorica Opens and Big Bang.
I also have to watch the NCIS finale this week sometime yet. Last week's episode left me on the edge of my seat on account of Gibbs.
Castle's finale made me cry a little, mostly in a good way - but there was a moment where Nathan Fillion did his really hurt betrayal face, it was almost like the one scene in Firefly: Ariel where he has Jayne in the airlock - he's so very good at that, and that was one of the bits that made me cry.

I just realised that once my shows are over, I'll have even less to write about. *sadface* Aw well, maybe I'll start doing movie reviews - the new Star Trek movie is coming out this week. Oh boy!

Anyhow, that's my day in a nutshell.

And yes, the title of this post is lines from some of the songs that I've heard on the radio this morning. Listening to the Eggman/Walrus song right this second, actually.
Toodles, all.

14.5.13

argh!!

So, I imaged a handful of computers yesterday, and I'm trying to finish off their setup this morning.

Of course the first one I try to get going doesn't
a) have the antivirus running on it
b) have the nfixes it's supposed to have.

The other fun bit is that there's network drives that are supposed to automagically map to drives on my admin account - but because there's some setting that's not set up for my account, that doesn't work. So I have to go and map the important drives by hand. Why hello, DOS command line. I missed you too.

And of course, the computer that does have the antivirus has out-of-date definitions. Or something.

Also, why do these updates take so flipping long? And why not just use Linux, really?

Well, I'm going to go watch computers update. It's like watching paint dry or grass grow.
Toodles.

13.5.13

Happy Monday

So I haven't written a post yet today; I suppose I ought to do that. For SCIENCE .... or something.

It won't be nearly as clever as a sonnet, nor nearly as full of content as the one I did when I came back to this blog, but that's mostly because I had no new revolutionary ideas over the weekend.

I did have a Nerf-gun fight with some friends on Saturday, it was my friend's birthday and he likes to throw Nerf-day parties. Basically we ran around in a park with lots of brightly coloured guns and foam swords, and lost a metric ton of little Nerf darts. It was fairly entertaining.
On Saturday, also, I watched the most recent Doctor Who episode. Besides the bratty kid and her brother, it was a damn good episode - I love Matt Smith's schizophrenic Doctor so very much! I am seriously looking forward to the next episode. Oh man. The one thing I am not looking forward to about next week is that it's the fricken season finale. *sadface* (Note to self: look up "He Said, She Said", the prequel to next week's ep, on youtube.)

I also had a rather wee, somewhat banal, but slightly euphoric epiphany this evening; I live in my own damn house.
I realise that's obvious to most of you, but one of the implications of that concept is that because it's my own damn house, if I feel like moving my pillows and my blanket to the couch and camping in the living room with a movie (or reddit) on my computer on my lap, I can do that. I could even sleep on the freaking couch if I want to. The only reason I haven't, is that old habits die hard (thanks, Mom).
So I'm happily camped under my blanket with a cup of chai tea poured from my charming TARDIS teapot. Because I can. Wheeee!

And that's all for now, folks.

(Did I really just say that? Oh dear. Next thing you know, I'll be saying YOLO...)

Anyhow -

Toodles!

10.5.13

Friday. Thank goodness.

Well, it's Friday. I can go home in twenty minutes, after the slowest eight hours of my life.
My supervisor has been at some kind of training for two days, so she wasn't in today, and my other co-worker stayed home sick, apparently he had some bad curry yesterday or something. So I've been sitting alone in the office all day without more than ten minutes' human interaction. I did have a phone call about a laptop (that I don't have the capability of fixing) and another about a printer (ditto) - but fortunately I was told that anything I couldn't do, I ought to refer to the IT guy at another location. So I did that. I did scan in some documents for someone, and sent some emails, so I wasn't entirely without duties...
When I get home, I think I might make some kind of paleo something-or-other and then take it with me to the young adults barbecue tonight. We'll see.

It's funny, cos I'm only out-of-my-mind bored because I haven't had anything to do. I could care less about human interaction; welcome to the world of introverts :)

Ah yes, and tomorrow, I believe, someone is having a Nerf-day party that I think I may attend. Replete with Nerf swords. Yes. I hope it stays sunny.

Finally finished: I Saw The Mountains Reappear, Fog-Kiss'd.

I started this Shakespearean sonnet in November 2011, and left it saved as a draft for quite a while. Thought I'd pull it out and finish it off. I almost declared it finished at ten lines after some effort this morning, and then realised that I needed another four! In my own opinion, it's not too bad for someone who doesn't usually write in form....

I saw the mountains reappear, fog-kiss'd,
As all your vast and undulating hills
Are ransomed by the rising sun from mist.
So let the dark eternal night that fills
The sky, and hosts the moon's alluring rest,
Now bid a fond farewell to waking Earth,
Who turns to warm herself at Sun's sweet breast
And slowly, in this dawn, a new rebirth;
Triumphal golden halos, touch of light,
Surrounding all with gentle flame anew,
Exalt the young and dewy Morning bright:
A princess, cloud-throned, in a sky of blue.
No longer let Earth rest in night enstarred,
Awaken all, and, with Earth, sleep discard.

9.5.13

A very small victory - you might call it miniscule...

I have just discovered - not that it's hugely important to the Future Of The World or anything - that my desk is adjustable in such a way that I can put it at a height that is comfortable for standing at.

I realise that it's not going to affect your life. But I was tired of sitting in a chair, and if I can stand at my desk, I will be much happier.

Toodles!

Another Thursday.

Good morning.

I have nothing to say today. Nothing exciting or new happened between this time yesterday and now, but I'll give a short summary just because I can.

Yesterday I was at work at 8 am. I opened and closed three tickets, and I sat at a desk. I ate my lunch and went for a walk with my co-workers after lunch. At four, I went home.
At home I watched Monday's episode of Castle, and Tuesday's episode of NCIS (on which topic, by the way: WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY DOING?!?), and I may have eaten some dinner. I actually legitimately don't remember. That's odd.
At 7.30, I left my house and did some quickie grocery shopping. Got home by 9, and spent another forty-five minutes or so wandering the series of tubes. Then I went to bed.
My alarm went off at 6.15, and I got up and did stuff and then went to work. At about 8 I submitted my timesheet for my first week of work, and since then I've been sitting at my desk browsing reddit. It's very exciting.

Oh, I guess one thing did happen: Hyperbole and a Half has returned to her blog this morning after about eighteen months away. It's good to read her stuff again. If you've never heard of her, she's the brilliant originator of "ALL THE THINGS".

In other "news", I'm completely obsessed with my Vibram FiveFinger shoes - I wear them everywhere I can get away with wearing them. Also, I require tea. Also, welcome to near-stream-of-consciousness writing, because I'm bored and I wish to write, but have no clue what to write about specifically. Hence the very short and uninteresting summary of Yesterday through to Today.

I suppose I could post this and go do something else, but frankly, Something Else will probably consist of Reddit or Minesweeper, both of whose depths I have plumbed enough for one week, so I'd honestly rather be inflicting Relentless and Unceasing Blog upon you all. Ergh, that sounds like a disease...

So. Relentless and Unceasing.
Ironically, I have now run out of things to say.

Signing off.
Toodles!

8.5.13

Working so hard.

Today marks the end of the first week working at my new job.

It’s a co-op job, i.e. co-operative with my university – meaning, I get university credit for it, and I get work experience for my resume, the company I work for gets cheap (that is, cheaper than a regular employee doing the same job) labour for a semester, so they don’t have to commit to hiring me forever, AND I get paid for my time. So it’s pretty much benefits on all sides.

Today I opened and closed my first ticket in the ticketing system – actually, my first ticket ever. Tickets, if you’re unfamiliar with them, are ways of reporting incidents (especially in helpdesk work) in such a manner that it’s easy to see whose the problem is, who’s reporting it, what the problem is, and whom it’s assigned to. You can assign it to someone specific, or to a group, and you can escalate a ticket by assigning it to someone higher up. Theoretically simple. A bit time-consuming in reality. But it gives management a good way to see statistics on what the IT department does and when. It probably took me longer to type in the ticket for the DVD drive replacement I did on Monday than to do the actual replacement, but hey. Just doing my .... job.

My coworkers are good fun – the two of them bicker like siblings. Sometimes it gets a little overwhelming, but I enjoy it most of the time – they do mean well, and there are some good jokes.

And then sometimes one has to deal with Users. Users are a special breed of human being. They don’t always do useful smart things, and in pursuit of making life easier for them, they don’t always make us do things that are useful or smart either. This I have learned after one short week.

But my day is almost over, and then I will go home and watch this week’s episodes of Castle and NCIS, because I went to Bible study last night instead of watching shows.

Toodles, all.

7.5.13

REAL people...

Last night, I was scrolling through my facebook news feed, as one does, and I saw a photo someone had 'shared'. It was a photo of a woman's belly covered in pregnancy stretch marks, and it bore a caption that (summarised) called for people to post photos of themselves, no matter what they looked like, to fight the Photoshop culture of media.

It also included statements like:
"Real women have stretch marks."
"Real women have curves."
"Real people..."

Don't get me wrong, here. While I am all for resisting the prevalence of Photoshop in advertisements and the like, I cannot help but be equally resistant to campaigns saying that REAL people are a certain way.

"Real women have stretch marks." So, because I've never had a child and therefore have no pregnancy stretch marks, I'm not a real woman? I beg to differ. I have breasts and a vagina just like every other female on the planet. Just because I haven't had children yet doesn't make me less than someone who has. And what about those few women who get to have children without the stretch marks? Does that make them not real, somehow? No, they're real just as much as I am.

"Real women have curves." Don't hate me, but I'm 5'9"ish, and 120ish lbs. I have always been a stick, a bean-pole, a twig, tiny, skinny, thin, slender - there's no end to the words that get applied to my body type. I have a small chest and nearly no hips. I am under no misapprehensions about what shape and size I am. Yes, I'm very close to the magazine ideal. But. Phrases like "real women have curves" make me feel angry - that the idea that having fewer curves makes me less of a woman. I'm not this way on purpose, I am just the size I am and have always been. Am I inadequate simply because I'm thin?

"Real people..." I realise all these "Real People" campaigns that get started are an effort to help people's self-esteem by accepting and de-marginalising the larger/stretch-marked/what-have-you people, but the problem is, this re-marginalises those who are thinner/scar-less/what-have-you. I'm not less than human simply because of what I look like, but neither are you.

So, I'd like to argue, with all due respect and consideration, that REAL people are kind, REAL people are accepting, and REAL people are all different sizes and appearances. REAL people don't marginalise anyone, REAL people don't judge books based solely on their covers, and REAL people don't allow others to judge or bully anyone.

Real people love.

Toodles :)

6.5.13

Blogging on purpose...

Sometimes I feel like I talk too much or too loudly, and sometimes I feel like I can’t open my mouth.

Today is one of the days where my mouth won’t open, and I have to work doubly hard to even make my fingers move on the keyboard. I feel like I have nothing to say that could possibly be worthwhile, and why would anyone listen to me anyways?

So today I’m blogging on purpose. Maybe it’ll help. It’s better than not saying anything at all, by far. Because there are a lot of days where I don’t say anything. I sit in my house and I don’t interact with people. Which, admittedly, I find quite pleasant on occasion; I even talk to myself, because, of course, one ought always to speak to the person present with the most intelligence, and usually, that happens to be me.

But not interacting can be isolating. I frequently have to explain to people (extroverts, mostly) that there is a difference between being alone, and being lonely. I like being alone; I like being left alone. It’s a pleasant break to not have to deal with people sometimes. But sometimes I get lonely. There’s a difference. I don’t know how best to describe that difference, I just know it’s there. And when I’m legitimately lonely, my head noise breaks in and makes me want to talk to people even less, while I’m still craving human interaction.

Goddamnit, head noise. Leave me alone.

Toodles, all.

5.5.13

Bombardments

It's been a while.

I could make excuses. I could say how busy I've been. I could, and I could, and I could...

But I think mostly it's because I'm unsure about how best to come back. Is it awkward, after eight months, to just jump back in and say, "Hey guys, it's me again, let me bombard you with my life and thoughts and stuff and things, same as I did ... a whole year ago!"?

Let's pretend, for the sake of argument, that people leaving and coming back without warning is normal and not awkward in the slightest.
So therefore, if that's the case, you may, if you wish, sit back with a nice cup of Tea Earl Grey Hot, and prepare yourself for a nice, calming, chilled-out:

"HEY GUYS, IT'S ME AGAIN, LET ME BOMBARD YOU WITH MY LIFE AND THOUGHTS AND STUFF AND THINGS, SAME AS I DID A WHOLE YEAR AGO."

Following that theme, in recent news (so that I don't alarm you unduly with references to things that happened that you didn't previously know about):
  • I sang backing vocals with a symphonic metal band for two live shows (one in December, one in April) and it was fantastic: http://www.leahthemusic.com/
  • I started playing Pathfinder, the D&D-like role-playing game. I play in two campaigns: one, as a skill-monkey half-elf rogue/ranger who speaks in a Scottish accent - and the other, as a dumb-as-a-post half-orc barbarian named Thump whose two obsessions are things that are Shiny, and things that can be thumped, such as goblins.
    • (I'm surprised it took me this long to discover role-playing games - SO MUCH FUN.)
  • I just finished my second year at university studying Computer Information Systems, and I've just started my second term as President of the Computer Information Systems Student Association. I've also just started my first Co-op work term: I get school credit for it, and work experience in my field, AND I get paid for it, all of which make me reasonably happy.
  • I got a new tattoo in April, bringing my total tattoos up to four, if you count the teensy stick-and-poke I did on my own hip four years ago. The new one is on the inside of my bicep, is in Latin, and says: "Sed et si monti huic dixeritis: Tolle et jacta te in mare, fiet." Translated: "But if you say to this mountain: Get up and cast yourself into the sea, it will be done." Found in Matthew 21:21, for the curious.
  • I'm still at my wonderful little basement suite, and I couldn't be happier with where I'm living. Even the occasional noise of the tenants upstairs doesn't bother me.
  • I've completely caught up on Doctor Who, at last, and I've been watching the current episodes as they come out, which has been great fun. I do love Clara with the Doctor. They have such great chemistry.
  • Speaking of TV shows, I've been watching NCIS and Castle as per usual, but on my dad's recommendation I've just started a new one, it's called Continuum. A cop from 2077 accidentally gets dumped into Vancouver in 2012 along with a terrorist group called Liber8. It's pretty good so far, but I'm only about halfway through the first season still.
 So there; I have accomplished my bombardments and my return. It wasn't too painful, was it?

But don't worry, you'll be hearing from me again, hopefully in reasonably short order.

Toodles!