Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known

• And on that note, I am walking away… from my masters, that is. Yes, I do love what I study but I can’t do it anymore. I am just over being poor, both in terms of time and money. I am almost certain I am cultivating the start of a stomach ulcer, I sleep badly, my skin is terrible and my eating is going to shit. It’s not worth it. There is basically no jobs for me when I graduate so I will have to do classroom teaching for a few years to get some worthwhile experience under my belt and then hope to fall into something that I could use my masters in. Basically by working full time I will have more free time than I do at the moment, a buttload more money and I will be able to establish a routine and plan stuff and just have some certainty. I actually really miss working with kids as well, I love working with them so it will please me to be able to chill with the wee ones again – not to mention get paid for it! Last night I had a dream that someone (not sure who it was, someone like a teacher-person) was trying to convince me to stay and finish my masters and telling me how I did so well and I was arguing, telling them that I was actually barely passing and that it’s not a bad thing at all to not do it right now and come back to it in a few years. I found out my marks for one of my latest assignments today and I just barely passed. Creepy, right?

• Jac has been and gone again. Despite not having seen her for like eight months, it was just like I saw her last weekend. We talked shit, pissed about and ate. Nothing has changed. I got to do the Miss Jones/Jac introduction and the way they got along could best be described as “house on fire” type stuff. I didn’t really doubt it would be like that, they are both just awesome, chilled, super fun girls so it’s pretty rare people like that wouldn’t get along. Jac is really happy teaching and loving life at the moment which makes me very, very happy.

• Miss Jones had her birthday last night. She got a little messy but it wasn’t too bad, I got to meet some more of her friends and see some of our mutual friends which was tops. I came late because of Kate’s wedding but still managed to pack in a few hours of socializing before everyone went home. Lucky Miss Jones got an iPhone (amongst other things) for her birthday and I doubt there is any better present for a tech than a gadget. She spent this morning playing with it and setting shit up while I tidied (after I convinced her to let me, I do love cleaning). Funny story – as anyone who knows me can atest, I am not a touchy-feely person. I am not a hugger, I don’t feel the need to touch people in conversation or anything like that. Miss Jones is super affectionate, she will hug and touch everyone and when we first met it was one of the things that made things a little awkward. Now? I can’t not touch her. If I am in arms reach of Miss Jones I will be rubbing her arm, back or leg. I do it without even noticing now and the other day when I was at Dreamworld with Jac I had to actively resist rubbing her arm because I am so used to doing it to Miss Jones, and because I am around her so often I don’t usually have to resist patting someone. Also, I can’t remember if I have mentioned it before, but I found out I follow Miss Jones in her sleep. I am obviously a much deeper sleeper than Miss Jones because I often fall asleep hugging her and don’t wake up when she manages to prise herself from my grasp and fall asleep herself, but I’ve been told that I turn when she turns in bed and constantly manage to wriggle up and spoon her. It’s amusing because with The Ex, I used to wake up because I’d be sleeping on the very edge of the mattress trying to avoid touching him. I think that speaks volumes.

• Kate’s wedding was amazing. Everything about it was just really elegant and classic and so very “Kate”. She looked radiant, the groom looked handsome and it was just charming. The ceremony was really good, the celebrant was fun and it was so sweet to see Kate being all giddy and excited. The food at the reception was totally amazing (deep fried rice balls?? YUM!) and Deb and I had the pleasure of sitting with cool people. Funny story 2: I was talking to Kate’s hairdresser about cutting short hair and mentioned that lots of stylists don’t get short hair, or the difference between boy short hair and girl short hair. The hairdresser started talking about how girl short hair is different and then jokingly said “Yeah, you have to be careful with short hair, if you get it wrong you can look like a lesbian” and I said “I am”. She looked a little mortified and another guy at the table half shouted ‘I knew it, I can always pick you people”. I resisted the urge to tear his face off because he used the term “you people” and laughed about it. I wasn’t offended, I know she didn’t mean to cause offence but people should kind of know that saying shit like that is offensive – some people are actually okay with looking like lesbians because they are. I won’t even start on “you people”, there is just so much wrong with that statement.

I created a new category for these sorts of posts – “self-indulgent whining”. Let me preface my whinge by highlighting that I do realise how privileged I am.  Whining about doing post grad study when some people can’t afford to feed their kids and stuff is entirely fucked, I completely accept and recognise that I am a giant tool in the big scheme of things. Having said this, I am going to whine because if I don’t my brain will explode and then I’ll have some real problems.

This masters is slowly killing me. It’s like a horrible disease that is eating me from the inside out – my stomach is usually in knots from worrying about passing stuff and worrying about all the stuff I have to do and it’s eroding my self confidence because I am perpetually convinced I’ve cocked everything up and am a big, giant spaz because I can’t even do this. Everything I do has a big, black cloud over it because I am constantly thinking about what I should be doing rather than what I am doing.

Despite the fact I still like what I am studying, I hate what my masters represents. It makes me feel stupid and incapable. During my undergrad I had a little fear before every assignment that I might actually fail something but fundamentally I believed that I’d piss through it. Now? Now, I am entirely convinced that I won’t earn my masters. If I can even submit everything that is required, regardless of whether it passes or not, I will be ecstatic. I can’t even imagine what will happen if I actually do earn it by some incredible miracle.

I’m going to try and organise some sort of timetable. It might not make any different to my results or anything but it might just preserve the last tiny remains of my mental health and if I can escape this year with my sanity intact, I’ll consider it a win. I am going to spend four hours a day on this, preferably 9am – 12pm. I work best in the mornings, it leaves me evenings to do stuff (like Miss Jones) and it means I can go straight from bed to books which reduces the likelihood that I will get sucked into Facebook or TV and get fucking nothing else done. I think my current panic attack is caused by the fact that from tomorrow evening to Monday morning, I won’t have time to scratch myself. Almost very second of every day is crammed full of something and while I just love being busy (and it’s all awesome stuff that I will be busy with) it also makes me freak out because there is no room for dicking around, and having dicking around time is my safety net.

That is it, I am pretty well exhuasted from using up all my energy on stressing. This is probably the biggest flip out I have had since having my brain candy which is awesome, because I used to be this fever pitch about like running five minutes late or forgetting to wear perfume but bad because it’s not fun to be this tense.

Anyways, tell me a story because I need to think about other junk. I want to know what you had for breakfast. This morning I had pesto and feta scrambled eggs with Miss Jones at a cafe at uni, it was yummy. Miss Jones had bacon, seeing as she is pretty much an anti-vegetarian which sounds like it wouldn’t work, but it’s kinda awesome seeing as we can order one meal and eat our respective bits. I also had an orange juice and a skinny latte which was a shit idea because juice and milky drinks aren’t great together, in case you hadn’t thought about it.

Most times when I think about Miss Jones, particularly when I am formulating a blog post in my head, I sing this Sinatra song to myself. I’ve always loved it (and besides, who doesn’t like Frank Sinatra? Like, no one) and now I have a Miss Jones myself, it’s kinda awesome. Anyways, something happened again just now, so I’m gonna mention it. We always seem to call each other at the exact same time, like randomly. Right now, I was gonna call her and tell her how the dentist went but I thought she may be busy so I was gonna text and then the phone rang and it was her. Another time, I had got her number from my phonebook and had my finger ready to press call and my phone rang and it was her. Kind of amazing, I know.

Anyways, I need to gush a little bit. I’ve officially fallen truly, madly, deeply and I am missing her – despite having seen her only like 4 hours ago. I’ve seen her every day that she has been back and I could happily see her again right now, this is unpresedented – everyone shits me at some point. I love my friends and all, but there comes a point when I need everyone to fuck off for a moment but not her. Even when she is shitting me with her lame jokes, or I’ve pissed her off by licking her too often I still want to be around her. This morning we went to the medical center so a nurse could prod at her wound somemore, then we had breakfast together at a cafe and it was just perfect. The honeymoon period is over, we nag at each other now and are much more like an old married couple but it’s so awesome. I really, really like her. **Bonus: Look for us in tomorrow’s Courier Mail, our second professional photo as a couple will be in the social section. What can I say? I guess we are just two extraordinarily good looking people!

Ok, so the dentist stuff. Well, the official verdict is “not so bad”. My feral tooth is feral and does need to come out, but that is what I expected. It’s not like rotting or anything but because it’s been all pressed up against my other tooth, the other one has developed some decay as well, so that needs a filling. I’ve also got another 2 wee fillings to be done, but they aren’t really a big deal and one is kinda just being done now because I am getting other stuff done – alone, I’m not sure if they’d bother with it. According to my dentist, the tooth that needs to come out will be no troubles, seeing as it’s already through the gum and well positioned and stuff. The other wisdom teeth are ok, and I can wait until next year for them to come out (MBF their waiting periods! Don’t move OS and cancel your private health cover, waiting periods are a bitch). While I’m not thrilled to have a tooth out, or fillings for that matter, it could have been worse. I half expected a root canal just as punishment for being a dentist dodger for so long so I am very glad that is not the case. I suspect the newfound dentist Zen has to do with my brain candy, it just makes it so much easier not to get all fever pitch about small things like the dentist.

For now, I am going to get cracking on some assignments. The lovely Jac is back for a bit and we have mucho plans for this week so I need to get a little bit done now that I have some time. It seriously feels like I saw Jac last weekend, not seven months ago, but it’s so great to have her around. Also, spending time with Miss Jones and Jac? Best. thing. ever.

I feel like shit.

I’ve kinda of had a cold type thing since I came back from Japan but I figured it was just because I’ve not really had  spare second since stepping off the plane. Tuesday night when I stayed with Miss Jones my throat started hurting but I suspected it was just caused by dry swallowing a pill and that it would go away but yesterday I started feeling really shit and was getting super cold when it wasn’t cold, had a really sore ear and all of that. This morning I woke up with the sorest throat I’ve ever had and figured it might be time to go see a doctor.

I have one badly infected tonsil (fear my skillz, I can reduce my sickness down to just one tonsil) and my persistant sore-ish throat and tickly cough are an upper respiatory infection I picked up in Japan. I have some medicine as well as a saline nose spray thing, basically I get to wash out all my ear/nose/throat tubes which should make things good again.

Yeah, that’s about it. I’ve seen Miss Jones every day since she’s been back, she is such a pleasure to be around. Even though sometimes we don’t go out or do anything in particular when I see her, it’s still fantastic.  Yesterday she was un-stitched so she’s on track to being as good as new really soon. The nurse who un-stitched her at the uni medical center gave her two little kits to take home they have a wee tray, gloves, tweezers, scissors and things. She also got an armful of dressings, bottles of saline solution and bandage things so now Miss Jones and I can play nurses (or set up a backyard hospital, either one). Miss Jones goes back on Monday to have it checked again, maybe we’ll end up with even more medical supplies!

• God, it’s so hot today. I am over it. Come on! It’s Autumn now, bitches.

• Finally saw Miss Jones yesterday/last night/this morning. It is so awesome to see her back in Brisbane and all in one piece. We spent yesterday …catching up (ahem) and then went out for tea, dinner and a movie. I had some super awesome tea thing that unfurled when it was in the freshly boiled water and turned into this full bouquet thing, plus it tasted good. Miss Jones had an iced coffee that you have to pour yourself from the thousand tiny little jugs they present to you on a tray. So cool. We then had dinner at Toscani’s the one place at Southbank that never fails to deliver the shittiest service in Brisbane, and made it in late to watch 17 Again where we had to pleasure of Mr One Trick Pony aka Zac Efron play his standard character. It was an ok movie, my feelings towards Mr Efron dampened it slightly as did the 238469186 other people in the cinema but it was alright, I’ve seen worse movies.

• I invented a new game this morning while in bed with Miss Jones, she loves it it annoys the fuck out of her. It involves her doing whatever – talking, facebooking, anything – and me licking her. Not eve licking so much, just poking her with my tongue. On her arm or hand or whatever is closest to me. I think it’s hilarious because it annoys her, so I do it more. One of the worse things about being single is not having someone around that you can annoy the piss out of on a regular basis.

• Oh, some rad news about my new car? It has a portable bathtub in the back, or, depending how you look at it, the boot leaks like a mofo. D’Mummy and I spent half an hour the other day literally bailing out the water from the spare wheel well. Some little dickface threw an egg at it over the weekend so I took it to a carwash the other day to clean it and I think the high pressure hose must have forced a fair amount of water into the boot. It’s not ideal but I’d rather the boot get water in it than the passenger seat or something. It adds character, I still love it madly though.

• Right now I am gonna go have a shower. Miss Jones and I are gonna go out and gorge on Mexican tonight. I fucking love Mexican food, and I haven’t had it for like 6 months or more, so I am hanging out in the worst way for some real Mexican food. Nom nom nom, plus I get to lick Miss Jones at random occasions so it’s gonna be super fun. Woo!

Something terrible has happened! I have discovered a jaggedy bit of one of my wisdom teeth as I was poking around with my tongue (as you do) and I started poking with my finger and discovered that it definately didn’t feel the way teeth should feel. After demanding D’Mummy poke it with her finger I remembered that D’Brother had one of those little dentist mirrors so I got that off him and commenced some home dentistry.

Horror of horrors, boys and girls! I have a hole in one of my teeth!

I must admit to being a dentist dodger. Teeth freak me out, my teeth, other people’s teeth, anything about teeth. My greatest fear is having no teeth so the dentist dodging is entirely illogical but I figure so long as nothing is bleeding (or otherwise oozing), feels weird, hurts or smells funky then chances are it’s all gravy. It’s the same approach I use when going to the doctor and I’m still standing so it’s obviously not that bad an approach to things??

I am going to get an appointment ASAP, and as punishment get all my wisdom teeth out – in the chair. I had always planned to have it as day surgery (should I not be able to dodge having them out any longer. So far it’s been a good 8 years and counting) but seeing as now I have a dirty, rotting, whore mouth I will just have them out as soon as I can, however that might happen.

As I just said to Miss Jones, I’d feel less disgusting if I had flesh eating bacteria. I can’t believe I have a tooth that is like rotting. I assumed there’d be some hurting, or funky smell involved if all that bad shit was going on in my mouth. As part of my violent knee jerk reaction to all of this I kinda feel like never eating sugar again, ever. I suppose even if you only ate fruit and veggies then your teeth could still go funky because of the natual sugars and acids and junk.

I do understand that it’s a complete and total overreaction to the problem and that million of people would love to have a hole in their tooth as the biggest problem in their lives, but I have never had a tooth out, only ever had one injection in my mouth so this is scary! Eeeeeeeeek!!

• I just realized next week I’ll have been blogging for 3 years! That is pretty mad, yes? I don’t plan on stopping but I have lost my mojo in the past couple of days which is why things have been a bit quiet.

• However, my blogging mojo was replaced with a crafting mojo and I fired up my sewing machine on Friday to make a dress I got an op shop into a tunic. It was too short for a dress that I would feel comfortable wearing but it does make quite a darling top. I also added darts because I am very clever and I’m also toying with the idea of ruffles, because when are ruffles ever a bad idea??

• Miss Jones will be home in two nights! It will have been 11 days since we’ve seen each other which doesn’t seem like that long, but we’ve only been together for a few weeks so 11 days is a relatively long time when you consider that. I am excited, to say the least. She is doing so much better, she is limping around and is in less pain and is slowly getting back to normal. Tuesday cannot come soon enough.

• I am watching The Biggest Loser at the moment. I’ve never watched previous seasons but Cam and Sam are kind of family friends (I guess? I don’t know what term you’d use? Cam is married to a girl who lived on the same street as D’Mummy growing up, my D’Nanny has afternoon tea with Cam’s MIL every Friday arvo). Anyways, the whole Megan and Sam thing is so sweet, I love friends!

• I’m inspired to reopen my online store. I am gonna set that up tomorrow so stay tuned for the link. It will have a bunch of cool shit for sale, plus Mr Rudd wants us all to stimulate the economy by spending, so please feel welcome to stimulate me. Ahem.

• I quit eating chocolate for a month as of Good Friday. I had already eaten so many Easter eggs by that point and spent Friday night lying in bed feeling very vom worthy and realised that it was so not worth it. I also decided to cut out any fast food for a month as well. No more chips out of little cardboard boxes and no more burgers wrapped in shitty paper. Fast food had become novel for me again because I have my own car and I can read the entire menu again (and actually order something vegetarian) and it’s probably not the best thing to be doing, so I cut it out. I can’t do moderation, this is how it has to be for me.

• Good god, the assignments are finally done and submitted and not a moment too soon. Things got a bit hairy yesterday when the NT lost all telecommunications which meant to uni website was fucked (i.e. the online location through which I submit assignments) but about midday I got it working and submitted so it’s all ok. The lecturer I emailed and begged for mercy replied to me and it’s all gravy, he seemed entirely unconcerned by my running a week late so that is tops. Such a huge relief!

• More proof I am obviously mentally ill and in need of a good firm shaking? I am considering my next university course. Yes, as in after my Masters. It’s just a little Grad Dip, which I probably should have done first but live and learn and all that. For reasons I cannot explain I’m considering high school teaching, there is a whole lot more jobs out there for secondary teachers. I am not sure if my Masters means I could kinda wing it as a HS teacher without needing a specialist senior teaching qualification? Looking at the course structure I have done all the educational theory type subjects as an undergrad and obviously by the end of this year I will have a fairly intimate knowledge of English language and grammar and all that, so I don’t imagine that 4 subjects about “teaching English” would be more comprehensive that my Masters? I presume I might have difficulty trying to land a high school job in the city without the grad dip, but if I went out west I imagine I could find a principal willing to give me a shot…something to ponder.

• My charming Miss Jones has had quite a rough trot this week. Monday she was striken with some sort of bug or something that lead to her spending the day attempting to vom out her internal organs. She got an injection that sorted it out but how bad would that be? Especially when you can’t even walk? I sent her an Edible Bloom (which was a far sweeter gesture when I ordered it…before she started to vom from her eyeballs) and it arrived yesterday. I believe it improved her day which is all I can ask for. I wish I could do something to make things less shit for her, she is going absolutely insane being confined to bed and there is nothing I can do to change that. That and I miss her, badly. Monday was actually painful because I hardly got to chat to her and it’s gushy, but I hated that. We see to touch base about every 6 hours (if not more at the moment, seeing as I’ve been online writing assignments and she’s online being a cripple) so to go for like 12 hours without any contact? It sucked. Yes, it’s lame, if I wasn’t me I’d want to glass myself for being such a lame, gushy twit but shut up…don’t judge me!

• Wooo, Easter! I don’t care to eat more chocolate nor do I care for the Jesus aspects of it all, but I do have to pass on my congrats to him for swinging a 4 day weekend. Nice work, J-Unit! I am pumped to have some time to DO stuff, yesterday I managed to clean my room which had been left sorely neglected for about 10 days. You know it’s bad when you can’t see any carpet and you have to kick all the shit away from the door so it can be closed. I swear I don’t have that many clothes and shoes, but when it ends up on the floor it seems like so much! Never fear, I can see my floor again, I have clean sheets and I’ve organised all my things into my new shelves. Good times!

• Yeah, that’s it. I am struggling to write today, I gonna go clean instead. I’m such a rockstar!

It is imperative I write this post. I’ve spent far too many of the past 24 hours writing assignments and I just need to switch my brain from stuffy academic language back to normal writing for a moment. I’ve submitted one assignment, the other one still needs to be finished off by this arvo but I need a break right now.

I am absolutely convinced that I am going to fail this Masters thing, my assignments don’t sound smart enough, I am not good enough at applying research to my own ideas to create innovative ideas. I kinda have this vision of my unit coordinators coming to my house, sitting me down over a cup of tea, clasping my hands in theirs and just being all “Honey…no, just no. Please stop now, k? You’ve made your point, we shouldn’t have accepted you, so let’s just leave it, ok?”. One subject in particular just feels way too hard, and it’s also the assignment I handed in late because I missed the note about not having an extra week. I emailed my lecturer right after I submitted it, throwing myself at his mercy. It was an honest mistake, I actually was following a plan and everything – it just happened to be the wrong one. Hopefully he understands that I am a mere mortal who has made a mistake and lets it slide, I’ll never do extra credit things if I need to. Fingers crossed he’s not a high and mighty academic type, I’ll use this as my chance to make a public assurance that if I ever get to become and high and mighty academic I promise to allow my little underlings to make up for their mistakes, because people are human.

In much less depressing news, I’ve converted Miss Jones to the darkside…she is now a blogger. Having to spend all day, every day in bed does limit the scope of lesuire activities one can pursue so last night I pointed her in the right direction so she could get a blog sorted for herself. I feel a little bad that her first post is mostly about me but considering her days consist of chatting to me, watching TV and hurting at the moment her options were kinda limited. Also, I’m not a total bitch for not commenting on her yet, I’ve already told her what I think about it and I don’t want to leave a shitty, rushed comment.

Right, three hours to knock out another assignment. Bring on Tuesday!!!

I swear, these last few days have been epic. Trying to get two assignments done, worrying about Miss Jones, being sick and generally feeling rather ordinary has taken it out of me. Thankfully, both assignments are almost done, one is at about 75% the other is more like 60% but I am confident with both of them. I need to have them submitted by about 4pm tomorrow, there is no alternative and I am pretty sure – barring any further disasters – that it will happen… *touch wood*

I spent all today writing, referencing and generally dicking around with the assignments so this evening I decided to reward myself, plus, you know, stimulate the economy and whatevs. These sweet little red ones are only $30! If there is anything I like more than shoes, it’s cheap shoes. They are kinda like upholstery  fabric (in a good way). The second ones I bought for Kate’s wedding later this month. They are fucking high (10cm!) so there is a good chance I will return them once I try them on….or end up in a cast if I attempt to wear them, it could go either way. The fact they have quite a sturdy heel and many, many straps makes me feel a little more comfortable about not stacking in them, but let’s not forget how unco I am. There is also a small chance I’ll just keep them and admire them, I’ve already got two beautiful (unworn) pairs of heels in my collection and three would be a much more pleasing number.

I think for now I am going to go do some more assignment work. I am so, so looking forward to Tuesday. My room is an absolute tip and I desperately need to organise it so that is my thrilling plan for Tuesday. I also hope to re-do my very trashy, chipped nail polish and I also am in increasingly dire need of a haircut. My mohawk is too long now and tends to flop over to one side when I put it up and my shaved bits are growing out so I want to have the opposide side shortened so it’s more even. I can stand for many things, but bad hair is not one of them so I’m gonna try to squeeze it in this week. Miss Jones got her hair cut yesterday but she won’t take a picture because she feels like death so I have to wait a whole week to see it in person. I am sure it will look fabulous though, it sounds hot.

Back to the grindstone…