Dali's 'St Jacques Le Grand'
I was aiming for a longer post but Mum's kicking me off the internet. *scrunches up nose* I'm in the mood to laugh at that. Now we should have some spare time to sit down and watch the David Gray concert DVD she borrowed from Chris. :-)
XMAS countdown: 33 days
Classics
I discovered a 'Top 100 Love Song' bargain-bin CD of my mother's and so now I'm typing away to the sound of Mozart's 'Eine Kleine Nachtmusik - Romance' (as it says on the back cover). :-) It's beautiful. Kinda puts me in the mood to read some 17th century romance... and if I drank wine now would be an excellent time to bring it out. I feel very girly.
Ah, Fur Elise! I used to beg my old piano techer to play this for me. It was amazing, skipping from the stilted rhythms of my practice jingles to that beautiful lilting melody. I loved it. ^ - ^
I wish I had a piano - ah, but no! I have a keyboard that was a gift from my grandparents hidden under my bed, and almost two months of free time to practise. I hereby declare that I will be able to play at least 10 seconds of 'Fur Elise' by the end of January (and without laying fingers to a keyboard in about a decade).
This is my new favourite CD... Pachelbel's 'Canon' has just finished. It's gorgeous...
Bach! :-D This music seems to call for warmth, wide open ballrooms, gowns of silk and brocade; for paintings by Rembrandt gracing gleaming, wood-panelled walls...
*an hour or so later* I've been browsing the Museum Art section of allposters.com (the good ones I go off and find in better quality elsewhere). The classical CD is on its second run-through, after a gap for a bit of Aerosmith - I've found a favourite, Love Story by Lai, and rediscovered just how much I love Monet. Mum's driven to port to return Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet to the public library and buy fish 'n' chips for Friday tea. ^ - ^
Corot! Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot! I'd never heard of him before today, but I love his landscapes. They're full of light and natural beauty, art which captures the inherent magic of a place. I'll stick one in for you.
Now I think it's time to go play with photobucket and upload some stuff. Thanks for reading. ^ - ^ Bye!
Website plan
No time to type: the All Blacks are on. This is what my gallery will look like when finished; the measurements are from a template but all the graphics were done on Elements (hopefully no major mistakes). ^ - ^
A weekend of silence
There is no-one here but me. It's a very strange feeling, made just a little bit more normal by the sound of the Stereophonics blaring from the sound system... I like it.
*Happily munching on Moroccan Tagine stir-fry* And I didn't even forget to turn off the gas cooktop. :-)
Oooh! Franz Ferdinand at the Big Day Out!!!!! I am so envious... Franz in NZ!!! It's brilliant! ^ - ^ The tickets are way too expensive for me (student) but the national music channel will broadcast it a few days afterwards. *gazes off into space* Ah, Franz. It's a thing.
Mmmm, peas in the pod are so good just cooked and crunchy...
I have started brainstorming for possible construction of an online gallery for pics like the one above (made on Adobe Elements and Paintshop). Should be great - the next post'll be a plan of the layout. :-)
Oh, I love this song: INXS's Never Tear Us Apart. For some reason, Rock Star: INXS just didn't manage to give this one it's proper dues. (They did have Dave Navarro, though *grins* so we'll forgive them.) Is it my imagination or have Limp Bizkit screwed with Bittersweet Symphony? *puzzlement* Why? Silly things. Hey! Blur! :-D This song is great. Have kinda just realized that my typing isn't quite keeping up with the changes on the radio... So I think we'll swap subjects. You guys have heard enough of my musical tastes by now anyway. ^ - ^
It's around now that the should-be-studying guilt comes out; this may have to be a shorter post than I'd planned. Just one last thing: algebraic graphs. Are they or are they not the most mind-bendingly frustrating mathematical device ever invented? (At L1 NCEA, anyway.) Beyond even the limits of my numbers tolerance... And I'm the geekiest girl in my class. ^ - ^
HA! No Maths next year!!! One more little exam, three hours total left of Maths work in my entire school life... *sighs*Art History rather than Maths. Exploring creativity and spirit rather than moving numbers around. The easiest trade ever made. :-D
(I'm pretty sure there's a contradiction in my thinking there, but it may be a couple of semi-realizations away and I really need to get back to New Zealand's Search for Security 1945-1985. Thrilling stuff.)
"For us, for them, for you." Bye! ^ - ^
Was that my English exam?
I've been fussing with blog stuff and exploring Radio Paradise for hours now... I think I'm in shock.
That was strange - the first booklet went all right (Romeo + Juliet ^ - ^) but half-way through my long text response (3rd one up, Chinese Cinderella) the judgement bit of my brain seemed to detach. Dear Lord, I hope I didn't ramble. *crosses fingers* I think it was my normal kind of response, at least not much worse... Well, I know I passed. I've been passing these things all year - I just want Excellence!!! Excellence for Scholarship, and because I know I can get it; and because other people know I can get it too and I don't want to let them down. Ms Martin... I didn't see her today because we were trapped in the Learning Centre (big main bit where the exams are held) from 9:30 onwards, but Jessie said hello for me at Group. :-)
Back to that damn exam... The unfamiliar text (comprehension) part was more challenging than I thought it would be, asking questions about verbal techniques in an NZ soap opera called Shortland Street which has appaling dialogue and has been running for a decade over here. Pure home-grown talent, that is! How can you show that a block of speech has been planned instead of being written down as it was spoken? (Excluding rushed mistakes, etc: it was typed. ^ - ^ And they wouldn't let you cite using italics for stress either.) I had no clue about that one, just had to leave it and go on with the rest. It's only one mark lost, though; I answered everything else. :-)Right! Well, that's all my English over with for the year. Is it weird that I want to cry? *sighs* 3 months now before my next class - and no Mr Wallace!!!! If I'm honest, that's what's ticking me off the most. Stupid... *frustration* And now I'm getting frustrated with myself as well. Me 'n' my Mum are so alike. *laughs* It's just that he's so easy to talk to (but then everyone finds him easy to talk to... I'm being stupid again). Oh, no, wait, I'm not. After all, it doesn't matter, right?
*re-reads entry* Oh crap... I'm leaving this subject.
:-) I'm listening to Radio Paradise online (link's over on the right) and they've just started playing Joe Cocker. My friend loves this guy... *chuckles* The DJ has an amazing voice; the epitome of American cool, twangy and deep and- you know what? Even better than Rick... Oh damn, what's his name? Rick Dees!!! ^ - ^ We used to get the countdown on Sunday mornings. Man, that was cheesy. *bites tongue* I think I might be a little off-centre today. Should probably go have a milkshake. Good day to all! P.S. Changed the jukebox a little, added some links and did some other stuff I can't quite remember - almost 500 hits! Whoop! :-D
Gorgeous artwork by Vlad Geanina Iustina, 'Red Rose'...
Tautuku
Tautuku Bay, Catlins, OtagoThis is the first decent pic of the place I've found it ages... *shakes head* Well, online anyway; I have a brilliant one stuck up next to me. :-) Last year I went with my classmates to a camp just off to the right, in the trees, and spent a week doing outdoorsy stuff (our group did the most walking of anyone, lol - we were exhausted by the end). On our second-to-last day we did a five hour trek from the beach up to the hill to where the photo was taken, then back up north (the pic's looking south) and inland in a massive circle. The final hour was through gorgeous (wet) NZ bush and mud that was so deep we sank in almost to our knees. It was fantastic. :-D I would upload some actual pictures from then, but this computer is agonizingly slow and I'm afraid the power supply couldn't handle it. *scrunches up nose* Silly thing.
Don't you just love camps??? (And I can just hear people moaning, even now... :-) I love them, anyway. Even if my bestish friend managed to stick her foot through a cargo net and we all got tired out and bitchy. It was fun. Sitting around a campfire with your mates at 11:30 at night, listening to murmurs from nearby tents and the crackle of logs bursting in the flames... Everything looks better by firelight. Noodles are a million times more satisfying if you're eating them with a plastic spoon in the bush - and need I even start about toasted marshmallows? Heaven on Earth! ^ - ^
I should really be studying right now, so I'll bottle up all my nostalgia for a bit. *deep breath* Exam on Wednesday.
Formal writing, here I come...
Email to Dad
Warning: this is from an email to Dad and it's a little... unrestrained. ^ - ^Guess what! I got all my 5 Excellences and Merit at Senior Prizegiving and everybody clapped spontaneously! Yay! :-D They did that too for Ash and Wei - they both got bucketloads. And we had fantastic music: Real Green Dress, LPHS band who are amazing (Neve Deighton-O'Flynn is the vocalist and she's very, very good) with electric guitar, kinda poppy-noveau: Neve even wrote the song. ^ - ^ Apparently the Principal's favourite school group (and there were significant whispers in the audience when she said that). *grins* Scandal!Then there was a classical piece composed by Alex Campbell-Hunt called 'Spectrum' which was (ahh, too many superlatives) astounding. Yes, astounding. :-) It was gorgeous. Alex performed it in the piano with John and another guy on violins... Makes me so proud to go to the same school as them. Logan Park rocks!!! The jazz band played at the start and end, wonderful as always; and there was the orchestra performing the Shaft theme accompanied by one very brave singer and back-up girls - Tenor Eleven, the vocal group, sang with Bevan Gardiner who's blind and has the most beautiful voice: he sounded awesome. Bevan played lead guitar in Real Green Dress as well. :-DWe had the Honourable Pete Hodgson as guest speaker, MP for Land something and something else, Representative of Dunedin North in Parliament... Hmmmm... He was more charismatic than Ms Johnson (easily) but even when he was telling us to beware of arrogance he didn't manage to shrug off his own. A good speaker, funny - what I expected a politician to be I suppose. He wasn't magnificent, he'd just had more practice, and he didn't even bother to hide his boredom when the Principal was speaking - just told us when he stood up how glad he was to be here. Said it, but didn't show it. *shrugs* Meh. I may be the teensiest bit biased, but he wasn't as appealing as Mr Wallace. (Though, come to think of it, Mr Wallace seemed a bit odd last night - maybe because he's got no more classes this year, maybe because Ms Martin is leaving.)Do you guys have the same rain we do at the moment? It's been suffocatingly muggy down here for the last few days, and it's still warm now even with the damp.
Oh, I forgot - for my English prize I got two books, Plumb by Maurice Gee and The Little Friend by Donna Tartt. Mr Wallace said I'd love them; I'm up to pg 110 in The Little Friend at the moment and it's definitely got something special about it. Hope I can write like that one day.
Now, that's enough I think. English exam on Wednesday! *shivers* I'm trying to talk Mum into grabbing Romeo + Juliet for me for some last-days revision. The exam itself starts at 9:30 Wednesday morning and goes through until 12:30... Shall catch the bus home I think. No more school for the whole year!!!! We get yearbooks on Clearance Day, the day after my Latin exam, December 3rd - that's when I shall say final goodbyes to Ms Martin. She's a fantastic Group teacher. ^ - ^ And a grandmother! Now she'll get to spend some more time with her family... We'll miss her though, and the chocolate cakes she bakes every Group party. (They are amazing chocolate cakes, a perfect example of how sweet she is.)
I had some strange thoughts yesterday, faced with whatever-the-hell-is-going-on in all my little affections... I think I might have a gift for that kind of thing. Silent, quietly embraced... And the truth is, I'm too sensible for this. That's why it's there. *shakes head* Reactions like that I can't control, though I try - and what I can control, the urges restrained, are what makes this strangeness what it is. It's weird being me in a 16-year-old's body. *laughs*
School?
(poppy. o.O)
Hi!
Am listening to 'Lock Up Your Daughters' by End of Fashion on *drum roll* The Rock FM. Oooh, Daniel Carter voted as NZ's sexiest man. Lucky him.
*chuckles* Ah, I'm feeling weird today... A week till exams!
Would you dislike me if I just stuck in some more lyrics? Sometimes I get this way, when the most brainless songs seem more eloquent than whatever the hell else will come out of my head. I'm resisting, though: no Robbie Williams for you! *trying really hard* Yep. No lyrics.
There's a drawing by a friend by my PC, a phoenix created in ink and coloured pencil. She'll be famous one day, she will (and somewhere in my rather messy room I have a signed piece of paper which says so) and then that little pic will be worth mill- well, hundreds of thousands of dollars anyway. :-P When she drew it she was only 13... man that's an odd thought. What might be stranger though is the idea that I will be a Year 12 after Christmas (that's the second-last year of school in NZ) and so will some of the people in my class, those who I always thought would never grow up. One loud American Army-hopeful comes to mind. *shakes head* Well, he's crazy. And named after a angel - I just don't get it. :-) Anyway, being a Year 12 means that I have just one more year afterwards of secondary schooling - that's just one more year before uni! Or travel!!! We'll all be "adults" and off into the world... Do you remember that feeling? Can you imagine it? Right now I'm safe, secure, without bills or debt or marital issues (*scratches head* ummm...?) or anything really significant to worry about. But once that buffer is gone... And again the scariest thought is that it's not just happening to me, it's happening to people I've grown up with. Seniors I remember from Year 7 have suddenly sprouted wings and flown away to Auckland, got a job in Queen St: they're doing degrees in business and psychology, law, biophysics, and, well, one of them is doing nothing but sitting in his house and killing brain cells. Girls that have been around me for the last 5 years straight, who I can recall playing hopscotch and writing crappy haikus, dressing up as faeries, playing tag in the fort - now they're gonna be seniors. Young adults... Writing essays, choosing careers, working 9 to 5 in some office somewhere, maybe even uprooting totally and making a new life somewhere else. We'll be split. That reassuring shield, that sense of returning always to a place where you know everybody, linked by a common interest, plagued by the same horrible teachers and impossible maths formulae, will be gone. Ah, but maybe I'm getting ahead of myself here. After all, if these are to be our last years, shouldn't they be enjoyed? *thinking* Torturous exams, stressful studying... That's what being a student (at the end of an NCEA year anyway) is all about. It's my buffer!!! Studying over debt. (*grins* Or, at uni, studying and debt.) Reports and viral reproduction and SOH/CAH/TOA over having to worry about things like electrics, plumbing or tax returns. I think I like it this way.
*newly imbued with gratitude* 'Imbued'. :-D My Franz is suffering badly: been kicked out by the Wallflowers.
Now, I'm off to do some actual study and actually earn some self-satisfaction... and all without resorting to lyrics. ^ - ^
Hmm well other than losing sight of the babies...
Wry and dishevelled
I was going to write about a biography of Alexander the Great, but I found this online and it deserved a post as bare as possible. Read, and please think."There are children standing here,
Arms outstretched into the sky,
Tears drying on their face.
He has been here.
Brothers lie in shallow graves.
Fathers lost without a trace.
A nation blind to their disgrace,
Since he's been here.
And I see no bravery,
No bravery in your eyes anymore.
Only sadness.
Houses burnt beyond repair.
The smell of death is in the air.
A woman weeping in despair says,
He has been here.
Tracer lighting up the sky.I
t's another families' turn to die.
A child afraid to even cry out says,
He has been here.
And I see no bravery,
No bravery in your eyes anymore.
Only sadness.
There are children standing here,
Arms outstretched into the sky,
But no one asks the question why,
He has been here.
Old men kneel to accept their fate.
Wives and daughters cut and raped.
A generation drenched in hate.
Yes, he has been here.
And I see no bravery,
No bravery in your eyes anymore.
Only sadness."
- James Blunt, No Bravery
bump
Hey peoples, it's been a while. :-)
Countdown to exams: 11 days. *deep breath*
*a great while later* Hmmm... this may be my shortest un-picture post in history. ^ - ^ Have goodness.
I was aiming for a longer post but Mum's kicking me off the internet. *scrunches up nose* I'm in the mood to laugh at that. Now we should have some spare time to sit down and watch the David Gray concert DVD she borrowed from Chris. :-)
I discovered a 'Top 100 Love Song' bargain-bin CD of my mother's and so now I'm typing away to the sound of Mozart's 'Eine Kleine Nachtmusik - Romance' (as it says on the back cover). :-) It's beautiful. Kinda puts me in the mood to read some 17th century romance... and if I drank wine now would be an excellent time to bring it out. I feel very girly.
There is no-one here but me. It's a very strange feeling, made just a little bit more normal by the sound of the Stereophonics blaring from the sound system... I like it.
Tautuku Bay, Catlins, Otago
