Recovery From the Sunday of Oblivion

Went to a movie marathon in Carousel that went from 8:30pm Sunday night to 3:00am in the Monday morning after! It was heaps better than the one I went to last time with Coop and Luke because the three movies that we chose were all humour movies. I went with my long-time friends Michael and Matthew, my sister Krysia, Mike's school friend Palvinya and Matt's friend Vanessa to Carousel by train. We got to Carousel quite early even though Vanessa arrived late to the Matt and Mike's place where we planned to meet up at hours earlier. I decided to go with Matt and Mike to grab a bite to eat at the nearest HJ's whilst my sister Krysia, Palvinya and Vanessa ended up going to KFC for their evening meals and they ended up coming back to us and bringing their meal up to HJ's (where I was at with the twins)and the people working there didn't even notice! I was thinking, What the fuck!? We were making a lot of noise after Vanessa decided to into the kiddies playground and I decided to take a few mobile camera pics and everyone inside the restaurant kept on staring and giving us strange looks (we sat at the "outside" of the restaurant, by the way). By the time we got back to the Carousel cinema to grab our tickets we ran into another group of Mike and Matt's school friends accompanied by another of our long-time friends, Luke from primary school who we invited into our group and went into Leisure Island with and I spent all of my coin change for tokens because of my older sister's strange obsession with The Jungle Cruise machine thingy that moves coins around. After spending our coins on tokens, playing on other games and killing time, we proceeded to the purchasing of our snacks and tickets. We were quite lucky because by the time it reached 7-something, the line lengthened. I purchased the Star Wars "Darth Mix" M&M's whilst Mike brought popcorn (which we all scabbed off). The cinema workers created a "barrier" of which we all sat at the front in while waiting to be let loose into the theatres, Palvinya, not telling to a relative about the marathon had to leave us which was unfortunate because it wouldn't be much fun without her despite the people that we met and grouped up with. At last, 8:30 pm, all of the people including our group were let loose into the theatres assigned. We went to cinema 14 and watched Dukes of Hazzard, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Wedding Crashers of which all was entrertaining and good. We finished at 3:00 am on the next Monday where Mike, Matt, Krysia, Vanessa and myself went to recover at McDonalds where some idiot (of whom I have no name for) sits in a baby seat and wheels it around the restaurant at everybody's obvious annoyance. The idot with his group of friends take the equipment outside and trash it in the empty McDonalds carpark. After having breakfast, us four leave McDonalds for the Cannington trainstation at 6:30 am to leave for Armadale. After all that I still feel as awake as ever, with the only cons being oily skin, a dry mouth and my need for a coffee. I ended up catching some Z's at 7:30 when I got home with my sis after being picked up.

One Exam Down, One More To Go

I finished my Senior English exam yesterday and unfortunately I still have one more yto go which happens to be Interactive Media on Thursday. Right now I feel like I have a slight headache, my eyes feel sorta "puffy" and I think it must be the dreaded cold and flu epidemic coming back again. On other things the kid who was missing from our school was actually kidnapped and he was hidden in his own house for twenty days. So the search is finally over after all with two men responsible for the kidnapping of Blake Reynolds arrested, and I thought it was going to be like the man going through a mid-life crisis running off. Well, this proved me wrong.

Yaaaaaaaawn!

The exam weeks are upon us! I didn't post for a day or two because of my tinkering with linux and of course having to deal with the stresses that is of school (yes, I don't like the overall atmosphere of Kelmscott Senior High School). I have one exam; Senior English at Monday so that's ok, at least Mr. Maughan gave us the test papers of prac time (we were lucky on account of him not being there today for class too). All we did in the SE class was watch Remember the Titans, which is ok, although I'd rather be watching documentaries. School is getting rather sleepy and boring now that it's nearly at an end. I wonder how this year's Year elevens will cope with being Year twelves next year because I heard my Admin Sys teacher saying that they are the worst year group she has come across. I wonder how an acquaintance of mine is doing at the moment. I also watched the first episode of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex on SBS last night too, It is quite different to the movie that this series is spawned from, but I think the lead character is voiced by the same person which did Motoko Kusanagi's voice in the movie, Mary Elizabeth Mcglynn. I hope that SBS will feature the second part of the series entitled 2nd GIG too, that'll be awesome! :)

One More Week Before The Finishline

One more week to go and then I'm done with my work placement for my work experience. Well, not that I am particularly happy about it, because I will miss the crazy antics of Mike, Adam and Jason and their arguements. I still haven't finished most of my competencies yet but I'm sure I'll get them all done (the industry specific section, not the first section). I know that the exams are approaching for all of us and the majority of the Senior English class will have to re-sit the exam (including myself). Thank god the senile teacher of ours decided to do something and give us prac papers before the exam week hits us like a falling rock. I bet the exam questions will be the same type of questions but with different articles knowing how predictable the exams are in these cases. The end is drawing quite near for us year twelves now that everything is nearly over.

The Replacement Has Arrived

The replacement for the black Washburn guitar has finally arrived at the time-space of two weeks, yes! I hope the manufacturers come back for the crappy and defected one and pick it up. Sooner or later we all have to bid goodbye to the even more crappy and very out of tune Ibanez guitar and send it to it one of it's new homes; either Cash Converters or Ebay. The guitar of legend and "tuning anguish" will never be forgotten. As they say, out with the old and in with the new. But still the instrument isn't mine, I play a piano instead :)

A Day Already Past

Went to a salvage yard last Saturday with a relative and I felt like I was in my Malay grandmother's house all over again! There was a lot of those old-styled sewing machines everywhere which were still usable if it were refurbished. I was really interested in a wooden piano until I found out the thing had been gutted of it's contents. Outside the salvage yard at the front there was an old train carriage which was sold already. As I went out of the shop counter of the salvage yard I saw two teddy bears hanging from the celling; one was being threatened by a hanging pair of scissors and another was trapped by a fishing net of some sort. The salvage yard had a lot of old (possibly ancient) and weird things.

Mother Nature on a hissy fit?

Nothing for us but rain, wind and guess what? More rain. Maybe Mother Nature is trying to tell us stupid human beings something about the state of the planet at the moment, like global warming. Or maybe it's hurricane Katrina passing by to say a quick hello. I hope the violent hurricane isn't coming here.

Nathan Hobby - The Fur ~ First Impression

I'm up to the fourth chapter of the novel and I must say that I wasn't incorrect about the book touted to be similar to The Catcher in the Rye. The book focuses on Michael Sullivan who is living in the small country town of Collie. The novel is set in the year 1997 and it is being attacked by what is called "the fur" (hence the title) which is an infestation which began before the main character was born.

Differences to The Catcher in the Rye:

• The Fur is alot darker and bleak
• The character Michael Sullivan does not refer in first person; the point-of-view is in third-person
• The novel focuses on other subjects and things besides Michael and tends to focus them around him

Positive aspects of The Fur:

• For those who feel like something futuristic sounding but placed in modern times
• For those who liked The Catcher in the Rye and the Adrian Mole diaries but wanted something more mature-sounding
• A little bit of "show and tell" mixed in

Negative aspects of The Fur:

• Chapter 1 to Chapter 3 can be too slow-paced and "sleepy" for most people

Technical details of The Fur:

• Title: The Fur
• Author: Nathan Hobby
• Publisher: Fremantle Arts Centre Press
• Year Published: 2004
• Pages: 283 (excludes Aknowledgements and About the Author segment)

J.D Salinger - The Catcher in the Rye

I've finally finished The Catcher in the Rye by J.D Salinger. I started reading the book last Friday after seeing it and thinking if that book was the same one that the anime series Ghost in the Shell: SAC was referring to; turns out the book being referred is this one. The book documents the "adventures" of ex-student Holden Caulfield who has recently flunked Pencey. He travels to different places in New York and sees past friends, enemies and his younger sister along the way. The title of the book refers to the thing that Holden pictures; himself standing in a field of rye with children playing in the field. The field turns out to have a cliff at the edge which Holden says he will save the children from, thus preventing them from falling into adulthood and losing their innocence. The most prominent theme in this novel is growing up. This book turns out to be the one that will change one's perspective of the world if you ask me.
My Rating for The Catcher in the Rye: 5/5
This book here is touted to be similar:
The Fur by Nathan Hobby, winner of the 2003 TAG Hungerford Award

Strange Behaviour??

Something worth noting happened today during my second session revolving Steven and him having to chuck a trantrum and go hell-violent on Mrs. Paul, the SWBL session supervising teacher. I didn't hear much of what Steven was saying because he was trying to keep his voice down whilst talking to Kelley at the same time to prevent the teacher from hearing. A few moments after Mrs. Paul tries to get both Steven and Kelley quiet, boom! Steven ended up blowing up! I remembered distinctly that Steven told Mrs. Paul specifically to "Shut the fuck up!" and "Fuck you!" to boot and kicked one of the bins (the one near the whiteboard) to vent his anger and frustration for good measure before being sent to another teacher. I am friends with Steven but I have never, ever seen him explode like this. To tell the truth, I was scared witless because of that distinct change of personality *shivers* and the way he acted. I could feel an invisible blanket of silence settling in the room seconds after he left and everything was still and quiet. It is just me, or is something wicked coming our way for this year?

Interruptions, interruptions

During the whole school day many of our lessons are being interrupted because of the search for a lower school kid in our school who went missing. The teachers within the school (but mainly Mr. McAleer) was calling up other students in the office to question them about the said missing kid. I saw a bunch of people with one of those "search dogs" (a blue heeler possibly?) looking for the same kid around the Kelmscott train station because I thought the people were training the thing. I hope this doesn't happen to be a kid-styled ripoff of the missing adult with mid-life crisis who did nothing but say sorry after wasting a lot of resources and manpower just to find the guy.