Well I've just finished paying for the big trip (apart from the post-tour accom in St Petersburg, still waiting to hear from Intrepid about that.)

The next big challenge is to organise the 3 visas I need, China, Mongolia and Russia.

Mongolia seems pretty straight forward and Russia, while needing a bunch of documentation aslo seems pretty easy. But I've been hearing things about China and the Embassy recently which is giving me pause. Seems like they've become a lot more "difficult" in recent months with regards to tourist visas. So I'm wondering whether I should use a visa procurement service like VisaLink or Visas.com.au. Does anyone have any experience of using a service like this, or recent experience trying to get a Chinese tourist visa?

Only 2.5 months til I go now... Eeep!

Happy birthday to the ever gorgeous and amazing ingysledge. I hope you have a wonderful day and a fabulous year to come! :)

It's been a while so...

Confess your sins, your secrets, your crushes and your shames. IP logging is off and anonymous posting is encouraged.

This is a Confession Box where you can get anything off your mind that you want, no judgement, no hassling, no recriminations, completely anonymous. Say what you want/ need to, say things that you normally never could/ would.

Green's Senator, the Hon. Sarah Hanson-Young has introduced a Bill into the Federal Parliament Senate which proposes to grant same-sex couples equal marriage rights.

Debate has been postponed and, as Parliament has just risen for Winter, won't be continued until at least August.

What I find amazing is that the Govt is trying to justify its position on denying a group of people equal human rights by saying it'll upset a few rednecks and, therefore, we can't do it. Fuckers. I'm not going to hold my breath that the Bill will pass, especially if people are meant to vote on party lines, but I'll hope and write to my local Members advising them to support the bill. Maybe one day everyone will wake up and realise that noone's different from anyone else, esepcially on the basis of who they love.

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25685626-661,00.html

Oh my gods, I've just done it - spent a moderately insulting amount of cash on a trip to China and Russia later this year. YAY! (I am kind of freaking out though, what else I could do with the cash...)

Will be doing the Intrepid Trans-Mongolian trip with a few extra days in St Petersburg, London and then Singapore at the end of it. Eeep!

I'm flying out to Beijing on 25th September and back home from Singapore on 29th October.

Kitties will be aquired when I get home, as there's not really too much time before I head off for them to get used to me and vice versa.

YAYAYAYAYAY!

So, a small thing called Pheno happened over the weekend here in Canberra and, seemingly, went very well according to all reports I’ve heard and read. People seem to have enjoyed themselves and the games they played are pretty much all getting rave reviews.

I didn’t get to play anything this year, which I really don’t mind terribly as I’m not much of a con player, or a player at all. It takes me far too long to warm up into the character and get comfortable for me to be any good at con games.

So, instead of playing I ran “Canteen, the freeform” for pretty much the entire weekend instead. Despite what people seem to think, I really don’t mind running the canteen, I get to talk to pretty much everyone at the con multiple times, even if it’s only for a short period each encounter. This year I was ably assisted by the lovely Ms gryff_lionheart and can’t thank her enough for her assistance. Especially as I was suffering from a yucky head cold and wasn’t really on form (i.e., was probably far too crabby with people.)

Running the canteen also provides numerous amusing anecdotes and encounters, some of which shan’t be repeated here. I did get to tell my boyfriend he was dumped ‘cos a cute girl told me she loved me and a poor wargaming boy who spent a lot of time hanging around the canteen got very sad when he saw the canteen girlies were spoken for.

Met some very awesome new people and caught up with some very awesome people I don't see often enough. :)

My (and the lovely Ms gryff_lionheart’s) choice of outfit for each day seem to have fulfilled my objective of providing eye candy as well as actual candy at the canteen, so yay for that. This may have contributed to the 3 different people trying to pick me up at post-con drinkies.


Post-con drinkies was ok for me, not great though, as by that time I was very tired and feeling very, very full of the cold. This generally translates into me feeling unloved, a bit like an outsider and like I won’t be missed if I’m not there. Sure people telling me I’m awesome is nice, if only I actually believed them (which is my general state of being anyway).

It also seems to me that I must have done or said something to piss off a number of people that I thought of as friends. Really not sure what it could be, but being very obviously avoided by certain people tends to make me think it must have been something.

So, all in all a pretty good con, which only could have been improved by the lack of a snotty headcold and possibly getting over myself and my ability to convince myself that no-one really cares.

Hi guys,

Just a quick reminder that online rego for Pheno closes at midnight tonight (Fri 29th May).

Don't worry if you can't make the online deadline, you can still register at the con itself on the Friday (5 June) night or Saturday (6 June) morning.

http://www.pheno.org.au

Hoping to see you all there!

Jen

I’m really far too angry to say much on this except that I can’t believe that the Californian Supreme Court has decided to uphold Proposition 8.

The only slightly positive thing to come out of it is that they agreed that all same-sex marriages performed before Prop 8 was passed would remain legal, but I’m sure some small-minded anti-gay group will appeal that soon too.

Also, I’m confused. If the court says the marriages performed before Prop 8 was passed are legal, then why uphold Prop 8 which makes same-sex marriage illegal? Doesn’t make sense to me.

http://www.smh.com.au/world/california-upholds-gay-marriage-ban-20090527-bmfu.html

Wow, could Zoli from Hungary be any camper? I think he'd be happier dancing with dudes than with the chicks he's got.

ETA I think he'd get one really well with Sakis from Greece, they'd make a cute couple.

P and I went to see the new Star Trek last night (which was awesome imho, but not the subject of this post). As always there were a number of movie trailers before the feature started, one of which was for 'Night at the Museum 2'. I happened to make the comment that 'Night at the Museum' was probably the worst date movie (that is, movie/ dvd seen while on a date) that I'd ever seen (it was on dvd and only made better by large amounts of booze). P stated that in his experience it was 'Twilight' (yeah, my bad).

So, out of simple curiosity, what's the worst movie/ dvd you've ever seen on a date?

I was reading the SMH this morning when an interesting headline on one of their blogs caught my attention, 'Beautiful Vs Sexy'. The article is a bit mediocre, but does raise the questions, can you be beautiful without being sexy and must you be beautiful to be sexy?


http://blogs.smh.com.au/lifestyle/fearclothing/2009/05/08/beautifulvsse.html

My thoughts are that being beautiful is not a pre-requisite for being sexy and vice versa. The two are often inter-related, eg (imho) Angelina Jolie, but not always. I would call Grace Kelly stunningly beautiful, but not at all sexy and I would say that (again imho) Ray Winston is not beautiful, but he is hella sexy.

Being sexy is a complicated interrelationship between a number of factors (icluding personal preferences), while beauty generally is not.

So, blog verse, your thoughts on the matter?

Just bought myself this top, in the hope it will arrive before Pheno so as I can wear it there with my PVC mini and pinstriped underbust Victorian corset.

It is my plan to provide another type of candy at the Pheno canteen, eye-candy! ;)

I always said it'd be the pigs and not the birds who got us in the end with flu. Swine is where the original transfer of influenza (and a number of other diseases) occured from animals to humans. As far as I can tell there's been no major diesease transferred from birds to humans which has become an epidemic or pandemic. Pigs are so much more like us, that, when a diesease transfers from them to us it's big trouble. It's thought the 1918 pandemic (where between 20 and 50 million people died) was H1N1 a swine flu based zoonoses which was introduced to that species by birds and then from the pigs to us. Pigs seem capable of much more easily catching avaian flu than humans, which they then have the potential to pass on to us, as seen in 1918.

And, to think most of the prep we've done viralogically an in vaccine development was around H5N1 bird flu. Oops?

I've done enough research in the past couple of years to know that the anti-viral agents we have won't last too long against any virus in a pandemic, antigenic shift and resistance development happens very quickly.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25387937-401,00.html

http://www.lubbockonline.com/news/032197/1918flu.htm

http://www.springerlink.com/content/m722mx74u2564736/

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6TD6-405KDD3-G&_user=10&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=784234c8f6e2777198885d574901f773

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

Lest We Forget

Also, here is the letter written by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk to the citizens' of the countries (especially the mothers) who lost men fighting the Turkish at Gallipoli in 1915. Ataturk was the first president of modern Turkey, but he was also a military man - leading the military campaign against the ANZACS and Allies and keeping them bogged down on the beaches and low country until they retrated on 20 December 1915. Rough estimates of casulaties are around 238,000 (55,000 killed) Allied casualties and 250,000 - 300,000 (65,000 killed) Turkish casualties. As leader of the new Turkish Republic in 1934 Ataturk wrote a tribute to all the men who died in the campaign.

Ataturk’s letter:
"Those heroes who shed their blood and lost their lives, you are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side in this country of ours. You, the mothers who sent their sons from far away countries wipe away your tears, your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land they become our sons as well."

I still can't read these words without tearing up, even though the first time I ever heard them was probably about 20 years ago when I was still a kid.

More information for all of you who aren't familiar with ANZAC day, what it is and what it means can be found here:

http://www.acn.net.au/articles/anzac/

For more info on the unique relationship between Australia and Turkey and why they are our only former "enemy" allowed to march on ANZAC or any other commemorative day with us go here:

http://www.abc.net.au/compass/s1353484.htm

So, I got a haircut on Saturday and got my hair dyed red and also, 'cos my hairdresser seems to love to do it, my hair straigtened.

At P's behest I asked the lovely and talented xole to take a few pics for me, so P could have a couple and I could send some to my Mum so she could see.

As always xole did a marvellous job (many thanks to eagle_riley for his comic relief) and got some lovley pics.

This is the best one imho, so you're being subjected to it here.




Hair's back to curly today.

I am highly suspcious that this is another "accident". Morgan Tsvangirai has been a thorn in Mugabe's side for far too long for it to just be conincidence that, when he suddenly gets a bit of power, his family start dying. First his wife dies in a car accident and now his baby grandson drowns. Call me cynical if you like.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,27574,25291945-23109,00.html

A sad news day for all Angel fans, with news that Andy Hallett, who played Lorne, has passed away at age 33 of heart failure. :( So very young to die from such a disease.

http://geeksofdoom.com/2009/03/30/angel-star-andy-hallet-passes-away-at-33/

Think I might watch a few eps of Angel tonight and enjoy Krevlornswath of the Deathwok Clan.

I came accross this site while pootling 'round eBay this morning looking for Miami Ink and LA Ink stuff.

http://www.tattoogolf.com/

A site decicated to tattoo insipred designes on golf clothing and accessories. It's pretty cool actually.

In the next few months I've got lots of lovely events to look forward to:

* Easter down the coast with P, gryff_lionheart and weaselfetish;

* A girly weekend down the coast in May with gryff_lionheart and R;

* The Presets gig in Canberra in May with gryff_lionheart, weaselfetish, xole and Mr Fluffy;

* Pheno in June

* Possible cheesemaking workshop with gryff_lionheart, R and M in July;

* And the one I just booked this morning, which is a trip to Melbourne with P in August to go and do the Elephant Introduction experience at the Melbourne zoo:

http://www.zoo.org.au/Melbourne/BehindScenes/Elephant_Encounters

Sooooo excited about that one! :) Flights with Tiger (yes, I know be there 2 hours before etc, but happy to hear your thoughts) were $28 each way, so massively cheap. Only decision now is to stay in the City or haul arse out to Berwick to stay with my brother.

Eeeee! Yay for happy fun things to look forward to! :)

* Off work today with fracked neck and shoulder. Meant to be lying on my back for most of the day, but need to sit up for 30 mins after taken meds and also to eat breakfast so I can take meds in the first place.

* Have tix for the Presets Canberra gig, yay!

* Still don't have an exit date from my current job to my new one. I only told them 3 weeks ago that I was leaving. They're using very crude delaying tactics to stop me from leaving at the moment. Pissing me off.

* Saw Watchmen, wasn't really all that impressed, too much gore for a sensitive thing like me.

* Parental units will be here for the coming weekend, taking them to see he Degas exhibition so that will be something at least.

* Still thinking about trip to China and Russia later in the year, hesitating because of my fracked up back - what if it fracks itself when I'm in the middle of Mongolia or something?

* Have a serious case of the travel bug though and need to do something about it soon. It's been 3 years since I went anywhere of note and since I had a decent holiday.

* True Blood, you must watch it!

* Lots more but not much else that anyone'd be interested in to say.