potato saturday + marshmallows

the other night i was working with a sort-of boss rather than just a manager, so i made sure i was wearing entirely correct uniform and whatnot. obviously one of the first things he told me was that my name badge was on the wrong side. i wanted to tell him he was lucky i was even WEARING a name  badge but i decided i would like to keep my job for now. the reason i stopped wearing my name badge is that it's so weird when people i don't know - complete strangers - say my name. it's creepy, actually. really, really creepy. the same thing happened at my last job - i stopped wearing my name badge because people would say 'thanks, jess' and leave me thinking, 'who the hell was that?' and feeling that moment of panic. even if i can clearly see somebody's name thanks to a badge, i don't say their name. it's weird, don't do it. 


on thursday, cate's last day, we bought a lighter and marshmallows and sat in the park, attempting to roast marshmallows on sticks. it was fairly unsuccessful due to the wind. tonight at my sister's birthday barbecue, we had a fire (easier to use than a lighter) and marshmallows. i like my marshmallows absolutely black and bubbling on the outside so that on the inside they are goo.

also on thursday we found these ridiculous 'self heating' cans of hot chocolate and mocha and bought them to test them out. sure enough, you press a button, shake the cans like crazy and they heat up. sounds insanely unhealthy and reminds me of the time i found 'instant mashed potato' which was powder that you just added water to to create mashed potato.. mash your own potato and heat your own chocolate people.

friday flight + socklessness

cate officially left australia today. i had a sick feeling in my stomach all day and even researched her flight to make sure it was still on track without delays. she has a stopover in singapore and it makes me a bit nervous finding out from the website that there are thunderstorms in singapore. cate also told me she would message me when she arrived there, and no word! but the website tells me that she is safe, so touch wood.


today bren tickled me to the point where i was on the ground, nearly crying. i narrowly escaped hiccups! he proved how much he loves me this afternoon when i realised i hadn't packed socks for work (i went straight from the bookshop to work). he sacrificed his socks for me and while that may sound disgusting, it was actually really good because not wearing socks with my work shoes is even worse! kylie offered me her socks too, but i would have felt bad stealing hers.
from work i received a monstrous burn from boiling hot pans and we are running low on aloe vera, go figure. 


i have just had to replace a book from the library that i apparently lost. to be honest i don't remember hiring the book at all! the library wanted to charge me $32 to replace a crappy old book, or i could find a band new copy of the book myself for cheaper. this is where having connections comes in handy; since bren's mum (kylie) owns a bookshop, we could find it for cheap.
ugh, i have books that are due back at the library soon and i haven't started them. i'm trying to finish nineteen minutes by jodi picoult but i am always distracted by the computer. the computer is the devil.

nothing thursday + proston

the first place that i am going on a roadtrip to when i have my p's is proston. never heard of it you say? i didn't expect you to have. proston is a tiny little town out whoop whoop and the only reason you'd ever go there would be that you're staying at the nearby dam and you need some fresh eggs. lake boondooma is a fairly popular dam and is probably the only reason that proston can survive. from memory, it has a supermarket, pub, warehouse, newsagents, post office and a few other things. so it's not exactly tiny, but it's still in the middle of nowhere.
a few months back, dad and i drove into proston from lake boondooma for some groceries and to use the pay phone. we walked past two elderly men sitting outside of the supermarket talking. they gave us odd looks as we walked past and when dad asked the register lady in the shop about phone reception, she laughed at him. obviously out of the question. but i was actually fine with going a few days without my mobile, it was relaxing.
anyway, proston really stirred the creative section in my mind and i decided to locate a story of mine there. words do not express how badly i want to go back. there was an abandoned butter factory, a laundromat, closed and for sale and a butchers shop (also closed and for sale). so picturesque and i think i could write books upon books whilst sitting on the same seat as the elderly men.
looking back on the photos that i do have, i am kicking myself for not taking more. the ones that i do have, i adore. i miss proston.

ps. the photos are awfully edited, it's currently too cold to venture into my room for photoshop. 

'make yours a butter home' abandoned butter factory

rainy wednesday + the land before time

the weather was against us today. cate, caitlin and i have been planning a trip to the coast for a long time now and this trip had to be cancelled last minute (and by last minute, i mean 8:30 this morning). many thanks to the ridiculous amount of rain. the backup plan, a trip to toowoomba) was also cancelled because our driver was too sick to take us. my brother was kind enough to drive us to a nearby shopping centre for a little while but wanted to get home early.
i cannot wait until i have my licence. i won't have to rely on people and pay insane amounts of money for my brother to taxi me around. also, i will be able to explore all of the places i have ever itched to visit. 
in the toy isle at target today, we found interactive dinosaur toys. so you press the buttons on the individual dinosaurs, and they have conversations and sing together. at one point i had about five or six dinosaurs singing together. it makes me wish that i could be a kid living nowadays, they have the best toys. 
i can remember when i was younger, we had a show called 'the land before time', or maybe they were a series of movies. either way, i remember always going to a friends house and watching them with her because we didn't own them.

tonight for dinner we had shepherds pie, except mum must have felt especially lazy (considering it was only for her and i) since it was a frozen meal. those sneaky people hid peas in the pie! i hate peas. how dare they.

àèòù tuesday + gremlin cats

tonight i am staying at the lovely italian (cate)'s host family's home. her host mother loves cats. but not just cute, fluffy cats. no, it's not like that at all. she loves UGLY cats. they are so ugly that they literally look like gremlins. they are extremely fluffy and look like walking footmats. cate also tells me that they smell awful.


i'm currently typing on cate's computer as well. it is an italian mac, and it is really confusing because nothing is where it is supposed to be on the keyboard. for example, where the apostrophe is meant to be, is this: à. and since everything is in italian, i have no spellcheck and hardly any punctuation (because i can't find it), so please forgive me. 


for a lot of reasons, we have decided to sell my F100. in all honesty, i don't trust the man who is buying it. why? because he has a ponytail and freaking drives a white van WITH NO WINDOWS. it doesn't seem right..  but today, i got to drive my beast for the first and last time. it was amazing! if only i could keep it.

these italian things keep popping up in my sentences! i'll be typing and then suddenly, òèà happens. this laptop is so difficult!

taco monday + 'late night strawberries'

tonight at 8:54 i ran into iga to buy strawberries. it was quite a frightening experience. there was more staff than customers and the few customers who were there looked very shady. a lot of lights were off in their lead up to closing and i felt like i was in a horror movie walking up the fruit and veg isle. it wasn't even worth it considering the strawberries are only half ripe.

it was taco night at bren's house and we discovered how great of a cook his mum is. she misread the instructions on the pack of soft taco shells, thinking that they said "microwave for 5 minutes." really it said "microwave a pack of 5 for 15 seconds" - they were extremely burnt! and they stank. lucky for her i forgive easily. i joke - the meal was brilliant (we cooked new shells).

after dinner we watched masterchef. i don't watch tv often - my parents are constantly watching movies - so i don't get to see ads. but there were at least two or three ads for 'new series' of tv shows. how many tv shows can there be? especially singing shows. there's not enough good singers for the amount of singing shows there are. 

saturday sausages! + party plans

so tonight there will be a party at my house - a going away party for cate. i've never actually had a party so i don't know what i should do, what to buy. and the fact that i'm not exactly a 'party person' (i don't get invited) doesn't help. we're planning to sleep in tents in my backyard but it's going to be absolutely freezing tonight and tomorrow. any plans of lighting a fire are about to go out the window thanks to the wind that has started up and it even looks slightly possible that there will be rain. wish me luck though.


while down town buying presents, there was a sausage sizzle outside of the supermarket. i love sausage sizzles. i don't just like them, i love them. i bought two sausages and i don't care who judges me for it. i wish there were sausage sizzles outside of my house 24/7 like at bunnings. i should move to bunnings. pitch a tent in the parking lot or something.

finally friday + self introductions

today was a pretty average day. not in an average way, but in a really-positive-really-negative kind of way. i got my math assignment results back after waiting an entire term due to a so-and-so teacher. i got an A! pretty impressive since i started the assignment a day or two before it was due, and finished it in the lesson that it was meant to be handed in.
in film i found out why you should ALWAYS wear waterproof make up, because the one day that you don't is guaranteed to be the one day you need it!
and in english, i found out that i completely ruined my good run in english, by misinterpreting the actual task. so after two A-'s, i dragged my mark down to a B+ by getting a B on the exam. very negative since it was a simple mistake, and not entirely my fault. but still so excited with these good marks.


enough boring school talk though. i got home to my dad in such a good mood, with a neighbour over watching the football. ben is the neighbour, who i have only ever seen from a distance, so to walk into my living room after finishing work to a stranger for the most part was a bit confusing. but i found out that i am awful at self introductions. i just said my name. not anything polite like, "hi, i'm jessica. nice to meet you." no, i just looked at him and said "jessica." i'm great at socialising apparently.


the good news is that i am now on holidays and sleeping in is mandatory from here on in.

tired thursday + sock mystery

today i feel like i'm going to keel over and die at any moment. i'm more tired than yesterday and snoozed my alarm about three times this morning.. but mum solved the case of the disappearing socks. turns out everyday for the past week or so i've worn socks to bed and during the night kicked them off. at least i got new socks out of the situation - i love new socks. i love sliding around in the kitchen in them.

in english today there were only four students there since it was the second last day of term. it was so quiet, that we could hear the clock ticking at the back of the room. and of course someone had to point it out so that i couldn't. stop. noticing.
tomorrow will be a sad day - it will be cate (italian exchange student/one of my best friends) and bren's last day at school. cate is going home and bren is leaving for tafe. and i'll probably be the only person in english with the loudest clock i've ever encountered.

also an update on my war with the free bars campaign; mum and i each bought a chocolate tonight and neither won. i'm much too determined to win this thing. 

wednesday hiccups + free bars

waking up today was especially hard. after saying goodnight to mum last night i stayed up late writing bren a letter with everything on my mind. lately there seems to be so many things that i'm thinking but can't put into words, and even if the words are there, won't i be bothering people by voicing them? everybody has their own problems and mine are just more for them to worry about. 

snickers and mars bars have started their 'free bar's' campaign where if inside the wrapper it's written 'you've won,' etc., you get an instant free bar. last time this happened, i was working somewhere that sold these chocolates and according to the company '1 in 6 wins instantly'. either i can verify that this is utter bullshit or i have absolutely no luck. i would literally have bought over twenty chocolate bars (i'd buy one or two each shift, sometimes more) and so many to the point that i didn't eat them, i gave them to other staff members because i was so determined to win. as soon as i opened that winning wrapper i didn't buy another for months.
kudos, mars bars and snickers for your awfully brilliant advertising idea.
this afternoon i bought a mars bar and obviously no such luck. tonight though, my sister, her boyfriend and i each bought two. amy had one that was a winner - 1 in 6. i can't even eat them and i can tell this is going to be so painful until i win.
also, a little bit of twisting the knife, one time at dreamworld i bought a chocolate bar from a vending machine. it was a 'free bars' bar, and it was a winner. the only problem was that it had expired a month beforehand.

this afternoon, bren made me laugh until i had a severe case of the hiccups. he then proceeded to tickle me to ensure that the hiccups didn't go away. just quietly, its a bit fun having hiccups. 

tuesday evening talks + wanderlust

today my big sister amy arrived home from seven weeks in new zealand. she doesn't live at home any more and i only get to see her every so often, but having her in another country meant there wasn't any way to visit her at all, apart from pretend visiting via skype. the only other time she's been overseas was a short holiday in fiji and having her gone so long (she was planning on staying for three-six months) was heartbreaking for my parents. i'd show them all of the pictures she'd upload and we'd occasionally call her. the first time dad saw her on skype (he's not very good with technology and didn't understand entirely), he started crying so much that he had to hand back my laptop.
amy is three, nearly four, years older than me and loves travelling already at age nineteen. i hope that when i'm her age, i have the money and confidence to travel abroad. i ache to travel and get much too excited over travel magazines. i'm the worst at geography though and have no idea where most countries are. i love making lists of where i want to go and what landmarks i want to see. my dream is to travel and i feel as though i'll be disappointed in myself if i never get or take the opportunity to. only a year and a half left of school before i'm free.

this afternoon i visited one of my best friends, marishka, who lives a street and a house away from me. despite the closeness, it's rare these days for us to see each other often. we stayed out til dinner time when it was dark and i was shivering on her driveway in my thin school uniform and the winter weather seemed to breeze straight through me. i saw the stars come out one by one and we talked and talked as the high beams of passing car headlights flooded our faces. 

monday, payday + pedestrian crossings

today is monday meaning payday. probably my favourite day of the week, followed closely by friday. the feeling of having money doesn't last long though, because i buy ridiculous things, like excessive amounts of makeup and energy drinks.


i have a friend who, whenever we cross at a pedestrian crossing, will thank the car waiting for us. she knows they can't hear her yet she will still add a little comment, "thank you, you are so kind." she's italian and has the most beautiful personality, along with enough patience to teach me certain phrases in italian. my favourite is 'io voglio cinque pizze!' meaning 'i want five pizzas.' she's promised to cook me pizzas - the italian way.

lazy sunday + crumpets

it's 4:06 of a sunday afternoon and i am in pyjama pants and bottoms that don't match, not because i'm going to bed early but because i've had a lazy day.
due to a severe lack of food in the house, i settled for crumpets. whenever mum cooks me crumpets, she does them in the grill because the brand she buys are too thick for the toaster. considering the difference in effort between the two ways, and since mum was sleeping, i opted to forcefully pushing the crumpets into the toaster. the main problem with this is that the top of the crumpet stuck out meaning that it didn't cook, and the second problem (which i will admit is my fault) is that i turned the cooking time down so that the edges wouldn't burn (or cook, at all, as i discovered). since they had to be shoved into the toaster, they didn't pop up when they were ready. i used a knife (after unplugging from the wall) and ended up with warmed up, uncooked, crumpets.