Well I have a a few bits of news; firstly Gang Show is over for anther year, 'twas an awesome amount of fun and great to be back. Being over 18 rocks; because you get to go to so many more parties including ROVER NIGHT!
For my second bit of news, I finally saw PotC: At World's End (I was terribly sick when the movies was released, and thus unable to go). It was brilliant, as good as the other two movies. A little complex at times, but I can't wait to get the DVD and watch it again :D The story was great, the action sequences outstanding. The whole movie was awesome. I particularly liked the song at the start (hoist the colours) and the many different Flags of each of the Pirate Lords; I hope they release a poster of something with all of them on them.
Finally I'm moving soon, we've got a flat in Footscray that I'm moving out to, I pay the bond tomorrow. Should be an experience
Well, take care all and remember; hoist the colors high!
Wednesday 4 July 2007
Sunday 17 June 2007
I tawt I taw a puddy tat!
Well, I was dragged kicking, screaming and entirely unprepared to my first football game today. After my lovely guides outfitted me with food, scarf and a far more advanced understanding of the
game to what I previously had. I was taken in to see the round 12 game of The Geelong Cats vs. The Brisbane Lions. Well my hosts, most of the crowd, and to some extent myself were cheering on the Cats.
The game started quite rainy and incredibly slippery, this lead to my first love in AFL; slides! Due to the large momentum the players build up, when they fall/get tackled/dive they continue to move quite a distance and with the slippery field this was quite exaggerated and for a new comer quite hilarious to watch. Over all the first quarter was very low scoring, but I didn't mind at all. Too me it was close competition with both teams fumbeling but showing extreme moments of skill as well; including my favourite part of the whole game. A geelong player (no idea who) took an amazing mark at an incredibly shallow angle that looked like it went straight over the marking pack, fumbeling mid air with the ball but recovering it just before he collied with the ground. It was simply amazing to see.
The second quarter was slightly drier and as such slightly more high scoring; but not by a great deal. The second half however the game had changed, the field was almost entirely dry and both teams showed why they're paid to do this.
But in the end the cats won the day, because of from what I could tell better tactics (playing more cautiously as their lead increased), far greater teamwork, and a few exceptional players.
Overall it was quite an experience and one I wouldn't mind repeating again; but not for a while, this is by far the most footy I've ever taken in at one time and I'm going to need some time to cool off.
game to what I previously had. I was taken in to see the round 12 game of The Geelong Cats vs. The Brisbane Lions. Well my hosts, most of the crowd, and to some extent myself were cheering on the Cats.
The game started quite rainy and incredibly slippery, this lead to my first love in AFL; slides! Due to the large momentum the players build up, when they fall/get tackled/dive they continue to move quite a distance and with the slippery field this was quite exaggerated and for a new comer quite hilarious to watch. Over all the first quarter was very low scoring, but I didn't mind at all. Too me it was close competition with both teams fumbeling but showing extreme moments of skill as well; including my favourite part of the whole game. A geelong player (no idea who) took an amazing mark at an incredibly shallow angle that looked like it went straight over the marking pack, fumbeling mid air with the ball but recovering it just before he collied with the ground. It was simply amazing to see.
The second quarter was slightly drier and as such slightly more high scoring; but not by a great deal. The second half however the game had changed, the field was almost entirely dry and both teams showed why they're paid to do this.
But in the end the cats won the day, because of from what I could tell better tactics (playing more cautiously as their lead increased), far greater teamwork, and a few exceptional players.
Overall it was quite an experience and one I wouldn't mind repeating again; but not for a while, this is by far the most footy I've ever taken in at one time and I'm going to need some time to cool off.
Sunday 20 May 2007
It is, it is a glorious thing to be a Pirate King!
Well I just saw Opera Australia's current run of The Pirates of Penzance. 'Twas a fun night out indeed (well any occasion where I can where my Tricorn's bound to be fun). And despite appearances they didn't try to make Pirates of the Caribbean: The Stage Show, instead they just cast Jack Sparrow as the Pirate King; and he fit perfectly. Following Jon English as the Pirate King is indeed a hard task but Anthony Warlow pulled it off. Unfortunately we didn't get an encore as Fredric wanted to go watch the Footy.
For all fans of theatre or pirates I'd recommend you go see the show, it's a fun night out.
For all fans of theatre or pirates I'd recommend you go see the show, it's a fun night out.
Saturday 28 April 2007
Major catch up
Well haven't I neglected this blog something I wasn't planning on doing. Oh well, here's a quick run down on what you missed:
After Nullus Anxietas I spent 3 days up in Sydney exploring and checking out my dad's new neighbourhood and helping a little.
After that was the APPLe First Year camp, an orientation camp for first years in my faculty ran by our awesome student group APPLe. On this camp I actually discovered I don't mind some alcohol. Also that toga parties are fun.
Then O-Week, throughout all this I earned a status as "the guy to know" and became the most popular first year in my course (or so I like to believe). I'm not sure how it is these days, I doubt I still have that status, but I'm sure I'm still up there.
Then I turned 18, and had a freakin' awesome party! It just went off from the start. Lots of fun and nothing went wrong.
Then Uni began, man is uni life busy. But so much fun, my course is filled with awesome peoples who make the whole thing so much more enjoyable, though it would just be that much better if it wasn't for the deadlines *sigh* Oh well, still good. Over the course of my course so far I've discovered I can (sort of) draw again; instead of just scribble.
I slept through a lot of my holidays and did practically no work, thus making the next two weeks (just passed) a little hectic and stressful but I'm to being almost up-to-date and can almost relax again.
Oh yeah, durring my time at uni I've done two week long quests. The first durring O-Week was I set myself the challange I've aquirring one balloon a day for the five days of O-Week I managed this, just. My second was a little more interesting a few weeks into the course proper I decided to hug one random/stranger a day, again I achieved my goal with only 1 rejection (on the first day) I learnt a fair bit from this experience I may post more latter.
I'm interested in doing more of these week long quests so if anyone has any suggestions post 'em and I might do them.
So yeah that's been my life for the last 3 or so months. Man I really gotta remember to keep this thing up-to-date in future.
Well take care.
After Nullus Anxietas I spent 3 days up in Sydney exploring and checking out my dad's new neighbourhood and helping a little.
After that was the APPLe First Year camp, an orientation camp for first years in my faculty ran by our awesome student group APPLe. On this camp I actually discovered I don't mind some alcohol. Also that toga parties are fun.
Then O-Week, throughout all this I earned a status as "the guy to know" and became the most popular first year in my course (or so I like to believe). I'm not sure how it is these days, I doubt I still have that status, but I'm sure I'm still up there.
Then I turned 18, and had a freakin' awesome party! It just went off from the start. Lots of fun and nothing went wrong.
Then Uni began, man is uni life busy. But so much fun, my course is filled with awesome peoples who make the whole thing so much more enjoyable, though it would just be that much better if it wasn't for the deadlines *sigh* Oh well, still good. Over the course of my course so far I've discovered I can (sort of) draw again; instead of just scribble.
I slept through a lot of my holidays and did practically no work, thus making the next two weeks (just passed) a little hectic and stressful but I'm to being almost up-to-date and can almost relax again.
Oh yeah, durring my time at uni I've done two week long quests. The first durring O-Week was I set myself the challange I've aquirring one balloon a day for the five days of O-Week I managed this, just. My second was a little more interesting a few weeks into the course proper I decided to hug one random/stranger a day, again I achieved my goal with only 1 rejection (on the first day) I learnt a fair bit from this experience I may post more latter.
I'm interested in doing more of these week long quests so if anyone has any suggestions post 'em and I might do them.
So yeah that's been my life for the last 3 or so months. Man I really gotta remember to keep this thing up-to-date in future.
Well take care.
Sunday 11 February 2007
Nullus Anxietas, Day 3
Time for my third and unfortunately final *sniff* installment in my series on my experiences at Nullus Anxietas (if you haven't already, go check out the first two parts).
Firstly I hate my alarm clock and plan to replace it tomorrow, I woke up naturally at 9:58am, when I planned to get up at 6:30 to catch the 7:30 train and be there by 9. Obviously none of this happened, instead I swung into action with keenness and speed and managed to get to the con at 11: 36. Quite a feat as metlink say the fastest you can get to the con from Hoppers Crossing station is about 1 hour and 20 minutes (I took 16 more minutes, but including breakfast, shower, dressing and running to the station I think I did very well).
Today once again I went in costume, a costume I Moist von Lipwig (pre-apprehension). No one recognised me as him, but I figure this is a good thing when you dress as a character who's biggest feature is his unidentifiableness (Okay, to be fair I know I got the hair wrong, but for a only 16 minutes including running I think I did pretty good).
Due to being late I missed my morning Thud games, as well as the Wyrd Sisters play :( I came in half way through the Terry Q&A session, but as I did not know what had already been asked I was unable to ask any questions. Following this was the first public performance of Pyramids, admittadly it was just a script reading and it was just the first half. But it was still a lot of fun, and I wish Unseen all the best when they put it on.
After that I watched the start of the great debate but didn't find it terribly thrilling, so I went to play Thud. First I played Dwarfs and started well, keeping the match even (at the start this is quite good for the Dwarfs) but after taking two trolls I found myself unable to take any more, and constantly on the run ending with 10 dwarfs. Then time for the role swap, and I managed to bring my opponent down to 8 dwarfs without losing a single troll (for those of you bad at maths, that means I won). But there's more to it than that, I won against the at that point undefeatable Watch Resuscitation Dummy and probably the best Thud player at the con, sure for that game he was playing one or two others (depending on which point you look at). But he played 4 games at once earlier that morning and didn't lose one, so I am quite proud and spent a short 5 minutes as an underdog hero to all the Thud players.
The catch of winning that game was I missed seeing the start of the stage production of Mort, as walking away before my score was actually better than his would not have meant victory although we both could see it coming (or at least I could). At the end of our game, I went to see the rest of Mort but as I knew how it started, ended and most of the stuff in between, yet not being properly introduced to this particular incarnation of it meant that I quickly got bored.
So thus it was that I found myself sitting in 'The Great Hall' awaiting the commencement of Fair Go Dibbler's Charity Auction. The money raised in this was first used to get the con to break even then the rest went to The Orangutan Foundation (Terry's Favourite charity), while I did not actually purchase anything in this it was a lot of fun to watch and I did add at least $10 to the total sum by bidding once or twice. The two most expensive items to go sold for $975 and $650, they being a set of three matching head sculptures (of Rincewind, Death and the Librarian) and a plush toy of Great A'Tuin and the discworld (and the elephants of course too). In my personal opinion the soft toys should have been worth more than the sculptures, but as an impoverished student I could bid on neither.
Then, it was time for The Apocralypse (the closing ceremony) *sniff again*. While not as fun as 'The Clearing of the Throat', still quite well done. After all was said and done it was time to return to the real world.
Over all the con was a lot of fun, and a great experiance. I am truely insired to read all the discworld novels now.
Oh once again if you want to see my photos from the con (none from Saturday) go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/fedorapirate/sets/72157594526073224/
But to see everyone else's photos too (probably a lot more fun) got to http://www.flickr.com/groups/nullus_anxietas/
Firstly I hate my alarm clock and plan to replace it tomorrow, I woke up naturally at 9:58am, when I planned to get up at 6:30 to catch the 7:30 train and be there by 9. Obviously none of this happened, instead I swung into action with keenness and speed and managed to get to the con at 11: 36. Quite a feat as metlink say the fastest you can get to the con from Hoppers Crossing station is about 1 hour and 20 minutes (I took 16 more minutes, but including breakfast, shower, dressing and running to the station I think I did very well).
Today once again I went in costume, a costume I Moist von Lipwig (pre-apprehension). No one recognised me as him, but I figure this is a good thing when you dress as a character who's biggest feature is his unidentifiableness (Okay, to be fair I know I got the hair wrong, but for a only 16 minutes including running I think I did pretty good).
Due to being late I missed my morning Thud games, as well as the Wyrd Sisters play :( I came in half way through the Terry Q&A session, but as I did not know what had already been asked I was unable to ask any questions. Following this was the first public performance of Pyramids, admittadly it was just a script reading and it was just the first half. But it was still a lot of fun, and I wish Unseen all the best when they put it on.
After that I watched the start of the great debate but didn't find it terribly thrilling, so I went to play Thud. First I played Dwarfs and started well, keeping the match even (at the start this is quite good for the Dwarfs) but after taking two trolls I found myself unable to take any more, and constantly on the run ending with 10 dwarfs. Then time for the role swap, and I managed to bring my opponent down to 8 dwarfs without losing a single troll (for those of you bad at maths, that means I won). But there's more to it than that, I won against the at that point undefeatable Watch Resuscitation Dummy and probably the best Thud player at the con, sure for that game he was playing one or two others (depending on which point you look at). But he played 4 games at once earlier that morning and didn't lose one, so I am quite proud and spent a short 5 minutes as an underdog hero to all the Thud players.
The catch of winning that game was I missed seeing the start of the stage production of Mort, as walking away before my score was actually better than his would not have meant victory although we both could see it coming (or at least I could). At the end of our game, I went to see the rest of Mort but as I knew how it started, ended and most of the stuff in between, yet not being properly introduced to this particular incarnation of it meant that I quickly got bored.
So thus it was that I found myself sitting in 'The Great Hall' awaiting the commencement of Fair Go Dibbler's Charity Auction. The money raised in this was first used to get the con to break even then the rest went to The Orangutan Foundation (Terry's Favourite charity), while I did not actually purchase anything in this it was a lot of fun to watch and I did add at least $10 to the total sum by bidding once or twice. The two most expensive items to go sold for $975 and $650, they being a set of three matching head sculptures (of Rincewind, Death and the Librarian) and a plush toy of Great A'Tuin and the discworld (and the elephants of course too). In my personal opinion the soft toys should have been worth more than the sculptures, but as an impoverished student I could bid on neither.
Then, it was time for The Apocralypse (the closing ceremony) *sniff again*. While not as fun as 'The Clearing of the Throat', still quite well done. After all was said and done it was time to return to the real world.
Over all the con was a lot of fun, and a great experiance. I am truely insired to read all the discworld novels now.
Oh once again if you want to see my photos from the con (none from Saturday) go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/fedorapirate/sets/72157594526073224/
But to see everyone else's photos too (probably a lot more fun) got to http://www.flickr.com/groups/nullus_anxietas/
Saturday 10 February 2007
Nullus Anxietas, Day 2
Well, overall today's (Saturday's) installment of the trilogy Nullus Anxietas (for more details, see my post on the first part) was not as exciting as Yesterday but was still a lot of fun, perhaps it was because I had a better idea of what to expect this time round. While it's peaks weren't quite as high, 'twas still a good day - and I got to wear me pirate costume, and those who know me will know how much I enjoy that!
This time I had a much better idea on how to get to the Crest, so was able to allow less time for getting lost and managed to arrive half an hour early (at 8:30am), once again I met The Other Dibbler before getting on the tram, I wonder if it'll happen again tomorrow. Upon arrival I once again settled into some games of Thud. I've now played 5 games, won 2 and I know roughly how to play dwarfs (a challenging task).
Then at 11:00am I was one of four on the Young Readers Panel and despite feeling somewhat out of place (as being neither terribly young anymore nor much of a discworld fan compared to many at the con) It was a lot of fun and due to my standard total lack of stage fright I think I managed to keep the whole thing together rather nicely. But I would like to give a big thanks to our audience who were awesome and in no way condemning and my fellow panelists who made it far more interesting for everyone.
Directly after this was an interview with the man himself Terry Pratchett, overall quite interesting but far from the best item so far. following that was an interesting block with a panel on producing Dicworld plays, a debate on "Is discworld young adult?" and a Sword and Armour demo. All things I'm interested in and I can only attended one, in the end I opted for the Sword and Armour demo, but I still wonder if this was the best choice, as the people who put it on were reenactors. So it was realistic, which unfortunetly often is fairly boring. It did never the less have it's moments though.
Directly after this it was time to line up to get terry to sign my stuff, I was in line for an hour and a half and Missed seeing the play of Wyrd Sisters though I will now see it tomorrow (missing out
on the Terry Q&A session - so the person who got me standing in line to sign her book - yu know who you are - feel grateful!).
Then more Thud to pass the time, went to see Wossnames, a discworld version of the Game show Blankety blanks which was absolutely hysterical at points, I will never look at a resuscitation dummy in the same way again!
Then it was 6pm, so of course time to read Where's My Cow? fun as per last night but not as much so, as this time we (the audience) just did the noises until we told our reader that we wanted to do improve like last night. As such many more people were shy (not me of course, I made a fool of myself at least 4 times in the space of 10 minutes).
Then the spontaneous mob formed before the Gala dinner (fancy dinner in costumes), I am unfortunetly too poor to attend such a function, but looking at everyone's costumes was still a lot of fun. I'm sure there were many brilliant photos taken of The mob!
Unfortunetly today I left my camera at home so I don't have any pictures yet, but worry not I have arranged to get some so you should see some here in the near future. Watch this space!
This time I had a much better idea on how to get to the Crest, so was able to allow less time for getting lost and managed to arrive half an hour early (at 8:30am), once again I met The Other Dibbler before getting on the tram, I wonder if it'll happen again tomorrow. Upon arrival I once again settled into some games of Thud. I've now played 5 games, won 2 and I know roughly how to play dwarfs (a challenging task).
Then at 11:00am I was one of four on the Young Readers Panel and despite feeling somewhat out of place (as being neither terribly young anymore nor much of a discworld fan compared to many at the con) It was a lot of fun and due to my standard total lack of stage fright I think I managed to keep the whole thing together rather nicely. But I would like to give a big thanks to our audience who were awesome and in no way condemning and my fellow panelists who made it far more interesting for everyone.
Directly after this was an interview with the man himself Terry Pratchett, overall quite interesting but far from the best item so far. following that was an interesting block with a panel on producing Dicworld plays, a debate on "Is discworld young adult?" and a Sword and Armour demo. All things I'm interested in and I can only attended one, in the end I opted for the Sword and Armour demo, but I still wonder if this was the best choice, as the people who put it on were reenactors. So it was realistic, which unfortunetly often is fairly boring. It did never the less have it's moments though.
Directly after this it was time to line up to get terry to sign my stuff, I was in line for an hour and a half and Missed seeing the play of Wyrd Sisters though I will now see it tomorrow (missing out
on the Terry Q&A session - so the person who got me standing in line to sign her book - yu know who you are - feel grateful!).
Then more Thud to pass the time, went to see Wossnames, a discworld version of the Game show Blankety blanks which was absolutely hysterical at points, I will never look at a resuscitation dummy in the same way again!
Then it was 6pm, so of course time to read Where's My Cow? fun as per last night but not as much so, as this time we (the audience) just did the noises until we told our reader that we wanted to do improve like last night. As such many more people were shy (not me of course, I made a fool of myself at least 4 times in the space of 10 minutes).
Then the spontaneous mob formed before the Gala dinner (fancy dinner in costumes), I am unfortunetly too poor to attend such a function, but looking at everyone's costumes was still a lot of fun. I'm sure there were many brilliant photos taken of The mob!
Unfortunetly today I left my camera at home so I don't have any pictures yet, but worry not I have arranged to get some so you should see some here in the near future. Watch this space!
Friday 9 February 2007
Nullus Anxietas, Day 1
Well today was the first day of the Australian Discworld convention and also the first day of the first ever Discworld convention held outside of the UK; by some strange coincidence they were both called Nullus Anxietas and both were held at the Carlton Crest; and guess what else... I was there! and you know what else, it was awesome fun!
Before I even got to the Crest I was having a blast, before getting on the Tram I found someone in costume, The other Dibbler, and we planned to get there together (bad plan on her part) after walking the length (north to south) of the CBD probably about 5 times we eventually arrived at what we found to be the right place, and if it wasn't we didn't care it was good enough!
I sign in meeting even more cool people in the line, get a rough idea of what's going on (and what I should be doing) then it's off to play Thud! in Koom Valley/The mended Drum for 2 and a half hours, I only played two games but it was a lot of fun and I know own a set of my own for only $35 (RRP is about $63).
After that I got some costuming ideas and listened to a vary interesting debate/discussion on Pratchett (author of discworld) vs Rowling (author of Harry Potter). This was in no way one sided as you would expect and even encouraged me to read the rest of the HP series (after I finish Discworld of course)
I also got to Game Master some games of Werewolf (Mafia), which was a lot of fun, later on I plan on posting the rules and some tips of my own on the Con's forum.
At 6pm, we read Where's My Cow? because there are some things you just have to do, and we'll be doing it again tomorrow which I just can't wait for. We read the book but we added many more pages with just improve; and tomorrow's session should be even better as now we've all got a feel for it everyone should be able to come up with even more sillyness :D
Finally, the last thing I attended before leaving tonight was strangely enough The Clearing of the Throat (the opening ceremony). This was just outright hysterical, having Rincewind run in, find a copy of The last Continent, realise that's him it's written about then walk up to Terry Pratchett and say in a big clear voice "You bastard!" was just perfect for the con. Nothing would have fit better!
In short I had a brilliant time and can't wait to go back tomorrow!
PS: Go check out my photos so far at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/fedorapirate/sets/72157594526073224/
Before I even got to the Crest I was having a blast, before getting on the Tram I found someone in costume, The other Dibbler, and we planned to get there together (bad plan on her part) after walking the length (north to south) of the CBD probably about 5 times we eventually arrived at what we found to be the right place, and if it wasn't we didn't care it was good enough!
I sign in meeting even more cool people in the line, get a rough idea of what's going on (and what I should be doing) then it's off to play Thud! in Koom Valley/The mended Drum for 2 and a half hours, I only played two games but it was a lot of fun and I know own a set of my own for only $35 (RRP is about $63).
After that I got some costuming ideas and listened to a vary interesting debate/discussion on Pratchett (author of discworld) vs Rowling (author of Harry Potter). This was in no way one sided as you would expect and even encouraged me to read the rest of the HP series (after I finish Discworld of course)
I also got to Game Master some games of Werewolf (Mafia), which was a lot of fun, later on I plan on posting the rules and some tips of my own on the Con's forum.
At 6pm, we read Where's My Cow? because there are some things you just have to do, and we'll be doing it again tomorrow which I just can't wait for. We read the book but we added many more pages with just improve; and tomorrow's session should be even better as now we've all got a feel for it everyone should be able to come up with even more sillyness :D
Finally, the last thing I attended before leaving tonight was strangely enough The Clearing of the Throat (the opening ceremony). This was just outright hysterical, having Rincewind run in, find a copy of The last Continent, realise that's him it's written about then walk up to Terry Pratchett and say in a big clear voice "You bastard!" was just perfect for the con. Nothing would have fit better!
In short I had a brilliant time and can't wait to go back tomorrow!
PS: Go check out my photos so far at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/fedorapirate/sets/72157594526073224/
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