Bright Copper Kettles

How can you just leave me standing?
Alone in a world that's so cold? (So cold)
Maybe I'm just 2 demanding
Maybe I'm just like my father 2 bold
Maybe you're just like my mother
She's never satisfied (She's never satisfied)
Why do we scream at each other
This is what it sounds like
When doves cry

What do doves sound like? Why would doves cry?

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i write down good reasons to freeze to death
in my spiral ring notebook
- The Mountain Goats.

Goodness it is cold! I might even have to get my heater out. Last night I wore socks and sweatpants and two icebreakers to bed with a hot water bottle. Tonight I will repeat except I will wear icebreaker socks instead of cotton socks and I will get my second duvet as well.

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Here is an interesting article about how our immaturity levels are rising. No wonder certain people are so immature and lacking in wisdom.

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I have been looking for free, simple software that will let me press "Start" when I start a certain task, "Pause" when I pause it, and then "Stop" when, you know, I stop it.

It's because I detest timesheets and I keep thinking there must be a better system than scribbling illegible numbers on loose bits of scrap paper. And no, entering times into my timesheet as I go is not practical. Our brand new timesheet system is unbelievably slow, unwieldy and annoying to use.

So I want something like Clockwork, but not web-based. And I want something as simple and small as the Outlook compatible TaskBlaze, but with a few more options (eg pause, multiple tasks, export to file, save). If you can recommend anything, let me know.

Oh. BTW I found this kind of cool piece of software: TimeSnapper. It takes regular shots of your screen over the week and then, when it is timesheet time you can watch a movie of how you spent the week. I have yet to test it and I have no idea if it provides any useful information, especially for chronic multitaskers like me (I usually have 6-8 Applications open at once, including Firefox, which will usually have at least 10 tabs open).

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Because I have no life and nothing better to do.

Make Sun Tea
Improve my gmail skills
Try some Hot Sauces
Make Fire From Ice (it is certainly cold enough!)
Embed an mp3 in a gif

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Here is an article with a perspective on the gay marriage debate that I haven't heard before.

Gay Marriage & Brain Drugs by Stuart Wilde

I think it is interesting and amusing.

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Chefen at Sir Humphreys has finally gotten around to the important stuff. They are compiling a soundtrack of the decade. I can't nominate just one song, so I am stealing the idea and making my own soundtrack. Double album of course. This will take a while...

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This may change

DISC ONE
1. Love Rhymes With Hideous Car Crash - The Blood Brothers
2. Future Boy -Catherine Wheel
3. Friend is a Four Letter Word - Cake
4. Just What I Needed - The Cars
5. Valentine - Delays
6. Why I Stay - The Black Heart Procession
7. Lover, You Should've Come Over - Jeff Buckley
8. Stabbed in the Back of the Heart - Burning Brides
9. Waste of Space - Delays
10. Someday You Will Be Loved - Death Cab For Cutie
11. Hurt - Johnny Cash
12. Have You Forgotten - Red House Painters
13. Quiet Liar - Handsome
14. Sugar in the Sacrament - Thursday
15. You Lied - Peach
16. I'm Not the Only One - Filter
17. Something I Can Never Have - Nine Inch Nails
18. We Came Along This Road - Nick Cave

DISC TWO
1. Come Back - Garageland
2. Mr Brightside - The Killers
3. Hey Ya! - Outkast
4. No One Knows - Queens of the Stone Age
5. Already Died - Eagles of Death Metal
6. Cats Eyes - Guillemots
7. For Whatever Reason - Supergroove
8. Wake Up - Coheed and Cambria
9. Voodoo Girl - Loves Ugly Children
10. Ichabod - The Legendary Shack Shakers
11. Wake Up - The Arcade Fire
12. I Just Wanna Live - Good Charlotte
13. I Miss You - Blink 182
14. Life Will Be The Same - Betchadupa
15. To Sheila - The Smashing Pumpkins
16. Pale Green Things - The Mountain Goats
17. Finality - Dimmer
18. Metamorphosis One - Philip Glass
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to refuse to pay attention to; to disregard
to refuse to acknowledge
to bar from attention or consideration
to fail to notice
to give little or no attention to
to be ignorant of or in the dark about

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This isn’t wise they say
to force a line engraved
though we may come close
these things won’t ever change

The Black Heart Procession. My new favourite band. He said "give me four songs to convince you." It took four seconds. I have only heard one album. Amore del Tropico. It is dark and bleak with a lounge feel and strings. Depressed cool. So appropriate. Now I must go check out their other albums.

this is why i stay
but this is why i must go...

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..to BSG. I have been trying to not watch anymore episodes (7 so far this weekend) but I think I am going to give in. After all, what if I get hit by a bus tomorrow? And everyone does say that I must make use of this valuable "being single" time. What better use than a 20 episode BSG marathon?

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I'm wondering: am I enlightened or just apathetic?

Zen's latest post at Sir Humphreys asks if redefining the word marriage (to include gays) is OK, why not then redefine the word Maori.Why not indeed. I could care less.

Some people are saying that for two gay people to marry, and declare it a marriage equal to a heterosexual marriage is dangerously diluting the meaning of marriage. They get scoffed at for this concept that two gay people could somehow threaten a heterosexual marriage, by redefining the meaning of marriage.

So how could a Maori person say their Maoriness is affected by my desire to be recognised by the State as Maori? I am not hurting them in anyway, I am just requesting that the state recognise my wishes to have equal footing (recognition and legal) with other Maori, since I have a commitment to be Maori, and Maori is after all, the consequence of being born in NZ.

It is interesting because I was thinking of this, but couldn't be fckd commenting (apathetic). I was going to comment (but didn't - more apathetic) that:

My perspective is that most of the things that I value are not defined by the law. I know that's unusual and probably a result of me not caring what other people think. For example, I could care less if the University went around giving "my degree" away to random people. I suspect most people would care though, because they have worked hard and need some sort of outside recognition of their work and achievements. They see the official piece of paper as the degree, not what they have learned.

Is that like what you are saying? That you would like some recognition from society? That you don't want to give marriage away to the undeserving and unqualified and those that have not worked as hard as you. Because that would make your Marriage piece of paper meaningless?

That is why I don't think whether I have children or not would make a difference to my viewpoint - I don't care what society thinks of me and I don't need outside recognition for what I do. Maybe it's a personality thing.

It is like at work. They give out certificates to recognise hard work and people who do special things. I detest these certificates. They mean absolutely nothing to me and I hate having to waste time going to receive them. Receiving certificates and recognition is more likely to make me slack off (in order not to receive recognition) than to work harder.

So personally I don't care about most labels, laws and outside definitions, but I know that most people do. So if I don't care, why comment? Maybe it's because I like to make sure people realise that there are people like me and that not everyone thinks/believes as they do.

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Statistics are lies about the past. Well maybe not outright lies, maybe more like well-intentioned lies, or things that were (sort of) true if a certain person scrunched their eyes and mind in the right way. I have done statistics and research and I have watched other people do statistics and research and I have read statistics and research and I am less than convinced. I get less convinced the more I read.

More importantly, the lies that statistics tell are certainly not true now. There is no published statistic for now. And there is no published statistic for the future.

People are individuals. People change.

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That music! Wow! It is stunning. Melancholy and intense and beautiful. Exactly my kind of music.

You know the music I am talking about... from epsiode two of season two. It is called Metamorphosis One, and it is composed by Philip Glass and you can find it on his album called Solo Piano. Thank you interweb. Without you I wouldn't even know what it was and I wouldn't have it playing right now, ten minutes after thinking "I must have this."

Metamorphosis One... how appropriate.

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Yet another post. This is what I get for participating, I should've just ignored it all.

Anyway, Zen raised some very good questions about the gay marriage thingamyjig (how do you spell that?).

It's like what I usually do... never decide about something because I'm always asking annoying questions "what do you mean by that?" and "what if?" and "why?" Because naturally the answer always depends on more than just the question and everyone knows (well they don't, but perhaps they ought to) that there is more than one Truth.

Somewhere along the way I have changed. I wonder why I am quite willing to not fence sit (on this issue at least). I speculate that it might be one of these things:
1. I don't care (very likely)
2. I am experimenting with extremes (possible)
3. My brain is not working at the moment (very likely)
4. I am tired (true)
5. I am really 100% Pro Gay marriage (impossible to give this a probability)
6. My current state (definitely)
7. Not my problem (likely)
8. The entire argument/question does not fit in with my life viewpoint (extremely likely - I find it difficult to answer the question because it doesn't really make sense from where I sit)
9. I am crazy (true and false)

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Admittedly my brain is utter Garbage at the moment and it is probably obvious to everyone else and I get the feeling I should know better and that I am being an Idiot. But I don't get this:

If the Ceylons can hack a network of fuddy duddy computers that they are not connected to, why can't they hack into the individual fuddy duddy computers that they are not connected to?

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This album by The Catherine Wheel is fantastic! I am discovering it all over again. I think it may be one of my all time favourites.

Currently I am listening to Future Boy on continual play. It made me cry, and the words aren't even sad... the voice and music are just very evocative of something indescribable. A brilliant song in a brilliant album.

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So the Marriage topic has popped up again at Sir Humphreys. This time it is the Gay Marriage flavour.

Until just now I have been studiously ignoring it, because I really do not care at the moment. And because I have expressed my opinion extensively in the past. Oh. Wait. I have just searched my blog. It is probably more accurate to say that I have gone on and on and on and on and on and on about the topic in the past.

Of course. I am a completely different person from when I wrote those posts. I will go re-read them and see if I still agree with myself.

Interestingly I chose to be on the "Pro" gay marriage side this time. This is what I said:

I don't really care. But if I have to choose, then I choose "Pro" because what does it really matter? If people want to marry someone of the same sex let them. If people want to marry more than one person let them. If people want to marry chairs let them.

It is interesting because I used to be quite the fence-sitter. Bob thinks I am lacking commitment and Bob thinks I am ungrounded, indecisive, flake who never gets anything done. I think they are quite wrong. Just because I don't do/think/believe/behave like they/society want me to does not mean I am any of those things. Some things that are important to everyone else are just not important to me. And vice versa.

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My eyes are changing colour. Or I am going crazy. Or both.

They have been looking lighter (hazel-green-gold) over the years. I am quite sure they started out as dark brown. At least I think they did.

And it is only in certain light and it is not a dramatic change, but it is definitely a change.

So of course I googled the topic and discovered that yes eye colour can change in adults. Who knew?!

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I have 20 episodes of BSG series 2 to watch! Yay!!!

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Odd day.

I had a sleepless night, tossing and turning. I am not a morning person. Usually I have to drag myself out of bed at 8:30. But today I am wide awake at 6am and panicking with these thoughts running through my head:

Something is going to happen. I wish Bob was here. I must get out of here. I wish I wasn't alone. No, I am being silly. It is not even that stormy. There is no rain. No, I must get up and get out and find people. There are no people to find. There is no one to call. No. I am being silly. Nothing is wrong. I wish I wasn't alone. I wish I had someone to call.

So I lie in bed trying to ignore the voice in my head which keeps getting louder and louder and I get more and more scared for no good reason. Eventually it gets too much, so I get out of bed, have a quick shower, throw on some clothes and go to work.

I am not usually at work at 7am, so I am surprised to see there are quite a few people there. It feels safer to be around people.

I work for a bit. Then sometime around 8:30 we have a major power blackout.

I really hope that was what was bothering me.

I'm glad I woke up and was at work ridiculously early. I'm glad I was with people who knew what was going on. If I had been home alone I would've been in a state. Blackout + storm + being woken up early in the morning with DANGER thoughts and feelings + home alone with no communication and no one to call anyway = panicky terrified suze.

Anyway, I sat at work for a few hours listening to the updates and doing nothing then I came home. Home has power. Work doesn't. Cool. I suppose I ought to locate my torch and batteries - I know they must be somewhere... I am not as well prepared as I ought to be. I don't have a radio and my torch is misplaced and I don't have a landline and my mobile is unreliable. Although I do have candles and water and food and alcohol and a gas cooker. It could be worse.
Although it would be nice to have someone to celebrate the storm and unexpected day off with.

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Extreme Instability - Some amazing storm photography.

Maybe renting isn't so bad after all.

Battery Powered USB charger - I'd make this if I had any of the tools.

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