"The Death Bed Theory"

When I was younger and confronted by a major life decisions (which most likely involved the typical Saturday dilemma of whether I should treat myself to a second viewing of 'Die Hard' or go for 'Grease' instead), I had two sure-fire ways to solve such indecision. The first was to write all possible options on alternative sides of a rubber, flick it in the air and let the even hand of gravity decide my fate. Otherwise as a keen netballer (I know, LOL), I would pick up my netball, ask myself a question and go for an impossible shot and if I landed it, the anwser to my question was to be in the affirmative. My point to this story is that kids are stupid AND that I have discovered a much more effective way to assist in making those big life decisions...

I like to call it "The Death Bed Theory". The way it works is, that whenever confronted by one of life's big questions ask yourself what you are likely to think of that decision years down the track when on your death bed. For instance, I was feeling miserable the other day about not having more disposable income to spend on clothes because I've been preoccupied with saving (first world problems). Then I asked myself the question, "Emma, when you're on your death bed are you going to wish you had bought that pair of wedges or would you be more content with the fact you saved that money to travel the world". All of a sudden, material things become unimportant. However, it doesn't have to just be applied to the decision-making process, it can help relieve a sense after guilt after doing something that appears to be negative on its face. A hastily considered example would be eating a lot of cheese on the weekend and feeling guilty about being such a slobby fat mess (relevant to yours truly). When feeling guilty about my excessive cheese consumption I asked myself this "Emma, on your death bed, are you going to look back on your life and wish you ate carrot sticks instead of all that vintage cheddar?" Of course not, because carrots are boring and cheese is amazing.

So in summary, kids are stupid and cheese is the best.
xoxo

P.S Do not apply this theory when choosing your Subway sandwich.

Be honest, meatloaf is not good in any form.

Due to popular demand (in other words a single request from Katie), I have decided to get the ball rolling on this pathetic excuse of a blog again. I also thought it was the perfect time to dedicate what little free moments I currently have to a pointless blog rather than a massive research essay that I have due in 3 days. Priorities. I also decided that playing golf on Rhys' xbox and watching 'Pleasantville' (a movie I have seen probably about 17 times) warranted a far better and worthy use of my time last night. I'm really going places.

Back to the point, it appears that the last post I wrote was just before my departure to South America. It seems fitting that my next post be on the same day I finally manage to pay back my parents for the said trip. Yes, feel free to refer to the date of my last post. Yes, it was a rather long time ago. Two conclusions can be drawn from this; a) the debt rivalled Greece's current financial woes or b) I am an average saver. I like to think it was a little bit from column a) and bit of column b). Regardless, it means I can start actually saving my pennies for something worthwhile again. However, deciding what to save for has left me torn. My brain is saying, "Emma you dumb bitch, Celia is on death row! Whenever she remains stationary for more than 20 seconds she starts spluttering so much that you actually verbally encourage her to get you home. What is wrong with you?!" And my heart is saying "Think about how much fun you had in South America. Stash aside whatever money you have so you can jump on a plane to Africa and go on safari! Do it!" Nutso internal dialogue aside, I'm not really sure what to do but as a logical person I imagine the brain will probably win out. Unfortunately.

So I realised that I haven't actually said anything of substance yet. I dont know how or why anyone (Katie) would choose to read this. Anyway I should probably insert some mandatory life updates just in case I decide to print this out one day and when I undoubtedly get dementia, posts like this might be useful to refer to.

1. If I have indeed gone senile and I am reading this now, your name is Emma. You're in a nursing home and no one is trying to kill you. Stop running through the hallways naked. It's embarrassing for your grandchilden.

2. Now that's out of the way, I have recently been employed at a discount shoe shop. The pay is better than average for retail but I miss the bookshop, I miss the people I used to work with and most of all, I miss my hands not bleeding at the end of an average shift because I have been handling cardboard boxes so much that my skin's cracked. Now I'm never going to be a hand model*

3. Uni is destroying any remaining shread of a soul I had left. 95% of my waking hours are either at work or involve me glued to the laptop writing assignments that will most likely get an extremely average mark anyway (that's the spirit!)

4. In good news the assignments will be completed by Friday and as I finally have a weekend off work, Rhysie, Dermott and I will head down to Rosebud. Hopefully activities will involve eating cheese and drinking wine but this has yet to be confirmed.

That's enough from me for now. I'm going to go listen to the 'Beach Boys' and not do my homework.

xoxo

*note: anyone that knows me/has had the displeasure of coming into contact with my hands would be aware of the impossibility of this dream.

Nerdy Tourist 101

I haven't written here in a while. I'd say it's mainly due to a combination of laziness and a current lack of mental stimulation due to having this trimester off uni to travel. My brain seems to be just useless grey matter that Currently only serves the purpose of filling the otherwise barren space within my skull.

Despite this current condition I'm consoled by the fact that I'm going away in under 3 weeks to South America. Finally. All the time spent saving, working, getting needles, filling out paperwork and meeting with the travel agent appears to be coming to fruition. This time in 3 weeks I will be most likely lying on a picturesque beach in Rio de Janeiro, sipping on cocktails before partying all night for Carnivale. As fantastic as this all sounds I have one concern currently plaguing me. Rio is infamous for petty crime and I don't want my shit stolen. I will be fuming if I even get $20 stolen. This could be due to the fact that I'm a massive tight-arse (I once lost $5 on the pokies and I vowed to never play again and I haven't) or it could be because I have spent so much time thinking about ways of avoiding would-be thieves that I will be disappointed if they manage to out-manouvre me.

So this leads me to an explanation of this blogs title... I tried on some of my travel attire and looked at myself in the mirror and my first thoughts were "you really are your father's daughter" AND secondly, you are a fucking nerd. Here I am trying on money belts weeks in advance of my trip, setting combinations for bag locks and seeing how my backpack looks when worn on my front.

My conclusion, I'm going to look like the ridiculous cliche tourist I once mocked for my entire trip but oddly enough, I have came to the realisation that I have no qualms with this. I'm embracing my inner nerd.

Humans.

I have come to realise that their are a lot of self-absorbed people in this world. They're so wrapped up in their own problems and own dramas that the thought of anyone else having anything significant occuring in their life is beyond them.

I find this infuriating.

They're the types that in the course of a conversation may ask you once how you are (often in a disinterested tone) before desperately trying to find a means to direct the conversation back to themselves. They are convinced they are the centre of the universe (whether they consciously or subconsciously think this way).

I heard a fact recently, "there are roughly 10.3 trillion stars in the known universe for every person on the planet, whilst our planet revolves around 1 star..."

So my message based on this fact is that people should put their own lives in perspective or at least consider the lives of others. We all have our own achievements, dramas, heartaches, disappointments, moments of ecstatic joy and times of soul-crushing sadness. No one's experiences are more significant than anyone elses.

On that note, I'm going to go to pee, go to bed and stare at the ceiling for a while and silently pray that I am not one of these people.

Adious

A bit of BBC to start the week...

When I think about it now, yes I do get upset. I get a bit angry. I get disappointed (mainly in myself) but I have realised that I am too much of an awesome person to care anymore. So when I get that gutted feeling like my insides are actually getting ripped out... I remind myself that I am a pretty cool.

If that doesn't work, nothing beats a bit of Christina Aguilera's 'Fighter' to get me through.

This probably wouldn't make sense to anyone else reading this and that doesn't really bother me. All I know is that when I read this back I will know what I am referring to.

Enough of that, I'm going to the dietician tomorrow. I doubt she will be impressed by my food diary. In fact, I'm pretty repulsed by what I eat. They say that when someone is trying to lose weight they should religiously record everything in a food diary so that the end of the day when you look at it you can appreciate how much horrible stuff you've been eating. Whilst my food diary is not for the purpose of weight loss, but more recording of my sugar intake, it is still quite confronting seeing how much shit I eat.

Considering I meant to be eliminating most forms of sugar in my life I doubt she is going to be impressed with the Cold Rock visit I had this week. Lemon sorbet with nerds, wizz fizz and fruit tingles... so much sugar.

I have no regrets.

Survivors Guide to Law School.

Think about all of the stereotypes of law school and legal types and I can assure you that what you visualise it quite close to the truth. From the Audi driving, immaculately dressed uptown girls to the tutor that wears nothing but sweater and shirt combo's and perpetually has a cup of coffee attached to his hand. The work is hard and unfortunately I'm learning that there are no shortcuts. You work hard or you fail. If you fail and repeat this adds to your ever increasing study debt.

I had an exam on Friday. It went horribly to say the least. Ridiculous time contraints on work that if done properly, would most likely take a couple of days to complete. There were tears and extreme stress from class mates. There was delirious laughter by some upon completion and you could tell exactly what they were thinking, "what the fuck have I gotten myself into?!"


This leads me to a discussion of a brilliant website my sweater-wearing, caffeine-addicted tutor got the class onto, 'Law School: A Survivor's Guide.' One post particularly amused me, it was one of the "You know you're a .... when ..." things that you often see floating around facebook. A few of them were so spot-on and brilliant that they warranted a re-post in my blog.

So you know you're in law school when...

• "You can't remember if you decided to come to law school because you wanted to help people and make a difference in the world or because you hate yourself."
• "In high school, receiving a mark of 80% was the end of the world. Now you're at law school a mak of 80% feels like the best thing that will ever likely happen to you."
• "You can't watch legal shows because of all the inaccuracies. You prefer to watch the far more realistic medical dramas and dream about the career you could have had."
• "When someone tells you things are not as bad as they seem, that person is wrong. Things are as bad as they seem, and they may actually be worse."
• "You realise your life is full of lawsuits waiting to happen. Someone knocks you over at the train station - assault? You're also carrying a bag - trespass to goods? The floor is wet and hasn't been mopped - negligence?"
• "Come exam time you get incredibly frustrated by the amount of study time you lose to mundane yet essential tasks like eating, sleeping and showering..."

Just to reiterate one of the above points, the whole time I was writing this I was thinking about the legalities about not properly attributing the above quotes to it's rightful author. Plagiarism? Copyright infringment?

The fundamental point is this: law life be a cynical life.

Just having a peruse...

I enjoy words that roll off the tongue nicely. Peruse is one of them.

Me: "Do you need a hand finding anything at all?"
Customer: "No, no just perusing."

Brilliant!

Archipelago is another particular favourite of mine. However it's difficult to just slip into conversation - although it has been easier is this last week following the spate of natural disasters afficticting the Indonesian archipelago.

(See what I did there? I managed to slip it in. Boo yeah!)

To tell you the truth, I'm going to stop there. I just realised how tired I am. I have a massive case of the CBFs at the moment.

I'm a horrible blogger. The last one I wrote was over a month ago and this is the best I can do? Pathetic.

I feel like a foot massage, some reassurance and an email from my tutor to say tomorrow's class is cancelled so I can catch-up on some sleep.

xoxo
P.S Meagan I am both inspired and saddened of your abandoing of Facebook. I wish I had your strength.