Grace Notes @ Snarkattack

Last month or so has seen me well productive! Have been writing and reading like a demon.

A couple of days ago, I sent a fresh poem to my online chum @gabfran who keeps a terrific blog called Law and Shoes. Sure, I might be biased as to why I think it’s a good blog, but let me try to persuade you otherwise:

1. it’s a themed blog – this lady loves shoes.
2. oddly enough, we garner personal history through her relationship with the various pairs of shoes she owns
3. she frequently has guests posting about their shoes

Themed blogs, and hers is definite inspiration, is one of the reasons I decided to start writing mini-reviews on books I read this year.

When I woke up yesterday, I found that she did me the honour of posting my greenstick poem (which has a good lack of shoes in it) on her blog. I very rarely post my own work here so I must confess it was quite a nice surprise.

I’d love to know what you all think. I’ve started editing it, so in my mind, the ‘more definitive’ version looks a little different to what is there.

Also, it’s still in baby stages but two of my closest friends and myself have started a food review blog called Eat, Drink, Stagger. It thus made my day when The Local Taphouse featured my newbie Ale Star post on their blog. Makes me wish I took better pictures of the beer bottles! But, no matter, from here on it’s nothing but improvement.

Grant at FoodStuffMelb was kind enough to do a shout-out (cheers, we’ll be adding FoodStuffMelb blog to our blogroll as soon as we get that sorted!) for us. Grant was a chef in a former life, and occasionally reviews eateries in Melbourne. I like his blog because even though he has ties to the food industry, he is warm and approachable. I’ve pestered him with my blog comments and he always responds.

So yeah, if you’re looking for some good, theme-focussed reading, there’s some suggestions!

By no stretch of the imagination am I a tech geek. Nu-uh. I think as far as arts geeks go, I tend to like getting my feet wet in some geekery, but not much.

A few weeks ago, I got a Nokia N95 and didn’t really think much of it at the time. I mean, it phones people, it saves numbers, woo-hoo.

Then, one evening I sat down with it and started to look into what it was this thing could really do. Hm. Mobile versions of websites, applications. Wot wot? I thought that stuff was only good for iPhones (which are the devil but I secretly lust after it. Are you happy, Amy?).

Some of you may know about my love for music. Fewer of you know of my love for scrobbling and last.fm. Imagine the figurative jizz in my pants when I discovered an application, specifically for the N95 that allows whatever I listen to on said N95 to scrobble.

The application is called Mobbler. I’ve installed it on my N95 and it indeed does work. I haven’t tested it with listening to actual last.fm radio stations (I don’t use that function much as streaming is slow and to be honest, I have shitloads of music to listen to as it is).

So yeah, now the music I listen to at work to combat Bad 10-Year Old Techno-Listening Guy will actually scrobble. Yeah, I know, easily amused. My life is crap, cut me some slack.

I was chatting with @lluke very early this morning and he told me that “blogging is so 2005″. I realise blogging isn’t en vogue these days, but I harbour a fondness for it. Perhaps because it allows me to crap on ad infinitum. I mainly do it as a record I can read back on for when I go all Mrs Dalloway Septimus, which isn’t really any fun.

I’m only listing the ones I use or have a signed account with.

So, you want to know what I’m doing now? Well, you can check my Facebook status, or check my Twitter updates. Want to see me on video or see things I’ve filmed? Well, there’s YouTube or if you really have a short attention span, see my 12seconds account.

Want to see what I’m reading, or what books are in my collection? Check out my aNobii profile, or LibraryThing. How about the music I listen to? Why here you go! Oh, and (some of) my music collection on CD is here too.

Have a really short attention span? Then check out Tumblr which is somewhere between blogging and microblogging. Bonus points to anyone who can tell me how Posterous is different to Tumblr.

Then integrate all your feeds into one using FriendFeed.

There are a bunch of others I have accounts with that I just haven’t bothered to mention. Also, if you haven’t done so, I do recommend reading Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. It’s actually really good.

My faves are Twitter, last.fm and Tumblr (I have two differently themed Tumblrlogs). I do use LiveJournal to subscribe to communities that post poems daily, and also to comment on friends’ LJs.

Twitter I use to communicate with others. last.fm I use to discover new musical artists. Tumblr – one is for posting poems I really like or really hate, the other is for posting images I like. I was pretty obsessive about aNobii a while back but I haven’t been reading as much as I used (gee, I wonder why).

I’d tell you what I’m going to do now, but you’ll probably find out – regardless of your interest – on several feeds in a bit. kthxbai.

(edit: christ, I didn’t even mention BrightKite or TwitPic, both of which I use! Head…going…to…explode…)
(edit #2: forgot blip.fm. Am worst blogger EVAR)

In list form, my current technological woes:

- cannot print out work at current residence. Not sure what happened, but it’s cool, right? I can print out stuff anywhere! *trots off to folks’ place*
- cannot print out work at parents’. Computer too sluggish and takes forever to load…anything. I’ve no idea what the hell my father has done to it
- stupidly, am using Linux/Ubuntu which means I use OpenOffice
- trying to copy and paste existing material into MS Word messed up the appearance of my work on the page. Poet(asters) are very fussy about this sort of thing
- my blog no longer lets me upload images like it used to which is okay, except that:
- TwitPic is upload bollocks at present, and don’t really want to upload my blog-specific images to anything else just yet

- it is a gross luxury, but hacked XBox is a bit stuffed so no listening to music whilst doing the dishes. I don’t really mind that one so much, just thought I’d throw it in
- I can’t update my blog software, or its plugins, which technically means I have no backups of the posts and have not for quite some time
- my browser window keeps making half of the toolbars disappear since I disabled a few addons for blip.fm – stop resizing without my consent damn you!

Nothing really major, just a bit of a bummer really. I think I’m really going to have to admit defeat and go back to Windows as I just don’t have the competence nor the time to learn to use Linux properly.

I should just submit my submission electronically. Except that I want it to be considered for the print edition of the journal rather than the electronic version, hence the snail mail submission.

Note to self: pay off debts and get a printer. Sigh.

Disclaimer: no, this post is not directed towards anyone. I am merely publicising my incompetence and current tech frustrations.

I know a few tech geeks, so don’t be getting ideas about who gave this to me. Actually, am going to have to get said geek to explain it to me again. I forgot what it means.

Plus, it seemed sort of…poetic?

#!/bin/bash
runtime=${1:-10m}
oralsex&
sleep $runtime
#end

I hate Linux. Or Ubuntu. Or both. I’m sort-of mad at tAlex & Rob for letting me believe I might be smart enough for it. Yes, I know it was my choice to install it…but at present I’m being angry, irrational and frustrated. I believe my exact words to FD about the Linux-Ubuntu matter was “they can go get fucked with rusty razor blades”. Sadly, not my expression. I did extend the metaphor to say I would crawl back (to L-U) like the pathetic significant other I am, despite it having slept with my hotter older sister. FD said ‘wait – did you just mention a hot sister?’. Sorry, dear, I don’t really.

(does that make Windows the comfortable, vanilla significant other I ‘turn to’ who’s filthy rich with whom I’m not in love…?)

Digression: clearly, I’m not smart enough.

Perhaps when I’m not quite so pissed off I shall attempt to Google and fix my (tech-related) problems. Though Googling how to set up a wireless network proved fruitless.

Anyway, yesterday. Drove for 2 hours for my second dress fitting. The dressmaker told me I sound posh on the phone. Hmm. That’s funny, seeing as she’s British. The dress is strapless, makes me look like I’m, um, well-endowed, and is red satin. It’s actually going to be nice when finished, I think. This translates as ‘rewearable’ unlike the last wedding monstrosity I had to wear as a bridesmaid.

Played Guitar Hero at my workmate’s for the first time ever. Apparently a beginner girl isn’t allowed to beat boys. I want to play more. It is ace. I also drank Victoria Bitter for the first time in ages. I shan’t be repeating that experience again. In case you missed it the first time: Guitar Hero is ace. I don’t get how I managed to beat boys: usually I suck at computer/video games.

Neighbour and I went to get Urban Burger…but it closed early due to unforeseen circumstances! It can’t do that! In his words, we sat down outside, like two lost souls before eventually wandering across the road for nasi lemak (which is much nicer on the plate than in a takeaway container). For some odd reason watched the second half of In Her Shoes instead of heading out with workmates to get sloshed…

After all of next door went to bed, I did at least four hours worth of poetry reading and my inbox is still not empty! Ugh! I also did not get to read yesterday’s paper. Don’t remember the last time I read the paper…bad nerd.

Today – brunch at the Hot Poppy in my hood with DF. We both had poached eggs with hollandaise sauce and pancetta, served on English muffins. It came with half an avocado, slivers of which I sneakily ate (I love avocado, my stomach does not) Gave him his copy of Snow, Glass, Apples, drank Turkish fruit teas and listened to music that my housemates would otherwise consider ‘noise’ (well, only one such artist – Bauhaus).

The kegs have been empty since Friday afternoon. I’m not quite sure how I managed to survive.

I think I might go (and) get*…one of those horrendous quad monster burgers people have been talking about after ‘Bela Lugosi Is Dead’ by Bauhaus is finished playing.

*You see what I did there? I employed a literary device. I started with the words “go get…” in the title and ended with the same words in the last sentence. J-P would remember, Mr Ryan taught us that in English class (final year of high school)

So…I’m back from my first ever MTUB gathering and I had a fantastic time! I can’t believe how friendly everyone was!

I first arrived at the Fad Gallery in Chinatown, Melbourne and had no idea where my fellow Twitterers were supposed to be…so I asked at the bar. They looked thoroughly perplexed which is never a good sign, so I decided I would try approaching a group of people that looked like they might be the people I was looking for…

Luckily for me I found the right group of people and was warmly welcomed and got myself the first of many gin and tonics. I found that I was in excellent company – many loved the xkcd tee I was wearing (the ‘just shy’ one). I did my best to talk to as many people as I possibly could and passed around a piece of paper so that I could jot down everyone’s Twitter nicknames and follow them there.

After much wonderful conversation, we headed out to a Chinese restaurant, stuffed ourselves stupid then headed back to the Fad Gallery for a couple more drinks before most of us retired knowing that there was the drudgery of work the following day. Many snickered upon inviting me out to see the X-Files film tomorrow night, which I very reluctantly turned down due to band practice! As you can well imagine, there was much mirth when they found out I played the flute (thank you American Pie).

But yeah, what a freaking awesome idea. I can’t wait till the next MTUB. And yes, I did check out Google Street View and am suitably freaked out!

So yeah, I had a wonderful time and am grinning like a Cheshire cat. Course, that could be all the gin and tonics I had…

Let me count the ways…

A transcript from a conversation between myself and FD.

(9:18:09 PM) Gem: dude i’m too depressed for beer. what’s that about?
(9:18:52 PM) Felicidade: You have good self-control – I’d be straight on the piss
(9:19:02 PM) Gem: hahahaha usually i am!
(9:19:13 PM) Gem: this last month i’ve drunk SO much
(9:19:22 PM) Gem: even at the pub i was…well-behaved, haha
(9:20:02 PM) Felicidade: Didn’t notice. Feeling worse than usual are you?
(9:20:15 PM) Gem: i don’t think so. it’s just no one’s home
****
(9:21:56 PM) Felicidade: Sorry, gotta go and eat Tim’s excellent cooking.
(9:22:03 PM) Felicidade: Be back soon
(9:22:07 PM) Gem: ooh lucky. kk
****
(10:27:35 PM) Felicidade: Gemma! I’m back again.
(10:27:41 PM) Gem: yea! felicidade!
(10:27:44 PM) Gem: welcome back
(10:28:17 PM) Felicidade: You too!
(10:28:27 PM) Gem: *giggle*
(10:28:30 PM) Gem: what was din-dins?
(10:29:29 PM) Felicidade: Beef and rice noodles
(10:29:44 PM) Gem: ooh nice
(10:31:18 PM) Felicidade: you?
(10:31:51 PM) Gem: leftovers from lunch. it was some pastry spinach and cheese thing, very nice
(10:32:39 PM) Felicidade: cool. What’s on the agenda now?
(10:32:51 PM) Gem: not much, listening to radiohead
(10:32:59 PM) Gem: chatting to a friend online
(10:33:02 PM) Felicidade: Huh. Cool
***
(11:14:05 PM) Gem: night Felix! thanks for chatting! xxx
(11:14:47 PM) Felicidade: No prob – a good way of honing my Dvorak skills
(11:14:54 PM) Gem: HAHAHAHAHAHAA
(11:15:06 PM) Felicidade: Good night!
(11:15:09 PM) Gem: night!

In case you’re wondering, Dvorak is an alternative keyboard setup. No, seriously, this really cracked me up. God I love my nerd friends, they are just so awesome in so many ways.

Well, I do for several reasons, but this is for a very specific reason, and I am sorely glad that Thoughtfix alerted me to this very important day…

System Administration Appreciation Day

http://www.sysadminday.com/ (sadly, this day has passed in Australia, but better late than never, eh?)

You can also read Cory Doctorow’s story about sysadmins…ruling the world, hehe.

Love your sysadmin! They deserve it!

Thanks Rob for all your awesome geekery and genius, u11 loves your work!

My blog proper, which I should declare dead, was hijacked! I was informed of this when a friend of mine said he did a Google search for my blog because he hadn’t yet saved it as a bookmark. I did a Google search and lo and behold, it said visiting this site might harm your computer.

Turns out Snarkattack proper was hijacked and I found posts that I’d never published about stupid polyphonic ringtones.

Thankfully, I had my awesome sysadmin housie to fix all the mess that was created! Man am I ever lucky (thanks Rob!)! Guess I better get ready for work and brush all the knots out of my hair.

I’d like to know why strangers are following me on Twitter! I think it’s kind of nice, but I don’t fancy myself as being very interesting and yet people seem to be adding my Twitter feed to theirs to follow. As an exercise in positivity, I think it’s going remarkably well. I do read back on it and see that I largely tend to focus on the good, fun things I’ve done in the day, and even if the day hasn’t gone so well, I’ll try really hard to record something nice that happened. Yea me, haha.
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I’m trying to listen to music on last.fm and not having much luck thanks to its update not downloading and installing properly.

I can’t uninstall it, meaning I can’t reinstall it and it’s not scrobbling (saving a history/list of tracks I listen to) properly. Thoroughly pissed off. Sigh, I’ll just have to wait till I move out and have my future housemate/good tech geek pal look at it and see if he can fix it for me.

If anyone else has any tips on what I could do, send ‘em my way, I’m all ears.

And I don’t care what my ex says, Joy Division rock. Of course, I haven’t heard as much of it as he did so that might account for my attitude (congrats on the new job too Z if you’re reading).

You will now notice that Grace Notes has its own favicon!

What is a favicon? Check beloved Wikipedia for their entry. I owe this favicon and the one on Snarkattack proper to the work of a lovely lady who has her own blog, Singular Scene, which I have a link to.

The now infamous Nerd of My Dreams (NMD) was supposed to have designed one for me but sadly, he forgot and he has still to repair my awesome death metal tee which I’m sadly probably too much of a fattie to fit into, sob sob.

So yes, I’m quite excited about finally having favicons for both my blogs. Silly of me perhaps, but eh, they’re cute and I’m allowed. It did take a little bit of tweaking by my friend Rob to get them to appear. Thanks for the magic as usual, Rob!

Hopefully by the time this is readable, the problem I pray will be resolved thanks to the hands of some real tech people as opposed to hacks like myself.

I attempted to upgrade my blog software. The last time I performed this, I was successful but it was still quite stressful. However, this time I was not so successful thanks to the software somehow being downloaded and getting all corrupt (thank you Dee for the support forum links that told me this), installation wasn’t as smooth.
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You might recall me saying something about being a bit of a Nintendo lover. I just remembered that the reason I initially started buying the older games about two or so years back was because I couldn’t afford the latest console.

In one eBay lot, I paid 10 bucks for 10 ancient NES games – we’re talking so ancient they were older than me. One of them was called Dragon’s Lair and was, for me, impossible to play. As in, I couldn’t get past the first screen.

It was time for reinforcements. Serious reinforcements. Bring on my tech geek maestro pal Rob. If he can’t do it, no one can.
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Amusingly, I read on a fellow NaBloPoMo participant’s blog that many blogs don’t have themes. Hmm. That might be…though admittedly I tend to prefer themed blogs, I find myself returning to read ones that aren’t themed.

But that isn’t quite the theme I’m referring to in the title of this post: I mean graphic theme, or layout one’s blog.
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‘Twas truly a geeky day. I always get very excited when I login here and my admin panel thingie tells me that an absolute stranger had linked to me. Now I begin to understand that social blogging thing…(darn it Caro, where are you?!?)

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It was a big mistake to begin the day by browsing through some toy catalogues that arrived as junk mail, methinks.

Yes, I’m 27. Yes, I’m female. Sadly, my interests are somewhat…diverse.

On the first page of the Toys-R-Us catalogue, there it was – the Holy Grail of Nintendo consoles (at least till the next one comes out): the Nintendo Wii on pre-order (cue Thus Spake Zarathustra by R. Strauss here).
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