The Rant Entry

What is about drinking that makes people believe it is essential to having fun. I mean seriously, it is so difficult to get ones head around the fact that you don't need to drink till you're blind to enjoy a night out??!!! It is perfectly possible to enjoy yourself and act like a complete idiot without the influence of the amber nectar (although, granted it is harder for some). In fact it's more fun only having a couple, seeing as you don't need to go through the whole rig-ma-role of hurling, being thrown out, hurling somemore and then waking up the next day in a place you don't recognise (or if you have nice friends, your place), with a bitch of a headache and remembering nothing of the previous night. Now correct me if I'm wrong, but I fail to see the appeal of the afore-mentioned stages.

Well that was my rant for the month. Thank you for listening, and do visit next month for more rants. Good day and farewell one and all.

On a lighter note, all is well at uni, although the assignments are piling up, and exams will soon be over. See all of you in Hong Kong next month.

Ash

Brief Hello

In comparison to the last post, this is somewhat of a meagre attempt at enthralling the masses that must pass through this site on a regular basis... That aside, this is more to say that I have lost FrontPage and as such have no website capability until I can get hold of a copy of said programme. Thus until that point, if you wish for photos from my time in the UK, South Africa or Hong Kong this winter (summer for the Aussies), then you need merely email me and I will send all requested photos to you. Although this could be an interesting endeavour as you cannot see them (ah the mysteries of life).

Apart from that, not much is new. I'm into the flow of things down here, and uni is in full swing. The assignments seem to have lost their length, but multiplied by a rather large figure, alas such is the price I pay for doing first year subjects in my third and penultimate year of my undergrad degree. About the only really interesting part of these last few weeks was a field trip to Queenscliff, which is on one of the points of Port Phillip Bay, for marine bio. As dull as that may sound it was spiced up by a limerick competition, and thus many minds set to with much fervour to produce the most inappropriate, sleazy piece of wit and rhyme that only come around when a group of university students are charged with creating limericks about sea creatures for the prize of a bag of chocolate frogs. And on that note, I will leave you with my third place limerick (it should have won...):

There once was a seaflea named Phoebe,
Who lived in an underwater teepee.
She ran a small brothel,
For all the Sea's offal...
And she rarely gave away any freebies.

Good night and adieu.
Ash.

Time Flies

It's been some time since my last entry, almost 5 months to be precise. But as these are my last few days before heading back down under, I felt it was time for an entry. I guess the best place would be to start at the beginning and work my way through to the end, pausing along the way to consider each of the middling parts (always seems to work for those author people). And so the question arises, what is the beginning of this particular chapter? I could go back as far as October, and relate the stress of the pre-exam runup, followed by the euphoria of at last completing yet another year at uni; failing that I could go straight to the holiday bits. Suffice to say we all know how exams feel so I will skip over that, and move on to the end of the year and the holidays.

Whilst living in halls is a wonderful experience, meeting new people and having the community feeling, it has the downside of watching many of those people leave as the years progress. This is even worse when those people are only over on exchange and thus stay for at best a year, and worst six months (hope all of you are well). That aside this year was as good, if not better than last year, and so we move onto the interesting part of the holidays.

It began when I returned from uni on the 5th November for mum's birthday (which incidently I was on time for this time). Having hung around for four days, I caught my next flight over to the UK, first class no less , arriving only to discover that certain friends were unable to rescue me from wimbledon station at 8am. That aside, I had a brilliant six weeks over there, catching up with friends, seeing older friends and just relaxing after the year. From England I flew down to South Africa to meet the family for christmas with the cousins. Lots of booze, a bucket load of food, and fun on the beach. What more could you ask for in a holiday. One of the more interesting presents has to be the I-dog I recieved, which as the name suggests is an ipod speaker made to look like a dog. The ears and head move, and depending on the music played the dog will gain personality. And very recently I recieved a new camera, digital with the functions of a proper camera - SLR for those of you that means something to. And thus returning to HK, I settled into the usual routine of riding in the mornings, relaxing afternoons and friday drinking sessions.

As I mentioned above, those were the middling bits, and now to round off in style. Firstly allow me to apologise for my website being down for so long, I had to format my computer and lost frontpage. I am currently endeavouring to solve this problem. Apart from that, all is well. Alas, it is the time of the hols, where I have to start separating essentials from excess baggage and begin to pack so that I can return once more for another year of absorbing information. And on that note, I need to head out and buy some supplies for Melbourne; so without any further adieu (sighs of relief all round), I bid you farewell and good wishes.

Ash

Pensive

Once again, at this darkest hour I feel the need to put pen to paper (in the metaphorical sense of course). To be honest I don't really have anything at all to say this time, but I'm feeling pensive and wanted to apply that to something before I slept.

It's strange how putting feelings into words is the hardest thing to do. Take now for instance, the best words I can put to how I feel are mellow and pensive, but both of those cast a negative light on what is actually going on inside me as I sit here and type rambling sentences. As I said I just needed to put pen to paper and see what emerged. It seems to me that often it is now, after watching a movie or finishing a book that I move into the frame of mind needed to write something productive (note this is not one of those times).

For the sake of continuing on indefinately, I will bid you all farewell on this calm and peaceful night. I wish all of you the best in whatever it is you are endeavouring to complete at this time. And so without further adieu, goodnight and farewell.

Ash (Nova)

The light fades away, darkness closes in once more.
Yet, the writer does not sway, lets his mind's eye soar.
A single light, a single mind,
A spark of inspiration one must find,
To close the tale, end the night;
Let in the light.
The Poet in the Dark.

It must be late for me to come up with something like that, but as i sit here late at night, it is remarkably apt. It has been sometime since I last updated and for that I apologise, so here at last I provide not an end to a tale, but certainly an end to yet another chapter of my uni life. As exams draw to a close, I look to the winter holiday with a mixture of anticipation and apprehension. Anticipation, for although it will only be a short time in Hong Kong, it is a chance to meet old friends once more, and just relax after another semester of uni. Apprehension because I am going to Canada and as much as I look forward to it, I am still nervous of competing overseas for the first time. Alas, you don't want to hear of me being worried about the chance of a lifetime.

Other than that, all goes reasonably well, exams leave a fair amount to be desired, but such is the nature of the beast. To those of you doing A-levels, which is most people, good luck and all the best for the future. To the rest of you, you should have finished exams by now so congrats and have a good summer.

Well thats basically it for the moment, all I have left to say is that I will be back saturday next week, and we must partay hard to celebrate something (I'm sure in a week I can think of something irrelevant and obscure enough to celebrate). So I will leave you on that note. Adieu and fare thee well, until we meet again.

Ash (Nova)