Grazie

It's always dangerous to sit down to write a blog without having had any constructive thoughts to it's content, but here we are. I don't want this to become like all my other blogs and lay dormant for months on end.

Last weekend I celebrated my 28th birthday. I had breakfast at my favourite breakfast restaurant with my family and a couple of friends, met a 3 week old baby for the first time, though he was too noisy for me to want to hold, caught up with some good friends who'd come down from Wellington to help me celebrate; especially awesome as they are moving to London in a week, so it will be the last time I see them for ages. Went to Winniebagoes for dinner with 22 family and friends, old and new, which was really nice. Had planned to go drinking afterward but everyone was shattered so we went home by 8pm. I must be getting old!

On Sunday I met up with some friends for brunch around the corner from home, then headed to Armageddon dressed as Tom Baker, the Fourth Doctor! I had jelly babies in my pocket so I was able to offer them to people (as Fourth often did) and everyone seemed to recognize my outfit, which was really cool. Katy had knitted me a scarf to the original pattern (though I was terrible at matching the colours), which really set the ensemble off.

Overall, from the massive number of people who spent time with me over the weekend, the 75+ people from all over the world who wished me a happy birthday on Facebook, or Twitter, or Xbox Live, I just felt a great lift every time I thought about all these people who I meant something to, who meant something to me. From my oldest school friend to my parents to people I had only known for a week. It's just..

Nice.

Thankyou to everyone, everyone reading this, everyone who has ever made me feel worthy of love and support, thankyou. You make me who I am.

Occhi stanchi

I went to a Tupperware party last night, which doubled as a bit of a house-warming party for the Frompsons. I even bought some Tupperware, basically for freezing and reheating leftovers. I really wasn't planning on buying anything but there you go.

My birthday planning is going well, I will be 28 on the 2nd July, and I am organising breakfast and dinner on the 2nd, and brunch on the 3rd. I love when my birthday falls on a weekend. I also love dining out with friends and family. On the Sunday I plan to go to the Armageddon pop culture expo after brunch, though I don't know how much of an event it will be, having been rescheduled and reorganised from February's earthquake. I invited like 65 people to dinner on the Saturday, at the moment it looks like I could end up with about 20-25? Biggest birthday ever! Even my 21st only had 12 or so people. I didn't plan for a big 21st though, just a quiet evening out.

I broke my pokermanz, I got greedy and cheated to get more masterballs, now my tm case is corrupted. I can start again and make better decisions now though. Like not cheating.

I haven't made any gamerscore progress for a few days, though the last achievement I got was 100G so that should tide me over. I should do things like find all the damn feathers in Assassin's Creed II, the flags in Assassin's Creed, drive a car 750 miles in GRiD, drive a total of 1000 miles in DiRT.. these are all such tedious goals though. Perhaps I'm better off starting fresh with Mass Effect 2, or giving Fallout 3 another chance. I'm in a bit of a gaming funk but it feels more positive than usual, as if I have too much to choose from, rather than no motivation to play.

We had a 5.4 magnitude shake last night at 10.35pm. It was a lurcher rather than a jolt. It's been four months since February's 6.3m. We had more shakes all through the night, everyone was a little bleary-eyed this morning. I think after June 13's shocks, people were subconsciously waiting for something bigger to follow the 5.4, so sleep was almost impossible to come by.

Despite being tired constantly, I feel pretty good about life. I've stopped saving for a little while, just til after my birthday, so I have a bit of extra cash to spend, I'm getting out there and being more social than I'm used to, I think it's all working for me. Life is what you make it, and if you sit around feeling sorry for yourself... it's a pretty crappy life to be giving yourself.

Stay safe.

Silencio bella

Life has been an interesting journey for me lately. Connecting with new people on twitter, going out for drinks with them, it all feels a little alien to me. I spend so little time at my computer anymore. I look back and think of the hundreds of people I used to interact with every day. Over time I think I closed that group down a little, to maybe ten or so who could still impact on my life. I was spreading myself too thinly. From that handful though, people were whittled away until there were about for people I'd even bother turning the computer on for.

The beauty of that small number, is that I know I don't have to talk to them every day. I know that they are there for me if I need them, and they know I am there for them too.

I wonder if I am trying to fill a void, by all this social activity, or am I just trying to be normal? I think I am trying to find out whether this is something I like doing, something I can afford to do. I think I struggle with finding a balance between recluse and overdoing it.

On the other hand, I've set myself a gamerscore goal on my 360 for the first time in ages. I want to get to 81000 by July 31. It's an arbitrary number, but I've been in the 70k region for ages and I want to break out. I basically need 50g per day between now and then, but I think I've done 500 in three days heh.

All of this, I think, is a bit of a distraction from the shakes. The less I have to think about them or anticipate them, the better. I just hope no more buildings fall down around me. If we can avoid that, I think I can make it through anything.

2am reflections

It's 2am so this won't be too long. It has been three long months since our city was torn to pieces in the earthquake. Things are getting back to normal, but it's 'a new normal', as people around here like to say. The roads are still incredibly bumpy. The council is doing their best to sort all the problems, but they get the road into a drivable state and move onto more serious work. Rightly so, I guess. The sewer mains over the entire city sustained massive damage, and are being worked through, suburb by suburb. Being so close to the creek, I'd imagine ours is pretty bad. We still go out to the street to use the portaloos. We can do laundry and have showers though, thank goodness.

Another turn of the wheel I marked recently was that I have now been single for a year. It took me a long time to work through the end of that relationship, with far too much retrospection and not enough common sense. Fortunately I have some amazing friends who were willing to lend me an ear and help me put the puzzle pieces together. Even if all the pieces weren't in the box in the first place. Thankyou.

I was inspired to start this blog by a friend who started hers, I realized how much I had missed hearing her thoughts, and I wondered if I needed to start putting mine down somewhere. It's not so bad to get all your thoughts in order occasionally. I will write here instead of livejournal because the lj client is not so great on the Tab, heh.

The Rock Band 3 Fender Squier guitar has been released in New Zealand, so I am breaking into my savings to get one. It's a fully working guitar, but it can also be used to play the songs in Rock Band 3. I'm pretty excited to get my hands on it!

For now,
the sandman calls.