Rachel

I was innocently looking up information on womens mentrual cycles to get more of an understanding of my own and chanced upon this informative document:

http://home.earthlink.net/~thogmi/curse/curse.html

I had no idea women were so evil and unclean! What religion lives by this 'menstual law' anyway? I s'pose I could have found out if I continued to peruse the rest of the wesite, but i thought it best I didn't.

My Supervisor for my Honours Research Project called me today to inform me that my other supervisor Professor FungYee Chan, the Director of the Fetal Medicine Unit at the Mater Hospital (among many other things!), had passed away. She committed suicide.
She could never say no to people, took on too much and could no longer take the pressure.

So terribly sad.

I worked with her for over a year. I've never personally known someone who has died before. It's a very sad, weird and confusing feeling.

I got my first credit card in the mail the other day. I'm Rich! Hooray for me, free money with absolutely no consequences. No, i'm going to be very responsible. The concert tickets I bought with it were a one off and that list I made of items I wish to purchase from the net will remain unfulfilled...for now.
Had lunch with the family today and saw Bede's new piercing. It's his 14th birthday next week so my mum took him to get his lip pierced as a present. He fainted on his way out of the shop, he's not good with pain. I personally think he should have waited till he was older, he's not even 14 yet! I feel really old when I say things like that.
Bed now...work tomorrow

You are The Lovers

Motive, power, and action, arising from Inspiration and Impulse.

The Lovers represents intuition and inspiration. Very often a choice needs to be made.

Originally, this card was called just LOVE. And that's actually more apt than "Lovers." Love follows in this sequence of growth and maturity. And, coming after the Emperor, who is about control, it is a radical change in perspective. LOVE is a force that makes you choose and decide for reasons you often can't understand; it makes you surrender control to a higher power. And that is what this card is all about. Finding something or someone who is so much a part of yourself, so perfectly attuned to you and you to them, that you cannot, dare not resist. This card indicates that the you have or will come across a person, career, challenge or thing that you will fall in love with. You will know instinctively that you must have this, even if it means diverging from your chosen path. No matter the difficulties, without it you will never be complete.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

Went for a drive down to Byron Bay yesterday with Dylan. He got his P's last week and is driving down to Byron for schoolies next week and wanted to do a dry run to make sure his car didn't start falling apart on the highway, as my first car tended to do once it hit 80km/h (actually so did my second car now that i think of it...ahh the escort, such fond albeit near fatal driving memories, right girls!). Anyway all went well, was a good day except the weather was rather shite; overcast and windy as hell. Oh and Dylan accidentally left the seat to my chair on the side of the road as he was putting it in the car. Fortunately we realised this when we visited the lighthouse and not once we had got all the way home. Was hilarious at the time, we had vision of it being run over by a car covered in oil etc or having a tug of war with the homeless in the adjacent park who had acquired it as a pillow. But alas it was found and all was good. Took a few photos of the day with my new phone, it's so much fun, has a video camera and everything, oh and the joys of bluetooth. I'm excited by technology even though i'm usually 3 years behind everyone else with it. Have my finger half over the lens in several of the photos; clearly i'm still learning how to use it.

Watched Charlie and the chocolate factory with Alana earlier today, she had yet to see it. I like that film, it has charm. I have had this conversation with people before, most likely purple orb, how frustrating it can be for both the 'acquainted' and 'acquaintee' when watching a film. Frustrating for the acquaintee as they are constantly being stared at eagerly by the acquainted (with the occasional shoulder nudge eh, eh?) for any sign that indicates how they feel about a particular joke/incident. And, frustrating for the acquainted when the acquaintee isn't laughing at this clearly hysterical film. But as I am aware of this infelicitous viewing behaviour i try to keep it to a minimum. Only the occasional glance over and definitely no laughing at the joke just before it happens!

Alana's back! so damn excited and a little inebriated! She came bursting through my gate at around 11.30 this morning after 21/2 years of absence. so great! Seeing her sitting on my couch. It was weird that it didn't feel weird if you know what i mean. Difficult to comprehend that there was in fact several years in between the last time. Anyway, she and Trent left just minutes ago after rousing her from her drunken stupor from my couch. A great first night back in oz i feel! Plenty more catching up to be had i hope. But does make me a little sad/frustrated or 'sustrated' that my life as stayed exactly the same after all that time :(.

I have never been one to pay too much attention to the mindless comments, which occasionally and often regrettably slip from the mouths of politicians, religious leaders (i.e. the pope) and actors (i.e. Mel Gibson). Such things are more often than not the result of misinterpretation or inebriation (the later of which though not an excuse is somewhat understandable/explained (?)). But I was so deeply offended by the recent comments made during a sermon by Australia’s Muslim cleric Sheik Taj Aldin Alhilali in which he suggested that immodestly dressed women are responsible for being raped:

"If you take out uncovered meat and place it outside on the street, or in the garden or in the park, or in the backyard without a cover, and the cats come and eat it ... whose fault is it, the cats or the uncovered meat. The uncovered meat is the problem."
"If she was in her room, in her home, in her hijib (head scarf), no problem would have occurred."

And his defence: his comment was misinterpreted! Phfffft! There is no way the above could be interpreted any other way. And frustratingly, he didn’t apologise for these comments, only that he was sorry they were misinterpreted, nor was he made to resign. I think it is quite scary that he will be allowed to continue to preach such violence-provoking views to hundreds of young Muslim men.

I know he has also outraged many in the Muslim community, several of which have spoken out against his ‘out of touch’ comments.

I hope he receives overwhelming community pressure to resign.

The days are getting warmer and longer, horay! However another not so appealing side of Summer has also reemerged. I received a rude surprise as i opened my car door today; I had grabbed a huntsman which was living under the handle (shudder shudder). I hope i don't forget to check for it tomorrow.
Nevertheless, Summer is still my favourite season i think, so many fond memories associated with it. I particularly love:
- The smell of the wattle and jasmine in bloom;
- my frangipani's coming back to life;
- the sound of the crickets;
- sleeping only in my underwear...or less (the freedom, the FREEDOM);
- sleeping with the fan on;
- delicious mangoes in season;
- guys in board shorts*;
- strolling along the broadwater watching the water glistening under the sun;
- drunken christmas get-togethers with family and friends;
- how fast my clothes dry following last minute washing just before work and going out, so handy!

Though not so much:
- the reappearance of cockroaches, spiders, lizards and fly's that choose to scuttle across my living room floor (the fact that they continue to thrive in a house with no food puzzles me). I have already spotted a couple of blue tongue lizards which like to remain semisubmerged in foliage thereby assuming the appearance of a snake and scaring the shite out of me on my way to the clothes line! A guy was on the news the other night in a critical condition after recieving several bites from a death adder. He picked it up thinking it was blue tongue, fool!;
- the heat interfering with my beauty regime: too hot to use the hairdryer, makeup melting off etc;
- guys in board shorts*;
- drunken christmas get-togethers with family;
- schoolies!!!!;
- whinging, crying, screaming children on school holidays whose parents decide to take with them to busy shopping centres amongst hordes of ill-controlled strollers...WHY?;
- how burnt and tanned my driving arm becomes whilst the remainder of my body maintains that hospital white glow

Goodnight!

*conditions apply - no beer guts, excessive/unusual hair growths, spedoes etc

"May your chooks turn into emus and kick your shithouse down!"

translation:
I'm not very happy with what you have done to me

Bahaha! A friend of mine who has recently moved here from Germany sent me a website of aussie slang that he is learning from. I haven't heard of half the words they have listed, It's quite amusing. The above phrase would have to be my personal favourite and I intend to use it as often as i can from now on.

I received first class honours!

I am so smart, i am so smart, S. M. R. T, i mean S. M. A. R. T.

Now i just need to find a bloody job. My supervisors have offered me some temporary employment, which will be good but i need something permanent to fund my plans (taping fingers together). They also invited me to do a Phd, which is damn tempting but i must earn a living and gain some real life experience first.

My thesis is due in exactly one week!!! Actually I have found the whole process rather un-stressful, which for those of you who know me is completely unlike me. Normally, and for far less important pieces of assessment, I would have made a few hysterical phone calls to friends by now (love you Nicky :)). Ok so I cried once but it was only for like 5 minutes. I think my self assurance with this project is because I actually find it interesting and want to do it. But there is still a week, anything could happen between now and then. Perhaps my computer will crash and my whole thesis will be lost the day before it's due, although even this is unlikely as i have saved it to about seven different locations.
So far I have my introduction, methods and results completed and some of my discussion (which is proving to be the most challenging part)and have received encouraging albeit sporadic feedback from my supervisors.
Also, as part of my assessment, I have to do a presentation on the 15th of June. I fucking hate presentations; I don't think it's fair that I have to subject myself to the scrutiny of pompous academics who don't even want to be there themselves when honours students in other faculties don't have to. My supervisor also wants me to do another presentation a month later for her colleagues at the hospital and I have a poster presentation a month after that for the genetics conference in Brisbane. I thought that being a science geek would mean i could hide away in my lab/office and not have to talk to anyone. I guess it's all good experience though. And in amongst all this I am still hoping to go down to Sydney again for some fabulous company and wine tasting (aka guzzling, binging and ultimately purging)in the hunter valley.
I'm also going to be submitting this study for publication in the Medical Journal of Australia, which i think would be awesome, the possibility of other people citing my name et al 2006 is exciting.
I'm still hoping that they will offer me a position as an RA but do feel somewhat more confident about pursuing employment after all this.
Oh and I can juggle now! except one of my home made balls had a blow out (i was showered with rice)so i'm out of action for the moment.

I'm currently learning to Juggle with the aid of some informative juggling instructions from the internet. I decided this last night but was soon to reach despair when I discovered I had no form of juggling apparatus. But i'm a problem solver! I managed to whip up some balls from old Mother's day catalogs and sticky tap, hence the pink tinge with the words love and beautiful splayed across the surface. They work remarkably well (my innate unco-ness aside) however the sticky tape collects more and more grit and dust every time they roll under the couch. Today I think I'll buy some balloons and rice. I'm not procrastinating...I'm not!

Right now i am in the midst of analysing all the data i have had to collect for my thesis; odds ratios, chi-square tests and the like. Eeeeew! I've just come from a meeting with the statistician who has informed me that because the questionnaire I used was badly laid out, he'll have to write a new computer program to analyse the results. Another stumbling block, but all a learning experience I suppose. On the up side the statistician in the next room is really cute and i get a glimpse of him every time i go to the bathroom. I've been going to the bathroom a lot! I think he's starting to suspect I'm suffering from cystitis.

Hello all...well...Krista,

Hmmm, where to begin. I have had a reasonably good day today, well except for one incident involving a middle aged man, a narrow and inescapable shop isle and waaaaaay too much information. I also managed to successfully procrastinate for the whole day, as planned. It's such as feeling of achievement when you complete the things you planned to do within the required time frame.

Well that's all for now! This journal business is taking me quite a while to figure out.