My biggest weakness

Kryptonite.

Not really, I can stand a bit of Kryptonite, but I'm giving away my biggest weakness here, for free, just because I love when it happens so much. Are you ready?

"Tashy".
When people call me Tashy, I melt, I am at their whim, I will automatically do whatever they are asking me to do, I will go out and kill that giant robot, I will give you my last cookie, of course I will kneel at your feet. It really works too, so next time you see me, give it a try.

Sorry, it's only a quick one today. I'm off work sick, and going to the doctor's tomorrow cause I keep throwing up. Yesterday I thought it was a hangover, but today I'm continuing to hurl, and now I can't hear anything, and life sucks so much sometimes, I swear.

The Path

It's been a couple of days since I blogged, so here I am again, in the flesh, alive. My mum's been visiting from Townsville and I've been busy for once. You know, eating fancy dinners, going shopping, staying at her fancy hotel, living the high life. This evening we're just sitting around until we head over to Bar Eleven-17 at Cannon Hill for my cousin's 21st party. It just occurred to me that I look way too sexy for a family event. I never dress up this good to go out with my friends. What is wrong with me?

I've recently been playing this awesome game called The Path. It's a twist on Little Red Riding Hood, you play as one of 6 girls and the only instruction you have in the game is to Go to Grandmother's House and Follow the Path. But if you do that, you lose. So you have to wander off the path into the woods where you come across...things.
I played it for about two hours today before I decided to find out if there was a purpose to it. Turns out there is no real way to win. Playing the game isn't about collecting things, or finding the end. It's about immersing yourself in this world, and forming theories of your own on what all the encounters mean. It's a beautiful piece of quiet-horror interactive art, the soundtrack is amazing and the design is absolutely beautiful. If you have Steam, you can get it there, otherwise check out Tale-of-Tales.com. Steam's also having a big sale on indie games at the moment so get into it. Here's a clip from SteamLog to show you what The Path is like. Enjoy.

Ada Lovelace Day

Ada Lovelace Day is...

an international day of blogging to draw attention to women excelling in technology. Women's contributions often go unacknowledged, their innovations seldom mentioned, their faces rarely recognised. We want you to tell the world about these unsung heroines. Whatever she does, whether she is a sysadmin or a tech entrepreneur, a programmer or a designer, developing software or hardware, a tech journalist or a tech consultant, we want to celebrate her achievements.

I am the LEAST prepared blogger in the entire world. I had planned on emailing a woman I saw at a panel about women in gaming a while ago, and I'd even written up the draft email but for some reason I just never sent it. So instead, I'm going to be extremely lazy and have put together a mashup of my favourite blogs and a couple of articles about women in tech. If you don't click through to links, then your best bet is to just leave now. Get ready for GRATUITOUS LINKAGE!!!

I shall begin with my favourite blog of all time, Jezebel. It deals up daily news, celebrity, sex, fashion, etc all with a bit of a feminist twist. It's also got a brilliant community of hilarious wimmen.
Now some love for my favourite blogger, Violet Blue. As it says on her front page, she is an "author, sex educator, blogger, podcaster, GETV reporter, The San Francisco Chronicle's sex columnist, robotic artist, and a Forbes Web Celeb." I head over to her blog Tiny Nibbles for all the erotica I could ever want.
ShinyShiny.tv is the pinkest website I've ever seen - it's updated daily with all the newest gadgets coming out on the market - phones, cameras, notebooks, game consoles and even vibrators.
Here's two new ones that I've just found recently - Emily Chang and GameGirl.com. Emily is an award-winning web designer and my favourite part of her site is the eHub which is a constantly updated list of web applications. GameGirl is like it sounds, a blog focused on all things gaming, written by girls, definitely worth a look.
Girl Geek Dinners plans meetups of girl bloggers in pubs and restaurants to share their love of all things geeky and tech.
Here's a cool article on wikipedia about women in computing with a timeline of women who made advances in technology.
I've posted it before but I'm posting again this post by a blogger named Kate Harding about cyberbullying and stalking.

These are a little off topic but I've been lurking around sci-fi blog i09.com all day and I looked up all the best posts regarding women.
What Chicks Don't Like About Science Fiction
Could You Live In A World Without Women?
Why All Female Superheroes Look The Same
and New Doctor Who Should Be Female, Say Female Scientists

And finally, one of my favourite songs, kind of a one-hit wonder from a band called White Town.
This is from their album "Women in Technology" and the song is called Your Woman. I'm sure you've heard it on Rage before at 2am. Enjoy!

I hate bikies

So it turns out that my plane was delayed on the tarmac yesterday for about 20 minutes because there was a BIKIE TURF WAR in Sydney terminal where one man was beaten to death. Honestly, this must have happened just as I was boarding the plane.

Here's a big article from smh.com.au called Behind Sydney's Bikie Bloodshed.

How the hell do these people exist? They ride bikes. This does not entitle them to own areas of land. I know it's all to do with drugs, etc but Jesus Christ, what happened to people who just share a love of motorbikes? Bikies are not cool. And while we're at it, Chopper Read is not cool. Stop thinking he is. Go read a book that ISN'T his, stop giving him money. Shut up. Stop killing people and delaying my flight.

Sydneytimes

Here's a little of what my diary would look like if I had bothered to write one while I was in Sydney.

Thursday: Read Pickman's Model and listened to Dresden Dolls on the plane down to Sydney. Lovecraft rules. Arrive at airport, Dad's waiting for me, take the double decker train back to hotel on York St. Amazed at double decker train. Walk through the streets to hotel in a daze because everything is so goddamn big. Drop bags at hotel, say hi to Mum and Mitch, we all go for a walk down to Darling Harbour. Everything is just like out of Looking for Alibrandi. We catch the monorail (MONORAIL!!!) back into the city, and walk through the city to our hotel. Sensory overload from gigantic-hugeness. Go to meet my internet friend Chris. We have a few drinks at one place, then go to Oxford St and have more. His friends start showing up, we drink more. Go to some free wanky pretentious music shows, drink more. More alcohol.

Friday: Throw up on the platform at Town Hall station, almost faint. I own it now. Have a shower, eat a piece of bread and go with family to Centrepoint Tower. Sit on the ledge looking down at the ants/humans below me and wonder what would happen if the tower split in half, and we all plummeted to the ground. Went into this stupid Oztrek thing that you actually had to pay money for, and was assaulted with the stereotype that Australians are dumb, dumb, dumb. Felt significantly dumber afterwards. Walked around and around looking for a shop that I may want to purchase things from. When I find one, realise I have no money, and trudge sullenly back to the hotel. Dad and I go grocery/booze shopping. That night, I eat chilli octopus. Suprisingly awesome.

Saturday: Wake up super late, get ready and follow family out to Darling Harbour where Mum and Mitch are part of a Capoeira demonstration. It's going on for five hours. Dad and I walk around and around and around, debating what to do, until we finally decide on just drinking beer. Drink beer. Oh, also, we go to the Chinese Garden, which was really gorgeous. Koi are awesome and evil and following me. Go back to capoeira. Watch. Walk off to drink more beer. Extremely sunburnt and sweaty and disgusting, considering all I've eaten is chips. Go home and crash. Night time, family goes off to some capoeira party in Bondi which I skip out to sit by myself at the hotel chatting on MSN to friends about how much I hate Sydney. I hate Sydney.

Sunday: Wake up super late again, chuck on some clothes and catch the monorail to go see the Star Wars exhibit at the Powerhouse Museum. Awesome, except can't move because of the sea of children smaller than my knees, and the army of prams. What the hell are these kids doing here? Take a lot of photos, get really annoyed and swear off procreating for good. Catch the monorail back to my hotel, grab my bags, off to airport. Eat a Krispy Kreme, then sit for an hour reading Lovecraft waiting for my plane. Get on the plane, the guy sitting next to me orders "3 rum and cokes and a cappucino". Shit.

I've uploaded a bunch of photos that you can check out here, and shall be putting up some awesome videos of the capoeira people doing their moves, so stay tuned.

Hump Day

Hey all, just going to post some things I found today that I liked. I'm a bit busy, packing to go to Sydney in the morning for 4 days - my parents and little brother are down there at the moment for a Capoeira festival and I'm joining them. There'll be plenty of pics and stories when I get back, but in the meantime you can follow me on twitter cause I'm kind of addicted to it now.
I spent a lot of time just surfing and slacking off today, and here's some things that I really loved...

This opinion article by Katrina Fox titled "Tick a box: male, female, unspecified" about how the Australian Human Rights Commission has a report on filling out legal documents for those who do not identify with a specific gender. I really love the idea. I've been thinking a lot lately about gender and androgyny and I completely admit that I don't understand it, but I guess that's why it's playing on my mind. Also, I am extremely in love with Tilda Swinton.

Those eyes, they are sucking my soul...

One I found a while ago but keeps popping up in conversation lately, a documentary about Objectum Sexuals titled Married to the Eiffel Tower.

Check out this awesome video of the Sydney Mardi Gras by Keith Loutit - it's amazing, it's actually hundreds of photographs spliced together that make everything look like stop-motion miniatures, really amazing stuff.

Mardi Gras from Keith Loutit on Vimeo.

Anyway, that's all for today, good afternoon, good evening and goodnight!

Thx

By the way...I just want to say thank you so so much to the people who ARE helping me right now, because I am extremely fucked up inside over this. Sometimes I wish I could break my leg to have an excuse to stay home every day, and I wish it would rain constantly and I could just listen to the Smiths and never do anything again....but you guys remind me there's a reason to just keep getting up every day.

Thank you.

Here's a kitten.

Fuck Monday

I'm having a really fucking hard time lately. I didn't sleep last night. Looking out the window periodically to see the sky becoming lighter makes me so upset. I broke up with my boyfriend last week, he has moved out of the house, and I still feel like it was the worst idea ever. Because I still love him so fucking much and I want to be with him all the time, but he doesn't feel the same about me. I guess you can call me an insane bitch, or high maintenance, or a harpy, or the crazy girlfriend like I know all his friends do, but I'm not apologising for expecting to be treated equally. Nutri-Grain is so fucking wrong. You do NOT get out what you put in. Sometimes you get nothing at all. And I can't deal with that anymore. I know you're reading this, and it's not for you, it's just because I wanted to get this out of my head.

A lot of people I know communicate to their "friends" through trading insults. I refuse to deign someone who hides their true feelings behind insults, with a response. If you want to be my friend, treat me as you would want to be treated, and I'll respond in kind. If you want to tell me constantly how terrible of a human being I am, how I'm just a "ball and chain", then you can't exactly expect me to continue being your friend for much longer.

There's a theory that you only have enough space in your life, enough memory, enough time, for 150 people. Some people have less. I feel like everywhere I turn, everyone I've ever wanted to be around, already has their full quota of people, and I'm not allowed in.

Well...fuck you all. I'm going to Vegas.

B-I-T-N-I-S

I may not be the most professional receptionist there is, but I'm kind of obsessive compulsive about portraying a professional manner towards clients. Perhaps clients feel differently towards us, as they're the ones paying us and can afford to do away with professionalism?
In my company I'm the lowliest staff member, but I'm also the first point of contact before you can get through to speaking to an engineer or manager. Because it's a given that all the engineers and managers are constantly busy, I will most likely 'lie' to you and say they are unable to take your call. If my company were a castle, I'd be the moat. If you are rude to me, you will drown in the mire.
I answer the phone as such: "XYZ Company, Zombietron speaking". Here is the part that most people never learnt. It's now your turn to say your name, what company you belong to, the general outline of what you need and who you wish to speak to. Was that so hard?
An appropriate response to "hello" is not "Bob please, now". Speaking monosyllabically is not going to get you very far. Telling me how urgent your problem is and how you need to be put through RIGHT NOW will not get you very far either. I can assess how urgent your problem is. Yelling at me because you made a mistake will not get you any assistance. Asking me if I am satisfied with my phone plan will not get you very far either.

The majority of my day is spent checking emails. I keep my Outlook open constantly, and not only do I check my own inbox, but most other staff member's as well. I'm basically a personal assistant to everyone, if that makes sense. As such, I have a few handy tips for how to compose a business email correctly.

• Use capital letters. And punctuation. And proper spelling. Jesus fucking Christ.
• Ensure you have an email signature. It's not rocket science. Usually, it's set up for you when you start working for a company.
• Learn the difference between a Subject line and a Message field. No really. This happens more often than you think.
• If someone sends you an email, generally the next step is to actually reply. I know that you received it.
• Start with Hello, end with Goodbye, Thank you, Cheers, ANYTHING. It's not hard.
• Keep in mind that text is not a great conveyor of emotions. So keep it bland and straight. I find that a lot of people's emails come across as extremely rude, mean, haughty and well, repulsive, when they were probably going for sarcasm. Or they could just be assholes.

These things can be incorporated into outside-work life too, to make interactions with people a little bit more polite and less straining. I guess the bottom line is, I don't want to be here as much as you, so let's make this all as painless as possible please?

Oh..I've joined Twitter. Mostly so a friend of mine and I can trade inane statements. Like about airplane food and those things on the end of your shoelaces. What is the deal? So if you wish, follow me.

Dear Gods of Fashion

Please banish skinny jeans to the realm of otherness.

They do not belong in this world, and they deceptively look like normal pants when I take them off the rack to purchase. Yes, I should be admonished for not trying pants on before I buy, and I repent. I just hate getting naked behind a curtain. And taking off my shoes.

One exception: Noel Fielding may continue to wear his drainpipes.

Please make all black items of clothing not fade in the wash.

Please stop making all my shirt side-seams twist around me. My torso does not twist sideways.

Please send to me a pair of jeans that fit perfectly without requiring taking up, or a belt.

Please stop making every women's shirt with stupid puffy shoulders and sleeves. It looks so dumb.

Please make capes fashionable again. Same goes for crochet dresses.

Please stop putting sequins and jewels on every item of clothing in Valleygirl. I'm not handwashing a fucking $10 shirt.

Please stop making women's shoes so goddamn uncomfortable. Please make flat-heeled knee-high boots more available to me.

Please make women's 'standard' sizes to fit normal people again. Not pre-pubescent twelve-year-olds. They are not women yet. I am a woman. And I am far from plus-size, so please don't try to tell me that I am.

Describe me

Because I love hearing about myself. Who doesn't?
Because my brother told me today:

"I miss you too Tashy...your fuzzy hair...your muffin-eating habits...your stupid dresses....the way you take insults like a sponge".

Yep. That's me exactly. Your turn!!

International Women's Day

International Women's Day was yesterday. I went in a fun run at Southbank that raised money for Chicks in Pink charity. It was 5kms long winding through the city and Botanic Gardens, which I'm sure would have been a really wonderful walk if it weren't for the fact that I was nursing a hangover of epic proportions, and with every step I had to fight to hold down my stomach which wanted to leap from its resting place up through my oesophagus and out, onto the ground in front of me.

It was neither fun, nor did I run. A more apt name would be Unpleasant Stroll. For charity.

I wanted to write something more about International Women's Day but then this morning I read this article about what the Vatican thinks of women and I pretty much just lost it. And then I remembered what my boyfriend said when I told him it was International Women's Day.

"Why don't men get a day?"

Because sweety, when you live in a patriarchy, EVERY DAY is Men's Day.

Happy International Women's Day for yesterday ladies. I hope you weren't as hungover as I was.

Wondering what her head would look like on a stick

The silicone chip inside her head gets switched to overload and nobody's gonna go to school today she's gonna make them stay at home. Daddy doesn't understand it, he always said she was good as gold. And he can see no reasons cause there are no reasons what reason do you need to be told?

I. really. don't. like. Mondays.

Sometimes I scare myself with the terrible things I think up inside my head. Well...that's not true. I'm not scared.
I was upset the other day to find that one of my old favourite websites - crimelibrary.com - had been changed into something WEIRD and DIFFERENT. What used to be a great website to while away the hours reading about serial killers is now something gaudy and tabloidy where the most-searched for articles on the front page are "Cheerleaders Gone Wild" and "Sordid Lesbian Affair Killer". Pah. The old articles are still there - but what has happened to murderers? They have changed with the culture where violence has become sexualised. Now, anyone can be a killer, big deal, you get angry, you get passionate, you take out a gun and shoot someone, then your lawyer gets you off on an insanity plea. Real original.

Where have the Ed Geins, Jeffrey Dahmers and Ted Bundys gone? I remember not sleeping after I first read each of their stories, just lying there trying to imagine how it was even possible for a person to continue doing the things they did, how can a brain just snap like that? I'm so fascinated by it, I've read their stories over and over again. I have books where the same crimes are thrashed out in the same words, yet I can't stop reading. They were the real walking nightmares, setting the bar high for human depravity. They truly strike fear into your heart.

I'm not frightened by cheerleaders gone wild. Come back Crime Library. Go away glitzy Crime TV.


Psycho killer...qu'est-ce que c'est......

coffee dreams

The cup is warm on my hands. I cradle it and smell the burnt aroma. The taste is bitter and it reminds me of her. Always her. Soul as black as the devil and as sweet as a stolen kiss. All the kisses she stole from me...I take another sip.
One more cup of coffee for the road.
One more cup of coffee before I go to the valley below.

Can't get you out of my head.

Sexsexsexsex

So...SEXPO! It was GREAT! Mum, please stop reading now. If you want.

I got all dolled up after work, went to meet my friends for some drinks beforehand and then we headed in. As you enter, sexy chicks in very few clothes and large muscled men also in very few clothes hand you a free DVD of porn and a magazine, so if you buy nothing else, at least you'll come away with something. I haven't watched/read either yet, but my friend Sharnee says it's just standard low-production-value girl-on-girl bore, so I might give it a miss. Anyone want some free porn?

Sexpo was held at the Southbank Convention Centre, so obviously it's freaking huge. To the left is a big stage and a few grandstand type seats surrounding it where they had strippers doing shows and whatnot - I didn't get much of a chance to watch, too many people packed in. To the right of the room at the far end there was a beach volleyball set up, the 'Laporium' lapdance area and also a little cordoned off room where a friend of mine played strip poker. And in the middle of all this were the STORES!
I would like to say "I saw things there I have never seen before"....but I'd be lying to you, because I've seen a lot. I didn't get to take any photos inside the event, sorry guys, but here's a photo of the stash I came away with, and me looking very happy with it.

Click to enlarge ;)

A lot of the stores had really great "showbag" deals - most for under $50. That's what I ended up purchasing - it contained that long purple vibrator to the right which is honestly the coolest thing I've ever seen...or used (it's self-penetrating), a vibrating cock ring, another cockring with a bullet and remote control, a pack of batteries, a squirt gun in the shape of a penis, a penis keyring, a cum towel and some fuzzy handcuffs - all for $50. Total bargain. The vibrator alone would usually cost something like $80 I'd say.
Also in the picture is the purple Rock Chick in the bottom left corner - I've been wanting one of these for AGES and yes, it's as good as they say. That cost me $100. You can get them on femplay.com for $116.95 - quick hit, femplay is actually quite a cheap Australian site with great (discreet) fast postage, you always get a free gift, and if you write a review for one of their toys like I did, you get a 10% discount next time you order!
The other two things I bought were that big metal pole with restraints on either side which I thought was way too cool to pass up - that was $30. And also just that blue bottle of toy cleaner (essential). So...I'm...well stocked for now.

As for the rest of the stores, there was a lot of the same thing around - lots of stores with same ol' cute costumes, LOTS of vibrators, lube everywhere. There was a huge range of prices vibrators though, everything from bargain- bin $10 ones all the way up to $300 chiq ones. I think it was Four Seasons that had a stall with just condoms, and strangely they didn't have much of a range from what I could see. Then there were the hardcore stores where you just stared open-mouthed at the giant black double-enders or the massive whips and things that you only see in your sexy sexy nightmares. Also, Pricasso was there, painting pictures with his ween.

The store that I couldn't stay away from though was called Merci Toys, and I've got a catalogue here that's so colourful and pretty and I wish you could see, but I just went to their website and it's entirely in Japanese. So if you can read Japanese or just wanna look at pretty pictures go HERE to check out their toys, my favourite of which seems to be a rip off of the fabled Hitachi Magic Wand. Now...I've never used one...but it's legendary. And Merci's rip off named the Fairy was pretty amazing. That's all I have to say about that.

Last but not least I'd like to round this post out by saying that I've become a voting member of the Australian Sex Party - Australia's newest political party. They are "for personal freedoms and sexual rights". You can have a read of their policies here, but definitely check out their whole site, it's pretty interesting. I know it's a fringe party at the moment but...I like it, hopefully it will grow to something awesome. And I got a free shirt that says I Love Sex. And seriously, who doesn't?

A simple rule

I was listening to a whole bunch of old music I haven't listened to in a long time...one of the songs being I'm Not In Love by 10cc. I guess I had never really listened to the lyrics before, because to me it was always a depressing, slow song to listen to when you feel jilted. Not so!

This song is all about a guy who makes a booty call to his ex girlfriend and forgets the One Simple Rule of booty calls. When one makes a booty call, one no longer has any rights to seem Not-Desperate. People seem to forget - relationships break up for a reason.

I'm not in love, so don't forget it
Its just a silly phase I'm going through
And just because I call you up
Dont get me wrong, dont think youve got it made.
Im not in love, no no!
Its because ...
I like to see you, but then again
That doesn't mean you mean that much to me
So if I call you, don't make a fuss
Don't tell your friends about the two of us
I'm not in love, no no!
It's because ...

Pshh what a douchebag! Calm, Cool, Collected = Not You.
Yeah yeah yeah I'm sure he's lying about it all to make himself feel better.
Sounds to me like he's one big emosogynist. My love for this song is now tainted.
In other news, how hot is Damon Albarn (see 0:35!).