^ This looks strangely delicious. I think I might try it. My dad used to have pear and apple on peanut butter toast.

C and I are about to go out for breakfast in Redfern. This place has had a bad reputation, but it's much lovelier than is given credit for. So many gorgeous terraces and old buildings. We're staying with C's friend Mel in her huge, gorgeous shared terrace. We slept in a massive loft. Yesterday when we got in off the train we had lunch at a kebab shop and talked to a young guy with a pony tail carrying a baseball bat. C said "Do you need that around here?" and he laughed and said "Not before 7.30" (apparently a friend had given it to him). Then we sat in the park and witnessed an almost accident, where a man nearly rear ended a lady's car and then proceeded to get out and yell in her window so that the whole street would hear; "Where did you get your license?!". Then we saw a thin hunching man in a knitted jumper being pulled along the street by his primary school daughter, who stopped at the park and sat down and wouldn't move, with her father trying to reason with her that he'd take her to the park tomorrow. Eventually she went with him, but later we saw her hiding in a shop and her father was standing outside with his bread calling "Beatrice! Come on, we've got to go". It was very cute. Aaaanyway, only a few more hours with C before he flies away, then back home to the cats. I left the house really messy, so I'll have something to occupy myself with, and Paige sent me up a copy of Dexter Season 2, so I'll get straight onto that. I MISS YOU ALREADY C ♥

Today I spent $17 on stamps. Eep. I didn't know it was possible. Today I'm feeling drained of funds (only bills in the mail today) and the dreary weather, which I usually love, is making things feel a bit down today. C and I went up to post mail and looked in two op shops on the way back. We saw a huge old low dressing table with a great big mirror which would be great for the spare room and a really interesting decorated old wooden record player/tape player/cd player for $50. C wanted it so bad. It would be perfect for our house. Buuuut, we didn't get either. The day before yesterday C and I went to Office Works and I bought some new textas and stickers and a date stamp to go with the purple ink pad I have. I need to find more things that need date stamps. I've been date stamping all my mail. I also sent out two mix cds to recipients in the UK and US for a swap I'm doing via Swapbot which requires you to make a mix cd full of songs that have names in the titles. I should receive two in return. Here's my tracklisting:

1. Patricia's Moving Picture - The Go! Team
2. Sarah - Bat For Lashes
3. I Have Forgiven Jesus - Morrissey
4. I Had A Dream, Joe - Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
5. Fred Jones, Pt. 2 - Ben Folds
6. Cath... - Death Cab For Cutie
7. Mr E's Beautiful Blues - Eels
8. Jesus The Mexican Boy - Iron & Wine
9. Noah (Ghost In A Sheet) - Fionn Regan
10. For Emma - Bon Iver
11. Samson - Regina Spektor
12. Simeon's Dilemma - Why?
13. Casey's Song - City & Colour
14. Bella - Angus & Julia Stone
15. Judy And The Dream Of Horses - Belle & Sebastian
16. Son Of Sam - Elliott Smith
17. I'll Have To Dance With Cassie - God Help The Girl
18. Alison - Elvis Costello
19. A Postcard To Nina - Jens Lekman
20. The Ballad Of Love And Hate - The Avett Brothers (I stretched it a bit with this one, 'Love' and 'Hate' are the names of characters in the song).

Want a copy? :)

Here's the packages I sent out (When I sent them out they were covered in gorgeous stamps. At $5 each to send I don't think I'll be doing too many of these swaps):





My next swap involves making postcards out of cardboard food packaging.

Here's another letter and some postcards I sent out:




I'm meant to be folding and hanging up the huge clothes pile in mine and C's room, but I've been putting it off all day. He can't pack his stuff up for going away until it's done, so I have to do it. Tomorrow we're catching the train to Sydney to stay with one of C's high school friends, and then he'll catch the shuttle bus to the airport in the afternoon and I'll train home. Might go out to see a band I like called The Heartbreak Club on Wednesday night and then one of my best friends, Paige, is holding her birthday 55th Anniversary of Lassie's Television debut celebrations in Newcastle on the weekend which should be lovely to attend.

Here are some interesting blogs I've subscribed to lately:

♡ Eat Drink Chic
♡ Only On A Windy Day
♡ Sending-Postcards
♡ You Are What You Love
♡ The Lovely List
♡ Just Something I Made

Today was Australian Father's Day. I never really know how to commemorate these dates in ways that aren't cliched or make me feel kind of melodramatic or awkward - I didn't even remember it was Father's Day today until I was going through my Google Reader and a whole lot of bloggers were posting their tributes to their dad's and some of them were so lovely. My dad has been gone for almost nine years, I miss him a lot, I love him a lot and I think I'm more like him than I probably know. He was in my life for just over ten years and left some really lasting memories. He didn't like hallmark occasions, and wouldn't have wanted me to celebrate father's day even if he was alive, but this is just my small gesture today. I hope he's in a good place :)

(Via Sweet Sweet Life, it's the contents of a Surprise Ball she received, I REALLY REALLY WANT A SURPRISE BALL)

I found this (extensive) list here and some of them made me laugh a lot, just browse through a few, it's worth it.

RANDOM THOUGHTS FROM 25-35 YEAR OLDS:

- I wish Google Maps had an "Avoid Ghetto" routing option.

- More often than not, when someone is telling me a story all I can think about is that I can't wait for them to finish so that I can tell my own story that's not only better, but also more directly involves me.

- Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong.

- I don't understand the purpose of the line, "I don't need to drink to have fun." Great, no one does. But why start a fire with flint and sticks when they've invented the lighter?

- Have you ever been walking down the street and realized that you're going in the complete opposite direction of where you are supposed to be going? But instead of just turning a 180 and walking back in the direction from which you came, you have to first do something like check your watch or phone or make a grand arm gesture and mutter to
yourself to ensure that no one in the surrounding area thinks you're crazy by randomly switching directions on the sidewalk.

- That's enough, Nickelback.

- I totally take back all those times I didn't want to nap when I was younger.

- Is it just me, or are 80% of the people in the "people you may know" feature on Facebook people that I do know, but I deliberately choose not to be friends with?

- Do you remember when you were a kid, playing Nintendo and it wouldn't work? You take the cartridge out, blow in it and that would magically fix the problem. Every kid in America did that, but how did we all know how to fix the problem? There was no internet or message boards or FAQ's. We just figured it out. Today's kids are soft.

- There is a great need for sarcasm font.

- Sometimes, I'll watch a movie that I watched when I was younger and suddenly realize I had no idea what the f was going on when I first saw it.

- I think everyone has a movie that they love so much, it actually becomes stressful to watch it with other people. I'll end up wasting 90 minutes shiftily glancing around to confirm that everyone's laughing at the right parts, then making sure I laugh just a little bit harder (and a millisecond earlier) to prove that I'm still the only one who really, really gets it.

- How the hell are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?

- I would rather try to carry 10 plastic grocery bags in each hand than take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

- I think part of a best friend's job should be to immediately clear your computer history if you die.

- The only time I look forward to a red light is when I’m trying to finish a text.

- A recent study has shown that playing beer pong contributes to the spread of mono and the flu. Yeah, if you suck at it.

- LOL has gone from meaning, "laugh out loud" to "I have nothing else to say".

- I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

- Answering the same letter three times or more in a row on a multiple choice
test is absolutely petrifying.

- Whenever someone says "I'm not book smart, but I'm street smart", all I hear is "I'm not real smart, but I'm imaginary smart".

- How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod and smile because you still didn't hear what they said?

- I love the sense of camaraderie when an entire line of cars teams up to prevent a dick from cutting in at the front. Stay strong, brothers!

- Every time I have to spell a word over the phone using 'as in' examples, I will undoubtedly draw a blank and sound like a complete idiot. Today I had to spell my boss's last name to an attorney and said "Yes that's G as in...(10 second lapse)..ummm...Goonies"

- What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?

- While driving yesterday I saw a banana peel in the road and instinctively swerved to avoid it...thanks Mario Kart.

- Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

- I find it hard to believe there are actually people who get in the shower first and THEN turn on the water.

- Shirts get dirty. Underwear gets dirty. Pants? Pants never get dirty, and you can wear them forever.

- I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired.

- Bad decisions make good stories.

- Whenever I'm Facebook stalking someone and I find out that their profile is public I feel like a kid on Christmas morning who just got the Red Ryder BB gun that I always wanted. 546 pictures? Don't mind if I do!

- Is it just me or do high school girls get sluttier & sluttier every year?

- If Carmen San Diego and Waldo ever got together, their offspring would probably just be completely invisible.

- Why is it that during an ice-breaker, when the whole room has to go around and say their name and where they are from, I get so incredibly nervous? Like I know my name, I know where I'm from, this shouldn't be a problem...

- You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you've made up your mind that you just aren't doing anything productive for the rest of the day.

- Can we all just agree to ignore whatever comes after DVDs? I don't want to have to restart my collection.

- There's no worse feeling than that millisecond you're sure you are going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

- I'm always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten page research paper that I swear I did not make any changes to.

- "Do not machine wash or tumble dry" means I will never wash this ever.

- I hate being the one with the remote in a room full of people watching TV. There's so much pressure. 'I love this show, but will they judge me if I keep it on? I bet everyone is wishing we weren't watching this. It's only a matter of time before they all get up and leave the room. Will we still be friends after this?'

- I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello? Dammit!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voicemail. What'd you do after I didn't answer? Drop the phone and run away?

- I hate leaving my house confident and looking good and then not seeing anyone of importance the entire day. What a waste.

- When I meet a new girl, I'm terrified of mentioning something she hasn't already told me but that I have learned from some light internet stalking.

- I like all of the music in my iTunes, except when it's on shuffle, then I like about one in every fifteen songs in my iTunes.

- Why is a school zone 20 mph? That seems like the optimal cruising speed for pedophiles...

- As a driver I hate pedestrians, and as a pedestrian I hate drivers, but no matter what the mode of transportation, I always hate cyclists.

- Sometimes I'll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still not know what time it is.

- It should probably be called Unplanned Parenthood.

- I keep some people's phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to answer when they call.

- Even if I knew your social security number, I wouldn't know what do to with it.

- Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car keys in a bag, hitting the G-spot, and Pinning the Tail on the Donkey - but I’d bet my ass everyone can find and push the Snooze button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time every time...

- My 4-year old son asked me in the car the other day "Dad what would happen if you ran over a ninja?" How the hell do I respond to that?

- It really pisses me off when I want to read a story on CNN.com and the link takes me to a video instead of text.

- I wonder if cops ever get pissed off at the fact that everyone they drive behind obeys the speed limit.

- I think the freezer deserves a light as well.

In the same vein, some of my favourite occasional internet hangouts are Texts From Last Night, Said In Bed, Awkward Family Photos and There I Fixed It. Also, my boyfriend just clapped around in the air trying to kill a mosquito and frightened the two cats were sitting either side of him, after which he patted them and told them 'Don't worry I'll look after youse girls'. Lol. I love the fact that things like that out of context are rarely funny... Now he's clapping mosquitos again and looking angry.

On a completely different topic, I've come to realise recently that when I type a smiley face ':)' I smile, when I write 'lol' I actually laugh out loud, and if I'm writing 'goodbye' I also smile as if I'm saying goodbye. WEIRD. People say 'lol' has lost it's meaning, am I the only person who writes 'lol' as they're actually 'loling'?.

Also, since watching an Australian movie called 'Hey Hey It's Esther Blueburger' I've wanted to get a xylophone to put on the wall next to my front door instead of a bell, like so;


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