LothedInJanuary

Well, it's Friday and if the gnomes of zurich would quit pounding my skull I'd actually be in a pretty good mood. I had a bad night last night. Dreamed that my new job was like the first day of tec and there were about 50 interns running around and one of the bastards stole my bag along with my cellphone, wallet, carkeys etc. I went into such a flat panic over this (credit card, drivers, cell phone - which is on contract, and I've only got one immobiliser for my car..) I actually had to wake myself up to reassure myself that it was all a dream and I still had all my stuff. As a result this day has not been a good one.

Otherwise TGIF! The only things that might spoil this weekend is Belinda randomly demanding to move at some point. Arg. Otherwise it's sewing (Yes, that making myself clothes shit - where else am I going to get an indigo satin and black lace bodice?) and maybe watching a band playing tonight (Sugardrive...). Shopping, Larp writing and going to Omega (local goth club - only open on Sat) and Sunday is taking it easy and either a braai or going to Drive-in in the evening.

Oh, yeah, my test of choice on http://www.liquidgeneration.com - link featured courtesy of GarethMojo - gave me this result

http://www.liquidgeneration.com/quiz/images/blackwidow.jpg

Bwahahahaha

!!I love everyone!

Wheee! I gotta job! I gotta job! I gotta job!

I even love my absentee boss, she was so happy that I've found a new job!

Yeah, some fool hired me straight out! He didn't even look at my portfolio, just two version of my CV I'd put together - one in Power Point and one in Flash! Yeah gads! It'll probably be crappy, but the pay's the same, the place is closer and if I can survive the three months of probation the job should have it's cool moments - and a raise! Oh, and it's a real design/ad agency, not a two-bit iternal DTP department. Even if I spend 90% of my time there working on Power Point presentations it will still be better than this crap!

I have the devil's luck when it comes to these things. Probably something to do with being related to Mojo. Bwahahaha!

Oh, and I don't think I ever mentioned: I have Fiiiishies! Baby Koi! They're soooo cute! I have 7 at the moment but might get more, 6 of them are goldish (they haven't fully developed their adult colouring) and one of them is black on top, white at the bottom with a gold splotch on it's head! Oh, and Mojo might like to know that my bonsai is still somewhat alive. It dies, it revives, it dies, it revives, it dies, wash, rinse, repeat.

I love my life!

!!I hate everyone!

I especially hate the person that keeps trying to phone the fax machine.

I also hate poles. Particularily medium blue ones. Medium blue ones that lurk in my blind spot and leap out to attack my car when I least expect it. Medium blue ones that leap out to attack my car and will cost me few thousand rand in repairs.

I hate work. I hate the fact that I'll have no work come March. I hate my boss for replacing me. I hate my replacement for accepting this crappy job. I hate tax. I hate phones. I hate moronic PC users. I hate people who have cell phones and don't keep them with them. I hate Power Point. I hate interviews. I hate traffic. I hate waking up at 5:30 in the morning thinking it's Monday and that I haven't set my alarm and getting up to do it and then remembering that it's Tuesday and I did. I hate peas. I really, really hate the person who keeps trying to phone the fax machine.

I hate my life.

It's been three days since I last posted. My appologies, it took me a while to recover from the "insanely and hectically busy" virus that I contracted while wrestling the evil lemur of work. Well, I guess if I was correct in my statement about everyone "not possibly last(ing) a day without a post from me" then I'm rather alone on the wiki, aren't I? Helloooo? Heeeellloooo o o o

Eh.

It's Friday. It's Summer. It's been pissing with rain for the last day and showing no sign of stopping any time soon. It's distinctly a DVD's and popcorn night. However, Belinda has delared she need to go out. Of course, Belinda's going nowhere unless I take her, but I guess I'm nice like that. She's having a shit time. The bitch is that she want a commercial club. Now in CT I'd just drag her off to Claremont and we could spend the night trying to squeeze out way around hordes of school kids trying to party away the fact that their holidays are over. Joy. Here, my options seem even bleeker. Rivonia or Fourways. Rivonia has way too many trendies - well practiced in their bitchy snobbery (I'd definitely have to wear heels, doll!). Fourways - slightly ageing, dull, nothing in walking distance of each other and I'm really not certain as to the ability of the DJs?. <sigh> We'll see.

Saturday is Pretoria Games day, which we are driving through to, and Russel Goldman's birthday in the evening, for which I still haven't found him a pressie...

Still haven't found a place to stay, either. Richard's place starting to look better, but we'd better decide soon...

Someone tell me why are there so many blondes in Joburg? grrr.

ArG?! The evil lemur of work has bitten me thoroughly, having finaly wrestled it to the ground and fled into the wide open planes of WABing? I have grabbed these few moment to post to the net realising that you, my fans, could not possibly last a day without a post from me!

I'm bloody depressed at the mo. Grrrr. My boss has told me that bar misfortune she's found someone to replace me and take my position permanently (I'm on contract - they can't hire me because of a slight flaw in my genetics - no, it's not because I'm related to Mojo, I'm a little on the low pigment end of the scale). So from the start of March if I haven't found something else I'm out on my ass. Which is a real bitch since I was intending to move in with Belinda at the start of March, but it's going to be a little difficult to find a place to stay when I'm not sure I'll have an income.

Especially Richard's place which we went to see on Sunday, small, dirty - very much the domain of two bachelors. Also, rather more than I can afford when you add in the fun things like: water, lights, phone, laundromat charges. Not to mention that it's too small to bother hiring a maid since there wouldn't be enough for her to do and it's totally unfurnished and well, so am I. I'd have to learn the sublime art of toilet bowl cleaning. Arg. Life sucks. I'm going to go home and cook chicken.

The evil lemur of work ate today's link and I don't really want to make him spit it back up. But if you really need to you can read http://ape-law.com/evilmonkey/hall.htm - untried, untested, but could have amusent potential - it's what I got when I decided to search for 'evil monkey' quickly...

In retort to the Skank Lord's comment about quality vs quantity I'd like to point out that when I'm VERY BORED at least I do something productive... Also certain people made the mistake of saying "So, what's joburg like?" And now you know. In excruciating detail!

This heat wave sucks! Bollocks! It makes trying to get a good night's sleep bloody difficult. Somethingthing about it's also giving me hayfever making the last few mornings sheer hell! <sigh>

Anyway, perhaps as a bow to my sibling's whinge, or simply because I've got to much work, too little sleep and I've said it all already, I'm going to keep today short. Have a killer weekend! Wish me luck 'house' hunting. And if you spot Mojo give him a noogie with love from me.

Oh yeah, todays link is http://www.rpglibrary.org/inspiration/darkdungeons/index.html. Required reading for every role-player and bloody funny! MST3K? vs Chick Tracts! Whooot!

Well, Belinda got back yesterday. As I was packing stuff for role-playing last night I picked up my phone only to discover a message from the child that was almost and hour old asking my if I could collect her from the airport. Arg! Well, she'd managed to sort herself out in the interim, but I had a few moments of panic there. Well, she's also looking for somewhere to stay so we've decided to move in together. This makes finding a place to stay even more of a bugger, since she needs to be in walking distance of RAU and doesn't have a hell of a budget. However, at least I'll be with someone I know, trust and get on with.

Last night's L5R? session was good, we managed to get through three month of 'static time'! A first - especially since we'd been playing for three months and only 16 days of game time had passed. The reason we so desparately need time to pass is becasue we're all playing young samurai who've just started their Dojo training (ala Harry Potter, 'cept with swords and in Rokugan). It's rather fun, and we get into a lot of deep shit - mostly because Laura's character, Keiko, keeps opening her mouth (She's the DnD? equivalent of INT 18, WIS 3 - very dangerous in a game like L5R?). My character is Inoko, who is quite the tomboy, not the brightest and most aware character on the block, but she's got a good heart and a stong sense of honour and duty and she's quite good with her hands. (Don't even think about it) She'll make a good bushi if she doesn't get herself killed because of her friends. Another stumblig block in her way to living to see adulthood is her 'cousin' (very distant), Kusemi, played by Angela, who is a manipulative little cow with a bit of a princess complex and a negative empathy rating, who sees Inoko as just another tool to be used to make her more popular and comfortable. Hehehe, I managed to indirectly spoil one of her plans by volunteering to go along with some of the party on a 'punishment' assignment, it was great, and totally unintended.

The work forcast is: Bleak, starting with a light wind this week we are predicting shifting pressure systems and rain accompanied by gale-force winds anytime in the near future. Therefore today's link is a rushed find of http://anime.jyu.fi/~anipike/, which in itself is a good starting point to find pics and info about a variety of Manga - it has multitudes of useful links!

Oh, and my irony of the day (not a regular feature) is that despite the fact that I'm working for a well-know international IT company I have to liaise with a remarkable number of increadibly stupid people within said organisation. Highlight of my day yesterday was trying to teach someone on a PC via phone how to copy and past images from one Powerpoint slide to another!

Well, they still haven't really found any more work for me. I'm not entirely certain where this day has gone, but it's been a decent one. For starters I had sushi for lunch! Always a good thing! I loooove sushi!

In the morning I designed my costume for Laura and Alan's wedding - it's Victorian themed. I've designed the dress so that the total effect is made out of two skirts, a bodice and some sleeves that I can detach from the bodice afterwards - hopefully this way I'll be able to wear everything again at some appropriate point. At the least the bodice will suit nights at Zeplins.

Finally, I created my first wallpaper! Whee! Used some of the Dirty Pair pics I found on Image Central! I really looks cool! (Any one wanting a copy - it's currently 1024 x 768 but can be sized down & possibly up and you have a choise of pink, green or blue - can mail me: robyn.saul@za.didata.com)

I've pretty much had enough of spending the entire day surfing the web so once again you get a link from my favourites page. Don't worry, it's fresh, only brewed yesterday! It is Cthulhu Coffee! To be found at http://cthulhu.kittyfox.net/index.phtml. It's a little amaturish, but worth a look at, got a few fun bits.

Oh, and Neeks and I are getting together tommorow when I finish work to start writing out Faerie Larp for Gencon! Book now!

Gods today is dragging! I can't believe it isn't even lunch yet! Of course, this is not helped by the fact that I was late leaving the house this morning and so missed having breakfast (and hence ate my lunch early).

The office has been smelling of boiled cabbages for the last ten minutes, this is disturbing, especially since there are no boiled cabbages in the vicinity. I took a walk to visit the fairy-rings on the complex field hoping the smell would have cleared by the time I came back, but no such luck

Last night was one of those nights. Came home in a bad mood, didn't have fun cooking, watched telly and then finished reading Night Watch . This meant I was up till rather late. Went to bed at about 12am, got up for the mosquito repellant at 12:30, got up to find something cooler to sleep under at 1am - fell asleep sometime after that, at about 5:30am there was this persistent noise like a big winged insect banging itself against a wall - kinda like dragonflies make when they get trapped inside - they keep hitting the roof as if gaining altitude was the solution. At 6am my radio alarm went off - I lay there listening to the news as I always to, waiting for the weather report to tell me what to wear - the nextdoor neighbour's dogs started barking at just the appropriate moment. I got up, had a shower and discovered that I hadn't sewn the button back on to the pants I'd decided to wear. Discovered that the only fruit juice in the fridge was that melon one which makes me feel ill and the only yoghurt around was equally disagreeable. On the way to work I got handed some promo post-its advertising a print shop. They have 'stick me' written on one corner. There were a couple more joys to my morning, but thats the gist of it. Except worse. I'm glad that the headache is only starting now. And that the smell of boiled cabbage is fading.

It has been expained - Michelle's stirfry lunch. There was boiled cabbage in the vicinity.

I currently have five ideas for Larps. I still don't have someone to write them with. Think I'll bother Neeks, or, push come to shove, Alan. Chris Cooper and I are supposed to be writing a DG module, but well, despite the fact that Chris is at home in front of his computer typing shit most of the time, he seems be too busy to invest a couple of hours each week in this activity. I'll give him a few more weeks and then demand the info and files off his computer and see what I can do with it myself. <sigh> I hate writing these sorts of things alone, everthing works so much better when you've got someone to bounce ideas back and forth with.

Bugger pool. I think I'll skip everything this evening and just go to bed really early - hopefully meaning I'll be fresh and lively for RP'ing tomorrow.

I'm a little ambiguous over today's link. This is probably because I couldn't actually find the 'operative' bit - possible since I've screwed up my flash plug-in by downloading wierd versions of it and quicktime, or alternative since I'm on a bloody Mac. Pity, I could have really enjoyed participating in some virtual genocide. The site is The Kill Everyone Project http://homokaasu.org/killeveryone/. Unfortunately, they've already decimated SA, but they are currently on Ethiopia! Go forth and do your bit for overpopulation!

Well, work's closing in slowly. Everyone's back at work and as the week goes on they're gradually going to remember that we're here... Doubt I'm going to be posting every day from now on.

My weekend was okay, had its ups and its downs. Friday evening I went out to Pretoria. Up: Zeplins was cool, the music was great and there were lots of people there. Down: I felt queasy so didn't drink, I danced so much it hurt - lots, and I recalled that I hadn't seen my Klute CD for a long time. Saturday morning I went to the Oriental Plaza. Up: I didn't spend any money. Down: I didn't spend any money and I got up specially early to go. Saturday night we had a quite night in with movies, food and wine. Up: My lamb chops rule, we got two half-way decent comedies, Zoolander & Not another Teen Movie (Molly Ringwold rules!) and wine is always good. Down: They had to wake me to cook, it took more than half-an-hour to pick the bloody movies and Peter and Danny finished most the wine, not me. Sunday we went to Bruma market. Up: I didn't spend any money and I now know where to get fluorescent spikey collars if I ever need one. Down: I didn't spend any money. It was long drive, a hot day, a full car and Grant's air-con is not exactly performing with peak efficiency. Sunday night I stayed home instead of going to the drive-inn with the rest of the house. Up: I missed Reign of Fire , I got to read half of Night Watch and I came up with three ideas for LARPs. Down: I was bored out of my cotton-picking skull for most of the time and I don't have anyone to help me write one of these LARPs.

I'm hoping this week will be a bit more lively than the last. I'm really hoping I feel bit more lively this week than I did last. RussGoldman is back this week, so role-playing will be on again. Belinda - my neurotic friend I made while waitressing - is back from the UK at some point. Bronwen Wheeler (Angela's girlfriend) is up from Durbs so there's a Doors mission on Friday night I suspect. Finally, Danny's leaving next Tuesday so we want to have a last big night out all together on Saturday. Arg.

Since I haven't really had time to surf the web today I'm dredging up my 'link for the day' from my favourites list. It's rather dull but unbelievably useful! http://www.onlineconversion.com Converts any measurement to any other equivalent measurement. Great for working out character stats when the bloody books give everything in feet and pounds! Ooh,ooh, I've just discovered it will convert from English to Haxor! ! H4v3 l33t $K!ll$ !ñ bull$H!t Whee! And much much more! Look under Funstuff!

Well, I didn't get the nice place in Emmarentia. <big sigh> However I've also realised that I'm really not going to be happy in the other place, it's just too far from the people I know and too small - there's no place for me to have people round really. So I've decided I'd rather just keep looking... At least now I don't have to lie to Tania. However I did promise I'd move in there at the end of the month - very sincerely. <sigh> Guess I can lable myself 'oath-breaker' and take a penalty to my neutral good alignment...

I'm going to Zeplins in Pretoria with Annick (Aneek, Nicky, Anicky, Neeks - the loud, scantily-clad one at every Icon) tonight. They play some really decent music! Better than Doors even, they've got a small dedicated Goth/EBM floor and a larger Alternative/Metal/etc. floor. I've just been feeling to stressed and wound up today over this 'place to stay' thing and I realy just need to get out and relax - take some tips from my cider-soaked sibling ( He he he - I like the assonance in that one)

Anyway, more on Monday - I'm off to get drink at the office bar now. Have a great weekend! Yeah, even you Gareth. :)

I think this 'get sleep' thing is actually bad for me. I've been getting more sleep than usual for the last few days and I've just been feeling damn tired as a result. I went to bed at 9:30 last night - although it took me a while to actually fall asleep. This morning I was delighted to wake up with a splitting head-ache! It has faded. Mostly

Today I don't have any real excuse to be writing this. They've finally found work for me to do - so I guess this time I'm just WAB'ing. I'll blames it on that mostly gone headache. That and the fact that the work is crap and involves scanning. I hate our scanner. It is is a piece of tatal crap. And the software that inferfaces with it is even worse! It's descreening is shite! It always starts previewing on a tiny area in the right bottom corner! If you change the colour from RGB tro greyscale it re-previews it. Previewing takes almost as long as scanning! Scanning takes forever! Arg! And worst of all, none of this bothers my boss! Guess what the chances are that we're getting a new one sometime soon are? Bugger!

Anyway, went to see that place in Emmarentia last night. It's very nice, huge rooms and lots of them. It's also only a short drive away from where I'm staying now which is actually nice. Seeing that I'm hoping to find another job, moving near my work might not be the best plan. Fortunately there is only one smallish yappy dog, the other dog is a rather placid rotwieler (sp?) and bother of them stay very much outside. It's a bit more expensive, but that because I have pay R200 towards the full-time maid! (I'll never have to wash dishes! Whoog!) And I also won't be saving much on petrol, but I think I'll be a lot happier there. I'm really hoping I get offered the place!

The internet is pure evil! I'm noticing that many things in this world are pure evil... Have you ever noticed how much time you can spend on the damn thing and never really find anything of use. Five hours later you look away from the screen and are hard-put to think what exactly you've been looking at for all that time! Especially if, like me, you're looking for images! Hundreds of advertising sites and deadlinks plague you upon your quest! I've found that the angelfire deadlink notice is actually rather humorous. They have a variety of them. I'm pretty certain I've seen them all. Well, I've seen the one about the cat twice at least... So finally towards the end of yesterday I found http://www.imagescentral.com which contains a really good selections of pics from a variety of comics and most of them are pretty decent quality! I was especially happy to find that it had more than 200 images by my favourite comic artist Adam Warren - of Dirty Pair fame. I'm thinking of making some wallpaper for my Mac using the pics.

Yes, it's early, this is about the time I usually get into work. Rushhour in JHB works to strange rules. There are two routes I can take to work; The longer (25km) yet more direct route via the Freeway or the shorter (22km) twisty route through the back streets of JHB. Now, if I leave the house at 7am or earlier the shorter route takes me about 35 to 40 minutes, however if I leave after 7pm it takes me an hour. Now the longer route via the freeway takes 50min no matter what time I take it. So, if I'm early I go the short way and if I'm late I take the long way.

However, this is all going to change! (No they're not going to do the sensible thing of building more freeways <sigh>) I've found a place to move into. It's really close to work - no more than a ten minute drive and the rent is good, R1200 and all in all it seems nice enough. (They've got a cute friendly black kitty called Luna) However, it's a bloody long drive away from all my friends in Westdene where I'm staying now and I would have likes to been a bit closer to them. I'm supposed to put down the deposite this afternoon, but I'm going to be scum. There's another place in Emmarentia (much closer to Westdene) which I organised to go see yesterday before the other place which I think I'm going to go see anyway. I'll phone the other lot and tell them 'something's come up' (I have a long list of plausable 'somethings' incase they ask...) and can I bring the deposite tommorow rather? It's all probably a waste of time, I've already been told that the place in Emmarentia has two small dogs (blurg! Little evil yappy insults to evolution), but if the place is crappy at least I'll be happier with my current decision. Options,dammit! I need options!

Oh, I found a cute list yesterdy for all you psycho Manga Fans, Lessons I learned from Manga (other than how to speak Japanese like a cartoon character) it's at http://www.senpai.org/~tonbo/lessons.html Have to have a link of the day - for now, while I'm on the net all day...

I lied again! I seem to be making a trend of this. I got sleep. Well, sort of, judging by how difficult it was to get up this morning I guess perhaps I need more.

It has once again been confirmed that I am indeed a true looser at pool. Of four games I won a grand total of one of them and only because Danny sunk the black ball just one ball too soon. However all in all it didn't suck as much raw mammoth dick as expected (well, except for the first game when AlanKent white-washed me), since towards the end I was vaguely remembering how to play (and had also borrowed a cue I liked.... excuses, excuses ;).

BTW for any arty types out there currently being molested by Brendon in the cause of CLAWmarks, GrantCharlton is also looking for art for ICON.

I really hate living in a house where all my house mates wear is black jeans and black t-shirts (except fo those scary checked shorts of Chris'). All my clothing, especially my white t-shirts and socks, are slowly edging their way towards a shade of concrete-grey. Looovely. I've taken to hording my light clothing for a week or so until there's enough for a wash load and then scrounging the house for beige towels and the like to make up the rest of the load. Robyn, defender of low pigment clothing! Definitely a minority cause among the people I know...

We were speculating on going to see a strip-show tonight, Peter's never seen one and reckons we'd be a good crowd to go with. Neither have I, but Danny and I reckon we can get out kicks from watching the people watching the strip show and make them really uncomfortable. (I can just hear my brother screaming 'Ho!' at the computer screen) Although, considering Alan's manifest apathy to do anything other than play computer games, I doubt the trip will happen tonight, probably next week or so.

Also I need to confirm that The Spark does indeed rule! Go to http://www.thespark.com for some of the coolest tests out where you can even compare scores with those you know! The e-mail addy they score me under is lothriel@kingsley.co.za. (Just don't mail me on that - I won't get it). They also have the Stinky Meat Project - all time classic; the Fat Project - 30 days, 30 pounds and more!

Well, I got bored fast. and despite my earlier claim in MojoComments that I wouldn't post any sort of journal, well I will. At least, that is, I will over the next few weeks until I either get swamped with real work, get sick of having to edit all my typo's, or just find the novelty wears off and my lazy bitch nature comes back....

Well, Joburg, yes, I'll repeat, you all aren't here! Bwahahaha Although is might not be as good a thing as I make it out to be. (I was cornered, you were supposed to fight back! Damn, no sense of humor!) Eh, shit, lying again. <shrug>

Well, my job is pretty dull, the pay is okay, and I get all day net access - although the firewall does prevent me from getting to some of the cooler sites like http://www.poisonedminds.com - I think that's the URL.

I'm staying in Grant's house, some of you may be very familiar with it's couches and floors. It's somewhat cramped, and I have to move out soon, especially due to the impending marriage of AlanKent to Laura Eviston? and due to the fact that I'm still not paying rent - tad of a guilt factor.

The weather up here is great. I'm sorry if you don't agree, but there's nothing better than a Highveld thunderstorm rolling in at 4pm in the afternoon after a long hot day. The noise, the rain, the lightening! Admittedly it gets bloody cold in winter, and dry, everything burns leaving a heavey smokey pall over the city which just doesn't shift - but at least you still get to see the sun! Oh, and the best thing of all is that I really don't get the same level of hayfever, meaning I feel less tired and can actually function off substantially less sleep leaving me far more time to party! Wheee!

Tonight I'm getting hauled off to play pool with the household (AlanKent, GrantCharlton, Chris Cooper), Laura and Danny and Peter. I'm really not a fan of pool. I suck. (at pool, damn you!) Think I'll have to bail early and get some sleep - but then again why? All I've spent today doing is browsing the Wiki and the usual Wednesday L5R? with Russel is cancelled since, well, he's in that steaming green hell-hole that some people like to call Durban. Eh, screw it. Sleep is for the weak!