But When You’re With Me, I’ll Make You Believe

[Moves Like Jagger – Maroon 5 ft Christina Aguilera]

Strange to be coming back to a habit which I used to have everyday. I read somewhere that 21 days make a habit, so here’s to 21 days of a new habit.

My comeback’s comeback’s comeback (did I count that right?) comes on the heels of a different direction that I’m taking in my life. Namely, that I’m going back onto the same direction that I was (hoping to be) heading towards this time last year.

Bar the stroke of depressing inspiration from the post prior, my life had taken a creative standstill. After graduation, I attempted to continue writing, but the lure of an obligation-free lifestyle took me in too far, and I found myself sitting at the tail end of May with nothing to show for it but working two 3-hour shifts a week, and taking benefits from the government (which isn’t something I’m complaining about). And while every day I told myself that I’d get right on it – ‘it’ being the first step towards a proper ‘life’, i.e. applying for writing/media jobs more seriously (more seriously than occasionally contacting some small publishing company about internships), or at least have a plan sketched out – it was simply more relaxing to watch old episodes of Buffy and gorge myself on Daredevil comics. I started and semi-abandoned two different writing projects, as well as a movie review blog idea which I’ve also heaped into a folder on my USB titled “Microsoft Docs”, the polite sign at the gate that is the graveyard of my creativity spurs.

So when June came whizzing around, I accepted a job at a local cafe, which offered me up to 20+ hours a week of working – and hard working, too. My paychecks started holding much bigger numbers, and I told myself that this was obviously my next step, since it was  next to impossible to find a job in the media these days (especially if I didn’t try), and at least I’m earning some seed money for when I take a step away from the ledge and start doing work for no money – an inevitable step.

Then, the other week, I reconnected with an old friend. She’s the kind of person who would ask about you out of the kindness of her heart, but not take a wishy-washy answer as fact and move on. She pressed why I didn’t have a proper plan, and even went so far as to contact an acquaintance of her own who works in the media, just to ask for how I can get started.

So I dug up my old internet bookmarks where I’d stashed away a few post-grad courses I’d been looking at in my final year of undergrad studying. I semi-made up my mind that I should return to study, if not only for the practical experience that those courses will provide for to fatten my port-folio. I sounded my ideas off of Amelia, who immediately seized on the fact that for the past half a year I’d done naught to further my own career, and guilt-tripped me into doing something about it. Granted, she told me to just go and properly look for a job, but I reviewed my own state of mind, and felt that perhaps I wasn’t ready to look for the job, but instead should study for it. If this would be a vain exercise to put off shouldering responsibilities…well, time will tell.

In any case, I’d applied for and am in the process of being accepted for a Masters in Media. I’d like to think I’d be one of the gap-year-taking older students (although, considering this is a post-grad degree, I just may be one of the youngest anyway) who studies above and beyond the requirement and partake in all class discussions.

600 words in: excellent. I should have weeded out the people who didn’t really care about my ramblings, and am left with Serena. Hi Serena, are you still reading this?

Much like the gag on Family Guy, I’m a writer who needs people to know I’m writing. I haven’t gone as far as to go into a cafe and bring my laptop, although if I am to work and study at the same time next year, it just may happen out of necessity.

So, Serena, please continue reading.

Yesterday was the annual Social Night, an event held by the SAMA club, or the anime club of Monash Uni. Amelia is a committee member this year, and she worked hard for the event. I’m not one for photo-blogging, but here is a glimpse of what the table settings that she designed looked like (if you click on the link).

The event was smaller than last year, but it was still extremely entertaining. Maybe it was because I know how hard Amelia worked for the event, but I felt it was more intimate.

Serena snuck a bottle of vodka into the party, and became the producer/enabler for most of the drunken behavior last night.

The night was capped by a rousing Happy Birthday for Amelia, who turned 21 at midnight after the event. I look at her, and sometimes I’m astonished to realize I’ve been with her for 2 years, which simultaneously feel like no time at all, and yet I can’t remember what I used to do without her in my life (no, I will not read through my old blog posts to refresh my memory).

I’ll find more interesting things to blog about apart from myself for the next 20 days. Unfortunately tomorrow is an entire day of work, so maybe I’ll find a funny customer anecdote to share.

Thanks for reading, Serena (and any of you other beautiful folks who I know have subscribed to and stuck with me despite the hiccups).

Alex.

All Hopes I Had Become Surreal

[My Heroine – Silverstein]

Today was my first official day at Melbourne. And, actually, you know what? Today was the first day of Autumn; that means that Summer has ended. I need to update my Summer playlist, and also it means that I’ll stop posting lyrical headings. This will thus be the end.

I think a lot of songs I REALLY WANTED TO USE didn’t get posted on. Well. Too bad. Perhaps I’ll do a Winter title thing as well.

Alright, to cut a long and obviously predictable story short: Yes Uni was pretty good. Lectures haven’t kicked in yet. There WAS one subject which reduced me to dozing, so I actually just changed out of it to something hopefully better EXCEPT I need to get it confirmed and get my timetables done. I hope I don’t get crappy times. I still get Tuesdays off. The food was expensive in Union House so I will start doing packed lunches. I’ll get a Union member friend to go heat it up for me.

Points of interest for today:

1) Josh and Annie are in the same lectures and breaks with me for the first 3 hours.

2) I am actually very excited about doing Professional Writing, even though a lot of the styles will be out of my comfort zone. But I think the Tutes will definitely help.

3) Seeing Zhen (3rd year student and friend) and saying hi to him at the cafeteria actually makes me feel really cool because I know a 3rd year.

4) The Norwegian guy I was talking about is also in my Professional Writing class. I really hope he never finds this blog or he’ll think I’m a complete freak.

5) Josh does not hesitate to tell disgusting stories while I eat.

6) Anna is very gullible. This I’ll go into detail soon.

7) I FINALLY MET SNEAKS!!! I FINALLY MET CHERYL! AFTER GOD KNOWS HOW LONG I ACTUALLY MET HER AND SHE IS RIDICULOUSLY TALL.

Alright, so Cheryl first. She’s doing Uni classes this year, so, because today I was going to stay back a bit to have dinner with Josh, Annie and Anna, I met up with her. This was the first time we ever did this.

I waited with her outside her room, and I swear, when she gets nervous she says the oddest things. CHERYL! WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?! But actually, it was so good to tall to her in person, and be dwarfed, literally, by her presence.

After that, I went to dinner at Red Silks with the other three.

I think I haven’t laughed that hard or frequently through a meal in ages.

Somehow we managed to convince Anna that the bottle of water she was pouring from is actually pure tequila. We pretended to down the “tequila” with some effort, while she obviously effortlessly chugged it down. She got rather worried that she had “alcohol” without knowing it. It went on for nearly 10 minutes of us just half pissing ourselves laughing.

At the end of the meal, and I swear this happened, I told her that “gullible is written on the ceiling”…AND SHE LOOKED! Man, the fact that she took all of this in good humor and still laughed and had fun with us, that is a sign of a truly awesome person.

We also, for some reason (which I think was mostly Mai), had a huge conversation about cleavages. I remarked that it is awkward for me to hug friends above a certain height, because it means my face is level with some awkward – albeit comfortable – cushioning. Annie asked, “well why don’t you turn your head to the side?” I replied, “I ALREADY DO?! What, do you think I currently hug people by burying my face in their chest?! NO!”

And then, and I can’t remember why, I started singing “Do your ears hang low, do they sway to and fro?” I think it’s because Josh said, “You can just throw [your breasts] over your shoulder when you hug someone.” And, if I recall correctly, the song goes, “Do you throw them over your shoulders like a marching band soldier?”

Alright, so, I think I may have laughed too much today because I read back on what I wrote, and not only does it sound insanely immature, it also sounds a bit high. So I’m sorry if it was tedious to read, but there you go.

I have tomorrow off, to do my subjects. My books, however, are a worry.

So, I bid you my reader, welcome to Autumn. If you also started Uni today, I wish you the best for the future, and I hope you didn’t get TOO ripped off by the expensive food today.

Alex.

Everybody’s Screaming

[Untitled – Simple Plan]

You know, the whingey one. Now, I haven’t written about yesterday, and since I have some time to kill before I gotta go shower, so I’ll write about both days.

Yesterday was my first O-day thing at Melbourne. I took the train up with Elmo (…Did I call her Jackie or Elmo? Who cares. It’s Jackie now.) and met up with Jen at Melbourne Central. She texted me saying “see you UCMC.” I replied, “Wtf is UCMC?” Now, who here remembers that blog post where I wrote “I invented a new acronym for ‘under the clock at Melb Central’ so it’s easier and faster to type”? Yes, I failed at remembering my own code.

Took the tram up to Melb U, and went to get my ID and concession cards done. I managed to look like a gimp in mine. Yes. I’m now stuck with it for 3 years.

Made it to my Host group just on time, despite getting lost and having to call my Host. Didn’t really know anyone there, quite a few of the other students in my group are doing Art as breadth or something, as a 2nd year transfer, or something like that, so I felt pretty small.

Oh, but there was this Norwegian guy in my group who closely resembled Cory Monteith from Glee. I may or may not have been walking close to him for the rest of the tour, just to hear his accent.

After the Host tour, I caught back up with Jen, Jackie, and then met up with Nay. We went around trying to get free stuff. We went to the Nando’s stall, thinking they’d hand out free Peri Peri sauce packets. We did get a packet. On the front it said “Not for soft cocks”. It took a good 20 seconds for us to realize we were each given a condom.

Got more free stuff walking around; lined up for 20 minutes for pancakes that came with really good strawberries, and then lined up for 20 minutes for the free BBQ. While we were eating we bumped into an old face from back old VET days with Nay. To cut a long story short, that was a very bad meeting.

Then lined up for snow cones. I wanted a massage too but you had to show that you were in the Student Union, not just lying and saying “yes I am” to get a free snow cone…

Caught up with more MacRob girls, then went home with Jackie. Hung out at the Glen for a bit before taking the bus back, just ‘cos there was nothing else to do.

Anyway, that was Tuesday. Now onto today.

Took the train up with Jackie again, and dropped her off at her building, which was pretty far away from the rest of the buildings. Went to my building which took a good 5 minutes to find, with many rotating bodies and maps.

Caught up with Spanna, who I hope doesn’t mind but from now I’m going to call Annie, her actual name. Then the Asian friends she made the previous day arrived, so I introduced myself. Thus I met Kristie (Christy? Christie? You know what I mean) and Josh. Josh, who was from Scotch, turned out to actually have many mutual friends with me. Also saw Pris, who looked really tanned, still.

Fast forward through a rather boring lecture, and we were lined up for the free BBQ (I love Uni having free BBQs all the time. Apparently later on they’ll have more, but with alcohol instead of soft drinks). Jen and Mai appeared, and smoothly we let them cut in line with us. Introduced Jen and Mai to Josh.

There’s a Facebook event called “Make things sexually awkward” so I decided to bring that up. It resulted in Annie asking Mai to hug Josh, because Mai has…rather…well…endowed assets. And Josh’s response was bloody funny (Let me clarify now that it was all in good humored fun, good humored and platonic fun, there was nothing there and it was all a joke):

“Wait, why are you hu-…WOAH!”

It was fantastic. And. Very awkward. So, mission accomplished.

As we were eating our lunch later, Dom and D.P. came along. Dom ditched us to hang off his MHS buddies (literally), so Josh was the only guy sitting with us. Had a pretty good lunch (I also remember an instance where Mai was holding my sunnies, and Josh pointed at them saying “Woah they’re HUGE!” But Mai was holding my sunnies around her chest area), and thank God we sat in the shade.

Went to another lecture thing later on, and it was so boring and patronizing. After that, Jen and I went to a final lecture, and I nearly fell asleep, or I did fall asleep, I can’t remember. Afterwards caught up with Annie and Josh who’d ditched us for something else. Jackie found us again, and then we took the tram back down to Melbourne Central.

At Melb Central, I managed to bump into Catherine and all, and it was fantastic to see them again! They were coming back from their Swimming Carnival (haha high school carnivals). Got home with a blister on my foot, from having to walk so much. Yes I am complaining.

So that’s my first 2 days of O week – two more days after this. There’s something happening with the Arts camp I think but I don’t know what. It’s rather confusing. Maybe I should rephrase: Arts “camp”. Yes, that does sound more suss. Good.

Will keep you posted.

Alex.

Breathe In So Deep

[Fall For You – Secondhand Serenade]

(I’m pretty sure I’ve used this song already.) Yesterday was the Melb Uni AAD and my audience participation in TAYG! So it was a long and very tiring day.

I got up at 7 so I could be at the Glen by 8:30 (it takes a while for Mom to get ready even though she seems to be okay to go back to work now). Why would I want to be at the Glen at this ungodly hour, you ask? Yes because Jenny said she’ll meet me there at that time. In the end she was 40 minutes late.

Took the train up to Melb Central with Jenny and walked around Borders while she tried to find the book that she wanted for her birthday. Couldn’t find it (I think if Borders didn’t have it…then…I mean…seriously…).

Waited under the clock for Pris who was 10 minutes late and made me worry a lot because I didn’t want to be late to our Info Session. Saw MacRob girls already, which was a prelude to how many we’d see throughout the day. Said bye to Jenny, as she was going to RMIT [insert giggle here…just kidding!] so Pris and I went up.

Saw some Brentwood people upon arrival, such as Huey, Swin and Jonga. Looks like the 2 parts of my life is going to join at Melbourne!

Then went on to Redmond Barry hall, and said morning to Mai and Jen. Went into our lecture theatre and there was greeted by the surprise of the month.

Spanna yelled out my name as I walked in. I had not known (despite apparently everyone else being clued in) that she was going to be in course, so you can imagine the speed with which I bounded up the steps to hug her.

The Info Sesh itself was pretty boring, and the lady and the guy more or less told us what we already knew. It was strange to see Esther from the previous year in our Info Sesh though. Asking around later I found out she’d deferred a year which is why she is now in our “year level”. It’s quite weird to think about that!

After the Info Sesh Spanna stayed in the Redmond Barry hall place, and Jen and I went to Union House with Pris. Pris left when we got to Union House and I met up with Mai and Jen again, and sat with them. Failing to remind me that there was a free BBQ, I bought lunch.

Oh, this is the point where I gloat that I managed to make one friend! (Yes, one.) There are probably around 6 Asians in our course, two of whom are males. So it was easy to notice the other Asians in the room. I saw a girl who was sitting by herself two rows ahead, and later on at Union House when I saw Sab- and Esther (different to the one doing my course) I saw that girl tagging along too. Her name is Anna, and turns out we have mutual friends! So there. I made a friend.

We saw many many MacRob girls there (and I saw Clare there too. I’d forgotten she was doing BA as well). So many, in fact, that we took up two picnic tables with our awesomeness (there were numerous MHS guys as well).

After lunch Jen went to a Diploma of Languages lecture and Spanna and I went to this lecture for Chinese. Saw Pam-, Andy, Theresa and many many other Chinese folks (duh). The guy who was in charge of the lecture was, as he reminded us many times, “only an ACTING consultant” as the real guy was on some “China Trip”. So in all senses he had no idea what any of the details were.

For example, when asked a question regarding which sort of classes to be in: “I really am not the person to ask that question. If you ask me I would probably say go to the website.” Pause. “Did that answer your question?”

No.

After that I found Jen again and we went to Brunetti’s near Lygon St and met up with her friend Martin. We had a drink, and talked about university, and then I had to leave to meet up with Swin so we could go to TAYG.

It was stressful to make sure that Mani and Michelle were at Southern Cross properly because, when I asked Michelle where she was, as I saw her train pull up a few moments ago, she replied, “the station.” Well d-fucking-uh.

Took the tram up to Docklands and went to the Channel 10 Studios. We waited outside for a bit, then got ushered into the audience foyer. Everyone was dressed very colorfully as the invitation suggests.

As we were going into the actual recording studio, we had to pair up, and since we were a group of 5, Wilson didn’t have anyone. So one of the security guards grabbed Wilson and shouted out to the rest of the audience: “THIS GUY DOESN’T HAVE A FRIEND! HE’S ALL ALONE IN THIS WORLD!” (Or something hilarious along those lines.)

The filming itself took over 3 hours. There was a guy called Michael who warmed up the crowd with some jokes and stuff. Then all the cast came out and greeted us. We cheered, applauded, whooped and pretended that we heard some jokes for the first time. I won’t give away what happened; you’d just have to watch it (it’s the 3rd episode of the new season). They threw lollies at us (and missed) and tried to get our cheer maintained so we were an awesome audience.

The show ended filming at around 8:30, and we stayed outside until Michelle got picked up by her family friend. Then we took the tram and trains back to Glenny. On the way back, Swin kept on making fun of me because I couldn’t hear her through my music. I COULD STILL TELL SHE WAS LAUGHING AT ME!

Today I went to Spanna’s house for her birthday, but that would be a different post which I am too tired to write right now. Tomorrow I have an interview at a Telemarketing company for a job (yes I know the irony is many layered), and going to one of Jenny’s friend’s house to hang out and have dinner. It will be a hectic day tomorrow as well.

Wish me luck!

Alex.