Much greater

Back in early march I wrote a post titled Bilboards from Phillipians or something of the sort. In that I quoted multiple parts of Phillipians 2 in relation to life and I guess a bit of what I was struggling with. Today it seems a little if someone has realised things weren't quite clicking and actually wound the film on for me. Self realization is a curious thing. You can stuff around for ages trying to work out what the heck is up, explore multiple options and then suddenly when you aren't paying too much attention you get this faint idea (which is what I'm writing off at the moment oddly enough) and pray like mad that you'll at least get enough of a grip to hold what your touching. Graduates of Tabor College, for I am one of those, had their 'prayer and prophesy' day today. It started with a "time of worship" (inverted comma's indicating worship in singing style) and then we split up according the the number you got shoved at you when you walked in the door. They had various faculty people and others connected with the college praying for the graduating students, who aren't all yits'ers, and are open as the name suggests for prophesy stuff. This simply makes sense, as prayer is communication with God and I sort of see prophesy as being open to God in a certain way. Awkward explanation, but I think the majority of prophesy is not at all about future telling stuff but far more about the truths in life at the present time ie: Martin Luther King Jr. a prime example of a 'modern day prophet'. So I sat with Darryn who was only other YITS'er in my group and we caught up a bit as we waited as it was one of those groups that initially just let one person go at a time which was fairly stupid. Other groups had everyone praying. Anyway it was good because I did get to know Darryn a little last year as we had a few good conversations on those late night Wednesday youth-min classes. The couple doing the praying for group 2, were ancient, there's nothing at all wrong with that and I was quite impressed when they knew what I was talking about when I mentioned online stuff. I basically chatted to them for a bit so they knew what I was up to, and knew a little about me. Her name was Helen and for the life of me I can't remember his. It was a funny little introduction really, because I said my name was Rebecca and he's like, "Oh, I was reading about you just this morning" (Not that I have an Issac or anything unfortunately ;P) He rambled on a little about meditation and how important it was to keep in tune with God. OK 'in tune' is my wording and I don't intend to steal from the other day's phrasing, but so be it. So we're chatting and they end up praying for me after asking about some specific things. He talked a bit about direction, which I thought was fairly irrelevant and noted my 'busy brain' (:P) and said a bit about choices, where by I got the, "Well you're not married yet" thing which slightly startled me as it was said out of the blue :P (Hey *snort* there's hope yet! haha I'm not going to be a permenant single if I follow Rebecca logic lines of thought). Hellen mentioned perseverance and patience and definitely prayed about it. Either way it was sort of nice to have these two people with their attention on me and seeking God for me. It concluded a little with the guy talking in the way some old Christian men do in getting some verbal affirmation of what I believe, much I think as just a way of talking about God, I was doing the, "This is funny of course I believe, I'm at a Bible College for one." But later I realized how much I guess I appreciated that subtle but still verbal proclamation of what I do believe. Something that tripped me a little was when he asked something about sharing your faith and priorities of that. Its funny really. It very easy to do the Christian thing and forget all about it, which hardly seems right and it entirely stupid. I do think of things in slightly different terms now, as I've looked at evangelism and my view would be far more post-modern in the perception of, "What exactly is discipleship" in relation to their (age) very modern view. I think that I'm probably more pushed along the lines of discipling ie: more of, golly this is hard to explain, moving people along? than the direct, "Hi, this is Jesus Christ and I'm Rebecca" thing - which btw is a pretty crude way to put it. I guess I still need to keep tabs on that and think about it more. Like, I care about it, but it certainly hasn't been my focus in the way he worded it. The predominant thing that came out of talking with Mr. Davies and Hellen was the absolute necessity of God. It's sounds funny. But leaning into God as the most pertinent thing. This is something thats been hazy on my radar for quite a while, that is, not that it doesn't entirely happen, but I know something more needs to be done about the importance level. It was kind of nice to have a little jab in the side about it. I joined another group after that, when I realised what was going on :P This time it was far more 'groupish'. Prayed for several others, including Jess. John Capper and Marko were 'leading' this one. Very different. Brief chatting before hand. Prayer. More I guess on the encouragement side of things this time, Capper gave me the Phillipians verses (from ch.2) as an encouragement as I was changing places with Katie, as in, "You're doing this, keep on at it." kind of thing. John Capper is cool (and its not just because of his long weird grey beard) I sort of wish I might have had a few more conversations with him throughout last year. For me the morning was a good experience. Some I think less so, I know there were a few a bit confused about some things around prophesy stuff. Cheryl (College Principal) did have the gumption to talk about it Biblically briefly before hand, so I think they'll be right. The click came with the God priority level and the pointer at the Phillipians passage. Keep on. Keep on. Work out my salvation with fear and trembling. Do it, but do it in the knowledge of a God much greater than myself a God worth fearing, honoring. Lunch was at some conference centre thing. Few speeches. Lots of funny talk and stuff. Shared a table with Jess, Jane, Mark (luskie), Michael, Dan, Marko. Got prepped briefly on what's happening tomorrow - which is all the formal actual graduation stuff. Hung around late talking with Katie and Alice and Rowan and the others until the centre started using their speakers as a not so subtle hint to leave. I drove Jess, Sam and Darryn to Croydon so I could pick up my slides. All done, I am isanely happy with them, a few bodgies, but it's to be expected. Technically they were all okay, just a few asthetically not so suitable. I love my camera. Found the slide scanner at uni the other day, so I'll get some to show off shortly. Got a free new release rental when I recharged my phone. So Sam and I went back to my place and watched The Constant Gardenner. Brilliant movie! Talked a bit. And now I am here, my feet have dropped several degrees below body tempertature which means that it is probably time for bed. (Image by Modigliani)

The song

I'm really fairly zoned out with the whole tired thing, but I've blahhed the uni junk out (which I have been meaning to do for a while now) it was a pretty shoddy job but it's gotten the immediacy (that's really not a word) off the plate. I can't not mention Young Adults tonight. Peter isn't back yet from some conference so Ross and Andrew ran it. Woah what a fantastic evening. Had an 'activity' to get us talking about how we can describe God then watched the Rythym - Nooma video which, like other Nooma's was utterly fantastic. Then well over an hour of solid discussions around God. Questions and answers and theories and metaphors and ideas and concerns. I was slightly blown away with the feeling of this is how it should be. I confess some of it hit home pretty well as I've been battling with the 'knowing God' thing for a while now. Not so much with the head knowledge, I've got plenty of that - but with the um I guess heart kind of stuff. Whether it answered any questions I don't really know. If you throw yourself on a scale of being perfectly in tune with God in the middle you can sit either side with the head (almost Pharisee notion as I described it) on one side,

"There are people who talk as if they know everything about being a Christian and yet seem way out of tune."

and the all I'm just "in love" with God I don't really have the need to search it out more on the other side. Before you critique the scale, we already did VERY thoroughly, I'm just using it as my example. Anyway, if the scale was perfectly sound (which it isn't) I would and have definitely been a bit too far on the 'all knowing' end of things and been a bit stuck on moving right. See the diagram which I'm about to attempt to draw with keystrokes: ~head too much ----------------in tune -----------------heart too much~ In some ways imoho I think it's almost harder to see where to move from head to the middle than the other direction. The 'all heart' business is a concious descision to actually seek the knowing (tangible/theological) stuff and it's well - quite directional. I'm still at a bit of a loss, but in some ways this evening smoothed things out a bit more. We discussed for a long time the metaphor of a song for God. It's beautiful when you look at the possibilities and some of the things people had to share, but it is of course a metaphor and is thus restricted. I was very encouraged, despite being dead tired. This is how I like and I think small group stuff should work. I feel quite at home to speak up, despite it taking an age to formulate my thoughts into words (as it always does). I got to chat with Tim afterwards, this is Tim the outdoor ed. one not the IT one (or the blonde/loudish one as opposed to the dark/quieter one). I was quite amused at the whole thing really, we were talking mostly about how it went and I confess not a lot was sinking in as my head was so wrecked, I was doing my best. I really like when I can start picking out what kind of person I'm talking to, be it my throw back to my Myers Briggs freak phase or not. Anyway he said the word 'feel' about 5 times in a short period and then asked me something how I felt of things being done differently. I couldn't resist dropping in a quick line about how I think first not feel. Oh yes, I'll just amuse myself by playing with people's heads. I don't think he got it, but hey. And now my head has just about had it. So I think it's time to knock off and hopefully forget about the 8hrs of work I have to endure tomorrow.

Seven hours at uni

Wednesday as you might somehow know by now is my full load day. Today seemed to be overly focused (I nearly wrote 'phocused') on photography in some way shape or form. Normally I would love this, as to be entirely honest photography has been the stuff at uni I've enjoyed the most thus far. Still images was the 'intended' topic of the SIT tute (10-12pm) whereby we played around with digital cameras after doing a bit of talking. Yeah, not hard but kind of boring. Not slrs, just your average little happy snap cannon or whatever. I did take the photo on the left as my 'contribution' (ie: to show I was participating) which I was fairly pleased with, but a lot of it was just mucking around. I do like that tute though. People wise, might be interesting to note a few of the mentionables. Firstly Jen, as I hang out with her a fair bit as she is another Interactive Media student and also in my Digital Photography lecture. You can sort of see her in this photo here... no not really, I'll just leave it out. Anyway. We tend to hang around eachother. She's easy to talk to and I dare say I'll get to know her a fair bit more before the year is through. The other guy (hardehaha) we hang round a bit with is Guy. Not sure how that all worked originally. But again, easy person to talk to. Share's his chips ;P Really don't know why he tends to hang round us, but hey he does. (Photo is of Studio class, as you can see I did not take it as that is the side of my head. Jen is next to me and well there are other people in the background.) Also worth mentioning from here are; Justin, the mature age student (late 20's?) talks a fair bit, likes to answer stuff and I've had a few conv's with him around well erm multimedia type stuff. It's nice when someone approaches you and actually treats you as if you know something. Um, Muffaro - who was the South African guy (3rd yr) that had me laughing my face off first class, he's good value and Amilla, the Sri Lankan (I think :S) guy who smiles lots but doesn't talk much - I think he's only fairly recently come to Australia. So to bore you more to tears (let me show you the pain of 7 solid hours). The tute that follows is for Comparitive Imaging (digital photog). Where I hang out with Jeremy who I've mentioned before and Zoe who's a 3rd year Pro Writing student, she's super nice and always late :P The three hour Still Images class finds me with Rebecca and Adina. There are now 4 Rebecca's in that class of about 30. I shall probably hang around with Jerome's Bec, but she didn't make it today. I probably enjoy this interaction most as Bec's a really cheerful kind of person and Adina's pretty cool. But boy was that a long class this afternoon. At 'half time' about 80% of the class went and bought some kind of caffinated substance. I'm not kidding. Fantastic assignments though, so I can't complain. And no I'm not kidding. Taking photos is not a duty.

How are you? Oh you're gagging what's wrong?! argh!

You will notice the new design, if you haven't yet get off your rss feed and get in here! Thanks a billion John. Please let me know if anything still looks wrong - because it wasn't perfect for me at uni, but looks fine from home. check out My Friend the Chocolate Cake - bought their cd today. also saw Weather Man - I don't know what to think, but I came out slightly depressed. I picked up the Purpose Driven Life where I'd left off about a month ago. I seem to read it when I'm severely lacking inspiration and it sometimes turns out to be oddly relevant. It also drives me slightly insane and I end up spending a lot of time talking in my head or scowling at the things that happen to be annoying me at that present moment. Or at least thats what it did last night. Chapter 18, centred around Galatians 6:2

"Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ."

And it was a bit like, Bah yeah right I really don't want to do that right now. I just got off the computer because I'm sick of hearing about people's issues because sometimes they should just deal with them and things aren't so bad and some of them are genuine and quite bad but sometimes I'd rather not know, sometimes I'm just worn out. I really don't want to have to ask or even hear the "How are you?" question at the moment. It's such a shallow courtesy. I'd like a bit of genuine.

Not another one

Well it happened and I'm minutely thrilled about it. Talk about an easy assignment. Studio this morning was on *drum roll* Blogging! And so we have to set one up and keep one going. I intend to give it a distinctly uni/studio/showcase work flavour to avoid doubling up as much as possible and burning up even more of my scarce time. I had to steer away from blogger to a wordpress one but who doesn't like new things to play with! It seems however fairly similar, except if I want to customise my own template, well that has to be emailed to the guy who's running the show. Regardless of waffle or toast or whatever else you had for breakfast, you can find it here: www.rebecca.studioblogs.net

Productive

I love sleep-ins that work! Assignment 1 for SIT submitted. A Resume/Coverletter thing that will slowly expand through the semester. Meant to be done electronically but I'll be blowed if they have actually set that up correctly because I have searched everywhere. I found coversheets, I logged into numerous other parts of the Deakin website but NO, such a thing does not exist for that unit! So she gets it by email and a hard copy on Wednesday. Stupid uni. One piddly little lecture today requiring my attendance but not necessarily my attention, maybe this time he'll be able to get the technology working properly. Then the treck back to Croydon to put my slides in. I really want to get this lot back, I'm hoping they'll work. Photography is such a cool medium. Which reminds me I have to locate the slide scanner at uni so that I can actually show off a few. Lets see, I also got off my butt and wrote an email to a group of people that need a good shove to get off their butts. Team work is frustrating at times. At least this makes me look like I'm doing something. I should have also cleaned my room as it is chaotic, alas I didn't quite get that far. New blog design could be up by tonight, John willing. He complained when he saw how 'simple' it was going to be after I gave him a mock up. We shall see what wonders he can work. Jess should be here in about 10 minutes so I'd better scram. Here goes another Monday.

Four things

I don't think I've done this before. If so then um, happy second time round: Four jobs that I've had 1. Something I vaguely remember to do with emails, and people sending and needing them in villages and putting them on disks and posting them out etc. 2. Kitchen work/serving up at ADANAC campsite, got to live onsite for two weeks away from home was brilliant. 3. Managed Business Outcomes, I did admin and reception there last year 4. Dymocks, this is current. Bookshop Four movies I can watch over and over 1. Amelie 2. Little Women :P 3. Pride and Prejudice 4. um... Gattaca Four places I have lived 1. Victoria 2. Papua New Guinea 3. Auki - Malaita, Solomon Islands 4. Honiara - Guadalcanal, Solomon Islands Four TV shows I like to watch 1. The Amazing Race 2. Survivor (sometimes) 3. The News (sometimes) 4. Any good movie that happens to be on Four foods that I like 1. Mum's stew 2. Chicken schnitzel (drenched in lemon juice) 3. Chicken and Broccli casserole 4. Dutch croquets Four websites I visit daily 1. Gush 2. Bloglines (which means ALL the blogs I follow - I'm up to about 50, should I be concerned?) 3. Blogger Dashboard (how else do you get these posts!) 4. Bible Gateway/Dictonary/Deakin email Four things I want to do before I die 1. Get married and probably do the family thing 2. Travel to Europe 3. Go back to the Solomons 4. Maybe write something that gets published (beyond just online)

Local

I think this makes number 2 post for tonight, and yeah there will be a number three but a 'boring' filler - which I sometimes amuse myself with and it's one floating around at the moment. First though, today (as all you strange readers seem to not mind them). I'll endeavor to make it interesting. Drove myself and Emily to church, while Mum took Laura to work and eventually made it back with Hannah who was with her. Church was alright. The sermon was on prayer and 95% was okay but there was something that sent critical spasms into my mind - just the way they went about things. Sometimes I would like to smash my head repeatedly and so kill off the offending cells. Before church actually started. I wandered over to where Bec and Jerome (Dan's friends who are new to YVV) were standing looking rather lost. I got talking to Bec and it turns out she is at Deakin and IN MY FLIPPING PHOTOGRAPHY TUTE! I can't believe that I didn't realise, I have met her once before. This is brilliant. A) she's an extravert which makes things REALLY easy for me. B) she's a Christian, which although is not crucial to uni survival or friendships, is still rather nice and C)I have other contact with her outside of uni which means a better kind of freindship. Bec is also in Jess and Isobelle's drama class and one of Jess' screen practice lectures. Funny world. The young adults did their every second week social thing. We ended up having lunch all together down at the local pub. I've never been there before - wasn't too bad. Food was alright. Company was better though. Poor Laura missed out, that'll teach her for working on Sundays. Jess, Dan (bongos), Dan (YITS), Bec and maybe Jerome and I are off to see a movie on Tuesday night. No idea what we'll see but should be good. I drove back to Jess's to pick up my camera and my thongs. Drove home. Drove - I like that word now that I can use it within the context of my own name :D New blog design should be up soon. John is being superbly nice and giving me some pointers on the coding side of things (unless I can just hoodwink him in to doing it all). The current one I've decided is horrible. Tell me, how have you put up with it for so long?!

Lark

An odd introduction to a band back sometime last year. I might not have noticed them or decided I like them otherwise, something was played in class, I scrawled the artist name in my notebook and remembered it months later. David Crowder Band. Their stuff's a bit unusual. Some of it I actually don't like too much, but the majority of it grows on you and becomes excellent to the point of, "I'm insanely curious to hear more of it". There is a song title at the end of the Beautiful Collision CD that refers to a poem by George Meredith, below is a shortened version, you can click here for the full.

A Lark Ascending He rises and begins to round, He drops the silver chain of sound, Of many links without a break, In chirrup, whistle, slur and shake. For singing till his heaven fills, ‘Tis love of earth that he instils, And ever winging up and up, Our valley is his golden cup And he the wine which overflows to lift us with him as he goes. Till lost on his aerial rings In light, and then the fancy sings.

"There's sky and there's ground and somewhere in between we live." - David Crowder There is an explanation I found about the secondary title of the CD, (3+4=7):

"You see, when these two symbols, 3 and 4, are inserted into a mathematical proposition of addition, the sum of them is 7. This numerical representation has the obvious implications of quantity or amount or measure but it also is a signifier of perfection. It, as a symbol, is symbolic of ‘numerical value’ but also of ‘good.’ It has biblical signification, one of my favorites being 7 days to create the earth, the seventh day for rest. We have culturally set aside the seventh day of the week for our corporate worship. The number 3 holds similar significance, it being symbolic of the divine; the three in one, while 4 has often been figurative of humanity. It is the collision of the two, divinity and depravity, that meet in the number 7. I believe art aspires to this. When it happens it is a moment of the divine stepping into our human experience. It is our ascending. It is his descending. It is a collision of the earthly with the heavenly. It is what often happens in moments of the corporate worship experience that in some mysterious way seems to transcend our common everyday experience. It is the divine and the depraved interacting and it seems our feet lift from the ground for a second. We rise from our condition. When our depravity meets his divinity it is a beautiful collision.' - David Crowder

The lark is an interesting picture of who it is to be born of God and that brilliantly sharp point of living worship or if you'd like to call it such, living life. I sincerely doubt we live up to this reaching, this focus upon God. Here's where the 'depravity' part fits in. It is something I am far too familiar with. It invites disappointment despite it being fudamentally easier. It is far simpler to just go about daily tasks, be they study, social, work or even church. None of it has to mean anything. We slide beautifully into autopilot. God is there but God does not mean a whole lot. We talk at God, but not with God. We talk about all manner of things theological and entirely miss the God behind it. We find relationships as crucial and love as the centre of life and sideline the creator, the instigator and the model of perfection in this area. It is what counts. The trinitarian God I think really wants us in the centre of this threefold paradox. Love. They say, "Love from the centre of your being." Taking the lesson from Meredith's lark; His voice the outlet, there to live Renew’d in endless notes of glee, So thirsty of his voice is he, For all to hear and all to know That he is joy, awake, aglow, The tumult of the heart to hear. We could all use a little renewal sometimes. A little shove, a reminder on who God is and who we are and just how amazed we should be that he even bothered with us in the first place and in this amazement make a priority shift back to the Creator.

Comment

It makes me very sad when I can watch statistics and I do get quite a few visitors if not regulars, and I don't get any comments. Here's where I smile with my eyes closed, somewhat like some cat off Aristorcats, and hold out my hands and wait for constant interaction to begin and continue. What kind of stuff do you like best to read? Random 'about my day' thing can't surely be that interesting.

Spiders and eggs and other such nasties

Call this anything you like, but procrastion is probably what fits best. Yesterday afternoon found me with Mum at Chateau Yerring. We had afternoon tea and then she was superbly nice and followed me round listing whatever I yelled out to her... I was taking photos for my, "The Formal Vision" assignment. Beautiful out there and if the photos work I shall be pretty pleased. Of course today when I go to drop off the film, the camera house is closed. What a waste to come the long way home for nothing. Jess's party was small but rather good. A police car was extremely annoying and followed me all the way to her place. Got to catch up with Jo, Alecia and Elyce as well as a few of the others I see normally. Katie (if you read this) your invite to your party via email never made it to me, I don't think you are being a cow because you are too nice and I have 'other' emails missing :S Jo let me know where it was, but I can't make it :( I am a bit cranky about all this very not impressed at gmail or kastanet or whatever! Happy Birthday anyway. So we sat around and cooked dinner in these small pan things - not sure what you call them. Watched the new Pride and Prejudice (which I still REALLY like even though the old one has it's firm place) Elizabeth Bennet is the worlds greatest character aside from equalling Jo March. If you are watching the dvd - which you should as videos SHOULD NOT AND SHOULD HAVE NEVER EXISTED, you can try the alterante ending. I suggest quite strongly that you don't as it is *gag* material and thoroughly ruins it. The others chose to watch Crash after that - oh did I mention the extremely fine raspberries I ate for dessert? So I half dozed half watched. At about 1:30am (Jess had gone to bed, as had Isobelle). Sam turns on the light to attempt to find this stick insect that was crawling across the screen, "In order that someone wont swallow it in their sleep", instead Laura spots this fantastic specimen of a spider up on the wall. So hushed shreiks and 'arghs' ensue. I think I was the least worried and was quite prepared to stay where I was half asleep. It was too high to kill. There was great discussion about 'not sleeping in that room' and where should we go? And to quote Laura, "I might just be paranoid, but is that another one?". More squealling of a kind. It was pale and even bigger. Downright refusal to stay there was made by everyone except me, and they started clearing the back room entirely of junk in order to fit all the beds. We made the jigsaw work evenutally, with Laura in Jess's room (who was fast asleep and knew nothing). I was lying in bed for about ten minutes when I thought of something and nearly gave myself away before I'd had a chance by laughing - great things coughs are. Another half minute or so and I had estimated where Sam's arm was. I reached over and touched her ever so lightly. The reaction was entirely worth the risk. She gave this massive gasp and I cracked up laughing, which when she realised had her laughing a little traumatically and Alecia and Jo laughing. Watched some Arrested Development (oh, yeah did I mention that Jess LOVES movies and such obsessively?) over breakfast. Then when I went out to the car, I made the beautiful discovery that someone had egged my (well Mum and Dad's) car . Took a while to clean the stinking mess off the windscreen - it was not a pleasant drive home. And I really should stop putting off writing that assignment...

Still Thursday

I intend to give you (and myself) some time tonight. Which means I would like to write half a decent blog - but I'm not sure on what yet. I feel this need to make myself think about something. Three stars for vagueness. If you EVER have any suggestions for 'what should bec blog on' please email me at rebecca.mylastname@gmail.com if you don't know my last name or can't spell it, just leave a comment somewhere (Do subsitute my actual last name in place of mylastname, I don't think you are that stupid but just in case there's the odd blonde floating around ;) I would LOVE to get suggestions as I'm sure your brain is entirely non-linked to mine and thus might come up with some left field possibilities. This is not a guarantee that I will post on what you send my way, but I'll have a shot at the interesting ones and keep a file of the others. *crosses fingers for LOTS of unique suggestions* Worked from 8:45-5pm. Met a clean cut Dave for lunch, well I ate lunch and then we wandered randomly into Kmart for a bit. I didn't recognise him at first, ach the shame! His hair was cut (good Dave) and back to a dark brown... if it ever even was that, I've lost track. I'm always pleased at how Dave and I just seem to get along fine and dandy even if we haven't seen eachother in ages. Some people are just simply cool like that. He's working heaps more because of changed circumstances re: uni so I dare say I'll see him round a bit more. I tried to get him to choose to graduate - he's still not sure and proably wont. Silly boy. (Hi Dave if you even still read this!) The message I passed on yesterday or the day before via phone to work unfortunately didn't quite get through properly. Mel had me rostered from 5-10:15 tomorrow again. I told her I wasn't coming because that's what I said. So I wont. I think she sort of gets it - she did vaguely remember. Which means. I CAN SLEEP IN TOMORROW!!!! A day to recover from how I've somehow been pushing myself. Plans are thus: sleep-in, do homework for assignment due Monday, afternoon tea with Mum at Chateu Yerring so I can take my next 'photo' assignment out to somewhere interesting (Pray for good light), go to Jess's at 6:30 for her party and then choice a)sleepover and get to work at 12pm OR b)go home late and get to work at 12pm. Wow oh wow, it's still only Thursday!

Hour or seven

Wednesdays happen to be very unfortunate. Out of all the classes I have at uni "the almost" 3 best sit back to back. I have solid classes from 10-5pm. This excludes the occasion of getting out fractionally early and the 10 minute lee way you have to sprint (ok thats a major exaggeration) between buildings that are pretty much next to eachother, or simply up one flight of stairs. The problem is, by the time I hit about 3 o'clock - which is the start of a three hour workshop for still images (thats the analog photography thing) I am fairly stuffed, just from sitting on my butt for four hours. Or in this mornings case, wandering around with sound recording equipment "playing" followed by the building shift to watch a good 115 minutes of other people showing the class their artistic and technical capabilities. I show my assignment, you show your assignment. We all learn. Somehow. I like still imaging I really do. I think having assignments where you are basically given a 'shot list' and freedom to go snap (or wind and push a button down after you have checked the ISO and the apeture and shutterspeed and compensation) whatever you so desire within a few minimal constraints plus no written explaination constitues less of an assignment and more of a good excuse to have a heck of a lot of fun. Yes the lecturer/tutor person guy thing looks like the spirit fingers guy off Bring It On (thanks Rebecca (other one) for that insight) but he's fairly amusing. So I like the class, I just don't like being half dead and half starved for it. I might have mentioned one time before that I used to be a bit hypoglycemic when I was younger - ie: search for symptoms on Google (Don't know where that is? Find that link on google). Basically it means if I didn't eat or eat at odd hours I get a bit shaky. Something to do with low blood sugar. No idea why I originally got it, I think Mum used to get it when she was younger. It now doesn't happen that often, but due to very late lunch or patchy lunches here and there when I can grab a spare few minutes I can tell it still lurks. This is annoying. So this afternoon after about 5hrs of straight classes I got to present my slides, along with about 7 other people and I'm pleased to report (if it doesn't sound like I have a big head) that he found nothing wrong with them, despite the fact that my one portrait (shape, not person) image was put sideways into the slide projector which is entirely his fault as I put it in correctly and he pulled out some wrong ones by mistake, found it and put it back in without looking. 2 hours earlier I presented my photoshop excercise. 4 images. Kitchen object on table. Normal photograph, Contrast/Colour altered photograph, Isolated object from background and Synthetic background that you your fine self with your fine talents whoever you happened to be even if you treated Photoshop like Paint, had created. Another easy assignment. Oh yeah did I mention the difficulty of the 300 words I had to write on, "Which was most like the original object?" Artistic explanation is the worlds greatest means of hoodwinking the common person (or tutor). Creativity in your words, describes exactly why that splattering of brown is where it is and why it is perfectly acceptable and 'actually quite good'. Oh yes, and after 7hrs of classes (are you following this chopping across my day?) I show my camera to Kim - the lecturer/tutor still photography guy. He asks where I got it. "Cash Convertors". Then offers me $50 for it - roughly what I paid. I said No... in my head. I think I actualy just smiled at him. Then says he think it is his old camera and it's a good camera. How that for going and buying something I didn't have a clue about! Got a third of the way home and Jess realises that her phone must still be in the uni library. We go back. I find it next to a computer. Poor girl, it's her birthday. Some painfully slow traffic. Make it to Sofias where she picks up her birthday dinner (why?!), I get some gelati as Im extremely thirsty and have run out of water and could justify spending the $2 I was going to but didn't spend earlier. Make it to her place. I drive home. I have tea. I drive back to Jess's with Laura and we watch some of series 2 of Arrested Development and some of Farenheit 9/11. And now I am back home, lamenting the fact I can't get on to Centrelink tomorrow - guess who forgot to report again! as I have to work from 8:45am-5:00pm. I am impressed. They'll be impressed. I think they have a file on me. How many times I have to call them up because I've forgotten. Please read all the above with a good idea of what exactly is sarcastic tone. I'm actually in quite a good mood. I just need a sleep in that reaches beyond 8:30(am or pm, your choice). I need to go to bed before 9pm before I hit 20 - which is soon, or I think I will retreat to the back corner of Dymocks and find a spot amongst the dictonaries and dream of long words and definitions.

140 dB

If you were enthralled with physics and sound you'd know exactly what I was talking about when I title a blog post 140 dB. For the rest of us, it refers to what sound engineers, (Or other freaks, I mean people) call the threshold of pain. This is a slight overexaggeration on behalf of a tedious 2hr lecture on sound. I had already dubbed the lecture room 'that which has strange noises', this time they were at least entirely intentional. An email from Penelope (the SIT that is Principles of Interactive Media, lecturer) informed us of the benefits of coming to hear this 'pro'. Two hours of watching him explain something he didn't explain well enough for complete naive to sound everything - except the use of ears, was quite enough. The explanation might have been fractionally interesting except that it was accompanied by multiple demonstrations of unbearable tone, frequency, pitch, purity, noise, harmony and brightness. Which shovelled simply more noise upon an already impending headache. There was some truth in part of what was shared. The start of a sound event (whatever the heck that happens to be) is called an attack, the end of a sound event is called the decay. This describes what it was like perfectly.

Trespassing the day

The Mellows came for dinner tonight. I love spending time with them. I like laughing my face off. Shannon bumped me on msn really briefly:

"hey bec...great to read your e-mail last week! Fantastic to hear what you have been up to -- sounds like some exciting things have been happening in your life and that God has blessed you with a great new church"

...the last line has me seriously confused. She isn't a Christian - last I knew. I know her best friend is???? What's going on there? Is she just saying it? Caught up with Sam around 3pm this afternoon. We wandered up to Morrisons. Had a good catch up. Decided I'd attempt a bit more face to face candidity (is that a word?). Tried to explain something thats be running through my head a bit lately. Maybe I got there. We theorised for a bit, paid and went next door to the Library which was open for once. I was looking for some photography books but they had about 3 and all crap ones. I came home with a book on body language - one I've eyed off in Dymocks. I also looked for the second book in the Number One Ladies Detective Agency books but no such luck. Car is down at my Uncle Arnie's (Anthony's)factory, who is kindly going to work on some stuff. Dad discovered something this morning. The speedo on my car doesn't work when it's cold. This is quite funny, bit annoying, it can be replaced fairly cheaply but just another little thing. Of the list for the roadworthy, Dad's fairly convinced that most will be fine when it's given a proper clean up so shouldn't actually cost me that much money. Dad leaves AUS at some horribly early hour. He's in the Solomons for two weeks. Misses my graduation and gets back just in time for my (and Laura's) birthday. No we don't get up early to say goodbye, that's done the night before. I've been to the airport more times than I can count. Sometimes it's a friendly place, but on the whole I'd rather avoid it. I had today off uni, due to my one lecture being cancelled this week. It gave me some time to finish a few things off homework wise - which has been very minimal really. I have a class on 'sound' sometime tomorrow and an assignment on that sometime in a few weeks - not so pleased about that as I haven't ever bothered learning anything about sound files or audio editing etc. to be honest it really doesn't interest me in the slightest. And that'll do for now because I've run out of things to say, and I'm sorry I haven't given you a theoretical one for a while but things go as they go, theoretical takes time.. and I want to get back to the Body Language book. It's really quite interesting.

temporary post

go have a look at commonweath games post now to see photos

Something

Psalm 44 1 We have heard with our ears, O God; our fathers have told us what you did in their days, in days long ago. 2 With your hand you drove out the nations and planted our fathers; you crushed the peoples and made our fathers flourish. 3 It was not by their sword that they won the land, nor did their arm bring them victory; it was your right hand, your arm, and the light of your face, for you loved them. 4 You are my King and my God, who decrees [b] victories for Jacob. 5 Through you we push back our enemies; through your name we trample our foes. 6 I do not trust in my bow, my sword does not bring me victory; 7 but you give us victory over our enemies, you put our adversaries to shame. 8 In God we make our boast all day long, and we will praise your name forever. Selah 9 But now you have rejected and humbled us; you no longer go out with our armies. 10 You made us retreat before the enemy, and our adversaries have plundered us. 11 You gave us up to be devoured like sheep and have scattered us among the nations. 12 You sold your people for a pittance, gaining nothing from their sale. 13 You have made us a reproach to our neighbors, the scorn and derision of those around us. 14 You have made us a byword among the nations; the peoples shake their heads at us. 15 My disgrace is before me all day long, and my face is covered with shame 16 at the taunts of those who reproach and revile me, because of the enemy, who is bent on revenge. 17 All this happened to us, though we had not forgotten you or been false to your covenant. 18 Our hearts had not turned back; our feet had not strayed from your path. 19 But you crushed us and made us a haunt for jackals and covered us over with deep darkness. 20 If we had forgotten the name of our God or spread out our hands to a foreign god, 21 would not God have discovered it, since he knows the secrets of the heart? 22 Yet for your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered. 23 Awake, O Lord! Why do you sleep? Rouse yourself! Do not reject us forever. 24 Why do you hide your face and forget our misery and oppression? 25 We are brought down to the dust; our bodies cling to the ground. 26 Rise up and help us; redeem us because of your unfailing love.

Commonwealth?

There was a brilliant article in yesterday's Herald Sun about three Solomon Islands Triathletes. Despite being rather Australian if push came to shove, I'd go for the SIslanders any day. I cannot find the article online anywhere, so you'll have to contend with this pathetic substitute.

A year ago, the only three triathletes in the Solomon Islands couldn't swim properly. On Saturday, they completed the Commonwealth Games championship course - albeit in the last three places. Stanley Ofasasili, Wilfred Bosa, and Marcus Farau were trained by volunteer coach Ross Andrewartha, an Australian expatriate. "The islanders are naturally great in the water and they'll never drown - but they couldn't swim,'' said Andrewartha. Conditions in Melbourne were in stark contrast to the Solomons - there, the three run in bare feet over gravel roads, ride decades-old bikes and swim in the ocean on a course marked out by beach balls wrapped in orange plastic. Cheered on by the crowd, Ofasasili finished 30th in the 32-man event - almost 39 minutes behind champion Bradley Kahlefeldt of Australia, who clocked 1 hour, 29 minutes 16.33 seconds. After crossing the line, Ofasasili hugged Andrewartha and exclaimed "I finished!'' Farau finished 31st and Bosa was last in 2:36:15.71...

I think in a way I am quite proud that they actually had the guts to get out there. Honestly the last article was so much better. They came with no sponsorship pretty much, one guy was practicing on a 25 year old bike. Doesn't suprise me. The article also mentioned how the Solomons was the poorest nation in the Pacific. I am again not surprised as I'm fairly sure the nation is in massive debt. It calls into question "Commonwealth" really. Sponsorship for three guys is a very small ask. aside from all that.... last night: It was most excellent. Facinating and I was mightily pleased I had my mp3 (that is radio) with me, so I got commentry - which was more than what the others got. Hannah and Laura fought it out over the spare headphone which I was nice enough to share. So Rod Laver. Artistic Gymnastics turns out to be all the apparatus, which was great. We had excellent seats, closest to the beam and vault. Floor was easy to see, the bars were a little further away.

Everything runs simultaneously so its very interesting. The Aussie girls wore bright pink so they were easy to spot and between the two of them they managed to score a Gold and a Bronze. So many falls and it came to a tight finish with Chloe Sims (AUS) and Elyse Hoppner-Hibbs (CAN) with the exact same score. Some tie breaker rule, sealed their fate in Australia's favor. Exciting evening. Very different. The city was very alive and very busy. Worth my time. Excellent experience.

Breaking news

Before I do any explanation whatsoever about last night, important news must be shared. I have a car! A 1986 Corolla CSX hatch (seca? however you spell that). For $900. Of a guy needing to get rid of it fast as going overseas. Needs a little work. No roadworthy, no rego and done a lot of km's. But otherwise in pretty good shape. I wont be driving it for a while as Dad's heading off overseas. My uncle has kindly volunteered to put it in his factory and get it all up to scratch so should be minimal $'s. The car was originally priced at $2000 (with Rego) and without was dropping to $1500... but then Dad did his negoitating which didn't really take much. He should've asked for $800 :P I don't think the guy knew too much about cars he seemed like a decent kind of guy though. So it's a bit of a bomb :P It was always going to be. It has got power steering. Hasn't got fantastic guts, but it'll get me from A to B when it's roadworthy. This is very good. oh, and the all important colour info: RED and no I don't have a photo for you yet.

Spoil sport

Turns out I was wrong. First I should learn how to spell: Aerial, Arial is a font and place name... but that's what laziness allows for - I knew it was wrong all along. Honest! Aerial Gynastics to my knowledge does not exist as its own sport. which means tonight I am actually seeing: Artistic Gymnastics. I can't remember who told me otherwise in the first place. Bah to them. This may mean people thinking that they have to be somewhat qualified to swirl ribbons around... and have people enthralled enough to bother going to see them swirl ribbons. (I think there will probably actually be some pretty cool stuff but for the sake of the rant we'll just ignore all that). I find this quite funny. Aerial Gymnastics sounds far more exciting. Perhaps I should invent my own sport? Experience matters right?

Stranger words

I really enjoy curious ways of meeting people. Today's episode was no exception. I had 10 minutes before work started at 5pm. So I grabbed a choc hot cross bun from the bakery as I was heading up and found a seat near some food place downstairs from work. I was there about two minutes and this Asian girl comes up to me, "Can you help me?". She has a workbook with a fairly basic crossword and is pointing out the ones she needs. It turns out that it's her son's homework that she's helping him with. She didn't look that old, early-mid twenties. Her english was passable but not fantastic. So we end up doing some of the crossword which was mostly done and some word fill in the blank things. Weird bonding moment with a stranger. I got her name just as I left. Michelle. She works at the asian food place right near where I was sitting. I hope I can remember her face so I can say hello sometime.

Beautiful Pretty

A couple of days ago I had a brief discussion with a friend about attractiveness.

"It's pretty difficult to be unattractive, that equates with repulsion."

And I asked, "Do you think then that we are programed to see 'attractive' a certain way?" I've been thinking about beauty and attractiveness a bit as I have stumbled across a couple of articles and have been doing a bit of digging. One being A Christian Vision of Beauty (Parts 1, 2, 3)by Albert Mohler. At one stage Mohler quotes Augustine and then goes on a little to explain it:

"It was you then, O Lord, who made them. You who are beautiful, for they too are beautiful. You who are good, for they too are good. You who are, for they too are. But they are not beautiful and good as you are beautiful and good. Nor do they have their being as you the Creator have your being. In comparison with you, they have neither beauty nor goodness nor being at all." Augustine realizes that in order to see true beauty, he has to go to his Creator, and then, knowing the Creator, he may observe the creation and see that it does indeed bear the mark of its Maker. There is undeniable beauty in creation, but in comparison with the infinite beauty of the Creator, such finite beauty no longer has the seductive allure it once had. All earthly beauty is simultaneously validated and relativized by the contemplation of the beauty of God.

I wonder now if this person and I were having a conversation on two different planes. The attractiveness that I was refering to was around simply that, being pretty/handsome and his perhaps slanting more towards what is often refered to as, true beauty. Of course, it could just be a gender perspective thing. Do all males really find all females attractive in one way or another? I can and don't have difficulty the majority of the time seeing 'the beauty' in people. A good lot of my thought time on public transport often drifts that direction. People's faces facinate me and it is rare, although I confess that it has happened, that I just can't see something curious, beautiful, facinating, unusual or attractive.

"Faced with the sacredness of life and of the human person...wonder is the only appropriate attitude." - Pope John Paul II

Humanity is beautiful. What I want to know is what makes one person prettier than the other? What induces females (and maybe males) to continue their subconcious or even very concious, I am x along the scale of attractiveness in relation to her/him. What defines what is pretty or not? We can be dictated by the latest trends, by the media, by peers. It really irritates me that the media always has to come into this kind of discussion but unfortuntely I suppose it does play a rather large part. We are so obsessed with our looks. I was deeply concerned the other day when I watched a 9 or 10 year old girl who was opposite me on the train. She had an innocent little face. Her hair was boy short, she had a pair of massive silver dangly earings on - suitable for the evening wear of a 30 something year old. She spent the whole time admiring herself in the window reflection, preening when she thought no one was watching. Poking her hair behind her ears, pursing and wetting her lips. She was with her mother and her sister who weren't peturbed in the slightest. It was a slight on the direction of humanity. I don't think I've ever seen anyone act so vain, so concerned about their appearence. This was a 9 year old. It disturbed me. I think the idea of beauty, of being beautiful appeal very much to females. A huge part of us wants that Geisha thing of being able to stop a guy dead in their tracks. If I can quote myself in that same conversation, "It would be kind of nice to know someone found you attractive even before they really got to know you, however superficial that sounds." Yes we should primarily be concerned about the person in their entireity. I think it would be extremely difficult to be one of those, "You could have any guy" kind of girls as they would find it more complicated in working out exactly why a specific guy wanted to be with them. *Insert some line on trophy wives or girlfriends here.* But to be honest I don't want to be (and this is how it often feels like) one of those girls that, you always have to get to know first before they are found to be 'beautiful' or pretty or "quite attractive" etc.

"There have been other instances where i've gotten to know someone and started to appreciate them more."

I understand that beauty as it should be is wound into the whole person. A bitchy, good looking female is not really all that beautiful. I find it difficult to explain this self image thing (it is a bit of that). Perhaps the underlying thought here is that say I were married. I wouldn't want to just be 'suitable', 'quite pretty', 'a bit of alright', but absolutely perfect (as far as human flaws allow) for the hypothetical him. I am not worried that I am not pretty. I am not worried that no one will ever find me attractive. I am worried that I, with a fairly reasonable self image does still sometimes look to the ideals and the surface. I somehow don't think we as females just want to be sitting on that level of, once known, are appreciated more. It falls short of what we've been programmed with. Yes we need to reconsider the meaning of beauty, but it would be nice sometimes to be appreciated on ALL levels. That shallow enough for you? Because welcome to the world of the female mind.

I like to be frustrating

Header

Yes I do know it's nearly 1:30. Yes I do think you might have noticed a new header image. Please note that this is only temporary as I don't think I like it too much. If I had the time I'd revamp the whole blog, and I shall some day. This is simply Rebecca stuffing around on now working photoshop doing such basic stuff you could cry. For now however, bed seems a better option, especially knowing I don't have work until 5:00pm tomorrow which means hours and hours for potential sleep.

Driving games

Well, there it be done. The first decent drive by myself. To work - where I parked fairly clumsily, hate multistory carparks. Worked 4 hours. Came back to the car and remembered just how close I was to a pole one side of the car... ho hum :P Thankfully I got out sucessfully without touching anything. Laura would've been cranky as. Drove to Croydon, where I parked perfectly. Picked up my slides which look good exposure/focus/everything-wise which is fantastic! Bought an el'cheapo camera bag for the SLR and some normal film play around with. Ahhh I love driving myself! If anyone is interested you can come and watch me graduate (from Tabor) Saturday 1st April at 2pm. Berwick Church of Christ. 432-446 Centre Rd Berwick. Melways 11 A12. You'll even get a free afternoon tea. I don't know how interesting it'll be though. I'm not too fussed about the whole thing. Its a bit of overkill having to wear grad gowns for a Certificate IV. Ah well. Tomorrow my family has 5 tickets to go (which someone gave us) see Arial Gymnastics for the Commonwealth Games. Unfortunately I found out today that I am working. 5-10:15. I am not impressed. I might attempt to get the shift off. If not, I guess that means the other five get the experience. To be honest I have absolutely zero excitement about the Commonwealth Games being in Melbourne. I mean who cares. It's not the Olympics. Having lived overseas I don't think I've ever seen a Commonwealth Games (or been around) when one's been on. I wouldn't mind seeing an event. I did not watch the opening ceremony, bar about 2 minutes when Mum insisted I look at something. It's a waste of money.

Here it is

"Where's your daily blog post?" - John Before I spit today onto paper a brief back track to yesterday afternoon. I walked up the road to Dominos and ordered pizza the way you're meant to have it, which means PINEAPPLE and CHICKEN (and something a bit different on Jess's half) waited for her. Then there was this massively memorable moment of having a very interesting talk in the car while stuffing our hungry mouths full of pizza, while Jess is driving of course and probably bopping (I dont know any other way to explain it) to whatever music she prefered. Anyway as that was a memorable moment I figured I'd better put it down somewhere so I wouldn't forget. Today bought 7 hrs straight of uni. Which, despite the reasonable nature of all three classes, is painfully long and pretty tiring. Wednesday shall have to become coffee day. The Corner Cafe has my full patronage after 5pm. The good thing about Wednesdays now is that my tute was shifted back one hour, so the 10 o'clock start is fractionally more blissful than the 9. Unfortunately this also means I get no lunchbreak until I can bolt out of class in the 'semi-break' around 3pm to stuff my face full of food (aside from a museli bar or two which I consume while I'm not being observed, as the room is not meant to be food friendly). Tute 1. Bought a 25 minute delay to even get the door open. So we all hung around outside sort of talking. Tutor of course did not have a key/swipe. Tute 2. Bought a weary hello to Jeremy and Zoe (whom I met today) a 3rd year Pro Writing student. Lucky girl. I was loading a photoshop file while class was going on, it took over half an hour and multiple restarts (this is on a Mac) stupid computers. It finally behaved and I compressed it immediately whereby it behaved. Tute/Worshop 3. Sat with Rebecca and Adina. Painful painful watching everyone show their slides for assignment 1 and hear him talk through all the mistakes. Painful because there were SO many people who had entirely missed that appetures and shutterspeeds actually relate to eachother. Had my break, met Lucas whereby we discussed the tedium of 3hrs and the, "Have you done photography before" type stuff. No problem that I couldn't show mine today there were about 8 others in the same boat. Slides should be ready tomorrow. Drove by myself tonight. Not too far, just up to the video shop. I tried seeing if I could catch up w/ various people but they were all either not home or occupied. Emily came with me to 'choose'. I like it :D Freedom. Tomorrow I'm stealing (with permission) Laura's car and heading to work then I have to work out how to get to Croydon to go pick up those slides. RAM came. I have now got a fast computer and Photoshop! I'm a happy chapp..girl. I watched When Harry Met Sally by myself and for the first time (yes I know it's really old), simply upon whim. Aside from the 80's hair and fashion and the unattractiveness of the actors it was quite a good movie, romantic comedy wise. Interesting theories :) I feel far too busy.

Zero alcohol tolerance

Yes you guessed right, Rebecca is now loose on the roads. Had a pre-lesson before the test so Emma ran me through a few last things and made me practice various manouvres. I ended up having to do a point-to-point. Which I think I managed fairly well. I was fairly calm (more so than I would've even thought). After we got out of the car, Emma informed me that the tester was one of the stricter ones. This was fairly obvious when I got the pink sheet back and it had a two marks against turning and against indicating (which wasn't a problem). Neither E nor I know why that's there. It matters not though. I passed! :D They made me take off my glasses for my photo so its a tad strange, but not any where near as horrible as my learners. Good thing no one ever has to see that one again. A celebratory lunch from The Bunker at Deakin by my ownsome. A phone call and a few messages to those worth it :P and those who wished me luck. I missed the first part of my back to back double lecture as my memory didn't serve me well enough and I rocked up at 1 instead of 12. Woops. It matters not. Everything should be up online - according to the others I didn't miss much. Went and got a keycard for The Studio. So I now have access to it, which is where I have been for the whole afternoon and am right now. I've been working on some assignment we have to do in photoshop but the computers have decided to hate me so I've given up until tomorrow. You'd think it would cope with a 40mb file. But NO! I really hate computers sometimes. I'm about to walk up to Dominos and order some pizza so it'll be ready when Jess shows up then I think she wants to head to a movie (free) which suits me. 5:30 I'm off.

Weekender

Ah such a let down for you to return to the day absent All Said and Done and find a crappy quiz result, which would mean you truly care about what goes on in here. Whether you found it so or not is entirely up to you and I don't really mind as I somehow think I write a lot of this for my own pleasure. In reality one day skipped, (Or was it two?) hardly seems significant in the blogosphere. That particular quiz result resulted from one very fried brain, although how that came to be I'm not so sure. All that saying, heres another HINT to comment a bit more than just once in every little while. Something with a bit of substance, a thought, a point, a criticsim (Not just of my spelling or grammar) would be extremely good. Although I write primarily for myself, it does gives a vague satisfaction to think one or two people might actually be enjoying this. I know each of you, whether you enjoy it or not has a big slab of unsaid advice and wisdom in you, even if you don't really know me that well. If you don't know me at all it would be common courtesty to drop me a line somewhere to say you who you are. A taste of your wisdom would be welcome anytime. Besides comments keep interest alive both for me and I hope for others. Blogs generally have readers funnily enough. Keeping this vaguely interactive is one of the reasons this stuff simply doesn't end up in a Word document or into a journal. The other reason is that I get shocking RSI whenever I journal on paper extensively but that's completely beside the point! "So Bec, where have you been for the past day? I noticed there was no blog for yesterday, that's a bit unusual!" *sheepish look* Friday afternoon my fine family ferried themselves forward to the YVV church family camp up in Belgrave and left me at home free of constraints. This was of course entirely by my own doing. After my thoroughly stressful day or so, which I now think was somewhat self inflicted, I needed some time. I decided I couldn't cope with tenting or caravanning it in close proximity to others without a decent sleep first. The morning came without that desired sleep in. However I had managed to get onto Sam who said she'd rescue me and help me out. So I got breakfast as much ready as I could and she came bearing eggs so we had a big lot of scrambled eggs on toast. Some talking followed and a goodly bit of mental screaming at the sun (that was all me) for being too bright and not bright enough when I was trying to take the last lot of photos. Sam, I owe you. After more scouting via phone, I ended up deciding to take the stupid slides to Croydon on my way up to Belgrave. I think I reached the 'beyond' caring point. I did email my tutor and the unit chair. According to the unit chiar, It's apparently okay to work it out with the tutor. Note to self: Kim Corbel (who would be my photog. tutor) does not respond or probably even read his emails as frequently as he should. There you go, Bec's first assignment is going to be late. Sam watched me amusedly as I ran around doing every little last thing, stole some books and then left for home with me as I made my way up the bus. Croydon, dropped off the film. They were kind enough to make a note to get it back by Thursday for me, which is a day sooner than expected which made me happy. I had a bit of time to kill so I wandered down to the out of the way rather good little clothes shop and tried a variety of mostly impractical things on, the lady who owns the place is nice, helpful and perfectly happy for you to do so. Nothing I liked enough or I really needed. Trained it up to Belgrave. Had a lazy hour or so sitting in this beautiful afternoon on my own reading a perfectly morbid Dorian Gray. It was holiday weather. Had a talk to God about what the time up on the camp was going to be for... I requested a continuation on the, 'knowing God' thing, as that has been a bit predominant lately. Tagged to one of the workshop things around 4pm. Entirely practical I guess, people in the church sharing 'skills' or offering up their time to show others how to do something. From pilates to tap dance to something on sailing to some hair one. Quite hilarious and I think a little of a waste of time if you don't count the relationship building over it (how you do that in Pilates I don't quite know). Anyway none of the really interested me but I figured I'd find my little sisters down at the hair one and seeing as I was being a loner in that I hadn't managed to run into anyone yet I decided to go. Came out with my hair straightened (Yes I do have pretty straight hair normally) and having met some of the other older ladies whom I would not have met so soon or at all otherwise. The evening was good. Laura showed up after work, ran into some of the Young Adults. Session was excellent. Some aspects of 'who God is' came up so I thought that was pretty cool. Notably something on God not being quantifiable. I had this really strange moment near the end of the session where I'd realised I'd drempt about it. Briefly but not a dejavu moment (Samantha!) because I remember thinking about the dream after I'd had it. Went down to the cafe, horribly named Gig and Bits. Sat with Dan and James and Laura and later Geoff. Madeline Coutanseau can sing amazingly (know her from childhood days)! Dan (not yits one) and Steve were pretty good (with Dan singing), as was erm whoever else sang... Some pretty nice chai tea and muffins. I was just in bed when Steve called me out to what I found was a quite hilarious way to meet someone. "Yeh I'll ask Bec she's pretty cool" (Bec's mind: "Oh, thanks Steve, wow didn't expect to ever hear that from you, what the heck is this all about?") "Hey Bec, _ needs to talk to you!" (Bec's mind: "Right, _, the _ I know, err okay I supose I'll get out, but why?") Bec's voice: "Um okay". I would like money for every time I have to give advice. It was slightly ludicrous where I found myself this time because I was outside in the dark, barefoot and in my pj's giving calming down this person I'd never been introduced to before. Steve did this hurried intro and left with his mate Sam "laughing all the way, ha ha ha". It wasn't the _ I know, but the other _. He had told Han he liked her. NB. he's what, 3 years older. And said it had just come out of his mouth, he wasn't in a good spot for it etc... he was honestly worried, highly concerned. So I did my best letting him know it was going to be okay and Hannah'd be right and I'd talk to her when I got a chance if that was ok. She'd let him know with an, "Uh I'm a bit young for you." (which had me mentally cheering) But yeh I think he was fairly crushed and just annoyed hugely at himself for blurting out something he hadn't meant to say. A group of the young adults went down into Belgrave to The Green Bean for breakfast. I ate way too much food and it cost a bit much, but it was great. Talked a bit with _ (of the night before) funny the random bonds you have with people after something crazy like that. Jess came up for a bit and then choofed off to work again. Morning Bible study. Again excellent then later 'church' with testimonies instead of a sermon. After lunch I ended up heading down to the beach with Dan, picked up his little brother Matthew on the way and a friend from school - Beth and later Lauren (Matt's sort psuepo). Dan's house is utterly amazing, the view is spectacular, overlooks Cardinia Resevoir and all the way to the bay. Million dollars couldn't buy it. I got along well with Beth which was a good thing as there ended up being no one else there that I knew aside from Cameron and Dan. So Elwood beach it was, which is just further down from St. Kilda beach. A hot but fun afternoon. Got to swim, properly which was a brilliant change. I did however have to go in my clothes which was a pain but ah well. BBQ just off the beach later on. Kicked a soccer ball around. Went for a walk/ride/blade along the shore (on the path) as it was dark. The cool change showed up around 9:30 and this massive lot of wind came in really suddenly. I'm beginning to really like these freak weather changes in Melbourne. Both their driving is quite...um.... male P plater'ish. Cam is by far the worst, absolute hoon. Bit disconcerting. Got back to Belgrave Heights. I went down and caught more of the cafe/gig thing. Dan and Beth had left. Everyone was sort of spread out rather than around tables. It was a good night.
Just in the tent yet again. When we hear people run up and yank all out tent poles out and shake it so the whole thing comes down on us. I lay there laughing while Laura managed to get out and we put the thing back up again. In the morning, I guessed it was Steve and co. So I went and hassled him for doing so - turns out it wasn't him (yeh good one Rebecca) so had to appologise to him this evening. We think Dan and Cameron showed up for a visit as they live reasonably near-by and might just do something like that. Uni was a 1pm. Got the train to BoxHill. Use the wrong ticket, I was a zone short. Waited ages and ages in the cold for a bus. A case of the blind leading the blind. Finally a connex guy came and said, "No, go get that one" (I didn't actually see him, as I went to grab some lunch but yeh). So got another bus, had to walk down Burwood Highway and got to my lecture in plenty of time. Not after running into Jeremy (whom I met last week in my tute) and so sat with him and Jen. Home via same alternate bus route, which let me get the earlier train, so I REALLY like that discovery. And onward ho, back to normal living. Am watching Crash again in a moment with Larue (Laura) and Dad. Oh yes. Prayer would be rather good as I shall be having my driving test tomorrow at 11am. Minimal nerves would be ideal. Mind you a few would be useful so that I'm over cautious on the speeding thing :P Next time I write a blog I promise I will have my licence. So if I fail, you shan't be hearing from me for a while... maybe self punishment is not the smartest way to go about it.

Movie life

How pleasing, seeing as I'm rather a fan of the old indie flicks. The Movie Of Your Life Is An Indie Flick You do things your own way - and it's made for colorful times. Your life hasn't turned out how anyone expected, thank goodness! Your best movie matches: Clerks, Garden State, Napoleon Dynamite If Your Life Was a Movie, What Genre Would It Be?

Dorian Gray

Lets start setting a record for how many blog posts I can make in a day. Below are part of the lyrics to a James Blunt song Tears and Rain (he who sings so high it's scary, dont' like him that much).

I guess it's time I run far, far away; find comfort in pain, All pleasure's the same: it just keeps me from trouble. Hides my true shape, like Dorian Gray. I've heard what they say, but I'm not here for trouble. It's more than just words: it's just tears and rain.

I point them out because I'm reading The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde at the moment. It's a truly facinating book. I don't think I've quite reached the horrors of Dorian's worst yet. Simply reviewed: Dorian Gray this rich, good-looking everything etc. young man has his portrait painted and then wishes that he could be "Forever Young" (insert other song lyrics here). All his misdeeds are represented facially in the portrait and his body stays perfect, thus he finds licence to go and do 'terrible things' be unfeeling etc... because the world can't see the evidence of his cruelty and misdemeanor. I think it gets far worse, I'm only a bit over half way through. The books says a lot about shame and choice and life and masks.

Oh dear

Dear Rebecca. We don’t process E6 on site, it leaves here on Tuesdays and Fridays so if you dropped off a film on Saturday it would leave Tuesday and be back on Friday of the same week. The pick up is usually around 10.30am. 24 exp $12.95 36 exp $16.95 Develop only $8.95 Nigel Croydon Camera House Crapsticks! I need it by Wednesday! Now I'm going to have to go into the city, sometime... ARGH. Burkie, help! Know anywhere that does 1-2hr processing like that?

Still kicking the wall

How to convey my annoyance? Well. Stupid Rebecca did not check how much RAM she had. So she couldn't install Photoshop. Techonology is the blackhole of wallets. More RAM should be here in a few days. How annoying. I do not feel like being patient today and I do not appreciate having to spend more money. It had to happen, but still. I managed to steal a sibling for a photo or two, but Emily can't run very fast and I doubt the others could either (don't ask) so I can't do the last bit, need to wait for Dad or someone (hey Sam?) to ride a bike past me. It's also still too bright to use the shutter speed specified for about four of the shots. Stupid assignment. The aspect of non-digital that I really hate is how you can't see if the photos turned out how you wanted them to until you finish the damn roll and get it processed. By then if you've screwed anything up you've wasted about $20. One day I'll get myself a digital SLR but until then I'm stuck with two very mediocre cameras, each not quite what I'd like. Not that I have a choice with this unit. Bah to down the line old fashioned photographers. I am minutely stressed. That's under exaggerating. Sam I will be maybe sending a 'Get down here' message your way later this evening or tomorrow morning.... but at the moment you're out :( Tonight I will scrounge some dinner, find a DVD and pig the chocolate. Any one want to keep me company? What a frustrating day and what happened to all the time?

Why relationship finds a reason and rules are a blind alley

Seeing as it's on my list of things to do, and I promised I would eventually get around to it, this 'comment' is in response to the, Let's Talk about Sex post over on Paul's blog. First, because I have absoultely no idea where my rambling will take me I shall point out the this sentence:

"I don't want sex without the promise of forever."

Whether you see the funny side of it or not I don't really care. I found it amusing. I do however know exactly what he's on about, I'd be as thick as my elbow if I didn't. That and I utterly agree. I've talked a fair bit about 'only one' and Mr. Right and those topics and I somehow hope that my opinion of how sex should be only within the context of marriage, has shone through. If not I'm stating it here as black and white as the text lets me: Sex belongs within and only within marriage. Although a tangent from Paul's focus of speaking to a group of Christian youth, I do not think that we can ever impose morals or ethical issues such as this upon those coming from an alternative position. By this I mean that Christians live under a different set of ethical (bit hesistant to use that, perhaps moral works better) standards. We cannot bind those from a strictly secular position by something that does not really have any relevance to them. Aside from the common 'Safe Sex' talks that go on in schools and around the home where 'The safest sex is no sex' catch cry lodges in the throat as being distinctly stupid (No sex is no sex basically, you can't change that!) the fact of 'saving yourself' is a personal choice when you have no God to honor or Biblical morals to follow. By this I certainly am not saying that all 'non-Christians' have no morals or restraint, nor am I saying that they choose unwisely as I think there would be people out there for reasons of their own choose that to wait. Many Christians stuff up the sex thing big time. I am simply stating that they (secular) are not bound by what we should be considering differently. Please note that I used the word standards rather than obligations previously. Christianity should never be lived legalisticly. Rules do come into it, but it's probably better to look at it as lining up with what we believe God wants us to do rather than the 'thou shalt not's'. This lets the Christian life centre upon a relationship rather than a stone tablet. Living a God honoring life sets you to where you need to be assessing a couple of things. Firstly what does the Bible say about it all. It's a pretty good place to start, seeing as it's the primary method of communication by being a story about how God has worked through history which really shows his view on a lot of things. Secondly, where do you fit in this God picture, where does God fit, where do others fit and what happens with the interaction there? I don't think being a Christian makes it any less easier to 'wait'. But if the issue of sex and marriage is looked at, weighed up and not just another law to follow you do end up with some kind of a reason for your self control and here is where it should make the difference. Might look at the Biblical view of Sex some other time so at least I've got it up here in front of my face but that will do for now as my brain has imploded.

Kicking the wall

It is to say the least INSANELY frustrating when everything refuses to cooperate. The sun is too bright, my family are too busy, the dog is barking his throat out, I have a todo list as long as a short arm, brand spanking new photoshop and all the etceteras are sitting on my desk waiting to be installed (you wouldn't believe how tempting it is to drop all and drool over it all day instead) and I have to get a stupid film camera assignment done. It is due on Wednesday and they are all deserting me for a church family camp some time this afternoon - Goodbye photographic subjects, I only need you for 10 short minutes when the sun isn't blaring down and cracking harsh jokes across your face! Maybe I'll call Sam later today and make her come down to help me. I'll make my own way to the camp some time tomorrow but I think I need some space and some time and one last shot at trying to find a few hours more to sleep in. Whereby I'll pray and hope that the Camera shop in Croydon develops slides on site so I can hang around there for a few hours on the way in and out to Belgrave. This effectively means my 'photos' will be ready on time and I can hit the destress button in my brain. Alternatively they can be left at the shop and I can hopefully pick them up on Monday morning or Tuesday afternoon. I want to install! I want to sit and be as nerdish as I possibly can and I haven't the time! "Be quiet Bec, get off blogger, do what you need to do and then go have fun - be sensible and stop whinging."

Asleep at the wheel

I find myself as a bleary eyed, overtired vegetiable in front of a computer late at night yet again. Knowing that I'm having trouble hacking 11:30 has got to be saying something. I had to forgo my sleep-in this morning as I had absolutely no idea what work was doing. I beat my alarm anyway which was a good thing, waking up 'naturally' is something I'd far prefer to do. I called work, Simone let me know I was on at 11am, which reduced me from pressure cooker status, oh I sincerely doubt it reached that, but it was a nice feeling to know I didn't have to rush. Dad got me to come and look at some car in Lilydale. A 1993 Laser (silver) with a bit of body damage (you can cope with such things when 90% of your many uncles are mechanically inclined and own/work where they can utilize those abilities). Nice car, newer than anything I'd looked at. Done way too many km's though and both Dad, my uncle and my cousin who happened to be at the workshop decided the motor was on its way out. Not worth the effort or $'s. Work was pretty good, maybe because the manager is away sick at the moment. Ho hum. Went and checked out another car this evening, again in Lilydale. An old ladies car, in fantastic nick and very low km's - quite a contrast to this mornings. So old-ladyish that it was light blue haha. I refuse to say powder blue even if it is true because that phrase makes no sense at all to me. A Ford Meteor or something of the sort. Had a lot of rego left and the guy was getting the roadworthy done, slightly on the upper of my price range though and no power steering. If he had come down in price a bit more I would have sacrificed my pathetic wrists for a half decent car. I like the idea of pain free driving a bit too much. It's not a problem all the time, not even the majority of the time, but I've experienced bad RSI and you really can't do a whole lot. My wrists and shoulders suck the fact that I can crack my neck without hardly trying at the moment does not impress me. So I'll keep being patient, wait for something suitable to come up, consider loaning money off Dad so I can get something better (in the sense that it has the bare minimums of what I'm after) and in the meantime work more which can only help in the dollar stakes. I have too many things I need to be doing tomorrow. Sleep would be brilliant. Emma will be here by 8:20 so I can perfect (cough) those oddly useless driving manouvres. I mean, come on, who ever does that thing that I can't remember the name of right now - where you start out one metre from the curb and back so you are parking properly with your wheels on the gutter, lined up with a tree nonetheless. Ah well. Tuesday's the telling day. So no sleep-in again. Bed right now. Everything else pales in consequence... or significance even.

From the keyboard of a pragmatic female

Dear Blog readers, Gloriously early start. Blergh to 6:00 wakings. Had my Principles of Interactive Media tute this morning. She is thinking of shuffling it backward one hour - so we start at 10. That would suit me JUST FINE! Parked Crackerjack style again. Thanks muchly to luskie who showed us that trick. Sorry to all the oldies who's lawn bowl car spots we take. They truly hate P platers on Mondays, but as today is Wednesday and we were early... Anyway, the tute was great! I got a tad lost finding the 'studio' room (which we are one of, if not the first class to use) but saw the lecturer of all people and so followed her, nothing like good timing. Jen and I turn out to be the only girls in that class, but it is small and four or five of the guys are Interactive Media people (and in our Studio class) so I at least know faces. About 15-20 of us all up. Spent an hour doing an introducing thing, which was really helpful and made everyone relax and actually talk. It was quite funny when it came to some group work because of all the situations we had to come up with for a context and everyone went way overboard. The guy next to me came in late. I think his name was Muffaro (or similar) South African, 3rd year eCommerce, anyway he was utterly hilarious, one of those laughs that makes you laugh. So it was good morning. Spent lunchtime with Guy and Jen on the lawn. This galah came up and started eating my lunch and then tired to climb up my leg, bit random. Comparitive Imaging (which is digital stuff) was all on photoshop, so as the guy talked I just ignored him mostly and did some of the excercises he sent around via a CD, mainly playing around with Mac shortcuts. I do like my shortcut and I think I have it almost all worked out. I really don't like not having a right mouse button though, or a scrolly wheel. Met Jeremy, who is a dwarf, and a nice guy. Helped some other girl with something computerish... really I am very surprised at how many people came into the course expecting something different, very few of them seem to know how to do the basics. Quite concerning. Three hour workshop thing on photography. Where I met Adina who is Jewish and has been in Israel the past year, she was really nice. Jo an Indian girl who's been in Australia only three weeks and has astoundingly good english and a Rebecca. Whom I introduced myself too with my name and she did a double take, "You know my name!" was quite funny. Nearly fell asleep. The Lecturer talks quietly and uses no visual aids, which makes it very hard for me as I don't do well with learning by just hearing things. He's such a typical oldish photographer kind of guy, stovepipe black jeans, black sunnies, bald head. Nice enough, but three hours is a bit much. Mind you the subject matter was some history of photography so boring was well on the agenda. Watched a documentry thing on American somethingorother photography which wasn't too bad. Then question time afterwards about anything. Got to clarify something about my camera which is very good seeing as I have to use it very soon and it's spiked my drink* with a bit of confidence. We finished early. So I got a coffee from the 'corner cafe' which is really quite nice and waited for Jess. We hung out in there for an hour waiting for Isobelle to finish her classes. Had a massively interesting/deep conversation around a variety of topics, namely relationships. She dubbed me as being, "Almost too pragmatic to be female" which was very funny considering the context. It was a genuinely good d&m. Hope it happens more frequently. Isobelle, Jess and I went to LaPorchettas on the way to Young Adults small group thing. It was okay, not great and they forgot to bring our water and gave Jess the wrong sized meal. Was a nice change from Sophias (next door) though. Late back to church, find out they've gone down to the lake, so we drove there. Found them all. Went for a walk around the lake. Truly beautiful evening (See the photo at the top for evidence!). Got a footy kicked into the back of my legs about three times, thanks to a certain individual. Caught up with Susannah. The Car trip back had a curious incident (lets just say a certain someone we know mooned us) which made Laura really annoyed. It was pretty dumb of them. Oh well, they'll probably feel like a fool if they think about it, or then again maybe he wont. About 8 of us came back at McDonalds where we had the for(mis)tune to run into Hannah and co. She won her basketball grandfinal. Good for her :) So weignored them after saying 'congratulations'. Hung out for a good while. Home. I don't know if I'm working tomorrow as I left my phone at home today (fell out of my bag in the car) and I forgot to call up. So no sleepin for Bec. *cries waterfalls* Goodnight all, or goodmorning just, Love the pragmatic. (btw, who are you? I think you've all multiplied into people I didn't specifically invite to read this, its fine that you are but knowing you exist beyond an IP address would be courteous) *sorry to report that such a drink does not exist, however it could be that I'm using a metaphor or a similie but it is late and I can't be bothered remembering which is which. If you are truly interested you could look both words up at www.dictionary.com and then decide whether the drink is literal in the possible sense or simply a substitue for something much much greater.

Bilboards from Phillipians

I generally throw the good quotes into First Phrase and I'm never really sure if they get read or not as no one has bothered commenting (I do like comments you know and not just limited to here). While I'm at it check out Red and Blue for some good or not so good books - comment there as well! This quote however, deserves not to be missed and so I'll share it here. It also helps to illustrate if not sadly illuminate a small part of my own life.

The reason some of us are such poor specimens of Christianity is because we have no Almighty Christ. We have Christian attributes and experiences, but there is no abandonment to Jesus Christ. - Oswald Chambers

I came out of Year in the Son with this thorough determination to be honest about what I'd spent the year doing. It could sound a bit silly but I think it's important to mention that it's not just a personal development course, despite coming out with a Cert IV in Youth Development, but that it's also theology and in throwing that simple word in you shed light on a lot of what you are on about, interested in. I guess I came to this conclusion after being influenced by those post yits-leavers who talked about how describing what you spent your time was difficult. I've stuffed up explaining, leaving the 'God bit' out several times now. I did it again today. The frustrating and bit I'm fairly ashamed about was that I actually remembered it. I think some of my fear lies in the potential questions that could follow and not being able to answer them properly. I had a talk to God about this stuff as it and was slightly encouraged in reading some of Phillipians 2.

Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. - Phil 2:12-13 (italics mine)

Another thing emerged as I considered myself and evaluated who Rebecca has been lately. A "harmless" comment made by a friend the other day pointed out that I can complain a lot. Yes this is aided with tiredness when you reach the point of don't care, but that's no excuse. Around this friend, much of my complaint is in jest or simply for fun - we both know that, however who can ever really disassociate one part of life with another? I have been hypersensitive in the past few days to the fact that I've been complaining a fair bit, or just had a less than godly attitude towards people. Specifically observing myself in a less than familiar situation at uni, in talking with a friend (still sort of aquaintence) from my course. I find myself gravitating towards highlighting the less than good about the individual - namely lecturers or a situation. Frustrating again as I keep catching myself short right after I say what I don't want to or in the attitude I really hate. It seems like Phillipians was where my face was meant to be stuck today,

Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe as you hold out the word of life—in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor for nothing. -Phil 2:14-16

If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from his love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others. - Phil 2:1-4

Read the rest of it here, as it is all pretty much relevant. A goodly bit of being pulled up short is useful now and then. I am rather ashamed I don't have the guts sometimes to be willing to be more open about what I believe. I've been burnt about it what, once before, and they soon got over me being a Christian and actually started talking to me again. I shouldn't have anything to hold me up. The least I could do is start acting more Christlike. :\