Tuesday, 30 March 2004

Silliness
Uomo puma, L' (1980)

For some reason I looked up The Pumaman on IMDb and noticed that it's in the 'bottom 100', to be more specific: number fourteen.
/me enjoys a gleeful grin and silent giggle

Now how did I get here and how do I find my way back? I'm lost in IMDb! Heeelp!!

~ posted by Anna @ 10:22 pm
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Monday, 29 March 2004

And another thing...
I'm having a bit of dilemma with my website layout and design. Got a new one, but it's somewhat less elegant than my last one. It's more fitting... themed, even... but I can't see how I could make it into a set of similar designs for the different sections, and if I used the same one for all, I'd be stuck with one design which doesn't entirely please me. I mean, I LIKE it, but not THAT much. Come to think of it, I have had a couple of ideas on how to modify it, but I don't know how to get or make the graphics I need for all the little elements of the layout. Once again I've come to the point where I can't realise my visualisations. *sigh*

~ posted by Anna @ 1:50 pm
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Possibilities
I still like my blog's title (even though it's kinda stolen - no, not from another blog, but from that poem), but I can't help thinking of other possibilities. For instance: "Anna's Junk Drawer". Or perhaps another slightly poetic, and stolen one: "Fearless, the idiot faced the crowd, smiling..." I almost called myself "Earth-bound misfit" before I chose "Across a roaring hill", but despite my liking of that phrase, it's all too common. Yeah, popularity puts me off. Anyway... I'll continue mulling it over. Do people change the names of their blogs? Or just make new ones to go with new names? o_O

~ posted by Anna @ 1:45 pm
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Haiku Quickie
Mmm mmm mmm mmm mmm!
Windmill biscuits and coffee
On a rainy day.

Autumn chills the air,
I wrap a shawl around me.
The dull hours plod on.

~ posted by Anna @ 1:41 pm
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Tomorrow
Yeah, I'll be dropping into the stoopermarket tomorrow at 4pm to talk about some trial shifts... just thought I'd let you know. Have to tell someone or I'll get too jittery. :P

~ posted by Anna @ 11:25 am
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Unconscious Mutterings
Linkety

Argh... eye have sleepy-cramp in my legs but I'll go one more mile before I sleep, just to get me mutterings done for the week.

1. Pitbull: terrier
   
2. TD: K?
   
3. Carter: smarter
   
4. Japan: yen
   
5. 50: thousand
   
6. Streak: streaker! hehe!
   
7. Rifle: shot
   
8. Trap: pit
   
9. Easter: bunny
   
10. Mitt: baseball
    

I must be tired, 'cause very few of those made sense. But then, this is a nonsensical sort of meme anyway... :)
/me shrugs, yawns and departs for bed

~ posted by Anna @ 12:03 am
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Saturday, 27 March 2004

Philosophusion
If I get down to simplicity, enough to say to someone, "We seem to have very different ideas about life - wouldn't you agree?" and they say "No,"... what am I to gain from this?

Do they drastically misunderstand me? Are they idealising me to fit their own preferences? Or am I misunderstanding them?

And how could any of these circumstances be possible after speaking about life, thoughts, feelings and values for hours on end? How much can we know about another person by the things they say in seemingly honest conversation?

*sigh*

~ posted by Anna @ 6:33 pm
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La-la-la-layout.
Working on a new one. Fun fun fun. Purple, black and white, with steely-silver runestones. Oh, I do adore a new curiosity.

~ posted by Anna @ 11:30 am
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Hmmm...
Water gets colder,
The sun gets older -
retiring early to his sleep

Leaves don't yet fall
but I know it's there:
Whispers of Autumn
are in the air

-----

This may grow, or it may not.
One nevers knows. It happens a lot. :P

~ posted by Anna @ 10:59 am
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Friday, 26 March 2004

Almost seems too late to turn?
Playing songs from Clannad's Magical Ring and Macalla. Found the lyrics and even some notes for particular songs. Really hearing more of them now. For this evening, at least, I shall abandon myself to an enchanted state of mind.

Fleas is jumping, fleeing. Cats is mad, pronking.

~ posted by Anna @ 11:39 pm
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Bits and bobs
Oh, yes - I told you I'd tell you about the interview. But I won't go into detail because (a) you don't know me or care, and (b) I've already described it in detail to Mum & Dad.

It went okay. I should get a call soon about getting a trial shift thingy.

On another matter... here's a couple o' pictures o' my luvly jubly haematite runes. I've been reading a wee beginner's book about runes, and they're fascinating. I've read a lot of it before but I might like to try and use the information this time. I mean in an active, learning sense.

  

-----

Edit: I shouldn't speak so hastily. Sometimes an uncommon sort of stranger stops by to tell me they do care.

Second Edit: Hey, this is fun. The thought occurs that I could make this more of a photo blog as well as a blather blog.

~ posted by Anna @ 2:35 pm
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Wednesday, 24 March 2004

Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod.
Job interview tonight. I'm so nervous, I'm shaking. Urk. Yes, it's ONLY for a supermarket job, but it's my first ever interview. Holy crap. o_O

I'll let you know how it goes.

~ posted by Anna @ 4:35 pm
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Monday, 22 March 2004

Heh.
Listening again to Clannad, I suddenly remember something. A wee memory of myself at around age 8, 9, maybe 10... pre-teen, anyway... before I really knew any music, voicing my approval of such musicians as Clannad and Enya, because they weren't all spouting lyrics of romance and love. Mum may have responded, "Well, with foreign lyrics, you may never know" - and I may have conceded that point... but the important thing is that I knew, back then, that romantic love would likely never take a front seat role in my life. I can say that my psyche knew it; before I started growing into an adult, before my hormones started moaning. So I shouldn't question my instincts or intuition now when I feel out of the ordinary, not desiring what most people seem to desire. It's a reassurance that I can remain true to myself.

Perhaps you'll say (if you're listening) that I'm making a mountain out of a molehill, a big deal out of a teeny unimportant recollection. But if it hadn't had import in some way or another, I reckon I wouldn't have remembered it at all. Like dreams... they only come back if we need them to come back, for some reason or another.

~ posted by Anna @ 9:22 pm
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Sunday, 21 March 2004

Thursday Threesome
Linkety

What's that you say? 'Tis not Thursday? Ha! I care not a jot. I'm having more bloggy surfy fun tonight than I've had in weeks.

::Blog Design Exchange::

Onesome: Blog: -- How long have you been a member of the blogosphere? ...and from a different angle: how long have you been on the Net?

Been blogging for four months and eighteen days. Couldn't say the length of time I've been on the net with any accuracy. Began chatting first at age sixteen... or was it fifteen?

Twosome: Design-- Do you do your own design work for your site? ...and if not, where are you finding templates you like?

Yup, my designs are my own. I'm moderately proud of them; just enough warm fuzzy feeling to keep me ticking over. ..... Ha! Who am I kidding? I'm thrilled to bits with the meagre designs/skills I've scraped together. :>

Threesome: Exchange-- ...and while we're on the Net, have you ever participated in any of the Net 'exchanges' such as recipes, Christmas ornaments, site exchanges, guest blogging or related things?

Nah, not really the angle I've looked for in my forays into the web.

~ posted by Anna @ 11:18 pm
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Unconscious Mutterings
Linkety

1. Wife: slave
   
2. Criminal: punishment
   
3. Campaign: popularity
   
4. Infection: spread
   
5. Portland: Oregon?
   
6. NASCAR: boring
   
7. IMAX: Cirque du Soleil
   
8. Martian: mystery
   
9. Nike: swoosh!
   
10. Trial: and error
    

~ posted by Anna @ 10:22 pm
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Saturday Slant: I Forgive...
Linkety

"We have all been wronged by someone, intentionally or otherwise. The wisest and strongest of us lets affronts slide off her like rain from her face. Most of us, however, hold onto at least some offenses and slights. Like leaves burnt on a Fall day, long after the upper thoughts have burnt to ash, some things beneath continue to simmer. Smoldering embers still produce quite a lot of heat. It's time to stamp out at least one sinder. Forgive an affront. Forgive the person who made it. Forgive yourself. And thereby free yourself to make better use of the emotional energy fueling the ember."

Well, this is a thought-nudger... I can't actually bring to mind a noteworthy incident of being wronged - not that much, good nor bad, has happened to me in my life. Yet I understand the kind of passion that drives a grudge. I've got to the stage where I begrudge those close to me their personal, everyday habits. I let them drive me crazy. Partly this is because of inactivity; I think to myself, Oh, I'll be fine once I get a job, a social life, and so on. But that's total escapism! regardless of the fact that spending less time around these people, or more importantly, spending less time brooding about these people, would likely relieve me of my malcontent... I should be able to control my bad thought and feelings towards people! I shouldn't waste energy letting my anger smoulder! Sure, sometimes I think I've squashed my grudges, but then they flare up again those birthday candles which can't be blown out. And what's more, I get angry with myself for being angry. At this point I honestly don't know how to proceed, except to take the fire escape: get myself a life, something to take up more of my time. Perhaps then, when my grudges seem smaller in perspective, I can figure out a way to snuff them out forever and start using that energy for positive things.

There we go, that was my first Slant. I'd been reading the Slants for a while, and perhaps entertaining a few idle thoughts which they provoke, but this time I got up off my virtual arse and responded to one. See, I can still carry out a train of thought. Goody for me. :P

~ posted by Anna @ 10:01 pm
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Catantics
Samwise had a visit to the vet yesterday, to check up on his punctured thumb. A few pokes and prods, a couple of jabs, and then the vet gave him a free mouse toy to take home. You know, like a lollypop for a child. Apparently Mr. Vet liked Sammy so much, he picked him up and gave him a hug before putting him back in his cage.

Perhaps it was jealousy of the new mousey, or the attention, which prompted Roux to drag home this strangely coloured critter this morning. Goodness knows from which neighbour's house it was pilfered. He's got strange taste at times, does our Roux (who shall henceforth be known as The Lion King). Or maybe he just has a flair for getting our attention.


~ posted by Anna @ 7:06 pm
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Grrrr.
I hate it when people cut off their conversation when I enter a room. Do they think they're protecting someone? It doesn't do anyone any good! I'd rather hear what they're saying, even if it's bad things about me. And if it's none of my business, fine! I won't listen. There should be no reason to keep it from me. Fuck dishonesty.

~ posted by Anna @ 6:50 pm
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Wednesday, 17 March 2004

Aquatic Haiku
While away the time...
An afternoon by the beach
Watching the ocean.

Fitful sun through clouds,
Gales of golden grains of sand
Thrown through the cool air.

Paddling in the waves
Curls of salt water roll in
Trying to snatch my toes.

Communing with the sea...
A fan of perfect pearly shell:
Neptune's gift to me.

~ posted by Anna @ 11:46 am
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Monday, 15 March 2004

Return of the Maudlin Monster
Pre-Script: Shorthand for this post: "Nobody loves me, everybody hates me. I'm going down the garden to eat worms."

Yeah, well. Alone-as-possible and crying once again. I can't hide, but I can stay quiet in the corner. Who this helps, I cannot say, but it's all I can bring myself to do at this moment.

I don't understand myself... and I'm wondering if it's worth the trouble to try. I've degenerated into a tangle of contradictions and a mess of conflicting emotions. From day to day, moment to moment, my whole demeanor changes - from craving the beauty of simplicity and, more importantly, feeling it is within my grasp; to the notion that I no longer know how to be happy. I have changed beyond my comprehension of myself, but on the other hand I have not, and now and then I just consider myself the same old same old, who's always been confused, but didn't always know it.

I always professed to be naturally optimistic and not easily worried, a person who quickly bounces back from any depressions that may overtake me (which in the past have been few). But now though I may bounce back almost as easily, the depressions recur. I bounce back, and forward, and backward and forward like one of those stupid toys with a ball attached by a string to the racquet, paddle, whacking device, whatever you call it. I keep coming back for more punishment, fool that I am.

I have so many ambitions, and positivity that leads me to believe - in theory - that I can attain them. But when it comes to the process of attainment, I strike myself and my hopes down and put up imagined barriers of every possible kind. Yeah, twice in the last four nights I've dreamed of an aggressive guard dog, belonging to someone else, which prevents me from getting to my house(home). The second time I did manage to shout it down, only to have its owners come growling towards me instead. If I were more paranoid about symbols in my dreams, this one would be pretty obvious. But I'm not going to say it first.

I don't want a boyfriend/partner/lover, but after a long time of not getting noticed because I'm not trying to be noticed (trying not to be noticed??), I get sad that nobody values me. Then I savagely berate myself for bothering about what people think of me, and indeed, I become angry in my mind towards strangers. Then I get miserable again, because who else are to be my new friends (if I could still make friends) if not strangers? It's been so long since I've met really new people that each encounter with a stranger dissolves me into a shivering puddle of nerves, which in no way helps the constant thought that nobody could possibly want to know me, because I have nothing to give. But why should I give my life to others? But then again, I don't even think I have anything to give myself. I'm starting to think I don't like people, but as soon as I read that thought straight through I relapse into weeping, because people are so hateful and wonderful and frustrating and confusing and mysterious and evil and good and ugly and beautiful... and... I can't live with them, and I can't live without them. But I DO, and there's no time to stop for thoughts like these, and such ideas do not help me at all, and they drive me crazy, or am I instead hideously sane?

Talking to a blog is not like talking to a person. I think the beauty of speaking one's mind to another - I mean a GOOD conversation in which they really get involved - is that they can speak back to you, and while this may give the illusion of helping to re-order one's thoughts, their responses are actually giving you more to think about, and thus forcing forgetfulness of one's own confusion. Whereas a diary lets thoughts flow out, but remain kept, and perhaps not better organised, but at least recorded. For posterity, or what-the-hell-ever.

And another thing. All the while I'm typing this, I notice that I don't just say what I think like other folks do... I speak of my thoughts (there's that word again) like they belong to someone else, objectively. Perhaps I am speaking what I feel, not what I think. Or perhaps I just don't believe what I'm saying. As I said, I don't understand myself. And this is the cynic in me who's taken over the podium. One thing I know is that I've never been so drawn into my negative thoughts before. I'm holding some of them closer to me and feeling them more keenly... like, I don't know... like an Evil Teddy Bear of Doom.

Anyway I'm just getting unreasonably depressed over the everyday-life things most people just get on with. I'm a basket-case, without even the option to crawl into my basket and never come out. And I've never run on reason, so bah humbug.

But that's enough bad thoughts for a while. I'm exhausted. I shall go and get drunkety.

~ posted by Anna @ 5:19 pm
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Unconscious Mutterings
Linkety

1. Old Navy: blue?
   
2. Out: -dated
   
3. Indecent: proposal
   
4. UPN: ...??
   
5. Pupil: eye
   
6. Toothpaste: commercial
   
7. 1999: party
   
8. Passion: flower
   
9. Social security: number
   
10. Cliff: Richard
    

~ posted by Anna @ 2:55 pm
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Friday, 12 March 2004

The Friday Five
Linkety

1. What was the last song you heard?

'Fallen' by Sarah McLachlan

2. What were the last two movies you saw?

The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King and Amelie.

3. What were the last three things you purchased?

A scratchie instant-lottery ticket. A bottle of Finlandia vodka. An ex-library book on self-sufficiency.

4. What four things do you need to do this weekend?

Check out the local market thingy and see Nana there. Go for walkies. Wax my legs. Read.

5. Who are the last five people you talked to?

In reverse order? Mum. Dad. California garden centre employee. Zenith garden centre manager. Raewyn of Springwood Nursery.

~ posted by Anna @ 10:02 pm
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Drunkety.
/mode cynical ON

Well, I won't bother doing Emode's ESP test and posting it here. Obviously, if I don't already know the answer, I must not have a shred of ESP. o_^ :P~`

/mode -c

~ posted by Anna @ 9:51 pm
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Thursday, 11 March 2004

Thoughts (Three Different Ones)
(1) Magic, to my mind, lies in asymmetry. Systems which are unobvious, and less easily plotted. Admittedly there is beauty in both symmetry and asymmetry, but of very different kinds, whose harmonies affect us in different ways. It occurs to me that if the colour of the ocean were simply a mirror of the sky it would be less awesome. Despite the fact that there can be great elegance in simplicity, like the pure reflection of a skyline in the still waters of a lake... The variance and unpredictability of sea colours seem to be the result of an individual soul of the depths. A kind of magic.

(2) Regarding Christianity. It seems to require one to give up one's energy, or self, in some respect, in order to be worthy of 'salvation'. My god does not require a trade for her love and blessings - only love in return. Spirituality should not be conditional. Also I would not want someone to die for my sake, even if I did believe it could make a difference. But it doesn't even make sense to me. I take responsibility for my own sins, such as they are. I do not want to be saved.

(3) Perhaps the reason that adults get annoyed seeing babies cry at the slightest provocation is because it reminds our subconscious of being in that phase of life which we would prefer to remain buried, forgotten. A child cries easily because it is a newly reborn soul realising the difficult incarnation it has chosen, and thinks "Oh shit!! What have I done?" Sometimes I feel like that - crying and wailing and gnashing my teeth at the idiocy of being in a human body on this awkward planet, which often seems determined to trip us up.

~ posted by Anna @ 8:40 pm
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Wednesday, 10 March 2004

Hey-oh, hey-ah, ah-oh, hey-ha-eh-oh...
You say the hill's too steep to climb...
Climb it
You say you'd like to see me try
Climbing

You pick the place and I'll choose the time
I'll climb that hill in my own way
Just wait a while for the right day
And as I rise above the tree lines and the clouds
I look down, hearing the sound of the things you've said today

Fearlessly the idiot faced the crowd,
Smiling
Merciless the magistrate turns 'round,
Frowning

And who's the fool who wears the crown?
And go down in your own way
And every day is the right day
And as you rise above the fear-lines in his brow
You look down, hearing the sound of the faces in the crowd

(Fearless, from 'Meddle' by Pink Floyd)

~ posted by Anna @ 10:25 pm
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Sunday, 7 March 2004

Unconscious Mutterings
Linkety

1. Dogma: karma
   
2. Spirit: vault
   
3. Voodoo: snakebite
   
4. Demon: dance (??)
   
5. Digital: camera
   
6. Ceremony: ritual
   
7. Research: and development
   
8. Career: path
   
9. Penis: envy
   
10. Film: noir
    

~ posted by Anna @ 3:52 pm
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Saturday, 6 March 2004

Amusing Anecdote.
There was once a penguin in Dad's folks' coalbox! Heeheehee! He can't believe he never told us before. Neither can I.

Apparently someone had found a wee blue penguin with a broken leg and taken it home to nurse it. Once the little guy was healed, he took the initiative to venture outside and back towards the sea. Following the stream bordering its rescuer's backyard, he toddled down it only to (perhaps) get tired along the way, and take shelter for a night in the Mulholland family's coalbox. Little did he know that the next morning was Saturday, the day of tidying up the yard, and several people young and old were making hubbub outside his refuge. He was found, and photos were taken. (Will post them here when they are dredged up from wherever they lie in our many boxes of stuff.) Mr. Penguin was brought inside, and no sooner than a map of the city was spread on the floor, he was heading for the ocean-blue corner of the paper and plonking himself down. Of course the family decided to return him to the sea. They piled into the car and headed eastwards. Even before the sea could be seen or smelt by human senses, he was perking up and sniffing wildly, and when the beach was reached and his flippers touched the wet sand, he waddled wildly and happily toward the vast blue yonder. ^_^

As Mum said, "Nothing so interesting ever happened in our house!"

~ posted by Anna @ 8:00 pm
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Friday, 5 March 2004

The Friday Five
Linkety

What was...

1. ...your first grade teacher's name?

Mrs. Bruce, I think.

2. ...your favorite Saturday morning cartoon?

Difficult to remember. I preferred afternoon cartoons, things like Duck Tales (or any of those similar duck-related shows), and now and then I watched Ahhh! Real Monsters. And oh my... cartoons were so much better when I was teeny. o_O

3. ...the name of your very first best friend?

Erm... perhaps Sue Battersby, though she was a friend of both myself and my big sister, as she lived just down the street.

4. ...your favorite breakfast cereal?

I used to like cocoa puffs (puffed rice), but nowadays I eat hardly any sugar, so my home-made muesli's the best.

5. ...your favorite thing to do after school?

I think I mainly watched TV when I was very young, and then got more interested in chatting and surfing the web in later teenage years.

~ posted by Anna @ 8:28 pm
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Thursday, 4 March 2004

Murp.
Wine... how I love thee, dearest wine.

And oh, how I wish I were able to wish everybody well. *sigh*

~ posted by Anna @ 8:50 pm
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Tuesday, 2 March 2004

Little, few, lack. Better.
Nasssty tiring walkies in the rain(drizzle). Mmm, mellow fizzly schnider. And funny-shaped grapes. :>

Yes, a great dirth of bloggage of late. Nothing to say... or perhaps too much. Yeah, don't ask. :P

~ posted by Anna @ 9:22 pm
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