Epic fail… here I come.

Posted on August 22, 2009 by borysSNORC

I had written something angsty about struggling with my current assignment but someone who shall remain nameless closed my browser before I hit the publish butter and all was lost. Never mind it was just a critical apprication of Homer’s The Odyssey in 500 words or less – I swear I’ve accidentally enrolled at the Reader’s Digest University or something. The fastidious and fickle faculty favour the 500 words or less approach these days it seems. The last ‘briefing note’ (not quite sure when essays became ‘briefing notes’) I completed was to answer the question ‘What is World History?

Yeah that one was fun. I should post it up here for shits and giggles and you can all pick it to bits. Was totally flying blind on that one and had NO idea what they were wanting from us. Received my graded ‘briefing note’ back on Wednesday and was rather surprised to be given a Distinction for it. However, when I read back over it – I discovered that I don’t even remember writing one iota of it. The content was familiar but the actual paper itself seemed unrecognizable to me. So that was probably either because my subconscious had blocked out the entire horrific experience (due to the psychologically traumatic nature of the damn question) or because my medications and generally pain muddled brain is messing with me again… which I admit seems more likely.

But I digress… back to Homer and the damn 500 word limit. How can you write about an epic saga in 500 words – let alone THE epic saga. I reckon if you did a word tally of every sentence in the poem that mentioned ‘the rosy fingered dawn’ you’d get more than 500 words. I’ve done a rough draft in dot points trying to be as concise as possible and I’m already 700 words on the page and it’s not even in proper sentences yet. Shame the assessment criteria doesn’t say anything about how much you get penalized for applying generous artistic license to the ‘limit’.

Anyway, in amongst the gnashing of teeth this afternoon I found this link to this Odysseus Nostos – little stick man anime thing of The Odyssey for anyone whose not read it… though in truth it’s probably more amusing if you have.
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Facebook protocol

Posted on August 20, 2009 by borysSNORC

Today I got sent a ‘friend request’ from someone I don’t actually know. Normally this is a no brainer… there’s the ‘ignore’ button… CLICK!

But this friend request came from a relative. A relative I’ve never met and am unlikely to meet in the foreseeable future given that this person lives in Canada-da and I’m all the way down here in Aus-tray-lee-yah.

So what do you do? Can I be rude to a relative whose a complete stranger and ignore the friend request? Or does the inherent connection mean I’m obliged to be amiable and friendly towards this person who was hitherto unknown to me?

I think someone is going through my trash….

Posted on August 19, 2009 by borysSNORC

Okay so I just did this weird little ‘What colour are you?" Facebook bit of stuff and nonsense test cos… well I’m in front of the computer and have this OCD like compulsion to fill in these damn things when they’re put in front of me. There was only a few questions – below – and then it spat out saying that I am ‘green’…. which I am definitely not. I’m pepto-bismol pink as well we know! But the little personality profile it spat out at the end is creepy… made me feel like someone was watching over my shoulder as I read it.

Have Facebook somehow gotten hold of notes from my shrink or something? I mean Fabebook often seems ubiquitous and all… but this is just… scary accurate…..

The real "true colors" quiz

Discover your personality style to learn your true purpose in life

1. Which word best describes you?
Compassionate

Flexible

Competent

Organized

2. Which word best describes you?

Honest

Competitive

Empathetic

Curious

3. Which word best describes you?

Loyal

Devoted

Independent

Open minded

4. Which word best describes you?

Inspirational

Active

Perfectionist

Cooperative

5. Which word best describes you?

Affectionate

Courageous

Orderly

Rational

6. Which word best describes you?

Theoretical

Communicative

Rule Follower

Impulsive

MY RESULT:

YOU ARE GREEN…

Values:
Intellectual Achievements
Logic
Competency

Joys:
Personal Achievement
Ideas
Meeting Challenges

Strengths:
Confidence
Logical
Problem-solver

Needs:
Autonomy
Truth & Facts
Accuracy

Frustrations:
Unfairness
Incompentence
Nonsense Rules

At work you are conceptual and an independent thinker. For you work is play. You are drawn to constant challenge in career, and like to develop models, explore ideas, or build systems to satisfy your need to deal wth the innovative. Once you have perfected an idea you prefer to move on leaving the project to be maintained and supported by others

In love you prefer to let your head rule tour heart. You dislike repetition, so it is difficult for you to continuously express your feelings. You beleive that once feelings are stated, they are obvious to a partner. You are uneasy when your emotions control you. You want to establish a relationship, leave it to maintain itself, and turn your energies back to your career.

In childhood you appeared to be older than your years and focused on your greatest interests, achiveing in subjects that were mentally stimulating. You were impatient with drill and routine, questioned authority, and found it necessary to respect teachers before you could learn from them.

I’ve been too fucking busy… or vise versa ;)

Posted on August 18, 2009 by borysSNORC

Haven’t been putting much down of late… probably because I’m a bit overwhelmed with the complete cluster fuck that is going on around me at the moment…. house… uni… family… it’s all too much I tell you! Something’s going to blow!

The house is in a general state of chaos and has been for over 12 weeks now. This extension is going to be grand once it’s completed but at the moment all I can see is a big old mess. As anyone who knows me will attest, this means that I’m basically having to force myself to not look and am working really hard at the whole not twitching thing… and this is quite difficult for someone who colour codes her sewing cottons, stores her movies alphabetically and her medicines by type, can’t go to bed at night unless her bed is made, hates seeing dirty dishes left in the sink or left over food covered in glad wrap in the fridge or wet towels on the bathroom floor or… or… or… I could go on all day about the things that make me twitch.

Then of course I decided to go back to uni just for some distraction because I’m climbing the walls being home by myself all day with only back pain for company. Concept was solid – but I am wondering whether dumping a study schedule onto myself was a wise thing to do given that most days I wake up feeling like I don’t have the energy to withstand the pain of getting out of bed.

Being back at school is okay I can’t say honestly say that I’m enjoying the lectures – the seats are crap and being sedentary for longer than about 20 mins is NOT making my back very happy at all. So I’ve been chewing down more analgesics than I was a few weeks ago and the only way I seem to be able to ignore the increase in pain is to madly type notes for the duration. At about 90wpm I’m just about getting the lectures down verbatim but when i go to get up I’ve nearly fallen over a few times and I can hardly walk. 🙁 Not so sure this is a sustainable plan… time will tell.

Other than all that –
Dr Nick… here is picture of bike as promised – ZZR250 and it’s kinda pinky red which is so me.
Sorry don’t have a photo of the Walden Miller custom leather jacket that actually fits Borys’ heaving bossoms… yet

The blue ZZR600 in the back belongs to Yale… and there’s no bees on it yet but it’s just a matter of time I suppose 😉

Sadness….

Posted on August 13, 2009 by borysSNORC

Three days ago, a sixteen year old girl who lived around the corner from us committed suicide.

I dont think I ever met this girl who lived so nearby.
I don’t ever remember seeing her in the street.
I don’t recall what she looked like.
I don’t know what her homelife was like.
I don’t know any of the circumstances of her situation.
I don’t know her name even.
I didn’t know her at all.

But I haven’t been able to stop thinking about her since.

I do know that in some unspeakable and socially unacceptable way I admire her conviction. No doubt this is my chronic pain and depression talking given I’ve spent many, many days wishing I could find a way out of my own sometimes overwhelming problems… but mostly I just feel sad.

I feel sad
… because she must have been dealing with seemingly insurmountable issues
… because they must have have been much larger than her maturity could handle.
… that she may have felt very alone or perhaps like she had no one to turn to.
… that maybe no one noticed her desperation.
… that maybe someone did but may have passed it off as adolescent angst.

I feel sad because at 16 you don’t know that today’s mountains might be tomorrow’s molehills.