The Journal of Lee Davis-Thalbourne

If we had to be fair, this update is probably unnecessary if you've been reading the Twitter Updates or on Facebook (And there's been a few - I was a busy little twitterer while I was in Adelaide...). Still, I figured it was probably worth a few words to fill in the gaps.

Monday
Monday was the trip over with the family. Not a great number of highlights, probably the big highlight was at the Horsham McDonalds when I met my cousin Paula's children for the first time in a while (a while enough that the oldest one didn't remember me...). It's a bit sad when I think about it, since my cousin and family now live in Melbourne, and it turns out that I saw them more outside Melbourne than within. Still, nice to meet the little ones!

We ended up getting to Adelaide about 6:00pm to my Nanna's and Grampa's place. I hadn't actually seen my grandparents for a very long time. My Grampa has finally retired from his barber shop, and this was such massive news that it made newspaper headlines. I'm actually not kidding - the local newspaper ran a front-cover piece about my Grampa's barber shop closing down. (He'd been in the paper previously for foiling a robbery, and since his shop had been there for 40-50 years, his shop was considered part of the fabric of a place or something). My Nanna was well-pleased with this, but not so pleased that my Grampa was getting ready to set up a salon in Nanna's place. It was great to talk to them, I forgot how much I missed them until I'd seen them again!

Tuesday
Tuesday I ended up going to Tea Tree Plaza with my parents, mostly to get random things like a cheap pair of sunglasses (since I forgot them when I left). Also, ended up with two new pairs of shoes, which was handy :)

Then went to Aaron's place. In the end, I spent most of my nights there (for which I thank Aaron and Emma quite extensively for :)). It was so great to spend time with Aaron, considering that we hadn't actually seen each other for almost two years! The first day we mostly just chatted (and went to Tea Tree Plaza again so he could get Emma gifts), but it's one of those things that when me and Aaron get together we really do nothing else much but talk - and I never tire of it. We're quite different these days, but we have very similar personalities. :)

Wednesday
Wednesday I spent walking around the Adelaide CBD, as is my habit. I'd thankfully done all my shopping before I went to Adelaide, but not_in_denial had jokingly asked me to buy some Gor novels for him, since the last Gor novels I got were from there too. not_in_denial, of course, deserved the Gor novel I bought him. Took me two second hand bookstores to find them, which was good because I wouldn't have run for a third. Not for Gor novels.

I then went looking around Adelaide's CBD sex stores to cleanse myself after purchasing the novels, and came to the conclusion that Adelaide's sex stores are really awesome. So much awesome stuff that I would never be able to find in Melbourne. Mostly, I suspect, because Adelaide sex stores don't specialise - they purchase heaps of awesome stuff, some of which doesn't quite sell, so they have the most random, awesome old stuff. Also, the "big" sex store in Adelaide often imports from Europe rather than look for local manufacturers, so there's a bunch of stuff (like, for example, a leather bodybag, from Germany, apparently. I'd so have gotten it too if it hadn't been $600...).

That night, I went to the Thalbourne Christmas, which was a nice sit-down affair. I ended up getting a "bitch" mug, which will be proudly placed in my kitchen for all to see. It was actually a very good night, and it was good to see all the Thalbournes again. Also, my Uncle Bryan's housemate is really good value. Absolutely brilliant wit.

Thursday
Thursday was spent at my Aunt's place doing the Davis Christmas. It was a great deal more enjoyable than I had expected. The food was delicious, everyone was nicely chilled and enjoying each other without drama, it was a really great day, honestly. My swag included hilarious t-shirt, a stab-mixer (a really cool one!), and a Pick-up-line Magnetic poetry kit. Which will be absolutely brilliant when I put it up on my fridge. I ended up getting a whole lot of photos there, because my Aunt's house is so incredibly pretty, but alas, I do not have the photos to show people, since my flash card decided to die on the way home, so I have to wait for my Nanna to send me the backup CD. I got to see some more of my cousins that I never see. I also got to play with my cousin's Wii, which has even more firmly convinced me that I indeed need a Wii. If only I had the money... :(

Friday
In Adelaide, Boxing Day is actually a public holiday in which there is nothing open. So, Boxing day was mostly me and Aaron spending the day chatting and watching DVDs. Which was good, since I have now watched some of Outlaw Star, The Lost Boys, Night Watch and Mirrormask, which has greatly improved my film-cred. Maybe. At the very least, I don't have to sound lost when these movies come up now! Also, got to introduce Aaron to the fun that is LoadingReadyRun, and also introduced him to xkcd (He's not a particularly internetty geek, but I think I showed him some good stuff...). It was a nice, good, relaxing day, honestly, and I'm kinda glad for it, all things considered. We (predictably) also talked about so much, including love, relationships, friends, addiction, etc. We talked so much in between all the watching, and it was awesome.

Saturday
Saturday was the last day before we went home, so I decided to spend it in the CBD again, after saying goodbye to Aaron and Emma. I actually ended up not doing much, despite it technically being the boxing day sales in Adelaide. I looked around for a bit, didn't see much worth buying, then went home to my Nanna's place, where I got to see my cousin Paula and her family, and also my Cousin Suzie, who again I never see, ever. Got to spend a day chatting and talking with everyone, actually interacting with my family.

It's kinda odd, really - I keep saying that family is really important to me, but then I don't seem to keep in particularly regular contact with them. And it's not because I hate them or anything, far from it. I just... have so much stuff in my life that I don't get to talk to my family much at all. If anything, the trip to Adelaide was good because I got to see everyone, many of whom I hadn't seen in at least two years, often longer.

Sunday
Sunday was, once again, a car trip home. We ended up going via one of my parent's friends, who has an extremely friendly doggy and a very large house (although I guess, when you're buying a house near not Adelaide, but Murray Bridge, you can get a lot for not much, I guess. I ended up getting a bit drunk, since he offered me a glass of wine, and I'd only really had a couple of pieces of toast for lunch. I kinda felt a bit fifth-wheelish, seeing as I didn't really know him that well, and it was mostly my parents reminiscing. Still, spent a good hour, then we all decided that it was time to actually head on our way.

Like the trip up, not a great deal of actual stops. We did stop in Bordertown where we went to a nice little bakery (which apparently wasn't as great as the last time my parent stopped there, but other than that most of the other stops were just driver-change stops. I finally got home at about 10:00ish, after which I pretty much immediately called not_in_denial and ordered significant huggles.

And thus ends to story of my Trip to Adelaide. Other stuff has happened since. I will report on it later :)

Yeah, so I haven't been posting much, probably due to lack of internets at my workstation. So, figured I'd do the obligatory posts...

Christmas
Christmas was excellent. Final Swag total includes a new Digital Camera (which me and not_in_denial have been playing with a bit!), BSG Season 1 (I got Season 2 Last Christmas, so I've been waiting a while for the first!), The Austin Powers Box Set (I had a craving for it. Don't ask), and various sugary goodies. Also got a car kit for my iPod, but as it turns out, the car kit was not, in fact, for an iPod, but was for another player instead, so I'm waiting for my brother to get that swapped for me. So, really, all good!

not_in_denial and I ended up going to my parent's place for Christmas Lunch, which was pretty much exactly as I was expecting (which was good food, chance to see family, nice relaxed atmosphere). not_in_denial was a little uncomfortable there, just because he's not generally comfortable around my family for the obvious reason (like, for example, they're his boyfriend's family). Still, we had a good time, had a go on my family's new copy of Buzz (Sports Edition - needless to say that me and Erin didn't do so well).

So, all up, a very good christmas, methinks.

New Years
Our household ended up having a small New Years (simma14's Party was far better advertised and thus just about everyone went there this year), but I think that was good because I actually enjoyed the small-party atmosphere for a change. Also, we had a couple of people come around that I hadn't seen for ages (Like Hannah and littlesir, pfhsblog, etc). So there was lots of nice discussion. It was, however, extremely hot, but I doubt that that's going to change significantly no matter where you went. Bizarrely, I managed to sleep like a baby afterwards - the heat didn't seem to affect my sleep patterns at all (I swear, my bed and I are sleep-bonded - any time I'm on my bed I get to sleep in less than 20 minutes. Well, to be fair, that's the same of just about every bed, but it's even more impressive on mine!)

New Years Day was, thankfully, a touch cooler. Me and not_in_denial ended up hanging at velitu's place. We ended up bringing up a few issues that not_in_denial had on his mind, which was good because they really needed discussion (mostly about my emotional issues and how they seem to be affecting certain parts of our lives).

As so often seems to happen on New Years, I had a bit of a breakdown, but it's gotta be a good thing in the end - We ended up coming out of it realising that I really need to work on improving my emotional skills, since I don't ever seem to actually feel much these days - I always seem to be one step removed from what I'm feeling. We're already making progress - I actually felt the love I have for not_in_denial for once, which was a little scary. I'm hoping that by the end of the year that becomes a constant thing, not something that Erin has to work on getting me to do.

I'm hoping that this is a good omen, and that this is a sign of good things to come. Happy New year everyone, I hope your New Year exceeds everything you could dream of.

After my previous post, I figured that I should probably update people on more of my life, at the very least to let people that I haven't already talked to know that I am probably okay at the moment. I certainly don't want people to think that I'm on the edge.

proxyryan - I'm not going to say that I'm over it (that would be insane), but I'm dealing. Certainly, it's not affecting me in nearly the same way as my previous breakup. I'm a touch irritated at the method of break-up, but overall, I think I'm dealing with it all okay.

Work - Yay! I have work. My Scanning job at Monash has officially started up again, and I happenned to be given a very sizeable chunk of work to be completed, which means lots of money. Which is excellent, because my previous plans of earning enough money from Santa Photography to make sure I could have January off, alas did not eventuate. But, if I've got my times right, I'll be able to make rent this month! Thus, another stress is removed from my life.

Thesis - Talk to me again later. I have resolved to start reading more stuff for my thesis. That's about as far as I've got right about now.

Arcanacon - Baron Munchausen topics are being written. With luck, I should have more than enough written and put onto cute cards by the time Arc swings around. Also, hopefully, I'll have enough money to do stuff at Arcanacon by then!

Home - As always, stable and dependable. Which is an excellent place for home to be.

Friends - Have I told you people lately that you all rock? If I have not, let this be the official "You rock!" post. I thank all of you who have weathered my presence in the past week, especially deird1, tacomonkey, not_in_denial, and Polly & Olav - I thank thee profusely!

Hey everyone, just a quick postcard from sunny Adelaide. Me and Lara are enjoying ourselves quite impressively here. The quick version:

• Train trip was uneventful, but my Nanna had mixed up the dates for our holiday, so thought we were arriving next monday. So, had to PT it down to her place, but thankfully this was easy.


• Monday we crashed.


• Tuesday we waltzed around the city, fed the swans on the River Torrens, looked around the Festival centre area, visited roleplaying stores, and had a quick lookaround for Daytrips to the Barossa.


• Wednesday we visited my friend Aaron and had a nice catchup with him and his mother (whom I haven't seen for longer than Aaron!). Spent the night playing that future Risk edition, and would have won if Emma (Aaron's girlfriend) hadn't decided to traipse around the Americas and knock me out in Europe. Such is life. Stayed the night.


• Today we went into the city with Aaron again, as he was due to pick up some wargaming stuff. Alas, he'd not counted on the 11am opening time of his chosen place of purchase. So, he had to go to work, and Lara and I played uber tourist. Went to the Central Markets, took a trip around the City Loop bus and soaked in the sights, booked our visit to the Barossa Valley, and then took a lovely walk around Adelaide Botanical Gardens (so cool!)


• Tomorrow we're being Daytrippers. We intend to go to the Barossa Valley and do the whole wine-tasting thang. Will bring home momentos...

So, yes, that's our holiday in a nutshell so far. Still intend to visit my paternal grandparents, Lara's aunt and uncle, walk around Glenelg, and visit Aaron again. This has been a much-needed vacation for the two of us, and I can report today that there was a sight of Lara in perfect relaxed bliss (in the botanical gardens). But I must go, as this is a dial-up connection, and I don't want to spend too much of my grandparent's free hours...

Well, the world changes, and another LJ post becomes inevitable...

Exams
Think I did rather well. Even my Operating Systems exam, which I felt woefully underprepared for, wasn't too bad after all. I'm confident I'll pass, and I'm confident I may do better than that even. My other subjects, I was always pretty confident with, but I don't think I did anything horribly bad on them.

Job
Well, Scanning's finished for another year, and I'm jobless until scanning starts again in January. Which means I have to go and find work. Which is a pain.

Web Projects
Deiludum seems to be chugging along slowly, but consistently, which is a blessing I guess. I'm still finding it really dirty to advertise the place...

Self
I think there's something horribly, horribly wrong. Well, maybe just wrong. See, I know I'm stressed (and everyone around me seems to know it too), and usually it would be good that I know this, because it would mean that I could button off a bunch of stuff. But frankly, I don't know what's stressing me, and that's really scary. Don't people usually have at least an inkling of what's troubling them? I mean, I can rationally pick a few things that could be it (Honours, Exams, Joblessness, Relationships, etc), but I can't figure out what's which and how much. This doesn't seem right - you'd think that if you're stressed, you'd know what was stressing you, right? Right?

Well, me and fireflyfaery went to Adelaide this week, and have just recently returned. As per usual, I have decided to compress the last week into dot points, for the sanity of the readers concerned. I figure that this is usually what gets expressed in conversation anyway, and if you're interested in any of the details you'll probably chase me anyway. It also has the advantage that it's less effort for me...

Monday

• Rested. Train rides are fun, but sleeping in those chairs is rather difficult.


• Organised Schedule for rest of week. Mostly.


• Due to my lack of organisational skills, cooked dinner for Lara and My Nanna and Grampa. See, I forgot to tell them Lara was vegetarian, so I made it up to them by cooking mushroom risotto. Was enjoyed by all.

Tuesday

• Spent most of the day with Aaron, my friend in Adelaide. It is good to see him again, and catch up on things. Was mostly spent basically talking. I noted that Lara and Aaron seem to have more to talk about than me and Aaron do, but that may be because my conversational style is more a listening style.


• Stayed over the night. Had Indian takeout, and indeed it was delicious.

Wednesday

• Ended up spending most of this day with Aaron too. Went around the city with him, watched him spend lots of money on roleplaying books. Almost spent $50 of the money dad gave me to buy a Gamecube game, then decided I much preferred to eat. Was useful, as it turns out.


• Went back to Aaron's place, did some general chat and playing and stuff, then went to Nanna's place.

Thursday

• Went to Grandma and Grandpa's place for Lunch. My Uncle Michael turned up for lunch as well, which was a great surprise. Had (once again) forgotten to inform them of Lara's dietary requirements, but astoundingly, Grandma didn't need to go through too much fuss - just adjusted the soup type for Lara. The Tuna patties were enjoyed by all, and had a good afternoon talking with my relatives. Ended up getting a tape of a Four Corners piece on Monash University, and am intending to watch just as soon as I have time and a VCR that can play Extended Play Video Cassettes...


• Went back to Nanna's place, and my Aunt Roxette visitted us while my cousin was at soccer practice. Once again got to show my culinary talents as I made a simple Tomato + whatever-other-veggies-seem-appropriate Pasta. Talked to Aunt Rox, heard much interesting gossip that probably doesn't need to be revealed here.

Friday

• Went to Lara's Aunt and Uncle in the Afternoon, and intended to sleep over. Went to Lara's Cousin's Hockey Match which was cancelled due to poor weather conditions. Once over there, Lara's other cousin came home. I suspect I may have inadvertantly done an assignment for him, but at least I helped him do something cool (for info's sake, he had a "metal presentation", where he had to pick a metal and give a speech. I convinced him to do Americium, the metal used in smoke alarm ionisation detectors). Am still uncertain how to pronounce Americium. Had Fish and Chips for dinner.


• My friend George called that night. Missed him earlier in the evening, when it would be sane to call him up, and thus called him near midnight. Still, he was awake, and we organised to meet in the city the following day.

Saturday

• Went to the City to first meet up with Lara's old friend. After hanging with them for a while (and going to Adelaide's last remaining Roleplaying studio/club), went to meet George. We realised we were in the city, and thus had precious little to do, so spent a good deal of time walking up & down Rundle Mall and Hindley street looking for an accessible Pool table. Played a couple of games, we were both rather pathetic. Realised that I was leaving the next morning on the train, so dragged George around while I bought food for car trip. I also finally found a copy of the book of Sudokus that we had seen earlier in the week.

Sunday

• The long trip home. Fun, but exhausting. I really should go to bed now...

And thus, the holiday in a nutshell. Feel free to ask questions...

Well, it's been a while, so I figured I should probably make an effort and try to start updating again.

It's been over a month; I ain't even going to try to recap the last month. These are various things that have happenned in the past month, that I can remember, that may be newsworthy.

* fireflyfaeryis still in Canada. I miss her so. Last time I talked to her, on Monday, she was headed off to Jasper for a few days. But those reading Lara's LJ will probably know that already.

* Start of the month was the SVGA's first attempt at a major event. Dubbed O-LAN, it was our attempt to have a small LAN weekend, and get some money. Probably due to a lack of advertising, and poor weather, we unfortunately lost money on the event. Ah well, next time someone else will be handling it.

* It's official - come next AGM, I'm not going to be SVGA's President. This is my third term as President, and I think I need to let go, and let someone else lead the club. I'm certain there will be some people willing to lead the club. I'm confident that I've done my bit to ensure the club will survive.

* University has started up. I need to relearn my discipline. I intend to do this.

* MURP has started. I managed to convince warragul to co-GM a multi-party Adventure! game with me (Adventure! being a pulp-style game). Currently, we've finished the first official session, having decided to throw everyone at the climax of their "last" adventure (which I had written up beforehand for my group). I unfortunately cannot divulge amusing aspects about much of the game that are amusing due to the metaplot me and Alicia have come up with, due to the fact that I know at least a few players are on LJ, and I'd hate to ruin their fun...

* The final MURP camp at Grefriars was last weekend. It was indeed fun, but seemed immensely short, for some reason. I suspect me doing a lot of helping out (I was in charge of soup, and indeed by pumpkin and sweet potato soup was well-received, and then stayed on, while tending the soup, to help with the mexican menu). I also had my first real Nitrous Oxide high. It was... interesting. Definitely better than the last time I tried Nitrous - I barely felt a thing then. Also played interesting games, and took many, many photos and movies. Probably enough to make a virtual representation of the Greyfriars site. If people are really interested, I may throw it all on Photobucket (though there's about 48MB of photos and movies...)

* I almost put mikeybidness on my friends list. I have now decided against this. For those of you unaware of the spectacle of the last few days, I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to find out, because as of tonight, I'm not going to bother continuing to reply. It's simply not worth it.

* My 21st is coming up. I'm almost wishing it wasn't because it means I have to make decisions and stuff. I already got the date, so no problem there, but I have to decide where to hold the party, what sort of things to serve there, what presents I want my parents to get me... It's actually quite stressful. We've now basically decided on nice restaurant dinner with family and fireflyfaery, then a house party. But of course, I have to decide whether I want my house party at my parent's place, or perhaps at Wolfenstein, and there are pros and cons to both.

I need to learn to be more decisive.

* In work news, on Monday I found out that some idiot in DLU had set my contract to expire on the 3rd of March. I've got a new contract all filled out and such, but this does mean that I don't get paid next week. Which is a pain. Thankfully my parents have said they'll lend me money to tide me over until my next pay period. Still annoying though.

* My older brother, Mathew, has his graduation tomorrow. There's nothing really stopping me from going, and I'd like to go, but to do so, I'd probably have to miss my only class tomorrow. And I've missed more than a few classes in that subject, and I really need to get my study discipline back. I'm probably going to go to my brother's graduation regardless...