kelly_holden

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 04:27:57 GMT

home again, home again, (jiggetty jig)

I don't know if I mentioned that this was happening, but Mum and Stepdad came to get us with the trailer so I could retrieve my furniture I left at Dad's. Stepdad decided to go back via Bateman's Bay, claiming the other way was boring and it wasn't that much further.
Whereis says it's 30km/half an hour longer that way. On a 2.5hr journey. It wouldn't be much longer on a 18 hour journey, but that's 20% again.
Oh, and Stepdad has a GPS now, and had fun playing with it.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 11:25:42 GMT

Oi, OpenOffice. Stop with the long word predictor thing. I've written "Sportacus" five times in this document, and "SportaSteph" once, stop telling me I want the word SportaSteph when I type the letters "Spor".

stuff.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Thu, 29 May 2008 14:11:34 GMT

Bob's quit TAFE again. He's decided even just the morning classes were too much, though it probably didn't help that he was sticking around to give me a ride home (because stupid me told the over-generous bloke that I dislike the afternoon bus much more than the morning one) even though he wasn't attending the classes. Rhonda's agreed to give me a lift for petrol money, but she's gonna be away next week.

The second half of my order from Decent Exposures arrived yesterday. *happy dance* They're not really pretty, and they don't give me an especially alluring shape, but until I got my first one, it had been years since I put on a bra as a routine part of getting dressed instead of as an uncomfortable concession to modesty because of guests or going out. (Also? They're less than the cheapest commercial bras that go to my size. Even with currency exchange and postage.)

My Visa debit paid for itself today: I booked Kyle and my bus trip to Dad's for the holidays online, and it came to $30 for the pair of us. We're going via Sydney, which although even without snagging a discounted fair would have been cheaper, means we still have to buy train tickets on the day, but that's a heck of a lot better than the nearly $100 going to Canberra for Dad's birthday cost just for me. Mind you, the trip will take all day (9am - 4:30pm) this way instead half a day (12:30-6pm) like it does via Bateman's Bay. I owe Kyle $5 change for his half, because he only had a $20 note on him, and I only had a $10 and some silver.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Mon, 26 May 2008 13:04:15 GMT

Those of you have been on my LJ flist for a while might remember that 2 years ago there was a double murder in my street. Two of the suspects are currently on trial (the two besides the one stepdad had worked with, he's already been found guilty). Mum's friends with the new occupant of the house where is happened, and the poor lady was rather rattled to get a tract with a picture of the Grim Reaper on the front the day after the jurors came to look at the place. Guess who leafleted the street with Chick Tracts?

X-posted from queer_rage

Dear Australian Newspapers:
When a 12 year old transboy wins the right in family court to transition over his father's objections, the headline should not say anything about a twelve year old girl.
I can't find a single account of this that calls the child a boy. Even the few that don't call him a girl in the headline call him that in the body.

Also, commenters on one of the news sites, it says right in the article that the hormone therapy he's beginning is a) reversible and b) not testosterone, and most of you still think he should wait until he's 18? When his body will be finished female puberty, when avoiding it starting is stated to be the reason he fought this now? WTF? Do you have no compassion?

I has computer back. It was almost exactly what I thought it was. Though I haven't as diligent about spyware scans as I should have been and I got a bit of a lecture about that.

And, yes, the person responsible for the Chick Tracts was Stepdad, who when asked about it asked Mum to lie and say we got one too, rather than admit it was him to the street in general. He was at least slightly sheepish that he gave Kylie an inappropriate choice, but still.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Fri, 23 May 2008 07:52:46 GMT

Stepdad's computer-fixing aquaintance has computer. His initial observations agree with my own hypothesis. Found LJ client for Linux. It doesn't appear to be able to crosspost like semagic, but at least I don't have to log in and go to the post entry page seperately on all three journals.

Have been in permanantly bad mood last few days.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Mon, 19 May 2008 04:18:37 GMT

So ... My computer is broken. Long story, but I tried to get stepdad to help with an intermittent problem, and we broke it completely. I personally think I know what it is, but stepdad doesn't agree and his mate who helps him with computer problems beyond his expertise wasn't home when he tried to call him last night.
So I'm stuck manually x-posting until it's fixed. It's annoying having to login to everything every time you open the browser, too. I couldn't even remember my Youtube and DeviantArt passes at 1st.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Thu, 15 May 2008 05:08:25 GMT

(LJ-only post originally, posted w/ web client from TAFE, reposted @ IJ and JF when I got home)
Feeling a bit better (the fact Mum made me buy some echinacea, and keeps nagging me to take it may have something to do with that), still on a reduced spoon ration but well enough to go to TAFE. Got a bit of a headache, but I took some paracetamol (US: acetaminophen) and I'm more or less all right.
My usual computer in our morning classroom died yesterday morning; got stuck booting up. I had to sit on the other side of the room, away from Bob and Viv. I was able to get the other seat next to Viv this morning, but it's still not mine.

Mikki got chosen to go to Stewart House next week, which she's dreadfully excited about, but she's not been well either and she's scared she might miss out. Bug finally got her speech therapy assessment appointment (her teacher can barely understand her), it's next month and that's only 'cause there was a cancellation.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Thu, 08 May 2008 08:03:50 GMT

Yep, I'm still sick. I'm now quite certain that's it's not influenza, whatever the heck it is.
Bob has decided to go back to our morning classes, so I could get a lift in the morning again, and I thought I was feeling better so I asked him to come get me Wednesday, but I had a horrible coughing fit that ate most of my spoons and made me throw up after he would have left home, so I had to tell him when he got here that I wasn't going after all. Still had not nearly enough spoons for normal function this morning, so I rang him up and told him well before he would have left.
I've also got stiff, sore joints, though I suspect that's the amount of time I've been spending in bed the last week and not an actual symptom of anything. *hums "I can move"/"Solla Stirða"* Kinda glad that all the bits of the house I need to use are upstairs, though, as I currently can't manage the stairs.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Mon, 05 May 2008 23:10:17 GMT

Turns out the whole Stefan quitting thing was a hoax, which kinda calls doubt on the other fan interviews on that site. A lot of ticked-off/relieved people in Lazytown. A couple of mums and other caretakers are pretty pissed on their kids' behalf as well. I didn't tell the kids. I had a bit of art Shinju did in response as my desktop, but the authenticity was already being called into question by the time Bug saw it, so I just told her what was going on in the picture, not the reason for it. I just told Leah the whole sordid thing, since she's older and smarter.

I'm feeling a bit better again, and I'm no longer sure if I'm sick. I've got a cough and between half and two-thirds my usual spoon ration, but I feel otherwise fine.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Sun, 04 May 2008 05:33:06 GMT

Getting better but still sick.

Australian LazyTown DVD release I mentioned in last post confirmed:
http://www.bigwentertainment.com.au/product/lazy_town_welcome_to_lazy_town_1690168_683377.html
release date is my birthday, too.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Sat, 03 May 2008 23:17:35 GMT

When I woke up yesterday, LazyTown fandom was looking up. Yeah, there's still no airing in the US or Canada, but supposedly they intend to work on that, there's new episodes (even if they are short ones) in production, there are Aussies coming into the fandom thanks to the ABC, and Aussie DVDs might be being released soon. When I went to bed, it was knowing that that there might not be any more after the episodes in production, and that even if there will be, it seems like nearly every active member of fandom intends not to watch it. Personally, even though I loved Robbie, as long as Magnús and Máni (Svavarsson, the composer) are behind the scenes holding pens I will give it a chance, even if they start again with a whole new cast or something.
(Oh, and for those who don't know, a link to a fan interview in which Stefan says he's quit LazyTown was posted last night on lazytown )

I has a 'flu

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:19:13 GMT

I think. Sinus headache, congestion, coughing, fever, aching joints, chills and fatigue. I don't think I'll be fit for TAFE tomorrow.

Oh, and Bob's withdrawing from the class, so I'm going to have to catch the bus for the rest of the year (at least the hours changed so that is actually possible). I think I might have to look into noise-cancelling earphones or something. My place is only a little out of the way for folks from the Bay&Basin, and I know at least few others in the class live out that way; Rhonda might be able to do it for petrol money, but a fair amount of petrol money might turn out more expensive than the bus (on the other hand: not trapped in a confined space with 100-odd high schoolers, including a 14 year old boy who thinks it's funny to sexually harass me, for an hour? I'm so willing to pay extra.)

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 07:18:37 GMT

I was re-arranging the mess in my room (the action can't be accurately described as tidying it, as all I've really accomplished so far is putting some of it in a box), and I found a bottle of shampoo. This is actually relevant, since on Tuesday I attempted to take my last shampoo purchase back to the soap shop on the grounds it wasn't cleaning my hair, was making my dandruff worse, and didn't appear to any of the senses I tried it on to be the same substance as I was using before. After the proprietor rang her supplier and verified they hadn't changed their formula, she compared what I had to the bottles in store, and told me I was remembering it wrong and to try the next one up in price/quality if it wasn't right for my hair any more.
This bottle proves that the differences in colour, texture, and scent I remembered are real. I don't blame her, except for her unwillingness to believe that a person who has been using a shampoo every second day for over a year can remember what it looks/feels/smells like better than a person whose most intimate interaction with it is to pour it into smaller bottles for re-sale, because I think the supplier gave her the wrong stuff. She claimed she hadn't had any other complaints, but really, if I'd been using it for the first time, I wouldn't have bothered complaining, I'd have just assumed it was a crap product, maybe even concluded that it's not worth going sulphate-free, and not bothered going back. I have a lot of loyalty to the product I was trying to buy, and I don't want to stop using it, I just don't want to have wasted $7 buying a litre of useless citrus-scented gel (which is one of the reasons I like the real product: it's only $7/L, most decent shampoos are more like $7/250mL).

Oh, and I've tried the next one up in quality, and it's too moisturising for my hair, which is still nearly as oily now as when I was 16. Also, is it seriously that hard to believe I have oily hair and dandruff at the same time? The flakes might not go anywhere 'cause they're oiled down, but my scalp still definitely flakes.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 11:22:27 GMT

goddammit I feel rotten today. I'd kick the dog, but he's a) all the way downstairs and b) big enough to take my leg off.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 01:36:44 GMT

I realised something this morning: the reason I'm open to the idea of SportaSteph but am never terribly excited about any I read is I don't like SportaSteph, I like StephieSport. Stephanie would be in charge, dammit. She's already bossing him around and half running the town at eight, no way in hell she's gonna grow up to be a weepy uke just because vagina-enabled people are 'supposed to'.

Also, have you noticed all of Magnús's female characters are bossy, some verging on domineering? Halla/Trixie and Stína/Bessie speak for themselves, but in Áfram, Eyrún practically mugs Lolli at one point, and, while I can't read it, Peggý in Latibær í Vandræðrum appears, from the pictures, to be pretty good at taking charge too.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 09:43:08 GMT

K, seriously, why on earth does Yahoo! keep delivering Nigeria spam to my inbox, but now routinely delays, sometimes by days, the daily emails I signed up for years ago from a TV guide site, even after I added it to my contacts, oh yeah, and fished a half-dozen out of the bulk mail and marked them not spam? I got Wednesday's this morning.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 23:23:40 GMT

Taken from Razoth

WHERE I COME FROM:
Adelaide SA (birthplace and early life) / Nowra NSW (schooling and current residence), Australia

WHAT DO YOU CALL:
1. A body of water, smaller than a river, contained within relatively narrow banks? Creek or stream
2. What the thing you push around the grocery store is called? (Shopping) trolley, and also we call the "grocery store" a supermarket.
3. A metal container to carry a meal in? I don't ever recall seeing a metal one, but lunchbox presumably.
4. The thing that you cook bacon and eggs in? Frypan, but this is probably the result of elision from "frying pan", which is also used but less often.
5. The piece of furniture that seats three people? sofa, lounge, couch, or futon, though the latter is only used if it converts to a bed in a specific way.
6. The device on the outside of the house that carries rain off the roof? Gutters.
7. The covered area outside a house where people sit in the evening? Verandah, but nobody sits there in the evening, they'd get eaten alive by mozzies in summer, and they'd freeze in winter.
8. Carbonated, sweetened, non-alcoholic beverages? Soft drink, or fizzy drink.
9. A flat, round breakfast food served with syrup? Pancake, though I've never eaten one for breakfast unless we were having McDonalds.
10. A long sandwich designed to be a whole meal in itself? Sandwich, strangely enough. Having a Subway shop in our town doesn't appear to have changed this, a sandwich specifically from there is merely known as "Subway" in the usual manner.
11. The piece of clothing worn by men at the beach? Swimmers, same as women. Speedo or boardies/board shorts for the specific types.
12. Shoes worn for sports? Sports shoes. Also joggers, or runners.
13. Putting a room in order? Tidying up.
14. A flying insect that glows in the dark? Firefly I suppose, but that's not regional as we don't have them here. We have glow worms, but I'm pretty sure they don't fly.
15. The little insect that curls up into a ball? well, Raz put "pillbug", but last time I did this meme I had no idea what it was asking.
16. The children's playground equipment where one kid sits on one side and goes up while the other sits on the other side and goes down? See-saw.
17. How do you eat your pizza? With my hands, usually the pointy bit first. Dad uses a knife and fork, and it's widely accepted he is strange for this.
18. What's it called when private citizens put up signs and sell their used stuff? Garage sale.
19. What's the evening meal? Tea, or dinner, supper if its light and had later in the night. All those words have at least one other meaning, which is why I call it "evening meal" in my posts.
20. The thing under a house where the furnace and perhaps a rec room are? Basement, not that I know anybody in meatspace with one. It could also be "cellar" but they have wine, not rec rooms. Round here, most houses have a space between house and ground, the only reason ours doesn't is it originally had a space big enough to build more rooms in, so a previous owner did.
21. What do you call the thing that you can get water out of to drink in public places? Bubbler. Usable ones are almost exclusively found in schools, as truly public ones are rarely in working order.

I forgot my wallet yesterday, and didn't realise until I was already on the bus (I thought it had fallen under something in my backpack, so I got on promising to pay when I found it). I know owe 2 fares each to Driver bus 5 and Driver bus 10, and the cost of a cup of chips to Mary, since I decided buying lunch again was cheaper than opening a whole tin of salmon for one sandwich. Thank goodness the buses I catch when Bob can't take me are school buses with nice drivers.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Tue, 08 Apr 2008 21:36:07 GMT

Oh. I forgot to make a packed lunch for TAFE last night. There's a canteen but it's not cheap and the food's not great, I'm kinda low on cash this fortnight (not as badly as some peeps *hugs Meko*, but enough that I'd rather not buy lunch), and since my ride's sick, I have to catch the bus, meaning I have to less time to get ready.

*lightbulb* I 'spose the chips (the fry-like things, not the sort the English call crisps) aren't too bad if you don't have to pay for the sauce (US: ketchup). *goes to pack sauce*

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 23:31:45 GMT

Got my Divacup and Lunette yesterday -- went out to check the letterbox even though Aunty Beth claimed Mum had already brought the mail in, and there were two parcel pick-up notifications in there.
Gave my Lunette a few tries, I can't quite get it in far enough yet, and I only managed to get it open once (and then had a hard time breaking the seal), and now my hymen hurts from trying to stick fingers into a vagina already full of cup :( .
Quarantine opened my Lunette package, despite it being labelled "hygiene items" and "soap" for Customs (I had a panic when I discovered one thing was missing from the package, but then I found the invoice that said they were out of stock and it was being shipped later), but didn't open the Divacup one, despite it bearing the cryptic Customs label "supplements", which seems more likely to me to mean something Quarantine would need to see. Oh, and Lunette wash is not soap, despite their claim on both the website and the customs label, it's sodium laureth sulphate.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 01:07:48 GMT

This was brought on by the most recent Darths and Droids strip being called Greased Lightnin', but not containing any of the lyrics 'cause it's a PG comic, which made me go look up the lyrics, but contains thoughts I've had a while.

OK, nice cars are nice, but I don't understand why women, who are otherwise (stereotypically) supposed to have no interest in mechanical stuff, are (according to the same stereotypes) supposedly aroused (in a literal and sexual sense, Greased Lightnin' has the line "chicks'll cream") by certain types of car. The only thing I can think of is the "women want a good provider" assumption, but surely being willing to spend a lot more than necessary on a car and not showing any other signs of wealth would function as proof a guy has priorities that would make him a poor provider, even though he has the cash to be good one? And it still doesn't explain why women are apparently expected to find these vehicles sexually arousing in and of themselves.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 09:45:21 GMT

Is it me? It seems like everytime I try to communicate on an issue of any complexity (and by 'complexity' I mean pretty much anything more important than fangirl squeeing), if I get any response, at least one of them will misunderstand me in some way. In this particular case, understanding may have been hampered by me slightly misremembering the spelling of the word I wanted, but I frickin' well defined it because the story needed the word, and I expected few would understand me from their natural vocabulary. For pete's sake, this time was far more necessary than the time I left the Aussie dialect word 'doona' in instead of replacing it with the more international 'duvet', and that didn't seem to hamper understanding any.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 04:38:16 GMT

dear bank's helpline,
stop apologising and telling me my time is important, and just play the flippin' music until a real person is free.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 05:58:40 GMT

Seven could hear the mental violin soundtrack.
"Prima Sportacia, you hardly know her," he pointed out.
"I know," she sighed, and sagged against him.
He put his arms around her and tucked her under his chin. "Don't be in such a hurry. Look at what a mess Ten got himself into by not thinking."
"I'm only forty," she said petulantly. "What's his excuse?"
"Mid-life crisis?" he suggested mildly.
The bit in italics (33 words) took about 2 weeks to write. I've got just 800 words in the 3 months since I put chapter 3 up. Why is this taking so frickin' long?

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 12:14:08 GMT

Have finally ordered a Lunette (and joined menstrual_cups*). Panicking a little that I got the size selection wrong since I went with my gut against manufacturer's suggestions, but unless/until cups end up mainstream enough that you can go the shops and try one on, it is a gamble. (And every other brand, including one whose small is even smaller than the small Lunette, would recommend the small for me, so it's not as if I deliberately took a totally illogical action.)

Strange site insisted on formatting my address as:

[number and street]
Nowra 2541
NSW Australia

(correct format is

[number and street]
Nowra NSW 2541
Australia

BTW. Most envelopes sold in Australia have squares in the bottom right corner for the postcode, but you only use them when hand-addressing.)

*I know I'm trying to reduce my LJ reading, but it's the best resource of its type that I know of. I'm thinking of unfriending Metaquotes to compensate, since I didn't miss it as much as I thought during the strike.

kelly_roquet@yahoo.com.au — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 12:24:16 GMT

Yes, I'm participating in the strike. It starts 11am tomorrow morning for me. Not sure if I'll be participating in the IJ meta thing, I can't think of a thing to say.
Just to warn friends, I'm not going to be reading posts from that period. I have made a small filter of political (queer_rage) and micro-fandom comms (indeedsir) to catch up with afterwards, but I won't be reading back along any other filter. It's your choice to post during that time, whether its deliberate strike breaking or just apathy, but I won't attentionise it.
If you really want me, I have an email address, and I'm at Insanejournal, which, yes, is somewhat lacking in design expertise and I wouldn't wear it's theme colour, but it's not as if it was deliberately created to hurt your eyes. I'd say 'it could be worse, it could be brown,' but several of the other site schemes are. You do know it has other site schemes, right?