ZOMGWTFBBQ!?!?!
100 proper pushups = ACHIEVED!!
When I started on 25 November (2015) I could do 10 pushups on my knees. I took the knee pushups to 100 (adding one each day) and then started all over from 1 with proper ones.
This is definitely my favourite Achievement to date. I *never* thought I could do this. It is such a perfect lesson that tiny, tiny increments can lead to great things!
another soothing babykitty shot
The difficult conversation went okay and I’d apparently already been provided for.
Such is Bobs’ paternalistic way that it seems to not have occurred to him to include me in discussions about money.
Oh well, I need to see the final numbers, but I believe it will be around what I was planning to bargain for (of course this is still less than I am worth, but baby steps).
I’m getting myself into a bit of an agitated state because I need to force myself to have an uncomfortable (for me) discussion with Bobs tomorrow about this exciting new opportunity he’s on the verge of announcing (which I’ve vague blogged about).
Bobs has agreed twice we need to talk about salary and so I’ve been waiting for this to happen. No big surprise that it hasn’t (he keeps postponing our one on ones – to be fair it is insanely busy), so I’m a trifle concerned that he will announce that I’ve been appointed to ExcitingOpportunity and there will be no accompanying salary increase. Best we get it sorted because no way am I taking this on if there aren’t more $$ involved – it is significantly more responsibility and infinitely more work (and so much capacity for failure!).
So here’s a lovely BabyKitty to soothe us:
adorable babykitty is adorable
Today was federal election day! We decided to vote at Stanmore Public School because the election sausage sizzle map told us it was the closest venue with sausage sizzle. For the non-Australians among us, elections are held on Saturdays, voting is compulsory and community groups generally hold fund raising activities – like cake stalls and selling sausages-in-a-bun – at polling places. It can be a very community-bonding kind of thing.
NewKity is uninterested in the democratic process
it was a long, long queue but the weather lovely and company pleasant
adorable miniature buskers rocking out – i kicked them $5
very excellent democracy sausage!
totally amazing democracy ginger cake
(relatively) minimalist wine + cheese to watch the election coverage
There is a very satisfying swing away** from the (conservative) Government, but after screaming at various politicians and commentators on various channels for hours, we landed on the very soothing first day of the tour de france (so pretty! plus, bikes!)
**though QLD – WTF is wrong with you?!
A few weeks ago we were trawling through some of Joan’s stuff when I came across a couple of very elderly photos. For various reasons, I don’t have very many photographs of myself (elderly or otherwise), so I’m always taken aback when I encounter them.
This was the most shocking of the bunch, taken in 1992:
I currently have this hairstyle (well close enough), am about the same weight, wear similar sunnies and rock a baggy shirt on casual occasions. This could in fact, be me right now, though rather a smidge less fresh-faced. I also believe I was wearing boyfriend jeans in the photo and I’d only wear skinny jeans with this ensemble today, and I’d likely add some sort of statement necklace.
Thankfully I’ve had a bunch of wildly different hairstyles, body sizes and clothing styles in the intervening 24 (eeep!) years, so I’ve mixed things up a little – but yikes! perhaps again time for something new.
NewKitty is excited to see the return of her winter boyfriend
It actually feels like winter is finally with us and it has been (relatively) cold over the past week!
Those of you from colder climes will scoff at us all shivering and complaing in 7oC temperatures – but most of our dwellings are really not designed for such things. We like to fool ourselves that we live in a sunny, warm city – which of course we do in spring and summer (and sometimes autumn and sometimes even winter), but houses tend not to have heating or be well insulated, for example.
I caved and grabbed myself a long (well, knee length) puffy coat from muji which is nicely warm – favourite feature is the fleecy-lined pocket (I’m definitely going to retrofit this sort of thing into other coats). I was really tempted by this patagonia coat – but not $700 tempted, especially when it doesn’t get that cold and I’m not out and about in it that much.
We finally succumbed to the dragging the heater up into the bedroom. It is ver nice, but not doing terribly great things for my skin – I feel like I should bathe in a vat of oil.
I spent part of this evening installing a video card in the very elderly (8 years old!) computer we have attached to the television.
We’ve been just using the onboard video for an age and realised this wasn’t really optimal when attempting to show this
very funny pitti uomo short film (seriously, go watch, I’ll wait) to Don and Joan. It worked fine on my laptop, but was all choppy and stuttery on the desktop – it was at that point I had the ah ha moment.
So it was either try a cheap ($60) video card or buy a new desktop for well over 10x that. I took the risk, there was always the chance it wouldn’t be the problem, and grabbed a video card from ebay – which arrived today. After sticking it in and wrangling with drivers for a while, we sat down to sparkling, crystal-clear video. Very exciting! And amazing to think that we’re still getting such good value from ancient technology.
It cheered me enormously, I’m always super-happy when mucking around the innards of computers.
In other cheerful news I managed to get a short run in yesterday (post, not pre-work) and have written my stresses/positives/action items in my wee book.
I’m slowly getting there.
I’ve been feeling really rather out of sorts today. Don points out that this has been going on for a good few weeks – which I hadn’t actually realised, but he’s correct.
On reflection, I think it is probably due to the gradual erosion of the Things Which Make Me Cheerful and this makes me progressively more meh as things fall off the rotation.
So here’s a short list to remind me of what I need to be doing to remain tolerably human:
I’m sure there are more, but that is enough to be going on with.
To kick things off, I will try to drag myself from my snuggly warm bed tomorrow, write in my book and try to squeeze in a 3km run in before we leave for SML.
We have a Federal election on Saturday (thankfully – this campaign seems to have gone forever!). And of course we will have the usual wine and cheese fest.
Several polls have revealed that around 20% of Australians intend to vote for minor parties. This is no real surprise as I think pretty much everyone is becoming increasingly less enamoured of the two major parties.
As is our wont, we were having a lively political discussion about this issue the other evening. Joe/Frank, as is his wont, was explaining some of the crazier minor party platforms to us, so we suggested as a uni-break-activity he compile a handy-dandy guide for the family.
I adored it so much I asked if I could share, and so, here’s the Joe/Frank guide to the minor parties running for Senate in NSW:
xxx
I’ve listed up all the parties that you know nothing about and what they stand out in a short, easy to digest summary.
Health Australia Party – officially ‘a centrist movement in favour of “promoting open and transparent government” and “stimulating individual freedom of choice and thought”‘, in practice has interest in “natural medicine” (i.e. homeopathy), is in bed with the anti-vaxers and anti-flouride in the water (clearly they’re all a bunch of GOVERNMENT BRAINWASHING GIVING YOU AND YOUR KIDS AUTISM people). So yeah.
Seniors United Party – campaigning for the rights for the aged, the main purpose is to try and push for a parliamentary inquiry into the way that nursing homes are run. Also wants simplification of superannuation policies (from income and asset tests to a single means test that does not include the family home) and the introduction of a national Pallative Care system.
Family First – religious right party that has links to Assemblies of God and other conservative Christian churches. I won’t go into depth as they are reasonably well-known.
Liberal Democrats – libertarians. Not to be confused with the Liberal Party/Coalition, which many people did in the last election.
VOTEFLUX – no official policies, but are interested in parliamentary reform. This means that how their MP’s would hypothetically vote on a bill would be determined by the will of the people through the Flux app by putting up the legislation on the app and making them vote ‘yes’ or ‘no’. People however don’t need to vote on every issue in VOTEFLUX’s world, instead they can trade votes with other users or save them up to have greater influcence on issues they actually care about.
Teresa van Lieshout – perennial candidate who usually runs as an Independent (with stints in the PUP and other unsavoury right-wing parties) in WA. Has had unorthodox campaign videos (seriously, look it up). Fell out with Clive Palmer due to anti-asylum seeker views. General nutjob, tbh.
Democratic Labour Party – was a political party back in the 50’s and 60’s that mostly existed to keep the ALP out of power following a stoush against Communism (long story that isn’t really relevant and you probably already heard of…) Anyway, they have since reformed (lol) and are basically the Catholic’s party, tend to be socially conservative (anti-SSM, pro-life, etc.) but is anti neo-liberalism (favour distributism as their economic philosophy instead of captialism or communism) and tend to be sympathic towards asylum seekers and want gambling reform amongst other things.
Science Party – formerly known as the Future Party, tends to be very progressive on technological issues and in general has an eye towards the future. Examples of this include opposing “unnecessary” regulation on new technology, increased immigration, higher population density, a republic, opposition to criminalisation of journalism and government monitoring of data and high-speed rail.
Shooters, Fishers and Farmers – pro-guns rights in that they favour the right for all citizens to own a gun and want to expand hunting. Vaguely libertarian, in the sense that they want to reduce government regulations and the like. Supports rural industries and consider themelves anti-green.
Voluntary Euthanasia Party – what it says on the tin, and not much more.
Socialist Alliance – main far-left/radical socialist party in Australia. Has heavy involvement in the union movement, civil liberties campaigning, immigrants and Indigenous rights, and other leftist causes in Australia and around the world. Policies are what you’d expect.
Rise Up Australia – RWNJ’s, essentially. Claim to want to preserve Australia’s “Judeo-Christian values” and oppose “the spread of the Islamic doctrine in Australia” and same-sex marriage amongst other right-wing BS.
Online Direct Democracy – essentially read VOTEFLUX, with some further restrictions (e.g. they must abstain if there isn’t a clear majority – as in the vote doesn’t clear 55%+ and more than 100,000 votes).
Derryn Hinch’s Justice Party – mostly follow the lead of Derryn Hinch. Although have some left-leaning policies – pro-SSM and voluntary euthanasia, pro-animal rights and wants further action on domestic violence, his main policies tend to criminal law reform, such as harsher bail and parole restrictions, and more importantly a national database of sex offenders.
Jacqui Lambie Network – again mostly the policies of Jacqui Lamie herself. Pro veteran rights and supports the implementation of a national Apprenticeship, Trade and Traineeship system with the help of the ADF and a carbon tax, but wants a ban on Sharia Law in Australia and wants ‘regulation’ of halal certification.
Pirate Party – based on the philosophy of pirate politics, which supports amongst other things reform of copyright and patent law, freedom of information, net neutrality and open content. In terms of Australia they also support things like clean energy, civil liberties, animal welfare, drug reform, the implementation of a bill of rights, and protection for whistleblowers.
Veterans Party – support the rights of veterans and care and support for them. For their full policy list read: http://www.advp.org.au/PDP_Files/Full_ADVP_Policy.pdf (unfortunately the most important ones haven’t been spelt out all that easily on their site or other sources)
Secular Party – support the seperation of church and state in Australia and related policies such as the defending of freedom of expression everywhere, promoting secularism worldwide and promoting the “fullest use of science for human welfare”
CountryMinded – claims to represent the interest of regional people and based around the philosophy that agriculture is “the key sustainable foundation of regional socioeconomic and political stability, both domestically and abroad for current and future generations” and therefore help foster awareness of rural issues and economies.
Socialist Equality Party – see Socialist Alliance. Bit of a Judean People’s Front/People’s Front of Judea going on here, you think.
Citizens Electoral Council – think LaRouchites and general nutjobs/conspiracy theorists. Tend to have some leftist views (e.g. they favour repealing all anti-union laws and repeal of anti-terror laws), but are climate change skeptics and amongst other conspiracy theoriesthink that the Port Arthur massacre was an inside job set up by the Royal Family.
Australian Motoring Enthuisatists Party – promotes the rights of motoring enthuisatists and road safety and vehicle regulations. In practice is the political wing of Ricky Muir, but he isn’t running in NSW. His actual ideology is hard to determine but he seems to be somewhat centrist/centre-left, and has the support of GetUp.
Animal Justice Party – pro animal rights. Specifically are in favour of policies such as banning the killing of wildlife for any purpose barring euthanasia, banning the use of animals in entertainment, banning exports of live animals to Australia for commercial purposes, and establishing animal specific under and overpasses to prevent roadkill.
Arts Party – for advocacy of the Arts community, and promoting the rights of budding artists and musicans.
Non-Custodial Parents Party – pro family law reform. In particular calls for laws to ensure that both parents to have a meaningful relationship with both parents, and for reform to Child Support to ensure that it meets its main goal, to support to child.
Mature Australia Party – calls for policies for all Australians (although with a focus of over 50’s) to secure and enhance their fundamental collective rights. Support amongst other things “remove all provisions which discriminate inequitably, or or against any individuals or sections of the Australian population in relation to conditions, penalties or privileges on the basis of colour, race, religion, or creed” and increasing the pension from below the national poverty line to a level around 75% of the official minimum wage of working Australians.
Christian Democratic Party – like Family First but more aggressive towards Muslims and the Greens (well Fred Nile is anyway) and perhaps more malicious in tone.
Australian Sex Party – also libertarians, but unlike the LDP they seem to put more focus towards social matters. For example they are opposed to internet censorship, support a royal commission into sexual abuse in Australian religious institutions, and is in favour of SSM, legalisation of cannabis and decriminalisation of harder drugs (although they also are in favour of instead using referrals to drug treatment centres)
Australian Progressives – left-wing party that calls for dental care to be added to Medicare, a federal anti-corruption body to be created, and increased funding to the ABC and SBS.
Nick Xenophon Team – who knows. Seriously, look at the sort of people he’s run with in the past over in SA. On paper they appear to be like the Democrats but with a populist and anti-pokies tinge.
Drug Law Reform – as it says on the tin. Specifically are lobbying to move debate about drug use towards decriminalisation and harm minimisation.
#Sustainable Australia – advocates a stable population for Australia, arguing that excess population would cause too much strain on Australia’s environment and economy. They also suggest that cutting high immigration rates (currently at 200,000, they suggest it should be at 70,000) would help improve our education and health care systems and they also propose improving public transport and revitalisiting rural and regional Australia.
Australian Liberty Alliance – OMG THE MUSLIMZZZ!!111!!!!! THEY’RE DESTROYING MY COUNTRY!!!11!!!11!11!! Suggest that Australia need a 10 year moratorium from Islamic countries unless they were persecuted non-Muslims. Also have general anti-Halal/anti-Islamisation views that need little introduction.
Renewable Energy Party – promotes renewable energy, and calls for the ‘utmost urgency’ into moving towards net zero emissions and by 2030 all of Australia’s energy comes from renewable sources. Though the party leader is Peter Breen, solicitor that was once in the NSW Lower House under the “Reform the Legal System” banner and was an advisor for Ricky Muir before being sacked. Do we another Glenn Druery on our hands?
Help End Marijuana Prohibition – as it says on the tin. And not much more.
Hope that helps. Some of the parties info was hard to refine to a bite-size form, if you want I can go in depth for the vaguer ones.