Do Not Read This Title

I haven't been writing about myself much. Mostly because my head is too full of thoughts to find room to put enough stuff together to make it worth writing a post.

This is the problem with the work I'm doing at the museum. Every piece of paper I handle is potentially new information. Everything interests me. I flit from pretty-shiny to another. A lot of it is routine -- coronations and funerals for a string of monarchs generate piles of ephemera, programmes for theatre, ballets, school presentations, fundraising balls, tickets and invitations to every sort of event you can think of. All marked on the spreadsheet and put back into the box. A programme for a Citizen Inauguration Ceremony almost got a similar dismissal until I noticed the time. Events (including a ball and firing of cannons) ran from about 10 pm on 31 December 1900 until late morning on 1 January 1901. Hmm. One rather big inauguration ceremony.

A lot of stuff on trains, of course. (The site is the former railway workshops.) Steam trains, accidents, fares & timetable, instruction booklets. The centenary in 1971 was obviously a big deal. (Would they have believed that just 7 years later, the passenger train service would be shut down.) Just before I burnt my hand on Tuesday, I'd started on religion. A page from Hobart Town Gazette detailed subscribers towards the construction of a Presbyterian place of worship and a Wesleyan chapel. Other papers on a similar theme. I think it's interesting because it's about the early cultural development in Tasmania, but really, it's about the development of religion in Australia. This is just 35 years after Europeans first dropped on the shores with their strange ideas about how the world works. It's too easy to look at these things from a modern perspective


Good thing about going to school is school holidays. Although I think this is because you need them. Just finished a 5 week unit "Assist with circulation services" i.e. working at the circulation desk in the library, and today was assessment day! Of course, while I'm being watched, the first two check-ins were complicated (one guy had renewals (overdue) + some to take out). The sort of things that are fine if you have a chance to think about it, but provide opportunities to mess up while being watched. Also a hold came in, so I had to *shudder* ring up the user to tell her. *sigh* But it seems I did really well. (And I'm good at "my numbers")

So that unit is done, and there's two weeks of holidays. So I can de-stress. This week has been particularly hard. Another unit is about customer service and dealing with conflict, and the assessment involves roleplays. I can't do this. This is not, "I find it uncomfortable to do this" but "I can't do this". I'm not sure the teacher really understands this. I've told him. I think he thinks that when it comes to do it, I'll manage. So this is causing some stress :(

Week after next, is our Melbourne trip (thanks to sister, who had frequent flyer points to use up). I haven't decided what I'm going to do. There are plenty of things I could do, but nothing that makes me go "Yes! I want to do that!". Every trip should have something you're particularly looking forward to doing. So this is a bit of a bummer.

Not writing now, which is also a bit of a bummer. Top Secret NF Project has decided it is silly and therefore not to be worked on. I'll turn up the heat under it and leave it until it comes back to the boil.

Also trying to ignore the voice that points out that giving up on a book before it's even been submitted anywhere is stupid.


Finding it hard to get into reading properly. When I find a book that interest me, it's easy to read. But little seems to interest me. There are too many boring books in the world. Oh well.

This year I shall be doing a Certificate III in Library/Information Services at the nearby tech college, and continuing the Grad Dip in Humanities that I've been doing externally.

Next week in lieu of any party that most people I'd want there wouldn't be able to get to, mother is taking me away for 3 nights to a twon I've never been to where there is nothing to do. (Really, I looked at the tourist information brochure and all of the "things to do" where in other towns, a state forest etc.) I like road trips, in case you hadn't noticed.

What else? I'm doing the submission thing with 2 novels which I've talked a bit out here before and the making spaghetti rewrite thing with another which I haven't talked us much about. Have some ideas for NF projects but haven't got around to starting them (sigh).

Planning to go to Worldcon, even if it's only for a couple of days. All right, I will be going but I'm hoping to add a side trip.

Have solved the problem of summer by keeping the blinds closed. Does have the side effect that I have no idea how hot it is when I have to go somewhere. But buses and shops are air-conditioned so it mostly works.

Possibly solved finger nail polish problem by buying some clear with sparkly polish which has to edges so I can't poke at chips and obsess about uneven patches. It doesn't work on toes though so I am Unmatched. This is something that has been bugging me for YEARS :)

Pictures on wall are slowly increasing. Although I bought a bunch of old National Bank Calenders with some pictures (they reprinted old paintings) I want to put up too. Obviously I need a new wall. Also I need to move the posted I see every time I turn around because it annoys me.

My tomatoes are almost finished. Rather disappointing this year. If I grow them in a foam box, they get off to a quicker/earlier start in spring, but some summer, they get too hot and need watering every bloody day so the fruit is tiny. Next year I shall put one of each in the ground and in a box. My lettuces bolted, but then they always do. I should stick to growing them in winter.

Can't think of anything else for now :)

Do you have someone among your family or immediate real life friends who, in the invent of you being seriously injured or detained, has been instructed to contact your online friends? (e.g. "email Fred" or "post a comment on my LJ")

And, among your online friends, is there anyone who has contacts details for a friend/ relative (distant enough they're not likely to be involved in an accident, close enough they'd know) so they can be contacted if you disappear for a couple of weeks?

Because we'd worry!
And, in the worst case, we might never know :(


(Of course, if you have family and close friends who are part of your online circle, this is less of a problem, but they might not know the best way to inform others or assume someone else will take care of it.)