It's Like Paintball, Only With Naps!

I have three weeks left of school. Ever. To be specific, 14 days not including weekends. 14.

When I was younger, I had many dreams about what I wanted to be when I grew up, as I guess everyone did. The older I got, the less of an idea I had. I guess it's because, when we're kids, we know we have ages to decide. We also don't realise the work that has to go into being any of these things. I didn't know the work that would be involved in being a farmer or a ballerina, let alone a farming ballerina (Yes, I wanted to do this at one stage at my life). The older you get, the more realistic you get. You realise that things aren't that easy. You can actually see some sort of a future ahead of you, so you realise how important your decisions and career actually is, as opposed to some fun, childish dream.

I'm extremely envious of all those people who have just always known what they want to be. They know what they love, they know what they're good at, they have a passion and they've always had a dream. Miss Invisible's one of them. Ever since I met her, 6 years ago, she wanted to be a vet or basically, work with animals. When you're like, 11 or 12, lots of little girls want to be vets and adults don't really expect that to be their dream forever, but Miss Invisible's dream hasn't wavered. Sure, she now wants to work with wild animals like lions and tigers and elephants etc., but she's kept her dream and her passion and I think it's pretty cool.

Since I was younger (once I got over the farming ballerina stage (look, it's not that weird. My grandfather was a farmer, so I guess I was inspired by him or something, and I was a little girl- I wanted to be a pretty ballerina. I was creative- I created my own job. Imaging a ballerina dancing around cows in the country is amusing though...) and grew up a little), I've wanted to be a teacher. I don't exactly know why. I think it's a combination of the fact that my dad was a teacher and I always loved correcting things. Anything. I'd correct anything my brother's wrote and loved it. We had a whiteboard on an easel and I loved playing schools with my brother. I was always the teacher though. I'd love to give them spelling tests and correct them.

I grew up and things changed again. I wanted to be an author at one stage. An interior decorator at one stage. These dreams were always short-lived and everything came back to teaching. It didn't matter then, because I had years to figure it out.

It's gotten worse over the past two or so years. And this year's been the worst of all. The closer I get to graduating and starting university where I am supposed to study something to give me a career I want, the more indecisive I become. I go from wanting to study Psychology but not wanting to be a Psychologist, to wanting to learn Spanish so I can go to Spain, to maybe wanting to be a Psychologist after all, to wanting to be an instrumental teacher, to wanting to study Psychology but not be a Psychologist again, to wanting to study Japanese so I can go to Japan and now, where I am again, wanting to be an instrumental teacher. I've gone through all of those phases many times this year and I am on the edge now.

Heaps of people are all, "I'd want to be a teacher, but I hate the thought of having to spend the rest of my life in school." I understand that, for some people, but not for me. I was talking to this guy from school on the bus once and he told me he kinda wants to be a teacher (which kinda surprised me) and told me that it might be weird, but he loves school. I've thought about that many times and realised I'm the same. Now, this year, I've hated school. Hated it. But there's so much I love about it. I love knowing everything about this place. I love knowing where everything is, who everyone is, where I should go, when I should go there, what I'll be doing once I'm there and who'll be there with me. It's just so comfortable. I just know my place and I like that. I know that's bad and I really need to get out of my comfort zone and I can't always live in a sheltered society where I know everything and uni is going to help me start that, but I still love the comfort.

Ever since I was around 12 years old, people have told me I'd make a good teacher. I don't know why they've told me that. I'm pretty impatient. I yelled at my brothers when I tried to teach them flute because they couldn't get the embouchure right... But, I dunno, they're my brothers, it's different.

Now, you may be thinking, "OK. You've always had this thing for teaching. You love school. People say you'd be good. Well... become a teacher. What the heck's your problem, girl?" You would be justified in thinking that. But... It's the problem of qualifications. I want to teach instruments, if anything. Woodwind. But, I don't want to study music. Studying education would be OK, because the Instrumental Music Teaching Subject looks pretty doable, but the only other relevant elective subject is Classroom Music and I just know I couldn't do it. It's not just a lack of faith in myself and my abilities or anything, I just can't play piano and I can't sing and I can't memorise piano pieces and sing intervals and stuff like that, which is required. I don't have that many musical skills. I could get them, but I don't want to do the things that would involve gaining those skills.

I would like to be a private tuition teacher. I could teach kids how to play the flute and saxophone from a room in my house (once I finally move out, that is...), but that's not a full-time job and I worry that no one would want to be taught by some random in her house. And, although that sounds cool for awhile and doesn't require as many qualifications (All my high school experience looks half-impressive written down, to people who aren't in the music business, so they're likely not to care as much if I don't have a degree), but I'd want to go to a school at some stage. That requires qualifications. Qualifications I won't have.

I just have a great dream of living alone in an old, but not decrepit, two bedroom home in an inner city suburb and having quirky stuff all through my house, having it looked lived-in (not overly clean, but not messy) and a pet cat and shelf of movies and box sets of my favourite TV shows and anime and a book shelf full of books and manga. Every morning I'll get up and drive in my old bomb of a car to the school I work at and I'll teach kids to play the flute and saxophone and maybe, someday, the clarinet too. I'll drive home in the afternoon and be in my quiet, peaceful home. Some nights I'll go out with friends, to a restaurant or coffee shops or shopping or something. On weekends I'll have with friends. Some times I'll go out for coffee with my mum, because she won't want to come to my house too much due to her being allergic to cats. Once a week or fortnight, I'll go to the gym and totes be fit. I'll go for morning walks as well. I'll have movie nights and mexican fiesta nights with friends. I'll be independent and be doing what I want.

That's my dream and I want it so bad. I wish I could graduate from school and go straight to that. I just don't know how I can get to that.

I wish someone could just come up to me say, "You're going to do *insert career here* and you're going to be good at it and love it and this is how you're going to get there- *insert uni course here* and that is actually doable." I need that. Bad.

Plane Food Is Ass

I don't know what I'm going to write here, but I just felt the need to write something. Anything.

Anyway, the title of this post comes from the episode of How I Met Your Mother, Last Words, where Marshall and the gang are at his father's funeral where the theme is "last words." Marshall realises his father's last words to him were, "plane food is ass," before remembering it was actually an "odd racist" comment about Koreans, before realising it was actually, "Rent Crocodile Dundee 3, it totally stacks up." This episode is one great episode and man, I have to applaud Jason Segel on his acting in that scene in the snow where he is yelling at God, before hearing his dad's actual final words in the form of a voice message. Beautiful stuff.

Anyway, I never thought I'd like this show, let alone love it, let alone use it constantly to cheer me up nearly everyday. It's strange but whenever I'm in a cruddy mood or just feeling bored (at least one of those feelings comes basically everyday), I'll just put on some HIMYM and feel almost instantly happier. I don't know what it is, actually, about it. I guess I kinda like the group and wish I could be like them when I'm that kind of age. You know, a really fun group of friends who genuinely care about each other, amongst all the joking. I don't want to be exactly like them, but I hope I'll have a group of friends like that when I'm in the "working world."

I also wouldn't mind turning out a bit like Robin. Independent. I admire her independence. I also wish I had a best friend like Marshall, but let's not go into my never-ending love for that character.

So, I am supposed to be doing a "skeleton draft" for my last English assignment ever right now. I just don't know what to do. This assignment sucks, man. We had a "choice" between doing a written or oral assignment based on if our grades were lower for written or oral. My grades were basically exactly the same (I'm a straight A- student...) for both, so my teacher decided to make me do oral. This terrifies me. So, so, so much. You have no clue how freaked out I've been over this.

I've also found myself becoming even more, even though I wouldn't have thought this possible, emotionally attached to fictional characters and ships between fictional characters. I genuinely think I'm compensating for something that I feel is lacking in my own life. Whether I wish I were like these characters or I wish I knew people like them. I just don't know why I find myself loving fictional characters so much that I can actually feel it in my body.

I re-watched the last two episodes of Kaichou wa Maid-Sama! this weekend. That was totally smart of me... I don't remember exactly what it was, but I think I read a short review of the manga on Wikipedia that something negative towards Usui. For some reason, this made me read the TVTropes page and read about him and feel so, so, so compelled to read the manga just so I could read more about him. I wanted to cry and hug him and read about him and learn everything about him. And, not just cause he's possible the hottest anime character I know of.

What else has been going on in my life? I had my grade 7 flute exam on Thursday. I am not quite sure how it went and I keep trying not to think about it, because my thoughts are not very positive.

I had my two last competitions for band and we got a silver for both. It's when I really love band- when we are performing and competing. That's when you realise how much of a team it is. Everyone relies on each other and we all share the successes or failures together. I will genuinely miss band.

I'm building a bridge in Physics with a group of my friends. It's not going too well, but whatever. As long as the assignment that I write on it is good, it doesn't matter if the bridge fails or not.

I have four weeks left of school. I would tell you how that makes me feel, but I don't think I can explain it and I don't think I want to, seeing as though, for some reason, I have butterflies in my stomach, am feeling really weird and emotional and am listening to Adele and Someone Like You just came on. I cannot relate to any of her music, but it always makes me feel emotional anyway.

"Never mind, I'll find someone like you..."

"I won't let you close enough to hurt me. No, I won't rescue you to just desert me. I can't give you the heart you think you gave me. It's time to say goodbye to turning tables." I don't know if those lyrics are totes correct, but whatever. Good song.

I've grown my nails pretty long in the past two weeks or so, so I've really gotten in the habit of tapping them on the desk or the laptop. I've been doing it tonight but it's started to hurt... Huh.

I've given up on my Photos of the Week. I just can't do it. I have so many other things on my mind everyday that I don't even think about the photo until Friday night/Saturday night or Sunday nights. I then spend Sundays trying to find something to take a photo of that slightly resembled my week. I forget and finally get ready to upload something two weeks later, only to find that my computer is being a bully and won't let me upload it. I don't like it becoming this extra stress that is just being done because it "has to be done," that's not what it was for. So yeah. I admit defeat.

Tumblr's stuffing up on me now. Guess it's a sign to get off.

Anyway, guess I should get off here now. I mean, the Adele CD just finished. Another sign. Bye y'all and remember- plane food is ass.

There's A Giant Rubber Duck In The River

I have had a surprisingly great day. I shall, therefore, outline it for all of you, despite your lack of interest in my daily life.

I woke up, lying in my dark bedroom covered in my doona listening to a wild storm raging outside my window. It was lovely. Due to the darkness and the fact that it, like, never storms at this time in the morning, I assumed it must have been like 2 or 3am and I could, therefore, go back to sleep for another 4 or so hours. I checked my iPod to find that it was 7:13 and I only had 17 minutes left to sleep, so I immediately tried to make the most of those 17 minutes. What seemed like only 5 minutes went by before my dad came and woke me up. I had a slow morning before leaving to go to my flute ensemble rehearsal, which was good and ran smoothly.

I then head over to the State Library. Now, usually, I have some assignment to do, or research to do. For the past month, I had read my English Extension book, The House of Mirth, in the library, or I did research for ExtEng or MusExt. But, as of yesterday, when I handed in my final assignments for both of those subjects, I know longer have to do them. I had no homework and no assignments yet, as it isonly the end of the first week of term, so I took the laptop and sat in the library snacking on sultanas (I usually do this. They are a good substitute for lollies...), scrolling through Tumblr, reading about anime and watching How I Met Your Mother, before Phantomess arrived. We were both wearing our senior jerseys, due to the cold rain outside, so it was quite amusing.

We then went to the food shops and I ate a spring roll before we went to our symphonic wind ensemble rehearsal. Now, it has been painful for me to play saxophone lately, since my wisdom teeth were removed. It was painful today, but bearable. The rehearsal was decent. Nothing great, but not bad. The usual, I suppose.

On the trip home, my dad and I drove past the city's big river and, believe it or not, there was a giant rubber duck just sitting there in the river. I stated this (exactly like the title of this post) and he simply replied, with some laughter, "There is." That was the end of the conversation. We both looked at it a bit, though. I mean, what can you say about something like that?

I came home to eat some ice cream with strawberries and scroll through some more Tumblr. Awhile later, I grabbed some BBQ flavoured Shapes, the jar of Vegemite and a glass of iced juice and went back to room. I just spent the last... hour to hour-and-a-half watching How I Met Your Mother while dipping Shapes in Vegemite. This is the life, guys. I mean, I should do some flute practice later, but that's it. I have nothing else I have to do. Isn't it amazing?

And, I have finally made a choice about uni. Now, it could change, but I don't think it'll change to much. I really hope I don't change my mind anymore, anyway. It's happened too many times already. As of now, I will be studying a Bachelor of Arts majoring in Psychology and Japanese for the next three years, at the uni that several of my friends are going to. Now, I don't want to go here solely because my friends are. I want to make new friends. I want to break out from my shell a bit. It'll be terrifying for me, but once I do it, I'll feel amazingly proud and like I can conquer the world, or something. I know, for many people saying "Hey, I'm *insert name here*, how are you?" is simple, but for me, it's terrifying. No, petrifying. Anyway, knowing that White Ribbon, Phantomess, Tenuto Tuo and even nath_alex01 (though I doubt we'll see each other as much as the others) are there will be so comforting. And, heck, I am seriously planning on finding some way to go visit Gojo or meet up somewhere, cause I ain't losing that gurl (I dunno. That's how I said it in my head) just because she goes to a different uni.

Now, you may be saying, "Japanese? I thought you loved Spanish?" I do, I really do. But I really like Japanese and the Japanese culture as well. I looked at the course lists for both and I swear, despite the fact that this doesn't make a lot of sense, the Japanese course sounds a whole lot less intense and scary than the Spanish one. I still intend to learn Spanish sometime in the not-too-distant future, I really do. I promise myself I will learn it and I have several other ideas of how I might do it, already. I will learn it.

I'm actually getting re-excited for uni. I know that really soon I'll be terrified and all, "I DON'T WANNA GO!!" again, but for now, it's good to feel OK about it.

Since I did an epic clean up of my room in the first week of my holidays, I've hated having it even slightly messy. I mean, the laptop bag on the floor is bugging me, along with the notebook, sticky notes (which are there for good reason. I am forgetful), iPod, panadol, Shapes box, Vegemite jar, empty glass and empty water bottle on my desk next to me are annoying me. As is the handbag on my laundry basket. Hm. I think I need to do a cleanup. I also haven't liked going to bed if stuff is lying around on my desk or floor. I find myself needing to do a 2-minute clean-up before I can go to bed.

I'm going to do a quick clean-up now...

Just had fried rice while watching Total Drama World Tour and trying to hide my fangirling from my dad... Anyway, a great day I have had.

Tomorrow may not be quite as relaxing, but it sure as heck won't be stressful.

I'll just chill out and watch a little anime, maybe some more How I Met Your Mother, maybe some flute practice. Who knows? I have around 2 hours before I'll be so unbearably tired.

Listening to catchy Japanese music from Special A is making me pumped for learning this language. And... I would love if I could go there for Study Abroad. Or Canada. Or anywhere in the UK. Mainly Ireland. Japan, Canada or Ireland would be great, thanks :)

Wow. It's only 8:30 and I am already so tired. Ugh, I don't want to go to sleep yet. I want to watch anime, for goodness sake.

So. Sleepy.

Well, farewell, y'all. I have nothing left to say.

No Comprende

So, I have recently come to the conclusion that I do not understand anything. Really, nothing. Life, death, the afterlife, people, relationships, thoughts, emotions- nothing. I don't even understand why or how I don't understand anything. What does that even mean?

I'm going to try and keep this as non-depressing as possible, though, so don't freak, y'all.

I was back at school today, after a two week holiday. The day was pretty good, but I wanted to be out of there, almost as soon as I'd arrived. Now, you see, I am also a person full of conflicting feelings and contradictions. I want to go to university next year, but I really, really, really badly do not want to go as well. Ever. I want to get the heck out of school, cause I hate it, but I don't want to leave everything there and I don't know if I'll be able to.

I am also an overly sentimental person. I keep so many things because they have some sort of significance to me and I love to pull them out every now and again and look at them and re-live some memories. School is the place that holds the most memories for me, apart from home I guess (well, my old house. Only been in this one a year...). I mean, 11.5 years carries a lot of memories. 9.5 of those years were spent in the same school. Surrounded by some of the same students and teachers. I still have 4 people in my grade that were in my class when I arrived at this school in grade 3. Sure, I barely talk to any of them and I only kinda get along with 2 of them, but still.

Now, heaps of people say, "High school are the best years of your life."I really hope they're not. Not that my 4.5 years at high school, so far, have been all that bad, they just haven't been wonderful. Now, I've made great friends and had some great memories. Nothing too traumatic but there were no singular moments that really stand out as The Best High School Memories, or anything. There are some great memories though.

Oh, man. I swear I posted a list of things I wouldn't miss about school earlier this year. I'm looking through my old posts, but I can't find it, because I name all of my posts stupid, random, unrelated things. Dang me and my individuality attempts!

I'm over my rant now. It's left me. Be happy. I feel like just saying other stuff now.

So, so far, this has been my afternoon (after school):
- Come home.
- Eat a mini ice-cream, lollipop and Freddo while scrolling through Tumblr.
- Search for places to watch/download the latest How I Met Your Mother episode.
- Download said episode.
- Watch said episode.
- Go make fairy bread.
- Open Music Extension assignment with the intention of doing something.
- Eat said fairy bread while staring at the hundreds & thousands thinking about how cool they look and how detailed and coloured they look when you actually properly look at them.
- Get kinda depressed for no real reason while doing this.
- Open Blogger.
- Blog.

Really? It's nearly 6 o'clock and that's all I've done. I KNOW I have two assignments due on Thursday and Friday. I KNOW I have Maths homework due tomorrow. I KNOW I have a flute exam in two weeks and a band rehearsal tomorrow. Yet, I'm not doing anything productive. Seriously. I don't even know why. Like, I know what else I need to do on my MusExt assignment and I think I can finish it relatively soon. I've opened it and looked at it and I just can't bring myself to write anything. It's not even the Voice of Procrastination saying, "Pfft. You can do it later..." I want to do it now and I know I can if I start. But I can't start. Asdfghjkl.

Just read an old post where I was talking about how excited I was to read my English Extension novel. Hahaha! I have the assignment due on it on Thursday and I am still 3/4 of the way through the book! Good book, just, not quite great enough to get me to finish it...

I realised that my blog is a great way to fuel my sentimentality. I can read these posts and just read about days that were pretty insignificant in the long run, but meant something at the time and it really does make me remember random school days that I would have otherwise forgotten. For example, a seriously funny Physics lesson with Miss Invisible would have been a highlight of a certain day. I would go home and blog. I read those 6-month-old posts now and laugh and remember the lesson. Maybe, in a few years, I can read my blog again and see what I was like for my senior year of schooling. And remember random days.

Oh dear. Now I'm getting so sentimental I want to cry. Daayyuuummmn. A two-syllable damn. HIMYM references FTW. I genuinely hope that, when I am older and independent and whatnot, I have a group of friends like them. Not exactly like each of them (I don't want a Barney. He's funny and all, but I'd kill him in real life), but their dynamic and the way they laugh at each other and joke around and help each other out cause they actually care. Also, I want to have something and call it Swarley. If you've seen HIMYM, you'd get it. I remember, a year or so ago, and old friend and I were talking and she was telling me that she'd named her guitar Swarley and that it was a HIMYM reference. I hadn't seen the show then, so I didn't get it. Now, I so get it and love it and I want to name something Swarley. Or Swarls Barkley. Mmm, Swarls Barkley. Gosh, I love that episode.

I was reading about jazz and why it was controversial when it was first introduced. The only source I've seen so far says it was condemned for being too sexual, or something. That is not going to go down well in my assignment. It doesn't even help my argument...

All this stuff I'm trying to read now is boring. So boring. I really don't care why jazz was controversial. Why must it be relevant to my assignment? Hm?

I can't reference something written in 1959, can I? WDFKGLNFHOPELDSKMFJNBGKFLD. KEY BOARD SMASH.

I also love reality TV. But, mainly reality TV game shows. Here's a list of the ones I love to indulge in watching, despite being lame, sometimes:
Masterchef, Junior Masterchef, Biggest Loser (less and less lately though), The Farmer Wants A Wife (my guilty pleasure to watch with my mum), Beauty and the Geek, Come Dine With Me (four dinner parties and they all rate each other. Good stuff), Four Weddings (LOVE this show), Wife Swap (no competition as such, but still one of the best shows, like, ever). I also love any reality show about weddings. Any. Especially, Don't Tell The Bride. Oh! I also do like to watch a little Toddlers and Tiaras, if only to rant about society, but.. well, I find it funny. Wow. I really love reality TV. Hm. Coolbeans.

I use the word 'commonplace' a lot in this assignment. Oh, only 7 times. Not as any as I would have thought.

1658 words. Daaannnngggg. Nearly 400 more. *sigh*

Don't you love that moment when you're searching for the photocopies of a really important reference for your assignment and you can't find them? Hallelujah I found them, though. Let's get referencing!

The even better moment when you found these references to get the page numbers used, but they don't have page numbers on them and, if they do, your photocopying cut them off. How am I supposed to correctly reference now? Huh?

I remember the pages being around 76-ish? Is it OK for me to make that up? Is anyone actually going to go find that book and check?

So, I need to write some concluding thing now, practice flute for band tomorrow for about 10 minutes before going to watch Packed to the Rafters with my parents, while doing my Maths homework. This is what you get when you spend over 2 hours eating and on the internet...

OK. Before I do that, this flute guy I'm watching is amazing. I mean, who memorises a veryyy difficult (I'm looking at the score. Like, holy cow this is hard stuff!) 10 minute piece and plays it this well, with a large ensemble and all while wearing such a niiice suit. I've developed a thing for suits, but that's not relevant. This guy is great. I applaud him on his greatness. Aw, a lady gave him flowers and he looked all modest and embarrassed, n'aww.

26th-2nd September/October 2011

So, last Monday I got my four wisdom teeth out. This week has been full of tablets, slow eating and ice packs. I am finally feeling very little pain, exactly one week later. Yay. Anyway, this week's photo is the stack of medication I have had to take each day. For about 3 or 4 days, I was taking 15 tablets a day. A couple of them were tablets I had to take everyday anyway, but whatever. Anyway, I felt slightly weird posting this, so I went crazy with weird, internet, Picnic effects. Once I started, I didn't want to stop. Do not judge me.

You like my crazy-editing-the-heck-out-of-photos-just-because-I-can skills?