My titles are always SO creative hehe. I sit down to write a livejournal entry and go 'what am I going to write about?' and just list them off - there we go, a title, that'll do!

Anyway, babies! My brother's fiancee Dani is having her baby today up in Renmark. I hope the hospital there has very good air conditioning, because it's just as hot there as down here! All the parents are heading up there tomorrow, but the siblings haven't formed a coherent plan as to what we'll be doing yet. I'm not sure how many extra people Dani and Andrew will want underfoot when she's recovering and they're trying to get used to looking after their day-old daughter. I don't know a lot about babies, but I suspect the first few days is a bit of a trial by fire for anyone, without 183289369263 relatives wandering around your hospital room/ house.

What the heck is going on with the weather recently? I've had so many people say to me 'whew, another summer!' or 'Aussie summers are always so hot!'... but... it's NOT summer yet O_O. That's what's so weird about it. I wouldn't bat an eyelid over 40 degree days if it was, but this year it was like 2/3rds of spring it was still winter, and then suddenly a switch was flicked somewhere and the next week we have a heatwave. Greeeat!! >.<;;

I've finally crept over 20,000 words in my thesis draft. It's taken a lot longer than I might have hoped, though my supervisors are trying to convince me that I'm actually ahead of schedule. I don't know about that - I've been in the course for 8 months, produced one research paper for a conference, written by thesis proposal, and done 20,000 words of the first draft. That seems like a lot less writing than you'd be doing in even 6 months of undergrad Arts.
I have had a few weeks recently where the writing has been incredibly tough going, but that seems to have passed for now. *KNOCK ON WOOD LOL D:* I've managed 5,000 words just in the last fortnight which is massively above average for me - generally I'm one of those writers who's lucky to average 150 words a day. My writing comes in hiccups as well; nothing for a week, then suddenly a 1500 word hiccup, another gap of a few days, another 500 words, and so on. I really need to try and get myself into a routine, but I find that when I don't have the material there, it's just not there and there's no point sitting around wasting time trying to force it.

At least no matter what pace the creative stuff is going at, it's better than trudging through the academic writing side of things. Urgh, so not looking forward to drafting the exegesis. I have a presentation of about 3,000 words I wrote for the conference in June, but that needs a lot of expansion. I still haven't decided whether to take the plunge and try to upgrade to a phd, either - I mean, I'm sure I could get it done and I think both my creative work and my research topic could easily be doubled in size, but dobbing myself in for a 15-20 k word exegesis makes it a bit less appealing. I know I HAVE the research topic and the material to write a great academic piece... just not so sure about the motivation. :P

I've almost finished up helping out with the research project at the CLPD, but I'm pretty frustrated with the uni's convoluted casual pay system. They sent me an excel document to fill out, but I don't have excel so I just printed it with excel viewer and filled it out by hand. But NUUU they cannot accept a hand written form. HAND WRITTEN??!! THE HORROR!! So I had to get one of the girls in the office to type it up for me and print it, so I could go in to the uni AGAIN to sign it, and I have to wait another 3 weeks to get paid. *Is disgruntled*. I reserve the right to be a tad shitty about it, since we could uuuse that $500 right now.

Work at my new law firm job is going pretty well. I've gotten a few opportunities already to show that I DO have skills beyond general office admin crap - which is a chance I never got in 2 years of working at Perry O'Brien. The best thing was being asked to make a powerpoint presentation for an Estate Planning seminar, which was so well received and so impressed the boss that he's planning on using it for all their seminars from now on. So I reckon I made a pretty good first impression and hopefully things will keep going well. It's really nice to have diversity in the tasks I'm given - not just filing, answering phones and doing rounds, but also editing legal documents, transcribing dictations, doing research for the solictors, writing up notes into full text versions, etc etc. I've had two long days this week (8:45-6:00) but they didn't seem that long because there was a whole range of things for me to do. So yay :D

Hope everyone has some cool stuff planned and has a great night :)
I'm not sure my two costumes for this year could have been more different if I'd deliberately chosen the two most opposite things I could think of to dress up as...

( My two COMPLETELY DIAMETRICALLY OPPOSED halloween costumes under the cut... )

For the last six months or so my wardrobe of choice has been one of Chris' shirts and my same old pair of jeans for all uni and social stuff. This is pretty ridiculous given the bulging wardrobe of interesting clothing I have, so I've been making vague motions towards dressing interestingly again.

( Minor outfit spam! (three pics) Loli-ish, retro-ish and... just kinda random. ^^;; )

I have also been cooking a lot more recently, but I won't spam a bunch of random meal pics. Just a couple of things I was really happy with!!

( Sushi, piles of bakegoods, and a MONSTAR STRAWBERRY! )

The wonderful jasonfischer (who Nett told me to friend in an effort to get to know some other Adelaide writers, and who very kindly accepted) has been talking about juvenilia recently... I guess writing that you produced during your developmental years XD
I'm still well in my developmental years as a writer, I think, and I haven't been published or anything, but it still inspired me to have a look last time I was at Mum's place for some of my old composition books from primary school.
And I *might* have found the first ever fantasy story I wrote - not sure, because most of the primary school books have gone walkabout somehow. But I was ten when I created this work of genius:

(abridged version because there's a really random intro segment with 'Kirsty' doing shopping, and in the middle like a half-page about the character eating dinner and playing Yogi Bear on the sega mega drive. Random grammar left intact. I was fond of people SCREAMING things as well.

I've been playing this game SO MUCH lately - I've finished it a couple of times before, but when I reformatted my computer I lost my old save game and hadn't really tinkered with Fallout 3 again since then... until now lol! I'm amazed how fun it is even starting from scratch and redoing a lot of content. Because I'm a scarily enormous geek for the heck of it, I put together a few screenshots explaining why I love it sooo... 

( An illustrated guide to pure gaming awesomeness! :D )

Plus, there's no way to screenshot this one, but the soundtrack is rocking - lots of 40s and 50s music, things like A Wonderful Guy and Easy Living. I never get sick of listening to the game music, which is saying a lot since it's normally the first thing I turn off.

The Game of the Year edition is coming out on October 13th, which includes all the add on packs. I don't have any of them, just the vanilla game, so I am SO getting it. I believe it's $60US in the states, not sure what it will be out here. NO MATTER. Even if it's $100AU that would still be super decent, considering its the regular game + I think 6 expansion packs? If you're looking for something to play and haven't tried Fallout 3 yet, DO CONSIDER IT :D

Dunno if you guys have seen it, I just yanked it from lainy122's livejournal post because it's SO IMPRESSIVE OMG. It's basically 6 versions of the same guy (who has a really good voice which sounds actually quite a lot like Michael Jackson) + a friend, who does a bit of backup and made the video - and they do this really awesome, perfectly blended medley of Michael Jackson songs.



The beginning is a tiny bit lacklustre but it gets better and better as they go, so keep watching XD

I love opening a new box of peppermint tea. It smells the way the filling in Cadbury Peppermint chocolate tastes. Yum yum yum.

I finally got my thesis proposal in last Wednesday, after really struggling with it and even contemplating dropping the course entirely. I think in the end it turned out pretty well, but still waiting to hear whether I got approved or not. Apparently it takes about two weeks usually, so not stressing, just incredibly relieved that it's done with. Work on the main thesis project has been going along at a crawl, though, so I have to step that up - supposed to have another chapter in to my supervisor by the 28th. Eeep.

I'm having what I *think* is my first ever lolita meet up as host on October 24th. So far there are 7 people coming, 9 maybes, and a few more that haven't said either way that I think are pretty likely to rock up. Should be good - we're going to have afternoon tea and watch the BBC version of Pride and Prejudice.
( Musings about afternoon tea menu )

It's at mum's house which is this beautiful French provincial themed two storey place with a glorious garden and a patio on stilts and such. And an enormous TV to better ogle Colin Firth with.

I missed an awesome dress on Y!J the other day. I put in a bit of a token bid, but then totally forgot about the auction and got outbid by 250 yen.

I kind of want to keep looking for it, but now I'm not sure if it would look way too Wap.. er, what's the Chinese equivalent of 'Wapanese'? 'Whinese' doesn't sound quite right :P Chris says it would, Nett says it wouldn't. I do wish it wasn't in the black brocadey fabric but that's par for the course with Black Peace Now.



I've only seen like two 'Qi' lolita dresses ever that I actually wanted. There was this really amazing similar cut dress from a Singaporean brand called Tantan, but I could never figure out how to order from them and now the brand seems to be defunct. I love the way high collars look on me, and I love the concept of a Qipao cut top and a retro skirt style bottom. Whinese or not T__T

It's raining AGAIN. And it's friggin freezing. This is supposed to be spring now, weather! Get with the damn program!

The Royal Show is on at the moment, so Chris and I went with the sisters Bean on Monday, and it was awesome XD
We may have totally piked before the main arena events, but we were mainly there to look at cute animals, browse stalls, and eat delicious food at the Taste SA pavilion... so we totally got what we came for :3

( Show loots under here - awesome nail decorating stuff and light up novelties?? Yes XD )

This week I also bought some super awesome diamante-edged flesh tunnels for my ears. I got the 12 mm, so it's an upsize from my previous 10s. This is my goal size for my earrings - its the biggest you can really go without totally distorting the shape of your ear. I really like them! In the pics my earlobes are a little swollen, they're not normally that puffy and pink XD. It's been a few hours and they already look 200% happier.

( Eeeeeeaaarrrrsssssss )

I think the slightly blinged out tunnels suit my fashion style these days a lot better, cos I wear a lot of the lolita, retroish, cutesy kinda stuff and less of the grungy / casual outfits I used to.

I'm going to post up an art timeline post later on just for the heck of it. Not sure why I felt I had to signpost that, but yeah. Lol.

Had a massively busy few days for me! Possibly going to be a kind of rambling post...

katu has been visiting from the states so we've been doing a bunch of touristy things. We went to the zoo on Thursday, then on Friday we had high tea at Just Tickled Pink, and then back to my place for a roast lamb rack dinner. Yesterday we went on the port river dolphin cruise - though we only saw a few dolphins, they weren't that cooperative sadly! - and then to Nett's for a kangaroo and prawn bbq :)
All in all a pretty fun few days, and I hope she enjoyed seeing a bit of Adelaide :D. She flew out at about 6:30 am this morning so she must be on the international leg now -- hope you have a good flight katu :D

In amongst all that I have actually managed to get some work done on my thesis. I haven't typed it up yet but it's about 7 pages longhand so it should be about a few thousand words hopefully. I need to get someone to start reading my chapters for me really >.< my supervisor is really not a fantasy specialist and my co supervisor has been really really busy recently and so hasn't been able to do much in the way of supervising...

Took a break from working my way through all the seasons of Top Gear to catch up on True Blood episodes. I love the slightly more vulnerable side of Eric they're showing this series (Alexander Skarsgard is super eye candy as well :P) but I am a bit disappointed at how flagrant they're being about "OKAY WE WANT YOU TO START DISLIKING BILL NOW". Poor Bill; still, it was always going to happen based on the book synopses I've read of the Southern Vampire series, and... well, I can't deny I'm barracking for Eric/Sookie, especially after 2.09. No spoilers, but WAHHHH T____T.
I made my new icon because I loved that scene in 2.08 so so much XD excuse the poor quality, I've never made a gif before and the font I chose didn't resize too well. Is it readable for you guys though? I can read it fine but it may be because I made it and already know what it says and all.

I've been baking a fair bit again so have some sugary pic spam! ( Lime tarts, Mocha cake and... cheeseburger muffins??? )

I also wore loli four times this week which is just, weirdly a lot for me XD two of them were pretty casual outfits, but still. I'll just post one pic here but if you're on daily_lolita  I'll make a more comprehensive post there.
( Loliiiii Jo with a sappy sign for mum :P )

Hopefully this post isn't too wall of text ish :P and that everyone else is also having a good weekend :D

I don't post that much, but I've been on a bit of a baking spree lately, trying out some different recipes and just experimenting generally. I've been trying not to worry about losing weight, but just about getting more healthy.. so mainly working on cutting out most of the processed junk foody crap in my diet. I've been baking a lot, something I've never really done much before now, and quite enjoying it :D
I bought a $12 electric hand mixer from Coles so suddenly the scope of things I can make has widened a lot!

( Mmmm... delicious cake... )

Not sure how many people read my journal, but if you have any favourite baking recipes or pictures to share for some different ideas I'd love to see! I'm going to make lime tarts tonight so maybe I'll post them up as well XD

Idea stolen from katu! I thought it was the cutest meme idea ever to post your action figures, so I totally ninja'd her idea and here they are! :)

I've also included plastic figurines generally I hope that's not against the er... rules? If there are any? XD

( Figurines, Action Figures, Bobble heads and... a Transformers Mr Potato Head???? Under the cut!!! :D )

If there is one person or more on your friends list who makes your world a better place just because they exist and who you would not have met (in real life or not) without the internet, then post this same sentence in your journal.

The finale for my round robin turn - thanks for reading everyone, hope you enjoy it :D stick around for the heir poll afterwards ^^



Warning: Some bad language, teen/adult relationships, adult themes etc..

( Ohshi~~~ almost time for generation 7!! :D )

 

Warning: Adult themes, some bad language, teen/adult relationship... etc...
ALSO, this is a RATHER BIG update - 115 pictures! I hope dialuppers can still view it.. ?? :(

( The only difference between stalking and courting is whether or not they eventually say yes ^^; )

 

Amidst all this Ouroborosing, the Kreechurs were getting a bit neglected :(
So I had two chapters worth of material from the Kreechurs saved, and I decided it's better to just get it all posted before I forget what the hell happened in half the screenies... and bring us up to generation two succession... all in one fell swoop :D

BE WARNED DIAL UPPERS... ENORMOUS update of over 100 pictures pluuuussss HEIR POLL :O!!



( In which we learn that American cheese is just weird looking man. No, seriously, just... what? How does it get that colour? Do they dye it? Do your cows produce some weird orangeing protein? I'm really confused :x )

Warnings: Language, realistic vomit, adult themes etc etc

( the first cut didn't seem to work, so have another! >_> )</div>

Usual warnings, some bad language, adult themes etc :)

( FOLLOW THE STINKY BABYYYY :) )

Generation SIX! The Ouborororsosossosorosorsrorososes come to the rather demented world of Jo's version of Belladonna Cove.

Disclaimer: Possibly a bit of bad language, really awkwardly resized pictures which might be very big, massive massive baby overload

( My brain is sleepy and I can't think of good cut text - FUNNY STUFF UNDER HERE? Err... GOOD READING FOR YA? Umm... IN SOVIET RUSSIA, PHOTOSTORY READ YOU!!... ah screw it )

Should be up pretty soon :D