I let my hair go again today!! I haven't done that for sooo long...it felt so good...curls went haywire...I looked like shirley temple and then some!! It was fun.

It's funny...somehow curls have become part of my personality. They never used to be. But now they are. I think I like it.

I'm looking forward to this week! I had a good day today. Making progress with projects always makes me feel good, and several things are going well.

I have a seventh grade flute exam in *gulp* about 35 days...around a month...and I am feeling more prepared every day. It's good. There is a *lot* to do, but my musicianship skills are actually growing, it's not just work, so that's fantastic! I'm so lucky...I love my music. I need to get back to singing too...

I am actually looking forward to starting my homework tomorrow. I know that I really can't put it off any longer (!) cause I only have a week...a week which will also involve much TIG-ness and other amazing activities...using money that I do not have! For the other amazing activities that is...I think I'm just going to have to do open-house stuff...i.e. stuff at home. Which, considering my home, will be fun anyway. It's only fun with other people around though, funnily enough. Anyway...

Making plans for 2003. After the big Year 12. It's strange, it's been in the far-off-distance my whole life, and in two weeks the change-over will have occurred. After speech night, we graduate to the next level... Top of the school... after all this time spent looking up to the Year 12s, we will finally realise that they were no different to the rest of us. Just older. Not even necessarily wiser.

I'm getting really excited about where Melbourne Team and TIG are going together...things are looking up and forwards...and we're having meetings this week! It's going to be all good...

As you can see, today I went shopping. I also went shopping earlier this week. (This is what happens when you have spare money!! It almost never happens to me, so I'm appreciating it while I can :)

So, if you don't want to read about my shopping exploits, feel free to stop reading!

So far...

I went shopping with my mum last weekend. We bought me three books (The first two Robert Jordan Wheel of Time books and the sequel to Into the Wilderness by Sara Donati, called Dawn on a Distant Shore. I highly recommend those two.), new thong sandals, which I broke in today by wandering all over the city, and a hair clip and some chopsticks.

***For those of you confused as to why on earth I would buy *chopsticks* on a shopping trip ;) - they are one of the very few things that one can use on extremely thick shoulder-length hair easily, quickly and without looking like a lion. Or a sunrise. (Or, as some irritating person once said, a flaming palm tree.) So yeah - you put your hair into a bun, and stick the chopsticks in, and twist. Voila. Chignon!***

Anyway...

Then, a couple of days ago, I went into Lush with one of my friends. (Those of you who keep up with my updates will know that $$wise this was a bad idea.)
So of course I couldn't leave without buying *something*! ;P
I got a "Lotta Iota" bath bomb. Goodness knows why it's called that. I guess I'll find out when I try it. It smells very citrussy and yum...

Then, I called one of my friends yesterday, and she suggested we go shopping ! (Was I going to turn her down? No!)

So I spent five hours in the city this afternoon. Together we bought:
- Lunch! (Subway)
- Lipgloss (me. of course.)
- Mascara (both of us - $5 special!)
- Jeans (!! I finally won the 'find flattering jeans' battle !! :)
- a hot pink bikini (HER. me - as if!! and she even looks good in it.)

I *almost* bought another lipgloss, but I decided that was going a bit overboard ;P . Maybe another time.
I also tried on this amazing Portmans dress...which I fully have every intention of going back and buying...some time when I have $90 spare...it was soooo good, and it actually fitted! And a couple of tops (ok, about ten) and other stuff...but enough about shopping.

I do other things too!! Really! But owning all these new things is very exciting *lol* ;)

So next week, I really need to start my homework! And cut back on exclamation marks...


NB. When I wrote my bio, - the short one that appears on the main page - I did NOT put all those exclamation marks in. At least, not so close together. It got edited. Read it as if it doesn't have exclamation marks please? Cause I'm not really about to explode, I swear!!
Oops... ;)

Because my life is crazy.
I ... often do not know how much to say, how much to leave out. Which things the world needs to know about my life, and which things I should leave locked in my mind, safe and quiet. (Although in person I tend to just blurt stuff out, even stuff I really shouldn't, online I tend to exercise a little more caution. Which is probably a good thing.)
So anyway...
I'm finally on real holidays! Work experience is over, thank goodness - it turned into a bit of a nightmare, so I'm glad I've finished it. I haven't started my holiday homework yet...it's hanging over me like a dark cloud that will explode and rain on me on Sunday fortnight very late when I realise it's all due tomorrow...unless I do it soon. So I might. Maybe. Tomorrow.
And just for the record, if anybody else tells me I have the life of someone in a movie, I'll kill them! (Unfortunately, that might defeat the purpose, as then I really will be like someone in a movie.)
The thing is, often the things that happen in my life tend to be somewhat unusual and ... almost extreme! I don't know if that's because I am unusual, or if I just live in the centre of a cosmic whirlpool...oh well. At least nothing freaks me out any more! Anyhow...
I put my hair in dreads yesterday =) it was very fun. They're out now (I did them with semi-permanent wax) but I'm thinking I'll put them in again soon. All my girlfriends were impressed. (One of the guys asked if I'd been swimming - I was not pleased!) But yeah...it was all good.

I think that this is the 21st Century version of waiting by the phone. Waiting for someone to come online!
Anyway...
How can standing around all day be so tiring?? Although I did lift a couple of *really* heavy boxes, mainly I was behind the register serving people, or stickering/destickering books...and my feet have never hurt so much! Never mind... I'll get used to it soon. When the week's over and I don't have to do it again!
And after that, two weeks of blissful holidays...no homework...if I get it all done this week, that is. Hopefully I'll find some inner strength and it'll happen.

I had a really beautiful day today.
In Melbourne, it's almost summer (ok, i'm exaggerating, we have two and a half months to go, but it feels like it!) and the sky is so blue, and it's just stunning. It's a paint-your-toenails-and-wear-summer-sandals feeling, this holidays thing. And as it was the first day of official holidays, I celebrated. By going to work! ;p
No, I'm kidding. I did go to work though. First day, and it was pretty good! I learnt to use a cash register, an eftpos machine, and look up books I never would have dreamed existed. People ask for the strangest things! One woman asked if we had any books about goats, or making cheese. In inner suburbia, Melbourne. I thought that was kinda cool, actually! Funny, but funky too.
Anyhow, I got home feeling good, and that feeling increased ten-fold when I gave myself a pampering sesh. Almost never do it, so it was extremely luscious. Speaking of which, girls who haven't tried Lush - do so!! The BEST products EVER - Amazing!! (And I know they have stores in Toronto, so you girls in Canada have no excuse!! ;) Guys, you can turn your brains on again now. So, I had a bath and facial while listening to mellow music, and then we had fish and chips for dinner. Blissful.
It was like all the feelings from the last week hit at once.

I would actually like to take this opportunity to say something rather important.

Part of me feels really guilty, because while on the other side of the world, tragedy is occuring every minute for people just like me, I am able to forget it all, and be happy for the most simple and trivial of reasons. This has been highlighted to me because of the New York disaster, and as one of the few people *not* updating on that, I feel kinda awkward.
BUT - then I thought about it a little more. It is true, that disasters happen for people on the other side of the world all the time, and also on a smaller scale, to people near me. And I am, as is everybody else, able to put those tragedies out of my mind for most of my time, because in my little sphere - our little spheres - these things don't make a big difference.
New York has made a big difference. There is no denying that, and I would not want to. However...

I can't read media reports 24-7. I can't stand to see the news footage any more. And all I can be is myself.
I...am motivated by the disaster. To change the world, in a way that none of us can imagine. More than I ever was before.

But my every day life goes on. Things have not changed for me to the extent that I will start discussing bomb shelters and war. At least not here.
Because this is my life. These are my updates. And this is now.

When I am scared to the extent that I need to write about it, when my life is directly affected in that I start figuring out my will and telling my friends I love them before I leave for the next period of school - then I will be perfectly happy to spend my every waking moment worrying about it. And trust me, I will write about it.

But now...
For now, I will be updating about my life.
After all, that's the point, isn't it?

Anyway...like I was saying...

I've had the best weekend. :-)

I am sooo impressed.
Guys, V3 is everything I thought it would be and more :)
I am especially impressed with the flash intro... I love those.
Thankyou guys so much for all your totally dedicated all-nighters, crazy times and amazing inspiring creativity... you have produced something as friendly as it is functional, and as beautiful as it is unusual. All I can say is *wow*...


:( ~ Cutting this update short cause I'm very tired and in a bit of a hurry, so...mmm...details on my life later! (Basically, when I understand what's going on, I'll let you know!!)

--> Online meeting. Asap.
--> Phone calls. (man, phone companies are going to make soooo much money this week. Anyway.)

I ... have so much trouble communicating as much as I would wish to online, and I know that I'm not the only one.

To the TIG Powers-that-be: we need to know your thoughts. Heck, guys, we need to know everyone's thoughts, and on that note the number of updates is so worthwhile. We need to continue to connect - like Josie has said, the internet is *such* a powerful communication tool - let's use it. Even though I want to actually *talk* to people, this is the most effective global communications system that we have. And further than that - we need to connect in such a way that we can all discuss the happenings whenever...24-7...

Guys is it possible to set up a TIG chat site - not a discussion board, but a real-time place to instant message the community so a 'discussion' is more realistic? I don't know if anyone agrees with this, but the sooner we can all communicate in a realistic way the better. Admittedly it would be wonderful if we could all meet in person, but considering we comprise people from over a hundred countries (and the fact that no planes are flying and we don't know when they'll be back up and reliable) it would be easier to discuss online.

These are just my concepts, sprung from a need to talk, to feel like I can communicate with people who wish, like me, to make a difference. Not in the future - NOW. Over the last few months TIG, and all the people involved, have made such a difference in my life, and thus I find that now, when such a global disaster occurs, that it is you I wish I could (physically) talk to.

Whatever I have to say seems pointless. Because, as I told my class earlier today, we don't really know anything.
We don't know who did it
We don't know why
We don't know about casualties
and worst of all
We don't know what's going to happen.
We don't know what to do - if there is anything that we can do.
While nobody can talk about anything else, and rumours abound, I sit and wonder
why?
and what next?

The people I most want to talk to, I can't. But what I can do is go home, and hug my parents, and try to focus on my work as if the world will be the same tomorrow as it was yesterday. And then when we do talk, it will be just to share. Share feelings and news and ideas and our lives the way that we always do ~ but with totally different emphasis and importance.

I don't think I've ever been so scared about my future. But more than that, about the future of our world. Will there be any left, after this year? Next year? Tomorrow? (ok, so I'm exaggerating, but that's the point I'm trying to make.)But what is more important, more than worry or fear - and I guess, influenced primarily by them both - is what to do. Not only as a nation, but as a person.

Tell my friends I love them
Tell my family the same
Express myself, more than ever before, with total honesty and depth
And...
Figure out what we, as TIG, can do. Maybe not much. Maybe a lot. But we have to start somewhere, and now that we seem to have established that we're alive and capable, we should decide our standpoint, our possibilities, our ideas. For now. For the future.

By myself, I don't think I can do much. Together, we can achieve...limitless possibilities...basically, anything.

Those who can see each other, brainstorm. Talk. Share. If you can. I don't know. There has to be SOMETHING we can do.

- Hi!
- Hi, how are you?
- Good, you?
- Yep, good. Where are you?
- Just at home...
- Are you sitting at your desk, or what?
- Nah, I'm on my bed. Pretending to do homework. Why, where are you?
- Outside your window.
- That's not funny.
- No, really, I'm outside your window!!
- Auugh!!! What are you doing here???
*** phone disconnected ***

Hehehe...that was funny. Talk about unexpected surprises. Anyhow......

Not very much has been happening. This week will be superrrrhectic...I should have done sooooo much more work this weekend...at least it's the last week of school.

We're going to see the Monet to Picasso exhibition at the Arts Centre for French class on Wednesday. Will be excellent. Looking forward to it muchly. Actually, Wednesday should be a good day - I have P1 off, and the excursion through lunch...of course, then in P4 (last period) I have the first half of my next History SAC!! The other half is on Friday, when I also have two other assessment tasks. Man, I will never understand teachers. Why give us all our stress on the last day of school!? Oh well...at least it *is* the last day of school!

And then I'm working at Dymocks Booksellers for a week, for a total of fifty bucks. Work experience...should be fun. Spending a whole week with books...and more books...and more books...I wonder if they'll mind if I read the books while I'm there, or if I actually have to buy them? (I like books. A lot. I always have.) In fact, I think if I had to be stranded on a desert island, I'd definitely take a massive library. Of course, I'd also take a lot of other stuff...sunscreen...a diet coke machine...a fully operational stereo with every CD ever created (except the really awful ones - I leave them to your imagination), quite a few of my friends, and some really nice bathing suits (will there be anything else to do??) - oh yeah, and a waiter to bring me strawberry daquiris. :P Sorry, tangent!...anyhow....

Better go to bed early to prepare for my crazy week - wish me luck! After this, three weeks of (relative) peace. Then I have to start thinking about exams, and year 12, and...ah well, I'll think about it THEN.

Today...I "wasted" time. Of course, for me, it was about as far from a waste of time as I could imagine, but others (ie parents, teachers, those who thrive on spending spare periods working) would have said it was.
Anyhow - I painted. I gatecrashed a Year 11 art class (with permission - I'm not that rude) 'borrowed' peoples' paint, medium, and palette paper, and started to create.
There is something magical about the first brush-stroke on a sheer white canvas. Beginning something, and watching it spin itself out of your imagination into reality, gently and subtly and with the fanfare of trumpets like a giant extravaganza...like something by Baz Luhrmann or music from an opera (for those who are able, check out Scarpia's Aria from the opera Tosca. INCREDIBLE - THAT'S what I'm talking about...)
Anyhow, creation is magical. Why I love to dance, to paint, to sing, to cook, to compose, to write...
It's just special.
Also, I guess, why I love to argue. You're creating a structure, a belief, almost like a maze or a bridge - concepts resting, balancing upon one another...dispelling illusions and unveiling truth. Or your image of truth, anyways.
But I'm tangenting. Again.
Anyhow...
My painting still has a long way to go. But I'm looking forward to it. A lot.