Me and my neglected blog...

You know it's funny; every time I come back to this thing, after an extended period of time, and read through my entries, I'm struck by one fact...

I'm a little bit mess-obsessed

Seriously; almost every post mentions the state of my room and my lack of tidiness...

... so now that I've just added to the problem...

I've been investigating other ways to procrastinate lately (which would be good considering that I like to think procrastination is just a brain-break and blogging isn't really a brain break per se). You know, things like watching a DVD, going for a walk, doing my washing, watching TV etc. Unfortunately, I've inadvertently settled on the one thing that is probably more addictive than you-tubing... The Twilight series...

Oh yes, I have succumbed to the latest girlish craze, the author heralded as the next JK Rowling (although that's clearly a form of blasphemy... heh), the series that is essentially a teenage romance with vampires...

Good grief, when I put it like that it sounds a little silly...

Ah well

On a random side note (although this is a little related) Annie pointed out something hilarious to me the other day. In the women's toilet on the concourse level in the tower building, some love-struck soul has drawn a love heart with "Edward Cullen" written in pink letters in the middle...

I think that level of commitment should be admired to some degree...

Oh and I've also decided that the two guys who were busking together in the tunnel on Tuesday are my new heroes - they were playing a duet on piano accordion and didgeridoo - fantastic :)

My tidy room...

Today, I did the unthinkable... I tidyied my room...

Or at least I thought I had - one of my friends came to borrow something off me and, noticing that I'd rearranged my furniture, said this;

"Wow, looks like you've got some tidying to do"

...

Perhaps I need to redifine the work "clean" in my head...

I will call it "Girl Procrastinating"

I've decided that...

...showers in winter in a bathroom with no heater make me sad...

Musings...

I've been reflecting on this for a while but I've realised that I am an extreme version of a "words of affirmation" person. For those of you who have no idea what I'm talking about, a guy called Dr Gary Chapman wrote a book on how people express or feel loved. The five languages listed are;

• Quality Time


• Words of Affirmation


• Gifts


• Acts of service


• Physical Touch

Of course, these are very generallised and often people are a combination of a few of these.

However, below is a diagram arranging these on a line of most relevent to least relevent language for me...

...Ok, so it's not quite that extreme... Physical touch is somewhere in the middle (i'm definitely a hug-a-holic) and gift giving and recieving is somewhere off this page (in the "I so don't get it" section of the line) but you get the point.

The thing I've realised about this though is that I'm looking for affirmation in the wrong place. It hit me at ETC really; I was one of the music organisers and it's a well known fact that in ministry, you shouldn't expect to be thanked very much (which is fair enough - you're not really supposed to be doing it for your glory... but that's getting ahead of myself).

This, was a severe problem...

You see, when people don't tell me I'm doing a good job at something, I start wondering why. Is it because I suck at whatever it is I'm doing? Is it because they don't like it? Do I look funny out the front? Does anybody like me? Am I... What's.... Why?

And so the stress builds up and I start to implode with worry...

This is exactly what happened at ETC. I ended up a in tears a few times because no one was telling me how much they loved the music and that I should keep up the good work!

Now please please please don't get me wrong here; I'm not saying that you all suck for not telling me I'm awesome (that would seriously not be helpful) I'm merely telling you all this to illustrate my point: I need to stop looking for acceptance and affimation from people and start looking more to God.

The way I see it is as long as I'm doing what He tells me to do through the bible I'll be fine. Of course this would be a lot easier to do if I got emails or something from Him to let me know I'm doing ok but unfortunately that's not how it works. I need to learn to do what He wants me to do and to be satisfied with the knowledge that God loves me no matter how good a job I do at it.

Maybe then I'll learn to see the occasional word of encouragement from a friend as icing on the cake... :)

I've been meaning to explain....again...

OK so i'm not sure you can see the circle, but my thumbs don't bend at the second joint - the one closest to my wrist...

So perhaps I should explain...

Alright so I've had a few people ask me to show them my non-bendy thumbs... so I will!




Yes... it is weird... Actually here's a better picture...

So now that I have fully cemented the knowledge that I'm a crazy person in your minds I'm going to sign off with a last comment along the lines of;

"I'm on holidays! Yay!"

heh...

Have you ever had one of those days where odd and unexpected things seem to happen continuously? Well admittedly, neither have I, but odd and unexpected things have been pilling up lately... (it should be noted that these events are odd and no surreal as helpfully pointed out by Adam Hills here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNFbG75hS5Q)

For instance...

A few weeks ago, I discovered that I don't have opposable thumbs. Most normal peopla have two joints in thier thumbs. This helps them grip things, write and freak a large number of people out if they happen to be extra lucky and double jointed. But in a small number of people one of the joints is fused and, tragically, results in a reduced ability to function... or so some people may think (...ok so perhaps I made that last bit up...).

But I say "poo" to them!

I thought I was normal! I play violin! I write! I still freak people out....possibly because i'm "no-jointed" (yeah... made that up to... but I like it) and it's weird... but hey - we don't have to focus on that.

Anway, the odd thing about this entire incident was not only that I discovered it was weird after 20 years of living, but that another of my friends dixcovered the same thing in the same conversation! This resulted in a "no-jointed" high-five and rather strange command from a "normal" person to never, under any circumstances, have children...

Secondly, lately I've been getting weird emails from a hybrid half crocodile, half platypus named (creatively) croco-pus. Apparently he got lost after ETC and now wants the Science and Nursing faculty at CREDO to sing him and song.

So basically, we're being blackmailed by a giant stuffed animal in a SaN t-shirt...

Great

Lastly... it occured to me last thursday that I'm learning how to synthesise illegeal drugs...




Ok so I should really expand on that one hey....

I'm doing a subject at Uni called "Chemistry and Pharmacology of Illicit Drugs" where we literally learn how to synthesise things like ice and speed and then get told not to because we will get arrested.

Seriously, last Thursday I was sitting in my lecture and our teacher suddenly pauses in his explanation of the various clandestine routes of synethsis of methamphetamine and says something along the lines of "and this was quite popular with bikie gangs in the 70s"

I'm going to let you all just think about that for a bit and see if you develop the same mental picture as I have...

"Boring Women Have Immaculate Homes"

My friend looked into my room yesterday and I swear her eyes very nearly popped out of her head! The conversation (from memory) went something like this:

Friend: Oh my goodness Joh, how has your room gotten this messy in a day?

Me: raises an eyebrow... or tries to... then gives up as I realise I've only cemented the knowledge that I'm mad in my friend's mind... Messy? What are you talking about?

Friend: Sounds exasperated Well there's all those clothes on your bed and the unemptied box and... (proceeds to list all of the things that are out of place which, admittedly is a rather long list)

Me: You've obviously never lived close to my room before have you?

It's true... I am the mess Queen. And I should probably just stress that the title of this entry has no reflection on my view of tidy people. In fact I admire them because no matter how hard I try, I can't be tidy.

Seriously - on the rare occasions that I get it into my head that perhaps having to take a running leap over clutter to get to my bed is not the best of signs and actually attempt to do something about it, I tidy things and then in five seconds my room looks like some long lost section of the himalayas...

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I grew up surrounded by mess... Our house was (and kinda still is... but maybe that's because they're renovating... not sure) always filled with clutter of some description. Fortunately it was only clutter and there was no chance of finding a rotten apple core that had been forgotten and had developed into intelligent life!

Mum tries to get us to be at least a little bit tidy... I remember once when I was little she sent me on a full on treasure hunt (with clues and everything) around my room to find the floor. (I was highly disappointed when I discovered that the hunt had nothing to do with chocolate of some description)

Unfortunately for her, I've come to the conclusion that being messy has some degree of eccentricity... it's different! Maybe that's why I never put anything away or throw my clothes all over the floor when I've brought them back from the washing machine - it gives my room character!

...

Or maybe I'm just lazy....

Either way, being messy is a habit that, hopefully, I'll be able to break someday because no matter how much I tell myself that I can "concentrate better when I have to physically clear a space on my desk with a bulldozer in order to study", a tidy room is so much less embarrassing and easy to vaccuum...

But for now, my idea of cleaning is to sweep the room with a glance :)

This is great...

www.xkcd.com

I can't wait to go back to Uni....

Alright, feel free to say it - I'm mad

I feel like a hypocrite right now - I spend half my time complaining about how stressed out I am and how my lecturers have a hit list with my name on it hidden somewhere within the trench coats they keep in their wardrobes and only ever wear during their secret late night meetings in which they plan sinister synchronisation of assesments... *takes breath* and now I'm saying I want to go back!!

I'm mental

So what am I doing here at 10:00pm?

Alright, so it's not really that late... still I'm just about falling asleep so if this post is so utterly incoherent then ash mblag ergh...

*ahem*

So I haven't really been writting here very often hey... as one of my friends put it the other day "You must be feeling very relaxed... no blog posts for ages!"

And the odd thing is, I am actually relaxed! I've only got four assesments to go (one exam and three assignments) and the end is in sight! Hoorah!

Mum, as with everything, puts this new state of mind down to my new gluten freeness but I don't know that it's entirely the reason... but I think that may be a topic for another blog... oh yes, I actually have direction in this one :)

Tonight, instead of the usual bible study at Flo, we took a brief (too brief) look at the persecuted church. It was so humbling to hear about some of the things a Christian in the Sudan or Indonesia has to deal with on a day-to-day basis.

To give you an idea of the sorts of things we looked at, Christians in China are at risk of being arrested purely for hosting a home group in their homes. They are tortured and forced to give up names of the others in their group. In the Sudan, southern christians (there are none in the North as it's the muslim demographic) are displaced, forced to leave the country or enslaved by the jihad which is sponsored by the government. Oh and forced conversion to Islam is legal. In Indonesia, the largest muslim country by percentage in the world, churches are frequently attacked and destroyed along with the people...

The thing that struck me was that the most I have to deal with in my average day, is a brief flicker of a disgusted expression across someone's face the minute I mention Christianity. To think that the thought of someone not liking me terrifies me, I wonder what I'd do, faced with the possibility that I could be arrested or killed for the Bible...

I definitely take the fact that I live in a free country (don't scoff; no matter how bad IR laws are treating you, it's true.) and that we are free to believe what we want to. I need to be more thankful for the fact that the most persecution I have to deal with now is someone "christian-bashing" to my face or indirectly.

God is so good.

Nehoo, I'll get down off my soap box now and go and sleep... I have an exam on Friday....

:)

Fairy Bread and Evil background music...

Wow... I've really been neglecting this blog haven't I? For the record, I told myself that I wasn't going to be sucked in by the halo of procrastination surrounding this website but still... as my mum pointed out yesterday on the phone *note - to be read in an exasperated mother tone* "I've worked out how to get onto the thing and you haven't written anything since the holidays!"

And so, I've decided to dedicate this blog entry to you Mum... mainly because I reckon you're about the only one who reads this anyway (... the comment box is most definitely OPEN right now for people to prove that i'm really not that pathetic)

...

Love you Mum...

*ahem* So anyway... The last few weeks have been more than a little hectic... seriously, I have this mental image of all of my uni lecturers sitting around eating fairy bread (why? I have no idea) and brainstorming ways to torture the second year students who became way too complacent in first year. To help, I've drawn a little picture....

Hmmm... I'm not actually sure that you'll all be able to read that.... or get past my wonderfully craptastic stick figures but hey.... the point is that my lecturers are ev...

Well ok - I should probably mention here that I'll be the first to admit that they're actually very helpful people and only give us that workload because they think they're the only ones who are setting crazy lab reports (I had 6 due last week.... 6!!!!!). I think it just seems like they're all banding together and lets face it... exaggerating is always fun!

So really I think I'm my own worst enemy. Mainly because I'm sitting here blogging and drawing stick figure cartoons when I really should be finishing my lab reports... what can I say? When your mother tells you to jump you ask how high ;)

Watch this! You know you want to...

My friend sent this to me... I was a little skeptical at first but eventually it made me cry... see what you think :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_M0H5nrY8E

Handy tip number one: have tissues on stand-by

Just for funsies...

http://www.xkcd.com/

Heh - how great is that? Although how did she not notice he never called her by name? How awkward would that have been?

Procrastinating? Me? Never!

Current mood....

Wow...

http://play.blogger.com/

Check it out - it's a slide show of all the photos people are uploading on their blogs... sounds strange, but it's bizarrely captivating....

My new direction...

So I've been thinking pretty heavily over the last few months (*sighs* yes, my brain hurts) and I've come to a pretty sad, but also incredibly exciting conclusion...

...I'm saying sayonara to CSI-land...

For those of you who don't know, for the last two years I've been embroiled in the wonderful world of Forensics, studying a bachelor of applied chemistry (Hons) in Forensic Science. Basically it's a stress-filled rollercoaster of struggling to keep above a credit average in some seriously hard subjects while trying not to lash out and strangle something because of it...
So on Monday I finally decided it really wasn't worth it! To be honest, the only thing I could have seen myself doing with the degree was going into the police force, stuffing around for about 5 years just so I could work in serious crime. To me, it just seemed like a lot of hooplah for a lifetime of stress and paperwork.

Forensics is not at all like CSI... oh no... most of it is lab work or painstakingly combing a crime scene for a skin flake that could (but probably won't) link a suspect to a crime scene.
Sound frustrationg or what?

So anyway, the question has to be asked - What am I going to do now?

I'm switching to Applied Chemistry - the plan is to finish that next year and then do the post-grad secondary teaching course here at UTS... That's right - I'm going to be a High School Science teacher

Don't laugh - I'm serious!

It's been a bit of a strange year; I remember someone coming up to me in church one Sunday and asking me how my degree was going; "you're doing education right?"

Ah... no...

A number of people I know really well have come out with "you'd be great teacher joh" seemingly from nowhere, includeing my Mum who then proceeded to tell me about the "teaching gene" that (admittedly a little obviously) runs through our family...

I think perhaps God's trying to tell me something... and true to form I, being the stubborn berk that I am, have been trying to go the other way. But I've given in (finally) and let me tell you I don't think I've ever been quite as relieved as I am right now... I don't feel nearly as worried about the future as I was a week ago, I'm not feeling stressed out about my subjects (I actually want to study now... warped huh?) and I'm much, much, much more excited about my course! My new course director gave me a long list of electives he thought I'd enjoy and I feel a bit like a kid in a candy store! Heh...

So there's what I've been thinking... weird huh?

Stressed is just Desserts spelled backwards...

In my brief (hah!) stay in the realms of stress-land, I have come to a conclusion which I hope will;
(a) put my current state of mind into some sort of perspective and;
(b) help me procrastinate just a little bit more (because we all know that's fun!)
The Three Stages of Stress

• Mildly worried

This is the stage where things are beginning to pile up but that day on which three of your assignments are due is still relatively far away so it doesn't seem so bad...

• Stressed to the point of nervous breakdown

Alright so this is a bit of a jump and should, by rights, be the final stage... I thought it was as well until this week, but I'll get to that in a second... This is the point at which everything becomes just too overwhelming. Assignment D-Day is rapidly approaching and it's not looking like they're going to be done in time. Panic decends and all one really wants to do is curl up in a corner and stay there until it's all over. This stage is usually accompanied by emotional, teary calls to the one's mother who really can't do anything to help but can at least knock some sort of sense into your panic-clouded brain. Yep... this is where I was a few days ago...

• Stressed beyond the point of nervous breakdown

This, I have to say, is my current state of mind. I am beyond the point of caring about the fact that I'm stressed. So much so that I appear completely nonchalant and well-adjusted when really, if I stop to think about it, I'm even more panicked and jumpy than I was when I made that phone-call at 11:00pm... I mean, think about it; I have an exam today that I only began studying for last night and what am I doing? Blogging!

Actually, I told someone about my crazy week and the amount of work I had to do and he laughed at me when I said I was stressed beyond all reason... huh - go figure

And while the final stage may seem wonderful and a marked improvement on the second, let me tell youl; it's not. I think I'd rather be in blind panic than total apathy - at least I'd be a little more concerned about the work I need to get done...

*sigh*

It's at times like this that I am immensely thankful that I have a God I can lean on - it's so comforting to know that even if I stuff everything up, I'll still be a beloved child of God - nothing's going to change that. As Jesus said;

Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

I'm supposed to be studying...

... So I'll make this blog my reward :)



... I'll be back...



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~



All right so I did a bit of studying... well I'm not sure if you could really call it studying - I was just doing some prelab work for Analytical Chem so it was definitely stuff I had to do... probably not study then... *sighs*



Ah well



Is it just me or is Uni out to get me? It's seriously killing all semblance of any sort of life I may have had... or have...



... random side note - ooo I love this song!...



*ahem*



Anyway... Uni, while fun and most certainly what I want to do, it REALLY hard right now. On top of everything I have going right now, I have a feeling I'm going to go completely mental by the mid-semesters... but that's going back into "negative-attitude-Joh" and that's not a good plan :)



Nehoo...



I think I've wasted enough time complaining about the fact that I have no time to do the work I need to so I think I'll get out of my "hypocrite" corner and go and do something constructive... hehe