taking a break

I am so tired of writing and researching, but only a little while now till the holidays. I want to find the pause button so I can take a break. The parcel man came to my house today and delivered me a present πŸ™‚ it was my threadless shirts from the $10 sale. I’m wearing one to uni today πŸ™‚

On Sunday, I just needed a break from sitting at the computer (which is something I find quite hard) and we were out of whole milk so I took a walk in the lovely May weather we are enjoying and went up to the local Aldi and picked up some milk πŸ™‚ As I walked home I took a moment to let my camera know that I do love it and that my neglect will not last forever. Here is to having one essay to edit, one to write, a presentation and five exams left for the semester! All of which will bring me one step closer to graduation.

These three photos are little snippets from thet “Streets of your(mine) Town”, the pot plants that have sat on this fence for as long as I can remember always glaringly white in the sun, the Bowls Club where Karl used to work and one of the bus stop signs on the street to our street. They recently changed all the bus stop signs, they used to be yellow and I like the old ones better.
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[audio:The Go-Betweens – Streets Of Your Town.mp3]

The Go-Betweens, a band from my town that recently became no more, when Grant McLennan died in his sleep. Streets of Your Town is one of their few songs that I know quite well and it always makes me think of this here town, Brisbane.

Streets of Your Town

Chorus
Round and round, up and down
Everyday I make my way
Through the streets of your town

Don’t the sun look good today?
But the rain is on its way
Watch the butcher shine his knives
And this town is full of battered wives.

Chorus

I ride your river under the bridge
I take your boat out to the reach
Cos I love that engine roar
but I still don’t hnow what I’m here for.

Chorus

they shut it down
they closed it down
they shut it down
they pulled it down.

Chorus

Threadless in Suburbia

threadless in suburbia I have known threadless rocks for the last couple of years now but only in the last month or so have I started to look at it more often and then actually made the jump and ordered two shirts. They arrived yesterday πŸ™‚

Here I am in shirt #1 – Suburbia. I just love how the letters are formed in the map of the roads πŸ™‚ Mum took this photo of me, standing in the middle of suburban Brisbane, which just happens to be on our street πŸ™‚

Shirt #2 will be photographed sometime in the near future when I can arrange styling I want for it πŸ™‚

One thing I love about the shirts is that they are a) relatively long because frankly I don’t want to show you my stomach and b) they have a nice neck. I hate t-shirts that have tight necks because I always feel like they are choking me.
There is a sale coming up soon so I plan on picking up a *few* more (I know Mum, you think I have enough shirts but it is not like I am spending money on sex, drugs or rock & roll, ok so maybe I do spend it on rock & roll but that is not the point).

For the next four weeks I have one essay due each week, so much *fun*!!! Back to essay writing now.

The Mountain Goats

Some bands you love because you can rock out to them, other bands you love because they let you indulge an inner persona when you dance round the room singing. Some bands you love for the ambience they provide, how they just melt into the background of what you are doing.However, there is small group of bands that you love on a whole other level. They are the ones where the songs reverberate through your soul, you smile/frown/cry/get angry/laugh at their songs. They are bands in which you feel connected to every other person at the gig, knowing that you are a select group of people taking part in something special. They are the bands that don’t need pyrotechnics, fancy lighting or 99 costume changes to make music. All they need is themselves and their instruments to create music that you can feel in the air. It’s music that tells a story, it’s what makes me live.

The very top of this list of this small group of bands for me is without a doubt The Mountain Goats.

The ‘Goats were incredible last night and as a matter of fact I even had a partner in crime last night, Karl’s friend from his Cisco days is currently in Aus doing the grand tour and last night came over for dinner. Discussion leads to what time I will be leaving for the concert, Scott enquires as to whom I am going to see. “The Mountain Goats”, I reply. Blah Blah Blah, turns out that when Scott was back home in NY at a NYE party a girl had told him if he had the chance to see The Mountain Goats, to go. Here he was in Brisbane, with his mate’s little sister raving on about The ‘Goats as well, so I ask him if he wants to check them out. Scott says he doesn’t want to intrude with my mates and I just say mate, I was going by myself anyway, come along so he did.

To cut a long story short, The Mountain Goats were incredible as they were when I saw them for my birthday last September and to make it better they will be back by January 2007! (I’m guessing that means they might be doing Big Day Out?) Rock on! And I have a shirt πŸ˜€

Giving you all what I know you want to see, the photos of course!

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πŸ™‚

Ali Rocks

There you go Ms Ali πŸ˜›

Today is Good Friday which means the start of a 4-day weekend here in Aus and the start of the mid-semester uni break for me πŸ™‚

To kick off the holidays, I had a sleepover at Ali’s last night where we spent the night singing(playing?) on Singstar and then scrapbooking except I had left my photos at home so I scammed a photo off Ali from when we went to The Whitlams last Novemeber. Lots of fun πŸ™‚ Then this morning we headed off to the Mt Cootha Botanical Gardens for a few hours of photographic fun before heading back to her house to do some more Singstar with Jack taking part this time. Lots of fun and I have to say Ali rocks Singstar pretty well. In all we probably did close to 4hrs of singing and I won 2 or 3 times lol.

Lots of fun, but then since we are both total dorks could we expect not to have fun????

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the sweetest day

The 6 5 things that make this day stellar.

1 – My new lens arrived – Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L USM

2 – a sweet little care package from my second mother, Tracy.

3 – Bought U2 tickets πŸ™‚ Andrea, Matthew and I are going to U2 πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

4 – Ben Lee is on Live at the Chapel tonight!

5 – Veronica Mars is on TV tonight, it premiered last week, sure it is slightly pointless but fun.

6 – Now that I have typed this out, I can’t recall the sixth thing πŸ™

Andrea has finished Uni!

Well actually all the Asian Studies girls bar me finished this year and we all passed our subjects with flying colours, I got two credits and two distinctions πŸ™‚

So Andrea had a happening shin dig at her place on saturday night. Drinks, Pizza, old friends, new friends, Midori and Kiwi fruit, cameras and of course who could not forget Mr Berg πŸ™‚ Go check out the photos

The party was the best I think I have ever gone too, small space, lots of talk, lots of drink, lots of laughs πŸ™‚ Love ya Andie πŸ™‚

Helen in all her craftiness is slowly making gifts to be given out and Andrea’s was the first to be completed so she got hers last night. The bag is made from denim and Japanese cotton, the pattern is based on Amy Butler’s Nappy Bag but a whole lot smaller and less pockets.

andrea's baginside

I also learnt how to free motion machine quilt on this bag, I used something like 3 or 4 bobbins doing the quilting on both sides of the bag.

quilting close up