Re-giftingI just watched a friend wrap a birthday present for another friend whose party she is going to tonight. It was a set of tealight candle holders that I had given her a year ago as a thank-you present. She said that she kept a drawer of 'emergency' presents for when she forgot about people's birthdays and needed to give something away at the last minute. I just sighed sadly and gave her a bemused smile. She thought I was bemused by the idea of an 'emergency present drawer'. Oh dear diary, if only she knew. I have decided to give her a Japanese table setting for her birthday. In fact, it may turn out to be identical to the Japanese table setting she gave me for christmas last year.
My New Happy Place I have a new happy place in my mind that I go to when I'm feeling stressed and sad. It used to be the hammock on the back verandah of mum and dad's place. Now, it's the High Altitude Training Camp for the Air Guitar World Championships. We dance around and play air guitar to AC/DC, and have great seminar discussions like the one in the picture above.  Talk about the creme-de-la-creme of the Air Guitar World. This is the 2006 US Champion (left) and the 2005 World Champion from Holland (right) battling it out during one of the open-air sessions at the training camp back in the beginning of September in North Finland. It was a joy to watch.
Stop the Torture! Close Alitalia! Part TwoMy bag arrived on Thursday. Hurrah! After I washed the mould and stench from the rotting clothes within, I changed for the first time in a week and sat down to enjoy the bottle of Jim Beam I'd stashed in the middle of my towel and sarong. The Jim Beam seemed to have aged well during its prolonged stay in my lost bag and was all the more sweeter for it. I also received a reply to my five-page rant of a complaint letter I wrote in a red haze of anger last Monday. Re: Your journey with Alitalia.
Thank you for your letter dated 18 September 2006 from which we are very sorry to learn that your baggage was mishandled following your recent journey with Alitalia.
We are further investigating this matter.
We thank you for your continued patience and for bringing this matter to our attention. We look forward to contacting you again as soon as our investigations are completed.
Yours Sincerely,
The Alitalia TeamI can't publish the entire letter here because the five screaming spit-speckled pages of my anger and venom (despite being good reading) are too long. Here's my favourite paragraph of my work, extracted from Section E. entitled "Loss of six-hours when trapped at Milan Airport waiting for new flight AZ0246 which left at 2035 hrs" "In our attempt to contact Qantas to inform them that your incompetence meant Michelle would inevitably miss her connecting flight to Australia (which she did, thanks!) we were advised by the Alitalia staff member at the desk to leave the departure lounge and go backwards through security clearance areas into the Ticket Sales area. As a result of this we were forced to check-in more luggage as we had liquids in our bags purchased from Naples Duty Free that they would not allow us to bring back through. Naturally, when by a miracle this smaller checked-in bag turned up at LHR, it was full of broken glass and leaking perfume and other assorted liquids. I couldn’t be bothered to fill-in the damaged bag form because by this stage, I was totally exhausted and you guys had totally broken my spirit and will to live."
Stop the Torture! Close Alitalia!Q: Why does the Pope kiss the ground when he lands in a new country? A: Because he flies Alitalia. Oh dear diary, it's been a torrid weekend. After a sweet holiday with all my friends on the Amalfi Coast, my spirit (and Michelle's) was crushed and broken by Alitalia airlines, who lost our bags, delayed us for hours and then told us to fuck off when we complained that Michelle had missed her connecting flight home from London to Sydney thanks to their incompetence. Alitalia sucks indeed. Sigh. As I sit here in my smelly underpants and socks, in my one pair of jeans and borrowed t-shirt, I choose not to dwell on the pain and misery. I choose to tell you about how brilliant it was to stay at Maiori on the Amalfi Coast and stay in a beautiful old villa that clung to a cliff face, surrounded by tiers of lemon and fig trees, basil and mint and so many tomatoes you could celebrate your own tomantina festival and throw a million tomatoes about and still have enough left over to cook a bruschetta entree for 12 people.
Crimean War-ChicI decided to take this video out because it was begining to annoy me.
doppelgänger I finally managed to get a photo of me with my doppelgänger, Lynn. When I first started working here, random people would yell "Hiya Lynn!" and other such Lynn-confused blah blah niceties. Just in case you are confused, I'm the one on the right. According to Wikidoodah, doppelgänger can mean evil-twin. So is she the evil one or am I?
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